Summation: I have written the things I have concerning the two major political parties because I hear and read things that make me believe I am not alone in holding the two major political parties in the highest contempt. And my concerns are pronounced and genuine because I have taken the next step in being concerned about the future of all middle class kids, especially mine, who in 16 years will be ready and willing, but not able, to attend college (see parts 7 and 8 and some upcoming parts which will address taxation). They will be forced to take lower paying jobs, earning less because they weren’t able to save enough for a college education, (see part 7, where I showed that a person’s level of education is directly associated with salary). I’ve continually identified other key reasons why this should be a major concern for the middle class going forward as the income gap between the extremely affluent and the middle class continues to grow.
Disclaimer: If in twenty to thirty years, my source of frustration has been fixed in some way where everyone, even the rich, are taxed less, the government wastes less money and prices on things such as automobiles, new furnaces, child care, college tuition, vacations, etc. don’t continue to rise in a manner that outpaces cost of living increases, then I won’t have been wrong- but rather one thing will have happened: the government altered some tax laws and more responsibly spends the money it receives from the various sources paying in. One could claim that another beneficial happening might be that some kind of minor regulation was instituted that limited the amount capitalists could overcharge the consumers for goods and services (ie. necessary costs), but if you take care of the excessive taxation and the subsequent government waste issues, there is no need, nor should there be a desire to, punish the entrepreneurial, though Grinchian, capitalist.
Disclaimer II: The taxation issue likely won’t improve unless you find different candidates to elect. If you’ve already advised your buddy whose loneliness is legendary to date former super M-I-L-F Charo and he instead sent away for a companion, acquired an STD from a blow-up doll, and then turned to the animal kingdom for companionship, impregnating a bovine that is lactose intolerant, but whose English is probably still better than Charo’s- well, maybe it is time to come up with a better plan. And don’t so easily dismiss Charo as one of the all-time former Cougar hotties. She appeared on the Love Boat eight times- so someone thought she was hot. “Cuchi Cuchi” is the best phrase for copulation I’ve ever heard of.
Stating the Obvious: So, millions and millions of people aren’t satisified with the nature of politics and aren’t happy with legislative bills that politicians unleash upon a largely unsuspecting public who helped get them elected. Read the editorial pages, listen to talk radio, pick up a book written by Chuck Schumer: “Positively American, Winning Back the Middle Class Majority One Family at a Time,” or Lou Dobbs: “War on the Middle Class,” books written by men that are far more qualified to write the types of things I’m writing. These guys are insiders, though I doubt Schumer (a democratic senator), would advocate not voting for someone from either party, but I wouldn’t know because I have yet to read his book. I don’t need to have read either book, but based on the titles- it kind of sounds like something me and millions of other middle-classers are living. People are not oblivious to their current economic condition, just to the probable future condition of their children. Some people may eventually become aware of the fact that this is the first time in American history that people’s children will not better their parent’s social condition, which is primarily derived from a paycheck, that’s earning power is best spent on a college degree, though the paycheck, via the increased prices on necessary costs, will not be able to stretch in order to finance said education. Schumer’s and Dobbs’ books are both over 230 pages, so I feel less guilty about subjecting any reader left out there to the type of punishment that comes with the task of deciphering my diatribe.
Hell, the Mitchell report, the former senator’s comprehensive, but ultimately toothless yarn about rampant cheating by professional baseball players using performance enhancing drugs, is over 400 pages. It resolves nothing, implicates no one and a man who spent about two years deposing witnesses in front of federal attorneys, advised the commissioner of baseball to not pursue any legal action against implicated violators. Wow! At least I am giving the problem, addressing the origin of the problem, and attempting to provide some solutions- though my comprehensive list is still to come.
Political Cartoons: One way for a voter to determine the pulse of a nation, often through the mind of one individual, is to look at some political cartoons, which is another format in which is expressed the disgust that is palpably, or really, felt by people who have to vote for one of the turkeys seeking office. After all, sometimes a picture is worth more than one thousand words. One cartoon I looked at just prior to Thanksgiving had an old farmer and his wife, with roasting pan in hand, standing outside of a pen filled with about 20 turkeys with several “gobble” captions above their heads. On the outside of the pen is a sign that reads: Candidates ‘08. The old farmer says to his wife- “See anything you fancy?” On the bottom of the cartoon is a bird of some kind, which looks to be representing either the conscience of the nation or is just a bird happening across the scene. The bird says- “Pick that sincere-looking one.” The couple would probably be standing there a long time if that were the criteria. It is hard to base my theory about the cynicism of a nation, as represented by a political cartoon, being the first step in a long line of desired mandates seeking governmental change that would most positively impact the middle class. Lucky for me, I’ve got plenty of other things to go on (see parts 5-13 of this topic). My question- if the vast majority of people are so disgusted with politics as usual- shouldn’t a different approach to voting a politician into office be tried? I’ve been skimming a book- A. James Reichley’s (The Life of the Parties: A History of American Political Parties)- things weren’t any better 214 years ago when the federalists were fighting the republicans during George Washington’s presidential administration. When will we learn?
Evolution: That is one cartoon, based on one person’s take on the political climate. A much more famous man born to the world in 1904 as Theodor Seuss Geisel (Dr. Seuss) may have given us dozens of more subtle, highly-evolved, rhyming social and political commentary pieces. Political cartoons have been in existence since cavemen were writing about mastadons on cave walls. Just watch Ice Age starring the voices of Dennis Leary and Ray Romano and you would know this is a proven fact. It comes to that, Dr. Seuss, according to Wikipedia, a source I have been weary of depending on for about six months now, evolved from a political cartoonist who wrote over 400 political cartoons in two years during World War II, into one of the most original artists we’ve ever seen. So, both the political cartoon and certain members of the political cartoon writing community have evolved throughout history.
Boys and Girls: I have two kids under the age of 3. I have read my share of Dr. Seuss stories. Some of them are pretty darn good, especially with the sneaky way that Seuss injected some social lessons, and even more veiled political ones into them (if you’re reading hard enough). I’ve already touched upon the inherent lesson of discrimination addressed with my two part “Sneetches and Racism” column from January 3rd and 12th, 2007.
I have started referring to republicans and democrats as the Thing 1 and Thing 2 of politics. The combination of the over-zealous Things in Seuss’ book The Cat in the Hat, who are let out of a box as a way to provide further entertainment for the two young children who are trapped inside of their house during the hull of a rainy day with their mother away, is irresponsibility in action. They cause such a mess in the house that it is barely put right again before the children’s mother returns. If that isn’t a comment on the lack of “bi-partisanshipfulness,” (to borrow a Will Farrell line while playing George W. Bush in an SNL skit) I would be shocked. The Things cause problems in the house; unfortunately Seuss didn't indicate that the Things had caused problems in the senate.
“Yertle the Turtle” is a story about a turtle so driven by the greed of monopolizing a vantage point, enjoying a better view, that he commands all of the other turtles in the pond to act as pawns to raise him out of the pond he inhabits. He discovers a rival in the lofty height he’s attained when the moon rises before him, so he says: “ ‘I’ll call some more turtles. I’ll stack ‘em to heaven!/I need ‘bout five thousand, six hundred and seven!’ ” This number is slightly less than a campaign contribution (in terms of- $) that the favor of a reciprocated vote will get you when you donate to the presidential hopeful of your choice in the January 2008 primary. Let’s also not dismiss the obvious charge against hypocrisy (toward candidates feigning piety, signaling that righteousness and money are quite linked) that Seuss levelled by placing the word “heaven” so near a number before which some careful readers might place a dollar symbol in order to demonstrate a point. Unintentional? I think not. Yeah, I worked overtime on that one. A plain turtle named Mack finally says:
“ ‘Your Majesty, please . . . I don’t like to complain,
But down here below, we are feeling great pain.
I know, up on top you are seeing great sights,
But down at the bottom we, too should have rights.’ ”
The symbolic meaning, delivered in the quoted lines, as it translates to my overall theme of the future downtroddenness of middle class citizens should not be overlooked.
In “Gertrude McFuzz,” an insecure bird greedily devours far too many pill-berries and her tail grows so large that she can no longer fly, all in the name of acquiring more beautiful feathers than a rival, more than the one with which she has been blessed. Clearly this is a prescient comment directed at Joan Rivers, Kenny Rogers, or any of a stable of celebrities who have decided that looking as goulish as Mike Myers (not the SNL alumnist) was occupationally advantageous, and that Myers needed some competition to play the heavy in the next Halloween movie. Some might consider this story a comment on steroids that would make someone look more healthy, or perform better athletically. But really this story, (isn’t it obvious), is a veiled comment about the nature of politicians attempting to grab too much money for their desired pork-barrel projects. Of course the difference between the events which take place in McFuzz and those which actually take place politically is that the politicians greed has the tendency of costing the public the freedom to fly. Metaphorically, or actually, it costs them, especially if one considers that taking a vacation, (that involves a plane ride) is one of the life events I would consider a necessary cost and which is becoming less affordable.
How I could go on- “The Zax” is about two creatures who share a stubborn psychological approach to ensuring their special interest group reigns supreme, for neither will get out of the other’s way, standing still upon meeting and never moving (even left or right- shockingly subtle was Seuss, as this is undoubtedly a comment on the political direction any candidate or private citizen could said to be leaning on any issue imaginable). Eventually, a super-highway is built up around them. Neither gets what they want- which is apt commentary on the nature of legislative government, for no one gets too much of what they want in a compromise.
“The Grinch,” perhaps the most well-known Seuss story, is about a green (think envious) washed-up creature who suffers from Affluenza,* a politician that can’t gather enough of other people’s (the Who’s) things in a meeting which is not symbolically unlike a congressional session where the Grinch attempts to grab all of the domestic products for himself in order to satisfy his constitutency. In the Grinch’s case, the rather forlorn looking Mack, the dog he keeps as a pet/reindeer, would seem a helpless accomplice, non-descript you might say, much as the corporations at the back of the candidates, the latter of which are supposed to be representing us. The Grinch is even seen meeting in subcommittee with Cindy Lou Who. We can hope, that like the Grinch, the politicians will eventually grow a heart three sizes and forego the greed that benefits relatively few people.
“Green Eggs and Ham” is the subtle story about a man named Sam, who like several politicians and legislators, continually attempts to force a disgruntled citizen to try something he wants no part of, until he finally relents, in order to shut up Uncle Sam? The unnamed creature is made to pretend to enjoy a new stadium, an urban development project, a round-a-bout on one of the busiest streets in his city, symbolized by the probably disgusting green eggs and green ham. Don’t lose sight of the fact that the ham is green and that it is in fact- HAM- a food cut from a pig. Please see my harangue from last time which talked about pig racing and pork-barrel spending. This Seuss guy was good.
I won’t spend much space on this one because it speaks for itself- “Red Fish, Blue Fish.” That couldn’t be a symbolic treatment of republican fish (red state) and democratic fish (blue state). No, there is nothing fishy in politics. Huh, the exception that proves the rule.
Another fairly obscure story, “The Big Brag,” will better serve as an analogy for my purposes. It begins:
“The rabbit felt mighty important that day
On top of the hill in the sun where he lay.
He felt SO important up there on the hill
That he started in braggin, as animals will”
The rabbit proceeds to laud his sense of hearing.
Quoting from these first four lines of the story reveals two things preliminarily: 1) that Seuss clearly meant to communicate how self-important politicians are- for after all they are up there on that capital “hill;” 2) the prevalence of my attacks upon residents of the animal kingdom which is a necessary part of any blog is well-intentioned, as I aim to get them to stop “braggin, as animals will.” Someone has to knock these feral bastard creatures down a peg or two. E.B. White or George Orwell, authors of “Charlotte’s Web” and “Animal Farm” respectively, or any celebrity “author” of a more unbelievably popular child’s book starring a wild or domesticated animal have seldom disparaged animals to the point where they will finally stop being so uppity (ahem, see my column from February 4th, 2007 on celebrity authors).
I could continue quoting from this book for the length of this column to the relief of no one in particular, for they wouldn’t have to read my original work, but I will attempt to offer some original thought. Suffice to say, Seuss outdoes himself in the area of thinly-veiled political commentary. On the next page a bear appears who says he is the “best of the beasts.” The bear and rabbit then argue for nearly ten pages about whose anatomical sense, the rabbit’s ears for hearing, or the bear’s nose for smelling, is more keen at detecting sounds or aromas at a greater distance.
After this time, up from the ground pops a worm. I’m not aware of a worm even having senses at all, let alone a sense, his eyesight, that could be more keen than animals that rank that far above it on the food chain. Nonethless, the little independent worm says to the bear and the rabbit, that it is obvious Seuss meant to signify are the democrat and the republican respectively, for the rabbit’s pronounced hearing is more conservatively demonstrated, distance wise, as compared to the bear’s sight, thus the bear brags more liberally . . . oh, the lines:
“ ‘Now, boys,’ said the worm, ‘you’ve been bragging a lot.
You both think you’re great. But I think you are not.
You’re not half as good as a fellow like me.
You hear and you smell. But how far can you SEE?’ ”
I can’t believe that I would willingly compare myself, or any independent considering upsetting the apple cart by not voting for a dem. or a rep. to a worm, but I’m humble and the rest of the story is so appropriate I have to overlook that. It pits two boastful, partisan creatures who overrate their abilities and so instantly dismiss their opponents’ that they just have to be prototypical Seussian symbols of political bombast. The worm tells the rabbit and the bear:
“ ‘. . . I saw on this hill, since my eyesight’s so keen,
The two biggest fools that have ever been seen!
And the fools that I saw were none other than you,
Who seem to have nothing else better to do
Than sit here and argue who’s better than who!’ ”
I have hinted and damn well said, (though probably not said well) that I have been looking into the future, given the current economic and political landscape and see things that the vast majority of people are looking past as determinants of what life is going to be like for our children. Those little replicas of their parents can’t possibly fathom the meanings, or uncover the subtext that a guy known as Dr. Seuss has prescribed in the lines of his stories. But let all of the more reasonable people who don’t know what they don’t know dismiss what hasn’t already be proven. Some writer wannabe, a subtext archeologist, and a long-winded one at that, can’t possibly be attempting to prove something that may happen in the future. Is he some wizard afflicted with acute paranoia, with too much time on his hands, another in a long line of goofy bloggers easily marginalized, who believes-
that the man who has much occur to him in connection with many things is under no obligation to keep this information to himself.**
* Affluenza is both a book and a term used to decry the contagious, socially transmitted condition of anxiety and waste, psychologically suffered by consumers who become addicted to the acquiring of possessions. It combines the terms- “affluence” and “influenza.”
** This may in fact be a confluence of thought by multiple philosophers, statesmen, or theologians, but I cannot determine where I might have potentially pilfered the sum existence of the words.
Saturday, December 29, 2007
Thursday, December 13, 2007
Middle Class Part 14: Political Oddsmakers and the Right NOT to Party
Last time: I spent four word document pages attempting to show how generally good an idea it is to maintain a balance in most walks of life, from athletics to economics. I gave one or two republican and democratic examples of how maintaining a balance in representative government with republicans v. democrats in our local, state and federal offices where that standard does not apply because of how they continue to mis-represent the middle class. Politicians from these two parties are simply too beholden to those who help to get them elected, or who have helped to push through a candidate’s policy initiatives.
The relative, unfortunate future condition of the middle class is not readily apparent, but neither is an illness which can incubate in a person’s circulatory (heart disease) or respiratory system (pneumonia) or in their blood streams or bone marrow for days, weeks, and even years prior to its bursting out and manifestly weakening or killing a person (cancer); yeah, this country is sick, “[it] has a fever, and the only prescription . . . is more cowbell,” or more votes for centrist/populist candidates so that a cure for the middle class may be found.
My son also rises: I am waiting on another balancing issue- It isn’t known when my son will reward his parents with their desire for him to balance his hopefully forthcoming lack of interest in causing havoc with his ability to do so. Word to the wise, if a child squirts liquid soap all over his grandmother’s carpeting, don’t add water as a way of fixing the mess. Soap + water = lather; this compounds the problem and literally expands it by making it more of a three-dimensional calamity. There isn’t room in this installment for a complete listing of things that my adorable young lad has been up to in the last two years. Not to worry, I’ve been thinking like a prison warden since he was crawling up the stairs at seven months. He would have to levitate to get at the steak knives . . . yeah, maybe I should move them to the padlocked shed in the back yard. How often do you really need cutlery anyway.
