FAKE NEWS

Oooh, this one is going to be fun!

I would encourage everyone to watch this video first, and then read the rest of the post:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdP8TiKY8dE&feature=share

I hope that this clip is also fake.  But if it proves to be real, what do we have?

I have been disappointed in the media for a long time, and especially recently.  The mainstream media plays lip service to objectivism, transparency, lack of bias, and promotion of fair assessment of the political landscape.

That. Never. Happens.

Let's take one media outlet for example:

--They create stories that purport to embarrass or expose corruption in one side of the political spectrum

Sound familiar?

--They will always support the other political ideology

Know of whom I speak?

--Businesses playing this particular news source were derided for their biased view.

Getting my drift?

--They weren't considered "real" journalism because their stories were said to be too biased.

Who are they?

Well, those accusations are, beyond question, now applicable to more than one media outlet.
--Fox News
--CNN
and, of course, others, but this example is to make a point.

News outlets that promote an agenda that is against a particular party or politician are all the same.

So, why is CNN ( along with other media sources) trying its best to "expose" a now obviously non-existent collusion between the President and the Russians during his campaign?

--It makes ratings
--It continues the narrative that was once thought to be Trump's downfall.

The problem with this idea is that Trump's campaign did not collude with the Russians to win the election.  Period.  News like that leaks out of campaigns.  There's nothing.  Crickets--

As I have long believed, Trump is actually OK with this talk of "collusion."  He welcomes it.  Because, while he is doing other things that don't get the press of people trying to tear down his presidency, the attention is taken off of those things he is busy pushing forward as his real agenda.

People, please pay attention.

I am not a Trump fan.  He did not receive my vote, and will likely never receive my vote in future elections.  But people are paying attention to the wrong things.  And, guess what--he will get by with things you don't like because you keep screaming "Russian collusion!"

Just wait.   Just watch.

Peace,
Anthony

Let's just go ahead and deal with this elephant in the room--

The Supreme Court did not make a new law concerning same sex marriage.  It turns out that all previous laws never specified that the two participants in such a legal document had to be of different genders.

That was only tradition.  A tradition based in religious habit.

Let's compare the two church sacraments of marriage and baptism.  For centuries they were both only church sacrament.  But in the last few hundred years, the governments of the world and ours have weighed in on marriage for inheritance purposes.  Then, about the time income taxes became a thing, the government decided that being married should afford some tax breaks.   At that time, our current civil marriage became associated with the same wording as the church sacrament, and it is still the only place in which the government blatantly violates the separation of Church and State.

Baptism doesn't have any money associated with it, so the government doesn't bother to try and regulate that.

I believe that every church should have the right to marry whomever they want.  Some believe in no divorce at all.  Some believe in polygamy (or did until the government told them that they can't do that).

Churches should baptize however they see fit--immersion, sprinkling, etc.

The point I'm trying to make is that the government does not have any business with an authority over marriage, or baptism.  Maybe we should call the legal document something besides "marriage."

But if the government is going to give the legal and medical advocacy rights to some people who choose to join together, they should give it to any two adults who want to enter into that civil agreement.  That is not the same thing as a church marriage.  These people aren't asking for a sacrament and it's not their fault that the civil, legal process is called the same thing as the church sacrament.

To be a witness to the world, the church should administer their sacraments as judiciously as they feel--

--and then live up to them.

Because as much divorce as we see in the strict, churchy world, they obviously don't believe in the sanctity of marriage.

Peace,
Anthony

They were supposed to win.

After the tumultuous election season and the first months of Trump's presidency, the Democrats were supposed to pick up at least some of the four special elections for vacant House seats.

They lost all four.

This was supposed to let Trump and the Republicans know that their agenda was not popular with voters, and was supposed to be a bellwether for the upcoming 2018 mid-term elections.  Maybe it is.  But why?

It turns out, that to win elections, you have to have fresh ideas.
--Not "We hate Trump"
--Not "Keep Obamacare"
--Not "Republicans are bad"

If the 2016 election told us anything, it told us that between an unlikable Presidential candidate who wanted to just keep all of the previous administration's policies, and an unlikable Presidential candidate who wanted to address head-on the policies that aren't working, voters will choose the one with new ideas.

