Hello everyone.
Sure. It's been a while since my last post, but, fret not, I've been quite busy for our cause. Recently, I've been ingesting and decifering the lastest revised bill to come out of the House. From what I can tell, there's is much to be explained for the layman. In my opinion, that's about 73% of our country's population.
Besides death panels and other outrageous drummed up issues, the opposition, which consists largely of simply uniformed individuals, has no foundation to stand on. Even in the bible, we learn the lesson of the house built on the sand. Because there is no basic principal foundation for the opposition, they will fall in the end.
A strong wind ( liberal uprisig - A.K.A. knowledge ralley) will began to tilt the house that health care reform ignorance was built on. Once this tilting occurs, most of the uninformed will stand with us. i know this because no one wants to be on a losing team. To drive that point home further, would you stand inside a collapsing building?
Therefore, though our work ahead will be strenous, we ought not wait to began bringing down the house that ignorance built. We have a way of bring understaning and confromity to our opponents when we show our teeth and extend our hands ( with the proper test answers scribbled on them). So get out there and turn water into wine. Trust me..., they'll love that.
Hello to everyone. December 10th was the 60th anniversary of the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the General Assembly of the United Nations. For me it is a time to reflect on how we are all united as one human family. Barrack Obama’s words have echoed this broad spirit of inclusion and certainly strategic policy changes will follow.
To many ‘human rights’ brings images of Tiananmen Square or the Guantanamo Bay detention camp. But there is another side to human rights, with its own violent nature and pervasiveness, and it is outlined in Article 25 of the Declaration:
‘Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.’
Are you worried that McCain's smears may be gaining traction in your state or district? I've been worried about Ohio, so I wrote a series of replies to fight back. Please feel free to use one of my letters as a model and send your own letter-to-the-editor of a local paper. Time is running short: many papers have cut-off dates for election-related letters, so do it TODAY! Small town papers are a better bet for getting printed than big-city dailies that receive tons of letters. Also, those "pro-American" towns might need some balance about now. Find lists of newspapers here: http://www.50states.com/news/ and here: http://www.usnpl.com/It's always wise to check in advance if your paper has a length limit. They often don't tell you this on the website, so a quick phone call can save wasted time. Most will accept letters by email, so ask for the editor's (or relevant person's) direct address, too. Please leave a comment below to let others know where you've sent a letter. Of course, you can also revise any of these letters in your own words. THANKs and FIGHT THOSE SMEARS! YES WE CAN!
160 words:
Dear Editor:
Governor Palin warned Ohio voters today that electing Obama to the Presidency will "invite a dangerous international crisis." Aside from the fact that she takes Joe Biden's words entirely out of context, wasn't it our Republican President who invited terrorists in Iraq to "bring it on," even though thousands of US troops lacked body armor and protective vehicles?Wasn't it John McCain who thinks it's funny to sing about bombing Iran and joke about killing Middle Eastern civilians with cigarettes? He boasts that our enemies "know me" and that he has "already been tested." But it is precisely this cowboy attitude that dares the opposition to attack and invites challenge with threats of overwhelming force. McCain's famous temper and saber-rattling do not offer the security we need today. I would rather have cool-hand Obama in charge in a crisis. And what enemy of America could resist testing Sarah Palin—Heaven help us--if she wound up in the Oval Office?
There may be good reason to vote the Republican ticket, but the hope that John McCain will bring change to Washington cannot be counted as one of them. Real change depends not only on promises made by the candidate but also his willingness to replace entrenched party operatives with new appointees who will make things happen.
Shortly after my Senate confirmed appointment in the Gerald R. Ford Administration, I was asked to attend a briefing at the White House with a handful of other new political appointees. We were told we should think of ourselves as “sprinters” – members of the President’s team charged with getting his agenda done before his term ended.
Back then there were some 600 Senate confirmed leadership positions for implementing the Administration’s policies. According to United States Government Policy and Supporting Positions, commonly known as “The Plum Book”, there were 1,137 such Senate confirmed positions at the beginning of the Bush administration in 2004. Historically Plum jobs go to party faithfuls who are loyal to the president. These are the president’s team – non-career agents of change appointed without regard to civil service regulations.
In addition to Senate confirmed positions, there is an army of other political appointees who are “subject to noncompetitive appointment”. These include partisan presidential appointments which do not require Senate confirmation, Senior Executive Service positions, “Schedule C” and other Statutory Excepted Appointments. The Plum Book lists over 9,000 official Plum jobs which are outside of civil service.
In addition to the official Plum jobs, there are those career positions which are theoretically protected from political influence but are filled by party ideologues anyway – as, for example, the controversial hiring and firing of US attorneys by Alberto Gonzales. There are probably tens of thousands of federal workers who were unofficially vetted for ideological loyalty. Also of significance among the president’s team of change agents are a host of government contractors like Halliburton and Blackwater, the heads of which are also often party loyalists.