Middle Class job: The job of the middle class voter is to vote for someone who better represents those caught in the middle- who are not considered by either the democratic candidate who generally panders to the poor, the immigrant, the economically weak, and the republican candidate who generally caters to the rich, the executive, the corporation, the economically strong. The first objection that someone will have toward this proposal, if they haven’t already promised their vote to either side, is to say that a third and fourth party candidate needs economic support (i.e. money) and that once they procure it, they will be just as beholden to their constituencies who provided the money to them as the democrats and republicans whose representation of the citizenry of this country millions of people have already informally called into question. I have just one thing to say about those people . . . they’re right. Friggin’ bastards!
But this is only true until such time as the politicians responsibly pass real campaign finance reform legislation that limits the amount of money candidates can accept and how much they can spend on an election . . . . . . . . But it is more likely that a nomadic royalist cleric lioness will have demographically irresponsible sexual relations with a eunuch marmoset (don’t ask) with a multiple personality disorder going through couples therapy by itself (see, because of the multiple personality disorder- ahem) than we have of enacting laws limiting campaign finance intake and outlays. We can’t control how our money is spent when the blood-sucking politicians are in office, there is not much chance in curtailing the money spent by big corporations who aren't getting something for nothing, when they financially back a politician's candidacy.
Right not to party: You can’t win an election without support, which primarily comes in the form of money. However, what needs to happen is to break up the monotony, the duality, the polar opposite viewpoints a voter is confronted with when they are undecided about who to vote for. Completely favoring one side over the other is far too simplistic for the more realistic voter, a member of the middle class who should not favor either party. The Beastie Boys were not telling the whole truth- we also have to “fight . . . for [our] right . . . [NOT] to paaaaaaaaarty!”
Bad Taste: Those who are voting on strict party lines, see nothing wrong with voting based on their best interests and completely ignore the overall health of the entire country. Legitimizing third and fourth parties, so they get equal press coverage, equal debate time, ensures that all economic and social classes are considered and ensures that some of the candidates, backed by the middle class, get elected. Me personally, I like to look at a menu- if I head to a craphole of a restaurant and if I don’t feel like consuming the overly-breaded E. Coli chicken wings or the seared to the point of cinder-pattied hamburger, I might want to choose something more palatable. As voters, continually supporting candidates who represent the democratic or republican parties, who are pretty much just spokes-people for a collection of a fairly predictable, seldom-nuanced, political, social or economic set of principles is in bad taste. Jeff Goldblum’s line from Jurassic Park while standing before a giant heap of triceratops dung could be used to adequately summarize most any republican or democratic candidate’s platform- “that is one big pile of shit.”
Political Mimes: Getting a number of politicians elected who aren’t republicans or democrats also eliminates the next issue that the narrow-minded republican and democrat will bring up when trying to strike down the idea of not voting for their respective parties—which is a nothing argument if you vote your conscience, your interest, and your country’s best interest. Yes, the democrats and republicans are better at making something out of nothing than the Momenchantz. Ahh, they were a mime group “popular” in the 1970s . . . think of a mime inside of an invisible box- ah, that would be making something out of nothing. Considering the double-speak of candidates, adopting southern drawls, and waffling on issues (see part 12), they aren’t definitively saying much of anything anyway and may as well be mimes.
The Elect: Electing multiple populists, libertarians, green party, or centrist candidates will ensure that presidents, governors, and congress-people have to work with them- which will mean that middle class, as well as the whole country’s interests are not pushed aside. The third/fourth party politicians wouldn't be attempting to conduct business with his political peers on an island if more of them were elected. If only a few populits are elected, and the votes on bills that could really help the middle class don’t go well, then the assumption by the voter is that the populist the middle class helped get elected has been politically compromised, has fallen under the spell of one of the other parties, or has otherwise failed. So then, support for these third and fourth party politicians will waiver and subsequent candidates will lose elections because voters didn’t elect enough of them to storm the castle of government- not because they were terrible representatives as combatants against the rampant status-quoism of oligarchy. In an age where people want instant satisfaction, advocating something where the payoff won’t come in 20-30 years is hardly a popular stance. Often the army with the most soldiers wins the battle.
People need not worry that they’ll feel like the last person picked at kickball because the lesser of the two evils they voted for didn’t win. Many things in life are about compromise, the game of politics is no different. I have never been a politician, so far as I remember, but I’m mindful of the old adage about the possibility of success in any endeavor, whether that is voting for a political candidate or plunking down a couple bucks on a steed at the track- you only have a chance to win when you have a horse in the race; the horses we’ve been betting on aren’t running with us in mind.
Segway paragraph: When I do go to the track, which is about once a year, I find that in the program there are opening odds on the likelihood that each horse will win the race. There are favorites and long shots and sometimes betting on the long shot makes the most sense because you get a better return on your investment- the possible reward is worth the risk. The odds change based on the amount of money placed on the respective horses that will be racing. The horse-racing analogy may be a good one to use as a comparison to the current contestants running for president. There would need to be two heats (one for republicans and one for democrats); there are plenty of nags, and even a philly running for the job to be the next person to screw over this country at the highest level. Candidates given the chance to debate the issues, resort to name-calling, lying, specialize in revisionism or simply dig up a misrepresentation of someone’s voting record and we lose out on real policy debate. I've seen some of the post-debate recaps on Fox News and CNN and read articles after the debates and this is exactly what has happened- it always does. I believe it is historically accurate to say that races involving a third candidate for any office contain a better discussion of issues than the bi-partisan variety we are usually treated to. I will forgo the opportunity of attacking the current field of presidential candidates individually and instead will do so collectively. And anyone that dismisses the notion of voting for a populist because of the election of a former wrestler to the governor's mansion in Minnesota in 1998, and his subsequent rocky political road, is dealing with a rather limited number of test cases. The two guys he beat were highly representative of their respective parties, which didn't serve them well. Ventura won for a reason.
Here piggy, piggy, piggy: There probably aren’t odds for this, but the primary election cycle would more aptly be compared to a race of pigs, especially if we were to know how much money the candidates had earmarked to their various pet causes—called pork-barrel spending; starting January 3rd (Iowa’s and New Hampshire’s primary date) there will definitely be a few pigs/candidates who will get slaughtered. There are plenty of boars/bores and one sow on the democratic side leading the herd; they wallow around in the mud, especially after one of their opponents has slung it at them . . . that might be enough pig analogies. And plenty of the porcine-egoed candidates have gone hog wild attempting to court voters. I couldn't resist.
Oddsmakers: I may be wrong, there may be pig-racing odds, but a contest that garners much more attention, and wagered money, is one that is fought by placing 11 men on both sides of a field fighting over- huh . . . the pigskin. I am talking about football. One way of influencing the outcomes of games, outside of videotaping opposing coaches using hand signals to direct one team’s defensive players and never really being punished for it, is to provide odds for a sporting event as a way to level the wagerable playing field for the purposes of drawing betting money to it, is to provide odds. Just kidding- I just had to take a shot at super-Satan Bill Bellicheck.
Oddsmakers II: Open the sports section or go to any casino in Vegas and you will be made aware of all kinds of spreads/lines/odds on which teams are favored to win games. Vegas is a place where you can bet on almost anything- who will win the game, by how much, who will win the opening coin toss, which team mascot will be more inebriated by the time the game concludes- everything! Vegas oddsmakers are pretty slick. It is their job to know all kinds of things that I can’t list because this post is already too damn long. The most important part of their job is to set the line (the number of points given to the underdog- i.e., how many points the oddsmakers would expect the underdog to lose by, to encourage betting on both sides for the favorite and for the underdog.) A line of 6 ½ for the Cowboys over the Packers, means that the Cowboys would have to win by 7 points (covering the point spread) for the person who placed the bet to collect their winnings. In politics, poll numbers accomplish pretty much the same thing- Clinton leads by 5% points over Obama or Paul trails Romney by 37%. The difference is, that in elections, by voting/betting on either a democrat or a republican- you lose your money (think tax money), because if any voter thinks the person they help elect will actually reduce or prevent a rise in taxes . . . well, let me know when I can stop laughing. This will be more obvious when/if you hear them trying to figure out which side of each issue to be on so as not to alienate potential voters who might vote/bet on them. When Clinton attempts a southern accent, Obama tries to act more black, Giuliani pretends to act tougher on immigration, or when Huckabee is deciding which red tie makes him look more presidential, they are attempting to manipulate the public and win voter approval, a practice commonly referred to as shading. Put simply- the republican and democratic parties balance each other out by appealing to one set of voters or another on any issue you can imagine. Their platforms seldom intersect: where the republicans are in favor of gun control, the democrats are against it; where the democrats are pro environment, the republicans are apathetic; where the democrats would over-tax the rich and middle class, the republicans would tax the poor and middle class. Hmmm. They are their own oddsmakers, who set the odds and benefit from having successfully fooled their half of the sheep who vote for them. Generally, there is more variety, both claimed and actual, on a top 20 radio station hosted by the Dr. Johnny Fever of the anteater species who himself knows he should vary his diet by eating more arthropods than there is amongst the candidates distinctively separate themselves from any number of rivals belonging to the same party.
I mentioned that each democrat is pretty much the same as their democratic counterparts. So it is important for them to remain competitively balanced, and not attempt to express themselves in the political margins. During the republican debate in Iowa on December 11, 2007 an MSNBC.com article was critical of a Huckabee tax position because it "could be used to paint him as outside the mainstream." And the problem with that would be? The candidates must be careful not to lose the vote of the immigrant, of the rich, of the farmer, of the union member. Often, candidates win just as many votes by staying on the fence on issues as they do when they make their intentions known. The public, even the debate moderators aren't making them alienate people on one side or the other. This too will have to happen in order to get third and fourth parties legitimized. Sometimes I feel like you couldn't get these waffles to come down against eating broccoli dipped in turpentine because it might offend all light-shaded coniferous trees and all members of the cabbage family. (Turpentine is derived from pine trees and the cabbage family enjoys broccoli as one of its members.)
Polls: I mentioned political poles a couple paragraphs above- these too are to the detriment of the public. Polls will be conducted within a week after the 2008 presidential election to get a preliminary read on who could be interested in running for president in 2012. Ridiculous! Why would the American public need to be told four years in advance who might be running for president when we haven’t even started getting screwed by the satan that just got elected? Poll results months and weeks before an election is bad enough. These polls influence voters who are only semi-aware of a few candidate’s positions on a limited number of issues. Likewise, the press, television, newspapers, magazines, even bloggers can’t focus enough time, attention, or space on more than two or three candidates from each party- because they don’t have it. Poll numbers put the idea of a fair election in jeopardy from the get-go. Asked by phone if one approves or disapproves of Ron Paul or Bill Richardson and we respond that we don't know. Well, we don't know because of the lack of news coverage, so then the news decides to focus on the leading candidates who are leading as much because of polls taken and news coverage as anything else- a self-fulfilling prophecy if ever there was one.
On Strike: I wandered across the news that the December 10th democratic debate was cancelled because of the writer’s strike. I initially thought the debate was cancelled in lieu of the absence of television and movie writers. But the reason the debate was cancelled was because the politicians didn’t want to cross the picket line- of the news writers, who have been working without a contract since April 2005. I assumed the debate was cancelled because writers who get paid for making stuff up wouldn’t be able to provide the candidates with fictitious platform stances, fresh new ways to waffle on issues, and the ‘devil is in the details’ clever turns of phrase that would perk up the ears of political pundits, words that impact elections by too often finding their way into the nightly news (ie. sound bites)- things like “read my lips” and “I actually did vote for . . . the bill before I voted against it.” Funny, there isn’t actually much “sound” (sensibly impactful) policy verbally delivered, relative to the noise of what religion someone is, whether they served in the military or come out against a Siamese mosquito species desiring the legal right to co-habitate.
Feed me: Besides, we should demand a meal from the candidates, and not just a bite, or we should learn to bite back; the best way for a voter to get a better political meal, and to beat the odds, is to stop betting on the favorites, demand another course, and to go on strike. A week out from christmas- I can’t put a better bow on the problem than that.
Next Time: A shorter blog? A columnist who will attempt to become a better friend to the animal kingdom he has alienated by discontinuing the practice of affixing physical or psychological maladies to various species in order to hyperbolically demonstrate how ridiculously unlikely certain desires might be? A new topic? After how successful this topic has been? That would be positively goofy.
The relative, unfortunate future condition of the middle class is not readily apparent, but neither is an illness which can incubate in a person’s circulatory (heart disease) or respiratory system (pneumonia) or in their blood streams or bone marrow for days, weeks, and even years prior to its bursting out and manifestly weakening or killing a person (cancer); yeah, this country is sick, “[it] has a fever, and the only prescription . . . is more cowbell,” or more votes for centrist/populist candidates so that a cure for the middle class may be found.
My son also rises: I am waiting on another balancing issue- It isn’t known when my son will reward his parents with their desire for him to balance his hopefully forthcoming lack of interest in causing havoc with his ability to do so. Word to the wise, if a child squirts liquid soap all over his grandmother’s carpeting, don’t add water as a way of fixing the mess. Soap + water = lather; this compounds the problem and literally expands it by making it more of a three-dimensional calamity. There isn’t room in this installment for a complete listing of things that my adorable young lad has been up to in the last two years. Not to worry, I’ve been thinking like a prison warden since he was crawling up the stairs at seven months. He would have to levitate to get at the steak knives . . . yeah, maybe I should move them to the padlocked shed in the back yard. How often do you really need cutlery anyway.
Middle Class job: The job of the middle class voter is to vote for someone who better represents those caught in the middle- who are not considered by either the democratic candidate who generally panders to the poor, the immigrant, the economically weak, and the republican candidate who generally caters to the rich, the executive, the corporation, the economically strong. The first objection that someone will have toward this proposal, if they haven’t already promised their vote to either side, is to say that a third and fourth party candidate needs economic support (i.e. money) and that once they procure it, they will be just as beholden to their constituencies who provided the money to them as the democrats and republicans whose representation of the citizenry of this country millions of people have already informally called into question. I have just one thing to say about those people . . . they’re right. Friggin’ bastards!
But this is only true until such time as the politicians responsibly pass real campaign finance reform legislation that limits the amount of money candidates can accept and how much they can spend on an election . . . . . . . . But it is more likely that a nomadic royalist cleric lioness will have demographically irresponsible sexual relations with a eunuch marmoset (don’t ask) with a multiple personality disorder going through couples therapy by itself (see, because of the multiple personality disorder- ahem) than we have of enacting laws limiting campaign finance intake and outlays. We can’t control how our money is spent when the blood-sucking politicians are in office, there is not much chance in curtailing the money spent by big corporations who aren't getting something for nothing, when they financially back a politician's candidacy.
Right not to party: You can’t win an election without support, which primarily comes in the form of money. However, what needs to happen is to break up the monotony, the duality, the polar opposite viewpoints a voter is confronted with when they are undecided about who to vote for. Completely favoring one side over the other is far too simplistic for the more realistic voter, a member of the middle class who should not favor either party. The Beastie Boys were not telling the whole truth- we also have to “fight . . . for [our] right . . . [NOT] to paaaaaaaaarty!”
Bad Taste: Those who are voting on strict party lines, see nothing wrong with voting based on their best interests and completely ignore the overall health of the entire country. Legitimizing third and fourth parties, so they get equal press coverage, equal debate time, ensures that all economic and social classes are considered and ensures that some of the candidates, backed by the middle class, get elected. Me personally, I like to look at a menu- if I head to a craphole of a restaurant and if I don’t feel like consuming the overly-breaded E. Coli chicken wings or the seared to the point of cinder-pattied hamburger, I might want to choose something more palatable. As voters, continually supporting candidates who represent the democratic or republican parties, who are pretty much just spokes-people for a collection of a fairly predictable, seldom-nuanced, political, social or economic set of principles is in bad taste. Jeff Goldblum’s line from Jurassic Park while standing before a giant heap of triceratops dung could be used to adequately summarize most any republican or democratic candidate’s platform- “that is one big pile of shit.”
