Saturday, 21 February 2009

Robin' Hood

I woke up this morning with a picture in my head of Barak Obama's face Photoshop-ed onto a striking pose of Errol Flynn dressed in suitable camo for Sherwood Forest... green cape, brown shirt and cap. Take 1:55 to see America through the eyes of Barak Obama.



Watching the trailer I had to hold back my laughter. It's not really that funny, though. The strange thing is that along with this image in my sleep was the soundtrack of the famous Rap group Public Enemy's recording, It Takes A Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back. Prophets Of Rage, Black Steel In The Hour Of Chaos and Rebel With Out A Pause served as the soundtrack for the meeting of the future President and Michelle Robinson in 1989. Just to let you in to a piece of the past... you need to listen to this music. You need to know the kind of fuel that feeds this fire.

Interspersed in between the tracks are recordings of Louis Farrakhan (born Louis Eugene Walcott) and Malcolm X (born Malcolm Little). Go check it out for yourself.

See you Tuesday November 2nd, 2010

-e.

Thursday, 12 February 2009

4M Jobs Saved

The phrase, "create or save 4 million jobs" or more recently, "create or preserve 3.5 million jobs" is driving me to drink. So many Talk Show heavyweights have missed the point. Rush Limbaugh asks repeatedly and correctly, "How do you calculate how many jobs have been saved?" WMAL's Chris Plante asks similarly. You know the list of others...

Let me set the record straight. Those 4 million jobs saved can only be the LAST 4 million jobs in America.

See you Tuesday November 2nd, 2010

-e.

Tuesday, 3 February 2009

Evolution to Pro-Life

My Pro-Life evolution continues.

Yesterday we received a mailer from Ken Cuccinelli who is running for Attorney General in the Commonwealth of Virginia. From an edited version of an email I sent to Mr. Cuccinelli...

100% Pro-Life?
You proudly proclaim to be "100% Pro-Life" on one page of your recent mailer and yet on another you highlight on the facing page your record as a "Strong defender of Virginia's death penalty". Then later headlined with the title "Defend Human Life" you underline, "Human life is our most basic right, and it deserves protection from conception until natural death". My question is this... How do you hold these plainly contradictory beliefs? To explain... there's nothing natural about a life ending by Execution. Frankly, if someone has committed a crime so terrible the State would consider ending that persons life, is it worth the Millions of dollars from taxpayer contributions to put that person to death?
Even if we were to do so, what have we gained? With such a great cost, what opportunities have we lost?


Position Politics

While Ken Cuccinelli is pointed out in this instance, it's his mailer which illuminates a problem with Position Politics. Republicans and Democrats take up sides and over the course of debate have switched and traded sides as time has passed. One paints the other unfavorably with some brush and the electorate has to choose the lesser of the evils they are presented. A Pro-Life stance and a Pro-Death Penalty position are incompatible with each other if we're honest with ourselves. The Pro-Abortion and Anti-Death Penalty views held together are also incompatible, intellectually.

Intellectual Dishonesty
You have to hold simultaneously that the essence of innocence, life as it is beginning, is somehow less precious than a life which the State might seek to end because of egregious acts committed against others... that's if you are a party line Democrat. On the other hand, saving the innocent and executing the viciously guilty is not a Pro-Life stance. It is a Pro-Punishment position.

Name Calling
Pro-Choice is anything but... Pro-Life is not necessarily.. Pro-Abortion isn't used much and isn't claimed by those who believe in it. But that goes just as well for Pro-Death.

Summary
"100% Pro-Life" means all mankind, to me. I agree wholeheartedly with Candidate Cuccinelli when he stresses, "Human life is our most basic right, and it deserves protection from conception until natural death." He just doesn't seem to agree with himself.

Life without the possibility of Parole satisfies a Pro-Life stance as it assumes God knows better than Man and leaves the ultimate fate of the criminal up to Him.


see you on Tuesday November 2nd, 2010.

e.