Kasich just said this and a lot more pretty damning remarks calling his competitors crazy:
politico.com/story/2015/10/john-kasich-critiques-gop-2016-candidates-215233Regardless which side of the aisle a politician is on, it's pretty unusual for one to break ranks like this. I wonder what the consequences will be. Will he gain in the polls or will it just seem like a desperate bid for attention in a crowded presidential race? Still, either way it's a pretty gutsy move. Props for courage, or, perhaps foolhardiness?
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My simplistic response to his assertions might be: "What has happened to his party?" ... OK - that's simplistic and probably unfair.
More seriously, what has happened to our way of selecting nominees in both parties? In my lifetime we've gone from "smoke filled rooms" to a "reality show" popularity contest in which the goal seems to be to bring out the vote of the most extreme wings of both parties (and to further polarize the country in the process). I'm not sure the latter is any better than the former. Hillary was funny in the SNL skit and great on Colbert last night. But what in hell does this have to do with being leader of the most powerful nation on earth? Nothing! And not to pick on her. All of them, to greater or lesser degree, seem engaged in this selling of soul to the devil to further their ambitions.
Sometimes I long for those smoke-filled rooms again.
Just kinda generally disgusted with the whole process - in case you can't tell.
P.S. - Score +1 for John Harwood!
As for economic conservatism: Global "free trade" agreements are the law. Corporate interests are prominently represented in the corridors of power. Personal tax rates are near multi-generational lows. An ever-greater share of household income is flowing to the wealthy. (which really is what the push for dropping marginal rates was about). The USD is "King Dollar" vs other currencies.
What happened to the Conservative movement? -- Maybe it succeeded.
Perhaps Kasich (or someone here who thinks they know what Kasich means) needs to define what "conservatism" he favors/advocates. Social conservatives (pro-lifers, pro-traditional marriage) seem to be treated like red-headed step-children among the Republican Establishment. --- Their votes are sought, but the policies they want are then time and again ignored.
Also, the term 'conservative movement' is defined as what people want it to be just before they knock it.
The conservative movement was about freedom e.g. civil rights act of 1957, defeated by Dems filibusterer.
If JFK and those before him came back to life today, they would be considered right wing extremest conservatives.
Why? Elites, both conservative and liberal, understand that governing is a game. You realize that it works if you and the guy on the other side sort of agree on rules and sort of half-like each other. You win some, you lose some, but you don't kick the game board over. You just reset and try again.
That makes for bounded competition but it also requires a weird and unnatural understanding of the other side. They're not Evil. It's not Light versus Darkness. It's not the End of the World nor is it The Coming Millennium. It's people about as smart as you and about as nice as you, who love their families and their country about as much as you, who happen to know that you're wrong.
So 10% of the population worries about politics (had I mentioned the etymology of "liberal arts"? "Liber" were "free men," as a practical matter they were free from the need to work for their own private gain and so assumed the obligation of working for the public good instead. "Gentlemen" in the English sense. "Liberal arts" defined the knowledge needed by those who sought to govern) and 90% check-in on the process every two or four years.
We have, I fear, upset that apple cart - perhaps for good. The prime imperative of broadcast media is to be entertaining, otherwise people surf away or walk away. Conflict entertains, long discussions leading to compromises ("half measures!" as if that's bad), do not. Add to that the ability of legislatures to craft "pure" congressional districts; ones that guarantee a Republic or Democrat win, with the only question being who will win the primary. That drives the Republicans right and the Democrats left, leaving almost no one (Jon Huntsman? John Kasich?) in the middle.
And then it's all William Butler Yeats all over again: David
If you must look at it as a game ... there are many games you could look at ... but seeing a game is like looking at a battle versus the war.
Prepare for what will be, not could be.
All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first, the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse’s arms.
Then the whining schoolboy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress’ eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honor, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon’s mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lined,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slippered pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side;
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank, and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.
The Tay Bridge Disaster
BY KNIGHT OF THE WHITE ELEPHANT OF BURMAH WILLIAM MCGONAGALL
Beautiful Railway Bridge of the Silv’ry Tay!
Alas! I am very sorry to say
That ninety lives have been taken away
On the last Sabbath day of 1879,
Which will be remember’d for a very long time.
’Twas about seven o’clock at night,
And the wind it blew with all its might,
And the rain came pouring down,
And the dark clouds seem’d to frown,
And the Demon of the air seem’d to say—
“I’ll blow down the Bridge of Tay.”
