Vote For McCain

Well, the New York Primary is coming up, just one of many states who will be voting a week from today to try to choose a Democratic and Republican nominee. I still think it's way too early for this and if we're going to have a Super Tuesday, let's have it around May or June so we are not subjected to 9 months of back-and-forth between the two presumptive nominees if indeed we decide them next Tuesday.

As I do live in New York and intend to vote in next Tuesday's Republican primary, I'mr sure you're wondering if I'm going to endorse someone. Actually, it's more likely that you don't care who I'm endorsing; in fact, I wrote an entry 8 years ago titled, "Like Anyone Cares Who I'm Endorsing." Be that as it may, I am using this space tonight to state why I am supporting Senator John McCain of Arizona and why you should too.

One big reason is that we need someone in the White House who we can trust. Let's face it; even most Republicans will admit that President Bush hasn't exactly been someone we feel comfortable trusting behind the wheel of our nation these last 8 years. John McCain doesn't just use "straight talk" as a campaign slogan; it's something he truly believes in. You may not like the stands he has taken, but he can tell you honestly and truthfully why he believes as he does. He's certainly a much better speaker than Bush. He's been firmly behind the Iraq War, declaring that we went in with a bad strategy before Bush would admit it, and supporting the surge even though it sunk his candidacy for several months until the surge proved successful. And he's not afraid to admit mistakes. While it's been a major bullet point of competing campaigns that McCain voted against the Bush tax cuts, he has seen the error of his ways and pledged to make them permanent. And he HATES earmarks. He wants to see spending reduced in Washington and pork eliminated.

However, the main reason I am for McCain is because he fits what I want to see in a Republican presidential nominee... which is exactly what right-wingers don't want to see. I've made it pretty clear in this blog/column over the years that I'm a moderate. As such and especially during election years, I get treated as persona non grata by my party. This is really unfortunate considering the fact that conservatives swear allegiance to the memory of Ronald Reagan, who as Barack Obama reminded us recently, was able to reach beyond the right wing to moderates for his appeal (remember Reagan Democrats?) Oh by the way, for making that statement, Obama was roundly trashed by his Democratic rivals for breaking the Prime Directive of Liberalism: NEVER praise Reagan. If you want to praise a former president, it has to be Jimmy Carter.

Anyway, I wholeheartedly agree with what David Brooks said in a recent column; the Republicans have gone from promoting the "big tent" philosophy to saying, "Conservatives only." For this, the moderate Brooks was promptly trashed by Rush Limbaugh, who called him a liberal. And this is the problem. Somewhere along the line, conservatives became as power-mad as liberals, and now they only want someone as the Republican nominee who marches in lock-step with all of their beliefs... even if it's someone who just so coincidentally changed his beliefs to match theirs in just the last few years. Of course, I would be referring to the candidate that most right-wingers are backing, Mitt Romney, former governor of Massachusetts. Anything short of that is a liberal. Moderates are liberals, so sayeth talk radio. Now anyone who reads this blog and notices how much more often I go after liberals than conservatives would know that I am definitely NOT a liberal. I know John McCain is trying to tout his conservative credentials, but I'm okay with that, because you have to try to appeal to a lot of people to be successful... but in truth, he's a moderate. And his appeal primarily comes from my fellow moderates. This is unacceptable to Limbaugh and his ilk. They take great pains to note that McCain has done best in states where Independents and Democrats can cross over and vote in the Republican primary. Have they ever stopped to think that most of those independents and maybe a few of those Democrats are FORMER REPUBLICANS? People who didn't hang on like I have and left, but now they see the opportunity to get a Republican they can be proud of into the White House?

So the smear campaign has been on pretty much since McCain won New Hampshire, the same tactics that worked for the right-wingers in 2000 are being employed once again, only they now feel they have much more ammo. Their biggest problem is that McCain (gasp!) partners with Democrats! He seeks bipartisan solutions to the nation's problems! He's for compromise! That is just simply not allowed in the Republican party, so sayeth talk radio. I've heard Rush Limbaugh say countless times that the goal of conservatism is not to make nice with liberals, it's to defeat them. Only one small problem with that... liberals are just as invested in defeating conservatives. The end result is... well, what you've seen for the past 8 years. A stalemate, or what I refer to as "50-50 Nation". Presidential elections decided by one state, gridlock in the Congress, very few of our nation's problems being fixed. Now, a majority of Americans are sick of it... the moderate majority. And they're attracted to candidates who offer a message of hope and change. Most notably, Barack Obama, but John McCain represents that as well. Because we know that you can't get anything done if it's "my way or the highway", and we've seen that prove itself to be true. But, that apparently violates the Prime Directive of Conservatism, so George Will accuses McCain of acting like a Democrat. Romney made the right-wingers orgasmic yesterday by calling McCain a liberal. McCain responded by reminding us that until just a few years ago, Romney really WAS a liberal, until of course, he decided that changing his beliefs would get him elected president.

