In 1955, future President John F. Kennedy's memorable biographical work Profiles in Courage was published. The Pulitzer-prize-winning book related the stories of eight U.S. senators who took difficult and often unpopular stands upholding principles rather than doing the easy thing politically. Here are three persons today who give us hope that courage to stand up for one's principles is still alive in the world. Sorry JFK, not one of them is a U.S. senator.
Hagit Ofran is an Israeli peace activist. In spite of right-wing extremist death threats, she continues to speak out against the illegal Israeli settlements in the Occupied Territories and in favor of a just two-state solution. November 4th marked the sixteenth anniversary of the assassination by a right wing Israeli extremist of Yitzhak Rabin, the Israeli Prime Minister who had signed the Oslo Peace Accords. It was an assassination with an impact on the Middle East peace process as great as the assassination of JFK in 1963 had on the US. Close to the assassination's anniversary this year, Jewish terrorists painted death threats on her home. Not backing down, Ofran delivered the keynote address at the annual rally to remember Rabin and all that he stood for.
Lydia Cacho Ribiero is a Mexican journalist, feminist and human rights activist. Cacho received death threats this summer after exposing a sex-trafficking ring. The November issue of The Atlantic named her as one of the "21 brave thinkers of 2011". For years she has written on the exploitation of women and children. In 1999, she was raped and beaten in the bathroom of a bus station for what she believes was her advocacy for women. In 2006, she took up the cause of the unsolved murders of women in Ciudad Juarez. She is the recipient of numerous awards for her her investigative journalism including awards from Amnesty International and UNESCO.
John Kitzhaber is the governor of Oregon. On Tuesday November 22, he banned the death penalty in his state for the duration of his term. In the only Western democracy with a populace whose majority supports the death penalty, Gov. Kitzhaber took the courageous step of banning it - calling the death penalty system "an expensive and unworkable system that fails to meet the basic standards of justice." An LA Times editorial rightly praised Kitzhaber for "one of the most courageous and conscientious acts we've seen on the national political stage in some time." This is what leaders do - they lead. When the majority are wrong, leaders have the strength to show them the proper path.
Sunday, November 27, 2011
Monday, November 21, 2011
Failure
As probably could have been predicted, the bipartisan deficit reduction committee failed to meet its target. News reports today have them throwing in the sponge early and trying to spin their failure. So now the automatic cuts begin. It's a shame that an automatic tax increase on the wealthy wasn't part of the deal. As noted previously, we cannot balance the budget solely with cuts to social programs. The only consolation in all this is that the unnecessary and over-bloated military budget will be cut automatically also.
The real problem with the economy is not the deficit - it's jobs. Congressional Republicans continue to stymie Obama Administration attempts to enact portions of the American Jobs Act. No surprise there either. The dysfunctional Congress, made ever more so by the Party of No intent on making Obama a one-term Presidnt, has upcoming votes on extensions of unemployment benefits and of the payroll tax cut. $1.00 to your 50 cents says they won't be passed.
In other news today:
The real problem with the economy is not the deficit - it's jobs. Congressional Republicans continue to stymie Obama Administration attempts to enact portions of the American Jobs Act. No surprise there either. The dysfunctional Congress, made ever more so by the Party of No intent on making Obama a one-term Presidnt, has upcoming votes on extensions of unemployment benefits and of the payroll tax cut. $1.00 to your 50 cents says they won't be passed.
In other news today:
- A financial services lobbying firm has proposed a $850,000 campaign to discredit the Occupy Wall Street Movement. (Slate, originally reported on MSNBC's "Up with Chris Hayes")
- A Fairleigh Dickinson University poll found that watching Fox News actually made a person less informed about current events than if he or she avoided watching or reading news altogether. Gives more meaning than ever to the watch-dog group News Hounds' motto "We watch FOX News so you don't have to."
- The World Meteorological Association reports that greenhouse gases in 2010 reached their highest level ever (CO2 is now at 389 ppm - 39% higher than pre-industrial age levels). This atmospheric CO2 concentration exceeds some of the worst-case scenarios projected by climate scientists. The really bad news is that the rate of increase is not declining but still trending upward.
- And finally, how about those classy NASCAR fans that booed Michelle Obama and Jill Biden ? The first and second ladies were at Homestead Miami Speedway to "promote the White House’s Joining Forces Program, which encourages Americans to pledge community service hours in honor of the troops serving abroad and send messages of support to military families". Kind of reminiscent of the Republican primary debate boos for a gay soldier and cheers for Texas executions. What a bunch!
