The Disputed Truth

What A Difference A Few Decades Make

2011-02-01T10:40:00.000-06:00

“The test of our progress is not whether we add to the abundance of those who have much. It is whether we provide enough to those who have little.” - Franklin D. Roosevelt

Sometimes I wonder what has happened to us as a nation. How have we allowed greed and selfishness to thrive and flourish so rampantly in our society? How can anyone take these so-called leaders seriously when on the one hand they continue to provide the corporate class and the wealthy with tax-cuts and on the other they tell the other classes that they are costing the country too much money? Can someone explain to me how the last time we faced similar economic conditions and the country was suffering so much pain that we created safety nets and today we are demolishing safety nets? How could we in the midst of a catastrophe find the resources and courage to provide for our countrymen but today we can provide for oil companies, wars, and corporate subsidies yet nothing for education, the unemployed or medical care?

I wonder what has fundamentally changed in our national psyche that we can now look at our fellow citizens suffering and have the ability to not only walk right by them but also curse them as we do so. The problem is not that we don’t have enough resources. It comes down to our priorities and what things do we value. Shortly there will be debates concerning our national priorities and what resources we are willing to allocate to them. There will be a lot of posturing and demagoguery concerning entitlements. Entitlements have become the new scapegoat for all that is wrong in America. Programs that have allowed seniors to live longer and more fulfilling lives will now be cut to shorten those lives. Obviously, it has been working too well and we have to cull the herd according to the wing-nuts. Death panels? Pulling the plug on grandma? How is this possible that even programs that have been successful are now being cast as failures? Sound familiar?

It is simple they have to cast these programs as failures so they can cut and eventually demolish them. The wing-nuts are realizing that the socialism tact is losing steam and so they have to develop a new strategy and with the help of the Democrats they will. If you continue to reduce revenues or shift revenues to corporate subsidies and war then of course the deficits are going to go up and spending cuts are going to seem like a necessary evil. The problem with this theory is that it flies in the face of reality and in the face of the majority of Americans who do not support these draconian cuts being proposed by the wing-nuts and the teabaggers. The majority of Americans do not support reducing the deficit on the backs of the poor and the elderly. The majority of Americans want to see the taxes of the wealthy increased not reduced and yet here we are. In America it is never about lack of, it is always about priorities.

We have gone from the poor and the elderly having problems to saying they are the problem. You see this is one of the things governments do, they support the weak and the old. So by saying that the government is the problem you are by extension saying these folks are the problem and to me that is a problem. The continued and strategic assault on unions, the middle-class, the elderly, and the poor is beginning to pay dividends, but for whom? If the majority of Americans support these items and yet the politicians are continuing to press their eradication then somewhere there is a disconnect. The will of the people is being circumvented by the interests of the moneyed few.

If our politicians aren’t willing to listen to us then we must “take our government back”, but not in the false sense of the teabaggers and their desire to return to 1776 when only white male property owners had rights. No, we must return to a “government of the people, by the people, and for the people”. Decades ago in the midst of a worse economic crisis our leaders used that opportunity to tell the American people the truth that many of our economic woes were due to the greed of unchecked capitalism and laid the foundation of many of the programs that ushered in the middle-class and dignity for our seniors. Wow, what a difference a few decades can make. Now our political leaders are telling us that the problem is no longer unchecked greed and capitalism it is the victims of unchecked greed and capitalism. Yeah, that’s it. This is akin to saying that prior to Nader’s crusade against unsafe cars that what caused the needless traffic fatalities wasn’t that automakers were designing and building unsafe cars, it was that drivers were buying and driving the unsafe cars.

When the “great debate” begins about cutting this and cutting that I hope we remember what made us a great nation. It wasn’t our huge military, it wasn’t our giveaways to corporate America, and it certainly wasn’t the unchecked greed of capitalism. What made us a great nation was our willingness to provide for the least of these and to provide an opportunity for all to succeed. These policies allowed a child from a family of 12 children living in a 2 bedroom house to attend college and grow up to be the Speaker of the House. It’s funny how these same folks who have benefited from these policies once they gain power want to pull up the ladder behind them. I will never understand the arrogance of these people.

Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. - Dwight D. Eisenhower

Citizens United By-Product?

2011-01-28T08:53:00.002-06:00

We need to start making things again in this country, and we can do that by reducing the tax and regulatory burdens on job creators. America will have the highest corporate tax rate in the world. Think about that. Look no further to see why jobs are moving overseas. – Michelle Bachmann Response

I cannot remember ever having three State of the Union speeches in one year. Normally the party in the White House gives the traditional State of the Union speech followed by the out of office party giving a response. Now thanks to our political system being awash in cash any crank can go on television and get their 15 minutes of fame. My question is who funded this little Bachmann escapade? Michelle Bachmann is supposed to be a money maker and according to reports she is a fund-raising machine, but where does this money come from? No one knows. I would venture to guess that it is the same AstroTurf funders who started the teabagger movement.

I have a hard time believing that it would be difficult to raise money with a platform of tax-cuts for the wealthy, removing regulations on businesses, and repealing health-care reform. I think there are a number of wealthy folks who would contribute to those causes, so the fact that she raises money should not be falsely correlated to her popularity. Cranks like Bachmann will always appeal to 15-20% of the population and while this sells a lot of gold and dog food it doesn’t translate well in national elections. Michelle Bachmann and her ilk are the pit-bulls of the right to make sure any compromise will be their compromise which is no compromise at all. Moving forward the new hostages won’t just be the unemployed, the poor, and the middle-class it will be the full faith and credit of the United States.

The new target will be the infamous entitlements. The line will be that you can’t be serious about deficits if you don’t cut entitlements. This of course will come from the same folks who want to make the Bush tax-cuts for the wealthy permanent. What I fail to understand is that we are having this one sided conversation about cutting the deficit without the other side of the equation which is to increase revenues. The way that Bill Clinton created a surplus was not by cutting Social Security and our safety net; he did it by raising revenues. And guess what the sky didn’t fall and the wealthy and the corporations did not move to Eastern Europe where the rates are much lower. The idea that you are going to cut your way out of this debt is ludicrous.

Is it just me or is it coincidental that following the Citizens United decision we are now being provided with every extremist view on full display. My concern is that we will be bombarded by these fanatical views not because those who espouse them are credible or even electable. The strategy will be to push the center further and further to their extreme view so that views that were once unthinkable are now being debated as mainstream. How many formerly extreme views are now a part of our political discussions? Anyone remember the 14th Amendment and how now it is open for public debate and re-litigation against Latinos? It wasn’t that long ago that this would have been considered an extreme remedy for the immigration crisis. Or how about referring to the unemployed and seniors as lazy and stopping benefits in the middle of an economic downturn like we haven’t seen since the Great Depression? Even the most ardent critics would not have proposed cutting off unemployment benefits in the midst of the "Great Recession".

The upcoming Presidential election is going to be full of cranks and fanatics and their goal will be to distract and confuse the electorate. They will be able to do so with the help of the Citizens United decision and the 501(c)4 organizations flush with cash that it spawned. These unnamed donors will be able to manipulate the issues and steer the debate away from the real issues and towards the dark hordes that are storming our borders or the socialist liberals who have the audacity to ask them to pay their fair share of taxes. Thanks to 24/7 cable news and the Supreme Court the airwaves will be flooded with the likes of Palin, Bachmann, and O’Donnell. The teabagger Barbie’s will be on full display and in rare form providing not only verbal, but visual distractions for the punditry.

We now have Supreme Court Justices hiding income from their spouses and conducting behind the scenes political talks for congressional audiences. My question is what job did Ms. Thomas perform to make $686,589 from the Heritage Foundation? Whether there is criminal intent or conflict of interest is not the issue. The issue is that under this Court more controversial decisions have been made and it doesn’t appear those decisions were based in Constitutional law, but instead on a political agenda. It is odd to me that the citizen’s of this country are overwhelmingly opposed to the Citizens United decision and yet our judiciary blatantly and apologetically displays their partisanship in a way that would have been unheard of just a few years ago.

It has been said that politics is the second oldest profession. I have learned that it bears a striking resemblance to the first. - Ronald Reagan

He Doesn’t Feel Our Pain

2011-01-26T19:42:00.002-06:00

After listening to the President’s State of the Union address I couldn’t help but to feel a sense of loss. I understand that this was a political speech in a lot of ways and will surely be the kick-off speech to his 2012 run for re-election, but with all of its platitudes and feel good rhetoric there was something missing. Could it have been that unemployment was not mentioned? Or that the poor and the middle-class were conspicuously absent? I don’t know about the state of your union, but in my union these issues are still alive and well. I have yet to hear this President connect to the pain that so many Americans are suffering from, especially black Americans.

One of the troubling aspects of the speech was how the President basically threw American manufacturing under the bus as a consequence of globalization. He stated that the American worker had to raise their game to compete for the future. That’s funny everything I read says that the American worker is one of the most productive workers in the world. Maybe instead of prodding the worker the President should have mentioned how the worker’s boss’ have outsourced all of their jobs overseas as China’s and India’s economies are the fastest growing in the world because they are making the things we used to make. The challenge should not have been that we have to give up manufacturing to these other nations but how American manufacturing can return and compete against these other nations.

This speech is named the state of the union for a reason; instead we got the state of globalization. The President should have been imploring this nation to support and rebuild our manufacturing base and buying our products. I don’t understand how promoting one’s own nation today is now considered un-American. I guess that’s because it is no longer what is good for America it is what is good for America’s multinationals. The truth be told as we found out during the gilded age is that what is good for Standard Oil is not always what’s good for America. I know there are those who will defend this President no matter what he says and does and I understand their fierce loyalty, but this is not about personality it should be about principles.

My fear is that in an attempt to appease the wing-nuts this administration is going to cave in some form on Social Security. We will either raise the retirement age or cut some benefits to show their seriousness in cutting the deficit. What is not being discussed is that Social Security was created by taxes that we all pay throughout our working lives for the benefits we receive. This isn’t some government give away where we take general tax dollars to support the weak, aged, and affirmed. There are less draconian ways to shore up Social Security but none of this is being mentioned or even part of the discussions. The problem with negotiating with folks who want to destroy what you are negotiating is that their aim is not to salvage it but to undermine it. I think Congressman Ryan made that point crystal clear last night.

This is a future in which we will transform our social safety net into a hammock, which lulls able-bodied people into lives of complacency and dependency. - Paul Ryan's remarks

So on the one hand we have the President telling American workers they have to stop whining and on the other hand we have the wing-nuts telling the American workers that they are lazy and complacent. I don’t know about you but my answer to Republicanism is not Republican lite. Just once I would like this President to speak to the pain of those folks on Main Street as eloquently as he spoke to the folks in Tucson. He should give a voice to the voiceless instead of vocalizing the talking points of the opposition. I am not naïve to the process of negotiation and it is important to throw meat to the opposition to appear open to compromise, but what has been missing from this equation is the suffering of the poor and the middle-class and the enunciation of their concerns.

Last night the President spoke to Wall Street and the business communities letting them know loud and clear that this administration is open for business. The problem with this is that they aren’t the ones suffering. The Dow is approaching 12,000, the banks are sitting on boat loads of cash, and businesses are doing likewise. These folks need signals like the millionaires and billionaires need a tax-cut. The message the President should be sending is to Main Street that this administration is serious about creating equal opportunity and securing workers rights. The problem is not the American worker it is the greed of the American corporation.

“What does labor want? We want more schoolhouses and less jails; more books and less arsenals; more learning and less vice; more leisure and less greed; more justice and less revenge; in fact, more of the opportunities to cultivate our better natures,” - Samuel Gompers (1st President of AFL-CIO)

Bankruptcy Is Not An Option

2011-01-22T21:26:00.002-06:00

"Should taxpayers in Indiana who have paid their bills on time, who have done their job fiscally be bailing out Californians who haven't?" House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, R-Wisc., asks. "No. That's a moral hazard that we are not interested in creating." - Fox News Blog

So the financial wiz-kid of the Republican Party believes that we are just a group of states that happen to share borders but have no inherent connection to one another? It is this type of rhetoric and mentality that fosters the divisions that keep us from moving forward as a nation. This simplistic view of the economy shared by the wing-nuts and tea-baggers makes it difficult to take any of their proposals seriously. We are not talking about some teenagers who have overspent their allowance and so the answer is to send them to their room with no dinner. We are talking about our fellow countrymen who just happen to live in another part of the country, our country. We are talking about our fellow countrymen who just happen to live in another part of the country, our country. We already know that being born in Hawaii makes you a foreigner, but this is ridiculous.

The fact that these clowns speak about morality just demonstrates their own immorality. Is it a moral hazard to watch our fellow countrymen suffering because the wealthy in this country decided they needed another transfer of wealth through market manipulation? What is a moral hazard is that we have seen the biggest financial theft of our economy in history and no one was prosecuted, no one was so much as even charged. Has our definition of morality been so corrupted that it is morally right to give billions to millionaires and billionaires, but immoral to give support to the elderly, the unemployed, and or the mentally ill?

As long as we continue to allow these snake oil salesman to advocate their bad medicine we will continue to focus on cutting out our safety nets so we can continue to provide tax breaks to the wealthy. I’m sorry I obviously missed the memo that stated paying taxes in a democracy is optional. It’s amazing how all of the tea-baggers want government services, but they don’t want to pay for them. The wing-nuts want wars, nuclear arsenals, and government bail-outs they just don’t want to pay for them. There is a reason why we pay taxes. There are certain things we have decided as a society that are important enough to share the costs. The problem arises when one segment of the population is paying more than their share.

One of the challenges we will face as a country is how do we make the tax code more progressive and more balanced in the face of this anti-tax and cut spending at all costs false meme being promoted by those who have demonized the very concepts that have made our country great. Shared sacrifice, social safety nets for the needy, and a common sense of fairness are concepts that make a nation strong. We can no longer continue to allow the corporate interests and the money changers to undermine and tear at the fabric that makes us a nation. This idea of undermining the middle-class and the poor is nothing new to America. From the Hooverites, to the greed of the 80’s, to the butter and war rhetoric of the last administration we have been under assault it seems with every generation. And every generation has had to reconfirm our commitment to what makes America great.

Unfortunately with the decline in liberalism and the ascension of conservatism with it’s everybody for themselves mentality the very underpinnings of our society are at risk. Programs such as Social Security, benefits for the unemployed, and funding for education are now bargaining chips, but what is not on the bargaining table are tax-cuts for the wealthy and military spending. What type of society is willing to defund the programs for the middle-class and poor to reduce the taxes of the wealthiest among them? I could understand if the tax burden for the wealthy and the corporations were oppressive but under our current tax system the secretary of a CEO will probably pay more in taxes than her boss. To argue that our current tax system is unfairly slanted towards the wealthy is an understatement. To present Mr. Ryan, as a voice of reason in the deficit conversation when he is saying that everyone is on their own is like saying that a secessionist was a voice of reason during the civil war.

We are a country; we are a diverse nation that still manages to share some common threads. We should not allow those common threads to be unraveled for the benefit of a small group who value profits over national interests or their own citizenry. It’s amazing to me how the media and the pundits criticized the Chinese when their president was visiting, but no one has found it necessary to criticize the very American business people who have handed the keys to the American economy over to the Chinese and the Indians. Mr. Ryan doesn’t want to bail-out the states but he doesn’t have any such misgivings about bailing out the folks who have put the states in dire straits.

“Corruption and hypocrisy ought not to be inevitable products of democracy, as they undoubtedly are today” - Mahatma Gandhi

The Cost of Victory

2010-12-22T21:02:00.001-06:00

The ultimate decision about what is accepted as right and wrong will be made not by individual human wisdom but by the disappearance of the groups that have adhered to the "wrong" beliefs. - Friedrich August von Hayek

As the President begins his victory laps and the pundicracy begins to fall back in line by touting the recent passage of some historic legislation I think it is important that we remember what the cost of these victories has been and what it will be in the future. So let’s be clear it took 700 billion dollars to get the Republicans to enact legislation that the majority of Americans supported. Is paying the ransom to the kidnappers a victory? I do not want to appear as if I am raining on the President and the Congress’ parade but the reason this legislation got passed was not because the Dems finally realized they had a majority that was due to expire or that the Republicans finally decided that bi-partisanship was worth pursuing, it was because the Dems gave them 700 billion dollars.

What we have seen the last few weeks is how our legislative system was created to work. Legislation was proposed, debated, and voted on. The only problem is that in America for our political process to work it took a bribe of 700 billion dollars. Welcome to the banana republic of America where payoffs and kickbacks are required to do the people’s business. The fact that everyone is so thrilled that the process worked just demonstrates how truly broken our system is. Forgive me but I will not celebrate this process as a victory. It may be a victory for this President but it is not a victory for the American people. The question we must ask is simply this, is any one President’s personal political survival worth giving up our principles? The repeal of DADT is an historic achievement by this President but at what costs?

Some may say that I am being overly dramatic but I don’t think so. By making the concessions that this President and Congress have made they have created two very big problems in the coming years. The first is that they have embolden the wing-nuts to take more hostages and this will be played out following the holidays when they begin debating the budget for the fiscal year of 2011 since no spending bill was passed this year. Anyone who thinks that what has happened recently will ring in this era of compromise from the wing-nuts is in for a rude awakening. Their constant refrain has been and will continue to be that everything must be paid for except tax-cuts for the wealthy. Now that they have delivered on the tax-cuts they will focus their attention on paying for them through cuts to our social safety nets. Funding for health and financial reform will be their first targets followed by our regulatory apparatus.

The second problem will be that by accepting the wing-nut philosophy of tax-cuts the President has now opened the door for negotiations on Medicare and Social Security. Based on how they have negotiated thus far I am not convinced that these programs will remain intact. The wing-nuts have learned that if you say something loud enough and enough times it becomes fact and in this case it will be that we can no longer afford these programs. The wing-nuts don’t want to “pull the plug” on granny they just want to work her to death. Make no mistake about it Social Security and all of the other safety net programs we have come to accept will now be re-litigated and are now negotiable. Were the legislative victories of the last few weeks worth dismantling the last 50 years of liberal values and programs?

Unlike many of my progressive and liberal friends I am not calling for a primary challenge of this President. To me this would be counterproductive and would allow a group that I know does not represent anything I support to come to power and this to me would be foolish. I am not a purist but I refuse to accept that everything is negotiable. There has to be some principles that are not open for debate or negotiation. I refuse to accept this false moral equivalency being promoted by the media and funded by the wealthy. There is no moral equivalency between funding unemployment for those ravaged by the greed of Wall Street and the huge bonuses for those same Wall Streeters. There is no moral equivalency between funding the medical expenses for first responders and tax-cuts for the wealthiest Americans.

Our job as progressives and as liberals is not to fall in line with the pundits and the apologist but to remain true to our visions and our principles that we may keep the light burning for those who may lose their way in the darkness. If those who seek our support will not stand for our principles then it is incumbent upon us to find those who will be willing to stand and create our own vehicles for success.

As long as we continue to allow these clowns the cover of moral equivalency then they will continue to take hostages. Our government has to become more representative of the people. We cannot continue to allow Senators from under populated and safe states to undermine the will of the majority of Americans. There is no moral equivalency between someone who represents 100,000 people and someone who represents a 1,000,000 people and by allowing this travesty to continue we will continue to have these obstructionists holding the rest of the country hostage.

Enjoy your victory Mr. President but know that those who were preparing your demise continue to lie in wait with their steely knives and their deceptive smiles.

In the beginning of a change the patriot is a scarce man and brave, and hated and scorned. When his cause succeeds, the timid join him for then it costs nothing to be a patriot. - Mark Twain

The Failure of Liberalism

2010-12-16T09:51:00.000-06:00

I think experience will teach you a combination of liberalism and conservatism. We have to be progressive and at the same time we have to retain values. We have to hold onto the past as we explore the future. – Oliver Stone

One of the greatest tragedies of the 20th century has been the decline of liberalism and the ascendancy of conservatism. While there are many opinions for the cause of this phenomenon the one that is the most fraudulent is that America is a conservative nation. This false premise has been propagated by those who want to maintain some fictitious sense of America’s past and a desire to reverse the progress we have achieved. Over the course of the last 50 years they have steadily and persistently chipped away at those ideas which defined liberalism (shared sacrifice, equality, and shared responsibility) and replaced them with greed, selfishness, and special interests while simultaneously demonizing liberalism as socialism.

Unfortunately, those of us who call ourselves liberals and subscribe to those principles that not only provided freedom, equality, and dignity to blacks and women, but also created the largest middle-class the world has ever known have allowed what we have accomplished to be tarnished and vilified. Unions which offered working-class Americans with livable wages, benefits, and organization became excessive and corrupt allowing themselves to be marginalized and thus laying the foundation for the corporate takeover of our political process. Without ongoing political organizations like unions to balance the scale the American worker has seen their share of the American Dream shrink while at the same time the wealthy class has seen their share increase to historic levels. While this is not a new phenomenon without the counterbalance of unions and organized political dissent the wealthy have been able to transform the political landscape in such a way that while the American worker is one of, if not the most productive worker in the world and yet they have seen their industries shipped overseas and their wages reduced or become stagnant.

The failure of liberalism is that while we focused on the physical aspects of inequality and poverty we did little to focus on the psychological effects of these issues. To use the analogy of “cream” rising to the top as that happens what is left at the bottom is more concentrated and more difficult to rise. You get less cream rising to the top and more sediment at the bottom. That sediment becomes more intransigent and begins to develop a mindset of poverty. Unfortunately today America is suffering from a large segment of our population with both situational poverty and generational poverty. Many of the people who are now dealing with situational poverty (poverty caused by a situation such as unemployment, medical reasons, etc.) will find it more difficult to overcome these circumstances as we face large unemployment as the new normal. Those suffering from generational poverty (poverty that has lasted over multiple generations) will find it next to impossible to overcome their external as well internal obstacles.

A couple of generations ago we had a strong manufacturing base that could absorb many of these low-skilled workers and offer them a pathway out of poverty. Today there are fewer opportunities for these workers to make a livable wage and move out of poverty. Because there is no longer a connection between effort and benefits or success we now have an intransigent underclass which is mostly urban and mostly black that lacks the opportunities to become middle-class and also lacks the desire to put in the work. Overcoming poverty requires hard work on the part of the individual to overcome the many obstacles designed to prevent their success and there appears to be an attitude among many of our young people that success no longer requires hard work. They instead seem to believe that there are short-cuts and easy money. It is important to be prepared for the opportunities but opportunity must also exist.

What we failed to realize is that while the fight to reduce poverty and inequality to us are self-evident concepts worthy of support there are many people who view them as collateral damage of capitalism. We falsely assumed that most caring people agreed with our position and supported the fight that has been waged yet there has been a slow erosion through materialism and greed undermining our social safety net and demonizing those who rely on it. We have not done a good enough job of combating the immorality of their argument and have allowed them to couch it in economics. Instead of it being our moral obligation to help those less fortunate, the weak, and the aged it has now come down to we can’t afford them. We can afford to give tax-cuts to the wealthy and corporations but we can’t afford to help the poor and less fortunate.

If we are to overcome the propaganda of the wealthy to demean and undermine the needy then we have to once again regain our moral footing and call out these tactics and their proponents for who and what they are. We must also be willing to address the excesses of our programs and be willing to innovate to overcome the intransigence of poverty. It is difficult to make the case for “food instability” while at the same time we have high rates of juvenile and adult obesity in these same communities. There is and has been a concerted effort on the part of the wealthy to undermine our social safety net. It has become fashionable to label the poor as lazy and morally bankrupt, but it wasn’t the poor who extorted billions of dollars from our economy, it wasn’t the poor who nearly brought our economic system to the brink of collapse, and it certainly wasn’t the poor who requested and received billions of dollars in wealth transfer.

There is this talk about class-warfare and I find it amazing that the only time we have this conversation is when the wealthy are being asked to contribute. I didn’t hear the term class-warfare when the rich were asking for TARP, bail-outs, and tax cuts. Hmmm, I wonder why? I guess it isn’t a transfer of wealth if it is going up only when it is comes trickling down.

My generation of the Sixties, with all our great ideals, destroyed liberalism, because of our excesses. - Camille Paglia

The Older Unemployed and Social Security Reform

2010-12-15T10:35:00.000-06:00

But that does not seem to matter, not for her and not for a growing number of people in their 50s and 60s who desperately want or need to work to pay for retirement and who are starting to worry that they may be discarded from the work force — forever...Of the 14.9 million unemployed, more than 2.2 million are 55 or older. Nearly half of them have been unemployed six months or longer, according to the Labor Department. The unemployment rate in the group — 7.3 percent — is at a record, more than double what it was at the beginning of the latest recession. - New York Times

One of the least covered issues facing this country is the growing number of older workers who are now unemployed and who because of it have gone through their savings, investments, and retirement accounts and who may never become employed again. Many of these workers had planned to retire with their savings and retirement accounts to supplement their Social Security and now they will have to rely entirely on the government for their retirement and medical needs. While this is a tragedy in and of itself, the real calamity is that not only will these people be old and poor but they have become the means by which the wealthy has decided to balance the budget. The really sad thing is that many of them will also be highly in debt and will spend their golden years struggling to survive.

As a nation we have decided that our best years are behind us and we are determined to repeat them especially the “Gilded Age”. If the wealthy and the wing-nuts have their way not only will there be no retirement accounts for many but there will also be little if any Social Security to sustain them. Folks this isn’t about class warfare, this isn’t about being envious or hating on the rich, and this isn’t even about taxes, this is about what is the fundamental character of this country. Many of these workers through no fault of their own have found themselves unemployed through downsizing and the “great recession” created by the same folks who want to displace them from the only thing that will separate them from elderly poverty the likes of which we haven’t seen since prior to Social Security.

The insidiousness of what the wealthy are trying to do with Social Security reform is that they recognize that not only is America getting older, but also the aged are going to have fewer resources. Prior to the real estate bubble crashing many of these workers had already racked up tremendous debt using their homes as credit cards which they will be carry into retirement. This environment will cause many people to have to continue to work beyond retirement and thus increasing the pressure to extend the retirement age for Social Security. I suppose the thinking will be since they can’t afford to retire anyway we may as well hold off on their government checks. The unfortunate aspect of all of this is that the wealthy through their minions have convinced a number of Americans to believe that these programs have become obsolete and a waste of taxpayer money. The main impetus of this strategy is to blame the poor and the elderly mantra casting them as lazy and a drain on society.

These were the same folks who lambasted this administration for “pulling the plug” on grandma during the health-care reform debate. I guess they want the elderly to live, but only in poverty. The strategy is the same in all of their proposals. They fight for the unborn until they are born then they are on their own. They refuse to provide for their education, to stabilize their families, or offer a pathway out of poverty besides their bumper sticker rhetoric. It is obvious they see the writing on the wall and realize that in order to address the long-term structural problems of this nation revenues will have to be increased so in their usual preemptive fashion they are laying the groundwork to minimize their portion or to shift those obligations to others. It is becoming painfully clear that reducing spending will not be enough but I guess they have adopted a scorched earth policy to squeeze as much from the most vulnerable as they can before we even begin to discuss increasing revenues.

I predict in the coming years that poverty amongst the elderly will increase dramatically as they watch their investments being looted, their homes being devalued, and their pensions disappear. These won’t be people who were marginally involved in our economic system but people who had worked hard and played by the rules but who have become expendable like so many before them. These people will be the collateral damage of globalization and free trade. Those who have profited from these strategies will continue to obstruct and demonize any policies to help those they have sacrificed for their own gain. We can continue to ignore the coming catastrophe by clinging to the fear and uncertainty being propagated by the wealthy or we can take a cue from our European brethren and demand that the system begin to work for the 98% for whom it no longer does.

If we refuse to act then many of our parents and relatives who have been replaced way before their time will become the new faces of poverty. Millions of workers will be too young for retirement and too old to work in a shrinking job market. They will have no health-care, no savings, and plenty of debt as they float in this purgatory of not knowing what their future will hold. In this backdrop the true character of America will emerge and to be honest I am not sure what that character will be. The more I read comments from folks extolling the virtues of giving the wealthy more the less hopeful I am for the future.

“You know, if I listened to him [Michael Dukakis] long enough, I would be convinced we're in an economic downturn and people are homeless and going without food and medical attention and that we've got to do something about the unemployed.” - Ronald Reagan

Selective Amnesia

2010-12-12T12:28:00.001-06:00

You don’t have to abandon your principles to cut a deal. You just have to acknowledge that there are other people in the world and even a president doesn’t get to stamp his foot and have his way…They believe nonliberals are blackmailers or hostage-takers or the concentrated repositories of human evil, so, of course, they see coalition-building as collaboration. They are also convinced that Democrats should never start a negotiation because they will always end up losing in the end. – David Brooks

This is what drives me crazy. Why is it that if Dems stick to their guns they are called immature or irrational but when the wing-nuts do it is a principled stand or a policy difference? Let me clear this up for you Mr. Brooks when you hold up 98% of Americans tax relief for the benefit of the wealthiest 2% by borrowing money from foreign countries and mortgaging our future that is not a difference in policy and that is not negotiating. It is blackmail pure and simple. So my question is how do you build coalitions with people who are willing to block all legislation until they get their way? Sounds to me like they are stomping their feet or holding their breath, but I am no student of politics like you.

Here in a nutshell is why Dems can never maintain the majorities like they did following WWII, they have lost the art of politics. It has only been two short years since one of the worst President’s in the history of America left office and they were given majorities in both Houses and the White House and now they are on the outside looking in. This is the same President who stomped his feet and invaded another country under false pretenses, who passed two tax-cut bills for the wealthy, and presided over the collapse of our economy. Remember how the wing-nuts were on the verge of regionalism and extinction as a major political party? What happened? Most Dems think that the power of their arguments and the strength of their ideas will carry the day. If we just educate the public to what we are trying to accomplish of course they will side with us. No, they won’t. You are bringing a knife to a bazooka fight and you are getting killed.

People on Madison Avenue make a boatload of money figuring out how to sell crap to a bunch of people who don’t need it. I mean really do you need a 500.00 cell phone? The wing-nuts have brought those same tactics to politics and the media. They have used branding to not make the country completely conservative, just more conservative than it was 30 years ago. So now the center is no longer the center. You now have Dems espousing former wing-nut positions as if they were now mainstream and rational.

The Dems refuse to call what the wing-nuts are doing for what it really is, immoral. During the healthcare debate it was never couched in terms of its immorality to allow the insurance companies to continue doing what they were doing to people. Is it immoral to have people dying, going broke, or be uninsurable because they happen to have gotten sick in America? No, it became an economic issue. The same thing is happening today concerning the tax-cuts. It isn’t about morality and fairness it is about economics. As long as Dems continue to allow the wing-nuts to frame their positions in purely economic terms they will continue to be defensible. We are just having a difference of opinion about economic policy so the rational thing to do is to split the difference. As if connecting Social Security, unemployment insurance, tuition support, and earned income tax credits with tax breaks for the rich is morally equivalent. And as long as we continue to allow the wing-nuts and their talking heads to get away with creating this false moral equivalency argument we will continue to lose.

