How Now Sacred Cow?

Welp, we've done it now.  Our illustrious Tea Party has held sway over the best minds of our political parties, and raised havoc amongst the world's financial institutions, all in the name of some principle they never understood in the first place.

I don't mind a person having principled interests in the direction their government moves, but when that principled interest causes something other than a positive in the ability of the United States to function as a leader of the free world, I question whether they, in fact, are as principled as they believe.

It is one thing to believe in your principles, and to act upon those principles in your efforts to move through life.  But one has to constantly apply those principles to larger things when one has become a representative of the people.  I'm not saying simply abandon those principles, but rather to enhance those principles with the combined efforts of those other representatives who have their own constituents and their own principles.

There is a guiding factor involved with the concept of serving the public good, and it has nothing to do with a principled stand which over-rides the will of the people.  It has to do with the ability to move into a circle that encompasses the greatest good for the greatest number of your constituents and thus actually adding to the well being of the citizens of the United States.

Any effort other than consensus aspires to the destruction of the American political system.  When any small group of individuals can constrain the function of government, we have a failure of the individuals in that group to recognize their responsibilities to not only their ideals, but also their constituent's hopes and dreams.

Let me preface the rest of this by that we now have a pretty good picture of just what a political system can do to the hopes and aspirations of the American people, all due to one simple fact that these new Tea Party members are not up to the snuff of doing the business of their own constituents, but only to their own personal glory as the new movers and shakers of a governmental body that has continually been able to move to the center to encompass the most good for the greatest number of people.

They have failed the country in the effort to enforce their own objectives, and they have precluded the possibility of regaining a foothold on our economic health and stability for at least a decade.

They can no longer complain.  They have the evidence.

It was possible, and highly desirable, to simply pass a debt ceiling increase without encumbering those Americans whom are homeless, or without the wealth they had accrued, nor without the wherewithal to continue to function in the world of politics.

If wealth equals freedom of speech, as has be ruled by the US Supreme Court, then the lack of wealth equates to the lack of freedom of speech.  By making such a determination the Supreme Court has concluded that the little people have no reasonable recourse to redress their grievances against the government, which is also a 1st Amendment Right.  And by doing so, every one does not have their 1st Amendment Rights.

It is now possible to ignore any of the 1st Amendment Rights of the people because they do not have the dollars to argue their case in court nor equally in the court of public opinion.  Religious organizations are now able to run rampant over the separation of church and state because the people don't have the money the churches do.  The corporations can design a brand new democracy that has nothing to do with democracy because the people cannot redress their grievances against corporations, and the government will not hear the case.

A further destruction of the 1st Amendment Rights is the right of the freedom of the press, which somewhat exists today, but only in the most obtuse manner.  For the freedom of the press only exists if the press itself is self-reliant enough to protect their own freedoms.

Our system no longer protects the freedom of the press, and yet when the press offers up vast amounts of information as to the degradation of government operations, the dollars come rolling in yet once again overshadowing the truth with which the public is faced.

President Bush admitted to overstepping his bounds by ignoring the FISA courts and wiretapping of all American citizens, yet he got away with it.  He did so on national television when asked by a reporter and yet still got away with it.

So somewhere along the line we forgot that we, the people, are the shepherds of our own government, plying the Bill of Rights to constrain government from acting in their own best interests by ignoring those rights.

And the .02 percent of the population represented by the Tea Party have added to the problem by being somehow the most important of our representatives when they only represent 6 Million voters.

Six million voter's representatives have placed out country into a tailspin that will take at least 10 years to sort out, and may well end up with a couple of lost decades of reasonable discourse in our governmental affairs.  At the least, they have decided a future that extends further than the next Presidency, and likely two or three Presidencies from today.

The ramifications are unsettling at the least.  The Constitution gives rise to the possibility of recess appointments and yet Congress never recesses any longer, giving rise to almost 3 years of Presidential nominations being filibustered, and George W. Bush's people still in charge.

The recent fiasco of arms sales to mules who then sold them to the drug dealers in Mexico was overseen by a Bush appointee.

Do some research and you tell me how many nominations by President Obama are still outstanding.  Then you'll see just how this government works against the will of the people, for if I wanted the same people running an imperfect government I would have voted for John McCain.

