Enough Already!

I am getting SO sick of the spurious argument "If Bush's war is so noble, why aren't either of his daughters over there?"

As a class, it may be true there is a much smaller percentage of children of the rich and powerful in the military, and it's an interesting, although not necessarily meaningful statistic if it's true.

But a few things that people need to remember:

• At this point in our history, the military is VOLUNTARY. It is not compulsory. That means that it isn’t up to George W. Bush whether Jenna and Barbara sign up, it’s up to Jenna and Barbara.


• The statistics of number of people over there in general are low. I have a lot of friends who are just a few years older than I and have children the right age, and the percentage of them that have joined the military is low. As a result, looking at any individual family isn’t statistically valid, because if you choose any random family with children of appropriate age for the military, the majority won’t have any children IN the military.


• Perhaps the difference between the children of the rich and the children of the poor isn’t less support for the military, but less NEED. My guess is that the military contains a much higher percentage of children of poor families or of disadvantaged circumstances than, say, the average University. And my guess is that this doesn’t necessarily correlate to a higher degree of patriotism, but a recognition that this is one way to pull themselves out of their situation.


• Finally, keep in mind what ages we’re talking about. Generally, the decision to join the military is made in the late teens, when children are becoming adults, but still have the last vestiges of rebellion against their parents. That’s why teenagers have always chosen to enjoy music that their parents hated. It’s why the boys of the 60s wore their hair long, the girls of the 80s copied the Madonna “underwear outside of the clothing” look, and why looks like goth, punk and human pin-cushion (serious piercing) have always been popular with teens. As a result, one would expect children of those in power to subconsciously rebel against their parents by NOT supporting the very war their parents got us into.

Now, do I think that there ISN’T anything there? No. Certainly I believe that the wealthy and privileged have always found ways out of going to war. I don’t believe that, were it up to him, Bush would send Jenna and Barbara over to Iraq, I don’t believe that we’ll ever reach a point where the children of the monetarily elite serve in equal numbers with their less privileged contemporaries.

But to trumpet this choice by the daughters as an indictment of the father is a logical fallacy, and gives those on the other side a very real and valid thing to point to and say “See, their argument is stupid!” while ignoring the very real concerns one might have.

I don’t support President Bush. I don’t believe this war was EVER a good idea. Further, I believe that the outcome we’re seeing now (near civil war, Iraqi women’s rights such as they were disappearing like the last donut at Rush Limbaugh’s show, etc etc) were destined to happen when we took our eye off of the ball (Osama bin Laden) and started swinging at phantoms.

But the people on BOTH sides of the issue have to start sticking to the salient points of their arguments, or we’re never going to have reasoned discourse in this country.

Liam.

Immunization Question

Folks, I have a question. This is real, I'm not just using a rhetorical device.

This morning on my drive in, I heard a news blurb about the new Meningitis vaccine. Apparently, the recommendation now is that parents have children vaccinated if they go to sleep-away camps or off to college, and eventually (once there are enough stores of the vaccine) all children will be recommended to get the vaccine at age 11.

As part of the same story, however, they mentioned that there are either 115 or 150 (the person slurred a little bit) cases per YEAR, and that it is 15% fatal. That means there are maybe 25 deaths per year from meningitis.

If those statistics are true (and I tend to think so, because the news article was very pro immunizing the children, so it wasn’t presented as a counter argument), how do we consider the benefits to be worth the risks of a new and not-yet-widely-tested vaccine?

I have the same question about the chicken pox vaccine also, actually, at least in children. According to one site I found, there are about 4 million children’s cases of Chicken Pox per year. Of those, 4000 require hospitalization, or .1%. The mortality rate is 50-100 deaths per year, or about .005% of cases. Pretty good odds, especially considering that many of the 50-100 children who died did so because they weren’t properly cared for during their illness (kept inside and resting, etc). In adults, the mortality rate climbs to a rather high 10%.

So, with chicken pox, we have a disease which is very dangerous to adults but the danger to children is almost non-existent. We have a disease which, by contracting it, conveys a life long immunity, and we have a vaccine which (like most vaccines) starts losing its effectiveness at the 10 year mark.

So why would we recommend immunizing all children against Chicken Pox, saving them from getting it as children, and then dropping them into vulnerability at the point in their lives when A) it’s more dangerous to them, and B) most people stop paying close attention to getting their booster shots.

