that's one of the reasons I don't vote.
the people who are most apt at winning an election campaign are not the same who are most apt at running a country. Mind you George Bush lost the popular election in 2000, he got less votes than the other guy but still won, that doesn't seem like an effective republic to me.
a two party system is a farce, are you telling me that for every issue those only 2 viable opinions? could we ever have another viable party?
with all that being said either candidate seems okay to me. I follow politics loosely but I abstain from contributing in any way, american politics are just too ridiculous.
I personally think Obama is getting all the attention because he's a fresh face and a more interesting story, remember the media only wants to print whats most interesting viewership is money, people don't know much about Obama yet so good or bad the cameras are there following him around he makes a good story. I don't think this is any sinister agenda as opposed to simple $$.
correct me if I'm wrong but I thought there was some laws or rules about campaign coverage for presidential elections I.e Each candidate can only have so much? or with respect to the other guy? maybe that has to do with advertising?
I'll make this short and...well short.
If John McCain was a member of a racist church for one week I promise you he would not EVEN be a senator much less the presumptive nominee for his respective party. The media would have crucified him. Remember Trent Lott?
The US is a representative republic, We have the congress & senate of course, but the electorial college are the representatives that vote in the president. Their distribution is and never was in direct relation to population by design.
While the Democrats with regard the 2000 election claim the system is out dated, if it had put Al Gore in office without winning the popular vote [if it had turned out that way] they would say that it is a good system, and that it works as intended.
The media sells it, the general public eats it up. Regardless of who or what they are advocating or annihilating. People, in general will believe anything they are told if it comes from a seemingly "credible" source. "It must be true, I saw it on TV!" S.W.
I think this lyric appropriate: "Can't stand it for another day...I ain't gonna live my life this way! Cold sweat, my fists are clenching...Stomp stomp stomp, the idiot convention. Which one of these words, don't you understand? Talking to you, is like clapping with one hand.....What is it? Caught in a mosh." (Caught In A Mosh, Anthrax, Among The Living LP)
Or...."F, is for fighting. R, is for red. Ancestor's blood, in battles they've shed. E, we elect them. E, we eject them. In the land of the free and the home of the brave. D, is for dying. O, your Overture. M, is for money, you know what that cures. This spells out freedom, it means nothing to me, as long as there's a PMRC!" (Hook In Mouth, Megadeth, So Far...So Good....So What...LP)
"about as subtle as a loaded diaper on a pastry buffet"
LOL
The lunatics are on the grass, the paper holds there folded faces to the floor, and everyday the paperboy brings more. : Pink floyd dark side of the moon.
OBEWAN,
You're right about depending upon the media. I was speaking predominantly of national television media. Newspapers nation wide are decentralized enough to carry diverse editorials, given you perhaps look beyond your local guys who may or may not have obvious political leanings, and talk radio is dominated by conservatives.
I also appreciate you placing 'tolerant' in quotes, since intolerance is manifest on both sides of the aisle,though I'm not sure that was your intent.
It absolutely amazes me that there seem so little recognition of the simple historical fact that a who's who of the the most intolerant regimes in the history of the world were from the left; those ruled by Stalin, Castro, Pol Pot, Mao Tse Tung, among others.
Hitler one might counter with? Or perhaps Augusto Pinoche. Its interesting much of the most recent scholarship, and scholarship of the time, clearly places Hitler on the left, not the right. But don't take my word for it, see for yourself. Compare the social policies of Hitler with say, Stalin, Mussolini, or even Woodrow Wilson, and Franklin Roosevelt (Hitler was very complimentary of his New Deal). At the time it was predominantly called progressivism
(a word still popular with liberals who wish not to be called liberals), which was tied into Fascism, a word which did not did not develope its negative connotation until the horror of Nazism was revealed.
I am not so sure that all who would be called 'liberal' would be in agreement with the totalitarian regimes you mention. I was educated by the liberal secular high school system, and we read works like 'Brave New World' that some would call 'liberal' but which were actually very much opposed to totalitarian regimes. The stock market is very democratic, and there are many wealthy democrats that would be opposed to rule by a totalitarian regime. Me? I was a radical conservative before the Iraq war. Now, I am in independent.
OBEWAN,
I did not mean to imply that liberals are in agreement with the listed totalitatarian regimes.
I know for certain, since many of my best friends are liberals :) , that they would be, and are, profoundly appalled at the manifestation and history of those regimes, and their hopes for this country could not be farther from what happened with those.
I also understand however, than many many liberals are totally unaware of the totalitarian/fascist tendencies of their own side of the aisle. It is popular today to label anything totalitarian or fascist as being right wing, and nothing could be farther from the truth. Mussolini, the father of Fascism was a originally a socialist, and was essentially considered by Lenin as one of his most promising allies, unitl he rejected the class conciousness dogma of Bolshevism/Leninism for a more Nationalist dogma.
But it is also a fundamental fact that advocacy of comprehensive government involvment in our lives is almost by definition left wing, and was part and parcel of all those regimes listed including Nazism. Whereas the minimization of government involvment is by definition right wing, regardless of how the current political parties manifest themselves. Hence, my beef with much of current Republicanism.
Radical conservatives, radical liberals, conservatives, liberals, democratic, republican, independent, and a host of other taglines that lionize or demonize a person depending on the context in which they are used. I personally find the mere existence of either party outdated. Both should be banned from Washington, the electoral college banned, and a straight up popular vote instituted. The presence of either party provides the means and direction for corruption, and corrupt they most assuredly are. The day and age of needing such parties has long since past. Time to put them out to pasture.
