Just Say No -- to Power
If you are anywhere near my age (59) you have seen the process play out many times. Some ordinary person gets into a position of power. He/she likes the buzz and craves more of the stuff. Maybe their first taste comes on a local school board. From that slightly elevated position they realize they are within reach of higher wattage, city councilperson. Oh yeah, that feels good! But they soon want more and they begin upping the dose as they slither further up the political pyramid.
Not everyone can handle the stuff as well as others. In fact, most burn out in their experimental stages. Those who are able to go on are a special sort. These types eventually end up in Washington. Think of it as natural selection at its most severe. Those who make it to DC get their drug of choice 24/7/365.
But even once they reach DC, there are still a half-dozen places where power goes from a just a great buzz to transcendental: President, VP, Speaker of the House, Senate Majority Leader and House Majority Leader. (And of course, there’s the Pope.)
It’s at this peak of peaks of power where the stuff becomes seriously toxic and makes its abusers mad.
We old-timers saw this drama unfold, like a slow-motion televised train wreck, with President Richard Nixon. The guy was always a bit strange, but once he reached the Presidency his madness, fed by unlimited power, came to full bloom.
We saw the same thing happen to House Speaker Jim Wright, who empowered his smarmy Texas savings and loan friends to run barefoot through the taxpayer’s checkbook as long as they shared their booty with him.
We saw again with Sen. Trent Lott of Mississippi who, when Senate Leader, waxed nostalgic about the good ole’ days in the South. The Days when segregationists like his friend, Sen. Strom Thurmond, fathered children with their black housekeepers while supporting those who stood in public school doorways to keep non-white kids -- including their own – out.
And yes, we even saw it with Bill Clinton, who figured since he was President he deserved a harem.
Those of you who were too young to have experienced the Nixon and Wright downfalls are in luck. Today we are being treated to another public meltdown, the demise of House Majority Leader, Tom (“The Hammer”) DeLay.
The DeLay “death watch,” as Doonsbury describes it, has reached the end Act II and is about to enter its third and final act. The only person who does not seem to understand this is DeLay himself. This is common. Dick Nixon was also the last person in DC, or the world for that matter, to see he was finished. It’s the drug talking. Power. It screws up almost everyone who gets too much of the stuff. It’s inevitable.
(Someone should develop a badge like the kind workers in nuclear facilities wear. A badge that turns red when they reach the point where power is about to make them crazy. But then, by the time their crazy badge turned red they would be too crazy already to pay any mind. They would probably just accuse their opponents of messing with their crazy badge.)
Anyway, it’s too late for DeLay. His badge turned red a long time ago and has since turned black. So, go get yourself a couple of six packs, a few bags of chips and dip and sit back and enjoy the show.
We all know how this is going to end; but the fun is always in the journey, not the arrival.
Knowing When to Fold-em
House Speaker, Dennis Hastert, is one of Washington’s power-junkies whose badge has not yet turned red. We know this because of what he did yesterday proving he can still sense danger when it gets too close to him.
Yesterday Hastert engineered a shameless strategic retreat. Seeking to end the impasse that has paralyzed the House of Representatives' ethics process, Hastert announced he was ready to 'step back' from changes that the Republican leadership – led by Tom DeLay -- had pushed through the House this year. The changes had effectively neutered the Ethics Committee at the very moment it was about to investigate DeLay. Also, its top Republican members on the committee who had already censored DeLay were removed and replaced by four DeLay sycophants.
The move proved a bridge too far, even by GOP standards. The public saw the move for what it was and Democrats built on public outrage by throwing a non-stop hissy fit.
Led by Hastert, the House rules were changed back to what they were before the fix was put in for DeLay. (Though the pro-DeLay ringers are still on the committee.) Hastert will be licking his wounds from that battle for a long time to come and is not too happy about it. The lesson is clear. Once someone like Tom DeLay goes critical get as far away from him as possible before he blows. Tom DeLay is on his own now. You could call the bill yesterday the “Throw Tom From the Train Act.”
Now attention shifts to the Senate. We have to watch to see if Senate Leader Bill Frist is still reasonably sober as well. If Frist pushes to end the filibuster, as threatened, he will discover, as Hastert did, the public recognizes the difference between power-crazy and just plain crazy-power.
Oily Politician Talk
Now that gas prices are high and going to stay high, President Bush is trying to convince angry voters that he understands the problem and has real solutions. Of course neither is true, but we are not talking here about a guy who parses out fact from fiction well, or for that matter cares to.
So what can he tell people? Anything is possible. Yesterday, for example, Bush – without a hint of embarrassment or irony – said he was for encouraging alternative fuels such as “bio-fuel,” you know, the stuff made from discarded cooking oils found in the grease pits at MacDonald’s.
Now imagine if, during the 2000 campaign, Al Gore had suggested that. Do you doubt for a moment that the Bush campaign would not have had a add on TV within days mocking Gore for such a numbskull idea. I can just hear it:
“Al Gore’s solution to America’s energy needs is discarded French fry grease. Is MacDonald’s really a substitute for Exxon? Is Ronald MacDonald going to be Gore’s Secretary of Energy? (Fade to clown image…)
In all fairness Bush had other suggestions too. He wants to build more nuclear power plants and build new oil refineries on deserted military bases. Let’s take these one at a time.
More nuclear power plants: Am I wrong about this or is there still no place on earth – including Nevada – willing to store the waste produced by nuclear plants? Yes. I am right about that. So, the radioactive stuff is being stacked up like glowing cords of firewood in lightly fenced backyards of existing plants. Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick…
And, assuming new plants are built, just where does Bush think they will be welcomed? True, nuclear accidents are rare. But when one happens casualties are high and continue for decades. Contamination spreads hundreds, even thousands, of miles and, in the hot zones, the contamination remains at fatal levels for centuries.
So, if indeed “s--it happens,” and it always does, it only has to happen once to make a lasting impression -- and one hell of a lasting mess. Just ask the folks who lived in Chernobyl – but hurry, not many are still alive to tell their tale.
Refineries on old military bases: On the surface that sounds like a good enough idea -- unless you live in one of those communities. These are little cites that grew around military bases. Hotels were built to house parents visiting their military sons and daughters. stores, car dealers, jewelers, Wal-Marts -- all thrived serving the troops. Now the troops are gone and these communities are suffering.
But, instead of turning former military bases into high-tech industry parks, college campuses, affordable housing developments, Bush wants to give them an oil refinery. Sure, a few local jobs would be created, but that’s the end of the upside for the community. After that all that’s left is a butt-ugly facility that releases foul gases engulfing the town in a ordor as if Godzilla had just farted right on them. And the get trucks, lots of trucks, fuel trucks rumbling through town filled to the brim with gasoline. Tick, tick, tick, tick…
I have a suggestion. Actually I stole this idea from Ross Perot, who was a crazy little bastard, but right about many things. Perot used to suggest that; before government launch full-throttle programs that they do smaller test projects to see how the idea works in the real world. So, let’s do this. Let’s build a new nuclear power plant and a new oil refinery on the outskirts of Crawford, Texas. Then wait five or ten years to see how things turn out.
Oh, one more thing – the legislation allowing the “Crawford Energy Independence and Clear Skies Project” must also include a stipulation that the Bush family cannot move from their Crawford ranch for ten years after both plants become operational.
Seems reasonable to me.
(Oh yeah, and remember, “Measure twice, cut once.” I kinda miss that little squirt.)
Best Line of the Week
Dennis Miller, on watching the appearance of the new Pope last week:
"Maybe it's just me, but I get squeamish any time I see a German guy on a balcony with 50,000 adoring fans below."
By Stephen Pizzo
Raconteur at Large
Email: stephen@pizzo.com
Friday, April 29, 2005
Wednesday, April 27, 2005
April 26, 2005
Another Magical Mystery Tour of the Morning News
Flying Miss Daisy-Cutter
What’s President Bush to do? On one hand his Social Security “reforms” are floundering. On the other hand his party’s leader in the House, fellow Texan, Tom DeLay, is dying a death by a thousand (self-inflicted) cuts.
Well, if you are George Bush what you do is put the two together to see if two negatives can add up to a positive – (further proof that in Texas schools at least one student was left behind, and yet he grew up to be President anyway.) But I digress.
Tom DeLay and Social Security, what kind of pairing is that? I mean DeLay is the same guy who cares so little for his own widowed, aging mother that he has refused to even talk to her for years. Now the President wants to see if DeLay can help him out of his SS mess in return for the appearance the Prez still supports the embattled Majority Leader.
CRAWFORD, Texas (AP) -- President Bush is adding a helper to his Social Security road tour: House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, who is facing allegations of ethical improprieties but is seen by the White House as crucial to pushing Bush's plans through Congress. (Full Story)
DeLay will even get to ride back to Washington aboard Air Force One. I don’t know about you, but rather than helping DeLay a ride back home on Air Force One is only likely to remind folks of Newt Gingrich’s final days as a Washington big shot. Remember, it was about the time that Gingrich’s arrogance had worn thin that he too got a ride on Air Force One back to DC. But Bill Clinton was President then and Gingrich got thrown in the luggage compartment instead of getting VIP seating up front. When the plane landed at Andrews’s AFB mechanics nearly scrambled the fire trucks because of a loud whine emanating from the plane. It turned out to just be Gingrich complaining about the service.
Anyway, shortly thereafter Gingrich was a private citizen again and is still flying coach.
Now we have this political kabuki dance of death, Bush and DeLay, two drowning men desperately clinging to each other hoping the other can figure out how to get them both back to dry land.
But it's not working. Polls have nose-dived for both Bush personally and his Social Security private accounts plan. The same goes for DeLay’s popularity as new stories break daily about his extraordinarily sleazy behavior in office. While a self-avowed born-again Christian, DeLay now appears to have more in common with felonious conman, Rev. James Baker than Rev. Billy Graham.
All of which makes the President’s DeLay-outreach so remarkable. The imagery dances in my head; Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid hiding out aboard Air Force One. Bonnie and Clyde upgrade their ride. Two of the universe’s emptiest of empty suits, flying high in tax-payer provided luxury singing “Closer my Lord to Thee,” in two-part harmony.
Imagine that.
Glass House Cleaning Time
The Crips and Bloods are fixin’ to go to war. The evidence is everywhere – shredders smoking late into the night in congressional offices and congressional aides running all over DC paying bills their bosses had let lobbyists pick up for them.
As Democrats mass for a frontal assault on House Majority Leader Tom DeLay’s fundraising, travel and lobbyist misbehaviors, they are busy trying to make sure the other side can’t find any dirt on them.
“Members of Congress are rushing to amend their travel and campaign records, fearing that the controversy over House Majority Leader Tom DeLay will trigger an ethics war that will bring greater scrutiny to their own travel and official activities….. Lawmakers are paying old restaurant bills, filing missing forms and correcting erroneous ones as journalists and political opponents comb through records and DeLay (R-Tex.) attempts to answer questions about travel financing and his past relationships with lobbyists. (Washington Post – Full Story)
And lookie here. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), who is leading attacks in the House on DeLay, failed to report a 2004 trip to South Korea until a Washington Post reporter asked her office about it. Presto-chango, in the blink of an eye Pelosi dispatched an aide to filed the late disclosure form for the $9,087 trip.
Pelosi’s lame response: “I did not know I was supposed to file these forms and I apologize for its lateness."
Okay, not to be critical and I’m just wondering out loud here, but what would Rep. Nancy say if Tom DeLay used that excuse? She’s a lady so I suppose she would probably not shout “Bullshit!” Maybe the lady would say something more along the lines of, “Give me a break, Tom. I wasn’t born yesterday, and neither were you!”
Of course now she can’t say anything like that.
Memo to Nancy Pelosi:
Review advice given to Caesar’s wife. Follow it.
Every Floridian a Dirty Harry
If you live in Florida and you have always wished you could pump hot lead into an overly aggressive Jehovah Witness or those way-too-clean-cut Mormon missionary kids, your chance has arrived.
It is either a Wild West revival, a return to the days of "shoot first and ask questions later," or a triumph for the "Castle Doctrine" -- the notion that enemies invade personal space at their peril…..Such dueling rhetoric marked the debate over a measure that Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) could sign as early as Tuesday. The legislation passed so emphatically that National Rifle Association backers plan to take it to statehouses across the nation, including Virginia's, over the next year. The law will let Floridians "meet force with force," erasing the "duty to retreat" when they fear for their lives outside of their homes, in their cars or businesses, or on the street. (Full Story)
The Florida measure stipulates that any person "has the right to stand his or her ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he or she reasonably believes it is necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm."
Can you imagine what might have happened if this were Florida law when federal immigration agents rushed into a private home to snatch young Cuban Élan Gonzalez? It could have gotten real ugly I think.
Anyway, Gov. Jeb Bush is all over this idea and says he will sign the measure into law just as soon as he finishes cleaning his gun.
The law’s nickname is “The Castle Doctrine.” Does that mean Floridians can also have moats filled with hungry alligators around their homes as well? I mean, that would sure save on ammo.
Just a thought.
This Just In – There Were No WMDs
The last hope for Bush Neo-cons who took us to war was that they would find Iraq’s missing WMDs hidden in U-Rent self-storage units in Syria. But all they found was tons of homus.
“U.S. investigators hunting for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq have found no evidence that such material was moved to Syria for safekeeping before the war, according to a final report of the investigation released yesterday. (Full Story)
The report blew away the last of the administration's arguments for going to war in Iraq. Instead inspectors found that the 1991 Persian Gulf War and subsequent U.N. sanctions had destroyed all of Iraq's illicit weapons.
This now leaves the Bush administration with one final rationalization – that Saddam continued to hope that someday he could resume his WMD programs. This the WWMD threat… Wishing for Weapons of Mass Destruction.
Anyone else out there wishing they had nukes? Oh yeah, Iran. North Korea was wishing, but they are over it. They have them now. That happened while John Bolton was wringing his hands over Cuba’s non-existent WMD programs.
But see, now I’ve said too much…
By Stephen Pizzo
Raconteur at Large
www.stephen.pizzo.com
Flying Miss Daisy-Cutter
What’s President Bush to do? On one hand his Social Security “reforms” are floundering. On the other hand his party’s leader in the House, fellow Texan, Tom DeLay, is dying a death by a thousand (self-inflicted) cuts.
Well, if you are George Bush what you do is put the two together to see if two negatives can add up to a positive – (further proof that in Texas schools at least one student was left behind, and yet he grew up to be President anyway.) But I digress.
Tom DeLay and Social Security, what kind of pairing is that? I mean DeLay is the same guy who cares so little for his own widowed, aging mother that he has refused to even talk to her for years. Now the President wants to see if DeLay can help him out of his SS mess in return for the appearance the Prez still supports the embattled Majority Leader.
CRAWFORD, Texas (AP) -- President Bush is adding a helper to his Social Security road tour: House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, who is facing allegations of ethical improprieties but is seen by the White House as crucial to pushing Bush's plans through Congress. (Full Story)
DeLay will even get to ride back to Washington aboard Air Force One. I don’t know about you, but rather than helping DeLay a ride back home on Air Force One is only likely to remind folks of Newt Gingrich’s final days as a Washington big shot. Remember, it was about the time that Gingrich’s arrogance had worn thin that he too got a ride on Air Force One back to DC. But Bill Clinton was President then and Gingrich got thrown in the luggage compartment instead of getting VIP seating up front. When the plane landed at Andrews’s AFB mechanics nearly scrambled the fire trucks because of a loud whine emanating from the plane. It turned out to just be Gingrich complaining about the service.
Anyway, shortly thereafter Gingrich was a private citizen again and is still flying coach.
Now we have this political kabuki dance of death, Bush and DeLay, two drowning men desperately clinging to each other hoping the other can figure out how to get them both back to dry land.
But it's not working. Polls have nose-dived for both Bush personally and his Social Security private accounts plan. The same goes for DeLay’s popularity as new stories break daily about his extraordinarily sleazy behavior in office. While a self-avowed born-again Christian, DeLay now appears to have more in common with felonious conman, Rev. James Baker than Rev. Billy Graham.
All of which makes the President’s DeLay-outreach so remarkable. The imagery dances in my head; Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid hiding out aboard Air Force One. Bonnie and Clyde upgrade their ride. Two of the universe’s emptiest of empty suits, flying high in tax-payer provided luxury singing “Closer my Lord to Thee,” in two-part harmony.
Imagine that.
Glass House Cleaning Time
The Crips and Bloods are fixin’ to go to war. The evidence is everywhere – shredders smoking late into the night in congressional offices and congressional aides running all over DC paying bills their bosses had let lobbyists pick up for them.
As Democrats mass for a frontal assault on House Majority Leader Tom DeLay’s fundraising, travel and lobbyist misbehaviors, they are busy trying to make sure the other side can’t find any dirt on them.
“Members of Congress are rushing to amend their travel and campaign records, fearing that the controversy over House Majority Leader Tom DeLay will trigger an ethics war that will bring greater scrutiny to their own travel and official activities….. Lawmakers are paying old restaurant bills, filing missing forms and correcting erroneous ones as journalists and political opponents comb through records and DeLay (R-Tex.) attempts to answer questions about travel financing and his past relationships with lobbyists. (Washington Post – Full Story)
And lookie here. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), who is leading attacks in the House on DeLay, failed to report a 2004 trip to South Korea until a Washington Post reporter asked her office about it. Presto-chango, in the blink of an eye Pelosi dispatched an aide to filed the late disclosure form for the $9,087 trip.
Pelosi’s lame response: “I did not know I was supposed to file these forms and I apologize for its lateness."
Okay, not to be critical and I’m just wondering out loud here, but what would Rep. Nancy say if Tom DeLay used that excuse? She’s a lady so I suppose she would probably not shout “Bullshit!” Maybe the lady would say something more along the lines of, “Give me a break, Tom. I wasn’t born yesterday, and neither were you!”
Of course now she can’t say anything like that.
Memo to Nancy Pelosi:
Review advice given to Caesar’s wife. Follow it.
Every Floridian a Dirty Harry
If you live in Florida and you have always wished you could pump hot lead into an overly aggressive Jehovah Witness or those way-too-clean-cut Mormon missionary kids, your chance has arrived.
It is either a Wild West revival, a return to the days of "shoot first and ask questions later," or a triumph for the "Castle Doctrine" -- the notion that enemies invade personal space at their peril…..Such dueling rhetoric marked the debate over a measure that Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) could sign as early as Tuesday. The legislation passed so emphatically that National Rifle Association backers plan to take it to statehouses across the nation, including Virginia's, over the next year. The law will let Floridians "meet force with force," erasing the "duty to retreat" when they fear for their lives outside of their homes, in their cars or businesses, or on the street. (Full Story)
The Florida measure stipulates that any person "has the right to stand his or her ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he or she reasonably believes it is necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm."
Can you imagine what might have happened if this were Florida law when federal immigration agents rushed into a private home to snatch young Cuban Élan Gonzalez? It could have gotten real ugly I think.
Anyway, Gov. Jeb Bush is all over this idea and says he will sign the measure into law just as soon as he finishes cleaning his gun.
The law’s nickname is “The Castle Doctrine.” Does that mean Floridians can also have moats filled with hungry alligators around their homes as well? I mean, that would sure save on ammo.
Just a thought.
This Just In – There Were No WMDs
The last hope for Bush Neo-cons who took us to war was that they would find Iraq’s missing WMDs hidden in U-Rent self-storage units in Syria. But all they found was tons of homus.
