| Posted: 18 April 2010 at 1:45pm | IP Logged | 11
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This has become a fruitless exercise.
Any attempt to raise issues for discussion is met with "The Democrats walk on water and the Republicans sodomize their staff" or "The Democrats are leading us down the path of socialist ruin and the Republicans are our last best hope before we all winding up singing the Internationale."
There is no third way, no middle ground?
Alas, no, as the response to either claim is merely "Well, Democrats sodomize their staff too" or "Republicans are corporate socialists and want ordinary people to die in the streets." Hardly statements to bridge the gap, unless we are constructing a bridge to nowhere.
I respect Mike O'B.
His continual rejoinder of "so vote Republican", however, is as tiresome as it is insulting. Essentially, he says "If you object to anything about my guy, then you must be one of them, and a pox on your house." And thus, I explore Mike's thesis with my own beliefs. I view life to be important and do not support abortion except in the most extreme need. No home for me with the Democrats. I do not interpret the Second Amendment to indiscriminately allow handguns into every home and I favour strict licensing and gun control. No home for me with the Republicans. I want a government committed to activities only government can do, which benefit the common wealth and not special interests with the deepest pockets, and elected officials who do not spend like drunken sailors in an attempt to curry electoral favour. No home for me in either party.
Mike, wouldn't it be better to have people of principle in office rather than just voting for them because they have an R or a D behind their name? When I managed candidates back in Canada, I worked for Liberals and Conservatives. (The party was then called the Progressive Conservatives; wouldn't Glenn Beck love that?) Party mattered far less to me than person. It still does. I hope it always will.
I respect Jodi.
Essentially her analysis of the GLB Act was it was Republican sponsored and Republican supported. Right on both points. But she ignores the overwhelming Democratic support for that Act and that the President signed it into law. Evidently they had no objections to this bad legislation. Are the Democrats absolved from any blame for the consequences of that vote because we are to interpret their support as being merely polite and bipartisan?
Look at the numbers, Jodi: If the House Democrats had gone solidly against that Act, it would have failed. Or the President could have vetoed it, and his veto would not have been overridden. I agree with you, Jodi, the Republicans put this bile on the table. But the Democrats didn't have to help us swallow it.
I respect Wayde.
Alas, his latest suggestion of tit-for-tat -- or, more accurately, more tit-for-tat -- is precisely what has got us where we are in this country. Think about all the partisanship and getting even over the last 25 years. You tried to impeach Nixon, so we'll try to impeach Clinton. Robert Bork pulled the trigger on the Saturday Night Massacre so we'll keep him off the Supreme Court, regardless of his qualifications, but now you must judge our nominees purely on their qualifications because the nomination process must not be politicized. And so on.
I believe Presidents Truman, Johnson, Nixon and Ford would have LOVED a country that rallied around a war-time (or police action) president. But more to the point, Wayde, perhaps you might want to invert your question. To paraphrase Peter, Paul and Mary, "Where have all the war protests gone?"
If I'm Blue, overseas wars are bad. (So where's Code Pink, Cindy Sheehan and the daily body count since January 2009?)
If I'm Red, taxes are too high and deficit spending is bad. (So who is first in line at the Tea Party rally to hand back their various subsidies to help cut the budget?)
At the risk of Mike O'Brien accusing me yet again of tut-tutting -- would that be tut-for-tut? -- why don't we try being White for a few minutes, that all too precious middle ground, so be can get back to being a Red, White and Blue nation?
Edited by Matthew McCallum on 18 April 2010 at 1:54pm
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Topic Closed)
