Budget (Debt) Numbers

The Outstanding Public Debt of the United States Federal Government as of 25 Jul 2011 at 01:45:42 PM GMT was:

$14,356,900,414,790.21

(click on the number for a current update)

In consideration of the partisan bickering going on in Washington D.C. these days - Today, some numbers to consider.

I googled "percent of U.S. budget" and got these very mixed numbers.

Defense Department between 20% and 31% - it depends on whether retirement benefits are a defense cost or put into social welfare or lumped with medicare and social security. Then there is the matter of Iraq and Afghanistan, because they are separately funded by Congress, they are often not included in the budget calculations for the Department of Defense.

Social Security - 20% of outflow but 0% of current taxes, because SS is already funded (though that money may run out in about 11-13 years). Any social security "fix" will have future implications for the budget debt but no immediate effect.

Interest on the national debt = 6% of total budget, but some of that is the federal government paying itself because the Treasury buys back high interest bonds before they are due and many of those debt instruments are held by other parts of the U.S. government.

If Defense, Social Security and Medicare are not on the table for budget discussions, then 61% to 79% of national government outflow is not even being considered.

A couple of more really interesting numbers. All the U.S. debt held by the Chinese (and they hold the most of any foreign country) equals less than 8% of the outstanding U.S. debt. The biggest holders of our debt - US. What with IRAs, pension funds, mutual funds, insurance companies and our dear bailed out banking system; we hold over 72% of our own debt.

Still, Fourteen Trillion Dollars seems like a significant number - $14,000,000,000,000+

A Modest Proposal for the U.S. Budget

There is not enough money to do everything everyone wants done. When we had enough money to do nearly everything everyone wanted done, we pissed it away on useless crap, foreign intervention, poorly organized educational reform, military toys and highways to nowhere. We were indeed on the road to nowhere. But that is the past, this is the reality of the present and to dig ourselves and the rest of the world out of this debt mess, we all will have to suffer. Suffering, in this case, for many, will mean not having all the stuff you never used anyway.

Here is my proposal for dealing with the budget problem as it exists today. Please note I am offering this within the context of the present two party system which I hate with a passion bordering on fervor. But we don't have the time to fix the political system and then deal with the budget. Priorities please.

This is a quantitative issue - we either spent less, raise more or some combination of both. Voodoo economics didn't work, neither did trickle down. The guiding principle shall be: Everybody Gives, Nobody Takes.

So, in order:

-Take all proposals that have been offered in Congress as of today, there will be no additions after today; that way no one gets to add anything to offset what they will lose under this proposal. Everyone has had plenty of time to make proposals. No new projects, period, end, done, stop.

-Everything is on the table, this includes Medicare, Social Security and the Department of Defense. It also includes: education, health care, foreign aid and whatever happens to be your pet project or program. Everything.

-First action: Both parties then get to throw out 10% in dollar value of the other guy's proposals. We call this the "are you insane!" rule. Yes, these cuts will be based solely on ideology, so get over it. Both sides get 10% and then you stop all the stupidity based solely on how you read the bible or the constitution or any other piece of moderately entertaining fiction.

-Next, cut the Republican cuts by 80% or if you prefer - restore $4 out of every $5 in cuts proposed by the Republican party. Now do the same to the Democrats cuts, yes they do propose cuts, they just hide them better. This will maintain an overall 20% cut in spending. Math wonks, take a seat.

-Cut all additional spending by 90%, even if they are being called "restored expenditures." It should be 100% but there actually are some new things that need being done.

-All tax cuts or tax break proposals will be taken off the table. Tax cuts currently in place will be rescinded, tax breaks will be rolled back over ten years. This does mean items like the oil depletion allowance. American business is supposed to be flexible and innovative, so prove it. Also the biggest tax break on the books, the home mortgage interest deduction must become part of the conversation.

-Each and every time anyone in the discussion refers to "they" or "them", as in: "they caused this problem" or "they don't want to pay their fair share", the person uttering the offending "they" will be fined five dollars which will go directly to state debt reduction. California should be fine in about two days.

-This budget is to be in effect for four years, subject to renewal under guidelines I will dream up as soon as they actually start implementing this proposal.

Next: Fixing those greedy bastards on Wall Street. First option - castration.

--

art from The Atlantic

Medical Marijuana (1): An Inquiry

This begins a series of posts of an as yet unknown length and breadth. I begin by saying that I have a new medical marijuana card. Under California law a M.D. can prescribe marijuana for a variety of conditions. I have the card for my back pain. Now whether it is going to actually work or not will be topic number one of this series. 

I'm not sure if I am going to deal with the politics of pot; maybe a bit later in the series. For now my intention is to walk you through my medical marijuana process/experience. I am engaging in empirical experimentation to discover if I can find a delivery vehicle for the THC in marijuana that will efficaciously dull the lumbar pain I experience. My secondary goal is not to be high all of the time. You see the prescription narcotics I have for my back pain do not get me high at all, at least not anymore; but they also do not control the discomfort. Hence the turn to THC for a possible solution.

First complication - I'm easy. Always have been. Back in the day I was an easy stone. It doesn't take much to get me buzzed. So the dilemma is getting the THC into my system with minimal euphoria. Can you actually believe having a goal of less euphoria. What has this universe come to?

For the uninitiated here are two different subspecies of Cannabis Sativa, they are sativa (cannabis sativa sativa) and indica (cannabis sativa indica). Most of the medical marijuana dispensaries are very precise in their labeling (it's the law). Unfortunately, the distinctions are not perfect for my purposes.

