The Sarah Palin Chronicles – Volume 2

This was the Week of Sarah Palin and I think I’m coming off a sugar high!

I couldn’t believe it that the party of conservatives would do something both bold and interesting!

They picked this woman – I think that’s quite something in itself! And she actually looks and talks like she could be your neighbor– a regular, middle class working mom. Only thing she’s been a mayor and a governor. And being from Alaska (a place I’d love to visit), there’s this kind of frontier woman side to her – she’s accomplished at hunting and fishing. Then she comes out of virtually no where and is standing in front of nearly 40 million viewers, taking it in stride and talking to the nation with poise and confidence.

And, even in full “attack mode” she’s just so not Bush/Cheney/Rove/etc. She’s actually likeable,

And she’s got a very handsome looking family. Certainly things aren’t perfect in the family (one case of pre-marital pregnancy), but no one is covering it up or denying anything (as the Nixon era Republicans would do) – the family is simply doing the right thing and moving on.

And she’s got that cute little daughter Piper. With a name line Piper Palin how could she not be cute!

But at some point, we have to come down from this sugar high and get back to making the choice of McCain-Palin or Obama-Biden.

The first downer was thinking back on McCain’s acceptance speech where he’s acting like the outsider and the maverick instead of the Senator who came to Washington 25 years ago as a Congressman.

It got me thinking if the whole RNC was not a “bait and switch” sales pitch where they sell McCain-Palin as the mavericks of change for the elections only to get 4 more years of same conservative Republican policies. Here’s my unanswered questions:

• If McCain voted over 90% of the time in line with the Bush administration, where’s the policy change?


• How can you want to cut taxes more when already we in deficit spending to pay for the war and reconstruction in Iraq and Afghanistan?
  
  
• What specific government spending does he want to cut?


• How effective could McCain be with what looks like a Democrat majority in the House and Senate?

These McCain promises are little more than the sugar candy that conservative feast on. Reality is sometimes a big downer. But once you’re back down, you can really see that, in the big picture, little has changed in the course of this week.

If the Republicans win, expect 4 more years of Republican policy. The management may change, but the menu will be the same.

Super but Undocumented

Truth, Justice and the American Way! Republicans endorse Superman, a fictional undocumented alien. But they sure don't endorse the 12 million non-fictional undocumented aliens!!!

Here's a letter to the editor from July 2006:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/05/opinion/l05superman.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

The letter is also posted on the blog Liberty Together:
Liberty Together: Super but Undocumented

The Sarah Palin Chronicles – The Continuing Saga

The Sarah Palin story gets more interesting day by day. People and the press want to know who she really is and what she is like. Yeah, we know her politics and religious beliefs are very conservative. But we want to know:

• Who is this Sarah from Alaska?


• What makes her tick?

Yeah, well yes, in another blog entry I emphasized how the choice of VP should be on the candidate’s competency. So, shouldn’t I be focused on evaluating her competency?

Nah, competency shompentcy! For now, it’s more interesting just to discuss who she is.

And who she might become if elected VP.

Last night the nation saw her acceptance speech. I think it was great that she introduced herself, her family, and gave us a little insight of where she is from and what she is like. She’s a wife, a mom, a hockey mom (otherwise known as a pit-bull w/lipstick), a mayor and a governor. She’s also ambitious, hard-working and ready for anything. And she comes across as “real” – a middle class, working mom, balancing family and profession.

Though an unlikely candidate for VP, she doesn’t seem in anyway overwhelmed by McCain’s choice.

We heard a little of her conservative politics (e.g., pro-drilling) and her accomplishments as governor (e.g., selling off the governor’s plane, turning down money for the “bridge to nowhere”). The NY Times and others have reported that she both backed and then opposed federal funds for this bridge – but, hey, she wouldn’t be a politician if she hadn’t done a 180 on at least one issue!

On these issues, there’s little surprise: she’s a conservative and she talks like a conservative. And her digs on Obama were so “heard-that-tell-me-something-new-will-yah.”

But, as I say in another blog entry, you can’t judge a candidate just on what she/he says or what party politics she/he parrots in speeches. I think you need to imagine this person in office and how she/he would function in that roll.

What I see is a person who is ready for anything but who is also miles from what we’ve seen the Republicans serve up. She is about as 180-degrees from the Bush-Chaney—Rumsfield-Rove mold that we’ve had for 8 years. Her conservatism comes from a practical common-sense base, and not neo-conservative ideology. Her understanding of issues comes from her lived experience, and not some theoretical product of think tanks.