“U.S. investigators hunting for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq have found no evidence that such material was moved to Syria for safekeeping before the war, according to a final report of the investigation released yesterday. (Full Story)
The report blew away the last of the administration's arguments for going to war in Iraq. Instead inspectors found that the 1991 Persian Gulf War and subsequent U.N. sanctions had destroyed all of Iraq's illicit weapons.
This now leaves the Bush administration with one final rationalization – that Saddam continued to hope that someday he could resume his WMD programs. This the WWMD threat… Wishing for Weapons of Mass Destruction.
Anyone else out there wishing they had nukes? Oh yeah, Iran. North Korea was wishing, but they are over it. They have them now. That happened while John Bolton was wringing his hands over Cuba’s non-existent WMD programs.
But see, now I’ve said too much…
By Stephen Pizzo
Raconteur at Large
www.stephen.pizzo.com
Tuesday, April 26, 2005
April 25, 2005
The Law of Unintended (Good) Consequences
No doom and gloom today boys and girls. Today I am a virtual Mr. Rogers, because our neighborhood is about to get a long overdue dose of good stuff.
We all are familiar with the bad side of the law of unintended results. Less recognized are the times when the unintended result is positive. That’s what’s about to happen. And whom can we thank? Surprisingly, George W. Bush & Co.
Yes, they finally did something right – though unintended. You still have to cut through a lot of bad sounding stuff before you find it, but the good stuff is there. It will just take a little more suffering before it arrives in full-flower.
Here are two glimmers among the muck.
Medicaid Cuts
The Bush administration and Republican-controlled congress finally has that thorn-in-their-side “socialist” program, Medicaid, in it’s sights. They are going to cut the federal share of Medicaid to states by enough to virtually kill the program in some states.
Medicare serves roughly 53 million Americans. Some states rely on Medicaid more than other. Tennessee, for example, says the federal cuts will result in more than 320,000 adults, many of them elderly, being cut. Minnesota says it will have to stop insuring 27,000 college students and adults without children.
A single mother of two who earns $3,800 a year will be considered too wealthy to qualify for Missouri Medicaid under the legislation, which is due to take effect this summer. The program pays the bills for nearly 60 percent of all nursing-home residents and finances 37 percent of all births. Because most states have added prescription-drug benefits, Medicaid covers the hefty pharmacy bills for many patients with AIDS, many transplant recipients and many seniors on dialysis or chemotherapy. The program also covers the more mundane medical expenses of low-income working families. (Full Story)
So, why is this seemingly awful news, really good news in disguise? Because things will not turn out the way pro-business conservatives in congress believe. In spite of all the evidence to the contrary, those troglodytes continue to insist that if government programs like Medicaid stop thwarting free market forces the private sector would be able to provide affordable medical insurance and services for everyone. And, for those too poor, faith-based groups would pick up the slack.
Of course that’s pure nonsense -- all of it. Private medical insurers will never insure all comers. When given a choice whom they will and will not insure, private companies will always cherry pick the actuarial pool. They will happily insure those who don't have pre-existing conditions or are statistically unlikely to get hurt or sick. Those who are likely to need medical attention will be rejected.
Many of those rejected by private insurers or too poor to afford the premiums -- I call them Americas "untouchables" -- found refuge in the state/federally funded Medicaid program.
Now, here's the ironic part -- this is one place when conservatives were right, but for the wrong reasons.
Medicaid did distort the medical free market system... by hiding its flaws. Because so many of this growing number of unisurables were picked up by Medicaid no one noticed. Medicaid provided cover for the very private insurers that refused to cover so many Americans in the first place. Medicaid has become a kind of government witness protection program for private insurers.
Let's imagine what the country would have looked like already if Medicaid were not there to hide all these people private insurers did not want. Many are elderly resthome residents, many are working poor with children, many are children. Think Calcutta -- poor mothers on New York sidewalks begging for money to get their kid an operation -- old people dying alone in stinking tenements or in the bushes of Central Park.
Oh, and remember those faith-based organizations that were going to pick up the slack, where would they be? After their charities became swamped by pleas for help these GOP-loving "people of faith,” would quickly reconsider their choice of political parties.
By cutting Medicaid conservatives are shooting themselves in both feet. The private medical/industrial complex they think they are helping will itself turn on them. You see, private companies really don't give a fig whether they get paid by an insurance company or the federal government, as long as they get paid. And, as the uninsurables lose Medicaid coverage these companies will see their own revenues drop. That in turn will create a whole new crop of socially conscious corporate born-agains demanding the government do something to cover "these poor souls."
Still waiting for that good stuff that’s supposed to come from all this Medicaid misery?
Okay, here it is. National, single-payer healthcare.
The US will be the last developed nation in the world to figure out that the private sector can do a lot of things right, but providing universal health insurance is not one of them. Only a single-payer system can (actuarially) absorb risks involved in covering everyone. No other system can. None. No way, Jose.
So, I say cut away fellas. Cut Medicaid and while you’re at it, go ahead and cut Medicare too. You know you want to, so just do it. And raise the retirement age for Social Security while you're at it. Keep those old folks in ill health AND working.
Go ahead. Frist, DeLay... I dare you. I double, double dare you.
It’s a Gas
Here’s another bad-but-good development: $3.00 - $5.00 a gallon gasoline.
As you read this President Bush is having Saudi Princes over to the ranch to beg them to pump more oil, to which our Saudi energy bosses will likely reply, “You want MORE oil?”
Even if Saudi Royal thugs agree to pump more oil gas prices will not go down but will will continue their climb towards $5 a gallon. Everyone (except those raised in Texas) understand that the whole petroleum enchalada has changed. Oil is so yesterday.
First there simply is not enough of the stuff down there any longer -- and there's millions of barrels less everyday. Then there's China and India. Both those over-populated nations have recently bellied up to the oil can demanding their share. Their industries gobble more energy every day. So do their people who want cars and other power-consuming goodies westerners have enjoyed for a century.
Joke's on them. They got to the party late and the key is about to start pumping pure foam. The jig is up for petroleum-based economies. There are maybe ten years left before everyone will have to come up with a new way to run all that stuff.
But conservatives have spent so many years convincing themselves that alternative technologies and fuels were formulas for economic disaster that the only solution they can imagine is to look for more of the black stuff. They remind me of heroin addicts cut off by their supplier. What do they do? Quit? Forget about it. They head straight out to search for a new supplier willihg to pay whatever to keep their feelgood juice coming -- even though they know the stuff is going to eventually kill them.
Gasoline and natural gas prices continue to climb. As they go up and stay up, alternative fuels and technologies will become increasingly attractive. Suddenly automakers, who have claimed for years they had no alternatives to the gasoline engine, will put more electric and fuel-cell cars on the roads. Traffic-chocked US cities will begin to look more like European cities as commuters turn to public transportation or ride thrifty and easy-to-park scooters to work. Neighborhood roofs start to sprout solar panels that convert each home from a power-parasite to a power-producer.
So here again the conservatives had it half-right. Free markets really do work if allowed to do so, just not the way they think. Once the real costs of oil – production costs, scarcity and environmental – are accurately reflected in its price, that price will become too high to bear. When that happens markets move to the next acceptable and sustainable alternatives, and that will not be oil. (Bonus! Saudi Princes will have to either find something new to pimp to the West or go back to herding goats. Poor goats.)
So, patience my friends, patience. Twenty five years from now we may look back at the years 2000 to 2008 as a turning point. And, Bush's policies as the best thing to happen since the last time free markets kicked the props out from under a fraudulent American Dream-façade -- the Great Depression.
Sure there was great suffering during those hard years. But, look what grew from that learning experience -- Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and a social conscience.
I have said for months now that you simply can not tell right-wingers anything. Nuance confuses and annoys those folks. So, you have to show them. The fall out from Medicaid cuts, attempts to gut and cripple other social programs like Social Security, and soaring energy costs will show them.
Then, and only then, will they get it. Then and only then, will we get the kind of government Americans really deserve.
Seton Sighting
"I should be packing boxes and moaning about throwing out what I’ve been carrying around for more than two decades, but I’m giving in to the need to use another part of my brain and comment on some of the news stories that have swathed the wires of late." (Full Tale)
No doom and gloom today boys and girls. Today I am a virtual Mr. Rogers, because our neighborhood is about to get a long overdue dose of good stuff.
We all are familiar with the bad side of the law of unintended results. Less recognized are the times when the unintended result is positive. That’s what’s about to happen. And whom can we thank? Surprisingly, George W. Bush & Co.
Yes, they finally did something right – though unintended. You still have to cut through a lot of bad sounding stuff before you find it, but the good stuff is there. It will just take a little more suffering before it arrives in full-flower.
Here are two glimmers among the muck.
Medicaid Cuts
The Bush administration and Republican-controlled congress finally has that thorn-in-their-side “socialist” program, Medicaid, in it’s sights. They are going to cut the federal share of Medicaid to states by enough to virtually kill the program in some states.
Medicare serves roughly 53 million Americans. Some states rely on Medicaid more than other. Tennessee, for example, says the federal cuts will result in more than 320,000 adults, many of them elderly, being cut. Minnesota says it will have to stop insuring 27,000 college students and adults without children.
A single mother of two who earns $3,800 a year will be considered too wealthy to qualify for Missouri Medicaid under the legislation, which is due to take effect this summer. The program pays the bills for nearly 60 percent of all nursing-home residents and finances 37 percent of all births. Because most states have added prescription-drug benefits, Medicaid covers the hefty pharmacy bills for many patients with AIDS, many transplant recipients and many seniors on dialysis or chemotherapy. The program also covers the more mundane medical expenses of low-income working families. (Full Story)
So, why is this seemingly awful news, really good news in disguise? Because things will not turn out the way pro-business conservatives in congress believe. In spite of all the evidence to the contrary, those troglodytes continue to insist that if government programs like Medicaid stop thwarting free market forces the private sector would be able to provide affordable medical insurance and services for everyone. And, for those too poor, faith-based groups would pick up the slack.
Of course that’s pure nonsense -- all of it. Private medical insurers will never insure all comers. When given a choice whom they will and will not insure, private companies will always cherry pick the actuarial pool. They will happily insure those who don't have pre-existing conditions or are statistically unlikely to get hurt or sick. Those who are likely to need medical attention will be rejected.
Many of those rejected by private insurers or too poor to afford the premiums -- I call them Americas "untouchables" -- found refuge in the state/federally funded Medicaid program.
Now, here's the ironic part -- this is one place when conservatives were right, but for the wrong reasons.
Medicaid did distort the medical free market system... by hiding its flaws. Because so many of this growing number of unisurables were picked up by Medicaid no one noticed. Medicaid provided cover for the very private insurers that refused to cover so many Americans in the first place. Medicaid has become a kind of government witness protection program for private insurers.
Let's imagine what the country would have looked like already if Medicaid were not there to hide all these people private insurers did not want. Many are elderly resthome residents, many are working poor with children, many are children. Think Calcutta -- poor mothers on New York sidewalks begging for money to get their kid an operation -- old people dying alone in stinking tenements or in the bushes of Central Park.
Oh, and remember those faith-based organizations that were going to pick up the slack, where would they be? After their charities became swamped by pleas for help these GOP-loving "people of faith,” would quickly reconsider their choice of political parties.
By cutting Medicaid conservatives are shooting themselves in both feet. The private medical/industrial complex they think they are helping will itself turn on them. You see, private companies really don't give a fig whether they get paid by an insurance company or the federal government, as long as they get paid. And, as the uninsurables lose Medicaid coverage these companies will see their own revenues drop. That in turn will create a whole new crop of socially conscious corporate born-agains demanding the government do something to cover "these poor souls."
Still waiting for that good stuff that’s supposed to come from all this Medicaid misery?
Okay, here it is. National, single-payer healthcare.
The US will be the last developed nation in the world to figure out that the private sector can do a lot of things right, but providing universal health insurance is not one of them. Only a single-payer system can (actuarially) absorb risks involved in covering everyone. No other system can. None. No way, Jose.
So, I say cut away fellas. Cut Medicaid and while you’re at it, go ahead and cut Medicare too. You know you want to, so just do it. And raise the retirement age for Social Security while you're at it. Keep those old folks in ill health AND working.
Go ahead. Frist, DeLay... I dare you. I double, double dare you.
It’s a Gas
Here’s another bad-but-good development: $3.00 - $5.00 a gallon gasoline.
As you read this President Bush is having Saudi Princes over to the ranch to beg them to pump more oil, to which our Saudi energy bosses will likely reply, “You want MORE oil?”
Even if Saudi Royal thugs agree to pump more oil gas prices will not go down but will will continue their climb towards $5 a gallon. Everyone (except those raised in Texas) understand that the whole petroleum enchalada has changed. Oil is so yesterday.
First there simply is not enough of the stuff down there any longer -- and there's millions of barrels less everyday. Then there's China and India. Both those over-populated nations have recently bellied up to the oil can demanding their share. Their industries gobble more energy every day. So do their people who want cars and other power-consuming goodies westerners have enjoyed for a century.
Joke's on them. They got to the party late and the key is about to start pumping pure foam. The jig is up for petroleum-based economies. There are maybe ten years left before everyone will have to come up with a new way to run all that stuff.
But conservatives have spent so many years convincing themselves that alternative technologies and fuels were formulas for economic disaster that the only solution they can imagine is to look for more of the black stuff. They remind me of heroin addicts cut off by their supplier. What do they do? Quit? Forget about it. They head straight out to search for a new supplier willihg to pay whatever to keep their feelgood juice coming -- even though they know the stuff is going to eventually kill them.
Gasoline and natural gas prices continue to climb. As they go up and stay up, alternative fuels and technologies will become increasingly attractive. Suddenly automakers, who have claimed for years they had no alternatives to the gasoline engine, will put more electric and fuel-cell cars on the roads. Traffic-chocked US cities will begin to look more like European cities as commuters turn to public transportation or ride thrifty and easy-to-park scooters to work. Neighborhood roofs start to sprout solar panels that convert each home from a power-parasite to a power-producer.
So here again the conservatives had it half-right. Free markets really do work if allowed to do so, just not the way they think. Once the real costs of oil – production costs, scarcity and environmental – are accurately reflected in its price, that price will become too high to bear. When that happens markets move to the next acceptable and sustainable alternatives, and that will not be oil. (Bonus! Saudi Princes will have to either find something new to pimp to the West or go back to herding goats. Poor goats.)
So, patience my friends, patience. Twenty five years from now we may look back at the years 2000 to 2008 as a turning point. And, Bush's policies as the best thing to happen since the last time free markets kicked the props out from under a fraudulent American Dream-façade -- the Great Depression.
Sure there was great suffering during those hard years. But, look what grew from that learning experience -- Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and a social conscience.
I have said for months now that you simply can not tell right-wingers anything. Nuance confuses and annoys those folks. So, you have to show them. The fall out from Medicaid cuts, attempts to gut and cripple other social programs like Social Security, and soaring energy costs will show them.
Then, and only then, will they get it. Then and only then, will we get the kind of government Americans really deserve.
Seton Sighting
"I should be packing boxes and moaning about throwing out what I’ve been carrying around for more than two decades, but I’m giving in to the need to use another part of my brain and comment on some of the news stories that have swathed the wires of late." (Full Tale)
Saturday, April 23, 2005
April 21-23, 2005
Weak-End Edition
Sissy Gates
The Microsoft Corporation withdrew its support for legislation that would have made it illegal to discriminate against gays in the state of Washington.
The move came after statements from a Seattle Christian fundamentalist minister who said if the company did not stop supporting the legislation, “I will give Microsoft a reason to fear Christians.” (Full Story)
As though we haven’t already seen and heard enough to fear Christian fundamentalists. But it worked. Microsoft dropped its active support for the legislation.
"I think people should feel betrayed," said Tina Podlodowski, a former Microsoft senior manager. "To me, Microsoft has been one of the big supporters of gay and lesbian civil rights issues, and they did it when it wasn't an issue of political expediency, when it was the right thing to do."
“Dr.” Hutcherson, pastor of the Antioch Bible Church, organized several rallies opposing same-sex marriage. He also threatened to organize a national boycott of Microsoft products. After that, "they backed off," he told reporters yesterday. "I told them I was going to give them something to be afraid of Christians about.”
Meanwhile God’s self-appointed hall monitors have been busy elsewhere as well. Evangelical Christian leaders, who have been working closely with senior Republican lawmakers to place conservative judges in the federal courts, have also been exploring ways to punish sitting jurists and even entire courts viewed as hostile to “their cause.” (Full Story here)
Stay tuned boys and girls. More fear is on the way. When these crazy bastards are done with us you will not only fear Christians but hate them as well. Then the maybe the rest of us will refuse to support laws prohibiting discrimination against “people of faith.”
Say Hey, Earth Day
President Bush is fixin’ to celebrate Earth Day.
"One of the greatest responsibilities in a free society is responsible stewardship of our natural environment," Bush said at the White House ceremony. "All of you have taken that duty seriously. You have set a clear and strong example, and you're inspiring others to do their part."
George Bush celebrating Earth Day is like Jeffery Dahmer singing the praises of PETA.
I have nothing more to say about this. It simply defies all attempts at satire, irony or ridicule.
Is It Warm In Here?
The first comprehensive survey of glaciers on the Antarctic peninsula has shown that the rivers of ice are shrinking, mostly because of warming of the local climate. Researchers from the British Antarctic Survey and the U.S. Geological Survey analyzed more than 2,000 aerial photographs dating from 1940 and over 100 satellite images from the 1960s onwards.
They calculated that 87 percent of the 244 glaciers going out to sea from the peninsula have retreated over the last 50 years and that the pace of shrinkage has accelerated over the last decade. Until now, scientists were uncertain whether the glaciers were growing or melting.
Of course, to the Bush administration this is just another example of “bad science.”
Of course there could be an upside if the scientists are right. The Bush ranch in Crawford, Texas could become valuable Gulf Coast property.
Oops, Killed the Wrong Guy
When his court got crowded frontier Judge Roy Bean used to joke, “Hang’em all and let God sort it out.” That’s pretty much been the state of mind in the state of Texas, which has the dubious distinction of having the busiest death house in the nation… maybe the civilized world. (Wait that can’t be right. Texas is not part of the civilized world, is it?)
Well, looks like one case got “sorted out” a little too late. A Texas Senate committee heard testimony Tuesday about the possibility that the state probably executed an innocent man.
Fourteen months after Cameron Todd Willingham was executed a renowned arson expert told the Senate Criminal Justice Committee that he believed Willingham was innocent but found nobody willing to listen to his evidence in the days before the executioner dropped the hammer on Todd in February 2004. (Full Story Here)
If the evidence stands up Texas will almost certainly have to apologize to Mr. Willingham. As for punishing those responsible for this little mistake – God will sort that out.
Chutzpah Alert: Muslims Sue US
Five Muslim-Americans are suing the Department of Homeland Security alleging racial profiling because they were detained and fingerprinted by border agents after returning from a religious conference.
Should I care about this? Let’s see. We have a bunch of Muslims in traditional garb, trying to cross the US border returning from a conference entitled, “Reviving the Islamic Spirit.”
For the past four years most of the non-Muslim world has developed a nervous twitch about that whole “Islamic Spirit” thing. The question at hand is whether that twitch is irrational prejudice or just plain commonsense?
After four years of open terrorist warfare against the West waged exclusively by Islamic radicals, just whom do these litigants think our border folks should focus on? Italians? Canadians? Norwegians? (The worst thing Norwegians are guilty of is Ludafish distribution.)
No. As long as nearly every person that crashes a plane into our buildings or wants to or gets caught plotting new terrorist attacks is a Muslim, Muslims will, and should, remain “the usual suspects.” Because they are.
