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Have You Taken Your Hate Pill Today?

  • Posted on August 21, 2010 at 9:08 pm

You have a choice to make: Hate and fear or more of the same. This is not an easy choice.

I’ll be the first one to tell you I have no love for the Democrats because they stole my primary vote on May 31st, 2008.  However, as much as I dislike the Democrats the Republicans are infinitely worse!  If you are thinking of voting those Republicans back in power really give some thought to what it would mean to the health of this country.  They are political obstructionist that won’t pass any legislation that might get this country moving again.  They deserve to be booted out of office, period!  If you are thinking about voting for a Republican just watch this video from the 2008 election.  It’s pretty snarky but pretty true.  Think about poor BP when you watch this as some Republicans felt so sorry for them.

When Ronald Reagan was President my mother used to say, “Have you taken your hate pill today?”  The Republicans were always good at breeding hatred.  They like stirring that proverbial pot of hatred and fear.  With the up coming November election I find it very interesting that we are discussing everything except what needs to be discussed, the economy.  This past week is a fine example of the smoke and mirror politics that continues to prevail in our country.  While most people are more concerned about the health of the economy, we are busy hearing talk about September 11th and whether a Muslim cultural center should be built a couple blocks from the World Trade Center site, whether President Obama is a Muslim and whether we should repeal the 14th amendment.  I, for one, am tired of the same old scare tactics that Republicans have always used to get people in line to vote for them in the next election.

The truth is both parties have problems but Republicans brought us to the brink of disaster and it is not time to reward them for that behavior.  It was Republican policies that lead us to this disastrous economy.  We have been told for years by Republicans that old tired theory of the “trickle down” economy.  We, as a country, have been rewarding the wealthy with tax breaks and special deals in the hope that one day all of it would trickle down to the little guy.  That hasn’t happened and it never will.  Republicans are good at changing the subject during an election cycle.  Currently, we should be talking about ways to move the economy and what are we doing?  Once again we are spreading hate and fear with the help of Republicans.  It’s popular now to hate Muslims.  After all they have that crazy religion and the women all look like nuns so it’s easy to pick on them.  We also hate those cute little brown babies the illegal Mexicans give birth to just so they can stay in this country.  You know the “anchor babies”.  I wonder how long those Repubs set around thinking that one up. President Obama must be a Muslim after all his skin is dark, his father was a Muslim and his name is so different.  What if the President really were a Muslim?  What happened to freedom of religion?  Many people could care less about religion but when it comes to politics it becomes an issue.

The Republicans breed hatred and fear.  They have hated gays for years and have done everything they could to obstruct gay rights issues during the political campaign seasons.  There are many gays that are practicing Republicans such as the “Log Cabin Republicans” but in my book they are all hypocrites that help to breed hatred and fear.  The abortion issue has been settled law since 1973.  It’s about a woman’s “choice” and yet this issue has been continually used by the Republicans to get votes.  They aren’t interested in really repealing the issue as it is settled law but they are interested in getting people riled up so they go out and vote Republican.

FDR famously said, “The only thing you have to fear is fear itself.”  Republicans want you to fear everything so you will vote for them to take care of you.  We are to fear our neighbors because they might be Muslims, illegal aliens, or heaven forbid “terrorists”!  We are supposed to watch each other like psychos on the “Big Brother” show but this big brother is the government of Republicans.  We are also to fear the government as it is bad.  The government doesn’t know how to do anything.  They fail at everything they do including education so naturally you don’t want the government to do anything.  This is the plan of the Republicans.  Fear the government but make sure you keep those tax cuts for the wealthy because if you don’t you will lose your job when they fire you.  Fear that dumb voters!  Hate brown colored people and crazy pro-choice women but most of all hate Democrats because they want to tax you and take your money away.  Republicans breed hatred and fear.  I’m a positive person.  I don’t hate and I refuse to fill my life up with fear.  I know the Democrats aren’t much better than the Republicans but at least they don’t breed hatred and fear.  I can live with that.

I just had to add this today to this post!  I guess I’m not the only one that thinks the Republicans are the party of hate!

Sarah, Sarah, Sarah

  • Posted on April 22, 2010 at 2:40 pm

When I first heard about Sarah Palin during the 2008 election I had much curiosity.  I had been bullied by the Democratic Party during the primary, so I kept an open mind about Sarah.  When the Democrats started treating Sarah much like they treated Hillary Clinton I became even more curious.  I found myself drawn to her for many reasons.  When the Democrats made fun of her down to earth attitude and folksy voice I was amused.  No she didn’t have an “ivy league” pedigree but I kept thinking “thank God”.  I’m really tired of the attitude the Democrats have taken against these two strong women, Sarah and Hillary.  I found Sarah to be a breath of fresh air, someone that seemed willing to tell it like it is and not cater to certain groups of people, like wealthy Republicans!  I listened intently to her speeches and found them to be more against corruption than anything else.  This was something I grew to admire as I think there is much corruption in government that leads to government waste.  I even admired the way she held her baby in one hand and managed campaigning with phone calls and all with the other hand.  Fast forward to the Republican convention and this electrifying speech:

I liked what I heard and I was totally annoyed with the Obama team anyway.  I continued to like and to be drawn to Sarah, even after the election.  I continued to follow her and even bought her book, Going Rogue.  I enjoyed the book until I got to the all powerful, all important, Ronald Reagan, section.  I couldn’t believe this woman that I had admired could herself so admire Ronald Reagan.  I kept thinking this must be for her base, you know those crazy Republicans!  I still liked Sarah’s take charge attitude and her willingness to remain a fairly “normal” person.  I could even over look many of her faults and found her interesting even though many of her ideas were diametrically opposite my own.

