So I just watched (most of) the first debate between McCain and Obama. I’m almost sad McCain went though, I honestly thought it would be super funny if Obama was the only one who went and it ended up just being Jim Lahrer talking to Obama. But whatever, I’m going to start off with that silly “Who won?” question.
So, Who won? Well in all honesty no one did, because the debates don’t really work that way and the election is the only real part of this entire process that can have a “winner.” However I can speculate about who did better, blah blah blah. This debate was quite interesting in that department too. There is always talk about how watching it on TV and just hearing the voices on the radio can change the general consensus, and just before watching it I had someone tell me they felt McCain had sounded better from what they heard on the radio. Now having watched it I disagree, however I can understand why it may of sounded like McCain was doing better, particularly after hearing just which part that person had heard on the radio.
So, I don’t really follow boxing, but I remember seeing some classic match up with a famous guy coming out of retirement to fight another guy in some super crazy match up. Now the older boxer was kind over the hill, so what he ended up doing was dodging around, not really throwing many punches for most of every round, but with 10 seconds left his trainer would signal to him, and he would do an all out flurry for 10 seconds. Now this being the last thing the judges would see of every round they would score him a little higher because “oh man he was really railing on that guy” or whatever. McCain in this debate seemed to be doing that kind of thing a little, only instead of punches, he was saying complete bullshit.
It kind went like this; Lead question about an issue, mild talking, signal that they needed to move on to the next question, McCain spouting a ton of shit that wasn’t true and NOT stopping, Obama not getting to correct the lies. Right towards the end of the debate McCain did this and Obama was saying, “that is not true I need to correct him on this,” and then while Obama was actually being given the chance to respond McCain just started talking again without shutting up until the moderator stopped them both and asked the next question. Obama was extremely professional during McCain talking, and McCain was just a total asshole.
Now, hearing this on the radio I can see it sounding like McCain was doing better, he was getting the last words in on every question. But watching the debate, seeing Jim trying to stop them both and having McCain just keep talking, watching McCain cut Obama off like a total asshole, and seeing McCain doing a rather forced and uncomfortable looking smile, gave the impression that McCain knew he was being rude and was doing it because he knows he is the weaker candidate.
There was one thing that McCain said in the whole debate that really was strong though. During a question about Iraq, Obama talked about how we never should have gone in, and McCain brought up that the next president isn’t going to be dealing with what should have happened but what is going to happen. That was the one thing that really did show McCain stronger. But Obama also was able to argue that his judgement, because of his views on the war in the past, are why we can trust that he will make the better decisions in the future. And I think that is where he is right, and why he still came off as the stronger candidate in the debate.
Saturday, September 27, 2008
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
4 - Sarah Pain (yes pain)
So today Sarah Palin met with some foreign leaders and the McCain campaign tried to stop the media from getting any access to it. They attempt to stop freedom of the press, given to us in the first amendment. The media revolted and they gave in, obviously, but the fact that they would even try to stop the press in horrible.
I’m sure that Mrs. Palin isn’t the one really doing all of this of course, so I can’t exactly hate her for it. However that doesn’t mean I don’t hate her. In fact, I think it is about time to go into everything I hate about her. For a quick list; lies, radical religious views, stands on issues.
Lets start with the lies. As I mentioned in my previous blog, her whole thing about the “bridge to no where” is a flat out lie. She was FOR the bridge. That isn’t all though, there is this stupid little thing about her firing some chef because tax payers shouldn’t be paying for that or something. Of course, she didn’t actually fire the lady, she just hired her under a different job title. And of course her jet that she sold on e-bay, only, she didn’t sell it on e-bay. She actually tried to sell it on e-bay a few times and no one would buy it so they sold it offline and used an aircraft broker to help.
Ok, radical religious views time. This lady is crazy religious, and said that it is God's will to have a pipeline built in Alaska.
