A New Season

     Ah yes, it is the political season again… well, sort of.  It is always the political season but in America we actually pay more attention at certain times than others.  Strangely we ignore the subject as much as we can in “off-season” mid-term elections.  The negative ads, designed to discourage voters from voting at all, have the effect of inoculating us against the scourge of voting.

     In any event, the Republicans have trotted out the immense slate of potential candidates and has begun its flavor-of-the-month process of vilifying each in turn.  The Churchy people on the Right have made a religion of hate and destruction on social issues.  The Small Government righties have a No-More-Government mantra.  The deceivers on the Right are sliming everyone in sight and the heart of the GOtP party are very busy spinning tweaks and lies on every day events so that all the oxygen is depleted for each news cycle. 

     Of course the news media is no longer the trusted Fourth Estate it once was.  It has been corporatized and compromised to the point of spewing what its 1% owners want you to hear.  Watching ABC, for instance, gets you all the update on what the Disney conglomeration wants you to hear about what they are doing.  Fox (so-called) News bends the facts to the breaking and unrecognizable point while pushing you toward Right-wing ideology.  NBC is dismantling any Left-wing stories and shifting to a Right-wing twist.  CBS, CNN and others are taking on the non-story and promoting the art of Not-News.  

     On the Left the Democrats are trying to act as if Hillary Clinton is the only story while she falls further in the polls.  Since they have, thus far, kept the debates at bay and the name recognition for others in the race a secret it appears that Hillary wants an automatic no controversy path to the nomination.  The best voice for the people, Bernie Sanders, is drawing huge crowds and climbs in any poll where his name is actually mentioned.  Chaffey and O’Malley are there but without a way to attract the national media to tell their stories it is assumed that they do not exist at all.

     What is most fun, for me, anyway, is the meme war on Facebook.  The cartons and the complete nonsense that passes for political discourse these days is an added bonus.  I have often said in posts of various sorts and in questions trying to point out bad logic that “If you repeat a lie doesn’t that make you a liar as well?”  It falls on deaf ears but at least it is out there for those of us to see that lying has become a sort of political reality all its own today.

     Having gone to a Bernie Sanders rally and listened to him for quite a while on the radio I have come to understand that his brand of political revolution is one I can relate to.  The founding fathers would appreciate that we need a periodic shake up.  America is, finally, coming to a momentary awakening and should provide that shake up this political season.  When the Democratic debates get started Bernie Sanders will have access to the microphone and the process should show what America actually believes as opposed to what the 1% want us to believe.  Appointing a “Blue Ribbon” panel is what punditry is about… it’s is a way to distract you from the facts.  It is a way to push you in a direction you can feel is wrong but the arguments are so convoluted you often can’t quite put your finger on what is wrong about them.  Senator Sanders steps to the microphone and you hear the unfiltered, unvarnished facts.  It is disturbing.  It is awakening.  It is a breath of fresh air.

WalMartians and the Lunacy of Less

This week it was announced that WalMart would cut back on the number of employees that would be covered for health insurance.  The number people affected is in the neighborhood of 30,000 people.  That is thirty thousand lives worsened by the owners of Walmart.

The largest shareholders are the Waltons… arguably some of the richest people in the country, if not the world.  The money “saved” by this change will mostly go to the bottom line, which is then the income line for the Walton's. 

Without the ability to organize, that is, to strike against their employer the employees are essentially cheated by the rules out of what they had up until now.  It is noted that part of the decision to discontinue coverage was that WalMart is now going into the healthcare business.  They cater to the least financially sophisticated populous in the U.S. and have shown an ability to exploit that population repeatedly.  Concentrating on having the cheapest price they sell substandard products manufactured in substandard conditions abroad.  They cheat the drivers that transport those goods and they hammer the producers on price.  The WalMart model is to exploit the tax payer as well.  It is said that each store costs the tax payer in excess of $900,000 per STORE in the state and local benefits needed by employees to live at a near subsistence level due to the starvation wages paid by the company.  The company has further violated laws in Mexico (for instance) by bribing local officials in order to by-pass local laws and build stores where none were wanted.  There is a long and growing list of reasons that WalMart is not a good citizen wherever it exists.

