Election Issues Today

What a popular topic today, the 40th anniversary of the first moon landing, July 20, 1969.

Like so many other space travel enthusiasts around the World, along with science fictions crazies, we thought a new age had dawned and that space travel was just a few years away for the rest of us.

Such was not to be. Not only is space travel not available to any but the very richest individuals in the World, a Russian Soyuz trip is about the only way to get into space. A trip to the International Space Station for ten or twenty million dollars is not what we had in mind for the masses.

Space travel is very limited even for the few countries who have engineered a vehicle capable of reaching orbit and returning. In fact, AFFORDING a national space program has become a real question of priorities in virtually every country, including the USA.

Back in 1969, NASA officials probably thought they would be engineering trips to MARS by the beginning of the 21st Century. So did I.

Now, however, even a return trip to the Moon is being re-tooled to do it on the cheap. Forget about Mars; the economy is so bad and the NASA budget so tenuous, that the “return to the Moon” plans are becoming doubtful.

For the population at large, the exploration of space, and manned space travel in particular, has lost the romance it once had. We need to feed our people, educate them, provide for their health and for their old age, not spend billions to put a man on the Moon. BEEN THERE; DONE THAT!

My head is still spinning from all the excitement, the media coverage, the speeches, the parade and the personalities.  Wow, what a day!

The millions of photos of the day will become treasured keepsakes for the masses of people who assembled in Washington.  Thousands of people have shared their photos online.   Not everyone sat in front of the television for eight hours that day, as I did.  Frankly, I am pretty glad that I was not in Washington DC.  I feel confined in an airplane or an elevator.  A million people in one place?  My home State of Montana does not have that many, in 147,000 square miles.

I was moved when one news reporter reminded us all that slaves had been used in the construction of both the capitol building and the White House, and that they had been housed in a pen adjacent to the site.  

I was taken by surprise when the oath of office was flubbed, not once but twice, and was comforted by the fact that even the big guys can get nervous.

I noted that one reporter referred to Obama’s Inaugural Address as his “acceptance speech.”  I laughed at that one.

I was offended by the analogy of the “Bush family perhaps feeling like the Romanov’s.”  Not appropriate.  Very bad form.  Rude. Disrespectful, and not at all accurate.  I think more than one reporter said this on more than one occasion. I wonder how many in the USA viewing audience understood what the reporter was talking about.  Perhaps the world-wide audience is better educated.

Personally, I suspect that the new President will force members of the Washington DC news media to improve their competence level. 

The new guy is a smart guy. 

Who gets the New York Senate Seat?

Cuomo, Kennedy, Gillibrand (l-r)

Now that Caroline has opted out of the Senate consideration, the focus for Hilary’s seat seems to be on Andrew Cuomo, the New York Attorney General and former HUD Secretary, and two term New York Congresswoman Kirsten Gillibrand.  Governor David Paterson is likely to announce his appointment choice in the next 24 hours, and no other top names have appeared recently. For weeks, there has been much speculation on whether Paterson would appoint a female to replace Hilary Clinton, and attention had been centered around Kennedy, and now, on Gillibrand.

I’ve seen that there is some concern that Andrew Cuomo’s younger brother, Chris, who works on-air at ABC’s Good Morning America, might present a political problem for Andrew (and for Governor Paterson), as some political and media persons are questioning the potential for a conflict-of-interest between family members sitting in the Senate and in the GMA anchor seat (potentially in the anchor seat, anyway).

I personally favored Caroline Kennedy for the Senate and thought she would have done an outstanding job in representing the people of New York.  At any rate, she has her own reasons for withdrawing her name from consideration and we have to respect that.

In the end, Governor Paterson may surprise everyone and appoint someone who has not been in the media and actively posturing for the Senate seat. 

Jacob Weisberg writes for Slate.com.  For the past nine years he has been assembling “Bushisms.” If you have never heard the expression, I will not try to define it, for the examples below are self-explanatory. 

