Just a quick hit to follow on a comment someone (supergoober) made to a previous blog. He used the term "moral imperative" for certain social spending, and jocularly, I shot back with a comment about of "I thought we couldn't legislate morality" obviously referring to the whole abortion argument in general. But of course, there was a little truth told in jest.
Supergoober's line did actually describe the feeling out there of how we should be kind and generous and giving to our neighbors - but that is, at heart, a religious/moral sentiment, and therefore a matter of personal choice. I deeply believe in the necessity of social justice, and in the religious tenet of "love thy neighbor", and neighbor is to be interpreted very broadly, but most of the social programs do not consist of me personally being generous, they consist of me insisting that people who have more than me be generous as well. I have taken my moral choice and evaded it by forcing someone with "more" to be generous instead.
Obviously, the government has some role in "promoting the general welfare", but as the government usurps this role more and more, it becomes easier and easier for all of us to neglect this aspect of our responsibility to each other. We succumb to an "I gave at the office" mentality - that is it is easier to evade our own personal duties if some mythical, mystical government entity can do it for me (perhaps very badly) and obviate me of any feeling that I might have of helping my fellow human beings. It is this fact that I find destructive to the soul of humanity, and while others might flinch at the use of the word, use it in any connotation you like, this attitude destroys any bit of the transcendent nature of our selves, whether that transcendence is divine or human doesn't matter.
Either way, you precisely are legislating morality, and in doing so, you are ultimately destroying the desire to make any moral choice in all of us. That is not to say, then, that we should never legislate morality - every law should be an extension of good moral sense - that is the origin of law. People who object to the "legislation of morality" really object to legislating anything that would feel bad for them because either it makes them feel guilty, or because they don't agree with the legislation of morality.
For example, it is immoral to kill, thus there are laws against murder. Were we to not consider that killing was wrong, we would have never legislated against it in the first place. A gross oversimplification, yes, but you get the gist of my point. We cannot escape the fact that morality is all we legislate - all civil rights legislation, for example, is an attempt to instill a certain form of morality, that is one of eliminating gender bias, racial bias, etc, so that we can treat each other as equals - but that is a fundamentally moral issue!!! Again, I am not saying that there is anything wrong with that - I think it is laudable and the way that laws need to be written. People start objecting when the "morality" in question makes them feel guilty about their own choices or those of their friends, and rather than process the guilt appropriately, they seek to externalize a moral standard that makes them feel better (a very typical, if dysfunctional, way of dealing with cognitive and emotional dissonance), or they object because the morality does not fit with their own moral sensibilities - I think you find the former more than the latter, however, especially with the abortion issue, and this is where the mantra of "choice" is ultimately detrimental and destructive.
Yep - I am about to write about that dread topic of abortion. I know that this is going to upset people, but I want you to realize exactly where this is coming from before I write it. It is coming ultimately from a place of care and concern, especially for children who have to go through this so-called "choice" (and believe me I have seen, on more than one occasion, the psychological and emotional trauma a 15 or 16 year old goes through when they have made this "choice" - and it is not because of some external standard of guilt imposed by a religion - they know that they had a child inside of them, whether fully developed or not, and as they are younger, they see the implications of what would have happened had their parents made a similar choice, but I digress, more on that later).
So, this is big-time a hot button issue, and rather than trivialize it, I will attempt to talk about some problems with our current standards. I am going to avoid the whole mess of legality or illegality; rather I am going to address the folly of saying that it is simply a choice (yep, I used folly, sorry if that is insulting, but my use of the word should become clearer as you read on) as well as the problem with allowing it without parental consent. And that part, the parental consent issue, is huge. I have had long discussions (and sometimes arguments) with my wife about this, and she makes some very valid points about how most children cannot approach their parents with a statement like "I am pregnant" or "I got my girlfriend pregnant". Very true, it is difficult to do, but I really hope that the majority of parent-child relationships in this world are not so strained and abusive that this conversation could never happen. That is my hope, but I know it is not necessarily a reality (but I believe that it is a reality more than not), however, allowing a child to make this kind of decision without her parents only serves to set up a government sponsored impediment to relationships between child and parent.
Let me explain; most of us (humans in general) avoid emotionally traumatic and difficult situations as frequently as we can. We try not to upset other people, and sometimes out of altruism or sometimes out of fear, we do not wish others to have to deal with our problems. This goes especially for teenagers, who are struggling through the tribulations of becoming adults. They have to deal with the fact that their parents treat them as children while they feel like adults; they struggle with impulses to simultaneously act childish and then engage in very adult behavior; and top all of that off with the fact that they have a feeling of invincibility that they do not want disturbed, and they do not want to admit that they were wrong about. That makes for a very messy, difficult space to approach a conversation with parents. If society gives them an out for this difficult situation, how are we going to expect them to ever develop the cognitive, social, or emotional skills for dealing with these situations? Yes, this would be an incredibly difficult conversation to have with your parents, but many teenagers might find that there parents were far more supportive of them than they had anticipated. Others might find that their parents are as flawed and human as they thought that they were. Either way, being able to struggle through this process is important, and while I cannot force this upon anyone, I bristle at legislation being used to give a "easy" out to this difficult situation. (GE)
Because it is not really an easy out. And this is the crux of the difficulty. When we say that this monumentally difficult decision is just a "choice" we do several things to the young woman involved. First, we make the decision, the blame, and the responsibility entirely hers. It implicitly states that it is her fault for getting pregnant - after all if she is the sole arbiter of choice, then she must be solely responsible. She is told that she has a choice, and that it shouldn't be difficult (again, this statement is implicit in the abortion rights movement, in my opinion), and when she struggles with the decision, and feels that there is a huge burden involved, she defaults to the fact that something is wrong with her. This conclusion is entirely wrong, but entirely common, and something young women must struggle with in silence. By telling a girl (and many are, unfortunately, just girls when they have to make this decision) that it is just a choice, when we use terms that make it seem like it is no different than choosing what breakfast cereal to eat, we set up a false expectation in them. When they struggle with the reality of the fact that they could give birth, in a short amount of time, to someone just like them, the decision becomes huge and traumatic. All our platitudes about choice serve only to undermine and separate the child involved. Because it was a "choice", her "choice", the implication is that she must make it without help. The trivial nature of the slogan is at odds with the traumatic reality, and, rather than realize that the slogan is wrong, she assumes that something is wrong with her - she doesn't feel comfortable seeking help, because she has always been told that she can make this decision by herself.
