What Would Jed Bartlett Have to Say About Arizona?

The recent attention on the Arizona state legislature and the abhorrent attempt by both local and national religious organizations to hide their bigotry and intolerance behind some bizarre interpretation of biblical commandment brought to mind Jed Bartlett's dismantling of a religious right radio talk show host on election night. For those inclined to find justification for your hatred and intolerance in biblical verse give a listen and have at it.

 

Barack Obama's Greatest Achievement

Presidential historians may well record that it was during the fall and winter of the first year of his second term that Barack Obama achieved his greatest accomplishment: destroying his legacy, paving the way for Republican control of both houses of Congress, almost guaranteeing that a Republican -- and likely an ideologically extreme Republican -- will ascend to the Presidency and, worst of all, making Ted Cruz credible. Indeed, the possibility exists -- however previously unimaginable and horrifying -- that there may be confluence of the rise in Cruz' credibility and the ascendency to the White House all as a result of Barack Obama's grande débâcle.

It was just a few weeks ago -- six to be precise -- that we were in the midst of a government shutdown which had been brought on by the Republican Party's own grand debacle, a seemingly misguided and miscalculated attempt to hold the government and economy hostage to force a repeal of the Affordable Care Act. At the heart of the effort was Ted Cruz who evolved during the shutdown to a laughing stock and tagline to jokes on late night television. Polls showed support of the GOP to be at an all time low. The public and, in fact, most of the world affected by the  instability of the US economy, stood with the President and, when the shutdown ended, applauded his handling of the situation while at the same time continuing to castigate the Republican party for pushing the world economy to the brink of collapse. When the shutdown was over it was Obama who stood tallest. The GOP was on the run and its chances of holding the House let alone securing any seats in the Senate at the upcoming mid-term elections on very shaky ground. Just six weeks ago it was the Democratic party which stood to gain the most from the "Shutdown of 2013", its chances of taking the House and increasing its majority in the Senate surely enhanced by the Republican Party's track to the darkside. 

Now six weeks later, all of that momentum, all of that good will, all of the credibility that fell into the lap of the President and the Democratic Party is gone and with it, I fear, any chance of the party gaining control of the government and ending, once and for all, the gridlock which has paralyzed the government and rendered governing nearly impossible. The details of the mishandling of the rollout of the The Affordable Care Act -- Obamacare -- are too numerous to recount for the purposes of this post. What is worth recounting, however, is the depth of the wound that the President has inflicted on himself as a result of his several mis-steps, a wound, I fear, which may be fatal to his Presidency and his legacy. Joe Nocera, in an Op-Ed piece appearing in today's New York Times "Obama's Bay of Pigs" analogizes Obama's mis-handling of the ACA roll out to Kennedy's handling of the ill-conceived and executed invasion of Cuba at the Bay of Pigs in 1961. The analogy, with due respect, does not hold. The plans to invade Cuba were already on Kennedy's desk when he took over the Oval Office in January 1961 and while he certainly had the authority to abort the mission, Kennedy, without experience or context for managing a military operation of this magnitude, chose instead to put his faith in his military and civilian advisors much to his regret. It was that experience as well as his having been in office for more than two years that allowed him to make the measured judgments which avoided a nuclear holocaust in April 1963. That growth would certainly have continued into a second Kennedy term.  

By contrast, the Affordable Care Act and its implementation are all Obama. Unlike Kennedy, Barack Obama  is already in his second term. The time for the type of mis-steps he has made (and is continuing to make) are long past and would more easily be forgiven had they occurred during his first term. That is not to say that he learned nothing from the political battles fought during the first four plus years of his Presidency. Indeed, his handling of the government shutdown would likely not have been so successful had he not spent so much of his tenure working his way around political land mines planted across the Washington landscape.  The nearly unified cries of the Tea Party and its Republican acolytes that the ACA was a disaster waiting to happen and in need of repeal before it began to affect millions of Americans were adeptly challenged by a President who stood on the moral high ground, imbued with the credibility built over months of having stood his ground against political forces that were increasingly viewed as extremist and out of touch with the majority of the American people. Rather than succumbing to Republican warnings about the disaster which was about to befall the nation, the majority of Americans believed in and stood by a President who assured them that their lives would be improved by the implementation of the ACA, that no one would lose their health insurance coverage and touting, as well, the ease with which it would be possible to shop for and acquire health insurance under the Act.

As we know, many of those pronouncements have turned out to not be true, at least in the short run. That the ACA, from a conceptual standpoint, has the potential to vastly improve the delivery of health care to millions of Americans is lost in the firestorm which has enveloped the Obama administration and the President himself. Much of what Obama said -- and said repeatedly -- has proven not to be accurate. As it has turned out, the Act does not allow a certain percentage of Americans to keep their existing coverage and actually provides for Draconian measures (i.e. the issuance of cancellation notices) to enforce its goal of ensuring that everyone has a health insurance policy that satisfies government standards. It was that very fact that the GOP warned about in their pre- and intra-shutdown rantings. That considerable blunder, together with the failed implementation of the ACA website has turned what should have been a crowning achievement that would stand as a testament to political will into a crowning disaster that should provide academia with curricula about how not to govern for years to come.

