The lies about criminal behavior of HERMAN CAIN hurt him, and America, in 2011, in the 2012 election cycle. This educated guy, this business leader, this free thinker, this open book, this conservative American, is owed more than an apology (which has yet to be given) from the attention-craving Gloria Allred and the two lying women who made headlines claiming that Cain sexually harassed them (link: http://ow.ly/qF0QX).
Americans are owed better than this lowest of political tactics in the age of social media and in-the-moment news reporting. If leading Democrats had any lack of cynicism among them, they'd have discouraged the effect of these unfounded claims during the campaign. I know some pundits on either side were frustrated by this bad showing, but I heard not a leader among Democrats say a thing against it certainly not the first black in the White House.
This was, in a way, the tale of two black men: the Conservative Black Man and the Liberal Black Man. It allows a comparison of the behavior of media and the supposed spokespeople for black people -- Democrats and black "liberal" pundits. The way they treat Cain, and other non-leftist thinkers such as Ben Carson, Allen West, Thomas Sowell, Clarence Thomas, is not compatible with their pandering habits toward blacks and other "special label" groups (minorities of whatever kind) in general. Yet, they give extra room to Barack Obama and ninnies such as former New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin (with a federal indictment on corruption charges and soon to be in court for it) and former Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick (convicted to 26 years for his office's bribery practices). Democrats and most of the mainstream media looked the other way in the midst of corruption by these last two fellows, until the story was essentially over.
Ruining the campaign of Herman Cain bolstered the left's authority and dominion over blacks in America. The great majority of our black community, it seems, were fine with it, too. Or, they simply didn't speak out against it. Too many are too happy to resent those who have known success to the extent of cheering even unreasonable attacks on the successful, black or not. Sadly, that's another thing that the rhetoric of the Democrats feeds.
Today's "liberals" (modern American leftists, really, sparsely liberals in any true sense) need some of those who are successful on their side, but can only win elections, as I see it, by pandering to the less-informed unsuccessful with promises of... ease without effort. The rhetoric of Barack Obama, especially during 2008 and since his presidency, have only made this cynical tactic of the Democrats more familiar. Not less. Not less, as Obama pledged the divisiveness would be. (He pledged a lot of things that proved to be nothing, didn't he?)
The minority pandering, low-information voter wholesaling, diversity rejecting (they accept diversity only on their terms, after all), status quo adoring, big government, control-addicted Democrats and their media pledges want to keep minority conservatives down, and that hurts America.
Their habit to passionately reject traditionalist, Constitutionalist, limited government, conservative thinkers, and especially those who think this way who are not old white men, hurt America's ability to get beyond the wrongs of racism and social and economic ruts that plague groups of people, black or not. Democrats claim to be the party of caring. Yet they have been proven to be the party of lies, spying, control, monetary abuse, budgetary disregard, growth in bureaucracy, and intolerance toward individualism.
Democrats and others of such thinking are, intentionally or not, pigeonholing people in certain special groups - race, sexuality, sex, regions, etc. - into easy stereotypes that suit them. In an official way. Everyone deserves the sense of liberty that America was founded upon. That's inconvenient for relativist leftists.
They are convinced it is their duty, as folks such as Barack Obama, Harry Reid, Al Sharpton, prove again and again, to be the spokespeople for these groups, to take from others and give to those groups, to coddle them for the sake of the great statist plan. That's not American. That's utopian. It's absurd. It's anti-American.
Black conservatives have for a long time felt they needed to be quiet because Borg-like neighbors who are long entrenched in the pandering, Democratic race machine would think they were betraying race for their affinity for traditional American ideals. So much misinformation about conservatism persists that it's as if being a conservative was equivalent to being a slave salesman in Africa in the 1700s.
Modern Democrats, this current, bureaucracy-loving, conceited, elitist leadership of theirs, seek a wholesale plan to buy votes to take more and more liberties away from Americans in the name of helping everyone reach an equal playing field, with welfare politics, driving the poor to their side in a cynical effort to hold power by mob, rather than by principle or love of the citizen and the individual. They love the idea of the state being the leader of society in every way, it seems, not the servant of a free people.
People like Herman Cain certainly get in the way of that.
- jR, aka AirFarceOne (Twitter)
Showing posts with label race. Show all posts
Showing posts with label race. Show all posts
While polls find King's 'Dream' is elusive, so are commonsense attitudes about racism
Check out this quote from a recent Pew Research finding on race in America (under the heading King's Dream Remains an Elusive Goal... ). I make a few points in reaction to it, and the circular problem of misusing racism in today's America:
Incarceration. Black men were more than six times as likely as white men in 2010 to be incarcerated in federal and state prisons, and local jails, the last year complete data are available. That is an increase from 1960, when black men were five times as likely as whites to be incarcerated.
