The Big Lie

Republicans say they can do something about the budget while continuing to cut taxes. Democrats say they will do it while making minmal adjuments to Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. But perhaps the biggest lie of all is that it matters. It does not. Middle class people pick sides between the political parties-- both morally bankrupted by their addiction to campaign cash and the big money interests that spend it-- and the poor struggle to survive. All the while those both rich and powerful have made off with the bank. Not a single conviction for the meltown on Wall Street which has set economic development back 20 years, the housing market perhaps further farther. Wall Street is rocking again up to nearly where it was before the crash, while the unemployment rate barely moves, real wages stagnate or drop, and the housing market remains stubbornly stuck in the tank. I am a long term progessive, a liberal even, but I am sick to death of all of it. While we argue over the crumbs, someone stole our house, actually drove it away in the dark of night.

The Brilliant Lewis Black

http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2011/03/watch_lewis_black_endorse_dona.html

Obama for President

I have really been struggling with McCain over the last few days. Despite it all, I still think he is an honorable man, though I don't think his campaign has shown much of that. The Palin thing was a catastrophe and showed the country the worst elements of McCain's personality. But some part of me is recoiling against the false hurt that some of Obama's supporters have shown. John Lewis is a great man, but using the the actions of some in McCain and Palin's crowds to compare McCain's campaign to that of George Wallace seems to me at least overwrought, if not overtly political code for the Democratic base of Liberals and minorities.

Yes, some of the McCain ads have been horrific, and Palin's "Paling around with terrorists" remark was dangerous and disgusting (though not that surprising coming from her. What a hack!). But I like to think, and I do believe that McCain himself has shown little stomach for the mud slinging. It's been odd really, and a little cowardly I guess.

But if McCain were willing to really "Willie Horton" Obama and if he had made a sober choice for VP I think the polls would be closer, though the landscape would probably feel meaner. And Christ it feels mean enough already. In the end, I just don't believe McCain's soul is that black.

Palin's crowds behaved at times like they were at a Klan rally, but I was deeply touched that McCain stood up three or four separate times last Friday, and even against the boos of his own crowd put down the stupidity of the ill-informed rabble and called Obama an honorable church going man that no American needed to fear. I know there are some who will say he did it out of political expediency, but I am not as cynical as that. Not yet, anyway, but ask me in a few months. Anyway, I would bet a hundred bucks that that woman that called Obama an

A-Rab really wanted to drop the N-word on him. But that woman is not McCain's fault and he did the righteous thing in taking the mike from her and responding the way he die. For me last Friday was the highlight of the either man's campaign, and I am trying now to remember if and when Obama showed such grace.

 McCain seemed genuinely disappointed last night that Obama did not agree to the Lincoln-Douglas town halls that were previously agreed to. The William Ayers thing was a red herring, but McCain clearly does not have an affinity for the argument. He has laid off Jeremiah Wright completely, which even to me was at least partially fair game.

And while I believe that the US should absolutely apply a more even hand to the till in the Middle East, Reverend Jackson's comments recently smacked of a sense arrogant entitlement that I found troubling. If he really used the word Zionist (I really don't trust the Post when it comes to the Rev) -- dripping as it does with the memories of "Hymietown"-- then Jackson needs to move on. This is no time to fight that battle, or settle old scores. And Obama needs to be careful not to get drawn into some "Don't Ask Don't Tell" trap in the first 100 days. These are very serious times.

Obama backed out of the town hall meetings, and public financing, as well as a handful of progressive policy decisions after his nomination. All of it was safe. Can't blame him I guess, but it does not make him flame retardant. To me Obama hid out for much of the campaign. I only hope that the cool that he exhibited belies a passion for fixing things, because this is no time for political caution. If he fritters away the next four years on school uniforms and highway projects, than the democrats deserve purgatory for the next 50.

So I do have some cold feet on Barack too. Perhaps we American's just have to learn to have to live with less certainty.

The country needs sound management not an ideologue. I am not at all sure that Obama will be able to work across the aisle and get things done. Somehow I think McCain would. What is unclear with McCain though is how much he would govern from the right. He certainly has run from the right.

So even though it'll probably cost me some dough I will still vote for Obama, with hope in my heart and the sure knowledge that even though McCain himself has recaptured some of what was honorable in him, there is no way he can fill 50,000 political positions without appointing hundreds if not thousands of the same political hacks, leeches, incompetents, and yahoo ideologues and that have populated Bush's completely failed presidency. It is time for a change.

I hope the kids are right about Barack. I really do.

Palin is a Boob

Palin is a boob, a useful idiot to distract us from the pitiful reality that the Washington power structure has created for us. Palin is Paris Hilton for the political chattering class, someone that makes everyone who sees her feel superior. There is not one among us as stupid as that, and not one among us that so brazenly would attempt to suggest her real lack of curiosity in the ways that world works as "down home", or more real than others. I don't know which is more annoying: Her parochial simplistic view of the way the world works, or her absolute insistence that those who don't agree are east coast twinks. F#$% her.

