December 19, 2006

More on politics

Caught Villsack on the Daily Show last night. Missed the first part of the show because of MNF, and its implications in my fantasy league. :)

I want to like Villsack, but he really annoyed me last night. This discussion of telling the Iraqi people that "you have become dependent on us and it is time for you to live and die for your country" is stupid and wrong. A) they are already fighting and dying. B) "Dependency" or "addiction"--as Jon Stewart pointed out--is a bizzare idea. As Jon noted, it sounds suspiciously like us saying to Iraq, "Hey, someone blew up your infrastructure, disbanded your military and completely destroyed your government. Time for you to actually do something."

Of course, the situation is so bad that there is really no answer. Thanks to Bush's incompetence, we have a "broken army" (Powell's words), a disintegrating Iraq (some million and a half have just left), and no real answers. We pull out--chaos. We stay there--slightly less chaos and more American soldiers die. Bush appears to be the only one who thinks we are doing fine and will win, even as his wife and other hacks lay the groundwork to blame the media and the American people.

******

Speaking of that, watched Chris Matthews the other night. The man bugs me big time--as do all the talking heads. But his panel was interesting, and during a discussion on Obama the question of his lack of foreign policy experience came up. Howard Fineman made a great point that Don Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney had more foreign policy experience than anyone and look at the mess they made?

At this point, my bar is incredibly low. Right now, I am willing to accept a President who speaks above a 7th grade level. I am looking for a President who can speak in complete sentences, people!

*******

Speaking of the most inept President in American history, I still think there is a really interesting story behind the scenes that may take time to uncover. I have speculated for years that W has a conflicted relationship with Daddy Bush (GHWB). I suspect that W has always resented Daddy's legitimacy and actual intelligence (and military service, btw) and has curried favor with Barbara. (Hmm, this sounds familiar. Why do I think someone will end up gouging out eyes?)

W uses HW's contacts to get into Yale, out of Nam, and into Harvard MBA, but resents him the whole time. Again, has to turn to Daddy's contacts to bail out a failed oil business. It is very hard to imagine him electable beyond (or at) the local level without that famous last name and huge Christmas list for fundraising.

Flash forward to his presidency, and he chooses Cheney for Veep--someone his father doesn't really trust or like that much. Cheney brings in more anti-HW people like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz.

Daddy never wanted to go into Iraq--and told several people while he was President why that was a horrible idea. He said that it would create chaos and undermine the stability of the entire middle-east. One of HWB's consiglieri--Brent Scowcroft--wrote a strident op-ed trying to get W to back off the war.

And now, of course, after three years, the war is worse than ever and is exactly what Daddy feared. The ISG, filled with Daddy's people, tells W directly that he screwed up horribly.

Here is the interesting part--at least from my view. Somehow one of Daddy's people is now Sec Def and Rummy is out, but W seems to be distancing himself from the rest of the paternalistic rescue, like the ISG report and some kind of exit strategy. Is Sonny throwing a tantrum here?

I hope someday we find out more about the inner workings of this family.

16 comments:

volfan007 said...

oh brother!

volfan007

Streak said...

By all means, keep giving us this wonderful commentary, Volfan. You are so insightful.

One of my friends said of you--not that you were stupid, though you often say stupid things--but that you are so superficial. No depth. No willingness to look beneath the surface, be it theology, politics or history. Won't even consider that some pro-choice candidates might actually do more to reduce abortions. No depth. College professors are just liberal to you. No possibility that there is some diversity of thought, nor that liberal profs might have something to teach you.

You are a joke.

volfan007 said...

i dont want to just reduce abortions. i want to end abortions. i want us to quit acting like nazi germany and thinking that we can decide who is worthy of living and who isnt.

about the college prof.'s....the studies done by different groups is what i was referring to. most news media people are liberal and democrats. and, college prof.'s are more liberal than the news media, and more are democrats. you are a prime example of this.

volfan007

Anonymous said...

You are not going to eliminate abortions. It's like trying to eliminate breathing. Some women are going to get abortions no matter what. The best we can hope for is to reduce the number to a bare minimum. Making it illegal is not the answer. Education is key. Reduce unwanted pregnancies, reduce abortions. Teach kids to be smart about sex. Abstinance is best, but kids make dumb decisions. At least show them how to be safe about it. Clinton did this, abortions went down. Bush reversed the logic, abortions went back up. Can't argue with results. Like Streak keeps saying, even pro-choice people don't think abortions are a good thing and want to see them disappear.
Great commentary on the inner workings of the Bush clan. Always thought there might be a bit of rebellion by 43 against 41. And volfan, let's remember this president's approval rating is under 40%. That means a large number of his own party disapprove of him. So being anti-Bush these days doesn't mean being liberal. It means you just need to recognize you've got a lemon running the White House, and even his own party has figured that out.

volfan007 said...

joe,

as i have stated many times before, i am not a huge bush fan. i voted for him as the lesser of two evils sort of thing. i would vote for him again if the choice was between him and hillary or between him and osama obama.

i hope that we will make abortions illegal again one day. it ought to rank right up there with first degree murder, because thats what it is.

volfan007

Anonymous said...

But making it illegal will not make it go away. There are still plenty of first degree murder arrests and convictions in the US.

Wasp Jerky said...

osama obama? that's absolutely pathetic. let's not forget who has spent five years failing to catch osama.

volfan007 said...

just because there are murderers still free out there and it still happens doesnt make it right. at least, they are punished for it if caught. and, our society knows that its wrong. and, i will guarantee that some people have not committed murder do to the fear of being punished.

our society ought to stand against things that are wrong. we should call them wrong.


wasp,

maybe you like alabama obama. i was just poking fun at his name. i didnt mean that he liked osama bin laden.....goood greif!

Anonymous said...

Volf -
Osama Obama is becoming a well-known Republican nickname for Obama to try and create fear that he will not do enough to stop terrorism and hurt him in the presidential polls and stop his rising stardom. Even if you meant it to be innocent, the common rhetoric of that phrase is what prompted Wasp's reaction. I took it the same way he did.

volfan007 said...

you have to admit....it kind of goes together. i mean, osama obama has a real nice ring to it. i never heard anyone say that before. it just came to my head due to the sound of it.

volfan007

Anonymous said...

"Sigh"
(c) Streak MMVI

volfan007 said...

hey, maybe we could make his name into a song....you know, osama obama, osama obama, yo mama, yo mama, osama obama.

sigh,

volfan007

Streak said...

between him and osama obama.

It is actually offensive. Racist, actually.

Streak said...

Good points, Joe. Volfan's response is like me saying to anyone--"if you aren't going to eliminate poverty, then I won't work with you at all." And like poverty, abortion will never be eliminated. But we can work to reduce it.

But volfan would vote for Genghis Kahn as long as he gave lip service to the anti-abortion side. Especially if Khan would execute scum and cut taxes.

volfan007 said...

where is genghis kahn when you need him?

volfan007

Anonymous said...

The difficulty with true ideologues is that their zeal for ideology often puts them at odds with pursuit of their stated goals. I am certain that we can find all sorts of examples.