The “Fiscal Cliff”

Some Politicians are very adept at inventing phrases to describe particular issues or situations, especially when they prefer not to deal directly with those issues.   Unfortunately, those phrases often do more to hide the real issues than they do to describe them.  Take the phrase “fiscal cliff”, for instance.  While it clearly portrays an approaching crisis and an extreme solution for that crisis, it hides more than it reveals.  For instance, while it illustrates a steep fall we face if we do nothing about fiscal matters like taxes, tax reform, over-spending and on-going issues of government insurance for the elderly and the disabled (misnamed “entitlements”), it clearly does not illustrate the steep climb we face to get back into a balance of disciplined spending, effective regulation of business and labor, and adequate revenue to accomplish what must be accomplished.

Secondly, as is true of our two-party system, the phrase serves to narrow options to too few rather than too many.  Sequestration is certainly a great narrower of options; rigid ideology is a second culprit, and partisanship is a third culprit.  These narrow approaches lead us to fewer and fewer options for acting in a manner that will facilitate a balanced and effective approach to fiscal crisis and help us to climb that steep slope that exists even after a fall over the fiscal cliff. 

One example of a narrow option, that is really not an option, is GOP reluctance to cut the military budget.  Instead, Republicans want to raise it.  Some option!  Not a very smart approach to cutting government spending in a time of “fiscal crisis.”

Some of the narrow choices being ballyhooed include: raising effective or actual tax rates on the rich or cutting deductions for the rich; closing tax “loopholes” (no one has suggested which ones!); cutting or reforming “entitlements“; cutting many governmental “social” programs like food stamps, and returning several programs to the states (like Medicaid).  In addition, there are some who want a “balanced budget” amendment to the constitution to enforce fiscal discipline for all time.  Others talk of certain caps, one on annual spending, another on spending in relation to GDP. 

Of course, there are those who say: just let us all go over the fiscal cliff and then we will be forced to solve our “spending crisis.”  In the meantime, the recession will grow, unemployment will rise, austerity measures will be put in place, and the crisis will have metastasized beyond our ability to resolve it in reasonable ways.

What we need at this juncture is not a phrase that illustrates narrowed options and hidden agendas.  What we need is a vision of where we want to go in terms of principles and goals.  I have some thoughts and suggestions for such an approach, although I must admit that I do not have, nor ever expect to have, all the answers.  I simply want to suggest by this that there is another way to act than by narrowing options.  We must attempt to broaden perspectives and options for action.

1)   Revenue must be increased, not just from taxes, but from closing of tax loopholes: such as hedge fund tax breaks; tax incentives for certain depreciations claimed by businesses; tax breaks and subsidies for big business such as Oil companies. 
2)    No corporation should be able to get away with paying $0 in taxes; there must be a minimum corporate tax and a minimum tax for the richest individuals among us, unless we can actually do away with the very tax breaks that allow corporations and rich individuals not to have to pay at a rate that is reasonable.
3)   All entitlements and tax subsidies must be examined, and reformed or eliminated, depending on their demonstrated outcomes.  According to Sen. Bernie Sanders, the federal treasury is losing over $100 billion annually because the wealthy and large corporations are stashing their money in tax havens in the Cayman Islands and elsewhere.  We must pass real tax reform that ends this outrage. 
4)   The military cannot be exempted from budget cuts, but must find ways to eliminate outmoded weapons systems, close unneeded bases, and streamline private contracts based on demonstrated outcomes that are tied to money provided
5)    All three branches of government must be the first to reform, reduce and re-invent before any cuts are made to programs that benefit the middle class.  
Congress, in particular, must eliminate all entitlements that have been granted it through the years such as: special transport and free parking, extra health care by the military that is not available to other citizens, and the automatic cost-of-living increase in their pay, which is now about 3.4 times as much as the average worker earns. Members of Congress are also eligible for two types of retirement plans and a retirement health care plan, all of which are far more generous than benefits typically offered to private-sector workers (one research group estimates that fringe benefits alone are worth about $82,000 per year to a federal legislator).  Finally, Congress must permanently ban legislative earmarks when their temporary ban expires in 2013.  The Executive must consolidate departments and agencies that essentially accomplish similar objectives; the Judiciary must remove special privileges that accrue to them and no one else such as their own police force.  They must also give up lifetime tenure, a luxury at best.
6)    All grants and contracts, including foreign aid, must be based on demonstrated outcomes with monies assigned based on a goal plan to achieve those outcomes; an evaluation and assessment of every grant or contract plan by outside citizens or citizen-based groups could determine whether continued funding is warranted
7)    Citizen audit groups must be assigned to every inspector general’s office, to all congressional offices, to oversee all contracts with outside agencies; charged with reducing costs, assessing outcomes and recommending needed changes to  operations.
8)    All budgets must be based each year on zero-based funding and not on prior year funding.  An inflation rate shall not be included in any budget automatically, but must be justified with corresponding outcomes expected.
9)   Lobbying and lobbyists must face strong restrictions on their activities, and the sooner the better if we are to see needed reductions in the budget.According to USA Today, for every member of Congress, there are about 22 registered lobbyists who donate money, throw fundraisers and manipulate legislation to the benefit of corporations and interest groups.  Some of the most powerful lobbyists are former members of Congress, who form a "shadow Congress" that has more influence over current lawmakers than pressure from voters does.  
10) So-called “entitlements” must be dealt with, but not in the manner that conservatives favor, such as cutting them, privatizing them, or pushing them off to the states.  Government insurance programs are what entitlements happen to be  (rates or premiums are paid in by workers with the expectation that certain benefits and protections will accrue to them, such as social security as retirement insurance; Medicare as health insurance, Medicaid as long term care and disability insurance).  Essentially, the principle that should hold sway here is that these insurances must not be treated as something one must qualify for (entitlement), but as basic governmental insurance against the exigencies of age and disability and long-term care, and the losses that result.  Rather than always discussing means-testing, or age changes or arbitrary taxing rates, perhaps it makes sense to pay more attention to benefits, coverage and life expectancy (actuarial) tables. 

Thus, we have proposed ten principles.  Why must politicians continually narrow options to a few talking points or tired phrases rather than establish overall principles that need to be maintained and honored so that change is not unprincipled, and undisciplined?  Why can’t we solve problems within a framework of principles, goals, and standards that make sense?

After all, budgeting is not simply a matter of crunching numbers.  Too many in Congress believe that “across-the-board” cuts are inevitable, but they are also nonsensical because they don’t deal forthrightly with endemic problems.  Too many in Congress also believe that we can simply impose caps on spending; others believe that we can set an arbitrary cap related to something like the GDP.  Then, of course, there are those who truly believe that a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution will resolve all of our fiscal problems.  It will not; and in fact will create other problems: emergencies will not be able to be met quickly; some programs, such as food stamps, will have to be cut to keep the military budget bloated beyond its capacity.  In fact, a balanced budget amendment can be seen as nothing more than an austerity measure meant to reduce social programs in lieu of  reductions in other areas such as the military.  Crunching numbers - or simple mathematics - is not the best approach to a balanced budget, or to a humane and effective budget, for that matter.

And there’s the rub.  Budgeting is people-enabling; it is institution-supporting; it is problem-solving and need-meeting; it is patriotism personified and made real; it is democracy and representation indemnified.  It is much more than simply putting together pages of numbers that will add up. That is our main problem: that we allow the bamboozlers in Congress and in the media and elsewhere to lead us astray as to what we are talking about when we debate fiscal responsibilities. 

In his message attached to his 2013 Budget proposal, President Obama made clear that it is much more than numbers that he is presenting.  He declared:

“This Budget reflects my deep belief that we must rise to meet this moment--both for our economy and for the millions of Americans who have worked so hard to get ahead.
“We built this Budget around the idea that our country has always done best when everyone gets a fair shot, everyone does their fair share, and everyone plays by the same rules.  It rejects the “you’re on your own” economics that have led to a widening gap between the richest and poorest Americans that undermines both our belief in equal opportunity and the engine of our economic growth.  When the middle class is shrinking and families can no longer afford to buy the goods and services that businesses are selling, it drags down our entire economy. 
“The way to rebuild our economy and strengthen the middle class is to make sure that everyone in America gets a fair shot at success.”

Now we have heard similar words from our President in other contexts, but in this context, they matter even more than in a political campaign, for instance.  Why?  Because establishing a budget based on principles is much more important than political rhetoric.  It is “putting our money where our mouth is”; it is the equivalent to “walking the walk, not just “talking the talk.”  When money is put behind principle, it changes the dynamic immediately.  For instance, had the Peace Corps not been adequately funded, it would have remained just a seminal and principled idea.

Likewise, when we fail to fund something adequately, such as inspectors of food, or border patrol agents, or regulators of wall street firms or big banks, we reap negative consequences in real time and in real life.  Take the recent example of complaints from Republicans about adequate intelligence being unavailable to us when our embassy in Libya was attacked and four US citizens were killed, including the Ambassador.  It came to light that the people who were criticizing our Intelligence agencies were the very same people who had cut their budgets leading to fewer agents in the field!  You simply can’t have it both ways: you can’t expect adequacy in any area if you are not willing to pay adequately for it!

