Ten thoughts to share with you this Christmas:
1. The holidays are a great time to surround oneself with friends and family, and to share in the spirit of giving. And, for us single folks, it’s a time when we become acutely aware of every moment of our lives that would be better if someone were there to share it with us. In other words, Christmas is a lonely time for lonely people. So if you know anyone who’s lonely (and trust me, you do), make them feel loved this holiday season.
2. Don’t talk about politics over Christmas dinner. As a young liberal tasting your first real political victory, you’ll be tempted to rub your parents’ conservative faces in the Obama victory. In the spirit of Christmas, spare your family the humiliation. And no diatribes about Proposition 8. Save it for Easter Sunday.
3. Ok, one quick diatribe on Proposition 8: for all you Christian fundamentalists, Mormon demagogues, homophobic bigots, and other members of the Intolerance of the Month Club: fuck you. Maybe your own lives would be happier and more fulfilling if you stopped wasting your breath trying to curb the happiness of others. If you oppose gay marriage because homosexuality is a sin, well then I hope you work just as hard to stop every other sinner from getting married too. Oh, wait; we’re all sinners. So, let’s just ban marriage altogether. And if you don’t mind gay couples getting married, as long you can call it something other than marriage, well then you’re talking about creating Separate But Equal institutions. How has that faired in American history? Should we make all the queers go to separates schools, drink from different water fountains, and sit in the back of the bus? Let’s stop pretending that Proposition 8 is anything other than legalized bigotry, and that the motivations behind it are anything other than intolerance, hate, and fear. If you can’t tolerate a man loving another man, or a woman loving another woman, then you are a small, small person. God didn’t put us on this earth to judge each other. He put us here to love each other.
4. On a lighter note, go treat yourself to a Peppermint White Chocolate mocha at Starbucks, or the coffee distributor of your choice. You deserve it.
5. It’s Christmas, so for God’s sake tip your barista. Even at the drive thru.
6. God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen is a Christmas song. Hark! The Herald Angel Sings is a Christmas song. Dan Fogelberg’s “Same Old Lang Syne” is NOT a Christmas song—it is a sappy, pathetic song about sappy, pathetic people. And don’t get me started on “The Christmas Shoes.” If I hear that song one more time, Mommy won’t be the only one meeting Jesus tonight.
7. “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus” is NOT a sexy song, no matter how sexily you sing it. It’s a song about your parents getting frisky on Christmas Eve. Let’s just pretend it doesn’t exist.
8. If you’re thinking of giving someone a gift card for Christmas, give them cash instead. Giving someone a gift card is like saying to them, “I don’t know what to give you for Christmas, but I know if I just give you cash you’ll waste it on hookers and blow.”
9. The internet will never replace cable TV news, and I’ll tell you why: if it wasn’t for MSNBC, nobody who reads the Huffington Post or DailyKos would be able to have a conversation about the Blagovevich scandal--because none of us would know how to pronounce his name.
10. If you have a brain full of festering complaints about crappy holiday songs, unbridled American bigotry, or the crushing sadness of being single during the holidays, don’t foist your ramblings onto unsuspecting friends and relatives. Either keep them to yourself, or post them on a blog that you rarely update and that nobody reads. Don’t sweat the small stuff, the big stuff, or any stuff in between. Christmas comes but once a year, so make it merry and bright.
Whatever your winter holiday of choice, I wish you a happy one.
Saturday, December 13, 2008
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Time Out
Pause today, if only for a minute. Examine your life, the grand themes that have emerged from it, the minute details of its daily grind. Consider in that minute of reflection what you have, and consider how the best of what you have is only possible in America. Consider the possibilities that lay before you, and consider the freedom to pursue them that is only possible in America. Consider the comfort in which you live, the opportunities to work hard and to reap the fruits of your labor. Consider your freedom, the freedom to have your own thoughts, to share them without fear of reprisal, to pray to whatever God you want, or to no God at all, and the freedom pursue that which makes you happiest.
Consider these things, and cherish them. On today, of all days, remember that however unpopular our opinions, however uncivil our discourse, however jaded and cynical and mean and petty our society chooses to be, we at least have the choice to be so. Ours are the freedoms worth fighting for, and ours is the nation worth dying for.
Today is a day when we honor and remember the dead. We can look back seven short years and be sad, or angry, or fearful. But whose memory do you honor that way? Whose life do you celebrate? Today is a day to look back not seven years, but 232. Every day from then until now, including that day seven years ago, has been a day that the citizens of this great nation have marched steadily forward in the pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness. In the face of great odds, in the wake of great heartache, we have endured. Our way of life has endured. Our freedoms have endured.
Today is neither a day to cower in fear nor a day to lust for vengeance. Today is a day to celebrate your life, to celebrate all life, and to cherish the freedoms that make your life possible. Today is a day to remember the words of Abraham Lincoln:
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
I wish you a happy day, today, tomorrow, and all days hence.
Consider these things, and cherish them. On today, of all days, remember that however unpopular our opinions, however uncivil our discourse, however jaded and cynical and mean and petty our society chooses to be, we at least have the choice to be so. Ours are the freedoms worth fighting for, and ours is the nation worth dying for.
