The Politics of Pigskin

Hello again. Today we are one week and five days from the NFL’s  Super Bowl. The Super Bowl brings images quickly to mind of tough football teams, finger foods, and exciting commercials. What it doesn’t bring to mind very quickly is politics, but let me tell you, there are certainly politics involved as well.

I’m not talking about your typical American partisan politics, but when you flip on ESPN and see New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin on the station, you know it’s a strange event.

What was Nagin doing there? Well, Mayor Nagin’s city’s football team, the New Orleans Saints, are one of the competitors in the upcoming super bowl. Everyone knows the story of Nagin, New Orleans, and Katrina, so I will not go into it here, but the fact is that more this season than any other, there are very strong politics involved in this Super Bowl.

The politics, in this case, is the politics of money.

The fact is that the team that wins the super bowl, and the city in turn, receive large amounts of money from merchandise, tickets, and concession sales. Over the next week and a half, you’ll hear a lot about how badly New Orleans as a city needs this victory. The team that was once the ‘Aints, they’ll say, has now become a beacon of hope for this destitute city.

Well I’ve been to New Orleans, and it’s not as bad as they’ll make it out to be, but quite frankly, New Orleans does need this win. And it’s not because they need a beacon of hope. It’s not because the Saints have never won it before. It’s because New Orleans could truly use the revenue they would receive from this win.

That said, let’s hope it’s a good game.

A Word on a Word

I’ve been wanting to write a little something for a while which was intended to explain my political stance to an extent.

As is made clear by my name, and the tittle of the blog, I consider myself a republican. Today, for the first time in a long time, I can truly say that I am proud to be one.

For several years, especially since I entered college, I would identify myself politically with the sentence, “I am a conservative, but I’m not a big fan of the republican party.” In fact, I only really chose the name Republicanrambler because I had been using the word rambler in my pseudonyms for quite some time and decided that the alliteration would be catchy.

There is certainly a difference between what it is to be a conservative and what it is to be a republican. Conservatives hold a certain set of beliefs that define them. These beliefs do, in fact, tend to line up most closely with the Republican party in America. Still, not all Conservatives are Republican (and many argue that not all Republicans are truly conservative. This is certainly an arguable point, but one I will not get into here).  For a long time I have been somewhat of a closet conservative. This will be true no more.

With the election of Senator Brown from Massachusetts, I see a sea change in the Republican party. It is not unfair to say that the public opinion of both the Obama administration and the Health Care Bill strongly influenced this man’s election, but to rule out party politics completely as a factor is truly slanderous. The fact is that the Republicans elected a Republican to replace TED KENNEDY. Brown had to run a strong campaign to even get serious consideration, much less to win by five percent. The party that won Senator Brown the election is not the same party that ran the Presidential campaign  of  Senator John McCain. It is a fresher, newer party which is eager to overcome the reputation it has built of late. Truly, this ain’t your Grand Old Grand Old Party. It is not long now until the next elections. All I can say is that the Democrats better be ready, because WE republicans are coming.

With that said, good night, and have a fantastic rest of the week.

And Your Winner IS…

Many of you know about a little special election for the U.S. Senate which occurred today. Those of you who do most likely know that what was up for grabs was a Massachusetts senate seat held for most of forty seven years by Edward Moore “Ted” Kennedy.

As most of you will know, Kennedy’s don’t lose in Massachusetts (well, mostly. Third party Kennedy’s can, apparently).

I will not speak much of the death of Ted Kennedy, the cause of the vacated seat. What I will say is that, while there were some shady bits of his history, Senator Kennedy served his country for most of his life. I will say nothing bad of him, and may he Rest in Peace.

Now for the good news. Today, with a margin of victory of 52% to 47% (as reported at this point) State Senator Scott Brown (R) has won the special election for the senate seat vacated by Ted Kennedy’s death. This election is being called a major upset, and certainly, as it involves a Republican winning statewide in Massachusetts, this is certainly not unfair.

But where does this lead us (and by us, I of course mean the GOP).

This leads the GOP with one more senator, making the Democrat lead seven. This also gives the GOP a new man to fight against the health care bill.

But more importantly, this win gives the GOP a new fire. To see a senator win a seat in Massachusetts of all places gives a strong indication of how the American people feel about their president. This is the Democratic parties warning shot.