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Deficit Solution
Today, it's hard to remember that in 2000 the Congressional Budget Office was estimating a surplus of $1.9 trillion for the coming decade. That was before Bush was "elected" by the US Supreme Court - which is to say before the Bush tax cuts and the ill-advised neocon wars added trillions to the deficit and before the karma from the conservative deregulation frenzy initated in the 1980's caught up with us in 2007 and we experienced the greatest financial crisis since the Depression.
It would seem that the right way to attack the budget deficit is to focus on what went wrong since 2000, on what is no longer relevant in a post-Cold War era and on what we need to do to correct these errors.
To start, no solution to the budget deficit will be possible without deep cuts in military spending. Fifty three cents out of every Federal tax dollar goes to pay for past, current and potential future wars. (Softbox Films put together an informative short piece on the breakdown of these expenditures on its YouTube channel.) A few ideas: The action with the most immediate effect on the budget would be the removal of all US troops from Afghanistan. Continued stationing of US forces in Europe at the current levels seems totally unnecessary. Dismantling of the country's nuclear arms is long overdue. And let's not forget about the other "toys" that the Pentagon continues to demand - serious consideration needs to be given to converting weapons factories to peace-time manufacturing. Why the world's only remaining superpower needs a military budget more than six times that of China is beyond comprehension. If we just reduced our military expenditures on a GDP basis to that of China, we could save $345 billion per year!
Secondly, John Boehner and Eric Cantor to the contrary, we cannot "cut" our way out of the deficit. Revenues must be increased. In a nation where 40 percent of the wealth is owned by 1% of the population, fairness and concern for the common good demands, at a minimum, an end to the Bush tax cuts for wealthy Americans or, even better, a return to the incremental tax rates in place during the administration of conservative icon Ronald Reagan. Corporations are currently sitting on significant amounts of cash - the problem is not with business profitability but with a reduced demand from customers. Fair taxation of corporations is also an important element. A revised tax code that reduces loopholes and provides selective tax credits only when companies create domestic jobs would be a good start in this arena. Revenues from the "rest of us" will increase as soon as jobs are created and more people find work. This cannot be done without additional stimulus spending that would be financed by the increased revenues from the wealthy and corporations.
Finally, sound financial regulations implemented during the Depression kept us from severe recessions for more than a half-century. These controls were gradually eroded, financial system complexity was increased, enforcement became more difficult, and greed and risk became accepted parts of the game. Perhaps the action most responsible for the current Great Recession was the repeal of some of the provisions of the 1933 Glass-Steagall Act in 1999. As the Wikipedia entry on Glass-Steagall succinctly states: "The repeal of provisions of the Glass–Steagall Act by the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act in 1999 effectively removed the separation that previously existed between investment banking which issued securities and commercial banks which accepted deposits. The deregulation also removed conflict of interest prohibitions between investment bankers serving as officers of commercial banks. This repeal may have contributed to the severity of the Financial crisis of 2007–2011 by allowing banks to become so large, complex, and intertwined that both they and their regulators failed to see the systemic risk that a failure in one part of one bank could lead to cascading failures across the global financial system."
It's too late to reverse the impact of the Recession on the lives of so many millions. But a little bit of old-fashioned root cause analysis can help us prevent this from happening again. A reinstatement of Glass-Steagall would be an important step in that direction.
It would seem that the right way to attack the budget deficit is to focus on what went wrong since 2000, on what is no longer relevant in a post-Cold War era and on what we need to do to correct these errors.
To start, no solution to the budget deficit will be possible without deep cuts in military spending. Fifty three cents out of every Federal tax dollar goes to pay for past, current and potential future wars. (Softbox Films put together an informative short piece on the breakdown of these expenditures on its YouTube channel.) A few ideas: The action with the most immediate effect on the budget would be the removal of all US troops from Afghanistan. Continued stationing of US forces in Europe at the current levels seems totally unnecessary. Dismantling of the country's nuclear arms is long overdue. And let's not forget about the other "toys" that the Pentagon continues to demand - serious consideration needs to be given to converting weapons factories to peace-time manufacturing. Why the world's only remaining superpower needs a military budget more than six times that of China is beyond comprehension. If we just reduced our military expenditures on a GDP basis to that of China, we could save $345 billion per year!
