Tag: Politics

Keith Olbermann recently came the closest he has ever come to saying something intelligent since he stopped annoying me on Sports Center. While he touches on a viable solution the road he took to get there was wrong. He says we should leave Afghanistan and bring the boys home.

We have been in Afghanistan for around 8 years now and what do we have to show for it? Not much. The heroin trade is still thriving, the terrorists keep coming, our guys keep dying and we do not have Osama bin Laden’s head. The sacrifice of our soldiers over there has not been for naught though. Many key terrorists have been captured or killed and the fight was taken to their doorstep instead of in the homeland. But as we sit now it is just a bad position to put our troops in. We should unleash their full power and obliterate the enemy from off the map or we should bring them home. Since we are now bringing Navy SEALs in for court martial because one of their prisoners had a fat lip it might be safe to say that they are being hampered from using their full force. In this case we should pull them home. To say that we need the country to be stable and the people to be free before we leave is a nice dream but will not happen. The founders of our country had a concern that the people of this country might not be “fit for liberty”. I propose that most people in the middle east are not fit for liberty and have need of masters. They are too far in vices, ignorance, anger and hatred to be fit for self government. Until the people who are fit can grow in numbers and overtake those who are not, there will never be a free and non-corrupt government over there and we should check ourselves in those areas too, of course.

Where Olbermann goes astray, this time, is in his insistence that the generals and the pentagon want the war because it is good for their business. He even goes so far as to say that it makes the generals “happy” when their soldiers “suffer”. While the military industrial complex can be a huge problem, I do not believe that generals are “happy” when service men and women are harmed or in danger. He makes a decent point about credibility after the disgusting Tillman debacle, although he is attacking McChrystal and it is not fully clear to me who is to blame for the lies about Pat Tillman. Then he makes the very accurate connection between what happened to the Soviet Union in Afghanistan before their collapse and the U.S. today. He also gives us the obligatory attack of Sarah Palin, which is very blatantly out of place and obviously in there only because he wanted yet another jab at someone he hates. You don’t have to subject yourselves to the torture of watching this video but here it is:

There were some other things that Olby said that amused me. First off, he said that Obama was greeted by a “Three Mile Island of an economy”. Three mile Island was an easily contained, quickly defused and overly reported incident. The current economic situation we find ourselves in is much larger, more dangerous and grossly under-reported, which is quite the opposite. He also states that Obama took a “biblical flood of finance” and turned it into a “cloudy day”. I feel sorry for people who watch this man to be informed. They know nothing of how the economic damage that was predicted to be the bad road, if no taxpayer money was used for stimulus and bailouts, has actually been surpassed with the bailouts and stimulus packages. They also know nothing of the ridiculous amounts of debt we have heaped upon ourselves which could very easily collapse our country.

The second amusing thing was his insistence that “We cannot afford this” referring to the Afghan war. This is amusing to me because he supports every other waste of taxpayer money under the sun and the only area he thinks to cut back is military. It’s just a little glimpse of his priorities.

In short I don’t really agree with him except in the fact that we don’t want our troops to be hanging out over there. Where I part with him is that I believe they should be swiftly destroying our enemies. If they are just going to be targets then let’s get them home.

I would like to take this opportunity to officially announce my candidacy for the 4th congressional district in Utah. This is an exciting moment for me and I hope to represent the 4th district well.

Since the district has received 1.1 million dollars from the federal stimulus I feel this duty will be very important to uphold properly and make sure that this money is assigned appropriately within the district. I can tell you that I will do nothing to embarrass the people who live in my district and I will always listen to every single person who lives in the district before I vote on anything. That’s right, every single constituent living in the 4th district of Utah will speak to me personally before every vote. That is a promise you can count on 100%.

As congressman for the 4th district I will insure that everyone in the 4th district has health care, Lamborghinis, missile defense systems, groceries paid for, new vending machines, less homework and a 100% clean environment. I will create or save jobs for everyone in the entire district.

If you support my run for the 4th congressional district in Utah let me know of your support in the comments below.

Jon Stewart recently interviewed Lou Dobbs and asked him a very good question that deserves a much better answer than what Dobbs was capable of giving.

Mr. Stewart posed this thought:

“People have apparently lost their minds. There seems to be a panic that we have lost the fabric of our society and I’m having trouble getting a handle on what has happened that is so drastic that people would think it’s tyranny or fascism or Hitler-esque or Stalin-esque or any of those things that…uh uh.”

Dobbs’ reply was weak and does not properly capture the true answer to Stewart’s excellent question.

