Oh Iowa

Cnn, along with all other news outlets, was filled with political analysts discussing the Iowa upcoming caucasus.

It is the Caucasus system that is remarkable for its undemocratic nature; basically small groups get together, discuss issues and then vote.

Iowa is dominated by conservatives; especially Christian conservatives. This means that Republican Presidential candidates must appeal to the most conservative, reactionary part of their party, in a sparsely populated state.

Some Republicans, I suppose, would say this is good. It "grounds" the candidates in the conservative base of the party.

As a Democrat I think it's nuts!

The country is not represented by Iowa in the least. Most Americans live in urban/suburban corridors, on the East and West Coasts. The average American is urban, multi-racial, and lives in large population centers. The average economic American lives increasingly in the Global Economy.

Neither of these apply to Iowa at all. So how on earth does what Iowa thinks make any difference to the "national interest"?

And then there is the electoral college.

This is an anachronism of not the twentieth century but the eighteenth century. I assume you know how it works.

Is is also deeply anti-democratic.

Because of their racist anti immigration, anti African-American policies, the Republican Party is increasingly the Party of the minority white elderly (and Iowa!) The electoral college system, protects minority interest, and has more than once, elected a President who has less votes that his opponent.

This just happened in 2000. George W. was elected but actually lost the "popular vote" by over a million votes. But, he won Florida and got a majority in the undemocratic electoral college.

The results were disastrous for America. When 9/11 happened, Bush was a minority elected President. To increase his base, he deliberately sought out a foreign conflict; it was all about getting more support. Lying to do this was acceptable, as a minority elected President, the ends justified the means.

America's is changing. People of color are fast becoming the majority in all population centers. Inter-marriage is acceptable, and the country is becoming a blend of cultures, nationalities, and races. America is becoming brown. (I always have wondered why whites decry people of color, but risk their health by lying in tanning booths!).

Although many white racists are aghast at this browning , it really is understandable, given the global nature of the world we live in. The global economy, the internet, and communications have tied the world together like never before.

A racist nation, that elects to isolate itself from the various nations of the world, stands NO chance of economic survival.

As Republicans appeal in Iowa to white only crowds, that are "social conservatives", they isolate themselves more from the world economy. As they lurch further to the right, hoping for another minority elected President (numbers-wise not racially), they offend nations of color with whom the United States must deal with economically (and socially, politically and otherwise).

The world is watching in more ways than one, as racially isolated elderly white men react to, rather than embrace the global economy.

Electing another minority President will be a disaster for the United States economically. "Whites only" won't work in the global economy. Iowa is so far removed from China, India, and Brazil that it is almost comical.

Moreover, the problems and issues in Iowa are light years different than the problems of Los Angeles and Chicago.

If we elected a minority elected President, based on Iowa's values, we will also elect someone who cannot relate to the critical problems of urban America; unemployment, housing, economic revitalization; etc.

Iowa, with an unemployment in single digits, is MORE different from urban America than ever before. Not only are their values different, their economic status is different.

A minority elected President will open the door for widespread urban unrest, upheaval and violence that could end our democratic system of government.

So, Oh Iowa, holds huge risks for our continued existence as a nation.

It isn't just a matter of race, or whites "taking their country back".

Oh sure, they can take it back, and doom us all to second class status in the global economy.

Iowa's values are not America's values. They used to be, in 1940 for example. But it "ain't 1940" anymore, and is sure as hell "isn't Kansas" either.

The midwest that used to be America's core stopped representing American forty years ago. It figures that conservatives would still hold that notion, they usually are fifty years behind the times.

Go to Salinas sometimes,or Chicago, or San Francisco: THAT is America and is becoming more America all the time.

And it isn't about race either, it is about the world, and how it has changed, and how our economy is not our economy anymore....it is the global economy, and whites make up a minority of that economy.

Oh Iowa...Oh no Iowa...

Just Don't Get It

I have several friends who once were Democrats and now are conservative Republicans. Some even still maintain their Democrat registration, but vote hard line conservative.

All of them have been in one way or another adversely affected by the changes that have damaged the middle class over the past thirty years.

Their pensions have declined, their children's employment has suffered, their standard of living has declined. Many are still working, long after I, a public employee, retired. They resent that by the way.

They are having to work because they have little or no pensions, their health care is a mess, they aren't old enough for Medicare; etc.

The bottom line is that many of my peers are either working to provide for themselves with no end in sight, or working to support their uneployed children.

Shasta County has over 20% unemployed right now and things seem to be getting worse.

Regardless, they support the cons, they rant about welfare, they call the President a socialist, they vote hard Republican for the very people who are cutting their throats socially, economically and politically.

We have a thirty year Congressman, who has done nothing for the county, but has become a multi-millionaire during his tenure. How he did this over thirty years, on a Representative's income is beyond me. But, at last check, he has admitted to a net worth or seven million (it has been reported in other circles as thirty million).

You can almost see the standard of living decline. And my buddies rant about Obama, criticize the Democrats at every turn.

Interestingly, Shasta County is a small minority in a California that is becoming more democratic all the time. This has meant no political clout in Sacramento to deal with our economic nightmare.

Demographic studies show this will not change, as the state becomes more diverse racially, more progressive politically, while Shasta County goes more conservative.

All around us are artifacts of the New Deal. Shasta Dam, one of America's largest, is a cornerstone of a host of federal and state water reclamation projects. Government is everywhere, federal forests, federal water reclamation;etc.

And the cons in Shasta County loath the government. They hate government in every form. The Tea Party is a mainstay around here. The City Council is hard right, whereas in the past it was non-partisan.

I cannot understand this. How can people be so conservative when the economic system is almost abusing them in its unfairness.

The only thing that makes any sense is race. Shasta County has hardly any racial minorities at all. Hispanics are a small group here, it seems the Latino Wave stops in Red Bluff (thirty miles south).

Of course when I bring race up to my friends, they go ballistic, claiming they are not racists. It is all economics they say. Then, they attack the poor, as welfare cheats who are lazy, shiftless and are "refusing to take Burger King jobs to stay on unemployment".

One friend angrily told me he knows of several people, all on welfare, that moved into a large custom house, combine their welfare, and "live like kings". The Democrats are to blame for this he says, they coddle the lazy.

So, in my buddies' world, the recession is all self made, there are jobs, people are refusing to work because of government hand outs. I am reminded of the passengers on the Titantic who chanted it will be ok, as the ship sunk.

Of course, statistics, evidence, reality all are opposite of these myths. But, no matter how many times it is shown that 5 to 10 people are pursuing every job, that well paying jobs with benefits are virtually non-existent, that their lives are spiralling down and down with no end in sight, they STILL hold to their position that by gawd......it is not the fault of an unfair economic system, people just are too lazy.

I don't get it....I just don't.

Of course, when I say that my buddies say...see...another liberal who is clueless.

And they are still struggling, and their children are losing hope....

And Fox News continues its propaganda...

I think all of us are clueless.....

He Don't Know Nothing

Recently I wrote a piece about redevelopment agencies, and how efforts to repair and build downtown areas had been hijacked in the past 50 years by urban sprawl proponents. I was talking about how local governments had failed, and most of us didn't pay attention, because frankly redevelopment is a pretty mundane and boring thing.

My point was, while we weren't looking, speculators and quick buck artists have moved in, modified redevelopment efforts to line their pockets, and left California with millions of square feet of retail space that will be empty for the next fifty years.

One of the criticisms of my piece was that I am an "educator", not a businessman so don't know anything about such matters.

"You never made a payroll, hired or fired", or did all those esoteric things business people do.

