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Showing posts with label 8OJM. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 8OJM. Show all posts
Monday, November 3, 2008
The Three Religions of Republican Power
8 Reasons to Oppose John McCain #8
I see three groups of Republicans today. On the surface, they don't seem to have much in common. In the past though, they have united to elect Republican Presidents. These groups are:
The Faith in the Bible Group - These are conservative, typically evangelical Christians who believe in the literal truth of the Bible. They believe that the United States government was founded as a Christian government that is intended to implement the word of God. They are socially conservative but take a generally more progressive attitude towards helping the poor.
The Faith in the Market Group - These are the corportists. They believe in the decisions of the market, both good and bad. The market is infallible. Any government intervention in the operation of the market is wrong.
The Faith in American Power Group - These are the neo-conservatives. They believe that America is so powerful that we can implement, at will, American style democracy on the rest of the world. Whatever loss of life and money is required to bring this about is irrelevant. They believe that we create our own reality.
John McCain has spent this campaign courting the votes of all three groups. His economic advisers have total faith in the market. His foreign policy advisers are neo-conservatives. He hasn't found a Christian conservative group yet to which he isn't ready to pander.
Do we want a President who blindly follows these faiths or one who will consider the impact of these beliefs on the people of our country? We need to restore the concept of "reality" to the White House. John McCain is not up to the job.
I see three groups of Republicans today. On the surface, they don't seem to have much in common. In the past though, they have united to elect Republican Presidents. These groups are:
The Faith in the Bible Group - These are conservative, typically evangelical Christians who believe in the literal truth of the Bible. They believe that the United States government was founded as a Christian government that is intended to implement the word of God. They are socially conservative but take a generally more progressive attitude towards helping the poor.
The Faith in the Market Group - These are the corportists. They believe in the decisions of the market, both good and bad. The market is infallible. Any government intervention in the operation of the market is wrong.
The Faith in American Power Group - These are the neo-conservatives. They believe that America is so powerful that we can implement, at will, American style democracy on the rest of the world. Whatever loss of life and money is required to bring this about is irrelevant. They believe that we create our own reality.
John McCain has spent this campaign courting the votes of all three groups. His economic advisers have total faith in the market. His foreign policy advisers are neo-conservatives. He hasn't found a Christian conservative group yet to which he isn't ready to pander.
Do we want a President who blindly follows these faiths or one who will consider the impact of these beliefs on the people of our country? We need to restore the concept of "reality" to the White House. John McCain is not up to the job.
Health Care
8 Reasons to Oppose John McCain #7
Bullet points:
Bullet points:
- John McCain does not believe that health insurance is a right deserved by all Americans. He calls it a "responsibility".
- John McCain's health care plan would tax employer provided health care benefits, eroding the employer-based health care system through which most Americans receive their insurance.
- John McCain would not require insurance companies to insure those with pre-existing conditions.
- John McCain supported President Bush's veto of the expansion of the State Children's Health Insurance Program.
- McCain said, "Opening up the health insurance market to more vigorous nationwide competition, as we have done over the last decade in banking, would provide more choices of innovative products less burdened by the worst excesses of state-based regulation." Yes, John McCain wants to make our health insurance industry more like our banking industry.
- John McCain's plan does nothing to get us towards the goal of universal health insurance.
The Environment
8 Reasons to Oppose John McCain #6
The Words ...
John McCain will say the right things about the environment on occasion. However, when his vote is needed, he has not been there. Why would that change with him on the White House?
The Words ...
We can move forward, and clean up our climate, and develop green technologies, and alternative energies for battery-powered cars, so that we can clean up our environment and at the same time get our economy going by creating millions of jobs.The Record ...
- Voted against Tax credits for clean energy research and development.
- Didn't show to vote on spending amendment to increase funding for renewable power. The amendment lost in a cloture vote, 59 - 40 -1.
- Voted against a windfall profits tax against the oil companies. The revenue would have been used to help fund clean energy initiatives.
- McCain received a 0% score in 2007 from the League of Conservation Voters for (LCV) his record on environmental votes.
- McCain's lifetime score from the LCV is 24%. This means that he has opposed around three fourths of the environmental votes in Congress.
John McCain will say the right things about the environment on occasion. However, when his vote is needed, he has not been there. Why would that change with him on the White House?
Taxes
8 Reasons to Oppose John McCain #5
Bush Tax Cuts in 2001? Irresponsible.
Bush Tax Cuts in 2008? Must keep for the sake of the economy.
Taxes in general? Bad.
Taxes on the rich in general? Really, really bad.
Lowering taxes on the poor and raising taxes on the rich? Welfare.
Stupidity level in tax debate from Mr. McCain? Very, very high.
Bush Tax Cuts in 2001? Irresponsible.
