We've been squanderng our kids future

Kevin Phillips has a new book out titled Bad Money: Reckless Finance, Failed Politics, and the Global Crisis of American Capitalism. Kind of punctuates the greedy insanity of our global financial sector brilliant idiots.

How in heaven's name (anyone else's?) did we get sold a bill of goods that if borrowed to buy stuff we would be building a strong economy? Essentially that we could borrow our way to prosperity. It's nuts.

And on top of that we are participating in one of the greatest transfers of wealth in the history of the human race ... due to the speculative frenzy in oil futures ... which in turn is due to the FACT that the globe is awash in US dollars that have to find a "hedge" against inflation ... which in turn is due to the fact that the government cronies (Treasury Department, Federal Reserve Board, ... U.S. Senate ... ) of our global financial services sector wizards are "printing" money faster than we ever thought possible ... because the whole house of cards they are trying to hold up is too big to allow to fail ... even though we all know it is going to.

And when you think of where our dollars are going for the petroleum products we use ... such as Saudi Arabia, Iran, Russia, Venezuela ... even if not directly ... and their sovereign accounts which can then be used to buy up our national assets ... this is not only crazy, it is traitorous -- in my opinion ( ... which is why I agree with blarneyboy about hanging our speculators from streetlights.)

We are being lied to on so many fronts ... the Consumer Price Index (inflation) has been "adjusted" ... the rate of unemployment is not a true measure of the unemployed ... and talk about our federal deficit:

What's the real federal deficit?
By Dennis Cauchon, USA TODAY,Updated 8/4/2006 9:55 AM ET

The federal government keeps two sets of books.

The set the government promotes to the public has a healthier bottom line: a $318 billion deficit in 2005.

The set the government doesn't talk about is the audited financial statement produced by the government's accountants following standard accounting rules. It reports a more ominous financial picture: a $760 billion deficit for 2005. If Social Security and Medicare were included -- as the board that sets accounting rules is considering -- the federal deficit would have been $3.5 trillion.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-08-02-deficit-usat_x.htm

Our kids are already shaking their heads at how shortsighted we've been ... squandering their future ... selling our birthright of liberty for another shopping trip to the mall ... and now money we spend on the gas we use to get to the mall goes to sovereign accounts so they can buy the malls where we shop ... brilliant!

It's time to lay the Grand Old Party to rest

It's pretty damn obvious that the Republican Party has knowingly participated in the deliberate shredding of our Constitution.

The president swears to the following oath "in accordance with Article II, Section I of the U.S. Constitution:"

"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."

http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/pihtml/pioaths.html

We all know there has been a deliberate attempt by the Bush 43 adminsitration to subvert the Constitution of the United States ... and those in the Republican Party who were not leading in the subversion, were acquiescing ... except for a few like Senator Chuck Hagel.

If we could get the Libertarian Party to focus more on those things we hold in common — like a functional government we can afford — and less on the peripheries — like legalizing marijuana — I think we could properly bury the GOP.

Save Bear Stearns and starve the world's poor

When Bernanke (the Federal Reserve Chairman) decreed that we would no longer be getting figures on the M3 money supply as he opened the floodgates on money ... where did we expect all the dollars to go when we weren't watching?

Is there any wonder why the price of oil, rice, etc. is going through the roof?

"Bernake's" money has found a home in commodities futures ... dah!

The Federal Reserve has "saved" Bear Stearns and given the U.S. economy a brief respite ... but at what cost to the world's poor?

Time to End "Bernanke Panky?"
By Kevin Phillips
Posted June 2, 2008 | 05:24 PM (EST)
The Huffington Post
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kevin-phillips/time-to-end-bernanke-pank_b_104769.html

Republicans have a lot to answer for ...

So how did the Republican Party leadership allow George W. to call himself a conservative and then ...

• Entangle us in the occupation of Iraq for five long years with no end in sight

• Run up the national debt by not even trying to balance the budget with no end in sight

• Continue the selling of America to foreigners with no end in sight

and so on and so forth ...

Let me put it to you straight ... if you vote for a Republican then you need to have your head examined.

If you don't like the Democrat ... then get involved with another political party. But Republicans? You're kidding, right?

Scott McClellan's epiphany ... is What Happened

Scott McClellan is the alter boy who finally realizes he's been sexually abused by his beloved priest.

He is the person raised as a true believer who discovers his guru was lying to him all along ... and using him ... and then mocking him.

He's the kid in junior high who gets suckered by the smart kids into carrying their water and then made fun of ... the humiliation is deep and lasting.

Scott was dumb enough to believe in George W. Bush ... well past the time when there was enough evidence to discredit the president ... but rose colored glasses are not easily removed from someone like Scott. It took a brutal act of betrayal ... on the part of people Scott looked up to and trusted ... Rove, Libby, and Cheney.

It takes time to assimilate this profound betrayal within one's psyche. Then there is the act of catharsis ... Scott wrote a book. Others go out and shoot somebody.

There is nothing puzzling about this. It fits the facts on the ground.

We need a new word for somethings we call taxes

"Tax" covers a lot of mischief, but it also is supposed to work when we talk about sharing in a common endeavor. It actually has too much negative baggage (rightfully so) to cover that wide a spectrum of meaning. But we have to use the word, whether it carries unintended connotations in our minds or not. For now, let's try to think past the negatives.

A gas tax to cover the cost of maintaining the streets and roads we the people drive on makes sense. If we drive a lot we'll need to keep up the streets and roads more than if we drive less. It also makes sense when it becomes obvious that we have to wean ourselves from petroleum-based vehicular energy. (Peak oil, anyone?) Do we prepare for the future or forget about it?

Again, a carbon "tax" carries the negative connotations of the "tax" word. My view is that we should think about the carbon tax as a reasonable attempt by reasonable people (anyone else been reading The Age of Reason by Thomas Paine?) to assign a cost to an externality (look it up) when the so-called "free" market is not very good at recovering the costs of externalities ... which is why they are called externalities, because the free market doesn't pay for them ... which is why we joke that the free market is great a capitalizing profits and socializing costs.

Just to dismiss a concept out of hand because it carries the omni-negativeness of the "tax" word ... well, it's not too smart. We have to move into the future ... and figure out how to pay for it ... as well as the wreckage of our past. We can't immigrate to another planet ... at least not yet.

Maybe we should come up with a new word for those taxes that actually work by paying the costs of a better life.

If we are being lied to ...

Does anyone not believe we are being lied to by our leaders public and private?

The Consumer Price Index as "the"inflation measure has been "adjusted". Unemployment stats are so far off the mark as to be laughable.

Our political candidates openly pander to us.

And maybe the worst lie of all is that all we have to do to turn the economy around is buy more stuff. Go shopping!

Is that crazy or what? How are we going to pay for it?

Oh right, the global financial wizards/gurus will invent new instruments of debt so we can borrow what we need to be able to buy what we want.

Need I tell you, this is crazy.

Acquittal!?

"A Queens judge on Friday acquitted three detectives charged in the shooting of Sean Bell, who died on his wedding day in a hail of 50 police bullets."

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/26/nyregion/26bell.html

Sean Bell is shot to death
in New York City
outside a strip bar
at four A M.

By the police
firing fifty shots

Sean Bell wasn't the one
the police thought had the gun.

Only the police had guns.

Fifty shots!

One police officer emptying, reloading, emptying ...

blam
blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam
reload
blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam-blam

Thirty-0ne shots among fifty shots!

Only the police had guns.

Sean Bell wasn't even the one
they thought had the gun.

Acquittal?!

Are you kidding me?

Note: I will research the testimony on the sequencing of the 31 shots by the police officer who emptied his gun then reloaded to be able to keep firing. It is the dramatic heart of this poem ... -hgl

An Easter Update: Thoughts on religion

Religion is our encoding of our tribal identity in ritual, liturgy, and dress allowing us to recognize friend from foe, particularly among strangers. A particular religion involves both the concept of perfection — or God — and the concepts of how best to meet the challenges we have identified as replicable in the human experience of existence, as well as what they mean and why they occur.

Note: I am most familiar with the Christian religion, and I have been reading in Buddhism off and on for most of my adult life. (But I am certainly no authority on Buddhism, and merely claiming personal -- rather than scholarly -- familiarity with the Protestant Baptist version of Christianity.)

The leading "thinkers" in human history have realized that there is a "standard instruction set" encoded in our biochemical processes that guide the organization of our perceptions and thoughts as well as the responses to them. Religious thinkers identify this "standard instruction set" as ordained/given by God.

For example, we have learned that we treat those we recognize as friends different than we treat those we recognize as foes, and that we automatically are wary of a stranger until we determine the stranger's status, and we know from experience that a tactic of an enemy is to get their foe to let their guard down by considering the enemy a benevolent party to the engagement ... a la the Trojan Horse.

