Okay, guys. As of today, we’re on a countdown. It is 10 days until the presidential election.
There are those of us who believe that the last two elections, 2000 and 2004 have not been handled fairly or in good faith, so I want to take a moment to address these issues.
Believe it or not, after the 2000 presidential election, I was one of these people who walked around for about a year saying “Gore lost. I don’t like it either, but get over it.” As certain facts became clear to me, however, I discovered that my simplistic attitude was not at all accurate.
1) When it was all said and done and the smoke had cleared, Gore had half a million MORE votes than Bush. Bush “won” the election by taking the electoral votes of the embattled state of Florida. For those who don’t know, the electoral college was set up by the founding fathers in an attempt to make sure that every vote got counted. It simply wasn’t feasible to count every vote from every state at that time. So what they did was to count the votes BY STATE, and then have “electors” ride to DC to express their vote as the will of the people. Now it IS possible for every vote to be counted, and so it should. The electoral college should be eliminated.
2) In the state of Florida, George Bush’s brother was governor.
3) The Florida secretary of state, responsible for a fair and legal vote was Katherine Harris, who also happened to be co-chair of the “Bush for President” campaign in Florida. This is a little like suing someone and then discovering that the judge is the brother of the person that you’re suing.
4) The night of the election, long before the votes had been counted, GWB said in an interview “I know that I’m going to take Florida – my baby brother (Florida Governor Jeb Bush) promised me that I would!”
5) You may have seen the “protests” on TV that featured “angry Floridians” demanding that the vote be counted. In fact, every single one of those young men were aides and assistants to republican congressmen, sent there by their bosses to shut down the recounts.
6) Among several Diebold voting machine irregularities was one in Broward county, Florida where the voting computer was counting Gore’s vote BACKWARD, ultimately subtracting 13,000 votes from his total. Lord only knows how many of these machines were doing similar mischief, but were never discovered.
7) Punch-tab voting machines in predominately poor and black districts (historically large turnouts for the democratic party) were old machines that had not had the chads (the small pieces of punched paper) emptied out of them in an unknown period of time. The result was that many of the ballots didn’t punch all the way through, resulting in the famous “hanging chads” which allowed these ballots to be cast out.
8) Florida state police set up “vehicle inspection points” in these same neighborhoods, delaying some voters in some cases for hours, until finally they were just too fed up and went home without voting.
9) Felons lose their right to vote. This is the law. Every election cycle a “purge” list is printed up so that felons can be removed from the voting record. For Ms. Harris, this was simply not enough. She also instructed the private firm that she had employed to do this not only to purge the felons, but to purge anyone with the same NAME or BIRTHDATE as the felons. The result was that, as later court documents stated, “tens of thousands” of African Americans were denied their right to vote including police officers, judges and grannies. In one small district, I forget which one immediately, the entire district (all African American) were illegally denied their right to vote.
10) When a Jewish resident of one old-age home in Florida discovered that ALL of the votes from his home went to anti-semite Pat Buchanan, when he intended to vote for Gore, he said “I would have sooner voted for Louis Farrakhan than Buchanan.”
11) Speaking of Buchanan, when he discovered how many votes he got in largely Jewish Florida, Mr. Buchanan said “As much as I’d like to see Bush win this election instead of Gore, it’s pretty clear to me that those votes should have gone to Vice-President Gore.”
Isn’t it strange that all of these “errors” favored George W. Bush? Finally, Mr. Bush took the case of the Florida recounts to the supreme court. The court, in violation of all state’s right’s laws, stopped the recount and declared GWB the winner of Florida and thus of the election. They also bizarrely stated that this case could NEVER be used as precedent for another case. My question is now and has always been that if GWB had nothing to hide, why did he work so hard to hide it?
So along comes 2004. Personally, I hoped that Kerry would defeat Bush, but knew that this was historically unlikely. America has NEVER unseated a president during wartime. The battleground state that this election came down to was Ohio. So what happened in Ohio that year?
1) The republican Ohio secretary of state refused to allow international election observers into the polling places.
2) A consulting firm called Sproul and Associates, hired by the Republican National Committee was caught shredding new democratic voter registrations.
3) In Miami county, a largely republican district, an astronomical (and nearly impossible) ninety-seven percent voter turnout was reported. A polling place in a poor area of Cleveland (a democratic stronghold) reported an equally bizarre seven percent turnout.
4) In Warren County, officials concocted a non-existent terrorist threat to prevent the media from monitoring the elections.
5) One quarter of Ohioans turned up at the polls only to discover that they were not listed on the voter registration forms.
In Ohio and other states, in districts where Diebold (a major republican supporter) voting machines were used, independent exit polls showed Kerry the winner, but those districts were almost unanimously given to Bush by exactly the same percentage. So, for instance, if the exit poll had Kerry winning by 54 percent to 46 percent for Bush, the numbers came out flipped, so that in that district the result came out for Bush by 54 to 46 percent.
In one town, I forget which one it was, with a population of around 300 people, the vote came out as 3000 votes for Bush, ten times the population. A voter turnout of 1000%, in other words. When Diebold was confronted with this, they said that the machine was “fatigued”. I wonder how many other machines this happened to that were not reported?
So how can we stop this? Use a paper ballot rather than a computerized voting machine. The machines are too easy to rig, and leave NO paper trail.
KNOW YOUR RIGHTS. Many democrats in battleground states received phone calls, supposedly from the elections office, telling them that the election had been postponed until Wednesday, the day AFTER the presidential election. It was later discovered that this fraud was perpetrated by republican operatives.
If you live in a battleground state such as Ohio or Florida, be prepared to spend as long as you have to getting to the polls. If you can, take the day off work and go first thing in the morning. If you have kids, get a sitter so that you don’t feel pressure to give up. In these states in both 2000 and 2004, poor and overwhelmingly democratic districts were given far too few voting machines for the population, resulting in people spending hours in line to vote. In the freezing rain in a lot of cases, so bring a raincoat and some layers of clothing.
If you can, volunteer. Election offices are in dire need of volunteers. Also, offer to shuttle people with no transportation to the polls. It will cost you some gas, but think of the good that it will do for our democracy. Besides, gas is back on the cheap side… at least until AFTER the election.
If you are voting on a “punch” machine, make sure that your punch is clean with no “hanging chad” before you put it into the lockbox. If it didn’t go through at all (a “dimpled chad”), then repunch the ballot. If the chad hangs, either repunch the ballot or brush the chad clear of the ballot. If you are using a “fill in the dot” ballot, and you make an error, ask for a new ballot. They are required by law to give one to you. Do not try to erase your erroneous mark, or mark the ballot twice. These will be discarded.
Check with your local elections office to see if your state is offering “early” voting. If they are, take advantage of it, especially if you live in a battleground state.
I kind of feel bad that I live in such a “blue” state. Washington state hasn’t elected a republican president in twenty-odd years, so there’s not a lot that I can do from here, except encourage others.
Okay, brothers and sisters. That’s all that I can think of for now. As someone said recently, “It’s not enough for Obama to win this election… he has to win by such a large margin that the election cannot be stolen.”
Peace.
Randal
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Socialism and Democracy
I would like to make a few precepts perfectly clear here, because America seems to be confused on them. If you know anyone who is confused on the following points, please forward a link to my blog to them. Thanks. The reason that I’m doing this post at this time is because Barack Obama’s opponents, having run out of every other thing both insane and sane to attack him on are now calling him a “socialist” because he wants to REdistribute the wealth that was redistributed over the last eight years. So I want, if I may, to clarify the idea of socialism somewhat.
1) Socialism is an economic system, not a political system. In other words, socialism is NOT in opposition to democracy, it is in opposition to capitalism. America is, by definition, a democracy… we are not, by definition, capitalist. As a matter of fact, if you think about it, socialism is much more in line with democracy than capitalism is. Socialism is primarily concerned with the people. Keeping the people healthy, educated, sheltered and happy. Sounds awful, doesn’t it? Capitalism, meanwhile, values only one thing: the bottom line. Where health care is concerned, for instance, capitalism has failed miserably. Between insurance companies lobbying for the right to increase their premiums while decreasing their coverage, McDonald’s lobbying to have their food sold to our kids without regulation and Dow Chemical lobbying to continue poisoning our earth, air and water, health care in this country is somewhere between a dirty joke and an epic tragedy. Oh, and let’s not forget the alcohol and nicotine lobbyists. To be clear, neither candidate is suggesting that we socialize our health care system, but if either one did, I’d probably vote for them. It’s worth a try, and about anything has to be better than what we have now.
2) To expand on that point… there ARE socialist democracies in the world, they are all our allies, and apparently their systems work quite well. The four that spring immediately to mind are England, Canada, Denmark and France. Of course, Denmark has taken our idea of democracy and run with it, keeping the government almost entirely out of the lives of the people while giving the people ultimate authority over their government. Prostitution and marijuana, for instance, are both legal there.
3) America is now, and has been since around the civil war, partially socialized. Socialized sectors of the economy include: libraries, schools, police, fire department and roads. The argument at the time, concurrent with the introduction of a national income tax, was that areas of education and public safety should NOT be put into the hands of private, for-profit companies. Back to health care, I would firmly put that in that category. It has not always been this way. Prior to that, if you wanted someone to come put your house out if it caught on fire, then you hoped that the volunteer fire department in your area was able to get to you, or you had a seal on your house for a nearby for-profit fire department. It was kind of like fire insurance. You bought coverage from your local fire department and then put their seal somewhere on your house where it could be seen from the street. On some historic farmhouses and barns in the east you can still see these marks. If an engine from another “company” came by your house while it was burning, that was just too bad. So, to you people who say that America should be free of socialism, I say “be prepared to have a credit card handy if your son gets mugged or your daughter gets raped.” Would you like to be personally responsible for the staggering costs of one of these investigations? I sure wouldn’t.
Am I a socialist? No way. I like money. I like the things that it can buy for me. I’m about to finish my first novel, and when I do, I hope that someone pays me a lot of money to publish it. Enough to comfortably quit my day job, at least. But that doesn’t mean that I think that America can’t adapt aspects of socialism as we have done so magnificently in our past.
One part of this argument that really bothers me is that the very same people who are arguing against American socialism are the people who are PRACTICING socialism for the rich. John McCain, who, when defending his decision to vote against Mr. Bush’s tax cuts for the wealthiest 5% of Americans said “I think that the rich can afford to pay a little more”, has recently spent a lot of time attacking Barack Obama for using the term “Spread the wealth”. Economist Thomas Friedman recently made a statement that I thought was absolutely brilliant. He said “In America, we have socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor.” When a multi-millionaire CEO gets into a bind because of stupid decisions that he’s made, the republicans are right there to “bail him out”. If, to use a recent media celebrity as an example, Joe the Plumber loses his job, his house and his health care because of that CEO’s bad decisions, well that’s just too bad. We don’t want to be socialist, after all, do we?
Sarah Palin, at the vice presidential debate, said that Obama wanted to institute redistribution of wealth, which is one of the precepts not only of socialism, but also of communism (which, by the way, is another economic philosophy, not a political one). What I want my middle and lower class brothers and sisters to understand is that, over the last eight years, we have witnessed the largest redistribution of wealth in human history. The reason that we don’t recognize it as such is because it has been redistributed from the poor to the rich rather than the other way around. Ending Bush’s tax cuts and instituting new tax relief for the middle and lower classes is only an attempt to balance that.
Am I a socialist? No way. But, at the same time, I see that America is the wealthiest country in the world. Because of that, I think that it’s reprehensible that there are Americans who have to struggle for food, shelter and health care. I think that every American should be guaranteed a roof over their head, food on their plates, and the care and medicine that they need to be well. These things should no more be privatized than the police or fire departments. And if we need to have Phil Knight make only six billion dollars next year than eight billion, so be it.
I know that it isn’t “PC” in America today to invoke Europe, but I’m going to. I can’t think of a time when anyone has accused me of being politically correct, except in the fact that say “happy holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas”, so I’m not too worried about the accusation of political incorrectness now. There is a concept in Europe called “Noblesse Oblige”. What that means is “the obligation of nobility”. The rich have an OBLIGATION to help out those less fortunate. This is also a Christian precept, by the way. Some rich people in America already do this such as Stephen King and Bill Gates and they deserve all credit for doing that. I said earlier that I hope someone pays me a lot of money to publish my book. If they do, I have already made a promise to God that if he sees fit to reward me in this way, ten percent of any money that I achieve from my writing will go immediately to charities that help people. Food banks, AA, homeless shelters. I challenge all people in America who are rich or potentially rich to do the same.
Peace.
Randal
1) Socialism is an economic system, not a political system. In other words, socialism is NOT in opposition to democracy, it is in opposition to capitalism. America is, by definition, a democracy… we are not, by definition, capitalist. As a matter of fact, if you think about it, socialism is much more in line with democracy than capitalism is. Socialism is primarily concerned with the people. Keeping the people healthy, educated, sheltered and happy. Sounds awful, doesn’t it? Capitalism, meanwhile, values only one thing: the bottom line. Where health care is concerned, for instance, capitalism has failed miserably. Between insurance companies lobbying for the right to increase their premiums while decreasing their coverage, McDonald’s lobbying to have their food sold to our kids without regulation and Dow Chemical lobbying to continue poisoning our earth, air and water, health care in this country is somewhere between a dirty joke and an epic tragedy. Oh, and let’s not forget the alcohol and nicotine lobbyists. To be clear, neither candidate is suggesting that we socialize our health care system, but if either one did, I’d probably vote for them. It’s worth a try, and about anything has to be better than what we have now.
2) To expand on that point… there ARE socialist democracies in the world, they are all our allies, and apparently their systems work quite well. The four that spring immediately to mind are England, Canada, Denmark and France. Of course, Denmark has taken our idea of democracy and run with it, keeping the government almost entirely out of the lives of the people while giving the people ultimate authority over their government. Prostitution and marijuana, for instance, are both legal there.