Secondly, John Boehner and Eric Cantor to the contrary, we cannot "cut" our way out of the deficit. Revenues must be increased. In a nation where 40 percent of the wealth is owned by 1% of the population, fairness and concern for the common good demands, at a minimum, an end to the Bush tax cuts for wealthy Americans or, even better, a return to the incremental tax rates in place during the administration of conservative icon Ronald Reagan. Corporations are currently sitting on significant amounts of cash - the problem is not with business profitability but with a reduced demand from customers. Fair taxation of corporations is also an important element. A revised tax code that reduces loopholes and provides selective tax credits only when companies create domestic jobs would be a good start in this arena. Revenues from the "rest of us" will increase as soon as jobs are created and more people find work. This cannot be done without additional stimulus spending that would be financed by the increased revenues from the wealthy and corporations.
Finally, sound financial regulations implemented during the Depression kept us from severe recessions for more than a half-century. These controls were gradually eroded, financial system complexity was increased, enforcement became more difficult, and greed and risk became accepted parts of the game. Perhaps the action most responsible for the current Great Recession was the repeal of some of the provisions of the 1933 Glass-Steagall Act in 1999. As the Wikipedia entry on Glass-Steagall succinctly states: "The repeal of provisions of the Glass–Steagall Act by the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act in 1999 effectively removed the separation that previously existed between investment banking which issued securities and commercial banks which accepted deposits. The deregulation also removed conflict of interest prohibitions between investment bankers serving as officers of commercial banks. This repeal may have contributed to the severity of the Financial crisis of 2007–2011 by allowing banks to become so large, complex, and intertwined that both they and their regulators failed to see the systemic risk that a failure in one part of one bank could lead to cascading failures across the global financial system."
It's too late to reverse the impact of the Recession on the lives of so many millions. But a little bit of old-fashioned root cause analysis can help us prevent this from happening again. A reinstatement of Glass-Steagall would be an important step in that direction.
Monday, October 31, 2011
Attacks on the Right to Vote
"One of the most pervasive political movements going on outside Washington today is the disciplined, passionate, determined effort of Republican governors and legislators to keep most of you from voting next time. There has never been in my lifetime, since we got rid of the poll tax and all the other Jim Crow burdens on voting, the determined effort to limit the franchise that we see today." - Bill Clinton, 2011 Campus Progress National Convention, Washington, D.C., July 6, 2011
From Maine to Florida to Wisconsin to Texas, Republicans are coordinating an effort to suppress the vote of citizens who typically vote Democratic. By doing so, they hope to deny Obama a second term and win control of both houses of Congress. If they can make the 2012 electorate more like the 2010 electorate than the 2008 electorate, they will succeed. Based on the chimera of voter fraud, which is almost non-existent in this country (or, as Think Progress quipped , "only slightly more common than unicorns") , Republicans have been mounting a coordinated assault on the right to vote by enacting measures that will suppress the votes of students, Afrrican-Americans, immigrants, the elderly and the poor. The Brennan Center for Justice at the NYU School of Law examined the 19 laws and 2 executive orders in the 14 states that have enacted these voter suppression measures. The Center estimated that 5 million voters could be prevented from voting in 2012 because of these laws alone.
It's clear that the Republicans assume that the fewer people who exercise this basic right to vote, the better their chances in 2012. And they are right. US voter turnout in the 2008 Presidential elections was 70%; in the 2010 Congressional elections, 42%. Guess who wins if just 42% of the voters show up in 2012.
The primary tactics of this voter suppression effort are:
As a side note, it is strange that we hear nothing from the Tea Party's self-described defenders of liberty about this denial of the most basic right in a democracy. If ever there were a loss of freedom worth complaining about, this is it. But then again the Tea Party funders are also helping advocate for the massive Republican voter suppression effort.
I served on a Federal jury several years ago. After the trial was over, the judge thanked the jurors for participating and reaching a verdict. He closed with this: "The citizen exercises his rights in a democracy most directly in the jury box and at the ballot box." Let's not allow the well-funded right-wing political machine to deny citizens their most basic right to vote.
