Georgia on My Mind?

In today's Sacramento Bee, a conservative columnist, former speach writer for Wilson, Reagan; etc., wrote a piece extolling the virtues of Georgia over California, for Georgia's supposed economic vitality versus California's lagging economy. She went on and on about Georgia's gentiel ways, its beautiful mansions....oh how "Gone with the Wind...ish!"

I guess she never drives west from Sacramento anymore to visit Silicon Valley, or the Bay Area, that is roaring back from the recession. Oh, that's right, San Francisco and the Bay Area is liberal territory. She must be talking about rural California, where conservatives rule, and everyone is broke!

Anyway, what follows is a response to her diatribe:

Are you kidding me? You actually deified the South, particularly Georgia, as the place California should be?

What! This is the same Georgia that killed Civil Rights Workers, forced thousands of Cherokees off their ancestral lands, fought for the continuation of slavery, was a bastion of segregation, and today has low wages, poverty and an economy based on third world values.

You wrote longingly about the Confederate Soldier Memorial, with its grand tribute to.....traitors. Yes, that is right, every Confederate Soldier, everyone was technically a traitor. And, those who had been soldiers before the war, broke their solumn pledges to preserve and protect the Constitution of the United States. They were not heros, they were traitors that cost the nation almost 600,000 dead! They cost another 100 years of Jim Crowe, countless lynchings, and agony beyond belief.

Did you read "The Help"?

The engine of California prosperity was two things: in the north the huge federal projects that gave us the Sacramento Valley as the breadbasket of the country; in the south, the huge wartime industry during WWII that morphed into the Defense Industry of today. The Space Race, with its enormous federal infrastructure investment, poured billions into California's economy.

Gold started the boom, mining next, logging, then agriculture and defense spending (lots of it).Through all of this, the state accepted the idea that the government needed to provide the infrastructure for commerce to thrive; so we have (too many) freeways, a K-16 "low cost" educational system; and a university research engine that has revolutionized the world.

Have you visited Silicon Valley lately? Everyday, Stanford, U.C. Berkeley, and the U.C. CSU system pours out thousands of research papers, reinventing us.

If we would listen to them, and embark on new green energy initiatives, solar power;etc., we would be into yet another Golden State boom.

But, thanks to wing-nuts like yourself, who are tying us to the automobile as it plunges us over the oil peak cliff, we are missing the train (literally and figuratively).

Does Georgia have a Silicon Valley, a Sacramento Valley? Your economic values and points of view are deeply flawed, and we are suffering everyday the products of a philosophy that has deregulated and savaged our economy.

Oh, I suppose "tax and spend" policies created the housing bubble, that is the single greatest reason California has not recovered fully from the recession. The housing bubble was a direct result of President Bush's wrongheaded "ownership society" deregulation nonsense. It was not caused by tax and spend...we had huge tax cuts, remember?

The state deficit, that you have the cheek to blame on tax and spend Democrats, is in fact the product of decades of senseless and non-productive tax cuts, that have greatly weakened the infrastructure supporting education, and transportation systems.

Our colleges are turning away the next Steve Jobs everyday. Our schools are overcrowded, class sizes at national highs, and a drop out rate second to none.

You are killing us! Conservatives convinced us in the 1970s, thanks to your patron saint Ronald Reagan, to stop supporting the very political approach that had resulted in decades of prosperity.

But Georgia, and the south, as an example for California to emulate? Really!?

If you like it so much, move there! Please.

Winning Like That Is Not Worth It

So once again we see a football power sanctioned by the NCAA. Once again, we hear the cries of "too strict" or "not strict enough" as the NCAA tries fitfully to police itself.

USC, Ohio State, SMU, etc., etc., the list goes on.

College football is big business. Millions of dollars are at stake, alumni bragging rights, and athletic departments rise and fall on ratings.

When I was playing for Stanford, in the 1960s, we struggled against UCLA and USC. We did not beat them in the three years I played on the Varsity.

We also heard that they cheated. O.J. Simpson apparently picked up thousands of dollars every week from his doorstep. UCLA players did not go to classes, or had jobs on campus they never did, and got paid for them. Some USC players never went to class, but miraculously passed 12 credits every semester. And, during the summer, players were able to accumulate units from junior colleges, separated by miles, in a five minute passing period (that later got USC on probation).

We did not cheat. We went to class, and graduated. The exceptional few who made the NFL, finished and got their BAs. And we got beat. We did not go to the Rose Bowl; although a couple years after I graduated we did.

Cal improved dramatically in the years after I graduated, and got put on probation for having students go to class in the place of football stars, who did not graduate, did not attend class, and learned nothing. African American student-athletes did not graduate in great numbers, were basically used by Cal, and then returned to the ghetto, no diploma, no future. But Cal won.

Stanford did not do that. Stanford still does not do that. Oh sure, we have a DUI every once in awhile, but cheat, no.

I sincerely do not think it happens, other than having a list of low homework classes that included Environmental Engineering; Art History, and other classes that are not easy by a long shot.

