Reap The Whirlwind

"For they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind" Hosea 8:7


If you read this blog enough, you already know that I am, quite possibly, the least religious person in the world. I couldn't believe in god less. I like the bible though. It's well written and contains some of my favorite quotes, including this one from the book of Hosea.

Hosea, by the way, is apparently one of the minor prophets. Tough break there. God talks to you, you're a prophet, seems like a pretty sweet deal. Then, somewhere along the way, you find out you're just a minor prophet. What a slap in the face. Why even bother being a prophet at all? I think the old testament prophets needed a union, so they could collectively bargain for equatable treatment of all prophets.

Anyway, I've been trying to keep up with the midterm elections. It isn't an easy task. Midterms can get pretty boring. First of all, who the hell are these people? Secondly, even when we have a supposedly huge change election, an overwhelming majority of Congress stays the same. For example, 1994 is basically the modern standard for a big change election. 1994 saw a 54 seat swing to the Republican side out of 435 House seats, or about 12%, which means 88% basically stayed the same. In the Senate, the Republicans picked up 8 seats out of 100, I don't really need to do the math for you there.

Boring or not, elections are important, especially Senate elections. The Senate holds the real power when it comes to making our laws. The House passes laws all the time with simple majority votes, but the Senate has all kinds of wacky rules and legislation generally goes there to die. So, if some dumbass state elects some dumbass Senator (I'm looking at you Pennsylvania. Rick Santorum? What were you thinking?) that dumbass is immediately 1% of the major governing body of our country for six long stupid years. Now, imagine what happens if dumbasses all over the country unite to elect a series of dumbass Senators.

In Nevada, the Republicans have nominated Sharron Angle, who, among other things, once suggested that ammunition shortages at sporting goods stores might be evidence that the nation is arming for a revolution against the federal government. Not crazy enough for you? How about this? In discussing her opposition to abortion in the case of rape or incest, Sharron suggested telling the hypothetically impregnated rape victim to turn what was really a lemon of a situation into lemonade.

You might think Angle couldn't possibly win an election, but Ms. Angle is running against Harry Reid, who is as charismatic is he is competent. The real clear politics average currently has Reid ahead of this lunatic by a whopping half a point. If you've ever seen Harry Reid talk, you can understand why I'm not optimistic about him being able to win over voters and take a real lead. If Sharron Angle can manage to avoid committing a felony in the next month and a half, I think she's got a very good shot.

In Kentucky, the Republicans nominated Rand Paul. Rand thinks the President shouldn't have been so hard on BP for filling the Gulf of Mexico with oil. Rand also would have voted against the 1964 Civil Rights Act. The latest poll in Kentucky has Rand Paul up by 7. Two earlier polls had him up 15. Get ready for Senator Paul (who promises he won't actually try to repeal the Civil Rights Act, seeing as it's already been passed and all. How sporting of him).

Recently, Delaware Republicans nominated Christine O'Donnell. Christine actually seems like a nice person and I think the media has been a little tough on her. First of all, I didn't dabble in witchcraft when I was in high school, but if you had asked 15 year old me if I wanted to go see the satanic altar with the blood on it, I would have said "of course, I'm 15, what about me being 15 would suggest to you that I wouldn't want to see that?".

They're also all over her about her opposition to masturbation. I don't know what to say about that. She was a young Catholic and she was saying what the priests told her to say. I'm less worried about O'Donnell than some of these other people because early polls have her way down and, considering how late her primary was, I'm not sure she has time to recover. However, being that she's wildly unqualified to be a Senator and got nominated over a solid moderate candidate, she's another example of what we're talking about today.

I could on and on like this. Alaska Republicans nominated a guy named Joe Miller instead of re-nominating Republican incumbent, and seemingly non-crazy person, Lisa Murkowski. I don't really know what Joe stands for other than not shaving and not wearing a tie (but if you want to know what Joe stands for, just ask Sarah Palin, because that's who Joe asks when he wants to know what he stands for).

I've already talked about Florida empty vessel Marco Rubio. If Rubio wins it'll be the first time exit polls show a candidate won a Senate seat because of his "great hair" and "winning smile". He and Sarah Palin would make an excellent weekend news team.

