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my political rant
Nov. 7th, 2000 02:58 am[I wrote this on a board last night, and wanted to preserve it for posterity. A few weeks ago, I made a deal with someone that I would vote for Nader if he promised not to vote for Bush. Notes are in italics in brackets, like this one.]
___
First of all, I have no party affiliation. I am a social liberal. I believe in touchy-feely things like moderate environmental protection, taxing the fuck out of the rich and not the poor, letting gay boys and hot dykes get hitched or at least get insurance coverage for their honeys. My mother is politically conservative; my father is liberal liberal liberal; I wasn't (successfully) indoctrinated in any particular way, but I have been both dirt-poor (welfare, etc) and middle-class. I have been vacillating between Gore and Nader. I will vote for Nader, but in a swing state, it is hard to resist the temptation to vote for Gore just to try to keep Bush where he belongs... messing with Texas. I was not a Clinton supporter; I did not vote in the last election because there was no candidate I could feel good about. Of the democrats who ran in the primaries, I liked Bill Bradley, and of the republicans, I liked McCain though I did not feel I could in conscience vote for him (temper, temper, temper).
[All dykes are hot.]
Unfortunately, the long list of posted quotes regarding liberty, thinking about who one votes for, and the right to bear arms, if properly applied, would erode most of Bush's support base. The majority of Bush's supporters either support him via a knee-jerk "morality" reaction (IE, he's a born-again xian, he's pro-life, etc), or they support him because he seems like he'd be a "nice guy to have a beer with". There is an anti-intellectualism at work as well - plenty of people revel in Bush's apparent stupidity, it makes him less intimidating. Bush is quite seriously the least qualified person to run for president in the past 100 years, and quite possibly the least qualified Republican candidate ever.
The guy you would want to invite to the block party is not necessarily the guy you would want for president. For a candidate running on his ostensible morality, he has been just as much of a lying slippery snake as anyone else (witness his Clintonian scrambling with Karen Hughes to spin his outright lie about the DUI into something minimal). This would not in itself bother me if he had not gone to such pains to cover it. But on top of that, the Christian Coalition and "big oil" OWN HIS ASS. Do you really want a president who is in bed with the Christian Coalition? (and for a party riding a moral high horse over an adulterous president, many of their leaders have certainly fallen to adultery charges: Henry Hyde, Newt Gingrich, and Rudy Giuliani have all had adulterous relationships, the latter two quite recently and with aides or appointees.)
The media has been pretty soft on Bush compared to Gore, and has continually leaped all over any slight misstatement Gore made (such as the Sarasota public school thing - the girl had a desk the next day, but only because another classmate GAVE her their seat; that person stood for several weeks). Many of Gore's "sins" have been based almost entirely on media distortions. Nader has been under-covered and the other third-party candidates are barely on the media radar.
As far as taxes - that's a campaign promise and nothing more no matter who you vote for. Even if taxes are raised, we are STILL the most under-taxed nation in the developed world. & the general trend of Republicans is to be very friendly to big business & not so friendly to the poor & the individual. So elect a republican president with a republican congress, and a republican supreme court by the time he's finished with it... and WHERE are the checks and balances? The republican party, while long having been one for fat-cat business, didn't become the party of creepy preachy christians who wanted to force their will on everyone until a lot more recently. It is not the party of my grandparents anymore. It ain't just about patriotism and the constitution & less taxation & smaller government anymore (& if you think it should be, look into the libertarian party. plenty of right-wing gun crazies, plenty of goofy left-wing liberals who want to have their pot and smoke it too.)
[note: i do not have a problem with christians per se. i have a problem with right-wing christian extremists who have decided that their way is best for everyone else and that they should have the right to hijack the government and make everyone live in their theocracy. there are plenty of christians who are not like that, i realise: i am not xian-bashing here, i am extremist-bashing.]
On gun control: The constitution says that you have a right to bear arms. By all means, line up for your bayonet and your hunting knives, because THAT (not a fucking UZI) is what you were guaranteed by the founding (rich white male landowning and sometimes slaveowning I might add) fathers.
