"You know, when I was running for president, in Chicago, somebody said, would you ever have deficit spending? I said, only if we were at war, or only if we had a recession, or only if we had a national emergency. Never did I dream we’d get the trifecta."
- George W. Bush
Sorry for the lack of updates this week (esp since I was so absent before the election) but I am kinda taking a break, licking my wounds so to speak. So far the only silver lining is that Herbert Vo beat Talmadge Heflin (by 39 votes if I hear right). There will be a recount so the results are unsure...but I remain hopeful.
So I am writing a bit today, then taking the rest of the week off. I will try to get up to speed next week.
But before I sign off there are a few things I have been hearing since the election that I want to briefly discuss. I might get more in depth next week then again, this may be it as I give the election up as a bad bad job.
G. W. Bush's mandate - I can't believe that there are people out there actually wasting time claiming that the 51 - 48 popular vote does not translate into a mandate. Which is true as far as it goes. But face it, the Republicans control all three branches of government. We lost seats in both the House and the Senate this last election not to mention the White House. We had everything going for us and we still managed to lose it. Believe me, that is going to be enough "mandate" for G. W. Bush. As was pointed out on the "Daily Show" this was a guy that had the presidency handed to him by the Supreme Court, lost the popular vote and considered that a mandate!
Voter Fraud - I am sure that it went on. I have read the sites devoted to fraud and there is some good stuff and some awful stuff. But bottom line, I don't think that we can explain the margin of the popular vote as being due to fraud. If Bush won the popular vote without having to resort to fraud then as far as I am concerned he won. It would be nothing more than sour grapes to have spent the past four years saying that Bush V. Gore, plus the losing of the popular vote equals an illegitimate presidency to now play election college tricks to argue that John Kerry is really president. In addition, I think the media will not be so hot to pursue the story. Kerry conceded, the media has a vested interest to foist the idea that we have "free and fair" elections, and I don't think the country really has the appetite to revisit the vote. My advice, give it up, our energy can be better used to other things.
Now does this mean I think this was a "fair and free" election? Nope it surly does not. Anytime a candidate is elected because of lies, distortions and bullshit, it is a blow to democracy. And that is exactly what happened in this election. When we see that a significant portion of the electoric believes that Saddam had WMDs and that there was a connection between him and Osama, well that is simply sad. I have talked quite a bit about having become a skeptic means I want to live in the real world. It makes me sad to see just how many people don't.
What do I expect in the next four years - This really sucks. First off I am one of those that is of the opinion that the great American experiment in democracy died Nov. 3 2004. The Republicans were already busy reshaping our form of government to insure not only that the Democrats never regain power, but that they become totally ineffective in Congress. They now have four more years to fuck the system...and fuck it they will. Needless to say we will have more debt, since the real aim of this administration is to break the U. S. Government in order to do away with social programs. Our government will spend on the military. That is about it. When the people demand more from their government (which they have every right to expect) the excuse is "we cant' afford it".
Four more years of doing nothing about the environmental disaster that is just over the horizon. Remember the Pentagon itself admitted that a climatic change in global climate could happen in as little as 20 years...and we are fast approaching the point of no return. I was talking to a winger before the election and this fool actually told me that when it happened, America would find a way to fix it. Well people, this is not Hollywood, there is no "happy ending" for global climate change. We will continue to allow manufactures to fill our sky and water with garbage. Fun times ahead.
War, war and more war. It makes me sick to think of the lives that will be wasted in Iraq for no better reason than to provide Bush with a hard on. There were no WMDs, no ties to Al Qaeda, and we had no fucking right to invade that country. Don't give me the bullshit that the "world" is safer because Saddam is out of power, what we have created is yet another hole from which terrorist will spring, where none existed before. The people of Iraq might (and that is a mighty big might) be better off, but only a total idiot believes that we are better off.
Say goodbye to civil rights, the wingers have been wanting to do away with them for a long long time. We are going to go back in time, back when it was perfectly okay to refuse to hire, house, or serve a person because of something as stupid as the color of their skin, or who the choose to sleep with. We are going to enshrine bigotry and fear in the U. S. Constitution. And to make sure it is all nice and legal, Bush will seat three, maybe four new Supreme Court justices. Wee!
As I said above, the great experiment is dead, instead we will get to live in the Religious States of America. We will have to follow laws to insure that Big Daddy in the Sky is not displeased with us. And before you liberal religious folks write me to say "Not me" allow me to say bullshit. You have allowed the wingers and the nutcases to take over your religion. When the rest of the world looks at U. S. religion, they see people like Pat Robinson and Jerry Falwell. And if that ain't your fault then who's is it? I seem to remember a passage claiming that Jesus will separate the goats from the sheep. And when they ask why Jesus ain't gonna say "When the U. S. was threatened, you failed to protect it" or "When it came to taxing the rich, you fought it" or "I say to you, failure to vote for G. W. Bush, my vessel will result in a boil". No, he is gonna ask "Did you feed the hungry? House the poor? Give clothes to the naked"? I can only hope I am in Heaven long enough to hear Jerry Falwell say "Why no Lord, I was too busy flying around the country in my corporate jet, spreading hate". Bah!
