In 2006, Joe Lieberman was making different statements about Barack Obama than what he did at the Republican Convention tonight. He promised to help Obama “reach for the stars” but today he seems more interested in hurting Obama than helping him. What explains this change of heart?
If you haven’t been getting your fill of politics already, it looks like there’s another election coming. This time it’s a Canadian federal election. Unlike the historic implications of the outcome of the election in the US, the Canadian race will inevitably result in another old white guy running the place.
Before the Democratic National Convention, the conservative evangelical christian organization “Focus on the Family” came out with a video which put forward the idea of praying for rain (I would link to the video but it looks like Focus on the Family had YouTube remove it). The thinking was that if God were to send a torrent, it would make it impossible for Barack Obama to deliver his speech before 75,000 people at the open air stadium. As it turned out, the convention was not rained-out. The weather was actually ideal and more people saw Obama’s speech on television than watched the finale of American Idol. But does this mean that God didn’t answer the prayers for rain?
It always baffled me how the Bush-Rove machine managed to constantly get away with accusing their opponents of the very flaw they themselves exemplified. Take for example one of Karl Rove’s favorite charges, that of being “elitist”. This accusation was one he made against John Kerry in particular, even though it was Bush who, behind the artificially-created facade of Crawford Ranch, most exemplified the traits of an elitist (from a rich oil family and ivy-leaguer who avoided the Vietnam draft).
Now it looks like McCain is using a variation of the very same tactic. His recent ad accuses Obama of seeing himself as “the One”, America’s new messiah. Yet McCain himself recently has come out with a poster that depicts him looking more like the second-coming than anything I’ve ever seen hanging on a Sunday School wall.
This pot-and-kettle politics move is usually a pretty effective tactic. After all it allows you to innoculate yourself from being called on one of your weaknesses by being the first to point it out in someone else. And it seems that the facts rarely get in the way of the perception that is ultimately created. As long as the accusation has an air of truth about it and you say it often and forcefully enough, you’re on your way to some good character assassination.
Lately President Bush has been talking about reducing American dependence on foreign oil by drilling offshore for it. But what’s the keyword in the phrase “reduce our dependence on foreign oil”? If you’re an oil tycoon like the president, your answer would be “oil”–as in, we need to go get more of it. The actual keyword there though is “reduce”. That’s right, if you want to reduce your dependence on foreign oil, why not reduce the amount of oil you use in the first place?
America guzzles oil by the millions of barrels. If you think about it, at some point this will not be able to continue whether or not you believe in “peak oil theory”. There are things that can be done right away to move in the right direction. Instead the Bush administration has opposed raising the fuel efficiency standards for automakers. That right there is one solid step in the right direction. But no, it seems that the only solution they can see is the one that’s most profitable for their oil buddies, go and drill for more. More money for them, same problem for us.
McCain has been getting a lot of credit for the so-called “surge” but Mitt Romney has taken the back-slapping to the next level. Apparently McCain “authored the philosophy” of the surge. I’m not really sure what exactly that means but the implication is that McCain invented it. This kind of reminds me of Al Gore’s infamous claim to have invented the internet. At least in the case of the internet, it works. The surge, on the other hand, was a less successful venture.
The scientific method has given us a lot of great stuff. Thanks to science we now live longer, travel farther, eat better and blow up more stuff than ever before. It has gotten to the point that in our culture, we pretty much put our lives in the hand of science every day. We do this without even having the faintest clue how most of the things we use all the time actually work. All I know is that if I put a bag of corn in the microwave for a few minutes, it’s all popped when I pull it out.
Yet despite our utter dependence on–and unquestioning trust in–the goodies science give us, there are some areas where we just don’t like what science has to say. Look no further than the issue of climate change
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The big issue for the past couple of days on the US Presidential campaign trail has been questions of patriotism. McCain and Obama are hot on the issue of whether they are patriotic enough. To me this just seems completely ridiculous. It seems that for some people out there, there’s nothing you can do to satisfy them that you love your country enough. Isn’t the fact that you’re a contender for the presidency of the country pretty decent evidence that you are patriotic? How many flag pins do you have to wear to make people believe you? Let’s move on to some real issues that matter here people!
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During the 2004 presidential election, John Kerry was criticized for being “elitist”. The same label is now being attached to Barack Obama. The question is, what’s wrong with having an elitist president?
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Following the devastation in New Orleans from Hurricane Katrina, people looked for explanations for why this happened.