Tom DeLay partisan or patriot?

On Sunday I was listening to AM radio during the long drive back from Joshua Tree to Los Angeles. A talk show guested former House Speaker Tom DeLay for a 10-15 minute interview. The topic was the upcoming election for the Legislative Branch. DeLay's vital point was that the country is incredibly polarized. He predicted that whoever ended up with the majority in both the House and Senate, it would be a knife edge margin. The result will be gridlock and there is little reason to expect much in the way of progress or achievement in any direction. I found myself nodding agreement. The polarization is a true reflection of divided public opinion; it represents in large part a fundamental split over fundamental US policy regarding the so-called war on terror. DeLays' forecast if the Democrats gain power is an immediate move to pull troops out of Iraq, which would embolden North Korea, Iran, and would severely undermine the war on terror. In contrast, he describes the Republican administration as a bulwark against terrorism and threats to US security. DeLay and supporters of the current administration are missing an essential piece of the political puzzle. The only apparent logical reason for this is partisanism over patriotism.

What an accusation! Calling a conservative unpatriotic? One of the essential features of American democracy is that political leaders are tested and either removed or retained via election. The issue before the voting public is not about what should be done to improve the situation in Iraq, its about holding political leaders accountable for their incompetence and removing them from office. The current administration desperately and tirelessly bulldozes the idea that elections are a choice between "cutting and running" (Democrats) and "finishing the job" (incumbent Republicans). In truth, the elections should be a choice between retaining or removing those who designed and executed a failed policy. Democrats are not spared from this choice - the primary in Connecticut showed that the distinguised past of Joe Lieberman was not enough to forgive supporting the invasion. What is so maddening about the Republican attempt to narrowly characterize the current Iraq situation is the unapolygetic notion that the current administration is the only source of good ideas on how to solve it. HELLO! Short term memory loss? Why is there even a problem to solve in the first place? That was rhetorical. It's like a doctor that makes a spurting awful mess of a promised simple surgery and is then indignant when the patient demands a new doctor ASAP instead of believing the original doctor is the best qualified to fix things.

I could launch into a detailed argument as to how current leaders have failed the US regarding Iraq policy, but it really isn't necessary (actually, perhaps I'll do this later). By virtually any metric, Iraq is worse off, the region is worse off, and the world is worse off than before the invasion. The existence or not of liberal media reporting negative news disproportionately does nothing to change the facts of the current misery. But I digress despite intentions not to. The question at hand is, why is anyone defending those responsible for incompetent US policy? Humans are creatures of habit. Pure partisan loyalty is the only reason I can see to support someone for continued office tenure, when they have been tested and found inadequate. Real patriotism is not flag waving, attempted associations between supporting the troops and supporting policy, rhetoric about building democracy overseas, prosecuting a "war" on terror, and so on. Patriotism is honoring the institution the Founding Fathers built by exercising personal integrity via honest evaluations of political leaders based on performance rather than party. Lieberman is still in the running as an independent candidate, but I'm not voting for him.

Panthera uncia

A little digging at wiki recently turned up the information that one of our members is a snow leopard, whose official name is Panthera uncia. He must be logging on somewhere in the Kazakh or Himalaya region, or from a zoo. The Panthera family is best known for its roarers, such as the ever-popular lions and tigers. Almost everyone in the clan is able to roar, but P. uncia is a distant cousin who does not possess the pipes for it. On the bright side, this may make him better at purring. For more information on how cool purring is, check out this article on how purring in cats strengthens and heals tissue: http://www.bksv.com/2798.asp

Inadvertent Poetry

The other day I was on the line with Him (Customer Service) and I inadvertently penned the following amusing lines,

Customer service is lovely lovely
lovely, okay sir just give me
a few more seconds okay?
lovely lovely customer service,
has the phone had any physical
or water damage done to it?
just bear with me okay,
bear bare
the burden of baring with me indefinitely.