NEON GODS

Our new Freedom. Freedom to ignore the sick, the injured, the poor.

I've been wanting to write about this piece by Charles Pierce because it captures the very essence of the America I grew up in.

Charles begins with something Dahlia Lithwick wrote about her impression of the right's argument before the Sureme Court where they are trying to have Obamacare overturned:

Until today, I couldn't really understand why this case was framed as a discussion of "liberty." This case isn't so much about freedom from government-mandated broccoli or gyms. It's about freedom from our obligations to one another, freedom from the modern world in which we live. It's about the freedom to ignore the injured, walk away from those in peril, to never pick up the phone or eat food that's been inspected.

Charley riffs off this:

For all the huffing and blowing we get about rugged individualism, the American spirit and the American experiment always have had at their heart the notion that the government is all of us and that, therefore, the government may keep things in trust for all if us. That was present at the very beginning, in the Mayfloer Compact, which was not a document through which individuals demanded to be free of their obligations to each other and to society; rather, it was a document through which free people bound themselves together, for their own good into a political commonwealth...

Chaley then reminds us that,

We, The People is more than a statement of purpose. It is an acknowledgement of an obligation to each other.

Have you ever thought about that phrase, "We, the people..."?  It doesn't say, "We, the individuals..."  It implies that our Founders saw Americans as a group speaking as one with common interests, not as many individuals who had no oblgation to each other.

The point is, America used to be a nation of people who felt we were all Americans, not Us and Them.  I remember hearing people tell us kids that we had an obligation to help our fellow Americans who were less fortunate.  We had an obligation to make it easier for Americans with will and ambition to go to college.  Back then Americans wanted to have a minimum wage that employers were obligated to pay so their employees could afford food and clothes for their kids.  We all recall that the United States was the leader in free public schools so that eveyone, no matter how poor, could insure their kids had a basic education and a step on the first rung of the ladder to success.  We wanted to help our fellow citizens and pay for it with our taxes. 

So what happened? We are now a nation with a significant population of people who begrudge even a single dollar of their taxes being used to help those less fortunate.  They claim the poor are merely lazy, and living well off the taxpayer's generosity, while the taxpayers themselves struggle.  They believe that if you make the poor suffer enough, they will magically find jobs where none exist, and other magical things will happen.

If you have a few minutes, read Charles' post, and the comments too.  He tells us we've lost our way and why.  We must work to find our way again.

--Trakker

The Catholic Church - pompous bullies who forget we are a SECULAR nation.

Our old friend Charles Pierce is pissed at the Catholics again - AND now he's even disgusted at the nitwits on the left who have been suckered into believing this is an issue of "religious liberty."  It ain't.  Take it away, Charley:

You may notice here that there is no "compromise" being offered. Emboldened by enablers, the bishops have expanded their demands for exemptions from simply Catholic institutions to every business in America. There's a reason for this and it all comes back to the Clan Of The Red Beanie again. They've been sitting back on their ermined duffs, believing that they were done so very wrong in the investigation of their crimes, and nursing the mother of all grudges, for over a decade. Now they've decided to strike back for the power they've lost. (That horrible Egan gossoon let the cat out of the bag yesterday.) Women's health is the issue they've chosen, because, in their little unindicted world, women don't count, and never have. Any Catholic pundit — yeah, that's you, E.J. Dionne, and you, Mark Shields [...and you, Chris Matthews!] — who carries water for this corrupt cabal

There were a couple of ways all of this could have been avoided. One, as Lawrence O'Donnell pointed out last night, would have been through a single-payer health-care system. The other would have been to toss a whole lot of bishops in jail for conspiracy to obstruct justice, enough of them so their power to influence the secular law was destroyed forever. They needed to be humbled, unmercifully, until the hubris was wrung out of every damn one of them. Now, a woman working a low-income service industry job under the supervision of a Catholic boss will have her access to essential health-care truncated by a discredited encyclical to which no Catholic has paid any heed since the administration of Lyndon Johnson. These bastards needed to be broken, publicly, and into a thousand pieces that were scattered to the winds. Instead, they are "voices of conscience" again. It is to weep.

