JTC Thinks....

RBS> wrote:
The only changes I made to what JTC wrote were to run the spell checker and break it into paragraphs. It came to me as one gargantuan paragraph. I present JTC’s thoughts to prove that I am not a lone voice in the wilderness. It’s important to me not to be seen that way as the history of such individuals tends to be dismal. Ask John the Baptist.

JTC> wrote:
Feel free to post whatever, man If you want to re-write, give yourself co-authorship credit; some of my rhetoric may need a touch-up :-). J.

RBS> wrote:
Well said. Actually, I'd like to post what you wrote on my blog and credit you for it.

JTC> wrote:
Cool. I also think that Richardson has advantages (as does Edwards) and we have to get past the stupid idea that the Dems can win without a southerner or westerner on the ticket. We know that Bush (with assistance from his brother) stole the first election, and that because there had not been such blatant theft of the Presidency before, not a single Senator spoke up to investigate the Black Caucus' legitimate concerns re: vote fraud in several close states, including Florida. And we know that there was massive, systemic voter fraud in Ohio in 2004.

I don't think that Hillary or Obama can win, except as a VP candidate. They are just not seen by the south and west as being "our kind of people" even though their views are pretty solidly aligned with most of the country, including the south and the west. It has nothing to do with gender or race, it has to do with being perceived as northern liberals which in the south is as dirty a thing as one can call someone.

Richardson has the west, the Hispanic vote, and conservative credentials while being liberal enough on the policies that really count (environment, restoring the Constitution, etc.). Edwards has been attacked as a "trial lawyer" but in this particular election a competent person who has been fighting for the "little guy" against the overbearing Repiglicans can easily make that a plus.

Although I'd love to see Gore get back in the race--he can come back with a fire in his belly that his previously wooden demeanor would be erased by and can directly attack the President where most candidates can't or are afraid to.

He can say things like "if people think we can't set a deadline for Iraq to take over for itself, they must be drinking something stronger than coffee, because that makes us occupy that country forever"

or "if bringing the troops home before the mission is accomplished, let's not keep changing what we need to accomplish. We've done everything we can, and given them a democracy--if they can keep it, as Benjamin Franklin once said about America. We've sacrificed enough blood and treasure to allow the six different rival sects--not just two, but some people in the administration can't count up to six--to work together if they have to. With us there, they don't have to."

or "Rebuilding America is more important than rebuilding Iraq. When New Orleans and Mississippi and Florida are rebuilt, when we stop being the #1 reason young men are flocking to anti-American causes around the world, we become a stronger and safer society."

or even "what this country needs is someone who doesn't rely on faulty intelligence and the dreams of a self-styled Presidential Monarch. The President is the people's servant, not the official wiretapper, kidnapper, torturer, gulag-runner, Constitution-underminer of the nation. Let's make one thing clear: this President has broken the law and admitted it. He claims it was to keep us safer. Yet he cannot prove one single instance in which he's actually done that, while incidents of terrorism and hate for Americans world-wide have risen under his law-breaking policies.

We need something better in the white house than faulty intelligence. And we need something better than Senators and Representatives who ignore what their constituents want by an overwhelming margin just because they want to keep spreading fear. The only reason we are more fearful now, that the world is a more fearful place now, is that America is no longer the shining moral beacon it has been for centuries. And that is squarely on the heads of not all, but quite a number of Republicans, including this secretive, law-breaking President and his inept cronies from Rumsfeld to Brownie to Gonzales to Miers and the list goes on.

When the President jokes about his Vice-President shooting someone in the face as "the good old days" it's easy to see how he can ignore reality. He makes Nixon look like a Saint, and the Communist Dictators look like they were running an open society. That's why only 3 in 10 still believe a word he says.

And my friends, that is fewer than the number of people who believe that Elvis is alive, that there are aliens among us and that we never landed on the moon. We are never going to win over minds like that. But we've already won over the rest of America. Let's not let what happened before to us happen again. Let's not let our policies add to our enemies and reduce our safety. Let's not shred our Constitution in the name of supposedly better--and completely unproven--security."

Sorry I droned on a bit there :-). Hope to see you on the 7th. See you at work Monday!
J.