I’m Fed Up Too, Billy

In his recent campaign for Congress Billy Long picked up the tea party chant "I'm fed up" and made it his tag line. Well, Billy, I'm fed up too.

I'm fed up with politicians who go to Washington pledging not to take earmarks and upon arrival declare that they will bring home all the money they can get their hands on ala Rand Paul. (Who got a knot jerked in his tail!)

I'm fed up with politicians who pledge to work for their constituency but link up with outfits like Halliburton and big oil companies bent on continuing their rape of the planet. Gee, Billy, what newly elected politician do suppose has done that?

I'm fed up with politicians who will spread any lie they think will get them traction. Lies like "Obamacare" is a government takeover of health care that will establish death panels and cut Medicare coverage. I'm completely fed up with politicians who say they will repeal "Obamacare" when they know darn well they can't and wouldn't if they could because it suits their private insurance industry friends from whom we must all now buy health coverage. While they say they're against this law because it forces purchase of a product, they will be working behind the scenes to modify it so that the forced purchase won't also force the insurance companies to provide the coverage required by the new law.

I'm also totally fed up with politicians who claim they will work for the needs of the people but argue that those who make significantly more than the average person should be exempt from taxation that could help those out of work get through tough times. It seems to me that if those on top were true patriots they would be not just willing but eager to contribute what they could to the well-being of the nation. Instead of patriotism they display only hunger for more wealth and power. I'm fed up with them, Billy, and the politicians who betray their constituencies to toady up to them.

And I'm fed up, too, with politicians who say they want to restore the Constitution, but support a Supreme Court that grants corporations human rights as unidentified, unbridled campaign spenders. I'm also fed up with an Executive Branch that usurps the powers of Congress and spies on the people.

Politicians who say they want to restore ethics but do nothing to stop the runaway system of false attack ads and huge advertising budgets that take the influence of the common voter completely out of the equation ought never to be reelected.

Yes, I'm as fed up as you are, Billy, so I want you to know that I, along with a great many Ozarkers, will be watching very closely to see how Congress goes about its business, and the next election will be even harder on those who said they were going to clean things up but don't than it was on those they just replaced. Keep watching.

What Now?

We survived the off-year elections, but will we survive the next two years?

Chances are we've just elected a do-nothing Congress, so our odds for survival may be better than you think. After all, the theory says, a Congress that can do nothing can do no harm.

I'm not so sure. One of the first problems they'll argue about is whether or not to extend the tax cuts the Bush administration put in place. The Democrats will argue that they should be continued for the middle class, but rescinded for high earners. The tea partiers will argue for extension of all cuts. If they win the day the cuts will all stay in place, but the consequence will be that the government will have to borrow money to cover the shortcoming in revenue – exactly the kind of borrowing that helped toss away our surplus in the first year of the Bush administration. They will have won their taxation argument, but deepened the deficit as a result. If they allow the tax, their angry base will accuse them of ignoring public demand for low taxes. Either way, they could be hoisted on their own petard.

The big problem, of course, is still the economy. We should note that on November 5, two days after the election, the Department of Labor announced an upturn in employment levels, GM announced its intention to buy back the government's investment in its stock, Detroit announced that truck sales are up and global stock markets surged in response to the "Fed's" buy of $600 billion in Treasury bonds. Our new electees have no claim on these accomplishments, though if the upturn holds they will surely try it later.

Still, we have a long way to go and the jobs lost over the last ten years will never return. Our manufacturing based economy has gone the way of the dinosaur. That's why the only way out is forward, and that's where the argument against government involvement falls apart.

Government created the highway system that enabled freight hauling to make available the consumer goods that drive our economy. Government created the G.I. Bill after WWII that gave us a college educated, home owning middle class. Government created the space program (ERTS-1) that gave rise to Landsat and, ultimately, the internet.

Yes, corporations built the manufacturing base, but there was government assistance involved in that, too. Given free reign, existing big corporations will do more to guard their present positions than to find new ways of competing with those positions. Government R&D and infrastructure investments in alternative energy sources and other sustainability oriented endeavors would do us a great deal more good, including new jobs, than curtailing social programs could possibly accomplish.

