Friday Night Latrines
You’d think that by now local anti-war protestors would feel free to deliver their messages among the masses huddled in high school football stadiums across Texas on Friday nights this and every autumn. It would make sense because these venues are quality places in which to build enduring relationships with families most easily infected by the disease of war. But no.
Pressure Congress To Dump Bush’s Lawyers: Author
ARLINGTON, Texas — You’d think that by now local anti-war protestors would feel free to deliver their messages among the masses huddled in high school football stadiums across Texas on Friday nights this and every autumn.
It would make sense because these venues are quality places in which to build enduring relationships with families most easily infected by the disease of war.
But no.
It seems as though the only way anti-war activists would ever consider sniffing near their likeness is when the possibility exists that former President George W. Bush has thought about deficating in any one of the 1,700 toilets housed in The Colosseum.
A number of anti-war advocates did just that on Sept. 21, the day that Bush was to have appeared at Cowboys Stadium, the new billion-dollar home of the Dallas Cowboys professional football franchise in Arlington.
Or as Cowboy fans call it: JerryWorld, JerryStar, JonesTown, JerryDome, Jones-Mahal, Boss Hog Bowl, or Six Flags Over Jerry.
“We felt compelled to remind people that even though George W. Bush is no longer in office, he and any government officials involved in decisions that led to torture and other crimes should still be subject to prosecutorial investigation… just as ordinary people are investigated when there’s a possibility they’ve committed crimes,” wrote activist Leslie Harris in her piece “Teachable Moments: Bush Back in Texas” on AfterDowningStreet.org.
So Harris and other activists from North Texas reportedly waved their signs and received anti-and pro-honks from passing motorists nearby (i.e. the usual anti-war protest).
No citizens’ arrests of Bush or his war criminal cronies were made, though; Bush fled the scene after attending the kickoff luncheon of the North Texas Super Bowl XLV Host Committee’s service learning program.
But anti-war activist turned radio show personality Cindy Sheehan did get a picture of herself with Roger Staubauch, the former Dallas Cowboy quarterback and Bush supporter.
“The expression on Staubach’s face: priceless!” wrote Harris at the righteous expense of the NFL Hall of Famer.
However, the protest outside Cowboys Stadium wasn’t a total waste for the activists; some took time to teach the “Freedom of Speech” to a few young students that were bused from an unnamed school district to listen to the former president.
“Before anyone noticed us, we swerved out from behind the bus into full view and paraded, single-file, in front of them, with the prison-garbed ‘W’ in tow, displaying our signs for them to read. The teachers, bus drivers, and security personnel just stopped and stared… but the kids reacted immediately,” Harris wrote.
In other words, before “security” threw them out of the area, the activists told the students (whose grade level was not disclosed) to ask their teachers about the First Amendement since the kids had no idea what it was when asked, and of course teachers are supposed to teach, not activists.
These activists were in the DFW Metroplex for a political forum at a local theater as well as a rally outside President Bush’s North Dallas home with Iraq veteran and war resister, Victor Agosto; nationally syndicated talk-show host, Thom Hartmann; musician, David Rovics; and author David Swanson.
“You might just be amazed that this festival of forward-looking environmentalism, peace, and social justice took place in Dallas,” wrote Swanson on his personal blog DavidSwanson.org.
There, Swanson, author of the recently released book “Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union,” was supposed to debate a “Bush-defender on the topic of whether Bush should be prosecuted for war crimes” live on Rational Radio AM 1360.
As it turned out, none of the invited defenders (i.e. the former president himself, right-wing astroturf organizers, or think tank consultants) showed for a host of reasons.
“Pro-immunity pundit Stuart Taylor told the radio station that he would rather not walk into such a ‘lion’s den.’ An AEI (American Enterprise Institute) spokesperson offered to take part for $100,000. Everyone else flatly refused. I did the radio show without an opponent,” wrote Swanson.
Swanson also told the crowd of activists that there are many, many, many, many things they can do to hold both the former Bush and current Obama administrations accountable.
And none of those things include demonstrating in or around sports complexes of any sort; for more suggestions, visit his website ProsecuteBushCheney.org.
For example, chief among the measures Swanson suggested is getting Congress to get off its ass and impeach the former lawyers for the Bush adminsitration, such as John Bybee, who backed limits to human rights like the torture and indefinite detention of detainees.
“If we can impeach a judge from Texas without causing any sort of trauma to the nation because he was groping people, can we not impeach a judge from the West Coast who legalized torture and aggressive war and warrantless spying?” Swanson asked. “If you can’t impeach him, who can you impeach?”
Swanson explained that Congress is terrified to issue subpeonas against former Bush officials because the Justice Department first under Bush and now under Obama doesn’t enforce them.
Yet, every single congressional committee on either side of the Hill, he said, has the undisputed power to send the Capitol police to pick up anybody anywhere and literally hold them in contempt until they testify to the full satisfaction of that committee.
“They won’t do it unless we force them to do it,” Swanson stated. “They don’t want power, but we should want them to want power because they might represent us.”
However, until the “OPR report” is released, the Judiciary Committee in the House and Senate won’t act accordingly; this report by the Justice Department explains what Bush’s lawyers actually did, he explained.
Swanson said that it is important to improve the federal laws, even though they have not been enforced as of late; among the changes to existing laws he advocated are:
– Make a felony and impeachable offense the authorization of war wihout Congress’s permission.
– Make a major felony war profiteering.
– Make serve in the most dangerous military positions the military-aged offspring of U.S. politicians.
– Make illegal the use of mercenaries.
– Make illegal the use of the U.S. military on U.S. soil unless they actually defend the United States.
– Make illegal secret budgets, secret laws, secret militaries, and secret agencies, including the CIA.
Swanson added that political election challenges are good as along as your energy continues after the election.
“There is absolutely nothing disrespectful of asking elected officials to do what you want. It’s your part of the bargain you make when you elect them,” he stated.
Obama Administration Revises State Secrets Policy
Attorney General Eric Holder vowed last month to tighten standards when the executive branch invokes the state secrecy privilege.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Attorney General Eric Holder vowed last month to tighten standards when the executive branch invokes the state secrecy privilege.
This privilage was abused by the Bush administration in order to cover up “government misconduct,” according to the American Civil Liberties Union.
Examples the ACLU citied include the uses of controversial warrantless wiretapping, secret kidnappings and renditions, and extreme interrogation methods of detainees accused of terrorism.
The Justice Department stated that it would “not to invoke the privilege for the purpose of concealing government wrongdoing or avoiding embarrassment to government agencies or officials.”
Judges Toss Dan Rather/CBS Lawsuit
Dan Rather’s $70 million breach of contract lawsuit against CBS Corp. is no more.
NEW YORK CITY, N.Y. — Dan Rather’s $70 million breach of contract lawsuit against CBS Corp. is no more.
But lawyers for the famed news anchor said that they would appeal the decision to New York’s highest court.
A panel of five judges — the Appellate Division of the state Supreme Court — unanimously tossed the suit on grounds that the network still paid its former anchor $6 million a year after he left his job.
Rather, a 44-year veteran of the network, claimed that executives had ousted him for reporting about President George W. Bush’s military service during the Vietnam War-era.
Rather’s 2004 report came underfire when the authenticity of his documents was questioned.
