Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight is working on a fabulous citizen resource that I think is going to take away a lot of the relative anonymity of congressional voting and drive a boom in blogosphere citizen-journalist awareness of Congress. He is working on a cartogram, a kind of map that shows every single congressional district so that voting records will be immediately available. Much more intuitive than listing votes, the map lets you go directly to a single congressperson, if you want to see how your representative stood on an issue, or to have a global sense of the voting around the country. His first iteration of the map along with an explanation of his process in designing it is here.
As you can see, the chart sort of represents a map of the US, distorted a bit by unequal population distribution, but still recognizable. The red and blue represent the Democratic and Republican districts. The balance and distribution of power is clearly visible for those who would philosophize on the state of the nation. I'm guessing that once the map is finalized, little rollover popups will tell the rest of the story. I can't wait.
Sunday, December 28, 2008
Fivethirtyeight's 435
Monday, December 22, 2008
Marriage: Saudi vs. Gay
Tradition-minded Americans would say this has nothing to do with them. They condemn the father, the judge, all of Saudi society, even as they apply the same mind-set in their own callous dealings with the less-powerful here. The Mormons, who would be better served accepting responsibility and cleaning up the mess of splinter sects of their own religion who practice variations on this kind of abuse, instead opt to pour money and energy fighting the gay marriage rights of people who do not belong to their church or any of its "kissin' cousins." And the traditional preachers, swelling with male pride in their struts and frets from the pulpits of America, raise their lusty voices in condemning gay marriage as dangerous to the children, even as they apply the tools of psychological foot-binding to the hearts of the girls who are told to submit to their fathers, husbands and male god. It is not the sanctity of marriage that is threatened by gay marriage, it is the divine right of men to be on top both in the world and with God. If men can marry men, then the ownership aspect of marriage is undermined. Most folks today would scoff at the idea of ownership of the woman by the man in marriage, yet they still think it’s beautiful for daddy to give his daughter away. No one gives away the groom; he stands on his own to feet ready to receive the hand of his bride from another man. Symbolic and potent, this pageant drama forms our minds and our relationships with its simple message and constant repetition. The image of a father “giving away,” say, a young black man to another man who happens to be white would induce a cringe because it unmasks the proprietorship implicit in the language and rituals of marriage. And if women can marry women, then suddenly there are women who neither belong to any man nor can they be shamed with the second class status of being unmarried. Male dominion would receive another blow, not in the courts of the law, but in the only other near-universal bastion of male supremacy: marriage. This is what makes gay marriage intolerable. In Saudi Arabia, a man can marry an 8-year-old girl, but can't have sex with another man on pain of death. This mindset is not just Saudi, or Muslim. It lies at the core of the fight against Prop 8 in California and the initiatives against gay marriage fueled by men who hate equality, who love power, and who deserve nothing but the contempt and resolve we apply to petty tyrants and selfish dictators.
The web is buzzing with the news that a Saudi judge has denied a divorce plea on behalf of an 8-year-old girl married without her knowledge to a 58-year-old man by her father in exchange for a $5000 dowry - apparently, he needed the cash. This is not merely a Saudi or Islamic crime against a girl-child’s right to liberty. Women in virtually all traditional societies are sold to men who pay “dowries” for their possession. How this is different from slavery has always been mysterious to me. Apparently, the “sanctity of marriage” making it not slavery is the fact that the woman cannot be resold to anyone else if she does not work out. This is no big problem for the man, as it is pretty safe to kill a wife in these countries.
Wednesday, November 05, 2008
Where's the Charity?
Palin kept saying the clothes bought for her would be donated to charity after the election. However, it now seems that some of those clothes have been 'lost.' 'Lost' as in once having found their way into the Governor's Mansion closet, they are now unable to remember how they got there or which way Neiman Marcus is from Alaska.
What I want to know is which charity will be receiving the clothes that were not lost. I'm betting the second-hand store in Wasilla, where the charity will sell the rags for a dollar a piece to the only woman in town who fits them.
From the upcoming Newsweek article:
Nicolle Wallace had told Palin to buy three suits for the convention and hire a stylist. But instead, the vice presidential nominee began buying for herself and her family--clothes and accessories from top stores such as Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus. According to two knowledgeable sources, a vast majority of the clothes were bought by a wealthy donor, who was shocked when he got the bill. Palin also used low-level staffers to buy some of the clothes on their credit cards. The McCain campaign found out last week when the aides sought reimbursement. One aide estimated that she spent "tens of thousands" more than the reported $150,000, and that $20,000 to $40,000 went to buy clothes for her husband. Some articles of clothing have apparently been lost. An angry aide characterized the shopping spree as "Wasilla hillbillies looting Neiman Marcus from coast to coast," and said the truth will eventually come out when the Republican Party audits its books.
Sunday, November 02, 2008
Problem Voting? Call Here
Democrat or Republican, if you find yourself unable to vote or confused about something at your polling place, you can call these people. Election Protection is non-partisan and will help you deal with whatever comes your way so that everyone's vote can be counted.
