Tim Alatorre Online

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Thursday, 16 October 2008 19:42
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I love Facebook.  I have been able to connect with so many past acquaintances and friends it is amazing.  What I love most about Facebook is the ability for me to share my life with my friends in a way that I have never been able to before.  I see a window into their experiences and beliefs, and they into mine.  Lately I have had a number of really good discussion with some of my friends, for those who are not in on the Facebook scene, I thought I'd re-post some of them here.

Oct 8th, in response to my posting of:

Barack Obama Lies To America 6:38pm
All politicians lie in one form or another. But i don't think flip flopping over his pastor is that important.  I also hope people don't vote solely on the candidates religious beliefs.
No Matt, I hope people don't vote solely on any one issue. I don't view the Rev. Wright issue as a religious one but rather political. Wright is more of a politician than preacher in many respects. His anti American and pro black supremacy rhetoric concern me more that any of his religious beliefs. The fact that Barack used his affiliation with the church to advance his political career, lie about it, then dump his friend like a stinking fish when politically convenient tells me a lot about his character.
either way, just because obama was a part of this church, it doesn't mean he was a strong believer in EVERYTHING Wright was preaching. neither you nor i can really prove or disprove that. i can honestly say i dont know everything on this issue. but from what i have researched, your youtube video doesn't point out the fact that in between these two interviews, Wright gave raciest public speeches to deliberately hurt obama's campaign because obama was distancing himself from the pastor's raciest comments. Of course he is going to dump him a "stinking fish".
I've always been mad that all politicians tend to lie in one form or another, it's the one thing that turns me off from politics. Really we need to stop the name calling and tearing down of either candidate in a way like that, and realize that both conservatives and liberals have a lot to contribute. It's not about good and evil, it's about our personal views on stability and change, the former being a more conservative viewpoint and the latter more liberal. Both sides have very good logical reasons to be fighting for that cause, and both causes are necessary for a better world.
Okay, I'll bite. This is going to be out there for everyone to see.
Tim, I've been seeing your pro-Romney, then pro-McCain posts show up in my feed here for some time now (PS - look up the White Horse prophecy, it has been widely repudiated). These posts and twitters have primarily amused me. But this is a serious race, and I think you are ignoring a large number of issues here, so I am going to try to address some of them.
I'm going to start by saying that I, too, am disturbed by Jeremiah Wright, and Obama's connection to him. Really, what kind of guy picks that kind of person as a spiritual leader? Where is his judgment? Is he completely devoid of any spiritual capacity, if he thought that was inspiring? These are completely valid and damaging points against Obama. Let me also state that I'm voting for neither Obama or McCain.
But let's go deeper. First off, Obama and McCain, as candidates, are almost identical to each other. We have a one-party system in this country. They are almost exactly the same, and they try to magnify minute differences to make it appear that they're wildly different, but they're not. If you can't see this, take a look at their foreign policy: Their differences on Iraq and Afghanistan are excruciatingly minor! We're talking about a difference of withdrawal times as a matter of months in Iraq, and virtually no difference on Afghanistan. They both want to send troops in for nation-building. Or the economy: They both voted for the $800 billion bailout package that was full of pork barrel spending. Thousands of economists have said it is probably unnecessary and that we have time to study the situation, yet neither party or candidate even attempted to look at other possible options such as forcing bankruptcies, stock ownership, or any of the other plans that have largely been ignored by the mainstream media.
Both Democrats and Republicans are afraid to stand out. I voted for McCain in the 2000 primaries, but since then, he's flip-flopped on over 75 issues. Seventy-five! Here's the link: http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/flipflops He couldn't even vote against waterboarding this spring, he voted 'present'. And if we're concerned about Obama's judgment and morals, don't forget that McCain ditched his first wife because she got overweight, then he cheated on her with his second while he was still married.
And now he announced his plan to buy up every bad mortgage in the country and resell it at a loss. This is obviously insanely stupid. Now to make it interesting, this was similar to something Biden said in last week's debate, claiming it was an Obama idea to "re-negotiate mortgages". But now that McCain is being ridiculed for suggesting the government take on trillions more dollars of bad debt, Obama is calling him 'Out of Touch' and is distancing himself from that plan.
If you want to get into lies, McCain has said plenty of them. How's he doing on campaign finance reform? Or, as I mentioned, torture? He has repeatedly misquoted Ahmedinajad by using the incorrect translation of some interpreter in the Bush Administration regarding Israel. And he double-talks about government spending while proposing a multi-trillion dollar mortgage bailout.
Don't you see that it's all just a big circus act? Both of these guys are clowns. Sarah Palin is the biggest clown of all. As far as I can tell, the only real difference between the two candidates is who they'll appoint to the Supreme Court. Now, strict constructionism and judicial activism are issues I can get excited about. And have they even discussed the issues in these terms? Of course not.Why vote for either of these tools, when they're clearly just trying to play us off of each other? We all know California is a blue state. Why not vote for a third party this year, as a protest vote? There is the Constitutional party, the Libertarian party, and the list goes on. There's a good chance that you can find a party that actually defines its stance, instead of giving out the double talk we're used to hearing.
My goal here is not to promote Obama over McCain or McCain over Obama. As I said, I am voting for neither. I focused more on McCain just to point out the silliness of calling Obama a liar, when they are clearly in league with each other. My only goal here is that we, especially Mormons, think critically about our political paradigm and escape from this two-party mold, which is clearly a broken system (incidentally, it was against the original intent of the founding fathers, as well). We owe it to ourselves and to our country.
All the best,
Ryan
You're goosed this year, Timmy. See you in 8. Maybe 12.
Forget the church for a minute, this election is all about inheriting a diving economy from W. That should be on the front burner more than anything else!
Ha, hopefully you're wrong David, the election hasn't happened yet : ) And even if BO wins I won't be going anywhere. As for the economy John, you're right it's a huge liability for McCain. Traditionally the sitting president gets credit for the state of the economy. However, the housing market problem was pushed by Democrats. On 11 separate occasions over the last decade , (some say 12 but I've only found 11) Republicans pushed for reforming Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. They were repeatedly blocked. Both organizations have connection with the Clinton administration and now Obama's campaign. ... I should blog about this. I've got too much to put in a comment box.
 
