Tuesday, January 8, 2008

Now is Not the Time for Bipartisanship

It is all over the main stream media. Like W’s promise to be a “uniter not a divider” it is the central theme of Obama’s concept of change. There is a conference in Lawrence, Kansas bringing together DINOs like former Senators Nunn and Brownback, with GOP moderates like former NJ governor Whitman and NYC mayor Bloomberg.

It is all a big bait and switch. A scam pure and simple. The economic elites who have benefited from the past 25 years of redistribution of wealth are scared and doing their best to limit the damage of the coming wave.

To me the plan goes something like this:

  1. Given the utter dissatisfaction the electorate has with conservatism and the GOP the first play is to get the Democrats to nominate someone who is unelectable for President. Hillary is very polarizing. Obama’s race may not be a factor among Democrats, but among white males of whom a majority vote conservative you had better believe race is an issue. The nomination of either of these candidates will narrow the margins in the general election. Heaven forbid Democrats pick a white male from a southern or western state as their nominee.
  2. In case no. 1 above fails, co opt the anointed Democratic candidates so that if one of them does win in the general election they will not push for radical changes. Both Hillary and Obama have been co-opted in this way from my perspective.
  3. Call for “bipartisanship” which translates as liberals compromising to adopt more conservative policies. Make any candidate who is unwilling to adopt this line appear to be a left wing whacko, or out of touch. (The treatment John Edwards is getting in the MSM)
  4. Keep the electorate unhappy with congress. Just imagine how much the Democrats could accomplish with a 60 vote majority in the Senate? The best hope here is to create an anti incumbent furor, so people vote against the current office holder rather than for a particular party. Do this by having the MSM talk about how the Democratic congress cannot get anything done, without mentioning it is because of Senate filibusters by the GOP and vetoes by the current occupant of the White House.

So, to a tin foil hat wearing nut like me, a vote for bi partisan change and compromise is really a vote for the status quo. My question is how do we get people to realize they are being manipulated? It is one of those things no one really wants to know. They would much rather believe they are actually choosing for themselves.

Friday, January 4, 2008

What a Way to Choose a President

Finally, after a year of campaigning, it has begun, the Iowa results are in and it does not look good. I’ll ignore the GOP side of things for now because the Democrats seem determined to give the presidency to whatever wing nut the Republicans nominate.

What I find so discouraging is how the main stream media do everything they can to limit the field to the few candidates they and their corporate masters find to be acceptable. On the Democratic side there are 2: Hillary, the choice of Wall Street, and Obama, the choice of energy and agri-businesses. Edwards has been written off as being “too populist”, a fault that is just beyond my comprehension.

To me this is all just so obvious. But then again I am just a tin foil hat wearing nut. The elites who control the MSM have determined a Republican is close to unelectable in ’08 so they hand picked 2 right of center “Democrats”, candidates who would not do much to disrupt the status quo and the continued redistribution of wealth. They then declared these 2 candidates to be the only ones who were “viable” or top tier. Unfortunately, John Edwards muddled things up by raising if not equal, comparable amounts of money and doing well in polls. Well now the Iowa results are in. A “must win” for Edwards. So according to the analysts he is no longer viable because he came in 2nd based upon the choice of roughly 250,000 people. For example writing about Obama's win NY Times columnist, David Brooks said: "He’s(Obama) made John Edwards, with his angry cries that “corporate greed is killing your children’s future,” seem old-fashioned. Edwards’s political career is probably over. " But keep in mind that Brooks is good source for the next set of conservative talking points so you can see where this is headed. On the other hand, Hillary, who finished 3rd still can win if she can do well in New Hampshire and so on according to the MSM.

It bothers me is that statements of this sort on or in the MSM do effect the way people perceive candidates and vote. It really is rather disgusting. What is perhaps more disgusting is how we (the American electorate) are so easily manipulated by people with an agenda so contrary to the self interest of the majority.

The irony is that Obama won on a platform of change, where when you look at his positions his proposals he offers the least change to the current way the country operates. You just have to wonder how a guy comes out of a state legislature to run for president in just 4 years. Who has been greasing the rails? As stated above: big energy and agri-business. Is it any wonder he won in a state so dependent on agriculture and looking forward to bio fuels? But you won’t hear that from the MSM.