On Sat, 18 Sep 2004 18:02:44 -0700 (PDT), Gautam Mukunda <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > True enough. Oh, what the hell, I'm not going to get > that job anyways. I have no idea who I'm voting for. > I find the Bush Administration to be brutally inept, > almost frighteningly incompetent across a wide variety > of areas, and wrongheaded in a fair number of others. > I think the second President Bush has been the worst > President since Jimmy Carter. > > Had the Democratic party nominated someone other than > a Massachusetts Senator who has raised political > opportunism to the level of performance art, been > wrong on every major issue of foreign policy in his > entire public career, and believes that four months of > his life 30 years ago are important enough to vote for > him while his entire public life is unimportant...I'd > definitely be voting for him. As it is, I still > would...but the problem is his supporters. There are > plenty of people like that on this list - one might > call them the "no enemies to my left" crowd. Or the > Michael Moore crowd and his enablers. The Michael > Moore crowd is obvious - people who hate the US. > That's not a very large part of Kerry's supporters. > The far larger problem is the humongous group of his > supporters who are patriotic people who are, > nonetheless, so consumed with hatred for the Bush > Administration that they don't have a problem with > Michael Moore. People who look at Bin Laden and John > Ashcroft and think we should understand Bin Laden and > hate Ashcroft. People who sneer at NASCAR. As > someone without firm partisan commitments, I tend to > look at these people and think, "If these people are > right, I'd rather be wrong." If John Kerry displayed > any sign of coherent principle I'd say, okay, he's a > good guy who's served his country, once he's become > President he'll tell these guys to go to hell. But he > appears to be, in Winston Churchill's marvelous > phrase, "The Spineless Wonder". Since Presidential > candidates cater to their supporters, I fear that he > might actually _do what they want_, and, say, become a > protectionist, stop offshoring, surrender our national > security to our French enemies, and so on. This would > be a problem. So I look at Bush and think - this guy > is a D- President. And I look at Kerry and think, > this guy _wants to be_ an F President. So who do I > vote for? I honestly have no idea.
I've gone through some of the same thought process, myself. I don't know about the protectionism stuff, but I have seen one or two speeches from him saying the US did not need UN permission to defend itself (ie: surrender to the French). The quote the Republicans are airing to the contrary is 30 years old and he has long since repudiated that belief. As for Iraq, I was concerned that his failure to support the $87 billion Iraq funding showed he was non-serious about achieving success there, but what doesn't get mentioned in the press is that Kerry was supporting an alternate version of the bill that would provide the same money, but the funding would come from revoking some of the tax cuts. http://www.dailyhowler.com/dh071604.shtml quote: KERRY: When say I voted for it, I was willing to vote for the $87 billion providing we paid for it! Providing we asked Americans to sacrifice, all of us together. So Joe Biden and I...brought an amendment to say, Hey Americaârather than have a $690 billion tax cut for everybody over the next ten years who are earning over $200,000, why don't we take just $600 billion, and that way we pay for the war right up front and not add it to the deficit. Guess what? George Bush said no. The Republicans said no. And what they're doing is trying once again to mislead America as they do so effectively, make a joke out of something that's serious. It was also my fear was he'd support a Vietnam-like abandonment of Iraq, but it's pretty clear he believes failure is not an option: http://www.johnkerry.com/pressroom/speeches/spc_2004_0430.html snippet: "I believe that failure is not an option in Iraq. But it is also true that failure is not an excuse for more of the same. Here is how we must proceed." ... I think Kerry grossly overestimates the willingness of France, et al to help us out there, even if he asks nicely, but it seems clear he isn't planning to back out. IMHO, Kerry has been doing a lousy job at making people confident in his leadership on security issues. He was forced to shift left to win the nomination, and I think he's worried that too strong a stance will turn off the anti-war and ABB crowds, so he's walking a fine line, and it's left him something of a "rorschach candidate", where people are left to form their own vision of his presidency, and the Republicans are pummeling him with it. > > For what it is worth I was wrong here. WalMart > > employess who work > > 32hrs/wk *are* eligible for insurance. Bad > > information on my part and > > bad interpretation of what I was told otherwise. > > > > My apologies and an admission of a head-up-the-ass > > event on my part. > > Hey, no need to apologize. Everybody makes mistakes. > Dan didn't like my 90% statistic. I know that they > don't necessarily get it from WalMart. So what? A > large part of that is because WalMart (very > intelligently) has decided to do things like offer > jobs to senior citizens, who are covered by Medicare. > Good for them. Who cares where the health insurance > comes from, as long as it's there? Maybe I'm mistaken, but isn't medicare quite inferior to normal employer-provided (ie: paid-for) health plans? I would think that where your health insurance comes from might matter a good bit in some cases. But in any case, I think the general point of conversation was about how Walmart treats its employees, so the percentage of employees who get their insurance directly from Walmart would be a more useful statistic, since their getting insurance from other sources says little about Walmart. (Note, I'm not trying to bash Walmart; I just agree with Dan that the 90% number isn't saying much by itself). -Bryon _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
