Page created 7 Jul 2004 by ulyssess00
I know we've got other entrees to cover politics and elections, but i thought it might be cool to give each major ticket thier own place here at the diner to discuss them exclusivley.... this could turn into a cross-posting quagmire, but the kitchen staff can handle it.
not voting on the federal marriage amendment. yikes. they're really trying to keep an even keel. don't rock the boat and maybe you'll make it to the other side of the river. but what happens when they bank?
...that politicians are in the business of getting elected -- not in the business of telling us what they really think. (And that's a bipartisan problem, btw.)
not that i'd be surprised, just curious where you get your political scoops
they're actually not showing up to vote on a procedural measure that would force the Senate to act on the amendment. No word on how they plan on actually voting for it.
according to another yahoo story they both plan to vote no, but i get the feeling that there won't be a vote since the leadership doesn't have a simple majority let alone 2/3 needed to pass it. Also, could the headline on that story be anymore misleading?The leadership must have known their vote counts so I'm guessing that part of this was to force Kerrdwards to take a stand on the amendment thus giving the GOP fodder for political ads. But even that seems to have back-fired. Somehow this doesn't make for effective political ads: "Kerry Edwards failed to vote for cloture!" (which techinically being absent is equivalent to a no on cloture so a physical no vote is symbolic only.) Given that the GOP leadership turned down the offer for a staight up-down vote on the original amendment and turned it down i have a feeling that it won't be voted on this week.
...that the GOP has pretty much conceeded, realizing they have nowhere near the 60 votes they need, Kerry and Edwards aside.
The original was a two sentence version that the dems offered to vote up or down on knowing full well that it might not even muster a majority. The republicans knowing they couldn't suffer such a bad defeat went back and axed teh last sentence making the amendment a single sentence without apparently going back to the judiciary committee. It doesn't look like there are the votes for cloture which means they are far short of the super-majority required to pass it. So'll they likely concede the shortened version as well and blame the dems for not allowing it to be voted on and charge Kerrdwards with shirking the vote. (In the event that it did pass, it would have to be reconciled with any house version that would likely be the 2-sentence original. Assuming it came back from committee as the original version I somehow doubt the senate would be inclinced to pass it when they refused to even vote on it knowing the lack of votes.)The procedural manuervering is fascinating and given how things have turned out and the general lack of business from the senate this year I'll bet Frist will be ousted as majority leader next time around. (None of this pertains to Kerry-Edwards really, but whatever.)
driving home last night, i listened to her close yesterday's events for the DNC and i was very impressed.she is a very moving speaker and her accent certainly adds to her already passionate touch.
i really appreciate the swing the DNC is taking. rather than slandering bush, they're going a more, this is who we are, patriotic type route. after all this time of hearing from many conservatives that if you're speaking out against our president and if you disagree with the current politics of the country and are critical you must be unpatriotic, i maybe was starting to allow myself to believe it to a degree.
listening to heinz-kerry, i felt so much affinity toward this country and what it stands for, what it can be. driving home through the mountains of southern california at sunset on a sort of hazy evening, might have had some effect as well.
i certainly don't think john kerry, in four to eight years can make this country everything it could and should be. but i'm convinced by this point, that he'll do more good than harm and might be able to turn the tide in some way. i might still be wrong.
Just about as stupid as "TIPPER ROCKS!" bumber stickers....
is that supposed to be a tongue-in-cheek statement? i think edwards looks weird.
john kerry's political expedienceI don't know what the author's politics are -- he doesn't seem to be thrilled with GWB. But he expresses something that I've felt for a while about John Kerry -- that he's not really a great candidate -- and that he lacks real political courage. I don't necessarily respect Bush's brand of political courage either (that is, "do whatever I want, let my staff sort it out"). But I feel like most people who support Kerry support him because he's not Bush, not because he's truly a compelling candidate. In fact, he's practically the most similar candidate to GWB we've had in a Democrat in the last 3...4...5(?) elections. I would rather have voted for Gore than Kerry -- he seemed like an actual alternative to Bush.
Oh well.
i mean, i can't say that i really am excited about kerry. i'm more excited about his wife, who i think is pretty awesome. she, at least, is an excellent speaker. but she's not working toward being president.i do, however, think that, at this point, anyone has to be better than bush. i don't want to make general sweeping statements that really are ridiculous. but over the years, following the things he's done [and he has made some moves that i don't despise] i've come to think he's really damaging to our country in many ways. he makes me want to leave. and i really don't want to feel that way.
if nothing else, his environmental disregard gets me in the gut. and this is something i know kerry has a very different stance on. if he follows through with what he says now, i think mother nature, for one, will be thankful we didn't reelect.
Why did Kerry have to criticize Bush's plan to redeploy troops when Kerry himself recommended the same thing a couple months ago?
It's predominantly a left-over plan from the Clinton years. Dates back to our first peacekeeping missions in the Balkans.Gonna be a lot of sad frauleins, though.
How do you know it's really humid in DC?Kerry is finally sticking to something.
(Yes I am a democrat. But humor's humor, folks.)
was at a dinner hosted by the drake law school where my mom was studying at the time. She now says that they should put bush and kerry together and see if either one can come up with a coherant statement that hasn't been rehersed.
also funny is the onion online, they have a great pic of kerry smiling, and the tag "Kerry's face droops with joy over latest polls" hyuck hyuck hyuck
...do i really need to type the punchline?
here we go with the medals/ribbons whatever again.
The Trib gets William Rood to talk, the Sun-Times publishes a counter story......Hmmm, just another day in the Dueling Newspapers.Look, folks, every day in Germany I, Radar O'Guncheon, walked an armload of documents into my company commander. When the new guy came in, by the second week he had trusted me implicitly by extension (everything had cleared the first sergeant, the executive officer, the platoon leaders, etceteras, etceteras.), and I could have turned him into Henry Blake. I didn't.
You simply cannot read everything you're supposed to sign. You would never sleep. You'd never leave the office, let alone do the 40 other things clamoring for your attention any given minute. Lehman saying "I never saw it" is really immaterial. Awards citations are like that. The only medal that ever gets really scrutinized at Cabinet/Joint Chiefs/Secretary level is the Medal of Honor. Now there are clarks whose job it is to keep track--this is why medals get downgraded, say from a Silver to a Bronze Star, because they keep track of the number awarded and what for--but it ain't the Secretary of the Navy/Army/Air Force's job. Her job is to ride herd on the generals, providing a civilian opinion and to beg for funding from Congress.