866-OUR-VOTE
Hope and the Clock
The clock is running out on the "permanent Republican majority" so sweepingly orchestrated over the last generation. This grandiose plan resembles the rise of every tyranny in history, combining public rhetoric that idealizes tribalism with backroom powergrabs that care nothing for anyone outside the inner cadre of rich and powerful influence peddlers. Whoever wins the presidency on Tuesday, this assault on republican (as opposed to Republican) freedoms will receive a grievous injury. The impulse behind it will not die, any more than the age-old battle between good and evil can ever be decisively ended. But at least my generation will not be the one surrender to the ignorant, hate-filled clannish straightjacket that keeps the masses enslaved by their own passions to the very rich and powerful.
This is the hope triggered by the Obama campaign and his steady, unruffled calm has been no small element in this uprising. Whether Obama can become a great president or not is almost irrelevant. His power is that he brings home the message of community power rather than injured helplessness. Lobbyists do not own Washington any more, not when individual donations can topple both the Bush and Clinton money machines. More importantly, our few dollars, like drops of water, can swell to oceans of cash for candidates we feel speaks to and for us, not special interests.
This empowerment of voice - for the courts have ruled that money is a form of "speech" and so giving it is a right under the Constitution - this takes us out of the dependent child role in the political family and puts us all on a more nearly equal footing. Corporations and PACs can no longer make my few dollars insignificant by comparison. And so I have hope that I will be heard in the same way an adult with her own income is listened to over the demands of children who want things but do not contribute to the family income.
We are becoming 'adults' in a system that has infantilized us to make us regress in our thinking about public life so that we look to the wise big 'fathers' to do what's best for us. Fear and scapegoating work on children and dependents, whose emotions are more volatile and exploitable. Adults are less afraid than children, in part because they have more personal power. Autonomy gives weight and weight is a key in keeping one's equilibrium. The public has grown up enough to see during the S&L crisis that Oz, far from watching over us, the "man behind the curtain" of deregulation didn't know any more than the rest of us about the forces of capitalism.
As Election Day nears, I think about the month-long recount in Florida eight years ago and the what-to-me-was-obvious machinations of the Republican operation to deliver the election by hook or by crook to George W. Bush. That they succeeded was an almost mortal blow to my sense of security and trust in our system. Until that moment, I had believed that truth would out and that, in the end, cheaters would not prosper.
Now, as I watch the arc of this election season, a bit of that faith is being restored. Not that people are any better, but that reality, as they say, bites. And once bitten by Republican methods, twice shy.
Friday, October 31, 2008
Abraham Lincoln: The Illinois Socialist
All this talk about Obama being a socialist for wanting the wealthy to pay higher taxe rates than those in the middle ignores the realities of society. After all, it was Abraham Lincoln himself who introduced a tiered income tax to pay for the Civil War "... with taxable incomes up to $10,000 taxed at a 3 percent rate and higher incomes taxed at 5 percent." (From the US treasury website) Higher taxes for the wealthiest who have benefited the most from the system is not Socialist, or Marxist, or whatever name you want to apply - it is a traditional all-American value called fairness.
Why is it fair? Take a look at the opposite idea and see how it sits. Do you think it is fair for those who have benefited LEAST from the current system to pay the most in taxes? That's the system we have now. Time to stop asking the poorer to cover the costs of living in this country for the richest 5%.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Redistributing the Wealth
McCain and Palin crying foul on Obama wanting to redistribute the wealth. But since Reagan, this is just what their party has been doing.
From Daily Kos:
Between 1983 and 2004 the net worth dramatically shifted as follows:
The top 1% net worth went from $8,315,000 to $14,786,000 - a 77.8% change.
The next 4% net worth went from $1,375,000 to $2,645,000 - a 92.3% change.
The bottom 40% net worth went from $54,000 to $22,000 - a minus -58.7% change.From 1983 to 2004 the income change was nearly as drastic
The top 1% income went from $689,000 to $1,169,000 - a 67.6% change.
The next 4% income went from $180,000 to $258,000 - a 43.1% change.
The bottom 40% income went from $16,800 to $17,500 - only a 4.3% change.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Holy Rhetoric, Batman!
A great McCain/Obama debate parody written in a time warp 40 years ago for the old Batman TV series. Were television audiences smarter back then? Check it out and have a laugh before the main event tonight.
Watch it here.
Sunday, October 12, 2008
RedState Cofounder Doesn't Vote for McCain
HuffPo reports that RedState co-founder Joshua Trevino wrote in his blog that he filled in his CA absentee ballot intending to vote a straight Republican ticket but in the end he couldn't vote for McCain. He wrote in Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana.
How about that for a kick in the teeth to McCain!
Saturday, October 11, 2008
Lying to Get Her Way
The legislative report that Palin abused her power in trying to get Trooper Wooten fired has some pretty damning conclusions about her character. Many of her claims described Wooten as dangerous, that he had threatened her and her family, and that she was afraid. The investigator, Branchflower, concludes:
I conclude that such claims of fear were not bona fide and were offered to provide cover for the Palin's real motivation: to get Trooper Wooten fired for personal family related reasons.More.
But don't take the committee's word that she lies. See her change her story on the issue of firing Monegan here.
How to Earn $480 Million
TPM has a great reader post on the math of the golden parachutes received by the CEOs after destroying the banking system. Puts their bonuses in perspective. Here.
Friday, October 10, 2008
The Verdict on Palin: "Abuse of Power" AND "Dereliction of Duties"
Today, in two separate arenas, Governor Sarah Palin has been rebuked for failures to carry out her duties as entrusted to her by the great state of Alaska.
