Mad Analysis: Politics Is Depressing

In the United States, the political contest has now entered the “serious” stage, we have seen both the Republican and Democrat conventions and they have together brought about a very definite emotional reaction in me. Unfortunately that reaction was depression. At the GOP convention we saw a succession of politicians who, during the primary, had called Mitt Romney basically “Obama-lite” come out, do a quick about face, and declare him the only man who can save America. We heard very few specifics, which is to say really no specifics beyond lowering taxes and cutting regulations. That sounds good (at least to me) but so long as we have a tax code the size of an encyclopedia it makes little difference to me who says what about taxes since only those with armies of accountants will be able to decipher the code and find the many loopholes both parties have interwoven throughout the whole complicated mess. There was not much energy at the Republican convention compared to the Democrats and it is no wonder. Mitt Romney is the living embodiment of boredom.

The only people with any zeal were the Ron Paul people who the party bosses ensured were soundly ignored after enacting a quick rule change to deprive them of their voice. I would feel more sympathy if they had not helped Romney win the primary in the first place and, I suppose, from the point of view of the GOP there is really little point in doing them any favors since they are most definitely not good, little, loyal Republicans. If Romney loses it will be interesting to see what had the bigger impact; picking a candidate who could not inspire Republicans to vote or disgruntled Ron Paul fans taking support away from the GOP ticket. Of course, the Republicans were perfectly excellent when it came to pointing out problems and listing all of the mistakes of the Obama administration but actual solutions were in very short supply. Like libertarian journalist John Stossel, I would have preferred to hear about what Romney plans to do as President rather than that his dad used to pick a flower for his mom every morning. Most of what came out of Tampa was simply, “Obama stinks but if you vote for us we’ll fix it”; even though that would require majorities in the House and Senate that I doubt Republicans have a prayer of winning.

Was there at least any entertainment value? Not as far as I was concerned. For me, the only highlight was Clint Eastwood, but I’m biased on that count having been a fan of his ever since his “spaghetti western” days. Well, we did get to see Paul Ryan give a great performance in pretending the budget Romney proposed is a great thing despite being far inferior to his own proposal but we got no verbal acrobatics from Mitt Romney in an effort to explain how he is now opposed to so many things he used to be for. He talked about his faith (a nicer-sounding word than “religion”) yet he failed to explain how, with such a deep faith and high position in his church, he managed to have such radical, and so numerous, changes on major moral issues always around election time. Funny that. He never even talked much about what one would think to be the backbone of the republican campaign; a smaller government with greater individual responsibility. No, instead it was a long list of praise for those plucky small businesses and a parade of minority-women-Republicans (See! We’re inclusive too!) and not much more. No clear plan, no specifics, just vague promises for something a little better than what we have. Yawn.

But, of course, it was excitement central at the Democrat convention in Charlotte, entertaining at least in watching them scramble to deal with one misstep after another. Thankfully Chairman Debbie was there to tell us not to believe our own eyes and ears as only someone like her can. This is the same woman who once said that Republicans wanted to ‘make it against the law to be an illegal alien’. Don’t think about that statement too much or your brain will start to bleed. They got into a little trouble with their party platform, leaving out any reference to God or Jerusalem being the capital of Israel (there were some other items but none that threatened to cause trouble with key voting blocs like these). There was a fuss brewing and Obama ordered them put back in to head off any bad press. Unfortunately, not too many were pleased with that decision and there were boos when the convention chairman took a vote and declared a majority favored the changes in spite of this obviously not being so. The Republicans pounced on it of course, and rightly so. After all, they had been clever enough to simply change the rules on everyone to avoid a scene like this while the Democrats were silly enough to actually have the delegates vote on something. Amateurs.

The Democrats, of course, accused the Republican Party of going too extreme and being dominated by the Tea Party “radicals”, which seems rather odd when the GOP candidate is someone not terribly popular with the Tea Party, someone who was Governor of a very liberal state and who had previously been okay with abortion and gay “marriage”. Mitt Romney hardly fits as a hard-line conservative. About the only thing “radical” (a good thing in my view) that happened in Tampa was calling for an audit of the Federal Reserve (don’t hold your breath for that one) and otherwise it was typical GOP business as usual. However, it was at the Democrat convention in Charlotte that the radicals on the left really did seem to have taken over. It could be called the convention of the Abortion-Birth Control-Homosexuality Party. About one third of Democrats (they say) are pro-life but one would never know it from the convention where anyone opposed to abortion, publicly funded contraceptives or legalizing gay “marriage” is clearly not welcome. About the only humorous moment was seeing Sandra the-taxpayers-need-to-buy-my-birth control-pills Fluke speaking in a primetime slot at a national convention on cable and network television to an audience of millions about how women are being “silenced”. That was a riot.