This court review marked the latest loss to Rather’s claims; in September 2008, a court dismissed claims of fraud.
Rather, 77, still works now as a producer for cable channel HDNet.
The Dow Jones Diet
Alcoholism is a disease. Obesity is a disease. Gambling is a disease. So why not capitalism, too?
For Academy Award-winning director Michael Moore, capitalism is essentially legalized greed.
And since greed is a sin (as the last three Catholic popes described it), then capitalism is also evil.
While it’s easier to control diseases than evil, you might as well lump them together as one big spiritual ailment.
It’s what a friend of Bill would do.
However, when Moore asked CNN’s Anderson Cooper where the “spine” of the Democratic Party was in its reformation of federal health care finance, The Lone Star Iconoclast couldn’t help but wonder:
Aren’t the American people the spine? Aren’t we also the eyes, nose, ears, and mouth? Aren’t we the heart and the soul of this nation?
Moore has been on a serious press tour for his new documentary Capitalism: A Love Story that has allowed him to show a more humble temperament, arguably even more-so than during publicity of his last film, Sicko.
Ironically, the very citizens that ought to see both pictures more likely than not can’t since they probably can’t afford the tickets.
As former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich pointed out, “One out of six Americans is either unemployed or underemployed. Homes can no longer function as piggy banks because they’re worth almost a third less than they were two years ago. And for the first time in more than a decade, Americans are now having to pay down their debts and start to save.”
That said, money might trickle down so that certain fannies can fill the theater seats.
Where is the money going to come from?
According to Reich, Big Government.
“The great consumer retreat from the market is being offset by government’s advance into the market. Consumer debt is way down from its peak in 2006; government debt is way up. Consumer spending is down, government spending is up,” Reich wrote in his piece, “Why The Dow is Hitting 10,000 Even When Consumers Can’t Buy And Business Cries ‘Socialism.’”
Unfortunately, as the federal government has supposedly “taken over” health care, autos, housing, energy, and finance, the average working class citizen hasn’t seen much relief.
So you’ve got to wonder, what are all those 29 million unemployed or underemployed people doing with their free time if not lobbying Congress.
Are they all on low-work diets?
According to KRGV Channel 5 News, students at Ochoa Elementary School in Donna, Texas, were already rationing toilet paper.
“The Donna Superintendent says toilet paper was removed Monday and Tuesday because of an ongoing problem with students putting too much paper in the toilets and clogging them. However, CHANNEL 5 NEWS has learned that that policy is changing today,” the station reported.
So if rationing is good enough for children in South Texas, why isn’t it good for Wall Street?
— Nathan Diebenow
Watch ‘The Wall’ Documentary
As Uncle Hugh used to say, “Ain’t no tailors in th’ legislature.”
Ricardo Martinez picked his way through a broiled Gulf tilapia surrounded by chicken fried Texans and animated border stories conjured by the West Coast-New Yorker’s new film.
As Uncle Hugh used to say, “Ain’t no tailors in th’ legislature.”
Ricardo Martinez picked his way through a broiled Gulf tilapia surrounded by chicken fried Texans and animated border stories conjured by the West Coast-New Yorker’s new film.
“The Wall” is a smorgasbord look at the politically rubbed-raw American immigration issue as varied and personal as the South Texas cuisine crushing the Kingsville bar table spread in front of Martinez.
He didn’t sample the dead cow slathered in library paste or the tacos al cabrón (pun intended), but he savored the experience shared with those of us who did, tolerated our indulgence, wondered at our wild appetites.
Exactly the way his film marvels at the horror and humanism along the Mexican-U.S. border.
Reared in Oakland, educated at NYU, Ricardo Martinez exhibits an openness in his film virtually unknown to an audience that sucks up to Michael Moore.
“I try to let people be who they will be,” he told a class of would-be story-tellers who had just made him their new hero. “I tell them that even though I may not agree with them personally, I want to give them the opportunity to tell the truth from their point of view.”
“The Wall” is a documentary.
It is no demonstration, no plea, no advocacy.
Rather, we watch a windshield tour of the 1,300-mile strip of purgatory between anticipation of salvation and acquiescence to despair, between lives in desolation and the United States of America.
We stop off for a visit with some graying, paunchy gun-toting “Minute Men,” lost souls pointing their cold, dead fingers toward the maw of hell, irrelevant and impotent unless they get in the way of the mastication.
“What’s wrong with being White?” asks their reality-show-run-amok spokeswoman, clinging dubiously to here contention that America is a White, Christian nation… and Jews, she concedes, clumsily deferring to Martinez, who she thinks must fall into some acceptable ethnicity.
After all, he can pronounce “cheese” and “chair” like a Native New Yorker.
We pass by the chewed-up, desiccated remains of those driven into the desert by the border wall, fallen on the pilgrimage to drive nails in Nashville or screed concrete in Cleveland.
We glimpse the gangs of one-time drug smugglers who have found it easier to prey on the scrimpings of immigrants, ironically victims of their illegal declaration by a legal system .
Martinez leaves it up to us to decide the moral dilemma of outlawing a man willing to ride freights and trek the desert for the dispensation of hanging drywall.
We follow a 40-year veteran sheriff along that wall, a man who “has seen three generations come out of a manhole” trying to get under, over, around, through it.
If there is an answer to the bitter riddle of the border, Martinez said, it is to let those who wrestle with it along the line; those usually the last consideration of American immigration “policy.”
Even in victory, the story of a woman whose legal battles drove Homeland Security out of her backyard, the family that saved its golf course from being walled off from his snowbird Yankee customers, of the cities and counties willing to tax themselves to build Rio Grande flood plain levees that the wall builder bureaucrats would have leveled, the defeat of a proposed 24-hour surveillance tower threatening to hold a small town under a federal microscope, the wall snakes its way across our path and leaves us, as we leave the theater, with a lingering, insoluble interrogative.
Can humanity live in a policy of exclusion?
To date this year, federal officials reported more than 1,200 breaches of the Mexican border wall.
For a showing of “The Wall,” go to .
Thankfully, Most Men Will Never Have To Butcher A Cow While Wearing High Heels
(Note from Ned: This column is dedicated to National Domestic Violence Awareness Month, and the Walk a Mile in Her Shoes men’s march taking place this weekend in Florence, Ore. Go to www.walkamileinhershoes.org to find out about a march near you.)
(Note from Ned: This column is dedicated to National Domestic Violence Awareness Month, and the Walk a Mile in Her Shoes men’s march taking place this weekend in Florence, Ore. Go to www.walkamileinhershoes.org to find out about a march near you.)
I recently went into a fancy women’s shoe store and, as expected, it wasn’t long before women were falling all over me. That’s because they were all trying on high heeled shoes, some of which were so towering that a special negotiator had to be called in to talk them down. I observed all of this knowing full well that if the shoe were on the other foot, men, given a choice, would rather have themselves hobbled. The reason is simple: Men are physically incapable of walking in high heels without looking like a poodle balancing on its hind legs for a piece of cheese. We just don’t possess that special gene that women have, which allows them to stride down the street in high heels with leggy confidence. And let’s face it. Even if we did have it, chances are we’d still walk — with leggy confidence — directly into a post.
I am going to reveal something about myself that could mean the end of my career. Or, at the very least, the end of my wife’s willingness to share a closet with me. You see, in order to prepare for writing this —
I dressed a poodle in high heels.