Recently, I have had to give up on Sarah.  It seems the Sarah that I was drawn to has disappeared and been replaced with a new Sarah.   The new Sarah is more about making her own money than helping others make and keep theirs.  The new Sarah is making crazy statements at Tea Party events that I find terribly troubling.  We live in a violent society.  People that are seemingly at their wit’s end because of the economy or whatever else is ailing them don’t need someone encouraging them to act out with violent actions.  Sarah can say that her words mean something else but most of us see that as just more political double speak.  Words do have meaning and saying things can have an effect on people at their most vulnerable times.  The new Sarah has embraced the most right wing of the Republican Party.  It is unfortunate that the Republican Party has encouraged her behavior because it’s good for their business.  They like the money she can bring in at these events.  They are banking on these Tea Party people voting for them.  Many of those Tea Party people will probably vote Republican but it isn’t because they liked GW and how he spent money.  They are banking on the Republicans becoming more conservative with their money.  However, it defies logic how anyone can view these Republicans as being fiscally responsible.  They bank rolled these two wars on the future taxes of our youngsters.  They’re good at spending money on war and pretty much nothing else.  Sarah speaks with that same old rhetoric when she talks about our soldiers.  She creates this picture of such noble, greatness when the truth is neither of these current wars could possibly be described as being noble or great.  The soldiers are doing their job and sometimes their job requires extreme bravery.  This is noble.  They sacrifice much but the Republicans that put them there are anything but noble.  They would send anyone’s child to war but not their own.  Of course there are exceptions to this.  We know that both Sarah Palin and John McCain have children in the military and are willing to send them off to fight but there are many that had better things to do with their time as Vice President Cheney claimed during the Vietnam War.

I am deeply troubled with the antics of the new Sarah.  I can’t embrace the verbal assault that she continues to make about the Obama administration and the federal government in general.  I want a solution driven Sarah, one with ideas, not violent tinged rhetoric.  As far as the Obama administration goes they have yet to earn my trust.  However, it would be foolish for any American to want them to fail in any way.  We are at the center of a storm.  We must work together creatively for a solution to the problems we face.  Democrats and Republicans should be working together for the common good of our nation.  The economy is in dire straits.  While some of the losses have been recouped from the stock market crash of 2008, much of that wealth has not spread to the little guy.  Sarah has much new found wealth but I fear with her wealth she has lost touch with the rest of us.  I can see that President Obama may be trying to make some changes to the banking industry.  I see this as a plus.  The verdict is still out on his administration but it is still far superior to the Bush years.  Those years have left our nation in a world of hurt.  For anyone to want to revisit those years they would have to be insane!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fp89-6_7Zsk

The two parties missed a great opportunity to help our nation during the health care debate.  Instead of real reform we ended up with some washed down version.  People and businesses would have all been better off if this reform had included a single payer option.  The cost of insurance is just mind boggling and I don’t see this changing with this watered down plan.  Sarah was against all of this.  On a personal basis it should be noted that her children and Todd already have health care because they are Native Americans.  Sarah doesn’t have to worry about health care for her children.  Unfortunately, most Tea Party people don’t know this information about Sarah.  When Sarah talks about death panels she omits the death panel that visited my sister that didn’t have health insurance.  My sister had her own death panel when her doctor made it very clear that she wasn’t “worth” much to him.  She didn’t have the true care that she deserved because she didn’t have insurance.  When my sister had insurance she doctored.  When she didn’t, she avoided going because it cost too much.  When she finally was forced to go it was late in her cancer, treatment was expensive and that in itself was a death panel!

I’m no longer looking to politicians for anything insightful.  I thought John Edwards was insightful but he was so busy screwing up his own life that he lost track of that insight.  He was a common man that I thought really cared about me.  John changed.  Sarah had something special.  She had a way of communicating to the common people that made us want to believe that she is one of us and that she cared about us.  She has lost all of this appeal.  She no longer interests me.  She has grown up into a full fledged millionaire that just doesn’t care about us little guys.  The Tea Party people need to figure this out.  Ronald Reagan was never one of us like so many tried to convince us.  George Bush wasn’t one of us either.  These politicians were wealthy people that were powerful and made to look common but were not common.  Sarah was common and powerful now she is wealthy and powerful but she doesn’t really speak the truth of the common person any more.  It is more Republican rhetoric and talking points.  Her power holds no truth and it is dangerous to have power and no truth!

Hug a Racist Month

  • Posted on April 8, 2010 at 9:24 pm

I would be the first to tell you that I am not a fan of Barack Obama.  For me he is too much of a Republican and not enough of a real Democrat.  I also didn’t like the way he ran his campaign including the way he treated both Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin.  He also basically implied that Bill Clinton is a racist.  Race was used throughout his campaign and it made me crazy.  No one could say anything against Barack Obama without being called a racist.  I felt this was all wrong during the election.   I really felt it divided our country instead of uniting it.