Today is a day when we honor and remember the dead. We can look back seven short years and be sad, or angry, or fearful. But whose memory do you honor that way? Whose life do you celebrate? Today is a day to look back not seven years, but 232. Every day from then until now, including that day seven years ago, has been a day that the citizens of this great nation have marched steadily forward in the pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness. In the face of great odds, in the wake of great heartache, we have endured. Our way of life has endured. Our freedoms have endured.
Today is neither a day to cower in fear nor a day to lust for vengeance. Today is a day to celebrate your life, to celebrate all life, and to cherish the freedoms that make your life possible. Today is a day to remember the words of Abraham Lincoln:
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
I wish you a happy day, today, tomorrow, and all days hence.
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Ulele Shin, You Watch Your Phraseology!
Sarah Palin doesn't like dirty books. Chaucer... Rabelais... Balzac!
And now that you've seen that, watch this again and try to figure out which person in this video is running for Vice President.
And now that you've seen that, watch this again and try to figure out which person in this video is running for Vice President.
We Need More Of This
--Update--
The video is now available. Please watch it: I'm only asking for five minutes of your time.
This morning in Norfolk, VA, Sen. Barack Obama responded to the latest false indignation from the McCain campaign. Every American should hear this:
Some of you may have -- I'm assuming you guys have heard this, watching the news. I'm talking about John McCain's economic politics, I say, "This is more of the same, you can put lipstick on a pig but it's still a pig."
And suddenly they say, "Oh, you must be talking about the governor of Alaska."
[Laughter from audience]
See it would be funny, it would be funny except -- of course the news media all decided that that was the lead story yesterday. They'd much rather have the story -- this is the McCain campaign -- would much rather have the story about phony and foolish diversions than about the future.
This happens every election cycle. Every four years. This is what we do. We've got an energy crisis. We have an education system that is not working for too many of our children and making us less competitive. We have an economy that is creating hardship for families all across America. We've got two wars going on, veterans coming home not being cared for -- and this is what they want to talk about! this is what they want to spend two of the last 55 days talking about.
You know who ends up losing at the end of the day? It's not the Democratic candidate, It's not the republican candidate. It's you, the American people. because then we go another year or another four years or another eight years without addressing the issues that matter to you. Enough.
I don't care what they say about me, but I love this country too much to let them take over another election with lies and phony outrage and swift-boat politics. Enough is enough.
The video is now available. Please watch it: I'm only asking for five minutes of your time.
This morning in Norfolk, VA, Sen. Barack Obama responded to the latest false indignation from the McCain campaign. Every American should hear this:
Some of you may have -- I'm assuming you guys have heard this, watching the news. I'm talking about John McCain's economic politics, I say, "This is more of the same, you can put lipstick on a pig but it's still a pig."
And suddenly they say, "Oh, you must be talking about the governor of Alaska."
[Laughter from audience]
See it would be funny, it would be funny except -- of course the news media all decided that that was the lead story yesterday. They'd much rather have the story -- this is the McCain campaign -- would much rather have the story about phony and foolish diversions than about the future.
This happens every election cycle. Every four years. This is what we do. We've got an energy crisis. We have an education system that is not working for too many of our children and making us less competitive. We have an economy that is creating hardship for families all across America. We've got two wars going on, veterans coming home not being cared for -- and this is what they want to talk about! this is what they want to spend two of the last 55 days talking about.
You know who ends up losing at the end of the day? It's not the Democratic candidate, It's not the republican candidate. It's you, the American people. because then we go another year or another four years or another eight years without addressing the issues that matter to you. Enough.
I don't care what they say about me, but I love this country too much to let them take over another election with lies and phony outrage and swift-boat politics. Enough is enough.
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Campaign First
John McCain’s campaign slogan is “Country First.” His argument for wanting to be president is that he is a War Hero, a Maverick, and a Patriot who always puts his country ahead of political considerations. Unlike his opponent, who supposedly has no record of putting country ahead of party, John McCain is a true American who will keep our nation safe and lead us to prosperity. John McCain always puts Country First.
Except, of course, when it comes to picking a running mate. John McCain is 72 years old, making him the oldest first-term presidential candidate in American history. If elected, he would be the oldest first-term president in American history. He is also a four-time cancer survivor (skin cancer, yes, but even skin cancer is potentially fatal.) And while John McCain likes to trot out his 90 year-old mother as an example of his good genes, the fact is his mother didn’t endure five years of torture in a North Vietnamese prison camp, which is sure to shave a few years off your life expectancy.
The point is, of the 43 people who have served as President of the United States, none have been as statistically likely to die in office as John McCain is. Therefore, his choice of running mate is the most important decision any presidential candidate has ever made.