What is going on in America today is not about economics, it is about strategically weakening and eventually removing our safety nets and our middle-class. Think about it what better time to set this in motion than when we were are in the midst of the “great recession” and everyone is fearful and trying to hang on to what little they have. This is no time to increase taxes, this is no time to increase infrastructure spending, this is no time to think about the environment. Basically this is no time to do anything but continue to provide the wealthiest more assistance because we know that if they drink enough champagne eventually some will trickle down on us. Of course it may be a little warm and discolored. This is about shared sacrifice and not about class warfare as the wing-nuts and wealthy apologists continue to claim. If I am receiving most of the benefits isn’t it only fair that in times of crisis I be willing to give back more than those who are not. This isn’t about economics it is about the so-called “Christian values” these folks are so proud to espouse and criticize liberals for not having until it actually requires having to live up to them. I am a Christian unless that means I have to stand up for the poor and sick against those who fund my campaigns, or my reality shows, or my library additions.

You did get one thing right Mr. Brooks we do believe that “these” Dems should never enter into negotiations because as the record plainly demonstrates they have a tendency to capitulate before any punches are thrown. This isn’t about purist versus non-purists it is about basic fairness or have you lost sight of that concept. After the way the teabaggers purified the last election how anyone could accuse the Dems as purist is beyond me. Again, it is how the media covers the traits of the two parties. Wing-nut intransigence and obstructionism is doing the people’s will, but you Dems are just being a bunch of crybabies and whiners. Buck up. The wing-nuts are forcing the Dems to take all of the tough votes so that no matter how it plays out they win. If you allow the tax-cuts to expire you raised taxes, if you put in the tax-cuts you have increased the deficit, and if the economy doesn’t turn around then it was your wasteful spending. Call me crazy but if you are going to get it no matter what, then you might as well do the right thing.

The main problem I have with all of this is that we are about to put more money into tax-cuts than we did in the original stimulus bill. Since when did cutting taxes become a Democratic solution to anything? No, Mr. Brooks it isn’t coalition building when you take on the policies of your adversaries. Would it have been negotiation with al-Qaeda if we had agreed to no longer recognize Israel in exchange for anything? If you begin to change your policies to match the opposition to get their approval that isn’t coalition building or collaboration, it is capitulation and that Mr. Brooks is what has so many angry. There was a time when we knew what the Dems stood for. Today the more I read and hear the less I know what they stand for.

If the administration wants cooperation, it will have to begin to move in our direction. - Mitch McConnell
The Disputed Truth

Armageddon Again

2010-12-09T23:41:00.002-06:00

I think that this is a long and winding process. But I think at the end of the day, members are not going to want to be in their districts, senators are not going to want to be in their districts when their constituents find out on the 1st of January that their taxes have gone up by several thousand dollars. - Robert Gibbs/Press Secretary

Can someone help me out here; why is it that every time the wealthy in this country are facing any type of loss of income through taxes or corporate malfeasance the situation becomes the onset of Armageddon for the rest of us? Remember the beginning of this “recession” at the end of the Bush Administration that was brought on by the investment community and bankers gambling with our economy? We were on the brink of Armageddon and had to pony up 800 billion dollars to rescue our economy which was being held hostage by the same people who were handing out multi-million dollar bonuses right up until the day of the bail-out.

Now two years later we are faced with another Armageddon this time over tax-cuts for the wealthy. If we don’t extend all the tax-cuts we will have another “great recession”, the stock market will tank, and we will suffer double-digit unemployment. Really. That’s funny when Bill Clinton enacted them not only did our economy not go into free fall, but it actually laid the foundation for one our biggest economic expansions. I agree with Mr. Tom Buffenbarger, President of the Machinist Union when he said that when the Bush tax-cuts were enacted his members who make a decent living barely felt any change and so having them expire will have little effect. He went on to state that for his members it is about sacrifice for the good of the country and if paying a few hundred dollars a year to insure the long-term health of America they would consider it an honor. It would be an honor because they still have jobs.

The problem today is that no one wants to sacrifice especially the wealthiest and most fortunate amongst us. Some people say that letting all of the tax-cuts expire would be just a symbolic ploy to stick it to the wealthy and would hurt working folks more. I could not disagree more. This isn’t about sending a message to the wealthy; this is about the very nature and future of this country. At some point the middle-class and poor have to take a stand and say enough is enough before there won’t be any middle-class left. If I hear Lawrence O’Donnell scream at one more guest concerning the 50% increase in the tax rate for the lowest brackets I am going to scream. Yes on paper and how Mr. O’Donnell is framing the question does appear ominous but the truth is that those lower brackets would not see a substantial increase in taxes just as they did not see any substantial relief when they were enacted.

I understand that the President promoted himself during the campaign as a pragmatist and not an ideologue. I get that. What I don’t get because I pride myself on being a pragmatist is how the President and his advisers cannot see how once you open the door to negotiating with terrorists that they continue to take hostages. Does he or anyone in the White House believe in two years it will be any easier to decouple the tax-cuts? It kills me how even the President’s own advisers talk about the tax-cuts as if there is no evidence about their effectiveness. The President’s chief economic adviser speaks about the tax-cuts as if they haven’t been in effect for the past 10 years. He stated, “I don’t believe that tax-cuts will work.” Really. How about all the evidence compiled the last 10 years are we suppose to discount it?

I was watching the news today and saw how the student demonstrators in England were willing to take to the streets of London and lay siege to Parliament over an issue that impacted their future. I was thinking the only way we could get that many people out to protest an issue it would have to be a Viagra recall or an Xbox 360 recall. How have we become so indifferent and apathetic? Is it any surprise that the wing-nuts and the rich have been able to transfer so much wealth from the middle-class to themselves? Unfortunately, in America it appears that by the time the middle-class decides to take a stand America will have already become a two-class society. The wealthy and the poor. This is the real message that the politicians and the talking heads don’t seem to get. There has to be a line in the sand if we are to salvage the future of the middle-class in this country and what is left of the American Dream.

My question is how have we connected help for those people who through no fault of their own are unemployed with giving tax-cuts to people who for the last 10 years have done very well and don’t need them. How are we even having this conversation? How can the wing-nuts make this case and get away with holding 98% of the country hostage and not pay for it? What we are seeing is the disintegration of our historical safety net and an unprecedented indifference towards those who are less fortunate. We are seeing it in our insensitivity towards the homeless and our refusal to spend the money necessary to attack what has now become the permanent underclass in our urban areas. I’ve never understood how we see folks struggling as just the way of the world, but when it comes to the wealthy it is the end of the world.

The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and undernourishment. - Robert M. Hutchins

The Fight That Never Was

2010-12-06T22:34:00.001-06:00

Weakened by the election, Obama would be likely to bear most of the blame as opponents accused him of intransigence and arrogance. Republicans are always happy to run campaigns based on tax cuts, and this impasse might set up 2012 nicely for them. - Larry J. Sabato

Now that the President has caved on the tax-cuts the question progressives must ask is this, “If not this issue, then what issue is this President willing to fight for?” This was supposed to be his signature issue. The one issue that he claimed was a “principle”. If this was a principled fight then I would hate to see an issue he didn’t care about. This issue was a no-brainer for the Dems. If you can’t win a fight against tax-cuts for people who have already made out like bandits for the last 10 years by borrowing from China to finance them, then what fight can you win?

I think this White House has underestimated the wrath of a scorned base. I think what this White House and President failed to realize is that while he is the President of those who didn’t vote for him, he owed it to those who did vote for him to stand up for the issues they elected him to stand up for. Those who did not vote for him will never vote for him. Does he think that if he passed all of the Republican agenda that they would not run a challenger against him in 2012? The progressives have for the last two years been waiting for this White House to fight for something. It began with the stimulus package that was too small and loaded with concessions to the wing-nuts and still did not get a single wing-nut vote. Then we had health-care reform where everything was bargained away before the negotiations even begun and progressives thought at least they would fight for the public option which didn’t happen. And of course we had financial reform and again no fight.

We haven’t even gotten to cap & trade, DADT, Dream Act, or Afghanistan and the White House continued to tell the base either this was not an important issue or that they got the best they could get. Here is where I get lost. The wing-nuts used intransigence and arrogance to not only block the Democratic agenda, but also rode it to victory at the polls but we are now expected to believe that on a Democrat it wouldn’t work? There is something sinister going on here folks. If this President won’t fight for the middle-class or progressive issues then what President will? If after this any progressive believes that the Democratic Party will fight for them I don’t know what it will take to wake them up. This game is rigged and if progressives can’t read the writing on the wall then God help them. These folks are lying, whether it is the blue dogs, talking heads, or Ivy-League economists there would have been no Armageddon by letting these tax-cuts expire. This nonsense about a second recession, the largest tax increase will hit the lower tax rates, or a massive stock market sell-off is a smokescreen designed to cover the massive give-away to the wealthy.

After listening to the President make his concession speech I was struck by how he looked like a defeated man. This White House cannot see that now the wing-nuts smell blood in the water and any chance for future compromise on any issue is finished. If you know that this is the only shot at compromise for your complete agenda then I would recommend that you get more than 13 months of unemployment benefits and the small tax-cuts from the stimulus package. What the President has done is kick the can down the road again which he said he would not do. In two years we will have this same fight again and if you can’t win a fight with 2/3 of the American people behind you then when can you win a fight? I thought we had this fight in 2008 with the election and we won or did we? From where I sit the wing-nuts must have won the election because they have been setting the agenda as if they had.

This President doesn’t seem to have the spirit for conflict and would rather be seen as more conciliatory than as a fighter. Maybe it is his fear of being seen or referred to as an “angry black man”, but whatever it is he is in danger of becoming a lame-duck President. This President cannot win without his base and right now he doesn’t have his base and I don’t know if he can get them back. This isn’t about the “professional left” this is about real voters feeling betrayed by this President. Sometimes you have to fight even if the odds are that you may lose. This is what is known as principles, you fight for them. If this White House was not willing to go the distance they probably shouldn’t have left Chicago. It’s like Martin Sheen said in Apocalypse Now, “If you are not going to get off the boat you shouldn’t go up the river.”

What this compromise has demonstrated is that these tax-cuts will now become permanent and it is just a matter of time. At a time when these tax-cuts should have been allowed to expire and replaced by more targeted ones we get this. The reason these awful tax-cuts will become permanent is that there will never be a better time to let them expire. If now was not the time to let them expire, then there will never be a time to let them expire. We are borrowing money from a foreign country to pay for tax-cuts for the wealthiest people in this country. What about this makes any sense? Does anyone really believe that if the economy turns around these greedy people are going to just voluntarily give up their tax-cuts? How is giving the wing-nuts two years of tax-cuts and prolonging the estate tax instead of making them permanent a victory?

Bear in mind that Republicans want to make those tax cuts permanent. They might agree to a two- or three-year extension — but only because they believe that this would set up the conditions for a permanent extension later. And they may well be right: if tax-cut blackmail works now, why shouldn’t it work again later? - Paul Krugman

America’s Insurgency Campaign

2010-12-05T23:24:00.000-06:00

When murder clearance rates were first documented in the early 1960's, about 90% of murders were solved. According to the latest FBI figures, just over 60% of murders were solved in 2007. Over that time period, the annual number of murders reported in the U.S. have increased from 4,566 to 14,811. - Shorstein & Lasnetski

Recently there was a story done by the newspaper in my city about how the number of unsolved homicides has increased to about 70% that means out of every 10 people murdered the local police solve about 3.5 of them. This is down from about an 80% closure rate in the 70’s. I don’t know about you but that doesn’t make me feel very safe. While there have been a number of reasons offered up for this frightening trend what strikes me as odd is that while the nature of the threat has changed how the police counter the threat has not.

I believe that there are two main reasons for the increase in unsolved homicides. The first is that despite changes in who commits homicides the police are still using the same methods for solving them. Because of our refusal as a nation to deal honestly and effectively with the “War on Drugs” many of the new homicides are drug related where there may not be a direct connection between the victim and the perpetrator. Continuing to use the same methods used when most homicides were committed by people who were connected to the victim to me seems counterproductive. What the police should be doing instead is developing more human intelligence resources inside these communities. This of course would require becoming connected to the communities they serve and getting out of the safe confines of their squad cars.

Because of how we are prosecuting the drug war we no longer do community policing. The idea of community policing has been replaced by the idea of having more police on the streets but in squad cars to cover more territory as a possible deterrent. The problem is that by using this technique the police never make contact or connections to the community because all they do is ride through the neighborhoods. What you see riding through a neighborhood is not the same things you see walking through a neighborhood and also you make personal connections to the residents who live in those communities. This squad car technique may work in some communities and should be continued where it is effective, but the truth is that for most of the urban areas it has been a disaster.

We should be placing small police substations in these neighborhoods to send a message to the community that the police share their concerns and are taking a stand with the community. By having these substations the police are saying to the community we have a presence and we will be here when you need us. This I believe will help to build relationships with the community that have been strained by the tactics of the drug war, which criminals have exploited and rightly so as a war against our community.

The second cause of this exploding number of unsolved homicides is the growing insurgency that is taking place in many of our urban areas by gangs of terrorists. I refer to it as an insurgency because many people in the community are harboring and abetting these criminals by not cooperating with the police. One of the main reasons we cannot repopulate our urban areas (not just with whites but also successful blacks) is the belief that not only will the community stand around and watch someone shoot, mug, or rob them but will also refuse to identify the people who did it. Few people are willing to put their families at risk under these conditions. The time has come for people living in these communities to take a stand and turn against this penitentiary mentality of no snitching. Reporting and helping to solve crimes is not snitching, it is what citizens in a free society do. The reason so many of our neighborhoods are in the condition they are in is because we allow them to be that way. We accept this penitentiary nonsense as if we were living in the penitentiary and not in a free society. By refusing to uphold our duty as citizens we not only allow murders, rapist, and robbers to walk free and continue to prey on us, but we also give them a feeling of invincibility and brazenness to do more heinous crimes.

With the increase of gang and drug related murders, murders have increasingly been committed by people who had no or little connection to the victim making it more difficult to solve...Another factor is that witnesses have become less likely to give statements to police and testify in court. In some communities, people are becoming very proactive in letting residents know that if they talk to the police about a crime, there would be serious repercussions. - Shorstein & Lasnetski

The solution to this phenomenon will be more difficult and require the same type of tactics we have been forced to use in other insurgency campaigns throughout the world. We must begin to attack the conditions that feed the insurgency. This means we have to create more employment, education, and training opportunities for the people living in these neighborhoods. We should also begin to change how we view and redevelop our urban areas. It makes no sense to me to believe that the people who moved out of these outdated and inefficient homes fifty years ago are now going to move back into them. We should be looking at ways to begin rebuilding entire neighborhoods. Just because something is old doesn’t mean it is valuable. We should be offering people incentives and homes that are comparable to those they are looking at in the suburbs. This cannot be accomplished one house at a time; we must be willing to do large scale rebuilding projects. If we do not then we are condemning these neighborhoods to always be what they are today.

Right now many of these neighborhoods are crime incubators where instead of raising productive and successful children they are raising the next generation of criminals. The work to turn this around will not be easy. We have become a photo-op society where we want to take the turkey or toy to the poor family and watch them smile and say thank you and then we go back to our safe neighborhoods and fine homes feeling good about our efforts. What we don’t think about is that someday the turkey will be eaten and the toy will be broken and that family will be right back in the position they were in. We are trying to defeat insurgencies abroad by nation building. Isn’t it about time we started doing some nation building at home? We should move beyond sustaining lives to changing lives.

“Sell a man a fish, he eats for a day, teach a man how to fish, you ruin a wonderful business opportunity.” - Karl Marx

Why We Must Allow The Bush Tax Cuts to Expire

2010-12-03T22:11:00.001-06:00

It was a time when higher taxes did not sink the economy. Instead, after Clinton passed a tax increase in 1993, the economy enjoyed an epic era of economic prosperity with over eight years without a recession in sight highlighted by an unemployment rate that fell below 4 percent - a level no one thought possible only a few years earlier. - Jules Kaplan/The Hill

Despite the propaganda from both the Dems and the wing-nuts the economy will not suddenly come crashing down if the Bush tax cuts are allowed to expire. The reason most people on both sides want to keep some form of the tax cuts is because they have a vested interest in their continuation. Many of the television pundits and reporters who have been covering this story have not called for letting all of the tax cuts to expire even though letting them expire is what is best for the country as a whole. The reason is because we have all become special interest groups who are choosing our own interests at the expense of the country. Does anyone remember “Country First”?

There are two reasons why I believe we should let all of the Bush tax cuts expire. The first reason is because as long as all of the tax cuts are connected then all of the tax cuts can be held hostage. As long as the middle-class tax cuts are directly connected to the higher rate tax cuts then the wing-nuts can continue to hold the entire tax cut process hostage into perpetuity. If all of the tax cuts were allowed to expire then the Congress would have a clean slate to create targeted tax cuts if that is the direction they want to go in. Every objective economist has stated that tax cuts are the least effective method for stimulating the economy and yet we are still having this debate. Because of decades of tax cut propaganda by the wealthy it has almost become political suicide to even discuss the removal of tax cuts regardless of their effectiveness. Every time anyone (ever) proposes allowing these or any tax-cuts to expire they will immediately be accused by the wing-nuts of raising taxes, is this a great strategy or what?

The wing-nuts under George W. created the perfect trap for all future Congresses despite their political makeup. By combining the tax cuts, no Congress will be able to separate them without catching the full wrath of the wing-nuts and their minions as demonstrated by the recent debate. Remember when the tax cuts were enacted it was because we had a surplus and the wing-nuts argued that same old tired argument from the 80’s; that the “people” knew better how to spend their money than the “government bureaucrats”. So tax-cuts were good during good times was their argument. Here is where the circular argument begins and why there can be no negotiation with these clowns. Now that the economy is bad they argue that tax-cuts are needed to stimulate the economy. So the previous 10 years of tax-cuts did not stimulate the economy, but now magically they are going to start stimulating the economy. My question to these wing-nuts is simply this, “When is it a bad time to give tax-cuts?”

By allowing all of the tax cuts to expire you diffuse the hostage crisis we currently find ourselves in by removing the incentive or reward for maintaining the crisis. To allow these tax cuts to expire of course would require political leadership and the courage of one’s convictions to be able to withstand the echo chamber and the false meme that is being propagated by the wealthy. The President should tell the wing-nuts that as a matter of principle he does not negotiate with hostage takers and to prove it he is willing to allow all of the tax cuts to expire. I have yet to see that sort of strength and leadership from this White House so I am not holding my breath.

The second reason for not extending all of the Bush tax cuts is because of all the folks who have benefited from the economy the last few decades the wealthiest have seen the largest increase in wealth since the gilded age. So while the majority of Americans have seen their wealth shrink and personal income stagnate the top earners have continued to see theirs expand. One of the fundamental values extolled by the wing-nuts is fairness except of course when it comes to paying one’s fair share. The federal revenues derived from personal income taxes and payroll taxes are at 15% of GDP, the lowest it has been in a decade. If all of the Bush tax cuts were allowed to expire the revenue would grow to 21% of GDP by 2020 or at the percentage of GDP they were during the 90’s.

The common argument among the wealthy is that because only 47% of Americans actually pay federal income tax they are already shouldering the bulk of the tax burden but that argument belies why we have income taxes in the first place. You may want to re-litigate the whole income tax argument or you may disagree with the concept on philosophical grounds but that does not afford one the luxury of ignoring the law of the land. We must decide (I thought we had already) if we are a serfdom society or we are the nation created by those founding fathers that the wing-nuts are always so quick to quote, except of course when it doesn’t fit into their narrow definitions of “conservative constitutionalism”. What the hell does that even mean?

If we are serious about fixing the mounting problems that are threatening our country then the first step towards demonstrating that resolve would be to allow these tax cuts to expire and begin to increase revenues. History has shown time and again that the doomsday scenario of raising taxes and wrecking the economy has never materialized and in fact the opposite has occurred when we have left the wealthy and the corporate interests to their own devices they have wrecked the economy. I hate to break the news but the free ride is over America. The decade of waging two wars, increasing entitlements through giveaways to drug companies and oil companies while at the same time cutting taxes is over. The time has come to face the music even though the sun is shining through and we are hung over and revolted by the partner laying next to us it’s over. It is now the morning after in America.

Bush said despite that current prosperity, “It’s time for a change” in Washington. “Some say [the economy] is doing pretty well - well it may be,” he said. But “People need more money in their pocket, as far as I’m concerned.” – George W. Bush

Where Have All The Democrats Gone?

2010-12-01T20:11:00.002-06:00

Where have all the Democrats gone? Long time passing
Where have all the Democrats gone? Long time ago
Where have all the Democrats gone? Hiding in their bunkers every one
When will they ever learn? When will they ever learn? – Remake of Where Have All The Flowers Gone

I hope Pete Seeger won’t mind my remaking of his beautiful song, “Where Have All The Flowers Gone”, but it seemed appropriate considering the times we are living in. If anyone still believes that the Dems are gonna fight for the middle-class of this country the next few days should remove all doubt about where their loyalties lie. The truth be told there is no longer any Party that speaks for the middle-class of this country or speaks to the issues that are crushing them. The dreaded Bush Tax Cuts that were the bane of the Party just a few months ago will be extended.

This transfer of wealth will be extended because once again the most powerful political party in America is incumbency and the word is out if you want political donations you wash the hand that feeds you and that includes Dems, wing-nuts, and tea-baggers. The wealthy in this country have co-opted both political parties and are laying the foundation for the outright theft of this country. The Dems talk about fighting for the middle-class but it is empty rhetoric. What the Dems have become is Republican lite. What kills me is all the internet chatter about how much better the Dem candidates are than the wing-nuts and tea-baggers and what that demonstrates is how pathetic we have become. Are we so desperate that we are willing to accept anybody who is not a wing-nut just to have somebody?

Here is what is not being discussed seriously by the media or the politicians, it doesn’t matter who the candidate is or what party affiliation they hold. The weapon being used against us is not politics, it is distraction. The goal of the wealthy is to keep the public so distracted with nonsense that no one notices that the country is being stolen right under their noses. This is why we are more concerned about Bristol Palin on "Dancing With The Stars" than we are about who is underwriting her mother’s new show or who is buying her books to keep her on the best sellers list when everyone knows she can’t write. Why Sarah Palin? Because Sarah Palin will not bring solutions to this country instead she will bring more distractions to the public discourse.

If the Dems were really concerned about the middle-class they would be doing the following. They would let all the Bush tax cuts expire, they would penalize every corporation that is shipping jobs overseas, they would focus on infrastructure improvements, and they would make college affordable again. Those four things would benefit the middle-class of today and create a larger middle-class in the future more than any of the red herrings being debated in Washington. By letting the Bush tax cuts expire we would return to the tax rates of the Clinton years.

Let’s look at this for a minute, under the Clinton tax rates more than 8 million jobs were created while under 10 years of Bush tax cuts we have lost jobs.

We have got to, got to, got to… give tax break to billionaires. I mean that’s what this whole place (Congress) is about, isn’t it? They fund the campaigns they get what’s due to the…” - Senator Bernie Sanders

Manufacturing in the US as a percentage of GDP has shrunk to its lowest levels in history since before the industrial revolution and we have tax breaks in place for those companies that are shipping American jobs overseas. Manufacturing was one of the major impetus for creating the middle-class and yet over the last 30 years we have not only allowed corporations to participate in this race to the bottom on cheap and slave labor we have funded it with tax dollars. If we are to ever return America back to competitiveness we must once again manufacture something. Less than 30% of the American public graduates from college so even if we were to find all of those clean high tech jobs we were promised while our dirty manufacturing jobs were shipped overseas we don’t have the workforce to sustain them. What are we going to do with the 70% of Americans with a high school diploma or less?

In order to be competitive globally in the future we need to rebuild our infrastructure. It lays the foundation for future growth and it also provides good jobs now. If history has taught us anything it is that during times like these we need to focus on putting Americans to work and if the private sector is unable or unwilling then the government must be willing to fill the gap until they are. This isn’t rocket science we have gone through depressions and recessions before but because of the influence of the wealthy every time we go through these cycles it is always like the first time. It’s as if we have no history to reflect on or policies to institute.

Finally, college affordability must be addressed. Education is the foundation of our upward mobility, it is known as the great equalizer. Education allows the child of an immigrant to move beyond his birth into the American dream. If we continue to allow our college graduates from lower classes to graduate with crushing debt into jobs at Wal-Mart we will have sealed our fate as a banana republic once and for all. For the life of me I cannot understand why anyone under 30 is not up in arms and protesting in the streets concerning the impending collapse of the middle-class. It is your country that is being stolen. It is your future that is being sold off. It sort of reminds me of the slow boiling frog. You may think that you are in a nice warm sauna but you are really in the steam pot. There is no profit in getting a degree and then owe 100,000 dollars before you get your first job. This game is rigged and you continue to bet. The sad truth is that instead of having to drag you to the polls to vote you should be screaming at the top of your lungs, but I guess “Call of Duty” or “Snookie” is more important than your future.

If anyone is still expecting one of these impotent political parties to stand up and fight for the middle-class then you have another thing coming. The fight will not happen unless you do the fighting. Both of these groups have been bought and sold and with it so has your future. As long as you continue to be distracted by this nonsense the pillaging will continue unabated. Where are all the Democrats? They are hunkering down in their fox holes waiting on Armageddon or the next election whichever comes first.

“The sound shivers through the walls, through the table, through the window frame, and into my finger. These distraction-oholics. These focus-ophobics. Old George Orwell got it backward. Big Brother isn't watching. He's singing and dancing. He's pulling rabbits out of a hat. Big Brother's holding your attention every moment you're awake. He's making sure you're always distracted. He's making sure you're fully absorbed... and this being fed, it's worse than being watched. With the world always filling you, no one has to worry about what's in your mind. With everyone's imagination atrophied, no one will ever be a threat to the world.” - Chuck Palahniuk

Credit Where Credit Is Due

2010-11-21T09:46:00.000-06:00

The administration noted Wednesday that the U.S. auto industry has added 77,300 jobs since GM and Chrysler emerged from bankruptcy, that vehicle exports are up more than 40 percent from 2009, and that the nation's Big Three car companies posted operating profits for the first three quarters of this year...Those millions of lost jobs would have been an significant number even in an economy as large as ours. The economic crisis we still face today would have been made much, much worse had the Federal Government led by Obama and the Democrats in Congress failed to act, and act promptly. - Alternet

I, like many other progressives have been highly critical of this President and this Congress in the last two years concerning many of the missteps they have made. However, their actions in bailing-out GM and the auto-industry is worthy of credit. It is one thing to criticize other people and only be willing to highlight the negative and God knows we have turned criticism into a new art form. With the advent of the 24/7 cable news cycle and the need to fill all of those empty hours with distractions and nonsense it is especially important to identify those policies and efforts that do what they are designed to do.

When the wing-nuts were pontificating on the demise of the free markets and the federal takeover of the private sector with efforts like the auto industry bail-out this administration made a calculated decision to step in and save American manufacturing jobs and a staple industry. The lack of repentance on the part of the wing-nuts should be proof for anyone in or out of Washington that these folks have no intention of changing the tone in Washington. You add to this intransigence the results of the last election and the wing-nuts believing they have received some sort of mandate and the prospects of our getting anything done to solve the massive problems facing this nation are almost non-existent. The fact that we have not heard from one Republican to step up and acknowledge they were wrong says volumes about who they really are and what their true intentions are.

At some point in America we have to be willing to overcome our selfish tendencies that have been exacerbated over the last few decades and once again consider what is best for the nation as a whole. The greed that was exemplified during the Reagan years has been pumped full of steroids and we now find ourselves in the grips of this me, me, me mentality. We have become a nation of special interests being led by the wealthiest among us. These folks are willing to flaunt the laws and rules of our country to advance their profit margins at the expense of our country. As a result we have become so tribal that instead of our politicians and many of our citizens asking what’s best for the country the mantra is now what’s in it for me and my group.

The time has come for those who have received the most among us to demonstrate one of the most American of traits and that is self-sacrifice for the sake of our country. We have a history in our nation of people who are willing to look beyond their own self interest for the benefit of the group and often times those people have been wealthy. How many wealthy folks were willing to make major sacrifices during WWII because of the call for self-sacrifice by FDR and the need for the benefit for all Americans? Today instead of an atmosphere of shared sacrifice we have this atmosphere of what can I get out of it. This attitude of selfishness permeates every area of our society. Over the last few decades the rich have done better than most Americans and now is the time for those people to step up and ask what they can do to help the country.

This administration has made a number of miscalculations but in this case they made the right decision despite the protests of the wing-nuts. I hope this success will embolden them to begin to stand up for the American people against the onslaught being waged by the wealthy through their political and media minions. I think this President should call for an end to all of the Bush tax-cuts and return the tax rates to the levels of the Clinton years. I know this is considered treason by many folks who want to consider raising taxes during a recession as insanity, but the truth is that having these lower tax rates in effect have done little to create jobs which is how the middle-class will see their lives improve. Some may say this will be political suicide for the President because of the successful campaign of the rich to equate tax-cuts to this panacea of economic growth that has little if any basis in reality.

Making tough decisions in the face of a crisis is the definition of leadership. The President must be willing to use his political skills to educate the American public on the nature of the challenges they are facing. If I were advising the President I would schedule weekly television addresses and town halls from now to Election Day to allow the President to make the case for what he believes in. My hope is that he believes in rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure through public works. I hope he believes in retooling American manufacturing and creating new entrepreneurs through investment. One of the things I think that has been lost in our loss of manufacturing is that the manufacturing industry was built by small plants that over time expanded. We should be providing investment to people who have ideas and products that we can develop for mass manufacturing to rebuild our base and middle-class. This idea that we can never make anything again is insane and being perpetuated by the ruling class to maximize their profits and not to keep America strong.

"Just giving them $25 billion doesn't change anything," Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona, the Senate's second-ranking Republican, said on Fox News Sunday. "It just puts off for six months or so the day of reckoning." - Senator John Kyl

Go Right Young Man

2010-11-17T01:33:00.002-06:00

And we were too deferential to our most zealous supporters. During election season, Congress sought to placate those on the extreme left and motivate the base — but that meant that our final efforts before the election focused on trying to allow gays in the military, change our immigration system and repeal the George W. Bush-era tax cuts. These are legitimate issues but unlikely to resonate with moderate swing voters in a season of economic discontent. - Evan Bayh

Now that the President has returned from his 200 million dollar a day vacation the pressure will surely intensify for him to move to “the center”. What exactly does that mean? The thing that always gets me is that people say this as if this or any other Democratic President since LBJ has ever been pushing a truly progressive agenda. What these people call left most progressives consider center right. The wing-nuts have succeeded in moving the definition of a liberal to just left of their most conservative member. What this has done is cause the Dems to change their agenda from what was once truly progressive to this watered-down version of Republicanism.

