Lest We Forget... What Was Accomplished?

Here's a bit of history:



This was from the period just before the mid-term elections.

Texas Under Rick Perry

 THIS IS TEXAS UNDER SUPERCUTS PERRY:

Overall Birth Rate – 2nd
Teenage Birth Rate – 7th
Births to Unmarried Mothers – 17th
Percent of Women with Pre-Term Birth – 9th
Cervical Cancer Rate – 11th
Percent of Women with High Blood Pressure – 16th
Number of Executions – 1st
Millions redirected from low-income electricity program
Mandatory vaccinations benefit family members and cronies
Diverted hundreds of millions from education to campaign donors
Diverted $16 million from the Texas Emerging Technology Fund to campaign donors
$14 billion in federal stimulus money diverted to cronies
Percent of Women Living in Poverty – 6th
Percent of Children Living in Poverty – 4th
Average Monthly Women, Infant, and Children (WIC) Benefits per Person 47th
Hundreds of teachers laid off this summer due to inadequate education funds
Total Health Expenditures as % of the Gross State Product – 43rd
Health Care Expenditures per Capita – 44th
Percent of Low Income Population Covered by Medicaid – 49th
Per Capita State Spending on Medicaid – 49th
Per Capita State Spending on Mental Health – 50th
Workers’ Compensation Coverage – 50th
Rejected $555 million in federal unemployment insurance funding
Wants to opt out of Social Security and Medicare,
though these are not entitlements but insurance programs Texans have paid for
Percent of Uninsured Children – 1st
Percent of Population Uninsured – 1st
Percent of Non-Elderly Uninsured – 1st
Percent of Population with Employer-Based Health Insurance – 48th
Percent of Non-Elderly Women with Health Insurance – 50th
Physicians per Capita – 42nd
Registered Nurses per Capita – 44th
Percent of Population Who Visit the Dentist – 46th
Rate of Women Aged 40+ Who Receive Mammograms – 40th
Percent of Pregnant Women Receiving Prenatal Care in First Trimester 50th
High School Graduation Rate – 43rd
% of Population 25 and Older with High School Diploma – 50th
State Aid Per Pupil in Average Daily Attendance – 47th
Scholastic Assessment Test (SAT) Scores – 45th
Per Capita State Spending on State Arts Agencies – 43rd
State budget shortfall: $27 billion
Income Inequality Between the Rich and the Poor – 9th
Income Inequality Between the Rich and the Middle Class – 5th
Income tax (16th) amendment is bad
Median Net Worth of Households – 47th
Average Credit Score – 49th
Mortgage Debt as Percent of Home Value – 47th

I got this from a comment on a story about Perry and  found the ones I could check to be correct.

Perry's Getting Corrected By the Court

Trumka Gets the Message Out to the President

While it makes sense to support the President in his push forward against a Republican Congress it does not make sense to let him slide on HOW to Push Back.  Richard Trumka, the President of the AFL-CIO has gotten onto the right idea here.  The president cannot just propose what he THINKS the Congress will accept.  What I am tired of in politics is that the Right has moved the discussion so far right that it is difficult to have reasonable conversation without straying back into the "talking points" of the Republicans.  The REAL discussion is NOT about dismantling the social net for the citizenry.  It should be about bolstering the net and making it so that no one falls through any of the widening cracks the Republicans have created.

 

AFL-CIO Points Out They May Not Support Democrats Unconditionally

What vision do YOU have the country?  Can you cut your way to that vision.   Can you see how less government makes a vision of anything other than a free-for-all happen?  Greed will push insane agendas down your throat and without controls on the "Free Market" you will have large economic entities steam rolling over you.

Perry Getting Thoroughly Dis-ed (Finally)

Here is a longer article telling the Perry story even better than most.

All Hat and no Cattle

By Way of Adding to Your Reading

So, this bit is about extending what you can read to get facts to work through the issues.  This link is the White House blog.  Since the right seems able to access the media far more easily than even the President of the United States it sometimes works to figure out what the discourse needs by looking at what the players say rather than by what others say about them.

The White House Blog 

In this particular case the public view is that the right (In the person of John Boehner) is saying that the President has not done anything while the voice of the Presidency is pointing out that lots has been done with more to come.  To balance this we can go to the regular media to see that the White House has less voice than the Right Wingers.