There are no "Mickies" at Stanford.

So, once again, a "football factory" is placed on probation. This time because the head coach, and other officials, keeping the football program in a "special status", went so far that they failed to turn in a predatory pedophile, who raped dozens of children, under the nose of the football leadership.

In fact, the pedophile was a former "emeritus" coach, who used his access to athletic facilities, to rape young boys.

But, like many football "powerhouses", a separate standard was the norm, football staff and players got special treatment, aloof even from criminal sanctions. A separate culture was allowed to fester, protecting the most heinous of crimes.

When I was a sophomore, in 1966, the United States was not sure of how it would feed the Armed Forces for the Vietnam War. If you fell behind in credits, or let your grades fall, you would be drafted.

Coach John Ralston called a team meeting, to discuss our deferments and the what the athletic department could do if we lost a deferment.

Now, we are talking not only the loss of your scholarship, the loss to the "program", but and an all expense paid one year visit to what we called "the green" (Vietnam).

And Coach Ralston stood there, and told us all, Jim Plunkett, Gene Washington, on down, that he would not lift a finger to help us if we lost our deferments. No special treatment, no deals, no interference with a draft board, no admission to a reserve unit: nothing.

Nobody lost their deferment, not one. We did have a couple who quit college and enlisted, but NOBODY fell short.

The coach made it very clear there was NO special treatment, no separate culture; even in possible life and death situations. No special treatment period. If we all were called to serve, like WWII, he would not lift a finger for any special treatment.

You went to class, you hashed (worked in the kitchens), you worked at the corp yard as part of your scholarship, and you went to practice, and played hard for the Cardinal. You put in longer hours than most other students, you were stretched thin during the season, but you learned to budget your time, marshall your energy, and succeed at one of the world's leading Universities and compete in one of the toughest conferences in the nation (USC was the National Champion in 1967).

And Stanford is not a football factory. And Stanford is not in the top 10 most of the time.

And Stanford proves that you don't have to be a Penn State to succeed. You don't have to cheat to compete. You are in college to get an education and play football, in that order. The only way you are special, is you are privileged to have such an opportunity, period. Otherwise, you are like all the other students, no more, no less.

What happened to Penn State is an illustration of the dangers to an institution's very soul that "winning at any cost" brings.

Winning like that is NOT WORTH IT!

Poor Little Rich Girl

Eva Rausing

I just read the partial obituary on Eva Rausing, the fabulously wealthy American wife of the Rausing fortune.

Note how the "fortune" is defined like a living thing. In America we worship wealth. In fact, we all pursue wealth as the single highest indicator of success. Once a few of us get it, many of us mess it up!

The United States, is the most materialistic nation on earth. This has been proven empirically by countless studies, surveys; etc.

We worship the rich and famous, no matter what their essential character. If a person acquires wealth, no matter how, they have automatic status. Even if they are scoundrels, we give them homage; Charlie Sheen, Donald Trump; etc.

And, in the American status game, the rich are praised for how hard they work, or worked to get what they have, even if they never have worked a day in their lives. We assume hard work created all wealth.

Polls show that President Obama's attacks on the top 1% of "wage earners" in the United States are problematic. Many middle class citizens resent such attacks on the rich, because "they worked hard to get it"; or "they are an example of what I aspire for"; "hard work gets you ahead".

In short, we worship the rich for their alleged work ethic.

Eva Rausing is a good example. She was born to huge wealth and married into one of the richest families on the planet.

It is interesting that the Rausing wealth came from the invention of a milk carton. The family got super rich because of a milk carton; one of real social advances of our age.

Eva's rich husband had nothing to do with that invention by the way, he was born into his family's wealth. Eva had nothing to do with her wealth either. They both were born rich.

Eva met her husband while trying to break her lifelong addiction to drugs. She "fought" her addiction for years, was busted four years ago while trying to smuggle drugs (for personal use), was not punished, and finally, predictably died of a drug overdose.

Her obit, written by her family, puts what you expect, a positive spin on her death. It remarks that "she worked tirelessly" on anti-addiction efforts.

She, and her husband, evidently gave millions to various philanthropic causes; including addiction programs. In fact, one of the C.E.O.s of such an addiction program, remarked how selflessly she worked to cure addiction.

In others perhaps! And "Tirelessly"? Really? What she probably did was sign checks, that went to addiction treatment. If she would have worked tirelessly, she would have got better. She didn't. But, note the myth, how hard she supposedly worked. She never worked! We just assume she did.

Addiction is a disease. It is very difficult to treat. Addiction is not a crime, it is a physical and psychological illness.

But, like any illness, it requires the patient to become actively involved in its cure. It is hard work!

Every study I have read on alcoholism states that the addict cannot recover, until they admit they have a problem, and even hit bottom, where death looks them in the face. And then, they must work at it every day to stay sober. And the work is hard, and it is unforgiving, and it is soul breaking.

Resisting the "need" for a drink, consumes many alcoholics until the day they die. You must work at it, and even then, some who work really hard, fail and relapse.