Right now she may be a Washington outside. But as party VP candidate, will this last? Will she become the attack dog mouthpiece for the party platform, with a direct feed from party headquarters? Will the party handlers morph her into an insider?

Does she have any chance to remain the maverick she says she is? Will she be able to reach across the isle and engage Democrats, as she had done as Governor? If she becomes VP, could she ever achieve that 80% favorable rating she has as Governor?

In the conservative wing of the Republican Party, the old guard is salivating on the arrival of a young, ambitious, and willing conservative. Will she become their new standard bearer? Will she walk the path of conservatism without wavering? Or will she tread a maverick’s path such as the “old McCain,” even to the point of annoying the party faithful from time to time?

So the question for now is, which Sarah will she be if McCain and she are elected?

• Will she remain the outsider, a maverick, and a “real person?”
  
• Or will she become yet another conservative “stiff shirt” and mouthpiece of conservative ideology?

Sarah Palin -- The Unexpected VP Candidate

Sarah Palin is just the person to bring new life to the Obama-McCain race, just when the never-ending campaign was about to put us all to sleep.

So, has the “old McCain” come through with a bold move (very bold, for a conservative republican)? Does this signal that the ‘old McCain” – the maverick, the free thinker is back? Or is this a brief reprise in a campaign where McCain has been straight-jacketed by his need to parrot misguided Republican Party platform planks.

(Personally, I enjoy the “old McCain who used his God-given intelligence to think for himself and his first amendment rights to say what he thinks! This is the foundation of my view of American politics – we all need to think for ourselves and say what we think! I have no respect for the McCain as a party platform parrot.)

No matter whether the old or new McCain is behind it, the selection of Palin makes the campaign interesting again.

Sarah Palin doesn’t quite fit any mold, even though the Republicans might like to say she does. Yes, she’s pro-life, a mother of 5, NRA member, and strongly pro-drilling for oil and gas. (This is all encouraging to traditional conservatives.)

Yet, she fought against her own party about corruption (something that would endear her to McCain). And in a party dominated by older white guys, she’s a younger woman - a working woman.

As a women, her life’s been a lot different than most of the party guys. She’s been through the struggle and balancing act of raising a family and having a job and working hard at both – something those Republican guys just don’t know first-hand. And unlike Cheney, who pretends to be a hunter, her credentials are bona fide.

Raising a Down syndrome child testifies to the strength of her person. This is no small accomplishment as anyone who knows first-hand about the heartache, struggles, and joys can tell you. (My mother used to teach one-on-one Sunday school lessons to Downs syndrome children – she knew that patience and endurance yielded great rewards and a lifetime of appreciation by the child’s family.)

The news of her daughter being pregnant won’t derail her, as it would in the “stained glass, holier than thou” piety of Pat Robertson/Ralph Reed/televangelist mold. Rather, in a more contemporary and “real” view of Christianity, there is the recognition that we may make mistakes (yes, even Christians may sin), but the key is turning away from the sin and then “doing the right thing.” And her daughter seems to be doing that by having the baby and planning to marry the father.

It’s too soon to see what Sarah Palin will be like in the campaign. Will she simply parrot what the conservatives want to hear? Will some shady details of her past political life put a shadow on her integrity? Or will she be her real self, for better or for worse, and tell us how she came to her political views from her life experience as a women, mother, Christian, and elected politician?

A McCain-Palin ticket with 2 mavericks speaking their mind would really spice up the election. Having a pair of party parrots will lull us back to sleep. (In that case, wake me when Obama is being sworn in.)

The Litmus Test in Politics

Senator McCain and the Republican Party are not free to pick the best candidate for Vice President.

You see, there is a self-imposed litmus test. The Vice Presidential candidate must be pro-life. One might think that qualifications for a candidate may include experience in elected office and knowledge of major policy issues, such as foreign affairs, energy, commerce, and education.

But not in the Republican Policy. They do not have the freedom to consider candidates first on their qualifications for office. Rather, their first consideration is the abortion litmus test. For those who do not pass this test, there is no chance to have their qualifications for office evaluated.

Yet another example of what our call our “fear of freedom.”

The Role of Government, or What’s Just Plain Wrong with the Libertarian Party Platform

In other blogs, I've criticized the conservatives and state socialism. This is my chance to criticize one of the things I think is wrong with the Libertarian Party Platform. The issue is: what is the proper role of government?