While Representative Boehner is going on about $100 Million in expenses for each regulation (the burden for which falls to those regulated) for a total figure somewhere north of $219 Billion, the White House is pointing out that $10 Billion has been identified and reduced already.  That is not what the national media understands at all.  So far (at the time of this writing) only the $100 Million per regulation is being talked about.  Thus the known "fact" is what Boehner says instead of what the White House has said.  Facts become elusive.

High Sleaze Factor -- Perry Wins.

So, here is a little tid bit on Scary Perry.  His administration in Texas took sleaze to a new high (or Low) by supporting a life insurance scam.  This is from someone who seems not to be mentally stable.  A Sociopath, actually.

His sense of what is right or wrong appears to be seriously off track.

Perry wanted Texas to Profit from the death of Texas teachers. 

Does it get any scarier?  Nope.

Some Scary Perry Stuff

This is some back up information already outlined on Scary Perry:

Perry & Big Pharma 

Perry IS the Chief Executioner in the U.S. 

Imagine executing 234 people and being proud of it... what a grand record of thoughtless behavior.

A Way to Ignore Facts and Still Believe What You Want to Believe

Notice in this piece by Faux Nooz that Bill O'Reilly does not concede any point even though he cannot cite any hard facts in his argument.  Likewise Ben Stein does not have time to respond with much by way of fact since as soon as he starts to go there O'Reilly cuts him off.  This form of argument changes how we perceive.  Repetition does not make something fact; to the contrary, it generally points out that a sales job is about to follow.



Here we have a straw argument placed in front of zero factual material.  Ben Stein seems to get the best of this nonsense despite O'Reilly's dogged insistence that taxing the rich will kill jobs.  Steins, "There is no correlation..." points out the vacuum packed statements by O'Reilly. 

Slower Day but That's Okay

While there is not a big story today I just had to further this pictures' trek through cyber space.  It reflects what I feel about Rick Perry and his idiotic ways.  There should be a threshold for intelligence for those that run for the Presidency.

More on the All Purvasive Koch Brothers

So, if you have been wondering where the Koch brothers get their wealth and how they view their interests being served by the far Right (i.e.: Tea Party), here is a link to that list.

Koch industries to avoid.

There is a protest/boycott if you are interested in that... be warned, you already use Koch products and it will be hard to avoid their clutches.

Boycott-and-Defeat-Koch-Industries

BTW, these guys are seriously rich, in case you missed that part.

More on Scary Perry

The question I just had to ask myself after hearing some of the so-called "Texas Miracle" drivel handed out by the Rick Perry campaign was, "What will I find if I dig a little deeper into this character's record?"  Well, that was not a tall order so I looked.  Viola!


Perry is the "Killingest" Governor


At 230 executions during his term as governor of the state some might say he is a "Law & Order" candidate for President.  Some might but I cannot.  What I can say is that he would be the 16th Century's leading candidate.  The least enlightened of all candidates during my lifetime might be the best description.  Ignoring studies and findings by the likes of the Innocence Project is an indicator of a state official trying to cover up bad justice.


"Perry has commuted the death sentences of 31 inmates, but 28 of them were juveniles at the time of their crimes, and the U.S. Supreme Court had ruled states could not execute those who were under 18 when the crime occurred."


Executions-United-States... more info


All this without looking into race.  A quick review would tend to say that a deep study of the race of those executed in Texas had a racial component.  It seems to but I cannot say how much without a thorough review of all those cases.  Having lived in Texas for a short while I can figure race to be a strong part of the judicial process but that's not the same thing.


His statements have included the idea that education in Texas is one shining spot in a nation that has largely abandoned educational excellence.  Not so fast there pilgrim!

Texans view of themselves...

Hmmm, one might think this is a very rosy state on the whole but wait there's more.  When you look for more information you can come away with site like this one:

Texas viewed from the outside 

There are lots of gems here even though, as these things go, some of the statistics are a bit stale the news here is pretty clear that Texas ranks in the lowest quarter of all states in its educational system.  I had heard that recent statistics reveal that Texas has one of the lowest High School graduate rates for those 25 years old or younger.  That is on Perry's watch.

Do you really want a President that lies to you about what he will achieve?  Can you afford to have a President that does not know what a good educational system looks like? 

