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| Rob's Soapbox | ||
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Congratulations!
You have finally landed on the one page on this entire site (and on the entire internet for that matter) that is purely without bullshit... my soapbox page. There are a lot of times during our show that, whether it's because of time constraints and other obligations, I don't always get to address some issues that I feel don't get the attention they deserve. There are even more times when I just don't feel like waiting until the show the next day to get some things off my chest. Thus, I have started the "Rob's Soapbox" page. If you have clicked on this page looking for someone to coddle your fragile sense of self-esteem, or tell you what you want to hear or to reinforce your outdated world view, then exit this page right now and go somewhere else. If you are in search of the last forum for reason and common sense left in the world, then sit back, relax, and enjoy. I make only one promise with this soapbox page... if you read long enough and often enough, you will eventually be offended. So here's my latest soapbox. Listen up, 'cause you just might learn something... |
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April 20th, 2009 THE REPUBLICANS ARE TO BLAME With almost no exception, everything going wrong in America today can and should be laid at the feet of the political leaders of the Republican Party and those of you who have staunchly and unwaveringly supported them. I am a political and fiscal conservative; I say so proudly and without apology. I believe in the power of the individual, small government, few taxes and a strong national defense system. Those are the core, defining principles that I rise and fall with each day and night and they are principles identical to those of America’s founding fathers. I am also a man without a political party. For the past two decades I have tolerated the Republican Party’s hypocrisy on issues that went against my core principals but ultimately affected matters that I personally cared about very little. Conservatives are supposed to believe in small government and the right to privacy of the individual, yet the Republican Party has made an ass of itself by attempting to censor pornography. Conservatives are supposed to stand for private choice and control (and no government intervention upon such matters), yet when Terry Schiavo’s husband wanted to allow his vegetative wife to die naturally, the Republican Party attempted to stop him, hiding behind a cowardly “culture of life;” barf. Conservatives are supposed to stand for a strong homeland made up of laws, not men, and a welcoming, though strict, legal immigration policy; yet, when a small boy from the Communist country of Cuba is brought to America, we are told by the Republican Party to look the other way and allow Elian Gonzalez to stay in America, as the party continues to fight a cold war that’s been over since before the debut of Seinfeld. I have tolerated such differences and many others because we live in a two party country and the Republicans still get it right occasionally, while the Democrats seemingly never do. Forced to choose, I have continued, begrudgingly, to support bad candidates and lame ideas emanating from the Republican Party since the alternate choice was even worse. It’s akin, I suppose, to choosing death by lethal injection over being drawn and quartered. The end result is the same, but the pain is far less. I enjoy talking politics with people. Mainly, I suppose, because I am so well versed on the issues and so able to separate my emotions from the facts; that’s the beauty of not being married to a political party. I have liberal friends, conservative friends, and a whole bunch of friends who lean one way or the other and hate both parties equally, but ultimately seem to side with the same party over and over again when push comes to shove (I’m in that last group, always siding with the Republicans and hating every minute of it). Lately, I have been driving my Republican friends crazy with logic; a pastime I enjoy more than almost any other. I truly love presenting facts and reason to people in an attempt to force them to examine their very soul. It’s a hobby. To those of you who declare yourselves “Republicans,” or even “conservatives,” I say this: President Barack Obama is exactly who we thought he was, isn’t he? He is nothing more than a socialist masquerading as a presidential Robin Hood, whose singular goal is to level the playing field of America not by lifting people up, but by tearing the successful people down. Obama wants a nation of people reliant on the government and wants to control and curtail behavior as he and his followers see fit. Obama believes that military might is obnoxious and America should be nicer; he wants no one to suffer anywhere, ever, and he believes that if you aren’t suffering you should feel guilty about it and give away what you have to someone who is suffering. Obama wants to advance the canard of man-made global warming in an attempt to save a planet that doesn’t need to be saved so that he and his followers can feel self-important. Obama is exactly who we said he was and would be and even more. In less than 3 months, he has been far scarier than most of us dreamed. He is our worst nightmare. And his presidency is completely the fault of the Republican Party. You’ve gotten exactly what you deserve. The American people did not elect Barack Obama because they supported his policies. They elected him because he was something different. Many voted for him hoping for change. Do the math; on the heels of the most unpopular president in history, Obama still only got 52% of Americans to vote for him; that’s hardly a mandate. Yet too many people were so fed up with what they’d lived with, they were willing to find out the answer to the question, “how can it get any worse?” In fact, as we argued the presidential campaign day after day during the summer of 2008, the number one reason given by caller and e-mailer after caller and e-mailer was “I am voting for Obama because he can’t be worse than Bush.” This to me was the nation in a nutshell. People actually believed that things couldn’t get worse. Imagine the ignorance of an American actually claiming things couldn’t get worse; how do you think that hypothesis goes over in Rwanda? Do you think a lot of Holocaust survivors are sympathetic to the claim that things can’t get worse than the most unpopular president in America? Probably not; how about citizens of Mexico? Do you think they honestly believe that things can’t get worse than living in America under George W. Bush? The good news is that everyone is in the process of learning the answer to the question “how can it get any worse?” How does government controlled everything sound for starters? 90% taxes on the most successful amongst us (again)? Electricity bills tripled as a result of a dishonest environmental policy? A weakened homeland more susceptible to attack? An attack on the second amendment? Most importantly, my Republican friends, how does it feel to be totally responsible for all of this? Those of you who have blindly supported Republicans and/or been anti-Democrat have gotten exactly what you deserved. In the weeks after 9/11, President Bush stupidly responded to an attack on our nation by creating a giant new government agency called the Department of Homeland Security; at that time I stood against such an outlandish idea; my Republican friends, who on principle should be against larger government, made stupid comments like, “well, it’s better than what Al Gore would have done,” which of course is un-provable and had nothing to do with reality or the argument at hand. Come to think of it, it appears as though silly statements are the hallmarks of both sides of the political spectrum; whether it be “how can it get worse,” or “Bush is better than Gore would have been,” dopey statements that simply state “my side is better than your side,” have become the new normal when it comes to the American political debate. So be it; you’re all getting exactly what you deserve, and America as a nation is suffering for it. Perhaps one day we’ll return to honest debate…a boy can dream, can’t he?
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