I mean, sure, I have nothing against religion, I have nothing against people praying for things, etc. But to say that it is "God's Will" is just ridiculous. I already think its ridiculous to think that the bible is perfect and all the stuff in it is God’s words, especially considering how much of the stuff people admit is interpretation. So to say that something like building a pipeline is God’s Will is crazy, you just can’t know, and there is nothing in the bible even slightly hinting at the fact that God could will such things. She even goes on to say, in that video I linked up there, that our government is sending our army on a task from God. Now I’m no Christian but aren’t Christians supposed to be against war? And killing? And all that other shit our military is doing?
Alright and lastly her stance on issues. This is the real kicker for me. To put it simply, she is just like McCain on everything except a few issues, and on those issues she is only more extreme then McCain. She is against abortion of any kind for any reason; rape, incest, serious health problem, TOO BAD. She for all the policies that got us into this economic depression America is in now. She is against a timeline to bring out soldiers home from Iraq. She is for privatizing social security. She is, and this is one of the most amazing things, AGAINST equal pay for equal work for women.
Somehow people like her though. I read an article the other night at www.salon.com, that was about peoples opinions on voting with Palin in the mix.
“Some former supporters of Hillary Clinton expressed excitement about Palin -- but gender was secondary. To them, she seems a fresher, more maverick, more populist agent of change now than Obama (who has endured media scrutiny, including revelations and rumors about his past, for more than a year and a half). Although some don't share Palin's far-right positions on social issues, or weren't fully aware of them, they were willing to overlook that.”
When I read that I wanted to puke. Sarah Palin is the polar opposite of Hillary Clinton. What the fuck is wrong with people? If I like granny smith apples and I hate oranges, but I can only choose between fuji apples and oranges, WHY THE FUCK WOULD I PICK THE ORANGE?!?!
I’m sure that Mrs. Palin isn’t the one really doing all of this of course, so I can’t exactly hate her for it. However that doesn’t mean I don’t hate her. In fact, I think it is about time to go into everything I hate about her. For a quick list; lies, radical religious views, stands on issues.
Lets start with the lies. As I mentioned in my previous blog, her whole thing about the “bridge to no where” is a flat out lie. She was FOR the bridge. That isn’t all though, there is this stupid little thing about her firing some chef because tax payers shouldn’t be paying for that or something. Of course, she didn’t actually fire the lady, she just hired her under a different job title. And of course her jet that she sold on e-bay, only, she didn’t sell it on e-bay. She actually tried to sell it on e-bay a few times and no one would buy it so they sold it offline and used an aircraft broker to help.
Ok, radical religious views time. This lady is crazy religious, and said that it is God's will to have a pipeline built in Alaska.
I mean, sure, I have nothing against religion, I have nothing against people praying for things, etc. But to say that it is "God's Will" is just ridiculous. I already think its ridiculous to think that the bible is perfect and all the stuff in it is God’s words, especially considering how much of the stuff people admit is interpretation. So to say that something like building a pipeline is God’s Will is crazy, you just can’t know, and there is nothing in the bible even slightly hinting at the fact that God could will such things. She even goes on to say, in that video I linked up there, that our government is sending our army on a task from God. Now I’m no Christian but aren’t Christians supposed to be against war? And killing? And all that other shit our military is doing?
Alright and lastly her stance on issues. This is the real kicker for me. To put it simply, she is just like McCain on everything except a few issues, and on those issues she is only more extreme then McCain. She is against abortion of any kind for any reason; rape, incest, serious health problem, TOO BAD. She for all the policies that got us into this economic depression America is in now. She is against a timeline to bring out soldiers home from Iraq. She is for privatizing social security. She is, and this is one of the most amazing things, AGAINST equal pay for equal work for women.
Somehow people like her though. I read an article the other night at www.salon.com, that was about peoples opinions on voting with Palin in the mix.
“Some former supporters of Hillary Clinton expressed excitement about Palin -- but gender was secondary. To them, she seems a fresher, more maverick, more populist agent of change now than Obama (who has endured media scrutiny, including revelations and rumors about his past, for more than a year and a half). Although some don't share Palin's far-right positions on social issues, or weren't fully aware of them, they were willing to overlook that.”
