RWNorman's Beer, Food and Politics

Nothing Changes in a Vet's Life

As a vet I have worked on getting other vets their due and after 20 years, finally Agent Orange was recognized as a legitimate cause of conditions our vets had found themselves in based on service in Vietnam.

The fight was long and hard, our vets already customarily dismissed for having Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome (at the time it was not recognized as a covered Disorder), so it was even much harder to get the government to recognize that continued exposure to Agent Orange (a product now known as RoundUp) as a cause for multiple maladies affecting our returning heroes.

Today is no different than those returning Vets in 1972 when we essentially turned over the war to the Vietnamese to finish.

A young man, John Kerry (now a Democratic Senator of Massachusetts and past Presidential Candidate in 2004,) once gave testimony to the Winter Soldiers conference where he asked the question "Who wants to be the last person to die in an unneeded war?"

Well, we have a problem Houston, and it is exactly the same thing.

Here I sit, on Memorial Day weekend Sunday, flipping channels between the French Open and the Indianapolis 500 and I can't stop thinking about this.

We have one Veteran or active duty soldier killing themselves every 80 minutes, and we have no answers from the government on how to fight this catastrophe.  PTSD (finally a Disorder requiring Government intervention and care) is now a known and accepted problem but our vets cannot get into programs fast enough to keep them alive.  The problem is not one of class, not one of our inability to give the proper care, but the problem of our government taking up to 18 months or more to start these heroes in a program than can help.

Part of the interval solution is the use of drugs, but the drugs only help in the act of taking their lives.  A bottle of pills without proper care by professionals is like handing a despondent man a loaded gun.

And if you look at the problem on a basis of geographical area, you won't find any differences in the outcome, but some of our Veterans offices are processing medical requests very efficiently whilst some are so overwhelmed that some of their cases are being handed off to other offices in other cities or extremely remote processing offices away from the Vets who are supposed to be receiving care.

I had first written about these problems even before the war in Iraq officially started, and the tales told then have only been proven as prophecy because nothing has changed.

Oh, well I guess I have to be totally honest here and say that the test we have passed is the one of protecting our active duty soldier in theater to the point where our combat deaths are very small in comparison with the Vietnam war.

In that war our dead simply didn't have the body protection our troops do today, and so our deaths far exceeded those of today, but the flip to that is that now we have tens of thousands that might well have been dead who are now alive and trying to learn to live with prosthetics we didn't have available for our wounded previously.

So we really did flip it, from 58,000 dead in Vietnam and thousands of wounded Vets, to about 4,500 dead in Iraq and tens of thousands of wounded Vets.

Wounded Vets, who by the way, have no place to go to get proper treatment in a reasonable timeframe, which leaves our Vets vulnerable and alone.  And they are not afraid of death.  They have lived with death enough to consider it one additional avenue they can take to end their misery, their problems, and perhaps even give something back to their families in terms of life insurance when they have nothing else to fall back on.

These guys and gals deserve one hell of a lot better than what they are given, and again the America people need to make sure that no President throws our troops into a war of choice effectuated by a bunch of lies.

So the question John Kerry asked as he was being abused by the media and the Republican right, is still pertinent and should be asked by every American.

Who wants to be the last person to die in an unneeded war?

Apparently we'll never know because those deaths are still going on today and will continue until we get our Veteran's Administration to do the job they are supposed to.

I respect General Shinseki, the current Veterans Administration Cabinet head and the only military man to tell George W. Bush the truth about how many troops we'd actually need to fight the war in Iraq and was subsequently relieved of his duty as the Army Chief of Staff.  But he needs to stand on some heads and get the VA up to snuff of doing the job as well as these young men and women did for their country.  

Let us remember all of this on this Memorial Day and understand that we wouldn't be saluting so many dead if we not only didn't fight wars of choice, but also made certain that we were able to help each and every Veteran and returning active duty soldier.  A dead soldier or Vet every 80 minutes of every day of every week of every month of every year isn't what America is about.

God bless our men and women in service to America.

There Is No Question About Leadership

Well, House Leader John Boehner again showed just why the Republicans should lose both the House and the White House in this election.

He told George Stephanopoulus "Well, George, you know that Leaders need followers", and from there on one has to ignore what he says.

There is a truth here, but not the one spoken.  It is a truth that people know, but apparently politicians do not, which is that Leaders don't need followers.

Leaders HAVE followers whether they want them or not.  Good leaders read the writing on the wall and try to use their leadership to the best advantage for their followers.  Some leaders are lucky enough to be right, and some aren't. You can recognize the ones that aren't because their followers will abandon them in a moment's notice.

John Boehner has not shown one ounce of leadership in the two years he has held the office of House Leader, and I have no false hopes that he will become the leader he think he is.

One day before the 2010 elections I made some predictions, one of which was that the new "Tea Party" people would end up causing the Leader to be a new type of Leader, one of both parties in order to get anything done for the American people.  He would have to garner the support of the non-Tea Party members and supplement them with overtures to those on the other side of the aisle in order to get the votes for necessary bills passed to put the American people back to work.

Well, I was right, but only in the prediction that didn't come true, if I can turn a missed prediction into a poignant one in the sense of what was necessary to put Americans back to work.  Boehner missed the whole idea.  He didn't stick his neck out and he said that he didn't have enough votes for anything.  He didn't try.  The Republicans didn't try.

