Saddleback and Why I'm Taking a Couple of Days Off

I thought both candidates did well in their conversations with Rick Warren. I liked Obama better, which isn't surprising because I like Obama better, but McCain was fine, too. We could more or less cancel the rest of the campaign, at this point, because we know what the two men are: reflections of the two ends of the political spectrum as posited by my Theory of Everything.

Obama looks inward, McCain out. Obama's world is all about improving ourselves, and McCain's world is all about going out into the world to seek enemies. Obama would "confront" evil through moral certainty and strength; McCain would "destroy" evil though the application of military force. Which kind of government do you want?

I'm tired of politics. The next couple of months are going to be nothing but tactical probes by the campaigns looking for a weakness that can generate a meaningless media flare-ups. Everyone is going to feign outrage or, worse yet, feel genuine outrage at things that don't matter. We here out in the electorate are apparently going to fall for it, because if we weren't they wouldn't do it. We'll get the government we deserve, God help us.

It will be particularly difficult as a Democrat, since the Republican strategy is to hype up the base by turning people like me into enemies of America. That's maybe what I dislike most about watching the news these days: John McCain and his angry Greek chorus, telling real Americans that what people like me believe is treason. I love being lectured on family values by hypocritical adulterers and having my faith questioned by people whose belief in God grows suspiciously more prominent during a campaign. I love sitting out in TV Land listening to someone on TV telling me that I'm unpatriotic because I hold the previously conservative position that the United States doesn't need to change the world through military adventurism, that I'm on the side of the terrorists because I believe in the Constitution.

At Saddleback, the great issues of our time were barely mentioned. The decision of what kind of country we're going to be, how we're going to deal with a world where cheap energy is a thing of the past, how we're going to adjust to what Fareed Zakaria calls "the rise of the rest"...nothing. Rick Warren did a nice job, but he's micro and the Presidency is macro.

For all the talk about media diversity, it's amazing how everyone zeros in on the same thing. I skimmed through four cable news nets last night and exactly the same clip of Obama at Saddleback was playing on all four. As a nation, we're in a psychological rut, and as a human being I'm in a personal rut. My personal life right now is office, hotel, office, hotel. I feel like one of those road comics who ends up with nothing but material about television and convenience stores, because that's all they ever experience. I've got work and television, and all television is about is politics and all politics is about is...well, nothing, actually. Our Presidential race is like one of those incredibly stupid, time-killing arguments my teenage sons have when they don't have anything to do. Like the other day, when I told them they needed to mow the lawn:

Older Boy: I get the back yard.
Younger Boy: How come you get the back?
Older Boy: You want the back?
Younger Boy: I don't care...

Every night,our political dialog consist of a highly paid media and political elite doing what my kids do, doing what drives me absolutely nuts. Then I write about it and get no satisfaction from the process and then my readers take a moment to call me an idiot.

This seems, to me, a less than satisfying way to spend my time.

I feel like I'm skimming over the top of life, and this blog is a reflection of that. I think I want to get away from wide and try for deep, stop writing about everything and start writing about one thing. So I'm taking a couple of days off. I'm going to rethink this blog and, inasmuch as F/A is reflection of real life, figure out what my my personal project for the next couple of years is going to be. The result will be, hopefully, a new set of things to read, think and write about. That may be a lot to ask of a couple of days off, but what the hell.

I'll see you in a couple of days.

Comments

[Mrs. A]

I think you should blog about traveling the world. Not alone, mind you. You'd have to take your lovely wife with you.

[Wally]

Ignnore the previous comment at your peril

[Wally]

Ignore the previous comment at your peril

[James]

Video games and bicycling are a lot of fun. You should also bring back sex day . . . what ever happened to that. It's all politics recently. Not that I don't enjoy reading politics, but it can be depressing to decide which of two bad candidates is worse.

[Lee]

I've always been a fan of the pointless rudeness.

[Squidley]

I hope you will continue to blog after recharging, and I look forward to your non-political writing, because you are a gifted writer.

However, I really must contest your assertion that the two candidates are at the opposite ends of the political spectrum.

McCain is a RINO, a closet Democrat, a liberal who wraps himself up in "patriotism." He is famous for being a "maverick," which means thumbing his nose at Republicans and conservatives in order to appeal to Democrats and Independents. As Lawrence Auster put it, "[McCain] is devoid of any intellectual process. Here is his modus operandi. He has certain sentiments and impulses, and he has a big ego, and he gloms on to an occasional "cause," typically a very bad cause such as campaign finance reform or the legalization of all illegal aliens, and he pushes it with all his might as though the fate of the country depended on it, making himself look heroic and important by the importance he attributes to that issue. Could there be a prospective president less thoughtful, more incurious than Busherino? With McCain, we're looking at him."

