Clinton/McCain Throw the Public a Bone

During the heydays of the old Soviet Union, to keep the people from complaining too loudly, the Soviet Politburo would raise the allowance on the amount of food the Russian people were allowed to buy. Instead of one loaf of bread; you could buy two. Instead of a can of soup; you could get three.

In the days before the French Revolution, Marie Antoinette, on being told that the French people were starving, was overheard as saying, “let them eat cake”.

Senator Hillary Clinton and Senator John McCain, upon hearing that the gas crisis was putting a hurting on the wallets of the average American citizen and their ability to buy enough food for their household have decided to throw the public, that proverbial dog, a bone by proposing to suspend the gas tax over the summer months … or basically give us all 30 dollars; or a half a tank of gas.

A half of tank of gas … on which, Senator Clinton thinks we should drive to our nearest bar and drink our sorrows away while Republicans John McCain and George Bush want us to ‘just travel and spend money’.

Thanks for the bone; for all that it is worth … a half of tank of gas which many burn in one to two days of travel back and forth to work.

It’s time for an economic plan that makes sense for Clinton and McCain’s plan is so faulty that economists disagree with it and favor Senator Obama’s plan.

It’s time to stop talking turkey when it comes to looking for alternative fuel sources and to start weaning the United States off of foreign oil.

It’s time for change.

It’s time for Barack Obama. Please see his latest video ad and his opinion on Hillary and John’s “bone” to the public.

 

John McCain’s “Pastor Hagee” problem

While the Republicans are cheering over the issues created for Senator Barack Obama by his former Reverend, Jeremiah Wright, they won’t be smiling for very long. 

You see, the Republicans chosen one, Senator John McCain, has his own “reverend” problem in the form of Pastor,TV evangelist and author, John Hagee. 

John Hagee is the founder of Cornerstone Church in San Antonio, Texas. His style of preaching has been classified as a ‘hellfire and brimstone’ style; kind of like a car salesman with whose pants are on fire. Outside of normality, Hagee denounces Romans chapter 9 through 11 and believes that belief in Jesus Christ is not necessary for salvation and that all Christians are ‘duty bound’ to support Israel no matter what it’s government does. Hagee has written in his book Jersualem Countdown that war in the Middle East will bring about the Second Coming of Christ. Hagee also has a history of being accused of being anti-Catholic, anti-Islamic and has been criticized by Jewish leader, Rabbi Eric Yoffie, as an ‘extremist’. 

Hagee has continuously denounced abortion and homosexuality which are common ‘cornerstones’, to borrow a word, of the conservative movement. He took this movement to new heights, however, when he claimed that Hurricane Katrina, which devastated the City of New Orleans in 2005, was brought upon because of “the judgment of God against the city of New Orleans.” “….New Orleans had a level of sin that was offensive to God,” Hagee said, because “there was to be a homosexual parade there on the Monday that the Katrina came.”

Apparently, San Francisco, New York and Las Vegas and several other major cities across the globe were spared God’s wrath.

Hagee endorsed McCain on February 27, 2008 whereupon McCain has been quoted as saying, “”I’m very proud to have Pastor Hagee’s support.”

Really, what else is there about Mr. Hagee we should know about?

Hagee on Hurricane Katrina

“All hurricanes are acts of God because God controls the heavens. I believe that New Orleans had a level of sin that was offensive to God and they were recipients of the judgment of God for that.” [NPR Fresh Air, 9/18/06]

Hagee on Islamic Beliefs

Fresh Air host Terry Gross asked if Hagee believed that “all Muslims have a mandate to kill Christians and Jews,” to which Hagee replied, “Well, the Quran teaches that. Yes, it teaches that very clearly.” [NPR Fresh Air, 9/18/06]

Hagee on African-Americans

The San Antonio Express-News reported that Hagee was going to “meet with black religious leaders privately at an unspecified future date to discuss comments he made in his newsletter about a ’slave sale,’ an East Side minister said Wednesday.” The Express-News reported:

“Hagee, pastor of the 16,000-member Cornerstone Church, last week had announced a ’slave sale’ to raise funds for high school seniors in his church bulletin, ‘The Cluster.’