No. I tried wearing a pair of my wife’s high heels. And let me just clarify that it did not include any type of accessorizing, unless you count the scarf, which was used to stop my nose from bleeding after I tripped headfirst into the coffee table. For obvious reasons, no one was home when I attempted this, which is to say that I risked my life for this column. One minute, I was making my way along the wall toward an arm of the couch (and feeling pretty good about the way my calves looked). The next minute, WHAM! My ankles were touching the floor and I was trying to remember the number for 911.
Don’t judge me. I was a journalist in high heels putting himself in harm’s way in order to bring you the truth. God only knows what would’ve happened if the dog hadn’t broken my fall.
The irony in all this is that men were actually the first to wear high heeled shoes. That’s right. An Egyptian inventor devised them as a way for butchers to elevate themselves off the messy stall floors. This practice of wearing heels lasted approximately 11 minutes, after which the chief butcher to the Pharaoh awarded the inventor his very own pyramid chamber, which he was immediately sealed into.
Eventually, high heeled shoes resurfaced again in the 1600s, when the French used them as a way to elevate themselves above anyone who wasn’t French. Ha! Just kidding! They didn’t need special shoes for that. However, fashion-minded women in France did hobble around on 40-inch heels, often using long sticks to balance themselves. This helped established Paris as THE fashion Mecca, and more importantly to travelers, as a place where crowded streets could be cleared easily using a single bowling ball.
Just like a pair of stiletto heels, there is a point to all this, which is that men should be extremely thankful for all the sacrifices women make in order to look and feel more attractive.
Especially since they can do it without breaking the coffee table.
(You can write to Ned Hickson at nhickson@thesiuslawnews.com, or at the Siuslaw News at P.O. Box 10, Florence, OR. 97439)
The Hoax of Building Border Walls: Maybe The Government Really Wants Illegals
It is estimated that the U.S. has an illegal immigrant population of 19 million. A large portion of that number is from Mexico. Most illegal Mexican immigrants come to find a better life, jobs, and human rights. Consequently, we may consider that there would be no need for illegal Mexican immigrants to come to the U.S. if their needs were fulfilled in Mexico.
It is estimated that the U.S. has an illegal immigrant population of 19 million. A large portion of that number is from Mexico. Most illegal Mexican immigrants come to find a better life, jobs, and human rights. Consequently, we may consider that there would be no need for illegal Mexican immigrants to come to the U.S. if their needs were fulfilled in Mexico.
The U.S. could “persuade” the Government of Mexico to provide its citizens with a better way of life, e.g., better paying jobs, and encourage human rights. It seems our own government does so haphazardly in places overseas, e.g., Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, etc., but never that much in Mexico. In fact, during the past decade our own rights as citizens of the U.S. have been manipulated and jeopardized by profiteers who seem to hold our lawmakers in their pockets.
Historically, border walls do not work, at least for the long term. For many years the Berlin Wall created a division of East and West Germany; finally it was torn down. Not even The Great Wall of China (parts of which are 25 feet high) could keep out invaders indefinitely and within many parts of the Great Wall are the “buried” remains — the hearts and souls — of millions of workers who died building it. However, we are told that the Great Wall failed, especially in “1644, when the gates at Shanhaiguan were opened by Wu Sangui, a Ming border general who disliked the activities of rulers of the Shun Dynasty. The Manchus quickly seized Beijing, and defeated the newly founded Shun Dynasty and remaining Ming resistance, to establish the Qing Dynasty.” It also took millions of guards to monitor the Great Wall. So, these days some in the U.S. may say a positive aspect of building border walls is to create new jobs. Even “more jobs” is not a good enough reason to build border walls.
Border walls send out a terrible message. It is received by humans and animals, who are forced to accept them as a new part of life, which then creates many other difficult issues. Walls create unnatural prisons that force different patterns of living and create additional “walls” of hate and fear. The world does not need more “walls” along various borders. Along the border, walls between the U.S. and Mexico, depriving access to the Rio Grande River for humans (e.g., farmers, ranchers) and animals is another difficult issue.
However, even if the American people managed to persuade Washington officials to approach the Mexican government to provide its citizens with jobs, human rights and a better standard of living, will that government move to do so? It’s doubtful.
And what if we persuade Congress to remove all border walls along our two nations? Would that benefit both nations significantly? That’s doubtful too.
We have 19 million immigrants who have arrived in the U.S. illegally. They have all committed a crime. To do nothing about this illegal population is to permit the crime. What do we do about this illegal population? Permit them to remain? Encourage more illegal movement? Why then do we have immigration laws and regulations? These are tough questions to answer.
While most of the Mexicans who come into the U.S. illegally arrive at great risk seeking jobs, better living conditions and better lives for themselves and their families, there also is a small percentage of that population who arrive with criminal records and intent, who then work in the shadows of freedom as parasites within our society. While certainly not the majority nor even a large number who come, they become part of an unaccountable negative infringement on our daily lives.
However, contrary to popular belief, illegal immigrants are paying U.S. taxes. How many pay and how much they are paying is not clear. In reality, the illegal population in this nation pays a large chunk of social security taxes. In fact, for this and other reasons our government may secretly want more illegals. So why then build and maintain those border walls?
Bottom-line is that why build border walls if they are a detriment and how do we get the Mexican government to provide its citizens with a better life so that the ever-increasing population does not continue to enter the U.S. illegally?
The direction is not clear. We can communicate to our lawmakers that they should contact the Mexican government to initiate positive change, pushing for human rights; however, the history of that nation highlights that the Mexican government owns production and reaps vast fortunes at a large cost to its people. How do we force change that certainly will impede the future fortunes of the Mexican government and wealthy private citizens, change that will cut its profiteering?
Furthermore, how do we encourage our government to enforce our immigration laws? We can’t even get our own government to enforce punishment (already provided for in our immigration laws) on American companies who hire illegal immigrants and who force that population to work in hostile conditions, with no benefits and at cheaper wages then are offered to U.S. citizens? Now that there are 19 million illegal immigrants living and working in the U.S. is it practical, and would we be able to enforce our immigration laws, to extradite that huge number? And at what cost [dollars, self sense of worth and world image] to do so?
We can also question our success in pushing for democracy and human rights in Iraq, Afghanistan and in other areas of the world [Africa, Far East]. After we leave that region will the governments we have helped support provide their respective populations with long-needed human rights and jobs with reasonable wages? It is doubtful.
Until we consider appropriately how to engage the Mexican government to change its historical and abusive political, social and economic ways, the population of that nation will continue to be undermined and treated poorly by their own government. They will continue to do anything and risk everything to leave their land of poverty and enslavement to search out better lives, under the dark of night, to live and work illegally here in the U.S. It is a vicious cycle that must be stopped, but how to do so intelligently and successfully remains a question.
So, what is the real purpose for building border walls? Do border walls serve a legitimate, positive purpose? Or do they send out a signal of hate and desperation?
Do border walls really work? No. They work only for the companies and people that build them, via earning money to do it. Otherwise, “Walls are for climbing over, digging under, or going through.”
(Peter Stern of Driftwood, Texas, , a former director of information services, university professor and public school administrator, is a political writer well-known and published frequently throughout the Texas community and nationwide. He is a Disabled Vietnam Veteran and holds three post-graduate degrees.)