The same people who rail against entitlements and “welfare programs” (the “welfare state”) are those who support the rich in not having to pay their fair share and who provide welfare to the rich in the form of tax breaks, loopholes and subsidies.  In my opinion, they are the very same ones who reject the idea of budgeting based on positive principles, goals and outcomes.  So let us not be drawn into the narrow categories and rhetoric of the radical Right.  Instead, let us stand where we have always stood:  dedicated to the proposition, paraphrasing Lincoln’s words, that all people are created equal, that they are endowed with certain inalienable rights, and that government of the people, by the people and for the people is that which must not be allowed to perish from the earth.

Translated to today’s budgetary debates, it means using government policies, programs and budgets to enable all people to advance, not just in terms of income, but in terms of opportunity.  It means supporting and lifting up those who are beaten down by life’s exigencies, whether they be physically or mentally disabled or challenged.  It means establishing programs that address the needs of people so that they can not only advance their own cause, but can contribute to the welfare of the nation and of other persons. It means acting as though we are interdependent and mutually responsible for one another; as though we have a contract with each other to enhance other lives as we enhance our own; and not to think of ourselves as somehow more deserving or privileged, or independent from others because we have achieved success.  Success is not just an individual achievement, but an achievement contributed to by many helpful and caring people along the path to that success, even if they are merely clients or customers. 

Elitism is the bane of democracy.  Acquired special privileges are equal to rewards stolen from all those who contributed to success and who remain unrewarded.  Not paying one’s fair share of taxes is equivalent to robbing the poor to compensate the rich.  Castigating union laborers is equivalent to cutting off one’s nose to spite one’s face.  Our Commonweal cannot be sustained if we continue the principle of protecting the rich and successful despite all the obligations that riches place upon them:  “of him to whom much is given, much will be required”. 

Let the principles of shared responsibility prevail; and let the elitism of those who believe in special privileges for the successful be undone.  The “fiscal cliff” is the rhetoric of nay-sayers, the privileged and the uninspired.  It is the invention of the few to bamboozle and frighten the many.  It is a device for holding hostage and subduing government programs for the poor and middle class.  And “Sequestration” is the facile way out of a fiscal responsibility that demands evidence-gathering, reasoning, scientific method and principled planning, as well as some common sense!   It is time to approach budgeting from a new perspective, and that is the perspective of meeting the needs of 98% of the people, rather than accepting the narrow dictates of an elite 2% of the country whose primary concern is their success and their rewards.  

“Citizens United” Undermines Free Speech

“The Court's ruling effectively freed corporations and unions to spend money both on ‘electioneering communications’ and to directly advocate for the election or defeat of candidates (although not to contribute directly to candidates or political parties).” (Wikipedia).

In Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, it is clear that the majority argued that the First Amendment keeps the government from interfering in the "marketplace of ideas" and "rationing" speech, and that it is not up to legislatures or courts to create a sense of "fairness" by restricting speech.  Such hogwash!  Legislatures and courts restrict and regulate speech all the time.  For instance, try planning to foment an action that could be interpreted as terrorism.  Use face book or E-mail to communicate the plan with friends.  The Patriot Act will come into play and you will be arrested.  Try slandering your ex-spouse by calling him a child-abuser.  Will you be liable for slander and will he sue you for slanderous speech?  Is fairness involved?  Of course it is, as there always is in the finding of the courts against a plaintive or defendant in a slander trial, or hate speech trial or false advertising trial.  Try harassing someone by what you say or write. Think you can get away with it by pleading “free speech”?  Not likely. 

Speech is already restricted.  There is no such thing as completely free speech, because some forms of speech can lead to consequences that are criminal.  Take  a perpetrated scam for instance.  Try getting out of that particular criminal behavior by pleading innocence on the basis of free speech.  Think you can say anything you want to, even though it might harm someone else?  Think again.  You can’t yell “Fire” in a crowded theater if there is none. You can’t slander someone; you can’t scam someone; you can’t claim something for a product or a service that is patently false as in “false advertising.”  Try speaking malevolently about a group of people such as gay persons, or about an ethnic group such as Afro-Americans.  Hate speech is now restricted and penalties are in place.  Try malevolent speech aimed at harming a politician or an office-holder; you will risk being arrested even though you actually never carry out your threats. 

Oh, and try speaking on-line in any way you choose.  There are many websites that do not allow “inappropriate speech” and you risk being disengaged from that site if you insist on violating their restrictions or are reported as doing so.  Free speech?  I’m sorry.  Your free speech ends at the point where it impinges on someone else’s life in a harmful or distorted or abusive way.  “Free” speech is not unlimited speech or  unrestrained speech.  Justice and fairness are always being judged by legislatures and courts.  To say otherwise is simply fantasy.  And, the Supreme Court conservatives are full of such fantasy judgments.

The conservative majority challenged the reasoning in Austin vs. Michigan Chamber of Commerce  that the "distorting effect" of large corporate expenditures constituted a risk of corruption or the appearance of corruption. Rather, the conservative majority argued that the government has no place in determining whether large expenditures distorted an audience's perceptions, and that the type of "corruption" that might justify government controls on spending for speech had to relate to some form of "quid pro quo" transaction: "There is no such thing as too much speech."  Justice Stevens in his dissent argued that independent expenditures were sometimes a factor in gaining political access and concluded that large independent expenditures generate more influence than direct campaign contributions. Furthermore, Stevens argued that corporations could threaten Representatives and Senators with negative advertising to gain unprecedented leverage.

The conservative Justices apparently do not live in the modern world.  To even say that corporate expenditures do not have a risk of corruption or even the appearance of corruption is to believe that corporate money does not have a distorting power at all.  Yet, take a look at corporate advertising in TV commercials particularly.  TV commercials are rampant with psychological gambits that distort reality.  They are rife with claims that cannot be substantiated.  They are meant to persuade and cajole the viewer into a state of belief in what they are selling; what they fear most is that the viewer will not accept the corporate “pitch”.  TV commercials are intended to distort one’s own reality into the reality of the corporation doing the advertising.  They cajole, they distort, they lie, they pander, they tend to “corrupt” one’s own beliefs and principles and actions if they can in order to sell their service or their product.  One might even go so far as to say that corporate speech is all about corruption in the broadest sense:  a corrupting influence.  Corporate ads tend to influence one toward acceptance of a distortion of one’s reality in order to be able to sell us a product or a philosophy or a way of living.

Take cigarette advertising from our recent past.  It tried to make you want to smoke, not by lauding the contents of the cigarettes, but by distorting your own view of reality.  The tobacco industry sold much more than cigarettes; they sold a style of life; they sold sophistication; they sold a distorted reality that one could be considered to be like the Marlboro Man; they sold the idea that smoking was healthy and showed smoking doctors to prove it.  Cigarette advertisements, and their progenitors, were the epitome of distortion and corruption.  My mother died at age 52 from a cerebral hemorrhage because her life and her beliefs were corrupted and distorted by the tobacco industry.  She knew tobacco was not her friend; that it was contributing to her ill health.  But she still sent me to the store for a carton of cigarettes whenever she was running low (two packs left in the old carton).  She was addicted to tobacco because the industry sold her the lie that smoking was not injurious to health.  The conservative Supreme Court Justices have perhaps forgotten the corrupting influences of the tobacco industry who kept Congress, state legislatures, and even the courts “in line” with their lies and distortions by spending great amounts of corporate lobbying money until finally it all came to a conclusion that could no longer be hidden or ignored:  too many were dying of smoking-related causes, and scientific reality caught up to distorted reality.  

But somehow the conservative Justices missed the boat by arguing that corporate money does not corrupt the market place of ideas, or that governments should not decide whether large expenditures of money by corporations distort an audience’s perception, or that only a “quid pro quo” constitutes corruption, or that there is no such thing as too much speech.  Too bad they forgot all the legislation that resulted from the lies and distortions by the tobacco industry.  Too bad they forgot all the court decisions that shot down laws made under the influence of tobacco industry lobbying money that distorted reality.  Too bad they forgot the summary judgments issued by the courts against the tobacco companies for their lies and distortions.  Too much free and unfettered speech by means of corporate lobbying is worse than “quid pro quo” because it goes to the corruption of reality, beliefs and principles of sound living.  Free and unfettered speech can destroy as well as preserve or innovate.  It is the mission of the legislatures and the Courts to determine which is which, as they finally did with the curtailing of false advertising by Big Tobacco. 

Fortunately, Justice Stevens in dissent reminds us of the nature of corporations.  Stevens argued that the unique qualities of corporations and other artificial legal entities made them dangerous to democratic elections. These legal entities, he argued, have perpetual life, the ability to amass large sums of money, limited liability, no ability to vote, no morality, no purpose outside of profit-making, and no loyalty. Therefore, he argued, the courts should permit legislatures to regulate corporate participation in the political process.  Hooray for Justice Stevens!

