McCain got this one Right

I am pleasantly surprised that John McCain got the pick for VP right. Sarah Palin seems like a great choice for several reasons. Everyone has some baggage, so we'll see what the opposition dredges up. But for now, let's review the positive points.

1. She's Pro-Life. Look at her family: she has five (count 'em) kids, including one who has Down's syndrome. That's love, and that's also a temptation to abort when it is convenient.

2. She's pro-drilling for oil in Alaska. She seems like one of those "Everything is on the table" types, which is good, because it will take oil, natural gas, nuclear, solar, wind, bio-mass, water, and any other power sources we can come up with to power our future growth. Voluntary conservation is good too, so I do mean everything is on the table.

3. She is for doing the right thing, even if it means bucking her party. Of course if everybody is a Maverick, then there is not party, only a bunch of people going their own ways, but kow-towing to the party to the point of compromising your core beliefs is not good. If there is corruption (Ted Stevens?) get it out. If there are problems, don't just defend them blindly, nor dump them under the bus in knee-jerk fashion. Get the facts, make a decision based on what is right, and then stick with it! Sarah seems to have done this in Alaska.

4. Have you seen her? She's cheerful, looks strictly business, and speaks clearly and forcefully. She took up the mantle of Geraldine Ferraro and Hillary Clinton without the liberal baggage and without Bill. According to Mrs. Ferraro, hillary never mentioned her run for VP in 1988, but Sarah Palin did that first. She gets it, knowing her political roots come from both sides. Let's see her finish the task of shattering the glass ceiling that those other ladies cracked. Note that she will do it mostly in dresses as well, not the de-feminizing pants suits. I believe she will attract a lot of Hillary voters, even if they are not all pro-life. They, like she, are pro-woman, and the Democratic ticket has two men, as usual.

5. Sarah Palin brings more executive experience than Joe Biden. I have never heard of Joe Biden running anything but his mouth, his campaigns and that Accela train home every night from DC to Delaware. Mrs. Palin even has more positive executive experience than Barack Obama, dare I say. The only executive experience Mr. Obama has is running the Chicago Annenberg Challenge with William Ayers, the unrepentant terrorist. The summary of his tenure as and executive of one of the two wings of the non-profit was that they used up $15 million in the first year, drew scrutiny for mismanagement, and had to reorganize, disassociating the group from it's original partnership groups, and then ultimately using up the $50+ million dollars with little to show for the money within six years. I'd say that being a mayor of a town, (albeit small) and then being elected governor over a sitting member of your own party is quite an accomplishment. Sarah Palin also governed for a year and a half, and has had a positive impact in that time.

6. Sarah Palin is an avid hunter, and support gun rights. She also understands that reasonable precautions need to be in place to protect the public. Let's see how she presents her position, as I am not yet as familiar with her positions as I will be in the near future.

7. She's from wa-a-ay outside of Washington. You can't get much further than Alaska, and still be in the USA. Alaska is very near Russia, so she may have some exposure to or understanding of how they work. Again, though, let's see what she says about this in the near future.

8. On foreign policy, if she doesn't have much in that area, she can certainly learn about it from John McCain. John McCain may get the border fence and immigration policy wrong, but he understands other things, like the threat of radical Islam and jihad, and how to deal with Russia and China. Sarah Palin may not bring much to the table in this regard, but she has at least as much foreign policy experience as Barack Obama, and she can learn from McCain as president, which is much better than President Obama learning from the VP Biden.

9. Sarah Palin offers change as historic as Barack Obama. With the choice of Mrs. Palin, there is certain to be someone in the White House who has never been there before, either a black man, or a woman in the highest offices in the land. I would also note that if the McCain/Palin ticket wins, Hillary is pretty much out forever. Sarah Palin is young enough to run in 2012 or 2016 (if McCain hangs in there), thus freezing Hillary out. If Obama wins, Biden won't run in 8 years, and if the Obama/Biden team fails in the first four years, Hillary has an opportunity in 2012. I doubt Hillary will be in the running in 2016, as she will be so old, both in years and in ideology. So I think women will figure this out as well, and vote for the woman who is likely to be the president ofter the winner of this fall's election.

More later, as things develop, but boy, this is a big improvement. I think I might even send the RNC some money!

McCain on the Brink

Wow, what a turn of events. I watched John McCain at the Saddle back forum, and he sounded like a guy I could really respect, like, and vote for. I mean, pro-life, sure of himself, all the right moves, or at least as many as can be expected from a political candidate these days.