Political Mimes: Getting a number of politicians elected who aren’t republicans or democrats also eliminates the next issue that the narrow-minded republican and democrat will bring up when trying to strike down the idea of not voting for their respective parties—which is a nothing argument if you vote your conscience, your interest, and your country’s best interest. Yes, the democrats and republicans are better at making something out of nothing than the Momenchantz. Ahh, they were a mime group “popular” in the 1970s . . . think of a mime inside of an invisible box- ah, that would be making something out of nothing. Considering the double-speak of candidates, adopting southern drawls, and waffling on issues (see part 12), they aren’t definitively saying much of anything anyway and may as well be mimes.
The Elect: Electing multiple populists, libertarians, green party, or centrist candidates will ensure that presidents, governors, and congress-people have to work with them- which will mean that middle class, as well as the whole country’s interests are not pushed aside. The third/fourth party politicians wouldn't be attempting to conduct business with his political peers on an island if more of them were elected. If only a few populits are elected, and the votes on bills that could really help the middle class don’t go well, then the assumption by the voter is that the populist the middle class helped get elected has been politically compromised, has fallen under the spell of one of the other parties, or has otherwise failed. So then, support for these third and fourth party politicians will waiver and subsequent candidates will lose elections because voters didn’t elect enough of them to storm the castle of government- not because they were terrible representatives as combatants against the rampant status-quoism of oligarchy. In an age where people want instant satisfaction, advocating something where the payoff won’t come in 20-30 years is hardly a popular stance. Often the army with the most soldiers wins the battle.
People need not worry that they’ll feel like the last person picked at kickball because the lesser of the two evils they voted for didn’t win. Many things in life are about compromise, the game of politics is no different. I have never been a politician, so far as I remember, but I’m mindful of the old adage about the possibility of success in any endeavor, whether that is voting for a political candidate or plunking down a couple bucks on a steed at the track- you only have a chance to win when you have a horse in the race; the horses we’ve been betting on aren’t running with us in mind.
Segway paragraph: When I do go to the track, which is about once a year, I find that in the program there are opening odds on the likelihood that each horse will win the race. There are favorites and long shots and sometimes betting on the long shot makes the most sense because you get a better return on your investment- the possible reward is worth the risk. The odds change based on the amount of money placed on the respective horses that will be racing. The horse-racing analogy may be a good one to use as a comparison to the current contestants running for president. There would need to be two heats (one for republicans and one for democrats); there are plenty of nags, and even a philly running for the job to be the next person to screw over this country at the highest level. Candidates given the chance to debate the issues, resort to name-calling, lying, specialize in revisionism or simply dig up a misrepresentation of someone’s voting record and we lose out on real policy debate. I've seen some of the post-debate recaps on Fox News and CNN and read articles after the debates and this is exactly what has happened- it always does. I believe it is historically accurate to say that races involving a third candidate for any office contain a better discussion of issues than the bi-partisan variety we are usually treated to. I will forgo the opportunity of attacking the current field of presidential candidates individually and instead will do so collectively. And anyone that dismisses the notion of voting for a populist because of the election of a former wrestler to the governor's mansion in Minnesota in 1998, and his subsequent rocky political road, is dealing with a rather limited number of test cases. The two guys he beat were highly representative of their respective parties, which didn't serve them well. Ventura won for a reason.
Here piggy, piggy, piggy: There probably aren’t odds for this, but the primary election cycle would more aptly be compared to a race of pigs, especially if we were to know how much money the candidates had earmarked to their various pet causes—called pork-barrel spending; starting January 3rd (Iowa’s and New Hampshire’s primary date) there will definitely be a few pigs/candidates who will get slaughtered. There are plenty of boars/bores and one sow on the democratic side leading the herd; they wallow around in the mud, especially after one of their opponents has slung it at them . . . that might be enough pig analogies. And plenty of the porcine-egoed candidates have gone hog wild attempting to court voters. I couldn't resist.
Oddsmakers: I may be wrong, there may be pig-racing odds, but a contest that garners much more attention, and wagered money, is one that is fought by placing 11 men on both sides of a field fighting over- huh . . . the pigskin. I am talking about football. One way of influencing the outcomes of games, outside of videotaping opposing coaches using hand signals to direct one team’s defensive players and never really being punished for it, is to provide odds for a sporting event as a way to level the wagerable playing field for the purposes of drawing betting money to it, is to provide odds. Just kidding- I just had to take a shot at super-Satan Bill Bellicheck.
Oddsmakers II: Open the sports section or go to any casino in Vegas and you will be made aware of all kinds of spreads/lines/odds on which teams are favored to win games. Vegas is a place where you can bet on almost anything- who will win the game, by how much, who will win the opening coin toss, which team mascot will be more inebriated by the time the game concludes- everything! Vegas oddsmakers are pretty slick. It is their job to know all kinds of things that I can’t list because this post is already too damn long. The most important part of their job is to set the line (the number of points given to the underdog- i.e., how many points the oddsmakers would expect the underdog to lose by, to encourage betting on both sides for the favorite and for the underdog.) A line of 6 ½ for the Cowboys over the Packers, means that the Cowboys would have to win by 7 points (covering the point spread) for the person who placed the bet to collect their winnings. In politics, poll numbers accomplish pretty much the same thing- Clinton leads by 5% points over Obama or Paul trails Romney by 37%. The difference is, that in elections, by voting/betting on either a democrat or a republican- you lose your money (think tax money), because if any voter thinks the person they help elect will actually reduce or prevent a rise in taxes . . . well, let me know when I can stop laughing. This will be more obvious when/if you hear them trying to figure out which side of each issue to be on so as not to alienate potential voters who might vote/bet on them. When Clinton attempts a southern accent, Obama tries to act more black, Giuliani pretends to act tougher on immigration, or when Huckabee is deciding which red tie makes him look more presidential, they are attempting to manipulate the public and win voter approval, a practice commonly referred to as shading. Put simply- the republican and democratic parties balance each other out by appealing to one set of voters or another on any issue you can imagine. Their platforms seldom intersect: where the republicans are in favor of gun control, the democrats are against it; where the democrats are pro environment, the republicans are apathetic; where the democrats would over-tax the rich and middle class, the republicans would tax the poor and middle class. Hmmm. They are their own oddsmakers, who set the odds and benefit from having successfully fooled their half of the sheep who vote for them. Generally, there is more variety, both claimed and actual, on a top 20 radio station hosted by the Dr. Johnny Fever of the anteater species who himself knows he should vary his diet by eating more arthropods than there is amongst the candidates distinctively separate themselves from any number of rivals belonging to the same party.
I mentioned that each democrat is pretty much the same as their democratic counterparts. So it is important for them to remain competitively balanced, and not attempt to express themselves in the political margins. During the republican debate in Iowa on December 11, 2007 an MSNBC.com article was critical of a Huckabee tax position because it "could be used to paint him as outside the mainstream." And the problem with that would be? The candidates must be careful not to lose the vote of the immigrant, of the rich, of the farmer, of the union member. Often, candidates win just as many votes by staying on the fence on issues as they do when they make their intentions known. The public, even the debate moderators aren't making them alienate people on one side or the other. This too will have to happen in order to get third and fourth parties legitimized. Sometimes I feel like you couldn't get these waffles to come down against eating broccoli dipped in turpentine because it might offend all light-shaded coniferous trees and all members of the cabbage family. (Turpentine is derived from pine trees and the cabbage family enjoys broccoli as one of its members.)
Polls: I mentioned political poles a couple paragraphs above- these too are to the detriment of the public. Polls will be conducted within a week after the 2008 presidential election to get a preliminary read on who could be interested in running for president in 2012. Ridiculous! Why would the American public need to be told four years in advance who might be running for president when we haven’t even started getting screwed by the satan that just got elected? Poll results months and weeks before an election is bad enough. These polls influence voters who are only semi-aware of a few candidate’s positions on a limited number of issues. Likewise, the press, television, newspapers, magazines, even bloggers can’t focus enough time, attention, or space on more than two or three candidates from each party- because they don’t have it. Poll numbers put the idea of a fair election in jeopardy from the get-go. Asked by phone if one approves or disapproves of Ron Paul or Bill Richardson and we respond that we don't know. Well, we don't know because of the lack of news coverage, so then the news decides to focus on the leading candidates who are leading as much because of polls taken and news coverage as anything else- a self-fulfilling prophecy if ever there was one.
On Strike: I wandered across the news that the December 10th democratic debate was cancelled because of the writer’s strike. I initially thought the debate was cancelled in lieu of the absence of television and movie writers. But the reason the debate was cancelled was because the politicians didn’t want to cross the picket line- of the news writers, who have been working without a contract since April 2005. I assumed the debate was cancelled because writers who get paid for making stuff up wouldn’t be able to provide the candidates with fictitious platform stances, fresh new ways to waffle on issues, and the ‘devil is in the details’ clever turns of phrase that would perk up the ears of political pundits, words that impact elections by too often finding their way into the nightly news (ie. sound bites)- things like “read my lips” and “I actually did vote for . . . the bill before I voted against it.” Funny, there isn’t actually much “sound” (sensibly impactful) policy verbally delivered, relative to the noise of what religion someone is, whether they served in the military or come out against a Siamese mosquito species desiring the legal right to co-habitate.
Feed me: Besides, we should demand a meal from the candidates, and not just a bite, or we should learn to bite back; the best way for a voter to get a better political meal, and to beat the odds, is to stop betting on the favorites, demand another course, and to go on strike. A week out from christmas- I can’t put a better bow on the problem than that.
Next Time: A shorter blog? A columnist who will attempt to become a better friend to the animal kingdom he has alienated by discontinuing the practice of affixing physical or psychological maladies to various species in order to hyperbolically demonstrate how ridiculously unlikely certain desires might be? A new topic? After how successful this topic has been? That would be positively goofy.
Friday, November 30, 2007
Middle Class Part 13: Political Synthesis
Some may wonder why a person would delve into the more rhetorical aspects such as that which I began last time, and continue to express below, on a topic which primarily addresses the future fiscal pitfalls of the middle class, via excessive taxation and increasing prices of necessary cost items. It is not speculation if I have gone to the trouble to back it up. Well, in order to trace what ails the middle class, I can’t just write about economic issues in a vacuum, without implicating the political climate from which they originated, just as the physician, ideally, does not administer medicine without diagnosing the malady based on a set of symptoms he witnesses or complaints he hears from the one whose physical or mental health has been compromised by illness.
Primum non nocere: is Latin for “First, do no harm.” This phrase, known as the Hippocratic Oath, has been informally included in a physician’s pledge for a couple thousand years, and pertains to the ethical practice of medicine. If there is any way the medical field could be compelled to share this mantra, and the expected practice of the aforementioned mantra proper, with the politicians of the United States, the American people would be extremely grateful. I don’t hold out any hope that politicians will adopt this saying, but if they did, it could be referred to as the Hippocratic hypocritical oath--for no politician, feigning genuineness, could pull it off in this age of justified pessimism; they would alienate too many constituencies and businesses that bought them the victory on election night. People are becoming more and more jaded for plenty of good reasons.
Questionable involvement: Think of eminent domain, unaccountable tax increases, eleventh-hour presidential pardons, executive privilege, sex scandals in bathroom stalls, Watergate, Whitewater, BlackWater, corporate welfare and tax shelters, wire-tapping, and government waste—which are issues I have already accounted for, have alluded to, or will address, if you are looking for justification of why one person’s view of politicians would be so lousy. Consider the background of the real/provable corrupt republican and democratic incidents, such as those noted below and imagine the probable sordid history of hundreds of others just like them, throughout our country’s history or those still in the offing. A celebrity-stalking, cross-dressing muskrat with an unhealthy addiction to Flomax, and a strange appreciation for the way Robert Wagner pronounces the word “Darling,” would be a more trustworthy, less odd candidate if it were to hold a political office compared to some of the elected men and women who are passing laws and “representing” the American people.
democratic Case in point: Bill Lerach, former partner of Mel Weiss, was a Lincoln Bedroom guest in president* Bill Clinton’s White House. Courtesy of George F. Will of the Washington Post from November 18, 2007—“With Plaintiffs in the Pantry, Attorneys raked in Cash” http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/16/AR2007111601756.html?nav=hcmodule: “Shortly after Leach attended a White House dinner, Clinton vetoed legislation that would have restricted class-action lawsuits. Lerach gave $100,000 to Clinton’s presidential library.” Just how much does that back itch—that’s an awful lot of political back-scratching. Will goes on to write:
“Does political money flow toward beliefs or do beliefs move toward money? Much scholarship strongly suggests the former. Democrats are rewarded for their devotion to trial lawyers . . . The problem is not that Democrats are ‘bought’ by trial lawyers. The problem is that Democrats, who see victims everywhere, are actually disposed to believe the narrative of pandemic victimization of investors.”
The title of the column addresses the hubbub caused by trial lawyers from the law firm Milberg Weiss, the nation’s largest securities class-action firm, who have won a total of $45 billion since 1965 by keeping various paid plaintiffs who helped the lawyers rake in money by threatening investment companies with lawsuits because the stock of the company had lost money and subsequently cost “three serial plaintiffs who testified in 180 cases over 25 years, claiming to have been repeatedly defrauded.” For the complete sordid mess that Will describes, please see the article. Three other things:
1) the firm’s partners have given more than $7 million to democratic candidates since 1980;
2) Lerach was a fundraiser for democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards, and collected $64k for Edwards prior to pleading guilty to some of, (not exactly) these crimes: racketeering, obstruction of justice, perjury, bribery and fraud. And some people want to have all the proof in their hands before figuring that the political system is unjust, continuing to champion a democrat or a republican, and naively figuring that all I have written thus far is one massive non sequitur. Constituents, on behalf of politicians, have been doing things like this in politics since well before 1965, since Caesar, since people used stones to write upon stone.
3) if George Will, one of the nation’s foremost intellectuals on topics such as politics, economics, history, society, even baseball, finds this type of corruption noteworthy, more than hinting that the cooks are purposefully spoiling the meal, shouldn’t we reevaluate where we are as a voter come election time? Meaning, some dope writing a column, for no one in particular- is giving all the proof one possibly can in the form of articles, columns, stories, budgets, political committee papers, consumer activism reports, audits, etc., citing no fewer than three dozen secondary sources to this point.
The Burden of Proof: At least 40% of the country feels the way I do, the way a George Will type feels. So my argument is not of the ambiguous, ad hominem, ancillary, improbable variety. When Tom Cruise is arguing with Demi Moore about the burden of proving the relative innocence of two marines in “A Few Good Men” stating- “it doesn’t matter what I believe, it only matters what I can prove!” Don’t I know it. I believe that what someone believes when he’s trotted out this much ammunition matters, but still not as much as what he can prove. I have spent, to the disgust of the few who actually read them, two blogs (#s 1 and 2) showing how difficult it is to actually prove something undeniably, irrefutably and with finality- for the same person who believes in a virgin birth, doesn’t believe we actually landed on the moon in 1969.
republican case in point: I covered a number of examples in part 11 when I revealed the amount of money going to defense contractors, with less than stellar returns on that investment. But here is another prime example of the hypocritical nature of republican politicians:
president Bush vetoed 3 bills in six years when there was a republican-controlled congress, none of which were appropriations bills (those are the bills that appropriate money to various government programs). “Federal spending increased 23% after inflation from 2001 to 2006” while the republicans controlled congress—the appropriations bills he did not veto “included hikes for defense, homeland security, entitlements, education and thousands of special-interest items called ‘earmarks’ that are tacked onto spending bills at lawmakers’ requests.” (source: David Jackson’s USA Today August 2007 article- “Squaring off with dems, Bush Makes More Veto Threats.”) Now, I’d agree that the democrats like to spend our money, particularly on earmarks for their constituencies back home, for those are the people who helped get them elected, but is there any point in a republican denying that they like to spend our money too? Incidentally, “Bush or his advisers have threatened to veto nine of 12 appropriations bills approved in the house of representatives,” – a legislative body currently controlled by the democrats. That is the definition of partisan politics coming from the president who ran with more expressed interest in uniting the parties if elected as any presidential candidate in recent memory.