3) America is now, and has been since around the civil war, partially socialized. Socialized sectors of the economy include: libraries, schools, police, fire department and roads. The argument at the time, concurrent with the introduction of a national income tax, was that areas of education and public safety should NOT be put into the hands of private, for-profit companies. Back to health care, I would firmly put that in that category. It has not always been this way. Prior to that, if you wanted someone to come put your house out if it caught on fire, then you hoped that the volunteer fire department in your area was able to get to you, or you had a seal on your house for a nearby for-profit fire department. It was kind of like fire insurance. You bought coverage from your local fire department and then put their seal somewhere on your house where it could be seen from the street. On some historic farmhouses and barns in the east you can still see these marks. If an engine from another “company” came by your house while it was burning, that was just too bad. So, to you people who say that America should be free of socialism, I say “be prepared to have a credit card handy if your son gets mugged or your daughter gets raped.” Would you like to be personally responsible for the staggering costs of one of these investigations? I sure wouldn’t.
Am I a socialist? No way. I like money. I like the things that it can buy for me. I’m about to finish my first novel, and when I do, I hope that someone pays me a lot of money to publish it. Enough to comfortably quit my day job, at least. But that doesn’t mean that I think that America can’t adapt aspects of socialism as we have done so magnificently in our past.
One part of this argument that really bothers me is that the very same people who are arguing against American socialism are the people who are PRACTICING socialism for the rich. John McCain, who, when defending his decision to vote against Mr. Bush’s tax cuts for the wealthiest 5% of Americans said “I think that the rich can afford to pay a little more”, has recently spent a lot of time attacking Barack Obama for using the term “Spread the wealth”. Economist Thomas Friedman recently made a statement that I thought was absolutely brilliant. He said “In America, we have socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor.” When a multi-millionaire CEO gets into a bind because of stupid decisions that he’s made, the republicans are right there to “bail him out”. If, to use a recent media celebrity as an example, Joe the Plumber loses his job, his house and his health care because of that CEO’s bad decisions, well that’s just too bad. We don’t want to be socialist, after all, do we?
Sarah Palin, at the vice presidential debate, said that Obama wanted to institute redistribution of wealth, which is one of the precepts not only of socialism, but also of communism (which, by the way, is another economic philosophy, not a political one). What I want my middle and lower class brothers and sisters to understand is that, over the last eight years, we have witnessed the largest redistribution of wealth in human history. The reason that we don’t recognize it as such is because it has been redistributed from the poor to the rich rather than the other way around. Ending Bush’s tax cuts and instituting new tax relief for the middle and lower classes is only an attempt to balance that.
Am I a socialist? No way. But, at the same time, I see that America is the wealthiest country in the world. Because of that, I think that it’s reprehensible that there are Americans who have to struggle for food, shelter and health care. I think that every American should be guaranteed a roof over their head, food on their plates, and the care and medicine that they need to be well. These things should no more be privatized than the police or fire departments. And if we need to have Phil Knight make only six billion dollars next year than eight billion, so be it.
I know that it isn’t “PC” in America today to invoke Europe, but I’m going to. I can’t think of a time when anyone has accused me of being politically correct, except in the fact that say “happy holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas”, so I’m not too worried about the accusation of political incorrectness now. There is a concept in Europe called “Noblesse Oblige”. What that means is “the obligation of nobility”. The rich have an OBLIGATION to help out those less fortunate. This is also a Christian precept, by the way. Some rich people in America already do this such as Stephen King and Bill Gates and they deserve all credit for doing that. I said earlier that I hope someone pays me a lot of money to publish my book. If they do, I have already made a promise to God that if he sees fit to reward me in this way, ten percent of any money that I achieve from my writing will go immediately to charities that help people. Food banks, AA, homeless shelters. I challenge all people in America who are rich or potentially rich to do the same.
Peace.
Randal
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
I'm A REAL Fake American
I would like to address Sarah Palin’s recent comment about “real” America and also all of the babble about small towns in this election in general. First off, let me say that Ms. Palin DID apologize… kind of… by saying that she was sorry if people “misunderstood”. I think that “misunderstood” is one of these words like “exceptional” that Ms. Palin only has a vague understanding of herself. You are “misunderstood” when you present an idea that can be taken in more that one way, and someone takes it in a way other than what you meant. The rule here, though, is that there has to be some leeway in the meaning of your words. For instance, if you want a lot of paper clips, and ask your assistant for a handful of paper clips and she only brings you two or three, you just have to understand that her hands are smaller than yours (to steal an allegory from Gib Whiteman).
So help me out here… let me give you Ms. Palin’s comment… which seems fairly unequivocal to me… and tell me how many interpretations there are for it. She said “We believe that the best of America is in these small towns that we get to visit, and in these wonderful little pockets of what I call the real America, being here with all of you hard-working, very patriotic, very pro-America areas of this great nation.” Here’s the way that I read it – cities… and, presumably, city-dwellers… are not the best of America, we are not very hard-working, not very patriotic and anti-American. This statement strikes me as what would be called in a debate class an “either/or statement”. Either/or statements are unequivocal, meaning not open to interpretation or debate. Or maybe I’m just not bright enough to see any other interpretation. Help me out if you do, please.
So what does Ms. Palin’s apology mean? Sadly, I think that it means that she doesn’t think her words out very well before she says them… probably one of the reasons that the Bush loyalists love her… she reminds them of their hero. Also like Bush, she presents very complex ideas (such as hard-working and patriotic) in such simplistic terms that the authors of the Dick and Jane books would look at them and go “Oh, come off it!” I’m flashing back to “You’re either with us or you’re with the terrorists” here. She isn’t sorry that she said it, she’s sorry that it bit her in the ass. Like a little kid – she’s not sorry that she did wrong, she’s sorry that she GOT CAUGHT. That’s one thing that peeves me about the modern republican party – it’s okay if you don’t get caught seems to be their mantra.
I’m also a little confused about whether that makes me a “real” or “fake” American according to Ms. Palin. I mean, I was born in Altus, Arkansas (population 80 at the time, about 800 now), a town that passed small and hit tiny on it’s way to nonexistent. I was raised in Chugiak, Alaska, which had a population of 26,000 in 2005, but was much smaller when I lived there. Still… a very small town. After that, I moved to Anchorage, which currently has a population somewhere around 260,000. No longer a small town, but still a VERY small city. I currently live in Renton, Washington, which currently has a population around 50,000, but lived for a while in Seattle (population around 580,000), which is my favorite city. I live in cities now because I love cities. I was tickled pink a couple of years ago when I visited some loved ones of mine from high school, when the husband of the couple referred to Anchorage as “the big city”. So… what I’m wondering is, where is the cutoff between “small town”, “large town”, “small city” and “big city”? To my loved ones in Fall River, Kansas (population 156), Renton would probably seem like an unbearably big city, although it’s twice as large as the town in which I was born. To someone in New York (population 8,000,000 plus) Seattle must seem hopelessly rural. So I guess that makes me a REAL fake American.
Look, I don’t like big cities. I live in Seattle instead of New York or Los Angeles because I choose to. Although I like cities, those cities are just too big in my opinion. But that doesn’t mean that I think any less of the people who live there. Several of my loved ones throughout my life have come from New York or Los Angeles.
So what’s with the romanticization of small towns in this election? I think that it’s largely that small towns contain largely what the republican party considers it’s second “base”. Their first base, of course, consists of the very rich, big city people that the republican party verbally denigrates, so this kind of nonsense is nothing more or less than playing to their base.
Personally, having come from small towns, I get a little sick of hearing Ms. Palin blow the inhabitants of small towns with talk about how wonderful and law-abiding and hard-working these people are. And I’m not saying that they’re not – simply that they are no more or less so than people in cities. There are crooked people, and lustful people, and kinky people in small towns, just like in big cities. The difference is that in big cities people are living right on top of each other, so it’s harder to hide these things and easier to indulge in them. And yes, for a thief or a rapist it’s much easier to find victims in big cities, where you have ten or twenty or more residences within the space of a block than in a small town where you have one residence every mile or so. Your odds of finding an unlocked house or car, or vulnerable victim are exponentially increased in a city.
Realistically, though, you also have higher per capita rates of domestic violence and drug abuse in small towns than you do in big cities. Anchorage has the highest per capita suicide rate in that nation. Ms. Palin’s town, Wasilla, has been called the Meth Lab capitol of the world. Texas, which, like Alaska, is mostly small towns with a few cities thrown in has the highest per capita murder rate in the United States.
Also, people in small towns have a very “It’s none of my business” attitude. People like Ms. Palin like to trot out the idea that people in big cities will just walk past someone laying on the sidewalk, whereas small town people won’t. Well, Ms. Palin, you have to understand that, in a city, that person may be hurt, or they may just be laying in wait for someone to get close enough for them to steal a wallet or purse. Sad but true. And let’s face it… in Wasilla, or Chugiak, or Fall River you may see a person lying on the sidewalk once per year or so… in a city, even a fairly small city like Seattle, you see ten or twenty or fifty every day. It does eventually get to the point of “am I going to spend my day doing the stuff that I need to do, or am I going to spend my day checking on every person that I see in a potentially sketchy situation to see if they’re hurt, or drunk, or just waiting to rob me?”
So what am I trying to say here, at the end of it all? Well, I believe that it was the eminent philosopher and mage Pogo Possum that said “People is people.” People living in New York are no more or less righteous or patriotic, or gentle or loving than people in Frog Balls, Booger Holler or Bug Tussell Arkansas. People is people.
But, Ms. Palin would do well to remember something that Bill Maher said recently. “Big cities have one thing that small towns don’t… VOTERS!”
Obama for president.
Peace.
Randal
So help me out here… let me give you Ms. Palin’s comment… which seems fairly unequivocal to me… and tell me how many interpretations there are for it. She said “We believe that the best of America is in these small towns that we get to visit, and in these wonderful little pockets of what I call the real America, being here with all of you hard-working, very patriotic, very pro-America areas of this great nation.” Here’s the way that I read it – cities… and, presumably, city-dwellers… are not the best of America, we are not very hard-working, not very patriotic and anti-American. This statement strikes me as what would be called in a debate class an “either/or statement”. Either/or statements are unequivocal, meaning not open to interpretation or debate. Or maybe I’m just not bright enough to see any other interpretation. Help me out if you do, please.
So what does Ms. Palin’s apology mean? Sadly, I think that it means that she doesn’t think her words out very well before she says them… probably one of the reasons that the Bush loyalists love her… she reminds them of their hero. Also like Bush, she presents very complex ideas (such as hard-working and patriotic) in such simplistic terms that the authors of the Dick and Jane books would look at them and go “Oh, come off it!” I’m flashing back to “You’re either with us or you’re with the terrorists” here. She isn’t sorry that she said it, she’s sorry that it bit her in the ass. Like a little kid – she’s not sorry that she did wrong, she’s sorry that she GOT CAUGHT. That’s one thing that peeves me about the modern republican party – it’s okay if you don’t get caught seems to be their mantra.
I’m also a little confused about whether that makes me a “real” or “fake” American according to Ms. Palin. I mean, I was born in Altus, Arkansas (population 80 at the time, about 800 now), a town that passed small and hit tiny on it’s way to nonexistent. I was raised in Chugiak, Alaska, which had a population of 26,000 in 2005, but was much smaller when I lived there. Still… a very small town. After that, I moved to Anchorage, which currently has a population somewhere around 260,000. No longer a small town, but still a VERY small city. I currently live in Renton, Washington, which currently has a population around 50,000, but lived for a while in Seattle (population around 580,000), which is my favorite city. I live in cities now because I love cities. I was tickled pink a couple of years ago when I visited some loved ones of mine from high school, when the husband of the couple referred to Anchorage as “the big city”. So… what I’m wondering is, where is the cutoff between “small town”, “large town”, “small city” and “big city”? To my loved ones in Fall River, Kansas (population 156), Renton would probably seem like an unbearably big city, although it’s twice as large as the town in which I was born. To someone in New York (population 8,000,000 plus) Seattle must seem hopelessly rural. So I guess that makes me a REAL fake American.
Look, I don’t like big cities. I live in Seattle instead of New York or Los Angeles because I choose to. Although I like cities, those cities are just too big in my opinion. But that doesn’t mean that I think any less of the people who live there. Several of my loved ones throughout my life have come from New York or Los Angeles.
So what’s with the romanticization of small towns in this election? I think that it’s largely that small towns contain largely what the republican party considers it’s second “base”. Their first base, of course, consists of the very rich, big city people that the republican party verbally denigrates, so this kind of nonsense is nothing more or less than playing to their base.
Personally, having come from small towns, I get a little sick of hearing Ms. Palin blow the inhabitants of small towns with talk about how wonderful and law-abiding and hard-working these people are. And I’m not saying that they’re not – simply that they are no more or less so than people in cities. There are crooked people, and lustful people, and kinky people in small towns, just like in big cities. The difference is that in big cities people are living right on top of each other, so it’s harder to hide these things and easier to indulge in them. And yes, for a thief or a rapist it’s much easier to find victims in big cities, where you have ten or twenty or more residences within the space of a block than in a small town where you have one residence every mile or so. Your odds of finding an unlocked house or car, or vulnerable victim are exponentially increased in a city.
Realistically, though, you also have higher per capita rates of domestic violence and drug abuse in small towns than you do in big cities. Anchorage has the highest per capita suicide rate in that nation. Ms. Palin’s town, Wasilla, has been called the Meth Lab capitol of the world. Texas, which, like Alaska, is mostly small towns with a few cities thrown in has the highest per capita murder rate in the United States.