SIX TIMES as likely?! Some want to call that racism. They are FOOLS of the highest order. Or, sad, piteous, willing victims of narrow-minded suspicions.
The disparity of prison time for whites versus blacks is about as much to do with race bias as someone being overweight has to do with food being advertised on TV. Not to mock actual racism, but those blame, the victimhood, and the paranoia that surrounds so much allegations of racism. That is: one's weight is about them, not food ads.
With criminal incarceration, it is about people being criminals, not some grand scheme to "keep them down." Racism exists, light and hard, but to run to it every time there's a philosophical or physical scuffle is a cycle of failure. That's not to minimize the matter, when facts prove racism had a hand in some event, but unreasonable aspersions ought not to be batched in with actual racist activities. Paranoia and habitual distrust isn't a reliable source for social change.
Committing crime and going to prison is a problem that cannot be solved through blame, racial or otherwise, but through improving one's plight. That's not easy, or simple, when one is steeped in a culture of victimhood, self-pity, misleading heroes, and a habit of blaming others for your problems. Changing the response of those who cry victim when it's not the case is what will change such a disparity as this prison one, not crazed claims of rampant racism in the courts.
Such lashing out is a cycle of failure, whether it is about racism or any other suspicion of being wronged. There is an understandable lingering sense of betrayal, frustration and anger in impoverished or dysfunctional communities, but that does not prove systemic racism.
How can getting jailed for committing a crime be racist, certainly to such an overwhelming degree, without it being proven as more than a mere suspicion? These claims amount to claims of having seen Bigfoot, though. Sometimes there is racial problems, but often, it's something else. You cannot call someone a racist for jailing a black criminal -- unless they let white criminals go SIX TIMES for every black criminal, for the same crime. Is this happening? Where's the exposés on that today?
Are we to all damn our lying eyes with regard to race and racial biases, or racial hypocrisy? I hope we can recover MLK's dream, but it won't be easy while people insist on pointing the finger, like stabbing their sword at imaginary dragons.
Let freedom ring, indeed. And let REASON reign!
- See the findings and comments by Pew Research: King's Dream Remains an Elusive Goal
- jR, aka AirFarceOne (Twitter)
WOW they are crazy
Chris Matthews is half the fool he was many years ago, and he can only manage the same-minded, and kiss-ups from the NBCs, on his Sunday show, I notice. He is unfunny, yet insists on being "funny" and has his own fawning pals, like some has-been comic who still somehow garners big paychecks. Stunning just how far NBC and MSNBC have plummeted into so much of the one-sided commentary and misleading so-called "journalism".
I guess they THINK they are the anti-Fox News, but that's such a joke, and I despise bias on either side, take it personally that the self-centered liberals ruined (for me) what I had once hoped would be and considered to be my career industry.
Fox News is red with embarrassment for MSNBC, due to how clear their bias is on discussion and commentary shows. Janeane Garofalo was on Olbermann weeks ago, was the most offensive I've caught (on YouTube or somewhere) any of these horrendous soap-box Hollywood liberals ever be in a highly public stage (word gets around about the crazy talk, but this was there on the show itself, not an anecdote). (She was thrashing Tea Parties as being purely, simply full of anti-black racists, that the whole thing was not at all about taxes, gov't spending, or anything, just an excuse for rednecks to be racist in public. Stunning, horrible, offensive, miserably out of her element idiot, she is.)
After that humorless tirade, I eagerly wanted to see her whiney little computer geek character on "24" this season die -- just for some joyous make-believe comeuppance. (I was disappointed.) I'm sure she is dead ... on the inside. Sure seems like it. Certainly, mentally, she's thoroughly contorted.
I don't have cable now, thanks to some tough months, and I don't think I want it back. Just limits me to a few channels and HULU, etc., online, and keeps me away from the moodily pontificating boobs on news programs. I can live with that. Did that while I lived elsewhere, for most of the years. Healthy!
So... Newsweek. Gag! They had that truly lame effort to sell magazines, "We are all Socailists now". It was a nothing article. I read it online. Like a fart in church, and not even a loud one. Har!
TIME is another great example of a pack of fawning roadies doing magazines. I had subscription for a year -- got it sorta free (NWA flight miles were to expire, so we got lots of magazines). I was eager to see it end after all the stupid adoration this year! You;d think it was exaggerating, but I was seeing it in every issue, just about. Amusing, were it not for so many go-along sheep believing what these drunken shepherds tell them to believe.
You should catch, online somewhere, the McLaughlin Group show of this past week, and the way Eleanor Clift of NEWSWEEK was going with both fists in favor of Obama and his apology tour of Arab nations and such. Simply stunning, how cozy it seems so many are in MSM -- with a utopian myopia.
