Politically Speaking: Now What?

Well the midterm elections are past and the Republicans gained power in the House while the Democrats kept control of the Senate. The big question is what does that mean for us? It was quite a election season with not only the Democrats and the Republicans fighting in the ring, but the Tea Party was there also, with both the Republicans and Tea Party thinking of victory by riding each others coat tails. My feelings are that the Tea Party got owned by the Republicans, time will tell, but it already looks like there is some dissension between the ranks, and it's only been a couple of days since the election.

I tend to lean towards the Democrats, but I am frustrated and disappointed with their spinelessness. There were investigations of wrong doing by President Bush and some of his close associates that showed that he was doing things wrong and he was intentionally doing them even though he knew they were wrong. Why then is it that the subject of prosecuting Bush, and whoever else involved, such a taboo subject even from the Democrat side? To make things worse, now George Bush has a book coming out where he admits once again of his war crimes. Will the insanity never cease?

Bush basically passed his own pardon and pardoned everyone who took part in all the illegal activities before he left office, put people in key parts of the government, while he was in office, that would allow him to get away with doing things that were wrong. Don't forget that both Bush and Cheney got on national television and admitted that they gave the orders and supported water boarding and other torture techniques, had secret prisons, performed secret renditions, and crimes against the American people and the constitution by the unlimited phone and internet monitoring, arresting people in the middle of the night and not charge them of any crime for 5 years if at all, with no rights, and going against the Geneva Convention rules and international laws and agreements. This upsets me with the Democrats. When Obama stood there and said, let's not bother going back and dwelling on the past, but look towards the future in reference to prosecuting Bush I stood in shock... I think there were many others who had the same reaction. In my opinion the people's mandate for election a great majority of Democrats in 2008 was so that something could be done about the rouge, run away government that the Bush Administration turned into, that included bringing to justice the people who blatantly and openly broke the laws of our constitution and how our government is supposed to operate, both at home and abroad.

The other thing that I and I think many other people that supported Obama are disappointed about is the health bill. Not for the fact that it was passed, but how fast the best parts of the bill were negotiated out before it even came to vote, and then that it really never mattered any way because it was pretty much a straight party vote, so there never was any compromise from the other side at all. Many people would have liked to see the single payer option at least seriously considered. Health care should not be run by organizations that their main purpose is not health care, but stockholders profits, that's just wrong. We need to get rid of all the swindling, lieing, profit machines that we call health insurance companies. A lot of money could be saved if the government took care of people with that money instead of a big company not worrying about if they will break even, but make record profits. This was another thing that didn't make me too happy with the Democrats.

The thing with the Democrats in general is that it's hard to try to compete with the bullies on the playground while playing by the rules and bending over backwards trying to appease any of them. Both sides worry more about being elected, getting their side in power, or keeping their side in power, that they don't really seem to care too much about us. In all fairness I guess I have to say the Democrats tried, they came in at the worse time since the great depression and actually did some good, tried to pass some good financial reform, credit card reform, health care reform, it just was a little too slow to help them for the mid elections.

What will we see going forward? I fear not much different than we seen these last couple of years. In the mean time we, meaning us common folk, will suffer while they all have their pissing contests.

What do you think? Agree or disagree, feel free to leave a comment.

Campaign Finances

It's time we get rid of the party system, there has been too much party and not enough system governing the the country. Each candidate should be running on his or her own platform and not be constricted by their parties as to what they can or can say, can or can't do, they are supposed to be doing the will of their electorates, not their party, not the special interests that are funding their campaigns, our government is broke in it's present form. We need to change campaign financing to fix things in Washington. How can we expect our representatives to vote with the interest of the people at heart when it is special interests that pay to get them elected in the first place? We need to finance elections with money from tax payers, or a pool of some sort. Somehow we need to start with a pool of people to run for the positions in government and then a way to quickly weed out the unwanted or unsupported, then support the runner ups by providing them all with the same amount of airtime, but only by showing their records and/or platforms factually and get away from the smears, lies, and rhetoric. The American people need a way to make informed decisions on electing their representatives without having to worry about getting fleeced by the lies told by the opposition. This could also save a lot of money that is now wasted on elections that could be spent better in other places. This would remove the conflict of interests that come into play now when politicians have to vote on bills that affect the people that paid to get them into office. Because we all know money is not the way to gauge the support or popularity of a candidate when special interests and corporations can spend more than individuals, this is why we have all these bills and laws catering to special interests, companies and the wealthy.

Tax Breaks for the Wealthy

We are only talking about the top 2-3% of the population losing tax breaks, not being taxed extra. We have gave these same people a break the past 8 years or so, now they scream bloody murder that they are being unfairly taxed. How can that 2-3% of the population scare the other 97-98% that the government is out to take income away from them? How can that big a chunk of the population be so gullible? Where has the tax breaks that the top 2-4% of the population got us? The way they talk it will make the difference of there being jobs or not, where are all the jobs that were being developed during the last 8 years? There wasn't any jobs made in this country in the last 8 years, only over seas by the tax breaks of the wealthy. While the general public has been providing tax breaks for the wealthiest 2-3% they have reciprocated by sending jobs overseas creating record profits for the big corporations while the rest of the country goes broke. If you are in the top 2-3%, vote Republican, otherwise, wtf are you thinking?