McCain partners with Democrat Russ Feingold to curb the influence of big money in politics and conservatives declare that he curbed free speech. I've said in this blog before that money does not equal speech, and if that was the case, then people like me oughta be declaring that OUR rights to free speech are being curbed because we don't have money! He partners with Ted Kennedy on Bush's immigration reform proposal and all we've heard is "Amnesty! Amnesty! AMNESTY!" Because for right-wingers, anything short of "deport all 12 million illegal immigrants" is amnesty. He partners with Joe Lieberman (not even a Democrat anymore) on a solution to greenhouse gases and gets criticized for that... then President Bush says in his State of the Union last night that he wants legislation to stop greenhouse gases! I guess Bush is now a liberal Democrat, right? Oh by the way, didn't Bush partner with Ted Kennedy on "No Child Left Behind"?

The rhetoric has gotten so fiery that many conservatives have said that they won't vote for McCain if he wins the nomination. Oh, they'll vote for him... especially if Hillary Clinton is the alternative. Nothing unites Republicans more than she does. Tom DeLay recently went on Sean Hannity's show and declared that if McCain wins the nomination, he'll sit out the general election.

Really, Tom? You promise? Well there ya go, one more reason to vote for McCain.

Anyway, I've pretty much stopped listening to talk radio because I can't take 3 hours of Rush trashing McCain, 3 hours of Hannity trashing McCain, and 3 hours of Glenn Beck trashing McCain (I almost regret asking for his book for Christmas). They have DeLay and Karl Rove on and they fawn all over them, this despite the fact that Rove is probably one of the 3 most hated men in the country (the other 2, of course, being Dick Cheney and Bill Belichick). They don't understand that most people see these guys as everything that is wrong with the Republican party. This is our chance to make it right. We are not compromising our principles, as Limbaugh accused McCain supporters of doing. McCain represents our principles, which are not identical to those of conservatives, and we're proud of that. This is the REPUBLICAN party, not the Conservative Party, and we want to make the Republican Party one that people will respect and support once again.

While we nervously watch the results of Florida tonight, I'll just say that if you're in New York or a Super Tuesday state and you can vote in the Republican primary, I hope you'll be convinced that we should elect a person who had no problem saying that he would put his country ahead of his party. Vote McCain '08.

Sailing the Seas of Cheese

Alright, it's confession time. I'm someone who seems to be pretty set in his ways as far as what he likes and doesn't like; at least that's what you might infer from reading this blog on a regular basis. At the same time, friends of mine have made mention of a couple of things I've said recently that threw them a little, such as: "You LIKE that Fergie song? Or ANY song by Fergie for that matter?"

Yes. "Clumsy" is pretty catchy too.

You see, I'm not above having a guilty pleasure or two, not when it comes to music. Among all the classic and alternative rock you'll find in my iTunes library, I also admit to having 3 Michael Jackson songs, 1 Madonna song, and yes, even a BEE GEES song. Once in a while you hear a song absent-mindedly, like it, and it sticks with you. Or you hear an older song, it reminds you of your childhood, and even though it's something like "We Don't Need Another Hero" by Tina Turner, you still like it for the memories it conjures up.

If you haven't figured it out by now, I make NO apologies for liking this stuff. Nobody should, nor should we hide it. The same goes for movies. I admit to having a celebrity crush on Julia Stiles, so I like pretty much any movie she's ever been in... which includes "Save the Last Dance", "A Guy Thing", and yes, even "10 Things I Hate About You". Plus she's a Mets fan, which will always score brownie points with me.

(On a very serious note, bringing up "10 Things" of course brings up Heath Ledger, another case of a good young actor taken from us too soon. While we don't know a lot of the details yet, it was definitely shocking news to hear today...)