I can’t imagine what the country would look like today if FDR and LBJ had not been pushing real progressive reform during periods when others were telling them to move to the right. The refrain from the right and the wealthy will always be don’t upset the status quo the system will fix itself if left to its own devices. Now you may disagree with some of the components of their agendas but who can argue that these brave men laid the foundation and increased the middle-class in this country. Democrats used to stand for groundbreaking and innovative thought to some of our most difficult challenges. Today, I don’t see that willingness for innovation or the bravery to even offer new ideas and solutions.

Let’s be clear moving to the center has never solved any major problem facing this nation. What moving to the center has done is insured that nothing gets done and this is exactly what the wing-nuts want. But why would so-called Democrats call for a move to the center? The answer is simple the corruptive influence of money in our system has had a negative effect on both parties. There is no longer one party that is willing to address the systemic problems that allow the wealthiest to profit at unprecedented rates while the rest of us are lucky to just break even.

The Bush Tax Cut debate will demonstrate for all to see how this phenomenon has affected our political system. The mere fact that we are having a discussion about whether to borrow money from China to pay for tax-cuts to give to the wealthiest 2% of our population speaks for itself. The mere fact that this President who campaigned vigorously against this very prospect is now considering allowing a compromise that will keep them in place is ludicrous. How could you not fight for this when the majority of Americans are opposed to it? This speaks volumes to what is meant by moving to the center and of where the center is. How is this the center and of what universe?

The time has come for progressives to do what the teabaggers did to the Republicans and that was to give them the balls to stand for what they believed in. When many were telling the Republicans that they would have to move to the center following two disastrous elections the teabaggers and their handlers would have none of that. The teabaggers didn’t come up with any new ideas for the Republicans but they forced them to stand on their principles-as misguided as they were. This is not the time to retreat back to some center-right agenda. The problems facing this country are too large and too important. It was the center-right that came up with a stimulus that was too small and misguided to address the problem it was created to fix. It was the center-right who came up with the debt commission recommendations that will put more burdens on the poor and middle-class to reduce the deficit. It is the center-right who believes that tax breaks and outsourcing are good for American workers and not unions. It is the center-right who wants us to believe that 8-9% unemployment is the new normal and we will just have to get use to it. It was the center-right who came up with a mandated healthcare bill that gave away the store to the same industries that were creating the problems.

After the 1994 midterm, when Democrats lost the House and Senate, Bill Clinton was told to "move to the center." He obliged by hiring the pollster Dick Morris, declaring the "era of big government is over," abandoning much of his original agenda, and making the 1996 general election about nothing more than V-chips in televisions and school uniforms....Oddly, though, after Republicans suffer losses in the first midterms they pay no attention to voices telling them to move to the center. If anything, Ronald Reagan and the two Bushes moved further right. - Robert Reich

Mr. President there comes a time in everyone’s life when despite everyone around them screaming not to do something you have to stand on what you believe in the innermost place of your heart. That time is now. You must not give in to the “voices of reason” because they are not being reasonable they are being accommodating to those who have your failure as their number one goal. How does one negotiate with someone whose sole mission is your destruction? Is it victory if they do it quickly or without pain? Is it better to lose clinging to what you believe in or winning by believing in nothing?

“Tell a man whose house is on fire to give a moderate alarm; tell the mother to gradually extricate her babe from the fire into which it has fallen; but urge me not to use moderation.” - William Lyon Phelps

I Support the Middle-Class is Not a Principle

2010-11-14T19:47:00.002-06:00

Divisions are evident here in the United States. Throughout the 2008 presidential campaign, Barack Obama lagged in appealing to white middle- and working-class voters who supported Hillary — and former President Bill — Clinton. Now, these voters, according to recent polls, are increasingly alienated from the Obama administration. Reasons include slow economic growth, high unemployment among blue- and white-collar workers and a persistent credit crunch for small businesses. These factors could cause serious losses for Democrats this fall — and beyond. - Politico

As an instructor for a male character building class one of the sessions we cover is how important specificity is in goal setting. One of the common goals I get from my students is I want to make a lot of money. The problem with this goal is that it lacks an actual completion point or destination. How do you know when you have accomplished it or if you need to reevaluate it? I mention this because this is where the Dems find themselves today. They have no specific principles to guide their goals. What they have are a lot of warmed over “Great Society” rhetoric such as we support the middle-class. What does that even mean? To me it is similar to the “We support the troops” argument of the last administration as if anyone would say, “we don’t support the troops”.

The time has come for Dems to develop their 21st century manifesto, a pledge to America, or whatever you want to call it. This would include not only the principles for the party but also the overall vision of where they want to lead this country. The people in America are looking for answers but what they are getting is bumper stickers and disillusionment. The new direction of politics is whatever you do don’t offer specific plans or ideas-stay flexible. This may serve the short-term campaign but it does nothing for long-term governance. Over and over the American people are saying we don’t want flexible we want solutions. What the mid-term election stated loud and clear is that this was not a ringing endorsement of the Republicans, but a frustration vote against the Democrats. The reason the teabaggers made so much noise was because they were the “none of the above” selection. The problem with having only two parties is that people keep going back and forth when they get frustrated and feel like they are not being heard.

The teabaggers presented themselves as an alternative for that frustration, but the truth is that they were not what they claimed to be. Many of them were recycled and repackaged wing-nut cultural warriors. Does anyone believe that the American public in two short years has forgotten the mess the Republicans created? If that were in fact the case their approval rating might be a little higher than 30%. When you only have two choices and you feel like neither is listening to you then you can keep going back and forth like most people or you just give up.

The Republicans govern like it is a dictatorship and the Democrats like it’s a social democracy. The Republicans demand and get party unity to their core set of principles; they do it through their party system. You do not get to represent the Republican flag if you don’t hold to those principles. The Dems on the other hand have a different philosophy. They are a loose coalition that shares some common elements (we are not Republicans) but for the most part have no overarching principles. It is because of this that Republicans can so easily undermine those coalitions and stagnate any Democratic majority. The Democratic leadership knows this (but the rank and file doesn’t seem to get it) and so they are constantly afraid of the breakdown of this fragile coalition by wing-nut scare tactics. Because of this loose coalition we are not offering the American public an alternative governing philosophy. Instead of progressive versus conservative we are offering them conservative versus conservative lite.

A perfect example would be the healthcare process and subsequent bill. How this should have been handled was in the following manner. Candidate Obama should have met with Democratic Congressional leaders and said if we win we plan to tackle healthcare. What we have to decide is if we believe that healthcare in America is a right of all Americans. Is this one of our principles? If it is then we have to present this to the American people and tell them how we plan to accomplish this goal. First, we will pass comprehensive healthcare reform so that all Americans can have affordable health-care without the restrictions on pre-existing conditions, caps or limits on coverage, or the fear that the insurance company will drop them when they get sick. In subsequent sessions we will continue to refine and improve this bill as we have done in the past with social security, Medicare, and etc.

By following this simple formula for not just healthcare but any “Democratic principle” you do two important things. The first is that you provide the public and your members with a cohesive and comprehensive message. You are not debating with yourself publicly. Here is our program and here is our message. The second thing you do is define the wing-nuts so when they start talking about “death panels” and socialism you can state that this is one of our principles and we have outlined our plan. The wing-nuts have no plan to address this issue and so this is about a choice between our plan and their rhetoric. It is a choice between those who want to provide healthcare and those who don’t. A choice between those who believe it is a right and those who don’t. In order to maintain control of the message you have to keep it simple. It is always a choice between right and wrong or good and evil. The wing-nuts have mastered this strategy. Remember in the run up to the war in Iraq, it wasn’t about agreeing or disagree with policy; it was about loyalty or treason.

Americans are simple people for the most part, they don’t want complex or nuanced explanations. What the American people are looking for is simplicity: black or white, cake or pie, friend or foe. If our goal is to provide the majority of Americans with a better life then we had better learn how to govern and that begins before you become the majority. You have to craft what you stand for and what you are willing to fight for. President Obama needs to call in all of the Democratic leaders from all over the country into a weekend retreat lock the doors and let them know there is a new sheriff in town and we are going to start standing for something. We are not leaving here until we come up with some core principles and issues we all agree to support and fight for. And anyone who wants to run as a Democrat must be willing to sign on to these principles. You see it does you no good to have a majority if you can’t accomplish what you believe in or have nothing you believe in. There is no majority if you are too weak or too afraid to govern.

“And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.” - Marianne Williamson

It’s Not Pelosi

2010-11-09T15:15:00.001-06:00

A member of the Democratic Party, Pelosi has represented the 8th Congressional District of California, which consists of four-fifths of the City and County of San Francisco, since 1987. She served as the House Minority Whip from 2002 to 2003, and was House Minority Leader from 2003 to 2007, holding the post during the 108th and 109th Congresses. Pelosi is the first woman, the first Californian and first Italian-American to lead a major party in Congress. - Wikipedia

With all of the haggling and debating going on among Democrats following their November embarrassment at the polls, it appears that Nancy Pelosi will be made the scapegoat for the historic losses. I am not one to wax sentimental over past victories and I recognize that now would be an opportune time to shake up the leadership in the party and maybe bring in some fresh blood. However, this is not what is being discussed in Democratic circles. What is being discussed is a push to the right from the same clowns who ran from the party during the mid-terms and lost. These are the folks who allowed their local races to become nationalized because they were too frightened to stand up to the wing-nuts. I understand that there is a difference between House and Senate races, but if anyone was suppose to be replaced this cycle it was Harry Reid. So how was he able to survive? He made the election a choice.

Now there will be volumes of political how-to’s from Senator Reid’s campaign and that is not the focus of this piece, but he didn’t run from himself. The problem with Democrats and governing is simply this: the Democrats do not have a set of core principles that they will defend at all costs. With the wing-nuts you can be sure of three core principles that to a person they will vote for en masse. They will always vote for tax-cuts, they will always vote for reducing regulation, and they will always vote for cutting entitlements. Given those three certainties you can craft a lot of policy and legislation to get their unanimous consent. What three core principles can you name for Democrats? Give me three core principles that all Democrats would vote and fight for. You can’t do it. Because you have Democrats who support tax-cuts, you have Democrats who support cutting regulation, and you most certainly have Democrats who would cut entitlements.

You see the wing-nuts understand how to govern. You either bring in those who are beholden to you or you co-op any renegades that happen to crash the gate-as they will do with the tea-baggers. When the American electorate voted for Democrats and gave them control of all branches they falsely assumed that they would govern like the Republicans. So when the wheels started falling off with their majority and they couldn’t get anything done not because of their majority but in spite of their majority the American voters became disenchanted. The voters want results. They don’t want to hear that Blue Dogs won’t support this or that. They see political parties as monolithic and if I give one group control then they will do what is necessary to get things done. With Democrats, that’s not how we do things. Prior to negotiating with Republicans we have to negotiate with ourselves. We give half the store away before we ever see the Republicans.

You are not going to keep a majority if you don’t have core principles that the people know you are going to fight for. And they can’t be core principles that some will fight for; it has to be everyone or no one.

Unfortunately we now live in the political sphere where half measures won’t do. The people are looking for champions, they are looking for super heroes who will defend them against corruption and sometimes from themselves. You can’t do that if you don’t stand for something. The Democrats need to use this opportunity to retool and decide on five core principles that they all can agree to and will vote for and present that to the American people. And when I say all; I mean all from San Francisco liberal to Midwestern Rust Belters, to the Bluest Dog-in for a penny in for a pound. And if you are not willing to support these principles then you cannot run under our flag. A perfect example was health-care. Is it a right or not?

A number of liberal Democrats, including three from California, have voiced their support for Pelosi. Rep. George Miller told the San Francisco Chronicle that Pelosi has been "attacked and vilified by the right wing because of her effectiveness. - Black Political Buzz

Speaker Pelosi was not the problem. If anything she was vilified because she was able to accomplish what many thought was impossible. Those who are crying the loudest for her head are the ones who could not and would not be able to past the core test. They were the ones who were running anti-Pelosi and anti-Obama ads to save their hides. At least they could have had some self-respect and dignity and ran on what they had done. Who is going to vote for someone who runs away from what they voted for? I think it would be a terrible mistake to replace Nancy Pelosi. You dance with the one who brought you. The wing-nuts hate her for a reason. She gets things done! Remember she was the one who stood tall when Rove and the wing-nuts were talking permanent majorities.

I will concede one point though and that is that the Democrats will have to come up with better messengers. The President cannot be the only voice in this wilderness. There has to emerge some cabinet member or some congressional figure who can take the fight to the wing-nuts. The wing-nuts have shown that there are no vacuums today. They will fill any empty space with nonsense if they have to but they will fill it with something.

And finally, the goal of the Congress and this President has to be jobs if they stand any chance of rebounding. The Republicans are going to provide ample opportunities for Dems to regain their majorities in two years because rather than focusing on solving problems they are going to focus on nonsense. I guarantee you we will have gotten no closer going forward to working on the major issues with Republicans than we have in the last two years. They will misread the electorate just like they always do. They see this as a referendum on their conservative agenda when the reality is it is a message to fix the jobs problem. It is not a message to throw gay people out of the military. It is not a message to give tax-cuts to the richest. It is not a message to shutdown the government.

There are many more wrong answers than right ones, and they are easier to find - Michael Friedlander

We’ll Leave a Light On

2010-11-06T11:04:00.001-06:00

The numbers evidently originate with the Press Trust of India, whose report was linked on the Drudge Report and picked up by Fox News host Glenn Beck. The news agency also wrongly said that the White House had blocked off the entire Taj Mahal Palace hotel for Obama's visit and that the U.S. was stationing 34 warships—roughly 10 percent of the naval fleet--off the coast of Mumbai for security reasons. – Yahoo News

The one thing about the wing-nuts is that they are consistent. If they find a game plan that works they continue to use it no matter what. Remember how they sold the Iraq War by quoting unnamed sources who would then quote other unnamed sources until they created this circular argument based on no facts. Well it appears they are back to their old tricks again only this time it is concerning the President’s trip to India. Let’s be clear this isn’t about spending or belt-tightening. This is about whether this President deserves to travel as past Presidents have done while representing American interests around the world.

Here is what is troubling to me about this canard and all of the other “concerns” about this first family’s trips no matter where they are to, there is this underlying current that they somehow do not deserve to travel as other Presidents and first families have traveled in the past. This President and this first family are being asked to travel in coach while no one has ever questioned the travel arrangements of any of our other chief executives. The question then becomes why now? I don’t recall anyone questioning how much it cost to create W’s infamous “Mission Accomplished” landing and potential political ad funded by the American taxpayers. It is as if for some reason the current President is not worthy of all of the trappings of the office of the Presidency of the US.

The crazy part is this. When he was first elected the wing-nuts attacked the first family because they were going to “ghettoize” the White House with bar-b-ques and drunken parties on the front lawn and now they are attacking him for keeping the prestige of the office when he travels. Here is the thing this isn’t about the recession or the amount spent on this trip. This is about whether this President deserves the privileges given to other Presidents? For some reason this President doesn’t measure up to past Presidents and therefore doesn’t deserve to travel as all other Presidents have traveled. America has always prided itself on providing every President what he has needed while conducting business in the name of America. Our national prestige is now being sacrificed for what particular purpose?

Despite continued denials from the wing-nuts their goal from day one has been to delegitimize this President and to subtly and not so subtly attack him personally. This isn’t about the health-care reforms, or the financial reforms, or even the stimulus. This is about President Obama’s personal character and not just him but his family as well. Would we allow the children and First Ladies of previous white Presidents to be treated with such disrespect? The troubling fact is that regardless of our personal feelings about the officeholder we as a nation have always respected the office, but today that concept that we were taught as children is now being undermined. If we as Americans regardless of our political leanings continue to allow this constant chipping away and undermining of our institutions it won’t be long before we are faced with all-out anarchy.

With confidence and trust in our institutions at an all-time low there are those who would further undermine our system for the sake of short-term political gain. The time has come for all Americans to stand up and put an end to this practice of attacking the President not because they disagree with his policies but that they disagree with his legitimacy to be the President. After the results of the last election I am not so sure that we as a nation are prepared to repudiate these unsavory tactics and to elevate our political discourse back to policy issues. The last election has shown us that fear and obstructionism are still running rampant and are still working to motivate a proportion of the electorate.

President Obama just like any other President deserves to be treated with the same respect as all previous Presidents. He does not deserve to be housed at Motel 6 and fly commercial just because he is black. This is the type of hypocrisy that continues to undermine our standing in the world and especially towards non-white and non-Christian populations. One of these days we are going to learn that there are far more non-whites in the world than whites and if we continue to treat this President as if this is the Jim Crow south we will do so at our own peril. Not only is it a bad precedence for the world it is a bad precedence for our own democracy. If we continue to weaken our institutions then no one should be surprised if they collapse. If government and our institutions do not function then what shall they be replaced with? Corporations? God help us if that is our alternative. The funny thing is that most of those who are attempting to undermine this President’s legitimacy are the same ones who claim to support “Constitutional Government”. I guess they missed the part about the office of the President and its place in our history.

Like Bachmann, several right-leaning pundits -- including Michelle Malkin and Fox News personalities like Eric Bolling and Sean Hannity -- have run with the $200 million per day number, touting it as proof that wasteful spending is alive and well. - AOL News

The tyranny of a prince in an oligarchy is not so dangerous to the public welfare as the apathy of a citizen in a democracy - Charles de Montesquieu

Why Blacks Need A New President

2010-11-02T09:18:00.002-06:00

“There was an expectation, particularly among African Americans, that the first African-American president would at least be vocal about feeling their pain,” Blow said last week on MSNBC’s Hardball. “I think that has not been the case. The president has given a couple of speeches and he has been very heavy on the stick and not very heavy with the carrot… Just in the inability for him to commiserate with that group of people, people feel a bit deflated… He said he’s not going to focus separately on African-American issues at all. That let a lot of people down.” - Charles Blow

As we begin the second half of President Obama’s first term I think it is important for black Americans to access what having the first black President has meant in terms of their overall well-being. As someone who has stated and understands that President Obama is not the President of black America but of all America I understand the limits of his influence. My concern though is that with the rising tide of the teabaggers and the constant push back provided by Limbaugh and Beck saying the President is racist against white people this President will actually do less for black Americans than a liberal white President would do. Why? Because a white President would not have to defend his support for black issues as some sort of undercover reparations or be afraid to discuss black issues in public.

It’s funny but having the first black President has been a dual edged sword. On the one hand we have been given the boost to our pride of finally achieving the highest office in the land and that black folks have all the skills necessary to overcome centuries of racism and on the other hand we have a President who can barely use the word black in public for fear of agitating the racist who will be agitated no matter what he says. The thing about those who accuse this President or any successful black man of being racist is that no matter what these men do it will be twisted to fit the real racists scenario. It is similar to what I hear all the time when I discuss publicly the subject of how blacks are undermining their own success through black on black violence, absentee fathers, and the lack of education being a priority in our community. There are those that say that the racists will use this as fuel for their already racists views.

But think about that for a minute. These folks are going to misconstrue any information they find to fit their narrative and by us being afraid to discuss these issues it only hurts our credibility not theirs. So by this President not being willing to stand up publicly and do what other white Presidents have been willing to do (namely discuss the disproportionate effect this economy has had on black folks and seek specific remedies) it sort of makes having a black President a liability, not an asset. This is not to say that the President should specifically seek to develop policies that only benefit blacks, but I think it is important for him to at least acknowledge that there are unique differences and issues that affect black communities and black people.

For me one of the biggest criticisms I hear concerning this President by black people is his inability to articulate or even acknowledge these differences. This may be due in large part to the style of this President who is seen as more detached and rational than empathetic and perceptive. When Bill Clinton said, “I feel your pain.” He touched a nerve in the American psyche that could not be reached with cold impersonal data or a logical recitation of the facts. There are times in this country and in a way I suppose every nation that the people want to believe that their leaders understand their personal daily struggles and their uncertainties. I believe that this President has the capacity to do it, but does not have the personality type to do it. I believe that if he tried it would come off as feigned and counterfeit. Somehow this President has to reach out to black folks and let them know that his being the first black President has some real benefit in their daily lives besides this sense of pride. Pride is important and God knows we need all of the positive male role models we can get, but pride only goes so far, it doesn't pay bills or hire people.

At some point we need answers to a criminal justice system that is marginalizing our communities by strapping our young men with felonies in many cases before they are even eligible to vote and sentencing them to a life of poverty. We need answers to an inner city education system that has been allowed to become more impoverished and darker because we have allowed suburban districts to opt out as our cities expanded. We need answers to a shrinking manufacturing base that once created a pathway out of poverty for those who were either unable or unwilling to go to college. We need answers to the redevelopment of our urban neighborhoods that will not just plaster over the decay and condemn these neighborhoods to stay what they are but create new and vibrant neighborhoods that people will want to live in.

The problems we face are huge and no one is expecting this or any President to be able to overcome decades of neglect with some magic wand. However, sometimes it is important to just get an acknowledgment that you are not being taken for granted and someone can identify with your struggles. There is no benefit to having someone in office that looks like you if they are going to ignore you. I understand that this President has given a great deal of access to black folks in the media and has hired a number of blacks to high level positions, but the truth be told I haven’t heard this President use the word black in public since his campaign speech on race. It would be a shame if our first black President were not allowed to speak to the very people who understand him the most for fear of alienating the people who understands him the least.

But unlike previous presidents, Obama doesn’t need to win over the CBC in order to pick up support in the black community. Polls show that 96 percent of black voters view him favorably — a number the CBC members probably can’t match themselves...“I think if you look at the polling, in terms of the attitudes of the African-American community, there’s overwhelming support for what we’ve tried to do,” said Obama. - Politico

My 1st Amendment Rights

2010-10-27T02:18:00.002-05:00

What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans, and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty or democracy? - Mohandas Gandhi

One of the more frightening aspects of what happened at the Rand Paul debate and the other events where the teabaggers have allowed their true colors to show through physical assaults and verbal harassment is their sincere belief that they are defending the Constitution and the First Amendment specifically. Unfortunately, the First Amendment rights they are defending are only their rights and those who agree with them. Where are these defenders of freedom on the issue of the Islamic Center in New York or on the separation of Church and State?

It appears that the only rights they are willing to defend are the rights of the rich and the corporate elite to circumvent democracy through unlimited money, pollute, and ship jobs overseas. What these incidents clearly display to anyone willing to acknowledge it is that the outrage is not about the deficits, the overreach of government, or the immigration issue. It is clearly about “us” versus “them” and just like during the Vietnam War and the turmoil of the 60’s these folks have no qualms about using intimidation and physical coercion to try and stop the movement of time. If these folks are willing to stomp on a white female imagine what they are willing to do to minorities, Muslims, and the rest of “them”.

My question is how can a group of middle-aged and older white people be new? According to the false meme there were millions of middle-aged white Americans who were not voting or participating in the political process until now. This silent majority was only roused by the budget deficits and the socialist agenda of the Obama administration. So are we to believe that these are not the same cultural warriors from the past? These are the same folks who have always believed that they are the only interpreters and the arbitrator of what is right for America. Much the same as all fanatical groups throughout history they falsely believe that they have received some divine or supernatural insight and only those like them are able to receive it or be part of the group. This is not so bad if you are one of the enlightened ones, but it can be dangerous for those who don’t quite measure up because of race, gender, or religion.

What should be frightening to all Americans is not that there were two thugs who were willing to assault this woman. What is more troubling is that the crowd surrounding them was willing to allow it to happen. While they may not have actually had their foot on her head they did not find a problem with it happening. The crowd included women who were willing to stand by and watch this being done to another woman without questioning it or trying to intervene. How does the saying go the only thing evil requires is for good people to do nothing.

I am not one given to hyperbole or yelling fire in a crowded theater but as one who has lived through the turbulence and violence of a nation struggling with change it seems as though we are entering a similar period of polarization. It is strange how the same themes continue to appear in America. Back then it was also about patriotism and tribalism. You were either with us or you were with them. The wing-nuts have for decades disguised their intolerance and bigotry behind the flag and the Constitution. They have continually recreated themselves under different names and behind different issues, but their core mission has not changed. Their mission back then and today continues to be trying to roll back the clocks and to try to halt the inevitably of change.

The hope for the future of this democracy does not lie with the older generations. Every generation has to decide what values they stand for and are willing to fight for. For many of those of recent generations there has not been much they have considered worth fighting for. My hope is that with this rise in corporations undermining democracy through propagandists and unlimited campaign spending, with the rise of intolerance and bigotry towards Latinos and Muslims, and with the selling of the American middle-class to nations overseas that this generation will rise up and once again reclaim democracy for all Americans. Hopefully their love affair with “Wall Street” and the Gordon Gekko wannabes will realize that greed and short-term gratification is hollow.

Maybe this economic situation will wake up the true patriots just as the war and racism did during the 60’s. You see during the 60’s the true patriots were not the ones that supported the war or supported racism and bigotry. The true patriots were the ones who stood up and said we will not accept the status quo and that we reject your vision of America. Many of us are too old for this fight and the truth is it is not our fight. The future belongs to the young, not the old. The time has come for our youth to put down the game controllers, smart phones, and other distractions that are reducing personage to an image or a message on a screen and become engaged. It is your future that is being stolen.

"Man is more disposed to domination than freedom; and a structure of dominion not only gladdens the eye of the master who rears and protects it, but even its servants are uplifted by the thought that they are members of a whole, which rises high above the life and strength of single generations." - Karl Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Work Your Way Out

2010-10-17T09:20:00.001-05:00

On the back of this industrial output, rose America’s middle class. High-paying manufacturing jobs in turn helped spur a robust and growing economy that had little dependence on foreign nations for manufactured goods and armaments...However, manufacturing, as a share of the economy, has been plummeting. In 1965, manufacturing accounted for 53 percent of the economy. By 1988 it only accounted for 39 percent of the economy, and in 2004, it accounted for just 9 percent...The loss of the manufacturing industry manifests itself most clearly in job losses. - The Trumpet

The wing-nut shell game continues as they on the one hand decry the loss of jobs and the high unemployment figures and yet at the same time were the architects of the policies that gutted the manufacturing sector which drove the job creation. The unfortunate truth that the politicians, pundits, and CEO’s refuse to tell the American public is that unless we retool our manufacturing base we will continue to have high unemployment. The current and future high unemployment numbers are not solely based on the recession. Prior to the recession we were seeing unemployment rising as the economy was supposedly humming along.

The historic fact is that you get out of a deep recession or depression by working your way out. You don’t get out of it through austerity measures or attacking the unemployed. You didn’t get out of it by giving tax breaks to rich folks. You build or make things. This presents us with an impossible scenario. We no longer make things. The engine that would power our economy back to profitability and high employment is now driving the economies of China, India, and Singapore. What we are witnessing in America today are the results that were predicted but roundly denounced when the whole outsourcing process began. You don’t have to be a Harvard educated economist to figure out that if you ship your middle-class creation mechanism overseas that you will have fewer middle-class people. In fact it’s probably easier to understand if you’re not Harvard educated.

Remember, how we were going to replace all of those “dirty” manufacturing jobs with “clean” new technical jobs. While granted there were people who were able to make the transition from the manufacturing sector to the technical sector the majority of people were not so lucky. Many of those living wage manufacturing jobs were replaced with low wage service sector jobs which did not offer benefits that many people were accustomed to. What the economist’s neglected to tell us was that there was going to be a segment of the population who would not be able to transition into the new technical jobs. This magnitude in the numbers of people who can’t transition is the real cause of the term “jobless” recovery.

According to one study, every 100 jobs in durable manufacturing support 372 jobs in other industries, while every 100 jobs in business services supports 164 jobs elsewhere in the economy. We are losing good jobs which will stimulate the economy (and we are left with the shit jobs). – Stephen Hanson

As the American labor force has become more efficient and with the advent of robotics and other technological advances this places more pressure on an already shrinking labor force. When you combine these with the changes in the attitudes of the corporate elite from thinking of what is best for America to what is best for their short-term profits you have the current situation we as a nation find ourselves in. Let’s be clear the early industrialists were no angels and they clearly made enormous profits on the backs of their workers but one thing many of them understood was that they were Americans and they were guardians of a dream (the American dream) and their long-term success was tied to their workers long-term success. At no point in American history has there been this large of a discrepancy between the corporate elite’s salaries and their workers. The really sad fact for most Americans is that the media and the politicians have been co-opted by the wealthy into this mind game that none of the policies they have instituted have led to this American trauma.

The current state of affairs with the American economy is not some accident of nature or some perfect storm of naturally happening occurrences it was orchestrated by a group of greedy and unscrupulous people who presided over one of the largest transfers of wealth in the history of the world. And yet despite all evidence to the contrary we have these shell groups who on the one hand claim to be against bail-outs and yet they are being funded by those who created the need for the bail-out. This could only be created in America. Where else would you have a group of peasants with pitch forks and torches at the gates of the wealthy but not to demand equality but to bring more riches to them? It would be funny if it weren’t so tragic.

Every person familiar with business knows that labor is always your biggest expense and whatever you save in labor goes directly into your pocket, it is this mentality that has caused this new class of corporate titans to join the race to the bottom searching the world for the lowest labor costs they can find. We have supported our own demise through allowing the politicians to give tax-breaks to those who have shipped our jobs overseas.

There are those who claim that the days of American manufacturing are gone and will never return. They claim we are better served as a country because of it. I disagree because if you look at the fastest growing economies in the world they all make things. The other thing that is not being discussed is that when you outsource your production you also outsource your ability to innovate. Innovation is primarily done through the production process by workers who through the process recognize ways to create a more efficient or even a better way to create a product. Those innovations are now being made overseas. It’s not surprising that all of the new green and innovative products are now being developed and manufactured overseas. We have not only lost our production capabilities we have also lost our ability to innovate.

If we are to regain our leadership in the world we have to become a producer again. We will have to do it better and cleaner than we did it in the past and how they are doing it overseas. As a country we have to make some tough decisions about our future. Are we going to continue to ignore the evidence and continue to listen to the greedy or will we demand a return to the principles and policies that created the largest middle-class in history? That is the choice that lies before America.

“I have come to a resolution myself as I hope every good citizen will, never again to purchase any article of foreign manufacture which can be had of American make be the difference of price what it may” – Thomas Jefferson

It’s Utterly Inhumane

2010-10-14T08:03:00.000-05:00

A number of people have taken up the sisters’ cause, including Ben Jealous, the president of the N.A.A.C.P., who is trying to help secure a pardon from Gov. Haley Barbour of Mississippi. “It makes you sick to think that this sort of thing can happen,” he said. “That these women should be kept in prison until they die — well, that’s just so utterly inhumane.” Bob Herbert - New York Times

This quote is about a case in Mississippi were two young women were sentenced to life in prison for allegedly being involved in a robbery that involved $11.00 and no one was injured. Only in Mississippi could this happen according to the article and while I can sympathize with the plight of these two young women, one of whom has lost the function of her kidneys. There is an even greater inhumanity taking place in every state in this country.