Also, people in small towns have a very “It’s none of my business” attitude. People like Ms. Palin like to trot out the idea that people in big cities will just walk past someone laying on the sidewalk, whereas small town people won’t. Well, Ms. Palin, you have to understand that, in a city, that person may be hurt, or they may just be laying in wait for someone to get close enough for them to steal a wallet or purse. Sad but true. And let’s face it… in Wasilla, or Chugiak, or Fall River you may see a person lying on the sidewalk once per year or so… in a city, even a fairly small city like Seattle, you see ten or twenty or fifty every day. It does eventually get to the point of “am I going to spend my day doing the stuff that I need to do, or am I going to spend my day checking on every person that I see in a potentially sketchy situation to see if they’re hurt, or drunk, or just waiting to rob me?”
So what am I trying to say here, at the end of it all? Well, I believe that it was the eminent philosopher and mage Pogo Possum that said “People is people.” People living in New York are no more or less righteous or patriotic, or gentle or loving than people in Frog Balls, Booger Holler or Bug Tussell Arkansas. People is people.
But, Ms. Palin would do well to remember something that Bill Maher said recently. “Big cities have one thing that small towns don’t… VOTERS!”
Obama for president.
Peace.
Randal
Thursday, October 16, 2008
What Happened to America?
I always like to think that America is exemplified in my mom. Especially the things that she said. Things like “You reap what you sow.” And “Do unto others as you would have others do unto you.” And then there’s my dad, who taught me that the strongest man in the room has to be the most gentle, and that anytime someone has a monetary interest in something to beware – they’re probably just trying to get their hand in your pocket.
I wish that Mr. Bush and the rest of our “leaders” throughout this mess since 9/11 had the same mom and dad that I did. Obviously THEIR moms and dads didn’t teach them the same lessons.
If they understood the meaning of “You reap what you sow”, they would understand that if you plant the seeds of money and training and weapons with a nutcase like Osama Bin Laden (as we did in the eighties), it will eventually come back to bite you on the ass. They would understand if there’s a picture of you shaking hands with Saddam Hussein one day and then calling him the most evil man since Hitler the next, no one will trust you.
And the golden rule? The eleventh commandment? Do unto others as you would have others do unto you? We called the leadership of Emperor Hirohito in Japan during World War II and the leadership of the Viet Cong in Vietnam twenty odd years later because they tortured. And, in the later war, a lot of our guys signed (what we call) false confessions under the strain of torture. And yet now WE torture, and prosecute people based upon the (what we call) false information achieved. Honestly, if we’re going to prosecute Middle Easterners for war crimes based on information achieved through torture, then don’t we have to go back and try all of our guys who signed confessions during Viet Nam? If the information is reliable, it’s got to be considered reliable in every case. Not reliable when we do it and unreliable when anyone else does it. Then there was the case of the Afghani cab driver who was taken to an American prison camp there, based on information from someone else in his village. Our camp had been attacked by rocket, see, and this dude fingered the cab driver and his passengers as the trigger men. Got a good reward for it, too. More on that later. Anyhoo, after five days of being sleep deprived, hung up by his arms from the ceiling so that every time he started to fall asleep the pressure on his lungs would become overwhelming so that he started suffocating (same way Jesus (and everyone else who was crucified) died on the cross, I might add), and numerous beatings, he died. No big surprise, I guess. When a doctor examined this cab driver, he described the man’s legs as having been “pulpified” from beatings. Do you have any idea the kind of condition that that man’s legs must have been in for a doctor to use an unprofessional non-word like that? He was literally beyond his ability as a doctor to describe the wounds.
As to the last point, my dad’s observation about human beings and money…
We offered rewards to people in Afghanistan who would turn in people associated with Al Qaeda. Of course, it only took us a couple of years to figure out that people were turning in their neighbors so that they could take over their neighbor’s farms and opium crops. Guys were turning people in that they just generally had gripes with. That’ll teach ‘em. And let’s not forget the guy who turned in his true love’s father because the man refused to let him marry his daughter. And they got BANK for this lynch mob bullshit. Oh, and the cab driver that I spoke of earlier? Turns out that he was totally innocent. Only took four or five times that the dude that turned him in turned OTHER people in for rocket attacks for us to figure out that HE was the one attacking us with rockets and then fingering some poor innocent in order to collect the reward. Oops.
We’re the strongest man in the room, folks. How long do you think that it’s going to take us to stop being the bully and go back to being the guy who’s protecting the weaker guys? How long is it going to take for us to go back to being the gentle giant who only beats up those who attack us, which these people didn’t?
Peace.
Eventually.
I hope.
Randal
I wish that Mr. Bush and the rest of our “leaders” throughout this mess since 9/11 had the same mom and dad that I did. Obviously THEIR moms and dads didn’t teach them the same lessons.
If they understood the meaning of “You reap what you sow”, they would understand that if you plant the seeds of money and training and weapons with a nutcase like Osama Bin Laden (as we did in the eighties), it will eventually come back to bite you on the ass. They would understand if there’s a picture of you shaking hands with Saddam Hussein one day and then calling him the most evil man since Hitler the next, no one will trust you.
And the golden rule? The eleventh commandment? Do unto others as you would have others do unto you? We called the leadership of Emperor Hirohito in Japan during World War II and the leadership of the Viet Cong in Vietnam twenty odd years later because they tortured. And, in the later war, a lot of our guys signed (what we call) false confessions under the strain of torture. And yet now WE torture, and prosecute people based upon the (what we call) false information achieved. Honestly, if we’re going to prosecute Middle Easterners for war crimes based on information achieved through torture, then don’t we have to go back and try all of our guys who signed confessions during Viet Nam? If the information is reliable, it’s got to be considered reliable in every case. Not reliable when we do it and unreliable when anyone else does it. Then there was the case of the Afghani cab driver who was taken to an American prison camp there, based on information from someone else in his village. Our camp had been attacked by rocket, see, and this dude fingered the cab driver and his passengers as the trigger men. Got a good reward for it, too. More on that later. Anyhoo, after five days of being sleep deprived, hung up by his arms from the ceiling so that every time he started to fall asleep the pressure on his lungs would become overwhelming so that he started suffocating (same way Jesus (and everyone else who was crucified) died on the cross, I might add), and numerous beatings, he died. No big surprise, I guess. When a doctor examined this cab driver, he described the man’s legs as having been “pulpified” from beatings. Do you have any idea the kind of condition that that man’s legs must have been in for a doctor to use an unprofessional non-word like that? He was literally beyond his ability as a doctor to describe the wounds.
As to the last point, my dad’s observation about human beings and money…
We offered rewards to people in Afghanistan who would turn in people associated with Al Qaeda. Of course, it only took us a couple of years to figure out that people were turning in their neighbors so that they could take over their neighbor’s farms and opium crops. Guys were turning people in that they just generally had gripes with. That’ll teach ‘em. And let’s not forget the guy who turned in his true love’s father because the man refused to let him marry his daughter. And they got BANK for this lynch mob bullshit. Oh, and the cab driver that I spoke of earlier? Turns out that he was totally innocent. Only took four or five times that the dude that turned him in turned OTHER people in for rocket attacks for us to figure out that HE was the one attacking us with rockets and then fingering some poor innocent in order to collect the reward. Oops.
We’re the strongest man in the room, folks. How long do you think that it’s going to take us to stop being the bully and go back to being the guy who’s protecting the weaker guys? How long is it going to take for us to go back to being the gentle giant who only beats up those who attack us, which these people didn’t?
Peace.
Eventually.
I hope.
Randal
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Thoughts on the Final Presidential Debate
Okay, before I get to the debate, let me make a couple of points.
One is that when Obama supporters talk about Palin’s lack of experience, the McCain supporters’ response is “Oh yeah? Well, you didn’t say that about YOUR guy.” Of course they didn’t that would be dumb. Their point is that the McCain team’s choice of Palin after saying that Obama didn’t have any experience was ALSO dumb. If you think that my guy doesn’t have enough experience, then you don’t go out and pick someone with less experience for your team.
The second thing is that none of the three national “debates” so far have been debates. I can’t remember if I ever saw a real debate between presidential candidates, although I vaguely remember one between Reagan and Carter. I watched a documentary about high school debate recently called “Resolved”, and in it, they made an excellent point. They were arguing the resolution that America should intercede in the Rwandan genocide, one team pro, the other con. The narrator pointed out that, even if the pro team figured out how to stop the genocide, they could still lose the debate. I remember in high school (ironically enough, considering Palin’s husband’s political affiliation) I had to argue pro on the issue “Alaska Should Secede From The Union”. If I had said “Well, my opponent wants to raise the cost of lunches, and I’m from a small town, and my opponent is a poopie-headed terrorist and I love Isreal” and then winked, I would have lost. As it was, I lost anyway – pretty much all that my opponent had to say was “As soon as Alaska tried to secede, the US would bring all it’s military might to bear to get those oil fields back.”
For the record, this is actual debate structure:
Resolution: the main argument – always stated in the positive
Affirmative: argues the resolution – tries to prove it correct
Negative: argues against the resolution – tries to prove it incorrect
Constructive Phase: each side will have 2 chances to construct their arguments
Cross-examination: each side will have a chance to question the other side after each constructive argument has been made
Rebuttal Phase: each side will have 2 chances to rebut the statements made by the other side and clear up any confusion surrounding their own arguments
I personally would love to see a presidential debate structured like that. Let’s face it, if you timed these phases to one to three minutes (strictly timed, as in turning off their mike at the end of that time) and actually have a set of judges to declare a winner, I think that you’d see some pretty excellent debates, with each debate covering several topics.
With that said, on with the debate…
Okay, Bob Schiffer has just laid out the ground rules, and they sound like this is going to be the most debate-like debate this year.
They start by talking about the candidate’s new economic recovery plans. Again, McCain says “Let’s cut taxes for rich people” and Obama says “Let’s cut taxes on the middle class”. As far as I’m concerned, Obama just won. Thank you, Barack Obama. “What we haven’t yet seen is a rescue plan for the middle class.”
A loved one of mine, as we shared one of our many marvelous conversations (who voted for Bush both times and is still undecided in this race, by the way) and is pretty well-off at the moment, commented that he wouldn’t mind paying more taxes as long as it was evenly distributed. Someone on the Bill Maher show commented that it’s patriotic to want to pay your fair share of taxes. Some things to think about.
Question one is “What are you going to cut back to help with the deficit?” Obama pointed out that for every dollar that he’s suggested spending, he’s suggested a way to earn that dollar back. Now he’s talking about what he wants to do for us. Great stuff, but not really telling us what he’d cut. McCain started off by doing something that I find reprehensible. He said “Back in the depression, we had a program…” He was a child when the depression ended. He has no active memory of the depression, and it kind of pisses me off when people claim to have been a part of that when they weren’t. Then he went on to talk about programs that he’d cut (not his, but existing programs) and his idiotic idea for a spending freeze. I guess that I have to give round one to McCain by a single hair because at least he DID talk about things that needed to be cut, which Obama didn’t. I don’t want to, but I have to be fair.
Question two is “Are you willing to say to each other’s face what your campaigns are saying about each other?” Ooh, good question. McCain said “It’s been a tough campaign and it’s all his fault, because he didn’t take up my offer for town hall meetings.” He then said that he regrets the turn that the campaign has made. That’s good. Personally, I think that Obama SHOULD have accepted the out of bounds remarks. Then McCain started whining about some comments made about him by some Senator or other. Now he’s whining about Obama not taking public money. Obama started off bad with “People expect presidential campaigns to be tough.” Now he’s talking about Bush’s failed economic policies. As near as I can tell, neither one is answering the question. Round two is a wash. Now Obama is pointing out that his campaign wasn’t connected with the candidate who attacked McCain, but was instead concerned with comments like “Terrorist” and “kill him” about Obama at McCain rallies. He then pointed out that his campaign repudiated some of the things that were said, and that the senator who authored the attack apologized. McCain commented that ACORN is trying to perpetrate the greatest voter fraud in American history. Apparently he’s forgotten Florida in 2000, and that the supreme court appointed our president that year. I would personally call that the greatest voter fraud in our history.
Question three is “Why would the country be better off if your VP candidate becomes president instead of his?” Obama said that Joe Biden has great foreign policy experience, and that he personally has experienced tough economic times, so he tends to fight for the “little guy”. McCain started talking about what an advocate for women’s rights Palin is, which is total bullshit. Then he said that when she saw corruption in a board that she was on, SHE QUIT! Then he started harping on the bullshit “maverick” thing. Round three to Obama. When McCain pointed out that Palin knows about “special needs” families (selfishly – I think that if her son didn’t suffer from down’s syndrome she wouldn’t) Obama pointed out that a spending freeze would hurt that.
Question four is “Would each of you give us a specific number of how much you think that your energy plan would reduce foreign oil imports?” McCain keeps talking about how we can “eliminate” our dependence on foreign oil, which, I think, means “100%”, which is bullshit… at least within the next four years. Even McCain said that it would happen within “7, 8 to 10 years”. Obama said “Within ten years, we can reduce to the point where we no longer depend on Middle Eastern oil.” Neither one is giving a specific number, so it looks like a wash.
Question five is “Would either of you favor controlling health care costs over expanding health care coverage?” Obama says “We have to do both and that’s exactly what my plan does.” He estimates that if you have health insurance now, that he can cut your premiums up to $2500 per year. If you don’t have health insurance, you can buy into the same federal health insurance that congress has. McCain started off by talking about how sad our health crisis is. Then he said that we need to put health insurance information on line, and reduce obesity, and blah blah blah. No answer. Round five to Obama. McCain started talking about his plan to issue a $5000 tax credit so that people could get their own health insurance policy. The problem is that the average cost of a health policy in the US is $11000. That means that it will COST YOU $6000 per year. Not a good plan. He also finally admitted that, for the first time in history, health insurance held by employed people in America would be taxed for his plan. He also commented that the $5000 would be in addition to your current health insurance plan. What if you don’t have insurance? You’re out of luck? Also, the insurance industry said that the McCain plan could result in mass canceling of employer-sponsored health insurance.
