ONCE AGAIN: THE BEST & THE BRIGHTEST

Those interested in current events, in politics and governing, generally fall into one of two camps. One is for preserving that which already exists, and the other is for changing that status quo we've endured for so long.

Last year I voted for Barack Obama twice; in both the primary of my state and in the general election. Granted, I wasn't deeply enamored of the man. At my age one looks at their tattered posterior and realizes that believing political promises is like reclining upon a chainsaw. A painful disappointment to say the least.

A great motive for voting for Obama was Senator McCain and especially his running mate, Gov. Sarah Palin. To me, they represented a status quo that was a greased toboggan headed for the abyss. After 8 years of the Bush administration, fear and doubt were put up against the "audacity of hope" promised by the senator from Illinois.

While many have analyzed President Obama's first 100 days, I've been thinking over the 20,000+ days I've traveled around the sun. After many mistakes and good decisions; after planned adventures and unplanned disasters, I've reached the conclusion that Karl Marx was sort of right about the masses. Something acts as an opiate. Marx said religion, but many things have evolved that keep the eyes of the masses wandering from that which is being done to them. Like that song from O Brother Where Art Thou?..."Go to sleep little baby"...is being sung as a lullaby to put us all back to sleep for another four years.

As during the short tenure of JFK, the Best and the Brightest have come to Washington. They have much more intellectual vigor than did the Bush people. Plus, the Democrats as a whole have become the party of answers....even for questions not being asked.

Let's be honest, if that's possible. Barack Obama was elected to the presidency out of hope (for a better-run government) and fear (to avoid an economic catastrophe). One could list many things he was NOT elected for. But, suddenly "mandates" take on a weird cloak of having been obvious to the voters while at the same time they were quite invisible.

To this particular voter, President Obama was sent to the White House for that hope for a better tomorrow. NOT for gay marriage. NOT to rescue a handful of greedy, spoiled, stupid, and incessantly demanding bankers. NOT to pay for the largesse to Wall St. on the backs of those whose Social Security has been daily stolen from them ever since the Greenspan Commission in 1983. NOT to completely devastate an already weakened economy by a vainglorious experiment known as "cap and trade." NOT to provide middle class health care benefits for children on the backs of the poorest quintile of income earners in the nation.

When running for his second term in 1936, Franklin Roosevelt said in a speech, "Let it be said that in my first term the forces of greed met their match. Let it be said that in my second term they met their master." Barack Obama is no enemy of the forces of greed. He, unlike FDR, will not be a "traitor to his class." He is a chameleon; he appears to be whatever people think they want to see. And sadly, like many other politicians, one must not pay too much attention to his words, but his deeds.

Ms. Pelosi, and Mr.'s Waxman, Reid, Durbin, et al will succeed over time in doing more to help the fortunes of the Republican Party than anyone else. President Obama is in there with them, more concerned with the Democratic Leadership Council than the average Joe/Jane Slob who trudged down to the polls to perform that sacred duty of voting. For hope. For change. Yes, this time...this time....we can.

God help us all.

You Can Put Lipstick On a Nazi, But.......

The photo is from the film "Triumph of Will," by Leni Reifenstahl. Reifenstahl was one of Hitler's favorite Nazis, as well as being an accomplished film-maker.

The torchlit parade seen here was the culmination of the Nazis' assimilation of power; "Ein Reich, Ein Volk, Ein Furher"...one nation, one people, one leader.

So why would this come to me now? Because the McCain/Palin campaign is using the same playbook of Adolph Hitler. Steve at "Out Of The Bingo Ditch" once related a law professor who said, "If you have the law on your side, pound the law. If you have the truth on your side, pound the truth. If you have neither, then pound the table."

There is a lot of table-pounding going on, and this is not politics as usual. No, the last few days are revealing something about modern America that is scary as hell. So far, in response to the drumbeats of Palin and McCain has generated shouts from their rallies that included the words "Terrorist!", "Kill him!", and "Treason!" The McCain campaign is inciting violence against a candidate for the presidency of the United States. Used to be against the law.

But, after the last eight years "the law" is apparently a very flexible thing. Perhaps, like after defending the Confederate flag in South Carolina, John McCain will apologize for lying; for betraying his precious "principles" to win an election.The fact that it might result in the death or maiming of Barack Obama would never, of course, be his responsibility. Nor Palin's; after all, she's only been at this what, five weeks? Totalitarian tactics don't need a lot of practice.

