Well, folks, Christmas has come and gone. As is often the case with the season, I'm stunned by the generosity of friends and family. Most of the gifts I received were clearly the result of genuine thoughtfulness. I like to think that the gifts I give hold similar importance to their recipients, but one can never really know. Virtually without exception, mine was a fabulous holiday. I hope everyone can say the same.
Unfortunately, there are always those determined to undermine my sunny demeanor. The recurring conflict between "Merry Christmas" and "Happy Holidays" bothers me. There are actually people (presumably non-Christians) who take offense when another wishes them a merry Christmas because it excludes well-wishing for other concurrent holidays. Wait...what? I may not be a good one, but I'm Catholic, so it follows that I celebrate Christmas. A theoretical Jewish friend would not, of course, celebrate Christmas, but I would never, ever be offended if that friend wished me a happy Hanukkah.
The United States is increasingly secular and I see nothing on the horizon that would slow that process. Nowadays, the phrase "Merry Christmas" is mostly a more concise way of saying "I hope you have fun on this upcoming December 25th." How is that a bad thing? The people who get angry are probably the sort who would interpret my self-identification with Catholicism with an endorsement of the Crusades...and Manifest Destiny...and probably slavery. It requires such a huge leap to hear "Merry Christmas" as a bad thing that I'm very nearly speechless. Happily, my fingers still work.
I was touring through Oprah's message boards before Thanksgiving--I'm comfortable enough with myself to admit it--when I saw a lady's post about her vowing to never celebrate Christmas again. Care to guess why? Go ahead, take some time. I'll wait.
Ohhh, so close, but still wrong. It's because Christmas is a lie! She has no fewer than three sources (THREE!) the 'prove' Jesus wasn't born until September 11, 0001 CE. Thus, Christmas, the supposed celebration of Jesus Christ's birth, is wrongly placed on the calendar and should therefore not be observed.
There are plenty of literalists out there who see the Bible as an historical text rather than a religious tome. That's silly. Those people simply lack imagination and live their lives in fear of defending their own opinions. Christmas certainly started as a straight celebration of the birth of Christ, but the word Christmas has become synonymous with the ideas of family, friendship, kindness, generosity, peace, and love--the driving forces behind any religion. In some sense, Christmas has come to represent what all religions hope to achieve.
Does this particular holiday draw attention away from other concurrent holidays? Almost certainly. Does that really matter? I don't think so. 'Tis the season to be jolly, regardless of what you believe. Just remember, when all's said and done, others wishing you good things deserves appreciation, whatever your personal beliefs.
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
Saturday, December 20, 2008
WoW, we should've met sooner
I consider myself to be an intelligent guy. People tell me I'm a smart guy (most of them are not coerced). As part of that, I like to think that I'm also mature enough to admit when I'm wrong. It is, in fact, extraordinarily rare for me to actually be wrong, which is all the more reason to draw attention to it when it happens. This time, I am wrong about a video game.
Blizzard's World of Warcraft (hereafter: WoW) boasts more than 13 million subscribers...that's 13,000,000! WoW is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG). The genre makes a fair bit of sense if you don't think too hard about it.
ArenaNet's Guild Wars (hereafter: GW) has something more like 4 million subscribers. A mere shadow of the fanbase for WoW. GW has a compelling, story-driven narrative, better graphics, a more forgiving battle system, and is much less intimidating.
Both these games came out about the same time and I tried them both. Once the respective trial periods expired, GW was the one that I continued playing...for a bit more than three years now. My initial impressions of WoW boiled down to an utter disbelief that anyone could actually prefer WoW to GW. GW simply outclassed its cousin in all the ways that mattered to me, and since I'm always right...
I maintained that belief for better than three years and played the bejesus out of GW. It's gotten to the point where the bad guys don't even bother trying to kill my party and me any more, they simply commit the appropriate ritual suicide as I approach. I love GW, but life started to get in the way of my fun. Virtually all the competent players in the game are in my guild (there are precious few). The guild is growing up and has competing commitments. Unfortunately, most of what I have left to do requires some of my guildies. This has led to a general ennui toward the game that will take some time to dissipate.
