Mike (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} iaminyourhead) wrote,@ 2008-02-28 01:32:00 |
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The things I believe: Politics.
So tonight I sat down and started cleaning up my bookmarks. You know, you bookmark a page for one reason or another, and two years down the road, it's a dead page, or you have no earthly idea why you saved it in the first place? Anyways, at some point or another, I ran across this:
Jiihad!
I have no idea why I saved this. None whatsoever. and after looking at it a few times, I decided to check out the page it was on. Neal Boortz's website, apparently. Neal Boortz is one of those conservative talkshow hosts. He's pro-Bush, anti-Anything not Republican, and believes that anyone who believes in global warming (or it's younger, possibly more accurate sibling, Global Climate Change) is anti-capitalism. I may be wrong on that last point, but it's the impression I got from reading his news page.
I read through his page for a while, as well as several pages he linked to. Oddly enough, his was the least crazy. He actually tells you on his front page to not believe anything you hear on his radio show, or read on his web-page, unless it "is consistent with what you already know to be true, or unless you have taken the time to research the matter to prove its accuracy to your satisfaction." He even chides the reader by saying "This is known as 'Doing Your Homework'". He's got links to pictures of Barrack Obama dressed intraditional Muslim clothes, but appears to be basically against caring about them, choosing rather to focus on what he sees as shortcomings in Obama's policy, and accusations of corruption. So, I don't agree with the guy, but for the most part, I don't think he's a whacko, and I don't think he's commiting outright falsehoods.
But here's the thing. like any time I read something one of these political cheerleaders writes (and I'm not really limiting myself to the right-wingers when I say that, There are plenty of liberals who are just as short-sighted and unwilling to listen to facts), I get angry. I get even angrier when the sites are open to comments by random folks. These people make me angrier than angry. But tonight I realized, that they're making themselves heard. So tonight, I present to you, Great Electronic Ether, the first of an indeterminate number of posts:
I think, for the most part, that I identify as liberal. I understand that in order to have money to spend on being a government, the government has to get money from it's people. That's why we have tazes. I believe in higher taxes for the rich. I'm not going to ask that we tax them down to my level, but damn, if I was making a quarter-million a year, I don't think I'd mind paying another ten grand in taxes, or even another fifty. two hundred thousand dollars is more than most people can ever expect to see from a year's pay. You're still wealthy, bucko. I don't begrudge you your money but think of it this way: You're incredibly lucky to be born in America, a country which has, in one way or another, contributed over and over to your ability to be wealthy. Now show some gratitude, and open your wallet.
I also believe in immigration reform. I believe it should be easier to immigrate legally into the united states. While I'm not able to find numbers on the cost on short notice (Google for some reason only wants to tell me about immigration *to* Mexico), I understand that legal immigration is quite expensive. I feel we would be able to eliminate much of the burden placed on us by illegal immigrants if we simply offered immediate Tax ID numbers to any foreign national who wanted in, allowed them to work anywhere they had the ability to, and placed them in a slightly higher tax bracket until we had the costs covered, plus, say, 25%. Take most of the money we spend on deportation now, and spend it prosecuting the ever-loving hell out of anyone who's paying people non-livable wages under the table. Also, require, by the end of some arbitrary period, basic competence in spoken English. For those people that want to, say move their elderly relatives to live with them, we allow them to extend their tax-increased term to cover the cost of inputting their old person into whatever databases, and boom, there you are. The elderly can be exempt from that whole "learning Engish" thing. I honestly don't care if your 78-year-old grandmother can't speak English. In fact, I think old folks who don't speak English are awesome. If you don't, well, that's on you. you tell me how it hurts America to have some old person unable to speak English, and I'll happily change my stance.
I'm not one -hundred percent liberal, however. I won't, for instance, tow the line of gun control. I'm for an armed America. I don't think making laws about guns will keep them out of the hands of criminals. I mean, jeez, that's why we call them criminals, right? You want to own an assault rifle? Cool. Buy a minigun and a few bricks of C-4 while you're at it, if you're so inclined. Assuming, of course, that you can get the licenses that I think we should have to have. No recent (say, in the last 15 years) history of mental illness, no violent crime convictions at all, and no more than a certain number (Not really sure what I'd want that number to be) of any other non-vehicular convictions of any sort.