It should be borne in mind that the Bush years, or the Rove years, if you will, have gone way beyond polarizing the populace of America. No, they have been teaching the sweet scent of intolerance of others; of that wonderful feeling of standing shoulder-to-shoulder with another soldier of righteousness. Compromise, reason, honor, patriotism....all are perverted into only one interpretation. Everyone not like us is an enemy, not a fellow countryman.

This disturbs me the most about Sarah Palin's latest rounds of invective. She is actually telling listeners, over and over, that Obama/Biden are not "real" Americans. Anyone with any semblance of education, life experience, or just plain intelligence would recognize the fact that there are many people out there just waiting for guidance to violence. It is dangerous, disingenuous, and frankly, un-American.

On a personal note, I've reached the limit of John McCain's constant referral to his POW years. ("Now goshdarnit, John, there ya go, talkin' about the past again"). Two of my uncles were prisoners of the Japanese for three and one half years. Rats and rice were a delicacy for them. They were starved, beaten, worked as slaves, tortured...and so on. I don't know how they survived, but they did return home (unlike 40% of Japanese POW's who did NOT) to learn that their brother had died the previous year fighting the Nazis.

I'll never forget what one uncle told me growing up,"Don't ever trust a government. They are designed to lie no matter what. But, always respect and love the flag. Too much has been sacrificed for it." Wise words, I think, and the man who told me this was a man of honor, through and through. He was a Republican; a very honorable one til the day he died in 1986. May he rest in peace, for I sure do miss him.

And I really miss the party he once belonged to. I think it died this year.

John McCain: Meet Some Of Your Fundamentals

Forest City is one of those places in western North Carolina that does not evoke images of much. Primarily because no one has ever heard of it. Nearby is Lake Lure and Chimney Rock, and that's about it. It is, however, a nice place to live; one of those "small towns" with matching "values" that the McCain campaign is quick to extoll, thanks to the Embarracuda, Sarah Palin.

There are no hockey moms or soccer moms. Maybe a bunch of Joe six-packs. It is the essence of what the Republican Party refers voters to when complaining about the evils of liberalism.

But....Forest City was also once a hub of textile activity. After NAFTA the area was devastated by plant closings. One by one the jobs (and machinery) made fast exits for China and Mexico. One remained however. National Textiles (Haynes Brand) still chugged along. In the Fall and Winter, one could see the plume of steam from the National Textiles plant rise in the clear sky. It was like the last candle burning on the cake.

Two weeks ago the evening shift was called together at 8 p.m. The plant was closing. The machinery was going to be relocated to Honduras. Good luck and don't let the door hit you on your unemployed ass. 500 people have been tossed onto the globalization bonfire, but that's small potatos, I guess. But in a small town, that's 500 families, 500 car payments, 500 mortgages. Anyone who has undergone this can relate to the rather implausible future that requires one to adjust from say $17.00 per hour at 40 hours a week to the Walmartized standard of $7.00 with no more than 32 hours a week.

This happened because of the 2005 Central American Free Trade Agreement, or CAFTA. So I did a little digging, and this bill passed with a razor thin margin in the House, and by a 55-45 vote in the Senate. The votes were as follows:

Voting in favor:

Elizabeth Dole (R-NC)
Richard Burr (R-NC)
JOHN McCAIN (R-AZ)

Voting against:

Barack Obama (D-IL)
Joe Biden (D-DE)

Now maybe the adults among those 500 families, tossed into the wilderness by the above votes, will go for McCain because Sarah Palin is cute; winks good, and promises "change." They may, as is the pattern, fall for the "re-education required" to get themselves "decent" jobs in the future. And hey, they are part of the strong "fundamentals" that McCain/Palin insist are strong.

Three weeks from the election and they are getting all the "education" they need. And it's real simple:

Their votes are needed to stop "radicals" like Obama and Biden from winning this election. After that, they won't be needed for anything.

An Economic Patriot Act?

After watching the events of Washington/Wall Street for the past few weeks, I've been stumped by the lack of the WHY things are going south.

Now I'll admit that with my lack of formal education in economics it would be unwise to trust me with matters financial. Give me a few years and I'd probably cause an economic meltdown due to my ignorance. Oh. Wait. Somebody from Yale or Harvard beat me to it.

This so-called "rescue" plan of Treasury Henry Paulson is emitting a disturbing resemblance to the Patriot Act. Or I should say, the passage of the Patriot Act. Basically it is this: there is no TIME to review it. Pass it. NOW. IMMEDIATELY. Ask your questions later, but uh, by the way, you won't be able to ask questions afterwards because the law will prohibit it. Just do it. The world will end if you don't.

And another thing: take that Constitution and shove it. We don't need no stinkin' Constitution. Sorry for the series of emergencies the past 8 years, but we've got practice at this. There's a fire here people, so just shut up and pass the gasoline.

