Monday, December 22, 2008

Guilt by Association

With the news that the governor of Illinois has tried to sell an appointment to the United States Senate to fill the position vacated by the President-elect, conservative commentators have responded with glee. They have been frantically looking for a weak spot in what has untill now seemed to be an upright character on the American political scene.

Barack Obama got his start in politics in Chicago. Everyone knows that Chicago is corrupt, the commentators say, and this latest event proves that Obama must be corrupt also. Along the way someplace Obama must have rubbed shoulders with the errant governor and therefore he is guilty of the same sin.

Guilt by association is all they have on the President-elect and they are making the best of it. From my perspective, conservatives should forget trying to find something bad about Obama and cooperate with him as he prepares to lead the country. They lost the recent presidential election so conservatives should get over it. It is going to be a long four years for them.

Thursday, December 18, 2008

Already

It has been very interesting to watch the right wing commentators rant and rave about President-elect Obama’s preparation to assume the high office in another month. While Obama has done an exceptionally good job of putting together a team of competent people to lead the nation, conservative writers are already claiming that he is a failure. They don’t seem to notice that he hasn’t taken office yet. However, they predict that he is going to fail even before they see what he does in office.

From my perspective, with such an obvious bias nothing they say will have much credibility. They could at least wait until he is in office a few months before they condemn his program. But, that’s not the nature of ultra-conservatives. They tend to be ideological to the core and just plain don’t understand nor can they accept anything outside the parameters of their strict philosophical beliefs.

Monday, December 15, 2008

Respect Our President

News from Iraq is very disturbing. No, it is not the conduct of the war. President Bush recently made a quick trip there as his final visit before relinquishing the presidency. At a hastily called press conference, one of the Iraqi reporters threw his shoes at Bush. Fortunately Bush ducked in time to avoid injury.

I find such behavior appalling. Evidently the Iraqi press has not learned that in a democracy there are appropriate ways to express opposition to leaders. Violent action is not among them. The reporter should be reminded that under Saddam he would have lived only a short time after such an act. His life would have been spared only for purposes of sadistic torture.

Like George Bush or not, he is still President of the United States. From my perspective, in that office he is deserving of respect both as an individual and as representative of our grand republic. Certainly the Iraqis owe us that regardless of their view of the war. The same is true for those of us who disagree with his politics.

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Buyout Instead of Bailout

Here is a novel idea. The Big Three automakers are asking the government to bail them out of their financial troubles. Their latest request is for $34 billion. However, the total market value of General Motors is only $3 billion. Ford is only worth $7 Billion. Chrysler is privately held so no one knows what it is worth. So, it would be cheaper for the government to buy GM and Ford than to bail them out. Then they could fire the current management team and hire competent managers to run the company in a profitable manner. Maybe they should outsource the management to Toyota or some such people who have shown skill at running a manufacturing business. Then when the stock value goes up the government would sell the companies at a profit. Just a thought.

Monday, December 8, 2008

Finally

I am finally getting back to my blog. I put so much energy into the election that I just got behind on sharing my perspective. But, I am back at it now so watch this site for all kinds of interesting ideas, some of which will actually be rational.

And, finally President Bush has admitted that he had it wrong in the run up to the war in Iraq. In a recent interview he was asked if he had any regrets regarding his eight years in office. He said he regretted the bad intelligence he got about Iraq and the WMD’s prior to the war. However, he did not say that he would not have gone to war if he had gotten accurate information.

It is not much of an admission, but it is a huge change from the arrogant, self assured leader who taunted the enemy with "bring em on!" at the beginning of the war. It is the closest thing we are going to get to an apology for the tragic blunder which led to the needless death of 4000 brave service men and women plus many thousands more who have returned home with bodies torn apart. From my perspective, it is a sad legacy Bush has left for our fair republic.