Liberal Voices

Too Disengaged to Govern

    Increasingly the evidence indicates that American citizens are too disengaged, if not too ignorant, to govern our country, at least by intelligently and conscientiously casting their votes.

    Now my analysis may be biased against Republicans because evidence proves them the biggest benefactors from this condition, as well as the best gamers of the political system.

    They are much more skillful users of negative campaigning techniques than Democrats. They are more unified, have greater access to power and money, much better at campaigning using fear and loathing and much better advised by their think-tanks on gaming voters.

    Their supporters are generally more prosperous and their campaign plans more calculating. They know the failings and the prejudices of the media, count many in the media as allies – Fox News, for one -- and know how to use the media better.

    The defeat of Republicans in 2006 and 2008 was a temporary setback wrought by their arrogance arising from a perceived invincibility during almost a decade of rule. That attitude spawned corruption, and their legislative favors for corporations helped to usher in a near global economic collapse.

    They have not been detoured from their Machiavellian ways and have rightly calculated that reactive and inattentive voters would become angered by the continuing ascendency of corporations over the people, prejudiced by their 24/7 denigration of any effort by Democrats, and turned by a perceived or real lack of progress by governing Democrats.

    The obstructionist ways of Republicans and their intense campaigns of spreading division, loathing and fear have been calculated and have easily counterbalanced any progress made by Democrats, especially with a feeble public opinion management by Democrats.

    Let me give some examples of the games, lies, distortions and fear-mongering that Republican leaders play. Some of the most odious are McConnell, Boehner, and DeMint. McCain, subject to re-election, is rising to this category.

    Mitch McConnell, the Senate minority leader, never reacts to anything as a statesman – he has forgotten what the term means – if he ever knew. The failed Christmas bomber, treated fairly and lawfully by the Obama Justice Department, spills his guts out to federal officials, revealing valuable ant-terrorist information.

    But Mitch says, “This is a very dangerous route. And it reflects a deeper problem; namely, the return of the old idea that terrorism should be treated as a law-enforcement matter.” Mitch forgets that that is the exact approach that Bush took with Richard Reid, the shoe bomber.

    Obviously, Mitch is not glad for our country. He is unhappy that we are, without using torture, getting good intelligence from the Christmas bomber. Even “Darth” Cheney has little to say, regarding the terrorist, at least anything reasonable or logical.

    Mitch’s agenda is to try to make Obama appear “soft on terrorists,” and of course scare the people. After all, the Republicans claim to be better for our security, and the public hardly notices Mitch-baby’s lies and distortions anyway.

    Mitch is fully aware that his pronouncements are lies. No one, not even many Democrats, reveal Mitch fabrications as lies, so why not deceive the public?

    Has one Republican voted for or furthered the cause of health insurance reform? Many voters must believe that Republicans have a viable plan which Democrats won’t consider, rather than having a no vote on everything.

    Has the narcissist Mitch ever considered saving the 45,000 Americans per year (a Harvard study revealed last September) who die for want of health care.

    Do Democrats call Republicans murderers for prolonging the battle against reform, even though it means more Americans will die? Do Democrats call them misanthropes because Republican policies hurt people.

    Actually the reverse is true. Republican lies claim that reform will kill “grandma” or that there are death panels or that government will take away Medicare, causing death.

    Dying Americans denied health care access do not get media coverage. Republican demagogues do.

    Enough uninformed voters believe Republican distortions of the truth, messages that play on deep-set fears, resentment and anger. This fact makes the lies worthwhile, and Republicans are not paying at the polls for their fabrications and obstructionism. Why not lie?

    Republican deceptions are gauged to frighten and/or anger Americans. They have nothing to do with truth. Most Republicans joined together in the top five lies of a few months ago regarding health care reform, and in fact still repeat them:

1. You’ll have no choice in what health benefits you receive.
2. No chemo for older Medicare patients.
3. Illegal immigrants will get free health insurance.
4. Death panels will decide who lives (supposedly started by Sarah Palin).
5. The government will set doctors wages.

    Though outrageous lies, the media reports them as credible and few media sources make an attempt to call them out as deceptions. More serious is that some people believe them, or at least are impacted by them.

    While Americans wait for healthcare reform, while the likelihood of regulatory legislation against Wall Street dwindles and while global warming cap-and-trade legislation is near dead, Republican Senator Richard Shelby of Alabama holds up some 70 executive branch appointments – for several months now.

    All Americans are the losers, but it makes Democrats look like incompetents. Shelby disrupts progress, but why not? There is little or no penalty for Shelby’s actions.

    One agenda-bound miscreant can do this, and he can say it’s for Alabamans. What does he want? He wants money for his state: an FBI laboratory focusing on improvised explosives – the bureau hasn’t requested it. He wants the Northrop Grumman and Airbus aerial tanker built in Alabama -- to hell with any other needs.

    The upcoming elections will be skipped by many alienated voters, a state of alienation Republicans have consciously promoted, and many of those who vote will vote in anger, against all incumbents. Yes, most will be Democrats.

    So is spreading fear, division, anger and lies a good plan for the Republicans?

    You betcha!!

After the State of the Union

    Many Progressives have compared President Obama with JFK or FDR while the hostiles portray him using the most negative images their limited imaginations can conjure up.

    Kennedy was running for president just when I reached the magic age of voting. I was still idealistic then.

    After the long winter of the darkness we call the two George W. Bush terms, I was swayed by the prospect of an intelligent man, Barack Obama finally filling the Bush-demeaned office.  Like millions of others, my hope unfolded like a long-awaited spring.

    Now, with the first State of the Union, I find that my expectations have diminished and are replaced with caution and skepticism, even cynicism. My current attitude is more healthy – at least for me.