Yes, this whole radical religious-right war on women has really triggered my growing animosity toward the Catholic Church.  I agree with Charles, "These bastards need to be broken, publicly..." and loudly ridiculed by the sane, rational, and outraged citizens who have been the intended victims of the church's perfidy.  It boggles my mind that after the way they have treated children in their care for the last century at least, anyone gives them any credence!

--Trakker

Conservatives: "...little regard to the realities"

I just saw this column about how loony conservative Republicans have become by Time magazine's Fareed Zakaria, a moderate conservative who usually has some pretty good insights about issues.

He is spot on about the current Republican party, but is he just noticing it? 

He begins:

From Aristotle to Edmund Burke, the greatest conservative thinkers have said that to change societies, one must understand them, accept them as they are and help them evolve.

Aristotle was a conservative?!  And what's this, "conservatives help societies evolve"?  Maybe before my time they did, but for most of my lifetime they have tried to bolt the door against any change (except backward).

Conservatives now espouse ideas drawn from abstract principles with little regard to the realities of America's present or past. This is a tragedy, ... 

Consider the debates over the economy. The Republican prescription is to cut taxes and slash government spending — then things will bounce back. Now, I would like to see lower rates in the context of tax simplification and reform, but what is the evidence that tax cuts are the best path to revive the U.S. economy? Taxes — federal and state combined — as a percentage of GDP are at their lowest level since 1950. The U.S. is among the lowest taxed of the big industrial economies. So the case that America is grinding to a halt because of high taxation is not based on facts but is simply a theoretical assertion. The rich countries that are in the best shape right now, with strong growth and low unemployment, are ones like Germany and Denmark, neither one characterized by low taxes.

If only the Democrats would shout this from the rooftops!

Many Republican businessmen have told me that the Obama Administration is the most hostile to business in 50 years. Really? More than that of Richard Nixon, who presided over tax rates that reached 70%, regulations that spanned whole industries, and who actually instituted price and wage controls?

In fact, right now any discussion of government involvement in the economy — even to build vital infrastructure — is impossible because it is a cardinal tenet of the new conservatism that such [government] involvement is always and forever bad. ...  From Singapore to South Korea to Germany to Canada, evidence abounds that some strategic actions by the government can act as catalysts for free-market growth.

The fact that the Republicans use the word "hostile" when describing the Obama administration's attitude toward business should tip anyone off that this is off the wall.  No President can afford to be "hostile" toward business in this country.  Trying to protect consumers by ensuring they don't get ripped of by shady businesses, or trying to protect our economy from being destroyed by businesses who are too big to fail is hardly hostile.  You might say it's actually good for businesses. 

Moving on to health care.

When considering health care, for example, Republicans confidently assert that their ideas will lower costs, when we simply do not have much evidence for this. What we do know is that of the world's richest countries, the U.S. has by far the greatest involvement of free markets and the private sector in health care. It also consumes the largest share of GDP, with no significant gains in health on any measurable outcome. ... Republicans don't bother to study existing health care systems anywhere else in the world. They resemble the old Marxists, who refused to look around at actual experience. "I know it works in practice," the old saw goes, "but does it work in theory?"

Zakaria is right, the Republicans have an agenda, shrink government and let the corporations and the rich run the country.  To do that they just make up crap that has no basis in fact and haven't been proved, and hope we're too stupid to figure out that it's all smoke and mirrors.  So far they've gotten away with it.  Does this mean that conservatives like Zakaria at Time magazine will now continue to blow the whistle on them?  I doubt it.  I'm sure that he will continue to treat Republicans like a responsible, respectable party.

--Trakker

Let's hope SCOTUS agrees with Judge Vinson

So a conservative judge in Florida declared ObamaCare - the WHOLE THING - unconstitutional, and the people on the right are deliriously happy.  "YEAH Baby, we're going to drive this stake through ObamaCare once and for all!  Woo-Hoo!"

That's funny because this was the best plan the right (and their insurnace company sponsors) could have ever gotten...except for the status quo of course.  If the conservatives on the Supreme Court prevail and deep sixes ObamaCare, all those minor but important improvements that have already kicked in will be gone and the people who benefited will lose - and they will be supremely pissed at the Republicans.