Executive branch appointments cover all functions of government ranging from the cabinet departments like State, Justice and Homeland Security to over 100 regulatory boards, commissions and agencies. These range from the CIA, CPSC, EPA and FAA to the Federal Trade Commission, Securities and Exchange Commission, Federal Reserve and Social Security Administration. The list goes on, giving the president’s appointees direct control of all aspects of our governed life.
The President, of course, also appoints people who affect the direction of the Judicial Branch. This includes not only Supreme Court justices but also lower level justices such as lifetime appointments to the Federal District Court bench.
Achieving real change in the direction of government requires replacement of tens of thousands of senior Bush officials with others having a new shared vision for change. If Barack Obama is elected, I would believe he will indeed set out to remove entrenched Republican appointees. And the new appointees would be expected to have real ideological differences with the Republicans they replace. If John McCain is elected, I have no hope real change will occur within the ranks of party loyalists who are running the government. This is for two reasons. First, it is not likely a Republican administration will terminate the employment of large numbers of historically important Republican faithfuls below the Cabinet level. Second, if they are replaced, the ideological differences between them and their successors will not be significant enough to, in the aggregate, cause change in the direction of our government.
The Federal government is a massive organization, slowly plowing ahead like a huge ocean liner. Even incremental change will require thousands of tugboats pushing in a new direction from every nook and cranny of the government system. It will not happen if John McCain is elected president.
The author is a native of Middlefield, OH. He was a life-long Republican, served in a political appointive position in the Ohio Department of Commerce under Republican Governor James A. Rhodes and in a Senate confirmed political position in the US Department of Commerce under President Gerald R. Ford. He is now a retired professor residing in Massachusetts.
EARLY VOTING...in all its glory...
"What I Saw When I Voted Today"...great story from Columbus voter......
"I headed down to the Hamilton County Board of Elections and saw the most beautiful thing ever - a line of people registering to vote at one end of the office and a line of people waiting to vote early at the other end of the office. It was an amazing sight!!As an African-American woman in her 20s, let me just to tell you how beautiful it was to see 90% of the crowd be African-American - and the majority of the rest were young college students. Single mothers with their children, older women with tears in their eyes and a mentally challenged man standing in line asking who we were voting for. "Obama, right?" he said. "Obama ya'll!" ....It was a beautiful sight and it was the one time in my life I was happy to stand in line."
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'How 1 Early Vote = 10 votes on election day'
by scimitar
I encourage EVERYONE who supports Obama to vote early. And here's why:
Come on, Ohio!!!...do you realize what a advantage we have, that other critical states like Michigan can only dream of? Please don't waste it. It's not enough to just early/absentee vote yourself, REACH OUT to help others early vote.
18 offices-- http://my.barackobama.com/page/content/inoffices
Find your countys' early-voting location/hours-- voteforchange.com
Look at ALL the students who would HAPPILY vote now if they have a ride to avoid long lines in Nov. during EXAMS!!!--
Ohio State University 59,568
University of Cincinnati 36,415
Kent State University 34,056
University of Toledo 22,336
Miami University of Ohio 20,126B
owling Green State University 18,980
Cleveland State University 15,664
Wright State University 15,985
Youngstown State University 13,157
University of Dayton 10,426
Cuyahoga Community College
PLEASE USE THIS SAMPLE LETTER, COPY AND EDIT, TO CREATE YOUR OWN--SEND TO NEWSPAPERS IN YOUR LOCALE OR REGION. THE FOLLOWING LETTER IS UNDER 200 WORDS LONG. MANY PAPERS ENFORCE A STRICT WORD LIMIT, SO CHECK ON THIS BEFORE YOU SEND. ALWAYS INCLUDE YOUR NAME, SIGNATURE (if sending by snail mail), ADDRESS, AND PHONE NUMBER. THEY WILL NOT PUBLISH YOUR CONTACT INFORMATION, BUT MAY CALL TO VERIFY THAT YOU INTENDED TO SEND THE LETTER.
Even before the current financial crisis, economists at the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center endorsed Obama 66% to 28%. Their reasons include inaccuracies in John McCain's proposal to slash earmarks: his own advisers admit that only a fraction of the amount first claimed could be saved without damaging defense priorities, such as aid to Israel. Others cite exploding deficits resulting from more tax cuts for the super-rich and the elimination of domestic spending. Former Fed Chairman Paul Volker affirms that Obama's tax proposals give more relief to more Americans—95% of working families. Under McCain's plan, 100 million Americans receive no tax cut. To address the current crisis, Obama demands safeguards for taxpayers: Oversight and accountability No "golden parachutes." Our investment must buy equity, not worthless paper. Help for families facing foreclosure. By contrast, McCain's trickle-down philosophy was never designed to protect common wage-earners. In 26 years in Washington, McCain's fight for deregulation led to the risky deals that are collapsing around us today. We need real leadership through these difficult times. Vote Obama for economic security.