The inhumanity that I am speaking of involves the systematic disenfranchising of young black and minority men. It takes place when these young men are arrested for oftentimes minor drug offenses and given felony convictions. These convictions then condemn these young men many of them before the age of 20 to a life of poverty. Think about that; for the next 40 to 50 years these young men will be discriminated against in employment, education, and housing. You see the only group in America that you can discriminate against with impunity is the convicted felon population.

You see we now have laws that prevent convicted felons regardless of the offense from receiving student loans and grants, housing assistance, and any other government assistance that they desperately need to change their lives and become reconnected to their community and our society. As if that were not enough most employers refuse to hire ex-offenders as a matter of policy except for menial low wage positions. No one challenges an employer for doing so, because we have the canard that most businesses have money and property on hand and the ex-offender cannot be trusted to be an honest person. After all, they are convicted felons. So we prevent them from receiving the support to change their lives and we won’t give them jobs to improve their lives, many of them for nothing more than having a bag of weed.

By condemning these young men to this fate of hardship we are also condemning the neighborhoods they live in to a future of violence and apathy. Once you remove the hope and the future of the young people in a community you suck the rejuvenating life blood out of that community. These young men now exist outside the system and the economy. They have been made invisible by a system designed to marginalize them and prevent them from competing successfully for their share of the American dream. These young men now have no reason to become involved in the improvement of their communities and often times their own lives. Many are not allowed or don’t vote. Many are unemployed. Many are not fathers to their own children and so the cycle continues.

What I think fails to get mentioned enough is that we are not only condemning these young men but entire communities to suffering. We set in motion the demolition of the underpinnings of these communities. Throughout history the fortunes of a culture or a community is driven by the fortunes of its young men and if you are able to somehow undermine those young men you in fact commence the destruction of that culture or community. You show me a vibrant community and I will show you one where the young men are intricately involved in the fabric of that community. Our community cannot afford to allow this destruction of our young men to go on unabated.

Just one galling statistic of many: in some states African Americans comprise 90 percent of the total drug prisoners and are 57 times more likely to be incarcerated for a drug offense than whites, even though whites use five times the amount of drugs as African Americans. - Michelle Alexander

The time has come for us to stand up and demand an end to this systematic destruction of our young men. We must begin to change a criminal justice system that routinely and selectively gives our young men felony convictions while at the same time giving whites diversion and other less punitive measures. We must begin to teach and train our young men to not participate in their own destruction. The training of our young men into responsible men is not being advocated and promoted as it should be in our community. There is this false assumption that boys just naturally grow into men, nothing could be further from the truth.

There will be racist elements who will seek to keep this pipeline in place. But in addition there will also be economic forces to contend with. Prisons now employ over 400,000 people throughout the country. Because many prisons are located in rural areas they have replaced other forms of employment such as manufacturing and farming. This source of jobs has kept many small towns afloat following the shrinking manufacturing and unskilled labor base. We now have a prison-industrial complex second only to the military in its size and scope. In order for prisons to be profitable they have to be filled. As a result of these policies we are pitting the employment and future of rural folks against the freedom and future of the urban folks.

As a society we cannot continue to operate on this level. The results of our inaction will be a permanent underclass in urban areas and a permanent siege mentality for those living there. It will also continue to foster and promote racial and geographical prejudice within our society. With two million of our fellow citizens incarcerated or on paper many for non-violent offences we must begin to seek and to promote alternative methods to incarceration and felony records. We should also support an atmosphere of support for second chances for these unfortunate people caught up in this “war” mentality. Businesses respond to customers and if customers were more receptive to second chances so would the business community. I ask you to begin speaking out in your communities for these young men. Become a part of the reentry movement where you live. You see condemning people before they are even 20 for a non-violent drug offense to a life of poverty is not just unfair or inhumane, it is immoral.

“Jails and prisons are designed to break human beings, to convert the population into specimens in a zoo-obedient to our keepers, but dangerous to each other.” - Angela Davis

Just the Facts Maam

2010-10-13T10:08:00.002-05:00

Mr. Johnson, on the other hand, proudly proclaimed recently that he doesn’t “think this election is about details.” That’s as good an explanation as any of why — in Wisconsin as in so many states — candidates like Mr. Johnson are ahead in the polls. Insurgent Republicans don’t need details when they can play on the furious emotions of voters who have been misled into believing that positive changes like the health care law are catastrophic failures...The misinformation and simplistic solutions propounded by talk radio and the Republican Party are having an effect even in a state that preferred Mr. Obama by 14 points two years ago. - The New York Times

One of the consequences of this election could possibly be the debunking of the long held myth of the inherent intelligence of the American voting public. This myth has been carefully orchestrated and promoted by the media, the wing-nuts, and any other group who has a stake in legitimizing the electoral process. In order for a democracy to be seen as legitimate by our standards it must be based on the premise of an informed electorate making choices in its own interest.

For a while now in America nothing could be further from the truth. The reason they don’t have elections at mental institutions is because the results would be subject to easy manipulation. Because the population would not be seen as having the mental skills to research and understand the breadth of the issues and are subject to varying forms of hallucinations and paranoia which could be manipulated by unscrupulous entities no one in their right mind would certify the results. The founders of this nation made the faulty assumption that the electorate would forever be this group of thoughtful and knowledgeable people who would weigh the issues and make informed choices.

Unfortunately, what we know today is this is often not the case. As we have evolved from a nation which read newspapers, books, and journals to a nation of sound bites, commercials, and bumper stickers we have become less informed concerning the crucial issues facing this nation. Because of this “cerebral laziness” the electorate is prone to accept the misinformation and propaganda of those who seek to promote their agenda over the interests of the country as a whole. The real tragedy is that if the teabaggers were really who they claim to be they would be a legitimate force for good in politics. But their selection of candidates and their adherence to the wing-nut rhetoric proves that they are merely another tool of the wealthy to create a smoke screen to hide behind.

I can understand someone having the misguided belief that giving billions of dollars to the wealthy in tax-cuts is a viable policy to stimulate the economy. What I cannot understand is how those who would directly be harmed by this policy continue to support it. The problem with recycling is that there is a history of what the product was and did before. We have a history of data concerning tax-cuts. It is not like this is some new concept that the wing-nuts just came up with. There is a track record for review. But this would require an electorate that was willing to do simple research instead of accepting on its face the propaganda being served.

The one thing that should be troubling to more and more Americans is that as we continue to progress down this shadowy world of anonymous donors and unlimited political spending we will be more and more at the mercy of those who use fear and tribalism to sway opinion instead of facts and research. You can elect whoever you want, I get that. But you can’t continue to send nut jobs to a place and then get mad when it turns into an asylum. I think what the Congressional dissatisfaction polls tell us about people is that each group is dissatisfied because they want the Congress to be more like them, which is fine if you have a clear majority and a clear direction. The problem now for this country is no such sense of clarity exists. The American people are being tossed in a storm that is being fed by the false meme that ignorance is bliss.

It is important to think about who benefits from a system that devalues education and knowledge and seeks to replace it with folksiness and stupidity. I guarantee you that the wealthy backers of this “know nothing” movement are not taking their kids out of their private schools and colleges and sending them through our public education system. So are we to assume that ignorance is only valuable to ordinary folks? Yes, because if education becomes reserved for only the wealthy, then only the wealthy will be educated and the easiest population to manipulate is an uneducated one.

"A popular government without popular information or the means of acquiring it is but a prologue to Farce or Tragedy or perhaps both. Knowledge will forever govern ignorance, and a people who mean to be their own Governors must arm themselves with the power knowledge gives." – James Madison

Republicans: The World is a Ghetto

2010-09-29T11:41:00.002-05:00

“We shouldn’t demonize wealth the way this administration has,” he said. “How many of you look at your balance sheets and say, ‘You know what? This profit thing is overrated?’” – Michael Steele

As America races head long into banana republic status what is so troubling is how many people have such a distorted view of what has caused it. Thanks to the constant refrain from the wing-nuts and teabaggers many Americans believe the cause of our economic woes is not from the greed of the rich but from the policies that created the middle-class in the first place. The problem is not that our political system is awash in corruption and corporate largess being fueled by wealthy people whose only mission in life is to get as much profit as they can at the expense of all else. The problem is not that the wealthiest among us refuse to pay their fair share to make our system more equitable. It’s amazing to me that if the wealthy spent as much time and money on playing by the rules and paying their share as they do avoiding it we wouldn’t be having this conversation or these deficits.

I wonder when did we changed from a society that provided an opportunity for many to improve their lot through policies that recognized that not only did it make economic sense to have a vibrant middle-class but also because it was the right thing to do into this selfish nation. Today that sense of collective good has been replaced by what’s in it for me. We have become a nation of hoarders. Don’t get me wrong I am not naïve or a revisionist that does not realize throughout our history there have always been greedy people among us, but today it has reached unprecedented levels. We have reached the point where people don’t matter, the environment doesn’t matter, and the future doesn’t matter. Many will say that this is the natural fall-out from a consumption driven and aimless society that despite its outward prostrations is not rooted in any deep and meaningful principles to guide us. While many claim an abiding belief in God just exactly who or what that God is has become a mystery to most.

A country without a memory is a country of madmen. - George Santayana

I understand the logic that deficits matter and there are those who are truly afraid it will ruin us, but there are two things that appears to be lost on this crowd. First, we have history concerning similar events not just in our country but nations around the world. Why is it so difficult for us to analyze those historical events and develop strategies based on what worked and what didn’t in those instances and move forward? The reason I believe that it is so difficult is because what has worked in the past and what will work now is a massive infusion of targeted spending to stimulate growth. You don’t have to be a Harvard educated economist to read a book and realize what is needed. In every case where there was failure the people tried to use austere method of cutting spending during a contraction in the economy. This isn’t debatable or conjecture, it is fact based in history.

The second thing that is lost in this debate is that deficits are caused by two events: spending and lost revenue. You can cut spending all you want but if you don’t maintain or increase revenues you won’t solve the problem. The rich and their middle-managers or the managerial class have for decades sought to reduce their tax burden through government policies and political corruption. A fact that seems lost on the teabaggers, many of whom are adversely affected by the policies they espouse. The troubling aspect about our current debate and election cycle is that easily obtainable facts are now controversial and debatable and many cases just plain ignored. As if to say we don’t know what got us out of the Great Depression. There are those who will argue that our economy today is different from the one back then. The truth is that it is not. We have created these excuses to keep us from acting in a similar way because it worked. Excuses like “structural unemployment”. The reason we have structural unemployment is because we don’t make anything anymore. We have outsourced our ability to produce our way out of this crisis. These policies worked so well that Democrats maintained a majority in Congress for decades following enacting these policies that laid the foundation for the biggest growth spurt in history. But what good are facts in an irrational tirade based on emotions and philosophical drivel.

In terms of types of financial wealth, the top one percent of households have 38.3% of all privately held stock, 60.6% of financial securities, and 62.4% of business equity. The top 10% have 80% to 90% of stocks, bonds, trust funds, and business equity, and over 75% of non-home real estate. Since financial wealth is what counts as far as the control of income-producing assets, we can say that just 10% of the people own the United States of America. - G. William Domhoff

My question is how many of those teabaggers with their colonial costumes and pointed hats are in this 10%? My guess is not many, if any. Just as the racists of the South turned the debate from slavery and Jim Crow to state’s rights, so the rich in this country have turned equitable distribution of wealth into the false argument of socialism or capitalism. The difficulty comes when so many of the people in this country are getting their information from sources that either confirm or reinforce their already currently held views. We have gone from a nation that read books to a nation that reads bumper stickers. So rather than having an honest and factually based discussion on the real issues we get this ginned up antagonism towards the people who are trying to level the playing field.

It’s strange to hear Rush Limbaugh constantly taking about class warfare and the Obama agenda because warfare would require both sides to be fighting. In America only one side is fighting and winning and that is the rich. If we are going to turn the tide in this country from the rich corporate class that is intent on raping the environment, creating a permanent underclass, and undermining our democratic principles then we will have to wage an insurgency campaign. Unfortunately, we are outgunned and with the collaborators we are out-manned. Those of us who realize where the real problems lie must begin to offset the well financed propaganda campaign which has already caused millions of Americans to vote and to campaign against their own interests. Our future and the future of America are at stake.

“Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it.” - Edmund Burke

Tea Party Independent Movement

2010-09-27T10:01:00.001-05:00

When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is about the end of ANY nation. - Dr. Adrian Rogers

Remember back when it all began and the Tea Party was being hailed as this “new” independent movement that was going to change the face of politics in America? These average Americans were mad at everybody and no politician was safe regardless of party. Well, now that the primaries are over what have we learned about this new independent movement?

We have learned that they may dislike Dems, but they hate Republicans. They hate Republicans until they win I guess and then they are waiting in line for the hand-outs and infomercials they get to do on FOX. We have learned that these folks were the crazy cousins hiding in the attic of the Republican Party. We have learned that these folks are the reincarnation of the “Know Nothings, the Moral Majority, and the Christian Coalition. We have learned that they really aren’t independent nor or they grassroots. If the Tea Party were an independent movement why did all of their candidates run in Republican primaries? You would think that a third independent party would want to run on its own identity and not the failed brand of another party.

The Tea Party appears to be an attempt to push the Republican Party further to the right and not to advance any independent ideas or agenda. It’s almost laughable when I hear the Republican leadership talk about co-opting the teabaggers. Why would you need to co-opt a group that is already a wing of your party? I think this is just to give the impression that this is actually some new force in the political arena. The truth is that these folks are not new. Many of them are descendents of the same old cultural warriors from the past who are disguising their brand of intolerance behind fiscal responsibility. We hate them because they are spending too much money. Please ignore the fact that we say racist things, that we are anti-Muslim, and by the way anti-immigration too. Our real mission is reigning in the runaway spending and over reaching power of the Federal Government.

Obviously they have forgotten that the Feds gained most of their power of intrusion from the Bush years following 9/11. They have forgotten about the Patriot Act, the secret files, and the eavesdropping on millions of phone calls of Americans. I guess it is ok for the government to be able to spy on its citizens so long as the government doesn’t provide a safety net for its most vulnerable or protect all of its citizens from profit driven corporations. This really isn’t about the size or scope of government. The reality is this is about the loss of responsibility to one another. We are witnessing a major turn in our collective consciousness towards one another. We are no longer our brothers keeper; instead it has been replaced with every person for themselves.

For many years following the Great Depression and World War II we as nation made the decision that it was important to care for our less fortunate brothers and sisters. Since that time the wealthy through their wing-nut surrogates have been whittling away at that concept. Taxes have gone from a necessary and honorable duty to a transfer of wealth. My question is why don’t we hear about the transfer of wealth when corporations and the rich are receiving government handouts? No, government support is only bad when it is given to ordinary or impoverished people.

The teabaggers are not some new populist independent movement despite the stories to the contrary. They are the same rehashed groups that have always been a part of the Republican Party who every ten years or so come up with a new name. And as if on cue the media portrays them as some new movement worthy of deeper investigation. The only problem is that they don’t do any investigation. The media accepts the narrative of the front men that they are in fact different from other past groups. But if the media would only do their homework they would easily see that these shadowy groups are all connected at the hip to their past personifications.

Remember following the trouncing that the Republicans took after the last two elections the question was asked if America had grown tired of the old “culture wars” that the Republicans had used to their advantage? Well the wing-nuts were listening and rebranded themselves as fiscal conservatives no longer publically espoused their desire to control the behavior of their fellow citizens. It appears that depending on the mood of the electorate the wing-nuts will reinvent themselves in that image. The goal is not principled “pledges” or “contracts” the goal is power and whatever they have to become to gain that power they will become. Because of the anxiety over the economy they are now populist but make no mistake their agenda has not changed. Their goal is to move this country to the right.

In ten years they will rebrand themselves something else and we will go through this same process of how some new independent movement is shaking the country and in the end when the curtain is pulled back it will be the same old wing-nuts offering the same old failed policies under some new guise. You would think that we would be tired of this game, but as long as they can find these “regular” American hucksters who are willing to do and say anything for a dollar with the ability to cajole millions into these false arguments with their false remedies the dance continues. See you in ten years.

"Gay marriage is probably the biggest issue that will impact our state and our nation in the last, at least, thirty years. I AM NOT UNDERSTATING THAT." - Michelle Bachmann

America is Not a Conservative Nation

2010-09-24T13:54:00.000-05:00

Conservatism clings to what has been established, fearing that, once we begin to question the beliefs that we have inherited, all the values of life will be destroyed. - Morris Raphael Cohen

I am so tired of this false meme that America is a conservative nation that occasionally flirts with liberal principles. The truth is that the majority of Americans favor those so-called liberal policies that have defined this nation. The policies that created the largest middle-class the world has ever known and allowed many people the opportunity to better their lot in life. So if this is the case then why do we hear so often that this is a conservative country?

I believe that the reason this false premise is allowed to persist is because the true conservatives are the wealthiest amongst us, it is only in their interest to keep the status quo. After all what are the tenets of conservatism? Adherence to the Constitution is one of their favorites, a document that was written by a group of all white male property owners. Imagine if we had not amended the Constitution the state we would be in. Another one they like to espouse is smaller government, which is a euphemism for lower taxes. Then of course there are family values, but those values are “their” family values. Which anyone familiar with the family histories of the rich and powerful would almost surely scoff at the idea of emulating.

If we dig beyond the rhetoric it isn’t hard to see who the main beneficiaries of the conservative platform are. It isn’t the minorities, the immigrants, or the poor it is those who are already established and wealthy. Here is the strange part; this group only comprises about 2% of our population. So how has 2% of our population been able promote and embed this notion of conservatism into the larger population? It has been done systematically and at great expense on the part of the wealthy. We see this scenario being played out today if we look at those “grassroots” groups who are promoting this agenda. If we pull back the sheet we will see that the majority of them are being manipulated by these super rich puppet masters.

Even so you say people should be able to see through this ruse. That is where the folks I like to call the middle managers come in. These middle managers who include the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Sarah Palin, Glen Beck and the others are paid quite handsomely to pretend that they are just regular folks speaking to other regular folks about the evils that surround them. How is it that whenever we begin to ask the wealthy among us to pay their fair share that we hear the term socialism thrown about by this crowd? What the wealthy have done is hand selected these once regular folks who have the skills of manipulation and believability and promote them as people to be listened to while paying them handsomely to dupe the people. These people do not possess any real expertise on anything but the power of persuasion. How is it that they are constantly being shown to be wrong, misinformed, and outright liars and yet they continue to find a place to disseminate their garbage?

Over the course of the last few decades we have seen an erosion of the media into this obvious propaganda machine and all have played a role. Even those stations that claim to be unbiased have played a role by legitimizing these charlatans in the interest of equal time. There is no compromise or middle ground between right and wrong and good or evil. These outlets are being controlled by conservative wealthy people who behind the scenes manipulate these same outlets into offering up these ridiculous ideas and theories as legitimate alternatives. If this were not true then whenever anyone appeared on any news show and began to speak about tax-cuts and deregulation they would be lambasted. They would be lambasted not because of a disagreement between two competing and viable alternatives but because we have history and data that shows these ideas to be dishonest. But we continue to play this game every election and each newsperson pretends that they have never heard these arguments before and that they have no independent data to quote to demonstrate the outright deceit being perpetrated on the American public.

In the end what we have seen is the inexorable shift to the right based on this constant and unending refrain that we are a conservative nation by nature and that these conservative ideas have been proven true or at the very least untested. How can anyone with a straight face claim these ideas are true or untested? But no one in the media wants to lose their status or job by calling these clowns out for who they are and so the game continues. How anyone can say that America was a conservative country by nature is beyond me. It is obviously someone who is unfamiliar with their history. If we were a conservative people we would still only have 13 states. Conservative people do not explore and homestead in the wilderness. Conservative people do not leave their safety and cross mountains, deserts, and rivers.

It is unfortunate that we have allowed our spirit to be broken by these charlatans and the wealthy. Conservatism by its very nature is a fear of the future and the unknown. It prevents us from being innovative and flexible in shaping a new destiny for all Americans. The reason there has been no innovation in America in decades beyond the entertainment industry is because of this conservative attack on our spirit, the very nature that made us America. The sad truth is that the change or breaking of these shackles won’t come from some media call, but will come from the remnant of Americans who still yearn for freedom of expression not for the gilded few, but for all Americans. Oh and by the way those aren’t the teabaggers.

Conservatism discards Prescription, shrinks from Principle, disavows Progress; having rejected all respect for antiquity, it offers no redress for the present, and makes no preparation for the future. - Benjamin Disraeli

Let The Co-Opting Begin

2010-09-16T23:40:00.003-05:00

Rove pointed to unresolved questions about O'Donnell's financial practices, potentially dubious campaign tactics, and generally "nutty things" she'd been saying.

Former Bush Senior Adviser Staff Karl Rove today defended his earlier criticisms of Delaware's Republican Senate candidate Christine O'Donnell and insisted he supports her campaign, since she is now the Republican nominee.

Asked today on Fox News whether he would endorse O'Donnell, Rove said, "I endorsed her the other night -- I said I'm for the Republican in each and every case." - CBS News

As more and more teabaggers are nominated during the Republican primaries the new task for the Republican establishment and pundits is to try and make them appear “main stream”. Under normal conditions this would be difficult because the candidates would have to face the media, their opponents, and the voters. What we are seeing now is a new strategy being instituted by Sarah Palin and her ilk. The new strategy is to avoid the media except for Fox, the voters except for your supporters, and no debates. This election will be telling not just in the policies and visions of the teabaggers, but also a demonstration of the political strategy of evasion. Are the voters so angry that politicians are no longer required to answer tough questions or that their personal lives are no longer relevant?

I believe that former Senator Trent Lott said it best on one of the Sunday talk shows when he said that the Republicans have to figure out a way to co-opt the teabaggers into the larger Republican movement. I have a question why are the teabaggers a natural outgrowth of the Republican Party? If you follow the logic of the teabaggers which is difficult they are for smaller government and fiscal responsibility (among a host of other non-descript principles) then you would think that they would support the only Party in the last 35 years to reduce the national debt and recorded a surplus which would make them Democratic supporters wouldn’t it? So obviously the size of government or the deficits is not what is fueling the outrage.

I think what is troubling to Karl Rove and what should be troubling to the other so-called Republican leaders is that what the teabaggers are putting on display is what is at the heart of the conservative movement which is fear, racism, and tribalism. The teabaggers are like the crazy uncle that you keep in the attic. He is in the family but you don’t want anyone to know about it. The teabaggers are the raw nerve of the Republican Party. They are the ones who are the attack dogs for the Party. Let’s not be naive the reason the so-called Establishment Republicans are not challenging the teabaggers is because the teabaggers are the heart of the Republican Party. And now the trick that they want to play on the American public is to disguise this dark heart as being normal or main stream. These folks are not extremists. They are just angry main stream Americans who may go a little overboard but who could blame them during these revolutionary times.

The Beckster is even trying to talk the teabaggers into toning down the costumes, signs, and rhetoric. According to Mr. Beck now that the teabaggers have made a name for themselves it is time to clean-up their image. He is now offering fashion tips for the teabaggers. When I heard this I was instantly reminded of the Klan’s attempts to become main stream by placing David Duke on the public stage. The problem with managing a mob filled with hate, fear, and paranoia is that there is no managing it. Since a recent poll shows that 50% of the public does not have an opinion of the teabaggers their handlers have decided now is the time for a facelift. Their hope of course is that the public will not remember the signs, the rhetoric, or the racism. Or there is another opinion and that is they truly believe that the majority of Americans secretly share these intolerant views.

I can’t speak for the voters of Delaware, but what gives me cause for concern about Ms. O’Donnell and her shortcomings is simply this, if someone is dishonest in small things they will be dishonest in big things. Although the amounts of her misappropriations are small by Washington standards she has demonstrated a lack of basic honesty. If you will misuse a few thousand dollars how can you be trusted with millions of dollars? Ms. O’Donnell has learned that all Senators are millionaires and she wants to join the club. The fact that the teabaggers will support her or any candidate regardless of their personal integrity demonstrates to me that they are a red herring.

These folks are no more concerned about the deficits than they are concerned about death rays from Mars. You can’t say that you are concerned about the federal deficit and not have enough sense to do a simple history lesson and learn what Party has done more to increase the deficit. This isn’t rocket science a simple internet search will give you the details. But again this isn’t about knowledge or facts it is about a clash of cultures and a clash with the future.

I'm not worried about the deficit. It is big enough to take care of itself. – Ronald Reagan

Why I Am Against Purity Tests

2010-09-07T09:52:00.000-05:00

Nobody is more dangerous than he who imagines himself pure in heart; for his purity, by definition, is unassailable. - James A. Baldwin

There has been talk recently about the Dems needing to imitate the wing-nuts and teabaggers and create purity tests for potential candidates to demonstrate their allegiance to progressive issues. While I personally support many progressive ideas and feel that our country would be better served if some were enacted, I do not believe for a minute that we live in a progressive nation. If we enacted these progressive purity tests we would have a very small caucus because many of these progressive candidates could not be elected in many districts and states. I am somewhat of an oddity in my state as I am sure many of the folks who will read this. I am fortunate to be represented by a progressive Congressman but my state went for McCain.

In a blog I wrote during the Arkansas primary with Blanche Lincoln against Bill Halter I stated that while I am not personally opposed to primarying Democratic candidates who fail to tow the party line on major initiatives, but is it rational to believe that those who do not live in a state can dictate how progressive that state’s voters should be. Are there many progressives who believe that the Republican candidate will be a better advocate of their issues than Blanche Lincoln? At least with Lincoln she may not support the public option but she supported the concept of healthcare reform. Would the Republican have even supported the concept? Whether progressives will acknowledge it or not there are states where a progressive candidate cannot win. An excellent example would be what happened in Massachusetts with Scott Brown. Of course it can be argued that his opponent was a lousy campaigner but this was Ted Kennedy’s seat and the seat had been in the Kennedy family before Ted was elected. Was there anymore progressive a Senator than Ted Kennedy and his seat was not safe from teabaggers.

It has been argued that the use of purity tests and other tactics have moved the country to the right. I disagree. All one has to do is to look at the history of this country to realize we have always been a conservative country which has at times of great social stress reluctantly risen to the defense of the defenseless. Let’s not be confused this notion of a social democracy is ludicrous. All one has to do is to go back a few months to the healthcare debate and see how single payer was demonized and how many folks who would have benefited from it that were turned against it. So is it a lack of education or fear that allows people to choose against their own interests? If it is education then it makes sense to promote a progressive campaign to instruct voters on issues that serve their interests. If it is fear as I think it is then any attempts at promoting progressive issues will backfire with these voters. Unfortunately, in our country we have an extensive history of division and fear. Those divisions and fears have been encouraged and fueled by the rich and the greedy. Who else benefits from keeping America divided?

I believe that progressives have to continue to press the progressive agenda nationally but it must be done strategically. There is a wing of progressives who want to emulate the tactics and mentality of the wing-nuts. Just as there were wing-nuts who justified torture and ignoring the Constitution because of the tactics of terrorists, so there are progressives who are willing to sacrifice principle for victory. It will always be easier to surrender one’s principles in times of crisis and hardship rather than standing firm in the face of fear. We should not allow the fear of defeat to cause us to change what we stand for. Our strength lies in the certainty of our ideas not in the certainty in any individual. The one thing we should learn from the wing-nuts is that these purity tests don’t always work. The other thing is that purity tests work great for campaigning but not so well for governing.
News Flash – Politicians lie.

While I am opposed to purity tests I do believe that as a party the Dems have to develop a set of governing principles, not campaigning principles. Different candidates in different regions have to campaign to their local electorates based on where those electorates are not on where progressives in other regions may want them to be. When you institute governing principles then regardless of what region or state a Democrat comes from as a Democrat they adhere to these principles. It would be similar to the “Contract with America” only this one would actually be for the American people and not for the corporate elites. The time has come in this political climate for the Dems to make a compelling case of their vision for the future of America and draw the contrast between the two. I believe it has never been easier to draw those contrasts. As the wing-nuts and teabaggers move the Republican Party further right and they continue to blatantly show disdain for the average American as they rally behind the rich and infamous there has not been a better opportunity since the 1920’s to provide the American public with such clear choices.

Those choices however have to be articulated and put forward with clarity and with unity. These governing principles will not work unless the majority of Dems sign off on them. The American public has lost faith in the credibility government institutions and politicians because they will say anything to be elected. The Republicans say they are for smaller government and have continually increased the size and cost of government. Democrats say they stand for the average American but they have allowed jobs to be shipped overseas and have not fought for what they said they would. This is the opportunity for the Dems to put into writing what they stand for and then fight for it because this would provide them with the mandate they so desperately need. The President has demonstrated the ability to take very complicated issues and articulate them in a way that most Americans can understand, but this election will not be won by him alone. With these governing principles every candidate will be able to articulate the Dems future of America and let the voters choose. This strategy would allow the Dems to focus on the future and not get caught up in the diversions and smoke screens being offered by the Republicans.

Here is my principle: Taxes shall be levied according to ability to pay. That is the only American principle. - Franklin D. Roosevelt

Made in America

2010-09-06T15:51:00.001-05:00

“I have come to a resolution myself as I hope every good citizen will, never again to purchase any article of foreign manufacture which can be had of American make be the difference of price what it may” - Thomas Jefferson

At a time when we are losing manufacturing jobs in this country, we should be doing everything we can to help our manufacturers stay competitive. They are the backbone of our economy. - Debbie Stabenow

This is my ode to the America worker on Labor Day.

Remember the “Made in America” mantra that epitomized our once mighty manufacturing sector. I wonder today if there are any products left to put the Made in America tag on. While this is definitely an ode to manufacturing in this country, it is also an indictment against those who have reduced the standard of living for the middle-class so that they are forced to purchase inferior products at reduced prices. As the manufacturing base of this country has continued to shrink I believe there is a direct correlation to the shrinking middle-class.

From the beginning of our Republic the founding fathers realized that it was imperative for a nation to be able to provide for the needs of its citizenry internally. The welfare of a nation and its citizens would be directly influenced by that nation’s ability to provide not only goods but also subsistence or employment to its citizens. Alexander Hamilton put it this way:

Not only the wealth, but the independence and security of a country, appear to be materially connected with the prosperity of manufactures. Every nation … ought to endeavor to possess within itself all the essentials of a national supply. These comprise the means of subsistence, habitation, clothing and defense. - Alexander Hamilton

There are those who have tried to put forward a new dynamic over the last few decades that say outsourcing manufacturing and other jobs overseas is a natural outgrowth of our new global economy and the evolution of the post-industrial age. While this philosophy has served the corporations and the investment class very well it has left the middle-class in shambles. Since the off-shoring of jobs began in the 1970’s we have lost millions of jobs that were supposed to be replaced with cleaner, better jobs. Despite their rosy prognosis our economy has not been able to keep pace with creating new jobs that provide livable wages to these displaced workers. Instead what we have been given is more service oriented jobs that tend to be low-paying and many without benefits. So we have replaced good paying manufacturing jobs that provided a pathway to the middle-class with these low wage nowhere jobs that are providing a pathway to poverty or the working poor.