We voted for change, but the only change that has been exhibited since the election is the change of our representatives in their being responsive to the wishes of 370 electoral votes and a 57% popular election.  We have had our ideals derailed, not by President Obama, but by a party that only desires to see America fail so they can come back into power and seemingly save it.

But they have gone too far.  The failure is complete and their ideals have been exposed as their failure to respond to their constituents and do the job they were sent to do.

They spoke to jobs, the promised jobs, and they have done everything they can do to ignore jobs.  They have attempted to de-fund abortion when abortion isn't funded by the federal government by laws already in place, and they have attempted to de-fund the EPA and the protection of our water and our air.  They have done everything they can do to end the rights of the people, particularly our unions through Republican efforts in the States, and to abuse the principles of the American people, and they have done so with malice.

Speaker Boehner said that he had gotten 98% of what he wanted from President Obama the day before the markets tumbled 527 points.  What would his other 2% have accomplished?

Where do these people come from?  How is it that a 527 point loss in the DOW doesn't end up being some kind of tax to the rich the Republicans desire to protect?  How is it that they actually have any thought process that ignores the big picture?

They continue to work against the small things like abortion rights, gay marriage and such as if they are making terrific strides in restoring America, but they apparently don't recognize that time keeps on ticking and their outdated ideas only add to the negatives the world observes as our continued downfall.

These outdated ideas have resulted in the first downgrade of our economic status by Standard & Poors, and a negative AAA rating from Moody's.  Interest rates are going to go up and the people will be the recipients of the bad news as they continue to try to claw their way out of a hole they did not dig and they do not deserve to be in.

And yes, I blame the weakness of the Republican party for falling prey to a limited number of Tea Party members in the Congress who have no clue as to what is going on right now.  No one can win if the country loses, and they have placed us in the losing column for the first time in America's history.

Gee, thanks guys.  You make it easy to point out the problem.

Comments

[Bill Perkins]

Roger, you need to go back to brewing beer. Whatever you’re on now doesn’t seem to prevent you from going on ad infinitum with confusing and conflicting thoughts. But, since you choose to keep putting these ideas in the public forum, I feel compelled to comment. I know you won’t respond to my thoughts, as you didn’t my prior dozen or so comments and will likely delete them altogether and go off on some other tangent of interest.

1. On the one hand, you state the lack of wealth creates lack of freedom of speech. Also, that “…somewhere along the line we forgot that we, the people, are the shepherds of our own government, plying the Bill of Rights to constrain government from acting in their own best interests by ignoring those rights.” What about the internet media we have today to voice our individual opinion (such as your blog, responding to blogs, responding to endless articles of this leaning or that, which I feel sure we both enjoy more than was ever possible 20 years ago). The Tea Party represents the very answer to your prayer. These are not wealthy people, although there may be a few as there are wealthy people of every political thought. In the main, they are everyday folks from all walks of life who have banded together in a common cause at the grassroots level. They are not violent, or racists, or anarchist despite the media’s best efforts to paint them so. But they have spoken to the country (you say 6 million) and shifted political discussion by electing house representatives who believe as they do. So, what about that process don’t you like? It’s as you describe a minority, they are not wealthy wall streeters out for bonuses, seeking to have their voice heard. Sounds like your kind of people--certainly mine.

2. You state Tea Partiers are .02 percent of the people (2 percent really, right) and don’t understand their own principles, but this inept handful of ignoramuses have nevertheless “raised havoc” with our financial institutions, somehow “held sway over the best minds of our political parties”, and even negatively impacted the ability of the U.S. to function as a leader of the free world. Wow. I am more impressed with the TP than ever, frankly. Of course, your statement is not correct Roger. To the extent they’ve accomplished the first two items, it’s because for every one of the active TP members, there are 3, 4 or 5 people like me out there voting along with them. Regarding our position as leader of the World, get with the program Roger, we’re leading from behind. It’s the new thang in leadership.