Plenty of blame to spread between the re pubs and the dems on this meltdown in the finance world. The repubs have been deregulating Wall Street for two decades. the dems just had their little nest egg with Fannie and Freddy. Both were looking for campaign grease. The culture of money is the real culprit, and neither McCain or Obama will tell you the real truth about that. Both will raise more than $100 million and a lot of that will come from will connected slobs looking to buy the trough at which they feed and which sucks the life from the rest of us. Both parties have bee n completely dishonored. For the first time in my life, I am really disgusted with the lot of them, and I really don't see one party as more pure (even with with qualifications) than the other.

If either of the candidates really told the truth and made indications they were really willing to do something about the obscene culture of money, I might vote for them. Even Mc Cain, even with Palin. Whatever McCain and Obama have said up until now is just platitudes, protecting the taxpayer, hitting the CEO's bla, bla, bla... Shut up already. I was born at night, but not last night and I really do believe that the parties that both of you both represent are completely corrupted by money. I understand that Obama must point to the Repubs efforts to to deregulate the financial industry, and that McCain and his cronies will point to=2 0Freddy and Fannie.

When one of them says, look Washington looked the other way because we wanted the campaign cash, then I will accept that there is seriousness. Not to worry, there is NO chance of the truth dripping from the lips of either of them. The system is completely corrupt

Wave That Flag

Old friend, I really get your disappointment now that Edwards has exited stage left, but are you really so down on Clinton and Obama, especially Obama? You're really bummin' me out.

Edwards spoke to issues that have been a concern to me for most of my adult life, but I still could not connect with him. Maybe I missed it, but it seems a lot of others did too. Edwards never seemed to connect with people the way that either of the Kennedy brothers, McGovern, or Jackson did. Maybe the media didn't give him a fair shake-- the debates were a joke, pissing matches between Clinton and Obama-- but I like to think that if he really had something I could have registered with I would have and could have found it. I give him credit for starting and ending in New Orleans, but at least for me he was not the right messenger.

So we are left with two, and in recent days we have seen again the ruthless nature of Clintonian politics. I heard Carville say yesterday that the Clintons are not racist, and I believe that it so. But they are ruthless and we have glimpsed again the compromises they are willing to make. I used to like that fighter’s spirit in Bill Clinton-- the idea that he could give as good as he got, until giving and getting was all we were seeing. It was ugly. These days have reminded me of that. But that’s a messy thing, not a deadly thing, or evil thing, and there’s a difference.

Obama is a great orator, but I have yet to connect with him. It seems to me he would be a center left-- as opposed to Clinton's center right-- leader.

I would like to think that both Clinton and Obama know fairly bright jurists to appoint to the court, and I would hope that both would discontinue the absolute assault we have seen on the Bill or Rights and Constitution. In Iraq both will bring the troops home. Though honestly, I doubt either will do it on a faster schedule than the other once they sit in the oval and have to face the possibility of genocide if they move too precipitously. At this point it is not even clear to me that either would move much faster even than a McCain. All will be under enormous pressures to bring the soldiers home while avoiding a humanitarian catastrophe, and I would think even the Democrats will be somewhat hemmed in by a desire not to give impression that everything that was lost has been for nothing. To some extent all of them will have to play out Bush's hand now, which is what he and Rove wanted once the realized the reckless course they had set us on.

The worst president in our lifetime…

On the economy Obama and Clinton, it seems to me, can both be counted on to at least level the field some with the tax cuts. I would hope both would likely rein in—all evidence to the contrary, I know, I know-- spending and tax cuts and getting closer to a balanced budget. The Republicans and Bush in particular, without a plan or organizing principle other than the ownership of power, have been reckless with the budget.

Both Obama and Clinton are clearly committed to doing something about health care reform. Clinton's proposal may be more progressive than Obama's, and neither was as forward thinking as Edward's plan, but all of them will have to compromise substantially to get something done. I do not see even the most conservative plan coming into law as currently proposed.

Neither will outlaw abortion or scapegoat the poor, gays, or emigrants.

Anyway, we were spoiled with Martin and John, and our old friend Bobby. Even “Tear down this wall” is pretty inspiring-- Would have been more so if Reagan also asked the South Africans or Israelis to tear theirs down as well. I have yet to be inspired. Gore and Kerry didn’t reach me much either. Two images; Gore inn the deabbtes talking about that f'in "lockbox" for Social Secuity, and Kerry Wind Surfing. These they brought on themselves.

But I am getting too old for the inspiring thing. If inspiring is not available, I'll be happy with professional at this point, Gore and Kerry might not have inspired, but neither one of them would have been so uncaring about the suffering in New Orleans even up to today, or blundered into Iraq.

Maybe we won’t see it again in our lifetime, and so far as hoping for it maybe that’s someone else’s deal. There’s a lot of time between now and the general though and I definitely perceive some fire in Obama. But even if they never nurture the flame. I am still Ok.I could still live with Clinton, though I am leaning towards Obama.

On second thought, Al might have been inspiring. And Clinton may be Satin. Maybe I am full of it, but at least our long national nightmare will soon be over.

Peace Brother,