We might want to ponder system that allows this.  We might want to consider the possible ways to change the course of this slide toward feudalism.  It is not just WalMart but it is useful to see and understand their model.

On one level there is problem involving the employees themselves.  They need the job, even as low paying and inferior as it is, they cannot do without it and therefore cannot strike or create a UNION to better their situation.  WalMart's history of union busting and illegal actions to pressure employees against forming any union are extensive but let’s just focus on part that is within what the employees can do for themselves first.  You cannot join a picket line if you are going to be fired.  It is necessary to have the job, remember.  You would others, by proxy, to stand in create the protest for you.  You need some way to keep them on the line.  Since there is no union you do not have the ability to have dues paid into create a fund.  But, in this day and age, it is possible to create on-line funding for a group that could fulfill the function of striking the employer.  I won’t go into the history of unions or the laws that now are currently used against the unions.  I would mention that protection of the middle class is the business of unions.  Our legislators have been co-opted, bought out, by businesses or organizations representing businesses.  The pendulum has swung so far to the Right that unions represent fewer than 7% of non-public employees today.  This, in wake of 30 years of Reaganomics (undisputedly bad for the middle class), has devastated the legal standing of most of the country’s working people.  The New Feudal Order (NFO) has positioned the employee without recourse, without a voice in the workplace.  The worker tends to feel that he/she should be doing the “right” thing and working ever harder.  Increases in productivity have been absorbed by the company and redistributed to the shareholders rather than the employees who made it possible.  Wages have decreased in real terms over the last thirty years.  The wealth of the nation has not been spread across the spectrum of people who have made it possible.

So, a first step in recharging the middle class could be creating a way for the worker to strike without leaving the workplace.  Creating a mechanism, a fund, targeting the worst abusers of workers for actions to get the public to understand the menace of, “Low prices always,” being the start of a downhill slide that needs correction.   

Drawing a Line

So much has happened in the last many months that show the consistent attack of the middle-of-the-road and Left-ish leaning of the U.S. populace.  Every single issue has a full attack mode slash from the Righties out there.  But, and this amazes me somewhat, the constant barrage from the Right has moments that make me cheer wildly.  Exposing stupidity and seeing the lies about the economy, science, education, immigration and so forth tumbled down is heartening at a time when I feel the attacks ever more personally.  In attending a Gun Violence conference recently it was clear that lobbying efforts can be overcome by ardent and consistent work on the part of those who can counter the NRA nonsense enough times but that the opposition is well positioned with money, now called free speech (Citizens United, thanks a bunch SCOTUS), is going to make this a long hard battle ground.  Action on a local level is what is needed and that is going to take a long time... even when the matter can be put to any sort of vote.

Along comes an issue that is very local but with large implications.  Our local government, the city council of Vancouver, has recently voted to allow a WalMart to go ahead with development of a store very near us.  I am concerned with everything from downward pressure on property values to job losses by local businesses and general degrading and the trash accumulation in the area now that the council has voted.  Because of the way that WalMart scams the system by creating employees on food stamps (by not paying a living wage), using corrosive scheduling so there are fewer full time employees and demanding tax concessions from the governing bodies where they locate stores while offering cheap off shore products it is impossible to feel that they will be good neighbors.  

Here's the thing of it though.  We don't have a vote in the matter.  We live a few blocks outside of the city.  We are in an area that will one soon probably be in the city but because it is not yet we do not have a real voice in this process.  

It is all about where a line was drawn and it's too late, probably, to effect the outcome.  We are late comers to the neighborhood so we were not "in the know" about the location of this WalMart nor its march toward completion but that's where activism, win or lose, comes in.  I do vote and I can attend future city council meetings.    

Rugged Individual Hangouts

On the Huffington Post comments section about the government shutdown pmttnp posted:

"Our DEBT/Government Spending Problem is RED STATES! THE TAKERS and the low wages

"Take a look at the difference between federal spending on any given state and the federal taxes received from that state. We measure the difference as a dollar amount: Federal Spending per Dollar of Federal Taxes. A figure of $1.00 means that particular state received as much as it paid in to the federal government. Anything over a dollar means the state received more than it paid; anything less than $1.00 means the state paid more in taxes than it received in services. The higher the figure, the more a given state is a welfare queen.