As a result, the Republican Party now seems positioned to supplant the President as the protectors of the people's interests. That Ted Cruz, of all people, may have more credibility that Barack Obama is simply astonishing. Concessions of mistakes and mis-statements by the President can and will do nothing to quell the storm brewing above his Presidency. So much of governing is about trust and credibility and if both are lost so too is the ability to lead. Unlike John Kennedy who, it was expected, would have the benefit of time to hone governing skills that were already producing impressive results by November 1963, Barack Obama does not have the luxury of time. Good will squandered is good will lost and possibly lost forever. I feel a bit adrift and let down. 

The Fix is In

Essential to making the Affordable Care Act affordable is that a significant percentage of those in need of coverage subscribe to the plans offered through the Act's insurance exchanges. By including in large numbers healthy people who will rarely if ever seek medical care beyond a routine check up with people, either because of pre-existing conditions or simply because they become ill and therefore in need of more frequent and costly care the cost will average out in such a way as to allow the exchanges to provide coverage at rates significantly below private coverage. The costs attendant to providing care should also be driven down through a variety of strategies (electronic medical record keeping and ACOs, for example) but at its core it is through this basic strategy that the true affordability of medical insurance coverage becomes possible. 

It is, however, that very simple concept that makes the strategy most vulnerable to failure and it is to that basic concept that Republicans, and in particular, the extremists in the party and their benefactors have directed their strategy. Through a multi-pronged campaign that intentionally lies about the Act...that it will kill jobs, drive up taxes, take life and death decisions away from the individual and hand it to the State, strip hard working Americans of their preferred insurance coverage...the goal has been to so frighten potential enrollees so that they won't enroll. If they are successful, the enrollment numbers will be too low for the Act to realize its potential benefits giving the Tea Party evidence that their predictions were correct and the Act an abject failure that needs to be repealed. That the Act failed  because it was intentionally sabotaged by the very people who will so gleefully take credit for their having been so correct in their predictions will, of course, be lost in the discourse that will ensue. 

To this point the strategy would seem to be working to perfection. With the exception of Kentucky no southern state has created exchanges leaving it to the Federal government to take responsibility for creating and operating the exchanges. Faced with such a well-funded campaign of lies and deceit, the government's chances of success, at least at this point, would seem remote. Compounding the problem for vast populations of people with a genuine need for help is that these same states have refused to expand Medicaid to provide assistance to those who are trapped in a government subsidy nether world because they are at the upper income levels of what constitutes poverty and, by those states' statutes therefore not entitled to Medicaid (again because the States refused to expand Mediciaid to accommodate these people). 

It is a political game to be sure in which literally millions of people, many though not all, poor and minority, are being used as pawns by the extremist wing of the Republican Party to supposedly make a philosophical point. What that point is remains as elusive as does the way out of this mess. In the meantime people in desperate need of help go without. 

The Legal and Moral Authority to Act

By now it should be apparent that a critical part of the thinking of House Republicans standing in the way of re-opening the government and raising the debt ceiling is the expectation that they will provoke the President into taking action under the Fourteenth Amendment that will provide a pretext for bringing impeachment proceedings and rid themselves of the Obama presidency. After all,  from the moment Joe Wilson of South Carolina yelled, "You lie" at the President during one of his early appearances before Congress, the more extreme factions of the party have made clear that they view Obama as a threat and want nothing more than to be rid of him.

Now comes the latest self-made crisis which they believe may finally push Obama to either act or not act and in doing so or failing to do so, again provide the pretext they have thirsted for to charge him with a "high crime" or misdemeanor. I preface what follows by acknowledging that this strategy is driven by some of the stupidest, most-ill-informed creatures ever to troll the halls of Congress. Add to it an extraordinary level of malevolence and a touch of violent rhetoric and you have just the right mix to further bring the country to a standstill while they pursue charges that, in virtually every courthouse and in the court of public opinion should not and would not see the light of day. 

So let's talk about the action they are praying for. The Fourteenth Amendment, section 4 reads in part: "The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned". The intent of the language is eloquently explained in Sean Wilentz' op ed piece which appeared in the New York Times on October 8th and is a must read for anyone interested in the history of the provision. What is clear is that the question of whether the language permits the President to act unilaterally to protect the constitution in circumstances which place the nation's sovereignty at risk remains open to debate. However, what Wilentz (and Bill Clinton, by the way)  argues and what I and many others agree with is that it is essential and fundamental to our very existence that the Constitution be protected at all political cost. The nation and now the world must be confident that we can and will stand behind our debt lest the government, as with any common borrower, lose its credit and with it it's ability to function.  In my view a failure to act, whether by the Congress or the executive, would place the Constitution and the government at risk and by that standard alone requires that someone...anyone...with the constitutional authority to act to act. If, as it appears, House Republicans are unwilling to act the President must and should.  If there be a firestorm of Protestant movement toward impeachment bring it on. 