Now, when choosing a Vice President, there are two schools of thought. Some say you should chose someone who will help you govern effectively, like President George W Bush did when he chose Dick Cheney, or former President Bill Clinton did when he chose Al Gore. Others will say you should chose someone who will help you get elected, like former president Kennedy did when he chose Lyndon Johnson, or John Kerry tried to do when he chose John Edwards. But no matter which way you go, making a governing choice or making a political choice, there is one thing you must, must do. You must choose someone who is unambiguously ready to assume the duties of President.
If you choose someone who is not ready to assume the presidency, but who may help you get elected, you have failed to put country first. That is an unconscionable act by any presidential candidate, but especially, ESPECIALLY for a 72 year-old four-time cancer survivor. John McCain put the least qualified VP candidate in the history of American politics one elderly heartbeat away from being a wartime commander-in-chief.
Why do I not believe that Alaskan Governor Sara Palin is unambiguously qualified to assume the duties of President? Let me lay out her resume. First, her education consists of a Bachelor’s degree in Journalism from the University of Idaho. My 22 year-old sister, by comparison, has a Double Major in Journalism and Communications from Western Washington University, which makes her better educated than our potential future president. I love my sister, don’t get me wrong, but I wouldn’t vote for her to be mayor of Wasilia, Alaska, let alone Vice President of the United States.
Speaking of Wasilia, Alaska, Sara Palin was the mayor of that town of 6700 people before she was Governor of Alaska. Her entire experience in elected office consists of 20 months as Governor of the 47th most populous state in the Union, preceded by several years as the mayor of beautiful Wasilia. Oh, and she was on the PTA for a while too, if that counts. So, six years ago, Sara Palin was the mayor of a town of 6700 people. Now she’s potentially one heartbeat away from the presidency. Think about the town you grew up in. Was it a small town, like Wasilia? Even if it was larger that Wasilia, think of the mayor of that town. Remember what you can about that person. Now, imagine that in six years, that person will be running for Vice President. Can you imagine that person in the White House? Can you imagine that person being one 72 year-old heartbeat away from the Presidency? What would that person have to accomplish in six short years to be worthy of the Vice Presidency?
Here’s what Sara Palin did in the six years between being mayor of Wasilia (where she was almost recalled for poor governance, and where she entangled the town in a legal battle over eminent domain laws that the town is still paying the legal fees for six years later) and today, where she is asking you to vote for her on a national ticket. She was appointed to co-chair an energy commission. She resigned after one year, citing too much corruption on the commission (admirable, I admit.) She than ran for Governor on a platform of reform, and won. She has been Governor for about 640 days. And now she’s the Republican nominee for Vice President.
That resume may sound a little thin, but the skeptical person will ask “what is her record?” Allow me to elaborate. In the 90’s, her husband was a registered member of the Alaskan Independence Party, and she attended one of their conventions (and actively courted their vote during her gubernatorial campaign.) The Alaskan Independent Party is a political party that advocates secession of Alaska from the Union, establishing it as a sovereign nation. It advocates the elimination of property taxes (you know, the taxes that fund public schools) and the return of all federal lands to the private ownership of Alaskan citizens (presumably so that places like ANWR or Glacier National Park can be opened up to oil drilling.) Sara Palin is a registered Republican, but her husband is a member of the AIP, and the AIP calls for the infiltration of major political parties by its members for the purposes of furthering its agenda. Someone should ask Sara Palin if she really is a Republican, or if she is one of these AIP infiltrators. Also, the founder of the AIP famously said that “the fires of hell are frozen glaciers compared the fire of my hatred for the American government.” Someone should ask Sara Palin why she courted the vote of a party that hates America.
Speaking of Sara Palin’s past, let’s talk about her church. As we all know, Barack Obama attended a church who’s pastor famously described 9/11 as “America’s chickens coming home to roost,” and who also said “not God bless America, but God damn America” for the way the government treated and continues to treat minorities. (By the way, did anyone stop criticizing Jeremiah Wright to consider whether or not he’s right? September 11th was terrible event, and a prime example of evil in the world, but does anyone remember that Osama bin Laden organized that attack as revenge for the 350,000 Iraqi children who died of malnutrition and disease after America bombed Baghdad’s water filtration plants and power plants in 1991? Al Queda directly killed 3000 Americans, but America indirectly killed ten times as many innocent children. This neither condones nor excuses the tragedy of 9/11, but it lends some context to the whole “coming home to roost” argument. And I don’t have to tell you what the last 300 years have been like for minorities in America. Long story short, Jeremiah Wright had a point.)
Anyway, since Pastor Wright’s comments have been fair game in this election, let’s talk about Sara Palin’s pastor, and what he’s on record as saying. In 2004, he told his parishioners that if they voted for John Kerry, he “questioned their salvation.” In 2005, he told the congregation that criticizing President Bush was the equivalent of “criticizing your pastor,” and that such an action could “only lead to hell.” Someone should ask Sara Palin if she believes that Democrats are doomed to eternal damnation. Her pastor also described 9/11 and the war in Iraq as battles in “a war for our faith.” In other words, the Iraq War is a holy crusade for Christianity.
