I never actually called for the Impeachment of George W Bush.
Oh, really?
I guess there is some argument going on here so I don't want to get involved in a flame war or anything except to say that alot of people feel the same way as you Gramps about Impeaching GW Bush: It SHOULD happen but it likely never will.
In the real world, particularly in this century the "elite" are certainly above the law.
There is a subtle difference between saying he deserved impeachment and actually calling for his impeachment.
While I thought he deserved it, I never really wanted it to happen. Is that okay?
So, wait, let me see if I can understand this. You think Bush deserves impeachment, but you wouldn't actually call for it? Why not? If you have proof the President violated the law, then you should absolutely call for it. I don't care how trivial the charge is, unless it is an unjust law, breaking the law is a crime, and the President should not get a pass just to avoid airing out America's dirty laundry to the press. In fact, that is what makes us different from the rest of the world. At the end of the day, our leaders are just men.
The way it is suppose to work is that our government is suppose to reflect the will of the people. You think the Democrats in Congress were too spineless to reflect the will of the people, and the Republicans too worried about their own party's strength (which I can't honestly disagree with you on either point), yet you re-elect most of them back to Congress, and you vote for one of the spineless Democrats for President? Why?
This sort of attitude makes me extremely sad. Perhaps we as a country got the President we deserved. Can someone here offer me some real hope that the world is not filled with people who are okay with a government that doesn't reflect the people's will?
You got that about right. Why ask for Impeachment if you know ahead of time that there is no chance of a conviction?
Sad, but that is real life.
You didn't answer my questions. Why were these idiots re-elected if they won't reflect the will of the people they represent? You seem completely apathetic to that situation. You voted for one, at least, so why did you?
Well the answer is obvious. No one votes for the entire line up in Congress. At most, you vote for one member of the House and one member of the Senate each time around.
Last November, my member of the House was such a shoo-in she didn't have an opponent. There was no seat up for election in Florida for the Senate, so I didn't get a choice for either.
As Big T would say, meet the new boss, same as the old boss. (Keep in mind that there was a sea change in the make up of both Houses of Congress in that election. That should give you some idea of how little is really going on in DC)
Well the answer is obvious. No one votes for the entire line up in Congress. At most, you vote for one member of the House and one member of the Senate each time around.
That is completely irrelevant. Most of those in Congress stayed in Congress. Only a few seats truly shifted in any way. Additionally, just like with the President, Congressmen can be recalled and tried for criminal actions. I've yet to hear a call for a single Congressman to be held accountable for their actions. It seems like the only thing Congressmen get held responsible for anything is poor choice of words or cheating on a spouse, neither of which is criminal (stupid, yes, but not illegal).
Last November, my member of the House was such a shoo-in she didn't have an opponent.
I find that incredibly unlikely. She may not have had another opponent listed on the ballot (which is another travesty of the American election system, but I won't go there), but you could have at least written in another candidate (assuming you didn't agree with the candidate on the ballot). There are usually several third party candidates who can't get on the ballot due to the manipulation of the rules by the Democrats and Republicans.
However, my question deals strictly with Obama, who also was one of those spineless Democrats who didn't want to impeach Bush, and interestingly enough, generally voted for most of the things Bush asked of Congress. Why did you vote for him? I don't want to hear about "hope" or "change", because those are empty platitudes for the weak-minded. Or did you actually not vote for Obama as much as vote against McCain?
I also say ... Vote Third Party ... because for the most part you can't tell the two parties apart since it seems the majority of the congress critters work for corporations, banks and Wall Street and do not represent the people who vote them in office.
If American voters were to vote for a candidate based upon their record, if they are an incumbent and not along party lines or vote for some person with fresh ideas that would really help some of the problems we face today.
I can't imagine that you really find this interesting, but here it is. My Congresswoman is Debbie Wasserman-Schultz (D-FL). She ran for re-election unopposed, as many entrenched member do in so called 'safe seats.'
Sure, you could write in Donald Duck or some such thing, but our gal was a 100% lock to win back her seat in Congress. Like it or not.
I did vote for 'change' in November, as much as I like Senator McCain. He spoke a university commencement I attended a couple of years back, and I was tremendously impressed with the guy. Of course two good reasons for me to not vote for him is that;
A) I disagree with him on almost every political issue
B) He ran the worst campaign in modern history, worse than Bob Dole, worse than Al Gore. I still like and admire the guy, but Bush's policies have been a melt down disaster politically, internationally, financially, and militarily. McCain's way of looking at things is pretty close to Bush's and I thought we needed a change of party to clear out some of the Bush era abuses that have piled up. Sadly, Obama has embraced some of those power grabs, and the change has been small change so far, but there were two viable options last November and I picked one.