Oh, they passed a lot of bills.  The stepped on the toes of women seemingly with every footfall, and they managed to make Doctors criminals for providing certain types of women's necessary health care.  Anything they can't get passed in the Federal balliwick they have moved aggressively to the states in order to continue to step not only on the toes of women's rights in health care, but the poor and particularly blacks in terms of their voting rights.

They also continue to try to kill unions even as unions are losing power across the board due to state laws, but also in the manner of their conversations, as if the people do not have the right to aggressively work collectively to get equal pay, fair work rights, and pensions they negotiate.  In today's environment, pensions are a matter of contention, and whether they were negotiated in good faith or not, they are targets.

The number of bills they have produced has reached a proportion edging on stupidity knowing that these bills would never pass the Senate which is why we have seen these bills move to the states almost clandestinely.  You can thank the "liberal" media for bringing these fights to the American people's attention, which the Republicans have consistently called down as trying to destroy the work for the people.

They wanted to show America they were doing their jobs, but unfortunately America didn't view it this way, and I blame John Boehner for not being the leader he believes he is.

His statement that leaders need followers irks me to no end.  It is the stupidest statement I believe he has ever made and almost reaching the actions of his handing out cigarette money to members on the House Floor during a vote.

I'm glad Boehner has never described himself as being a Navy man because his 8 weeks of service is essentially boot camp and out.  But maybe, because he didn't really serve, he simply hasn't had the experience of working with a leader.

Now I'm not saying you can only find a leader in the military because that wouldn't be true, but you're more likely to find both kinds of leaders in the military, and it makes it much easier to distinguish between the two.

One type of leader is automatically followed without asking, without telling, without hardly even noticing, but a leader he is.

The other type we all know well.  They say they are leaders, and some follow willingly, but others only follow because they see nothing else to follow.  And as I said earlier, they will abandon this type of leader as soon as any other real leader shows up.

But today people are confused by what a leader really is because they haven't experience leadership for the full two terms of President Bush, so they don't recognize it in President Obama.  Today's followers in fact do represent what John Boehner said for today's followers are the leaders by implication of numbers and generally negative thoughts against almost everything.  So today's leaders grasp onto this generally negative atmosphere and surmise that being negative about everything makes them the leaders of some type of new American movement.

Truth be told, they were the architects of this attitude by largely being the people in power at the time all of these changes in attitude were festering, and in fact, the Republican party was constantly picking at the scabs of pain that they had created for the American people.

We wouldn't have these great holes in the economy had it not been for the 8 years of Bush spending.  Two unfunded wars, one of which we are still involved with, which will ultimately cost us some $3 Trillion when all of the mental problems fall out from 870,000 people not suffering from PTSD.  This was a serious failure of an experiment in American empire, and hopefully something we will never undertake again.

The Bush unfunded mandate for Medicare Part D, pledged to pay for medicine directly from the manufacturers (meaning big Pharma) at full retail price, not at the negotiated discounts that the VA already has, so we have a vast disparity of what the American people pay for medicine for our Vets and what our American people pay at their own health care facility.

Our hopes were never to borrow on tomorrow, even as we were told that deficit spending wasn't "so bad" by VP Dick Cheney in discussing the two unfunded wars.  We now know that moving our costs from being paid for by borrowing to creating an environment where we do things that are positive for America and paid for with the revenues our government receives is, and has been, the prudent thing to do.  We used to have Pay as you Go, PayGo, that meant we didn't have programs if we couldn't pay for them.

The Republicans want to continue the current attitude until they can get rid of Obama, and believe me, if he gets re-elected, there will be a number of Republican hearings on Obama's first term.  If they tried to murder Bill Clinton's administration with the love the country had for him, just think of what they will be willing to do to Obama to end his Presidency, regardless of the cost to the American people.

And that is what it really comes down to.  The loss of what means something to the American people, because that is whom you want to lead.  But if you want something for the American people and you describe it one way when you mean something else, you are not leading, you are playing a shell game and the American people are the losers.

I don't believe the American people are losers.  I just don't think they've seen any Republican leaders for a long time even though they would like to.

Maybe all the Republican leaders are hiding and waiting for 2016, but if that's the case then they aren't leaders either because America needs someone and if the people really want someone different than Obama, couldn't they at least have a capable leader?

The Question of Bowles-Simpson

I have to bring this up because there is a consistent theme amongst Republicans about how President Obama essentially threw the Bowles-Simpson debt commission recommendations under the bus.  More specifically it was Kelly Ayotte, a Republican Representative appearing on Meet the Press this past Sunday, 05/06/2012.

First, the rules adopted by the commission itself said that their recommendations would go to the floors of both houses without debate and for a straight up majority rules yes or no vote.  But in order for such a set of recommendations to be voted on in such a way, if then passed and being sent to the President for signing into law, the commission itself must present a super-majority vote of 14 out of the 18 commission members.

There's a reason for this super-majority idea, not because it sounds like a good idea, but because the manner in which any law which may ensue would not follow the manner in which laws are made under the Constitution, so the necessity of the super-majority was established with the agreement of both houses of Congress, in order to fall within the legislative constraints placed upon Congress by the Constitution.