Leave it to the Republicans to make me slide to the side of President Obama.  Governor McDonnell from the state of Virgina has declared April to be Confederate History month.  I thought the Civil War was over and the slaves were set free.  Yes, the winners got to write the history book and thus get to celebrate their victory.  However, the victory was a victory for our country.  I get tired of hearing about the Civil War.  Back in the eighties I lived in Oklahoma.  Just about every pickup I saw had a Confederate flag hanging in the back window.  That flag is a symbol for racism.  The fight was about slavery.  For a governor in the 21st Century to want to celebrate anything about that war I find it just ridiculous and an amazing step backwards into ignorance.  We have a racial and class divide in this country as it is why would any politician want to push those buttons of hate?

Living in Oklahoma was interesting.  The people were really nice and friendly but some of them were racist.  They loved the University of Oklahoma black football players but they only loved them for winning a game.  They certainly wouldn’t want them dating their daughters.  I could feel it.  They flew their Confederate flags with such pride that I thought the war was still going on.  They would reference the war to me solely because I was from the north.  I, of course, never even thought about the Civil war.  I went to Michigan State University in the seventies.  While I grew up in a small town in Michigan where it would be rare to even know a black person, attending the university allowed me to grow as a person and meet many people of color from all over the country and even the world.  I always felt like I lived under a bubble at MSU as it was sort of like a utopia in the way we all embraced our differences.  I can assure you that many of the people that I met in western Oklahoma thought about the war and when someone from the north was in their midst it was mentioned as though it happened yesterday.  Now I know that many of them lost family and friends in the war and maybe there was never a real “healing” for this but to want to celebrate such a tragedy in our history is a mistake.  Just when a wound is beginning to heal why should we pick at that scab?  I can only believe this is so important this year because Barack Obama dared to become President.  Gov. McDonnell mentions next year as being a 150 year celebration but what is there to celebrate?  The lives lost by both the north and the south?  That scab will never heal unless we all become one as a nation.  We shouldn’t celebrate the north and the south.  We should celebrate America!  If you are so inclined to celebrate April with Confederate History month please hug a racist as they need all the love they can get.

The Video We Aren’t Supposed to See

  • Posted on April 7, 2010 at 12:36 pm

Please don’t watch this video if you can’t take the truth of it all.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJ_zTrjMhX8&feature=player_embedded

This is the article that accompanied the video that I first watched.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/apr/05/wikileaks-us-army-iraq-attack

War is hell.  We all know this but what we don’t spend a lot of time thinking about is what happens when the men and women that are part of that hell come home.  After seeing this video, that we aren’t supposed to see, I could only think about the inhumanity that I witnessed.  The men talking and shooting acted like they were merely at a shooting range.  The people they sniped off were poor unaware bastards that were in the wrong place at the wrong time.  I first saw the incomplete video on CNN.  CNN explained they wouldn’t show the complete video out of respect for the dead and their families.  I think it was more like to cover up the deeply disturbing video that showed American soldiers, acting like this was nothing more than a video game they were in the middle of playing.  There was no thought for the people below that were kept in the gun’s site.  There was no thought for the guy that was wounded and trying to crawl away except for wanting him to pick up a gun so they could shoot some more.

We have been raising our children for war now for some time.  Since September 2001 we have spent these last nine years filled with hate and creating children that have learned how to hate like us.  We have desensitized them through video games that even the Pentagon loves for training their future soldiers.  What I worry about is what is happening with our society.  We seem divided as a nation but when I look at these two stupid wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, we seem to be united in our hate.  A Republican president started them and a Democratic president continues them.  What is this really going to get us?

I do know that we have many men and women that are coming back hurt by their time engaged in war.  Some have mental hurts and others are physical.  Some have shed their blood in these wars with no clear mission of what has been accomplished.  We, as a society, will have to deal with all of this pain when these soldiers come home.  Some will turn to crime and have already and some will live with their own personal hell hidden in sweat filled, agonizing nights of horror while others will feel daily the looks from strangers at their mangled and burnt bodies.  What will all of this do for our country and what has it done for our country.

We glorify war in movies hoping to propagandize the next generation into thinking that being a soldier is filled with honor and glory.  Being a soldier may be honorable but the government that often sends these soldiers to war often is not honorable.  We have war hawks in government that have never been a soldier themselves.  Government officials that would never send their own children to war but would ask you to send your children in a heart beat.

I feel the wounds deep in our country for our children.  I look in my art classroom and I wonder about the children I am teaching.  How many of them will go off to these crazy wars.  Am I just teaching children so they can be used in a future senseless war?  Will these young children be put to the test of their lives in the hell that is Iraq or Afghanistan?  No one can give me that answer because I taught young people in 2002 that have ended up fighting in these two wars of today.  We are in a senseless, endless war with the boogey man that is terrorism.  We will give up our freedom and even our children to fight this boogey man.  We will allow our hate to change our children into hate filled, killing machines so we can feel “safe” once again.

We will protect ourselves from the hell of it all by watching cleaned up versions of the news and heroic movies.  We will excuse the behavior of these soldiers when they come back as we all know war is hell.  However, if they get too out of control we will slap them in jail and throw away the key.  I remember Timothy McVeigh and the truth is he was created by our government.  He was filled with hate and loathing.  Are we creating more soldiers like him to come home to no job and filled with anger and hate?

