Tag Archives: republicans

Medigap.

My first thought at a Democrat winning the 26th district congressional race in upstate New York was one of deja vu. Didn’t this happen two years ago, with that seat up near Watertown, when McHugh was appointed Army Secretary? Bill Owens won, then won again last fall – the only Democrat in my little backwater region of upstate to manage reelection, as it turned out. Dems and liberal commentators tried to read that race as a bellwether, too, but it didn’t turn out to be predictive at all of the 2010 election. What matters is what the party does in between. If the Dems sit on their asses and wait for the check to arrive, they’ll be sorely disappointed.

There’s no denying, though, that this speaks to a strong undercurrent of distrust in the Medicare “reform” cooked up by Paul Ryan and company. As much as they try to dress up their voucher / privatization program, it’s still just a pig with way too much lipstick, and any fool can see it.  I am a bit heartened that their attempt to buy off the elderly by saying their privatization scheme would only affect people under 55 (i.e. me) has thus far failed miserably. Perhaps they neglected to consider that eighty-year-olds might have fifty-year-old children. In the midst of all their yak about family values, they apparently forgot about families. Nice try, mothers!

This should be a gift to Democrats, but if they keep participating in the GOP narrative about deficit reduction, any political benefit will evaporate. Democrats have to overcome the generalized distrust people tend to have for all politicians, and they won’t do that by agreeing to choke off the sick, poor, and elderly person’s lifeline a little bit more gradually than their colleagues across the aisle. If they’re truly on the side of ordinary people, they should say to the Republicans: Want to cut the deficit? Bring tax rates on the wealthy at least back to where they were prior to 2001… or wherever they need to be. Shut down the wars, shutter the overseas bases, and cancel the over-the-top weapons programs. And join the rest of the developed world in building a single payer health care system for everyone, not just the oldest, poorest, and sickest people in the country. And by the way – insist that everything the U.S. government purchases is made in America.  

Do all that, and if there’s still a massive long-term deficit, I’ll eat my shoes. (I don’t have a hat.)

luv u,

jp

What now.

Gingrich has thrown his hat into the presidential ring. That should go well. Not so long ago, he was the most hated man in America. I have to think he has moved up from there – perhaps that fact alone has encouraged him to try. Or maybe he’s pulling a Buchanan and using it as a fundraising, image-building exercise. (Great way to sell books.) Either way, I can hardly imagine a less likely or desirable prospect, and I don’t think I’m alone in this. It’s no accident – the policies he has been most closely associated with over the years are wildly unpopular. The current crop of GOP congresspeople represent an odious distillation of his most extremist positions. What’s not to hate?

Back when the Newt was Speaker, I wrote a song about his crusade against welfare – one cheerfully joined by Bill Clinton and various other Democrats, eager to throw the poor over the side for a few cheap political points. Written like a bloodthirsty hymn sung aboard a pirate ship, the lyric went, in part, like this:

Please, Newt Gingrich, save us from welfare dependent mothers
whose hungry infants threaten our fortunes with default
Please, o Speaker, drive them away from this captain’s table
Please drive them from below the salt!

Bring to us the biscuit, that humble little biscuit
Please add it to our bounty, we savor every crumb
Take it from the infant, that greedy mother’s infant
Please pluck it from his toothless gums!

Mr. Speaker – we beseech thee, for the gods of war and industry
Mr. Speaker – we beseech thee, please… Bless This Feast!

Imagine the singing pirates being all of those industrialists, corporate CEOs, and generals/admirals who benefit from budgetary largess, year after year, to the tune of billions of dollars (at the expense of all of the rest of us, including many in dire need) and you’ll get the idea.

I suppose it makes sense that Newt would think this is a good time for him, since the ethos of greed and further targeting of the poor/working class has descended upon us once again. Given today’s sensational announcement that the Social Security trust fund will be expended in 2036 (instead of 2037), after which the fund would only cover 75% of its costs (assuming we never come out of deep recession and never again experience economic growth above 1% a year), he may be right.

But I doubt it.

luv u,

jp

Money down.

