Same ol' same ol'

In home of former girlfriend
man attacks rival with pipe, flees
by swimming across lake but sinks.

Yes, I wasted another couple of hours watching the Democratic "debate." It was pretty much the same as all the others. The first few minutes were almost exciting as it took a while for Wolf Blitzer to get it under control (I didn't think he did a very good job of moderating although he was better as it went on). It never seems to me that I see the same thing others do. I don't think it is simple enough to say that so-and-so won, or so-and-so lost. Actually, I thought Biden did well. I thought Kucinich, when given an opportunity, did well (as usual). Richardson did well at times. Obama did well at times. Hillary did well most of the time as usual. It was interesting that both Edwards and Obama drew some boos when they seemed to get too rough with Hillary (she's predicted to win Nevada easily). The much advertised notion that Obama would go on the attack and/or Hillary would attack didn't seem to amount to much. Edwards was much more the attack dog than Obama but I think all he accomplished was maybe to help Obama. The commentators all seemed to think Hillary redeemed herself after her stumbling on the last debate. I didn't think she really stumbled badly in that debate (but of course the media has to make mountains out of molehills). In any case Obama stumbled worse tonight than she did on the subject of drivers licenses for illegal immigrants. But I thought he might have earned some points on his plan to raise the cap on Social Security. As usual some of the questions were pretty impossible. How, for example, could anyone answer a simple yes or no when asked if human rights were more important than national security? That seems to me the kind of question that could be debated for a very long time, taking into account all the particular circumstances, the urgency, the nature of the threat, etc., etc. All in all, I think Hillary began the debate as the front runner and ended the debate as the front runner. But along the way each of the candidates made a few points (but not enough to unseat Hillary). I must confess to being surprised that Edwards is not getting ahead more for his insistence that the system is rigged in favor of corporations, which it clearly is. I think Hillary may have somewhat taken this issue away when she said from the beginning that much of the special money she takes comes from nurses, firemen, policemen, and so on. With the exceptions of Edwards and Kucinich I get the impression the others, while they want to attack, want to do it gently (are they all angling for Vice-President?). My son observed that Kucinich seemed to be angry or out-of-sorts tonight. If I were Kucinich I'd be angry and out-of-sorts all the time because of the way he's being treated. There is supposed to be another Republican "debate" coming up soon. Is there no end to this basically useless procedure?

I confess that the one thing that enrages me the most when I hear it is that we need more troops and more money for defense. Thompson has called for a million man military and Richardson said tonight he wanted more troops. I cannot understand this. Are they not satisfied that we already spend more than virtually all the rest of the world on defense? And are they unaware that most of that money has much more to do with enriching corporations than it does with defense? Like, we really need more tanks and howitzers and nuclear bombs? We need to bring what is left of our military home from Iraq, rebuild and repair it, and give up the insane idea that we should somehow unilaterally rule the world. And please, no more cannon fodder. When you lower the qualifications for the services to accomodate felons and those of lesser abilities, and when you spend money to outfit them and send them into combat while at the same time refusing to spend money to repair and help them when they return, it is obvious they are seen simply as cannon fodder. The shame of this administration is simply boundless when it comes to our valiant but quickly forgotten veterans. And how about the 120 suicides per week that seems to be the current figure for our returning soldiers and marines?

LKBIQ:
"This will never be a civilized country until we expend more money for books than we do for chewing gum"
Elbert Hubbard