socio-politics

This reminds me of Clinton’s amazing 3 am phone call in that both of them just leave you wanting to watch it two or three more times just to make sure it is as absurd as you think that it is.

McCain camp though process:

1) Obama is famous around the world

2) We can’t stop him from being famous………….but we CAN make fame into something pitiful….we think
3) Britney Spears and Paris Hilton are the two first names that come to mind for fame and name chanting and celebrated trips to Berlin, let’s throw their faces in….though we’ll be subtle about it

4) Now that we got the point across, lets just throw in the generic attack on Democrats and try to use the poor economy and oil situation to our advantage.

5) close with campy cell phone commercial music playing to John staring off into the sunset

The odd thing is, this ad would have a chance to be successful if it did not attract so much attention to itself. It incorporates most of the most successful marketing ploys: it connects the hate and pity for Hilton and Spears to Obama, the ten seconds dedicated to anything of actual political substance repeats the same two points and it takes advantage of people’s economic troubles.

However, the ad was far too forward with its message, and when the message can even be seen as absurd by those that hate Obama, there will be problems.

The ad is offensive towards those that support Obama. Associating Obama with a fallen pop start and a woman that is famous for no particular reason shows a poor attempt by McCain’s campaign staff to reduce all credibility from Obama’s name. It equivocates a vote for Obama to a vote for a no-talent pop star, and this is not the right thing to be telling people if you wish to win their votes. It makes the voter out to be a sheep, and suggests that the road to originality is a vote for McCain.

Apparently, since the “maverick” label didn’t make him cool, McCain has decided to make his regular self out to be the cool and original thing………..it’s just pathetic.

This ad is a sign of McCain’s desperation. Much like Hillary Clinton, he has begun to advocate ill-advised attacks upon his opponent. And when that becomes the focus of the campaign, actual substance is shifted to the background, which may have been successful previously, though it will not work against Obama.

Ted Stevens, a man who has been an Alaska senator almost for most of the time that it has been a state, was indicted yesterday for lying to federal investigators and failing to disclose hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribe money that he received from VECO, an oil contractor.  Alaskan congressman Don Young is also under investigation.

What frightens me most about this is not the corruption - I’m sure that he’s not the only politician that is currently in office to abuse power.  Most disturbing is the probability that there will not be adequate measures taken to ensure that this will not continue to happen with other politicians.  In all likelihood, Stevens will be convicted and will not be reelected, and everybody will forget about the whole situation.  What should be established is full disclosure of financial records for all members of one of the three branches of government - at the very least, this would act as a deterrent.

Politicians should not be protected as much as they are.  They have too much power, and it is too easy to abuse this power.  It makes me think of the Enron scandal - it was well acknowledged the members of both Clinton and Bush’s administrations were involved with the scandal, though  only the masterminds of the corporation were convicted - nobody put pressure on to find out more about the politicians that enabled the corruption to occur.

So now there’s a group called PUMA (party unity my ass) that refuses to vote for Obama. That’s their choice, but using Hillary Clinton as a reason for doing this is absurd, insane and shows a monumental distance from reality.

These people that claim to be part of PUMA say that they refuse to unite either because the primaries were rigged or because they just hate Obama. They cite the disputed Florida and Michigan primaries and the readiness to declare Obama the nominee as evidence.

As for Michigan -

And as for Florida and Michigan (and RIP Tim Russert)

When it was looking like she would, without a doubt, be the democratic nominee, Clinton had no problem with Florida and Michigan. And when things started to shift towards Obama, she started to say how the DNC plotted against her and how our whole electoral system is ridiculous.

And as for the DNC favoring the “weaker candidate” Obama - you’re insane if you truly believe that the DNC would choose a weaker candidate. They care about winning the election in November, and they know more about the candidates than any of us ever will. They devote their lives to politics, and yes, that involves corruption, but they would not choose a weaker candidate and risk losing the election. The fact is, they know things that we do not.