Oh really? I was a school administrator for most of my educational career. In the district I worked most of my career, we had a payroll of about 400! I hired, I fired, I dealt with the union. I administered workman's comp, I balanced budgets (or at least tried); etc., etc.

The idea that government is not a business is ridiculous. The myth that "if only we ran the government like a business, things would get better" is ridiculous.

Every governmental service, every one, uses the same business priciples as private enterprise.

Sometimes that can be a problem, especially with social services, because people are not widgets. Using production models to manage large scale social programs often backfires. In fact, running social programs solely like a business is a bad idea.

The record is repleat with examples of "business people" trying to run school districts and failing; not because business principles don't apply, but because they don't understand the culture.

That was the point of my previous article. Lewis Mumford (that nobody bothered apparently to Google), studied and wrote about how urbanization created a culture, that greatly affected government. That is proven by a study of redevelopment and urban sprawl, which affects our culture today in mostly negative ways.

For example, dispite the fact that there are many more of us in smaller areas, Americans today are more isolated from one another. How can that be?

We spend hours each week sitting alone in our vehicles, droning away at 10 miles per hour, going to and fro from work. We listen to talk radio, that rants about the damn government, the damn liberals, and pushes a conservative agenda constantly.

It is no wonder that people hate government, distrust public schools, want to give tax cuts endlessly; even though they don't work to much help the econony.

A propaganda machine works on us everyday; one , by the way, that does not care about truth.

So we watch, and we bemoan our helplessness, as our political system sinks into dysfunctional oblivion.

We can still change this. We can read. We can use empirical evidence to prove that tax cutting does NOT stimulate job creation; that governmental programs, can be well run, and can revitalize our economy without waste.

And, these can be implemented and not cost liberty, or the private sector, any distress.

In fact, liberty, social justice, and even economic justice can co-exist.

But our culture will have to change. We will have to get out of our gas guzzling cars, agree to pay higher taxes, and demand that our tax money be used efficiently and well.

And yes, we can run government like a business; a caring, compassionate and competitive business for the best intersts of us all.

It is right there, in the Preamble to the Constitions...."We the People.....

Rant a little...to rats

Ok, I know most of my posts are calm, well stated, exercises in cool reason: (?) Anyway forgive me but here is a rant: Let's call it Rant Points...or Rat Points depending on your perspective.

1. To the House of Representative Tea Party: Rats to you for consistently stopping bipartisan compromise which has a direct effect on keeping my friends and family unemployed. Rats to you for actually voting against the extention of a tax cut for wage earners, which result in a tax increase for millions, an end to unemployment for many, and higher medical bills for the elderly. Raise taxes and cut spending during a recession will bring on a depression.....FDR 1936 (which it did by the way).

2. To the Heath "Care" Insurance Industry: Rats to you for refusing to disclose how you set rates while most of you make record profits from employer provided health insurance. This you did in the depths of the worst recession since the "Big One. Your premium rates outpace inflation by almost 100%....that's right 100%! So, while many cannot even get health insurance because they don't have a job, those that do are getting soaked; and the small businesses that strain to provide a decent benefit simply cannot do it.

3. To the Cons who have "kill Obamacare" in front of the loaded Supreme Court. Rats to you. Read #2.

4. To Newt: Rats to you because I detect your slimy hands behind #1.

5. To the the smug, medicare receiving, social security receiving old farts: Rats to you for being so damn selfish that you have thrown your children and grandchildren under the bus, voting Tea Party because you can't stand the idea of a Black Man being President while collecting entitlements that you think should be cut for the next guy.

6. To Big Oil: Rats to your lying, profits worshipping, polluting rotten souls. Thanks for ruining the planet...see Redding California weather forecast for Christmas, 60 degrees with howling and warm north winds...this is Christmas day for Christ's sake (pun intended).

7. To the global warming deniers: See # 7. Rats to phony patriots, big oil lovers, selfish, short sighted, expediency worshipping, science liars, who are quite literally sponsoring the end of times (and not in a religious way).

8. To the homo haters: Rats to those of you who divide churches with their hatred, while cheating on your wives of either gender. That's right, homo hating and hypocracy go together.

9. To Americans: Rats to all of us for tolerating and even voting for these fools.

Sprawl You All

Governor Brown, as part of his first actions in office, and at great shock to his developer followers, stopped state sponsorship of redevelopment agencies. They are still screaming! The fact that Brown is in his 70s, and gives a rip about re-election is not lost on this writer for sure.

Brown acted primarily to help balance the seriously underfunded California state budget. But, Brown was up to more than just balancing the budget; he was attacking the source of the housing bubble, the source of our unbalanced economy, and yes, the source of our present economic misery.

When I was in graduate school, I studied Government. Oh, you are probably saying, THAT is the source of our misery; Government.

Not quite!

Now there is Government and there is political science. Political Science is the fun side of government, the clash of ideas, biographies of great leaders; etc.

Local governmental planning and development begins to fog over the lenses pretty quick. I remember being assigned readings from Lewis Mumford, who wrote in the thirties about the dynamics of urban growth. He basically studied the growth of cities, and how that reflected the culture. Go ahead, google it...not exactly the most exciting topic.

I can tell I am losing you already. I can see the eyelids dropping.....

But, local government and local development is really where good government needs to be. Our problem is not government, our problem is the lack of anti-speculative government.

The ways communities grow, renew, or die are essential parts of governmental planning. Good government results in good planning, which causes in healthy growth. Bad government comes when the speculators run the show!

Since some real conservatives might still be reading this (a longshot), look for example at the Central Valley Project in California. This massive governmental plan, was developed over years, by both political parties, to counter the damage placer gold mining had caused to California's aquafers. Rivers and streams had been mauled by the gold rush over fifty years, turning the fertile Sacramento Valley into a flood zone, and filling the rivers with sludge. The result was economic disaster for California.

Hum......economic disaster caused by short sighted economic greed....hum....

Anyway, the Central Valley Project, a well planned governmental effort, has resulted in a series of dams, that are still criticized by ecological purists, but have certainly worked to reclaim thousands of acres of farming land with huge economic benefits. We are talking the most important economic engine in California is due to the Central Valley Project.

In short, good government planning, which is boring planning by bureaucrats who nobody knows or cares about, works for the benefit of us all.

It seems the more boring and mundane the project is, the better it turns out. The less speculative in nature the better. Long term, reliant but reasonable return on investment is best.

Brown, who is just such a bureaucrat, no matter what you think of him politically, is a political and governmental wonk. That is, he has lived in governmental dynamics and politics, particularly at the state and local level, all of his life. He has a deep and thorough understanding of local planning and its implications for our culture.

He understands that boring, thorough planning, works in the long run; not expedient quick profiteering.

In attacking our redevelopment planning sector in California, he is calling our attention to a toxic and harmful trend in local urbal planning that threatens California's prosperity.

It is not high taxes or over regulation, in fact, it is speculation and expediency that have us in trouble.

The enemy is urban sprawl, and the destruction of downtown areas. This has NOT been a natural consequence of growth at all, but a calculated urban planning strategy, fueled by the petroleum industry, fostered by real estate interests, and pushed always by quick buck artists.

At its core is rampant short sighted speculation; from the same people that brought us the recent housing bubble and Wall Street speculation. These charlatans are killing us!

And, it has not been the province on either political party; both have participated and both are guilty. It really is not a political issue. It is a planning issue. It is a moral issue.

It really is not difficult to understand (look out here comes the dull, boring local government lecture).

In the 50s and 60s local government embarked on redevelopment plans. This is not surprising considering the Great Depression started in 1929, and then came World War II, not allowing any financial resources to be available for urban renewal. The government was too busy keeping people alive, or later killing them, to spend much fixing a downtown sewer.

