Economics and Annoying Smart Guys

This is a nice explanation in laymen terms about how we should approach economics and voting.

more about “Economics and Annoying Smart Guys“, posted with vodpod

Barack Obama is making an unbeliever out of me

Now that he’s the undisputed nominee for the Democratic Party and is free to just do his normal campaign of “Change,” Obama is becoming more politicized and is playing “the game” he was overly opposed to before.  This brings me great sadness as I was starting to truly believe in his cause.

The first shift in my opinion came when Congress passed a compromise of the original FISA bill that was originally rejected in the House earlier this year.  After this came to pass, Obama spoke on it and endorsed this act, which gives the phone companies retroactive immunity to the illegal wire-tapping that has happened across this country under the Bush Administration.  In doing this, crimes go unpunished, government stays corrupted and reform initiatives are once again stifled.

This in itself isn’t what made me really start to lose faith.  Yeah it angered me but the real kicker is the spin he tries to evoke when he adds to his explanation:

“It restores FISA and existing criminal wiretap statutes as the exclusive means to conduct surveillance — making it clear that the President cannot circumvent the law and disregard the civil liberties of the American people. It also firmly re-establishes basic judicial oversight over all domestic surveillance in the future. It does, however, grant retroactive immunity, and I will work in the Senate to remove this provision so that we can seek full accountability for past offenses.”

In other words, yeah the bad guys will get away this time, but under me things will get better and I’ll be the good sheriff in town.  This is especially frustrating as he acknowledges that, as cited in TPM Election Central, “last year I opposed the so-called Protect America Act, which expanded the surveillance powers of the government without sufficient independent oversight to protect the privacy and civil liberties of innocent Americans.”

The most recent action Obama has taken that has ruffled my feathers is his pledge to support Bush’s faith-based initiatives and add an extra $500 million dollars to this program.  Let’s first focus on the fact that this vehemently goes against the U.S. Constitutions policies of separation of Church and State.  The whole first amendment makes it clear that this is a country of religious tolerance and a freedom to express any point of view; furthermore, it separates religion from government so that it gives equal and fair representation to all without anyone being persecuted for their beliefs or lack thereof.

When Bush started his faith-based initiatives, it was enacted to give an unbalance of representation and governmental power to a select group of people, mainly the evangelical sect of Christian believers in this country.  This action has helped the Republican party dominate the government for the past eight years.  It is also powerful pandering tool.

Now I understand the political reasoning behind Obama’s motives.  He is unfairly being labelled a Muslim in some media outlets, which causes a push-button effect of linking Obama to terrorists.  When that isn’t being done Barack Obama is linked to “radical” christian leader Reverend Wright.  By endorsing Bush’s faith-based initiatives, he’s trying to curb the conservative Christian vote that isn’t too keen on McCain as their representative.  A brilliant political move for sure, but it’s a cynical cold-calculating move that goes against Obama’s campaign of “Change” and not using the “old-style” politics of Washington.

Jennifer Loven, Associated Press Writer, also states that Barack Obama, “proposes allowing religious institutions to hire and fire based on religion only in the non-taxpayer-funded portions of their activities — consistent with current federal, state and local laws.” This again, goes against the First Amendment which prevents these types of discrimination, regardless of what type of loop-holes you try to create for them to take effect.

With these two grievances that I have with Barack Obama, I cannot help but think jaded-thoughts of politics as usual.  Political Podcaster Dan Carlin said it best, in one of his recent podcasts, when he explains how the word “change” is a funny word and how it can mean anything.  Not only that, but because Barack Obama initially has been very abstract in what his own definition of change is, hopefuls have been projecting their own definitions to his platform and thereby, or partly, bringing the popularity that Obama has received.  This is definitely true for me, as I naively thought that he would keep to his pledge to go against old-school politics and bring about real reform.  Now we’re stuck once again, at least in my once again jaded opinion, with Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dumb.  And pundits wonder why every election year brings about a smaller voting turnout than American Idol.

Cool Mash-up video about Obama’s Nomination

I just came across this on the Ill Doctrine Blog and I thought I’d share this. I’m definitely inspired.

Clinton campaign is grasping for straws to slow down Obama’s momentum

After losing 8 primaries/caucuses in a row to Barack Obama, Clinton’s campaign is trying anything they can to slow down his momentum. They’re intensifying their fabrications of facts and financing more smear ads on television in hopes that voters will listen to their propaganda and lose the fire and inspiration that Obama has sparked in them. Today she has gone to a new low by trying to attack Obama’s strength, his words and speeches. Clinton’s campaign is accusing Obama of plagiarising his speech on Saturday night to a Wisconsin crowd by borrowing from a fellow supporter, and current governor of Massachusetts, Deval Patrick.