Hillary Clinton tried to employ dirty politics, though she just is not good at it. She lies nonstop and has no definite agenda because her agenda changes with whatever polls say will be popular for her. The really funny thing about this is when she gets called out about her changes in opinion (I.E. her Iraq vote, her opinion on the FL and MI primaries), she sticks by her old opinion while still trying to maintain her new one (see http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/01/13/574097.aspx)

And she has the audacity to say that she is one with her supporters, and that they are all in the struggle together. It makes me feel bad for the PUMA members because they must be so desperate for change that they will believe anything that they hear, without incorporating any sort of logic. I’ve had many discussions with people that still support Clinton and, much like how Clinton handles any challenges, they refuse to acknowledge any of her contradictory statements. It is not possible to get them to justify her change of position on MI and FL, yet they still complain about how people were “disenfranchised”. They need the hope that Clinton provided them, though unfortunately, there would be no way that she could have followed through.

So many horrible things have also been exposed about the Clintons throughout this whole process. I do not believe that Bill was an incredible president, though he was undoubtedly one of the most brilliant politicians that we have had - Hillary however is not too intelligent. Bill tried to support her, though when somebody like Hillary has no capacity to justify her own actions, there is nothing that can be done. It wore on Bill, and resulted in some very uncharacteristic statements.

And Chelsea………….how could anybody believe somebody that refuses to answer any questions? It is obvious that she is just told what to say, and does not know enough about the issues/ can not justify what her mom says. And any of the speculation about her getting involved with politics just scares the hell out of me.

PUMA also strongly believes that the media was/is against Clinton. This is another belief that Clinton instilled. In the beginning, the media treated her as if she was entitled to the nomination, though when people actually began to vote and it became obvious that Obama had a strong chance, the media started to get behind Obama more. Clinton quickly stated that the media was sexist and was holding her back, and that they were always talking about Obama. As a result, whenever people heard the name Obama (regardless of the context), an alarm went off, though if they had listened to how many times they heard Clinton’s name mentioned, they would have found it to be equal. It was a smart strategy that was successful to a small extent, though unfortunately, it has had negative repercussions for the democratic party.

Hillary Clinton is a dirty politician that manipulated people’s minds to gain support. She focused on attacks, rather than substance, and avoided anything involving the actual issues. There were only a few topics that she readily talked about, and these were the topics that undeniably sound good i.e. universal health care. The rest of the time, she diverted her attention to attacks on Obama and fabrications about unseen forces preventing her from getting nominated.

As for the Puma members - they have shown themselves to be hypocrites and not knowledgeable on politics. Many say that they will be voting for McCain, and if that is true, then they are the most petty and shallow people in the country. They must not have any real values, because McCain and Hillary have very different ideologies that are not at all compatible. They let these fabricated grudges dictate their actions, and it puts so many questions into play about what Clinton’s intentions were. She may have known that she would be dividing the party like this, just for the sake of her own potential personal gains. Even more depressing is the probability of her taking advantage of the PUMA members so that she can help to pay off her $25 million debt.

I normally would not speak out so strongly about any group of people, though the effect that Clinton had says too many depressing things about the condition of our country and society to be able to reconcile it.

All there is to it is that Clinton was a weak candidate, and she lost. Obama has a definite agenda, and he gained the support of the democratic party. If that means losing the support from the kind of people that are in PUMA then so be it - they obviously do not subscribe to any of the values of liberalism anyway. Liberalism is about questioning what you hear, and initiating a conversation to see all views and to determine what could be best for more people. On the other hand, conservatism relies more on following a specific set of values. From that standpoint, it seems that the PUMA members are all closet conservatives anyway.

Yes, all media outlets are biased, and most of them favor the left. However, this does not have a very big impact on determining the part of the political spectrum that an individual will be on.

It is impossible for a media outlet to be completely unbiased; the media’s purpose is to supply the news that they deem most important with the intent of saving people time, and the selection of what is important and what is not will expose some degree of bias.

And I’ve been hearing far too much this year about how much the media is in love with Obama and will never say anything ill of him. They do favor him, but they have shown that they have no problem with bringing him down if it will make a good story. Just think about the two biggest occasions where his relationship with Reverend Wright were somehow made into the top news story - all of the major stations were showing the clips of Wright 24/7, and there was plenty of questioning as to whether or not he could be trusted, with CNN and MSNBC showing no reluctance in tearing into him. These stations could have just as easily allowed Fox News to have fun with the clips of Wright and instead teamed up to discredit the story as best as possible, though they decided to discuss the controversy.

