A Response to an Email

At the end of last week, a response I received to my blog on whether Obama deserves a second term caught my attention and I thought I would share it with you together with an expanded response.  My friend said, "Yes, Obama deserves another term. In part because the Supreme Court is at risk of admitting justices who are anti-abortion, this is a serious issue and will inject religion further into our national political landscape. I believe Obama has a far superior and progressive social policy than Romney."

My reply was basically as follows: I am always delighted when someone takes issue with me, particularly someone who is as bright as you.  People like you force me to take a second look at my position.  Having done so, I might have responded differently had I not watched "Need To Know" last Friday on PBS.  It covered the voting laws in Florida which some say are designed to take away voting rights of certain of its citizens, including felons. There was one African American woman who was a college graduate, written a book, and had started her own publishing company, all after being released from a federal prison after serving 20 years for a non-violent drug offense.  After years of trying to get back her right to vote she received a notification that her right would not be restored until 2017.

What bothered me most about this story was her having spent 20 years in prison. I am willing to bet that the majority of inmates in this federal prison are black, poor and uneducated. We both know that African Americans do not make up the majority of the prison inmates because crime is in their DNA. Yet in the 4 years that Obama has sat in the Oval Office, I have never heard him say one word about the blatant racism that exists in our judicial system.  My concern today is not with Obama's policies but his failure to use his office to take on what I would call "social corruption."

However, as for Romney, trust me ..., he has no intention of interfering with a woman's right to contraceptives or abortion; and he has no interest in turning this country into a theocracy. Romney is interested solely in this country being economically superior to the rest of the world and he understands that it is only achieved by having a strong middle class (anyone with even a passing familiarity with economics would understand this). Destroying the middle class would send us back to 18th and 19th century Europe, when the nobility thought they were secure with the poor tilling the fields. You know how well this worked out for them.

Obama knows that the rich is this country are really at the mercy of the middle class.  Why?  Because it is the middle class that buys all the goods and services.  Obama’s claim that he is the one who will save the middle class just does not comport with his record.  Compare how little he did to protect the housing market and the homeowners to the actions taken by FDR.   Any improvement to the housing market was in spite of Obama's policies.  Such improvement was the result of economics 101-supply and demand, boasted by the Federal Reserves QE policy to flood the market with newly printed  money.   Obama’s middle class policies were best summed up by Joe Biden when he said the middle class has been buried for the last four years.  Oops.  (Out of the mouth of babes and Joe Biden).   Look at what the stimulus money could have done had some of it been used to upgrade our outworn and outdated electric grid.  Many of those 8 million customers would not have lost their power as a result of Hurricane Sandy.  

America cannot remain the world's largest economy if it crushes the middle class.  Romney understands this.  Even the Chinese recognize this because they are doing everything they can to bring more of their people into the middle class.  This abortion issue is nothing more than a diversion. Without jobs more women will slide into poverty; and if you take a look around you will find that a whole lot of females of child bearing age who are poor and/or poorly educated are having babies. They are not getting abortions or using contraceptives, even though both have been legal for over fifty years.

A democracy is only secure if the electorate is informed.  People like Obama depend on people being uninformed, or at odds with one another.  They appeal to our basic animal instincts and not "the better angels of our nature."  These animal instincts are the ones that most threatened a democracy.  Obama's social policies is the opposite of superior and progressive. because if allowed to succeed they would bring us to a place we have never been.

An enlightened electorate will make mistakes as it did in 2008 although it could be argued that  Obama may have been the lesser of two evils.  But history tells us that the light will eventually break through.  I hope that it happens this November.

Does Obama Deserve Another Four Years?

My mother passed away the year Obama was nominated for president. I know that she would have felt such pride in pulling the lever for him in the voting booth. She was 101 at the time of her passing. She had lived through Jim Crow and would have understood the significance of a black man becoming President of the United States of America.  My mother would have believed that Obama would make a difference if not in her life, at least in the lives of those who came after her.  But she would have been disappointed.  

This time around, Obama will get 94% of the African American vote even though you cannot get 94% of any group to agree on whether the earth evolves around the sun.  Obama will get this vote because he is black.  But, can anyone name one thing that Obama has done to benefit black folks? The drop out rate of black kids in inner-city schools is the highest it has ever been. The incarceration rate of black men is off the chart.  The number of black unwed mothers has skyrocketed.  More blacks are unemployed and their slide into poverty is unparallel.  Yet, all we have demanded of Obama is he stay black. 

Last month the teachers in Chicago went on strike for higher wages (the average pay for a Chicago teacher is $76,000.00 a year, the highest in the country).  The teachers also wanted to  maintain the status quo, meaning no performance evaluations, no time added to their school day, and no system of merit pay. The majority of the students attending the Chicago public schools are Black and Hispanic. The majority of them are poor. Over 55% of these kids never complete high school.  Here was a chance for Obama to take a public stand on behalf of the children, but he kept quiet during the strike because he did not want to offend the union. The Mayor, Obama’s former chief of staff,  brought the strike to a speedy conclusion because he was involved in Obama’s reelection effort.  In the end, Obama was safe but there was no meaningful improvement to the quality of education for the kids. 

Blacks want school choice yet Obama and the Black Caucus have done absolutely nothing in furtherance of securing for these kids any hope of attending the same public or private schools enjoyed by whites.  Obama has had two opportunities to appoint judges to the Supreme Court, yet he failed to appoint an African American even though blacks have been shafted by the judicial system since the Dred Scott decision.  Obama has been more interested in waging a war against the Arizona law which he incorrectly states allows the police to stop an individual who is doing nothing but  driving while Hispanic yet he has been silent on the decade long practice of police stopping individuals who are driving while black. 

Obama is now locked in a lawsuit with Catholic and Evangelical churches over birth control. During the Democrat Convention, he pranced a white law student out onto the stage to advocate a woman’s right to have her birth control pills paid for by her employer or her school. This $9.00 a month benefit was more important than attempting to do anything to halt the rate of teen pregnancies amongst black females who are guaranteed to spend their lives in poverty, while the law student will be spending her life on Wall Street.