It's really the guy in theater--in Kerry's case, the admiral commanding the fleet in which he served--who gets to decide what is true and what is not about actions that have been nominated by an award. In World War Two, Douglas MacArthur, probably the greatest military prima donna since Julius Caesar, walked around with a bunch of Silver Stars and Purple Hearts in his pocket and pretty much awarded them at random, trusting his minions to come up with the appropriate citation. Since he was the only living five-star general in the entire Army, no one was going to argue with him.
Go watch "Courage Under Fire" if you want the idea how awards are vetted--it's fairly accurate on the process, though Hollywood-ized, or better yet, go rent one of the greatest movies ever made, Kurosawa's "Rashomon", and tell me what the central truth/the central action is--concisely and consensusly, mind you, in that movie.
One of the metaphors that intrigues me as a religious man and once a soldier, is the phrase "proving on wounds"....the whole Doubting Thomas aspect of this story with John Kerry.
Although the weariness and the it's-so-last-week of Grady's tone--I'm assuming, G-man, feel free to correct me--is something I also feel, the debate over this shows how badly scarred our society--many of them our parents and aunts and uncles--is over Vietnam.
And one last word to clarify terms, in case anyone's confused; Medal refers to the actual medal, which in many cases is suspended from a ribbon. Medals are only worn in extreme formal cases--"mess dress", the uniform equivalent of a tuxedo. Ribbon can be two things; the piece of colored cloth from which hangs the actual medal and is backed by the straight pin by which it is fastened onto a uniform or the inch-long, quarter-inch high tiny cloth pin you see arranged in rows on military everyday uniforms. It is colored to represent the medal it stands for (A collection of these is referred to as "Fruit Salad" or "Confetti")--for example, the ribbon for the Medal of Honor is blue with white stars, matching the silk ribbon from which the medal is hung around the wearer's neck--the only U.S. military medal to do so--all others are hung on the chest.
Now you know...
G-I Gunnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnch!
disclaimer: the following post is a rambling endorsement of Kerry-Edwards written over many days and without editing. It is perhaps not a very good argument as to my support of KE04 but it's what I came up with and I'm sick of writing it. Enjoy and fire away
In the upcoming election, I am supporting John Kerry for president. I have supported his candidacy since the Democratic primary elections and I believe he and John Edwards are the right choice for president and vice-president. My support for Kerry hinges not on my dislike of Bush and the record of the Bush administration but on Kerry's policy stands and my optimistic belief that a Kerry administration will help us achieve a better, stronger, and more secure country.So far this election season the debate has been about foreign policy issues. Tomorrow night, as the formal debate turns to domestic issues, I think more people will get a sense of the policies that made my decision to support John Kerry an easy one. I'm guessing that a major portion of the debate will be on the economy. The economy is always one of those funny things for presidents to be talking about because they always want the credit for when it goes boom but never the blame for when it goes bust. But then again I think a president's economic policies can have a significant impact on the economy. Bush likes to call Kerry a tax-and-spend liberal which I guess is in contrast to no-tax-and-spend conservative. Kerry has proposed some pretty ambitious programs which are contingent on rolling back tax cuts and reduction of the deficit. Bush has pushed through several large tax cuts while at the same time discretionary non-defense spending has risen by the largest amounts in the last 25 years. Defense spending is at levels 46% higher than Clinton's last budget, non-defense is 36% higher, and entitlements are 30% up [*]. Bush also has the highest yearly increase (8.2%) in non-defense discretionary over the last six administrations [CBO]. Kerry has a plan to roll back the tax cuts that have created record deficits. He will use this money to fund certain programs while at the same time working to reduce runaway discretionary spending and the deficit. He has also made it clear that the US Government should work on a pay-as-you-go system so if he can't pay for all his ambitious goals, they will get scaled back. I also believe that Kerry has the fiscal discipline to veto bills from congress that are full to the brim with pork, something Bush has not been able to do.
Another important factor in my decision to vote Kerry is his strong positions on national security and foreign policy. I should frame this section with a brief bit on Iraq since that will pretty much define any foreign policy discussion for this election cycle. Put simply, going to war in Iraq was a bad idea. We invaded a country that was not an imminent threat to our security and have now created a situation on the ground that is ideal for breeding more terrorists willing to die to kill a few Americans. Whether or not you agree with my assessment, it's pretty clear that Iraq is a messed up place right now and more of the same is not what we need. And honestly, I'm not sure what can be done at this point. But it points to a larger foreign policy problem with the current administration. Without a decent coalition and without a valid reason we attacked a sovereign nation. Our reasons have been reduced to UN Oil-for-Food violations and Saddam's deeply held desire to have weapons someday. I trust Kerry not to take us down that road again and I believe he can get the war on terror back on track. Kerry will also bring in a team of appointees who will bring some sanity back to our foreign policy and some moderation of the hard-core conservatism that has dominated that area for the last four years. One of the things Kerry likes to talk about in relation to national security is energy independence. Given the rising demand for oil and our national pastime of consumption I'm pessimistic as to our chances for energy independence but I believe it's a worthwhile goal.
Energy independence is not only about reducing our dependence on mid-east oil but also reducing our oil consumption altogether. Normally when you hear arguments about energy independence, the next sentence usually is a case for drilling in ANWR, the Rockies, Utah, or somewhere else within our nation. Kerry plans to achieve energy independence not through more drilling but through conservation, new technology, and diversification of our current energy production sources. The plan calls for tax breaks for clean energy sources and funding for R&D on new technology. As one who believes that oil production is going to peak one of these days, it is vastly important that we begin to reduce or consumption of oil. Hand-on-hand with our reduced consumption of oil is stewardship of the environment. I believe that one of the area in which Christianity has failed is environmental stewardship. God has given us so much beauty and so many resources and yet we have continued to neglect our environmental discipleship. This is yet another reason I support John Kerry. He has a good record on the environment and will not be blinded by ideology when it comes to science. The major issues in this area that I see are emissions, sprawl, protection of parks/forests, and clean water. Which I guess pretty much covers it all. I would love to see power plants have their emissions reduced and I would love to see CAFE standards implemented. It would be wonderful if Kerry could keep the road-less ban in effect and it would be great to see someone address sprawl it's affects on water pollution. And if none of that gets through congress, the least he can do is appoint a true environmental steward to the EPA (RFK Jr.?) who will return the agency to it's watchdog status and restart criminal prosecution for companies who violate regulations.
