Republican Pundits NOT Conservatives

Many in the media classify republican pundits, the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and the rest of the FOX television channel commentators, as conservatives. I beg to differ. I call them great political tacticians applying their craftiness to gain notoriety, and therefore, the financial rewards beyond their own wildest imaginations. These republican pundits have mastered the art exploiting their self created fictitious political and ideological differences, and the rest of the electorate goes along for the ride without question.

Most people think Mr. Rush Limbaugh is a conservative, but what issues are professed to be of interest to Mr. Limbaugh and his radio listeners? Has he established his bona fides on any issues and/or policies that are actually conservative? In other words great conservatives are associated with conservative policies and movements, and I cannot think of one policy that Mr. Limbaugh has championed.
Present day so termed conservatives, those noted above, are mere opportunists and loud-mouthed pretenders, who scream slogans and epitaphs against their imaginary opponents, and their shameless use of insults to sensibilities of those who listen to the fear mongering and scapegoating of people with different perspectives and different policy issues.

When Mr. Rush Limbaugh publicly, over the national air-waves, stated he wants our president to fail, a treasonous proclamation, no pragmatic real conservatives publicly confronted and rebuked him, they all tip-toed around him, because the so called conservatives are cowards and mere opportunists.

Remember, the Health Care Bill that the republicans were all supposed to be against because it was tagged as government run, although all the implementation for all the provisions of the bill is by private companies just as the predominantly employer based health insurance system we have come to accept as the model private enterprise system. The irony is all the republicans in congress who voted against the bill, enjoy their health care plans administered and paid for but the government.. hypocrites !!

Last December 2009, Mr. Limbaugh vacationing in Hawaii fell seriously ill and was taken cared of free of charge by the free government run health care system in Hawaii. I thought he would have refused treatment from a government run health care system, this was a person who claims to be vehemently opposed to government run health care system, guess what, it is the right thing as long as the opportunists are receiving the benefits.

Who will fit my definition of a nearly true conservative currently on the political scene? The answer is: any politician that subscribes fully and/or partially to some of these tenets:

• Supports no Military Interventionist policies except limited military actions deemed necessary to maintain national security
• Proposes the immediate and orderly closures of the many foreign military bases maintained around the world, which make the US look like the Occupying Empire
• Supports auditing the Federal Reserve [and the Treasury] actions and policies, for a true democratic idea of transparency.
• Supports established Constitutional Rights and Amendments, and their applicability for the modern world, forward thinking.
• Supports prudent Fiscal Policies coupled with Targeted Investment for future development and growth of the USA, that supports my definition of what makes USA Exceptional!!
• Supports government policies of providing basic Social and Economic Protections for the politically Not well connected citizenry, so called social safety net.

This is a small subset of tenets I would call conservative political policy baselines. Do republican pundits in the media proclaiming their brand of conservatism, subscribe to any of these tenets? I am not sure but does the voting public consider any of these tenets in their decisions during elections?  I would like to get some feed back...

Conservative/Libertarian-Liberal/Progressive.. Really!

As a self defined fiscal conservative/libertarian and social liberal/progressive, I am struck by the rigidity of the general media characterization of the highly demarcated political infrastructure, or I should say political architecture. I am also dismayed when I have discussions with people I considered very educated and relatively well informed, or so I think, and find that they are so caught up within the political labeling infrastructure to the extent that they leave behind all their own thoughts and reasoning thereby, making them pick a political label that goes against their own self interest. Sometimes I wonder if such people are merely following the fashionable political label of the moment or they are not as informed as I give them credit for.

Who is a Conservative? I dare to ask in abstraction, because I have NEVER come across a human being, who I consider, really and completely Conservative. I have met people who take certain positions that are labeled conservative by the media and other organizations, and base their conservative labeling on such classifications. Is that a conservative or a situational and issue conservative? I will give a specific example later.

A Libertarian, I thought, is supposed to be 'a live and let others live' conservative, or 'a leave me alone and do not intrude in my or anyone's private life' Conservative-Liberal. I think a libertarian can be a practicing conservative with a liberal mind upholding fairness.

Who is a Liberal? I should definitely ask this in serious abstraction, because I have NEVER come across a human being, who I consider, really and completely Liberal. I have met people who have taken positions that are labeled liberal by the media, and therefore, they base their liberal credits on such classifications. Is that a liberal or a situational and issue liberal?

A Progressive, I thought, is supposed to be 'a live and let us live' liberal, or 'a leave me alone and do not intrude in my or anyone's private life' Liberal-Conservative. I think a Progressive can be a good practicing liberal with somewhat conservative leanings and propensity for fairness.

The political term or label Independent would seem more pragmatic than any of the other labels, but I simply consider an Independent as a more realistic classification of any of the other political labels, except there is a practical absence of rigidity in an independent minded politician.

