Governing from the bottom up

There are two old adages that apply to this topic and any topic of political or social or economic impact, which in this instance are precisely the same.

1) Connect the dots..... AND...... 2) Follow the money!

In my view, the most important issue in our ongoing attempt "to form a more perfect union", is campaign and election reform. Because it impacts every act of congress, each element of social and economic activity, it is more important than issues as diverse as selection of Supreme Court Justices, climate reform, health care, economic reform, jobs, immigration or anything else we struggle with today. The way we elect our 'representatives' underpins everything that occurs as regards the moment by moment effects of our government on all of us.

In our republic where we trumpet democracy as our method of governing, we have turned away from the very precepts imagined and invented and written in blood by our founding fathers. Democracy is 'supposed' to mean we all have one vote, equally weighted whether you are the CEO of Goldman Sachs or the guy who loads trucks on the shipping dock of some manufacturing concern. That however, is not what we currently have. Until and unless we as completely as possible, remove the ability of Wall Street, banking and financial institutions, health insurance companies, big pharma, corporations, and big law firms to finance the candidacies (for or against) of would-be representatives, we will never have representative government, much less even the tiniest bit of bipartisanship in government. In comparison to the CEO's and wealthiest among us, the guy on the dock's vote has not even a scintilla of significance. It's not an exaggeration to say our elected officials (and candidates) are bought and paid for by special interest groups whose 'only' agenda is to profit, whether that profit be money or power. These same special interests create, write and pass legislation and regulatory policy that considers only their own agenda. Their 'hirelings' (our legislators) perform like trained seals for their masters, 'mouthpiecing' the droning disingenuous and harmful dogma of those they serve.

Whether we are right, left or center, perhaps most of us can agree the current system does not, will not, and cannot ever be a democratic process for electing those who would manage 'our' government. A 'public' repository of taxpayer funding must be created, whose sole purpose is to provide 'all' the resources that are legally available for campaigns. This has two important and positive elements. First, it is the only way to make our representatives answerable and accountable to 'we the people' in equal (or nearly equal) manner to special interests, and second, such reform is a much less expensive way to conduct elections. In fact, it's more than likely it would have the impact of reducing the currently protracted election cycles where candidates are focused on running and winning office for months or even years at a time. In the back of our minds, each and every one of us know if candidates are so busy trying to raise money for their campaigns, each day begging for contributions, or trying to find ways to do favors for those from whom they hope to enlarge their coffers, they are not doing the business of government and 'we the people'. We can discuss term limits and other aspects of campaign reform, but beneath it all, the most important and 'critical' element is 'money'. Money should not have influence in our elections. Ideas should! Elevated influence based on power should not have impact on who gains office. Americans should! Individual voters should. 'WE, the people' should.

Breaking the current system won't be easy. It's entrenched and so vast it will be like moving a mountain to succeed. Those people who are already in office have an advantage because they are the recipients of the largesse of special interests and can throw money at campaigns much more readily than the office seeker whose funding is far outstripped. Indeed, it's currently impossible for anyone to gain office who may wish to serve only at the will of the people. He/she is marginalized in any possible attempt at elected office. Again, to succeed in an effort to change the system will be difficult. However, in my long lifetime, I've not seen the will of the people readier to take on the task than I do right now. Americans are finally 'connecting the dots', finally following the money', and now they are beginning to KNOW with true realism and focus, and perhaps even commitment, exactly what it is that ails us. There are lots of small and disparate groups who possess the goal of election reform. They're easy to find online. It's my humble suggestion we reach out to those groups and participate in any way we can to the process of taking control of a government that is supposed to be ours. We ARE the government, and and it's time to make efforts to make that clear to our representatives. If we don't do that, it's our own fault. No blame can be placed upon anyone but us. If we do succeed, we once again have the opportunity to continue what has always been the promise of the great experiment with democracy.

Vote Them All Out! Or Don't!

I keep seeing the same phrase in thread after thread on various internet political sites. It's a phrase meant to confuse us, one designed specifically to influence us unduly, and one crafted specifically by an entity whose goals are NOT those best suited to our communal task of 'making a more perfect union'.

