Coralville Courier

The Latest Scoop On The Coralville Courier

 

 

Sponsor

 

The importance of properly vetting political candidates

By Mike Thayer

So what does vetting actually mean exactly? 

The term actually comes from horse racing, the act of a veterinarian examining horses, making sure they are healthy enough to run a race. The job of the veterinarian isn't just about checking the general condition of the horse either.  It goes deeper than that.  The veterinarian also evaluates for illegal substances and assesses risk.  A veterinarian can scratch a horse from the race.

A political race is really no different than a horse race.  Consider the primary season, where political parties go through the process of determining their nominee for a governor race, a senate seat, the presidency.  Candidates are the horses, that's obvious, so who are the veterinarians?  Party activists.   For the most part, the party faithful examine the horses, to see if they're healthy enough to run.  Activists evaluate risk, review backgrounds, analyze flaws and assess the lies.  Party activists, scratch horses from the race.

That's what's supposed to happen anyway.  The final act of that party activism is voting and it's a duty that must be taken seriously.  Unfortunately not enough people do so.    Another problem:  Of those people that do vote, they aren't as informed as they need to be - many, are not even close to being properly informed.  In other words, we don't have enough veterinarians evaluating horses and of those veterinarians checking out horses, some of them don't know enough to be good pet owners, let alone be assessors of political health.   

I can't stress enough the importance of really knowing everything possible about a candidate, that the truth must be told about every candidate.  It doesn't matter if it's for the position of dog catcher or president.  In order to make a truly informed vote, everything possible must be learned about a candidate.  We can't ignore anything, it must all be looked at.  Why do you think we have the current problems we have at all levels of government?  Because far to many veterinarians, er, party activists don't do thorough evaluations.  What a shiny coat, or, he seems to be the most electable simply isn't good enough.  That's like saying, that horse looks fast.  You need to KNOW, a vote is too important to be guessing at.   

To me, properly vetting a political candidate is a more important duty than the vote.  The vote is the part where the Dr. is putting the stethoscope away.    The important part is when the stethoscope and the gloves are put on, not taken off, the important part is in the examination, determining the truth.....  The vetting.

People who don't care to be real activists and just cast a vote in the name of participating in the political process are nothing more than casual fans placing bets at the horse track.  That's a description for the general election to be sure.  And I'm only writing what many of you are already thinking when I state; I'd rather not have uninformed people casting votes. 

John McCain anyone?    

Ladies and gentlemen we can no longer afford to treat the political arena like a horse track.   I'll ask again, why do you think we have the current problems we have at all levels of government?  Because too many people aren't taking the job of voting, seriously enough.  We're not examining the candidates as intensely as we should be, we're not demanding details and more importantly the truth.  It's not enough to hear a candidate say they are for or against something.  We need to know what a candidate's plan is to fix a problem.  We need to hear a candidate's actual proposal to take something that's working for people and expand on it.   It's not enough to hear a candidate say they believe in the American Dream, we need to hear what their plan of action is for maintaining it!  Mr. Candidate, you have a nice looking family, but this isn't a photo op, I respectfully don't want stories about how Democrats have straddled your kids with debt.  We all know that already.   I want details, plans of action.  You say you want to lower the nation's debt and that sounds great, but just how are you going to go about doing that?  Cut spending?  How exactly?  Get with peers and form a coalition?  Use the media and voter pressure against opposition to persuade?  Negotiate an exchange of some kind?  What?  All I hear is shallow talking points, give us details please.

When a candidate doesn't answer our questions with a straight forward and direct answer, we need to put the rubber gloves on.  I know that's not a pretty visual, but if we're to truly examine candidates, it MUST be done.  Otherwise, we'll find ourselves stuck at the track, watching the same old horses, placing the same losing bets.  We need to ask candidates tough, probing questions, give them a thorough examination.

Put the rubber gloves on, it's the only way to get better government.

Gallup: Gingrich maintaining grip on new lead

Newt Gingrich is now the candidate of choice for 32% of Republican voters nationwide, his highest level of support this year. The 24% supporting Mitt Romney is his lowest.

Read more at GALLUP.com.

Warren Buffett hypocrisy

"Warren Buffett says the criticism of his secretary is 'ridiculous,' and he wants everybody to leave her alone.  Well, who brought her up?  Who put her up there in the gallery next to Moochelle Obama during the State of the Union rally?  Warren Buffett and Barack Obama!" - Rush Limbaugh

Will Peyton Manning play again?

NFL.com writer Pat Kirwan joins Tim Brando to discuss Jim Irsay's reaction to Peyton's recent interview. Tune in as Kirwan also shares his thoughts on whether Peyton will be able to play again.

Iowans For Tax Relief: Governor Announces Efficiencies

This week Governor Branstad announced $50 million in efficiencies from the Department of Transportation. These efficiencies were originated to help cover the shortfall for road repairs. It is important to note that $33 million of the $50 million in efficiencies will be annual savings and only $17 million will be one time. Iowans for Tax Relief applauds the Governor and the Department of Transportation for working towards these savings, but we are disappointed by legislators that continue to push for a gas tax increase on all Iowans.

