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Is Massachusetts Turning Republican?


Twenty years ago such a question would be laughable.  Even today some might scoff at it considering the makeup of the Massachusetts legislature is overwhelmingly Democrat.  I am, and always have been, a registered Democrat.  But I suspect that like me, many of my fellow Democrats in this state are rather fed up with the arrogance shown by the state’s Democrats.

Massachusetts has elected the occasional Republican to state-wide and national office, Edward Brooke and William Weld in the more distant past.  But they were more the exception.  State politics has been large dominated by Democrats since the FDR administration, and to some degree prior to that with James Michael Curley.  But recent events where Democrats have been accused and convicted of felonious acts has given the state’s voters reason to question their elected leaders.  The worst thing they have done, which is not a crime but a betrayal of faith, has been the arrogance of the party leadership in the state.

Two national offices are being heavily contested in the state right now, that for a U.S. Senate seat, Brown vs. Warren, and US Representative seat, Tierney vs. Tisei.  And in some sense, Mitt Romney too, although I view him as truly a Michigan native rather than a Massachusetts resident.

In the case of Brown vs. Warren, we have a very affable Republican in Brown who is the state’s Republican US Senator being opposed by a very cerebral and professorial sounding Warren.  And that is her biggest problem.  She claims to come from blue-collar America but sounds anything but.  If anything, she comes across as preachy and professorial.  She is difficult to identify with at much of any level.  Brown, quite simply, comes across as entirely middle-class.  He is a middle-class veteran that I can more easily identify with than Warren’s academic persona.  If history teaches us anything, it is that people vote for who they best identify with which does not necessarily mean who is best qualified.  In this case, however, I cannot say that Brown is not best qualified to both serve and properly represent me.  That, it is my guess, is the question Warren needs to respond to more than any other and which, I doubt, the Democratic leadership of this state will come to terms with.  In the end, I expect Brown will be re-elected.  And even though I cannot say for certain right now, he may well get my vote.

Tierney is a case of absolute arrogance.  I do not, for a second, want Tisei to win this race however I feel he has an excellent chance of doing exactly that.  Not so many years Thomas Finneran had the same arrogance being displayed by Tierney.  As it turned out, Finneran was guilty of, at the very least, comprising the public trust for his own personal ends.  I think Tierney is guilty of the same thing.  It is difficult to believe that a man, as intelligent as he is, had no idea of his family’s involvement in illegal gambling activities long before it became public.  I have to admit that my distrust of Tierney pre-dates that.  It goes back to the mid-1990s when he was opposed by a man named Peter Torkilson, a Republican.  I voted for Torkilson back then on a gut feeling that he was simply the better man.  Unfortunately I am no longer in that district so I cannot have any say in that election.  I do not believe, however, that the state’s Democratic leadership has properly and fully addressed the charges leveled against Tierney by the Republican party.  It simply and arrogantly believes he will get re-elected because you have to go far before anyone’s memory to find a Republican being elected from that district.  The thing is, I know that district to be more conservative than party leaders tend to believe.  It would not take much for more conservative Democrats, like myself, to turn the present election in favor of Tisei.  And that is exactly what I believe is going to happen.

Right now probably few people in Massachusetts believe that Mitt Romney will carry his declared home-state in the presidential election.  The last time that happened was when Al Gore failed to carry his home state of Tennessee.  And as likely as it is that Obama will carry Massachusetts, it should not be taken for granted.  And yet that is exactly what Democratic leadership is doing.

In the latest round of political debates, Warren, Biden, and Obama each lost their respective debates.  Tierney and Tisei will not have any public debate forum although they should.  The point is, Democrats seem to be riding on their laurels thinking they have the upper hand.  They do not, by any stretch of the imagination.  Since those debates, each of the Democrats has lost their lead in the respective race to their Republican opponent.  That is extremely significant because it shows a reversal of fortunes.

I think most Americans find it difficult to believe much of anything politicians say, even those they vote for.  You frequently hear them state they are “voting for the lesser of two evils.”  How can that ever be a good thing?  I noted in the debates that when asked direct and simple questions, those question largely went unanswered.  The politician being asked did a tap dance around the truth, but seldom gave what was a clear and simple answer.  Would it not be refreshing to hear a candidate just once say, “I don’t know, but I intend to find out.”

