Congratulations to President-Elect Obama who will become the 44th President of the United States. He has run one of the most well-organized (maybe the most well-organized) campaigns in history. As Americans in difficult times, it is incumbent for all of us as citizens and leaders to forget agendas and get to policymaking. Our country and its people deserve no less. Democrats are the party in power and now have the opportunity to lead, and no longer obstruct. republicans have lost their position of power, and must now find ways to help lead, and not simply replace the Democrats as obstructionists. President-Elect Obama is my president and your's, but he is a representative of our views on how best this country must proceed. We need to hold him to account when he is wrong, and praise him when he is right. We need to see that he is now a leader who will be a puppet of no special interest or party. In doing so, I hope that we can make it policy-driven; not disgraceful and personal as has been done too often with President Bush. That is my wish this morning.
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
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Very good blog Mr. Sutton. Last night I went out with a friend who asked me "what are you gonna do tomorrow if you wake up and find out McCain didn't win?" I said "Hope that Obama can do a good job and go about my daily business". I only hope everyone feels the same as we do, and that no matter how we may feel about him, give him a chance. I do not want my party to become the same as the democrats. Also I'm just thrilled that after 2 years I won't have to have my phone ringing off the hook for McCain, or someone pounding on my door for Obama. Just one of the perks when you are registered republican and your wife is registered democrat :)
I agree, I think we all need to stand strong and work together. The results are in, and there is no need to fearful the new president elect, Barack Obama. We need to give him a chance to try and get America going in the right direction. He has not even stepped foot in office, and some people already have a negative outlook before he has taken any actions as the 44th President of the United States. I salute Gary Sutton for being a stand up guy and accepting Mr. Obama as “his” president.
I agree, I think we all need to stand strong and work together. The results are in, and there is no need to fearful the new president elect, Barack Obama. We need to give him a chance to try and get America going in the right direction. He has not even stepped foot in office, and some people already have a negative outlook before he has taken any actions as the 44th President of the United States. I salute Gary Sutton for being a stand up guy and accepting Mr. Obama as “our” president.
Finnie, try re-registering as'independent' or 'no political affiliation' as I do. For the most part, both tribes will leave you alone..........as far as they are concerned, you don't exist.
I've grown to like that and I'm free to vote for who I please without some subconscious feeling I need to invest my loyalty to a tribe instead of a human being.
"We need to hold him to account when he is wrong, and praise him when he is right. We need to see that he is now a leader who will be a puppet of no special interest or party. In doing so, I hope that we can make it policy-driven; not disgraceful and personal as has been done too often with President Bush. That is my wish this morning."
MY GOD!!!!
Bush's policies have been insane.
Literally.
God spoke to him and told him to attack Iraq.
Bush's original concept of what-to-do when he got into office was a manned mission to Mars.
He didn't even know where foreign nations were on the planet.
His advocacy of war, torture, detainment, imprisonment, spying, extraordinary rendition, refusal to obey signed laws, secrecy, violations of Constitutional Amendments, violations of international law, lying to the electorate, fiscal cronyism, and about 12 pages more-----------made the Bush administration the WORST in most historian's view of any president.
That anyone could have supported Bush's BS as you have done, Gary, is tantamount to an admission of woeful ignorance of reality.
As I said, this election was as much a repudiation of Cheney/Bush policies as it was an endorsement of a charismatic leader.
Thankfully the American electorate awakened slightly-----not enough. They still returned MOST incumbents to office.
As they typically do-----and then they wonder why nothing changes significantly . . .
I wonder why...?
We need Constitutional reform for a badly broken system: term limits, balanced budgets, citizen oversight committees, restraint on corporate/Congressional revolving door, elimination of lobbyists, representative gender parity, referendum voting, etc.
I pray Obama does well, and stays safe. He's a lovely fellow and genuinely offers hope to America.
And, if his first efforts are to allow Cheney, Bush, Rumsfeld, Perle, Wolfowitz, and the rest of the PNAC signatories to be prosecuted by the World Court for crimes against humanity, I'm there.