My decision of late is to avoid the news as much as possible. I know what I know, let the loud mouths ruin someone else's day, not mine. Local news, I read some stuff online, and otherwise, the world can rot. For now. I needed a loooong breather from the divisiveness that the election and the economic crisis has brought out. It is too much about amateur pontificating on subjects, rather than interviews with true experts.
Saw rerun of the March 2009 interview with Federal Reserve Bank Chairman Ben Bernanke on 60 Minutes (also can catch that online), which I avoided first time it aired. Was the most plainspoken, fact-involving, emotions involved but not hysterical thing on the economy I've seen in a long, long time. It made sense, and he seemed sincere. Stunning, seeing what he is and what he's up against. For me, with a view from business education and long interest in economic things, it was a very good perspective to hear. He is THE MAN on economic matters, and far more "safe" than blowhards like Obama, etc.
We need more professionals, like Bernanke, and less blowhards, in every walk of life. Especially as essential leaders.
Just some of my thoughts of late.
- jR, aka AirFarceOne (on Twitter)
Majority Whip Clyburn calls stubborn guvs racists for disliking stimulus
Michelle Malkin » Top Democrat accuses anti-stimulus GOP governors of…RAAAAACISM!
Well, Attorney General Eric Holder, here's your conversation about race: House Majority Whip James Clyburn of South Carolina is now accusing GOP governors who have fundamental misgivings about the trillion-dollar stimulus of opposing the law because they don’t like black people.I cannot believe this comment from a high-placed national government leader. It is such a dumb claim, evidence of a mind enshrined in some bitter, unreal viewpoints, that I am stunned of its source. This man was appointed by his peers as a leader among leaders. His comments are more a judgment of his peers and his constituency on its own that I could ever improve on today. Not without a lot of acid pills. One would think this guy was on a school board or county council somewhere, at best. But no, James Clyburn is none other than the House Majority Whip!
Who’s being divisive, Eric Holder? Who’s obsessed with race? Who needs to stop self-segregating and stop spreading race-based poison? Where’s the outrage? Clyburn earlier this year invoked plantation imagery to suggest that S.C. GOP Gov. Mark Sanford’s opposition to earmarks was based on RAAAACISM (another blog post by Malkin referring to black race-baiting leader, quote obtained from it below).
Thanks, Majority Whip. You do justice to the title, though you're more polarizing than I might have imagined. Where do we get the criteria for leadership roles?!! One could say this guy is Trent Lott's reflective opposite, with this bizarre rhetoric! Only worse!! Will he step down? Does he have any HONOR? We will have to stay tuned!
“[H]e happens to be a millionaire,” Clyburn said of Sanford. “He may not need help for the plantation his family owns, but the people whose grandparents and great-grandparents worked those plantations need the help” in the form of federal money.Wrongs were done. They cannot be forgotten. But it is always the case that weak minds offer far out or foul arguments. This is one of those. To inject slavery, racism, and plantation innuendo into this debate is about as high minded as a college course on Family Guy.
- jR
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Why Obama matters to Africans: An observation by a white conservative guy
This is the first such piece I've come across. Good stuff.
Dennis Prager : From Africa With Love - Townhall.com
The election of a man of black African heritage as president of a predominantly white nation, and one that also happens to be the most powerful nation in the world, is taken by blacks the world over to mean that their centuries of suffering under the racist yoke of implied inferiority are coming to an end.
This is especially felt in Africa itself because Africa is largely benighted. Though many African countries have now been independent for nearly half a century, Africa remains particularly poor, particularly corrupt, and particularly violent. Africans, of course, know this, and while Barack Obama’s election will probably do nothing to end African poverty, corruption, or violence, it does seem to mark the end of the era of belief in black inferiority.
Hope. For Africans and their lineage everywhere. That is a good thing. Will it change anything? Who knows. Latin America cannot seem to get past its history of poorly educated masses, generally. Even our close neighbor, Mexico, cannot bring itself to dispose of mass corruption in order to develop further. It is a land where bullies reign and intellects either get killed or go along with the bullies, generally. What of Africa, then? And what else of this fanaticism? Is it due to the color of the skin? The ethnic familiarity? I hope they are happy for good reasons. Period.
What of improvement coming to Africa? Do they simply assume that now the U.S. will throw money at them? I certainly hope not. I hope we throw education and development at them. And push broad Chinese corruption out. In Africa, that is.
- jR
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GOP selects black dude, 'what?' moment courtesy of NY Times
The Mexican-sponsored, conservative-bashing, often deceptively liberal clarion (OK, The Nation and TIME do it as much, so perhaps "clarion" is harsh) publication, the NY Times, continued its jab and run efforts to brazenly distort the ranks and reach of the biggest party for conservatives and political right of America upon the selection of the new Republican Nat'l Committee chairman.