    Many were clueless about George W. Bush, the man supporters wanted to have a beer with. We still don’t have many voter options, nor do we have much savvy in choosing the best leadership.

    My firm belief is that if people understand the issues and acquaint themselves with voter choices, then emotions, prejudice, rancor, and anger will not muddle their crucial role of citizen.

    In reaction to informed voting, politicians will be less apt to offer demagogic representation, which purposely spreads angst, anger, and rancor with every utterance. It might even force representatives to serve the people. While Democrats are tiresome and reactive to Republican criticism rather than people’s needs, most Republicans block all reform and attempt to deceive.

    Democrats are still in the crouch of defense. They are like a sports team given the lead, who only defend against attacks by the opponents, hoping they might possibly win by default.

    Rather than focus on the reform they advertised in past elections, Democrats let feeble criticism by opponents intimidate them and thus alter the trajectory of good legislation – legislation that voters want and expect.

    Like other voters, I don’t care what Republicans say or do. I know that it is all sound and fury, signifying nothing but the tantrums of self-centered children, who will destroy progress to get their own way.

    Democrats still don’t know that; the media likes the conflict and the spectacle; and voters need to recognize its lack of productiveness.

    President Obama has wasted more than a year trying to garner support from Republicans and from vested interests. Conservatives and big business interests have amply demonstrated that compromise is not possible.

    Even the last Democrat to occupy the White House before Obama thought he was compromising for the common good but was actually swallowed by vested interests -- neo-conservatives and business. Deeply harassed and attacked by Republicans, Clinton sought to one-up them with many anti-people programs, including trade agreements, workfare and de-regulation.

    We have suffered from Clinton’s efforts, though the stagnant wages, unemployment, the increased gap between rich and poor, war, and budget deficits were more specifically ushered in by George W. Bush and neocons.

    Now Obama revealed in his State of the Union that he will waste our time and jeopardize a tenuous business upturn with a budget freeze, affecting some 17% of the budget, this in reaction to meaningless attacks by Republican dogmatists. Rather than educate the people about the need for deficit spending during recessions and economic stimulus for the 20% unemployed and underemployed, he caves to demagogic chatter.

    Any thought of budget freeze, even if anemic in scope and politically motivated, could easily reverse the policy-induced economic upturn at a crucial time in GDP growth. Economists agree that economic volatility will mark 2010, so the burden of a politically-motivated freeze is too much to bear. Tax help for small business can’t be fruitful without government investment spending and continued consumer demand.

    Also reacting to the election of Scott Brown, Obama has finally raised the level of rhetoric against the Wall Street bandits.

    But without continuously revealing the nakedness of Republican attacks and the arrogance of Wall Street moguls – revelations that must come from all Democrats – it’s unlikely that constraints against Wall Street will ever be passed by a Democrat majority in the House, especially when hampered by some 54 “Blue-Dog Democrats,” or the Senate, paralyzed by an everyday Republican legislative blockage and by intractable ConservaDems.

    Unfortunately a lack of focus and vision accompanied with tentativeness has been true for all legislative efforts that Democrats have attempted.

    Even now, Democrats appear to be cowered and indecisive about health care reform and other programs our nation needs because of Scott Brown’s successful bid for Ted Kennedy’s old Senate seat. They don’t know that voters are disgusted with their unwillingness to push hard for reform – to do what their campaigns said they would do.

    While still in cowering, reactive mode of leadership, Democrats will not give us a sensible health care reform plan, a further stimulus for new jobs, much-needed investment for education, technology and infrastructure. And we won’t get smaller banks, and workers won’t garner bigger shares of national income.

    Voters must clearly communicate with their representatives that they expect more. Certainly voting in more obstructionists like Scott Brown only cripples the majority’s dithering initiative, while further hampering progress on lifesaving reforms.

    Politicians are rather thick and slow to react. Several million phone calls, faxes and emails might penetrate that thickness. Why should paid lobbyists be the only active participants affecting decision-making?

The Threat From Within

    The most serious attacks on our democracy over the last decade haven’t come from terrorists and cannot be found among enemies in Iraq or Afghanistan. They are forces operating within our country and sustained through human weakness, including the thirst for power, self interest, greed, and the paralysis of fear or the destructive force of anger.

    The forces are, in effect, working in concert, operating with agendas and ignoring the harm they’re doing to our country. The combination of forces make up a perfect storm.

    There are Republicans who use fear among voters and exorcise rancor against their opponents to tear down and obstruct all progress in bringing health and vigor to our country. There are corporation executives who would undermine our democratic principles for the sake of money and power.

    There are Democrats whose primary goal is re-election rather than defense of democratic principles. There are citizens who feed self-interest and display rancor against those with differing opinions, while giving lip service to democracy. There are also forces set in motion by agenda-bound politicians of the past, placed like insidious forces hidden in a Trojan Horse.

    Perhaps more deadly than sleeper agents, Supreme Court justices, advertised as impartial but actually dupes of special interest, have arisen to strike out protections for our democracy. Their numbers have grown so that a majority can now make anti-people decisions.

    Their two most damaging moves are now separated by almost a decade. It appears to be a one-two punch that may ultimately knock-out democracy in our time.

    Perhaps you could excuse the first assault, impacted by fear, seduced by plutocratic propaganda, and exposed to too many right-wing radio rants, or perhaps tasting the rancid bitterness of racism – directly or in reverse. But plutocratic propaganda has done a head-job on many of us. As a result many people think of capitalist leaders as high-achieving individuals rather than power-drunk exploiters and users.

