Ron Paul, Change and Obama

As some or all of you know, I no longer endorse Ron Paul for President. That was a very reluctant choice, for at heart I am a Conservative. Indeed, I am a some senses a Paleo-conservative, even as is Alex Jones.

I have come to the decision that for the moment, at this particular time, what is needed is another FDR. As a reflexive conservative, I of course despise all that Franlin D. Roosevelt stood for - and yet as an American - and indeed, as a Canadian, I stand upon his legacy.

As a Canadian-American, I have come to the realization that at some points in time, one must allow Radicalism to reign, in order to rationalize, regulate and restate it in terms of the status quo ante.

For some time past - and I include the Clinton years in this - we have haplessly drifted rightward, to the land of "I don't give a fuck about you."

Taken in isolation, Bill Clinton was one of the best Republican Presidents of the last Century - and all the things he is given credit for, the balanced budget, "Welfare Reform" and the surplus are things that are honestly things that are triumphs of a deliberately Conservative leadership. One can also point to the economic prosperity under Clinton - and the corresponding growth in enterprises such as privatized prisons - as being indicative as the objectives and fruits of a genuinely Conservative president.

Clearly, when Bill Clinton is held up by the Right as the Great Demon of the Left, it is time for the People to demand a correction toward the Center.

That is what happened with FDR, and that is what is going to happen with Obama. Yes, he is more "radical" than what we are accustomed to - but in point of fact, "radicalism" and "conservatism" have never been strange bedfellows.

Scratch a genuine conservative and you will find an idealist, one who genuinely believes that the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Deceleration of Independence are all fundamental to that which is quintessentially American.

American Conservatism is built upon extremely radical ideas - the sovereignty of the individual, as advised by the wisdom of crowds and the power of open and honest debate among equals - regardless of social advantages.

Ron Paul has overstepped his place if he genuinely desires to be President. Or rather, he would be wasted in that capacity, would find it an infuriating and demeaning exercise in compromise and would, alas, find himself unable to implement or even effectively express his best ideas.

Further, I'm afraid that in order to become more universally appealing, he would have to revise his views regarding abortion and the rights of women.

And yet, and as much as I disagree with him on these points, I find his refusal to cede a matter of principle in order to gain a scintilla of political momentum to be genuinely endearing. Indeed, the less I find Ron Paul to be eligible as my choice of president, the more I find him to be one of the few people I really wish to know.

I endorse and support Obama. That does not mean that I particularly care if I like him as an individual.

I LIKE Ron Paul. And the more I like him, the less willing I am for him to be thrown under the bus of History.

Let us face it. FDR, whatever else you may say about him, was a martyr to the cause of these United States. He chose to sacrifice what remained of his life for his country, and I think it a good thing that we have enacted term limits so that no others may answer the call to that degree.

Did he made the choices I would have? No. Not. At. All.

Ever.

And yet, grudgingly, I must admit something - his choices worked out about as well as my vision would have in theory. But in fact, his vision worked out in practice. So, as radical as FDR was at the time, HIS vision brought us a stable status quo that held far, far longer than his tenure; indeed, it lasted until the Neocons who desire to dismantle every vestige of it.

And as Dr. Phil is wont to say: "How's that workin' out for you?"

Ron Paul represents a very old tradition within American politics, one that predates Republicans, Democrats, Libertarians and even the majority of Whigs. He represents the best of both Jefferson and Hamilton who, if they agreed on anything, agreed upon a common standard upon which disagreement could be based.

Both Hamilton and Jefferson were men of substantial property. Indeed, in terms of effective wealth and influence, both would be billionaires today. Each gained their wealth by different means, and each viewed that wealth in different ways, but neither could conceivably be considered to be unbiased by it. And as far as I know, both knew the importance of real, hard, inarguable cash money as a foundation to the economy.

Further, and obviously, I think both would concede that the Federal Reserve is largely a scam.

I cannot go farther than that. For myself, I think it a scam that has achieved real positives - but I think also that it's time has come and gone.

Further than that, I giggle shamelessly in the face of an economy based on gold or silver, though I think currency minted of these metals would go a long way toward reestablishing faith in it's "basement value."

That is to say, I would approve of a dollar that is worth no less than once ounce fine silver, as constitutionally defined - but I would not at all object to it being worth so much more that we regularly use paper Yen as small change.

