Senator Barack H. Obama, now President elect Obama. He got 368 electoral college votes, quite the blowout really from 2004, when President Bush barely got a majority electoral college vote and 3% advantage over Senator Kerry. Michael Barone, in a republished to the Spokesman-Review editorial, downplayed the electoral college blowout as well as the 53% to 46% Obama to McCain percent of votes cast. Obama got a 7% point difference to McCain that GW had not gotten with Kerry. Looks to me that the voters gave Obama a mandate. No, the Democrats did not get a supermajority in Congress, but they did put the GOP into a much smaller percentage of overall Congressional seats than they had before. Only Mr. Barone would make the argument, that because the Democrats had not obtained fillibuster proof majorities, Obama has no mandate. Uh, he won, didn't he?
In the aftermath of our first credible African-American presidential candidate winning handily against that "old white guy" Senator McCain, I have seen GOP types to include Amy Holmes on CNN trying to make the argument about what it will take to get back in power. Have these people considered exactly why they are not now in power? It starts with GW, who currently enjoys a 76% disapproval rating. The highest to date of any other prior president whether GOP or Dem. Even Clinton, with his Monica problem did not have such a high disapproval rating, around, so CNN informs, 54% in 1994. It continues with compounding economic disasters. Wedge issues on a national scale such as abortion, gays and stem cell research will decidedly have to be taken off the table as people who struggle are going to be more concerned with where they live, if they have a job, if they will be able to educate their kids, if they will have health care, period. With Circuit City going into bankruptcy protection, DHL now pulling the plug on North American operations, AIG now demanding and getting an even heftier and more favorable bailout package, GMC looking to go broke by the end of the year; abortion, gays, stem cell research become issues that can only ideologically matter when people are satisfied with their lives and don't have to fear for their personal futures. Yet, this is the "spirtual awakening" that the self-proclaimed "religious right" keep wanting to bring to the table. Even in the face of very heavy losses for their side.
Gas prices going through the roof helped to destablize American car manufacturing. Just as it encouraged the early closure of businesses including a dairy company in Washington state. People reduced the demand by turning to alternative sources of transportation, as a consequence, gas prices dropped. But, in a massive effort to break the back of the consumer, first by denying them good paying jobs and encouraging the exploitation of the foreign work force, then calling on them to turn their homes into credit cards so that they could keep on spending; the credit crunch that came as a consequence that saw favored businesses begin to crumble and financial bailouts and nationalization of financial systems; there could not be a better recipe for setting the stage of fiscal socialism, even communism in this country. GW's domestic policies created this. And GW called these "business first" policies "conservatism." We all know what happened that the GOP suffered such heavy losses, except for the GOP themselves.
Smaller gvt, so they said, except that was never really what happened, was it now? Gvt that favors business interests isn't any smaller than a gvt that favors the impoverished. Or for that matter, gvt that favors religious interests. Fiscal responsibility, so they say in the aftermath of Dems now claiming larger legislative percentages. But, when the GOP had full control over a 6 year time period, they spent like drunken madmen, now didn't they? Returning to constitutional constraints, during the 8 years of GW, we saw no desire on his part to keep gvt within constitutional constraints and no desire on the part of the GOP to restrain him. Only the U.S. Supreme Court was willing to do that.
I recall a letter that was published in the Coeur d'Alene Press within a few months of my returning stateside from having served in Germany. The woman who wrote this letter was describing a page of Communist revelution that not only sought to destroy natural leaders but also recognized institutions. With the GOP, ultimately, we saw the Communist revelution play out in the last 8 years of GW. Consumption as an institution has now been destroyed. The financial institution has been destroyed. Natural leaders such as Gore and Kerry were considerably damaged, who might not have done the damage to this nation that GW had. The tactics used to destroy these natural leaders were called Rovian. The institution of trust between people and their gvt was destroyed. The fear by the gvt toward its own people was created, the day that GW decided that Americans could be spied upon for writing e-mails and making over seas phone calls. And there were myraid attempts to create an official religion as well. A faith based office in the oval office? Gvt should ride to the rescue of one Terry Schiavo? Moral politics when it came to gays and abortion? Gvt should dole out taxpayer moolah so that favored churches can better benefit the socially least of these among us?