I do not think Massachusetts is suddenly going to become a state in which Republicans rule the roost.  But I do believe, at least in the two contests mentioned, that Republican will prevail.  I think it good that Republican should have more of a say in this state’s politics.  It makes the Democrats more honest, or possibly honest in the first place.  But maybe, just maybe, it will knock some of the arrogance from the state’s Democrat Party.

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Are Our Political Parties Killing Our Country?


The short answer to that question is “yes” and “no.”  Party politics in our country is historically rife with both questionable conduct and criminal conduct.  In the case of the latter, I am referring to Senator Charles Sumner, a Massachusetts Republican being viciously attacked by Representative Preston Brooks, a South Carolina Democrat.  Brooks entered the chamber and beat Sumner mercilessly with his cane in December 1855 because of Sumner’s stance on the Kansas-Nebraska Act, “Free-Soilers” vs. Pro-slavery.  After his election, Andrew Jackson’s wife was openly referred to as a whore by opposition press because she was a divorced woman.  Political parties are not nearly so blatant today as these two examples but what they lack in being blatant they make up for, and then some, in subtle and not so subtle statements.

The Republican party is labeled by Democrats as the party of “meanness” and racism.  Republicans paint Democrats as the party of big government and entitlement.  But are these charges true, even a little bit?  Yes but for both parties.  Both are racist, both are for big government, both over-spend, both promote entitlements, and both are entirely motivate towards their own political expedience and very little towards the public good.

Let me start with the national debt.  Both sides say it needs to be reduced now although they of course differ in how that should happen.  A leading economist, who I believe has a somewhat conservative leaning, though not a lot, said the national debt is virtually meaningless.  He pointed out there are two huge debts that must be dealt with and that you cannot, in fact, deal with both at the same time.  The second debt, that no one is talking about, is private debt.  That debt that you and I hold.  He said that debt is far more important than public debt because it has a far greater effect on spending and our economy than the public debt.  He stated that the public debt can be carried forward for quite some time while the private debt is reduced.  He suggested a slow reduction of the public debt while the private debt is dealt with.

Now, as to big government, since 1933, when Franklin Delano Roosevelt first took office, the size of our government has been increased by each and every administration from then on.  And during that time both major political parties have been complicit in its growth.  The only question is, has it needed to grow?  Of course it has.  As public programs are added to government there is the necessity of administration over those programs.  Prior to World War 2 there was no Veterans Administration, now there is.  With the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, the Nuclear Regulatory Administration was formed.   In the mid-1950s NASA was formed when Russia entered space.  And that is how it has gone.  Without exception, the formation of these agencies has required the blessing of Congress.  Those Congresses have been led by one or the other party.  But since 1933 only one agency that I have been able to identify has ever been disbanded.  That was the CCC, the Civilian Conservation Corps, and that was only because it was declared unconstitutional by the US Supreme Court after a Republican challenge to its existence.

What I am saying is that both parties are equally guilty, if there truly is guilt, in our government being as big as it is.  That brings to question what the role of government is.  By definition, “the administration  and control of public policy in a political unit . . . [the] exercise of authority in a political unit . . . the agency . . . [that] exercises authority and performs the required duties.” (Webster’s Dictionary, Riverside Publishing, 1988, p. 541).  Simply put, we need agencies to assist us in living in our defined society.  What both parties are trying to sell us is that we need to reduce the Federal Budget without reducing that actual size of its agencies except under the threat of diminished budgets.  That is unreasonable.  The first to take the hit, which I find particularly offensive, is the Dept. of Defense.  Right now the government is giving the appearance of being responsible with its latest incantation of the Base Closure and Realignment Committee.  That is 100% unnecessary, or at the very least, of a much lower priority in that domain. A military no longer engaged in a war will naturally need fewer dollars to continue.  Its demand for armaments will naturally reduce.  If anything, our military is already too small.  The Department of Defense has too long been an easy target.  That has got to end!

