Sadness in America

Supreme Court guts key part of landmark Voting Rights Act | Reuters

A sad day for America.  If one is to believe that the long struggle for equality at the polls is over then one must suppress credulity.  There are attempts in many states, most recently in Alabama and Texas, to place hindrances at the doors of the polling places.  Indeed, it seems we must continue singing the old songs of struggle.  We can only trust that the "better angels of our natures" will furnish people who are outraged at this spectacle of discrimination.  In the memory of the great struggles that led to the Voting Rights Act here is a song of that time.

The War on the ...............Middle Class?

Assault on the Middle Class

In Philadelphia the news came out over the weekend of the closing of many city schools at the same time the state is looking to build a new $400 million prison. If there is a person on whom the irony in this action is lost please seek help immediately. It is a documented fact that a lack of educational opportunities and economic parity contributes mightily to crime and dependence on social programs. One has to wonder if, in this instance, Pennsylvania is also planning to privatize this prison so that the closing of schools will fill the pipeline to the prison.

Already the United States imprisons people at a higher rate than anyone else in the world and that includes China and Russia. A dismal statistic for the land of the free.

Today's news featured a report that the House of Representatives could not pass a farm bill even after slashing the Food Stamp Program by $2 Billion. The party of NO wants to slash this economic support program even more to help offset the generous increase in crop insurance benefits that largely benefit large farms and more than a few Congressmen. That's right. We want to give the corporate farms more money so that imported rice and sugar won't affect their bottom line. Why are we more concerned with their bottom line than we are the dinner tables of the people who have been left high and dry by the great theft perpetrated by Wall Street? The former middle class has been left without decent paying jobs, health insurance and, in far too many cases, food. To deal with this the party of NO wants to increase the profitability of the corporate farms presumably so they can create jobs that won't pay enough to keep a family from qualifying for food stamps. It's no wonder they say they need immigrant workers that will work for far less than a living wage.

Another item in the current news is the report from Brazil of tens of thousands of people rioting in the streets over the vast inequities in wealth between the rich and the poor. Brazil is scheduled to host the next Olympic Games and is spending billions on new infrastructure to meet the need for the world games. Already they have moved the poor from the slums of the city in order to present a glossier picture to the television viewers but the people of that country are enraged by the wealth that is shown to be available but not to them. This is a cautionary tale because that can happen here too. Already the United States is far down the list of countries in which economic and social mobility is probable. The inequities between the rich and the poor rank the United States near the top in that statistic of discrimination. Some have been warning for years that the United States is becoming a nation with a caste system based on economic standing. If you are wealthy you are in a very good place but if you are not your chances of becoming well off are minimal. The canard is still spread about that this is the land of opportunity but that is becoming an illusion. Just ask the thousands of college graduates that will not be able to find a job equal to paying down their student loan debt and what about those men and women who were in the last third of their working career that became unemployed during the Great Recession. They will never have a secure retirement nor will they ever hold a job equal to what they had before.

What is happening in Brazil, Greece and many other less wealthy places around the globe can happen here. The people will not forever watch the wealthiest nation in the world continue to shortchange the middle class that made it great. The American people only want to be able to raise their families in peace and be able to provide their children with a reasonable opportunity of a good future. Instead we are given need and want, non-existent health care with medical bills we have no chance of ever paying off, and an educational system that denies the middle class entry by costing what a middle class salary no longer will pay for. Yes, it can happen here.

Abraham Lincoln said, “you can fool all of the people some of the time” and that is a caution that you “cannot fool all of the people all of the time.” Our leaders have kept the middle class in line by introducing diversionary issues, many of which are genuine concerns, that cause us to take our attention from the issues that affect the middle class and are designed to subjugate the middle class until we are no longer relevant. These issues stir up passions that cause us to vote against our economic interests. Many say that they are important enough to impoverish the middle class over and they certainly have the right to do that but I would point out that without the blessings that economic parity brings those rights to have an opinion will vanish.

So, whatever you think about the free market, capitalism, socialism, abortion, gay rights or holding back the godless horde we need to make a priority out of repairing the economic status of the middle class. I won't pretend that there are not those who wouldn't work in a pie factory but there are many more who would do almost anything and for whom food stamps are a necessary bridge to a healthy family. I won't ask you to believe that government can do things better than anyone else but governments are who builds the bridges and roads and many other public projects that are withering from lack of funding. Just wise up. It can happen here and it has before.