Some of the other issues that get a lot of play in campaign season are health care and social security. Being young and healthy I don't pay a whole lot of attention to these issues but I've read through John Kerry's health-care proposal and I think it's a good blueprint for beginning to reform the health care system in this country. I like the fact that his plan focuses on actual treatment issues and not just on the medical malpractice bogeyman. As an aside, I've never bought the argument that med mal premiums are rising based on lawsuit awards. The evidence I've seen is that awards have actually gone down over he last ten years or so and that even in states where there are award caps, med mal premiums still rise at or above the national average. The plan that John Kerry has proposed will help subsidize catastrophic costs, lowering the shared burden and lowering overall premiums. It's an interesting idea and I would love to see it in practice but I kind of doubt it ever makes it out of congress looking anything like Kerry proposes. Health care is one of those areas in which there is a whole lot of money pouring into the lobbyists to win friends and influence lawmakers. On a similar front, social security is a hot button issue for a lot of people. I'm more or less resigned to the fact that the baby boomers are going to bust the system and no private retirement accounts or lock box is going to fix the system. One of the things that Bush promised four years ago was to never dip into the social security surplus which was the first thing he dipped into to pay for the tax cuts. I think one of the main things that could help save social security is some long term fiscal discipline.
Other issues that are important in my decision to support Kerry include his support for a woman's right to choose and the impact that any future supreme court appointments might have on said right. Kerry has also talked about strong funding for scientific research as well as improved science and math education for K-12 students. Kerry supports a large expansion in national service which I think is wonderful way to not only to serve the neediest in our country but also build a stronger, more unified America. It sounds cheesy to write, but I believe in John Kerry's vision of a better America.
I guess those are kind of the main points. I could go into more detail why I won't be voting for Bush but I won't. Instead you can go read McSweeney's Daily Reason to Dispatch Bush for one source of some of those reasons.
So to sum up, John Kerry will be a fantastic president and strong leader who will do his utmost to keep America safe, strong, and the most respected nation on earth. He will be committed to health-care for all Americans and a strong economy to provide jobs. John Kerry will protect our environment and put us on the right track for energy independence.
I'm Lukas Eklund and I approve of this message.
amen. Thanks for that lengthy and articulate explanation. I have way way way way too much going on right now to give my reasons for voting for Kerry/Edwards--some the same as yours, a few others different--but along the same lines. Looking forward to watching the debates tonight.
Last night we watched Going Upriver: The Long War of John Kerry. If I ever had any doubts about the courage and leadership of John Kerry that movie pretty much erased them. It also brought home a sense of just how screwed up things got in Vietnam that so many men came home and spoke out.
Errol Morris made a bunch of switcher ads of people who voted Bush in 2000 but are voting Kerry in 2004. I haven't had the chance to watch any of them yet, but I like Errol Morris' work a lot so I can bet that they are at least well put together ads.
I'm posting the whole thing here because you gotta sign up on the post to read. And I find it odd that a media organization should endorse a candidate, but I agree *wholeheartedly* with this editoral. Insightful and brilliant - I hope Kerry wins.Kerry for President
Sunday, October 24, 2004; Page B06
EXPERTS TELL US that most voters have had no difficulty making up their minds in this year's presidential election. Half the nation is passionately for George W. Bush, the pollsters say, and half passionately for John F. Kerry -- or, at least, passionately against Mr. Bush. We have not been able to share in this passion, nor in the certainty. As readers of this page know, we find much to criticize in Mr. Bush's term but also more than a few things to admire. We find much to admire in Mr. Kerry's life of service, knowledge of the world and positions on a range of issues -- but also some things that give us pause. On balance, though, we believe Mr. Kerry, with his promise of resoluteness tempered by wisdom and open-mindedness, has staked a stronger claim on the nation's trust to lead for the next four years.
The balancing process begins, as reelection campaigns must, with the incumbent. His record, particularly in foreign affairs, can't be judged with a simple aye or nay. President Bush rallied the nation after Sept. 11, 2001, and reshaped his own world view. His commitment to a long-term struggle to promote freedom in the Arab world reflects an understanding of the deep threat posed by radical Islamic fundamentalism. His actions have not always matched his stirring rhetoric on the subject, and setbacks to democracy in other parts of the world (notably Russia) appear not to have troubled him much.
But Mr. Bush has accomplished more than his critics acknowledge, both in the practical business of forming alliances to track terrorists and in beginning to reshape a Middle East policy too long centered on accommodating friendly dictators. He has promised the large increases in foreign aid, to help poor nations cope with AIDS and for other purposes, that we believe are essential.
The campaign that Mr. Bush led to oust the Taliban from Afghanistan seems easy and obvious in retrospect, but at the time many people warned of imminent quagmire. Mr. Bush wasted valuable time with his initial determination to avoid nation-building after Kabul fell and his drawdown of U.S. forces. But even so, Afghanistan today is far from the failure that Mr. Kerry portrays. Afghans and U.S. security alike are better off thanks to the intervention.
In Iraq, we do not fault Mr. Bush for believing, as President Clinton before him believed, that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction. We supported the war and believed that the Iraqi dictator posed a challenge that had to be faced; we continue to believe that the U.S. mission to promote a representative government in Iraq has a chance to leave the United States safer and the Iraqis far better off than they were under their murderous dictator.
We do, however, fault Mr. Bush for exaggerating to the public the intelligence given him privately and for alienating allies unnecessarily. Above all, we fault him for ignoring advice to better prepare for postwar reconstruction. The damage caused by that willful indifference is incalculable. There is no guarantee that Iraq would be more peaceful today if U.S. forces had prevented postwar looting, secured arms depots, welcomed international involvement and transferred authority to Iraqis more quickly. But the chances of success would have been higher. Yet the administration repeatedly rebuffed advice to commit sufficient troops. Its disregard for the Geneva Conventions led to a prison-torture scandal in both Iraq and Afghanistan that has diminished for years, if not decades, the United States' image and influence abroad. In much of the world, in fact, U.S. prestige is at a historic low, partly because of the president's high-handed approach to allies on issues ranging far beyond Iraq.
