Politcs is not a game to be played with no rules

Monday, March 10, 2008

Politics is not a game to be played with no rules

I am pretty moderate politically. Slightly left of center. But I do mean slightly. I used to and hope to again vote democrat and republican depending on who is better. National and local Dem. vs. Rep. are totally different things. Example if I lived in Philly the Democrats have been in power since the beginning of time, so I would have to vote republican to get any kind of changes. When ever one party owns a city or state there will be serious corruption and unlimited problems!

My big problem at this time on a National level I can not even think of voting for a Republican until this batch of neocons that has taken over the Republican party is gone! To me in a perfect world right now we would get all Democrats in charge for no more then 4 years to restore the Bill of Rights and some kind of sanity to government.

After that I hope the republican party will exile the right wing talk radio types from their ranks and I can go back to hating both parties equally. That would be wonderful. Then if one party could be in control of the Senate while the other has the Congress I would love it! When the government is divided no one has enough power to do permanent damage. The more they fight each other instead of us the better. It would be nice if the presidency changed every 4 to 8 years too. I used to think when one party had control more got done and the government would run better. I was half right, as slow and unaccomplished as they are with public affairs. That's how efficient they are behind the scenes dismantling everything not in the neocon play book. Appointing old pals to important positions they know nothing about. This administration sure didn't invent this but they are the Michael Jordon of shady maneuvers. The Nixon administration who even had some of the same main players looks clean next to this mess.

I don't care what your beliefs are. If you are far right or far left please shut up and go away, and if you could take Ralph Nader with you too that would be very nice! if you are rational right, center or rational left we need all those points of view to make things work. The last important thing is radio. IT IS NOT THE NEWS they do not get payed to be correct. They get paid to find ways to yell and get you worked up over things that usually never happened so you get so worked up you keep listening! It is entertainment not news never was and never will be. Most of them don't even believe their own garbage, read a interview some time. They understand why they get paid and how much. It's all about holding a audience any way you can. They don't usually out rite lie, but live on exaggerations of half truths. I am always amazed when I talk to a Rush or clone fan at a bar. They start yelling about all these horrible liberal plots that are just around the corner! The strange thing is I have never heard of them and they never happen.

Reading a little history doesn't hurt either. Over time memories distort quite a bit leading to bumper sticker level debates. Yes Carter was pretty bad. Then Ronald Reagan came in and made many much needed changes and things got better. That part is true. Unfortunately while some tax cuts did bring in more money, the big picture over all was a larger deficit then we had ever had to that time. It's not a example here and there the country runs on it is the big picture.

Tax cuts do not over all pay for them selves! To still be claiming this after all these years and all these cuts is kind of naive at best. There are always one or two that help. But not taxing a single penny a American company makes in another country they shipped our jobs to UNLESS they bring it back to the states is a very bad idea! that leads to a huge deficit. Making it more profitable in every way and even giving tax cuts to send jobs over seas so "Americans can pay lower prices and are better off" is somewhere between stupid and treason, As a side point the reason we won WW II was not out technology that was very good, but so was the germans. It was our massive industrial base. We could build anything 10 to 1 against any other country in the world. We can't do that any more.

There may be a problem when any party strongly believes that all current and future problems can only be solved by in this case Reagan and what he did. What year was that? About 2 decades ago, please think about that. If your plan for the future is over twenty years old. Don't you think someone somewhere should be able to come up with something new? Name on thing besides gravity that has not changed completely in the last two decades. Is there a single solution to anything in today's world with all the new technology like computers and cell phones....that still work? In closing I don't really care what you think just think instead of just repeating word for word what you hear on the radio please.

Labels: democrats, government, politics, Republican control, right wing radio

Wednesday, March 5, 2008

John McCain the perfect Presidential Candidate for 2000 2008 not so much

The Republican nomination of John McCain is causing me the worst conflict of my political life. In todays political climate let me declare my biases right off. I am a registered independent comfortable voting republican or democrat. In short I am a angry moderate. Not a term you hear a lot but I have a feeling there are many of us. Flash back to the year 2000 when everything was up for grabs. Traditionally the Republicans have a great shot at the presidency just because after eight years of one party people are often ready for a change. Enter the evil empire of talk radio and Fox news 24/7 far right wing propaganda. Early on John McCain is the front runner and looking good with his “Straight Talk Express” Talking to the public like no one has done before. He ran a open campaign not only talking but listening to the people along the way. Then things go horribly wrong, enter a mostly unproven and unknown candidate who was willing to work with the far rights plan to expand their power to unprecedented levels. They not only wanted a “Permanent majority” with virtually no limits on their power but were willing to do absolutely anything to get it. This is the politics as war scenario. Nothing is off the table. It's no longer about what you feel you can do for the country but how can you impose your political and moral will on every aspect of the government. Besides not playing by the rules they have two other advantages. There is the well proven psychological tool. If you say something loud enough and long enough it will eventually become common knowledge and unquestionably true. I thought this trick was obvious when I noticed every single person on talk radio had the exact same opinion on every single issue and where all saying the exact same thing at the exact same time. This is when I learned about “republican talking points”. Their second psychological probably came threw luck. People are always more comfortable with things they now and have a natural attraction to anything in pares. Example ask any man about twin fantasies, or how
often the term “double double” pops up. “So nice they named it twice” syndrome. Please go to your favorite psychological text books at this point for further explanation. At this point the only thing anyone outside of Texas knows about George W Bush is “He looks exactly like George Bush!” Followed quickly by “wouldn't it be cool to have two Presidents with the same name! Like a double Double, that would be history!” So now the table is set and enter our villains Carl Rove, George W Bush, Dick Cheyney, and Donald Rumsfeld. What I heard time and time again was. “These are the people with experience who will really run the government” , “Wouldn't it be cool to have a President who isn't some cardboard intellectual but a guy like us?” not to mention the ever popular “How does a President really effect your life?” Even if you leave out the Ralph Nader disaster (thanks dick) things are starting to look very scary.