    In the 2000 presidential election, Justices Kennedy, O’Connor, Rehnquist, Scalia, and Thomas were the majority votes that failed to give Florida additional time to recount the ballots after the first count had Bush ahead by a few hundred votes

    In all fairness Supreme Court justices whose majority vote disallowed the Florida recount of votes for Bush vs. Gore could not know what a disaster George W. Bush would be as president when they allowed his election by a majority of few hundred votes. They felt legitimacy in citing the “equal protection” clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, criticizing the different methods of counting used by different Florida counties.

    They most likely felt pressured, and thus did not give election officials the right to make recount rules uniform and extend the deadline for a recount. Most probably, they were swayed by the pressure of the times, including the paid Republican aids or workers who stormed the halls of the building where election officials were recounting votes in Florida, reminiscent of thugs.

    Gore won the national popular vote by more than 500,000 votes, but Republicans were not going to be denied the White House, feeling a great deal of built-up animosity toward Democrats and devising Machiavellian tactics to remove Clinton during his two terms as president. So playing fair or being statesmen had not been in Republican rulebooks for some time.

    The second blow is sure to knock the people out of the election picture, allowing powerful corporations to spend unlimited money to buy elected officials. It is inextricably related to the first. Without oilman Bush in the White House and his Machiavellian neo-conservative supporters, we would not have had the radical right-wing Roberts and Alito on the Supreme Court. But easily intimidated Democrats in the Senate did acquiesce to approve Bush appointments.

    Joined by Scalia and Kennedy, Reagan appointees and Clarence Thomas, from the senior Bush, they recently voted to allow corporations to spend unlimited money on political campaigns, claiming that a corporation has the same rights as an individual.

    The five said that the Federal Elections Commission overstepped its constitutional authority when it barred a conservative group called Citizens United from running ads for a movie attacking Hillary Clinton during the 2008 election season.

    Our democracy was already weakened by several decades of influence from monolithic corporations, where short-term gain and the self-interest of leaders took precedence over all else. Now the stage is set for total domination by corporate forces, forces that took us to the brink of global ruin.

    Our government is assuredly crippled in any attempt to set any standards of nurture for democracy. With some 35,000 corporate lobbyists in Washington and thousands more in state capitals that distribute billions in corporate money to shape and actually write legislation, what chance do average citizens have?

    Parochial self interest alone isn’t the issue, but the overriding forces of human weakness will do what the terrorists alone have failed to do: bring down our democratic form of government.

    The 9/11 attack by terrorists and the travail they still attempt to spread did contribute to and enable demagogic forces, but these forces had already been fashioned.  

    Perhaps it hastened the corruption that followed, but like failing ancient civilizations of the past, we have clung to our human idols rather than to one another.

    Near the tipping point of our democracy, we can still seek the light, or just curse in darkness.

Global Problems, Parochial Views

    We are at the center of world events with global ramifications for our every action, but we don’t seem to have the wits, the vision or the will to correctly lead.

    In politics, especially, myopia is with us at all levels of leadership. Perhaps it has always been that way, but the world is infinitesimally smaller than it ever has been.

    Our wishes, our actions and our governments have been too often self-centered, short-sighted and fallow. Business and political leadership have marketed profligacy until the criminal behavior of Wall Street brought us to our knees economically.

    Even many economists, all Republicans and too many of other stripes have eschewed Obama’s economic stimulus program, even in the face of economic Armageddon, saying it is too much deficit spending.  Cautious Democrats watered it down to the point of tax breaks, pork, and a little stimulus.

    Of course, fearing deficit spending is totally ludicrous in the face of Bush borrowing for a needless war. Somehow Democrats failed to mention this. The impact of these actions on the dollar and the global economy were never considered by the feckless BushCo.

    Many applaud the progress of the two houses of Congress in passing two highly flawed, health-industry-friendly health care reform bills. From the start the thought was to placate ConservaDems, neutralize tea-baggers, solicit obstructionist Republicans, and negotiate with greed-Meister  health care giants. The cost efficiency of the health care system, its fairness, and the health of Americans are secondary; self-absorbed and emotional views were primary. 

    But this narrative of self-absorption continues.

    Yesterday Bay State voters filled the Senate seat for Massachusetts, a seat vacated by Ted Kennedy’s death. A generic demagogue, with a generic name, has won, vaporizing the patchwork veto-proof majority Democrats had in the Senate, a troubling development for even a mediocre health care bill.

    Massachusetts voters obviously felt hurt with the flagging economy and unheard in the echo chambers of Congress. Perhaps, with their own better health care system, they could be excused for not seeing the national repercussions of electing the narcissist, Brown.

    Brown is handsome and savvy, especially regarding the right things to say in swaying the voters. That of course is the mark of a good politician, whichever party he or she represents. He lauds his independence while his voting record is 97% Republican as a Massachusetts state senator. Voters had a choice of two: Brown promised change, something that the Democrats have not delivered for things that count, especially the economy and Wall Street’s rip-off of the people. The reality of Brown is a negative stand on all legislative endeavors of the Democrats.

    This includes the global-warming front. Conservatives are girding their loins to fight against any meaningful global warming legislation, and the energy industry monoliths are hacking at cap-and-trade, the current Obama plan. “Global warming is a hoax,” myopics say.

    Never mind that the Arctic is melting or that most mountain-top glaciers are gone – or going, or that average global temperatures are 1 degree C higher. “Look at that huge winter storm,” they say, “that is proof that global warming is a hoax.” Ridicule Al Gore and say he is a hypocrite, but offer no constructive plans.

    Wall Street in its power-greed quest almost took down the global economy. There is ample documentation that a few of the most-well-placed executives helped engineer the whole debacle, profiting wildly. But the Obama administration and Congress still genuflect before them. The administration says they’re too big to fail, but we wonder if their power and money make them untouchables.