The plus side of the election is that the two sides must now work harder at working together. The question is will they take us forward or backward? Stay tuned.

Don’t Vote Them In

The first president I remember is Harry Truman. My favorite, Ike, was Republican. I've seen a lot of changes since then and seen several national neuroses, but until now I never thought I'd seen national insanity.

C'mon folks. Taxation is necessary, and godless Socialism isn't the problem. The problem is we are being robbed, and if you've bought into it you're blind to it.

Did anyone really think that Obama or anyone else could clean up this mess in two years? We are faced with economic and environmental disaster brought on by short-term policies favoring individual wealth over all other considerations. That's what's destroying both the American conscience and the middle class.

On September 17, the News-Leader reported that in 2009 poverty increased to 14.3% from 2008's 13.2%. The country is blaming Obama.

A new study released by the research and consulting firm Spectrem Group says the number of millionaires in the U.S. increased by 16% in the same year. So is Obama to blame for this, too? (http://www.spectrem.com/ProductInfo.aspx?productid=AFFLUENTMARKETINSIGHTS2010)

Unemployment remains over 10%, 12 million more home foreclosures are forecast, wages are dropping and college grads are competing for jobs flipping burgers. Department of Labor data says that if this continues, the income gap in the U.S. "will resemble that of Mexico by year 2043." What's really happening is that the widening gap between haves and have-nots is destroying the middle. (http://www.workplacefairness.org/sc/incomegap.php) (http://www.sustainablemiddleclass.com/Gini-Coefficient.html) (http://www.workplacefairness.org/sc/incomegap.php)

The problem is not the so-called "socialistic" policies of the Obama administration but the "welfare at the top and cheap labor at the bottom" policies of the right. To compound the error, tea party carping about going back to the "good old days" before Social Security and Medicare not only offers no solutions, but adds to the problem.

Voting current politicians out of office makes sense for the country, but only those from any party seeking to reinstate tax cuts for the top and remove initiatives for those in the bottom and middle, i.e. hard-line republicans, rogue democrats and tea partiers.

The policies of the present administration have been vilified by sound bites from the right, but facts show the country is making a slow but sure turn-around from the cliff's edge that trickle-down economics has brought us to.

Elect a group of wing nuts like Rand Paul (KY), Joe Miller (AL), Dan Maes (CO), Sharron Angle (NV) who favor abolishing income tax, Social Security and Medicare, and our own tragi-comedy team, Billy and Roy, who will belly up to the lobbyist trough, kill regulations on financiers and corporations in the name of smaller government, and reduce upper crust taxes, and they'll turn this country back toward the brink of disaster at breakneck pace.

Social Security is a universal safety net, Medicare a lifesaver, and "Obamacare" morphed from a 1993 Grassley/Hatch Republican proposal to counter "Hillarycare". (http://trueslant.com/rickungar/2010/03/27/hatch-and-grassley-poster-boys-for-gop-hypocrisy/)

Tea partiers talk of revolution, but "Taking our country back" a hundred years isn't revolution. It doesn't even make sense. Vote only for those who will take us forward.

Left, Right, or Just Wrong?

It has been said that if a politician moved far enough to the right he'd get to the left (and vice-versa). With the emergence of the tea partiers, I began to ponder whether or not that was correct.

The far lefties and the tea partiers do agree on a few things like: concentrating power into too few hands creates problems for the people; the country has moved so far from its original constructs that we are on the verge of needing a revolution; and the people need to wrest power from entrenched politicians (Congress) in order to salvage what potential still remains for the nation.

The differences between the two perspectives re-emerge though, when you consider that the solutions offered from the left include reinstating taxation that tries to reduce the split between the upper classes and the working classes by asking for higher contributions from those who make the most, wage controls designed to return to the wage differentials of the fifties and sixties, and reduction of military spending while solutions from the right call for tax regulations designed to grow corporate strength, smaller government - which translates to relaxed regulation of banking and other financial industries, reduced investment in social programs, and steady or increased investment in defense and other security measures.

