Reality Bites
Wake-up call. After hearing John McCain's acceptance speech tonight, I'm afraid I feel it is imperative that John McCain does not win this November. To distinguish himself from his opponent, he needs to look tough and grizzled on foreign policy. Consequently, since McCain is also a man of his word, a McCain victory will without doubt result in another costly, protracted, and very dangerous cold war with Russia.
And to burnish his free-market, globalistic credentials, he will do nothing to protect American jobs. For workers whose factories have closed, he promises job re-training at community colleges where they would learn skills that can't be exported. Of course the only such jobs are manual service jobs, such as landscaper, bartender, or WalMart greeter. I hope he's not thinking in terms of easily outsourced tech jobs like computer programmer.
So at home and abroad, McCain will be a disaster. Of course on the real threat facing America, the inevitable plunge into the Third-Worldom that our demographic trends promise, neither he nor Obama offer any hope. But at least Obama promises less near-term ruin. Sarah who?
And to burnish his free-market, globalistic credentials, he will do nothing to protect American jobs. For workers whose factories have closed, he promises job re-training at community colleges where they would learn skills that can't be exported. Of course the only such jobs are manual service jobs, such as landscaper, bartender, or WalMart greeter. I hope he's not thinking in terms of easily outsourced tech jobs like computer programmer.
So at home and abroad, McCain will be a disaster. Of course on the real threat facing America, the inevitable plunge into the Third-Worldom that our demographic trends promise, neither he nor Obama offer any hope. But at least Obama promises less near-term ruin. Sarah who?
posted by ziel | 9/04/2008 11:07:00 PM
14 Comments:
Ziel, forgive for my rants on your Palin post... (emotional hangover?)and thanks for this post... once again at least you, as a rightie are trying to inject some issues into this national debate... though I can´t stand Krugman, his column today brings up the point that it´s the same old Nixonian party of anger and resentment (I´ll add paranoia) and it gets a little tiring, hence my last night frustration with your Palin post...
McCain is completely in their hands...
I like to look at things for what they are and represent - so Palin is a phenomenon, in my opinion, and that has nothing to do with her position on any issues or the words in the speech she gave. I thought her very presence was astonishing - as with Obama, she generates her own aurorea-borealis. I'm not saying she's as good as Obama = I don't know if she is or not - I'm sure she's not as smart as Obama, and being a rightie I will agree with her probably more often than I do with Obama (which is rarely).
But the McCain speech was a real come down for me (as I knew it would be, but it was still depressing) and probably will be for many others. I wish polling were more accurate and timely withing 24 hour periods so we could see the real Palin-bounce and then see the McCain deflation.
And Krugman is the worst - because he's a really smart and reality-based economist, but he's such a partisan he ruins any real insights he could provide.
Krugman... at the top of the heap of a nation of whiners...
of course I´m not the only one to point this out, but no matter how effective she is, Alaska chick is not at the top of the ticket... Obama is... Though I didn´t (could sit through it?) watch it myself, my impression from the reviews all around was that it was a mild disaster... McCain himself is just not an effective candidate and is and will do and say whatever it takes to get elected... Obama has had plenty of opportunities to do the same and hasn´t... sometimes I wish he would...
McCain long ago pissed-off true righties like you and my mom.. I think come election day, alot of conservative voters will sit this one out... which is still a victory of sorts for Obama... hence, his visit to O´Reilly... to calm people ´s (like you) nerves... "he can´t be that bad..."
Shall I assume your McCain being a man of his word line was tongue in cheek?
With a bit of reflection on these conventions, especially the RNC, it couldn´t be clearer that the times,especially economically, call for a change in government.
At their convention, the Republicans are remarkably trying to sell themselves as the party to make that change, when they are the ones who need to be removed from power... So, it´s not so remarkable that we heard hardly anything about real issues and all of the same old bullshit instead, because on issues, they haven´t really changed...
Thus, if they can pull this one off, they would accomplish something even Goebbels wouldn´t dream of...
ziel, from your comment at HalfSigma: "a smart, charismatic, tough, attractive broad like Ms. Palin wouldn't have any trouble navigating these halls of power."