On the death penalty: Bush has been presented with seriously doubtful cases where there was a good chance of the innocence of the condemned and spends an average of a half-hour reviewing each case. In several cases, exculpatory evidence has been provided, and he has refused to stay the execution, let alone call for a review of the case. Texas is known for the horror that is its state judicial system. I believe that we are talking about a man with blood on his hands. I believe we are talking about a man who could and would buy or sell any of us. (Cheney too, maybe more so - even Norman Schwarzkopf had not much nice to say about his work as Secretary of Defense in the Gulf War, as Cheney repeatedly came up with strategically disastrous plans of attack which could have resulted in great loss of US life if they had not been averted... yes, a S of D with no military qualifications). I believe that the republican party cares about little anymore but money and the pretense of morality. i'm not sure about the other parties... i'm not claiming they are any better, just that i haven't quite figured them out yet.
As far as being anti-grrl - I can spell girl however I want & so can you; I personally shudder and retch at the spelling "womyn". The point is that I don't think much of anyone here is old enough to remember a US without the gains that feminism made in the 70s; nobody here is old enough to remember first-wave feminism, though maybe some of our grandparents or great-grandparents are. For instance, while sexual harrassment charges are occasionally abused, until those laws were put into place it was perfectly legal for a man to insist that a subordinate female co-worker have sex with him to keep her job... that's the tip of the iceburg of abuses we aren't supposed to have to deal with anymore, & we STILL don't have equality or anything close. I am very afraid that things will start to backslide very soon, in the event of a "return to traditional values" (IE, "children, church, kitchen" for women)... and I don't want to live in a theocracy, however tacit.
(and if you are female and the smartest thing you can think of to say about my comment that women's rights, such as they are, have a serious chance of backsliding in the event of a Bush presidency is based on me using the style "grrl", go back to the drawing board. without feminism you wouldn't even be making political arguments or worrying about who to vote for, because you WOULD NOT BE ALLOWED TO.)
I read and adore the comic book Transmetropolitan, which tends to some pretty blistering social critique. I believe that we are fucked (up the ass. with a branding iron.) pretty much no matter what. But we do still have the ability to choose how hard and fast... and in a Bush/Cheney presidency, i'm worried that you won't know what hit you.
___
First of all, I have no party affiliation. I am a social liberal. I believe in touchy-feely things like moderate environmental protection, taxing the fuck out of the rich and not the poor, letting gay boys and hot dykes get hitched or at least get insurance coverage for their honeys. My mother is politically conservative; my father is liberal liberal liberal; I wasn't (successfully) indoctrinated in any particular way, but I have been both dirt-poor (welfare, etc) and middle-class. I have been vacillating between Gore and Nader. I will vote for Nader, but in a swing state, it is hard to resist the temptation to vote for Gore just to try to keep Bush where he belongs... messing with Texas. I was not a Clinton supporter; I did not vote in the last election because there was no candidate I could feel good about. Of the democrats who ran in the primaries, I liked Bill Bradley, and of the republicans, I liked McCain though I did not feel I could in conscience vote for him (temper, temper, temper).
[All dykes are hot.]
Unfortunately, the long list of posted quotes regarding liberty, thinking about who one votes for, and the right to bear arms, if properly applied, would erode most of Bush's support base. The majority of Bush's supporters either support him via a knee-jerk "morality" reaction (IE, he's a born-again xian, he's pro-life, etc), or they support him because he seems like he'd be a "nice guy to have a beer with". There is an anti-intellectualism at work as well - plenty of people revel in Bush's apparent stupidity, it makes him less intimidating. Bush is quite seriously the least qualified person to run for president in the past 100 years, and quite possibly the least qualified Republican candidate ever.
The guy you would want to invite to the block party is not necessarily the guy you would want for president. For a candidate running on his ostensible morality, he has been just as much of a lying slippery snake as anyone else (witness his Clintonian scrambling with Karen Hughes to spin his outright lie about the DUI into something minimal). This would not in itself bother me if he had not gone to such pains to cover it. But on top of that, the Christian Coalition and "big oil" OWN HIS ASS. Do you really want a president who is in bed with the Christian Coalition? (and for a party riding a moral high horse over an adulterous president, many of their leaders have certainly fallen to adultery charges: Henry Hyde, Newt Gingrich, and Rudy Giuliani have all had adulterous relationships, the latter two quite recently and with aides or appointees.)