Would it not make a lot MORE sense to NOT immunize children, but to immunize teens who had not had the disease (or for whom the titer indicates insufficient immunity)?

But back to Meningitis… If there are really only 150 cases of this disease per year, the odds of contracting it are low, the odds of dying from it are low, and the risk of taking a new and not widely tested vaccine are high. Why would we do this? Am I missing something?

Liam.

Sick? See a Cop!

This past Tuesday, Michael Chertoff, Secretary of Homeland Security says that his department, and NOT the CDC or any other federal medical department, would be in charge if bird flu or any other disease causes a pandemic.

So now diseases are considered terrorist threats and our FBI and other federal police agencies will be empowered to do what? Detain, confine and quarantine anyone suspected of having the disease?

And I suppose if it's not convenient for the FBI, medical care for people is of secondary importance?

Every few years we hear about another potential pandemic, so perhaps the fear of millions of deaths by natural disease factors isn't a high likelihood. Still, at a time of a MEDICAL crisis in this country, I'd be a lot more comfortable knowing that someone with actual medical training was on the job, not a batch of federal cops treating any victim of the disease as a terrorist threat.

Liam.

Car Fuel Efficiency standards...

How nice. The news lately about fuel efficiency standards is the Bush Administration's new plan to increase Corporate Average Fuel Efficiency rules.

It's already been reported how laughably minimal these rules are, requiring an increase in Fuel Efficiency of 10% by 2016, more than 10 years from now.

10% in ten years. That means that your SUV that currently gets 20 mpg is required to rise to a whopping 22 mpg over the next 10 years. (Yes, I know it's average across all vehicles sold, but the point is the same. 10% is a good goal for each year or two, not for ten years out).

But in fact, this legislation is not INTENDED to cut our use of OIL, at least not by much. Want to know why? Because buried hundreds of pages into the legislation is language making it illegal for states to impose higher standards for their own states.

Ever heard of California emissions laws? Not allowed, under this new bill. California and New York have both either enacted or are in the process of enacting higher in-state fuel efficiency standards for cars sold within their borders. The Bush Administration has reportedly filed suit against California to try to stop it and failed on the basis of there being no law that says California can’t enact higher standards.

So, we have a former OIL man and a former energy company CEO who have now given us an energy bill that subsidizes the OIL industry and does laughably little to foster new or sustainable energy sources, and then a new CAFE standard which does the bare minimum over a really short period of time, while making it illegal for local areas to have higher standards.

Does anyone still doubt that the OIL industry is really running the country?

Liam.

Mass Debt

As we probably are all aware, there’s an overhaul of the bankruptcy laws set to take effect soon, and I have a really hard time deciding which side of the issue to come down on. Ultimately, the culprit is the consumptive nature of our society.

As I see it, the arguments for and against line up like this:

On the anti side, we have poor people, unable to make ends meet (particularly with the minimum wage stagnant through nearly ten years of inflation) who get ever more into debt, and the only way to get out is to declare bankruptcy. The argument here is that if we paid them enough to actually live their lives they wouldn’t have to go bankrupt. The argument also is that the whole concept of bankruptcy is supposed to be to give someone a fresh start after screwing up, and by turning that into a restructuring of debt, you leave someone who is honestly in dire straits unable to climb out of the pit.

But the most compelling reason to me is that this is only PERSONAL bankruptcy. Heading every closer to a fascist state, as far as I can tell there’s no reworking of CORPORATE bankruptcy. This is further tipping the scales in favor of the corporations and away from the citizens. For an example of how this isn’t fair (and I recognize this may not be a typical example. It’s illustrative, however, of how the system isn’t fair):

Suppose Mr. & Mrs. Jones scrape and save to eek out a living, and they’re responsible about their debt load. They carry a mortgage and maybe a car payment, but they don’t carry revolving debt on their credit cards and they haven’t run up lines of credit anywhere else. Mr. & Mrs. Jones retire, having figured out that their pensions will be sufficient to pay their required monthly payments and still have enough left over to eat and live.

Now suppose Mr. & Mrs. Jones’ former company declares bankruptcy. As part of corporate bankruptcy laws, corporations are allowed to default on pensions. It’s one of the threats Northwest Airlines has been throwing at the striking union to try to force them to accept much lower wages. “Look, if you don’t take this pay wage, we’ll have to declare bankruptcy, and then you’ll all lose your pensions.”

