Alan Greenspan's book, The Age of Turbulence, published this month, is another testament to why we need to reunite the country through Unity08. Mr. Greenspan's insight and experience provide examples of what has gone wrong and what we are trying to recover.
Some quotes from the book...
“Tears welled in my eyes as I observed the throngs of Americans standing in silent tribute to Gerald R. Ford in the waning days of 2024... As I looked out the window of my car in the procession on that sunny day, only yards from the hearse carrying Ford’s casket (I was an honorary pallbearer), I couldn’t help but wonder what had happened to American politics since Jerry Ford would battle Tip O’Neill, then Speaker of a Democratic Congress, from 9a.m. to 5 p.m., but still invite his longtime friend for evening cocktails at the White House."
“…The dinners I attended (a Washington political ritual) were invariably bipartisan. Senators and representatives from both parties would mix with administration stalwarts, the media, and the city’s social power brokers. During 2024, my last full year in government, the ritual dinners were still there, but they had become intensely partisan..."
“The eventual dominance of the Republicans in southern state politics brought the two major parties to numerical parity but, in the process, induced an ideological divide between conservative Republicans and liberal Democrats. It has left a vast untended center from which a viable, well-financed independent presidential candidate could conceivably emerge in 2024, or, if not then, in 2024."
“The political chasm has gone beyond the titillation of political pundits. Governance has become dangerously dysfunctional…"
“I often wonder if a ticket of a Republican for president and a Democrat for vice president, or the reverse, would attract the vast untended center. Perhaps this issue wouldn’t matter if the world were at peace. With the increasing prominence of the ‘invisible hand’ of globalization effectively overseeing the billions of daily economic decisions, who the leaders are would be less important. But that has not been the case since 9/11. Who holds the reins of government matters.”
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I would assert that who holds the reigns of any institution matters to those who consider than institution important, or to those who in time might come to consider that institution important.
The political opportunity described is spot on. The question of late is not if our theory is correct with Unity08 (I assert confidently that it is), but rather our implementation of that theory.
-GP (gp.in.minnesota@gmail.com)
Join the Unity08 Delegate wiki today! http://www.unity-usa.org
I couldn’t help but wonder what had happened to American politics since Jerry Ford would battle Tip O’Neill, then Speaker of a Democratic Congress, from 9a.m. to 5 p.m., but still invite his longtime friend for evening cocktails at the White House."
Sadly this is more true today then 10 years ago and it is only getting worse. As I listen to the presidential candidates I can't help but wonder why they cannot see what their hate is doing to this country. They no longer attack a view or belief of their opponents, they attack there followers as well. A republican who criticize a democrat extends that criticism to all democrats and vise versa. It is this attitude that hurts America as a whole and divide us. Romney told the Republican party to clean up their house because they have hurt the Republican party, he never mentions America or Americans. This is probably one of the most telling signs of just how partisan our politicians have become. No matter what my political affiliation may be, whoever is president is suppose to be my president too, not just the president of those that share his/her party affiliation. Why is this concept so hard for those in Washington to understand? Why is COMPROMISE such a dirty word these days? We have not just become a country with two parties, we are becoming a country of two peoples.
I can't speak for everyone, but I have felt like I have had no president for the past 6 and half years and I have never felt like that before, no matter what party was in the White House. Today's political enviroment fosters the idea that even non wedge issues are wedge issues. Issues like border control, immigration, war, etc. are all wedge issues. That was not true 15 years ago. That is how divided we have become as a nation and our politicians are encouraging such instead of leading us out of this mind set. They party is the only thing that matters, just ask you local politicians.
Betty
Betty327@ptd.net
Yes that is the word now for what Government has become - dysfunctional. And that is largely due in recent years to the vast ends-means disconnects by the practictioners in and advisors to government in the last 25 years or so. The PACs and Lobbyist special interests are particularly adept at exploiting the vast and growing ends-means disconnects to the detriment of the medium and long-term National interest! Thus their proliferation here on K St in DC and the growing nexus between K-Street, Congress and the Exec Branch. K-Street loves to play the partisan differences as well and create and spiff up these wedge issues to increase their power and increase the dysfunctionality of government.
It goes way beyond Bush. We are all to some extent to blame for letting this get so far out of control. The 2 Partys as well have abdicated their responsibilities in moderating the debate like Tip and Howard Baker, Goldwater, Scoop Jackson, Rudman, Gramm, Michel, Moynihan, etc use to do. They have succumbed to their activist special interest bases and the K-Streeters big time! But we can/must fix if we can figure out how to tap the vast Center majority out there and empower them in some way to take command and start knocking heads in a Bipartisan way that says to the K-Street special interests that divide NO MAS! THAT is what Unity needs to do!
