A Little Political Rant

There have been stretches of time on this blog when I have been more active commenting on what was going on in the news. Recently, though, I have stepped back a little with my reactions, especially regarding the political give-and-take (and grandstanding) that will most assuredly only intensify in the coming weeks as presidential campaign fever settles in on the media. I pretty much know where I stand on the issues, which more approximates the Democratic viewpoint than the Republican.

I find it extremely disingenuous of long-established GOP lawmakers, who scarcely raised a brow during the George W. Bush era of massive deficits and who rubber-stamped that deficit spending with their votes, suddenly "getting religion" on this issue the moment that a Democratic president was sworn into office. I resent the phony stances that the Republicans have taken over the years (flag-burning amendments, anti-gay rights ballot initiatives, the Terri Schiavo fiasco, opposing any reasonable immigration reform) that fly in the face of reasonable political debate. The idea fomented by a perverse alliance between libertarians and the Christian right that government is evil unless it is used to pass into law and enforce a particular moral/religious code on everyone is in itself evil, in my opinion. And don't get me started on the right-wing media and how it has taken over the Republican Party to the extent that otherwise reasonable politicians like John Huntsman, Tim Pawlenty, and Mitt Romney now feel the need to pander to the peculiar worldviews and egos of ideological talk jocks of the likes of Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity.

By contrast, I see the Democrats as representing more or less the status quo, the party that is more likely to keep things stable and predictable in America. I don't like everything they do, though, and there is an extremist wing of this party that I find unrealistic in their agenda. But compared to the extremists running the Republican party, they are much weaker and fewer in number.

As of now, I sadly see the Republicans as the party of ideology and the Democrats as the party of centrism and looking for practical solutions to the many difficult problems facing us today. I hear NONE of the Republican politicians speaking to my interests and concerns, only to the far right, be that the corporate far-right or the religious far-right. That's a shame, for I do think that conservatism is an important part of political debate but has been demagogued to the point where mainstream, reasonable conservatives have been marginalized within their own political party by the more extreme elements.