THEMCKAYPOST

Was Bush directly involved in decision to fire U.S. Atty.’s?

Everyone is talking about the mysterious 18 day gap in email activity regarding the planned firings of these attorneys, liking it to a cover up, but there just may be another explanation. It appears that GWB was out of town during this period, and emails between Harriet Miers and DOJ official Kyle Sampson would strongly indicate they were waiting for the “Green light” from the “boss”.

The emails are a little small in this post, but they are completely readable.

See the story from CREW.

Big sister

In case you have not seen it yet, here is the video everyone is talking about. Actually you could put any conventional politician on the screen. The message, which was produced by an organization supporting Obama, is that we are not going to blindly follow the rhetoric put out by politicians of the past. It's time for fresh thinking and fresh blood, and in that sense, it is a pretty good ad!

Click to view via YouTube

An update to yesterdays post

Yesterday I posted about comments that were made by the Presidents mother, Barbara Bush. I came upon these comments at AmericaBlog, and because of the way they were presented, I had the impression that these comments were made sometime after engagement in the war had begun, if not fairly recently. This turns out not to be the case. Her comments were made before the invasion actually took place. I think America blog has a responsibility to make mention of this, but they did not. Kind of sneaky if you ask me, and one reason political blogs on both sides are often criticized by many as being extremely biased and of twisting or manipulating the truth. Something our politicians, and certainly our current administration does, but this is not something that I want to be a part of. Of course some of the blame falls on me, as I point out in the comments to yesterdays post, I should have done a little more research and checked the facts before posting about this. If I want this to be a different kind of political blog, one that will be read by people on both sides of the issues, then I have to make sure it is accurate and fair, and not representative of a single point of view. I also have to make sure that I don’t engage in the same sort of deceptions or fact manipulation that I personally dislike and criticize.

Thanks to Andy Swan for pointing out the facts which I so carelessly missed.

That said, I still have trouble with Mrs. Bush’s comments. We all knew there would be those who would be killed and wounded, and we should be thinking about that, and the price we were about to pay before going in. Questions should be asked, such as do our troops have the proper armor to protect themselves (we learned that for a very long time they did not), is there a better way to do this (oust Saddam) with less risk and cost?, etc., etc. These questions were not asked, and will never be asked if our president adopted his mothers attitude, which, by all appearances he did, and continues to do.

I have trouble with the media blackout imposed upon our returning casualties by the bush administration. This is another form of manipulation, and it directly correlates to the comments Mrs. Bush made. It is the prevailing attitude in the White House. That attitude may have been present long before we went to war, but it is obviously alive and well today.

A mothers words of wisdom, and a quote from Barbara Bush

I once wrote about how my wonderful Mother used to take me to Canada (just across the Detroit River from where we lived). She was a single mom who divorced my dad when I was a baby and did so for good reasons. My Mother made a point of explaining that we were in a foreign country, and of telling me what it meant to be an American citizen. She taught me many important lessons when I was young, lessons that I have carried with me all my life. Most parents do this, and even when their children rebel against them and there ideas, they usually take with them in their journey through life, at least a fraction of what their parents were when they were growing up. One of the things she taught me was a deep respect for humanity, and for human as well as all animal life. Everyone is precious and unique, with their own capabilities and potential, and we should treat everyone as we would want to be treated. These were not just words to me. Even at a very young age I understood what this meant because in addition to saying these things, my Mother taught them by example. She practiced what she preached, and now I thank her often for helping me to become the person I am today.

Here is a short quote from an interview Diane Sawyer did with Barbara Bush that I came upon at AmericaBlog 

It is no wonder to me at all that GWB, by his own admission, sleeps very well at night.

McCain stumbles on HIV prevention

In an interview while traveling in his campaign bus, Senator John McCain admitted he was stumped when asked if he thought the use of condoms helps prevent the spread of HIV. He also said he favors promoting abstinence and is against educational programs that incorporate teaching students about the health benefits of using condoms.

OK, on the surface we can all agree that we don’t want our younger teenagers going out and having sex, but it does happen, even in the best of neighborhoods, and among the most conservatively raised kids. This is a fact of life. At these ages, hormones are raging, and in some cases young people will succumb to their biological urges despite the best upbringing, and having the most loving, concerned and well educated parents. It still happens sometimes. It happens to preacher’s kids, and doctor’s kids, and evangelical’s kids, and upper middle class kids. It always has, and it always will.

That said, what about all the kids in the inner cities (our inner cities are full of young pregnant teens), or impoverished rural areas who don’t have the benefit of parents who are educated in these matters? What about the kids being raised by the types that appear on shows like Jerry Springer? These kids are bound to have less ability to use good judgment and exercise self control for many reasons, and are much less likely to get the loving support, and sound, well explained advice than those who come from better educated families. These kids need to get their education in these matters from the school systems, because they aren’t getting it anywhere else.

I am not a McCain fan, and never was for reasons I will explain in a future post. He is a war hero. He deserves respect for that, but this does not qualify him to be either a U.S. Senator, or the President of the United States. Not by a long shot.

Read the full article in the New York Times

Triangulating politics, and the coming together of minds.

Triangulation is the process of determining the distance from one point in space to another using geometry and trigonometry, when physically measuring these distances is impossible.

In politics it has another meaning, but I don’t think this is a good formula for achieving what is best for us, and our country.