All of our banal platitudes that were put in place with the best of intentions, our sincere attempt to diminish a child's sense of culpability in this difficult situation, have only served to undermine her emotional and psychological stability and, even worse, have only served to traumatize and isolate her. She can only seek the help of her peers, and even then only in whispers, not because of the stigma attached to abortion, but because she feels weak at not being able to make such a simple choice, or because she feels guilty at having made such a choice. And that guilt is not something for which she was prepared because, while she understood some of the magnitude of the decision, again, it was always trivialized in discussions on choice, and again, she feels wrong for feeling guilty.
So all that this choice for children has done is put them in harmful situations and removed any sort of support structure from them, all in the attempt of minimizing the impact of this decision. One cannot argue the good intentions - I believe that virtually all (with some specific exceptions) of the major players in the pro-choice movement are well-intentioned. They don't want people to feel the trauma that they felt or that they assume might be felt at the proposition of an abortion. Either that or they have excessively intellectualized the debate, and removed the emotional aspect from it in an attempt to diffuse the tension surrounding the issue. All this has served to do is to alienate young women who are going through this and who have intensely powerful feelings about it - when they were always told that they shouldn't have those feelings. Now when they experience guilt over the choice, their guilt is de-legitimized and they are forced to struggle with it alone.
So what do we do? I don't know, but I will give you my response. If it wasn't obvious up til now, I am nominally pro-life, though the descriptor is rather silly (everyone is both pro-life, and pro-choice, I don't know anyone who hates life, or anyone who wants to take away all choice - the issue at had is abortion, the monikers merely take away from the argument, so I seldom use them). In terms of moral culpability, from Catholic moral teaching (and many others, but I will cite Catholicism as I was raised Catholic and am well-versed in the moral teachings (not just the dogma)) the less choice one has, the less moral culpability one has. This is a nod to the "can you be evil with a gun to your head" line of thinking, and was introduced into Catholic moral teaching in full-force (though it had precursors) around WWII. It was originally given as a moral "out" so Catholics could feel comfortable lying to hide Jews and others from the Nazis - Catholics were good at guilt, and right and wrong, so Catholics who would hide Jews would feel guilty for lying to state officials about it and confess to priests, I don't need to go through all of it now, you get the idea, right?
Anyway, the less capable you are of making a decision, the less wrong it is. I do believe that abortion is wrong (more on the science of that in another post, and yes, there is science and not just dogma or emotion, though the science still relies on valuing human life; if you don't believe in the value of human life, then the science won't persuade you either). But a girl who is in an incredibly difficult situation, whose parents or boyfriend pressure her into the decision cannot be truly said to have committed a "sin" or done something truly immoral. Was the act right - no, clearly not, but it is by all major moral thinking less wrong than an affluent woman in her late 20s using abortion as a birth-control technique (and I hope that doesn't happen, but I would guess that it might have, but I would argue not frequently). It is the moral imperative of the community around a girl to support her through the difficult process of recovering from such a life-altering decision, not trivializing it and telling her it was nothing. They should provide counseling and emotional support (and yes I do mean professional counseling). Many women end up counting birthdays of unborn children, or have pangs of guilt when they see a child that they know would be the same age as the child they aborted. Do we force women to dear this guilt in silence by denying its existence, or do we help support them as people of care, concern, and conscience would? Do we diminish people by saying that the choice is trivial when it isn't? Should we try to eliminate the emotion involved in the decision, again by trivializing the decision, or do we help people who have made this decision come to terms with it and grow as a result?
My answers to these questions are pretty obvious, as I have already stated. Notice in my argument above, I didn't even get to the social and financial pressures that make the decisions even harder, or the fact that easy availability of abortion makes it easier for boys to exert sexual pressure on girls (and no, this is never explicit, but it is becoming built in to the psyches of young people as a potential out - fear of pregnancy is less acceptable as an "excuse" for a girl who doesn't want to engage in sexual behavior), but all these serve only to bolster my point, and I could write books about all of them.
I know that some people deny the existence of the feelings that I have mentioned above, or they attribute them to the moral upbringing in a puritanical society, but I do not agree with those contentions. Even from a purely biological standpoint, our emotions must exist to preserve the species, so the "love of a mother for her child" is biologically selected, even if you don't buy any of the moral arguments. It is very likely that the moral construct of guilt in the situation is biologically inspired as much as it is morally inspired (and many contend that our morality may flow out of our biology - I do not agree with that entirely, there are major flaws in the logic, but there are reasonable points that can be made). My point is that the guilt associated with abortion is not entirely a social construct of religion that we can eliminate. Many in the "pro-choice" movement tacitly accept that it can be removed because they do not want anyone to have to deal with the guilt. Rather, we should be focusing on how to support kids through the trauma, not invalidating it. By saying that there is or should be no guilt, we try to shut off a part of ourselves, and we damn the children to struggle with it in silence, alone. Even if you look at it from purely a therapeutic mindset - therapy does not seek to eliminate guilt, pain, or other emotional responses, rather it tries to put them into perspective so that we can live our lives as whole human beings rather than flawed constructs consumed with guilt and self-loathing or shallow non-entities who have shut off any capacity for emotion in ourselves to stave off uncomfortable feelings. I guess that gives a little insight into what I believe and why, and I hope that whoever reads this knows that the decision to be "Pro-Life" or "Pro-Choice" shouldn't be undertaken lightly, and what we say and do has a tremendous impact on each other, especially on the young and vulnerable in our society.
Wow, I had originally intended to talk about legislating morality and construction of morality outside of belief in a deity of some sort (a near impossibility if you want to generate a non-Nietzschean, non-Machiavellian morality - try reading John Stuart Mill, for example - his utilitarian ideals are so flawed you could drive a Mac Truck through them, not that they had Mac Trucks in his day, insert the Victorian equivalent), but my progression of thoughts led me to the abortion issue. If you've made it this far, I hope I haven't upset too many apple carts, and I hope that you can still engage in conversation with me later...
I suppose this one might pop up on a number of search engines now, and I might get wanderers in that don't normally read this blog - if that is you, feel free to comment, but try to remain thoughtful in your comments, as I tried to in this lengthy discussion. Feel free to dispute what I have said, but don't just come down on my side or on the opposition side with irrational or argumentative garbage... if you have a counter argument, I would love to hear it; this does not capture all my reasoning, but I have given it a bit of thought...