Our country was born out of economic disparity when our Mother Country used policies that would funnel profits to England and deny the colonies the profit of their labor. Our revolution was when the people got tired of that and took to the streets. Most of the colonists really didn't want to break from England but it became inevitable that to achieve economic parity that would be necessary. Yes, it can happen here. During the Great Depression in 1932 it did happen here. There were riots in the streets over the lack of food and economic deprivation. You may recall that we elected a new type of President after that.

My take? Check this out. The heirs to the Wal-Mart fortune hold more wealth than the bottom 41.5% of our population COMBINED. Add in Warren Buffet, Bill Gates and a few others and you're talking real money. Now, ask yourself if anyone, yes anyone, has ever done anything to be worth that kind of money especially when we have people in want and need.

A New Economy--pitfalls to avoid.

Comeback: America’s new economic boom | The Great Debate

Part two of these related posts.  The salient part here is the gas production companies desire to have unlimited export potential which would necessarily reduce the economic advantage that having access to cheap energy would bring.  It is noted that the giant oil and gas production companies do not share in the patriotic and national desire to see the United States prosper.  Their allegiance is to the bottom line.

The Coming of a New Economy

Comeback: Why the US Sits at the Brink of a New Boom | The Business Desk with Paul Solman | PBS NewsHour | PBS

This is an incredibly interesting piece on the economic future of the United States which may provide some relief for our children and maybe even for us in retirement.  I am posting this piece and another related piece that mentions some of the things that can restrict the impact of this positive note.

Time Out

Patriot Coal, a misnomer if ever there was one. It may even rise to the level of oxymoron. It seems that this company was born out of the detritus of Peabody Energy Company when it sought to remove the less profitable divisions from its balance sheet. In the process the company born with negatives in the balance sheet proceeded to lose profitability and has now been through bankruptcy proceedings and has been successful in unloading much of the pension liabilities of Peabody Energy and Arch Coal. It is a good strategy, or perhaps I should say an effective strategy having been used by the auto industry and others when it became apparent that they could not both give stockholders dividends and appreciating stock values while living up to their promises to the people who gave their lives generating those profits. It is a deplorable attempt to place the retirements and health benefits of thousands of people in the same class with utility and material costs and simply declare them null and void through the bankruptcy process. Oh, like the other creditors the pensioners will receive cents on the dollar in settlement it will do nothing to secure their security in retirement thereby inevitably placing the load on the American taxpayer. Patriots, indeed. Like Washington, Jefferson, Hamilton, Jackson and Franklin. No, not the ones who founded this republic but more like the ones that grace our folding money. It is a despicable way to do business.

But this is not the only way in which Patriot Coal is failing to act like a good citizen. You know, corporations are citizens just like anyone else if you adhere to the definition of our Supreme Court who held that position in the Citizens United case. Difference is if we get caught tossing a trash bag in the creek it is money out of our pockets but Patriot Coal is attempting to avoid the costs that amount to hundreds of millions of dollars for the massive trashing of the mountains and the water supply incurred during the mining operations. If they are successful, and if history is any indication they will be, the costs will fall on, you guessed it, the citizens of the United States of America. In the parlance of country music, “they got the money, we got the shaft.” To hear the legislators and coal executives tell it the Environmental Protection Administration and this radical, liberal Obama administration are waging a war on coal that will result in widespread unemployment and depression of the minefields. If the despoiling of Kentucky's resources and loss of benefits are part of the way Patriot Coal does business then there needs to be a war, not just on coal but on the illegal way they do business. This is the way that the coal industry has avoided the true costs of burning the black rock. By moving the environmental costs onto the backs of the American citizen. Just another way that corporate socialism is OK.

This is just one instance of how corporate America is ripping off the American public. These monied giants understand the value inherent in spending millions of dollars to lobby our representatives in Congress to pass favorable legislation that is very often written by the entities being regulated. In any other area such action would be called bribery but those receiving the money say that it has no influence on their vote and those spending the money swear they have the public's welfare at heart so it can't be bribery.

After the Wall Street crash that took the world economy into the tank one would think that those responsible would be contrite and at least promise to do better. Think again. When our Congress sat down to write regulations to ensure that this could never happen again those banks and hedge funds were the first in line with millions of dollars to educate those Senators and Representative on the niceties of how we needed those behemoths to create wealth and jobs for our economy that they drove into the ditch. And those guys and gals fell for it. There are some very simple proposals, the Volcker proposal for one, that would greatly diminish the damage that failure of one of those giants could once again require the American Taxpayer to cover its losses. One of them would require that those banks keep a larger percentage of capital reserves to cover losses but they don't want to do that since it means they can't use that money to make more money. I don't really care if they lose money but I certainly don't want the taxpayer to be on the hook for it. So, are these guys working on behalf of the people of the United States or on behalf of their stockholders? It should be obvious and yet we have a significant number of our representatives who do the shilling for these banks.