Here is a typical summary of the effects of each subspecies.

Sativa is often characterized as uplifting and energetic. The effects of a sativa marijuana are mostly cerebral. They give a feeling of optimism and well-being, as well as providing a good measure of pain relief for certain symptoms. A few pure sativas are also very high in THC content. They are known to have a quite spacey, or hallucinogenic, effect. Sativas are a good choice for daytime smoking. 

Indica is most often described as a pleasant body buzz. Indicas are great for relaxation, stress relief, and for an overall sense of calm and serenity. Marijuana indicas are also very effective for overall body pain relief, and often used in the treatment of insomnia. They are the late-evening choice of many smokers as an all-night sleep aid. A few pure indica strains are very potent in THC, and will cause the "couchlock" effect, enabling the smoker to simply sit still and enjoy the experience of the smoke.

As you can see, both are effective for some types of pain relief. And, but, also each can get you really stoned; a drawback from my point of view.

Next issue, there are various methods of delivery. Obviously you can smoke the weed, all of the dispensaries sell marijuana buds in a wide range of varieties, both sativa and indica; as well as hybrids of both. Edibles are also available in an ever increasing variety: cookies, candies, butters, spreads, crackers, drinks; the list goes on. All of these have various mixes of the marijuana plant and the two subspecies. There are also tinctures, creams, salves, ointments, unguents and balms.

Thus far I have obtained some smoking material, several baked goods including one (Bud-O-Scotch cookie) that came highly recommended by another back pain sufferer. I also have a hot cocoa mix to please my chocolate addiction and this week I am going to pick up a tincture that comes very highly recommended by a long time pain patient.

I can report that my preliminary pilot study served to remind me that I really have to be careful with dosage. I was given two lemon cookies by the first dispensary I visited as a welcome gift. The packaging said "1+ dose" and contained two Lemonade Soft cookies. I ate 1/3 of one cookie and was semi-dysfunctional for several hours.

Today begins Phase One of my experiment with clinical notes before and after dosing as well as reports while using the medication. Notes and commentary will appear here on a regular basis, for now once a week on Fridays.

Social Scientist Sees Bias Within

A very interesting NYTimes article from a couple of months back reported on potential liberal bias in social science research. It seems that the organization - The Society for Personality and Social Psychology is made up of over 80% liberals. The article touches on the generalized 'fact' that academia in general is more liberal than the society as a whole. What makes this more interesting is that the SPSP focuses research on areas of gender, racial, ethnic and other forms of social prejudice but when it comes close to home, the article suggests, the professors are unable to see their own bias - liberalism.

The counter arguments ("80% of cops are conservative," "conservatives are X or liberals are Y") play out quite effectively in the comments section attached to the article. And while I do recommend both the article and the follow-up debate, I am more interested in what the article implies about the liberal mindset. 

You see Barack Obama has announced his intentions to seek a second term and my liberal friends are beginning to line up in one of two muttering masses of thought.  

Pro-Obama - "He remains the bright shining light of hope." "Have you listened to the Tea Party!" "Of the two choices..."

Not-So-Much-Anymore - "He hasn't kept any of the promises I heard in '08." "What about Gitmo?" "How can our guy bomb Libya and keep us in Iraq and Afghanistan.."

So yes, this is the opening salvo of my 2012 advocacy of third party candidates but with a twist. It has become more and more apparent to me that liberals including many of my liberal friends are engaged in really weak-willed self delusion. Conservatives don't listen to your old worn arguments, they reject them as 'heard it all before.' Conservatives know what they believe and they often know they are right in those beliefs. Liberals or Progressives, on the other hand, tend to hang out with the antiquated notion that every position deserves equal time and contemplation again and again and again. Stop! Stand up for what you belief. Be willing to say that others are wrong, entitled to their opinion yes, but wrong is still wrong.

There is a huge difference between being co-opted by local prejudice of your self-selected tribe and simply but vocally declaring that some truths are self-evident and not subject to interpretation or political spin. Some truths are etched in stone and conscious, do you know which of your beliefs rise to that level of truth? And perhaps even more importantly to a civil debate, which of your beliefs are not actually up to the label of truth and therefore are capable of compromise.

Recycled Political Observations

Someone said to me the other day: "Doesn't it frighten you that a major political party in the United States has been taken over my extremists."


I'm not proud of my answer, I think it was really low-hanging fruit but I couldn't resist. I, of course answered: "Which party?"


As expected he didn't think it was a particularly funny line and gave me an exasperated sigh coupled with a downturned slow shake of his head.


"No really, which party." OK, I was just rubbing it in at this point. Later and away from my much too seriously middle of the road lefty friend, I remembered that I had blogged about this back somewhere in the past. Today I recycle that post, in the hope that no one ever again attempts to draw me into a serious discussion about the merits of the two party system in this country.

                                                     

Paranoia strikes deep

Into your life it will creep

It starts when you're always afraid

-Buffalo Springfield

For What It's Worth is the song by Messrs. Neil Young, Stephen Stills, Richie Furay, Jim Messina and perhaps Dewey Martin and/or Bruce Palmer depending on the version you listen to and who was caught up in the last drug bust.

Just a small digression, when Buffalo Springfield broke up after about two years of revolving bass players and the aforementioned drug busts---Stephen Still hooked up with Graham Nash of the Hollies and David Crosby from the Byrds and formed a little band, they took in Neil Young and played some music. Jim Messina and Richie Furay joined forces and formed Poco. Jim Messina eventually teamed up with Kenny Loggins.