Health care? Look, universal health care works. Every time I've seen numbers that seem to suggest otherwise, I've checked on them, and the fact of the matter is they never pan out upon closer inspection. Single-provider government healthcare. Good stuff. Now, I realize that would put a lot of honest, hardworking folk out of work. And I don't suggest that we do this overnight. Start with a government-run alternative. Run it as a non-for profit, with enrollment being as simple as a check-box on your tax form, with an added yearly taxation of a percentage of your earning, decided by tax bracket. Allow people to choose it, or choose not to do it. I guess (and I could be wrong) that over the next thirty or so years, the privately owned insurance companies will find it harder and harder to stay in business. If I'm wrong, no harm done. The government office fails, and we go back to doing things the way we are now. I'f I'm right, well, then everyone's got health care in the space of a generation, and the lay-offs we see from the private insurance companies will happen slowly enough for those workers to find other employment.
The Economy is boned. I know it. You know it. The American People know it. Everyone seems to think handing everyone a few hundred dollars is going to make everything better. The housing market lost tens of billions of dollars for American homeowners. Six hundred dollars, even if everyone gets it, means nothing in the greater scheme of things. I really don't know how to fix this. It's a giant loss of illusory wealth. it think it will be a long time before we recover from this, but in the mean-time, we need to focus on making sure that everyone has what they need to live. What exactly that means, I'm not entirely sure, but health care is a start, certainly.
Oh! The war! Right! I'm pro-military. Very much so. I believe we should have a large, well-trained, and well-equipped military force. I also believe we should keep out collective military nose out of places where it doesn't belong. Saddam Hussein was a shitty man. I'm glad he's out of power. But why couldn't we continue our long-standing tradition of deposing one dictator to install another one? Nowhere in history has any country transitioned from despotism to democracy. It doesn't work. as soon as we pull out, there will be utter chaos. I'd love to see our troops home, but realistically, we've got to own that country at this point, and continue martial law there until such a time as we can figure out how to reconfigure socio-politcal reality in such a way that we can leave any kind of stable government there. Democracy can't just happen. it's got to rise naturally from the ashes of a slightly less complicated form of government. The war in Iraq is short-sighted and stupid, but now it's our cross to bear. In twenty years, it'll be our children's cross to bear, twenty five years after that? Our grandchilden's. Look upon our legacy.
I'm pro-choice. Don't use abortion as a contraceptive afterthought. But use it if you feel you need to.
I'm pro-stem cell. In addition to the stem cells we harvest from aborted fetuses, we also get them from the afterbirth from live babies, and can now somehow manufacture them out of skin cells. There's no more controversy there. You want to prohibit the use of aborted tissues? OK. Sure, go ahead, the fetuses are no less dead for your efforts, but ban that all you want. Just don't ban the research on the stem cells we can get without doing harm to any life or potential life. That's just plain dumb. The diseases we may be able to cure using stem cells are numerous, and if you ever get Alzheimers, I'll remind you every time you forget about it that legislation you were in favor of is preventing a potential cure for your disease right now, and you're going to die as a result.
I'm pro-torture. Yeah, that's right. Under certain circumstances, I think we should torture folks for information. I strongly believe, however, that physical pain is no way to torture folks. eventually, they'll say whatever you want to hear, whether it's true or not. They'll tell you that two plus two equals five, if you'll pardon a 1984 reference. Psychological torture, on the other hand, is perfectly OK in my book, as is physical torture which doesnt cause actual harm. There should, however, be some sort of oversight, as well as a process to get clearance to use such techniques, as well as a very well defined set of circumstances outside of which torture is not permissable.
I'm also pro-death penalty. I think that it needs to be done on a federal level, and that death row inmates should have to be there a long, long time (say, a minimum of ten years) while an independant investigatory commitee does their damnedest to prove the innocence of the condemned. Yes, ten reasonable men found that there was no reasonable doubt that the condemned committed the crimes of which they were accused, but I'd like to leave no room for people whining about innocent people put to death. Plus, hey, look at that, I'm creating new jobs!
