The Empty Chair

So, most of you have heard about the odd performance piece Clint Eastwood put on at the Republican National Convention, where he cross examined an imaginary President Obama signified by an empty chair. I like Clint, even if I don't agree with his politics and, as Bill Maher pointed out the other night, he went up there with no prompter and a chair and he got good responses from the audience, so you gotta give him credit for stepping out there. But it wasn't till I was watching The Daily Show with Jon Stewart this weekend that I realized the significance of Eastwood's conversation with the empty chair. A significance that is obviously lost on the Republicans themselves.

As Jon Stewart put it, "Eastwood finally revealed the cognitive dissonance that is the beating heart and soul and fiction of [the Republican] party.   . . . I could never wrap my head around why the world and the President, that the Republicans describe bears so little resemblance to the world and the President that I experience. And now I know why. There is a President Obama that only Republicans can see. And while the President, the rest of us see has issues, apparently this President, invisible to many, is bent on our wholesale destruction." This theory is startlingly true. And it's been true since the campaign began. No, let's be honest, it's been true since January 20th, 2009. The GOP has based the majority of its attacks, not on the actual policies President Obama has championed or put into place, but instead, they have continually referred to a mythical, alternate reality version of Obama. Always exaggerating anything he said or did, and shockingly, often telling outright lies!

I can't even count the number of 'scandals' pushed, and often generated from thin air by Fox News and other GOP leaning sources that were completely untrue. And I mean proven false by objective investigation. But Republicans, and especially Fox News, know one very important thing about Americans and the media. They know that a salacious lie told today will be remembered, even if it's completely debunked tomorrow. Get your version out there first and proclaim it loudly and repeatedly. Then even if irrefutable proof arises later, you simply let it go without comment and your viewers and supporters will never even notice. Any proof offered later will be considered liberal propaganda. It's simple, and it works.

Look, I have a number of issues with Obama and his policies. I'm ticked off that the Gitmo gulag is still in operation. I'm ticked that we have made it OK to execute Americans via drone with little oversight. I'm ticked that we are still expected to be in Afghanistan for years to come, when we really aren't doing any lasting good and really don't have any control over the stability of the Karzai government. I'm pissed that the Bush tax cuts are still in place and continuing to feed the deficit. That's just what comes immediately to mind. Though even some of those items bear the fingerprints of the GOP. My point is that I can understand reasoned disagreement with the policies of this President. What I cannot understand is how much time is spent by Conservatives ranting and raving about policies Obama never proposed or on intentional misinterpretations of policies that actually were implemented. If we can't even agree on the basic facts, then how can we ever agree on anything else?

As an American, you must decide this November who you will support for President. I'm not asking that you blindly vote to reelect Barack Obama. But I do ask that you base your voting decision on facts. Not sound bites. Not some off the cuff remarks by Mike Huckabee or Sean Hannity. Not some unconfirmed headline you read on the Drudge Report. Not a Crossroads GPS funded attack ad. Base it on facts, that is all I ask. Wanna know the details on past and current fiscal policies and how they affect the deficit now and in the future? Actually go to the official sites and find the info! Don't pull it from breitbart.com! Visit the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), which is the non-partisan organization that is relied on by both parties for 'scoring' legislation. You want to hear some level-headed analysis of a Supreme Court ruling? Don't wait for Nancy Grace to enlighten you, go to the SCOTUS Blog, where experienced law scholars parse through the dense rulings and discuss the repercussions without adding partisan spin. Hear about a scandal that sounds shocking? Then investigate it through non partisan sources, or at least across a wide swath of sources, to see if maybe the reason it's so shocking is because it's made up! Vote for who you think is best for America, going forward. Just make sure you're basing your decision on factual information and not single sourced from a partisan pundit with an axe to grind.

Self Evident

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

As you no doubt know, the preceding quote is from the Declaration of Independence. Our resignation letter from the British Empire, you might say. It speaks of what the American colonies believed were the rights of every citizen. This belief, that "all men are created equal" sits at the heart of the US Constitution. A document that attempts to codify the principles of fairness and equality for all Americans.

So why is it that, after 235 years, we are still struggling to live up to the ideals Thomas Jefferson put to paper all those years ago? In 2011 we are still debating whether particular Americans deserve the same rights as the rest. Should they be treated differently by the law? Do they have the right to do what their neighbors have always been free to do? Should you be payed the same wage as the person sitting next to you who does the same job? These questions, to me at least, are astonishing in that we are even asking them. I'm sure someone reading this is already trying to determine who I'm referring to in each question. But why? Does it matter? I don't recall the Constitution or it's amendments having any asterisks tucked away in the text.

Does it change the answer if I'm referring to an America who is gay as opposed to straight? Does it matter if it's an American man or woman? Does it matter if the American is lighter or darker skinned than me? The Constitution certainly wasn't written to only apply to certain Americans and not others. Each of us can point to someone we know who will eagerly agree that America is the land of equality and that everyone has the right to reach any level of society if they work for it. But if you mention homosexual or muslim, how many of them will get nervous and start looking for the right way to explain how that's different.

Personally I can't even grasp the idea of paying a qualified woman less than a man for the same job. It wouldn't even be an option to weigh! She's qualified, she has X years experience, so let's offer her X salary, based on that criteria. I don't get how someone can actually go out of their way and fight to prevent two gay Americans from marrying. I understand that some would have personal issues with it, perhaps, but to campaign to stop it? It has zero effect on them, so why do they spend their time and money trying to stop two people who love each other from formalizing their relationship as everyone else is allowed to do? Something every OTHER American is allowed to do.

America was built to be a meritocracy. A level playing field. The founders wanted to escape a world where the circumstances of your birth would be the prime determining factor in what you could do or become. They wanted to do away with the aristocracy and a class system that dictated who could do what and who deserved which rights. So they created a government built on these principles of equality and fair play. You can see it in the painstaking way the Constitution lays out the United States government, with careful checks and balances to spread the power. It's inefficient, but it's about as fair as any single document could manage. But leave it to us to screw it up!

How many years after we declared those "self evident" truths till we stopped the practice of owning other people? How long till we gave roughly half our population the right to vote? How long till we finally admitted that the color of your skin did not limit your Constitutional rights? And how much longer before we stop pretending that who a person is intimately attracted to has any bearing whatsoever on their worth or rights? How much longer till, as a nation, we finally stop dictating what makes a 'proper' marriage or a proper American?