If Muslims are tired of making everyone else nervous then they need to do a whole lot more than they have to put a lid on the spread of radical Islam within their own countries, communities and mosques. This should not be hard. A religion that has rules about such minutia as which hand to use to wipe should also be able to develop a hard and fast rule against the wholesale killing of innocent civilians.
The real message is that Islamic terrorists are not just our problem, but theirs too. A good Islamic-led self-housecleaning is long overdue. Stop whining and get on with it.
Popeus Updateus
In yesterday’s column (which you can still read below) I said that Cardinal Ratzinger had been to Pope John 23rd what Nancy Reagan had been to Ronny during his final days in office – a kind of cognitive seeing-eye dog.
That now appears to be wrong. We are now learning what really happened behind the locked doors of the Papal Conclave. It appears that Ratzinger was not Nancy Reagan at all, but the Vatican’s version of Dick Cheney.
According to leaks from reform-minded cardinals, Ratzinger, who in earlier reports was described as “surprised and humbled” when elected Pope, had in fact run an aggressive and well-organized campaign for the job. Liberal cardinals, who had backed a candidate from South America, are letting it be known that Ratzinger and his conservative supporters in the Conclave, waged a ruthless behind the scenes campaign that included attacks on potential challengers.
The Holy Spirit, which the Church says guides the Cardinals in the selection process, has been reported missing.
April 20, 2005
Religion Reporting – With a Twist
With the old Pope’s departure and the new one’s election we’ve gotten a belly-full of religion news. But have you noticed how differently the media reports on the religion than it does on politics. I have.
When covering a major political story the press goes out of its way to get both sides, the pro and the con. But when they cover a major religion story they either entirely avoid the cons or make damn sure the viewer/reader does not think the cons’ views represent anything more than a fringe opinion. When it comes to religion news we don’t get balance, we get a balancing act.
But fair and balanced religion coverage may be even more important than fair and balanced political reporting. After all, we can fix what a politician breaks a lot faster than we can fix a bad Papal Edict. When the Pope says no to something, like contraception, there is no appeal and the results – poverty, environmental degradation and over-population -- roll on for centuries.
So, the press needs to get over their squeamishness about doing their job – their whole job – when covering big religion stories.
Since they haven’t, let me add to the public record the stuff they left out of a few major religion stories published recently. The stories below are all true events, though I have taken liberties with each. You have expected nothing less (or more) from me.
Catholics Pick New Pope
The Catholic Church has elected a new CEO. The German Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, who now goes by the name, Pope Benedict the XVI, was elected on the second day of the conclave.
Ratziner is the cardinal often seen whispering into Pope John 23rd’s ear in recent years. Vatican insiders say that Joseph Ratzinger played the same role during the last years of Pope John’s tenure as Nancy Reagan did for Ronald Reagan during his final months in office.
While the policies of the new Pope remain to be seen, Ratzinger’s views on a number of key issues facing the Church are a matter of record.
* The priest sex abuse scandal in the US Church is largely a coordinated effort by the press to smear the Catholic Church.
* Homosexuality is a “human disorder.”
* Condom is always wrong, even to prevent transmission of AIDS.
Ratzinger takes over at a time when Vatican policies are killing more of the Church's followers than since the Inquisition.
Africa, where the Catholic Church is seeing it’s highest growth in membership, has been particularly hard hit by AIDS. HIV infection rates now surpass 25 percent of the population. In Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland, prevalence rates still exceed 30 percent among pregnant women. Life expectancy has dropped below 40 years in nine countries in the region.
The prohibition against contraception is not biblical but a rule the Vatican can change at will. AIDS experts universally agree that condom use could cut the AIDS transmission rate dramatically. Nevertheless the Vatican prefers to bury its African flock rather than allow them to wear a half-ounce piece of latex on their John Thomas during sex.
While the Church’s flock in Africa dies in grace, Latin Americans are ditching Catholicism in record numbers. Millions have left the Church in favor of Pentecostal evangelical sects. The reasons are many.
Some say they switched because they found Pentecostal services more lively and the songs easier to memorize. They also say they appreciate being able to use birth control. "We can now have a child or two instead of litters," said one former Catholic woman.
Those who hope their children will someday immigrate to the US noted that the evangelical practice of holding both hands over their heads during services also prepares their kids for dealing with U.S. authorities.
Parents who had left the Catholic Church also noticed that that evangelical ministers don’t seem at all interested in keeping their boys at the rectory for sleepovers.
Mary Opens New Show
She was once a superstar who appeared at healing fountain spas and in other lush outdoor venues. But in recent years the Virgin Mary has appeared at far less glamorous venues. Her longest recent show ran on a partially eaten melted cheese sandwich, for example.
Yesterday Mary opened a new show with a surprise appearance on a cement bulkhead under the Kennedy Expressway in Chicago. It is unknown if she accepted the gig because Kennedy was Catholic or if that is just a coincidence.
While believers are sure it’s Mary, engineers at the Chicago’s roads department say the image is just a salt stain caused by this winter’s snowmelt runoff.
A transient who goes by then name "Dog," and calls the underpass home, claimed that the Mary image appeared two days after Elvis played the same wall.
“I liked Elvis better,” he said. “She may be the Mother of God, but Elvis was the King dude! Hey, got any spare change?”
Since the Mary overpass-apparition can’t be sold on Ebay, as the cheese sandwich was, it is unknown how long Mary’s show there will run. But if the overpass gig closes the faithful can still catch her famous cheese sandwich show which now runs 24 hours a day in a glass case at a casino, where the faithful can lose not only what’s left of their minds but their money as well.
News For Real Exclusive
(Caution: Satire ahead. Suspend disbelief and remain seated at all times until we come to a full stop.)
Vatican City: After denying demands by American cardinals for a recount, German Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger became the new Pope. Today he issued his first list of Papal Edicts, which we obtained from an unnamed Vatican source:
I) The Sign of the Cross will be replaced by a smart snap of the worshipper's heels.
II) The Communion Host will henceforth be made only of pumpernickel.
III) Note to Jews: The last Pope was just kidding. You’re still in the doghouse.
(You Muslims are not in the doghouse, but you are definitely pushing your luck.)
IV) Alter boys will henceforth be required to sign a lifetime oath of silence.
V) The only Sacramental wines allowed for Masses shall be Riesling, Elbling, or Spätburgunder.
VI) I shall be referred to as "Herr Papa."
VII) Only Wagner compositions shall be played during Mass.
VIII) Catholics can't sing in church - so stop trying.
IX) The archdioceses of Germany and Poland are to be merged immediately.
X) The Vatican will henceforth be referred to as "Der Popenhausen."
Now, back to the real news.
News for Jews:
God Hates Buggerers but Viagra is Kosher
Conservative Judaism's Rabbinical Assembly announced last Monday that a key panel has "upheld the biblical injunction against homosexual behavior."
“Circumcism is not a license to do whatever you please with that thing,” one Rabbi noted after the vote.
The Committee on Jewish Law and Standards, which sets policy on application of halakha (Jewish law), also kept in place a 1992 ruling against both ordination of openly gay rabbis and commitment ceremonies for same-sex couples.
That decision came on the heels of an earlier one last month where the chief Rabbi ruled that the erection drug, Viagra, could be made kosher and taken during Passover. He advised that all the observant limpee had to do to comply with Jewish law was to slip the Viagra pill into a pure gelatin tablet before swallowing it.
Catholics may want to make note. This is the kind of rulings you get when your religious leaders do not have to take an oath of chastity.
The chief Rabbi said he was not amused by emailed jokes linking his Viagra ruling with kosher franks.
Russian Astrologer Sues NASA
“Hands off the comet!” That’s the message being sent by a Russian Astrologer Marina Bai who plans to sue NASA to stop the space agency from blowing a comet as planned.
NASA’s space probe, dubbed, Deep Impact, is scheduled to crash into the comet, Tempel-1 on the Forth of July. Bai says doing so would totally screw up the astrological mojo.
“The actions of NASA infringe upon my system of spiritual and life values, in particular on the values of every element of creation, upon the unacceptability of barbarically interfering with the natural life of the universe, and the violation of the natural balance of the Universe,” Bai said in her claim.
Bai is demanding that NASA call off the $311 million operation, with the spacecraft already in its cruise phase. She also wants 8.7 billion rubles (the ruble equivalent of the entire cost of the mission) as compensation for “moral damages.”
Houston Minister Rev. Robert Synner said the lawsuit should be thrown out.
“Astrology is not a religion,” he said, “it’s superstition. I mean, come on. Who but a complete idiot could believe that stars determine human fate? Everyone knows only the Bible can predict the future. It says so right here in Revelations.”
Astrologer Bia said not so. “That star Jesus was born under was a comet. So, padre, leave the damn comet alone.”
Reached for comment the Vatican said it had no official position on the comet flap but noted that if the NASA probe wore any form of protection during impact, that would be wrong.
By Stephen Pizzo
Raconteur at Large
Sissy Gates
The Microsoft Corporation withdrew its support for legislation that would have made it illegal to discriminate against gays in the state of Washington.
The move came after statements from a Seattle Christian fundamentalist minister who said if the company did not stop supporting the legislation, “I will give Microsoft a reason to fear Christians.” (Full Story)
As though we haven’t already seen and heard enough to fear Christian fundamentalists. But it worked. Microsoft dropped its active support for the legislation.
"I think people should feel betrayed," said Tina Podlodowski, a former Microsoft senior manager. "To me, Microsoft has been one of the big supporters of gay and lesbian civil rights issues, and they did it when it wasn't an issue of political expediency, when it was the right thing to do."
“Dr.” Hutcherson, pastor of the Antioch Bible Church, organized several rallies opposing same-sex marriage. He also threatened to organize a national boycott of Microsoft products. After that, "they backed off," he told reporters yesterday. "I told them I was going to give them something to be afraid of Christians about.”
Meanwhile God’s self-appointed hall monitors have been busy elsewhere as well. Evangelical Christian leaders, who have been working closely with senior Republican lawmakers to place conservative judges in the federal courts, have also been exploring ways to punish sitting jurists and even entire courts viewed as hostile to “their cause.” (Full Story here)
Stay tuned boys and girls. More fear is on the way. When these crazy bastards are done with us you will not only fear Christians but hate them as well. Then the maybe the rest of us will refuse to support laws prohibiting discrimination against “people of faith.”
Say Hey, Earth Day
President Bush is fixin’ to celebrate Earth Day.
"One of the greatest responsibilities in a free society is responsible stewardship of our natural environment," Bush said at the White House ceremony. "All of you have taken that duty seriously. You have set a clear and strong example, and you're inspiring others to do their part."
George Bush celebrating Earth Day is like Jeffery Dahmer singing the praises of PETA.
I have nothing more to say about this. It simply defies all attempts at satire, irony or ridicule.
Is It Warm In Here?
The first comprehensive survey of glaciers on the Antarctic peninsula has shown that the rivers of ice are shrinking, mostly because of warming of the local climate. Researchers from the British Antarctic Survey and the U.S. Geological Survey analyzed more than 2,000 aerial photographs dating from 1940 and over 100 satellite images from the 1960s onwards.
They calculated that 87 percent of the 244 glaciers going out to sea from the peninsula have retreated over the last 50 years and that the pace of shrinkage has accelerated over the last decade. Until now, scientists were uncertain whether the glaciers were growing or melting.
Of course, to the Bush administration this is just another example of “bad science.”
Of course there could be an upside if the scientists are right. The Bush ranch in Crawford, Texas could become valuable Gulf Coast property.
Oops, Killed the Wrong Guy
When his court got crowded frontier Judge Roy Bean used to joke, “Hang’em all and let God sort it out.” That’s pretty much been the state of mind in the state of Texas, which has the dubious distinction of having the busiest death house in the nation… maybe the civilized world. (Wait that can’t be right. Texas is not part of the civilized world, is it?)
Well, looks like one case got “sorted out” a little too late. A Texas Senate committee heard testimony Tuesday about the possibility that the state probably executed an innocent man.
Fourteen months after Cameron Todd Willingham was executed a renowned arson expert told the Senate Criminal Justice Committee that he believed Willingham was innocent but found nobody willing to listen to his evidence in the days before the executioner dropped the hammer on Todd in February 2004. (Full Story Here)
If the evidence stands up Texas will almost certainly have to apologize to Mr. Willingham. As for punishing those responsible for this little mistake – God will sort that out.
Chutzpah Alert: Muslims Sue US
Five Muslim-Americans are suing the Department of Homeland Security alleging racial profiling because they were detained and fingerprinted by border agents after returning from a religious conference.
Should I care about this? Let’s see. We have a bunch of Muslims in traditional garb, trying to cross the US border returning from a conference entitled, “Reviving the Islamic Spirit.”
For the past four years most of the non-Muslim world has developed a nervous twitch about that whole “Islamic Spirit” thing. The question at hand is whether that twitch is irrational prejudice or just plain commonsense?
After four years of open terrorist warfare against the West waged exclusively by Islamic radicals, just whom do these litigants think our border folks should focus on? Italians? Canadians? Norwegians? (The worst thing Norwegians are guilty of is Ludafish distribution.)
No. As long as nearly every person that crashes a plane into our buildings or wants to or gets caught plotting new terrorist attacks is a Muslim, Muslims will, and should, remain “the usual suspects.” Because they are.
If Muslims are tired of making everyone else nervous then they need to do a whole lot more than they have to put a lid on the spread of radical Islam within their own countries, communities and mosques. This should not be hard. A religion that has rules about such minutia as which hand to use to wipe should also be able to develop a hard and fast rule against the wholesale killing of innocent civilians.
The real message is that Islamic terrorists are not just our problem, but theirs too. A good Islamic-led self-housecleaning is long overdue. Stop whining and get on with it.
Popeus Updateus
In yesterday’s column (which you can still read below) I said that Cardinal Ratzinger had been to Pope John 23rd what Nancy Reagan had been to Ronny during his final days in office – a kind of cognitive seeing-eye dog.
That now appears to be wrong. We are now learning what really happened behind the locked doors of the Papal Conclave. It appears that Ratzinger was not Nancy Reagan at all, but the Vatican’s version of Dick Cheney.
According to leaks from reform-minded cardinals, Ratzinger, who in earlier reports was described as “surprised and humbled” when elected Pope, had in fact run an aggressive and well-organized campaign for the job. Liberal cardinals, who had backed a candidate from South America, are letting it be known that Ratzinger and his conservative supporters in the Conclave, waged a ruthless behind the scenes campaign that included attacks on potential challengers.
The Holy Spirit, which the Church says guides the Cardinals in the selection process, has been reported missing.
April 20, 2005
Religion Reporting – With a Twist
With the old Pope’s departure and the new one’s election we’ve gotten a belly-full of religion news. But have you noticed how differently the media reports on the religion than it does on politics. I have.
When covering a major political story the press goes out of its way to get both sides, the pro and the con. But when they cover a major religion story they either entirely avoid the cons or make damn sure the viewer/reader does not think the cons’ views represent anything more than a fringe opinion. When it comes to religion news we don’t get balance, we get a balancing act.
But fair and balanced religion coverage may be even more important than fair and balanced political reporting. After all, we can fix what a politician breaks a lot faster than we can fix a bad Papal Edict. When the Pope says no to something, like contraception, there is no appeal and the results – poverty, environmental degradation and over-population -- roll on for centuries.
So, the press needs to get over their squeamishness about doing their job – their whole job – when covering big religion stories.
Since they haven’t, let me add to the public record the stuff they left out of a few major religion stories published recently. The stories below are all true events, though I have taken liberties with each. You have expected nothing less (or more) from me.
Catholics Pick New Pope
The Catholic Church has elected a new CEO. The German Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, who now goes by the name, Pope Benedict the XVI, was elected on the second day of the conclave.
Ratziner is the cardinal often seen whispering into Pope John 23rd’s ear in recent years. Vatican insiders say that Joseph Ratzinger played the same role during the last years of Pope John’s tenure as Nancy Reagan did for Ronald Reagan during his final months in office.
While the policies of the new Pope remain to be seen, Ratzinger’s views on a number of key issues facing the Church are a matter of record.
* The priest sex abuse scandal in the US Church is largely a coordinated effort by the press to smear the Catholic Church.
* Homosexuality is a “human disorder.”
* Condom is always wrong, even to prevent transmission of AIDS.
Ratzinger takes over at a time when Vatican policies are killing more of the Church's followers than since the Inquisition.
Africa, where the Catholic Church is seeing it’s highest growth in membership, has been particularly hard hit by AIDS. HIV infection rates now surpass 25 percent of the population. In Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland, prevalence rates still exceed 30 percent among pregnant women. Life expectancy has dropped below 40 years in nine countries in the region.
The prohibition against contraception is not biblical but a rule the Vatican can change at will. AIDS experts universally agree that condom use could cut the AIDS transmission rate dramatically. Nevertheless the Vatican prefers to bury its African flock rather than allow them to wear a half-ounce piece of latex on their John Thomas during sex.
While the Church’s flock in Africa dies in grace, Latin Americans are ditching Catholicism in record numbers. Millions have left the Church in favor of Pentecostal evangelical sects. The reasons are many.
Some say they switched because they found Pentecostal services more lively and the songs easier to memorize. They also say they appreciate being able to use birth control. "We can now have a child or two instead of litters," said one former Catholic woman.
Those who hope their children will someday immigrate to the US noted that the evangelical practice of holding both hands over their heads during services also prepares their kids for dealing with U.S. authorities.
Parents who had left the Catholic Church also noticed that that evangelical ministers don’t seem at all interested in keeping their boys at the rectory for sleepovers.
Mary Opens New Show
She was once a superstar who appeared at healing fountain spas and in other lush outdoor venues. But in recent years the Virgin Mary has appeared at far less glamorous venues. Her longest recent show ran on a partially eaten melted cheese sandwich, for example.
Yesterday Mary opened a new show with a surprise appearance on a cement bulkhead under the Kennedy Expressway in Chicago. It is unknown if she accepted the gig because Kennedy was Catholic or if that is just a coincidence.
While believers are sure it’s Mary, engineers at the Chicago’s roads department say the image is just a salt stain caused by this winter’s snowmelt runoff.
A transient who goes by then name "Dog," and calls the underpass home, claimed that the Mary image appeared two days after Elvis played the same wall.
“I liked Elvis better,” he said. “She may be the Mother of God, but Elvis was the King dude! Hey, got any spare change?”
Since the Mary overpass-apparition can’t be sold on Ebay, as the cheese sandwich was, it is unknown how long Mary’s show there will run. But if the overpass gig closes the faithful can still catch her famous cheese sandwich show which now runs 24 hours a day in a glass case at a casino, where the faithful can lose not only what’s left of their minds but their money as well.
News For Real Exclusive
(Caution: Satire ahead. Suspend disbelief and remain seated at all times until we come to a full stop.)
Vatican City: After denying demands by American cardinals for a recount, German Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger became the new Pope. Today he issued his first list of Papal Edicts, which we obtained from an unnamed Vatican source:
I) The Sign of the Cross will be replaced by a smart snap of the worshipper's heels.
II) The Communion Host will henceforth be made only of pumpernickel.
III) Note to Jews: The last Pope was just kidding. You’re still in the doghouse.
(You Muslims are not in the doghouse, but you are definitely pushing your luck.)
IV) Alter boys will henceforth be required to sign a lifetime oath of silence.
V) The only Sacramental wines allowed for Masses shall be Riesling, Elbling, or Spätburgunder.