I hate war.  I have been told that sometimes it may be necessary.  However, when I look through the history books war seems to be more about turf building than people building.  Powerful countries have warred on to control land, minerals, and people.  I don’t think it is much different today.  We have even had holy wars because God would have wanted this to be so?  One of my brothers even worries about the terrorists taking over the United States and making us all bow to Allah.  I hear paranoia in this kind of thinking but it is brought on by a corporate controlled and owned media in America that makes much money off these wars.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WfA8JWMgiQ&feature=player_embedded

War is man made hell created by a society that cares more about their next computer gadget and social networking than it does about the innocence lost by our children from this hell and the numbing of our souls by this warring mentality.

Coffee or Tea? Neither Please!

  • Posted on March 13, 2010 at 4:14 pm

Coffee or Tea, what do you prefer today?  Today is the coming out party of the “Coffee Party”.  You know the anti “Tea Party” party.  I’m already tired of both of these parties.  Neither one has a clue what’s really going on across this country.  People are anxious but they aren’t looking for cutesy named parties like “Coffee or Tea”.  People are tired of being taken for granted and worrying about their jobs and health care.  Neither of the two major parties, Democratic and Republican, are meeting the needs of their constituents.  Both are working hard to garnish money from lobbyists and those lobbyists are not our neighbors.  This newly formed “Coffee” party has Obama’s fingers all over it from the association to Jim Webb to people that worked to elect Obama.  I, for one, am tired of being manipulated by any political party.  My best guess is these are the “Starbuck” lovers that are willing to pay $4.00 for a cup of coffee.  They are definitely out of my league and are probably what the right refers to as “latte” lovers.  Oh, well, these are just labels we bandy around.  I refuse to put a label on my frustration and distrust of this new movement or the Tea Party one as well.  The Republican Party was quick to get on board the funding of the Tea Party movement so that makes that party completely distrustful to me.  I can probably say the same for this new Coffee Party.  From my point of view I want to hear more politicians sounding like Rep. Patrick Kennedy from Rhode Island:

http://www.c-spanarchives.org/program/ID/220793&start=18530&end=18784

He isn’t running any more so maybe he decided he was free to say what he’s really thinking.  I don’t know but this is the fire for the people that I want to see in my representatives.

Here is a post by “Wonk the Vote” much worth reading about coffee, tea and FDR.  http://letthemlisten.wordpress.com/2010/03/13/coffee-summits-not-coffee-parties/

I really enjoyed reading about FDR and his discussion of a second bill of rights.

I want a party that represents the “workers” of America.  These are the people that keep this country moving from factory jobs, police, teachers, transportation, and healthcare to the guy that picks up your garbage.  These are the people we all know that are our neighbors.  They aren’t a CEO and they don’t work on Wall Street.  They aren’t a Washington politician and while they may own a “mom and pop” store.  They don’t own “Wal-Mart” and they certainly aren’t a movie star!  We are the forgotten in this country.  While we make up the largest share of voters we are woefully under represented in our government.  While the wealthy including the politicians, CEO’s, Wall Street and Hollywood try to manipulate us at every turn by showing us what a war should be on screen, or by telling us to buy those ridiculous light bulbs that don’t last six months let alone five years, to always telling us we are the “greatest” and hoping we still believe that lie or to manipulating us to grasp our little “nest egg.”  We are the greatest to them if we keep buying the same old garbage they keep selling.  It’s time all of us woke up and figured out that these people are only looking at their own best interests.  The politician wants to get reelected so he will tell us anything.  The movie star wants to make more money so they call us to action on everything from the environment to our values of patriotism.  They do this because they are part of the corporate owned media.  Wall Street just wants our money and they will play games with the market to get it.  Once you’re in that market they will shake a few out ever so often and it could be your retirement that’s lost!

We, the true Americans, need to wise up and see these people that garner so much respect in the media for what they truly are.  We have the Internet.  We don’t need to be told by some Joe Scarborough on MSNBC or Wolf Blitzer on CNN or any other media pundit what’s going on in this country.  We can see by getting online and also by talking to our neighbors.  Here in Sturgis we know our property values have gone down.  We know there are vacant homes in town.  We can see that funding in our state is getting pretty down right scary.  We know that everything from the police to schools to state services have been cut and yet we still see plenty of money for war and politics.  We see politicians whooping it up at the Whitehouse with parties and dignitaries and don’t forget about those constant calls from the two parties for money for their next campaigns.  We see money going to two wars and a potential third and no one says, “Whoa, wait a minute!  What about the American people?”  I hear this phrase in my head.  I heard it as a teacher from GW Bush and now I’m playing it over in my mind.  That is over and over, “Expect more and pay less!”  This is in reference to teachers and I am a teacher but it really is in reference to all American workers.  We can all expect to do more and get paid less if we continue to buy what the politicians and the wealth in this country are selling.  Hollywood, politicians, CEO’s will all live large while the rest of us tighten our belts, pray we don’t lose our jobs or health insurance and scrape by.

Now do I want coffee or tea?  Not exactly!  I want real representation and I’m not going to get it over a cup of coffee or tea.  The best I can do as an American worker is to keep putting my voice out there.  I’ll keep calling my congress people and hope they change and I’ll keep saying what I think!

