Shadowraven's Madman Ravings

Shadowraven's Lunatic Ravings

My ravings have been proven to induce hypnosis or insanity in 98% of their readers, so read them at your own risk!
All jokes aside, be aware that some of the content below may offend some people.
You have been warned!!

My Views on Politics

___ I started out as a Nixon Republican. I didn't know what that meant then, but I still believe that he had greatness in him. He simply failed to realize that the world had changed and what other presidents had gotten away with in the past would not work anymore. I found later that he was a rather progressive Republican in that he opened relations with China, ended the Vietnam War, enacted in Clean Air & Water Act, etc. His commitment to open the world, and to improve and clean up the environment inspired me. Ford seemed to me at the time to continue in that vein, so I stayed with the Republicans until Reagan took office.

___ It was then that I began to see what the Republican party really represented. Reagan showed me that his party was not in the least bit concerned about what happened to the common man, but was more concerned with corporate profits. His presidency marked the time when the gap between the richest and the poorest Americans widened alarmingly. Soon after he took office good jobs began to be lost or sent out of the country and replaced with lower paying "service" jobs. People were no longer able to support their families on just one income. Prior to that my father had no problem providing for the News with just his job. But we soon found that my mother now had to work as well, even though most of the kids had left home. Reagan's voodoo economics plan of trickle down was a joke and putting people in the poor house. When Bush, Sr. took office he showed time and again just how out of touch he was with the lives of most people.

___ When Clinton took office I had high hopes that things would finally improve, and they did, to some extent. More jobs were created and we had a good economy, but things really didn't improve much. Wages didn't go up, or keep pace with inflation, corporate greed still ruled supreme. Clinton was probably one of the more accomplished and talented politicians we've had in office for a while, but he was a disappointment. He was better than the alternative, but he failed to realize his promise because he refused to lead the country. He depended on polls to help him govern (Whereas Bush could care less what we think, now). To be sure, his presidency was hindered by the sour apple politics of the Republicans. They kept distracting him with ridiculous minutiae that had no bearing on governing the country. Obviously his actions with Lewinsky were reprehensible, and didn't endear him to me, but that was between him and his wife, not us. He was still an effective chief executive, if a disappointing one.

___ Then came the 2000 election. If you are being a fair observer, you while realize that something funny occurred in that election in Florida. Too many coincidences occur there to be just coincidences. First of all Bush's brother was the state governor. Then the person in charge of the state election was not only a Republican, but in charge of the Bush campaign in Florida. Aside from the lost ballots (of which some were found in a landfill some month's later), the list that she had, of felons ineligible to vote, had some serious problems. It had a suspiciously high percentage of black voters (who traditionally vote Democratic) and a suspicious lack of Latino voters (even though they account for 11% of all felons, and traditionally vote Republican in Florida). One of the election supervisors was given a list of 600 names which he found to be 85% wrong and included what he considered to be an abnormally high number of people who had never even been arrested, much less in jail. This was only one county out of many, adding up to thousands of people unable to vote at the polls. With the other evidence that surfaced later in the year, it becomes clear to a fair observer that Bush does not belong in the White House. Gore only gave up his fight because, right or wrong, it would only have hurt him to pursue it.

___ This really turned me against the Republican party as a whole since they not only managed to do this, but they managed to get away with it as well. Most people prefer not to believe that this is the case because the alternative is too unsettling to consider. But if it occurred once it could occur again, and has. When the felon lists showed up last year in Florida they again had the same problems as in 2000. The state tried hard to downplay it and said it was a "computer error", but it is hard to believe this just a simple mistake when it has happened before. If it was just a "simple mistake" why did they not exercise more care when compiling the list, considering what happened before? In addition, the Deibold electronic voting machines that were put in to replace the paper ballots still have some serious security issues and have been known to "lose" votes. There have been found even more irregularities with the votes in Ohio with the last election. You can see where this is heading.