So now Mr. & Mrs. Jones no longer have the income they earned, were promised, are owed and were counting on, and so they have no choice but to declare bankruptcy themselves so as not to lose their house and their cars and be either homeless or forced back to work in their golden years. But oh, no, according to the new PERSONAL bankruptcy laws, all they do is restructure their debt so they can make smaller payments, payments that, with no income, they still can’t afford.

In the extreme case, let’s assume Mr. & Mrs. Jones had actually worked for the very bank which holds their mortgage note. We would end up with a case whereby the corporation (the bank) could completely screw the Joneses and then turn around and hold them responsible for payments that they (the Joneses) could have made if the bank hadn’t defaulted to them.

Further examples of the fascist nature of the neo-conservative agenda. Anything that interferes with corporate profits is evil, even if it’s simply holding corporations responsible for cleaning up their own messes and meeting their own obligations.



However… on the other side of the coin, we have rampant consumerism leading large sectors of the population to go into debt for things they just don’t need. When we look at the middle class, not starving, not risking homelessness, but so many of them opening up lines of credit for that new wide-screen TV or that luxury automobile or for designer clothing when they could be similarly clad (but without the pricey designer name) for much less at generic stores.

Our society is so heavily oriented towards consuming more than our means will allow that huge numbers of people with the fiscal acumen of a toadstool get themselves so far into debt that they can never climb their way out. Should bankruptcy become just another step in the standard middle class life? “Well, let’s follow our parents. Buy lots of stuff on credit until we’ve maxed everything out, then declare bankruptcy sometime around 40 and live out the rest of our lives on the income that remains after being freed from our obligations” sounds too much like welfare for the middle class, funded by whoever granted them credit.

…and yet back to the anti side of the argument again, right now we’ve got too many companies pushing too many people into financing things they (the people) really can’t afford. If this law is passed, instead of getting better this situation will get worse. When there’s no longer much risk of default to the corporations, we’ll start seeing even more of these “Bad credit? No credit? NO PROBLEM!” ads exhorting the financially disinclined to open up more lines of credit. Why not, we’ll get our money back eventually!

The thing is, bankruptcy acts (or should act) as a deterrent to this sort of behavior. I’m not saying such loans shouldn’t be available only that they shouldn’t be so actively marketed to those who can least afford them.

So what it comes down to is that I just don’t know what’s the right thing to do here. I’m all about personal responsibility, and that part of me positively screams that this is a good thing, that we shouldn’t be giving people license to run up obligations and then legally stick it to those who were nice enough to provide the loan. On the other hand, let’s keep the playing field level and if we’re going to severely restrict personal bankruptcy, restrict corporate bankruptcy at the same time.

Liam.

Question for Pat Robertson

It's all over the news, so I don't need to rant at length about how entirely UN-Christian it is for Pat Robertson to call for the assassination of someone, nor how woefully uninformed he is to talk about Communism in a country with democratic elections.

But I heard a comment that made me laugh, so I thought I'd put it here:

Mr. Robertson, when did "What Would Jesus Do?" become "Who Would Jesus Kill?"

(If anyone doesn't know what I'm talking about here, please let me know, I'll fill you in.)

Liam.

What do we owe our troops?

President Bush tells us we have to stay the course in Iraq because we owe it to those who gave their lives to stay the course and make sure that their lives weren't spent in vain.

That logic fails to fly, however, if there is no value in what we're accomplishing.

Even assuming we didn't know what we were doing had no value when we started, the logic is flawed.

Suppose you own a house which you think needs painting, because you haven't had it painted in 10 years. You don't have enough money to paint it all, so you decide you're going to paint one side of it each year for the next four years. After two years and two sides are painted, someone points out to you that your house has vinyl siding, and so doesn't require regular re-painting.

Does it make sense to continue the job, because to not do so would have made the spending of the money on the first two sides valueless? Or does it make more sense not to spend MORE money on a valueless endeavor? And if you were one of the dollars yet to be spent, how would you feel, having your value expended on a worthless pursuit, because you owed it to other dollars which were irretrievable?

