April 12, 2005
Don't buy the Propaganda
The Godless Commie Hellhole know as Cuba has a lower infant mortality rate than the USA. (185th and 187th, respectively) This isn't according to some random leftist like me, but the CIA World Factbook. Generally rather reputable, it is. I don't care for Castro's politics one whit, but socialized medicare works. Given that Cuba's per capita GDP is about 1/13 of the USA, that it's medical care is about up with the USA, you have to realize something about how forked up Free-Market Medical Care in the United States is. Need a bit more proof, check out this. Nice liberal European democracies, wipe the floor with us in terms of healthcare. Next time you hear some drone whining on and on about the horrors of Canadian Healthcare, remember that they are the ones foolish enough to have an effective Medical system for anyone who isn't uber-rich (the Canadians, not the Drones). What is really sad is how much the very people who would benefit from a more equitable system are the ones who really accept the brainwashing.
November 09, 2004
The Democrats can win Kansas
These northern elites in the Democratic Party and in the media just don't get it. They cast Kansas off as a lost cause. But here in Kansas we have a popular Democratic governor. In 1991 the Democratic Party controlled the Kansas congress. Why is it that on a statewide race a Democrat can get more then 50% but Kerry looses 62.2% to 36.5%? Because that Governor Kathleene Sebelius ran on three things only: Education, Healthcare and Jobs. ECONOMIC ISSUES. See, you have to shut the hell up about social issues such as god, gays, guns and abortion, because that's what divides people here. But everyone needs a job, everyone needs healthcare and everyone here supports education. Many people assume Kansas is just packed with partisan Republicans. How is it that 70% of Kansans strongly support education funding, yet the BOE can ban evolution and Susan Wagle can get reelected on a platfrom of shutting down all of KU because of the content of their sex ed class? Because politics isn't as important or as divisive here as it is in Massachussets. It's not that people are either partisan pro-choice Democrats or partisan anti-labor Republicans in the midwest. People can consider themselves pro-education, but when Republican politicians shift the focus to moral issues, that moral value can trump a progressive value. There are actually three parties in Kansas, the Democrats, the moderate wing of the Republican party, and the growing religious right-wing of the Republican party. The latter with the backing of lots of pro-life money is now going after the moderates that had been in control for a long time of the Republican party.
All people want to be united behind something, and for people here in Kansas religious fundamentalism unites us more than common political progressive values that would also unite us would the Democrats ever stop electing elite intellectual liberal multimillionaire like Kerry who married into more mony than anyof us have here and inherited more drug money than any of us have here.
The Democratic Party is full of old, out of touch rich guys who get elected to the Senate and stay there forever. We need to change this because who is electable is whoever can connect with voters, not whoever is most established in the party. Those who argued that John Kerry was the right pick because he was the most "electable" are retarded. Whoever we decide is our candidate is electable, and then we only have to reach out to extra voters with charisma from there. We need progressive down-to-earth people to take over the Democratic party, indeed, to SAVE to Democratic party.
It is not all Kerry's fault however. Kerry didn't get media exposure beyond two minute answers and 30 second jabs at Bush. I saw the mainstream media cover one of his speeches and he was very charismatic and witty. Unfotunately, they cut back to discussion when he started talking about the issues, because heaven forbid, the voters vote on the issues instead of moral values.
Also the nature of social stratification and the rich being so rich right now makes it hard to get anybody that is in touch with the American people from either party. Aynone who has political power has gotten so by rigorously conforming to the nature of our elite political structure.
There were two ways to frame this election: either with a progressive outlook or a moralist outlook. Kerry shunned his liberl record and tried to convince voters from a moralist perspective that he was the better candidate. He didn't use Clinton's masterful approach by saying that both parties are full of good people, but they have two completely different ways of approaching the issues and here is why my approach is better. No, he didn't lay out the issues and show his his way of thinking and approach works better for solving the problems America faces and will take up into a better America instead of into a regressive America full of nepotism, fear and lies. Instead, Kerry said that he can fight a better War of Terror. That he agrees with Bush on foreign policy, but by simply changing leaders our allies will respect us more and come help us because John Kerry is smarter than Bush. A moralist approach hails the myth of the American rugged individualist and believes that the best a country can do is get a competent, strong-willed leader to get things down and stand up to evil and corruption. Kerry tried to appeal to this and simply posed himself as the better, stronger, more hopeful, smarter candidate. That is not enough!