You are wrong, I find it incredibly interesting because you strike me as the normal "everyman" American. You say your candidate was a lock to win her Congress seat again. Okay, so what? If that is true, why not vote for someone you like? It is not like you are hurting her chances for re-election, so why did you vote for her? Is it just because you have to vote for the winner? And as far as your comment regarding Donald Duck, that is just another logical fallacy, specifically an appeal to ridicule.
As far as your reasons for not voting for McCain, I think your first one is perfectly valid (although I also find it entirely unlikely, as statistically speaking you should have some shared political issue, and considering he and Obama share the vast majority of political opinions, you must disagree with Obama as well). The second, however, is simply personal opinion. What saddens me again, however, is the fact that you have such dislike that you would vote for someone who you disagree with on most political issues (Obama) simply to prevent someone from winning who you disagree with on more issues (McCain). It is that sort of attitude that has led us to this sorry state of affairs, and I want to try to figure out what to do to get people to vote for those they want to win, rather than against those they don't want to win. Maybe you find that naive on my part, or a lost cause, but it is still what I would like for the country. Hypothetically speaking, what would it take for you to have voted for someone you wanted to win rather than against someone who you wanted to make sure didn't win?
You misunderstand.
I voted for Obama. I wanted him to win. I happen to be a fan of his opponent, so I had, in making my final opinion, to come up with reasons to vote for the guy with the most unelectable name I can think of (some comedian came up with a candidate with a worse name, "Charles Manson Hitler"). That reason is change from the previous Administration. I wanted that.
Also, I didn't want any sort of continuity between Bush's policies (radioactive disaster) and the next president. McCain was just too close to Bush for my comfort, so that was a good reason to rule him out, in my mind.
There is a funny thing about me. The people I like, such as McCain, are people I don't necessarily agree with. Conversely, people I agree with politically, such as Wasserman-Schultz, I don't necessarily like.
Certain members of my own family consider me a grouch because of that. I am never really satisfied.
I can't answer your hypothetical question, but I voted for one conservative GOP candidate in November, a guy I disagreed with on just about everything, because I thought he was the better person for that particular job.
So I don't always vote my politics. I try to think like a hiring manager when I vote. Who is the best person for the job?
You misunderstand.
I definitely misunderstand.
I voted for Obama. I wanted him to win. ... That reason is change from the previous Administration. I wanted that.
So you wanted change from the current administration. I can definitely understand that mindset. I am not happy with everything Bush did, even if some of the end results were things I am happy with (for instance, Saddam Hussein is a very bad individual, and I am quite happy he is gone). What I do not understand is why you think Obama would be any sort of change. His Congressional record certainly didn't support his words of change, which in my opinion basically makes him a hypocrite (and really, a liar, and in his case, I can prove he has explicitly lied to his constituents, whatever his motivations for doing so).
Certain members of my own family consider me a grouch because of that. I am never really satisfied.
Bizarrely enough, one of my friends recently told me my catch phrase is "It is and it isn't", so I can definitely understand not being satisfied. I possess a practical side to my personality, but I hold out some very tiny nugget of hope for a perfect world. I just recognize it is tremendously far away from out current state, and requires a vast amount of effort and even blood from the current generation to reach that point.
I can't answer your hypothetical question, but I voted for one conservative GOP candidate in November, a guy I disagreed with on just about everything, because I thought he was the better person for that particular job.
So I don't always vote my politics. I try to think like a hiring manager when I vote. Who is the best person for the job?
Okay, this makes no sense for me. Politics, by definition, is really not cut and dried. It is a collection of ideas that don't necessarily have any basis in facts. Essentially all political opinions boil down to just guesses (some guesses may be stronger than others, but almost all have no basis in science). What would make you vote for a candidate that didn't agree with your political opinion? Is it that you thought he would represent his constituents regardless of his personal opinions? I can certainly understand and support that. If not, what made you think he is the best person for the job?
The job was for sheriff of my county, a job with a bad recent history of corruption and abuses of power (really bad ones) from previous sheriffs of both political parties.
I voted for the guy with the best credentials for the job who also seemed to have the best mindset and the most integrity. Those things are more important to me in a sheriff than what the guy thinks about abortion or taxes.
