Category Archives: government, law, and politics

Cheap Imitations

For the last hour or so, I’ve been watching the second of two debates between Vice
President Bush and Governor Dukakis on CSPAN. I was in sixth grade at the time of
original broadcast. I idolized the character of Alex P. Keaton in “Family Ties”
and parroted his conservative statements and supported the candidates he liked,
much to the chagrin of my liberal Democrat parents. In my social studies class,
I debated, as if I were Bush, against a classmate playing Dukakis. I don’t recall
the substance of the debate, but I know that, in the eyes of my classmates, I cremated
“Dukakis”.

A lot has happened since them. I’ve grown up and changed. I eventually shed my conservative
skin and accepted what my parents said as political gospel. I was a bleeding heart
liberal through most of college. I gradually learned that idealism and naivete
are a bad combination. I slowly drifted toward the middle, where I am today. I’m
still and idealist, but some of my ideals have changed. My political acumen is still
dwarfed by my knack for science, but I believe I have lost much of my former naivete,
and I think I see things more clearly than I used to and many of my peers currently
do.

I watched that Bush-Dukakis with great interest. I was surprised to note the similarity
of the questions asked. I was further surprised by how similar the answers were
to those heard from Kerry and Bush. There was a very distinct difference, however.
Both candidates were more thoughtful, intelligent, and responded to more questions
without evasion, than today’s candidates. Bush, Jr. and Kerry rarely strayed from
their campaign slogans and ready-made rebuttals. Neither has debated with either
the prowess or the substance of Bush, Sr or Dukakis.

When I stepped away from the TV to write this entry, I had one very clear idea in
my head. Both of the candidates in 1988 were head and shoulders above the candidates
of 2004. 2004’s candidates are cheap imitations of 1988’s. Given the chance,
I would vote for either Bush, Sr. or Dukakis before wasting my vote on either of
the vapid, inept, self-serving, self-aggrandizing, grandstanding egomaniacs running
today.

Shut Out

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Libertarian candidate Michael Bedanrik and Green candidate David Cobb were arrested
at the site of the second debate. They were attempting to serve papers to the
Commission on Presidential Debates. The story makes for an interesting read. (Thanks,
Slashdot)

Supporters of the two-party system have argued that minor candidates shouldn’t be
allowed to participate in debates. The problem with that reasoning is that’s it’s
circular. As long as third party candidates get shut out of mainstream events, they
will remain minor. If people get a chance to see them in action, they might actually
change some people’s mind. *Gasp* The horror!

Weapons of Mass Obfuscation

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By now you realize that I never finished my summary of the first debate. I probably never will. Trying to write my own loose transcript was a bad idea. Live and learn.

I took a different approach to this debate. I jotted down impressions and the occasional zinger. So, without further ado, here’s my take.

Continue reading →

Rabid Dogs

1 Reply

Some people don’t care who gets trampled in the mad rush to uncover the truth.

There’s a side to RatherGate that not everyone knows about. Not everyone who said the memos were real were maliciously trying to deceive the public. Some people, like David Hailey, Utah State University associate professor of technical
communications, actually believed the memos to be real and wrote a paper attempting to prove it. This action was not well received, and Hailey’s reputation was dragged through the mud by the lynch mob looking for liberals to string up for daring to
trust the documents.

Bene Diction sums up the events nicely.

This is the bad side of blogging – the drunk driving so to speak – uncivil, hateful, vindictive, swarming.

Misconceptions

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Pro-life, I thought, meant being pro all life. Not just the unborn. No matter what. Neither of the candidates are that. However, a democrat is more likely to fund a system to help out teenagers and college students to make other options besides abortion attractive. Honestly, isn’t that the way you want to go? Not force women to not do something, but make it something that’s less desirable than any other option? Last time I checked, there were a lot of abortions before it was legal.

There are several misconceptions embedded in these statements and others in this post. The author seems unaware of how forceful and deceptive Planned Parenthood can be. They don’t see abortion as even slightly wrong, so they don’t hesitate to council women to abort as the first and best option. They’re not above coercion, either.