Watching the first two days of the Democratic Convention has been inspiring and interesting. So many women and girls. People of different colors. Different ages. Different economic statuses. Kind of like the USA.
And the estrogen. WOW. As a human male I have to admit that I am a bit taken aback by so many women having power. All those female delegates. And female leaders. All very proud to be nominating and (hopefully) electing the first woman president.
Which leaves me on the outside looking in. You see. I won’t vote for a woman. I REFUSE to vote for a woman. Especially for president.
In 2008 and 2012 I refused to vote for a black man for president. For pretty much the same reason. I have known black men and boys. Some have been awful. Most have been nice. Some have been criminals. Most have been decent. And competent.
And I have known many women and girls as well. Some have been awful.Most have been nice. Some have been criminals. Most have been decent. And competent.
But I won’t vote for a black man or a woman. I take to heart the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. when he said: I look to a day when people will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.
That day is here.
I will not vote for a black man. Or a woman. But I did vote for Barack Obama. Twice. And I will vote for Hillary Clinton. Not because of skin color or gender. But because he was and she is the best person for the job. Period.
In some ways, being singled out as the “first” black man or the “first” woman diminishes their accomplishments. They are competent, decent, hardworking, empathetic human beings. Excellent candidates. Skin color and gender should be irrelevant. Someday they will be.
So excuse me if I don’t vote for the first woman POTUS. I’ll just vote for the best person. Hillary.
There is an old saying: Where there is smoke, there is fire.
And over the years we have seen the Republican Party stir up a whole lot of smoke when it comes to Hillary Clinton. I am not quite sure why the GOP has gone after Clinton for over 25 years. What are the roots?
Could it be the fact that she was one of the assistants on the committee that investigated the Watergate break in? She was on the staff of the committee that discovered the complicity of Richard Nixon with the cover up of the burglary. Which led to his eventual disgrace and resignation.
Or was it her demand for justice for small children. The whole “it takes a village to raise a child” mentality. The GOP was somehow offended by the idea that all of us should be responsible for all children. That children are not ours to “own” and dispose of as we wish. That in civilized society we have responsibility to ALL kids, not just children of the elites.
Or was it her support for equal rights for women? Maybe the concept that all Americans should have rights was threatening to the GOP philosophy of patriarchy. After all, it was not until the post WW2 era that women in some states could even sign contracts without hubby’s approval. And her support for the radical idea that a woman should control her own body! Perhaps the GOP was upset with her for that?
At any rate, over the years the Republicans have been constantly investigating Hillary. With tax dollars. Your dollars. My dollars. The attempt to find some law she has broken has become an obsession. And with so many investigations many people are convinced that she must have done SOMETHING illegal. Not sure what. But, where there is smoke, there is fire..
There is plenty of SMOKE. To recap.
The Whitewater investigation by Ken Starr. Determined to find illegal activity by the Clintons, both Bill and Hillary, in the land purchases in Arkansas. So they investigated. And investigated. Starr found nothing. And investigated. And investigated.Lots of smoke. No indictment for Hillary. No illegal activity. But lots of smoke.
Then, with the help of Linda Tripp, they finally got a young woman alone, without a lawyer present, in a Washington, DC apartment. And they got her, without a lawyer, to admit that she had oral sex with the president. That was it . That was the outcome of the Whitewater investigation. $80,000,000 in taxpayer money (That would be $ 115,000,000 in today’s dollars). Smoke. For their money..I mean, OUR money… they got the most expensive blowjob in world history. Lots of smoke.
Then we have Vince Foster. A friend of the Clintons . Dead. Well, if he was a friend of Hillary and he dies there must be some connection ! Could not just be a suicide. Pretty suspicious that someone who knows Hillary Clinton happens to commit suicide. Smoke. She must have had him murdered. Smoke. Why else would he be dead? Smoke. He had terrible secrets. We will never know them, because they are secrets. Smoke. Although more than 40,000 Americans commit suicide every year, he was the one who knew Hillary. Connection. Smoke.
Next stop on the smoke parade? The very high speaking fees. Why did she take so much money for speaking? Just because, when she left the White House, the Clintons had massive debts. Up to $12,000,000 in debt when they left the White House. Debts from what? From legal fees defending those smoky accusations. Debts from defending themselves in the Whitewater affairs. The impeachment proceedings. Lot of debts. But for some reason, making a great deal of money is suspicious. Smoke. Did people want to hear her speak? Evidently. Otherwise why would they pay her to speak. Free enterprise? Nope. If someone else gets massive fees to speak, well, more power to him. But if Hillary commands massive speaking fees it must be related to some illegal activity.Smoke. Can’t put our finger on exactly it is, but it MUST BE something nefarious. Something fishy. More smoke.