Money Creeps In

So, by now you know who the Koch brothers are.  Between them it is estimated that they have a combined net worth of $22 Billion and that their father was one of the founding members of the John Birch Society.  They have continued Papa's work by throwing money into all sorts of political corners through Americans for Prosperity and the Tea Party.  The reach for these guys is incredible and goes all through our landscape... even down to the school board level and up through Congress.  Their goals seem to include taking apart anything that government has a hand in helping us all do together.  Here's one example of how this works:

Kock brothers behind the destruction of school policy. 

One of the ways to combat them is to take a few pages out their playbook and go at it in the same way they do.  Thom Hartmann had suggested this a while back.

Become the Precinct Chair in Democratic districts.  What you then have is the power to name who will go on the ballot (especially for the primaries).  The training ground for any of this would be local office, including school districts and city councils.  The way this works is by, in many places, getting ten signatures and the local party has the list of possible Democrats to talk to (and ask to sign your petition) so that you can do this job of Precinct Chair.  The way that the Tea Party took over the Republican party so effectively was that they put themselves into this position and then packed all or most of the possibilities with Tea Party candidates.  If you did the same in the Democratic structure but putting forward Progressives and Liberals you would effectively leave centrist candidates on the sidelines.  Then the dialog would shift a touch left.  The reason, basically, that it is necessary to shift left is that the Republicans have shifted so far right as to be over the horizon.  The little secret here is that it is not expensive for a normal person to get that level of control.  What is difficult is seeing clearly enough to be effective at that job.

Another Bloody Texan

Brrr, gives me the willies...

The leader in the money raising race to gain the White House for the Republicans, other than Mitt Romney, says some extremely scary stuff.  It is unbelievable that anyone can take this guy seriously as a candidate after the damage he has done in Texas with his governorship.  More amazingly, he knows how to raise money and looks the part of a serious candidate... it is what comes out of his mouth that gives me the shudders.  Here are a few things he said yesterday when he announced he is entering the 2012 race for the Presidency.

Appealing to the under educated.

The Hispanic voter cannot be any too happy about this guy either.  He has such gems tucked away in his past as:

opposing the Affordable Care Act
opposes any form of amnesty for illegal aliens
further militarized the national border along Texas at a cost of over $400 million since 2005

 Everywhere you look inside of Texas, even among the conservative business groups, he is not the most popular Dude of this century:


"...the "Texas Miracle" may have run out of gas in 2011. Texas faced a massive deficit and recently approved a state budget with $15 billion in spending cuts, including $4 billion in cuts to public education spending."

Texas Democratic Party spokeswoman Kirsten Gray, "Not surprising, Rick Perry is making his announcement in South Carolina instead of Texas – there's nowhere in the Lone Star State he could announce without an angry mob showing up,"

His money raising has put him in the midst of some fairly slimy folks... long time connections:

Of the seven Super PACs supporting Perry: Make Us Great Again, Jobs for Vets Fund, Veterans for Rick Perry, Americans for Rick Perry, have close ties to illegal activity, violation of federal campaign laws, and shady strategies.


Euwww, We've been slimed...

Much of what he brags about is pure nonsense, the Texas Miracle is anything but:

"The Texas budget for the next two years is a mess of accounting tricks and gutted programs, thanks to an unprecedented budget shortfall."


Rip off's for all at the expense of kid's education.

It's Broken...

From MoveOn.org here's a little treat:

Do you think we might be seeing this in a political arena near you this coming year?

It is more than just Irritation...

Knowing that the "mood" of the country is changing you might look for evidence of what that means. Well, here is a sense of about 10% of what I have been hearing out here in the Real world and it is interesting that Dylan Ratigan is the one to bring forward so forcefully:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

To say that there is no strong feeling that is pent up and looking for solutions would be to not understand anything about people.  If this is not addressed pretty soon the weight of the frustration will well up in very negative ways.  We do not want THAT to happen... we NEED a peaceful revolution to start now.  Get the money out of the system, or at least, keep the money from driving the system.

Jobs, Jobs, Jobs

Here is a bit from Jan Schakowsky's proposal to create jobs in the U.S. NOW:

"Under her plan, the following policies would be implemented:

• The School Improvement Corps would create 400,000 construction and 250,000 maintenance jobs by funding positions created by public school districts to do needed school rehabilitation improvements.

• The Park Improvement Corps would create 100,000 jobs for youth between the ages of 16 and 25 through new funding to the Department of the Interior and the USDA Forest Service’s Public Lands Corps Act. Young people would work on conservation projects on public lands including the restoration and rehabilitation of natural, cultural, and historic resources.