Anon. #2,
I think I'll stand by my original statement, not buy into every bit of tripe you obviously have decided to bite on, and stay away from drinking the kool-aide full of vitriol you have drunk. This kind of blind diatribe and lack of critical thinking, complete with blind hatred of everything Bush can be contagious to other administrations. Be careful. You may well be a significant part of the polarizing "I win, you lose" attitude in America.
Re: Anon #2
Thus sayeth the "enlightened" ones of liberal ilk who want hope and change...which is exactly why we can't roll over and play dead now that the election is over.
Gary, you're ignorant.
That's it.
You're ignorant.
And to be ignorant means to ignore.
You ignore the excesses of the Bush junta.
I have no time for someone who describes what I said as: "...every bit of tripe you obviously have decided to bite on, and ... drinking the kool-aide full of vitriol you have drunk. This kind of blind diatribe and lack of critical thinking, complete with blind hatred of everything Bush can be contagious to other administrations. Be careful. You may well be a significant part of the polarizing "I win, you lose" attitude in America."
You're ignorant.
Lack of critical thinking?---Let's see:
"God spoke to him and told him to attack Iraq."
(from Woodward's interview)
"Bush's original concept of what-to-do when he got into office was a manned mission to Mars."
(from his first 120 days)
"He didn't even know where foreign nations were on the planet."
(he admitted to staff)
His advocacy of war, torture, detainment, imprisonment, spying, extraordinary rendition, refusal to obey signed laws, secrecy, violations of Constitutional Amendments, violations of international law, lying to the electorate, fiscal cronyism, and about 12 pages more"
(from the news of what has happened in America the last 7 years)
are definitely not critical thinking are they?
-----But calling someone "vitriol Koolaid drinking " is perfectly acceptable critical thought.
This is RC---I tried to post on this stupid site under my google name and all it allowed was "anonymous"----but for you to attack me personally for your own intellectual frivolity of endorsing the CheneyBush doctrine tells me that you're not able to even think critically without divorcing yourself from your inherited Republican allegiance.
As if that's news.
Cut the crap.
"We need Constitutional reform for a badly broken system: term limits, balanced budgets, citizen oversight committees, restraint on corporate/Congressional revolving door, elimination of lobbyists, representative gender parity, referendum voting, etc.
I pray Obama does well, and stays safe. He's a lovely fellow and genuinely offers hope to America."
Term limits: I agree
Balanced budgets: I agree
Citizen oversight committees: that one I don't follow you on...sounds like you just want to add a new level of micromanagement to government instead of actually fixing the problem called voter apathy.
Restraint on corporate/Congressional revolving door: if you're making a case against special interest groups, then yeah I'm with you.
Elimination of lobbyists: I agree.
Representative Gender Parity: this is ridiculous, and I haven't heard a single reason why this would do anything good for our country. I'm not sexist either, although I'm sure somebody could spin it that way and make a stink. What good would gender parity in Congress do for us?
Referendum voting: didn't we just do that yesterday? Are you suggesting more referendum voting? Because if we're only getting 50-60% during Presidential elections, we'll get 10-15% for "just referendums".
Obama offering hope to America: Obama offers as much hope to America as McCain...none. What these guys are offering is socialism, plain and simple, and they're offering a slippery slope to the complete collapse of the economy and military.
What we need is smaller government, plain and simple. That is what Republicans/Conservatives spend so much time talking about, but when push comes to shove they just make government bigger. They enact new legislation that takes away liberties (see Patriot Act), they further inflation and economic instability, they force us to pay through the nose for bad decisions on Wall Street...statism, pure and simple!
Yo Doug,
Thanks for an intelligent reply.
Let me make an argument here as to why gender parity makes sense:
The Constitution was written by men. The Constitution was written at a time in history when women were seriously regarded as intellectual inferiors to men.