Then of course, there's TV. From my "State of the Tube" addresses of the past, you've seen that my appreciation of well-written shows makes for some uncomfortable faves. I watched every single episode of "The O.C." during its run on Fox (although I will not watch reruns on SoapNet, I mean, I've gotta have my limits). I liked "American Dreams" because it was a good family show and I'm a sucker for TV history like "American Bandstand". I watched "7th Heaven" faithfully (no pun intended) until it jumped the shark. And of course, in this space I have previously admitted to being a fan of all incarnations of "Degrassi", past and present. If Kevin Smith can be a big fan (big enough fan, in fact, to appear in 4 episodes of "Degrassi: The Next Generation" as himself), that's good enough for me. To quote Banky Edwards in "Chasing Amy", "I got a weird thing for girls who say, 'Aboot.'"

And then there's my recently-acquired habit of watching the Game Show Network. My old PD down in Chambersburg used to be into that, and I fell into the trap during my week of recuperation from having my wisdom teeth out last summer. You'll enjoy the craziest things when you're on pain meds; the crazy part is when they wear off and you STILL enjoy reruns of "Press Your Luck" and "Tic Tac Dough". But again, it's all about remembering those sublime childhood days of the 1980s, and how can you not like Wink Martindale? It's just not possible...

So there you go... guilty pleasures. We all have them, and we shouldn't feel weird about having them. I'm not gonna give everything away, but suffice to say I'm sure you now think me even more of a nutjob than before. But to that, I just bask in the knowledge that some of you out there like watching "A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila", and with that I would call us even.

Oh, and bonus points for anyone who recognized that the title of this entry is the name of a Primus album...

Fact-Checker For Hire

Before I got sick, I was preparing to write an open solicitation to a certain local newspaper to take me on as a volunteer fact-checker for both their op-ed page and letters page. I feel this is necessary, because I don't think a newspaper gives a fair forum on the issues if it just prints baseless claims by its readers, but they still show up in print, day after day. I'm not trying to stop your right to free speech, but as you may have noticed from reading this blog, whenever I write about something that is even in the least bit controversial, I link to where I got the info so you can tell I'm not just pulling it out of my hindquarters. Why can't you, the letter-writer, at least say "according to such-and-such" when you say something along the lines of "President Bush stuck me with a bad mortgage and spends my tax money on bombing Iraqi women and children" (WARNING: NOT AN ACTUAL QUOTE!), so inquiring minds like mine can at least look it up and see if you aren't just shooting your mouth off?

So as a public service, I will show some recent examples from both the op-ed and letters pages. The letter-writers will remain anonymous, because as I noted in my last entry, I can't afford a good lawyer for the inevitable libel suit. I'll name columnists, though, cuz I do that all the time and none of them could give a rip about me...

Letter-writer #1 claims that when Hillary Clinton initially tried to fix health care, she was "opposed by a partisan Congress." You mean the partisan Democrats? In 1994, when Hillary's health-care fix was proposed and rejected, the Democrats ran the Congress. That was an easy fix. Revisionist history can easily be defeated by facts.

Oh, and this letter also mentions the problem of "tax breaks for the rich." This is an easy fix, too. Look here... it's a fact-check where Bush is shown to have stuck his foot in his mouth, but that happens all the time. The point is that everyone who pays income taxes had their taxes cut by President Bush and many of the "rich" who got substantial amounts cut make $50,000, $75,000... hardly "rich", except maybe to Democrats. Of course, the rich got the biggest cuts... because they PAID THE MOST IN TAXES!

Which leads me to our favorite raving liberal, Paul Krugman, who once again proclaims that tax cuts do not increase tax revenues. So are you saying that your own newspaper was wrong, Mr. Krugman, when the New York Times reported lower deficits from higher tax revenues caused by the tax cuts? Liberals will NEVER admit that tax cuts cause economic growth that grows tax revenues, because they think the rich should be taxed as much as possible.

In this aforementioned column, Krugman slams down the growing hopes people have for a president who will bring the country together. I find it interesting that we moderates can somehow get conservatives like Cal Thomas and Kathleen Parker to come to the party on actually trying bipartisanship and seeking compromise on solutions (even as they attack John McCain, the only GOP candidate who has done that), but the liberal Krugman says forget it. You know what that says to me? He doesn't WANT to be bipartisan. It's the old "we're right, they're wrong, our side must prevail" BS that the right and left have given us for years.