One of my best friends has been a WoW-er for some time and likes to pester and pressure me into his gaming universe. At one point I promised him that when (and if) I start to grow weary of GW and have some money lying around, I will give WoW another try.
Those conditions were met about a week ago and I need to revise my initial assessment of WoW. It's a beautiful world that's fun to play in. There isn't the same degree of graphical precision I enjoyed in GW, but WoW's strongest asset is starting to pull me ever deeper into the experience: sheer size. The world of Warcraft is massive beyond reckoning.
I'm still not convinced that WoW deserves its amazing popularity or that competing games should quiver and die before the onslaught of WoW. Now I'm convinced, at the very least, that WoW is fun. I just have to learn how to go to bed before 4am while I'm playing.
Blizzard's World of Warcraft (hereafter: WoW) boasts more than 13 million subscribers...that's 13,000,000! WoW is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG). The genre makes a fair bit of sense if you don't think too hard about it.
ArenaNet's Guild Wars (hereafter: GW) has something more like 4 million subscribers. A mere shadow of the fanbase for WoW. GW has a compelling, story-driven narrative, better graphics, a more forgiving battle system, and is much less intimidating.
Both these games came out about the same time and I tried them both. Once the respective trial periods expired, GW was the one that I continued playing...for a bit more than three years now. My initial impressions of WoW boiled down to an utter disbelief that anyone could actually prefer WoW to GW. GW simply outclassed its cousin in all the ways that mattered to me, and since I'm always right...
I maintained that belief for better than three years and played the bejesus out of GW. It's gotten to the point where the bad guys don't even bother trying to kill my party and me any more, they simply commit the appropriate ritual suicide as I approach. I love GW, but life started to get in the way of my fun. Virtually all the competent players in the game are in my guild (there are precious few). The guild is growing up and has competing commitments. Unfortunately, most of what I have left to do requires some of my guildies. This has led to a general ennui toward the game that will take some time to dissipate.
One of my best friends has been a WoW-er for some time and likes to pester and pressure me into his gaming universe. At one point I promised him that when (and if) I start to grow weary of GW and have some money lying around, I will give WoW another try.
Those conditions were met about a week ago and I need to revise my initial assessment of WoW. It's a beautiful world that's fun to play in. There isn't the same degree of graphical precision I enjoyed in GW, but WoW's strongest asset is starting to pull me ever deeper into the experience: sheer size. The world of Warcraft is massive beyond reckoning.
I'm still not convinced that WoW deserves its amazing popularity or that competing games should quiver and die before the onslaught of WoW. Now I'm convinced, at the very least, that WoW is fun. I just have to learn how to go to bed before 4am while I'm playing.
Monday, December 8, 2008
I Can't Believe I'm Siding with a Bully
This has been stewing in the back of my head for quite some time now. Our policy-makers still seem to struggle coming to grips with this newfangled "Internet" thing and how to deal with all the meanies. The most recent scandal is the 13 year-old girl who killed herself "because" of cyber-bullying.
For those not keeping up, Lori Drew (49) created a MySpace account posing as a 16 year-old boy for the express purpose of crushing the feelings of Megan Meier (13). This is really the horrifying part to me: how does a 49 year-old mother stoop so low? Megan struggled with depression and apparently found solace through MySpace. Lori's persona flirted with Megan over some time; Megan thought the relationship to be fairly serious. At that point, Lori got what she wanted: an opportunity to cause maximum damage. Lori "turned on" (read: betrayed) Megan. Naturally, the younger girl was crushed, though I can only imagine that the subsequent suicide was a surprise to everyone.
The end result of all this is that there is a dead child and a broken family. The next logical step is a lawsuit. Even though the idea of a lawsuit like this offends me (it essentially attaches a discrete value to the life of a loved one) I can understand the drive to get some sense of retribution. After all, traditional vengeance is largely frowned upon. However, I'm not sure there's really a crime here.
Sure, there's an apparently-morally-base woman bent on destroying 13 year-olds and an unfortunately dead child, but where's the crime? Lori was recently found guilty of violating the MySpace license agreement which essentially states that users must accurately represent themselves on the website. Due to this heinous infraction, Lori faces the potential for three years in jail and a $300,000 fine. This is a dangerous precedent to make.