The vote failed to pass with a super-majority by seven votes, that vote being 3 sitting Republicans legislators and 3 sitting Democrat legislators and one left leaning commission member, which is surprisingly bi-partisan, but also surprisingly bi-stupid considering that all of those who voted against the recommendations worked on creating those same recommendations.

Now just how was President Obama supposed to have approved the commission's report and subsequent recommendations if it could not, by law, be presented to either house for a straight up or down vote?  What difference would it make no matter how much he approved or disapproved?

We're talking about a true possibility of having established a level of bi-partisanship in the future of the country, and the members of the commission, some current legislators, and others of mixed public service including ex-legislators, so they knew they had the responsibility and the power to get their recommendations onto the floor of both houses in that bi-partisan way.  Some chose not to accept the recommendations they had worked so hard on, and as it turned out, there simply were not enough votes for the process to continue.

This is not a failure of President Obama, but every time the Republicans say that it was, the American public believe it because there is no rebuttal on the process itself.

It is true that the commission's recommendations weren't going to pass the muster in either house simply because the Republicans simply weren't going to put up with $2 Trillion in increase tax revenues, and the Democrats weren't going to put up with what essentially was a total revamp of entitlements.  Since this was known, why waste the better part of a year?

This was probably one of the best presentations of exactly what is wrong with the way our laws, our tax structure and our entitlement structures ever presented to the American people.

However, one must understand, this report and the subsequent recommendations were not a blueprint on how to end our fiscal problems.  It was an extremely good documentation of exactly what was wrong with our fiscal condition and just what needed to be done to rectify the situation in terms of cutting deficit spending and raising taxes.

The end results of how these cuts and increases in revenues were left to the legislative branch to figure out, but there were goals to be me on everything of consequence, and the truth apparently scared the shit out of Congress.

Yes, working under the commissions recommendations for the next ten years would have been difficult for virtually everyone (well, the 1% would have noticed and undoubtedly complained and released thousands of more lobbyists so that most of the pain was felt by the poor), but once you look at facts and figures, the only thing one can do is accept the truth.

And in accepting that truth, we would have been set upon the road to sustainability whilst being able to apply some of the increased revenues towards creating jobs and righting the economic ship.

Having at least debated such a huge step for America to take, the rest of the world would have been less shaken in their positions, and world economies would have responded a little less with fear and doubt, further increasing the chance for an improved economy.

However, one CANNOT blame President Obama for the failure of Bowles-Simpson.  That failure is laying directly upon the shoulders of 3 Republican and 3 Democrat sitting legislators who apparently didn't take their responsibilities as seriously as they should have.

I'd much rather be working to fix the problem right now than still debating on whose fault it is that the problem still exists.  I think that question has already been answered by the Republicans in their desire to stop this President from achieving a second term at any costs.

We already know what those costs are.  They are the continued stagnation of a weak economy, the devaluation of the American worker's experience and work ethic, and the high cost of living forced upon the poor and less well off as hamburger is now a luxury (with or without the pink slime) and the rich speculate on oil futures raising prices on a daily basis.

The failure of working to fix the future of America was bi-partisan, but the actions by the Republicans suggest that they are feeling pretty cocky about killing unions, defeating health care reform, and kicking Obama out of office.

It is true that the Republicans know how to USE power, but their actions for the past three+ years brings to question their knowledge on how to wield power for the betterment of the People.

Old is New Yet Again

I actually wrote this next piece a couple of days before the 2010 elections.  How did I do?

Well, not as well as I would have liked, but I was right more than not, and way to optimistic because I didn't think pessimism would be appropriate.

Anyway, here it is again.

The Republicans Just Got Where We Wanted Them

The next two years will not end Health Care as enacted, nor make the Financial Reform law go away.

The Republicans in the House will have subpoena power, and will be able to pass bills at will. My problem is whether they will again take the "majority of the majority" rule to mean that only Republicans can submit bills.

However, there will be minimal consensus in the Senate and the President will have a Veto power unlike most any other President's Veto power because there won't be enough votes to over ride his Veto.

The Congress seems to be coming back into balance, even if the two houses are divided, because the White House comes back into play.

The House will offer changes or total repeal of the Health Care law, the Senate will talk about it until they shelve it, and if the repeal got by the Senate, the President would Veto it, and there wouldn't be enough votes for an over ride.

Actually, if this President is strong, the Republican takeover of the House is the worst thing they could have happen. Leader Boner will have to kowtow to all kinds of individuals to get consensus in the House, and even then the Senate is going to let the importance of the bill in question reside with them. Then some more of the old politics in order to get something through both houses, perhaps only to see the Executive pocket it or outright Veto.

Even though it appears that the President is in the worst position right now, the real analysis is that he is in the strongest position.

This new House will not be able to block the EPA, not give the Bush tax cuts to everybody for ten more years at the cost of $700 Billion, and they will not be able to alter the current Health Care law because there really isn't any American desire to do such things.  As it stands, most Americans still think there are death panels, $500 Billion in Medicare cuts, and no subsidies to low income earners so they can get health care too.

What the people want is honesty in government, and representatives who can explain the things that are taking place, although it appears that the people really don't want to know how the sausage is made.

Congress will have to go back to real debate and incremental changes that work for the people, in which case the people win. In case you didn't know, the House is supposed to propose bills and vote on them, the Senate is supposed to debate bills and either help make them laws or cut them off at the knees.

The President then has the ability to either sign the bill into law, or Veto, which requires a 2/3 majority of both Houses to over ride.