For starters, it could be the exorbitant amount of money that has recently been spent by the government that will almost surely turn us into the Weimar Republic part 2. Watch this video and understand one thing that is “drastic” that would cause “panic”:

This video doesn’t even include the new unconstitutional health care plan and he still gets to 174 mph. As was pointed out in the video, that is adequate reason to freak out. Where the national debt sits now we could take all the money that every Fortune 500 company made in profit last year and not be able to pay off the current debt in 140 years of doing that. With the pedal to the metal on spending we have a real problem.

Next up is the personal beliefs and associations of the new leader. Contrary to what people said during the campaign your associations do matter. It is the old “Show me your friends and I’ll show you your future” bit. When the man sits in a church with a leader spewing hateful anti-American and anti-Semitic type stuff for 20 years, he is either an idiot, or deaf or he agrees with it. To think that the crazy Jeremiah Wright waited for when Obama was gone to go off is just stupid. I can see it now: “Is Barack here? No. OK good, cause let me tell you about how America Sucks and is crawling with those damn Jews.” It isn’t just Wright either the Ayers thing is still a viable issue and I do not buy the whole “He is just some guy around the neighborhood” defense. Especially when you find out that Valerie Jarrett’s and Bill Ayers’ parents were good friends. Obama claims Jarrett is like family and Valerie and Ayers have connections since the time they were childhood playpals. Then you have all the nutjobs that have been selected for positions. There is the large group of upstanding, honest, hard-working Americans who evaded their taxes in key positions. Then you have the population control people, the media controllers, the communist and Maoist types. These things are all concerning to someone who doesn’t want to live under such a government. Obama himself said of his time in school, “I chose my friends carefully. The more politically active black students, the foreign students, the Chicanos, the Marxist professors and structural feminists and punk rock performance poets” He has also said he wants to “fundamentally transform the United States of America.” Americans don’t want to change the fundamentals of the country, they want the politics and the politicians to fundamentally transform, but not into Marxists. I think those are reasons enough for people to panic.

Stewart seems to be viewing things with partisan eyes and seems to believe that the people who are stirred up are just out to get Obama. He has a short memory for how low Bush’s approval was and all the hullabaloo from back then. The truth of it is that the changes to America and the ignoring of the Constitution started a long time ago and have happened so gradually that people didn’t notice much. Things have happened recently that have made many Americans go back and look into what exactly is off. Many people may have read the Constitution for the first time in their lives and now understand that they have been getting ripped off. They may understand more now that States and individuals should have a much bigger role than the federal government. Stewart misunderstands the Constitution and Declaration of Independence. (Watch segment 3 of his Dobbs interview) He thinks that “All men are created equal” = You must help everyone through government control. It is completely devoid of any logic to believe such a thing. The only role of government is to protect fundamental rights. A fundamental right is something that can be claimed without forcing or requiring anyone else to do something. (More on that another day)

When speaking of getting back to fundamental rights and smaller government Stewart states:

“That is, in some ways, idealistic flattery. You know when you watch kind of the stump speech of like a Sarah Palin who will say, you know, ‘It’s time we got government out of our lives and lowered taxes and increased freedom’ We’ve been sold that. That was the 8 years of the Bush administration. ‘I’m gonna lower your taxes I’m gonna bring freedom’ and that was disastrous for us.”

It is amazing to me that anyone thinks that George W. Bush brought us smaller government which failed us. The lowering of taxes had nothing to do with the housing collapse. Smaller government, lower taxes, less intrusion and more freedom are not just idealistic flattery they’re real things that we must get back to. The central government is much too powerful and has taken powers that were never theirs to take. In doing so they have taken power from states and individuals. People today just don’t notice how much trouble the government causes. All of societies problems can be traced back to two things; morals and government. Who prevents real competition in health insurance and then invents a new way to bring health insurance competition? Who makes too many hoops and waiting to become a citizen or limits the number of guest workers and makes it fairly difficult to be a guest worker and stirs people up to fight about illegal immigrants? Who gives married people special treatment over unmarried people, thus not treating them equally and then watches the fight over a word which some see as giving them new rights when redefined? ‘Government’ is the answer to all these questions which means government is not the answer to any of our problems, but the limiting of it is the solution that is needed and many people are finally seeing why the founders of our nation concluded that same thing.