If this ruling passes, it means that something as minor as fudging one's age on a social site could warrant some time in the slammer. If this ruling passes, it makes the Internet a treacherous place to be. If this ruling passes, it will shine in my mind as a victory of lawyers over justice, and stand anathema to what I believe is right.
Does Lori deserve punishment? Probably, but more for being a horrible person than any actual wrongdoing. Bullying is bullying. It has always existed and will always exist. So long as any differences, real or imagined, exist among individuals of a population, there will be bullies to point out those differences as loci of ridicule. It is a rite of passage that most must simply endure and learn from as they move into adulthood. What the thrust of cases like this seem to be is to outlaw bullying in the presumably-safe, imaginary world of the Internet. I submit that the virtual world is very much like the real one. People lie, cheat, and steal when it best serves their needs. When the anonymity of the Internet is factored in, I'm honestly shocked that there is so much truth out there.
As with so many of today's problems, I see this as a failure on the parent's part. I have no doubt that Ms. Meier was a loving, doting mother who wanted nothing but the best for her child, but someone dropped the ball in this. It may have been that Megan was too embarrassed to tell her mother of a burgeoning online romance. Perhaps Ms. Meier placed undue confidence in her daughter's ability to judge online interactions. Maybe Megan was just too sneaky.
The biggest lesson in this is that parents have a responsibility to understand whatever it is that interests their children. If a kid is drawn to rap music with explicit lyrics, ask why. Is it really the message, or just the rhythm? If they like some awful cartoon, watch it, with or without them, and determine why it draws them in so. I don't encourage spying, but parents have exactly one job on the planet for the first 18 years of their child's life: get them to that 18th year; everything else is relegated to the back burner.
Lori Drew should be ashamed at what she's done. Not for the bullying or subsequent suicide per se, but because, as a direct result of her actions, Lori made it impossible for Ms. Meier to complete her job.
Ms. Meier should be (and probably is) ashamed that Megan didn't see her mother as a safety net. When someone that young turns to suicide, I can't help but eye the family. In particular, when a girl that young and her mother are that distant, something is amiss.
While I wouldn't endorse it, I would understand a monetary penalty against Lori. Her infractions do not warrant jail time, but her character flaws should be listed for all to see. If she gets her monetary reward, Ms. Meier should put it in trust, clear her debt, donate to Megan's favorite cause, something other than deposit in into her checking account. One should never profit from their child's death.
Everything on the Internet, even well-meaning blog posts, should be taken with a fist-sized grain of salt. Never assume truth in a place where anonymity is the rule, not the exception. Kids in particular need to understand this, but parents have to know that it's their job to teach the lesson before something terrible comes from that juvenile ignorance.
The moral of this story: keep your kids close, love them dearly, and know what makes them tick.
Now go call someone you love.
For those not keeping up, Lori Drew (49) created a MySpace account posing as a 16 year-old boy for the express purpose of crushing the feelings of Megan Meier (13). This is really the horrifying part to me: how does a 49 year-old mother stoop so low? Megan struggled with depression and apparently found solace through MySpace. Lori's persona flirted with Megan over some time; Megan thought the relationship to be fairly serious. At that point, Lori got what she wanted: an opportunity to cause maximum damage. Lori "turned on" (read: betrayed) Megan. Naturally, the younger girl was crushed, though I can only imagine that the subsequent suicide was a surprise to everyone.
The end result of all this is that there is a dead child and a broken family. The next logical step is a lawsuit. Even though the idea of a lawsuit like this offends me (it essentially attaches a discrete value to the life of a loved one) I can understand the drive to get some sense of retribution. After all, traditional vengeance is largely frowned upon. However, I'm not sure there's really a crime here.
Sure, there's an apparently-morally-base woman bent on destroying 13 year-olds and an unfortunately dead child, but where's the crime? Lori was recently found guilty of violating the MySpace license agreement which essentially states that users must accurately represent themselves on the website. Due to this heinous infraction, Lori faces the potential for three years in jail and a $300,000 fine. This is a dangerous precedent to make.
If this ruling passes, it means that something as minor as fudging one's age on a social site could warrant some time in the slammer. If this ruling passes, it makes the Internet a treacherous place to be. If this ruling passes, it will shine in my mind as a victory of lawyers over justice, and stand anathema to what I believe is right.