Controversy is what media outlets like Fox, NBC, and CNN care about most. Being more biased has no impact on increasing ratings, though inciting controversy grabs people’s attention like nothing else. Just look at the Democratic primaries - it was statistically impossible for Clinton to win, though the media treated her West Virginia victory like she could go the whole way. Meanwhile, she only gained ten delegates from the victory, and when Obama was gaining several superdelegates a day over Clinton, it was hardly publicized. When billion dollar corporations are in a competition for ratings (which thus allows for more money and bragging rights) , they are not going to have some kind of “higher duty” to try and shape people’s opinions - they will do what it takes to get people watching.

And as much as people (conservatives) love to make the media bias out to be a devastating problem, how often is the actual impact of this considered? Multiple studies have shown people to almost solely notice bias in information that they do not agree with. The political inclination of an individual is shaped too strongly by more personal factors to be shaped by the media. And there are plenty of conservative media outlets to choose from, which possibly impact a higher number of people than the liberal outlets do; just look at Fox News’ claim of having higher ratings than any of the other outlets. I would hope they do, since liberals are split between MSNBC and CNN, while conservatives have a single source.

I am not trying to judge conservatives by saying any of this - if it were the other way around, the liberals would use it to their advantage all that they could. Along with liberal professors in all schools, the liberal media has become much too much of a trump card for many conservatives, though worst of all, it is mentioned without anybody really doing anything to change it. If people complain about something this much, they should at least have some way of proving what they say to be legitimate and it should be accompanied with some kind of solution. Otherwise, it just comes off as whining.

Another thing to remember in this election year is that it is hard to deny that Obama is a strong presidential candidate, while McCain is a weak one.  McCain does not do enough to help his self out, and it is too easy for the “Bush’s third term” junk to be played up.  Obama speaks well and does not have too many glaring holes in his ideology, not that this would prevent the media from tearing into him if given the chance.

… or at the very least, the “us” as opposed to the “I”.

Cell phone usage has gone far beyond the novelty of always having a phone to use - they are preventing people from having normal social interactions and separating us from the rest of the planet. Regardless of where you are or who you are with, you know that, with just a few phone calls or text messages, you can find out what else you can be doing. There is also no pressure to devote yourself to the current situation that you are in because, if you get bored, you can start conversations with anybody that you have the number of.

I might just demand attention too much, but I can not stand cell phones. If you are around any other people, just devote yourself to enjoying the situation that you are in. It is not right to always have your phone out and to not think anything of it. Granted, there are some exceptions, but the whole situation prevents the genuineness of social interactions.

I do use my phone plenty -there are obviously plenty of benefits to having one. The down side is that the negatives will increase in severity as more technological discoveries are made. Being able to create a fanbase through any kind of self-indulgent online site such as youtube is isolating enough at the present time. In not too long it will undoubtedly be as easy to do any of these things on your phone as it is on a computer, any people will be able to immerse themselves in their online world whenever they like. And the more that people can immerse themselves within their own private world, the less they are in tune with other peoples, and this can cause some serious problems.

AND our phones may be giving us all brain cancer……..

All of the current issues between the United States and the middle east can very possibly be attributed to the United State’s support of Israel. The United States initially began to support Israel just minutes after it was officially created in 1948, and it has been by far the strongest supporter of Israel since.

Despite any positives of having an ally in that area, it is becoming more difficult to justify the relationship. The United States sends about three billion dollars each year to Israel for economic and military grants. The money does help to continue to build Israels already powerful military, which in turn helps the United States; during the Iraq War, Israel has been aiding the United States with armored cars and other supplies.

However, our relationship with Israel has also put us at ends with most of the middle east. Much of the middle east is against any degree of western influence in their area, since religious extremists strictly interpret the Koran to explicitly state that western influence must be stopped. Extremists groups such as al quada were formed largely with this objective in mind. The United States also would not have been obligated to perpetrate much of the military action, including the gulf war, against Iraq and other middle eastern nations if we did not have the alliance.  Therefore, 9/11 and the Iraq war would not have happened.

The support of Israel would be ideal if the consequences were not so dire, but in the present situation, the pros seem absurd when compared to the cons. One of the strongest factors contributing to the United States’ support of Israel is the long-standing democracy that is established there, though since time has proven that the surrounding nations are not going to follow that lead, it is of little use to the United States.