Or so I believe in my ignorance, and in this regard, I commend Ron Paul to Barack Obama, who probably knows no more about the function of currency in the economy than do I.

What I do know - and this is for sure - is that neither man has the entirety of understanding required to repair our economy and our personal self-confidence. Even including John Edwards' perspective, I come to this conclusion so I must say that if Obama cannot include Ron Paul in his official Cabinet - he should include him in his Kitchen Cabinet. The man has earned that place, if only by making a Fed chairman cry in front of Congress.

Dominionist Bush Appointee Resigns, facing funding changes in family planning services.

Just as health care providers get wind or possible changes to federal funding for family planning services, Susan Orr, Bush's pick to administer the program steps down from her position after just eight months on the job. Citing a professorship from Regent University on one's resume should now be known as the embarrassment that it's become.

read more | digg story

James Baker: "Diplomacy is not Appeasement"

Uttered on Fox News, no less...




One more reason to wake up and smell the bullshit, people. This "appeasement" meme regarding Obama was not just odious, it's factually wrong, and had anyone taken it seriously might have done even more damage to our international credibility. I'd say "If that were possible..." but I look up and there are no black helicopters yet, and no troops wearing blue berets and driving white jeeps.

But that eventuality hasn't been completely inconceivable since 2004, and it IS the sort of outcome that we as citizens should be concerned about. Especially since as humiliating as such an outcome would be, the alternative would have us all waving little blue flags.

McCain's Lobbyist Problem: 5 Down and Counting

The guy who won't be owned by Washington lobbyists — owned by Washington lobbyists. Or in other words, the Perfect Republican Punchline. Whatever a Republican says, the complete opposite turns out to be true.

read more | digg story

Will we ever prosecute People Like That when they have robbed and murdered People Like Us?

We just won't go where that leads. It's hard to even talk about impeaching the President much less prosecuting him and his co-conspirators for aggravated murder and racketeering. I think the idea that such a thing should be done stuns us.

These are very real crimes committed for very ordinary reasons of power and profit differing only in terms of scale from ordinary muggings and murders. What bothers is that we are supposed to have a society and culture that precludes people like that gaining a position such as this.

Vincent Bugliosi: The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder - Politics on The Huffington Post:

"In a November 15, 2005, editorial, the New York Times said that 'the president and his top advisers . . . did not allow the American people, or even Congress, to have the information necessary to make reasoned judgments of their own. It's obvious that the Bush administration misled Americans about Mr. Hussein's weapons and his terrorist connections.' But if it's 'obvious that the Bush administration misled Americans' in taking them to a war that tens of thousands of people have paid for with their lives, now what? No punishment? If not, under what theory? Again, you're just going to go on to the next paragraph?

I'm not going to go on to the next unrelated paragraph."

If Bush, in fact, intentionally misled this nation into war, what is the proper punishment for him? Since many Americans routinely want criminal defendants to be executed for murdering only one person, if we weren't speaking of the president of the United States as the defendant here, to discuss anything less than the death penalty for someone responsible for over 100,000 deaths would on its face seem ludicrous. But we are dealing with the president of the United States here.

On the other hand, the intensity of rage against Bush in America has been such (it never came remotely this close with Clinton because, at bottom, there was nothing of any real substance to have any serious rage against him for) that if I heard it once I heard it ten times that "someone should put a bullet in his head." That, fortunately, is just loose talk, and even more fortunately not the way we do things in America. In any event, if an American jury were to find Bush guilty of first degree murder, it would be up to them to decide what the appropriate punishment should be, one of their options being the imposition of the death penalty.

I'm going to write MY next paragraph here.

What allowed such a confederation of murderous dunces to gain power? Who gains most from this climate of fear and the terror of black helicopters and fluoridated water supplies? What particular groups seek influence over not merely our spiritual health, but our material wealth and the ways we choose to spend it?

Yes, I've said it before and I've said it again, the unholy alliance between the Religious Right (Dominionists and Prosperity Gospel types) and the political right has created a toxic karmic waste dump. The likely outcome in the immediate short term is likely the end of the Republican Party as we know it, but it may also lead to the end of the Religious Right as people see these scandals unravel to reveal major secular and religious "wingers" having had unholy congress with one another for profit.

When people seek out a moral example to follow, only to find that those teachings either lead directly to personal pain and loss or that the leadership does the exact opposite themselves, it's only reasonable to expect the flock to scatter. No moral compass is better than the assuredly wrong one.