@edgarblythe,
PDiddie commentary is somewhat overblown but he's correct about a lot of things.
I was able to get through the overblown bits because it's clear he's not trying to blame one "side" over the other; not viewing the political landscape as a battleground on which the forces of Good are losing to the forces of Evil.
Having said this, I should point out what I think are his most egrious cases of hyperbole:
Basic social service funding is not being "slashed." Perhaps they are not being funded at the levels with which Mr. Diddie would be comfortable but they cannot in any way be considered to have been gutted:
Education:
Healthcare:
Welfare:
There has been a decrease in federal spending on welfare every year since 2010 when spending spiked to $495.8 billion, but in considering if this constitutes "slashing" we should look at spending in the 8 years that preceded the Obama presidency. Over that period we spent on average, $243.7 billion. The average annual spending during the Obama years has been $425 billion or 67% more than during the Bush years. The projected spending for 2014 is 54% greater than the average under Bush and 20% higher than the highest year under Bush (2008 -$313.4 billion)
Putting aside whether spending more on Welfare is a good indicator, it's tough to make the case from these numbers that the current level is woefully low. Keep in mind that during the years the Democrats controlled congress under Bush the spending on welfare averaged $265.8 billion annually, which is only about 44 billion per year less during the other years. The Stimulus resulted in a significant spike in spending that was never intended to be permanent and since then spending has come back down to an amount more in keeping with what the Democrats planned for in the first year of Obama's presidency. It fairly ludicrous to claim 67% greater spending than the prior administration is evidence of current gutting of welfare programs.
Federal spending on Housing is included in spending on Welfare.
PDiddie is, obviously, of a mind similar to many of those posting in this forum in that he believes government spending is the solution to every problem and that the government never spends enough. If more money needs to spent on the area which he believes are underfunded the money can only come from four places 1) Increased borrowing, 2) Increased taxes, 2) Diversion from discretionary spending and 4) Diversion from Entitlement programs.
We already borrow too much and as it now stands, debt servicing is one of the largest areas of government spending. Increased borrowing would be irresponsible and ruinious. Cleary taxes can be increased quite a lot. Whether they should or not is a topic of fierce debate, but,even the politicians who want to raise taxes only want to do so for those designate "rich" ($250K or higher). There isn't enough wealth in the pockets of these taxpayers to pay for everything we do now, let alone what additional things PDiddie and others think we should do. The only pot with discretionary spending that is large enough to draw from to increase the amounts in the other pots is Defense and that's already happening.
There is currently a rather vocal crowd in congress that believes we are drawing down too much on defense spending so it's unlikely that the rate of decrease will increase. It is interesting though to note that in the last year of the Bush Administration, we spent $729.6 billion on defense while in the six Obama years we have average $831.5 billion and that's with decreases in 2012, 2013 and 2014.
As we all know, the most money is spent on so called "entitlement" programs. This spending is mandated by law and so reducing it will require very open and obvious action by the White House and congress, but so far, while a lot of people will talk about reform, its gone nowhere and won't, at least, while Obama is president.
Assuming that the activity in Ferguson, MO after the shooting was a clear case of trampling on democratic rights (which isn't something everyone agree with) one example is hardly enough to back up the statement that these rights are being shredded.
In any case, despite being wrong is so many ways, PDiddie is also right in others. In terms of election campaigning the two parties are hardly distingusishable. They both spend massive amounts of money that they will accept from just about anyone, and whenever a candidate of either party feels himself or herself slipping in the polls, if there wasn't already a heavy load of negative campaigning it comes out in full force. With rare exception, all of the candidates in either party say what they think the voters want to hear rather than what they feel they need to hear, and if they feel it is necessary they will jettison, for the campaign, all the principles upon which they will serve should they be elected.
Right now it's the Democrats who are running away from an unpopular president, trying to somehow make the voters believe they didn't support virtually all of his unpopular policies throughout the prior years. We even have a Democrat candidate in Kentucky who feels the need to use rhetoric that evidences favor for coal while her staff are recorded telling an "undercover" reporter that she doesn't believe what she's saying but that she has to say it get elected. So she is decieving the voters of Kentucky to get elected, and she rationalizes this how? That she is deceiving them for their own good? This is certainly not to say that Republican candidates are not guilty of the same thing, because if they are not this year they have been in prior years.
Well, that's it. That's what he's right about. He certainly not right that the majority of people who will not vote in the upcoming elections are not doing so because they have lost faith in the system or think there is no point since parties are essentially the same. This would be a lousy excuse even if it was true, but it's not. Sure some people feel this way and actually don't vote as a result but most of the people saying these things just can't be bother to vote and their gripes are just an excuse. And they're not even the majority of the people who don't vote. Those people not only can't be bothered to vote, they can't be bothered to know anything more about what is going on in the country and the world beyond what the may see in a headline or hear on The Daily Show or TMZ.They take all of their freedoms for granted and then a relative few of them show up for presidential elections, because they can't avoid hearing facile comments from their favorite TV and movie personalities.
I'm not going to bother to point out all the other things he's wrong about or which he has blown all out of proportion, but the reality is that there is enough of a difference between the two parties to make voting very important. No matter how venal most of them are you can generally rely on certain things to happen when Republicans control things and when Democrats do. Whether it's because of the money their trying to chase or special interests they are trying to serve, governments under each party are distinguishable and will have a different impact on voters' lives.
If you are looking for one party or the other to solve all the ills of the nation and the world, you have foolish expectations, but, I would suggest, you really are not going to come close to having those expectations met if we all keep voting based on charisma, the endorsements of celebrities, or and effort to make our votes somehow indicative of our personal characters. If we want things to get done we have to elect people who have a track record for getting things done, not just talking a good game.