Very Short Memory: president Bush was rather dismissive when he vetoed a $1 billion spending bill passed by a democratic-controlled congress for the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services and Education, stating that “Congress is ‘acting like a teenager with a new credit card.’ ” (Source: Minneapolis Star Tribune’s “by the numbers” column, from November 18, 2007.) Ahhhhh, in 2005 Bush signed a spending bill passed by a then republican-controlled congress that amounted to $1.3 billion for the, you guessed it, Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services and Education . . . And you people keep voting for these hypocrites. I would rather approach an intemperate, paranoid starving cheetah, that has a history of bad experiences with English majors about the idea of donating money to aid an antelope self-awareness group than to vote for a candidate from either political party.
In fairness- another Deliverance: “Bush vetoed the first spending bill May 1, 2007, not because of spending levels but because the supplemental budget bill contained a timeline for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq. Democrats removed that provision, and Bush signed the bill.” (David Jackson, USA Today, see above) That is ridiculous- an appropriations bill with a troop withdrawal rider--even despite how much money some have projected the Iraq and Afghan wars (which is not a violent entanglement over who should be granted the use of a homemade blanket made of yarn this winter) will cost. These are the types of games being played by the politicians who continue to fool people into voting for them. Are we not tired of being treated like Ned Beaty, from a certain, uncomfortable-for-males-to-watch-movie from the 1970s, who is “held up” on an infrequently traveled river in the deep south. Getting a genocide bill through the legislature with a rider attached that allows geese to be hunted along strip malls using dental floss laced with contact lens solution is far more likely than getting our political representatives to effectively work together to save our being overtaxed and over- necessary-costed to death. I think of the conjoining of the biblical verse from Matthew 6:13, and the line from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar when I think of politicians: “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from [the] evil that men do . . .” For all kinds of politicians have led voters into the temptation of voting for them and then done nothing to reciprocate the supposed faith which compelled the voter to cast a vote for the hypocrite they elected.
Scientific/Political synthesis: I’m an English major, but have studied enough philosophy to be aware of a term that combines both the thesis, a theory that one contends is true (concerning this topic, mine was found in part 5 of this blog series) and its exact opposite, its antithesis. The synthesis is born out of the combination of the two and often represents the most clear thinking of the three, as it claims the most advantageous, fair, and reasonable elements of each, often with the benefit of hindsight. This process then forms a new thesis. This is a workable scientific and philosophic way to remove one person’s, group’s, or country’s prejudices and monopolizing ways of thinking, so that something better may come, via objectivity. The stubborn are not allowed to railroad the more reasonable members of a society by just doing it the way it has been done for hundreds of years. Isn’t it about time that the thesis of democratic thinking (which originated with Jefferson and Madison in 1792) and the antithesis of republican thinking (which originated in 1854 with Lincoln) welcomed the synthesis—which is a set of candidates who take the better aspects of both, such as they are, and dutifully follow through on commitments (albeit with the understanding that checks and balances moderate one’s ability to do so?) Consider it the buffet of politics, we actually vote for and elect people who share our views, or at least more of them than our elected officials share with us now. This a la carte approach when we run through the Old Country Buffet feed line/go to vote, ensures that we aren’t forced to use the feces-covered serving spoon that someone’s sweaty-assed, sumo-sized uncle just used after having used his index finger to dig buggers out of his nose before dishing up the metaphoric fruit salad that a dying, cataracts-inflicted doberman with scurvy wouldn’t touch. I didn't actually give you the the big words that would necessarily comprise America's traditional republican political thesis or the democratic antithesis, but if you pay any attention to the political climate, you know that for every republican/conservative political principle, the democrats/liberals have the antithesis to it that they prefer.
To that end: Elected officials pretend to care about a balanced budget; we call someone who equally balances his losses with his gains- even Steven; international trade is more healthy when we have a fairly even share of imports and exports--in terms of dollars and numbers; our athletic coaches desire a level playing field; we appreciate someone’s viewpoint when they “level” (ie. are fair) with us; coaches also advise their players not to get too high or too low after wins or losses; in football, an offensive coordinator usually attempts to call about as many running plays as passing plays to keep the offense balanced for a better chance of the team advancing down the field and to keep the defense off-balance; we are instructed by nutritionists to eat a well-balanced diet; many psychologists and psychiatrists have written of the slight differences in our genetic makeup having an affect on what sex we are physically and what kind of psychological makeup comprises our unconscious- (people hate it when I do this so I won’t even bring Jung’s anima and animus into the conversation); the housing market is considered healthy if there are just enough existing houses on the market- (flooding the market lowers the average selling price of a home and a dearth of available homes raises the price); the government controls the price of a jar of peanut butter, affecting it by as much as 70 cents per jar,** by limiting the number of peanut farmers allowed to grow peanuts; we use a programmable thermostat to set the average temperature of our house at various points in the day—attempting to balance how hot or cold we are willing to be with an eye on how much our relative comfort will cost us; one can bet on red or black on the roulette wheel, with those placing bets having a 50-50 chance of winning; the federal reserve adjusts interest rates on all kinds of things in order to balance the national economy, to encourage spending on things like cars and homes, by tinkering economically with bonds and farm commodities, by attempting to foresee economic factors that might cause inflation or recession, or in fact being the cause of them, whether purposefully, or unwittingly, (this is outside of my comfort zone to declare); in short, the old law of supply and demand, and the maintaining of balance in all walks of life makes sense in so many areas: athletics, commerce, health, psycho-social behavior, physical comfort, subconscious thought processes, gambling, and economics, among other things.
Time for assertions on behalf of the middle class: There is at least one area that I can think of where balancing one mode of thought, one viewpoint, and one set of parameters against its supposed opposite, with an interest in maintaining an equal footing in the universe for the appealing confluence of both . . . that is in the area of the "representation" by political candidates, for the benefit of the hunyucks who voted for them. Maintaining a slight majority for one party or another in the various state and federal branches of the government is often considered desirable. Maintaining a balance in the political realm is the dangerous exception to the thesis, the cliche- everything in moderation. Many thinking inside the box consider a fairly equal mix of dems and reps is advantageous to the public. It was George Orwell who wrote in Animal Farm: "all animals are equal, but some are more equal than others." Equality is not assured the middle class when neither political party represents us, excepting when they are pleading for our vote. The check on the power, determination and political monopoly of either by electing both to political offices is no fail-safe to freedom from excessive taxation- yeah . . . I already mentioned the wire-tapping and veto threats right? We have been led to a point in our political history—where each side (dems and reps) doesn’t so much monopolize the other, as that both sides plausibly deny they are working together to monopolize the middle.
Not the concluding conclusion: I’ve collected and dispensed enough, but not all, of the information necessary to begin to draw some conclusions. Detractors would claim that the portion of the argument I am beginning to bring to the forefront is pure speculation, is an ad hominem argument, a non sequitur, a logical fallacy. But the people that would combat all of the information I have provided about the way things are would not concede that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line or that if A=B and B=C, then A=C. Thinking of voting for a candidate other than one that has a chance to win is too revolutionary for them. Those voters don’t know that when they decide to vote for a candidate because the candidate has a chance to win, only the voter loses.
Barbaric Yawp: Apparently I am not the only one who has come to the conclusion that the federal government is failing the citizens, even the state governments over which it presides: The state of California is suing the federal government “to force a decision about whether the state can impose the nation’s first greenhouse gas emission standards for cars and light trucks. More than a dozen other states are poised to follow California’s lead.” A spokesman for the New Jersey attorney general said: “ ‘it’s time for [the] EPA [that’s Environmental Protection Agency] to either act or get out of the way.’ ” (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21691277/) The current administration is demonstrating a profound ability in the event of feet-dragging in the political Olympics. So, I am not one voice crying out in the wilderness for wholesale political change. In a recent editorial in the objectively-suspect Minneapolis Star Tribune, these words appear: “Calling a politician a hypocrite for behaving like a politician probably won’t raise many eyebrows.” So, we all know who is most to blame for our problems; I am not telling children that Santa Claus doesn’t exist, adults that their spouse has been cheating on them, a snake that he sucks at tying his own shoelaces or asking when the alligator is going to lose the baby weight because the blouse she thinks she looks looks good in makes her behind look as big as a crocodile's. People are writing articles, books, hosting talk shows and news programs that address the apathy, corruption, and general incompetence in Washington and its ancillary state governments because it is impossible to ignore. People already know about the general ineffectiveness of the politicians that assume the offices some of us elect them to. Politicians have a superiority complex, use the hint of executive privelege when they aren’t executives; politicians use the notion of diplomatic immunity from all sorts of crimes they have been convicted of in the court of public opinion. It is time for us to convict them of obstruction of justice, perjury, bribery and fraud, and time for them to serve their sentence by voting for a candidate who is not a republican or a democrat. It is time for the middle class, for the rich and poor have been and are quite catered to, to act on the sentiment expressed in the last section of Walt Whitman’s famous poem- “Song of Myself”:
I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable,
I sound my barbaric YAWP over the roofs of the world.
* - some may wonder why an English major would mistakenly leave words such as senator, president, governor, house of representatives, etc. uncapitalized when they appear preceding the proper noun, such as a person’s name who held or holds a particular office. That is no mistake. I don’t capitalize the word god because I don’t believe in the entity. So, President Lincoln, President Jefferson- to be sure, but President Bush or Senator Clinton . . . to quote Dana Carvey, who did an off the wall impersonation of the first president Bush- “not gonna do it . . . not gone do it.”
** - Cato Institute- http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-254.html (Cato Policy Analysis No. 254- May 15, 1996). I'll have a further comment on that next time.
Next Time: “You gotta fight, for your right . . . to paaaaaarty” . . . or not. And more, but I can’t predict what that might be at this time.
Primum non nocere: is Latin for “First, do no harm.” This phrase, known as the Hippocratic Oath, has been informally included in a physician’s pledge for a couple thousand years, and pertains to the ethical practice of medicine. If there is any way the medical field could be compelled to share this mantra, and the expected practice of the aforementioned mantra proper, with the politicians of the United States, the American people would be extremely grateful. I don’t hold out any hope that politicians will adopt this saying, but if they did, it could be referred to as the Hippocratic hypocritical oath--for no politician, feigning genuineness, could pull it off in this age of justified pessimism; they would alienate too many constituencies and businesses that bought them the victory on election night. People are becoming more and more jaded for plenty of good reasons.
Questionable involvement: Think of eminent domain, unaccountable tax increases, eleventh-hour presidential pardons, executive privilege, sex scandals in bathroom stalls, Watergate, Whitewater, BlackWater, corporate welfare and tax shelters, wire-tapping, and government waste—which are issues I have already accounted for, have alluded to, or will address, if you are looking for justification of why one person’s view of politicians would be so lousy. Consider the background of the real/provable corrupt republican and democratic incidents, such as those noted below and imagine the probable sordid history of hundreds of others just like them, throughout our country’s history or those still in the offing. A celebrity-stalking, cross-dressing muskrat with an unhealthy addiction to Flomax, and a strange appreciation for the way Robert Wagner pronounces the word “Darling,” would be a more trustworthy, less odd candidate if it were to hold a political office compared to some of the elected men and women who are passing laws and “representing” the American people.
democratic Case in point: Bill Lerach, former partner of Mel Weiss, was a Lincoln Bedroom guest in president* Bill Clinton’s White House. Courtesy of George F. Will of the Washington Post from November 18, 2007—“With Plaintiffs in the Pantry, Attorneys raked in Cash” http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/16/AR2007111601756.html?nav=hcmodule: “Shortly after Leach attended a White House dinner, Clinton vetoed legislation that would have restricted class-action lawsuits. Lerach gave $100,000 to Clinton’s presidential library.” Just how much does that back itch—that’s an awful lot of political back-scratching. Will goes on to write:
“Does political money flow toward beliefs or do beliefs move toward money? Much scholarship strongly suggests the former. Democrats are rewarded for their devotion to trial lawyers . . . The problem is not that Democrats are ‘bought’ by trial lawyers. The problem is that Democrats, who see victims everywhere, are actually disposed to believe the narrative of pandemic victimization of investors.”
The title of the column addresses the hubbub caused by trial lawyers from the law firm Milberg Weiss, the nation’s largest securities class-action firm, who have won a total of $45 billion since 1965 by keeping various paid plaintiffs who helped the lawyers rake in money by threatening investment companies with lawsuits because the stock of the company had lost money and subsequently cost “three serial plaintiffs who testified in 180 cases over 25 years, claiming to have been repeatedly defrauded.” For the complete sordid mess that Will describes, please see the article. Three other things:
1) the firm’s partners have given more than $7 million to democratic candidates since 1980;
2) Lerach was a fundraiser for democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards, and collected $64k for Edwards prior to pleading guilty to some of, (not exactly) these crimes: racketeering, obstruction of justice, perjury, bribery and fraud. And some people want to have all the proof in their hands before figuring that the political system is unjust, continuing to champion a democrat or a republican, and naively figuring that all I have written thus far is one massive non sequitur. Constituents, on behalf of politicians, have been doing things like this in politics since well before 1965, since Caesar, since people used stones to write upon stone.
3) if George Will, one of the nation’s foremost intellectuals on topics such as politics, economics, history, society, even baseball, finds this type of corruption noteworthy, more than hinting that the cooks are purposefully spoiling the meal, shouldn’t we reevaluate where we are as a voter come election time? Meaning, some dope writing a column, for no one in particular- is giving all the proof one possibly can in the form of articles, columns, stories, budgets, political committee papers, consumer activism reports, audits, etc., citing no fewer than three dozen secondary sources to this point.
The Burden of Proof: At least 40% of the country feels the way I do, the way a George Will type feels. So my argument is not of the ambiguous, ad hominem, ancillary, improbable variety. When Tom Cruise is arguing with Demi Moore about the burden of proving the relative innocence of two marines in “A Few Good Men” stating- “it doesn’t matter what I believe, it only matters what I can prove!” Don’t I know it. I believe that what someone believes when he’s trotted out this much ammunition matters, but still not as much as what he can prove. I have spent, to the disgust of the few who actually read them, two blogs (#s 1 and 2) showing how difficult it is to actually prove something undeniably, irrefutably and with finality- for the same person who believes in a virgin birth, doesn’t believe we actually landed on the moon in 1969.
republican case in point: I covered a number of examples in part 11 when I revealed the amount of money going to defense contractors, with less than stellar returns on that investment. But here is another prime example of the hypocritical nature of republican politicians:
president Bush vetoed 3 bills in six years when there was a republican-controlled congress, none of which were appropriations bills (those are the bills that appropriate money to various government programs). “Federal spending increased 23% after inflation from 2001 to 2006” while the republicans controlled congress—the appropriations bills he did not veto “included hikes for defense, homeland security, entitlements, education and thousands of special-interest items called ‘earmarks’ that are tacked onto spending bills at lawmakers’ requests.” (source: David Jackson’s USA Today August 2007 article- “Squaring off with dems, Bush Makes More Veto Threats.”) Now, I’d agree that the democrats like to spend our money, particularly on earmarks for their constituencies back home, for those are the people who helped get them elected, but is there any point in a republican denying that they like to spend our money too? Incidentally, “Bush or his advisers have threatened to veto nine of 12 appropriations bills approved in the house of representatives,” – a legislative body currently controlled by the democrats. That is the definition of partisan politics coming from the president who ran with more expressed interest in uniting the parties if elected as any presidential candidate in recent memory.
Very Short Memory: president Bush was rather dismissive when he vetoed a $1 billion spending bill passed by a democratic-controlled congress for the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services and Education, stating that “Congress is ‘acting like a teenager with a new credit card.’ ” (Source: Minneapolis Star Tribune’s “by the numbers” column, from November 18, 2007.) Ahhhhh, in 2005 Bush signed a spending bill passed by a then republican-controlled congress that amounted to $1.3 billion for the, you guessed it, Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services and Education . . . And you people keep voting for these hypocrites. I would rather approach an intemperate, paranoid starving cheetah, that has a history of bad experiences with English majors about the idea of donating money to aid an antelope self-awareness group than to vote for a candidate from either political party.
