I haven't posted anything to my blog in a couple of years, but I wanted to do my own thinking for this election and post my thoughts in a place that is completely mine - not Facebook, for people to criticize or flame me, and not in a truly public forum (meaning if you were to leave messages here that are derogatory or uneducated, or if you're just here to bash people, you're outta here!).
I have friends who are politically vocal on both sides of the fence. I don't have to use the word "friends" carefully; these are all people I've known for years. I don't discuss politics with people I don't know. In fact I don't discuss it with much of anyone. It's a hot button topic, and I'm not a hot button person. I've seen friendships frazzled due to people who have differing political views. I've seen people live together just fine with them also. Two of my best friends are not politically on the same page; however, they aren't highly politically motivated either.
It's funny how the party of Lincoln over the years seemed to swap places with the Democratic party - the Republicans, led by Northern leaders, abolished slavery and were instrumental early on in the advancement of civil rights, while the Democratic party, strong in the South and represented by a majority of slave owners, not only didn't allow blacks to vote, but did't invite them to the Democratic Convention until the 1920's. Until this point, most blacks (with a larger population in the South than North) voted Republican. The change began in the 30's with FDR and the New Deal bringing us out of the Depression and creating jobs. The tipping point was when Truman desegregated the armed services and set up regulations against racial bias in the workplace. He got 77 percent of the black vote. The final straw was LBJ signing legislation outlawing segregation in public places while Republican Barry Goldwater opposed this. This was the true alienation of blacks from the Republican party, and since then, no presidential Republican candidate has gotten more than 15% of the black vote. There is a recent shift that sees young black people moving back to the Republican party, but it's far from balanced.
I have to begin by saying I grew up as a Democrat; in a Democratic household in a Blue state. My state is now red - that's been a long time coming - but my childhood area of the state has long been red. The Northshore of New Orleans, St. Tammany Parish in particular, has long been a Republican stronghold. My coming of age President was Reagan, and for a while if fell in with my red friends. Smaller government. Let business grow the economy; that's the way free enterprise works. I can't say I went as far as to become a real Republican, but the under-educated me was definitely more conservative.
I am now an independent. When asked, I often say I'm fiscally conservative, socially liberal, with libertarian tendencies. I don't like big government, disdain excess government spending & pork barrel politics. I don't like tax and spend, but on the flip side I also hate slash and spend/reallocate. I think it's silly to rob Peter to pay Paul on a governmental level. I don't understand how you can cut spending on higher education and expect to have and educated workforce. I think the "Trickle Down Economics" theory of the Reagan administration was a nice idea but woefully short-sighted. It doesn't account for the extremes of either end - greed on the rich end and hand outs on the poor end. The rich that own/run corporations are supposed to get tax cuts to help to expand business and create more jobs. Great thought. One problem - you give tax cuts, that's more money in the pockets of those who already have enough. Then greed comes in - they don't create more jobs, they create more tax shelters. They take their extra money offshore. They invest in foreign countries. They see a cheaper workforce in other countries so they outsource jobs, creating fewer jobs for Americans and driving the costs of goods and services upward. The rich get richer, the gap gets larger between rich and poor. And there become fewer middle class jobs. On the poor end, due to that empty middle class and the fact that goods and services' costs rose, the poor get poorer and there is more need for hand outs. Hand ups are difficult because there is no middle class to fall into - there are not enough jobs that pay reasonable wage because instead of creating jobs, the rich hoarded money without creating more jobs. No this isn't conservative thought, but it should be. This is American thought. We need to help each other. We need to help ourselves.
I'm disgusted about the current state of politics. Years back parties were just names that went with the people. You were really voting for the candidates and what you felt they could bring to the table - you voted for the person whose policy most mirrored what you felt was best for you and your family, and the country as a whole. Those days are gone. It may be inaccurate, but I feel that Reagan was a catalyst for this. Don't get me wrong - I think Reagan was a good man. In fact, I don't think anyone who runs for the office of President is a bad person. What they will have to deal with during their term of office is something most of us couldn't fathom and it takes strength beyond anything we could conjure up to make the tough decisions and lead a nation. Bur Reagan was our first "star" President. No disrespect to Kennedy, but Kennedy was from a political family. He knew how to talk politics. Reagan knew how to act. This was enormous in his campaign. Now, lets face facts - Reagan didn't have to do much. Jimmy Carter was a poor President, so Reagan didn't have much to overcome. And Mondale wasn't much to overcome in 84, either. But Reagan sold us on the economic prosperity of supply-side economics, and we bought it, mainly because we didn't have anything else to work with. But Reagan's biggest asset was his ability to speak. He was an actor, and people listened to his words. He moved the entire nation to the right during his two terms of office, and at that point we went from being a nation working from the center to try and best handle our issues, to a right leaning nation. This, in my opinion, is where we went wrong, because now we are a nation at odds with each other...