We are constantly being bombarded with the images of folks saving money at these big box retailers. What is not being shown in those commercials are all of the small businesses in towns all over the country who will not be able to open businesses or who has had to close businesses. These small business owners will not be able to return their profits to their local economies. What we don’t see in those commercials are the inferior quality of the products we’re being sold or the sucking sound as our trade deficit with China and other Asian countries continues to rise. While their standard of living improves ours declines. Researchers are beginning to believe that our economy can now perform at capacity using 25% fewer workers. That means we currently have a surplus of workers due to increases in our productivity. Yet while the American workers productivity has continued rise their wages have remained flat for almost a decade. With the wing-nuts assault not only on the middle-class but also against the unemployed how will our society deal with such a large portion of our fellow citizens not engaged in our economy?

Consider the depths of our new dependency. Imports, 4 percent of GDP for the first 70 years of the 20th century, are near 15 percent now, and 30 percent of the manufactures we consume. Pat Choate, author of Agents of Influence, gives the following levels of U.S. dependency on foreign suppliers for critical goods:

Medicines and pharmaceuticals: 72 percent
Metalworking machinery: 51 percent
Engines and power equipment: 56 percent
Computer equipment: 70 percent
Communications equipment: 67 percent
Semiconductors and electronics: 64 percent

There are enormous challenges facing this nation and one of the greatest is reestablishing our ability to manufacturing and produce things. Has our society been better served by dismantling our manufacturing sectors, by off-shoring jobs, or by removing the incentives for small business development? With our march into the future and our drive towards technology is it inevitable that we will continue to push so many of our neighbors into economic peril? Some would have us believe that we don’t need to produce anything that we will retool our workforce and reeducate our workers into more technical positions. I personally don’t consider just the economics of manufacturing as reason to reestablish it. I believe that there are some intrinsic values gained for a society that creates and builds things. It gives the society a sense of accomplishment and the people a sense of pride. The time has come for us as a nation to stop allowing the folks who have sought to gut our middle-class for their short-term profit and against our long-term benefit.

“As long as our culture continues to fawn over its downward-aspiring lowest common denominators, the United States will remain a social and political punch line. As long as we continue tracking the every deed and fart of the Paris Hiltons and Kevin Federlines among us, we will continue to come out sixteenth best with regard to producing and introducing to the human race things of true substance worth appreciating for their aesthetic ingenuity.” - Anthony Beal

Stupid Is, As Stupid Does

2010-09-02T23:58:00.001-05:00

I have opinions of my own - strong opinions - but I don't always agree with them. - President George Bush

The one thing you have to admit about the emergence of all of the teabagger candidates is that the political discourse in this country has gone from bad to worse. The intelligence quotient which has always been low in our political debates has certainly hit an all-time low. However, before I make that declaration I know that we still have two months remaining and anything is still possible. The recent performance of Arizona Governor Brewer and Republican Senatorial Candidate Angle in debates demonstrates what many of us have known to be true for a long time many voters select candidates not on perceived intelligence or merit but on identification with the candidate.

The one thing that has concerned me about the blanket assertion made towards blacks and President Obama (all black people voted for him because he was black) is that whites have been using identity politics forever. You don’t have to be a historian to realize that politics has rarely been a meritocracy. Can anyone argue that Bush II or Reagan were intellectual heavyweights? No group has used identity politics more than whites let’s not forget it has taken 44 white presidents to get to this one. So were all the whites who voted for whites racist? But I digress. Some have asserted that President Obama’s own educational achievements are fueling this wing-nut campaign against knowledge. I don’t believe this entirely because they had the same criticisms for any previous Democratic candidate who had similar achievements. Bill and Hillary were lambasted as cultural elitists out of touch with average Americans.

Let’s be honest stupid candidates are nothing new. What is troubling to me about the current trend of candidates especially the teabaggers is not that they are less than scholarly but the fact that their lack of knowledge is what makes them appealing to their constituents. There has been a steady assault on education by the wing-nuts for decades. We have been bombarded by the wing-nuts and their media outlets with the constant railing against the northeastern urban educated elite and their prejudice against the common folks. These are the folks who are leading the destruction of the family by promoting homosexuality. These are the folks who are destroying our social fabric by promoting affirmative action and giving away the country to lazy black folks. These are the folks who are destroying our education system by forcing integration. They are destroying “our America” with their social experiments.

There was a time in America when knowledge and education were valued and stressed as ways to overcome one’s humble beginnings. Many of our early presidents and statesmen were products of these opportunities. However, we also have an equally dark history of denying education to prevent groups from achieving success. We have been a country that has valued the pursuit of education not just for its material gains but also for the pursuit of knowledge. For many years we have led the world in educational achievement and have been the destination of the best and brightest of the world’s students. Over the last two decades our achievement scores have continued to drop and now we rank 18th among 36 nations. Now is not the time with a global economy for America to promote ignorance as a virtue. We need to promote education now more than ever for our young people. What message are we sending our young people with these simpletons vying for power and flaunting their lack of knowledge?

I mentioned the dark history of our nation denying education to blacks during slavery because of the belief that education made folks more difficult to control. My guess is that this is the underlying strategy of the rich and infamous who are funding these candidates and their agendas. There are those who want to dumb down our population to make us easier to control and what better way to do it than by implying that knowledge is somehow evil. Of course there is also their blatant desire to shutdown the Department of Education. We must resist this trend to devalue and demonize knowledge and education because it is putting our democracy at risk. What makes democracy work is an engaged and knowledgeable electorate and the more detached and uninformed the electorate the easier it will be to deconstruct social security, Medicare, and all of the other programs that have provided a safety net for our most vulnerable citizens. The same folks who are touting this knowledge is bad line are the same folks who are making sure their kids are attending all of the right schools. So are we to assume that knowledge is only bad for us?

With the lost of our manufacturing base we no longer have a path from high school to middle-class as we once did. What this has done is made education not only a luxury but a prerequisite for any decent job in our highly technical society. I am a firm believer that we have to reestablish our manufacturing base if we are to continue a viable middle-class. Let’s be honest not all of our kids are going to be engineers and neither should they have to be. Manufacturing in the 21st century will require some technical skills which will require knowledge and education. One of the benefits to the rich and infamous by dummying down the nation is that it reduces the competition for their kids for scholarships and employment.

Don’t get me wrong I don’t believe that education and secular knowledge should be the only characteristics to base a decision on who is qualified to serve this nation. But to ridicule intellectual curiosity as some kind of satanic plot to brainwash our children is dangerous. Our political system must be open to all and all have the right to seek public office but with that right comes a responsibility to be as knowledgeable as you can be about the material and issues that you are asked to preside over. Unfortunately, what many politicians learn the hard way is that governing is a lot more difficult than campaigning. Not knowing anything may have appeal with some voters on the trail but as we have seen with the last administration it does not make for good governance.

"Genius may have its limitations, but stupidity is not thus handicapped." - Elbert Hubbard

Democrats Winning Strategy

2010-09-01T23:38:00.001-05:00

History isn't on the GOP's side, either. If keeping the top marginal tax rate at 35 percent—the rate under Bush, and the rate that Republicans are fighting to preserve—spurs so much hiring, why didn't America experience any job growth at all during Bush's time in office? And if a top marginal tax rate of 39.6 percent—the rate under Bill Clinton, and the rate that Democrats are fighting to restore—is such a job killer, why did payrolls grow by 20 percent during the 1990s? – Newsweek Blog

I have become so tired of the gloom and doom of the Democrats in the upcoming mid-term elections. It seems everywhere you turn the news keeps getting worse. Based on these reports there won’t be any Democrats left in the Congress following November. I believe that the Democrats can not only survive November but can also prosper. In order for this to happen they will have to do a number of things that Democrats historically don’t do very well.
The first thing they will have to do is to craft a coherent message that they all unite behind. Because of their lack of a national message the Democratic caucus is plagued by rogue members who feel little if any national allegiance to the party. Because so many of their members are products of local issues and electorates too often Democrats are left with the type of majorities we’ve had the last two years. The Dems have been a majority in name only and incapable of crafting a cohesive governing philosophy. What we don’t need and I am certainly not suggesting are litmus tests like teabaggers or wing-nuts, but instead we need to have certain principles that make us Democrats. I know that we have the general terms of working for the middle-class and for the downtrodden, but that is so open to interpretation that it provides little structure in times of great calamity like the ones we are in. As a party the Dems should craft a set of principles that all members of their caucus agree to work and fight for. And once accepted it should be provided to the American people as a contrast to the Republicans. This message should be honed and offered by all candidates as the governing philosophy of this party. Those who are unable to uphold these principles are free to run as independents or Republicans.

The second thing they should do is at every interview, town hall, and campaign stop carry a chart of the federal deficits under all presidents dating back to Eisenhower. This chart should appear in all of the ads and should become the mantra of the party. They should all provide the American public with an image of the failed policies of these fiscal conservatives who have always preached one thing and done another. This would be a symbol to all but the truly partisan of the duplicity of this party and their unrelenting assault on the middle-class. This is the type of symbol that resonates with the independent voters. This President and these Dems were elected by drawing just such a sharp contrast between their policies and the policies of the wing-nuts. Unfortunately, in America it is not enough to just talk about the lack of consistency and the hypocrisy of the Republicans many of our citizenry need an illustration to drive home points. The success of the bumper sticker rhetoric of the wing-nuts will bear this fact out. This point of preaching austerity and yet every chance they get to govern they raise the deficit to record highs must be repeated over and over. The Dems should take a page from the wing-nuts and that is if you repeat something long enough and loud enough people begin to accept it as fact.

Finally the Dems should propose sweeping public improvement and infrastructure projects to attack the intransigent unemployment that is gripping this nation. It is time to force the Republicans to either support the American people or be seen for the hypocrites they are. Regardless of anyone’s political persuasion few can argue against the historical truth of the “New Deal”. It is time for the American people to get another new deal. Just as FDR recognized the economy had been shanghaied by the wealthy of his time so it is again today. Instead of hoping to negotiate with those seeking short-term greed, it is time for this President to call them to task for the sake of the country. No group, no single person’s agenda can be allowed to supersede the greater good of the majority of Americans. It is time for the Dems to go on the offensive. If they truly believe that they have the best minds with the best plan for America then now is the time to show it. The time has come to craft a set of programs that will actually stimulate the economy and reduce unemployment and at the same time they must demonstrate how implementing these initiatives will in the long run reduce the long-term deficit by fueling the expansion of the economy. Just as the New Deal laid the foundation for the greatest expansion of the American economy in our history so it must be done again.

If the Dems are going to survive and keep the momentum now is not the time for timidity, instead it is the time for bold visions and actions. The Republicans have shown that they are devoid of any new ideas to address the major challenges we face as a nation. So rather than cowering in the corner waiting for the day of reckoning the Dems must provide the American people with a stark contrast of the future of America. If the Dems cannot defeat the rehashed ideas of the past then they are not worthy to lead into the future.

“When it comes to the future, there are three kinds of people: those who let it happen, those who make it happen, and those who wonder what happened.” - John M. Richardson, Jr.

Why The Beck Event Didn’t Need Politics

2010-08-30T21:47:00.002-05:00

Palin likened the rally participants to the civil rights activists from 1963. She said the same spirit that helped them overcome oppression, discrimination and violence would help this group as well."We are worried about what we face. Sometimes, our challenges seem insurmountable," Palin said. "Look around you. You're not alone." - Yahoo News

Many of the pundits and talking heads were concerned today about what the motive was for Glenn Beck’s rally over the weekend. Many questioned why Mr. Beck who has been one of the staunchest critics of this president would hold a political rally without the politics? By all accounts the rally was a cross between a revival meeting and a church picnic. There were no political speeches extolling the shortcomings of this president and his administration. There were no references to liberalism, socialism, or Obamacare in any of the speeches. So with one of the largest captive audiences in recent memory why was there no demagoguery by two of the best in the business?

The answer is really very simple. All one has to do is look at the demographics of the rally goers to understand that there was no need for these types of speeches. The majority of the participants were white, over 50, and evangelicals. With this group there was no need for over the top rhetoric, racists signs, or t-shirts. Just as the Pope does not have to detail the tenets of the Catholic faith during Mass at St. Peters Basilica neither did Glenn Beck have to give the tenets to those gathered at the rally? Is there any doubt what the political leanings of those people in that demographic would be? The people who showed up at that rally are conservative right-wing voters and their politics is their religion. In their minds there is no separation of religion and state or religion and politics. America in their minds is a Christian country and anyone who does not share their brand of Christianity is an outsider. One of the reasons that President Obama’s religion is questioned and is treated with skepticism is because he does not espouse or demonstrate their brand of Christianity. So we get “He says he is a Christian and I take him at his word.”

When groups of like minded individuals get together there are certain ideas or values that don’t require being spoken. Your very presence at the event signals your agreement with the group’s positions on politics, social values, and community mores. We are God’s people and everyone else are godless infidels who are not worthy of our compassion but instead they are worthy of our contempt. The thing to remember with group dynamics is that certain words can carry special meaning that the majority of the group understands so even a non-political rally can carry political significance. So instead of talking about liberals or foreigners we talk about those who share our version of religion and those who don’t. To the folks in the crowd the meaning is crystal clear and there is no difference.

"When the government puts its imprimatur on a particular religion it conveys a message of exclusion to all those who do not adhere to the favored beliefs. A government cannot be premised on the belief that all persons are created equal when it asserts that God prefers some." - Supreme Court Justice Harry A. Blackmun

The question that continues not to be asked today is not why more people think that President Obama is a Muslim today than when he was elected. The question that needs to be asked is in a country where we supposedly have freedom of religion why does it matter what religion he is. So we have these endless conversations on the television about what the poll numbers mean to the President’s ability to do his job and no conversation about the hypocrisy of this whole conversation. The thing that should scare the hell out of all Americans who value freedom about the Glenn Beck rally is that today it is the liberals tomorrow it will be the Methodists or the Catholics. A prime example of this is the fall-out from some Christian groups that stated following the rally that because Glenn Beck is a Mormon he is unfit and offering a false gospel. You see that once the hate mongering starts it becomes contagious and it will infiltrate and contaminate everyone it comes in contact with.

What Glenn Beck was attempting to do was to marry religion with politics. He is seeking to rally the troops under the cross, the flag, and oh yeah a little gold wouldn’t hurt. America has a history of following these Elmer Gantry wannabes promoting that good ole time religion. The problem with these charlatans is that their version of ole time religion is not very old. I truly believe that no group has done more to divide the Church in the history of the Church than the Evangelicals. According to them God is constantly providing new revelations that only they can hear and decipher which of course makes it next to impossible to dispute. Glenn Beck decries the liberation theology of others yet as you can see from Ms. Palin’s remarks that this is exactly what they are promoting only it is liberation for those who are the most liberated in the country. Who is more liberated than middle-aged white people? What they don’t realize is Beck, Palin and their rich cronies are the ones who are oppressing them.

You can safely assume that you've created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do. - Anne Lamott

Citizens Against Taxing Big Oil

2010-08-26T11:51:00.000-05:00

You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time. – (attributed to) Abraham Lincoln

One evening I was watching the news minding my own business when I was astonished by what I saw. It was an ad paid for and produced by the American Petroleum Institute or API. API is the main trade association for the oil and natural gas industry. According to the commercial which depicted what appeared to be ordinary Americans upset because the Congress is considering raising the taxes on the industry by 80 billion dollars in the 2011 budget. According to these ordinary Americans raising taxes during a recession on anyone is bad policy. This rationale sounds eerily familiar to the rhetoric being used to justify keeping the Bush tax cuts. It is this type of blatant propaganda that must be exposed for what it is.

What is amazing to me is that we have all read how energy company profits have been at all-time highs for the last decade. Each quarter they set new record highs not just for energy companies but for all corporations. So with all of these record profits you would think that these concerned energy titans would be using that money to research and develop new cleaner energy technologies right? Wrong. Many of these companies are using less than 1% of their income to research new clean energy technologies. Most of them are using these enormous profits to buy back their stock and thus insuring even larger profits in the future. So at the end of this decade of record profits we are to assume that taxing these companies is going to wreck the economy and kill 400,000 jobs?

We as Americans through the work of our political leaders have been subsidizing an industry that continues to make money hand over fist. We do this not only in paying higher energy bills but also through subsidies to this industry.

All of this political gamesmanship aside, consumers have good reason to be angry. Not only are the oil companies racking up extraordinary profits, they’re doing it while continuing to enjoy generous tax breaks and economic subsidies paid for by the same people who are also paying exceptionally high prices at the pump. Essentially, consumers end up paying oil companies twice for the same product, first subsidizing their production and then buying the finished product at inflated prices. – Larry West

So let me get this straight, the people who are being gouged are upset because the people who are gouging them are going to have pay taxes on these record profits and lose some of the subsidies they don’t need in the first place. How stupid do they take us for? I thought the ad about an energy company being in the people business was bad, but this one sets a new low. The thing that troubles me the most about this ad is that the people being interviewed obviously have no clue who the tax would impact. One woman states that some people are barely hanging on so raising taxes would be a burden. I agree if the tax was for ordinary working people but this tax is on an industry where the top 5 companies made over 550 billion dollars under the Bush administration and has not slowed down since. Are we to assume that the oil industry is just barely hanging on? If it weren’t so dishonest it would be almost comical.

We as a nation I believe will not get serious about clean energy until we make it too painful to continue down the path we are on. Unfortunately humans respond best to two stimuli; pain and fear. Most of the countries that are pioneering clean energy and sustainability are doing so because they had to. Until gas prices reach about $5 a gallon we will continue our urban sprawl with bigger and more congested highways, we will continue to refuse to develop and implement clean energy sources for providing energy to our homes and businesses, and we will ignore rail and other transportation alternatives. The truth is that gas prices will reach $5 the question then becomes do we allow the profits to go to an industry that has repeatedly shown it has no desire to provide clean sustainable energy or do we create a self-imposed tax that will be used to fund the switch to clean energy? How can we expect an industry with little or no incentive to develop the clean energy technologies we need?

Following the oil embargo of 1973 the nation of Iceland embarked on a radical and massive shift in its energy policy. Because the cost of fuel had skyrocketed they made the calculated determination that they would begin to seek alternative fuel sources and conservation. The people of Iceland created a self-imposed tax on oil to fund their transformation to renewable energy and today are reaping the benefits. So while we went left (change suppliers), they went right (reducing dependency and alternative sources). So while they now enjoy the freedom of renewable energy we are still being held hostage by foreign governments (many of whom are hostile to us) through our big oil companies. History has shown us that we will not develop sustainable energy policy until the last drop of oil is gone. The problem with that strategy is by that time it will be too late.

The use of solar energy has not been opened up because the oil industry does not own the sun. - Ralph Nader

I’m Not Paid To Be A Role Model

2010-08-25T14:37:00.000-05:00

"I'm not paid to be a role model. I'm paid to wreak havoc on the basketball court." – Charles Barkley

Every time I read about the excesses of professional athletes and entertainers I am reminded of this quote and subsequent commercial given by Charles Barkley. Although he received a lot of criticism for the ad what he stated remains true. It has always amazed me how we as a society place the responsibility of providing the mores of our society on those who have demonstrated nothing more than a penchant for athletic or artistic ability without regard to their suitability as humans. Tiger Woods is no exception. With his divorce finalized, his personal and professional life in shambles what can we as a society take away from this monumental fall from glory?

I cannot think of any athlete that was better packaged as a commodity than Tiger Woods. He was handsome, articulate, and wholesome. He is the closest any black athlete has come to the all-American image reserved for white athletes and celebrities. And no athlete has capitalized more on this squeaky clean image than Mr. Woods whose empire has been estimated as high as 900 million dollars. But for all of his financial wealth and marketing savvy it appears that Tiger Woods is just another fallible human with all of the frailties and shortcomings as the rest of us. If there was ever an athlete that epitomized the consummate role model it was Tiger Woods. His well crafted image was the envy of many on and off of the golf course. So what went wrong?

What happened to Tiger Woods is not unique in the annals of celebrity or history. It is the result of this cult of celebrity or personality that has been created to market merchandise to our consumer driven society. The problem with this strategy is that in order for it to work there has to be a direct correlation between athletic prowess or celebrity status with ethical behavior. You see in a culture where everyone is ducking responsibility from everything from their children, to their fellow citizens, to life in general. We need these surrogate heroes to provide our children and in many cases ourselves with this hypocritical message. In creating this parallel universe we force these superstars to live up to a standard that no human could possibly maintain. We basically set them up to fail and when they do fail we hold these contrived public apologies to allow ourselves the opportunity to forgive our fallen heroes.

The problem is that we honor people for being heroes who really aren’t heroes at all. Being a great athlete or celebrity does not make you hero in and of itself. What makes one a hero is what one is doing with the God given talent that they have been given to help others. Many of our best athletes and celebrities have proven to be pretty lousy human beings. The truth is that real heroes aren’t good marketing tools. The school teacher who continues to struggle for excellence in a troubled inner city school district, the average Joe who risks his life to save a stranger, or the people who everyday sacrifice their own lives for the benefit of others. These folks aren’t glamorous or exciting. And that’s why in our society we value entertainment over attainment. Style is to be valued over substance. Our children are offered these false idols to emulate without anyone asking the question, “What kind of person is this?”

The true tragedy of Tiger Woods is that we will have learned nothing from this. We will continue to follow this cult of personality. We will continue to reward those who are willing to be prostituted as heroes while the true heroes of our society will be ignored except when they too can be used for marketing purposes. Has our culture become so devoid of true nobility that we have to rely on marketers to tell us what a true hero is? Have we become so enamored with the cult of celebrity that true virtue is now no virtue? While Tiger Woods is the latest victim of this phenomenon this is in no way about him. It is about the larger issue of what do we value as a culture. Are we left to accept the empty characters that are being thrust upon us in an effort to get us to buy more and more crap we don’t need? Although he and many others like him accepted the trappings that went along with his notoriety how many of us know the pressure of trying to appear perfect when you are deeply flawed? And can trying to carry that burden create flaws of its own? Can anyone live up to the expectations we as a society place on these unfortunate ones who happen to excel at some sport or entertain us? Isn’t it enough that they provide us with the entertainment we seek?

I don’t know if Tiger Woods can recover from this episode in his life. I can’t begin to imagine the difficulty of having your life implode while billions of people watch. What I do hope is that we as a society begin to recognize the damage we are causing to not just these people but also to ourselves by creating these false idols. True heroism is not something you do in a stadium, or on a course, or on a stage it is what you do every day in how you live. There are millions of unknown heroes who aren’t paid millions of dollars, who aren’t receiving plaques or awards but none the less they continue to persevere every day in thankless sometimes hopeless circumstances. The time has come for each of us to be our own role models by living up to the ideals we want so desperately to bestow on others.

“Being a hero is about the shortest-lived profession on earth.” - Will Rogers

How the Black Church Has Failed Us

2010-08-24T11:28:00.000-05:00

Almost 90% of Black Americans express absolutely certain belief in God; compared to just over 70% of the total U.S. population. Two other important statistics gleaned from this survey: (1) 80% of Black Americans report that religion is very important in their lives as compared to 57% of the general U.S. population; and (2) 55% of Black Americans report that they interpret scripture literally as compared to 32% of the general U.S. population. - PEW Research Center's Forum on Religion and Public Life

There has been a lot of discussion lately concerning the role of the black church. It has been accused of subjugating women and keeping them single, it has been accused of hypocrisy concerning gays, and for being impotent when it comes to resolving the major social issues that we face as a community. While these may be legitimate criticisms and worthy of discussion I don’t think these are the reasons for the failure of the black church in our communities. What many of these authors argue is that in their opinion the church should become more liberal on social issues. I couldn’t disagree more.

Based on the research you would think that black people were the most pious people in America if not certainly the most religious. But in looking at the data there seems to be a disconnect between what people are saying and what they are doing. I believe that disconnect is a direct result of the “Gospel” they are receiving from the pulpits. I would never claim that the black church is some monolithic entity that follows the same doctrine in all locations. But in my experience the message being preached in most black churches is the same message that was preached during reconstruction. The black church continues to manifest itself as if nothing has changed in the last 250 years. The problems that we face today as a people are not the same problems we faced following slavery when the daily lives of black people were controlled by outside forces.

If we are to overcome the new challenges that face us such as unwed single mothers, the disintegration of the black family, and the escalation of black crime and violence we must provide new solutions. The church has not provided black people with the direction and the tools to attack these challenges. As a result you get this disconnect between believing in God and living for God. An example would be the discussion concerning the black church and the high rate of single mothers. What the authors fail to realize is that prior to becoming a single mother these women were single non-mothers who attended church and professed a belief in God, a belief that spells out in its text in chapter 2 that we are to be married prior to having children. This is in chapter 2 of the Holy Bible which the majority of black people believe to be literally the Word of God. If we can’t get pass chapter 2 of our Holy Book what chance will we have with the other concepts being expressed later?

The black church doesn’t need to become more liberal in its interpretations of the Word; it needs to become more consistent. The black church has fostered this belief in the “Magic Jesus”. A Savior who will magically appear and solve all of the cares of life so long as you pledge allegiance not to Jesus but to this church and thus removing all responsibility for one’s behavior by the waving of a wand. So rather than providing black people with the tools to combat crime, irresponsible behavior, and lack of preparation the church instead gives them a lucky charm or a magic genie. In 1967, 25% of black children were living in single female heads of households today that number is over 70%. While the black church is not the single cause of this epidemic it has remained primarily silent during this explosion. Want to have pre-marital sex; don’t worry magic Jesus will save you. Don’t want to prepare your children for the future; don’t worry magic Jesus will fix it. Instead of offering magic Jesus the church should be providing our people with things like parenting training, character building classes for our young men being raised by single mothers, and financial training.

Finally, there must be an awakening in our people concerning our role in God’s plan. Prior to being our Savior Jesus must be our Lord. Jesus states, “If you love me, you will obey me.” To blame the institution that you are not being obedient to for your problems is like my going to school every day not paying attention and then blaming the school for my lack of learning. We should stop excusing our behavior because we are black, or we are poor, or discriminated against. As a human being I owe it to other human beings to do certain things. Not because they are white things or black things, rich things or poor things, they are human things. I owe it to other human beings not to kill them, to pick up after myself, and to try and be the best person I can be. These are not acting black or white, they are acting human.

The time has come for our churches to leave the rhetoric of the reconstruction era behind when blacks were unable to control much of their daily lives and recognize that there are things we must do for ourselves. We must come out from the pews and pulpits and reach out to those who need our support and guidance. We must provide those in the pews with the tools to better their lives and the lives of their children. The black church will need to do a better job of reaching out to our men by providing them more than just a magic Jesus and we must do it while we have them there. The majority of black men were in church at some point in their lives and the church lost them. The children have not failed, we have failed them. We have to do a better job of training them up to be men of character and that job cannot be done by women.

The Jews tried to keep Christ contained within their law, while the Greeks sought to turn Him into a philosophy; the Romans made of Him an empire; the Europeans reduced Him to a culture, and we Americans have made a business of Him. – Unknown

The Right Wing War Against The Future

2010-08-24T00:06:00.003-05:00

"Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!" – Statute of Liberty

For the past two years the Republicans, the tea-partiers, and the other wing-nuts have been waging war, but despite the prognosticators on cable and the talking heads they are not at war with President Obama, the Muslims, or the Latinos. These folks are not upset about health-care reform, deficits, or bail-outs. This war is not about secret Muslim terrorist’s plots, socialist takeovers, or gangster governments. What we are witnessing is the historic battle between those who cling to a false sense of history against what they see as an uncertain and frightening future. A future that is frightening because it is looking darker and more foreign.

For all of the talk about the promise that is America the truth is that there is and always has been a large segment of our society that has sought to prevent the inevitable movement into tomorrow. The one constant in life is change and those cultures that have resisted change have done so at their own demise. It’s not like we don’t have thousands of years of human history to study and learn from. But let's not forget that the Flat Earth Society still meets annually. All we have to do is look at our own brief history to witness the lengths that some will go to prevent the march of time. Our history is filled with anti-immigrant, anti-religion, and racial prejudice all under the same pretense of maintaining someone’s version of their America that didn’t include the unfortunate groups who were targeted.

It is mind boggling to me how those who sought change, tolerance, and what appeared to be an embracing of the future by electing our current president could so easily be frightened by the rhetoric of those who for personal gain are willing to stoke the fears of so many. I believe that America is schizophrenic. On the one hand we want to be perceived as this nation of tolerance and equal opportunity and on the other hand we cling to this desire to maintain the status quo. Change is great so long as nothing really changes or change is what other people need to do. I believe that there is a deep seated fear within all of us that we try to keep hidden. A fear that dates back to the beginning of human time that if fed or left to fester can lead to unspeakable horrors in the human soul.

We all at some point have had to face this fear of the others. Some of us have been able to confront these fears and overcome them and are better people for it. However, there is also a segment of the population who has chosen not to confront these fears and instead have chosen to allow innuendo and stereotypes to reinforce their worst fears about their fellow citizens. I guess it just goes to show that if you repeat something often enough and loud enough some people will eventually begin to believe it. What is troubling to me about this current state of political discourse is that the further we get into the term of this president the more people begin to question his religion, his right to be president, and even his Americaness.

What the wing-nuts don’t seem to understand is that in a republic form of democracy the representatives govern by the agreement of the governed. Once you delegitimize the government then anarchy and chaos are sure to follow. You can’t throw gas on the conspiracy crowd by calling the government illegitimate and unlawful and then expect them to recognize it for the rhetoric that it is. I don’t think there is any serious person who would argue that our government is broken, but those who have for years worked to break it should not be rewarded for their efforts.
We have a choice in America as we’ve always had. We can cling to our fear of the future and each other choosing to try and go backwards. The problem with that strategy is that you can never go backwards because the world you are trying to recapture never truly existed. Or we can continue on the path we have embarked on choosing rather than fearing change we embrace it and rationally direct it.

The liberties of none are safe unless the liberties of all are protected. – Justice William O. Douglas

Let’s Make A Deal

2010-06-22T16:43:00.003-05:00

“I agree, Lord of Darkness, if you grant me the following wishes: First, I would like the nation to be hurled into an economic crisis caused by Wall Street greed and recklessness. This will discredit free-market fundamentalism once and for all.” – David Brooks

I just read the David Brooks ode to liberalism article and I must say he makes a compelling case not for the decline of liberalism but for the decline of our shared consciousness. The problem with pundits is that everything happens in a vacuum in their world. According to him there are no connections between any of the events that he described except that they occurred while Mr. Obama was President. So the link is not the failed policies of the Right, but that liberals could not clean them up fast enough. So the future of our governance is not based on those who caused the disasters but on how quickly those elected to repair them can get them repaired.