What I find most appealing about theoretical Christianity is that it invites all human beings to explore friendship through a commitment to the concept of Jesus as perfection. And I find the concept of Jesus as perfection to be an ideal that offers the most hope for humanity to live in peace. The traditions of the Judaic-Christian religion heritage provide the admonition to progress from our "isness" to our "oughtness", ever mindful of the dynamic tension in the struggle. Although I must say, the evolving interpretation of Christianity by many politically dominant religious leaders has not proven to provide the best path toward peace, nor was King David of the Old Testament a particularly peaceful leader. (Note: I do not believe that a "God" exists in the meaning of "God" expressed in the Christian Bible.)

I accept the challenge of the struggle to become what I believe I ought to be. And that it is my commitment to my concept of human perfection, to my "God" ... which in itself is dynamic ... that identifies me as a "religious" person, and my "religion" is the path I have identified to follow in my commitment.

This all melds back into my understanding that my existence -- coming out of the evolution of human existence -- preceded my awareness of my existence, and that -- therefor -- my awareness is organized by my existence folding back upon itself ... so that I am capable of choice ... which is an essential characteristic of the an intelligent life-form. I can, in fact, choose to learn how to choose based on reason.

I would even suggest as worth examining, the idea that it is the concept of an ideal of human perfection in the form of God that initiates choice because as reality unfolds/evolves, whatever God was defined to be carries with it the limitations of past experience, never able to anticipate all that we will learn about ourselves and our world in the cosmos. The cosmos continues to surprise us. Even adding "omni" to our God's attributes does not drown out the call to our renewal of choice in the face of new experience, as Joshua challenged the Israelites in the Old Testament, "Choose you this day whom ye will serve." - Joshua 24:15, KJV Blue Letter Bible. 1996-2008. 24 Mar 2008. http://www.blueletterbible.org/kjv/Jos/Jos024.html#15

Confronted with the dialect of "isness" vs. "oughtness" -- individually within each of us -- we are thrust out on the unfathomable (we do not know were we go with any certainty) depths of the awareness of our individual existence to choose, and through our actions express our faith in a path ahead. Even choosing to do nothing is a choice.

For example, I can decide whether a stranger is a friend or foe or nothing of note ... and then what to do about it, or not. I can decide to learn how to make friends of foes, or not, and then decide to go about doing that, or not.

And because I can imagine a better world, I can choose to try to bring that better world into existence, or not.

I believe the most fundamental choice is whether I act to benefit myself irrespective of the effect on my community/tribe, or I act to benefit my community/tribe irrespective of the effect upon myself.

Christianity teaches that the first option, or greed, is the root of all evil, and that the second option, or the giving up of one's own life for others, is the greatest love we can have. And in framing our options it circumscribes our choices as Christians.

The vaunted MBA mantra that acting to benefit myself provides the greatest benefit to my community goes tilt upon any reflection beyond the statement on the surface.

Christianity also proposes that all humans God's children, are destined to become friends.

That addresses my Christianity, my existentialism, and my atheism. What is left is to consider my transcendentalism ... which to me is simply that my awareness transcends my concept of God ... because God is the product of my past awareness and present reality unfolds in the present into the future as a dynamic process of adaptation based on the past correctly anticipating possibility emerging in the present but never "knowing" exactly what is in store.

Ah yes, deregulation ...

"Deregulation" was the buzz-word ... the group identifying slogan aka tribal dress of the moment ... right up until the sub-prime mortgages started falling apart. We are now re-examining the meaning and worth of "regulation" ... surprising how many times we can re-invent the wheel, don't you think?

What is "regulation"?

As the noun "regulation":

1. a law, rule, or other order prescribed by authority, esp. to regulate conduct.
2. the act of regulating or the state of being regulated.

"regulation." Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1). Random House, Inc. 14 Mar. 2008.

As the verb "to regulate":

1. to control or direct by a rule, principle, method, etc.: to regulate household expenses.
2. to adjust to some standard or requirement, as amount, degree, etc.: to regulate the temperature.
3. to adjust so as to ensure accuracy of operation: to regulate a watch.
4. to put in good order: to regulate the digestion.

"regulate." Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1). Random House, Inc. 14 Mar. 2008.

Starting with the basics, we regulate weights and measures, minimum-maximum limits such as highway speed, minimum qualifications such as education plus experience plus licensing exams. These forms of regulations most of us would recognize as positive "influences" on the our communities, and we quickly can imagine negative outcomes if they were removed.

The common denominator for positive regulatory outcomes is that each can trust the other to perform as expected in a given transaction ... which dramatically increases the efficiency of transactions, thereby adding measurable to the value of the regulation. If one can process a thousand transactions in the time it would otherwise take to -- let's say -- process ten, the savings per transaction is huge ... adding tremendous value to the use of the regulation.

Take for instance if we now have to examine every child's toy coming into the USA from China for lead, the increase in cost for those toys will become staggeringly high.

When the customer doesn't have to bring their own measuring cups and tapes to the store to assure the accuracy of the amount of goods being purchased; when the driver doesn't have to play bumper cars on the freeway in order to travel; ... and when the borrower doesn't have to wonder if the lender is disclosing the real terms of the loan to the borrower's level of understanding -- in other words, can once again trust his/her local banker without the help of a lawyer.

Yes, the more complex the transaction, then it is conceivable that the regulations should reflect the level of impact the failure of trust will have on the community. It is one thing to have a three shells and a pea game of chance to be taking place in a back alley, and quite another for homes to bought and sold based on a similar shell game.

However, regulations can also interfere with the efficiency of transactions. Some of the most egregious of these negative impacts stem from politically based bureaucracies imposing fees and restrictions with the clear intent to reward a political party/entity ... especially the party/entity that historically benefits most from an increase in government employees, paid for by the increase in fees.

The speed traps along highways that interrupt the smooth flow of traffic to generate the local town's revenue through tickets to non-local drivers.

Here in New Jersey we recently defeated a strong effort by the Governor to pay the costs of a State government engorged with new employees beholden to the Democratic Party with a turnpike asset monetization scheme euphemistically titled "Governor Corzine's Financial Restructuring and Debt Reduction" plan.

One more thought ... for the deregulation tribe ... the most efficient safeguards of the public interest are the rights of the whistleblower to be protected in his/her job combined with an actively vigilant and independent press.

Note: This post was written in response to a discussion I had yesterday evening with a brilliant young college student over free market concepts. I continue to think about the relevancy of the cogent arguments she made. I respect her point of view enough to explain my own in response.

The day the debt came due

Joseph Racioppi posted this in a column of his titled Subprime mortgage mess just a symptom of what ails us on NJ Voices yesterday, Monday, January 21 — Martin Luther King Jr. Day — when Wall Street was closed:

Our entire economy is debt based. The Federal Government is in debt $10 trillion. New Jersey is in debt billions and billions and many Americans are "maxed out" on credit cards. Rather than addressing the problem of a debt based economy, our leaders try to find more ways of continuing the spending that runs the economy. When our leaders, after September 11th, tell us to "go shopping", that says a lot.

This was my response for today, Tuesday, January 22:

How prescient of you, Joe. This may be the day the debt comes due.

The above the fold main story on the front page of the NY Times this morning was headlined: Awaiting Wall Street's Open, Asia Market Plunge.

The lead paragraph read:

"Stock markets across Asia plummeted again on Tuesday, and European markets saw volatile trading, as anxious sellers worried about the global ramifications of a slowdown in the United States."

Here's the link: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/22/business/worldbusiness/23cnd-asiastox.html

It's going to be an "interesting" day: "The Day the Debt Came Due"?

Do you think we the people will finally get it ... as Pogo told us: "We have met the enemy and he is us" ... or will we in more typical fashion start looking for scapegoats?

Personally? I'm rereading Thomas Paine's Common Sense ... and it is making a lot of sense.

Need I add, "Duh!"?

Hoo boy!

The New Jersey Star-Ledger poses this Q&A in its editorial, Foreign money to the rescue, January 19:

"Is foreign investment a bad thing? It is not."

This was my comment in response:

That's like asking if drinking water is a bad thing. Depends on how much you drink. Too much water and you upset your electrolytic balance, the brain swells, and you die ... or something like that.

Let's start with some economic basics that the common person can understand. (I have to do that because I am not an economist and I have never read one who has ever gotten economics right over time outside of tightly controlled models ... which is kind of like pouring sand through a funnel into neat little cone-shaped mounds on a beach on a windless, sunny day below the high-tide mark and thinking they are going to last ... but I digress.)

First, if you don't produce something of real value, you are not creating wealth. Money has no "real" value, it has "virtual" value relative to its ability to help exchange things of real value between strangers ... close and far. Money has value if the two parties to a transaction using money BELIEVE the pieces of paper they are using has the exchange value (translatable into real things of real use value -- like food that actually keeps us from starving to death) printed on it ... or something like that.