But for the super rich, it is even more of a challenge. Because the middle class in this country mindlessly worships wealth, rich addicts can do about anything they want. The rich are given countless chances, will never lose everything to addiction, so many don't get well.

Charlie Sheen leaps to mind. He even has done a commercial, in which he stands in front of a train, causing a massive train wreck, then walks directly toward the camera and says, "Life gives you limitless chances".

He should say, "life gives us rich guys" endless enabled chances.

For the rich. But for the poor addict, the wino on the street corner, endless chances are pretty small. In fact, zero would be the amount of chances they get.

The vast majority of poor addicts, after family enabling, run smack into the criminal justice system, that tries to reform them by punishing them. And, the resulting felony record, ends their "chances", leaving them homeless, and jobless, almost guaranteeing they will relapse.

And then there is Charlie and Eva, who relapse hundreds of times, buy their way out of any punishment, and we worship them for it.

Whitney Houstan is DEAD. Eva Rausing is DEAD. And Charlie Sheen, unless he gets well, will also be prematurely DEAD.

Death is the end of every addiction that is not treated. Premature death is the end for every addiction period. Recovered addicts, especially to tobacco, can never erase the damage done to their bodies. My mother was part of a large family, whose life expectancy was in the 90s, and died prematurely in her late 70s. She smoked for forty years. She died of emphysema.

The majority of the super rich have never worked a day in their lives. Eva certainly did not. Her and her husband, were born into wealth, got hooked on drugs as teenagers, and had absolutely, as Charlie Sheen remarkably states, "endless chances".

And those "endless chances", killed Eva.

And THAT is killing America. Everyday, our criminal approach to addiction, our one strike and you are done, creates more doomed addicts. And, our mindless worship of rich addicts, creates a culture of enabling that dooms ALL addicts.

Addiction is not easy to treat. True addicts relapse. But endless relapses, must be enabled. Wealth enables addicts. Families enable addicts.

We enable addicts!

Only tough love, and of God too, by the way, can begin to the heal the addict.

And Love, is the one thing all the money on earth cannot buy.

What Are You Thinking?

Ok, predictably the House of Representatives once again voted to repeal the Affordable Care Act.

Meanwhile, yet another health insurance company, Aetna, made a mistake and disclosed the millions it has sent to political super pacs to destroy the Affordable Care Act.

This is AFTER they sat in "collaborative sessions" with Congress, to input into the writing to the bill, and have PUBLICLY come out in support of the Bill. That's right, Aetna has come out in support of the Act, but send millions to Super Pacs to destroy it. Real character, huh?

Ok, listen closely, all you middle class fellow citizens. It you dare, take this list off of this blog, copy it, and put it on your refrigerator.

1. Rich people hate your guts. They hate you. They want to destroy you.

2. Rich people want to take all of your rights away from you.

3. Rich people disdain your very existence. They consider you less than human, because you "work for a living". You are "commoners"; sounds aristocratic because it is.

4. Rich people are scared to death of you. They know how outnumbered they are; they are basically afraid.

5. Rich people are very good at manipulating you. They constantly put out propaganda that stresses that people beneath you are getting something for nothing so you will support their crap. That is it, no more complicated. You are being used!

6. See number 5, you are getting worked, used, manipulated, fooled, conned...how many other ways can I say it.

7. Your parents, and grandparents, who survived WWII and the Great Depression would be ashamed at your gullibility. Many of you, "who used to be a Democrat", now consume the lies that are dealt you every day, on Fox News, and Con Radio. And you believe the lies...when deep down you know better.

8. You have abandoned the American Dream. Many of you have simply quit, in cynicism. You have turned your back on a fight, a fight for the welfare and happiness of your fellow citizens.

9. You have quit on democracy. Shame on you. Your parent and grandparent died to protect the rights you are giving away.

9. Rich people, and the Republican Party, have now decided to destroy you. That's right, destroy your lives, your fortunes and your children's future.

10. You are conned into believing that Global Warming is a sham, when it is going to kill your grandchildren. So you believe the crap that it all is a liberal plot, when you see its evidence all around you.

11. And the worst thing, is you can, in an instant, end this bullshit, and get the country back to what we should be doing. But you have decided to renounce your progressive routes, hate government, and play into the hands of (see number 1). So you vote the bastards in, who mock you once they are elected.

There, that is the truth, as I watch the county I love being destroyed because of the foolishness and gutlessness of my fellow middle class members.

No Laughing Matter

It's killer hot, with tornadoes, wild lightning storms....ha, ha, ha.....

I mistakenly watched Good Morning America today, and got the weather, and talk about the weather once again from Disney Incorporated (who true to its conservative owners actually makes fun of the killer weather). The group chortled about the weird weather, really funny huh...They talked about it with smiles and laughter...

A five minute bit was presented, showing people sweating, hurting, a baseball team run off the field by lightning; and all the while the commentators laughing, making light of a heat wave that has killed over twenty at last count.