There’s obviously plenty of debate about Iraq and whether or not the world is any safer after the United States’ actions, though it is hard to deny that, under Bush, the Iran situation has become much worse. Bush has treated Iran the way that he treated Iraq - like it is a nation hell-bent on destroying freedoms, and negotiations would only be aiding their cause.

Iran is a completely different situation than Iraq. There is nowhere as extreme a presence of extremists, and Ahmadinejad is somebody that it is possible to negotiate with. However, he does not want to negotiate with Bush, though this fact is conveniently ignored all too often, or is treated by Bush’s administration as a clear sign that nations such as Iran and Iraq would prefer to see a democrat in office.

Ahmadinejad is a horrible man, though it is difficult to judge too thoroughly without knowing all of the details of why he has taken some of his actions (which is impossible to know). He has had a history of torture, corruption, and restrictions on freedom of speech, and while this may be an extreme comparison, George Bush shares that history. The relationship becomes much more difficult when it comes to the issues of Iran initiating a nuclear program and of Israel.

Ahmadinejad states that he wants a nuclear program for peaceful reasons, and while this may seem absurd, it is at the very least worth considering what that could mean. The middle-east is all but universally disliked, which is hard to deny (though Russia has been kissing some ass as of late). Citizens of the middle-eastern nations experience discrimination and nullification of their opinions to an extent that is unlike what any other group of people in the world will experience. Nevertheless, this is pretty justified when the bulk of the violent extremists of the world reside in your territory.

Ahmadinejad states that Iran having nuclear capabilities would give it more respect from the rest of the world. Sadly enough, this is plausible. It is also unlikely that Iran would find themselves in a situation where they themselves would use a nuke, and I do not believe that there is any way that he would allow terrorists to take hold of something like a nuke, since his interests do not lie close enough to that of the terrorists.

On the other hand, there is no guaranteeing that Iran having a nuclear program would prevent any kind of military interactions between Iran and the United States, and if this were to happen, it would be for the United States’ best interest for them not to have the capabilities. It is not as much that we would have to worry about nukes getting dropped on us as much as the loss of leverage that such a situation would present.

This could keep going back and forth as such forever, though it is impossible to know what Ahmadinejadng’s intentions are. However, one important thing to remember is that Iran is much more civilized a place than Iraq, meaning that you can assume that they would do anything to avoid facing a military force like the United States. Most probably, Ahmadinejadng is just trying to gain sympathy and to have other civilized nations view Iran as their peer. He is also taking advantage of the United States’ current position - the unpopular-everywhere Iraq war is still going on, and we still have the diplomatic liability George Bush in office. It is the perfect time for Ahmadinejadng to try and gain leverage. Nevertheless, we’ll only really know the situation once Bush leaves office.

New polls show McCain to hold 42% of pet owners’ votes, with Obama getting only 37%.  There are many potential reasons for this discrepancy - different races, socioeconomic classes, and residents of cities compared to rural or suburban areas - though why should any of this even be worthy of consideration?

I would not have a problem with pointless statistics like these, as they are somewhat interesting, I guess, but some of the quotes from pet owners as to what McCain having several pets in his household means are…..disturbing.  Take these examples:

“I think a person who owns a pet is a more compassionate person — caring, giving, trustworthy. I like pet owners.”

Having a pet “tells you that they’re responsible at least for something, for the care of something.”

And Obama has two daughters………………………………………………………

Do people really believe these things about pe

t owners?  Or is the media just creating something out of some very specific responses?

McCain owning pets probably only impacts the retirement age crowd, and those that are single, but of an age where most other people are married.  Pets play a bigger role for these people because of the elevated necessity for dependable companionship.  Sure enough, the two quotes are from “a retired stay-at-home wife” and a 79 year old man from Washington whose dog had recently passed.

I don’t have a problem with anybody having pets, I just can’t believe that anybody would commend McCain for his animals, yet not also mention that fact that he has raised seven (!) children.  If anything, Obama would deserve extra points for currently “caring” and being “responsible” for two living children, that both come from a single marriage.