The Constitution reflects that patriarchal bias when it says "all men are created equal"------even the fact that the word "men" was used instead of "people" or "human beings" tells us that men were regarded as the leaders.
We know that free black men earned the vote in post-Revolutionary days, and all black men in 1870.
It was given to them.
The right to vote was denied women until they mounted a powerful protest movement, suffragism, and finally were grudgingly "allowed" that right in 1920. They were treated badly, called the most insulting things and roughed up----just because they asked for the same rights as their fellow human beings.
This is not a right that should have been denied citizens of this country for almost 140 years: women should have had that right to participate in a "representative democracy" from Day 1.
But it's a patriarchy.
So what is the lingering effect of being denied equal rights since that time?----the idea that most people have that women are not capable of decision-making as well as the men.
This idea is still threaded into the social fabric (contract)-----and even though women today have the vote, their representation and their ability to ascend to higher office is still denied them. It is denied them because the system we have by which people campaign for office plays by male rules. Politics is cutthroat, below the belt, nasty, dirty, mean spirited, and competitive to the max.
This is not how women operate-----instead, it is a masculine notion of what it means to be a politician. Women by their nature are more cooperative, more nurturing, gentler, kinder. The whole game of politics would change if female energy was forcibly introduced to level the playing field to allow them to compete with the men. The men aren't going to give it to them---they'll have to be forced to "let" them.
The analogy is one in which the biggest, strongest, loudest and most aggressive person in the room gets to be called the leader:
after a while, (200 years?) anyone who doesn't fit this image isn't even considered leadership material in the mindset of folks who expect something that resembles that engraved image in their heads, which is an image with male characteristics. For women to meet this standard they either have to look the part by wearing men costumes (power suits, pants suits) or walk and talk with more of a male mimicry. They either do it openly, or subconsciously. The few women who get into office who don't play by these rules are the exception. Mostly all our female politicians are lawyers----trained to mimic the males to be competitive, trained to act manlike to play the game at that level.
Just as we opened universities to "allow" blacks to attend, just as we "allowed" blacks to play in pro sports, we need to "allow" women to participate in governing this nation since 51.5% of us are females.
It is only right and fair to create a nation in which the decisions are crafted by all citizens.
This is why.
Because it's the right thing to do.
And it will change the way we make policy from the way the men have done it.
We are not yet civilized as humans: if we were this would already have happened.
Why 50% of all politicians?
--Why not 25%, or 33%?
Because half of us are female.
It's only fair.
I'll play along. Let's say that we enact legislation that says Congress must be a 50/50 split between men and women. Do we also split the Supreme Court? What about state legislators? And what happens when the quickly growing hispanic population wants a share of Congress? Suddenly we've got various quotas to fill when we're electing our officials...
And all of a sudden, YOU will find yourself in the strange situation of having to vote for someone to fill a quota instead of voting for someone qualified.
It's simply affirmative action in government. We've seen it in sports (Title IX, hiring processes in the pros), we see it in education (universities filling quotas), and has anything good come out of those programs?
It's not about man versus woman. It's about electing the people that are going to do the best job, whether they are black or white, man or woman, Catholic or Protestant.
Congrats to President-elect Obama.
Dear Christian conservatives,
I realize that this morning may not have revealed the outcome you had prayed for. However, let me remind you of somthing.
In the third year of Jehoiakim king of Judah, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and besieged it. And The Lord delivered Judah into his hand.
Four young Isrealites, probably teenagers, were captured and set apart for the purpose of retraining and serving the new king. They did serve the king well too, while not defiling their bodies with the tempting ways of the Babylonians, They honored and respected the king and never even bad mouthed him. In the end the pagan king of Babylon came to realize and know the God of the universe, because of the faithful service of four young men.
Let us as Christians follow this example and follow Paul's directive as well. We shall honor and respect our new President, and continue to serve God, and men.
God bless America.
"It's simply affirmative action in government." (DW)
Yes, it is.
But it also is creating equality of the sexes.