Bush Tax Cuts in 2008? Must keep for the sake of the economy.
Taxes in general? Bad.
Taxes on the rich in general? Really, really bad.
Lowering taxes on the poor and raising taxes on the rich? Welfare.
Stupidity level in tax debate from Mr. McCain? Very, very high.
Social Security
8 Reasons to Oppose John McCain #4
Social Security is one of our most popular government programs. How does John McCain feel about Social Security? In his own words:
Social Security is one of our most popular government programs. How does John McCain feel about Social Security? In his own words:
- "Americans have got to understand that we are paying present-day retirees with the taxes paid by young workers in America today. And that's a disgrace. It's an absolute disgrace, and it's got to be fixed." This is, of course, how Social Security is intended to work. Would I be out of line assuming that what he is essentially saying is that "Social Security" is a disgrace?
- "My friends, there is only one solution if Social Security commitments are to be honored without breaking the backs of the next generation: bold reform -- genuine reform -- that allows workers to invest some of their Social Security savings, privately, in higher yielding accounts." I wonder, how well would these accounts have done over the last eight years? McCain has been voting for privatizing Social Security since at least 1998. Why stop now?
Make War
8 Reasons to Oppose John McCain #3
John McCain has seen war up close. He was brutalized at the hands of the North Vietnamese. He knows as well as anyone in American politics today the price that our soldiers pay for armed conflict. Still, he wants more.
He wants the war in Iraq to continue. He has said he could see our troops spend the next 100 years in Iraq. He has, by his own claim, supported President Bush on Iraq more than anybody. The cost of the war? Mr. Budget Cut doesn't seem to care.
He wants to become increasingly hawkish on Iraq. John McCain believes that Iran is our greatest challenge, outside of the war on terror, since the end of the Cold War. He has even joked about bombing Iran. (It's so much fun!) Know this: McCain is committed to escalating the diplomatic conflict with Iran, but is not committed to the hard diplomacy to resolve this peacefully. Beware the friend of the neo-conservative.
He wants conflict with Russia. "Today, we are all Georgians", McCain said in the aftermath of the 2008 South Ossetia War. McCain blamed this war on Russia looking to restore the old Czar Empire. The fact that Georgia fired the first shots in the conflict is irrelevant to McCain.
McCain believes in conflict. McCain associates with people who believe we can and should enforce our will around the world. Can we afford the neo-conservatives running our foreign policy again?
John McCain has seen war up close. He was brutalized at the hands of the North Vietnamese. He knows as well as anyone in American politics today the price that our soldiers pay for armed conflict. Still, he wants more.
He wants the war in Iraq to continue. He has said he could see our troops spend the next 100 years in Iraq. He has, by his own claim, supported President Bush on Iraq more than anybody. The cost of the war? Mr. Budget Cut doesn't seem to care.
He wants to become increasingly hawkish on Iraq. John McCain believes that Iran is our greatest challenge, outside of the war on terror, since the end of the Cold War. He has even joked about bombing Iran. (It's so much fun!) Know this: McCain is committed to escalating the diplomatic conflict with Iran, but is not committed to the hard diplomacy to resolve this peacefully. Beware the friend of the neo-conservative.
He wants conflict with Russia. "Today, we are all Georgians", McCain said in the aftermath of the 2008 South Ossetia War. McCain blamed this war on Russia looking to restore the old Czar Empire. The fact that Georgia fired the first shots in the conflict is irrelevant to McCain.
McCain believes in conflict. McCain associates with people who believe we can and should enforce our will around the world. Can we afford the neo-conservatives running our foreign policy again?
Women
8 Reasons to Oppose John McCain #2
The Republican Party does not, as a rule, think very much of women. They do not believe that women should be allowed to make choices about their own bodies. They do not believe that women should receive the same pay for equal work. You wonder if they don't still believe that women are inferior to men and should be denied the right to vote.
Despite his carefully crafted moderate image (you know, the one that has fallen apart over the course of this campaign, but the image that he still seems to believe is true), John McCain is no better than the rest of his party on women's issues. He threw women under the bus, along with his dignity and self respect, when he knew he had to in order to win the Republican nomination for the Presidency.
In 1999, the moderate version of John McCain was riding high. Seeking to appeal to voters in the middle, he abandoned his own party when he told the San Francisco Chronicle:
Finally, his most prominent slap in the face of American women is his nomination of Sarah Palin as his running mate. There are a number of women in the Republican Party who have long, distinguished careers in public service. (Kay Bailey Hutchinson? Condi Rice? Sure, they'd suck on the issues but at least they wouldn't inspire abject terror at the thought of them being in office.) They have thought about the big issues. They have studied them. They would have made serious candidates. Instead, he chose Sarah Palin not because he thought she would make a good President, but because he cynically thought any woman would do. Wow.