CEO Pay and the American Dream

  • Posted on February 23, 2010 at 7:21 pm

Gary Markstein from Cagle Blogs

http://cagle.msnbc.com/news/CEOSalaryCaps/1.asp

I came across an interesting website yesterday.  I was searching for information on the cost of congress.  I read some things but happened upon this site.  http://www.bls.gov/oes/2008/may/oes_nat.htm#b00-0000 What is interesting to me about this site is in the area of healthcare support workers.  Since there are so many people in the baby boom generation getting ready to retire I kind of think there will be plenty of jobs in the future in the area of health care workers.  You know the low paying type jobs where people are cleaning bed pans and taking care of the daily lives of our aging population.  Our young people looking for jobs have so much to look forward to if they are in food service or healthcare support.  Maybe one needs to be an air traffic controller instead.  Even though Reagan busted that union in the eighties it sure looks like that’s a job some might want with the high pay.  An ambulance driver makes less than a bus driver.  Wow, when your life is on the line, who are you going to call?  Sadly missing from this list are the CEO’s of the corporations which earn multitudes more than anything on this list.  They get paid the big bucks making sure we get paid the peanuts.

The AFL-CIO has data on their website about CEO pay.   http://www.aflcio.org/corporatewatch/paywatch/

Wouldn’t you like compensation like this?  http://www.aflcio.org/corporatewatch/paywatch/ceou/top100.cfm I really don’t feel I need that much money and wonder why these guys need that much?  Is there ever enough?  The CEO for Visa makes almost $18 million dollars.  Little people with credit card debt should be mad as hell while they scrape their money together to pay their bills.  Omnicare, they provide pharmaceuticals for seniors, at least that’s what the web said.  I see lots of insurance and health care companies making the big bucks for the CEO’s.  The talking heads and Republicans are so worried about socialism.  Socially, I find these CEO pays unacceptable!  If you really search through the data on the AFL-CIO site it is quite interesting.  They list everyone from A-Z.  Do you know where your money is going?  My guess would be probably to some of these guys.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/IH31Dj02.html

Here is a snippet from this article:

American opinion on CEO pay
In the United States, only 32% of the public currently supports an outright pay cap on executive earnings. But average Americans appear to be every bit as outraged over CEO pay excess as average Europeans. Indeed, 77% of Americans say corporate executives “earn too much”. Only 11% admire “those who run” America’s “largest companies” either “a great deal” or “quite a bit”.

CEO pay isn’t limited to being a problem just here in the United States of America.  It is obviously a problem world wide as the rich appear to be getting richer and the poor poorer.  The bottom forty percent of the people in our country own less than one percent of its wealth.  It may be time for a revolution.  http://www.faculty.fairfield.edu/faculty/hodgson/Courses/so11/stratification/income&wealth.htm

If we can’t get Congress and the President to hear us, we may have to protest for the greater good of all the people.  I hear Republicans screaming about “Socialism” but if Capitalism is producing such a high discrepancy in the wealth distribution maybe we should consider more social type programs to even things out a bit.  It just isn’t right that it is getting harder and harder to earn a living wage in the U.S.A.  We all have heard since we were children about the “American Dream”.  You know the good job, white picket fence, nice house, nice car, healthy kids and the kids able to afford to go on to college.   And health care?  We never even had to hardly think about that.  My mom had fourteen children.  She used to spend about two weeks in the hospital.  Today all of that would be impossible!  All of the “American Dream” is in jeopardy at the current time for most of the American people.  There is a growing divide between those that “Have” and those that “Have not”.  I see it in my art classes.  Some students do a lot of traveling, have every toy you can imagine and some are just scraping by and hoping for some heating assistance for the winter months.  We need to shake up things in Washington D.C. before our communities all look like the war torn looking cities like Chicago and Detroit.  We must hold the Congress accountable for how they’re spending our money and who they are giving it to.  You know if they would have given that bail out money back to the people, I think the economy might have moved a bit.  They wanted to get money out in circulation.  The American people could have circulated that money a lot better than a band of bankers.  I’m sure they would have paid bills, bought vehicles, homes and everything else which would have stimulated this economy.  Congress in their infinite wisdom thinks we are too stupid to know what to do with our money.  Instead they kick it back to their friends and endorsers.  As a final note it will be interesting to see what Evan Bayh will do with his almost $14 million in campaign funds that he has left over.

Dropping Like Flies

  • Posted on February 21, 2010 at 6:07 pm

Evan Bayh listening to the American people?

Is there something in the Washington D.C. water?  Why are all these congressmen deciding not to run?  Another one bites the dust with Evan Bayh from Indiana.  The talking heads keep telling us the so called reasons but are there more sinister motives.  Are some being pressured not to run much like the Lt. Governor Democratic nominee from Illinois, Scott Lee Cohen?  Oh, the shame of it all.  The people voted for him to be the nominee even with his scandalous past but the Dems in power will have none of it.  “One day you’re in and the next your out!” as Heidi Klum claims on Project Runway.   Evan Bayh gave an emotional speech that seemed honest.  It really seemed like he didn’t want to leave at all.  Maybe he’s getting ready to run for the White House or maybe he was forced out because of some hidden, secret scandal yet to be revealed.

