Dubya talks

sigh. might as well talk about the politics here as well.

Bush won his reelection bid. whopeee-do. sadly, this diplomacy-lacking man has become more arrogant in his actions and statements lately ("i earned capital, and i plan to spend it"... yee, cringe!) that, despite his moral convictions, one begins to wonder if he really is concerned with his country's welfare or his term's legacy.

now with the backing of a mostly-Republican-seated Congress, he's confidently pushing for more proposals and appointments. its only natural that he should meet skepticism.

i have my own doubts as well. i'll raise some topics (in my own terms) that are presently being debated. pardon me if i may skip some relevant issues, or if i'm being too narrow-minded. i'm still new at this.

social security system
Bush is calling for a privatization of the social security as a means to give people more choice and make them more individually responsible for their retirement. he also adds that by sometime in the near future, the system is likely to give out more money in benefits than what it can receive in taxes.
it has been raised that what the SSS needs is to just get additional income somewhere else. some have suggested an increase in taxes (which bush opposes).

my take on this?
- the people already are doing their share of responsibility because they have their taxes taken out of their salaries.
- having SSS privatized will indeed lessen the burden of the government but will make the people more prone to becoming victims of possible schemes by retirement companies. they need something more stable.
- i think they just need the present money in the SSS for something else.

IRAQ war
US continues to spend billions of dollars for this. as of present, the Democrats are pushing Bush for a timetable on US troops pullout (which i think he won't ever give), especially after the Iraq elections. Bush has also suggested raising the death "compensation" package for fallen soldiers to as high as 250,000 (?).

- it sneakingly suspicious. i think the underlying conclusion is, they really want the US troops to stay in Iraq. why???????
- the people sure don't want the dreaded mandatory drafts, and the US military is still running out of military power. so maybe this is the government's way for families to willingly give up their husbands/fathers/sons ("we'll be financially compensated anyway if you die"?). how sad.
- furthermore, just where the heck are they gonna get all that money? i thought they were already losing money, esp since they brought up the SSS topic. very contradicting.
- doesn't sending out more troops out of the country mean you won't have enough of them in the country? how's that going to help security issues?

CIA and the Pentagon
this is not a much-discussed topic, and i only happened to have a glance at a column, so i can't provide much info. CIA is taking the heat lately for the mishandling of information pre-, during, and post-9-11. but the columnist mentions that the pentagon may be made the prime source of intelligence-gathering, or that the CIA will report to them now and not the president.

i really may just have read wrong. anyway...
- i think the CIA were just pushed to say there were nuclear weapons in Iraq. too bad they're taking the fall.
- the way i see it (personal opinion lang ha), a prez holds more authority in pentagon, including which info can be released as public statements, whereas the CIA (which is kinda independent from the state) can give more complete reports.

nominations for multi-racial officials
condoleeza rice as secretary of state (the first ever african-american woman to be so). alberto gonzales as attorney general (possible first hispanic-american).

- so they're not caucasian, big deal. maybe Bush is thinking of running for another term, this time using the minority communities to gain votes. or maybe he wants his term to be recognized in history books as one with the most "first-ever" or multi-racial officials.
- rice has been accused of heavily agreeing with Bush on the war, and gonzales, now intensely scrutinized for his role in approving the tortures of Iraq officers (he did write that controversial memo), is also a Bush supporter. is the prez afraid of opposition?
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dubya is gonna give his State of Union speech tonight. while i could pull on my hair and scream hysterically at the stupidity of my government, i feel my attitude towards the US prez should be more of, well, like going against a chess player. oh, i'm calm, but i'll have a crease on my forehead... and will be nervously biting my fingernails.