These failings have a common source in Mr. Bush's cocksureness, his failure to seek advice from anyone outside a narrow circle and his unwillingness to expect the unexpected or adapt to new facts. These are dangerous traits in any president but especially in a wartime leader. They are matched by his failure to admit his errors or to hold senior officials accountable for theirs.
ON THE DOMESTIC side, Mr. Bush and his Republican allies in the House have governed as heavy-handed partisans. We applaud Mr. Bush's campaign to promote accountability in elementary and secondary schools, and some of his other ideas may sound attractive as well: a degree of privatization to give people more control over their retirement funds, individual health accounts that might better match the mobile 21st-century world of work, market incentives to reduce pollution. But he has failed to do the hard work to turn such ideas from slogans into fair and balanced programs, and he has never said how he would pay for them, as in the case of Social Security private accounts.
Which brings us to his reckless fiscal policy. Mr. Bush inherited a budget in surplus but facing strains in the long run as retiring baby boomers intensify their claims on the nation's resources for pensions and health care. A recession that was gathering as he took office, and the economic blow delivered by the Sept. 11 attacks, would have turned surplus into deficit under the best of circumstances.
But Mr. Bush aggravated those circum- stances and drove the deficit to record levels with tax cuts that were inefficient in providing economic stimulus and that were tilted toward the wealthy. Despite the drains on the Treasury from the war in Iraq, he insisted that all the cuts be made permanent; no one, no matter how rich, was asked to sacrifice. Mr. Bush's rationales have shifted, but his prescription -- tax cuts -- has remained constant, no matter what the cost to future generations. The resulting fiscal deficit has dragged down the national savings rate, leaving the country dependent upon foreigners for capital in an unsustainable way. Mr. Bush says the answer lies in spending discipline, but he has shown none himself; see, for example, the disgusting farm subsidies he signed into law.
In 2000, Mr. Bush justifiably criticized his predecessor for failing to deal with the looming problems of Social Security and Medicare. In office, though, he has been equally delinquent, even as the day of reckoning drew closer. He championed a huge new entitlement for Medicare without insisting on the cost-cutting reforms that everyone knows are needed.
SO MR. BUSH HAS not earned a second term. But there is a second question: Has the challenger made his case? Here's why we say yes.
Mr. Kerry, like Mr. Bush, offers no plan to cope with retirement and health costs, but he promises more fiscal realism. He sensibly proposes to reverse Mr. Bush's tax cuts on the wealthiest and pledges to scale back his own spending proposals if funds don't suffice. He would seek to restore budget discipline rules that helped get deficits under control in the 1990s.
On many other issues, Mr. Kerry has the better approach. He has a workable plan to provide health insurance to more Americans; the 45 million uninsured represent a shameful abdication that appears not to have concerned Mr. Bush one whit. Where Mr. Bush ignored the dangers of climate change and favored industry at the expense of clean air and water, Mr. Kerry is a longtime and thoughtful champion of environmental protection. Mr. Bush played politics with the Constitution, as Mr. Kerry would not, by endorsing an amendment to ban gay marriage. Mr. Kerry has pledged to follow the Geneva Conventions abroad and respect civil liberties at home. A Kerry judiciary -- and the next president is likely to make a significant mark on the Supreme Court -- would be more hospitable to civil rights, abortion rights and the right to privacy.
None of these issues would bring us to vote for Mr. Kerry if he were less likely than Mr. Bush to keep the nation safe. But we believe the challenger is well equipped to guide the country in a time of danger. Mr. Kerry brings a résumé that unarguably has prepared him for high office. He understood early on the dangers of non-state actors such as al Qaeda. To pave the way for restored relations with Vietnam in the 1990s, he took on the thankless and politically risky task of convincing relatives that no American prisoners remained in Southeast Asia. While he wrongly opposed the first Persian Gulf War, he supported the use of American force in Bosnia and Kosovo.
As with Mr. Bush, some of Mr. Kerry's strengths strike us as potential weaknesses. The senator is far more likely than Mr. Bush to seek a range of opinions before making a decision -- but is he decisive enough? He understands the importance of allies and of burnishing America's image -- but would he be too reluctant to give offense? His Senate record suggests an understanding of the importance of open markets, but during the campaign he has retreated to protectionist rhetoric that is troubling in its own right and as a possible indicator of inconstancy.
We have been dismayed most of all by Mr. Kerry's zigzags on Iraq, such as his swervings on whether Saddam Hussein presented a threat. As Mr. Bush charges, Mr. Kerry's description of the war as a "diversion" does not inspire confidence in his determination to see it through. But Mr. Kerry has repeatedly pledged not to cut and run from Iraq, and we believe a Kerry administration would be better able to tackle the formidable nation-building tasks that remain there. Mr. Kerry echoes the Bush goals of an elected Iraqi government and a well-trained Iraqi force to defend it but argues that he could implement the strategy more effectively.
Mr. Kerry understands that the biggest threat to U.S. security comes from terrorists wielding nuclear or biological weapons. He pledges to add two divisions to the U.S. Army; try harder to secure nuclear weapons and materials around the world, and improve U.S. preparations for a bioterrorism attack. There is no way to know whether he would be more successful than Mr. Bush in slowing North Korea's and Iran's march toward becoming nuclear-armed states, but he attaches the right priority to both problems. He is correct that those challenges, like the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, call for the kind of sustained diplomacy that has been missing for four years. We hope he would be firmer than Mr. Bush in standing up to the genocide unfolding in Sudan.
We do not view a vote for Mr. Kerry as a vote without risks. But the risks on the other side are well known, and the strengths Mr. Kerry brings are considerable. He pledges both to fight in Iraq and to reach out to allies; to hunt down terrorists, and to engage without arrogance the Islamic world. These are the right goals, and we think Mr. Kerry is the better bet to achieve them.
© 2004 The Washington Post Company
Errol Morris is the man!So is Errol Flynn.
btr
Dave
The Chicago Tribune endorsed Bush. Next the Sun-Times will actually not print something Mayor Daley told it to....
CST endorses Kerry. ridiculous, methinks, for a newspaper like that to endorse a candidate.
"That's disconcerting."
the tribune has consistently endorsed republicans for president. see the public editor's response. Every race since 1872.