“The item was introduced with the sentence ‘Slavery in America is returning to Cornerstone” and ended with “Make plans to come and go home with a slave.” [San Antonio Express-News 3/7/96]

Hagee on Catholicism

“Most readers will be shocked by the clear record of history linking Adolf Hitler and the Roman Catholic Church in a conspiracy to exterminate the Jews.” [Jerusalem Countdown by John Hagee]

Hagee on Women

“Do you know the difference between a woman with PMS and a snarling Doberman pinscher? The answer is lipstick. Do you know the difference between a terrorist and a woman with PMS? You can negotiate with a terrorist.” [God's Profits: Faith, Fraud and the Republican Crusade for Values Voters, Sarah Posner]

“[T]he feminist movement today is throwing off authority in rebellion against God’s pattern for the family.” ["Bible Positions on Political Issues," John Hagee]

Hagee on LGBT Americans

“The newspaper carried the story in our local area that was not carried nationally that there was to be a homosexual parade there on the Monday that the Katrina came. And the promise of that parade was that it was going to reach a level of sexuality never demonstrated before in any of the other Gay Pride parades. So I believe that the judgment of God is a very real thing. I know that there are people who demur from that, but I believe that the Bible teaches that when you violate the law of God, that God brings punishment sometimes before the day of judgment.” [NPR Fresh Air, 9/18/06]

Hagee on Iran

“The coming nuclear showdown with Iran is a certainty,” Hagee wrote [in 2006] in the Pentecostal magazine Charisma. “Israel and America must confront Iran’s nuclear ability and willingness to destroy Israel with nuclear weapons. For Israel to wait is to risk committing national suicide.” [The Nation, 8/8/2006, http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060814/new_christian_zionism]

It is pretty apparent that McCain will not be laughing at Senator Obama for very long as ‘guilt by association’ is the new guideline for choosing a candidate for President. If this keeps up, with Senator Clinton already having a closetful of skeletons, this type of rosetta stone for President will leave very few people able to accept the nomination come August.

Let’s See Real Solutions

A nice article appeared in PhillyBurbs today about Barack Obama’s late remark about us Pennsylvanians being ‘bitter’. What is it, critics ask, do we have to be so ‘bitter’ about?

To quote a few paragraphs from the well-written article by Pamela Washington of Levittown, “People are losing their homes, their jobs, their self-respect, ambition, and the belief that the government is designed to support them. Instead, some people become most active and vocal in areas of their lives that they feel they have the most control — sometimes gun control or gay rights.

But they want schools that are funded adequately to provide their children with a quality education, not just a law that imposes policies on local school districts without providing the funding to implement them.

They want to work for a company that will remain within U.S. borders, pay them a decent wage, provide them with health care and a means to prepare for their golden years.

They want a government that will legislate to bring jobs back to the United States, provide health care for all constituents, secure Social Security or a similar program for working people, secure our borders from illegal immigrants and terrorists, and provide academic and employment opportunities for our youth so they no longer see crime as a viable choice for employment.”

Those are good reasons to be ‘bitter’ to me.

Much has been made over the remark by conservative radio junkies, but little has been offered by either Hillary Clinton, or John McCain, to prove otherwise; that we are not bitter. Instead of offering solutions to our ‘bitterness’, both Clinton and McCain could only offer personal attacks upon Senator Obama. Hillary even went as far as stating that we should just ‘have a few drinks’; to drown out our sorrows. McCain, who is proving himself as inept to me as George Bush is, could only offer a solution of ’spend more money’.

I guess we could do this, of course, if we actually weren’t so ‘bitter” over the fact that we don’t have any money to spend!

Way to go John! 

Hillary, of course, is even worse for her ‘band-aid’ to solve our economic woes is to just get drunk and forget about it.

Nice.

Perhaps when Hillary and John can actually offer solutions to our problems instead of deflecting our concerns with personal attacks we may actually consider voting for them.