Now if you take something of real value and you auction it off to people who want it (think it desirable and worthwhile to own, like a house -- hint, hint) with an excess of money to spend (either their own or what they can borrow ... 'cuz that's the job of the Fed to insure we have enough liquidity to get the things we want 'cuz we're a nation of consumers), they will in all likelihood pay more for it than they would have otherwise. If they then turn around and get even MORE money for it than what they paid because others in turn bid higher with the extra money they have or can get ... well, the PRICE of that something will go up. Do I have to say, "DUH!"?

Let's not get too complicated here ... if a nation reduces the amount of real things of value that it produces ... and starts a bidding war on the things of value it does produce ... while the Fed keeps printing money so we can all bid as high as we want for something ('cuz -- you guessed it -- we're consumers now!) what do you think the outcome will be?

And you have economists with mathematical models who tell us this imbalance of real production to virtual wealth is what is real? and can continue indefinitely? and folks fall all over themselves BELIEVING it when they see with their own eyes that the real wealth of our nation has been deteriorating ... while the dollar amount (virtual wealth) of the money supply has been growing?

And now that our money has been siphoned off to the oil producing nations and the goods producing nations because our vaunted economic leaders thought it better to pass along windfall profits in a "free" market rather than "tax" ourselves for our own rational benefit ... you say there is nothing wrong here because this is the way the "free" market is supposed to work?

And I'm not supposed be laughing until I start crying?

From my notes about Milton Friedman and the so-called "free" market:

Milton Friedman, the guru of profoundly influential monetarist and laissez-faire ideas of the past few decades has pulled the plug on free markets ... maybe without realizing it.

From NPQ, the New Perspectives Quarterly:

Free Markets and the End of History

Friedman | ... "Free markets" is a very general term. There are all sorts of problems that will emerge. Free markets work best when the transaction between two individuals affects only those individuals. But that isn't the fact. The fact is that, most often, a transaction between you and me affects a third party. That is the source of all problems for government. That is the source of all pollution problems, of the inequality problem. There are some good economists like Gary Becker and Bob Lucas who are working on these issues. This reality ensures that the end of history will never come.

Intrepretation: Because transactions using the medium of money ALWAYS affect a third party, there is no such thing as a "free" or "unfettered" market in terms of the customary definition of the economic term. The reason for this is the clear fact that all costs incurred in the production and distribution of goods and services are not paid for out of the monetary selling price of the goods and services ... only the reimbursement of "ownership" costs ... so what is "free" about free markets is their being free of the costs they incur to others than the legally defined owners of the goods and services for sale--sellers and buyers.

http://www.digitalnpq.org/archive/2006_winter/friedman.html

Read that again: Because transactions using the medium of money ALWAYS affect a third party, there is no such thing as a "free" or "unfettered" market in terms of the customary definition of the economic term.

Need I add, "Duh!"?

Y'know, if something is too complicated for us common folks to understand ... when it affects our daily lives ... then we probably should figure something else out ... because the brilliant idiots are gonna screw things up trying to get more than their fair share of the real wealth ... which as the Good Book laid out: greed ... aka the love of money ... is the root of all evil.

All us working folks are asking is to give us the opportunity to go to work and create real wealth, and then be paid our fair share of what we have helped create. That's pretty darn simple. You'd think these geniuses could figure that out. Or ... could have figured out how not to screw it up.

Got a lot of "Duhs!" in this piece.*wink*

Too late for Hillary to go authentic on us

Apparently Hillary Clinton teared up yesterday in her bid to seek the nomination of the Democratic Party for president.

Hillary Rodham Clinton's eyes welled up and her voice broke repeatedly Monday as she talked with voters in a restaurant about her campaign for the presidency.

The former first lady was making a last-minute pitch for support as she spoke on the eve of the state's primary, with polls showing her trailing Democratic rival Barack Obama.

Asked by a sympathetic voter how she keeps going in the grueling campaign, she replied, "It's not easy. It's not easy."

"And I couldn't do it if I just didn't, you know, passionately believe it was the right thing to do," she said, her voice catching.

-http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/01/07/hillary-tears-up-on-the-c_n_80254.html

I can try to understand her feelings. I have witnessed them in others all too frequently now that I am in my 70th year. Here she is having lived her whole life in pursuit of a goal ... clawed, scratched her way to the top of the heap, done everything she thought she had to do to earn the prize ... remnants of opponents strewn left and right ... and it begins to dawn on her that it's been in vain. In fact, the very life she lived is now her biggest obstacle.

It's not fair!

I think she is really saying, "It's not fair, Bill!"

Sibel Edmonds on YouTube

References:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article3137695.ece

http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=12166

http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_mike_mej_080107_times_of_london_blow.htm

A Political Tsunami: Obama's win in Iowa

For those of us who remember Bobby Kennedy's win in California before he was assassinated, Barack Obama's win yesterday in Iowa is a similar earthquake. The energy generated by the audacity of hope in our youth will again transform an epoch.

The youth turnout in support of Obama was huge. It represents an opportunity for we the people to alter the course of our nation in a historic manner. This is a politcal tsunami.

It will be interesting to watch the old guard politicians try to plug the breached dikes.

Note 1: Originally posted as a comment on the Star-Ledger's NJ Voices website in response to the John Farmer's column, For two also-rans, it's crunch time.

Note 2: According to the results of the entrance polls for the Iowa caucuses posted on CNN's website, Obama was supported by 57% of the 17-29 age group, and 42% of the 30-44 year olds.
(See http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/primaries/results/state/#IA )

New Jersey MUST apologize for slavery

Out of our reflections on our past, our history ... we create a narrative of existence that we then teach ourselves ... to guide us into the future.

We as a people write our bibles, our stories ...

It takes time and distance to put things in perspective ... and correct the lies we previously told ourselves out of false understanding, a false narrative ...

False in the sense that our beliefs were wrong because we had been taught a false narrative of our past ... and these beliefs were proven wrong when we finally had the courage to examine them in the light of new evidence, new revelation.

An apology for slavery is not just important, it is necessary. We need to plant that marker in our collective consciousness, our narrative of our existence ... reminding ourselves how wrong we can be at times.

Note: Originally posted as a comment on the Star-Ledger's NJ Voices website in response to the editorial, Apologize for slavery:

The evil that men do: trial by jury

Trial by jury ... or the threat of trial by jury has too often become the denial of justice to the accused ... for reasons worth exploring in our nation.

From Hillel the Elder, a famous Jewish religious leader:

If I am not for myself, who will be for me?
If I am only for myself, what am I?
If not now, then when?

That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow. That is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn.

If the last quotation seems familiar, this is how it is attributed to Jesus in KJV of the New Testament:

Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.

- Matthew 7:12

Please read the following:

Juror in Long Island Killing Says He Was Pressured Into a Guilty Verdict
Article By
By COREY KILGANNON and NATE SCHWEBER
Published: December 25, 2007
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/25/nyregion/25jury.html

Colorado Hearings Re-examine ’87 Murder Case
By KIRK JOHNSON and DAN FROSCH
Published: December 27, 2007
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/27/us/27fortcollins.html

Their are many -- too many -- stories being accumulated in the annals of injustice. Some of the most egregious cases are chronicled in the:

Innoncence Project

http://www.innocenceproject.org/

If ever there was a stench of evil in a land ... have we become so used to it that we do not smell it? Or are our slogans for our type of justice such tribal marks that we dare not question them individually for fear of being turned upon ourselves? When will we question the evil we do to others?

"If not now, then when?"

Putting Ayn Rand to rest ... finally!

Please read Paul Krugman's column in today's (Friday, Dec 21) NY Times:

Blindly Into the Bubble
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/21/opinion/21krugman.html

Alan Greenspan was/(is) a brilliant idiot who wrapped old fashioned greed in the false Ayn Rand ideology of free market Capitalism ... destroying the safeguards that are needed to protect ANY market from thieves and charlatans. Even the ancients knew you had to have things like uniform weights, that some things cannot be left to the goodwill of the transient carnival vendors with no stake in the village.

I am tired of the "us vs. them" around here ...

Whites vs. blacks, GBLT's vs. straights, one religion against another, and on and on and on .... while it's really rich vs. poor.

America, the rich folks have got us laboring folks fighting among ourselves ... jumping up and down. Are we trying to get the attention of the rich folks so they will invite us to join them?

Here we are squabbling over a Democrat US Senator from New York running for President, Hillary Clinton, who shouldn't even be running on a Democratic ticket anywhere in Yankee territory -- and I ain't talking baseball.

Hell, they are making the street-hole covers for New York City in India under sweatshop/slave labor conditions, for chrissakes! We all know what has happened to fair labor practices under the Clintons ... they kiss up to the global corporationists to advance their personal political careers and leave the working families groveling for crumbs from the rich folks feast.

