What A Self professed Moderate Believes (Hold Your Nose)

These are my very sincere personal reasons for having no current intention to vote for Mr. Romney in November. I post this because I 'went off' at another thread because of my love for OUR country and contentions there by a Poster still that our President is a Muslim and supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood. That level of absurd rhetoric and direct lying continues to create Divides instead of Common Grounds, and totally on purpose. That is not acceptable in a free country.

In stating these, I preface by saying quite clearly that I do not believe at ALL that the Democratic Party has all, or even necessarily most, of the right, or optimum answers, policies, or ideas.

But I demand cooperation and compromise, and see, still, absolutely no desire,even, from the GOP for compromise. That is arrogant, especially with the recent track record during the prior 2 GOP Administrations. The Parties need each other, period, because it is well proven that NEITHER has the optimum answers alone.

1.We are in wartime. We are normally very averse to changing leadership during wartime. Given the extreme nature of certain elements of the GOP and the history of Mr. Bush, I see nothing at all 'better' about Mr. Romney internationally and am impressed with the rise in our international 'status' again under Mr. Obama and I approve of his actions in Pakistan re Bin Laden, in Libya, and in staying out of Syria for now. I'm not certain how I feel about Afghanistan and I am perfectly ready and willing to continue to listen to all pleas and plans for more immediate withdrawal from there.

Our current President has built and re-built international relationships absolutely obliterated by the Bush Administration. I have no reason to believe Mr. Romney will continue that nor any reason to change from the President whose Admin has accomplished that in a rather remarkably short timeframe given that our international approval rating was at its lowest ever by 2008.

Whether some of you like it or not, that international cooperation is absolutely essential in the modern global world and will become absolutely more essential in the coming years. The days of 1950 are over; the U.S. cannot choose its own path only, world-wide. Cooperation is required if for no other reason than that we cannot DO IT alone.

2.The base of the GOP has always been its Moderates, a 'center-right' leaning, if you will. And that is the base for which I voted until 2004. However, the extreme elements of the GOP that have arisen in the past dozen years and seem to be getting worse, are the most harmful elements in the United States to our own future. Again, these are all my OPINIONS, not to be blasted as 'socialist' or any other label or term.

Note that I did not say that many things the tea party (when it becomes a party, the words get capitalized) is trumpeting are wrong; it is their approach and methods and expressed hatreds that I denounce. It is not proper, fair, nor accurate to continue to label our President as a 'socialist'. Neither he nor the Democratic Party are 'the enemy'.

While of course these groups are not supported by most of the GOP voters, it IS documented fact that the violence created by extremist groups such as white supremacists is on the rise; literally those groups have risen in number a few hundred times over what they were and those groups number far more variety than merely white supremacists.

This should upset and frighten all of us, given what we all see elsewhere in the world when violence erupts inside a country.

Violence within our own Country against our own Citizens is not a Solution, and does count as treasonous behavior, and suggestions of revolution and the rise in these violent groups can generally be traced to those we all would call 'right-wing' extremists. Those are not elements from the thinking of the Democratic Party, which is certainly not 'right-wing'. Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck are hate-mongers who fit into this element.

3.Compromise is the key to our government working. The GOP has refused, far more than the Democrats, to cooperate at all for the past 4 years, and Mr. McConnell's statement remains in bold-face type in many Citizens' minds, that the major goal of the GOP from 2008-2012 was to insure that Mr. Obama is a one-term President. He and his Party have certainly followed that credo for 4 years, paralyzing our government, all while offering nothing of substance in counterpoint, merely anti-Democratic rhetoric.

4.Health Care Reform has long been needed in this country. Costs are too high, and pre-existing conditions prevented coverage before for millions of Americans, among other ills of the past system.

Hillary Clinton (her political party is of NO importance here!) was squashed like a bug in 1992 when she initiated health care reform efforts and that squashing was not led by the Democrats. Nothing happened for reform in the Bush years, 2000-2008. And then the GOP absolutely and totally refused to even discuss the matter, even though the current reform includes many of the GOP's own thoughts from the past and even after Mr. Obama offered to take the entire PLAN off the table and engage in PUBLIC discussions.

The GOP refused. That shows no desire for cooperation and no concern with health care reform that was required and still is. The facts are that literally millions of Americans are now receiving care they would not have received before. It boggles my mind that so many seem to ignore that.

I am not at ALL saying I believe that 'government control' or mandates re health care is my method of choice, but something had to be done, and something was done, despite the GOP.

Could it/would it be better if there had been cooperation from the GOP? Undoubtedly.

5.The financial bailouts have had varying degrees of success/failure, to date. However, Detroit is quite happy and so is the U.S. auto industry, at least. The banks and financial institutions continue to run somewhat amok; I am not willing to have them sink on the 'principle' that the Federal Government should not become involved when its citizens need help. Again, something had to be done, and something was done, again over the refusal of the GOP to help.

