5 posts tagged “politics”
I don't mean to be a lawyer basher, but I think lawyers shouldn't be running the country. I know legislators create laws, which a lawyer should theoretically be good at. My point is what does a career lawyer know about economics, IT security, dam construction, or say environmental science. These really aren't the best people to run the country. After all, congressmen usually don't even write laws themselves. Usually lobbyists or staff write them. There should be a good balance of educators, scientists, engineers, financial analysts, economists, and lawyers. I don't think there is any democracy where this is the case. The Soviet Union actually had engineers. As an example, I believe Yeltsin had an engineering degree. Overall, as a whole, we really don't have much real-world experience in any branch of government. Sure, there are a few business executives, which is nice; but then you can't even run a company without any field experts.
I've begun to wonder if America is ready to elect a black president. It seems like it, but personally, I was very disillusioned when Ron Kirk, a very popular black mayor from Dallas, lost in his bid to become Senator for Texas. I guess maybe it was because he was just a Democrat, but the numbers seemed to just go too far away from him for me to completely believe that.
Anyway, If Obama can't do it now, maybe it can't be done. Republicans aren't gonna make it any easier. I guess the experiment has begun.
Please chime in to tell me what you think.
I recently noticed that all of the last five presidents have been white males. You may not have realized it, but George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George Bush, Ronald Reagan, and Jimmie Carter were all white men. I recently wondered what has caused this trend and if it would continue. Looking at Fortune 500 companies, I noticed that nearly all their CEOs are white males. Perhaps this hasn't come to your attention. I guess America has tired of the leadership of women and minorities. They've almost completely turned to white men for leadership. To be honest, I really didn't have the time to dig in and do the research, but maybe it was Margaret Thatcher that turned us off from female leadership. If you don't know, she was Queen of England or something. Maybe it was a leader of a foreign country that turned us off of minority leadership. Consequently, a lot of countries are run by a minority leader, including China, India, and Venezuela. My research has turned up that many African nations are lead by black presidents. It may surprise you, but Mexico even has a Mexican President.
I wonder if the U.S. will buck recent trends and go with Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama. It's been a long time, but I think it's time Americans can trust a woman or a minority with the Presidency again.
Politics are so divisive these days. I mean in the context that most people think you have to be one or the other. Democrat or republican. Many people think you have to even be conservative or liberal. If you take a look at comments on USA Today you'll see "sounds like you're a stupid conservative" or "only a liberal would write something like that." What's up with that?
Negativism aside, why do people have to be one or the other. Do people just go online, check out each parties' general platform and say, "Hmmm. I'll pick that one. Okay, but I'm going to have to start being pro-life and against gay marriage. I guess I can swing that. Awesome, I'm a republican now!!!"
Seriously, I think it's directly a product of environment. And I don't mean that personal morality or opinions are directly a product of environment. I mean the party people choose. I've really seen it first hand. I grew up in a wealthy, all-white area of North Texas. Everyone was a conservative republican. I became a liberal because everyone was a conservative republican (That's how I rebelled). But a little later on, I moved to Northern California. Everyone there was a liberal democrat. When I lived in Texas, I thought those conservatives believe a lot of crazy shit, so I must not be one of them. Therefore, I must be a liberal. Soon I learned that those liberals believe a lot of crazy shit. I figured out that I don't fit into any specific platform. My opinions diverge from the right and left on different issues.
As I interrogated some friends that said they were liberal or conservative, I realized that quite often, they are not. They just weren't too familiar with the party line. In some cases, they picked up an opinion or two based on the respective party's platform; which they, in fact, could not bring themselves to whole-heartedly accept. I began to realize that people who grew up in Berkeley were liberals because they grew up in Berkeley and people who grew up in rural Louisiana were conservatives because they grew up in rural Louisiana. Oddly enough, beliefs and values are secondary to geography.
Most often people's political affiliation is a result of the environment they grew up in. Quite often it has nothing to do with their political views. Their political views came after the chose, often unconsciously, their party affiliation.
My theory is actually even backed up by psychological studies. Psychologists found that if they pick 5 strangers at random and put them in a room with 15 moles, they could get nearly all 5 strangers, in nearly every case, to believe whatever the 15 moles influenced them to believe; no matter how ridiculous.
This is kind of like what happened in Germany prior to WWII, of course to a much lessor extent. People are social creatures and they will do whatever is necessary to be loved and accepted by the group.
Yeah, this IS messed up.
This is from CNN / Politics.
It was a couple weeks ago, but a Virginian Republican congressman said, without immigration overhaul "there will be many more Muslims elected
to office demanding the use of the Quran."
http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/12/20/lawmaker.koran/index.html
It amazes me that a government representative could be openly bigoted and still keep his job. Seriously, recently it seems like we are living in the 1950s again. I've heard more and more shit like this in the news and in person relating to Hispanics and Muslims. Tonight I just read a story in the Dallas Morning News about a pizza chain in the southwest that was accepting pesos as a promotion. Their headquarters got inundated with hate mail. http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/011207dnbuspesofolo.2e173218.html
Come on people, let's not hate people because they are different. Show a little love. You're really bringing me down.