The fallacy of this approach is that it assumes people are either moralists or progressives. Places like Kansas (and other midwest states like Minnesota and Texas) used to be dominated by progressive Christian leaders. There is still a religious left in America and the Democrats are killing it by abondoning progressive values. When people are thinking from a moralist outlook they aren't being as rational as we want them to. But these same people can think from a progressive outlook if you focus on getting people to vote in their best economic interests, and not on moral values. Remember: everyone needs healthcare, everyone needs a job, and everyone needs education. These values unite people.
We have to focus on these values long-term, at every juncture, in every race. Once we have taken back over the House, Senate, White House and Supreme Court, the social issues such as gay rights, and abortion can come naturally because they are decided by the courts, not so much by legislators. Furthermore, those issues will be won out because people will be voting and thinking rationally and progressively instead of voting on sigle issue moral choices and justifying a moralist approach by seeing two rich powerful guys running against each other. Also, Republicans won't be able to Jerrymander half the states to give them near permanent power for the ten years between every census. Since we have failed to unite people and get them to vote in their own best economic interests, the court will fall further into the hands of the Republicans and the Democrats have lost their social and economic agenda.
How do we do this? People have a fundamental need to coopeate and find identity in a community. Fundamentalist evangelism provides this for them. We need a simple campign focus that will tear through barriers and unite people as evangelism does. Investing in renewable energy sources is an issue that is in Kansas' best economic interest because Kansas is the ideal place to put lots of those new expensive energy windmills and harness the power of our great flatness! This would bring lots of money to Kansas for building them, create high-paying jobs, and then produce revenues from energy harvested. Everyone in Kansas is feeling the high price of gas and our home energy bills have been increasing like you wouldn't believe as well.
It's puzzling to many how 70% of people in the United States can say that they want less money to go to welfare, but 70% of people also say that more money should be given to help the poor. It's because people aren't just one thing or another. We aren't either progressives or moralists, most people in Kansas are both and if we focus on issues that have the potential to unite everyone, instead of issues in which we can coast by with 50% of the vote we will grow stronger and stronger every year. When it comes down to it Kansans fund a quality education system and fully fund their roads system. But when an issue is framed in terms of a moral debate, such as the BOE evolution or the KU sex ed. issues, moral issues will trump that. We have to make sure we are focusing on issues that unite people so that they vote in their best economic interests so that wealthy Republicans can't keep destroying the United States by shifting the focus of the elections voting on moral issues because it happens to help them to continue to prop up their business interests over the interests of the American people.
All people want to be united behind something, and for people here in Kansas religious fundamentalism unites us more than common political progressive values that would also unite us would the Democrats ever stop electing elite intellectual liberal multimillionaire like Kerry who married into more mony than anyof us have here and inherited more drug money than any of us have here.
The Democratic Party is full of old, out of touch rich guys who get elected to the Senate and stay there forever. We need to change this because who is electable is whoever can connect with voters, not whoever is most established in the party. Those who argued that John Kerry was the right pick because he was the most "electable" are retarded. Whoever we decide is our candidate is electable, and then we only have to reach out to extra voters with charisma from there. We need progressive down-to-earth people to take over the Democratic party, indeed, to SAVE to Democratic party.
It is not all Kerry's fault however. Kerry didn't get media exposure beyond two minute answers and 30 second jabs at Bush. I saw the mainstream media cover one of his speeches and he was very charismatic and witty. Unfotunately, they cut back to discussion when he started talking about the issues, because heaven forbid, the voters vote on the issues instead of moral values.
Also the nature of social stratification and the rich being so rich right now makes it hard to get anybody that is in touch with the American people from either party. Aynone who has political power has gotten so by rigorously conforming to the nature of our elite political structure.
There were two ways to frame this election: either with a progressive outlook or a moralist outlook. Kerry shunned his liberl record and tried to convince voters from a moralist perspective that he was the better candidate. He didn't use Clinton's masterful approach by saying that both parties are full of good people, but they have two completely different ways of approaching the issues and here is why my approach is better. No, he didn't lay out the issues and show his his way of thinking and approach works better for solving the problems America faces and will take up into a better America instead of into a regressive America full of nepotism, fear and lies. Instead, Kerry said that he can fight a better War of Terror. That he agrees with Bush on foreign policy, but by simply changing leaders our allies will respect us more and come help us because John Kerry is smarter than Bush. A moralist approach hails the myth of the American rugged individualist and believes that the best a country can do is get a competent, strong-willed leader to get things down and stand up to evil and corruption. Kerry tried to appeal to this and simply posed himself as the better, stronger, more hopeful, smarter candidate. That is not enough!