The conservative judges also asserted that the public has a right to have access to all information and to determine the reliability and importance of that information. Additionally, the majority did not believe that reliable evidence substantiated the risk of corruption or the appearance of corruption.  What fools these mortals be!  Reliable evidence and information is not what corporations are peddling.  Big Tobacco, Big Oil, Big Coal, Big Whatever are not in the business of providing reliable evidence so that the public can make informed decisions.  In fact, the “Bigs” do not want the public to be well-informed lest they make decisions that do not turn a profit. 

Natural gas extraction from the earth is now a major issue because Big Energy sees big dollar signs whenever they discover more shale deposits from which they can draw natural gas.  Unfortunately, the process by which that gas is being extracted (“hydro-fracking”) has not been proven to be environmentally safe for the people who live on the affected lands.  The chemicals used in the extraction process are potentially hazardous to drinking water, land use, and human consumption of produce grown near those fracking sites.  Are the corporations involved providing all the information necessary for the public to make a decision about hydro-fracking?  Not on your life.  They are instead using corporate money to lobby for drilling rights, to promote hydro-fracking as a safe procedure, to distort the results of studies of the effects of such extraction, and above all to convince the public that job-creation is more important than environmental safety. 

The corrupting influence of the Natural Gas companies is reminiscent of Big Tobacco, but more so of the Chemical company involved in the Love Canal debacle of decades past (1970s) when a local newspaper brought to light that a 36 square-block area of  the city of Niagara Falls was contaminated with 21,000 tons of toxic waste buried underground by Hooker Chemical (now Occidental Petroleum Corporation) in the 1950s.  Liability for the toxicity was denied by Hooker Chemical until the deaths and birth defects became overwhelming enough to spur real investigations and a finding of negligence and the settlement of subsequent lawsuits brought by individuals.

The corrupting influence of corporate speech begins with the distortion of information, not with a quid pro quo.  That is what the Justices missed.  They themselves distorted the issues in this case in order to protect the coercive and blatantly distorted speech of the corporations.  There is no such thing as undistorted speech from corporations that deal in profits, selling, and marketing.  Distortion is their bread and butter.  It is how they get us to buy, and to feel good about spending our hard-earned dollars.  The conservative Justices are naïve in their belief that there is no corruption or appearance of corruption when distortion and coercion are at the heart of corporate speech and influence. And why is that?  Justice Stevens in dissent alludes to the reason:  corporate spending on politics should be viewed as a business transaction designed by the officers or the boards of directors for no purpose other than profit-making. Stevens called corporate spending "more transactional than ideological".

Apparently, the majority opinion also relied heavily on the reasoning and principles of the landmark campaign finance cases of Buckley and First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti, in which the Court struck down a broad prohibition against independent expenditures by corporations in ballot initiatives and referenda. The majority argued that to grant First Amendment protections to media corporations but not others presented a host of problems, and so they concluded that all corporations should be equally protected from expenditure restrictions. 

And now, we all are bearing the consequences of the decision of the five conservative Justices.  We now have unrestricted third-party political advertisements by corporations and individuals through the advent of Super PACs.  Unfortunately, those advertisements are not meant to support a particular candidate or a particular issue, but are overwhelmingly negative in nature, meant to distort one’s view of whatever issue or candidate the donor opposes.  These advertisements follow a pattern of distortion, misleading and false information, outright lies, and innuendo.  They are not in any way constructive.  They are a form of corruption.  That is, they distort the process of sorting out the best candidates; they distort the character of the opposition, and most of all they are secretive.  There is no requirement that the perpetrators of such ads must come forth to approve the ads or to reveal their intent, or even to say who is funding them.  One of the aspects of “secretiveness” is that of concealment; another is that of “not open”.  The majority of Justices has willingly consented to a falsity, a covering-up, a reduction of the amount of information that they said would contribute to the public being able to make informed decisions.  So here they are contradicting themselves, and providing the very means by which corruption can take place. 

In spite of the Justices’ decision, corruption is not the main problem.  The main problem with the free political speech granted to corporations (as individuals) is that their ability to spend enormous amounts of money on political advertising is a distortion, and indeed a corruption, of the right of other individuals to an equal quantity of free speech, and to the equity of one‘s vote.  By granting free speech rights to corporations, and allowing them to spend unlimited amounts of money, the Supreme Court has unwittingly distorted and minimized the free speech of all those who cannot afford to equal those expenditures.  In other words, the Court has given an enormous advantage to the rich that is not available to others.  They have distorted the electoral process so that “one man, one vote” no longer has meaning.  It is now one substantial corporation or rich person against whom only a huge association of other persons can stand.  Our speech, our voices, our political clout has been undermined by a Court decision that by its very nature, introduces inequity into the electoral process.      

The conservative wing of the SCOTUS missed the point of this in more ways than one.  They said that corporate spending was not corruptive.  They claimed it does not even approach the level of the appearance of corruption.  But the very nature of corporate advertising is to distort and corrupt.  The justices said that we should have all the information we need to make political judgments, but they missed the point that corporations tend to limit the amount of information provided the public so that the public can be lured into their reality.  The five conservative Justices unwittingly allowed secretiveness to conceal, not only truth, but the perpetrators of negative and false advertising about candidates and issues.  They thus introduced into the electoral process the very thing they had touted: the concealment of substantive information from the public. 

In my opinion, Citizens United is not just a bad decision; it is a corrupting decision because it distorts the electoral process and destroys the one person, one vote principle.  Ill-conceived is too polite a phrase for this failure to understand the coercive power of money, and the corrupting influence it has on our electoral process.  Citizens United must be over-turned!

How Did We Get Here?

Just when did the purpose of the federal government become the protection and support of big business, and of the richest among us?  When did the federal government become the Department of Business?  When did the focus of the federal government become the tax rates for the rich rather than a fair tax code for all?  When did the focus shift from caring for the poor, the downtrodden, the homeless, the veteran, the disabled, the widow, the orphan and children to an all-out subsidization of big oil, wall street and big banks?  When did the shift  occur that discredits civil rights and labor rights in favor of breaks for big business, small businesses, hedge funds and CEOs?  Does it matter that it is now unclear as to the basic Purpose and Mission of our federal government?

I think it matters a great deal.  I think it matters that the middle class is experiencing more difficulties in a recession than are the richest 2%, who have seen their income increase while that of the vast majority of those below $250k has remained stagnant.  I think it matters when government attacks the bargaining rights of unions.  I think it matters when health care reform is made into a debate about everything other than heath care: death panels, unelected advisory boards, government takeover, and religious freedom.    I think it matters when education of our children is not given top priority by government at every level.  One program dedicated to “Race to the Top” is an inadequate response to our inadequate public education system. 

After all, as long as we continue to use 19th century categories, symbols and methods, we are failing our 21st century children and youth.  Desks in rows, having to be called upon after raising a hand, not using computers in every room, vacations following an agrarian calendar, teachers acting as proctors and founts of wisdom at the head of a class rather than as enablers and facilitators in the middle of a community of learners and teachers, is not conducive to experiential or long-term learning.  The lack of teamwork in classrooms-- including aides, parents, students and mentors -- is an absolute denial of the way that most institutions function in this century.  On the other hand, the lack of individualized education plans for each student says that group-think and narrow one-size-fits-all grading and class assignment fit our modern needs.  It does not, because it misses the uniqueness and individuality and particular skill set of each individual.  The need for individual attention within a team concept is something our current education model does not even address.   

I think it matters that decisions are being made, particularly in Congress, based on what the power-brokers in the form of lawyers and lobbyists and money-raisers, want for their clients.  And those clients are not primarily non-profit organizations looking for reforms.  They are primarily members of financial institutions, large business interests and associations or coalitions of like-minded or similar interests.  They are not there for broad-based purposes.  They are there to promote their very narrow interests which will enhance their revenue, their power, or their prestige.  Let’s take a look at the top groups spending the most on lobbyists, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.  In 2012, the top twenty groups included:

Lobbying Client                                            Total
US Chamber of Commerce                      $95,660,000        
National Assn of Realtors                        $25,982,290
Blue Cross/Blue Shield                            $16,238,032
General Electric                                       $15,550,000
Google Inc.                                              $14,390,000
Pharmaceutical Rsrch & Mfrs of America  $14,380,000
AT&T Inc.                                                 $14,030,000
American Hospital Assn                           $13,275,200
National Cable & Telecommuns Assn      $13,010,000
American Medical Assn                            $12,980,000
Northrop Grumman                                 $12,980,000
Comcast Corp                                         $12,420,000
Boeing Co                                               $12,010,000
Verizon Communications                         $11,670,000
Lockheed Martin                                     $11,518,870
National Assn of Broadcasters                $11,220,000
Royal Dutch Shell                                    $10,860,000
Southern Co                                           $10,500,000
Edison Electric Institute                          $10,130,790
Exxon Mobil                                              $9,870,000

Over a longer period, 1998-2012, things didn’t change much, with a very similar list during that longer time:  US Chamber of Commerce,  General Electric,  American Medical Assn.,  American Hospital Assn.,  Pharmaceutical Rsrch. & Mfrs. of America, AARP, National Assn. of Realtors, Blue Cross/Blue Shield, Northrop Grumman, Exxon Mobil, Edison Electric Institute, Verizon Communications, Boeing Co., Business Roundtable, Lockheed Martin, AT&T Inc., Southern Co., National Cable & Telecommunications Assn., General Motors, National Assn. of Broadcasters.