    Scott Brown won in Massachusetts! It must feel like a slap in the face for Democrats, especially considering that it is a seat held by Ted Kennedy who spent a career trying to get health care reform passed. Brown says he will vote against reform. Since his vote represents 41 in the Senate, Democrats no longer have the 60 they desperately need when the bill comes out of the conference committee.

    You can argue that Scott Brown is using the same rhetoric for change that Barack Obama used when he ran for president. It can be argued that Obama did not deliver, for many decisions still seem to put special interests ahead of the people.

    Probably the one that chafes the most is Wall Street bailouts have taken precedence over help for the people. After all, the reckless policy of Wall Street bankers left one out of five Americans out of work or underemployed, and help for the unemployed seems minimal in the face of billions to bail out Wall Street and billions in executive bonuses.

    The 2.8 million foreclosures last year make suffering Americans feel like chopped liver in the face of the arrogant and clueless bankers who took our money, used it to kill banking reform, and then gave themselves bonuses. In contrast, real wages of average Americans have not increased since the 1970s. Obama still appears weak in dealing with them.

    Much of the plutocratic privileges we associated with the Bush days are still there and much of the suffering of the people still seems to be ignored.

    This is the message of the Scott Brown election -- one which wimpish Democrats should heed. Many progressives see Brown as phony and unqualified, but how phony are the promises of Democrats from the last election, including those of our president.

    I don’t think there is any doubt that Scott Brown will join the obstructionism of the Republicans and will be proven another demagogue, but does it help our long-term prospects to say that?

    If Democrats heed this wake-up call, we can improve our prospects for the future.

Haiti and the US

    You could say that America had a hand in setting the stage for the horrendous catastrophe in Haiti – extreme poverty and a flimsy infrastructure, leaving Haitians exposed to a massive earthquake.

    Haiti has the lowest per capita income in the Americas; we have the highest. Our paths have crossed in the past. You might say that Haiti fared worse than we did for the experience.

    Haitian history has been full of exploitation, slavery and struggle. First the Spanish and then the French used Haitian slave labor for the profits of sugar and coffee. Slave rebellions near the turn of the 19^th century brought some independence but it was tentative with one dictator after the other.

    The competition for government control in the 19^th and early twentieth century culminated with an angry mob tearing apart the self-installed president who had executed some 200 political prisoners.

    The breakdown of law and order and the installation of an American bank (now called Citibank) in Port-au-Prince was our justification for sending in American troops in 1915. We occupied Haiti for almost 20 years, eliminating Haitian patriots and diverting some 40% of Haiti’s income to U.S. bankers[i].

    Haitians were banned from government jobs. Educated and ambitious Haitians were directed into an American-formed military junta. This set the stage for over 50 years of a US-backed military dictatorship.

    In 1957, continuing civil unrest prompted the CIA to install Francois “Papa Doc” Duvalier, who became President-for-life. During Papa Doc’s brutal rule, his “goon squads” murdered at least 30,000 Haitians. Demoralized and savaged, educated people fled into exile. Upon Duvalier’s death in 1971, his even more brutal son, “Baby Doc,” ruled with an iron fist.

    Supporting right-wing dictators was a typical policy for the US during the cold war, believing that right wing tyrants could stymie the spread of communism, especially with the bogeyman of Castro’s communist government in Cuba.

    Consequently we justified pouring arms into Baby Doc’s military and training his soldiers. In the process Baby Doc stole some $300 to $800 million dollars from the national treasury, according to Transparency International, hiding it in Switzerland bank accounts. During his rule cheap American food products ruined Haiti farming and drove Haitian farmers to Port-au-Prince.

    Cold war times are gone but life in Haiti has not improved. With the earthquake, the Obama administration is making all of the right moves, but greedy and miscreant elements still reside here. The former lay low out of fear of discovery. The latter have no inkling that they fit that description.

    Scoundrels and reprobates have no conscience. Pat Robertson for one revealed himself by blaming Haitian troubles on the late 1700s Haitians, “making deals with the devil.” One would guess that Robertson is so desperate for attention that he resorts to self-serving and inane statements. If his audience would chide him for his absurd remarks, he would be silenced.

    Then we have the burden of Rush Limbaugh who somehow draws some $40 million a year from Clear Channel for – one might guess -- being a jackass on the radio. Surely he must fear that demonstrating an ounce of humanity might abrogate his Clear Channel contract. Clear Channel could dissipate his fears by making criticism of Obama’s Haitian activities taboo.

    On his show last Wednesday, the day after the devastating earthquake, Limbaugh was asked by a caller about Obama urging Americans to go to Whitehouse.gov to contribute to the Red Cross to help Haitians.

“Would you trust that the money is going to go to Haiti?” Limbaugh said. “Would you trust that your name is going to end up on a mailing list for the Obama people to start asking you for campaign donations for him and other causes?”

    The ditto-head caller said, “No.”

    On another segment, Limbaugh displayed his race-baiting tendencies. “This [the earthquake] will play right into Obama’s hands. He’s humanitarian, compassionate. They’ll use this to burnish their, shall we say, credibility with the black community – in the both light-skinned and dark-skinned black community in this country. It’s made-to-order for them. That’s why he couldn’t wait to get out there, could not wait to get out there.”

    Our government policies have done damage to Haiti. Our capitalistic system has used them. Now that the Obama administration is doing the right thing in helping an already poverty-stricken people with an already weak infrastructure totally destroyed, they cannot be burdened with misanthropes like Robertson and Limbaugh.

    We shouldn’t have to mute their voices. It should be done by the media, by ignoring them.