I would guess that many Chicago parents voted for Obama because they believed he would do something to improve the education system. I am sure that many black folks voted for Obama because they believed he would do something to stop racial discrimination in America.  African Americans probably think Obama shares their values and understands their experience.  But this was not true in 2008 and it is not true today.   Folks, we deserve better.

Were my mother alive today, I would hope that she would understand why I am voting for Mitt Romney.

I THINK . . .: The Government Cannot Solve Societal Ills

I THINK . . .: The Government Cannot Solve Societal Ills: Some people are convinced that the government could solve the problem of poverty, poor housing, inadequate medical care, a substandard educa...

The Government Cannot Solve Societal Ills

Some people are convinced that the government could solve the problem of poverty, poor housing, inadequate medical care, a substandard educational system, if it would devote more resources. I do not agree. I think the government is ill-equipped to solve any societal ills.  Remember when President Johnson began waging the war on poverty in the 60s?  Since that time, trillions of dollars have been spent on housing, food stamps, Medicaid, education, and welfare, yet the percentage of people who are poor is greater than when the war began and our educational system has failed all but the affluent.  We speak of "government" as if it is some computerized contraption that can be fed a problem and spit out a solution. We think of the government as if it was IBM’s Watson.

The government is made up of a bunch of people in Washington who sit around and ponder how they can line their pockets, get reelected, or how can they get a promotion. We might define a politician as one who will say anything or make any promise, to get elected.  They talk about change we can believe in while hiding what they believe in.   The only hope they deliver is the hope we will not discover who and what they really are.   These are the same people who broadcast their genitals via tweets. These are the people who think that a report that Medicare will be broke in 10 years and Social Security benefits will be reduced by 25% within the next 23 years is proof that the programs are in good shape. These are the people that pass a health care law which prohibits Medicare from negotiating prices with drug companies. These are the people that want 310 million people to have health insurance yet do nothing to increase the number of primary care physicians or bring down the cost of health care.  These are the people who must be led kicking and screaming before deciding whether to intervene in Syria before the November election because their courage to act only occurs during lame duck sessions. These are the people who will not reform an unfair tax code and would rather keep corporate profits overseas than expatriate them at a lower corporate tax rate. These are the people that tell us there is nothing wrong with borrowing 40 cents of every dollar spent or that the national debt is 16 trillion dollars when it is actually 54 trillion dollars.  These are the people who refuse to cut the level of spending that brought about the fall of Rome, the British Empire, and today is threatening the economies of Greece, Portugal, Spain, Ireland and Italy. 

It doesn’t matter who wins elections.  Consider the Black and Hispanic Congressmen in Washington.  They were voted in because it was believed they could represent the interest of their constituents, many of whom are disadvantaged. In the end, most of them have turned out to be no better than those they replaced.  Like all of Congress, these lawmakers have accumulated power and wealth, while their constituents are still poor, live in the most dangerous neighborhoods, have the highest rate of incarceration, the highest rate of unemployment, and attend the worse schools.   For two years following the election of Barack Obama, the Democrats had a filibusters proof Senate and a large majority in the House. Yet during this same time, there was no Buffett Rule proposed, no comprehensive immigration bill introduced, no attempt to pass the so-called Dream Act, no attempt to extend the minimum wage beyond the 2007 amendment which only provided for $7.25 per hour effective July 24, 2009, no attempt to extend the low interest on student loans beyond 2012, no attempt to rein in the high cost of prescription drugs, no real attempt to aid homeowners who were underwater on their mortgages in spite of the banks receiving almost a trillion dollars in bailout money, no attempt to end corporate subsidies, and, no stimulus money was used to put large numbers of people to work on any major rehabilitation of roads, bridges, rails, airports, or electric grids.  These are the people that want us to forget the past when they did nothing but remember to vote for them now when they can do nothing.

As for those employed by the government, these are the people who get into arguments with prostitutes in Columbia over the fee for services, who spend almost a billion dollars on team building retreats in Vegas and give out “jackass” awards in order for their meals to be paid by the taxpayers, who allow drugs to be smuggled onto airplanes in exchange for money and demand that old ladies remove their underwear, or who loss track of guns they have allowed to be run into Mexico, one of which was used in the death of a border agent. I once saw a definition of these bureaucrats as officials who work by fixed routine without exercising intelligent judgment.

No, the government cannot solve societal ills until principle starts to trump self interest and desire to hold on to power at any cost.  Unfortunately, all attempts at this have failed throughout history.   Perhaps that is why it is said that in the end we must take responsibility for ourselves and voluntarily take responsibility for our neighbor.

Recently, I was asked if the government has ever done anything right. I think there is one thing. From time to time the government has been successful in waging war. However, let us all hope that it never decides it can make the guns, bullets, tank, and other armament because there will not be enough room on that hill to which we will all have to run.

I THINK . . .: Is There An Antidote To Greed?

I THINK . . .: Is There An Antidote To Greed?: Does the Occupy Wall Street movement believe it has the antidote to greed? Is simply protesting the disparity in income and assets between ...

Is There An Antidote To Greed?

Does the Occupy Wall Street movement believe it has the antidote to greed? Is simply protesting the disparity in income and assets between the 1% and the 99% enough to overcome that age old deadly sin?  I suspect that most of us belonging to the 99% think the 1% are greedy but would trade places with them in a heartbeat. So why are we so upset that some people have a lot of money when so many of us wish we had it?   We tend to think of greed as one of those seven deadly sins which afflict only rich people.  However, if this was merely a disease suffered by the rich, it probably would not really qualify as a deadly sin since so few people are rich.  Greed is an equal opportunity affliction. Greed is behind just about every major crime committed in the world.  It has been the primary cause of every revolution since recorded history.  It has been the downfall of every attempt to create a utopian society.  It is ignited by the fear that we will not get something we want or we will lose something we have.  It is at the root of hoarding.  Even if we got what we wanted or we kept what we have, we would want more. Why, because in order for greed to sustain itself, it can never be satisfied.