President Bush’s logic presumes several things which many no longer believe to be true:

• That this war is winnable.
• That our goals in Iraq are worthwhile.
• That those goals are worth not only the lives spent, but the additional lives yet to be lost.

There’s an expression, “good money after bad”, and in this case, it seems like we’re spending good lives after bad. We can’t get back the lives of those who’ve been killed, but it doesn’t make their sacrifice worth anything more to pile more bodies on top of theirs in a fruitless and stupid pursuit.

Liam.

Approval Watch

For those who haven't heard, the latest approval poll numbers for Bush are 36% approval, 58% disapproval. These are from the American Research Group, released yesterday.

On the economy, 33% approval, 62% disapproval.

For reference, this is in the same range as Nixon's approval rating during the middle of the Watergate scandal.

Liam.

Be A Witness

I suppose we in the blog world are more politically aware than others, so probably everyone reading this is aware there is a genocide going on in the Darfur region of the Sudan.

A group called Be A Witness has compiled statistics and the amount of coverage this atrocity has gotten on the major networks combined amounts to about one minute of air time per hundred thousand people killed.

To try to get the word out, this group has created a video, which you can watch at:

http://www.beawitness.org/video

Interestingly, ABC, CBS and NBC have all refused to air the ad in Washington DC. So not only is this not getting coverage, you can’t even BUY airtime to get the word out.

Check out the video. It’s worth noting what we are and are not being told in our news about what’s going on on our planet.

Liam.

What's a few lives?

Today, I was in the Bangor, ME airport, putting my children on a plane to Wyoming for the school year. It was a most sad day.

While we were there, there were about 200 young marines lolling about the airport, freshly in from NC and waiting for the plane that was to take them to Iraq. As they boarded their plane, I applauded, because what else can you do for someone who has volunteered to fight for our country.

Nevertheless, as they filed carefully out of the terminal and one by one entered the plane, I couldn't help but wonder how many of these young men would never be returning home again. And of those who would, how many would be maimed, a lost limb here, lost vision there, the best and brightest young men and women of this country coming back broken and damaged, if not physically, then certainly emotionally, psychologically.

And the hell of it is, as I sat there watching these brave young people go overseas for a nine month tour of duty, in my heart of hearts, I know that they're being asked to go over and give of their bodies, their psyches and even their lives in support of an unconscionable war. They are not protecting our country from anything, they are not making the world a better place, they are being asked to risk everything so that a few chessmasters in Washington D.C. can move a few more pieces around the board and solidify a bit more personal power.

I honestly don't know how President Bush sleeps at night.

Liam.

Enjoyable post

Over on Huffington Post, Cenk Uygur has posted this article which I quite enjoyed.

Liam.

Comments Change

Note: I've gotten a huge increase in the number of spam comments lately, so I've enabled a new Blogger feature that makes you type in a verification word before you comment.

My intent is not to stifle legitimate comments (which is why I still allow anonymous comments), just to stop these damned 'bots coming in and spamming the world on my blog.

I know the word verification is annoying, and my apologies. It's the best solution to the problem.

Liam.

Quotes on the war...

I have a set of quotes for you...

"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is."

"You can support the troops but not the president."

"Well, I just think it's a bad idea. What's going to happen is they're going to be over there for 10, 15, maybe 20 years."

"Explain to the mothers and fathers of American servicemen that may come home in body bags why their son or daughter have to give up their life?"

"[The] President . . . is once again releasing American military might on a foreign country with an ill-defined objective and no exit strategy. He has yet to tell the Congress how much this operation will cost. And he has not informed our nation's armed forces about how long they will be away from home."

"I had doubts about the bombing campaign from the beginning . . I didn't think we had done enough in the diplomatic area."

"I cannot support a failed foreign policy. History teaches us that it is often easier to make war than peace. This administration is just learning that lesson right now. The President began this mission with very vague objectives and lots of unanswered questions. A month later, these questions are still unanswered. There are no clarified rules of engagement. There is no timetable. There is no legitimate definition of victory. There is no contingency plan for mission creep. There is no clear funding program. There is no agenda to bolster our over-extended military. There is no explanation defining what vital national interests are at stake. There was no strategic plan for war when the President started this thing, and there still is no plan today"


You all know I agree with most of these with respect to the Iraq war. And you know that the administration and its apologists are more than willing to call anyone making such statements "unpatriotic" or "treasonous" or "America hating".