It would, of course, be for the House to commence impeachment proceedings and it will certainly be frustrating and heartbreaking to be subjected to the incredibly stupid and ill-informed hyperbolic rambling a of the Tea Part acolytes conjuring up the "high crimes and misdemeanors" with which to charge the President. Saving the country from default? Now that is certainly a criminal act. Putting his name to legislation that was passed by both house of Congress and upheld by the Supreme Court that provides insurance for millions of Americans? Unquestionably a misdemeanor if not an outright felony according to those who have spent their political lives seeking ways to deprive the poor of even the basic necessities of life because those necessities had to be provided or subsidized by the government. 

And let's assume that the Bachmanns, Gohmerts and Kings of that world succeed in convincing their "friends" to go along with such a fiasco (and their track record, predicated on threats of reprisals is actually likely to succeed to gathering enough votes for the passage of an article or two of impeachment). What then? The trial is then conducted before the Senate, not the House, where a Democratic majority would end the charade before it began. 

The time to act is now. I am sick at heart of where we have come and frankly frightened of where we are headed. The legal and certainly the moral authority to act has never been more apparent and required. Our future as a nation may very weld depend upon it. 

What Do They Really Want?

“One faction of one party, in one house of Congress, in one branch of government doesn’t get to shut down the entire government just to refight the results of an election”.

A brilliantly concise summary of the problem confronting the country. What it seems to so eloquently suggest is that the forces driving this "one faction" are limited to an extreme fringe wing of the Republican party that can, with patience, be broken. The growing body of evidence suggests otherwise. As reported on the front page of the New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/06/us/a-federal-budget-crisis-months-in-the-planning.html?hp the strategy that led to the shutdown was born not by the lunatics who now stand in the well of Congress spewing into the Congressional Record nonsense about the dangers of the ACA but by their benefactors who have been planning the execution of this strategy for months. Most, though not all of the financing for the strategy has been provided by Koch Brothers whose resources are as limitless as their hatred for the President and the policies enacted on his watch. Precisely how far they and their cohorts are willing to go remains to be seen. The true test will come on October 17th when the debt ceiling requires adjustment. The ramifications of our failing to act, we are told, will be catastrophic to both the domestic and global economy and would, one would expect, cause the Koch brothers irreparable harm. I emphasize, "one would expect" because, to this point, the strategy appears nonplussed by the prospect of an economic calamity and the resulting impact on those like David and Charles Koch who, one would think, would be so damaged by the anticipated effect on the economy. Have the Koch boys "shorted" their interests so that they would actually benefit from a collapse of global markets? We  certainly seem to bystanders to a game of chicken playing out on a global stage that now has the feel of a runaway train running uncontrolled downhill with little chance to avoid the inevitable crash to come. One wonders if it is that crash which is precisely what the strategy contemplates.

The End of the American Experiment is Nigh

It is fundamental to every democracy that its participants express their views of how we should be governed by casting a single vote, counting those votes and deciding upon the form of government based upon how the majority of voters have cast their votes. If any democracy is to survive it is paramount that that very basic principle be applied and honored. If it is not so honored and so applied, notions of a democractic government can no longer apply. In its place is anarchy and those in control anarchists. Such has become the government of the United States. While I expect that we will eventually find our way through this current debacle, the paradigm has so shifted as a result of the conduct of the Republican party that I fear we will never return to the pure form of governance that was so essential to the American experience. It is no longer beyond the realm of possibility that the outcome of elections will no longer be honored by the loser and if that becomes the norm surely all is lost. To be clear, whether it is the ACA or the President that the Republican party refuses to accept, both were the product of a democractic process by which the majority of the voting populace expressed their opinions about how they wished to be governed. The ACA, in its current form, in fact, reflects the will of the people as expressed through the actions of all three branches of government: executive, legislative and judicial, the last coming by way of the a Supreme Court decision that upheld the constitutionality of the law. To be clear, again, it is the law of the land. The time to debate ended years ago. A Presidential election, in large part, was fought over the question of whether or not the people wanted the ACA to be the law of the land and, by an overwhelming majority made clear their preference that those among us who are without health insurance should have the opportunity for a healthier and safer life. It is no longer open to debate and it is the fact that the Republican party refuses to accept that outcome that poses the greatest threat to our democracy for if they are incapable of accepting the will of the people, as expressed through the vote of elected officials and through the vote of the supreme court of the land, then there is no reason to expect that the party of Lincoln will ever be counted upon again to accept the results of any vote with which they do not agree. If that be the case then we have truly stepped through the looking glass with no way home and to an uncertain future that may very well alter for the worse the very principles upon which we so long ago chose to govern.

Obamacare 1

I have paid close attention to the vitriol spewing forth from the likes of Ted Cruz, Mike Lee and the Louis Gohmerts of the House railing against the ACA and not once have I heard even a remote suggestion of how the law should be changed or what they propose should replace it. Millions of people go without health insurance or have access to meaningful healthcare. Seventeen percent of our GDP goes to healthcare to the ruin of our economy and beyond railing against the law not one offers a suggestion of what they propose in its stead. Part of their problem may be that the ACA, in its current form, is modeled after the last and only suggestion the GOP made throughout this debate. Rather than the universal healthcare plan endorsed by most Democrats and a significant number of prominent economists we have capitulation by House Democrats and the President to the plan proposed by the Republican leadership...the very plan they now condemn. Perhaps they are unable to offer an alternative idea because what we now have IS their best and only idea?!