Earlier this week, I was invited to attend a workshop on how to organize immigrants. Since immigration is not one of those issues putting me over the edge, I spent the first part of the workshop wondering why I was there. Once I thought about the fact that I had adopted a new approach to life called “do what comes next,” I decided to sit back and listen with the expectation that I would learn something.  I had been invited to attend this workshop by a woman who is very committed to empowering Latinos. Her commitment interested me more than the empowering. She was a young white woman from an upper middle class family who was certainly not reaping any great economic reward for her effort. Although she was employed by an organization helping immigrants, she was probably just making enough to satisfy basic needs. Yet when I looked at her I saw more than a woman committed to immigrants, I saw a woman waging a war on greed simply by her generosity.

I was glad I attended the workshop because I did learn for the first time just how the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) had created wide spread poverty in Latin America. This was the driving force for so many Latinos and Haitians coming to the United States after 1994.  Days later, two questions came to my mind: who benefited from NAFTA and why is the United States so attractive to immigrants from these third world countries?  I think the answer to both questions is money. Money in the abstract is like oxygen. It serves no purpose unless we use it, unless we spread it around. Money is the means by which we fairly exchange goods and services, and unless that fair exchange is going on, we are as poor as those immigrants who fled to the States. 

Greed is like a Catch 22.  If immigrants who have come to the United States are fortunate enough to get a job, they start buying those items manufactured in countries that have benefited from NAFTA. These are the same products that cost them their security in the first place.  But fair exchange is not going on here.  Money is simply creating more money because the quality of those goods and services is declining and bears little relationship to how much is spent on them.  The poorer the quality, the more money is spent.  Today, money has become another name for greed and everybody wants some or what it can buy.

A few years ago I was in a store shopping for Christmas. The prices were low because everything had been made in China or India. I remember thinking about the number of American jobs that had been lost but I kept on buying. I was championing free trade. Now that our factories have closed up and there are around 20 million people out of work, we are still buying goods made in India and China. We are told that our economy is dependant on our spending.  We are obliging and going deeper and deeper into debt.  But what if we stopped and put our greed on hold for just a little while and shared what we have with those who have less just as this young woman is doing. I think we would learn that generosity is really the  antidote for greed.  In this way, greed might just lose its place as number two on the list of the seven deadly sins.

The Root Of All Evil

I cannot count the number of times I have heard that the Bible says money is the root of all evil. If you search the Bible to find this you will be disappointed because the Bible doesn’t say it. What it does say is the love of money is the root of all evil. I think this is more than a distinction without a difference. There is nothing wrong with having money but there is a whole lot wrong with loving it. Take Warren Buffett for example. Buffett is 81 years old. He has 44 billion dollars and he is the third richest man in the world. He lives in a modest home in Nebraska and drives his own car. It has been reported that Buffett doesn’t really care about money he just enjoys making it. He is like a chef who doesn’t care about food, but just enjoys cooking it. Buffett has been called a great philanthropist but all I have ever heard is he plans to leave 99% of his estate to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Whatever he has donated over the years has not made a dent in his net worth. Unlike Facebook's Mark Zuckerman who gave 100 million dollars to the Newark Public Schools, I have never heard of Buffett doing much to help improve the lot of Americans living at or below the poverty line, or decrying the state of our educational system.   I have not heard of Buffett helping citizens who lost their homes, their savings, who cannot afford to send their children to college.  When Americans lost 10 trillion dollars in equity as a result of the financial crisis of 2008, Buffett remained one of the richest men in the world.  Buffett made money investing in companies who received bailout money. Since the start of the financial crisis he has made lucrative profits in Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, and General Electric.  It has never been reported that Buffett has ever tried to persuade financial institutions to make any widespread effort to help homeowners who are underwater on their mortgages, even those who have been diligent in their payments.  Why?  Because such an effort would impact his return on his investments.  Buffett says that the rich should pay more in taxes but he has yet to pick up his pen and write a check to the IRS. I have never heard that he even returns his social security check.  And while he doesn’t purchase the big houses, cars, and boats, he does use his money to acquire power.  Buffett delights in being called the Oracle of Omaha. He is like EF Hutton, when he speaks, people listen. The so-called Buffett Rule is hailed as the solution to our tax problem. His op-eds are talked about for weeks. When he is interviewed he never wipes the smile from his face.

I believe that Buffett loves money, because he loves power. President Obama has not invited the poor, the unemployed, the underemployed, and members of the dwindling middle class to the White House to give him advice on entitlements, homelessness, poverty, or jobs. Buffett is a regular visitor.  In spite of the fact that Americans made the Buffetts of the world rich because these people bought their goods and services, the rich don't offer the President advice on how to rebuild the middle class because they no longer need the middle class. There are only about 150 million American workers but there are millions more in China and India.  The rich don't offer advice on how to bring the gas prices down because they have no problem paying these prices.  Don’t be fooled by the rhetoric that alternative sources of energy is the real solution to high gas prices,  the rich see this as the new source of wealth. They tout the need for wind, solar and electricity, yet they love it that GM made a huge profit on vehicles that use gasoline. They push the Chevy Volt which cost $40,000.00 and which has been recalled due to problems with the lithium battery.  The rich talk out of both sides of their mouth.  They give advice which keeps the cost of gas at $5.00 a gallon (helping the oil companies), extolling the virtues of buying American cars (keeping the automotive industry profitable), and focusing on wind and solar energy (tomorrow’s source of wealth).  Making gasoline affordable is not on the agenda of the rich and powerful. Affordability is so yesterday. That small change adds up to a lot is passé. Today, there is not a need behind every decision made in Washington, only a dollar.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t begrudge Buffett making money. I want everyone to make money and lots of it. I would never subscribe to putting a cap on earnings nor would I want to impose taxes on the rich to punish them for their success. The haves do create the jobs. Yet, we have to remember that but for the have-nots, people like Buffett would have very little. But for the taxpayers paying for the roads, the military, the fire departments, and the police, the rich would not be able to transport their goods or be safe in their homes and businesses.

