Okay, the Democrats National Organization set rules for primaries. The states that broke those rules would have their delegates thrown out of consideration during the convention. Hillary was the only major candidate to leave her name on the ballot in those states, though the other candidates could have their name written in. Florida and Michigan break the rules and there votes are discounted. The 2,025 delegate figure the Democratic candidates are trying to reach does not include those two states. Now, since the election is so close, those two states could swing the nomination to one of the two candidates. The states are also now crying to have their votes counted. What to do? The party wants new primaries paid by the state. The state said it would hold new primaries if the Democratic National Convention would foot the bill. Neither is budging. They want the other to pay.
The solution I embrace is being called the Solomon Solution. Take the delegates from the states and split them evenly between Obama and Clinton. The two states would then have a zero net effect on the primary. This would be the punishment, they have no influence on the nomination, but there delegates would still be seated and they would be represented at the convention. It is simple and easy, but will never happen.
Sorry, it has been a while since I posted. My wife has been sick, I have been sick, I lost my part-time job, etc… So far 08 has been a bummer. Things are looking up though. We seem to be coming out of the worst of it and hopefully things will start looking up soon.
A lot has happened since I last posted a topic. John McCain is now the Republican nominee for president. It looks like he may chose Mike Huckabee as running mate though names, such as Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, have also been floated as possible VP candidates. I know McCain is not the staunch conservative many in the party want as their candidate but he strikes me as a practical man who looks at problems and tries to solve them based on reality not ideology. An example, the reality of illegal immigration is there is no good way to stop it short of militarizing the border. There are ways to staunch the flow. But there are by some estimates 20-30 million illegal immigrants in the country now. There is no viable way to remove them. There needs to be a way to absorb them into the populace. McCain realizes this. He is in favor of tightening the border but also wants to find a way to bring the rest into the fold, as it were. On other issues he seems to bring the same practicality to the table. I can support a man who is willing to look at the reality of the situation and move to fix it in practical ways instead of someone who has an ideological vision whose actions would end up harming the system more than helping it. The government needs healing and I don’t believe that will happen with any other candidate.
Published on January 9, 2008
in politics.
So far there is no clear winner for any party, though several that obviously are not going to win their nomination. The biggest test is still yet to come since the waters are so murky. We shall see.
As to who should be allowed into the debates at any given time. I would agree with those who say any party sponsored debate should include all candidates from that party, but the situation in NH was a forum and debates set up by private, although news, organizations. Those organizations have the right to set the criteria for any debate or forum they chose to have. As independent, private organizations they have the freedom to include or exclude anyone they chose, just like any private company or individual has the right to determine who they will hire or hang out with. The fact they were news organizations does not change that fact, in my opinion. Plus I think the criteria they set for the debate was fair and open. The fact that some candidates did not meet the criteria does not change the validate of the debate.
p.s. I watched part of a Ron Paul speech on CSPAN last night, I do agree with a lot of what he has to say, but I think he speaks of an ideal world that will never be a reality, as much as I wish it would become one.
Published on December 19, 2007
in politics.
One story I heard this morning was about Congress passing legislation or at least considering legislation that would change the way the Alternate Minimum Tax is used. This would reduce the tax burden for many middle class tax cut. At the end the reporter said Congress was trying to find ways to offset the “cost” of the bill. There is no cost to the bill. It is a reduction of revenue. That I might have accepted but not the word cost. A cost is money spent, this is money not received. I think what bugs me about the story is it seems the government feels it has an implicit right to any and all of our money so that if for some reason they can’t collect it then it is a cost. I am sure if it wasn’t political suicide the government would love to take all our money. Then they would have the ultimate power since they would control what services we could and couldn’t receive, which is what I think is the ultimate goal of the government.
Published on December 4, 2007
in politics.
Yesterday I speculated on the need for unifying figures in revolutions. The issues in Iraq and Afghanistan are modern day examples of how revolutions can not work without a single unifying leader that many citizens can back in any attempt to overthrow and form a new government. In Iraq there was loosely organized resistance against the ruling government. When the Americans invaded to help the resistance there was no person to pull the people to in forming the new government. The resistance ended up with compromise candidates that have only minority support. In Afghanistan there was a promising figure in Ahmad Shah Massoud but he was assassinated before the invasion. The resistance again had to settle for a compromise candidate that was weak in ineffectual. What is happening now in these countries? Confusion and splintering. Without the help of the American government supporting them the leadership of both countries would fall.
What do all revolutions need? A person that the majority of revolutionaries are willing to follow. If you look at all the revolutions in the past, those that succeeded and those that failed, you will see the need for a leader. In Cuba there was Castro, in Russia there was Lenin, in China there was Ze Dong, in England there was Cromwell, in France there was Napoleon, in America there was Washington, in Rome there was Caesar, in South America there was Bolivar. The theme continues through the ages, strong, unifying leaders help bring about revolution. Many of these revolutions started with a ground swell of support from the people, led by their charismatic leader against a government they viewed as being against their interests. It didn’t hurt that many of the people were able to get support for their fight from an outside source that opposed some aspect of the government the revolutionaries were fighting.