ABUSE OF POWER
The bipartisan (mostly Republican) panel in the legislature investigating Troopergate released its findings. As reported here:
Sarah Palin unlawfully abused her power as governor by trying to have her former brother-in-law fired as a state trooper, the chief investigator of an Alaska legislative panel concluded Friday.DERELICTION OF DUTIES
A judge has ordered both the State of Alaska to contact Yahoo, preserve any emails sent from her outside accounts and to attempt to resurrect those in deactivated accounts. As reported here:
Outsider reformer? If you consider the fox an outsider to poultry farming and elect her to reform business in the hen house, then sure, Palin is both an "outsider" and a "reformer." But why re-define two perfectly good words, when we already have terms for her kind of politician: "crook" and "bully.""We shouldn't be in a position where public records have been lost because the governor didn't do what every other state employee knows to do, which is to use an official, secure state e-mail account to conduct state business," (Judge) McLeod said after the 90-minute hearing.
"It's a dereliction of the governor and her duties," she said.
Thursday, October 09, 2008
Who Is Barak Obama?
The vicious innuendo that fills the new RNC ad as well as the McCain campaign ads and speeches needs to be met head on. I hope Obama develops an ad campaign with the same slogan, the same techniques, and answers the sleazy lies with the truth in clear images and words that rebuke the falsehoods and shame the ad makers.
Who is Barak Obama?
Voter Insecurity
The New York Times today reports on how states are illegally purging voters from their rolls. There are purging voters too close to the election day in violation of federal law. And they are using the Social Security database, a database that Social Security says is unreliable and should only be a last resort, as a first resort, which is in violation of their agreement for permission to use that database. But behind all that is the huge hand of human error. Conspiracy? We'll see how this plays out.
For example:
In the year ending Sept. 30, election officials in Nevada, for example, used the Social Security database more than 740,000 times to check voter files or registration applications and found more than 715,000 nonmatches, federal records show.Later in the same article:
Nevada officials said the large number of Social Security checks had resulted from county clerks entering Social Security numbers and driver’s license numbers in the wrong fields before records were sent toNevada officials said the large number of Social Security checks had resulted from county clerks entering Social Security numbers and driver’s license numbers in the wrong fields before records were sent to the state.What a surprise that there were over 95% nonmatches. They were looking for their driver's license numbers...
Wednesday, October 01, 2008
Million-Dollar Web Design Company
Say you've got a million dollars to spend on a website. Your first thought is probably, do I really need to spend that much on a website. But, okay, you need to launch big and launch now. So who do you hire. You can have your pick of top firms. Would you choose a company that not only never ran a website before, but has as its website something that looks like the free template that comes with your domain name? Like this one below. Would you hire these people at even one-tenth of that, say $100,000?
These are the people McCain hired to do his website. Well, you say, Gramps is no wizard when it comes to the web. But it doesn't take a genius to figure out what's going on the minute you hear the names. Partner - campaign manager Rick Davis, the same Rick Davis who is a partner in the lobbying firm Davis Manafort, a firm that lobbies for the mortgage industry. The campaign has been saying that Davis hasn't worked for the firm for years, but it turns out his salary is paid to the lobbying firm! So Davis, and his lobbying partner Manafort start up a web design company and right out of the box they get a million dollar contract. What are the odds of that happening to you or me?
Cronyism is the heart and soul of lobbying, of influence peddling, of corruption in government and business. Welcome to McCain's world.
BTW, this is from US News and World Report in May, 2007.
Sunday, September 28, 2008
Afraid to Hope, Yet Hoping
The Daily Kos has a set of graphics about the Presidential debates that brought home the results to me. The responses to the debate categories were broken down by Republican, Democrat, and Independent. In evaluating the candidates, you'd expect the partisan approvals by the party-affiliated responders. But the base hasn't decided a presidential election in years. The Independents must break your way if you want to win. And even with the Dems so far outpacing the Republicans in voter registration, the Independents will be decisive. What the graphics made clear to me, even though I have heard the info already many times, is how out-of-step the Republicans are with the direction of the country. It gives me hope I mostly dare not allow myself to contemplate.
See for yourself:
We the People at Palin's Hat Shop
The Washington Post has reported on yet another ethical lapse by Governor Palin. Apparently, state officials in Alaska are forbidden by law from taking sides on ballot initiatives. Palin bit her tongue about a conflict between mining and fishing industries, but put up partisan info on her government website. When the fisheries complained, she was ordered by the courts to remove the info. She did and then called a press conference, explained that she was "taking off her governor's hat" and told them that as a private citizen she was against the protections for fishing. The next day full page ads in the papers carried her picture announcing Governor Palin (not private citizen Palin) was against the initiative. It failed.
As former Governor Tony Knowles told the Post:
"She says, 'I'm going to take off my governor's hat,' but the only reason the press was there was that they were called to a press conference by the governor. Being governor is not a costume -- you either are the governor or not."In honor of Sarah Palin's discovery that laws only apply to those wearing the appropriate hat, I would like to celebrate the ways in which this discovery could make all our lives easier.
"I took off my teacher hat and cursed out a fifth-grader. And then I went back to being a caring instructor. But I'm only human and the kid was getting on my nerves."
"I took off my employee hat and took a nap. My boss started to yell at me, but I showed him that hat on the rack and he was suddenly embarrassed. You can't just scream at people unless you're their boss. He apologized and just to show no hard feelings, I put my hat right back on and got to work."