But, here's the twist: These quotes are in response to President Clinton sending troops to Bosnia, and they are from people like Tom Delay, Sean Hannity, Rick Santorum and President Bush himself (then Governor Bush, of course). The whole list comes courtesy of a fellow blogger.

Playing the quotes again, with their attribution:

"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is." -- Governor George W. Bush (R-TX)

Really... Perhaps this is the same Governor Bush who stated on the campaign trail that he did not believe America should be involved in so-called "nation building". It certainly can't be the same President Bush who has for years now failed to have anything like an exit strategy for Iraq.

"You can support the troops but not the president." -- Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)

I guess that's just Democrat Presidents, because if we're not 100% behind our President now, we're America-hating and possibly treasonous.

"Well, I just think it's a bad idea. What's going to happen is they're going to be over there for 10, 15, maybe 20 years." -- Joe Scarborough (R-FL)

No, actually, we weren't. But now we have Rumsfeld saying that Cheney's "last throes" of the insurgency could go on as long as another 10 years. Right quote, wrong war, wrong President.

"Explain to the mothers and fathers of American servicemen that may come home in body bags why their son or daughter have to give up their life?" -- Sean Hannity, Fox News, 4/6/99

Kind of what Cindy Sheehan is asking now, while Sean Hannity and the other pro-Bushites try to "Swift Boat" her.

"[The] President . . . is once again releasing American military might on a foreign country with an ill-defined objective and no exit strategy. He has yet to tell the Congress how much this operation will cost. And he has not informed our nation's armed forces about how long they will be away from home." -- Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA)

Really, Senator Santorum. As opposed to THIS President, who has so vastly overspent his administration's initial estimates of the cost of the war in Iraq as to make a teaspoon of water into Lake Erie?

"I had doubts about the bombing campaign from the beginning . . I didn't think we had done enough in the diplomatic area." -- Senator Trent Lott (R-MS)

Thanks, Senator Lott. I had, and still have, the same doubts about the current war. Glad to know it's okay to state them.

"I cannot support a failed foreign policy. History teaches us that it is often easier to make war than peace. This administration is just learning that lesson right now. The President began this mission with very vague objectives and lots of unanswered questions. A month later, these questions are still unanswered. There are no clarified rules of engagement. There is no timetable. There is no legitimate definition of victory. There is no contingency plan for mission creep. There is no clear funding program. There is no agenda to bolster our over-extended military. There is no explanation defining what vital national interests are at stake. There was no strategic plan for war when the President started this thing, and there still is no plan today" -- Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)

Mr. Delay, I couldn't have put it better myself.


The Republican Party: Making statements they will later call anti-American when made against one of THEIR guys since 1992.

Liam.

Oil Company Insanity

Last year's profits for the Oil industry were record setting. According to an article I read recently, financial statements issued in July show that profits are up significantly this year over last. Exxon Mobil is up 35%, Shell 34% and Conoco Phillips up a whopping 51% over last year.

Tell me again why we needed an energy bill to give these guys incentives? Tell me again why we're paying $2.50/gal for regular at the pump these days?

More and more of our money is being taken away to feed ill-advised wars and corporate coffers, and we continue to take it.

For the record, I'm not against higher gas prices, I think that higher prices might help curb the American appetite for excess consumption. If those higher prices were created via taxes (not that I'm in favor of higher taxes) in order to drive down usage of a dwindling resource, or to fund research into replacement resources for when the oil is finally all gone, I'd be more inclined to agree. But to send the Oil Industry's profits soaring over last year's huge record levels and then try to blame it on the turmoil in the middle east is insane.

This is what the energy and corporate policy of this administration is getting us. Higher prices for the things we need to fuel ever greater riches for a few corporations, who are then given further "incentives" by the energy bill.

It is astounding to me the number of people who are being directly harmed by this administration's actions and lies who continue to support it in knee jerk fashion.

Liam.

More on Cindy Sheehan

I keep hearing Cindy Sheehan described as having an "anti-Bush agenda" as if this is somehow an indictment of her current actions. Folks, don't let this fool you: It's just another case of repackaging something, to make it seem like something it isn't. Cindy Sheehan disagrees with President Bush. She is asking him to provide some insight into what the noble purpose is that her son died for.