Using that logic then if I start a fire in a building and then when the fire department gets there I cut the water pressure to the hoses and someone dies in the building then it is the firefighters fault for not putting out the blaze quicker. What Mr. Brooks and many of his talking head friends fail to realize is that very few of the upcoming midterm elections will be decided by national issues. So while they will be trumpeted as the beginning of the end for Obama what they fail to realize is that following the midterms in 1994 Bill Clinton won reelection handily. I suspect the same will be true for President Obama. It is one thing to win an election in South Carolina running on corporate largess and apologies it is a far different thing to win nationally running on those issues. It is amazing to me how quickly these clowns forget that when we had a national referendum of policies the country overwhelmingly chose the policies of the Dems. Are we to believe that after four years of Republican prostrations in front of the corporate gods that the majority of Americans will turn away from those who are at least trying to solve the gigantic problems facing this nation?

Are we also to believe that the majority of Americans will agree with the likes of Glenn Beck that this President is a racist? If I have any complaint towards Mr. Obama it is that he has been too cautious towards the issue of race in America. The reason we are not moving forward as a nation is precisely because we are so divided. As a nation we are not using all of our resources we continue to choose tribalism over nationalism. We will not be able to compete against the likes of China and India if we continue to be willing to marginalize large segments of our population. We are going to need every able body and mind if we are to overcome the problems of energy, climate change, and retooling America. I read that some black leaders are offended by Mr. Beck holding a rally at the Washington Mall on the day that Dr. King gave his dream speech. Their fear is that Mr. Back will somehow diminish the stature of Dr. King and what he accomplished. To me this is akin to worrying about Joseph McCarthy diminishing the legacy of FDR because he accused him of having Communist sympathies. The biggest challenge to blacks in America is not Glenn Beck it is our refusal to deal with the problem that we are allowing women to train up our boys and the outcomes are abysmal. Instead of holding a rally to combat Glenn Beck we need to be holding a rally to recommit to our children.

Another missing component from Mr. Brook’s fairytale is that the Dems are not a monolithic party like the Republicans. An example would be what is currently taking place within the Republican Party with the teabag crowd if this were a Democratic group the Dems would allow them to caucus but that would be the extent of it. No one would suggest and rightly so that the Dems should adopt the lunacy of the fringe but with the Republicans that is exactly what they are doing. I guess when you are void of ideas and critical thought then any ideas seems plausible. The election of 2008 demonstrated that the Republicans were bankrupt of ideas and I have seen nothing since then to make me think they have found any now. With the political landscape of today you will never be a majority party if you are appealing to a shrinking base of gun-toting, history revisionist, pseudo patriots. I don’t know many Americans who want to see America returned to the “good ole” days of intolerance, bigotry, and robber barons. But I could be wrong and if I am then were all in trouble anyway.

Finally, the devil in the details that Mr. Brooks has mischaracterized is that leadership is what we elect President’s to have, that and a vision. Sometimes when you are leading a ragtag mob like America you will appear unpopular because you have to make some unpopular decisions, but the alternative which the Republicans are offering is to continue to defer these difficult choices until they are no longer choices but we are left with imperatives. Prior to the spill in the Gulf we had choices about how to conduct deep water drilling, due to our refusal to stand up to corporations we now are left with an imperative. Plug the hole. My fear is that there are many who are willing to shy away from the difficult in search of the easy quick fix. However when it comes to the issues facing America (climate change, clean energy, unemployment, depression, etc.) there are no easy quick fixes. So if the Right wants to govern based on popularity I suggest the majority of us begin to prepare our tin roof shacks because we are not far from a banana republic.

The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity. The fears are paper tigers. You can do anything you decide to do. You can act to change and control your life; and the procedure , the process is its own reward. - Amelia Earhart

Risky Business

2010-06-22T00:03:00.000-05:00

“The first step in the risk management process is to acknowledge the reality of risk. Denial is a common tactic that substitutes deliberate ignorance for thoughtful planning.” - Charles Tremper

Is it just me or have we entered a stage in American business life where corporations and in some cases entire industries have thrown risk management out the window and have decided that all risk is acceptable? There was a time when companies did a series of calculations where risk was measured against not just the corporate good but the societal good, but that time has passed. It has passed because as we have allowed corporations to undermine our political and regulatory bodies their exposure to risk has been greatly reduced not because of better management techniques or greater technological advances but by the corresponding greed of our elected officials. As more money has been deposited into the already murky waters of Washington and state capitals the American public has seen its share of risk underwriting increase in direct relation to the reduction of underwriting by corporations.

As the disaster in the Gulf continues to play out instead of having a real national referendum on the transition from fossil fuels to clean energy technology we are treated to elected officials apologizing to corporations for their having to pay for the worst natural disaster in American history. The sad part is that this was not some natural disaster that no one could foresee it was a calculated series of premeditated violations and oversights for the sake of cost cutting and profits. Once again Mr. Paul with all of your teabagging cronies we see what happens when corporate America is left to its own devices. According to Mr. Paul the free market will protect us from these types of disasters because it was not in BP’s interest to drill a hole in the bottom of the ocean that they could not plug up, just as it wasn’t in Goldman Sachs interest to market and purchase credit swaps and derivatives. The crazy part about the smaller government crowd is that even despite the massiveness of this disaster their lesson from this is that government doesn’t work because it can't plug up a hole in the bottom of the ocean? That's like the lesson from Vietnam was that we should have stayed longer.

What corporations have earned from all of that campaign cash and straight up bribes is that the new risk mitigation program is the American taxpayer. Bring the economy to the brink of another Great Depression, no problem the taxpayers will bail us out. Drill a giant hole in the bottom of the ocean, no problem the taxpayers will pay for it. Unless of course you have a gangster government from Chicago in charge that does shakedowns of poor innocent corporations who were just minding their own business when out of nowhere this giant hole appeared under their deep water drilling platform. So what does the Supreme Court decide? That we don’t have enough corporate money in the process let’s give them unlimited access to public officials.

The sad truth is that what we are watching is the same thing that other empires and cultures have witnessed during the days of their demise. It isn’t the American people who will bring about the final demise of America (although in a sense it will be but through apathy) it will be the greedy and immoral political and economic leaders. The same leaders who are willing to risk our long term future not only as a nation but as a species on this planet for their short term profit. It has always been the corrupt rulers of an empire or culture that has brought about the destruction of that empire or culture. The role that we play as citizens is that we become so apathetic and jaded that we quietly sit with our heads between our legs while the plane is crashing. Where is the uproar? Mr. Barton should have been tarred and feathered and ran out of Washington on a rail. Unfortunately for America it is going to take some greater disaster than this for us to finally realize that the cheap oil party is over. It will take gas going up to 5.00 a gallon and electricity prices doubling before we will take clean energy serious and demand that our political leaders pass real energy reform legislation.

Just like every other monumental change in American history it is never from the top down that things get done, it is always from the bottom up. There will be no good guy riding in with the white hat on the white horse to save us. As long as we continue to accept that Chevron is in the human energy business, that banks are in the rebuilding America business, and that corporations are our benevolent friends whom we could never survive without then we will continue to have messes like this to clean-up. We have to understand and accept that it is not the President’s job to get Mitch McConnell, Joe Barton, and the rest of the corporate apologists on board, it is our job. It’s not like the President is the only one who is elected in this country. We have an opportunity to change the debate and the direction of this country forever and that thought is scaring the hell out of all of the energy companies. Will we demand the future or will we continue to cling to the past? The choice is ours.

If we don't succeed we run the risk of failure. - Dan Quayle

Slippery When Wet

2010-06-16T01:31:00.002-05:00

We can’t impede progress in the name of environmental action that yields little for the environment and even less for our people.. and we should look at the environment as an economic opportunity. – Meg Whitman

As we enter the 60th day of the BP oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico it has been amazing to me the outcry that has occurred from all camps concerning the responses to the crisis. The one which has troubled me the most has been the criticism which has been directed at the president. Let us be clear this disaster was masterminded and created by the profit seeking British Petroleum and they should be held responsible for all aspects of this disaster. My concern is with those who believe unrealistically that this or any president can somehow plug up a hole in the gulf that is 40 miles off-shore and a mile deep. Or that we have the technology to respond to such a disaster somewhere on a shelf somewhere and we are just not using it. The truth is that the majority of this country has been asleep on the possibility of a disaster like this because of our dependence on fossil fuels and the marketing of big oil.

Many of the critics have suggested the President institute special powers such as the war powers given during a state of attack by foreign powers or terrorists. The problem with these suggestions is that they ignore the reality of our current political state or the current state of our judiciary, specifically the Supreme Court which has shown recently its propensity for corporate bidding. Have these critics so easily forgotten the mantra of the right for the last two years that President Obama is a socialist looking to privatize all industry and undermine our way of life. Now they are suggesting that this same president seize BP to insure their compliance even temporarily is absurd. Not to mention the fallout from the oil industry lobbyists and their congressional minions. Does anyone think that this Supreme Court would allow such tactics without taking action to prevent it?

I understand that this is an environmental disaster of monumental proportions but let’s not be naïve enough to believe that the criticism from the teabaggers stoked by their Astroturf benefactors would somehow be silent because this is a national disaster. While for most Americans this is a tragedy of historical proportions for these folks it is just another opportunity to fault the President and his administration for not safeguarding our country. Unfortunately when disasters of this magnitude occur many folks are unable to get their heads around it and so they become overwhelmed and desensitized to the suffering of others. As a nation we have become more regional and isolated from each other and so if these types of things don’t directly affect us we tend to compartmentalize them as someone else problem and so it is difficult to craft national responses or national outrage. While those in the gulf and environmentalists understand the depth of the disaster there will be those who will attempt to minimize the human and environmental toll on this nation.

The tragedy in the gulf demonstrates our false reliance on technology or our belief in technology and how we have convinced ourselves that technology can and will solve all of our challenges. Many critics believe we have the technology to plug a hole in the ocean as if it were some hole in the bathtub to be plugged by so much silicone. Should we have had in place safety precautions to deal with this tragedy? Of course we should have been more vigilant in holding these corporations to higher safety standards, but let’s not forget that for years we have allowed these corporations to skirt safety and write their own rules. The answer to this disaster is not to criticize this President but to put in place the regulatory mechanisms to prevent future disasters and to hold BP responsible for the entire restoration and financial liability for this one. But let’s not kid ourselves into believing that those forces who want to keep us dependent on fossil fuels will go quietly into that good night.

Here are a few quotes that demonstrate willingness of these paid clowns to sacrifice the rest of us for their short-term gain.

"What better way to head off more oil drilling, nuclear plants, than by blowing up a rig? I'm just noting the timing, here." —Rush Limbaugh

"Extreme deep water drilling is not the preferred choice to meet our country's energy needs, but your protests and lawsuits and lies about onshore and shallow water drilling have locked up safer areas. It's catching up with you. The tragic, unprecedented deep water Gulf oil spill proves it." —Sarah Palin

"From time to time there are going to be things that occur that are acts of God that cannot be prevented." —Texas Gov. Rick Perry

If the firms that employ an increasing majority of the population are driven solely to satisfy the owner's greed at the expense of working conditions, of the stability of the community, and of the health of the environment, chances are that the quality of our lives will be worse than it is now. - Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

Blanche Lincoln’s Victory

2010-06-09T01:26:00.002-05:00

Blanche Lincoln’s victory or as some are calling upset over Bill Halter I think gives some important lessons to those who think you can come in and decide local elections by trying to nationalize the election. For years I have argued that voters in one district or in one state do not value the same characteristics or gravitate to the same issues as other voters. The netroots community and labor spent a lot of political capital challenging the incumbent Senator Blanche Lincoln with many folks believing their own hype. The hype was that if the netroots community targeted a candidate then that candidate was in trouble. The problem is that with a big tent party like the Democrats you cannot conduct purity tests. They have never worked and they never will.

There are certain states where the electorate defies the talking heads, prognosticators, and any logical conclusions. The state that immediately comes to mind is Kentucky. Kentucky has continued to elect Mitch McConnell who is the poster child for receiving corporate largess and despite the media coverage of his unbiased defending of corporations he remains popular. Not only have they continued to elect Mr. McConnell they have now nominated Rand Paul as a senatorial candidate. Unfortunately in America people of like minds tend to live in close proximity to each other and thus they create these pockets of suspended disbelief and as a result we get elected officials that are not accountable to their voters.

What the netroots community did was to allow Blanche Lincoln to portray herself as a victim, a victim of outside agitators, corrupt unions, and special interests. She was able to present herself as a populist against not just corporations but also the unions. And in a right to work state like Arkansas unions are easy targets. Did everyone forget that Arkansas is the home of Wal-Mart public enemy number one for unions? Conservative or centrists Democrats will always be a part of the Democratic Party and as such the Democrats will continue to be a majority party while the Republicans continue to purify themselves in a bid to attract a shrinking electorate. The people of Arkansas have decided that they preferred Blanche Lincoln despite her shortcomings to the progressive community.

So what are the lessons to be taken from her victory by the netroots community? The first is the first law of politics and that is that all politics are local. They are local to the voters of whatever district or state that they are in. The second is that not all voters in all states share the same understanding or perceptions of the issues. The fact is that for all the talk of the intelligence of the American electorate the truth is that in many areas of the country the electorate is anything but intelligent. Too often we have seen voters who have been bamboozled by special interests to vote against their own interests. The third is that the friend of my enemy is not necessarily my enemy. There are some states or districts where a progressive candidate cannot win despite the best efforts of the netroots community. There are no moral victories in politics. Despite the ramblings of the talking heads on MSNBC tonight was a loss for the netroots community.

Poor Ed Shultz looked like the proverbial deer in the headlights following the election being called for Senator Lincoln. Ed Shultz was in Little Rock to celebrate the netroots victory of Bill Halter. The problem is that someone forgot to tell the voters of Arkansas. The public option was suppose to be her “Waterloo” and as with so many other Waterloo references in politics they were greatly exaggerated and unfounded. Once again we have to reexamine our current reliance on polls and how they really affect voters. The public option polled very well in Arkansas but when given the opportunity to punish a politician who voted against it the votes were just not there. So this tells me that it was not as great an issue with the voters of Arkansas as it was with the progressive community.

There will be a lot written about what happened in this election and what can be taken from it both in victory and in defeat. I don’t know what this says about the current mood of the electorate or how this plays nationally, but I do know that when preparing to wage war one should always count the cost prior to taking on an enemy.

“The enemy isn’t conservatism. The enemy isn’t liberalism. The enemy is bullshit." - Lars-Erik Nelson

The Copperfield Dollar

2010-05-16T12:55:00.001-05:00

What I have found interesting about the financial crisis of 2007-2010 as it is being referred to is that prior to the crisis there was a lot of money that was being invested in derivatives and other risky investments and yet after the crisis none of that money was accounted for. My question is where did that money go? I understand that some of the money was for loans that were defaulted on so there was no recovery there and there was the money that was built into the value of overvalued assets that will also never be recovered. However there was real money in the system that has never been accounted for. According to my crack research staff there was billions in profits made from selling these derivatives and other investment vehicles by the large trading companies. Those are the same trading companies that we had to bail-out. So again my question is where did that money go? What about all the billions the hedge funds made by betting short on the market?

It has taken me awhile but I have figured out what happened to all of that money. You see it wasn’t regular currency like we are use to using. No it was a special currency used only for these types of special transactions. You see these transactions were done using “Copperfield dollars”. For those who don’t know David Copperfield is a famous magician or illusionist who is famous for among other things making the Statue of Liberty disappear on television. So as you can imagine anyone who can make the Status of Liberty disappear would have no trouble making a few hundred billion dollars disappear. These Copperfield dollars on the surface appear to resemble ordinary currency however they have one unique characteristic that other currency do not have. These Copperfield dollars once placed in certain banks vaults disappear into thin air without a trace. You put them in the vault in 2006 and you go back in 2007 and they are gone. Poof like a puff of smoke, gone.

Now let’s be clear not every bank used these Copperfield dollars. They seemed to only have been circulated at the largest banks, investment houses, and hedge funds. So are we to believe that during this gambling frenzy that there were not profits being made. That would be like the casinos in Vegas winning all the bets but at the end of the night they have no money to show for the day’s receipts and yet there were no payouts either. So no one won any bets, but the house has no money either. How is that possible? Oh yeah I forgot they were using those pesky Copperfield dollars. Every time you think you see one you really don’t, it was an illusion.

I have to admit I have an economist friend who I think is a pretty smart guy and he has tried to explain to me what happened and the more he explains the less I understand. Finally I walk away just shaking my head with a headache. One thing he did tell me though that I thought was interesting and I believe it is something most people don’t know. Based on the terms of the bail-out loans ( yeah they were loans or stock options) it is estimated that in the final calculations it will have cost the American public around 38 billion is the figure I think he used (it may have been 48) but anyway that worked out to be about 280 dollars for each household in America to save the financial system. Now of course these were not Copperfield dollars because they came out of mine and your pockets and we are not allowed to use these special Copperfield dollars.

My question is this, why aren’t the armed tea-partiers at the offices of Goldman Sachs, Citi, and the others who used those Copperfield dollars to make 10% of our economy disappear? Who are the real terrorists here? Even the 9/11 terrorists did not shrink the economy by 10%. We started two wars behind that attack, but you’re telling me some folks can get away with stealing 10% of our economy and nothing happens? That 10% by the way is conservative because it only includes what we had to replace 700 billion not what actually disappeared in Copperfield dollars. We will never know the extent of that robbery I’m afraid. I understand people being angry, but what I don’t understand is this misplaced anger. Was it the overreach of the government that caused our economy to crash? No on the contrary it was the fact that government was not upholding its responsibilities to watch out for its citizens or is that a function of government? According to these folks it is everybody for themselves. I think these folks have been watching too many John Wayne movies because they surely don’t want that scenario.

Well, I have decided because the banks and others were so successful using those Copperfield dollars that I am going to replace my currency with them and I am going to paying all of my bills with them. Let’s see how the banks like it when they go to cash my checks and the money that was there yesterday is gone today. Poof!

“If you ever have to steal money from your kid, and later on he discovers it's gone, I think a good thing to do is to blame it on Santa Claus” - Jack Handy

Profits Before People

2010-05-14T14:29:00.001-05:00

Pruning relatively less-efficient employees like clerks and travel agents, whose work can be done more cheaply by computers or workers abroad, makes American businesses more efficient. Year over year, productivity growth was at its highest level in over 50 years last quarter, pushing corporate profits to record highs and helping the economy grow. - NY Times

Over the last two years I have had trouble keeping the stories straight coming from corporate America. On the one hand American workers are lazier and less productive than their counterparts in other parts of the world and then on the other hand productivity in America has never been higher. It is so high in fact that many companies are doing twice as much work with half the workforce. The good news there is that it makes the companies huge profits. As every student of business knows labor is always your highest expense. The bad news is that the American worker has become so efficient they are cutting their own throats. The proof is in the last two “so-called jobless” recoveries. Companies are using the recessions as tools to cut labor while increasing the amount of work being heaped on those employees who are left.

These remaining employees have seen the amount of work they are being asked to do more than double while their wages have remained stagnant. This has been accomplished with fear of lay-offs or fear of outsourcing jobs to overseas. So I am a little confused the employees have become more productive creating millions in profits for their employers and yet their wages have not improved markedly for the last ten years. I’m no Ivy League educated economist but even I can see that this doesn’t quite add up. How is it possible for corporate America to pull this off? It is simple really and it involves a three prong approach that has been successful for generations and continues to be so.

The first prong is that they convince enough people that someday they could be wealthy too and so it is not a good idea to create problems or taxes for wealthy people because someday they could affect you. Let’s take a closer look at this concept that anyone can get rich in America. The truth is that while this country more than any other offers the opportunity for almost anyone to become wealthy, the truth is that few of us ever will. The idea that you could go from humble beginnings to great wealth is a well worn myth that continues to be propagated in our society. The truth is that less than 40 folks a year get rich by means other than inheritance, marriage, or criminal enterprises. So good luck with that!

The second prong is to convince people that having wealthy people pay their fair share is somehow evil or socialism. You would not know it but the current tax burden of Americans is the lowest since Harry Truman was president. If this is true then why are the tea-partiers and their wealthy benefactors complaining about the government’s assault on working people by over burdening them. Much of our debt could be reduced if we just went back to the tax structure we used under Bill Clinton. The problem in America is that no one wants to pay for anything. Everybody wants free stuff. I can understand middle-class folks complaining about being squeezed but we have the biggest discrepancy between wealthy and everyone else since the “Gilded Age”. Is it unfair to ask those who have received more to pay more? If it is then our democracy and our economic system is a sham.

The third and final prong is the tactic of diversion. The wealthy get the people to focus on issues that divide versus issues that unite. This is the job of their high paid mouthpieces Rush Limbaugh, Glen Beck, and Sarah Palin. Their goal is to focus people’s attention on the black and brown hordes who are stealing “our America” and our “way of life”. The one thing I have noticed at all of those Congressional hearings about the economic meltdown, the ecological disaster in the Gulf, and any other current complaint that the tea-partiers are complaining about all of the CEO’s and representatives were not black or brown. They were to a person white and male. So who is really stealing us blind?

If our system is to survive we will have to figure out a way to have reinvestment of some of those billions in profits that have been created not by the overpaid CEO’s but by the productivity of the American worker. I don’t believe that it is only the government’s responsibility to retool the American worker. Is it not also the responsibility of those who have profited from these workers to provide for their future or are they just responsible for their demise?

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts. - Daniel Patrick Moynihan
The Disputed Truth

Moses & The Constitution

2010-05-11T00:31:00.003-05:00

Today's Constitution is a realistic document of freedom only because of several corrective amendments. Those amendments speak to a sense of decency and fairness that I and other Blacks cherish. – Thurgood Marshall

The one thing that troubles me about many on the right and the left is both sides belief that the Constitution is untouchable and engraved in stone. The American Constitution despite the proclamations of tea-baggers was not written by the hand of God Almighty, instead it was written by a group of 18th century men with the limited knowledge of the world and history that they had. I will grant strict constructionists the fact that many of the concepts they enshrined in the constitution were ahead of their time, but let’s not forget all of the concepts that they neglected in the document or perverted due to their prejudices. All “men” were created equal so long as they were men, white, and property owners.

I believe that instead of looking at the constitution as absolute and complete we need to view it as a living, breathing document. A document whose basic tenets we hold untouchable but one where we also recognize that it can be amended to include those situations that men of the 18th century would never have imagined would exist. How could we expect them too, unless we believe that it was written by the hand of God a position which I personally do not subscribe to? Students of history can attest to the fact that the complexion of our country has changed dramatically and continues to change. There are those who want to cling to the America of the 18th century in the false hope that the sands of time can be stopped by the sheer will of stubbornness and ignorance.

What does it mean to be a strict constructionist? Does it mean that you believe that the constitution was complete as originally written or does it mean it was complete after certain amendments? I have never been sure what exactly these people believe. As a member of one of the groups who were originally left out of the constitution I find it difficult to accept the completeness of the original document. We are not the society we were in the 1700’s and we will never be again. Our society and our country are evolving and if we believe that our constitution will not have to evolve then we are laying the foundation for our demise into irrelevancy. I find it interesting that those who label themselves strict constructionists are usually those who were included in the original document and therefore believe that there is no reason to make it more inclusive.

"With regard to that we may add that when we are dealing with words that also are a constituent act, like the Constitution of the United States, we must realize that they have called into life a being the development of which could not have been foreseen completely by the most gifted of its begetters. It was enough for them to realize or to hope that they had created an organism; it has taken a century and has cost their successors much sweat and blood to prove that they created a nation. The case before us must be considered in the light of out whole experience and not merely in that of what was said a hundred years ago. The treaty in question does not contravene any prohibitory words to be found in the Constitution. The only question is whether [252 U.S. 416, 434] it is forbidden by some invisible radiation from the general terms of the Tenth Amendment. We must consider what this country has become in deciding what that amendment has reserved." – Oliver Wendell Holmes

I believe that the constitution has been incorrectly interpreted in decisions like Dred Scott, the Santa Clara County decision, and even today with the recent decision to allow corporations unlimited campaign funding. These decisions have one thing in common and that is they were decided using strict constructionist views. The courts rather than applying the standards of the period they were in chose to retain the standards of the original framers complete with their prejudices and ignorance. As the President continues to fill vacancies on the court, as groups like the tea party continue to call for strict constructionist reading of the constitution, as states continue to enact draconian legislation, and as the threat of terrorism continues to loom over us it is important that as nation we define what we stand for. Do we stand for a society that is inclusive and believes in the value of all people or will we continue to claim this right only for those who look like we do?

The tyranny of a prince in an oligarchy is not so dangerous to the public welfare as the apathy of a citizen in a democracy - Charles de Montesquieu

Race, Politics, & Immigration

2010-04-28T16:31:00.001-05:00

With the new law in Arizona which allows local police personnel to act as immigration agents many people fear that it will lead to widespread arrest and detention of Latinos legal or illegal. While this is a valid concern it really misses the whole point of the law. Except for some small town sheriffs seeking to use this for political or personal gain most local police have their hands full with the crimes they already enforce and will not have the inclination or desire to add this onerous duty to their already busy schedules. So if there is little chance of real enforcement of the law then why propose it and sign it into law?

What we are seeing in Arizona is similar to the sundown laws in the south during Jim Crow. The real purpose of these laws is not to be enforced but to intimidate. They are designed to say to all Latinos not just in Arizona but all over the southwest that we can mess with you anytime we want so don’t get comfortable. Historically whenever some whites have felt disenfranchised they have enacted these draconian and odorous laws to inflict psychological damage on those who they feel are the culprits. Do we really think that most local police will stop investigating crime and begin to focus on illegals? No, this law has broader implications and is a heavy-handed attempt to put Latinos back in their place. Don’t think for a minute that there won’t be some cowboy sheriff with a posse that won’t try to make some local political hay out of this, but overall police will continue to pursue local crimes.

I believe because this is an election year and the media can’t seem to get enough of the angry white voter, the politicians in Arizona decided to pander to the worst of our angels and send a message to that socialist in the White House that we have no intentions of just sitting back while our precious America is overrun with this brown tide of illegals that you seem incapable or unwilling to stop. I think everyone agrees that we need to secure our borders. Every country is entitled to know who comes in and who goes out of its borders, but let’s not use this as an excuse to marginalize a whole race of people. It seems important to some folks to be able to intimidate other folks but that solution has never been useful in bringing about positive change. It only seems to allow chaos and confusion to replace dialog and mutual understanding.

I find it interesting that there has been no major outcry from the libertarians or the tea-partiers concerning the fact that a government official can stop Americans and ask for their “papers”. Hell, I didn’t even know we had papers in America. I can’t imagine what I would do if a policeman stopped me on the street and asked for my papers. In my opinion the only way this could be even remotely constitutional is if we were all required to carry papers to verify our right to be in this country. Could you imagine the outcry from these patriotic white Americans if they were forced to carry papers to verify their being in America? You see it is ok for “those people” to have to prove their citizenship, but not those pure blooded Americans. When I heard about this law my first thought was did I accidentally be teleported back to an episode of “Hogan’s Heroes” and we now had Sgt. Schultz guarding our southern border?

I believe we must do more to secure our borders and for those who have to face this issue daily I sympathize with their frustration. I agree with those who are calling for a larger or even military presence on the border to stem the tide of undocumented. But the border is only one facet of the problem. We have millions of people who are residing in this country right now. What are we to do with them? What about the businesses that make it profitable for illegals to cross the border and work here? Do we ignore their role in this? Despite the decision of the folks in Arizona this is a complicated issue and one that requires more than a knee-jerk reaction. The time is overdue for real comprehensive immigration reform. We need reform that will recognize the complexities of this issue and balances the rights of current Americans with those of the immigrants. I hate to burst the bubble of the wing-nuts but you were once an immigrant in this country yourself.

It is vitally important that we implement immigration reform. We need a bill that strengthens our borders and protects this nation, but that also makes it simpler for good people to become Americans. - Dave Reichert

You’re Surprised

2010-04-27T22:49:00.004-05:00

Hell and destruction are never full, so the eyes of man are never satisfied. – Proverbs 27:20

I find it amazing the degree of surprise so many people are feeling while witnessing the level vitriol being spewed at President Barack Obama the first non-white president in our nation’s history. Who thought that a country who only less than 50 years ago allowed black folks the right to participate in our democracy and still have not fully integrated non-whites into our society would quietly accept this change with open arms. It never fails to amaze me how dumbfounded white folks are when they have to face the racism of their fellow citizenry. I remember the horror of my white friends as they watched the dogs, water hoses, and bombings televised on their television sets as they were forced to accept the hatred that has permeated America for centuries.

The thing that surprises me is that racism is now being used to make a profit for those who are willing to traffic in it. At least in the old days the leaders were true believers and not hucksters marketing gold, books, and other trinkets. Unfortunately, today there are plenty of folks who are willing to exploit the true believers hatred for short-term political and personal gain. Not only do we have individuals willing to profit from the spewing of hatred but also major media outlets in which to disseminate it. My question is how do you win national elections if you continue to alienate persons of color? The demographics of this country do not lie. The days of white majorities controlling elections on a national scale are over and no matter how much the tea-party protests they are not coming back.

My guess is that the only way this strategy can work is by marginalizing the non-whites while you play up the fears of whites to the point that it becomes an us versus them scenario. This strategy may have worked 50 years ago, but today even the white population is too diverse to accept this obvious ploy. How many times have white supremists attempted to start the dreaded race war by providing provocative acts to rally whites only to not be able to find enough takers to materialize. It is difficult to find revolutionaries when you have all the money, systems and power. Despite the claims of the tea party and their ilk that white folks are being discriminated against in this country by this black president and his extremist white sidekicks there appears to be few outside the movement who are taking these claims seriously. And who could argue with the numbers. Nearly twice as many whites as non-whites graduate from college, 91% of the richest 1% of the population is white, and the average net worth of white families is 10 times higher than black families.

There is fear in this country today among whites that they are losing their wealth and it is not completely unfounded. The problem is not that non-whites are stealing wealth from whites. The problem is that rich whites have stolen wealth from middle-class whites. We have witnessed the greatest transfer of wealth in our nation’s history and that wealth has moved from the middle income brackets to the top income brackets. The wealth that middle-class families once had in their homes, stocks, and retirement plans has evaporated. The wealth was not taken by non-white home invasion robbers; no it was taken by greedy white men in suits. You have to admit though that they are good, they have turned attention away from their pillaging of the national treasury by putting the focus on folks who are barely making a living in this country.

