Obama and the Constitution

Writing about politics in the United States has to be one of the more disappointing things anybody can do. Where it would be nice to have one side to be on and see the other side as the bad guys, I don't see a good and bad guy world. I see a bad and less bad one. I wish I saw an alternative to that.

While the right wing accuses Obama of being unconstitutional on things like health care, Social Security and Medicare, I think that's ridiculous. Are they kidding? The requirement in the Constitution for the federal government to be concerned about the well being of the citizens means that those things are very constitutional and that includes education for our children as a federal and public concern where not just the elite get an opportunity for an education that enables them to compete for a piece of the pie.

What is not constitutional is what Obama has done in carrying on the powers of the Bush administration to 'fight terror'. I am so disappointed in that because there is not one single right wing candidate for president who will not do the same thing. Once power has been given up, it is not easily taken back. I thought we had a hope with Obama, certainly not with Hillary, but he disappointed me by his continuance of the Bush policies and maybe worse.

Obama's terrorism policies worse than Bush's

Basically is there any way out of this trap?  I sure don't buy that crap about a revolution as the solution. Does anybody who says that so glibly actually know what happens in revolutions? Who takes power when they are finished? No, they just like the sound of it as being easy. Revolutions are not easy and few end as well as our American revolution. Most cut off heads and end up with worse dictators than they began.

So it's got to be through voting and real candidates with real values. Vote for Republicans right now for a change and they will indeed spend the next two years investigating Obama for everything but what really matters-- violation of our Bill of Rights and Constitutional rights. They won't investigate that because it'd lead back to them. No, it won't be about what really is the invasion of our rights. It will be over health care or some other silly issue like does he use a teleprompter illegally. They will find plenty of things to take up their time without risking the real issue being revealed which is that the federal government continues to take power from citizens with things like increased spying on Internet usage of course, in the name of safety for the citizens. 

If you can read that article and not recognize it is what has happened, if you can read it and find some way to defend Obama, then I would say you are as extreme to the left as the right has been in defending Bush. So many people think (when it's their side) well the one they want to assassinate 'this time' has got to be a bad guy. Honestly, you can still believe that after all the times that has been proven to not be the case?  The right justifies what is done in its name just as the left does and because of that we are where we are...

I am so disgusted; and although I will be voting for Democrats in November, because of the disgusting stands from those on the right, if there ever rises up someone who really cares about the Constitution, not the right wing's reinterpretation of it to include corporations as being people, but really cares about what it actually says and sets out real plans for taking back our rights, for stepping back from the brink of a totalitarian government that will not change no matter who we elect, they'll have my vote.

Currently, I don't see anybody like that on the left or the right certainly not the tea partiers, that sad bunch who are totally oblivious to what government means and what is happening to ours as they lament the idea of health care for everyone while they ignore the real destruction of our freedoms with this continuation of Bush policies.

With the social Darwinism philosophy of the right wing Republicans, it can't be them. They have no clue what is happening either as it's all about lowering taxes (which already have been on the middle) and defending the rights of the richest citizens. They worry about old folks getting Social Security and want to privatize it for Wall Street to get it. They would end public education to save it... or something like that. No, it's not them.

Once again it's lesser of evils but that's not good! That is majorly disappointing.

Social Darwinism

Just out of curiosity, I'd like to know what people who call themselves conservatives mean by that word. They fling it around as though it meant something sort of like they did clean air, where it meant deregulating environmental controls, or the patriot act, which had nothing to do with being a patriot and everything to do with undoing what the original patriots established as rights of American citizens.

Words mean something. Really? What exactly is a conservative today? Is it whatever that particular voter wants done? Does it relate to conservative living? So like fighting a war you don't pay for won't happen?

Anyway besides a little rant, I thought this was worth reading about the latest Republican contract on America...

Social Darwinism by Robert Reich

Let the weak starve? Don't worry about jobs for anybody as that's their problem? Health care? Let them eat cake! Don't discourage any jobs from going overseas if it will increase the stock market at home? Destroy the public education system, who needs the rabble to be educated? Who cares about anybody except themselves? Is that what being a conservative means today? 