Serious protester or grieving mother, she's asking Bush to stop using platitudes about noble causes and actually provide some actual backing to the words. So yes, she disagrees with him, and yes, that qualifies as an "anti-Bush agenda".

However... the last I checked, we're still free in this country to speak out when we disagree with our leaders. We should not allow our leaders to dismiss any disagreement with fancy words that boil down to "she disagrees with me". Because that's really what those words mean. Her disagreement with the President shouldn't be taken seriously because she disagrees with the President.

Folks, it's dangerous if we let our leaders and those who surround them define as ridiculous anything which disagrees with them. Our fundamental principles as a country give us the right to disagree and the freedom to speak out when we do. Don't let those fundamental freedoms be eroded by making it TOO easy to dismiss out of hand any dissenting opinion.

What this turns out to be is another case of President Bush refusing to hear from the common people. His whole image is based on being a regular guy, just plain folks, and he likes us to believe he's out there talking to the regular population. And yet on Sunday he had time for a two hour bike ride, but can't find time to talk to someone who believes so strongly in her cause that she's willing to sit in a tent in sweltering temperatures, just to get her message across.

Remember, this is the President who, when he speaks in public, requires that everyone in the audience be pre-vetted so that the deck is stacked with those who agree with him. How can he ever claim to understand what the people want, when the only people he ever hears from are those who are selected based on their agreement?

This administration has done everything in its power to squash dissent, to demonize it or trivialize it or prevent it from being aired. Just about everything but actually answer it.

Liam.

Questions for today...

Can someone tell me why Four Star General Kevin Byrnes was fired from his job? It doesn't make sense to me. I know these are liberal talking points, but nevertheless:

Why does the man who was 180 degrees off on the "slam dunk" about WMDs in Iraq merit the Medal of Freedom, but a general who has a consensual relationship with a woman after separating from his wife (even if they were not yet officially divorced) merit firing?

Why do generals who have presided over torture in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay keep their jobs and even get promotions, but a guy who by the accounts I've read is a stand up guy gets drummed out weeks before retirement for not wanting to be alone?

Liam.

More Radio Stupidity

Wonderful...

As you know, I occasionally sample the various wing radios. A few weeks back, I reported on just how stupid I found the left wing stations at RadioPower.org. Tonight, I listened to Matt Drudge's radio program (there was a guest host).

Obviously, a lot of what they presented as obvious fact was far from obvious to me, but one moron caller really typified for me why the two sides will never see eye to eye. This person's call was about Cindy Sheehan. This caller had been to "protest the protest", and the majority of her complaint about the "Camp Casey" protest was taking down the liberals for not living up to conservative stereotypes of liberals.

For example, she spent several minutes ranting on how they (the Sheehan camp) were eating donuts and even offered some to the protest protesters. She said, with scorn in her voice, something like "I answered 'No thank you, I eat better than that'" and then went on to say "These are liberals! Shouldn't they be eating vegetables and tofu?"

That was it! Her prime complaint was that liberals might actually eat poorly and smoke, as if it's any kind of indictment that liberals might not all be the tree-hugging, tofu-eating nutcases the conservatives portray them as.

Now, to me, the hidden message is that a batch of people who are there to protest a war were actually so friendly, they offered to share their donuts with people who were there protesting the other side. Maybe not a huge story, but had I been involved, I would have said "Well, I still disagree with them, but I have to give them credit, they were nice, happy to discuss with us, and even offered us a share of their snacks", not "Hey, some liberals they are, they weren't even eating tofu!".

This show seems to all be calls about Cindy Sheehan, which I suppose isn't a surprise, it's been a slow few news days as far as I can see from here on vacation. That said, if I hear one more person say that Cindy Sheehan has done "a complete 360" I'm going to scream. A quick note to the geometrically challenged: If you do a complete 360, you've done a loop and end up going in the same direction. If you want to claim someone has reversed themselves, the term is "a complete 180". And from what I've read, the idea that she's reversed herself only works if you selectively edit her statements from when she originally saw President Bush. But I'll do some more research on that and post on it separately.

Another stupidity: Someone who claimed that the liberals were undermining their own argument by paying their taxes. This person's argument was that our taxes pay for the war, if you don't support the war, you should protest by not paying your taxes, and so by doing so, you're proving you don't really support your own argument.

Stupidity.

Liam.

Vacation...