And the lightning storms, and the tornadoes, and the sixty mile per hour winds that have burned Colorado, New Mexico, and now Idaho almost up, are also funny somehow.

Its just old "mother nature" messing with us.

Nowhere in the weather reports is a mention made of the record breaking phenomenon and the link to climate change.

That is because, they made us promise now, that individual violent killer weather phenomena, let's call it happy times, cannot be connected to something as "controversial" as climate change.

It is just old "mother nature" messing with us.

A weather forecaster in Washington D.C., actually slipped, told the truth, that the blazing and unremitting heat, wind, tornadoes, hurricanes; just basically hell on earth, is part of climate change (global warming). He was nearly fired for that conclusion.

Watch your local weatherman sometimes. They often kid about extraordinary weather, or marvel at it, like a kid at Disneyland. They act like the killer weather is somehow like an amusement park, or day at the zoo; watch the people cook!

Now over 99% of climate scientists are saying we have moved past the "tipping point" and global warming is irrevocably damaging the environment, and will get worse, much worse.

But we have a political party in America, the Republicans, who deny climate change. In fact, their standard bearer, who used to publicly support efforts to at least recognize global warming, now is a loyal skeptic too. After all, I am told by my conservative friends, in the 1970s scientists predicted another ice age.

So freaking what? That was a small percentage of scientists, who were using erroneous data. Every climate scientist in the freaking world is saying global warming is NOT just coming, it is here!

Watch the major league rs run for their lives from a freak lightning storm (caused by unreal heat clashing with a cold front)....ha, ha, ha. Marvel at the airliner that sunk into the runway, because it was so hot it melted the asphalt....ha, ha, ha. Tickle me with pictures of garages blown miles away from their houses...ha, ha, ha. A real knee slapper, the old lady, who withers from the heat, her electricity has been off for a week due to extraordinary storms...ha, ha, ha. Laugh hysterically as the forest service bombers spray tons of fire retardant on sides of mountains that look like a nuclear free fire zone...ha, ha, ha.

Are we out of our fricking minds? What kind of people are we, when we allow these fools to get away with this? Our world is melting in front of our eyes, millions are going to die, other millions are going to have to move or die; and our idiot weather people joke about the greatest threat to mankind since when the last comet crashed into the planet.

Ha....Ha...Ha...

Do Nothing LaMalfa

After trying to pass a symbolic motion for a public vote on rapid rail, that had no chance of passing, our earnest state legislator "Do nothing La Malfa", walked up to the head of the State Senate and made some attempt at congratulations. As if his move was in any way serious!

La Malfa had no chance to force a public vote on the state senate's deliberation on the future of the high speed train project. He was, of course, grandstanding so he can tell his Northern California sucker consituents that he fought for them, blocking a project that will bring thouands of jobs to San Francisco south, do nothing for us and enhancing his coronation as our next Congressman.

As usual, yet another huge state/federal project has been adopted, with no benefit to the north state. As usual, now that we elect one Republican after another in a Blue State, we get absolutely nothing, other than increasingly rich representatives.

Conservatives like do-nothing Wally Herger, and his partner, do nothing Doug LaMalfa, know that once elected, they can use their position to make themselves rich (or richer), while doing nothing for the voters back home, because they stand for fiscal austerity, except for themselves; amassing millions while on the public dole is the way to represent an area with 25% unemployment?

Here's an idea. How about fighting for an extension of the high speed rail system through Redding on to Seattle? And, start talking about cutting a rail system through to the coast from Redding. This would link the noth state with the Pacific, be a huge boon to commerce, and would give access to a port that will not be adversely affected by the inevitable damage that rising sea levels will do to the San Francisco Bay area.

But a person would have to look forward, not backward into his own pocket. A person would have to put his public's interest ahead of his own.

LaMalfa, oh no...he stands for....what does he stand for anyway? Oh yes, agricultural subsidies for the rice industry that is his industry and meal ticket.

He sure doesn't stand for us.

United We Stand

On this Fourth of July, as we celebrate the birth of the United States, it is wise I think to discuss why we are here.

Why is the United States in existence, rather than still being 50 colonies, or provinces of Great Britain (or France for that matter)?

The thirteen colonies became economically viable in about two hundred years or so.

Starting from a handful of mostly religious exiles, the colonies grew in white population by quite frankly relocating or killing the Native American inhabitants.

To jump start the economy so it could compete with Europe, slavery was introduced with indentured servitude. Many of our ancestors were either slaves, or indentured servants. The slaves could not gain their freedom, the servants could.

This, in a sense, was the birth of the American Dream, a person could advance past his station through hard work, which excluded slavery in some cases. For a time, slaves could also work their way to freedom; this ended with the cotton gin.

Of course, the American Nightmare, was the development of one of the most brutal slave systems in human history. Fully two million slaves were imported into the colonies over about 150 years, with many dying along the way.

We still struggle with that.