We'll see. Maybe the Tea Party candidates weren't the worst thing to happen to our system of government. After all, elections aren't about the qualities of a candidate, but the foibles.

Then again, we'll see in the House and Senate elections.  It is possible that a candidate will arise in the House to challenge John Boehner, as well as some who might want to rise in the Senate, seeing as how unlikely it seemed to be that Harry Reid would again win in Nevada.

If that were to happen, I'd like to see Senator Durbin as the leader.  I'd like someone a little more reasonable and less likely to fall to the hype of the other side.

Then again the other side is House rich and politically poor.

The Crisis of Presidential Power and the Balance of Power in a 3 Part System of Governance

I whole-heartedly recommend you read an article published in the New York Times today, 23 Apr 2012, titled Shift on Executive Power Lets Obama Bypass Rivals.

The Office of the President and level of power imbued by the Constitution have been under assault in both in the apparent abuse of Presidential power under George W. Bush, and the abuse of Congressional power to stifle this President's ability to do the very job he was elected to perform.

First off, there is a loss of political captital when a President appears to be doing nothing just because he has a Congress that, in fact, is the portion of government actually doing nothing.  There is nothing new with this response on the part of the President.  In fact, over the past 30 years one side or the other of the aisle in Congress has been yelling about the increase in Presidential power, but the fact is that the Constitution was set up to create a balance of power, and when Congress won't do the job they assume that the President can't either.  But the President can indeed do something, which is to combat the lack of Congressional action by acting himself under the powers granted by the Constitution.

Second, anyone would have to admit that if the House, for instance, were to refuse to act upon legislation proposed by the President time and time again, then the House would technically be guilty of obstruction of Presidential power, but only marginally so.  Such is the case in the Republican's usage of the filibuster and the "advise and consent" portion of Article 2 of the Constitution.

The filibuster was not set up to be a never ending use of Senatorial rules, and although it is perhaps the one tool which supports the rights of the minority party, should not be used to end a proper vote for any bill by the unreported hold order of one Senator ad infinitum.  A filibuster is specifically a Senate rule passed to allow the opportunity of the minority to stall a specific vote, in some cases for more Senators to be present for a vote, in other cases simply to provide for the record a disagreement with the likely outcome of a specific vote.

But a filibuster only lasted as long as the Senator who called for the filibuster rose to speak, and was "re-enacted" by Senator Bernie Sanders, D-VT, on 10 Dec 2010, to prove just that point.  When a Senator could no longer speak (any subject in the world was allowed), the filibuster was over.  Can you imagine a Senator speaking for two years?

The Republican Senators have, since this session of Congress began, abused both the filibuster and the "advise and consent" clause of Article 2, Section 3 through their headstrong desire to create a one term lame duck President.

In such exercising their power using the extended and undocumented Senator who called for a filibuster, and their refusal to advise and consent on Presidential appointments, they have worked to change the balance of power, not just to the Legislative branch, but specifically to the Republican party, even though in the senate they are the minority party.

It is not that the Senate Republicans cannot use such actions in their exercise of whatever power a minority party may have, but that they have openly and specifically applied this power in the desire to see this President fail in his efforts to do his job.  And if the President fails, the whole country fails, as we have seen and has become evident to even the most ardent of Republican supporters.

Obviously these actions are an abuse of power in the effort to strip the powers of the President.  And to do so in opposition to not only this particular President, but in defiance of the Constitution's creation of three equal branches of power.  For nowhere in the Constitution is there indicated the power to NOT GIVE advise and consent on Presidential appointees, nor deny any bill the ability to come to the floor of the Senate for a full up or down vote via a never-ending filibuster.  No where in the Constitution are these powers to negate Presidential and Majority party power created.

As far as the powers granted to Congress, and specifically the House, yes, the majority does have the right to refuse to bring any proposed bill up for a vote on the house floor.  If one remembers under the Bush administration during the Republican majority, the Speaker said in 2004 that no Democratic bill would ever make it to the floor.  I believe he said only bills from "the majority of the majority" would be presented for a vote, which meant that they would automatically pass.  Obviously it also meant that no bills from the Democrats would even be looked at no matter their relevance or solutions.

Since the House does have this right, as I said, ignoring an issue backed by the President could only be considered marginally an effort to change the balance of power.  But the cumulative effect of not allowing the minority party's bills to get to the floor has the adverse effect of only passing bills for half the country's people, seeing as how the electorate is about evenly split.

Let's face it, hungry children don't do well at school, and yet Republicans, whether their terms be in good times or bad, have always wanted to negate those poor children's head start opportunities, and even subsidizing their lunches.  Without having consensus votes for these types of programs means that this year these children have food and a chance in education whilst next year they may well not.

The point here is that even in the House there are methodologies used to create somewhat a quest for power, if not the actual acquisition of such power.  In most cases these grasps for additional power usually end up putting the most needy of Americans in a bad place, and that means a lost group of Americans' abilities to exercise their potential.

We don't know where the next Einstein may come from, but the odds are just as good that he or she would come from the poor as they would from the rich.  We harm America when we harm Americans, especially when we try to create castes and then make laws to keep those people in their caste.