So, is anyone in Washington DC talking about what we can do to help the people who have lost their jobs, health benefits and pensions and who will likely never again be employed at the same pay grade? If they are I'm not hearing it. What I hear is our representatives still arguing over who we should blame for Benghazi. Not over who to blame for it happening but who to blame for not having the gift of foresight in explaining what happened. Or what about the IRS ruckus in which some staffers used the words “Tea Party” or “Patriot” as keywords to flag groups asking for tax exemption under the 501 C(4) statute. For crying out loud, this is what they are supposed to do. And now the revelation that the NSA is collecting data of the same sort that any other business collects as if we didn't know that was already happening. Rand Paul says it is as bad as King George but then he is given to statements of hyperbole. If anyone ever looked at the Patriot (there's that word again) Act this revelation would be no surprise at all. Now, personally, I don't like it but I said that ten years ago and no one paid attention.

We all know what the problem is here and it begins with a group of people with megaphones who can control the temperature of the national debate. Don't think they don't have an agenda because they most certainly do. This problem lies with a group of people in Congress who will refuse any attempt at any legislation that carries the approval of the President even if they originally proposed it. And the problem lies with an electorate that has been swayed by the shrill voices with diversionary tactics.

So, that's my take on the way things are. I don't know if we can return to sanity before disaster strikes or not. We certainly need for cooler heads to prevail and for the impertinent kids to be put in time out.

Why We Do It.

I have reprinted in its totality a column by Paul Prather, a religion writer for the Lexington Herald-Leader. It comes as close as anything I have seen to describing why I worship at and go to an evangelical church.  I have followed Mr. Prather's writing for some years now and have watched him go through travails in much the same way that any of us do and have been encouraged by his examination of and adherence to his faith.  He leaves us where we are but with an account of his travels that I find thoughtful.  I hope it gives you some of the peace it gives me.

Bob

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Few evangelicals conform to the stereotype