In the fifties and sixties, local governments noticed the basic infrastructures were wearing out. Downtowns were becoming areas of blight, the wealthy were moving out of neighborhoods into the suburbs.

To counter this need, redevelopment efforts were started at the local and state level, with some influence even from the federal government. The idea was to counter urban blight and rejuvenate downtown. This goal was hijacked.

Expediency got in the way. Since people were fleeing the downtown area (mostly to get away from the people of color who lived there); redevelopment was "hijacked" by developers who shifted it from downtown revitalization to suburban sprawl.

And, the automobile culture was exploding at the time. The national highway system was growing, tying remote areas to urban centers. Shopping malls replaced downtown development as the sign of urban economic health.

And sprawl intensified. At first the sprawl was not significant, a few miles out of town. Then it grew into twenty, thirty miles. Why worry, everyone had a car, so a few more miles to work (which stayed in the downtown area with the advent of multi-story high rises) was easy.

Today this has resulted in the average urban communter having a 40 mile drive one way to work every day. This commute is usually at about 10 miles per hour, spewing tons of CO2 and pollution into the atmosphere. It is so bad that to drive in Sacramento in the morning or late afternoon is virtually impossible. It is so bad that the San Jose Mercury devotes several columns each day to the "choke points" (no pun intended) of the freeway madness that communters endure everyday. People spend hours each day in their cars, going 5 to 10 miles an hour, cussing the madness.

Meanwhile train tracks are empty. The bullet train project is attacked as madness, as wasteful, by a car culture that thinks nothing of spending billions a day going nowhere fast!

Californias pay so much for cars and insurance, that they even recalled a Governor, for having the temerity to renew a vehicle license fee level, which was called for by law by the way, and elected yet another actor who this time didn't have clue what he was doing.

The actor then reduced the vehicle fee, was a momentary hero, than flopped around bewildered when the budget didn't balance. That fee non-renewal by the way was tax deductable, so its impact to the average taxpayer was minimal. The impact to local governments and now schools was huge!

Meanwhile, multiple car ownership was encouraged, especially of gas hogs, that now sit in commuter's driveways since they can't afford the gas to run them! And people still sit in traffic all day, every day....on and on and on....

Having fun yet?

And who benefited from the sprawl? Land was certainly cheaper the further you went out of town. Speculators swooped in, buying up large tracts of what was farming land, at low prices, and got rich using local governmental redevelopment funds (at taxpayer expense), to build auto malls and shopping malls that now lie vacant.

Developers became quick buck artists, looking always for the fast and easy profit.

Let's add Prop 13 to the mix. This tax con, rewards speculators and large developers far in excess of homeowners, resulting in billions of dollars of profit for the apartment and mall developers, and pennies of tax savings for the ordinary homeowner. And, local schools and services have been cut ever since.

How, you might ask, can someone make money building malls that nobody occupies? Try capital gains tax games, where a loss actually cuts your tax liability. Trust me, they are making money; they are the 1%. We are the 99%, left holding the bag, as our tax dollars help redevelop areas that actually kill our economy and cost jobs.

It is kind of like Potterville in "It's A Wonderful Life", where the rich banker, speculator, if left alone, ruined the little town with his quick buck dishonestly. In fact, it is EXACTLY LIKE POTTERVILLE!

The result of what must be called basic dishonesty, was sprawl for sprawl's sake. Of course the driving force was that it was cheaper and quicker.

Downtown real estate costs more than Farmer Brown's almond orchard. To develop a flat area is cheaper than tearing down an old building and putting up a new one. Short cuts are good business. Hey, its profit, "Greed is Good"...

But, as most of us know, cheaper is not always better. You get what you pay for is not an irrelevant saying. There is no such thing as a free lunch. If it looks too good to be true, it isn't.

Speculation will hurt your on the long run....

I could go on and on....But you get the picture.

I live in a very poor county that has been hit hard by the recession. Right now there are plans to build a large shopping mall in the middle of prime farm land, at least ten miles outside of Redding. This is being pushed by a developer from Idaho (?), and local builders as the panacea to stimulate Shasta County's economy.

And you should hear the builders salivate. Of course, Redding right now has millions of square feet of retail space that lies vacant. The old malls are less than half occupied, so where will the renters come from?

Don't worry about that, say the developers. We will build it and they will come.

They never come!

The locals don't think so, and have floated a petition that is putting the development to a vote.

People are tired of the sprawl, and are even willing now to forego the temporary economic stimulus that the mall supposedly represents; the stimulus never comes. They also smell a rat.

Brown, who unlike most of us, actually revels in this stuff, has been around so much government that he knows urban sprawl, as it is presently practiced in California, is toxic to real economic growth. Read carefully........this nonsense is killing us!

How can this be, you ask? How can redevelopment be bad?

Here are a few toxic consequences:

1. Building office space far in excess of demand, in remote places makes NO SENSE!

2. Spending millions of dollars of tax money, developing remote shopping malls while the downtown area rots makes NO SENSE!

3. Catering to quick buck artists, whose only motivation in developing a farm into a parking lot to make a quick buck makes NO SENSE!

4. Forcing urban renewal forty miles out of town, or building an auto mall when car sales are way down makes NO SENSE!

5. Being at the mercy of developers, who attack anyone who questions their motives as being "anti-growth" makes NO SENSE!

6. Sacramento's Natomas area, built on a flood plain, pushing dwellings miles away from downtown, into a flood plain, makes NO SENSE!

7. Expanding freeways, adding lanes, encouraging multiple ownership of cars that are poisoining the atmosphere and accelerating global warming, makes NO SENSE.

I could go on and on.

We have been duped, fooled, lied to and manipulated. Lewis Mumford would have a field day with the pure speculative nonsense that particularly California has practiced for the past fifty years regarding urban planning.

The housing bubble, that should have been a clear lesson to us of the dangers of spleculation, poor planning, and the quick buck, is deeply engrained in the urban sprawl, and false, dishonest, and lousy urban planning "redevelopment" of the past fifty years.

It is all a toxic brew, that is poisoning us.

We have fifty years of bad governmental planning, and frankly crooked dishonest speculators to overcome.

We should be giving credit to Governor Brown for finally calling our attention to this fraud. We should be putting some of these crooks in jail!

Development for development's sake is a fraud. Short term profit and gain that contain disastrous consequences in the future, like developing the Natomas area north of Sacramento, is a fraud.

If there are good chances the wheel will fall off the wagon when you go to fast...it probably will.

Finally there is Jacksonville, California. A few years ago I visited Jacksonville to do a school accreditation. As I drove into town, I could not help but notice a huge development. It was an auto mall, one of the biggest I had ever seen.

At the high school I asked about it. Some of the teachers were skeptical, worried about building such a large auto mall almost 50 miles from the nearest population center. But, others, believing the developers, expressed hope that the new mall would be a source of employment for the local economy, that had been suffering from the shift from logging and agriculture to suburbia.

Three years later, I returned for another visit. I looked to my right, as I came into town, and saw the auto mall, closed! Acres of pavement, thousands of square feet of space, emply, closed.....nada!

I asked about it when at the high school again. I was told, this time with a tinge of anger, that the mall had opened all right, in 2007, hired lots of people, then crashed to a close with the recession.

As it turned out, the people in Sacramento, for whom the mall was intended, would not drive the fifty miles to Jacksonville to visit the shiny new mall to buy a car they didn't need and now could not afford.

The city if Jacksonville, I was told, was trying to lure tenants to occupy the thousands of square feet of retail space that was just sitting there. Of course, no tax proceeds were coming from the mall, it was vacant; and prospects for occupancy were nill. Jacksonville basically got screwed!