Not sure whether or not the government will have been shut down by cartoon pirates by the time you read this, but there’s a fair chance of it. It never ceases to amaze me how deeply insane our national legislature can become when there are no effective checks placed upon it. And trust me, there are no effective checks. We have a bicameral legislature in a federal system that divides power into three branches. With respect to initially passing legislation, really only two of those branches are relevant; the Democrats control the executive branch and the upper house of the legislative branch, the Republicans the lower house of the legislature. So who calls the shots? The Republicans, of course, by default.

Boehner started negotiations on the current fiscal year budget with a demand for $30 billion or so in cuts. The Democrats have acceded to that and then some. So now, naturally, Boehner’s caucus wants $60 billion in cuts, plus the passage of a bunch of extreme right riders that defund the EPA, banish Planned Parenthood from any federal support whatsoever, and so on. This is what you get when you give them what they want. Like any good blackmailer, they always want more. Democrats should have bitten the bullet during the lame duck and passed a reasonable spending resolution before the log went into the spokes. But there was a lack of spine then, and it’s still lacking now.

Does anyone in America remember the 2010 election? Is it just my imagination, or did these tea-party and mainstream Republicans ride around the country promising that they were going to focus like a laser beam on fiscal issues and on the mutually-exclusive values of job creation and deficit elimination? Bad as that was, I believe people expected to get that. What they didn’t expect, for example, was an all-out vendetta against Planned Parenthood, which provides vital health services – most notably cervical cancer screenings, breast exams, etc. – to women in poor communities all across the country. None of the federal funds sent to Planned Parenthood cover abortion. (That’s the product of a far earlier Democratic cave, frankly.) To reprise Keith Olbermann – Mr. Boehner, where are the jobs?  

As with Scott Walker, John Kasich, and other new G.O.P. governors, Boehner and company’s legislative agenda – contrary to what they claim – has little to do with balancing budgets and everything to do with scoring political points with their deluded, misogynistic, crypto-racist electoral base – essentially, the five psychos you see planted outside the local PP clinic every freaking day. There’s no point in trying to please them.

luv u,

jp

Rollback.

Some short takes. Pretty seriously under the gun these days (figuratively, though, not literally as many just now). Just make mention of a few serious setbacks this week.

Wisconsinitis. Got to hand it to the GOP – they are good at the old sucker punch. Gov. Scott Walker and his political allies were determined to curtail union organizing rights, and they succeeded via political maneuvers that their Democratic opponents would never dare attempt on the state or national level. Always the way, it seems: Republicans are willing to push to the wall, no matter how unpopular the position. Democrats tend only to push their own base to the wall. The situation is, if anything, worse in Michigan, where not only are union rights being curtailed but the republicans have passed legislation that enables them to dismiss local elected officials under certain vague “crisis” circumstances and replace them with hired hacks, perhaps corporate subcontractors. Pretty ugly stuff.

Of course, as we know, elections have consequences. If you give a drunk a gun, don’t be surprised when s/he shoots you in the ass. (Lesson leftover from the Bush administration.) But the warning goes both ways. If you shoot someone in the ass, don’t be surprised if s/he kicks yours a little later on.

Libya redux. The opposition to Qadaffi’s government is seriously outgunned, largely thanks to the Western governments now threatening to send the strong man and his crew to The Hague. And yet, with respect to the no fly zone, I’ve found myself agreeing with Defense Secretary Gates in that it is not simply a matter of putting a few flights in the sky above Tripoli. Such a policy would entail a full on assault against Libya – no other way to accomplish it. When they put the zones in place in Iraq in 1991 (after many thousands were killed), it was following an attack that destroyed Iraq’s capacity to fight back. If we were to proceed today, it would involve killing many Libyans, attacking a sovereign African state, and all that those things entail. Seriously…. aren’t there other ways to help?

Afghanistan. Word has it that we’ve started pounding Afghanistan in a more serious way, since the counterinsurgency tactic is proving itself an unmitigated failure. Where is this headed, after ten years? Back to bombarding villages into oblivion? We are manufacturing future enemies – that’s all we’re accomplishing. In the words of the late Molly Ivins: Get. Out. Now.

luv u,

jp

Them-ism.