Mr. Wiesberg has documented over 500 “Bushisms” and has published his Favorite 25 in a farewell “tribute” … to a President whose way with words gave us as much to laugh about as his actions gave us cause to suffer.  (my words)

The following are direct quotations from President Bush as published by Jacob Weisberg in Slate.com on January 12, 2009. (Locations and explanatory remarks as needed are also provided by Mr. Weisberg):

1. “Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we.”-Washington, D.C., Aug. 5, 2004

2. “I know how hard it is for you to put food on your family.”-Greater Nashua, N.H., Chamber of Commerce, Jan. 27, 2000

3. “Rarely is the question asked: Is our children learning?”-Florence, S.C., Jan. 11, 2000

4. “Too many good docs are getting out of the business. Too many OB/GYNs aren’t able to practice their love with women all across the country.”-Poplar Bluff, Mo., Sept. 6, 2004

5. “Neither in French nor in English nor in Mexican.”-declining to answer reporters’ questions at the Summit of the Americas, Quebec City, Canada, April 21, 2001

6. “You teach a child to read, and he or her will be able to pass a literacy test.”-Townsend, Tenn., Feb. 21, 2001

7. “I’m the decider, and I decide what is best. And what’s best is for Don Rumsfeld to remain as the secretary of defense.”-Washington, D.C., April 18, 2006

8. “See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda.”-Greece, N.Y., May 24, 2005

9. “I’ve heard he’s been called Bush’s poodle. He’s bigger than that.”-discussing former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, as quoted by the Sun newspaper, June 27, 2007

10. “And so, General, I want to thank you for your service. And I appreciate the fact that you really snatched defeat out of the jaws of those who are trying to defeat us in Iraq.”-meeting with Army Gen. Ray Odierno, Washington, D.C., March 3, 2008

11. “We ought to make the pie higher.”-South Carolina Republican debate, Feb. 15, 2000

12. “There’s an old saying in Tennessee-I know it’s in Texas, probably in Tennessee-that says, fool me once, shame on-shame on you. Fool me-you can’t get fooled again.”-Nashville, Tenn., Sept. 17, 2002

13. “And there is distrust in Washington. I am surprised, frankly, at the amount of distrust that exists in this town. And I’m sorry it’s the case, and I’ll work hard to try to elevate it.”-speaking on National Public Radio, Jan. 29, 2007

14. “We’ll let our friends be the peacekeepers and the great country called America will be the pacemakers.”-Houston, Sept. 6, 2000

15. “It’s important for us to explain to our nation that life is important. It’s not only life of babies, but it’s life of children living in, you know, the dark dungeons of the Internet.”-Arlington Heights, Ill., Oct. 24, 2000

16. “One of the great things about books is sometimes there are some fantastic pictures.”-U.S. News & World Report, Jan. 3, 2000

17. “People say, ‘How can I help on this war against terror? How can I fight evil?’ You can do so by mentoring a child; by going into a shut-in’s house and say I love you.”-Washington, D.C., Sept. 19, 2002

18. “Well, I think if you say you’re going to do something and don’t do it, that’s trustworthiness.”-CNN online chat, Aug. 30, 2000

19. “I’m looking forward to a good night’s sleep on the soil of a friend.”-on the prospect of visiting Denmark, Washington, D.C., June 29, 2005

20. “I think it’s really important for this great state of baseball to reach out to people of all walks of life to make sure that the sport is inclusive. The best way to do it is to convince little kids how to-the beauty of playing baseball.”-Washington, D.C., Feb. 13, 2006

21. “Families is where our nation finds hope, where wings take dream.”-LaCrosse, Wis., Oct. 18, 2000

22. “You know, when I campaigned here in 2000, I said, I want to be a war president. No president wants to be a war president, but I am one.”-Des Moines, Iowa, Oct. 26, 2006

23. “There’s a huge trust. I see it all the time when people come up to me and say, ‘I don’t want you to let me down again.’ “-Boston, Oct. 3, 2000

24. “They misunderestimated me.”-Bentonville, Ark., Nov. 6, 2000

25. “I’ll be long gone before some smart person ever figures out what happened inside this Oval Office.”-Washington, D.C., May 12, 2008

I hope we never see another person elected to the U.S. Presidency who is so totally inept, so clueless, so dim-witted.