The United States of America is sliding down a Democrat greased slope to banana republic status ... with nothing left to break its slide ... while we the people are totally distracted by fighting over the dwindling scraps falling from the platters we deliver to the table.

And there are so many of us who believe this is a "God thing" based on our devotion to religious belief ... and who are so far removed from practicing what they preach, using their doctrines as tribal identifiers rather than guides to life ... that it's pretty damn obvious that we are going to need the kind of upheaval brought about by the depression of the 30's to actually get this nation back on track ... if it can get back on track and not descend into fascism.

Hope? What's hope got to do with it? We need practical solutions. We need jobs that pay a living wage ... that also don't destroy our health as we work.

That's not socialism or communism ... that is "fair is fair"-ism in a nation as wealthy as ours.

Note (January 5, 2008): Barack Obama has won a transforming political victory in the Iowa caucuses. "Hope" may have a lot to do with it! -NCS

Concerning organized labor and Hillary ...

From posts to HuffingtonPost.com ... where I post as hglindquist ...

Hoo boy ... did you see the picture on the front page of the NY Times recently of the New York City street-hole covers being cast in India under slave-like wages and conditions? Where was labor when THAT was printed? American organized labor has been contemplating its navel for so long that there are no jobs left to worry about fair treatment over.

Been to Pittsburgh lately? I guess working retail on the river is supposed to compensate for steel-mill jobs?

Unions got suckered into hanging onto their turf as it got smaller and smaller ... when they should have been looking out for all workers. There is no freedom to do anything if you are a worker and you don't have a job that pays enough to meet your needs let alone your wants.

When we gave up on requiring everything sold in this country to be produced under fair labor practices, we gave up on the America our labor had built ... and decided we should become a banana republic.

The horse is already out of the barn on what our old unions should have/could have done. We need a new revitalized labor movement for all workers.

And that is NOT socialism or communism. It is "fair is fair" ism.

And that sure ain't gonna come with Hillary!!!

New York Manhole Covers, Forged Barefoot in India

NY Times
By HEATHER TIMMONS and J. ADAM HUGGINS
Published: November 26, 2007

Photo caption: "Workers in Haora, India, have few protections while making manhole covers for Con Edison and some cities" utilities."

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/26/nyregion/26manhole.html

Now tell me again about Hillary's support for fair treatment for workers!!! I know she lived in Arkansas for awhile, but isn't she the U.S. Senator from New York? And isn't New York City in New York?

Concerning vouchers ...

Concerning vouchers ... and being a member of the working class ... with bono fides extending from my parents and their parents to my children and their children ...

Most of us from the small towns and communities that spawned the public education system were part of mostly homogeneous communities ... at least I was in most of my years in public education. My family's values were the values taught in public school ... yes, religious, ethical, and social values were pretty much common ones ... at least publicly ... including prejudices (all one has to do is read the text books).

And I think the majority of folks still believe their particular public school is teaching the values they want taught. (Which is why they are against vouchers. They think vouchers will be net resource losers for their schools.)

But it is appears to be equally obvious that a (growing?) number of families -- particularly the working poor in large urban centers -- are discovering that their children come back from public school in worse condition than when first enrolled ... with the strong arm of the state forcing them to keep sending their children to these schools even though the parents know it is harming their children's value system. They would like vouchers ... but they are a minority.

Gunfight at the DC Corral

The Baker Boys are shooting it out at the DC Corral with the Cheney Gang ...

A fictionalized scenario ...

Poppy Bush was keeping his hands off the Shrub presidency ... as Poppy watched his son once again slide into ignominy ...

Decision time for the senior Bush evolved through the outing of Valerie Plame as a CIA operative by Robert Novak on July 14, 2003 followed by the awarding of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian award in the United States, on December 14, 2004 to L. Paul Bremer III, Tommy R. Franks, and George J. Tenet.

Privately grousing about the situation with his wife, Barbara Bush, Poppy Bush realized "It's like déjà vu all over again". Shrub was screwing up again.

Moma Bush (Barbara) cried, "You have to do something, Poppy! Look what that Cheney Gang is DOING to our boy."

"I know, I know," Poppy replied. "And I will. Those Baker Boys -- our boys -- can shoot straighter than the Cheney Gang." (To be proved later when Dickie -- leader of the Cheney Gang -- shot his hunting companion on Feb 13, 2006.)

The Baker Boys first attempt to extricate Shrub from the clutches of the Cheney Gang failed. Shrub disregards the Baker-Hamilton Report and the cowardly Democrats inexplicably fail to act on it -- even though they had just won majorities in both the House of Representatives and the Senate of the U.S. Congress and could hold Shrub's feet to the fire by withholding funding unless he went along with the bipartisan report. The cowardly Democrats were so focused on winning the 2008 election that they stumbled over what was placed in front of them on an oil-slick platter.

Whew, who would have thought THAT was going to happen?!

But the Baker Boys were undeterred. They knew the intelligence had been cooked on Iraq and was being cooked on Iran. With Shrub refusing to be extricated from the manure piling up in the DC Corral because the cowardly Democrats weren't hauling it away -- even though they now had the manure hauling contract for the place -- the Baker Boys realized THEY would have to pump it out -- like NOW -- meaning they would have to shoot it out with the Cheney Gang.

The Baker Boys fire a shot that hits the target. In August, 2007 the new NIE report was issued.

Shrub still doesn't surrender or fall.

Blam-blam, in quick succession the Baker Boys "commence firing at will" ... the NIE report is released and the CIA Director is forced to acknowledge the destruction of the interogation tapes ...

Shrub staggers ... but will he fall? Will the DC Corral be saved? The manure drained or carried away?

Stay tuned, folks ... this is getting interesting.

Fear and fairness in determining the collective good

Author's note: My post from September, 2005, Katrina and the collective good is my "most read" post. This post expands on the concept of the collective good by examining the essence or essential nature of fear and being fair in an industrial/technological society. Also, two recent books make this an appropriate time to revisit these issues:

The Squandering of America,
by Robert Kuttner

and

The Soul of Capitalism: Opening Paths to a Moral Economy,
by William Greider

Plus, this article in the December, 2007 issue of Vanity Fair:

The Economic Consequences of Mr. Bush,
by Nobel laureate, Joseph E. Stiglitz

To live in fear is the essence of slavery, or the essential characteristic of liberty is to live without fear. Freedom is having no fear.

As FDR -- President Franklin Delano Roosevelt -- said in his first inaugural address, "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."

I am certain that my fellow Americans expect that on my induction into the Presidency I will address them with a candor and a decision which the present situation of our people impel. This is preeminently the time to speak the truth, the whole truth, frankly and boldly. Nor need we shrink from honestly facing conditions in our country today. This great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper. So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that theAnd only thing we have to fear is fear itself—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance. In every dark hour of our national life a leadership of frankness and vigor has met with that understanding and support of the people themselves which is essential to victory. I am convinced that you will again give that support to leadership in these critical days.

- Franklin Delano Roosevelt
First inaugural address

And fairness? What is fairness in our individual lives interacting with each other? What is fairness in the commons, the public arena? How does what we do privately affect others publicly, and what is fair about it? How does what is done publicly affect us privately, and what is fair about it?

In political history we have specific interpretations attached to fairness such as President Harry S. Truman and his Fair Deal, and the Fairness Doctrine as an FCC regulation.

Here I want to strip away this historical baggage and get to the core meanings of fear and fair as we live our daily lives ... starting as children on the playground where we learn to handle bullies, and we go by the rule, "fair is fair".

Here I will explore the premise that my country, the United states of America, is faltering because our leaders are bullies who have abandoned fairness.

Economic smoke and mirrors ... or the love of money is the root of all evil

Fact: The cost of oil and food are not counted when measuring "core inflation".

Fact: The unemployment rate does not include workers who have given up looking for a job.

And our vaunted leaders have kept telling us the US economy was doing great ... right up until now when the plummeting value of the dollar has pulled back the curtain ... a la Wizard of Oz.

And we no longer have the industrial base to take advantage of a weaker dollar. We don't have anything to sell except Manhattan real estate. (That's metaphorical, folks ... just in case you didn't catch the sarcasm.)

And we the people have our brilliant idiots — our leading economists — conspiring with our greedy elite ruling class of global corporationists to thank for the mess we are in, and the coming catastrophe ... which they will sell to us via the religion of True Believers as the moral decline of the people ... when they should be reminding us of the age-old wisdom of "the love of money is root of all evil."

For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.

- 1 Timothy 6:10 KJV

"The flimflammery of official statistics ... "

The country has been in denial for years about the economic reality facing American families. That grim reality has been masked by the flimflammery of official statistics (job growth good, inflation low) and the muscular magic of the American way of debt: mortgages on top of mortgages, pyramiding student loans and an opiatelike addiction to credit cards at rates that used to get people locked up for loan-sharking.

