I‘ve been a negligent blogger the past couple of weeks or so, what with real life getting in the way and all. Here are a few things to come up this week that should have been posts of their own, but will be relegated to bullet point format because of my general lack of time and wherewithal lately.
- Last night’s MARTA meeting - As seen on the GDGF’s website. The presentation materials were among the worst I’d ever seen, except for the maps. The presenter preceding the public discussion session was among the most boring I’d ever heard (his name was Ted Williams, I think, and he was a project manager). The biggest issue was the presentation seemed geared more toward a consulting firm or a county commission or a corporate board than it did toward a general public audience. If I had access to a scanner right now, I’d post the graph they gave out, which was full of jargon and buzzwords and was for all intents and purposes worthless to me.
The night did liven up during the public discussion when this crazy old codger got riled up about The Beltline.
“Cars are the only mode of transportation that will carry you from point A to point B!”
“It’s not possible for something that was designed a hundred years ago to work in the 21st century!”
Amber and I thought this 18-year-old kid and the codger were going to scrap in the center of the room. Unfortunately, the codger couldn’t hear the kid’s cries of, “I don’t have a car! I get everywhere by MARTA and on foot!”
- Tom DeLay finally gets indicted - Of all the sons of bitches in politics, he’s in contention for slimiest. Between this and President Bush’s sagging popularity, this is a chance for the grown-ups and non-psychos to take back the Republican Party from the theocrats and neo-cons. Here’s hoping, for everyone’s sake, that they do.
- Cathy Cox takes heat for elections performance - The Huffington Post has it, and it’s well worth a read.
Mystate representative is a fucking nut - Read it and the follow-up at Decatur Guy’s joint. If I ever get some time, I want to try to arrange an interview with her. It’d be nothing if not entertaining.- Readers who shall remain nameless try to convince me Sonny’s snow days were a good idea - Gas shortage or not, I don’t agree.
- Legislator tries to claim diplomatic immunity after getting caught driving around shitfaced - Heh. I couldn’t possibly make this story funnier than it already is. Too bad he didn’t get acquitted. That would have been a circus.
And his lawyer’s name is Bubba Head.
I get the feeling, given her district is way over near the GA-SC border, that she’s not your state rep (or senator). However, if your Senator happens to be John Wiles (which it might be), I would highly encourage you challenge him in the primary as a moderate Republican and find a Democrat to run against him, too. You probably wouldn’t beat him (unless the voters in his district are suddenly overcome with a wave of intelligence), but you’d at least make him spend some of that campaign money he doesn’t need.
Having been to a DfG meeting or two, and seen the remarkable hatred directed toward her, I’m not surprised the Howard Dean wing of the Democratic party is dishing it out at her. To be honest, I had never heard conspiracy theories circulate around the party faithful until I attended Howard Dean meetings.
Oops, yeah, you’re right. Not my Rep. Doh. That’s what happens when you rush a post to fruition.
There is no debt with so much prejudice put off as that of justice
Perhaps God is in attendance on this earth.
Heralds: Majorit…
Once again I have to say that if the moderates and the Democrates wish to take back the White House and the Senate and the House, that they need to bottle the anger and hostility and start presenting counter points.
Howard Dean and the far leftist ilk have a serious problem in that when you hear sound bites from them on the radio or see them on TV they sound and look like they are borderline pyscotic. All I can say is that if they don’t start taking a “progressive” stand and by that I mean a solid idea presenting, counter point platform look for more of the same in the next election.
People are not brought around by anger, yelling, indictments and screaming. All you have to do is look at the last election to see the truth in that statement.
And his lawyer’s name is Bubba Head.
You laugh, but if I ever get a DUI - I hope to God that I can afford him.
You would think after all this time people would have figured out that Dean is not a progressive. He was a moderate DLC governor until 2002 when he decided the only way a guy like him could even possibly win the Dem nomination was to be the anti-war candidate.
Then, a lot of people who are anti-war and vocal, the kind of people who volunteer for a candidate two years before the election, who were mostly far-left, attached all of their beliefs to Howard Dean because the only thing they knew was he’s against the war and hey so am I so we must be 100% alike.
It amazes me how people know nothing about a candidate and they just assume and attach all kinds of meaning to them, and then they either get disappointed or go crazy. And they never learn. They pick a new candidate to do it to each election and each election cycle. Same disappointment each time. Strange.
You see, J Sherman, that statement just confuses me. The bulk of what I ever hear from the right wing is anger and resentment, even after they win elections.