‘Orchid Lady’ Of Silent Screen Withers Into Wealthy Wacko
On Sept. 30, 1918, every seat was full in Dallas’ Crystal Theater for every showing of “The Girl of Today” because Corinne Griffith was there in person to promote her latest silent picture.
On Sept. 30, 1918, every seat was full in Dallas’ Crystal Theater for every showing of “The Girl of Today” because Corinne Griffith was there in person to promote her latest silent picture.
Just three years earlier in November 1915, The Morning News informed readers: “Texarkana has given to the world who it is claimed will be a real star of the movies in the person of Miss Corinne Griffin (stage name Griffith).”
Born in 1895, the daughter of a Methodist minister lived in the town that straddles the Texas-Arkansas border until she was 10. Her mother then took her to a finishing school in New Orleans, where the teenager dazzled everybody, including the judges of a Mardis Gras beauty contest, with her grace and stunning good looks.
There are two versions of how Corinne got her big break. In the first, a Vitagraph director spied her at a high-society function in the Crescent City and offered her a movie contract on the spot. In the second, Texas-born director King Vidor opened the door to her silent-screen debut at age 20.
Corinne started out as a bit player in so-called “two-reelers” with a western theme. But Vitagraph bosses soon realized they had a hot property on their hands and began casting her in leading lady roles in their feature films.
After only two years in front of the camera, Corinne was receiving top billing in expensive productions custom-made for her. To quote an historian of the silent era, “Griffith played a series of beautiful yet suffering women in dramas whose focal points became the star’s ever-changing wardrobe. She made up for a lack of thespian talent by sheer beauty.”
Fans and Hollywood types too were often at a loss for words to describe the beauty of the “Orchid Lady,” a studio-invented nickname, but not Adele Rogers St. Johns, queen of the fan magazines. She wrote in 1923, “Her physical charms are too obvious to mention. In the old days, her little, slender feet, and her lovely hands – have you ever noticed her hands? – and her white teeth and her soft hair would have been the subject of poems.”
Although she could have skated by on her physical assets alone, Corinne took a serious interest in all phases of movie making. After putting in 10 or 12 hours on the set, she did not party all night like most actresses of those wild times but instead spent her evenings at the studio watching the “daily rushes,” reviewing scripts, making cast suggestions, and learning the finer points of behind-the-scenes production.
An important part of the Griffith persona that made her so popular with the public was her pure-as-the-driven-snow reputation. She did not smoke, curse, or even wear make-up off-camera, a puritanical code of conduct that caused St. Johns to comment, “She is innocence personified.” Clean living clearly helped her weather the scandalous storms that would have damaged or destroyed the career of most twice-divorced actresses.
Sadly Corinne was one of the famous casualties of the “talkies.” She tried to make the transition from silent pictures but simply did not have the voice. In a review of “Lilies of the Field,” a 1930 flick with sound segments, Time magazine pointed out, “Pretty Corinne Griffith talks through her nose in her first sound film.”
In a matter of weeks, the “Orchid Lady” went from box-office gold to box-office poison. First National, Corinne’s employer for the past seven years, agreed to pay her off if she would just leave quietly. She accepted their generous terms with the parting words, “Why should I go on until I am playing mother roles? I have plenty of money.”
That was no exaggeration. At the peak of her earning power, when she was pulling down $12,000 a week, Corinne wisely invested most of her money. Her knack for picking profitable properties caused “an old financier of Beverly Hills” to marvel in 1927, when she already owned $500,000 worth of real estate, “What a brain that girl has!”
A third marriage to Washington Redskins owner George P. Marshall in 1936 kept Corinne in the public eye. But she did not need the heir to a chain of laundries, who purged the National Football League of black players, to stay center-stage. A very successful second career as an author with two best-sellers did that for her.
In the 1950s, Corinne launched a personal crusade calling for the repeal of the Sixteenth Amendment. Throughout the ultra-conservative Cold War decade, she was the best known critic of the federal income tax.
But a day in court in 1966 stripped her of her credibility and caused many devoted admirers to question her sanity. Filing for divorce from her fourth husband, who happened to be 26 years her junior, she swore under oath that she was not Corinne Griffith but her much younger sister!
“Mary” claimed she had secretly taken her famous sibling’s place in the mid-1920s after the sudden death of the movie star on location in Mexico. And Corinne Griffith stuck to that silly story until her dying day in 1979, when she passed away with $150 million in the bank.
Bartee Haile welcomes your comments, questions and suggestions at or P.O. Box 152, Friendswood, TX 77549. And come on by for a visit!
Message In A Bovine — Humans Not Center Of Food Universe
They have helped stop the Trans-Texas Corridor. They are fighting the misuse of “eminent domain.” Hey, they will even notify you of the international climate change negotiations in Copenhagen, Denmark, Dec. 6-18.
WACO, Texas — They have helped stop the Trans-Texas Corridor. They are fighting the misuse of “eminent domain.” Hey, they will even notify you of the international climate change negotiations in Copenhagen, Denmark, Dec. 6-18.
But, now, the Texas Farm Bureau has admitted that it believes that humans, thanks to God, are the center of the food universe.
Mike Barnett, the advocacy group’s publications director, said as much in his recent blog entry “God made cows to eat” on Texas Agriculture Talks.
The entry detailed an anecdote about Barnett explaining to his fourth-grade son why he was eating more vegetables as of late. Through the course of their conversation, the boy revealed his anti-vegetarian and pro-meat bias.
However, on the question of the sanctity of cattle, his father’s earlier message of tolerance for picky eaters and advocacy for balanced diets rang a tad hollow because in the end, Burnett supported his son’s theological position, namely “I think God made cows to eat.”
“I just had to crack a smile. That’s my boy,” wrote the TFB employee.
Since Texas Agriculture Talks is “a forum of ideas and opinions covering all aspects of Texas agriculture from the perspectives of two veteran agricultural journalists on behalf of the Texas Farm Bureau, the state’s largest farm organization,” there were dissenting, though civil comments to the entry.
“Whose ‘God’; Whose bible? You are really attempting to base your world view in the limited scope of western theology. After all, in other countries the cow is revered and killing them is definitely not what ‘God’ made them for,” replied commenter Bea Elliott.
While Barnett had failed to elaborate on his own theological stance, Gene Hall, Texas Farm Bureau public relations director, admitted that he himself “should have been more clear” in his responses below the entry.
“I was not referring to theology, but the fact that humans developed the brain capacity necessary to master our environment when we began consuming the protein necessary to do so,” Hall wrote.
That said, Hall was not about to back down from the assumption that humans are the center of the food universe.
“Humans are in charge of the planet. This is not really in question is it? There are no hospitals, museums, universities, or monuments built by dolphins, Great Danes or field mice,” he explained earlier in the same entry. “This comes into question only in those rare moments when humans encounter predators and become part of the food chain themselves.”
However, if you ask Michael Pollan, professor of journalism at the University of California, Berkeley, humans are still a part of the “food chain,” even though Hall’s ancestors formed sentences with which to organize themselves against attacks from saber-tooth beasts long ago.
Speaking to the nonprofit Technology, Entertainment, Design (TED) Conference in 2007, the author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma and In Defense of Food challenged his audience to see nature through nature’s perspective.
“It’s not my idea. Other peoples have hit on it,” Pollan admitted, “but I’ve tried taking it to some new places.”