It sure seems that way to me, and most of them call themselves Christians too. Wonder how much of the Gospels most have ever read.  I'd suggest starting with the Sermon on the Mount. Although the way they redefine words maybe they'd like to rewrite the Beatitudes for today, something a little more in keeping with their concept of Jesus, you know the guy who liked money and didn't have much use for mercy.

The Man Knows

This was on: Plead Ignorance with two links to Bill Clinton on Jon Stewart. The links are well worth watching and I hope everyone will. I have been on the road; so little time to watch television but this is one I regret missing.

Critical thinking

This was such a good piece that I thought it worth posting here so others would be sure and see it. It's about Christopher Hitchens, who is fighting what is thought to be terminal esophageal cancer. If he dies, it will be such a loss as he puts out a way of thinking that the world needs. Not all want to hear hard truths, and I haven't always agreed with him, but he is always worth reading. I hope he can win this battle because we are in a time where so many operate on emotions not logic. We need people like Hitchens (who can't be labeled a leftie or a rightie based on his opinions) more than ever.

Cancer is taking Hitchens' voice when we need it most

All I can add is Amen!

the evils of taxes

This quote pretty much says it all, I think. The right wing won't agree, of course, they who are defending keeping the tax cuts on the millionaires before they rush back to saying we all must sacrifice to bring down the deficit. At least you now know who they mean by 'we'...

“Taxes are what we pay for civilized society.” Oliver Wendell Holmes

Untamed Power

One of the things that concerned me a great deal about the American willingness to give up power to the Bush administration after 9/11 was that once power is yielded, it is seldom given back at least not willingly. I asked a question back then which is still valid. You don't mind it now but what if it's someone from the other party who has it?

People often are comfortable with the power being in those who talk like they want to hear, in their own party, but they should not be. Nobody can be trusted with ultimate power and yet that is what has been happening in the United States and it has not been undone as I feared it would not.

Some liked Hillary Clinton's foreign policy address a lot. I did not and this article says well what my concerns were. I hope righties and lefties will read the article. This problem is not linked to one or the other party. It's about power. I don't care if it's in a personal relationship or a business or a country-- power once given away is hard to get back.

The Untamed Prince

The party that gave up this power to the last administration in the name of revenge and physical safety is the party that wants it back again. Americans might well give it back. Will that party have learned anything through it all?

We all need to look at who wants the power and what they are doing with it.  Is there anybody running, left or right, who would give this kind of power up? For those who worry about the growth of government, this is what they should fear. I have a fear too that by the time they finally realize it, it might be too late to do anything about it. Maybe it already is given the Supreme Court is totally in the hands of power to the prince mentality.

What the heck is going on?

IF you are a Democrat, moderate or independent, you are shaking your head over what happened in Delaware. How does a no-nothing, incompetent, profiting only from running for office, whose previous big issue was masturbation, win a nomination to run for the United States Senate from what used to be known as the Grand Old Party?

Christine O'Donnell-- Delaware Primary

This and a lot of other primaries conclusively say, to me, that Republicans can and very well might nominate Sarah Palin for president in 2012. It also looks likely that, given Newt Gingrich's reach to the fringe, his racist comment that Obama might have a "Kenyan, anti-colonial worldview," was aimed at one thing-- he hopes to be Sarah's running mate and I don't mean on the top of the ticket.

Newt is an opportunist who clearly can see which way the wind in his party is blowing and what it smells like. He knows he can't run for president; but could he be her Cheney, the power behind the throne? I would guess he hopes so. Given the mentality of the right wing voters today, who are angry at something, even if they can't articulate what, beyond the signs they carry, it all could happen.

Sorry, Romney, but I think selling out is too late and you didn't go far enough-- Romney endorses and donates to O'Donnell campaign. It's one of those questions that one has to ask about now, if that one is not a Republican anyway-- how low can they go?

I wouldn't try to tell tea partiers or right wing Republican how to vote. I pretty well think that's a lost cause as they have proven to be self- and nation- destructive, people who only care about three things--  revenge, winning and low taxes (oh and they want their country back, not sure who has it but they want it); but I will suggest to any leftie reading here-- think long and hard before you decide you don't need to vote, you don't need to work for candidates with your principles. When you feel upset that Obama hasn't gone far enough, just imagine for awhile a Palin/Gingrich ticket and it might help you get re-enthused!