Oh and Ryan, I agree with you 75%. I think that insinuating I don't take the election seriously was uncalled for, I'm not sure what prophecy you're talking about, and I disagree with your 3rd party protest vote, but other than that I pretty much agree. : )

I've never been a McCain fan but I feel that Obama is going to take our country in a very dangerous direction. And yes, I do mean dangerous. Politics is really a series of compromises, I understand that. No individual will ever get 100% of what they want, if that was the case we would have a monarchy. Instead we debate and try to persuade others to our point of view to obtain a majority. If either McCain or Obama wins I will continue to voice my opinion. McCain's beliefs are closer to mine than Obama's. I know there are some people I am just not going to persuade. The people who have commented on this post are included in that group. However, I think the discussion is good for everyone. So, Thank You!
Thanks Tim! No, I was not insinuating that you aren't taking it seriously. Far from it. I wrote that you seemed to be ignoring a large number of issues, based on what shows up in my feed.
If you agree with McCain, by all means vote for him. He's a moving target though, and that makes me nervous. I haven't decided yet who I'm voting for, but a protest vote is only meaningful if you agree with who you're voting for, and I meant that there are many parties that may align more closely with one's beliefs than one of two major parties that compromises on pretty much every issue. I think Chuck Baldwin of the Constitution Party, for example, is stronger on the Constitution and family values, without all the big spending that both the Republicans and Democrats have/are/will push through. He is a little evangelical-ish, however.
I am just an advocate of exploring all the issues and parties. I think you wrote once during the primaries that Romney was the last or only conservative.
At the time, Ron Paul was still in the race, and he was much more conservative than Romney.
My point is more about how our system is just messed up. For example, during the debate, CNN had a live "scorecard" on the candidates. Lame. As a news organization, why didn't they have a live fact-checking box instead? Then, I would have learned that the $3 million projector McCain was whining about was actually for a Planetarium, without having to go look it up myself on the internet.
 
I suppose in the end, my angst should be directed more towards the apathy of the average American for taking what these two guys say at face value and believing any of it, and allowing news organizations to get away with sloppy one-sided reporting. I don't believe you're one of those people!
Ryan, once again I mostly agree with you : ) Maybe I was reading too much into your first comments so thanks for clarifying. My views on our 2 party system are a bit more than I feel like writing right now, but I'll definitely put it on my to do list. Hopefully it will show up on my web site before the election.
I do completely agree with your statement about the apathy of the average American. Our world has been reduced down to 15 second sound bites, a headline, and late night comedy. I'm not surprised that CNN had a "scorecard." I find it almost impossible to find unbiased reporting anywhere. I do what you do, I question things and try to discover the source of the claim. McCain did mention the Planetarium in the debate when he first mentioned the projector, however both candidates love to throw out vote counts and other facts and statistics that really don't mean much on face value or are out right distortions or lies. The media isn't holding them accountable, so we need to.
Amen to that about the sound bites.. What I meant about the planetarium is that it was a real commercial planetarium projector, not a dinky little one, which costed $10 mil (mostly private funded) and requested by the state legislature, not Obama.

 


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