One word about Saddam. Yes, indeed, the world is a better place without that scumbag consuming oxygen, but don't forget the price, everything has a price. I don't even want to count the indirect costs, the loss of national integrity and the loss of credibility the US has on the world stage after the deliberate campaign of deception on the part of Bush, etc, to paint Saddam as being involved with al Qaeda and with developing weapons he wasn't developing, and so on. Just the direct cost of the war, the money, the American lives, the Iraqi lives lost and broken due to this war of choice. You may think it worth the cost, but don't flinch from calculating that cost first before you decide. It cost us a lot. A whole lot.
Will Joe 6 Pack ever know what the real reasons for the War in Iraq ... we now have one of the largest 'embassies' in Iraq - there is 'democracy' there and let's not forget about the oil.
Other great mysteries - who shot Kennedy .. and just as important .. why' Does the CIA traffic in narcotics .. and why .. and is there an alien in a hangar in Area 51?
Having digressed to this point however, I do think this is a travesty to American justice that AG and investigators are fired if they rock the boat - not the first time it's happened - it is none the less sad.
The job was for sheriff of my county, a job with a bad recent history of corruption and abuses of power (really bad ones) from previous sheriffs of both political parties.
I voted for the guy with the best credentials for the job who also seemed to have the best mindset and the most integrity. Those things are more important to me in a sheriff than what the guy thinks about abortion or taxes.
Hey, I've lived in New Orleans and I'm currently just outside Baltimore, so I can easily understand corrupt government officials. However, I will say that voting for a sheriff is a vastly different sort of position than voting for a President or Congressional member, and that is what I am concerned about at the moment.
One word about Saddam. Yes, indeed, the world is a better place without that scumbag consuming oxygen, but don't forget the price, everything has a price. I don't even want to count the indirect costs, the loss of national integrity and the loss of credibility the US has on the world stage after the deliberate campaign of deception on the part of Bush, etc, to paint Saddam as being involved with al Qaeda and with developing weapons he wasn't developing, and so on. Just the direct cost of the war, the money, the American lives, the Iraqi lives lost and broken due to this war of choice. You may think it worth the cost, but don't flinch from calculating that cost first before you decide. It cost us a lot. A whole lot.
Again, I say I am happy with the end result, but I do not necessarily agree with the process, and I do think the costs were too high. However, the fact is it happened and we just need to make the best of it. I do want to correct a couple of things you said, though. Saddam Hussein did have weapons he was not suppose to have (they were found by the French weapon inspectors appointed by the UN), they just weren't really WMDs.
Also, the US did not lose credibility in the world by invading Iraq. The rest of the world has never really cared for America, so there really wasn't anything to lose. America has done these sort of acts before (Vietnam, Korea, etc), all in an attempt to prevent another world war (maybe the mindset is to keep a bunch of little brush fires going to prevent a massive conflagration). America has acted like the parent because that is how it has been treated, and the analogy is also apt because think about how children whine and complain about their parents. America acts like a first-time parent, sometimes going overboard in an attempt to help its "children" grow up, and sometimes it does to little.
Gramps
You are a "new user" how do you know what I wanted to do when Bush was president?
But to correct you ever so gently (as a 'new user' and all) I never actually called for the Impeachment of George W Bush. Not that he didn't earn Impeachment and removal from office, in my opinion he did disgrace his office many times over, not the least of which was telling us fairy tales to get us to invade Iraq, a massive abuse of president power, for reasons still not disclosed.
The reasons I never called for Impeachment are several, but in practical terms, there was never a real possibility of a conviction. The Congress was full of Bush Loyalists and spineless Democrats who were too timid to take such bold action. Impeachment would have been a waste of time, just like it was for Clinton (although for vastly different reasons)
But don't worry cut, er I mean cat, history has a way to getting out eventually. If we live long enough, we will have the answers. Bush has tried his best to prevent history from getting out, deleting millions of emails and so on, but just like the dinos in Jurassic Park, the truth has a way of getting out. And it will.
One more thing, I think Impeachment isn't for trivial matters, such as the ones used to impeach the two presidents who have faced it so far. I think a president really has to screw up so massively that he, or she, must be removed from office. Nixon earned that and so did Bush, but it is still a terrible process, one that does a lot of damage to the nation. Al Qaeda was plotting our destruction while the House was trying to figure out which end of the cigar Clinton stuck into Monica. Pure silliness, and deadly dangerous as well.