Meanwhile back at the topic of this here post: Paranoia Strikes Deep. That was the tagline for a Nov. 9 (2009) opinion piece in the NYTimes. The paranoia being discussed is that the Republican Party has or will be taken over by an extremist right wing. Whether this has or hasn't happened yet depends on just how left or right you already are and in particular (here comes the point) how paranoid you are about such a possibility. The article can be summarized with it's last two lines:

"The point is that the takeover of the Republican Party by the irrational right is no laughing matter. Something unprecedented is happening here--and it's very bad for America."

In case you missed it, the lyrics from Buffalo Springfield are:

"Something's happening here, what it is ain't exactly clear. There's a man with a gun over there, telling me I got to beware."

The cultural distortion is that you can't tell if the guy with the gun is an extreme conservative, a paranoid libertarian or a fearful liberal who has decided to defend his turf. That it ain't exactly clear is why paranoia strikes deep but it starts when you're always afraid.

M&M Monday - Elections

It's one state, two state; red state, blue state for the 2008 Obama-McCain election above.

For any ardent red-staters, this is the 1984 Reagan-Mondale election. Only Minnesota and Washington D.C. marred your boy's sweep.

And for the blue-state crowd, the 1964 Johnson-Goldwater election map. Back in the days when labeling someone an 'extremist' actually was a bad thing. (Apparently they was a problem with Florida voting back then as well.)

And finally, my personal peering into the future to the 2012 confrontation between horses of an only slightly different color.

--

M&M Election Graphics by me

Circulation of Elites

An academic friend tells the story of being asked about the 'revolution' in Egypt and replying: "It's not a revolution, they aren't changing the government only the names on the masthead." That basically describes the principle known as the Circulation of Elites. Vilfredo Pareto is credited with postulating this theory in the late 1800s. He suggested that political and therefore governmental change is nearly always the result of one elite replacing another. And despite the images on television and the internet it is not clear that Egypt was a popular uprising or simply a popular following of the new elite.

Most of the talk about democracy comes from outside Egypt. It appears what most Egyptians wanted was the removal of a tyrant who had ruled for three decades. Time will tell if any actual governmental or political change will result from the departure of the most recent elite. 

Revolutions, on the other hand, sweep the old regime from power and replace it with a new government. Not always a new form of government and not always a better one for those who were actually in the streets doing the revolting. You could use Cuba as an example to prove either point of view here. But one might better look to the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia in 1989, where actually governmental change (communist to democratic) did take place and then either did or did not sustain itself depending on your political point of view.

There are those who would argue that bloodless revolution is an oxymoron. Others might look to the old adage 'revolution is the result of a nation pregnant with itself.' Both good solid political arguments, which may or may not speak to what is actually happening in the backrooms throughout the region. What remains to be seen is what actually did happen in Egypt. Was it a revolution? Probably not. Was it a change of elites? Most likely. What will be the eventual outcome? Ah, well there lies the piece for the historians. 

Now what about Bahrain, Lebanon, Yemen, Iran, Libya and . . .


[It has been pointed out to me by the aforementioned "academic friend" that Ibn Khaldun back in 1377 proposed the theory of the "oscillation of elites," which may be an even more explanatory model as it suggests that elites not only supplant each other but they also recycle (oscillate) and recirculate through the corridors of political power.]

--

art - Clay Bennett in The Christian Science Monitor

Why Oh Why?

"Baby mice fathered by mice receiving a donation of spermatogonial stem cells from mice expressing green fluorescent protein." 


Only half the baby mice show the green color. This is because each spermatogonial stem cell has only one copy of the gene for green fluorescent protein. When the spermatogonial cell divides, only half the cells that result from it have the gene for green fluorescent protein.

Brought to you by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.


Sometimes I just wonder why.


On another why? If you have wondered why the Middle East has been blowing up, I would direct you to a wonderful blog post about Tunisia and its place in the simmering region. I do mean simmering since the post is mostly about food... or is it? 


Sometimes the response to a "why?" is just not something you would ever conjure from the depths of your own experience.

Politicus Vomitus

An opinion is an opinion is an opinion. Yes, there is a difference between expressing an opinion based on fact versus one based on personal belief. Also facts are made to be altered, misunderstood, distorted and misinterpreted. It seems to me the larger question is -- does the first amendment mean what it says or only what current political winds interpret it to mean.

Some examples: 

Yesterday I was running errands and Rush Limbaugh showed up on the FM dial. I haven't listened into the olde Rush dog in awhile so I gave him his sixty seconds. It seems some sheriff in Arizona said that right wing commentators, specifically Rush rhetoric, had caused a 22 yr. old adult to open fire on those people in Tucson.*

*notice I have used some facts here. Tucson is a fact. People and open fire are facts. I have gleaned from the news that he was 22 yrs. old. I have added what I consider to be a fact that he is an adult not a "kid" or "disturbed youth" as some reports have characterized him. I would compromise on "young man" but that's as far as I would tolerate this stretching of the facts.

Back to Rush. Apparently the sheriff in question went on to say that one political party was trying to save America and the other was attempting to destroy it. So Rush asked whether he should turn the other cheek and not respond, after all the sheriff was speaking under some duress. But Rush being Rush suggested that the sheriff was being coached by 'democrat policy makers'. I have no problem with this Rushism, he is who he is. You know that first amendment thing I mentioned before, let them all speak I firmly believe.

