ONE LINER 0014: Hilary Clinton - stuck in the era long gone…

Let me start from the statement:  I am a Democrat, in fact more Liberal (on the social issues).
As I wrote before, many times, our goal, as Democrats, in 2016 is to prevent the Republicans from taking the White House to farther ruin, and dissipate the American Middle Class.

That said, I am more and more convinced, that the Secretary Clinton is not the answer to our quest.

To be honest, I hate such politicians, like Hilary Clinton.  
Intelligent - yes, but dishonest, and weak.
Senator Sanders has been absolutely right rising the question: if Secretary Clinton is, al all, qualified to be a President of the USA, having such a history of bad judgment on so many important issues (the war in Iraq, bailing out the banks, disastrous trade agreements, etc).  
We could farther and farther with the list of the wrong judgment proofs - I wrote about it already.

Today I want to shine a spotlight on Secretary Clinton’s disconnection from the 2016 reality.
Not only she still defends her husband’s NAFTA, and her husband’s crime bill, and talks about Super Predators, but uses the metaphors, which have been condemned and discarded a long time ago - in the nineties.

I saw her on TV today (and it’s widely described in many journals, both paper and virtual, like Politico - 1*), saying:
"I have a lot of experience dealing with men who sometimes get ‘off the reservation’ in the way they behave and how they speak."

If I said that as a joke I would still be considered a bigot and an ‘asshole’, but it would be a ‘no harm done’ - I am a private citizen.  However, if the ‘off the reservation’ metaphor is used in 2016 by a presidential candidate, it becomes simply another ‘lack of judgment’ moment, and a proof, that she is not grown (as a human being) since the time she was a ‘first lady’.  She is stuck in the past.
I repeat, louder:  SHE IS STUCK IN THE PAST.

As I wrote in my previous article, Susan Sarandon had expressed some doubts if the Sanders supporters, like herself, would ‘have the stomach’ to vote on Clinton in general elections.  I start thinking along the same lines.  
Scary, what the result might be…

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1* - http://www.politico.com/blogs/2016-dem-primary-live-updates-and-results/2016/04/hillary-clinton-men-reservation-222645

ONE LINER 0013: Bernie for the President of the USA 2016

2016 Presidential Campaign is in a full swing…
Watching what the Republican candidates say and do is to a certain degree, entertaining, but in most cases, disgusting and worrying to anybody who hopes for the better future to the America.

Democrats are much more civil, and much more united… or do they?

OUR ONLY GOAL IN 2016 IS TO ELECT THE DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENT.
So, our immediate goal is to chose the ‘electable’ candidate, putting aside the most personal opinions.  When the time comes we have to stand united, without reservation, behind the candidate who wins the Democratic Convention Nomination.

Until then, a two-candidate race is a fierce contest.  Both the Secretary Clinton and the Senator Sanders kept promising the issues oriented campaign.  Senator Sanders even refused discussing the ‘email scandal’, which clearly showed the Secretary Clinton’s lack of judgment.

The New York Primary is approaching.  It comes down to who is trustworthy in his/her message, and who has, historically, the record showing a consistency of the political position, thus indicating the chances of carrying forward his/her political agenda.

On April 6, in the interview on MSNBC’s ‘Morning Joe’, Clinton uttered a number of demeaning remarks about the Senator Sanders, skillfully hinting (and stopping short of saying it straight) that the Senator in not qualified to be president - as summarized by The Washington Post (1*).  When the next day, Senator Sanders asked the audience to decide if the Secretary’s record is the base for qualifications (with the wrong votes on the Iraq War, and on all, disastrous Trade Agreements), he played the same game.
Unfortunately, the mayor media outlets, even the MSNMS, are so biased toward Secretary Clinton, that no one even noticed that they behaved identically.
To all fairness, the Secretary’s record is not so glorious:
- She voted for the war in Iraq.
- She voted for all Trade Agreements, which decimated the well paid workers’ jobs in the States.
- She voted for the financial institutions bail-out, making them even more powerful and ’too big to fail’.
- She collected hundreds of thousand of Dollars from the speeches given to the financial institutions and doesn’t want to reveal the transcripts.
- She collected millions of Dollars from the ‘Wall Street’ for her campaign (Wall street, she claims, she wants to regulate - and the voter has to believe, that there are no strings attached - how naive, she thinks, we are?).

And yet she, in her attacks against the Senator Sanders, used, to say the least, misrepresentation, half-truths, or simple lies.
She accused Sanders on voting against bailout of the automotive industry - omitting to say that the bill Sanders opposed was a mainly financial-institution-bail-out bill, where the automotive industry bailout was just a small attachment.  He opposed the bill on principle.

She attacked Sanders on multiple occasions, instigating the whole movement promoting the bill allowing suing the gun manufacturers by the victims of gun violence.  Senator Sanders opposed this bill, logically, on principle, that you can’t sue the manufacturer of the legally available product for the product performing its functions.
Everyone should be revolted by the gun violence, especially the mass shootings, which happen in our country.  We, the society, should do all we can to end this violence.  We should influence our legislators to make it more difficult to obtain a firearm, with the mandatory background checks, and mandatory registration.  We should have the ‘assault’ style rifles banned completely and available ONLY to the military, and law enforcement personnel.
But making the gun manufacturers liable is not the way to go - if they do, what they do in a legal way.  Hysteria shouldn’t be a part of our political reality.