Don't take the above as despair, it ain't despair, it is pure, unadulterated anger. I don't believe the right wing's vision of this country is the people's vision of this country. I think we were manipulated, lied to, and gamed. I think people allowed their fear to override our basic good nature.
It is a shame, and I truly do not know where the Democrats go from here.
A Black progressive independent's open letter to the civilized world
Submitted for your opinion
Greetings,
I ran across your site while doing a boolean search. I have a commentary that I am sending out to anyone who will listen. I would appreciate it if you posted it.
*A Black progressive independent's open letter to the civilized world*
I am a Black progressive independent. Having been born and raised in Texas (Wbush is from Delaware and NOT Texas. He came here in High School. His accent is as faux as his compassion) I often have limited options in local candidates and tend overwhelming to vote democratic and sometimes libertarian. There are not many Lincoln Caffee (senator who neither supports bush nor the invasion of Iraq) types of Republicans around here. Alas, Senator McCain has proven time and time again he is only a maverick in his own mind. I am using the last vestige of free speech, the internet, to extol my views. I am sending it in some shape or form every which way I can.
If you are easily shocked or offended DO NOT read on
The following are my thoughts on Wednesday morning:
I am proud of how Black Americans stepped up but I am particularly saddened about how Ohio voted. Those poor fools will lose thousands of more jobs in the next 6 months alone. There was malfeasance and voter intimidation everywhere in the nation but the media and so called Middle America accepts that as par for the course so the point is moot. In any event I am very disgusted with white evangelicals who fell for the distraction of Gay marriages and glass house morality as opposed to the economy, healthcare and true national security. Add to this list Keyesians (Republicans with Black Ancestry), and other self destructive non-whites.
I have been under-employed and unemployed for the last four years in no small part due to this administration's policies. For those of you naïve enough to believe a President does not have the power to heavily influence the economy just wait and see cause the worse is yet to come! You do know about the multi-billion dollar tax breaks to Wal-mart, the PGA, Microsoft and others right? Juxtapose what this administration perpetrated without a mandate from the last election to the potential for damage with what they will tout as a mandate. Want a salient example? The proposed bush solution to unemployment is education. What people fail to take into account is that there are millions of under employed and unemployed workers, including myself, with college degrees from every discipline. Combine this with the fundamental flaw of the unfunded mandate of leave no child behind and you create masses of educated individuals whose living wage positions have been outsourced. Not to mention a new generation of workers who, due to budget restrictions, will not receive the necessary education and skills required for college level work. A fact my wife, who is a public school educator, can woefully attest to. In addition, due to astronomical tuition, many academically qualified students will be unable to afford secondary education. Not a pleasant thought huh?
Well all I can say to those bush folks is that they can rejoice in the fact that they are about to lose some more kin folk to the inevitable draft. Revel in the fact that this purportedly security conscious administration has yet to put up proper safe guards for our ports and municipal water and power supplies. Feel secure in the knowledge that the economy will continue its shift toward the outsourcing of more jobs to India and China. Always remember that the US is THE Superpower. Well, at least, that is until the economy starts being surpassed by China. This is a country that has been waiting in the cut for the US to make the unmitigated mistakes it has continued to make over the last 3 1/2 years.
Better use your right to speak freely now. It will be gone very soon.
Sincerely,
Patrick Thompson
P.S. The Chinese are doing some visionary work with Stem cells.
A new service brought to you by "A Skeptical Blog"
I have decided to start listing the lies that George. W. Bush told (or his surrogates and as far as I'm concerned it is the same thing) during the election, and of course beyond. Because if there is one thing we know for sure, the guy just can't stop lying.
So let's get started!
Remember those high grade explosives that went missing from Al Qaqaa? You know, the ones that the Bush administration suggested "could have been carted off by Saddam Hussein's forces before the war began"? Well guess what. Turns out that was a lie!
Iraqis piled high-grade material from a key site into trucks in the weeks after Baghdad fell, four U.S. reservists and guardsmen say.
By Mark Mazzetti, Times Staff Writer
WASHINGTON - In the weeks after the fall of Baghdad, Iraqi looters loaded powerful explosives into pickup trucks and drove the material away from the Al Qaqaa ammunition site, according to a group of U.S. Army reservists and National Guardsmen who said they witnessed the looting.
The soldiers said about a dozen U.S. troops guarding the sprawling facility could not prevent the theft because they were outnumbered by looters. Soldiers with one unit - the 317th Support Center based in Wiesbaden, Germany - said they sent a message to commanders in Baghdad requesting help to secure the site but received no reply.
The witnesses' accounts of the looting, the first provided by U.S. soldiers, support claims that the American military failed to safeguard the munitions. Last month, the International Atomic Energy Agency - the U.N. nuclear watchdog - and the interim Iraqi government reported that about 380 tons of high-grade explosives had been taken from the Al Qaqaa facility after the fall of Baghdad on April 9, 2003. The explosives are powerful enough to detonate a nuclear weapon.
