Politics and Culture

Literally, the candidates stood calmly behind their lecterns. Figuratively, the Democratic candidates tripped over each other to prove who could offer the most brain-dead solutions to the nation’s problems. If one had to declare a winner, it would again be Hillary, for only she realized that non-Latino Americans will read the translation the next day and that the people who are going to elect her, moderates, may not like the Latino-first vibe in the Coral Gables Debate Hall. The others competed for the title of Mr. Latino panderer in an unseemly display of platitudes and obsequiousness that would have embarrassed Latinos like me if I cared about such things.

Generally, I think that most Americans will be appalled by the things said in the debate, but that Republicans won't be able to capitalize on tonight's foolishness in the general election since the likely candidate, Hillary, refused to toss any softballs for Republicans to slam.

Before I get more into it, I’d also like to say that the Republicans are making a huge mistake by avoiding groups that may have some antipathy to them. How great would it be to get booed for defending the sanctity of marriage or wanting to enforce the border? Very valuable and brave.

Terrorism-(the phantom menace):

Follow up:

OK. Back to the debate: To gauge the intellectual level of the national security portion, one need only know that one of the questions on the terror situation had to do with capturing Osama Bin Laden, as if that would end the whole thing. Otherwise, each promised to hand Iraq over to the terrorists and effect an Iraqi bloodbath faster than their opponents. Richardson said he’d hand Iraq over to Iran and Al Qaeda in a record six to eight months, a number no doubt based on precision analysis and cold calculation. Edwards pre-emptively accused Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, and Ambassador Ryan Crocker of lying. Dodd would rather spend the money in Afghanistan which is something so odd that either he’s not a very smart man, or he wants to build hawkish, anti-terrorist credibility, but only by associating himself with wars that are going well. Only Hillary was smart enough to say something banal and meaningless like:

Nothing in the Bush administration's report will change the fact that there is no military solution to the problems in Iraq.

Domestically, the candidates offered solutions not unlike those I read when I grade essays from my high school sophomores.

Health Care:

The question started with the forty million uninsured distortion, if not outright lie. Quick rundown: Richardson wants to let you know that every color and race should have health care. Dodd not only thinks that illegal aliens deserve health care, but maternity leave (for their new American citizens). In fact, Dodd wants to give everybody in South and North America health care as part of a public relations tour (Maybe if we offer bin Laden a CT scan or some calf inplants, he'd leave us alone). Clinton doesn’t want health insurers to deny anybody any procedure like they once did to her “Latino” friend. Obama’s mother worried about how to pay for her medical care (I guess Obama, a wealthy attorney, didn’t want to chip in).

But Edwards, Ravel, and Kucinich took it a step farther. They think the problem is capitalism itself. Edwards said that if you “invite insurance companies and pharmaceuticals to the table, they’ll eat all of the food,“ which makes me wonder who would invest in those companies after Edwards is elected. It also makes me wonder why he wouldn't nationalize other for-profit distributors of life-essentials like farms and supermarkets. Wouldn’t food be cheaper if dairy farmers didn’t spend all of that money to promote cheese?

Edwards proudly declared that he’d raise taxes to do it. Let’s think about this, friends. Since every government responsibility given over to private enterprise has resulted in greater efficiency and the opposite has greatly increased costs-(what incentive do they have to be frugal?); and nobody wants to deny anything to anybody; and nobody has said anything about cutting Edwards’ bread and butter, lawsuits; can you imagine how much this thing is going to cost?

Oh, and Richardson is for prevention which is like saying you’re for dental floss.

Housing:

Since sub-prime loans are bad for Latinos, guess who should help them? Now, you’re getting it.