The point being this:  our representative form of democratic government is under attack by these special interests and may be too far gone to be retrieved.  This topic was addressed in an article by Paul B. Farrell for Global Research, September 03, 2009.  His assertions were:

-- “Lobbyists now run America, own America, rule America. Forget the 537 politicians you thought we elected to the White House, Senate and Congress to run America for us. No, they’re mere puppets, pawns for the “Happy Conspiracy,” an oligopoly, plutocracy, cabal, monopoly all-in-one — a private club of America’s richest few on Wall Street, in Washington and in Corporate America.”

-- “Voters and elections are irrelevant. Lobbyists decide what’s in the best interests of this elite club”

-- “There’s a huge, highly paid army of mercenary lobbyists in Washington. Registered lobbyists may be 42,000 versus a mere 537 elected officials. American University political scientist James Thurber says there are actually 261,000 members of the “influence-lobbying complex” running your government. Many are former congressmen, senators and staffers. Others are ad hoc mercenaries, like the 350 hired by the GOP just to kill health-care reforms at a cost over a million bucks a day.”

-- “Unfortunately, the vast majority of Americans will never hear about all the day-to-day shenanigans: the buying, selling and bartering of sweeteners, earmarks, votes and senatorial seats. Most of the behind-the-scenes deals never cross the radar of Middle America.”

In an interesting section of the article, Farrell lists 16 principles by which these lobbyists operate.  A few more compelling of these, include:

“Lobbyists must nudge voters to elect “friendly” politicians. Lobbyists must invest millions to elect officials favorable to special interests.
Lobbyists protect special interests using taxpayer money. The wealthy will have ready access to the assets and credits of the Treasury.
Lobbyists amass extra capital anticipating a new meltdown. Plan ahead for the next recession by stockpiling benefits for your clients.
Lobbyists hire new blood directly from inside government. The contacts of senators and congressmen are worth millions to clients.
Lobbyists reward politicians, treat them like co-lobbyists. Everyone in Washington wants to get rich off big government, help them.
Lobbyists must defeat programs unfavorable to clients. Programs that weaken the power of the rich must be aggressively defeated.
Lobbyist clients’ interests come before public interest. Principles of fiduciary duty mean clients take precedence over public needs.”

So, the answer to the question -- when did the purpose of government change from protecting the rights and lives of all of us to the subsidizing and enhancing of the rich and of large corporations? -- must probably go without an exact in-depth answer.  Special interests have been active in lobbying and influencing the operations of government since the very beginning of this nation.  However, according to Farrell:  “modern lobbying actually began in the mid-1970s with the innovative ‘earmarked appropriations,’ federal funds directed by Congress to private institutions when no federal agency had proposed spending the money.”

The important question is more pointed: how do we get money out of politics?  In reality, we can’t.  But we can begin to limit the money allowed to influence elections and legislation.  Public funding of all elections, limits on total expenditures for every office and strict limitations (or abolishment) of PACs and super-PACs are all appropriate ways to limit the influence of special interest money.  It would help to reform elections and government tremendously if the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision was overturned by a constitutional amendment.  Within that amendment would need to be the abolishment of PACs and Super-PACs, and all third party advertisements.  Then we would need to move to allowing “equal time” -- free rebuttal to on-air attacks on one’s person or character.  Hopefully this would help to reduce the acceptance of scurrilous ads in the first place by TV and radio stations.

Next, we must put limits on terms of office for legislators, clearly limit lobbyists’ access to congress and the executive branch, and demand that lobbyists identify their clients. We must do this on the basis of the concept that unfettered access is equivalent to the diminution of free speech on the part of the rest of us.  Next, we must turn to the “revolving door” and prevent congressional members and their staffs from taking a lobbying job within 12 years of leaving office.  In fact, Congress has become a training ground for future careers in lobbying and in other businesses where legislators have been actively involved.  This using of public office for future personal gain is a travesty of “public service.”

Finally, we must eliminate all “earmark” legislation by constitutional amendment. We must set in stone penalties for “insider trading” based on knowledge received through the legislative or oversight processes, and for “conflicts of interest” through appointment to committees that conflict with individual interests and investments.  Penalties must be attached to all actions that abrogate rules and ethics of the Congress or other branches of government, and be strictly enforced.  We do not have time to allow delay on these reforms.  We are too close to the destruction of our form of representative government to allow any intransigence or blocking of these reforms to occur.

How did we get to this point?  We got here through a series of  missteps that went unheeded.  We got here because the citizenry failed to keep tabs on its representatives.  We got here because the public was too trusting that its representatives were trustworthy, instead of recognizing the potential of every human being for flawed actions.  We got here because the people failed to find ways to oversee their own elections process and the process of governance.  We got here because government manipulation for profit became the standard practice of too many powerful individuals, associations and corporations.  We got here through legislative practices like earmarks, and failures such as lack of election reform, that flew under the radar of the voting public.  We got here through neglect, and apathy, and cynicism and greed.  We got here because of our insistence that public schools not be required to prepare students for their role as citizens.  We got here through inattention to the vital role of “the people” as the source of governmental power. 

We got here through an inability to sort out facts from myths and illusions.  What does that mean, you may ask?  We have allowed to be created certain myths that keep us from acting decisively on behalf of our best interests as citizens.  Here are just a few:

1)    that elected officials have some sort of wisdom, experience or expertise that sets them apart, resulting in less scrutiny by us, and the acquisition of power and special privilege by them;
2)    that “the American People” speak with one voice usually through the official speaking at the moment, which leads to illusory and manipulated thinking on the part of the electorate;
3)    that “compromise” is always in our best interest when the truth is that compromise is often a watering-down of principles and needed solutions;
4)    that a “two-party system” is best for our country, when we know that narrow opinions and options often lead to ineffective or minimalist solutions and actions;
5)    that a “strong military” is indispensable, leading to all kinds of abuses and over-reaching in terms of letting of contracts, wasteful spending, bellicose policies and armed conflicts;
6)    that “religion” is indispensable to government, leading to all kinds of attempts to force upon individual citizens the particular views of a religion or denomination, resulting in conflicts over doctrines or practices that have no place in political legislation, i.e. to force one view of abortion or contraception upon the citizenry through legislation or constitutional amendment is abhorrent in a government that was founded to protect religious liberty for all and to prevent the establishment within this nation of one particular religious viewpoint or practice;
7)    that corporations are equivalent to individual citizens, and that their monetary support of political entities must not be abridged, because it is a form of (free) speech protected by the constitution, leading to the horrendous abuse of the political system evident in the 2012 election., during which the secret contributions of a small number of millionaires attempted to influence the outcome of numerous elections through scurrilous negative advertisements. 
8)    that our election system is “open and free”; it is neither, and recent attempts by over half of the state governments to suppress the votes of minorities, women, young people, and inner city residents is a testament to the inadequacies of our electoral process; as is voting on a Tuesday.  If ever a situation demanded a national set of guidelines and practices, this is the one.

The list of myths and illusions is much longer, but the time for getting beyond them is growing short.  We cannot nurture our great republic without the reforms that must be made to salvage our democratic ideals.  In every generation or so, there must be attention to the elemental principles of our system of government.  The change in purpose and mission that has occurred in our federal and state governments is but a symptom of the fact that reform is imperative.  This is that time, and we must be the catalysts.

Will the GOP Ever Change?

The Republican Party just got swamped, and they still don’t believe it!  As has been said by many a pundit, demographics had a lot to do with this.  But it was the ignoring of the demographics that really hurt.  The GOP continues to live in a parallel universe that does not any longer exist in the real world.  I, for one, hope they stay there, because far be it from me to want to help them recover from their blindness or their myopia or their ignorance.  But, I do not believe for a minute that the likes of the Koch brothers will stop pushing their agenda wherever they get the chance: in the states and local governments, for instance.

I suppose one has to agree that it is not just the ignoring of demographics that hurts the GOP; it is primarily their policies and attitudes that keep them from influencing the electorate much beyond the white men who are overwhelmingly dedicated to their bellicosity, their fear-mongering, their rugged individualistic approach to all things (social Darwinism), and their jingoism which attempts to declare exceptionalism when we are behind other developed nations in practically everything from education to environmental protection to oil independence to health care to entrepreneurship to research and development.  In fact, it’s difficult to find any major area of nation-building in which we do hold the lead, except the power of our military and our weaponry.  Is that what attracts these white men to the GOP: dominance through military power?  Or, is it the simple fact that these are WHITE men, as opposed to men of color?  It’s probably both for some.

