NFLGOPKSAJPS

            Some stuff I understand and some I don’t.  So why is the National Football League under fire because a few of their athletes are abusive of women and kids?  Of course it doesn’t reflect well on the sport but how is it the fault of the NFL or their CEO, the commissioner?  Has anyone investigated WWE?  Or chess players?  Okay, so the critics just want us to have a discussion of abuse.  But then if we discuss the topic of over-discipline why aren’t we including the topic of too little discipline.  It seems to me that the true epidemic is a society of almost no discipline at all.  Many renters suffer from this.  They fight and the police have to be called.  They can’t learn to budget.  They lie about the dogs, the breakage and the missing payments. They may have an IQ of 134 but their emotional IQ is about 80 and the ethical IQ is 65.  They are just the opposite of Forest Gump.  This is why they can’t seem to get ahead in life and are constantly mad at the world.  No discipline, no descent father, no responsibility.  Last night a guy came and wanted a copy of his rental agreement.  No problem.  I ran off a copy.  No, he needed one without his wife’s name on it so that the city would hook up his utilities.  She had a $600 arrears bill and the city doesn’t hook up the power and water unless the recipient makes some attempt to pay the old bill.  And he wanted me to lie to the city?

            Now for something I do understand.  Rush and Hannity and every other commentator on talk radio is decrying the lack of a message by GOP candidates.  Why, oh why, won’t the party stand up and say what it believes?  I know.  I’ve been a campaign manager and I will tell you why.  If a candidate is running for state senator or representative, his district is 90,000 or 37,000 people.  That is small enough that he can just about know everyone in the district.  Or if not, when someone has a problem, they talk to friends and someone says, “Oh yeah, call the guy.  He’s approachable!”  And that personal popularity is how these guys win. They say what they think.  But when you talk about federal offices, the size of a congressional district is 760,000 people and most people get their info in 30 second ad spots bought by big money on radio or TV.  The image projected is how they get elected.  A fatal mistake is to make a controversial statement early and have the other side make a field day of it in their ads.  So consultants say you shouldn’t say anything definitive until the end of September.  But most voters have made up their minds by then!  Only about 10% are undecided a month away from an election. This same consultant baloney is spread to candidates in state legislative races because the consultants learned it in school.  It’s a truism.  But it leaves many voters gnashing their teeth over lack of committal.  It is especially held as sacred by the political establishment. Newt disobeyed it in 1994 and won anyway.  Since then the old politics has returned. And since only the R's are strong on a political philosophy, the advice works to their detriment when voters grow disillusioned.  D's benefit.

            Here’s how we could fix it.  The orginal concept of the founders was for the people’s House to have Reps who represented about 50,000 people.  Nothing in the Constitution restricts the size of the House.  It could be 2435 members or 435 members.  If it was 2435, each member would represent about the same number as a state senator and the retail politics of listening to concerns, voting what his citizens desire, having town hall meetings, would be back in style.  The entire House would have to use the internet to debate and do certain things.  Major votes could take place in a larger Capital building in Washington.

            Meanwhile the popular election of Senators creates a House of Lords who all think they will surely be the next President.  The founders thought the Senate would be the States House, members appointed by governors or legislators, and could have their chain yanked at the behest of the states.  If we can’t bring ourselves to not having a popular election, perhaps we should have the states given the ability to cast a vote of no confidence, prompting another election.
            But given the present circumstances, what can be done?  Candidates running for US Senate should state their general principals much ahead of time.  But that's usually a yawn to the news media so you get little coverage.  Gingrich began his Contract with America right after Labor Day.  Good strategy to list 10 things you support and get many signatures thus nationalizing the elections.  But Senators are such individual egotists, this would be hard to get agreement.  Personally, I think the RNC should promote one Senator as the guy to state party goals quite loudly, maybe someone who really doesn't want to run for President but who looks Presidential so it tickles the media's fancy.  And, the guys who do want to run for Prez, should be out there promoting other R's right and left if they have no election of their own.  Sarah Palin principle.

            What I don’t understand is how someone like Landreiu or Roberts thinks they can represent a state and not live there.  Whether you are and R or a D, you should not serve a place where you don’t live.

            American Journal of Political Science had an article written by scientists from Brown University suggesting that you can identify a liberal or a conservative by how they smell.  True!  Conservatives smell like work and usually sweat.  Libs dress to the nines and smell good.  They come to rent an apartment from us, dressed in flip-flops and shorts, tank tops and 2 inch finger nails.  And they are “paid on the 3^rd of each month” which means they are on disability, though you can’t guess what they are disabled for.  No limp or lisp, strong backs, but they do have an allegy to mornings, I think.