VI) I shall be referred to as "Herr Papa."
VII) Only Wagner compositions shall be played during Mass.
VIII) Catholics can't sing in church - so stop trying.
IX) The archdioceses of Germany and Poland are to be merged immediately.
X) The Vatican will henceforth be referred to as "Der Popenhausen."
Now, back to the real news.
News for Jews:
God Hates Buggerers but Viagra is Kosher
Conservative Judaism's Rabbinical Assembly announced last Monday that a key panel has "upheld the biblical injunction against homosexual behavior."
“Circumcism is not a license to do whatever you please with that thing,” one Rabbi noted after the vote.
The Committee on Jewish Law and Standards, which sets policy on application of halakha (Jewish law), also kept in place a 1992 ruling against both ordination of openly gay rabbis and commitment ceremonies for same-sex couples.
That decision came on the heels of an earlier one last month where the chief Rabbi ruled that the erection drug, Viagra, could be made kosher and taken during Passover. He advised that all the observant limpee had to do to comply with Jewish law was to slip the Viagra pill into a pure gelatin tablet before swallowing it.
Catholics may want to make note. This is the kind of rulings you get when your religious leaders do not have to take an oath of chastity.
The chief Rabbi said he was not amused by emailed jokes linking his Viagra ruling with kosher franks.
Russian Astrologer Sues NASA
“Hands off the comet!” That’s the message being sent by a Russian Astrologer Marina Bai who plans to sue NASA to stop the space agency from blowing a comet as planned.
NASA’s space probe, dubbed, Deep Impact, is scheduled to crash into the comet, Tempel-1 on the Forth of July. Bai says doing so would totally screw up the astrological mojo.
“The actions of NASA infringe upon my system of spiritual and life values, in particular on the values of every element of creation, upon the unacceptability of barbarically interfering with the natural life of the universe, and the violation of the natural balance of the Universe,” Bai said in her claim.
Bai is demanding that NASA call off the $311 million operation, with the spacecraft already in its cruise phase. She also wants 8.7 billion rubles (the ruble equivalent of the entire cost of the mission) as compensation for “moral damages.”
Houston Minister Rev. Robert Synner said the lawsuit should be thrown out.
“Astrology is not a religion,” he said, “it’s superstition. I mean, come on. Who but a complete idiot could believe that stars determine human fate? Everyone knows only the Bible can predict the future. It says so right here in Revelations.”
Astrologer Bia said not so. “That star Jesus was born under was a comet. So, padre, leave the damn comet alone.”
Reached for comment the Vatican said it had no official position on the comet flap but noted that if the NASA probe wore any form of protection during impact, that would be wrong.
By Stephen Pizzo
Raconteur at Large
April 20, 2005
April 20, 2005
A Rare Win
Being a Blue State voter has helped me understand what it must have felt like to be a Red Sox fan. It’s been such a long time since we won anything worth the winning. But yesterday we won one.
John R. Bolton's nomination to be ambassador to the United Nations suffered a setback yesterday when the Senate Foreign Relations Committee unexpectedly decided to spend three more weeks investigating allegations that he mistreated subordinates, threatened a female government contractor and misled the committee about his handling of classified materials. (Washington Post)
I had to pinch myself. And how did we win? We won because Democrats on the committee threw themselves into the fight against Bolton with a kind of sincerity and vigor we have not seen out of them in years.
Joe Biden and Chris Dodd in particular were spectacular. I got chills watching them. They were angry. No, seriously. They were really angry. Outraged that this administration would have the chutzpah to put such a crazy, mean, lying son-of-bitch up for one of the most important jobs in the world – representing the United States of America at the United Nations.
And look what happens when Democrats get angry and act on that anger instead of selling their souls to woo Red State voters.
"The dynamic has changed," said Republican Sen. Lincoln D. Chafee, who before yesterday's session had said he was reluctantly inclined to vote for Bolton. "A lot of reservations surfaced today. It's a new day."
Oh gawd I hope it’s a new day. How I hope so. I hope that this message infuses the rest of the Democrats on The Hill with the same take-no-prisoners fighting spirit. Not only would they begin winning more than they lose, but they would be able to even feel good about themselves again.
Look at how Biden and Dodd’s righteous indignation won the day.
Sens. Joseph R. Biden and Christopher J. Dodd spent nearly an hour attacking Bolton's record. They said he repeatedly tried to dismiss subordinates who had challenged him and later misled the committee about his efforts. Biden said committee aides had learned that Bolton, then working as a private lawyer, had chased a woman through a Moscow hotel in 1994, throwing things at her and falsely claiming to U.S. aid officials that she had misused funds and might go to jail. Melody Townsel of Dallas said in a letter to the committee that Bolton "put me through hell" when he represented a firm that was at odds with her client in a USAID project in Kyrgyzstan. Biden taunted GOP members pressing for a vote yesterday on Bolton's nomination, saying, "I guess you don't want to hear about that."
Biden’s face was so red it screwed up the color balance on my TV. Dodd shouted into his mic, "This ought to be indictable!"
For a change Casey did not strike out or throw the game, but knocked the ball out of the park with the bases loaded.
Memo to Democrats: We want a lot more of that and a lot less of the other stuff. Get on it.
Darwin Rules – or Should
The Bush administration’s scorn for any scientific result that gets in the way of making a buck has permeated corporate boardrooms. Look no further than the US auto industry. Here’s an industry that loves nothing better than to cozy into any fool’s paradise that suits them. And they will stay right there even as the fire alarms blare, warning them that their world is on fire.
Global warming: Forget about it. Not true. The weather’s never been better.
The world is running out of oil: Not true. There’s plenty of oil. Just have to drill a few more holes.
Those are the Bush administration’s beliefs and they suited Detroit perfectly. SUV’s and Hummers fill our roads and auto showrooms.
Which represents an appallingly flat learning curve by US auto companies. Back in the mid-70’s these very same companies got their asses kicked around the block by the Japanese. Back then; despite an Arab oil embargo and sky-high prices, Detroit kept building big, heavy, chrome-laden V-8 gas-guzzlers.
The Japanese saw the calligraphy on the wall and flooded the US market with thrifty little four-cylinder Toyotas and Hondas. Pretty soon almost everyone was driving a Japanese car. Then a Japanese pickup. That mistake almost killed the entire US auto industry. Taxpayers even had to step in and lend Chrysler money to keep it afloat and put import restrictions on Japanese autos. Even with all that, it was close call, and a real scare. One would have thought US auto companies learned something. But they didn’t.
So it’s Deja Vu all over again. As gas prices reach towards three bucks a gallon, Detroit finds itself up to its Adam Apples in gas-guzzlers – again. And, guess who’s just coming to market with a bunch of hot little hybrids – yep.. the Japanese.
Ford Motor Co., the nation's second biggest automaker, admitted last Wednesday its earnings had plunged 38.5 percent in the first quarter as automotive profits fell sharply.
And who has the hottest selling car on the market today? Toyota. It’s little hybrid, the Prius, is so hot dealers can’t keep them in stock. People are buying them at full-sticker price and reselling for several thousand dollars more.
Why? Well, let’s see. A Hummer, on a good day with the wind at its back while going downhill, gets about 12 miles to the gallon. A Prius gets up to 60 miles to the gallon.
Duh. Again.
And how is Ford reacting to this new threat? Ford released the following statement:
''Going forward, we will continue to focus on improving our quality, lowering our costs and delivering exciting new products, as well as taking actions that strengthen our finances, optimize our global footprint and lead to faster development of new products.''
Right, whatever the hell all that means.
I have a suggestion. This time let’s not bail out US auto dealers. Let’s play by Darwin rules. The same goes for the folks who bought these gas-guzzlers in the first place. When I see a Hummer at a gas station I flash the driver the “loser” hand sign. Then I floor my VW and buzz off before they can get the gas nozzle out.
DeLay-ing the Inevitable
A cartoon in today’s paper shows black smoke coming from a chimney atop the US Capitol building. A news commentator explains:
“The black smoke means Tom DeLay’s pants are on fire.”
Cartoons like that are to political junkies like me, what a bleeding animal is to a vulture. It says that it’s just a matter of time before dinner is served.
DeLay has turned for help to an audience he knows he can count on – right-wing talk radio – where high-expectations meet low IQ, s. Sieg Heil on your radio dial.
"We have the opportunity to set up courts; we can also dismantle courts and reorganize them," DeLay told Tony Snow on Fox News Radio. (Full Story)
DeLay got into trouble last month by threatening federal judges in the wake of the Schiavo case. But never mind, now he is threatening the Supreme Court justices as well.
"We've got Justice Kennedy writing decisions based upon international law, not the Constitution of the United States. That's just outrageous. And not only that, but he said in session that he does his own research on the Internet? That is just incredibly outrageous."
DeLay also indulged in some messenger-killing by lashing out at journalists who have who had the bad taste to write stories raising questions about his past relationships with lobbyists and the sources of funds for his overseas travel. Talking on Fox Radio.. no less -- he said this without a hint of irony.
"You talk about judicial activism," DeLay said. "We now have journalistic activism."
But there is good news. DeLay said that all the scrutiny "certainly has gotten me closer to God."
Still not close enough though.
Site of The Day
http://2politicaljunkies.blogspot.com/2005/04/what-if-right-is-right.html
A Rare Win
Being a Blue State voter has helped me understand what it must have felt like to be a Red Sox fan. It’s been such a long time since we won anything worth the winning. But yesterday we won one.
John R. Bolton's nomination to be ambassador to the United Nations suffered a setback yesterday when the Senate Foreign Relations Committee unexpectedly decided to spend three more weeks investigating allegations that he mistreated subordinates, threatened a female government contractor and misled the committee about his handling of classified materials. (Washington Post)
I had to pinch myself. And how did we win? We won because Democrats on the committee threw themselves into the fight against Bolton with a kind of sincerity and vigor we have not seen out of them in years.
Joe Biden and Chris Dodd in particular were spectacular. I got chills watching them. They were angry. No, seriously. They were really angry. Outraged that this administration would have the chutzpah to put such a crazy, mean, lying son-of-bitch up for one of the most important jobs in the world – representing the United States of America at the United Nations.
And look what happens when Democrats get angry and act on that anger instead of selling their souls to woo Red State voters.
"The dynamic has changed," said Republican Sen. Lincoln D. Chafee, who before yesterday's session had said he was reluctantly inclined to vote for Bolton. "A lot of reservations surfaced today. It's a new day."
Oh gawd I hope it’s a new day. How I hope so. I hope that this message infuses the rest of the Democrats on The Hill with the same take-no-prisoners fighting spirit. Not only would they begin winning more than they lose, but they would be able to even feel good about themselves again.
Look at how Biden and Dodd’s righteous indignation won the day.
Sens. Joseph R. Biden and Christopher J. Dodd spent nearly an hour attacking Bolton's record. They said he repeatedly tried to dismiss subordinates who had challenged him and later misled the committee about his efforts. Biden said committee aides had learned that Bolton, then working as a private lawyer, had chased a woman through a Moscow hotel in 1994, throwing things at her and falsely claiming to U.S. aid officials that she had misused funds and might go to jail. Melody Townsel of Dallas said in a letter to the committee that Bolton "put me through hell" when he represented a firm that was at odds with her client in a USAID project in Kyrgyzstan. Biden taunted GOP members pressing for a vote yesterday on Bolton's nomination, saying, "I guess you don't want to hear about that."
Biden’s face was so red it screwed up the color balance on my TV. Dodd shouted into his mic, "This ought to be indictable!"
For a change Casey did not strike out or throw the game, but knocked the ball out of the park with the bases loaded.
Memo to Democrats: We want a lot more of that and a lot less of the other stuff. Get on it.
Darwin Rules – or Should
The Bush administration’s scorn for any scientific result that gets in the way of making a buck has permeated corporate boardrooms. Look no further than the US auto industry. Here’s an industry that loves nothing better than to cozy into any fool’s paradise that suits them. And they will stay right there even as the fire alarms blare, warning them that their world is on fire.
Global warming: Forget about it. Not true. The weather’s never been better.
The world is running out of oil: Not true. There’s plenty of oil. Just have to drill a few more holes.
Those are the Bush administration’s beliefs and they suited Detroit perfectly. SUV’s and Hummers fill our roads and auto showrooms.
Which represents an appallingly flat learning curve by US auto companies. Back in the mid-70’s these very same companies got their asses kicked around the block by the Japanese. Back then; despite an Arab oil embargo and sky-high prices, Detroit kept building big, heavy, chrome-laden V-8 gas-guzzlers.
The Japanese saw the calligraphy on the wall and flooded the US market with thrifty little four-cylinder Toyotas and Hondas. Pretty soon almost everyone was driving a Japanese car. Then a Japanese pickup. That mistake almost killed the entire US auto industry. Taxpayers even had to step in and lend Chrysler money to keep it afloat and put import restrictions on Japanese autos. Even with all that, it was close call, and a real scare. One would have thought US auto companies learned something. But they didn’t.
So it’s Deja Vu all over again. As gas prices reach towards three bucks a gallon, Detroit finds itself up to its Adam Apples in gas-guzzlers – again. And, guess who’s just coming to market with a bunch of hot little hybrids – yep.. the Japanese.
Ford Motor Co., the nation's second biggest automaker, admitted last Wednesday its earnings had plunged 38.5 percent in the first quarter as automotive profits fell sharply.
And who has the hottest selling car on the market today? Toyota. It’s little hybrid, the Prius, is so hot dealers can’t keep them in stock. People are buying them at full-sticker price and reselling for several thousand dollars more.
Why? Well, let’s see. A Hummer, on a good day with the wind at its back while going downhill, gets about 12 miles to the gallon. A Prius gets up to 60 miles to the gallon.
Duh. Again.
And how is Ford reacting to this new threat? Ford released the following statement:
''Going forward, we will continue to focus on improving our quality, lowering our costs and delivering exciting new products, as well as taking actions that strengthen our finances, optimize our global footprint and lead to faster development of new products.''
Right, whatever the hell all that means.
I have a suggestion. This time let’s not bail out US auto dealers. Let’s play by Darwin rules. The same goes for the folks who bought these gas-guzzlers in the first place. When I see a Hummer at a gas station I flash the driver the “loser” hand sign. Then I floor my VW and buzz off before they can get the gas nozzle out.
DeLay-ing the Inevitable
A cartoon in today’s paper shows black smoke coming from a chimney atop the US Capitol building. A news commentator explains:
“The black smoke means Tom DeLay’s pants are on fire.”
Cartoons like that are to political junkies like me, what a bleeding animal is to a vulture. It says that it’s just a matter of time before dinner is served.
DeLay has turned for help to an audience he knows he can count on – right-wing talk radio – where high-expectations meet low IQ, s. Sieg Heil on your radio dial.
"We have the opportunity to set up courts; we can also dismantle courts and reorganize them," DeLay told Tony Snow on Fox News Radio. (Full Story)
DeLay got into trouble last month by threatening federal judges in the wake of the Schiavo case. But never mind, now he is threatening the Supreme Court justices as well.
"We've got Justice Kennedy writing decisions based upon international law, not the Constitution of the United States. That's just outrageous. And not only that, but he said in session that he does his own research on the Internet? That is just incredibly outrageous."
DeLay also indulged in some messenger-killing by lashing out at journalists who have who had the bad taste to write stories raising questions about his past relationships with lobbyists and the sources of funds for his overseas travel. Talking on Fox Radio.. no less -- he said this without a hint of irony.
"You talk about judicial activism," DeLay said. "We now have journalistic activism."
But there is good news. DeLay said that all the scrutiny "certainly has gotten me closer to God."
Still not close enough though.
Site of The Day
http://2politicaljunkies.blogspot.com/2005/04/what-if-right-is-right.html
Thursday, April 21, 2005
April 20, 2005
April 20, 2005
A Rare Win
Being a Blue State voter has helped me understand what it must have felt like to be a Red Sox fan. It’s been such a long time since we won anything worth the winning. But yesterday we won one.
John R. Bolton's nomination to be ambassador to the United Nations suffered a setback yesterday when the Senate Foreign Relations Committee unexpectedly decided to spend three more weeks investigating allegations that he mistreated subordinates, threatened a female government contractor and misled the committee about his handling of classified materials. (Washington Post)
I had to pinch myself. And how did we win? We won because Democrats on the committee threw themselves into the fight against Bolton with a kind of sincerity and vigor we have not seen out of them in years.
Joe Biden and Chris Dodd in particular were spectacular. I got chills watching them. They were angry. No, seriously. They were really angry. Outraged that this administration would have the chutzpah to put such a crazy, mean, lying son-of-bitch up for one of the most important jobs in the world – representing the United States of America at the United Nations.
And look what happens when Democrats get angry and act on that anger instead of selling their souls to woo Red State voters.
"The dynamic has changed," said Republican Sen. Lincoln D. Chafee, who before yesterday's session had said he was reluctantly inclined to vote for Bolton. "A lot of reservations surfaced today. It's a new day."
Oh gawd I hope it’s a new day. How I hope so. I hope that this message infuses the rest of the Democrats on The Hill with the same take-no-prisoners fighting spirit. Not only would they begin winning more than they lose, but they would be able to even feel good about themselves again.
Look at how Biden and Dodd’s righteous indignation won the day.
Sens. Joseph R. Biden and Christopher J. Dodd spent nearly an hour attacking Bolton's record. They said he repeatedly tried to dismiss subordinates who had challenged him and later misled the committee about his efforts. Biden said committee aides had learned that Bolton, then working as a private lawyer, had chased a woman through a Moscow hotel in 1994, throwing things at her and falsely claiming to U.S. aid officials that she had misused funds and might go to jail. Melody Townsel of Dallas said in a letter to the committee that Bolton "put me through hell" when he represented a firm that was at odds with her client in a USAID project in Kyrgyzstan. Biden taunted GOP members pressing for a vote yesterday on Bolton's nomination, saying, "I guess you don't want to hear about that."
Biden’s face was so red it screwed up the color balance on my TV. Dodd shouted into his mic, "This ought to be indictable!"
For a change Casey did not strike out or throw the game, but knocked the ball out of the park with the bases loaded.
Memo to Democrats: We want a lot more of that and a lot less of the other stuff. Get on it.
Darwin Rules – or Should
The Bush administration’s scorn for any scientific result that gets in the way of making a buck has permeated corporate boardrooms. Look no further than the US auto industry. Here’s an industry that loves nothing better than to cozy into any fool’s paradise that suits them. And they will stay right there even as the fire alarms blare, warning them that their world is on fire.
Global warming: Forget about it. Not true. The weather’s never been better.
The world is running out of oil: Not true. There’s plenty of oil. Just have to drill a few more holes.
Those are the Bush administration’s beliefs and they suited Detroit perfectly. SUV’s and Hummers fill our roads and auto showrooms.
Which represents an appallingly flat learning curve by US auto companies. Back in the mid-70’s these very same companies got their asses kicked around the block by the Japanese. Back then; despite an Arab oil embargo and sky-high prices, Detroit kept building big, heavy, chrome-laden V-8 gas-guzzlers.
The Japanese saw the calligraphy on the wall and flooded the US market with thrifty little four-cylinder Toyotas and Hondas. Pretty soon almost everyone was driving a Japanese car. Then a Japanese pickup. That mistake almost killed the entire US auto industry. Taxpayers even had to step in and lend Chrysler money to keep it afloat and put import restrictions on Japanese autos. Even with all that, it was close call, and a real scare. One would have thought US auto companies learned something. But they didn’t.