On the other hand, we have Obama, who is a stealth socialist. By being vague on everything, by having no record of substance, he allows us to project on to him what we wish to see. Those of us paying attention to the man behind the curtain, however, see his unsavory associates: racists (Wright), unrepentant terrorists (Ayers), anti-Americans (Michelle). What's more, as explained in Investor's Business Daily, Obama is inspired by the radical leftist activist Saul Alinsky. Using the deceptive techniques extolled by Alinsky, Obama is poised to thrust socialism upon an unsuspecting American people.

Two extremes, indeed--on the left side of the political spectrum.

[fish]

Squid....You just can't help yourself can you?

[fish]

is poised to thrust socialism upon an unsuspecting American people.

Unsuspecting? Americans are great socialists. We love our handouts. Mortgage got you down....Uncle Stupids got your back! Neighbor making 5K a year more than you...we'll fix him! Unsuspecting my ass!

Crap. I guess I can't help myself either!

[Squidley]

Well, fish, not everyone thinks it's a good idea to bail out the people who are defaulting on their mortgages. Not everyone agrees with Obama's class-struggle plan to increase taxes on oil companies, which anyone with half a brain realizes will be paid by consumers, not corporations.

More importantly, most Americans disagree with Obama's radical agenda--cleverly disguised in palatable rhetoric. His plans to massively increase the amount of Federal spending is called "recasting the safety net woven by FDR and LBJ." He decries the "winner take all" market, but this is an attack on our capitalist economic system--the system proven to increase societal wealth and well-being most effectively. His plans for unprecedented tax increases, increases which can only harm the economy, are cast as "restoring fairness to the tax system," because after all, for a socialist, your money isn't yours--it's for the government to take and spend for you. Socialists always believe that unaccountable bureaucrats know how to spend your money better than you do. Most Americans disagree.

No, there's a hidden agenda here, and it's a socialist one.

[fish]

No, there's a hidden agenda here, and it's a socialist one

Not so well hidden that you couldn't pick up on it. Without evidence I'll assume that most Americans have the perceptiveness to see what you see and still vote for Obama.

(Watch me contradict myself immediately below.)

Obama's class-struggle plan to increase taxes on oil companies, which anyone with half a brain realizes will be paid by consumers, not corporations

Half a brain....you're being far to generous! Remember that this is a country that voted for Clinton and GW TWICE! It would have been far more accurate to state that we are no longer capable of self government.

His plans for unprecedented tax increases, increases which can only harm the economy...

I'm not sure that you've noticed but its not just individual citizens looking for handouts these days. Fannie, Freddie (or Phony and Fraudie if you prefer), Chrysler and a whole bunch of others who consider themselves too big to fail have their hands out as well. Since people and business constitute the bulk of the "economy" I think its safe to assume that we are all okay as wards of the state.

His plans for unprecedented tax increases, increases which can only harm the economy, are cast as "restoring fairness to the tax system,"...

Well we have been told that "deficits don't matter", that we can project power across the whole of the earth at no cost, democratize (yeah cuz its working so well here) every shit hole country in the world, all have "free" health care, all go to college on our benevolent uncle, fund the greatest generations drug habit, take care of everyone for all time and in all cases without any economic pain or consequence. Maybe its time that we get the economics lesson that we so desperately need!

Face it! Obama will almost certainly be elected, unless the she dragon manages to pull a stunt at the convention, and he's writing check that our asses can't cash.

Grab some popcorn and sit back and enjoy it.

[Wally]

"plans to massively increase the amount of Federal spending"

I am hoping Obama will not increase Federal spending but reallocate where it is spent. Maybe shift some funding from Iraq to the home front?

[yankeegirl]

Thankfully for me I have a 9 year old to temper my political television viewing. He much prefers the history channel or the military channel. Lest you think I'm raising him republican, the last McCain ad he saw where it said "I'm John McCain & I approved this message" he chimed right in and said "Yeah, but I bet Obama didn't!" lol
I'm a former political news junkie( and former republican) and I have absolutely no interest in the approaching political season.

[Squidley]

fish, your swipes at W are well-placed. I agree with you.

My attack on Obama should not be seen as approval of W, who will certainly be rated by future historians as one of our "less distinguished" presidents (not in the bottom tier, but in the one just above it, I'd say), nor should it be misconstrued as an endorsement of the abominable McCain, who will be a terrible president. We haven't had a good president since Reagan, and we have no hope for one until 2012 at the earliest. (Unless! Whoever wins picks a good VP, and something happens to the president before his term is up.)

I stand by my prediction: many Americans feel, for reasons that have nothing to do with racism™, that a black man is an inappropriate choice for POTUS. Many Americans also believe that Obama's atypical background and extreme political positions are inappropriate for the job. McCain is an awful, awful candidate, and he should be way behind in the polls--but he's getting stronger as people learn more about Obama.

I understand Yankeegirl's position: with candidates this bad, it barely matters who wins, so what's the point in paying attention?