The big story out of Mr. Bernanke’s appearance before the Joint Economic Committee was his prediction that the economy was likely to worsen. Only the people still trapped in denial could have believed otherwise.

This is what Representative Maurice Hinchey of upstate New York told the chairman:

“This economy is not doing well. And the example of the mortgage closures on 2 million people — and maybe a lot more than that as time goes on — is really not the cause of the economic problem we’re facing, but it’s just a factor of it. It’s a factor of the weakness of this economy.”

In an interview after the hearing, Representative Hinchey discussed the disconnect between official government reports and the reality facing working families. He noted that the unemployment rate does not include workers who have become so discouraged that they’ve given up looking for a job.

And the most popular measure of inflation, the Consumer Price Index, does not include the cost of energy or food, “the two most significant aspects of the increased cost of living for the American people.”

The elite honchos in Washington and their courtiers in the news media are all but completely out of touch with the daily struggle of working families. Thirty-seven million Americans live in poverty and close to 60 million others are just a notch above the official poverty line.

- Bob Herbert
Recession? What Recession?
OpEd - NYTimes
Saturday, November 10, 2007

When the labor movement in the United States failed to fight for the right of every person willing and able to work to be able to work at a job that at least paid a living wage for a worker's family, the labor movement failed the worker and his/her family.

The principle of having a job that pays a living wage for a worker's family for everyone willing and able to work is NOT socialism, communism or even unionism. It is the cornerstone of a free society.

Variations on the human theme ...

We all know that people have different eye colors ... and that there are major differences like brown and blue ... and that there are tint and pattern variations of the main differences.

Most of us know that traits like response to certain stimuli also vary, like sexual arousal to specific visual images ... and that individuals are aroused differently, to different levels of arousal, by different images.

What we may not have thought about is how that translates to different levels of group identification. I would suggest a spectrum of emotional commitment to one's "identity groups" -- family, and other forms of "tribe" such as religion, alma mater, company, etc. --from intense embedding to casual acceptance like, "Oh yes, I belong to the local bowling league."

I would speculate further that the ability of the symbols of any one of our identity groups to trigger an emotional response is a key indicator of "embeddedness" within that group. In examining the relationships of symbols to their emotional responses, the variations of individual emotional response need to be factored into the analysis.

"Symbols" in this context mean any "identifying" signs, sounds, rituals, etc. For instance our national anthem, The Star-Spangled Banner" is a symbol of our national identity.

Taking a leap ahead, we can envision a political party that unites the "religious identity" with "national identity" as creating a strong pull on its members. And those individuals with the strongest positive emotional response to religious symbols are -- hypothetically at least -- the ones who would develop the strongest positive emotional connection to the political party and its symbols.

We should keep in mind that slogans and phrases can become symbolic elements of group identity as opposed to rational elements of public discourse.

And if the political leaders merge the religious and national identities of the people by using symbols of the religious identity to interweave the emotional connection rather than overt statements which would be rationally rejected out of hand ... and if they do this consciously ... don't we have what is actually going on today in the United States? And what went on in Hitler's Third Reich within the lifetime of some of our citizens?

And isn't this the whole thrust of the neocon a la Leo Strauss political movement?

References:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neocon

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leo_Strauss

"They" are trying to hold back worldwide panic over the dollar ...

Just before Christmas in 2005 I advised my friends that they should either sell their home in the coming year or plan on staying in it for awhile.

Their children were going to college and it was obvious from all the key indicators that the housing bubble was getting ready to pop. Mostly I had been reading Paul Krugman's column on the OpEd page of the NY Times and putting two and two together.

Currently it is obvious that the economy of the United States is tanking. And if the US Dollar becomes funny money, the Chinese are going to be pissed. Like 1.5 trillion dollars is a lot of swag anywhere ... and there is only so much Manhattan real estate ... and as the dollar plummets ... the amount you can get for any given million or so is less and less.

What will our brilliant financial idiots do then? Like, when the dollar tanks? Right now they are trying desperately to hold back the panic that a real run on the dollar would cause.

And you see, folks ... there isn't any vast industrial base to pick up the slack ... in like churning out something the world wants at the lower prices the falling dollar would bring ... so we are caught in the economic vise of our own making ... not the making of we the people, but of the making of our great greedy leaders ...

The only question left is who are "they" going to blame.

Oh ... and my friends didn't sell their home. They enjoy living in it, their neighborhood, and their community. And they will not retire for another ten years or so. They love what they do and how they live.

Well, we're in for it now ...

How I see things as an American citizen ... now that General Musharraf of Pakistan has declared a state of emergency and suspended that country's constitution.

Our military's ground forces are almost totally decimated by the protracted military occupation of Iraq since our victory there in the Second Iraq War ended by mid-2003 with the overthrow of Saddam Hussein. (But we still have our nukes.)

Russia, Venezuela, and Iran are earning gajillions off the "risk tax" added to the price of oil by our participation in destabilizing the Middle East.

China is buying up the world's resources with our U.S. dollars as fast as it can, ahead of the falling value of the U.S. dollar.

What else? There is so much more going on ... like the resurgence of Hezbollah in Lebonon and the Taliban in Afghanistan ... and we haven't even begun to decipher the deterioration of our moral authority with the all but concrete revelation that we tortured human beings in our custody.

The Cheney/neocon/Bush 43 administration's foreign policy has been a disaster in so many ways that it is hard to keep track of them all ... and the large number of problems cannot be hid by the relatively small fig leaf of General Petraeus's tactical surge with its principle outcome being the balkanization of Iraq ... which, by the way, benefits Iran to a great degree.

My God, it is a mess, isn't it?

What is more ... our enemies know all this.

Wages for labor is the primal discussion ...

Wages for labor is the primal discussion ... how do we divide the rewards of the hunt ...

If we view "labor" as a cost like any other material than we actually/literally make those who labor into commodities, something other than primary participants. But we all know this ... and we console ourselves by becoming consumers.

The narratives we pass onto our children and our children's children is "be good and we will buy you something" ... the emotional expectation of becoming an adult gets wrapped in the opportunity to buy ... not in the ability to do ... for too many of us.

We who labor have all to often accepted the role of gun-bearer and guide to the Great White Hunter as if he were some kind of god-man when it is our labor and skills that allow him to hunt.

The problem from the labor side is that too often labor has been organized to exclude, and organized labor becomes viewed as an obstacle to many -- if not most -- who want to work ... an obstacle to those who want to, but are not allowed to join the hunt.

As long as organized labor colludes with the man to limit access to work, labor in general will lose.

That is not to say that specific skill sets/individual parameters cannot be defined or selected for specific jobs/assignments, or that pay rates can't vary. It is to say that labor solidarity must be for the principle that everyone willing and able to work must be given work at a living wage (in the context of a working family's needs).

I don't really give a rat's butt how many rich folks there are, as long as all who want to work can earn a living wage.

My labels ...

Politically, I consider myself a conservative progressive ... for example, I believe in states rights but not to block minimum standards from some, rather to provide a necessary flexibility on how we apply those standards in our communities for all.

I know, I know ... issues like that can get rather nuanced ... and that is why our founders created a republic with a balance of powers (not a one-man, one-vote herd-like democracy) based on levels of representation ... so we could sort it all out as we moved forward ... carefully. (The "moving forward" is the "progressive" part.)

Now, I gotta admit, our Declaration of Independence is a pretty radical document ...

Philosophically, I consider myself a Christian Existentialist ... for example, I believe the values of individual dignity and worth coming out of our Judaic-Christian heritage are supreme ... and without a sense of purpose and destiny expressed in the concept of "God", we descend into brutish chaos as Nietzsche predicted with his "God is dead."

As an Existentialist I believe with Sartre that it is immaterial whether God exists or not. What is material to MY awareness of MY existence (existence preceding awareness) is whether I BELIEVE in God ... or not.

I choose to believe that human existence IS in itself (life is, actually) an expression of purpose and destiny ... therefore God exists.

There's something going on in the economy ...

There's something going on in the economy that is being covered up ...

Inflation.

The price of oil is going through the roof ... medical and education costs have been mounting (among other things) ... the value of the dollar is falling precipitously ... AND "undocumented" workers aren't sending as much money home to Mexico ...

But the financial wizards tell us that inflation is not growing ...

Are they covering up the numbers until we have a Democrat in the White House to blame everything on?

Am I a Christian Existentialist? - Revisited

On July 26, 2005 I posted Am I a Christian Existentialist?.

I want to come back to it and pose the concept that we are ethical life-forms because we can choose our immediate action based on what we have learned from past experience what we now believe to be the best course of action for what we have also come to believe is the best future for us.