"I took off my law-abiding-citizen hat and robbed a bank. Just for a minute, and then I put that hat back on. Now my finances are peachy and I want all the laws enforced, as any law-abiding citizen would."
Fox Fixes the Debate
A reader of Talking Points Memo noticed Fox News playing around with the debate footage. They flipped the debaters positions on a split screen so that it looked like McCain was addressing Obama and that it was Obama who was looking away from McCain.
Fox should explain that when they say "fair and balanced" they mean that they will actively 'balance' reality so that it meets their idea of fair.
Post Turtle Palin
TPMcafe has a funny Palin story that reads like a classic joke. A 75-year-old rancher is talking to his doctor and the subject of Palin comes up. Enjoy.
The old rancher said, "Well, ya know, Palin is a 'Post Turtle'".Not being familiar with the term, the doctor asked him what a 'post turtle' was.
The old rancher said, "When you're driving down a country road you come across a fence post with a turtle balanced on top - that's a 'post turtle".
The old rancher saw the puzzled look on the doctor's face so he continued to explain. "You know she didn't get up there by herself, she doesn't belong up there, and she doesn't know what to do while she's up there, and you just wonder what kind of dummy put her up there to begin with".
Saturday, September 27, 2008
$700,000,000,000.00 and Counting
While we are all gritting out teeth and accepting the inevitable bailout of unregulated banking in the mortgage sector, the credit card sector is still completely unregulated. Congress is trying to address that in separate legislation at the same time they are proceeding with the bailout by writing some pretty tame limits on how credit card issuers deal with consumers. Mostly the legislation is about notification. It has no caps on interest or fees charged, just on how much time the lenders give you. And guess what. The banking industry is pushing back, saying this time of crisis (that their own desire to conduct business unfettered created) is no time to make it harder for consumers to get credit. And by extension, for lenders to continue to make the obscene profits they have been raking in ever since the Supreme Court overturned all the state-level laws controlling interest rates and penalty fees, leaving them free to charge as much as they can bleed from desperate, bad risk consumers. They hang their heads and accept that the free lunch is over in mortgages, but don't see why they should have to put up with consumer protections on credit card debt. After all, if the situation gets too rough, the government can just bail them out again.
Monday, September 22, 2008
McCain Camp Goes To War With New York Times
Notice in the article that the campaign strategist, Schmidt, doesn't address the merits of the accusations. He attacks the paper and somehow makes the conversation about the liberal media.
Davis at least admits he worked for Fannie & Freddie but claims he didn't lobby–he just met with his friends in Washington who worked for the government. Right. And I don't teach school, I just go every day to a classroom where there are students and talk to them about stuff.
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost
Saturday, September 20, 2008
Reality's Liberal Bias
The chairman of the Federal Reserve, Ben S. Bernanke, and the Treasury secretary, Henry M. Paulson Jr., have thrown their party's theories aside and dived into the financial crisis determined to avoid the mistakes that turned a depression into the Depression. The New York Times chronicles in its business section (here) how the "professor" prevailed against the "banker," the crisis returning us to a valuing of intelligence over savvy, of education over "gut." All the adolescent absolutism and macho aggressiveness of laissez-faire business dealings so beloved by the Republican Party have been shown once again to be neither wise not prudent. I can only hope that people will see that, in a real world, the only things that work for long are "nuanced" and the "complex," awake to history so that we don't repeat it and educated in how to see beyond the end of one's ambition.
Deregulation and Privatization - Terrible Twosome
Can you imagine if the Republicans had gotten their way during the Clinton years and if Social Security had been privatized and was dependent on the very financial institutions now collapsing? And McCain wanted to put your health insurance in the same pocketbook. Sure it sounds good: you make your own choices and have more control. But this is the same rationale my dad made for not wearing a seat belt: he imagined he could throw himself out of the way of the accident, never mind the physics of 2 cars moving at 65 miles per hour. It sounds good, but the laws of physics are not amenable to personal ideas.
Privatization and deregulation are masks for corporate greed. Talk about government taking over health care and the cry against "socialized medicine" goes up and people figure if it's like the old Soviet Union and must be bad. But what are these bailouts but all the bad parts of socialism - no responsibility, taxpayer supported fat cats - without any of the benefits. Unregulated businesses make tons of money taking foolish chances for quick profits knowing they will receive bailouts when their house of cards collapses. The Republican Party, for all its "free market" posturing, only wants government to stay out of the way of its own greedy backers, but when they overreach, they expect we-the-people via our government to bail them out WITH NO STRINGS ATTACHED. No regulation. No personal responsibility. So you and I essentially buy the failed banks' bad debt. Then the Republicans will say we need to let the private sector handle money, and so some corporation will buy the failed banks at pennies on the dollar for what we paid to help them. We eat the loss and the private buyer reaps the rebound profits. This is socializing risk and privatizing profit.
But when individual taxpayers fall on hard times, all the babble is about personal responsibility and letting the market correct itself through foreclosures. There is no bailout for you, the taxpayer, even as you foot the bill for the banks. Not even bankruptcy will clear your debts now or ever.
Banking on Health in a McCain World
You better stay healthy if McCain gets elected. McCain was quoted recently in a business magazine, Contingencies, saying that the way to fix health care was to use the deregulated banking industry as the model.