Thanks for reading :)
Friday, October 24, 2008
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
On Socialism
In a response to the last blog, supergoober mentioned the word "socialism", and I responded with the fact that Obama clearly is "socialist" in his aims. I feel that I should define a bit more clearly what I mean by that, and mention the specifics where he, as well as many Democrats and Republicans have socialist tendencies.
But first to address the resistance to the word in general. Many people tie this to the failed economies of the Eastern Block, and rightly so, as those were communist governments (actually formed into oligarchical dictatorships) that had socialized economies - specifically the branch of socialism that deals with the state controling the means of production. The fact that Soviet Communism was deeply entangled with Socialism really did a lot to throw the economic principles of socialism into doubt.
Many people now will debate whether socialism and communism are the same thing, adherents to one socialism generally try to distance themselves from the name communism. Marx viewed the proletarian revolution and socializing of economies (socialism) as a step toward the communist utopia that he posited.
The actual history of the names, however, is much more interesting. Communism was the European term for the atheist utopia that Marx envisioned. In Protestant England, however, the term was deemed to be to close to Communion (the Catholic Sacrament) and the term socialism was favored. They both actually describe the same, or very similar, philosophies, however, adherents to each will spit hairs over who falls into what category.
Even among Socialism, which could be defined as the movement to remove control of industry from the hands of a few "capitalists" and return it to either the laborers or the government, depending on your flavor of socialism. A free-market socialism would have labor organizations running all businesses rather than individuals, while a national socialism (the term now being far out of favor since the Germans used it in that upsetting period in the late 1930s and early 40s) focusses on the state controlling industry. In addition, the Marxist philosophy of "from each according to his means, to each according to his needs" also affects social policy - particularly "liberal" social policy, which flows from the social democrat ideal (most notably used in England) of state ownership of key market industries and tax-funded social welfare programs for the population.
The social democrats (not affiliated with the Democratic party of the USA, though holding many of the same ideas), are the socialist ideology to which Barrack Obama is most closely aligned. He favors punitive actions towards owners of businesses (aka Joe The Plumber, sorry, but it is the most obvious reference) making him "spread the wealth around" to favor people who for whatever reason could not achieve what Joe did. He had some lines where he danced around the issue and said that he would have liked to do things to help Joe reach where he did (not that he needed any help, apparently), but now that he was there, it was his responsibility to help his fellows, not by employing them, but by giving back some of that presumably ill-gotten gain to the government so that Obama could "spread it around" as he saw fit. That is a distinctly socialist idea, and naming it as such does no harm.
If Obama does not like that, he should adopt a philosophy that does not espouse that, but it would undermine everything he ostensibly believes in. He should instead embrace the term and tell people what it means and why he believes that it will work. McCain could reasonably counter with why he thinks it doesn;t work and why free-market capitalism does.
But that would require both candidates to be intelligent and genuine, and it would also require that McCain be a free market capitalist. He is, however, very socialist in his approach to government, perhaps not so much as Obama is (ie socialized medicine), but attempting to manipulate the housing market and control that entire sector of the economy with a government institution is completely and 100 percent socialist. I don't know if he knows that or believes that it is actually the right solution (or is it just what voters want to hear?), but you cannot argue that it is anything but socialism. Government economic regulations put us in this position with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac being regulated into making these loans, and main street and wall street were complicit in this action (yes, theGM and I talked a bit about this, and I do believe that it is all three, I always have, but I feel that Wall Street gets all the blame, so my other blogs were an attempt to show where the Wall Street attitude came from. These loans used to be considered to risky, but when Carter started pushing for them, and regulations started mandating them, Wall Street quickly fell into lock-step realizing there was money to be made and that the Feds would bail them out, and main street jumped on board, conveniently never stopping to read the fine print and happy that the world was giving it up for them for once... long parenthetical finally concluding, Socialized Government started it, wall street and main street hopped on for a ride, but the fundamental precipitating act was the government attempt at controlling the economy and money supply).
So, long story short, McCain and Obama have very strong socialist leanings in their policy (government funding of energy - wind, solar, nuclear, etc. also socialist Mr. McCain), and I do not particuarly like either one. I am not a free-market nut, the government should oversee in a regulatory capacity, but I have an intense dislike for government ownership and for control of the economy as an engine for social policy change - because it doesn't work well (if it does at all). The need for social welfare from the government is largely self-fulfilling - the government usurped the roles of the traditional organizations involved in these activities and began doing it less efficiently and in a more dehumanizing way...
But that is for a later blog on liberal supermajorities in 1933 and 1965, and I think you can already see where this is going. Talk to you soon, I have to go tutor chemistry again :)
But first to address the resistance to the word in general. Many people tie this to the failed economies of the Eastern Block, and rightly so, as those were communist governments (actually formed into oligarchical dictatorships) that had socialized economies - specifically the branch of socialism that deals with the state controling the means of production. The fact that Soviet Communism was deeply entangled with Socialism really did a lot to throw the economic principles of socialism into doubt.
Many people now will debate whether socialism and communism are the same thing, adherents to one socialism generally try to distance themselves from the name communism. Marx viewed the proletarian revolution and socializing of economies (socialism) as a step toward the communist utopia that he posited.
The actual history of the names, however, is much more interesting. Communism was the European term for the atheist utopia that Marx envisioned. In Protestant England, however, the term was deemed to be to close to Communion (the Catholic Sacrament) and the term socialism was favored. They both actually describe the same, or very similar, philosophies, however, adherents to each will spit hairs over who falls into what category.
Even among Socialism, which could be defined as the movement to remove control of industry from the hands of a few "capitalists" and return it to either the laborers or the government, depending on your flavor of socialism. A free-market socialism would have labor organizations running all businesses rather than individuals, while a national socialism (the term now being far out of favor since the Germans used it in that upsetting period in the late 1930s and early 40s) focusses on the state controlling industry. In addition, the Marxist philosophy of "from each according to his means, to each according to his needs" also affects social policy - particularly "liberal" social policy, which flows from the social democrat ideal (most notably used in England) of state ownership of key market industries and tax-funded social welfare programs for the population.
The social democrats (not affiliated with the Democratic party of the USA, though holding many of the same ideas), are the socialist ideology to which Barrack Obama is most closely aligned. He favors punitive actions towards owners of businesses (aka Joe The Plumber, sorry, but it is the most obvious reference) making him "spread the wealth around" to favor people who for whatever reason could not achieve what Joe did. He had some lines where he danced around the issue and said that he would have liked to do things to help Joe reach where he did (not that he needed any help, apparently), but now that he was there, it was his responsibility to help his fellows, not by employing them, but by giving back some of that presumably ill-gotten gain to the government so that Obama could "spread it around" as he saw fit. That is a distinctly socialist idea, and naming it as such does no harm.