I would further suggest that this is the "God in us", that we can learn from our past and consciously attempt to teach ourselves how to have a better future by what we do in the present.

We can choose based on what we know. Expanding to its limit, the wisest choice is when we know everything ... thus being the oracle of the omnipotent and omniscient—or God—is the highest position for a human being.

It isn't too hard to figure out that there are those who come along and pretend or even think they are oracles of God in order to advance their own selfish ends, leaders who use religion or science to rule for their personal benefit or the benefit of their particular group. They are wolves in sheep clothing. Some do it purposely, like Hitler. Some actually believe what they are doing is ordained by God, like George W. Bush.

Nor is it difficult to realize that the siren song of relative ethics can degenerate into short-sighted selfish behavior. "If I do what is best for my future, then I am doing what is best for the collective future" is the dictum of the coward.

But as a wise man taught, "By their fruit, ye shall know them." For what is the value of one person's wealth if all others are paupers?

That is why in my culture I choose to be labeled a Christian Existentialist ... and because Jesus taught "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God."

Archetypes as interpretive images ...

The way I look at it ... Part III

We have sets of evolved integrated responses on which the awareness of self as an individual being is superimposed.

These sets of integrated responses are "automatically" triggered by our internal/external environment ... and then given culturally appropriate (and accepted) descriptions or interpretive images ... as Joseph Campbell wrote about the masks of God ... each becoming (the description or interpretive image becomes) an archetype.

We become aware of these integrated responses as they occur, such as fear in response to danger, or lust in response to sexual stimuli when we are mature enough to be sexually aroused. (More about the process of fear becoming motivation for fight or flight ... and the forms that our personal fighting or fleeing will take.)

We start off as newborns with these sets of integrated responses—hardwired within a range of variations in all of us—and a fairly blank mental "slate" or awareness of who we are. We are taught a sense of self, a narrative our personal existence, by others ... out of their own narratives of existence ... with the "stories" of the culture's archetypes to explain the emergence of the integrated responses as we mature in body and mind.

We are a boy or a girl. We are of specific ethnic and cultural heritages ... with friends and enemies. We are expected to behave in certain ways ... keep our clothes on and NOT urinate or defecate in public (here in western civilization). We have "invisible fences" put in place around our psyches.

This sense of self (inside the fence), we have labeled our "soul".

Archetypes provide us with mind gates for integrating our sense of self with our internal and external environments. These mind gates allow us to mentally—both consiously as in rituals and storytelling of all kinds, and subconsciously as in dreams—interact and integrate with these "prewired" sets of response—the archetypes evokes the set of responses in us—in preparation for the real thing. The more realistic the evoking of the set of responses, the more realistic we consider the archetype.

When I speak of "we"at this point, I am really speaking of a the limited group of individuals who share similar narratives of existence with me. And maybe I need a new word such as "we-as-me" ... weasme? ... as opposed to the broader sense of "we" as the whole human race ... so I would rewrite ...

This sense of self (inside the fence), weasme have labeled our "soul" ...

I will exploring all these issues in my new play, "On His Steps" ... the story of a fallen warrior trying to find and then reintegrate into a weasme community.

Life is a biochemical process ...

The way I look at it ... Part II

See ... life is a biochemical process that dynamically replicates itself by interactively integrating with its environment.

If it didn't dynamically replicate itself by interactively integrating with its environment, it wouldn't "evolve".

The proof that it does (replicate itself by interactively integrating with its environment) is that it has (evolved).

One can say, the "purpose" of life, therefore, is to evolve. That is what it does.

This, then, is the basis of ethical value ... the pursuit of the evolution of life ... which is NOT now best served by conflict, but by cooperative collaboration ... not by guardians on the boundary (though necessary) but by the community they protect ... though we need our guardians—our warriors—to preserve and protect the community.

See, the way I look at it is ...

See, the way I look at it is that we—as a life-form—are a set of interactively integrated biochemical processes dynamically responding to the environment within which we are interactive.

Over the course of our emergence as a life-form, awareness—our conscious sense of our existence—has also emerged. And as it has emerged, we have created—as best we can—a narrative to explain the emergence of our existence and the type of awareness that has developed out of the biochemical encoding of current states of existence as memory for future reference.

We not only interact in the present with the environment "out there" but also with the memory environment from past experiencing of existence, and with the sets of "automatic" responses "hardwired" into us ... such as that of fear or lust or awe.

It is important to note that others as well as ourselves can erect a "mental monument" or archetype such as a concept of God that becomes a reference in our lives for the rest of our lives.

Death takes on resonance in reflection ...

We don't like to think about death and dying much—individually, about our own, that is—in my community. We certainly don't talk about it much.

Death is closing in on me.

I'm coming face to face with it ... again. This time it's not as close as last time. Theoretically there's some space, some distance ... some time.

Last time in July, 2002, it was in my face and touch and go whether I survived the next few hours as my medical team brought me through acute renal failure. I had lethal levels of potassium and creatinine in my blood from my kidneys shutting down.

This time I have significant blockage in my left carotid artery. I smoked heavily for a lot of years and I have had high cholesterol for as long as I can remember. The chickens are coming home to roost.

I'll have an MRI in the next few weeks and then my medical team and I will assess the risks. My biggest fear is a stroke. And the biggest problem in addressing that fear is my ongoing chronic kidney failure that has left me with less than 30% kidney function. Surgery will be risky.

I will be thinking about dying and I will share my thoughts here. Mostly—I think—because I can. And I am curious about how I will write about it ... knowing anyone can read this.

My death could be years away. It could be tonight. That hasn't changed. The change is that because of the blockage in my artery, I am reflecting on my death ... creating the resonance in my mind.

Alan Greenspan claims Iraq war was really for oil

Dah!

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/article2461214.ece

Powerful interests play "we the people" like a drum. In the United States it's an oil drum. (Cheez looueez, aren't I clever?! *wink*)

Global monopolists cloak themselves in the trappings of petite market capitalists and decry government regulation ... so the global bullies can control (aka regulate) the markets. And we blissfully let them.

Think sports ... where would we be without foul lines, umpires, field judges, rules and regulations? Without 'em the Yankees would move the homerun fence closer every time they were up to bat at home, and refuse to play anywhere the other team did the same. 'Cuz they have the juice.

And now that our elected officials have sold out to corporate power and wealth ... and we've let them ... the checks and balances of our republic have been lost. We are consumers, not citizens.

We had better figure out a way to get our nation back ... we should be choosing between leaders more like Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich, than like Rudy Giuliani and Hillary Clinton.

Pogo was right all along, "We have met the enemy and they is us."

We won the war and failed the occupation

It's always been about the oil. It's the neocon ideologues who tried to frost the cake with the Zionist agenda (which is NOT synonymous with "Jewish" agenda or even "Israeli" agenda).

Basically it was the Gunfight at the OK Corral between the Cheney gang and the Baker (Street?) Boys. Cheney had the upper hand for a time as he played Junior (aka Bush 43) as the clown puppet he is. Now the Baker(-Gates) front line of the Big Oil Bushies A-team is on the ascendant arc ...

We won the war and failed the occupation ... and now we are federalizing (balkanizing?) Iraq to secure our nation's strategic objective (since when? WWII?) of access to Middle East oil.

And the Democrats' leaders (my party) know full well that it isn't just getting "Vietnam" draped around their necks and jerked, its having odd-even days at the gas pumps coming back. And they damn well remember what happened to Jimmy Carter.

The freedom the majority of Americans will vote to support FIRST, is the freedom to come and go in their cars, pickups, and SUVs.

Pogo said it best, "We have met the enemy and they is us."

Living with hope as a horizon, rather than fear as a fence, Part I

Whew, I can hardly say it ... "Christian transcendentalist existentialist". Actually the transcendentalism is at least implied in the existentialism. But that is what I am, a Christian trancendentalist existentialist.

I wish by the time Sartre and Camus got into full swing they could have come up with a more easily pronounced label besides "existentialism" ... but be that as it may ... it is not as deep as you might think, though it can be kind of scary on the first go-round of thinking about it ... because we do wind up kind of floating out here in the cosmos as individual centers of awareness for god knows why ... and when you are right smack dab in the middle of the Nazi ascendency with swatikas flying over Paris--as Sartre and Camus were ... well ... that must have been a wee bit stressful, don't you think?

Anyhow, existentialism--to my way of thinking about it--is simply understanding that awareness--our consciousness, the fact that we think about ourselves as unitary beings for one thing--is produced or comes out of our existence. Awareness does NOT exist BEFORE existence. In other words, awareness does (did) not produce existence, existence produces (produced) awareness.