Whether it is Arizona or Washington, DC the game is the same. Despite many volumes being written by white authors about the corporate and individual thefts of our economy by their white brethren we still have the racist rants of the tea-partiers and their corporate overlords distracting the debate from the real culprits to some “bogeymen” who are not like us. If we as a nation following this corporate theft of historic proportions cannot recognize once and for all that we are not each other’s enemy but are all at risk from the rich and powerful then we will surely deserve our fate.

The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie -- deliberate, contrived and dishonest -- but the myth -- persistent, persuasive and unrealistic - John F. Kennedy

The Ugly American

2010-04-11T10:17:00.001-05:00

In my class and place, I did not recognize myself as a racist because I was taught to see racism only in individual acts of meanness by members of my group, never in invisible systems conferring unsought racial dominance on my group from birth. - Peggy McIntosh

As the flames of revolution are being stoked by the loyal opposition, the tea-partiers, and libertines everywhere I think it is interesting to note what issue is at the heart of this fervor. It seems odd to me that when George W. was spending money like a drunken sailor, dismantling the financial regulatory system, and expanding government that these angry mobs were nowhere to be found. So if we strip away the deficit spending, the expansion of government, socialism, radicalism and all of the other red herrings we are left with only a handful of possible issues. I think the largest and most dangerous is the issue that has always been simmering just below the surface in American history. This issue has never gone away but becomes more pronounced during periods of economic uncertainty and general fear by the majority population.

In spite of the great opportunity American presents to the world that people from different countries, races, and religions can live harmoniously together that opportunity has never truly been realized because at our core we are a very tribal nation. We have accepted the false dichotomy that in order for one tribe to prosper another has to decline so during times of economic uncertainty each tribe begins to protect what it perceives as its right to the remaining assets. The problem with this scenario is that it is based on the false premise that we are operating under a truly free market system and of course we are not. The system we are employing is akin to placing magnets on the roulette wheel in Vegas. It is slighted to one group over another already. I believe that a lot of the anger that is being displayed is legitimate. Hell, I’m angry. But I think it is being misplaced.

Instead of focusing on those who are using house money to make extravagant bets and when they win they keep their winnings, but when they lose their loses are being covered by the house. Imagine going to Vegas with 100,000 of someone else’s money and placing bets and if you win you keep all of the winnings, but if you lose the house pays your losses. We are the house and we are paying the winners and the losers. My problem with this round of protests is this. The majority of us are being screwed. The difference is that if you belong to the majority group you are getting lubricant while the rest of us are not, but make no mistake in the morning all of our butts are sore. My question is that if you wake up and your butt is sore and so is mine why would you blame me for what happened. It would seem to me that the logical thing to do would be to find those folks who do not have sore butts and ask them why not.

But the reason this is not happening is because of a little thing we have in this country called “white privilege”. To show how deep this runs in our society imagine if a group of Latinos would show up at an immigration rally armed or a group of blacks would show up at a affirmative action rally strapped what the reaction would be. You see the media and the talking heads debate the appropriateness of the venue of being armed but never that you have an angry mob of armed white folks talking revolution. White folks have an inherent right to be angry when their perceived privilege is threatened and this right goes without question, it is considered patriotic. However, when any other group replicates this behavior it is considered treason and a threat to our security.

What many of these protesters are angry about is not a real threat to America, but a perceived threat to their America”. What is “their America”? It is an America where their tribal right’s supersedes the rights of others. An example of this mentality would be when Pat Buchanan on MSNBC stated publicly that the white man single handedly built this country and that the only contribution of Blacks, Latinos, and Asians was the drag they put on the white man’s progress by living off of the system and abusing the kindness of white folks. Not to mention that the blacks were the cause of the “2nd American Revolution” when the Yankee aggressors took away the “states rights” from the peaceful southerners. To rewrite history in this way is akin to Japan stating that Pearl Harbor was a precursor to the Bush Doctrine of preemptive strikes to prevent the western aggressors from enslaving the peaceful Japanese people.

What we are seeing with these latest protests is that because they are really about maintaining white privilege there will not be a groundswell of support from those who are not white. This is just another example of “the ugly American” truth that we are not ready to put tribal differences aside for the sake of something larger like “country first”. Until we realize that we are all taking it on the chin for the sake of a few who are making out like bandits we will continue this tribal warfare against those whom we have the most in common with. All the while the real culprits will continue laughing all the way to the banks we bailed out in the cars we bought. Is this a great country or what?

Many of us believe that wrongs aren't wrong if it's done by nice people like ourselves. - Author Unknown

Stoking the Fires

2010-04-05T12:59:00.001-05:00

Extremists and populist movements are exploiting people's fear of those who are not like us. We can see the consequences in the form of terrorism and racially motivated violence. - Kjell Magne Bondevik

As the rhetoric continues to heat up around our political discourse I think it is important to understand the ramifications of such rhetoric. While there are those who see it as a vehicle to accomplish their short-term political aims, I think we should step back and look at its long-term consequences. It appears that as part of the Republicans long-term strategy of crippling the federal government and making it look impotent in solving real large-scale problems in the lives of its citizenry (except of course in the case of war and national security) they have decided that to help stoke the fires of populist anger they are going to use every tool available in our political system to obstruct the power of the government in any way they can.

While this strategy may yield the short-term political points they seek, what they are either unwilling to accept or willingly hoping to bring about is the total collapse of the faith of a nation in its government. Governments were created for a reason. What governments were created to do was to allow societies to take groups of people with differing selfish pursuits and allow them to unite under a larger purpose. While I would be the first to say that governments haven’t always lived up to their lofty goals I am not ignorant enough to believe that they are unnecessary. We as nation should be always debating the intrusion and scope of government in our everyday lives but the debate we should not be having is the loss of government. Now
there are those who will say that the removal of government is not the debate we are having today, but when you intentionally sabotage the ability of governments to serve their people and then hype up the hyperbole concerning governments over-reaching and inability to serve those needs it doesn’t take a rocket science to figure out what the natural outgrowth of that will be.

So one must ask what would be the benefit to politicians to encourage the loss of government. The answer is simple really without the government to look out for those who cannot look out for themselves the rich and powerful will have unfettered rule over our daily lives. Now while you may believe that having government intrusion into your life is intolerable that would in no way compare to the intrusion that corporations and other tools of the wealthy would exert in our lives. The rules that the government currently have in place to protect consumer safety, equal treatment under the law, and financial regulations would only be obeyed at the discretion of the corporations and the wealthy. Being a student of history I am not willing to rely on the “kindness of strangers” to protect me against the greed and corruption that would be sure to follow any loss of government protections. One only need to remember as far back as…..last year!

There is a reason we have Social Security. Prior to its enactment seniors in America were forced to work until they died. There is a reason we have child labor laws. Children were taken out of school and forced to provide cheap labor. There is a reason while we have civil rights legislation. Minorities and women were systematically excluded from our society. So these populist movements that yearn for the good ole days obviously are not familiar with their history or they are choosing to use some kind of selective amnesia. Either way as we become a more diverse nation the idea of going backwards to some false Norman Rockwell Americana will not hold much appeal to a great many Americans who were not depicted in those paintings. The population that these types of appeals reach out to is dwindling and as their lack of diversity demonstrates it is not resonating with the majority of Americans.

My advice to the folks who are stoking this anger for short-term gain is be careful what you wish for. When hatred and vitriol become your platform you never know who or what is going to jump out of Pandora’s Box. As any lion tamer will attest when the lions are hungry they have very short memories.

Better the occasional faults of a government that lives in a spirit of charity than the consistent omissions of a government frozen in the ice of its own indifference. - Franklin D. Roosevelt

It’s Just A Kiss

2010-03-16T11:51:00.002-06:00

In a perfect world the photograph of a black man kissing his white wife on television would illicit little if any reaction from those viewing the photograph. However, we do not live in that perfect world and so last night when the producers of MSNBC’s, “Countdown with Keith Oberman” repeatedly cut to shots of the photograph of Justice Clarence Thomas kissing his wife while discussing her lobbying and tea party activities seemed designed to exploit the prejudice and discomfort of a certain segment of the population. It is unfortunate but we live in a world where racial prejudice is still a part of everyday life. If we are truly honest with ourselves that photograph to many is the culmination of their worst fears and nightmares. This is true in a subtle way for many Americans not just the raging bigot.

For those who are unaware of the story last night during the MSNBC show, “Countdown with Keith Oberman”, they did a story on Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas’ wife Virginia (who happens to be white) establishing a conservative lobbying firm and also her possible attendance and speaking engagement at two upcoming tea party events. During the report they were showing pictures of Justice Thomas and his wife together in a variety of pictures including one of them engaged in a full mouth kiss. During the reporting of this story the show continued to cut back to the photo of Justice Thomas and his wife kissing.

Let me be clear I think that Justice Thomas and Justice Scalia are two of the worst jurist we have had in the history of the Supreme Court. I think that the activities of Justice Thomas’s wife highlighted in the story were worthy of media scrutiny. My concern does not lie in his wife’s activities reported in the story or the implications being drawn from those activities concerning possible conflicts of interest or the hypocrisy of the wife of someone who is paid by tax dollars rallying against taxes. No, my concern is with the show using what I know the producers knew was an inflammatory photograph to help bolster their argument. The show did not merely show the photograph once as part of a montage, but continued to cut back to that particular photograph and stay locked on it.

It is one thing to decry the tactics of Lee Atwater and Karl Rove; it is another to imitate those same tactics. I think it is the willingness of both sides of the political spectrum to use inflammatory images and speech that has allowed our political discourse to devolve into its current state. Was it necessary to continue to show that photograph to the reporting of that story? Remember the uproar concerning the ad that was used against Harold Ford Jr. with the white woman at the end of it winking and saying I’ll see you later or call me. I understand the desire to fight fire with fire, but in the end all you end up with is a bunch of burned up stuff. Are we, the public better served by the use of these tactics?

In my opinion by MSNBC using that photograph in that manner they are perched on a slippery slope that leads from journalism to Fox News. Is scoring short-term political points worth rousing the fears and prejudices of some people’s baser natures? For many years on the right the answer to that question has been a resounding yes, but is this a model we want to emulate? I fail to see the long-term strategy in arousing historical fears, anxieties, and prejudices in developing partnerships and common bonds. My hope is that this was a temporary lack of judgment and not a preview of coming attractions. Come on MSNBC you are better than this, that story has legs without the use of inflammatory pictures and incendiary language. I’d be curious to know if I was the only one who felt this way after the segment. Let me know what you think.

Education – Kansas City Style

2010-03-11T12:34:00.001-06:00

The plan will leave the district operating 33 schools, the fewest in 120 years. The district’s enrollment in 1889 was less than 18,000 — the same as its current enrollment. At its peak in the late 1960s, Kansas City was using more than 100 buildings and serving some 75,000 students. – Kansas City Star

As the school system in Kansas City, Missouri takes the national stage it is unfortunate that the reason is not because of better student achievement or more students graduating and going off to college. Instead it is because after decades of mismanagement and instability the current superintendent had to make some tough decisions. These decisions should have been made years ago as the board sit idly by while every school year more and more students left the district, but the school board chose to continue to kick the can down the road expecting some miracle to increase enrollment despite mounting evidence to the contrary.

I expect faith and looking for miracles from my religious leaders but not from elected members of the school board. There job was to evaluate the data and make planning decisions based on that data not continuing to placate a shrinking population. Each year parents in the district were voting by removing their kids from the district. I also expect stability in administration of the district’s curriculum and staff. Again we did not receive it. Instead we have had 26 superintendents in the last 39 years with a number of acting and interim folks at the helm of what can only be described as a troubled school district.

In a school district were only 30% of the students read at grade level and with a drop-out rate of 50% you would think that there would be some sense of urgency and commonality of purpose. Unfortunately in Kansas City you would be wrong. You see the school district problem is just a microcosm of the problems that have plagued Kansas City from the 60’s and 70’s. You see Kansas City is one of the most segregated cities in America. As a young man I recognized this fact and when I went away to college I promised myself that I would never return. At 17, I realized that no matter what I did at college I would be forever constricted in Kansas City. In Kansas City the racial lines are clearly defined and although few people talk about them we all know where they exist and to many they are stifling. You live in this area and you only socialize with these folks.

The Kansas City school district is 86% percent minority students and 80% of those students are receiving free or reduced lunches. What this means is that the school district is predominately minority and predominately poor. Since its peak enrollment of 75,000 the district has lost over 60,000 students. What that tells me is that those students who could have gotten out have left and what we are left with are the most difficult students to educate. But as with every issue in Kansas City it is cast in racial terms so the politics of race and division have trumped the welfare of the students. How many more students must the district lose before this becomes a priority for city leaders? Rather than developing a strategy to overcome these difficult challenges city officials and the school board are locked in this ninja death match where personal agendas and appealing to peoples worst angels are substituted for substantive discussion.

The unfortunate truth is that no matter how bad a system is if it is allow to continue it is because someone is profiting from it. Both sides of the racial divide in Kansas City are willing to sacrifice generation after generation of kids primarily minority kids for the sake of continuing this factionalism. The problem with a system like this is that both sides become very adept at framing issues in racial terms. One side states that there are no racial issues and the other that everything is a racial issue. It is very difficult to come together to solve major challenges when there is so much polarization. This was played out in the voting on the decision to close the schools which of course broke along racial lines. It took the courage of one African-American board member to enact this plan. My question to the other board members is this, “What is your plan to address a district that is operating at capacity when you have the student body at 40% capacity? Do you continue to ignore the reality like you have for years that your population is shrinking and your product is being rejected?

City Councilwoman Sharon Sanders Brooks, speaking to the board, lamented that the school closures will hurt the city’s central core. “Continuing the blighting of the urban core,” she said, “is scandalous and shameful.” – Kansas City Star

Instead of getting real answers to serious problems we get sound bites that play great to a certain constituency but adds nothing to the public discourse or to solving the problems. How anyone who has presided over this debacle can still remain at the head of this board is beyond me. This demonstrates the lack of priority that not only the city government puts on this issue but the public at large. We should realize that these aren’t their kids, they are all of our kids and act accordingly. Of course the answer will not be to replace those whose leadership is failing instead we will fire this superintendent and blame him for a dysfunctional system that he inherited and did not have the authority to change. How many more students, families, and jobs must we lose before someone takes this matter seriously? The three largest determinants to business development and relocation are public safety, schools, and a trained workforce. How are you doing Kansas City?

Bizarro World: The New Left is now the Tea Party

2010-03-05T14:46:00.002-06:00

Because of this assumption, members of the Tea Party right, like the members of the New Left, spend a lot of time worrying about being co-opted. They worry that the corrupt forces of the establishment are perpetually trying to infiltrate the purity of their ranks. – David Brooks New York Times Columnist

First of all I want to apologize to all of those people from the peace movement, civil rights movement, and the other groups from the sixties who fought and died for long denied social change in America for this article from David Brooks. Obviously while so many Americans were actually trying to grapple with a social system that they felt no longer represented who they were Mr. Brooks was too young to know what was going on. I have a real hard time taking anyone seriously who writes about a period of history that they did not actually participate in. To me most post-history is either conjecture or an attempt at a mulligan for those who are promoting their own agendas.

At no time has this fact become more true as it is now during the current period in our history when we are about to be bombarded by the “memoirs” of the disgraced Bush officials and their apologists. The three poster children for this period of selective amnesia ought to be Cheney, Rove, and now Brooks. If this column weren’t so dangerous it would almost be laughable. The reason that this column is dangerous is that it attempts to give legitimacy to the tea-partiers as neo-hippies taking on “the man” and “the system”. Nothing could be further from the truth. The tea-partiers began as astro-turf bankrolled by the defeat health-care lobbyist and no amount of cover from the right will legitimize them.

What Mr. Brooks fails to realize is that there are profound differences between what the tea-partiers are protesting and the protests of the “new left”. Has he forgotten that there was actually a war going on in Southeast Asia that was taking the lives, dreams, and family members of hundreds of thousands of Americans? Has also forgotten that blacks were living under the crushing oppression of Jim Crow while their civil rights were being denied in all areas of America? Has he forgotten that many blacks were still being lynched, sent to prison, and beaten for trying to express the rights that he and his friends take for granted? His attempts to equate the tea-partiers exploits to those of people who were willing to risk life, limb, and future for a true cause is not just disingenuous, it’s an insult to the memory of all of the slain civil rights workers and anti-war protesters.

To be fair many people may actually believe that President Obama is a foreign-born citizen and is not legitimately President. There also may be those who truly believe that he is leading the country towards socialism through a government take-over of healthcare. There may be those who truly believe that the federal budget was balanced prior to his taking office, that the country was at full-employment, and our economy was flying right along until President Obama’s coup took over in January of 2009. The truth is that we know that the “paranoia” of the sixties radicals was well founded by the release of so many FBI documents and internal government memos. To compare their legitimate fears to those of a bunch of folks many of whom who have some form of government healthcare today who believe that healthcare reform is a government plot to create death panels is unconscionable.

Actually, I am quite pleased that the Republicans are trying to recruit the tea-party folks it will give them a taste of what Democrats go through daily when you have a big tent. When you allow every voice to be heard you are liable to hear some things you weren’t expecting and for a party where everything is scripted right up to the candidates voting record for the next 10 years this could be a little disheartening. I agree the tea-partiers are radical and theatrical but to compare corporate mouthpiece Dick Armey to Saul Alinsky who spent his life trying to improve the lives of those less-fortunate is a stretch even for Brooks.

"Negroes were being lynched regularly in the South as the first stirrings of black opposition began to be felt, and many of the white civil rights organizers and labor agitators who had started to work with them were tarred, feathered, castrated -- or killed. Most Southern politicians were members of the Ku Klux Klan and had no compunction about boasting of it” – Saul Alinsky

For David Brooks to try and give credence to the “straw” and “boogie” men of the tea-partiers as being similar to the new left is criminal. Mr. Brooks, I don’t know where you got your research of the sixties and seventies but you might leave that history to those who were actually there. Another small difference between the two that continually gets ignored by the mainstream media is during the protests of the new left all races were represented because the issues being addressed affected all the people in the country. Where is the “melting pot” with the tea-party movement? If the issues they are protesting actually affected us all like the injustices of racism or the destruction of a senseless war where are the rest of the folks? Are minorities not concerned with losing their freedoms in a communist takeover?

One of the most important things in life is what Judge Learned Hand described as 'that ever-gnawing inner doubt as to whether you're right.' If you don't have that, if you think you've got an inside track to absolute truth, you become doctrinaire, humorless and intellectually constipated. The greatest crimes in history have been perpetrated by such religious and political and racial fanatics, from the persecutions of the Inquisition on down to Communist purges and Nazi genocide. – Saul Alinsky

Corporations and the Destroying of America

2010-02-25T21:58:00.001-06:00

There is one rule for the industrialist and that is: Make the best quality of goods possible at the lowest cost possible, paying the highest wages possible. – Henry Ford

We are entering a new era in the history of American life. Never in our history have we faced the possibility of millions of Americans not only being unemployed during this recession but not being able to be employed once this recession ends. Many economists predict that even after we recover that the unemployment rates will continue to be high for years. Job growth has continued to shrink in America for decades as many corporations have elected to ship American jobs overseas in a race to the bottom for the cheapest labor. They have moved manufacturing from third-world country to third-world country with no regard for its long-term consequences to the American worker. Corporations have traded the viability of the American labor force for short-term profits and Wall Street ratings.

What the heads of many of today’s corporations have forgotten is that if we lose the American middle-class which was created with manufacturing there will be no one left to purchase their products. The thing that Henry Ford understood was that if his workers or the American people could not afford the products he was manufacturing then there would be no profits and that is why he wanted to pay his workers a livable wage. Now does this take away from the fact that he was adamantly anti-union? Of course not, but it does prove that he recognized how consumerism benefited not only Ford but American corporations as a whole.

When Ford started the 40-hour work week and a minimum wage he was criticized by other industrialists and by Wall Street. He proved, however, that paying people more would enable Ford workers to afford the cars they were producing and be good for the economy. Ford explained the change in part of the "Wages" chapter of My Life and Work. He labeled the increased compensation as profit-sharing rather than wages. – Wikipedia

Imagine today if someone like Ford were to once again make such proposals how they would be criticized by other CEO’s and Wall Street. This mentality of greed and getting rich at any cost by American corporations is going to turn the American economy into the very rich and the rest of us. If we do not have a vehicle for the majority of American citizens to reach and stay in the middle-class we are setting the stage for our descent into third-world status. Are we willing as a nation to accept large numbers of our fellow citizens unemployed and living on the public welfare rolls. Those same rolls we have continued to reduce in an effort to decrease our support for our friends and neighbors. At least the Europeans have laid the foundation for a support and safety net to help them adequately address the shortfalls in the capitalist model. We on the other hand have accepted the false meme of the wealthy that “good” citizens don’t take handouts.

But here is something that the wealthy have not shared with the general public, “There have been no new manufacturing jobs created in the US since 1999” - Red Alert

In addition "Middle-income families made less in 2008, when adjusted for inflation, than they did in 1999 – and the number is sure to have declined further during a difficult 2009," the Washington Post reported. "The Aughts were the first decade of falling median incomes since figures were first compiled in the 1960s."

It is no wonder the ranks of the fringe groups are growing whenever the white middle-class feel threatened there is never a shortage of scapegoats to be sacrificed. The concern of course is that the real culprits are allowed to continue business as usual while the rest of us fight it out over the crumbs that have fallen from the table. Instead of fighting over the rich folk's crumbs we need to be demanding the pie be enlarged so that we all can get our fair share. For too long we have bought the lie that there is only limited assets and that our corporate overseers know best how to distribute those assets and anyone who complains is naïve at best and a socialist at worse.

The time has come for this dysfunctional government to begin to stand up for the people of this nation and not just the corporations. We need to enact a fee on corporations who ship our jobs overseas and invest that money to allow entrepreneurs who are willing to create green sustainable manufacturing jobs right here in America to do so. You should be allowed to create jobs wherever you choose but our tax dollars should not be used to subsidize our own demise. We should be manufacturing new battery technology, wind turbines, and solar technology right here in America. It is up to our elected officials to predict the future technologies and ensure that our workers are in a position to take advantage of those trends. We have economists, experts, and futurists who have for decades predicted where technology and manufacturing are headed and yet the American worker finds themselves in this position?

The American consumer is also the American worker, and if we don't do something to protect our manufacturing base here at home, it is going to be hard to buy any retail goods. - Lindsay Graham
The Disputed Truth

The Next Election Syndrome

2010-02-21T15:49:00.002-06:00

''In my father's day, you legislated for four years and campaigned for two; now it's full time,'' Bayh said this week. ''It never stops. My bottom line is that there are a lot of really good people trapped in a dysfunctional system desperately in need of reform.'' - Ohio.com

One of the main causes of the political gridlock that is gripping Washington and has brought our federal government to a screeching halt is the phenomenon of the constant campaign. Regardless of whether you win or lose moments after the election it all begins again. The problem with the constant campaign is that you basically invalidate the results of the previous election. You exchange long-term legislative initiatives for short-term political gains. Because you are always running for re-election or election to another office there is little if any incentive for compromise or accomplishing any legislative business. Bringing home pork has replaced solving complex political issues. Instead of running on any legislative record of accomplishments our congressional leaders are now campaigning on how much pork they have delivered to their districts.

As a result of this process we have sessions of congress that continue to kick the can down the road when it comes to solving major issues facing the American people. Issues like campaign reform, entitlement programs, and health-care reform continue to be discussed, debated and left to languish in session after session of congress. There may have been a time when this process was allowable in our nations past, but with the looming crisis's facing our country this attitude is no longer an option. With massive unemployment, thousands of Americans dying each year due to a lack of health-care coverage, and the corporations amassing millions of dollars of profit at the expense of middle America we no longer have the luxury of a dysfunctional government.

The main problem I have with the tea-baggers is that they have allowed themselves to be co-opted by the same interests they claim to be against. If we in America could ever get past the trivial tribal issues that continue to divide us we could remake this country into a greater vision than the founding fathers could ever have had. The problem with going back to 1776 is that we were not a land of freedom for all and so there are many folks who are not willing to go backwards to some false premise of America. There has to be a way of taking what was good with the original visions of the fore fathers and wed it to the inclusion of all Americans. We will never be able to accomplish this if we continue to hold on to the things that divide us and ignore the so many more things that unite us.

If we allow this phenomenon of constant campaigning to continue to invalidate our elections it will only give rise to the lunatic fringe and the anarchists who want to remove all government from America. We have elections for a reason and when you lose an election you do not have the option of preventing the victorious party from governing. You have the right to present your arguments and ideas but you lost for a reason. You can't have it both ways where on the one hand you laud the political process of democracy, but at the same time if the results are not to your liking you can invalidate them through obstructionism and become political opportunists. We have to get rid of this false meme that there is a rational opposition with rational grievances against the Dems and this President. If the bi-partisan commission on the budget is not proof enough of the duplicity of these Republicans then no amount of proof will suffice. It is incumbent upon a free press to expose this duplicity and not allow these obstructionists to have it both ways. This notion of an objective press being one that presents both sides as rational is absurd when one group is not acting rational.

Another problem with the constant campaign is that campaigns are also constantly doing fundraising and putting campaigns into bed with special interests that are now crafting our legislation. The key to election victories has gone from candidate competency to candidate fundraising ability and the two are not the same. Candidates now have to appeal to the baser instincts of the party faithful and cannot be seen as being complicit in the legislative accomplishments of the other side. This has led to obstructionism versus compromise. It becomes almost impossible to work with someone whom you have demonized in getting elected and now must work with once the election is over. Of course now the election is never over so where does that leave the American public. What many of today's politicians have forgotten is that in order for democracy to work it must be by the consent of the people and if you contaminate the process then you can very easily remove the consent.

This is the era of the constant campaign – where in order to break through the clutter, first time candidates must start their campaigns two years out and former candidates start campaigning again the day after Election Day. - Joe Garecht

The tyranny of a prince in an oligarchy is not so dangerous to the public welfare as the apathy of a citizen in a democracy - Charles de Montesquieu

The Republicans, the Supreme Court, & the Corporations

2010-02-15T18:32:00.002-06:00

I use to think that what has occurred over the last few years has just been a random series of political events and while they were devastating they were still unrelated. As I see more of our democracy breaking down I am becoming more skeptical concerning the randomness of these events. I have still yet to figure out how you lose two election cycles in a row and yet claim victory for your ideas that were soundly rejected and proven to be bankrupt. The thing about the Republican PR machine is that they have been allowed to create an alternate reality.

This alternate reality resembles our reality in many ways albeit one. In both realities the facts are the same but how they are interpreted are very different. It is a fact that the Republicans were decisively defeated in the election of 2008, no one can dispute that. Yet according to this alternative reality the election was not a repudiation of Republican ideas it was a repudiation of George W. Bush as if he were acting single-handedly to bring down the government and the country. It didn’t take long for them to throw George W. under the “straight talk” express bus. The sad part of all this is how Democrats have allowed this re-writing of history to continue unabated. It is one thing for Dick Cheney to come out from under his rock to defend his torturous record, but to allow these other clowns to distance themselves from the impending collapse that the Dems inherited is unconscionable. There have been more Dick Cheney sightings since he left office than the entire eight years he was in office. I don’t recall him being this accessible when he authorizing torture.

But let’s take a moment to see if we can connect the dots. First the Republicans work to cripple the government and make it appear incapable of solving the problems of average Americans. These average Americans become disillusioned with their government and accept the Republican meme that the government cannot be trusted to do anything and therefore all government intervention is anti-American and anti-founding fathers. Yet the government has a record when allowed to perform of successfully running programs like Medicare and Medicaid which these same average Americans count on every day. Add to this mix that you prevent any Democratic legislation from being enacted not because it is bad for the country but merely because it is politically expedient and you now have a dysfunctional legislative process. So you have a government that is not trusted to correctly sell postage stamps and a legislative process that is being obstructed to the point of a standstill.

The next dot is in the event that the federal government no longer functions to solve average American’s problems who then fills the void? Who then is able to advance policy and get legislation through? Well, thanks to the recent ruling of the Supreme Court that void will now be filled by the corporations. Let’s be clear it is not that the corporations were not instrumental in our body politic prior to this ruling. Corporations have continued to circumvent our democracy through campaign cash and lobbying efforts. Corporations have historically influenced public opinion and policy through the media by using advertising; they have used campaign cash and lobbying efforts, and the threat of extortion through plant closures and higher prices. What the Supreme Court has done is allowed the corporation’s unfettered access and influence in our political system at a time when the system is perceived as broken. What they did was the equivalent of giving Halliburton a no-bid contract to America to provide arms and materiel during war time.

The final dot is the corporations themselves who have historically shown that they have little regard for democracy or the will of the people. It is common wisdom in the world that the capitalists of America will sell you the rope to hang them with and this decision by the Supreme Court may bring this gem of wisdom to fruition. Once the will of the people has been stymied by corrupt politicians and obstructionists the only coherent voice from the chaos will be the benevolent corporations who will ride in and rescue the American public from its impending doom at the hand of government mismanagement. These of course would be the same corporations who took this economy to the brink of Armageddon and continue to provide each other with immoral compensation for these failures. I guess the Republicans are not the only ones living in this alternative reality. You now get giant bonuses for running your company into the ground by gambling with its assets and why not your company will not be liable for it anyway.

There is a foundation being laid in America and I am afraid that we are so busy concentrating on the minutiae of the 24 hour news cycle that we are missing the larger picture. As Pink Floyd so aptly stated you build a wall one brick at a time and these are just more bricks in the wall.

I find rebellion packaged by a major corporation a little hard to take seriously. – David Byrne

Republicans Do Not Have To Win

2010-02-12T13:51:00.000-06:00

The election of 1994 only reinforced the strategy of no. Why help the majority pass legislation when you can stall until voters, frustrated with gridlock, throw the other side out? Once out of power, Democrats went to school on the GOP delaying tactics. - Robert Schlesinger

As I look over the Republican strategy of the last year and its impact on the electorate one thing is abundantly clear. The Republicans do not have to win at anything, because even when they lose they win according to their scorecards. The Scott Brown election in Massachusetts has been presented as this massive shift in the public’s desire for President Obama’s “changey, hopey” message. While the Scott Brown election was troubling, I think in the long run it will be beneficial to Democrats. It will be beneficial to Democrats because I think it has exposed the absurdity of this super-majority being necessary to govern and to pass any legislation.

Already we are beginning to see stirrings from Democrats about changing the Senate rules and for good reason. The Republicans have turned the filibuster into their own personal veto. Election results have become invalidated and the democracy that so many Americans grew up believing in has become dysfunctional. And as long as nothing gets done then the minority party can claim that the majority party is not responding to the wishes of the American people. By employing this strategy the Republicans have given fuel to the directionless populist movement known as the “tea-baggers”, who’s only common thread appears to be that they are against government and who can blame them. My belief is that what many of them are against is a government that is broken with no possible remedy in sight.

