The Red Sox are doing better lately. That is one bright spot in the day to day goings on. The Iraqi situation is pretty much status quo. Bickering and sectarian jockeying for advantage in the "new" government. Democracy does not spring full blown out of a few "elections". There appears to be the need for the civil war that will be the coauldron out of which comes the distilled product still to be determined. The hope is that it will be a unified Iraq, however the sectarian violence portends deep divides that sre based on religious beliefs that are intolerant of any deviation. Democracy demands tolerance and compromise for the greater good. Religious fanaticism is anathema to those ideals. Thom Friedman stated that "until Islam goes through a reformation, as the Catholic church did, and frees itself from theological domination it will continue to wallow in sectarian strife."
As if Bush didn't have enough on his diminishing plate the illegal immigrant problem has blossomed into a national crisis. This situation which has been growing for decades, and ignored by successive administrations, has commanded the headlines for several weeks now. Our democracy requires that representatives be elected to carry out the duties of government. It is the duty of the electorate to make judicious choices when electing representatives. Thus it ultimately is the electorate that is responsible for the government's functioning. If one votes and then forgets about it there is no oversight as to how effectively the government runs. "When the cats away, the mice will play". This adage applies to explain how the corruption, mismanagement, and misdirection of government occurs. Democracy does not work well with ideologues in office. Once in they feel compelled to carry out the agenda their ideology dictates regardless of other views. Their zeal causes them to see opposing ideas as heresy and they take on the characteristics of the religious fanatics. In the current presidential term the legislative bodies are controlled by the Republican majorities. The margin of winning the presidency was very small. In other words close to half of the electorate made a different choice.
Because of the legislative rules however the majority can effectively shut out the voice of the minority. Committee chairman are all of one party. They control what bills are voted out of committee. Under such procedures there is little or no opportunity for the minority to have any influence over legislation or presidential appointments. The result is that almost half of the electorate has little say in what gets done. That is not representative government, it is restricted representation. That is not true democracy.
When ideologues control government the country's welfare depends on how good the administration's judgment is. In the present administration the judgment has been
anything but good. The lofty intentions motivating government policy have been sadly
defeated by poor, or no, planning, poor, or no execution, stubborn refusal to recognise, let alone, admit to, mistakes in policy or judgment. Frantic afforts to suppress criticsm and total lack of candor or transparency. It's as though a secret society was running the show. Hey! Who am I to act as though I had all the answers?
Fortunately the use of a blog is a way to vent safely since nobody reads these entrys but me.
My social committments are minimal and confined to the golf course and singing.
Both are pleasant pastimes and nonthrearening to anyone---except other golfers and
singing partners. The sun is out, the living is easy--- so what am I bitching about?
I guess I just hate to see a "post turtle" that I cant help down.

Bummer!. The Red Sox have gone into a slump on the road. Next they play NY at Boston. That will be interesting. NY now leads the league.
An old Texan labeled Bush a "Post turtle". Asked to explain he said, "if your driving down a country road and see a turtle balanced on top of a fence post you know he didn't get there by himself, he doesn't belong there, and he doen't know what to do while he's up there, and you just want to help the dumb shit get down."

At last Colin Powell has spoken out to the effect that he voiced his concerns about going into Iraq, also expressed to General Frank, Rumsfeld and Bush that the troop strength should be far greater then planned. Rice claims she doesn't remember what all Powell said but that the Pres. listened to everyone and then made his decision.
It is apparent from other facts that the decision had been made long before that. All the discussion and going to the U.N. was merely a formality endured with mounting impatience. Hopefully the President's abysmally low confidence ratings will forestall any continuation of the grand design to remold the Middle East into a democracy. As Thom Friedman said, "better a nuclear Iran than another Rumsfeld run war". Friedman also said that the best way to deal with Iran is to explicitly state that if they or any proxy were to harm another country with a nuclear weapon they would be subject to devastating nuclear retaliation. We have dealt with a Russian threat of "mutually a assured destruction" for close to fifty years and things have gone along fairly well. Little desert kingdoms hardly pose a real threat. Let us be realistic. Of course the rhetoric is about Nuclear threats, the reality is about regime change. The naive notion that democratic elections produce democracy has been dissproved in Palestine with Hamas, an avowedly belligerent group, winning an election