If Obama does not like that, he should adopt a philosophy that does not espouse that, but it would undermine everything he ostensibly believes in. He should instead embrace the term and tell people what it means and why he believes that it will work. McCain could reasonably counter with why he thinks it doesn;t work and why free-market capitalism does.
But that would require both candidates to be intelligent and genuine, and it would also require that McCain be a free market capitalist. He is, however, very socialist in his approach to government, perhaps not so much as Obama is (ie socialized medicine), but attempting to manipulate the housing market and control that entire sector of the economy with a government institution is completely and 100 percent socialist. I don't know if he knows that or believes that it is actually the right solution (or is it just what voters want to hear?), but you cannot argue that it is anything but socialism. Government economic regulations put us in this position with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac being regulated into making these loans, and main street and wall street were complicit in this action (yes, theGM and I talked a bit about this, and I do believe that it is all three, I always have, but I feel that Wall Street gets all the blame, so my other blogs were an attempt to show where the Wall Street attitude came from. These loans used to be considered to risky, but when Carter started pushing for them, and regulations started mandating them, Wall Street quickly fell into lock-step realizing there was money to be made and that the Feds would bail them out, and main street jumped on board, conveniently never stopping to read the fine print and happy that the world was giving it up for them for once... long parenthetical finally concluding, Socialized Government started it, wall street and main street hopped on for a ride, but the fundamental precipitating act was the government attempt at controlling the economy and money supply).
So, long story short, McCain and Obama have very strong socialist leanings in their policy (government funding of energy - wind, solar, nuclear, etc. also socialist Mr. McCain), and I do not particuarly like either one. I am not a free-market nut, the government should oversee in a regulatory capacity, but I have an intense dislike for government ownership and for control of the economy as an engine for social policy change - because it doesn't work well (if it does at all). The need for social welfare from the government is largely self-fulfilling - the government usurped the roles of the traditional organizations involved in these activities and began doing it less efficiently and in a more dehumanizing way...
But that is for a later blog on liberal supermajorities in 1933 and 1965, and I think you can already see where this is going. Talk to you soon, I have to go tutor chemistry again :)
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Republicans Wrong? Of Course!
In answer to your earlier query in the blog response, I just want to unequivocally say that certainly there are times when I feel the Republicans are wrong. In case you don't remember, this cycle I view it as my civic duty to not vote for either presidential candidate. I feel that both of them are naive, neither has appropriate leadership qualifications, and both the economic plans are patently ridiculous. I will vote for the propositions and so on, but I refuse to vote for either candidate.
Some people at work who have heard me mention this say, "If you aren't going to vote, you have no right to complain about what you get." BS - not exercising one right does not mean I waive another (free speech). Even if you buy the non-sequitor, I still have the right to complain because my refusal to vote is because both are horrible. I will bitch quite loudly about disastrous policy decisions of either one, because I would if I voted for either one anyway.
In terms of why my comments are so resoundingly anti-Democrat, it is because I am not following any of the crap that is going on. I will listen to snippets of news, but I do not cruise the blogs or follow FOX or CNN religiously. I flip on network news every once in a while - since the press seems to have a love affair with Obama and Biden, I will more often hear their idiotic comments and respond to them.
If you recall a couple of blogs ago, I decried the "Carbon-Tax Plan" that Palin mentioned as about an idiotic idea as one could have, especially in the current climate (pun intended - check out the cooling trend of the last 7 years, plus the cooling trend of the economy - a carbon tax would screw up America, but it would condemn 3rd world countries to economic bankruptcy were it ever instituted in a widespread fashion).
As to the racist and overtly homicidal comments, I haven't seen them, but if I had, I would be quick to damn them. Rush's bit on being sexist is surely a joke - that sounds like it is right out of his playbook on commentary that would infuriate the left - and he tends to play this stuff as a "straight-man" style humor for as long as possible. What are you referring to when you talk about comments from the candidates - can you point me to a quote? I am not being flip, I am really not plugged into this campaign because it is such a joke on both sides.
As far as the election fraud, the Disney character bit is extreme, but the voter rolls not being purged of felons and deceased persons is ridiculous - that should be done immediately, because that is where real voter fraud takes place. ACORN is a politically active organization that does actually encourage voter fraud (a bit extreme of an accusation, but it can be backed up - now is not the time, because I need to finish grading (midterm grades due 8:30 am tomorrow)).
But what I really find troubling are the proposals Obama has made in the past - and he is just echoing the Dem. party line on these. He wants to allow "day-of" voter registration. That is you can register to vote the day of the election - eliminating checks on citizenship, residency, and eligibility - not overtly, but because there will be no way of immediately checking. This is a horrible idea, and it only encourages fraud, or at best ignorance in voting and bribing of voters (Chicago machine politics, anyone?). The other thing that he supports is eliminating the secrecy of voting for unionization - labor organizers could petition people and have knowledge of who voted against "organizing" and pursue aggressive campaigns to convince anti-union people. This is dangerous - when someone knows how you vote, they can intimidate you, and just as big monopolies tried to crush unions in the early 1900's, big unions have tried to crush opposition to them in the late 1900's to early 2000's (and yes, I know that I don't need the apostrophes, but dammit they look better).
An unfortunate necessity, however, is that of spoiled ballots being discarded. As much as people complain about this, it affects both sides about evenly. There are neutral parties who inspect ballots and discard any ones that do not meet certain requirements... it is impossible to intuit what a voter would have wanted if they could not follow instructions. While it seems ridiculous to discard a ballot that did not have a line completely connected (for example) when it is "readily apparent" who the person wanted to vote for, we cannot embark on the road of letting a third party interpret who they thought someone was going to vote for. This is the same way people lose points on the SAT and other standardized tests, and when you are dealing with that many votes, it is unfortunately the only way.
I will aways favor paper ballots, because there is a "paper trail". Can fraud occur? Yes. Can it occur more easily and less verifiably with an all electronic system? Oh my yes. To falsify large amounts of ballots, it would take the concerted efforts of many, while to screw up an electronic system on a fairly large scale would require less effort. I am not a tinfoil hat nut that says that evil liberals or evil conservatives would do this, but it puts voter fraud on a massive scale within reach of small pockets of people who, on some level, just like to f__k with computerized stuff.