Here is where Rush and I have issue. While ranting (I rant, you rant, he rants, we all rant...) Rush said that he clearly disagrees with the sheriff's characterization of the republican party and the good Rusher went on to make some good points about how the politics of the last two years illustrates the democrats may not actually be "saving the country". Again, no problem with the argument at all. Rush further said that making statements like that about the two parties only serves to divide us further at a time when everyone should be working together in a non-partisan way. Particularly, says Rush, on issues like the Arizona shootings. No place for inflammatory speech. Now I was a bit shocked to hear that out of the olde Shockmeister himself, so I stayed tuned.

Rush once again read the sheriff's statement verbatim; one party saving, one party destroying. Then, wait for it, you knew he would. Rush said: "Since I completely disagree with the sheriff and I happen to believe just the opposite is true about the two partys." Well so much for non-partisan, non-inflammatory, we're all in this together. Al Franken was wrong; Rush Limbaugh is not a big, fat liar; he is simply a bigot and he knows it.

Part two. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton tripping and falling down is not news. And no matter how much Wolf Blitzer, Hannity, Rather, Koppel or whomever is playing the role of talking head today protests-- you are not journalists. At best you host an infotainment show on cable, at worse you are a media whore hucking Toyotas and Subway foot longs for your corporate overseers. By the way, CNN (The Cable NEWS Network) did a montage this morning of dozens of politicians slipping and falling. You all remember Gerry Ford right. No not John Steward nor Steven Colbert but CNN, I assume Fox covered Hillary's pratfall as well, but possibly with some comment about Obama's foreign policy taking a fall.

Let me repeat - Not News!

Final part for today, I had six but three will be enough, I am beginning to feel better.

Sarah Palin, need I go on?

Seems Sarah had a 'hit list' for last fall's election. Seems Sarah has a graphic display of the U.S. with  gun sight superimposed on each congressional districts she was "targeting", seems Sarah does not think that was inflammatory. Now she could have approved something like a braying donkey or maybe a donkey sitting on his ass or even a big, bold red X over those congressional districts. Nope it was a gun sight.

Yesterday Sarah said linking that graphic to the violence in Tucson is ridiculous. I agree. Not that her ad was a good idea, but that she had the right to use it. However, Sarah also said yesterday that we should all be working together to lower the level of the political debate that has gotten so out of control Sarah Palin said that, no really Sarah Palin. Next thing you know Ann Coulter will be wearing flowers in her hair.

So to Sarah's speech writer, try this on for size.

"You know, sometimes things get by us when we have a big staff. In hindsight, we should not have used that graphic. We should be debating the merits of our positions and not demonizing our opponents who hold views different from our own. Using that image, which appears to be a gun sight was poorly conceived and I regret that we used it."

You see we call that lower the rhetoric, I believe that is what Sarah was suggesting we all do. I suggest leading by example.

I will now return to never-neverland where all the men are beautiful, all the women are strong and they all think I'm wonderful.
---
US Map graphic -- NYTimes

Whores of Convenience

Now that some of the noize around Wikileaks and Julian Assange has died down, I have a question of my many liberal friends and, of course, the liberal media. How is it that Julian Assange is some kind of hero, when he is charged with sex crimes against two women in Sweden? How does his leaking of governmental information obscure violence against women. Can't he be both your driveling hero in the great tradition of Ralph Nader and Daniel Ellsberg and still be a sexist and a criminal?

I would like to remind some of those same left leaning friends and all of the liberal press of how the Anita Hill/Clarence Thomas sides were chosen. No one on the left gave Thomas one iota of potential of being innocent 19 years ago. He was a pervert and a near rapist because of what he allegedly did to Anita Hill and it had nothing at all to do with his reactionary politics.

Did it?

So how do Julian Assange and Clarence Thomas end up on opposite sides of the liberal fence?

Or perhaps a better question. How do Anita Hill and Julian Assange end up under the same blue tent?

Just how convenient are the politics of sexism?

Stubborn Slime Stains

For some time I have been considering writing a political blog. Either starting another completely new blog with fair warning that it will be completely political or dedicating one day a week here to a political posting. My reasoning goes something like this:

Nearly anything I hear out of the mouth of a politician, a lobbyist, a cabinet member and most certainly a political personage in the media is a lie. Politics lives on lies. Some are willing to call it spin or even "politics as usual." I prefer the slightly more pure analysis when I call it "lies, damned lies and statistics."

One problem I have with this idea is that I will probably need to reconnect myself to the contemporary political conversation. For the past 20 years I have been able to remain on the periphery only catching what drifts by on the wind. One simply has to detect the rancid smell of an approaching political utterance and listen for just a moment to detect the falsification. However, if I dedicated any portion of my writing time to politics I am going to need to reengage with the swill. I really don't like the feeling of needing to sterilize my keyboard after reading more than a single political blog.

The good news is that I have as much trouble with Michael Moore as I do with Glenn Beck. No one actually uses the facts to make their point. I remember so clearly hearing an attack ad on George W. and thinking -- Why would they make up something about him, he says so many incredibly stupid things, why not just play the tape?

In the recent race for governor here in California, the democrats made a big deal of a major newspaper saying of Meg Whitman (the defeated GOP candidate) that she had "a loose relationship with the truth." Don't they get it? The voters all believe that to be the very definition of a politician. Just about the only position worse than actually being a politician is being a voter who actually believes in either of the two parties cancerously alive in Amerika today.