Back to the letters... Letter-writer #2 writes an attack letter against Destiny, proclaiming that after all the tax breaks, it is "something that has not materialized." I guess all of us who see the steel rising when we drive past Carousel are just hallucinating. He then says that Destiny should be able to come up with "a detailed plan, timeline, and secured funding" if it has such a wonderful vision. You mean like the timeline printed in the May 20 issue of this certain local newspaper that spelled out chapter and verse of what would happen when? The one they are keeping to and are on time for a late summer opening? Maybe if you moved back here from Colorado, you'd see that.

Letter-writer #3 begins, "I watched the Tournament of Roses Parade New Year's Day on WNYS." Nope, Channel 43 in Syracuse didn't show the parade. Are you perhaps referring to this WNYS? And if so, do you know that they changed their call letters 30 YEARS AGO? Things like this are why I used to get phone calls at WSYR from people looking for WSYR-TV... and they meant Channel 3 (which was WSYR-TV until 1981). Pay some freakin' attention! That goes for both the writers and the newspaper, which should have EASILY caught the mistake since they too should know which channel is which in this town... you would think.

Lastly, Letter-writer #4... he writes to counter a previous writer who claimed that God was taken out of our history books. He cites several facts about our founding fathers that prove that these great thinkers, such as Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine, were Deists and agnostics, NOT Christians, taking the starch out of the argument that this country was created as a "Christian nation." Actually, there's nothing to fix about this one... the writer is correct on everything. Good job.

Maybe there's some hope for people after all... And as for me, I feel much better having done my part to set some people straight and get things off my still-somewhat congested chest...

Being Sick Sucks

Pop Quiz: What's the quickest way to derail any positive forward momentum that a blog and its blogger had going for it going into the New Year? How do you find a way to not be able to accomplish any of the things you wanted, no, needed to do in your last week of winter break? What's the best way to lose a week of your life and never get it back?

Answer: Get sick.

Monday evening, I got walloped by a doozy of an illness, from which I still have not fully recovered. For the first few days, I barely left my apartment. The one exception came Tuesday afternoon... because it hit 70 degrees in Syracuse in January and dammit, I was gonna at least get to experience it a little. For the most part, however, I spent my week indoors confined to the barcalounger, covered in a blanket, feeling like crap. Now I'm at the point where I feel normal for stretches, but if I have to do a lot or stress over something, my tank will hit E as soon as I let up for even a minute. Kinda like having to keep your motor running to keep your battery from dying.

I've had this particular bug before. I don't know what it's called, but I previously suffered its wrath during my one-semester "senior year" at Susquehanna University. It came on the first week of November... and when you're in your last semester of college and you have a radio job and you really have no time to be sick, a bug like this takes its sweet time going to town on you. I can thank it for completely wiping out my 21st birthday (night of drunken excess? not when you're zonked out on meds). I hit the exhaustion stage while trying to promote an on-campus Smash Mouth concert; the concert itself was the best show ever, but what I remember most is the concert ending, me turning to leave... and almost passing out. That night, I missed a chance to party with the band. Then for an encore, this bug decided to rewind to the "feel like death" stage for a few more days before I FINALLY got relief in the form of "Thanksgiving break."

So that's my getting sick story... Next time, I'll go back to the real reason you read this blog: me whining about OTHER PEOPLE, instead of MYSELF.

If This Isn't Corporate Greed, What Is?

I know this may get me in a ton of trouble, and really I don't have the money these days to pay for a good lawyer, but I have to admit that I am currently doing something which might land me in a court of law sometime soon.

I am listening to music on my computer.

No, not downloading illegally, not sharing music illegally, just listening to a Lenny Kravitz song right now, one that I ripped off his "Greatest Hits" CD a couple years and two computers ago. However, the RIAA has officially set a dangerous precedent in their unending attempt to extort money out of music fans... they are now suing people WHO BOUGHT THE MUSIC LEGALLY.

