Post in McCain's best choice for VP is Guiliani

Jul 17 17:45 UTC

Ed Fesler: "The public doesn't want captured terrorists to have "rights".
Guiliani can talk about his record as a crime-fighter. He can say that every
American city is safer because of what he did in New York. Guiliani can frame
the election as a choice between "soft on crime" and "tough on crime". Does the
public want civil libertarians on the Supreme Court?"

McCain's choice of veep is a choice as to who will be president when McCain
drops dead in office. If you have seen the man in the past two weeks, it's
clear that he is not a well man. Note that every president ages ten years or
more in office during the first four years. This man, not because of his age
but because of his health, hasn't got ten years of aging left in him.

Last time I checked, I was still part of "the public" (Some 19th Century writer
once quipped that "The public is an ass."), so it's a dubious appellation. I DO
want alleged terrorists to have rights so we can have the right to incarcerate
only those who are really terrorists, as opposed to everyone who has made a
phone called between here and the Middle East.

The "public" has also gone along with the stupidity that building more prisons
is somehow "tough on crime." What a laugh. The prison system is a way to pen up
those people who don't have a job. There are murderers and rapists and
assaulters who need to be locked up because they have demonstrated they are not
competent to live with others, but we are using our burgeoning prison system
like we once used the Army, as a way of keeping a false tally about the number
of unemployed. It's costing us tons of money put to a negative use. Conversely,
if we put the same amount to use in employment efforts, we could truly have
fewer crimes and fewer prisons to support.

Empires have to figure out ways to keep huge numbers of men employed (and women
pregnant) to avoid revolts while they squeeze every drop out of the population
to fund their rapaciousness. Other empires have fought disastrous wars which
have positive effects on their economies: population control and war materials.
The SPCA does the same thing for other animal species at a lot less expense and
grief.

For those who would vote for McCain, it might be important to know that as a
student of the Naval Academy, McCain graduated 894 in a class of 899. Not even
in the top half of the class. Also he exercises both an ungoverned temper (he
was called McNasty in high school for it) and an ungoverned mouth. Those
behaviors take a huge toll on a human's health, chronically weakening the
physical self. When choosing McCain, voters are choosing two presidents, McCain
AND the next president but one.