Fiscal Responsibility

Fiscal Responsibility = Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele has raised $96.2 million during his tenure, but he has spent $109.6 million. (The Washington Post)

Where Does Dick Cheney Get his Special Powers

I was reading along through my news emails the other day and I came across an article talking about Dick Cheney criticizing the appointment of a special prosecutor by Eric H. Holder Jr. What caught my eye was a transcript of Cheney stating, "at his request" the CIA release a document showing whether or not the Bush Administration's interrogation methods were responsible for defeating all efforts to attack our country. Later in the article said something else about the CIA memos released at Cheney's urging.

I have one BIG question. Who the hell is granting Dick Cheney the power to advise the CIA about anything? Hey Dick!, I thought you were a vise president, not only that, but didn't your side lose the last election? What gives Dick the power to be still advising the CIA on anything? Releasing documents?...Dick? Weren't you the one in the last administration that was calling most everything in the form of documents, that were requested by oversight committees, protected by executive privilege?

In your defense of torture you say that it worked, it kept all the evil powers from hurting anyone in the US. What doesn't seem to get through the thick Dick head is it doesn't matter if you think what you did worked, it doesn't even mattered if it did work, breaking the law is breaking the law, and torture is breaking the laws of both the United States and of international treaties we have agreed to. I get jumping up and down, pulling my hair out mad as hell that we have a person like Dick on just about every major television network, if not every major television network, admitting publicly, in the light of day, that he is proud of what he done, and that he'd do it again, he'd still be doing it. Even though it is illegal. Why isn't he arrested already?

Maybe Dick does get it. Maybe he knows that on the merits of law and order he is guilty as sin. That is why he holds that the ends justified the means. It worked, this makes it better than the law. He thinks that if he can paint enemy combatants as sub human, others will commit unheard of acts against them out of fear, and he is right, but does that make it right. Didn't this happen before...hmm...perhaps Nazi Germany with the Jews? This is just the thing that happens when a group of people acquire power with no oversight. It was what we got as a result of a closed door meetings with what was said vailed by the phrase executive privilage.

Still, after all this, Cheney crawls out from under his rock, from the death of his political career, and he still has the power to request and urge the CIA to release documents

Let's Applaud Those Who Stand up for What is Right

Dear Senator Feingold,

I just want to thank you for your stand against not only CIA torture abuses, but your outspokenness that the interrogation probe on CIA abuses, does not go far enough and that "The abuses that were officially sanctioned amounted to torture and those at the very top who authorized, ordered or sought to provide legal cover for them should be held accountable,"

I do not know why there are not more people in Washington who will take a stand against this blight that is contrary to the ideals on which our country was founded.

In the past our great country could take the high road in fighting against the tyranny of rulers from other world countries, but now we need to take the high road to fight the tyranny the Bush Administration.

Other countries knew that they could depend on our high morals and honor and even the solders of countries that we have fought against knew that they could have faith in the humane treatment that they would receive if captured fighting us.

The Bush Administration has given our country a black eye that won't heal in the eyes of the rest of the world if we don't honor our international agreements concerning the treatment of our captured combatants.

Our country was instrumental in bringing to justice people from Germany and Japan for the same types of apostrophes that people in the Bush Administration have encouraged.

I can't believe that Dick Cheney can go out in public in the light of day and try to justify breaking of US and International laws by using the ends justify the means argument.

If nothing is done to correct things done during the Bush Administration, history is going to report that not only did people in the Bush Administration do horrendous wrong, but that the following administration was just as horrendous for not making things right.

Please continue to stand up against the wrongs done in the name of our country until what is wrong is right. You, me, our descendants, and our country will be the better for it. Thank you.

IndictBushNow.org

Congressional leaders demand:
"High-ranking officials and lawyers …
be held legally accountable."

Help the IndictBushNow movement grow by making a donation today!

As hundreds of thousands of people at the grassroots are taking action, leading members of Congress are joining in to demand that the coming prosecution for Bush-era crimes include the high officials who authorized the criminal acts.

The disgusting, outrageous and criminal acts were not committed by a few bad apples. It is Cheney and Bush and Rumsfeld and others who are guilty, and they must be held accountable.

Congressman Jerrold Nadler, D-NY, sent a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder Tuesday reiterating his calls for a special prosecutor that makes these demands crystal clear. Nadler is chairman of the panel’s subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties Committee on the Judiciary.

"There simply is no legal, moral or principled reason to insulate those who authorized the torture of detainees, either through legal reasoning or other policy directive, from investigation," Nadler wrote. "This country has been instrumental in establishing the principle that high-ranking officials and lawyers who use legal reasoning to justify or otherwise authorize war crimes can, and should, be held legally accountable.

"The ban on torture is absolute and we have a legal obligation to investigate torture and all of those who may have been party to its use."

Nadler’s letter is a follow-up to one sent to Eric Holder in April that was signed by other members of the House Judiciary Committee. That letter stated:

"The Geneva Conventions obligate High Contracting Parties such as the United States to investigate and bring before our courts those individuals ‘alleged to have committed, or to have ordered to be committed grave breaches of those Conventions."

There is not a moment to spare in this historic effort to restore the Constitution and to send a message to future officials that no one is above the law. Election to high office can never be seen again as a blank check to torture, to carry out secret assassinations, establish secret prisons, spy on the people and launch unprovoked wars of aggression all in the name of "protecting" the country.

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--From all of us at IndictBushNow.org