To Rule versus Govern

To rule or to govern.

Govern

1. (Government, Politics & Diplomacy) (also intr) to direct and control the actions, affairs, policies, functions, etc., of (a political unit, organization, nation, etc.); rule

Rule

1. Governing power or its possession or use; authority.

George Washington’s Farewell Address, speaking on political parties (from wiki.answers.com)

“They serve to organize faction, to give it an artificial and extraordinary force; to put, in the place of the delegated will of the nation, the will of a party, often a small but artful and enterprising minority of the community; and, according to the alternate triumphs of different parties, to make the public administration the mirror of the ill-concerted and incongruous projects of faction, rather than the organ of consistent and wholesome plans digested by common counsels, and modified by mutual interests.”

Since the political shift of 1994, with Newt Gingrich and his Contract for America, bitpartisanship has become a dirty word in the conservative vernacular.

This disdain for anything that smacks of compromise intensified exponentially with the advent of the Tea Party and their candidate’s successes in the 2010 elections.

What we have now is an attempt by the Tea Party Republican ‘faction’ to rule as a minority. They have little interest in governing, if the difference between ruling and governing implies a requirement for political compromise.

This is exactly what our first President warned us of. He foresaw those ‘small and artful’ politicians with their ‘ill-concerted and incongruous projects’ trying to force their vision of our country instead of attempting any ‘common counsel’ or ‘mutual interest’.

So what to do in counterbalance to this force dedicated to foisting its policies and dictates on the American people?

My answer would be to do whatever it takes to remove them from their temporary seat of power. I would remove them as a statement that our founding fathers fully intended, by virtue of the checks and balances they carefully crafted into our governmental system, to forge a system based on compromise.

Every major crises with the exception of the Civil War has been resolved by the two major parties, regardless of the rancor of the debate, crafting a give and take answer that at least temporarily put the issues to rest.

We can’t afford to lose sight of the precedent and traditions that have served us so well since our founding some 220 plus years ago. We must send the Tea Party packing.

Voter Caging Being Done in Swing States – By Accident?

From the New York Times today via MSNBC ~ States’ purges of voter rolls appear illegal

The article reads:

“Tens of thousands of eligible voters in at least six swing states have been removed from the rolls or have been blocked from registering in ways that appear to violate federal law, according to a review of state records and Social Security data by The New York Times.

The actions do not seem to be coordinated by one party or the other, nor do they appear to be the result of election officials intentionally breaking rules, but are apparently the result of mistakes in the handling of the registrations and voter files as the states tried to comply with a 2002 federal law, intended to overhaul the way elections are run.”

There’s more at the link.

This is a disaster in the making. In some states twice as many voters have been purged than new registrations.

We should be demanding provisional ballots if we are told at the polls that we’re ineligible due to purging. We should be in the streets on November 5th if McCain wins this election due to this improper purging of eligible voters.

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McCain lambasted by vets for his GI Bill flip flopping

The site VetVoice had this article posted yesteday.

A Tale of Two Johns

Lambasting Johns Coryn (R TX) and McCain (R AZ) for their shoddy faux support of Webb’s GI Bill. Quoting the article
“Senators John Cornyn and John McCain are like two anti-troop peas in a pod. After voting against the Dwell TIme Amendment that would give soldiers equal time at home as they spent overseas, both adamantly opposed the new GI Bill as “too generous.” Going a step further, Cornyn’s aide personally told me during a call to his office that the new GI Bill would encourage soldiers to leave the service. Of course, Cornyn pulled that notion out of John McCain’s ass, who repeatedly suggested the new GI Bill would harm the military by way of reduced retention. Transferability of the bill to family members never came up during the opposition to this bill. “

McCain then shamelessly tried to take credit for the bill.

Veterans of America, you should know who’s on your side, and McIIIrd, it ain’t.

Rep Hoyer, Sen Rockefeller take massive crap on Constitution

From TPM today:

WASHINGTON – Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman John “Jay” Rockefeller (WV), Senate Intelligence Committee Vice-Chair Kit Bond (MO), House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (MD), and House Minority Whip Roy Blunt (MO) announced today that a bipartisan compromise has been agreed to that will modernize the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

The FISA Amendments Act, H.R. 6304, will increase the nation’s security by strengthening the ability of the intelligence community to conduct lawful surveillance of terrorists, as well as protect constitutional rights by requiring warrants before the government can surveil any American.

