On Tue, 26 Oct 2004 12:01:29 -0700 (PDT) David Brin wrote: >--- Ruben Krasnopolsky is a perfect example of the >sort of nit-picking conservative who I pray will step >up and rescue the movement. Until a few weeks ago he >was holding his nose and leaning toward Bush.
I am a nit-picking one indeed, and so I will present the obvious nitpicks on this... I think David is not right if he counts *me*, personally, as a conservative who could rescue any American movement. By ideology, I am not so much a conservative as a centrist. By citizenship, I am not an American, or even a permanent resident of these USA. I guess that David meant not so much me personally, but was thinking about the many people who have political ideas similar to mine, such as the many American independents who did vote for Bush in 2000, or the many conservatives who do not feel the need to tow the party line on every single issue - hopefully, most of them, even most of those who will end up voting for Bush again in 2004. I think he was thinking about people like for instance, Andrew Sullivan: http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?pt=qFFINfAm4eR7PMnY1tkQ2m%3D%3D http://www.andrewsullivan.com/ I was the closest example of similar ideas at hand on this mailing list :-) Next closest I *think* is Gautam; even if he still keeps to his pro-Bush stance, I can see he realizes it's not a position free of problems. So, I've said who I am not. Maybe you want to know who I am. David already knows it, but I wanted the list to know it too. Here I try to say who I am: <http://www.astro.uiuc.edu/~ruben> I am an Argentine citizen, did grad school on Astrophysics at Caltech, then a postdoc at UChicago, now I am doing another one at UIUC. Luggage is made for the next job, wherever on this planet that it might be. F1, H1B, and thanks to the INS/USCIS for these many special opportunities: <http://uscis.gov/graphics/howdoi/h1b.htm> Filling up the 1040 forms was a special thrill too :-) The nomadic existence is good for the soul in many ways, but it's surely not convenient to get seriously into politics. By many Argentine standards I am quite conservative indeed. But for the spectrum of American politics, I am clearly a centrist rather than a doctrinaire conservative. I tend to the right on some issues, to the left on others. I am concerned about the war on terrorism, a global war that potentially hits everywhere, the USA no much more so than many other places. Bush declared being serious and constant about fighting that war; and I welcomed that, just as most Americans did. However, recently I have realized that perhaps the current President might be serious enough, but he's not doing it right by any means. I believe that a change of leadership is needed, and now. I must say that, with all respect due to the President and the Republicans. They are also America too, and as a visitor I respect that. Ruben _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