3. However, you don’t state what the Tea Party principles are that they “never understood in the first place”. It’s a lot easier to smear an unstated principal isn’t it? Of course since they are generally Republican/Libertarian types, they deserve to be smeared—doesn’t really matter what their principles are does it? Having attended a couple of TP rallies, I can tell you what they generally want, however there is no single, ruling TP committee or “by-laws”. Nevertheless, as you know, they generally want smaller government, which is directly tied to reducing federal, state and local expenditures and getting the debt in line, which is directly tied to getting back to what the constitution states are the enumerated tasks assigned to the federal government. Corollaries of that include empowering free trade by reducing tax burdens and regulation. I would be shocked to find anyone who states they are an active member of one of the TP groups that couldn’t tell you exactly what they believe and what they’re trying to accomplish. Tea Partiers are not mad at the government, but they are scared to death that the progressive politics imposed by both parties in the last 50 years is bringing this country financially and morally to its knees, and all the burden of this is being kicked down the road to our grandchildren.

4. “…we now have a pretty good picture of just what a political system can do to the hopes and aspirations of the American people, all due to one simple fact that these new Tea Party members [of Congress] are not up to the snuff of doing the business of their own constituents, but only to their own personal glory…” How can you get this so wrong, Roger? First of all, the TP Republicans are elected with significant majorities in their districts and are doing EXACTLY what their constituents want. And when this constituency extends to such places as Wisconsin and Ohio, then this is more than 2% of the people Roger. Just wait until 2012. On the other hand, if Obama seriously encouraged business, reduced regulation, got the trade agreements he’s shelved for 2.5 years passed, and positively impacted jobs, he’d have the TP on his side. It’s not all about jobs, it’s all about supporting business so it can foresee a profit and create jobs. But that’s totally antithetical to the liberal view.

5. In paragraph 4 and 5 of your post you speak almost with almost religious fervor about “serving the public good”, “the will of the people”, “the greatest good for the greatest number”, and “any effort but consensus aspires to destruction…”. These phrases epitomize the evils our founding Fathers feared most about true democracy and so they created a constitutional republic with separation of powers to combat the evils of majority rule. Why? Because they believed, as do I, that mankind is inherently evil left to its own devices. So they set up a system to protect the citizens from politicians and anarchists and themselves.

Compare what happened in the American Revolution (AR) with the French Revolution (FR). The FR ended up being controlled by the leftist Jacobins under the philosophy of Rousseau and implemented by Robespierre. That philosophy stated that mankind was inherently good and therefore the “general will” of their good people should control and be implemented by whoever had the fortitude to do so. And “whoever” did until Robespierre did in fact assert his egotistical view, resulting in “the Terror”, which eventually put him under the guillotine as it did all his predecessor FR leaders. The FR resulted in no constitution, no bill of rights, no elections, no states rights. No, it got them Bonaparte, and then more monarchs and something of a Republic finally after 150 years or so. About 8,000 lives were taken in combat in the AR, at least 40,000 died at the guillotine, and many times that by famine that mob rule created. The best minds of the day whose head didn’t get paraded around on a pike fled to England, America and elsewhere. It left the population totally adrift without guiding principles and looking anyplace, even to a egomaniacal dictator, for a stable environment.

6. So the Tea Party is conducting itself in the exact manner the FF’s designed. I believe the TP is trying to right this ship that the Obama administration seems determined to destroy. The left has designated Corporate America as the great evil, and they will kill it with taxes, spending, presidential proclamations, unions, financial regulations, environmental regulations, labor regulations—whatever it takes, while simultaneously demanding it create more jobs. If the country goes bankrupt, no matter. Perhaps Obama’s middle name should have been Robespierre.

7. The S&P announces the downgrade of the US credit rating to AA+ after the debt ceiling was resolved because of our heavy debt load, the projected continuing deficits and the lack of political will to fix it. The Tea Party has the will to fix it. It’s the only one with the will to fix it. And yet you liberals blame the Tea Party for this? “The Tea Party” downgrade. What a joke.

[Bill Perkins]

http://www.breitbart.tv/small-businesswomans-epic-rant-against-obamas-disastrous-economic-policies/

This woman says it all Roger. Best summary of this president's posture I've seen.

[Roger W. Norman]

Well Bill, I haven't deleted anything you have written here. I deleted one of my responses, and, as I'm paying for my space on this blogosphere, I can do so.

The problem I determined after trying to answer all of your comments was that you were re-directing me away from my own blog, causing me to spend more time on answering you than directing my writing towards what I wanted to say.