Would cooperation and compromise, again, have led to better solutions? Quite likely, sure.

6.I am very much impressed and happy when leaders from either Party show flexibility; however, Mr. Romney's very clear history is one of what, IMHO, must be characterized more as 'waffling' than flexible, i.e. blowing with the political wind rather than him being a man of certain convictions.

7.Taxation Laws in this country are arcane, confusing, slanted, and ridiculous. We all know that. Yes, I am an advocate of a simple, flat tax and (speaking of smaller government) essentially the total elimination of the Internal Revenue Service and all the infernal sub-groups that spend wasted employment doing nothing productive, but merely adminstrating a system that can be stream-lined quite easily and needs to be..... but that is not important here.

What is important is that those below the level of 'rich' continue to pay a higher percentage of their wages and income in taxes than the rich do. This clearly robs us all of billions of dollars in tax revenue. The Rich and their unfair tax breaks are being supported by the GOP.

Simply put, it is not in ANY way 'fair and equitable' to have lower tax rates for those who make more money and income!

I see absolutely no reason for the cap on Social Security contributions at $110,000 income, and removal of that cap would generate more BILLIONS in revenue to SAVE that Social Security system, but, again, that is another issue.

But the GOP staunchly refuses to even discuss taxing the wealthy at a higher, fairer rate than currently. This to me is absurd, and the 'investment in business will go down' argument is poppycock perpetrated by the Rich who unfairly and greedily wish to have more, more, more with no concern that Others get less when that happens.

The TRUE base of our country, the 'working people', are squeezed more and more and more every year, and this is neither fair nor anything but disastrous for the future.

8.Energy...this Nation needs to become energy-independent. I have seen far more efforts from the Democratic Party than the GOP to attempt to make this happen. The very philosophies of the GOP seem far more 'in bed' with Big Oil and I have not agreed at all with most GOP positions in terms of their non-efforts toward solar, wind, and nuclear power, let alone ethanol. All they have produced is empty rhetoric while deflecting any and all actual concrete efforts to create new energy sources here that can and will provide new jobs HERE.

I reluctantly agree to more oil-drilling within our own territories; however, I want a cap on that drilling based on a very clear PLAN to wean us eventually from oil, also, but the FIRST priority, IMHO, is to become independent, so if that requires some more drilling here, I will live with that temporarily in order to achieve the first priority which is energy independence.

Once that happens, the Middle East can do as it wishes over there, and we have no further reasons for troops, lives, and monies to be wasted there.

We must become independent and that has never been something touted and worked for by the GOP. I shall leave it to Others to speculate as to how much if any of that refusal to work for alternates is due to Big Oil influences on the GOP.

9.The GOP is purposely attempting to keep legitimate voters from the Polls under the guise of needing an i.d. card to prevent 'voter fraud'. The number of cases of voter fraud is laughingly small (fortunately) and these efforts are not even smokescreens but clearly intended to disenfranchise various minority groups that likely would vote Democratic. I do not care what happened in the past, I am centering on the ridiculous idea of pushing this concept through in a very few months; likely, I have no problem with the I.D. at all as long as that is phased in and not forced in so that the GOP can win the White House.

10.Mr. Obama was a rookie. All too many of his top people were rookies. I see nothing of 'leadership' in Ms. Pelosi, some in Mr. Reid, but neither of them have been able to bridge divides either and come across quite negatively often. Some of Mr. Obama's people had to be replaced, some of his initial ideas and methods were not efficient.

And as I made quite clear in his first year, I disagreed strongly with the concentration on the health care issue in that first year, at the expense of so many other areas not being able to be attacked that needed solutions also.

Had the GOP cooperated in Health Care Reform, however, they all could have moved on far faster than in year Two to attempt TOGETHER to solve more problems.

After 4 years, however, my preference is to continue what at least has been some progress because I happen to believe in Mr. Obama's international approach far more than a strict hard-line, militaristic one. He has proven he has the courage to make the Big Decisions. I have no reason, based on what he has said, that Mr. Romney would be nearly as efficient nor able to work with the very complex series of inter-laced situations and peoples and world situations. I want to build on the new relationships, not destroy them or have to start over yet again, internationally.

Those are my feelings as of today. I am not at all 'against' the GOP, nor anti-GOP.

My complaint is that the Party for whom I voted rather consistently until 2004 has become controlled not by its Moderate Base but by its right-wing elements and that limiting the thinking and policies to such right-wing solutions only is not what will work in 2012 and indeed what would harm us for years.

That is my single most over-riding reason, maybe, to strongly desire NOT to vote for a Group that I see as far too limited in thinking and scope, far too inflexible, and far too full of itself with no track record of its own success.