"Opening up the health insurance market to more vigorous nationwide competition, as we have done over the last decade in banking, would provide more choices of innovative products less burdened by the worst excesses of state-based regulation." (full article here)
To be fair, this isn't just McCain. It's the whole big business arm of the Republican Party. The Reagan Revolution deregulation and trickle-down tom-foolery have left us all holding the bag.
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Palin Quoted Racist
Sara Palin quoted Westbrook Pegler in her acceptance speech, "We grow good people in our small towns, with honesty, sincerity and dignity."
The writer a person quotes approvingly is likely to be a writer that same person reads and enjoys, especially if the quote is not some famous old saw or the words of an emblematic public figure. Like is drawn to and values like. So it says a lot about Sarah Palin, her reading habits and her taste in thinkers when she quotes a writer.
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. had these words to say about Pegler, the author of that quote.
Fascist writer Westbrook Pegler, an avowed racist who Sarah Palin approvingly quoted in her acceptance speech for the moral superiority of small town values, expressed his fervent hope about my father, Robert F. Kennedy, as he contemplated his own run for the presidency in 1965, that "some white patriot of the Southern tier will spatter his spoonful of brains in public premises before the snow flies."
It might be worth asking Governor Palin for a tally of the other favorites from her reading list.
Hunting Bulwinkle - Palin's Idea of Sport
Paul Theroux brought me Thoreau on hunting moose today here and I am now ashamed that on hearing about Palin's love of moose hunting, I didn't question the 'sport.' Where is the sport here?
All this talk about moose hunting! It is as though, because of the animal's enormous size and imposing antlers, bringing one down is a heroic feat of marksmanship. Nothing could be further from the truth. As Henry David Thoreau wrote in "The Maine Woods," killing these big, gentle, myopic creatures is more "like going out by night to some woodside pasture and shooting your neighbor's horses."Theroux goes on to make a parallel between hunting style and political style. And when I understand how moose hunting involves no skill or bravery, but just brute force inflicted on something bigger yet peaceful, I fear Palin even more.
Thoreau's descriptions of the moose he saw in Maine are inspired and fanciful. "They made me think of great frightened rabbits," he wrote.
Sunday, September 14, 2008
Survey Says...
So many people are writing about how the poll numbers they are seeing cannot be correct. I, too, am weirded out by them and have been trying to figure out how these stats can be true. One of my friends suggests that poll answerers are a self-selecting group, and that folks like my friends or like me do not answer them. So today, I took my first poll in over 10 years.
The last poll I took was a push-poll in Seattle, a "poll" designed to promote a big pro-big-business renovation project. I was so angry at the sly, slanted questions that I wouldn't finish the poll and swore never to take one again. But I see how polls are used to drive the public opinion and news coverage, and so, like voting, I want to make sure my voice and the voices of people like me are included in the data.
Saturday, September 13, 2008
Palin Budget Cutting-Folks-Off-At-The-Knees and Giving Herself the Keys to the Chevy
As reported in the New York Times, Palin's style of budget cutting has all the empathy of a Mafia don.
The mayor quickly fired the town’s museum director, John Cooper. Later, she sent an aide to the museum to talk to the three remaining employees. “He told us they only wanted two,” recalled Esther West, one of the three, “and we had to pick who was going to be laid off.” The three quit as one.Budget problem solved.
But Slashin' Sara doesn't only cut costs. When it's important, she finds the funds for vital equipment like a new white Chevy Suburban for her own use.
Ms. Palin ordered city employees not to talk to the press. And she used city money to buy a white Suburban for the mayor’s use — employees sarcastically called it the mayor-mobile.
You have to admire such moxie. But you don't have to vote for it.
Palin's Call to Embrace the Dark Side of Our Nature
Deepak Chopra wrote a column called Obama and the Palin Effect that explains the appeal of Palin. Instead of looking at the facts of the candidates or the role of the press, he looks at the unconscious emotional dynamics at play in the electorate. The press may be promoting the idea that the McCain Republican campaign is once again outfoxing the Democratic machine, but the real culprit is found in the American psyche and how people may wish for change in the abstract while being terrified about losing the little they have should change really happen. It is the call for change that is triggering this fear; the Republicans are simply fanning the flames and capitalizing on it.
In her acceptance speech Gov. Palin sent a rousing call to those who want to celebrate their resistance to change and a higher vision.Here lies the the key Bill Clinton's, and to a lesser degree, Hillary Clinton's success. They did not just inspire people to their cause; they simultaneously soothed the fears that their call for change evoked. Folksy and friendly, they reassured the populace that the changes that were coming would not ask anything of them and give everything to them.
Look at what she stands for:
--Small town values -- a denial of America's global role, a return to petty, small-minded parochialism.
--Ignorance of world affairs -- a repudiation of the need to repair America's image abroad.
--Family values -- a code for walling out anybody who makes a claim for social justice. Such strangers, being outside the family, don't need to be heeded.
--Rigid stands on guns and abortion -- a scornful repudiation that these issues can be negotiated with those who disagree.
--Patriotism -- the usual fallback in a failed war.
--"Reform" -- an italicized term, since in addition to cleaning out corruption and excessive spending, one also throws out anyone who doesn't fit your ideology.