Most of us go to church to shore up our faith, find hope, healing

   Paul Prather Contributing columnist

Among the frequent misperceptions about Christians in general, but about evangelicals especially, is that we're rather simple, mindless creatures who accept unquestioningly the existence of God and every tenet our churches teach. I've always found this caricature lazy at best, condescending at worst. Anyone who sees evangelicals that way hasn't bothered to actually know many of them. It's true that evangelicals sometimes proclaim, "God said it. I believe it. That settles it." In daily life, though, this typically works itself out as, "Maybe God said it. I kind of believe it, today. I'm not sure what it settles." Lately, I ran across two pieces online-an op-ed on the New York Times' Web site and an "On Faith" video on the Washington Post's site-that emphasized how nuanced evangelicals' faith can be. In the Times, T. M. Luhrmann, a professor of anthropology at Stanford, wrote about her lengthy study of evangelicals. Theologically liberal Christians (not to mention secularists) often misunderstand what drives these other disciples, she said. For instance, Luhrmann found that evangelicals tend to embrace religion for its practical benefits more than to resolve abstract, philosophical questions. "Not all members of deeply theologically conservative churches - churches that seem to have such clear-cut rules about how people should behave and what they should believe - have made up their minds about whether God exists or how God exists," Luhrmann wrote. "In a charismatic evangelical church I studied, people often made comments that suggested they had complicated ideas about God's realness. One devout woman said in a prayer group one evening: 'I don't believe it, but I'm sticking to it. That's my definition of faith.' " Theological liberals and secularists, Luhrmann said, assume that people go to church because they strongly believe in God and a set of tenets. "And that was not really what I saw after my years spending time in evangelical churches," she said. "I saw that people went to church to experience joy and to learn how to have more of it." That's what she meant by evangelicals being more concerned with the practical. They wanted to fix a problem, such as their lack of joy. They weren't automatically sure God was real or that all their church's teachings were accurate. The same day I read Luhrmann's essay, I happened across a video interview by the Washington Post's Sally Quinn with Kay Warren, cofounder of Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, Calif., which draws 20,000 worshipers each week. Kay Warren is married to Rick Warren, Saddleback's senior pastor and author of The Purpose-Driven Life. They're evangelical poster children. Quinn asked if Warren ever entertained doubts about God's existence. "More than once. Absolutely," she said. "There are times that I feel like it's all a big cosmic joke, you know?" She didn't mention it in this interview, but Warren has endured two life-threatening bouts with cancer. In April, months after the interview was taped last August, the Warrens' youngest son shot himself following a long struggle with mental illness. Quinn asked how Warren would eventually like to be remembered. "I think I would be very happy if somebody said that she was a seriously disturbed and gloriously ruined woman who chose to live her life with joy," Warren said. Which echoed Luhrmann's explanation of why many evangelicals attend church: for the joy it offers, more than for the sure-fire answers it tries to promote. Quinn asked how Warren could reconcile human suffering with Christians' belief in a loving God. Warren said she couldn't, that the older she got and the longer she endeavored to serve the Lord, the less she possessed answers for much of anything. Still, "for me," she said, "I would rather ... walk in the darkness with a God who in some ways remains a mystery, than to try to walk in complete daylight without him." These might not be the responses you'd expect from a visible and respected evangelical leader. But they're common sentiments. I've heard the same thoughts within my own congregation. There are many reasons people attend evangelical churches. An absolutist, lockstep faith is not the most common. Some people have that kind of faith. They're a minority. The rest of us go to church because we believe more than we don't believe. There's a seed of faith, or else we might as easily have joined Rotary or a book club instead. But many evangelicals are critical thinkers, and struggle with their beliefs. We also go to church because a well-functioning congregation becomes a family. Sometimes it's literally so; people attend with their parents or kids. Yet it's still a family if we don't have any kin there. We're spiritual brothers and sisters. Church is, or should be, a place you're welcome even if you're "seriously disturbed and gloriously ruined." We go to church because it's uplifting. Usually it imparts joy and strength, and challenges us toward higher standards. We go to church to build up our lagging faith. As with Warren, many of us feel that a feeble, imperfect belief is preferable to our own alternative: bitterness or nihilism. That said, we'd like our faith to grow stronger. We go to church because, in a frequently unforgiving society, it provides hope, redemption and healing. A lot of us have gotten our fractured souls put back together, and then have been able to help others. I once heard a critic sniff that our brand of Christianity was merely a "crutch." A buddy of mine, a new convert, beamed, nodded vigorously and said, "Yes! Exactly! When you're crippled, a crutch looks pretty good!" Paul Prather is pastor of Bethesda Church near Mount Sterling. You can e-mail him at pratpd@yahoo.com.

Read more here: http://nl.newsbank.com/nl-search/we/Archives?p_action=doc&p_docid=146CE890A97CD598&p_docnum=1#storylink=cpy

Oysters on the no shell

Thirst for Fresh Water Threatens Apalachicola Bay Fisheries - NYTimes.com

Water is going to be the next flash point for international relations and a primary cause of war and human suffering.  Aquifers are being depleted and rivers are running dry at their mouths.  Thirty years ago I had a friend who made regular trips to Apalachicola and would bring back a trunk full of oysters on ice on which we would feast.  Another resource that will be left in a past of plenty that no one thought would be depleted.  Not much of old Florida is left.  I had the pleasure of experiencing much of it but it is only a story I tell to grandchildren.

The Inquisitor

The man that has the task of inquisitor attempting to link alleged misdees to the White House should, instead, be subjected to an inquisitor himself.