So, long story short, Republicans piss me off on some level just as much as Democrats. There is nothing I hate more than having an idiot try and defend a position that I hold - and I am sure you feel the same way.
But more on that later, and I would also like to discuss the "Bradley Effect" and race in elections... coming soon to a blog near you :)
Some people at work who have heard me mention this say, "If you aren't going to vote, you have no right to complain about what you get." BS - not exercising one right does not mean I waive another (free speech). Even if you buy the non-sequitor, I still have the right to complain because my refusal to vote is because both are horrible. I will bitch quite loudly about disastrous policy decisions of either one, because I would if I voted for either one anyway.
In terms of why my comments are so resoundingly anti-Democrat, it is because I am not following any of the crap that is going on. I will listen to snippets of news, but I do not cruise the blogs or follow FOX or CNN religiously. I flip on network news every once in a while - since the press seems to have a love affair with Obama and Biden, I will more often hear their idiotic comments and respond to them.
If you recall a couple of blogs ago, I decried the "Carbon-Tax Plan" that Palin mentioned as about an idiotic idea as one could have, especially in the current climate (pun intended - check out the cooling trend of the last 7 years, plus the cooling trend of the economy - a carbon tax would screw up America, but it would condemn 3rd world countries to economic bankruptcy were it ever instituted in a widespread fashion).
As to the racist and overtly homicidal comments, I haven't seen them, but if I had, I would be quick to damn them. Rush's bit on being sexist is surely a joke - that sounds like it is right out of his playbook on commentary that would infuriate the left - and he tends to play this stuff as a "straight-man" style humor for as long as possible. What are you referring to when you talk about comments from the candidates - can you point me to a quote? I am not being flip, I am really not plugged into this campaign because it is such a joke on both sides.
As far as the election fraud, the Disney character bit is extreme, but the voter rolls not being purged of felons and deceased persons is ridiculous - that should be done immediately, because that is where real voter fraud takes place. ACORN is a politically active organization that does actually encourage voter fraud (a bit extreme of an accusation, but it can be backed up - now is not the time, because I need to finish grading (midterm grades due 8:30 am tomorrow)).
But what I really find troubling are the proposals Obama has made in the past - and he is just echoing the Dem. party line on these. He wants to allow "day-of" voter registration. That is you can register to vote the day of the election - eliminating checks on citizenship, residency, and eligibility - not overtly, but because there will be no way of immediately checking. This is a horrible idea, and it only encourages fraud, or at best ignorance in voting and bribing of voters (Chicago machine politics, anyone?). The other thing that he supports is eliminating the secrecy of voting for unionization - labor organizers could petition people and have knowledge of who voted against "organizing" and pursue aggressive campaigns to convince anti-union people. This is dangerous - when someone knows how you vote, they can intimidate you, and just as big monopolies tried to crush unions in the early 1900's, big unions have tried to crush opposition to them in the late 1900's to early 2000's (and yes, I know that I don't need the apostrophes, but dammit they look better).
An unfortunate necessity, however, is that of spoiled ballots being discarded. As much as people complain about this, it affects both sides about evenly. There are neutral parties who inspect ballots and discard any ones that do not meet certain requirements... it is impossible to intuit what a voter would have wanted if they could not follow instructions. While it seems ridiculous to discard a ballot that did not have a line completely connected (for example) when it is "readily apparent" who the person wanted to vote for, we cannot embark on the road of letting a third party interpret who they thought someone was going to vote for. This is the same way people lose points on the SAT and other standardized tests, and when you are dealing with that many votes, it is unfortunately the only way.
I will aways favor paper ballots, because there is a "paper trail". Can fraud occur? Yes. Can it occur more easily and less verifiably with an all electronic system? Oh my yes. To falsify large amounts of ballots, it would take the concerted efforts of many, while to screw up an electronic system on a fairly large scale would require less effort. I am not a tinfoil hat nut that says that evil liberals or evil conservatives would do this, but it puts voter fraud on a massive scale within reach of small pockets of people who, on some level, just like to f__k with computerized stuff.
So, long story short, Republicans piss me off on some level just as much as Democrats. There is nothing I hate more than having an idiot try and defend a position that I hold - and I am sure you feel the same way.
But more on that later, and I would also like to discuss the "Bradley Effect" and race in elections... coming soon to a blog near you :)
Monday, October 20, 2008
Joe Biden: Hello Mouth, Meet Foot
Joe Biden has a habit of continually putting his foot in his mouth; and I am not talking about the kind of gaffs that go largely ignored because they are inevitable mistakes for a person who makes his/her living by speaking in public. Most politicians have many of these types of mistakes - how often do we all fumble over words at times. Most times, these mistakes are picked up by comedians (and sometimes journalists) to poke a little fun at a politician or politics in general.
Biden spent a long time criticizing Bush's education policy and No Child Left Behind, and then concluded with the statement: “There’s less than 1 percent of the population of Iowa that is African American. There is probably less than 4 or 5 percent that are minorities. What is in Washington? So look, it goes back to what you start off with, what you’re dealing with.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/24/AR2007102402716.html
Anyway, that is not the only gaffe, but I do not want to rehash his long history of ignorant and arrogant statements, but one he made recently was incredibly stupid from a political standpoint. I don't remeber the exact quote, but he effectively said that within six months of being elected the world would test Obama the way it tested Kennedy. He implied that there would be some potentially catastrophic confrontation of Obama because of his lack of experience.
Whether this statement is correct or not, it shows an incredible lack of sophistication about national politics. The Republicans would probably never bring something like that up for fear of being called scaremongers or being too negative. But if Biden brings it up first, it all of a sudden becomes fair game. You go from being politically unable to touch the inexperience angle, and then Biden just opens the floodgates and makes that aspect of the debate relevant again.
Think about it. Biden basically says that because Obama is inexperienced, the world will test him - what exactly does that mean? It seems to express a real lack of confidence in his presidential candidate. That is not a good thing to have your running mate say less than a month before an election.
Just an observation, more later, but not on Biden - he is just another boring racist elitist, and there is lots of proof of that from his own mouth.
Biden spent a long time criticizing Bush's education policy and No Child Left Behind, and then concluded with the statement: “There’s less than 1 percent of the population of Iowa that is African American. There is probably less than 4 or 5 percent that are minorities. What is in Washington? So look, it goes back to what you start off with, what you’re dealing with.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/24/AR2007102402716.html
Anyway, that is not the only gaffe, but I do not want to rehash his long history of ignorant and arrogant statements, but one he made recently was incredibly stupid from a political standpoint. I don't remeber the exact quote, but he effectively said that within six months of being elected the world would test Obama the way it tested Kennedy. He implied that there would be some potentially catastrophic confrontation of Obama because of his lack of experience.