Even folks who previously believed in the power of government to affect positive change in the lives of people are on the ropes after the whole health-care debacle. Unlike many of the right-wing conservative talking heads I do not think that the way to move forward is to go backwards. This strategy plays right into the hands of their obstinate politicians who only have to prevent government from working to win and not actually get anything done. The Democratic strategy moving forward should be to make democracy work again not by trying to continue to seek bi-partisanship with a group that has no intention of working with you, but by changing the rules to allow our democracy to work. What many Americans just want to see is action being taken even if that action is wrong.

The American public is not that concerned with ideology as much as we are being told. There are segments to the extremes of both parties that hold those entrenched ideological positions but most Americans are pragmatist and they just want to see that something gets done. They want to believe that somebody is listening to them and responding to their concerns. If the Democrats are not able to provide them with that then they will suffer great loses in November. The truth is that for the long-term future of America this strategy of breaking our democracy holds dangers that the politicians and strategists of today are not concerned with and that is dangerous. If we continue this cycle of each party getting elected and no one accomplishing anything then the future of our whole democracy is at stake. Eventually the country will become ungovernable and maybe that is the goal of the Republicans.

A good example of this phenomenon of just do something is George W. Bush even in the midst of his wrecking the country he continued to score fairly high marks until the end. Those marks were due in a large part I believe to his ability to appear to be getting things done, they may have been the wrong things but they were getting things done. If the Democrats have any chance of salvaging this November they had better get down to the business of making government work again. I say this not because of its short term benefit of keeping them in power but because of its long-term benefit and that is because it is the right thing to do for our nation.

Scorched earth campaigns may win you the battle, but it leaves the land barren and unfruitful for a long time and with the current state of our nation is this something we can afford?

In the first 50 years of the filibuster, it was used only 35 times. But the last Congress alone had 112 cloture motions filed, plus threats of more. This is the tyranny of the minority. - Peter Fenn

I Give Up

2010-01-26T12:03:00.002-06:00

I support the Weak and Feckless Approach. Trust is based on mutual respect and reciprocity. If, at this moment of rage and cynicism, the ruling class goes even further and snubs popular opinion, then that will set off an ugly, destructive, and yet fully justified popular rebellion. Trust in government will be irrevocably broken. It will decimate policy-making for a generation. – David Brooks, NY Times

I had promised myself that I wasn’t going to blog about the lessons of Massachusetts or the direction the President should take in its wake. But leave it to David Brooks to bring out the worst in me. First let me begin by saying that what happened in Massachusetts was a message but not the one that the talking heads and pundits in the media are determined to sell us.

The election in Massachusetts was about President Obama and it wasn’t about President Obama. What am I saying? Am I trying to have it both ways like many of the talking shirts on television who purport to be journalist? No. Let me explain. The election in Massachusetts and the two governors’ races prior to it was not about the President or his policies. What those voters and future voters are repudiating is how our democracy currently functions or fails to function. What the fight over the health-care bill demonstrated to many Americans is that when it came to how our democracy works they didn’t know Jack. Prior to the health-care fight most Americans believed that our democracy functioned like it was taught in civics class so many years ago by a pleasant slightly overweight elementary school teacher. What they witnessed in the past few months turned their stomachs and rightly so. Many Americans had believed the system was broken and now they have some idea how truly broken it is.

The election in Massachusetts was about the President in the fact that he has not been the President he campaigned to be. He was the candidate of change and yet since his election he has not begun the most important change of all, fixing our broken government. The President like so many other politicians thought that the way to fix Washington was this elusive false narrative of bi-partisanship. The way to fix Washington has nothing to do with bi-partisanship in this toxic atmosphere. The term bi-partisanship supposes that you have two parties that are interested in a greater good, the benefit of the people. We currently do not have two groups who share that belief. What the two groups do share is that the greater good is their re-election and job security. The way we fix Washington is to allow our government to function on the most cherished democratic principle; the majority rules. The history of how we have gotten to this mythical 60 vote plateau is long and tawdry but the truth is as long as we allow it to dictate our politics then people like Ben Nelson and Scott Brown become more important than the will of the people.

When President Obama came into office his advisers mistakenly thought that it was George Bush and the Republicans that the public was repudiating, but it was deeper than that. Poll after poll showed that Congress and the government had historical lows in popularity and trust with the American people. To understand this you have to understand the Republican agenda. The Republicans have for decades sought to limit government and its influence in the lives of Americans. Many people have been blindly led to believe it was for patriotic reasons but the truth is that those who have power and rule over others do not need the same government as average Americans do. They don’t need or want for the government to regulate industries, or provide emergency services, or safety nets. In order to convince the American public that government is unnecessary and ineffective each Republican administration has allowed the government to function ineptly and then said, “See we told you the government can’t solve problems.” What this systematic assault on the government through incompetence has done has convinced a large portion of the American electorate that government is unable to help average people. The most recent example would be the Bush administration response to Hurricane Katrina. Has the federal government ever looked more pathetic?

If I were President Obama my number one priority would be to do a series of weekly fireside chats with the American people. I would begin by saying that I am just as appalled at the democratic process as the rest of the American people and we need to begin the process of changing it. Most Americans voted for dramatic change not in their lives but a dramatic change in how government functioned. President Obama was elected to change how the government worked in the lives of average Americans and that should have been one of his top priorities because without that mandate any changes in policy were doomed by the politics of negativity and incumbency. It is time for the President to side with those who elected him and rally those folks to help repair this broken democracy. Until we address this problem it won’t matter what the policies are or who the President is there will be no change. With the latest opinion of the best Supreme Court corporate money could buy the time for change has never been more critical.

"If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you; and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen." - Samuel Adams

White Defenders

2010-01-10T17:49:00.003-06:00

In a private conversation reported in a new book, Reid described Obama during the 2008 presidential campaign as a "light-skinned" African-American "with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one."

I have to be honest that I am always a bit skeptical when white folks feel compelled to step up and defend black folks from other white folks. I am even more cynical when it is white Republicans doing the defending. This would be the same Republican party who has since the 60’s run on the southern strategy, whose conventions look more like all-white country clubs, and who have from his election sought to de-legitimize this President. Now we are to believe that they are so concerned with the delicate psyche of African-Americans that Senator Reid’s remarks rises to the level of Trent Lott? For those who don’t remember Trent Lott was the Republican majority leader who stated that the country would have been better off if unrepentant segregationist Strom Thurmond had won the presidency in 1948.

For the sake of argument let’s look at Senator Reid’s reported statement concerning then Senator Obama. He stated that he was a light-skinned black man which as far as I can tell would be a true statement. My guess is that Senator Reid was alluding to the fact that historically lighter skinned blacks have fared better in American society than darker skinned blacks so that would be a positive in his bid to become president. On the surface this would appear to be a callous statement however if we look at not only the history of blacks within the majority society but also within the black community the statement tends to stand on its own merits. Now does this excuse the fact that darker-skinned blacks tend to be discriminated more than light-skinned blacks? Of course not, but the truth is still the truth. Let’s face it folks whites tend to be more comfortable with light-skinned blacks. If you were to poll blacks and say does the fact that President Obama is light-skinned does that diminish his status as an African-American I think the answer would be a resounding no based on the fact that he received almost 100% of the black vote.

The second part of Senator Reid’s remarks could be more problematic in the sense that he stated that Obama had no Negro dialect which could be offensive to some blacks. The question then becomes do blacks as a group speak differently from whites and can those differences be readily apparent to the listener? I think Senator Reid was stating that Barack Obama could choose to speak black or white depending on his audience. The problem here is that we are talking about politicians who often craft their message depending on their audience and for a politician to be able to speak to multiple groups is an asset. I think I remember during the campaign how Hillary and Bill changed dialects when they were speaking in black churches or to primarily black audiences. Does that make them racists? I think not, it makes them politicians. As every successful black man knows who is not in the entertainment business or a professional athlete knows we live in two different worlds we have to adept in the white world as well as the black world. I have to be able to speak to white businessmen as well as black community folks and they are not the same.

The biggest problem I have with this faux Republican outrage is that in order to determine Reid’s remarks one has to look at his intent. Was his intent to racially disparage Barack Obama? No, in fact in his mind he was giving a list of the positives for then candidate Obama. We must remember this was the beginning of a historical campaign and who amongst us did not consider these if not other positives and negatives of the candidates. The problem for Senator Reid is that his remarks were recorded. To me this just demonstrates the problem with the current Republican strategy and that is it shows their total lack of principles. When you attack everything you find yourself defending some former positions that you once opposed, by doing this you appear hypocritical at best and insane at worse. Republicans defending Medicare? So what we have is Senator Reid stating that Barack Obama was a light-skinned black man who could speak to both black and white audiences. Yeah, that’s grounds for his immediate dismissal. Speaking as a black man I’m still missing the outrage no matter who had made the statement.

For Michael Steele to go on television and equate what Senator Reid reportedly said to what Trent Lott said is beyond me. Are we to believe that saying the country would be better off today if in 1948 an avowed racist had won the Presidential election is comparable to saying that Barack Obama was more electable because he was light-skinned and he spoke to both blacks and whites? I don’t think so. Have we become so racially sensitive that stating the obvious is now considered racist? The reason Mr. Steele will never be able to accomplish what he was elected to do which I think was to reach out to African-American voters is because in order to defend his task masters he losses any credibility with the very voters he is charged with attracting. Mr. Steele’s remarks may appeal to whites but if that is his core audience then the Republicans would have better served if they had elected another white man who would not have brought the baggage Mr. Steele has obviously brought. Do Republicans believe that blacks are that gullible? I hope not for their sakes.

"Genius may have its limitations, but stupidity is not thus handicapped." - Elbert Hubbard
The Disputed Truth

Negro or African-American?

2010-01-07T10:37:00.002-06:00
“While the term "Negro" has appeared in previous census forms, some young or first-time African-American census participants may find it offensive, which could present a problem for the 2010 census campaign, which has focused on inclusion.” - theGrio

I was watching the Rachel Maddow show last night on MSNBC and I couldn’t help but be intrigued by a young black man who seemed obviously intelligent discussing why having the option Negro on the census form was an insult to black people and how he thought the option should be abolished from those forms. The young man’s name was David A. Wilson, managing editor of theGrio.com. For those who don’t know “theGrio” is a news site launched by NBC to provide news content with an African-American slant. While I have not done extensive research on the site, I did find the argument against the census option confusing at best and naïve at worse.

The article and the young man argued that many younger African-Americans who may be participating in the census for the first time will be offended by having the option of Negro because it is a term that they have rarely if ever used. I understand the desire and the need for young people to help move the society away from past colloquialisms, however here is my problem with this and similar scenarios taking place in the black community. With so many enormous challenges facing the black community we continue to focus on issues like these which in the overall scheme of things are a matter of semantics at best.

As a neighborhood leader I am constantly confronted with this type of attitude in meetings ranging from school performance to the green economy. We continue to debate facts that are already in evidence and the effects of past problems as if to deny facts or to solve past injustices will remedy our current situation. A case in point is that in our school district we have a 50% drop-out rate for minority students, only 30% of our students are reading at grade level, and unemployment is at over 25%. Now rather than suing the school district for obvious under performance we have folks suing a property management company in our newly renovated downtown district because they have a dress-code that precludes sagging pants and white t-shirts. Now while I am not minimizing the importance of not allowing racially motivated policies to go unchallenged in public accommodations is that really the most pressing issue in our community? At a recent meeting discussing violence in our community the president of the school board when presented with the fact that the dress code for the schools was not being enforced in the schools by an officer who works with the schools, she stated that first the officer was incorrect and then followed that up with that the statement that the charter schools are having similar issues. Now these statements are from the head of our school board which to me is tantamount to the excuse that all the other kids are doing it and as all good parents know that excuse has never held water.

I have to confess that I use the term negro as a replacement for the widely used and accepted term in our community of “ni**a”. It seems odd to me that young African-Americans would have an issue with the term negro but don’t seem to show the same disdain for the term “ni**a”. It seems logical to me that if the Census folks were striving for inclusion that they would want to provide as many options to folks as they could since so often today everyone wants their own category or box to check. Have we become so sensitive that the term used on the census form has been elevated over more serious issues like health, unemployment, and education? I wish our bright young folks were spending more time articulating solutions to these issues than what term to use on a once every ten year form.

For my money if NBC wants to attract serious black readers they would focus more on the major issues facing our communities and not these types of red herrings. I would love to hear the editor’s opinion on what we must do as a community to combat the lawlessness and violence that is rocking so many of our communities or the lack of education being a priority for so many of our parents. We must begin to refocus our attention and our efforts on the issues that will make our young people more successful and prepared for the world that awaits them and not focus on an issue that will have little effect on their ability to graduate from college or become employable. We as a community have not done a very good job of preparing our young people for the world around them and it has resulted in the state that Dr. King feared most and that was that after all of the marching and dying that when the doors were finally opened there wouldn’t be folks ready to take advantage of all of the hard work of their ancestors (formerly known as Negroes).

There are many more wrong answers than right ones, and they are easier to find - Michael Friedlander
The Disputed Truth

Controversy

2009-12-14T00:49:00.003-06:00
“As a black member of the media, I know what I’m expected to do today — shout that Gill’s hiring as Kansas’ new football coach is a bold step for college football mankind, a terrific hire by Lew Perkins and the culmination of Martin Luther King’s dream.” – Jason Whitlock

I just finished reading Jason Whitlock’s column in the Kansas City Star concerning the recent hiring of Turner Gill as the new head football coach at the University of Kansas. Many of you might know Mr. Whitlock as the controversial sports writer who has weighed in on some very controversial topics such as the Jena 6, the Don Imus affair, and the Mark Mangino firing. I wrote a diary concerning Mr. Whitlock’s Jena article and thought that he had reached his lowest point as a journalist. However, his column concerning the hiring of Coach Gill I think has taken him to a new all time low.

Mr. Whitlock is entitled to his opinion as to the qualifications of Coach Gill, but as his quote demonstrates Mr. Whitlock has decided to forego journalistic integrity for the sudden fame he has received as the Morton Downey Jr. of sportswriters. He begins his article looking for controversy and a fight and if one isn’t present he wants to create one. My guess is that Mr. Whitlock has witnessed the rise to fame of another former radio sports personality Rush Limbaugh and has decided that controversy can also be his ticket to fame and fortune. The only problem with controversy is that it is a double-edged sword and certainly in today’s newstainment market controversy does sell and gets you page hits but it also comes with polarization. Mr. Whitlock after beginning his column with the decision that he wants to be controversial goes on to state that Coach Gill has had a lackluster career at the University of Buffalo where he was the head coach. Based on Mr. Whitlock’s analysis one could conclude that Coach Gill’s hiring is another example of affirmative action going haywire.

As a former student at KU when I heard the news of Coach Gill’s hiring I was excited for two reasons. The first is that I think Turner Gill is a rising coaching talent he took a program that hadn’t won in 10 years and made them respectable, even defeating Mr. Whitlock’s vaulted Ball State undefeated squad in 2008. The second reason to be honest was that my school had hired a black coach for a BCS school. For those who are not familiar with the pathetic hiring record of college minority football coaches; there are 121 division I schools and out of those schools only four of them have black coaches. Now black kids make up 50% of kids playing college football and yet only four black men are qualified enough to coach them? For the sake of black folks everywhere I hope this is not true.

The problem I have with Mr. Whitlock and other black men like him is that they show a certain ambivalence towards their own racial identity. They are willing to accept the benefits of being black but are not willing to accept that there are disadvantages for other people who are black. These are the men who take, “you are not like those other black folks” as a complement, not realizing that it is in fact an insult. Mr. Whitlock is fond of mentioning all of his rapper friends and his “street cred” but he has no trouble throwing other black folks under the bus for the sake of his pursuit of controversy. While there is a lot of internal work that black folks need to do to overcome their continuing to undermine the opportunities that we receive, but a crucial component of this work is to have symbols of success that they can look to for inspiration. Whether it is a black president or a black head coach it is something to take pride in and a goal to strive for. God knows we need all the positive role models we can get. One of the major challenges for black folks especially for those living in our crumbling inner cities is the lost of successful role models due to integration and the desire of some to believe that I got mine and the hell with those left behind.

Is Coach Gill going to be the next great coaching phenom? I don’t know, but what I do know is that he deserves a chance. The problem with Mr. Whitlock and blacks like him is when white coaches or white folks fail they don’t question the ability of white folks to continue to have opportunities presented to them. My question is since Coach Weis failed at Notre Dame why is Mr. Whitlock not calling for no more white coaches at Notre Dame? It is hard enough for black coaches to get shots in NCAA football the last thing they need is another black man questioning their abilities to coach.

Ability is of little account without opportunity. - Napoleon

Republicans & Big Pharma

2009-12-07T12:23:00.002-06:00
(By my count, there are still 24 Republicans in the Senate who voted for the drug benefit, including such alleged conservatives as Jim Bunning and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, John Cornyn of Texas, Mike Crapo of Idaho, Orrin Hatch of Utah and Jon Kyl of Arizona.) - Bruce Bartlett

While hypocrisy is not confined to one political party or the other what the Republican senators who are now defending Medicare and fiscal responsibility are doing is beyond the norm even by Washington standards. The Republicans who were standing at the podium with Senator John McCain should have been ashamed. While Senator McCain can stand up and say that he opposed the Medicare Part B plan and voted against it many of his Republican counterparts supported the largest public giveaway in decades. Medicare Part B was George W. and Karl Rove’s attempt to buy the seniors for the 2004 election by providing unfunded prescription drug coverage to seniors.

Not only did they simply attach it to a federal budget that went from a surplus to record deficits they also provided the pharma industry with millions of new customers without requiring any cost reductions or anyway to pay for it. For these same senators to now claim to be fiscal conservatives is laughable. Senator McCain is once again displaying why his “Country First” campaign slogan was empty rhetoric by allowing members of his own party to stand behind him as if they had shared his concerns about the Medicare legislation. If Mr. McCain was the “maverick” he claims to be he would speak out against the hypocrisy being displayed by his fellow senators. It is one thing to be against legislation that is seeking to be budget neutral on philosophical grounds, but not if you voted for the Medicare Part B legislation.

Somewhere in a cave between Louisiana and Mississippi some Republican strategist came up with the strategy that the way you prevent spending on social and domestic issues is by bankrupting the federal coffers through tax-cuts, fighting two wars, and drug giveaways. The thing we have to remember is that by starving social programs there are groups who benefit. If you can reduce the number of middle and low income kids going on to college then your kids have a better opportunity to attend a prestigious college and in turn you reduce the number of graduates that your kids will have to compete against for jobs. The same can be demonstrated for healthcare, jobs, and many other social programs that could benefit the masses. It plays out in the healthcare debate by rationing care to those who are unable to afford the high cost of health insurance thus insuring better healthcare for those who can.

Once again the Republicans are demonstrating their utter lack of regard for average Americans by attempting to block legislation that would begin to free Americans from the yoke that the insurance companies have placed around our national necks. To turn what is clearly a moral issue into a financial issue after you have given away the whole barn would be farcical if it wasn’t so criminal. The way you balance the budget is by spending all of the money? I guess it’s like the joke we had in college for balancing our checkbooks, “You’re not out of money until you run out of checks.” The Republicans have not only run out of money and checks but have also run out credibility.

How are these hypocrites being allowed to stand before the American people without the media presenting the complete story is unconscionable? The American people deserve a media that is willing to call out the hypocrites publicly especially on issues of this magnitude instead of this false objectivity that all voices are equal and all seek what’s best for the majority when in fact this is not true. It is one thing to be against legislation on principal, but you can’t selectively apply these principles when you are in or out of power. If when you were in power not only did you not hold your party to these principles, but you violated those principles you now hold up as sacrosanct then how sacred can these principles be? A famous Republican once stated that the definition of hypocrisy is the man who murders both parents and then ask the court for leniency because he is an orphan. This appears to be the strategy of the current Republican party they were against Medicare before they were for Medicare before they were against it and then for it, etc. etc. How ironic it is to see Republican lawmakers claiming that they are the defenders of a program they have for decades sought to eliminate.

Hypocrite: the man who murdered both his parents... pleaded for mercy on the grounds that he was an orphan. - Abraham Lincoln

Commander in Chief

2009-12-05T15:53:00.001-06:00
This review is now complete. And as Commander-in-Chief, I have determined that it is in our vital national interest to send an additional 30,000 U.S. troops to Afghanistan. After 18 months, our troops will begin to come home. These are the resources that we need to seize the initiative, while building the Afghan capacity that can allow for a responsible transition of our forces out of Afghanistan. – excerpt from President Obama’s speech

From the “be careful what you wish for” department we have the previous statement from the first US President to invoke the “Powell Doctrine.” Ever since the Vietnam War we have been inundated with the oft repeated chorus of “don’t send in troops without an exit strategy”. From Reagan to Bush II it has been the same refrain and to a man none of them heeded the warning. Each one of them to a man committed American troops without consideration of how they will be extracted. The closest to come to observing this doctrine was the elder Bush with the Gulf War when he went against conventional wisdom and did not allow US troops to enter Baghdad.

How anyone could be surprised by the president’s decision is beyond me. Even as a candidate Senator Obama stated that he wasn’t against all wars, just dumb wars and that he felt the trouble with Afghanistan was a lack of resources. So he decides to provide the resources for a limited amount of time and see if this will provide the impetus needed to reverse the momentum loss caused by the previous administration’s lack of focus. We must remember that there were no good options. The thing that troubles me about many of the critics of the President’s policy is their seeming naiveté concerning what those options were. They provide the false dichotomy of only two options: escalation or retreat. This President would be damned if he did and damned if he didn’t. If he had chosen to remove our presence from Afghanistan and there would be another terrorist attack on American soil as so many of the wing-nuts is hoping for, he would receive a mortal wound and not just him but the Democrats as a whole.

Right, wrong or indifferent we invaded Afghanistan and as a result of that invasion we owe it to those folks to give them our best effort and after that effort if we fail then at least we tried. To say that we are packing up and leaving at this stage was a viable option was not only disingenuous but also foolish. No rational person would advocate limitless war as many on the right seem to be doing, but at the same time we have an obligation to make an effort to meet our goals. The problem previously has been that there were no goals, at least now we have goals and a strategy. No one knows if they will succeed, thus the need for an exit strategy.

A legitimate concern is that this escalation could lead to a more protracted conflict; after all we have been there for almost eight years. In this instance we have to trust the man elected to be commander in chief to stand by his word. The question then becomes do we have reason not to trust this president? This is a question every American has to answer for themselves. I for one have not received enough evidence to the contrary not to at least give him the benefit of the doubt. Undoubtedly there will be those who would argue the opposite and they are entitled to their opinion, but where are the facts?

The bottom line remains the same as it is in Iraq and that is if the Afghanis are not willing to support our efforts and themselves then no amount of troop increase or expenditure of wealth will make this effort a success. The key to this or any military action comes down to the folks who will be left behind when we finally leave and make no mistake we will leave. Too often our past foreign policy decisions have been based in the false premise that all nations want our form of government and our capitalistic society. The truth is that there are many nations who are not willing to accept our excesses as their own, who have historical cultures that predate our own that are not conducive to democracy. Does that make them wrong? Maybe, but that is not an issue for us to decide but for the citizens of that country. Our goal should be to provide them with the opportunity to choose for themselves and the wherewithal to defend those choices.

I for one applaud the President’s decision making process and his willingness to take the political hits to be thoughtful and deliberate. I applaud the fact that he did not make this decision in the heat of the political winds and that he realized the gravity of this decision. I may not agree with the exact decision, but I respect how he arrived at it enough to give him the benefit of the doubt and I think the men and women in our military feel the same way. Part of the greatness of America despite the fear mongering of the wing-nuts is our ability to have debate without fear of reprisals, such as being called traitors or un-American. Thank God those days are over, so even if you disagree with me and the president I promise I want dismiss you as being unpatriotic.

“The first quality for a commander-in-chief is a cool head to receive a correct impression of things. He should not allow himself to be confused by either good or bad news.” - Napoleon

A More Decent Society

2009-11-26T12:06:00.001-06:00
Reform would make us a more decent society, but also a less vibrant one. It would ease the anxiety of millions at the cost of future growth. It would heal a wound in the social fabric while piling another expensive and untouchable promise on top of the many such promises we’ve already made. America would be a less youthful, ragged and unforgiving nation, and a more middle-aged, civilized and sedate one. – David Brooks; NY Times

I never thought I would see the day when I would agree with David Brooks, the syndicated Conservative columnist from the New York Times. But when you’re right, you’re right. This health care debate is about the values we hold as a nation and those things we think are important. However, after that point our views are markedly different. You see Mr. Brooks believes that wealth should only flow upwards from the middle and lower classes to the wealthy. He believes that by taxing the wealthy we stifle future growth and make ourselves a less vibrant nation. I would be curious as to how he would explain the Bush tax-breaks for the wealthy and how removing the regulations from Wall Street made us a more vibrant nation?

You see what Mr. Brooks fails to divulge is that giving money to rich people has never stimulated anything except profits made from capital manipulation and not the profits made from manufacturing anything. The goal of the wealthy is not to spend money but to hoard money; this is how you get to be wealthy by not spending your own money. His premise that if we continue to funnel money upward that this will insure the future growth of this nation is false and has historically been proven to be false. What has stimulated growth in our nation’s history have been those expensive promises that he and so many other compassionate Conservatives have been opposed to from their inception. It was not the robber-barons that made us a vibrant society; on the contrary it was those programs put in place that created the middle-class. If Mr. Brooks and his cronies had their way we would have two classes: the very wealthy and the rest of us.

But beyond the economic benefits of these “promises” there is also the moral imperative of a society to provide basic services to all of their people. Just once I would like to completely shut down this evil government for one week. For an entire week the government stops providing all the services it now provides and then see how these anti-government wing-nuts would respond. My guess is they would do rather well considering the have the funds to replace government services, but what about all of those folks without a pot to piss in or a window to throw out who turn out for these anti-government rallies? I remember during the Presidential campaign at McCain rallies when he would say Obama wants to raise taxes on those people earning over 250,000 dollars a year and there would be boos and then they would pan the audience and no one at the rally appeared to make over 50,000 a year and it was amazing to me to see their responses to policies that would benefit them.

Another thing that troubles me about the column is its inherent divisiveness. Mr. Brooks is attempting to appeal to the young to choose greed over compassion. As if money and the acquisition of stuff is all that defines a nation and a person and this conversation has come to dominate the health care debate in our country. What’s in it for me is the new mantra of our society. There was a time not long ago when sacrifices for our country was more than a bumper sticker; when having compassion on your fellow citizen’s did not have to be justified by a bottom line. It’s funny whenever we discuss helping the least of us we become suddenly fiscal hawks, but where were these fiscal hawks when Mr. Bush was funding two wars and giving tax-breaks to the richest among us? Why weren’t these expenditures scrutinized to the level that health reform has been?

The bottom line is that our systems are failing not just the least of us, but all of us and until we come to that conclusion jointly as people it will continue to do so. This debate isn’t really about right or left, rich or poor it is about what is best for us as nation. We have seen firsthand what the politics of greed has wrought us. Every twenty years we are brought to the brink of self destruction by a financial industry that puts profits not only before people but also our nation. But why should we believe our eyes when we can take the word of shrills like Mr. Brooks and believe beyond reality that the rich folks will take care of the rest of us once they get enough money. The only problem with that theory is that they will never get enough money and so it goes.

Wisdom: to live in the present, plan for the future, and profit from the past – Unknown
The Disputed Truth

The Forgotten

2009-11-09T00:39:00.002-06:00
From the outset of the healthcare debate I have been amazed and deeply troubled by the tone of the debate. I was not troubled by the tea-baggers and town hall crazies; they can be explained by the history of our country’s corporate takeover of any serious debate concerning changing the status quo. I wasn’t even troubled by the Republican’s complete abdication of their responsibility to this country’s future by deciding that short-term political expediency trumps long-term engagement in the political process. No, the thing that has troubled me the most is how this healthcare reform debate has focused not on those who have needed it most (the uninsured) but on those who currently have healthcare. Somewhere a political calculation was made that the best way to pass reform was to downplay the moral imperative of having at least 46 million uninsured and thousands dying every year from lack of healthcare.

I wonder what does it say about a country when you have to frame an issue like this in what’s in it for me? Have we become so selfish and insensitive that we have lost the capacity to care for our fellow citizens who happen to be not as fortunate as we are unless there is something in it for us? Granted with the current economic downturn we all could use some relief and it is only human nature to seek out our own self-interest, but this latest trend of everybody for themselves is a little disheartening. It appears that the only folks who have been the recipients of charitable giving are the ones who least need it, i.e. bankers, CEO’s, etc.

Not since the death of Senator Ted Kennedy has anyone in politics spoken of our moral obligation to one another to give everyone in this country healthcare. It is amazing to me how the Republicans and health insurance companies have frightened the Democrats into abandoning the argument that people are dying every day from a lack of healthcare coverage and not only that but people’s long-term health is being seriously affected by their lack of access today. Rather than treat a cough today we prefer the current system that waits until it becomes pneumonia before providing the highest cost and least effective treatment available. I don’t understand how anyone can get traction from the argument of screw your neighbors because it is going to limit or ration your care. Would this argument be persuasive if we were stranded somewhere and had to rely on each other’s provisions or would we setup “death panels” to decide who was worthy of compassion and who was not? This argument that there is only so much healthcare to go around and that if you share it you will lose what you have goes to the heart of something dark and sinister in the human soul.

With the historic passage of the healthcare bill by the Congress it is still surprising that to me that we have not had a national outpouring for the right of all Americans to have healthcare. When it comes time to transfer wealth from the bottom up we never see commercials talking about how the corporate welfare system is running our “way of life”, but whenever we speak about transferring some of that wealth down to be shared by all Americans we have commercials and rallies comparing having compassion to communism. So let’s be clear, all of the other industrialized nations in the world who provide healthcare for their citizens are communist? The sad part is that the majority of Americans don’t even know what a communist is and so it’s this red herring used anytime anyone threatens the status quo. We must decide as a nation if access to healthcare is a privilege for just the wealthy or a right for all Americans. This I think is the fundamental question that this debate has failed to ask or to answer and as long as we have not answered that question then we continue to address peripheral issues and not the fundamental question of if it is a right then what is the most efficient and cost effective way to do it.

It is unfortunate that the majority of those 46 or so million of uninsured do not vote, so they are the forgotten or the invisible. Who speaks for those who have no voice? We have ads now asking folks to adopt animals like we use to have for adopting children, but there are no ads depicting the carnage of watching poor folks die of curable and common illnesses because they could not afford proper decent healthcare. Who comes up with this stuff? There has to be some mastermind behind this, I cannot believe that we have become this hardhearted on our own. We are willing to speak up for defenseless animals, but defenseless humans they’re on their own.

Real charity doesn't care if it's tax-deductible or not. - Dan Bennett
The Disputed Truth