Category: take action

politics, social justice and ways you can make a difference in the world around you.

energy independence

From the Mike Huckabee camp:

  • The first thing I will do as President is send Congress my comprehensive plan for energy independence. We will achieve energy independence by the end of my second term.
  • Achieving energy independence is vital to achieving success both in the war on terror and in globalization. Energy independence will help guarantee both our safety and our prosperity.
  • We have to explore, we have to conserve, and we have to pursue all avenues of alternative energy: nuclear, wind, solar, hydrogen, clean coal, biodiesel, and biomass.

Continue reading energy independence

Clinton gives nod to Huckabee

Former Arkansas Gov. and former U.S. President Bill Clinton gave a nod toward Gov. Mike Huckabee this week on ABC’s “This Week.”
While right-wing Christian conservatives threaten to pull from the GOP party, Clinton had this to say to George Stephanopoulos about the former Arkansas Gov.:

Mr. Huckabee is the “only dark horse that’s got any kind of chance. … He’s the best speaker they’ve got.”

Former presidential candidate Newt Gingrich expressed a similar statement:

Mr. Gingrich described the candidate on the same show as “very effective. … If Huckabee can find money, he will be dramatically competitive almost overnight. You have to like Mike.”

A recent Newsweek poll shows Huckabee continues to gain momentum.
Huckabee is now ahead of Sen. John McCain in Iowa and nearly tied with former Mayor Rudy Giuliani, according to a Sept. 29 Newsweek poll conducted with 1,215 Iowa registered voters by Princeton Survey Research Associates International on Sept. 26-27
In a campaign press release Huckabee said, “The Newsweek poll reflects what we’ve been feeling on the ground for some time: that there is steady, upward momentum for my campaign in Iowa and New Hampshire, and other early primary states… We’ve got a winning message. Our focus is on the money game.”
In addition, the campaign press release pointed to a possible match-up between Clinton’s wife Sen. Hillary Clinton and Huckabee.

Last month, a NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll showed Huckabee and former Gov. Mitt Romney nearly tied in respective head to head match-ups against Hillary Clinton. Clinton led Huckabee 50-36 with 6% undecided, while she led Romney 51-38 with 5% undecided. The poll also gave Huckabee the lowest negative ratings among all Republican candidates for President, boding well in a potential match-up against Clinton.
Huckabee said Sen. Clinton’s “front-runner” status gives her a natural advantage, which could be overcome “once Republicans rally around their candidate.”

Christian conservatives could bolt from GOP

The NY Times reports:

Alarmed at the possibility that the Republican Party might pick Rudolph W. Giuliani as its presidential nominee despite his support for abortion rights, a coalition of influential Christian conservatives is threatening to back a third-party candidate.

It’s interesting to me to see the “you’re either with us or against us” ideal of many conservatives on the abortion issue and others. Don’t get me wrong, I’m against the practice as well and honestly I’m not a Giuliani fan, but this article really makes Don Miller’s point in “The Search For God Knows What” that much clearer.
Miller argues that we view life as riders in a lifeboat. He tells of a question an elementary teacher asked his class (I’m probably butchering this since I don’t have the book in front of me), “If a lawyer, a teacher, a doctor and a cripple are stranded in a lifeboat and one of them must be thrown overboard to keep the lifeboat afloat, which one do you choose?”
Miller remembers people arguing for various people right away – as if one person somehow is more valuable than the other.
Miller continues to point back to the lifeboat illustration throughout the book and just last night I read his thoughts on the war on popular culture between the “godly moral right” and the “godless immoral left” (my words not his).
It seems that many Christians want to rage war against everyone who don’t measure up to their/our moral standards – yet we can pick and choose which moral standard(s) we want to hold them to.
Miller makes the point that if we’re really “waging war” against someone the only option is to either handcuff them or kill them. Doesn’t sound very Christian to me. Yet we wage war against others as if to prove that our side is really better than their side and that somehow we, or the person we chose deserves to stay in the lifeboat.
My boss and I talked about this lifeboat phenomenon a couple weeks ago and he made the observation that in reality, as Christians the answer should be – we’ll jump out of the lifeboat. I agree, “What greater love has any man than this, that he lay down his life for his brother.”
What are we saying to the lost when rather than showing them love, we simply bolt and say we want nothing to do with them?

$5,000 for every baby

From DallasBlog:

During a forum hosted by the Congressional Black Caucus Friday, Hillary Clinton suggested every child born in the U.S. should get a $5,000 “baby bond” from the government, according to the AP.
“I like the idea of giving every baby born in America a $5,000 account that will grow over time so that when that young person turns 18, if they have finished high school, they will be able to access it to go to college or maybe they will be able to make that down payment on their first home,” Clinton said.

Wonder what she’ll cut to raise the $20 billion to pay. Or maybe she’ll just raise our taxes to do that. Hmmm.