Pollan said that he first caught wind of this “literary conceit” while planting potatoes in his own garden seven years prior. He said he noticed that he and the bumble bee flying around a nearby flowering apple tree had much more in common than he had previously thought.
As Pollan explained, he had indeed selected a type of domesticated potato, planted them, and cared for the garden accordingly; and, in its own right, the bee decided on an apple blossom, retrieved the nectar from it, and then left for another flower.
But the bee wasn’t calling the shots because the flower had manipulated the bee through its color, scent, flavor, and patterns to lure the insect into picking up nectar for its consumption and pollen for the flower’s gene distribution, he observed.
“And I realized I wasn’t (in control) either,” Pollan said. “I had been seduced by that potato and not another into spreading its genes in another habitat.”
Agriculture, then, appeared to him not as a human-centered technology but as a co-evolutionary development among a specific set of species, he said.
Mowing the grass in his yard that day took on new meaning for Pollan, he explained.
“I had thought always, and in fact had written this in my first book about gardening, that lawns were cultures under nature’s boot, that they were totalitarian landscapes and that when we mowed them, we were cruelly suppressing their species and never letting it set seed…
“Then, I realized this is what the grasses want us to do. I’m a dupe of the lawns whose goal in life is to out-compete the trees for sunlight,” he said.
Applying the same understanding, cows fool humans, too, with their sweet meat, milk, and penchant for modeling in Chick-Fi-La advertisements.
So what does this nature-centered thinking gain for humans? Pollan asked.
“Looking at the world through other species’ points of view is the cure of the disease of human self-importance,” he said.
In other words, the intellectual line between culture and nature disappears, and human consciousness, reason, tool-making abilities, and language become just another set of tools for living, not “the crowning achievement of nature.”
“It’s kind of natural that we would think it’s the best tool, but there is a comedian, who said, ‘Who is telling me that consciousness is so good and so important? Well, consciousness.’”
And it’s hard not to say that cattle aren’t taking advantage of their current industrialized situation; 5.15 million head of beef cattle were scattered across farms and ranches in Texas in 2008, according to the Texas Agricultural Statistics Service.
On a practical level, Pallon’s Darwinian point of view allows for all animals, including humans, and plants to realize their full biological uniqueness.
As a consequence of industrialized farming with its government regulators disregarding the “pigness of the pig,” we humans become more vulnerable to the H1N1 (swine) flu.
Actually, that’s what Pallon’s hero who practices this “pigness of the pig” view on his 500-acre farm in Staunton, Virginia, would say.
“What happens when the USDA determines that feeding dead cows to cows is the new science-based technique? Mad Cow,” said that hero, grass farmer Joel Salatin, in the most recent issue of The American Conservative.
Case in point: Earlier this year, the USDA recalled 143 million lbs. of frozen beef.
That’s almost twice as many pounds of beef (87 million lbs.) that fast food chain McDonald’s bought in 2005 from Texas to the tune of over $100 million, according to the Texas Farm Bureau.
In contrast, on the 100 acres of his Polyface Farm, Salatin produces 40,000 lbs. of beef, 30,000 lbs. of pork, 25,000 dozen eggs, 20,000 broilers, 1,000 turkeys, and 1,000 rabbits, according to Pollan.
“If I run a dirty ship here, I’m only affecting a few customers,” Salatin told TAC.
That said, Salatin refers to himself as a “Christian-libertarian-environmentalist-capitalist lunatic.” In fact, Bob Jones University, the Christian college and seminary located in Greenville, South Carolina, honored Salatin, their former undergraduate, as “alumnus of the year.”
“The question is not whether we can eliminate [evil], but whether we centralize it or decentralize it,” said Salatin.
And it appears that the Texas Farm Bureau supported centralization when it co-sponsored the beef section of an agricultural promotional area with Cattleman’s Beef Board (i.e. “Beef: It’s What’s for Dinner”) and McDonald’s at last year’s Fort Worth Stock Show and Rodeo.
So this begs the question: did God make clowns to eat?
When Fruitcakes Go ACORNs
ACORN has shown the world who has really gone nuts.
This community organization has exposed the idiocy of the Power Elite the likes of which organizers from Moses to Saul Alinsky could only dream.
And it was all by accident really — like a prank that backfired on the pranksters.
The conservatives in more honest clothing thought they were taking down a radical organization when they posed as a pimp and a prostitute to ask employees of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) how to launder prostitution money to pay off their brothel’s mortgage.
Instead, Karl Rove wannabes James E. O’Keefe III and Hannah Giles set up opportunities to take down the entire American military-congressional industrial complex.
As the dust settled from Congress’s votes to defund ACORN, the truth came out:
Rep. John Boehner’s bill (H.R. 3571) would cut off federal funding to “Any organization that has filed a fraudulent form with any Federal or State regulatory agency.”
When the Project on Government Oversight (POGO) was asked to find government contractors that might get nailed with the ACORN hammer, defense contractors came up first.
As the Huffington Post noted, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Gumman “popped up quickly, with 20 fraud cases between them.”
This truth was even accounted for by the office for the Republican congressman (Rep. Darrell Issa of California) who filed the parliamentary maneuver to separate ACORN from federal funding.
“Obviously there are a lot of interpretations out there. And lot of misinterpretations,” Issa spokesman Kurt Bardella told FoxNews.
Ain’t that a great explanation for why your pant’s leg is on fire and your shoe smells like dog shit?
The Lone Star Iconoclast is sure that this look would translate well on a Paris catwalk during Fashion Week.
But we’ve got to draw the line somewhere; we can’t label every government contractor “socialist,” only the ones that receive $3.5 million in taxpayer dollars a year (ACORN), not the ones that get $35 billion (Lockheed Martin) or $18 billion (Northrop) a year.
Moreover, if you register people of color and people in poverty to vote, obviously you deserve to suck it; if you build expensive weaponry, then by all means, suck Uncle Sam’s tit.
So thanks to the 345 House representatives and the 83 Senators who voted to defund America’s war machine.
By not taking time to investigate any contractor (let alone ACORN) for alleged fraud or even read the fine print of your legislation, you have done your country proud.
And a special thanks for all the Vichy Democrats who are lock-step with the Right’s demonization tactic yet again.
While it’s tempting to break with tradition, what good are bonfires without McCarthyism, Nixon’s “Southern Strategy,” Reagan’s “welfare queens,” and Bush I’s “Willie Horton” to burn?
Vanity loves company.
— Nathan Diebenow
Truth: You Need It To Survive Meltdown
“War is a Racket” by Major General, Smedley Butler
This book is essential to your survival.
As the world melts down around us we look for answers. The media provides only spin. This book, by a man dead since 1940, provides to you the through line of action. Read it. It is free online. The first chapter delivers a message Americans need to understand. This message needs to sink in past the patriotic fervor and spin that sends our sons and daughters into ugly death and destroys other people, for the profit of corporations, around the world.
The real explanation for war and the devastation we face today here in America is written in the ugliness of greed and the ability of the greedy to persuade by the use of disinformation, stealth, and by using our own love of country against us.
War Is A Racket
WAR is a racket. It always has been.
It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.
A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small “inside” group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes.
In the World War [I] a mere handful garnered the profits of the conflict. At least 21,000 new millionaires and billionaires were made in the United States during the World War. That many admitted their huge blood gains in their income tax returns. How many other war millionaires falsified their tax returns no one knows.