When I read that I wanted to puke. Sarah Palin is the polar opposite of Hillary Clinton. What the fuck is wrong with people? If I like granny smith apples and I hate oranges, but I can only choose between fuji apples and oranges, WHY THE FUCK WOULD I PICK THE ORANGE?!?!
Sunday, September 14, 2008
3 - RNC Week
Ok finally getting to this; the Republican National Convention. I must admit, I really didn’t watch much of this one. After watching so much of the DNC I didn’t really feel like boring myself again in addition to hating what they would be saying even more.
However, before I get to the convention itself a little story got hushed up quite a bit. Namely, our government acting a bit more like a police state then they would ever like you to know. Arresting people in St. Paul before the convention started with claims that these would be protesters were suspected to do criminal things, rather then practicing their constitutional right to protesting. Read more about it here.
So for the first 2 nights I have pretty much no idea who spoke. I think our current president might have spoke Tuesday night but I could be wrong on that. So what I did was pay more attention to the daily show and their coverage of how ridiculous everything happening there was. And everyone should really see this clip involving the "unbiased media."
So then Wednesday night was Sarah Palin’s big speech, full of... inaccuracies. The biggest one being her, “I said thanks but no thanks to the bridge to nowhere,” line. Something used in a way to sound like she saved tax payers tons of money. But that wasn’t what happened, and it seems she finally admit to that fact during her interview with Charlie Gibson this week. Although she still isn’t admitting to the difference in what she is saying on her campaign and what actually happened. The short story is she was all for the project and then when it was apparent that the project wouldn’t be able to succeed she still took the federal money and then started lying about what happened on her campaign trail for vice president. For a little more depth on the issue click here.
Needless to say, I'm not a fan of Sarah Palin, but I’m thinking I might write a whole blog dedicated to her at some point. Anyway, I’m not a fan of John McCain either. Unsurprisingly for some of the same reasons, although mostly because I pay some amount of attention to this stuff and he is NOT a candidate of change. No matter what he said on the last night of the RNC. A night that was, to my amusement, the openning of the football season. Apperently this gave them a bigger audience for McCain's speech. Although, considering some of the mistakes they made, that is probably not a good thing.
That is it for tonight. From here on out my entries are going to be on whatever inspires me to write about.
However, before I get to the convention itself a little story got hushed up quite a bit. Namely, our government acting a bit more like a police state then they would ever like you to know. Arresting people in St. Paul before the convention started with claims that these would be protesters were suspected to do criminal things, rather then practicing their constitutional right to protesting. Read more about it here.
So for the first 2 nights I have pretty much no idea who spoke. I think our current president might have spoke Tuesday night but I could be wrong on that. So what I did was pay more attention to the daily show and their coverage of how ridiculous everything happening there was. And everyone should really see this clip involving the "unbiased media."
So then Wednesday night was Sarah Palin’s big speech, full of... inaccuracies. The biggest one being her, “I said thanks but no thanks to the bridge to nowhere,” line. Something used in a way to sound like she saved tax payers tons of money. But that wasn’t what happened, and it seems she finally admit to that fact during her interview with Charlie Gibson this week. Although she still isn’t admitting to the difference in what she is saying on her campaign and what actually happened. The short story is she was all for the project and then when it was apparent that the project wouldn’t be able to succeed she still took the federal money and then started lying about what happened on her campaign trail for vice president. For a little more depth on the issue click here.
Needless to say, I'm not a fan of Sarah Palin, but I’m thinking I might write a whole blog dedicated to her at some point. Anyway, I’m not a fan of John McCain either. Unsurprisingly for some of the same reasons, although mostly because I pay some amount of attention to this stuff and he is NOT a candidate of change. No matter what he said on the last night of the RNC. A night that was, to my amusement, the openning of the football season. Apperently this gave them a bigger audience for McCain's speech. Although, considering some of the mistakes they made, that is probably not a good thing.
That is it for tonight. From here on out my entries are going to be on whatever inspires me to write about.
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
2 - DNC Week
Now I should have started doing all this a while ago. So, I’m going to play a little catch up. Starting with the Democratic National Convention. This was the first national convention of I had ever attempted to watch.