Does Lori deserve punishment? Probably, but more for being a horrible person than any actual wrongdoing. Bullying is bullying. It has always existed and will always exist. So long as any differences, real or imagined, exist among individuals of a population, there will be bullies to point out those differences as loci of ridicule. It is a rite of passage that most must simply endure and learn from as they move into adulthood. What the thrust of cases like this seem to be is to outlaw bullying in the presumably-safe, imaginary world of the Internet. I submit that the virtual world is very much like the real one. People lie, cheat, and steal when it best serves their needs. When the anonymity of the Internet is factored in, I'm honestly shocked that there is so much truth out there.
As with so many of today's problems, I see this as a failure on the parent's part. I have no doubt that Ms. Meier was a loving, doting mother who wanted nothing but the best for her child, but someone dropped the ball in this. It may have been that Megan was too embarrassed to tell her mother of a burgeoning online romance. Perhaps Ms. Meier placed undue confidence in her daughter's ability to judge online interactions. Maybe Megan was just too sneaky.
The biggest lesson in this is that parents have a responsibility to understand whatever it is that interests their children. If a kid is drawn to rap music with explicit lyrics, ask why. Is it really the message, or just the rhythm? If they like some awful cartoon, watch it, with or without them, and determine why it draws them in so. I don't encourage spying, but parents have exactly one job on the planet for the first 18 years of their child's life: get them to that 18th year; everything else is relegated to the back burner.
Lori Drew should be ashamed at what she's done. Not for the bullying or subsequent suicide per se, but because, as a direct result of her actions, Lori made it impossible for Ms. Meier to complete her job.
Ms. Meier should be (and probably is) ashamed that Megan didn't see her mother as a safety net. When someone that young turns to suicide, I can't help but eye the family. In particular, when a girl that young and her mother are that distant, something is amiss.
While I wouldn't endorse it, I would understand a monetary penalty against Lori. Her infractions do not warrant jail time, but her character flaws should be listed for all to see. If she gets her monetary reward, Ms. Meier should put it in trust, clear her debt, donate to Megan's favorite cause, something other than deposit in into her checking account. One should never profit from their child's death.
Everything on the Internet, even well-meaning blog posts, should be taken with a fist-sized grain of salt. Never assume truth in a place where anonymity is the rule, not the exception. Kids in particular need to understand this, but parents have to know that it's their job to teach the lesson before something terrible comes from that juvenile ignorance.
The moral of this story: keep your kids close, love them dearly, and know what makes them tick.
Now go call someone you love.
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Remember, remember: The 4th of November
I've been thinking about this for a while now. Here we are, a little more than a week after the election and I'm not sure what I want to discuss.
Sure, I could drone for entire paragraphs about any number of topics. Not the least of which being the sheer importance of this election. Putting my politics aside for the moment, we were all involved in a vital change in leadership last Tuesday and that's worth keeping in mind as we progress toward the new year.
Part of me would love to talk about McCain's and Obama's awesomely respectful concession and acceptance speeches.
I'm sure I could amuse some with a commentary on Palin's sorta-kinda-almost-but-not-really bid for future high office. For now, anyway, she's too much of a punchline to have a prayer.
Goodness knows I would love to try and refocus attention to the potential hornet's nest we've elected into our highest office. When the Taliban leadership (such as it is) makes specific demands that the United States do almost exactly what Obama's campaign platform promised, it leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth and more than a little concerned for our future. Then there's all the likely hiccups that come with enormous spending plans with a foundering economy.
The selfish part of me wants very much to mention my nigh-uncontrollable excitement knowing that my recently-deceased Xbox 360 should arrive at my doorstep sometime between the convenient hours of 8am and 7pm tomorrow.
I also need a job.
More than all of that (though by the slimmest of margins in the latter three cases) I want to impart my surpassing relief that the campaigns are over. No more speculation. No more annoying damn commercials. No more stump speeches. No more "debates." No more pollsters sitting on my doorbell. No more awkward phone calls from the friendly, neighborhood campaign office. And, at long last, the tacit acknowledgement that there is something else happening on the planet.
