Long Live the Queen

I just finished watching the Democratic National Convention (DNC) and I also watched the Republican National Convention (RNC) last week. I didn’t watch every speaker, but I did watch all of the prime time speakers on every night and some of the non-prime time speakers.  And my source for most of this viewing was from CNN. They had the most uninterrupted coverage and didn’t have their annoying anchors talking over the speakers about plagiarism.

I am a die hard Liberal at this stage of my life. I usually watch NBC for news, but even I had to say enough is enough already after they just kept harping on about Melania Trump’s speech, which was really good. It was an honest mistake; move on people. And props to Melania who has held her head high in all of this

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However, the mistake in the speech and how the Trump campaign and the Republican Party handled the aftermath once it was known part of the speech was plagiarized is why every Republican needs to be concerned. It was complete chaos and confusion. It shows the Trump kids are complete rookies at running a campaign and the Party is not helping them at all.

There is clear division in the Republican Party. Neither President Bush (George H. nor W.) showed up, let alone spoke on behalf of their Party’s candidate. They have both publicly stated they would not show up and would not support Trump.

And then there was Ted Cruz shoving a torpedo right up division road with his, “vote your conscience”.

Ok, enough beating on the Republicans. They are making it far too easy now.  The Democrats on the other hand are for more devious in their devilry.

Bernie Sanders can say all the right things publicly about “getting behind The Party” and “Hilary Clinton must be President or else…” (FYI: I am a huge Bernie supporter) But you cannot hide how miserable he looked sitting in the stands over the last two nights of the convention. Every time the camera panned to him he looked exactly liked you would expect a man to look after he made a deal with the devil (the DNP, not Hillary) and then got publicly humiliated about it: the leaked emails and forced resignation of the Chairwoman was a huge slap in Bernie’s face.

Senator Sanders gave into the DNP for a few meager concessions. They embarrassed him first by picking their VP, Tim Kaine who is far too conservative of a Democrat for any Sander’s supporter and then the public humiliation with the emails and resignation of Debbie Wasserman Schultz the morning of the opening day to the convention with Sanders speaking that night in prime time.

And Schultz already has a job…with the Clinton campaign.

There is clear division in both parties. So who do you pick? You vote for the party and not the person and hope for the best. It’s going to be a crap shoot either way. The reality is our next President will not be able to do anything without the permission of their respective Party.

Despite Donald Trump’s bolstering that he can fix everything by himself, he needs Congress to get anything accomplished. And Congress is now and will be in 2017 controlled by Democrats and Republicans. Sorry my Libertarian brothers but that is reality.

The Party that controls the House and Senate ultimately controls what the President can and can’t do. Congressmen and Congresswomen typically vote their Party line with very few exceptions. And they vote based on the platforms they have each established. Or so they say. And that is what most people believe.

"Outside special interests like to spend money in Ohio," Senator Sherrod Brown (D) Ohio said in an email. "Back in 2012, they spent $40 million trying to buy my seat in the Senate. … Right now, the special interests are up to $30 million spent against Ted (Ted Strickland (D) running against incumbent Republican) -- with the Koch network spending more money in Ohio than anywhere else in the country." ^{http://www.politifact.com/ohio/statements/2016/jul/28/sherrod-brown/are-koch-backed-groups-spending-most-ohio-senate-r/}

FYI: Charles and David Koch, of Koch Industries, are tied as the sixth-richest people in the world, each worth an estimated $42 billion.

Both Parties raise hundreds of millions of dollars year after year after year. Where do you think that money is coming from? It mostly comes from the 1/10^th of the 1% of the wealthy in this country. Either by personal donations or through corporate donations. The same super rich that Hilary Clinton has pledged to pass a huge tax cut against. She says she will make them pay their fair share.

Really? I’m calling bullshit on that one. Are you really going to kill the hand of your masters that have been feeding you and sustaining you for the last 188 years. I don’t think so lady.  Your own Party is never going to let that happen. And we already know the Republicans are against it as well.