I would say that someone should ask Sara Palin if she agrees with that, but we already know she does. Just three months ago, she gave a speech in that church in which she described the war as “a commitment to God’s plan.” So, God’s plan was for 4100 American soldiers and an estimated 125,000 Iraqi soldiers and civilians to die while America spends 12 billion dollars per month occupied a once-sovereign nation in the Middle East? Her pastor once said that while Jesus was a good shepherd, he also kept part of his mind in “war mode.” Funny, I would have assumed that Christ would practice what he preached.
While we’re on the subject of practicing what you preach, let’s talk about Bristol Palin. Bristol is Sara Palin’s unwed 17 year-old daughter, pregnant with a child conceived out of wedlock. Normally, I would say that this kind of family drama is off-limits for political conversation, but it is relevant here. Sara Palin herself conceived her first child out of wedlock, which makes the whole unwed mother thing kind of a family tradition. I don’t disapprove of pre-marital sex, but the Palin’s do, and that’s why this subject is fair game. Sara Palin disapproves of sex-education in public schools, and wants to replace every sex-ed program with abstinence-only education. How can Sara Palin advocate abstinence-only education when both she and her daughter are living examples that people will have sex out of wedlock, regardless of what you teach them? If Sara Palin had used the experience of her own pre-marital pregnancy as a teaching opportunity to explain the importance of contraceptives to her daughter, Bristol would not be saddled with an unwanted child while still in high school. This woman wants to force America to employ a teaching program that has failed in her own family, more than once. It is the height of either hypocrisy or stupidity. Maybe both.
Of course, it is possible that Sara Palin promotes abstinence-only education because she believes that contraception is a form of murder. It’s the logical conclusion of her stance on abortion: she believes that abortion is murder, and that it should be outlawed, even in the case of rape or incest. This is an EXTREME point of view, and if you agree with her, you are one of only 7% of all Americans who do. If she so strongly believes that abortion is murder, isn’t it logical to conclude that birth control in all its forms, from the pill to condoms to RU486 to IUDs, are also forms of murder? Someone should ask Sara Palin if she favors a constitutional amendment banning contraceptives (it would require such, as the Supreme Court ruled in Griswold v. Connecticut that such a ban is unconstitutional.)
Now, supporters of Sara Palin will argue two points: one, she has more experience than the Democratic nominee for president, and two, this election is really between John McCain and Barack Obama. I’ll address that second point in a minute, but let me talk first about the comparison between Sara Palin’s experience and Barack Obama’s. First, Sara Palin has been governor of Alaska since December, 2006. Barack Obama has been one of two Senators representing Illinois since January, 2005. Sara Palin was the mayor of Wasilia, Alaska, from 1996 to 2002. Barack Obama was a Senator in the Illinois State Senate, representing the 13th District, from 1997-2004. Wasilia, Alaska had a population of approx. 6700 when Palin was mayor, and the entire state of Alaska is home to approx. 683,000 people. By comparison, Obama’s district in the State Senate was home to approx. 781,000 people, and the entire state of Illinois has a population over 12.8 million.
But, Sara Palin was a Governor! Never mind that the president of the Alaska state senate says that she “isn’t qualifed to be governor; how can she be qualified to be Vice President or President?” Sara Palin has experience commanding the Alaska National Guard! Except the head of the ANG claims she has “no role” in anything they do outside the state, like fighting in Iraq. But what about her foreign policy cred? Alaska is the closest state to Russia, after all. If she ever has to negotiate a fishing agreement with Vladimir Putin, we can all rest assured that she’ll be experienced.
Meanwhile, Barack Obama has been on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee for nearly four years; he has traveled to Iraq twice, Israel twice, Germany, France, Afghanistan, Indonesia, and Pakistan. By comparison, Sara Palin landed at a campaign stop in Pennsylvania and promptly told reporters that it was “nice to see another part of the country.” Ladies and gentlemen, our potential next VP, just happy to be in Scranton! To be fair, she has been to Kuwait, Iraq, and Germany to visit the troops. She also claims to have been to Ireland, but it turns out her trip to Ireland consisted of thirty minutes in the Shannon Airport while her plane refueled. Someone should ask Sara Palin why she feels the need to embellish her credentials by bragging about a half-hour of duty-free shopping.
I could go on about Sara Palin’s record (and lack of record,) about her views (and lack of views; she said just two years ago that she “wasn’t paying much attention to Iraq,) or about the various lies and hypocrisies she has been caught in. Maybe I’ll address them in a future post. Since you and I are over 2200 words deep into this, I’ll get to my point.
John McCain did not select a running mate who will help him govern. He did not choose a running mate who is qualified to fulfill the duties of President in his absence. He did not choose a running mate who shares the values and views of the majority of Americans. What he did was chose a person who would potentially help him get elected. He chose a woman, which presumably will attract disenfranchised Hillary Clinton supporters (a ridiculous notion, but I’ll talk about that another time.) He chose a social conservative whose views appeal to the most extreme wing of his party.
