Wednesday, April 30, 2008

Combating the warmongers

A well known musician, one with outspoken political views, recently made the following statement in relation to the war in Iraq.
One would hope we'd have made more progress than we have combating the warmongers.
If you think about it this statement could have been made by someone like Toby Keith or by someone like Roger Waters. Two artists with radically different views on the war in Iraq and on the war against the Jihadists in general.

In fact this statement was made by one of those two people. How you interpret the statement and who you think made it speaks volumes.

By the way, I positively adore Roger Waters music, am going to his concert in a couple days, and fully expect to love it completely. I don't even plan to take offense when he disses my country and my president.

Obamafacts

Fact 1: Senator Obama's old pastor, Reverend Wright, made a variety of controversial statements in his recent press club speech. This fact is easy to prove since the entire contents of the speech are readily available and have been aired, re-aired, and discussed incessantly.

Fact 2: Senator Obama, at his press conference on Tuesday, denounced and distanced himself from his former pastor. His desire was clearly to show that he did not support, believe in, or share the thoughts, attitudes and opinions of his former pastor. This fact is also easy to prove for the same reasons as fact 1.

Fact 3: The statements and sentiments of Reverend Wright that Obama specifically took issue with, and tried to distance himself from, are statements and sentiments that Reverend Wright has made repeatedly over the last several decades. This fact is also very easy to prove since these are the very statements and sentiments that have been aired and re-aired so many times since this whole controversy began.

Fact 4: Senator Obama made the claim in his news conference that the thoughts, ideas and sentiments of Reverend Wright, as expressed in his speech before the press club, were somehow those of a different person than the Reverend Wright whom Obama until recently praised as his friend of 20 years, his pastor, his mentor, his adviser, the officiator at his marriage and the baptizer of his children. Again, all of this is unquestionably true and very easy to prove.

So, what can we deduce from an examination of these facts? What does the relationship between these two men, taken in conjunction with their most recent statements, tell us about the man who is asking us to vote him in as our next president? I'd say we have to conclude one of the following:

1. Senator Obama was deceived by Reverend Wright. Reverend Wright was somehow able to portray himself to Obama over the past 20 years as someone completely different than who he obviously is.
I think we can all agree that this is extremely unlikely given how intelligent the senator clearly is. There is simply no way Reverend Wright could pull this off. Besides that, Obama has been directly confronted about these issues going back quite a while now and would certainly have checked it out for himself. He would have discovered the deceit and denounced his pastor long before now if this were the case.

If, however, it is true that he was deceived and remained unaware of it for 20 years, that certainly disqualifies him from being president. Not only that, it disqualifies him from pretty much any position of public trust.
2. Senator Obama never actually listened in church, read the bulletins, or listened when they had private conversations. Somehow he managed to remain completely oblivious, over a period of 20 years, to the clear thoughts, ideas and sentiments of Reverend Wright.
If Senator Obama is so oblivious that he managed to miss all of this over 20 years, and even missed it over the last several months when the whole country was watching Reverend Wright on YouTube, then he is clearly not qualified to lead the local PTA, much less the country.
3. Senator Obama made a calculated decision over the years to associate himself with Reverend Wright and his church in order to reap the political benefits of doing so, which clearly helped him get started up the political ladder. He never actually shared the divisive thoughts, ideas and sentiments of the pastor or the church, but simply used their association for his own purposes and is now having to deal with the (somehow unexpected?) fallout from that as best he can.
Given what we know about the type of person who would go into politics, this option unfortunately seems more plausible than the first two. If this option is true then Senator Obama is simply another opportunistic, calculating, lying political hack. And, if that is true, then given the choice between two such politicians (Hillary and Barack) it seems quite clear that Hillary is the better choice. She is better at it, more experienced at it, and has the dubious fortune of being married to the best of the best. Lets face it, Bill could, and did, skate through scandals like this in his sleep.

For Senator Obama, getting caught in a deception (which this clearly is), is very damaging given who he is portraying himself to be. The Clintons have perfected the art to the point that when Bill stood before the entire nation and lied through his teeth (and was caught at it) we just kinda went "aww shucks, there's our guy".
4. Senator Obama shares, and has for many years, many of the thoughts, ideas and sentiments of Reverend Wright, but is smart enough to know that he would never stand a chance of being elected president if that became known.
Given some of the senators past statements and certain passages in his book, some of his other associations with people such as William Ayers, and given the content of various speeches by Mrs. Obama this option is also fairly plausible. Lets face it, Senator Obama's voting record puts him as far left as possible and the thoughts, sentiments and ideas espoused by Reverend Wright are fairly well in line with the far left.

There are a couple problems if this is the case. First, such a person could never be elected president (at least not yet) if this were known. Second, if this is the case then Senator Obama is guilty of cold, calculated, deceitful manipulation of the American public and his denouncement of his former pastor is nothing more than a lie. And, if Reverend Wright is not in on the whole deceit of the public (which doesn't seem to be the case now) then after being cast aside by Obama he can definitely make life pretty difficult by simply exposing Obama for what he actually is.

If it comes down to duel by oratory between Obama and Wright I think my money might be on Wright.

My personal opinion is that the truth lies somewhere between options 3 and 4. I don't think Senator Obama is stupid or gullible enough for options 1 or 2 to be the case. Unfortunately Barack Obama stood before us and claimed that the truth was option 1 or 2. So your are left with two choices.

1. Take Senator Obama's own word for it that he is so completely naive and oblivious that he somehow either missed all of this or was deceived.

2. Reach the conclusion that Obama is at best a calculating, opportunistic, deceitful political hack or at worst a dangerous, far left radical whose plans for this country are certainly not in line with the bulk of the population.

Either way you look at it you can't possibly vote for him. Frankly when you apply this whole exercise to Hillary Clinton you can't vote for her either. To the extent that the electorate wises up to this the party leaders had better be formulating a plan B as quickly as they possibly can or their chances for winning the White House are pretty much nil.

Now will the electorate wise up to this? Something tells me the media's complicated love-quadrangle with Obama, Wright and Clinton are going to wise the electorate up whether the electorate wants to be wised up or not.

Wednesday, April 23, 2008

If I were an ideologue

If I were an ideologue or an opportunist, say along the lines of Al Gore, I'd be strongly tempted to take hold of stories like this one and start my own climate-change religion. There's money to be made in the prophet-of-doom racket, fame to be won, perhaps even a Nobel prize or an Oscar.

But I guess I'll decline the opportunity that is presenting itself and content myself with a few smug nods as the man-made global warming scam becomes harder and harder to prove and the true-believers become more zealous, fanatical and fundamentalist every day. I'll shake my head in sadness as their holy sacraments, such as CFL's and Ethanol, turn out to be poison and ashes rather than body and blood.

The engine of commerce is quite literally running out of gas. Hunger is on the rise as food is stolen from the mouths of children and sold to the distillery. The Church of Blessed Greenness came up like a harmless, furry little woodland creature, but has since grown fangs and embarked on its holy inquisition. Woe to you peoples of the earth, you were mesmerized by the oracles of Gaia, but the prophetic words have led you to the precipice of doom. Let the sleepers awaken, let them take up once again the free tools of their enterprise. This is a moment of destiny, choose well whom you will follow.

Tuesday, April 1, 2008

How does your garden grow?

In case you've been living in an alternate reality somewhere and hadn't yet realized the magnitude of government ineptness, I offer up this (guaranteed to make your head explode) article as exhibit A.

In my opinion the government really should Farm This Out.