In fairness- another Deliverance: “Bush vetoed the first spending bill May 1, 2007, not because of spending levels but because the supplemental budget bill contained a timeline for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq. Democrats removed that provision, and Bush signed the bill.” (David Jackson, USA Today, see above) That is ridiculous- an appropriations bill with a troop withdrawal rider--even despite how much money some have projected the Iraq and Afghan wars (which is not a violent entanglement over who should be granted the use of a homemade blanket made of yarn this winter) will cost. These are the types of games being played by the politicians who continue to fool people into voting for them. Are we not tired of being treated like Ned Beaty, from a certain, uncomfortable-for-males-to-watch-movie from the 1970s, who is “held up” on an infrequently traveled river in the deep south. Getting a genocide bill through the legislature with a rider attached that allows geese to be hunted along strip malls using dental floss laced with contact lens solution is far more likely than getting our political representatives to effectively work together to save our being overtaxed and over- necessary-costed to death. I think of the conjoining of the biblical verse from Matthew 6:13, and the line from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar when I think of politicians: “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from [the] evil that men do . . .” For all kinds of politicians have led voters into the temptation of voting for them and then done nothing to reciprocate the supposed faith which compelled the voter to cast a vote for the hypocrite they elected.
Scientific/Political synthesis: I’m an English major, but have studied enough philosophy to be aware of a term that combines both the thesis, a theory that one contends is true (concerning this topic, mine was found in part 5 of this blog series) and its exact opposite, its antithesis. The synthesis is born out of the combination of the two and often represents the most clear thinking of the three, as it claims the most advantageous, fair, and reasonable elements of each, often with the benefit of hindsight. This process then forms a new thesis. This is a workable scientific and philosophic way to remove one person’s, group’s, or country’s prejudices and monopolizing ways of thinking, so that something better may come, via objectivity. The stubborn are not allowed to railroad the more reasonable members of a society by just doing it the way it has been done for hundreds of years. Isn’t it about time that the thesis of democratic thinking (which originated with Jefferson and Madison in 1792) and the antithesis of republican thinking (which originated in 1854 with Lincoln) welcomed the synthesis—which is a set of candidates who take the better aspects of both, such as they are, and dutifully follow through on commitments (albeit with the understanding that checks and balances moderate one’s ability to do so?) Consider it the buffet of politics, we actually vote for and elect people who share our views, or at least more of them than our elected officials share with us now. This a la carte approach when we run through the Old Country Buffet feed line/go to vote, ensures that we aren’t forced to use the feces-covered serving spoon that someone’s sweaty-assed, sumo-sized uncle just used after having used his index finger to dig buggers out of his nose before dishing up the metaphoric fruit salad that a dying, cataracts-inflicted doberman with scurvy wouldn’t touch. I didn't actually give you the the big words that would necessarily comprise America's traditional republican political thesis or the democratic antithesis, but if you pay any attention to the political climate, you know that for every republican/conservative political principle, the democrats/liberals have the antithesis to it that they prefer.
To that end: Elected officials pretend to care about a balanced budget; we call someone who equally balances his losses with his gains- even Steven; international trade is more healthy when we have a fairly even share of imports and exports--in terms of dollars and numbers; our athletic coaches desire a level playing field; we appreciate someone’s viewpoint when they “level” (ie. are fair) with us; coaches also advise their players not to get too high or too low after wins or losses; in football, an offensive coordinator usually attempts to call about as many running plays as passing plays to keep the offense balanced for a better chance of the team advancing down the field and to keep the defense off-balance; we are instructed by nutritionists to eat a well-balanced diet; many psychologists and psychiatrists have written of the slight differences in our genetic makeup having an affect on what sex we are physically and what kind of psychological makeup comprises our unconscious- (people hate it when I do this so I won’t even bring Jung’s anima and animus into the conversation); the housing market is considered healthy if there are just enough existing houses on the market- (flooding the market lowers the average selling price of a home and a dearth of available homes raises the price); the government controls the price of a jar of peanut butter, affecting it by as much as 70 cents per jar,** by limiting the number of peanut farmers allowed to grow peanuts; we use a programmable thermostat to set the average temperature of our house at various points in the day—attempting to balance how hot or cold we are willing to be with an eye on how much our relative comfort will cost us; one can bet on red or black on the roulette wheel, with those placing bets having a 50-50 chance of winning; the federal reserve adjusts interest rates on all kinds of things in order to balance the national economy, to encourage spending on things like cars and homes, by tinkering economically with bonds and farm commodities, by attempting to foresee economic factors that might cause inflation or recession, or in fact being the cause of them, whether purposefully, or unwittingly, (this is outside of my comfort zone to declare); in short, the old law of supply and demand, and the maintaining of balance in all walks of life makes sense in so many areas: athletics, commerce, health, psycho-social behavior, physical comfort, subconscious thought processes, gambling, and economics, among other things.
Time for assertions on behalf of the middle class: There is at least one area that I can think of where balancing one mode of thought, one viewpoint, and one set of parameters against its supposed opposite, with an interest in maintaining an equal footing in the universe for the appealing confluence of both . . . that is in the area of the "representation" by political candidates, for the benefit of the hunyucks who voted for them. Maintaining a slight majority for one party or another in the various state and federal branches of the government is often considered desirable. Maintaining a balance in the political realm is the dangerous exception to the thesis, the cliche- everything in moderation. Many thinking inside the box consider a fairly equal mix of dems and reps is advantageous to the public. It was George Orwell who wrote in Animal Farm: "all animals are equal, but some are more equal than others." Equality is not assured the middle class when neither political party represents us, excepting when they are pleading for our vote. The check on the power, determination and political monopoly of either by electing both to political offices is no fail-safe to freedom from excessive taxation- yeah . . . I already mentioned the wire-tapping and veto threats right? We have been led to a point in our political history—where each side (dems and reps) doesn’t so much monopolize the other, as that both sides plausibly deny they are working together to monopolize the middle.
Not the concluding conclusion: I’ve collected and dispensed enough, but not all, of the information necessary to begin to draw some conclusions. Detractors would claim that the portion of the argument I am beginning to bring to the forefront is pure speculation, is an ad hominem argument, a non sequitur, a logical fallacy. But the people that would combat all of the information I have provided about the way things are would not concede that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line or that if A=B and B=C, then A=C. Thinking of voting for a candidate other than one that has a chance to win is too revolutionary for them. Those voters don’t know that when they decide to vote for a candidate because the candidate has a chance to win, only the voter loses.
Barbaric Yawp: Apparently I am not the only one who has come to the conclusion that the federal government is failing the citizens, even the state governments over which it presides: The state of California is suing the federal government “to force a decision about whether the state can impose the nation’s first greenhouse gas emission standards for cars and light trucks. More than a dozen other states are poised to follow California’s lead.” A spokesman for the New Jersey attorney general said: “ ‘it’s time for [the] EPA [that’s Environmental Protection Agency] to either act or get out of the way.’ ” (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21691277/) The current administration is demonstrating a profound ability in the event of feet-dragging in the political Olympics. So, I am not one voice crying out in the wilderness for wholesale political change. In a recent editorial in the objectively-suspect Minneapolis Star Tribune, these words appear: “Calling a politician a hypocrite for behaving like a politician probably won’t raise many eyebrows.” So, we all know who is most to blame for our problems; I am not telling children that Santa Claus doesn’t exist, adults that their spouse has been cheating on them, a snake that he sucks at tying his own shoelaces or asking when the alligator is going to lose the baby weight because the blouse she thinks she looks looks good in makes her behind look as big as a crocodile's. People are writing articles, books, hosting talk shows and news programs that address the apathy, corruption, and general incompetence in Washington and its ancillary state governments because it is impossible to ignore. People already know about the general ineffectiveness of the politicians that assume the offices some of us elect them to. Politicians have a superiority complex, use the hint of executive privelege when they aren’t executives; politicians use the notion of diplomatic immunity from all sorts of crimes they have been convicted of in the court of public opinion. It is time for us to convict them of obstruction of justice, perjury, bribery and fraud, and time for them to serve their sentence by voting for a candidate who is not a republican or a democrat. It is time for the middle class, for the rich and poor have been and are quite catered to, to act on the sentiment expressed in the last section of Walt Whitman’s famous poem- “Song of Myself”:
I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable,
I sound my barbaric YAWP over the roofs of the world.
* - some may wonder why an English major would mistakenly leave words such as senator, president, governor, house of representatives, etc. uncapitalized when they appear preceding the proper noun, such as a person’s name who held or holds a particular office. That is no mistake. I don’t capitalize the word god because I don’t believe in the entity. So, President Lincoln, President Jefferson- to be sure, but President Bush or Senator Clinton . . . to quote Dana Carvey, who did an off the wall impersonation of the first president Bush- “not gonna do it . . . not gone do it.”
** - Cato Institute- http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-254.html (Cato Policy Analysis No. 254- May 15, 1996). I'll have a further comment on that next time.
Next Time: “You gotta fight, for your right . . . to paaaaaarty” . . . or not. And more, but I can’t predict what that might be at this time.
Friday, November 16, 2007
Middle Class Part 12: Lesser of two Evils and Consent of the Governed?
I’m a clairvoyant- so I know that if anyone reads this they will wonder what it has to do with the overall topic. I’m just putting a dot way out here . so I can connect it to others later on.
Since I began this blog topic in May with things we know that may or may not be true (ie. they are difficult to prove) here are a few more:
Smells Fishy: Recently, there was a report that stated that a pregnant woman who eats 12 ounces of fish a week may actually be helping to improve brain growth in fetuses, her own fetus, not some random stranger’s. Unfortunately, I read in an Elizabeth Weise USA Today column that “the group’s work was paid for in part by a $60,000 grant from the National Fisheries Institute.” (That darn rooster in the hen-house again?)
Drink up: Another study reported that a beer was better than water after a strenuous workout. Lazy husbands across the country currently enjoying the NFL this year collectively rejoiced at this news and made every lame joke in the book about how much effort it takes to walk from the recliner to the refrigerator. (FYI- no word yet on whether the Miller Brewing Company or Anheuser-Busch Companies had anything to do with this spectacular news.)
Amputee: Next, we’ll be told that the 2-year-old, formerly 8-limed Indian girl had some of the wrong appendages removed, that some of them were from a parasitic puma carcass with a severe co-dependency issue, and that she has, as an illegal alien, already been allowed the right to procure a driver’s license by any and all democratic presidential candidates except for Hillary Clinton. What’s that- now Hillary is willing to allow that? . . . Huh, now she’s not? . . . She is? . . . Not? . . . Is? Better get used to it- the primary elections are around the corner and we are about to see more waffling from political candidates than from a bus-load of porcine guys forsaking their Over-Eaters Anonymous pledges ordering the big breakfast at IHOP. Might as well take the next step and just refer to the candidates as- waffles.
No Strike: See, it is difficult to prove things. I thought I would remind the negative number of readers about that before continuing. I would also like to remind them that I will forego the writer’s strike and will go on producing largely unread blog columns, until someone pays me $60,000 to stop (see- Smells Fishy above). Altruistically, I cannot let the millions that I would be in line for from residual DVD sales affect my devotion to a cause that literally no one appreciates, except for those would watch Simon and Simon reruns on cable while they get over their bout of pneumonia.
Political Analogies: Ok, so we’ve established that the government and the business industry, to the detriment of the public,* continue to make the kinds of deals that the plunger and the toilet bowl scrubber would make in that dirty world behind the toilet if there were votes to swing, politicians to pay off, kickbacks to hand out, and “free” elections to bastardize. If you haven’t come to realize that fact because it hasn’t been as advertised as the “Bee Movie” then perhaps more digesting of second-hand msnbc articles borrowed from The New York Times and Associated Press is in order.
Political Analogies- the Sequel: Speaking of analogies and movies—my favorite scene from “Planes Trains and Automobiles” where John Candy is goofing around with the electronic seat adjuster, which is very amusing to the audience, only comforting to him, and only after he has found a position that is just good enough given his exhaustion. Candy’s antics are rather annoying to Steve Martin, particularly because once it is Martin’s turn to relax, while Candy drives, the seat is broken. That is how I see politics. We are uncomfortable, annoyed and tired. Someone, kind of, gets their way, in a potentially cozy position and then all hell breaks loose. Keep in mind, that scene ends with Candy driving the wrong way in the dark on a freeway heading right toward a semi-truck or two, and oh yeah, ends up setting the car on fire because his lit cigarette never makes it out of the window. Now, tell me that doesn’t sound like a perfect analogy for the nature of politics, and as I have demonstrated, I’m only just learning about it.
General Truth: Last time I nailed the government in terms of how much money they waste on the military. I am not advocating isolationism from a military or an economic perspective because there is too much money to make globally in a capitalistic society. But what sense does it make to be imperialists militarily if a good piece of the money we make economically is spent on wars we should want no part of, at least not anymore. The federal budget is weighted too much in one direction and another, which doesn’t satisfy anyone in the middle caught between the republicans and the democrats. Who is in the middle but a growing number of independents who are members of the middle class. Case in point: from, I don’t know, part 4 or 5 of this blog epic, I revealed that the two biggest recipients of federal money are the military (21%) and major social aid programs such as Medicare and Medicaid (28%). Well, generally, the biggest backers of an unreasonably strong military are republicans, and the biggest backers of a completely broken, corrupt and abused Medicare system are the democrats. I could trot out a number of Time or Newsweek articles and newspaper and internet columns that back this point and I may do so, but for now, trust me on this—it is very provable. The military annex of the federal government named its preliminary Iraqi offensive- “shock and awe.” At this point, since we are still there well over four years later, perhaps it should be renamed “awe shucks,” for it has had a Devin Hester opening kickoff of the Super Bowl returned for a touchdown kind of effect. The Colts still beat the Bears by 12 points.
Change: Problem is, while I’m convinced that the disgust and frustration is growing among people who may be naturally inclined to vote for an independent/populist type candidate, many of them in the political middle simply aren’t secure enough in the knowledge that they are probably going to have to “waste” their vote on political candidates for a party that doesn’t control the executive, legislative, or judicial parts of our government. To me, this is not a wasted or a protest vote. Someone I know voted against every incumbent in the last election because they wanted- change. However, political change in this country isn’t about voting in a democrat when we are dissatisfied with a republican. Change is- voting them both out. Unfortunately, short of a peaceful, well-organized, well-financed revolt, the only way to do it is through a decades long, systematic, impassioned voting strategy where all the people who complain about the way things are, actually do something about it. Besides, no revolt of the masses would ever happen- for two reasons:
1) the politicians, by letting in all the immigrants, are turning this country into one massive Tower of Babel. I decided to go with a biblical reference—Tower of Babel, see god makes everyone speak a different language in order to stop them from working together in their building of a very structurally unsound edifice that would reach into the heavens, allegorically anyway. My allusion is as much literal, as figurative, for Mexicans, Hmong, Haitians, and all the rest, are causing the unrest of the more naturalized citizens, because of their disregard for our country’s language, customs, and oh yeah, our laws (by coming here illegally, among other things). Hey, we have enough Americans breaking laws, we don't need ringers in the game of law-breaking. It is hard to be a unified populace if, to continue the Babel analogy, all groups want different social, economic, and political gains;
2) money. Ironically, the government is stripping this from everyone anyway with the heavy taxes it is imposing, so we wouldn't have enough money to finance a peaceful uprising, which begins with a vote.
Your Vote: Trust me; I would have earned at least a C in every political science class I took pass-fail since I swore off attempting to obtain my GED. Change is going to take: writing in Mickey Mouse, Harry Truman, Ralph Nader, “Not You” or simply voting for the independent, populist, or green party candidate whose name appears on the ballot and doing so en masse (that means everyone so inclined should go ahead and do so). One gubernatorial election will not be enough, and voting for Giuliani or Edwards and voting for an independent for your district’s state house of representative’s seat isn’t enough. This has to be a carte blanche (across the board) vote against the democrats and republicans and a vote for a la carte politics- taking the best aspects of both, such as they are. Just complaining isn’t enough anymore. Politicians should have to pay, by losing their jobs, for being more loyal to the resurrection of an antiquated, marginally appreciated historical site, toward which they throw a million dollars, than to the citizens they are supposed to dutifully represent? The governed certainly have not given their consent for congress or the president, or their state legislators to send $2.2 billion and $1.3 billion to Israel and Egypt respectively, while ignoring domestic issues such as pathetic emissions standards affecting the environment, street crimes, and any of a number of other economic issues that might cause a recession. We did not authorize them to allow corporations to skate as it pertains to how much tax they pay because the politician wants to secure the campaign finance support from those tax-protected businesses. No candidate should be in favor of allowing an illegal immigrant a driver’s license when the illegal shouldn’t even be in this country to begin with! We want an immigration bill—as Steve Martin from the same movie I reference above states in a scene where he was left stranded in a massive parking lot full of rental cars, except for the one he was supposed to have rented- “right f------ now!” We want one even if it isn’t the perfect law, because it is better than nothing. I look forward to the day when congress is equally populated with democrats, republicans and independents. I look forward to that day slightly more than I do to 3M window insulation weekend. And, I might be dead before I see it . . . never mind.