You know I really needed to get this down on cyber-paper, if only to remind myself what I really think about the state of the political debate today. Fear not fair readers I have once again talked myself out of reentering the world politics, they just don't make enough soap to wash off those stubborn slime stains.

Sky Watching: the Leonid meteor shower peaks tonight.

Vote!

I want to encourage you to make a wise and thoughtful decision today to vote. I am not advocating going to the polls because it is your civic duty or your democratic right. Rather I would ask that you seriously ponder whether your old congressman, senator or governor really is good for your city, state or nation because of what they have not done for all of us in the past. Also, if you are leaning to a non-incumbent candidate--are you really convinced they will do any better?

Why not start now -- today! Say no to old time politics, say no to the left, no to the right and cast your vote for real change. Vote for a third party. Any third party is okay by me.

I mean it, staying home is certainly an option when all the candidates disgust you, I get it. But I would ask that you go to the voting booth and cast a strong None of the Above vote by voting for a third party candidate. Make them count your vote. Let's hear it said time and time again -- no one got a majority of the vote -- the people need to say to the two major parties that they simply must do better or we will give our support to third party candidates until they do.

Biennial Political Rant

As regular readers know, I reserve the right to regale you with my third party rant every four years. Today I modify that imposition to once every two years. There was a great op-ed piece in the NYTimes about the potential for a third party candidate in 2012. I want to quote extensively from that article but first let me just say to my Tea Party relatives and friends:

"Don't chicken out at the last minute and vote for the republican because the evil democrat is just too far left to even consider having as your representative or senator."

To my left wing, liberal friends and olde college alumni -- ditto. That Palin clone on the right side of your ballot is really no more evil than the long term democrat living in the pockets of lobbyists and blue dog sentiments.

Remember my great and wise friend Bill, who hath said: "We all believe one party is evil and the other is stupid; all we are arguing about is which is which."

It's not too early to step up and say to the two parties: Neither! No! Not Again! And 2010 is a good year to try out the pulling of a third party lever. Just pick the third candidate in a congressional or senate race and give them your vote. It won't hurt that much and you will be sending a message to all your fellow voters that it really is time for a change, a big change. Let's start having the major parties win with 48% of the vote, then 45% then a couple of seats go to third party candidates. Come 2012 we can have a full fledged uprising and a third party candidate in the White House in our lifetime.

From the NYTimes article:

“We basically have two bankrupt parties bankrupting the country,” said the Stanford University political scientist Larry Diamond. Indeed, our two-party system is ossified; it lacks integrity and creativity and any sense of courage or high-aspiration in confronting our problems. We simply will not be able to do the things we need to do as a country to move forward “with all the vested interests that have accrued around these two parties,” added Diamond. “They cannot think about the overall public good and the longer term anymore because both parties are trapped in short-term, zero-sum calculations,” where each one’s gains are seen as the other’s losses.

We have to rip open this two-party duopoly and have it challenged by a serious third party that will talk about education reform, without worrying about offending unions; financial reform, without worrying about losing donations from Wall Street; corporate tax reductions to stimulate jobs, without worrying about offending the far left; energy and climate reform, without worrying about offending the far right and coal-state Democrats; and proper health care reform, without worrying about offending insurers and drug companies.

“If competition is good for our economy,” asks Diamond, “why isn’t it good for our politics?”

We need a third party on the stage of the next presidential debate to look Americans in the eye and say: “These two parties are lying to you. They can’t tell you the truth because they are each trapped in decades of special interests. I am not going to tell you what you want to hear. I am going to tell you what you need to hear."

$150 Million Dollar Governor

California politics are always interesting. They do things bigger, better, dumb and dumber out here on the edge. Right now for instance the former governor ('75-'83) and frequent presidential candidate ('76, '80, '92) Jerry Brown is running for one of his old jobs again. Jerry wants to be the Once and Future Governor. He is currently the Attorney General of California and has been the Mayor of Oakland, the chairman of the California Democratic Party and a candidate for U.S. Senate. He is remembered fondly and otherwise as "Governor Moonbeam", which had something to do with proposing a state owned communications satellite and dating Linda Ronstadt. 

So you might say this election is Moonbeam vs. Moneybags. You see Brown's opponent is former CEO of eBay, Meg Whitman. Last week Ms. Whitman became the highest personally financed candidate in U.S. history. She has now officially spent $119 million dollars on her own campaign. Extrapolated through the November election, she will easily top $150,000,000 in out-of-pocket expenses in her attempt to become the governor of California.

Now I acknowledge that all politicians have fairly hefty egos. The psychological factors behind running for public office would make Sigmund spin in his coffin, but what on earth would make someone want to be the head of a bankrupt state with a shrinking population, failing schools.... well you know the laundry list. On top of that, not only is Meg Whitman running to head up this disaster, she is spending one hundred and fifty million dollars of her own money to get the job.

Yes there is another argument to be made about internet multi-millionaires. Did eBay actually need to give her hundreds of millions of dollars for merely staying out of the way of that internet juggernaut, they did - well actually as CEO, she did. Now she wants to spend part of that cyber-wealth to be governor, I mean make a list of all the things you would or could do with a couple of hundred million dollars, where does politician fall in your rankings? Doesn't wanting to buy this office make you supremely unqualified to manage the California State budget?