There are two kinds of people who will tell you to "Vote them all out". The first are Republicans, whether they call themselves Republicans, libertarians, independents, Tea Partiers or whatever. Some will even tell you they are disenchanted democrats, a lie they believe gives them credibility. They tell you 'Vote them all out" because they KNOW if they can convince us to vote all the incumbents out of office, it's to their advantage. After all, since there are more Democrats in congress than republicans, if everyone is voted out, the net result is Republicans will control congress 'after' the election. BTW, that phrase comes straight out of the Republican playbook. I'm not kidding at all. Republican political consultants created the 'vote them all out' talking point exactly because they know it's an election changer in their favor. This group concerns me quite a bit. It demonstrates Republican leadership's ever present intention to continue to trick the American public into believing things or doing things for their own political benefit rather than what might be good for America. They fooled us into believing the lies that got us into an unnecessary and deadly and costly war in Iraq. They fooled us into believing that deregulating Wall Street was good for the country. They fooled us into believing bail outs of banks and Wall Street and corporations with tax money with no accountability was completely in our interest, even though it was our money they gambled with. They fooled us into believing we shouldn't address immigration reform. The fooled us into believing it was a great idea to cut the taxes of the obscenely rich, which along with the financial sector collapse and the costly wars, drove our country into the worst fiscal abyss since the Great Depression. I worry about a political party who has demonstrated for decades they'd rather use politics against 'we the people' than use statesmanship FOR 'we the people'. It's always my hope Americans have gotten too smart to fall for this sort of thing, but we all know there are some who continue to surrender to their own fear and ignorance to the detriment of our great nation.

This then is second group mentione, easily swayed and easily duped people. They don't seem to have the capacity to figure out they're being taken for fools by Republicans. They cannot or will not make the elementary deduction that getting rid of everyone will serve only to swap control of both houses from Democrat to Republican. This group saddens me more then the first. The first is of course easy to dislike because they are actually doing something proactively evil simply to further their own political and power agenda. Feeling sad for them isn't even a consideration. The second group though is more than ample reason for sorrow. I don't like the fact they are lemmings being led to the edge of the cliff and then pushed over by those intent on misleading them. I don't like they surrender to their own ignorance or fear or laziness or lack of responsibility to educate themselves about the issues of the day, and instead simply spit out the canned speeches fed to them by their masters. But, I can't dislike them. While I believe many of them are fully capable of making better decisions if they would face their own emotional and intellectual failings, it's impossible for me to know why they do not do so as I've not walked in their shoes. Fear is an insidious emotion, and all negative emotions are offspring of it. Fear is the parent of hatred, bigotry, bitterness and all things destructive. It is an incredibly difficult emotion to overcome, and at some time or another, all of us have been beaten by it. Most of us get up and try again, but 'some' of us don't. And perhaps environment or culture or even physiological or psychological challenges make this even more difficult for this group than it is for most of us. The truth is, this group is even more dangerous than the first. After all, if they weren't so gullible or filled with fear, the first group wouldn't be able to leverage them to their own benefit. Without this second group, the first would be irrelevant, unable to influence America's social and fiscal structures. Still, I can't help feeling sorrow for them. After all, what must it be like to be them?

We are targeting the wrong devil. Yes, we are all sick of government not operating the way we want, and in some cases not operating at all as is their job, and why we put elected officials in office in the first place. However, there is something we forget. WE are the goverment. Our representatives and officials are 'vested' by us, 'we the people' with the 'privilege of serving us. We are the ones who 'grant' them the power to make laws, execute them, and define them through our three branches of government. To wit:

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

The Preamble does not grant any particular authority to the federal government and it does not prohibit any particular authority. It establishes the fact that the federal government has no authority outside of what follows the preamble, as amended. "We the people", is one of the most-quoted sections of the Constitution. It was thought by the Federalists during this time that there was no need for a bill of rights as they thought that the preamble explained the people's rights.
There are dozens of places in the Constitution that reference the 'fact' that government serves at the pleasure and 'for' the citizens of this nation. It (along with the Declaration of Indepence) vests us, 'we the people' with the responsibility to be an 'informed electorate', participating actively in the political process with an educated manner, in order that we are able to inform and advise our government's operatives. If our government isn't operating properly, it is no one's fault but our own. If we allow our government to favor Wall Street, or health insurance companies, or big pharma or corporations, or unions, or lawyers, or any of a myriad of special interest groups to hold more sway than 'we the people', it's our own fault. If laws are passed that allow special interests to leverage their power and money to buy legislation for their own ends, it's no one's fault but our own. 'We the people' ARE the power behind government, we are at the top of the food chain in government, we are the 'bosses' in government. If we don't use our power as the master in charge, we are doomed to be enslaved by those who, under our constitution do NOT have the right to encumber us with exactly what is bad for our nation.