From Maine to Florida to Wisconsin to Texas, Republicans are coordinating an effort to suppress the vote of citizens who typically vote Democratic. By doing so, they hope to deny Obama a second term and win control of both houses of Congress. If they can make the 2012 electorate more like the 2010 electorate than the 2008 electorate, they will succeed. Based on the chimera of voter fraud, which is almost non-existent in this country (or, as Think Progress quipped , "only slightly more common than unicorns") , Republicans have been mounting a coordinated assault on the right to vote by enacting measures that will suppress the votes of students, Afrrican-Americans, immigrants, the elderly and the poor. The Brennan Center for Justice at the NYU School of Law examined the 19 laws and 2 executive orders in the 14 states that have enacted these voter suppression measures. The Center estimated that 5 million voters could be prevented from voting in 2012 because of these laws alone.
It's clear that the Republicans assume that the fewer people who exercise this basic right to vote, the better their chances in 2012. And they are right. US voter turnout in the 2008 Presidential elections was 70%; in the 2010 Congressional elections, 42%. Guess who wins if just 42% of the voters show up in 2012.
The primary tactics of this voter suppression effort are:
- Requiring government issued ID cards to vote - it's estimated that 18% of young voters and 25% of African-Americans do not have such ID's. Six Republican-controlled states have passed laws making this a requirement - Alabama, Kansas, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Wisconsin.
- Enacting laws that make it more difficult to register new voters. Florida's anti-voter law provides for fines for procedural errors in registering new voters. This had the desired effect - the non-partisan League of Women Voters suspended its voter registration efforts in Florida. And let's not forget the shutdown of ACORN, the advocacy group for the poor that was so effective in getting lower income people and minorities registered.
- Decreasing the time period for early voting. In Florida (rapidly becoming the poster-boy of this voter suppression effort), voting on the Sunday before election day was eliminated. Maine passed a law that for the first time in 38 years prevents a person from registering the same day that he or she votes.
- Prohibiting or making it difficult for college students who live in-state for most of the year to vote there. (Example: New Hampshire)
- Denying the right to vote to felons who have served their time and probation. (Example: Florda and Iowa)
As a side note, it is strange that we hear nothing from the Tea Party's self-described defenders of liberty about this denial of the most basic right in a democracy. If ever there were a loss of freedom worth complaining about, this is it. But then again the Tea Party funders are also helping advocate for the massive Republican voter suppression effort.
I served on a Federal jury several years ago. After the trial was over, the judge thanked the jurors for participating and reaching a verdict. He closed with this: "The citizen exercises his rights in a democracy most directly in the jury box and at the ballot box." Let's not allow the well-funded right-wing political machine to deny citizens their most basic right to vote.
Monday, October 24, 2011
Obama's Short(falls) List
A friend suggested a while back that this blog rant against Democrats as well as Republicans. That's been pretty hard to do on a regular basis given the consistently outrageous behavior of Republicans. But I'm willing to give it a shot.
My friend also said that he had voted for neither Obama nor McCain in the 2008 election. His comment on Obama was that he was too "green" (in the experience sense not in the environmental sense) to be president. He may well have been right. Obama appears to have been bullied by everyone from freshman Congressmen to the medical industry to the military to Benjamin Netanyahu and the so-called "Israel lobby". Maybe he is naive or maybe he really has been a centrist all along. In any case, the change we can believe in didn't happen. Yes the 111th Congress had some pretty decent accomplishments but they were shoved out in 2010.
So without further ado, here are the top 10 disappointments of the Obama Presidency.
10. Not requesting Harry Reid to change the filibuster rules in the Senate. This procedure ensures that the party that wants government to fail or do nothing will always win - even if they control just 40 of the 100 seats. It has no place in a democracy.
9. Allowing the most reactionary elements in our country to control the political conversation. A year or so after the election, I saw a cartoon on the wall of a local business. Obama was dressed as Steve Urkel and looking at a graph with a seriously down-sloping line. The comment from the cartoon Obama-Urkel was "Did I do that?" No, actually you inherited the biggest economic crisis since the Great Depression from your predecessor and it's proving a major challenge. Maybe it's because Obama thought himself the Great Compromiser, maybe it's because he realized too late that the fear-mongers and haters were out to ruin his Presidency, maybe Democrats just don't know how to respond to lies and distortions...whatever the reason ...he failed to make the case for his policies. This led to the 2010 election bloodbath and the Democratic majority was lost.