So it’s Deja Vu all over again. As gas prices reach towards three bucks a gallon, Detroit finds itself up to its Adam Apples in gas-guzzlers – again. And, guess who’s just coming to market with a bunch of hot little hybrids – yep.. the Japanese.
Ford Motor Co., the nation's second biggest automaker, admitted last Wednesday its earnings had plunged 38.5 percent in the first quarter as automotive profits fell sharply.
And who has the hottest selling car on the market today? Toyota. It’s little hybrid, the Prius, is so hot dealers can’t keep them in stock. People are buying them at full-sticker price and reselling for several thousand dollars more.
Why? Well, let’s see. A Hummer, on a good day with the wind at its back while going downhill, gets about 12 miles to the gallon. A Prius gets up to 60 miles to the gallon.
Duh. Again.
And how is Ford reacting to this new threat? Ford released the following statement:
''Going forward, we will continue to focus on improving our quality, lowering our costs and delivering exciting new products, as well as taking actions that strengthen our finances, optimize our global footprint and lead to faster development of new products.''
Right, whatever the hell all that means.
I have a suggestion. This time let’s not bail out US auto dealers. Let’s play by Darwin rules. The same goes for the folks who bought these gas-guzzlers in the first place. When I see a Hummer at a gas station I flash the driver the “loser” hand sign. Then I floor my VW and buzz off before they can get the gas nozzle out.
DeLay-ing the Inevitable
A cartoon in today’s paper shows black smoke coming from a chimney atop the US Capitol building. A news commentator explains:
“The black smoke means Tom DeLay’s pants are on fire.”
Cartoons like that are to political junkies like me, what a bleeding animal is to a vulture. It says that it’s just a matter of time before dinner is served.
DeLay has turned for help to an audience he knows he can count on – right-wing talk radio – where high-expectations meet low IQ, s. Sieg Heil on your radio dial.
"We have the opportunity to set up courts; we can also dismantle courts and reorganize them," DeLay told Tony Snow on Fox News Radio. (Full Story)
DeLay got into trouble last month by threatening federal judges in the wake of the Schiavo case. But never mind, now he is threatening the Supreme Court justices as well.
"We've got Justice Kennedy writing decisions based upon international law, not the Constitution of the United States. That's just outrageous. And not only that, but he said in session that he does his own research on the Internet? That is just incredibly outrageous."
DeLay also indulged in some messenger-killing by lashing out at journalists who have who had the bad taste to write stories raising questions about his past relationships with lobbyists and the sources of funds for his overseas travel. Talking on Fox Radio.. no less -- he said this without a hint of irony.
"You talk about judicial activism," DeLay said. "We now have journalistic activism."
But there is good news. DeLay said that all the scrutiny "certainly has gotten me closer to God."
Still not close enough though.
Site of The Day
http://2politicaljunkies.blogspot.com/2005/04/what-if-right-is-right.html
A Rare Win
Being a Blue State voter has helped me understand what it must have felt like to be a Red Sox fan. It’s been such a long time since we won anything worth the winning. But yesterday we won one.
John R. Bolton's nomination to be ambassador to the United Nations suffered a setback yesterday when the Senate Foreign Relations Committee unexpectedly decided to spend three more weeks investigating allegations that he mistreated subordinates, threatened a female government contractor and misled the committee about his handling of classified materials. (Washington Post)
I had to pinch myself. And how did we win? We won because Democrats on the committee threw themselves into the fight against Bolton with a kind of sincerity and vigor we have not seen out of them in years.
Joe Biden and Chris Dodd in particular were spectacular. I got chills watching them. They were angry. No, seriously. They were really angry. Outraged that this administration would have the chutzpah to put such a crazy, mean, lying son-of-bitch up for one of the most important jobs in the world – representing the United States of America at the United Nations.
And look what happens when Democrats get angry and act on that anger instead of selling their souls to woo Red State voters.
"The dynamic has changed," said Republican Sen. Lincoln D. Chafee, who before yesterday's session had said he was reluctantly inclined to vote for Bolton. "A lot of reservations surfaced today. It's a new day."
Oh gawd I hope it’s a new day. How I hope so. I hope that this message infuses the rest of the Democrats on The Hill with the same take-no-prisoners fighting spirit. Not only would they begin winning more than they lose, but they would be able to even feel good about themselves again.
Look at how Biden and Dodd’s righteous indignation won the day.
Sens. Joseph R. Biden and Christopher J. Dodd spent nearly an hour attacking Bolton's record. They said he repeatedly tried to dismiss subordinates who had challenged him and later misled the committee about his efforts. Biden said committee aides had learned that Bolton, then working as a private lawyer, had chased a woman through a Moscow hotel in 1994, throwing things at her and falsely claiming to U.S. aid officials that she had misused funds and might go to jail. Melody Townsel of Dallas said in a letter to the committee that Bolton "put me through hell" when he represented a firm that was at odds with her client in a USAID project in Kyrgyzstan. Biden taunted GOP members pressing for a vote yesterday on Bolton's nomination, saying, "I guess you don't want to hear about that."
Biden’s face was so red it screwed up the color balance on my TV. Dodd shouted into his mic, "This ought to be indictable!"
For a change Casey did not strike out or throw the game, but knocked the ball out of the park with the bases loaded.
Memo to Democrats: We want a lot more of that and a lot less of the other stuff. Get on it.
Darwin Rules – or Should
The Bush administration’s scorn for any scientific result that gets in the way of making a buck has permeated corporate boardrooms. Look no further than the US auto industry. Here’s an industry that loves nothing better than to cozy into any fool’s paradise that suits them. And they will stay right there even as the fire alarms blare, warning them that their world is on fire.
Global warming: Forget about it. Not true. The weather’s never been better.
The world is running out of oil: Not true. There’s plenty of oil. Just have to drill a few more holes.
Those are the Bush administration’s beliefs and they suited Detroit perfectly. SUV’s and Hummers fill our roads and auto showrooms.
Which represents an appallingly flat learning curve by US auto companies. Back in the mid-70’s these very same companies got their asses kicked around the block by the Japanese. Back then; despite an Arab oil embargo and sky-high prices, Detroit kept building big, heavy, chrome-laden V-8 gas-guzzlers.
The Japanese saw the calligraphy on the wall and flooded the US market with thrifty little four-cylinder Toyotas and Hondas. Pretty soon almost everyone was driving a Japanese car. Then a Japanese pickup. That mistake almost killed the entire US auto industry. Taxpayers even had to step in and lend Chrysler money to keep it afloat and put import restrictions on Japanese autos. Even with all that, it was close call, and a real scare. One would have thought US auto companies learned something. But they didn’t.
So it’s Deja Vu all over again. As gas prices reach towards three bucks a gallon, Detroit finds itself up to its Adam Apples in gas-guzzlers – again. And, guess who’s just coming to market with a bunch of hot little hybrids – yep.. the Japanese.
Ford Motor Co., the nation's second biggest automaker, admitted last Wednesday its earnings had plunged 38.5 percent in the first quarter as automotive profits fell sharply.
And who has the hottest selling car on the market today? Toyota. It’s little hybrid, the Prius, is so hot dealers can’t keep them in stock. People are buying them at full-sticker price and reselling for several thousand dollars more.
Why? Well, let’s see. A Hummer, on a good day with the wind at its back while going downhill, gets about 12 miles to the gallon. A Prius gets up to 60 miles to the gallon.
Duh. Again.
And how is Ford reacting to this new threat? Ford released the following statement:
''Going forward, we will continue to focus on improving our quality, lowering our costs and delivering exciting new products, as well as taking actions that strengthen our finances, optimize our global footprint and lead to faster development of new products.''
Right, whatever the hell all that means.
I have a suggestion. This time let’s not bail out US auto dealers. Let’s play by Darwin rules. The same goes for the folks who bought these gas-guzzlers in the first place. When I see a Hummer at a gas station I flash the driver the “loser” hand sign. Then I floor my VW and buzz off before they can get the gas nozzle out.
DeLay-ing the Inevitable
A cartoon in today’s paper shows black smoke coming from a chimney atop the US Capitol building. A news commentator explains:
“The black smoke means Tom DeLay’s pants are on fire.”
Cartoons like that are to political junkies like me, what a bleeding animal is to a vulture. It says that it’s just a matter of time before dinner is served.
DeLay has turned for help to an audience he knows he can count on – right-wing talk radio – where high-expectations meet low IQ, s. Sieg Heil on your radio dial.
"We have the opportunity to set up courts; we can also dismantle courts and reorganize them," DeLay told Tony Snow on Fox News Radio. (Full Story)
DeLay got into trouble last month by threatening federal judges in the wake of the Schiavo case. But never mind, now he is threatening the Supreme Court justices as well.
"We've got Justice Kennedy writing decisions based upon international law, not the Constitution of the United States. That's just outrageous. And not only that, but he said in session that he does his own research on the Internet? That is just incredibly outrageous."
DeLay also indulged in some messenger-killing by lashing out at journalists who have who had the bad taste to write stories raising questions about his past relationships with lobbyists and the sources of funds for his overseas travel. Talking on Fox Radio.. no less -- he said this without a hint of irony.
"You talk about judicial activism," DeLay said. "We now have journalistic activism."
But there is good news. DeLay said that all the scrutiny "certainly has gotten me closer to God."
Still not close enough though.
Site of The Day
http://2politicaljunkies.blogspot.com/2005/04/what-if-right-is-right.html
Wednesday, April 20, 2005
April 19, 2005
You Want MORE Pills?
Apparently the next evolutionary step for a fully mature democracy is to allow every citizen to do whatever the hell they want. That seems to be the message we are getting from the far right. Laws are all well and good – but only as long as you personally agree with them. When a law runs counter to your own personal conscience/religion/superstition/phobia or compulsion, just make your own rule.
That seems to be the point being made by right-wing pharmacists who are encouraging similarly inclined pharmacists to refuse to fill certain lawful medical prescriptions. As is so often the case with things that bother conservatives this is about sex.
The meds these government-licensed professionals object to involve those that control conception; birth control pills, condoms and now, the so-called “morning after” pill. They are simply refusing to fill such prescriptions, saying doing so would violate their religious or personal beliefs.
So, what’s that state license hanging on their pharmacy wall mean -- anything at all? Not much if you listen to what those who want the right to decide for the public they were licensed to serve. Just listen to what Illinois state Senator Frank Watson had to say when Gov. Rod Blagojevich ordered pharmacies, including the Watson family pharmacy, to fill prescriptions for women wanting the new "morning after" pill, even if it meant putting aside their employees' personal views.
"The governor is trying to make a decision that must be left to the pharmacy," said Senator Watson, whose family business, Watson's Drug Store in Greenville, Ill., does not stock the pill. "It's an infringement on a business decision and also on the pharmacist's right of conscience." (Full Story)
Ah, so we are not now a nation of laws, but a nation of individual conscience. I see. Do you have to be a Christian pharmacist to exercise this new right? Or is it just for right-wing pill pushers? I want to know because I have a long list of things I am being forced to pay for through taxes that offend my personal conscience too. Can I stop paying my share of the war in Iraq, for example? Capital punishment, I want to stop paying for that too. If I withhold just those from my share of taxes would it be okay, or would it land me in a cell at Ft. Leavenworth? I am against those things, they are wrong in my mind – ah, I mean in “my conscience.” They are against my secular humanist religion too.
There is a bright side to this story though. The biggest contributors to the GOP have been the pharmaceutical companies. Their money helped put these right-wingnuts in power. And now that they are at the controls they are doing what nuts do. When it comes to a choice between money and votes, they will always go for the votes. In this case the votes they value most are those of religious right wing groups who have all kinds of “issues,” that have nothing to do with science or the drug company’s bottom lines.
Those drug companies have spent billions of dollars complying with the law to bring these drugs to market. They jumped all kinds of regulatory hurdles to get that stuff on the shelf. Tens of millions were spent getting FDA approval. Now, after all that, some tight-ass, holier-than-though pharmacist in Dog Patch is going to refuse to sell thier drugs. And you expect the drug companies to let that happen? Not a chance. (You might say this issue is pregnant with political opportunities. You might.. but I won't)
If pharmacists can decide which drugs they will and will not provide, where will end? Can Viagra et al, not be next? Can it be long before some whacko pharmacist decides that heart attacks are God’s way of calling us home and refuses to “artificially extend lives” by selling drugs that combat heart attacks? You laugh?
Even if this trend only limits availability of contraceptives it threatens drug company investments in the hundreds of millions of dollars. And it’s not just the drug companies that should worry. Drugstores, even those that continue to fill these prescriptions, should worry. And they have good reason to worry, because both nature and commerce abhor a vacuum. Once customers are inconvenienced by this nonsense, we will see a robust online contraceptive mail order industry spring up to fill that demand.
And recent history shows that once people discover a convenient way to buy anything online that they consume regularly, they never go back to the store for it again. You doubt that premise? Okay, here’s a little experiment you can do yourself. Walk into your local Blockbuster video store, look the manager right in the eye and shout: “NetFlix.” '
Then run.
I have been predicting for the past three years that once conservative Americans see what right-wingers do once they get into power, they will work day and night to get them out of power. That process has finally begun. When they voted for these guys they thought they were getting people who would control spending and defend us from those who would do us harm. Instead they got this:
* Budgets: The biggest government deficits in the history of bipods.
* War and Peace: Two wars and itching for a third.
* Diplomacy: a crazed (rhetorical) bomb-thrower nominated as our ambassador to the UN.
* Spying: the guy who, under Ronald Reagan, managed US aid to South America’s dirty wars, appointed to head our new master spy agency.
* No Child Left Behind: has hit schools in conservative rural areas squarely in the frontal lobes. (Er you sayin’ my kids is stooped?”)
* Medicare, Medicaid: both on the ropes, something that will hit more Red States harder than the Blue ones.
* Social Security “reform:” another scare for Red State voters where the promise of a guaranteed monthly $1500 government check at 65 has been and remains the only carrot at the end of their life’s stick.
* Jobs. What jobs? Wal-Mart? Thanks a lot.
* Inflation. some already – a whole lot more just round the bend.
* State Rights: Forget about it. Feds rule now – a development that should just tickle all those militia types who voted for Bush because of Waco and Ruby Ridge.
* Homeland Security: While our southern border remains wide open, if someone checks a suspicious book out of a local library the FBI will swarm their house. (“Just drop the DaVinci Code and no one gets hurts.”)
* Religion and Government: This one has not gotten through to them quite yet, but it will. When government starts pandering to religions there is no end to it. Right-wingers might love to see the Ten Commandments on their local Courthouse lawn, but they will hate it when someone plants a Star of David next to it. And they will really hate it when the Hindu Goddess, Shiva (pictured right)is placed on the other side of their sacred tablets. And that’s when fundamentalist Christian voters will discover that there is nothing they can do about it. Say hello to the law of unintended results.
*
Okay, so back to our conscious-burdened pharmacists. Lawmakers need to have the following little heart to heart chat with these folks, and here’s how that chat should go:
“We understand and respect that you have strong religious/personal objections to providing customers with certain legal medications. We had a similar problem in the military with conscious objectors, men and women who object to war. And so we made allowances for this by saying they don’t have to serve in the military. Likewise, if you cannot fulfill your statutory obligations as a state and federally licensed dispenser of all legal medications, then you don’t have to. Just find another line of work.”
I suspect Pfizer agrees, is watching this closely and has already sent a secretary off to find the mailing address for the DNC.
Which brings me to the 2006 mid-term elections and the 2008 Presidential race. May I suggest a GOP slogan for both:
“Hey everyone, how are we doin’?”
Apparently the next evolutionary step for a fully mature democracy is to allow every citizen to do whatever the hell they want. That seems to be the message we are getting from the far right. Laws are all well and good – but only as long as you personally agree with them. When a law runs counter to your own personal conscience/religion/superstition/phobia or compulsion, just make your own rule.
That seems to be the point being made by right-wing pharmacists who are encouraging similarly inclined pharmacists to refuse to fill certain lawful medical prescriptions. As is so often the case with things that bother conservatives this is about sex.
The meds these government-licensed professionals object to involve those that control conception; birth control pills, condoms and now, the so-called “morning after” pill. They are simply refusing to fill such prescriptions, saying doing so would violate their religious or personal beliefs.
So, what’s that state license hanging on their pharmacy wall mean -- anything at all? Not much if you listen to what those who want the right to decide for the public they were licensed to serve. Just listen to what Illinois state Senator Frank Watson had to say when Gov. Rod Blagojevich ordered pharmacies, including the Watson family pharmacy, to fill prescriptions for women wanting the new "morning after" pill, even if it meant putting aside their employees' personal views.
"The governor is trying to make a decision that must be left to the pharmacy," said Senator Watson, whose family business, Watson's Drug Store in Greenville, Ill., does not stock the pill. "It's an infringement on a business decision and also on the pharmacist's right of conscience." (Full Story)
Ah, so we are not now a nation of laws, but a nation of individual conscience. I see. Do you have to be a Christian pharmacist to exercise this new right? Or is it just for right-wing pill pushers? I want to know because I have a long list of things I am being forced to pay for through taxes that offend my personal conscience too. Can I stop paying my share of the war in Iraq, for example? Capital punishment, I want to stop paying for that too. If I withhold just those from my share of taxes would it be okay, or would it land me in a cell at Ft. Leavenworth? I am against those things, they are wrong in my mind – ah, I mean in “my conscience.” They are against my secular humanist religion too.
There is a bright side to this story though. The biggest contributors to the GOP have been the pharmaceutical companies. Their money helped put these right-wingnuts in power. And now that they are at the controls they are doing what nuts do. When it comes to a choice between money and votes, they will always go for the votes. In this case the votes they value most are those of religious right wing groups who have all kinds of “issues,” that have nothing to do with science or the drug company’s bottom lines.
Those drug companies have spent billions of dollars complying with the law to bring these drugs to market. They jumped all kinds of regulatory hurdles to get that stuff on the shelf. Tens of millions were spent getting FDA approval. Now, after all that, some tight-ass, holier-than-though pharmacist in Dog Patch is going to refuse to sell thier drugs. And you expect the drug companies to let that happen? Not a chance. (You might say this issue is pregnant with political opportunities. You might.. but I won't)
If pharmacists can decide which drugs they will and will not provide, where will end? Can Viagra et al, not be next? Can it be long before some whacko pharmacist decides that heart attacks are God’s way of calling us home and refuses to “artificially extend lives” by selling drugs that combat heart attacks? You laugh?
Even if this trend only limits availability of contraceptives it threatens drug company investments in the hundreds of millions of dollars. And it’s not just the drug companies that should worry. Drugstores, even those that continue to fill these prescriptions, should worry. And they have good reason to worry, because both nature and commerce abhor a vacuum. Once customers are inconvenienced by this nonsense, we will see a robust online contraceptive mail order industry spring up to fill that demand.
And recent history shows that once people discover a convenient way to buy anything online that they consume regularly, they never go back to the store for it again. You doubt that premise? Okay, here’s a little experiment you can do yourself. Walk into your local Blockbuster video store, look the manager right in the eye and shout: “NetFlix.” '
Then run.
I have been predicting for the past three years that once conservative Americans see what right-wingers do once they get into power, they will work day and night to get them out of power. That process has finally begun. When they voted for these guys they thought they were getting people who would control spending and defend us from those who would do us harm. Instead they got this:
* Budgets: The biggest government deficits in the history of bipods.
* War and Peace: Two wars and itching for a third.
* Diplomacy: a crazed (rhetorical) bomb-thrower nominated as our ambassador to the UN.