Worse, we will be back to having 50,000,000 uninsured Americans, and no plan in place to help them, and each year a number of those people will be bankrupted by medical bills (and guess who ultimately pays for those bankruptcy losses? You and me.)

We'll also be back to square one, and Congress will have to decide whether to devote a huge amount of it's time and energy to craft a new health care reform bill.

I don't know for sure, but I suspect Europeans and people in other developed countries must be shaking their heads in awe of the Americans who are so selfish and greedy that they refuse to provide health care for those without.  Wasn't this the nation that was universally admired for their generosity and kindness to war-ravaged people during and after WWII?  Wow, what happened?

Personally I'm delighted with Judge Vinson's ruling that ObamaCare is unconstitutional, and I fervently hope the Supreme Court agrees (please, please, please!).  ObamaCare sucks and if it is fully implemented the insurance companies will learn to game the system and bleed the government dry.  While in theory it will reduce overall costs, that underestimates the cleverness and greed of the private health insurers to find ways to circumvent the rules and increase profits.  Congress will tweak it but never fully fix the problems because that would mean an end to their campaign contributions.

If SCOTUS kills ObamaCare, the next health care reform bill will most likely be simpler (like this one should have been) and will almost certainly involve more government control (like extending Medicare to everyone).  Either that or we'll have to live with 50 million uninsured Americans, a number that will mushroom as health care insurance rates continue to soar.  I don't see us allowing that to happen.

But this really puts me in a bind.  I want those improvements ObamaCare has already made, but I hate ObamaCare in general and want it struck down.  But this means a huge number of Americans will be stuck without coverage with no relief in sight.  A lot of people will suffer for that.  But in my opinion that's the only way we can eventually get single payer universal health care that works.  We need a system that will reduce overall health care costs and keep them under control, and I believe only a government run system can do that.  But given the virulent anger of the tea party toward government and it's clout, I'm not sure we can get anything like that passed for years - unless the American people finally rise up in anger and shove the tea party movement back under the slimy rocks where they came from.

--Trakker

Repeal ObamaCare

Wow, this is great!

House Republicans plan to bring up a vote to repeal the health-care overhaul early in the new Congress that opens Wednesday, at least before President Obama delivers his State of the Union address later this month, a key Republican lawmaker said Sunday.

Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.), incoming chairman of one of the House committees that oversees health policy, said undoing the Democrats' health reform law would be a top priority for the new GOP-controlled Congress.

If the Democrats are smart they will call the Republican's bluff on this and not oppose it.  Why?  Because the health insurance companies would go ballistic if it is repealed.  They love Obamacare because it will result in millions of new customers for them.  They also know they can successfully find ways around a lot of the restrictions intended to keep costs (and their profits) down.  So the Republicans don't really want to repeal Obamacare and incur the wrath of the huge health care insurance industry.

The Republican's call for repeal is nothing but theater.  They want their base to think they tried hard to repeal Obamacare, but the arrogant, liberal Democrats in the Senate wouldn't let them.  The Republicans have the votes in the House to repeal it, but not the Senate, so they figure they are safe. 

However, Obamacare is a terrible way to "reform" health care in America so I would urge liberal Democrats in the Senate to agree to support the Republican's repeal measure.  This will force the Republicans to make one of two choices: back down and let the measure die (and piss off their base!), or vote to repeal Obamacare knowing Obama will veto it. 

BUT, vetoes can be overturned by two-thirds majority in each house of Congress, and if enough Democrats join Republicans, Congress can overturn Obama's veto and repeal Obamacare.

And we should.  Obamacare relies on private insurance companies to pay the bills and administer the system.  These insurance companies must show a healthy profit for their shareholders and that profit adds a lot to the premiums that people must pay (or the government must subsidize).  That profit generally ends up in the pockets of the rich. 

Once Obamacare is repealed, we will be stuck with millions with no health insurance and an out-of-control insurance industry reaping huge profits. The Democrats must then look at the various health care models in place around the world and pick one that we believe would work for us, and convince Americans that we can provide quality health care for everyone at a lower cost than the present system.

