Peter King: Halt donations to House GOP
This is what I have done for the past few years. I have given no money to the GOP. One of the reasons why I haven't given any money is because I don't have it and what little money I do have to give has gone to help the Church and some individual causes.
I received a phone call on Saturday asking for a contribution to "Activate" my GOP membership. I told the guy I wasn't giving them a damned thing. First off, the only reason I answered the phone was because I thought it was a family member, because my family was in town, but if this guy was going to talk it up, then I was going to give him a piece of my mind.
I could tell that he was going over a schematic list... if I say this, then you say that type of thing. The first thing out of his mouth was about the Fiscal Cliff and how we need to beat back the Democrats to get the governments finances under control. I told him the Fiscal Cliff was a joke and we've gone over the cliff long ago. I told him that our party has contributed to this as much as the Democrats. We just initiated and pushed through a $677 billion Defense Authorization Program and how much is Homeland Security costing us? I fully support our troops, but in 2001 I wasn't signing on to wars that would last forever. I feel duped by all of that stuff. Hell, we blow things up to build them back again to blow them up again... How much is that costing along with giving billions to Warlords all over the Near and Far East?
Then he switches and says he understands my anger. Yeah, we need to get some of our guys out of there, how he is AWAKE, but we can only do that by supporting the party. Sounded like Bush telling us how the only way to save the free market system was through policies that interfered with the operation of the free market. I gave him Harry's line about "if you keep doing what you're doing, you're gonna get what you've got."
Can you give $100... Our party was fully instrumental in destroying my community's Industrial base through all of these "Free for All" trade agreements like GATT, the WTO, and NAFTA, why should I support that?
Can you give $50... My party turned a blind eye on immigration and worked with Democrats to allow an influx of people who have helped, along with the one way trade agreements, to diminish my ability to earn income, then they fuss about people not working or being on food stamps. That helps Democrats look good, because at least they say they don't want people being homeless or starving to death. Hey Republicans, why not work to bring decent paying jobs back to America? Then you will have a right to tell people to work or starve. Right now you just come across as apathetic idiots and hypocrites.
Can you give $25... The Republican Party says it is against unions, but they run the party like it's a union. Everybody is supposed to wait their turn and be seen, but not heard. This is as much our country as it is the bigwigs. They aren't going to get that until we show them that. I believe in a Meritocracy. I like the best ideas to come forward... the cream to rise to the top. One of the points of the Contract with America in 1993 was the idea of term limits. The idea that citizens would serve a few years and then go back home to rejoin society as a citizen - to be like everyone else as one of the people. When the Republicans won the majority, this was pushed to the background and rarely heard of again,. The Congress continued with their special salaries, special healthcare, special pensions, and other special privileges and amenities, while most of the rest of society has continued to decline... No I am not going to give you any money to continue on with your party and these policies.
Can you give anything... You don't get it. Back when I was making decent money and expenses were a lot less, I gave you money. That is how I got on this list. I gave you money, because I had it and I believed in the cause and the agenda you were espousing. And you took my money and you worked against my interests, because my money didn't amount to a hill of beans compared to that of the spoiled, effeminate Wall Street and Main Street Nutthuggers. You didn't do what you said you were going to do. I'll tell you what. When you do what you said you were going to do all of those years ago and you accomplish what you promised me and you begin working in my interests (the majority of the working public's interests), then I might feel like giving you some money and better yet, I might be able to afford to give you some money.
Til then GOOD BYE!
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Wednesday, January 2, 2013
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8 comments:
I quit giving to the gop right after the mid 90's when it became obvious to me that they aren't serious. The idea of limited gov't like Reagan and Kemp spoke about gave way to Trent Lott (puke here) splitting the difference to make any kind of deal - good or bad. And then the "compassionate conservatism" which translated means big spending gov't that goes to GOP cronies rather than the Democrat cronies.
What we still have is a system of permanent politicians who use marketing and manipulation to attain power and do just enough work to keep us afloat. Real reform and serious retooling for the modern world isn't even on the agenda. Fear mongering about how bad the other guy is is all they have to offer. And they expect me to write a check for that? Dream on.
I’m confused. After contemplating the message I began to do some rudimentary searches and I discovered the following.
Patrick McHenry since he took his seat in the 109th Congress, has voted with the Republican party on average, 95.2% of the time. I’ve always held his intentions as being dubious and counter to the good people of his district and however well intentioned he might have been in his own convictions, voting only 92% of the time in the 109th, that number has went up across time as his indoctrination into party dogma has been on-going. So far with the 113th Congress, his record is 100% with the party. His predecessor Cass Ballenger was a little better, but their voting records mirror each other as time goes by. From the 102nd Congress, Cass started out voting with the party 88% of the time to his last two terms in Congress when it reached a high of 97% of the time. http://projects.washingtonpost.com/congress/113/
I see those vote records mirroring the problems identified by the Hound with the Republican Party. Not a reflection of the man, not a reflection of the district nor the people, but an adherence to the status quo that is oft referred to here as being negative and counter to what is necessary for progress; and you’re not wrong.
This is not to level blame or point fingers. But to support Patrick McHenry is to support the party. To support the party is to continue the disconnect that is robbing this nation for the benefit of a few and denying the people their voice and what they are hoodwinked into believing is their fair representation.
