Just when you thought it was safe to go back to the voting booths…
Not this year — please not this year. I’ve rambled about my reasons for feeling this way fairly recently, so I won’t beleaguer the point, but…danger, Will Robinson, danger!
I don’t have time to rant about this like I’d really like to. As far as I’m concerned, though, getting Bush out of office should be the number one priority — and Nader just isn’t the answer. He wasn’t last election, and he won’t be this election.
Anybody But Bush continues to be my battle cry.
iTunes: “I’m Afraid of Americans (v3)” by Bowie, David from the album I’m Afraid of Americans (1997, 6:06).
CJ
Brandon
Tim Who?
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I’m with you on this one. Frankly, I think he is the best candidate…but this isn’t a matter of who is the best but who could win. United we stand, divided we lose. We need to keep the anti-Bush contingency (i.e. the majority) on the same side. After the last election we should all be well aware that a close race isn’t a good one.
I would like to extend an open invitation to Mr. Nader’s campaign workers. Please stop by house and feel free to engage me in coversation.
Thank you.
Ego. Pure ego. He has no realistic chance, but he’d rather be important as a spoiler than compromise for the greater good: exactly the quality which would make him an awful President. Do we really need an environmental ayatollah running things? (And I say this as someone who is an environmentalist for a living.) We’ve seen what happens when an uncompromising idealogue from the other end of the scale runs things.
I thought he had already thought about it and decided not to throw his hat in the ring this time. He needs to let it go, and work with whoever gets the Democratic nomination to make sure the Greens are represented in his platforms. That would show me he cares more about his message than about being president.
He has stated he is NOT going to run but I’m thinking he keeps it in the back of his mind. Well I could…if I wanted to. Knowing full well he hasn’t a prayer. Ego! Its all about ego.
Anybody but Bush” continues to be your “battle cry” but can you (without calling people names) articulate intelligently an effective, not wacko, alternative to Bush’s policies ?
Are you people even capitalists anymore?
How would the liberals stomp out terrorism exactly? Negotiate the terrorists to death? Please don’t tell me the United Nations has anything to do with it. Please!
Before the Libs take back control of government they must find their mission. What is your purpose? What will you do besides call everyone who isn’t a liberal “extreme”? What need do you intend to fill? Your own worst enemy is yourselves. All I ever hear out of you Dean/Nader/Gore/Kerry types is the childish rhetoric of spoiled children.
At least spoiled children have the excuse of innocence. Whats yours?
John —
Any particular one? Probably so, given a little time and research. All of them together? Sure — elect a Democrat in ‘04.
I can’t speak for anyone else who reads or comments on my site, but for myself — to be honest, I can’t really give a good answer right off the top of my head. I did take a moment to look up “capitalist”, though, and I can say quite definitely that I am neither “an investor of capital in business, especially one having a major financial interest in an important enterprise,” nor am I “a person of great wealth.” As far as being “a supporter of capitalism,” it’s been far too long since I took an economics class for me to really answer that.
I am, however, a little curious as to the question itself. If I were to say that I wasn’t a capitalist, what would that make me? Are we dealing with McCarthey era Capitalism vs. Communism here? Would I be a Communist? A “red”? Or are there other options for me to choose from?
“The liberals”, to begin with, might not be so concerned with “stomping out” terrorism as if that were the only solution. Scoff all you like, there are situations where negotiation might not be such a bad idea. Admittedly, there are also situations where negotiation is not a realistic option, but to so casually negate that approach is foolish.
Much of this world sees the United States and its current apparent attitude of expecting everyone else to adopt our social, political and religious beliefs (whether they like it or not) as a threat to their way of life. Recognizing this and realizing that attempting to force “democracy” down everyone’s throat at the barrel of a gun might be a good place to start. Recognizing that many of these terrorists have reasons for why they dislike and distrust the US and seeing what we can do to dispel those feelings would be another good place to start. There are a lot of possibilities beyond simply jumping directly into the “bomb ‘em back into the stone age” approach.
And if we do decide that it’s time to use military force, how about acting with justification and with support, rather than doing whatever we want to whomever we want whether or not anyone else agrees with us? Immediately after Sept. 11th, we had the sympathy of the world, and if handled the right way, not only could we have gone quite a ways towards disrupting or even destroying the Al Qaida organization, but we could have used that solidarity to build better relations between the US and the rest of the world.
Instead, we squandered that opportunity by telling the rest of the world to kiss off, we started going after Al Qaida on our own — and then, after moving into Afghanistan and scattering what we could find of the Al Qaida network (but still managing to completely lose track of bin Laden himself), we suddenly decide that the real enemy is Saddam (even though he had nothing to do with the Sept. 11th attacks), we invent charges of posession of WMD’s (which still are just as nonexistant as they were before we went in), and we begin an unfounded and unjustified war that has to date claimed more American lives than the first four years of the Vietnam war. Meanwhile, Al Qaida continues to regroup and is still a threat, and most people in the US feel no more secure now than when the “war on terrorism” began.
Sure sounds like a rousing success story to me.
Unfortunately, they don’t, thanks to the arrogant blundering of Bush et al. They should, however, and repairing our relationship with the UN and its member nations should be a priority of the next administration.
My purpose is simply to do my duty as a citizen — to keep an eye on what my government is doing, and when I disagree, to examine, question, voice my opinion, and when necessary, vote in whatever way I see fit to do what little I can. And don’t think for a moment that I’ll stop doing this if and when a Democrat gets in office, either! I agree with Dean more than I do the rest of the potential nominees, but I don’t agree with him on everything, and I’ll certainly question him if I find it necessary.