In Search of Home

It is admittedly overly dramatic to say that as with the story of the Jews cast out by Pharoah and left to wander the desert, I, too, feel as though I have been wandering a spiritual desert in search of a comfortable place, existentially speaking, for my Jewish religious identity. Too often I have found myself standing amidst strangers chanting prayers which have no connection to my life and leaving each such attendance completely unfulfilled and caught between still wanting to find something with some relevance to my life and my ethical being and gradually coming to the conclusion that I would never find such a connection. This year we chose...finally...not to succumb to the numbing traditions of years past by attending yet another meaningless service conducted by a rabbi who does not speak to anything relevant to my life. Instead, we joined tens of thousands of Jews around the country and the world, attending both Rosh Hashanna and Yom Kippur services streamed online from Temple Beth Adam in Loveland, Ohio through ourjewishcommunity.org. For the first time in my life I have found a view of Judaism that finally and for once speaks to my view of religion and history, of an ethical foundation and of a relation to the world around me that in my nearly sixty years I've never once experienced. Thank you for bringing me home.

Open Letter to President Obama

Dear Mr. President,

I had hoped that with the passing of a few days since the debate and some additional time to reflect upon what transpired, I would feel better about your performance. Unfortunately, time has diminished neither my disappointment nor my anger. True, the campaign has begun to push back and to expose a number of the lies Mr. Romney conveyed during the debate and, damn, if it isn't cute how the campaign has made children and their parents fearful of losing Big Bird. However, there remains the very disquieting realization that you let millions of your supporters down, not because you had a bad night, but because you didn’t fight and simply did not have our backs.

Throughout the campaign to this point, I know you are aware of how much energy has gone into pushing back against the assorted lies that had become the mainstay of the Romney/Ryan campaign whether it was Medicare, the budget, Obamacare, the military or Israel. The list of mis-steps by Mr. Romney came fast and furious and every one of your supporters stood ready and willing to push back…to take issue with and, in doing so, expose the lie. The stage was yours to bring our efforts full circle; to make good on our efforts and, with the entire country watching (not simply your devout followers) expose the lies for what they are. The opportunities were plentiful. How many times, for example, did Mr. Romney accuse you of “cutting” $716 billion dollars from Medicare? While I understand that he was baiting you and that there was certainly time enough during the debate to respond, your ultimate silence left exposed so many who so pointedly took issue with the Romney/Ryan $716 billion mantra. With each passing lost opportunity to respond I could only think about Soledad O’Brien’s unrelenting reproachment of Tim Pawlenty over the issue. If that effort and every effort each of your supporters made on your behalf is to have any credibility it was for you to stand before the nation in the debate forum and put the issue to bed once and for all.

Instead, you stood silent while Mr. Romney not only continued to mis-represent and mis-stated the facts not only about you but about his own positions, but accused you of lying! How, on earth, do you allow yourself to become the poster boy for the “Big Lie” when it is and has never been the case.

An old high school friend of mine, Ken Grant, left the following post on Facebook in the quick aftermath of the debate:

Last night’s debate made me sick, literally. The GOP plan to reinvent Romney worked perfectly: 1) any plan you might have had in the last two years that was unpopular, simply deny that you ever had that plan. 2) any plan that Obama has that contains some popular elements, simply claim that your [new] plan has this too. What made this so infuriating was how easily it worked. Obama had the worst performance of his life and Lehrer was totally ineffective at calling anyone out on the facts. After the GOP convention they openly admitted that they weren't going to let their message be affected by the fact checkers. No truer words were spoken. (http://www.facebook.com/ken.w.grant)

If you lose this election…and you may very well…you will have no one to blame but yourself. You took a lead which was well-earned, but earned on the efforts of so many people who went to such great lengths to defend you and to expose Mr. Romney and you simply did not reciprocate. I can forgive a poor performance…we all have them. However, simply leaving your supporters to twist in the breeze (and that is exactly how it felt) cannot be forgiven. I wish it were otherwise. 

The Week in Review

An interesting five days have we just witnessed, noteworthy not only for the events of those days but for the response  (or curious lack of response) to those events. Two such responses, in particular, stand out.

First, on Tuesday we awaken to learn that Benjamin Netanyahu has chosen regime change as an Israeli strategy for its self-defense though in this instance it is not the regime of its enemies that he seeks to change but that of the government of the United States. Bibi, it seems, has grown tired of the Obama administration’s prudent and cautious approach to Iran and saw fit to use the opportunity of a fairly ordinary news conference to castigate the Obama administration for not providing him carte blanche authority to launch a pre-emptive strike against Iran in an unquestionably fruitless attempt to end the Iranian nuclear program. That the statement, made to an Israeli audience, was spoken in Bib’s nearly accentless English left no doubt about his intended audience – the American Jewish community and its renegade sponsors like Sheldon Adelson. In so doing, Mr. Netanyahu has clearly dropped any pretense of sitting on the sidelines waiting for the Adelson/Koch/Rove strategy to place a Republican in the White House and decided to take matters into his own hands by making a point that he knows will clearly stir the pot of conservative Jewish anxiety about a Black president with a Muslim-sounding name seeming to hold Israel’s fate in his hands.