As we inch closer to the election, we are now less focused on America as a whole than we are on the candidates themselves and, in particular, their shortcomings. And in some cases perceived shortcomings. We do this for many elections too, not just those on a national level. It is the basis of how we elect. We now vote for a color, or the letter behind the name. Not for the policy, not for the perception of what can be done - often for the perception of what the other candidate ISN'T or can't do. We bash. We taunt. We name-call people whose opinions differ. And we fear - and that's the saddest part of this. We have gone from a nation of the fearless, beating up on the world and exerting our might, to a nation of the weak and fearful; and we'd rather point fingers of accusation at each other and taunt the "other side" than actually start a dialogue about how to get back to the center and make smart decisions on what is best for the country. I can guarantee if I go to my personal Facebook page I can find WAY more people condemning one side or the other than I can people just wanting to fix problems. I can find tons of negative commentary on Romney and Obama - on the things they've done wrong and you shouldn't vote for them because of this. The latest one I got today - Obama cancelled the National Day of Prayer and said we are not a Christian nation, then held a national day of prayer for Muslims. This one didn't include the photo, but there was also a photo associated with the story, where Obama is purportedly taking off his shoes to pray... It's sad and offensive to Americans that people think like this and perpetuate false stories just to say I'm not voting for that guy. The story is false, the "National Day of Prayer" isn't a particular day, it's just a bill stating that the US should recognize a day for this. It has been recognized on many different dates; Reagan slated it for the first Thursday in May. But the bill doesn't mention anything about how it is to be recognized or what role the President should play in it's observation. W had ecumenical services in the East Wing, but that doesn't mean that anyone else has to or that anyone else did before. In fact, W was the ONLY President that hosted regular services in the White House for the observance, Reagan only did it once. The email I got went on with a supposed link to a site showing more about this. Obviously the sender of this had seen enough without clicking the link - the hatred and fear consumed them to the point that they should just post. Had they clicked the link, as I did (against my better judgement, but I have good anti-virus protection...), they would have found the domain for sale on GoDaddy, at which point maybe they'd have rethought whether this was a real document or not...
But this is the type of thing that happens daily and this is the travesty of our country - we resort to fighting each other over fighting the issues. Or even paying attention to the issues. Often the real issues are just a footnote - it's much easier to point out flaws than to fix problems. I'm saddened that so many people I know to be well educated and intelligent people choose this route as opposed to pointing at issues. They litter their Facebook pages with "look at how dumb this guy is" types of things instead of "my guy proposes to do this, and that's why I'm voting for him". It's the easy way out.
My own personal opinion is meaningless to anyone but myself, but I'll give it - it's my blog. I felt that Bush led us down a bad trail, between the Iraq boondoggle, then a lack of focus and clarity on our spending issues. Before you go there, the problems - as I alluded to before - go back to Reagan and Carter before him, so I don't blame it all on Bush or his dad or Clinton. There is plenty of blame to be shared by all parties and all people involved. Point is, I look at what Obama inherited with the mortgage crisis, banks crumbling and auto dealers and note that there were many issues. I felt that McCain - who I have respect and admiration for - wasn't going to get things moving. And forgive me, but Sarah Palin is a twit. Having her anywhere near leadership was scary. I was intrigued with Obama and the fact that he hit the ground running was impressive. I hated the bailouts though. While I understand the overall economic impact losing these companies would have made, I think the CEO's of those companies played the government. They also knew the impact. I was disappointed because if you or I own a business and we can't figure out how to do the math to keep that business afloat, no one is going to bail us out - we will fail. I would have felt bad for the employees of those companies who punch clocks every day and would have been unemployed. But I feel that if people are lining their pockets with cash on the backs of others and then they falter, they should figure out how to live on less like their employees do. Don't call me a socialist - I'm not advocating everyone split the pot evenly; I'm advocating fewer trips to Barbados, fewer corporate jets and spa treatments, especially while you have people who are just trying to pay for insurance and a mortgage. Bailing them out was a blessing to them, but it was a goodwill measure on Obama's part to try and show the conservatives he was willing to work with them. I appreciated that he was making efforts though, where I felt the previous administration was just biding its' time. Obamacare isn't the answer, but if he hadn't done that, would there be any dialogue about healthcare reform? There sure wasn't enough before, and no one had lifted much a finger to fix it. Obama has done many things I've applauded, and some I have disagreed with. Overall, I wish I had confidence in him, but I think regardless of his desires, he'll continue to run up on so much opposition in Congress that he'll fail to get many of his initiatives accomplished.
