Rebuttal to one track minds

I'm glad someone else noticed the 'open season on black men' verdict but this letter is something I can wrap my head around and not go nuts. I sent this letter to the local papers yesterday. Any comments or questions gladly accepted.

More and more often, I have been getting emails that are couched in "common sense" political and/or religious ideas, which seem to channel the public and private discourse. In an effort to expand the audience, I would like to present a public answer. Before going any further, I want to say that I prefer to discuss politics and religion with people who understand that a discussion does not inevitably lead to conversion. I won’t speak to all of the subjects; I’ll just hit some basic problems underlying these tirades.
1. There is never only one answer for complicated problems. In most of the items listed, there is an expressed viewpoint that all "good" Americans agree with - and if you don’t agree, you are a "bad" American or you should go back to where you came from - won’t work for me since I, and my ancestors for several generations, were born here in the United States. I learned in school that I have a constitutional right to disagree with others and at home that I should be courteous when speaking up. And, by the way, "American" is used constantly to mean "people of the United States" but people in Canada, Mexico and Central and South America are also living in the Americas and are therefore "Americans."
2. Having "God" on our money is against the 1st amendment to the U.S. Constitution because it puts the power of the government behind a specific group of religions. There are many non-Christian religions plus agnostics and atheists who are not represented by the term "God." Many of the colonies that became the United States had been founded in order to practice, not freedom of religion but freedom to practice only their religion. Most of these colonies exiled or even executed those who followed their conscience away from the ‘established’ religion of that colony: Puritan, Catholic, Baptist, Quaker or other. In fact, one of my relatives died in prison during the Civil War because he would not promise to refuse food to any rebel soldier.
3. I agree that everyone in the United States should learn English. I also think everyone should learn at least one other language. The speed of communication means that we are living closer than ever to other countries. Besides, I only understood English grammar when I was studying Spanish. That doesn’t speak well for the 1950s education: I was an honors English student.
4. I was blessed with a large, loving and available family so I had help when the world crashed down around my ears. Many, many people are not so lucky. It may not take a whole village to raise a child but I was glad that my daughter was known in town and that she knew it.
5. Most of these attacking rants include the insistence to forward this if you believe but if you don’t agree, just delete it. That means that only those who agree will be heard. It is a tactic to limit the discussion to those who agree with all of the slanted, one-way arguments.
It is vital to democracy to have a discussion among an educated electorate. Even an argument among educated citizens will work best if everyone listens and reasons and works together. The scorched earth divisions in the US society are leading toward chaos. Reality is usually more complicated than a few quick slogans - and more interesting too.
Vicki

It's open season on black men

At least in New York.

I thought this was supposed to be a free country

Someone at the Alchohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (did you even know that there was such an agency?) needs to grow a sense of humor.

This silliness is being paid for by your tax dollars. Where's Ron Paul when we need him?

Field report: Clinton supporters are demoralized

I just got back from the Democratic delegate caucuses in Claremont. It was an interesting experience -- Democracy in action, in all its chaotic messiness. There were people carrying signs, distributing flyers, shaking hands, and I couldn't help but wonder if the winner of the 2024 Presidential election might not be walking around here somewhere.

There were actually two caucuses, one for Hillary and one for Obama. It should come as no surprise to anyone reading this blog (hello? Anyone out there?) that I'm an Obama supporter, but I was curious what the Hillary folks had to say for themselves so I registered, cast my vote (not to self: have a chat with the Powers that Be about security. I don't want to go into too much detail, but if someone had wanted to rig that election it would have been utterly trivial to do so) and wandered over to the Clinton caucus.

The mood could not have been more different. There were no lines. There was no chaos. There was hardly anyone there at all. I asked a couple of people why they were still supporting Hillary and the answers ranged from, "Oh, I'm supporting Obama. I'm only over here because my friend is supporting Hillary." to body language that said, "Please don't ask me that" accompanied by some less-than-heartfelt mumblings about "experience" and "3 AM phone calls" or something like that.

I left thinking that if we could just get some of that spirit over to Pennsylvania that all would be right with the world.

David Dreier represents us?

During the 1996 campaign, filmmaker Michael Moore sent $100 checks from a fictitious group to each candidate. Bob Dole received $100 from the Satan Worshippers for Dole Club, Clinton got $100 from the Hemp Growers of America, Pat Buchanan received $100 from Abortionists for Buchanan, and Ross Perot got $100 from the Pedophiles for Free Trade. In each case, Moore received a response.

The La Canada Flintridge Democratic Club has sent an invitation to David Dreier to speak and answer questions at a monthly meeting four times. These invitations have been faxed to Dreier’s Washington and San Dimas offices in November, December, January, and February. So far he has not responded even though he spoke before the La Canada Republicans in February. David Dreier was elected to represent us all, not just the Republicans. We have over 200 members in our group and it is important that he hear and understand our views and concerns on the pressing issues that face our country. As our representative he owes us the same courtesy as the Republicans and that Pat Buchanan extended to Abortionists for Buchanan.