Friday, September 12, 2008
Palin Poor Judgement and Abuse of Power Evidence Keeps Comin'
Todd Palin Subpoenaed in Troopergate
Palin, cast at last week's Republican National Convention as a supportive husband, oil rig worker and championship snowmachine racer, has emerged in the days since as also a powerful figure in his wife's administration. Despite holding no government position, he attends official meetings and is copied on e-mails concerning state business. (italics mine)
Whatever the outcome of the Troopergate investigation, the fact that a governor gives an unelected spouse surrogate power in running the government reveals a Mafia mentality management style. How would you feel having your government job overseen not only by your boss but the boss' husband? I remember the public outcry over Hillary being in charge of the health care task force under Clinton which was at least above board and in her area of expertise. But this kind of shadow power given to family members in government is just creepy.
Saturday, September 06, 2008
When Elephants Forget
The elephant and the donkey. Republican and Democrat. Elephants are supposed to remember. Remember when you opposed integration - of the military, of baseball, of schools? You were angry and resentful. Remember that? All the liberals you hated and now you have to admit, it was the right thing to do.
Remember when you said going after Osama bin Laden was a Clinton ploy to draw attention away from the Monica Lewinsky scandal? How you spent our national will on an impeachment instead of stopping a terrorist? The terrorist who masterminded 9/11? Do you feel at all responsible? Clearly not, as you still insist your party keeps us safe where we Democrats would not.
Time and again, you sneer and gleefully block the liberal bogeyman, and end up harming this country while you moan about how much you love America. And time and again, when the liberals do get in power, yes, they bring about change that you only later admit was fair, but they also bring higher net paychecks to your bank account, lower taxes on working people, and general prosperity for the country. Always.
Maybe we should trade symbols. You take the donkey. You sure seem stubborn enough. You ignored the hated liberals and gave Bush a blank check and now you won't admit you prefer seeing American young men and women kill and die or come home broken by a criminal war than admit it was criminal, that you fell for his lies because because you wanted to. You probably still deny it. But I promise you, like an elephant, I will remember.
Friday, September 05, 2008
Palin's Gives America the Finger
My mother told me long ago, "when you point a finger at someone else, you are pointing three back at yourself." The Republican playbook runs the 'finger-pointing, name-calling' game and wins with it time and again. The names work for the simple reason that there is truth behind them. Not the truth of the accusation. The truth is in the accuser.
And so it is that the shockingly joyful response to Sarah Palin's snide speech reveals the flaws of the party members and un-self aware independents who cheer her. Palin points a finger for them, and they join in enthusiastically, because they are three times more guilty than the Democrats of every single accusation she makes. Yet the jiu-jitsu of projection allows them to believe they are happily innocent in their righteous hatred of their enemies.
I don't blame Sarah Palin. I blame every Republican and Independent who votes for people like her. They are the ones who refuse to take the schoolyard truth from their own hands and see where most of the fingers are pointing.
When my niece was a toddler, if you asked her who licked the frosting off the cake or drew with crayons on the wall, she would reply, "I can't know that." My niece grew up and now takes responsibility for her errors, even the ones made in good faith. She has become an adult. The Palin cheering crowds are emotional toddlers willing trade their country and mine for their own illusion of innocence.
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Obama Tagging
Obama’s opponents are trying to tag him like a gang in the ghetto of American political speech. I’d like to see the candidate boldly incorporate the tags, redefining them and making them part of his platform. If people see this divisive language being defused and de-clawed, they will begin to have hope again for the future of American politics, and isn’t that what his campaign is all about? Here is one tag I’d like to see him embrace.
He will raise taxes. Two-thirds of all corporations paid no taxes last year. Your darn right, we need to raise taxes. Make no mistake. Corporations use the benefits from taxes more than individuals. It is trucks that eat up roads, not cars, and taxes are needed to build heavy-duty highways and to keep them in repair. Corporations use a disproportionate amount of the national infrastructure. Their massive requirements for energy and water and waste management depend on massive public utilities networks. Schools educate their workers for them. They damage the environment and then the public needs to clean up. It’s time they started paying for what they use instead of getting a free ride on the back of the average American worker.
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
The Cult Vs. the Culture of Life
Cult - a closed group or religious sect devoted excessively to one idea or person; an unothodox or false religion
Culture - growing, cultivated organisms or social community; refinement
A cult is narrowing and hierarchical. A culture is expanding and communal.
Cults point the finger outward and find everyone else evil and advise either isolation or evangelism to cleanse it. Cultures hand everyone some seeds and a hoe and sends them out to the garden together.
Cults are ultimately about death. Cultures are about life.
Evangelical Christianity is a cult. Liberalism is a culture.
Saturday, August 09, 2008
An Election of Hoaxes
A flock of birds. A herd of cows. A school of fish. An exaltation of larks. Many nouns in English have another, special word to designate a grouping. In the run up to the elections, I have been listening to the reports being circulated about the candidates and noticing they resemble nothing so much as those emails friends forward with capital letters and exclamation points, full of dire warnings or outraged sensibilities that turn out to be pure hokum. The aggregate of the missives is what I propose we call “an election of hoaxes.”
Thursday, July 24, 2008
Our Expensive Third-World-Quality Health Care System
In San Francisco for the BlogHer Conference last weekend, I met a young woman who had just arrived from Canada to study medicine at Stanford. Her mother is a physician in Canada and her mother’s associates had encouraged her to study in the US because, "You’ll see a lot of crazy things there.” I thought she meant culturally, but no. Apparently, doctors see many diseases in far more advanced stages here than in Canada where public medicine means lots of preventive care and diseases are often caught early. The US health system provides a clinical laboratory where disease is allowed to wreak its damage on humans unchecked and untreated. People are more afraid of the economic consequences of disease than the physical ones, and so they wait to go to the doctor until they cannot bear it any more.