So Jacksonville was left holding the bag, while the developers profited from the redevelopment taxpayer dollars and enjoyed the tax break caused by the loss.

Urban sprawl wins again...sprawl you all....

What Are Your Belliefs?

Ultimately it comes down to what you believe.

There is an incredible struggle going on in this country for your beliefs. Fox News, MSNBC, and countless Internet Bloggers are writing a blizzard (like this one) of appeals to your belief structure.

It is not hard to understand why it is so hard to know, "What to believe?"

Empirical evidence is a place to start. There is empirical historical, social and economic evidence to back up many of the political and economic appeals to belief.

Unfortunately the closer you get to present time, the more conflicting the empirical evidence is. This occurs naturally, because historical perspective adds veracity to belief structures.

For example, in the latter part of the twentieth century the struggle between capitalism and communism was the premiere belief struggle in the world.

Today, in 2011, we can look back at how communism in the USSR failed, and was trashed in the rest of Eastern Europe. It appears that communism lost to capitalism.

Except for China of course, where a blend of communism and capitalism is beginning to conquer the economic world. The empirical economic evidence seem to be proving that a blend of both economic belief structures is the most competitive.

There was virtually no one in the twentieth century, who predicted this. But the evidence seems to be bearing out that a blend of capitalism to encourage invention and innovation, and communism to bring government regulation and overall planning, works!

The same could be said in foreign policy. Take Iraq for example. The United States poured trillions of dollars into Iraq to "establish democracy", with few results. Moreover, America disregarded her economy, cutting taxes while spending enormous sums to "nation build" in Iraq.

Today, we are counting down the days until the United States pulls ALL of its troops out of Iraq.

And what did we gain, empirically?

Vietnam is probably far enough in the past to use empirical historical and ecnomic evidence to determine if the foreign policy that dominated the 1960s and 1070s was justified.

Clearly, 55, 000 American dead and millions of Vietnamese dead were not worth it.

Vietnam is a blended economy. It is copying its foremost rival, and traditional enemy China in world economic behavior. It has shown no aggression to its neighbors, discrediting totally the "dominoe theory" that led millions into battle against the "Communist Menace".

Empirically there was no menace. And, Vietnamese were right who said it was a war of national liberation, not communism versus capitalism.

It seems that the more ideology pushes an agenda, the greater the odds empirical evidence will prove that agenda was dead wrong.

Hitler for example pushed the agenda that the Jews were responsible for the Great Depression, and his brand of fascism would create a "thousand years" of German hegemony.

Clearly empirical hisorical evidence has disproved his agenda and theories at the cost of millions of lives and trillions of dollars, marks; etc.

So beware of ideologues! Take Newt Gingrich for example, who declares that Muslim Law is out to conquer the world. We need a crusade against Shariah Law his agenda says.

So, if he is elected, his belief structure, which has trouble with empirical evidence from the beginning, would plunge the United States into an idelological war with a legal system that hardly anyone can define, or find for that matter.

It is what you believe, but try to find some valid evidence empirically..

Otherwise you fall victim to demogogues!

My Way or Highway

We all sit and watch with disgust as the Congress is hopelessly deadlocked.

The national deficit is at record levels. There is little doubt that over time, this deficit will retard the growth and recovery of our economy. The short term effects however are less than certain.

Meanwhile conservatives try everything they can think of to cut spending, especially in programs that they hate like Social Security and Medicare.

Medicaid has been cut severely in several states. Welfare has been cut. Schools, public services are being cut everywhere.

So, even though there is gridlock in Congress, conservatives have been successful on several levels in cutting and ripping the economic safety net throughout the country.

Many Americans think there is some kind of strange balance between the two philosophies, that there is some kind of tie in the struggle to change American society. This is simply not true.

Conservatives are winning all over the country. In California, the "free" public university system has long ago been destroyed. Tuition and fees have gone up dramatically, making the system both not free, nor inexpensive. Thousands of middle class college students are finding themselves priced out of a college education.

This led to the famous pepper spraying of students at U.C. Davis (not exactly a hotbed of radicalism), who were protesting the endless tuition hikes.

So, there is NO balance between conservative political philosophy and progressives. Conservatives are winning.

The reason for these victories is conservatives have a 24/7 propaganda machine in Fox News and talk A.M. radio. These propaganda outlets are literally selling the public on several myths, and are dramatically shaping public opinion. Meanwhile, progressives have MNBC and that is about it, to counter this avalanch of propaganda.

So, middle class, ordinary Americans, who used to side with the New Deal philosophy because of the huge gap between the rich and poor, now support positions that only encourage that gap to grow.

Today America has a dramatic imbalance between the very few fabulously rich, and the rest of us. The 99% movement really is not accurate in its depiction of economic reality; it should be more like a 99.998% movement. Wealth is accumulating more in a few thousand mega-rich citizens, many of whom are conservative fascists. The Koch brothers for example are not putting millions into conservative propaganda but billions!

And the damage to democracy is palatable.

We are sliding into a fascist state, run by plutocrats, with myths holding the entire structure in place.

If history is an indication, this will ultimately implode, resulting in widespread protest, repression, and the evolution of a fascist dictatorship.

It is coming folks, unless you decide to turn off Fox and Limbaugh!!

Why Lie? Fascism is the Goal!

There were several articles in today's papers that pointed to the right's unbelievable propensity to lie about public issues.

One piece dealth with the latest "debate" and focused on foreign policy. Several flat out lies were exposed. Other mere exaggerations for effect were disclosed.

The funny thing is most of lies were so blatant that anyone with a cursory information source would see right through them.

And that is the rub. The truth is most conservatives have walled themselves off from objective media. Fox News, Lindbaugh and AM Radio dominate their reality.

Now I am not talking about conservatives reading "The Nation" or other progressive magazines. They don't even read "Newsweek" or "Time". They don't tune in "ITunes U" to listen to discussions. They avoid conflicting opinion like the plague.

I read, and read and read. I read conservative columns, like George Will, and tune in Fox News as long as I can stand it.

And what do I see...lies.

It really is a mirror universe of reality.

And this scares me. I have read extensively about political philosophy. Fascism is a political philosophy that so greatly damaged the world in the 20th Century that society itself crumbled in many areas; eg., the holocaust.

Propaganda is an essential ingredient of any fascist state. Moreover, mythology, exaggerating past glories and nostalgia for the past are center pieces of how a fascist state develops.

You see this everyday in the conservative lie factory. There appears to be a real belief that liberalism is so bad that lying and cheating are justified to attain political goals.

So Michelle Bachman lies about foreign policy. Mitt Romney runs an ad, quoting the President out of context, with devastating effect. The President's birthplace is still questioned.

It just goes on forever.

The danger? The danger is the development of fascist momentum to destroy our democratic institutions.

This danger is apparent and is increasing. It is manifesting itself in the radicalization of the Republican Party. There is simply no room in the Republican Party for moderation. Orville Norquest, who is quite simply a fascist, has pushed Republicans to sign a "no tax increase " pledge to the point that the very legitimacy of government has been irrevocably damaged.

This is readily apparent in California. Tax cutting is used to so hamstring government, that its very legitimacy is questioned. For example, local school boards are under attack all over the state, and are blamed by the public for the incessant cuts that are occurring.

And what comes of this? A mythology is created, that democratic decision making processes are too cumbersome, that government does not work. In America, when you mention the government, you are talking about the Constitution that begins "We the People". So, dysfunctional government really means dysfunctional democracy.

So how, you might ask, does this jive with "The Tea Party" movement, who uses the Constitution as their Bible?

If you listen to them, their "Constitution" is their interpretation of the Constititution. Liberal judges must be eliminated to make the "Constitution" pure. They yearn for a return to "a literal interpretation" of the Constitution; which of course is according to radical right wing dogma.