I absolutely believe that Romney is out of touch with average Americans. I know many politicians have come from political backgrounds and wealth, but Romney is more wealthy than most and that just doesn't jibe well for the working class American. To be honest though, both candidates are delusional when it comes to speaking about what they think middle class is. I don't think they realize how many of us live so close to poverty they can feel it; how many live week to week on paychecks. I've not heard enough from Romney about what his policies are, what he wants to implement and how it will improve life for me and my family. As with many politicians, I'm absolutely turned off by the fact that he spends more time talking about how bad Obama is. Don't you have your own platform to run on? And if most of what you do is talk negative about your opponent, why is that? Is your own record not sound? Do you not really have a great agenda? Do you just not really have anything to say and you're pandering to the right?
Partisan politics to me is a sham. The silent majority is the people like myself in the middle. We aren't heard over the din from the left and right, and we just don't engage in the arguments - we can't win. We won't yell because we don't really have a lot to say - we want simple. Balance the budget without raking us over the coals with taxes. Give us affordable healthcare so we can take care of our families, including our elderly. Provide enough tax incentive for businesses to stimulate economic growth and hiring, but have enough oversight to make sure they aren't taking and not returning, or sending jobs abroad. And protect us from aggressors. Pretty simple stuff. The rest of it will work itself out. It's hard to believe that neither the right nor the left have any answers of how to do this. And it's sad that with the electoral college and with the two party financial machine, independents and third party candidates have little chance to succeed - they're not even allowed to participate in the major debates, having to instead debate only other 3rd party candidates. The political machines don't want a strong 3rd party weakening either of their own parties or sucking votes from them. What's sad is that even though centrist voters probably make up the voting majority, our disdain with the system leads many to either not vote or simply vote within the lines already drawn, that way you'd at least felt that your voice meant something. We are mute by choice, choosing not to argue with those at either end - we don't yell over the din, we let their yelling speak for itself... If you have to yell to be heard, you're probably not saying anything I want to hear. If all you have to say is negative about the other side, then you're not really thinking or focused on real issues. You are simply a rhetoric tool of the machine. Reiterating lines like, 'if Obama wins I'm moving to another country' or 'we are in for 1,000 years of darkness', or 'if Romney wins he'll set us back to the good old boy days' is simply allowing the machine to work.
So back to the beginning - there is this election coming up in less than a month now. There are actually 5 major candidates running - do you know the other 3? Educate yourselves. Go to websites that promote neutrality - give up MSNBC and Fox for a few hours and truly find independent sites that ONLY DEAL WITH FACTS, NOT SENSATIONALISM. While Obama may have had ties to extremists in his past, it's not necessarily who he is today, and to say that he's trying to make us a socialist nation is ludicrous. It's not possible for any one person to do that. You are buying into the machine - that is a sensational remark that bears no basis is facts. Now if you look at his record and say that his economic policy is poor, THEN you have a real discussion. Why is that - because his ideas are flawed or because the was stonewalled by Congress? Romney dumped a whole bunch of stock interest in questionable investments shortly before he ran for President. If you say that he's a bad person for that, you're buying into the machine - it's a sensational remark that while based in fact, doesn't necessarily reflect on his policy for governing our country. And the "anyone but him" vote is a cop out. No candidate will 100% reflect your views unless you yourself are running. But there might be a candidate who you agree with more than you expected. I did some checking and found that I'm highly compatible in my thought process with a couple of candidates. Surprising who they were though. But I went in with an open mind. Check out ProCon.org for facts (be ready to deal with reality though; you may be surprised) and FactCheck.org, where you get REAL facts instead of the line of BS often fed to you by the politicians themselves or the parties in general.
My talk has rambled on long enough - you get the point. I'm an independent. I'm tired of the crap people put on Facebook and whatnot about how bad this one is or that one is. Educate yourselves - quit being sheeple and become people again. Government is supposed to work for us, but if all we do is go 'that guy is dumb', nothings going to work for us. Vote. You have to - people have died for your right to do it, don't let them down.
Some of you will read this and think I'm silly - or worse. That's fine. I didn't expect those people to get it anyway... Some will not read because it's too long. I get long winded when I haven't said anything in a while. Sorry. I'm not really doing it for you; I did it for me. If you like it, awesome. If not, awesome. But if not, don't give me crap about my ideas here - like I said earlier, if you do I'll just zap you. It's my blog. I can do that. If you have intelligent discussion, thought out that doesn't include a rant against either side, I'm all ears - I love to be educated! I love learning things I don't know.
Have a great day! And don't forget to vote!