The fallacy of this approach is that it assumes people are either moralists or progressives. Places like Kansas (and other midwest states like Minnesota and Texas) used to be dominated by progressive Christian leaders. There is still a religious left in America and the Democrats are killing it by abondoning progressive values. When people are thinking from a moralist outlook they aren't being as rational as we want them to. But these same people can think from a progressive outlook if you focus on getting people to vote in their best economic interests, and not on moral values. Remember: everyone needs healthcare, everyone needs a job, and everyone needs education. These values unite people.
We have to focus on these values long-term, at every juncture, in every race. Once we have taken back over the House, Senate, White House and Supreme Court, the social issues such as gay rights, and abortion can come naturally because they are decided by the courts, not so much by legislators. Furthermore, those issues will be won out because people will be voting and thinking rationally and progressively instead of voting on sigle issue moral choices and justifying a moralist approach by seeing two rich powerful guys running against each other. Also, Republicans won't be able to Jerrymander half the states to give them near permanent power for the ten years between every census. Since we have failed to unite people and get them to vote in their own best economic interests, the court will fall further into the hands of the Republicans and the Democrats have lost their social and economic agenda.
How do we do this? People have a fundamental need to coopeate and find identity in a community. Fundamentalist evangelism provides this for them. We need a simple campign focus that will tear through barriers and unite people as evangelism does. Investing in renewable energy sources is an issue that is in Kansas' best economic interest because Kansas is the ideal place to put lots of those new expensive energy windmills and harness the power of our great flatness! This would bring lots of money to Kansas for building them, create high-paying jobs, and then produce revenues from energy harvested. Everyone in Kansas is feeling the high price of gas and our home energy bills have been increasing like you wouldn't believe as well.
It's puzzling to many how 70% of people in the United States can say that they want less money to go to welfare, but 70% of people also say that more money should be given to help the poor. It's because people aren't just one thing or another. We aren't either progressives or moralists, most people in Kansas are both and if we focus on issues that have the potential to unite everyone, instead of issues in which we can coast by with 50% of the vote we will grow stronger and stronger every year. When it comes down to it Kansans fund a quality education system and fully fund their roads system. But when an issue is framed in terms of a moral debate, such as the BOE evolution or the KU sex ed. issues, moral issues will trump that. We have to make sure we are focusing on issues that unite people so that they vote in their best economic interests so that wealthy Republicans can't keep destroying the United States by shifting the focus of the elections voting on moral issues because it happens to help them to continue to prop up their business interests over the interests of the American people.
August 14, 2004
I couldn't have said it better myself. Article by Richard Reeves.
WHY ARE WE IN NAJAF?
Fri Aug 13,12:03 AM ET
Op/Ed - Richard Reeves
By Richard Reeves
SAG HARBOR, N.Y. -- Sen. John Kerry (news - web sites) has not been successful so far in articulating answers to questions about whether and how the United States should go to war. But he will be guided by this draft of military application policy:
"The United States should not commit its forces to military action overseas unless the cause is vital to our national interest. If the decision is made to commit its forces to combat abroad, it must be done with clear intent and support to win. There must be clearly defined and realistic objectives. There must be reasonable assurance that the cause we are fighting for will have the support of the American people and Congress. Our troops should be committed to combat abroad only as a last resort, when no other choice is available."
The author of those words, slightly paraphrased here, is not working in the Kerry campaign. Those are the words of President Ronald Reagan (news - web sites), condensing the thoughts of his secretary of defense, Caspar Weinberger, whose original version, part of a speech he made in late 1984, included the phrase "or of our allies" after "vital to our national interest."
So what are we doing in Najaf? Is killing the followers of a nasty Shiite preacher, killing them at the gates of the most holy shrine of Shiite Muslims all over the world, vital to the national interests of the United States and its allies?
And why is it that we are killing Shiites, the wretched of the earth in the secular Sunni Muslim country of Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)? That is the same Saddam who murdered the father of the preacher five years ago. Was that our clear intent and realistic objective in invading Iraq (news - web sites)?
Would the American people and Congress -- and our allies -- have supported a $200 billion war to get preacher Muqtada al-Sadr?