It's obvious I come from a position left of center, although fiscally I tend to be what we used to be called conservative. I believe in social and financial justice, but only if legislation provides at least as much value as the cost. Given a choice between two programs, one of which provides obvious and quantifiable advantages, both socially and fiscally, to the largest number of Americans, while the other plan may be beneficial and advantageous to a lesser amount, or perhaps not work as well as the first, I'll opt for the former over the latter every time. And if a program fails to provide us with the benefits we expect, then I favor changing it to meet our needs better, or to eliminate it altogether. However, as the 'liberal' I am, I truly do not care who you vote for, republican, democrat, independent, libertarian, green party, tea party, socialist, or any designation, as long as you vote FOR someone, rather than AGAINST someone. What is the point of simply putting someone in office who may well be worse than the person who is already there, and perhaps doing a better job for their individual constituencies than his or her opponent would do if elected? We all have the ability to study the candidates' records, to discover the way they are likely to legislate, to understand if they are truly interested in helping our government work the way we want, or if they want the job for their own agenda instead of ours. They all have histories, they all have resumes, and we all have the ability to educate ourselves with a depth of understanding if we wish to do so. I appeal to those among us who think 'Vote them all out', might be an appropriate reaction to our current environment to look at each of their potential choices individually, and as the old saying goes, "Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater". Please take your responsibility as an American, as our most precious documents charge us to do, very seriously, as adults, with consideration for our own principles and opinions, and always with the unshakable foundation of doing what is right for ALL our citizens, and in the best interest of our nation, even if it's not in our own 'personal' interest! Democracy is a 'messy' thing, but it becomes much less messy when we pay attention and actively participate. That's our job! We indeed are the government, and it's in our interest to govern wisely!

Violence right vs. left

The following is my response to someone on an internet thread who tried to compare Bill Ayers and the militancy of the 60's with what is happening today on the right. As usual, there was an element of derision in the post as often happens when someone of one political philosophy tries to degrade the thoughts of another, even asking me if I even know who Bill Ayers is. He didn't know who he was asking.
______________________________________________________________
I was an off and on (mostly off) participant in SDS (Students for a Democratic Society) in the late 60's/early 70's. SDS was the most visible non-violent anti-war movement of that time, also involved in civil rights, women's rights, apartheid, et. al. A group of radicals within that organization broke off and formed another group. The new group was not committed to non-violence as SDS was, and 'some' of them participated in crimes of violence. This new group was called the 'Weather Underground', or Weathermen. You ask if I know who Bill Ayers is? What do you think?

It's interesting you should bring it up though. Left wing groups have not participated in violent tactics to any degree at all since that time in our country's history. However, there is a commonality with what is happening today. An argument can be made for the following:

The Tea Party is to the Republican Party what the Weathermen were to SDS. The difference is, the Weathermen NEVER killed anywhere nearly as many people as the fringe right has in the past decade right here on American soil. As a point of fact, it can be argued the Weather Underground was responsible for NO deaths, only damage to various facilities. Other groups took responsibility for the handful of fatalities that occurred. Ayers was mentioned as a 'possible' suspect in a fatal bombing of a police station in S.F., but never charged because authorities didn't believe he had anything to do with it. Meanwhile confederates, both friendly and unfriendly to Ayers in the subsequent years have said Ayers was never involved with that or any other fatality. Meanwhile no member of the 'underground' was ever convicted of killing anyone. In fact, the Weather Underground suffered more fatalities of their own during that time when attacked by police than all the fatalities contributed to the entire left, whether the underground or anyone else.

So the transition from SDS to Weather Underground, to more violent groups in fact occurred. The transition from Republican Party to Tea Party has already happened. One wonders if there will be further iterations that increase the danger of this group. Homegrown right wing militants have already killed more people in our own country since 9/11 than all other terrorist attacks combined. Don't ask me why militants of the right are so much more violent than militants of the left. I don't know unless it's an intrinsic value on human life. Even in the worst cases in the 60's and 70's, the acts were designed to send a message without the intent to actually kill anyone. They took pains to avoid the loss of human life. Their attack on the Pentagon was scheduled and carried out when they knew no one was present and the bomb was only two pounds, designed to cause damage and gain publicity, not to harm anyone. One of Ayers' targets was a statue erected on Chicago's Kennedy Expressway to honor police involved in an attack against a left wing group. Ayer's blew it up twice, but with no fatalities because it wasn't close enough to people (being far from the roadway or housing) to harm anyone. That hasn't been true of today's rightist militants.