Disagree with me on any of these points? I welcome your input, as long as it's level-headed and not inflamatory.
So tonight I sat down and started cleaning up my bookmarks. You know, you bookmark a page for one reason or another, and two years down the road, it's a dead page, or you have no earthly idea why you saved it in the first place? Anyways, at some point or another, I ran across this:
Jiihad!
I have no idea why I saved this. None whatsoever. and after looking at it a few times, I decided to check out the page it was on. Neal Boortz's website, apparently. Neal Boortz is one of those conservative talkshow hosts. He's pro-Bush, anti-Anything not Republican, and believes that anyone who believes in global warming (or it's younger, possibly more accurate sibling, Global Climate Change) is anti-capitalism. I may be wrong on that last point, but it's the impression I got from reading his news page.
I read through his page for a while, as well as several pages he linked to. Oddly enough, his was the least crazy. He actually tells you on his front page to not believe anything you hear on his radio show, or read on his web-page, unless it "is consistent with what you already know to be true, or unless you have taken the time to research the matter to prove its accuracy to your satisfaction." He even chides the reader by saying "This is known as 'Doing Your Homework'". He's got links to pictures of Barrack Obama dressed intraditional Muslim clothes, but appears to be basically against caring about them, choosing rather to focus on what he sees as shortcomings in Obama's policy, and accusations of corruption. So, I don't agree with the guy, but for the most part, I don't think he's a whacko, and I don't think he's commiting outright falsehoods.
But here's the thing. like any time I read something one of these political cheerleaders writes (and I'm not really limiting myself to the right-wingers when I say that, There are plenty of liberals who are just as short-sighted and unwilling to listen to facts), I get angry. I get even angrier when the sites are open to comments by random folks. These people make me angrier than angry. But tonight I realized, that they're making themselves heard. So tonight, I present to you, Great Electronic Ether, the first of an indeterminate number of posts:
I think, for the most part, that I identify as liberal. I understand that in order to have money to spend on being a government, the government has to get money from it's people. That's why we have tazes. I believe in higher taxes for the rich. I'm not going to ask that we tax them down to my level, but damn, if I was making a quarter-million a year, I don't think I'd mind paying another ten grand in taxes, or even another fifty. two hundred thousand dollars is more than most people can ever expect to see from a year's pay. You're still wealthy, bucko. I don't begrudge you your money but think of it this way: You're incredibly lucky to be born in America, a country which has, in one way or another, contributed over and over to your ability to be wealthy. Now show some gratitude, and open your wallet.
I also believe in immigration reform. I believe it should be easier to immigrate legally into the united states. While I'm not able to find numbers on the cost on short notice (Google for some reason only wants to tell me about immigration *to* Mexico), I understand that legal immigration is quite expensive. I feel we would be able to eliminate much of the burden placed on us by illegal immigrants if we simply offered immediate Tax ID numbers to any foreign national who wanted in, allowed them to work anywhere they had the ability to, and placed them in a slightly higher tax bracket until we had the costs covered, plus, say, 25%. Take most of the money we spend on deportation now, and spend it prosecuting the ever-loving hell out of anyone who's paying people non-livable wages under the table. Also, require, by the end of some arbitrary period, basic competence in spoken English. For those people that want to, say move their elderly relatives to live with them, we allow them to extend their tax-increased term to cover the cost of inputting their old person into whatever databases, and boom, there you are. The elderly can be exempt from that whole "learning Engish" thing. I honestly don't care if your 78-year-old grandmother can't speak English. In fact, I think old folks who don't speak English are awesome. If you don't, well, that's on you. you tell me how it hurts America to have some old person unable to speak English, and I'll happily change my stance.
I'm not one -hundred percent liberal, however. I won't, for instance, tow the line of gun control. I'm for an armed America. I don't think making laws about guns will keep them out of the hands of criminals. I mean, jeez, that's why we call them criminals, right? You want to own an assault rifle? Cool. Buy a minigun and a few bricks of C-4 while you're at it, if you're so inclined. Assuming, of course, that you can get the licenses that I think we should have to have. No recent (say, in the last 15 years) history of mental illness, no violent crime convictions at all, and no more than a certain number (Not really sure what I'd want that number to be) of any other non-vehicular convictions of any sort.