    One only hopes that this tragedy will lead to a more permanent brotherhood with the Haitian people, a Christian practice that has been missing for decades, subsumed by the capitalist model and, in effect, replaced by our paranoid fear of outside enemies.

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[i] Ted Rall, “Haitian Earthquak: Made in the USA”, 1/13/2010, CommonDreams.org

Doom and Gloom?

    I see and acknowledge many predictions of doom and gloom.

    None of us could be faulted for taking the dim view after surviving the Bush Dark Ages, when business leaders were granted status as aristocrats and we, their chattels.

    When will we see the light?

    You have heard the saying, “It’s better to light a candle than to curse the darkness.”

    I have conservative friends who would rather curse and deride Obama even while pursuing their own light, not knowing it is a reflection of our former greatness, or something out of a fantasy world created by their faded memories.

    Is there reason for gloom? Most likely, yes.

    In our polarized world, a divisive world which a conservative quest for power has built, we have Americans uninsured for health care. We have global warming that could shorten the life of our planet.  We still have an economic disparity with those at the top growing richer and picking our pockets more, for in the last 40 years those at the top went from 40 times the average worker’s pay to over 450. A declared government of change, still allows it.

    We have many hyped -- most unnecessary -- wars. We have a war on drugs, a war on terror, a war for personal independence,  and a war on just about everything else, tangentially, if not directly,  inspired by the state of perpetual conflict that conservatives love to maintain, all to preserve an imagined way of life and scare the dissent out of us. Being drudges, we allow it and the $1 trillion for our two wars.

    Conservatives are so sure that their way of life and their way of thinking is correct, that they would and do obstruct all others, that is, as much as is humanly possible. Their tactics are usually fear, propaganda, division, and much noise.

    We might say that egalitarian progress in the United States has been restricted by these notions, notions that are funded by big money. The equality engendered by higher wages, adequate health care coverage, good educations, and good housing – these are things restrained by conservative power and money.

    It is true that the good news of prosperity, happiness, and well-being has always been within our grasp, but our cultural forces have always eschewed it, driven it away with fear, smeared it or demonized it. After all, we are a society of strong individuals who don’t need outside ideas or help, unless it applies to monolithic corporations.

    What are these ideas -- this good news? Actually, conservatives don’t want to hear this news and many progressives are too culturally cowered to pursue these ideas.

    But if you looked across the Atlantic with an open mind, you would see many European countries, the most notable, members of The European Union [EU]), with citizens who are wealthier, healthier, and happier than most Americans.

    Europeans work shorter hours, have more voice in how their employers treat them, receive longer paid vacations, have paid parental leave, paid pensions, inexpensive health care, and free education. They imprison a smaller fraction of their citizens, have less violence and have more and better democratic representation. Furthermore, the EU tries to draw countries into their cooperative economy while we drive them away from us.

    You know how conservatives characterize most Europeans, especially those who won’t fight in our wars? They are drones and have higher taxes -- so say the conservatives.

    Europeans do pay higher income taxes but generally pay lower state, local, property and social security taxes. And as average Americans have experienced in the last couple of decades, we do pay lower income taxes, but out of stagnant wages. Overall, our taxes are about the same.

    But what about hidden taxes, things we pay for that the government doesn’t offer?

    Economists would tell you that there are a host of expenses Americans pay because of services that European enjoy but we don’t. European taxes assure a cleaner environment, something we often pay higher prices to businesses for. We pay large co-pays, deductibles, and high insurance premiums for health care. We pay to enter national parks and state parks. We pay for college, job training and numerous other services that are supplied in Europe.

    Where do our taxes go? Have you seen our military budget, some 45% of world military spending? And you have seen our corporate bailouts. We have a for-profit health insurance system, making our healthcare cost nearly 18% of GDP, which will rise after the current reform debacle. Europeans pay 9-10%.

    Conservatives have demonized our government since well before Ronald Reagan, though the pace has accelerated since Reagan’s presidency. George W. Bush practically celebrated its failures and, in fact, starved funding so much that government services faltered under his ignoble rule.

    This, of course, helps to discredit and/or limit any attempts to redistribute income through the government, unless of course it favors the super-rich like George Bush’s tax break for the rich.

    Will we see economic and political services like the Europeans? When you consider that we can’t even get real health care reform that won’t add another 2% to its cost, that is, as a portion of the GDP, it is highly doubtful.

    Conservative lies, obstructions, and distortions and our life-long prejudices, fed by decades of conservative propaganda, will not allow it, even if it would improve our lives, and it is unlikely we will wake up to these facts.

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Some information from David Swanson, January 12, 2010, “There’s Plenty of Good News, But Will the US Ever Hear It?”

Airport Security

   

    Can we consider homeland security efforts at airports anything but fluff and folly? Can politicians and the intelligence community dare to look us in the eye and say they are doing their best to protect us?

     The CIA was warned by the latest bomber‘s own father, but didn’t share it with Homeland Security.

     The Christmas Day PETN explosives debacle is the latest of several terrorist misfires, each followed by a Pavlovian reaction by Homeland Security. Also using PETN, the shoe bomber, through a reactive homeland security policy, rendered all travelers shoeless in our airport security lines. The liquid bombers, in effect, raised stock prices for Glad but altered our cosmetic liquefaction lives.

     This time will you forfeit the ability to move about the cabin or rest pillows, blankets or personal belongings in your lap for the last hour aloft, this in honor of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who in the waning moments of Northwest Flight 253, tried to detonate PETN in his shorts.

     I can see airline passengers now, briefed for landing, many with crossed legs, and strapped into their seats.

