August 12, 2005

• Topic: in the news, a rambling

  
  

  So…as a result of my dazed education, whenever I try to follow the news, it’s like I’m trying to jump into the middle of a movie, but no matter how many times people explain the beginning, I still can’t quite grasp the whole plot.

  
  

  What’s the deal w/ the Israeli pull-out of Gaza?  I guess the big question I want to ask, is much the same as asking, “Why are many blacks poor, poorly educated, and committing crime?  Is it their own fault, or are there forces beyond their control doing this?”  My question is, “Are the Palestinians awful living conditions in the Gaza Strip and West Bank a result of there own actions bringing this situation on themselves, or are have they been handed a bad deck of cards from the Israelis?” 

  
  

  It’s like if your neighbor were to try to blow up your cat, and you’re like, “dude…that’s my cat you’re trying to blow up,” so you go kick some ass of your own.  You realize that your neighbor has a vicious propensity for wanting to kill your cat, so you decide to build a massive fence that requires extends into the road, causing your neighbor a large inconvenience while driving to work.  And you shake your head and say…”if only you could learn to leave my cat alone.”

  
  

  I’ve caught the tail end of the John Roberts abortion scandal, just enough to remember why it is that I can’t follow politics…because everything is so damn twisted, and turned into a zero-sum game.  Some pro-abortion group decided to make shit up about Roberts supporting those who would bomb abortion clinics, and spend $500,000 on tv ads, to which I”m sure conservative groups spent as much money combatting.  You know…if they only made a straight forward ad w/ a human being talking instead of some creepy lying voice-over, I might give a damn about your cause.    

  
  

  Anyways…what gets me, is how liberals freak that all the conservatives care about is gay marriage and guns.  But…it seems liberals get all crazy about the right of a woman to eliminate a pregnancy.  Not saying it’s not important…but look at it this way…

  
  

  I don’t smoke pot.  I don’t care if others smoke pot.  I don’t think the gov’t should have any say whether people smoke pot or not.  Same thing w/ gay marriage, same thing w/ abortions.  Let people do what they want, as long as they’re not physically hurting anyone.  If my actions or opinions upset you, that’s ok, because it’s ok if yours upset me too.  I guess I’m feeling pretty libertarian today.  Extend that philosophy to my favorite topic of education…and we’d have way more drop-outs because there wouldn’t be truancy laws, and likely, those people would find themselves doing a whole lot better things w/ their lives.  Gotta love those drop-outs.  Speaking of which, Peter Jennings…never even finished high school!!!  How the hell’d he become so smart w/out going to school? 

  
  

  Personally…I think legalizing pot should be as big an issue as keeping abortions legal.  I hate the culture of fear that comes w/ pot being illegal, I hate the whole social stigma and feeling of rebellion that is attached to smoking, I hate all the propaganda created about pot, I hate the fact that people are sitting in prison for pot.  All those things bother me.  But…an issue tends to get attention depending on the group fighting for the attention.  I caught an article today (NYT or Newsday, i forget) about the famine in Niger.  It’s really not a big deal compared to other countries, but it’s the new “hunger fad,” it’s almost like the “cool country to care about.”  Media attention drives an issue. 

  
  

  And so for liberal women, abortion happens to be the hot button issue.  I’m trying to think of an analogy for abortion, but it’s just strange to me that what they’re fighting for is the right to eliminate an unwanted pregnancy.  “It’s my right to get drunk, get knocked up, and then have an abortion,” or, “It’s my right to get pregnant w/out the financial means to support a child and have an abortion.”  There’s also more appropriate cases, “It’s my right to discover my child will be born w/ a terminal illness and to have an abortion,” or, “I was raped, it’s my right to have an abortion.”  For me…abortion is one of many issues that I struggle to express w/ good taste because I have no personal experience w/ the issue, except I know someone whose work involves advising couples about abortions in the case of children who are likely to be born w/ life crippling illnesses.

  
  

  But what if all these women decided to band together, less as female-rightists than as mothers, and called for the end of No Child Left Behind?  What if they put up attack ads for virtually every politician who has gone ahead and sold our public education system down a dead-end track?

  
  

   

  • 1:20 pm
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