Whether this statement is correct or not, it shows an incredible lack of sophistication about national politics. The Republicans would probably never bring something like that up for fear of being called scaremongers or being too negative. But if Biden brings it up first, it all of a sudden becomes fair game. You go from being politically unable to touch the inexperience angle, and then Biden just opens the floodgates and makes that aspect of the debate relevant again.
Think about it. Biden basically says that because Obama is inexperienced, the world will test him - what exactly does that mean? It seems to express a real lack of confidence in his presidential candidate. That is not a good thing to have your running mate say less than a month before an election.
Just an observation, more later, but not on Biden - he is just another boring racist elitist, and there is lots of proof of that from his own mouth.
Monday, October 13, 2008
McBamaNomics
Yep, well, I've been busy lately, and I don't have a ton of time to write right now, but just want to opine about the state of the economy and how our two wonderful candidates proposed to deal with economic issues, and how, if either one institutes their ideas, what a disasterous mess it will cause. Pardon me as I go through this, it will have a bit of a CW feel to it (check the sidebar for the definition).
Anyway, the first question was basically, "What do you think we should do about the crisis?" If either one thought that their answer was the right one, then God help us should either of them get into the White House. Actually, in a way I hope that Obama does, because it will (in my mind) mean the ultimate repudiation of his economic school of thought. Of course, no one else may actually be paying enough attention to what actually happens for this to matter, because his ideas are nice and help out the little guy (insert mewling voice here). Never mind the fact that they ultimately screw the little guy worse harder than Ned Beatty got screwed in Deliverance, harder than Jodie Foster got screwed in The Accused, harder than any contemporary porn actress gets screwed in any of the modern mysogynistic miasma of pornography, harder even than Greedo got screwed when Lucas editted Star Wars so that he shot first (now that should get you an idea how strongly I feel about Obama's plan - I don't want to live in a universe where Greedo shoots first!!!!!!)
But I digress... Obama's plan was basically this: spend money on public works, create government jobs, bailout any person who got in over their ignorant head, and tax the hell out of the evil corporations who got us here in the first place. If this sounds familiar, it should - it is a page out of FDR's playbook, and unfortunately, anyone with any historical savvy can tell you it did not work. It mired us in a worldwide depression for over a decade, and only a World War got us out of it. Not that even a world war would do that, now; we have switched from a manufacturing based economy to a service based economy, so a war would not really help gear up economic growth (and even that growth was government spurred, but not in the same way - that's for another time, kiddies). Anyway, if you want a decade of malaise, go with the Obama plan.
The McCain plan was just as bad, perhaps worse. His idea was to have the Treasury purchase and renegotiate loans so that the loan would not exceed the value of the home. This would supposedly stabilize home prices. Unfortunately, it wouldn't work. Lots of lessons in the past have showed us that government price and wage fixing don't work at all. Whether they were put forth as part of a disastrous domestic plan of Richard Nixon or of Jimmy Carter, they f---ed up the economy royally the last time. Trying to "stabilize" home prices is ludicrous. Some people are going to lose their homes, and lose their investments. Sorry, there are no rewards without risks, and that was the risk that some people took. If these cycles never happened, no young buyers would ever be able to get into homes.
I bought my home in 1996, at the bottom of a market slump that started around 1994 (which Clinton tried to reverse by freeing up capital by mandating Freddie and Fannie make more risky loans). I bought my house for $202,500. I only mention that because the guy I bought it from had purchased at the height of the previous craze for $330,000 and he got screwed in the deal. he couldn't afford to live in the area and was moving to the East Bay, and he lost all of his down payment, and actually owed more on his loan than we paid. Did that suck for him? Yes, but were it not for his bad judgement, I would not have been able to buy a home. There are many reasonable people who can now (or soon) afford homes in the area, and the prices will stabilize themselves. If that means that some people have to pay unreasonable amounts for a home that is worth less than the loan, then they had better keep doing it.
They have a couple of options: keep paying on a loan that is higher than the value of the home and wait for prices to rise again (as they will), or sell it at a loss because they cannot afford the payments because they got themselves into a stupid loan in the first place. That is it. End of story - just like owning a car, you make loan payments for quite a while when you owe more than the car is worth (instant depreciation) and no one has a problem with that unless they overextended to buy that car. Not too different, and it isn't rocket science.
But back to the plans - long story short, they both suck, but I take solace in the fact that, in all likelihood, neither will be instituted; debates are all about who sounds like they care more, and seldom actually have anything to do with what people are going to do in office.
Obama is not going to cut taxes on 95% of Americans (even his proposed plan doesn't work out to this number). He ran on a similar line for the Senate and always voted against any tax cut, whether for rich or poor. McCain will not get rid of earmarks, too many people love them - it is their principle method of getting re-elected.
I will have to labor these points more later, right now I am going to tutor someone in Honors Chemistry.
Anyway, the first question was basically, "What do you think we should do about the crisis?" If either one thought that their answer was the right one, then God help us should either of them get into the White House. Actually, in a way I hope that Obama does, because it will (in my mind) mean the ultimate repudiation of his economic school of thought. Of course, no one else may actually be paying enough attention to what actually happens for this to matter, because his ideas are nice and help out the little guy (insert mewling voice here). Never mind the fact that they ultimately screw the little guy worse harder than Ned Beatty got screwed in Deliverance, harder than Jodie Foster got screwed in The Accused, harder than any contemporary porn actress gets screwed in any of the modern mysogynistic miasma of pornography, harder even than Greedo got screwed when Lucas editted Star Wars so that he shot first (now that should get you an idea how strongly I feel about Obama's plan - I don't want to live in a universe where Greedo shoots first!!!!!!)
But I digress... Obama's plan was basically this: spend money on public works, create government jobs, bailout any person who got in over their ignorant head, and tax the hell out of the evil corporations who got us here in the first place. If this sounds familiar, it should - it is a page out of FDR's playbook, and unfortunately, anyone with any historical savvy can tell you it did not work. It mired us in a worldwide depression for over a decade, and only a World War got us out of it. Not that even a world war would do that, now; we have switched from a manufacturing based economy to a service based economy, so a war would not really help gear up economic growth (and even that growth was government spurred, but not in the same way - that's for another time, kiddies). Anyway, if you want a decade of malaise, go with the Obama plan.
