End All and Be All

Throughout the years I've spoken on a vast number of issues. Political issues, social issues, economic issues, and just plain people with issues (like myself some have said). But I want to set the record correct here and now. What I say on a given topic is not the end all and be all of my belief on that subject. Many times I'm simply being facetious. Other times I am poking fun or pointing something out. Still other times my opinion will change. It happens. Flipping and potentially flopping back to the original is not a sign of weakness, it's the sign of an open mind and an accepting mindset.

More so, I usually don't spend too much time on a single article, although there are some exceptions. And I don't go back to see what I previously said on something to make sure that nothing I say contradicts something I am going to say. Modesty aside, that would take forever. So, the best thing to do would be to trust my most recent words on a particular topic (if not meant as a wise crack or the like) as what I believe on it and give lesser weight to older posts. Maybe I believe both. Maybe I believe neither anymore. I couldn't begin to guess. My point here is not to create a compendium of topic-based articles, but to talk about what's bothering me at a particular point. And, those things change from time to time, as does my point of view. Sometimes I will update an article usually with a "(revised)" label on it, although not always. I tend to update my Highlighted Topics more than others. Sometimes I'll delete old entries. Sometimes I'll move stuff around. It's really up to me and that may be a scary thing for those looking for order.

That's all. Nothing all that enlightening yet tonight. We'll see what else I'll get out. Incidentally, I've got about a half dozen things I have bouncing around that I may get to this weekend. Particularly, religion and the origin of Christianity are on the chopping block. Enjoy. That is, if I get to it.

FFF

Sean Hannity

I felt it necessary to share a gem describing Sean Hannity. It was written by John Cleese and read last night by Keith Olbermann on Countdown. Enjoy.

"An Ode to Sean Hannity"
by John Cleese

Aping urbanity
Oozing with vanity

Plump as a manatee
Faking humanity

Journalistic calamity
Intellectual inanity

Fox Noise insanity
You're a profanity

Hannity.

Lies and the Lying Liars Who Spin Them -Or- What to Do When Even the Shit Stops Hitting the Fan?

What is the McCain Campaign to do when all else fails?

Lie.

Lie out of their asses. Lie and say that they're not lying. Lie and say that Barack Obama is lying. Lie and say that they never lied even if it's on film. Lie about lying. Lie about lying about lying.

Just plain lie.

The John McCain Campaign has moved into desperate mode. Now that most major polls have McCain well below Obama in their surveys, they've decided to pull out all the stops. And, instead of sticking to their proverbial guns and staying the course in their campaign for the White House, they've dug deeper into the Rovian handbook.

Lie.

Distort the truth. No. That hasn't worked. Don't mix up numbers and fool with wordplay making what you say technically true by intently inaccurate. No, that hasn't worked. Push it one step further. Just lie. Call Obama a terrorist. Tell him that he wants to raise taxes for the middle and lower classes. Tell him that he waffles on the economy. Tell him that the surge worked (because working doesn't mean we have left, it just means that we're still there) and that his position on it was therefore wrong. Tell the public that they don't know Obama. Who is Obama? WHO IS OBAMA? (Sometimes it helps to yell.) He's "that guy" from the debate. He's that Hussein terrorist fellow. He's Obama Bin Laden. He's unpatriotic. In short, he's everything but a child rapist at this point. But who knows, there are four weeks yet to this campaign season and they've got to do something to keep in the news. The McCain Campaign has to do something to push the economy and his history of deregulation (the self-anointed "Reagan foot soldier") from the headlines and the punditry.

They have to do something to keep relevant. Shock and awe doesn't work anymore. That damned "liberal media" debunked that foolish tactic last week, and besides it's so August and this is October. The fact of the matter is that they are going down with the Rethuglican ship. They've made their beds and now they have to sleep in them. And all those other stupid cliches. Buh-bye Johnny. Bye-bye.

Politicking and the Ends of Means

Okay, before we begin let me point one thing out that's really been bugging me. You know that $700 billion in "taxpayer" money that's going to be used at some point to "bail out" the financial industry? Well, guess what. It's not taxpayer money, unless you're talking about the taxpayers who own Chinese and Western European banking conglomerates. They will be giving the US government the money to "bail out" or otherwise entitled buy out parts of the financial industry. This isn't money that has ever come from the taxes of you or I. If we had that kind of money, why are we financing two wars with foreign money? Why is the national debt expected to hit $11.4 TRILLION (that's $11,400,000,000,000 for those keeping track) because of this buy out? Because it's not money that we own. It's money that own us to them. That's all.

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And on to what I really wanted to talk about tonight...


Politics is a polarizing entity. It fashions large divides out of tiny differences and makes issues out of differences that can coexist. It seems now that we are more polarized than ever. Yet this may not be true. A particularly insidious aspect of politics is that we things are happening for the first time every time. Or that there have never been such political gaps between the people of this nation. I beg to differ. We forget things too quickly and cannot accurately make such determinizations.

There is another interesting aspect to politics. When one is getting their way, they always claim that the other is a radical. Day to day as polls change each side of this election process alternates accusations of radicalism. In fact, on a larger scale for much of the past decade we've been calling the radical the Republican Party and through its "Rovian" techniques, it gained power for the first time in decades in Congress and the first time in 8 years in the Oval Office. As they gained power, the left ascribed their techniques as being radical.

Now the tide is turning again. Barack Obama is leading the Democratic ticket and gaining power in this nation. He proposes change and a new style of politics, and so it seems to his followers, because he is winning. Likewise, his opponents assail him as a radical, because they are losing.

It must be asked then if this "radical" ends justify the means (or "Rovian") mentality that each losing side claims the winner uses even exists at all. On the contrary, if one can only gain power by actually using such techniques then perhaps their followers are only blind to its usage.

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In politics does the end justify the means? To the aggressor, yes, to the loser, no. The same rings true for everyone in every aspect of discord. I believe that in all realistic applications getting my way does justify my means. In politics I will smear and I will go for the jugular. Why? Because I can't live with myself if I don't try every avenue. To me this is war and I intend to be on the winning side. I cannot accept the policies of Bush II. Such acceptance would be more destructive to me than would be my means to my end.