Souce - http://news.yahoo.com/page/election-2008-political-pulse-pets-and-politics

Links to the op-eds:

Obama’s Piece

McCain’s Piece

why Shipley would not publish McCain’s piece:

Shipley’s response

When I first read the two pieces and NYT opinion editor David Shipley’s reason for not publishing McCain’s op-ed, it just seemed to me like a couple children were bullying and teaming up against the old guy that still thought he could hang out with the kids without anybody finding it weird……then i read each thing a couple more times. Now I still think that Shipley and Obama are kind of smug bastards, but the kind that I can agree with, while McCain is still old and weird.

It just seemed very shady to me that the NYT editor refused McCain’s piece but approved Obama’s, and while it still does seem that way to me (for obvious reasons), McCain’s piece kind of is just crap. He does not say anything new, just the same old anti-liberal, pro WINNING rants. He never gets into implications of the United States initiating a war that most people (in the world…….) agree that they should not have initiated, and then just being concerned about winning, though having winning purely be what’s best for the United States. The thing is, Iraq was at least stable under Hussein, which is a bizarre thing to say, but it is true, not to mention that Hussein was our ally again Iran. So, we got involved in a war that we can admit we should not have, but instead of stopping, we just try and get back to the situation that we had before the US screwed things up.

Oh, and not to mention that $5000 per second that is being spent, and the 4000+ American casualties, and the 1,000,000+ Iraqi casualties.

And after McCain was rejected, he refused to resubmit the piece. A spokesperson for McCain said that McCain’s stance on Iraq “will not change based on politics or the demands of the New York Times,” which brings up a few more questions, namely, HOW DOES ASKING FOR CLARIFICATION MEAN ASKING FOR A CHANGE IN POLICY? That alone exemplifies McCain’s inability to justify himself.

On the other hand, Obama did lay out some new groundwork for what to do in Iraq. Given the recent comments by Iraqi officials, his approach just seems to make much more sense, if not purely for the reasonable withdrawal facets. He also speaks of things like Afghanistan and Pakistan, which McCain conveniently ignored. And there is the interesting aspect of piece actually involving a PLAN…..other than just repeating how badly Americans love to win.

This is a war that has been going on for far too long, and people really need to consider what winning means to them, especially when it involves life and death. I do not understand how McCain just redundantly speaks of winning, without speaking of the repercussions of the United States “winning” a war that they never should have began in the first place……not to mention that a United States, Britain, Australia, Italy, etc. partnership sure as hell better be able to win against Iraq. I hope that after we win, McCain has a long, satisfying patting of his own back.

Before anything else, I’ll say that it is completely absurd to feel like you trust any politician, especially one that has achieved enough to be considered presidential material. Yet there is still so much talk about whether or not America can trust Obama, and absurd questions like if he’s a Muslim, and does him not owning any animals make him irresponsible (see the details about the animals comment here….anybody else find this frightening?).

Of course we can’t trust him. Just think about the kind of power he has right now - he’s worshiped by people, in the United States and abroad, he has million upon millions of dollars at his expense, and he has a team of individuals devoted to making him look as good as possible. I believe that power does not always corrupt, but it usually does, and there’s no way of telling what the situation is with Obama.

However, his record is very consistent…..for a politician, anyway. He has maintained his values from when he worked as a community organizer, and he does not shy away from taking more moderate or conservative approaches on some issues. You compare this to McCain and his sudden boost in conservatism, or Clinton and her complete lack of standards, and Obama does come out looking pretty good.

But still, there is the whole Wright ordeal. Yes, Wright is a bit extreme, though he is also very calculating in how he handled the situation with Obama, and he put Obama in an impossible situation. There was no possible way that Obama could justify the “GodDAMN America!” clip that everybody in the country has seen at least ten times. Sure, he started to change his view after that, but the alternative was trying to explain the reasoning behind Wright saying all that he did,but this would never work - an American seeing a black man saying things that can be conveniently edited down to be even more scary than it originally was is so terrifying for America that it makes people unable to think. Therefore, for the sake of his political aspirations, he had to denounce him. I’m not saying that he agreed or disagreed with what Wright said ( not that some degree of agreement would be bad) because it is impossible to know.

Obama makes sense when he speaks, and it is extremely believable that what he says is what he believes - either that or he has found a brilliant political scheme. It’s just completely ludicrous that people are lamenting on how Obama can not be treated…..honestly, get into reality.