The McCain plan was just as bad, perhaps worse. His idea was to have the Treasury purchase and renegotiate loans so that the loan would not exceed the value of the home. This would supposedly stabilize home prices. Unfortunately, it wouldn't work. Lots of lessons in the past have showed us that government price and wage fixing don't work at all. Whether they were put forth as part of a disastrous domestic plan of Richard Nixon or of Jimmy Carter, they f---ed up the economy royally the last time. Trying to "stabilize" home prices is ludicrous. Some people are going to lose their homes, and lose their investments. Sorry, there are no rewards without risks, and that was the risk that some people took. If these cycles never happened, no young buyers would ever be able to get into homes.
I bought my home in 1996, at the bottom of a market slump that started around 1994 (which Clinton tried to reverse by freeing up capital by mandating Freddie and Fannie make more risky loans). I bought my house for $202,500. I only mention that because the guy I bought it from had purchased at the height of the previous craze for $330,000 and he got screwed in the deal. he couldn't afford to live in the area and was moving to the East Bay, and he lost all of his down payment, and actually owed more on his loan than we paid. Did that suck for him? Yes, but were it not for his bad judgement, I would not have been able to buy a home. There are many reasonable people who can now (or soon) afford homes in the area, and the prices will stabilize themselves. If that means that some people have to pay unreasonable amounts for a home that is worth less than the loan, then they had better keep doing it.
They have a couple of options: keep paying on a loan that is higher than the value of the home and wait for prices to rise again (as they will), or sell it at a loss because they cannot afford the payments because they got themselves into a stupid loan in the first place. That is it. End of story - just like owning a car, you make loan payments for quite a while when you owe more than the car is worth (instant depreciation) and no one has a problem with that unless they overextended to buy that car. Not too different, and it isn't rocket science.
But back to the plans - long story short, they both suck, but I take solace in the fact that, in all likelihood, neither will be instituted; debates are all about who sounds like they care more, and seldom actually have anything to do with what people are going to do in office.
Obama is not going to cut taxes on 95% of Americans (even his proposed plan doesn't work out to this number). He ran on a similar line for the Senate and always voted against any tax cut, whether for rich or poor. McCain will not get rid of earmarks, too many people love them - it is their principle method of getting re-elected.
I will have to labor these points more later, right now I am going to tutor someone in Honors Chemistry.
Thursday, October 2, 2008
So, I'm watching the debate...
So far, it is what I expected... Biden is playing it safe, and chanting the mantra about his tax cuts for 95% of Americans - avoiding details, Palin is doing about as well, saying the same McCain line over and over.
The problem that I am seeing right this second is that Biden is talking out of both sides of his mouth - we are causing global warming, "we know the cause" and yet still advocates "clean coal". Sorry, you can't have it both ways - if you buy the line that CO2 is a greenhouse gas, and that we are causing the majority of warming - clean coal doesn't help. In fact, according to their science, low sulfur coal would increase CO2, while decreasing sulfur - sulfur is actually toxic, but it actually results in cooling, so this is actually a horrible solution (switching from one carbon source to another does not lessen the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere).
Of course, I don't think that our production of CO2 has a marked effect - I'll explain why later - the point is still valid. It is hypocritical. But people don't care - they just listen to whoever says the words "clean energy" more - regardless of the truth.
And Palin just supported a carbon tax -a horrible idea (unless it is very small - statistician/environmentalist Bjorn Lomborg did a study that showed the optimal rate was two to three dollars per ton - any more puts the brakes on economies without measurable positive effect).
They are actually going after each other a bit, now, but it is actually pretty boring - McCain/Palin supporters will still go that way, Obama/Biden supporters the same. It is possible that a small portion of the undecided might be swayed - possibly to McCain - Palin seems a little more convincing, Biden seems to be saying the same thing over and over. I don't think that this debate would really sway anyone, and I am getting bored - both are just putting forth the standard campaign lines. I am just going to shut it off and play some more Silent Hill 5.
The problem that I am seeing right this second is that Biden is talking out of both sides of his mouth - we are causing global warming, "we know the cause" and yet still advocates "clean coal". Sorry, you can't have it both ways - if you buy the line that CO2 is a greenhouse gas, and that we are causing the majority of warming - clean coal doesn't help. In fact, according to their science, low sulfur coal would increase CO2, while decreasing sulfur - sulfur is actually toxic, but it actually results in cooling, so this is actually a horrible solution (switching from one carbon source to another does not lessen the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere).
Of course, I don't think that our production of CO2 has a marked effect - I'll explain why later - the point is still valid. It is hypocritical. But people don't care - they just listen to whoever says the words "clean energy" more - regardless of the truth.
And Palin just supported a carbon tax -a horrible idea (unless it is very small - statistician/environmentalist Bjorn Lomborg did a study that showed the optimal rate was two to three dollars per ton - any more puts the brakes on economies without measurable positive effect).
They are actually going after each other a bit, now, but it is actually pretty boring - McCain/Palin supporters will still go that way, Obama/Biden supporters the same. It is possible that a small portion of the undecided might be swayed - possibly to McCain - Palin seems a little more convincing, Biden seems to be saying the same thing over and over. I don't think that this debate would really sway anyone, and I am getting bored - both are just putting forth the standard campaign lines. I am just going to shut it off and play some more Silent Hill 5.
Regulatory Reform Act of 2005
Just a quick blurb for supergoober, who earlier queried about my sources, here are a few interesting links on this act. Sponsored by Hagel - R, cosponsored by Elizabeth Dole, John McCain, and John Sununu, it called for regulatory oversight of Fannie and Freddie, including investigation into bookkeeping "irregularities". It attempted to stop risky loans and 0 down loans that were the hallmark of what the Dems wanted - to turn "The American Dream" into the American Right - that is, it is everyone's right to own a home.
I don't want to belittle the American Dream, and home-ownership is a big part of that. But it requires hard work, dedication, sacrifice, and it still might not happen. Hell, I wouldn't own if I hadn't gotten lucky with some idiot screwing up his own shot at the Dream. Sometimes, you can't always get what you want... and I know that this seems harsh, but shit happens and chips fall where they may and about a hundred other cliches - life doesn't always work the way we want it to - but the purpose is to live it and try and figure it out for ourselves, not to have people hand us stuff to try and pacify us into re-electing them (a long time Democrat strategy, oft employed by Republicans as well, but we can't forget who mastered the art of creating a dependent class of voters - that is a capital D!)