And don't even try to tell me it doesn't matter who gets in, that they are all the same. Just check out O'Donnell's record such as it is, read what she says she stands for, and then realize she got nominated by the same kind of voters who will be nominating a presidential candidate in two years.

Art and Politics

Awhile back, I liked what my friend, Parapluie, had said in a blogger comment. I saved her words because I thought they deserved being repeated. Then what does she do but paint two abstract paintings that exactly illustrate what she was talking about.

The paintings above are hers on her Umbrella Painting Journal site. What she is depicting is how journalism is impacting our culture using fear and anger as tactics to gain ratings or is it because of who owns the stations? I don't know but it's happening on all the media if you look at them. She explained the double inspiration for the paintings at Red Hype and Yellow Truth Twisters  Don't they illustrate what many of us are feeling right now about the news media.

What she had said before was:

 "As an artist, I find inside myself a transformation departing from the ways of our culture. Being involved in the creative process is very satisfying. Creative expression directs anger positively. Focus on making rather than tearing down is very healthy and healing. Debating politics and the act of trying to convert others to my way of thinking has not worked for me.

"The more I paint the more I want to explore. I am not so interested in making a product of art to sell. What I hope to do is engage my grandchildren and friends in creating.

"One of my projects is a chess puzzle for a group of four or more. It is a co-operative game in which all the pieces are used except the pawns. One person is the time keeper and historian who writes down the placement of the pieces and the moves. The diplomats who move the pieces must move all the pieces to the opposite end of the board from their starting place in the fewest possible moves. The game is made more complex by stationing pieces on two white boarders and two black boarders. The diplomats win when they all have moved their pieces to the opposite side without blocking other pieces. Before the timer is started there is a long untimed creative discussion and treaty making process." 

We are in a period of time where people lash out at others in anger and worse, where the media is so powerful, so invasive that it not only shows us what is happening but it can twist how we respond to it by their choice of what to cover. Her paintings of that seem to me to say a lot as well as her example of how art can used in ways that are sometimes stronger than words.

Politicizing 9/11

While the Florida burning of the Quran on 9/11 might/might not have been canceled, apparently other so-called Christian wing nut churches are jumping on the bandwagon to burn the Islamic people's holy book. This definitely suits a certain mentality helped along by the media covering it blow by blow which infuriates me as much as any part of this story.

Media relishes such an opportunity and look how the opportunity has expanded as they can now post pictures of thousands rioting in Muslim nations. The media has now gotten around to asking why this story was ever important. IT WASN'T. It was a 50 person church that managed to get its 15 minutes of fame at the expense of everybody else. Nothing new about that in our reality tv entertainment media world.

It never made sense to me to burn someone else's idea of a holy book, a banned book, or anything else as a protest. The idea that some would do it though isn't surprising. There have always been wackos (and not just in religions), and with the extreme righties screaming how evil Islam is, well this just fits the whole atmosphere. It does not reflect the thinking of the majority of Americans, not even a fourth of us although I won't guess how many, since I do read right wing blogs sometimes. It's got to be a small percentage though who would cheer this.

For some background, America is a very Christian nation with diverse Christian churches everywhere. Our culture encourages religion as is evidenced by the tax breaks given to them all. In any poll of Americans, many label themselves believers in the Bible and Jesus. It would be nigh unto impossible to be elected president here without espousing Christianity as the person's religion although it might vary as to how religious voters demanded they be.

For some, religious talk is enough no matter what the deeds end up. Others are busy looking at whether the Obamas registered as members of any church in DC after arriving. Part of the appeal of checking this out would be to use what the pastor said against Obama if it didn't fit someone else's religious agenda. Given his past experience, I can't  blame him for thinking it's wiser to not be affiliated with any church, as long as he's president. Of course, that still leaves a certain percentage to then think he's a Muslim in disguise...

I believe, right now in our country, we have conflicting emotions driving what is happening regarding Islam. First obviously was the attack on 9/11 where despite how many times President Bush said we are not at war with the religion of Islam and that tolerance is important, many people wanted revenge. They got some of that by bombing Afghanistan but it didn't get the one who planned 9/11 and it didn't really satisfy the need many had for a reckoning.

