In Defense of Airheads

British Ferry Captain hires foreign
workers because British workers
are “quite fat and covered with tattoos.”

What does it take nowadays to be unqualified for public office? Let us take the case of Christine O’Donnell for an example. Here is a woman who has apparently never had a permanent job, has made her career (such as it is) promoting abstinence and anti-abortion nonsense, along with other rather extreme far right issues. She claims to have “dabbled in witchcraft,” an issue dismissed by many with the disclaimer, “she was only in High School and kids in High School do lots of stupid thing” (personally I find this kind of reasonable). However, she also has said that masturbation is the equivalent of adultery, a claim I find not only extreme but rather absurd. She has said she has now “matured,” but as far as I know no one has asked her if she now thinks masturbation is okay. Apparently her statement that she has matured is sufficient to dismiss this rather absurd claim. She has also said that scientists have cross-bred or otherwise modified monkeys so they have fully human brains, a claim so hare-brained one wonders if she actually has one. But no less a critic than Bill Maher has suggested, “she must have read the report wrong.” He likes her but of course does not want to see her in the Senate. O’Donnell has also claimed she would never lie, even to protect Anne Frank from the Nazis, as God would intervene to do something or other to resolve this dilemma (as far as I know this has left everyone so speechless no one has pursued it). She now stands accused of illegally using campaign funds for her own personal needs, such as paying her rent, buying gasoline, and etc. Naturally she denies any wrongdoing but I’m pretty sure there is genuine evidence to prove otherwise. In short, this woman is a certified “Airhead,” with no qualifications for office whatsoever. But no doubt some will keep making excuses for her, and this is not keeping her from continuing and, what is worse, being supported by the Republican Party. Someone once observed that running for Congress was the one job that required no qualifications whatsoever. He/she was right.

It is one thing to try to defend an Airhead like O’Donnell, but quite another to defend many of them already in the Congress. Today the Senate filibustered the entire Defense Bill for no reason other than to postpone the inevitable acceptance of doing away with Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, a useless and failed policy that began under the Clinton Administration. Everyone knows, including those who voted to filibuster, this is inevitably going to pass. There is no good reason for this particular filibuster. Their arguments for it were pathetic. The military needs more time to study it is absolute nonsense. They need time to implement it, equally nonsensical. What are they going to do, build separate showers, toilets, and living quarters? The issue has been studied to death. Every major military in the world already allows Gays to serve actively in their respective services. Gays have served since time immemorial in the U.S. forces, many of them highly decorated and highly acclaimed by their peers. This was a shameful performance, and no one was more shameful than John McCain who insisted, in spite of the facts, that searching for Gays in the military was not a policy. One could argue that McCain was right in the sense that this was not a formal policy in the military, but demonstrably has been “the policy,” and McCain has been personally informed of this. I attribute his resistance either to stubbornness or senility. No defense bill like this has ever before been filibustered. Republicans now are so obsessed with destroying Obama they are willing to sacrifice the military and even the nation. In spite of Obama’s election, large numbers of American are not comfortable with a Black President and determined to see him fail. Their racism drips like pus from a gangrenous sore in spite of their euphemisms and not so artful dodges. I said from the beginning that Obama’s election would represent the “fifth great blow to the Western-European ego,” an attack on the most basic paradigm of Western-European thought, and so it is proving to be.

A large Democratic voter turnout could put an end to this ultra-right wing idiocy for a long time. But as Obama has not proven his ability to walk on water or otherwise work miracles it might not come about. This is called ,I believe, “cutting off your nose to spite your face.”

On Tom Dispatch.com today, as featured on Buzzflash, is an article that predicts the end of the American empire, and, by implication, of the American dream. Similarly, one young man was also heard today asking President Obama if the American dream was over for him. There appears to be a strong notion on the part of many Americans that it is. With the end of our empire, the end of the American dream, will come an inevitable decline in our standard of living. Tom Dispatch suggest this is not all bad, as our troops will come home, we will pay more attention to our crumbling infrastructure, education, and so on. The American century, so-called, is coming to an end, and with it the American dream. It also means an end to our traditional way of life, based as it has been, on exploiting the earth’s resources shamefully and exploiting other countries for their resources. I guess we might sum this up as “Stealing less but enjoying it more.”

LKBIQ:
The best argument against democracy is a five minute conversation with the average voter.
Sir Winston Churchill
TILT:
There are at least 372 species of parrots.