Our latest local lunacy

Our beloved local newspaper, The Salem News, is pretty reliably right-wing in the editorial section. And beloved libertarian crank Barbara Anderson is one of our most reliably nutty contributors. Sparring with her was fun back in the day when you could comment anonymously on the boards there, but since they went to a "Real Names Only" policy I've stayed away (as have the vast majority of posters). Here's her latest drivel - be entertained by the comments there as well:

http://goo.gl/AnN2Y

Short version is this: Any Republican is better than what we've got. Really? One poster in the comments makes plenty of salient points, only to get accused of racism for not mentioning Herman (who?) Cain as a serious contender. Gee, surprised? And then Robin Douglas does a great job of summarizing the real Obama resume/record, only to be greeted with the all caps "NONE OF WHICH QUALIFIED HIM FOR THE PRESIDENCY". Really? Plenty of presidents (including our last one) got the job with fewer achievements in the real world. But in the end, here's what finds Obama qualified:

- He was elected to the Presidency by a majority of voters across the nation. Period. The American people have already held forth on his qualifications, and by electing him they found his qualifications acceptable. Period. Next years' election will hold judgement on his accomplishments in the office, not his qualifications for it. That argument is over. He was elected. Move on, mouth-breathers.

Newsflash: We are digging out of a recession still. The economy has improved but is not yet back where it was in 2007 and prior. We have a huge deficit created by the combination of a massive tax cut and two wars, added to by a recession (which collapsed revenues further) and a moderate stimulus program (which wasn't as effective as hoped but likely prevented the damage from being worse). One party thinks we can cut taxes to solve any problem - the other knows better. I've never loved the Democrats but at least they're the adults right now.