I mean, this is precisely why I don’t listen to Neal Boortz, Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, or Bill O’Reilly. It’s also why I would never vote for Newt “Impeach” Gingrich, George “Flip Flop” Bush, or anyone supported by the Club for (Stagnant) Growth.
They’re not?
Oh right, you forgot to add fear-mongering and/or FUD to that list.
I mean, this is precisely why I don’t listen to Neal Boortz, Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, or Bill O’Reilly. It’s also why I would never vote for Newt “Impeach†Gingrich, George “Flip Flop†Bush, or anyone supported by the Club for (Stagnant) Growth.
I respect that you do not listen to the people that you named however you should realize that not all the people belong or believe the same thing. In fact they are very different in thier core beliefs.
I do listen to all the people you named, and one thing about many of them is that they are not politicians. This means that they are speaking for a different purpose they are mostly entertainment, much like any of the “news” programs on TV or Radio, and that means they are not only spreading ideas, but also entertaining. People like Howard Dean and others of his ilk have to be held to a higher standard.
As for Newt Gingrich, there are many things he has said in the past I was not a big fan of, but I do agree with more of what he says then I don’t. As for George “Flip, Flop” Bush, I find that nickname a little hard to swallow.
The thing I think that frusterates people the most about Bush is that he very rarely admits a mistake and therefor very rarely “flip, flops”. You are entitled to your opinion however.
Lastly, I am sorry, but I feel that while having personal freedom is somethign that each and every person deserves, that every person also has a responsibility because of those freedoms. I find that most of the “left” wishes to have all the freedom and not take any responsibility.
As for you Amber, I have read your blog and plan on posting some over there but I would love to see more than just a one liner. You have really solid thoughts, but your one line comeback really makes no sense. I am not pointing a personal attack I just felt that you should explain what you mean by fear-mongering because you feel so poignant about it maybe I am missing something however you will never convince me to look at it more deeply with just one line. Also just an opinion.
Dude. It was late. And I typically don’t give a TON of thought to what I write in blogs anyway because they’re, well, blogs. Once in a blue moon I give something on a blog some real, hard, serious thought. But most of the time… I guess you’re going to be disappointed by my comments.
All that being said… perhaps later I will expand slightly. We’ll see. Don’t hold your breath.
Once again I have to say that if the moderates and the Democrates wish to take back the White House and the Senate and the House, that they need to bottle the anger and hostility and start presenting counter points.
Oddly enough, when their counter-points are written and distributed, they’re ignored for more, ahem, gratuitous displays of “liberaldom.” It’s kind of how you can have 1000 normal-looking adults marching in a protest and the media will pick out the freaky kids with anarchist face tattoos and giant paper mache puppets. You can thank the corporate, bought-and-paid for, sensationalistic, yellow media and the rubes that buy the products that pay for them for all that.
Howard Dean and the far leftist ilk
Howard Dean never was “far left.” You do realize that, don’t you? Hell, he was a center-right Democrat who felt the way the wind was blowing and took a stand. The far left rejected everyone to the right of Kucinich and, really, they weren’t that wild about him. Far leftists have a tendency to stay on the fringes anyways, trying to start more political parties and cleaning their guns. At least, that’s what I’m doing…
have a serious problem in that when you hear sound bites from them on the radio or see them on TV they sound and look like they are borderline pyscotic.
You’ve never really seen a borderline psychotic, have you? What exactly would you base that on, anyways? A five second clip of Dean screaming at a political rally? C’mon. Stop listening to Boortz and Rush and the Loufah O’Reilly and get out there and meet the candidates. You’ll see that they are by and large a run-of-the-mill bunch. That’s why, despite the facile differences ladled onto the people by the corporate media and eaten up by partisan idealogues, these men and women get along so well and always manage to come out better than the rest of us. But, don’t feel bad, there are a few hundred million other suckers out there, you’re just one of many.
Your perceptions aside, I would argue that all of the politicians you see and the perceptions you have of them are based on decisions made in the editing room and by the corporate sponsors of the tripartite media multinationals that give you your “news.” Simply put, it’s not about ideology, it’s about class and power.
All I can say is that if they don’t start taking a “progressive†stand and by that I mean a solid idea presenting, counter point platform look for more of the same in the next election.
Been there. Done that. No one wants to listen because they’re all too afraid of the TERRORIST CHATTER. There might be ANTHRAX in the mail. DUCT TAPE AND PLATIC WRAP must be bought to protect us. FUD by this administration and the various growing federal agencies (you know, justifying their existence) has truly reached a fever pitch. True threats to this nation, like Al Qaida, are ecstatic, they couldn’t have imagined it would go this well for them. If there’s anything Osama actually wants, it’s the chaos, looting, privateering, and outright theft of our public money by the same people who we elected to watch over it.