So if there is a "God", he, she, or it does not necessarily "think" like we do. And it matters not to the existentialist whether there really is a God or not ... we still must deal with our own personal awareness of our existence. If I choose to believe in God, fine. If I choose not too, fine ... maybe a wee bit more scary, but still fine. It really is up to me to choose ... even if the narrative of existence with a God is so ingrained in me that I never think about the actual choice.

"Transcendentalism" means that "what is" came out of (was produced by) "what was". And whether I am a point of consciousness running on a predetermined track or a fractal event in chaos, I experience my awareness of my existence as coming out of the past and going into the future. The future comes through the present. And I have no reason to think this has not always been the case which puts no limits on how in fact that happens to be the case.

OK, now the "Christian" part. Life--my individual being--is an enigma wrapped in the mystery of existence, to tweak Winston Churchill's phrase. My quest for resolution stems from the sense of awe I feel when looking up at the stars on a moonless night in the dead of winter from the frozen banks of the Yukon River, or hold my child as a newborn in my arms. What is this all about?

I choose the life of Jesus as an "iconic image" for resolving the mystery in my consciousness: What is it all about ... for me? I ask, and I must answer ... because I stand alone as a center of awareness in the cosmos ... or, rather, I experience myself (am aware of myself) as a unitary being in the environment in which I find myself. How do I live in that environment? How do I harmonize with the mystery?

I want to live with hope as a horizon rather than fear as a fence. Moving forward, horizons recede before me. Fences come closer.

Personally, I don't consider it necessary to believe that Jesus was a real person, nor that he was "the only begotten Son of God". And I find it strange that many who do believe, do not follow his message by trying to live their lives according to the values attributed to him.

For me, the message attributed to Jesus teaches us how to live without fear and full of hope ... and that is what I want focus on next.

You have to hand it to Baker and Gates, the Big Oil Bushies' A-Team front line ...

They--Baker and Gates--know what the hell they are doing.

And they ARE protecting the clearly defined strategic interests of our nation even if it means losing the 2008 election to the Democrats ... which is me, because I'm registered as a Democrat to vote.

And this is the huge difference between the talking heads type of leadership of my Democratic party and the serious professionals in the global arena. The top professionals like Baker and Gates are focused on achieving results.

Do you notice how Cheney is moving farther and farther into the background? God, what a deranged ideologue that guy was ... is, rather. Talk about the man behind the curtain in Wizard of Oz! Of course, Cheney knew how to make Junior--aka President Bush 43--think he (Junior) was President in more than title. What a mess!

And guess what? The Bush family pros are cleaning Junior's mess up once again. And I say, THANK GOD!

I mean, for chrissake, Baker handed the Democrats political leaders a bipartisan solution to Iraq in the policy recommendations of the report of the Iraq Study Group ... and they couldn't handle it! See, the Democratic pols are too worried about the 2008 election to focus on what is best for our nation. They simply think getting Democrats elected is ipso facto best. (Tell THAT to us folks in New Jersey, and you will have us rolling in the aisles ... laughing.)

Think about it, Bush threatened to veto anything he didn't like. So? Then he's left with nothing! The Democrats couldn't handle that. How the hell does anyone think they can handle a culture with young men and women willing to commit suicide for their beliefs?

And then we have all those Cheney-Rumsfeld-neocon clowns ... all of 'em hiding behind Cheney's juicing the imperial presidency concept of unitary executive powers with Junior as President? Baker must have seen the trainwreck coming over the horizon. (Personally, I think it was Barbara Bush who intervened. "You have to do SOMEthing, Papa. They're creaming our boy.")

Geez loueez ... if it weren't for people like Mitch McConnell I might even register as a Republican so I could vote for Ron Paul in the primaries.

Baker and Gates are good at what they do ...

The big Oil Bushies' A-Team--headed by James Baker (the Third)--organized the best possible strategy to clean up (once again in G.W.'s life) the mess Junior (aka President Bush 43) had made in Iraq. This strategy was spelled out in the policy recommendations of the report of the Iraq Study Group last year. Remember?

When the Democrats--having been given the majorities in both Houses of Congress by we the people--could not muster the political backbone to simply tell President Bush that nothing was going to happen until AFTER he adopted and started to implement the Iraq Study Group's report ... like, for instance, if Bush vetoes something he is left with nothing. Or am I missing something? What's this big threat of a veto? Congress passes the legislation. The Democrats didn't have the guts of leadership to stand up to Bush and his disaster ... even when handed the gift of the Iraq Study Group report by Big Oil Bushies A-Team!!! That was the easy out.

So the A-Team's front line (Baker-Gates -- that's Secretary of Defense Gates) is going to protect the strategic interests of the United States the hard way ... because they can't depend on the Democrats to do anything but talk. We are going to align ourselves with the Sunnis (think Saudis) to control access to the oil in the Middle East.

And the Democrats, again, aren't going to do a damn thing about it -- except talk -- BECAUSE they KNOW that if they force the pullout of troops, it isn't the bloodbath for Iraqis that the American public is worried about ... it's the odd-even days for pumping gas! aka the Jimmy Carter effect ... and the Democrats will be blamed for it.

You have to hand it Baker and Gates. These guys are good at what they do ... protecting the strategic interests of Big Oil ... oops! I mean the United States. Oh well, they seem to be the same for now.

The only people dumber than Bush 43 are the Democratic politicians ...

The reality is that the invasion of Iraq PLUS no serious plan for the occupation to follow BECAUSE THE CHENEY-RUMSFELD-NEOCON CABAL DIDN'T THINK WE NEEDED ONE was the pinnacle of foreign policy folly.

And the only people dumber are the politicians in the party under which I am registered to vote (Democrats) who are now letting the Big Oil Bushies' A-Team of Baker-Gates once again clean up Junior's mess. Instead of a regional arrangement involving all relevant parties (which Baker offered to us on a silver (gold? platinum? oil-slicked?) platter, we are aligning ourselves with the Saudis (aka Sunnis) to put the power politics squeeze on the Shiites and Iran. (We already have the Kurds.)

We are setting ourselves up for years of mischief by China and Russia in the Middle East instead of resolving this issue when we have the strength to do so, simply because our Christian Right supports a unilateral policy of support for Israel against all foes AND the Democrats didn't cement the Iraq Study Group policy into place when they had the chance.

The Democrats today do not have the operative wisdom necessary for strategic leadership. That wisdom is bought and paid for by the Big Oil folks on one side and the "Rockefeller" Globalists on the other. (I don't consider Hilary a Democrat. She's what I remember as a "Rockefeller Republican": internationally, a globalist; nationally, a moderate corporationist; locally, a pot-hole politician.)

We are kicking the can down the road, and the Democrats are playing right into it because they (we?) are afraid of two things (primarily): 1. The Jimmy Carter affect of losing strategic control over the petroleum we need to fuel our cars, pickups, and SUVs; and 2. The Zionist agenda (which is NOT synonymous with "Jewish" or even "Israeli" agenda) and their attack style of politics (Where did Rove learn his tactics? I wonder.)

While posturing to the left-wing base, the Democrats are doing nothing to effectively alter course, complaining that even with a majority, they don't have the votes. Dah! If Bush 43 wants to veto something, he winds up with nothing. That's pretty effective ... unless you're worried that it will backfire when gas is pumped on odd-even days matching your license plate. They could have simply said, adopt the Iraq Study Group policy suggestions or you aren't going to get anything passed.

When we Americans talk about our freedom, it is about a freedom to get up and go in OUR personal vehicle. Take THAT away and there is hell to pay. (Again, do you remember Jimmy Carter, folks?)

We WANT our government to protect our strategic interests ... wisely.

Gawd, how I would have loved to be a fly on the wall when the Saudi ruler had that sit-down "Let's get things straight" talk with Cheney.

From another perspective: All a person has to do is go to where the people are doing whatever it is they really want to do ... like living in the Alaska bush ... farming in the Northern Midwest ... or fishing for stripers on the shore when the bennies are gone *wink* ... and you get a sense that the dynamism of our culture is not in global monopolism but in petite market capitalism ... where people can effectively do their own thing. Protect the right of the people to do their thing within fairly applied (for all) foul lines, and that political party would trounce all comers.

The Democratic politicians got snookered ... again!

When will the politicians in my party (the one I am registered to vote under) get AHEAD of the curve?

The Big Oil Bushies' A-Team is taking charge ... just like they always do to clean up the messes Junior aka George W. makes.

When the Saudis called Cheney over for that sit-down talking to, they told him to stop screwing up and let the Baker-Gates team do their thing to preserve the Big Oil cartel. We're talking real money here, folks. Mama Bush has been totally upset by what the Cheney-Rumsfeld-neocon gang that couldn't shoot straight did to (with?) her boy. "Do SOMEthing, papa!"

So now we have movement to protect our vital interests as a nation ... which should be accompanied by riding George W. out of town on a rail, tarred and feathered. But, no, them darn Democratic politicians are going to hand this one to the Republicans by getting all in an uproar over General Petraeus ... when the huge majority of Americans trust the General to protect our interests more than the politicians of either party.