8. Continuing Bush-era policies against civil liberties developed during the new Age of Fear and taking it a step further by approving unnecessary (Bin-Laden, who could have been easily captured for trial as a war criminal) and unlawful (Anwar al-Awlaki, an American citizen) assassinations. As noted by Glenn Greenwald in Salon.com , "No effort was made to indict [al-Awlaki] for any crimes [and]...no evidence (as opposed to unverified government accusations) was presented of his guilt."
7. Taking until YE 2011 to get out of Iraq (McCain and Romney: please shut up). The troops could have been easily and methodically withdrawn within 6 months of his becoming President. Based on misinformation and lies and abetted by a complacent media (remember how thrilled these idiots were to be "embedded" with the troops), this war of the Neo-Cons was totally unjustified. It elevated Iran, a fundamentalist Islamic state, to be the major player in the Middle East with Iraq as its puppet. Well done, Bushie.
6. Agreeing to a stimulus package that, in the end, was too small. While it had a signicant impact, it was not anywhere near large enough to prevent the "jobless recovery". See also #3 and #4 below.
5. Spending all of his political capital after the election on health care and getting only a half-loaf solution. It may have been worth it if he got a single-payer solution (the one sure way to reduce health care costs) but this was not even on the table. See also #3 below.
4. Appointing Wall Street players and Bush-era advisors to his economic team. These were the clowns that got us into the mess in the first place. His focus on the deficit when 16% of Americans are either unemployed or underemployed is self-defeating. At a time when bold Keynesian moves are needed, the Administration settles timidly for half-measures.
3. A) Thinking he could compromise with Republicans and B) not controlling the Red Dog Democrats. Democrats held 60 seats and controlled the House when Obama became President. Instead of FDR (or even LBJ) style arm twisting, he let a small minority of Democrats combine with Republicans to dictate the policies of his Administration. When the stated aim of the opposing party is to limit you to a one-term Presidency and their media minions are hoping for you to fail, you do not compromise. You call them out and fight.
2. Failing to achieve a Palestinian - Israeli peace accord. After a good and somewhat even-handed start (for example, his 2009 speech in Cairo), he was manhandled by the right-wing Israeli President and AIPAC. Instead of doing what is right to get the two sides to the table - namely insisting on an immediate settlement freeze in the occupied territories, he fell victim to domestic politics, the Israel lobby and their right-wing Republican and Christian fundamentalist allies. His failure to support Palestinian statehood at the UN was one of the major low points in his administration. While not the only issue that energizes Muslim fundamentalists, the Occupation remains a key factor in the antagonism against us. I guess Americans for Peace Now will just have to raise more money to get its progressive Jewish voice heard above the right-wing babble.
1. Escalating the war in Afghanistan. The war is no more winnable or justifiable than was Vietnam. The surge has not worked but our money and blood continue to flow in that "graveyard of empires". The so-called "war" on terror should have been a police action not a war. Terrorism is prevented by detection not by war.
Having said all that, unless he is challenged by a progressive Democrat (yeah, I know, fat chance), he remains the least bad option for 2012. Hopefully enough of his 2008 base will be inspired enough by this bland reality to go to the polls. (I mean can you imagine a Rick Perry presidency?) For all the talk of the importance of "independents", if the Democratic left doesn't show up next November, Obama will lose.
My friend also said that he had voted for neither Obama nor McCain in the 2008 election. His comment on Obama was that he was too "green" (in the experience sense not in the environmental sense) to be president. He may well have been right. Obama appears to have been bullied by everyone from freshman Congressmen to the medical industry to the military to Benjamin Netanyahu and the so-called "Israel lobby". Maybe he is naive or maybe he really has been a centrist all along. In any case, the change we can believe in didn't happen. Yes the 111th Congress had some pretty decent accomplishments but they were shoved out in 2010.
So without further ado, here are the top 10 disappointments of the Obama Presidency.
10. Not requesting Harry Reid to change the filibuster rules in the Senate. This procedure ensures that the party that wants government to fail or do nothing will always win - even if they control just 40 of the 100 seats. It has no place in a democracy.
9. Allowing the most reactionary elements in our country to control the political conversation. A year or so after the election, I saw a cartoon on the wall of a local business. Obama was dressed as Steve Urkel and looking at a graph with a seriously down-sloping line. The comment from the cartoon Obama-Urkel was "Did I do that?" No, actually you inherited the biggest economic crisis since the Great Depression from your predecessor and it's proving a major challenge. Maybe it's because Obama thought himself the Great Compromiser, maybe it's because he realized too late that the fear-mongers and haters were out to ruin his Presidency, maybe Democrats just don't know how to respond to lies and distortions...whatever the reason ...he failed to make the case for his policies. This led to the 2010 election bloodbath and the Democratic majority was lost.