___ My problems with Bush just continued after his first inauguration. Soon after he was in office he asked his advisors to see if we could attack Iraq and take Saddam out of power, but there was not. He then tried to quietly push through bill after bill under the table that benefited only his elite corporate contributors. He often showed himself to be incompetent and uninformed on many issues. His missteps had started to effect his standing with the American people until September 11th. Then everyone began to rally around him and say what an effective leader he was. Although I hate to say it, you could not have handed an event more beneficial to him than this. It shored up his sagging ratings and enabled him to push through legislation he would have never gotten away with before. One of which was to legalize a previously illegal tactic by employers to eliminate overtime for their employees by reclassifying it. Another was to open ANWR to oil companies like they always wanted, even though it would never show any substantial benefit to the country. He has also raped the Clean Air & Water Act and let's not forget about the Patriot Act. What good does any of this do for us? What good do we get out of providing tax cuts to companies who outsource jobs from here to other countries? What good do we get by attacking Iraq? What good do we get from making bankrupcty more difficult?

___ Then we come to the issue of Iraq. He lied to us about the intelligence he received and who was at fault for that. He exaggerated claims that Iraq had WOMD and squandered much of the goodwill we had with of the rest of the world, alienating ourselves from them. Just in case you think this does not matter, imagine what life would be like for you if you did the same to all your friends, coworkers, and acquaintances. Would it be easier for you to get along without them or harder? He also ignored the plan that Colin Powell and the State Department had taken months to prepare. It included a comprehensive plan to of how go into Iraq and improve the situation once we were there, complete with an exit plan. But, for some reason, Bush ignored it and proceeded without a plan. He sent our troops into Iraq saying that they had connections with Al-Qaeda and might provide terrorists with WOMD. Far too few troops. There are more generals who have said that Bush has made mess of this situation, than say he was right. This has resulted in the deaths of more than 1000 Americans and injuries, some permanent, to thousands of others. Not to forget the thousands of casualties to Iraqi civilians. Then to make matters worse he would not provide body armor to National Guard troops. Their families had to take up collections to provide armor for them. He also sent them into battle without properlly armored vehicles. Then when the troops come back they find out that their veteran's benefits have been cut. Does this sound like the actions of a man concerned with the well being of our troops or his people? One thing I can assure you of is that if Al-Qaeda was not in Iraq before, they certainly are now... recruiting. So where are the WOMD? In Bush's head.

___ The simple fact of the matter is that since Bush took office I honestly cannot think of a single good thing he has done for the country. When he attacked Iraq, it did nothing for us, and has made matters worse. There has been a net loss of jobs and some of the highest unemployment numbers in the past 60 years. The jobs that have been created to replace the ones lost earn 10 to 20 thousand dollars less than the ones they replace. I know that you have heard most of this all before, but you don't need to take my word for it. Do some research yourself and you will find out that the sad fact is I am not making any of this up. These are all verifiable facts of what has occurred since he took power.

___ Do you feel safer now, than you did after 9-11? You shouldn't. While Afghanistan had little effect on terrorist recruitment, the same cannot be said for Iraq. Afghanistan was understandable for most people, but Iraq is not. Arabs only see yet another attack on them by the "Great Satan". They have already been feeling oppressed and powerless in our relentless assault on their culture to adopt our values. Iraq is the best advertisement they could have ever received for recruits. They believe that we are trying to corrupt and co-opt their people for our own gain. Instead of attacking them we should be helping them provide schools for their children. Right now many Muslim children have no access to schools other than the wahbei, which teach hatred of the west in additon to the three R's. The terrorists aren't stupid, at least they are providing schools.

___ Domestically, Bush has only slightly increased the security at the airports, but that is not how most things are shipped into the U.S. Most items arrive here on container ships without inspection and nothing has been done to improve that situation. Now after the 9-11 commission's report has come out he is ignoring it in favor of other things that do nothing to improve our safety. Most of what he has done is window dressing and has had no real effect. I find it impossible that he will do any better job the second time around and could quite conceivably make things worse. Hence, I will definitely did not vote for him in 2004.

___ I see our political system as one in crisis. One side is the Republican Party and their overemphasis on the American elite, and the other is the Democratic Party who keep leaning too far the other way, for the poor. Consequently the middle class has been getting squeezed between the two. One cares nothing about us, and the other has done little to stop them. Both parties need to become more moderate.

___ But I must admit when I look at history that our greatest presidents came from the Democratic Party. Men such as Woodrow Wilson, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry S. Truman, and John F. Kennedy. They defined themselves in terms of what they are for, and emphasized hope. Only 2 ever came from the Republican Party and they were progressive. They were Abraham Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt. Otherwise the conservatives have only given us the paranoid Senator McCarthy in the 1950's, Reagan and his destruction of our economy, and the wasteful impeachment proceedings against Clinton. Republicans define themselves in terms of what they oppose, and seem to emphasize fear.