Anyway, as to the source, citations, etc. on the bill, I've included a summary below from govtrack.us, and their main source material is the Congressional Record (I still reminisce fondly about those days working in the Millbrae Library when I would read those on my break, so I could actually see what bills were like and how the debates went down).
The summary:
1/26/2005--Introduced.
Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Reform Act of 2005 - Amends the Federal Housing Enterprises Financial Safety and Soundness Act of 1992 to establish: (1) in lieu of the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), an independent Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Agency which shall have authority over the Federal Home Loan Bank Finance Corporation, the Federal Home Loan Banks, the Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie Mae), and the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (Freddie Mac); and (2) the Federal Housing Enterprise Board.
Sets forth operating, administrative, and regulatory provisions of the Agency, including provisions respecting: (1) assessment authority; (2) authority to limit nonmission-related assets; (3) minimum and critical capital levels; (4) risk-based capital test; (5) capital classifications and undercapitalized enterprises; (6) enforcement actions and penalties; (7) golden parachutes; and (8) reporting.
Amends the Federal Home Loan Bank Act to establish the Federal Home Loan Bank Finance Corporation. Transfers the functions of the Office of Finance of the Federal Home Loan Banks to such Corporation.
Excludes the Federal Home Loan Banks from certain securities reporting requirements.
Abolishes the Federal Housing Finance Board.
The site of this is http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s109-190&tab=summary
If you want McCain's remarks on the senate floor, they are at http://www.govtrack.us/congress/record.xpd?id=109-s20060525-16&bill=s109-190
Hagel's introduction of the bill is at http://www.govtrack.us/congress/record.xpd?id=109-s20050126-53&bill=s109-190#sMonofilemx003Ammx002Fmmx002Fmmx002Fmhomemx002Fmgovtrackmx002Fmdatamx002Fmusmx002Fm109mx002Fmcrmx002Fms20050126-53.xmlElementm39m0m0m
The full text of the bill is at http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=s109-190
Interesting video on the debate http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MGT_cSi7Rs - a montage of Democrats saying Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will be just fine, despite Republicans maintaining that we need more regulations on the two organizations. Check out Barney Frank maintaining that there are no problems, and that the Republicans are just trying to stir up trouble - and he has the audacity to now claim that it is the Republicans fault (and , yes, I know that I split that infinitive, but I felt like it, okay - get off my back!).
Also, the bailout bill sucks - do we really think any of the senators read the 450+ page bill - a typical Senate bill with loads of crap having nothing to do with the bailout - subsidies for energy, rum, railroad ties. So before you think that I am just listening to Right-wing nutcases, know that I love to research :)
No offense, supergoober, but one of your responses was a tad snitty, and what, no response on the origin of the universe ;)
Now I am off to play a little of Silent Hill: Homecoming before the debate - preliminary judgement - the game is frickin' awesome... a tad on the linear side so far, but I still hold out hope.
I don't want to belittle the American Dream, and home-ownership is a big part of that. But it requires hard work, dedication, sacrifice, and it still might not happen. Hell, I wouldn't own if I hadn't gotten lucky with some idiot screwing up his own shot at the Dream. Sometimes, you can't always get what you want... and I know that this seems harsh, but shit happens and chips fall where they may and about a hundred other cliches - life doesn't always work the way we want it to - but the purpose is to live it and try and figure it out for ourselves, not to have people hand us stuff to try and pacify us into re-electing them (a long time Democrat strategy, oft employed by Republicans as well, but we can't forget who mastered the art of creating a dependent class of voters - that is a capital D!)
Anyway, as to the source, citations, etc. on the bill, I've included a summary below from govtrack.us, and their main source material is the Congressional Record (I still reminisce fondly about those days working in the Millbrae Library when I would read those on my break, so I could actually see what bills were like and how the debates went down).
The summary:
1/26/2005--Introduced.
Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Reform Act of 2005 - Amends the Federal Housing Enterprises Financial Safety and Soundness Act of 1992 to establish: (1) in lieu of the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), an independent Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Agency which shall have authority over the Federal Home Loan Bank Finance Corporation, the Federal Home Loan Banks, the Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie Mae), and the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (Freddie Mac); and (2) the Federal Housing Enterprise Board.
Sets forth operating, administrative, and regulatory provisions of the Agency, including provisions respecting: (1) assessment authority; (2) authority to limit nonmission-related assets; (3) minimum and critical capital levels; (4) risk-based capital test; (5) capital classifications and undercapitalized enterprises; (6) enforcement actions and penalties; (7) golden parachutes; and (8) reporting.
Amends the Federal Home Loan Bank Act to establish the Federal Home Loan Bank Finance Corporation. Transfers the functions of the Office of Finance of the Federal Home Loan Banks to such Corporation.
Excludes the Federal Home Loan Banks from certain securities reporting requirements.
Abolishes the Federal Housing Finance Board.
The site of this is http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s109-190&tab=summary
If you want McCain's remarks on the senate floor, they are at http://www.govtrack.us/congress/record.xpd?id=109-s20060525-16&bill=s109-190
Hagel's introduction of the bill is at http://www.govtrack.us/congress/record.xpd?id=109-s20050126-53&bill=s109-190#sMonofilemx003Ammx002Fmmx002Fmmx002Fmhomemx002Fmgovtrackmx002Fmdatamx002Fmusmx002Fm109mx002Fmcrmx002Fms20050126-53.xmlElementm39m0m0m
The full text of the bill is at http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=s109-190
Interesting video on the debate http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MGT_cSi7Rs - a montage of Democrats saying Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will be just fine, despite Republicans maintaining that we need more regulations on the two organizations. Check out Barney Frank maintaining that there are no problems, and that the Republicans are just trying to stir up trouble - and he has the audacity to now claim that it is the Republicans fault (and , yes, I know that I split that infinitive, but I felt like it, okay - get off my back!).
Also, the bailout bill sucks - do we really think any of the senators read the 450+ page bill - a typical Senate bill with loads of crap having nothing to do with the bailout - subsidies for energy, rum, railroad ties. So before you think that I am just listening to Right-wing nutcases, know that I love to research :)
No offense, supergoober, but one of your responses was a tad snitty, and what, no response on the origin of the universe ;)
Now I am off to play a little of Silent Hill: Homecoming before the debate - preliminary judgement - the game is frickin' awesome... a tad on the linear side so far, but I still hold out hope.
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