I remember reading stories from my childhood and teens of American doctors going around to third world countries to help the sick. They described with great pity the advanced stages of diseases they would find in those places. I was shocked that people should suffer long and lingering deaths from diseases we had cured or could cure if caught soon enough. When I traveled in my college days, I was warned off with horror stories from going to doctors or dentists in Europe. The evidence of my friends' actual experiences confirmed that the United States had the best medical treatment in the world and I was grateful for it.
That idea may be fixed in my brain but it is simply no longer true. We rank 37th in the world, right after Costa Rica and just ahead of Slovenia when it comes to the quality of oour health care. When I look at my life and how I use the health care system, I understand. I have health insurance that only covers one checkup a year and then doesn’t kick in again until after I have spent $5000 each benefit year. This is the level of care that I can afford. Chronic or serious illness would not only limit my ability to work and thus reduce my income, my deductible amount would mean that the first $5000 I earned every year would go for doctor bills. I cannot afford to get sick.
Earlier this year I went to a doctor for palpitations. When I asked the cardiologist to discuss how to investigate the problem with an eye to cost because I had such a high deductible, he dismissed my request, saying, “That was your choice.” To him, my lower coverage was a choice to be like the grasshopper and not the ant in the Aesop fable. He must have figured I had fiddled instead of saving, coming as he does from an income bracket with excess income where saving is an option.
It turned out that my problem was no health risk and I would just have to live with thepalpitations. I was upset at having to spend so much money on doctors and tests to find out it was nothing. Yes, I know it is important to know for sure, which is why I went. But now I sit here trying to decide on whether I should have other preventive tests that doctors recommend for women my age: mammogram and colonoscopy. I’m not sure I can afford them. What would be the harm if I waited another year? Or two.
You might ask why taxes should pay for these tests if I am not willing to do it on my own. I am willing to pay several hundred dollars a month for health insurance so that if I find I have a serious problem, I will not find myself in the pitiable place of those childhood third-world ghosts I carry around in my mind. If and when that happens, the insurance will have to pay much, much more if it is discovered later rather than sooner, but the financial calculus for me does not encourage me to discover it earlier. Once I have a serious health problem, I am looking at financial ruin on top of ruined health. So I delay. I tell myself I should go but never get around to scheduling the tests. Time passes.
Yes I have my head in the sand. The cardiologist was wrong. I am not a grasshopper. I am an ostrich. I am an American.
Saturday, July 12, 2008
The Softball Ex-Press
The blogosphere and supporters of Barack Obama have been railing over the mild-mannered treatment John McCain has received from the main stream media. The examples of glossing over his inconsistencies, mistakes and downright lies are so numerous, the voices pointing them out sound like broken records in their call for more balanced reporting. There are several reasons, however, why this gentle treatment makes sense, though none of them are about truth or the interests of the body politic. They are all about the nature of the news in the post-journalism era and the human preference for equally matched opponents.
The MSM is fighting for its life. The advertiser-driven model that pays for news wants eyeballs on the page. The big problem in covering McCain in the news is that nobody really cares about him. Obama is the story. Obama gets the eyeballs glued to the TV so that the advertisers can market their razor blades or deodorant. It has nothing to do with fairness. Obama is a celebrity, and every detail of his day will be picked apart endlessly by a ratings-driven broadcast news system (thanks to Reagan) hosted predominantly by spokesmodels instead of reporters. (Who but a bevy of spokesmodels would think that photoshopping a competitors face would be a legitimate attack against their reporting as was done at Fox News this week?) Since ratings are all, the ‘news’ must find or manufacture controversy and excitement in the subjects of interest to its viewers. And the only political subject of interest is Obama.
But it seems the media are actually bending backward to try and frame McCain’s failings and gaffe’s in a positive light. McCain’s non-joke that exporting cigarettes to Iran would have the benefit of killing our enemies was headlined by the Associated Press as a moment of fun spousal play when Cindy McCain poked hubby in the back for his comment. Or how about the headline that shows McCain leading Obama among the all-important voting bloc of pet-owners. This goes beyond picking apart Obama. It seems the MSM is actually supporting McCain by white-washing his image for him.
The election year ratings are at the core of this artificial 'balancing' of the candidates. If only one candidate is likely to be elected, if there's no real contest, then there's no news. Some semblance of a competition has to be maintained if coverage of the election is going to draw enough viewers and readers to keep news departments afloat. That presidential press corps is expensive. What's the point of spending all that money if the race is over. People will not watch a sport if the outcome is known beforehand. The Yankees playing my office baseball team would not draw much in the way of fans. After the 217th home run by the Yanks in the first inning, who would keep watching. Golf lets people of unequal skill play each other. Think of the MSM bias as being McCain's high handicap score. The media is actually raising McCain and trying to lower Obama so that the American people will be uncertain of the outcome and tune in.