The next place politician looks to reduce the budget is entitlements, social security,  medicare, welfare, and other programs.  It would be far more expedient, and reasonable, if, with the exception of social security, these programs and their administration were turned over to the individual states to include their complete funding.  I think the entire Department of Housing and Urban Developement could be greatly reduced, along with Health and Human Services, were they turned over to the various states for funding.  The exceptions from those departments would be the regulatory portion that must be administered by the Federal Government, and, those portions that necessarily cross state lines as provided by the 14th Amendment.

We Americans, all of us, are allowing of minds to be manipulated by political think tanks and behind the scenes operatives.  Two such operatives are James Carville, Democrats, and Carl Rove, Republicans, have been allowed to wield too much power over us by spinning their messages without regard for the truth.  In recent years I was offended by Republican operatives putting into question John Kerry’s awards in Vietnam.  People who get silver stars are vetted extremely well prior to the award and to ever claim anyone received such an award without good reason puts all awards into questions.  But I found equally offensive the Democrats contending that George W. Bush somehow dodged military service by joining the Texas Air National Guard.  I know for fact that there were national guard members who served in Vietnam.  Bush did not dodge a thing, and in fact was honoring a commitment many others of his monetary level avoided.  In both cases politics tried to portray these individuals as being something less than honorable, and their actions as being highly questionable.  Also in each case, it was the desire of those behind the attacks to manipulate our feelings even though their statements were entirely without merit.  But we all have been complicit in these horrible allegations by not calling down those of our own political bent.  As a Democrat I defended Bush’s service when it was called into question.  As a veteran I look at all other veterans as brothers in arms and I never allow their political preference to make a difference in that feeling.

What I am saying in all that is, we as Americans have got to take back our political parties.  We as individuals no longer have any control what-so-ever over them.  Both political parties now only pay homage to the Super-PACs that fund them.  What each major party needs to do is to make a statement that all political statements not made by a candidate or their authorized committee is without merit, that we should ignore any statements made by such groups.  I do not want large environmental PACs telling me that drilling in Northern Alaska will kill indigenous life when in fact government can work out contracts that will allow for proper care nor do I want big finance PACs telling me that federal oversight of Wall Street at a greater level is unnecessary when all evidence says otherwise.  I believe before anyone should yell how they want government out of their lives, they should be yelling they want the power of PACs over our government reduced to something next to zero.

In the past election cycle I voted against all incumbents, and where there was no opposition, I wrote in “none of the above.”  I am so tired of the party I have generally supported, Democrats, coming off with all its self-righteousness.  I am equally tired of Republicans claiming they know what “Americans want” and being the patriotic party.  I have seen no proof recently that either political party has any clue what most Americans want.  I believe they are so out of touch with the average American that even a detailed account being given them as required reading would not allow them to see the light.  They would each likely dismiss out-of-hand what they were being shown as somehow being wrong.  To me, it looks like all 535 senators and representatives are some of the most clueless bastards to have ever walked the halls of Congress.  Congress has forgotten that it represents people, all the people who elected them.  It is not to consider the desire of corporations, PACs, foreign delegations, foreign corporations, or any other entity that cannot cast a vote.  Each and every one of them takes an oath of office to which they swear to “bear true faith and allegiance” to the Constitution of the United States, and by extension, to the people who it is supposed to protect.

I ask any who read this to take the time to challenge any and all statements made by individuals who are running for office and any group that makes statements that purport to support a particular political agenda.  We must start thinking for ourselves or we will find ourselves victim to our own negligence.

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Our Politicains Are Brainwashing Us


Please note, I did not assign this to any particular political party, and that is because both major political parties are equally guilty.  This is not anything new either.  Political parties have been trying to do this forever.  It is not anything new.  The new part is their use of the media to convince people of the righteousness of their position.  At this point you are  probably saying that that is what they are supposed to do.  The response to that is an emphatic no!

In the early 19th Century there was a large portion of our country that was illiterate, and an even larger portion that had something less than an 8th grade education.  As time passed that changed, but political parties approach to the average American has not.  The Whigs, the Bull Moose, the Republicans, and Democrats have each partaken in a manipulations of the truth and outright lies all in an effort to ally people to their way of thinking, the right way according to them.

Democrats love to use the absolutism that green house gases are causing a global warm and they make sure you are looking at industrialists to take the blame.  The fact is, plant life itself causes greenhouse gases.  Democrats love to give that portion of the truth that bolsters their take on global warming.  What needs to be given is the whole truth along with what is in doubt and unknown.