And was invasion our last resort? Even the war-maker himself, President George W. Bush (news - web sites), never claimed that. In the beginning, he said, it was the last resort because the United Nations (news - web sites) had not found weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. When there were no such weapons, he said Saddam was a very bad guy. That was true -- and it was true 20 years ago when we were supplying him with weapons to use against Iran. But was he a great enough threat to go to war ourselves? Was killing Iraqis after the war our last resort?
"I know what I'm doing when it comes to winning this war," said Bush last Wednesday on the campaign trail in Albuquerque. That's good to hear. What exactly are you doing in Najaf? Killing bad guys, I guess. If that is the criteria for putting the Marines around the shrine of the Imam Ali, then we will be at war forever, everywhere.
Reagan, no "girly-man" he, began thinking hard, and differently, about sending young men and women into harm's way after 241 U.S. Marines on a peacekeeping mission to Lebanon were killed by a truck-bomber who crashed into their barracks near the Beirut Airport in October 1983. (Fifty-eight French soldiers were killed in a simultaneous blast.) Seven years later in his autobiography, he wrote:
"Perhaps we didn't appreciate fully enough the depth of the hatred and complexity of the problems that made the Middle East such a jungle. Perhaps the idea of a suicide car bomber committing mass murder to gain instant entry to Paradise was so foreign to our own values and consciousness that it did not create in us the concern for the Marines' safety that it should have."
Reagan pulled the Marines out five months later, saying: "In the weeks immediately after the bombing, I believed the last thing we should do was turn tail and leave. ... Yet the irrationality of Middle Eastern politics forced us to rethink our policy there."
It was then that Reagan wrote his list of policies regarding use of the military and concluded with this: "I would recommend it to future presidents."
August 09, 2004
Powerful RNC Video about Kerry
The RNC/Bush team have released this 12 minute video showing clips of Kerry speaking about Iraq.
This is powerful stuff that will not only ring true with republicans that eat this Kerry Flip-Flop stuff right up, but also Democrats, most of whom oppose(d) the war and want a strong candidate that will (did) too.
This is a preview of what the RNC in New York will foucs on, Kerry's Senate record.
Heh, I hate to say this but I was right. I looked at Kerry's Senate record and knew it wouldn't fly quite so well in the general election and that a person without a long Senate voting record is always a better bet. Oh well, Kerry's not my man, but he certainly will need to respond to the video and maybe we can help him do that.
They really did some cheap editing with this video. Several times, if not more than half of the time, Kerry's sentences are cut off in the middle, and the viewer has no idea what his point is. For several quotes in the video, audio and visual are not provided, they just past some crap up there and expect the American public to believe what they say. At one point there is a quote from Kerry and then a written quote which tries to use an ellipse to splice together two sentences which were not originally together.
Nonetheless, powerful propaganda.
This is powerful stuff that will not only ring true with republicans that eat this Kerry Flip-Flop stuff right up, but also Democrats, most of whom oppose(d) the war and want a strong candidate that will (did) too.
This is a preview of what the RNC in New York will foucs on, Kerry's Senate record.
Heh, I hate to say this but I was right. I looked at Kerry's Senate record and knew it wouldn't fly quite so well in the general election and that a person without a long Senate voting record is always a better bet. Oh well, Kerry's not my man, but he certainly will need to respond to the video and maybe we can help him do that.
They really did some cheap editing with this video. Several times, if not more than half of the time, Kerry's sentences are cut off in the middle, and the viewer has no idea what his point is. For several quotes in the video, audio and visual are not provided, they just past some crap up there and expect the American public to believe what they say. At one point there is a quote from Kerry and then a written quote which tries to use an ellipse to splice together two sentences which were not originally together.
Nonetheless, powerful propaganda.
What Republicans Really Stand for
I dunno whether I despise the Ivy-League educated elitist moderate pro-business Republicans like Bush that run the party and simply pander to the Religious Right, or the Religious Right that actually gets out the vote for them.
But today I want to focus of the radical right with three great examples...
James Hart Is running in for the U.S. House of Representatives in Tennesee on a Eugenics platform. According to James, low IQ based on genes is the cause of poverty and urban decay, thus eugenics is needed.
As someone who has spent a decent amount of time, both academicly and individually, studying genetics I can say that he is probably off on the whole Eugenics thing though. This social darwinist that he worships wrote on a false pretense that natural selection was a brutal process of competition and killing. From what we know now, we know that environmental changes have more to do with natural selection than brute killing, and that COOPERATION is and has been at least as important a part as the brutal competition 'survival of the fittest' notion of the early 1900s. Btw, in 1919 the Supreme Court upheld South Carolina's right to use Eugenics and the ruling still stands. The Eugenics movement started not in Nazi Germany, but in America.