Repealing the 14th Amendment is an immediate target. This is ostensibly to counter federal power. But the heart of the 14th Amendment is "equal protection under the law', which protects individuals from states who discriminated after the Civil War. Without the 14th Amendment, Civil Rights essential end.

And that is exactly what the fascists want; to rid the country of civil rights.

And that means the end of our freedom. That means a single party state, and ultimately a dictator.

The stage is being set. I will bet you that in meetings with the rich and powerful, who are bankrolling the whole thing, they have openly hoped for the overthrow of the "liberal state" and the establishment of corporate backed dictatorship.

Sound far fetched? Just stay tuned.

This nation is not locked in a struggle between conservative and liberal, the conflict has gone way past that. This nation is locked in a struggle between liberal democracy and fascism.

The Coming of Fascism in America

California used to be a nice place to live. During the Great Depression, millions of Americans fled the Dust Bowl to come here. Hollywood was established with the movie industry, that still anchors the perception that California is place of beaches, clean rivers and majestic beauty.

All of these myth are at least partly true. Silicon Valley is a reality, spawning the development of a technological revolution that has literally changed the world.

Economic growth at a frentic pace, including the Dot Com Bubble, has resulted from this scientific, engineering marvel.

Silicon Valley has been fueled by the Universities that ring it. Stanford has led the way, followed by U.C. Berkeley, Santa Clara, CSU San Francisco, etc., etc. Brainpower has proven a substitute for the manufacturing muscle that powered the United States in the 20th Century.

And then there is Howard Jarvis, and Orville Norquist. In the 1970s the relatively high tax rates on income caused by the need to pay for WWII, and the inflationary surge that drove up property taxes, were used slyly by Howard Jarvis to lead a tax revolt.

There are two key ingredients to this revolt: 1. Taxes were characterized as too high. 2. Government spending at all levels is wasteful. The key ingredient to selling this to the voter was simply, the Republican Party saw a huge opportunity to finally turn the progress of the New Deal and regain politial parity with the Democrats.

So the formula was developed to cut taxes and raise spending. Ronald Reagan, a former Democrat, saw the opportunity to use the tax revolt to launch his political career, and ran on increasing defense spending to counter what the right wing of the Republican party had depicted as Democrats softness on national defense. This of course is the classic cut taxes, raise spending formula: Sold to stimulate the economy, really bad relative to creating huge deficits, which as we are learning, actually depresses the economy. In short, it doesn't work to stimulate the economy ast all!

Of course this all was a lie. The State Department and the Defense Department knew for decades that the Soviet Union was not near the threat that the public was fed, but it got people elected. And the Reagan tax cuts were immediately overshawdowed by an exploding federal deficit and immediate return to recession. Even Reagan saw the damage to the economy of tax cut led deficits, and disingenously quietly raised taxes to partly make up the difference, while still professing to be a "tax cutter" He then recruited Orville Nolrquist to sell the falsehood that he was a born again tax cutter, while spending like crazy, and backfilling the deficit with "tax reform" (he raised taxes eight times!). In other words, he lied to us for political reasons.

Expediency counts in politics. Lying wins!

Orville Norquist was recruited by Reagan to spread the myth that government is too "fat" (except in defense) so taxes could be cut and cut. In fact, an economist named "Laffer" even crafted a deception that cutting taxes would actually raise government revenue because the economy would grow faster. This of course never occurred, but Republicans still are chanting this lie. Norquist, a rich fascist (in the classical definition), took Reagan's charge and developed an anti-tax national movement that now forces Republicans to sign a no tax increase pledge, that directly is responsible for the huge federal deficit we see today. Norquist also is leading the secret plan to turn the United States into a fascist state (see below).

The "Super Committee" that was supposed to address the federal deficit, has predictably failed to reach any agreement, once again proving the government is deadlocked and quite literally cannot fund itself. A dysfunctional government is all part of the fascist plan to discredit the democratically elected government, and lure citizens into a plan to "fix it" by first discrediting then jailing those who disagree with them.

And then we have Bush and Gingrich. Recently Newt Gingrich, defending himself for the lobbying he most certainly did, but says he didn't, declared that he warned Freddie and Fannie (partly government sponsored mortagage organizations) not to give subprime loans to home buyers because he saw the "housing bubble". He did no such thing.....he is lying.

Conservatives try to explain away the housing bubble, that literally destroyed the middle class, as caused by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, not by the wholesale reduction of government regulations of banking led by George W. Bush.

This is nonsense, just like the tax cutting myth is nonsense. I am surprised Democrats don't use the video of President Bush's infamous "Ownership Society" speech, when he tried to sell privatization of Social Security AND deregulation of the mortgatge loan industry.

He failed miserably in "reforming " (read destroying) Social Security. He succeeded in deregulating housing loans, that in turn ruined the economy.

A ruined economy is fertile ground for fascism!

American business used the boatload of money from the tax cuts and capital gains cuts for the rich, to bankroll housing starts all over the country. The "sunbelt" particularly benefitted from this huge influx of money, and millions of homes were built in Nevada, Arizona, Texas; etc.

Of course, nobody paid much attention to the increasing heat of the summers and the dwindling water supplies. And, nobody really noticed that the housing starts were way out of proportion to the state and local economies; that there were not enough potential jobs to support all the new arrivals.

So, America was again duped, more is better they were told again and again; except when it comes to taxes. Liars loans were the standard, and millions entered the housing market, other millions began to play the housing market like a slot machine, buying houses, taking out seconds on them, and then selling them for a profit as the values went up and up.

California, thanks to good ole Prop 13, had low property taxes guaranteed by law, and greately inflated home value rates, that greatly encouraged the bubble. And, since the property taxes were now insufficient to fuel the infrastructure to support the millions of new homes, developer fees had to be used, further straining local governments. This resulted in massive cuts to local government, reducing police forces and encouraging will ultimatley encourage massive civil disobedience.

Do you detect a plan here?

In effect, thanks to Orville Norquist, government truly is being slowly drowned, starved for revenue at every level. The weaker the government, the better the chances for fascist "solutions" to grow.

There are templates for this kind of fascist revolution: read the Weimar Republic in Germany, 1917 to 1932.

The housing bubble of course burst, millions lost everything, the real estate and builder industry was destroyed, and the economy in California, Nevada and Arizona was destroyed.

And the culprit, according to Gingrich and Norquist, is "exessive government spending" . And the remedy is? You guessed it, more tax cuts; leading to more ineffective government, and the increasing call for fascist "reform".

Just today, on the news, a Republican said that we must cut, cut, cut and increasing revenue for government is "off the table".

And the economy? Well it is dead. People don't remember Bush's "The Ownership Society" speech. People in California, according to recent polls, still cling to the myth that taxes are actually too high, and government is wasteful. This myth continues while roads and bridges fall apart, schools are closed, college tuitions are raised to private school levels, police and fire are cut; etc.

On the federal level, since the "Super Committee" failed to compromise, Defense Department cuts, where the real money is, are supposed to automatically take place in 2013. Almost immediately, Republicans vowed to introduce legislation to stop these cuts; sounds just like Reagan doesn't it. Cut taxes and spend!

Ok, listen closely. IT DOES NOT WORK. IT IS BULLSHIT. THEY ARE LYING TO YOU. AND THEY HAVE A PLAN. THIS IS NOT HAPPENING BY ACCIDENT!

For months I have written countless articles on this blog, showing this truth over and over. And the fascist right in the country, with their billions of dollars, have continued lying to the American People about practically everything.

And you buy their story.

So, don't come crying when the gauntlet finally falls, and your democratic freedoms are taken away.

