An Active Oligarchy

It is interesting today how varied is truth.  It all depends to whom you are listening.  Often truth is stated as a polar opposite taking for example President Obama's hypothetical approval ratings.  It seems, much like senatorial candidate Thom Tillis, all Republicans can do is cite their own opinion, which is a scathing admonishment of the president.  In the recent televised debate between sitting North Carolina senator Kay Hagen and Tillis, almost every rebuttal to Ms. Hagen was a preplanned attack on the president and thus her candidacy.  Really it was not a debate at all.  With no audience and no panel to ask impromptu questions, how could any potential voter have learned anything about the capabilities of these lawmakers?  Mr. Tillis's responses were so robotic it was difficult to surmise if there was any active thought occurring in his brain.  It was unsettling seeing such juvenile debate.  Hopefully in the two upcoming debates a more telling dialog will emerge.  The Republicans think this juvenile criticism of the president somehow will translate into effective legislation that will solve America's domestic problems?  I for one have stopped listening to the rhetoric on television.  It doesn't concern me because it is irrelevant.  Only a grade schooler responds to playground taunts.  Adults think about what they are doing.  Evidently Congress never has grown up.  Evidently they have been so sheltered from reality in their lives, they never have had to become accountable for the responsibilities of their jobs.  How were they even elected?  How did they dilute term limits?  How have they legislated their own pay raises while the minimum wage has stayed the same?  On a somewhat higher level they intimidate President Obama into a corner.  While the beheading of a captured American journalist videoed and made public via the internet is heinous, such a single event should not "call" on the American president to force his hand.  It did just that.  
I was surprised by President Obama's recent address.  It was the first time he actually appeared to be trapped in a corner.  Was it the Republicans who were demanding his plan?  This incident is indicative of many actions in the War on Terror that are using a base and primal tool.  It consists of using media often slated for social uses as a tool of aggression and propaganda.  It was bold for a English-born soldier of Jihad to challenge the President of the United States.  Surely with the death of Osama Bin Laden such a man is aware that Obama will kill him.  It was unnecessary to ask the president to state publicly his plan of action regarding the challenge.  The tactics of the sitting Republicans are so primitive and juvenile it is difficult to comprehend.  "We must hear you plan now concerning this beheading."  Are we as a nation really vulnerable enough to declare war on other countries simply because a psychotic extremist demands it?  Certainly the waste of a human life is tragic, but there have been many sacrifices of human life in America's history.  Surely one or two are not great enough to demand another ground war in the Middle East just as both the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan should be drawing to an end.  Somehow this tirade seems eerily reminiscent of the beginning of the Iraqi war.  There are contingencies of Americans who profit from war.  That was proven in such a stark way when Vice President Dick Cheney appropriated rebuilding contracts in Iraq to his own company Halliburton.  Fuck me.  Why does it seem that this syndicate, ISIS or ILIL, (I wish we could make up our minds) is being funded by our own?  There are contingencies of Americans who profit from war.  There are world leaders such as Saddam Hussein who knew anarchy was a tool of the totalitarian oligarchy.   it is sickening to see such immature politics play out on national television.  Because both our newspapers and internet news services have become compromised in respect to truth, where are we to turn?  You must stop listening and watching.  President Obama, credited with his intense victory killing Osama Bin Laden, should be respected enough to be allowed to do his job.  Pushing him into a corner and demanding  he recite a plan was lowbrow.  I felt badly for the President.  It was another American low point in politics.  Considering the sordid past of American politics I guess we should feel lucky there has not been a major scandal in recent years.  With the name Monica Lewinsky dominating newspaper headlines for over a year, we should feel lucky.  I do not feel lucky because this recent threat, while not epic in content, is epic in terms of philosophy.  Philosophical things deserve intellect, reflection, and wisdom, not a school yard taunt from a President backed into a corner by the Republican party.  It made my stomach turn.  Near the end of the speech the president relaxed somewhat into his traditional oratorical style.  He became more confident with his own thinking and plan.  It would have been much more effective if the senatorial debate between Kay Hagen and Thom Tillis was as visceral.  A call to arms would be more effective than the continual reiterating of mind-numbing Republican dogma.