She is an intelligent, successful woman. She has gone through a lot of hard things, the death of a child for one, and is still very positive and strong, and a good role model for women (or anyone, for that matter). And for the love of dog will the media stop calling her fat--it's pissing me off. She looks good for a 55 year old woman who's had 4 kids, and I think it's in part because of the contrast with her husband, who looks so young and IS four years younger than her. I think she's great and I'd really like to see her as the First Lady someday.
Heh. It's the devil and the deep blue sea, I guess, Lukas. The Daley Public Affairs Paper or the conservative Tribune?Mike Royko is trying to claw his way outta his grave, right now....
ManThis smells like one of Nixon's dirty tricks. I hope Kerry didn't just get baited, cuz if he did, he gutted the hook.
btr
Dave
and be unconscious for the next 6 days, and I could wake up next Wednesday and we'd have a new president. I can't stand living like this. I physically feel myself getting all worked up when I read anything about the election or see TV coverage. I need to stay away from it all. Self-preservation!
I can't believe Bush was able to get away with accusing Kerry about make statements without having the facts and pretty much NO ONE called him on it...WMDs anyone?
btr
Dave
i just waited two hours to vote for john kerry. i don't even care that i got a parking ticket.
that's rough. I was in and out within fifteen minutes. That's the right spirit, though, parking ticket or no. I trust that if Kerry is elected it will reward enough. :)
Go dems!
We voted a month ago....
and I mourn. I hang my head in shame. Ugh.
F#######################CK!
Jeff Greenfield, who wrote a really smart political novel called "The People's Choice" said last night, "The Democractic Party has lost touch with rural, conservative America."That's what lost this election for Kerry....
SHAME ON YOU.
how do liberal, urbanites align themselves with rural conservatives?you can't fake it. rural conservatives are even skeptical of one of their own [john edwards] if he looks clean cut and fresh scrubbed [and smart]. i guess you have to flub your words, and look like you wish you were hunting.
we're screwed.
about nothing... in my opinion.
Well, not saying things like: "Today I side myself with the rest of the world", and "Shame on you, America" might be a good start.
Gimme a break.btr
Dave
and free speech is already being discouraged! Sorry, Alaric, nothing against you, but I am simply expressing myself. As an American, I thought I was allowed to do this. ?I stand by my statement. I am ashamed to be part of a country in which a president can be re-elected (when the first election was fradulent, by the way) after declaring unjustified, unsupported, and pre-emptive war on an innocent people, endangering jobs and the health and well-being of an entire nation, isolating the global community, taking away scads of our civil liberties, and on and on and on.... I'm not saying anything anyone doesn't know. Being that we know this (or should), I am simply saying that I don't understand how anyone could vote this person back into office. And yes, I am ashamed to be part of such a nation where this opinion, shown by popular vote, expresses the sentiment of the majority. I'm not saying that I'm right or wrong and I know we all have our own (strong) feelings on this, but that is how I FEEL as an individual.
"Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard."
- H.L. Mencken (1880-1956) more...
I'm ashamed that our country has been so EQUALLY divided for the past four years...ashamed that this election was so damn close (you'd hope that at least one candidate would have devised a plan that was HONESTLY best for america, not just their personal interests). I'm ashamed of the two people that we actually had running for the big job and even more ashamed that we probably won't get our shit together for the next 12 years.
First of all, no one is discouraging free speech.I think Alaric's point was regarding this -- barefoot asked, "how do liberal, urbanites align themselves with rural conservatives?"
And alaric wrote "Well, not saying things like: "Today I side myself with the rest of the world", and "Shame on you, America" might be a good start."
I took him to be saying that he feels that that kind of attitude is definitely not a way to build consensus among differing demographics -- that dividing yourself from "those people" is not an effective way to encourage them to see things your way. I think if the election had gone the other way and Alaric had made similar statements about his disappointment, many here probably would have taken great offense to the idea that electing John Kerry was shameful for America.
I think that people here should feel free to feel the way they want to and since emotions are running high about this election specifically for some very good reasons (some of which Cinnamongirl just listed), I think it's inevitable that people are going to say some pretty intense things about how things have turned out. But free speech is free speech -- and saying intense things often elicits intense reactions.
I honestly want people to feel free to express their opinions and even argue about it here. I hope the discussion is constructive, but that is pretty hard to do, and frankly, often people don't really want to be constructive. But that has consequences.
No one is discouraging your free speech. I responded to a question by noting that "liberal urbanites" have distanced themselves from rural America through the use of over-the-top rhetoric. And either way, if you had a passing familiarity with the first and fourteenth amendments, you'd know they protected your speech from discouragement by federal and state governments, not private citizens.
and smax, that's one of my favorite mencken quotes.
One way to help make things constructive is by not making your arguments personal and sarcastic.
But when someone accuses me of personally violating their constitutional freedoms, I react strongly.
Taming strong reactions is one of the first steps on the road to meaningful dialogue. :)
just so you know, the supreme court has roundly rejected prior restraint.
;-)
ps That means i'm just kidding.
I'm just happy it's all over, i'm sick all the brou-ha-ha. One guy told me that i should break up with my girlfriend a week ago cause of her stance (and he was serious)...but then, he voted almost completely on basis of religion and stance on abortion.
other than saying that, i'm going to try hard to stay out of this, cause like i said, i'm just happy it's over and isn't going any further, though i really wanted to make a "thanks again, florida!" t-shirt.
i know you were being playful there pedro, i just wanted to cover myself so that i don't get taken the wrong way. It's time to build bridges today.
I heard part of Kerry's post elections speech today on the radio. 1. I'm impressed he wasn't whiny. 2. I think everyone (reguardless if you like donkeys or elephants) needed to listen to the part where he basically said just because a little under half the country lost the election, it doesn't mean any of us should stop trying to make things better. That's a bit of a pharaphrase, but even if that's not what he meant, that's what I got from it.