* Spying: the guy who, under Ronald Reagan, managed US aid to South America’s dirty wars, appointed to head our new master spy agency.
* No Child Left Behind: has hit schools in conservative rural areas squarely in the frontal lobes. (Er you sayin’ my kids is stooped?”)
* Medicare, Medicaid: both on the ropes, something that will hit more Red States harder than the Blue ones.
* Social Security “reform:” another scare for Red State voters where the promise of a guaranteed monthly $1500 government check at 65 has been and remains the only carrot at the end of their life’s stick.
* Jobs. What jobs? Wal-Mart? Thanks a lot.
* Inflation. some already – a whole lot more just round the bend.
* State Rights: Forget about it. Feds rule now – a development that should just tickle all those militia types who voted for Bush because of Waco and Ruby Ridge.
* Homeland Security: While our southern border remains wide open, if someone checks a suspicious book out of a local library the FBI will swarm their house. (“Just drop the DaVinci Code and no one gets hurts.”)
* Religion and Government: This one has not gotten through to them quite yet, but it will. When government starts pandering to religions there is no end to it. Right-wingers might love to see the Ten Commandments on their local Courthouse lawn, but they will hate it when someone plants a Star of David next to it. And they will really hate it when the Hindu Goddess, Shiva (pictured right)is placed on the other side of their sacred tablets. And that’s when fundamentalist Christian voters will discover that there is nothing they can do about it. Say hello to the law of unintended results.
*
Okay, so back to our conscious-burdened pharmacists. Lawmakers need to have the following little heart to heart chat with these folks, and here’s how that chat should go:
“We understand and respect that you have strong religious/personal objections to providing customers with certain legal medications. We had a similar problem in the military with conscious objectors, men and women who object to war. And so we made allowances for this by saying they don’t have to serve in the military. Likewise, if you cannot fulfill your statutory obligations as a state and federally licensed dispenser of all legal medications, then you don’t have to. Just find another line of work.”
I suspect Pfizer agrees, is watching this closely and has already sent a secretary off to find the mailing address for the DNC.
Which brings me to the 2006 mid-term elections and the 2008 Presidential race. May I suggest a GOP slogan for both:
“Hey everyone, how are we doin’?”
Tuesday, April 19, 2005
April 18, 2005
Can You Hear Me Now?
There are a couple of subjects on which I accept the charge I have become a broken record; the coup underway by America’s Christian right, and America’s Potemkin village of an economy.
In very real ways almost everything that currently plagues this country can be connected in some way to those two issues. I already slapped religious fundamentalists around in this past weekend edition. (If you missed it you can read it here.)
Last week’s stock market meltdown offers me another opportunity remind everyone that, as a nation and a people, we have been living on borrowed money – and therefore, borrowed time.
Well, time’s up.
From here on natural economic forces will drive all future economic events. Over the past four years those natural forces had been held by Bush’s enormous tax cuts, historically low interest rates and super-easy consumer credit.
Five years ago the national bank account was rolling in dough with projected surpluses approaching $6 trillion. Today I would be happy if I could say we were just flat broke. But it’s worse than that. A lot worse. We are now running half trillion-dollar deficits each year and have been borrowing money at record rates from other countries. We are now $7.8 trillion in the hole.
Your share of this debt is $26,342.28. (Same goes for your spouse and your kids and the horse you rode in on.) And you bill is going up everyday. The National Debt has been increasing by an average $2.08 billion per day since September 30, 2004! http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/
So much for "tax and spend liberals," huh? And would it be terribly bad taste to stop here and remind ourselves that under the last Democrat administration the budget was not only in surplus but we were paying down the national debt?
Anyway, as history teaches that, while government spending and easy credit can temporarily hobble the immutable laws of business physics, they will eventually reassert themselves, and with a vengeance.
When Bush took office in 2001 he had a chance to address some of the systemic weaknesses just emerging. NAFTA, a Bill Clinton legacy, was not working the way it was supposed to. Neither were a host of other “fast tracked” trade agreements signed during Clinton’s tenure. As well-meaning as they might have been, these one-sided open trade agreements stripped American manufacturers of competitiveness. Cheap labor, lax worker safety and environmental rules overseas went unaddressed and the giant sucking sound that resulted were American jobs heading overseas.
Right under Bush’s nose US jobs by the millions flowed to those offshore venues. He could have rectified this by insisting that any country that wants to trade with the US had to do so on a level playing field, our field. If spreading democracy is so damn important to this President, why then isn’t it also important to spread the best industrial practices we have learned over the past century as well?
But Bush did nothing like that. Instead of trying to revive the American economy by making it truly competitive again with world trading partners, he reached into the federal checking account and poured $1.36 trillion in tax giveaways onto the smoldering economic embers. And when that money began to burn, he claimed it proof of his wisdom.
Well, that money is now in ashes, the embers are again smoldering, and what now, genius?
Those other nations – particularly China – to whom our trade agreements gave away the farm, no longer want to buy US dollar investments. In other words, the lending window is closing. Domestic rates are going up as the dollar goes down. Homeowners who became serial refinancers have now sucked the last dime of equity out of their homes. Credit card companies are still lending, but have raised their rates and won new legislation that no longer allow their sucker customers to slip their leash by filing bankruptcy. Americans are driving around in giant SUV's, which they still owe a bundle on, and gas prices are heading for $3 a gallon. Soon they won't even be able to give those things away. Then what?
Isn’t it ironic? The US destroyed one Communist giant, the Soviet Union, by forcing it to spend itself into fiscal collapse by provoking a space arms race. Now the last remaining Communist giant, China, has forced the US into near bankruptcy by setting up shop at Wal-Mart and selling us all manner of cheaply manufactured goods, and even lending us the money with which to buy the stuff. (“When we hang the capitalist they will sell us the rope.” Stalin)
I wonder if Chinese leaders still sneak off for a few tokes off the old opium pipe? If so I suspect you can hear more than a few muffled and drossy chuckles in the Beijing night these days.
As for the question "what now?" Stagflation. If you're too young to remember the last time it hit, read all about it.
Bush Family Expand Thier (own) Ownership Society
While his father was President of the United States Neil Bush got caught looting Silverado Savings and Loan. When daddy liberated Kuwait, Neil and Jeb and Marvin Bush jumped on the first jet heading that way and set up for business offers in a Kuwaiti hotel suit. Now the action is Iraq. The Bush kids are once again pulling themselves up by their family bootstraps. Read this grossly under-reported expose for a bellyful of the Bush’s getting another bellyful. (Link to Full Story)
The full rundown on the Bush Boys and their smarmy business deals can be found HERE.
Hypocrite Watch
I have to admit to judging a book by its cover. Every time I see the boyish Christian
right-winger Ralph Reed on TV I see a guy who I know in my gut would have eagerly slipped into an SS uniform had he lived in Germany in the 1930s. I can't help it. It just pops into my head every time I see the guy.
Anyway, Reed has shelved the Elmer Gantry routine to become a declared politician. The former head of the Christian Coalition has been a high-priced communications consultant, a top Bush campaign adviser, chairman of Georgia's Republican Party and now a candidate for lieutenant governor in Atlanta.
But as he morphs from Christian advocate to professional politician, Reed, 43, finds himself carrying some baggage: his ties to an old friend, documented scumbag Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Yes, the same scumbag who is Tom DeLay’s chief Capo who is now in trouble for bilking American Indians out of a bundle while defending their right to build casinos in which to bilk other folks out of money. So much for Christian values.. blah blah, etc. etc. ( Read the FULL STORY here )
Also if you have not read DeLay's Axis of Influence... it's HERE.
There are a couple of subjects on which I accept the charge I have become a broken record; the coup underway by America’s Christian right, and America’s Potemkin village of an economy.
In very real ways almost everything that currently plagues this country can be connected in some way to those two issues. I already slapped religious fundamentalists around in this past weekend edition. (If you missed it you can read it here.)
Last week’s stock market meltdown offers me another opportunity remind everyone that, as a nation and a people, we have been living on borrowed money – and therefore, borrowed time.
Well, time’s up.
From here on natural economic forces will drive all future economic events. Over the past four years those natural forces had been held by Bush’s enormous tax cuts, historically low interest rates and super-easy consumer credit.
Five years ago the national bank account was rolling in dough with projected surpluses approaching $6 trillion. Today I would be happy if I could say we were just flat broke. But it’s worse than that. A lot worse. We are now running half trillion-dollar deficits each year and have been borrowing money at record rates from other countries. We are now $7.8 trillion in the hole.
Your share of this debt is $26,342.28. (Same goes for your spouse and your kids and the horse you rode in on.) And you bill is going up everyday. The National Debt has been increasing by an average $2.08 billion per day since September 30, 2004! http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/
So much for "tax and spend liberals," huh? And would it be terribly bad taste to stop here and remind ourselves that under the last Democrat administration the budget was not only in surplus but we were paying down the national debt?
Anyway, as history teaches that, while government spending and easy credit can temporarily hobble the immutable laws of business physics, they will eventually reassert themselves, and with a vengeance.
When Bush took office in 2001 he had a chance to address some of the systemic weaknesses just emerging. NAFTA, a Bill Clinton legacy, was not working the way it was supposed to. Neither were a host of other “fast tracked” trade agreements signed during Clinton’s tenure. As well-meaning as they might have been, these one-sided open trade agreements stripped American manufacturers of competitiveness. Cheap labor, lax worker safety and environmental rules overseas went unaddressed and the giant sucking sound that resulted were American jobs heading overseas.
Right under Bush’s nose US jobs by the millions flowed to those offshore venues. He could have rectified this by insisting that any country that wants to trade with the US had to do so on a level playing field, our field. If spreading democracy is so damn important to this President, why then isn’t it also important to spread the best industrial practices we have learned over the past century as well?
But Bush did nothing like that. Instead of trying to revive the American economy by making it truly competitive again with world trading partners, he reached into the federal checking account and poured $1.36 trillion in tax giveaways onto the smoldering economic embers. And when that money began to burn, he claimed it proof of his wisdom.
Well, that money is now in ashes, the embers are again smoldering, and what now, genius?
Those other nations – particularly China – to whom our trade agreements gave away the farm, no longer want to buy US dollar investments. In other words, the lending window is closing. Domestic rates are going up as the dollar goes down. Homeowners who became serial refinancers have now sucked the last dime of equity out of their homes. Credit card companies are still lending, but have raised their rates and won new legislation that no longer allow their sucker customers to slip their leash by filing bankruptcy. Americans are driving around in giant SUV's, which they still owe a bundle on, and gas prices are heading for $3 a gallon. Soon they won't even be able to give those things away. Then what?
Isn’t it ironic? The US destroyed one Communist giant, the Soviet Union, by forcing it to spend itself into fiscal collapse by provoking a space arms race. Now the last remaining Communist giant, China, has forced the US into near bankruptcy by setting up shop at Wal-Mart and selling us all manner of cheaply manufactured goods, and even lending us the money with which to buy the stuff. (“When we hang the capitalist they will sell us the rope.” Stalin)
I wonder if Chinese leaders still sneak off for a few tokes off the old opium pipe? If so I suspect you can hear more than a few muffled and drossy chuckles in the Beijing night these days.
As for the question "what now?" Stagflation. If you're too young to remember the last time it hit, read all about it.
Bush Family Expand Thier (own) Ownership Society
While his father was President of the United States Neil Bush got caught looting Silverado Savings and Loan. When daddy liberated Kuwait, Neil and Jeb and Marvin Bush jumped on the first jet heading that way and set up for business offers in a Kuwaiti hotel suit. Now the action is Iraq. The Bush kids are once again pulling themselves up by their family bootstraps. Read this grossly under-reported expose for a bellyful of the Bush’s getting another bellyful. (Link to Full Story)
The full rundown on the Bush Boys and their smarmy business deals can be found HERE.
Hypocrite Watch
I have to admit to judging a book by its cover. Every time I see the boyish Christian
right-winger Ralph Reed on TV I see a guy who I know in my gut would have eagerly slipped into an SS uniform had he lived in Germany in the 1930s. I can't help it. It just pops into my head every time I see the guy.
Anyway, Reed has shelved the Elmer Gantry routine to become a declared politician. The former head of the Christian Coalition has been a high-priced communications consultant, a top Bush campaign adviser, chairman of Georgia's Republican Party and now a candidate for lieutenant governor in Atlanta.
But as he morphs from Christian advocate to professional politician, Reed, 43, finds himself carrying some baggage: his ties to an old friend, documented scumbag Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Yes, the same scumbag who is Tom DeLay’s chief Capo who is now in trouble for bilking American Indians out of a bundle while defending their right to build casinos in which to bilk other folks out of money. So much for Christian values.. blah blah, etc. etc. ( Read the FULL STORY here )
Also if you have not read DeLay's Axis of Influence... it's HERE.
Monday, April 18, 2005
April 15-17, 2005
Weekend Edition
Onward Christian Soldiers
Did you see this story?
“As the Senate heads toward a showdown over the rules governing judicial confirmations, Senator Bill Frist, the majority leader, has agreed to join a handful of prominent Christian conservatives in a telecast portraying Democrats as "against people of faith" for blocking President Bush's nominees….. Asked about Dr. Frist's participation in an event describing the filibuster "as against people of faith," his spokesman, Bob Stevenson, did not answer the question… ” (New York Times)
The event is being sponsored by a half-dozen of America’s leading fundamentalist Christian Taliban; Chuck Colson (of Watergate fame,) Dr. Al Mohler, president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and what gathering of religious wingnuts would be complete without Dr. James C. Dobson.
Why is Frist doing this? I mean the guy wants to be President some day. Here’s why, in Dobson’s own words:
"Does the Republican Party want our votes, no strings attached--to court us every two years, and then to say, 'Don't call me; I'll call you'--and to not care about the moral law of the universe?...Is that what they want? Is that the way the system works? Is this the way it's going to be? If it is, I'm gone, and if I go, I will do everything I can to take as many people with me as possible."
Yep. There it is … America’s own homegrown religious fundamentalism in all its bullying glory. Dobson, Colson, and Mohler are hardly unique. As you read this Dobson’s intolerant counterparts are whipping up hatred against Christians and Jews in mosques across the Middle East. Religious fundamentalists have been the same throughout history and throughout the world. All that differs is their choice of superstition.
Religious fundamentalists are usually not terribly bright. After all, these are people who actually believe that the universe is only 6000 years old, that Noah really got two of every creature on earth onto a boat he built in his backyard, that burning bushes talk and that Jesus’ mother was a virgin (because sex would have been just too icky to contemplate.)
But what America’s Christian fundamentalists lack in critical thinking skills they more than make for in sheer staying power. They never get tired of the sound of their own message. They will pound on it and pound on it until they get what they want. And they more often than not do get what they want, not because their demands are rational, or right, or based on anything real, but because we continue to hope they will leave the rest of us alone if we give in.
Of course just the opposite is what we get. Giving in to a religious fundamentalist is just like paying a blackmailer. It’s just proof of concept for them. And so they are soon back with a set of new and even more outrageous and intrusive demands. And the process begins all over again.
When it all began over two centuries ago all they wanted was a country in which they could practice their own religion unmolested by the authorities. Back then America really was a Christian nation, but by default, not by design.
As the American experiment began succeeding immigrants from non-Christian cultures joined the mix. Christians didn’t like it one little bit and discrimination against other religious persuasions, particularly Jews, was both common and socially acceptable. The Protestant majority didn’t care much for Catholics either but tolerated them in public – they were after all, Christians, sort of…. But they warned and plotted against them behind church doors.
Nevertheless the American experiment in inclusive democracy continued to succeed and grow. Then came along the development that really threw a monkey wrench into Christian control -- free public education. Suddenly everyone could get a liberal education undiluted and undistorted by religious dogma. Ordinary citizens started to get smarter and began engaging in the unthinkable… they started thinking. That led to some to question whether religious thought might be little more than institutionalized superstition.
And that’s when the real trouble started. And it’s why we are having this conversation today. The America of Puritan Christians had evolved into -- gasp -- “E Pluribus Unum.” From many, one -- many cultures, many religions, many beliefs – one nation. For fundamentalist Christians that outcome is simply unacceptable, the handiwork of Satan Himself.
Like their Muslim fundamentalist counterparts in the Middle East, America’s Christian fundamentalists hate where all this inclusiveness has led America. So, rather than embracing a vision of a country in which law-abiding, peaceful citizens are allowed to live as they please, they want lawmakers to roll the social calendar back a hundred years or so.
They want to return to the way things were when they felt superior to anyone who did not share their narrow set of religious beliefs and were allowed to treat such “sinners” accordingly.
They want to return to a time when they made the rules and punished those who broke them -- a time of scarlet letters, shunning, banishment, and worse.
Ah, those were the days! When America was a REAL Christian nation.
The fundamentalist demands of the James Dobson’s of America’s religious right mirror almost precisely the wishes of the Osama bin Laden’s of radical Islam. They too want, under the guise of religious modesty and protection, to subjugate women to rules that segregate and exclude them from normal social intercourse and commerce. Both Christian and Muslim fundamentalists want to return to the days when the rights of no less than half the world’s population were reduced to serving men, bearing and raising children – without complaint, without legal recourse, and without choice.
And those are the very people Republican Senate leader Bill Frist will be affirming when he gives that speech accusing Democrats for not being true “people of faith.” It’s a new demagogic low, even by Washington standards. It is the first time I can't recall another time when a national party leader literally demonized the political opposition.
Onward Christian soldiers, marching as to war. And it is a war, don't doubt that for a moment. A war between those who want America to continue to be the nation of E Pluribus Unum and those who want it to return to a nation where women, gays, non-Christians and atheists are marginalized and demonized. Their soldiers are massed on the ramparts of public debate. And, they have been virtually unopposed by the very men and women we sent to Congress to protect and defend our liberties.
"As the liberal, anti-Christian dogma of the left has been repudiated in almost every recent election, the courts have become the last great bastion for liberalism," Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council and organizer of the telecast on which Frist will speak. "For years activist courts, aided by liberal interest groups like the A.C.L.U., have been quietly working under the veil of the judiciary, like thieves in the night, to rob us of our Christian heritage and our religious freedoms."
This war began years ago. It's been a one-sided battle so far as secular forces sit on their hands hoping that eventually their leaders in Washington will come to their senses. Well they are not going to unless we make them, because these fundamentalists scare the hell out of elected politicians. Frist’s decision to pander to the worst of the worst of America’s Christian Taliban shows just how much they fear alienanting America's Christian Taliban.
There is a bit of good news though for you ladies. Berkas are black. And we know how black is ever so slimming...
LETTERS....
Steve,
I used to be pretty religious when I was younger (then I went to college where I learned to think). My mother's side of the family were fundamentalists. ( http://www.newsforreal.com/letters.html )
Onward Christian Soldiers
Did you see this story?
“As the Senate heads toward a showdown over the rules governing judicial confirmations, Senator Bill Frist, the majority leader, has agreed to join a handful of prominent Christian conservatives in a telecast portraying Democrats as "against people of faith" for blocking President Bush's nominees….. Asked about Dr. Frist's participation in an event describing the filibuster "as against people of faith," his spokesman, Bob Stevenson, did not answer the question… ” (New York Times)
The event is being sponsored by a half-dozen of America’s leading fundamentalist Christian Taliban; Chuck Colson (of Watergate fame,) Dr. Al Mohler, president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and what gathering of religious wingnuts would be complete without Dr. James C. Dobson.
