Jindal's World

This was not a fair fight. No, this was more along the lines of Ali - Liston. Bobby Jindal was completely over-matched, and it showed. Rather than getting bludgeoned by speedy fists, he was furiously pelted by someone who knows how to craft a sentence above the 8th grade level. This, apparently, is not something that can be said about Jindal's speech writer! Maybe Jindal can at least use that old excuse, "hey, I didn't write it, I just had to read it."

It's hard to know what planet Bobby -- "Americans can do anything" -- Jindal, and by implication the bulk of the Republican Party, has been living on for the past few years, but it clearly has not been the same one the rest of us toil upon. This short speech, all of 12+ minutes, was an exercise in self delusion. Jindal attempted to blame Democrats for "Big Government," deficit spending only a month or so after the end of a singularly disastrous period of Republican governance. A period in which Jindal's party took Clinton surpluses and proceeded to run them up into the most fantastic deficits in our country's history. Jindal argued that "... Democrats have spent our children's money on things we don't need." How quaint, apparently Jindal is not familiar with such prudent Republican spending as, say, the IRAQ WAR?

About mid-way through his remarks, Jindal, seeking to thump away on that old GOP meme about how government is really the problem, uttered this bit of balderdash from between his lips, "THE STRENGTH OF AMERICA IS NOT FOUND IN OUR GOVERNMENT." Wow, at a time when many Americans are really facing difficult and uncertain times, only the Republicans would stoop so low as to try and further alienate people from the one remaining institution that can and should be a source of aid, their very own government.

If we are indeed a government of the people, by the people, and for the people, then what else can we draw from this shocking statement other than that Jindal does not really believe we are a strong people, and with compassion, should help one another through our shared government. Moreover, aside from the astonishing nonsense of what he's saying, if Jindal and other Republicans really believe this tripe, then why do they want to be a part of our government, that is, to govern? Why does anyone in Jindal's Party want to be part of the government? As far as I'm concerned they can do the rest of us a big favor and just stay home and leave the governing to adults. We'd all be a lot better off, Republicans included.

Jindal then moved on to a few other hot-button issues, notable among these was health care. He had the chutzpah to suggest that Republicans want, and by implication are working for, universal health care for all Americans. This was classic right-wing smoke and mirrors. This bald-faced fib comes from the spokesman of the Party that had been in power for eight straight years--with control of both the Congress and White House for most of it--and that did exactly NOTHING on health care!! Indeed, they clearly love health care so much that Jindal's own President vetoed health care for children, twice! Now that's what I call tough love.

According to Jindal, "Americans can do anything." While I generally share Jindal's professed belief in the resilience of my fellow citizens, I was always taught that one should also be honest when making self assessments. Indeed, given the current state of affairs in the Nation, it would appear to seeing eyes that there are a few things that Americans cannot seem to do. These would include, for example; 1) Managing banks. 2) Managing large manufacturing enterprises, such as, for example, car companies. 3) Finding weapons of mass destruction. 4) Providing health care for all our citizens. Interestingly, of the first three items listed I'm willing to bet that the particular Americans who can't seem to do these things are overwhelmingly registered Republicans. Funny how that is. Moreover, these are examples where government was taken "out of the way," so to speak, so as to let those enterprising Americans in charge of our corporations lead us all to financial nirvana. Isn't it just a tad ironic that after working so vigorously to "get government off their backs," these Americans whom Jindal argues can do anything are the first to run to Uncle Sam to get on the public bailout dole?

Maybe the strength of America really should be and needs to be in it's government? At any rate, it presently is most certainly not found in it's Republican-stuffed corporate board-rooms! While that conclusion should be as emphatically clear as an Ali jab, you can be sure that you would never hear it cross the lips of Bobby Jindal.