So it went along pretty much as it had been with fighting a war supposedly to help Muslim people and most Americans not thinking top deeply about what that meant, not complaining, even when it put our country into debt and we lost too many of our soldiers-- not to mention the death toll among the Iraqis and Afghans. But this was festering and all it took was politicizing the building of an Islamic center near the site of the terrorist attack in New York City. That even was quiet to begin until it got closer to the election and the things that began to be said stirred the anger that had lain dormant.

Add to it a pastor (and now maybe other pastors across the country) wanting to burn Qurans, which stirred up overseas riots, and it's all going nuts with who knows what Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin will add to it with their joint 9/11 rallies in Alaska. One thing about mob action is if you are a leader, you either join with it or you will find yourself out of leadership. It begins to take on a life of its own. Both Beck and Palin did speak out to say the burning was wrong but there is so much that at least Beck has already said that who knows what he really thinks or will say next.

Some of this in Americans is fear more than hate as so many know so little about Islam. They are being told by righties that all Islamic people are the same. Now the same people know that all Christians are not the same but they are buying into thinking that the demands from radical Islamics for war and death means all Islamic people feel that way. It feeds the fear that 9/11 will happen again.

Truthfully we may well be attacked again. Whoever doesn't think that is not paying attention. Whether pastors burn Qurans or not, the threat is out there. When you have one and one half billion Muslims worldwide, there are bound to be some who will do something destructive again. It's not about their religion though. It's about something else, and you know that if you remember what was discovered about how the 9/11 terrorists spent their days ahead of their suicide attacks. Clue. It wasn't all fasting and praying.

Some are trying to say now that we didn't really go to Iraq to liberate Muslims and make them stronger. It was supposed to be about us being attacked by Saddam with all his imaginary weapons. We had to get rid of the bad guy, right? Except, we could have arranged to have him assassinated at any time. Spare me saying we couldn't do that morally. We did a lot worse than that in the last ten years.

No, what Bush finally came up with for a reason for the war in Iraq was to bring democracy and freedom to Muslim people which it seems the right has forgotten in their deluge of fear and anger. If that faith in Allah is so evil, a religion that traces itself back to Abraham, why are we over there? Why did we go there? You know it wasn't the WMD. You know it wasn't to kill one tyrant. It might have been about oil wealth there but  if that's so, we wanted to make a Muslim nation wealthy? After all, to some, the only good Muslim is a dead one.. sound familiar to anyone? Clue. It's been said before in this country about an earlier enemy.

What we have seen happen to our country where logic has gone out the window and hysteria has replaced it simply amazes me. I really thought we were better than Glenn Beck or Sarah Palin but not sure why I thought that. It's not like our history is lily white despite the rewriting of it by some righties into us as the noble saviors of the world. Pardon me, some lefties too if you read Hillary Clinton's recent speech. Neocon philosophy knows no party boundaries.

I kind of understand the motives of the little religious group in Florida who got this whole burning the Quran (Koran) thing going. They think everybody, which also means you, Glenn Beck, is going to hell who does not believe like they do. Sarah with her church that had exorcisms, she might be safe.

I have an artist friend who once painted all the images that people see of God in various religions. In her small town, a pastor got hold of the prints and made a show of burning them. It's not like fear of the 'other' is new.

What is new is the media drumbeat for it as we get ready to once again celebrate one of our greatest failures of intelligence and defense. Yeah, Pearl Harbor beat it but Pearl Harbor came when we had a lot less tools than we did in 2001. 9/11 happened when it should not have but it did. And what will burning the Quran and the hysteria over a Islamic center near where 9/11 occurred, what will they do to our global 'war on terror'. [I swear I hate these expressions that make no sense at all. Like when wasn't the civilized world going to be fighting against terrorism? Anybody really believe that began with 9/11? We were the first hit by terrorism? For that matter the first time even we were hit by it? Oh never mind, I am using logic again].

I wasn't going to write anything about 9/11 because I think we have wallowed in it enough, haven't we?  The more I think about what has happened to us since it, the destructive things we have had happen to our Bill of Rights, our freedoms, our sense of morality, our economy, our belief in religious tolerance (or at least pretending we believed in it), I think what I have so often. Bin Laden could not have asked for more success.

It really does make me mad and at us. If we aren't better than that, we should be. A good start would be to stop celebrating this day, stop letting politicians use it for political points or ministers to give them their 3 minutes of fame. Let those who lost loved ones that day mourn as is appropriate, pray for them if you are a believer, but as Jesus said to do it-- in a closet, not for points. But we as a nation have to go on and make this country into what we said it was. Words are cheap.