“This bipartisan bill balances the needs of our intelligence community with Americans’ civil liberties, and provides critical new oversight and accountability requirements,” said Hoyer. “It is the result of compromise, and like any compromise is not perfect, but I believe it strikes a sound balance. Furthermore, we have ensured that Congress can revisit these issues because the legislation will sunset at the end of 2012.”

 

Ummm, they caved on immunity. It is now officially OK for a private company, on the request of the executive to violate our Constitution and break the law. There will be no penalty.

Welcome to The Fascist States of America

 

Daddy, what is Cheating?

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What is cheating?
Why are there rules?

If there is no penalty for breaking the rules, then the rules are useless. How do you explain to your children the stance that the Clinton camp is making to seat the Michigan and Florida delegations as currently constituted?

When attempting to answer these questions that your children inevitably bring up, the Michigan and Florida primaries and delegations make a great example.

Although both states have been pushing the DNC to change the timing of the primary cycle for years, they were unable to get the DNC to change the rules.
So they broke them.
There must be consequences for breaking rules, or they have no meaning.
Senator Obama removed his name from the Michigan ballot, and neither candidate campaigned in earnest in either state.
The rules were clear, and accepted by both candidates, although Senator Clinton failed to remove her name from the Michigan ballot as Obama did.

No one thought much of the fact that the DNC insisted, up front, that these delegates would NOT be seated.

So now, in a desperate ploy, the Clinton campaign is trying to move the goal posts to include those delegates in the count for the nomination.
This will be decided by the rules or credentials committees, whose job it is to determine the fate of those delegations.

To agree to a set of rules, then, when things don’t go your way, you attempt to change the rules is cheating.
Even a child understands this.

What Obama should Do NOW.

Barack Obama’s campaign has been eerily quiet since the pastor episode. It’s as if they aren’t quite sure what to do now.

Senator Clinton came out with a major proposal, and we hear nothing from Senator Obama’s campaign.

It is time for him to come out with detailed proposals and programs. Put the flesh on the bones of the bullet points on his platform.

• Increase investments in infrastructure
• Energy independence
• Education
• Research and development
• Modernize and simplify our tax code so it provides greater opportunity and relief to more Americans
• Implement trade policies that benefit American workers and increase the export of American goods.  

Each of these bullet points needs a clear definition and details about how each will be paid for, and as much implementation detail as possible.

This flies in the face of conventional wisdom, which says that fuzzy is better, as there aren’t details to pick apart. I disagree with that wisdom at this time.

He doesn’t have to win Pennsylvania, but coming within four percent or so would allocate sufficient delegates to make Clinton’s continued fight irrelevant. I believe that with more clarity on these positions, more people will realize that he is the ‘real deal’, and put aside notions that ‘he isn’t ready’.

Castro Steps Down

Shades of Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush finally gets an international victory. As Fidel Castro announced in a letter today that he will not serve another term as president of Cuba.

Bush will be seen as a great hero by historians who will point out that his cowboy diplomacy of shoot first and ask questions later was responsible for the downfall of Castro.

In other news, since Castro’s brother, Raul has taken over most of the duties of the Cuban presidency since Fidel’s illness over a year ago, no change is forseen in Cuban politics.

Burger King must have its tomatoes.

Check out this link to a NY Times article about the migrant workers who pick tomatoes for the fast food industry.

Pay is .45 per 32# basket. Up from .40 in 1980.

Geebutz…

The price of tomatoes

Benazir Bhutto Assassinated

The AP wire this morning is reporting that Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was assasinated in a bomb blast. She was attending a political rally in Rawalpindi when the explosion occurred. At least 20 others were killed.

This will undoubtedly destabilize an already fragile political climate in that country.

Missionary attacked

What did we miss?

Rio – Argentina
Rotters newswire

An American pseudo-missionary was arrested after being roughed up by a hostile crowd on the nude beach in Rio yesterday.
His proseletyzing was infuriating the Roman Catholic residents, as he was ranting about Reverand Jeffers being the True Church.
At one point, the crowd was going to bury him in the sand and let the crabs feast on his head. The crabs, however, refused to go anywhere near the missionary, identified as Daryll Deludo.
His wife, when asked to comment, got up from her blanket and asked for a towel to cover herself, before replying in disgust, ‘I often wonder why I married a lame ass religious bigot’.