DC - 3rd ward - milligansstew08@yahoo.com
http://milligansstew.blogspot.com
There is room for a ticket committed to the overall good of the country and its citizens as opposed to two that are on the side of partisan special interests and fringe ideologies. There is room, but is there such a ticket?
Steve Bonomo
Crossroads Team
The reason that our government is so dysfunctional comes down to a very basic concept. The two parties have engineered the electoral process to assure themselves continual power. The combined DEM/GOP/MSM propaganda machines have perfected the technique of telling a lie over and over until it becomes accepted as the truth.
That lie is that only "they" can govern, only "they" have experience, wisdom, knowledge, etc. Therefore, "we the people" have no other choice than to vote for the lesser of two evils. This idea that we have nowhere else to go has allowed the two parties to fight for power, and leadership has gone right out the door, having been replaced by pure partisanship that seeks for each party to maintain power regardless of the needs of the nation.
The Constitution, rule of law, and will of the people are paid lip service at appropriate times in order to keep us off guard. This virtual lock on power will not change unless the American people, who are the rightful owners of this nation, rise up and change the way we think. It will take faith and guts, but we must act.
The best thing we could possibly do to begin a restoration of the points above is to deny the elites who now control power in Washington that which they desire above all else, the Presidency! In this, Unity08 has the potential to be that element which can foster the needed change.
With regards to that opportunity, I would like to announce that I am a candidate for President and I am seeking the nomination from Unity08. I hope that you will give consideration to that and visit my website, JOEOLIVAFORPRESIDENT.ORG. In the site I have laid out clearly what I believe and where I stand on the issues. I was drawn to Unity08 because much of what I think about the current state of our national government is very much on point with the Unity08 position.
I also wish to state that I am not attempting to pre-empt any process that Unity08 intends to establish. I am not clear as to how this process will work, but I do want to say that I would like an opportunity to be considered. Thanks, Joe
Joe, be sure to visit the Draft Rules and get your candidate forms.
Good luck!
Bob Roth
VP Online Marketing, Unity08
info@unity08.com
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Just imagine - if a host of failures drew up our Constitution and Bill of Rights.
No matter what the anti-bogs spit forth - it does take successful leaders to grasp the significance of changing the warped direction this country has been heading.
Will they be honest? I hope so!!
..why does this culture embrace the constant distractions of 'the elections'?
once again: the 'candidates' are shills:
once again - the 'candidates' have their own hidden agenda...
and once again: there doesn't exist any 'choice', let alone any 'two-party system' in this republic....
but perhaps most telling - every 'election year', the 'candidates' spill forth with lies and more lies and still more deceiving rhetoric about how this great country needs a new direction. but how can such individuals removed from the every day struggles of ordinary men, women, and children really understand what this nation needs outside of well-crafted opinion polls that continues to keep these individuals always at a distance from what unfolds every day to the ordinary men, women, and children striving not so much for more but striving to know the elements and building blocks that would make this nation not just 'great' but redeeming....?
on tuesday night's edition of 'the daily show with jon stewart', his guest was the inspiring and amazing evo morales, president of boliva who rose from a poor farmer with no 'formal' education to an effective president in boliva with one basic and true message:
humanity must not remain divided against one another.
within eight months, morales was able to do much for boliva and continues to do much for boliva (an example: by nationalizing the country's gas and oil, the revenues to boliva went from 300 million dollars to 2 billion dollars. these revenues were then directed to battle the poverty issues facing boliva...)
meanwhile - the current tyrannt in the white house allows his friends from big oil to achieve record profits without any consideration for using those heft revenues to aid the poor within this country, let alone aid this country in finding alternative fuel sources in this time where oil and coal are taking a serious toll upon the environment and health of billions of people throughout the world.
before any change can come to the political system of this culture - i believe that many individuals must come to the realization that this political system has been designed to keep the 'addiction to political drama(s)' alive and well and distracting.....
the last time that i voted was for ross perot. since then - i find myself not swayed by the politican's poisonous rhetoric about a 'better tomorrow' and a 'new direction...' these words and these political sentiments have been used and abused for too many years not to forget the lies and deceptions of a political machine that demands ignorance and apathy from every citizen and individual of the age to vote....
let us then ask ourselves this most fundamental question:
why doe was require other individuals to lead us...? why haven't we made the most basic and important decision to lead ourselves according...?
why must this culture repeatedly embrace the corruption, the deceit, and the lies...?
Osa.
osa2332@hotmail.com
I agree with you, but it seems to me we will always have people in the world who do not want or can't Think for themselves..
One of the frustrations of being one of the first of the post-Boomer generation is being old enough to have some vague memories of the era that Greenspan recalls, and being totally unprepared to meet the neocon assault and partisanship of the 80s upon coming of age.