Normally I don't jump on the "corporations are evil" bandwagon, but for several years now, I've been railing against those who feel that the millions of dollars they make in the music business just isn't enough. I trashed Metallica when they went after Napster. I've long been against the Recording Industry Association of America (motto: suing college kids and grandmothers for everything they have since 2001) and their practice of filing lawsuits against people who download music. I've always felt that there are better ways of fixing the problem of the record labels losing money, things like, I dunno, PUTTING OUT BETTER MUSIC! Now to be fair, they have lowered their prices, with the help of chains like Target, Wal-Mart, and Best Buy, and they have begrudgingly allowed iTunes to flourish because they at least get money through that system. Myself, I am a reformed downloader, meaning I used to use Napster and Morpheus and all those file-sharing sites to download songs, but once I realized that it was probably safer to spend a little now than a lot later on lawyers, I stopped. Now I pay the 99 cents per download for iTunes, I download songs for free when they're made available by places like Fuse (legally), and of course, I still buy CDs. So I figured I was safe.

Apparently, now none of us are. Last week, the Washington Post reported that a man in Arizona has been sued by the RIAA for ripping songs off of CDs he purchased onto his computer. The RIAA is actually claiming that it is ILLEGAL to rip songs onto your computer!

This is the last firewall we have, folks. Existing copyright law says that if you buy a CD, you own the tracks on that CD, and can do with it what you like. Listen to it, rip it to your computer or iPod, use it as a target for skeet shooting, whatever, it's all legal; it's what is known as "fair use". Legal experts and courts have agreed that if you buy a CD, you can rip it to your computer and listen to it AS LONG AS YOU DON'T GIVE IT TO ANYONE ELSE. However, the RIAA disagrees with this and they maintain that since the Audio Home Recording Act of 1992 does not explicitly mention computers as a means of recording music, it's illegal. Of course, it would invite all kinds of bad publicity if the RIAA sued Microsoft, Apple, and every other maker of CD ripping technology for giving people the means with which to rip songs off of CDs. So naturally, they go after individuals, hoping that once faced with a RIAA "pay up or else" letter, they will quietly fork over the money and you'll never hear about it.

This of course tells us what needs to be done: we need to SPEAK UP! We need people to say, as this man in Scottsdale has, that we're not going to take this. We're not going to allow ourselves to be bullied by an industry that makes billions of dollars, and we're going to fight back. I hope this guy takes the RIAA all the way to the Supreme Court if need be. Then, I hope he countersues the RIAA for all that he's had to go through. I would say a perfect amount would be... every penny the RIAA has collected from all the college kids they've sued these last few years. You see, according to a recent article from our very own Sub-Standard, errr, Post-Standard here in Syracuse, the RIAA's lawsuit system has become self-sustaining. They send letters to college kids telling them to pay or else, the kids pay, and the money goes to send more letters. Well, if this guy in Arizona (or anyone else who fights back) finds a way to get that money shelled out for "mental anguish, pain and suffering", then that takes away the incentive to keep sending those letters. That's just how it is with lawyers; take away the incentive to sue ($$$$) and they'll stop suing, at least in this case anyway.

If the RIAA wins and sets the precedent, then what's to stop them from suing ALL OF US? They see no connection between this practice and falling CD sales; they prefer to think that they're suing because of the falling CD sales when in reality, these lawsuits are as much to blame as anything. You know what the stupidest part of all this is? The RECORD COMPANIES THEMSELVES helped to create this mess by creating technology that lets a person rip a CD to their computer but then blocks it from playing if it gets shared illegally. Now of course, this didn't really work all that well, but you conceivably have a situation where someone bought, say, Velvet Revolver's "Contraband" CD, which has this technology, used it to rip some tracks for use on his computer only, and then he could get sued by the very industry that created the technology FOR USING IT! Oh by the way, the person in question here is ME. Because I HAVE that CD and I USED THE TECHNOLOGY TO RIP IT!

My biggest question with all of this is: where are the usual anti-corporate players in this? Where is the ACLU? Where is John Edwards, Mr. "I'm Running For President to Stop Corporate Greed"? I would ask where are the Hollywood liberals, but they're the very artists that the industry is trying to "protect", so you have to wonder where their loyalty is in this. If you're all so concerned about what corporate greed is doing to the youth of America, you had better take a look at this, because more and more young people are reacting to what is going on by buying FEWER CDs and obtaining MORE music illegally. It's your choice; tell the recording industry to move into the 21st century, pass laws to force them to do it, or watch the whole thing go belly-up as all of our money ends up in the hands of lawyers.

As for me, I think I'm going to now listen to an "illegal" Modest Mouse song...