Uninsured more likely to die from cancer

Off the AP wire today…

ATLANTA – Uninsured cancer patients are nearly twice as likely to die within five years as those with private coverage, according to the first national study of its kind and one that sheds light on troubling health care obstacles.

People without health insurance are less likely to get recommended cancer screening tests, the study also found, confirming earlier research. And when these patients finally do get diagnosed, their cancer is likely to have spread.

 

I consider this a national disgrace. As a cancer survivor (one year now), it really pisses me off that those who have this disease eating away at them don’t get timely diagnoses that might give them a fighting chance for survival.

War for Sale

Here’s a little tidbit of a poll just out today, from our fiends, er, friends at Fock Snooze.

FOX News/Opinion Dynamics Poll. Sept. 25-26, 2007. N=900 registered voters nationwide. MoE ± 3.
						.
“Do you believe Iran‘s nuclear program is for peaceful purposes or military purposes?”
						.
		Peaceful	Military	Unsure
		%	%	%
	9/25-26/07	6	80	14
						.
“Do you believe the United States should take a softer line with Iran, including more diplomacy, or take a tougher line, including military action if necessary?”
						.
		Softer Line	Tougher Line	Same as Now (vol.)	Unsure
		%	%	%	%
	9/25-26/07	31	50	8	11
						.
“If diplomacy fails to convince Iran to end its nuclear program before President Bush leaves office, which of the following actions would you prefer? Do you think President Bush should take military action to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities before his term ends, or let the next president, whoever that may be, deal with Iran?”
						.
		Take Military Action	Let Next President Deal with Iran	Unsure
		%	%	%
	9/25-26/07	29	54	16

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The only saving grace seems to be that the majority of the sheeple don’t want Fush to Buck it up.

Here they Go Again, Social Security must be Cut!

Story off the AP wire via MSNBC:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20957376/
The Bush administration said Monday the only way to permanently fix Social Security is through some combination of benefit cuts and tax increases.

That was one of the key findings in a new paper on Social Security released by the Treasury Department in an effort to achieve common ground on the politically explosive issue.

“Social Security can be made permanently solvent only by reducing the present value of scheduled benefits and/or increasing the present value of scheduled tax increases,” the paper said. The Treasury paper said that while other changes to the giant benefit program might be desirable “only these changes can restore solvency permanently.”
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Unfortunately, these clowns completely forget to mention that uncapping the SS contribution or raising the interest rate for raiding the surplus would fix the problem permanently…

Guns for Money…

Story on MSNBC Business Section this morning

War means a Windfall for CEOs

Highlight of the article:
CEOs at top defense contractors have reaped annual pay gains of 200% to 688% in the years since the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.

• The chief executives at the seven defense contractors whose bosses made the most pocketed nearly a half-billion dollars from 2002 through last year.
• The CEOs made an average of $12.4 million a year, easily more than the average corporate chief.
• Since the start of the war, CEOs at defense contractors such have made, on average, more in four days than what a top general makes in a whole year, or $187,390
• General Dynamics CEO Nicholas Chabraja tops the list of defense-contractor chiefs who have made the most money during the 2002-2006 defense buildup. Between 2002 and 2006, he pocketed $97.9 million, or an average of $19.6 million a year.Sales at General Dynamics increased 76% from 2002 to 2006, with significant help from Department of Defense spending. Overall sales increased to $24.1 billion from $13.6 billion, and at least a third of that increase came from higher Department of Defense spending.

Read on, but get your barf bag in place, just recommendin…

Foreclosures soaring

U.S. home foreclosures soared in August

New data suggest homeowners can’t make mortgage payments

From AP via MSNBC
The story notes that “The number of foreclosure filings reported in the U.S. last month more than doubled versus August 2006 and jumped 36 percent from July…”
The rate of increase in foreclosures is going to have a ripple effect that is signalling recession.

Clinton offers universal health care plan

‘Individual mandate’ centerpiece requires all to have health insurance

Although Hillary finally gets around to proposing a health care system, she fails to implement Single Payer system.

There’s something for everyone to pick at on this proposal.

via the AP

link at http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20819827/

C-Span Covering Senate Report on US Operations in Iraq today

Right now C-Span TV is covering Senate’s Report on U.S. Operations in Iraq

http://c-span.org/watch/cspan_wm.asp?Cat=TV&Code=CS