I didn’t know “co-opting” and “increasing” were synonyms.

Wow, do you really believe that? It really, really sounds like a bunch of crap. I mean really.

For the record, I don’t beleive it. In 2000 I thought “compassionate” consevatism was just a ruse to get elected, after which Bush would fulfill the Contract with American promises of abolishing departements like Energy, Education and Commerce, not double their budgets! It wasn’t a ruse. I’ll give Bush credit for one thing: he’s honsest. When he talked about spending more tax-payer money he meant it.

As happy as I am to have the Democrats defeated and the Europeans contemplating suicide, my happiness is much subdued becasue Big Government is here to stay.

George W. Bush most certainly is NOT about to reverse that trend. Social Security “privatization” will actually cost more money, not less.

Why include this with the other two? When voters cite health care issues as most important to them, they are not talking about the quality of health care here in America, which is the best in the world. They cite it because they are concerned about health care delivery/costs/coverage, which are clearly economic concerns.

This puts economic concerns at 33%, one point under national security.

Looking at the data this way, we find that 2 out of 3 voters (67%) chose either security or economic concerns as most important to them in deciding whom to vote for.

In order to work, this change to “marriage is just a contract” will have to be incidental to other salutary changes. First, tax health “benefits” given by employers, to discourage the practice of employer-provided health benefits and open up a more responsive health insurance marketplace; the issue of what is and is not a “family” or “couple” in terms of group health insurance goes bye-bye, as different companies cater to different customer bases. Second, shrink the government to a point where the tax rates can be lowered to such a degree that simultaneously getting rid of tax breaks is a wash. The message behind it will still offend a lot of people, but it won’t cost them extra money or other benefits on top of that.

Yeah, that’s kind of a long shot. But it’s the only way I can think of to defuse the marriage issue for good. Given that, I think we’ll just have to live with it for a good long while.

I think it boils down to the fact that the government gives special treatment to heterosexual married couples which is unfair. My solution is not to grant these priveleges to homosexuals, but to take them away entirely.

Marriage is a just a contract, and anyone should be able to draw up a contract with any other human being.

That means that 25% of the people live in a different universe of reality than I do. No wonder I have lost touch with them.

No meangiful dialog is possible if we operate on different facts.

Should I change to their reality, I think not. To reference an old proverb, I refuse to drink the water.

To sleep, perchance to dream.

The dems in New Hampshire, and Iowa chose a man with so much baggage, I could not support my own party. That, and when I called my local democratic party for answers to quetions they were rude, and seemed like they could not take the time for me. I decided pretty early on that my vote would go to Bush.

At least, it’s quite entertaining. I nailed someone the other day who almost screamed at me 4 years ago that someone who “lost” the popular vote by .5% of ballot cast had no moral authority or legitimacy. Yet, a 3+%, 3.6m victory was “certainly” no landslide and weak at best.

Riiiiiight.

At the same time, the recent events will probably make the Democratic Party more interesting to watch than its opponent in the future.

Before the ’70s, we had the Draft to “mix” them up with the Red folk… so they had some idea of what they were like and could therefore appeal to them.

I think that schools and even Big Media are not the only way folk get taught and form opinions. There is also a strong tendency to want be contrarian, to make mistakes your own way. Getting out of the education bind is, as you point out critical. But there will be some movement as Rather, Chomsky and fiends give way to newer voices. Some of it will be a reaction away from “Get away with what you can, it’s for The Cause”. I just don’t know how much, how soon, and whether the result will promote more intellectual activity or sameness. If the latter, we have a bigger problem. But i’m hoping that the alternative information sources provide diversity of ideas as well as opportunities to polarize.

Matya no baka

1. The War on Terror: GWB has opened a can of whoop ass on the nuts. J.Kerry was too ambivalent.

2. Iraq (if you want to separate it from the WOT): No matter how badly GWB has mishandled it, he “gets” that the only way, long term, to avoid another 9/11 is through massive reform in the Arab world. J. Kerry rejected this notion outright.

3. Economic Issues: Democrats like to raise taxes on people like me and my wife. We aren’t rich, we aren’t poor, but we have worked pretty hard to get where we are. I don’t want my wife to have to work 60 hours/week to stay where we are economically speaking. Sorry, I love her more than I love government programs.

4. Government Reform: Believe it or not, President Bush was the more reformist of the two candidates. He campaigned on: changing/reforming Social Security, the Tax Code, improving educational/retraining programs. J. Kerry was a reactionary, rejecting all change especially with regard to Social Security.

5. Gay Marriage: For me, not a moral issue…just kind of creepy. I always thought that gay folks had their own way about how to live, were ‘liberated’ from bourgeois constraints, and wanted to be left alone by mainstream society…all things that are ok with me, but why mess with the institution of marriage? Marriage is for a man and a woman. If you guys want civil contracts, etc. Fine, fine…I don’t hate you, but stop dickering in things that are not yours.

Like I said, I campaigned and volunteered for GWB, so I talked to a heck of a lot of Republicans/Republican leaners over the course of the campaign (probably more than a 1000+) none said to me that they were supporting GWB in “moral values” alone, but rather a combination of these things.