--Trakker

Why Not Us?

An American expat living in Europe, Democrats Ramshield, has been blogging at various liberal sites like Daily Kos and Alternet about the differences between the way the U.S. and the Europeans treat their citizens. For example:

The European Union has a larger economy and more people than America does. Though it spends less -- right around 9 percent of GNP on medical, whereas we in the U.S. spend close to between 15 to 16 percent of GNP on medical -- the EU pretty much insures 100 percent of its population.

The U.S. has 59 million people medically uninsured; 132 million without dental insurance; 60 million without paid sick leave; 40 million on food stamps. Everybody in the European Union has cradle-to-grave access to universal medical and a dental plan by law. The law also requires paid sick leave; paid annual leave; paid maternity leave. When you realize all of that, it becomes easy to understand why many Europeans think America has gone insane. [emphasis added]

America is insane.  I blame our schools, and not for the reasons you assume.  Our schools teach kids in America to worship capitalism and the free market.  America and capitalism are one and the same.  Criticize capitalism and you criticize America.  Criticize capitalism and you are "unAmerican," a traitor.  We treat socialism as a dirty word. We don't teach kids the strengths and weaknesses of capitalism and socialism, we just teach kids that capitalism is "good" and socialism is "a slippery slope to decadence and eventual loss of freedom."

Maybe the schools don't teach this explicitely, I assume the kids pick some of it up from their parents, but the schools don't teach kids the many weaknesses of capitalism or that we have plenty of examples of popular socialism in America that everyone is pretty pleased with (police/fire departments, etc.).

Look at the benefits (in bold above) that Europeans have and we don't.  Yes they have higher taxes, but wouldn't you be willing to pay more to have these benefits guaranteed for all Americans?  Capitalists insist that providing all these nice little benefits make people lazy, and it would make American companies uncompetitive.  Are Europeans lazy? No.  Are their companies uncompetitive?  Obviously not.  For that matter, it appears that WE are the country that is uncompetitive, considering all the jobs we've lost to outsourcing.  Maybe we're being lied to?  Heh!

I hope more and more people begin to realize what benefits Europeans have, that we don't, and begin asking why??  Or better yet, Why Not Us ??

Check out the rest of Democrats Ramshield's post.

--Trakker

Pelosi: the unsung hero of the 111th Congress

I've had a love-hate relationship with Nancy Pelosi ever since she became Speaker of the House.  I loved her when she was chosen, and had high hopes for her and the Democrats.  Then, when she took the impeachment of George Bush of the table, I hated her.  I still think that was a huge mistake, but it's obvious Washington NEVER punishes anyone powerful (unless your name is Bill Clinton and you employ a cigar to pleasure an adult(!) intern. Sleazy? Yes.  As bad as authorizing torture?  Not even close!).

On the whole, though, Pelosi has been the best friend progressives have had in Washington because she happens to be possibly the most effective Speaker of the House in many years.  Over the past two years I've come to admire her.

Eugene Robinson wrote a nice tribute to her this morning.

...amid the wreckage of Tuesday's GOP rampage, there's one person for whom I feel awful: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. She's losing her job not because she does it poorly but because she does it so well.

Pelosi would never ask for, or even accept, my sympathy - that's not her style. Her place in history was secure the moment she became the first woman to take possession of the speaker's gavel. Still, she squeezed every drop out of her four-year tenure. To string together a couple of sports cliches, she came to play and she left it all on the field.

I regret that the nation has never come to know the actual Nancy Pelosi. ... While the term "San Francisco liberal" is accurate, it's also true that she grew up - and learned the rough-and-tumble of politics - in gritty Baltimore. ...

Colleagues on Capitol Hill almost universally describe her as a good boss and simply a good person.

It was frustrating to hear Republicans demonize her in their thunderous public statements, then confess privately that they really liked her. Ain't politics grand? ...

Some of the votes she won looked impossible. On health-care reform, there appeared to be no way the House could ever be persuaded to pass the more conservative bill that had passed the Senate. At one point, she told me she could find only "maybe a dozen votes" for the measure. But she and Reid managed to find a workable set of modifications - and a clever parliamentary maneuver to pull the whole thing off.