But these are not the days of Reagan, nor even of George W. Bush. The persona that was presented at Saddleback was not the person who would take a pro-choice VP. It was not the person who would ban drilling in ANWR, nor who would sound wishy-washy, as he so often does in other settings. It also was not the angry person who grudgingly gives lip service to a border fence (or the more often repeated phrase secure the borders first).

I mean, if he selects a pro-life VP running mate, you can pretty much kiss the GOP goodbye. We cannot out-Democrat the Democrats. If voters want a Democrat, they will vote for Obama. He's the true Dem here. Or they could even still engineer the overthrow of the Obama candidacy, and install Hillary as their candidate, as she would love to have happen. But the GOP depending on Democrats that they attract by alienating the GOP base is like a football team putting their defense on the field to beat the defense of the other team. It just doesn't work! You play to your strengths, and beat them fair and square. Yes we can (to borrow a phrase)!

Not to be outdone, the Democrats are trying to get the pro-life vote, while remaining solidly pro-abortion. They put some mealy-mouthed mushy words in their party platform about protecting the life of babies, and supporting pregnancy, a few paragraphs after stating they will never allow Roe v. Wade to be overturned, nor infringed upon in any way. One pundit called it putting some words out there for pro-Obama Republicans to have an excuse to vote for him. It's too thinly veiled to fool us. Anyone who thinks will see thru it.

Battling the Braviax

A strange thing has happened. I've been invaded by a virus. It resides on my PC, but since 3/17 it has impacted my life.

I have been battling this thing so much that my wife is mad at me, my kids think I'm ignoring them, and my wrist hurts. I bought an anti-spyware/Anti-Virus program from Webroot, because a respected friend told me he used it to fix his impossible virus infection. He got a similar virus, and they had to custom update the program for him. Well, I'm at that point, but they have not yet come back with the fix.

Here's what happened. My wife got this nasty gram from a program in our PC that it had been infected with spyware, and the windows was going to load the latest antispyware to pervent (sic) spreading it around. I thought my old trusty AVG Free would handle it, but it has been knocked out. KO'd cold. Won't even come up. And poor Zone Alarm is keeping it contained as best it can. At least ZA is working, and visible. AVG is not even visible! I tried using the free spy sweeper, and it found two viruses. I bought the SW online, and installed it on the "little PC". Then I wrote the setup files to a CD and carried it via sneakernet to the "big PC". I had previously disconnected the big PC from the internet, to contain the virus.

So what are the Braviax? I think they came from another planet, and are trying to take over earth, starting at my PC. Nobody has a way to stop them that I am aware of, though there are some posts on the web about those who have fixed their PCs of it. How it was healed was not recorded, but just a given in the story. They sound like some reject from star wars, or some really smart heroes. Anyway, it is slowly eating away at me and my family. In fact, I should be up int eh bed right now, but I had to vent about this, and they are sick of hearing about it,and of seeing me at the PC nearly every waking moment.

So I broke down, plugged my big PC in, downloaded the file the tech support guy suggested, and it turned out to be the same rev as the program that was already loaded. Plus, it "corrupted" the files in the Webroot folder. I was more scared than Obama's Grandma walking through Harlem at night! I rebooted into Safe Mode, and removed it manually from the list. I left the old version installed, and reran its installer. I ran the scan in safe mode, and then rebooted into normal mode. The virus greeted me at the middle of boot up, before the AV/AS got started. It can't do much with the already running virus.

Well, I'm getting sleepy, so I better go. I'll fill you in on more of this later. Right now I better go. and BTW, I am going to go cleanup and archive my old "Anybody but McCain" style posts of the past month. they don't seem to be getting any traction, and though I am still disgusted by him and his Open Borders philosophy, etc., I am not going to slam him so hard. I'm going to focus on the real enemy, our opposition, the Democrats. Good night!

Fear: not the motivation we need, from Hillary or McCain

I wrote a reply to Gary Bauer's article of 2/29/08 on why we should vote for anybody but Obama. I am not an Obama supporter, let me make that clear. However, Gary was using fear as the key argument against voting Democrat, no matter who wins. I'll try to put the link in here:

John McCain may be strong on the war, but he too, would close Gitmo. He would limit our ability to interrogate (waterboarding, anybody?). McCain would fight the war "over there" while letting illegals in over here: ask Juan Hernandez, his adviser on immigrant affairs.

