Reply With QuoteYou might be surprised hearing it from me Joe, but X2 well said.
You can't blame the "GOP". Blame the piss poor education level of the mongoloids that vote in the primaries and get swayed every 2 weeks by some new shiny thing. If you run a bunch of weirdos that spew religious dogma and deep throat corndogs every 5 minutes you're going to end up with a crap candidate. The candidates that the religious right love, scare the sh*t out of the rest of the country.
It's been said before. Real, honest, intelligent people with charisma, in either party, are not going to run anymore because they may have been to a keg party once in college. Romney may be a real nice guy, and he has 5 fine sons that have never knocked over a liquor store as far as I know, but the guy has the interpersonal skills of a chair. He's horrible interacting with "average folks". In general he's a sh*tty "politician".
That's not a shot at his character, just at his style. Not everyone can do that crap day after day after day. He's a rich guy, and he acts like one. He really doesn't have a great frame of reference for the "average" American. His problem is he can't fake it and act like he does.
Conservatives used to be smart white guys from Ivy League universities that owned businesses, now it means anyone who thinks abortion is the tool of the Devil. Maybe Romney is a throwback to that privileged class of white guys, but I don't see William F. Buckley when he speaks. And he isn't half the man his Dad was.
You might be surprised hearing it from me Joe, but X2 well said.
I'd vote for a genuine "Conservative" like Barry Goldwater in a heartbeat if they'd tell the religious right to go f*ck themselves and stop playing "lets make America go back to our version of Leave It To Beaver."
They can throw the damned abortion card out too.Originally Posted by California Joe
Though with certain reservations and exceptions, Im inclined to agree on this CJ...perhaps the rise of Religious Right in the end wasn't good even for the RR. While Im not even Christian, and disdain comments like America is a Christian country, nonetheless having visible religiosity is good imo. The PROBLEM in this regard is people who love to show it off. This goes for any religion. And maybe this is for politicians in general, but its like few are humble anymore, about anything. And in the end, people who hold others to such high moral standards are destined to get burned. That said, they are not totally wrong. There IS something fundamentally wrong with the social breakdown in our society today. Its appalling that there is a 50%+ divorce rate, broken homes as far as the eye can see, etc etc. So its not as if everything they say is wrong...perhaps its that their solutions are too over the top the other way. To me though, I don't think it has to do with extremists taking over the parties as is the general line of thinking. From my experience of life, everyone is an extremist on at least one issue, if not more. So its not failing to capture the moderates which is the failings of the parties...because I don't believe there is a defined 'middle'. People are people. Pure speculation on my part, but perhaps Americans are turned off the RR in a way not seen before because the RR insisted on placing their Christianity not in context of American civil religion, but above it. Its kind of hard to explain, but its like they crossed some unseen, unfelt line with all Americans.
As for the GOP...even if he is some kind of throwback, its the totally wrong kind. In a way, its why I liked Cain, even with all his supposed moral failings. Here is a guy who connected on a very real, genuine level with the people he wanted to lead. And its kind of related to why I still like W. Sure, I suppose depending on one's level of cynicism and/or incredulity at being naive this could all sound like ****, but I think that all his folksy-ness wasn't made up. It was real. Sure, he was a rich boy and went to Ivy League, but for all those traits, he was little like his father. People who've known him personally have always remarked how...genuine he is. I mean even down to simple goofs like giving Frau Merkel an improptu shoulder massage, none of that was contrived.
As for the Democrats, if even harder for me to digest what happened. After all, I'm a guy who idolizes Andrew Jackson.
Meh...I still have hope though they'll fix their ****. At the deepest, Im an optimist. Always was.
Well as you told Cj, with certain reservations and exceptions, I'm inclined to agree you on this...and: Thomas Jefferson.
W did connect with people, He had it. Clinton had that in spades. History will judge whether either one of them was a total clusterf*ck or not. Herman had the folksiness and the connecting part right. It's just that he was a knucklehead in a pimp hat on a book tour that didn't know **** about the gravity of the job and probably had an overwhelming urge to grab women's asses a little too much...
Hell, Jimmy Carter probably practiced his "faith" more openly than any President in my lifetime. Reagan was a Christian, but he wasn't bloviating about it all the damned time. Your religion should be way down the line on the list of requirements for the job but it's now the be all and end all. It's f*cking retarded. Social issues like abortion and gay marriage do not actually effect anyone's daily lives and yet the litmus tests to get through the Republican primaries make getting to Mordor look easy. And f*ck Grover Norquist, who is that c*nt to tell an elected official that under NO circumstances can they raise taxes. That's retarded.