The Republican Party does not, as a rule, think very much of women. They do not believe that women should be allowed to make choices about their own bodies. They do not believe that women should receive the same pay for equal work. You wonder if they don't still believe that women are inferior to men and should be denied the right to vote.
Despite his carefully crafted moderate image (you know, the one that has fallen apart over the course of this campaign, but the image that he still seems to believe is true), John McCain is no better than the rest of his party on women's issues. He threw women under the bus, along with his dignity and self respect, when he knew he had to in order to win the Republican nomination for the Presidency.
In 1999, the moderate version of John McCain was riding high. Seeking to appeal to voters in the middle, he abandoned his own party when he told the San Francisco Chronicle:
(I)n the short term, or even the long term, I would not support repeal of Roe v. Wade ...There are still some women who refuse to accept that John McCain is anti-choice. Proof?
- From his own web site: "John McCain believes Roe v. Wade is a flawed decision that must be overturned ..."
- At Rick Warren's Saddleback Church, John McCain adopted that typically cynical Republican view of "life" when he said that it begins "At the moment of conception."
- McCain has promised to nominate judges along the lines of Antonin Scalia and Samuel Alito to the bench. They are both well known for their opposition to a women's right to choose.
- For his running mate, he chose a woman who is "opposed to abortion in almost all cases, including rape and incest."
Finally, his most prominent slap in the face of American women is his nomination of Sarah Palin as his running mate. There are a number of women in the Republican Party who have long, distinguished careers in public service. (Kay Bailey Hutchinson? Condi Rice? Sure, they'd suck on the issues but at least they wouldn't inspire abject terror at the thought of them being in office.) They have thought about the big issues. They have studied them. They would have made serious candidates. Instead, he chose Sarah Palin not because he thought she would make a good President, but because he cynically thought any woman would do. Wow.
Age and Ideas
8 Reasons to Oppose John McCain #1
John McCain is a very old man. He needs an afternoon nap. He loses energy as the day wears on. If he has to put in too many long days in a row, he's not sharp. He's admitted as much. Clearly, he is much too old to be President. Perhaps worse, he's as old in ideas as he is in age.
For John McCain, politically anyway, the world began and ended with Barry Goldwater in 1964. It was the birth of the modern conservative movement. Our political landscape has been crafted by the conservatives since the ascension of Ronald Reagan to the Presidency in 1980. People of all political stripes have even come to accept much of conservative ideology as the truth. (Government? Bad. Taxes? Bad.)
Much of this is the fault of the left though. We watched as Reagan ascended and decided that we had to steal some of his ideas to survive. We adopted much of the same language thinking we could blunt their criticism of ourselves, but we failed. (For more on this, see Bill Scher's Wait! Don't Move to Canada.) We played the game on their turf and we had our asses handed to us. In the battle of ideas, we conceded without a real fight. The result? 28 years of conservative rule by conservative ideas.
The state that we find our Nation in right now is a direct, and inevitable result of the implementation of conservative ideas. The very idea of laissez-faire capitalism has, for the second time in our history, blown up in our faces. How will we deal with this crisis?
John McCain proposes that we haven't been conservative enough. We need a New Deal, and he wants a return to the Age of Reagan. If there's anyone out there who doesn't think things can get worse, then vote for John McCain.
John McCain is a very old man. He needs an afternoon nap. He loses energy as the day wears on. If he has to put in too many long days in a row, he's not sharp. He's admitted as much. Clearly, he is much too old to be President. Perhaps worse, he's as old in ideas as he is in age.
For John McCain, politically anyway, the world began and ended with Barry Goldwater in 1964. It was the birth of the modern conservative movement. Our political landscape has been crafted by the conservatives since the ascension of Ronald Reagan to the Presidency in 1980. People of all political stripes have even come to accept much of conservative ideology as the truth. (Government? Bad. Taxes? Bad.)
Much of this is the fault of the left though. We watched as Reagan ascended and decided that we had to steal some of his ideas to survive. We adopted much of the same language thinking we could blunt their criticism of ourselves, but we failed. (For more on this, see Bill Scher's Wait! Don't Move to Canada.) We played the game on their turf and we had our asses handed to us. In the battle of ideas, we conceded without a real fight. The result? 28 years of conservative rule by conservative ideas.
The state that we find our Nation in right now is a direct, and inevitable result of the implementation of conservative ideas. The very idea of laissez-faire capitalism has, for the second time in our history, blown up in our faces. How will we deal with this crisis?
John McCain proposes that we haven't been conservative enough. We need a New Deal, and he wants a return to the Age of Reagan. If there's anyone out there who doesn't think things can get worse, then vote for John McCain.
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