I have a different take on how triangulation should relate to politics, but first, for those unfamiliar, below is an illustration of how triangulation (in geometry, and trigonometry) works:

When you get down to brass tacks, most of us are really interested in achieving the same things in the long run (with the exception of the fringes, the psychopathically greedy, the morality police, and other such fanatics on both sides of the Isle, and the coin), we simply prefer to take different roads, and perhaps different vehicles to get us where we both want to go.

Looking at the model above, and keeping in mind that the goal is to determine the distance (d?), applying the principles of triangulation to the political arena, should, in my view, draw us closer together, and closer to the answer to the equation. For that however, we would need to put aside (only slightly) those attributes that make us all human, egotistical, vulnerable, passionate, passive, and fragile in the complected, multi faceted aspects of our lives. Emotions (none of which are bad, and in moderation are actually very good, and necessary for a healthy existence) that we all thrive on.

It is a paradox for sure. Those vary things that emanate in our brainstem, and give us the gifts of emotions such as love, ambition, perseverance, fear, and the survival instinct, also provide us with the path to being closed minded, stubborn, selfish, bullying, and greedy at all cost.

I think we can use the model triangulation presents to come closer together, to reach for similar, and mutually beneficial goals, and to understand one another better, but before we can do this, we have to overcome that nemesis in our brainstem that has plagued us in our modern days, but was a very important component to our survival in prehistoric times (like the once necessary, now obsolete organ we know as the Appendix).

I’m not saying we should strive to overcome love, (hell no, I am in love and wouldn't trade it for anything), the survival instinct, or our drive and ambition to succeed, and our desire to compete, and to win. No that’s not what I’m saying at all. I’m simply saying we need to recognize where these emotions emanate from, and occasionally set aside, or override the impulses that they evoke, when strategic alliances, and mutual concessions to those who disagree with us may result in a better outcome for all involved.

Triangulation in politics should be an approach, and a method to solving problems, rather than one of creating negative spin, and this may just be what our country needs right now, mandated by the voter, on both sides.

Montesquieu; French guru of American democracy

Montesquieu is especially relevant today in the U.S. debate over concentration of presidential power.

Read the article in the International Harold Tribune

What is she thinking?

I am all for developing alternative energy. I know there is more oil out there than we thought there was just a few years ago, and there are new high-tech methods available to extract it, but it is what consuming it does to the environment that worries me the most, and I am for developing clean, efficient alternatives. That said, there is a right way and a wrong way of going about this. I wrote previously about some of the pitfalls inherent in the production of corn ethanol (and point out some of the better alternatives). You can read about rising corn prices and the effect this is expected to have on the price of meat in the near future in this article from Yahoo! News.

We need to pursue the best alternatives available, and we need to use both the private sector, and government incentives to do this, but what we don’t need is for the government to seize big oil profits and mandate that this money be spent on alternative energy development, as Hillary Clinton suggests in this video I came upon thanks to Andy Swan.

Just what is she thinking?

It all goes out the window, when politics are involved

It’s so interesting to me, how so many good people, people with principles, people with passions, people with ideals, goals, and real desires to see a better world can’t seem to coagulate. It bothers me because we are fighting among ourselves, when there are so many larger issues at stake. Simple issues of right and wrong go out the window when politics are involved, because political ambitions override the inclination to “do the right thing”. The right thing becomes what is advantageous to the campaign, rather than the original cause that gave rise to the desire to run.

We are allowing the culture of politics as usual to grow. The smoke filled rooms of the 20's and 30's have been replaced by the well contrived Youtube videos, and quasi interactive and manipulated use of the Internet by those who seek our highest office. By our own complacency, we have become our own worst enemy. We have become the monster within the machine. We allow this. We agree, we accept, just like we did with the lies that have taken us on this path to war, and we shouldn't. We simply shouldn't!

I promised myself I wouldn’t go here, but…

Some recent developments have come to my attention and I have to share my thoughts on the matter.

So where did I promise myself I wouldn’t go? I was not going to go near the Ann Coulter thing. It was too “Hollywood” for me, and I really don’t like to bash people. It’s not my style. I will attack view points, and debate issues, but rarely do I get “personal”. I just don’t like doing it, and it’s unprofessional, but I will make an exception here. I never liked Coulter, even before the comments she made in her book about the 9/11 widows, she was just to much like nails on a chalk board, and it has always been obvious to me that her agenda was to promote Ann Coulter at any cost. The conservative movement just happened to be the conduit she decided to use to do this. I often wondered who really took her seriously because she often twisted facts, or even got them outright wrong. An aura of insincerity just seemed to hang in the air around her whenever I heard her speak, and the icing on the cake was her disgraceful comments regarding the 9/11 widows and their deceased husbands.

Well, it seems that the Age of Ann is finally coming to a close. Several news papers have dropped her column, and now a group of conservative bloggers has petitioned CPAC/ACU not to invite her back again, ever.

As I said, there are not to many people that I attack personally. In fact there are not too many people in whom I can’t find some redeeming qualities, even among those I don’t particularly like or agree with (it’s my nature to try and find the best in people, not the worst), but Ann Coulter would challenge even the most open minded and forgiving among us. The end of Ann in the media! It couldn’t happen to a more deserving person.

You can read the post about this, and an excerpt from the conservative bloggers petition at AmericaBlog.