I’ve never been a union member for more than maybe eighteen months as a part-timer, back when I was a 1/8-time adjunct at S.U.N.Y. Empire State College and belonged to the A.A.U.P. (I paid dues to the Teamsters for about two weeks when I had a stock room job at a Caldor in Albany back in 1982 – the kind of job that lasts two weeks when you’re me.) Likewise, my dad spent the vast majority of his working life – perhaps all of it – unaffiliated, unorganized, call it what you will. But though he was no fan of Hoffa, Meany, and the other union bosses of his day, he understood the power of labor organizing and was always supportive of it – not out of loyalty to an organization, of course, but from a deep identification with the experience of working people, as he worked hard pretty much the whole 40 years I knew him.

I have to say that my sentiments run along the same lines, though I’ve never worked as hard as my father did. Still… I understand what it is like, what many of the hidden costs of labor are, and that informs my perspective as well as that of many, many Americans. A vast majority of Americans, in fact, if recent polling is to be believed – Wisconsin Governor (and former pop star) Scott Walker and his peers in Indiana, Ohio, and elsewhere appear to have been working on the assumption that most people who do not belong to a union see no value in organized labor and have no knowledge of its history in this country. Evidently, they are mistaken. Polling has long shown that most American workers would, if given the opportunity, join a union. While they understand the necessity of making concessions from time to time, they do not agree that one should concede one’s basic rights. The right to collective bargaining was hard won, fought for. It will not be relinquished casually.

Of course, it’s no surprise that organized labor is under attack five minutes after the latest crop of Tea Party-fueled Republicans have taken office. For some reason, most people think the GOP is going to be reasonable if we just allow them to take power. The fact is, every successive time they win an election, they get more aggressively destructive than the time before. Walker and others were trying to cram this anti-union legislation through before anyone noticed. They are trying to drive a wedge between “us” (non-union workers, or at least those who don’t belong to public employee unions) and “them” (union workers), for the benefit of their well-heeled patrons… like the real David Koch (not the admirable ersatz one from the Buffalo Beast who called Walker a couple of weeks ago). Typical divide and conquer strategy – the top 2% who made out like bandits over the past 10 years in particular are taking time out from collecting their tax breaks to help set the rest of us at each other’s throats, fighting over the scraps that remain.

Remember, friends. If there’s a “them” here, it’s not organized labor. It is, rather, that thin layer of folks who own everything and wish to part with none of it.

luv u,

jp

The fight.

This has been one of those weeks when I’m not sure whether to look east or look west at any given moment. So many compelling things happening both at home and overseas at the same time – a monumental struggle in the case of the Libyan nation; certainly dramatic ones at play in Wisconsin, Ohio, Indiana, and elsewhere.

Just a few thoughts about Libya. Muammar Gaddafi appears to be turning his country into the Romania of this particular wave of revolutionary movements, importing mercenaries to buttress his failing grip on the capital, using all the armaments that western money has bought him against his own countrymen and women, turning 50 caliber anti-aircraft guns against unarmed civilians. Terrifying stuff, and likely hundreds – possibly thousands – are dead. Gaddafi is now phoning in his incoherent rants from an undisclosed (probably mobile) location, blaming the uprising on Al Qaeda and drug-crazed youth, among other things. (Now I understand why Bush took a shine to this wack-job. His administration used similar rhetoric against opponents to the Iraq war.)

I’ve heard many helpful suggestions about what we can do to help the Libyan rebels – everything from cat calls to military invasion. That last one worries me a bit. Frankly, I think the best thing western countries can do is just not buy oil from the regime, freeze assets, etc. We’ve floated him in much the same way that we support and have supported other despots in the region and elsewhere in the world, from Saddam Hussein in the 1980s to Hosni Mubarak three weeks ago. As always, it’s all about the money. What else would put him two seats down from Obama at an international conference? (Expect to see THAT picture during the 2012 campaign.)