Plainly stated, Mr. Netanyahu’s efforts are an outrage and an affront to this country, no less than the willingness of the Eqyptian and Lybian governments to remain mute while American interests are attacked to deadly affect.

And then there is Mitt Romney who somehow   has demonstrated an extraordinary ability to say the wrong thing at the wrong time. Putting aside the impropriety of his having commented upon a highly sensitive and explosive international crisis by criticizing the policy of the United States when a united front is needed, he offered those comments without having the facts and thus offered a critique that had no basis in reality. It is indeed remarkable that he finds it appropriate to make inappropriate comments upon issues he knows nothing about while offering the American people not a word about what his government would do to solve the problems which he claims have so damaged the nation. That he would think it appropriate to politicize the death of four Americans for his own political gain can only be viewed as a desperate attempt to reverse a course in his campaign for the White House that has gone astray. If nothing else, Mr. Romney’s performance either in or commenting upon the international stage has revealed one of his strengths…alienating our allies and undermining the interests of the United States.  Unfit to govern is the only way to describe Mr. Romney’s performance to date. The only thing more frightening about Mr. Romney’s performance is that it has had so little effect upon his standing in the polls.

Eastwood Redux

I suppose because the real Barack Obama was a less viable target for the Republican's aspiring to supplant him in 2012, the primary season bore witness to the creation of a "Straw Man" version of the President. Over and over again, from the mouths of everyone from Mitt Romney to Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum to Michelle Bachman, the candidates took turns blasting away at a President and a set of policies that did not and never had existed. Cheers rang the halls where stood the GOP aspirants as they pointed at the fictitious Barack Obama and condemned him for being a socialist, for being a "baby killer", for not being born in the United States, for being a Muslim who was secretly the leader of the Muslim Brotherhood and for conspiring to strip fine law abiding Americans of their right to carry a WMD in their pockets. Listening to this lunacy we took solace in the expectation that because so many of these candidates were playing to the lunatic political fringes of our society, the hyperbole would quiet once a candidate emerged and the true campaign started. Boy were we wrong.

Not only did the "Straw Man" version of Barack Obama not exit left, but he, in fact, became front and center at the recently completed Republican convention. Nothing could have more perfectly underscored the fear of the Republican party running against the real President and his real policies than the sight of Clint Eastwood speaking to an empty chair upon which sat an invisible President who, in much the same fashion that Michelle Bachmann and her cohorts lambasted the President during the primary season for all of his fictitious failings, was then lampooned by Mr. Eastwood much to the delight of the assembled hordes. The performance by Mr. Eastwood was not the actions of a doddering old fool. This is, after all, one of our leading movie makers and actors who continues to deliver some of the most powerful films of our day. No, Mr. Eastwood's performance perfectly encapsulated what has been apparent to anyone who is not part of the base to which this tragi-comedy is directed...that because the Republicans and Mr. Romney realize that they cannot take on an actual Barack Obama, they have to make one up and then expend tens of millions of dollars to convince the unconvinced that the fictitious Obama is real and the real Obama is fictitious. 

One can only hope that when Mr. Romney is forced to stand beside the actual Barack Obama and not the invisible, foul-mouthed one dragged onto the stage of the RNC convention by Mr. Eastwood,  that Mr. Romney will be forced to address the real President, his real policies and his real plans for the future. There are, without any doubt, questions...real questions...that should be asked an answered by the President about his policies and his plans. The American people are entitled to those answers, but so too is the electorate entitled to have a choice between two candidates who base their positions on the facts and in reality. To this point, Mr. Romney has not shown an willingness to deal with the facts and with the reality of those facts. One can only hope that the President will leave Mr. Romney no choice but to finally engage the real Barack Obama. 

Ungovernable II

What the Republican Party has done to this country is despicable. What the Democratic Party, including the President, has done in allowing the Republican Party to get away with its agenda is as despicable. Both parties are equally responsible for damaging if not outright ruining the lives of millions of Americans and should be held accountable. The Republican agenda is clear and quite publicly stated by many including most notably Mitch McConnell, the Senate Minority leader. Regardless of the damage inflicted, they have made clear that they will not permit the President to succeed. To that end, taking advantage of Senate rules that somehow, in clear denigration of the Constitution, did away with the filibuster rules, Republicans took turns announcing their intention to filibuster virtually every piece of legislation advanced by the Obama administration. For their part, rather than demanding that the Senator at issue actually filibuster in public by tying up Senate business spending days reading from a telephone book, Senate Democrats simply put their collective tails between their legs, looked at the numbers and concluded that were the threat to filibuster actually carried out they wouldn't have enough votes to end the strategy. Consequently with the threat alone,  in the comfort of their offices and out of public purview, Republicans, seemingly engaged in a macabre tag team wrestling match, took turns announcing their intention to filibuster thus ending any chance of any Obama-sponsored legislation getting passed  without ever having to carry through on their threat. Having barred Obama at the barn door, like a schoolyard bully, Republicans now blame Obama for failing to fulfill his promises. How many times during the recently completed convention did Republican speakers castigate the President for failing to fulfill his promises without once acknowledging not only that they were complicit in the failure but that it was central to their strategy. Meanwhile, despite their laughter at the conundrum they have successfully created for the President, millions of Americans suffer as pawns in a sick game of chicken. In any event, so goes the strategy which they have executed to horrific effect.