When the love of money takes precedent over the social contract, a contract that provided for all Americans to have an equal opportunity to succeed or fail in a system that was only partially rigged, we end up with greed, 20 million people unemployed or underemployed, and ultimately resentment.

I think the love of money is what is at the core of America’s problems because we can never get enough of what we love.

Facts Can Sometimes Get In The Way

When I was a young girl I didn't always distinguish between fact and fiction. Facts made me unhappy while fiction allowed my imagination to go to the most beautiful places. For starters, I believed I would fall in love with the man of my dreams and live happily ever after.  I would go to the movies every Sunday and watch love stories that always ended with the man and woman getting together against all odds. No matter how difficult the circumstances, the story had a happy ending. When my first relationship ended poorly, I simply chalked it up to a bad choice. The man of my dreams was still out there looking for me. I never thought about what happened after the movie announced "The End." The movies never took me beyond that last kiss to the day of the divorce. I was living in a fiction where I remained for many years. That I would live happily ever after was one of my earliest fictions and the one I found hardest to stop believing. But once I did things were never the same again.

Second, I believed that every country should have a two party system and all people wanted to live in a democracy with our Constitution and Bill of Rights. Whenever I would hear about the citizens of the former Soviet Union only having one choice when they went to the polls to vote, I was grateful that things were not like that here in America. I never considered that we only had two choices and more importantly we had no choice in our choices. We were fortunate to be able to speak our minds without the fear of having our doors kicked in and being arrested because we had spoken out against some politician or political party.  I remained in this belief until the New York Times published the Pentagon Papers exposing the truth about the Vietnam War and Daniel Ellsberg's life became a living hell. Ellsberg threatened the status quo. I was starting to learn that sitting in a barroom yelling to kick the bums out is not the free speech the Founders had in mind. It was not the free speech that needed protecting. 

Third, I believed there was an American Dream. If you worked hard, kept your nose clean, you could succeed. It didn't matter that success was always measured in terms of material possessions. The proof that you had made it was whether you owned a car or a house. As years passed, whether you had graduated from high school or whether you had a degree or profession were added to the mix. But even higher education was not for the mind it was for the pocketbook. I remember the time when a family could sacrifice and save its money to send the kids to college. Today, the whole neighborhood could save the money and few if any kids would have enough money to go to college.  Today, the debt from student loans has exceeded the entire credit card debt.  And if one of these kids were to invent a light bulb that never blew out, the major manufacturers of light bulbs would lobby politicians to pass legislation putting a height requirement on light bulb inventors.

Fourth, I believed that unions helped create the middle class.  After laws were passed giving workers the right to organize and bargain collectively with management, wages did increase. Unfortunately as the workers saw this increase in their paychecks, employers saw an increase in their profits. Eventually, the disparity in earnings between management and labor grew so wide that much of the gains brought about by unions went by the wayside. In those industries where labor continued to enjoy these gains, management simply picked up its ball and outsourced. Of course as unions became more powerful and politically connected it became increasingly difficult to tell the difference between the friends and the enemies of the middle class.  Union leaders started having a vested interest in maintaining the status quo. The disparity in income between the haves and the havenots has become so great that today 47% of households don't earn enough to pay federal income taxes. The number of people below the official poverty line is the highest in 52 years. Americans are going to bed hungry while farmers are still being paid not to grow food. We use enough corn each year in making ethanol to feed over 300 million people. Grass would make more ethanol but there is not enough profit in grass. Putting corn in our cars has caused the price of food to rise greater than the rate of inflation. We are in danger of becoming a third world country.

Fifth, I believed that the financial crisis of 2008 would open up everyone's eye to the fact that no matter how much money Wall Street was making, greed would insure it would not be enough. Yet we suspended our disbelieve thinking that a new president would solve the problem. I think President Obama had good intentions but consider what he has done in the face of this crisis. He brought Lawrence Summers, Timothy Geitner, and Jeffrey Inmelt into his administration. Summers was Treasury Secretary under Bill Clinton. It was during the Clinton Administration that the Glass Steagall Act was repealed and commercial banks were allowed to invest in mortgage-backed securities and take on collateralized debt obligations. Summers in his testimony before Congress in 1998 said the banks could be trusted. "The parties to these kinds of contract," he said, "are largely sophisticated financial institutions that would appear to be eminently capable of protecting themselves from fraud and counterparty insolvencies and most of which are already subject to basic safety and soundness regulation under existing banking and securities laws." Instead of relegating Summers and his policies into the back alley where they belonged, Obama made him the director of the National Economic Council. Obama is now considering nominating him to head the World Bank. Geitner was head of the New York Federal Reserve Bank during the financial crisis. He helped these "trusted banks" get the bailout. Once Obama got into office, Geitner was named Treasury Secretary. As for Inmelt, the Chairman and CEO of General Electric, it has been reported that he secured up to 182 billion dollars in bailout money at a time when GE was one of the most profitable companies in the world and was one of the leading outsourcer of jobs. Last year Obama named Inmelt to head up his Jobs Council. While serving in this capacity, GE has continued to move more of its infrastructure to China.   Cronyism is no new in America, but now it is out in the open because there is no attempt to hide it.  But when crony capitalism begins to destroy even a semblance of free market capitalism, we will not return from the brink of disaster.  We will down in history as just another great power that destroyed itself.  

So what can you and I do about this? We could start by giving up the fictions and start facing facts.  The answer is not to go from one of the political choices to the other.  A Republican President will not change things anymore than Obama is able to change things.  The only thing those in leadership understand, be they in Washington, Wall Street, or the corporate board rooms, is money and power.  We could stop allowing their opium to be our drug of choice.  We could follow the lead of that young woman who used the social media to take on Bank of America. We could stop doing business with the banks who received bailout money.  We should put our money into neighborhood banks and credit unions and demand they be accountable.   We should also demand that those individuals who caused the crisis be punished not through imprisonment but by billions of dollars in fines.   Today, Wall Street is laughing at us. It did not even bother to wait until the heat was off before giving out millions of dollars in bonuses.  Banks that were said to be too big to fail have grown even bigger. They have increased their fees, refused to give loans or grant credit to individuals and small businesses, and raised their interest rates on credit cards.   The Financial Services' percentage of  GPD keeps growing yet it makes nothing we can use.  And if they try to intoxicate us with handouts, we could resist.  After we do these things, I suppose we could pray.