When the train left Edinburgh
The passengers’ hearts were light and felt no sorrow,
But Boreas blew a terrific gale,
Which made their hearts for to quail,
And many of the passengers with fear did say—
“I hope God will send us safe across the Bridge of Tay.”
But when the train came near to Wormit Bay,
Boreas he did loud and angry bray,
And shook the central girders of the Bridge of Tay
On the last Sabbath day of 1879,
Which will be remember’d for a very long time.
So the train sped on with all its might,
And Bonnie Dundee soon hove in sight,
And the passengers’ hearts felt light,
Thinking they would enjoy themselves on the New Year,
With their friends at home they lov’d most dear,
And wish them all a happy New Year.
So the train mov’d slowly along the Bridge of Tay,
Until it was about midway,
Then the central girders with a crash gave way,
And down went the train and passengers into the Tay!
The Storm Fiend did loudly bray,
Because ninety lives had been taken away,
On the last Sabbath day of 1879,
Which will be remember’d for a very long time.
As soon as the catastrophe came to be known
The alarm from mouth to mouth was blown,
And the cry rang out all o’er the town,
Good Heavens! the Tay Bridge is blown down,
And a passenger train from Edinburgh,
Which fill’d all the people’ hearts with sorrow,
And made them for to turn pale,
Because none of the passengers were sav’d to tell the tale
How the disaster happen’d on the last Sabbath day of 1879,
Which will be remember’d for a very long time.
It must have been an awful sight,
To witness in the dusky moonlight,
While the Storm Fiend did laugh, and angry did bray,
Along the Railway Bridge of the Silv’ry Tay,
Oh! ill-fated Bridge of the Silv’ry Tay,
I must now conclude my lay
By telling the world fearlessly without the least dismay,
That your central girders would not have given way,
At least many sensible men do say,
Had they been supported on each side with buttresses,
At least many sensible men confesses,
For the stronger we our houses do build,
The less chance we have of being killed.
There once was a man from Nantucket
Who kept all his cash in a bucket.
But his daughter, named Nan,
Ran away with a man
And as for the bucket, Nantucket.
We are reverting to the mean or past.
Abandon all hope.
Feel like throwing up your hands? Sequestering yourself in front of the TV? Under the bed? We've kinda been here before (those of us old enough.) May I submit if you want things to change you must (we all must) convert fear/hopelessness into anger. We’ve all first, got to get MAD!
------------------------------
“I don't have to tell you things are bad. Everybody knows things are bad. It's a depression. Everybody's out of work or scared of losing their job. The dollar buys a nickel's worth, banks are going bust, shopkeepers keep a gun under the counter. Punks are running wild in the street and there's nobody anywhere who seems to know what to do, and there's no end to it.
We know the air is unfit to breathe and our food is unfit to eat, and we sit watching our TV's while some local newscaster tells us that today we had fifteen homicides and sixty-three violent crimes, as if that's the way it's supposed to be. We know things are bad - worse than bad. They're crazy. It's like everything everywhere is going crazy, so we don't go out anymore. We sit in the house, and slowly the world we are living in is getting smaller, and all we say is, 'Please, at least leave us alone in our living rooms. Let me have my toaster and my TV and my steel-belted radials and I won't say anything. Just leave us alone.'
Well, I'm not gonna leave you alone. I want you to get mad! I don't want you to protest. I don't want you to riot - I don't want you to write to your congressman because I wouldn't know what to tell you to write. I don't know what to do about the depression and the inflation and the Russians and the crime in the street. All I know is that first you've got to get mad. You've got to say, 'I'm a HUMAN BEING, God damn it! My life has VALUE!' So I want you to get up now. I want all of you to get up out of your chairs. I want you to get up right now and go to the window. Open it, and stick your head out, and yell, 'I'M AS MAD AS HELL, AND I'M NOT GOING TO TAKE THIS ANYMORE!' I want you to get up right now, sit up, go to your windows, open them and stick your head out and yell - 'I'm as mad as hell and I'm not going to take this anymore!' Things have got to change. But first, you've gotta get mad!... You've got to say, 'I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!' Then we'll figure out what to do about the depression and the inflation and the oil crisis. But first get up out of your chairs, open the window, stick your head out, and yell, and say it: "I'M AS MAD AS HELL, AND I'M NOT GOING TO TAKE THIS ANYMORE!"
(Howard Beale, "Network" -- a movie whose prescience of the future grows more accurate with each passing year)
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