And why aren't there any pro choice, AR owning, pro gun, fiscal conservatives, that don't care if homos get married, dig the grunts, and want a streamlined government? Why?
Well concerning President's and religion...I think my position would be whether a President IS religious or not
Most Americans agree, considering how a vast majority in polls time and again would not vote for an atheist, let alone a militant one.
Personally, I think Obama wins if his campaign can prevent this election from being a referendum vote on the economy, and Romney wins if his campaign can make the election a referendum vote on the economy.
I am absolutely disgusted that not just the Obama campaign, but the President himself have stooped to pretty much calling Romney a criminal during his role in private equity.
It really does have me thinking that the Obama campaign is farther to the left than they claim.
Private equity runs the full life cycle of business:
Everything from business birth/germination(although usually only after proven ability to survive)
through business adolescence
through business growth
through business maturity
through business illness, death, dismemberment, and recycling
Private equity is like Mutual of Omaha being an active player in helping ecosystem conservation in Wild Kingdom.
Calling private equity evil or criminal is like calling farmers, hunters, conservationists, wild animals, vultures, and even the weather evil, directly or indirectly.
It's just insane.
Having said that, Romney IS "The Man" in the special interest devil sense of the word and America will continue to orbit the 5th level of hell until political campaign finance is TRULY reformed....still broken, but called reformed with victory declared with that piece of rubbish legislation by McCain-Feingold.
Until someone sorts out the dirty money and influence in American politics nothing will change so why bother trying? Seriously.....the game is rigged.....no one worthy of the office makes it past the primaries.
Someone needs to figure out how to decisively disrupt the campaign finance gravy train.
Because failing to do so means orbiting the 6th level of hell......and eventually reaching a level of pain in the US where people will be at FAR greater risk of voting for far greater populist stupidity......
There's clearly not enough pain yet to get the majority of voters politically active.
But I'm increasingly of the belief that a "window of pain" exists to improve the chances of positive and necessary political reform(campaign finance) to get the US back on track.
I believe that if the US as a society blows through the top of that "window of pain" to the upside and the pain(economy/social/political) becomes intolerable for enough, then irrational populism could take the country down a dark path.
The whole idea that taxes can't be raised at all, period, ever, regardless of economic realities is a more like a freakishly dogmatic religion than governance.
There are a whole lot of Republicans and Democrats that fit this description but with with redistricting, the blowhards on tv and radio, special interests, money, "the base", and all the other crap, they're almost unelectable.And why aren't there any pro choice, AR owning, pro gun, fiscal conservatives, that don't care if homos get married, dig the grunts, and want a streamlined government? Why?
I think each candidate should be capped at the same fundraising amount (and spending) and then let them sell themselves however they see fit.
I am but I consider myself an Independed. Reason, just look at the GOP's last 2 candidates. I am voting against Obama because of his policies, not for Romney.And why aren't there any pro choice, AR owning, pro gun, fiscal conservatives, that don't care if homos get married, dig the grunts, and want a streamlined government?
IDK I think the only reason Romney isn't beating Obama across the head with a economic slant, is probably both the fact that he doesn't have any real plans to fix it, and that if some economists (and Flagg) are to be believed, we aren't going to be getting out of this economic stagnation for quite a while. so whats the point in focusing so much on the economy that it could potentially hurt you in near-term and you end up suffering the same fate as the guy you replaced?
The average wage earner in America now works to pay government taxes, fees and whatnot for more than half of the year. When on average more that 50% of everything you earn is going to the government, people who say we need higher taxes to give even more of our hard-earned money to bloated, wasteful government entities should be publicly flogged.
http://www.idahoreporter.com/2012/re...f-years-labor/
I think the more ideologically extreme people are, the less able they are to deal with complex problems. It becomes not about problem solving, looking at a situation and asking what various things will work here and what won't, what's realistic and what's not, but instead an absolute conviction that they're right, the other guy is wrong, and accepting no middle ground.
With things like the tax pledge it's not "Hey, let's get together and balance the budget; let's hash out a deal and try to fix this" but rather "I don't like government and neither do my base and my big donors and I will pout, shout, and obstruct, unless I get things 100% my way 100% of the time"
I think any real solutions to our economic situation would include things that would piss damn near everybody off. Or it least it would piss off the ideological devout of the left and right. It would mean higher tax rates and closing loopholes but also big, big cuts in spending and entitlements.
Nobody likes taxes. I don't like taxes. A no tax increase pledge is a very easy vote getter for a politician. But on the other end a lot of people like entitlements and services, and they're going to have to face some pretty serious cuts too.
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