How many of these war millionaires shouldered a rifle? How many of them dug a trench? How many of them knew what it meant to go hungry in a rat-infested dug-out? How many of them spent sleepless, frightened nights, ducking shells and shrapnel and machine gun bullets? How many of them parried a bayonet thrust of an enemy? How many of them were wounded or killed in battle?
Out of war nations acquire additional territory, if they are victorious. They just take it. This newly acquired territory promptly is exploited by the few — the selfsame few who wrung dollars out of blood in the war. The general public shoulders the bill.
And what is this bill?
This bill renders a horrible accounting. Newly placed gravestones. Mangled bodies. Shattered minds. Broken hearts and homes. Economic instability. Depression and all its attendant miseries. Back-breaking taxation for generations and generations.
For a great many years, as a soldier, I had a suspicion that war was a racket; not until I retired to civil life did I fully realize it. Now that I see the international war clouds gathering, as they are today, I must face it and speak out.”
Smedley Butler died in 1940. Many believe he was assassinated while in the hospital. Butler was the most popular military figure in America when he was asked to carry out a military junta on behalf of wealthy businessmen. The planned coup d’état failed because Butler exposed them. Variously known as the “Business Plot,” the “Plot Against FDR” and the “White House Putsch” took place in parallel with Hitler’s move towards power in Germany.
Imagine a group of the corporate greedy, many of whom like the Bushes, have investments there, seized with the excitement of emulation. Greed begets more greed, as we have learned to our sorrow.
The corporates have not changed, but they have become more efficient, skilled, and organized in planning their disinformation campaigns and in their abuse of power.
Today you see Newt Gingrich posturing. Standing with the woman he finally married, seeing their happy smiles remember the woman Newt abandoned to die of cancer, the mother of his children who made his career possible. They want to tell you how to be a Christian. Does this seem odd? Samuel Adams was not the last of the Puritans, those who saw the real vision of Christianity, the coming together as one people. Descendants of the Puritans brought you the Abolitionist Movement, the Suffrage Movement, and today continue to work for peace, justice and care of the Earth. I know, my family was there, not selling supplies to the British.
The list of those employed by the corporations to pull the wool over your eyes is long. How they spin the world into cotton candy by Monsanto to destroy your health, steal the power of the people, and convert our institutions into tools of oppression is both complex and simple. But once you see it, you are immunized against their lies.
Read this site before you consider having a vaccination. Think about the motives and methods of those who would force you to comply. Consider what is happening to those under orders.
Read the book, visit the links, your survival depends on it.
LINKS
Still A Rogue Nation
America, the Beautiful ain’t so pretty any more. It is time for the American people to take back their nation from irresponsible and lackluster special interest-motivated elected officials. Replacing top members of the Obama administration may be in order.
America, the Beautiful ain’t so pretty any more.
It is time for the American people to take back their nation from irresponsible and lackluster special interest-motivated elected officials. Replacing top members of the Obama administration may be in order.
The majority of Americans should be unhappy with our nation’s growth and evolution — or, if you believe it — intelligent design.
It doesn’t matter if you are Republican, Democrat or Independent. It is of no importance whether you are wealthy, middle class or poor, religious or atheist. As Bob Dylan sang during the 1960’s, “You don’t need a weatherman to tell which way the wind blows.
On the national, state and local levels, generations of Americans will have to struggle to change the last decade of harm generated by wealthy special interests and the elected officials they have placed in their pockets.
Most Americans, individuals and families, are hurting—big time! The American economy still is failing the majority.
For just a few people to achieve vast wealth and power, generations of our children’s children’s lives have been placed on a back-burner. They will continue to pay the price for our folly, which was to permit leaders to squelch or circumvent constitutional laws to gain more profits. The American people have been deceived and scammed. Here is a list of some of the ways:
* Starting a needless invasion and war with Iraq
* Determining to install a democratic nation of Iraq, without being requested to do so
* Sending our children soldiers on missions in Iraq and Afghanistan, which were ill-conceived and absurdly planned with no victory in sight
* Cutting taxes for the rich, while spending more than $3 trillion on war costs
* Determining many U.S. policies and actions behind “closed doors”
* Providing false and/or misleading information and intelligence to the American people
* Eliminating urgently needed social programs for children and poorer citizens
* Doing little to prevent the diminishing quality of public education
* Bailing-Out and increasing government intrusion into business affairs
* Permitting increasing health care costs despite curbing “frivolous” medical lawsuits
* Permitting astronomical costs of fossil fuel — gas, oil, electric — while avoiding real investment and progress into alternative fuel possibilities
* Permitting increasing costs of tuition for higher education without improving learning skills
* Outsourcing millions of American jobs and services without providing new opportunities for American workers at home
* Lying to the people of New Orleans and not providing needed emergency financing and services during the Katrina fiasco in a timely manner
* Selling off American public lands and ports for special interest gains
* Permitting only special interests to bid (or not even have to bid) on lucrative service contracts
* Permitting the “sale” of American government to the highest special-interest contributors
* Privatizing Medicare programs recklessly and irresponsibly for special-interest gains
* Pushing to privatize Social Security for special-interest gains
* Allowing the increase of voter fraud and countenancing lack of voting machine integrity (with these machines manufactured by special-interest campaign contributors)
* Cutting financing for public education during the past decade and diverting those tax dollars to other interests
* Permitting our infrastructures to decay and become unsafe
* Promoting irrational and unneeded toll road plans to generate more profits for special interests
* Freezing gas taxes, which build and maintain roads, and/or diverting gas taxes to other special-interest needs
* Providing loose or no enforcement of immigration laws and policies
* Permitting the corporate sector to remain under capitalism during good times, while enabling socialism during tougher economic times
* Allowing the large number of layoffs without providing companies with incentives for keeping American employees and/or developing alternative jobs
* Continuing to increase America’s debt via wars, tax increases, aid to other nations and corporate bail-outs
* Permitting illegal U.S. government spying and wiretapping on private citizens.
The list goes on. These are criminal and/or reckless irresponsible actions perpetrated by U.S. elected officials against the American people. There was a Connecticut “cowboy” in the White House who needed to be “lassoed and reined-in.” Currently, the Obama administration also is failing the American people, families and children. It seems to be doing so unabashed and without a conscience.
It is time for the American people to take back their nation from irresponsible and lackluster special interest-motivated elected officials. Demanding change of administration members, policy, objectives and actions may be needed.
It is time to create stronger campaign finance laws with enforcement capabilities that tell billion-dollar corporations they no longer can purchase “the best government money can buy.”
America has become a rogue nation and is distrusted by the world and by many of its own citizens.
We should have learned by now that U.S. leaders cannot be permitted to continue to operate as some sort of religious zealots and blatant imperialists. The U.S. must be managed as the nation of, by and foremost for American citizens.
Where, oh where, has America gone?
(Peter Stern of Driftwood, Texas, , a former Director of Information Services, university professor and public school administrator, is a political writer well-known and published frequently throughout the Texas community and nationwide. He is a Disabled Vietnam Veteran and holds three post-graduate degrees.)