Ah well, it is nice being back in California. You just have to be really quick with the mute button or you might actually have to listen to these egomaniacal millionaires tell you that they really care. Well that really isn't fair because her ads are not about her accomplishments or her proposed programs, nope -- the Meg Whitman ads are all attacks on Jerry Brown, including one where she uses a '92 Bill Clinton clip from a presidential debate with Brown. Such dirty politics in California may be the single largest drain on the State's water supply because every time they run an ad, we all want to take a shower. My solution - bring back the 'None of the Above' voting option.

By the way the the book cover up top is a parody, she really did co-author a book called: The Power of Money with the subtitle: Values for Success in Business and in Life. Values something else Meg Whitman and I do not share, that and a hundred and fifty million dollars worth of hot, dirty air.

You Say You Want a Revolution

The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions, that I wish it to be always kept alive. It will often be exercised when wrong, but better so than not to be exercised at all. I like a little rebellion now and then. It is like a storm in the atmosphere.    
                                                                    -Thomas Jefferson


Nope not a Tea Party fan here. I have stopped calling them tea baggers because of Bill, oops I did it again - nevermind. I am not a fan but I completely relate to their feelings of being disenfrancised and so should everyone of my generation. Remember the resistance of the great silent majority to the "revolution" of the 60s, you remember the one born of drugs, sex, rock & roll and then fueled by the war in Vietnam. There was simply mindless opposition to what was being said. Change was an evil word.

Now I will admit that the opposition to the Tea Party rhetoric is more articulate today and the opposition holds both the White House and the Congress. The Johnson and Nixon administrations had all the power around Vietnam until we took it away from them.

How did that happen?

Recruitment, which is precisely what the Tea Party movement must continue to do. Winning a couple of seats in November from a few old, worn political soft targets won't do it. Any revolution that seeks to overturn the current order without burning it down must have a strong, vocal base. Wacko speeches and thinly veiled conspiracy theories won't reach enough of the disgusted voters who may be sympathetic to the emerging platform of the Tea Party.

Many on the left and in the middle thought that Obama was going to be like a little rebellion now and then, clearly they were wrong. Sorry friends but I did tell you. Yes I know "only two years" and "Bush left the financial mess" and "worldwide economic downturn" but the left wing talking heads on CNN are just as much talking point mimes as are the Fox News naysayers. We've been through one revolution, how was that for you? I mean compared to today . . . Yes, you can work within the system, if the system works.

I'm not sure if the Tea Party will ever be the storm in the atmosphere that Jefferson was referring to but I, like most of you, feel the days of slow gentle rains are not going to cut it anymore. What we need is another good cleansing tsunami.
---
art: Barry Blitt-NYTimes

Facts, Family and Distortions

Parts of my far flung family have been reconnected via several social networks and while keeping up with the relatives adds some flavor and spice to life, there is the matter of conflicting politics. In particular, what passes for truth. Now there have got to be several hundred quotes about truth and politics repelling each other like opposite poled magnets. Just turn on any news talk show (Fox, CNN, MSNBC, LSMFT), the plot goes like this. The anchor names a topic. A question is asked to the talking head from one side. They respond not to the question but with a talking point, which attacks the other side. Anchor steps in asks for a response from the other "guest", who then does their own talking point counter attack. To this point nothing has been said about the actual topic. The gritty anchor then offers up another question that can only be addressed with a fact, which let's the audience know we have now moved into phase two which means we are about to hear a huge distortion of reality, not fiction but distortion. But let me clarify a bit for those not used to logical, empirical debate.

Fact: The sun rises in the east.

Actually "sun" is a label by which we mean the large yellow star around which the solar system we inhabit more or less revolves. "Rises" is also inaccurate since the sun itself is stationary with regards this planet we ride upon. So, in fact, the rotation of the planet and the orbit around the "sun" causes what appears to be a "rising" of the "sun" each morning. Of course, it is the "sun" causing the morning and not the morning heralding the "rising." Finally, "east" is another construct we have created to mean "over there" or "that way." What is "true" is that if you stand facing the arbitrary direction we call west, you won't see the illusion of sun coming up. So as qualified as it is, there is at least some discernible truth in the statement: The sun rises in the east.

On the other hand, what politicians, talking heads and unfortunately many citizens, including my relatives state as "truth" is in fact opinion generally based on "distortions" of the truth. For instance:

Distortion: They want to build a mosque at ground zero.

"They" want to exercise their property rights to build within all the local codes. Fact

It isn't a "mosque", it is a community center. Distortion

"Ground Zero" is near Alamogordo, New Mexico where the first nuclear explosion in history took place. Japan also has a fairly strong claim to not one but two "ground zeroes." In New York City, the former site of the World Trade Center is several city blocks from the proposed community center. You need a map to find it and once you did, you would have no idea you were anywhere near the current construction site. Distortion.

When I as in Oklahoma City, we visited the memorial to the domestic terrorist bombing. My reaction was not meant to be cynical but honest. I thought that if they built a memorial to every attack in Israel the entire country would be one big memorial and since you can't allow people to live on such hallowed ground, the Middle East problem would be solved. Israel would be one big memorial to human hatred. Guess I am not an advocate of memorials to terrorism, doesn't it just encourage them to commit more acts of violence so they can be memorialized?

Now there are some other WTC/mosque distortions as well. Not all of those opposing the building are bigots. Fact. Some of them are. Fact. But generalizations are generally soft facts. You know like there actually were some African Americans who voted for John McCain, which proves nothing other then human beings have free will. But let's look at some hard facts that don't seem to be useful to either side of this false debate.

