Paddy Ryan: A Personal Indictment of the Democrats and our Screwed up Political and Media Systems

A BUZZFLASH READER CONTRIBUTION
by Paddy Ryan

I think George Bush and Dick Cheney must have videotape of every Democratic Senator and Congressman (or woman) having sex with animals. I cannot think of anything else that would explain their total cowardice in the face of the slightest threat from the White House.

Do you remember the Republicans threatening to use the "nuclear option" to stop the filibuster in the Senate or the Democrats not filibustering the appointment of Roberts as the Supreme Court Chief Justice because they wanted to save that option for when it was really important? What about the Democrats approving the appointment of Mukasey as the new Attorney General even though he wouldn't give them an opinion about the legality of waterboarding?

Democrats couldn't bring themselves to filibuster the Military Commissions Act, a piece of slime legislation that forever diminished our standing in the world and did away with habeas corpus.

And now Harry Reid is falling over himself to give the telecom companies immunity for spying on us. Why? Supposedly because the telecoms did their patriotic duty, but probably because they are big political donors.

The war on terror (sic) and the threat posed by Al Qaeda or any other number of terrorist groups is trivial compared to our response (but this isn't meant to trivialize the tragic deaths of anyone killed by terrorist acts). Nothing at all justifies the removal of our civil liberties or the war crimes of Fallejuah. The terror plots heralded in our media are so puerile and pathetic that a bunch of fourth graders could do more damage. Are these the results of an enemy to be feared to the extent that it provides political cover for everything this administration and its enabling Democrats do? Every year, over 30,000 people die from gun deaths. Where is the war on illegal gun sales and gun shows (where many perpetrators of gun violence obtain their weapons)? Since 1975, more Americans have died from being struck by lightning than terrorist attacks. Where's the war on lightning?

So pathetic is our logic about all this that a tiny Swiss Army knife will be confiscated by Airport Security but flight attendants can still serve wine out of glass bottles. Which would you rather have as a weapon, a one inch knife blade or a broken bottle? (And exactly how are you going to knock down that Kevlar reinforced cockpit door while pursued by angry passengers?)

Now we have Nancy Pelosi still refusing to start impeachment proceedings against Bush and Cheney. What do they have to do for their behavior to be considered egregious? Lucky Bill Clinton got a blowjob and lied about it. Bush lied about everything and several hundred thousand Iraqis and nearly 4,000 American service people are dead. And while this was going on, Bush and Co trashed our environment (logging Tongass, proposed drilling in ANWR) and relaxed business laws to the extent that we have had Enron, WorldCom, and now the mortgage crisis while our jobs are sent overseas. Oh, and you have to add unprecedented media consolidation into the mix too.

Just listen to the Republican Presidential candidates (with the exception of Ron Paul) fall over themselves to try and justify the Iraq war. What drugs are they taking? How does the MSM let them get away with it? Has everyone in the MSM lost the power of critical thinking or are they all (apart from Keith Olbermann) bought lackeys?

Now we have the Straits of Hormuz boondoggle. According to Bush, the Iranians carried out an act of aggression against us. Let me see, three huge well-armed warships, each with more firepower than every surface ship in the Iranian navy added together, sailed within 17 miles of the Iranian coast. We've invaded two of Iran's neighbors and have military bases in several others. Who is carrying out the aggression here? Have you forgotten that the USS Vincennes shot down an Iranian airbus in Iranian airspace in 1988 killing all 290 passengers on board? I bet the Iranians haven't.

Recently, the Democrats capitulated on an Energy Bill. Republicans refused to back down on their demands for subsidies for big oil. The Democrats wanted to use the money to help develop green technologies. But of course the Democrats capitulated, Big Oil got their money, and the renewables will languish until the individual states pass their own legislation. The oil companies made the biggest profits in corporate history but the Republicans apparently felt they weren't earning enough. So the Democrats, true to their recent cowardice, ran up the white flag. Why? President Bush would have vetoed it anyway. This is a reason not to stand on principle?

Because the American motor companies cannot think beyond the internal combustion engine, ethanol became a cornerstone of the bill and was heralded by many groups, including those on the left, as a victory. Some victory. Currently solar cells can convert around 15% to 20% of incoming sunlight into electricity. The average green plant converts around 2% of the incoming energy into the energy in plant biomass. We then extract a small percentage of this in the form of ethanol, after fermenting the carbohydrates in the plant. The net energy return from the original sunlight is probably on the order of 0.4% (I leave this to those better versed in the subject to arrive at the correct figure). Ethanol from corn requires vast amounts of water, some of which comes from the Ogallala aquifer, which is rapidly diminishing as we continue to take more water out than is replaced. It also requires major fertilizer input, which pollutes our waterways, contributes to an enormous dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico, and requires substantial fossil fuel input. Oh yeah, and the greenhouse gas contribution from fertilizer application is huge. So which makes more sense, huge economic stimulus in the form of new electric car technology and solar energy or unbelievably inefficient corn ethanol? Oh, let's go for corn ethanol ... got to keep those Iowa farmers happy, don't we?

The U.S. has an amazing intellectual and scientific infrastructure but we are sorely let down by our politicians. The time has come for a major overhaul of the U.S. political system. The Republicans appall me. They are so crooked they could eat nails and shit corkscrews. I don't think the Democrats are crooked; it's just that many of them seem to have no moral or political courage. This is the best we can do? Wellstone, Kennedy, and Martin Luther King would be turning in their graves. My Senator, Ken Salazar, appears to be a Republican in disguise, along with the likes of Dianne Feinstein and Mary Landrieu. We should work to get rid of these people and replace them with progressives.

Already 44% of Americans prefer John McCain to Hillary Clinton's 42% and Barack Obama can only tie. Perhaps if their colleagues in Washington had been prepared to stand up for the average American, these figures wouldn't look so dire. It looks as if the American public will drink the Kool Aid one more time, unless things change radically before the next election. What is it about the American poor and middle class that they enjoy being screwed so much? Are we really a nation of masochists governed by sadists? So let's all bend over and let the Republicans do it to us one more time.

I think the American dream is over. It was hijacked by corporate and political greed a long time ago. We have the government we deserve. Is it too late? Please reassure me there is still hope... Hillary, Barack ... just nick back to Washington and oppose immunity for the telecoms, will you? That would be a start.

A BUZZFLASH READER CONTRIBUTION

Paddy Ryan
Colorado