People are not brought around by anger, yelling, indictments and screaming. All you have to do is look at the last election to see the truth in that statement.
All I see from the last election is a populace scared, lied to, manipulated and given a faulty view of the nation. Ask 100 bush voters from 2004 if they had known then what they knew now would they still have voted for Dear Leader? My money says no.
Your analysis is faulty, but then you’re not really performing an analysis, are you? Begging the question doesn’t really suit you, you write much to coherently and well for that…
My biggest problem with Bush is not his failure to admit all of his mistakes its the fact he makes so fucking many of them and then tries to blame others for his mistakes- like it was all Clinton’s fault for not handling Osama, its New Orleans’s and LA’s fault for the screw ups after Katrina, it was the CIA director that screwed up that there were no WMD in Iraq and not just Bush’s own bullshit, its 9/11’s fault that his brillant tax cuts didn’t help the economy, and so on.
Not taking blame is one thing, hell all politicians do that; but to do nothing but pass the buck and never solve the problem is irresponsible and stupid.
Oddly enough, when their counter-points are written and distributed, they’re ignored for more, ahem, gratuitous displays of “liberaldom.â€Â
This is an interesting thought… However, if that is the case then why is it that Democratic leadership, the one Howard Dean and the esteamed Senators from Masschusettes Kerry, Kennedy and Hillary Clinton all flooding to the aid of the screaming, ballistic Cindy Sheehan (whose own family is embarassed by her rhetoric). I would buy the arguement above, but the reactions of the leadership of the Democratic party if it were truly centric would be falling to the Lieberman’s and possibly the Obama’s, and not the Kennedy’s and Kerry’s.
are based on decisions made in the editing room and by the corporate sponsors of the tripartite media multinationals that give you your “news.†Simply put, it’s not about ideology, it’s about class and power.
Another interesting point, however the idea here states that the media is trying to sell a Republican agenda. This is simply not the case. While over the course of the last eight years “televised” media has become much more centric, the “print” media is still far to the left, and communities large and small still depend on print for local feel and opinions. Secondly, my opinions don’t come from the media, my opinions come from a belief system that I would say from reading your last blog you and I differ on. Once again not a personal gibe, but being a Christian, like it or not, does persent a value system with which I have to way choices, and driving a car off the Chapiquitik (probably butchered the spelling) bridge and murdfering someone does not lead me to voting for them for public office.
All I see from the last election is a populace scared, lied to, manipulated and given a faulty view of the nation. Ask 100 bush voters from 2004 if they had known then what they knew now would they still have voted for Dear Leader? My money says no.
Once again look at the argument you make and the presidential debates from the last election, and they don’t mesh. You say the populace voted from a sense of fear or scared. Yet if I recall Kerry was selling the “ports are not secure enough, the nation is not secure enough, and we need to take a look here at home at our security instead of being in Iraq.” I quote this only in case I might have hit a Kerry quote directly on (good chance), while Bush made the argument that we didn’t need to press back home, we needed to assure that “these terrorists” were stopped before they have a chance to get here.
I believe the populous of this nation voted not out fear but out of “faith”. Now once again I expect to take a ribbing on this as people on a whole do not “believe in that religous crap”, and why should they nobody bothers to teach it right anymore anyway. Another point for another time though.
I feel that it is going to come down to the strength of the cannidates. I will say this though that if the Democrats run another Kerry, or Hillary Clinton, they are not only gonna loose again they are gonna get destroyed by voters.
Amber no worries I won’t hold my breath, but I do enjoy reading the more thought out points you make in your blogs, and look foward to the next one. I will keep reading and posting.
like it was all Clinton’s fault for not handling Osama
Hannities quote almost exactly and I don’t agree and niether does Bush although, Sandy Berger was fined for the role played in the 9/11 commission cover up, and it is public knowledge that Clinton had a shot at Osama. So there is partial blame to the “Great Democratic God of Clinton”.
its New Orleans’s and LA’s fault for the screw ups after Katrina
Funny, now even the people of New Orleans are saying it was partially New Orleans and Louisiana’s fault for Katrina. Local construction not done to Cat 5 code (local government), public housing built directly in the flood plain (local government), supplies not getting to the local communities (according to the last three indictments of local community leaders also the local government). Once agian, lets be real yes Mike Brown wasn’t the right man for the job, and pretty much Hannity, Boortz, Limbaugh, me and all the real extreme right wingers will admit that. But to say that Louisiana is not partially to blame for the choas is ludicrous and wrong period.