While reporting on the election of the new, -- take a breath in order to state some "obvious," "bigoted" reasons why they did it, lefties -- black (!!!) RNC chairman, they might as well have belabored the fact that the guy is not a black space alien, thus the RNC is still -- as they see it -- the small-minded party of bigots. After all, they took Al Gore from the White House, the bad people.
Republicans Choose First Black Party Chairman - NYTimes.com
From the start, Mr. [Katon] Dawson, while well-liked in the party, was hampered by worries that his selection would reinforce the notion that Republicans are increasingly becoming a Southern regional party.What? The GOP is risking being considered a regional party. Seriously? Notion, huh? Of whom? And barbecue-lovin', drawlin', Democratic Party paragons Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, Al Gore, are what, exactly? Too far into the past, are they? Not sure they would agree.
Is that quote the dumbest sentence in the NY Times for the day? I want to hope so, but I can only guess. It is a poorly written sentence (but since I note it in a hastily written blog, I will only point that out in passing, adding that the NYT piece was not from a blog).
I suppose around the NY Times offices, GOP chairman Michael Steele might be nicknamed Uncle, uhh, Mike, for being in with the slave owners of the GOP, too. Next there'll be a cartoon on their opinion page with Uncle Mike being denied service at the GOP's HQ cafeteria.
The paper also mentioned this, before bothering to go into Steele's win any further:
Mr. Dawson also withdrew from an all-white country club he belonged before he started running for office, a point that was raised by Republicans concerned that it would provide a bad contrast in a year when the country elected its first African-American president.
Now, the fact that there exists clubs that are intentionally (I don't care what they claim, I mean a presumed intent) all-white anywhere is disgusting to me (unless, of course, there are nothing but white people in the general area). But, to me, such clubs simply remind us that there are more white snobs than other types of snobs in the country. I wish they'd spend more time in those clubs, and less time ruining the fight for scraps of the rest of us.
Democrats should really beat this one to death, even though this Dawson dude didn't get the chairmanship. You know there's never, ever been a white Democrat member of an all-white country club, that's simply unimaginable. And never were any of the important members of the Democratic Party ever in any groups such as the Ku Klux Klan, or some all-white frat or anything, or directing hoses to be fired in the direction of blacks, or anything like that. Nope! Never!
Mr. Steele made no mention of his race in his acceptance speech, and members said that was not a major factor in their decision. Nonetheless, it was clearly a force, playing out at a time when the nation has just inaugurated its first black president.The song was a parody, and it actually was a response, meant in humor, to a LA Times article from which that phrase came. But don't confuse anyone with the facts, just poop out propaganda for sucker liberals to step onto -- and walk it around.
In addition to Mr. Duncan’s experience with a white country club, another candidate for candidate — Chip Saltsman of Tennessee — came under fire after distributing a Christmas CD with a song parody entitled, “Barack the Magic Negro.”
As usual, the liberal obsession is with things such as race, sexual interests, and how to ban dodge ball and God from playgrounds. Let's hope at least one knows how to save the world from the bums that hate America. A JFK-type of Democrat. In other words, not a rabid, bellowing liberal.
Ron Brown was the first and only black chairman of the DNC, from 1989 to 1992.
- jR
The super-evil conservatives must die! Nut jobs alive and well on the Internet
Counterpunch.org: George Ciccariello-Maher: By the Time I Get to Arizona
Much has been eclipsed in the post-election euphoria, not least of which is the continuity of racist violence in the United States. The election of Barack Obama notwithstanding, the black population still bears the overwhelming brunt of this violence, in its systematic and informal guises, in prisons and on the streets, and with the far-right gearing up we can expect more of the same. [The far-right, in this instance, is actually the radical fascist far-right, or the Nazis and white supremacists, according to what I found in a link. That's sensible, yup. GW Bush is a Nazi. Uh-huh.] But with new dynamics, political and geopolitical, come new violences, and we have seen in recent years a steady increase in anti-Latino or anti-immigrant violence alongside a notable spike after September 11th in anti-“Arab” violence.Let's forget that 20 full-fledged gang members were picked up in one little raid alone. Foreign, illegal, and trouble. Let's forget that hate crimes are CRIMES. Let's forget that these folks, if committing hate crimes, actually serve time for it. That's inconvenient and rational. Let's forget about rational! Further, in another section of the piece:
Recently-released statistics show violence against Latino immigrants to be the fastest growing of all hate crimes, fuelled by an atmosphere of linguistic-racial hatred and permissiveness to violence against all those deemed to be from “elsewhere.” In a recent report, the Southern Poverty Law Center noted the shocking growth in anti-Latino hate crime, and in early November, an Ecuadorian man was beaten and stabbed to death on Long Island, New York, by a lynch mob of young, mostly white teens looking for some racist fun “hunting beaners,” a game they claim to have played weekly. Less than a month later yet another Ecuadorean was beaten until brain-dead in Brooklyn, this time allegedly by black men who shouted ethnic and homophobic slurs.