Essentially I failed myself and I failed to recognize a tactic that negates one's ability to expound upon ideas important to themselves. By having to answer your diametrically opposed points, I have to repeat myself, of which the ideas are already published. Either they speak to some people or they don't.

Either what I have to say is acceptable to others or it is not, and comments as to that acceptability is fine, but the transposition from expressing my own views to answering your opinion of my views is counterproductive to my blog.

Look, I'm a musician, a songwriter and a studio owner. The creative function of writing these blogs and writing songs is about the same thing. My expression of my ideas. Were I to always listen to those that don't like my music, I would either become a shadow of myself on what I consider to be really personal matters, or I would become someone else' mouth piece.

Either way, I only get to be responding to someone else rather than creating whatever it is that I believe I'm doing.

You bring up valid points but your methodology is aggressive, daring me to answer your comments rather than being inquisitive and expansive by a request for greater discourse, which is what I thought we had discussed previously.

Therefore, if you wish to accuse me of hiding or not answering your comments specifically, then you have missed the point of my blogs in the first place. You can either accept them for what they are and agree with them or not, or you can continue to write your comments, which I invite, but I don't make any promises that I will enter into a debate with you on my blog.

Perhaps you have some suggestion as to some place where any debate you wish to participate might be carried out? Debate increases the knowledge of everyone involved, and those would be those that read the debate. Here I'm not certain that people are looking for debate as much as checking out other writings I have produced.

Roger

[Bill Perkins]

Roger,

There's a big difference in using your creative talents in music, poetry, or art as opposed to political discourse that aggressively critiques one group based upon facts you imagine, presume or create out of the mists.

I understand you don't want anyone to challenge your view, but are you willing to hold that view even though you know your view is incorrect? That is what confounds me about the "progressive" view. I'm willing to change my ideas based on logic and fact, but not because it feels good.

Who is it you presume is reading your monologues other than yourself? I searched quite a ways back looking for an atta boy comment or you're full of it comment.

What benefit is it to sit and talk with yourself? I guess it's a nice safe place huh?

Well, I promise to leave you to yourself.

[Bill Perkins]

One last point: Your liberal perspective and all those others who voted for Obama have the potential to destroy the values of self reliance, self respect, ingenuity and family that made this country great. But you HAVE managed to finally wake up the vast center-right majority to the danger socialist programs pose. I just hope it's not too late.

[Tor Hershman]

I'm a registered member of the Jedi Party - do you really think I waste my time votin'!
I waste postin'.

[Tor Hershman]

Then I waste time signing-in to add a "My."

[Roger W. Norman]

I'm not certain I understand Tor's comments.

I absolutely have the right to yell, even if I'm yelling into a sponge. If the only replies I get disagree with me, then their assumption is that I'm completely incorrect or have ulterior motives.

For all practical purposes I expose myself in my own blog as the person I am, and for all practical purposes I expose myself to those who would question whom I am without much in the way of explaining whom they are.

Its part of the process. The difference is that I include 10 years worth of writings in my signature on NYTimes comments, and in my opening article on this blog I referenced my 4 year stint on Salon.com.

If there are those that wish me to be labeled as a bleeding heart liberal, then I wear the mantle proudly. But that's not all of what I am or have done in my 60 years.

In good times I'm more of a Libertarian. I believe in rugged individualism in that it doesn't hurt anyone else. I believe in capitalism, but not free market capitalism because I haven't seen anything good from it. I believe in the right to own weapons because I don't believe that we are a civilized enough of a nation to protect the people, even as we see that the people are up for fleecing any time bigger concerns want.

So when people get hurt, I'm not a Libertarian, I'm concerned. I'm concerned that there are some out there with lots of power, tons of money, and they don't even know the rest of us exist, much less care about our existence.

I believe in Atlas Shrugged in so far as it defines the Republican's Bible, but no further. I have it, I've read it, it sucks. Unfortunately not enough people believe it sucks, so many follow it religiously, which is why I call it the Republican's Bible.

I don't make any of this stuff up. I'm not from Planet Nine nor in a constant LSD haze. I've served my country in the Air Force and in Viet Nam. I've served my fellow service members as the Eastern District Commander of the State of Virginia AmVets, and I've been a business owner, a computer systems design professional, a songwriter, a musician, and a recording studio owner. I have two sons and 4 granddaughters.