The World Trade Center terrorists were all males. Well we can't really condemn 49.4% of the planet's population, even thought they do start all the wars and commit 93% of the murders, 99.9% of the rapes and cause 99.4% of the urine splatters in public restrooms.

The World Trade Center terrorists were all citizens of Saudi Arabia. Now there' s a nice big fact that no one really wants to look at. There are 1.5 Billion muslims in the world but only 25 Million Saudis. So why the focus on the religion and not the country of origin? Best estimate of the number of members of Al -Qaeda, you know the group that actually admitted to being behind the WTC attack - best guess at the high end is perhaps 150 Thousand members. Seems like a better investigatory or military strategy to focus on 150,000 instead of 1,500,000,000. But that's a number thing and you know how numbers tend to be all factual & focused.

Today's conclusion. Think for yourself, whether you are on the right, left or middle. Stop quoting politicians to me, it simply cannot be true that "your guys" are truthful and honest and the "other guys" are liars, socialists are fascists. It can't be true because I have friends and relatives on the "other side" who send me internet propaganda that says exactly the opposite of what you send me. Its called free and open debate but I am really only interested in what you have to say, not what some paid talking head as vomited up in a sound byte.

Pass the chocolate and don't forget to take your meds before the family reunion.

Not My Father's Blog

At a backyard barbeque I was introduced to a nervous lady this way.

"Here, if anyone can cure your blogger's block, this is the guy."

She was the typical failed blogger. One post six months ago announcing her intention to fill her generic blog with wit, humor and deep insight into the condition of humankind. One borderline interesting, if rambling post the next day. A follow-up post a week later confessing to be too busy to blog. An additional post in each of the next two months further lamenting her lack of time and suggesting that the local city council may be a nest of communists or perhaps closet anarchists -- details to follow. Eventually she delivered the stereotypical blog apology to her massive audience of one. She is shrouded in guilt for not writing and has exactly nothing to write about, save not writing.

I put on my best shrink demeanor and gave her my absolute top of the line advice:

"Don't write, don't blog, don't even open the site. Don't even think about blogging, not for one single moment."

The point is that blogging should not be about pressure. Blog writing is the furthest activity from a 'to do' list that humanoids have ever invented. If you have something to write, I told her, it will arrive fully formed and it will simply flow thru the keyboard and disgorge your wisdom to the multiverse.

She looked at me like I had made some graphic observation about her alimentary canal. Apparently she is one of those people who believe since everyone knows how to write, then it follows that everyone is a writer. I restrained an avuncular "Bite Me!" and moved on to the next gaggle of cocktail drinkers as the first round of braised cow rose from the grill.

Another guest had overheard the blog conversation and told me that not only was the reluctant blogger uptight about just about everything on the planet but her 82 yr. old father was an avid bird watcher and faithfully maintains a birders blog, which he updates several times a week. Aha! Paternal blog envy, got it.

As I drifted past the potato salad and ambrosia I wonder what my father's blog might have looked like. Reminiscences certainly would have brought up the Great Depression and later his service as a junior naval officer in the pacific during WWII. Nearly 30 years in the Dexter Pharmacy would have made for some interesting personality profiles, I know the pharmacy is still the set & setting in some of my dreams.

Politics! Now that would have been fun. We could have written dueling blogs in the late 60s and early 70s. We never saw eye to eye on anything political, but fleshing out our differences in writing would have been an interesting experience.

Late in the party the aforementioned birding father arrived home, until that time I was unaware the nervous non-blogger was also our hostess. Bird dad and I were introduced and we exchanged some thoughts on blogging, widgets and other blogger ephemera. We exchanged URLs and then he said:

"If you mention me in your blog......"

I completed his thought . . . "don't link you up."

"Exactly" he smiled.

Some bloggers like an audience. Others write for a small select group of followers, in Jack's case his birding group. Me?  I like an audience. Agree with me or disagree loudly please, but Read Me! Read Me!

p.s. for the poker boyz -- the plant's name was Audrey II not Seymour.

Stuck in the Past

After today's post, I am going to move on from the topic of war and causes of war. But I want to offer and ponder one more aspect of war and terrorism in our time.

A few days ago I was reading a piece in The Atlantic by a reporter who had an ongoing relationship with a Hamas leader. The article was a mixture of ode and homage to the man who had recently been killed by a bomb dropped on his home in a refugee camp. This highly articulate man with a "bigoted worldview" had written his master's thesis on martyrdom and had sent one of his sons to his death as a suicide bomber. With all of the contradictions of east versus west, Israel versus Palestine, haves versus have nots; what came clearly to the writer and to me was this leader's "fatal obsession with the past."

How does anyone get beyond horrors that are inflicted upon them by others? Some are able to forgive, often as a sign of faith. But hundreds of intra-tribal conflicts simmer or rage around the world from the Middle East to East Timor, the Congo, Sri Lanka and certainly Afghanistan and Iraq. How do cultures, tribes, countries and races move beyond the mire of blood-stained history?

I don't have the answer but I strongly sense that imposing democracy with combat soldiers and predator drones is not ever going to succeed. Foreign aid that mixes wheat, soy, rice and C4 explosive is unlikely to win the hearts and minds of any population. Particularly when that population is itself divided by hundreds even thousands of years of racial and tribal hatreds.