What Obama actually did was use the same famous sayings from former presidents, that Deval Patrick used in his own speech 2 years ago and made the same argument that powerful speeches aren’t just words. Not only that, but Deval Patrick had suggested Obama use these quotes and David Axelrod, who is currently running Obama’s campaign, ran Patrick’s campaign two years ago; therefore, Axelrod might’ve been the original influence behind the original use of these famous quotes. So the question is, when is plagiarism really plagiarism? I doubt using the same quotes that everyone knows and grasping the same universal meaning behind them counts.

Besides, Hillary Clinton is not only guilty of “stealing” speeches from her own husband but she also has taken slogans right out of Obama’s camp. Just another example of Clinton following the same old “Do as I say, not as I do” politics. She should really stop trying to point fingers of possible missteps that Obama may or may not have committed when she is guilty of the same transgressions.

Obama’s “plagiarism”:

One of Obama’s repeating slogans and Clinton’s plagiarism of it:

Everyone knows Obama’s “Yes We Can” slogan, well guess what:

Hillary Clinton really needs to look in the mirror.

 

Barack and his disappointing stance on gay marriages

As I went into my myspace account, for one of the last times, I noticed out of the corner of my eyes some videos called “Presidential Dialogues – Super Dialogue”. Needless to say my curiosity was piqued and I caught some videos about Obama’s stance on gay marriages. Now gay marriages isn’t really the biggest issue for me; however, this is a civil rights issue. Because of this, I found his answer very disappointing; especially, because he’s attempting to break the racial barrier and be the first black president of the United States yet, he won’t allow gays to be married. How perplexing is that?!

Sure he softens the blow by saying that he’ll do the best he can to make sure that “civil unions” of gay people have the same rights as that of a heterosexual marriage. He just won’t call it a marriage. I’m sorry but this type of compromising doesn’t bode well for the future and what his decisions might be on more serious and more controversial issues if he does end up winning the Presidency.

Down below are the myspace links to those videos so you can check them out yourselves:

Super Dialogue: Barack Obama – Part 4 of 10

Super Dialogue: Barack Obama – Part 6 of 10

Two days have passed but the Democrat’s delegate count continues to confound

With the exception of MSNBC (which still shows Obama up 838 to Clinton’s 834), it seems that the other websites now have new delegate counts. The NY Times originally showed the Associated Press’ delegate count on their homepage and their own delegate count. Now, the Associated Press’ numbers are nowhere to be found and their own count has spiked. Yesterday, they had Obama beating Clinton 34 to 21. Today, however, Clinton is now winning, with two sets of numbers. Her Feb. 5th numbers are up 667 to Obama’s 583 but now, it seems, they’re also using Super Delegates which balloons her lead to 892 over 716.

CNN originally had Clinton up 818 to 730 but now that has changed to 823 over 741. In case you weren’t confused enough, here are some other sites I forgot to mention before. Yahoo’s political dashboard shows Clinton at 830 delegates and Obama at 820. Fox News shows Clinton ahead 1,024 to Obama’s 933. Finally, Real Clear Politics, shows Clinton in the lead 1,060 to 981. I’m sure there are more numbers out there, but I don’t have the energy or the patience to delve into more baffling results.

So why is there still discrepancy to the delegate counts? Well, according to MSNBC, “Different news organizations make different delegate calls at different points along the process” and “some estimate what the candidates will get after the lengthy counting process has played itself out.”

However, the NY Times claim they use officially pledged numbers. If this is the case, how are their numbers higher than MSNBC, CNN and Yahoo? It made more sense yesterday when their numbers were drastically smaller. It doesn’t make sense that the other sites would keep official counts out of their estimated totals.

What is the lesson to all this? For me, it’s to vote for the person that best represents your cause and just be patient until the official candidate is delared at their respective Conventions.

Super Tuesday and Delegates and Super Delegates, oh my!

So I’ve been trying my best to follow the political races and I’m getting confused beyond all reason. According to MSNBC, Obama has 838 delegates to Clinton’s 834. However when I jump over to CNN, Clinton is up with 818 while Obama is down with 730. The Associated Press (found on the homepage of NY Times website) shows that Clinton is leading Obama in the delegate count 1,000 to 902; whereas, the NY Times’ actual count is showing Obama winning 34 to Clinton’s 21. Now why are the NY Times numbers so drastically smaller than everyone else’s you might ask? Well the reason is that, “the New YorkTimes counts only delegates that have been officially selected and are bound by their preferences.”

So what does this all mean? Heck if I know. The only constant, no matter the numbers, is that the Democratic race is a close one. Now the Republican side is a different story. There are some discrepancies with the numbers for the Republican on the websites I mentioned above as well; however, they all show McCain with a large majority. This doesn’t hold true for the Democrats because some sites show Obama winning, others show Clinton in the lead.