Pedro's Podium: Chess, Checkers, or Poker

For many of the people in politics they spend their lives playing games. They’re constantly jockeying for positions and positioning themselves for power. The games they play can and do have different degrees of effect on the population as a whole. Some good and some bad, but sometimes the most benign policies can have the most devastating effects. These plays for power can be even more dangerous when the goals of those playing the game are hidden or obscured by lies and political trickery. It is not surprising to me that during the height of the so called government shutdown the Congress declared that week National Chess Week. Most people did not understand the message that they were sending. They were telling the political class that they were beginning to play a game with the nation.

After the last election the Democrat party made no secret to the fact that their goal was to destroy the Republican Party. They seem to be doing a good job of it. This would create by default a single party system. There is another name for single party rule. It is called a DICTATORSHIP. One of the first acts of a dictatorship is to eliminate all opposition and outlaw other political parties. Dictators do not negotiate. Dictators do not compromise. Dictators rule through force of will, executive orders, and thug tactics. They suppress any opposition through any means available. They play both chess and poker by both planning their moves far in advance and then executing them or if that fails they bluff their opponent into caving.

The greatest danger of a person who is an egomaniac and has sociopathic tendencies is that you don’t know how far they will go to obtain their goal of total power. It is very possible that they will take a scorched Earth tactic that says: if I can’t have it, no one will. This was the danger warned about with the latest debt ceiling debate. There was a justifiable fear that Mr. Obama would violate the Fourth Amendment and refuse to meet the physical and financial obligations of the nation in order to through the world into chaos. Only an anarchist or dictator would be willing to punish those who he was elected and serve in such a manner.

But let’s also consider that the leadership of the Democrat Party is not as egotistical or sociopathic as it seems. True they had no problem shutting down the government and doing unnecessary things to elevate the pain of the American people. From closing the White House tours due to the Sequester to Barrycading national monuments to closing private businesses and evicting people from private homes due to the so-called government shutdown. They wasted a lot of money to punish people to place the blame on the Tea Party. The Democrat Party leadership went as far as closing overlooks on state highways just to inconvenience vacationers and the random traveler. It was enough to convince a lot of people that with the threats of default being used by not only the president but by the leaders in both parties it could have happened. Yes there were Republicans repeating the threat and not pointing out that it would be a violation of the Constitution for the government to not pay its obligations or that Social Security is self-funded from the SSI trust fund and by law, payments must be made. But that didn’t stop the threats or the fear that this government would ignore the law and The Constitution. It’s not like anyone in any of the leadership positions seem to show any concern for their oath of office.

Checkers
It appears that the leadership of the Republican Party is happy to help the president and Democrats with that goal by destroying the support for the party among its base in the general population. Without popular support and a loyal party base there is no way they can win. The establishment GOP has not only abandoned their base. They have alienated some of their strongest supporters.

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The leadership of the GOP is either extremely stupid or they are in league with the Democrats. There is no doubt that the Republican Party has no love for the Tea Party. They see them as interlopers who are interfering with the finely tooled machinery of Washington. How many times have you heard John McCain or another leader within the GOP talk about how this is not the way we do things in Washington? Yes GOP attempted to take over one of the largest Tea Party support organization, Freedom Works. They’ve worked hard to discredit and discourage members of other organizations because they consider them a threat, not to the nation, but to the power structure of the GOP.

So it seems to some people that the Democrats are playing Chess while the GOP has been playing Checkers. Well I really don’t know if it is that simple. Yes the Democrats want to destroy the Republicans but that would be too dangerous for them until they can take complete control of the nation as a whole. As long as they need an antagonist they want to keep the GOP alive but very sickly. They need an adversary to blame all the bad things that occur. The Democrats still must worry about the state governments. Although they have a strangle hold on Washington, with a very accommodating opposition party, there are state governments that are not falling in line. For your average tyrannical government this is not a problem, but time may not be on their side as long as there is a strong grass roots effort opposing their goals.

It now seems that the kabuki theater in the District of Columbia over the budget battle and the debt ceiling has been won by the Democrats and a major lose for the Tea Party. It seems that way because the media and the political leaders of both parties are busy blaming them for all the trouble over the government budget issues. But is it possible that both parties have overplayed their hands? Could it be that they were only bluffing themselves? Could it be that too many of these so called leaders have spent too much time in government and lost touch with the populace? It is too early to tell, but the idea that we are still back in the 90s when the major networks had a total monopoly on the information given to the public is a bit naive. There are forces at work that make the political games very important to all Americans. Will the GOP and Democrats win their games? Well I don’t know, but it is not a game when you are talking about the lives of millions of people.

The ideas that made this nation the greatest in the world were freedom to succeed or fail by controlling our own destinies. There are people awake to the destruction of our way of life and they want it stopped. We are tired of the corruption in Washington. We want leaders who will protect our rights, not look for ways to circumvent them. We want respect for our views, not condescension from a self-appointed ruling class that uses their power and influence to become millionaires and then use it to solidify their power. We need to remove this every growing government that thinks they know how to run our lives while they run their own. It is time to stop playing games with the middle class, buying off the poor with empty promises that only keep them poor and enrich the rich.

No matter the game being played by the politicians in our capitals, they win and we lose. It is time for a change. We need to realize that the system is not a two party system. It is a one party system playing all of us for fools. It is time to put an end to their games. It is time to look for new leadership that will return us to the original intent of those who created this nation and made it great. It is time for free people to once again be free. It is time for We The People to end the games that are being played by the politicians, no matter if it's Chess, Checkers, of Poker.