Back here at home, we’ve got a somewhat more amiable struggle between the ownership class and, well, all of the rest of us. And yes, I know – most of us are not members of unions; I am certainly not. But this is an important fight for working people in general, because it is a concerted, premeditated effort to erode some of the hardest won rights of organized labor. As those rights are taken away, those of non-union workers are further undermined. But even more fundamentally, the Wisconsin fight is a question of basic fairness. The reason why public pension funds are in trouble is not because they are too generous, but because many of them invested heavily with Wall Street and because we are in the worst economic downturn in recent memory. Public workers are being scapegoated because conservatives are taking the opportunity to pin the blame on them. Meanwhile… Wall Street is doing just fine, thank you.

Class war? Guess what… it’s being waged against us all the time, whether we admit it or not. Time to fight back.

luv u,

jp

Money speaks.

What is the best thing that can be said about the House majority in the 112th Congress after its first full day of business? My vote would be for the fact that they seem to have the seeds of self-destruction sown deep in their DNA. It’s a teeth-clenching joy to behold, frankly. I’m particularly enamored of the fact that, in the days leading up to the session’s opening, they were swarming the swank venues of Washington D.C., being celebrated by lobbyists, plied with drink, etc. – the whole Abramoff/Delay machine back in action once again. Two of their number – Reps. Pete Sessions (R-Texas) and Mike Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) – were so immersed in the never-ending delight of fundraising that they hilariously neglected to make it to the Capitol for the swearing in ceremony, opting instead to raise their right hands to a nearby T.V. screen at the bar/restaurant of choice. Good start, guys.

One wishes that were the full extent of the madness – just the Keystone Cop-like clumsiness – but it goes much deeper than that. The corporations that poured money into this last campaign will be getting just what they paid for: a legislature devoted to ensuring full federal compliance with their legislative and regulatory priorities. They got some love from the 111th Congress, to be sure, particularly in light of what has happened to the economy and the environment over the past two years, but this is a prize of an entirely different order of magnitude. This is a paid-for House, pure and simple.

It is now clear the degree to which corporate money was a factor in the closing days of the 2010 election cycle. Though it ran consistently high, post Citizens United, there was a significant spike at the end. Without question, it is now payback time. They’ve gotten a downpayment in the form of the recent tax compromise legislation. Now the focus will be on disabling the few progressive successes we’ve seen in the last session – aspects of financial reform, such as the Consumer Protection Bureau, parts of the health care legislation, and so on. It is incumbent upon us to press the President, the House minority party, and Democrats in the Senate to hold onto these modest gains.

It is also incumbent upon us to take this lesson to heart – elections have consequences. If we sit them out, someone will still win. And that someone is usually a tremendous tool.

luv u,

jp

Dear Santa.

I’ve heard a kind of depressing story the last couple of days about a bureau of the Postal Service tasked with opening letters to Santa Claus. Here’s a somewhat strange version from NPR’s All Things Considered in which Robert Siegel tries to lighten things up with some lame quips. They’ve been finding that, this year, kids are tending less to ask for gaming consoles and the like than stuff like warm coats, shoes, etc. Just a hint of how rough people have it these days – a peek into the Dickensian hellscape inhabited by the millions upon millions of children (and their parents) living in poverty. Our top-down economy is literally killing hope before it even has the chance to learn how to express itself.

I’m not a practicing Christian, nor am I big on organized religion in general, but if there’s one thing valuable about the Christmas season it’s the sense of possibility it can engender in people – not so much the expectation of personal gain, but more the notion that things can be better, that in the midst of an unforgiving universe, we can be fair and decent to one another. So in a way these letters show that, even in the midst of an unrelenting consumer culture, these kids are more focused on those ideals than might be expected. So even though Santa may not be coming for many of them, they are very good little girls and boys indeed.

