Well, I make a pretty strange conservative. I don't watch Fox News (nor
MSNBC for the same reason). I favor a single payer health system (or
even Obama/Romney Care with a lot of caveats) and I think the fiscal
cliff should be resolved by a 50/50 split of tax increases (did I say
that?) and expense reductions. But I did vote for Romney because I
consider him a moderate Republican (despite the lies he had to tell to
get the nomination) and for the reason I stated below which is that I
thought he had the best chance of working a compromise with the Senate
and House.
And there is one other big reason which is that I gravely fear the well
meaning intentions of the Obama EPA. After about 3 years of fairly
intense study I am convinced that the modest climate change we have seen
is primarily natural, that we have no way to predict where its going and
any attempt to defeat it is bound to failure and will be an absolute
colossal waste of resources and a major drain on world economies.
Furthermore, if I'm wrong, I'm not much concerned about it. That's
because I also follow the ideas of Bjorn Lomborg (a Danish economist)
who (unlike me) believes that much of the climate change is
anthropogenically caused. But whether it is or not I agree with him in
accepting his economic analysis which is that mitigation of the effects
of climate change is vastly cheaper than trying to prevent it. He argues
that, even if we can defeat it, we will sacrifice untold numbers of the
poor because of the resources foolishly wasted on trying to save what
will be a much richer world population in 2100 rather than the poor of
today's world who are dying of disease and malnutrition today. If
you're unaware of Lomborg see this 16 minute TED presentation on
establishing global priorities. Fighting climate change is the last
thing on the list.
<http://www.ted.com/talks/bjorn_lomborg_sets_global_priorities.html>
Chuck Norcutt
On 11/8/2012 10:48 AM, Bob Whitmire wrote:
> Well, this is hardly the place to really rock the vote, but I think
you're way, way off. As I see it, the Tea Party took a buggering on the
order of the German army at Stalingrad. The President won handily in an
election a lot of people were banking on him losing. If you were a
multi-millionaire or billionaire funder of Super Pacs, literally banking
on him to lose, it was worse than Stalingrad. I wonder if Karl Rove is
wearing a fedora and sunglasses with his cell turned off?
>
> It's not the same Congress, either. More Dems in the Senate, 9 more
Dems in the House. All the rape guys lost, and lost big. Plus there's
some fairly luminous demographic handwriting on the wall. Don't know if
the GOP has enough sense to actually read it, as they seem to spend all
their time over at Fox News, but the handwriting's there. (If you want
to really see some election night entertainment, get hold of a clip of
when the Fox News team sent one of their own down to the boiler room to
challenge the numbers guys on the early calling of Ohio. It's a riot.
Really. Unless you like Fox News. Then it's not so funny.)
>
> Don't get me wrong. I'm happy it turned out the way it did. But I'm
not happy with the state of American politics. I believe the
conservative movement has a lot of offer, in fact I believe it's a
necessary component of our two-party system. IN a lot of ways, I'm more
at home on the conservative side of things, but it's been usurped by a
bunch of raging lunatics who believe no compromise is the only
compromise. That element of the party really took a drubbing, and the
drubbing will continue in the coming years if sensible conservatives
(such as yourself) don't reassert control.
>
> I'm probably a lost cause to conservatives because of Tea Party
lunatics and religious zealots. Can't abide either. Matter of taste. So
I remain a registered Independent, caucusing with the Democrats--for the
time being.
>
> That's all I have to say on the subject. Probably. Well, maybe.
> <wink>
>
> --Bob
>
>
> On Nov 7, 2012, at 6:10 PM, Chuck Norcutt wrote:
>
>> Yup, for 2% on the popular vote and hardly a mandate... it was low and
>> petty, but I just couldn't help myself. :-)
>>
>> Actually, I voted for Romney since I figured the congress would end up
>> with exactly the same split that it's had for the past 4 years. And it
>> has. That likely means that Obama wouldn't be able to work with the
>> House next year any more than he has in prior years. Romney might not
>> do any better with either the Senate or the House but I figured he had
>> at least some chance of doing so. Happy financial cliffing.
>
--
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