Why is Frist doing this? I mean the guy wants to be President some day. Here’s why, in Dobson’s own words:
"Does the Republican Party want our votes, no strings attached--to court us every two years, and then to say, 'Don't call me; I'll call you'--and to not care about the moral law of the universe?...Is that what they want? Is that the way the system works? Is this the way it's going to be? If it is, I'm gone, and if I go, I will do everything I can to take as many people with me as possible."
Yep. There it is … America’s own homegrown religious fundamentalism in all its bullying glory. Dobson, Colson, and Mohler are hardly unique. As you read this Dobson’s intolerant counterparts are whipping up hatred against Christians and Jews in mosques across the Middle East. Religious fundamentalists have been the same throughout history and throughout the world. All that differs is their choice of superstition.
Religious fundamentalists are usually not terribly bright. After all, these are people who actually believe that the universe is only 6000 years old, that Noah really got two of every creature on earth onto a boat he built in his backyard, that burning bushes talk and that Jesus’ mother was a virgin (because sex would have been just too icky to contemplate.)
But what America’s Christian fundamentalists lack in critical thinking skills they more than make for in sheer staying power. They never get tired of the sound of their own message. They will pound on it and pound on it until they get what they want. And they more often than not do get what they want, not because their demands are rational, or right, or based on anything real, but because we continue to hope they will leave the rest of us alone if we give in.
Of course just the opposite is what we get. Giving in to a religious fundamentalist is just like paying a blackmailer. It’s just proof of concept for them. And so they are soon back with a set of new and even more outrageous and intrusive demands. And the process begins all over again.
When it all began over two centuries ago all they wanted was a country in which they could practice their own religion unmolested by the authorities. Back then America really was a Christian nation, but by default, not by design.
As the American experiment began succeeding immigrants from non-Christian cultures joined the mix. Christians didn’t like it one little bit and discrimination against other religious persuasions, particularly Jews, was both common and socially acceptable. The Protestant majority didn’t care much for Catholics either but tolerated them in public – they were after all, Christians, sort of…. But they warned and plotted against them behind church doors.
Nevertheless the American experiment in inclusive democracy continued to succeed and grow. Then came along the development that really threw a monkey wrench into Christian control -- free public education. Suddenly everyone could get a liberal education undiluted and undistorted by religious dogma. Ordinary citizens started to get smarter and began engaging in the unthinkable… they started thinking. That led to some to question whether religious thought might be little more than institutionalized superstition.
And that’s when the real trouble started. And it’s why we are having this conversation today. The America of Puritan Christians had evolved into -- gasp -- “E Pluribus Unum.” From many, one -- many cultures, many religions, many beliefs – one nation. For fundamentalist Christians that outcome is simply unacceptable, the handiwork of Satan Himself.
Like their Muslim fundamentalist counterparts in the Middle East, America’s Christian fundamentalists hate where all this inclusiveness has led America. So, rather than embracing a vision of a country in which law-abiding, peaceful citizens are allowed to live as they please, they want lawmakers to roll the social calendar back a hundred years or so.
They want to return to the way things were when they felt superior to anyone who did not share their narrow set of religious beliefs and were allowed to treat such “sinners” accordingly.
They want to return to a time when they made the rules and punished those who broke them -- a time of scarlet letters, shunning, banishment, and worse.
Ah, those were the days! When America was a REAL Christian nation.
The fundamentalist demands of the James Dobson’s of America’s religious right mirror almost precisely the wishes of the Osama bin Laden’s of radical Islam. They too want, under the guise of religious modesty and protection, to subjugate women to rules that segregate and exclude them from normal social intercourse and commerce. Both Christian and Muslim fundamentalists want to return to the days when the rights of no less than half the world’s population were reduced to serving men, bearing and raising children – without complaint, without legal recourse, and without choice.
And those are the very people Republican Senate leader Bill Frist will be affirming when he gives that speech accusing Democrats for not being true “people of faith.” It’s a new demagogic low, even by Washington standards. It is the first time I can't recall another time when a national party leader literally demonized the political opposition.
Onward Christian soldiers, marching as to war. And it is a war, don't doubt that for a moment. A war between those who want America to continue to be the nation of E Pluribus Unum and those who want it to return to a nation where women, gays, non-Christians and atheists are marginalized and demonized. Their soldiers are massed on the ramparts of public debate. And, they have been virtually unopposed by the very men and women we sent to Congress to protect and defend our liberties.
"As the liberal, anti-Christian dogma of the left has been repudiated in almost every recent election, the courts have become the last great bastion for liberalism," Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council and organizer of the telecast on which Frist will speak. "For years activist courts, aided by liberal interest groups like the A.C.L.U., have been quietly working under the veil of the judiciary, like thieves in the night, to rob us of our Christian heritage and our religious freedoms."
This war began years ago. It's been a one-sided battle so far as secular forces sit on their hands hoping that eventually their leaders in Washington will come to their senses. Well they are not going to unless we make them, because these fundamentalists scare the hell out of elected politicians. Frist’s decision to pander to the worst of the worst of America’s Christian Taliban shows just how much they fear alienanting America's Christian Taliban.
There is a bit of good news though for you ladies. Berkas are black. And we know how black is ever so slimming...
LETTERS....
Steve,
I used to be pretty religious when I was younger (then I went to college where I learned to think). My mother's side of the family were fundamentalists. ( http://www.newsforreal.com/letters.html )
Friday, April 15, 2005
April 14, 2005
The old adage about how “the other half” lives needs some serious updating. There is nothing even close “half” about them. The more accurate description is the other 5%. This is a good news/bad news story. The good news AND the bad news is that there are fewer of them. – the really rich, I mean.
And, conversely, there are more un-rich.
It wasn’t always this way. For a while there, let’s say from the 1950’s to the 1990’s, hard working middle class chumps actually had a shot at becoming rich. They were climbing that ladder to the America Dream.
But over the past decade Robber Baron Republicans have kicked the bottom rungs oout of that ladder, first outsourcing blue-collar entry-level jobs, then the next rungs up, white-collar jobs. And to make damn sure that no one puts those rungs back in, they now want to liberalized immigration laws to allow a flood of low-wage workers in from Mexico.
You think I exaggerate? Well, okay, I do sometimes. (But just for effect.) The numbers speak for themselves. The Wall Street Journal reported this week that one of the problems plaguing Social Security is not just that fewer people are paying into it, but that a rapidly increasing income gap between top earners and the rest of us is putting more and more income out of reach of the tax. You see, only the first 90 grand of income is subject to Social Security tax. Every dime above that escapes that tax.
The trouble is middleclass wages are not what they were, even ten years ago. Fewer of us ordinary folk are pulling in those fat $60,000-$85,000 annual incomes. Where did all that money go? Up, of course. Only shit rolls downhill. Money always rolls up.
Much of the income that was once subject to Social Security taxes now escapes that tax as wealth has shifted to the wealthiest Americans. Every dime they make beginning at $90,000.01 of is free of SSI taxes.
And, according to the Wall Street Journal, that wealth gap is getting worse every year. The rich really are getting richer. Man, are they ever. (Read here how well they are living - and then spare me any crapola about how pointing this out is “sour grapes” or “the politics of envy,” or “class warfare.”)
After decades of fighting for relief from taxes, unions, expensive environmental laws, paying into workers pension funds or any estate taxes, the rich finally busted through. After seventy years of “suffering” under pro-worker, pro-middleclass social policies that began with Franklin Roosevelt, the rich are finally once again free of virtually any social responsibility. (Free at last, free at last, thank George they are free at last.)
The rich may be stingy but they are certainly not stupid. They know they have had a great run, beginning with Newt Gingrich’s Contract With America and then super-charged when GWB won the Presidency and the GOP won majority status in both houses of Congress. But, as they say on Wall Street, “trees never grow to the sky.” There are limits and the rich know that this run is already long in the tooth and probably close to winding down. Backlash is in the air. So their goal now is to consolidate their wins and set them in stone.
Which is why we see them rushing through legislation like this:.
“The House voted 272 to 162 yesterday to permanently repeal the estate tax, throwing the issue to the Senate where negotiations have begun on a deep and permanent estate tax cut that can pass this year, even if it falls short of full repeal…. Democrats, who questioned how Congress could support a tax cut largely for the affluent that would cost $290 billion over 10 years, in the face of record budget deficits.
"This is reverse Robin Hood," said House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). "We're taking money from the middle class and giving it to the super-rich."
(Washington Post)
Class warfare it was, and they won. To the victor went the spoils. The rich did not work so long and spend so much money buying members of Congress to bag this windfall transfer of wealth to just see it go back into the pockets they picked when they die. No way, Jose. They stole it fair and square and they want it to say in the family. So the estate tax has now become the “death tax,” another Orwellian term designed to make something good, sound bad.
Here’s another law being ram-rodded through Congress in just the nick of time:
“Bankruptcy legislation that could make it impossible for thousands of people to wipe away their debts is nearing passage by Congress. After eight years of failed efforts by banks and credit card companies, the biggest overhaul of bankruptcy laws in a quarter-century has been catapulted toward enactment by a Republican majority buttressed by the fall elections.
"With solid control of both houses of Congress and the White House, the Republican leadership thinks they're free to show their true colors - taking from the middle class and giving to the wealthy and corporations," said Tom Matzzie, the Washington director of MoveOn's political action committee. "But we're going to call the Republican agenda what it truly is: a war on the middle class. ..." Matzzie said.
(Associated Press)
New York Times columnist, Paul Krugman calls this a march towards a “debt-peonage society.” The term comes closest to describing what we are becoming; a society in which wages are driven lower and lower by cheap labor and cheap imports and national employers like Wal-Mart.
Workers, whose wages can no longer keep up with prices, are encouraged to close the earning gap with offers of quick and easy credit that charges unconsciously high interest rates. Millions of working Americans a year soon find themselves drowning in debt that they can never seem to pay off. And now the final blow. Once the new bankruptcy law is signed, they will become defacto-indentured servants to predatory lenders -- who spent over $40 million on politicians to get this bill passed.
The new bankruptcy law will keep up to 210,000 working Americans from escaping debt through bankruptcy. Instead they will be tethered to a court-ordered repayment plan. And what if they can’t or won’t comply with the repayment plan? Now armed with a court judgment Shylock Credit Inc will garnish the wages of their growing herd of peons. A whole new profit center for credit card companies. And, if that’s not enough, well there’s always the late night visits from the Repo Man.
If you’re like me you get somewhere between one and five credit card offers a day in the mail. These companies are to hard-pressed working Americans what crack dealers are to inner-city poor. They are beneath contempt. They have no consciences, no scruples, and no values worth mentioning. There outta be a law.
Now, in my own small way, I am striking back. I scrawl,
“Stop sending me this crap”
on the pre-approved credit application and mail it back to them in their own postage paid envelop.
Pathetic, I know. But what else can I do? This is what it's come to under one-party Republican rule. The only weapon I have left against these voracious, predatory behemoths is to roll a 29-cent postage grenade into the bastard’s PO boxes.
By Stephen Pizzo
Raconteur at Large
And, conversely, there are more un-rich.
It wasn’t always this way. For a while there, let’s say from the 1950’s to the 1990’s, hard working middle class chumps actually had a shot at becoming rich. They were climbing that ladder to the America Dream.
But over the past decade Robber Baron Republicans have kicked the bottom rungs oout of that ladder, first outsourcing blue-collar entry-level jobs, then the next rungs up, white-collar jobs. And to make damn sure that no one puts those rungs back in, they now want to liberalized immigration laws to allow a flood of low-wage workers in from Mexico.
You think I exaggerate? Well, okay, I do sometimes. (But just for effect.) The numbers speak for themselves. The Wall Street Journal reported this week that one of the problems plaguing Social Security is not just that fewer people are paying into it, but that a rapidly increasing income gap between top earners and the rest of us is putting more and more income out of reach of the tax. You see, only the first 90 grand of income is subject to Social Security tax. Every dime above that escapes that tax.
The trouble is middleclass wages are not what they were, even ten years ago. Fewer of us ordinary folk are pulling in those fat $60,000-$85,000 annual incomes. Where did all that money go? Up, of course. Only shit rolls downhill. Money always rolls up.
Much of the income that was once subject to Social Security taxes now escapes that tax as wealth has shifted to the wealthiest Americans. Every dime they make beginning at $90,000.01 of is free of SSI taxes.
And, according to the Wall Street Journal, that wealth gap is getting worse every year. The rich really are getting richer. Man, are they ever. (Read here how well they are living - and then spare me any crapola about how pointing this out is “sour grapes” or “the politics of envy,” or “class warfare.”)
After decades of fighting for relief from taxes, unions, expensive environmental laws, paying into workers pension funds or any estate taxes, the rich finally busted through. After seventy years of “suffering” under pro-worker, pro-middleclass social policies that began with Franklin Roosevelt, the rich are finally once again free of virtually any social responsibility. (Free at last, free at last, thank George they are free at last.)
The rich may be stingy but they are certainly not stupid. They know they have had a great run, beginning with Newt Gingrich’s Contract With America and then super-charged when GWB won the Presidency and the GOP won majority status in both houses of Congress. But, as they say on Wall Street, “trees never grow to the sky.” There are limits and the rich know that this run is already long in the tooth and probably close to winding down. Backlash is in the air. So their goal now is to consolidate their wins and set them in stone.
Which is why we see them rushing through legislation like this:.
“The House voted 272 to 162 yesterday to permanently repeal the estate tax, throwing the issue to the Senate where negotiations have begun on a deep and permanent estate tax cut that can pass this year, even if it falls short of full repeal…. Democrats, who questioned how Congress could support a tax cut largely for the affluent that would cost $290 billion over 10 years, in the face of record budget deficits.
"This is reverse Robin Hood," said House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). "We're taking money from the middle class and giving it to the super-rich."
(Washington Post)
Class warfare it was, and they won. To the victor went the spoils. The rich did not work so long and spend so much money buying members of Congress to bag this windfall transfer of wealth to just see it go back into the pockets they picked when they die. No way, Jose. They stole it fair and square and they want it to say in the family. So the estate tax has now become the “death tax,” another Orwellian term designed to make something good, sound bad.
Here’s another law being ram-rodded through Congress in just the nick of time:
“Bankruptcy legislation that could make it impossible for thousands of people to wipe away their debts is nearing passage by Congress. After eight years of failed efforts by banks and credit card companies, the biggest overhaul of bankruptcy laws in a quarter-century has been catapulted toward enactment by a Republican majority buttressed by the fall elections.
"With solid control of both houses of Congress and the White House, the Republican leadership thinks they're free to show their true colors - taking from the middle class and giving to the wealthy and corporations," said Tom Matzzie, the Washington director of MoveOn's political action committee. "But we're going to call the Republican agenda what it truly is: a war on the middle class. ..." Matzzie said.
(Associated Press)
New York Times columnist, Paul Krugman calls this a march towards a “debt-peonage society.” The term comes closest to describing what we are becoming; a society in which wages are driven lower and lower by cheap labor and cheap imports and national employers like Wal-Mart.
Workers, whose wages can no longer keep up with prices, are encouraged to close the earning gap with offers of quick and easy credit that charges unconsciously high interest rates. Millions of working Americans a year soon find themselves drowning in debt that they can never seem to pay off. And now the final blow. Once the new bankruptcy law is signed, they will become defacto-indentured servants to predatory lenders -- who spent over $40 million on politicians to get this bill passed.
The new bankruptcy law will keep up to 210,000 working Americans from escaping debt through bankruptcy. Instead they will be tethered to a court-ordered repayment plan. And what if they can’t or won’t comply with the repayment plan? Now armed with a court judgment Shylock Credit Inc will garnish the wages of their growing herd of peons. A whole new profit center for credit card companies. And, if that’s not enough, well there’s always the late night visits from the Repo Man.
If you’re like me you get somewhere between one and five credit card offers a day in the mail. These companies are to hard-pressed working Americans what crack dealers are to inner-city poor. They are beneath contempt. They have no consciences, no scruples, and no values worth mentioning. There outta be a law.
Now, in my own small way, I am striking back. I scrawl,
“Stop sending me this crap”
on the pre-approved credit application and mail it back to them in their own postage paid envelop.
Pathetic, I know. But what else can I do? This is what it's come to under one-party Republican rule. The only weapon I have left against these voracious, predatory behemoths is to roll a 29-cent postage grenade into the bastard’s PO boxes.
By Stephen Pizzo
Raconteur at Large
Thursday, April 14, 2005
April 13, 2005
John Bolton is a certifiable horse’s ass. He represents exactly the kind of mediocre person I described in an earlier column. The kind of person who rises to the top (as I indelicately put it) like a turd that refuses to flush. He is, as was the described before the Senate yesterday, a “kiss up, kick down,” kinda guy.
Bolton was among those the top ranks of Bush's Neocon sycophants who eagerly and actively distorted and lied about the state of Iraq’s weapons programs. And he wasn’t going to stop there either. At the very same time he was also cooking up false reports that Cuba had an active and highly developed biological weapons program as well. Yeah, Cuba, where they the 57’ Chevy still rules the road.
I sincerely hope Bolton gets his ass kicked down the Senate steps instead of confirmed as our new ambassador to the United Nations.
Now, having said that, I also hope we send someone to the UN who can and will kick ass there as well. That’s the only argument Republicans have in favor of Bolton, that, while seldom right, he is never in doubt. He is blunt, gets right to the point and is in your face if you cross him. Take those qualities and add a genuine intellect and you have exactly the qualities we want in our ambassador to that wholly dysfunctional organization.
I hate it when I have to rag on the UN because I can almost hear all those knuckle-dragging right-wingers out there grunting in agreement. But the UN really is a mess and it’s not getting any better. Hypocrisy runs like rivers down its halls. Diplomacy, supposedly a tool of civil discourse, has instead become a license to obfuscate and lie with utter impunity. The whole membership seems to have signed a pact:
“You pretend we are telling the truth and we will pretend you’re telling the truth. And never… never, ever, point out when making pious, self-serving pronouncements any hint that we may be being hypocritical. Because that would be undiplomatic – not to mention embarrassing..”
Just look at today’s paper and you will find a perfect example of what I speak:
“Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said Tuesday that Japan would not be ready for a permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council until it admits its history of aggression in World War II and earns the trust of the people of Asia.” (Washington Post)
Exccccccuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuse me. Might this be the same China that already sits on the Security Council but has yet to admit it massacred hundreds, maybe thousands, of its own students in Tiananmen Square? And which continues to jail anyone who tries to exercise freedom of speech, religion or politics? Unlike Japan which is at least an open society and a parliamentary democracy? Is it THAT China making this demand?
What jaw-dropping chutzpah! This is exactly a moment when we would want the US representative to the UN to stand up in open session and say something along these lines:
“We agree with the esteemed representative of China. Japan should not be given a seat on the Security Council until it admits and apologizes fully for the crimes it committed prior to and during World War II. And, in precisely the spirit that the representative of China demands that of Japan, we would like to ask that China’s membership on the Security Council be suspended until it admits and apologizes for the crimes committed against its own citizens, particularly those during democracy demonstrations in Tiananmen Square Square in 1989. Anything less would be a double standard, one standard for Japan and a different standard for China. I am sure our esteemed representative of China would agree and we await China’s response.”
John Bolton is the wrong person for the job because he is a known liar and bully. Bolton has more in common with some of the dictatorial regimes he claims pose a danger to the US than he does to genuine American values.
But we do badly need someone at the UN who is not himself a liar, but knows a liar when he sees one, and doesn’t hesitate to say so, right out loud.
Yeah, yeah, yeah… I know that’s not very “diplomatic.” But then it’s a hell of lot more diplomatic than bombing the living crap out of them, which is usually Bolton’s first choice.