Ari Melber, co-host of “The Cycle”, joined Martin Bashir on his show Thursday evening to denounce Darrell
Issa’s unprecedented behavior and charges toward Obama and Eric Holder. Ari pointed out that Issa’s
unf ounded accusations have caused several journalists to begin digging into his checkered past. It’s not pretty.
MARTIN BASHIR: Many of us don’t know much about him. Darrell Issa. He’s worth $745 million. He made that
f ortune largely by running a car alarm company which is f unny because he was once indicted to stealing a car
as well as one other arrest f or carrying a concealed weapon, all of which I guess makes him the paragon of
virtue and the man who can grandstand and treat with ranked discourtesy the attorney general, is that right?
ARI MELBER: Congressman Issa has been throwing out a lot of charges but there is f inally some scrutiny of
his background, both bef ore serving in Congress and running the oversight committee. Ryan Lizza and “The
New Yorker” as we discussed went in and looked at his record, looked at the indictment on the stolen car, an
arrest f or concealed weapons. Looked at Congressman Issa’s def ense, of ten saying his brother who’s had
trouble with the law was the target of these investigations. Also a lot of serious allegations about arson in a
f actory he owned although he says it was an accidental f ire. Even bef ore coming –
MARTIN BASHIR: Just on that, sorry, bef ore we move of f , that warehouse and that f ire seemed to coincide
with him just bef ore the f ire raising his insurance policy f rom $100,000 to $400,000.
ARI MELBER: That’s right. He took out a signif icant increase in the insurance and there was also an accident
report that “The New Yorker” discovered that talked about the f act that the nature of the f ire didn’t match up
with the kind of — kind of accidental arson — nonarson, I should say, accidental f ire that could have occurred.
On the oversight committee, I’m so glad you showed some of those clips just now because people have to
understand a lot of those exchanges including Congressman Issa telling Eric holder you’re not a good witness,
answer the question, kind of berating that is unusual treatment f or our top law enf orcement of f icer occurred a
year ago in the f ast and f urious investigation.
And that led to the f irst contempt citation ever of a sitting attorney general. So Martin, when people say, oh,
there’s always skirmishes, both sides do it, no. As a matter of historical precedent, this is the f irst time we’ve
had a chair, Congressman Issa, take the oversight committee and hold an Attorney General in criminal contempt
f or what I wrote at the time were f limsy charges.
End transcript
Ari Melber is an attorney, so when he says the charges against Holder were “f limsy”, it means a bit more than a
convicted criminal calling AG Eric Holder a “bad witness”.
The New Yorker article ref erenced is f rom 2011, but it’s coming to the f oref ront now as journalists and pundits
search Issa’s name f or clues as to who he is. Described as a “working class high school drop out”, Issa makes
f or a colorf ul character with various criminal charges peppered through his lif e. “Issa, it turned out, had, among
other things, been indicted f or stealing a car, arrested f or carrying a concealed weapon, and accused by f ormer
associates of burning down a building.”
Naturally, this is the man the Republicans vested with total power to investigate the Obama administration f or
any reason at any time. You don’t appoint someone with actual ethics to do your dirty work, because, well, that
wouldn’t work. “Now that he had been given the power to subpoena, investigate, and harass the Obama
Administration, Issa was being described as a f uture leader of his party—and the man most likely to weaken
the President bef ore the 2012 election…”
What’s Issa’s word worth? Not much, except as a warning that what you’re hearing may likely be inaccurate. For
example, Issa claims he was always given “highest marks” by the Army and had provided “security” to then
President Nixon, but a reporter dug into his past and f ound that Nixon had not even attended the events Issa’
claimed to have provided security f or, and Issa was known as a car thief in the army (separate incident f rom his
later more well known arrests f or car thef t).
Furthermore, “In May of 1998, Lance Williams, of the San Francisco Examiner, reported that Issa had not
always received the “highest possible” ratings in the Army. In f act, at one point he “received unsatisf actory
conduct and ef f iciency ratings and was transf erred to a supply depot.” Williams also discovered that Issa didn’t
provide security f or Nixon at the 1971 World Series, because Nixon didn’t attend any of the games.”
Issa was soon af ter arrested f or stealing a red Maserati, but the judge dropped those charges around the time
that Issa was arrested in a separate incident f or having a .25 Colt and “44 rounds of ammo and a tear gas gun
and two rounds of ammo f or it.” Just the kind of guy you want leading your party, especially when your party
stands f or vigilante justice via the NRA. Issa pleaded that case down to a lesser charge.
Just when things started to look up f or Issa in the Army, he was arrested yet again f or car thef t, but this time
he was also indicted f or grand thef t. The prosecution ended up dropping that case af ter smoke and mirrors
coupled denial and some f ancy Issa f ootwork. That didn’t stop Issa f rom committing hit and run soon af ter
evading prosecution.
Af ter that narrow escape f rom the law, Issa was suspected by of f icials of arson and accused of f iring an
employee by giving him a box with a gun in it. While investigating the arson charges, authorities realized that
they could not trace the original capital Issa used to start his business. Shady dealings, but Issa once again
managed to escape the law, but not their suspicion. All of this adds up to a great criminal resume f or a
henchman, and that is what Issa is f or the GOP.
Darrell Issa may discover that he doesn’t like the sort of scrutiny his behavior is bringing upon himself . Af ter all,
while his charges against his “enemies” don’t hold water, his criminal past is largely a matter of public record,
rather than the f ictional hysteria of a bitter party that can’t win a national election any other way.
Darrell Issa’s Lies Create an Uncomfortable Scrutiny of His Criminal Background was written by Sarah
Jones f or PoliticusUSA.

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