Or maybe we should just take him at his word.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/21/opinion/21bayh.html?hp=&pagewanted=al

We all know that congress is dysfunctional.  It’s a given and we don’t label them a “do nothing” congress for nothing.   The two parties have run amok.  We used to at least feel like one of the two parties represented us, the little people.  Conservatives had the Republican Party and liberals had the Democratic Party.  Today it feels more and more like the two parties represent corporations and no one else.  Under George W. Bush the congress ran up the debt in unprecedented numbers.  Conservatives weren’t represented neither were the liberals but corporations were highly represented especially the ones that were profiting from these two wars we have been enmeshed in for years.  Have you noticed how the press portrays Barack Obama as a liberal and claim he’s moving to the left and so on?  This is just smoke and mirrors as much of the press is controlled by corporations.  This is to make those of us that are liberal feel like we got what we wanted.  How untrue all of this is as I find it amazing to note that the “change” from one party to the other has virtually gone unnoticed by most of us little people.  If I had fallen asleep after the 2008 election and just awaken it would seem as though GW was still president.  If I were voting right now I would vote for women because we are under represented and I would vote out most of the incumbents.  If you have spent the majority of your life campaigning you more than likely are out of touch with the American people any way.

Republicans feel a surge coming on.  They think that the American people want their type of rule.  How unquestioningly they miss the mark.  They fuel the Tea Party people thinking that it is the Republican Party that the Tea Party wants to emulate.  I find this all very doubtful.  It seems to be more of a Libertarian view or a left over fringe of the Ron Paul movement rather than the Republicans that have the hearts of the Tea Party movement.  Truthfully people in this country are fed up with both parties.  We don’t like the money involved in elections and the partisan way everything is seemingly decided.  That of course is just to fool us as both parties are really representing corporations.  The question is really which corporations back which party?   http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/index.php Anyone that has ever gone to Open Secrets usually comes away with their eyes open as to who is running our government and it isn’t “We the people!”  This next site is interesting for finding information in the news about corporations and politics.  http://www.corpwatch.org/index.php I contend that we should change the way we elect out politicians from the local sheriff to the highest office in the country, the President.  We should make elections meaningful again with much debate so we can truly see where these people stand on the issues.  We should bring back the League of Women Voters to organize the debates.  Now Presidential debates are negotiated between the two parties.  Forget about the parties.  Take them out of the picture and ask whatever the people want to know.  We should give equal television time to all of the candidates.  Independent candidates shouldn’t have different requirements than the two main parties when trying to get on the ballot.  In many states Independents have to jump through extra hoops to try and get on the ballot.

In the Michigan Presidential primary of 2008 when the people voted some of their votes ultimately were given to a candidate that they did not vote for on May 31st, 2008 when the Democratic Party rules committee met to decide what to do about the Michigan Primary.  When my sister called the Attorney General of the state of Michigan she was told that the Democratic Party could do what they wanted with those votes.  It’s like a club or a union.  They can decide things for us.  What I don’t understand is the fact that we, the taxpayers, paid for this “club” to have their primary.  I believe it cost our very “poor” state twenty million dollars to have that primary.  What a waste of tax payer money!  I would have to say whether Evan Bayh is talking truth to power or has been pushed out, much of what he has said is a known fact.  Congress doesn’t accomplish much these days but they do manage to irritate the hell out of the American people, the voters.  Let’s hope we stay mad as hell and remember these antics the next time we go to the polls.  Let’s start thinking about voting against the two party system and the money interests.  Let’s ignore the media and search for our own truth.  There are plenty of publications on the web that can better inform the public about what’s really going on.  So let’s all get educated and do what we can in our own communities to inform people about the corruption in Washington D.C. and even in our local communities and states.

Locally, there are two main issues that rise above most other issues.  The first is job security and the second is the education of our children.  We want our jobs to be secure with benefits and comfortable enough so we can raise our children and have something left for retirement and we want our children to have a life filled with opportunities that only a good education can provide.  Slowly but surely we are failing in these two main areas.  The federal government has abandoned us on both issues.  They have transported our jobs out of the country, killed unions to lower our wages and have tried everything they could do to destroy public education.  They are watering down the education system by slowly but surely sneaking money out to “charter” schools with far different requirements than public schools.  They have done a wonderful job of convincing the people that everything is wrong with our children’s education in a public school and it must all be changed from the bottom up.  We have lost our local control over our schools and our jobs.  Some might think the main issue is taxation but truthfully if you have a good job with benefits taxes aren’t as difficult to pay!  It’s time to fire the people that brought us to the brink of disaster and to a life of recession and depression.  The government has wasted our money, our resources and now they will lay waste to our children in endless fighting of endless wars.  We must dismiss them as surely they have abandoned us, the American people!

The Angry Sting of Political Manipulation

  • Posted on February 15, 2010 at 1:22 pm

Do they represent us to the best of their ability?

I’m sitting here on this cold February President’s Day thinking about the past decade and of course politics.  I have come to the conclusion that I, like all Americans, have been manipulated by politicians, the government, media monsters and of course the corporations that control them.