So where is the Republican Party going to adjust itself?  Are they going to support a balanced approach to solving budget and deficit/debt issues?  Probably not without the caveat of no tax increases for the wealthy.  Are they going to stop treating women as second class citizens, and support the Ledbetter Act for equal pay for equal work?  Are they going to stop trying to define “rape” for women so that victims cannot  be seen as other than willing (“she wanted it”)?  I doubt it. Will they stop trying to dictate women’s health issues like contraception availability? Are they about to give a break on abortion or will they continue to seek to make abortion completely illegal, with no exceptions for rape or incest or health of the mother?  You know as well as I do that, as long as the Party caters to right-wing extremists and evangelicals, the push for a constitutional amendment to outlaw abortion will not go away. 

How about immigration?  Will the GOP be able to give up the mantras of “protect our borders”, “no amnesty” and “illegals” in order to construct reasonable immigration laws that allow for children of adults who brought them here illegally to become citizens?  Will they support a plan for non-citizens who fled  across our borders for work and hope for a better life, to have opportunity to go through a reasonable process to become citizens?  Will they be able to appeal to the Hispanic voter with the same old rhetoric that insults and demeans and chastises Latinos who want to be a part of this country?  I doubt it.  They fail to see that even “illegals” have something to offer this nation.  They are not just “takers”; they are, in most cases, people looking for a better life, and are willing to give back to a country that will nurture them toward that better life.  The Republican Party can not seem to let go of it’s harsh rhetoric in order to advance the cause of expanding the life-blood of this nation:  its immigrants. 

Instead of fixing blame and shame, how about we approach this in a more positive way: give people who have come here illegally the chance to show their patriotism.  Instead of talking amnesty, let us talk of service and sacrifice.  Let us allow non-citizens the chance to show what they have done for this country, or can do for this country, in terms of service in the armed forces, service in their communities, efforts to lift others as well as themselves.  Let us ask a reasonable number of years of community or national service from them instead of ten years of processing their “papers”.  I’m tired of negative approaches to issues.  Can’t the Republican Party find positive initiatives in these policy areas?  Probably not, as long as the right-wing nuts are in charge or are being catered to. 

Is the Republican Party prepared to face facts?  That is the real question regarding climate change.  It is always easier to live in a world of denial of evidence.  But that is not the real world.  Here we are in the midst of a planet that is giving us signals as to its ill-health, and half of the population is simply ignoring the signs and the evidence.  The deniers would rather stick their heads in the sand and hope for the best, rather than face the reality of our planet’s situation.  Is it not possible that the planet is sick; is it not possible for us to be facing a catastrophe of our own making?  Is it possible that our industrial waste and gasses and soot and chemicals and nuclear wastes have NOT injured our planet?  That is the real question.  Those people who have been the victims of environmentally-caused disease and cancer,  may already have an answer.  They know the toxic effects of our industrial waste and effluence.  They know what chemicals can do that lie buried but not inert.  They know what smoke of any kind can do to one’s lungs.  They know the result of nuclear leaks and explosions. 

We stand at the precipice of further destruction of our planet.  The weather patterns are changing; icebergs and glaciers are melting; the oceans and seas are rising; storms are record-setters;   Yet the GOP refuses to face the inevitable.  Romney wanted in his Plan to eliminate all regulations related to controlling carbon emissions.  The Republican Party platform wanted to put environmental regulation with the states.  The thrust of their environmental platform was to protect economic development over the protection of our planet. Our planet is displaying symptoms that cannot be ignored, anymore than we would ignore a lump in the body that appears all of a sudden.  Will the GOP change its attitude toward environmental policy?  Not likely.

Maybe they will appeal to a broader constituency by making some attempt to improve the health care system.  There are some signs that they are not going to attack Obamacare in the same way they did in Obama’s first term.  There was even some recognition from Speaker Boehner that this is now the law of the land and that there may be some parts of it that are worth keeping, even supporting.  Wow!  But, what will they do to further reform the health insurance business?  What will they do to increase the coverage of Medicare and Medicaid?  What will they do to the insurance exchanges that are soon to be structured in each of the states (something they should support considering their mantra about states being the right places for most innovation and oversight).  I confess I don’t really know.  One thing I do know: many Republican Governors will be happy to accept federal support when it comes their way under the Affordable Care Act.  But taking initiative to improve the quality of healthcare?  That’s something else.  I see nothing on the horizon that will do that from the Republican side.  Tort reform is not an answer, nor is opposition to boards of experts who would make suggestions for improvements in Medicare and health care delivery.

Can Republicans ever deal fairly with any of this?  I don’t know, but I know some in the past who could.  Where are those people?  That is the real question.  For the Republican Party is at best its own worst enemy.  It needs to change; to move away from right-wing rigidity, and come back to the real world.  But that may be impossible without a civil war within the Party.  The Republican Party has to move back from the right-wing; back to a more moderate stance on almost every issue.  And it cannot do that with the Tea Party radicals hanging around its neck. 

It’s more than demographics.  It’s more than rhetoric and talking points.  It’s true reform that is needed.  Policies must be re-examined in light of what is occurring in the real world: the world of facts and empirical data.  The Republican Party has to move to the Center or even to the Center-right.  But that means jettisoning the right-wing nuts in the Tea Party.  And, right now, they are the “base.”  Is a new Party necessary?  Probably.  Certainly, new policy innovations are imperative.

Lack of Spine: the ethical question

Does Mr. Romney have a serious flaw that prevents him from making strong ethical statements or decisions?  Is it the lack of a spine, or something less vivid?  Perhaps it is the lack of a strong moral base or a strong set of principles that bespeaks his lack of “taking a stand.”  He often talks a good game, but when it comes to the point where a situation demands a strong response, Romney fades away. 

Let’s take a look at a few examples. 

1)    The Blunt Amendment
A controversial proposal pushed by Republicans that would have allowed religious employers to opt out of providing health care coverage for contraception.  The amendment was sponsored by Missouri Sen. Roy Blunt, a supporter of the former Massachusetts governor. The provision was an attempt by Senate Republicans to confront a simmering controversy over rules governing religious employers and health care coverage they are required to provide.
At first, Mitt Romney said he was against the amendment.  This occurred on Feb. 29th, 2012.  In an interview with Ohio's ONN, Romney was asked whether he supported the Blunt measure.
"The issue of birth control, contraception, Blunt-Rubio is being debated, I believe, later this week. It deals with banning or allowing employers to ban providing female contraception," asked the reporter, Jim Heath. "Have you taken a position on it? (Santorum) said he was for that… have you taken a position?"
Romney responded: "I'm not for the bill, but look, the idea of presidential candidates getting into questions about contraception within a relationship between a man and a women, husband and wife, I'm not going there."
The Romney campaign criticized the "rushed" nature of the question and pointed out that the amendment did not "ban" contraception.
For his part, Romney, appearing on the Howie Carr Radio show after the ONN interview, said he misunderstood the question.
"I didn't understand his question. Of course, I support the Blunt amendment. I thought he was talking about some state law that prevented people from getting contraception. So I simply misunderstood the question and of course I support the Blunt amendment," Romney said before further outlining his position in support of the amendment.
"I simply misunderstood what he was talking about. I thought it was some Ohio legislation that, where employers were prevented from providing contraceptives so I talked about contraceptives and so forth. I really misunderstood the question," Romney said. "Of course Roy Blunt who is my liaison to the Senate is someone I support and of course I support that amendment. I clearly want to have religious exemption from 'Obamacare.'"

Obama’s campaign responded in a statement that Romney showed in one hour "why women don't trust him for one minute."
"It took little more than an hour for him to commit his latest flip-flop," Stephanie Cutter, deputy campaign manager, said in the statement. "Even worse, he ended up on the wrong side of an issue of critical importance to women.”

2)   Rush Limbaugh and Sandra Fluke
Rush Limbaugh made a very big thing out of a statement by a graduate student at Georgetown University. Wikipedia recalls the controversy:
“In February 2012, she came to attention in the United States when Republicans refused to allow her to testify to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on the importance of requiring insurance plans to cover birth control during a discussion on whether insurance should have a contraception mandate.  She later spoke to only House Democratic members. Commenting on her testimony, Rush Limbaugh made inflammatory comments about Fluke on his talk show, consisting of speculation and slurs regarding her sex life.  Now.org picks up the story:

Rush had this to say: "What does it say about the college co-ed Susan [sic] Fluke who goes before a congressional committee and essentially says that she must be paid to have sex, what does that make her? It makes her a slut, right? It makes her a prostitute. She wants to be paid to have sex."
Limbaugh continually misrepresented Fluke's testimony, repeatedly claiming she said that she (and other students) are "having so much sex, she can't afford her own birth control pills."  Fluke said nothing of the kind.
3/1/12: Limbaugh suggests on his show that if Fluke wants contraception to be fully covered, she should post videos of herself having sex online so Limbaugh and others can watch.