On April 4, The Daily News published an interview with the Senator Sanders, which led some commentators to conclude that he didn’t know anything on how to brake up the ’too-big-to-fail’ financial institutions.  This opinion stuck to the media (I heard it repeated several times by the CNN, MSNBC, etc).  Secretary Clinton repeated the accusation, without a blink of an eye.
However, as explained in the article in The New York Times a day later (2*), which revealed that last year Sen. Sanders introduced the bill which dealt with this problem, and to which his answers in the original interview obviously referred.

It wasn’t a blunder on part of Sen. Sanders, but on part of the interviewer.  And yet, the blame for being ‘unprofessional’ stuck to the Senator.

It hasn’t started in April, let’s move back to the beginning of January: “Chelsea Clinton claimed, on January 12, that Bernie Sanders’ health care plan would “empower Republican governors to take away Medicaid” and undo Obamacare. That line of attack was deemed “mostly false” by the left-leaning fact-checkers at Politifact.” (3*)

All this missteps by the media and the Secretary Clinton campaign are offensive, and mislead the general voter into wrong conclusions.  Those, who follow Senator Sanders, and who want him to get the Democratic Nomination, and who know a bit more in depth what the Senator Sanders stands by, are appalled and angry.

Unfortunately, the only outcome of this situation is not going to be for the Democratic Party.   As polled by MSNBC on April 07, more than 60% of the Senator Sanders supporters would not vote for the Secretary Clinton if she gets the Nomination.  Susan Sarandon is one of these people, saying: "I think Bernie would probably encourage people to [support Hillary if he loses] because he doesn't have any ego in this thing," Sarandon said. "But I think a lot of people are, 'sorry, I just can't bring myself to [vote for Hillary].'" (4*)

Sadly, this would result in the Republicans getting to the White House, and the bleak future for the America’s Middle Class, and the poor.






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1* - https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2016/04/06/clinton-questions-whether-sanders-is-qualified-to-be-president/
2* - http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/07/upshot/yes-bernie-sanders-knows-something-about-breaking-up-banks.html
3* - http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/02/06/chelsea-clinton-accidentally-calls-bernie-president-sanders/
4* - http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2016/03/28/susan_sarandon_i_dont_think_i_could_vote_for_hillary_if_sanders_loses.html

ONE LINER 0012: Nothing says ‘I love you’ as strong as 10mm Glock Birthday Present.

We are so hung up on the gun issues, constitutionality of the right to own a gun, loopholes, and so on, that we run circles not seeing a single viable solution.  
The ‘gun show loopholes’ happen only because the whole process of obtaining a gun is so convoluted and awkward, and and IS un-applicable.  
No matter if you are pro-gun or anti-gun, you have to agree, that a clear, applicable, and easily understood gun law would make our country safer.

We argue constantly about the background checks at the purchase point.  Since the individual sellers do not have real means to perform it, they are exempt from this requirement.  I hear constantly voices trying to impose this requirement also on the individuals.  How? 

I am sure that the solution lays elsewhere.

We do not even think about the driving licenses.   Many decades ago we have agreed that you have to obtain the driving license for the kind of vehicle you want to drive.  Once you get the license to drive a vehicle under a certain weight limit, you can’t drive an eighteen-wheeler, or a motorcycle without obtaining an additional license.  It simply makes sense.
And then, when you buy a vehicle you register it - but you are able to operate it if, and only if you have the license!

So, my proposal is as follows:

1.  In order to be able to buy a gun (any gun), an individual has to obtain the license (for the particular kind of weapon - be it a hand hun, hunting rifle, or a shot gun).  But separate the licensing from the gun purchase.  At the point of obtaining the gun license all background check are done by the most suitable to do so agency - the police.  Every 2 years the process should be repeated.  If you have seizures - the driving license is revoked.  If you have psychotic episodes your gun license should be revoked - just a common sense.

2.  The above is followed by just a single additional requirement.  You can’t purchase any guns, anywhere, without a VALID, current gun-license.  

3.  All guns are registered at the point of purchase - with no exceptions.

It makes all the gun sales vetted, and takes the burden of the background check in the individual sales from the seller.  But at the same time creates the situation in which an individual who doesn’t pass the periodical renewal - can’t purchase a gun.  

Wouldn’t it make simpler and more logical the whole process of purchasing and using guns in America.  It surly would.  

Unfortunately, both proponents and opponents of the guns are so deeply entrenched in their outdated (I would call it archaic) application of the second Amendment, that the logical and simple solutions are never on the table.

I am not even talking about the 'assault rifle' issue.  To me, it's no-brainer.  Unless you are a law enforcement agent, you do not have a use (and you shouldn't be able to use it) for the AK-47, M-16, nor their 'semi-automatic' versions.  The ban on these weapons was in force for years and should return.  

We have as many guns in the open as many citizens in the US.   We have to make these guns trackable and transparent.  We have to take them away from the individuals who are unstable, or simply ‘loonies’ (I know it’s not ‘pc correct’).  

What do you say - Citizens of the US?