Dumbasses on both sides

Lately I’ve been taking a break from politics. I haven’t been watching the news, visiting the political web sites or listening to the talk shows all that much. It’s been a pleasant break. However, when I heard that Ted Kennedy was in the hospital I read the stories and visited some of the conservative web sites to see what kind of reaction conservatives had to the news. I’m not sure if it is because I’ve been staying away from these kinds of things lately or not but I was disturbed by the comments that some, so called, conservatives posted. Lots of people hoping Kennedy dies or is incapacitated enough to be forced to give up his seat. The thing is, these are probably the same self righteous, hypocritical bastards that throw a fit when they read similar comments about conservatives posted by their liberal counterparts at sites like Democratic Underground or Huffington Report. These people are as much an embarrassment to conservatism as the nut jobs on the left are to liberalism.

Now, I’m not a fan of Kennedy in any way, shape or form. I think the man’s political beliefs are the total opposite of what the founding fathers intended for this country. I don’t like his political game playing or underhanded techniques. There’s a lot of things I don’t like about the man. Still. I don’t want him dead and I hope he fully recovers from his illness. Politics isn’t important enough to wish anyone dead just because they’re on the opposite side.

When it comes to people like Kennedy, Michael Moore, Obama and moonbats in general, I’ll make fun of their ideas and may even poke fun at them as people but I  hope each has a long, healthy, happy life and die peacefully in their sleep. That’s what conservatives are all about, wanting the best for everyone, even those we don’t like. Besides, the longer they live, the more time we have to show them just how wrong they really are.

A lot of hardcore conservatives have gotten it so wrong. Rather than doing what is right, they take great pride in just doing the opposite of what liberals believe just so they can piss them off. Liberal want us to conserve gas, they take pride in owning a big honkin’ SUV. Liberal want clean water, they want to pee in a river. Yeah, it makes no sense but that is what some people believe it means to be a conservative.

Real conservatives want the same things liberals want but they approach problems from different angles. When it comes to things like energy, the liberals , like that dufuss Obama want you to set your thermostat higher in the summer and lower in the winter. Their answer is to cut back. Conservatives say develop new technologies to overcome the problem. Rather than cut back, let’s make energy abundant for everyone. When it comes to pollution, liberals want to make laws to force companies to reduce  emissions. Conservatives want to reward companies that come up with new ways to run cleaner. For health care the left wants to tax us into oblivion so the government can provide us with it. Conservatives want to make it so everyone can afford to get it on their own. Same problems, different solutions. No country ever made progress by going backwards.

Ok, I kind of strayed off my original post a bit. The point of it is that it doesn’t matter if you’re hardcore left or right, if you take joy in someone dying just because you don’t like their politics you’re a jerk. If you disagree with me then you are worse than Hitler.

I stole that last line from Greg Gutfeld , the host of my new, favorite nighttime news show Red Eye on Fox News Channel. 

The sport of politics

 

Politics is an odd animal. It used to be the way a country decided to run itself. A noble, worthwhile endeavor for the most part.

It consisted of two or more sides with differing ideas as to the direction a country should take. What policies should be put into place. How much you were going to be taxed and how those taxes were going to be used. How much or how little the government should be involved in the day to day life of its citizens. Things like that.

 The different sides would present their ideas, explaining why their ideas were good and the other side’s ideas were not so good. The public would listen and, after deciding who they thought was going to screw them over the least, cast their vote. Sometimes they made a good choice, sometimes a bad choice. The great thing about this system is that when people felt they made a bad choice, they could attempt to fix the problem a few years later by voting the bums out and voting a new bunch of bums in.

A simple enough system that worked great for a long time.

These days, however, elections treated less like a political process and more like a sporting event. Gone are the days when most people, actually, listened to the candidates. In today’s world, people pick a team(read political party). It doesn’t matter what players the teams decide to put on the field, the loyal fans or voter base if you will, cheer them on even if they stink on ice.

Politics isn’t as much about who has the better idea as it is whether the candidate is a Republican or Democrat. Oh, the fans of either side will tell you that it is more than just that. They will tell you that the party they support represents what they believe is best for the country. That the candidates of their party represent ideals that they believe in. This is, of course, a fib.

It really doesn’t matter who the parties run in an election, a good portion of voters will vote for their candidate for one reason and one reason only. So the other side doesn’t win. Their party could run a Snickers bar for office and people would vote for the tasty confectionery treat because it has to be a better choice than what the other side has to offer.

Now, of course, most of these people will deny that it’s as simple as that. They’re voting on principle. Really? Then why is John McCain leading the polls at this point. He’s leading both Clinton and Obama. If the election were held today he would probably win. That means a whole lot of conservatives would be voting for him. Conservatives voting for McCain? John McCain is not a conservative. He even considered switching parties at one point. Conservatives, tell me with a straight face that you and John McCain are on the same page. That he represents what you believe. “But he’ll be strong on the war”. Yeah, and? “Ummmm, did I, already, say he’d would be strong on the war? Besides, if Clinton or Obama wins, they’ll ruin the country. We need a Republican”. Ah ha!

Of course, the Democrats aren’t any better. Barack Obama is winning their primary elections? Barack freakin’ Obama? He has a whole lot of people supporting him that have, absolutely, no idea why. Ask an Obama supporter why he/she is supporting him and you’ll get the answer “Well, he’s for change”. Really? What kind of change? “You know….change change”. But what does he want to change? Not all change is good you know. “Yeah, I know that but he’s for good change. Not bad change…… good change…………..Hey! He’s for Universal Health Care. That’s a good thing. Free health care”. Well, not exactly free. You’ll be paying for it in higher taxes. “Huh? What? He’s for change I tell ya”. So, you’re supporting a guy just because he says he’s for change even though you have no idea what kind of change he means? “Yep. Besides, we can’t let the Republicans stay in office. They’ll ruin the country. We need a Democrat”. Gotcha!

The truth is that the Republicans could run Hitler and the Democrats run Stalin in an election and there would be party loyalist who would argue over who had the better candidate. The Republicans would say that Hitler only killed seven million people while Stalin killed twenty million. The Democrats would respond that Stalin offered Universal Health Care for all the people he didn’t kill so he is a better choice.

Yes, politics is a sport. We want our side to win at any cost. If we lose it can only be because the other side cheated. They stole the election. There was voter fraud or any other reason we can think of to help us sleep better at night. Because, as we all know, it can’t be that some people listened to the candidates and thought about their choice. No, if they voted for the other side or, god forbid, they voted for a third party candidate, they must just be stupid.

 

As a side note. I just wanted to mention something about Rush Limbaugh. I used to have a lot of respect for him. However, his Operation Chaos is about as anti-American as you can get. Rather than letting the political process operate the way it was intended. You know, let the Democrats and Republicans pick their candidate and then run them against each other. He is attempting to mess with the primaries by having Republicans vote in the Democratic primaries. He is having them cast their votes for Hillary Clinton in order to have an effect on who the Democratic candidate is. Even if it has zero effect on the outcome, just attempting it is disgusting. Is this the kind of thing the founding fathers would have approved of? Do you think this is the way they intended the election process to work? I may be wrong but I don’t think so. I really, really don’t like Obama but if he is the candidates the Democrats choose then so be it. That is their right and anyone who attempts to interfere with the process is a fool and does not respect the ideals this country was founded on. This just makes me want to take a rolled up newspaper and hit him on the nose while waving my finger and saying “Bad Rush, Bad Rush”.