A time for ‘none of the above’
After watching Virginia’s two gubernatorial wannabes hack away at each other in a televised debate Monday night, I’m hoping this year’s ballot has a a check box for “none of the above.”
Neither Bath County’s Creigh Deeds or Northern Virginia’s Bob McDonnell gave an informed viewer any reason to put either one in the governor’s mansion for the next four years.
If these two are the best that Virginia’s Republican and Democratic parties have to offer then the Commonwealth is headed for a lot of trouble.
“If these two are the best that Virginia’s Republican and Democratic parties have to offer then the Commonwealth is headed for a lot of trouble.”
Doug, it is my opinion that your statement typifies many of our elections in this country, top to bottom, for some time. Where have all the statesmen gone?!
Remember the old saying ‘Cream floats but so do turds’ ?
The corollary is that if the system is clean you will get cream but the more the Government system behaves like a sewer . . . well as we witness we end up having to choose ‘tween two witless venal turds.
I saw the debate…tho i didn’t listen much. I am not very informed on the “issues” and they usually just sound like alot of meaningless soundbites to me. What I did pay attention to was the body language and facial expressions. McDonnell had a shit-eating smug grin on his face the whole time which made me sick…and Deeds looked like a sad puppy. Deeds seems much more genuine and sincere to me but he stumbled so badly during his closing statement that it was a mess.
It is a pitiful choice but McDonnell is one scary, sexist dude. VA has a history of voting the party opposite of the president to the governors house. VA also has a history of low voter turnout for these elections. Please encourage all your friends to vote!
At least McDonnell has a plan, that better than Deeds who seems to just want to win before telling the voters what he is going to do.
I would be interested in hearing Mr. Thompsons take on the schoolboard race in the courthouse district.
I´m really excited who will make it in the end. Let´s see…
I have to say that the television ads running for McDonnell and Deeds leave little to be desired. They look like they are running for some small town Mayor position instead of the Governor of Virginia. I’d like to see an amendment offered to the voters of Virginia to limit the terms of both state and national representatives. If it is good enough for our Governor it should be good enough for our representatives. Oh that’s right, they really don’t represent us, just their interests. I say clean house – State, and Washington D.C. Lets get rid of the people who think this is their career, instead of a public service.
Lately most politics is pouring perfume on what you like and bad tastes and odors on what you don’t. In NY a pro-choice Republican had to face phony ads that looked like she put out, shrilling overstating her positions. Instead of noting that it made the Democrat win, I wish some would call for the dirty trickster to be punished or at least fined.
It’s not easy to know what Rush Limbaugh stands for because, instead of stating it, he spends his time putting bad odors and tastes and generally smearing what he doesn’t like.
A few people who actually still state what they believe like Michael Moore, Mike Huckabee, and Sarah Palin, and they leave themselves venerable to being doused with bad odors and tastes. People lose their jobs for speaking their views like Marc Lamont Hill, who was canned from Fox News, and Van Jones by Obama in part because of their support of controversial on and off again death row inmate Mumia abu-Jamal. I am not even cheering Lou Dobb’s being fired by CNN as much as I abhor his views.
In foreign policy in Afghanistan sub-tribalism is important. The US’s most reliable allie against the Taliban is what is left of the Afghan Communist party, while the US continues to boycott Cuba to the determent of the US economy. So domestic politics is interfering with the US’s ability to conduct a rational foreign policy.
Cuban-Americans of all stripes condemned and signed a petition condemning the death threats against Cuban-American performers who were thinking of attending a peace concert in Cuba. It would be wonderful if somehow Sarah Palin would condemn the dirty tricks in NY, and the bury Obama next to Kennedy posters, and Michael More defend Sarah Palan’s right to express her views. Sarah Palin, Vance Jones and Marc Lamont Hill are in trouble for presenting a firm partisan position. Partisanship is part of the solution not the problem if partisans can bring themselves to defend those who disagree, their right to state their opinion as well.