For their part, Democrats, at least until recently, had as big a set of balls as a Roman Eunuch when it came to pushing back against the Republican strategy. Recall that they were the party in power in 2008 having seized both houses as well as the White House and with a clear mandate to implement the policies which the public endorsed in the voting booth. What did we get instead? A President so intent to avoid any criticism that he was not making an effort to work with the Republican minority that he never realized until it was too late that the Repbulicans had no intention of cooperating on anything advocated by this President. The President's intentions, however good, nevertheless doomed much of what he hoped to accomplish (though he was able to accomplish much despite the Republican strategy) and set him on the a path toward possibly being a one-term President. For their part, House Democrats literally ran against many of Obama's policies, fearful that a stand with the President would result in their losing in the coming election. What they didn't realize or seem to understand is that the electorate, at least that part which actually demands facts and principles, does not and will not favor an elected official who doesn't have the guts to stand by his or her principles. Regrettably, Democrats never realized that the only thing they should have feared was their own loss of principle and for that transgression they were punished by an electorate that, at the time, was becoming enamored with the violent rhetoric of the Tea Party. The Democrats, and the President, fearful of taking a stand and telling Republicans to get on board or get out of the way, lost their way, leaving in their wake the disaster which masquerades as the federal government. 

If Mitt Romney is elected the Democrats will have no one to blame but themselves.

Apple Clearly Has a Short Memory

In his article, "Apple's Lawsuit Sent a Message to Google (Rich Karlgaard: Apple's Lawsuit Sent a Message to Google - WSJ.com:) Mr. Karlgaard argues, appropriately, I believe, that Apple's lawsuit against Samsung was, in truth, a proxy fight between Apple and Google. Curious that in touting its victory against Samsung that Apple ignores its own history. As Karlgaard notes, following Jobs' visit to Xerox' Palo Alto Research Center in 1979 he developed a machine and operating system that drew heavily on the Xerox model...windows, mouse...and the rest, as they say, is history. Point is that the way technology companies were able to advance their concepts and push what has become a revolution in technology was by sharing information and design and improving upon both. That's how Apple got the point we find it today; this is how Samsung has been able to achieve the results which led Apple to file suit.

'via Blog this'

Lady Liberty is Broken

As the Republican faithful gather in Tampa to nominate the Romney/Ryan ticket, it is astonishing to observe what has befallen the party of Lincoln and, in fact of Reagan. No longer is there a willingness to compromise and hence to govern. It is in fact now viewed as treasonous to their cause to even contemplate reaching consensus. No longer is there a willingness to listen to new ideas or opposing views, to be guided by facts, to be guided by basic principles of science, to even consider how or to what extent their philosophy for governing will affect tens of millions of Americans. Fundamental to the founding principles of this country are the words that adorn the Statue of Liberty, facing to the east and beckoning the world to take comfort in the protection of the United States and all that it stands for. "Give me your tired, your poor/Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free" The Republican party of today, dominated by some of the most extreme views since the Union was torn apart during the 1850s and '60s, has no interest in the tired or the poor or those who have lived under the heel of tyranny. Rather, the Republican Party of today is the party of intolerance, hatred and exclusion. The Republican Party has become the school yard bully, either espousing violence to gain the upper hand or not having the courage to stand up against violence and the fanatics who would threaten the very fundamental fabric of our democracy. They are a party of the gun, in both literal and figurative sense, unwilling to do anything to protect Americans from the explosion of gun violence that continues to sweep across the land and intent on holding a figurative gun to the head of the American people in order to push down their throats their vision of legitimate governing...the debt ceiling debacle being the latest and most dangerous example. This is the party that attracts people to its ranks who ridicule the disabled, for having the audacity to ask for help from the government in the form of healthcare reform;  this is the party that wants to rid the country of help for the poor in every form and help for the elderly in the last years of their lives. This is the party that denies women rights and equally standing, made emphatically clear by a perverse view that rape isn't so bad and then not surprisingly advocates positions that would rape both the land and our economy. This is the party that offers no solution for the tens of millions of people out of work and facing the loss of their homes other than to let them know that if they wait long enough, the huge tax breaks afforded the very rich will eventually make their way down to them without explaining how that will happen or why that strategy will work when it has never worked before.