Late in the fourth quarter...., senator Mccain shows his age. To suspend his campaign is either age old tricky from wisdom, or the political equivalent of tom brady after getting sacked more times in the superbowl than he had done in all of the '07 regular seasons games.
Sure the guy and his crocked campaign needs time to recoup. We've been hitting them with political mayweather-like counter punches. Mccain obviously can't stand the pain.
My other thought was to say that Mccain and his people are truely afraid of facing Obama in this debate. He's just not ready to face up to all his negative ads.
My conclusion is that John Mccain is simply just a man who talks the talk, without knowing which path to walk. Coward!
Thursday 11 September 2008
by: Paul Krugman, The New York Times
According to Paul Krugman, the McCain-Palin campaign is built on a "blizzard of lies." (Photo: Getty Images)
Did you hear about how Barack Obama wants to have sex education in kindergarten, and called Sarah Palin a pig? Did you hear about how Ms. Palin told Congress, "Thanks, but no thanks" when it wanted to buy Alaska a Bridge to Nowhere?
These stories have two things in common: they're all claims recently made by the McCain campaign - and they're all out-and-out lies.
Dishonesty is nothing new in politics. I spent much of 2000 - my first year at The Times - trying to alert readers to the blatant dishonesty of the Bush campaign's claims about taxes, spending and Social Security.
But I can't think of any precedent, at least in America, for the blizzard of lies since the Republican convention. The Bush campaign's lies in 2000 were artful - you needed some grasp of arithmetic to realize that you were being conned. This year, however, the McCain campaign keeps making assertions that anyone with an Internet connection can disprove in a minute, and repeating these assertions over and over again.
Take the case of the Bridge to Nowhere, which supposedly gives Ms. Palin credentials as a reformer. Well, when campaigning for governor, Ms. Palin didn't say "no thanks" - she was all for the bridge, even though it had already become a national scandal, insisting that she would "not allow the spinmeisters to turn this project or any other into something that's so negative."
Oh, and when she finally did decide to cancel the project, she didn't righteously reject a handout from Washington: she accepted the handout, but spent it on something else. You see, long before she decided to cancel the bridge, Congress had told Alaska that it could keep the federal money originally earmarked for that project and use it elsewhere.
So the whole story of Ms. Palin's alleged heroic stand against wasteful spending is fiction.
Or take the story of Mr. Obama's alleged advocacy of kindergarten sex-ed. In reality, he supported legislation calling for "age and developmentally appropriate education"; in the case of young children, that would have meant guidance to help them avoid sexual predators.
And then there's the claim that Mr. Obama's use of the ordinary metaphor "putting lipstick on a pig" was a sexist smear, and on and on.
Why do the McCain people think they can get away with this stuff? Well, they're probably counting on the common practice in the news media of being "balanced" at all costs. You know how it goes: If a politician says that black is white, the news report doesn't say that he's wrong, it reports that "some Democrats say" that he's wrong. Or a grotesque lie from one side is paired with a trivial misstatement from the other, conveying the impression that both sides are equally dirty.
They're probably also counting on the prevalence of horse-race reporting, so that instead of the story being "McCain campaign lies," it becomes "Obama on defensive in face of attacks."
Still, how upset should we be about the McCain campaign's lies? I mean, politics ain't beanbag, and all that.
One answer is that the muck being hurled by the McCain campaign is preventing a debate on real issues - on whether the country really wants, for example, to continue the economic policies of the last eight years.
But there's another answer, which may be even more important: how a politician campaigns tells you a lot about how he or she would govern.
I'm not talking about the theory, often advanced as a defense of horse-race political reporting, that the skills needed to run a winning campaign are the same as those needed to run the country. The contrast between the Bush political team's ruthless effectiveness and the heckuva job done by the Bush administration is living, breathing, bumbling, and, in the case of the emerging Interior Department scandal, coke-snorting and bed-hopping proof to the contrary.
I'm talking, instead, about the relationship between the character of a campaign and that of the administration that follows. Thus, the deceptive and dishonest 2000 Bush-Cheney campaign provided an all-too-revealing preview of things to come. In fact, my early suspicion that we were being misled about the threat from Iraq came from the way the political tactics being used to sell the war resembled the tactics that had earlier been used to sell the Bush tax cuts.
And now the team that hopes to form the next administration is running a campaign that makes Bush-Cheney 2000 look like something out of a civics class. What does that say about how that team would run the country?
What it says, I'd argue, is that the Obama campaign is wrong to suggest that a McCain-Palin administration would just be a continuation of Bush-Cheney. If the way John McCain and Sarah Palin are campaigning is any indication, it would be much, much worse.