Immigration:

But it was immigration where the stage at Coral Gables turned into a logic wasteland with a series of contradictions, lies, and bafflingly-reasoned arguments. Figure this out:

Any talk of border enforcement is racist except when they want it. Edwards wants to help the poor by legalizing millions of low-skilled workers to compete with them. Illegal immigrants (sorry, Mr. Kucinich. I know “nobody is illegal” to you, but that’s how we know them) help the economy, but Dodd, Obama, Ravel, and Kucinich want to help the Mexican economy so that they won’t want to come here. If they don’t come, how will they help us, then?! Richardson is for border enforcement, but then said it’s futile (“if we build a 12 foot wall, they’ll build a 13 foot ladder”), however, blockbuster can keep track of customers, so we can keep track of illegals. As per his analogy: won’t they just use more sophisticated forgeries?

They also said that it’s we who are abusing illegal immigrants (we’d better be nicer to them or they’ll all leave), and instead of deporting them, we should be unionizing them (Kucinich). Hillary Clinton fondly sentimentalized Ellis Island, a situation that every “racist” conservative would be happy to recreate.

I’ll just say that the second question asking why we’re worried about the Mexican border and not Canada’s is as stupid as asking… actually nothing’s as stupid as that. Still, all of them essentially said, “yeah, good point” It’s another example of the equality fetish afflicting our political left wherein no equivalence is too ridiculous. Wrapping up: Something about not separating families and Kucinich said something else about blaming NAFTA, which I didn’t understand. Is he saying that NAFTA hurts the U.S. economy or the Mexican one? If it hurts ours, why would that encourage illegal aliens. If Mexico’s…I just don’t get it.

Hillary mentioned Jesus.

Education:

Education was worse! 33% of Latinos don’t graduate from high school, so what do they need? More school, of course! After a couple of months with their birth unit, kids will be whisked away to day care and preschool and all-day kindergarten. Then they’ll fail high school, at which time they’ll partake of free university (for the sons of illegal aliens), gracias a Democrats.

Again, let’s think about this for a minute. Why do Asians and every other immigrant group do great in school and some Latinos don’t? I teach high school in a 99% Hispanic school. It’s not hard, folks! What do you need to graduate? Books, check; teachers, check; pencils, check; thousands of dollars in special programs for hard-of-learning kids, check. What more does a student require? How do the other 66% manage to graduate? And, I don’t say this to disparage Hispanic students whom I love (my own kids are Hispanic students), but so that they stop humiliating themselves by wasting time in school and then blaming it on a lack of money. Let’s go Latinos! Get it in gear! It’s embarrassing.

Why do the Democrats think more of the same failed programs will help? Woops, sorry I asked such an obvious question.

Foreign policy other than Iraq:

Two lies occurred here. Dodd said that Nixon and the C.I.A deposed Pinochet and Ravel insisted that the C.I.A tried to topple Hugo Chavez, the dictator in waiting, of Venezuela. I was shocked, shocked! that Ravel tried to rationalize Chavez’ idiotic anti-Americanism by insisting it’s our fault. We should be nice to him, but not to the people fighting alongside us in Iraq. Only squeaky wheels get our grease.

Panderfest 2007:

Univision unleashed what must have been the most degrading pandering since Mozart agreed that his opera had “too many notes” by asking the question, “How have Latinos contributed to America?” or, in other words, “this is your queue to tell us how great we are.”

Dodd said Latinos are valuable because of Latinos’ boundless aspiration for improvement and their determination (except about finishing high school, I guess). Ravel and Kucinich were more hypocritical. They wanted Latinos to be proud of their heritage which is good when minorities do it and thought that it's good that they stayed together (shouldn’t we be united?), which, again, is good for minorities that vote Democrat. Richardson brought up the disgraced Henry Cisneros. He might as well have mentioned Alberto Gonzales. And, Hillary talked about their family values which is yet another good thing for minorities.

To reiterate, Hillary Clinton didn’t go Latino ga-ga so she won. And from now on, one can be fairly certain that Obama will precede every answer with a personal story no matter how unctuous or irrelevant.

Nobody mentioned gay marriage. Bill Richardson is too weird-looking. Thanks for reading.