I try not to preach when it comes to my observations, but in this case I cannot help delving a bit into religion as the Democrat convention seemed to be both a really big slap across the face of the Catholic Church as well as an indication of, well, just what the state of the Catholic Church is these days I suppose. Here was a convention where, for the first time ever in the USA, gay “marriage” was made an official plank of the party platform, along with the right to abortion at any time for any reason and that taxpayer-funded birth control is a “human right”. All of these things the Catholic Church opposes (supposedly anyway). Yet we saw a parade of one Catholic after another cheering for all of these issues and for a President who was against saving the life of a child who happened to survive an abortion (so blatant infanticide in other words). In just one day there was LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa (divorced, adulterer pro-abortion and gay “marriage” Catholic -his openly gay cousin John Perez also spoke but he doesn‘t claim to be Catholic anymore as far as I know), Illinois Congressman Luis Gutierrez (big supporter of “Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender” issues), union boss Richard Trumka, Congressman John Larson, Senator Patty Murray, Commissioner Pedro Pierluisi, Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy (champion of the transgender crowd), former Speaker Nancy Pelosi (who has actually said the Catholic Church doesn’t enforce the no-birth control rule, and I guess she’s been proven right on that one), Secretary Tom Vilsack, Senator Barbara Mikulski (who led a big cheer for “reproductive rights” at the convention), and do I need to go on? We also had Vice President Joe Biden (who beat Obama in endorsing gay “marriage”) and a pro-Obama Catholic nun.

We also had Caroline Kennedy who said that “as a Catholic woman” she supported the Democrat platform of pushing “reproductive rights” for women. Why was she there? Why does anyone care what she says? Because her daddy was President and anyone who says the United States doesn’t do royalty is living in deep denial. The first speaker was, of course, San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro, another pro-abortion, pro-gay “marriage” Catholic. The last to speak (though many networks cut him off) was Cardinal Archbishop Dolan of New York who gave the closing prayer, as he did at the Republican convention, calling for a greater respect for life. I admire the Cardinal for praying on such an issue in front of such a crowd but I have to scratch my head in confusion when so many Catholics promote what the Catholic Church says is wrong and that so many Catholics vote for these people. I live in a heavily Latino and heavily Catholic part of the country and it is so overwhelmingly Democrat that Republicans don’t even bother to run where I live and none of the social issues taken up by Democrats over the years have changed that. It really starts to look like the Catholic Church doesn’t care as much as it claims to or a whole bunch of Catholic politicians would be excommunicated -and don’t tell me the Church doesn’t do that because the Church excommunicated more than one southern politician for opposing de-segregation. Of course, if I’m missing something, feel free to let me know.

We did get to see all the old favorites. President Jimmy-the source of all problems with Iran-Carter, President Bill Clinton and finally President Barrack Obama who rightfully chided Republicans for giving no specifics and then proceeded to give none of his own. In fact, he gave fewer specifics than he did the last time which is probably because he failed to deliver on any of the promises he made back then regarding certain goals. He did learn one thing in office it seems. People don’t like it when you don’t keep your promises so -just stop making promises! Simple enough. He accused the GOP of having no new ideas, just the mantra of “lower taxes and cut regulations” while repeating the worn and weary liberal mantra of “higher taxes and more regulations”. Because that is what it all comes down to for the Dems; there is no problem that cannot be solved by throwing money at it and putting the government in charge of it. Romney hid from his record, Obama just lied about his. And to all of you people living in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Great Britain, Spain, The Netherlands, Belgium, Sweden, Norway, Denmark and so on…this is how Presidents are made folks. By collections of professional liars in huge conventions where party bosses work to thwart the will of their own delegates. And despite all the talk of “hope and change”, trust me, you can NEVER change it. Just ask Ralph Nader or Ron Paul. It is a disgusting, disheartening process and while I don’t doubt that between Obama and Romney one would certainly be the worse of the two, I still think the country will lose no matter who wins. I look at the two of them, their parties and all I can think is “you just don’t get it”. And they don’t, because the people don’t either. My oh my is politics depressing…