     Republicans believe national security will get them free political mileage. Among them are Cheney, who forgets his failings as Bush’s VP and a far-right senator from South Carolina, Jim DeMint, who wants to run for president in 2012.

    DeMint, with a sterile, partisan mind, sees the opportunity to stoke our fears, trying somehow to tag Obama as soft on terrorists.  

     The incoherent verbiage of Jim DeMint manages to tie together airport security worker unions, homeland security, Iran nuclear talks, and closing Guantanamo Bay, all to this terror threat or an unknown terror plot.

     The media in European capitals like Copenhagen seem able to disregard the disjointed and severely compromised, like Republican Senator, Jim Inhofe, a non-global-warming nut, who flew across the Atlantic using taxpayer funds, only to be ignored by the European press.

     Yet, with the aid of our own corporate media, we suffer the Purgatory of insufferable blubber-mouths like DeMint, hypocritical statements from former Vice President, Dick Cheney, and even the “global warming is a hoax” chatter of Jim Inhofe.

     I can see the next reaction from the miasmic dual of airport security and Republicans like DeMint, with the next potential scenario of mind-numbing fear.

    Let us imagine -- if we dare.

     PETN is implanted in the rectum of the next bomber. But hopefully when the bomber rises to ignite the implanted bomb, passengers will notice he is not heeding the latest rule to sit -- that is if it’s the last hour of flight.

     But afterward we would be subjected to the claims of Senator DeMint that suppositories are either socialist poison plots or terrorist tactics to transport plutonium for nuclear weapons. And it is all secretly planned by enemy combatants from American prisons.

    Meanwhile airline passengers will need to line up for their colonoscopies.

    From the ludicrous to the sublime?

    What we are really saying is that it is now time to get serious about our country.

     Politicians and intelligence communities need to work together on everything that is vital for survival of all residents on our planet, especially the responsible residents, and, meanwhile, bury their own self interest.

    We might say that 9/11 happened because intelligence communities have failed to work together, because the partisan Bush administration had great prejudice against the Clinton administration and did not want to accept its warnings about an upcoming attack in 2001.

     Now we have Republicans who reject anything that the Obama administration proposes because he is a Democrat, and because they want him to fail. Lies, distortions and fantasies are acceptable in this equation. Ask Jim DeMint and many other Republicans who snivel, and plot.

    Airport security must stop being reactive, and be proactive. It must use all the tools that are available to minimize the risk of terrorism, including full-body imaging scanners, “sniffer” machines or even dogs.

    And as citizens, we must demand more informative news coverage from the media, more problem-solving from politicians, more cooperation from business, and more use of technology.

    No less than the future of our planet depends on it.

    The last decade was the “dark ages” of polarization, lies, deceit and partisan politics.

    Isn’t it time for a Renaissance?

Set the Alarm!

    Before Democrats in Congress get too comfortable with a perceived health care reform victory, they had better get to work displaying a modicum of savvy regarding American economic and trade policy. Especially during the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations, other countries and America’s Wall Street stole our lunch while predatory politicians stole the American government.

    Furthermore, several decades of bone-headed government policy have assured the fast decline of America’s means to function as an independent country. Indeed, while neo-conservative forces planned and implemented a plutocratic and political takeover, mercantile countries and Wall Street worked together, the former to steal our industrial base and the latter to redistribute our wealth.

    Our leaders have been pushovers when it comes to trade and industrial policy. We have been patsies to others, especially Asian countries, and servants to Wall Street for so long that even Chinese and Japanese leaders treat our president and members of Congress like boobs, anticipating the same dumbed-down leadership we have displayed over the last several decades.

    The Copenhagen Summit, meant to discuss vital concerns of global warming, saw Chinese, Indian, South African, and Brazilian leaders putting off our president, a more common attitude than we think.

    Certainly flies on the walls of high-level foreign meetings will see and hear other leaders mocking and deriding American leadership.

    Through two Bush and one Clinton administration, our negotiators, sucking on the monolithic teat of Wall Street, pushed free trade deals that made Wall Street rich, set American industry adrift toward foreign climes, and neither supplied nor required an anchor to American interests.

    Politics and short-term profit overrode all other considerations. Meanwhile, de-regulation assured a laissez-faire capitalism which had no national base for business, and least of all our national concerns.

    The result we see today is American manufacturing, American labor, and American economic independence hobbled, spiraling toward decline and ruin.

    Seventeen percent of Americans are unemployed or underemployed. Many once-proud workers are standing in food-lines in order to feed their families. Many will take any job as their unemployment benefits run out.

    Employment in manufacturing dropped to 11.7 million last October. The last time we had less than 12 million in manufacturing was in 1941. Manufacturing has been on the decline since before the Reagan administration, while leaders were entangled in the military-industrial complex, technology leavings with which American companies proffered.

    The slide accelerated after trade agreements started. The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was signed in 1993. Employment rose afterward until after 2000 but in the next two years 2.4 million jobs were lost, most forever, primarily in the manufacturing sector.

    During the last 3 decades, the US has had steadily growing global trade deficits, which accelerated after NAFTA took effect on January 1, 1994. Much of this can be attributed to the flight of industrial production to other countries, from which we imported an immensely growing number of goods.

    The truth be told, we didn’t get into our current funk of high unemployment, large trade deficits and a dwindling manufacturing base overnight. We allowed our leaders to sell us into this slavery, so much so that our total manufacturing gross domestic product in 2008 had declined to $1.64 trillion, some 11.5% of U.S. economic output. To put this in perspective, it was 17% nine years ago, preceded by 28% in 1959.

    How long do you suppose we can continue two wars, more than a half trillion deficit (this year), and handouts from Asian countries to finance our wastrel ways? When can we say the word Investment without stuttering?