Health care? Look, universal health care works. Every time I've seen numbers that seem to suggest otherwise, I've checked on them, and the fact of the matter is they never pan out upon closer inspection. Single-provider government healthcare. Good stuff. Now, I realize that would put a lot of honest, hardworking folk out of work. And I don't suggest that we do this overnight. Start with a government-run alternative. Run it as a non-for profit, with enrollment being as simple as a check-box on your tax form, with an added yearly taxation of a percentage of your earning, decided by tax bracket. Allow people to choose it, or choose not to do it. I guess (and I could be wrong) that over the next thirty or so years, the privately owned insurance companies will find it harder and harder to stay in business. If I'm wrong, no harm done. The government office fails, and we go back to doing things the way we are now. I'f I'm right, well, then everyone's got health care in the space of a generation, and the lay-offs we see from the private insurance companies will happen slowly enough for those workers to find other employment.
The Economy is boned. I know it. You know it. The American People know it. Everyone seems to think handing everyone a few hundred dollars is going to make everything better. The housing market lost tens of billions of dollars for American homeowners. Six hundred dollars, even if everyone gets it, means nothing in the greater scheme of things. I really don't know how to fix this. It's a giant loss of illusory wealth. it think it will be a long time before we recover from this, but in the mean-time, we need to focus on making sure that everyone has what they need to live. What exactly that means, I'm not entirely sure, but health care is a start, certainly.
Oh! The war! Right! I'm pro-military. Very much so. I believe we should have a large, well-trained, and well-equipped military force. I also believe we should keep out collective military nose out of places where it doesn't belong. Saddam Hussein was a shitty man. I'm glad he's out of power. But why couldn't we continue our long-standing tradition of deposing one dictator to install another one? Nowhere in history has any country transitioned from despotism to democracy. It doesn't work. as soon as we pull out, there will be utter chaos. I'd love to see our troops home, but realistically, we've got to own that country at this point, and continue martial law there until such a time as we can figure out how to reconfigure socio-politcal reality in such a way that we can leave any kind of stable government there. Democracy can't just happen. it's got to rise naturally from the ashes of a slightly less complicated form of government. The war in Iraq is short-sighted and stupid, but now it's our cross to bear. In twenty years, it'll be our children's cross to bear, twenty five years after that? Our grandchilden's. Look upon our legacy.
I'm pro-choice. Don't use abortion as a contraceptive afterthought. But use it if you feel you need to.
I'm pro-stem cell. In addition to the stem cells we harvest from aborted fetuses, we also get them from the afterbirth from live babies, and can now somehow manufacture them out of skin cells. There's no more controversy there. You want to prohibit the use of aborted tissues? OK. Sure, go ahead, the fetuses are no less dead for your efforts, but ban that all you want. Just don't ban the research on the stem cells we can get without doing harm to any life or potential life. That's just plain dumb. The diseases we may be able to cure using stem cells are numerous, and if you ever get Alzheimers, I'll remind you every time you forget about it that legislation you were in favor of is preventing a potential cure for your disease right now, and you're going to die as a result.
I'm pro-torture. Yeah, that's right. Under certain circumstances, I think we should torture folks for information. I strongly believe, however, that physical pain is no way to torture folks. eventually, they'll say whatever you want to hear, whether it's true or not. They'll tell you that two plus two equals five, if you'll pardon a 1984 reference. Psychological torture, on the other hand, is perfectly OK in my book, as is physical torture which doesnt cause actual harm. There should, however, be some sort of oversight, as well as a process to get clearance to use such techniques, as well as a very well defined set of circumstances outside of which torture is not permissable.
I'm also pro-death penalty. I think that it needs to be done on a federal level, and that death row inmates should have to be there a long, long time (say, a minimum of ten years) while an independant investigatory commitee does their damnedest to prove the innocence of the condemned. Yes, ten reasonable men found that there was no reasonable doubt that the condemned committed the crimes of which they were accused, but I'd like to leave no room for people whining about innocent people put to death. Plus, hey, look at that, I'm creating new jobs!
Disagree with me on any of these points? I welcome your input, as long as it's level-headed and not inflamatory.