And to all those Sara Palin defenders who say that this election isn’t about her, it’s about John McCain and Barack Obama, I say you are absolutely right. Which candidate has the temperament and the judgment to be President? Well, a candidate for President only gets to make one presidential decision before being elected, and that is the choice of running mate. The choice reveals what kind of president the candidate will be. And in that test of presidential judgment, John McCain failed. He chose a person who is dangerously unqualified for the position. He chose a person for purely political reasons. The man whose campaign slogan is “Country First” decided to put his campaign first. As an American citizen, the President of the United States works for me. And I will not accept such recklessness in my White House.
Except, of course, when it comes to picking a running mate. John McCain is 72 years old, making him the oldest first-term presidential candidate in American history. If elected, he would be the oldest first-term president in American history. He is also a four-time cancer survivor (skin cancer, yes, but even skin cancer is potentially fatal.) And while John McCain likes to trot out his 90 year-old mother as an example of his good genes, the fact is his mother didn’t endure five years of torture in a North Vietnamese prison camp, which is sure to shave a few years off your life expectancy.
The point is, of the 43 people who have served as President of the United States, none have been as statistically likely to die in office as John McCain is. Therefore, his choice of running mate is the most important decision any presidential candidate has ever made.
Now, when choosing a Vice President, there are two schools of thought. Some say you should chose someone who will help you govern effectively, like President George W Bush did when he chose Dick Cheney, or former President Bill Clinton did when he chose Al Gore. Others will say you should chose someone who will help you get elected, like former president Kennedy did when he chose Lyndon Johnson, or John Kerry tried to do when he chose John Edwards. But no matter which way you go, making a governing choice or making a political choice, there is one thing you must, must do. You must choose someone who is unambiguously ready to assume the duties of President.
If you choose someone who is not ready to assume the presidency, but who may help you get elected, you have failed to put country first. That is an unconscionable act by any presidential candidate, but especially, ESPECIALLY for a 72 year-old four-time cancer survivor. John McCain put the least qualified VP candidate in the history of American politics one elderly heartbeat away from being a wartime commander-in-chief.
Why do I not believe that Alaskan Governor Sara Palin is unambiguously qualified to assume the duties of President? Let me lay out her resume. First, her education consists of a Bachelor’s degree in Journalism from the University of Idaho. My 22 year-old sister, by comparison, has a Double Major in Journalism and Communications from Western Washington University, which makes her better educated than our potential future president. I love my sister, don’t get me wrong, but I wouldn’t vote for her to be mayor of Wasilia, Alaska, let alone Vice President of the United States.
Speaking of Wasilia, Alaska, Sara Palin was the mayor of that town of 6700 people before she was Governor of Alaska. Her entire experience in elected office consists of 20 months as Governor of the 47th most populous state in the Union, preceded by several years as the mayor of beautiful Wasilia. Oh, and she was on the PTA for a while too, if that counts. So, six years ago, Sara Palin was the mayor of a town of 6700 people. Now she’s potentially one heartbeat away from the presidency. Think about the town you grew up in. Was it a small town, like Wasilia? Even if it was larger that Wasilia, think of the mayor of that town. Remember what you can about that person. Now, imagine that in six years, that person will be running for Vice President. Can you imagine that person in the White House? Can you imagine that person being one 72 year-old heartbeat away from the Presidency? What would that person have to accomplish in six short years to be worthy of the Vice Presidency?
Here’s what Sara Palin did in the six years between being mayor of Wasilia (where she was almost recalled for poor governance, and where she entangled the town in a legal battle over eminent domain laws that the town is still paying the legal fees for six years later) and today, where she is asking you to vote for her on a national ticket. She was appointed to co-chair an energy commission. She resigned after one year, citing too much corruption on the commission (admirable, I admit.) She than ran for Governor on a platform of reform, and won. She has been Governor for about 640 days. And now she’s the Republican nominee for Vice President.
That resume may sound a little thin, but the skeptical person will ask “what is her record?” Allow me to elaborate. In the 90’s, her husband was a registered member of the Alaskan Independence Party, and she attended one of their conventions (and actively courted their vote during her gubernatorial campaign.) The Alaskan Independent Party is a political party that advocates secession of Alaska from the Union, establishing it as a sovereign nation. It advocates the elimination of property taxes (you know, the taxes that fund public schools) and the return of all federal lands to the private ownership of Alaskan citizens (presumably so that places like ANWR or Glacier National Park can be opened up to oil drilling.) Sara Palin is a registered Republican, but her husband is a member of the AIP, and the AIP calls for the infiltration of major political parties by its members for the purposes of furthering its agenda. Someone should ask Sara Palin if she really is a Republican, or if she is one of these AIP infiltrators. Also, the founder of the AIP famously said that “the fires of hell are frozen glaciers compared the fire of my hatred for the American government.” Someone should ask Sara Palin why she courted the vote of a party that hates America.