In short, the tea partiers seem to feel that any attempt to reduce military, defense or homeland security spending is unpatriotic while the left feels that excess spending in those areas is eating into our ability to take care of our own increasingly needy citizenry.

We all share the goal of a thriving economy with work for everyone, but the dividing line comes from the left believing that the way to do it is to empower the bottom end of the spectrum while the right believes that the way to do it is to empower the top end.

So far, though, what we've created is a system that tends to create a lower class that is dependent on welfare and an upper crust fattened by reduced regulation and tax breaks (hidden welfare) and favored by a constant source of cheap labor; none of which gives the poor a means of pulling themselves up or the nation a stable platform for security. So why are we, the middle class, living in a lopsided welfare state where the bottom gets welfare and the top gets welfare, but the middle just gets the squeeze?

It seems to me that if we want the nation to revitalize we need to devise a way to grow production from the middle. It's probably just campaign season hype, but I was encouraged recently by news of John Boehner's willingness to consider tax legislation that provides support to small businesses even if it ultimately means the end of the Bush tax cuts for the upper crust. If it isn't just hype, maybe it's the beginning of actual bipartisanship.

Well, I can dream, can't I?!

Tar Sands Oil

A friend recently characterized President Obama as a modern day Lincoln because he is faced with a nation more divided than it has been since then end of the civil war. In the face of citizens divided right against left and a Congress at loggerheads across the aisle, Obama has succeeded in passing significant legislation just as Lincoln succeeded in quelling the revolution and managing the nation at the same time.

Whether you like him or not you must admit, as the CSA had to admit of Lincoln, that this president has a way of getting his way.

In much of this I have agreed with him, but he is about to accomplish a goal that I think is a great mistake. He will take advantage of our national addiction to petroleum to achieve bipartisan legislation by funding a new pipeline to bring tar sand oil into the U.S. from Canada as soon as he can ram it through Congress.

It won't take Lincolnesque diplomacy to do it either, because it fits in with the right wing desire to feed our appetite for cheap gasoline plus something they can point to as evidence of their bipartisan cooperation – in the face of their obstructive efforts to make this president fail. The more liberal wing sure won't fight it because they also recognize that "cheap oil at any price" has become our national motto.

We pay one of the world's lowest prices for gasoline at the pump, but ignore the fact that our government subsidizes oil well development and production so that the gasoline producers don't have to charge us the actual cost of that production. (http://cleantech.com/news/node/554) Even more insidious is the ecological cost involved.

The recent BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico was so graphic an example that it actually caused us to consider the wisdom of deep water drilling for, golly, almost three days! The ecological cost of tar sands extraction is even greater, but it takes place on Canadian soil not ours, so we can conveniently ignore it.

As Wikipedia puts it in their synopsis of 89 links related to greenhouse gases - "Making liquid fuels from oil sands requires energy for steam injection and refining. This process generates two to four times the amount of greenhouse gases per barrel of final product as the production of conventional oil. If combustion of the final products is included, the so-called "Well to Wheels" approach, oil sands extraction, upgrade and use emits 10 to 45% more greenhouse gases than conventional crude."

The indigenous peoples of Canada are up in arms about it, (http://www.ienearth.org/) but we are willing to overlook the true cost of our oil as long as the price at the pump is affordable.

The ultimate cost, as with all of our polluting practices, is the destruction of the planet, but what's that compared to being able to drive anywhere we want to any time we want to?

I Might Not Be a Patriot If . . .

Jeff Foxworthy's "You might be a redneck if. . ." lines were funny. Sadly, these aren't:

I might not be a patriot if I think the Constitution is the greatest work in political history, but don't read it.

I might not be a patriot if I think that every time a president declares war I should salute the flag and send in my sons and daughters without question. (Hint: The Constitution doesn't authorize presidents to declare war.)