Such informal violence has always gone hand-in-hand with the structural violence of the state. ...
In this rising tide of state and informal violence, Arizona has come to be ground zero. There, Lou Dobbs darling “Sheriff Joe” Arpaio of Maricopa County has institutionalized a “Posse” program, deputizing civilians to enforce anti-immigration laws.
Ahem, that would be anti-ILLEGAL immigration. You know: people who are coming over here, flouting our laws, taking SS numbers from dead people -- and the living -- and generally adding to our legal and social problems, not reducing them. Which includes criminal creeps illegally creeping across our borders. Note that there is ABSOLUTELY no concern for the rape, murder and other crimes committed by the truly despicable illegals in thisa, uhhh, thoughtful piece about poor, poor victims of crimes who are in fact also criminals themselves. No, hurting or killing them is not a solution -- DUHH -- but neither is this drivel from the counterpunch'org crackpots. What of deaths of Pakistanis, Indians, for any variety of violent reasons? I guess they specialize in the Hispanic and black victims. It's good to specialize, as one evil whitey showed us with the assemply line (Henry Ford, that was).
This is not here to comment too deeply on it, but simply to note that counterpunch.org goes to lengths to connect conservatives -- and those not interested in a free-for-all society of anarchy -- with radical fascist and hate groups such as the KKK and neo-Nazis.
If you want to read this garbage, go for it. Don't try to claim any rational learning out of it, however. Please note that every time I come across this site I find thoughts that are anarchist, radical socialist, race-baiting, pure prose for preying on those who feel victimized -- especially if they are Hispanic or black. These guys LOVE to bait the illegals and blacks!
Here's one things that makes this especially offensive stuff, in my mind: Tragic and contrary to counterpunch.org's madness, there has been a lot of black folks shooting other black folks in my area. In front of nightclubs, etc. I guess there's some clever reason why that is the conservatives' faults, too. Can't blame that on Ted Kennedy or any other long-serving liberals, huh?!
So, race war, anyone? Yeah, I think counterpunch.org writers have dreams about race wars. They want to be the great white leaders of a black and Hispanic war against non-liberal whitey. So, think for yourself, not according to these kooks. I've yet to read anything on this site that doesn't smack or paranoia, race-baiting, some sort of crude race-rage-inducing victimization fantasy. Half-truths are still half-truths, no matter which side is served. These guys excel at telling a very queer, unsavory, one-sided story.
I figure that sites like it are part of the problem, not interested in a sensible solution. Not interested in a solution at all.
So, watch out for anything and anyone linked however loosely to the nuts at counterpunch.org. Enough said.
- jR
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Race and politics still taboo: NY Times' Friedman wrote this drivel... half-drivel
Isn't it a bit goofy that some crystal-clear white liberal guilt is the predominant reflection of one longtime NY Times columnist's upon Barack Obama's win? The regular NY Times nay-sayers would think not; it is clearly a liberal, politically correct (favoring not the poor white guy, but favoring everyone else except him and the slovenly rich) newspaper despite its other reputation, as a publication for superior journalism.
Thomas L. Friedman leads from some white liberal joy into a commentary on some real (in his mind) reasons for the Obama win. I am amazed at what this guy does not see, based on his insight for what he does see.
Finishing Our Work - NYTimes.com
This moment was necessary, for despite a century of civil rights legislation, judicial interventions and social activism — despite Brown v. Board of Education, Martin Luther King’s I-have-a-dream crusade and the 1964 Civil Rights Act — the Civil War could never truly be said to have ended until America’s white majority actually elected an African-American as president.I guess we ought to thank God, then, that we did not elect a woman, or an Hispanic, Native American, Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, or someone else. Bobby Jindal, don't expect such a big deal should you be elected to a higher office, because you're just a damned Republican, first of all, and second, it's all about the blacks versus the whites here in the good ole US of A!
Let every child and every citizen and every new immigrant know that from this day forward everything really is possible in America.How did Obama pull it off? To be sure, it probably took a once-in-a-century economic crisis to get enough white people to vote for a black man. And to be sure, Obama’s better organization, calm manner, mellifluous speaking style and unthreatening [sic] message of “change” all served him well.
But there also may have been something of a “Buffett effect” that countered the supposed “Bradley effect” — white voters
telling pollsters they’d vote for Obama but then voting for the white guy. The Buffett effect was just the opposite. It was white conservatives telling the guys in the men’s grill at the country club that they were voting for John McCain, but then quietly going into the booth and voting for Obama, even though they knew it would mean higher taxes.