New York Republicans nominated some guy named Joe DioGuardi to challenge Kirsten Gillibrand. Senator Gillibrand isn't exactly a political dynamo, Republicans could have stolen that seat by nominating a moderate that people have actually heard of instead of some guy who has run for Congress four times and only even managed to get nominated once.

The far right wing of the Republican party and the tea people have sown the wind. This is why I'm not a Republican anymore, the party is now routinely passing on qualified, reasonable people in favor of crazy, unqualified super-duper conservatives. Ideally, we'll watch them reap the whirlwind when they blow a chance to take back Congress from the consistently hapless Democrats. But what happens if all these crazy people ride an anti-incumbent wave to victory on November 2nd? Then, we all have to deal with the whirlwind.

Guardians Of The Secret

About three years ago, a friend of mine told me she was a fan of Jackson Pollock's work. I asked if she'd ever seen the movie about Pollock starring Ed Harris. She said she didn't think there really was a movie like that because, if there was, she would have seen it. This presented me with a golden opportunity. By purchasing this movie for my friend, I got to do something nice and be right about something at the same time. That's a perfect storm for me, so I went to Amazon.com, got the movie and gave it to her.

Since then, without fail, Amazon.com sends me an e-mail anytime something new goes on sale that's related to Jackson Pollock, or artists, or art, or colors, or really anything that can be connected in any way to my one purchase. I always laugh a little when I get the e-mails. How do they decide who gets what e-mails? Do they just send me an e-mail every once in a while that tells me about whatever new things are closest to my previous purchase, even if they aren't that close? Or are there certain parameters, and I get an e-mail whenever something new falls into those parameters?

I don't know, and I don't really care either, but I thought of those questions when I heard about the new immigration reform law in Arizona. As I understand it, Arizona law enforcement will be able to ask anyone for identification, specifically proof of U.S. citizenship, if they have a reasonable suspicion that the person might be an undocumented immigrant.

How will they define reasonable suspicion? What will the parameters be? Will they post a Spanish language billboard for free dinero at the police station and arrest anyone who shows up? Will they just stop anyone who seems muy caliente? How exactly does one go about acting like they're here illegally? This seems like a poorly thought out idea. I'm not here to complain about Arizona though. I'm a states rights guy and if they want to try a terrible idea, that's their problem.

On a related topic, Congress is talking about taking on national immigration reform. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has threatened to make it the next issue after financial reform. Alternatively, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is all but begging Reid not to do it. Yesterday, I heard Senator McConnell say that we currently have very high unemployment and we have serious border security issues, so this isn't the time for immigration reform. Wait, what? That sounds like a great time for immigration reform.

Democrats don't really care about immigration, they don't even want a bill. They just want the argument so they can call Republicans racists. It might work too, because some of those guys are racists. Republicans don't really care either, and a lot of them would probably support a bill on immigration reform, but they don't want the argument, because it'll give the Democrats a chance to call them racists.

I think Republicans picture a future time when the mood of the country is different and they can win an immigration reform argument by accusing Democrats of being hippies and leaving the borders open in the name of rainbows and moonbeams, but they know that time isn't now. I also think both parties have a secret. There's actually not a whole lot we can do about illegal immigration from Mexico. Here are some bad ideas that won't work:

#1 That idiot-ass border fence
When I was a kid, there was a fence between the house my family lived in and the neighbors' house. It was literally ten feet out of my way to walk around it. How many times did I climb the fence just for the hell of it? Hundreds, maybe thousands, I don't know, I lost count by the time I turned seven. I know we're building a better fence then the one I climbed as a kid, but unless we're building a magic fence, I'm pretty confident the clever Mexicans will find a way around our super awesome fence technology.

#2 Armed rednecks patrolling the border
I know, if America has a problem that can't be solved by armed rednecks, we may be in trouble. I didn't say I had good news, I'm just telling you what I know. Putting the actual military at the border might work, but they're busy trying to restore order to countries we invaded.