Should We All Speak English?

The other day I was thinking about the number of Latinos who live in my community who do not speak English. This got me to thinking about other immigrants who have settled in this country over the last 100 or so years. Within the span of a generation the children of these immigrants were speaking English. There were no accommodations made. It was fish or cut bait.  Latinos now make up over 14% of the population, but how many of them are succeeding without knowing English? None of my research turned up an answer to this question but if I were to guess I would say very few. I would also guess that a large number of Latinos don’t speak English since just about everything is now in English and Spanish. I think they are the first group of immigrants that have not been required to fish or cut bait. Is there a reason for this? Is it the same reason that slaves were not allowed to read and write?

It was against the law in slave owning states to teach blacks to read and write for fear they would get ideas dangerous to the status quo.  The fear was so great that even after the end of slavery, blacks, who lived in the south and some border states, were poorly educated and required to attend segregated schools. It took 101 years after the Emancipation Proclamation for the Supreme Court to rule that separate schools were not equal. It took another 10 years for the passage of the Civil Rights Act.  African Americans have always known of the connection between quality of education on the one hand and second class status on the other. My parents and their parents knew this.  No liberals were patting them on the head saying there was an easier, softer way.   Of course, learning to speak correctly was one of the prerequisite to getting ahead.  If you doubt this, just ask Barack Obama.   Today, in spite of these gains, children of color, including Latinos, are once again segregated in the poorest performing schools with the highest drop out rate. They don't have books, pencils, and in some cases toilet paper. If they are fortunate enough to have a good teacher, that teacher is usually new, poorly paid, and the first to be laid off due to budget cuts.  I believe these conditions are by design because schools are again separate and unequal.  Keeping the status quo intact has been achieved.

Only recently have many Latin Americans countries, including Puerto Rico, required their citizens be educated.  Since mostly the poorest individuals have migrated to the United States, many Latinos do not know how to read or write well in their own language.  In this respect they are no different from the poor Irish or Italians who settled here.  However, unlike these other groups, Latinos have been told there is an easier, softer way.  They are accommodated.

Latino immigrants usually started off in menial jobs.   Years later their children are still in menial jobs.   I am reminded of a conversation I had a couple of months ago with a bright young 22 year old woman from the Dominican Republic. She had come to this country when she was 15 years old. She graduated from the local high school and she learned English; however her grammar was so bad my ears were hurting. She was working as a home health aide and most of her life was spent in a Latino community where she spoke only Spanish.  I asked her what she intended to do in the future. She said she hoped to continue as a home health aide.   I felt sad for her because she had no higher ambition.   This is one of the unintended consequences of accommodation.  So why have Latinos been accommodated?   I firmly believe it is to keep them picking the fruit, working for minimum wages, mopping the floors, and cleaning the toilets.   As for the young home health aide, she needs only to know enough English to get by which is not enough to get ahead.

Last night I attended a meeting with a number of Latinos. The group discussed the fact that our city was trying to pass an ordinance requiring all taxi cab drivers be able to read, write, and speak English. People were up in arms since so many of the drivers don’t know the language. In all the years I rode in cabs, I don’t remember needing the driver to read or write but it certainly helped that we could talk to each other.  I was probably only one of two people in the room who thought such an ordinance might not be a bad idea.  Of course, I was too much of a coward to share this with the group. Somehow, I got the feeling that what I thought would not go over very well.  I think accommodation is now part of the politically correct lexicon. Today I did share my concern about cab drivers with a young African American who lives in a nearby city. He informed me that there is a section of his city where the police ticket illegally parked cars which are driven mainly by Latinos who cannot read the parking signs. Thinking about this made me realize that it would be helpful for cabbies to be able to read signs. I decided to find out if an individual can get a driver's license without being able to read English.  I was surprised when I learned that Massachusetts offers the written test in over 25 languages. Massachusetts also offers an audio test in Spanish.  I guess when it comes to fees and fines, accommodation does have its advantages.  I just hope that everyone at least understands "do not" and “stop” when they are behind the wheel.

I think it is somewhat ironic that now that Latinos have political power, they will vote for politicians who encourage them to use it against themselves.  Rather than bite that bullet and learn English they have used their power to help maintain the status quo that slave holders worked so hard to protect.  It has long been said that one of the reasons this vast country is so rich and strong has been its common language (this is not to downplay the fact that it was stolen from Native Americans). Do we want to weaken the country or have we come up with some new and ingenious way to engage in racial,  ethnic. and class discrimination?  I think it is the latter. But it is having a weakening effect as well.  Lack of communication has been one of the leading causes of friction throughout all of history starting with the aftermath of the building of the Tower of Babel. I think it is the leading cause of opposition to comprehensive immigration reform. Remember, it is human nature to reject those we don't understand.   In time rejection turns into loathing.

What Hole Did These Crazies Crawl Out Of?

After commanding Noah to build an ark and gather the female and male of each specie, God sent a great flood. Things must have been pretty bad then but could they have been any worse than they are now?

Today, Dr. Richard Land, a leader in the influential Southern Baptist Convention, said he does not consider Mitt Romney and other Mormons to be Christians – and likens Mormonism to Islam. I think that given all that is being said today by the so-Christians, Romney should consider this to be an endorsement.

This week a federal judge in Montana sent this email about Obama to his friends using a government computer:

                 "A little boy said to his mother; 'Mommy, how come I'm black and you're white?
                  His mother replied, 'Don't even go there Barack! From what I can remember about
                  that party, you're lucky you don't bark!'"

Apparently, this judge has some bad stuff on his mind.