I just don't understand your overwhelmingly positive reaction to this woman or that of other men. Why do you think she's smart? Why do you think she's so capable?
It's more likely Palin will be corrupted by DC than she will pull him to the right. The Russia stuff is not joke.
There's part of me that wants to see her strong in 2012, but she may be better off not being corrupted by Mr. Invade-the-World/Invite-the-World's policies.
I just don't understand your overwhelmingly positive reaction to this woman or that of other men. Why do you think she's smart? Why do you think she's so capable?
My comment at Half Sigma was in the context of agreeing that she probably isn't that smart. She is such a formidable presence - such a dynamo - that if she were smart she'd have been sucked up by some major corporation and be making some real serious bucks. But you have to be smart to get in the door in such places, so I'm guessing that's the talent she's lacking. But maybe things are different up in Alaska, or for she just had other priorities besides graduating from college (she took 6 years). It's notable that she managed to turn her journalism degree into an on-air sportcasting gig - evidence of her magnetism but not of intelligence.
Of course the magnetism thing is just a feeling, and different people react differently to different people, but either you've got it or you don't. I doubt science will ever be able to explain why John Paul II had that magnificent aura about him, but I've never met anyone who was anywhere near him and were not overwhelmed in his presence. Sarah Palin is no JP2, but I'm confident she has IT. She may not have it for you, but I believe she has it for most people.
A good one from Frank Rich today. Amongst other things:
"How long before we learn she never shot a moose?"
Like Bush, Palin is good looking but marginally intelligent and talented. The difference between them and Obama and McCain 2000 is that the 2 prez candidates are/were their own men...the actual core of their respective candidacies. Obama is still running the show, McCain has all but handed over all the reins to the Rovian machinery. Bush Jr. and Palin were fast-tracked to where they are now... easy show gigs, governorships with little need for any real governing skills... History has plenty of other examples...
The ones who stand out had the proper balance of both, which I feel Obama has.... FDR, Ike, JFK, Reagan... others lacked the star appeal and had to make it with other attributes, Truman, Nixon, Carter, which in some cases were their undoing...
McCain is now a shell of his former self and his acceptance speech really demonstrated that. The powers were quite aware of that and their "hail Mary pass" in Palin was one of the best things they could have done at the moment. If not, I think this election would be over by now. It wouldn´t surprise me that they´ve had their eye on her for a while.
The fact that Karl Rove is now a correspondent for Fox News should show anyone how skewed the process has become.
Murdoch has the power to make Rove unemployed now. Think about that for a second. Whose opinions are being propagated here?
The neo-cons, who are really Trotskyite leftists---basically liberals who are extremely bullish on the Israel issue and extrodinarily pro-intervion in every little problem on earth---with the aid of the blood of poor kids who sure as hell aren't their own, run the party. They have a media "godfather" who will keep them employed. In the free market of ideas, nobody would listen to WIlliam Kristol, but there he is, every Sunday, on Fox. The neocon takeover of National Review and Murdoch's underwriting of The Weekly SLandard (not a misspelling), The New York Sun, and a few websites they proferred as anti-Clinton gathering places in the late-nineties like Free Republic and Lucianne have allowed them to pose neo-conservatism as conservatism. Real conservatives they derride as fascists. '
The Palin choice was a brilliant one. I'd love to vote for her---as the president. But she will not be the president if J.McCain wins. He will be. He will start a war with Iran and will attempt to provoke Russia (could you imagine fighting a war with Russia? How many kids would we lose? Would Russia make it nuclear? Would we get the Armaggedon that John Hagee wants.............all for some small province in Georgia or the Ukraine where we have had advisors trying to stir things up?), keep selling the economy to China, and work to make the "North American Union" a reality. It would be better to elect a Republican Congress to oppose Obama at every turn and try to get a Palin-like candidate at the TOP of the ticket in three more years in my opinion.
Miles.
Miles - right on, bro.
Also, your warnings on terrorists using wild fires has proved to be somewhat prophetic - or perhaps culpable:)
http://blog.vdare.com/archives/2008/09/06/forest-fire-jihad-considered-by-hostile-muslims/
... wake up everybody... can we calm ourselves down for a moment from all of the hype. "She" read one speech from a teleprompter... and she is running for vice president...
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