Things I’ve Learned This Election
1) One can have a 2-week long media scandal about your Christian preacher and still have a significant portion of the population believe you are a Muslim.
2) Having an out-of-wedlock birth is statement against abortion unless you are black or hispanic in which case it is just evidence of cultural disintegration.
3) Unlicensed plumbers should be foremost concerned with how they will have to make difficult choices once they are taxed on their income exceeding $250,000 per year.
4) Russia is plotting to take over Alaska and would have taken it over were it not for the valliant defense of the Alaskan Air National Guard.
5) One is middle class or a Regular Joe if they make over 6 times the poverty level for a family of four. ($17,500)
6) It is possible to spend $150,000 for clothes without being a commercial buyer.
7) Katie Couric and Charlie Gibson are hardball, no nonsense interviewers.
8) Asking what someone’s favorite magazines are is a form of gotcha journalism.
9) The poor can bring bankers to their knees and force them to make loans with interest rates that can adjust to over 10%.
10) The sum total of one’s commitment to fighting for the unborn is measured by whether one votes against Obama.
Trackbacks
- Man Bites Blog » Blog Archive » Just when I want to get out…
- Ad Dominum » Blog Archive » Things I’ve learned this election
Comments are closed.
Brilliant!
Amusing.
*zing*
Oh good, another “look how awful Republicans are” post. That’s a brave witness these days…
1. I’m not sure what anyone was supposed to do about that — McCain explicitly said Obama is not a Muslim. Most of the events surrounding this happened during the primary campaign anyway.
2. Who has asserted this? I think what most people pointed to as a pro-life statement was Sarah Palin’s giving birth to a Down’s Syndrome baby. Do you deny this?
3. The problem was that the taxes would present a disincentive for the plumber from doing something that would benefit the economy. You can dispute that if you want to.
4. Again, who has asserted this?
5. That’s $105,00 — for a single person, yes, that would be upper class. For a family with bills and schools, etc. I know your reference to “learning” is sarcastic and facetious, but if you didn’t think that was middle class, it is proably good that you learned it.
6. Fine, not going to defend that. Only to note what a trivial issue it is compared to what it ignores.
7. I would say they’re about average as TV interviewers go.
8. Fair enough. Again, so what? Ooooh — the Republicans try to spin a poor interview perfromance — no politicians ever do that!
9. I don’t think anyone blamed “the poor” — they blamed lenient lending policies encourage by Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, in a well-meaning but misguided attempt to expand home ownership.
10. No, but one’s willingness to flood the zone with trivialities like how much a candidate spends on clothes in the face of a candidate advocating a rabidly pro-abortion agenda is telling.
It looks like the view of some VN contributors that B.O.’s social policies will reduce the abortion rate has been pretty much debunked.
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=YjIxNzhmOGEyZjY4OTYyZTAyOWJhZjQyNDg1YzY1NmQ=
8) Asking what someone’s favorite magazines are is a form of gotcha journalism.
Actually, at that point of the interview, I thought it was… I was just embarrassed for Palin by that point. I truly felt bad for her when she couldn’t answer the question. I don’t think it is because she doesn’t read ANYTHING at all, but just because she didn’t want to say something wrong that the base or the Hillary voters wouldn’t like. I think the McCain campaign, at first, didn’t know what to do with Palin in order for her to appeal to both the base and the more moderate/liberal Hillary voters, hence the disastrous interviews.
Great post!
Knuckle Dragger,
It’s better to read the actual study and the accompanying press release from the organization itself than to read it through the lens of NRO. Here is what the press release fromCACG had to say about its own study:
Of course, Republicans can play this game, too.
1. An unplanned baby is a punishment that women should be spared from, rather than a blessing to be celebrated.
2. Someone who has spent the last 36 years representing Delaware as a Senator can claim Pennsylvania as his home.
3. There was television during the Great Depression, which President Roosevelt used to lead the nation.
4. People who take risks to grow their businesses and give people jobs should be forced to spread their wealth rather than reap the rewards of their labor.
5. It is acceptable to blame the financial crisis on deregulation without offering a regulation that would have prevented it.
6. You’re not a “real woman” unless you support unrestricted abortion.
7. Any criticism of an African American candidate’s liberal policies is really racist coded language.
8. Most people who claim to be voting against Obama because of his support for abortion are really just masking their racism.