During this time, the Romney campaign kept silent about Limbaugh’s comments and his obvious insults hurled at Ms. Fluke.  Although Limbaugh finally issued a non-apology apology, blaming Obama’s socialist agenda for his remarks, Mitt Romney remained silent, never commenting on the situation or on Limbaugh’s comments.  The jelly in his spine simply became more obvious.

3)   No mention of the armed forces
September 20, 2012 from mccall.com:
“When you run for president of the United States, you're also running for commander in chief of our armed forces. You'd think, in the most important speech of his life (the convention speech), Mitt Romney would have addressed the Afghanistan War and the sacrifices of our men and women in uniform (nearly 20,000 dead and wounded). Romney didn't even mention one word regarding Afghanistan, our current heroes or our veterans in his speech. Since he has claimed sole responsibility for its content, it proves he simply cannot relate to common issues like a normal person (this is the bane of multimillionaires living in glass towers).”

Or is it simply because Mitt Romney has no regard for the armed forces; that his major obsession is his own situation and circumstances?  Hard to say, but one might say that his attention is focused elsewhere, not on the sacrifices of young men and women.  Too bad he doesn’t have the foresight to provide positive reinforcement to those who deserve it.

4)    Re-definition of rape and belittling of women

Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) and "Fox News Sunday" host Chris Wallace argued on Sunday over GOP vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan's position on abortion. Warner said that during Ryan's 14 years as a Wisconsin congressman, he backed legislation that would not only ban abortion, but made no exception for pregnancies resulting from rape.
Wallace responded that Ryan supports Mitt Romney's position on abortion, and argued that Ryan has supported exceptions to opposing abortion for "some period of time."

A look at Ryan's record on abortion shows a different path than that Romney will call the shots on abortion 

Last year, Ryan co-sponsored a bill that aimed to give fetuses "constitutional attributes and privileges" and did not include exceptions for cases of rape, incest or life-threatening pregnancies. Ryan and Rep. Todd Akin (R-Mo.), a Senate candidate who recently claimed that women's bodies can prevent pregnancy in the event of a "legitimate rape," were among a group of 54 co-sponsors of the bill, most of whom were male. The measure, known as the Sanctity of Human Life Act, was referred to the House Judiciary Committee and has not reached the floor for a vote.
Ryan and Akin also co-sponsored a 2011 bill identifying cases of "forcible rape" as the only exception to an existing law that withholds federal funding for abortions. Known as the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act, the bill would have effectively eliminated funds for victims of statutory rape. Abortion rights advocates said the bill also would have limited the ability of women who are drugged and raped to terminate any resulting pregnancies.
The "forcible rape" language was later removed from the bill. Ryan described it as "stock language" and said in August that he agreed with its removal. In May 2011, the measure passed the House, but it is not expected to reach the Democratic-controlled Senate floor for a vote.
The National Right to Life Committee has said Ryan voted with the group on 78 abortion-related measures considered during his tenure in office. NARAL Pro-Choice America has also reviewed Ryan's voting record and described him as uniformly opposed to abortion rights.

5)    The Ethical Dimension of Global Warming   
Romney has opposed legislation designed to reduce greenhouse gases citing two reasons. In an October 2011 he asserted in response to a question about his view on climate change that he was opposed to climate change legislation because:
He did not know whether climate change was caused by human beings.  Secondly, he has stated that climate change is a global problem and the US should not spend huge amounts of money on a problem that is global in scope.
(See: Romney : We Don’t Know What’s Causing Global Warming, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmfoQZMzsh8)

In addition, during his acceptance speech at the Republican convention on August 30, 2012, Romney commented on climate change by asserting that President Obama said he would try to stop raising seas and heal the planet while Romney would help American families, thus implying that he would not support climate change legislation while he was President (Lacey, 2012).
The potential ethical significance of an unwillingness to act on climate change is obvious once one understands that:
--High emitting nations and individuals are putting tens of millions of the world’s poorest people at risk.
--Tens of thousands of deaths and other harms caused by climate change are already attributable to human-induced warming; that is, climate change is not just a civilization-challenging future problem but the present cause of misery to some humans in some parts of the world.
--Even if the international community could stabilize atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gas emissions at current levels further warming will continue for as much as 100 years because of thermal lags in the climate system.
--The mainstream scientific view holds that the world is likely running out of time to prevent rapid, nonlinear, and potentially catastrophic warming.

Romney has no idea about such ethical questions.  He mainly sees restrictive regulations as standing in the way of dollars able to be acquired by industries that should not be held to standards that would benefit the earth’s population.  His concerns are that we produce more jobs with fewer environmental regulations; that the energy sector has been stifled; that oil is more important to our well-being than controlling the environment; that EPA regulations target the entire American industrial base.  He says in his “Plan” that “green jobs” might actually hurt employment rather than help it; that the traditional energy sector -- oil, coal, gas and nuclear -- holds remarkable job-creating potential.  He has absolutely no idea of the ethical dimension of this issue.

And that is really the heart of the matter herein discussed.  He has no idea of the ethical dimensions of many issues.  He speaks about taxes and debt and industries and job creators and Chinese trade policies. But nowhere does he speak about human need, human potential, human concerns.  This is a man focused elsewhere, outside the ethical realm that involves community interactions.  His moral energy is focused on individual morality alone, and even there he fails to speak up when a woman is attacked, or when women are demeaned.  If you want a President who cannot be trusted to put himself and his policies on the line for community health and well-being, this is your man -- and you are welcome to him!

NO, He Won’t! Oh YES, He Will!

A major problem with the electorate is that there are just too many people out there who believe that Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan won’t do what they say they will do once they’re in office.  It is one of the worst attributes that some voters possess: they actually discount what they see and hear.  They think that this man Romney can’t be what he seems to be; that he can’t mean what he actually says in his plans because he flip-flops on almost every issue; that in the end most people just aren’t unfair, detached, untruthful, mean-spirited or other than middle-of-the-road in their beliefs.  

But the truth is that there are politicians who actually do what they say they will because their sponsors demand it.  Romney said he will cut many taxes on the “job creators” (multi-millionaires like him).  He will cut the top income tax rates, the estate tax, the corporate tax, the tax on dividends and the tax on overseas businesses who try to repatriate their profits, but he will never say how to pay for all that lost income.  Ryan says we must change Medicare.  They will, but not for the better because their aim is to diminish that program until it either goes away or ends up with state governments.  They say that Social Security is not going to be solvent in a few years and that they must change it.  They will, and younger adults will be left with their money being filtered through the banks and Wall Street firms (with extra fees) as they try to live in retirement off their individual accounts; at a later age, by the way.  They want another war because war brings new productiveness, sacrifice, and sometimes austerity, as well as prosperity for some who can capitalize on its exigencies.  They will repeal the many good things that Obamacare instituted and women, children and seniors will suffer the most from their losses. 

If Mitt Romney had his way, he might move back to the center of the political spectrum (as he has already attempted to do).  But a Romney presidency will be reduced to doing the bidding of the Radical Right, the Tea Party types who now control the GOP.  They already have proposed the most egregious legislation on many issues that matter to them just waiting for him to win.   Let’s take a look.

1.  H.R.6518 - State Nutrition Assistance Flexibility Act of 2012 
To replace certain Federal nutrition programs with a block   grant to the States
2.    H.R.358 - Protect Life Act
    To amend the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act to modify special rules relating to coverage of abortion services under such Act.  Amends the new health care law so that no federal money could be applied to health insurance plans that cover elective abortions, even if the abortion coverage is paid for entirely with private funds. It also states that a federal agency can not force a health care provider that accepts Medicare or Medicaid to provide abortion services, even in cases when the mother's life is endangered.
3.    H.R.2 - Repealing the Job-Killing Health Care Law Act
    To repeal the so-called job-killing health care law and health care-related provisions in the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010.  Passed the House on Feb 1, 2011
4.    H.R.212 - Sanctity of Human Life Act
    To provide that human life shall be deemed to begin with fertilization
5.   H.R.6173 - PRO-LIFE Act
    To amend the General Education Provisions Act to prohibit Federal education funding for elementary schools and secondary schools that provide on-campus access to abortion providers
6.    H.R.822 - National Right-to-Carry Reciprocity Act of 2011
    To amend title 18, United States Code, to provide a national standard in accordance with which nonresidents of a State may carry concealed firearms in the State
7.    H.R.25 - Fair Tax Act
    To promote freedom, fairness, and economic opportunity by repealing the income tax and other taxes, abolishing the Internal Revenue Service, and enacting a national sales tax to be administered primarily by the States
8.    S.3445 - Domestic Energy and Jobs Act
    A bill to approve the Keystone XL Pipeline, to provide for the development of a plan to increase oil and gas exploration, development, and production under oil and gas leases of Federal land, and for other purposes
9.   H.R.1135 - Welfare Reform Act of 2011
    To provide information on total spending on means-tested welfare programs, to provide additional work requirements, and to provide an overall spending limit on means-tested welfare programs
10.    H.R.5 - Help Efficient, Accessible, Low-cost, Timely Healthcare (HEALTH) Act of 2011
    To improve patient access to health care services and provide improved medical care by reducing the excessive burden the liability system places on the health care delivery system; provisions regulating lawsuits for health care liability claims

From tort reform, to health care repeal, to limiting welfare programs, to energy excesses, to preventing choice as to abortion or telling us when life begins, but touting gun-carrying everywhere; the Radical Republicans are geared up for a legislative tsunami if and when they take charge of the White House, the Congress and the already pretty much in-their-hands Judiciary.  