Failed revolutions are marked by little or weak unification. The American Civil War is an example of a weak unification, little cooperation happened between the seceding states. This lead to an inability to coordinate an offensive or defense to drive the Northerners to surrender. The French revolution against Louis XVI had too many competing groups with no unified vision of the future to last. The revolution that occurred in Cuba, with the help of the Americans at the Bay of Pigs, failed because there was no figure that could ralley the support of the common people against Castro. If a revolution has no strong leader, then it is doomed to failure.
Tomorrow, what this has to do with Iraq and Afghanistan.
Published on December 2, 2007
in politics.
My friend Jerm and I had a wonderful conversation last night. We discussed politics and society, all kinds of things. One subject I wanted to discuss was faithfulness of the candidates. One of the issues I have with candidates, like Giuliani, is their infidelity with their wives. Many people will say this is a personal issue, but, in my opinion, it highlights a problem with a candidate. My question is, if they can not be faithful to the promises they made to the people they professed to be the closest to them, the ones they loved and made a major promise to when they married, how can I be sure they will be faithful to the promises they make me as a voter? So the candidates that have had multiple marriages or have had many affairs are not the people I want to support.
Published on November 30, 2007
in politics.
Back on topic
Another aspect of the movement Durden-Smith discusses is the extreme paranoia the members felt because of the rumors that spies had been planted in the movement. Also, there had been several prosecutions were members had turned states evidence against a conspirator. Several people in the movement had disappeared mysteriously, some obviously murdered and some either left to avoid consequences of spying or left because they didn’t feel they could trust the members of the movement.
The whole thing reminds me of the stories you heard in communist countries. Members of “freedom movements” have never been able to be assured they are not being spied on. You never knew if your neighbor was secret police or a radical, either that may kill you or turn you in depending on how they viewed your actions. Secret police worked for the state and the radicals worked for the overthrow of the state. If it was viewed that you supported radical thought you were in danger from the state and if you seemed to support the state too fervently you had to worry about radicals trying to eliminate someone they viewed as an obstacle. Both seemed to be happening in California. Durden-Smith was not from the movement. He was an outsider who sympathized but was not known to the insiders. He felt his life was in danger constantly. He began to do things, like buy a gun, that he never thought he would do when he was just an ideologue in England. It wasn’t until he got into the movement he began to be paranoid.
This seems to be the lesson. Radical movements tend to breed paranoia amongst themselves. Trust is never guaranteed. A similar theme runs through Herbert Philbricks autobiography I Led Three Lives about a man who infiltrated the communist movement in New England during the forties. Again paranoia reigns supreme. Paranoia will tear apart any movement because trust is gone. Only mutual trust amongst the participants will keep a movement strong because then you can be open about your objectives. If you can’t trust the person beside you to fervently agree with your objectives you will never be able to truly move forward because you don’t know if the person beside you will move with you. And as the old saying goes, united we stand, divided we fall.
Published on November 28, 2007
in politics.
The whole situation made me think of how we treat news, in general. When I hear about car bombings and murders I don’t really think about the people. Unless you identify with a person it is hard to sympatize with them. It wasn’t until 9/11 that we truly could understand the devastation a terrorist attack has on a nation. We had not felt the pain for some time. You could point to Oklahoma City and the original terrorist attacks on the Twin Towers. Those were the most recent and they had been six years or more previous to 9/11. The tragedies were great but not to the scale of 9/11. If you think about it, it was three attacks in about a 10 year period. It is not everyday, like it is for many. But 9/11 should be the touchstone we use to understand their suffering. The car bombings in the Middle East are just as horrible for them as 9/11 was for us. They, however, get attacked almost daily. The fear we felt after 9/11 is the fear they feel everyday. It is when we realize what they experience daily, we can truly feel their pain and finally identify with them.
More thoughts this book spawned tomorrow.
Published on November 27, 2007
in politics.
Something I enjoy about working at a school is the chance to check out a variety of books. There are many older books that haven’t been checked out in a while. Many of these books end up being insightful. One I read recently was Who Killed George Jackson? by Jo Durden-Smith. The story is about the death of a prison radical, George Jackson, during a riot and whether or not he had been set up or not. The book is divided into three sections. The first is the official story about the events, the next is Durden-Smith’s investigation into the conspiracy theory, and the third is a psychological look at the left at the time. The first two sections are disjointed and hard to follow. He jumps around too often in the story and refers back to conversations he hasn’t written extensively about. The last section, though, was fascinating.
What really struck me was a comment by a prisoner about how easy it was to kill guards and other prisoners that were not part of your group. The point was the guards and the other groups were just ideas, not people, to the prisoners. It is easy to kill an idea and as long as you did not get to know the guards or people from the opposite group you could kill with no conscience. Durden-Smith makes realized part of the problem was the way the prison was run. For many years the prisoners had direct contact with guards. They got to know them and in some ways become friends. With the advent of new technology that allowed less contact between the two groups, the guards now longer were familiar with prisoners and prisoners were able to separate the guards in their minds from people and made them symbols of the system they saw as unfair. Many of the prisoners were radicals from the civil rights movement who saw the system as corrupt. They saw not only the guards, white or black, but also the white prisoners as part of the problem.
Tomorrow more thoughts.