Last week Santorum was against public education and compared our schools to factories. He called the President a snob because Obama said everyone should go to college. Santorum also thinks there is a connection between using contraceptives and girls having babies out of wedlock. He wanted to throw up when he read JFK's speech in which he said the wall between church and state should be absolute.   Of course, being the grandson of a coal miner, Santorum must have attended private school,  didn't go to college, law school, or business school.  Santorum must have gotten his three degrees from a Wheaties' cereal box.  How else would he know that that the solution to unwed motherhood is to ban contraceptives?

I know that every society has had its crazies. But today with the 24/7 news media, we are finding out who they are. Of the people who voted in the Michigan primary on Tuesday, the crazies represented around 38%. They agree with Santorum. How might things work out if everyone had to take an "Are You a Crazy" test before they could vote?

In the end Obama might just get reelected, not because of his record, but because the crazies are not only shooting themselves in the foot but they refuse to go back in their holes.  Maybe Newt Gingrich 

is on to something when he says we should colonize the moon.  There are no new worlds on earth to flee to get away from the impending flood.  

When is enough enough?

I don't trust politicians and I don't care what they say or how they say it.   The media say Obama isn't bold enough; Romney doesn't relate to the average person; Santorum is living in the wrong century; and Gingrich carries a grenade in his pocket with the pin pulled.   All of these things are probably true but does it really matter?  Jon Huntsman said Americans were suffering from a deficit of trust.  But it isn't just politicians.  I have reached a point where I simply don't trust any corporation, small business, service provider, or product. 

For several years I have paid my communication bill on line directly through Verizon.  At the end of last year, Verizon removed money from my bank account and applied it to a customer in upstate New York.    I made six phone calls and there were three faxes sent by me and the bank to Verizon.  The New York customer even notified the company that a mistake had been made.  It took Verizon thirty two days to return the money.   I switched to Comcast the beginning of the month.  The service came with Norton Security Suite which I have always liked.  Almost immediately my laptop started acting up.  The keyboard numbers kept coming up incorrect and I couldn't install any windows updates.  I called Comcast and was told that the problem had to be with the Sony computer.   Last week, I contacted Sony online and a technician told me my laptop was corrupted and when did I last optimize it.   Having no idea what he was talking about I immediately went into panic mode.  I was talked into purchasing a service plan for $299.99.   I came to my senses about two hours later, went back online to cancel the purchase.  This same tech engaged in a one hour dialog with me on why I should keep this one year service plan.  His supervisor even agreed to extend it for an additional six months.   I refused to give in and I got a little angry that they didn't offer an eighteen month plan in the first place.   I was told that I would be charged $25.00 for the cancellation and $34.00 for fixing the problem that caused me to call in the first place.  I refused the service charge since it was supposed to be free.  Later that evening, I discovered the problem had not been fixed.  I learned today that I was still charged the $25.00 cancellation fee (I guess this goes directly into their petty cash account). 

Yesterday, I spoke to a man from Xfinity tech support who wanted me to purchase a plan to correct the problem.  I refused because I don't believe in coincidences.  I had no problem with the laptop for the three years before Comcast.  I later found out the problem was with a program called Comcast Security Guard which had also been installed.  Once I removed it everything worked fine.  I am so sick of these companies coming up with new ways to put the screws to us.  My service with Comcast wasn't even a month old and their Xfinity tech probably knew what would solve the problem, but they wanted money.  I think that businesses have determined that if they swindle 100 people, only 5% will complain.  What a windfall!  It doesn't matter how big the company is or how much money they make, it isn't enough.

I THINK . . .: Only card carrying Christians can be President.

I THINK . . .: Only card carrying Christians can be President.: Franklin Graham was a guest of Morning Joe this morning and he gave us quite a lesson in who is a Christian. Graham refused to say Presiden...

Only card carrying Christians can be President.

Franklin Graham was a guest of Morning Joe this morning and he gave us quite a lesson in who is a Christian.  Graham refused to say President Obama was a Christian.  He said we will have to ask him.  As for Mitt Romney, Graham said Mormons are not really Christians.  Graham's statement dovetails with that of Rick Santorum who said that Obama has a theology that is not in the mainstream.  When I listen to these guys I have to check to see if I am watching an episode of "Back to the Future” or are these guys living on another planet or in some parallel universe.  Grahams says that the question is really "what is a Christian?”  I thought Christians were people who loved God and loved their neighbor.  

Why can't folks just own up to the fact that they do not want a black President even if he found the cure for cancer?   Last week Obama was being accused of violating religious freedom, now Graham and his kind want to violate Obama's.   Small minded people must be really upset that attacking Obama's performance isn't enough because they are going to great lengths to delegitimize him.   The other day I heard that someone said "if he had met Jesus before he met Christians, he might have liked him."   I can certainly identify with this sentiment.  Graham and Santorum give Christianity a bad name just as Bin Laden gave Islam a bad name.   Considering how popular Graham is and Santorum's front runner status, I guess a young Muslim or Jewish child had better give up any notion that she/he can grow up and become President.  It is time to admit that if you want to know what many Americas are really made of simply tear up its founding documents. Watching Franklin Graham today, all I could think of was this cannot be Rev. Billy Graham proudest moment. 

I THINK . . .: What are we going to do?

I THINK . . .: What are we going to do?: I think we are in the midst of a critical time in our history. For starters, President Obama failed to push the Bowles Simpson plan for de...

What are we going to do?

I think we are in the midst of a critical time in our history.   For starters, President Obama failed to push the Bowles Simpson plan for deficit reduction.  The plan was big and bold although somewhat light on entitlement reform.  Nevertheless, it recommended tax reform which included lowering the rates but eliminating most of the loopholes.  Everyone agrees that our tax code is costing billions of dollars in revenue and is simply unfair to those of us who do not have the lawyers and lobbyist to bribe our elected officials.  In spite of a consensus to reform the code, no one, including the President, is moving towards that end.  Reforming the tax code would mean, among other things, that companies like General Electric would pay corporate taxes and the rich would pay more.  We keep hearing that the problem is so complicated that it cannot possibly be resolved in the near future.  So the matter was put on the back burner.  It is like putting off cleaning your room because it is too cluttered. 