And this negates the power of the President by negating what the electorate clearly says as represented by polls.  In our current times the Republicans are doing just these types of things in the House, as they continue to talk about jobs but have yet to offer up on piece of legislation that has one thing to do with jobs.  They would rather offer up legislation on social issues that were decided, often in the Supreme Court, 30 years ago.  And these actions represent a lack of doing the people's work.  Unfortunately most people do not even realize that Representatives have to run for office every 2 years, which means throwing the bums out has more possibility than the Senate or even the President.

But the real power play comes from the Senate, having rules assumed and requirements placed upon it not present in the House, of which I have just described above.

So the outcry of the President trying to usurp power is just another political ploy.  If the President operates outside of the political scope of his power there are options available to combat such operation, either in the legislature combating it with new law, obviously which must be veto proof, or the Supreme Court can be pressed upon to take up the legalities of any supposed grab for power not granted by the Constitution.

On the other hand, when Congress fails to act in accordance with the needs of the people, the President needs to use all the power the Constitution gave him or her.  If THIS President needs to use all his power to get things done that work for the American people, or put Americans back to work, then so be it.  If the Republicans squawk, then we know the President is doing the right thing.  And if the Republicans don't have anything to say bad about the President, then we know they have obtained the power to keep him from working for the betterment of the American people.

If it comes down to a vote, which it will in November, then I'm hoping the American people will vote for the person who fought for them during this do nothing Congress. 

I'm hoping that the American people will put others in place to support the efforts of the President, for the American people really do need a knight in shining armor to get us past this economic crisis that seems to continue to hang around as Congress yet again votes on whether a woman has reproductive rights or not.

What Idiots

This is about the last straw for me.  When it comes down to governance that places the American people between a couple of boulders instead of a rock and a significant mass of hard place, this Boehner run House of Representatives has taken the cake.

Now don't get me wrong,  I am well aware that both parties play a part here in some way, but when the House only has the Republican view, then it is their fault that we are looking at so many detrimental laws coming to a head on the same day.

For instance, if all of the Bush tax cuts were to finally (and yet hopefully) expiring, then the average American family will find themselves with somewhere around $1,700 less to live with over the coming year.  The absolute poorest of the country will still see an increase in what it costs them to live.

Yes, the richest of the country will be hit with some large increases in their taxes, but I'm not worried about them.  On the average, each and every rich person in the country eats about as much food as the next 150 million, and that number eats about as much as the lowest wage earning 150 million.

So when you see hamburger prices up at $3.99 per pound vs. the $1.99 per pound of just a few years ago, you can see just how the tax increases will adversely affect these people as prices continue to rise on food stuffs.

But I've talked about a lot of this before.  The problem I'm talking about now is that the House Representatives have made such bad bargains in an effort to have all of their pie and eat it too that they cannot do much but hope that everything continues on as it has for the past two years, which is the extenuation they received from President Obama.

Unless Obama has some surprise in his back pocket, the likelihood is that these Bush tax cuts will continue to be reauthorized for an additional two year period every two years just to allow for the unlikely acceptance of the Bush tax cuts as permanent.

Now there is something to be said about the concept of a President such as George W. Bush having easily having achieved these tax cuts under an almost purely Republican led House and Senate, particularly if you want to suggest that any President puts all of his eggs in one basket must surely have some plan for the future in case anything goes wrong.

Even when Senator John McCain, R., Arizona, suggested on the floor of the Senate that tax cuts were never before given during the duration of war, no one seemed to be interested in that really important piece of information.

But no, then we still had the tax cuts even though we had a war of choice in Iraq, and yet, still the President had even more borrowing to do.  Suddenly we had a Medicare Part D bill put into law without any additional revenues, again continuing President Bush's propensity towards borrowing money rather than have money come into the coffers of the Treasury with new revenues.

In all, President Bush cost this country some $5+ Trillion dollars of unsupported borrowing, as revenues continued to drop to the point that today, our normally 19% revenues to 23% expenditures were down to 13.5% revenues and our expenditures were moving up to 26%.

Even with a GDP of  $14 Trillion we were borrowing at an unprecedented rate.

Now some might wonder why would China (mostly) continue to buy our paper and the answer is obvious if you look at the place we hold in the world economy and China's desires.  And certainly no one can hold China accountable for bad purchasing of debt because they obviously had the money to spend and we had a NEED to borrow.  One cannot fault China for our electing a person who had no idea of what the world of finance looked like.  Dick Cheney told Bush and America that deficit spending wasn't a bad thing, as taught by his mentor, Ronald Reagan, supported by Alan Greenspan, an adherent to the ideas of Ayn Rand as expressed in the book Atlas Shrugged.

So now, we have an end of the year scenario that somewhat justifies the Mayan's idea of Armageddon only it is going to be a mini change with maxi problems for the 99% when December 30 hits.

Even Alan Greenspan, during an interview in 2010 prior to the Obama signed extension to the Bush tax cuts, said that all of the Bush tax cuts should be allowed to lapse.  Now we're going to find out what happens when every person gets hit with another $1,200 to $1,700 tax bill.

But hey, at least it will put some revenues into the government's coffer, which is sorely needed and Republican proof.

With all of these Republican screwups hitting at one time is it any wonder the pontificators are expressing concern for taxmageddon?

The point is that unless both sides of the aisle learn to work together for consensus on the people's business, this type of politically incorrect application of government will continually come to a head, with bad results for the people, and neither side will end up with any advantage.