I was at the Capitol that day when the House passed the landmark health-care bill. Tea Party groups were protesting outside, egged on by Republican members of Congress who came out onto a balcony and led the catcalls.

Pelosi did what was right for the country, and what's right isn't always what's popular. Democrats may decide they need a less-polarizing figure as minority leader; if they do, well, that's politics. But I'd love to see her stay in the Democratic leadership ...

Nancy Pelosi has taken more abuse and been demonized even more than Obama and yet she has kept pushing good bills through the House only to see them ignored by Reid's Senate.  They are still there waiting for the Senate to pass them in the lame duck session, but we know that would require an effort on Reid's part so they will almost certainly die in December.  I don't like the health care reform bill that Pelosi worked so hard to pass, but it was better than nothing - and it salvaged all the political capital Obama used to get the bill passed.  It passed only because Pelosi refused to give in, and for that she became the Wicked Witch of the West to all Republicans and Blue Dogs.

The irony is that when losing an election of this magnitude, both Reid and Pelosi (and the President's advisors) should be sacked, but it's clear Reid will not be replaced, but now we find that there is a big move by the Blue Dogs to replace Pelosi.  If they replace her with a Blue Dog it will be another big blow to progressives and I hope we make them pay.

--Trakker

Chyme? Morford Smears an American Icon.

If you read the Huffington Post you've probably already seen Mark Morford's hatchet job on KFC's new sandwich, the Double Down!  The Double Down is lovingly constructed with 2(!) slabs of fried chicken intersliced with 2(!) pieces of bacon, 2(!) slabs of cheese, and the Colonel's "special sauce." It comes in the form of a sandwich, with the fried chicken where the bread usually goes.

What could be better?  A sandwich with all the important food groups: bacon, fried chicken, and cheese.  Yum! Evidently Morford is not a big fan of the sandwich: "...I know this horrible crapbucket of chyme joins a very long list of fast-food nightmares you should never put anywhere near your mouth, unless you deeply hate yourself and don't give a damn anymore, and you want to die fat and stupid and smelling like that rotting thing you found in your rain gutter." 

Chyme?  Really, Mark, that's no way to talk about food from 'the Colonel,' he's a true American icon.

To show why I have trouble keeping my weight down, when I saw a picture of the Double Down, my first thought was, "Sweet!  I wonder if they have a Double Down Plus that adds a burger patty?"  I'm confused about one thing though, why is there no shredded iceburg lettuce on the sandwich.  Iceburg lettuce has no nutritional value, it's cheap, but most importantly it adds the cache' of health!  Yeah, this sandwich might be a "horrible crapbucket of chyme" but if it comes with shredded lettuce it's gotta' be healthy, right? Just like eating a salad.  Better get to work on that oversight KFC.

--Trakker

Gun owner and concealed carry permit holder threatens to kill a U.S. Senator

If you listen to gun zealots they will tell you that guns make America safer.  They will tell you that  people who get concealed weapons permits are all good people who merely want to protect themselves, their families, and the rest of us from criminals.  No reason for the rest of us to be concerned.

Here's the reality.  Gun owner and concealed carry carry permit holder Charles Alan Wilson has been calling Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) and threatening to shoot and kill her.  Police have arrested him.  They confirmed that he carries a gun with him and that he has a concealed carry permit.  Here are some of the things he said on the phone between March 22 and April 4:

"I want to ... kill you"

"Kill the .... senator! Hang the .... senator! I hope somebody puts a .... bullet between your .... eyes,"

"It only takes one piece of lead....Kill the ..... senator! Kill the .... senator! I'll donate the lead,"

"Since you are going to put my life at risk, and some bureaucrat is going to determine my health care, your life is at risk, dear. Yes, your life is at risk,"

According to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer newspaper (where the above quotes were copied), "During [a] call with the FBI agent, Wilson said he hated health-care reform and that he called Murray and her fellow Washington Democrat, Sen. Maria Cantwell, every day. He called them both "Pike Street whores," which is phrase that court documents say was used in the messages left at Murray's office."