Democrats, if it has not become clear yet, let me sum up. We’re coming, we’re ready, and we can win.

Thank you for reading. Good Evening, and have a fantastic week.

That Little Birdie

Hey all. I just wanted to let anyone who cares about the blog (those who do, I truly salute and thank you) know that I do have a twitter account. That’s right, I’m taking full advantage of this wonderful tool invented by Al Gore. There are other jokes to be made about Tools and Al Gore, but, well, I’ll leave those for another day…

Anyway, you are more than welcome to follow me at Elephantrambler on twitter. That’s right. ELEPHANTRAMBLER (No caps, just emphasis) on twitter. I will send updates when new blog posts are out, and so forth.

Good Night and have a Fantastic week!

The True Message

Today, as all of you most certainly know, is Martin Luther King Day in the United States of America. This day is designed to remember the contributions of the premier Civil Rights Movement leaders in the U.S. Most people in this country remember this fairly easily because most people in this country get the day off. But today is much more than just a day off.

The true message of Martin Luther King day is not, in fact, to give Americans a day off from their hard work. True, this is a convenient side bonus, but this is not something we should be lost in. We should all use today to truly remember the sacrifice of Dr. King.

A pastor’s child born in Atlanta, Georgia in 1929, Dr. King was raised through the Great Depression. His childhood was one of segregation, racism, and degradation. Dr. King was undoubtedly used to the treatment of African Americans in this country, as, being raised in the south, he was most certainly on the receiving end of harsh treatment.

Instead of using this as a fuel for his hatred of whites (which, even as one, I could not begin to imply was anything less than justified) Dr. King used his upbringing as a pastor’s child to fuel something very different. It was certainly a revolution of sorts, but a peaceful one, which would lead to a much safer and more equal country.

I won’t go over the details here, you all undoubtedly know the story. Dr. King leads protests, and, though he loses his life to the struggle, his battle is successful. More than he could ever believe, in fact. Not fifty years after the culmination of his work, an African American was elected president of this country which Dr. King loved so very much.

Dr. King dreamed of a day where his children, and all of his countrymen, would “not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.” Today he has that dream. Almost.

If we are truly to honor Dr. King’s message, we must stop this attitude that President Obama must be given free pass as the first African American president. I am in no way saying we should be prejudiced towards the president. I revere the message of Dr. King, and in no way hope to defame it. Still, I must stress that for this country to be truly equal, we must judge all men, presidents or not, black or white, as really, truly equal.

That said, let us together remember the good message, the dreams of Dr. King. I wish you all a good Martin Luther King Day. Good Evening, and have a fantastic week.

It’s Been a While

Hello, everyone, and let me wish you a very happy upcoming Christmas season (screw you, secularism!) Still, to whoever may read this that might believe differently, I hope your season and your respective holidays are filled with joy as well.

I am here to update you on something fascinating that was said in one of my college classes. I attend a Liberal Arts University, and as an English and Political Science major, one would assume I, though openly a conservative, would be receiving perhaps the most liberal education possible without traveling to the coasts. That is why I was, and I suspect you will be, shocked with the following statement made by my American National Government professor:

“Mark my words… Sarah Palin will be the first female president of the United States of America…”

Wait, what? Did he just say that?

Of course, as college students tend to be only somewhat informed on their political beliefs, but strong in their social liberalism, Sarah Palin, as the enemy and whipping post of the Democratic party,  received laughs as the subject of this sentence. The professor continued by saying:

“You may laugh, but write it down…”

Well, professor, you just might be on to something. Is it true that Governor Palin has been the Democrats of late? Absolutely. But as I am sure Governor Palin herself would say, “when you whip a pit bull, it bites back.” 

I heard a statistic yesterday that stated that Governor Palin’s popularity is one percent lower than that of President Barack Obama. If this is the case, it bodes very well for the fulfillment of the professor’s prophecy. President Obama still has several years in the spotlight to lose popularity, while Governor Palin has several years out of it in which she might subtly gain popularity.

I can not guarantee that my professor will be correct. I can only speculate that perhaps his doctorate allows him more credibility than most. Only time can tell if he will be right, but as for me, I’ll side with the Hockey Mom.