Question six is “Could or would you support a supreme court justice who disagrees with you on Roe Vs. Wade?” McCain said that he’s a federalist so he thinks that it should be a state-by-state decision. For the record, since the revolutionary war, a federalist is a person who supports a strong federal or central government. McCain ultimately says that he would not oppose a candidate who opposes him. Obama said the same. That’s a wash.
The final question is basically, “Why, since we spend the most on education, does our educational system suck so bad?” Obama said that we need to recruit better teachers and pay them better, as well as increase pre-school education and make college more affordable, such as his $4000 tuition tax credit. Also, parents are going to have to show more responsibility, thank God for him. McCain is using this as an opportunity to talk up charter schools. I’m personally still undecided on that issue. I think that Obama gave a better answer, but McCain’s answer was not bad, so I have to call this a wash.
Final result? Obama 2 rounds, McCain 1, with four ties.
I think that this has been the best debate this year, and I give credit to Senator McCain for addressing Senator Obama directly, instead of ignoring him like he did in the first debate, or referring to him as “that one” as he did in the second.
One point that Obama made is that we can’t talk about spending money without talking about paying for it. Thank God for that. I think that our government and our people have lost the concept of the value of money.
I can only close this with what Bob Schiffer quoted from his mom… “Go vote now. It’ll make you feel big and strong.”
Peace.
Randal
One is that when Obama supporters talk about Palin’s lack of experience, the McCain supporters’ response is “Oh yeah? Well, you didn’t say that about YOUR guy.” Of course they didn’t that would be dumb. Their point is that the McCain team’s choice of Palin after saying that Obama didn’t have any experience was ALSO dumb. If you think that my guy doesn’t have enough experience, then you don’t go out and pick someone with less experience for your team.
The second thing is that none of the three national “debates” so far have been debates. I can’t remember if I ever saw a real debate between presidential candidates, although I vaguely remember one between Reagan and Carter. I watched a documentary about high school debate recently called “Resolved”, and in it, they made an excellent point. They were arguing the resolution that America should intercede in the Rwandan genocide, one team pro, the other con. The narrator pointed out that, even if the pro team figured out how to stop the genocide, they could still lose the debate. I remember in high school (ironically enough, considering Palin’s husband’s political affiliation) I had to argue pro on the issue “Alaska Should Secede From The Union”. If I had said “Well, my opponent wants to raise the cost of lunches, and I’m from a small town, and my opponent is a poopie-headed terrorist and I love Isreal” and then winked, I would have lost. As it was, I lost anyway – pretty much all that my opponent had to say was “As soon as Alaska tried to secede, the US would bring all it’s military might to bear to get those oil fields back.”
For the record, this is actual debate structure:
Resolution: the main argument – always stated in the positive
Affirmative: argues the resolution – tries to prove it correct
Negative: argues against the resolution – tries to prove it incorrect
Constructive Phase: each side will have 2 chances to construct their arguments
Cross-examination: each side will have a chance to question the other side after each constructive argument has been made
Rebuttal Phase: each side will have 2 chances to rebut the statements made by the other side and clear up any confusion surrounding their own arguments
I personally would love to see a presidential debate structured like that. Let’s face it, if you timed these phases to one to three minutes (strictly timed, as in turning off their mike at the end of that time) and actually have a set of judges to declare a winner, I think that you’d see some pretty excellent debates, with each debate covering several topics.
With that said, on with the debate…
Okay, Bob Schiffer has just laid out the ground rules, and they sound like this is going to be the most debate-like debate this year.
They start by talking about the candidate’s new economic recovery plans. Again, McCain says “Let’s cut taxes for rich people” and Obama says “Let’s cut taxes on the middle class”. As far as I’m concerned, Obama just won. Thank you, Barack Obama. “What we haven’t yet seen is a rescue plan for the middle class.”
A loved one of mine, as we shared one of our many marvelous conversations (who voted for Bush both times and is still undecided in this race, by the way) and is pretty well-off at the moment, commented that he wouldn’t mind paying more taxes as long as it was evenly distributed. Someone on the Bill Maher show commented that it’s patriotic to want to pay your fair share of taxes. Some things to think about.
Question one is “What are you going to cut back to help with the deficit?” Obama pointed out that for every dollar that he’s suggested spending, he’s suggested a way to earn that dollar back. Now he’s talking about what he wants to do for us. Great stuff, but not really telling us what he’d cut. McCain started off by doing something that I find reprehensible. He said “Back in the depression, we had a program…” He was a child when the depression ended. He has no active memory of the depression, and it kind of pisses me off when people claim to have been a part of that when they weren’t. Then he went on to talk about programs that he’d cut (not his, but existing programs) and his idiotic idea for a spending freeze. I guess that I have to give round one to McCain by a single hair because at least he DID talk about things that needed to be cut, which Obama didn’t. I don’t want to, but I have to be fair.
Question two is “Are you willing to say to each other’s face what your campaigns are saying about each other?” Ooh, good question. McCain said “It’s been a tough campaign and it’s all his fault, because he didn’t take up my offer for town hall meetings.” He then said that he regrets the turn that the campaign has made. That’s good. Personally, I think that Obama SHOULD have accepted the out of bounds remarks. Then McCain started whining about some comments made about him by some Senator or other. Now he’s whining about Obama not taking public money. Obama started off bad with “People expect presidential campaigns to be tough.” Now he’s talking about Bush’s failed economic policies. As near as I can tell, neither one is answering the question. Round two is a wash. Now Obama is pointing out that his campaign wasn’t connected with the candidate who attacked McCain, but was instead concerned with comments like “Terrorist” and “kill him” about Obama at McCain rallies. He then pointed out that his campaign repudiated some of the things that were said, and that the senator who authored the attack apologized. McCain commented that ACORN is trying to perpetrate the greatest voter fraud in American history. Apparently he’s forgotten Florida in 2000, and that the supreme court appointed our president that year. I would personally call that the greatest voter fraud in our history.
Question three is “Why would the country be better off if your VP candidate becomes president instead of his?” Obama said that Joe Biden has great foreign policy experience, and that he personally has experienced tough economic times, so he tends to fight for the “little guy”. McCain started talking about what an advocate for women’s rights Palin is, which is total bullshit. Then he said that when she saw corruption in a board that she was on, SHE QUIT! Then he started harping on the bullshit “maverick” thing. Round three to Obama. When McCain pointed out that Palin knows about “special needs” families (selfishly – I think that if her son didn’t suffer from down’s syndrome she wouldn’t) Obama pointed out that a spending freeze would hurt that.
Question four is “Would each of you give us a specific number of how much you think that your energy plan would reduce foreign oil imports?” McCain keeps talking about how we can “eliminate” our dependence on foreign oil, which, I think, means “100%”, which is bullshit… at least within the next four years. Even McCain said that it would happen within “7, 8 to 10 years”. Obama said “Within ten years, we can reduce to the point where we no longer depend on Middle Eastern oil.” Neither one is giving a specific number, so it looks like a wash.
Question five is “Would either of you favor controlling health care costs over expanding health care coverage?” Obama says “We have to do both and that’s exactly what my plan does.” He estimates that if you have health insurance now, that he can cut your premiums up to $2500 per year. If you don’t have health insurance, you can buy into the same federal health insurance that congress has. McCain started off by talking about how sad our health crisis is. Then he said that we need to put health insurance information on line, and reduce obesity, and blah blah blah. No answer. Round five to Obama. McCain started talking about his plan to issue a $5000 tax credit so that people could get their own health insurance policy. The problem is that the average cost of a health policy in the US is $11000. That means that it will COST YOU $6000 per year. Not a good plan. He also finally admitted that, for the first time in history, health insurance held by employed people in America would be taxed for his plan. He also commented that the $5000 would be in addition to your current health insurance plan. What if you don’t have insurance? You’re out of luck? Also, the insurance industry said that the McCain plan could result in mass canceling of employer-sponsored health insurance.
Question six is “Could or would you support a supreme court justice who disagrees with you on Roe Vs. Wade?” McCain said that he’s a federalist so he thinks that it should be a state-by-state decision. For the record, since the revolutionary war, a federalist is a person who supports a strong federal or central government. McCain ultimately says that he would not oppose a candidate who opposes him. Obama said the same. That’s a wash.
The final question is basically, “Why, since we spend the most on education, does our educational system suck so bad?” Obama said that we need to recruit better teachers and pay them better, as well as increase pre-school education and make college more affordable, such as his $4000 tuition tax credit. Also, parents are going to have to show more responsibility, thank God for him. McCain is using this as an opportunity to talk up charter schools. I’m personally still undecided on that issue. I think that Obama gave a better answer, but McCain’s answer was not bad, so I have to call this a wash.
Final result? Obama 2 rounds, McCain 1, with four ties.
I think that this has been the best debate this year, and I give credit to Senator McCain for addressing Senator Obama directly, instead of ignoring him like he did in the first debate, or referring to him as “that one” as he did in the second.
One point that Obama made is that we can’t talk about spending money without talking about paying for it. Thank God for that. I think that our government and our people have lost the concept of the value of money.
I can only close this with what Bob Schiffer quoted from his mom… “Go vote now. It’ll make you feel big and strong.”
Peace.
Randal
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Republican Shame
Are you a republican who’s ashamed to admit it? I understand, Bunkie, really I do. I mean, for eight years you’ve been arguing for the policies of the Bush administration, and about now, they’re all starting to look pretty much like silly failures, aren’t they?
So what do you do?
Well, if you’re the republican presidential ticket, you call yourselves “Mavericks”. That’s right, we’re republicans, be we’re REPUBLICANS GONE WILD! We don’t have to stick to any freaking party platform. (Except of course for changing the presidential candidate’s views on abortion, tax cuts and Christian extremism for public consumption.)
Or, if you’re Washington representative Dave Reichart, you call yourself an “Outsider”! How very sci-fi of you, Dave. As near as I can tell, you’ve supported every policy of the Bush administration, all the way down to literally being struck dumb at the debate over the question “Is there ever a case where you could see yourself raising taxes?” But hey, let’s face it… those of us in your DISTRICT only hear your name when it’s time to run for reelection, so it’s really not all that hard to imagine you as an “outsider”. Hell, from where I’m sitting, you hardly seem to exist at all.
Or, if you’re Washington gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi, you have your party affiliation listed as “GOP” instead of “republican” on the state ballots. Not that it matters a huge amount – members of the republican party have referred to it as the “GOP” (Grand Old Party) since it’s inception. It hasn’t really been used in recent years, but I guess that if you HAVE to distance yourself from your party somehow, that’s the best way to do it.
Look, my republican brothers and sisters… if you don’t like what your party’s doing, speak out about it. CHANGE THE PARTY. Now if, on the other hand, you STILL agree with the policies of the Bush administration and are simply trying to avoid being tarred with the same brush as Bush, then go hide your heads in shame. These policies have failed miserably. Bush, Rove and Cheney have done far more damage to the reputation of the GOP than Clinton did to the democratic party.
One final thought… the republican die-hards keep talking about “Winning In Iraq”. Reasonable republicans (like Colin Powell) are now saying “we did a bad thing and we need to end it.”
The reason that I say this is that there’s an organization out there with the same party line called “Move America Forward”. Their e-mail is info@MoveAmericaForward.org. I sent an e-mail to them with the following text…
Hello. I recently saw Ms. Morgan on Penn and Teller's Bullshit on the Showtime network and have a question for her.
First off, since you present yourself as a pro-troop organization, please allow me to establish my bona fides. I come from a military family. My paternal grandfather served in the Navy in the Pacific theater in WWII. One of my paternal uncles was in Korea with the army. My father was in the Air Force in Bermuda during the Cuban missile crisis. Two paternal uncles served in Viet Nam, one of whom did not return. My older brother served in the Army. I served four years of ROTC and was then denied military service for medical reasons. My nephew served in Kuwait for the first several years of the current engagement in Iraq. Now that you know my history with the toops, please allow me to proceed with my question.
In her appearance on Bullshit, Ms. Morgan said "Move Forward America supports our troops and their mission... we wish for victory for our troops and our soldiers." So my question to Ms. Morgan (or anyone else who would care to address it) is "What is the mission of our troops? What is victory in Iraq?" As near as i can tell, and all of my friends who have served agree with me, Iraq is a mission without an objective. When no objective is given, there can be neither victory or failure - only the endless death and destruction of the young people valiant enough to serve their country to no positive means. One conservative friend to whom i addressed this question said "Well, when you put it straight out like that, i just don't know. I suppose get the oil and get out." Then he shook his head, realizing, i think, that he has adopted the party line that this war ISN'T about oil.
If you can answer this question for me, i'd appreciate it. I support our troops and the thought that they are being fed into a meat grinder for no noble purpose sickens me. Thank you.
Randal Schaffer
I sent this e-mail two months ago today and have received no response. So please… anyone out there with the same concerns that I have, please bombard the e-mail address of these morons until we get an answer. If we let them get away with their rhetorical bullshit, they’ll just keep doing it while more American kids die and more money gets pissed away pointlessly.
Peace.
Randal
So what do you do?
Well, if you’re the republican presidential ticket, you call yourselves “Mavericks”. That’s right, we’re republicans, be we’re REPUBLICANS GONE WILD! We don’t have to stick to any freaking party platform. (Except of course for changing the presidential candidate’s views on abortion, tax cuts and Christian extremism for public consumption.)
