Posts by Hines Brian

"Majority rules." Makes sense to me. I can live with that. In both the House and the Senate. Do away with the Senate's stupid filibuster custom where 41 out of 100 Senators have veto power over what legislation will be passed by Congress, and whether Presidential nominations of administration officials and judges will be confirmed. Republican abuse of the filibuster has led to Senate gridlock. Then Republicans complain that the Obama administration can't get anything through the Senate. This hypocritical insanity has to end. There's a lot to like about a parliamentary system of government. An election is held. A…

Even though I have not yet attained to my complete 100% Buddha Nature, I'm compassionate enough (just barely, but enough) to reach out to almost half of American voters and say, echoing my idol Bill Clinton:  I feel your pain. Not as much as you do, because you're you and I'm me. But I know how badly I would be feeling at the moment if Mitt Romney had been elected president last Tuesday instead of Barack Obama.So I can easily empathize with the disappointment of those who were intensely looking forward to Romney winning. I was nervous myself for several…

Disappointingly, yesterday Oregonians voted down Measure 80, which would have decriminalized marijuana and allowed its sale in state-sponsored stores. But Washington and Colorado approved their own marijuana legalization measures. Kudos to the Portland Oregonian editorial board for recognizing that marijuana tourism across the Columbia river from this state is going to enlarge Washington's government revenues.  In an online editorial published today, which likely will be in the print paper tomorrow, the editorial board said "Oregon lawmakers should take up marijuana legalization." Yes, the failure of Oregon's marijuana legalization measure Tuesday must have disappointed its sponsors and supporters. But how sad can they…

Yesterday Nate Silver, superstar data-based Five Thirty Eight political analyst, shared an enigmatic tweet: "This election is an epistemological watershed." I loved it. Even though I really didn't know for sure what Silver was talking about. I felt like I did, though.  Thus my divided reaction to the words "this election is an epistemological watershed" seems to reflect why the 2012 election here in the United States is so important. Knowledge vs. feeling. Facts vs. fantasy. Science vs. religion.  A watershed is marked by a divide. The choice between Romney and Obama, along with the choice between Republicans and Democrats generally, indeed…

Ah, I so like plain talk in politics. Lie is a wonderful word that usually gets disguised by "falsehood," "untruth," or some other polite term that may be appropriate for mild lies, but are too weak for whopper lies. Like Mitt Romney's claim that Chrysler and Obama are working together to ship American jobs to China, since Jeeps supposedly will be made there instead of the United States. That's a lie. The Romney campaign must have known this. Or they could have learned the truth with a short phone call to Chrysler headquarters. But liars like to lie, and Romney…

Three weeks ago, October 4 to be exact, I was feeling pretty damn good about the presidential election. Eighty-seven percent good, to be exact. Back then this was the chance Nate Silver of highly respected Five Thirty Eight was giving an Obama win. Wow!, I thought; 87% is close to 90%, which is so close to 100% I figured Romney should just concede now, rather than waiting for the inevitable. Unfortunately for progressives like me, Romney showed up at the first debate and Obama didn't. At least, not as the Obama we saw in the second and third debates.  So…

I'm feeling good about the presidential election. Let's have it tomorrow, not in two weeks. Obama whipped Romney's ass tonight, just like he did in the second debate.  Don't believe me. Believe the snap polls.  CBS: Obama won - 53%  Romney won - 23%PPP: Obama won - 53%  Romney won - 42%CNN: Obama won - 48%  Romney won - 40% The CBS poll was of undecided voters, so that's great news for Obama. Wow, he beat Romney by more than two to one among those who may tilt the election one way or the other. Not surprising. Romney looked lip-smackingly…

Yeah, it's a fantasy, but I can dream about Romney apologizing to Obama at Monday night's debate. "I'm sorry, Mr. President, for asserting that you and your administration misled the American people about what happened in Benghazi right after the attack on our consulate. Now information has come out that supports the initial analysis of the situation." This assumes that Romney reads the Los Angeles Times, and saw its recent "No evidence found of Al Qaeda role in Libya attack" story.  Excerpts: The assault on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi last month appears to have been an opportunistic attack rather than…