I might not be a patriot if I think my church should be the official American church.

I might not be a patriot if I think a person can't be a patriot and a Muslim, too.

I might not be a patriot if I think I owe my loyalty only to elected leaders from my chosen political party.

I might not be a patriot if I think that anyone who protests an American president's actions is unpatriotic.

I might not be a patriot if I think that my needs outweigh those of any other citizen of the world.

I might not be a patriot if I think anyone of any race other than mine is automatically inferior to me.

I might not be a patriot if I won't listen to or can't tolerate others' opinions.

I might not be a patriot if I'd rather accept a corrupt status quo than agitate for change.

I might not be a patriot if I am willing to support uncontrolled growth of ruthless corporate power instead of supporting regulation of that power. (Hint: Corporations aren't people.)

I might not be a patriot if I think that corporate well-being outweighs the well-being of the people.

I might not be a patriot if I support my government right or wrong.

I might not be a patriot if I think that the deaths of hundreds of thousands of civilians are justified as long as it keeps the U.S. at the top of the food (or oil) chain.

I might not be a patriot if I think that Karl Rove's tactics represent the pinnacle of American political thought.

I might not be a patriot if I think that no one has the right to reject my opinions.

I might not be a patriot if I think that ridiculing or belittling those with whom I disagree is a valid method of rejecting their views.

I might not be a patriot if I think that the country should be run by only one political party.

I might not be a patriot if watching news shows that support my views is more important to me than analytical, investigative reporting.

I might not be a patriot if I think that my freedom can be secured at the expense of anyone else's.

I might not be a patriot if I think we have no need for a strong national defense.

I might not be a patriot if I'm willing to sacrifice any of my freedom in exchange for security or safety.

 

OBAMA IMPROVES VETERAN CARE

As a veteran I have been troubled by our nation’s treatment of its military since the beginning of the Iraq war. The continuous rotation of soldiers and marines into combat zones with little or no rest is horrendous and has led to an extremely high incidence of Post-traumatic Stress Disorder. Anyone forced to endure multiple rotations into combat situations is likely to emerge with some level of PTSD.
One of the most blatant contradictions within the Bush administration was the difference between the flag-waving rhetoric and the treatment of veterans. We saw it in the ugliness of mistreatment at Walter Reed and in the practice of prescribing psychotropic medications for PTSD suffering men and women so that they could be sent back into combat situations.
Department of Veteran Affairs regulations in place during that era made it increasingly harder for our veterans to obtain help in dealing with their PTSD, but the Obama administration has changed regulations to enable treatment.
In the past, veterans had to prove that they served in a specific situation which produced symptoms of PTSD. The paperwork was often arduous and the reaction of those charged with evaluating applicants was frequently demeaning and discouraging. All this kept a great many suffering veterans from seeking or obtaining help.
New regulations will not only eliminate the need to link the presence of symptoms to a documentable incident and the people present, but will also recognize that even those in support roles can be susceptible to the disorder.
The upshot is that one of the many problems faced by our veterans is being addressed. We should all be watching to see whether the changes have a real effect and also whether or not other problems are seriously addressed.
Will this administration stop sending people into multiple combat and other high-stress rotations? Will they end the military slavery created by extending service terms beyond the time agreed to at recruitment? Will veterans be able to obtain services throughout the VA system without humiliation or subjection to services below accepted standards of care? And, ultimately, will this administration that so proudly touts transparency achieve ultimate visibility by re-instating the draft?
The American public remains ignorant and powerless in relation to military policy by virtue of the distance created by a totally volunteer military. A volunteer army removes widespread objection to inappropriate warfare and attracts not only the highly motivated patriot, but those who cannot imagine anything they would rather do than fight and kill.
A draft forces all citizens to evaluate the quality of the war they or their sons and daughters are forced to fight and so requires constant public analysis that could squelch false wars like the one in Iraq.
Yes, we need a military defense, but we also need to use our military correctly and wisely and to honor their service by providing quality care for them.
Score one for the Obama administration, but demand more.