Personally, I don't want nuts like this carrying guns around in public.  Just remember Charles Alan Wilson the next time you hear a gun zealot try to tell you how important it is for society to allow decent, law-abiding gun owners carry guns in public.

Update: the WaPost has more.

--Trakker

Tea Parties? No, adult tantrums.

Nice to see people catching on to the real reason for the rage that is so apparent in the tea party movement.

Frank Rich in the NYTimes:

In fact, the current surge of anger — and the accompanying rise in right-wing extremism — predates the entire health care debate. The first signs were the shrieks of “traitor” and “off with his head” at Palin rallies as Obama’s election became more likely in October 2008. Those passions have spiraled ever since — from Gov. Rick Perry’s kowtowing to secessionists at a Tea Party rally in Texas to the gratuitous brandishing  of assault weapons at Obama health care rallies last summer to “You lie!” piercing the president’s address to Congress last fall like an ominous shot.

If Obama’s first legislative priority had been immigration or financial reform or climate change, we would have seen the same trajectory. The conjunction of a black president and a female speaker of the House — topped off by a wise Latina on the Supreme Court and a powerful gay Congressional committee chairman — would sow fears of disenfranchisement among a dwindling and threatened minority in the country no matter what policies were in play. It’s not happenstance that [Rep.] Frank, Lewis and Cleaver — none of them major Democratic players in the health care push — received a major share of last weekend’s abuse. When you hear demonstrators chant the slogan “Take our country back!,” these are the people they want to take the country back from. [emphasis mine]

Digby at Hullabaloo (responding to te report that of the 34 Democrats who opposed the final health care bill, 28 represent districts with an above-average share of whites without college educations):

But why is it that these voters don't think the government cares about their needs when it just passed a health care reform that will help them since they currently lack health insurance. is it possible that their issue isn't the government caring for their needs at all? Is it possible that the issue is that they simply feel the government shouldn't be giving help to people they think don't deserve it? I think you have to admit that this is a likely scenario for a fair number of those people. They would rather do without health insurance themselves than have the same benefit going to black and brown people. It's always been that way.

It's not entirely about race. Remember these are not the brightest bulbs in the lamp.  They are used to believing anything their authority figures tell them (preachers, Republicans), and most of them have been condition to think the very worst of Liberals and Democrats.  Just look at how easily they accepted the claim that Obama's health plan included death panels(!) to decide which senior citizens should be exterminated and when.  After all, don't we already gleefully support "the killing of babies?" 

Some of their anger is triggered by the assumption that our black president, with the help of white Democrats who need black votes to stay in power, is determined to steal white's "hard-earned" tax dollars and give it to the lazy, black inner city residents who spend their weekdays in recliners watching Oprah instead of working.  They assume a black President will use his power to take from whites and give to the blacks because that's pretty much what white politicians did until recently (exploit blacks to enrich whites).

The point is, what we see as anger is really fear.  For all their life they have seen themselves as the real Americans, the greatest, smartest, mightiest people in the world based on their white, small-town Christian values.  These rubes actually thought they were superior to Europeans (whose socialist nanny-state economies will fail "any day now" - something they been predicting for decades!), Indians with their poverty and dark skin, and certainly the Chinese communists.  But now everything is starting to crumble.  A black man is president, the Indians have our jobs and the Chinese own our economy...and atheists are telling them they can't put a manger on the courthouse lawn or start the school day with a prayer. Oh my!

The tea parties are their tantrums.  As any parent knows, giving in to a tantrum is the worst thing you can do, but of course Fox News and the Republican party - and the MSM - are doing just the opposite, so we can probably expect the tantrums to grow in number and violence until something really bad happens ('a la Timothy McVeigh), and then the Republicans and Fox News will quickly blame the Democrats for making these people people so mad.  

Other than violence (which could be widespread), the tea partiers are nothing to worry about.  If anything they are hastening their own demise. The coming election this fall is going to be very entertaining, especially if the Democratic party shows some backbone.  Be sure to have plenty of popcorn on hand...

--Trakker