I was busy doing school stuff for the opening day and Michelle Obama’s speech. So I watched it in full on the internet later that night, or perhaps the next day. Although I found her quite a fine speaker, engaging and easy to listen to, I didn’t feel like there was much worth listening to. Of course the point of her speech wasn’t to tell people about issues or anything I wanted to hear, it was saying “Hey look we are Americans with American values.” Great, fine, next day please.
Now I was home for day 2 and tried to watch a lot of the live DNC feed. After the first 45 minutes or so I realized I really didn’t need to watch all 4 or whatever hours of it. Just person after person saying pretty much the exact same thing with a few different words and a slightly different accent. I wanted to see the Hillary speech though, so I made sure to tune back in closer to when she was supposed to speak.
From the get go, I did not like Hillary Clinton. During the beginnings of the primaries I found myself sickened by her. Something about the way she spoke. It was slow, made me feel like she thought her audience was a bunch of children. And as the months grew longer and it came down to just her and Obama, I found just about everything she said to grow increasingly atrocious.
I was one of those people afraid of what she might do up on that stage during the DNC. But once she got up there and started speaking my mind was soothed. She didn’t say or do anything to draw support away from Obama. She didn’t alienate her supporters. She did exactly what I had wished for months before.
Day 3, school once again making me miss the live broadcasts of Bill Clinton and Joe Biden. And once again I watched both speeches later on with the help of youtube. Bill was a great speaker as always and I trust his charisma campaigning for Obama in the general election will be very nice to have. As for Joe Biden, he gave a good speech. He attacked McCain without overstepping the line the Obama Campaign is refusing to cross. I must say though, having Obama come out as a surprise afterwards, although exciting, made me forget a lot of what Biden had said.
The final day at the different location. I wanted to badly to watch that one live. But alas, my job got in the way that night. But when I got home I watched Obama speak to the impressively large crowd. He outlined many of the things he wants to accomplish. I’m sure much of it won’t really get done, but when Obama speaks he sounds sincere. He sounds like he really is wearing his “American Hat.”
But of course, with Friday came the announcement of Sarah Palin. I was driving and listening to NPR and heard about it. At first I just heard the name and thought, “Wait hold on, did they say Sarah? A Woman?” As the voices continued to elaborate much of my hope from the night before was coated with a sickening bile that the GOP really pulled something like that. My mind instantly assumed the attempt at disgruntled Hillary voters. I’m happier now knowing that was a slightly lesser reason for the pick though.
That is it for tonight though. Next time I’ll get on about the RNC and much more of my Palin opinions.
I was busy doing school stuff for the opening day and Michelle Obama’s speech. So I watched it in full on the internet later that night, or perhaps the next day. Although I found her quite a fine speaker, engaging and easy to listen to, I didn’t feel like there was much worth listening to. Of course the point of her speech wasn’t to tell people about issues or anything I wanted to hear, it was saying “Hey look we are Americans with American values.” Great, fine, next day please.
Now I was home for day 2 and tried to watch a lot of the live DNC feed. After the first 45 minutes or so I realized I really didn’t need to watch all 4 or whatever hours of it. Just person after person saying pretty much the exact same thing with a few different words and a slightly different accent. I wanted to see the Hillary speech though, so I made sure to tune back in closer to when she was supposed to speak.
From the get go, I did not like Hillary Clinton. During the beginnings of the primaries I found myself sickened by her. Something about the way she spoke. It was slow, made me feel like she thought her audience was a bunch of children. And as the months grew longer and it came down to just her and Obama, I found just about everything she said to grow increasingly atrocious.
I was one of those people afraid of what she might do up on that stage during the DNC. But once she got up there and started speaking my mind was soothed. She didn’t say or do anything to draw support away from Obama. She didn’t alienate her supporters. She did exactly what I had wished for months before.
Day 3, school once again making me miss the live broadcasts of Bill Clinton and Joe Biden. And once again I watched both speeches later on with the help of youtube. Bill was a great speaker as always and I trust his charisma campaigning for Obama in the general election will be very nice to have. As for Joe Biden, he gave a good speech. He attacked McCain without overstepping the line the Obama Campaign is refusing to cross. I must say though, having Obama come out as a surprise afterwards, although exciting, made me forget a lot of what Biden had said.
