After catching up on some recent news, I feel sorry for Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan. The economic, domestic, and foreign policy messes they are about to inherit are enormous — unprecedented, even. Well, at least they have a solid 4 years to blame everything on their predecessor’s arrogance, inexperience, and shear incompetence. Right, President Obama?
Decision 2012: The One Question to Ask Yourself
Credit Charles Krauthammer, in his 8/12/12 Op-Ed piece:
“Are better off now than you were 5 trillion dollars ago?”
Vote Romney/Ryan in November! It’s time to retire the amateurs.
Posted in Commentary, Politics
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Where were you when the world changed? Remembering 9-11-2001
I was driving to work at JSC when the news of the first crash was reported on the radio. I got into the office just as news of the second plane hitting the other tower was being reported. I went to the Building 30 lobby, the entrance to the Mission Control Center, where there is a television mounted up high, and stood with a number of folks who were taking in the televised reports. As the images were played over and over again, it occurred to me that the people who did this were attacking icons of American superiority. And there I was with these other folks, standing in the lobby of one of those icons. I felt a kind of fear I don’t think I’d ever felt before. Not terrifying, not paralyzing, not even very pronounced in terms of symptoms. But very deep and very unsettling. Perhaps it was the fear that comes when you realize that your world will never be the same again, and you’re unsure just what it will be.
I drew a lot of strength from the way the country responded, though. For a time we left all politics behind and came together as Americans. We gathered in our churches to pray together. We set aside differences and focused on the well-being of the country together as one people.
And God bless President George W. Bush. The President, having suddenly been thrust into one of the most difficult positions a leader ever could be in, handled the crisis and so much that followed with strength, conviction, intelligence, and passion. He was exactly the leader that America needed in that hour, and in the days, months, and years that followed. I disagreed with the President on some issues. But on national security, on keeping America safe, on keeping our national word to respond decisively and justly without compromise, he was dead on.
In a way it’s disappointing that political tenor of the country has become so rancorous in the decade since 9/11. Yet at the same time, perhaps it is because we remain free, because we remain strong, because we remain safe, that we can afford to play our stupid political games, even to the point of electing an unqualified amateur because we were so darned eager to elected a black president, no matter who it was. ;)
Okay, that was a cheap shot, but I’m convinced that had we still been suffering terrorist attacks running up to 2008, McCain would’ve slaughtered Obama at the polls.
So perhaps, just perhaps, there’s something to be celebrated in our partisan bickering and heated political debate. We can celebrate that we are free enough, strong enough, and safe enough to be able to fight amongst ourselves!
God bless America. And thank you, God, for having blessed America so much.
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Forget the Birth Certificate, it’s the Leadership that’s Fake!
A dear friend forwarded an Email about authentication problems with President Obama’s birth certificate. The following was my response. Comments, anyone?
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Given how badly and awkwardly the whole birth certificate thing was handled by the White House, I’d not be one bit surprised if the certificate they finally produced was indeed fabricated in order to placate Trump, the press, etc.
I don’t like being that cynical, but President Obama’s own words and behaviors – let alone his ill-conceived and anti-success policies – have left me with little to hold onto besides cynicism. Even if some brave citizen were to sue over his apparent lack of proof of natural citizenship, the matter would be tied up in the legal system for years, I’m sure.
My fervent hope is that the whole point becomes moot next November! Next year we need to get the word out as strongly as we can — vote, and vote for WHOEVER the Republican candidate is, whether you like him/her or not! Even a weak, tenuous grasp of the traditional Republican platform and positions would be a vast improvement in leadership and governmental philosophy than what President Obama and his administration have (badly) demonstrated these past few years.
Other than that, I have no opinion. ;)
How about you?
Living here in NASA Town
The past couple of years have been rough for a lot of people who work for NASA, especially, it seems, for those of us in the contractor workforce, which consitutes the majority of the folks involved in the human spaceflight program. My company, United Space Alliance, has been downsizing regularly as we tumble toward the end of the Space Shuttle program with no replacement in site. And USA is not alone. We’ve already lost thousands of good, smart people to layoffs, with more to come. The Constellation program, which had been NASA’s forward plan for human spaceflight, was infamously (and I believe thoughtlessly) killed off by President Obama in 2009. The President did this before having formulated a reasonable alternative plan for NASA, and to date there is still no viable program in place to keep the NASA workforce intact moving forward. So even though NASA’s budget is intact, the agency is not willing (or perhaps allowed) to spend that budget employing the very workforce that made it great.
So morale has been hit hard, and many of our valued colleagues have left — some voluntarily, due to the stresses of such an uncertain future here, and others, sadly, quite involuntarily. To those folks, and to those who remain, I dedicate my latest song, which is probably more of a commentary than my usual parody-type fare: http://music.chuvala.com/songs/nasa_town .
Posted in Music, Politics, Work
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No excuse for voters, though!
In response to my “Excuses, excuses” entry (https://blog.chuvala.com/?p=146), a FB friend longed for a plan from either party that sounded workable, and ended by saying “I wish we could just disband the blues and the reds.”
My response:
I get that; I’ll bet a LOT of us get that. But for me it’s utterly insufficient as a reason/excuse to tolerate OJT, or incompetence, or distaste for American leadership in the world, in the Office of the President. He’s had his shot, he’s performed poorly, and it’s time for him to move on. He got to be the first black President, and he and the country will always have that. And that needs to be enough. It was a bad reason to elect him in the first place; his resume was razor-thin, and we got what we hired, an inexperienced and ineffectve leader. He talked a good game (or so many thought — personally I could never get past his economic policy, which looked bad on its face long before he was elected), but he never really had the game at all. He needs an involuntary opportunity to serve in another capacity. I’ve said before that Romney was not my first — or second, or third — choice for Republican nominee. But there’s a reason late 20th and early 21st century America has had a penchant for electing former governors (Reagan, Carter, Clinton, Bush); at least you know that they have experience… governing! We didn’t get that with Obama, and he proves regularly that he’s not a fast learner in this regard. Vote better this time! Vote Romney/Ryan!