Or, if you’re Washington representative Dave Reichart, you call yourself an “Outsider”! How very sci-fi of you, Dave. As near as I can tell, you’ve supported every policy of the Bush administration, all the way down to literally being struck dumb at the debate over the question “Is there ever a case where you could see yourself raising taxes?” But hey, let’s face it… those of us in your DISTRICT only hear your name when it’s time to run for reelection, so it’s really not all that hard to imagine you as an “outsider”. Hell, from where I’m sitting, you hardly seem to exist at all.
Or, if you’re Washington gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi, you have your party affiliation listed as “GOP” instead of “republican” on the state ballots. Not that it matters a huge amount – members of the republican party have referred to it as the “GOP” (Grand Old Party) since it’s inception. It hasn’t really been used in recent years, but I guess that if you HAVE to distance yourself from your party somehow, that’s the best way to do it.
Look, my republican brothers and sisters… if you don’t like what your party’s doing, speak out about it. CHANGE THE PARTY. Now if, on the other hand, you STILL agree with the policies of the Bush administration and are simply trying to avoid being tarred with the same brush as Bush, then go hide your heads in shame. These policies have failed miserably. Bush, Rove and Cheney have done far more damage to the reputation of the GOP than Clinton did to the democratic party.
One final thought… the republican die-hards keep talking about “Winning In Iraq”. Reasonable republicans (like Colin Powell) are now saying “we did a bad thing and we need to end it.”
The reason that I say this is that there’s an organization out there with the same party line called “Move America Forward”. Their e-mail is info@MoveAmericaForward.org. I sent an e-mail to them with the following text…
Hello. I recently saw Ms. Morgan on Penn and Teller's Bullshit on the Showtime network and have a question for her.
First off, since you present yourself as a pro-troop organization, please allow me to establish my bona fides. I come from a military family. My paternal grandfather served in the Navy in the Pacific theater in WWII. One of my paternal uncles was in Korea with the army. My father was in the Air Force in Bermuda during the Cuban missile crisis. Two paternal uncles served in Viet Nam, one of whom did not return. My older brother served in the Army. I served four years of ROTC and was then denied military service for medical reasons. My nephew served in Kuwait for the first several years of the current engagement in Iraq. Now that you know my history with the toops, please allow me to proceed with my question.
In her appearance on Bullshit, Ms. Morgan said "Move Forward America supports our troops and their mission... we wish for victory for our troops and our soldiers." So my question to Ms. Morgan (or anyone else who would care to address it) is "What is the mission of our troops? What is victory in Iraq?" As near as i can tell, and all of my friends who have served agree with me, Iraq is a mission without an objective. When no objective is given, there can be neither victory or failure - only the endless death and destruction of the young people valiant enough to serve their country to no positive means. One conservative friend to whom i addressed this question said "Well, when you put it straight out like that, i just don't know. I suppose get the oil and get out." Then he shook his head, realizing, i think, that he has adopted the party line that this war ISN'T about oil.
If you can answer this question for me, i'd appreciate it. I support our troops and the thought that they are being fed into a meat grinder for no noble purpose sickens me. Thank you.
Randal Schaffer
I sent this e-mail two months ago today and have received no response. So please… anyone out there with the same concerns that I have, please bombard the e-mail address of these morons until we get an answer. If we let them get away with their rhetorical bullshit, they’ll just keep doing it while more American kids die and more money gets pissed away pointlessly.
Peace.
Randal
Saturday, October 11, 2008
Christian Mythology
I want to get it straight here that I am a Christian, okay? I follow the teachings of Jesus Christ to the best of my ability. I wanted to get that out of the way right off the bat, because my Christianity is constantly thrown into question by people with whom I disagree.
The reason that I started with that statement is because I’m about to address something here that makes many Christians uncomfortable… Judeo-Christian Mythology. When we start to insist on Biblical literalism, we start running into problems, because some of this stuff is obviously mythology. Noah and the Ark. Stopping the sun in the sky. Jonah living in a “big fish” for three days. Adam and Eve. Creation, as presented in Genesis.
You see, every time that you read a verse from the Bible, you have to realize that it will fall into one or more of the following three categories:
1) History. Stuff that really happened. Verifiable by other sources. Historically, for instance, we know that Jesus and his followers existed, because other cultures and sources record them. We also know that the Jewish bondage in Egypt and the Exodus probably DIDN’T happen historically, at least not as laid down in the Bible. There is no record of this anywhere outside the Torah.
2) Mythology. And no, by mythology, I don’t mean “lies”. Mythology is cultural stories created to explain the unexplainable. Where does lightning come from? Zeus throws it at bad people. What is thunder? That’s Thor smiting the clouds with his hammer, Mjolinar. Where did people come from? God made us out of dirt and blew life into our lungs. See how that works? When we can’t explain something, we blame God. (Or “Gods” if you’re a pantheist.)
3) Teachings. My favorite part, and the part that tends to get lost when people get two hung up on the first two. I mean, why debate what Jesus said about caring for the poor and sick when we can, instead, argue about whether or not his mommy was a virgin?
Let me give you an example of what I mean. We all know the story of Christ, right? Born in a manger of a virgin attended by shepherds, given gifts at birth, part man part God, bucked the establishment, persecuted, executed, raised from the dead, yeah? Okay.
How about this? Five hundred years before Christ came Attis. He was born on December 25th to a virgin. He was considered both God and man. He was crucified on a Friday, and, after three days, rose from the dead. His resurrection is celebrated on March 25th – a date shared by Easter some years.
Six hundred years before the birth of Christ came Mithra. Mithra was born on December 25th in a cave (some Christian stories have Jesus born in a cave), had twelve followers, was considered a great teacher, rose three days after his sacrifice and his resurrection was witnessed by two women (as Christians hold that Jesus’ was).
Also about six hundred years before Christ, we had Zoroaster, who was born of a virgin. He was baptized in a river. Wise men were astounded by his childish wisdom. He was tempted in the wilderness by a devil. He began his ministry around the age of 30. He cast out demons and healed the blind. His followers expect a second coming in the year 2361.
Dionysus, the Greek God of wine from about a thousand years before the birth of Christ was born on December 25th of a virgin, considered a holy child and placed in a manger. He was sacrificed and rose from the dead on March 25th. He turned water into wine. He was called “king of kings”. His representative animal was a lamb.
The Egyptian god Horus, who predates the Exodus, was born in a manger on December 25th of a the virgin Isis who was also known as Merian. His birth was attended by a star in the East and three wise men. His human father’s name was Seb, which translates as “Joseph”. He was a child teacher in the temple at twelve, then disappears from history for eighteen years until his baptism at 30. He was baptized in the river Eridanus, which we now know as “Jordan” by a baptizer named Anup, which translates as “John”. He had twelve disciples. He performed miracles, exorcised demons, and raised a man from the dead named “El-Azarus”. (Say it out loud and see what it sounds like.) He walked on water. He was crucified between two thieves and then, after three days, rose from the dead.
About three thousand years before the birth of Christ, Krishna was born of a virgin on December 25th. His earthly father was a carpenter. His birth was attended by a star in the east, angels and shepherds and was given spices (such as myrrh) on his birth. He was persecuted by a tyrant who ordered the murder of thousands of infants in an attempt to kill him. He raised the dead and healed the sick (including lepers) and blindness. He lived among the poor and was said to “love the poor”. He was crucified on a tree between two thieves at the age of 30. The sun was said to darken at his death. He was called “Jeseus” by his followers, which means “pure essence”. (Jesus’ name was not Jesus, his birth name was Joshua. He was called “Jesus” by his followers, which means “light of God”.)
Do you see what I’m trying to say here, brothers and sisters? I think that it’s high time that we let the mythology go, recognize it as the cultural storytelling that it was, and just concentrate on his teachings.
Peace.
Randal
The reason that I started with that statement is because I’m about to address something here that makes many Christians uncomfortable… Judeo-Christian Mythology. When we start to insist on Biblical literalism, we start running into problems, because some of this stuff is obviously mythology. Noah and the Ark. Stopping the sun in the sky. Jonah living in a “big fish” for three days. Adam and Eve. Creation, as presented in Genesis.
You see, every time that you read a verse from the Bible, you have to realize that it will fall into one or more of the following three categories:
1) History. Stuff that really happened. Verifiable by other sources. Historically, for instance, we know that Jesus and his followers existed, because other cultures and sources record them. We also know that the Jewish bondage in Egypt and the Exodus probably DIDN’T happen historically, at least not as laid down in the Bible. There is no record of this anywhere outside the Torah.
2) Mythology. And no, by mythology, I don’t mean “lies”. Mythology is cultural stories created to explain the unexplainable. Where does lightning come from? Zeus throws it at bad people. What is thunder? That’s Thor smiting the clouds with his hammer, Mjolinar. Where did people come from? God made us out of dirt and blew life into our lungs. See how that works? When we can’t explain something, we blame God. (Or “Gods” if you’re a pantheist.)
3) Teachings. My favorite part, and the part that tends to get lost when people get two hung up on the first two. I mean, why debate what Jesus said about caring for the poor and sick when we can, instead, argue about whether or not his mommy was a virgin?
Let me give you an example of what I mean. We all know the story of Christ, right? Born in a manger of a virgin attended by shepherds, given gifts at birth, part man part God, bucked the establishment, persecuted, executed, raised from the dead, yeah? Okay.
How about this? Five hundred years before Christ came Attis. He was born on December 25th to a virgin. He was considered both God and man. He was crucified on a Friday, and, after three days, rose from the dead. His resurrection is celebrated on March 25th – a date shared by Easter some years.
Six hundred years before the birth of Christ came Mithra. Mithra was born on December 25th in a cave (some Christian stories have Jesus born in a cave), had twelve followers, was considered a great teacher, rose three days after his sacrifice and his resurrection was witnessed by two women (as Christians hold that Jesus’ was).
Also about six hundred years before Christ, we had Zoroaster, who was born of a virgin. He was baptized in a river. Wise men were astounded by his childish wisdom. He was tempted in the wilderness by a devil. He began his ministry around the age of 30. He cast out demons and healed the blind. His followers expect a second coming in the year 2361.
Dionysus, the Greek God of wine from about a thousand years before the birth of Christ was born on December 25th of a virgin, considered a holy child and placed in a manger. He was sacrificed and rose from the dead on March 25th. He turned water into wine. He was called “king of kings”. His representative animal was a lamb.
The Egyptian god Horus, who predates the Exodus, was born in a manger on December 25th of a the virgin Isis who was also known as Merian. His birth was attended by a star in the East and three wise men. His human father’s name was Seb, which translates as “Joseph”. He was a child teacher in the temple at twelve, then disappears from history for eighteen years until his baptism at 30. He was baptized in the river Eridanus, which we now know as “Jordan” by a baptizer named Anup, which translates as “John”. He had twelve disciples. He performed miracles, exorcised demons, and raised a man from the dead named “El-Azarus”. (Say it out loud and see what it sounds like.) He walked on water. He was crucified between two thieves and then, after three days, rose from the dead.
About three thousand years before the birth of Christ, Krishna was born of a virgin on December 25th. His earthly father was a carpenter. His birth was attended by a star in the east, angels and shepherds and was given spices (such as myrrh) on his birth. He was persecuted by a tyrant who ordered the murder of thousands of infants in an attempt to kill him. He raised the dead and healed the sick (including lepers) and blindness. He lived among the poor and was said to “love the poor”. He was crucified on a tree between two thieves at the age of 30. The sun was said to darken at his death. He was called “Jeseus” by his followers, which means “pure essence”. (Jesus’ name was not Jesus, his birth name was Joshua. He was called “Jesus” by his followers, which means “light of God”.)
Do you see what I’m trying to say here, brothers and sisters? I think that it’s high time that we let the mythology go, recognize it as the cultural storytelling that it was, and just concentrate on his teachings.
Peace.
Randal
Friday, October 10, 2008
A Thought
I watched the debate tonight between my local congressman, Dave Reichart and his opponent Darcy Burner. Congressman Reichart keeps saying something that I’ve also heard Senator McCain and Governor Romny say as well, and I wanted to point out why it’s a factual error. I have also received this in an e-mail that, every day, I wish that I would have torn up at the time.
That comment is that we currently have a democratic congress, so everything that’s going wrong is their fault.
What we have in congress is a fairly toothless majority. Yes, there are more democrats than republicans representing us right now – but we do not have enough to override a presidential veto. So anything good that they try to do gets vetoed by Mr. Bush, and that’s it. And as long as we continue to engage in petty partisan politics, we’re not going to have enough republicans with the guts to join them in overriding that veto.
Peace.
Randal
That comment is that we currently have a democratic congress, so everything that’s going wrong is their fault.
What we have in congress is a fairly toothless majority. Yes, there are more democrats than republicans representing us right now – but we do not have enough to override a presidential veto. So anything good that they try to do gets vetoed by Mr. Bush, and that’s it. And as long as we continue to engage in petty partisan politics, we’re not going to have enough republicans with the guts to join them in overriding that veto.
Peace.
Randal
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
Second Presidential Debate 100708
Okay, second presidential debate.
I thought this was supposed to be about the economy, but according to Tom Brokaw, it’s a wide range of questions on domestic and foreign policy.
The debate tonight is town-hall style. First question is “What’s the quickest way to bail Americans out of THEIR financial difficulties?” Obama said Step one: last week’s bailout, and making sure that it’s executed right. Step two: tax breaks for the common people. Step three: health care and help with the oil crunch. McCain said energy independence, tax cuts for the rich and stop the Washington spending spree that he’s been a big part of perpetuating. Finally, he said as president he would order the treasury department to buy up bad home loans and renegotiate them based on the reduced value of the home. So, in other words… send Washington on a spending spree.
Round one to Obama.
Just discovered that one of my heroes among the wealthy, Warren Buffet is an Obama supporter.