Both Parties have and will continue to make outlandish promises and will say anything to get your vote. Who knows, maybe one of them will be stupid enough to ask a foreign country to commit espionage against an American citizen. Oh shit, hang on this just in…Trump did say something this stupid.

If you don’t think this country is stupid enough to elect Donald Trump then I will remind you of this. George W. Bush was our President….twice. We were stupid enough to elect him TWICE! Although the second one I still have issues with thanks to the good folks in the sunshine state of Florida.

So who do you pick?  Look at what each Party presented as their message to you. The Republicans painted a very bleak picture of America with crime out of control and radical Islamic terrorist living next door to us. They believe unemployment is too high and the economy is in terrible shape.

The Democrats painted a more positive outlook on American today. They believe the last 8 years have been great and we should continue to move forward with the Democratic Party. And here are just a couple of ideas the Democrats have planned.

They want to revitalize our nation’s postal service.  Why? Why spend money resuscitating something that should be self-sustaining and is in fact a relic. In the modern digital age we should be downsizing the postal service, using our tax dollars for something sustainable for the future and of course, save trees with less snail mail.  I am pretty sure Hillary Clinton has heard of email by now and knows what it is.  Paperless bitches, let’s go paperless.

“Fostering a manufacturing renaissance” is another DNC initiative. Reality check here. The United States can’t compete with the manufacturing capabilities and COST that overseas manufacturers can get away with. This is just another empty promise the DNC knows they can’t actually follow through with. Their super rich overlords will never let this happen anyway.

Most Americans do not want to work in factories. The ones that do want do want to work in factories want too much money for their labor (wages and benefits) compared to the 3^rd world countries that can produce the same sneakers, jacket, tie or whatever with the same quality but for pennies. Trump would be bankrupt if he didn’t use overseas manufacturing and in fact he does have many products that are manufactured in the US.  Both Parties tell lies and half-truths.

The US needs a cheap labor force in order to get manufacturing back in America. Oh wait, why don’t we let in a lot more immigrants to fill those jobs?  Sounds like the Democratic platform to me.

By the way did you notice what Hillary Clinton was wearing for her coronation as the Queen Presidential nominee?  An all-white pant suite. She looked great but the color choice is what I am pointing out. White. The Republicans have portrayed themselves as a rather dark/evil, closed-minded group. You better believe that Hillary’s choice of white was intentional to be seen as “good.” Ha. And soon I will have a Star Wars reference in here. Good versus evil.

Believe it or not the best advice I can give anyone at this point is to take the advice (*gulp* I can’t believe I am going to write his name) of Ted Cruz (yuck; spit; I can’t believe I wrote his name down). Vote you’re conscious.

Is your own personal life here in America dark, bleak and dangerous? If Yes, vote for Trump. If you feel safe in your community and you think the last 8 years of your life here has been good, then vote for Clinton.

If you want a larger war presents in the Middle East and a lot of US flag draped coffins coming back to the US with our soldiers in them, then vote for Trump. He will get thousands of our sons and daughters killed in another pointless war.

If you think Obama’s policy of surgical air strikes and limited boots on the ground is good enough for you, then vote for Clinton. Notice I did not say this strategy is working. It has worked well so far but we will not be able to rid the world of extremist Islamic terrorist with air strikes only.

Neither full scale war nor “from a distance” air campaigns are a winnable formula for long term peace in the Middle East. But that is a subject for another time.  Personally I like the air strikes and the almost zero dead US soldiers coming back home.

When you walk outside into the world each day, which America do you see?  Dark and gloomy or bright and hopeful.

When you walk into the voting booth you can vote for good or evil. It’s that simple.  And that is why Senator Bernie Sanders is sitting their eating shit and taking it up the a-hole and trying to smile through this. Bernie is taking one for the team; for us. We should listen to him.

Long live the Queen.