It wasn’t that long ago I was a “Yellow Dog Democrat”.  You know that democrat that would vote for a yellow dog before she would vote for a Republican.  Even saying the word republican could cause me to go into convulsions of disgust.  Well, that hasn’t really changed but I find myself having the same feelings when I say Democrat.  I wonder deeply what has happened to my beloved party, the Democratic, big “D”, party.  How did we get from FDR to Kennedy to the current cast of characters including Obama?  I was a child of the sixties.  I remember sitting in my third grade classroom when we were told the president had been shot.  I remember the grief and sadness.  It’s one of those memories that will never leave me.  Everyone that was old enough to remember will remember what they were doing when they found out about Kennedy.  It was a life changing moment for our country.  We probably haven’t ever truly recovered from that loss.  We have wallowed in the consumption of conspiracy theories about his death only to have fuel added to the fire because everything is sealed.  It’s all too awful for us little people to comprehend.  Only those in power have the ability to understand what truly happened.  LBJ was probably a great warrior but the Vietnam War was the legacy most will remember.  While he signed the legislation for the “Great Society” and marshaled us through the civil rights movement, he will best be remembered for the horrors of the Vietnam War and its escalation and his inability to conclude it with positive results.  I don’t know if this was the end of the Democratic era or what but something happened over the course of the past many years that has ultimately destroyed the Democratic Party and my trust of it.

When I was in high school in the early seventies I was a political junkie fueled by my huge family’s constant discussion of all things political.  My parents were strong democrats and of course Nixon, or “Tricky Dick”, was in office.   Just the name “Tricky Dick”, tells how much he was respected at our house.  Nixon led the way for the first truly non Democrat, Democrat president to be elected.  Of course I speak of President Carter.  I spent many years defending Carter but now I find him pretty indefensible.  Would anyone out there believe that it was Carter that started taxing unemployment benefits?  Of course it became fully taxed in 1987 but who would think this would start under a Democratic president?  Well, it did.  That kind of sounds like a republican plan, doesn’t it?  Carter was a “moral” president, a seemingly very religious guy that wouldn’t even serve booze at the White House.  Well, he did serve wine but any Irish Democrat, like me, should have found that to be a distrustful thing to begin with.  It was a way of controlling other people and their behavior.  It was also a continuation of Democrats having to be southern and white to be president.  It seems Democrats couldn’t carry the south without it.  Those Democrats from the south tend to be a bit more conservative than their more liberal, northern cousins.  I gave Carter a “buy” all of these years for his inability to govern this country.  During the Carter years Michigan was devastated.  In fact it was during this time that many people left Michigan for greener pastures or at least a job in another state.  Our current situation in Michigan isn’t really much different than the late seventies and early eighties, which is another story for another day.  Well, I survived Carter and voted for Mondale but of course we all know that the supreme leader, Reagan, was elected.  Please note the sarcasm in my voice.  Republicans want us to believe that Ronald Reagan was the greatest president that ever lived.  I, of course, remember him for being a union busting freak.  We all remember the plight of the air traffic controllers.  He busted them like a twig.  It’s been a downward spiral for unions ever since.  Unfortunately, the propaganda that we have been fed about unions doesn’t help but unions are responsible for many of the work place rights, however small, we have as well as the salaries and protections and benefits that they helped negotiate.  Unions brought up the pay of non union workers as well.

After Reagan’s popularity it seems like the Democratic Party was looking for a Democratic version of Reagan.  Maybe this is why Barack has such an admiration of all things Reagan. Remember how he said Reagan was a transformative president while Clinton wasn’t.  Those were code words to get the old turncoat Democrats that had voted for Reagan and were secretly voting for Republicans to come back and vote for Barack.  After Reagan the Democratic Party put up Michael Dukakis.  He was a decent guy but of course quirky like Dennis Kucinich.  The Republicans were able to reduce him to a cartoon character.  Everyone remembers the helmet he wore, Willie Horton and of course the ridiculous question about if his wife had been raped.  He was quirky and nerdy which is not popular.  I remember he even mowed his own lawn with a push mower.  That wasn’t going to get the macho, white man’s vote.  I did my best to canvas the highly Republican town of Empire, Michigan with Dukakis literature.  However, with no measurable results as Leelanau county went for Reagan.  My heart was still in it.  I was still keeping my beliefs in the Democratic Party.  Those horrible Republicans, however, were still in office!  I suffered through those Bush years when my pottery sales started taking a hit.  Under Reagan there were many wealthy consumers out buying art at the art shows.  They didn’t mind spending a hundred bucks or more on a piece of pottery.  There were still many poor people but there was a group of young buyers that I was happy to see at the art shows spending big bucks.  Under Bush all of that changed.  People wanted the same pottery for less money.  Every artist had to adjust their prices if they were going to sell art.

The nineties gave us Clinton.  Now I love Bill but let’s be real, he really wasn’t and isn’t a big “D” Democrat.  If he was he wouldn’t have sold out the unions and everybody else with NAFTA.  He also wouldn’t have made all of the heartless cuts to welfare.  Business was booming during those dot com years that probably gave people a false sense of reality because for the “little guy” there really wasn’t a boom.  They actually just survived and got by which leads us up to the Bush years of gloom and doom and more war.  The problems Clinton had in office probably hurt Gore’s election but of course Gore hurt Gore as well.  We were all manipulated by the fake outrage about the Monica Lewinsky affair.  All of those Republicans and even Democrats, like Lieberman, were oh so disgusted with Clinton.  Well, of course today we are finding out that many of them have their own little skeletons in the closet.  They only are let out of the closet when we, the people, need to be controlled.  This is all part of the many ways we are manipulated.  We all have the fresh sting of the Bush years in our rear view mirror, where if you are a Democrat, you will always feel the elections, both of them, were stolen!  I learned to believe that Republicans steal elections.  Now, I know those Republicans think that Democrats steal elections because they always go back to the Kennedy, Nixon election and Chicago politics and vote counting.