Yes, I suppose we must keep on trying but killing one segment of the population seems to align us more with the dark side and not with the international rhetoric of peace we spout to the media. History teaches us that violent suppression does not work, never has and never will. So we must stop. The only way to truly give peace a chance is for the strongest military power on the planet to renounce the use of war as an instrument of foreign policy.

Have You Listened to the Other Side Lately?

I have mentioned before that these days I have a much more politically diverse group of friends then I had a decade or three ago. This means that I get email forwarded from all sides of the political spectrum. My usual response is to fire back some sobering historical fact or debunking statistic whether I am responding to liberal or conservative propaganda.

Periodically I file some of these items away for future use or further dissection. Today in the wake of three consecutive anti-war and some might say anti-government posts, I want to paraphrase a few examples that might make everyone ponder their political position whether left, right, middle or other.

* In the early 60's Secretary of State Dean Rusk was in France when President Charles DeGaulle made another of his often repeated threats to pull France out of NATO. He told Rusk that he wanted all US military out of France.

To which Rusk responded: "Even those buried here?"

**More recently, Colin Powell was asked by the Archbishop of Canterbury if George Bush was not practicing more American empire building in Iraq.

General and then Secretary of State Powell responded: "Over the years, the United States has sent many of its fine young men and women into great peril to fight for freedom. The only amount of land we have ever asked for in return was just enough to bury those that did not return."

***At a International conference of naval officers, a French admiral noted that European citizens learn more than one language, yet "Why is it that we always have to speak English at these events?"

A U.S. admiral quickly said: "Perhaps its because the Brits, Canadians, Aussies and Americans arranged it so you wouldn't have to speak German."

Now don't going running to Snopes to verify these little stories, they are clearly metaphors that serve as a reminder that no policy, foreign or domestic, is all good or completely evil and that a wider perspective is something sorely lacking on all sides of nearly every political debate.

I remind you once again of my favorite quote that really was said by someone I know. I was there for the first utterance and can historically verify its accuracy.

"We all agree that one political party is stupid and the other is evil; all we are debating is which is which."

What Is It Good For?

War!

What is it good for?

Absolutely nothing.

Say it again.

-Edwin Starr

Several months ago I wrote a short piece voicing my opposition to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The very first response I got to that post was: "Would you say more about your position?" This is the first of three or four posts on the subject of war, opposition to war and the dark reaches of the American psyche that still resonate from the war that nearly destroyed us -- Vietnam.

My first point is also my primary thesis for everything that follows on the subject. War as we know today flows from the experiences in the 20th century. History, in this case, is a horrible guide to current international relations. It matters not that General Patton studied the military tactics of the Romans and Greeks, this is not World War II. Today any serious reflection on the conduct of human relations must come to the contemporary conclusion that war as an instrument of national politics is obsolete.

War is obsolete.

Not that history is a useless guide but what we learn from and what we take with us into the future are critical decisions. My parochial school education taught me that for every christian martyred by the romans another three converted to the fledging sect of christianity. Today the madrasah that indoctrinate radical islamists find their young converts in backwash of western alliance military activities. Over seven years of occupation of Iraq simply provides too many opportunities for citizens of that country to turn against the U.S. Even if you hated Saddam and welcomed the liberation of 2003, over the ensuing years your neighbor is shot, your daughter is searched on the street by soldiers, your infrastructure is not rebuilt and foreign troops patrol your country. Your heart and your mind change.

I do not blame Barack Obama nor either George Bush. I blame history. I can only imagine, but I can imagine it vividly, the first time the joint chiefs of staff briefed the new president. The new president who spent 8 years in the Illinois legislature and 4 years in the U.S. Senate must have been overwhelmed at what the U.S. presence in Afghanistan was holding back. Hundreds of suicide bombers and dozens of dirty bomb plots hatched by Al-Qaeda were going to rain down on the west without a continuing war against terrorism in Afghanistan. Iraq perhaps is more a war of the western hubris that we can and should impose democracy on those backward middle-east countries and their oil reserves. 

In either case the problem is blindly following a failed course of history. War stopped Germany and war stopped Japan but since then no country has risen up to attempt to conquer the world. Terrorism cannot be defeated with historically warlike tactics. The western world should and must present a cultural shining example of what peace can mean in a post-industrial society. An vibrant example of what society can be is what will win the hearts and minds of those seeking freedom. Instead we use bullets and predator drones to kill those who with justification believe we are trying to conquer them for our gain.

Are they right? Well of course they are and of course they are not. There is no overarching governmental policy that drives those opposed to "Amerika". But we are the wealthiest, most successful nation in human history. We can have a clear, articulate policy towards the rest of the world, that policy should begin with the words: "We have made mistakes in the past." But we wish to change the course of our historical path and we invite others to join us in this historic opportunity to abandon war and embrace peace.

Of course not everyone will come along. Of course not everyone will forgive us for past transgressions but that is no reason to compound our historical mistakes and create even more enemies. Declare our current foreign policy bankrupt. Envision change -- c-h-a-n-g-e, where have we heard that before?

To those who find this proposal naive, to those who find the words: Give Peace a Chance absurd. I would like to ask: Just how long do you think you get to prove your path of death and destruction will win out? The lessons of history are clear, when it doesn't work you stop or your culture and your country will collapse. It takes some time to turn the ship of state away from a course founded in worn out principals, but we simply have to begin and no nation on earth can make these changes except the United States of America.

The first step -- bring all of the troops home now.