8. Continuing Bush-era policies against civil liberties developed during the new Age of Fear and taking it a step further by approving unnecessary (Bin-Laden, who could have been easily captured for trial as a war criminal) and unlawful (Anwar al-Awlaki, an American citizen) assassinations. As noted by Glenn Greenwald in Salon.com , "No effort was made to indict [al-Awlaki] for any crimes [and]...no evidence (as opposed to unverified government accusations) was presented of his guilt."
7. Taking until YE 2011 to get out of Iraq (McCain and Romney: please shut up). The troops could have been easily and methodically withdrawn within 6 months of his becoming President. Based on misinformation and lies and abetted by a complacent media (remember how thrilled these idiots were to be "embedded" with the troops), this war of the Neo-Cons was totally unjustified. It elevated Iran, a fundamentalist Islamic state, to be the major player in the Middle East with Iraq as its puppet. Well done, Bushie.
6. Agreeing to a stimulus package that, in the end, was too small. While it had a signicant impact, it was not anywhere near large enough to prevent the "jobless recovery". See also #3 and #4 below.
5. Spending all of his political capital after the election on health care and getting only a half-loaf solution. It may have been worth it if he got a single-payer solution (the one sure way to reduce health care costs) but this was not even on the table. See also #3 below.
4. Appointing Wall Street players and Bush-era advisors to his economic team. These were the clowns that got us into the mess in the first place. His focus on the deficit when 16% of Americans are either unemployed or underemployed is self-defeating. At a time when bold Keynesian moves are needed, the Administration settles timidly for half-measures.
3. A) Thinking he could compromise with Republicans and B) not controlling the Red Dog Democrats. Democrats held 60 seats and controlled the House when Obama became President. Instead of FDR (or even LBJ) style arm twisting, he let a small minority of Democrats combine with Republicans to dictate the policies of his Administration. When the stated aim of the opposing party is to limit you to a one-term Presidency and their media minions are hoping for you to fail, you do not compromise. You call them out and fight.
2. Failing to achieve a Palestinian - Israeli peace accord. After a good and somewhat even-handed start (for example, his 2009 speech in Cairo), he was manhandled by the right-wing Israeli President and AIPAC. Instead of doing what is right to get the two sides to the table - namely insisting on an immediate settlement freeze in the occupied territories, he fell victim to domestic politics, the Israel lobby and their right-wing Republican and Christian fundamentalist allies. His failure to support Palestinian statehood at the UN was one of the major low points in his administration. While not the only issue that energizes Muslim fundamentalists, the Occupation remains a key factor in the antagonism against us. I guess Americans for Peace Now will just have to raise more money to get its progressive Jewish voice heard above the right-wing babble.
1. Escalating the war in Afghanistan. The war is no more winnable or justifiable than was Vietnam. The surge has not worked but our money and blood continue to flow in that "graveyard of empires". The so-called "war" on terror should have been a police action not a war. Terrorism is prevented by detection not by war.
Having said all that, unless he is challenged by a progressive Democrat (yeah, I know, fat chance), he remains the least bad option for 2012. Hopefully enough of his 2008 base will be inspired enough by this bland reality to go to the polls. (I mean can you imagine a Rick Perry presidency?) For all the talk of the importance of "independents", if the Democratic left doesn't show up next November, Obama will lose.
Friday, October 14, 2011
1.9 Million Jobs Gone
The American Jobs Act is dead. Nearly two million Americans will not have the jobs that this act would have created. Given Republican refusal to raise taxes for the wealthy and their determinatiion not to give Obama a "victory", its defeat was totally predictable. But the loser in this is not President Obama, the loser is the entire country.
Earlier this week, the Senate could not muster the 60 votes to prevent a Republican filibuster. The House Republicans will not allow it to even reach the floor for a vote. Let's hope the voters remember this come the 2012 elections.