Let's take the Obamacare issue as an example, since it is forefront in politics at the moment.  Now, to be fair, I don't think the Republicans are doing the whole healthcare thing right.  I wish their plan would have looked different out the gate from the House, and I wish the Senate was being more transparent.  But the Democrats who are losing are lauding Obamacare as the only viable option, and are not addressing what has become (obviously) unpopular with voters.

Being against Trump doesn't work either.  He doesn't give a damn what anyone thinks.  He truly has the thickest skin of anyone I've seen, orange tint and all!  Sure, groups can bond over their hatred of a politician, but that doesn't gather the middle-of-the-road voter who could go either way and help win elections.  Extreme left and extreme right politicians must address the concerns of the silent, more moderate majority.

So, Democrats, do you want to win elections?

Tell us what you will do differently to address the issues that are making voters pull the lever for the other side.

If you do so in a way that makes it clear that you have new ideas, and do it in a way that makes it clear that you are welcoming of those who are not extreme left of center, then you will get a lot more votes.

One of them could be mine.

Peace,
Anthony

Polarization in politics produces poisonous propaganda.

I just wanted to use some alliteration there--but you know what I mean.

In my lifetime, the polarization in politics has worsened substantially.  Today, Ronald Reagan and George HW Bush (41) would likely struggle to win the Republican nomination for President. They would seem too liberal to the right wing of the party.  Likewise, Bill Clinton would seem too conservative for the liberal wing of the Democratic party.  In contrast to much of what we see in politics, these three men seem to be closer to the middle politically.

There are many reasons for that, but a few that I note:

--The Republican Party has been, by all intents and purposes, hijacked by the religious right.

--The Democratic Party has been hijacked by the social justice warriors.

To be fair, there are many people in the middle in both parties who don't feel like they belong either place.  

--Last, but most importantly, the polarization is magnified by the relatively new phenomenon of social media

Let's look at each of these in more detail:

1.  The hijacking of the Republican Party by the religious right

Sure, the Republican Party has long been the party to which the more fundamentalist Christians migrated.  That did not mean that the Republican Party of two decades ago shunned people who differed religiously.  In the last decade, especially with the emergence of the Tea Party with a fundamentalist Christian agenda, the moderate voices have been drowned out by the louder voices of the more strictly religious members of the party.  Of course, there is no negotiating in their minds, because God is on their side, and you can't argue with God, now, can you?  The end result is a party that is putting more and more candidates forward that are antithetical to the beliefs of Democrats.  President Trump is an interesting exception to this extreme religiosity.  But, while not an ideologue himself, his extreme rhetoric on the campaign trail resonated with the extremism of the party, and that irritates the rank and file politicians in the party.  Republicans deserve Trump.  

Religion has little place in politics.  While acknowledgement of God was common in the day of the Founding Fathers, most of them were Deists, believing that God set the world in motion and then has had little to do in intervening in the affairs of humankind.  They were for freedom to worship as you feel directed, but did not advocate legislation of morality beyond common human decency.  We should still be guided by those principles.  

My summation is this:  If you can legislate Christian rules and regulations, you have set a precedent for Sharia law.

Let that sink in.

2.  The hijacking of the Democratic Party by social justice warriors

I am for doing all we can to enhance the equality of all people. Many people in this country have been treated in horrendous ways, and often by our government.  Native American slaughter and displacement, African American slavery, women's voting rights and inequality in the workplace, the mistreatment of two consenting adults who love each other and just want to be left alone are a few examples of where we as a nation got it very wrong in the past.

But social justice warriors are hijacking the Democratic Party, and once again speaking with voices that are louder than the majority of democrats.  This leads to the same phenomenon we see in the Republican Party, only in reverse. Each of the groups above (with the exception of the Native Americans, who seem to uniformly approach advocacy the right way), has a very loud group of social justice warriors who have the audacity to think that they speak for everyone in their demographic.

They don't.

3.  Social media as a polarizing force.

Look at your social media friends list.

Do most of them agree with you?  Probably.

When we have the choice, by nature we surround ourselves with people who agree with us.  In social media, the number of people with whom we can communicate is exponentially more than what was possible even two decades ago.  

More and more shares of articles (some with dubious sources) that agree with our opinion are seen by us every day.  That leads to the belief that most people believe like us, and--horror of horrors--if there is someone who disagrees with us, they must be out of their minds.