As for Moore’s campaign contributions… Buchanan’s and Clinton’s campaigns cashed their checks while Perot sent back a very nice form letter saying, “thank you and your fellow pedophiles for your support.'

2008 Emmy for “Lack of Courage in the Media” goes to

KCET, for pulling "Unnatural Causes: Is Inequality Making Us Sick?" from its schedule over concern about possible fines from the FCC even though PBS stations in Alabama, Kansas and Mississippi have already aired episodes of the documentary.

“The four-part documentary series, which examines the effect of social and economic inequities upon health, contained a graphic depiction of body parts and an obscene word that could run afoul of federal decency standards, station spokeswoman Laurel Lambert said Friday.”

The Los Angeles Times gave the documentary a must see review Friday while the UCLA Center for Community Learning included this on their website: “You may want to encourage your colleagues and friends to watch this series to better understand the social and environmental determinants of health and to stimulate discussion on how we might adapt our efforts to better address some of these determinants.”

What’s going on at KCET?

The Democratic Party must repudiate Hillary's lies

Let us not mince words, Hilary did not "misspeak." She told one big honking whopper of a lie. That in and of itself might not be so bad. After all, just being a liar is clearly not a disqualification for being President of the United States. Our last two presidents have been liars. No, Hillary's problem is not that she's a liar. Hillary's problem is that she's a bad liar.

You'd think that someone who has spent as much time in politics as Hillary would have figured out by now that sometimes people will actually check up on the things you say, especially when you're running for President of the United States. Most people figure this out at the age of four when, in response to their earnest claims that no, they did not eat the cookies, their parents ask them why their hands and face are covered in crumbs. This lesson apparently has never registered with Hillary Clinton who still insists she's the best person for the job of guarding the cookie jar while wearing a facial mask made of Oreos.

Someone tell me again why I'm supposed to be voting for a Democrat this year? Didn't it have something to do with George Bush being a liar, something about him lying to get us into a war? So if Hillary is willing to lie to get herself into the White House, what exactly makes her any different from George Bush? (Oh, she's going to get us out of Iraq? How do I know she's not lying about that? After all, candidate George Bush condemned nation-building too. Haven't we learning anything?)

There is absolutely no excuse for anyone in the Democratic party to be supporting Hillary Clinton any more, not if they want the party to have even a shred of credibility going into the fall. It is not the case Republican lies are bad while Democratic lies are OK, any more than it is the case (as John McCain seems to think) that Republican wars are OK but Democratic ones are not. Either the Democratic party stands for honesty or they do not. Whether or not Hillary wins the nomination, at this point anything short of running her out of town on a rail would give me serious qualms about continuing to call myself a Democrat. The longer Hillary's corrosive presence is so much as tolerated the more credence is lent to Ralph Nader: there really is no difference between the two parties. There certainly is no discernible difference between the Bushes and the Clintons.

Cha-ching!

Hillary has finally released her income tax returns. The Clintons have done quite well for themselves since leaving the White House. Kinda makes you wonder why her campaign is stiffing vendors and running up thirteen million dollars in debt.

Who should John McCain should pick as his Vice Presidential candidate ?

AND WHY?

Thread of the day. Open for Comments!

President and Super Delegate Jimmy Carter

From President Carter:

"We are very interested in the primaries. Don’t forget that Obama won in my state of Georgia. My town which is home to 625 people is for Obama, my children and their spouses are pro- Obama.
My grandchildren are also pro- Obama. As a Super Delegate, I would not disclose who I am rooting for but I leave you to make that guess."

Hello? Is this thing on?

Not a single comment on my last post. I keep hearing that there are still a few Clinton supporters out there. (She did win California after all. Surely all fifty million of you who voted for her can't possibly have all changed your minds in the last two months?

So that leaves me wondering if anyone is actually reading this blog. I'm happy to keep posting as long as I know someone is out there, but if the mike is dead I have another gig to attend to.

No honor among scoundrels

As is usual in political debates the kerfuffle over whether Hillary lied or "misspoke" about coming under sniper fire in Bosnia is missing the point. Making such a claim is deeply insulting to the military. It is essentially saying that the military failed to do their job of protecting Hillary while she was first lady. It is a slap in the face to the many soldiers who put themselves in the path of real bullets so that Hillary didn't have to.

Either Hillary didn't understand this or she did understand it and made those statements anyway, either deliberately or inadvertently. No matter how you slice it, her willingness to puff herself up at the expense of the military completely undermines her claim that she is better qualified to be commander-in-chief. The person who answers the now-proverbial 3 AM phone call needs to understand that falsely claiming to have come in harm's way is something you Just Don't Do. Hillary doesn't understand it. Her lame excuse of having "misspoke" shows that she still doesn't get it. She repeated the claim at least three times. That's a lot of misspeaking.