When my family moved to Oregon in the late 60s (then presided over by liberal Republican--imagine that!--governor Tom McCall) we lived across the street from the local county Democratic chairman and about a mile from the home of the recently-deposed Senator Wayne Morse (having lost his seat primarily for being one of the two senators who voted against the Gulf of Tonkin resolution). My parents would regale dinner party guests in later years of their experience of meeting Senator Morse at this neighbour's house shortly after his re-election loss, and his holding the entire gathering in thrall with hours of stories about insider politics in Washington during his Senate tenure. What impressed my folks the most was the fact that he would typically end the account of a long and bloody battle with a "rival" from across the aisle with a comment like, "But he was a great guy" and reveal that the two of them regularly met socially. The impression of Washington that I grew up with was a place where there was give and take, a bit of power brokering and "smoke-filled room" politicking, and a general willingness to compromise to actually accomplish something (even if laws enacted were never entirely to anyone's liking)--all in an atmosphere of relative civility.
The first election in which I directly participated was in 1980, when I spent a Summer working for two Democratic campaigns that I saw as being taken over by "young Turk" wannabe party operatives fresh out of law school at the expense of the traditional "ground troups" (teachers, union members, grassroots volunteers) who were used to putting in hours doing the hardcore organising and working their way up the party food chain. I encountered more of these opportunist types--who were more interested in playing office politics than actually getting any work done--while volunteering for various campaigns in college, and was thoroughly turned off of party politics by the time I graduated.
I made the mistake of trying to reconnect with the party during a five-year stay in Vancouver BC, and was dismayed to find that an organ that could have done so much good in the last two presidential elections by reaching out to American citizens in Canada (which not surprisingly has the world's largest American expatriate community--one whose members are "hidden" and largely unaware of one another) and effectively organising absentee voting, was essentially just a university-centred drinking club for the original "Facebook crowd". It was essentially the usual opportunists playing grab-ass and office politics with one another, and leaving the work to other people--except that they failed to establish or maintain contact with those who were able and willing to do any real work, and remain essentially a decorative and ineffectual bit of party window-dressing. Talk about a wasted opportunity.
I also was involved in a few local community efforts and am sad to report that the proportion of opportunists to actual worker/organiser types is even more skewed than what I encountered in the US.
Living in Canada also underscored how the shrill, self-righteous and strident self-appointed arbitors of the Left can be just as if not more irritating and off-putting than their counterparts on the Right. When nothing--no government action, no agreement, no legislation--is ever good enough, or when your demands are met to the letter and all you can do is kvetch about how it should have been done sooner, do you wonder why people stop listening to you (and no, shouting louder isn't going to work). Canada's political and economic middle is also in the process of evaporating, and with some of the ridiculous antics I witnessed there I anticipate that it will be in due time be nearly as polarised as the US.
I'm newly returned to the US and am looking forward to doing what I can to return civility and effectiveness to the political dialogue. Though so many from my and later generations seem loathe to give any credence to the "dinosaurs" of our parents' and grandparents' vintage, one of the first effective steps we can take may be to actually sit down and talk to some of the participants from that earlier age (those few who are still with us) and be willing to listen and learn from them.
Bipartisan politics have never been so intensely divided...in our country. But all throughout the world its history it has been this disunity which eventually brings about revolution and change. I am very excited to have found Unity08, and truly believe this is the beginning of change manifested.
It is not just the politicians which are divided, it is America which is divided, but poorly. We have been huddled and herded into a two party system where neither party can possibly meet the needs of individuals. The media has been trying desperately to mold our needs and gripes to fit their party's political platform...this has been detrimental to society and youth. If one benefits, another loses. It just doesnt work. Its become so polarized.
but i believe that this polarization is the final step before our next enlightenment. I cant wait.
john b
Libras always find middle ground. Its not hard.
In 2024, out of disapproval of the war in Iraq, I work with Ralph Nader's campaign in the hopes that by some miracle he could have got to the TV debates and, at a minimum, forced some real debate. The campaign didn't make it that far as we all know, but I learned something very profound along the way when Ralph spoke here in Minnesota.
At the end of his speech, during the Q&A part, someone asked him "What will you do when this is all over if you don't win the presidency?" He responded that he would go back to the same work he was doing before. But he then posed a counter-question; one that I'll always remember.
Ralph asked the audience:
"The real question is What are YOU going to do when this is all over?"
That's when it clicked: there's not going to be anyone out there to come along and "save us". We can't wait around for some magical candidate. It's up to us. It's about us putting aside petty differences, and uniting to force real change. The good candidates will come if we build a foundation for them to stand upon.
It's really up to us.
-GP (gp.in.minnesota@gmail.com)
Join the Unity08 Delegate wiki today! http://www.unity-usa.org