But the colonies persisted, and quickly clashed with Great Britain economically and politically. Great Britain was locked in mortal combat with perennial rival France, culminating in what we call the French and Indian War. The aftermath of this, was that the colonies enjoyed increased status with the British, having assisted the King in his spat with France, and were able to push the Native Americans back further as a result of the war. Victory in the French and Indian War was good for the colonies, bad for the Native Americans.

The Cherokee Nation, the strongest and most formidable opposition to colonial expansion, suffered the most from this development. My ancestors backed the wrong side.

To win the Revolutionary War, or War for Independence, the thirteen colonies had to unify. This was difficult, because over 2/3 of the the colonists did not want to separate from England.

Improbably, the war was won, because the Continental Congress and George Washington somehow figured how to beg borrow, and yes steal, enough money from a reluctant citizenry, to beat the most powerful Army on earth at time. Native Americans helped colonists as well, hoping to redeem themselves for backing the wrong side with the French. It didn't work.

After the War, a loose, confederation of colonies (states) was established to rule the colonies. It was fashioned along many of the principles, that our Tea Party friends harp on today. States rights, free market, weak central government, were main ingredients. And, it failed miserably. In fact, it was so bad, that may Tories (those who still wanted to be part of Britain), openly asked England to come back.

The true American Revolution then occurred, when somehow, against all political odds, the Constitution was barely adopted in 1789. Note, this is several years AFTER the Declaration of Independence.

The Constitution was a series of compromises, with the late addition of the Bill of Rights (the first 10 Amendments).

The colonists, not even a majority at the time (it's lucky they didn't have polls then) realized that they needed central government to deal with the myriad of issues facing the fledgling nation; not withstanding the need to have a unified force to steal more Native American land to the west.

Big problems needed government to address. Divided we were destined to fall, united we could prevail.

Today, on another anniversary of that realization, incredibly we are faced with the same dilemma. The Republican Party has been taken over by Tea Party Patriot zealots, who argue that the Union is wrong, that private interests are more important than public interest, and are intent on destroying the Union.

The latest reaction to the Constitutional Ruling on the Affordable Care Act proves this Tea Party zealotry. The Act was passed without a single Republican vote, and now they vow to repeal it at all costs. Republican governors vow to not accept federal funds to expand health care for the working poor.

The Republican Party, the party of the "great emancipator and union hero" seek to tear the union apart!

The Constitution provided for judicial review. It is an integral part of the social compact embodied in the Constitution.

Radical right wingers, and even some moderates, have been politically indoctrinated to hate every centralized government solution (except the military), engaging in a life and death struggle with the rest of us, to basically stop government solutions for a whole host of national problems; including energy, education, health, infrastructure, crime; etc.

All problems must be addressed by states or even individuals; remembering that corporations are people "my friend". Private interests are in fact, the public interest according to this point of view.

This reminds any American History teacher, of the Articles of Confederation, one of the most wrong headed governmental solutions in history.

In fact, when I was getting my Masters in Government, we studied the Articles, and the Civil War era's Confederate Constitution, as examples of democracy producing extremely unworkable and fatal governmental structures.

Nations fail because their governments fail Nations are their government. That is why the Constitution begins with "We The People". When democracies lapse into fits of selfish individualism, forget that organization and unified law means security, peace and ultimately protects individual freedoms, all hell breaks loose.

Usually this manifests itself in Civil War and violence, read the Confederate Constitution. The Confederacy, that traitorously attacked the Constitution of the United States, invented a government that led them right down the path to defeat.

One critical aspect, was the predictable lack of effective taxing power, there was no reliable way to raise funds for the government, and the army. States could contribute money if they wanted. This decentralized system led to widespread starvation in the rebel army, slaughter at the hands of the blue coats, and ignoble defeat.

Recently, the Supreme Court Chief Justice, holding his nose in approving the Affordable Care Act, once again reaffirmed the principle that the ability to tax is what holds the country together. Without it, the nation is in peril; it cannot "insure domestic tranquility"...or provide "Life Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness".

The inability to tax, to act as a unified country (each rebel state had its own Army) led to defeat for the treasonous Rebels.

As an aside, you may wonder why I bring up treasonous Rebels. I have taken the Constitutional Oath over 10 times in my life being a public school teacher and administrator. I also raised my right hand when I entered the United States Army. Those words, it was rather directly taught to me, mean something. Traitors, and treason, are the only capital crime identified in the Constitution. I do not take that oath, embodied in the Constitution lightly. Every time I see the rebel flag, I get mad, because it represent treachery, and treason. It also represents the most undemocratic political thinking. It also represents how our country may one day fall; to mindless disunity.

Many of these same errors in governmental structuring, we see in the Tea Party Patriots today. No surprise here, because predictably the core of the Tea Party Patriot movement lies in the South; as in the "the South will rise again".

Finally, the unyielding attacks on the "centralization of power" that is allegedly in the Affordable Care Act is reminiscent of the Confederacy's and the Article of Confederation's fundamental errors.