Political stagnation in the application of governance is the beginning of the road to the end of a once proud nation.  If the Republican base believes we are on the wrong road, then they should remember who put us on this road in the first place.  As Obama said, we've not got the car out of the ditch and pointing the right way, but it appears we're still on the same stupid road, and the ditches are getting bigger whilst the road continues to narrow.  Pretty soon there will only be ditch and no way to back up because apparently this car doesn't have a reverse.

Stand Your Ground is a War Cry, not a Defense.

I just want to take a moment or two in order to discuss this problem being addressed in Florida about the Zimmerman killing of a young man, Trayvon Martin.

The circumstances are being beaten about like a shuttle cock by both sides, but I believe there is a preponderance of evidence which illustrates that Mr. Zimmerman killed this young man in cold blood.

So addressing the specific situation is really just a regurgitation of known and unknown facts, speculation, and perhaps some serious analysis, but until the state and federal officials get in there and start doing their jobs, the outcome is somewhat iffy.

Instead, I'd rather talk about the law that supposedly "allowed" this killing to occur.

First of all, too many people are blaming the law as if the law has any personal animosity to people or animated motives.  It is just a law, whether it is a good law or a bad law.  The law, in the specific case, did not cause Zimmerman to kill this young lad.  Only his perverse and twisted viewpoint of his place in life allowed him to pull the trigger on an unarmed youth.

As I stated in a NYTimes comment this morning, this man, Mr. Zimmerman, purposely set out to kill himself a black man, and Mr. Martin just happened to be the person that strolled into his view.

Now to admit it, I doubt seriously if Zimmerman would have done the same thing to a white man, and with the apparent lack of concern for a black man's life in that particular county, it could be said that there were some outside circumstances that influenced Zimmerman's decision, but I doubt that there was any mental impediment to Mr. Zimmerman's desire to kill someone that night.

And if not that night due to a lack of victim or the correct circumstances, then some other night and some other young black male.

Assuming that the above situation is a fair assessment of the situation, the Stand Your Ground law simply had nothing to do with the killing.  It might have something to do with the offering up of a defense, but apparently this man, Mr. Zimmerman, isn't all that much of a criminal mastermind and too many witnesses are available to offer up conflicting evidence and Stand Your Ground will be a failing defense.

Which leaves Mr. Zimmerman with only one possible outcome.  He purposely, and with malice, murderer Trayvon Martin in cold blood.

But again, Stand Your Ground, has absolutely nothing to do with the murder.  It wasn't an enticement to kill, nor does any of the evidence fit with a reasonable or acceptable defense.

No, the law itself is not at fault for the actions of Mr. Zimmerman that night, but the law itself might be a good reason for a full psychological evaluation of the lawmakers who voted the bill into law (and the Governor for signing the stupid thing).

Yes, I believe the law is about as intelligent as the people who wrote it, and that causes me no end to questioning just whom is getting elected these days, and what kind of background they come from where such a law seemed to be such a great need.

The thing I don't like is that the people determined to make this law a part of the killing obviously have a desire to use the killing to kill the law.

Look, the law didn't do anything, but if you wish to repeal it, as most good citizens would, then the smart thing to do is work it out in the State House rather than through the media on TV.

As far as I'm concerned the law doesn't meet the sniff test and is obviously the effort of people who believe that conflict must be allowed to continue to its ultimate end, which is to support who can be the best predator.  The psychology of the law indicates that the national standard of leaving a conflict if possible must be attempted before one can claim self defense is for pansies and you NEED to be able to stand up to a possible assailant and still claim self-defense if you pull a gun and shoot your assailant, even if you could have left the scene.

The law promotes allowing any conflict go into full assault, rather than promoting the effort to end the conflict without any assault.

Besides, there will never be a case where you can pull a gun on an unarmed individual and kill them claiming self-defense.  That's still called murder

A Note To My Readers

I have to apologize in that I haven't put anything new up since Feb. 5th, but I have been ill now for the past year + and am fighting some type of problem the doctors cannot diagnose and fighting through 24 hours of pain per day.

So considering the number and amounts of pain-killing drugs I use per day, perhaps it is better I haven't posted anything new.  Having gone from 147 lb. since this started to a whopping 114 lb. now I even end up with both of my arms sometimes tingling until I can no longer make the effort to write.

I have continued to write these little 1500 character comments in the NYTimes, and have composed a number of the beginnings on some new articles, but without completion and the pace of the news today, most of those subjects have fallen through the cracks, perhaps to be lost to the light of day forever.

However, despite the efforts of my some 10 doctors and biopsies with inconclusive results and blood, cancer and tuberculosous tests all saying that I was the picture of health, I just take my pain pills as my body has finally started fighting back.

Considering that, and my general but slight feeling better, I thought I'd bring you up to speed and I promise to direct additional effort to restart my articles on a normal schedule.

Thanks for reading (yes, Bill, even you! <g>), and check back soon.  I appreciate that many return so often.

 

Roger Norman

 

 

Fostering an embryo of hope and health, or an ember of hatred to fuel fires of the future?

The attacks on Planned Parenthood, whose efforts in women's health include 97% of their activities as normal health care for poor and indigent women, are a clear waste of virtually everyone's time.  The problem is that the attacks keep popping up and wasting our time, not to mention putting people into situations where they need the help and no one is there to help.