I hate campaigns more than I hate movie-talkers. More than politicians in general. More than Christmas commercials before Thanksgiving. More than chick-flicks. I am thrilled that the process is over for three years or so.
That said, I am even happier that so many went to the polls. We are a democratic republic, but fancy ourselves the be-all and end-all of democratic knowledge. We love controlling our own destinies (to a point) and often encourage others to follow suit. But we try to ignore the nagging incongruity that it is a good year when some 35% of the population finds six minutes of their day to elect the next leader of the free world. That's atrocious. Millions more came out and voiced their opinion. For better or worse, most voted for change. The vital part to remember is that they voted and it mattered.
If an annoying 20-month campaign is what is takes to get our people off their asses and fulfill their duty, then so be it. More than anything else right now, I am pleased to know we are waking from our comfort-induced stupor to see how much trouble we are in and how strong we are when united.
For too long we've been flirting with the prospect of "United States" becoming oxymoronic. The threat still looms, but it remains firmly in the realm of "possible" instead of "inevitable." Remember this feeling, ladies and gentlemen. Someone once said, "All it takes for evil to flourish is for good men (and women) to do nothing." Always fight for what is right, for we are the good.
Sure, I could drone for entire paragraphs about any number of topics. Not the least of which being the sheer importance of this election. Putting my politics aside for the moment, we were all involved in a vital change in leadership last Tuesday and that's worth keeping in mind as we progress toward the new year.
Part of me would love to talk about McCain's and Obama's awesomely respectful concession and acceptance speeches.
I'm sure I could amuse some with a commentary on Palin's sorta-kinda-almost-but-not-really bid for future high office. For now, anyway, she's too much of a punchline to have a prayer.
Goodness knows I would love to try and refocus attention to the potential hornet's nest we've elected into our highest office. When the Taliban leadership (such as it is) makes specific demands that the United States do almost exactly what Obama's campaign platform promised, it leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth and more than a little concerned for our future. Then there's all the likely hiccups that come with enormous spending plans with a foundering economy.
The selfish part of me wants very much to mention my nigh-uncontrollable excitement knowing that my recently-deceased Xbox 360 should arrive at my doorstep sometime between the convenient hours of 8am and 7pm tomorrow.
I also need a job.
More than all of that (though by the slimmest of margins in the latter three cases) I want to impart my surpassing relief that the campaigns are over. No more speculation. No more annoying damn commercials. No more stump speeches. No more "debates." No more pollsters sitting on my doorbell. No more awkward phone calls from the friendly, neighborhood campaign office. And, at long last, the tacit acknowledgement that there is something else happening on the planet.
I hate campaigns more than I hate movie-talkers. More than politicians in general. More than Christmas commercials before Thanksgiving. More than chick-flicks. I am thrilled that the process is over for three years or so.
That said, I am even happier that so many went to the polls. We are a democratic republic, but fancy ourselves the be-all and end-all of democratic knowledge. We love controlling our own destinies (to a point) and often encourage others to follow suit. But we try to ignore the nagging incongruity that it is a good year when some 35% of the population finds six minutes of their day to elect the next leader of the free world. That's atrocious. Millions more came out and voiced their opinion. For better or worse, most voted for change. The vital part to remember is that they voted and it mattered.
If an annoying 20-month campaign is what is takes to get our people off their asses and fulfill their duty, then so be it. More than anything else right now, I am pleased to know we are waking from our comfort-induced stupor to see how much trouble we are in and how strong we are when united.
For too long we've been flirting with the prospect of "United States" becoming oxymoronic. The threat still looms, but it remains firmly in the realm of "possible" instead of "inevitable." Remember this feeling, ladies and gentlemen. Someone once said, "All it takes for evil to flourish is for good men (and women) to do nothing." Always fight for what is right, for we are the good.
Saturday, October 18, 2008
I'm Chris Gilstrap, and I approve this message.
I alluded to offensive ads in my last post. They still bother me. I've gotten pretty quick with the mute button whenever I see them come on--a practice that briefly solidifies my sanity. As with most things, it's not really the words that bother me, it's the principle. I'm even (mostly) okay with attack ads as attack ads, but such tactics should never be used as campaign propaganda.
