A Touch Of Class

You can tell the Democrats won the election because there has not been a single complaint about disenfranchised voters or voting machines. Despite their army of lawyers throughout the nation they did not file a single complaint after almost a year's worth of creating the environment to make such a contention possible. After two tumultuous elections in which democrats filed hundreds of complaints and used those to declare George W. Bush an illegitimate President, this year's elections did not elicit a single one. Over the last eight years the constant refrain about the stolen elections of 2000 and 2004 permitted the press to pound the President almost every day until his popularity was driven so low that he was never able to recover. Either the Democrats now have cheating down to an art form or these issues never really existed or both. You be the judge. You can also tell the Democrats won by the class shown by Republicans who despite their opposition to Obama are willing to give him a chance. Something the Democrats never gave to George Bush. Republicans seem willing to wait on his action to make any judgments about his policies. Even the President showed a great deal of class when he acknowledged Obama's victory and promised a smooth transition. Let's hope some of it rubs off.

Obama the First

The pretensions of the man that has ascended to the Presidency cannot be overstated. He began his victory clothed in the colors of black power. Like the ersatz presidential seal he used in his campaign, his latest attempt at shallow symbolism was yet another seal that reads Office of the President Elect. In his first press conference he was surrounded by adoring, fawning white men who are so over the hill it puts the lie to his entire hip and new campaign. Among the things he promised to address as President is the conflict concerning Iran's nuclear program. To be precise he said he would begin a new intense diplomatic effort with Iran. Where has he been? The world, as represented by the UN, as well as individual nations including the United States have been having an intense dialogue with Iran for more than a decade on this very topic. Something the press failed to point out during the entire election season. However, Iran's intransigence on the matter of nuclear might is unambiguous. It has lead to recriminations by many nations including sanctions, but every effort has so far failed to deter Iran’s belligerence. The other thing he promised to address immediately upon taking office in January is the economic crisis. In case he hasn't heard the government has already promised over a billion dollars to deal with the current situation. Actually if you include the $300 billion that the Congress appropriated for troubled mortgages in July of 2008 it’s almost $1.3 billion. He voted for both. Oh, on second thought he missed the July vote. He was too busy running for President. Now that he will take of the oath of office in January he will have to do the work. There will no voting present or not showing up. There will be no blaming the other guy. There will be no excuses. Unlike the Democrats who never accepted George Bush as President, Republicans for the most part will accept Barack Obama and give him a chance to get it right. And while he may continue to escape the scrutiny of the press he will not escape the scrutiny of citizens, both Democratic and Republican.

An Inconvenient Formality

If you've been watching the election coverage you already know that your vote on Tuesday is just an inconvenient exercise for a media that has picked Barack Obama to win the Presidency by a landslide with as many as 370 electoral votes. They have also given the Senate a virtually filibuster-proof majority and the House another 30 seats making the Democrats very close to a two-thirds majority in the House. At the same time they are attempting to cover themselves by saying that the polls have great variability in the event the unthinkable happens. That is, if the Republicans have any success at all in the Presidency, the Senate or the House. It is quite stunning that such an overwhelming victory is being predicted in a country that the media readily admits is basically a 50/50 country. This merely proves that the media is in the tank and they hope to convince you to vote for Obama or stay home. If they succeed we will be treated to a self-fulfilling prophecy, but if we act as Americans normally do the media will be surprised. Americans are being asked to overlook many things to choose Obama and give the Democrats bigger majorities in the House and Senate. In the case of Obama you are being asked to overlook his questionable ties to Jeremiah Wright, Louis Farrakhan, Tony Rezko, Bill Ayres, Rashid Khalidi and others. You are also being asked to overlook his failure to provide little more than a doctor's note for a medical record, the lock down of his academic records at Columbia and Harvard and his questionable birth documents. When you raise these issues they are treated as old news or racism. Will this persist if he is President? In the case of the House and Senate you are being asked to overlook an economy that has tanked since the Democrats came into power two years ago, as well as their opposition to the emerging victory in the war in Iraq. In addition, it is widely acknowledged that the current financial meltdown is the direct result of social engineering by the Democrats, as well as questionable accounting procedures by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to keep the bonuses rolling. It shouldn't be overlooked that George Bush was one of the first to voice his concerns about this as was John McCain and former Treasury Secretary John Snow. Democrats obstructed reform and the result was the mortgage meltdown. Readers of this blog know that John McCain is far from a perfect choice from my perspective. His willingness to betray his party for good media coverage is the mark of a people-pleaser, which is not always the best choice for a President. However, given the choices a vote for McCain is a vote that will give us breathing space until the next election when we may have some better choices.