Friedman then noted the following, which I think is accurate, fair enough, and not nearly as myopic as his Obama win comments (that fact says soemthing about his perspective, indeed):
Somewhere they also knew that after the abysmal performance of the Bush team, there had to be consequences for the Republican Party. Electing McCain now would have, in some way, meant rewarding incompetence. It would have made a mockery of accountability in government and unleashed a wave of cynicism in America that would have been deeply corrosive.What I find curious is that he, as everyone seems to, refers to Obama as our first black president. He is, by appearances, our first, indeed. However, Obama's mother and thus half his lineage and half his family is white. Why is this not something to be pointed out, and why do such great writers (though not great thinkers, zing). Is being of mixed race lineage still taboo for the liberals, for crying out loud? Not much to sing about for the white liberals who wish to relieve their racist guilt, then, is there? So where does Friedman fall on the scale of taboos -- pro-mixed race or still afraid of the idea? I suspect he has no issue with mixed race, it's just that liberals like to avoid talking about such things. (It's like seeing something in another's teeth at a Manhattan cocktail party -- best that you say nothing, and love them for the toothy grin they give you, spinach and all. Aw, love them! Take them off my invitation lists! Love them!)
I guess it is a good for a writer to see things through myopic glasses than to suspect the whole gamut of reasons why Obama won, why GOP congressmen lost out, and why people blame a president for all their problems. I would rather contemplate it all, but I guess you can't win Pulitzers if you work that hard.
Troubling.
As for Friedman's piece, be sure to read the last two paragraphs, for the ideas within them. He could have left all the other crap out of it.
I hope we see a new age of public service in the vein of what I saw in Israel. Americans, college-educated or not, around me in my little depressing world are quite selfish little turds. In Israel, they would be the ones getting low-end jobs, or scared shitless in the required military service, prompting change in their attitude. We could use a little scared-shitless in our youths these days that doesn't involve video games or misused firearms.
- jR
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What is today's liberalism?
What's wrong with liberal ideals? Part I
I consider myself a center-right conservative. I think that there is nothing wrong with certain liberal ideals. It is the outlandish, no-holds-barred "rights" and government funding and taxing that I have a problem with. Some so-called issues promoted by liberals extended to the absurd, offensive, amoral, fascist, one-party demagogic, and irrational, in my lifetime (I am around 40 yo). The issues were even more absurd just prior to my birth, in the 1960s. Civil rights is one thing, walking around naked, having sex with anyone and using drugs freely and openly (like pot, acid, etc.) was beyond idiotic.
Naturally, the same adjectives can be placed on some conservative ideas. However, renaming French fries as "freedom fries" was a goofy reaction to something that offended someone and it wasn't combative; calling nearly all whites racist, simply because they are the majority skin color and facial features in this country, is extreme and offensive. These two have been in the common dialog in recent years.
As an example of going liberally overboard, a guy who maintains a solid status among liberals despite his hate-filled agenda, Spike Lee seems to have in him a belief that non-liberal whites - especially George Bush and any aligned conservatives - hate poor black people. Or at least they hate all poor black people who are living in New Orleans, LA. Yet this guy is a champion of cinema (deserved, artistically) and is somehow an example of someone who stands up for civil rights (undeserved, for his irrational and paranoid viewpoint). Ignoring the truth that Hurricane Katrina was a one-in-400 storm seems awfully convenient, and his avoiding an outright damning as well of the Democratic operators of the city and the state pours gas on a fire of political bias. It is agenda over truth that Lee chose to favor in his movie about Katrina. It's sad. I would say it is pathetic, but Spike Lee knows what he is doing. Hardly pathetic - more like divisive.
I suspect one problem is that some people who are socialist or Marxist stumble into the liberal camp and they are welcomed to stay. If that's the liberal, or the Democratic Party, idea of inclusiveness -- welcoming bizarre, ineffective or dangerous ideologies -- then liberals will hopefully never succeed in becoming a long-term dominant force on America. That, or we will lose our position as a capitalist, freedom-loving society. It is simple. If Bill Maher represents your ideas, you are unsavory and never going to gain traction with self-respecting, self-motivated people. Perhaps such people are the minority in America now. I suspect that spoiled celebrities such as Maher, Larry King, and Al Franken are among the minority, though.
The Republican Party, or conservatives, are generally not interested in extreme right ideas, such as white supremacy, racial inequality, racial separatism, or any kind of fundamentalism. There was a time when a conservative would not be deeply troubled by liberal views. There was a time when the great dividing line was tradition and economics, not social issues. As such, calling rabid KKK members conservatives misses the point, just as immediately pairing fascists or socialists with liberals. Ideas such as racial equality are liberal; pay equity for women; non-prejudice against blacks, Latinos, Asians, women, homosexuals, and the disabled. If these are liberal ideals, then I am a liberal. But I am not a liberal. How so? Because I do not agree with the extremes brought about by those whose ideas are today considered liberal. And I am conservative where economics comes in.