So why the attacks?  Because the other 3% involves anything from just information about abortion, to actually providing abortion services for those in need, which is, once again, a specific person's health care rights.

Now let's just sit back and think about that for a minute.  We're not talking about some type of leniency supposedly given on abortions subjects because they are illegal.

No, we're talking about presenting abortion, yet once again, as if it is, in fact, illegal.

So let us say this out loud.  Planned Parenthood fosters nor commits any  illegal acts, follows the law and does so in compliance with all the laws of all the states in the nation, but also they adhere to all Federal Laws.

Why people still believe that abortion is illegal I don't know, but the fact is that the people espousing their undying hate for abortion providers seem to more easily break the laws than those simply trying to provide women's reproductive health care.  People, mostly doctors, have been murdered as if they are fair game for providing health care services, which are legal in all 50 states.

However, all of the murders committed by anti-abortion forces are illegal in all 50 states, and in fact, all of the world.  How anyone can justify the murder of a single person in support of the sanctity of life just doesn't make sense.

Now events have continued to evolve in this Komen/Planned Parenthood situation, the results being that the Komen Foundation have backed off their original premise and reinstated the donations they have been providing.

I see no reason for the Komen Foundation to any longer be trusted in their efforts to provide women's reproductive health care because they can obviously be influenced by the darker side of anti-abortionist.

How not?  This is an obvious invasion of a Foundation which has done good work in a field that is totally legal, and that invasion of anti-abortion sentiment had severely damaged the Foundation's reputation and made their actions suspect.  Either there will be watchdogs constantly paying attention to them, or they have destroyed a Foundation whose provided services have protected millions of women's reproductive health care.

Whomever designed this little effort to deny women their rights to legal health care obviously had more ambition than brains.

The battles have been fought on the Federal level and abortions are legal.  Congress battled for years and have been able to place roadblocks on taxpayer dollars being used for a woman's reproductive health, but still abortions are legal.

And so the religious right have done everything they can to reverse established law, becoming almost terrorists in their efforts and apparently lack of concern for life, all in the name of fighting to be able to be called pro-life.

The Republicans have, for 30 years, been on the attack against anything that provides women with their full rights in a country where the women have a 53% majority of all voters.  Just the search for the right words to describe a clearly defined ideological difference has played a part of the rest of their agenda.

Rather than accepting what has been re-affirmed as legal for at least 40 years and moving on, they continue to fight the same battles using different words to describe the same disdain for the rule of law.

Having gone through all of there efforts in the Federal and state law to overturn Roe v Wade, they have succumbed to tactics to again create a divisive environment which supposes that abortions are illegal.  So they infiltrate all avenues even unto having an adverse effect on the ability of a Foundation to provide donations' distribution and, in effect, taking away the rights of those who have donated money to help supply women with their reproductive medical rights.

This is the point of the entire conversation, which is the ability of some to manipulate or outright deny the rights of others, and it appears that some simply revel in the ability to do so.

The evidence is simply too large to ignore.  The 2010 midterm results created a Republican rush on the State level to institute new laws by hook or by crook, using tactics worthy of all of the crony institutions which, over the years, have been supposedly abolished in the 50s and 60s.

Just recently a Congressional committee public hearing on natural gas fracking was turned on its head by the Committee chairman denying America citizens the right to film the proceedings.  Since we're talking about Congress, and we're talking about public hearings, all of this will be covered by C-Span and be available in their video archives, but our aging or stagnant Republicans believe they still have the power to stifle the power of the people by using stupid delaying tactics.

Instead of creating an environment where they control everything in secrecy, they simply bring it more forcefully to the attention of the public.  Natural gas fracking isn't any different than the sanctity of a woman's right to reproductive health.  Both are efforts to support the ideology of one group of people to control the lives of hundreds of millions of Americans.

In the case of this one Committee chairman, Rep. Andy Harris (R-Md.), we have an obvious and unacceptable effort to deny an American the rights he was given by the Constitution.  Josh Fox's original Gasland documentary should not have created a situation where Mr. Fox was handcuffed and physically removed from a Congressional hearing because one Republican had the power to step on Josh's rights.

And the same efforts to step on Josh Fox's rights is the same effort now promoted by the infiltration of the religious right into institutions who truly care about their efforts to apply the rights of all under the Constitution.

Let's get this straight.  Congress has the right to call recipients of government funds to testify as to the dispersal of those funds, and that is fine.  It does not represent an official Congressional investigation into any sort of wrongdoing unless one were to get a subpoena stating that such an investigation was for the purpose of determining the extent of any criminal acts using taxpayer funds.

The fact that such a Congressional committee brought forth a hearing just prior to the fact that the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation determined that they would stop funding any organization under federal investigation simply defies logic.  The timing is simply too close to have been a couple of disparate actions falling into place in such a manner as has panned out.  And only one word defines all of the subsequent actions.

There has not been any investigation.  There has only been calling for a Congressional Committee hearing orchestrated by one Republican Representative from Maryland.  This man's constituency is about 712,000 Marylanders, yet he is willing to use his power to adversely affect millions of Americans from the entire country.

This seems somewhat of a stretch to me on how one should wield the power of a single Representative, regardless of his place in the Republican political circle.

So what it shows to me is that the Republicans will continue to fight this fight no matter how far down into the depths of depravity they have to descend.