Re-enter our hero John McCain. Some how in this process McCain the decorated Naval officer who not only fought in Vietnam, but spent time as a POW. As if that's not good enough to show patriotism, leadership, and commitment. He turned down the chance to get out earlier so that others he felt a commitment to could go. On the other side we have a huge group of people with multiple collage military deferments lead by a guy who some how leaped to the front of a long line to enter the National guard guaranteed not to go anywhere near a foreign country. Then to show commitment for some reason in order to avoid his final flight physical just left the National guard a few months ahead of schedule. This is normally called AWOL or absent with out leave. There is no way for me to prove anything but for some reason the commercial jingle “thinks go better with coke” keeps playing in my head. We will put that aside for now and compare the last two paragraphs. In the real world who do you think would be the “patriotic leader” and who would be the one that is 'not dependable because of his anger issues”?

That is a short description of how I feel the Republican party has been stolen by the neo-cons. Of course there was much more to to it like the bottomless pool of political has beens and want to bes found among various “think tanks” and organizations such as the Heritage Foundation, CPAC and others willing to go on talk shows and say anything at all to improve their standing in the club. I am also not even going to touch the Florida voting scandal that just gets uglier now that the people involved at the time moved up the politic ladder into job like Ambassador to the UN leaving evidence trails of their true nature. That was anything but the Republican but fair minded looking for the truth image they portrayed as. Not to mention it is all under the heavy influence of the states Governor who happens to be the candidate's brother. What could possibly go wrong?




John McCain the perfect Presidential Candidate for 2000

The Republican nomination of John McCain is causing me the worst conflict of my political life. In todays political climate let me declare my biases right off. I am a registered independent comfortable voting republican or democrat. In short I am a angry moderate. Not a term you hear a lot but I have a feeling there are many of us. Flash back to the year 2000 when everything was up for grabs. Traditionally the Republicans have a great shot at the presidency just because after eight years of one party people are often ready for a change. Enter the evil empire of talk radio and Fox news 24/7 far right wing propaganda. Early on John McCain is the front runner and looking good with his “Straight Talk Express” Talking to the public like no one has done before. He ran a open campaign not only talking but listening to the people along the way. Then things go horribly wrong, enter a mostly unproven and unknown candidate who was willing to work with the far rights plan to expand their power to unprecedented levels. They not only wanted a “Permanent majority” with virtually no limits on their power but were willing to do absolutely anything to get it. This is the politics as war scenario. Nothing is off the table. It's no longer about what you feel you can do for the country but how can you impose your political and moral will on every aspect of the government. Besides not playing by the rules they have two other advantages. There is the well proven psychological tool. If you say something loud enough and long enough it will eventually become common knowledge and unquestionably true. I thought this trick was obvious when I noticed every single person on talk radio had the exact same opinion on every single issue and where all saying the exact same thing at the exact same time. This is when I learned about “republican talking points”. Their second psychological probably came threw luck. People are always more comfortable with things they now and have a natural attraction to anything in pares. Example ask any man about twin fantasies, or how
often the term “double double” pops up. “So nice they named it twice” syndrome. Please go to your favorite psychological text books at this point for further explanation. At this point the only thing anyone outside of Texas knows about George W Bush is “He looks exactly like George Bush!” Followed quickly by “wouldn't it be cool to have two Presidents with the same name! Like a double Double, that would be history!” So now the table is set and enter our villains Carl Rove, George W Bush, Dick Cheyney, and Donald Rumsfeld. What I heard time and time again was. “These are the people with experience who will really run the government” , “Wouldn't it be cool to have a President who isn't some cardboard intellectual but a guy like us?” not to mention the ever popular “How does a President really effect your life?” Even if you leave out the Ralph Nader disaster (thanks dick) things are starting to look very scary.


Re-enter our hero John McCain. Some how in this process McCain the decorated Naval officer who not only fought in Vietnam, but spent time as a POW. As if that's not good enough to show patriotism, leadership, and commitment. He turned down the chance to get out earlier so that others he felt a commitment to could go. On the other side we have a huge group of people with multiple collage military deferments lead by a guy who some how leaped to the front of a long line to enter the National guard guaranteed not to go anywhere near a foreign country. Then to show commitment for some reason in order to avoid his final flight physical just left the National guard a few months ahead of schedule. This is normally called AWOL or absent with out leave. There is no way for me to prove anything but for some reason the commercial jingle “thinks go better with coke” keeps playing in my head. We will put that aside for now and compare the last two paragraphs. In the real world who do you think would be the “patriotic leader” and who would be the one that is 'not dependable because of his anger issues”?

That is a short description of how I feel the Republican party has been stolen by the neo-cons. Of course there was much more to to it like the bottomless pool of political has beens and want to bes found among various “think tanks” and organizations such as the Heritage Foundation, CPAC and others willing to go on talk shows and say anything at all to improve their standing in the club. I am also not even going to touch the Florida voting scandal that just gets uglier now that the people involved at the time moved up the politic ladder into job like Ambassador to the UN leaving evidence trails of their true nature. That was anything but the Republican but fair minded looking for the truth image they portrayed as. Not to mention it is all under the heavy influence of the states Governor who happens to be the candidate's brother. What could possibly go wrong?