Generally, the Libertarian view is that to be truly free, there should be as little government as possible. This is in part left over from the days of monarchy in Europe, yet partly reinforced by the role of our federal government in things like land management in the West. And there are many examples of government incompetence, corruption, and the general failure of various agencies to do what they are supposed to do.

Still, the problem with the Libertarian Party is that they take an insistence on small government as some kind of religious tenant -- a “doctrine of small government” -- a “given” that can’t be questioned and therefore is central to all policy formation.

Fundamentally, once you hold a doctrine as sacred, you’re really limiting your own freedom and the freedom of others. I believe we are intelligent creatures and we need to think freely, unencumbered by such bondage as this “doctrine of small government.”

This is where I disagree with both traditional libertarianism and traditional socialism! (Hence, “the new Libertarian Socialist”)

The libertarians tend to say government is never the answer; the socialists tend to say government is always the answer. I say both are wrong!

My view: government is a tool of the people.

We live in a democracy, right? Government by the people, right?

Then government should be as big or small as it needs to be to serve the people.

We need to look at each function and program of government as ask:
· Is this the best way to do it?
· Is there a better way?
· Does government in this role make me freer or restrict my freedom?

If government is doing a good job and, from a management perspective, where government is the best way to accomplish a task, well let government do it.

Take our national highway system (as a transportation engineer, this is something dear to my heart). The prosperity and mobility of the American public is due in large part to having one of the most extensive and best highway systems in the world. And it’s a product of federal and state governments.

Is the government the best agent to build and maintain our national highways? If not the government, should it be sold to private investors to create a network of privately held toll roads? Granted bridges have fallen and some roads are poorly maintained, but looking at the big picture, is there any agent in the roadway business that would be more effective than government?

For national defense, the treasury, foreign policy, even the Libertarian Party agrees the government should be in this business.

Given the poor record (e.g., incompetence at FEMA, snooping on international phone calls and e-mail, etc.) of Homeland Security, I wonder if we’re better off taking care of ourselves! (See my blog: Are the Bush Republicans Really Maoists at Heart?)

As we think of the other hot issues of the day: how to pay for health care, our energy future, global climate change, etc. – I propose we use the same model I have above. Let’s assume that government is neither good nor bad. Then let’s think rationally about which is the best way to accomplish the goal.

Sometimes government may prove the best tool for the people. Sometimes it may be the worst.

But let’s not be so constrained by assuming that government either is or isn’t the solution.

How Do You Tell a Libertarian from a Conservative?

I suspect there are a lot of conservative politicians pretending to be libertarians. But there’s a simple test to tell the real supporters of individual freedom from the imposters:

• A libertarian believes in freedom, but lets you decide what to do with it.
• A conservative believes in freedom, but likes to tell you how to use your freedom.

You can weed out the “conservatives in libertarian clothes” with the wedge issues such as immigration, abortion and gay marriage.

Take immigration. The pure libertarian view is based on the free movement of people: that people should be free to live and move where ever they want. Even the somewhat timid 2008 Libertarian Party platform in item 3.4 says “Economic freedom demands the unrestricted movement of human as well as financial capital across national borders.” (http://www.lp.org/platform)

Contrast that with any conservative politician or talk radio host advocating for tight borders, limited immigration, and the prosecution of illegal immigrants. Thanks to conservatives, we now have to prove we are US citizens when we start a new job. Like many of you, I was born here and lived here all my life. Why do I have to prove I’m a citizen? This type of conservative-supported harassment of US citizens is only worse if you a citizen who happens to look like the current wave of immigrants (e.g., if you happen to be Hispanic, for example).

When it comes to immigration, as with homeland security, the conservatives will always pick “security” at the cost of personal freedom.

With abortion and gay marriage, there is a huge disparity in the opinions of citizens nationwide. In many cases, personal opinions are strongly held and based on deep religious convictions, beliefs that must be respected if we choose to support personal freedom. Like you, I have my own opinions on these issues. But a national consensus is impossible. So, it is best that government (particularly national government) just stay out of these issues.

In particular, I think that government has no role in defining what is or isn’t marriage. Definitions and traditions of marriage are deeply seeded in religious and cultural heritage. And these traditions evolve – fewer cultures retain arranged marriages today, whereas this was the norm in many cultures in centuries past. Let religions and cultures define what marriage is. Let government help couples make the legal arrangements related to such issues of joint property, inheritance, and consultation in medical matters.

Of course, I don’t think there’s a conservative politician who does now want to impose her/his definition of marriage on us all.

So that’s the test. If a politician prefers security over freedom or really wants to tell you how to use your freedom, she/he is not a libertarian!