What both wayward approaches share, is the critical error placing parochial, individual, and yes, free market interests ahead of national ones. As I have said many times on this blog before, there is a definable public interest. It evolves through democratic debate, and ultimately some kind of agreement MUST be reached, for democratic government to function.

This is our problem today. We have about a third of our country, who has decided to not compromise in the debate defining the public interest. This has meant the Democratic Party has done this pretty much alone.

This is bad politics, and leads to stalemate and inaction, since the Constitution is based on compromise. There is great danger here.

Hence, the Affordable Care Act, is remarkably still under attack, even after passing through the Supreme Court.

Much of the Act, is experimental, several commissions and study groups are in it (no they are not "death panels") in an effort to somehow modify the costly and inefficient health care system. It is not a perfect bill, most are not. It is meant to be evolving, most bills are. It has many provisions in it to allow states to experiment. It also is meant to be tweaked along the way.

After all, the New Deal was hundreds of laws, that grew as time went on, or died, or were declared unconstitutional; in an attempt to bring a semblance of economic stability to a depression torn nation.

And, ultimately, it worked, contrary to the inevitable revisionist conservative history. The New Deal, that demonized experiment in Constitutional central government leadership, worked to lessen the Great Depression, preserve the capitalist system, and most importantly, prepare the nation for World War II.

I shudder to think, what would have happened, if our industrial might would have been mothballed in 1941, like it would have been without the New Deal. Conservatives don't like to talk about that!

We need the power and stability of the United States government, to deal with complex problems that individuals and states have failed to solve. There is a balance to this, too much centralization is not necessarily good. But centralized government, the Union if you will, is essential to our national survival. It was in 1989, it was in 1861, 1917, 1941 and 2012!

That used to be the great debate of the public interest, how much centralized government, between progressives and conservatives; now progressives essential debate themselves, conservatives have all signed "no tax pledges" and it is "my way or the highway"; compromise is seen as weakness, an impure thought.

Chief Justice Roberts is saying that compromise is NOT weakness in his decision....and the conservatives hate him for it. He is saying that it IS a function of the United States government, through the Constitution, to wrestle with the issues embodied in health care.

In short, health care is a large problem, a big issue, that the central government is suited for, as is intended for under the Constitution (the Supreme Court, in a 5/4 split with the Chief Justice affirming just agreed).

In the past, after some gnashing of teeth, the country was forced to identify the public interest and moved forward. People saw the way forward, that the Chief Justice just showed us, and compromised.

I only hope that sane minds prevail, and we do so again. But the right is who has to move, their intractability is causing this democratic crisis.

Otherwise, we are looking down the bore of Civil War.

I saw it, could not believe it!

I saw it, and could not believe it.

On CNN today, I was watching the heartbreaking videos of what has to described as hell on earth. The wildfires have burned hundreds of homes, and still are not fully under control.

A representative of the Fire Department broke into tears as he described firefighters valiant, and often useless efforts to stop the fires.

One video showed sparks jumping from roof to roof. And then I saw it, from wood shake roof to wood shake roof.

I could scarcely believe my eyes. Colorado Springs is a city around and engulfed by forests. The hills go up around the city, and fires running downhill have thousands of beautiful, expensive, mountain homes, in their path. The rich always build higher up the hill for the view, in the beautiful forest, with beautiful, practically explosive wood shakes on their roofs!

And Colorado has endured years of global warming caused drought (there I said it, so sue me). The snow pack, that feeds rivers, streams and lakes has declined. There isn't enough water, no rain to dampen the time bombs on every hill side.

And, the heat, continues unstopped. The winters are the warmest ever, hundred degree temperatures have gone on for days, with sixty (60) mile per hour winds.

And wood shakes cover the houses. In fact, a cursory check of the city's website state that replacement roofs must not be wood, but that apparently just went into effect.

However, several Colorado Springs roofing sites were found, touting the beauty and affordability of cedar shake roofs. So, more likely, outside the city limits, wood shake roofs are still alright. Or, the ordinance is not enforced. The house I saw explode in flames was pretty new.

Colorado is a conservative state, these are rugged individualists, damn those pesky regulations, I want my shake roof.

I actually watched the sparks fly onto a shake roof, and the roof caught on fire, and within seconds, the whole house was ablaze. It's like having a fireplace for a roof. Shake roofs explode into sparks, the winds catch the sparks, and torch the neighborhood. Often, a composition roof simply melts, or catches fire as the fire gets the hottest. Shake roofs are like kindling. In fact, we use cedar FOR kindling in the winter!

What is the matter with us? First, deniers have so assaulted climate scientists, that they are afraid to state publicly that we are now in global warming big time, and wildfires will be the standard; multiple days of 100 degree weather the new normal, water drought a standard, "extreme weather" (shit that can kill you) is no longer rare; etc.

And the cons rant that it is all a liberal plot. And some person in Colorado Springs must have successfully sold the idea that concrete or composition shingles, next to a damn forest, was too expensive, or unwieldy, and good cedar shakes were more attractive and cheaper. So people covered their homes with kindling!