The "Occupy - 99%" demonstrations continue across the country. It's not clear that the demonstrations will be any more effective than Obama's stump speeches as long as Republicans control the House and block jobs legislation and taxes in the Senate. Class warfare? Gangs? The Republican empty suits that are decrying the OWS demonstrations were egging on the Tea Party loonies just a year or two ago. The Republican Party has been captured by an extremist wing funded by billionaires. If there is class warfare, it is one the Republicans have created over the past 30 or so years by continually redistributing the nation's wealth to the richest. The country is now on the verge of becoming an oligarchic banana republic.
So this will be theme number one for the 2012 elections for the Democrats: the absolute intransigence of the Republican Party on anything that might have helped the economy or create jobs. Republican lawmakers would rather cater to the wealthiest Americans (and many of these wealthy do not even want to be catered to!) and to the corporations that fill their campaign coffers. This needs to be drummed into the American consciousness continually from now to November 2012.
Earlier this week, the Senate could not muster the 60 votes to prevent a Republican filibuster. The House Republicans will not allow it to even reach the floor for a vote. Let's hope the voters remember this come the 2012 elections.
The "Occupy - 99%" demonstrations continue across the country. It's not clear that the demonstrations will be any more effective than Obama's stump speeches as long as Republicans control the House and block jobs legislation and taxes in the Senate. Class warfare? Gangs? The Republican empty suits that are decrying the OWS demonstrations were egging on the Tea Party loonies just a year or two ago. The Republican Party has been captured by an extremist wing funded by billionaires. If there is class warfare, it is one the Republicans have created over the past 30 or so years by continually redistributing the nation's wealth to the richest. The country is now on the verge of becoming an oligarchic banana republic.
So this will be theme number one for the 2012 elections for the Democrats: the absolute intransigence of the Republican Party on anything that might have helped the economy or create jobs. Republican lawmakers would rather cater to the wealthiest Americans (and many of these wealthy do not even want to be catered to!) and to the corporations that fill their campaign coffers. This needs to be drummed into the American consciousness continually from now to November 2012.
Monday, October 10, 2011
Columbus Day
Columbus Day has traditionally been the day that we Italian-Americans celebrate our heritage. Pride in Italian ancestry is reflected in the old, half-tongue-in-cheek saying, "There are two kinds of people in the world - Italians and those that want to be Italians".
The Italian character, personality traits, foibles, and stereotypes have been oft commented on. Luigi Barzini's 1969 classic, The Italians, is a must read. Also, if you can get a copy of it, Barbara Grizzuti Harrison's Italian Days (Ticknor & Fields, New York, 1989) is a journal of the author's travels in Italy that is filled with keen observations and insight into the land, the people and her own life. In fiction, Marco Tullio Giordana's "The Best of Youth" follows a family over four decades while capturing Italy during a period of social unrest in one of the best films I have ever seen.
Columbus accidentally discovered America for Europe on his way to India more than 500 years ago and the world has not been the same since. For more than 500 years, people have come to the New World. My own family came here in the early 1900's - indeed, my mother came here as a two-year old immigrant in 1913.
Maybe this is the thought we should take with us today. We are a nation of immigrants - everyone of us except, of course, for Native Americans. And everyone of us would do well to remember this when anti-immigrant rhetoric strikes our ears. Fear of the Other is a potent political weapon, which demagogues, Know-Nothings and their ilk have used for centuries. Let's not believe their lies any more and let's be fair and just in our laws.
The Italian character, personality traits, foibles, and stereotypes have been oft commented on. Luigi Barzini's 1969 classic, The Italians, is a must read. Also, if you can get a copy of it, Barbara Grizzuti Harrison's Italian Days (Ticknor & Fields, New York, 1989) is a journal of the author's travels in Italy that is filled with keen observations and insight into the land, the people and her own life. In fiction, Marco Tullio Giordana's "The Best of Youth" follows a family over four decades while capturing Italy during a period of social unrest in one of the best films I have ever seen.
Columbus accidentally discovered America for Europe on his way to India more than 500 years ago and the world has not been the same since. For more than 500 years, people have come to the New World. My own family came here in the early 1900's - indeed, my mother came here as a two-year old immigrant in 1913.
Maybe this is the thought we should take with us today. We are a nation of immigrants - everyone of us except, of course, for Native Americans. And everyone of us would do well to remember this when anti-immigrant rhetoric strikes our ears. Fear of the Other is a potent political weapon, which demagogues, Know-Nothings and their ilk have used for centuries. Let's not believe their lies any more and let's be fair and just in our laws.
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