| That could be true about Dean I don't know. But that's also true about senate member Bill Frist (Tennessee) and also a doctor and who is the leading Rebulican behind the resent Health Care package that was just passed and that is so generous to health care providers and drug companies. Again, this crap works both ways.
Clearly these single sentence snips at politicians can be fun but ultimately not very useful. God forbid if we allowed the board to be polluted with facts. It seems to me, but apparently not to all, that the dividing line between liberals and conservatives is very ambiguous and unclear. For example, the current conservative administration has greatly increased the size and expense of the federal government under the Homeland Security Act, The record budget deficit also give the lie to “conservative” fiscal management. The Bush administration has also increased the power of government over its citizens under the Patriot Act, which limits or eliminates many of our protections under the Bill of Rights. Liberals are not the only ones who have supported big government programs and restrictive regulations.
The first conservative President Bush raised taxes, and the current conservative Bush is supporting the authorization of interstate toll roads (a tax) and taxes on online Internet sales, both are serious tax levees. The point being is that liberals are not the only politicians to raise taxes. Conversely, liberals have proposed legislation to raise the wage earner and dependent income tax exemption on more than one occasion, so conservatives are not the only ones to support lowering taxes. Liberals also sometimes reduce the scope of big government as well. President Clinton cut back on the federal Aid to Dependent Children welfare programs, while Vice President Gore led a task for which reduced the number of federal employees by tens of thousands of people. On the other hand, conservative President Bush has proposed doubling the size of the Peace Corps, a liberal Kennedy program.
The facts show that both liberals and conservative raise (or lower) taxes, both conservative and liberals sometimes increase (or reduce) the size of government, and both some liberals and some conservatives display courage in the face of adversity. Some even display personal physical bravery in the manner of Senators Kerry and McCain.
It just seems to make more sense to look at government policies, proposals, performance, and issues rather than the political labels and one sentence snips. A well-known poster on another trumpet board that most of us are familiar with often holds the radio talk host Rush Limbaugh in high esteem for his conservative views and “good sense” insights. I frankly don’t see Limbaugh as either a great conservative or a great American, since he not only dodged the draft during the Vietnam War (due to having a pimple on his @ss), was recently fired from ESPN for racist remarks, and underwent treatment for drug use problems. Ordinarily, I would have some sympathy for Limbaugh and his drug problems, but he has been hypocritical in criticizing opponents of the war and in recommending that drug addicts be locked up. I can tolerate a draft dodger, and I can feel sorry for a drug addict, but I cannot tolerate a hypocrite who wants everybody else to go to war, and drug laws that apply to everybody but him.
Larry |