By the way, write this prediction down someplace:

The fascist takeover of the United States will be initiated to counter the endless demonstrations and violence by the dispossesed victims of a lopsided economy (in fact we are seeing the beginning of this with the 99 percent sit ins).

Fascists will finish the job Ricard Nixon almost accomplished, calling on "law abiding citizens" to quell the endless acts of civil disobedience. This will be coupled with the hard sell foreign terrorist threats, and will target a supposedly nuclear Iran. The Constitiution will effrectlively be suspended by a conservative Supreme Court, who will take away civil liberties. A fascist conservative President will complete the coup, being very careful to only jail "the protestors", but then will branch out as he declares martial law, to counter the millions who will be demonstrating.

The more protests go on, the more civil liberties are cut, the more repression will be justified. They are planning this right now!

So, don't complain as your standard of living continues to slide into Third World levels. Don't complain, when your son or daughter is jailed in "relocation camps" because they demonstrated against the increasing repression all around them. Don't complain when they finally come for you!

And when will this occur? It will begin in 2013 if a Republican is elected President and will take only eight years to accompliish. Oh, and I will probably be jailed as part of it, for this and other essays, along with thousands of my fellow progressives.

It is coming! You were warned!

The 99% Left Holding the Bag

The latest and greatest in the disingenuous legacy of the cons: Pat Toomey, a Tea Party Republican, has come up with a "compromise" that supposedly gets around the "pledge" to not raise taxes.

What amounts to the greatest sham in tax history, is being hatched by Toomey, an arch conservative, government hating fascist. That's right, fascist. Read the book, The "Anatomy of Fascism" before you call me a "namecaller".

At first, some progressive reporters even fawned over Toomey, because it appeared he was trying to break the Norquist pledge to never, and I mean never, raise taxes. Cutting taxes insanely forever is alright, but never raise a tax, no tax, ever....ever...ever...

So here comes Toomey's plan. What it appears to do is close lots of loopholes, resulting in an increase in taxes for the poor and middle class, and cuts the tax rates for the richest of the rich by about 10%!

That is right, he cuts the rich tax rate below the Bush tax cut rate. I will say that again, he gives a tax cut to the super rich, raises taxes on the middle class and poor to make up the difference.

What gall! With the 99% movement almost reaching the revolutionary stage, this aristocratic fascist has the temerity to actually slyly develop a plan that takes deductions for mortgages away, messes with the standard deduction, and slashes taxes for the richest of the rich.

By the way, the mortgage interest deduction does need to be reduced or eliminated, but another source of revenue must take its place! Toomey, as usual, has a tax cut for the rich take its place. There is no way the revenue can be replaced.

If you read about his Tax "idea"?, you will think for a moment that he has developed a plan to close loopholes, eliminating the need to stop the Bush tax cuts, and actually reduces the deficit.

Not so. Even if you entertain this madness, and I can't believe I am even doing so while writing this blog, the horrible fact is that the middle class has been dramatically reduced in size and wealth. Toomey's plan for example imagines a large revenue increase from the mortgage deduction elimination. What he misses is the middle class has lost homes at a record rate and now are renting. Young people, who have never entered the housing market, may never own a home, since renting foreclosed houses is now endemic all over the United States.

So, no mortgage interest deduction windfall if the tax deduction is removed. And, the amount of money in mortgages is about 1/2 of what is was, since millions of homeowners new have homes that are worth way less than they once were. When a family buys a home, that once was worth $400,000, it is now worth $200,000; you do the math on the mortgage interest loss.

Of course, Toomey and his fascist collaberators (sounds pretty harsh huh?), are so out of touch with mainstream America they haven't even considered this. Conservatives frequent only the rich and super rich (who are of course actually the sponsors and owners of the teaparty), and don't have a clue about the rest of us.

I am reminded of George P. Bush's famous grocery store incident, when he got in line to buy something, to mingle with the "common folk", and didn't know how to get by the cash register. It had been so long since he had to do a "commoner" task like buying a stick of gum, that he did not know how! Things like this cost the aristocrat the election.

Same thing with Toomey and his con fascists. They are so out of touch they don't or won't relate to ordinary Americans; even upper middle class Americans.

Ok, here is a primer about why the marginal tax rates where "high" in the post war world and why a cut could be done around 1980 by President Reagan.

World War II was the most destructive and expensive war EVER. In 1945 the federal deficit was almost 100% of GDP. That's right, we owed to ourselves almost as much as we totally produced.

This is even more impressive, considering America's industrial capacity was at full throttle in 1945.

I know, I know, the war bonds; they paid for the war. No they did not, they couldn't. In 2011 dollars the deficit was almost twice what it is today or more.

So, at the end of the war we had to start paying ourselves back.

Why ourselves? Well, in 1945 the rest of the world was destroyed. The United States did not, in fact could not, borrow from anyone to pay for the war. Europe was destroyed, most of Asia likewise. We basically put the war on the future generation (the baby boomers) to pay for over decades.

So, to start doing that effectively, taxes were raised, especially on the super rich. Democrats had long before, during the Great Depression, realized that the American economy has a propensity to concentrate wealth, much more than other economies. The middle class was growing fast to be sure, but to insure a core of payment for the war, marginal tax rates on the rich went up to almost 90%.

Dwight Eisenhower, no raging liberal to be sure, continued these tax rates, in fact increased them.

Meanwhile the middle class was booming, having a boatload of children, and paying more and more in taxes.

Around 1960, America was in a small recession, and the bill was being paid faster than anyone could have imagined. The economy was growing at a rate no one could have predicted, because the imbalance in income was flattening out, and the masses had way more to spend.

It did not hurt that Europe, Russia, and Asia were still recovering from the war. The United States quite simply was not only militarily the strongest nation on the planet; economically, even with the recession of 1959, America was supreme.

And, the middle class, the upper middle class, and the rich were prospering.

And then Europe and Asia (and the USSR) began to catch up.

Kennedy knew all this, and made his famous tax cut of 1960, modest by Bush standards, BECAUSE THE BILL FOR WWII WAS BEING PAID AT A FASTER RATE THAN PREDICTED.

Okey, now for the clincher. Most American did not realize that is what was going on, because almost all Americans wanted desperately to forget WWII.

If a politician had argued that we were paying for WWII with the relative high tax rates, they would have lost. Nobody talked about it. Nobody wanted to. Veterans, especially combat veterans even hid their citations (my wife's father did) from their families. They just wanted to live a nice middle class life, with a nice home, a white picket fence and no more war.

Vietnam changed all that. But that is another story.

Reagan and the Prop 13 tax cutting crusade were born out of the realization that the present tax rates (state and federal) were beginning to develop surpluses. Johnson's "War on Poverty" came about because revenues were sufficient to actually address the damage 250 years of slavery had done to African-Americans. This greatly overdue effort lasted exactly four years, and began to end with the election of Nixon in 1968.

So, next came the Reagan revolution, blaming liberals and the New Deal for the relative high tax rates, especially on his rich Hollywood friends, and establishing the cut tax religion.

Big government was the enemy, tax and spend liberals were holding back economic growth.

Of course the truth was Europe and Asia were finally able to globally compete for a share of manufacturing, cheap Japanese and European goods began to out compete more expensive American made ones. The manufacturing hegemony of America began a slow, steady decline, as foreign made goods flooded the hungry American consumer market.

And American went nuts. Rather than develop sensible trade policies, and a national economic policy to compete in what was fast becoming a global economy, we descended into an endless economic debate over lower taxes, free enterprise, state competition; et al. Meanwhile we also totally ignored the energy crisis, assuming the con by petroleum aristocrats that oil was going to last forever with no climate change results. Again, this is another story.