That’s hardly my approach — and besides, there are plenty of liberals who I would call extreme, and plenty of conservatives whom I wouldn’t. Merely disagreeing with someone doesn’t automatically give me (or anyone else) the right to denigrate them.
If that’s all you ever hear, than I suggest you either start listening more closely, or start listening to different “Dean/Nader/Gore/Kerry types”. Every group has its fair share of extremists and wackos, to be sure, but there are also plenty of well-reasoned, very intelligent people out there. Don’t just knock them out of habit because they espouse beliefs that you don’t share. I try to avoid falling into this trap (though I’m sure I fail at times), and I’d appreciate it if you did the same.
Your post here was little more than an eloquent “you suck” — can you at least give reasonings and positions beyond that? Or is this all I should expect?
As had been discussed elsewhere in response to this boring whine:
the current administration was briefed on a complete and well-designed plan that would broken the back of Al Queda in early 2001, making the WTC attacks difficult to impossible. They ignored it: tax cuts to pass, oil field concessions to grant, you know.
I don’t want to be drawn into any discussion or debate where insults (the “Libs”, “you people”, etc.) are the norm.
I recommend taking this quiz as a way of learning more about the issues, policies and ideas that should matter, as well as how you think about them.
With liberals its always “Blame America First”.
John’s answers to the “Are you a neoconservative?” quiz:
Well first of all I am baffled why liberals keep me a “neoconservative”. I consider myself a conservative with no prefix. I see no need of a prefix. However I must say I think the term “neoconservative” is quite nifty sounding! Its soooo Retro! I like it!
I am just curious of the dif between the two terms in the liberal mind.
Anyhow the first question isn’t really a fair question (or more to the point the answer choices aren’t fair). The third one down is the closest to being true. However that nonsense that’s thrown in there about there being “no compromise on Israel’s borders” is crap. Of course there needs to be a compromise on land. Peace seems very illusive for that part of the world. What is most needed is effective Palestine leadership who can lead his or her people towards civilization and peaceful co-existence with their brothers. Instead Palestine leaders privately or not so privately encourage endless senseless violence. I do not hold out much hope this day for peace here. American leadership can not accomplish the goal of peace alone. Liberals need to accept that the violence in Israel is not an American diplomacy failing.
Question two the 3rd one down is clearly the correct answer but there was not enough emphases on the fact that the Vietnam war was executed very badly by both Nixion and Johnson( particularly Johnson). Had a military strategy been employed instead of political one than the outcome would have been different. Its certainly debatable whether or not American troops should have ever been deployed in the first place ( I would oppose such action), but once they were, than we should have fought the war to win. That wasn’t done.
Question 3, the third answer down is once again the correct one. The novel concept of the first Bush Administration of inching China slowly towards reform using free trade as a carrot and its experimental use of capitalism as a poison pill seems to be working —- slowly. I thought this approach was morally misguided at first but time has proven me wrong. This strategy may take much time but China has Hong Kong and Taiwan — both thriving capitalists markets. Taiwan is even a democracy. Both set examples for the people. Sooner or latter the people will assert their basic human rights. China however remains very dangerous and treacherous. They are our enemy, the government is the enemy to her own people and they must never be fully trusted until they reform. However, unlike the USSR, China has no illusions of world conquest so its probably best and safest to continue the Bush I Doctrine of nudging China towards civilized behavior and reform of human rights. China’s 1989 will happen within our lifetimes ( or at least it is my hope) but till then we must remember that they are heavy armed with nuclear weapons (and God only knows what else) which are all pointed directly at American cities. Dealing with these commies is a tricky but less so than the USSR.
In Question 4 again the third answer is the closest to being true however military action is highly unlikely. Iran, like Iraq, has all the necessary ingredients for democracy and a stable constitutional government. Popular revolt is likely here.
Question 5. The first answer is insane. Answer three again comes the closest to being true but just barely. Bush’s approach to get the regional governments to put pressure on this tyrant is more likely to work than the Clinton approach of bribing them with goodies and looking the other way while they violate the terms of agreement.
Question 6. The 4th answer totally true. “The war against Saddam Hussein’s regime was…Long overdue. Bringing democracy to Iraq is the first great step in democratizing the Middle East.”
Question 7. 4th answer is the closest to being true. However the way the answer is phrased suggests that the United States will be invading another country every other Wednesday. That of course is preposterous. The writer of this test betrays his or her liberal bias and a reckless disregard for fairness.
Question 8. The first and second answers are both true. The first answer most directly answers the question. The forth answer is almost true. However it should have read “The U.S. cannot afford to act alone [in every situation but when the UN and American allies — like France — fail as they did in the 2nd gulf war than the US must stand alone if she must].
Question 9. People who think question one is correct are the “Blame America First” crowd. I have no respect for such people. Answer 2 is most correct but America is not as warlike as the wording of the answer tries to suggest. Answer 3 also seems correct but on reflection it is rather French. That is to say that we would work against terrorism but when it came to put up or shut up, we would cave in and never take meaningful action.
Question 10, answer 2 is very interesting! “Managing a global empire?” A global empire??!! Is that what liberals think of America these days? That must surely be some kind of infantile joke! Answers 1 and 4 are both correct.
After taking the test I was defined as a (neo) conservative but I must quibble with the notion that conservatives want to “Promote the development of an American empire”. That’s crap. America hasn’t expanded its boarder in quite some time and its ridiculous to conclude that it will do so any time in the future. Nor is the fiction about exporting American values have much basis in reality. I have traveled all over the world and know all to well how false that contention is. I think the only value we are pushing down people’s throats is the value of human rights.