9. It is of grave concern whether someone who asked Barack Obama a question about tax policy as a plumbing licesne.
10. The sum total of one’s concern for the poor and committment to peace is measured by wheter one voted for Obama.
—
Have I proven anything here? Have I advanced the discourse? No.
Katerina,
The NRO article is a critical analysis of the CACG study by an assistant professor of political science at the University of Alabama. He questions the validity of the study’s conclusions.
Great post JohnMcG!
While some offerings were admittedly partisan, I didn’t use Obama, Biden, McCain, or Palin by name. Some of the items are obviously applicable to said persons. I get the sense you had no fun creating your list. I have to confess I had difficulty after number 6 coming up with items, but I still managed to have fun.
MZ, you are begining to sound like a partisan hack.
An unplanned baby is a punishment that women should be spared from, rather than a blessing to be celebrated.
BTW, if you think out-of-wedlock birth should be celebrated, be my guest. I fail to see what virtue that is an exercise of.
1) One can have a 2-week long media scandal about your Christian preacher and still have a significant portion of the population believe you are a Muslim.
A “rumor” that started in the Democratic primary by Democrats. And much of the criticism of Wright is legitimate, especially if one would like to criticize crazy statements from big-living “rightist” preachers. Concerning Wright: the gov’t spread AIDS among black people, and his very large house, ect.
2) Having an out-of-wedlock birth is statement against abortion unless you are black or hispanic in which case it is just evidence of cultural disintegration.
When a teenager gets pregnant and is not married or engaged with strong nuclear family support, that is actually cultural disintegration. Very different cases, Bristol Palin and much of teenage pregnancy.
3) Unlicensed plumbers should be foremost concerned with how they will have to make difficult choices once they are taxed on their income exceeding $250,000 per year.
Obama came up to him, he gave his opinion, and now Ohio public officials – Obama max donors too – have rifled through his records. Lovely. And his concerns are based in reality: his taxes will go up, especially when Bush’s tax cuts expire. He’s trying to build a small business. We should not be snide about Joe in the slightest.
4) Russia is plotting to take over Alaska and would have taken it over were it not for the valliant defense of the Alaskan Air National Guard.
Palin’s point overreaches. So? Where did she indicate Russia is a threat to the U.S.? And I’ll take her lack of expertise over Biden any day, given his many missteps on that in their one debate alone. He’s a blowhard with a history of running, very confidently, at the mouth.
5) One is middle class or a Regular Joe if they make over 6 times the poverty level for a family of four. ($17,500)
They are. Raising a family on 100k a year or so is not easy in most of the country.
6) It is possible to spend $150,000 for clothes without being a commercial buyer.
Nothing unusual about this at all. National committees spend this and more on a wide variety of things every single year. The snideness against Palin is what is appaling. I like that she couldn’t afford high end clothes (one of the few things I like about Biden too).
7) Katie Couric and Charlie Gibson are hardball, no nonsense interviewers.
8) Asking what someone’s favorite magazines are is a form of gotcha journalism.
No doubt Palin failed in these interviews. I agree with Half Sigma (www.halfsigma.com) in his posts about this.
9) The poor can bring bankers to their knees and force them to make loans with interest rates that can adjust to over 10%.
Giving loans to people who shouldn’t have them is a bad idea. The Fed, the bankers, the GSEs, and the federal government acted irresponsibly. As did the people who took the loans, including the poor.
10) The sum total of one’s commitment to fighting for the unborn is measured by whether one votes against Obama.
Who argues this? One thing that cannot be argued: Obama is the most “pro-choice” presidential candidate in U.S. history, and no. 2 ain’t close.
BTW, if you think out-of-wedlock birth should be celebrated, be my guest. I fail to see what virtue that is an exercise of.
This makes no logical sense whatsoever. The goodness or the badness of out-of-wedlock births stand completely independent from the disturbing statement of Obama (one made in the context of support for absolute abortion rights). That statement, and that position, is in and of itself disqualifying in the opinion of myself and many others, regardless of the consequences that may come from any birth. Your statement here is approaching the consequentialist. Obama’s statement is inherently immoral.
Yes, I had no fun making my list, because I think it amounts to fiddling while Rome burns.
That politicians try to stretch the truth to their advantage, manipulate the media’s coverage of them, are vain, and in talking non-stop occasionally say something quite stupid is not a stunning observation. It’s the reason why Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert can each have a half-hour program a night making fun of them. It’s true for Replublicans; it’s true for Democrates.