Second question is “What in the bail out package will actually help out the average American?” McCain is talking about how he “suspended” his campaign to vote on the first bill. Now he’s talking about good republicans wanting to stop FMNA and FDMC and bad democrats fighting to continue it. Then he reiterated that we needed to buy bad home mortgages. Didn’t answer the question at all, in other words. Obama said that it would help small businesses get the loans that they’ve come to rely on to stay in business.
Round two to Obama.
Third question is “How can we trust either of you with our money when both parties got us into this mess?” Obama pointed out that we had a projected budget surplus before the Bush administration took over. So in other words, “We may be bad, but we’re not as bad as them.” He then said that he plans on cutting more from the federal budget than he increases spending, so it winds up being a net cut. McCain started talking about what a maverick he is. Then saying that the answer is bipartisanship. Which I agree with. Called Obama a liberal. Talked about how much Obama voted on in pork. Then he started babbling about offshore drilling.
Round three is a wash. Neither one of them really answered the question.
Okay, during the follow-up discussion, Obama set a goal for us… energy independence before 2018. Good for him. We like goals.
Fourth question is “Since WWII, we have not been asked to sacrifice for America except for the blood of our troops. What sacrifice will you be willing to make to help us out of this mess?” McCain’s talking about eliminating earmarks and examining the spending of government agencies. Then he started talking about his asinine one year spending freeze. Again, didn’t answer the question. Obama immediately started talking about 9/11. Now he’s talking about energy. I can’t help but wonder if either one of them understood the question. He’s talking about sacrifices that AMERICANS can make, not him.
Round four is a wash.
Fifth question is “What about unfunded liabilities such as social security and medicare?” And Tom Brokaw added “How will you fix these within the next two years?” Obama took the time to respond to McCain’s attacks on his tax plan. Ah, I take that back. He said that his tax cuts and health care fixes will decrease the burden on these programs. McCain talked about what a maverick he is and how it’s going to take bipartisanship and that we should start a commission on medicare.
Round five is a wash. Neither one really answered the question again.
Round six is “What would you do in the next two years to make sure that congress acts as fast on issues like the environment as they did on the economic bail-out?” McCain started talking about the importance of nuclear energy, and, of course, that he’s a maverick. Didn’t address the question at all. Obama followed suit.
Round six is a wash.
Round seven is “Selling health care coverage has become a very valuable commodity. Do you believe that health care should be a commodity?” Obama talked about the burden of health care, and what he would do to help with that. Didn’t answer the question. McCain followed suit.
Another wash.
They both spent some time here talking about how scary government mandates are. I’d just like to remind everyone here of what “Mr. Conservative”, Barry Goldwater said. “Some problems are so big that only a federal government can handle them.”
Round eight is “How will the recent economic threat inhibit our role as peacemakers in the world?” McCain started talking about how America is the greatest country in the world, and that we need to start learning when we can reasonably make a difference. Awfully strange coming from someone who would keep us in Iraq for a hundred years. Obama attacked McCain’s support of Iraq. Good for him, but not the question. Finally, he said that no country facing economic issues can retain it’s position as a peacekeeper. Good for him.
Round eight (barely) to Obama.
Now McCain is babbling about “Victory in Iraq” again, like this is actually something feasible, without actually talking about what it might be.
Round nine is “Should the US support Pakistani sovereignty, or should we root out Al Quaeda there, even if they don’t want us to?” Obama said that we have to root those terrorists out, regardless, and in order to do it we have to withdraw our troops from Iraq so that we have the troops to do it. He also said that we need to increase non-military aid to Pakistan to give them an incentive to cooperate. McCain said that we couldn’t repeat our mistakes of withdrawing from Afghanistan before we stabilized the country like we did in the eighties. Of course, he and the other senators who voted for us to get out of Afghanistan and go into Iraq made exactly that mistake.
Round nine to Obama.
Round ten is “If, despite your best efforts, if Iran attacks Israel, would you act immediately to support Israel or wait for the security council?” McCain said that he would act unilaterally. Obama started off by talking about how important it is to prevent Iran from going nuclear.
Round ten to McCain, because at least he answered the question.
Last question is “What don’t you know and how will you learn it?” Wonderful question. Obama says most of the time he learns what he doesn’t know from his wife. Then he dodged the question, instead talking about how important support has been in his life. McCain said “What I don’t know is what all of us don’t know, and that’s what’s going to happen both here and abroad.”
I give that round to McCain, because he answered half the question.
Let me take a moment to say here how disappointed I was in this debate. Neither candidate really took any time answering the questions, and Tom Brokaw didn’t call them on it.
Debate to Obama, barely. Not because McCain did well, but just because neither of them bothered to answer the questions.
Peace.
Randal
I thought this was supposed to be about the economy, but according to Tom Brokaw, it’s a wide range of questions on domestic and foreign policy.
The debate tonight is town-hall style. First question is “What’s the quickest way to bail Americans out of THEIR financial difficulties?” Obama said Step one: last week’s bailout, and making sure that it’s executed right. Step two: tax breaks for the common people. Step three: health care and help with the oil crunch. McCain said energy independence, tax cuts for the rich and stop the Washington spending spree that he’s been a big part of perpetuating. Finally, he said as president he would order the treasury department to buy up bad home loans and renegotiate them based on the reduced value of the home. So, in other words… send Washington on a spending spree.
Round one to Obama.
Just discovered that one of my heroes among the wealthy, Warren Buffet is an Obama supporter.
Second question is “What in the bail out package will actually help out the average American?” McCain is talking about how he “suspended” his campaign to vote on the first bill. Now he’s talking about good republicans wanting to stop FMNA and FDMC and bad democrats fighting to continue it. Then he reiterated that we needed to buy bad home mortgages. Didn’t answer the question at all, in other words. Obama said that it would help small businesses get the loans that they’ve come to rely on to stay in business.
Round two to Obama.
Third question is “How can we trust either of you with our money when both parties got us into this mess?” Obama pointed out that we had a projected budget surplus before the Bush administration took over. So in other words, “We may be bad, but we’re not as bad as them.” He then said that he plans on cutting more from the federal budget than he increases spending, so it winds up being a net cut. McCain started talking about what a maverick he is. Then saying that the answer is bipartisanship. Which I agree with. Called Obama a liberal. Talked about how much Obama voted on in pork. Then he started babbling about offshore drilling.
Round three is a wash. Neither one of them really answered the question.
Okay, during the follow-up discussion, Obama set a goal for us… energy independence before 2018. Good for him. We like goals.
Fourth question is “Since WWII, we have not been asked to sacrifice for America except for the blood of our troops. What sacrifice will you be willing to make to help us out of this mess?” McCain’s talking about eliminating earmarks and examining the spending of government agencies. Then he started talking about his asinine one year spending freeze. Again, didn’t answer the question. Obama immediately started talking about 9/11. Now he’s talking about energy. I can’t help but wonder if either one of them understood the question. He’s talking about sacrifices that AMERICANS can make, not him.
Round four is a wash.
Fifth question is “What about unfunded liabilities such as social security and medicare?” And Tom Brokaw added “How will you fix these within the next two years?” Obama took the time to respond to McCain’s attacks on his tax plan. Ah, I take that back. He said that his tax cuts and health care fixes will decrease the burden on these programs. McCain talked about what a maverick he is and how it’s going to take bipartisanship and that we should start a commission on medicare.
Round five is a wash. Neither one really answered the question again.
Round six is “What would you do in the next two years to make sure that congress acts as fast on issues like the environment as they did on the economic bail-out?” McCain started talking about the importance of nuclear energy, and, of course, that he’s a maverick. Didn’t address the question at all. Obama followed suit.
Round six is a wash.
Round seven is “Selling health care coverage has become a very valuable commodity. Do you believe that health care should be a commodity?” Obama talked about the burden of health care, and what he would do to help with that. Didn’t answer the question. McCain followed suit.
Another wash.
They both spent some time here talking about how scary government mandates are. I’d just like to remind everyone here of what “Mr. Conservative”, Barry Goldwater said. “Some problems are so big that only a federal government can handle them.”
Round eight is “How will the recent economic threat inhibit our role as peacemakers in the world?” McCain started talking about how America is the greatest country in the world, and that we need to start learning when we can reasonably make a difference. Awfully strange coming from someone who would keep us in Iraq for a hundred years. Obama attacked McCain’s support of Iraq. Good for him, but not the question. Finally, he said that no country facing economic issues can retain it’s position as a peacekeeper. Good for him.
Round eight (barely) to Obama.
Now McCain is babbling about “Victory in Iraq” again, like this is actually something feasible, without actually talking about what it might be.
Round nine is “Should the US support Pakistani sovereignty, or should we root out Al Quaeda there, even if they don’t want us to?” Obama said that we have to root those terrorists out, regardless, and in order to do it we have to withdraw our troops from Iraq so that we have the troops to do it. He also said that we need to increase non-military aid to Pakistan to give them an incentive to cooperate. McCain said that we couldn’t repeat our mistakes of withdrawing from Afghanistan before we stabilized the country like we did in the eighties. Of course, he and the other senators who voted for us to get out of Afghanistan and go into Iraq made exactly that mistake.
Round nine to Obama.
Round ten is “If, despite your best efforts, if Iran attacks Israel, would you act immediately to support Israel or wait for the security council?” McCain said that he would act unilaterally. Obama started off by talking about how important it is to prevent Iran from going nuclear.
Round ten to McCain, because at least he answered the question.
Last question is “What don’t you know and how will you learn it?” Wonderful question. Obama says most of the time he learns what he doesn’t know from his wife. Then he dodged the question, instead talking about how important support has been in his life. McCain said “What I don’t know is what all of us don’t know, and that’s what’s going to happen both here and abroad.”
I give that round to McCain, because he answered half the question.
Let me take a moment to say here how disappointed I was in this debate. Neither candidate really took any time answering the questions, and Tom Brokaw didn’t call them on it.
Debate to Obama, barely. Not because McCain did well, but just because neither of them bothered to answer the questions.
Peace.
Randal
The Second American Commandment
The second amendment to the Constitution says “The right of the people to bear arms shall not be infringed”, right? That’s what you’ve heard, that’s what our current supreme court says, so it must be true, right?
Except that it’s not. It actually says “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
The suggestion of pro-gun advocates is that the two clauses of the sentence are entirely separate. The first half states that a well-regulated militia is necessary for a free state, the second half says that we have the right to bear arms, and they have nothing further to do with one another.
Before I go any further, let me be clear about one thing. I LOVE GUNS. I haven’t been target shooting in years and am miserably out of practice, but I enjoy it. I like the way that they feel, I like the way that they look, I like the noise that the make and the way that they blow shit up. Personally, I don’t use guns to hunt because killing an animal from a quarter of a mile away seems a little unsporting to me. A hunt is supposed to prove that I have the right to eat the flesh of that animal because I beat it in a struggle. If I assassinate it with a sniper rifle, I’m really not proving anything except that I have better ordinance. When I’ve hunted (and again, it’s been a while) I hunt with a bow. I also reject “sport” hunting. To me, sport hunting = killing for fun, which is the same thing that serial killers do. Killing is not fun. My understanding of the gospels is that Jesus commanded us to revere ALL life, and so I try my best to do that.
Having said that…
With all due respect, whoever tries to parse this sentence to divorce the two clauses is unfamiliar with American history and the intent of the founders.
The founding fathers never wanted us to have a standing army. George Washington believed that a standing army, controlled by the federal government, could easily be used to take away the rights of the people by force. He and the other founders believed that, instead, each state should maintain a militia of citizen soldiers who could come to arms immediately. The OTHER George, King George, saw the arming of the American people as a threat, which of course it was. So he passed a law forbidden colonials to own guns. That was one of the many straws that broke the camel’s back and started the revolution. So the founders, not wishing to see that kind of mess again, granted Americans the right to bear arms.
You also have to look at this in a historical context. In 1800, just after the Bill of Rights was passed, there were just over 5,300,000 people in the US. There are now about one and a half times that number in NYC alone. At that time, if you didn’t have a gun then you became bear bait. Or wolf bait. Or you got killed by Indians, pissed that you had taken their land away from them. You were also a vegetarian, because there was no Safeway to go buy meat. As a matter of fact, there was no way to ship and store fresh meat. When you killed something, you relished the fresh meat for a day or two, and then turned the rest into jerky, so that it wouldn’t go bad.
In case you didn’t notice, we don’t have those problems anymore. Bears and wolves have almost been hunted out of existence, the Indians (for the most part) are content with casinos, and you get your meat at the store and keep it in your fridge. And, contrary to the wishes of the founders, we DO have a standing army at the command of the federal government.
So does that mean that I support abolition of the second amendment? I do not. As I said… I LOVE GUNS.
What I think that it DOES mean, though, is that we have to apply the second amendment to the situation that we’re living in today.
The first thing that you have to realize is that regulation was built right in to the amendment. “A WELL-REGULATED militia…”
Let’s take another little historical journey, shall we?
I love westerns. A loved one and I recently went to see the new western “Appaloosa”, and I thought that it was a pretty good film. My dad reveres westerns, so I grew up watching Gunsmoke and The Rifleman and Have Gun Will Travel. As a teenager, I read the bulk of the works of Louis Lamour and Zane Grey. I own Shane on DVD, and think that I’ve seen every western that John Wayne ever made. But the fact is that, historically, if you went into Dodge City or Tombstone or any of those other towns, the first thing that you had to do was surrender your guns to the town Sheriff. They didn’t want nuts shooting up their towns anymore than we do. YOU HAD TO SURRENDER YOUR GUNS. And then, when you left town, you went to the sheriff and got your guns back. That, my friends, is gun control in a nutshell.