My Views on Society

___ Do we have problems with race in this country? Yes we do, but I think not in the way many people perceive it. I believe that all parties, including the minorities themselves, are equally responsible for the problem. I have experienced hate and disrespect while giving others no cause to behave that way. All because I am of a different race. I've been falsely accused of prejudice and have seen how some folks manage to get their way at work by making race an issue when the real issue is that they are too lazy to do their job. Then you see this the idea of acting cool when it means being an asshole, and the derision some minorities have for others, when they try to get ahead, as having "sold out". When you add all this together it begins to form a negative picture of that "other society". Before I had much direct contact with minorities, I really had no opinion one way or the other. But my experiences have made me leery and suspicious. I will always take each person I meet as an individual, but many monorities I've had contact with have left a bad impression. If you treat someone with hate and dislike, you can't really expect to receive respect in return. Act like a jerk and you'll get treated like one.

___ While reading this you must remember that I believe in personal responsibility and accountability for your own actions. It is not where or what you are born into, but what you do with what you have, that matters. If you act like a jerk, and cannot find a job, that is no one's fault but your own. If you blame someone else for your problems and refuse to take responsibility for your own life, you can't expect to get much. If you refuse to act in a responsible fashion, treat me with hate, or as a demon personified, why would I want you around me? That does not mean that I would never hire minority workers, but I would be more cautious when I did. Hence, I firmly believe that many problems that some minorities experience are, at least partially, of their own making. This can apply to anyone though, black, white, latino, or whatever.

___ However, lack of responsibility is a problem that pervades our whole society. Americans in general have an annoying tendency not to take personal responsibility for their own behavior. We always want to blame someone else for our faults or carelessness, rather than admitting that they belong to us. This is quid pro quo in politics and the corporate community. The rest of us tend to be very litigious and want to sue others for the most ridiculous reasons. When things go wrong at work we would rather pass the blame onto someone else than take ownership of our own mistakes. This tends to not only raise everyone's insurance rates, but also makes everyone overly cautious of each other.

___ Some liberals have made this worse with their concept of political correctness (ugh), fear of damaging someone's self-esteem, and insistence that we all must be careful what we say lest it 'gasp', offend someone. I can tell you that while I always strive to be considerate as possible to others, I will NOT bend over backwards to be politically correct. If you piss me off, I'm going to offend you. This cautious attitude has also had a negative impact in our schools, as some do not give grades anymore. Grading implies that some children are not as capable as others are, and this might damage their self-esteem. Well, I hate to be the one to bust their bubble, but some kids are not. Where there is no sense of failure, there is also no sense of accomplishment. The whole system is brought down to the lowest common denominator and children are not challenged anymore. I believe that this helps explain why many schools are not as effective as they used to be.

___ This "walking on eggs" mentality has also affected how we raise our children. Many parents are afraid to apply effective discipline to their children for fear of being seen as abusive or uncaring. This makes them ineffective parents, because their children know that the kids are in charge. I don't advocate beating children, but prosecuting someone for child abuse when they smack their child once on the bum is going too far. There is a difference between spankings and a beating, I've been there. Spankings should be kept as a last resort, since other forms of discipline are generally more effective, but they should still be kept in the toolbox. I've seen too many children without any form of discipline who actually challenge anyone to do so. They threaten to "turn you in" if you try any type discipline. This makes it difficult to be an effective parent or educator when you cannot enforce compliance to the rules. We need to back-up the cart on this issue to regain control.

___ We have also become more insulated from each other, of which technology is at least partly to blame. When I was a child you could go outside on most any summer day and see kids playing everywhere. Now if you go outside you rarely see any kids out there. They are all inside in the air conditioning watching cable, playing on the computer, or playing video games. While global warming has something to do with this, since summers are generally hotter now than 25 years ago, it doesn't explain it all. People may still communicate with each other, but it is now less direct than it used to be. Now we tend to communicate through cell phones, e-mail, and messaging. We engage in more activities with little personal interaction, such watching TV, playing on the computer, or video games. This begins to make it harder for people to communicate with each other. Humans need that face-to-face interaction to remain connected to each other and remain aware of other people's feelings.

More to come...

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Page Last Modified On: Monday March 9, 2009