What’s the alternative? I’m afraid I don’t have an answer to that one, but it is certainly worthy of discussion and that is something that I think that has been going on here, if we lay the caustic vitriol of the just past ‘Backward’ campaign aside.
For some reason, winning has become more important than living in the halls of Congress. Words such as freedom, liberty, and people are used as by-lines in a shifting means of manipulation in pursuit of winning ones’ way rather than doing the right thing or the most good for the most people. Because without the people, there is no party, there is no government, there is NO nation. And without those things of the people, there can be no freedom, liberty, prosperity, or pursuit of happiness for the people.
I mostly agree. The GOP is nearly as much of the problem as the Dems.
But the problem is where else do we go? (By the way I am a Libertarian in philosophy but registered Republican and voted RP in the primary).
I would LOVE to see a 3rd party (or better yet no parties at all) become relevant, but that ain't happening. Like saying I would like to see a new pro football league formed. We know how well that has worked.
Don't disagree with the McHenry comment either, but voting with the Republican Party by definition means voting AGAINST the Democrat Party. Sure the modern Republican establishment is nutty, but the Democrat one is freaking looney tunes straight jacket nut house crazy by comparison.
So what do we do? Vote straight Democrat because the total collapse and then reset comes faster? That is an option that I have considered, but haven't been able to make myself actually execute.
Balance. It's all about balance. For me, two parties are enough. Can you imagine what would happen if three or more groups emerged in the same manner they have in Europe? The way our election system is, we'd stay perpetually in run-off elections. As bad and as drawn out as the election process is, I can see it getting worse and voter apathy growing beyond the point it is now.
Moronic policies and law formulation isn't the domain of one group. Both demonstrate their ability to be stupid on a regular basis.
Right now, the Republican party is matriculating through an extremist shift. Democrats started progressing through their change in the early 60's when what was known as "The Northeast Liberal Elite" began it's push to over the party platform and that spread to California. The difference is that one shifted far left of center, the other right now is drifting toward the far right of center. And some that read those words might not view that as such a bad thing. But as I've said more than once, extremism, left or right, is never a good thing for the people. Both extremes lead to despotic governments for despotic people. And as I eluded to earlier, we need to stay near that balance point in the middle.
There is no balance with the two party system. All there is is game playing. One side pretends to represent one view and the other pretends to represent the other. It's just like professional wrestling.
Perhaps Thom, but with two providing a counter-weight to each other, it beats one party controlling everything. Absolute power corrupts, absolutely.
And three, four, five, ten parties all have their own little niche following. Rarely do they appeal to the mainstream. While poster mbg professes to being a Libertarian (and there is certainly nothing wrong with that) look at how long they've been trying to make headway into the mainstream and haven't accomplished it yet. Sure, they've picked some support along the way, but not nearly enough to be accepted in the political mainstream without fighting tooth and nail every time an election is in the offing.
I still contend that two is plenty. Sometimes its two too many and sometimes its twos' not enough.
You're certainly not wrong though. Both are big into pretending and all the while, looking out for their own best interests; individual and group.
There is no counterweight, because they are both tied at the hip and in the end there is so little difference that they may as well be one party.
I don't go by the television theatrics and the "will they make a deal" and/or "Oh no it's the end of the world BS."
Why is having just two paries for the best and allowing them to monopolize and control the important issues faced in this country. Why should they get automatic ballot status and everyone else has to get all of these signatures. It is an unfair and corrupt system and it does not represent the vast majority of our interests.
I don’t go for the theatrics either. I don’t like political correctness. Plain talk is easily understood and that is where we seem to be missing much of what transpires. The commonality between them seems to resonate with, “Talk much, Say little.” There is very little meaning in the double speak, generalized political babble. But there are still marked differences between the two. I genuinely believe that.
Ours has pretty much been a two party system. That by no means signifies that it should remain so or quantifies its’ perpetuation. It simply means that is the historical construct of the two party system. That and the fact that ours is a ‘winner take all’ system. To the victor goes the spoils, or in this case, the election. Does the system serve to perpetuate the two party system? Sure it does. The rules for upstarts are quite extensive. By the same token, why should an upstart be granted entry into the arena simply because they insist upon it? From another perspective, insistence on the price to enter the arena shows a certain proclivity to sticking around rather than being some here today, gone tomorrow political flash in the pan. It also prevents the rampancy of ‘spoiler votes’ being cultivated by the strategists for either party that would readily seek to gain their will through that tried and true method, ‘Divide and Conquer’.
That’s not true in Europe. If a certain party wins 5% of the vote, they likewise win 5% of the representation. So in context, if we are to perpetuate more parties than two, winner take all will have to change as well. I don’t see that as being likely, us being Americans and all.
Typically you will have only two sides to most any issue. There will be varying fractional support and opposition to augment those wholly for and against. I don’t always agree with our government. It is certainly not virtuous nor perfect; but of all the systems I’ve seen, I prefer it over the others. I don’t always agree with the manner in which our system is allowed to operate. I damn sure don’t agree with the infusion of limitless money into campaigns.
There may be a niche for the Reformers, the Libertarians, the Greens, the Socialists, the Anarchists one day. But when we open up the barn door, shutting it will prove more difficult than opening it.
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