3-29-2010 (Monday)

Happy Monday to my loyal readers. It is a wet one out there today. But the drive went pretty smoothly and I am starting to feel even more comfortable driving the new car. It really seems to handle the wet roads well and I only hit one possible hydro-plane spot which is a record. Because in the old car I was always feeling like I was on the verge of spinning out of control. To the extent that drives in the rain like this morning were almost white knuckle experiences and made we want to pull over and just wait it out.

Today on the way up to work they played a clip on the radio from a protest that took place in Nevada this weekend. It was a "Tea Party" protest directed at Harry Reid and put together by The Tea Party Express. It was an interesting piece because while it was on National Public Radio (NPR) it really seemed to be just about letting the people who were attending the event tell why they were there. Now for me. Even if I do not agree with what the people are saying. I think that far to often when it comes to news be it on television or the radio. That far to often we hear the opinion of the broadcaster or commentator rather then the reasons why the people are there from the people themselves. I find hearing from the people to be both far more interesting and more enlightening because you get a better idea as to what the common man is thinking.

I realize we are in a representative democracy and since we are it sometimes doesn't seem to matter what the common man is thinking. But, it sure feels like at any given time at least 50% of the country or a little bit more feels like they are not being heard. It is interesting to me because I remember during the last couple of years of the Bush administration, or even longer for me, I knew lots of people that felt like they were not being listened to. What has me a little bit bothered about this whole Tea Party movement is that it just feels so organized and any kind of dissatisfaction before was not so organized.

Now, that may just say more about the conservative versus the liberals and which group is better at really getting together and organizing a movement. There is also a more centralizing voice I feel for the conservatives in terms of both Fox News as well as talk radio. Now some would argue that the whole of mainstream media is a liberal strength. I would say that, while it may be true there is not a centralized voice for the liberals. They tried that with the whole Air America thing and it failed. I am not sure what that says about liberals but you would think that they could have supported a radio station that catered solely to their political positions. I realize that there are more complicated issues as well here and some are going to argue that MSNBC meets the need for liberal news. But, I think people are so varied in there positions that to try to direct a group of liberals is really a little bit like herding cats.

That is my two cents. Take it for what it is worth. I am also starting to get interested in what court cases are going to be popping up as this whole health care thing begins to build. I know that there are already several states that have filed suit or will file suits against the mandatory nature of the bill. I am awaiting with interest the end result of these suits and I think that they may do more for states rights then anything else in the last 100 years. So I hope things will grow more interesting as we move further into the future.