Elections should be a battle of ideals and plans. As a nation, we're in some trouble. So, who has the best ideas to help up get out of the rut we've been digging for a decade? Each candidate has an answer that distills the solutions for intensely complicated problems into ten-second sound bites. Barring some fabulous exception I've not seen, that sound bite, by definition, is a half-truth. I only like full truths.
Everyone has flaws. Everyone. I don't mind my politicians having flaws. I don't really care what company they kept 20 years ago. I don't care if they inhaled. I don't care about their kids. I don't care about their marriages. In my mind, a person if free to do pretty much whatever the hell strikes their fancy without having to worry about offering a formal apology and dodging the judgments of talking heads or the Schmo family. However, the single trait I demand from public officials, even though I so rarely get it, is honesty. Thus, sound bites and campaign ads offend me.
Obama's health care ad that pawns the death of his mother for some public sympathy (which can then be pawned off for support) angers me in a way more often reserved for movie talkers and infants in nice restaurants. His mother died of cancer. That's sad, but so what? She worried about medical bills. So does everyone else in the hospital for any length of time; why does this matter? I understand the intent here, but it falls on callous, disinterested ears. He's handsome though, so he can get away with it.
Even if I believed universal health care was a good idea right now, that ad would really stretch my dedication. It's not quite dishonest, but one should never use personal tragedy to drum up support for an idea. Good ideas, really good ideas, can stand up all by themselves.
McCain has also earned my ire, but it's less focused than my feelings toward Obama. Both candidates have fallen into the trap of negative campaign ads. This mud-slinging is an affront to everything the elections are supposed to mean. First and foremost, these elections should be aimed at choosing the best-qualified person for the job. Instead, these ads force us to choose the least-offensive candidate. The thrust of most of the commercials I've seen is "The other guy is worse than I am" rather than "I am the best choice" as it should be, and it bothers me to no end.
My last entry was a plea to voters. This one is a plea to candidates. Stop being so damn lazy with your campaigning. Don't bother explaining why I shouldn't vote for someone. Prove to me that you deserve my vote. What I want is more a shift in emphasis than a change in content, but it is important nonetheless. We tout ourselves as the greatest nation on the planet and take pride in our democratic processes, but that is no reason to stop striving for better.
Elections should be a battle of ideals and plans. As a nation, we're in some trouble. So, who has the best ideas to help up get out of the rut we've been digging for a decade? Each candidate has an answer that distills the solutions for intensely complicated problems into ten-second sound bites. Barring some fabulous exception I've not seen, that sound bite, by definition, is a half-truth. I only like full truths.
Everyone has flaws. Everyone. I don't mind my politicians having flaws. I don't really care what company they kept 20 years ago. I don't care if they inhaled. I don't care about their kids. I don't care about their marriages. In my mind, a person if free to do pretty much whatever the hell strikes their fancy without having to worry about offering a formal apology and dodging the judgments of talking heads or the Schmo family. However, the single trait I demand from public officials, even though I so rarely get it, is honesty. Thus, sound bites and campaign ads offend me.
Obama's health care ad that pawns the death of his mother for some public sympathy (which can then be pawned off for support) angers me in a way more often reserved for movie talkers and infants in nice restaurants. His mother died of cancer. That's sad, but so what? She worried about medical bills. So does everyone else in the hospital for any length of time; why does this matter? I understand the intent here, but it falls on callous, disinterested ears. He's handsome though, so he can get away with it.
Even if I believed universal health care was a good idea right now, that ad would really stretch my dedication. It's not quite dishonest, but one should never use personal tragedy to drum up support for an idea. Good ideas, really good ideas, can stand up all by themselves.
McCain has also earned my ire, but it's less focused than my feelings toward Obama. Both candidates have fallen into the trap of negative campaign ads. This mud-slinging is an affront to everything the elections are supposed to mean. First and foremost, these elections should be aimed at choosing the best-qualified person for the job. Instead, these ads force us to choose the least-offensive candidate. The thrust of most of the commercials I've seen is "The other guy is worse than I am" rather than "I am the best choice" as it should be, and it bothers me to no end.
My last entry was a plea to voters. This one is a plea to candidates. Stop being so damn lazy with your campaigning. Don't bother explaining why I shouldn't vote for someone. Prove to me that you deserve my vote. What I want is more a shift in emphasis than a change in content, but it is important nonetheless. We tout ourselves as the greatest nation on the planet and take pride in our democratic processes, but that is no reason to stop striving for better.
