freedom of choice

Mercury News.com
has a good article about the late Neil Armstrong, written by Martin Snapp.

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The Republican Convention speeches generated some commentary on the internet.
Quotes from Reddit participants (they sound like people who are young):

"Hold the ----ing phone. Are you being serious right now? Did she really say she had to eat macaroni and tuna off an ironing board?"



"Yes, she said they were struggling while living off Mitt's dad's stocks."


"He's not kidding, that is exactly what she claimed they were doing in their basement apartment.

Everyone else seems to have liked the speech. I found it condescending and sanctimonious. "See, I struggled too and I'm just like you, now vote for my husband so he can make sure rich people hardly ever pay taxes again!" If I heard her say that she liked Romney because he made her laugh and they met at a high school dance one more time, I was going to gag."

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It seems like when people -- famous people, politicians and stuff -- talk about their love life, or personal life, it doesn't tend to come off as well as a person would like.  I'm not sure why that is.  Maybe because some of these kids experience it as "condescending and sanctimonious."  [The name of a new punk band:  Condescending-and-Sanctimonious!  ...and the "!" would be part of the band's name.]
And -- women do tend to say, in speeches or sound bites, that their (Wonderful) Husband "makes them laugh" and "we met at a high school dance."  It's like -- too much repetition, or something.  That part, while not making me feel like I "was going to gag" did recall part of that Don McLean song, "American Pie":

Now do you believe in rock and roll?


Can music save your mortal soul?

And can you teach me how to dance real slow?



Well, I know that you're in love with him

Cause I saw you dancin' in the gym

You both kicked off your shoes

Man, I dig those rhythm and blues--ooz!--

I was a lonely teenage broncin' buck
With a pink carnation and a pickup truck
But I knew I was out of luck
The day --

the mus--    ic died
[nah nah nah Nah nah na--]

I started singin'


Bye, bye Miss American Pie

Drove my Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry…

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Was Mr. Romney a lonely teenager?
Was there a pink carnation?
Can't picture him being out of luck.

--------------------------------------- --------------------------------------- [youngster comments from Reddit continued]:   "I'm a liberal, but I think you're wrong in saying all republicans are dumb. Just because someone believes in small gov't and free economy doesn't mean they agree with all the other nonsense the GOP has been doing lately.

The problem is fundamentalist whackjobs and corporate puppets have hijacked a once-legitimate political party."

-----------------------And here's my thought on the above:  the Republican party (or maybe its -- people you hire to help you win, political operatives, or something) wanted to "hijack" what the commenter calls the "fundamentalist whackjobs and corporate puppets," drawing them into the party & get the support of their votes, and then the jobs-and-pets, having been drawn in, hijacked the party...------------------


"Conservatives aren't dumb. Republicans are."

•

"When we say Republicans here we mean the American republican platform for the past 20+ years. It's hard to separate the the two when it's been that way for all if not most of many of our lives."

---------------[And that's where my personal experience differs from these folks:  that's the only Republican Party they've known, so that's it -- on the other hand many of us who lived through that evolution, or some would call it de-evolution (another punk, or New Wave band, Devo) -- we experience that yucky/horrible feeling when something changes for the worse instead of the better, and you want it to go back but it doesn't....]--------------------



"Anybody who believes in small government and the free market but none of the other GOP nonsense has no business still being a member of that party, IMO."

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IMO.  (In My Opinion - ?) Mh.

-30-