This isn't an homage to Ayers or anyone else who chose militancy over non-violence, in fact, exactly the reverse. It was wrong then, and it's wrong now. Even Ayers himself has expressed regret to both those who were of the opposite political philosophy and his own confederates for his actions and leadership of his movement. The point however is this. What is happening on the far fringes of the right today, while it mirrors 'some' of what happened in the left in an earlier time, is much more dangerous than any number of Ayers or others from that era.

Those of you on the right who continue to bring up Ayers as your example of the horror of the left as equal or even worse than what the militant right wing has and is doing now, need to get out your weigh scales and do a truly balanced analysis. Your rhetoric only encourages your own fringe groups to do more, to kill more, to destroy more and to further divide the nation. You need to stop the Timothy McVeighs and the Koressh's and doctor killers like Scott Roeder and all the others who use conservative politics as their rationale for a campaign of murder and mayhem. The truth is, many of us in the 60's in fact did that. We made no bones about deploring violence, and said as much often and publicly. Think Dr. King Jr. He abohored the violence of splinter groups like the Black Panther movement and the groups that came from that. I believe that our ethic was in no small part responsible for limiting violence. Meanwhile, we certainly didn't promote violence with our rhetoric, (remember 'make love, not war) which cannot be said of many on the right today who would never commit acts of violence themselves, but seem to have no problem encouraging it. including Republican leadership in congress and the right wing media talking heads.

It's much easier to have a dialog designed to find resolutions to the issues of the day if we aren't aiming guns and bombs at others.

Following is a report compiled and prepared by the Dept. of Homeland Security and the FBI during the latter part of the Bush administration and released in the first quarter of '09. It outlines the threat of right wing militancy and terror as the Number 1 threat to American security.
http://www.fas.org/irp/eprint/rightwing.pdf

Quick Fiscal Myth Buster

Only 12 of the past 45 years has seen a Democratic president on Pennsylvania Avenue.  I have provided a list of all presidents from '68 onward below, along with the percentage of our national debt as contrasted to our Gross Domestic Product.  Where there are minus percentages, it means as a country, our GDP exceeded our national debt.  Where a plus exists, it means the growth of the national debt exceeded our GDP.  In short and all things considered, it is best to be in a 'minus position' as regards GDP versus national debt.  To simplify matters, I've used the old 'red ink accounting ledger color code to demonstrate which presidents put us in unhealthy fiscal positions.  Nixon/Ford are combined since 'together' they served 2 terms.   President Obama is not included as he is barely halfway through his first term. 

+0.1% Nixon/Ford
-3.2% Jimmy Carter
+20.5% Ronald Reagan
+13.1% George H. W. Bush
-8.8% Bill Clinton
+28.6% George W. Bush

The reader will note even the 'best' Republican presidency as regards our economy was Nixon/Ford, who held a fiscal negative position of .1%, while the worst was George W. Bush at 28.6%.  Both Reagan and George H. W. Bush were well into double figures as well.  Meanwhile the twelve years of Democratic presidents yeilded a 'positive' fiscal positions.  Most of us already realize during the Clinton years, the nation had the longest and most sustained economic growth in recent history, adding jobs and handing an economy to the Bush administration that included a deficit surplus. 
 
Conclusion:  A 'fiscal' conservative should vote Democrat!

Following is the interactive link from "US Government Spending" with GDP vs. deficit from 1900 to present. 
http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/federal_deficit_chart.html

'Some' poetry'

From time to time I'll copy my poetry into this space, swapping them out from time to time, adding a couple, taking a couple away.

Skipping Stone

I become a stone on water tossed

seven times proudly skipped

over liquid skin until… kerplunk

I sink into the pond settling

for a time at the bottom

until time and tide, currents and

seasons being what they are,

I wear down and particle-ize

into the water itself

picking up others melding with us,

washing over and under the land forever,

becoming part of something

greater than a stone or water

or tree or flesh or wing.

I become part of it all as it

becomes part of me until even I

can't see me for it, or see it for me,

if you catch my drift?

Isn't it all too obvious, this journey

taken with my permission and

against my will, seeking playmates

along the way to the end and the beginning?

What do they bring to this? Like me?

Hollow words, resounding forever

without a sound?