That’s not to say that Santa isn’t coming for anyone. Not a bit of it. Our nation’s millionaires and billionaires can now expect a little something extra in their Christmas stocking, like another yacht or a Lamborghini, perhaps. Yes, the tax compromise package has been passed by both houses of Congress and is on the way to Obama for his signature. That means low, low taxes for everybody, ludicrously low estate tax rates, and an untold bonanza for the richest 1% in general. Also… a pile of additional, non-investment debt to be paid off at some point uncertain, a significant undermining of the funding vehicle for Social Security, and a paltry 13-month extension to unemployment benefits.

And for those kids, maybe some second-hand shoes for mom. Jesus… this is why we suck.

luv u,

jp

On capitulation.

Okay, so the president has a bit to apologize for. He’s not alone in that respect – plenty of blame to go around here. Fact is, the administration is certainly wrong to criticize the liberal-left for denouncing the deal he cut with Republicans this week. If the president was painted into a corner, it was not by the left. The Congress members who were dead set against raising the tax issue before this past election were “Blue Dog” conservatives, worried about offending their constituencies – the same voters that would soon send more than half of them packing.

It is now these conservative Democrats that Obama is relying upon during the lame duck session to shepherd this deal through the House. It seems likely that most Republicans will support it, so he hardly needs the entire Democratic caucus. In any case, the capitulation happened a long time ago. At this point, the main thing is making certain that unemployed workers get the help they need. I don’t care how we get there, particularly, so long as they don’t give away the store… and reserve the right to start fighting again fresh on January 1.

There will be a lot to fight about, particularly when you consider how the Republicans have been behaving in the wake of their electoral victory. To wit,

  • Jim DeMint has talked about the possibility of making unemployment insurance more like “a loan” to give unemployed people incentive to go to work. No, really… he’s serious.
  • The main talking point on these upper income marginal tax cuts is that they are “NOT tax cuts”, that to not implement them is, in fact, a tax increase.  I heard Jon Kyl plying this one yesterday. A little wordplay here – perhaps they don’t remember that when they invented these tax cuts nine years ago, they put an end point on them. The tax cut has a time limit; when that passes, it’s over. Extend it, that’s a new cut because it involves additional billions. Got that, Jon? 
  • Tax cuts for the rich don’t add to the deficit. Unemployment benefits do.

You get the picture. One last point… it was mentioned in passing on NPR business news today that American corporations are sitting on $2 trillion in cash. Sitting on it.

Again… do these people really need a tax cut?

luv u,

jp

Payback time.

The election is barely past us and corporate America is already knocking on our door for the rent.

Speaking of timing, former Sen. Alan Simpson and former Clinton Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles, co-chairs of the president’s commission on deficit reduction, have agreed we should gut Social Security, Medicare. Well, there’s a surprise – both have an execrable history of animosity towards these quite successful social programs. (Simpson’s contempt for elderly people is palpable and disgusting, and he never misses an opportunity to toss a rhetorical brick at them.) Of course, their proposal also calls for tax cuts for the rich and for corporations. Again, no surprises there.

This is just the latest chapter in the attack against the poor, working class, elderly, and infirm that has been underway for decades in this country. Time and time again they have sought to undermine Social Security, to loot its trust fund, and to convert it into something it was never intended to be – an instrument for the creation of private wealth. Social Security is a supplemental guaranteed retirement program and, as such, an extremely successful one. It has kept elderly people (at least the ones who did not retire on a mountain of money, like Simpson) out of poverty for seven decades. Likewise, Medicare has not only made the elderly more financially secure, but it has also improved their quality of life in demonstrable ways. Not for nothing that these are the most popular social programs in America.

It may mean little to Simpson, Bowles, and many who share their views that people they don’t know will have to work until 68 or 70 and do without adequate cost of living adjustments in their old age. It sure as hell matters to me, and I imagine to many others as well. Social Security is not on the brink of bankruptcy – far from it. They just want to use its revenues to cover our government’s bad decisions with regard to financial regulation and foreign policy – decisions that have cost trillions of dollars over the last decade alone. Now we are being asked to pay for those criminal actions. There can be only one answer to that.

Don’t know, but we may have to take a page out of France’s book. If it takes standing in the street to protect the lives and livelihoods of ordinary people, it’s goddamned worth it.

luv u,

jp