Of course Benghazi is in a class by itself. Lots of smoke. Over many years. Mountains of smoke. Smoky Mountains of smoke. The first Benghazi investigation found no wrongdoing or criminal activity. But that can’t be right. So, the GOP have Benghazi 2. Smoke. Nothing. Benghazi 3. Smoke. Nothing illegal. Benghazi 4. Smoke. Benghazi 5. Nothing. Benghazi 6. Smoke. Benghazi 7. Nothing illegal. Benghazi 8. Smoke. But the GOP had to get to the bottom of this, so… Gowdy’s Benghazi 9. Smoke. Smoke. And nothing illegal. 800 pages of nothing illegal. BUT. With 9 investigations she MUST have done something. Otherwise why are they investigating? Smoke and more smoke. Benghazi 9 costs $30,000.000 in taxpayer funds. Money gone up in smoke.
But, we got her now, boys ! Those emails. Those 30,000 emails the FBI scoured through. And the millions of email fragments they scoured through. Smoke. Or so the GOP FBI Director concluded. Hillary and her staff let about 20 POSSIBLE highly classified emails slip through. Smoke. Nothing illegal. Careless? Yes, a little bit. Illegal. No. Lots of smoke. Lots of tax dollars. Nothing but smoke.
So, now, the GOP want to investigate their own GOP FBI Director. There MUST BE SOMETHING illegal. All that smoke.
25 years of smoke. 25 years of innuendo. Investigation after investigation. All paid for by the taxpayer. Accusations. Never supported by the facts. But all that SMOKE. So the average citizen says: Look, where there is smoke, there is fire. She MUST have done something illegal. Right?
Where there is smoke there is fire. Sometimes. Or. Where there is smoke there is a smoke machine. Simulated smoke. They use them at concerts and movie sets. Looks like smoke. Seems like smoke. Simulates smoke. Acts like smoke. Cloudy like smoke. Must be smoke.
NOPE. Sometimes , where there is smoke…there is just a smoke machine. Manufactured to look like the real thing. An illusion. Set up and plugged in to fool people. Welcome to the Republican Party Smoke Machine. The 25 year old smoke machine. Spewing phony smoke. Spending millions of dollars on the illusion.
You can buy one for yourself. For less than 50 bucks. I think the GOP overpaid, don’t you?
We all know the words….”life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”. From the Declaration of Independence. 240 years ago.
According to Tom Jefferson these are three of the inalienable rights all human beings possess. (He made a few exceptions in regards to “human beings” which we need not go into at time). In the Lincoln-Douglas debates Old Abe often referred to this phrase and included ALL men, even 0nes not recognized by Tom. A different time.
And anyone who listens to politicians today, especially those on the right side of the political spectrum, certainly recognize the call for “liberty”. Freedom ! Freedom ! Freedom from tyranny. Freedom from Obamacare. Freedom from big government. Ad nauseum.
So, we agree that all men should have life and liberty. Those rights are explicitly mentioned in the Declaration of Independence.
But that third one? The pursuit of happiness? Seems like our modern right wing scholar/politicians are ignoring that third “inalienable right”. Nothing new there. After all, they ignore half of the 2nd Amendment…the part about “a well-regulated militia”.
The idea that people should be able to be “happy” seems foreign to them. People should be free. People should be rich. People should be able to raise their kids as they see fit. People should not have to pay taxes. People should fight terrorism. But happy?
Happiness is just not part of the right wing equation when it comes to rights. Jefferson and the other men who voted to leave the British empire did so , primarily, because they just weren’t happy. And, gol darn it, they thought every man had the right to pursue happiness. That may have been a more radical idea than the right to life or liberty, which most people readily accepted. Happiness was one of the big three. Important enough to mention in the seminal document in US history.
Watching the “Make Him Fail” haters and the “Make America White…er..Great” chanters you would think that happiness is the last thing on their minds. I would guess that if all the terrible “liberals” like myself disappeared tomorrow it would not make a bit of difference. If all the soft, commie-loving “libtards” suddenly became invisible, it would not change a thing.
These sour politicians with their sour view of life would find something else to be angry about. The very idea of people pursuing happiness seems to bother them. They want laws about everything , from conception to birth to the grave. While they claim to want freedom, they really want to make sure others do not pursue too much happiness. Wipe that smile off your face and salute the flag.
They want to punish women who have sex. They want to punish people who smoke dope. They want to punish hardworking (illegal) Mexicans who are trying to make a living. They want to punish gays for..well.. being gay. Happiness is not in their Declaration of Independence.
I wonder what Jefferson would make of these folks. After all, he did write that we have inalienable rights, and AMONG THEM are the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. So, he did acknowledge that those three were not the ONLY rights. He understood that we have many rights, some unwritten.
I suppose if he lived today he might consider the feelings of the right wing politicians and add a fourth right. The right to be miserable. And I accept that people have a right to be miserable. They have to right to emphasize the negative. To be nasty and insulting.
I just wish they would not exercise that right on the rest of us.
The Old Liberal 