Next, the real reason tax reform is dead is that solving complicated problems don't garner any votes in the next election.  During any six year period, the President has to be concerned about an election every four years, House members every two years, and Senators every six years.  Raising money for the next election begins as soon as the returns are in.  This leaves little time to tackle serious issues.   Getting elected or reelected seems to be the real job description of our politicians.  If any governing takes place, it is merely coincidental.  Take for example Super Pacs.  Last week, Obama reversed his position on taking money from these pacs.  In 2010 he said that these Super Pacs were a threat to our democracy.  This year he says he needs the dough to win the election.  I guess Obama will worry about the threat again if he gets reelected.  Great example of our democracy taking second place to money.  

Consider the issue of a budget, despite the law requiring both Houses of Congress to pass a budget every year, it has been over 1000 days since the Senate passed one.  Obama's new Chief of Staff said on Sunday that the reason the Senate has not passed a budget is the requirement of 60 votes. Apparently, no one informed Mr. Lew that this talking point doesn't fly since passing a budget takes only 51 votes and the Senate has 51 Democrats and 2 Independents who vote with the Democrats.  The Democrats have had a majority over 1000 days.  No budget means no criticism of Democrats, a threat to reelection.  On Monday, President Obama rolled out his 2013 budget.  Those on the right see it as just a campaign tool. Those on the left see it as a way to rally voters to reject the Republicans in 2012.   Everyone knew the budget would be dead on arrival but this was only the latest in a series of Obama proposals that would never become law but would drive up his base. These political games really are a waste of taxpayer money: reams of paper being generated to no end; lots of fuel being burned to transport the President from one swing state to another to deliver his latest message; and politicians getting a paycheck. I am beginning to wonder if we need politicians at all.  If you are not in the military or wealthy, has your life been truly affected by anything these politicians have done over the last year?  I don’t think so.  In fact, the death of one of the greatest singer in the world touched more lives in a single day than Obama, John Boehner, and Harry Reid touched over the last two years.  Oh, I forgot, wage earners did get an extra $20.00 a week in their paycheck.  Unfortunately, this extra money is temporary and will eventually come to an end either before or after it is repaid to the Social Security Trust.

On April 15, 2012, the IRS will collect tax revenues.  If every politician took the next year off, people would still get their Social Security and SSI; health care providers would get their Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements; and Veterans would receive their benefits.  Most of the agencies, including Defense, would continue to function. Of course, political pundits would have to look for another line of work, cable news outlets would temporarily freeze up, and late night comedians would have to come up with some new lines.  But it would not be the end of the world; in fact, it might just be the beginning of something new.

Can we look to any point in history to help us figure out what are we going to do?  Ron Paul is on the right track when he says something has been fundamentally wrong with our system for a long time but judging from his all over the place rhetoric, I don't think he really knows what it is.  

I THINK . . .: Has the Federal Government gone too far this time

I THINK . . .: Has the Federal Government gone too far this time: The Affordable Health Care Act of 2010 mandates that employers who offer health insurance must include coverage for contraceptives, includin...

Has the Federal Government gone too far this time

The Affordable Health Care Act of 2010 mandates that employers who offer health insurance must include coverage for contraceptives, including the morning after pill, and sterilization.  A narrow exemption will apply to houses of worship.  But schools, charities, and hospitals run by religious organizations are not exempt.  The Catholic Church and some Protestant religions are up in arms.  Those in favor of the narrow exception are citing polls showing the high percentage of women, including Catholic women, agree that women should have access to contraceptives as justification, but they overlook or ignore the broader question.  Does a requirement that religious hospitals, schools, and charities offer contraceptives and sterilization violate the Constitution?  Most people don't know that the first two prohibitions in the First Amendment are "making of any law respecting an establishment of religion, . . .[and]  impeding the free exercise of religion."  These prohiblitions come even before speech and the press.  Based on the history I was taught, religion was the driving motivator for the early settlors to come here.  

Since shortly after it's founding, Catholic doctrine has prohibited the use of contraception just as it decries abortion.  If the doctrines mean nothing than how do we define religion?  I am not a Catholic and I believe that if more people used contraceptives there would not be so many children born out of wedlock to mostly poor women.  However, what I and the majority of people think about this narrow exception is irrelevant if it does not satisfy the First Amendment.  What the fickle public thinks should never be the reason for most things.  Consider what the majority of the citizens of California thought when they voted Prop 8 to ban same sex marriages.  Yesterday, the 9th Circuit ruled that the ban was unconstitutional.  If we say that it is okay that the Constitution prohibits a ban on same sex marriage but we should disregard the possibility that this same Constitution might prohibit a requirement that religious hospitals, schools and charties provide coverage for contraceptives and sterilization, we are talking out of both sides of our mouth.  We are engaging in ideological double talk.  We can't have it both ways.  Either the Constitution stands for something or it stands for nothing.   Further, It does not help resolve this issue of religious freedom by some people ridiculing clergy members, questioning a religious belief as outworn, or bringing up Viagra.

Debating the issue of whether such a narrow exemption to providing contraception unconstitutionally tramples on religious doctrine is one of the unintended consequences of broad and sweeping federal legislation, in this case, the Affordable Health Care Act.  It should be becoming clear that this law is doing more than just mandating that everyone have health insurance.  I think it is time we stopped spending money of polls, and start spending it on education.   An uneducated citizenry is the pawn of ideology. 

I THINK . . .: Keeping the poor poor

I THINK . . .: Keeping the poor poor: Yesterday, Mitt Romney said he was not concerned about the poor, they have a safety net and if it needs repairing he will fix it. The Obama...

