February 01, 2006

Politics: A Bit of SOTU Housecleaning

*Sigh*

After the State of the Union Address and the astoundingly feeble response by Tim Kaine (who?), I can't imagine anyone calling the U.S. Government a "two-party system" anymore. The Democrats are a real party like Vichy France was an independent government. If you look closely, you can see Kaine forgot to remove his kneepads from when he was under the podium during Bush's speech...

(Here's a brief visual history of Bush's SOTU addresses.)

Some people have said that when other countries critisize the United States, it's out of jealousy: partially, I think that's true, but it's a small part jealousy mixed with a healthy dose of frustration. Imagine having an older brother who's brilliant, talented and charismatic; loaded with virtues and skills and abilities who could be anything he wanted to be from a world-class athlete or brilliant scientist or revloutionary engineer or visionary leader or human rights champion.

Wouldn't you be disappointed when they ended up being a small-time thug and a loan shark?

Can it really be that this petty sociopath is in the most powerful office on Earth? Not only is it a question of how did it happen, but why is it still happening?

One famous quote is this: "The price of freedom is eternal viligance." This is occasionally used to imply that the army needs to be bigger, or that the political will must be there to use it (as was it's original intent), but it's now used to justify spying on civillians to the tune of overwhelming the FBI with so many recordings that it they will never actually be able to hear them all. It doesn't seem to occur to anyone that democracy - the idea itself - also needs it's defenders.

The administration lies about needing quicker access to wiretaps, and that's apparently okay.
They plant stories with reporters (or create fake stories themselves), and that's okay, too.
They plant fake reporters in White House Press briefings, and it gets a chuckle.
They apply pressure on scientists to report what they want to hear, not what's happening, and there's nary a shrug.
When female American soldiers die of dehydration because they're afraid to go to the bathroom at night due to sexual assaults, no one really cares.
There is clear evidence of election fraud, which is treason of the highest order by any definition of the word, and it's shied away from.
Several people retire/are retired from the White House and write books on just how disfunctional the new government is; must be a coincidence.
The former Homeland Security Chief openly admits that scare tactics were used as a politcal weapon, but that doesn't count.
A massively underqualified political appointee actually has to do his job and not only fails spectacularly but is congratulated for doing so, but that's just one of those things.

In other news from the same folks:

Iraq was going to pay for itself.
The U.S. Army would be greeted as liberators.
Gas and oil prices are only going up so much because of the war and Katrina's damage to rigs in the Gulf Coast.

And from the Leader himself, on just one subject:

"I want justice [...] [Osama bin Laden is] Wanted, dead or alive."
-September 17, 2001
"We're going to get him."
December 12, 2001
"I am truly not that concerned about him."
-March 13, 2002
"We're at war [...] Osama bin Laden made that clear the other day, and I take his words very seriously."
-Last week.

Any of these, all on their own, should be enough to cause a major scandal. They didn't.
Must be that liberal media.

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posted by Thursday at 10:26 am

3 Comments:

Blogger Wise G said...

Did you watch the democratic response? It was pretty sad, they went with some moderate from Virginia who came across as a smarmy wimp. I'm afraid the republicans might be in power for a long time to come.

4:04 pm  
Blogger Thursday said...

Yeah, that's Kaine. Why on Earth they're trying for reconciliation with a party who's leader is so massively unpopular is simply beyond me.

I haven't even bothered with all the insider trading, vote buying, industry connections with no-bid contracts, etc.

Should be a slam dunk, and the Democrats just stand there dribbling...

9:03 pm  
Blogger RossK said...

That Vichy thing......

And how did things turn out for them anyway?

Yikes.

9:50 pm  

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