Let's take a little sidetrip to the 1920's. The "roaring 20's." The name for the decade was derived from the economic "boom," particularly in the stock market. Along came FDR in 1933 and started saving capitalism from its own excesses, and fought every inch by the "investing" class. It wasn't until the advent of World War II that Americans started making money...I mean a LOT of Americans. It produced the solid middle class that endured for 30 years.

Looking back with 20/20 vision, many economists realized that the 1920's weren't so "roaring" after all...at least for farmers and in particular, industrial workers. You see, productivity skyrocketed. A single worker on average was producing double or triple every few years what he or she was producing the year before.

But...but...where did those productivity savings go? To the top. It boiled down to the relatively simple observation that those producing goods and services were not being paid enough to purchase those same goods and services. Post World War II this problem did not exist. The middle class expanded and everyone got fat, dumb, and Republican.

Take a look, particularly in this decade, where productivity gains have gone. It's the same as the 1920's and has been so for several decades. Perhaps the subprime mortgage collapse came about more from underpaid workers than anything else. That is because Wall Street, with its golden blinders on, convinced itself that while Americans stretched their work hours, went deeper and deeper in debt, and saw their real wages fall while productivity increased...that this was as it should be.

The ultimate in chutzpah is Wall Street, over the weekend, devising a new myriad of schemes to profit even further from their galactic gambling. The last two investment banks got the Fed to agree to allow them to become holding companies. That way they can take deposits and pretend to be like a real bank. I remember what Will Rogers said in the 1930's.." A holding company is a thing where you hand an accomplice the goods while the policeman searches you. "

The is the ultimate Bush legacy: a Thelma and Louise, sans Constitution, flying off a cliff.

And we, fellow citizens, are locked in the trunk.

The Hurricane Ike Election

In the year 1900, William McKinley and William Jennings Bryan fought for the presidency. McKinley, the Republican, beat Bryan in that election. At one campagin stop in West Virginia, Bryan was cussed out on the train platform by my great-grandfather. Bluntness runs in the family I guess.

But then, my great-grandfather had two brothers who fought in the Civil War, and being the only state formed because of that Civil War, it was reasonable to assume no Democrat was going to get a warm welcome in that state. The scars from the Civil War still ran deep forty years after the firing upon Ft. Sumter.

Also in 1900, the city of Galveston was destroyed by a hurricane. Not damaged, but destroyed, along with over 6,000 people. It was the worst loss of life in U.S. History. The scars and memories from that ran very deep.

But scars heal and sometimes fade a bit. People forget things, or memories of one generation fail to get passed on to another. Not to sound like a prig, but that is what history is for; it lets us travel the future with references from the past.

So I'm a little taken aback by those in Galveston who ignored dire warnings, and decided to "tough it out" while Hurricane Ike chewed up the Texas coast. Anyone who has lived through a hurricane knows that you don't "tough it out." You boogey, and then some.

Yet thousands didn't, and now await rescuers out risking their own lives needlessly. Despite all the technology available to warn people, these foolish souls decided to ignore what Galveston had gone through a century earlier.

I thought there is an anology here. It's why there is such a "buzz" about a former P.O.W. turned bald-faced liar and a neophyte neocon sycophant running for national office. The American electorate (or at least a sizable portion) are fascinated by the soap-opera aspect of this. It's fun, and let's just not get bogged down in details. Details like, oh, maybe at least four more years of policies (or non-policies) inflicted on those who adhere to Einstein's observation that insanity is doing the same thing over and over yet expecting different results.

2008 is the year Americans actually vote on a hurricane. Oddly, instead of wanting it to go away and let the damage control begin, there is this narcotic effect luring people to ask for a hurricane's return. It's insane, but let's try the same way just one more time.

Indeed.

JOHN MCCAIN RATTED OUT FELLOW POW'S WHILE CAPTIVE!!!

There is someone I've known for many years who, while totally opposite my views on most things, is at least consistent in her approach. Should I put forth the observation that I question Barack Obama's ability to keep his promises, she agrees. If I question Joe Biden's temperment, or ability to compromise, she agrees. But, that is not enough. Much more follows in the form of those "talking points," whereby one recites that which is pushed daily. There is no questioning these things; they are repeated without question or thought.

For example, she will volunteer, in hushed tones, that Obama is not really American; that he is secretly a Muslim; that he's a pervert wanting to teach kindergartners about sex. And so on. And on. And on.