Oh, they did say on one page, that fire retardant was on all cedar shakes (neglecting to say that it must be redone regularly). I have yet to see fire retardant stop cedar burning, unless you put it in an aquarium.

And Colorado continues to burn, the fire chief sobs, and wood shakes are still being put on roofs.

Sheer insanity!

We Have Lost the Public Interest

It's the public interest. That's right, the public interest that we have lost.

We are seemingly locked in yet another perpetual argument about health care. Republicans once again, after losing in Congress, after losing in the Supreme Court, now will vote meaninglessly, since the Senate and the President will not go along, to repeal the Affordable Care Act. And they promise, scouts honor, to repeal it forever in the future, never to give up in their efforts to "save us from socialism".

And their reasons for rabid opposition: Government takeover of private enterprise. Socialism.

Nonsense.

For the past fifty years, there has been a trend in our country in the exact opposite direction. Privatization has been the call conservatives and unfortunately even some progressives have heeded. The United States has become a country of privatized public services, corporate run governmental programs, and a host of reductions in traditional governmental services.

States have privatized hospitals, prisons, schools, highways, canals, airports; etc. The federal government is about ready to privatize mail, the postal service is about ready to go to UPS and others.

I would argue that health care was essentially privatized in the past fifty years not socialized as my conservative friends like to shout. Medicare is NOT socialized medicine. In fact, governmental owned medical services are at an all time low.

I can remember a county hospital in our town and county clinics. These were publically owed hospitals, non-profit, that were paid for by a combination of tax dollars, patient fees, insurance payments; etc. They operated way cheaper than their current for profit cousins.

President Bush used the Iraq War as a grand experiment of privatization and failed miserably. The Marshall Plan was implemented by U.S. Army Privates, who had been drafted, operating tractors for $25 a week, rebuilding countries they had blown up five years before. In Iraq, private companies were paid thousands of dollars a week, with weak governmental oversight, to repair damages the all volunteer Army had rendered. Private corporations made a mint in Iraq.

Privatization is all over the place, costing the American taxpayer our economic future. The result, is a deficit that is going to take generations to pay down, an economy in chaos, and a political war in the United States.

When the public interest is most in play, health care, education, infrasructure; etc., for profit, free market solutions do not work cheaply.

When private interest is involved, where innovation is most in play, private enterprise solutions work best.

This basic rule of government and economics has been lost on us, in the past fifty years.

Thanks to the conservatives, the line of efficient, apolitical governing, has been crossed, with public interest issues being more and more addressed with privatization.

The New Deal is long gone, replaced by Haliburton.

In Mississippi a private prison company was hired to run juvenile detention. The result was a system that hired former gang members as guards, that did not allow government inspection of problems, and culminated in children being beaten so savagely that brain damage occurred. The state, after being beaten by lawsuits, finally closed the private prisons. But the inefficient, expensive brutal private prisons had done their damage to a generation of young people. And, Mississippi was out millions of dollars.

I would argue that the Affordable Care Act is a privatization of health care, but we have gone so far to the right, it is attacked as a government controlled program.

But, it was the brainchild of the Heritage Foundation, its cousin was implemented by the present Republican candidate for President, and its roots are deep in the private sector, with some governmental regulation oversight. The fact that the conservative right attacks what is at its core, a privatized approach to health care, is indicative of how far gone traditional government programs are.

When a public interest is addressed with for profit private companies, costs go up because the company must make a profit. Supposedly, savings occur because employee costs go down with a private company, because most are non-union. But, as the example in Mississippi shows, the non-union, non civil service employees, are usually poorly trained, poorly paid, and many times fail in their tasks. The overall cost to the taxpayer, after all the lawsuits, jailbreaks, and screw ups, is more.

How else do you explain the trillions of dollars that were wasted in Iraq. Privatization does not work to replace government. It don't work!

But nothing was learned from Iraq, or Katrina. America continues its love affair with governmental by private business, now endorsing the Affordable Care Act as a "government control solution", when in fact it is the height of privatization.

The good old county hospital, where my second daughter was born, and I paid the bill in cash since it was so small, is long gone, with for profit hospitals in its place; where my last bill for a simple out patient sinus operation was $64,000. I am reminded of the old T.V. show, the $64,000 question, where contestants vied for a "fortune". It cost Medicare, my Supplemental Insurance, and me a "fortune" for a simple sinus operation with no overnight hospital stay. That is the result of a system that addresses public issues with for profit solutions, that are incredibly expensive.

Privatization has cost the taxpayer trillions of dollars over the past fifty years. The truth is the "old" civil service system, the draft, and other governmental approaches to providing quality services at low cost to the taxpayer, have been replaced by a system of for profit private companies, that promise savings, but once in place, rip off the taxpayer, deliver inferior service, and do not serve the public but serve themselves.

The private interest can never serve the public interest, and we are all paying for it everyday in inferior service for incredible cost.

The Banality of Falsehood

The banality of falsehood.