More Hypocrisy
Ariel Sharon was here for visit this week. Jesus that guy is fat. Why do the Gods let bad fat guys live but give coronary disease to good old jolly fat guys? It’s off the subject, but I was just wondering. Seems unfair.
Anyway, while here visiting the Bush ranch, Sharon asked Bush to get Iran to give up its nuclear weapons program.
“Spreading photographs of Iranian nuclear sites over a lunch table at the Bush ranch in Texas on Monday, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of Israel urged President Bush to step up pressure on Iran to give up all elements of its nuclear program, according to senior American and Israeli officials.” (New York Times)
Here was another golden opportunity for a bit of hypocrisy-cutting candor. If only Bush had replied thusly:
“You betchya Ariel. I’m with you on that one, partner. In fact I figure no one in that part of the world should have nukes because everyone there hates everyone else there. The whole area is just one big Jerry Springer show with guns. So, let’s do this. You guys agree that if Iran gives up its nukes Israel will give up it’s nukes, I think we can do that deal. Oh, one more idea. See that barbed wire fence way out there. That’s my neighbor’s land on the other side of it. He would be mighty pissed if I claimed it as mine and put my cows in there. Might even open fire. People are that way about their land. So, don’t you think you should stop stealing other people’s property? Maybe I’m wrong about this.. just thinking out loud. But I think that when you steal someone’s property it really pisses them off. And every time you do that it creates a whole new bunch more folks who want to blow Israel up. Am I crazy about that or what?”
Would that have been refreshing, or what?
Yeah. In our dreams….
DeLay Droppings
What morning would be complete without a fresh story about the antics of that wild and crazy Tom DeLay? This morning the Gods present us with this tasty morsel.
DeLay put a link on his official web site where kids could learn about the march of freedom through history.
“Here they find, first, the Magna Carta in 1215, with a nice overview of its place in the road to democracy. Next, the Declaration of Independence in 1776 and, of course, the Bill of Rights in 1791. But then there's a bit of a dry patch for a couple of hundred years until -- what else? -- the "Contract With America" in September 1994.” (Washington Post.. full story)
Yes boys and girls, over two hundred years passed before Western Civilization progressed on it’s next step toward enlightenment. And that step was the GOP’s Contract With America. And, for over two centuries mankind stumbled through darkness and ignorance before it another crop of great minds emerged to pen the Contract With America, a document now enshrined (in DeLay’s twisted mind) in history alongside the Magna Carta and Declaration of Independence.
And, can you doubt that when DeLay closes his beady eyes at night he envisions his and Newt’s marble busts tucked lovingly between those of Jefferson and Franklin at the National Museum.
Further proof – though none is needed in this case -- that, as Seneca noted, "Whom God wishes to destroy he first makes mad."
By Stephen Pizzo
Raconteur at Large
http://www.stephen.pizzo.com
Bolton was among those the top ranks of Bush's Neocon sycophants who eagerly and actively distorted and lied about the state of Iraq’s weapons programs. And he wasn’t going to stop there either. At the very same time he was also cooking up false reports that Cuba had an active and highly developed biological weapons program as well. Yeah, Cuba, where they the 57’ Chevy still rules the road.
I sincerely hope Bolton gets his ass kicked down the Senate steps instead of confirmed as our new ambassador to the United Nations.
Now, having said that, I also hope we send someone to the UN who can and will kick ass there as well. That’s the only argument Republicans have in favor of Bolton, that, while seldom right, he is never in doubt. He is blunt, gets right to the point and is in your face if you cross him. Take those qualities and add a genuine intellect and you have exactly the qualities we want in our ambassador to that wholly dysfunctional organization.
I hate it when I have to rag on the UN because I can almost hear all those knuckle-dragging right-wingers out there grunting in agreement. But the UN really is a mess and it’s not getting any better. Hypocrisy runs like rivers down its halls. Diplomacy, supposedly a tool of civil discourse, has instead become a license to obfuscate and lie with utter impunity. The whole membership seems to have signed a pact:
“You pretend we are telling the truth and we will pretend you’re telling the truth. And never… never, ever, point out when making pious, self-serving pronouncements any hint that we may be being hypocritical. Because that would be undiplomatic – not to mention embarrassing..”
Just look at today’s paper and you will find a perfect example of what I speak:
“Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said Tuesday that Japan would not be ready for a permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council until it admits its history of aggression in World War II and earns the trust of the people of Asia.” (Washington Post)
Exccccccuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuse me. Might this be the same China that already sits on the Security Council but has yet to admit it massacred hundreds, maybe thousands, of its own students in Tiananmen Square? And which continues to jail anyone who tries to exercise freedom of speech, religion or politics? Unlike Japan which is at least an open society and a parliamentary democracy? Is it THAT China making this demand?
What jaw-dropping chutzpah! This is exactly a moment when we would want the US representative to the UN to stand up in open session and say something along these lines:
“We agree with the esteemed representative of China. Japan should not be given a seat on the Security Council until it admits and apologizes fully for the crimes it committed prior to and during World War II. And, in precisely the spirit that the representative of China demands that of Japan, we would like to ask that China’s membership on the Security Council be suspended until it admits and apologizes for the crimes committed against its own citizens, particularly those during democracy demonstrations in Tiananmen Square Square in 1989. Anything less would be a double standard, one standard for Japan and a different standard for China. I am sure our esteemed representative of China would agree and we await China’s response.”
John Bolton is the wrong person for the job because he is a known liar and bully. Bolton has more in common with some of the dictatorial regimes he claims pose a danger to the US than he does to genuine American values.
But we do badly need someone at the UN who is not himself a liar, but knows a liar when he sees one, and doesn’t hesitate to say so, right out loud.
Yeah, yeah, yeah… I know that’s not very “diplomatic.” But then it’s a hell of lot more diplomatic than bombing the living crap out of them, which is usually Bolton’s first choice.
More Hypocrisy
Ariel Sharon was here for visit this week. Jesus that guy is fat. Why do the Gods let bad fat guys live but give coronary disease to good old jolly fat guys? It’s off the subject, but I was just wondering. Seems unfair.
Anyway, while here visiting the Bush ranch, Sharon asked Bush to get Iran to give up its nuclear weapons program.
“Spreading photographs of Iranian nuclear sites over a lunch table at the Bush ranch in Texas on Monday, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of Israel urged President Bush to step up pressure on Iran to give up all elements of its nuclear program, according to senior American and Israeli officials.” (New York Times)
Here was another golden opportunity for a bit of hypocrisy-cutting candor. If only Bush had replied thusly:
“You betchya Ariel. I’m with you on that one, partner. In fact I figure no one in that part of the world should have nukes because everyone there hates everyone else there. The whole area is just one big Jerry Springer show with guns. So, let’s do this. You guys agree that if Iran gives up its nukes Israel will give up it’s nukes, I think we can do that deal. Oh, one more idea. See that barbed wire fence way out there. That’s my neighbor’s land on the other side of it. He would be mighty pissed if I claimed it as mine and put my cows in there. Might even open fire. People are that way about their land. So, don’t you think you should stop stealing other people’s property? Maybe I’m wrong about this.. just thinking out loud. But I think that when you steal someone’s property it really pisses them off. And every time you do that it creates a whole new bunch more folks who want to blow Israel up. Am I crazy about that or what?”
Would that have been refreshing, or what?
Yeah. In our dreams….
DeLay Droppings
What morning would be complete without a fresh story about the antics of that wild and crazy Tom DeLay? This morning the Gods present us with this tasty morsel.
DeLay put a link on his official web site where kids could learn about the march of freedom through history.
“Here they find, first, the Magna Carta in 1215, with a nice overview of its place in the road to democracy. Next, the Declaration of Independence in 1776 and, of course, the Bill of Rights in 1791. But then there's a bit of a dry patch for a couple of hundred years until -- what else? -- the "Contract With America" in September 1994.” (Washington Post.. full story)
Yes boys and girls, over two hundred years passed before Western Civilization progressed on it’s next step toward enlightenment. And that step was the GOP’s Contract With America. And, for over two centuries mankind stumbled through darkness and ignorance before it another crop of great minds emerged to pen the Contract With America, a document now enshrined (in DeLay’s twisted mind) in history alongside the Magna Carta and Declaration of Independence.
And, can you doubt that when DeLay closes his beady eyes at night he envisions his and Newt’s marble busts tucked lovingly between those of Jefferson and Franklin at the National Museum.
Further proof – though none is needed in this case -- that, as Seneca noted, "Whom God wishes to destroy he first makes mad."
By Stephen Pizzo
Raconteur at Large
http://www.stephen.pizzo.com
Wednesday, April 13, 2005
April 12, 2005
Good Morning Comrades
Something very Soviet is going on here. What’s most surprising is that the very party that brags it’s guy, Ronald Reagan, crushed Soviet communism, is driving this trend. Of course you don’t need to be a Commie to be a Soviet at heart. And the Neocon wing of the GOP are Soviets right down to their toenails. They want one-party rule and all power shifted to the federal government. And they are well on their way to getting what the want.
Confused? I’m not surprised because this came right out of far right field. But let me explain what dawned on me this morning.
Look at what the Bushites have been up to here at home while everyone has been obsessing over their goofy foreign policy. Step by step powers the Constitution explicitly reserved for the states have been systemically weakened or revoked and those powers shifted to appointed Washington bureaucrats. The party that once filibustered for state’s rights has spent the last five years stripping states of those very powers. (Oh, and now that they are in control, they want to outlaw the filibuster too.)
Whether it was Florida’s right to keep Terri Schiavo alive or let her die, or Oregon’s assisted suicide law for the terminally ill, or reining in trial lawyers or pushing for a federal ban on gay marriages -- no matter what the states want the Neocons have chipped away at state independence from central government rule.
But for the GOP Neocons, reducing the independence of individual states is nothing personal, just business – literally. Many states now have voter initiatives where the power of big money has considerably less heft. Such elections were producing way too many laws reigning in big business and big money interests. State laws, for example, that allowed consumers easy access to the courts and liberal class action rules had resulted in huge judgments against the very interests that put George W. in the White House. But under the rules as outlined in the US Constitution the White House could little to help their friends. That is unless of course state’s right could be defined more narrowly and key rights slowly shifted to Washington.
But there was an obstacle … the US Constitution, which specially barred the federal government from any powers not explicitly given it. Every other right belonged to the states.
What to do? Damn Founding Fathers! Well, the Neocons could just do what they want anyway and deny that’s what the framers meant. But that would not work because the damn federal courts would throw a fit and rule against them.
So the Neocons launched a full frontal assault on the federal judiciary. To assure future cooperation from the courts they would nominate judges they could count on. But that would still leave thousands of sitting judges unlikely to side with them. So they decided to publicly pound on those judges until they either get with the program or retire in fear or frustration.
And so began well financed smear campaigns, quickly launched whenever a federal court rules against a hot-button conservative issue… gay marriage, right to die, family planning services, rulings that hobble business interests. Even before the ink dry on the verdict they don’t like the names and faces of judge(s) that made the ruling are plastered all over the Internet and in ads questioning their integrity, intelligence and motives.
"If they don't get what they want, they attack whoever's around,"
(Senate Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.)
You can get a handle on just how important de-fanging the federal judiciary is to the far right by how they have put their top leaders right out there on the firing line. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and Sen. John Cornyn, both of Texas, openly threatened violence against federal judges in the wake of Terri Schiavo’s death. Cornyn said, right on the Senate floor and in front of Cspan cameras, that he suspected the increase in violence against federal judges was being driven by frustrated voters who believe federal judges were “making political decisions.”
Okay, so far, so good. Congress is now loaded with right-wingers and, now that they also control the Executive Branch, they are more than happy to transfer state powers to Washington. Their smear campaign has stirred up just enough knuckle-dragging citizens out there to have many sitting federal judges low crawling to their cars every morning and afraid to open then incoming mail. And finally they have big crop of sympathetic judges already confirmed more in the pipeline.
Now they can begin to transform the states into Soviet-style vassal states -- the Ukrainization of California. The Romanianization of Oregon. The Lithuaniaization of Wisconsin.
Oh sure some states will try to put up a fight, but they have plan for that too -- break the states financially. Create so much budgetary chaos at the state and local levels that they will not have the time, energy, money or political support to fight Washington.
And, in case you were wondering, that explains the changes the Bushites are trying to push through on Medicaid funding, If passed the accounting changes will strip states of over $15 billion in federal Medicaid matching funds. And, since Medicaid is the fastest growing budget item in nearly every state, this will be crippling.
“Federal and state spending on Medicaid, the nation's largest health insurance program, has grown an average of 10 percent a year over the last five years and now totals more than $300 billion a year. Federal Medicaid officials said the questionable arrangements would cost the federal government $5.8 billion in the next five years and more than $15 billion over 10 years.” (Washington Post)
But wait, they’re not done. As Bush’s tax cuts for the wealthy create larger and larger federal budget deficits the states are being told to expect less and less financial help from Washington. If they want better roads, schools, hospitals, prisons, healthcare for the working poor etc, they will just have to raise state income and property taxes and issue more state backed bonds to raise the money.
And, left with no alternative, that’s exactly what states are doing.
“...a review of five years of local budgets shows that those tax-rate cuts have been far too small to offset the climb in home values, and, as a result, average tax bills in much of the region have gone up as much as 70 percent in just five years. Other government expenditures are soaring as well. Budgets for public safety and parks have risen rapidly, a survey of area budgets shows. In five years, public safety budgets have risen by one-third or more across the region. The increases in recent years, however, are more than making up for lost time. Even taking into account the last 10 years of taxes and taking out the effects of inflation, average home tax bills in Fairfax County have risen about 70 percent.” (USA Today)
Are these guys good at what they do, or what? I mean think about it folks, that was a classic two-fer for the Neocons. They not only were able to bag huge tax cuts for their wealthy supporters, but have also gotten away with shifting the burden of those cuts to state and local taxpayers.
Hot diggity! Can the life of a pack of modern-day Robber Barons get any better?
Well, they certainly hope so.
And they have three and half more years to try -- comrades.
By Stephen Pizzo
Raconteur at Large
Something very Soviet is going on here. What’s most surprising is that the very party that brags it’s guy, Ronald Reagan, crushed Soviet communism, is driving this trend. Of course you don’t need to be a Commie to be a Soviet at heart. And the Neocon wing of the GOP are Soviets right down to their toenails. They want one-party rule and all power shifted to the federal government. And they are well on their way to getting what the want.
Confused? I’m not surprised because this came right out of far right field. But let me explain what dawned on me this morning.
Look at what the Bushites have been up to here at home while everyone has been obsessing over their goofy foreign policy. Step by step powers the Constitution explicitly reserved for the states have been systemically weakened or revoked and those powers shifted to appointed Washington bureaucrats. The party that once filibustered for state’s rights has spent the last five years stripping states of those very powers. (Oh, and now that they are in control, they want to outlaw the filibuster too.)
Whether it was Florida’s right to keep Terri Schiavo alive or let her die, or Oregon’s assisted suicide law for the terminally ill, or reining in trial lawyers or pushing for a federal ban on gay marriages -- no matter what the states want the Neocons have chipped away at state independence from central government rule.
But for the GOP Neocons, reducing the independence of individual states is nothing personal, just business – literally. Many states now have voter initiatives where the power of big money has considerably less heft. Such elections were producing way too many laws reigning in big business and big money interests. State laws, for example, that allowed consumers easy access to the courts and liberal class action rules had resulted in huge judgments against the very interests that put George W. in the White House. But under the rules as outlined in the US Constitution the White House could little to help their friends. That is unless of course state’s right could be defined more narrowly and key rights slowly shifted to Washington.
But there was an obstacle … the US Constitution, which specially barred the federal government from any powers not explicitly given it. Every other right belonged to the states.
What to do? Damn Founding Fathers! Well, the Neocons could just do what they want anyway and deny that’s what the framers meant. But that would not work because the damn federal courts would throw a fit and rule against them.
So the Neocons launched a full frontal assault on the federal judiciary. To assure future cooperation from the courts they would nominate judges they could count on. But that would still leave thousands of sitting judges unlikely to side with them. So they decided to publicly pound on those judges until they either get with the program or retire in fear or frustration.
And so began well financed smear campaigns, quickly launched whenever a federal court rules against a hot-button conservative issue… gay marriage, right to die, family planning services, rulings that hobble business interests. Even before the ink dry on the verdict they don’t like the names and faces of judge(s) that made the ruling are plastered all over the Internet and in ads questioning their integrity, intelligence and motives.
"If they don't get what they want, they attack whoever's around,"
(Senate Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.)
You can get a handle on just how important de-fanging the federal judiciary is to the far right by how they have put their top leaders right out there on the firing line. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and Sen. John Cornyn, both of Texas, openly threatened violence against federal judges in the wake of Terri Schiavo’s death. Cornyn said, right on the Senate floor and in front of Cspan cameras, that he suspected the increase in violence against federal judges was being driven by frustrated voters who believe federal judges were “making political decisions.”
Okay, so far, so good. Congress is now loaded with right-wingers and, now that they also control the Executive Branch, they are more than happy to transfer state powers to Washington. Their smear campaign has stirred up just enough knuckle-dragging citizens out there to have many sitting federal judges low crawling to their cars every morning and afraid to open then incoming mail. And finally they have big crop of sympathetic judges already confirmed more in the pipeline.
Now they can begin to transform the states into Soviet-style vassal states -- the Ukrainization of California. The Romanianization of Oregon. The Lithuaniaization of Wisconsin.
Oh sure some states will try to put up a fight, but they have plan for that too -- break the states financially. Create so much budgetary chaos at the state and local levels that they will not have the time, energy, money or political support to fight Washington.
And, in case you were wondering, that explains the changes the Bushites are trying to push through on Medicaid funding, If passed the accounting changes will strip states of over $15 billion in federal Medicaid matching funds. And, since Medicaid is the fastest growing budget item in nearly every state, this will be crippling.
“Federal and state spending on Medicaid, the nation's largest health insurance program, has grown an average of 10 percent a year over the last five years and now totals more than $300 billion a year. Federal Medicaid officials said the questionable arrangements would cost the federal government $5.8 billion in the next five years and more than $15 billion over 10 years.” (Washington Post)
But wait, they’re not done. As Bush’s tax cuts for the wealthy create larger and larger federal budget deficits the states are being told to expect less and less financial help from Washington. If they want better roads, schools, hospitals, prisons, healthcare for the working poor etc, they will just have to raise state income and property taxes and issue more state backed bonds to raise the money.
And, left with no alternative, that’s exactly what states are doing.
“...a review of five years of local budgets shows that those tax-rate cuts have been far too small to offset the climb in home values, and, as a result, average tax bills in much of the region have gone up as much as 70 percent in just five years. Other government expenditures are soaring as well. Budgets for public safety and parks have risen rapidly, a survey of area budgets shows. In five years, public safety budgets have risen by one-third or more across the region. The increases in recent years, however, are more than making up for lost time. Even taking into account the last 10 years of taxes and taking out the effects of inflation, average home tax bills in Fairfax County have risen about 70 percent.” (USA Today)
Are these guys good at what they do, or what? I mean think about it folks, that was a classic two-fer for the Neocons. They not only were able to bag huge tax cuts for their wealthy supporters, but have also gotten away with shifting the burden of those cuts to state and local taxpayers.
Hot diggity! Can the life of a pack of modern-day Robber Barons get any better?
Well, they certainly hope so.
And they have three and half more years to try -- comrades.
By Stephen Pizzo
Raconteur at Large
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