Or thundering energy so vast and small

it explodes everything without moving a cell?

No matter. We are here in any case,

and will be, and won't be,

makes no nevermind.

Cursing Autumn

I've gone so many miles it must be

autumn and late at that, the legs gone

from beneath me and sore back needful

of rest, it's probably not long 'til all the leaves

are gone and green no longer springs from dirt

moistened by angel's tears laughing.

The fall comes and I'm weary

my body heavy for a carrier of my soul.

What happened here yesterday ere I was young,

body coiled to spring for no reason

except to show the strength it possessed.

Youth wasted on youth again.

Thoughts labor from me slowly,

then escape too quickly to catch.

What a laugh I'd have at myself

were I younger than today,

watching me peer feebly at a past

that no one else can see.

It's autumn here amidst my breast.

In the darkness there's no sound,

no light, no smell, no time.

I bless the wings that bring my heart

to where I've been before.

Rebellion

The poet sat at the keys,

considered writing a poem,

but instead decided, “no,

I’ll do this instead!

I’ll tread water

and count the grains

of sand, and lean my head

to and fro for a while”

The poet refused the presence

of the muse for whom his disdain

had no limits.

“To hell with turbid splendor!” he said.

And then jacking himself in the eye,

because he was deserving,

he ripped open his chest

to look at his heart.

Holding it in his hands,

he laughed when it grayed

before his eyes and thumped so hard

it leapt from his fingers to his lips.

He screamed with joyous glee

when it spit at his face

and slapped him soundly

across his spirit.

“Dunno whether to keep this or not,”

he spewed, before slamming it back inside.

“Thump, thump,” it went, just to piss him off.

He sneered at the effrontery and gall.

“Who the hell do you think you are,

that you can get away with this?” he roared,

laughter boiling from his lips.

“No one,” came the answer clear.

He snorted and stomped his foot

upon ground rising up to smash him.

The sky dropped suddenly on him,

crushing his head beneath.

He rose, shook the dust from his shirt,

and spat at the earth below.

He didn’t give up easy, this poet.

There was too much left to do, perhaps even

a poem to write.




Mortality
A page, vacant in the morning
backlit through a window muddied
with feet splatters from drizzled paws
telling me I’ve much to do.


Two primordial oaks deceased outside
the glass, moribund limbs hanging by
no more than a thread, crashing silent now
and then, no one there to hear.


Each line of the poem so sluggish
to materialize and then only dimly
in the haze of a morning with no slumber
thinking, judging, what will I do.


Trash pulled hurriedly and chaotically
to the curb, some whose life continues
while others will be buried inside the earth
to nourish the reaper greedy.


A house quiet at the top of a hill,
latent and nestled within the trees,
breathing occasional as needed,
waiting for new life inside.


The old life there lights another smoke
and watches the gas escape his lungs
glancing uneasily from time to time
at the primordial oaks deceased outside.

Dickens

He sang softly to me as he left,

His breath coming shorter all the time,

His heart, always strong, swung open to me

As it had so many times before.

And all I have left is his soul.

When we first gathered him into our arms

To take him home, his plaintive bark echoed,

shattering thoughts of the pet we had in mind,

the one with the calm demeanor, the quiet and lazy way.

Dickens’ path was on another road, one we travel’d gladly.

As he grew, he imposed his will, not because he desired,

But because he was. Such a friend again I’ll not have.

I talked to him the whole night through,

Making him stay for my own sake.

He didn’t have to, he did it for me,

Giving me one last piece of his heart,

And all I have left is his soul.

Blog Intent

This blog seeks to provide positions and philosophies from a progressive point of view as follows:

1) Educate (and entertain) the blogosphere. (Influence and promote alternate ways of thinking and analysis)
2) Clarify issues by employing facts and perspectives.
3) Provoke 'discourse'. Meaningful dialogue in a manner designed to resolve differences toward common goals.
4) Promote 'involvement', and active participation in the socio/economic/political culture.
5) Provide a forum for discussion (please feel free to use the 'comment' icon at the end of the  published posts)

Those who wish to ‘guest post’ are welcome to submit articles on diverse subject matter that fits within the overall tone and content of this blog. Suggestions on how the site could improve or otherwise provide additional value are appreciated.

Coming Soon!  Articles on 'Commerce Without Conscience', 'Religion's Impact On Government' and 'What If...' 
Contact: mikeborgstadt@msn.com