Today, if a town tried to follow this western ideal and pass a law saying that you had to surrender your guns when you came into town, that town would be sued out of existence.
Let me ask this… can you name an item that is a potentially deadly weapon that has to be registered and you need a license to operate? That’s right. I’m talking about cars. Or dogs. Or motorcycles. The idea that America is a place where you can have whatever you want without regulation is simply insane.
I don’t have a problem with the assault weapon ban. People try to justify this by saying that they need automatic weapons to hunt or protect their homes is also insane. If you need two hundred rounds per second to kill a deer, you should probably learn to shoot before you go hunting next time. And do you need two hundred rounds per second to protect your home? Hate to break it to you, but if you fire two one-second bursts at an intruder, you’re not going to have much home left to protect when it’s all done. It is going to tear your place up. Assault weapons serve one purpose and one purpose only, and that is to kill a lot of people, very quickly.
And waiting periods? I have no problem with that. If I need a gun to hunt, or want a gun to protect my home, I’m okay waiting a couple of days before I get it.
And registration? Almost everything that you own that could kill someone has to be registered, for the simple reason that if someone DOES get killed with it, they know who to come to.
If you need an unregistered assault weapon RIGHT NOW, odds are that you really don’t need it because you’re pissed off and want to kill someone without anyone knowing who did it.
The late great George Carlin said that the quickest route to reasonable gun control would be to remove the metal detectors from around Congress and the White House. If our lawmakers lived with gun violence on a day to day basis like the rest of us do, the NRA wouldn’t hold the kind of sway over them that it does now. (I believe the same thing about education, by the way. If we really want to see major reforms in public education, we need to force our lawmakers to send their kids to public school… without that, they have no incentive to clean up public schools.)
So yes, brothers and sisters. I believe that the commandment “Thou shalt not take an American’s guns from him” should stand, but I also think that we need to temper it with common sense, wisdom, and historical knowledge.
Peace.
Randal
Except that it’s not. It actually says “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
The suggestion of pro-gun advocates is that the two clauses of the sentence are entirely separate. The first half states that a well-regulated militia is necessary for a free state, the second half says that we have the right to bear arms, and they have nothing further to do with one another.
Before I go any further, let me be clear about one thing. I LOVE GUNS. I haven’t been target shooting in years and am miserably out of practice, but I enjoy it. I like the way that they feel, I like the way that they look, I like the noise that the make and the way that they blow shit up. Personally, I don’t use guns to hunt because killing an animal from a quarter of a mile away seems a little unsporting to me. A hunt is supposed to prove that I have the right to eat the flesh of that animal because I beat it in a struggle. If I assassinate it with a sniper rifle, I’m really not proving anything except that I have better ordinance. When I’ve hunted (and again, it’s been a while) I hunt with a bow. I also reject “sport” hunting. To me, sport hunting = killing for fun, which is the same thing that serial killers do. Killing is not fun. My understanding of the gospels is that Jesus commanded us to revere ALL life, and so I try my best to do that.
Having said that…
With all due respect, whoever tries to parse this sentence to divorce the two clauses is unfamiliar with American history and the intent of the founders.
The founding fathers never wanted us to have a standing army. George Washington believed that a standing army, controlled by the federal government, could easily be used to take away the rights of the people by force. He and the other founders believed that, instead, each state should maintain a militia of citizen soldiers who could come to arms immediately. The OTHER George, King George, saw the arming of the American people as a threat, which of course it was. So he passed a law forbidden colonials to own guns. That was one of the many straws that broke the camel’s back and started the revolution. So the founders, not wishing to see that kind of mess again, granted Americans the right to bear arms.
You also have to look at this in a historical context. In 1800, just after the Bill of Rights was passed, there were just over 5,300,000 people in the US. There are now about one and a half times that number in NYC alone. At that time, if you didn’t have a gun then you became bear bait. Or wolf bait. Or you got killed by Indians, pissed that you had taken their land away from them. You were also a vegetarian, because there was no Safeway to go buy meat. As a matter of fact, there was no way to ship and store fresh meat. When you killed something, you relished the fresh meat for a day or two, and then turned the rest into jerky, so that it wouldn’t go bad.
In case you didn’t notice, we don’t have those problems anymore. Bears and wolves have almost been hunted out of existence, the Indians (for the most part) are content with casinos, and you get your meat at the store and keep it in your fridge. And, contrary to the wishes of the founders, we DO have a standing army at the command of the federal government.
So does that mean that I support abolition of the second amendment? I do not. As I said… I LOVE GUNS.
What I think that it DOES mean, though, is that we have to apply the second amendment to the situation that we’re living in today.
The first thing that you have to realize is that regulation was built right in to the amendment. “A WELL-REGULATED militia…”
Let’s take another little historical journey, shall we?
I love westerns. A loved one and I recently went to see the new western “Appaloosa”, and I thought that it was a pretty good film. My dad reveres westerns, so I grew up watching Gunsmoke and The Rifleman and Have Gun Will Travel. As a teenager, I read the bulk of the works of Louis Lamour and Zane Grey. I own Shane on DVD, and think that I’ve seen every western that John Wayne ever made. But the fact is that, historically, if you went into Dodge City or Tombstone or any of those other towns, the first thing that you had to do was surrender your guns to the town Sheriff. They didn’t want nuts shooting up their towns anymore than we do. YOU HAD TO SURRENDER YOUR GUNS. And then, when you left town, you went to the sheriff and got your guns back. That, my friends, is gun control in a nutshell.
Today, if a town tried to follow this western ideal and pass a law saying that you had to surrender your guns when you came into town, that town would be sued out of existence.
Let me ask this… can you name an item that is a potentially deadly weapon that has to be registered and you need a license to operate? That’s right. I’m talking about cars. Or dogs. Or motorcycles. The idea that America is a place where you can have whatever you want without regulation is simply insane.
I don’t have a problem with the assault weapon ban. People try to justify this by saying that they need automatic weapons to hunt or protect their homes is also insane. If you need two hundred rounds per second to kill a deer, you should probably learn to shoot before you go hunting next time. And do you need two hundred rounds per second to protect your home? Hate to break it to you, but if you fire two one-second bursts at an intruder, you’re not going to have much home left to protect when it’s all done. It is going to tear your place up. Assault weapons serve one purpose and one purpose only, and that is to kill a lot of people, very quickly.
And waiting periods? I have no problem with that. If I need a gun to hunt, or want a gun to protect my home, I’m okay waiting a couple of days before I get it.
And registration? Almost everything that you own that could kill someone has to be registered, for the simple reason that if someone DOES get killed with it, they know who to come to.
If you need an unregistered assault weapon RIGHT NOW, odds are that you really don’t need it because you’re pissed off and want to kill someone without anyone knowing who did it.
The late great George Carlin said that the quickest route to reasonable gun control would be to remove the metal detectors from around Congress and the White House. If our lawmakers lived with gun violence on a day to day basis like the rest of us do, the NRA wouldn’t hold the kind of sway over them that it does now. (I believe the same thing about education, by the way. If we really want to see major reforms in public education, we need to force our lawmakers to send their kids to public school… without that, they have no incentive to clean up public schools.)
So yes, brothers and sisters. I believe that the commandment “Thou shalt not take an American’s guns from him” should stand, but I also think that we need to temper it with common sense, wisdom, and historical knowledge.
Peace.
Randal
Sunday, October 5, 2008
Sarah Palin and Sexism
I have accused people of being racist for not supporting Barack Obama. I have, in turn, been accused of being a sexist because I don’t support Sarah Palin and John McCain.
Here’s the difference.
If you know someone who either typically supports progressive candidates, or who is sick and tired of the current administration, but is NOT voting for Barack Obama, listen for the following answers… they all equal “Because he is black”…
1) “Er… um… ahhhh… yeah… um…”
2) “He’s a Muslim.” (He’s not.)
3) “His middle name is “Hussein””. (Yeah? And my middle name is “Hucares”?)
4) “There’s just something about him that bothers me.” (Like you wouldn’t want him sleeping with your daughter, living in your neighborhood or being promoted over you.)
5) “He wants to take away my gun.” (For the record, he doesn’t. He supports the assault rifle ban, he supports registration for gun owners and waiting periods for buying a gun. Frankly, pal, if you need an unregistered assault rifle RIGHT THE FUCK NOW then I don’t want you anywhere NEAR my neighborhood.)
All right. Now, ask me the same question about Palin/McCain. No, I didn’t put Biden on the chopping block, because frankly, barring assassination, Obama will make it through a term or two. The main assassin that McCain has to worry about is God – he’s seventy-two years old, for crying out loud. So go ahead – ask me – let’s see if my answers are vague enough to qualify as “I don’t like her because she’s a woman.”
1) McCain would be perfectly happy if we keep funneling money through Iraq to Halliburton for another hundred years.
2) McCain supports keeping taxes on the middle class right where they’re at and cutting taxes for corporations and the wealthy. Obama supports decreasing taxes on the middle class and increasing taxes on the wealthy and corporations.
3) Sarah Palin refuses to recognize that a woman’s right to a safe and clean abortion is a basic human rights issue.
4) I’ve seen video of Sarah Palin being exorcized of witches by an African Witch Doctor, and it fucking creeps me out. Can you imagine what would happen if a video like that existed of Obama?
5) She seems to be almost entirely ignorant of world affairs.
6) As evidenced by her pregnant, unmarried (then) sixteen year old daughter, she obviously doesn’t practice what she preaches in her own family. Hypocrisy PISSES me off.
Here’s the final evidence that I’m not a sexist…
Good candidates for president or vice-president: Condoleeza Rice. Donna Brazielle. Katie Couric. Naomi Klein. Elizabeth Edwards. I can’t remember her name, but the woman who has been reviled by the Bush administration for protesting the Iraq war after her son was killed in Iraq. Hillary Clinton used to be on the list until she got in the senate and got in touch with her inner neo-con.
So you see? I don’t have a problem with a woman in the highest or second-highest office in the land. I have a problem with the thought of THIS woman in that role. If she was a penis-dragger instead of a vagina-carrier, I’d feel exactly the same way.
Peace.
Randal
Here’s the difference.
If you know someone who either typically supports progressive candidates, or who is sick and tired of the current administration, but is NOT voting for Barack Obama, listen for the following answers… they all equal “Because he is black”…
1) “Er… um… ahhhh… yeah… um…”
2) “He’s a Muslim.” (He’s not.)
3) “His middle name is “Hussein””. (Yeah? And my middle name is “Hucares”?)
4) “There’s just something about him that bothers me.” (Like you wouldn’t want him sleeping with your daughter, living in your neighborhood or being promoted over you.)
5) “He wants to take away my gun.” (For the record, he doesn’t. He supports the assault rifle ban, he supports registration for gun owners and waiting periods for buying a gun. Frankly, pal, if you need an unregistered assault rifle RIGHT THE FUCK NOW then I don’t want you anywhere NEAR my neighborhood.)
All right. Now, ask me the same question about Palin/McCain. No, I didn’t put Biden on the chopping block, because frankly, barring assassination, Obama will make it through a term or two. The main assassin that McCain has to worry about is God – he’s seventy-two years old, for crying out loud. So go ahead – ask me – let’s see if my answers are vague enough to qualify as “I don’t like her because she’s a woman.”
1) McCain would be perfectly happy if we keep funneling money through Iraq to Halliburton for another hundred years.
2) McCain supports keeping taxes on the middle class right where they’re at and cutting taxes for corporations and the wealthy. Obama supports decreasing taxes on the middle class and increasing taxes on the wealthy and corporations.
3) Sarah Palin refuses to recognize that a woman’s right to a safe and clean abortion is a basic human rights issue.
4) I’ve seen video of Sarah Palin being exorcized of witches by an African Witch Doctor, and it fucking creeps me out. Can you imagine what would happen if a video like that existed of Obama?
5) She seems to be almost entirely ignorant of world affairs.
6) As evidenced by her pregnant, unmarried (then) sixteen year old daughter, she obviously doesn’t practice what she preaches in her own family. Hypocrisy PISSES me off.
Here’s the final evidence that I’m not a sexist…
Good candidates for president or vice-president: Condoleeza Rice. Donna Brazielle. Katie Couric. Naomi Klein. Elizabeth Edwards. I can’t remember her name, but the woman who has been reviled by the Bush administration for protesting the Iraq war after her son was killed in Iraq. Hillary Clinton used to be on the list until she got in the senate and got in touch with her inner neo-con.
So you see? I don’t have a problem with a woman in the highest or second-highest office in the land. I have a problem with the thought of THIS woman in that role. If she was a penis-dragger instead of a vagina-carrier, I’d feel exactly the same way.
Peace.
Randal
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Notes on the 10/2 Vice Presidential Debate
I sit here preparing a glass of Fireball cinnamon-infused bourbon and a Torano Virtuoso cigar, watching an eighteen year old episode of “Tales From The Crypt”, waiting for the vice presidential debate to start.
And dreading it.
So far, Sarah Palin has proven herself to be nothing more than an empty, if rather pretty vessel and I don’t expect that to change tonight. I’ll try to keep score of the number of times that she spouts some asinine piece of neocon rhetoric such as “victory in Iraq”, or using “our fine troops” to justify continuing the pointless slaughter of “our fine troops”, or “tax cuts” meaning “tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations”. Oh, and let’s not forget “Me and John are just a couple of Mavericks.” My hope is that Biden, being kind of a tough old campaigner, won’t let her get away with it too much.
Okay, the debate’s starting. Here come Palin and Biden. “Mind if I call you “Joe”?” She asks, right off the bat. He should have said “I actually prefer “Mr. Vice-President.”