#3 Laws that allow police to ID anyone with brown skin, or a nice tan
I expect the Arizona law to get destroyed in a courtroom somewhere before it ever goes into effect. I hope they televise the case just so I can see if the judge laughs at the people defending it. You never know with judges these days, but I wouldn't get my hopes up for that law.

It's an equilibrium problem. Living in America is awesome, everyone wants to be here, plenty of room to succeed. Mexico, not so much, lots of pressure to leave. So, people will keep flowing from Mexico to America until we reach some kind of equilibrium. This is why you don't see thousands of undocumented Canadians running around putting syrup on everything and robbing people in Minnesota at hockey stick-point. Life in Canada is pretty cool. That leaves us with two things we actually could do...

Possible Solution #1: Fix Mexico
This is the better of the two solutions, but it isn't going to happen. I don't know how much money it would take to make life in Mexico comparable to life in the U.S., but since we're, ya know, massively in debt, I know we don't have it. I guess we could borrow money from China and Japan and give it to Mexico, but I'm not sure how much overall good that would do. This brings us to...

Possible Solution #2: Break America
There are plenty of ways to do this.
-We could do away with our currency and switch to an entirely cheese-based economy (that sounds delicious, doesn't it? Different cheeses would be worth different amounts. It would actually be pretty awesome at first, but eventually it would fail because we'd eat all the money).
-We could genetically engineer an army of killer zombies and unleash them on ourselves.
-We could allow the big banks to use campaign contributions to control both political parties, and therefore the government, leading to an endless cycle of economic failures at the hands of the economic equivalent of war profiteers. (wait, we're already doing that one? Uh oh). I probably won't get a lot of support for possible solution #2.

(Sidenote: I don't really have anything against actual bankers. I interned at a big bank in grad school. Everyone has to make a living, there are plenty of good, regular people working in the financial sector and it isn't their fault that the system is a mess)

I guess there's a third possibility. We could invade Mexico. If you wait around long enough, I'm sure you'll see some intrepid young President come up with an excuse to invade Mexico (manifest destiny!), but until then, like I said, there's nothing we can do.

Poetry and Prose

Before we start, and this is sort of around the same topic as the rest of this post, it's in the neighborhood anyway. What's up with the Senate Majority Leader? First of all, I was surprised to find out that Harry Reid has the ability to say anything even remotely interesting or note-worthy. Second, it's not the racism in Harry Reid's comment about Barack Obama that struck me, so much as it was the inability to stop himself. Most people, if they accidentally said the first thing, about people being more comfortable with Obama because of his "light skin", would catch themselves and try to walk it back. Senator Reid, on the other hand, kept digging until he got to the part about Barack Obama not having a "negro dialect, unless he chooses to". I can't even begin to guess at what he meant by "negro dialect". Also, I know it's tough for some people to keep up with the politically correct lingo, but I'm pretty sure we all got the memo about "negro". For me, the real genius is the "unless" section. There's just so much there to be uncomfortable about, it's like a 7-layer dip of racial insensitivity. I may have to read that whole book. OK, on to the blog...

A broken campaign promise is the easiest target in politics. Especially now, when even local politicians can't say anything without being video taped. All you have to do is show the tape of the candidate making a promise followed by the new footage of the same person saying or doing exactly the opposite of what was promised, and there it is. Candidate Obama explicitly and repeatedly promised to have Congressional health care negotiations televised on CSPAN. Now, not only is the White House not pushing Congress to have televised negotiations, but they are, in fact, pushing Congress to skip conference committee negotiations altogether to get a bill to the President's desk as quickly as possible.

This was a silly and unkeepable campaign promise and candidate Obama, then a Senator, knew better(by the way, blogger spellcheck insists that unkeepable isn't a word. I say it's my blog and I decide what's a word). Cynically, I think the Obama campaign knew this was a good thing to promise, even if it couldn't be delivered. I think they also knew failure to deliver on this promise could be blamed on Congress. And I think they knew that while people liked this idea when they heard it, they wouldn't really get that upset when it didn't happen. Come to think of it, maybe I'm not the cynical one.