Some argue that this is a betrayal of the protections offered the Fourth Estate. News should be impartial and serve the public interest. And the public needs to know just how awful McCain is. These folks are looking at the McCain campaign as a fair fight and want the blows by each side to be covered evenly. But let's face it; on a human level, it's not a fair match. No one wants to see the shame of an old man brought to face his decrepit and degenerated state. The more awful McCain is, the more I see a pathetic old man. And hitting a weak man when he’s down elicits a reaction against the messenger. The news tries to be a happy place despite the litany of death and destruction, and rubbing grampa’s nose in the mess he’s making smacks of senior abuse. They can’t admit it because he is the presumptive Republican nominee, so they avoid noticing his decline and keep us all focused on the glory that he enjoyed in his prime.
Such is the softball game played by the press with the McCain campaign. It is not a love affair with him and his maverick image. It is a self-serving posture of neutrality with all the trappings of a kangaroo-court where the verdict has been decided beforehand: the two Presidential Candidates are locked in an even battle for the White House. Details at 11.
Sunday, July 06, 2008
Vampire Republicans
Vampires - they suck your blood, infect you with their curse of bloodlust, and have no reflection that is the mark of soullessness. They might be creatures of fantasy in the literal sense, but metaphorically speaking, they are all around us making pronouncements on the television, strolling the halls of power, and debasing their enemies real and perceived in interrogation rooms around the world.
The Los Angeles Times reports that the Republican Party is worried about losing big in the coming Senate races. Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.), chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, lists a host of problems facing candidates from his party. These are all problems of what teachers would call 'plot' and not 'character.' Bad things have happened to the party. Nowhere is there an examination of whether the party's mindset and values has any responsibility for the disastrous situation.
It is not schadenfreude that makes me want to see them grovel, wear hair shirts, and climb the steps of the Capitol on their knees. Unless they see that they committed the sin of pride, dismissing with contempt their opponents on legislation and political action simply because they held all the reins, they are going to continue to support policies harmful to the body politic. Now that they see their control over the reins slipping, they moan about bipartisanship. Without acknowledgement of their fundamental failure to do the right thing - share the power when they had it all - their bipartisanship is a sham.
Amends need to be made. I know it is an election year, but the Republicans must do for their nation what Hillary has done for her party. She still believes she is the better candidate, that Barack cannot win, and if he does, his policies will sometimes take us in the wrong direction. But she has put on a smile and is supporting him absolutely.
After 9/11 the Democrats did that for the President and his party. Sometimes they held their noses and voted with the majority trusting that the other side also had the nation's best interests at heart. Republicans now trying to blame the President for all the failings of his administration look in the mirror of history and do not see themselves at all. Like vampires, they sucked out much of the wealth and national standing in the world gained during the Clinton years and now are wringing their hands wondering what went wrong. They look in the mirror and do not see their own faces. Like the vampires, they have lost their soul.
If the Republican in the Senate want to salvage some of this next election, they have to make amends to redeem their souls. Not just apologize, but support the Democrats on issues important to them as a way of admitting that the elephant in the room is not always right. The reality of this country right now shows that their policies were often wrong-headed. How can we trust giving them the means to govern again unless they can demonstrate that they have eyes to take a good look at themselves in the mirror in the light of day?
Friday, April 04, 2008
Family Squabbles
The death of the head of a large family with a substantial estate reveals, in the power struggle that ensues, all of the unhealed wounds and undeveloped characters of the family members remaining. Sometimes, the family members' inability to reconcile with one another means that the inheritance will be squandered in the fighting with little or no benefit ever passing on to those who grabbed so fiercely for it. In the end, everyone loses but the lawyers.
Substitute "the Republicans" for the dying person and "Democrats" for the inheritors and as for the estate, that would be the States. And while Uncle Elephant may not be quite dead yet, the brutality with which the family is grabbing at the chance to be the executor of the will of the People, namely President, has convinced me that a Democratic Congress and Administration will be paralyzed with infighting once in the power.
Look at the issue of what to do with the 'delegates' from Michigan and Florida. At a recent party fundraiser in NYC, several major donors got into it with Howard Dean for not providing leadership on this issue. All sides have a sound-bite opinion about the right thing to do which curiously matches the decision that would most benefit them. It may very well be that the Bentley (or Air Force One) was promised to both claimants and sure, she did have the use of the Bentley on loan for years, and yes, he has never driven a stick shift before, but that is not the issue. The issue is that the sides are lining up, and each side is identified with only one outcome or else. Any 'leadership' in the 'wrong' direction yields escalations of rhetoric and more damage done.
I also look at how the Democrats, now in charge of both chambers of Congress, have been unable to use that majority to counteract the worst excesses of the current Administration. The Senate margin may be slim, but the Republicans passed miserably partisan proposals with the same slim margin. Yet from Mukasey confirmation to the recent gutting of the mortgage bailout of every Democratic initiative that might have actually helped for a watered-down bill that came out of committee was watered-down and only really had provisions to help builders and lenders and only a nod for the actual people in distress. Now the Democrats say they need a larger margin, but that will only up the stakes, not change the SOP. Look at the way the family is feuding in the election and you would feel justified in discounting the Democrats in the manner of the worst cliches of right-wing talk radio.
Some say the party will come together once the nominee has been chosen. I don't see it. But having lived in a family and observed the volcanic consequences of spiraling power struggles among those who know and love one another best, I do not see this settling sweetly into greeting card warmth any time this year or next. The time is past for the canditates to vie for the job based on their own statements about themselves and their own record of actions and initiatives.