The result was, as we are seeing today, the lack of a competitive advantage in the global economy.

So, WWII and paying for it was the culprit for high taxes, not the New Deal. We paid down the debt faster than predicted, and then cut taxes way more than we needed to, which has created (ironically) a competitive disadvantage in the global economy.

Now, in over-reacting to the recession, the foolish tax cut caused Great Recession, we stand to make things much worse.

It is the revenue. We need to pay for the Bush tax cuts and the Bush terrorist wars with more revenue. Luckily, even though the middle class has been decimated, the rich are awash in revenue, and higher marginal tax rates, plus reducing tax cuts to what is left of the middle class (they were not enough to make much difference anyway to individual families) will reduce the deficit and put us in a more competitive position in the global economy.

And what are Toomey and the cons doing? Why, they are cutting taxes even more, creating a even greater inequality between the rich and rest of us, and dooming our competitiveness in the world economy. Without a middle class to consume world economy goods and services, middle classes are growing rapidly in the "third world". In a sense, or tax cut mania is producing a third world country here, and the middle class consumer engine, that drove our prosperity, is moving overseas. The market is moving away from the United States. For example, when was the last time you though about the consumers in Brazil and how many American products they buy? You haven't of course, because we are all trained that we are the ONES, the only global market that counts. Talk to a current global economy CEO, and they will tell you the American market is no longer the only one, it is fast fading.

Leaving the 99 percent of us holding the bag.

It's the Head Stupid

It happened yet again. Chris Owusu, of Stanford, was hit in the head by a defensive back in the Oregon State game Saturday. This time he didn't get up. He laid there, seemingly unconscious. The crowd, who cheered the "big time hit" and fumble that led to a possible game changing touchdown, booed as a yellow flag flutterred down; negating the fumble and touchdown

The Oregon State crowd was much more enraged by what they perceived as a bad call, of a head shot hit, than by the safety and mortality of Owusu.

As time passed, and Owusu did not get up, some stopped booing and started praying.

It has always disgusted me when a player is hurt severely in football, the fans and teams start praying, and then, when the player gets up, or is carted off, immediately go back to "kill him" chants.

Does God just look the other way to this Roman Gladiator type behavior?

And then the T.V. "experts" weighed in. Typically, they ranted about how the players could not "play the game", or "act aggressively" if head shots were called. One of the announcers, who interestingly played quarterback, went on and on about how head shots were part of the game.

Bullshit! I played four years in what was the Pac-8, and coached high school football. I was coached by some of the greatest coaches in history. Head shots are NOT a part of football, they are a product of helmets that weight way too much, and a gangster mentality that has no place in the game!

This is what a head shot really is: It is a chickenshit tackle. When a receiver is running at you, and ball is coming at you, and you are essentially stationary, it is a visual nightmare. Most DBs are smaller than the receivers they must cover. A post or stant, positions the receiver at the defender. The defender must break up the pass, or tackle the receiver. This all takes place in an instant. The EASY play is to aim your shoulder pad at the side of the receiver's head. DBs are coached to push the receiver's head, disrupt his eyes, so he can't catch the ball. If you hit the receiver's head, ESPECIALLY WHEN IS IS LOOKING BACK FOR THE BALL, more than likely he will drop the ball. The danger to the DB is minimal, unless you lead with your head, then you could break your neck and die. So, you shut your eyes (all tacklers do) and hit his head with your shoulder.

The DB will look like a hero, he will have made a "big time hit". The receiver will probably get a concussion, and you might "turn the game".

But secretly you just executed a chicken shit hit, a cowardly act where he really shyed (avoided contact).

What does that mean. Okey, I played at 183 pounds. The typical tight end in those days weighed 250. When the tight end came over the middle, I was giving up almost 50 pounds, to an object moving at me at 25 miles an hour. Think about it! A head shot is a coward hit.

Head shots have NO place in football, they never have, never will. Many times, if you try for a head shot, you "whiff" (miss), and the receiver trots into the endzone. If you do hit him, you can kill him. That is courage????

Fractured skulls killed so many football players at the turn of the 19th century that Teddy Roosevelt almost banned the game. Many colleges dropped football in the late 19th century, because young men were dying. The flying wedge was banned, and helmets required, and fractured skulls stopped. Concussions did not.

Getting your "bell rung" was so common when I played that we didn't even tell the trainer most of the time. My ears have rung constantly ever since, every day, along with an aching back, from my big time college football years. I can remember (?) sitting in front of my locker trying to remember my combination (many just left their locker unlocked) because of getting my bell rung almost every week.

And that was practice, game collisions are twice as strong.

The idea of football is to tackle the opponent. If his knee touches, he is down and the play stops. If you can break up the pass, by hitting the ball or intercepting it, that is your job as a defensive player.

Hitting with great force supposedly cowers the opponent, making them fearful, so your team can win and dominate.

Think about that for a minute. In NCAA D1, ALL the players are all state. All the players, even the bench sitters, are "football players", not pretenders like high school. There are very few physical cowards out there. Getting hit hard is part of being a football player. A huge hit is simply forgotten, the idea is to score more points. You can wear a team out with conditioning and physical play, the "big hit" just isn't consideded by the players. In fact, a chicken shit hit, only motivates a team to play harder.

It's the crowd that craves the big hit. It is the Roman Gladiator effect that does this.

Calling and fining head shots must continue, and must be inforced more strictly. There can be no exceptions. Those players who do it consistently need to be suspended or driven from the game.

Owusu was wearing a mouthpiece that registers the force of head shots. Data from that hit is transmitted to a receiver that records the violence of the hit. I will bet that the data from that hit will astound any scientist. The wonder is he ever got up. The intensity of head shots is MORE than we estimate, the damage to the brain is MORE than scientists care to admit.

Football is a great game. And it can remain a great game without the "crowd pleasing" head shot. There is simply no purpose in pulverizing athlete's brains, so they go prematurely senile, or have a whole host of other brain impairments.

So, the next time a head shot happens, and the crowd roars, tell them to shut up. If an idiotic announcer prattles on about how it is "part of the game", switch channels.

Mark my words, if we don't end head shots now, the game will end. The scientific data that is finally being considered, cannot be ignored.

We don't have to kill players to win!

Cut taxes raise spendng

George W. Bush had won in Florida by a combination of no re-count, subtrafuge, and the a conservative majority on the Supreme Court. He was the first President in the modern era elected by the electoral college with a minority of the popular vote. The fact that such an undemocratic thing could occur in the world's most advanced democracy was no lost on Americans.

Nevertheless, Bush blundered on. Immediately, due to the taxing nature of basically stealing an election, he took weeks of vacation; blithly ignoring warnings that terrorists were planning an attack on the United States.

Of course 9-11 changed all that. In a right world, Bush's temeridy and reluctance to act in the critical moments of the attack would have been further proof that he was an accidental President, not fit to govern.

But, 9-11 gave him an opportunity.

The opportunity was not only to start a war with a country that had nothing to do with the attack; the opportunity was to adopt the most basic political strategy used by the inept, and the incompetent politician.

Bush decided to cut taxes and raise spending.

The economy flagged after 9-11. A small recession started, primarily because the American People were frightened, and Bush provided zero leadership during the crisis.

To counter that Bush built up the military, started wars in two places, and CUT taxes.

Ostensibly the cut in taxes was to "stimulate" the economy. Actually what it did was shift trillions of dollars to the rich 1%, who had bankrolled Bush's theft of the election. The spending accelerated, as Bush and the neo-cons attempted to run "nationbuilding" exercises in two countries, by privatizing the efforts.

