Spanky's Place

1 - Oh Devin! Have you actually heard yourself saying that out loud yet?!?!?! Billary Clinton!?!?!

Let's have a serious talk before you jump off the deep end! Also, before you commit to that, please read the real news....not stories from mainstream media. Maybe you should listen to Zell Miller's (D) speech at the RNC. Amazing speech from a Democrat at a Republican National Convention about the direction of his own party.

https://www.americanrhetoric.com/mp3clips/politicalspeeches/convention2004/zellmiller2004rnc.mp3

2 - To be truthful, I strongly doubt I could ever vote for Hillary, no matter what the circumstances. I'm just venting a bit. President Bush still has my full support, although I wish he would address some of the political rhetoric going on in a "put the hammer down" serious manner rather than the aparrent "it's not worth my concern" attitude he seems to be displaying.

Also, have you heard the latest "trial balloon" being floated for a new "Hurricane Czar" position? By leading republicans such as Texas Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison and Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum? Good golly, whatever happened to the idea of smaller government!? Please, Senators Hutchison and Santorum, for the love of all that is conservative, shut the hell up!

...see what I mean? Man, these folks need to think before they speak.
-Devin

3 - Here's why "smaller government" doesn't work for disaster management in our country: we don't have a government. We have a minimum of three: federal, state, and local. It's becoming clear that there was significant failure at all three levels, but more important than any individual failure was a massive failure at the boundaries. There was bad communication, bad coordination, not to mention a serious problem of turf wars... and there was nobody in charge of fixing that. This can't be fixed by a "smaller is better" attitude at the federal leval, because it leaves all the elements that failed exactly as they are.

I think the solution must be not a "disaster czar", but a new regime for establishing temporary but unambiguous federal command and control in an emergency -- a temporary suspension of bureacracy and of certain checks and balances in order to get the job done. Maybe a structure like the Joint Chiefs of Staff would make sense, cutting across local/state/federal lines similarly to the way the Joint Chiefs cut across the lines of the military branches. In keeping with our general principles of representative government, constituional protections and separation of powers, I would not propose that an emergency regime could be imposed by presidential decree, but it shouldn't require the consent or request of governors or mayors either, and it shouldn't take action by the entire Congress to do it either. It should be limited, and it should be subject to it's own unique checks and balances. I'll write about my ideas on this over on my own blog sometime within the next few days/weeks. I have something specific in mind, but I want to mull it over a bit more.

4 - P.S. Until recently, the idea of a Hillary candidacy scared the heck out of me and a lot of Democrats; but at this point W. has damaged his own party so severely that I'm beginning to think she could win despite the visceral reaction so many people have to her.

5 - I'll be posting something about my ideas on that in the next couple of weeks. I have some "deep thoughts" on that topic.
-Devin

6 - Man, it will be scary if we're thinking alike on this

But not altogether impossible, or even necessarily surprising.

7 - the thing about bush and gang is, those of us who wanted to see conservative values (and i guess i really mean neo conservative values, but wow that is a whole 'nuther, um, blog / essay / whatever) have finally gotten what we wanted. and what we wanted turns out to be, well, really f*kd up.

at one time my political views were much closer to yours devin, than they are now. in fact in the election between gore and W, if i had been able to vote (i'd just moved between states and just didn't get m'self together in time) i'd have voted for W. seriously.

but the many many things W has done and not done since he's been in office have radically changed my mind.

he does not have my support or approval in any way, shape or form, and in fact for the first time ever, i am now a registered democrat, and vote that way right down the line. more because of what you are saying, although i'm sure we disagree about a lot of things. for me it is more a reaction against what i see than anything else. i'm not too sure the democrats really are saying *anything* at all. i don't know what those people are doing. but just about anything is better than what we've ended up with. i'd even vote for hillary, if it came to that. and i NEVER thought i'd EVER say that.

there sure is an interesting mix of opinions, just in our little community. devin, the round peg in the square hole. me, the almost 100% changed/reformed "conservative", capt oblivious, the flaming liberal who supported the war... kinda makes my head spin a little.

8 - LOL. Yes, we are a bunch of "mixed nuts".
-Devin