For those who think that most of this will not take place, be warned that some of this legislation has already passed the House, but not the Senate.  If both houses contain a majority of Republicans, and Romney is elected, everyone can be assured that much of this legislation will be passed by both houses and sent on to a President Romney who will inevitably sign the bills into law.  It’s a very good bet that the first to be passed will be Eric Cantor’s bill on repealing Obamacare.  Follow that with the extension of the Bush tax cuts for the rich, and you have two attacks on the middle class that will be felt from Maine to California.  It’s only a matter of time.
 
So, if you are one who believes that electing Romney is the way to go because his views will moderate, you will be taking the risk of a lifetime.  The change that will come to this society with the ascendancy of this man and this Party is nothing short of revolutionary because that is their aim, their target, their mission.  They believe in a society and government that is built on individual initiative and responsibility, but unlike most of us, they also believe that the “fittest” or the strongest should govern.  That leads to a concept of power that is antithetical to a society governed by representatives of the people who are to reflect the will of that people.  In spite of the name of their Party, and their emphasis on states being closer to the people, and their slogans about individual liberty, they are not immune from forcing their views and ideology on the people from the vantage point of the central government whenever they get that chance. 

One example is all that legislation about “protecting life”.  Their anti-abortion tenets take away choice, life-saving of the mother, and freedom from interference in our private lives by the national government.  They throw out some of their principles in order to protect that one belief.  They even allow the Constitution’s prohibition of non-establishment of a religion to be breached by churches that hold the strongest anti-abortion views when those churches receive federal funds for their institutions, but assert “religious liberty” when the government requires them to carry out certain health insurance requirements.  Another example is their pro-active stance on military intervention in other countries.  They force upon all of us a view that the military must be showered with our tax money to support the strongest military forces in the world.  This ends up giving our money to support ineffective weapons, unneeded weapon systems, contractor abuses, and support of bases spread throughout the world, some of which could be closed without affecting national security. 

The primary flaw in their argument for smaller government, and less intrusive central government, hinges on the fact that they are willing to spend enormous amounts of money to maintain a majority in the Congress and to win the Presidency.  Why is that?  How come they want so much to control the national government if it is such a source of economic and social problems?  Well, it just might be that they want to control every aspect of our lives that it is possible to control so that their concept of society, morality, religion, and capitalism can be manipulated through that government.  Is that why they hate Liberalism so much?  Because liberals are known to be more open, more choice- oriented, more apt to support people in need, and certainly more progressive in attitudes toward most aspects of life?  They vehemently oppose liberal attitudes toward community responsibility for the betterment of life and living.

Let us not get too philosophical.  Let’s stay in the pragmatic mode.  Romney and Ryan are not running simply to make the economy better.  That is a crock.  That would happen eventually anyway, building on the stimulus measures put in place by the Obama administration.  They are not running to broaden and lead the middle class and the working class to greater prosperity.  Their attitude toward health reform and “entitlements” alone denies that.  They can’t be running to improve America’s reputation in the world.  After all, they oppose the involvement of the UN in almost all of our concerns.  Their bellicosity bespeaks a different agenda:  to prove our exceptionalism. 

So why are they running?  To change the direction of America.  To enhance the business community in general.  To keep their donors intact.  To get rid of the concept of a “welfare State.”  To end “entitlements.”  To assert the primacy of the conservative approach to society and to government.  To foster states rights and primacy over that of the federal government.  To return control of the Presidency to the white race.  To keep women “in their place” by rolling back years of  progress toward equal pay, contraceptive health care, re-definitions of rape that favor the perpetrators, and by removing funds from agencies like Planned Parenthood.  To lead us all down the primrose path to believing that Republicans don’t overspend when every Republican administration for the last few decades has shown a deficit and has increased the size of government.  To convince us that Republicans should hold power from now until eternity.

Maybe that portion of the electorate mentioned at the beginning will believe what they see and hear when their children have no Head Start, their children’s education falls farther and farther behind that of other developed countries; when getting a Pell grant for college is impossible, when college is entirely unaffordable except at a very few schools of higher learning.  Maybe they will awaken when they realize that abortion has become illegal, and cannot be performed even to save a mother’s life.  Perhaps waking up will take the fact that grandma can get no support for a nursing home and she has to move in with the grandchildren, or that seniors are having to work until they drop because of the lack of health care and a social security system that is out of reach because of the increase in the age eligibility.  Maybe it will come home to some when their children have children with disabilities and they can’t find affordable help for those children because of program cuts and inadequate, understaffed state Programs that used to be funded by something  known as Medicaid. 

Beware of  ostrich syndrome.  Take your head out of the sand and realize before its too late that they mean what they say.  They are going to do all this, and more, to YOU!

Who Won the Debate? Pinocchio!

It is somewhat exhilarating and affirming that what one says in one week’s blog is confirmed the next week by a presidential candidate.  Mitt Romney, in the first of the presidential debates, made it perfectly clear that what I said on this Blog last week is patently true:  the real platform of the Republican Party is that of lies and distortions.  Romney presented us with no fewer than 15 lies or distortions and probably more (some counted 28).  Let’s start by listing his Ten Most Shameless Lies as contained in an article by Alex Kane on AlterNet.org:

1. An ‘Unelected Board’ Controlling Your Health Care
    In reality, as the Associated Press points out , the board that is tasked with bringing down Medicare costs is prohibited from “rationing care, shifting costs to retirees, restricting benefits or raising the Medicare eligibility age. So the board doesn't have the power to dictate to doctors what treatments they can prescribe.”
2. A Bipartisan Record
    ABC News calls the claim “not quite factual.” Indeed: Romney’s health care plan was enacted with the help of a Democratic legislature. But in general, the body was “frustrated” with Romney “because he wanted to govern like a ‘CEO’ and ‘didn’t pay heed to the legislature and they resented that,’” according to the Massachusetts Taxpayer Foundation’s Michael Widmer.
3. Dodd-Frank Labels Banks as ‘Too Big to Fail’
    As ThinkProgress notes, this is far from the truth: “the law merely says that the biggest, systemically risky banks need to abide by more stringent regulations . If those banks fail, they will be unwound by a new process in the Dodd-Frank law that protects taxpayers from having to pony up for a bailout.”
4. Obamacare Leads to Loss of Healthcare
    Governor Romney claimed that the passage of the Affordable Care Act will lead to 20 million people losing health insurance.  PolitiFact’s final verdict on the claim is: “That number is cherry-picked, and he’s wrong to describe it as only including people who ‘like’ their coverage, since many of those 20 million will be leaving employer coverage voluntarily for better options. ”
5. The Failure of the Obama Economy
    Romney hammered Obama on the economy’s performance over the past four years. One claim Romney made was this: “[We have] 23 million people out of work...The proof of that is that 50 percent of college graduates this year can't find work.”
    The AP breakdown of the facts on this claim: “The number of unemployed is 12.5 million, not 23 million. ”  And on the college graduate claim, Romney was also wrong. Back to the AP: “A Northeastern University analysis for The Associated Press found that a quarter of graduates were probably unemployed and another quarter were underemployed, which means working in jobs that didn't make full use of their skills or experience.”
6. Obamacare Cuts Billions From Medicare
    This was one of Romney’s favorite attack lines debate night: the notion that the Affordable Care Act is siphoning off funds from Medicare, giving the impression that the law takes money already allocated to Medicare away from current recipients, which is why it gets only a "half true" rating.   The specific claim is that $716 billion was cut from Medicare because of the Affordable Care Act.  "That amount — $716 billion — refers to Obamacare's reductions in Medicare spending over 10 years, primarily paid to insurers and hospitals," says PolitiFact. What the number refers to is money that is saved “primarily through reducing over-payments to insurance companies under Medicare Advantage, not payments to beneficiaries. Paul Ryan’s budget plan keeps those same cuts , but directs them toward tax cuts for the rich and deficit reduction,” ThinkProgress notes.  But perhaps more to the point, because the savings are over a decade, and, since this money is in savings, there will never be a lump sum that Romney can “give back.”
7. Gas Prices Increase
    Romney said that “gasoline prices have doubled under the president. Electric rates are up.” This is true--but to blame it on the president is highly misleading. Instead, as the Associated Press states, “Gasoline prices are set on financial exchanges around the world and are based on a host of factors, most importantly the price of crude oil used to make gasoline, the amount of finished gasoline ready to be shipped and the capacity of refiners to make enough to meet market demand.”
    The AP also skewers Romney’s claim on electric rates going up: “Retail electricity prices have.…grown by an average of less than 1 percent per year, less than the rate of inflation and slower than the historical growth in electricity prices.”
8. Health Care Costs Rising Under Obama
    FactCheck.org was on this false claim back when Romney used it on the campaign trail in September: “Romney says health insurance premiums have gone up $2,500 (per family) under Obama. The actual increase has been $1,700, most of which was absorbed by employers and only a small part of which is attributable to the health care law, which is why it gets only a "half true" rating.
9. Oil and Gas Production Increases Only on Private Land
    The former Massachusetts governor said debate night that “all of the increase in natural gas and oil has happened on private land...Your Administration has cut the numbers of permit and licenses in half.”  ABC News says Romney is playing loose with the facts. Data from the Bureau of Land Management shows that “the number of drilling permits on federal lands approved during the fiscal years President Obama has been in office has decreased somewhere between 20 and 37 percent compared to the years before he became president - not the 50 percent Romney claimed.”
10. No Tax Cuts for the Rich
    To fend off the perception that he’s only concerned about the wealthy, Romney made sure to emphasize that his economic plan would not lower tax rates on rich people.  Think Progress has the details on that claim: “If Romney were to actually implement his plan to reduce tax rates by 20 percent while eliminating tax deductions in order to pay for it, taxpayers with more than $200,000 would certainly see a tax cut. But everyone else — 95 percent of Americans —will see their taxes increase.” The New York Times notes that Romney "has proposed cutting all marginal tax rates by 20 percent — which would in and of itself cut tax revenue by $5 trillion."
   