I recently was on a conservative talk radio station that purports to be "community based". Of course, I was considered a real oddity, because I am a progressive Democrat, and was representing the Democratic Central Committee in the a conservatibve county.

At one point, off mike, during a discussion with the host (who was very friendly and cordial; I was invited back), I quoted a World Health Organization study, that found the American health care system the most expensive in the world, but ranks in the mid-twenties among all nations for quality of care applied to all citizens.

I got this reply, "Well, what is the background and veracity of the study you use. How do know the figures are correct". This exact same retort has been used by my conservative friends on issues from global warming to illegal immigration.

In short, if a progressive uses a study, any study, the conservative response is to belittle it, discredit it, and counter with anectodal "facts"; like at one point, my host mentioned that there was one school administrator for every teacher in California. I must admit my jaw dropped at that one.

Within seconds of the recent Affordable Care Act Supreme Court decision, conservatives started a campaign that "Obamacare" (as they love to call it), was the "biggest tax on the middle class in history". Next came, "small businesses will all stop insuring their employees". And, "the Act will bankrupt states".

None of these accusations are backed up with any empirical evidence at all. And the biggest reason I can state that unequivocably, is the Act is not even implimented yet.

In Massachusetts, that implemented virtually the same law under the leadership of the Republican candidate for President, none of these draconian things have come to pass. None of them!

So, we have an empirical "demonstration site" if you will, that can predict how the Affordable Care Act will work, and conservatives never mention it, in fact the guy who passed it, Mitt Romney, says he will repeal and replace "Obamacare" with....guess what, the same thing he got passed in Massachusetts, which is the same thing we have now. Sound confused....I sure am!

He slipped last week and started to list the main ingredients of the Massachusetts law and the Affordable Care Act as part of his "replace" plan. Of course, most conservatives, like the Senator from Wisconsin, are screaming that repealing the act is necessary "because liberty has the benefit of denying insurance to cancer victims."

What? So liberty means you are free to die, of a usual painful disease, because in American you are free to not have health insurance or health care. What is the matter with these people?

The point is we have in America now a "sound bite" political party, that has deterorated into an artificial reality, denounces any empirical, scientific reality, and reacts with anger and vengence (for lack of a better word), to almost everything.

The phone video of the conservative congresswoman, reacting to the mistaken report that the Affordable Care Act had been overturned, shows vivid video evidence of what can only be called rabid reactionary fanaticism.

Conservatives are all in to destroy President Obama and anything he promotes.

The racism of this just oozes all over the political landscape.

Finally, the Supreme Court should never even heard the case. The Injunction Law (not aptly named) does not allow Supreme Court challenges in cases of alleged unconstitutional issues, until the harm has occurred. In short, a person has to have a wrongful tax applied and them sue.

So where was the harm? There was none. The fact is conservatives conspired to get the Affordable Care Act to the Supreme Court, before the 2012 election. They figured a 5-4 majority to overturn the Act was a given. Then gambled that Roberts and at least four other conservatives would vote to overturn. They screwed up!

Chief Justice Roberts, I think knew that the "fix was on" and realized the credibilty of the Supreme Court was directly on the line. So, he took the taxation power of Congress as justification for what in essence is a penalty that a few have to pay, if they refuse to purchase health insurance, which will be much cheaper than the choices that have stopped them before.

The insurance area that is most effected by the Affordable Care Act is not group insurance, or Medicare, but individual polilcies that have traditionally been nearly impossible to purchase by the sick or the injured. Moreover, exchanges will make individual insurance, non-employeer provided, affordable. If you can already can afford it, you either purchase it, or get a penalty, actually a charge, and the insurance is purchased. And that is a tax? And, if Massachusetts is a guide, about 2% eventually are so "taxed"...that is a far cry from the "most massive tax on the middle class ever".

Republicans are now screaming that this is a tax, when it is the legal reasoning Justice Roberts used to allow the bill to pass constitutional muster. But, the "tax", as they are now ranting, buys you health insurance! And, it is way cheaper and better than what you could not afford before. And, if Massachusetts is any guide, very few people are ever forced into paying it, because almost everyone buys health insurance before a penaly is enforced. Some tax, huh?

But you cannot find that logic anywhere on the right. They are screaming that this is the greatest blow to liberty ever. That seniors are in danger. That millions will in fact lose their insurance. That the world will sure end. Fear, fear, fear, is pushed, along with huge lies about the Affordable Care Act as par of their rabid reaction to the Act being declared Constitutional.

Go to Massachusetts, look at how that law has worked out. See how the Act that Governor Romeny brokered, and signed, and supported, and you can see how the Affordable Care Act will play out. None, I mean none, of the horrible outcomes Republicans are predicted, have occurred.

Finally, you cannot appeal to reason with these folks. I recently wrote on a conservative friend's wall, in reation to a serious of mis-representations about the Affordable Care Act. Her hysterical reaction tells it all, she would not debate the issues, she invited me off her wall.

You see, they cannot take the truth, because the only thing backing up their arguments is mis-representation, lies, and falsehoods.