Chris

Taxes (0%)
Education (0%)
Iraq (25%)
Terrorism (25%)
Economy/Jobs (0%)
Moral Values (50%)
Health Care (0%)

The zeros are for where I do not see a dimes worth of difference between the candidates in those categories. Bush is on domestic issues just another a big spending politician.

On Iraq and Terrorism I think Kerry would be a complete flop. In fact where Bush gets it wrong is exactly where Kerry thinks he got it right. I think there was too much diplomacy involved, in fact over 12 years worth. To the point where sactions were hurting the little guy in Iraq, while UN officials lived off the blood. This should have been resolved after the Gulf War and that would have required us to have less allies involved even back then. I really don’t see the point in including allies who are fundamentally against a job that needs doing. Especially if they do not have an troops or material to contribute.

The mistake in Iraq was the attempt to use sanctions and diplomacy. Sanctions being the worse because they harm civilians much more than even war does, and the results being to naturally hate the sanctioner.

I do think Kerrys plans for Iran are incredibly stupid. He wants to give Iran nuke material and expertise plus a treaty then sit back and see what happens. When the inevitable nuclear bomb is manufacture he then plans to SANCTION Iran. Does that sound familiar. The result being that civilians who now hate Mullahs will start hating us. In the meantime it will be a decades long protacted economic war that much ultimately lead to a military one. This time with a nuclear armed Iran.

If you are interested a good summary of other reasons there was a comment at another blog that pretty much summed up where I was at: http://brainwacker.blogspot.com/2004/11/why-i-voted-for-bush.html

Then there is the whole Kerry sh.tstorm of BS. The whole Vietnam lies, traitorist behavior, opportunism angle. I investigated and found that Kerry was wrong and the Swift Vets were right. That along with the obvious lies in his personal life like marathon runner, fake sports fan, on the belly deer hunter, Christmas in Cambodia, I met with the UN security council, secret Draft, chopping SS, magic hat, I wasn’t at the VVWA assanation meeting, and I’m not a liberal. Please!

The long and the short of it is that I don’t trust Kerry, and it is obvious from his behavior that he is not to be trusted. That’s a moral issue and that is why I would have picked “Moral Values” as the most important issue.

I think Bush believes that per Sulaiman there is little market for true small government. People, even people who vote Republican, want the government involved in things like health care and education. Weaning them off the idea that government should run their lives is a long term project.

Bush has started the project buy co-opting the big government entitlements. The prescription drug benefit (which was going to pass in some form regardless) came in a form where people get to choose among several private providers which gets people in the mindset of efficiently using their federal benefits. No Child Left Behind gave block grants to States which gives more local control over education spending. Now Bush will strongly push Social Security privatization.

For a person who’s reputation is one of unsophistication and bluntness Bush political strategies are one of subtle long term shifts. He employees political jujistu to turn a opponents momentum against them. He plants seeds that will long term erupt into major changes.

Our leftwing education system from earliest daycare through graduate school has been passed down practically intact for at least 50 years and probably even longer than that.

Until we put a stake through the heart of the education unions and stop giving tenure only to those professors who toe the party line, nothing will change. More and more people who can afford it are sending their kids to private school and that includes most affluent liberals. Many who can’t afford the 10 to 20 thousand dollars for private school are home schooling. Still the public schools are demanding and getting more and more of our tax dollars.

The complicit media have taught the public to equate a good education with spending more money. Ipso facto, kids can’t read or add & subtract because we don’t spend enough money on our schools. This notion is nonsense and the has been debunked many times. Fact: black slaves learned to read employing a stick scratching out letters in the dirt and learned to do arithmetic by the same low tech method, yet blacks in schools where over $10,000 per child is funded by generous tax payers, they can’t learn these two basic skills needed for life in the 21st century.

Why? My theory — the left wants to keep this population in permanent custodial care
for the same reasons “Palestinians” have been kept in “refugee” camps for three generations. To provide fodder for the grist mills of leftwing propaganda.

Allah akbar, this election is the beginning of the end of this long nightmare.

Yes, certainly encourage folk like the one in Paul Bixby’s link to publish their ideas. After all, the new ideas have to have some currency, people have to see that there is an alternative. But their effect will not be now, and probably not in the next four years. We need to wait for time to take its toll.

It seems it has already done so in the Republican party. In some sense the leftoid complaint that Bush is not a conservative is right, in the sense that small government is no longer a significant motivator in the party leadership. (OK, i should soften that to “I don’t see it as a significant motivator…” For example, i can’t think of two people in the federal government today who would agree with the statement “But Government IS the Problem!”)

The question for me is, how will the the ideas tilt? Is the generation after the 60′s folk going to be more tolerant and less intrusive? Well maybe. Certainly the strident ones got the publicity, but then the squeaky wheel does get the oil.

Matya no baka

Ugh

And we’re supposed to be the stupid and ignorant ones.

That is all

HIM: We didn’t need to kill all those people at Nagasaki, we should have just dropped the bomb on Mt. Fuji or something to show them what we could do.

ME: Actually, we had already showed them. The fire-bombing of Tokyo killed more people than Nagasaki, and it didn’t seem to change any minds.

HIM: Really? Wow, I never knew that. I guess I’m pretty ignorant about military history.

ME: You’d rather be one of the ones doomed to repeat history then?

HIM: Well, I don’t make those kinds of decisions.

ME: You did on Tuesday.

HIM: Oh, well I voted against the war.