My main question is whether pointing out how one side stretches the truth, manipulates the media, is vain, and says stupid things is the best use of this time for a blog with a Catholic identity and mission when both candidates are promoting morally unacceptable positions.
Which raises the question of whether confronting it is the best use of my time and talents, so I’ll move along…
“Very different cases, Bristol Palin and much of teenage pregnancy”
Huh?? the only difference is she is a rich white girl. Apart from that, I many similarities: high-school drop-out, baby’s father who has no desire to have children etc. You kind of prove the point being made.
MM: No, very significant differences. A young woman that marries the father (and, certainly, stays married) will likely avoid the troubles faced by approx. 75 percent of black women, 50 percent of Hispanic women, and 32 percent of white women – that is, essentially being on their own, with no marriage to the father. This has huge impact on poverty and crime.
On average, it is perfectly healthy for a teenager to have a baby, and healthier for her and child than the 30s. Every society, it seems, except for prosperous Western ones after the world wars understood this.
The problem is not teenage pregnancy, it is the seperation of procreation from marriage.
Are you kidding me? Were they Catholic (if the girl’s grandmother had not apostacized), a tribunal would annul this thing in a minute. And statistics on this type of marriage point to one thing: divorce.
No, I am not kidding. Two contexts here: Bristol Palin and her fiancee and their strong family support and then the many who have children without faithers in the lives of those children, most notably living in the household and sharing responsibilities. The difference there is obvious.
Second, on the point of teenage marriage/pregnancy: it is simply indisputable (but go ahead and dispute this if you want, I’d be happy to have a dialogue on it) from a medical / biological standpoint that having children in the teenage years is healthy and normal. The Blessed Mother was quite likely a youngish teenager when she gave birth to Our Lord (but who knows, the point is the commonality through history). In the prosperous, modern, liberal, entitled Western societies after the world wars, there are all sorts of other things that come into play that would make you or I very wary of our own daughter’s being pregnant as a teenager. But the point remains: the fundamental problem is the decline of marriage and of the intact family – which is, as we’ve discussed in previous dialogues on this topic, a root cause of crime rates, especially in black and Hispanic communities where illegimacy is present in more than half of births.
Jonathan, back in the day people HAD to reproduce early because they died early. We are living longer and that probably impacts why reproduction is so delayed.
Can we a agree on two things?
1. It is not desirable for an unwed teenager to become pregnant.
2. Once this occurs, the child should be treated as a blessing rather than a possible punishment.
John, can we add a third?
3> That getting married simply to “fix” an unwed pregnancy does not an “intact family” make?
I’ll take Catholic political bloggers more seriously when they devote at least twice as much energy criticizing the wickedness of the candidate they have endorsed as they spend criticizing their candidate’s opposition.
Jonathan, back in the day people HAD to reproduce early because they died early. We are living longer and that probably impacts why reproduction is so delayed.
Yes, no question. And it still remains that biologically and medically, having a child (on average) is a perfectly healthy for a teenager to do. In fact, it may well be the best time for quite a lot of women (and men have a “biological clock” we are starting to learn, but it “slows” much later).
This is NOT to advocate for teenage pregnancy. It is simply to state that Bristol Palin and those who do like her (early motherhood and marriage) are taking a good path, absent a divorce (much less likely with strong family pressure and support).
Can we a agree on two things?
1. It is not desirable for an unwed teenager to become pregnant.
Yes.
2. Once this occurs, the child should be treated as a blessing rather than a possible punishment.
No. I do not find it to be a blessing that I grew up in a broken home. It is not a blessing for a child to be born into a home without a father and mother. That child is indeed being punished for the poor choice of the mother and father. That the child wouldn’t have preferred death doesn’t make being born into a screwed up situation a blessing.
John, can we add a third?
3> That getting married simply to “fix” an unwed pregnancy does not an “intact family” make?
It’s a good start toward making a family. It’s better than a vague commitment to offer money and visit on weekends.
Very well done post!
MZ:
You know, I DO get nervous with all the flyovers the Russian Air Force does every other day here .
Anyway, laughing very hard.
John McG
9. I don’t think anyone blamed “the poor” — they blamed lenient lending policies encourage by Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, in a well-meaning but misguided attempt to expand home ownership.