For instance, FDR was a liberal - he'd gag at some of the obsessions of liberals today, I suspect. Woodrow Wilson was liberal. JFK was an old fashioned liberal, and he got us into Vietnam (much as his many worshipers want us to forget that).
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Obama: America's destiny? More like America's folly, considering this
Blogging the election
Barack Obama might as well have called John McCain a “Nigga Hating Cracker”… : P.U.M.A
What's so ironic, to stray, is that the Dems are using racist tactics -- yes, they are! -- along with the press, to make America feel "bad" if we don't elect Obama. So, I say, if he gets elected, we're simply all idiots, not just half of us. OK, maybe that's a bit harsh. CNN is mostly idiots, and MSNBC - why doesn't it just rebardge itself, fire Joe Scarborough, and call itself "LibTV"? Can't blame the electorate for believing what the liars tell them, I guess.
I hope they know what they are creating by using race in this election like it had been used in the O.J. Simpson murder trial. What is Obama loses? What will happen then? Who would be to blame then?
Shame on America for turning a professional candidate into a false prophet.
Thanks for this, "Woman_in_Virginia" at the PUMA08 site. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3hSnEMV58F8
Barack Obama might as well have called John McCain a “Nigga Hating Cracker”… : P.U.M.A
Ever since Spike Lee’s Malcolm X was released, two words entered the popular lexicon of racial intolerance, those words are “hoodwinked” and “bamboozled” .This comes from a blog that is by a black guy. Not that that amazes me, but frankly, race is being used against white people in general, simply because the Democrats have a black guy running for president. So the tenor of this, I would have actually freaked if it were a white dude.
In isolation they might be innocent, however when a black man says a white man is “hoodwinking” and “bamboozling” black people, he might as well be saying that the person he is referring to is a “nigga hating cracker” . Taking it to its logical conclusion, same can be said about the supporters of that person (gosh darn it, I guess that makes me an Uncle Tom).
Either way, for reasons best known to Obama, this [hit link, read, watch video] is the second time in this campaign he has used exactly this phraseology while giving a speech geared to a predominantly black audience. The first time he did was in South Carolina when he was referring to Bill Clinton. Afterwards, Bill went from being the first black President to a racist demagogue as far as the black community was concerned. Now in Philadelphia, he has chosen to do the same against John McCain.
From his utterances it seems till there is a race war, Obama would not be satisfied. Why he would channel Malcolm X at the height of his militancy against a GOP that already has to contend with (false) accusations of racism is beyond me, but as stated earlier, Obama is willing to destroy the country to win an election.
What's so ironic, to stray, is that the Dems are using racist tactics -- yes, they are! -- along with the press, to make America feel "bad" if we don't elect Obama. So, I say, if he gets elected, we're simply all idiots, not just half of us. OK, maybe that's a bit harsh. CNN is mostly idiots, and MSNBC - why doesn't it just rebardge itself, fire Joe Scarborough, and call itself "LibTV"? Can't blame the electorate for believing what the liars tell them, I guess.
I hope they know what they are creating by using race in this election like it had been used in the O.J. Simpson murder trial. What is Obama loses? What will happen then? Who would be to blame then?
Shame on America for turning a professional candidate into a false prophet.
Thanks for this, "Woman_in_Virginia" at the PUMA08 site. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3hSnEMV58F8
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McCain addresses CPAC, and I got to thinking
McCain is not too old, Obama is not too Black (or not Black enough), and Hillary Clinton is not too female.
Welcome to the 21st Century, when Black people, women and old men can actually do things the rest of us can do. (What about Huckabee? C'mon -- see note at bottom.)
Now that that's out of the way, here's some of what I think -- not that you asked.
Here's a few of McCain's words, from comments to a conservative group:
Note: If you think Huckabee can win it, you live in a different country than me. Reality is knocking, and Divisiveness is not standing next to him. McCain just whipped Divisiveness' butt, around the corner, and old dirty "D" is running to Rush Limbaugh's house to have an emotional breakdown with Ann Coulter on Rush's couch. (Mind you, Huckabee is no friend of Divisiveness, but he is not going to be president. Not this time around.)
You have heard me say before that, for all my reputation as a maverick, I have only found true happiness in serving a cause greater than my self-interest. For me, that cause has always been our country, and the ideals that have made us great. I have been her imperfect servant for many years, and I have made many mistakes. You can attest to that, but need not. For I know them well myself.
McCain also has a strength of character and wealth of experiences that make is all too much more capable than the other contenders. Like him or not, personally, this is the case. Propaganda will contort that, but it is why he became so popular since the 2000 election.