Why We Shouldn’t Care

Lately we have all heard a certain amount of controversy surrounding Notre Dame University’s choice of commencement speaker…

And by a certain amount of, I mean a hell of a lot…

The opinion is (and in some ways understandably so) that a distinctly catholic university such as Notre Dame should not choose as their commencement speaker one of the most liberal, and more importantly most Pro-choice, politicians in the nation. The opinion is that the priests who are in control of ND should not decide to give the privilege of this speech to a man with such vile opinions on the subject of abortion. The opinion is that President Obama was not the right person to speak at the Notre Dame Graduation.

Here is why that opinion is wrong, in my personal analysis.

As someone who graduated Friday (from high school, not Notre Dame) I consider myself somewhat of an expert on recent commencements. Mine, for example, was a speech looking back at the four years we had spent in high school and what we should do with our future. This is what all commencement speeches should be about.

There’s no reason for someone to go on stage at someones commencement and begin talking about their political views. It doesn’t make sense. So I do not see why a person’s political views should even matter to making them an appropriate commencement speaker, and the certainly should not be a deterrent.

Secondly, I want to announce something that many critics of this may not have heard. Barack H. Obama… is… the President… of… the United States! If he is not qualified to give a commencement speech at a university, then I do not know who is. I realize no one questioned his credentials, but let me put you in a similar situation.

I assume that by your reading this, you are probably assured to be a conservative. Now, imagine if you will (for some of my peers this will not be hard) that you are approaching or have recently had your graduation. Would you not want the opportunity to have President Obama speak at your graduation. I don’t care what his political views are. I know I certainly would want nothing more. So shouldn’t we be thinking more about the wills, needs, wants, desires, and cares of the STUDENTS at Notre Dame before we think about the ethics of the people running it. Just because these people chose to attend one of the nations most prestigious universities, one that happens to be very catholic, does not mean that they chose to let that catholic influence guide every decision that was made in their regard. It should be their opinions, not the conservative base (of which, I will now remind you (so as not to come off too liberal) I am a strong member) which decides who the commencement speaker is at a graduation?

Finally, let me propose a deep thinking question. Who Cares??? Why should anyone, besides the students and faculty of the school in question, honestly care who gives the commencement speech at Notre Dame. It’s  because of the high profile that anyone honestly gives a… darn. If the Fighting Irish had nominated Evan Bayh as their commencement speaker, someone who receives a 100% rating from NARAL, no one would have been surprised, shocked, or offended. I hate to demean my own party (although, while this is not a time for a long discussion on the subject, but I prefer to think of myself as conservative rather than republican) but this is pretty clearly an instance of the Right trying to rag on President Obama for anything and everything they can. It doesn’t make much sense to me that they should make such a big deal out of this issue. Hey, guys, I don’t know if you know this, but he’s a TERRIBLE president. But I guess you’ll keep on focusing on why he shouldn’t be nominated to perform in his strongest form: speaking.

Don’t Think Twice

Arlen Specter…

“As the Republican Party has moved farther and farther to the right, I have found myself increasingly at odds with the Republican philosophy and more in line with the philosophy the Democratic Party”

Also…

“In the course of the last several months since the stimulus vote, I have traveled the state and surveyed the sentiments of the Republican Party in Pennsylvania and public opinion polls, observed other public opinion polls and have found that the prospects for winning a Republican primary are bleak.I am not prepared to have my 29-year record in the United States Senate decided by the Pennsylvania Republican primary electorate — not prepared to have that record decided by that jury, the Pennsylvania Republican primary electorate.”

So which is it chief? Are you really at odds with the party you’ve counted yourself a member for the past twenty-nine years? Or are you just a yellow coward. Because when you started your speech, I almost believed you were sincere. And then I realized, big shock, that you’re a politician!

This game isn’t about morals. This game isn’t about “finding yourself increasingly at odds” with anything. This game is about winning, and if you thought you could be successful with the Libertarians you sure as hell would be.

So if you don’t want to call yourself a republican, that’s find. We don’t want to call you one either. But don’t by God call yourself a liberal because you sure as hell ain’t that either.

You’re an official member of the coward party, and when if you ever win a state they won’t paint it red, or blue, they’ll coat it yellow.