    So what are those flies on foreign walls telling us? They are telling us that foreign leaders are mocking us for giving away our technology secrets to any country that promised short-term benefits for monolithic corporations that no longer have allegiance to our way of life. That allegiance was traded in for profits and bonuses -- their own bonuses.

    Wall Street calls the shots when we negotiate with other countries, and American leaders indicate this by helping to bargain away American industry. Leaders have demonstrated that they don’t care where American corporations manufacture.

    While the Chinese protect their industries and forge agreements that steal our technology – there is still some to steal, US financial industry leaders seek global reach and allied industries want to produce in the cheapest location. National interests take a back seat.

    We have not lost old, inefficient industries. There is ample demand for production capabilities we have lost, including flat-screen televisions, sporting goods, bicycles, blenders, hearing aides, golf clubs, laptops and desktops.

    A caravan of imports, via ocean containers, come in regularly from overseas factories, many from Chinese factories. In 2007, it included Walmart,  with 720,000 containers; Target, 435,000; Home Depot, 365,300; and K-Mart with over 248,000 containers.

    In tandem, our technology is declining: from printed circuit boards, to solar products, to wind-energy, to cell phones to semi-conductor fabrications.  Oil mogul T. Boone Pickens gave up on pushing wind power when he realized that other countries must supply the technology and the wind turbines.

    We are in decline, unless you want to count the predatory know-how of the arrogant leaders on Wall Street, with their sterile financial empire, and their bonuses – you know, the leaders served by the last four or five decades of American leadership.

    The decline will continue until Congress and our administration wake up.

    Maybe we should set the alarm!

 Some information garnered from “Nothing Made in USA” in The American Prospect, January/February, 2010

The Health Care Reform Debacle

    Joseph Lieberman, a name that will live in infamy -- Can anyone find a redeeming quality in that man? 

    A politician often becomes narcissistic as he or she suckles on the teat of power, and attention, especially while nurturing a self-deceiving view that their reelection and continuation in office is for the public good, and thus their actions involve principle. 

    I know. Pure BS, but remember our last president thought he was sent by God. Unfortunately right-wingers still attempt to exploit religion.

     A prayer-cast against the health care reform demon featured many of the Republican demagogues: Rep. Michele Bachmann,  Jim DeMint, R-S.C., Sam Brownback, R-Kans., and Rep. Randy Forbes, R-Va. Anti-gay rights preacher Bishop Harry Jackson was on hand to smite Obama’s plan. Pastor Jim Garlow, who cites gay marriage as a worse threat to America than terrorism, also fought the reform demon.

     Lieberman stands out, but many legislators have been compromised by the big money of private health care moguls and by pharma. This doesn’t excuse them but it certainly gives us a lot more obstructionist targets.

    Am I bitter about the health care mess. You’re damn right I’m bitter. After the Bush Dark Ages, many of us expected reason and sanity in an administration that advertised change and a majority in Congress that calls itself Democrats.

    What did we get: a conciliatory president whose enemies mock and deride him each time they assemble, and crazy tea-baggers carrying ludicrous anti-Obama signs, many – in thought, word, or action -- furnished by vested interest groups, Republican right-wingers, and usually Fox (Faux) News.

    At staged grass-roots rallies, a few are openly armed. And these are paid events, many organized and paid for by fat cats like the Koch brothers, who don’t want change of any kind – unless they dictate it. They resemble “paid advertisement” that you see more and more on late-night TV.

    I did not expect real health care reform – meant to provide equal footing for all of us – to be hijacked by billionaire money, lobbyists, and Dick Armey, the sly Texas wolf among lambs.

    The stirred-up tea-bagger anger seems to be transferring to progressive sources now as conservatives dash meaningful reform. Progressives say that health care reform in the Senate is so watered down and so pro-private-insurance-companies that the United Health Cares (less) have no competition and thus few restrictions on cost.

    It’s a slap-in-the-face insult!

    In this land of choices, a Senate proposal imposes penalties if you don’t buy this over-priced, profit-laden, private insurance with no competition, an insurance that doesn’t fully launch until 2014:

• Penalty: Starts at $95 a year per person in 2014 and rises to $350 in 2015 and $750 in 2016, with a maximum of $2,250 for a family. No penalty if the cost of cheapest available plan exceeds 8 percent of household income.

• Exemptions: American Indians, people with religious objections and people who can show financial hardship.

    Thus we have Howard Dean and Keith Olbermann railing on the latest Senate version of so-called health care reform, saying – among other things – that it forces you to buy over-priced insurance and mandates that private health care sources – and it is only private for-profit companies that are left in the bill --  can charge several times more if you are older.

    I couldn’t believe that Senators would sink so low, so I looked at HR 3590 online. Sure enough in Title I, Subtitle C, Section 2701, Entitled Fair Health Insurance Premiums, it said that health insurance carriers can vary premiums if 1) an indidividual vs. family buys 2) by geographic rating area (leaves a door open) 3) age varies, charging up to 3X more (door is wide open for abuse) and 4) tobacco use (up to 1.5 times more).

    We do not trust politicians, and our disgust has grown over the last 2 decades of “corporate interest over people interest.” The George W. Bush administration and the 107^th to 110th Congress were so partisan and pro-business that the people finally threw them out.

     Well, I have since seen Press Secretary Gibbs deriding Dean, his judgment and his sanity. Some of Dean’s critics called him irrelevant. I have seen others citing how we have been trying reform for some 60 years and should let more coverage and a few restrictions carry for the day, believing that congress-people will tweak it later.

    The Senate version of reform will cover 30 million more people, almost 70% of those not covered now. It will ban insurance company practices such as denying coverage because of pre-existing conditions. The bill includes hundreds of billions of dollars in subsidies to help lower- and middle-class families afford it.