its 9/11’s fault that his brillant tax cuts didn’t help the economy
Good sneak in, almost got away with it there, but this one is another far left argument, and has been made since the beginning of Regan’s term. Sorry, but the tax cuts are working and I will be posting numbers to back that up later in my blog because of the idiocy of that statement. Look, all I ask is that people identify themselves as they are, I am a right winger, and I hope that I have correctly identified myself as that. Don’t call yourself a moderate when you are riding Hillary Clinton’s coat tails. That is only directed at one person and not eponymous or Amber. Oh…. is that a tell.
Jeffrey, re:
I can only assume you’re referring to me. Correct me if I’m wrong. When have I ever said I’d support Hillary Clinton? Over Bush, sure. But I’d vote for a hobo’s toilet jar before I’d vote for Bush. Over Joe Biden, for example? No. Over Evan Bayh? No. Over Rudy Gulliani? Doubtful, though possible if it looked like the Congress was going to remain Republican (which stands to be a factor for me for quite some time the way things are going). Anytime there’s an opportunity to vote against one party control of the executive and legislative branches, I will do so.
If you’re not alleging specific support of that candidate but rather saying broadly that my ideology is to the far left, you’re mistaken. I’d venture to say I’m probably more conservative than you are, if you’re going by the libertarian definition of the word and not the bogus religious definition of the word, which brings me to point 2…
I’ve been chatting with you and reading your blog on and off for a couple of months, and some of your beliefs are not as conservative as you’d have people believe. Wanting to impose religious dogma on a population is actually a leftist/liberal belief. Wanting to grow the army or the intelligence agencies or a police force or any other branch of government is a leftist/liberal belief. Leftist/liberal, by the most technical definition, meaning favoring larger government versus smaller government (righty/conservative).
The absolute perversion of the words and phrases liberal/conservative and left wing/right wing is a major pet peeve of mine, and I think it detracts greatly from all political discussion that takes place right now.
Don’t for a second try and tell me where I stand…especially not anywhere near Hillary Clinton…it sort of smells over there.
Jeffery while you and I are both able to see that in all of the cases I presented that there are many more then just one point of fault my point was that Bush and the Republican spin machine routinely blame everyone but themselves. And even in the points that you brought up to counter there are multiple counters back i.e. they couldn’t build category 5 level protection without federal funds which they couldn’t get.
And a few quick words on Katrina…those levees were maintained by the Army Corps of Engineers and were really the responsibility of the federal govt. However the idea that they should have built the levees to the level that was needed is faulty. Theres no way anyone would have apporved the probably billions dollars it would have taken to do so…especially for a once in a hundred years possibility. Yes in an ideal world they would have but thats just not how things get done…if they had asked for it they would have received nothing as opposed to the limited funds they did get.
This however in no way excuses the fuck-ups,at all levels, that took place in the aftermath.
And by the way are you now part of the Sheehan family and have some proof that they are embarrased by her? In my opinion that woman can say whatever she wants about this foolish war and the louder the better. The Republicans are making a huge mistake and looking downright asshole-ish by trying to discredit her after what she’s been through. To call her wacko, or crazy, or whatever “lets make her look foolish in front of everyone” name is boorish and I’d like to see them try and act raional after losing a child to a war that day by day has less and less meaning…oh wait none of them have kids over there…geez isn’t that interesting.
Yawn…back to work.
Actually Rusty I was not refferring to you. I have had many conversations with you and moderate is exactly how I would describe you. However the person I was redderring to commented directly after you. Sorry, Rusty never thought you would take it that way. I would have been more precise had I thought you would read it that way.
Greatly apologize,
Jeffrey “Scott” Sherman
No Scott was referring to me since he thinks because I don’t agree with everything he says I’m evil and therefore a liberal.
Well, I didn’t mean to be so obtuse about my use of the nickname. It’s the name his campaign used to describe his opponent. It’s an example of the sort of rhetoric and personal attacks that Republicans use to either express or conjure up the sort of “anger, yelling, indictments and screaming” you condemn.
Well, I find your view of the “left” a bit hyperbolic. But then again, I can understand why you would believe such bullshit. After all, you listen to Boortz, Hannity, Limbaugh, and O’Reilly. They want you believe that bullshit because it helps them get higher ratings. It’s worse than entertainment — the “entertainment” argument is just a regurgitation of the sorry excuse Boortz uses every time he’s caught in a lie.