Right now the Republican party is saying that taxing the upper 1% is being unfairly targeted for a tax increase.  Gov. Romney showed in his 15% tax rate that their statements are rather disingenuous.  They claim that it will stifle those who create jobs from doing that.  Really?  You mean they will no longer desire to make money so they are going to withdraw from all market, because that is exactly what you are saying since that 1% has little effect of creating jobs.  Companies create jobs and as long as any company desires to make a profit it will create more jobs to do just that but only as the market bears.  Thirty years ago that same 1% paid triple in taxes, or more, than is demanded of them today.  It was also a Republican idea to have a minimum tax.  Why have they run from that now?

Democrats are famous for their gun control moves.  Their problem is, they have never offered gun owners anything that resembled a guarantee that the individual’s right to own such weapons will not be impeded.  They would be better served by coming up with a system whereby those guilty of violent crimes spend a lot of time in jail and are properly monitored upon their release.  That done, then maybe they can offer ideas on gun control.  But if they do, they had better have an ironclad guarantee along with it.

Republicans chafe at the idea of increased regulation of anything.  Their claim is that we are overregulated as it is, and that government is interfering in people’s private lives.  They say they want government out of our lives.  Last thing first, you cannot get government out of your life.  It is a fact of life that has nothing to do with the type of government but rather mankind’s desire to live in a society.  Orderly society have rules and regulations to live by.  The more freedom demanded for the individual the more extensive the rules and regulations regarding those freedoms.  One of the purposes of those rules and regulations is to protect us from ourselves.  Humans can be extremely greedy, lazy, gluttonous, and other things that have the possibility of hurting others.  That is where governments come into play to protect the individual from the shortcomings of others.  It is that simple.

Today’s politicians take the current issues and become rigid in their position.  They do this successfully because they have convinced their constituents that theirs is the only correct position and to move away from that position, even slightly, is just wrong.  They take issues where 75% of Americans feel one particular way and because they are in the other 25%, and in power, they pay millions of dollars in advertising to change the thinking of the average American so it lines up with their thinking.

Politicians are also giving the appearance of being at the beck and call of the PACs that fund their reelections campaigns.  Again, these PACs do not have the public’s interest at heart, even when they say they do, but have the ideals of their contributors front and center.  Politicians allow themselves to be bought off by such special interest groups.  God forbid they should stand up to one of their sacred cows to stand with the people who elected them.

I find it incredible that the house and senate both to have ethics committees.   I see no proof that any of them have any understanding of ethical behavior.  One of the prime ideals of ethical behavior is that you do not give even the appearance of unethical behavior.  Senators and congressmen regularly not only give the appearance of unethical behavior, they flaunt unethical behavior.  For example, they should never accept any gifts from any corporation vying for government contracts, government approval, or any other government action that they have sway over.  But such action happen daily.  They allow corporations to wine and dine them at a rate well above the $25 a civil servant is allowed.  They take ride in corporate jets, get seats in very expensive corporate booths at sporting events, take gifts of all sorts and supposedly they claim that such gifts do not affect their participation in events that corporation has in the government.

The bottom line is, we as Americans need to do more thinking for ourselves.  We cannot allow ourselves to be swayed so much by the politically motived ads that pollute the airwaves at election time.  We must be willing to investigate the truth of any and all claims made by every politician, and when they do not line up with the truth, we need to make that known to the politicians involved.

Right now the Republican candidates for president are making all sorts of claims of what Obama did or did not do.  What they do not offer is how they were complicit in things not happening that should have or vice versa.  They are not the least bit forthcoming in their own failings.  And when the time comes, the Democrats will practice the very same less than honest portrayals of the Republican presidential candidate.

Americans need to understand one thing very clearly.  The president cannot make a single law, only congress can.  And while presidents make lots of claims of what they intend on doing, without the cooperation of congress, none of it will happen.  Quite simply this means, if you do not like where we are right now, look to congress as the problem, and then at yourself, to find the root of all our problems.  We do not live in a dictatorship and the influence of any president is rather limited.  Do not allow all the various candidates to convince you otherwise about the president or any other person they are running against.