I'm about as normal as a person can be.

I used to like hunting, and would still do the same if deer, for instance, were so prominent that some of them needed to be thinned out. I'm not adverse to killing varmints if they are eating my garden. I'm not adverse to killing varmints that are stealing a life from good people, but that's not legal.

If anyone wants to call me names, then do so, but do so with the knowledge of what I have written over the past 10 years before you decide exactly what I am or whether I am worth the time.

After all, the complaints here show that the time hasn't been applied, and the respondents haven't applied any usable references to their own material nor their accomplishments in life.

Roger

[Bill Perkins]

When you critiqued authors of Salon or NYT pieces had you read everything they had written in their career? Did you know them personally? I don't have to read all your stuff or know all about you to take issue with a point in your post, even if it's the only one of yours I've ever read. I'm not interested in calling you names and I'm not challenging your manhood. But when someone writes something in the blog medium that is counter to my understanding, I want to know what you know that I don't. I assume your conclusion is fact based and is logically derived. In short, I want to learn something.

Congratulations on the sons and grandchildren. I have 3 1/2 grandchildren myself.

[Roger W. Norman]

Ah, you suppose that I'm in the critique business. I'm not. I'm in the opinion business, and I don't really critique someone else's opinions, but rather find something within their writings that I can address from a different point of view.

I don't agree with David Brooks very often, for instance, but I don't take him to task for his opinions. In fact I often agree with him in some of the most wide spread readings of his work, but I'll take a sentence of his and work on that. Not because his sentence deserves to be bashed, because I don't do that, but because he brought up a different train of thought.

Most of what I write in comments in the NYTimes and other blogs actually have nothing or very little to do with arguing with them. I use their thought process to energize my own thought processes and work from different angles to come up with arguments for my own perceptions.

If I use quotes in my own articles here on my blog I still pretty much do the same. And I'll just as quickly take something Paul Krugman says and work on that as I will David Brooks.

But, to be totally honest with you, no, I haven't read everything that David Brooks has written, but I've read everything he's written during the time that I've been making comments on his opinion pieces. The same goes for Paul Krugman, Bill Kristol, Ross Douthat, and others.

I started all of this in 1996 when I decided to write a book I intended to call 50 Years of Regime Change, and after 10+ years of research (yes, real research), Naomi Klein came out with "Shock Doctrine" and blew me out of the water.

Now, if I actually do write the book, it will have to be an addendum to her book, and I've changed the name to "Meanwhile".

The problem I ran into was that 50 years didn't go back far enough, and the further I went back in research, the greater the problem I found with trying to define what Regime Change meant in the picture of American history and how long it has been going on.

The point is that there is plenty of chances to express your opinion, even if you are doing so with historical fact. George W. Bush said that it would take history to say whether he was right or wrong. He also said that people were still debating George Washington's Presidency.

Well, he didn't get either one right, but hey, he's George.

My point is that I'm at liberty to talk about anything in my blogs, and in my comments, as long as I'm not taking on the author I am, again, at liberty to take on anything I want to talk about.

You, Bill, do the same thing but in a clumsy manner. You address me specifically for my own opinions as if you have the answer to change my opinions. My life has informed me of what my opinions are, and you really aren't up to the task of changing them.

Discourse is not trying to shred another person's argument, but rather to put forward something different that makes your own point.

You are consistent; I will give you that. But in your consistency you have a fault, which is that you can't delve into the realm off the beaten path. You don't come up with something, you simply cut down somebody else's something.

Dig deeper. Do the work. Think the thoughts. Find the flaws and then expound upon them, not simply point out what boiler plate responses perceive to be the flaws in my arguments.

You are wasting your time and your brain on picking fights with me. If you want to be good, bring your own thoughts to the party. And I don't want rehashed bullshit (my blog, remember), but original thoughts based on research and your gut.

Take me to task because you don't believe that our Federal Highways program almost killed railroads, or something that you really believe in. I read the stuff you write all day long by a thousand people that write just like you.

I expect better.

Otherwise, get the fuck off my blog because you're wasting my time and yours.