Of the twenty worst states, 16 are either Republican dominated or conservative states. Let's go through the top twenty.

New Mexico: $2.03
Mississippi: $2.02
Alaska: $1.84
Louisiana: $1.78
West Virginia: $1.76
North Dakota: $1.68
Alabama: $1.66
South Dakota: $1.53
Kentucky: $1.51
Virginia: $1.51
Montana: $1.47
Hawaii: $1.44
Maine: $1.41
Arkansas: $1.41
Oklahoma: $1.36
South Carolina: $1.35
Missouri: $1.32
Maryland: $1.30
Tennessee: $1.27
Idaho: $1.21
Does anyone else notice the overwhelming presence of northern "rugged individualist" states, like Alaska, the Dakotas and Montana, along with most of the South? Race to the bottom!"

Read more: http://articles.businessinsider.com/2011-08-18/politics/30039546_1_blue-states-federal-taxes-red-states#ixzz2OtabJq7d


That's certainly something to ponder.

Meanwhile, another commenter, Beatriz09, was pointing out the idiocy of where the Teapublicans have been going in a great way:

"  Members of the GOP conference acknowledged there was not yet a firm plan. "I think that there are some ideas that are percolating, and I think those ideas are part of this process, and I think that as those ideas get vetted among people in formal and informal discussions, then two or three of the better ones start coming to the top," said Rep. Jack Kingston (R-Ga.).
WHAT? Their government shut down will soon cost the taxpayer (= INCREASE the deficit by) $3 billion, and they didn even have a PLAN before they started this kind of wasting of taxpayer money? They just want us to pay even more, all while being busy with "thinking that there are some ideas that are percolating" ... NINE days after they did something as radical and expensive as shutting down the government?
You cannot but remember the beginning of the Iraq war. There too, the GOP leadership had lied the American people into something big, then spent billions to launch it, but once Saddam was toppled, Bush STARTED to consider the idea that he should begin to think about HOW to deal with the aftermath, politically and militarily. Result: a decade long war, that could have been ended MUCH earlier, as generals on the ground constantly told Bush and the GOP in the WH. They refused to listen to basic facts ... .
The same is happening today, but now on the domestic front. After having lied about Obamacare AND Obama's debt and spending record for years, the GOP decided that maybe shutting down the government for a while might POLL well. ALL independent experts and this time EVEN Karl Rove warned them that that was wrong, and that it would lower the GOTP approval rate. Now that that's EXACTLY what is happening, they realize that MAYBE they'll also have to come up with a plan that allows them to get out of the mess they created ... . Incredible. I still don't understand what happened to the Grand Old Party since the neocons and TP took over."

That makes for two fantastic ponders from a single article about the Shutdown.

The Death of the TEA Party.

Ultimately Libertarianism is anarchy.  That conclusion, once you ponder the question for a short period of time, is inevitable.  We are seeing the destruction of the democratic system through a continuous waging of radical anarchy.  It is not complicated and we already know where it will end.  The death of the TEA Party (and they will yell at you that they are NOT a party at all) will be swift and violent within the Republican party.  No system can survive anarchy for long.  Creating a Somalia within our borders is going to end badly for Teapublicans.

Senator Warren Is Clear Headed

This small bit was posted on Social Media by Senator Elizabeth Warren:

"We are now four days into a completely unnecessary, completely avoidable Republican shutdown. Now that the House Republicans have shut down the government - holding the country hostage because of some imaginary government health care boogey man – Republicans almost immediately turned around and called on us to start reopening parts of our government.

Why do they do this? Because the boogey man government is like the boogey man under the bed – it’s not real. It doesn’t exist. What is real – what does exist – are all of those specific, important things that we as Americans have chosen to do together through our government. In our democracy, government is not some make believe thing that has an independent will of its own. In our democracy, government is just how we describe all of the things that “we the people” have already decided to do together."

Speech by Senator Warren

Who is Getting Hurt?