Wow, it's amazing what a week in a small cabin with parents, spouse and four children does to take one's focus off of politics.

Add into the mix that we have no television, no radio, and only very sporadic internet access, and I really don't know whether John Roberts, John Bolton and their neocon masters have revealed themselves as aliens bent on taking over the planet yet or not.

Really, it's very relaxing NOT knowing what's going on in the world and not having to get all worked up about it.

We're about half way through our two weeks up here, now. I will surely be back ranting eventually.

Until then, enjoy this vacation from me.

Liam.

They Own You...

The National Labor Relations Board has ruled that it is legal for companies to prohibit fraternization between employees outside of the office.

The suit in question specifically dealt with sexual liaisons between coworkers, but the ruling is so broadly worded that it makes it legal for a company to prohibit ANY contact between coworkers outside of business hours and/or business functions.

My own company is really cool in this regard, so I doubt it will ever affect me, but the truth is that with this ruling, it would be perfectly legitimate for my company to prohibit me from going out to lunch with my co-workers, or going out for a beer with them after a particularly long day. Some of my best friends also work for my company, and we might be prohibited from going hiking on weekends or getting together for a barbecue in the evenings. Several of my co-workers are married to other company members. I’m not sure how the company could prohibit that, perhaps by firing one of the two on the ground of unsanctioned fraternization.

Applied literally, this ruling allows companies to effectively prohibit unions, because it’s already legal for company to require that union activity not be undertaken during company hours, and now they can prohibit employees from getting together after hours.

To me the most scary part of this is the reaffirmation that it is any of the company’s business what I do in my own hours.

I write this blog. It has nothing to do with my company. I have not identified my company, I do not claim to speak for my company, but the implication is that if my company supports President Bush and they find my blog, it is perfectly legitimate for them to fire me for this blog that I write on my own time, regardless of my performance for the company or the fact that I have never once tried to ascribe my beliefs to the company.

This week, I’m on vacation in Maine. We’re in a remote spot, if I were to choose to go skinny dipping, there’s no one around to see it unless a spy satellite happens to have an odd interest in watching me. And yet apparently if I happen to mention my hypothetical skinny dipping on my blog, and my boss is a prude who disapproves of public nudity, he can fire me.

This is insane. My company does not own me. I am not an indentured servant, we have a contract, they agree to pay me a certain amount, I agree to perform certain services for them. It is not stated anywhere in our contract that I agree to behave according to their standards at all times, the best they should reasonable be able to expect is that I will behave in accordance with company standards at any time that I identify myself as a representative of the company or am in situations where I can reasonably be expected to be identified as such.

Liam.

Work Ethic

Interesting. Prior to the current administration, the President who took the most vacation days during his time in office was President Reagan, who over the course of 8 years took 335 days of vacation time.

That record has now been shattered. If you just count the time in Crawford, TX, and not any other vacations, prior to the start of the current trip, Bush has in four and a half years taken 319 days, and this doesn't count trips to Maine or anywhere else.

With the current 5 weeks, he's up to 344 days. Almost a full year on vacation, or 20% of his Presidency. How many of us get a day off per week? How many jobs carry 10 weeks of paid vacation?

Certainly the President isn't entirely on vacation during his vacation, but the arguments in favor of these trips don't wash.

It is suggested that Bush goes back to Crawford to "reconnect with the people", but interviews with Crawford residents say that he's never seen off of the ranch, the fact that he's there makes him no more accessible to locals than the fact that he's in the White House means that the average DC resident can talk to him.

The Presidency is not suppose to be a telecommuting job. If you don't have the fire to be President and put in the huge amount of work necessary to run the country, don't run. By the end of 5 years of Presidency, George Bush will have SHATTERED the old record of days off for a full 8 year Presidency.

Now, on top of that, even when he's working, this President isn't working. He's publically stated that he refuses to work weekends. His wife reports that he's in bed by 9pm every night, he doesn't get up particularly early, and it's reported that he takes two hours to exercise mid-day every day.

President Bush needs to realize that the Presidency isn't another cushy job gotten for him by one of his Dad's rich friends. This guy's work ethic sucks, and he's the one whose Administration is giving ever more of our money to corporations and rich buddies? Giving billions in "incentives" to ExxonMobil and the rest of the OIL industry, and industry that had record setting profits last year? Refusing to support a higher minimum wage?

