Saturday, August 13, 2005
Flash blogging
I have 22 kids coming to my classroom in three days, so I'm a little busy right now, so I thought I'd take some time for some lightning fast blogging, quick opinions on this and that:
1) President Bush likes to think of himself as the heir to Ronald Reagan. Taking a look at his guns and butter approach, what with this ongoing mess in Iraq and his pork-packed highway bill that went over his original estimate by $3 billion, perhaps Bush should start looking at himself as the heir to LBJ.
2) Does it seem like Bush is looking more and more foolish trying to pretend he doesn't see this woman camped out in front of the "ranch" in Crawford? I'm sure you've heard all about this mother of a fallen soldier in Iraq who demands an audience with the president. Apparently, she's joined by an increasing number of people, who remain undaunted by a passing parade of drive-by yahoos trying to bully and intimidate them into leaving. Meanwhile, our president refuses to acknowledge that this woman is sitting by his front gate. To my knowledge, Bush still has not attended one funeral of a fallen soldier out of a persistent fear of what that would do to him politically. What kind of leadership is this?
3) And here we thought that the Tom Delay affair had quietly blown over as right-wingers were hoping. Fortunately, federal prosecutors are quite tenacious and work on their own schedule. Republican lobbyist/crook Jack Abramoff was finally indicted Thursday for his trail of malfeasance. As you know, this guy is connected to Christian right leader Ralph Reed, whose own ethics have been questioned lately, and of course connected to Delay. Of course we're also hearing that Delay's own PAC has been rife with inconsistencies and bad bookkeeping. We'll stay tuned for further news on him. Of course, I'm sure right-wingers are continuing to make excuses.
MAIL
We had some interesting responses to my blog on Monday discussing how reasonable conservatives continue to see morning in America, while right-wing ideologues peddle the end times to score donations and votes. One reader said this:
Good blog, Mouth. I get sooo tired of conservatives harking back to the good old days of the 1950's. Yeah, lets go back to Jim Crow, Red baiting, and mono. Where we all walked lockstep together in our homogenous staid society. Where conformity was a virtue. I think the 60's and 70's was a convulsive reaction against this, though no doubt it went too far and has left some societal problems that we are still dealing with. I got a novel suggestion: instead of pointing a finger at others, how about we reach out a help hand.
Indeed. The basic philosophy guiding many right-wingers is, "I'm just fine. You're the problem."
Another reader said this:
You are also correct about 48% of the electorate voting for the party of the far left. However, I just think this goes to diminish your suggestion that we're slouching towards Jerusalem.
It seems statistically impossible for all this positive change to take place if 48 percent of the electorate is this bad. And do you really believe that because someone voted for Kerry that means they support drug use, divorce and teenage promiscuity? If so, then thank you for illustrating what I've been saying all along about right-wingers.
Furthermore, I urge you to revisit my June 24 posting, which shows some strong evidence that while red-staters talk the talk on family values, blue-staters are far more likely to actually walk the walk.
1) President Bush likes to think of himself as the heir to Ronald Reagan. Taking a look at his guns and butter approach, what with this ongoing mess in Iraq and his pork-packed highway bill that went over his original estimate by $3 billion, perhaps Bush should start looking at himself as the heir to LBJ.
2) Does it seem like Bush is looking more and more foolish trying to pretend he doesn't see this woman camped out in front of the "ranch" in Crawford? I'm sure you've heard all about this mother of a fallen soldier in Iraq who demands an audience with the president. Apparently, she's joined by an increasing number of people, who remain undaunted by a passing parade of drive-by yahoos trying to bully and intimidate them into leaving. Meanwhile, our president refuses to acknowledge that this woman is sitting by his front gate. To my knowledge, Bush still has not attended one funeral of a fallen soldier out of a persistent fear of what that would do to him politically. What kind of leadership is this?
3) And here we thought that the Tom Delay affair had quietly blown over as right-wingers were hoping. Fortunately, federal prosecutors are quite tenacious and work on their own schedule. Republican lobbyist/crook Jack Abramoff was finally indicted Thursday for his trail of malfeasance. As you know, this guy is connected to Christian right leader Ralph Reed, whose own ethics have been questioned lately, and of course connected to Delay. Of course we're also hearing that Delay's own PAC has been rife with inconsistencies and bad bookkeeping. We'll stay tuned for further news on him. Of course, I'm sure right-wingers are continuing to make excuses.
We had some interesting responses to my blog on Monday discussing how reasonable conservatives continue to see morning in America, while right-wing ideologues peddle the end times to score donations and votes. One reader said this:
Good blog, Mouth. I get sooo tired of conservatives harking back to the good old days of the 1950's. Yeah, lets go back to Jim Crow, Red baiting, and mono. Where we all walked lockstep together in our homogenous staid society. Where conformity was a virtue. I think the 60's and 70's was a convulsive reaction against this, though no doubt it went too far and has left some societal problems that we are still dealing with. I got a novel suggestion: instead of pointing a finger at others, how about we reach out a help hand.
Indeed. The basic philosophy guiding many right-wingers is, "I'm just fine. You're the problem."
Another reader said this:
You are also correct about 48% of the electorate voting for the party of the far left. However, I just think this goes to diminish your suggestion that we're slouching towards Jerusalem.
It seems statistically impossible for all this positive change to take place if 48 percent of the electorate is this bad. And do you really believe that because someone voted for Kerry that means they support drug use, divorce and teenage promiscuity? If so, then thank you for illustrating what I've been saying all along about right-wingers.
Furthermore, I urge you to revisit my June 24 posting, which shows some strong evidence that while red-staters talk the talk on family values, blue-staters are far more likely to actually walk the walk.