What is facinating about this guy though is that he is right-on as far as the economic issues go: NAFTA, Jobs, Tax Cuts, Social Security, and Worker's Rights.
Susan Wagle: There is now a war between the religious radical right of the Republican Party of Kansas and the ruling-class pro-business corrupt branch of the Republican Party. The religious right has oulled into the lead. This week republican moderate and Wichita Mayor for over 20 years, was defeated in a primary by Susan Wagle. Now Susan tried to pull all funding to the University of Kansas because she didn't approve of the content of their sex education class. It was really quite embarrassing. What's even worse is that she not only stands by her bill that would have ruined KU, but she is making it a centerpeice of her re-eleciton and fundraising efforts. Susan beat Knight for a Kansas State Senate seat in my city 64% to 36%.
There is also a guy running on an anti-evolution platform. We fought not to re-elect two of the State Board of Education members who made Kanss that laughingstock of the nation with their anti-evolution campiagn a while back. Well, the far right's moneymakers are back and putting up candidates.
The Religious Right will seriously vote for anyone!
But today I want to focus of the radical right with three great examples...
James Hart Is running in for the U.S. House of Representatives in Tennesee on a Eugenics platform. According to James, low IQ based on genes is the cause of poverty and urban decay, thus eugenics is needed.
As someone who has spent a decent amount of time, both academicly and individually, studying genetics I can say that he is probably off on the whole Eugenics thing though. This social darwinist that he worships wrote on a false pretense that natural selection was a brutal process of competition and killing. From what we know now, we know that environmental changes have more to do with natural selection than brute killing, and that COOPERATION is and has been at least as important a part as the brutal competition 'survival of the fittest' notion of the early 1900s. Btw, in 1919 the Supreme Court upheld South Carolina's right to use Eugenics and the ruling still stands. The Eugenics movement started not in Nazi Germany, but in America.
What is facinating about this guy though is that he is right-on as far as the economic issues go: NAFTA, Jobs, Tax Cuts, Social Security, and Worker's Rights.
Susan Wagle: There is now a war between the religious radical right of the Republican Party of Kansas and the ruling-class pro-business corrupt branch of the Republican Party. The religious right has oulled into the lead. This week republican moderate and Wichita Mayor for over 20 years, was defeated in a primary by Susan Wagle. Now Susan tried to pull all funding to the University of Kansas because she didn't approve of the content of their sex education class. It was really quite embarrassing. What's even worse is that she not only stands by her bill that would have ruined KU, but she is making it a centerpeice of her re-eleciton and fundraising efforts. Susan beat Knight for a Kansas State Senate seat in my city 64% to 36%.
There is also a guy running on an anti-evolution platform. We fought not to re-elect two of the State Board of Education members who made Kanss that laughingstock of the nation with their anti-evolution campiagn a while back. Well, the far right's moneymakers are back and putting up candidates.
The Religious Right will seriously vote for anyone!
August 05, 2004
How does this moron not choke on his own food... Oh wait, he does.
Today Bush said, "Our enemies are Innovative and resourceful and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we."
Audioclip available here.
This guy is not qualified and doesn't deserve to be President.
Why wait until November, impeach this imbecile now!
Long Live 'The Pretzel'
Audioclip available here.
This guy is not qualified and doesn't deserve to be President.
Why wait until November, impeach this imbecile now!
Long Live 'The Pretzel'
August 04, 2004
Republican National Convention Platform
I have received an exclusive peak at the 2004 RNC platform. It goes as follows:
Freedom through conformity
Sadam is Osama
God is Country
Ignorance is power
Shalt not kill is shalt not murder
Supporting troops is shutting up
More deaths is more security
Five Votes is Democracy
Left is Wrong
Right is Left
Country is God
Life is Death
Black and White
Us and Them
Up is down
Ignorance is Strength
Freedom is Slavery
War is Peace
Obey
Freedom through conformity
Sadam is Osama
God is Country
Ignorance is power
Shalt not kill is shalt not murder
Supporting troops is shutting up
More deaths is more security
Five Votes is Democracy
Left is Wrong
Right is Left
Country is God
Life is Death
Black and White
Us and Them
Up is down
Ignorance is Strength
Freedom is Slavery
War is Peace
Obey
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