The fact that the race was this close signifies, in many ways, the success of democracy rather than it's failure. An election like this has the highest amount of unhappy losers -- yet it is precisely because these candidates capture an almost equal amount of the populace that we find ourselves in this situation. The further fact that the country remains stable and the system continues to work (in it's flawed way) shows an amazing amount of desire to have a good government. In many nations if the election was this close, you'd be boarding up your windows. Having candidates win by such a small margin ultimately means that people had such good choices, they couldn't make up their mind.(Obviously, the flip side of this situation is that many voters knew exactly who they would vote for, but that is always true.)
i mean, it's true. I still haven't found out just how many people actually voted. But i just think it was great because so many people came out to make their opinions known. Even if the majority opinions were polar opposites, that's of course, by description and not by content. I have to say though, that i think the election was more of a referendum to retain bush, rather than an election. Most of the people that i had spoken with just wanted bush out, which is fine, i don't have a problem with that, but i think the ballots almost may have well simply said "bush: yes - no" and you just circle your choice. I feel that this is shown by how the third party candidates were almost forgotten about this time around, I stress "almost". I think though, yes, all in all, the election was good. I probably put this in the wrong thing, but I felt it was complementary to ped's post.
Going to get a chance to use all those nice riot moves they taught me in this country. Sigh.
Time to mobilize for 2008. Tomorrow our College Dems are having their first meeting on that subject.But I really am dissapointed in America. Bush will be... oh, acceptable I guess. We've got to content ourselves with a bad lot. But we're gonna think it's a very bad lot. I can see Very Bad Things, stripping of freedom of choice for one, on the horizon. More bad environmental policy. More hasty foreign policy moves. Very Bad Things. I'm praying and praying and praying (and God please don't ignore the millions of voices who're doing the same!!!) that I'm wrong and that Bush will be highly ineffectual this next four years as well. But I don't know - my gut instinct is no.
Up until the election, this thread was mostly Kerry supporters talking to each other. Then the election happens, and now some Bush supporters get involved in the thread...Up yours.
If its gloating, fine. Get it out of your system.
But if any Bush supporter thinks they have any build bridging power, it will all be circumvented by the machine that powered on today.
Bush doesn't want to build bridges. He has never indicated as much.
btr
Dave
forget the guy in office. in so many ways, the candidates were not that far apart from each other.also, the president is only as powerful as the people he leads and the congress that works with (or against) him.
what can we do? realize that there are people out there that think differently than you do. this should be obvious by now, but maybe the message hasn't hit home.
am I a Bush supporter? no. otherwise I would have voted for him.
I am sad about this election because I don't think any outcome would have been good for this country. I think it has polarized Americans against each other in such a harsh and negative way, and that's bad for people who want this world to be better.
instead of wallowing in despair at how the system has failed us all (which should be evident, i think, on some level) we need to forget about Getting Out The Vote and instead Get Off Our Asses and do something about this world. not that we're not, of course. but as lazy Americans, we like to pretend that our vote is so strong and powerful (there is power there, but it's not the only weapon we have) and that our number one priority is to vote and then let Washington clean up the mess that we're in.
as I've said before, this country (and the last 4 years specifically) could be better if we worked together to make it better, instead of bitterly fighting those in leadership at every step.
is that a bunch of rhetoric? maybe. but, the question still remains, 'What are we doing about it?'.
TO SHRED: Bush supporters were encouraged to post in other entrees, to provide for peace and tranquility in the Diner. perhaps that mandate should still hold. but this seemed to be the entree where the discussion was taking place, thus the presence of this most recent conversation.
anyway, I think the Stones said it well when they wrote the song 'You Can't Always Get What You Want'.
for bush.
and, likewise buddy
Understand that I genuinely like you as a person.Bush does not want peace and tranquility. He wants docility. And he wants it in the young.
So, up yours, too, for suggesting that I go quietly into the night.
With the huge Republican machine now in full gear, the media is propagating the message that nothing can stop their political agenda. Is that constructive? Is that a disposition that spurs happiness among the masses? Is 51% the masses?
If Bush moves to undo the things the Dems have done over the last 20 years, like say shutting down Title 10 Clinics, is THAT an act of peace and tranquility? Is that an act that should serve to unite a polarized country?
I don't understand how someone who starts a war by misleading the people gets re-elected because the same people wanted a moral leader.
That kind of hypocritical idiocy makes me embarassed to be an American.
I don't understand how winning a 51 to 49 split gives said winner an air of legitimacy and I don't see how it clears the slate of the last 4 years.
That lack of perspective makes me hang my head.
I don't understand why I'm supposed to sit down and shut up.
btr
Dave
First, if people want to keep this entree to be Pro-Kerry (or anti-Bush) only, that's fine with me, but you guys should make that call. I was thinking along the same lines as Baggins when he said, "this is where the discussion seemed to be" so when Alaric posted I chastised because I felt like his post was non-constructive, not because he posted in here specifically. But if people would rather put general post-election discussion in political soup and leave this for Kerry supporters to vent or anything else, that's fine with me. The "moratorium" on out and out political debate I think should be lifted -- I should have lifted it a long time ago, but I honestly forgot to do that. I had said it would only be for a week or so. I don't think that anyone minded the peace and quiet.So if people want to argue about politics, go for it. I encourage communication and God knows I would like to see people learn from each other's ideas. But if you aren't taking pains to be constructive about it, you will just be wasting your breath. Often, people argue with the pretense that they are trying to show someone else the error of their ways but the way that they argue is totally counterproductive. When that happens, all you really do is listen to yourself talk. Resist that temptation.
"Up yours" falls into the category of counterproductive at all times, for all sides. At some point, somebody has to be the bigger person, or eventually communication will just turn into throwing barbs back and forth.
That said, I agree with a lot of what Shred just said, but I will take it to political soup to leave peace and tranquility here.
yesterday i wept for the future of my country. Call me a sucker if you will, but I truly believed that John Kerry could bring a new prosperity and unity to America. A future where perpetual war would be a bad memory and not a daily nightmare. A future where protecting and not exploiting God's creation is a priority. A future where the gap between rich and poor shrinks rather than grows.This morning I was greeted by the voice of Bush telling me that if I voted for his opponent that for the sake of national unity he needed my support. But I can't support his policy of pre-emptive war and indefinite detention. I can't support his disastrous energy policy or his misguided healthcare reforms. I can't support his push for a flat tax (referred to in code as "simplifying the tax code"). For months Bush has been using the words Massachusetts, Liberal, Urban Elite like four letter words. One of the underlying themees in his campaign was that a vote for Kerry was a vote for terrorism. So today I'm asked to turn around and support a president for the good of the country. I guess me and George Bush have different ideas about what is good for this country.