If there were even the tiniest shred of honor left in Hillary Clinton, this would be the end of her campaign. She has undermined her last frantic argument for having the superdelegates override the will of the voters and give her the nomination. But of course this will not be the end of her campaign. Because Hillary, like George Bush, knows nothing of honor, cares nothing for democracy or the party or even the country. It's all about Hillary. It's all about winning no matter what the cost. By any means necessary.

I've been an Obama supporter since the beginning, but up until a few months ago I would have been happy with either one of them. No more. I swear to God, if Hillary somehow manages to twist enough arms to get the nomination, I'm voting for John McCain.

Worried about the economy? It’s the war, stupid.

“When you’re spending over $50 to fill up your car because the price of oil is four times what it was before Iraq, you’re paying a price for this war. When Iraq is costing each household about $100 a month, you’re paying a price for this war…”

“And the price our families and communities are paying reflects the price America is paying. The most conservative estimates say that Iraq has now cost more than half a trillion dollars, more than any other war in our history besides World War II. Some say the true cost is even higher and that by the time it’s over, this could be a $3 trillion war…”- excerpts from a speech by Barack Obama on the war.

Finally, a politician is speaking the truth about why our economy is in a tailspin. With oil costing $100 a barrel, we are experiencing the double whammy of both the budgeted cost of the Iraq invasion and the hidden cost of energy price increases in every thing we buy, including necessities such as food and electricity. It is not very complicated. When folks need to spend more on necessities, they spend less at the mall and save less.

It’s the war, stupid.

Listen to what each candidate says about the major issues

Here's an easy way to hear for yourself where the presidential candidates stand on key issues: ExpertVoter.org. This site consists of a grid with candidates on the y-axis and issues on the x-axis. When you click on a square, you'll see a short video of that candidate speaking on that issue.

I've never even heard of some of these candidates. Too bad for them.

Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain

While the news media has a sex scandal as its top story no one seems to be noticing that the U.S. economy is quietly coming apart at the seams.

Extra! Extra! Democrats grow a spine!

Not just a spine, but a brain too! Will wonders never cease?

Keith Olbermann takes Hillary to the woodshed

For a well deserved spanking. It's ten minutes long, and like most of Olbermann's special comments worth every second.

Should we throw money at the schools? No!

Kathy writes:


Want to provoke me? Then say this, "Throwing money at the schools won't fix them."


OK, I'll bite: throwing money at the schools won't fix them.


If that's true, then
Why do some people pay $25K a year for their kid to attend private school?


Because some people have more money than sense. The LCF public schools are a prime example. They spend less than $7k per child. Does a $25k private school provide an education that is three times better?

Education depends far less on money than it does on a student's willingness to learn and a teacher's ability to teach. To the extent that private schools are better than public schools (and certainly in many cases they are) it is less because they have more money and more because they can afford to be selective about their students and teachers. Private schools can fire incompetent teachers and expel disruptive students. Public schools can't. And one of the reasons they can't is (watch me torpedo any I hope I ever had of a political career in California) the teacher's union and their intransigent tenure policies.

(Since I'm an equal-opportunity basher, I'll also call out the no-child-left-behind law as a major contributor to the disaster that is our public schools. We need to be teaching our kids how to think, not how to game standardized tests. Life doesn't have an answer key.)

Money may be part of the solution, but it is only one component of what has to be a more comprehensive set of reforms. Absent those, throwing money at the problem is not likely to accomplish much.

Retroactive immunity: Victory! (Again!)

Well, the Dems somehow found their spine (again) and refused to pass retroactive immunity.


Locked in a standoff with the White House, House Democrats on Tuesday maintained their refusal to shield from civil lawsuits telecommunications companies that helped the government eavesdrop on their customers without a secret court's permission.


So for now the hope remains alive of some day uncovering the full extent of the Bush administration's lawbreaking.

Should we throw money at the schools? Yes!

Want to provoke me? Then say this,

"Throwing money at the schools won't fix them."

If that's true, then

• Why do some people pay $25K a year for their kid to attend private school?


• How would we pay the teachers required to reduce our class sizes down from 31 per class in the high school?


• How would our school district pay for art, music, drama, counselors, librarians, computers and more if parents didn't generously donate to PTA, Boosters, the Educational Foundation and more?

My husband and I recently attended the LCF Educational Foundation fundraiser. It was great to see old friends, make new ones, and raise loads of money for the schools. Our community's lucky that it can supplement the meager money it gets from the state. Even with what the parents chip in, our district spends $6,875 per child. Unfortunately, the Pasadena Star News says that the state budget shortfall is expected to shrink our school district's budget by about $2 million, or 6% of the total. That'll be tough to do without impacting classrooms.

I recently sat on a panel with a member of the Westport, CT school board. He told the audience that his district was getting SmartBoards into the classroom. I laughed, as there's no way we'd have money for that. I looked their district up on GreatSchools.net, and their high school spends $15,610 per pupil. It's no wonder they have one teacher per 10 kids.

We only dream of such things in California...California dreaming, on such a winter's day...