Yes, Obama is a leftist with some even more leftist supporters. However, I can't count on McCain with a Democrat house and Senate to do Republican things. With the Gang of 14 ideology and his signature piece, McCain-Feingold on the line, he won't push strongly for strict constructionist supreme court nominees, Ted Olson not withstanding. For every Ted Olson, there is a Warren Ruddman (David Souter, anyone?)in his campaign.
McCain is doomed to fail, because if he moves right, the libs who nominated him will bail. He will also be a flip flopper, which doesn't attract most people, if he moves right. If he moves left, Obama will be the true lib, and we, the true conservatives on social, defense, moral, and immigration issues, will stay home or vote Ann Coulter-style.

John McCain is not moving right, and he is not naturally conservative. He curses people out, holds grudges (Bush 2000), and does not admit his failures. I think McCain's Freudian slip was showing when he said his upcoming debates would be "dispirited", and he is "a proud Conservative Liberal Republican". I know what he was trying to say, but I also saw his heart. Nobody is perfect, and I certainly do not expect a candidate for President to be perfect. However, I do expect a person who seems to have a humble heart (G. W. Bush, Ronald Reagan), and who is not just the lesser of two evils. I think a good strong Republican congress and senate are the best checks against a probable Democrat president next year. Fear will not motivate enough people to swallow their principles and vote McCain in, especially when McCain is not likely to protect us much better than his opponents.

Why I Don't Support John McCain for President - Updated

I am trying to get down to the bottom line on how I feel about this current Republican Presidential Candidate. This is a summary that I hope clears things up. Maybe I'll write about the other Presidential candidates similarly, if time permits. Here goes!

1. He has these open borders guys on his team, including Juan Hernandez, which indicates Mr. McCain does not "get it" about the border. He would still sign the bill that he co-sponsored with Senator Edward Kennedy. Kennedy may yet send it back, if the Democrats win the Congress again. Then we would be a world of trouble, so Mr. McCain is not trustworthy there.
2. the Gang of 14 deal weakened the President's ability to submit and get votes on the Supreme court justices of his choosing. Mr. McCain even believes that he should consult the Senate on his possible nominees before actually submitting them, so there is little if any chance a true conservative judicial appointee will be submitted. In this regard, he differs little from the Democrat opponents he will face.
3. Mr. McCain fought against the Wisconsin Right to Life on a life issue, so his vaunted Pro-Life position is not as strong as it might seem when he proclaims it from the stump.
4. A Republican president will be the de-facto leader of the party. As such, Congressional Republicans will not fight him on issues that he is liberal on, and will just go along to get along. As president, Mr. McCain will want to get things done, and with a Democrat Congress, he will fight his own party more (maverick, anyone?) than he will fight the Democrats. They will be easier to beat.
5. Mr. McCain is too old to be President. A contest between him and Barack Obama would be a cakewalk for the first black American President. Mr. McCain might be able to defeat Hillary, because there is so much Clinton fatigue, but he has no chance against a young, popular articulate man with destiny on his side. Also, the war is not as popular, so Mr. McCain's strongest issue is not the top priority in this upcoming election. The war may be my top priority, but many view it as either too long, or almost won, or immoral.
6. Lastly, the war. I believe it is a travesty of justice to close Guantanamo, which is what he and the Democrats want to do. Keeping the enemy combatants out of this country is essential to keeping our legal system out of military proceedings, and ensuring that we can get the intelligence we need. Also, waterboarding is not torture, as Mr. McCain should know best. I hope never to learn what the other non-torture techniques that are used against terrorists, because they too would become ineffective and Mr. McCain would probably outlaw them too. I am sure that we do not use any tactics nearly as brutal nor unethical as those used on Mr. McCain when he was held by the North Vietnamese. So rather than support Mr. McCain in his effort to become President, I will contribute to congressional candidates, and Senatorial candidates, and hope for the best.
   

Subsequent comments, 3/23/08: I wrote this in a very angry time in my political life, and while I still believe this, Obama has shown himself to be the Liberal that he has been portrayed as, and Hilary has shown herself to be the ruthless, selfish, spoiled brat of a candidate that she seemed to be before the carefully crafted image she set up for this political race. She's not only bad for the country, she's bad for the Democrat party. She is trying to either win or tear down the party, whichever comes first. It's sad!