The fun part about this is even the Republicans aren't making too much noise about it, because they don't want to negotiate in public anymore than anyone else does. Even the political media gave it sort of a glancing blow, because they know any televised negotiations would be proceeded by secret private negotiations so all the tough decisions could be made before they got in front of the cameras. And I'm not really bothered either, because I think if the average person actually saw how political deals get done in this country, they'd be overwhelmed by the urge to sit down in a corner and cry for a while.

This whole little episode reminded me of the old saying about campaigning in poetry in governing in prose. I've actually thought about this a few times lately, since the Senate has spent the last few months embarrassing themselves on national TV whenever they get the chance, and I don't remember any campaign promises about the Senate floor looking like recess in a kindergarten. It used to be the House of Representatives was the arrogant, inexperienced, childish, power hungry idiots of Washington, and the Senate was supposed to be the grown-ups. Now where do I find the grown-ups? If the Senate is currently writing prose, it's a 3200 page novel with a picture of a giant middle finger on the cover.

I bring this up now because it's about to be campaign season again. That's right! Put on your votin' shoes, it's the 2010 midterm elections! I'm usually the kind of person who tells people to pay attention and vote, because it's important. And it should be important, the whole House and a little over 1/3rd of the Senate is up for re-election. Honestly though, I'm not excited, at this point I'm barely even interested. Why? I feel like I don't really care what any of the candidates are saying.

I'll hear Republicans tell me about tax cuts. Republicans are like South Park underpants gnomes when it comes to the economy. Phase 1: tax cuts - Phase 2: ? - Phase 3: thriving economy. Democrats will tell me about tax cuts too, but they'll be far less convincing. The national security debate will be similarly similar, but I won't care because, as far as I can tell, Congress' role in national security presently seems to be limited to bitching about it. I might even hear some Republicans tell me about big government liberalism, and maybe even socialism(my thoughts on that last thing are coming soon to an internet near you).

Right now, the most interesting thing for me about Republicans this year is whether or not they'll go back to illegal immigration as an issue. It's hard for Republicans to talk about immigration without offending Hispanic voters, which would be political suicide at the moment. On the other hand, I wonder if they can't help themselves. On top of everything, I'll have to endure the usual Republican talking points about values and misreading the second amendment, and more than a few tearful rants from Glenn Beck.

Impossibly, the Democrats are somehow worse. Why worse? Because I don't care what Democratic candidates say. The party as a whole can't govern worth a damn. I swear if you took 4 Democratic Senators to an IHOP and told them they couldn't have any food until they agreed on one style of pancakes for all four of them to eat, they'd all die of starvation. So Democrats can make a lot of promises, and some of them will be good ideas, but I have no confidence they can get anything done.

This isn't to say I hate both parties. I don't think either party is inherently bad, or full of bad people. One of the underlying points of the poetry and prose quote is the idea that you can't really govern in poetry, and you can't win by campaigning in prose. I've also commented here that we get the leaders we deserve, and we get the campaigns we deserve too. My point is only that I'm having a hard time getting interested in this next round of elections, and I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one. I'll try my best to pay attention and care, but I think it'll be a lot like eating my vegetables. It's hard to care that much when it's so difficult to see any real correlation between campaign promises and governing actions.

Maybe I can start a third party. We're going to need a name though, and maybe some principles. Tell you what, I'll get back to you on that. Either way, I don't think my new, awesome third party is going to be ready for 2010. So, in the mean time, I have to try and muster an argument for getting invested in the upcoming midterm elections. Here's the best I can do...

The crazies on both sides of the aisle will be voting. Both parties have plenty of misguided lunatics, and they like to vote. So, if the rest of us stay home, we're pretty much letting the lunatics decide our future. Hmm, yeah I think that did it. I'm off to learn who's running against my current Congressman. I voted for him last time, and as far as I can tell, he's been pretty much inert since then (OK, that's probably not fair, but I watch as much political news as anyone and I haven't heard his name once in a year, so, at best, he seems to be voting as he's told and staying quiet). If the Republican in the race seems smart and reasonable, he's got a decent shot at my vote. If not, maybe I'll stick with the current guy, if I haven't heard his name at all, at least it means he hasn't done or said anything incredibly stupid yet, like, say, the Senate Majority Leader.