Speaking of Sara Palin’s past, let’s talk about her church. As we all know, Barack Obama attended a church who’s pastor famously described 9/11 as “America’s chickens coming home to roost,” and who also said “not God bless America, but God damn America” for the way the government treated and continues to treat minorities. (By the way, did anyone stop criticizing Jeremiah Wright to consider whether or not he’s right? September 11th was terrible event, and a prime example of evil in the world, but does anyone remember that Osama bin Laden organized that attack as revenge for the 350,000 Iraqi children who died of malnutrition and disease after America bombed Baghdad’s water filtration plants and power plants in 1991? Al Queda directly killed 3000 Americans, but America indirectly killed ten times as many innocent children. This neither condones nor excuses the tragedy of 9/11, but it lends some context to the whole “coming home to roost” argument. And I don’t have to tell you what the last 300 years have been like for minorities in America. Long story short, Jeremiah Wright had a point.)
Anyway, since Pastor Wright’s comments have been fair game in this election, let’s talk about Sara Palin’s pastor, and what he’s on record as saying. In 2004, he told his parishioners that if they voted for John Kerry, he “questioned their salvation.” In 2005, he told the congregation that criticizing President Bush was the equivalent of “criticizing your pastor,” and that such an action could “only lead to hell.” Someone should ask Sara Palin if she believes that Democrats are doomed to eternal damnation. Her pastor also described 9/11 and the war in Iraq as battles in “a war for our faith.” In other words, the Iraq War is a holy crusade for Christianity.
I would say that someone should ask Sara Palin if she agrees with that, but we already know she does. Just three months ago, she gave a speech in that church in which she described the war as “a commitment to God’s plan.” So, God’s plan was for 4100 American soldiers and an estimated 125,000 Iraqi soldiers and civilians to die while America spends 12 billion dollars per month occupied a once-sovereign nation in the Middle East? Her pastor once said that while Jesus was a good shepherd, he also kept part of his mind in “war mode.” Funny, I would have assumed that Christ would practice what he preached.
While we’re on the subject of practicing what you preach, let’s talk about Bristol Palin. Bristol is Sara Palin’s unwed 17 year-old daughter, pregnant with a child conceived out of wedlock. Normally, I would say that this kind of family drama is off-limits for political conversation, but it is relevant here. Sara Palin herself conceived her first child out of wedlock, which makes the whole unwed mother thing kind of a family tradition. I don’t disapprove of pre-marital sex, but the Palin’s do, and that’s why this subject is fair game. Sara Palin disapproves of sex-education in public schools, and wants to replace every sex-ed program with abstinence-only education. How can Sara Palin advocate abstinence-only education when both she and her daughter are living examples that people will have sex out of wedlock, regardless of what you teach them? If Sara Palin had used the experience of her own pre-marital pregnancy as a teaching opportunity to explain the importance of contraceptives to her daughter, Bristol would not be saddled with an unwanted child while still in high school. This woman wants to force America to employ a teaching program that has failed in her own family, more than once. It is the height of either hypocrisy or stupidity. Maybe both.
Of course, it is possible that Sara Palin promotes abstinence-only education because she believes that contraception is a form of murder. It’s the logical conclusion of her stance on abortion: she believes that abortion is murder, and that it should be outlawed, even in the case of rape or incest. This is an EXTREME point of view, and if you agree with her, you are one of only 7% of all Americans who do. If she so strongly believes that abortion is murder, isn’t it logical to conclude that birth control in all its forms, from the pill to condoms to RU486 to IUDs, are also forms of murder? Someone should ask Sara Palin if she favors a constitutional amendment banning contraceptives (it would require such, as the Supreme Court ruled in Griswold v. Connecticut that such a ban is unconstitutional.)
Now, supporters of Sara Palin will argue two points: one, she has more experience than the Democratic nominee for president, and two, this election is really between John McCain and Barack Obama. I’ll address that second point in a minute, but let me talk first about the comparison between Sara Palin’s experience and Barack Obama’s. First, Sara Palin has been governor of Alaska since December, 2006. Barack Obama has been one of two Senators representing Illinois since January, 2005. Sara Palin was the mayor of Wasilia, Alaska, from 1996 to 2002. Barack Obama was a Senator in the Illinois State Senate, representing the 13th District, from 1997-2004. Wasilia, Alaska had a population of approx. 6700 when Palin was mayor, and the entire state of Alaska is home to approx. 683,000 people. By comparison, Obama’s district in the State Senate was home to approx. 781,000 people, and the entire state of Illinois has a population over 12.8 million.
But, Sara Palin was a Governor! Never mind that the president of the Alaska state senate says that she “isn’t qualifed to be governor; how can she be qualified to be Vice President or President?” Sara Palin has experience commanding the Alaska National Guard! Except the head of the ANG claims she has “no role” in anything they do outside the state, like fighting in Iraq. But what about her foreign policy cred? Alaska is the closest state to Russia, after all. If she ever has to negotiate a fishing agreement with Vladimir Putin, we can all rest assured that she’ll be experienced.
Meanwhile, Barack Obama has been on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee for nearly four years; he has traveled to Iraq twice, Israel twice, Germany, France, Afghanistan, Indonesia, and Pakistan. By comparison, Sara Palin landed at a campaign stop in Pennsylvania and promptly told reporters that it was “nice to see another part of the country.” Ladies and gentlemen, our potential next VP, just happy to be in Scranton! To be fair, she has been to Kuwait, Iraq, and Germany to visit the troops. She also claims to have been to Ireland, but it turns out her trip to Ireland consisted of thirty minutes in the Shannon Airport while her plane refueled. Someone should ask Sara Palin why she feels the need to embellish her credentials by bragging about a half-hour of duty-free shopping.