The final day at the different location. I wanted to badly to watch that one live. But alas, my job got in the way that night. But when I got home I watched Obama speak to the impressively large crowd. He outlined many of the things he wants to accomplish. I’m sure much of it won’t really get done, but when Obama speaks he sounds sincere. He sounds like he really is wearing his “American Hat.”
But of course, with Friday came the announcement of Sarah Palin. I was driving and listening to NPR and heard about it. At first I just heard the name and thought, “Wait hold on, did they say Sarah? A Woman?” As the voices continued to elaborate much of my hope from the night before was coated with a sickening bile that the GOP really pulled something like that. My mind instantly assumed the attempt at disgruntled Hillary voters. I’m happier now knowing that was a slightly lesser reason for the pick though.
That is it for tonight though. Next time I’ll get on about the RNC and much more of my Palin opinions.
Sunday, September 7, 2008
1 - Who and What
Alright! I starting this late but that is to be expected of me. On top of that, this is not about me or my bad habits. Its about politics! And what a year for politics it is, eh?
So to start off lets take a little look at who I am politically. I am officially a member of the Green Party, but I don't really know much about them other then pro-environment. So, to be somewhat accurate without a party affiliation, here is my “political compass” results from that silly online test:
CLICK HERE!
So as you can see, I am a young “liberal, left" male. I am for the right to choose in terms of abortion, I am for homosexual’s right to marriage, I am for taxes that increase based on wealth, etc.
Of course some issues aren’t quite so black and white. For example, I am all for equality in the workplace and all that, however, I also feel like if women are to get all the same everything as men it must include EVERYTHING, like the draft. I know, I know, the chances that the draft would every be reinstated is so amazingly slim its hardly worth mentioning. But as a male, you are required to sign up for it anyway, and I just feel like women should also be forced to sign that little paper and possibly forced to goto war just like the men. I am for TOTAL equality.
Now that we are, at least somewhat, clear on who I am, it is time to ask what should I do?
Well that is a much harder question. Especially with my somewhat apathetic approach to politics. Don’t misunderstand, I am politically active. I’ve only missed one voting opportunity since turning 18. I listen to NPR and watch the daily show, I have gone to protests and put on bumper stickers, I have many opinions from the normative to the empirical questions involving various issues, and I am often willing to speak about politics at just about any time. I just don’t actively go out seeking people to debate with, or involve myself as a volunteer with my candidate of choice or anything.
Should I though? I do not know. And for tonight I shall leave it at that.
So to start off lets take a little look at who I am politically. I am officially a member of the Green Party, but I don't really know much about them other then pro-environment. So, to be somewhat accurate without a party affiliation, here is my “political compass” results from that silly online test:
CLICK HERE!
So as you can see, I am a young “liberal, left" male. I am for the right to choose in terms of abortion, I am for homosexual’s right to marriage, I am for taxes that increase based on wealth, etc.
Of course some issues aren’t quite so black and white. For example, I am all for equality in the workplace and all that, however, I also feel like if women are to get all the same everything as men it must include EVERYTHING, like the draft. I know, I know, the chances that the draft would every be reinstated is so amazingly slim its hardly worth mentioning. But as a male, you are required to sign up for it anyway, and I just feel like women should also be forced to sign that little paper and possibly forced to goto war just like the men. I am for TOTAL equality.
Now that we are, at least somewhat, clear on who I am, it is time to ask what should I do?
Well that is a much harder question. Especially with my somewhat apathetic approach to politics. Don’t misunderstand, I am politically active. I’ve only missed one voting opportunity since turning 18. I listen to NPR and watch the daily show, I have gone to protests and put on bumper stickers, I have many opinions from the normative to the empirical questions involving various issues, and I am often willing to speak about politics at just about any time. I just don’t actively go out seeking people to debate with, or involve myself as a volunteer with my candidate of choice or anything.
Should I though? I do not know. And for tonight I shall leave it at that.
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