#overrant

When I first joined the Overwatch fandom I headcanoned that McCree killed his own parents as a gang initiation type of thing. I also headcanoned that they abused him, and so he was initially more willing to kill them (due to frustrations and feeling wronged, not because victims of abuse want to kill their abusers). However, a day or so after the murders he was traumatized by it (I mean he killed his own parents, even if they were shitty parents it's a difficult thing to process)

The liberal demigod JFK is being pulled into contemporary U.S. politics and no doubt some of the shine is coming off his 1960′s Camelot. Most left-wingers would be discouraged by this (as John Kennedy is considered a fourth member of Trinity, or at least worthy of being the fifth Beatle) but this plays perfectly into the hands of President Barack Obama who has a habit of using the words “the previous administration.” It has always been assumed (and we all know what happens when you assume…you make the Democratic animal out of u and me) that BHO was constantly referencing George W. Bush and blaming him for the current state of U.S. affairs…but recent data and hindsight has given Obama the ammunition to turn his guns on JFK and fire fifty years into the past.

What Jack Kennedy did was change the mindset and values of governmental spending which trickled down to the common man and some would argue that the age of entitlement began…which ultimately cost Jimmy Carter a second term (although it did usher in the brilliant Conservative King Ronald Reagan, who not only turned around the economy but saved the U.S. from the metric system.)

How did JFK do it? With the mindset of reaching ‘full employment’ and eliminating the threat of recession, Kennedy cut taxes (when it wasn’t really needed) with the hopes of manipulating budgets, unleashing a soaring deficit and thus bringing in the practice of ignoring fiscal responsibilities (much like Bill Clinton ignored his wedding vows). The country never returned to budgetary restraint and as Obama opens the floodgates of the Affordable Health Care Act, he has fifty years of administrations to blame…not just the eight years of W.

History is catching up to JFK and it will be interesting to see how the History Channel treats Obama…I won’t be around to see it air but my kids and grandkids will. At least I hope.

Thankful Joe Biden Won't Be The Next Pope

As a kid growing up in the ’70s and ’80s, there were usually only two names coming out of the news-cycle from the Big Apple…George Steinbrenner and Ed Koch. That’s right, the owner of the Yankees and the mayor of New York, New York (the town so nice they named it twice or possibly the founders weren’t that creative, who knows?)

Koch, who died last week, was truly a maverick politician and completely unpredictable; which made him a joy to watch…albeit from a distance. When asked to define himself, he responded that he was a ‘liberal with sanity.’ Some would find it odd that Charles Manson described himself in the same way.

If there were ever a politician who was all things to all people…it very well may have been Koch. This is the guy who won his second term as the NY mayor while running on both the Democratic and Republican ticket. Democrats hated him because he supported the death penalty while Republicans loved him…because he supported the death penalty. The man had the chutzpah to  endorse George W. Bush for the Oval Office in 2004, which in liberal-minded New York is a cardinal sin. In ’08 Koch endorsed Obama, then rescinded in ’10, gave it back to Barack in November of  ’12 and then criticized BHO last month for backing off the Israeli/USA relationship. I haven’t seen this much yo-yo-ing since Bill Clinton was with Hillary..then Gennifer…then Hillary…then Paula…then Hillary…then Monica…then Hillary.

Regardless, Mayor Ed was able to mix it up over the smallest issues. In 1984 he resisted the idea of New York City adding a second area code, for fear it may divide the city. I don’t believe that Koch thought it would be a model for a Hotel Rwanda Hutu vs. Tutsi type of thing; but this New York we are talking about here, so maybe he knew what he was doing after all.

The tagline of Overrant is a George Will quote…’convictions cause conflict’, and that was surely the case with Mayor Ed Koch. He was a life-long Democrat but he stayed to the middle…not to secure votes but because he had convictions. You have to respect that regardless of your political slant.

R.I.P Mayor.