There have been sooo many political issues during the last month to ponder that it has been difficult to write a consolidation/distillation of where we are heading and what logic there is for it. 

Today we have several lines coming together in a perfect storm of events.

The beginning of Obamacare (ACA) has seen the web sites have so many people trying to get in that they are having a problem getting into the information.  Simultaneously the Congress has not created a Continuing Resolution to fund the government so there is a shut down of the Federal Government.  In just over two weeks there is fight looming about the Debt Ceiling and yet another period of uncertainty over our national credibility and credit rating.  This is an amazing period.

The Teapublicans do not, repeat, do not want you to get ACA coverage because once you do there will be no going back.  Obamacare will be a political reality for the foreseeable future.  Yet the Teapublicans are willing to fall on their sword to prevent it from happening despite the fact that they cannot unfund it with their antics.  The polls show that the majority of people want the ACA to go into effect.  The Teapublicans have used the tactic of attaching every bizarre idea on their agenda to the Continuing Resolution and sending the resulting bill to the Senate where it is dead on arrival.  Normal would be to send a "clean" bill up without all the nonsense attached to it.  The Democrats swat the bill down and send it back in a clean fashion to be voted on again.   The Speaker of the House, John Boehner (R-OH), has almost no power because if he puts a clean bill on the floor he will lose his position as Speaker.  If Rep. Boehner does allow a clean bill to be voted on there are enough votes that include both Dem's and Repub's that it would pass.  From there it would go to the Senate and pass.  It then would go on to the President and Barack Obama, in wisdom, would sign it. 

But, that is not what is really happening except on the surface.  The second thing to happen might play out many different ways.  The Debt Ceiling must be increased - This is money that has already been spent and the increase is required to pay the bills, including the interest, must be paid or the Credit Rating of the U.S. will be seriously reduced.  Even if you forget how the government works, that is, the Congress produces ALL spending bills (not the President).  They authorize the expenditures through the budget process.  We spend the money and to have the money available we create debt for all or part of it.  We are the owners of most of that debt but so are other countries.  Our currency is used as a base currency around the globe.  Without our being able to easily raise these needed funds we become a deadbeat nation.   There is a provision of the U.S. Constitution that (paraphrased) says that no one shall question the full faith and credit of the country.  The ONLY way that continues to happen is to pay our bills.  The credit rating companies can and will down grade our rating making it harder to have a smooth running economy. 

Further along here is the Political Terrorist mantra at work.  If the Dem's cave into the Teapublican demands it would be government by a minority of the minority rather than by the majority.  That is unacceptable.

The tactic here is to create a crisis to extract a "negotiated" concession.  Follow that with another crisis and "negotiate" a further concession.  In this case, one can create a never ending set of crisis's.  What we have is a set of polls that say that 72% of the people do not want to have a problem - or a continuing problem - in running the government.  The People want to have an end to this crisis... now.

Government by and for the minority of the minority party... what is it about election results don't they get??

The Teapublicans (as opposed to the Republicans) are cheering for the destruction of the government.  They want a failure of the government.  The Congress in the past has always (except for the Newt Gingrich engineered 1995/6 shut down) voted for the Continuing Resolution AND the Debt Limit Increase as often as required.  

What might happen here is that the shut down continues through the next couple of weeks up to the vote for the increase in the debt limit.  That would create a huge problem with any "negotiations" - holding a gun to our heads to get your way is completely unacceptable.  It is therefore impossible to negotiate with terrorists that have the hammer of continuing to hold that gun to our head even after we solve the current problem by caving into their demands.  Terrorists make demands.  Criminals holding hostages make demands.  Negotiating is not an option.  The Teapublicans have made a massive miscalculation here.  They believe that their demands will met.

An irony for all this is that the ACA, by law, cannot be de-funded.  The Sequester did not do it.  The failure to create the Continuing Resolution will not de-fund.  The failure to raise the Debt Limit will only make it more expensive to run government and will not de-fund Obamacare.  The death of the Republican party is a sad thing to contemplate but it may well happen.  Without a viable opposition it will be more difficult to run the country.  In the end John Boehner will lose his precious leadership position because in order to keep it he would have to lead.