Tuesday, July 27, 2004
Depends on your definition of "better"
Yesterday's DNC lineup seemed to be a good round-up of reasons NOT to vote the Dems' ticket this November. Jimmy Carter spoke about foreign policy--ironic since the main things he accomplished in office were getting our asses kicked in Iran trying to get our hostages back, and giving away the Panama canal. Al Gore re-iterated his "count 'em til I win" philosophy, which translates into "every vote counts, and every vote (for the right people) will be counted."
Then Bill Clinton got up and made the most asinine statement I can imagine for this convention: "By the only test that matters, whether people were better off when we finished than when we started, our way works better . . ." I fail to see where that's the only test that matters . . . and I fail to see where his party passes the test. Clinton left office with the fuse lit on a grossly overvalued stock market, an open-door policy towards terrorists, and far more ammunition for anti-government radicals here in the U.S. thanks to his administration's handling of situations like Waco and Ruby Ridge. He pushed the highest tax increases ever through the house and senate, vetoed laws banning partial-birth abortion (not once, but twice), and appointed some of the most radical liberals ever to pass the bar exam to the Federal Judiciary.
Mr. Clinton, with all due respect, I am an American, and as my Country goes, so go I. If the United States sits weakened, a sitting duck for terrorists, I am vulnerable as well. If she cries with the pains of her nearly-born, my tears flow. If her life's-blood economic structure is in danger of collapse, I shall be found at the bottom of the rubble. If her founding principles are ridiculed, her proud heritage trashed, then I, like every other American, am nothing but a bastard child of superstitious plunderers.
Americans at the end of the Clinton administration's tenure were as blissfully ignorant as a cancer patient before his trip to the doctor. We had masked so many symptoms and denied so many "little" problems, that we were totally convinced that all was well. Nine months later, the diagnosis came. We were horribly ill, and too pumped-up on good feelings to notice.
By Clinton's line of reasoning, the cancer patient was much "better off" before he went to the doctor, and John Kerry really does need to be President. He'll make us feel better.
Then Bill Clinton got up and made the most asinine statement I can imagine for this convention: "By the only test that matters, whether people were better off when we finished than when we started, our way works better . . ." I fail to see where that's the only test that matters . . . and I fail to see where his party passes the test. Clinton left office with the fuse lit on a grossly overvalued stock market, an open-door policy towards terrorists, and far more ammunition for anti-government radicals here in the U.S. thanks to his administration's handling of situations like Waco and Ruby Ridge. He pushed the highest tax increases ever through the house and senate, vetoed laws banning partial-birth abortion (not once, but twice), and appointed some of the most radical liberals ever to pass the bar exam to the Federal Judiciary.
Mr. Clinton, with all due respect, I am an American, and as my Country goes, so go I. If the United States sits weakened, a sitting duck for terrorists, I am vulnerable as well. If she cries with the pains of her nearly-born, my tears flow. If her life's-blood economic structure is in danger of collapse, I shall be found at the bottom of the rubble. If her founding principles are ridiculed, her proud heritage trashed, then I, like every other American, am nothing but a bastard child of superstitious plunderers.
Americans at the end of the Clinton administration's tenure were as blissfully ignorant as a cancer patient before his trip to the doctor. We had masked so many symptoms and denied so many "little" problems, that we were totally convinced that all was well. Nine months later, the diagnosis came. We were horribly ill, and too pumped-up on good feelings to notice.
By Clinton's line of reasoning, the cancer patient was much "better off" before he went to the doctor, and John Kerry really does need to be President. He'll make us feel better.
// posted by Jamie @ 7/27/2004 01:08:00 PM 