i feel abandoned, in some sense. when i heard teresa heinz-kerry speak at the democratic national convention, i sat in my car listening and crying. because her words made me feel patriotic. they made me feel hopeful. they made me trust the hands of her husband as a safe place to put our country. and because i hadn't felt those things in a long while.george w. has never made me feel at ease with his leadership or trust that he was pulling for things that mattered to the country as much as he was pulling for things that mattered to him and his family.
some might say that that is what makes him a good president - he's just another american in an american family with values that they fight for. but i am not swayed by those that think that way.
i fear for the country. and i disagree with baggins. it does matter who is at the helm. he's pulling the strings. maybe it hasn't always mattered as much as it does now, but i believe [and perhaps wrongly, but you'd need to supply a lot of evidence to convince me otherwise] that george is seriously effecting major decisions in this country and that his intentions are not good.
our environment is not a foolproof, unbreakable piece of plastic and right now i think it is hurting. my hope is that things are done to reverse some of the damage we've done. but i am not sure what four more years of atrocious environmental policies will do to our beloved country, our beloved world.
i, too, can not align myself with this man and his administration simply because he's nicely asked me to for the sake of unity after he's done everything he could to drive unity among americans and throughout the globe into the ground. he has assisted in dividing us and now, preemptively he asks us to unite behind him.
thank you john kerry and family, john edwards and family for making me feel the things all americans ought to feel.
i too hold the utmost respect for you.i'd just like to point out that i said nothing even close to 'go quietly into the night'. you'll notice that i actually said 'get off our asses'.
I do not support GWB in any way. Let's make that clear. I also do not support John Kerry. I don't believe in either of them. I don't believe they are good for this country. I don't believe America could have won this election. I think our system is so flawed it's sick. and I refuse to take part in the machine.
And I understand - people put their hope in Kerry. people hated Bush so much it was scary. Now we fear that his last 4 years is going to be worse than his first 4 (rightly so, probably.)
but I'm not suggesting that we go quietly into the night. I'm not suggesting anybody sit down and shut up. Keep talking. it's fine. I'm just suggesting that after we're all done bitching and moaning, we GET THE FUCK UP AND MOVE! together. start now. make an impact in your community. let's figure out how to change out system so that we're not stuck voting blue or red for the rest of our lives.
I don't have any good answers, yet, as to how to do this. but I know that we need to move. sitting and crying about it isn't solving anything.
I know, this is where we post our opinions. I understand. I'm not criticizing anybody for disagreeing and feeling let down or anything else. I'm just saying that after we're all done with that, we need to mobilize.
So I'm confused and more than a little angry about GW's win. I'm not one bit hopeful about our future as a country, and some things that he speaks of are downright scary.However, maybe another 4 years of this clown is exactly what the US needs in order to make a change. Maybe things will get so bad and people will get so angry that things will begin to happen... kind of like when an overweight person has a heart attack at the age of 45, then they start making the changes they need in order to take care of themselves and have some hope for a future.
my uncle sent me this the other day.What John Kerry should have said at his concession speech: My fellow Americans, the people of this nation have spoken, and spoken with a clear voice. So I am here to offer my concession. I concede that I overestimated the intelligence of the American people. Though the people disagree with the President on almost every issue, you saw fit to vote for him. I never saw that coming. That's really special. And I mean "special" in the sense that we use it to describe those kids who ride the short school bus and find ways to injure themselves while eating pudding with rubber spoons. That kind of special. I concede that I misjudged the power of hate. That's pretty powerful stuff, and I didn't see it. So let me take a moment to congratulate the President's strategists: Putting the gay marriage amendments on the ballot in various swing states like Ohio... well, that was just genius. Genius. It got people, a certain kind of people, to the polls. The unprecedented number of folks who showed up and cited "moral values" as their biggest issue, those people changed history. The folks who consider same sex marriage a more important issue than war, or terrorism, or the economy... Who'd have thought the election would have belong to them? Well, Karl Rove did. Gotta give it up to him for that. [Boos.] Now, now. Credit where it's due. I concede that I put too much faith in America's youth. With 8 out of 10 of you opposing the President, with your friends and classmates dying daily in a war you disapprove of, with your future being mortgaged to pay for rich old peoples' tax breaks, you somehow managed to sit on your asses and watch the Cartoon Network while aging homophobic hillbillies carried the day. You voted with the exact same anemic percentage that you did in 2000. You suck. Seriously, y'do. There are some who would say that I sound bitter, that now is the time for healing, to bring the nation together. Let me tell you a little story. Last night, I watched the returns come in with family and friends. As the night progressed, people began to talk half-seriously about secession, a red state / blue state split. The reasoning was this: We in blue states produce the vast majority of the wealth in this country and pay the most taxes, and you in the red states receive the majority of the money from those taxes while complaining about 'em. We in the blue states are the only ones who've been attacked by foreign terrorists, yet you in the red states are gung ho to fight a war in our name. We in the blue states produce the entertainment that you consume so greedily each day, while you in the red states show open disdain for us and our values. Blue state civilians are the actual victims and targets of the war on terror, while red state civilians are the ones standing behind us and yelling "Oh, yeah!? Bring it on!" More than 40% of you Bush voters still believe that Saddam Hussein had something to do with 9/11. I'm impressed by that, truly I am. Your sons and daughters who might die in this war know it's not true, the people in the urban centers where al Qaeda wants to attack know it's not true, but those of you who are at practically no risk believe this easy lie because you can. As part of my concession speech, let me say that I really envy that luxury. I concede that. Healing? We, the people at risk from terrorists, the people who subsidize you, the people who speak in glowing and respectful terms about the heartland of America while that heartland insults and excoriates us... we wanted some healing. We spoke loud and clear. And you refused to give it to us, largely because of your high moral values. You knew better: America doesn't need its allies, doesn't need to share the burden, doesn't need to unite the world, doesn't need to provide for its future. Hell no. Not when it's got a human shield of pointy-headed, atheistic, unconfrontational breadwinners who are willing to pay the bills and play nice in the vain hope of winning a vote that we can never have. Because we're "morally inferior," I suppose, we are supposed to respect your values while you insult ours. And the big joke here is that for 20 years, we've done just that. It's not a "ha-ha" funny joke, I realize, but it's a joke all the same. And I make this pledge to you today: Next time, there will be no pandering. We will run with all the open and joking contempt for our opponents that the President demonstrated towards the cradle of liberty, the Ivy League intellectuals, the "media elite," and the "white-wine sippers." We will not pretend that the simple folk of America know just as much as the people who devote their lives to serving and studying the nation and the world. They don't. So that's why we're asking for your vote in 2008, America. I'm talking to you, you ignorant, slack-jawed yokels, you bible-thumping, inbred drones, you redneck, racist, chest-thumping, perennially duped grade-school grads. We know better, and I truly believe that we can help your smug, sorry asses. And may God, if he does in fact exist, bless each and every one of you. By comedian Mark Fedler
talk about biting the hand that feeds
talk about DEMs wondering why they appear to have alienated people?I don't even know where to begin to respond to such blather. so i won't.
was written by comedian/writer/radio personality adam felber
and, as it was written by a humorist (a satirist if you will) I think that some of you are taking it too seriously...