1) Because it is not socialistic enough for them to be able to sit around in coffee houses smoking and trying to use their college degrees in "poetry," "communications," and "womyns (sic) studies."
They find that there is just no market for "economic poets," "transgender engineers" and "fecal perfomance (sic) artists," and so they must begrudgingly work for "the man." They hate America because they cannot compete in the real world with real ideas.
2) Because most of them are uninterested in actually solving real problems for good; they are only interested in the "democritization (sic) of misery." They do not wish to elevate anyone to a better life, they only wish to bring those who have a better life down to an equal level with everyone else; All cornstalks MUST be at the same level, even if it means cutting the heads off of the best growing ones.
3) They believe that most Americans (the "great unwashed") are just too stupid to understand their so-called "progressive" ideology which is nothing more than a thinly-veiled Stalinism. They know "what's good for you."
4) They project and transfer their own rotten behavior and amorality upon everyone else. The cynically think that everyone else engages in the same twisted behavior that they do and thus they see that nobody can ever have truly good intentions or a moral reason to act in certain ways.
See it is perfectly ok for Republicans to "belittle [liberal's] beliefs and convictions". But if you, in turn, make fun of Republicans, then you are just soooooooo mean! I have to agree with Bill Maher on this one. Republicans fight like girls. "I can call you all the nasty names in this world, but I will cry like a baby if you insult me". Yea, even when those insults are true!
Let's face it, Republicans live in StereotypeVille.
"Why there is no racism in America, if a black man is not working it is because he does not want to work. They expect the government to pay their way." I hear this about the homeless too. "Why don't they go work at McDonald's" stupidly not realizing that 34% of the homeless in this country do work at jobs that don't even pay enough for them to have housing!
"Gays are perverted sinners that deserve no 'special rights'. And we all know those special rights are a right to fair housing, to work at a job without fear of being fired because your gay, the right to live your life without fear of being beaten up for no better reason than people don't like your choice of lovers.
"Liberals are traitors, socialist, communist, who hate America, want to see the terrorist win, want to turn over the running of the country to Saddam, want to punish rich people by taking all their money...yadda yadda yadday! Please give me a break.
Bruiser, old man, you have a lot of fucking nerve trying to tell me how bad liberals are at respect, when the Republican Party allowed the trashing of the reputation of a highly decorated Vietnam Vet, a hero who fought well and saved lives. He was called a coward, a cynic who's only reason for going to 'Nam was to advance his political career, a man who lied about wounds received in battle, who lied about saving the lives of his crew and who lied about taking fire. If there is one lesson I have certainly taken away from this election it is that no matter much Republicans pay lip service to the idea that they "back" the troops, the reality is that you support the troops if they walk lockstep with the Party!
The Bush administration could not run on the issues, so instead they ran on bullshit. What is so bitterly disappointing to me is that it worked.
I tell you I simply cannot believe that Bush won the popular vote. Even now you can here the Republican talking point. Even if Kerry eventually wins Ohio, the Republicans will claim that Bush really won because he had such a large section of the popular vote. It makes me somewhat sick to think that this many Americans went for Bush!
I have been a proud egalitarian all my life, but now I have to wonder if my brother does not strike closer to the truth. Are we really a nation of bigoted morons who are willing to vote against our own best interests if that means the "darkies" and "fags" won't get what they deserve? Lord knows I hate to think this is so, but it is hard to come to any other conclusion looking at the raw numbers.
At 6:30 this morning the race was still too close to call. It looks like it all comes down to Ohio. It would be nice if Kerry won Ohio since Bush will be hard pressed to complain that he won the popular vote so he should be president (as they were planning to do if Bush won the popular vote against Gore in 2000), without looking like a complete idiot. Still looking like a complete idiot seems to have worked out well for him so far...
All ready I can hear the rumbling in the bloggerverse, the post mortem on just what did we do wrong? Once again I will hear that it was the "looney left's" fault - that Kerry should have gone more middle of the road. Personally I don't see how he could have gone more in the middle, hell he was walking down the yellow stripe as it was. I tend to agree with those that complain about the DLC. Terry Mcauliffe has to go, this is the third election disaster that he has overseen, and if heads must roll (and believe me, they must) his has to be the first to go.
Yet as bad as the mistakes the Democrats made were (and in my humble opinion they were not nearly as bad as the 2000 and 2002 races) what the Republicans pulled was so much worse. Voter repression, dirty tricks, and a big heapin' helping of lies, lies, lies. It is clear that Republican's pay lip service to the ideas that made this country one of the best in the world, and in the next four years, if they have anything to say about it, they will surly dismantle those ideas, put them in a lock box, and make sure they never see the light of day again.
I worked my buttinky off this election cycle. I knocked on doors, I manned phone banks, I worked, worked then worked some more. Worked so hard I even neglected my blog. Needless to say Harris County voted for Bush. To say this is discouraging is to say nothing. Yet there is a silver lining. Chet Edwards managed to hang on to his State seat and Loyd Dogget will stay in the U. S. House. Other than that there is not much to celebrate.
So I am off to bed. Tomorrow I will take a closer look at what went wrong.