Earliest High Holy Day Memories
The High Holy Days bring back long-ago, bittersweet memories for me, of childhood lost, days past, and friends and family now gone. Some of my earliest memories of this time are of the old Temple. I’d gaze up at the domed ceiling, over to the stained glass windows, and down at my little, white-gloved hands, willing the services to pass more quickly. The electric fans slowly moved the air in heat waves you could almost see. It was odd to be excused from school, so we could be with our families at Temple. That in itself, that interruption of routine, lent an air of unreality. Rarely we’d accompany my aunt and uncle to services at the Conservative Synagogue where things seemed different and strange. Their prayer book read from right to left (just as ours does now — funny how things can change).
The High Holy Days bring back long-ago, bittersweet memories for me, of childhood lost, days past, and friends and family now gone. Some of my earliest memories of this time are of the old Temple. I’d gaze up at the domed ceiling, over to the stained glass windows, and down at my little, white-gloved hands, willing the services to pass more quickly. The electric fans slowly moved the air in heat waves you could almost see. It was odd to be excused from school, so we could be with our families at Temple. That in itself, that interruption of routine, lent an air of unreality. Rarely we’d accompany my aunt and uncle to services at the Conservative Synagogue where things seemed different and strange. Their prayer book read from right to left (just as ours does now — funny how things can change).
The funniest memory I have is of our Rabbi blowing the shofar (ram’s horn) for all of us during Sunday School. A huge moth that had been living there blasted dizzily out. No one else seems to remember this. But I swear I’m not making it up.
Some of my strongest memories of this time were of food. Naturally. After the Erev Rosh Hashona service, I remember cubes of Challah to be dipped in honey— tasty wishes for a sweet year. Holiday memories at home centered around tables beautifully set, laden with food surrounded by family and friends. I was almost always the only child present. Everyone seemed so old. They were probably younger than I am now.
There’s one other early memory that —pardon the pun—sticks with me. There was a traditional candy made for the holidays that my uncle loved from his childhood. The recipe came with my grandmother from Russia in the 1800s. This was tegleich. Each year, my mother made it her brother, but we all ate it (or tried to). It wasn’t my favorite. For me, back then, candy meant Hershey bars. Tegleich is made from three main ingredients; pecans, honey, and flour. Like matza balls, the little clumps of honey-coated dough and pecans yielded unpredictable outcomes. (It’s as if even our holiday food reminds us that life can be uncertain). Rarely did the tegleigh turn out soft and chewy. Most often, it was sticky enough to pull fillings from teeth. I always considered it a strange delicacy.
I’ve thought lately of making tegleich again, for old time’s sake. I did this once when my children were small. They didn’t like it. I’ve resisted preparing it again. With age, I’ve come to understand that there are many “strange delicacies” in life, not all edible. As my uncle had his favorites, I now have mine. I’ve also come to believe that some things are best kept preserved in one’s heart, as sweet (if sticky) memories.
Save Water — Fix That Leaky Light Switch
The great thing about shows like Extreme Home Makeover is that they inspire ideas on how to improve your home. The bad news is that people like me then try to implement these ideas without the benefit of a trained professional. The result is our bathroom, which currently has a commode with hot running water and a wall heater that can only be turned on by unscrewing the third bulb in our vanity mirror.
The great thing about shows like Extreme Home Makeover is that they inspire ideas on how to improve your home. The bad news is that people like me then try to implement these ideas without the benefit of a trained professional. The result is our bathroom, which currently has a commode with hot running water and a wall heater that can only be turned on by unscrewing the third bulb in our vanity mirror.
I’d like to point out it wasn’t my idea to take what had been a simple plan to increase the space in our bathroom and turn it into a major remodel. However, after one teeny mistake, my wife insisted on a total makeover — which brings us to our first home improvement tip: The Importance of Bearing Walls.
You will discover that there are certain walls in your home — possibly even in the bathroom — which should not be removed because, as it turns out, portions of your home will collapse. As important as “bearing walls” are to your home’s infrastructure, they aren’t marked as such and, as a general rule, look just like other walls in your home. Which is why anyone who accidentally removes one, thereby inadvertently causing the total destruction of an otherwise functional bathroom should be forgiven for this oversight.
So, let’s assume the worst happens, and you find yourself standing in the middle of the downstairs bathroom while surrounded by the upstairs closet. And let’s assume your wife, in a show of support, still hasn’t insisted on hiring a professional. Such as a hit man.
The next step is to rebuild the bathroom — and your marriage — as quickly as possible. To do this, you’ll need organization and a basic knowledge of plumbing and electricity. If you don’t possess this knowledge, don’t worry! You will quickly gain it through practical experience, i.e., connecting the wrong wires and practically electrocuting yourself. Through this process of trial and error you will eventually be able to flush the commode without causing the outlets to spark.
The first step, however, is to clear the area of debris. Depending on the extent of damage to your bathroom, you may be able to do this quickly and easily by shoveling the debris directly through the floor and depositing it under the house. If a hole doesn’t exist, feel free to make one. If your spouse catches you, feel free to crawl inside and seal it up behind you.
Once the room has been cleared, it’s time to rebuild. Start with the bearing wall. Aside from its structural significance, it will symbolize the emotional healing process you are trying to foster with your wife — and help avoid the need for a physical healing process should the bathroom be out of commission for more than 24 hours.
Next comes plumbing and wiring, which, I’d like to point out, should never been done at the same time. Sure, it may be faster and easier to run new wiring through an existing water line. But take it from me: If your pet occasionally drinks out of the commode, it’s not worth the risk. The same goes for any other shortcuts that could turn your morning bathroom visit into what looks like an episode of Dance Fever.
That said, I hope this advice has been helpful. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions. I’ll be happy to answer them as soon as I fix this leak in the light switch.
(You can write to Ned Hickson at nhickson@thesiuslawnews.com, or at the Siuslaw News at P.O. Box 10, Florence, OR 97439)
Fancy Pageant Talkin’ With Miss Wasilla
At an annual conference of global investors in Hong Kong, Sarah “Barracuda” Palin was (allegedly) paid more to give one address than the average family earns in several years.
At an annual conference of global investors in Hong Kong, Sarah “Barracuda” Palin was (allegedly) paid more to give one address than the average family earns in several years.
What the f#%*!?
Alaska’s “Runaway Governess” used this opportunity — one most thinking folks would consider golden — not to throw open doors to understanding and extend olive branches of friendship, instead, she turned it into a campaign speech for her already-failed bid for the presidency in 2012.
The woman gives being clueless a bad rap.
At the outset of her diatribe to a gaggle of high-fliers from the worldwide investment community, (how on gawd’s green and blue planet was she even allowed in that room other than to clean tables and mop the floor?), the former Miss Everything-She-Ever-Got-Involved-In claimed that she was going to “share… candidly a view right from Main Street — Main Street U.S.A.”
So, the secessionist’s wife would speak for all Americans about life in these United States — as she sees it from a semi-isolated state perched atop the Northwest Territories of Canada — while being put up in luxury accommodations and getting a single-appearance fee large enough to buy herself a second airplane.
You see, with two planes, the great huntress won’t have to wait for Todd to return from the Iditarod when she wants to fly off and slaughter defenseless denizens of the wild from above.
(Does anyone remember why Native Americans hated the Iron Horse so much? It was because privileged sleazebags from the East slaughtered buffalo indiscriminately from the relative comfort and safety of passing trains.)
