Gabrielle Giffords is portrayed to be a nice woman who really cares about doing what she thinks is the right thing and of honestly representing her constituency. She is a blue dog democrat: one of those oxymorons whose voting record contradicts principles held by both major political parties; something that can be good or bad depending on what side of a particular issue one stands. Blue dog democrats always strike me as wanting to have their cake and eat it too. They don't stand in the middle ground on principle, they just seem to arbitrarily pick one issue or another from either side.
As I weighed the pros and cons of getting out of a warm bed into the cold world, the news was punctuated with different reports about Ms. Giffords' shooting, and about her character, history, and service to the country. The reports informed me of her political positions. She is pro-abortion, which puts her in the democratic camp and pisses off the religious nuts. She voted with the democrats for the health care bill, which sends republicans into apoplectic fits. She then did a turn around and voted against Nancy Pelosi as speaker of the house, thus going against the democratic majority, but making no sense since Pelosi was instrumental in passing the health care bill which she did indeed vote for. And finally, Ms. Giffords is a supporter of the 2nd amendment, which endears her to republicans, but not so much to democrats.
Whether or not to support the 2nd amendment seems to be more a question of form than content these days. Supporting it or not is a political tool used to win votes with no real consequences. There are just too many guns out there. There's no putting the cap back on that genie bottle. Having lived here more than 30 years, I've noticed that no serious discussion about the easy availability of guns is ever broached in this country. It's possible that more stringent restrictions and controls of fire arms would help us track the things better; but that discussion can't even begin to be broached since the supporters of the 2nd amendment will not hear of it, ever. I am pretty sure that as smart as the forefathers were, they never foresaw this future when they wrote that amendment into the constitution. The irony here is that it is this very amendment, supported by Ms. Giffords, that made it oh so very easy for some nut to get a gun, shoot her, and take the lives of 6 others, including that of a 9 year old.
Another snippet of news that struck me as ironic this morning was that in Afghanistan five NATO troops were killed in five days on this nine-day-old year. They were all killed by road-side bombs that seem to be getting more powerful. That in itself is not ironic. These bombs are made using chemical fertilizers; and the irony is that it is highly probable that the fertilizers used to make these bombs intended for the killing of westerners were donated by the West itself in the misguided belief that they will be used in the production of non-narcotic agricultural goods; and that their use in agriculture will lift Afghanistan from the Middle Ages and into Civilized Times, where the occasional politician (together with innocent bystanders) gets shot by legally and profitably manufactured guns and not blown up by makeshift bombs produced with donated materials that kill haphazardly.
Good morning cold floor...
No comments:
Post a Comment