Ok ok, it took me forever to finish watching this debate and make my post! But here are my thoughts on the California Republican Debate, forgive my grammar and writing, I'm just getting my thoughts on paper..... rather, the web.
Overall, I really enjoyed the cohesiveness of the republicans. They really refused to be divided all that much. They were determined to beat Obama and find the best candidate to do so and less interested in tearing apart the other candidates. Kudos to them! They took the high road.
Right out of the box the thing that stinks me is a lot of the candidates continue to say "If I get elected, on day one, I'm going to do _____." That killed me. #1 Do they really think the American public is so stupid to think that they can do that all on their own? #2 I sure hope they aren't diluted enough to think that they really can do all that immediately? If they could, then our country would change drastically every time we got a new president. I hope for their sake that it is just political lingo and not a true belief that they can really make such changes on day one without having to go through any processes.
They brought up Social Security a lot. I feel like Perry will end up with the young vote since he is appealing to their concern that it won't last long enough for them to receive it. robbing the program to pay other people. Even on this issue Perry and Romney refused to let the questions divide them. I think in general the mass media are trying to polarize this idea that Social Security is a ponzi scheme, but what they don't understand is that Perry is just trying to get people talking about. Sure there are some key differences, yes the public is aware, yes it isn't optional, so by pure definition it may not be a ponzi scheme, but what Perry and Romney are wanting people to see is that it is not going to work long term without some major changes. I have to agree and I think most of my generation agrees with that concern as well.
On the topic of the HPV vaccine. Bachman was trying to make this issue divisive and she said it isn't right for the government to force people to take a vaccine. However, we have a lot of mandates for childrens vaccines already. Kids can't go to school without certain shots and they must provide a shot record in order to register for school. So that isn't a valid way to oppose Perry's initiative. On another note, by age 50, 80% of women in america have HPV, and it is known to be a cause for cancer. I am with Perry on this. Any other disease or cancer of the body that can be prevented would have been on the vaccine list long ago. It doesn't make sense that this one would be excluded. Something needs to be done, I think Perry was right in what he did. I found it interesting that even Romney supported Perry, saying Perry knew he should have go about it differently, but his heart was in the right place. That support again shows how united the GOP is.
I have a lot to say about Congressman Ron Paul. #1, I can't stand him, he is extremely far right. To me, he is irrational and I am unsure how he can get any supporters, are his fans as uneducated as the entire GOP is turning out to be? I'm so confused on how people can support him. He wants to abolish way too much of the government. i.e., Take air conditioning away from our armed forces? are you kidding me? These people are there because our government put them there, they deal with 120+ degree weather, that is an unacceptable to consider taking away their A/C simply because it costs us a lot. That is part of the cost of war that is in a place that we are unaccustomed to living in. unacceptable Ron Paul, unacceptable.
They brought up the topic of Texas school reductions. That may be the case, but Perry pointed out that the graduation rates are up to 84%, which is higher than ever before. If he has raised the graduation rates to the highest level a state has ever seen, how can you condemn him for that? He is doing the best with what he has. To that point, he said: "That is what happens when you share the boarder with Mexico; we have a unique situation in our state." This isn't him trying to push the blame onto the Mexican immigrants. This is pure fact. We do share a boarder with another country that is pouring in immigrants into our state. It does skew our numbers, which then brings us back to the 84% graduation rate and it makes me admire him for that even more.
Perry was also asked about border security. I really agreed when he said: "For the President of the United States to go down to El Paso, Tx and say that our border has been the safest it has ever been, either he has some of the poorest intel. of a President in the history of this country or he was an abject liar to the American people. It is not safe on that boarder." It isn't safe, and the border is only halfway protected. Everyone in Texas knows that the closer you get to the border, the more dangerous it is. I also liked his point that we need to turn off the magnet. i.e., stop giving them jobs, stop giving them aid to school. Those things draws them here. I enjoyed hearing the GOP unite on this subject. They all said that first they needed to get the fence on the border complete and secure and after that then they would be able to effectively talk about immigration reform.
Perry, seems to want to walk a narrow line on the environment. One moment he talks about not believing that human activity is affecting our environment, and in the next he talks about how he lowered emissions in Texas more than any other state. That doesn't make sense. If he doesn't believe the environment is changing because of our interaction, then why is he actively trying to change the emissions in Texas? I would like to see him clear this up in the future. Still on Perry, but another subject; the death penalty. He keeps getting bashed for it, but I don't think it's fair. Perry said if you come into our state and you murder someone, you will be prosectued and given a fair trial. If you have committed a murder you will recieve the full punishment for your actions and be put to death. He keeps getting flak for that, but then isn't that what we did when 9/11 happened? We basically said, if you come into our land and kill our people, then you receieve the ultimate punishment of death. Obviously as a nation we agree with Perry and it's not like he is going to instill a Nation wide death penalty, so really I feel this question isn't debate worthy.
Ok, as much as I have a distaste for Ron Paul, I agree on some small level with him. The moderator asked him how he felt about school provided lunches. He kept saying if it was on a state/local level then he was fine with it, but the government doesn't need to mandate it. I suppose it made me really think about how, as a culture, we truly rely on the government to feed starving kids and meet the needs of the community. We refuse to do it for our neighbors and pass the buck on to the government to do something about it. Our communities have become apathetic and have hidden away in our suburben houses. We need to stop allowing the government to do what the community should be doing. If we actually get out of our houses and know our neighbors then we can meet the needs of those around us and then we wouldn't need government to feed these poor kids who have nothing to eat. All of that said, I'm not sure the American public will do it, so at the end of the day, I don't think what Ron Paul wants will actually work out. I think idealistically it sounds great, but in reality it isn't feasible. Just my thoughts.
Well, that's my soapbox. Now it's time to watch the New Hampshire GOP Debate and put my 2 cents in on that one.
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