“Bible Spice”* blamed the economic disaster on “government interference,” when the reality is we’ve languished in a two decade governmental policy of eyes shut.
*I can’t take credit for this descriptor, but I wish I had. I read it in an uncredited comment somewhere, and have been anxiously waiting for an opportunity to use it.
According to Mrs. Palin, she praised the Gospel of Economics according to Saint Ronnie Reagan, and — get this — even invoked the name of former British PM Margaret Thatcher.
Mrs. Thatcher? Indeed.
Just how thick is Alaska’s “Quitter-In-Chief?”
The elimination of “government interference” into commerce and industry was the brainchild (if such a thing was possible) of Saint Ronnie.
Throughout the Reagan-era, bankruptcies and corporate failures ran rampant; massive deregulation of virtually everything during his tenure is the major reason why so many corporations, banks and media sources grew to gargantuan proportions, gaining enough muscle to thumb their noses at Government while raping the American people.
The overall effect was to eliminate any choice whatsoever for the individual, and crush smaller businesses.
In the view of the ex-guv, “the U.S. economy would roar back to life” with the elimination of capital gains and estate taxes on top of further tax cuts.
Even after these policies have proven to be failures of the highest magnitude, this vacuous waste of oxygen lauds the very administration that began this snowballing turdstorm as having the right idea.
Ms. Sarah attacked the administration of President Barack Obama, inheritor of the worst financial mess since the Great Depression, by referring to his campaign promises as “nebulous” (does she even know the definition of the word?), and “utopian sounding.”
Well, I’ve always figured that a positive outlook trumps hate and derision every time, especially when the negativity is only speculative and accusatory, incapable of being backed up with no basis in fact.
Numerous attendees were less than impressed with what could best be labeled as a political speech, hoisting high the Righties’ mantra while minimizing Centrists and demeaning those on the Left.
By offering her opinion on China’s internal struggles — “China lacks mechanisms to deal with regional issues” — stating that the U.S. will help China find its future (we’re all about promoting freedom, you betcha), Sarah left little doubt that her acumen of serious issues, both nationally and worldwide, is severely limited at best.
With true self-righteous Christian zealotry, this painfully maladroit basketballer- turned- sportscaster goes to Hong Kong and regurgitates how it’s up to the 233-year-old new kid to show the 5,000-year-old nation, that’s something like 10 times our size, how to live.
Can you say “hubris?”
While none of those offering comments would share their identities with interviewers, one was quoted thusly by Agence France-Presse (AFP, an independent international news organization): “As fund managers we want to hear about the United States as a whole, not just about Alaska. And she criticized Obama a lot but offered no solutions.”
Sounds an awful lot like what we heard from August until November of 2008.
It was noted by some in attendance that this warm-up campaign address by a veritable amateur was politely received, yet marked by general disinterest.
Two members of the U.S. delegation were so disgusted they walked out early in her diatribe.
It kind of makes one wonder how she went over with any Russians that may have been present.
I’d like to know how many conference-goers demanded their money back.
So, Sarah, tell us — What are you doin’, pallin’ around with Commies?
Shalom.
(Erstwhile Philosopher and former Educator Jerry Tenuto is a veteran who survived, somewhat emotionally intact, seven years in the U.S. Army. Despite a penchant for late-night revelry, he managed to earn BS and MA Degrees in Communications from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. On advice from a therapist, he continues to bang out his weekly “Out Of The Blue” feature in The Lone Star Iconoclast — providing much-needed catharsis. Jerry is also licensed to perform marriage ceremonies in 45 states.)
Argument For a Single Payer National Health Plan
My Country suffers that Irish curse: “May you have all the money in the world but not enough to pay your doctor’s bill.”
This curse hits home here where our per capita medical costs are two times that of other nations and excessive medical costs are a leading cause of personal bankruptcy in this country. Of those who are forced into bankruptcy, half of them have health insurance. Our health care funding system is unique among developed nations and so its flaws are evident. We have added a layer of cost on our health care that adds nothing to the service but additional costs and in doing so increases costs throughout our economy.
The first thing that you will notice when you seek health care is the processing of your insurance. The billing staff will confirm you are correctly insured to receive services from the clinic. Out of your health care dollar you first pay to get billed.
Every businessman knows that eliminating unnecessary costs is key to market efficiency; so why do we allow ourselves to be saddled with another industry that’s sole purpose is to make our health care more expensive and thus justify its existence. The medical insurance industry is an experiment that has failed. It has had 70 years to refine its product, and it is still broken. In the early days of the automobile we didn’t choose to subsidize buggy whip manufactures and livery stables owners. We did, however, choose to subsidize roads and infrastructure to support that new industry. Those who are insured are better off than those without for a while until they get really sick then the whole system conspires to financially ruin your family.
Using mandatory insurance will not solve the cost problem either; the insurance will always add a layer of cost on your health care. The idea “that when everybody is required to buy insurance the price will go down” has not happened where auto insurance was made mandatory, and I doubt it will reduce the cost of medical insurance. We will just become customers by mandate.
When you are healthy, your insurance seems to cover anything a reasonable person could expect. It’s when you get seriously ill we find out about the lapses in our coverage, and we always learn it the hard way. If you have a serious disease and you need the latest treatment… well your provider “is very sorry but won’t pay for experimental treatments.” You need two years to rehabilitate, you find again they are very sorry but your provider only pays 80 percent for 90 days and then you are on your own again.
A Single Payer Health Care System doesn’t have those kinds of limits and still costs less.
Why are we reluctant to adopt the Single Payer System? Or more to the point since about 60 percent of Americans want a Single Payer Health Care System why are our politicians reluctant to adopt one? My guess the reason for the reluctance of the politicians to take action on this is fear of the anger at the loss of insurance company jobs. Unfortunately at this time there are many good-paying middle class jobs in the medical insurance industry that would have to be sacrificed to eliminate the medical insurance industry. When we look at what a insurance company does to add costs we can count the jobs that will be unnecessary and how their elimination will result in savings: In order to compete with other companies the insurance company has to advertise. In order to pay its shareholders, the insurance company must make a profit. In order to manage the corporation they need a management team and a board of directors. The insurance company needs lawyers and claim investigators to fight you over your claims. They need policy writers and actuaries; they need billing clerks and accounts payable management and staff. They need to hire lobbyists to maintain the status quo.
Medical insurance increases you cost at the doctor’s office as well; your doctor keeps a full time medical billing employee to confirm your insurance will pay. He also hires a collection company to hound you or your loved ones if you can’t.
The Single Payer System just pays your doctor a salary and you pay one third to one half of your current premium to you tax collector. No money, no billing, no added costs. You are covered from cradle to the grave and on average you will have wider coverage.
The suffering of the former insurance employees will need to be mitigated in order to garner their support for eliminating their livelihood. The cost of making a comfortable transition for middle management on down would be would likely still result in a net savings to taxpayers, so it would be wise to initiate generous employment adjustment and severance packages.
The reduction in costs to all aspects of our economy as a result of lifting this burden could stimulate manufacturing; reduce lawsuit costs, and various types of liability insurance costs. If you don’t pay for medical costs you can’t sue for their reimbursement and then you don’t need to insure against them.
Lets lift this curse of waste and allow our people and our economy relief from the failed experiment of Medical Insurance.
(Quin Harris resides in Houston, Texas.)