    I really hate it that so many people are uninsured and underinsured, but I can’t bring myself to support the mess both Houses are proposing just because we have been brainwashed and/or severely compromised by moneyed interests for so long. A large majority wants the public option. A large majority wants a choice.

     Why are we still willing to accept the terms of the health care industry that confiscates17% of our national income? The majority has rightly given up on all Republicans, living demagogues.

     What do we do about conservative Democrats who ignore their constituents, favoring their health care donors? Will we be duped by the Astroturf tea-baggers backed by billionaires who have bought Republicans and ConservaDems, while the scam is supported by Faux News, owned by a foreign billionaire?

     Does anyone wonder why reasonable people are angry and why President Obama’s approval rating has sunk below 50%, and members of Congress are rated like used-car salespeople?

    When will we get serious about our country?

On the Outside Looking In

We live in a country in which money buys almost anything, not just goods and services, but also  the voters and the government.

Now even if the people elect what they think is a people-friendly government, the power of influence and money can relentlessly attack what the people want, indeed what the people and our country need.

Such is the case with health care reform, a need which carries potential for strengthening an egalitarian  society. But such a society is faltering under the weight of conservative mean-spirited demagoguery.  Yes conservatives, some duped and some with their own agendas, are working against our right to be healthy without risking bankruptcy or ruin.

Demonstrating the weight of money and its influence are the billionaire Koch brothers. The 9^th richest men in America, they have been ardently working to dismantle all progressive efforts by President Obama, starting with Obama’s first piece of signature legislation, the stimulus plan.

The Koch brothers have reason to mold our government, indeed, our culture, into their desired image. They sit at the helm of Koch Industries, a massive, privately owned conglomerate of manufacturing, oil, gas, and timber interests. As libertarians, they justify dictating how they use us, their wealth, and our resources.

They spend millions to shape our society and our government into a form that nurtures their own interests, while average Americans rely on elected leaders to oversee theirs. Unfortunately our leaders are compromised by money and by favors from vested interests, interests like those of the Koch billionaires.

Our taxes pay for these government leaders and services, but in addition, we are solicited by non-profits for the vital causes that government neglects and continues to neglect because corporate power tugs in the opposite direction. Among these causes are health care reform, reduction of greenhouse gases and pollution control.

The most recent effort of the Koch brothers was stymying real health care reform. Thus the weak public option and a few restraints on the bloated private care monoliths is all that we can manage, even as public interest groups like Move-on solicit contributions from us to influence reform legislation.

Since money is like manna from their heavens, billionaires like the Koch brothers must feel entitled to dictate their own causes and purchase their own desired reality, oftentimes masquerading their efforts behind solicited malcontents while marketers like Faux News’ Glenn Beck solicit their causes.

Lee Fang, in the Boston Globe, described Michele Bachmann’s performance on Capitol Hill last month in front of tea-baggers, criticizing Pelosi’s “takeover” of health care. Few people knew that the Koch billionaires had paid for the debacle, included the meals, buses and salaries of the helpful guides. On the same day, David Koch was toasted in Manhattan at the City Opera’s opening night for his $100 million contribution to refurbish the opera house.

While Koch saved this year’s performance of the “Nutcracker,” he also helped greatly obstruct meaningful health care reform, weakened global warming legislation efforts through denial of climate change, and continued efforts to weaken much of President Obama’s domestic agenda.

Lies, distortions, misrepresentations – all are Machiavellian justifications for Koch’s “enlightened” agenda. The memos his apologists cited to discredit global warming were out-of-context misrepresentations from ten years ago which only documented squabbles between scientists. Furthermore, “death squads” were manufactured to discredit health reform legislation,  Nazi signs depicting Obama as Hitler enable tea-baggers to avoid real issues while suggesting that Obama is not “one of us.”

Why would the Koch brothers finance this? They are libertarians from a long line of libertarians, believing that people should have complete freedom of thought and action. The problem is that millions of dollars pushes, indeed buys, their own agendas and their own causes, rebuffing the needs of the majority. Manufacturing, oil, gas and timber carry their own needs and interests. The general welfare interferes with these needs.

Media Matters gave specifics about Koch brother causes and money spent in 2009. Over the years, Koch money has flowed to right-wing think tanks meant to change our politics and our government, to front groups which affect our political discourse and our need for change, and to publications.

The following are just of few that Media Matters cited:

·       Freedom Works got around $6 million for various conservative lobbying efforts, including the tea-bagger effort to squelch health care reform. It is run by corporate lobbyists, not grassroots activists and is chaired by Dick Armey.

·       Cato Institute got $4 million, a libertarian group whose mission is to push limited government, free markets, and  individual liberty, all neo-conservative goals.

·       The Institute for Human Studies at George Mason University go $2 million to provide support to libertarian students across the country.

Our democracy has come to this. Lobbying efforts are dominated by big money and the trend is to push forward the pretense of grass roots movements, the angry and disgruntled are raucous and visible in the foreground, but supported by the money of billionaires like the Kochs.

Meanwhile union membership declines, wages drop and jobs go overseas. Money for education dries up, health care burdens are still imposed on the people and monolithic corporations like Koch Industries and the corporate media keep a lid on change. These conditions tend to keep the masses poor, insecure, and ignorant, thus ready to mold for vested interest bidding.

Money still buys influence for plutocrats, trumps majority needs and majority interests, and seeks to change ideas, even our culture to reinforce the casino capitalism that neo-conservative ideas nurture.

The Koch brothers money and influence continues to do its part in promoting a government for the rich.

Forces are still aligned for them.