Okay, first off, of course, Gwen Ifull asked about the economy. Joe Biden did a good job of talking about the problems and how we could fix them. Sarah Palin said “If you want to know if America’s economy is in good shape or bad shape, go to a youth soccer game and turn and ask the parent next to you and ask them.” Want to know if the economy is in good shape or bad shape? Watch the news. Read a paper. Look at your portfolio.
First round to Biden. You know, as Palin babbles about how Americans are craving the change that her REPUBLICAN running mate who’s been in the Senate throughout this mess will bring… uh… back? To Washington. I also think that there needs to be a permanent moratorium on her EVER using the term “hockey mom” again. Joe Biden should be able to shoot her on the spot of she ever says it again. She needs to understand that being a “hockey mom” and being able to see Russia from your house doesn’t qualify you to be vice president.
Okay, first attack on Obama for trying to raise taxes on the wealthiest 5% of Americans.
Now, I will say this… Palin is at a real disadvantage here because she isn’t in the Senate. Joe Biden was there in the Senate with Obama and McCain, so he knows exactly what happened.
Hey, you want to get young people watching this debate? Make it a drinking game. Every time that Palin mentions tax cuts, one team gets to take a drink, every time Biden says “Wall Street Gone Wild”, the other team gets to.
Round 2 is health care. Palin is sticking firmly to “Obama wants the government to run your health care”. She also outlined McCain’s idiotic “plan” to raise taxes on your employer for providing health care for you and give you a $5000 tax credit.
When Gwen Ifull asked them to answer the question that neither Obama nor McCain did about what they’ll give up to help the economy. Biden said that they wouldn’t be able to go forward with their planned increases in foreign aide, and that they would halt the proposed McCain tax cuts to the wealthy. Governor Palin started talking about energy plans, and how she “took on” the oil industry in Alaska. Finally, when Gwen Ifull asked the question again, she admitted that she had no idea, having been basically “at this” for five weeks.
Round 2 to Biden.
God, I love Gwen Ifull. She’s asking them both about a recent bill making it more difficult for Americans to declare bankruptcy, which McCain and Biden voted for and Obama voted against. Biden has to guts to say that he and Obama don’t agree on that, and defended his stance. Palin, again, started talking about energy.
Okay, round three is about… are you ready… ENERGY! Specifically, climate change. I love how Palin consistently says she doesn’t want to talk about the causes. Kind of like after the unprovoked invasion of the sovereign nation of Iraq, the neocons started saying “Let’s not talk about whether or not we should have gotten into this mess, let’s just deal with it.” Balderdash. Biden: “If you don’t talk about the causes, it’s virtually impossible to come up with a solution.” Thank you, Senator Biden. One thing about increasing off-shore drilling that neither side (both of which support it) is taking into account is the environmental threat that transporting both oil and Ms. Palin’s beloved natural gas poses.
Round 3 to Biden.
Round 4 is about providing benefits to same-sex couples, which Ms. Palin approved in Alaska. Biden says yes. Palin now says “no”, if it would lead toward “redefining” marriage. But she says that she’s tolerant of people picking their own partner. Hmmm. Fastest turn-around I’ve ever seen. A note is that both McCain and Obama oppose “same-sex marriage”. Personally, I’d love to see the government taken out of marriage entirely.
Round 4 to Biden.
Round 5 is about Iraq. Biden has a son in Iraq, Palin has a son headed for Iraq. Palin used it as an excuse to talk about the “surge” (actually an escalation). Oooh, there it is. “We have got to WIN in Iraq.” “We’re getting closer and closer to victory in Iraq.” Governor Palin brought up the same issue about funding the troops that McCain did, and Biden is tearing her up on it just like Obama did. And just like McCain, she completely disregarded the fact that McCain voted against funding for the troops as well.
Round 5 to Biden.
When they’re talking about Pakistan and Iran, and she’s rehashing an issue that was already addressed in the presidential debate, Obama’s willingness to talk to these people. Oh, and she also said “They hate us for our freedoms.” And she, who opposes a woman’s right to choose a safe and clean abortion EVEN IN CASES OF RAPE AND INCEST and made women pay for their own rape kits, talked about how Iran and Pakistan don’t respect women’s rights. Jesus, someone needs to define these terms for her. BOTH of these are basic women’s rights issues. Biden, unfortunately, is giving her a pass on this.
Now they’re both blowing Israel, without commenting on how our giving arms to Israel has caused a lot of the terrorist mess that we’re in today.
Oh, there she is talking about what a couple of “mavericks” they are.
By the way, I’m counting all of these follow-up questions as part of round 5 – it’s all under an umbrella.
I also wonder why any politician thinks that it’s okay for Israel and Pakistan to have nuclear weapons to use as deterrent, but not Iran.
Oh, God in heaven… now she’s using her political inexperience to mean that she’s a “Washington outsider”. Please. Give me someone who knows how the fuck the other Washington operates.
Round 6… their varying comments on their comments on being vice president. Sarah Palin explained that hers was a “lame attempt at a joke”. Then they both explained that they look forward to being vice president under their principles.
Round 6 is a draw.
Round 7 she asks what their true “Achilles Heels” are. Sarah Palin started babbling about how great her experience as a mom and governor of a large state (largest state with the smallest population, truth be told) would count in her favor. Biden said, just as his detractors have, that his is a lack of discipline. And thank God for it, when you define “discipline” as doing what the executive wants, like Bush does.
Round 7 to Biden.
Well, there she goes again talking about what a couple of mavericks they are. Here’s what Sarah Palin needs to understand… those of us who respected John McCain loved this about him. He gave up his right to claim “maverick” when he took his turn to the right over the last year. Like Arianna Huffington said, “The John McCain that we all knew and loved is dead.” Thank God, Biden is taking her to task for that comment.
Round 8 a question about if there has been any area where they’ve had to change long-held views. Biden said that there has for him. His change has been the realization that the ideologies of a potential judge SHOULD matter on confirming him or her. Bravo. Palin said that hers is that she didn’t veto certain budgets. Other than that, no. No guts to admit her changes, for instance, on the bridge to nowhere in other words.
Final round to Biden.
I think that Biden has won this debate handily.
One thing that I’d like to comment on here is Sarah Palin’s consistent reference to increasing taxes on the super-wealthy as “redistribution of wealth”. I want to make it clear here, brothers and sisters, that over the last eight years we have witnessed the largest redistribution of wealth in HISTORY, from the middle class and poor to the rich. What Biden and Obama are looking to do is bring that redistribution back into balance.
Thank you, Sarah Palin for using the term “walk the walk, talk the talk” correctly. Maybe I’ve heard the end of “walk the talk”. I can hope, can’t I?
Peace.
Randal.
And dreading it.
So far, Sarah Palin has proven herself to be nothing more than an empty, if rather pretty vessel and I don’t expect that to change tonight. I’ll try to keep score of the number of times that she spouts some asinine piece of neocon rhetoric such as “victory in Iraq”, or using “our fine troops” to justify continuing the pointless slaughter of “our fine troops”, or “tax cuts” meaning “tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations”. Oh, and let’s not forget “Me and John are just a couple of Mavericks.” My hope is that Biden, being kind of a tough old campaigner, won’t let her get away with it too much.
Okay, the debate’s starting. Here come Palin and Biden. “Mind if I call you “Joe”?” She asks, right off the bat. He should have said “I actually prefer “Mr. Vice-President.”
Okay, first off, of course, Gwen Ifull asked about the economy. Joe Biden did a good job of talking about the problems and how we could fix them. Sarah Palin said “If you want to know if America’s economy is in good shape or bad shape, go to a youth soccer game and turn and ask the parent next to you and ask them.” Want to know if the economy is in good shape or bad shape? Watch the news. Read a paper. Look at your portfolio.
First round to Biden. You know, as Palin babbles about how Americans are craving the change that her REPUBLICAN running mate who’s been in the Senate throughout this mess will bring… uh… back? To Washington. I also think that there needs to be a permanent moratorium on her EVER using the term “hockey mom” again. Joe Biden should be able to shoot her on the spot of she ever says it again. She needs to understand that being a “hockey mom” and being able to see Russia from your house doesn’t qualify you to be vice president.
Okay, first attack on Obama for trying to raise taxes on the wealthiest 5% of Americans.
Now, I will say this… Palin is at a real disadvantage here because she isn’t in the Senate. Joe Biden was there in the Senate with Obama and McCain, so he knows exactly what happened.
Hey, you want to get young people watching this debate? Make it a drinking game. Every time that Palin mentions tax cuts, one team gets to take a drink, every time Biden says “Wall Street Gone Wild”, the other team gets to.
Round 2 is health care. Palin is sticking firmly to “Obama wants the government to run your health care”. She also outlined McCain’s idiotic “plan” to raise taxes on your employer for providing health care for you and give you a $5000 tax credit.
When Gwen Ifull asked them to answer the question that neither Obama nor McCain did about what they’ll give up to help the economy. Biden said that they wouldn’t be able to go forward with their planned increases in foreign aide, and that they would halt the proposed McCain tax cuts to the wealthy. Governor Palin started talking about energy plans, and how she “took on” the oil industry in Alaska. Finally, when Gwen Ifull asked the question again, she admitted that she had no idea, having been basically “at this” for five weeks.
Round 2 to Biden.
God, I love Gwen Ifull. She’s asking them both about a recent bill making it more difficult for Americans to declare bankruptcy, which McCain and Biden voted for and Obama voted against. Biden has to guts to say that he and Obama don’t agree on that, and defended his stance. Palin, again, started talking about energy.
Okay, round three is about… are you ready… ENERGY! Specifically, climate change. I love how Palin consistently says she doesn’t want to talk about the causes. Kind of like after the unprovoked invasion of the sovereign nation of Iraq, the neocons started saying “Let’s not talk about whether or not we should have gotten into this mess, let’s just deal with it.” Balderdash. Biden: “If you don’t talk about the causes, it’s virtually impossible to come up with a solution.” Thank you, Senator Biden. One thing about increasing off-shore drilling that neither side (both of which support it) is taking into account is the environmental threat that transporting both oil and Ms. Palin’s beloved natural gas poses.
Round 3 to Biden.
Round 4 is about providing benefits to same-sex couples, which Ms. Palin approved in Alaska. Biden says yes. Palin now says “no”, if it would lead toward “redefining” marriage. But she says that she’s tolerant of people picking their own partner. Hmmm. Fastest turn-around I’ve ever seen. A note is that both McCain and Obama oppose “same-sex marriage”. Personally, I’d love to see the government taken out of marriage entirely.
Round 4 to Biden.
Round 5 is about Iraq. Biden has a son in Iraq, Palin has a son headed for Iraq. Palin used it as an excuse to talk about the “surge” (actually an escalation). Oooh, there it is. “We have got to WIN in Iraq.” “We’re getting closer and closer to victory in Iraq.” Governor Palin brought up the same issue about funding the troops that McCain did, and Biden is tearing her up on it just like Obama did. And just like McCain, she completely disregarded the fact that McCain voted against funding for the troops as well.
Round 5 to Biden.
When they’re talking about Pakistan and Iran, and she’s rehashing an issue that was already addressed in the presidential debate, Obama’s willingness to talk to these people. Oh, and she also said “They hate us for our freedoms.” And she, who opposes a woman’s right to choose a safe and clean abortion EVEN IN CASES OF RAPE AND INCEST and made women pay for their own rape kits, talked about how Iran and Pakistan don’t respect women’s rights. Jesus, someone needs to define these terms for her. BOTH of these are basic women’s rights issues. Biden, unfortunately, is giving her a pass on this.
Now they’re both blowing Israel, without commenting on how our giving arms to Israel has caused a lot of the terrorist mess that we’re in today.
Oh, there she is talking about what a couple of “mavericks” they are.
By the way, I’m counting all of these follow-up questions as part of round 5 – it’s all under an umbrella.
I also wonder why any politician thinks that it’s okay for Israel and Pakistan to have nuclear weapons to use as deterrent, but not Iran.
Oh, God in heaven… now she’s using her political inexperience to mean that she’s a “Washington outsider”. Please. Give me someone who knows how the fuck the other Washington operates.
Round 6… their varying comments on their comments on being vice president. Sarah Palin explained that hers was a “lame attempt at a joke”. Then they both explained that they look forward to being vice president under their principles.
Round 6 is a draw.
Round 7 she asks what their true “Achilles Heels” are. Sarah Palin started babbling about how great her experience as a mom and governor of a large state (largest state with the smallest population, truth be told) would count in her favor. Biden said, just as his detractors have, that his is a lack of discipline. And thank God for it, when you define “discipline” as doing what the executive wants, like Bush does.
Round 7 to Biden.
Well, there she goes again talking about what a couple of mavericks they are. Here’s what Sarah Palin needs to understand… those of us who respected John McCain loved this about him. He gave up his right to claim “maverick” when he took his turn to the right over the last year. Like Arianna Huffington said, “The John McCain that we all knew and loved is dead.” Thank God, Biden is taking her to task for that comment.
Round 8 a question about if there has been any area where they’ve had to change long-held views. Biden said that there has for him. His change has been the realization that the ideologies of a potential judge SHOULD matter on confirming him or her. Bravo. Palin said that hers is that she didn’t veto certain budgets. Other than that, no. No guts to admit her changes, for instance, on the bridge to nowhere in other words.
Final round to Biden.
I think that Biden has won this debate handily.
One thing that I’d like to comment on here is Sarah Palin’s consistent reference to increasing taxes on the super-wealthy as “redistribution of wealth”. I want to make it clear here, brothers and sisters, that over the last eight years we have witnessed the largest redistribution of wealth in HISTORY, from the middle class and poor to the rich. What Biden and Obama are looking to do is bring that redistribution back into balance.
Thank you, Sarah Palin for using the term “walk the walk, talk the talk” correctly. Maybe I’ve heard the end of “walk the talk”. I can hope, can’t I?
Peace.
Randal.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)