Tag Archives: Politics

Last Men Standing: Losers

Posted on March 16, 2012 | Leave a comment

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about the losers (literally — they all have suffered huge political loses in the past) that are leading the Republican race this year. Why are the second — or third — string players the last men standing this year of all years? It’s rare that a sitting president is so vulnerable during their reelection year as Obama is. You’d think the field would be a little more — impressive than it is.

While I don’t know the answer, one possibility that occurred to me is the financial problems our country faces is so insurmountable that the smarter, more capable ones see they’d just be the captain of a sinking ship. What’s the point in that? They don’t think they can fix it, and have a reasonable chance of being The Guy that’s in charge when the Schumer hits the fan. Not a great place in history.
So who’s left? Delusionary Megalomaniacs (Newt), Sent by God (Santorum), and the Inevitable (Romney).

Or… smart, capable, freedom loving people just generally don’t do well at politics in America these days. Probably more likely.

Leave a comment

Posted in Uncategorized

Tagged

Health Care and Corporatism

Posted on May 13, 2009 | Leave a comment

Ron Bailey over at Reason wrote up a pretty interesting piece breaking down what some of Obama’s recent health care announcements mean to the average joe. It’s a good read, especially to someone who has had precious little time to study all of these announcement in detail of late. It’s also a defense of that dirty concept: capitalism and competition.

What’s more interesting to me is what he calls what the Obama’s administration is doing: “corporatism”. He quotes the Concise Oxford Dictionary of Politics:

“a system of interest intermediation linking producer interests and the state, in which explicitly recognized interest organizations are incorporated into the policy-making process, both in terms of the negotiation of policy and of securing compliance from their members with the agreed policy.”

He wisely doesn’t drop the ‘f’ bomb: fascism. No, I’m not calling Obama a fascist. That term has really lost all it’s meaning. Bush, also, was not a fascist. Wikipedia has an interesting section in their fascism article actually covering it’s loss of meaning due to it’s use as an epithet. So, Ron is smart not to use it, simply because it’s so polarizing.

Still, if you do happen to read the Wikipedia article, it really is kind of chilling. Corporatism? Check. Cult of personality? Check. Abortion and euthanasia? Check. Social interventionism? Oh yeah, big, big check. There’s a lot of commonly associated pieces of the puzzle that are missing, though: single party government, blatant disallowing of criticism, suppression of class warfare, blatant racism, etc.  It still bares watching, though. That Obama is a man of the Left is obvious. But, what Left, exactly? Something new?

I can certainly say, almost 4 months into his presidency, that he’s worse than I thought he was going to be, and closer to the serious doom and gloom predictions of the Republicans. I was hoping for something closer to Clinton, who wasn’t nearly as bad as the Republicans of the time warned he’d be. Instead, we have someone much farther to the Left than Clinton or Carter. Combined.

Leave a comment

Posted in Politics

Tagged , , ,

Bush = Chimp is OK, Obama = Chimp racist?

Posted on February 19, 2009 | Leave a comment

This is just too obvious and easy. The New York Post published a cartoon that some inferred constituted calling President Obama a chimp. Immediately, black leaders, such as Rev. Sharpton, flipped out with calls of racism. No where in the CNN article about this row (isn’t that a British term?) does it mention that it was common for President Bush to be called a chimp by the Angry Left when he was in office. That, of course, wasn’t racist, since Bush is white.

Does this make any sort of sense? Take a step back and think about it. So, what can the Angry Right call the new president without being labeled as racist? I think there needs to be a term that indicates a below level IQ, but does not draw attention to his skin color, all things being equal. Let’s see: how about a dog? Oh, that’s insulting to Muslims. Neanderthal? On the right track.

By the way, I don’t think that Obama has a below average IQ — and neither does Bush. To really, honestly think either one of those is honestly, well, crazy.

Leave a comment

Posted in Politics

Tagged , , , , ,

Now a Bailout of GM?

Posted on November 18, 2008 | Leave a comment

I’m not saying anything here that hasn’t been said much eloquently elsewhere, but it’s incredible to me that there will likely be a huge bailout of GM — and the Other Two — within the next few months, and perhaps much less if Congress gets their way. Let me say this for posterity: this is a bad, bad idea. It rewards bad business decisions, as in entering unsubstainable contracts with the UAW, as well as putting all your eggs in the truck and SUV basket. It pushes the problem down the road, as this issue will not go away just by throwing money at it. It gets close (or will, depending on the bailout package) to having a true, honest-to-God socialist government stake in a major manufacturing sector, reducing market responsiveness, reducing efficiency, and ensuring further degradation of the American-owned auto industry. In other words, it’s bad, all around.

And it’s almost certainly going to happen. Why? Because Democrats in change — including President-Elect Obama — are the same old politics. They are beholden to those interests that put them there, and in this case, one of those interests are the labor unions. A new kind of politics? Prove it. This is the incoming administration’s first test of that claim. As far as how toxic this is for America and it’s people, this is just as bad as being beholden to corporate interests. It’s putting a benefactor’s interest ahead of the country’s citizens.

This is going to come back and haunt is horribly in the future.

Leave a comment

Posted in Politics

Tagged , , , ,

How Bad Is It?

Posted on November 5, 2008 | Leave a comment

I’ll now have to get used to saying President Obama. How unfortunate. How surprising. How depressing. 

Yes, I’m a conservative, and no, I’m not a happy person today, the day after the 2008 election. In the run up to yesterdays historic election, I learned much about Barack Obama, and nothing has changed my opinion that he’s extremely liberal, completely inexperienced for the job, and dangerously ignorant of the world in general. I believe he’s too slick. Too polished. I think that anyone who, when they speak, causes shivers to run up the leg of Chris Matthews is bound to be scary. 

So, the day after the election, where the American people have decided that I’m incorrect in my beliefs of the man, is it all that bad? Maybe, but given what I know about American history, probably not. While we now have Democrats controlling two out of three of the branches of government (and the third leans liberal), the same situation happened in 1992 and the Republic survived. I do believe that those in leadership positions now are more radicalized than those of 16 years ago, I believe in the moderating influence of the voter. If they attempt to overreach, they’ll get slapped hard, so that’ll help.

This isn’t to say that there won’t be damage. I think that the next four years will see some really bad mistakes, on par to the Carter Administration, both foreign and domestic. I do think there’s a lot of on the job learning that’s going to happen, and that increases the chance of mistakes being made. I hope I’m wrong, of course. I refuse to be one of those people, on either side of the fence, that hopes for problems just to point out, “I told you so!”. I do hope and pray that President-Elect Obama learns quickly, governs wisely, and inspires a nation. I’m just… very, very worried.

Leave a comment

Posted in Politics

Tagged , ,