January 31, 2008 by fbk.

The Presidential primaries present an interesting conundrum this year.  The front runners of the moment are a 1940’s-style Democrat (Big Government CAN do it all, strong on defense) and a 1970’s-style Democrat, who looks and talks like Jimmy Carter, but actually votes to be strong on defense in the Senate.  Both have proven to find the truth a highly-elastic material.  The net difference between the Republican and Democratic frontrunners is that one of the two has real testicles.  Of course, they originally belonged to her husband.

Many might consider this to be an unfair characterization of Senator McCain.  He is a war hero, after all.  But, that war ended more than thirty years ago, and while he may have had a backbone against the North Vietnamese, he’s never shown one against the Democrats.  He’s thrown more punches, literal and figurative, at his Republican colleagues than at the Democrats.  He talks much more like Walter Mondale than Ronald Reagan, with references to “greedy people on Wall Street who need to be punished” and “for patriotism, not for profit.”  Anyone remember his comments from 2000 about the Christian right?  I could believe much of what he says coming from a John Kerry or Dennis Kucinich, but from the Republican frontrunner?

I cannot see myself voting for this man under any circumstances.  So, where does that leave me if he gets the nomination?  He can’t be trusted on Supreme Court nominations.  He has flip-flopped on what sort of Justice he would nominate.  Right now, he’s trying to claim to be conservative, but he’s had a reputation as a maverick for much longer.  There are also rumors that he has said he’ll only run for one term.  That means the day he takes office, he’s no longer beholden to the people who elected him.  He can follow his true inclination without worry about upsetting all of those wacko right-winger types, who just happen to be the bulk of his party.  I wouldn’t trust him on any issue.

On economic issues, issues of freedom, paying attention to the Constitution, and big government programs, he aligns pretty well with Senator Kennedy.  In fact, McCain is to the left of the former Senator Kennedy who became President.  John F. Kennedy at least understood the power of tax cuts to free the economy.  McCain would be likely to let the tax levels rise back to the former levels under Clinton, if not higher.  He certainly has no clue about regulation and its effect on the economy.  Comparing Senator McCain to the average Democrat would only yield a slight divergence on winning the war in Iraq.  But, despite many of the things she has said about the war, Hillary Clinton’s voting record isn’t that different from McCain’s.

If we’re going to get basically the same results either way, with one result being an economic disaster, wouldn’t it be better to let the Democrats have the White House for four years, and let them get the blame for the recession caused by economic ignorance?  If the candidates are so close on the issues and neither is a disciple of the truth, what’s the downside?  If McCain gets elected and does as expected, the Republicans get blamed.  I don’t consider myself so much a Republican as a conservative.  But, most of the other conservatives are in the Republican Party, and what hurts the party will hurt the conservative cause.  I’d much rather see the Democrats take it on the chin as they did in 1976-80.

I can’t quite bring myself to think that I’d vote for Hillary, but I’ve actually been considering it, which scares me.  How many other conservatives are thinking that Hillary might do less damage than McCain?  How many conservatives will just sit out the general election if McCain is the Republican nominee?  How many will seek a third party, such as the Libertarians?  How many will just hold their noses and vote for McCain?  I don’t have the answers to any of these questions.  But I have a feeling that if McCain gets the nomination, nothing good will come of it.

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December 11, 2007 by Les Smart.

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November 3, 2007 by fbk.

Reading back in the blog, I saw one of my first posts and the reference to Lyn Nofziger.  I used to read his wonderful blog wherein he often had silly doggerel poetry about politics and events of the day.  It wasn’t meant to be serious.  He certainly never considered himself a serious poet with those bits and pieces.  But I think that kind of thing is more likely to be remembered and appreciated than most of the serious poets working, just as Ogden Nash is a bigger part of the popular poetic culture than many who took themselves more seriously.

There aren’t many like Lyn that I know of.  I have seen poems in National Review.  And of course, there is the incomparable F. R. Duplantier with his Politickles.  But there aren’t too many out there who seem to be having fun with light verse at the expense of their political opponents, at least not on the Republican and Libertarian side.  Since we at the Attila the Hun School of Political Science do not bother reading the liberal magazines too much anymore, we may be missing a new trend there.  But traditionally, combining liberal politics and poetry comes out more earnest than fun.  So, where have all of the light verse artists gone?  Have they all gotten serious?  Are they just in the deadly drought of media attention deficit?

I think I’d welcome a candidate who had a twinkle in his eye and a limerick on his lips to counter some opponent’s windy gustations.  Maybe it’s even time we had a Poetry Party of America?  Maybe that would get more people engaged in politics if the candidates would have to frame all of their debates in verse, preferably limericks?  It could start a whole trend with new parties representing different streams and subgenres in poetry.  Someone might have the next Presidential nomination all “rapped” up.  Maybe we could put the stress in the language and get it out of the politics?

This started to be a post about politics alone and how I seem to feel less engaged with politics this year.  It migrated and twisted and turned, but in a sense, it did get there.  Would a metrist get me more engaged this year?  Perhaps not.  But it might give us all a bit more levity and leavening in this extended political season to make it more bearable.

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