Just one more in a long list of reasons why I think this guy is the worst President in my lifetime. And you'll note, not a single bit of this argument is partisan. It's personal.

Liam.

Liberal vs Conservative

I’ve written before about how neither political party can fairly lay claim to the label they choose for themselves (liberal and conservative). Both have become mired in special and self interests to the detriment of their philosophies, constituencies and responsibilities.

My wife and I were having a discussion on what it really means to be liberal and what it really means to be conservative, and I think we’ve got a pretty good handle on it, and it reinforces my opinion that the best place to be is in the center.

In a nutshell, conservative thinking respects the status quo. Liberal thinking is actually better represented by the new term they take for themselves “progressive”, looking to change things for the better.

The thing is, by definition, true conservative opinion is going to be much less contentious than liberal thinking, because if you are conservative on an issue, that’s it. The only area of contention is whether you are conservative based on the current status quo, or conservative in thinking the old way was better and wanting to go back to that.

Contrast that with liberal thinking which, by advocating change, opens up the debate over which change is actually “for the better”. But certainly most of the things we take for granted these days came about because of liberal thinking, not conservative. Abolishing slavery was a very liberal idea in its time. Voting rights for women and minorities as well. Equal protection and rights clauses too.

Heck, the very notions on which this country was founded were liberal in their day: democracy, personal liberties, fair representation. These were all changes from the status quo, liberal ideas decried strongly by conservative British citizens.

Not all change is for the better, of course. Throwing more money at a corrupt and broken welfare system may feel on the surface like “giving more to the poor”, but it doesn’t make things any better.

And this is why I have a hard time respecting anyone who asserts that they are conservative to the exclusion of all things liberal, or liberal without a trace of conservative thinking. Without liberal thought, life remains static, boring, and nothing ever changes. Without conservative thought, life is constantly in flux and there’s no stability.

We need both respect for tradition and an activist nature to prevent us from stagnating.

Liam.

Senator Rick Santorum doesn't get it

This morning, on an interview on NPR, Senator Rick Santorum was commenting on those who speak out against his ultra Christian stance on abortion, gay marriage, women working outside the home, etc (all as found in his recent book "It Takes A Family"), and he commented that Christian ideology was out of favor with the media, and so tended to be attacked.

He read off a long list of things he's been called recently, and then (in that smug, superior, holier-than-thou tone of voice we hear so much of out of our leaders these days) commented that he respects opposing viewpoints and doesn't call those who hold them names, and doesn't understand why people don't respect HIS opinions.

But here's the key: It isn't about respect for his opinions.

If Rick Santorum went to church every day and donated half of his salary to his church, married a woman who felt like he did who would stay home and tend the house while he went off to work, I'd have no problem with that. If he raised his children in like fashion, instilling in them the belief that they should marry and settle down, that the boys should grow to be men who support their families and the girls should grow to be women who run the home, that's perfectly fine. If Rick Santorum and his wife went to counselling any time they had problems and stayed together for the sake of the family even when their marriage had degraded to the point that it really wasn't worth keeping, I would applaud him.

But... Rick Santorum is a United States Senator. He has the power to enact laws forcing his views on other people, and has advocated doing just that. To me, that is not showing respect for opposing opinion. Put another way, it's easy to be quiet and respectful of those who disagree when you hold the power to make the final decision.

Rick Santorum, I applaud your strong moral code. If you follow it as well as you preach it (something I find lacking in a lot of religious-right-pandering pols these days), you have my respect. But don't try to impose your morality on others where there is no victim involved. Stop trying to pass amendments to ban homosexual marriage. Your way may be the only way for you, but it is not the only way that exists. By trying to codify your way as law, you infringe on the freedoms and rights of those who disagree with you, to nobody's detriment except possibly their own.

Liam.

A quick update...

My life has become a swirling mass of dishes, laundry and household chores when I'm not at my paying job.

I have not lost my passion for politics, I've simply lost my free time, as I mentioned before.

However, I'll post a note like this every few days, just to keep people aware that I haven't abandoned the blog entirely.

Come next week, I'll be on vacation. I should then have time to start writing a lot again (assuming we have connectivity from Maine, which isn't a given).

Until then, I'll be living in this fog of exhaustion, and I'm sorry I'm not updating more often.

Liam.