So, the question becomes:  is an inveterate liar and flip-flopper someone we want to put in the White House as President of these United States? 

Maybe that’s exactly what a significant number wants, so that they do not have to face the reality of today’s economy, or the reality of a global economy, or the reality of having to fight through the worst recession since the Great Depression.  Or, more to the point, maybe they are simply tired of hearing how difficult it is to climb out of the mini-depression we have been forced in to by Bush policies that augured trouble from the beginning.

Interestingly, George W. Bush prepared us for this barrage of untruthfulness.  The original reason for the Iraq War perpetrated by his administration was that Iraq had weapons of “mass destruction” and would use them at a moment’s notice.  Secondarily, it was because Al Qaeda was active there (which it was not, of course).   Then, we were led down a primrose path regarding our individual rights, and all kinds of scare tactics were put into use to keep the American people in support of the War.  The Patriot Act made us more vulnerable to government intervention in our lives: all public travel but mainly air travel, surveillance, including the government’s ability to search our private documents and belongings without cause, or to take our pictures without permission, confiscate our computers or library records or what have you, just to see if we had any terrorist tendencies.

We did, after all, buy into this craziness.  And here we are again, allowing a Presidential candidate to lie to us over and over in order to win a debate and to put himself back in the running for the highest office in the land.  But here are a few of his commitments out of which he cannot squeeze:

First of all, whatever he says to the contrary, Mitt Romney is committed to the people of his economic class.  He is going to see that they are well taken care of.  You can’t say that he won’t favor the rich when he has already promised them:
A reduction in the corporate tax rate to 25%
To reverse Executive orders that favor labor especially the one encouraging use of union labor on government construction projects
To lower and then eliminate the estate tax
To lower tax rates for investment income to 15%
Continue the Bush tax cuts that favor the aggrandizement of the 1% over $250k per year
Lower the marginal tax rates (meaning the top rates) substantially from35% to something around 28%
In the long run, lower and flatten the tax rates (which automatically favors the rich)

Second, Mitt Romney is committed to making ours an austere economy for millions of our people, by:

-Immediately moving to cut and cap spending at 20% of GDP, meaning that many programs aiding vulnerable or poorer citizens will have to be cut.  Even Big Bird will take a hit!
-Immediately cutting non-discretionary spending by 5%, reducing the annual federal budget by about $20 billion, by his own estimate.
-By instituting “entitlement  reform,” which comes down to an assault on Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, as well as Food Stamps.  Block granting some of these entitlements - like Medicaid and food stamps -- to the states will have the effect of increasing administrative costs for those states who will then have to cut other  programs in order to maintain even a semblance of the benefits now offered.
-By cutting federal government personnel across the board by 10% or more which will have the effect of gutting some programs and curtailing the services of others.
-By eliminating the Affordable Health Care Act, he will devastate millions of people who had already benefited: young adults up to age 26 no longer on parents’ policies; women - no longer able to receive certain services with no charge; seniors - no more help with their medicines: the donut hole returns; and no more restrictions on private insurance conglomerates who will raise your rates, restrict your benefits and cap your payments for certain procedures and services; to say nothing about the fact that a pre-existing condition can again prevent you from even getting insurance!   

Third, no matter what he says, we can count on Mitt Romney to mess-up our foreign relations.  He’s already shown how well he can do that!  But the devastating conclusion is that a bellicose attitude toward other nations, brought on by a jingoist concept of “exceptionalism,” is bound to get us into more wars.  We may be unique among democracies, we may be a leader in certain areas of manufacturing, we may be a wonderful people, and have a beautiful country with great schools and colleges and health care facilities; we may be many things, but “exceptional” crosses a line between special and outright arrogant.  Calling ourselves exceptional but acting as though we are simply better than everyone else, does not make it so.  We must demonstrate our best intentions in our relations with other countries.  Actions speak louder than words and we can be exceptional only when others come to regard us as such by how we act.

So, let us ask again:  do we really want a President who has shown over and over that he will lie, distort, and change his policies and ideas just to get ahead?  I think we have had enough of that in the previous administration.  Romney will listen to his rich friends.  Romney will act as he is told to act by the radical right controllers of his Party. Romney will not move to the center as many predict because his Party is not there.  But mostly Romney will lie to you whenever he is in trouble on any front.  That is his pattern, in business and in government, and it is not going to change.  In order to be the kind of CEO he was, Romney had to “fit” the circumstances or the constituency with which he was presented.  Distorting the truth for him is a way of life; it leads to his kind of success.  Manipulating people, firing them, stripping them of meaningful jobs was his way of life with Bain.  The aggressiveness, the distortions, the outright lies used at Wednesday’s debate was not just for that moment; it is his modus operandi - his manner of operation. 

An untruthful and vacillating President is a disaster in a free and democratic society.  So be aware, be cautious, be wary.  Here are some questions to ask yourself:

*Can I trust Romney as President to protect Medicare from being diminished or developed into an inadequate voucher program, when he actually has praised his running mate’s budget that intends to do just that?
*Can I trust Romney to keep the plusses in Obamacare, such as no pre-existing conditions, children under age 26 being on parents plan, making drug costs less expensive for seniors, or even the improvement of the quality of health care? 
*Can I trust Romney to advocate for the middle class and the poor when he seeks to cut entitlements, cut government spending, and cut programs like food stamps?
*Can I trust Romney when he says that he won’t raise the taxes of the middle income group to pay for tax cuts for the rich and corporations?
*Can I trust Romney to put in place any protections for consumers, since he favors massive changes in regulations that control businesses, wall street, banks and the environment? 
*Can I trust Romney to invest the funds necessary to improve our environment, to put us on a track toward oil independence, when he talks only about cutting regulations, getting rid of the EPA, and depending on our own limited oil resources?  When he believes “green jobs” actually hurt employment more than help it?
*Can I trust Romney to enhance our public school system when he advocates for state and local control as opposed to federal involvement?  Can I trust him to advocate for teachers as professionals when he opposes unions and supports a budget that does not envision supporting more teachers?  Can I trust Romney to care about school building refurbishing when he stands against government help for such matters?
*Can I trust Romney to do anything about our crumbling infrastructure when he believes that such “intervention” is not appropriate?
*Do we really want a President who lies to us, deceives us, and changes policies every time he confronts a particular constituency?  Do we really want such a man to have the power to appoint Supreme Court Justices, to hold the detonator of hydrogen bombs in his hands, to command the strongest military in the world?

While President Obama has a specific and concrete plan to stimulate our economy, and has already demonstrated the effectiveness of that plan in moving us forward, Romney wants to go back to the failed policies that got us into this mess.  Romney not only won’t discuss specifics on almost any topic, he purports to keep some things secret until he can discuss them with Congress.  Can I trust Mitt Romney in any matter? since it is unclear what he believes; since he changes positions on issues at the drop of a hat; since he lies or distorts facts and data to suit his own purposes?  Not on YOUR life!