Consider this, each and every one of these so called "right wingers" were so busy wanting gvt to comply with their every ideological whim that they were forgetting that the more you ask of gvt, the more you apparently want its intrusion. The more gvt intrudes, the less leeway you have for keeping ninth and tenth constitutional principles in place. We now have Dem majorities in Congress, we have a Dem in the White House, simply because those who claimed "conservatism" forgot their own rules. If we have socialism or communism in this country today, it is because the GOP and indeed GW wanted it that way. Now if the same party wants for this nation something entirely different, instead of looking for ways to get back in power, look instead for ways to create a whole new attitude about what they think should be the future of this nation. Obama did that, and that is why he won.
In the aftermath of our first credible African-American presidential candidate winning handily against that "old white guy" Senator McCain, I have seen GOP types to include Amy Holmes on CNN trying to make the argument about what it will take to get back in power. Have these people considered exactly why they are not now in power? It starts with GW, who currently enjoys a 76% disapproval rating. The highest to date of any other prior president whether GOP or Dem. Even Clinton, with his Monica problem did not have such a high disapproval rating, around, so CNN informs, 54% in 1994. It continues with compounding economic disasters. Wedge issues on a national scale such as abortion, gays and stem cell research will decidedly have to be taken off the table as people who struggle are going to be more concerned with where they live, if they have a job, if they will be able to educate their kids, if they will have health care, period. With Circuit City going into bankruptcy protection, DHL now pulling the plug on North American operations, AIG now demanding and getting an even heftier and more favorable bailout package, GMC looking to go broke by the end of the year; abortion, gays, stem cell research become issues that can only ideologically matter when people are satisfied with their lives and don't have to fear for their personal futures. Yet, this is the "spirtual awakening" that the self-proclaimed "religious right" keep wanting to bring to the table. Even in the face of very heavy losses for their side.
Gas prices going through the roof helped to destablize American car manufacturing. Just as it encouraged the early closure of businesses including a dairy company in Washington state. People reduced the demand by turning to alternative sources of transportation, as a consequence, gas prices dropped. But, in a massive effort to break the back of the consumer, first by denying them good paying jobs and encouraging the exploitation of the foreign work force, then calling on them to turn their homes into credit cards so that they could keep on spending; the credit crunch that came as a consequence that saw favored businesses begin to crumble and financial bailouts and nationalization of financial systems; there could not be a better recipe for setting the stage of fiscal socialism, even communism in this country. GW's domestic policies created this. And GW called these "business first" policies "conservatism." We all know what happened that the GOP suffered such heavy losses, except for the GOP themselves.
Smaller gvt, so they said, except that was never really what happened, was it now? Gvt that favors business interests isn't any smaller than a gvt that favors the impoverished. Or for that matter, gvt that favors religious interests. Fiscal responsibility, so they say in the aftermath of Dems now claiming larger legislative percentages. But, when the GOP had full control over a 6 year time period, they spent like drunken madmen, now didn't they? Returning to constitutional constraints, during the 8 years of GW, we saw no desire on his part to keep gvt within constitutional constraints and no desire on the part of the GOP to restrain him. Only the U.S. Supreme Court was willing to do that.
I recall a letter that was published in the Coeur d'Alene Press within a few months of my returning stateside from having served in Germany. The woman who wrote this letter was describing a page of Communist revelution that not only sought to destroy natural leaders but also recognized institutions. With the GOP, ultimately, we saw the Communist revelution play out in the last 8 years of GW. Consumption as an institution has now been destroyed. The financial institution has been destroyed. Natural leaders such as Gore and Kerry were considerably damaged, who might not have done the damage to this nation that GW had. The tactics used to destroy these natural leaders were called Rovian. The institution of trust between people and their gvt was destroyed. The fear by the gvt toward its own people was created, the day that GW decided that Americans could be spied upon for writing e-mails and making over seas phone calls. And there were myraid attempts to create an official religion as well. A faith based office in the oval office? Gvt should ride to the rescue of one Terry Schiavo? Moral politics when it came to gays and abortion? Gvt should dole out taxpayer moolah so that favored churches can better benefit the socially least of these among us?
Consider this, each and every one of these so called "right wingers" were so busy wanting gvt to comply with their every ideological whim that they were forgetting that the more you ask of gvt, the more you apparently want its intrusion. The more gvt intrudes, the less leeway you have for keeping ninth and tenth constitutional principles in place. We now have Dem majorities in Congress, we have a Dem in the White House, simply because those who claimed "conservatism" forgot their own rules. If we have socialism or communism in this country today, it is because the GOP and indeed GW wanted it that way. Now if the same party wants for this nation something entirely different, instead of looking for ways to get back in power, look instead for ways to create a whole new attitude about what they think should be the future of this nation. Obama did that, and that is why he won.
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