I agree that having .9 of an Inuit or 18% black representation is irresolute.
I believe that since America is made up of ethnic minorities of almost every nationality and origin it is going to be impossible to not construe America ultimately as a melting pot and allow representation to be there for the concerns of the minorities without quotas.
Quotas do happen in given districts where for example there's a Polish ancestry, and chances of a Workowski getting in are much better than a Jones.
So how do I reconcile the indefensible logic of enacting the most stringent of quotas for gender, 50%, when I am not in favor of ethnic quotas..?
I don't.
I can't.
And I choose to argue for gender parity because the 51.5% of the populace who are female have not been part of the political process.
Without the National Guard in Selma ---authorized by the President--- protecting those young blacks in Mississippi, higher education would continue to be offbounds in most of the Southern states for AfroAmericans, for darkskinned people.
Sometimes the barriers have to be broken to hasten the process of restoration to levels artificially blocked for years. Or for centuries.
If you want to term it "integration of women into politics" instead of gender parity, I wouldn't argue it.
I am not for inequality.
Political, economic, legal, educational, medical, social, whatever. . .
Do you think that women have the same political opportunities as men...?
Do you think there is an inequality the way the political process is established and run by the parties . ..?
If you don't, there's no way to convince you that that inequality needs forcibly to be overturned.
If you don't think that those invisible barriers serve to maintain the male prerogative, and continue to keep women at a second class level then no argument is going to create that consciousness.
But I will ask you this:
What if a Jackie Robinson hadn't gotten into the Majors?
What if all sports had a color barrier? They did for years, you know, and everybody white just accepted that it was the way it was supposed to be. If I had at that time tried to convince someone white that by keeping blacks out of sports, we were denying equal opportunity to blacks, and we were reducing ultimately the caliber of the athletes AND the sports by their exclusion----I doubt they'd believe me.
That the energy and quality of women is kept out of the policy-making of this country means that the caliber of the process is also lesser for it.
Our policies could be much more sensible if housewives and mothers had direct say.
Like I said, it is a dogmatic proposition, but one I ardently believe in-----because it corrects a longstanding inequality.
RC/ANON,
No crap! No ignorance! Please check the cliff; you have gone over the edge.
These pictures are waaaaaaaay cool:
Click here
RB,
Very cool pictures! Thank you for sharing. It is hopeful.
Pulling this in from the other thread...
"Doug, if I recall, you were a serious Ron Paul supporter. I thought he was a solid guy, too.
Anyhow, which political tribe dumped on his campaign? The Republican Tribal Poo-Bahs controlling the show wanted no parts of him because he appeared to be a................wait for it.........a "Maverick".
John McCain learned his lesson in 2000, while Ron Paul has yet to learn his."
I totally agree with you Fred, and yes, I was a solid enough Ron Paul guy to write him in when I voted on Tuesday. Sure, you might look at it as if I wasted my vote because I'm not even really sure if it was counted, but I voted on principle and I can sleep at night knowing that I stood up for something I am passionate about.
Dr. Paul seems like a pretty bright dude, so I highly doubt that he went into this election cycle with the expectation of winning. If anyone knows the whole truth about how oppressive our two party system is, it's him. But yes, he did get dumped on by the Republican party, his fellow "conservatives". They can't stand him because he actively derides them and their Democratic counterparts for their shallow politicking.
I am glad that he hasn't dropped off the map completely. So often the 3rd party candidates only surface around election day, but I have a feeling that Dr. Paul's Campaign for Liberty will only grow in strength as the economy continues to suffer. I doubt he'll run again in 2012 (he'll be 76 I think) and hopefully someone like him steps up in his stead. Too bad I'll only be 28!
Wow. People are still writing on the blog site? Anyone still listening to the garbage on the air? Miss you, Gary Sutton Show.
This blog looks a little stale. Whatever happened to an engaging personality such as the vaunted Gary "The Voice of Mainstreet Commonsense Talker" Sutton? Hello?............Hello?........
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