I actually saw a Mallard Fillmore editorial cartoon in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review that did explicitly blame the poor. So, at least some people do.
Thanks, MZ. I needed some inspiration to write a blog post so I could take a break from school work. A dumb post needing only a quick response was precisely what I needed. Thanks!
Hey MZ, why don’t you try responding to what was actually written rather than what is easiest to address?
I said the child itself, in your case, you are a blessing, not a “punishment” to your parents for their bad behavior.
Are you really defending the “punished with a child” rhetoric? Are we really that far into the tank?
MZ,
Where’s the out of wedlock births. I’ve noted a couple of out of wedlock conceptions? Pro-creation of a new immortal human is always a joyous occasion – at least in heaven.
I addressed the specific quotation of Obama here: http://vox-nova.com/2008/04/03/punished-by-choices/
Long time readers of me know that I have had a high disdain for treating out-of-wedlock birth as a good thing, such as condemning having baby showers for unwed mothers. This goes back publicly at least a half dozen years. This goes along with my strong antipathy for divorce. My opinion doesn’t conform with the larger society’s excuse making over the disregard for the next generation, but I can at least say I’ve been consistent in my criticism of it.
Here I was reading the list thinking that it was humorous – I guess I missed the miserable political hack bent on tormenting the Republicans. (Sarcasm).
I though it was pretty darn funny myself.
Go see an optometrist. You’re blind on the left eye.
“condemning having baby showers for unwed mothers” You certainly are a real charmer. Given your history of sexism and paleolithic views on, well, everything, your idea of marriage probably includes an actual ball and chain.
You forgot one:
11) an unborn child is a punishment
There is a significant amount of territory between celebrating illegitimacy, and considering illegitimate children a punishment, akin to an STD.
Now, I’m inclined to forgive Obama for slipping into a clumsy parallelism that was ill-advised. But forgiveness is not excusing or defending.
I too would forgive him for the slip. Except that based upon his actions, it was a Freudian slip at best.
Interesting post, but, honestly, overdone. It’s all much simpler, and sadly, bi-partisan.
For a vocal segment (which may or may not be a majority) of the population:
1) Their political stances stem from emotional attachments to positions that make them feel better about themselves and the world around them. They tend to see policies and initiatives they support as being unmitigated goods for everyone.
2) They actively, if unconsciously and unintentionally, edit their perception of the world around them, so that they perceive said political stances as objective, fact based and self-evident rather than emotionally comforting.
3) They are convinced enough of their own sophistication that they believe themselves to be immune to being played for cynical political purposes.
4) Understanding their politics to be obvious, they refuse to see those who disagree as intelligently, thoughtfully and rationally having come to a different conclusion as to the way forward; instead they see them as stupid, and therefore easily mislead by some cynical and evil mastermind, or as intentionally evil, themselves.
5) They are apt to understand publicized flaws in people that they support as being overblown, while seeing flaws in the opposition as being the tip of the iceberg, and indicative of much greater problems.
“5) One is middle class or a Regular Joe if they make over 6 times the poverty level for a family of four. ($17,500)”
I’m sorry, but your math sucks, MZ. $250,000.00 is roughly 14.3 times $17,500.00, not 6 times.
MZ: $250K wasn’t the target number.
Regarding item #2 on the list, the comparison is a foolish one, albeit a common one. It simply does not make sense to compare a specific instance involving specific people to some hypothetical “others” who differ based on some arbitrary factor, such as race. We should speak plainly that extramarital sex is wrong and that unwed pregnancy is not an optimal situation morally or practically. But when it comes to individuals, we must show compassion, though not to the point of excusing (or celebrating) the sin. Furthermore, if compassion had not been shown to Miss Palin, I am guessing Item #2 on the list would read: “Self-described pro-life Republicans are too squeamish to be of any help to real unwed mothers.” At least, let’s limit ourselves to comparing actual cases – or, better still, let’s drop this tired whine already.
1. An unplanned baby is a punishment that women should be spared from, rather than a blessing to be celebrated.
You are the first person I know of you uses the term “women” in reference to the Senator’s daughters. And Obama is right. It is not a “blessing” for an unmarried junior high school girl to have a baby. And Obama is right that these girls should be given the information and moral guidence they need to avoid this type of “blessing.”
As for authentic blessings, I’ll take all I an get.