Tag Archives: political extremism

when politics gives me pause

Posted on by

Octorara School District. It’s way out there in Chester County. And something I am struggling with is one of the candidates there and it’s not because of them per se or that I know them personally as I do not, it’s because of what their day job is and I don’t see how you can be a politician and a police officer.

And truthfully, I never would’ve paid attention, except their candidates page seems to be using the day job as a marketing tool for the political campaign, and I’m just not sure how that sits with me.

I’ve had family in law-enforcement over the years. I’ve had many friends in law-enforcement. Many of them had businesses on the side and side gigs but none of those side gigs involved being an elected official and a school board member is an elected official. A school board member is a politician.

And this one seems tied up with that contrarian person and their litigation if not formerly but by association? And then it seems like somebody sending weird letters to the contrarian person and I guess the police/ school board guy and why would somebody do that? That is WRONG no matter what you think of their politics. Doesn’t whomever get those things are always found out? And then you wonder, is it a political tactic that those letters are happening or is it somebody really doing something bad? Either way, it’s horrible and it’s wrong. These people have families.

I guess what I’m also asking is this anonymous letter thing is psycho by design? I’ve actually been the victim of things like this in the past and I remember when the postal inspectors came to pick up the questionable mail back then. What was sent to me went through all sorts of tests at I believe, a federal lab. It was no joke. These things are taken quite seriously and investigated thoroughly.

I am not now, and never have been anti-police, but it gives me pause in this situation when I stop to wonder how does their belief system affect their work potentially? I’m sorry if anyone thinks I think too much, but how do you not think about this?

I just don’t see how you can be both a politician and an officer of the law. I just don’t. I would also note what else gives me pause is this is someone who is also endorsed by Klanned Karenhood.

Anyone endorsed by that Stepford Wives for Totalitarianism you have to look twice at no matter what your politics are because the only way we’re going to get anything done in this area, in this county, in this country, in our individual municipalities and school districts is if we find a way to meet in the middle and those people aren’t about meeting in the middle. And the largest objection I have for them is they are based out of Florida they are NOT a group that is from Pennsylvania, these are people from outside our state, wanting to mess with where we call home and I think that’s wrong. They are an extremism group by their very nature aren’t they?

So there now to all of these candidates who wonder why I have such a problem with these endorsements understand why, even though they should be intelligent enough to already know why.

Anyway, if anyone has thoughts on the topic, I’d be willing to hear them. If anyone attacks me for posting this, I will file a police report.

I am asking legitimate questions I am not slamming anyone. But at the end of the day my feeling remains the same: police officer by day, and politician by night doesn’t work. Also, how do we know night job doesn’t bleed into day job?

Sign me pondering. Thanks for stopping by.

political apathy.

Posted on by

There are some mornings you just think you should go back to be and start the day over.  This morning is one of those mornings. No Mitt Romney, today is not a good day for America.

Mitt Romney just picked his running mate.  Actually social media leaked it out a few hours ago, while mainstream media is hawking it as breaking news.

It’s not breaking news, it’s bad news.  Mitt Romney has chosen his running mate and he might as well have chosen Sarah Palin. He has chosen Congressman Paul Ryan. 

It is official, the politics of extremism will be running the elections in the U.S. this November.  Sign me one frustrated Republican.  Romney, like Obama, panders to small factions, pockets of extremism.  Like Obama, he does not speak to the average, nor majority of Americans.

The majority of Americans are in the middle, they try to belong to a political party and are trying to desperately believe in  anything and anyone, yet both political parties worship at the extreme sides of their respective parties, leaving little in reality for the Average American to grasp or hold onto.  Let alone believe in. Is the United States becoming a rudderless political ship steered by warring extremist political factions?

This choice by Romney makes me like a woman without a country. There is NO place in this election for voters in the middle of either party.  And Paul Ryan certainly won’t respect my right to choose as a woman.  And I am not saying what my choices are incidentally, only a Romney-Ryan ticket might as well have me proverbially speaking being barefoot, pregnant, and in the kitchen. And silent.

Obama has done nothing for me, and truthfully what has Obama done for the majority of Americans?  The answer is nothing. He has been four long years of BTLA – big talk little action.  He’s good at talking, but while he is fiscally fine, can you say that for the majority of people in this country?  What is so fabulous about what he has done with healthcare? Has he reformed the actual healthcare companies? Look at bibles of wasted money like the largely uninterpreted Dodd-Frank Act?  Has there been sensible Wall Street  reform with rules people can actually follow?  Or has it merely given the Securities and Exchange Commission a bigger bully stick that comes complete with selective enforcement versus creating a better system through rule making that can actually work and not just grow their workforce?

Our country is an economic cesspool and the problems that existed four years ago, still exist today, only worse.  We might as well be in a depression.