To keep public opinion quiet, to avoid large causalty numbers, Bush's administration attempted to fight two wars with small combat arms units, and large support contigents. These support contingents included Halebuton Inc, and others, private companies who moved in, getting trillions of dollars for essentially doing nothing.

The corruption is just now being uncovered, with billions of dollars given away, books cooked; etc. Iraq and Afghanistan have basically been raped, trillions of dollars have been squandered on water systems that don't work, barracks that don't exist, and on an opium trade that is better than ever.

And the effect of basically eight years of cut taxes and raise spending, was a huge recession/depression that destroyed America's middle class.

This also added enrormous power to the wealthy conservative elites, who already were profiting hugely from the increase in oil prices that naturally occurs from the oil peak (we are slowly running out of gas so it costs way more).

The result was the election of a Democrat in 2008.

Unfortunately, the conservative elite will not tolerate that. A Democrat, and a smart one at that, understood the con that has taken place, and began working to reverse what is an avalanch of inequality in the country.

So, we go into 2012 with President Obama incredibly being blamed for the economic catatrophe that Bush so artfully fashioned. And, the conservative elite is throwing billions at the political process in an attempt to continually fool an American population that stupidly buys the idea of lowering taxes, but doesn't want to give up the government programs (and defense spending) that keeps some of them at least working. Essentially they want their cake and eat it too.

If Bush would have demanded sacrifice to pay for the wars, raised rather than lower taxes, the defict we all "worry about" would never had happened.

But the truth never works against a cut taxes/raise spending politician, with a population who still holds to buying snakeoil rather than truth.

So we continue our spin down into fascism.

Sportsmanship

The recent Stanford/USC game was a classic. Both teams struggled for almost four hours and the game was finally decided (?) in the third overtime.

As a former Stanford player, I was impressed by the effort by both teams. It was, I thought, and example of the best in college football.

Then the demon in USC football stepped up. USC in on probation for the Bush transgressions of five years ago. The school had to forfeit all games, give up a BCS Championship, and Bush had to turn in his Heisman Trophy. There was talk of the dealth penalty by the NCAA, the violations were that egregious.

This year's team was adversely affected, no post-season play, no league championship, and several scholarships were taken away. Moreover, while on probation, any player can transfer to another school with no penalty.

This is pretty serious stuff by any measure.

So, what does the head coach do after the game, he whines about the officiating! Meanwhile, during the game, some of the USC players, not all, are flagged for unsportsmanlike conduct, taunting, and a head shot that incapacitated a Stanford standout player. In short, some (not all) of the USC players acted like street thugs.

And what did the head coach do, he whined about the officiating. He whined, in fact, so much, that he was fined by the PAC-12, $10,000, and a player was suspended for a half in the next game.

Any of the good feelings anyone had about USC's effort in the game were quickly lost in the post-game controversy. USC has an image problem to be sure, but their coach surely doesn't act like it.

The old arrogance of "we are SC" was in evidence; which means USC hasn't apparently learned a thing.

Football is a game. When I was at Stanford, in my three years on the Varsity, we lost my Sophomore year fairly close, were blown out my Junior year, and lost on a last minute field goal my senior year to USC. Those were the days of O.J. Simpson, who apparently, according to locker room rumors, was collecting money from alumni while he was playing. The USC teams then were dominant, competing for the mythical national championship every year.

When we played them we were competing against players who rarely attended class, were basically semi-professionals, with future doctors, teachers and lawyers. USC a couple years after I graduated were cited by the NCAA for sending players during the summer to make up units to Junior Colleges that were miles apart, for morning classes! This was technically impossible; they cheated and got caught.

We competed to be sure, gave them all we had, but usually lost.

But hardly any of them graduated. Most, especially minority players, wound up back in their poor neighborhoods, nowhere.

Stanford ex-players did something. After over forty years I can attest to that. Many of the USC players did nothing.

Oh sure, O.J. did something; he was all NFL and in the Hall of Fame. But then...?

My point is USC still has the same old problem. The arrogance is still there. The expediency is still there. And they are losing. The NCAA by the way is still there as well.

They just do not get it.

Bonus March Again

The Bonus Marchers and the 99%

During World War I, it became evident that the country could not pay its soldiers enough.  The war was fed by the largest peace time draft in the nation's history, larger than the Civil War.   And, unlike the Civil War, patriotic young men could not buy their way out of service.  During the Civil War the draft was very unpopular, resulting in some rioting.  To quell this anger, a draftee could pay someone else to take his place. 

Of course this meant that the rich did not have to fight, and many did not, as the casualty rates climbed into the hundreds of thousands. 

World War I was different.  A patriotic fervor shot through the country, as the United States entered the war to prove it was now a great power on the world stage. 

As usual, this inferiority complex was based on nothing, since America had been a world power for nearly one hundred years; after the Civil War the United States was without a doubt the most powerful military force on the planet, it just didn't know it.

So, the draft filled the ranks, and the war was fairly short by world war standards.  It was so short,  the income tax had just been started in 1916, that the pay was ridiculously low.

So, Congress came up with the idea of a Bonus, that would be paid in 1940, to WWI veterans, who would be retiring about then.  Moreover, widows and orphans of veterans would also get the bonus.

This was the first "entitlement" benefit ever attempted by the United States government.  By today's standards it was ridiculous low, but it was a promise nonetheless.

Everything was fine until 1929.  The Great Depression made it clear that the government would have great difficulty making good on the bonus, since tax revenues had already been cut by Republicans during the 1920s, with the same assumption that the free enterprise system would fix everything.  This approach worked as well then as it has now, resulting in economic ruin, injustice and inequality. 

Of course, in 1929, 30 and 31, it was obvious the private enterprise system was failing, and the small bonus the veterans had been promised, became a "pipe dream".

At first this was not a big thing, after all it was a small amount of money for each veteran.  But as the depression deepened, and it became obvious Wall Street Bankers and investors had schemed, cheated, and lied in rampant speculation that destroyed middle class lives.   Veterans, who had no unemployment insurance, now looked upon the bonus promise as yet another lie that had cost them their economic futures. 

In 1930 there was no safety net.  Private charity was it, no welfare, no unemployment.  People were starving.

So the veterans marched.  They marched all over the country, calling attention to the unfairness of the American capitalist system.  To be sure, there were socialists and communists involved, seeing an opportunity for their cause (remember the Bolshevik Revolution was barely a decade old).  Regardless, there is no evidence that the radical left in fact led the Bonus March, even though conservatives have been claiming so eversince. 

Like today's 99 percent demonstrations, the Bonus Marches started peacefully.  After all these were veterans, of the Great War, and deserved respect.

Soon however, conservatives like Hoover lost patience with the marchers, and finally called in troops to contain the protests.  Famously, in Washington D.C. a riot broke out, mostly led by the bungling of  Douglas MacCarther (who even then was fancying himself a national leader).  The Army charged the marchers, shots were fired, and there were casualties.  The marchers were driven from their encampment, and Hoover was made out to be the villain;  attacking brave veterans.    In fact, history shows this debacle to be the Army's fault. 

Hoover's apparent lack of compassion, added to Roosevelt's campaign, and led to Hoover's defeat in the 1932 Presidential race. 

Today, the 99% are in a sense just like the Bonus Marches of the 1930s.  They are marching because of economic injustice and are angry with the financial elites in the country.  And, conservatives are calling for violent put downs of their supposed unlawful assemblies. 

It is interesting,  to watch conservatives  when the obvious economic injustice of the United States is divulged.  Af first they are amused, then they discount the protests, then quickly they call for violent suppression. 

Of course, in the 30s this suppression only added fuel to the fire, leading to the New Deal under Roosevelt.

Should we be so lucky again this time!!!!