The Debate should be on Issues not Persons

Sad to say that the political discourses in United States today is out of control. Last night, I wrote a few replies to some members of a "Patriot Forum" when this post surfaced; shared by an angry conservative and distributed by most Republican and conservative bloggers. This is insane, in my opinion. While we all agreed that Representative Alan Grayson (a Democrat) of Florida is insane, the best responds to his attack on the Teaparty should have been based on issues - point by point - pointing out what's wrong with his views of the TP and the Republican party. Putting his photo, his name, and his phone number on the Internet/website in order to harass the man, is wrong and insane! We can disagree on policy, ideology, and politics, but going out to hurt a person in a very personal way is not only unethical, it is wrong.
However, I can understand why on earth this seemingly harmless Representative is being treated this way. Recently, Rep. Grayson posted a picture of Ku Klux Klan (KKK) standing around a cross using the cross as T to represent the Teaparty. This is the picture he posted.

Grayson's photoshop depiction of the Teaparty

It is sad to see politicians, right and left, depicting each other in such dishonest way. But this is not the first time this congressman depicted his opponent in such wild way. In 2010 while debating the Affordable Care Bill - dubbed the Obamacare - he blasted the Republicans and remarked that those who opposed the the bill had a plan and that is "if you sick, die quickly" and off course that was absolutely ridiculous. But for the media who hammered the Teaparty after one man at a Teaparty rally against Obamacare held up a NAZI sign, who was obviously not a member of the TP groups, refused to call Grayson out himself. But why bother? the media is in cahoots with the administration in defending it, distorting their records, editing audios to create something, and apologizing on behalf of the president. This and many other instances show how far the political discourses are from the real issues.

The Birth of Teaparty
Those who depicted TP in some of the most reviled manner possible, do have reasons to fear the TP. The birth of the TP is not a mystery nor was it born the same way Moveon.org which was created by the Clinton administration to smear Clinton's women accusers and worked successfully to defeat his impeachment. The movement was not to smear the administration but to show the voter's utter disgust for the Affordable Care Bill which was before congress. What Grayson failed to acknowledge is the fact that so many Democrats and Independents jointed the movement to express their bitterness toward the Tsunami of changes the government instituted in just two years since Obama's official inauguration in 2009.
The president propelled to political stardom by Democrat's distaste of the Bush's wild pursuit of terrorists, and for the wife of the man - Bill Clinton - who tarnished the reputation of the party in his sexual relationship with various women on the hill including one of his interns, Monica Lewinsky. And with a slogan - "Yes We Can" - and a promise to unite America like no other president in US history, both conservatives, Independents, and Democrats rallied behind him. The president's promise to "fundamentally transforming" America sounds extremely good to a nation starving for sociopolitical change. They welcomed such promise. But that transformation is everything except that which was promised. Many people suddenly realized that he was not honest in transformation plan but that he shut them off from any discussion about it. Millions of dollars were paid to rebellious Democrats in Congress to support the bill. Most of the negotiations were held behind closed-doors leading many of his supporters and opponents to question whether the president who promised "honest and transparency" to be the "touchstone" of his administration, was indeed serving their interest.

Senator Ted Cruz (Harvard Law Grad) elected by TP in Texas

And while the TP was branded a racist Republican conspiracy to fight against the president and often compared to the KKK, no one can dispute the fact that many Democrat Representatives were thrown out of office by unhappy Democrat TP members; a sign that the TP was not a partisan movement from its inception. Contrary to biased media reports, the TP's impact on the 2010 midterm election and other special elections, such as that in Massachusetts, was sign Americans of both political persuasions weren't interested in political ideologies but their own welfare and how socioeconomic policies of the Obama administration was poised to alter their lives for good.
After passing this very unpopular law, not by majority vote required by law, but by 50% of the voters using the conference parliamentary maneuver, the Democrats and the executive branch decided to put off its implementation for the next 8 years; a strategy employed to avoid an adverse impact on American voters of 2012 and 2014. The strategy seemed to work as the president and the Democrats refused to talk about it. As time goes by, rebellious Democrats settled back down, not feeling the stinging effect of the Obamacare, and voted their traditional way in 2012. During the presidential election of 2012, the vote they threw behind Republicans began to sway the other direction with the help of the media who spent majority of its time bashing and investigating the Republican candidate and in many instances distorted his record and misrepresented who he is.

Former Sen Scott Brown elected by Democrat TP in MA

Today, with the partial implementation of the Affordable Care Act, the unease feeling American voters had in 2009-10 is now back to the forefront. Polls show many Americans don't want Obamacare and want to repeal it. And that the TP elected senators took the administration to task over whether the law should be funded at all. These are the thrree important aspects of the law that are the central arguments of the TP and its supporters in congress that many pundits - both on the left and right - failed to consider. 1. The role of the legislature is to pass and amend laws. The executive branch's role is to ensure laws passed in congress are in harmony with his policies or his views on the state of the nation. The executive has the veto power to struck down any laws. Yet Obama went on, as in many occasions where things are done clandestinely, announced that the corporations of businesses hiring more than 50 won't be required by Obamacare to pay taxes, on their website. It was also revealed that the executive circumvented the legislative process and by way of "executive order" amended the law and giving himself the authority to stay and to execute portions of the law he agrees with. It is a clear violation of power of the the branches of government, the executive, the legislature, and the judiciary, and the media is ignoring it, the Democrat leadership also tagged along. 2. The Obama administration passed a law by pure partisan vote but when it comes to its implementation, people who helped elected Obama received exemptions and that big companies were given special treatment, leaving behind ordinary Americans to pay for the bill. TP asked for a year extension of the bill and refused to fund it. That infuriated the administration and decided shut down government. 3. The president refused to meet GOP for negotiation and just leveling them all kids of names.Thus, the portrayal of the TP as racist, bigots, homophobic, and terrorists are a desperate assault on voters that aimed at eclipsing the real radical agenda of this government.