I prefer to consider myself as "myself" and "non of the above".
I think for myself, and study the world and it's events for myself, and form my own opinion based on that. In short I prefer to think, than be feed my position by others who clearly have an agenda. As to how I know they have one, a lesson learned early in life was that if the sell is hard enough, there is a purpose behind it. Until that purpose can be discerned, the thought being sold is taken with a grain a salt, and even after, dismissed all together if I determine it to be BS.
Now, and as always, I am simply me.
As far as Our government goes I feel no party makes any difference, the rep and dems both have agendas both play us like a cheap fiddle. The media IMO is pumping junk through the TV. tonight Katie courics news station did a story about a dog.......I love my pets but come on!!!!!!! Of all the things going on in this country how can a story about a dogs face get air time over real adult issues. I think one could fill many hours of news with things such as...... housing crisis......gas prices......crooked stock brokers.....violent illegal immigrants.....maybe start talking about how china is buying up major amounts of American industrial property.......and the poison they sell to us as toys for our kids.....how about stories on how molesters scam our justice system and get off with a slap on the wrist.
sometimes I feel like the media, the government, and courts are part of some huge conspiracy to dumb down the American population and fill our country with low life crimminals . I heard a bill was passed that allows women to breast feed in public, wow glad thats been fixed....a few people cry about this and in a short time there's a bill to address the issue....but a huge majority of Americans scream about our open boarders and nothing is done, I don't even hear anything about the issue from the "candidates", but mention Bobbies and the politicians are all over it like a monkey on a cupcake, they probably had charts graphs and pictures all over the place.
I say clean house and go back to majority rule like a true democracy, too many times in the recent past has a small minority run the majority.
I go to get some Sudafed I go to the shelf where they keep it and I find a card, I take the card to counter to pay only to be asked for my license (what if I didn't have one does that mean I cant get any Sudafed) I hand it over and they scan it in, the scan didn't work they call a manager he punches in some numbers I sign the little computer screen and hit ok,and only then can I get this "dangerous drug". ok people make METH out of it I do understand the reason for the security but.......again the government sets up a tracking system so if I went into another drug store tomorrow to get more I could not buy it, our allowance of this "DANGEROUS DRUG" is 3 grams per day, yet they say they cannot track social security numbers being used by 20 different people.
They go though all this effort to protect people who want to destroy themselves, but they do nothing to protect normal citizens like the man and his 2 boys shot to death by an illegal immigrant who was caught more than once but never prosecuted for the crimes he committed, or deported because a small minority of people would be upset.
We are heading down a very dangerous road.
Great post michael.
I agree with everything you said except the majority rule thing.
A lynch mob is majority rule. I like our nations government based on laws.
Our supreme court judges can rewrite our laws and corrupt the true intent of our constitution. For that reason alone the next president is important. He will appoint several judges in the next 4 or 8 years.
The democratic party panders to the illegal immigrants knowing that they will likely vote democratic when given the right to vote.
The republican party panders to them to provide cheap labor for corporations.
I think the two parties only care to promote their agenda and not what is best for the country. Not every member of each party but the majority in each party. The hate that each party has for the other is so bad that our success in Iraq is secondary and the defeat of the other party is primary.
You stated that we are headed down a very dangerous road. I agree it looks like a bumpy ride but we will get through it.
Today our probable next president is trashing the USA, in Berlin, for everything from torture to global warming (you folks in Boston turn your cars off and walk) to giving away our wealth to other nations. The US is the most generous nation in the world. His plan is to reduce the worlds poverty by 50% by 2015. A noble goal but can we afford it and it didn't work in Somalia with food it just ended up in the hands of the warlords.
So many interesting things to comment on I can only at this time limit myself (which may be welcome by some :) ) to this. I'm not sure that this period in time is any more dangerous than other periods in time. This country has gone through many periods when its very existence was considered threatened. From its inception in struggles against Britain and France right through two world wars, the flirtations with Fascism in the teens and 30's, the nuclear annhialation of the 50's (some older fellas may remember the popularity of bomb shelters), the radical fractiousness and nuclear brinksmanship of the 60's, gas wars and rampant infllation in the 70's, the expansion of global terrorism in the 90's, 911, etc.
What I fear more than anything is what George Carlin once called Fascism with a Smiley face. A fascism that takes place so slow that it is almost imperceptible. A Fascism that we in our infinite ignorance beg to be imposed upon us by our leaders because we perceive a threat so dire that only the most extreme and reactive measures can save us.
If you read the thoughts and words of our founding fathers there is a single thread running through it all of the utmost importance. And that is that a government of the people cannot survive without the people keeping themselves educated.
An earlier post mentioned dumming down. That is precisely what is happening though we are living in an age of an unpercedented information explosion. But thats OK. If we insist on letting our leaders lead us around by our noses they will be more than happy to do so. After all, the elites do know best.
What I fear more than anything is some nutjob blowing up the Saudi oilfields.
So very very true. I recall a quote that I'll probably butcher.... "The people should not fear the government, the government should fear the people". I could go on for hours on this thread but the bed is calling me and I'm to lazy to type. So I'll end with this... I LOVE this country but I am afraid of where its headed.
"this is about as subtle as a loaded diaper on a pastry buffet"-quote
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