Assessing the Field (such as it is) Part I

Welcome to 2008, a Presidential election year. A troubling lot all of them, save Dennis Kucinich and well, we all know the forces that are at work against anyone progressive enough to actually have voted AGAINST the war in Iraq AND its continued funding. A real Health Care Plan and new direction for the country don't gain the approval of the powers that be.

So, here we are, faced again I'm sure with the evil of 2 lessers. The miniscule difference in the positions of the (alleged) 2 parties has never been more evident. What follows is an honest assessment of the candidates. Part One of our series looks at the 3 leading Republican candidates.

The thus far media anointed frontrunner is former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, with his movie idol good looks; he is a sort of Heinrich Himmler of the Gas and Oil Party. Mitt isn't sure if waterboarding is torture. I wonder if Mitt and all the others out there claiming this (yes, I'm looking at you Mr. Attorney General) would like a chance to decide for themselves. Why not simply get some CIA (or Mussad or any number of other organizations) agents to demonstrate on Governor Romney and the others? Or course, using Romanian or Hungarian agents might be better so they can scream at the "detainees" in a foreign tongue while bringing them to the verge of drowning, just to make it seem more...Iraq-like. The good Governor also thinks the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay should be doubled in size. Obviously Mitt's never been to Gitmo but, as with his father and Dr. King, perhaps he saw the place. As one who has been to the Naval Base at Guantanmo Bay (granted, it was many years ago), I can say there isn't unlimited room for such expansion. Perhaps Governor Romney advocates reducing the size of the minefields that line the northern, eastern and western boundaries of the base. Or, more likely given his mental state, perhaps the he advocates invading Cuba and just taking some more space. Either way, it's lunacy and well, not real great foreign policy as the past 7 years have shown.

Joining Governor Romney at the "head of the field" after his win in New Hampshire is Senator John McCain. McCain, the senior Senator from Arizona and again Captain of the Straight Talk Express is a shadow of his former self, Tuesday evenings win in New Hampshire notwithstanding. Once the voice of reason in the Republican Party, McCain has found himself pandering to the same "evangelicals" whom he railed against in the past. The Senator not only spoke at Bob Jones University, an institution of which he once said "If I’d have been invited to go to Bob Jones University, sure, I’d have gone! And I’d have told them, ‘Get out of the 16th century and into the 21st century. What you’re doing is racist and cruel!’" but, he also met with and spoke in glowing terms of the late Jerry Falwell, a man he said was, "an agent of intolerance". Clearly, McCain has put his political ambitions above any principles he might have once had.


Governor (and Reverend) Mike Huckabee rounds out (not quite like he once did) the Republican Top 3. He is a publicly affable man of great charm. He has gone as far as praising former President and Senator Clinton for keeping their marriage together and raising a "wonderful" daughter”. This alone would seem to make him an outsider in the Party. But, the Right reverend is far from a "forward thinking" mind in the GOP reaching across Party lines, he advocated quarantining HIV/AIDS patients. “It is the first time in the history of civilization in which the carriers of a genuine plague have not been isolated from the general population, and in which this deadly disease for which there is no cure is being treated as a civil rights issue instead of the true health crisis it represents.” Unfortunately, the governor is really comparing apples to oranges. The plagues one can only assume he is referencing would be things like TB and Bubonic Plague. Neither of these plagues requires INTIMATE contact for transmission. One is hard pressed to figure out how HIV/Aids is comparable to TB, Bubonic Plague or any other "plague" as a direct public health risk. The entire Health Care System is a public health risk. It would appear that Governor Huckabee believes that Medical Science, like Huckabee's thinking is stuck in the Dark Ages. Perhaps his Surgeon General would be (shudder) Bill Frist! We won't even mention his bearing of false witness in regard to taxation in Arkansas during his tenure.

So, there we have it, the Top 3 Republican candidates. Don’t worry Ron Paul and Fred Thompson fans, we’ll get to them and Rudy Giuliani in our next installment.