So, I thought...why not join 'em if I can't 'beat 'em? Why not let the McCain campaign thugs (separate, in my mind, from decent Republicans) have fun fending off something?

JOHN MCCAIN RATTED OUT HIS FELLOW POW'S WHILE IN THE HANOI HILTON.

MCCAIN TRIED TO HELP MANUEL NORIEGA ESCAPE U.S. TROOPS IN PANAMA.....BECAUSE MCCAIN, LIKE NORIEGA, WAS BORN IN PANAMA, NOT THE U.S.

JOHN MCCAIN ROLLED A WAR PROTESTER DOWN 3 FLIGHTS OF STAIRS....IN HER WHEELCHAIR!!!

Are the above lies? Of course. But what difference does that make this year? All you have to do is keep repeating them. Like symantic fatigue, you just drone them over and over until you don't really CARE what you're saying any more.

Please note: you will not hear anything about healthcare, a few pesky wars going on and what new ones may be rolled out in the future, the ridiculous state of our energy non-policy, home ownership (or the increasing lack thereof).

No, because all that boring stuff involves governing, and we don't do that now. No, now we win, and winning is all that matters.

Is there honor in this? Absolutely not, but what has honor got to do with being president these days? Opportunity is the key: use every opportunity to do whatever you want.

Lying has reached new heights in politics. It's not an art form, because lying repeatedly and with malice requires no imagination nor character. It's perfect for the Rovian Rule of Deceit.

It does, if you think about it, show an awfully deep contempt for people in general.

And so does the "governing" that follows.

Election 2008: Will The Center Hold?

"This morning, as for some days past, it seems exceedingly probable that
this Administration will not be re-elected. Then it will be my duty to
so co-operate with the President elect, as to save the Union between
the election and the inauguration; as he will have secured his election
on such ground that he cannot possibly save it afterwards."



----Abraham Lincoln, prior to the election of 1864.



The above quote is apt at present, for while there is not a raging Civil War as in Mr. Lincoln's time, we are a house divided.



Even worse, we are not two sections of one nation at war, but rather hundreds, if not thousands, of factions fighting for the absolute in a world gone immeasurably gray. On the one hand, the Left finally gained some say-so at the 1968 Democratic Convention. This was the blossoming of political correctness; the era of identity politics whereby one's skin color, religion, or sexual orientation DID matter more than one's citizenship.



Coincidentally, Richard Nixon used his "Southern Strategy" that year. It was a veiled appeal to the racism being fanned by federal court orders and forced school busing. Over the years such things have not, to say the least, appealed to the better angels of our nature.



No, the lowest common denominator is the highest form of "discourse." For discourse it is not. It is McCarthyite warfare with no prisoners taken. It is a constant barrage of sound bites and perfumed insults. It has begged the question in my mind as to what the end result of all this is going to be? Other than scalping all my enemies, what am I voting towards? Not for, but towards. There is a future in there somewhere; a goal that is better than our present and also better than ourselves.



To secure that future, two questions must be addressed: Are we going to continue on the path towards a land where a few live splendidly while the vast majority accept squalor, albeit with TV and sports? The other is: will the future executive recognize the Constitution as something worth following, no matter how inconvenient to any particular agenda?

Using the past and present as a guide, I can't say I'm too optimistic about either of those questions. The reference to our country being polarized is highly inaccurate. We have become more like the U.S. of the 1850's. Those in favor of eliminating slavery and those opposing said elimination, found plenty of fire to toss at each other. There were other issues involved in our Civil War, but too-simply put, a lot of blood was spilled in order to resolve what kind of nation it was going to be.

However, even that period falls short of the present when it comes to invective. What is happening now is beyond insults. It is a divide and conquer mentality that not only questions opposing viewpoints (which is fair enough), but the patriotism, the American-ness of those who are not with the program. I have listened to "talk radio" in my area, which is 100% "conservative," when in fact it's not. It's reactionary. There is nothing accomplished for the nation to use the airwaves to claim one needs a bath by being around Democrats. Or that Democrats (who somehow are all part of a liberal monolith) are simply not "real" Americans.

What is most disheartening is that John McCain has co-oped (or been co-opted by) the Rovian Right of politics. With a minimum of thought one should see that there is a huge gap between successful campaigning and successful government. Senator McCain cannot win this election through the technique of destruction and then come along post-election and talk about "uniting" the nation. We've all been there, done that, and bought the T-shirts this decade.

At the moment, there is still enough of the America others in the past have built to salvage. One more term; one more exercise in bringing the campaign drones into government is going to ensure a wasteland.

And Senator McCain, whatever honorable motives he has, will not be of any use in the wasteland he is helping to create.