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Let's avoid hanging chads this time, hmm?
I enjoy a fairly sheltered position from all the economic turmoil of late. I am young; I still live with my parents, and I am unemployed. I'm sort of an instinctive miser, so I've got a comfortable bit of cash set aside that can support my needs for a while. All things considered, I've got it pretty nice right now, but I'm still worried.
There's so much emphasis on the economy recently that it's frighteningly easy to forget that election on the horizon. Choosing between Obama and McCain is a bit of intellectual masturbation--a pursuit of self-satisfaction, but this time built upon the campaign-trail platitudes that pollute the whole process. Obama is so far to the left that, if he gets his way, we'll edge perilously close to a socialist state. McCain is far enough from the right that his victory wouldn't quite be a loss for the democrats. So what are we debating? Party lines.
The race card will inevitably be a topic for the pundits, but I don't think it'll be much of a legitimate issue. This is going to be just like every other election. Some 35%-40% of the population will deign to cast a vote (maybe more if the youth vote can finally be mobilized), maybe 40% of those will be educated enough to make a reliable decision, the rest will vote for an elephant or a donkey simply because they are an elephant or a donkey, and we'll magically get a new Commander-in-Chief.
On principle, I’m concerned that we are still largely bound to party lines. Ideas on the scale of a presidential election are so huge and nuanced that they deserve deeper consideration than we often give. Obama has lots of support because he gives a hell of a speech, is a handsome man, and advocates policies that appeal to the helper in all of us. But where's the substance? He's got multi-step plans to solve all the world's ills. Let me know the first two steps, just so I can have some assurance that there's at least an idea behind the rhetoric. The big mover though, is universal health care (I'll try and skip over the damned-near-offensive ads Obama has running that uses his mother's death as if it's a poker chip for another post). Everyone deserves to be healthy. Everyone deserves equal access to qualified doctors. Everyone should pitch in to help the have-nots with their problems, be they structural or self-inflicted. On some level, that all makes sense. I agree with the sentiment. I personally believe that we all have a moral obligation to extend whatever aid we can to those who cannot sustain themselves (I'll also leave the topic of the billions of dollars donated overseas when millions of our own citizens wallow in nothingness stateside for another post), but that's just the point: it's a moral obligation.
It is not, nor should it ever be, the State's responsibility to declare my morals. The obligation of supporting those less fortunate falls on individuals, communities, places of worship, and maybe states—Notably not the federal government. Most pertinent now is the minor issue of funding such a plan. We are at war. Social Security is dying. The economy is limping along. And we've committed ourselves to almost a trillion dollar expenditure (that's $1,000,000,000,000) to bail out this mortgaging debacle. Where, pray tell, will the money for universal health care come from? Raising taxes is the obvious answer; it also happens to send us right down the road toward socialism.
As a country, we like to live just within our means. Raising taxes means less spending money, which means some people will be less able to cover their living expenses, which means more banking problems, which means more people defaulting to the new universal health care system, which means fewer people actually funding the thing, which means an even deeper economic crisis.
Good times, eh?
There are bigger fish to fry than the warm-and-fuzzy sound bites Obama has built his campaign upon and McCain seems to realize this. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a particular McCain supporter, but he does seem to have a deeper grasp on just what this war means and how important it is. If Obama is a wide-eyed, optimistic puppy dog, then McCain is a grizzly bear: tough to look at and terrifying, but still deserving respect. Everyone would rather have a puppy in their homes, but right now we need a more intimidating figurehead.
Obama has so saturated the airwaves with memorable ads and delivers such great speeches that McCain almost gets lost in the fold. For what it's worth, I'd rather have McCain in office for the next four years than Obama, but not necessarily because of politics, but because of what I see as their priorities.
We are living in difficult times right now. The market will most likely recover in time. The wars will end in time. But what we need is time. More to the point, we don't need change. The status quo we grew used to may be untenable now, but that is not call to change the parameters. We need to focus on getting back to center, even if it's on a lower rung than before, before we start making too many adjustments.
