Posts
I have some political links to share:
1. Glenn Greenwald has a thought-provoking article in Salon, entitled “Progressives and the Ron Paul Fallacies”. I appreciate this article for two reasons. First, it illustrates how the American political process—-especially its polarization of red vs. blue—-gets to be pretty ridiculous. Greenwald astutely remarks:
“Then there’s the full-scale sacrifice of intellectual honesty and political independence at the altar of tongue-wagging partisan loyalty. The very same people who in 2004 wildly cheered John Kerry — husband of the billionaire heiress-widow Teresa Heinz Kerry — spent all of 2008 mocking John McCain’s wealthy life courtesy of his millionaire heiress wife and will spend 2012 depicting Mitt Romney’s wealth as proof of his insularity; conversely, the same people who relentlessly mocked Kerry in 2004 as a kept girly-man and gigolo for living off his wife’s wealth spent 2008 venerating McCain as the Paragon of Manly Honor.”
Second, Greenwald talks about how Ron Paul is addressing important issues, such as the negative effect of the drug war on minorities and the killing of Muslim children in war—-under the current administration. I plan to vote for Ron Paul in the primaries but not in the general election, if he makes it that far, because I find some of his positions to be extreme and harmful. But I appreciate him bringing certain issues to the table and talking boldly about them.
2. Laura Rozen has an article, Rick Santorum’s foreign policy: combative hawk–and, according to Bono, “defender of the vulnerable”. It discusses Santorum’s Catholicism and how that shapes his foreign policy. Essentially, Santorum is a hawk, yet he promotes compassionate policies regarding the vulnerable in the world.
I applaud his support for compassion. I do not, however, agree with his view that the private sector should handle welfare, since I do not think that the private sector has the resources to do so fully (and even someone from a private charity told me this). Both the public and also the private sectors should help the poor.
3. Ann Coulter has a funny line in her latest column: “Newt Gingrich…took $1.6 million from Freddie Mac (his latest excuse is that he got only $35,000 of that money and the rest went to “overhead” — there’s a great fiscal manager)…”
I like this because I find Newt Gingrich to be pompous, even though I admire him for his policy-analysis.