In the meantime, with no net gain or loss, the Republicans continue to fight the fight that was fought and decided in the US Supreme Court in the 1973 Roe v Wade battle.

Perhaps they are just trying to tie up the US Supreme Court by continuing to test law that has already been decided.

The Supreme Court has not taken up the mantle of being a bastion of Republican law, but American law.

Come on guys.  Everyone is watching and there are no closed mics nor video cameras that aren't running.  If you say something or have questionable actions taking place on your command, you are responsible for the repurcussions.

Average Never Goes Away

Tom Friedman's article in today's NYTimes, Average is Over, 1/25/2011 is an effort to explain a concept which requires a whole lot of change to accept even with the proof all around us.

And this gap between the reality of the situation and our ability recognize the reality of the situation might well define just how long this latest economic downturn continues.

For you see, what Thomas is talking about refers to the idea that no one can any longer afford to be average, but the reality is that there is always average.  Even in a room full of gifted and brilliant people, there is an average of their brilliance, or their ability to work with others, or some (any) factor one wishes to choose.

So there are two problems here butting their heads together without any onlookers who actually understand the totality of it.

One of the problems is "who determines what average is" and will those who don't agree with other's assessments ever be brought around to a new way of thinking.

And herein lies the conflict.

We know that there are things to be done, of which the doing isn't based on some new technologies nor specially acquired knowledge.  Just good plain hard work.

In this case I'm talking about infrastructure, and in our immediate future with our infrastructure crumbling around our knees is the most important of all the items on the list.  And, I might say, one of the last things on that list that will allow for an average worker to do quality work.  None of the other things on our list allow for us to massively employ people with the right skill sets available today other than infrastructure.

I mean this in the sense that, even though there will always be average workers, now is the last time we could actually do a massive project such as infrastructure with the work force we still have left.  From here on we will need to employ an ever growing level of skill sets, for we cannot have the best health care nor the best educated workers in the world if we don't understand that today's skill sets are antiquated.

As pertains to Tom's article, I have watched Tom give his speech about Average is Over in terms of his book "That used to be us", and all of his points are right on target.  Obviously some of his points put the people in the audience into an uncomfortable position because they had never looked at just what was really happening.

However, Thomas is right.  Average is over, but only the average of today.  Tomorrow's average will be in a much higher level of knowledge and somewhat offering its own problems because we will be forcing everyone to excel.  Tomorrow's average will be somewhere in the stratosphere in comparison to today's requirements.

And these are some of the things I've been writing about for years included (at the time) studies conducted by groups of people with multi-disciplinary skills sets.  But even I was wrong.

In tomorrow's world, everyone will be required to have multi-disciplinary skill sets, which means our educational system will have to be extended, somewhat in the length of time studying these disciplines, and in the acceptance that college is no longer a reasonable average.

Average, in the world just around the corner, will be the college graduate.  You know, the ones that can't get jobs right now because they studied one discipline and found out the world doesn't need that skill set.

The new average will be an entirely new group of graduates with Ph.Ds, and not in just one discipline.

This presents its own problem, for we are not prepared to educate enough people to fill the new requirements in skill sets within a reasonable time frame.  Largely we are wasting millions of our young with an education that won't allow them to make the change over at just the time they need to have the education to do so.  And we can no longer waste an entire generation of people by supplying them with unacceptable levels of education.

But one must understand the scale of the situation to understand just how large the problem is.

If we do not support giving everyone in our country the best education they can consume, then we are creating a new "average".  Certainly higher on the educational scale than now, but we actually continue with the "success" of education as we have today.

Again, don't get me wrong.  There will always be an "average".  There is only the difference of where that average will lie, either by giving everyone the best education or we continue to pick and choose those who WILL receive that education, and those our system simply will allow to become the lost part of humanity.

I realize it is a tremendous requirement to give everyone the best education they can absorb, but the alternative, as I've said, is to waste a generation without them even having the option of choice.

Which brings us to the need we really have to fundamentally change our system of education.  When I think back to my youth and education, some of the things that stick out to me are little niggling points, but ones that have continued, over the years, point out the fundamental error of our ways.

One of these things has been our school administration failures to recognize bright students who may have many negative environmental factors which need to be overcome.

I mean, come on, as a student in the 50s and 60s, I've seen lots of smart young ladies who were sidetracked by "guidance counselors" into becoming a teacher if they were exceptionally bright, or into a secretarial position if they weren't the cream of the crop.

What, are there only two possible paths of employment for females, which equates to one half of our population?

Now I'm not saying that all guidance counselors are bad, but I'm saying that the full knowledge of the circumstances weren't taken into consideration, and as such, we effectively left 20 years of bright young minds behind by offering only lackluster careers down to even just popping out babies.

It wasn't until the 70s that we had the Jane Goodalls of my generation.  Today physics is evenly split by gender, but what happened to those young ladies of the 50s and 60s who were talked into giving up on higher education simply because they wouldn't need it.

So what I'm saying is that we have already developed an educational system flawed from the start through the outside force of the education administration, and it continued to get eaten up by creating an average that Thomas says we can't have any longer.

And Thomas is right.  We can no longer teach for average, and we can no longer allow politically motivated educational administrations to create a new average where potential is lost. 

We waste too many lives with vast potential by not educating everyone to their full potential, AND we lose when it comes to competition around the world.