I am on record with several people as being one who can’t really stomach Sean Hannity. Not for the usual reasons like me being a communist or a baby killer, but because I have seen him do some misleading and/or nitpicky things. I complained about him in 2008 when he brought up Obama’s mortgage rate that was slightly lower than the average rate at the time as though it is impossible to buy down a rate. If you want to make Obama look scary just show his own words to people. There is no need to make up stuff about mortgages. He also has always been an extremely loyal party man for the Republicans. George W. could do no wrong from what I ever saw coming from Hannity. If someone is wrong they are wrong regardless of party affiliation and I don’t see that attitude from Hannity. Then, you get something like this:

To be fair to Hannity, he may not have known that his crew was using this deceptive editing. Regardless of his knowledge beforehand, it made a worthy cause that he appeared to endorse look stupid because of a pointless deception. He did offer an apology for the creative editing…

…but I still personally believe he is too much of a party man and a nitpicker in some cases. I will not however stoop to the level that most Hannity dis-likers go to and call him names and use other ad hominem attacks that are so prevalent from leftists. I could be wrong about him because I don’t follow him much but, I will simply state that I am not a big fan.

I have never really been a fan of Elton John. Some of his older music is decent but overall his sound has not struck a chord with me. Add to that the crazy fashion sense and it was secured that I would not be a fan. He has done duets and accompaniments with every one from Eminem to Leann Rimes. A few years ago when I heard about another group featuring Mr. John I joked that he was going to soon work with Alice in Chains, which has now happened.

Mr. John recently stated that he thinks Proposition 8 in California was asking too much:

“I don’t want to be married. I’m very happy with a civil partnership. If gay people want to get married, or get together, they should have a civil partnership. The word ‘marriage,’ I think, puts a lot of people off. You get the same equal rights that we do when we have a civil partnership. Heterosexual people get married. We can have civil partnerships.”

Many people who are ignorant to the real situation behind Proposition 8 think that by having it passed that homosexual people were denied equal treatment with heterosexual people. This could not be further from the truth. Homosexual people already have the ability to form domestic partnerships in California which allow them the same treatment by government as married people. So what was lost with Proposition 8? The word ‘marriage’ was the only thing on the table. If marriage were to be declared a civil right then religious institutions would have been forced to participate in activities that go against their beliefs because otherwise they are denying someone their civil right. That is a clear violation of the first amendment which we could discuss in greater detail later. The battle over the word ‘marriage’ is as silly, to me, as battling over the word ‘heterosexual’. It has a clear definition and origin as being between a man and woman. Where, in principle, procreation is impossible, marriage is also impossible. I always imagine homosexuals protesting the fact that they are not referred to as ‘heterosexual’.

There are two more important issues than the definition of the word, which underlie this issue. First is the issue of government treating people in different circumstances differently. All citizens in good standing should be treated equally in the eyes of the government. Allowing married couples to have tax breaks and other benefits while denying them to others is wrong. This line of thinking should be extended beyond just people who have a sexual partner, over to single people as well. It is unjust discrimination to charge single people at a higher tax rate because they are loners, picky or ugly. The government began treating married couples in such a way because nuclear families are good for society, which leads me to the second underlying issue. Marriage and families are essential to having a thriving, civilized society. Although redefining ‘marriage’ would distort it’s importance, there are much bigger problems to worry about in regards to marriage such as improper treatment of spouses and children and divorce. I have a special disdain in my heart for abuse of children and women. Disloyalty to family and breaking of vows is another despicable act that has a negative effect on society. Failures in marriage and family pose a much more dire threat to society than the definition of words.

Sir Elton John is reasonable and classy in his view on the word ‘marriage’. He is also correct that he has the freedom to choose how to live his own life and has the right to equal treatment under the government. Once again by butting in where it didn’t belong government has created more problems. This issue has served to distract and promote disunity amongst people who should all be concerned and fighting for individual freedoms and keeping government limited.

I was doing some calculations recently about what could have been purchased for the $1.4 Trillion that our government has gone overboard with this year and came up with some interesting ones. Possible purchases include:

1. Every home that is currently being foreclosed on
2. Every team in the NFL, NBA and MLB X 12
3. A small sedan for every household in America
4. A free home for every illegal immigrant in the country
5. India

After playing with the insane numbers I also saw this video:

After listening to people go on about politics and government for some time I must conclude that most people don’t really understand government. The American system of government was made to limit government and it’s intrusion on the lives of citizens. That is an essential principle and is worth stating again. The American system of government was made to limit government and it’s intrusion on the lives of citizens.

The founders of the US were fed up with the age old problem of power-hungry, greedy people ruling over the masses. They devised a system that allowed the people to remove government when it began to oppress them or go contrary to their will. The system that they have created has kept the US free from despotism for the most part, for all the years since and has inspired other countries to creep closer to our system. If you do not believe that people want to enslave and gain power over the American people, then you are a complete idiot and that is the nicest term I can find.

Many of the ways which our independence can be taken were set forth by our founders as warnings of what not to do. A majority of the people of this country have completely ignored these warnings and are sending us down a very bad road. I will post more on these weaknesses later, but for now it will be good to teach ourselves the proper place of government and why it must be kept in that place.