I could go on about Sara Palin’s record (and lack of record,) about her views (and lack of views; she said just two years ago that she “wasn’t paying much attention to Iraq,) or about the various lies and hypocrisies she has been caught in. Maybe I’ll address them in a future post. Since you and I are over 2200 words deep into this, I’ll get to my point.
John McCain did not select a running mate who will help him govern. He did not choose a running mate who is qualified to fulfill the duties of President in his absence. He did not choose a running mate who shares the values and views of the majority of Americans. What he did was chose a person who would potentially help him get elected. He chose a woman, which presumably will attract disenfranchised Hillary Clinton supporters (a ridiculous notion, but I’ll talk about that another time.) He chose a social conservative whose views appeal to the most extreme wing of his party.
And to all those Sara Palin defenders who say that this election isn’t about her, it’s about John McCain and Barack Obama, I say you are absolutely right. Which candidate has the temperament and the judgment to be President? Well, a candidate for President only gets to make one presidential decision before being elected, and that is the choice of running mate. The choice reveals what kind of president the candidate will be. And in that test of presidential judgment, John McCain failed. He chose a person who is dangerously unqualified for the position. He chose a person for purely political reasons. The man whose campaign slogan is “Country First” decided to put his campaign first. As an American citizen, the President of the United States works for me. And I will not accept such recklessness in my White House.
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Criminal Negligence
So, today thousands of flights were grounded, and thousands more were forced to stay in the air, because the FAA had a computer glitch that made it difficult to process all the flight plans of all the commercial and private flights.
In the course of reporting this event, news agencies have discovered that the FAA computer system is a patchwork, ad-hoc network of outdated equipment that has been in need of an holistic upgrade for several years. After last April’s FAA controversy, where thousands of flights were grounded over the FAA’s failure to properly inspect planes for a certain cabling issue, it should now be clear that the FAA is a poorly run, poorly organized division of the federal bureaucracy.
If only they were the only ones. How about the FDA? Just this year, we’ve had reports of salmonella from spinach, tomatoes, and jalapenos, all of which sneaked past FDA inspectors and made it into our grocery stores. How about the Consumer Product Safety Commission, who let children's toys come into our country from China with lead paint? And what about FEMA? We all remember how the response to Hurricane Katrina went.
And of course, there is the Justice Department. Eight Federal Judges were fired for their political views, an act that is unquestionably illegal. The former AG Alberto Gonzalez’s response, under oath, was that he “couldn’t recall” why the judges were fired, he “couldn’t recall” who told him to fire the judges, and he “couldn’t recall” what as discussed in the meetings regarding those judges, or even who sat in on those meetings. The White House chief of staff and the White House Counsel were both subpoenaed to testify before Congress regarding the issue, and of course neither one showed up. Congress held them in contempt, the courts agreed, and the White House’s response has been to appeal the decision. They don’t have anything to hide, of course.
Speaking of the Justice Department, the woman who was in charge of hiring federal prosecutors was Monica Goodling, the former Bush Campaign opposition researcher. It turns out, she was asking job applicants for the non-political position of prosecutor questions like “why are you a Republican?” and “what is it about George W Bush that makes you want to serve him?” Obviously, this is highly illegal. But the Justice Department has refused to investigate itself in this matter. The Attorney General’s reason for not investigating: “Not every violation of the law is a crime.” Wow.
Finally, there’s the FEC, whose job it is to be the referee in all federal elections. During the primaries, when the McCain campaign was running low on cash, they requested public financing. The deal with public financing is that the government gives you money for your campaign, but on the condition that you accept a spending limit. The McCain campaign requested the public funds, then used the promise of public funding as collateral to obtain a private loan from a bank. Once they received the private loan, they cancelled the request for pubic financing. At the very least, this is a shady abuse of a loophole in the public financing system.
But there’s more: according to public financing laws, laws that John McCain himself co-wrote in the McCain-Feingold Campaign Finance Reform Act, a candidate cannot opt out of public funding once he’s signed up for it, unless he gets permission from the FEC. It is the job of the FEC to investigate this and other possible breaches of finance law, and to impose penalties accordingly. However, the FEC has not investigated the McCain campaign’s shady abuse of public funding, because the FEC cannot do anything right now. The FEC is supposed to be made up of six members, three from each party, and a quarom of 4 members is required to initiate investigations. Right now, there are only two people on the FEC, with four vacancies waiting to be filled.
That’s right: in the middle of the presidential election, there is no referee. It is the responsibility of the President to appoint people to fill vacancies in the FEC, with Congressional approval. The problem is, the President keeps nominating unqualified friends for the position, and the Congress will not approve them.