Romney unfortunately is in that class of super rich who are out of touch with reality.  And his running mate is too extreme.  Ryan’s policies are too extreme and would punish everyone in this country except the infamous top 2%.

So where does that leave the rest of us?  We are not better off.   If anything, the Average American is more pissed off.

Romney’s Palin for Decision 2012 (Paul Ryan) may just hand the election back to Obama.  So I guess we had all better hope Obama can actually do something to benefit all not just select factions the next four years, hadn’t we?

I am so tired of the politics of extremism in this country, that I truly might not vote this November.  I have never said that, never done that.  I was going to volunteer at my new poll.  Why bother?

Sign me disgusted by American politics, and if Romney had chosen more wisely and chosen someone like Tim Pawlenty this might be a very different blog post.

But what do I know from American politics?  I am not of a religion that believes in magic underwear, after all.

The Wall Street Journal has some Ryan sound bytes:

WSJ: Paul Ryan Excerpts: ‘We Can Turn This Thing Around’

August 11, 2012, 8:42 AM

“I represent a part of America that includes inner cities, rural areas, suburbs and factory towns.”

Dude, you don’t represent me or my part of the country and the USA is pretty darn large.  Wisconsin is not representative of who I am as a Pennsylvanian.

REUTERS: Romney campaign confirms Paul Ryan as running mate

By Steve Holland

NORFOLK, Virginia |         Sat Aug 11, 2012 8:08am EDT

NORFOLK, Virginia (Reuters) – Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has picked Congressman Paul Ryan as his vice presidential running mate, the Romney campaign confirmed on Saturday.

“Mitt’s choice for VP is Paul Ryan. Spread the word about America’s comeback team,” a Romney campaign mobile phone application said, confirming widespread reports he had selected the 42-year-old Wisconsin lawmaker who chairs the U.S. House of Representatives Budget Committee…..

Conservative leaders, increasingly anxious over the state of Romney’s campaign, had urged him to pass over reliable – but not particularly inspiring – figures such as Ohio Senator Rob Portman and former Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty, and instead go for Ryan.

The Wisconsin congressman is a favorite of the conservative Tea Party, an anti-tax, limited-government movement that helped Republicans take over the U.S. House of Representatives in 2010.

But Ryan’s selection immediately draws attention to a budget plan he proposed as House budget chairman that would include controversial cuts in government health programs for the elderly and poor…..

By choosing Ryan, Romney effectively adopts the Ryan budget, which includes proposed cuts to Medicare, the healthcare program for the elderly, long considered to be politically taboo.

Ryan would set up a voucher-like system for the program to help beneficiaries buy private health insurance or give them access to the traditional fee-for-service plan.

Another controversial portion of Ryan’s budget is a plan to reduce the cost of Medicaid, the federally backed healthcare plan for the poor, by turning it into a block grant program for states.

Several Democrats have said that among the potential running mates for Romney, Ryan was the one they would most like to face because of his budget proposals.

And d’oh Romney just did his speech and goofed – he just asked people to welcome the next “President” of the United States and then had to correct himself.   Well every campaign needs a Sarah Palin and Dan Quayle. Ironically, Obama did the same thing when introducing Biden.

Also check out The New Yorker on this.

August  9, 2012
Posted by

As you may have noticed, I’ve largely avoided speculating about Mitt Romney’s  choice of a running mate. That’s partly because I don’t have any inside  information and partly because of something I learned back in 1988, when I was a  young whippersnapper covering the Presidential election for the Sunday  Times of London. At the Republican convention, in New Orleans,  Vice-President George H. W. Bush stunned almost everybody by picking Dan Quayle,  a young senator from Indiana, as his running mate.

After a string of gaffes on Quayle’s part, following questions being raised  about his résumé and lack of experience, the Bush campaign sent in the heavies  to shore him up: James Baker and Roger Ailes….Quayle was irrelevant….In 2008, Sarah Palin reprised the role of clueless running mate, providing the  press corps with even more entertainment than Quayle had done twenty years  earlier. But Palin, like Quayle, didn’t have much, if any, impact on the result.  By the middle of August, before John McCain announced his choice of Veep  candidate, Barack Obama was already holding a steady lead in the polls, which he never relinquished….

Now there’s another veepstakes, with speculation that an announcement of the  candidate’s name could come as early as today. Rather than trying to make  predictions, it may be more productive to assess what Romney’s choice might  mean…..But my hopes would be tempered by the memory of Quayle, Palin, and all the other  Veep candidates who garnered acres of newsprint and didn’t count for much on  Election Day. In fact, here’s a challenge: Can anybody think of a running mate  who made a substantial difference?

I am not a Tea Partier and I am not a Democrat.  There is no place for me in this election as a voter.  It also makes me wonder where there is a place for average Americans in American politics at all.  Paul Ryan is not a choice. He’s more political extremism.

The politics of extremism will ruin this country if we are not careful.