PolSynth - Political Synthesis

Silence the pianos and with muffled drum,

Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead,


Scribbling in the sky the message He is Dead.

Farewell, Uncle Teddy. You were the best of us; our great hero.

Actions as well as words are a faithful barometer of the judgement that guides a person’s life. John Mccain’s words are full of reasons for us to make sure he never sets foot in the White House except as a visitor.

According to John McCain, General Petraeus travels Iraq in an unarmored vehicle(!). According to John McCain, he doesn’t know enough about the economy. According to John McCain, because of his ambition, he argued in favor of a statehouse flying the Confederate flag, even though he didn’t agree with it and felt it was offensive, in order to get votes.

Don’t believe those statements? Watch him say it all in his own words:

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Rapturous. Incomparable. Breathtaking. Once in a lifetime. I can find no more apropriate words to describe the sum total of the performances at the October 1st Jazz for Obama event in NYC.

Obama: Jazz man

I didn’t plan to write any of this but I just couldn’t keep this experience to myself.  Hank Jones, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Dianne Reeves, Roy Hargrove, Stanley Jordan, Roy Hanes, Jeff Tain Watts, Aaron Goldberg, Bilal, Edsel Gomez, Joe Lovano, Christian McBride, Brad Mehldau and so many others whose names I don’t have at hand but whose performances were stunning. It’s impopssible for mere words to fully capture the experience of such a signal event for a lover of Jazz. This assemblage of Jazz luminaries will most likely never happen again. I’m still in shock. The standing-ovations still seem too short. …Read More

One of the core issues facing the Congress in considering the passage of this bill is the need for there to be clear bi-partisan support for any plan. It is insufficient for any one party to comprise the passing majority with a bill of this magnitutue. …Read More

So, today’s befuddlingly stupid comment from the possible next VP, who didn’t know what the Vice President’s job was and wasn’t paying attention to Iraq in 2007 and seemed to think that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were government owned is that the economic bailout is about Healthcare reform. I kid you not. Here’s the video:

She is either a truly stupid, charming ideologue, or she’s simply experiencing a meltdown from being thrown into such a glaring spotlight.

So Obama contacted McCain, had a discussion, then McCain jumps in front of the media to say he’s cancelling his campaign. Seems like it was a surprise to Obama. Guess all’s fair in love and politics. 

Obama made some good points. First of all: a president needs to be able to do more than one thing at a time. Is McCain admitting here that he can’t multi-task? Makes me think McCain just realizes that he’s not ready to have a debate.

Hmmm…smells fishy to me. I think this is just another McCain stunt. His campaign is so bankrupt of substantive ideas that can stand the light of day that they have to resort to running from the campaign. McCain knows that if they have the debate this Friday they’ll need to discuss the economy and that’s not his strong suit. 
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So, to recap the last couple of weeks, our economy is in meltdown and the only way out of it is to empower Hank Paulson with $700 billion and unquestioned power for two years. Oh, did you miss that last part in the nightly news coverage of this bailout?

Here’s the fundamental threat to the Constitution that the nightly news really meant to address:

A key section of the bailout proposal reads as follows:

“Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.”

So, in case we were wondering what Paulson has in mind, here it is spelled out: our crisis is so deep and so urgent that we must act immediately and the actions taken can never be questioned, never held up to the light of day as regards legality. Seriously. …Read More

Is the McCain attack ad regarding sex education racist? I don’t know. Here’s what I do know:

My America has a long and bloody history of playing on deeply held myths and fears regarding non-mainstream ethnic groups, as blacks have been viewed for centuries. One fear (among others) pertains to black male sexuality. In the foundation and nurturing of America’s particular, and arguably dominant, “race” mythology, black men have been assigned several roles, one being that of sexual predator juxtaposed against the pure, wholesomeness of white womanhood. In short, the black man is cast as the despoiler of virtue, against which white manliness must contend by all means available. …Read More

It’s interesting to note that so many of us, instead of focusing on the many central, defining issues at stake in this election, seem more intent on dwelling on tabloid, sensationalist issues.

Shouldn’t we be actively steering the discourse to the range of topics that this country needs to address? How does the bitter, media-stoked bickering help us reach our goals of improving our country? Can we please stop playing into the hands of people who are intent on dividing us? …Read More