Because you’re dying to hear my debate opinions

I promised myself that I wasn’t going to make this another blog from some shmo pushing his stupid-ass political opinions. But this is my website; this stupid ass will say whatever stinking thing it wants to say. So here are some of my thoughts on the first presidential debate.

 

Enough with the earmarks

McCain seemed out of his depth debating the economy, not because he lacked knowledge but because of his inability to stress what is most important to people right now. We’re facing a potential financial catastrophe and he can’t let go of earmarks? Obama was right: everyone hates earmarks and we should do something about them, but can $18 billion really compare with the $700 billion challenges we face?

 

The other “R” word

I agree with McCain: reform is needed. However, regulation is needed more, especially in the financial sector. Can he really discuss further regulations with any credibility?

 

Obama’s courageous fiscal discipline

McCain was the only one to not completely ignore the question about the programs he’d have to cut due to the bailout. Still, suggesting he’d freeze everything but defense and entitlements was laughable. What makes up the majority of any federal budget? Defense and entitlements. However, Obama’s litany of the additional programs he would fund was even more funny (comprehensive healthcare reform, grand new renewable energy initiatives, scholarships for everyone, an overhaul of the nation’s infrastructure, etc., etc.).

 

Johnny’s fountain of youth

McCain relaxed visibly when switching to foreign policy questions. He also seemed younger.

 

Zinging Vladimir

McCain was more interesting than Obama when discussing foreign relations — for example, how Russia’s incursion into Georgia was really about Ukraine. “I looked into Putin’s eyes,” he said, “and I saw three letters: K.G.B.” He’s used that line before, but still, nice.

 

Just talk already

I continue to be impressed by Obama’s stance regarding direct talks with rogue leaders. McCain seemed smaller as a leader by so forcefully railing against the possibility. And he knows better than to scoff at Obama’s suggestion that Ahmadinejad is not the most powerful leader in Iran.

 

Duck!

How can McCain possibly not see the decision to go to war in Iraq as an important policy issue to discuss in a presidential debate? Knowing the reasons why a leader would or would not go to war is of the utmost importance, perhaps the most important thing you can discuss. Oh, but the next president won’t face the decision to go to war with Iraq when he takes office, McCain said. Do I hear quacking?

 

Birds of a feather

Of course, Obama ducked McCain’s jibes about his stance regarding the surge.

 

Nice restraint

In the primaries, McCain began to hedge about his anti-torture stance, so I was surprised that Obama not only didn’t note this fact when McCain referred to his own history on the issue, he praised McCain’s record. It was a nice counterpoint to Obama’s attacks.

 

And the winner is…

I don’t think either candidate clearly won. But by clearly not losing, especially in a debate stressing foreign policy, Obama probably won.

Hear no evil

The thing that gets me most about Sarah Palin is the “bridge to nowhere” issue. Every politician gets caught in a lie at some point in a long career, but most have the decency to stop when caught. But Palin keeps using the “thanks but no thanks” line even after it has been well documented that she had supported the bridge project until the public tide turned against it, then took the federal money for the project after Congress killed it.

 

I’ll hand it to her: she knows the score. On the whole, people will believe what they need to believe in order to better support their side. They’re happy with their rose-colored glasses. What’s the point in seeing the world clearly? Palin will keep using “thanks but no thanks” because the people she’s saying it to have distorted logic to make the line seem credible.

 

But that’s just the way we are. We don’t act according to reason; we act according to our needs and use reason to justify the choice.

 

It holds for Democrats, too. I know people who supported Obama throughout the primaries even though they never heard him say a word of substance beyond “change” and “hope.” They simply trusted this guy, they told me, that he really would bring change to Washington. (And now that he’s actually talking about the issues and it’s the same old Democratic stuff, isn’t that disappointing?)

 

McCain wants it both ways, too. He’s says “maverick maverick maverick” then talks tax cuts and deregulation and pro-life and blah blah blah. Because he knows that the folks who need to hear “maverick” will hear it and those who need the same old Republican stuff will hear that. (And what happened to the Straight Talk Express? It got buried under a pile of lipstick.)

 

I know we all have to choose. We can’t just hold our cynicism above everyone’s heads like a crown of superiority. But let’s at least try to see the world clearly, to listen to reason first, rather than follow the Pied Piper of our own choosing down into the waters of ignorance.

Dream hauntings

New books by Bob Woodward and Thomas Friedman came out this week. I would certainly enjoy both books. Woodward’s take on the Bush administration fascinates me, as do Friedman’s views of geopolitics, the environment and the new economics. But I hesitate, because the writing in the books might not live up. It might not teach me enough about sentence structuring, the use of action verbs and metaphors. I need that education for my glorious writing future, you see.

 

It’s still there, that dream. It’s buried under the basement, six feet in the dirt. I gave it up for dead but it still talks to itself and sometimes I can hear it, like a whisper. I don’t know what it wants anymore. To be a novelist? A humorist? A poet? I can’t tell; I can’t hear the words. But it’s alive.

 

It used to be all I knew, back ten years ago. It was my only hope from the fate of the ordinary. Even if I didn’t become rich from writing (and rich was acceptable, believe me) I’d still have the adulation of being published, and that would be enough to tell me that I’d lived up to whatever it is I needed to live up to. So I dreamed of writing and sat in front of a blank page for a decade. Soon the blank page became louder than the dream. So one night when I was asleep the blank page tied the dream with thick rope and dragged it downstairs with a shovel.

 

Here is my view of dreams. They are great things to have. Maybe you want to be the next great motivational speaker or own your own chain of Irish pub/restaurants. Whatever it is, it gives you a little lift, to imagine where you could be with a little hard work, to have something to shoot for. But don’t need the dream to happen in real life, because it’s going to take more than a little work. Dreams are, by definition, hard to realize, or else they wouldn’t be dreams. You must construct a life that allows you to be happy even if your dreams fizzle. You owe yourself that much.

 

I needed the writing dream too much. I couldn’t see past it. It was a smothering lover that called me every 10 minutes. That kind of romance I can do without.

 

The blank page has left my life. I write what I write — poems, these silly posts — and it is enjoyable and everyone is happy. I can see writing a book one day, probably non-fiction. I know I have the skills, it’s just a matter of picking the subject and carving out a mountain of time. Maybe that’s a dream, but a quiet one, not like the one buried in my basement, grumbling to itself in the night.

 

Dreams are tough sons of bitches. They look like the last kid picked for the dodge ball game, but they’re stubborn, and they have voices that carry through your ground.