More Political Thoughts

Peter Finch won a posthumous Oscar for his role in Network.  He is remembered for his famous line, “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore!”  Apparently that is a prevalent feeling in America today and the more political news I read the more I am feeling the same way.  However, I will never be mad enough to support Donald Trump or any of the GOP candidates with the possible exception of John Kasich of Ohio.

Today, President Obama announced his executive action on gun control.  He is an intelligent, rational, eloquent, witty man.  He shares these virtues with John Fitzgerald Kennedy who was also elegant.  JFK was my teenage idol and I doubt that I will ever completely recover from his assassination.  President Obama spoke with all of his virtues evident.  Yet, as soon as he stopped speaking the far right started their attacks.  They even attacked him for crying over the massacre in Newtown.  He proposed basic rational changes—background checks, registration for gun dealers who have to start the background checks, more money for mental health which the GOP claims is the sole problem with gun violence, and more money for the FBI to do those background checks.  Since we have to learn how to drive, register the car, have insurance and pass a driver’s test to get a license to drive a car, why is it so terrible to require a background check to buy a gun?  I think gun owners should have to demonstrate gun safety and be licensed to own a gun.  These requirements do not infringe on Second Amendment rights!

While Cruz et al are complaining about executive action, Christie is calling Obama a “would be king”, and Paul Ryan is complaining that the President is circumventing Congressional prerogatives, Obama is doing something that Congress should have done immediately after the Newtown massacre.   They have not only been a “do nothing” Congress they have pledged since his first day in office to obstruct every proposal he ever made, regardless of its value to the country.  That level of vituperative action does not belong in a democracy.  However, the bigotry against the first partially African-American to be President is so fierce that these people have been re-elected each time.  There is no way that the anti-Obama feelings and actions are not racially based.  Incidentally, Obama has issued fewer Executive Orders than any of his recent predecessors.  Obviously, FDR issued the most but he was in office longer than anyone else.
Meanwhile, we have a group of terrorists who took over a federal installation in Oregon.  They are a far-right “militia” protesting the jailing of 2 men who started a fire intentionally on federal land.  These people oppose the concept of federal land.  The organizers are the sons of Cliven Bundy who should have been jailed years ago for ignoring court orders to pay the fees to graze his cattle on federal land.  He is above the law and does not believe that he needs to pay.  He is still a free man.  If he were a person of color he would have been arrested or killed!  If these terrorists were not white, they would have been killed by the police or troops.

The Republican Clown Car still has too many candidates.  Trump is leading in the polls and will probably win in NH.  Cruz, who is even more frightening, will win Iowa.  That leaves SC as the next test case.  Cruz believes that his evangelical religion should govern American law and policy.  A theocracy is not a place in which I want to live.  The fact that it is also unconstitutional is irrelevant to him and to his supporters.
I have a problem tolerating ignorance.  Stupid people anger me.  Unfortunately there are a lot of stupid people in this country.  Even many of our political leaders and candidates for President lack a basic understanding of our government, the Constitution (which they think was given to us by God) and the rights of the individual.  Trump’s call for registering all Muslims is unconstitutional.  The fact that FDR placed American citizens in detention camps during WW2 because they were of Japanese ancestry is not a justification.  That was ethically and legally wrong!  Trump’s claim to build a wall along the Mexican border and have the Mexican government pay for it is ridiculous.  It will never happen.  However, his supporters love the idea.  He is playing on the xenophobia of white America that is threatened by all of the new people in the country.  The newer immigrants are not necessarily white, have different religions and different customs.  It was bad enough for these people when Jews and Catholics arrived but now we have Hindi, Muslims, Buddhists and every other religion in the world.  This is too much for these xenophobic people, who still think America is a white Protestant county, to absorb.  They need to spend time in NJ or NY where the diversity of the population would astound them.  If they took NJ Transit or walked up Seventh Avenue in NYC they will see an amazingly diverse group of people and hear a dozen different languages.  Maybe then they would start to understand that America is a nation of people from every part of the world who practice every religion and have different customs and traditions. Yet, they are all part of that melting pot that is America.

Christie is a bully and thinks he can bully the Russian President, Mr. Putin.  That is a laugh.  Putin was a KGB operative.  He will not be afraid of “fat boy” and will call his bluff.  Christie has chastised Marco Rubio for missing votes in the Senate.  Yet, he has been away from his job as Governor of NJ for 261 days out of 365.  That is 71.5% of the year.  He announced today that he is taking a short break form campaigning to delivery his State of the State address.  He hasn’t been here enough to know what the conditions are in NJ!  He is also hated by the far right who will never forgive him for hugging President Obama!

Jeb Bush, who was the great hope of the establishment, continuously proves that he is not the smarter of the Bush boys.  He suffers from foot in mouth disease.  He is going nowhere. 

The rest of the group is also going nowhere.  Huckabee is a religious bigot.  Santorum is a far right religious nut who won Iowa last time but hasn’t a chance this time.  Fiorina isn’t getting any traction.  She has little to say and what she does say is false.  Pataki, Jindal, Walker, and Perry saw the light and withdrew.  A few more need to do the same.

Actually, I think the GOP should nominate a far right candidate to run against Hillary Clinton.  I believe it will be 1964 all over again. Barry Goldwater tried the far right approach.  He lost dramatically to LBJ.  I think Cruz or Trump would also lose big time.  Rubio has flip-flopped on so many issues and is not loved because he worked on immigration reform.  I just don’t know how he will fair in the race.