Evil Ways of the Election process: Voters in every election choose, or are fooled into voting, for the lesser of two evils. One candidate may appear more youthful and the other more experienced; one may feel a bit more touched by the pleading of a destitute farmer, and one less unnerved by a foreign threat. Or, we vote for them because we just like their smile. After all- “one may smile, and smile and be a villain.” –spoken by Shakespeare’s Hamlet. The difference between the two candidates in terms of quality (how effectively they might govern) is negligible (that is, there is little difference). If you feel differently, and are as narrow-minded as some people’s aunts, who have lived such stubbornly-sheltered lives they haven’t even realized it yet, and vote for political candidates based on their stance on abortion, then I pity you. One candidate may be deliberately evil in one way, and the other is over-sexed. Where one would give the rich tax breaks incommensurate with what is objectively just, the other would allow massive amounts of illegals into the country, and make the middle class foot the bill for their health care. Either way, to put it bluntly, the taxpayers are screwed, and not because we have chosen one candidate over the other, but because we have chosen either of them. The metaphorical fork in the road that leads in one direction to voting for a democrat and the other toward a republican, has a third way- voting for an independent because we can. Choosing this way means we start out on a bumpy dirt road in a jalopy, but ends in our voice being heard loud in clear.
Be Governed: One caveat here, the first response of a defender of the status quo, an opinion akin to apathy, or the political climate’s equivalent of religious agnosticism, is to blame the voters. The voters who are disgruntled by the amount of tax they are paying say and write such things as this line paraphrased from the Declaration of Independence- “this country is not run with the ‘consent of the governed.’ ” The contrarian-revisionists who oppose this stance say and write such things as- “well, you people who are complaining about what the government (presidents, legislators, congressman, governors, state representatives, even city council men and women) are the ones who voted for the people misspending your money- so it is your (the voter’s) fault.” Let me set something straight- the second group of people is speaking complete nonsense. How does a man who can barely keep his son from stealing mystery meat chunks and jarred green bean nuggets from his daughter’s tray decide this? Because it is a much easier task to determine who should be blamed for placing which politicians in office than to be determined to halt any food ownership disputes involving a toddler and an infant.
Opinion pages: I have read columnists and letters to the editor that espouse that view, that cite the fact that certain politicians are put into office because we voted for them. That is as much because the collective majority liked the other person the least, not because the winning candidate’s skill set was above reproach. One letter to the editor writer, shortly after the 35W bridge collapse, under the heading- “Voters must bear blame” came up with this quaint story about who is to blame for our current situation- “one of my teachers used to say that when we point the blame finger at others, three are still pointing at ourselves.” Are you kidding me! After how politicians misspend the money that they already have, we are to blame? The letter writer concludes: “It’s time that we all act more prudently when we elect (or reelect) politicians to office.” Do you think this sheep-man actually voted for anyone willing to upset the apple cart? I would have concluded the letter with Howard Beale’s famous line from the movie “Network” after he has implored that all of the viewers go to the window, open it, stick their heads out, and yell- “I’m as mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore!” Ah, irony- the Network bosses keep Beale on the air because his insane tirades are great for ratings- (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Beale). The ironic part, during one of his tirades “he exposes business links between the corporation that owns the network and Saudi Arabia,” which is where, in real life, America had received the majority of its oil supply until the late 1990’s. Now, is that life imitating art or art imitating life? One thing is for sure- that’s like the fox pedophiliac running the henhouse daycare . . . or something.
Time to pay: Let me assure you, I will not: “ ‘have the courage to say to the American people, ‘We are sending our soldiers, would you please help me pay for this?’ ” This was spoken by the democratic senator from North Dakota- (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21774226/.) If the senator from my state said this, do you think I would vote for them, if they were against abortion? I care about the soldiers but not to the tune of funding wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to the tune of $3.5 trillion through 2017, according to the same msnbc article referenced above. I would rather try “awe shucks” again and spare their lives by avoiding a futile protracted occupation in a country that has historically been a mess. An Associated Press article (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21766479) estimates that a middle class family of four can expect the wars to cost them $20,900. I don’t want to be an alarmist, but I have a family of four. This affects me. So, I am inclined to be concerned about it. I’m concerned about families, or individuals who are financially affected by an over-funded war. We may not have lost a son on a battlefield in a foreign country, such as Cindy Sheehan had, but we are losing all kinds of ground on the myriad of domestic issues we can’t focus on due to our continued “telescopic philanthropy,” to quote Charles Dickens. Telescopic philanthropy is our sometimes unnecessary involvment in entangling alliances or the proliferation of ego-centric foreign policies for reasons like oil. Domestic issues, such as immigration, health care reform, social security, taxation, campaign finance reform, big business kickbacks, necessary cost items price increases, and attending to defaulted mortgagees are much more worthy of resolutions. Domestic issues that should concern us should not be restricted to the mediation of cuisine brouhahas where one tries to keep his daughter’s more mobile brother from pilfering her banana puffs. There are far too many domestic issues on our plates, so to speak.
Don’t Worry = Be Happy?: I’m considered as being the gloom and doom, chicken little, glass is half empty guy, and am only considered as such by people who don’t know any better, who see their life as pretty darn good, but not perfect, as it is never going to be. I admitted in part 1 or 2, (hey, I am cross promoting my other blog entries on this topic) that my life is pretty darn good. Nevertheless, I began this whole expansive, apparently immortal blog harangue by clearly stating that I was concerned about the next generation and those after it. I would only be seeing the state of this country through rose-colored glasses if I were completely oblivious to economic trends (increasing prices of necessary cost items [parts 6-8] coupled with the amount of taxes we pay [still upcoming subtopic] ) or an egocentric, apathetic person who has never wondered why Americans preferred the German version of 99-Luft Balloons, (or just an egocentric, apathetic person.) I know people who are only concerned about how something affects them, and I know this because they told me: “unless something affects me, why would I worry about it?” Thing is—it does affect you, you just haven’t realized it yet, or you undervalue the futures of your middle class kids. So, not worrying about anyone but yourself is the way to go? I’m as against that as I am against shorter paragraphs, car accidents, snow still on the ground in April, coughing, and burying pet snakes in a marked grave in the back yard that died of the dreaded combination of acute gingivitis, brought on by fetal alcohol syndrome.
* See the USA today August 6, 2007 front page of the Life Section- “Science vs. Politics Gets Down and Dirty” article. Looks like there are issues with the FDA about “ignoring its science advisers and being influenced by political ideology,” that “the chief of staff for the White House Council on Environmental Quality, a former oil industry lawyer, had altered climate reports to soften scientific findings showing that fossil-fuel use and deforestation triggered global warming” and also that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service “reconsidered” an Endangered Species Act which made eight species less than endangered- “Questions have been raised about the integrity and legality of the decisions, which were overseen by a political appointee.” I wonder why they would do such a thing. They wouldn’t want to alarm any members of the public and have them connect the dots concerning what species’ natural habitat might be affected next, or possibly lose the financial support of major businesses, with the government’s allowance, that would be most responsible for the endangeradeness- (yeah, that’s not a word, but I went with it)- for as you can see, the government alters more than just the English language with its inner-workings.
Next Time: The nature of being well-balanced people, peanut farmers, Walt Whitman and Political synthesis.
Since I began this blog topic in May with things we know that may or may not be true (ie. they are difficult to prove) here are a few more:
Smells Fishy: Recently, there was a report that stated that a pregnant woman who eats 12 ounces of fish a week may actually be helping to improve brain growth in fetuses, her own fetus, not some random stranger’s. Unfortunately, I read in an Elizabeth Weise USA Today column that “the group’s work was paid for in part by a $60,000 grant from the National Fisheries Institute.” (That darn rooster in the hen-house again?)
Drink up: Another study reported that a beer was better than water after a strenuous workout. Lazy husbands across the country currently enjoying the NFL this year collectively rejoiced at this news and made every lame joke in the book about how much effort it takes to walk from the recliner to the refrigerator. (FYI- no word yet on whether the Miller Brewing Company or Anheuser-Busch Companies had anything to do with this spectacular news.)
Amputee: Next, we’ll be told that the 2-year-old, formerly 8-limed Indian girl had some of the wrong appendages removed, that some of them were from a parasitic puma carcass with a severe co-dependency issue, and that she has, as an illegal alien, already been allowed the right to procure a driver’s license by any and all democratic presidential candidates except for Hillary Clinton. What’s that- now Hillary is willing to allow that? . . . Huh, now she’s not? . . . She is? . . . Not? . . . Is? Better get used to it- the primary elections are around the corner and we are about to see more waffling from political candidates than from a bus-load of porcine guys forsaking their Over-Eaters Anonymous pledges ordering the big breakfast at IHOP. Might as well take the next step and just refer to the candidates as- waffles.
No Strike: See, it is difficult to prove things. I thought I would remind the negative number of readers about that before continuing. I would also like to remind them that I will forego the writer’s strike and will go on producing largely unread blog columns, until someone pays me $60,000 to stop (see- Smells Fishy above). Altruistically, I cannot let the millions that I would be in line for from residual DVD sales affect my devotion to a cause that literally no one appreciates, except for those would watch Simon and Simon reruns on cable while they get over their bout of pneumonia.
Political Analogies: Ok, so we’ve established that the government and the business industry, to the detriment of the public,* continue to make the kinds of deals that the plunger and the toilet bowl scrubber would make in that dirty world behind the toilet if there were votes to swing, politicians to pay off, kickbacks to hand out, and “free” elections to bastardize. If you haven’t come to realize that fact because it hasn’t been as advertised as the “Bee Movie” then perhaps more digesting of second-hand msnbc articles borrowed from The New York Times and Associated Press is in order.
Political Analogies- the Sequel: Speaking of analogies and movies—my favorite scene from “Planes Trains and Automobiles” where John Candy is goofing around with the electronic seat adjuster, which is very amusing to the audience, only comforting to him, and only after he has found a position that is just good enough given his exhaustion. Candy’s antics are rather annoying to Steve Martin, particularly because once it is Martin’s turn to relax, while Candy drives, the seat is broken. That is how I see politics. We are uncomfortable, annoyed and tired. Someone, kind of, gets their way, in a potentially cozy position and then all hell breaks loose. Keep in mind, that scene ends with Candy driving the wrong way in the dark on a freeway heading right toward a semi-truck or two, and oh yeah, ends up setting the car on fire because his lit cigarette never makes it out of the window. Now, tell me that doesn’t sound like a perfect analogy for the nature of politics, and as I have demonstrated, I’m only just learning about it.
General Truth: Last time I nailed the government in terms of how much money they waste on the military. I am not advocating isolationism from a military or an economic perspective because there is too much money to make globally in a capitalistic society. But what sense does it make to be imperialists militarily if a good piece of the money we make economically is spent on wars we should want no part of, at least not anymore. The federal budget is weighted too much in one direction and another, which doesn’t satisfy anyone in the middle caught between the republicans and the democrats. Who is in the middle but a growing number of independents who are members of the middle class. Case in point: from, I don’t know, part 4 or 5 of this blog epic, I revealed that the two biggest recipients of federal money are the military (21%) and major social aid programs such as Medicare and Medicaid (28%). Well, generally, the biggest backers of an unreasonably strong military are republicans, and the biggest backers of a completely broken, corrupt and abused Medicare system are the democrats. I could trot out a number of Time or Newsweek articles and newspaper and internet columns that back this point and I may do so, but for now, trust me on this—it is very provable. The military annex of the federal government named its preliminary Iraqi offensive- “shock and awe.” At this point, since we are still there well over four years later, perhaps it should be renamed “awe shucks,” for it has had a Devin Hester opening kickoff of the Super Bowl returned for a touchdown kind of effect. The Colts still beat the Bears by 12 points.
Change: Problem is, while I’m convinced that the disgust and frustration is growing among people who may be naturally inclined to vote for an independent/populist type candidate, many of them in the political middle simply aren’t secure enough in the knowledge that they are probably going to have to “waste” their vote on political candidates for a party that doesn’t control the executive, legislative, or judicial parts of our government. To me, this is not a wasted or a protest vote. Someone I know voted against every incumbent in the last election because they wanted- change. However, political change in this country isn’t about voting in a democrat when we are dissatisfied with a republican. Change is- voting them both out. Unfortunately, short of a peaceful, well-organized, well-financed revolt, the only way to do it is through a decades long, systematic, impassioned voting strategy where all the people who complain about the way things are, actually do something about it. Besides, no revolt of the masses would ever happen- for two reasons:
1) the politicians, by letting in all the immigrants, are turning this country into one massive Tower of Babel. I decided to go with a biblical reference—Tower of Babel, see god makes everyone speak a different language in order to stop them from working together in their building of a very structurally unsound edifice that would reach into the heavens, allegorically anyway. My allusion is as much literal, as figurative, for Mexicans, Hmong, Haitians, and all the rest, are causing the unrest of the more naturalized citizens, because of their disregard for our country’s language, customs, and oh yeah, our laws (by coming here illegally, among other things). Hey, we have enough Americans breaking laws, we don't need ringers in the game of law-breaking. It is hard to be a unified populace if, to continue the Babel analogy, all groups want different social, economic, and political gains;
2) money. Ironically, the government is stripping this from everyone anyway with the heavy taxes it is imposing, so we wouldn't have enough money to finance a peaceful uprising, which begins with a vote.
Your Vote: Trust me; I would have earned at least a C in every political science class I took pass-fail since I swore off attempting to obtain my GED. Change is going to take: writing in Mickey Mouse, Harry Truman, Ralph Nader, “Not You” or simply voting for the independent, populist, or green party candidate whose name appears on the ballot and doing so en masse (that means everyone so inclined should go ahead and do so). One gubernatorial election will not be enough, and voting for Giuliani or Edwards and voting for an independent for your district’s state house of representative’s seat isn’t enough. This has to be a carte blanche (across the board) vote against the democrats and republicans and a vote for a la carte politics- taking the best aspects of both, such as they are. Just complaining isn’t enough anymore. Politicians should have to pay, by losing their jobs, for being more loyal to the resurrection of an antiquated, marginally appreciated historical site, toward which they throw a million dollars, than to the citizens they are supposed to dutifully represent? The governed certainly have not given their consent for congress or the president, or their state legislators to send $2.2 billion and $1.3 billion to Israel and Egypt respectively, while ignoring domestic issues such as pathetic emissions standards affecting the environment, street crimes, and any of a number of other economic issues that might cause a recession. We did not authorize them to allow corporations to skate as it pertains to how much tax they pay because the politician wants to secure the campaign finance support from those tax-protected businesses. No candidate should be in favor of allowing an illegal immigrant a driver’s license when the illegal shouldn’t even be in this country to begin with! We want an immigration bill—as Steve Martin from the same movie I reference above states in a scene where he was left stranded in a massive parking lot full of rental cars, except for the one he was supposed to have rented- “right f------ now!” We want one even if it isn’t the perfect law, because it is better than nothing. I look forward to the day when congress is equally populated with democrats, republicans and independents. I look forward to that day slightly more than I do to 3M window insulation weekend. And, I might be dead before I see it . . . never mind.
Evil Ways of the Election process: Voters in every election choose, or are fooled into voting, for the lesser of two evils. One candidate may appear more youthful and the other more experienced; one may feel a bit more touched by the pleading of a destitute farmer, and one less unnerved by a foreign threat. Or, we vote for them because we just like their smile. After all- “one may smile, and smile and be a villain.” –spoken by Shakespeare’s Hamlet. The difference between the two candidates in terms of quality (how effectively they might govern) is negligible (that is, there is little difference). If you feel differently, and are as narrow-minded as some people’s aunts, who have lived such stubbornly-sheltered lives they haven’t even realized it yet, and vote for political candidates based on their stance on abortion, then I pity you. One candidate may be deliberately evil in one way, and the other is over-sexed. Where one would give the rich tax breaks incommensurate with what is objectively just, the other would allow massive amounts of illegals into the country, and make the middle class foot the bill for their health care. Either way, to put it bluntly, the taxpayers are screwed, and not because we have chosen one candidate over the other, but because we have chosen either of them. The metaphorical fork in the road that leads in one direction to voting for a democrat and the other toward a republican, has a third way- voting for an independent because we can. Choosing this way means we start out on a bumpy dirt road in a jalopy, but ends in our voice being heard loud in clear.