Across the country, in every state and locality in which Republicans dominate, the theme is the same and provides a vivid example of the what this country will look like should they come to control the government. The poor will be cast off because local governments, already placed on the precipice of bankruptcy by a Republican dominated Congress which slashed federal subsidies to the states for social services, will be unable to provide the services they are already obligated to provide. Our infrastructure will continue to crumble because again the Republican-led Congress places a far higher premium on cutting taxes than providing the government with the resources needed to provide even the most rudimentary services. Our schools will continue to decline because, again, the states, faced with providing broad services to its citizens with limited resources, will not be able to support public education; and, of course, millions of Americans will go without medical insurance and thus be unable to afford basic health care.

Republicans, obviously tired of the "tired" and "poor" hope and pray that the downtrodden simply go away, perhaps hoping that if they stop providing the revenues necessary to provide the "huddled masses" with the basic necessities of life, they will simply die off and leave, in their wake, the utopian existence essential for the Republican philosophy to have any chance of success. What their increasingly extremist views do not seem to understand or acknowledge is that these people are not going away. These people are the very soul of this country and, having fought for the liberties that the Republican platform would so blithely strip from them, through their service and their work, they have every right...nay, a greater right to share in the nation's bounty and opportunity.

One can only trust that what we are witnessing is cyclical and will die of exposure to the light in the same fashion a vampire cannot stand the light of day.

Ungovernable

It is the essence of a constitutional democracy that all viewpoints are invited and considered. Representing hundreds of millions of individuals, it is expected, indeed required, that those persons elected to represent, consider not only their insular interests, but the interests of the population as a whole. Compromise, in this context, is a virtue and a requirement of a successful democracy, not a sign of weakness. Somewhere along the way, this concept not only lost it's central role but became anathema to the role government is to play in our lives. Indeed, in many Congressional districts, the word itself has become tantamount to a four-letter word to be hurled with the same vile contempt that many (often in these same districts) use to describe those ascribing to a progressive political view. Indeed, in many of these districts and the States in which they are situated, even the mention of a willingness to listen and consider an opposing view has garnered threats of political retaliation that all but guarantees months of abuse ultimately culminating in an electoral loss to someone more "pure" in his/her thinking.

Such is the world we now live in, brought to you by those who created the Tea Party and by their followers. So long as this extremist world view continues to dominate our political landscape (and there is no sign that this political terrorism will cease anytime soon) there is simply no chance that the principles underlying the Constitution...a vigorous democracy where all viewpoints are invited in order to arrive at a governing decision that provides for the well-being of the entire population...can and will be realized.

Bin Laden Getting the Last Laugh?

Say what you will about Bill Clinton's presidency, he managed to leave us with a budget surplus so flush that it was expected that by 2009 we would have no debt whatsoever. Since then, and more particularly as a result of George Bush' election and the attacks of September 11, 2001, that surplus has not only been squandered, but we have been driven to a multiple-trillion dollar deficit that has left us virtually unable to pay to run the government without help from the Chinese and Saudis. It is a popular notion, driven by Tea Party extremists (and their lackies in the more mainstream Republican party) that our current economic and political morass is the result of unrestrained spending by Barack Obama. Nothing could be further from the truth. Putting aside recriminations about Bush' negligence in committing us to an unnecessary war in Iraq, that venture, waged in purported response to the attacks of September 11th, started us on this inexorable march toward economic and political ruin that now consumes the nation. Viewing the surplus as a blank check, the Bush administration poured trillions of dollars into the Iraq war leaving virtually nothing left of the Clinton surplus. Compounding the erosion of our national savings, Bush, riding an early wave of popularity resulting from his "mission accomplished" proclamation, cut off revenues that would have offset the economic erosion he unleashed by enacting severe tax cuts for the wealthiest individuals and the largest corporations and then, of course, doing away with whatever modicum of regulation of the financial markets remained.

The current conflagration, unleashed by Tea Party Republicans, promises to dominate the discussion for months to come. It's roots, however, can clearly be traced to Bin Laden's vision of a smoldering World Trade Center. Congratulations to the Tea Party and it's followers. Even in death, you continue to give life to Bin Laden's goal of bringing the west, and in particular, the United States, to economic ruin. Osama Bin Laden would proud.

Osama Bin Laden is dead

This is becoming rather unseemly, don't you think? It's one thing for the President to announce that a Special Ops mission successfully - and finally - located Bin Laden and killed him. It's a whole other matter to be dancing in the streets, wildly celebrating a death no matter how vile the decedent. Not even the guardsmen protecting the Wicked Witch of the West continued to celebrate after handing Dorothy the witch's broom. Are we not better than this? Should we not to be measured as a society by how we respond to the killing of another human being? Is not the out-pouring taking place throughout the country precisely the type of public rejoicing often seen in the Arab world in response to a successful attack on western or Israeli interests that we are so quick to condemn? On some levels, I suppose, the nation's exuberance may be the result of a perceived unburdening of the chains thrust about our collective souls as a result of the events of September 11, but even were that the case, that exuberance has to be tempered with some degree of understanding that gaining revenge for a despicable act does not give license to relieving us of our moral imperatives.