• The Student Jobs Corps would create 250,000 more part-time work study jobs for eligible college students through new funding for the Federal Work Study Program.

• The Neighborhood Heroes Corps would hire 300,000 new teachers, 40,000 new police officers and 12,000 new firefighters.

• The Health Corps would hire at least 40,000 health care providers, including physicians, nurse practitioners, physician assistants, nurses, and health care workers to expand access in underserved rural and urban areas.

• The Child Care Corps would create 100,000 jobs in early childhood care and education through additional funding for Early Head Start.

• The Community Corps would hire 750,000 individuals to do needed work in communities, including housing rehab, weatherization, recycling, and rural conservation.

In addition, the bill would give priority to the long term unemployed -- the so-called "99ers" who have exhausted both their state and federal unemployment benefits. Federally extended unemployment benefits are set to expire this year, even though nearly 14 million Americans remain out of work and it takes the average worker nine months to find a new job."

Huffington Post article.

No one can say there is NOT a viable plan out there to put the country back to work.  It just takes getting the country back from the Republicans... especially the Tea Partiers.

Right Idea Comes Along

Every so often the right idea comes along.  Every so often that idea takes root and grows.  This is probably one of those ideas.  Back at the end of June I came across a wonderful video by Van Jones explaining that we needed a new idea.  He outlined some essentials of possible ideas and asked for everyone's input.  We (Sandy & I) went to a meeting a couple of weeks later to rate and add any ideas to the list that had come about as a result of the initial appeal.  It turned out that there were 1600 meetings around the country.  From there until this Monday (August 8th) that information was mulled over and digested by the core of what was/is becoming the Rebuild the American Dream movement.  The highest rated ideas were released as a platform for future work.  

What came from this is amazing in so many ways.  It reflects positive energy and moving forward.  It is a way to regrow the middle class and give a course correction that will become a basis for all of us to take better care of each other.


Take a look at the values expressed. 


This is an incredible time.  Yesterday a few of us (a little over a hundred of us) visited the local offices of our Representative and Senators for southwestern Washington and presented a signed copy of the Contract for America.  Later I will talk about a few problem faced by those of us a bit more level headed in getting this Dream moving forward.  Right now I will just say that this is a huge task but well worth spending time on.  The right wing will have a lot of problems with all this and it will meet opposition but what else is new?  These are solid ideas that can be fleshed out and enacted.

Keeping Track, or Not

There is that underlying doubt we all have that the Federal government does not know what it is doing.  Alan Grayson gives good focus to how we need to find out.  The answer is not likely to be the Tea Party approach but, rather, dig in and ask each of those charged with regulating to do their assigned jobs.  This is where we go astray though.  One side, the least informed, decides to trash the whole of government, while the informed say,"Let's keep track of what we are doing and keep pressure on to find solutions."

It seems the best course is to have an informed populous.

Asking the right question is how we find out what we need to know.   

Sometimes you just need a laugh...

Every so often you have to take in things that can give you a chuckle.  After the chaos of the last several weeks this is one of those times:

The Daily Show
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How Does Low Info Voting Happen?

We will follow the money injection into the political parties some more later.  Right now we are post down-grade-of-the U.S.-credit-rating.  This money issue was caused directly by the Tea Party members’ intransigence in the debt ceiling raising debate.  It is claimed and owned by the Tea Party that they caused this.  That is, they now cheer and seem to welcome the down grade.  It is well documented during the negotiation that no matter what was proposed the Republicans, mostly driven by the Tea Partiers, said, “No,” and then repeatedly claimed that the opposition had, “put nothing on the table.”  This continued lie is what differentiates the two main parties at this time.  The Tea Party, as the primary driver of the Republican Party, is willing to distort any fact and repeat that lie ad infinitum.  It is trickle down as they develop their talking points to say that the democrats did nothing positive to end the debate in a good way even though that is their (Democrats') main claim to fame right now. 

This is interesting because Talking Points are simple, often two word, phrases that become code for an attack on their perceived enemies.  The more often they can get these phrases on or in media the more success they seem to have with moving the debate in their direction.

Here in the world of fact it becomes very difficult to hold a reasoned debate because they unyieldingly do not let fact change the assault.  That is sort of a, “Don’t confuse me with Facts,” repetitive mantra.  This part of the tactic is working but at the price of having informed voters. 