Be Governed: One caveat here, the first response of a defender of the status quo, an opinion akin to apathy, or the political climate’s equivalent of religious agnosticism, is to blame the voters. The voters who are disgruntled by the amount of tax they are paying say and write such things as this line paraphrased from the Declaration of Independence- “this country is not run with the ‘consent of the governed.’ ” The contrarian-revisionists who oppose this stance say and write such things as- “well, you people who are complaining about what the government (presidents, legislators, congressman, governors, state representatives, even city council men and women) are the ones who voted for the people misspending your money- so it is your (the voter’s) fault.” Let me set something straight- the second group of people is speaking complete nonsense. How does a man who can barely keep his son from stealing mystery meat chunks and jarred green bean nuggets from his daughter’s tray decide this? Because it is a much easier task to determine who should be blamed for placing which politicians in office than to be determined to halt any food ownership disputes involving a toddler and an infant.
Opinion pages: I have read columnists and letters to the editor that espouse that view, that cite the fact that certain politicians are put into office because we voted for them. That is as much because the collective majority liked the other person the least, not because the winning candidate’s skill set was above reproach. One letter to the editor writer, shortly after the 35W bridge collapse, under the heading- “Voters must bear blame” came up with this quaint story about who is to blame for our current situation- “one of my teachers used to say that when we point the blame finger at others, three are still pointing at ourselves.” Are you kidding me! After how politicians misspend the money that they already have, we are to blame? The letter writer concludes: “It’s time that we all act more prudently when we elect (or reelect) politicians to office.” Do you think this sheep-man actually voted for anyone willing to upset the apple cart? I would have concluded the letter with Howard Beale’s famous line from the movie “Network” after he has implored that all of the viewers go to the window, open it, stick their heads out, and yell- “I’m as mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore!” Ah, irony- the Network bosses keep Beale on the air because his insane tirades are great for ratings- (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Beale). The ironic part, during one of his tirades “he exposes business links between the corporation that owns the network and Saudi Arabia,” which is where, in real life, America had received the majority of its oil supply until the late 1990’s. Now, is that life imitating art or art imitating life? One thing is for sure- that’s like the fox pedophiliac running the henhouse daycare . . . or something.
Time to pay: Let me assure you, I will not: “ ‘have the courage to say to the American people, ‘We are sending our soldiers, would you please help me pay for this?’ ” This was spoken by the democratic senator from North Dakota- (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21774226/.) If the senator from my state said this, do you think I would vote for them, if they were against abortion? I care about the soldiers but not to the tune of funding wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to the tune of $3.5 trillion through 2017, according to the same msnbc article referenced above. I would rather try “awe shucks” again and spare their lives by avoiding a futile protracted occupation in a country that has historically been a mess. An Associated Press article (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21766479) estimates that a middle class family of four can expect the wars to cost them $20,900. I don’t want to be an alarmist, but I have a family of four. This affects me. So, I am inclined to be concerned about it. I’m concerned about families, or individuals who are financially affected by an over-funded war. We may not have lost a son on a battlefield in a foreign country, such as Cindy Sheehan had, but we are losing all kinds of ground on the myriad of domestic issues we can’t focus on due to our continued “telescopic philanthropy,” to quote Charles Dickens. Telescopic philanthropy is our sometimes unnecessary involvment in entangling alliances or the proliferation of ego-centric foreign policies for reasons like oil. Domestic issues, such as immigration, health care reform, social security, taxation, campaign finance reform, big business kickbacks, necessary cost items price increases, and attending to defaulted mortgagees are much more worthy of resolutions. Domestic issues that should concern us should not be restricted to the mediation of cuisine brouhahas where one tries to keep his daughter’s more mobile brother from pilfering her banana puffs. There are far too many domestic issues on our plates, so to speak.
Don’t Worry = Be Happy?: I’m considered as being the gloom and doom, chicken little, glass is half empty guy, and am only considered as such by people who don’t know any better, who see their life as pretty darn good, but not perfect, as it is never going to be. I admitted in part 1 or 2, (hey, I am cross promoting my other blog entries on this topic) that my life is pretty darn good. Nevertheless, I began this whole expansive, apparently immortal blog harangue by clearly stating that I was concerned about the next generation and those after it. I would only be seeing the state of this country through rose-colored glasses if I were completely oblivious to economic trends (increasing prices of necessary cost items [parts 6-8] coupled with the amount of taxes we pay [still upcoming subtopic] ) or an egocentric, apathetic person who has never wondered why Americans preferred the German version of 99-Luft Balloons, (or just an egocentric, apathetic person.) I know people who are only concerned about how something affects them, and I know this because they told me: “unless something affects me, why would I worry about it?” Thing is—it does affect you, you just haven’t realized it yet, or you undervalue the futures of your middle class kids. So, not worrying about anyone but yourself is the way to go? I’m as against that as I am against shorter paragraphs, car accidents, snow still on the ground in April, coughing, and burying pet snakes in a marked grave in the back yard that died of the dreaded combination of acute gingivitis, brought on by fetal alcohol syndrome.
* See the USA today August 6, 2007 front page of the Life Section- “Science vs. Politics Gets Down and Dirty” article. Looks like there are issues with the FDA about “ignoring its science advisers and being influenced by political ideology,” that “the chief of staff for the White House Council on Environmental Quality, a former oil industry lawyer, had altered climate reports to soften scientific findings showing that fossil-fuel use and deforestation triggered global warming” and also that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service “reconsidered” an Endangered Species Act which made eight species less than endangered- “Questions have been raised about the integrity and legality of the decisions, which were overseen by a political appointee.” I wonder why they would do such a thing. They wouldn’t want to alarm any members of the public and have them connect the dots concerning what species’ natural habitat might be affected next, or possibly lose the financial support of major businesses, with the government’s allowance, that would be most responsible for the endangeradeness- (yeah, that’s not a word, but I went with it)- for as you can see, the government alters more than just the English language with its inner-workings.
Next Time: The nature of being well-balanced people, peanut farmers, Walt Whitman and Political synthesis.
Friday, October 26, 2007
Middle Class Part 11: Corporate CEO Pay and Tax Shelters continued
“The length of this document defends it well against the risk of its being read.” – Winston Churchill
More on Corporate CEO salaries from Michael Brush- see http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/investing/companyfocus/isaceoworth364timestheaveragejoe.aspx
1) “Top executives at Fortune 500 companies averaged $10.8 million in total compensation in 2006. The average worker . . . made $16.76 an hour, which worked out to $29,544 for the year. Those numbers are from a report called ‘Executive Excess 2007: The Staggering Social Cost of U.S. Business Leadership.’ ” Further, “CEO pay in the U.S. has grown to become 364 times the average worker’s pay. It was just 40 times the average pay in 1980. It’s hard to imagine that top leadership skills have grown much scarcer in the past 37 years.”
2) The minimum wage was increased from $5.15 to $5.85—“the first increase in the federal minimum wage in 10 years. But the minimum wage is still 7% below where it was 10 years ago, adjusted for inflation. Meanwhile, CEO pay has gone up 45%, adjusted for inflation, according to the ‘Executive Excess 2007’ report.’ ”
3) Milton Friedman wrote in “Capitalism and Freedom” that the raising of the minimum wage may actually have the effect of putting people out of work because it raises the controllable costs, which is employee salaries. If the cost of paying any number of employees is raised, and a business has to continue to justify keeping a certain number of employees employed, it will raise prices on consumer goods and services. So, an increase in the minimum wage has an adverse affect on those it is most meant to help. A car of marginal quality would perhaps cost $500 more after an across the board wage hike, which is an increase someone making over $100k can afford, but someone making less than $50k may not be able to. Keep in mind, if the minimum wage goes up 70 cents, it is more likely that other salaries will go up, so that certain job markets can remain competitive. This affects all businesses, not just McDonald's who now has to pay a burger flipper 70 cents more. A factory worker now must be paid 50 cents more per hour, and so on, because, that particular business wants to retain their services, while now being able to justify letting a slightly less productive worker go because of the increased wage-scale across the board, not just because of a minimum wage increase. Hm, I wonder if certain types of politicians might want illegal immigration to continue, thus voting against any type of immigration bill because the illegals will work for lower wages, which keeps corporation/business profits high. See below for why I would think this. Yet another connection between sub-topics- no wonder this blog diatribe is so friggin' long. Raising a wage 70 cents in 10 years is the best that can be done? Milton was against raising the minimum wage, (which I agree with), against taxing corporations for reasons I'll get to eventually, and against the graduated income tax. If I could channel Friedman's spirit, perhaps it would have a better idea of how to collect money to run the government, even if it were restricted to just the apects that he approved of, than he did while he was alive. Conservatives- that is your economic deity? Wow.
4) CEOs at Fortune 500 companies “retire with an average of $10.1 million in their supplemental executive retirement plans . . . In contrast, only 36% of American households headed by someone over 65 even had a retirement account in 2004—and those that did had an average value of $173,552, according to the Congressional Research Service.” (I see this getting worse in the future as the taxes and necessary cost item prices [particularly health care, the most necessary of the necessary costs for the elderly] continue to rise. Connecting the dots- the money we could be saving for retirement, in order to pay for the increased cost of health care, is being stripped from us by excessive taxation and spent on wasteful government programs I already have addressed, or will address. I knew conservatives would need help seeing my point, so I thought I would help out. Incidentally, two dots connected looks nothing like this: ÷ . That’s the symbol middle class people use to represent into how many different ways the net money on their pay check must be divided.)
5) Why is this all so noteworthy you say- this is the essence of capitalism you say. These CEOs have rare talents, but not as rare as you think. “U.S. executives make three times as much as their European counterparts, even though these European bosses manage companies that are 40% bigger . . . Yet, presumably, companies on both continents draw from similar talent pools in terms of education, work experience and cultural background. It that’s true, it’s hard to accept the notion that rich pay in the U.S. is the result of scarcity of talent.” (People espousing the idea that all the stars are aligned and all is right with the world because there is inequity, and continue to believe that talented people are justly rewarded, even if they don’t display any talent, should change the way the furniture is arranged in their living room every once in awhile, which would be an activity that would display their ability, but perhaps at most their interest, in obtaining a different perspective. These are the types of people that would have been keen on serfdom, justifying everything their king says because he instituted a clean food mandate that guaranteed that 20% of the rat excrement must be removed from their bread pudding prior to distribution of this food-stuff to the masses.)
6) “Exorbitant pay packages are often awarded by board compensation committees that are too cozy with CEOs” . . . that “fail to link pay to performance” . . . [and] are the result of “consulting firms that advise companies on CEO pay. The problem is they have an incentive to recommend rich pay packages—because they also get paid for doing other consulting jobs for the same company.” (See #12 below) (The proliferation of nepotism granted by the father of an adopted badger who votes to give the albino squirrel more nuts, at the expense of hard-working foraging squirrels, is preposterous and must stop! Yeah, I was tired of the pedophile running the daycare analogy. The conservatives would put this issue in a vacuum and say: “so someone is being paid more than he or she is worth, that happens all the time, so what is the big deal.” Well, couple that salary, that comes out of the pockets of middle class workers and combine it with corporate tax loopholes/shelters (see #7), which means that more tax must be collected from the rich and poor workers at graduated levels, and there is your problem.)
7) “Tax loopholes let companies deduct as much executive pay as they want, as long as the compensation is defined as a performance incentive.” (Paying a CEO the type of money they are paid is like rewarding an elephant whose job it is to go up on the high wire, but whose weight when standing on the wire, brings the wire down to ground level. See, there is no risk if a CEO under performs, when neither the inner-workings of private business nor the government [via the tax loopholes for the companies paying the exorbitant CEO salaries] don’t hold them accountable. The reason they aren’t held accountable is because they are in bed together- and they are cheating on us! Yeah, we’re getting screwed, and our children will be the offspring of that fiscal illegitimacy.)
8) There are governmental reform proposals “to tax the earnings of the top [executives] at private-equity shops and hedge funds as ordinary income instead of distributed capital gains . . . The loophole costs the federal government about $12.6 billion a year, says the Economic Policy Institute.” (Ah, so there is a connection between government waste and these disgusting details about how the government has been protecting private business. Guess I lucked out on that one- finding a connection that is. Go look up “hedge fund” on Google and read the wikipedia offering. I don’t quite understand all of that hedge fund stuff, but I’m sure the government is right in not taxing those managers more and passing a tax rate incommensurate with middle class wage-earnings onto the private citizen earning $15 an hour. When Homer Simpson is likely to be more diligent in his promise to god to give up doughnuts for lent than the government is at recognizing its own failures, or those of enterprises it allows for, we’re in trouble.)
9) “Another proposal seeks to limit the amount of income [executives] can roll into their retirement plans, where the money grows tax free. Rank-and-file workers face limits, but top [executives] do not.” (Helloooooo, Securities and Exchange Commission . . . are you there? Or are you turning in that application for the events coordinator opening at New Horizon (daycare)?
10) The proposals in 7-9 above are the brain-children of democrats. Shocking. Good work democrats, but now go look into your policies on immigration, health care, and welfare before getting too self-righteous. Oh, and see this Cato Institute article about the revered Bill Clinton and Congress: “Policy Analysis—How Corporate Welfare Won: Clinton and Congress Retreat from Cutting Business Subsidies” (from May 15, 1996) – http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-254.html. Said report goes on to relate that “the president’s vetoes of the GOP budgets specifically targeted corporate welfare cuts as being too deep.” (Meaning, Clinton rescued the corporations from losing funding when Congress had meant to reduce corporate welfare. On the flip side- “Of the $19.5 billion budgeted from the 35 least defensible programs, Congress cut just $2.8 billion in 1996. That was 15 percent cut from the 1995 level. Eighty-five percent of corporate welfare spending survived.” It is important to keep in mind that the Congress at that time was held by a republican majority. If corporations weren’t rescued by the president, they were bailed out by Congress.)
11) Some corporations need and deserve subsidies and each side does a poor job attempting to justify what that type of corporation might be: “the military continues to purchase weapons systems, not because they are needed for national security, but because the spending ‘creates jobs’ or helps a firm back in a representative’s district.” (That quote was from the Cato Policy Analysis No. 254, linked above from 1996; well, it is 11 years later, the democrats now control Congress and a republican is in the white house and we have this: “The State Department ‘does not know specifically what it received for most of the $1.2 billion in expenditures under its DynCorp contract for the Iraqi Police Training Program.” (from Aram Roston’s article which can be found at- http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21428395). You might wonder why I would leak the topic back into government waste within the subtopic confines of CEO salaries and corporate tax shelters. The military the quite probably the biggest corporation we have, especially if the federal budget numbers I included in part 5 are any indication? In the wake of the BlackWater information, (see #12 below) shouldn’t we be concerned that the soldiers in our military have useful, necessary weaponry and that the money that is earmarked in the budget for military spending isn’t lost track of as in the DynCorp matter? We’re due to spend $2.4 trillion on wars projected over the next decade according to an NBC News and Associated Press report-http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21456930.
12) BlackWater is a military company that has been awarded a series of “no-bid contracts,” which means that they do not need to bid against any other companies in order to obtain the rights to have the government as the customer. To be fair, perhaps there aren’t any other companies equipped to take on such a task- given conflict risks and the overall scope of the job. Courtesy of the Wikipedia “Blackwater” offering: “The cost for each Blackwater guard in Iraq . . . [is] $445k a year . . . the company has received over one billion dollars in government contracts.” Is there some kind of frequent buyer discount the government could use to save some money? When I go to Fantastic Sams to get the hairstyle refreshed, (and I might just as effectively use my Yard Machine lawnmower) I am rewarded, after buying 12 haircuts, with a free haircut. Also interesting is that Blackwater’s owner and founder is a guy named Erik Prince who “was an intern in George H.W. Bush’s White House . . . and is a financial supporter of Republican party causes and candidates.” Hmmmmmm- that sounds like the government and a corporation are in bed together to me. This seems no different than the CEOs collecting huge salaries and incentives granted by board members at the expense of the workers for those companies, and probably the American people who are paying CEO salaries by consuming their goods and paying for that company’s services (flying on their airlines, buying 2 x 4s from their home improvement store, etc.)