Obama's Long-Form Birth Certificate Released - NYTimes.com

Why on God's green earth would Barack Obama accede to the utter stupidity surrounding his birth by releasing his birth certificate? Does he really believe that anyone who is stupid enough to buy into the conspiracy theories surrounding his birth would be satisfied by his releasing this information? The only thing that the release of this document has done is make Donald Trump actually look important. Instead of keeping Trump and the lunatic fringe at arm's length and simply paint them as detached from reality and not interested in the Country's well-being and the difficult issues we are facing. the release of the document actually legitimizes the discussion. To see the Times' coverage of the release click on the link that follows. Obama's Long-Form Birth Certificate Released - NYTimes.com.

This is a real head scratcher. Nothing gained but much lost.

Today's Commentary

The Middle East

While the uprisings which have swept across the region suggest a yearning by the populace for a real voice in their governance I can't help but wonder who or what is at the root of the discontent. One of the major failings of the war in Iraq was its having created an open invitation to Islamists to spread fundamentalism from Pakistan to Iran; that by removing Hussain we remove es the most viable obstacle to the spread of fundamentalist Islam through the region That invitation continues to be accepted wear speak.

Certainly a yearning for true democracy in the affected countries can only be a good thing for the region and our national interests. If, however, the movement which has swept across the region, swept Mubarek out office and threatens Assad in Syria and Abdullah in Jordan is simply a cover for a radical Muslim agenda then we are looking at a major shift of power that threatens our interests and, of course, threatens the very existence of Israel. Indeed even those espousing democratic ideals have already expressed their intention to dismantle whatever peace has been negotiated by the current government.

Case in point is the current engagement in Lybia. While ground forces have not been committed we and the rest of NATO have committed to suppressing Gaddafi's forces for supposed humanitarian reasons and while that cause may be well-intentioned the real and most direct beneficiaries are the so-called "rebels" who have been offering organized resistance to government forces. The problem, of course, threatens is that no one seems to know precisely who the revelation are or what their ultimate intentions are. Given that the bulk of the fighting has taken place in the region which produced the largest number of foreign fighters at work in Iraq it is likely that these rebels are fervently anti-US and anti-west.

It is a delicate balance facing Obama but through supposedly good intentions we may be very well be aiding the very cause which continues to threaten our interests.

Japan

As the Japanese people continue to struggle to recover from the earthquake and its aftermath, the response of this country to the disaster cannot go without comment. No, I'm not talking about the usual out-pouring of support, the donations to the often-suspect Red Cross, the albums cut so proceeds can be donated...Rather, I'm the the fact that so many people, famous or not, have seen fit to use this evolving disaster as the butt of their jokes. Whether its the idiot valley girl from UCLA who thought this the perfect time to unload her racist anger toward the Asian population and, in particular, the Japanese population in Los Angeles to Gilbert Gottfried to other twitter celebrities who have crawled out of the wood-work, like someone named, "50 Cent" to a Haley Barbour staffer to a writer for "Family Guy". What is it about dead Japanese bodies that spurs one to comic commentary or racist rant? None of these morons was alive in 1941 and, I dare say, knows anything about the Japanese role in World War II so what is it? I don't recall jokes about the disaster in Thailand and certainly not an unkind word was said about the Haitians who suffered through a disaster which continues to consume their lives. Certainly we can do better. Certainly we can aspire to a higher standard than that espoused by bottom feeders like Rush Limbaugh who takes joy in mocking the pain of others.

Thank You, Rush

Over the past several months, since President Obama's election, every time email arrived from MoveOn, PFAW or the Obama organization itself, asking for contributions to keep up the fight, I passively read and then deleted them without response. After months and months of increasing tension, worry and angst over the outcome of the 2008 election, I, and I suspect many people, were exhausted. Our goals had been met, the President, while seemingly everywhere and applying a full-court press to policy, seemed to have momentum and widespread support as he confronted the political and economic morass he had inherited. Things seemed so under control that there was simply no need to keep contributing. After all, with batteries re-charged there would be plenty of time to give anew as the mid-term elections and 2012 presidential elections approached.

Somewhere along the way, things changed and changed drastically. The last few months have revealed the very worst of what we are as a nation and what we can be. Having lost control of the discussion, seeing themselves marginalized and their base dwindling, hate-filled demagogues like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Sarah Palin, the "birther" movement, have decided that this is the time to make their stand and, to that end, have unleashed their minions on what otherwise should have been an intelligent, thoughtful discussion of health care and how to ensure no one is left unprotected. One can only imagine the self-satisfaction these "Americans" draw from watching a wheelchair-bound woman being shouted down and threatened for simply stating aloud that she is afraid of losing her insurance. One can only envision the shrug of shoulders when one of their "birther" minions kills a guard at the Holocaust museum to garner attention for his and their hatred of Barack Obama and all that he represents.

So while we are besieged with reports that Obama's speech to school-children telling them to work hard, stay in school and listen to their elders -- certainly all radical ideas -- will not be carried in schools throughout the country because extremist demagogues have complained of its socialist content, I can only respond with hardy congratulations and a big thank you to Rush, Sean, Sarah, Betsy and the "birther" boys. Thank you for reawakening the grass roots organization which pushed you to the brink of extinction. The next push will hopefully be the last. Enjoy the ride.