I agree with what Lt. posted right after the election, that the Democratic party has isolated the people of the "heartland" (it made more sense than that but I can't find his quote). I guess some people would rather have their sons and daughters die in Iraq than live next door to a gay couple. I have to say that, beyond any other election I've voted in (not that I'm some seasoned voter; luckily I turned 18 a few months before Clinton's second term and then I voted in the Gore/Bush election, now this one), I DO NOT find Bush's horrific presidency to be a partisan issue. I am not saying I would never vote for a Republican, though in all honesty that would probably be a cold day in hell. I did not vote for Kerry just because he's a "Democrat." If Bush had been on "my side" I would have wanted him out of office just as vehemently. The facts speak for themselves. Granted, we do need some good strong Democratic leaders who people actually WANT to elect. I came to respect Kerry more once I saw the debates and thoroughly researched his policy, but I don't think he swayed too many undecided or non-commital voters. Say whatever you want, this country is f&$*ed right now.
...that most people who voted for Bush would rather have their kids die in Iraq than live next door to a gay couple. I guess it's conceivable that there are people out there like that, but I really don't think they are the people that elected GWB. Maybe you are just being hyperbolic but the problem with communication in America right now is that it's almost impossible to tell the difference between people being hyperbolic and people regurgitating party rhetoric. Practically any time anyone from either side opens their mouths, the other side sits with theirs agape thinking, "can he (or she) actually be serious?" I think a good part of this is due to the fact that we try to talk about reality in terms of simplistic and charged soundbites which do not reflect reality, serve to make us more incredulous and fearful of the "other side," and really don't do much of anything to increase understanding between opposing viewpoints.I don't mean this as a criticism of you specifically, Cinnamongirl... and I respect what you have to say, but I really am unsure of whether you meant that comment as truth, or as a joke (and I hear other people on both sides say things like that all the time).
that was an exaggeration. I was writing on emotion rather than reason. Sorry, Pedro, and anyone else I've offended (not that I think you're offended) since the election. Like alaric. I really don't mean that comment literally; I just have strong and not very happy feelings about this whole thing. And I DO think there are a few people out there THAT afraid of homosexuals having equal rights and/or the possibility or unions or marriage. Why is it so frightening to them?
I still do think we're screwed.
I saw a bumper sticker today that put it my feelings very well: "I'm straight, but not narrow." I'm still trying to figure out why anyone cares what other people do. As far as I'm concerned anyone can marry a toaster and it wouldn't bother me in the least. Fear of someone else's sexual preference is one of the dumbest things I've ever heard of, well except fear of their race, or maybe haircut. I still believe no one is scary or strage given enough understanding.Question: (I'm not trying to be a jerk, but it will come off that way.) Are any of us doing anything about any of these issues, or are we just complaining? What can we do?
i've never heard any conservative say anything like that about liberals. I also didn't know he was a comedian so I can't just not take it seriously. Regardless I don't think even rush makes nasty comments like that about people, the worst i've heard from him in awhile is calling people communist, which is hardly a criticism. I can't believe he's a children's show writer.
on another note, just in case anyone was wondering, iowa turned out a higher percentage of voters than any other state for the election, 72%. The other 28 were felons. ;-)
RE taking it seriously:i guess it just didn't seem funny to me. it seemed bitter and resentful and defensive and like a pot-shot, last-ditch attempt to get in a mean-spirited shot at all those idiots out there who see things differently than the author.
the other thing is, I've seen ALL of those arguments and attacks in that letter/statement come from people who are serious about them. so I am used to hearing them come not as jokes, but as serious attacks on a group of people that don't deserve as much. it didn't seem like anything that was meant as a joke. the arguments are too close to rational to take as farcical, and too far from good-natured to assume otherwise.
i mean, i don't see it as serious enough to really have to deal with. what's done is done. all the angry comedians in the world aren't going to change anything by writing anything like that. the only danger in treating something like that as a joke is that there are enough people out there who will buy into the arguments and not see them as a joke, and that sentiment, then, can have a negative effect on any real progress that can be acheived from where we stand now.
i think the speech is funny if you think of it in terms of - oh, what if kerry actually said those things instead of being decent and humble as expected? - that would be funny.in that sense, it's the kind of humor that comes out of someone unexpected saying the things other people are thinking.
this whole thing is annoying because everyone has their panties in a bunch over every little goddamn thing. i'm not talking the diner, i'm not talking this entree. i'm talking the whole big shebang. i think it's just as serious a situation as most others, but for god's sake, relax america!
where did our spirit of 9/11 stick-together, unified to survive, and pre-9/11 strength and overall good nature go?
does this mean that even though we keep shopping the terrorists are winning?
i can see how you would think that was funny. didn't strike me the same, though.
Satire isn't meant to be good-natured funny. It is mean and cynical. That said, it appeals to a certain audience. Me- I was part of the audience that it appealled to because I laughed out loud.... Am I an evil anti-"homophobic hillbilly" ex-patriot? Based on everyone's comments apparently.
This is not a semantics issue folks. And there are certainly no take-backs (for the author or anyone who posted about the speech). Perhaps, we should move on to new subjects....
neo, turn on rush limbaugh or ann coulter or dan savage. heck, i played with a keyboard player who equated dems to terrorists and called them evil and it wasn't satire. ann coulter wrote a best selling book accusing democrats of treason, all of em, and lamented the downfall of mccarthyism. again, not satire. james dobson said patrick leahy was a "God people hater"...not satire. this stuff is coming from prominent people in the conservatism movement not just random writers on the web.