Letters to the Editor
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If there IS a next president
The way Bush and Cheney are ginning up the faithful for an attack on Iran, given the fact that it's quite believable that they'd start another war and declare martial law or the equivalent (if they can get a real shootin' war going) right around the time of the next elections -- hey, who says we're going to have elections? These guys, I kid you not, are capable of trying anything. The only thing that might stop them -- it sure as hell won't be Congress -- is the military itself, refusing to go along.
We're in for an interesting year and a half. I won't believe we're rid of Bush until the next prez is on the stand with the bible under his left palm.
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not to mention....
...Bush/Cheney have established a dangerous precedent with their Unitary Executive approach to the Oval Office. Power, once seized, is not relinquished voluntarily. The next president, Democrat or Republican, will retain the powers that Bush/Cheney have taken to the office. If it's a Republican we can expect more of the "civil liberties are a quaint notion" policies. If a Democrat, unexpectedly, wins, I truly don't expect much more.
I agree that it is unnerving to see how far the Republican candidates are willing to go in an effort to sound tough on terrorism. Their ignorance of the realities of the Middle East is astounding. Unfortunately I don't hear much from the other side to make me confident that they could actually reverse the trend.
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I'm having trouble with your characterizing the Muslim Brotherhood as "moderate."
If they're "moderate," heaven help us all.
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"If the next president is Republican, our military will be destroyed."
So says a life-long Republican in my family who happens to be in the Armed Forces.
Even with that view, it's doubtful he could stomach voting for a Dem. More likely, he won't vote.
I wonder if he's alone in that opinion among conservatives in the service?
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I fear what Jim fears
right after the 2004 election I told a friend that I expected martial law. The fact that Bush believes we are in an existential struggle for the very future of the US, coupled with the fact that there is no real "successor" to the Bush/Cheney administration (unless Cheney runs), scares me. Would they really just walk away from all this?
One more attack on US soil could very well result in suspension of elections for the duration of the "emergency". God help us.
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The Party's Over
Or at least it will be, come the elections. I'm not sure the Other Party will survive either, but it likely will, as Americans in general are only beginning to rediscover their inner revolutionary. But my party, the one symbolized, for me, by the dead elephant, needs to be cleansed, purged, destroyed and then, maybe, rebuilt. It seems like a fairly reasonable expectation as well as a righteous one. While Democrats have been spinning around like the Three Stooges even worse than usual since they grabbed the outstretched Upper Hand, my party has put the gun to its head and pulled the trigger. I'm grateful, as there was a time when one could take some degree of pride in either afilliation. While there is no horrendous shame in being a Democrat which is comparable to what we Republicans have to endure right now, there is also no great shining prize lying over there across the aisle, although some of my best friends...well, you know.
The current crop of Republican hopefuls fill me with hope because of their utter lack of humanity, intelligence, grace, compassion and anything else of any political utility Ron Paul excepted but also excluded), all of which pretty much assures unilateral self-destruction. I'll continue to do what I've done in the past: vote for the best candidate. However, the band of swine who now represent that dead elephant could actually send me across the aisle at least long enough to enable me to vote in local Democrat primaries, as there is a certain danger in going to the polls and having to choose between Hitler, Mussolini and Torquemada.
I continue to remain optimistic about America's true raison de etre and in our ability to rehabilitate our government and our image abroad - as well as right here at home. When my relatives start rebelling against their own sworn political allegiance you know the party's over, but even they have realized they've been beating a dead elephant.
Oh, by the way, while I do admire a lot about libertarianism, I'm not ready to contract out road work, public safety, etc. I'd rather trust the good intentions of communitarian aggrarians, and that bunch (me included) have yet to mount a serious fourth party threat. Hopefully we won't have to. At least we can still think.
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This is one of the consequences
...of a system and a party and a mentality that values 'strength' - defined as ignorant, anti-intellectual, cryptoracist faith in brute force - above every other attribute. The spectacle at the Republican debate of the candidates competing in a 'brutality auction' of who would treat most harshly the prisoners in Guantanamo (who have already had their rights unconscionably trampled and who, in the proposed hypothetical, would have zero relevant intelligence).
When machismo is the key value, and thoughtfulness is actively discouraged, why is there any surprise when these are the candidates thrown up (image intentional)?
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Lost my way
...in a sentence. ;) I meant to say that spectacle of the brutality auction at the debate was symptomatic and instructive.
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If You Think They Hate Us Now??
Most of the world dislikes America. But not Americans. Go figure -- maybe "they" really dislike the crooks and the maniacs and the morons and the missionaries who are shaping America's policy. And I suspect a lot of "us" hate "us", too.
But it's not just these incredibly inept, shallow, ego-driven and bare-faced opportunist politicians -- it's the people and corporations and cronies that are backing these gawd-awful people.
The Heritage Foundation. The Weekly Standard. The American Enterprise Institute. AIPAC.
Follow the money. Connect the dots. Catch the man behind the curtain.
Never to late to start mending fences . . .
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Anything Is Still Possible
Have you ever seen Giuliani in a press conference when he isn't standing in front of a mound of rubble, or selling himself? He's mostly in a hurry to get someplace else, or more there to spar with the press than tell it anything. His attitude is almost entirely adversarial--and haven't we seen enough of that lately?. So far, he's been maketing a new, more genial guy, but it's hard to imagine it's going to last for long.
The you-tube of Romney with the conservative radio snark was the most revealing scene in the entire GOP race so far. The guy actually has a brain rather than simply a posture. At least, he had the guts to fight for himself when it was called for--not for the cameras. I saw a guy at work in that video selling air conditioners to Eskemos--which isn't something this country holds against you.
While he had nobody else in mind he did the other candidates a service as well. That fundamentalist ball and chain has to go. But chances are it won't, and that leaves Mitt "the imperfect" but a genuine practitioner of an American born Christian faith whose members have served other GOP presidents . The last place you'd expect him from is Mass., but didn't Clinton come from Arkansas, and Carter from Georgia?
Anything is still possible.