WHO'S SCARY AND WHO IS NOT
What we need to be concerned with, from here on out, is the differences between the people running for the White House. Who is a Commander-in-Chief? Who is able to think for themselves without alienating a majority of people? Who will work with the other side of the aisle (and has proven, both right and wrong, to be able to do so).
Why did Hillary Clinton
chose to move to a state in which she never before lived, to run for a high office from that state when she had never before held a high (elected) public office? Why is it she did not choose to lead from a seat won in Arkansas, or in her home state of Illinois? Certainly I am not the only one that has trouble with that! Clinton chooses, of all places, New York State -- the Land of the Elitists. Creepy!
chose to move to a state in which she never before lived, to run for a high office from that state when she had never before held a high (elected) public office? Why is it she did not choose to lead from a seat won in Arkansas, or in her home state of Illinois? Certainly I am not the only one that has trouble with that! Clinton chooses, of all places, New York State -- the Land of the Elitists. Creepy!
Whose approach in this campaign smacks of the right to be president more than the desire to serve the country? Not McCain's.
As an independent-minded, registered Republican, I ask you: which candidate's campaign reminds you of the "establishment" that was quietly apparent as GW Bush ran for the office? I think it is Clinton whose interests we should be wary of. Hers is far more a candidacy of expectant, dynastic ascent than the McCain campaign. Now, I do not expect everyone to agree with me on that, naturally. I just would rather express my feelings about it and have you react (or simply bristle in disgust) than leave it be.
I like Barack Obama, but he has not matured enough, and I am not ready for someone so young as president. He will serve honorably in the senate, but he is no JFK (which is both to his credit and to his discredit, for a variety of reasons). The presidency, of course, is not just one man's job, but a whole administration, with a White House staff, a Cabinet, directors of
this and that, etc. Still, I do not see Obama as ready for it.
this and that, etc. Still, I do not see Obama as ready for it.
I am far more ready for a true war hero who suffered and yet still dedicated his life to serving, to be president. Right now, I think that is EXACTLY what this country needs. I cannot write this with a straight face, but: McCain should have won in 2000 (I can hear the groans, and the comments that Gore did win... enough).
TODAY, TOMORROW, NOVEMBER
George W Bush will not go down as the worst president in our history. He will not go down in history as the leader-hero who brought us all together after the tragedy of September 11, though. History remembers Franklin Roosevelt after Pearl Harbor and into WW II as the great leader who brought us to war and did not provoke us into strangling each other, and our allies, in the midst of it.
Perhaps it is unfair and even (in some opinions) ridiculous to suggest it, but Bush seems to have been granted permission to be president by the establishment, the movers and shakers his father has been so deeply involved with. G W Bush had the backing of the big political machine some have mistakenly called Destiny.
I think we have had two mediocre presidents for the past 16 years. I don't despise either one of the men, as they both have their good qualities. As presidents, though, they were not exactly doing the business of the people the way I would expect it to be done. If those presidencies were movies, I wouldn't even rent the DVDs -- I might sit through them once they made it to TV. (I would have fast-forwarded through the Lewinsky thing and quite a few other stupid parts!)
SEE IT IN THEATERS, OR WAIT FOR THE DVD?
McCain is known for his efforts to work on change that brings politics down to street level: fighting for campaign finance, against budget and legislative "pork", and more. Perfect? Hardly! Untested? Of course he's tested -- he's been in the wide public eye for at least a decade! Able to lead? Of course!
McCain may not be Lincoln, or JFK, or Reagan, or Roosevelt, or Truman. But he won't be as frighteningly untried as Obama or as unbelievable and divisive as Clinton (Ms. Clinton). It is not unreasonable to suggest that some conservatives actually hate McCain. That is not just politics talking, that is some kind of eery intolerance. I would rather ally myself with McCain than hateful, spiteful, myopic people, thanks. I think it showed great decency and reason for GW Bush to push recently
for wide (far-right conservative) support of McCain, as McCain has been as supportive as he could be of Bush for eight years. That's part of GW's good side.
for wide (far-right conservative) support of McCain, as McCain has been as supportive as he could be of Bush for eight years. That's part of GW's good side.
I believe McCain will serve us as a president we can respect, and one that other nations will respect. Isn't that the optimal necessity? We can beat on out Congress all day about local issues -- we need a president who will assure other nations can respect us again.
McCain can be president. We can make sure by assuring that voters are going their thing in November.
Did you know that Democratic voters, so far in the primary and caucus votes, are far outweighing Republicans, in voting numbers? John McCain is not going to win by turning Dems and Independents alone. People need to VOTE for the best person to win.
Feel free to pass this rant along. To people you like, or to people you don't like. Either way, or both!
Or, at least, remind those who care about this country's fate that voting actually does count and maybe they should do it in November.
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