To flesh out the disparate political labels, I choose the recently passed Health Care Bill [Obamacare as the republicans call it] a truly brilliant legislative achievement, which attempts to expand health care for most people in the USA. The magic of effective mis-information, crafty distortion of facts, and most of all, blatant outright lies cloaked in idealogical differences, and brilliant artistically packaged media blitz, made it all look like, the health care bill and its intents and benefits, were merely demarcated by political ideological infrastructure; liberals and progressives on one side and conservatives and libertarians on the other. How about that! The poor and dis-enfranchised people in West Virginia, Kentucky, South Carolina, Arkansas, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, and similar states, who do not have health insurance and adequate health care, and have not been able to afford health care in their lives, at any cost, were able to be convinced that they were conservative republicans, and therefore, were against the health care bill... whoaa wow..!! I call this phenomena ingenuity, because I know, I cannot in this life time, be convinced, ever to vote against my self interest on any issue, period. It is interesting to note how the use of political labels and slogans have become so effective and powerful in creating a herd-mentality, where people entrench themselves in to these political labels, and like a herd of cattle, follow all the way into the slaughter house without thought or reason, figuratively speaking!

I would love to read a good comment [comment on this blog] from a well thought out position, that aligns with professed opponents of the Health Care Bill, outlining the virtues for political labels, I have outlined. I chose the health care bill, because all of us in the USA are affected irrespective of our political positioning and/or cherished political labels, Conservative-Libertarian-Liberal-Progressive.. Really!! And a healthy discussion of this subject is in order...I believe, .... really!!

Obama, a practical-minded politician? I believe so..!!

I must disclose, before I continue with my political analyses that I am mostly a conservative [by nature and not by label and/or definition], and of the independent type, and practically the pragmatic political being. With that said, I hope readers and/or commenters will afford me the liberty of self definition, in the political context. I am a trained scientist and engineer, but also an avid participant in the political discourse. Enough about me.

Mr. Obama has been president for close to two (2) years, and I should confess, he has surprised me with the tremendous successes and accomplishments he has demonstrated, to date. Considering the immense blatant proclamations of opposition from the Republicans in the congress, and down-right treasonous pronouncements from certain radio and television personalities, who seem to root for failure of my cherished, good old US of A, to every proposal coming from the White House. It is note worthy that political historians will rate these accomplishments very high in comparison to previous presidents. In future blogs I will take some of the legislative accomplishments and discuss the merits from a scientist-engineer's mind and perspective.

For this first blog posting, I choose the so called "Tax Compromise Bill" legislation, the president and the senate republican leaders achieved, and other very important legislation, in the so called lame-duck session, as my first analyses.

I believe Mr. Obama  thinks like an engineer. President Obama, sees most issues that affect the United States and the natural alignments of ensuing debates, from the concept of first principles, the building blocks of reasoning and deductive inference of outcomes. It was a mystery to me and probably to most political observers, that the democratic leadership in both houses of congress, notwithstanding, a democratic president, did not see fit to table and/or champion one of the defining campaign policy promises of the candidate Obama, of Not Renewing the President Bush era tax cuts for income over $250K, and forcing a vote in the congress to expose the political fault lines in the context of the current US economic and financial status, prior to the last November mid-term elections. Naturally, since I was not privileged to data the democratic polsters and consultants used, I would still surmise that it would have been good politics to at least create that showdown. I am sure Speaker Nancy Pelosi would have cherished the spotlight. I can assure myself that President Obama, my scientist-engineer minded politician and leader would have suggested that the tax cut debate should occur prior to the mid-term elections.

President Obama, subsequently made the deal with the republicans that he only could make. Mr. Obama gathered the facts contained within each component of the deal, established the viability of each proposed component and the practical boundaries and/or constraints on a per component basis, as well as component interactions within the deal he was working out, and projected subsequent [future] deals that had to be considered in future policy implementations, notwithstanding the obvious vehement opposition from his negotiating partners, the republicans, of his approach, all taken into account. It turns out, President Obama and his staff, believe in optimization techniques as implemented in engineering and therefore, factual life of people in the USA. In short, the tax bill compromise [a word Mr. Obama seems not afraid to use, unlike Mr John Boehner, the incoming speaker of the house of representatives], was the optimum outcome for President Obama.

"Don't Ask Don't Tell [DADT]" legislation passed and was signed into law on December 22, 2010, by President Obama. His address before the invited dignitaries during the signing showed echos of why most of USA voted for him for President. The speech was passionate, concise and very emotionally moving, even for 'straight' or 'heterosexual' americans. The debate on this issue was sometimes incoherent, especially from the opposing side, and similarly the conjecture of many Gay Americans on the perceived slow pace of repeal process on the part of the President was noteworthy. I say noteworthy, because certain media correspondents, some notable openly gay, made claims on what they thought was the method Mr. Obama should have used, namely executive order instead of fighting for legislation through the congress, because they were not confident the repeal would succeed in the face of vehement republican opposition. Again, President Obama, my scientist-engineer minded politician and leader, insisted on finding the optimized solution, which when implemented will serve to resolve just about all difficulties and issues associated with the entire DADT policy. As a great constitutional law professor, and a good lawyer, President Obama's approach was to pass legislation that will supersede all existing DADT policy implications and legal challenges, which is exactly what has happened. Bravo President Obama, bravo to President Obama, my scientist-engineer minded politician and leader. !!

As a practical conservative, I am tempted to remark that Mr. Obama has demonstrated the virtues of the glaring need for a well educated and a thinking pragmatist, as the leader of the USA and the free-world, and people like me are grateful in the wisdom of the voting public when we make the prudent choices, such as the selection of Mr. Barack Obama as our President. Bravo to informed electorate, and shame on those who seem to fanatically vote against their own self-interest, believe me that happens..!!