Nobody in this media is going to criticize you, after all your not a liberal becoming a democrat. You’re not Joe Lieberman… Because, among other things, Lieberman became a Republican when they weren’t the entirely dominant party. And I’m not about to say that he wasn’t playing the game, because there is no doubt he was. But the fact is, he’s a much more sneaky game player than you.

Now, I don’t want to take away any of your achievements. You’ve served your country and your former party for 29 years, and that’s great. But don’t think about crawling back when were back on top…

 ”I ain’t sayin’ you treated me unkind. You coulda done better but, I don’t mind. You just sorta wasted my precious time. But don’t think twice, it’s alright.”

It was a bright cold day in April, and the clock was striking thirteen

What is a billion? It is something that we cannot truly understand, but know this. If we go back a billion seconds in time, the year would be 1959. If we went back a billion minutes, Jesus Christ would be walking the earth. If we went back a billion hours, you’d better be a stonecarver because it would be the stone age. A billion days? There would have been no animals on the land.

So what’s 787 billion then?

I can’t even begin to tell you exactly what 787 billion dollars. What I can tell you is that 787 billion dollars is wrong. 787 billion dollars is messed up. To dig into my deepest, darkest, most Hemmingway inspired depths, 787 billion dollars blows.

Hard.

But lets move past the dollar figures for a second, shall we. Let us move past even the millions of dollars of wasteful pork included in the bill. I want to focus on one particular portion of the bill. I want to focus on the Federal Coordinating Council for Comparative Effectiveness Research, the health care plan included in the stimulus package that I’ll bet you’ve never heard about. From this point forward, I will refer to this bill by a delightful respelling of its acronym, FCCCER will become FUCKER.

Now, I’d  like to point out that this Fucker is the brainchild of a great American. I would never defame a man so patriotic as to not pay his taxes for three years and to thus loose his nomination as secretary of Health and Human Services. That’s right, children, the man singley not trustworthy enough to run our HHS is in fact trustworthy enough to change our health care system forever.

Fucker is a program which is designed to “moniter” our health care providers. It will “moniter” every treatment made by every dictir un this country. It will “moniter,” children, every thing that goes on between your trusted health care professionals and you.

Fucker is a real asshole. So is Tom Daschle. In Daschle’s book  Critical: What We Can Do About the Health Care Crisis, he addresses the subject of ‘experimental procedures.’ He says we should abolish them. So when you’re sitting at the foot of Grandma Suzie’s hospital bed, being told that she has an inoperable brain tumor, don’t even think about asking your doctor about experimental procedures. Fucker won’t let you do that. Fucker’ll fire your doc for trying to ave your grammy’s life.

So lets sum up. Burried in a bill designed to save your failing economy is a health care bill which will change the way you do business with your doctor forever. It effectively shuts down the health care field as we know it, freezing treatment and care where it is in 2009. It also provides very vague descriptions of what should be done in hospitals, and it gives one man at the head of Fucker the complete power to rule on the actions of hospitals, and their future.

So Tom Daschle got his way. Don’t feel bad for him. Sure, he lost his job, but ol’ Tom’s got something far better. He’s got love. Because Tom Daschle love’s Big Brother.

Now in the morning I sleep alone, sweep the streets I used to own…

The word insanity is one rarely tossed around loosely anymore. In recent memory, this tag was thrown about more often than a third-string NFL quarterback with a pop-gun arm. (For more on this, see Ken Kesey’s classic novel on the subject… see, even independent bloggers can have product placement.) Still, there are certain people who deserve this word even in today’s incessantly politically correct world. I’m not talking about the young man who I walk past at school every other day who mutters incoherent greetings to passersby, nor am I even talking about the high-school graduate who occasionally enters my place of business hand-led by his mother, able to express nothing but pure joy. No, these people have serious  mental defects, and I pray for people in their place. Now, I am talking about the truly insane, the truly mad. I am talking about those perfect able to function, and still unwilling to do so. I am talking, of course, in this case, about Rod Blagojevich. He is truly a madman. I feel no sympathy for this man who still refuses any guilt in his corruption charges. He was corrupt, and deserves every day of jail he earns. Lets be honest, he is an evil man, and St. Peter will NOT call his name.