See, we the people know we gotta have that petroleum to fuel our vehicles ... and if we don't! Well, Jimmy Carter can tell you what happens if we don't.

And the Saudis (read "Sunnis") want us to have it, too. Translation: This ain't no Vietnam, folks.

Geez loueez, George W. screws up—just like he always does—and now the Democratic politicians are being made to look worse than him! No one could make this stuff up.

Let's face it. Until we are ready to give up our cars, pickups and SUVs ... we're joined at the hip with the Middle East ... and the political party that screws that up is going to have hell to pay down the road.

It's autos and oil, folks

The Democratic politicians should know by now that we love our cars, pickups, and SUVs. We are still an oil dependent economy, folks ... just in case you haven't noticed.

This means securing access to Iraq's oil is STILL (continues to be) a strategic objective of the United States.

What is so difficult for y'all to understand? There is no way a responsible national leader can advocate pulling out of Iraq ... ending the war, yes ... because it isn't a "war" for us, it's an occupation. The "war" is the non-traditional civil war between the different factions--tribes and sheiks--of various ethnic and religious stripes ... and we are smack-dab in the middle of "it".

The thing is, we are now behaving somewhat rationally in this situation. We're aligning ourselves with the interests of our historical allies in the region ... who are (dah!) the Saudis (hence the Sunnis in Iraq.) We already have the Kurds with us, of course ... just in case anyone hasn't noticed.

What does all this mean? Well, until we stop being dependent on petroleum as a primary energy source for the masses who love their vehicles ... no Democratic politician is going to risk destabilizing the supply ... the masses really do have a short memory and are not entirely rational in the short-term ... pull our troops out and they will quickly stop worrying about war casualties and start worrying about odd and even days to buy gas. (Remember when we all blamed Jimmy Carter for THAT?)

The Energy Crisis
That week, the energy crisis that Carter had been trying to avoid since taking office had finally erupted. The OPEC oil producers' cartel had recently announced another in a series of oil price increases that sent gasoline prices skyrocketing and led to severe shortages. Long gas-pump lines and short tempers started in California and spread eastward, focusing Americans' outrage over a seemingly endless economic decline. Much of that anger was directed at the White House: Carter's approval rating had dropped to 25%, lower than Richard Nixon's during the Watergate scandal.

The president did come home, canceling his vacation and retreating to Camp David, where he started working on what would be his fifth major speech on energy. But Carter soon realized that Americans had stopped listening to him. "Jimmy had made several speeches on energy... and it just seemed to be going nowhere with the public," recalls Rosalynn Carter. "So he just said, 'I'm not going to make the speech,' and instead went to Camp David and brought in lots of people to talk about what could be done."

- from PBS, The American Experience

We're choosing sides in Iraq's civil war ...

It's obvious, isn't it? We—the U.S.—are allying with the Sunnis to counter the Shiite-Iranian connection. We've already partnered with the Kurds.

This is the part of the surge that is working ... well, in the sense of protecting our strategic objective of securing access to the oil.

And the Democratic politicians know better than to pin their hopes on the rational nature of the American citizen en masse. If the Middle East dissolves into chaos and the Republicans can in any way hang a following economic upheaval amongst the gas-guzzling masses on the Democrats ... well, Katie bar the door, folks ...

You can see the leadership of Defense Secretary Gates in tandem with James Baker behind the scenes in the current strategy. We are pursuing stability in our interest by aligning with those groups that need us to gain or hang onto power and territory: the Kurds and the Sunnis. We are establishing ourselves in the periphery of the Shiite area to keep the outcome under control.

We can say to the Shiah leaders, "We gave you a chance to govern democratically, and you blew it. We will now use the realpolitick of power politics to keep a lid on the area."

What we are not admitting (or at least President Bush isn't) is that we so bungled the post-war period that the Iraqis never had a real chance to make their country work. We did not occupy the country with sufficient forces to counter the inevitable anti-occupation insurgency ... quickly attracting Al Qaida to the conflict. This was a result of the Cheney-Rumsfeld-neocon cabal's echo chamber policy making.

And President Bush is again screwing up the policy by cheerleading with a ridiculous kick-butt posture ... He really doesn't have a clue about what's happening ... just like he didn't when Cheney-Rumsfeld were in charge ... the BIG difference is in who is driving policy now.

It's a Gates-Baker process. And it is in accord with the strategic objectives of the U.S.

The Democrats had better get on board.

As yes, the surge is working in Iraq ...

The surge is working in Iraq to divide the country into sectarian enclaves, separating the population into Kurds, Shiites, and Sunnis ... also resulting in an enormous number of refugees fleeing both to other countries and to other areas within Iraq from their homes.

And the surge is working in Iraq to create allies for our military forces from Sunni insurgents.

And this is supposed to be success?

It is seen as success in achieving the strategic objective of the United States in securing access to Iraqi oil ... which for me has always been the basic goal since day one. If we can't do it because we bungled the post-war period thereby seeding the civil war now raging, then we will do it by choosing up sides with those (Kurds and Sunnis) most likely to align with us.

We can forget democracy because the majority are Shiites and their affinity tends towards Iran, not us or our ally, Saudi Arabia. (Please note that the same logic holds for the Palestinian areas between Jordan and the Mediterranean Sea ... not that they affiliate with Iran, but against us and our ally, Israel.)

Is this wrong ... or right, for that matter? Neither. It's reality ... the realpolitik of power politics reality ... really.

Let's shift our thinking about the minimum wage

The global economy is having a race to the bottom in wages paid for human effort. Any rational person immediately recognizes the conditions under which many third world workers perform for pay are tantamount to slavery. For that matter, the bind that illegal immigrants find themselves in here in the United States—because of their inability to report unfair labor practices without identifying their own illegal status—is also a form of indentured servitude.

Why can't we start by saying a person should be able to earn at least enough to live on by working 4 hours a day, six days a week for 24 hours per week ... wherever that person works? This would be three 8-hour days ... or two 12-hour days. This would define the local minimum wage. The important thing is to leave time for personal development. The requirement that all minimum wage labor jobs be limited to 24 hours per week unless the WORKER specifically agrees to longer hours at overtime wages would be written into law.

It isn't just the low pay but the low pay AND long hours that leave the individual worker unable to alter his or her labor value in the labor market.

By working fewer hours the individual could then choose from whatever variety of opportunities present themselves in his or her area ... such as education, additional or self employment (which can lead to ownership, for one thing), thinking (which can lead to invention among many, many outcomes), leisure activities or entertainment, whatever.

The next thing I would start in the industrialized countries—where forms of energy other than human effort predominate—is mandatory work for everyone past the age of 16 and not in school full time except the elderly and disabled. We have enough work to do here in the United States to keep everyone eligible working 24 hours a week. And we have enough income from the technologically developed use of energy to pay for full employment of this kind. Government agencies would be "employers of last resort".

My reasoning stems from the rational requirement to give each individual a reasonable opportunity to improve his or her life according to the individual's own needs and desires, and thereby be a real participant in the labor market.

Furthermore, considering an individual's needs and desires in a general sense, we know that a staple need and desire of maturing adults is to have children and raise them successfully to maturity. In other words, to have a stable family over an extended period of time. Stable families are also a goal of mature societies ... or should be. A mature country like the United States should be seeking ways and means to create a solid economic foundation for its families.

I also believe that sorting out economic solutions in a rational market ("rational" in that the rules have been imposed fairly out of experience by the participants—those at risk—themselves) where the participants have relatively equal equity in the transaction creates the most positive economic dynamism ... and that freeing the worker from the social encumbrances imposed by mandatory long hours at low pay would do more to energize the economy and or families and communities than any other single act.

Note: Let me clear about what I mean by "relatively equal equity in a transaction". It only exists when both the seller and the buyer do NOT have to sell and buy, or both the seller and the buyer HAVE to sell and buy to get what each needs. If the seller does not have to sell but the buyer has to buy, or the seller has to sell and the buyer does not have to buy then there is NOT relatively equal equity in the transaction.

The problem with unregulated capitalism—among other things, and not meaning rational market capitalism which creates the positive economic dynamism of the industrialized world—is not that it devolves into a "free" market, but that the stronger participants use monopolistic practices and become the sellers who do not have to sell when the buyers (as in consumers who need gasoline to get to work and there are a limited number of gasoline suppliers) have to buy, or become the buyers who do not have to buy when sellers (as in sellers of their personal labor) have to sell.

The so-called "free" market (which because of externalities does not exist) let's the bullies regulate the market substituting monopolism in the guise of capitalism. We need to reinvigorate our marketplaces by establishing relatively equal equity in all transactions ... starting with the most basic transaction of all: wages for labor.