One of my chief concerns in the past has been of gun control or better stated, ones free ability to have arms. I am guilty of sometimes being a single issue voter for I reason that if a politician doesn't trust the populace to have arms, I cannot trust him to put MY freedom in his charge. Without knowing who to quote on this statement but I see truth in it, "The second amendment protects all the others." A quick study of history reveals that every populace who has had sweeping gun control policies, a brutal government quickly follows who often uses violence to further its own aims. In reading the second amendment, it seems very plain, that the founding fathers intended for private firearm ownership to be a normal part of life but many liberals and democrats have viewed the "militia clause" to mean that only the military or national guard should have access to weapons. Another short motto as follows, "an unarmed man is a subject, an armed man is a citizen."
With that said I begin to wonder what classification my values fall under and what it would take to slide to the right. First off I value separation of church and state, as outlined in the constitution, I value the secular state. I also value environmental standards. I value individual rights, an almost tripe utterance with no meaning of its own. I also value free expression, protesting the government and corporations, helping the poor, and smaller government. Both parties pay lip service to these values but I have to state that the republican party as been the most ardent violator of these principals.
The republican party swaggers up to the podium and invokes god at nearly every turn at the same time they are opposed to the welfare state. If they believe in the tenants of Jesus Christ, they must also give as much support to the poor as possible and yet giving to the poor seems to be a democratic idea. Or better stated, the government giving to the poor as opposed to the church giving to the poor and yet the government gives welfare out in orders of magnitude more than the church does. Very confusing. When I say welfare state I do not merely mean cheese and milk, I mean all welfare programs, living assistance, unemployment insurance, and yes even health care. Jesus said, "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter heaven."
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The environment: Since when did protecting the environment become only a democratic ideal? I suppose since it 'infringes' on the 'rights' of business to pollute indiscriminately that this becomes a leftist anti-business issue. I would agree that many environmental policies go haywire as in the case of connecting wind farms to the power grid by not letting power lines be built though the forest. And yet in many, many instances, we let business pollute on a horrendous scale. When an animal farm dumps it's waste into public rivers and waterways and disrupts all life in that ecosystem, why does bipartisan outrage evaporate? The same republicans who love the outdoors, who love to go boating, hunting and fishing also pay for this environmental cost for the benefit of a tiny minority. Very confusing.
Rich Santorum has seen broad support in the party. I participated in the republican caucus in Spokane, WA and in our precinct Ron Paul narrowly won with Santorum only one vote behind while he took second in the overall county vote. (http://elections.msnbc.msn.com/ns/politics/2012/washington/republican/caucus/#.T1W1_ocgdTI) Even though Paul took a narrow second in Washington total counts, Santorum has done very well in other parts of the country. These polling results show that Santorum's views are indeed indicative of the party as a large percentage. Santorum does not support the separation of church and state but would insert HIS version of the bible into the law of the land. Would your religious views align with his? I would be certain that statistics would prove me correct in saying that Santorum's views DO NOT represent the nation as a whole and yet his supporters care not for this fact. Santorum would fit in very well with middle eastern Imams and Ayatollahs in regards to the structure of government they both pursue. Very confusing.
Expansion of government has been the norm under both parties but it is the republican party that advocates the loudest for smaller government. And yet it was Bush II and his party that created the Patriot Act, no child left behind, and expansion of the TSA to name only a few. By the way the Patriot Act is anything but and in fact it should be called the 'Repeal the fourth amendment act'. If they want smaller government why have they increased it exponentially. Very confusing. I won't bother much with the TSA here (which gives a good idea for a future post) other than to say; how can normal men and women do this as a job everyday. It is disgusting what we have become and how did we survive before this aggressive abuse? Oh, we did just fine.
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I really don't understand why conservatism has been reversed to mean abuse of power. I don't know why 'conserving' our resources by keeping our water and air clean now equates to a 'radical liberal agenda'?. I would have to suppose by what conservatives call conservation is; keeping the money changers and abusive business in power. One question which seemed to separate left from right was: Do corporations have a social responsibility or do they simply need to create money for the shareholders? Certainly the main goal of business or a corporation is to make money but to suggest that a business has no social responsibility is a backwards idea. They may not need to feed the starving but at the very minimum a corporation should do no harm. Instead our corporations, as evidenced by the wall street debacle, have become predatory and acutely greedy.
And I haven't covered 'gay rights' which is another anomaly of the republican parties lip service to individual rights. Very confusing.
We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.- Einstein