Money with Interest

Here is an example of money spent by a particular interest to confuse and obfuscate.  Any misdirection is felt by some to be acceptable even if some of uf might consider it to be election tampering and, oh, illegal.

The Colbert Report
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Yes, that's right, this is a comedian having to explain how this money was spent to misdirect.  At this time there are reports of this incident in very little of the "regular" press.   A normal part of news these days seems to be to not report actual news.  We will get to that in a bit.  In case the video doesn't show here is a link to the Raw Story.

Colbert expose the not-so-funny in a funny way. 

Money Makes the Many Wonder

So, here we go again.  Money affects everything that now happens in government.  Without curbs on lobbyists here is what happens to any bill with a profile above ground level:

Patent "reform" goes nowhere. 

It is the never ending attack of those Special Interests on legislation that makes any proposal stall and end up in a tail spin of debate.  Debate is a good and healthy thing when used in a good and constructive way.  The lobbyist, however, do not use debate in a constructive way.  Often the goal is simply to create uncertainty in the mind of the legislators as the corporate interests continue to do whatever they want in the absence of rules.  Money drives the government, in this sort of case, to become less and less effective.  When the public perception wavers and you start to hear the comment that government is the problem it means that the lobbyist has won.  The old quote from Ronald Reagan, "I'm from the government and I'm here to help." is a statement of the defilement of the view that our government is of/by the people.  It has not been so for a very long time but usually if you look closely enough this view traces back to some monied interest pushing useful government to the sides so that it/they can proceed unhindered.  More later on how the re-framing of an idea can poison the well.

Another Trail

Okay, now follow another trail to its source.  This Video is a retired Republican Senator (Alan Simpson) who knows where the trail leads but wants you to find the answers for yourself.

Where does Grover Norquist get his scratch? 

More to follow.  In the meantime where is the committee to investigate this question (VERY) publicly.

Money and the Wrong Direction

Here is an example of how monetizing our process and confusing free speech and money:

Koch Brothers sneak into your brain and take over.

This is just one of many places money has effected your and supplanted rights.

While We Were Busy

     It seems that while most of us were busy living an active life the political folks on the Right have been busy stealing our future.

     They have been developing a two word culture that has very little real logic behind it if you are looking at the world through the eyes of having your needs fulfilled and being comfortable.  In fact, the recent “debate” in Washington D.C. about the debt ceiling makes this suddenly plain as day.  It has also been a lot like running naked through a shit storm… no part of you is going to smell like roses.

     In a recent batch facebook exchanges I was made to realize just how far gone logic has become through this two word culture wrap.  It is easy now for guys like Rush Limbaugh to tweak heads with just the mention of a “two worder” that is code for a longer idea that is floating in a detached logic field.  It turns out that when legislation is introduced these days the titles are often misdirection of the worst sort.  There will be examples given in another entry.  For now let us just say that it always takes careful reading of a bill to discern what the true intent of it would be.  That seems to be the missing piece since very few people have the time or energy any more to be informed at that level.  Even after reading the bill it likely takes some research to put a proposed bill in a historical context and follow the ideas that led to someone proposing it.  Who has time like that in this sped up world we live in?  Well, it turns out that there are a select few who can take that sort of time… lobbyists.  That is not an average sort of person.  That is a person paid to take up the effort of supporting a bill with “facts” to move it through the legislative process or kill a bill that those who pay the lobbyists.  So, there is a link of money to almost every bill that gets proposed.

     The folks with the money have, for years, been busy creating institutes to create the misleading wording of bills and titles of bills.  There is a group, ALEC, which brings mostly Republican (or Tea Party) Representatives and Senators, at both state and federal levels, together to show them fully formed, pre-written, legislation that the Representative or Senator can introduce… as is!  This is a secondary level of the link between the money and the ultimately submitted legislation.

     The other side of this is that when a misleading bill is found out it is easier to kill than to pass it.

Long, short and idiotic...

Here it comes; the idea is that I would ever write this blog is shaking me up.  It is about the level of frustration I am feeling about the propagation of lies in the political arena.  The slant on each bit of nonsense from the politicians is grating on my every nerve.  It's time to say something and to act.  That is the essence of why I would start this.  It will be hard to maintain during the times that I am out of the country but I will continue to try.  I do not have resources to become a political version of Snopes.com but I will feel better if something is said from time to time to set things straight.