And this gets to my point. The heads of the FAA, Justice Department, CPSC, FDA, and FEMA were all unqualified friends of the President who were nominated by the President and rubber-stamp approved by the Republican Congress. And in every one of the those agencies, there have been catastrophic failures ranging from national inconveniences to national tragedies. The management of the federal bureaucracy has been criminally negligent.
So, when bleeding heart liberals like me whine about impeaching our president, it’s not just because of the inhumane treatment of prisoners of war, or the abuses of federal power through the FISA program, or the use of Executive Signing Statements as a de facto line-item vito, or the systematic use of former Pentagon officials as agents of propaganda on American soil, or the selective use of intelligence to mislead the nation into supporting an unnecessary war, or the nationwide use of the politics of personal destruction, or the reckless waste of taxpayer money in the biggest expansion of the federal government in fifty years, or the leaking of an undercover CIA agent’s identity into the press as a way getting revenge on her husband, or the granting of no-bid contracts to companies whose executives are personal friends of the administration, or the decision to grant federal contractors in Iraq full exemption from both American laws and Iraqi laws, or any of the other countless hundreds of examples of corruption and poor judgment. We ask for impeachment because the primary responsibility of the president is not to be commander-in-chief, or to be chief diplomat and head of state, but to be the manager of the federal bureaucracy, to “take care that the laws be faithfully executed.” And with all the failures of our government in the last eight years, at some point we have to blame the guy in charge.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
The Ground Rules
I need to lay out a few ground rules, because apparently we were not all blessed with the same level of common sense. Please, PLEASE remember the following:
- If we are walking toward each other on a sidewalk or in a hallway, I am going to move to my right. You need to move to YOUR right. If I wanted to dance with you, I would have worn more comfortable shoes.
- At a four-way intersection, everyone gets to go in the order they arrived. In the case of a tie, yield to the person on your right. I know this isn’t new information to you, because you had to hear it in order to receive the license in your wallet, purse, or glove box. If it is your turn, I am NOT going to go, no matter how much you waive, beckon, and flail about in the cabin of your Toyota Camry. You are NOT doing anyone a favor by letting someone go out of turn. Just stick to the rules, and everything will be fine.
- If we start talking at the same time, whoever spoke last should shut up and let the other speak. If I say “go ahead,” do NOT reply by saying “no, you go ahead.” Reply by GOING AHEAD.
- If the conversation wanders off to a new topic, do not be Billy Buzzkill and interject with a smug “getting back to what we were talking about…” Nobody likes the Conversation Police. Let the fluidity of discourse flow where it may.
- If the stranger behind you walks at a faster pace, find an excuse to stop or move to one side and LET HIM BY. As a fast-walker, nothing drives me crazier than the slow-walker in front of me who refuses to yield. Believe me, I don’t want to be the creepy stalker guy who nips at your heels. I just can’t help it, since you insist on trotting along with the gait of an 80 year-old arthritic in a blizzard.
- I’m bad with names. I’m sorry, but it’s not like I’m the only one. If you say hi to me, and I reply “hey, you,” it means I have forgotten your name, probably because we met once at a party three months ago when I was so drunk that I couldn’t remember my own name, let alone yours. So please, when I say “hey, you,” reply by reminding me what your name is, where we met, and if I said or did anything that should make our subsequent conversation awkward and interminable. In fact, if I did say or do something that would make our subsequent conversation awkward and interminable, don’t bother saying hi to me at all. Let’s just move on with our lives, and chalk the whole thing up to Jager.
- No one loves your cat as much as you do. If this is news to you, I’m sorry.
- Any conversation that begins with “I had a dream last night” will end with me putting bricks in my pockets and jumping into a river. If we had sex in your dream, and you’re telling me this by way of a come-on, then by all means, keep talking. Otherwise, I’ll be keeping my eye out for a high bridge over deep water.
- This one’s a little graphic, so hold your nose: When it comes to moving one’s bowels, the process can take anywhere from a couple seconds to a full half-hour. It’s all a function of diet and body chemistry. So, if I’m in the bathroom for a long time, please do not make a big production out of it when I emerge. I was in there a long time: I get it. It smells really bad: again, I get it. I was pooping, ha ha. Get over it.
- If I like you enough and/or am drunk enough to want to dance, I will ask you. Otherwise, my default position in regards to dancing is sheer, mortal terror. So, don’t ask me to dance. I’m only going to make a protracted show of saying NO that will start out as self-effacing humor, then descend into mild annoyance, and finally full-throated rage. Please don’t take it personally.
- This last rule goes out to the waitresses of the world: If you say “enjoy your meal,” and I reply “you too,” it’s not because I’m an idiot. It’s just an automatic thing, a dummy phrase that I’m conditioned to say in response to anyone wishing me a happy anything. Let’s just ignore it and move on with our server-customer relationship as if nothing happened.
If anyone has any questions regarding these rules, or would like to dispute them, please feel free to email me at mille324@cc.wwu.edu. If you would like to add a rule to the list, get your own damn blog. If you would like to purchase a hard copy of these rules, you’re an idiot. Just print them off my blog for free. I don’t do business with tree killers.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)