And while I am at it, quit expecting some miracle leader (from either party) to fix it all. It's us who fixes it through the responsible way we live our lives, the care we take in voting, the American businesses we start or  help get started by investing or buying their products, the  concern we have about our educational system, and the list goes on. We could be doing a lot more as individuals if we wanted to or we can wallow in it waiting for our prince to come (more on that in a coming blog).

Rewriting history to suit an agenda

 Politics has been so disillusioning lately that I haven't had the heart to write about it after reading this or that. What I am trying to understand is who are Americans, at least that 50% who seem ready to vote Republicans back into power in Congress. Two years ago Americans wanted change. Change came. Now they want whoever was in power before they felt they needed that change? This makes sense???

Some is the rewriting of history by those who were involved in doing what Americans didn't like but evidently do now. It starts with memoirs to justify their actions by redefining what happened to make themselves look better. There have been a ton of books about how we got into the Iraq war, but the big players waited. Now here comes Tony Blair, with Bush following in the fall, as Blair defends his decision to go to war in Iraq even though it might have been wrong-- even though it might have been based on lies because after all, lying is sometimes a good thing.

So apparently is omitting all of what happened: Tony Blair Memoir

This war was not paid for, at least in the United States. It was justified by deceit. It is still being defended by the right and will increasingly be so as we move forward into elections to decide if our country puts the people back in power to do it all again.

Just think how it'd have been if Dick Cheney had been in total power instead of just the power behind the throne. According to Blair, he wanted to invade Iran, Syria and I forget who else... obviously without paying for any of it. I always find it amazing how those who feared fighting wars when they had their own chance are so quick to send others off to do it when they get too old to go themselves. How convenient!

Immigration issues

For anyone who thinks that immigration reform should begin with amnesty, please explain how it will help this:

Inside the Brutal World of America's Kidnapping Capitol

Real reform must address these kind of problems first, and I use that word problem loosely as this goes way beyond a problem. What is happening in those houses in Phoenix and in Mexico will, as the article indicates, happen to more than the immigrant population if the United States doesn't get tough on the border and make its immigration policies mean something more than words. And I give full credit to the sweeps that they are engaging in across other states. They have done more of that then past administrations but they have to do more.

When you show a group of lawless, soulless people, such as these human and drug smugglers, these coyotes, that you are not tough enough to stop them, they will take their violence further and further. There is profit to be made and they don't care who they hurt to make it. People like that prey on the weak. We better hope they don't think we are among them. Anybody who doesn't know that has lived a very sheltered life. 

Where it comes to immigration reform, it is not okay to do nothing and amnesty is doing nothing without other tough policies in place.

Some have found fault with Arizona with their attempt at a law to stop human smuggling at least. The liberal media found every bit of info they could to show how there was no real problem in Arizona. Try this article on for size and then tell me again there is no real problem.

Signs along freeway in Arizona warn of smuggler dangers

I've driven that freeway a lot. Really and truly, that is acceptable in the United States? Blame Arizona's governor Jan Brewer all you want but look at the problem and then tell me the solution. For now the media has rushed onto other problems to cram down people's throats, but this doesn't go away in Arizona because they did. And if you pay any attention at all to how things are south of the border, you would have to be an idiot to not see it spreading north if something isn't done-- besides talk that is.

The Obama administration is suing to block Arizona's law as unconstitutional. Fine if it is but then what? Forget about it and put up signs on government land warning of the problem? That's enough? Turn our heads the other way at the brutal massacres happening in Mexico due to the cartel wars? Ignore the abuse of those who have been brought up with no clue what was going to happen to them?

Obama promised 1500 National Guard troops (currently has sent [thirty], (Bush was about as effective);  but even if they go down there, what real difference can they make unless the reason people smuggling is successful is dealt with at the other end also. Then the government can concentrate on the other half of the problem-- the illegal drugs that the same people bring up.

It is not okay to just do nothing even if a lot of liberals think it is. Someday it will be in their back yard and then they will think otherwise but the time to deal with it is now and it has to start with border control and making the reason humans can be treated like merchandise no longer profitable.