Not that complicated
It is my belief, and I could be wrong–like I said yesterday, the more I learn, the less I realize I know–, that for many Tennessee Democrats, they are Democrats because they are. Not because they believe in any mutual goals or subscribe to a broad, similar philosophy, but just because. So, I’m not sure what being a Democrat in Tennessee means.
I’m not sure anyone does.
All it means is that they’re not those other guys.
March 25th, 2009 at 9:37 am
Heh. I had the same problem with Republicans. They didn’t actually stand for anything, they just weren’t Democrats. Well, they weren’t Democrats in Name Only. In increased governmental regulation of every last bit of your life, they were hand in hand.
March 25th, 2009 at 9:57 am
I hate, HATE people who are members of a political party because “My people have always been X”. That’s gotta be the biggest cop-out for ones political views ever. I can understand people who are too lazy to vote. I can understand people who just don’t give a damn who wins, but people who always automatically vote for one political party because that’s the party their great-grandfather who they never met voted for are idiots, pure and simple. Parties change. Ideologies change, the party that fought for states rights 140 years ago is fighting to turn us all into a Marxist oligarchy today.
People should be required to pass a basic civics exam when they register to vote.
March 25th, 2009 at 10:18 am
Matt, I hold the view that voting isn’t a right. Your actions when you vote affect millions of others. With our system, one would hope that the idiocy like you describe can self-cancel, but alas it doesn’t.
I don’t have a problem with a basic exam either to get a voting license. Unfortunately, even that is subject to abuse that makes the idiots voting look perfect in comparison. So we have a Catch-22.
March 25th, 2009 at 11:02 am
I would be in the Democratic Party IF, IF, they believed what the supposed “father of the Democratic Party, Thomas Jefferson, believed. I admit to being a “Jeffersonian Democrat”….but there probably ain’t none in the Democratic Party. And I would be a Republican IF,IF, they believed in “a republican form of government” (Article IV, Section 4) as defined by an objective (plain English) reading of the Constitution and Bill of Rights…which are also the beliefs of a Jeffersonian Democrat.
The ambiguity and lack of clear principle of today’s major parites, not to mention their petty politics are probably a few of the reasons that George Washington warned against “party spirit” in his Farewell Address”.
March 25th, 2009 at 11:37 am
I hold an opposite view that meanders about until it finally arrives at a similar destination. Voting is a right, but like any worthwhile right it comes with duties, obligations, responsibilities… my thesaurus is JUST out of reach so I’m going to assume you get it by now. Anyway, my thought is that we have a pervasive problem with voters ignoring these responsibilities, and their fellow voters failing to call them on it, even when most needed.
Still, voting is no less a right for the fact. By way of illustrative similarity, free speech is as or more dangerous if you disallow free thought for yourself.
March 25th, 2009 at 11:42 am
To me it just means that they’re incapable of individual thought processes and instead need to hide behind a political party for identity.
Alas, the same goes for republicans. In fact the two parties (at this stage in time) are basically just different piles of crap – and both stink to high hell.
March 25th, 2009 at 11:44 am
The constitution disagrees a few times:
once, twice, thrice, quadrice.
It’s not specifically enumerated but mentioned enough that I feel comfortable asserting it is a right guaranteed by the document.
I don’t know that quadrice is a word. But what the hell comes next?
March 25th, 2009 at 1:06 pm
four times a lady?
March 25th, 2009 at 3:50 pm
Bad wording on my part. It’s a right like the right to swing your fists. Your right to self defense stops when you start shooting the wrong people.
Eric worded it better. I write computer code for a living. Don’t force me to be clear without using if..then statements, okay?
March 25th, 2009 at 4:45 pm
Uncle:
Nothing. Just “four times.”
March 25th, 2009 at 8:27 pm
In Sacramento California they both stand side-by-side in bipartisanship, hands in each other’s pockets, squeeling and feeding at the public trough – while making up stupid and useless laws that only create more wealth for their skeezy developer friends who kickback a percentage.
Like the phony “bullet train” to nowhere that will never happen but collect Federal dollars to be siphoned-off later. And similar “green energy” schemes.