Taken to the extreme, this kind of polarization of ideas is what leads to wars between religions and countries.

But does that really matter?  Can someone have an idea different than my own, and still be a good person?  

I believe they can.

I close this post by encouraging everyone to Google Carl Sagan's "Pale Blue Dot" quote.  There is an awesome Youtube video that has his voice quoting it.

Let us not be so polarized, and think that our opinion is the only right one when we are but passengers "on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam."


Peace,
Anthony

This is my first post.  How do you start this kind of blog?

Years ago, I was a staunch conservative.  I was harsh.  I was unwavering in my belief that my opinion was right.  And was I ever "right", in the political sense.  Now, I am older and (hopefully) wiser, and have experienced more of the world.

Am I still a conservative?  Well, yes.  Especially in the fiscal implications of the label.

Am I more understanding of the view of the other side?  Yes, for many reasons.

Am I right?  Probably not, and maybe not most of the time.

But this is what I believe.

How am I the same as before?
--I feel that with the Bill of Rights comes the Bill of Responsibilities
--I feel that the duties of the Federal Government are to, as Ronald Reagan said, "Defend the country and deliver the mail."
--On that note, I believe that states should have say over more of the laws than the Federal Government.  Yes, I'm more of a States Rights kind of guy.
--I feel that the greatest President of my lifetime was Ronald Reagan.  Not because he was the best at being President, but he was the best at making us feel proud to be us--US.
--I grew up around guns and have known how to use them my whole life.  They are a tool to use in the same way a knife, or a pressure cooker, or a bag of fertilizer are tools.  In my whole life I have personally only seen guns used in appropriate ways.  I have read stories and have seen news articles of them being used in inappropriate ways, as I have pressure cookers, knives, and fertilizer.
--I am thinking of getting a carry permit
--I think that people should work for their sustenance, except in instances where true disability makes that an impossibility.
--I believe that the unemployment rate is vastly different than the unemployed employables rate.
--I believe that if you get paid by the government (be it my state employee salary, or Welfare), that you should be subject to a random drug test.
--I think that many people call for "accessible healthcare", yet they do nothing to help.  There are many avenues to help, and one of the things that I have continued to do in my career as a physician is to volunteer in free clinics to give healthcare to uninsured patients, both homeless and working.  I am continually frustrated by "liberal" people who decry the state of healthcare accessibility, yet only work as a physician or nurse for monetary remuneration and never donate their time.  Others can donate money to those worthy causes.
--I respect the office of President of the United States.

How am I different?
--I have never personally owned a gun.  There is not currently one in my house.
--I am for sensible, enforceable gun laws that mandate background checks and keep guns from being bought by criminals or mentally unstable people.
--I am much more culturally aware than my upbringing taught me.  My parents are sweetly not racists.  For that, I applaud them.  My ministers for my whole life were blatantly racists that could have poisoned my mind, and it is only by the grace of God and the influence of my parents who checked that thinking that I escaped being a racist myself.
--I grew up in an appallingly, viciously cultish church.  I can never forgive those people for the irreparable harm that they brought to me and to many other people.  I am not sure that I know the right way to Heaven, but I can assure you that the way I was raised is not it.  I am now in a loving, affirming church.  It is not the job of the church to fix you.  It is the job of the church to give you a place where the worship of God is made accessible to all, and it is God's job to speak to you.
--I am for a healthcare system similar to Great Britain or Australia.  Yes, a single payer system.  When you look at patient outcomes, the US performs waaaay behind all of the countries that have universal, government-run healthcare--in cost, and in patient outcomes, and in life expectancy, and every other measurable outcome of the efficacy of healthcare.
--People who love each other should be able to marry (if that is what we call the legal document).  It's not the fault of two men or two women that the legal document is called the same thing as the religious procedure.
--I didn't vote for Trump.  How is that different? I have voted for the Republican nominee for President every other time I have voted since 1988.  (I didn't vote for Hillary either.)


These are a few thoughts in my mind as I start this blog.  I will talk about each one at length.

Conservatives think I'm Liberal.
Liberals think I'm Conservative.

I just take each question, each topic, and decide how I feel about it.  Yes, I lean conservative.  But I am now a more compassionate conservative.

I look forward to sharing my ideas with you.  You may not like them, but, hey, this is America. And I believe in the first amendment, as I hope you do also.

Peace,
Anthony