The Current State of Things

Since my last couple posts, I have been asked to clarify some things, and I thought this would be a good time to have a current status assessment. Right now we pretty much have two candidates running for the office of president, Barack Obama and John McCain. For me, this election is just another election of choosing the lesser of the two evils, or really, choosing a candidate whose political, moral, spiritual and social beliefs differ in one way or another from my own. How important is it to have ones values line up with a candidate? I have never been a groupie and I am not the type of voter that puts superficial issues above others in choosing to support a candidate. For instance, when Rudy Giuliani ran in the primaries, I did not support him, even though he is a New Yorker and an Italian American. Those issues don't do it for me. He is pro-choice, anti-gun, socially very liberal, and has enough skeletons in his closet to populate Arlington National Cemetery. Rudy is also a somewhat autocratic individual that likes to surround himself with yes men, and this proved out with the results. 

Now back to McCain and Obama. I could never support Obama because I differ with him on almost every issue. As far as I am concerned, he is a marxist in democrat clothing. McCain offers meat to chew on, but I can't find substance of agreement with every bite. He says he's pro-life, and pro-gun, which are two important issues, but he also believes in man caused global warming. Also, as a senator, he has sponsored legislation that creates more governmental control over people's lives, something I am definitely against. In the political spectrum, he is a moderate republican that has too much in common with the opposition. Now some of you may say bipartisanism is a good thing and shouldn't politicians work together on a common goal? From my standpoint, anything done by a committee dilutes the results and compromises people's values. In the case of the congress, it seems like the republicans have compromised more than the democrats, but none the less, the results are such that the congress has a sub 10% approval rating. Basically, you are prostituting yourself to a process instead of standing up for what you believe in. I would also ask, if your world view is different, how can one have common goals? The common goals that are truly shared between democrats and republicans are that they want to be reelected and they preach the same fairy tale every election, and we fall for it. At this point, my observations are that it is like 1996 again. My question is, is this the best the republicans can come up with? I thought Bob Dole was an honorable man, but not the best by a long shot. All he served as was cannon fodder for the democrats. The press plays an important role in this. By all surveys, the press, meaning print, broadcast and internet journalists are around 90% liberal or left leaning. When you look back on the past year, the New York Times for instance bent over backwards to promote John McCain, who was perceived to be the weaker candidate compared to Romney or Huckabee. If it weren't for the liberal press, John would not be where he is. So where does this leave us? It leaves us with two candidates whose candidacies were decided by the parties and the press by at least 50%, leaving us with poor choices indeed. No matter who gets elected, we have to face the possibility of  new cold war, illegal immigration, a fiscally unsound and irresponsible government, choices for the supreme court, energy, and the direction we will go as a nation in the 21st century. I find myself in  situation where I can't hold my nose anymore when I vote. We need someone that has strong core beliefs, and doesn't need polls to decide what to do. In that context, even if the person is somewhat inexperienced, they will have a sufficient moral compass to make proper decisions. Some of my right wing journalistic brethren have become quite the water boys for whomever the republican party puts up. Even though Rush Limbaugh swore he would never carry water agin after the 2006 elections, he still does so with loyal aplomb. It's the same with Sean Hannity. I like loyal people, but even loyalty has its limits. Until we put our foot down, they will keep giving us the same lame candidates. So come November, in spite of my support of McCain at times, I probably won't be voting for him. At least there's bread and circus no matter who gets elected and honestly, for many of us, the day after the election, like The Who said, "meet the new boss, same as the old boss". At least with Stymie, I'll have more to write about. 

Now on to other explanations. I was asked about the "Stymie" reference to Barack Obama in my last post. I want to say it had nothing to do with race, but rather the character Stymie embodied, which was that of a con man. Enough said. As far as "The Swimmer" goes, you are on your own. :)

Thank you for reading this blog.