Letters to the Editor
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Operation Chaos
Is real. There are going to be Republicans voting for Hillary tomorrow with no intention of voting for her in the Fall, absolutely confirmed.
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Conservatives Get Up Off the Canvas and Do What ?
While I agree that "liberals" want to help the disadvantaged, I cannot quite agree with the notion that those pick-myself-up-by-my-boot-straps-and- forge-ahead "conservatives" are such self-reliant, strong-willed, proud, look-to-the-future Americans. Both groups use our taxpayer money to achievge certain ends. Yes, the "liberals" do it to help others. But the "conservatives", especially the neocons, do it - - along with soliciting bribes, arranging quid pro quo deals in the Congress, and all sorts of imaginative corruptions - - TO HELP THEMSELVES. (REPEAT "TO HELP THEMSELVES" three times). They may seem a bit "tougher" under the radar, but we have usually seen them whine and squeel very loudly when they are exposed.
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Not surprisng...
Perhaps this is guilt by association, but I remember reading in the NY Times in the aftermath of the 1994 Congressional election, the Newt Era, Bill Clinton said that they, the Democrats in the White House, were "Eisenhower Republicans." This is the Democratic Leadership Council, which is represented by Bill and Hillary.
So, it doesn't me that this praiser of Clinton is a conservative, praising her for edging up on "traditional" GOP issues: defense, but what does that say she notes that HRC is for universal healthcare, a "nanny-state type"? Well, it's selective.
Remember when some of them loved Obama because he was doing damage to their bete blanc, Hillary?
Also, HRC was a Republican—a "Goldwater girl"— before she became a Democrat; maybe she's going back to her roots.
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Hillary & her Hawk Talk
Hillary
Do you promise to use NOOKULAR weapons in the middle east?
many happy returns, or maybe I should say, many happy
returns from the edge of obivion.
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Drewonimo
Actually, I think it is the exact reverse.
Hillary's speeches and interviews are where one is most likely to learn of her standpoint on policy.
To this end she has stated that she will ignore economists, has a hawkish view on foreign policy, particularly in view of Iran and oddly enough, Russia, and she has very little idea of how to enact her health policy.
While it is morally conscienable to hold a parent as not being fit if they cannot maintain the upkeep of their child, and thus a mandate making parents cover their kids is workable, to try and enforce the same mandate with adults, will be more difficult.
Hillary waved off enforcing that mandate - a central problem that indicates to me at least, that while Hillary's policies have a lot of breadth (In that they very wordily cover a lot of ground all at once) they lack depth and are in fact pipe-dreams.
Hillary gets around this on pure bravado - she projects an image of toughness and competence even as the evidence points the other way. Voting for a politically expedient war is not tough, threatening to nuke an unpopular country is not tough it is bravado, which she does with some degree of style.
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individual responsibiliti + collective responsibility
"It is a truism that liberals think people are formed by exterior forces around them and are helpless before them, while conservatives think individuals make their own destiny."
Ooh, this burns me up. Everyone knows that the nature/nurture debate can't be neatly resolved by an either/or formulation. (Advances in genetics show that environment and genes interact, which only makes thing more gray...)
In practical terms, it can be a benefit to choose to focus only on what one can control. (And a detriment to cast oneself as passive victim rather than active agent.) I'm definitely for self-responsibility, and think there's merit in the ideas of choosing to be responsible for one's own destiny.
But if we choose to completely ignore these "exterior factors," our ignorance could hurt us in a big way.
Take high fructose corn syrup: since its introduction into our food supply, levels of diabetes have risen correspondingly.
Now, I'm not a saying every overweight American is an innocent victim; clearly people are making decisions and many of them aren't healthy/responsible, etc.
But should we really close our eyes to this clear social trend? Just pretend there isn't a multi-billion $ food and ad industry selling us and our children fatty, sugary junk "food" 24 hrs a day? That the poor and less educated (black and white) have much higher levels of obesity?
It's also true that we're animals who have evolved to crave fat and sugar (calorie gold mines in the life of a hunter/gatherer). That we are as capable of being psychologically conditioned as Pavlov's dogs. We don't like to admit that ads affect us, but obviously they do.
Acknowledging this doesn't necesarily mean we are renouncing free will. In fact, if we use this knowledge to make smart decisions, we can actually increase our liberty by guarding against the temptation to shackle ourselves to fatty foods or credit card debt in the service of needless consumption.
So there's that. The moral problem with refusing to see the powerful influences of "external factors" is the ugly Calvinistic tendency to assume that wealth (or lack) is itself representative of a person's moral virtue. Empathy and compassion aren't dirty commie words.
So how do we balance 1) honestly acknowledging the powerful influence of external forces with 2) accepting reponsibility for our actions and encouraging others to do the same?
There's no easy answer.
Pretending there is, though, and demonizing though who want to do grown-up evaluations of the world we live in doesn't seem particularly moral, responsible, or forward-thinking.
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Fish in a Barrel
Picking apart a Bill Kristol column/diatribe/etc. is like shooting fish in a barrel. Actually, it's more like walking by fish in a barrel -- or uttering the phrase "fish in a barrel." The man deserves credit for indisputable devotion to the company (GOP) line. Unfortunately, the company line is a good country mile away from the truth. This quote/column gets everything wrong, starting with the definition of a liberal and conservative. (When is someone finally going to exercise the damage done by Michael Dukakis who stood around with his thumb you-know-where when Bush senior called him a "liberal" as if the word was interchangeable with rapist or communist? When is a major political leader going to stand up and say, "Damn right I'm a liberal and damn proud of it"?)
Along the way he alludes to one of the biggest misconceptions forming around this election. That is that Hillary Clinton is somehow outworking or out fighting Barack Obama. I don't think even Hillary supporters will argue -- at least not the rational ones -- that the biggest reason she is in the position she is in right now (fighting for survival) is because she sat back and did nothing to challenge Obama in the states that fell between Super Tuesday and Ohio/Texas. If she had fought as hard and tenaciously as she is doing now, chances are the delegate count would be reversed. A fighter comes out charging in the first round, not just in the later rounds when a knockout is the only chance you have to win.
Please keep in mind that I'm not attacking Clinton or disparaging anything about her. Chances are that it was her campaign and not she that was to blame for that tactical blunder. So please keep your witty "but Obama is an empty suit" replies to a minimum.