Saturday, October 18, 2008

Endorsements, change to my website and this blog

Endorsements

First, I would like to enthusiastically and with all my heart endorse Barack Obama for President of the United States of America, and I hope that Mississippi helps elect him. I don't hold a lot of hope for that, since Mississippi uses the winner-takes-all method with our Electoral College votes, but it's just possible. (Any Republicans ready to change the Electoral College now that it appears that it may actually help elect Obama? I think that's my big issue right after this election, win or lose).

In the state level races, I would like to endorse Travis Childress over Greg Davis, Ronnie Musgrove over Roger Wicker, and somewhat regretfully, Eric Fleming over Thad Cochran. Eric is a fine candidate and worthy of endorsement, and I have greatly respected Mr. Cochran as a man, but I shuddered as he voted with the Bush Administration, time after time. His acts of defiance of the Bush administration in the bailout votes was too little,too late. God bless him, it's time for Senator Cochran to retire to his beloved Mississippi and enjoy life, and let a young man take over.

I'd like to endorse both Jim Kitchens and David Chandler for the Mississippi Supreme Court. More endorsements will come as I find out more about those candidates I'm not so familiar with.


Changes to companion website and to this blog


I'm getting ready to change things at my website, Mississippi Political, and spend more time here blogging. It's taken so much of my time, there hasn't been enough left for me to keep the blog going as I would have liked.

Of the two big changes to the website, the first one has already been evident, most likely, to frequent visitors, so I'll tackle it first. While I still am not a registered member of either major party, and never have been, I joined the Green Party last year partially out of protest to those two main parties. I can no longer attempt to be non-partisan, given what has happened in this country since I started that website with the state intention of staying nonpartisan (although with an agenda).

Back to the party thing - may I state that I like the Green Party, except for a few fringe edges, but all the political parties have their fringe edge. Being a pragmatic sort, I recognize that the Green Party has no power, except a small bit of leverage against the main parties, and this year I do not choose to express my feelings about the way this country is moving with that tiny leverage. Things are beyond critical and that's not enough. I recognize, as well, that the Repulican party has become so infiltrated and compromised by it's lunatic fringe that for all intents and purposes, I might as well be a Democrat this year.

This is not to be taken as an uncritical love for the Democratic Party, but as a sign that I have finally had my eyes opened to the extent of destruction the lunatic fringe in the Republican Party has unleashed on American freedoms and civil liberty. The only power strong enough to counteract the power-crazed neo conservatives who now run the Republican Party is the Democratic Party. My rationale is the hope that the neo conservatives can be contained if the Democrats are in power; then we can deal with the faults of the Democratic Party once the greater danger has been averted and some of our civil liberties and freedom have been restored. It's never been clearer how true it is that power is corrupting and absolute power is absolutely corrupting.

This year, and any other year until I believe the radical lunatics in the Republican Party have been cleaned out and stripped of power, I will not vote for a Republican, I don't care who he or she is. Returning or putting any Republican into office is only going to be an encouragement and a firewall for the neo conservative movement to lean on, to hide behind. These people are ruthless and are destroying the fabric of our country, are destroying the Constitution and the basis of equal justice under the law, and they cannot be allowed to continue.

From hence forward, I will not be printing any press releases from any Republican on my website without a critique attached. With the rapid dissemination of news via the internet, by RSS and other more direct methods, cable, network and print, those will be available as quickly, or even more so, by other methods, anyway.

And that leads into the other change, which affects both that site and this blog, that will be coming soon after this presidential election. I will still have the old url address for some time, but it will pop you to a new url where I will have all the photo albums, blues information, essays and editorials from Mississippi writers, notices as to cultural and musical happenings around the state, and a link to my blog, Remedial Redneck, where I will then spend most of my time. This will give me some time to transition everyting to the blog as I learn how to manage it from a blog.


Mississippi Political News Headlines
will soon cease to exist in it's present form, but you will still be taken to the above mentioned material by way of the old address (for at least a year). A lot of the details of the blog will have to evolve as I learn more about this format, but the headline site has outlived it's usefulness and has, oddly enough, while providing me a stage for my editorials, taken so much time that I've almost ceased to write the editorials that were much of inspiration for beginning that site.

So, with a sense of both relief (from the time demands first thing in the mornin) and sadness (because this was a big part of my life for the last 7 years), I'm giving notice that things are evolving! I've felt constrainted in my attempts to remain reasonably nonpartisan while the world around us has been going to hell in a hand basket, and now I'm about to break those constraints!

God bless you all, and join me in prayer for our country, even if your beliefs are perpendicular to mine, because America needs all the prayers she can get right now. We can all pray "God's will be done."

2 comments:

  1. Here's another comment for your edification. Some people in Silicone Valley are working to change the way electoral college votes are handed out. Most states currently use the winner (in the state) takes all, with a couple doing it by district or percentage. But these guys want to do it by who wins the national popular vote.

    Electoral College votes are designated after all polls close and the winner of the popular vote is decided. Then the state would award all votes to the winner. The Constitution only says how many votes each state gets. It's up to the states to decide how to hand them out. Illinois is one of the states that has already voted to do so--when the rest of the states make the same decision.

    Here's the website: http://www.nationalpopularvote.com/

    Diane

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  2. http://www.youknowster.com/jokes/view/288-you-know-youre-in-a-redneck-hospital-when

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