Those elements have a very narrow view of the world, and of our country, and all too many have a problem with the current and growing non-Caucasian make-up of our Nation. They must live with it, not attempt to change it, for it is no one's fault that non-Caucasian births outnumber Caucasian births.

It is not 1950, but that ultra right-wing element seems to wish nothing but return to 1950 and its policies. I shall ignore for the moment that the Civil Rights act was not passed until 1964, and what that alone says about the 1950 mentality.

We have grown to a Nation with 300,000,000 Citizens who are more diverse in make-up than ever; a melting pot we have continued to be.

Each and every one must be considered equally, and on that there can be no compromise.

Bigotry against ANY group of our Equal Citizens cannot be tolerated, no matter how it is couched, and while the word 'bigotry' is quite a strong one and not to be thrown out lightly, IMHO there are far more examples of various sorts of racial and ethnic bigotry among the ultra right-wingers of the GOP than anywhere in the Democratic Party.

One Citizen, one vote. That is who we are, no matter the make-up of our Citizenry. Again, there can be no compromise on that basic Principle of the United States of America.

The person is for certain, not a moderate. Liberal republican, possibly. Democrat posing as ‘moderate republican’, possibly.

The sad thing is that this person likely thinks herself (assuming female) a deep thinker. Though she won't admit it, she's more concerned that she's espousing ideas and beliefs that mirror those of the groups she wants to think highly of her. All the really cool people on TV think this way, and would be super impressed that she's a "Republican" who "saw the light".

Well in excess of 2,000 words of pure, unadulterated pop-PC.

Yup. These are the kind of people that try to find a middle ground between right and wrong. They are completely shaped by the media. They will never espouse an opinion that hasn’t been thoroughly screentested to oblivion, and they consider them “above” us troglodytic ideologues simply because they never had a conviction about anything in their life except for their favorite band.

These are all stupid, but to defeat Pres. Obama, we have to be able to calmly explain why these are wrong and to explain how we have better ideas. I have acquaintances who think the same and are resistant to logic, math and history, but I keep on plugging away. At the very least, I've created doubt, and maybe I've got a couple to switch their votes or at least stay home.

Know your enemy!

A true moderate would not blather on for so long. And, a
real moderate would include a modicum of criticism of the
other side.

When liberals make hard left turns and conservatives predictably
stand their ground it is always the conservatives who are accused
of becoming radical. Those who believe this are called liberal, not
moderate.

“Yup. These are the kind of people that try to find a middle ground between right and wrong.”

Guess I’m in a quote mood ... Ayn Rand said this best, you said it fine.

“In any compromise between food and poison, it is only death that can win. In any compromise between good and evil, it is only evil that can profit.”

What BS! This was posted on 9/15 at this link:

http://deadskirts.com/superboard/viewtopic.php?p=234684&sid=c887d15c3595ddc5c42566c6292ace88

She calls herself Sandi and if you look at the pic she uses I think shes probably a prostitute.

A “moderate” is just another name for a fence-sitter, a middle-of-the-roader and a wishy-washy fantasizer who thinks that “everyone is really good deep down inside”.

I, a woman, will solemnly agree. It is sad, but many girls are taught such gross materialism/secularism/irrationality that there is not a brain left in their bleached little heads when they reach adulthood. So many women “think” like the ladies on the ‘View”, which is not at all. It is all emotion-—non-rational “feelings”. If they pick up a book at all, which most don’t, it has no substance whatsoever.

Your friend epitomizes the essence of the word “schmuck”.

I don’t understand why this friend hasn’t been downgraded to acquaintance en route to stranger status.

Life is too short and too filled with survival critical issues to further endure crap such as this.

It’s time to cut this particular cord.

...and I am perfectly ready and willing to continue to listen to all pleas and plans...

Wow! And I am perfectly ready and willing to bash this idiot's head against a brick wall after only a few lines of reading.

Consider this a bump until a time ever occurs that I have calmed down enough to continue reading.

This was written by no Republican. There ability of this person to percieve reality is severely impaired. This individual would have us believe that the (not capitalized on purpose) is full of dangerous Timothy McVeighs and “the rise of right wing hate groups has grown one hundred fold” is a fact and not her personal Brown Shirt Media fed delusion. She is able to maintain this delusion by supporting folks like Zero and the CLintons while completely ignoring the “game plans” these folks are pursuing as outlined by Cloward and Piven and Saul Alinsky and others. I would question this individual’s intelligence. What else in their life have they accomplished that would make you believe they are a functionaing, rational person?

Quite right and the most elegant answer I have ever seen to respond to folks like this in power was articulated concisely by Ayn Rand. Go Galt. They can’t build their delusional dystopia without our money. Pound sand.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.