Comments | candlelight1228: Thinking about the Election

candlelight1228

Thinking about the Election

Jan 30, 2008 10:20

I have been watching the Primaries much more closely in the last couple weeks since reading Lee Iaccoca's book, "Where have all the Leaders Gone?". (I would highly recommend that book.) I suppose it helps that I get paid to watch the Daily Show and the Colbert Report everyday. Either way the mixture has pushed me to pay closer attention. I have ( Read more... )

politics, election, 2008

Comments 10

obsidian468 January 31 2008, 00:37:37 UTC

I actually just commented on another friend's post with the same topic, but a slightly different scope/point. It's good to see that my peers/friends are very aware of the election. We all need to be ( ... )

hex61 January 31 2008, 02:03:43 UTC

Ron Paul didn't impress me much. There were a lot of things he said which would be great accomplishments - and a lot of other things that seemed worse than isolationist and spun for a naive audience to latch on to.

obsidian468 January 31 2008, 03:40:28 UTC

I hate to use the phrase, "toeing the party line", but this is exactly what Ron Paul has done. He is a Libertarian at heart. He ran in 1988 as a Libertarian. He is only running Republican this year as he wanted more of a fighting chance. He really is still a Libertarian.

At the most basic level, the Libertarian party is about stripping down the government so far that the only role they play is national defense (not offense as the Bush administration of the past 8 years would have you believe), peacekeeping (with many roles delegated to the state/local governments), and a possibility for educational involvement.

Essentially, Libertarians want to strip the role of a Federal government to the role they had shortly after the Declaration of Independence, when the Federal government swore to keep out of the day-to-day lives of Americans.

To put it at its most base level, Ron Paul wants to hit the reset button.

candlelight1228 January 31 2008, 20:13:19 UTC

You know I didn't realise that that's how Ron Paul thought. I admit I didn't give him much of a chance to persuade me one way or the other on supporting him. There was never much that really grabbed me about him. Either way though in all honesty that would be far to far in the other direction in my opinion. There's a fine line somewhere in the middle.

hex61 January 31 2008, 01:56:02 UTC

Today's news provided more clarity in the Democratic nomination process. Now the Democratic Party choice is between two people - both of whom have little or no experience running anything. One has charisma, the other has the Bill Clinton spin. It's hard to say which is really the go forward contender - you cannot count Hillary out, after all her husband is the one who testified that oral is not "sex" and convinced Americans everywhere that this was true enough for them.

The Republican Party is still a mess. Thank goodness Ron Paul is fading into nothingness (he was really scary). Huckabee is also really scary but only Super Tuesday will tell us how powerful the Christian Ignorant have become. Mitt Romney is an excellent candidate based on practical experience, but I think he is going to the gallows as Ross Perot did. So the next two weeks will be a big deal on the Republican front.

obsidian468 January 31 2008, 03:48:18 UTC

The media would have you believe that Ron Paul is fading into obscurity. After all, they've buried him from the start. The mainstream media feels that he's too radical.

See my above post(s) as to why I still support Ron Paul. Frankly, to the educated American, who cares more about where this country came from than of the petty issues of today (yeah, when gay marriage is still an issue, it's pretty damn petty), and the same American who cares about the major issues of today (such as an unjust war, the slaughter of thousands, and the permanent mental and physical scarification of children (I refer to the 18-20 year old kids that make up a significant portion of our military, most of whom are unhappy with this war), we, as Americans, need to hit the reset button. We need to finally realize that everything America stands for now is complete bullshit, and we need to actively try and take America back for the people, for whom it was established for.

hex61 January 31 2008, 04:56:13 UTC

The media would have you believe that Ron Paul is fading into obscurity. After all, they've buried him from the start. The mainstream media feels that he's too radical.

I think his standings in the primaries do a pretty good job of showing him fading into obscurity. Whatever the mainstream media reasons were though - they definitely buried him and several other alternative candidates right from the start.

same American who cares about the major issues of today (such as an unjust war, the slaughter of thousands, and the permanent mental and physical scarification of children (I refer to the 18-20 year old kids that make up a significant portion of our military, most of whom are unhappy with this warAh. See this would be one of the reasons why I see Ron Paul as disingenuous. Because I think the Iraq war was necessary because of the global community not doing their job, and unless we ascribe to a policy of foreign disengagement across the board we will always have to fight a just war against embedded dictators that openly brag about ( ... )

candlelight1228 January 31 2008, 20:30:47 UTC

The "Bill Clinton" spin is perhaps another reason I don't want Hillary in office. I can only imagine him sleeping his way into every democratic visitors pocket. Not to say it would happen but you wonder when a guy comes out and says, "I didn't have sexual relationship with that woman." Only to be clearly proven wrong later ( ... )

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