Fundamentalism vs Traditionalism

Obama teaching community organizers the tactics. The Diagram is telling!

Politics is a battle of the minds and political ideologies and often the losers are the people. Obama is a student of the radical mastermind Saul Alinsky, communist in America; a man who wrote the "Rules for Radical" which community organizers and protesters against governments, banks, and big corporations, often use. In Chicago, then freshly graduate and former head of the Harvard Law Review, Mr. Obama, taught these rules to his students. He often joined the rallies against banks and corporations, and in 1995, Obama sued Citibank in one of the most racially charged suit ever recorded in the history of that bank. In the suit, Obama claimed that the lending policy of the CB was discriminatory against African America. Off course he won and about 200 homes awarded to African American families, only 19 of them still live in those homes. Why bringing this up all the time? It is important to note the mindset of the man Americans blinded elected in 2008.
But in 2008, Obama promised Americans he was going to "fundamentally transformed" America. To many voters, the word "fundamentally transforming" sound extremely good since they've been fooled to believe that the War Against Terror was winnable and that the US pursuit of Iraqi's Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) turned out to be a big farce. A transformative (for lack of a better word) figure is what many wanted, needless to say they had no idea that they were led to the slaughter house by a man who befriend every American hater he could find during his years in college and postcollege career. Today, the changes many Americans expected never come and what they see is their rights stripping off them left and right by this president and his drones in Congress.
But more myths came out of his mouth. During the healthcare debate, president Obama promised healthcare coverage for all Americans, especially those who couldn't afford HC insurance. Then a year later, the promise was refined to "Healthcare accessibility" and before it went to the house, the bill carries the mantra "Affordable Care Act". Between 2008 to 2012, Obama's supporters thought they were getting "free money" and "free healthcare insurance," a mindset the Obama administration created to get political support. As I stated in the past, there's no coincidences in politics; everything is carefully crafted for specific reasons with specific outcomes in mind.
Traditionalists or conservatives are those who want to protect the originality of the US politics and who are continued to stand up against government intrusion. They have a mandated right to challenge the government in any way possible on behalf of the people. Sometimes they lost, other times they won. In the process, congress is expected to solve their issues by sitting down together and go through their differences; when they don't agree, they find ways to agree or compromise. This is the socalled "conference" process. Since congress was created in a way that the House controls the funds, and the Senate passes laws and the president signs it into law, the constitution also provides for the two branches of congress ways and means to sit down and sort it out. The Obama administration hates this process and President Obama rarely executes it in search of common groups. He rules by dividing people against each other, and through executive fiats.
Every president sits with his counterparts to negotiate their differences. President Reagan, Bush, Clinton, and Bush all executed the "Conference protocols" and agreements were reached. Not Obama. Not Harry Reid - the Democrat majority leader of the Senate. They didn't want to negotiate with their counterparts but found a lot of free times to go to the press and accuse their opponents with every nasty term and word they refused to give to terrorists that attacked America. To them, the TP and the Republican party are racists, terrorists, suicide bombers, hijackers, hostage-takers, science deniers, KKK, bigots, old people haters on and on and on. But when they asked why they didn't find solution to the problems, they say their opponents aren't willing to compromise. That's the new norm and that's the kinds of transformation Americans are now witnessing today!

The Supreme Court Ruling 
It is fair for the Democrats and for Obama to make the argument that the ACA was vetted by congress and the Supreme Court and it should not be attacked but fully funded. Well, no Republican voted for it and the Democrats voted to pass the bill using a trick in the book never used to pass such a massive public law. Listening to the audio of the battle in the SC, one can draw the conclusion that the Administration's attorneys arguments on "Individual Mandate" and the "Commerce Clause" were indeed weak and for many who believed the SC would ruled against it, the outcome was a shocking display of judicial malpractice. But what was the rational behind the ruling?
It is easy to understand why the SC ruled the way it did. It sets the groundwork for more legal suits against the law by ruling the way many never anticipated. The judicial branch's main role is to "interpret" what's written on the paper, not what they perceived to be the intention of the authors of the law. The ruling argues that the administration cannot force Americans to buy something they don't like, especially if they are young and healthy. Doing so is a violation of their rights. Since government only has the power to tax people who are in the economy or participates in commerce, they can cannot penalize those who are not. The SC rules that the Obama admin can only tax people, not penalizing them. Yet the administration persists that the it is not a tax rather a "penalty" because if its a tax, those who don't work can't be forced to buy a healthcare insurance for they aren't engaging in commerce. Even so, the Obama administration bows to penalize those who don't purchase a HC insurance; a landmine for future implementation of the law. Americans and corporations will surely drag the administration to court for violating their constitutional rights to purchase something against their will.

Conclusion
It is obvious from the exchanges in the last few weeks leading up to the government shut down and the post government shutdown, that the the two parties won't negotiate, but there's room for proper discourses. It is rather foolish to level each other in such manner, and it is equally wrong for them to put out pictures and phone numbers of opponents to be harassed by angry voters. Meaningful debates are those that stick to the substance of the issues and not on the persons or reputation of that person. Pointing out your opponents' views is part of the political nature of Democracy, but using the process maliciously is not going to help America. It is the nature of Democracy that once a president is elected, he is the president of all Americans, not only the special interests of WA, D.C and lobbyists from corporations. For that reason, it is important for Obama to take the lead and stop dividing Americans as he did in 2012, successfully. He is ought to be the uniter and the post-racial president and he should live up to that expectations.