Oh, as for Steele, I don’t own a gun but that doesn’t mean a whole lot. If ever I need one, I won’t have a problem not only getting it but using it. I believe I was about 16 last time I shot one. Haven’t had a use for one since. If you need one for hunting or home protection, well, that’s okay. But to have one lying around serving no real purpose is just more to worry about when there’s plenty of other things to worry about.

Apologies… I had an article to post for Friday and lost track of time… Turned out it was fortuitous that I forgot as I now have more to add to it due to another occurrence on the heels of the first.

I’m still wavering toward Steele in spite of the “questions” about his PAC or whatever. He has drive and passion.

I know who I don’t want and of those remaining I could live with whichever one gets it.

It’s real easy to sit back and nitpit, isolating this thing or that, that might have caused his loss, but at everything in a relational manner, it was the sum total, not events in isolation, that caused his loss; not the bailout, not Palin, not even his defacto endorsement of Obama right at the last of the campaigning.

I have a lot of respect for McCain as a former POW but there’s something you really need to understand about POWs: they’re appeasers. It’s part of what happens to them psychologically while prisoners. Appeasement meant survival and I really can’t fault him for doing his best to survive, which is a feat in and of itself. Be that as it may, we can’t afford such appeasement in a president. Look where we are now because of such things.

Nothing could be further from the truth. The mainstream media considered John McCain politically dead even while he was gaining support. Even after he became the GOP nominee he was still ridiculed and derided relentlessly by both the left and right wing media.

But, the major polls kept him close, seldom departing more than a 5% spread and at times they had him ahead by 3 to 5 points.

The post-election numbers show that McCain-Palin still received almost as much of the Religious Right and Evangelical votes, 74%, as G. W. Bush did in 2004, 76%. But, as I’ve said before, that solid 20% of the electorate Base could not overcome the desire by the voters for change. I believe if John McCain had picked Mitt Romney instead of Sarah Palin as his running mate, McCain would have won by a narrow margin.

You are right on the money regarding the two-party system when you stated, “Lately I sometimes wonder what differentiates the two when their actions don’t match their words regardless of whether it’s an R or a D. These days, no matter which party is in power, it’s just more of the same.”

Barack Obama inherits a trillion-dollar deficit and two wars when he takes office on January 20. The corporate mavens have got our citizens just where they want them. By that I mean they know Obama will be insulated from harsh criticism and get a free pass for at least a year.

But, I doubt if we’ll ever see much reform or oversight of the Wall Street Ponzi Scheme swindlers either from the SEC or by Congress in the coming year. Maybe they’ll establish another one of their laughable Blue Ribbon panels to study the issue.

The real battle for the GOP prospects to take back one or both houses of congress in 2010 will begin after the public recognizes that deficits will balloon to two trillion or more while pie in the sky social projects ala FDR’s New Deal will fall flat.

Like they say, you can’t squeeze blood out of a turnip. The truth is, huge numbers of American workers are either broke or on the verge of entering the ranks of the unemployed.

Sometimes a lot of what the government does isn’t fully felt for a few years after it has been put into effect. That’s why a lot of things that the government is talking about doing now were done away with in the past.

I lost internet connection for a good part of yesterday. It must have been bad because I couldn’t get through to them. The line was always busy. I apologize for the belated response.