Ok, so I survived those Bush years and was really excited about the 2008 election.  I thought the Democrats had a real chance to do something big and of course get us out of these wars which I have never believed in.  I believed in a candidate who has since become the symbol for “Worse Husband of the Year Award”.   I was deeply devoted to the candidacy of John Edwards.  I gave over five hundred bucks to his campaign.  Anyone that knows me will know that for me to give money to campaign, I have to be a true believer.  It was the message that I believed in which has now been killed because the messenger was imperfect.  I blame the Democratic Party for much of what happened in this past election.  They wanted Barack Obama and they manipulated all of us Big D Democrats to get what they wanted.  They knew all about John’s problems and probably know about current secrets of people in power.  They needed John to get Obama through Iowa.  If John hadn’t been in the primary, Clinton would have probably won the election.  Those of us in the “know”, know she had more votes in the primary any way.  It was those pesky super delegates and the way they divvied out votes in Michigan and Florida that hurt her.  After John got out I went to see Clinton in Southbend.  I loved her and would definitely have voted for her even though there were things I disliked about her husband’s presidency.  John and the other good boys including Obama staged a “coups” in the Michigan primary.  They knew what they were doing when they removed their names from the ballot.  They set everything up for May 31st, 2008 when my vote for John was confiscated and some votes also taken from Clinton and given to Barack Obama, a man I would never vote for because of his stance on merit pay for teachers.  That’s union busting talk for anyone that understands the lingo.  On that day my blinders were torn off and I saw the Democratic Party for the down and dirty dog it is, a shill for the corporations just like the Republican Party.  They aren’t “Blue Dog Democrats” or even “Yellow Dog Democrats”.  They are pit bulls for the corporations.  How long we have been manipulated, I’m not sure.  I know that we, the people, haven’t been represented for our own best interests, whether the president is a Democrat or a Republican, for many, many years.  I’m angry about being manipulated as I well should be but I can’t understand why more people aren’t fed up with this systematic manipulation of our vote and even our thought process.   The Democratic Party with Barack Obama can’t seem to get anything done.  It’s just a game folks as the stock market is fine with how things are going.  The wars that so many thought a Democrat would pull out of continue and business is the same as it has been.  Stimulus money is going to China and no one is outraged.  It’s just business as usual. A billboard of GW shows up in Minnesota asking if we miss him yet.  I say, “How can we miss him?  He’s still in office!”   For all the “hope and change” that Barack Obama said he would bring to Washington D.C. it is amazing how nothing has really changed.  The only thing that continues is the constant manipulation of the American people.  We hear about Sarah Palin writing on her hand and Robert Gibbs, Obama’s press secretary, yucks it up with the press about it.  More manipulation as we are told she is soooooo stupid.  I sit here unable to be manipulated and controlled any more by these two parties that are shills for the corporations.  I don’t care two twits about Sarah Palin writing on her hand.  She isn’t in office.  She doesn’t control my taxes, job and everything else in my life.  The government does.  I’m angry that Gibbs wastes time on such frivolous matters when there is so much unemployment, under employment and people hanging onto their jobs by the seat of their pants!  I’m angry about all of the political manipulation of my mind and most of all, my vote.  Do I really care who these guys are sleeping with?  You know that’s what done in John Edwards.  If I cared, I would probably have to hate FDR as we all know about his love life.  Today some woman is selling love letters from JFK!  Do I really care who he slept with or do I care about how he governed?  We all know that Jefferson slept with his slave, Sally Hemmings, who happened to be born from the slave of his wife’s father, and today we respect Jefferson as a great man.  I read that she may have been the half sister of his wife.  Of course his wife was dead when he took her to bed but come on we see Jefferson as one of the great founding fathers of our country.

The Democratic Party continues their manipulation with the sick portrayal of the TEA Party, Taxed Enough Already Party.  You know they didn’t refer to themselves as “tea baggers”.  I first heard that on MSNBC.  It was another form of manipulation.  Of course, I didn’t know what “that” meant until I googled it.  I couldn’t believe the media would be so distasteful.  I remember a lot of it coming from the likes of Chuck Todd and his cohorts.  As far as I am concerned people have a right to protest our government if they don’t feel they are being properly represented.  I know Michigan is not getting the representation that they need in Washington D.C.  We’ve been hurting for years and nobody seems to care.  They’re too busy working on their next election and finding ways to manipulate the masses into believing they are actually doing something constructive for the people.   The two parties, Republican and Democratic both work hard to manipulate the masses into going along with the current plan.  When Bush was in office we were manipulated by that phrase Bush used, “You’re either with us or against us!”  Today we are manipulated by the Obama administration with race.  If we don’t like the Obama way or policies we are automatically branded a “racist”.  Now nobody really wants to be labeled a racist.  For me all of this just makes me angrier and angrier because my party has let me down and through the corporations my country has been hijacked by these two ineffective, shills for the corporations, parties.  Corporations, as noted by the Supreme Court, have more rights than I do.  If you aren’t angry about this manipulation, like me, you should be!