The media has been pretty soft on Bush compared to Gore, and has continually leaped all over any slight misstatement Gore made (such as the Sarasota public school thing - the girl had a desk the next day, but only because another classmate GAVE her their seat; that person stood for several weeks). Many of Gore's "sins" have been based almost entirely on media distortions. Nader has been under-covered and the other third-party candidates are barely on the media radar.
As far as taxes - that's a campaign promise and nothing more no matter who you vote for. Even if taxes are raised, we are STILL the most under-taxed nation in the developed world. & the general trend of Republicans is to be very friendly to big business & not so friendly to the poor & the individual. So elect a republican president with a republican congress, and a republican supreme court by the time he's finished with it... and WHERE are the checks and balances? The republican party, while long having been one for fat-cat business, didn't become the party of creepy preachy christians who wanted to force their will on everyone until a lot more recently. It is not the party of my grandparents anymore. It ain't just about patriotism and the constitution & less taxation & smaller government anymore (& if you think it should be, look into the libertarian party. plenty of right-wing gun crazies, plenty of goofy left-wing liberals who want to have their pot and smoke it too.)
[note: i do not have a problem with christians per se. i have a problem with right-wing christian extremists who have decided that their way is best for everyone else and that they should have the right to hijack the government and make everyone live in their theocracy. there are plenty of christians who are not like that, i realise: i am not xian-bashing here, i am extremist-bashing.]
On gun control: The constitution says that you have a right to bear arms. By all means, line up for your bayonet and your hunting knives, because THAT (not a fucking UZI) is what you were guaranteed by the founding (rich white male landowning and sometimes slaveowning I might add) fathers.
On the death penalty: Bush has been presented with seriously doubtful cases where there was a good chance of the innocence of the condemned and spends an average of a half-hour reviewing each case. In several cases, exculpatory evidence has been provided, and he has refused to stay the execution, let alone call for a review of the case. Texas is known for the horror that is its state judicial system. I believe that we are talking about a man with blood on his hands. I believe we are talking about a man who could and would buy or sell any of us. (Cheney too, maybe more so - even Norman Schwarzkopf had not much nice to say about his work as Secretary of Defense in the Gulf War, as Cheney repeatedly came up with strategically disastrous plans of attack which could have resulted in great loss of US life if they had not been averted... yes, a S of D with no military qualifications). I believe that the republican party cares about little anymore but money and the pretense of morality. i'm not sure about the other parties... i'm not claiming they are any better, just that i haven't quite figured them out yet.
As far as being anti-grrl - I can spell girl however I want & so can you; I personally shudder and retch at the spelling "womyn". The point is that I don't think much of anyone here is old enough to remember a US without the gains that feminism made in the 70s; nobody here is old enough to remember first-wave feminism, though maybe some of our grandparents or great-grandparents are. For instance, while sexual harrassment charges are occasionally abused, until those laws were put into place it was perfectly legal for a man to insist that a subordinate female co-worker have sex with him to keep her job... that's the tip of the iceburg of abuses we aren't supposed to have to deal with anymore, & we STILL don't have equality or anything close. I am very afraid that things will start to backslide very soon, in the event of a "return to traditional values" (IE, "children, church, kitchen" for women)... and I don't want to live in a theocracy, however tacit.
(and if you are female and the smartest thing you can think of to say about my comment that women's rights, such as they are, have a serious chance of backsliding in the event of a Bush presidency is based on me using the style "grrl", go back to the drawing board. without feminism you wouldn't even be making political arguments or worrying about who to vote for, because you WOULD NOT BE ALLOWED TO.)
I read and adore the comic book Transmetropolitan, which tends to some pretty blistering social critique. I believe that we are fucked (up the ass. with a branding iron.) pretty much no matter what. But we do still have the ability to choose how hard and fast... and in a Bush/Cheney presidency, i'm worried that you won't know what hit you.