Innumerable people have been on TV pleading the public to go and vote. The subtext being to vote for "Change," but I want us all to vote for the people in whom we place the greatest confidence to do what is needed right now, even if doing so means sacrificing what could or even should be. We all need to vote for the right people, for the right reasons, not for a mascot.
There's so much emphasis on the economy recently that it's frighteningly easy to forget that election on the horizon. Choosing between Obama and McCain is a bit of intellectual masturbation--a pursuit of self-satisfaction, but this time built upon the campaign-trail platitudes that pollute the whole process. Obama is so far to the left that, if he gets his way, we'll edge perilously close to a socialist state. McCain is far enough from the right that his victory wouldn't quite be a loss for the democrats. So what are we debating? Party lines.
The race card will inevitably be a topic for the pundits, but I don't think it'll be much of a legitimate issue. This is going to be just like every other election. Some 35%-40% of the population will deign to cast a vote (maybe more if the youth vote can finally be mobilized), maybe 40% of those will be educated enough to make a reliable decision, the rest will vote for an elephant or a donkey simply because they are an elephant or a donkey, and we'll magically get a new Commander-in-Chief.
On principle, I’m concerned that we are still largely bound to party lines. Ideas on the scale of a presidential election are so huge and nuanced that they deserve deeper consideration than we often give. Obama has lots of support because he gives a hell of a speech, is a handsome man, and advocates policies that appeal to the helper in all of us. But where's the substance? He's got multi-step plans to solve all the world's ills. Let me know the first two steps, just so I can have some assurance that there's at least an idea behind the rhetoric. The big mover though, is universal health care (I'll try and skip over the damned-near-offensive ads Obama has running that uses his mother's death as if it's a poker chip for another post). Everyone deserves to be healthy. Everyone deserves equal access to qualified doctors. Everyone should pitch in to help the have-nots with their problems, be they structural or self-inflicted. On some level, that all makes sense. I agree with the sentiment. I personally believe that we all have a moral obligation to extend whatever aid we can to those who cannot sustain themselves (I'll also leave the topic of the billions of dollars donated overseas when millions of our own citizens wallow in nothingness stateside for another post), but that's just the point: it's a moral obligation.
It is not, nor should it ever be, the State's responsibility to declare my morals. The obligation of supporting those less fortunate falls on individuals, communities, places of worship, and maybe states—Notably not the federal government. Most pertinent now is the minor issue of funding such a plan. We are at war. Social Security is dying. The economy is limping along. And we've committed ourselves to almost a trillion dollar expenditure (that's $1,000,000,000,000) to bail out this mortgaging debacle. Where, pray tell, will the money for universal health care come from? Raising taxes is the obvious answer; it also happens to send us right down the road toward socialism.
As a country, we like to live just within our means. Raising taxes means less spending money, which means some people will be less able to cover their living expenses, which means more banking problems, which means more people defaulting to the new universal health care system, which means fewer people actually funding the thing, which means an even deeper economic crisis.
Good times, eh?
There are bigger fish to fry than the warm-and-fuzzy sound bites Obama has built his campaign upon and McCain seems to realize this. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a particular McCain supporter, but he does seem to have a deeper grasp on just what this war means and how important it is. If Obama is a wide-eyed, optimistic puppy dog, then McCain is a grizzly bear: tough to look at and terrifying, but still deserving respect. Everyone would rather have a puppy in their homes, but right now we need a more intimidating figurehead.
Obama has so saturated the airwaves with memorable ads and delivers such great speeches that McCain almost gets lost in the fold. For what it's worth, I'd rather have McCain in office for the next four years than Obama, but not necessarily because of politics, but because of what I see as their priorities.
We are living in difficult times right now. The market will most likely recover in time. The wars will end in time. But what we need is time. More to the point, we don't need change. The status quo we grew used to may be untenable now, but that is not call to change the parameters. We need to focus on getting back to center, even if it's on a lower rung than before, before we start making too many adjustments.
Innumerable people have been on TV pleading the public to go and vote. The subtext being to vote for "Change," but I want us all to vote for the people in whom we place the greatest confidence to do what is needed right now, even if doing so means sacrificing what could or even should be. We all need to vote for the right people, for the right reasons, not for a mascot.
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