Despite the new found savings, Senator Rielly, D-Oskaloosa announced that he would be moving forward with a bill, in the Senate Transportation Committee, to raise the gas tax by 8 to 10 cents. This is more disappointing when considering that the Director of the Department of Transportation, Paul Trombino, stated in a House Transportation committee meeting on Thursday that, “our primary road system is functioning well”.

ITR still believes that this is the absolutely wrong time to raise the gas tax on Iowans, especially, by such a significant amount. We continue to urge legislators to consider the economic consequences such an increase would have on border communities and many hardworking Iowa families.

ITR encourages you to email your legislators to ask them not to raise the gas tax. You can find their e-mail addresses by going to ITR’s Legislator Lookup feature at: http://www.taxrelief.org/legislators.

Newsbusted: Obama goes for huge venue to accept Dem nomination

Americans wanted to hear specifics President Obama's SOTU speech, didn't get any

According to Gallup.com polling data, "Americans would prefer that President Barack Obama use his State of the Union address mainly to make specific proposals for Congress to pass this year, rather than to outline his broad vision for the direction of the country."

So did the President do that?  Did he provide the country specifics, or did he just outline a broad vision?

To read more of Mike Thayer's Yahoo! Contributor Network article, click the link:  http://voices.yahoo.com/americans-wanted-hear-specifics-president-obamas-10881665.html?cat=75

Building your food reserve at 26 cents an item!

By Mike Thayer

Whether you trying to build up a 72-hour emergency supply, a one month supply, or you want to beat inflation or maybe just save some money this week, you can find some great deals right now at HyVee locations in Iowa City/Coralville.

If you can still find a Wednesday edition of the Iowa City DePressed Citizen, HyVee has a coupon sheet in there for eight items for just 26 cents each.  Here's what I bought, with intended use in italics:

• HyVee tomato sauce (canned) - food storage
• Jiffy brand corn muffin mix - food storage
• HyVee macaroni & Cheese - food storage
• HyVee aspirin - medicine storage
• Paper Towels- misc. storage
• Ketchup - money saver
• Sour cream - immediate use
• Bananas - immediate use

Now the items marked for storage (except the paper towels of course) all have expiration dates of March 2013 and beyond, so I'll just rotate those out accordingly when the time approaches.

For a little more than $2, I bought all that stuff.  

Oh, and I bought a one gallon jug of HyVee drinking water for 69 cents.  Remember, one adult needs a gallon of water a day in emergency situations; most of it to drink; some to cook with; some to wash/brush teeth with, that kind of thing.

Last week, I wrote about how to build up your food reserves over time by spending just $1 a day.  That's usually good for the purchase of one item.  Today, by taking advantage of a sale, I got five items I can store for an emergency, for just 26 cents each. 

Related story:  http://coralvillecourier.typepad.com/community/2012/01/building-up-your-food-reserves-for-1-a-day.html

Clayton County Republicans are doing things right

By Mike Thayer

FARMERSBURG, IA. -- I had the priviledge of attending a Clayton County Republican Central Meeting last night and it was truly enjoyable.

The folks of Clayton County know what they're doing!

Attended by about 35 people, the meeting chaired by Denny Hamann was very cordial, informative and productive.  Everything was very polite but relaxed, people asked great questions, nobody talked over each other, answers given by members of the committee were straight forward.  Three members of the Central Committee are also elected officials of the county, all giving nice updates regarding county business to the GOP Central Committee members in attendance.

Being from Coralville and attending several Johnson County Republican Central Committee meetings over the years, what I witnessed last night was refreshing.  In Clayton County, there was no bickering, no whining, no sidetracking on nonsense, and most importantly, no progressive thought!  And here's something else of note:  Clayton County knows how to raise cash.  Their fund balance was surprisingly similar to that of Johnson County's!  That's an indicator of what healthy party production will do for you.

Clayton County is in northeast Iowa and includes towns like Strawberry Point, Elkader and Guttenburg and makes up part of Iowa's First Congressional District. 

Also on the agenda last night were some speakers.

Mike Breitbach, a resident of Strawberry Point is running for a state senate seat (state district 28).  A lot of people have high hopes for this man, more information can be found at his website at:  http://www.friendsforbreitbach.com/

Businessman Rod Blum of Dubuque, is running for Congress, hoping to face off this fall against Democrat incumbent Bruce Braley.  At this time, Blum is the only announced and official GOP candidate and has no competition for the primary race.  A detailed story regarding his comments at the Clayton County meeting is forthcoming.

Lawyer Ben Lange of Independence also spoke to the committee.  Lange ran against Braley and lost in 2010 and is considering another run.  He is currently in Exploratory Committee status, which means he can't actively campaign.  A detailed story regarding his comments is also forthcoming.  You won't want to miss this, it's a follow-up to the related stories here on the Coralville Courier regarding the FEC stated differences between testing the waters and active campaigning.

Again, it was a pleasure to attend this meeting and I look forward to atttending another, as well as others throughout the state.

Our children should be able to rehearse the history of our country

"Every child in America should be acquainted with his own country. He should read books that furnish him with ideas that will be useful to him in life and practice. As soon as he opens his lips, he should rehearse the history of his own country." -- Noah Webster, On the Education of Youth in America, 1788

---