One more thing on Blackwater and DynCorp. Blackwater- “it is estimated by the Pentagon and company representatives that there are 20 to 30 thousand armed security contractors working in Iraq, and some estimates are as much as 100,000, though no official figures exist.” When we’re paying $445,000 a year per contracted guard (#12 above), ah, maybe we ought to get an estimate that closes the gap by more than 70 thousand guards. DynCorp was paid $1.2 billion (#11 above) for its contract with the government, and spent $4.2 million of that on “ ‘unauthorized work’ –that is, on projects that were not approved by the State Department,” including the construction of “a U.S. taxpayer-funded Olympic-sized swimming pool” in Iraq.
13) The "State Department," and "federal watchdogs": These phrases are used in a number of the articles I’ve perused while doing the research. They seem as inept as the government they are investigating, given the number of government waste projects I’ve identified and the amount of money lost to those projects. See, I’d just as soon employ a pro-active, engaged, non-governmental sponsored entity before the end of time so that our children and their children aren’t held hostage by the conniving, irresponsible ways of federal and state governments. Does all the proof need to be in to do something? Can we start to vote for candidates more aligned with our political, social, and economic principles now or should we wait until we are ushered back to some Hoover-ville environment by the two major parties, due to their excessive greed, oversight, and fiscal mismanagement that I have PROVEN? Or do you like working until mid April or early May, (depending on what state you reside in), to see your money flushed down the drain by the government who has conditioned us to feel they are entitled to it?
14) “Consultants expect CEOs to cite the fat paychecks of hedge fund managers and the kings of Wall Street to argue for even more lucrative packages . . . The Securities and Exchange Commission required companies starting this year [2007] to more completely disclose what they’re paying their top executives. But the SEC’s approach has been criticized for failing to provide useful figures for investors.” http://www.msnbc.com/id/19079624. (It is 2007, it took this government 230 years to check into corporate/business handouts? A tubercular, drunken hedgehog (ahem) would move through a cold vat of molasses the size of the universe more quickly.)
15) I encourage the reading of the Cato Policy Analysis report I link above. There really are more facts and figures than I have the space to include contained therein about the excess of government sugar-daddied corporate welfare. I really like the information about kick-backs to companies like Mars, Pepsi, Tyson Foods and Dole to the tune of $85.5 million for foreign advertising. In one case- there was a $125k outlay to promote frozen bovine semen (hopefully that is not an unmentionalbe ingredient in my beloved Mt. Dew). Huh, and even I thought all of those animal analogies I’ve been using were insignificant and distracting.
Note: This footnote (no. 17) appears at the end of the Cato Policy Analysis report: a Harvard economist “estimates that every additional dollar of federal spending costs the economy between 30 and 40 cents of efficiency lost from the taxes required to fund the spending . . . every additional dollar of spending would need to lead to at least $1.30 of public benefit to be an efficient transfer of resources.” Any chance that a significant portion of federal spending would lead to the public benefiting?
Next Time: Voting for the lesser of two evils and consent of the governed.
More on Corporate CEO salaries from Michael Brush- see http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/investing/companyfocus/isaceoworth364timestheaveragejoe.aspx
1) “Top executives at Fortune 500 companies averaged $10.8 million in total compensation in 2006. The average worker . . . made $16.76 an hour, which worked out to $29,544 for the year. Those numbers are from a report called ‘Executive Excess 2007: The Staggering Social Cost of U.S. Business Leadership.’ ” Further, “CEO pay in the U.S. has grown to become 364 times the average worker’s pay. It was just 40 times the average pay in 1980. It’s hard to imagine that top leadership skills have grown much scarcer in the past 37 years.”
2) The minimum wage was increased from $5.15 to $5.85—“the first increase in the federal minimum wage in 10 years. But the minimum wage is still 7% below where it was 10 years ago, adjusted for inflation. Meanwhile, CEO pay has gone up 45%, adjusted for inflation, according to the ‘Executive Excess 2007’ report.’ ”
3) Milton Friedman wrote in “Capitalism and Freedom” that the raising of the minimum wage may actually have the effect of putting people out of work because it raises the controllable costs, which is employee salaries. If the cost of paying any number of employees is raised, and a business has to continue to justify keeping a certain number of employees employed, it will raise prices on consumer goods and services. So, an increase in the minimum wage has an adverse affect on those it is most meant to help. A car of marginal quality would perhaps cost $500 more after an across the board wage hike, which is an increase someone making over $100k can afford, but someone making less than $50k may not be able to. Keep in mind, if the minimum wage goes up 70 cents, it is more likely that other salaries will go up, so that certain job markets can remain competitive. This affects all businesses, not just McDonald's who now has to pay a burger flipper 70 cents more. A factory worker now must be paid 50 cents more per hour, and so on, because, that particular business wants to retain their services, while now being able to justify letting a slightly less productive worker go because of the increased wage-scale across the board, not just because of a minimum wage increase. Hm, I wonder if certain types of politicians might want illegal immigration to continue, thus voting against any type of immigration bill because the illegals will work for lower wages, which keeps corporation/business profits high. See below for why I would think this. Yet another connection between sub-topics- no wonder this blog diatribe is so friggin' long. Raising a wage 70 cents in 10 years is the best that can be done? Milton was against raising the minimum wage, (which I agree with), against taxing corporations for reasons I'll get to eventually, and against the graduated income tax. If I could channel Friedman's spirit, perhaps it would have a better idea of how to collect money to run the government, even if it were restricted to just the apects that he approved of, than he did while he was alive. Conservatives- that is your economic deity? Wow.
4) CEOs at Fortune 500 companies “retire with an average of $10.1 million in their supplemental executive retirement plans . . . In contrast, only 36% of American households headed by someone over 65 even had a retirement account in 2004—and those that did had an average value of $173,552, according to the Congressional Research Service.” (I see this getting worse in the future as the taxes and necessary cost item prices [particularly health care, the most necessary of the necessary costs for the elderly] continue to rise. Connecting the dots- the money we could be saving for retirement, in order to pay for the increased cost of health care, is being stripped from us by excessive taxation and spent on wasteful government programs I already have addressed, or will address. I knew conservatives would need help seeing my point, so I thought I would help out. Incidentally, two dots connected looks nothing like this: ÷ . That’s the symbol middle class people use to represent into how many different ways the net money on their pay check must be divided.)
5) Why is this all so noteworthy you say- this is the essence of capitalism you say. These CEOs have rare talents, but not as rare as you think. “U.S. executives make three times as much as their European counterparts, even though these European bosses manage companies that are 40% bigger . . . Yet, presumably, companies on both continents draw from similar talent pools in terms of education, work experience and cultural background. It that’s true, it’s hard to accept the notion that rich pay in the U.S. is the result of scarcity of talent.” (People espousing the idea that all the stars are aligned and all is right with the world because there is inequity, and continue to believe that talented people are justly rewarded, even if they don’t display any talent, should change the way the furniture is arranged in their living room every once in awhile, which would be an activity that would display their ability, but perhaps at most their interest, in obtaining a different perspective. These are the types of people that would have been keen on serfdom, justifying everything their king says because he instituted a clean food mandate that guaranteed that 20% of the rat excrement must be removed from their bread pudding prior to distribution of this food-stuff to the masses.)
6) “Exorbitant pay packages are often awarded by board compensation committees that are too cozy with CEOs” . . . that “fail to link pay to performance” . . . [and] are the result of “consulting firms that advise companies on CEO pay. The problem is they have an incentive to recommend rich pay packages—because they also get paid for doing other consulting jobs for the same company.” (See #12 below) (The proliferation of nepotism granted by the father of an adopted badger who votes to give the albino squirrel more nuts, at the expense of hard-working foraging squirrels, is preposterous and must stop! Yeah, I was tired of the pedophile running the daycare analogy. The conservatives would put this issue in a vacuum and say: “so someone is being paid more than he or she is worth, that happens all the time, so what is the big deal.” Well, couple that salary, that comes out of the pockets of middle class workers and combine it with corporate tax loopholes/shelters (see #7), which means that more tax must be collected from the rich and poor workers at graduated levels, and there is your problem.)
7) “Tax loopholes let companies deduct as much executive pay as they want, as long as the compensation is defined as a performance incentive.” (Paying a CEO the type of money they are paid is like rewarding an elephant whose job it is to go up on the high wire, but whose weight when standing on the wire, brings the wire down to ground level. See, there is no risk if a CEO under performs, when neither the inner-workings of private business nor the government [via the tax loopholes for the companies paying the exorbitant CEO salaries] don’t hold them accountable. The reason they aren’t held accountable is because they are in bed together- and they are cheating on us! Yeah, we’re getting screwed, and our children will be the offspring of that fiscal illegitimacy.)
8) There are governmental reform proposals “to tax the earnings of the top [executives] at private-equity shops and hedge funds as ordinary income instead of distributed capital gains . . . The loophole costs the federal government about $12.6 billion a year, says the Economic Policy Institute.” (Ah, so there is a connection between government waste and these disgusting details about how the government has been protecting private business. Guess I lucked out on that one- finding a connection that is. Go look up “hedge fund” on Google and read the wikipedia offering. I don’t quite understand all of that hedge fund stuff, but I’m sure the government is right in not taxing those managers more and passing a tax rate incommensurate with middle class wage-earnings onto the private citizen earning $15 an hour. When Homer Simpson is likely to be more diligent in his promise to god to give up doughnuts for lent than the government is at recognizing its own failures, or those of enterprises it allows for, we’re in trouble.)
9) “Another proposal seeks to limit the amount of income [executives] can roll into their retirement plans, where the money grows tax free. Rank-and-file workers face limits, but top [executives] do not.” (Helloooooo, Securities and Exchange Commission . . . are you there? Or are you turning in that application for the events coordinator opening at New Horizon (daycare)?
10) The proposals in 7-9 above are the brain-children of democrats. Shocking. Good work democrats, but now go look into your policies on immigration, health care, and welfare before getting too self-righteous. Oh, and see this Cato Institute article about the revered Bill Clinton and Congress: “Policy Analysis—How Corporate Welfare Won: Clinton and Congress Retreat from Cutting Business Subsidies” (from May 15, 1996) – http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-254.html. Said report goes on to relate that “the president’s vetoes of the GOP budgets specifically targeted corporate welfare cuts as being too deep.” (Meaning, Clinton rescued the corporations from losing funding when Congress had meant to reduce corporate welfare. On the flip side- “Of the $19.5 billion budgeted from the 35 least defensible programs, Congress cut just $2.8 billion in 1996. That was 15 percent cut from the 1995 level. Eighty-five percent of corporate welfare spending survived.” It is important to keep in mind that the Congress at that time was held by a republican majority. If corporations weren’t rescued by the president, they were bailed out by Congress.)
11) Some corporations need and deserve subsidies and each side does a poor job attempting to justify what that type of corporation might be: “the military continues to purchase weapons systems, not because they are needed for national security, but because the spending ‘creates jobs’ or helps a firm back in a representative’s district.” (That quote was from the Cato Policy Analysis No. 254, linked above from 1996; well, it is 11 years later, the democrats now control Congress and a republican is in the white house and we have this: “The State Department ‘does not know specifically what it received for most of the $1.2 billion in expenditures under its DynCorp contract for the Iraqi Police Training Program.” (from Aram Roston’s article which can be found at- http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21428395). You might wonder why I would leak the topic back into government waste within the subtopic confines of CEO salaries and corporate tax shelters. The military the quite probably the biggest corporation we have, especially if the federal budget numbers I included in part 5 are any indication? In the wake of the BlackWater information, (see #12 below) shouldn’t we be concerned that the soldiers in our military have useful, necessary weaponry and that the money that is earmarked in the budget for military spending isn’t lost track of as in the DynCorp matter? We’re due to spend $2.4 trillion on wars projected over the next decade according to an NBC News and Associated Press report-http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21456930.
12) BlackWater is a military company that has been awarded a series of “no-bid contracts,” which means that they do not need to bid against any other companies in order to obtain the rights to have the government as the customer. To be fair, perhaps there aren’t any other companies equipped to take on such a task- given conflict risks and the overall scope of the job. Courtesy of the Wikipedia “Blackwater” offering: “The cost for each Blackwater guard in Iraq . . . [is] $445k a year . . . the company has received over one billion dollars in government contracts.” Is there some kind of frequent buyer discount the government could use to save some money? When I go to Fantastic Sams to get the hairstyle refreshed, (and I might just as effectively use my Yard Machine lawnmower) I am rewarded, after buying 12 haircuts, with a free haircut. Also interesting is that Blackwater’s owner and founder is a guy named Erik Prince who “was an intern in George H.W. Bush’s White House . . . and is a financial supporter of Republican party causes and candidates.” Hmmmmmm- that sounds like the government and a corporation are in bed together to me. This seems no different than the CEOs collecting huge salaries and incentives granted by board members at the expense of the workers for those companies, and probably the American people who are paying CEO salaries by consuming their goods and paying for that company’s services (flying on their airlines, buying 2 x 4s from their home improvement store, etc.)
One more thing on Blackwater and DynCorp. Blackwater- “it is estimated by the Pentagon and company representatives that there are 20 to 30 thousand armed security contractors working in Iraq, and some estimates are as much as 100,000, though no official figures exist.” When we’re paying $445,000 a year per contracted guard (#12 above), ah, maybe we ought to get an estimate that closes the gap by more than 70 thousand guards. DynCorp was paid $1.2 billion (#11 above) for its contract with the government, and spent $4.2 million of that on “ ‘unauthorized work’ –that is, on projects that were not approved by the State Department,” including the construction of “a U.S. taxpayer-funded Olympic-sized swimming pool” in Iraq.
13) The "State Department," and "federal watchdogs": These phrases are used in a number of the articles I’ve perused while doing the research. They seem as inept as the government they are investigating, given the number of government waste projects I’ve identified and the amount of money lost to those projects. See, I’d just as soon employ a pro-active, engaged, non-governmental sponsored entity before the end of time so that our children and their children aren’t held hostage by the conniving, irresponsible ways of federal and state governments. Does all the proof need to be in to do something? Can we start to vote for candidates more aligned with our political, social, and economic principles now or should we wait until we are ushered back to some Hoover-ville environment by the two major parties, due to their excessive greed, oversight, and fiscal mismanagement that I have PROVEN? Or do you like working until mid April or early May, (depending on what state you reside in), to see your money flushed down the drain by the government who has conditioned us to feel they are entitled to it?
14) “Consultants expect CEOs to cite the fat paychecks of hedge fund managers and the kings of Wall Street to argue for even more lucrative packages . . . The Securities and Exchange Commission required companies starting this year [2007] to more completely disclose what they’re paying their top executives. But the SEC’s approach has been criticized for failing to provide useful figures for investors.” http://www.msnbc.com/id/19079624. (It is 2007, it took this government 230 years to check into corporate/business handouts? A tubercular, drunken hedgehog (ahem) would move through a cold vat of molasses the size of the universe more quickly.)
15) I encourage the reading of the Cato Policy Analysis report I link above. There really are more facts and figures than I have the space to include contained therein about the excess of government sugar-daddied corporate welfare. I really like the information about kick-backs to companies like Mars, Pepsi, Tyson Foods and Dole to the tune of $85.5 million for foreign advertising. In one case- there was a $125k outlay to promote frozen bovine semen (hopefully that is not an unmentionalbe ingredient in my beloved Mt. Dew). Huh, and even I thought all of those animal analogies I’ve been using were insignificant and distracting.
Note: This footnote (no. 17) appears at the end of the Cato Policy Analysis report: a Harvard economist “estimates that every additional dollar of federal spending costs the economy between 30 and 40 cents of efficiency lost from the taxes required to fund the spending . . . every additional dollar of spending would need to lead to at least $1.30 of public benefit to be an efficient transfer of resources.” Any chance that a significant portion of federal spending would lead to the public benefiting?
Next Time: Voting for the lesser of two evils and consent of the governed.
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