Keeping the poor poor

Yesterday, Mitt Romney said he was not concerned about the poor, they have a safety net and if it needs repairing he will fix it.  The Obama people intend to use just the "not concerned about the poor" as a tool against Romney in the campaign in November.  They intend to take the statement out of context to persuade voters to reject Romney.  But this is not a tactic unique to the Democrats.  Even Romney used a line from a speech delivered by Obama which was a quote from John McCain.  I think that these tactics are not only dishonest but they all but scream out to us "you are so stupid that I can say anything and you will believe me.".   I once told a friend never to read to someone a passage from a book which says "I hate you and I am going to kill you."  I told her if that person were to wind up dead, a prosecuter, with the judge's permission, would force an admission that my friend said this to the victim and a conviction could ensue.  Taking things out of context can have terrible consequences.  At least when Romney was called on his use of a statement from the Obama speech, he owned up to it and said "what's good for the goose is good for the gander." 

I don't know if Romney cares about the poor.  But I do know that Democrats don't care about them.  Democrats have the monopoly on keeping people in poverty.  While the poor need a safety net which does need fixing, it is the Democrats who oppose school choice, support teachers unions, support dumbing down education, insert the loopholes in the tax code, think it is okay for immigrants not to learn English, allow the Walmarts to come into town and drive out small businesses, create an environment in the inner cities which foster food deserts, and promise a chicken in every pot in exchange for a vote. 

But every thinking person knows a safety net, even a fixed one, is not the solution to poverty.  The only solution is to provide a vehicle out of poverty.   Whether we like it or not, we, as a people, are joined at the hip.  So long as there is no way for an individual to get, he will take.  We need to come to the realization that if one person is in poverty, we are all in poverty. 

I THINK . . .: What Education?

I THINK . . .: What Education?: When I was a student in the public schools, educated women did not have many options. Consequently, I had some of the best and the brightes...

What Education?

When I was a student in the public schools, educated women did not have many options.  Consequently, I had some of the best and the brightest teachers, who, together with my mother, awakened me to the challenge of learning.  So many of my teachers were responsible for my intellectual development, for making me feel valuable as an individual, for setting me on a course where learning was truly a gift.  Unfortunately, once more opportunities for women opened up, the best and the brightest moved into more lucrative professions.  I believe that this was the beginning of the dumbing down of the educational system.  The teachers I had would never have put their own interest before that of their students nor would they blame the parents for their failure.   The best and the brightest would not have needed job security because they possess that inner security in themselves and what they were contributing.  They did not need the teachers union.  Recently, I began to wonder how many leaders in the teachers unions were ever amongst the best and the brightest.  My guess would be there were and are very few. 

Some time agao, I learned that Finland holds their teachers in such high regard that they are paid at the rate of doctors and lawyers.  In Finland, only the top of the class are selected to teach.  In the United States teachers come from the bottom of the class and are paid at a rate commensurate with their contribution to society.  From time to time a good teacher is produced, gets hired, and excels at her job, but when the budjets are cut she is the first one fired because the unions insist on protecting the more senior, mostly ineffective teacher.  You might say I am painting the problem with a very broad brush and you might be right.  I am sure there are excellent teachers with tenure who have made a difference in a child's life.  But given the quality of the education provided our children, I don't think the brush is that broad.   The teachers unions balk at merit pay because everyone is equal and therefore worth the same.  We all know that this is not true and any good teacher has to cringe at this notion.  While merit pay is good, the real solution is to do whatever is necessary to get back the best and the brightest.

Obama's State of the Union Address

I watched Obama's State of the Union address on Tuesday and once again he demonstrated his great orator skills and once again I asked myself "where the beef"?  Obama has had three years (two of which with a majority in both chambers) to effectuate meaningful improvement to our dismal economic situation, yet he spent his capital on a failed stimulus and healthcare.  Now that he is up against a Republican House, dominated by the Tea Party, and a do-nothing Democratic Senate, all he can do is deliver good speeches.  The middle class has been shrinking and the hope that the so-called American dream will be realized has been fading for over thirty years now. It did not start with George W. Bush. This problem ran through the Reagan and Clinton Administrations.  The rich got richer and the rest of us didn't notice that we were not making more only borrowing more to get those granite kitchen counter-tops.  Obama promised change.  Within a year of Obama's becoming president, his grand plan for change consisted of gimmicks like cash for clunkers, a poorly thought out mortgage program, a tax break so measly that most Americans didn't even know they got one, and shovel ready projects that were not shovel ready.  Still his Tuesday night speech was impressive.  All we need now is a leader who can turn a laundry list into results.  This gets me to Mitt Romney.

I think Romney is a doer and a fixer.  He has succeeded in almost every venture he has taken on, including establishing a first rate, highly successful private investment firm, turning around a corrupt and failing Winter Olympics in Utah, and turning a budget deficit into a surplus when he was governor of Massachusetts.  Unfortunately, he is now lumped together with a bunch of clowns and the most laughable one is Newt Gingrich.  Actually, it isn't Gingrich who bothers me; it is the people who are voting for him.  I am so disgusted with this side show that I have left the Republican Party and if Gingrich is nominated I probably will vote for Obama.

Gingrich needs an audience

Did you hear that Newt Gingrich is threatening to pull out of future debates unless his supporters are allowed to applaud?  I am not surprised that Gingrich doesn't do well without an audience considering how tongue tied he got last night during the first Florida debate.   If he becomes president, perhaps he can recruit some members of the community in South Carolina who voted for him to cheer him on during his talks with the Iranians. I was a member of the Republican Party until last year when it became too embarassing to tell anyone. The Party's hate for Obama has reached such a fever pitch that it will drive any right thinking person into the arms of the Democrats. South Carolina proved that overt racism has become respectable again, so much so that even well meaning people are afraid to stand up against it.  This is how really bad stuff starts.  Soon we will all need to watch our backs. 

Why Iowa?

Last Tuesday I stayed awake long enough to learn that Mitt Romney won the Iowa caucus by beating out Rick Santorum by 8 votes.  By Wednesday afternoon I was asking myself why I stayed awake long enough to learn that Mitt Romney won the Iowa caucus by beating out Rick Santorum by 8 votes.  What is there about Iowa that I should care who some predominately white evangelical Christians think should be the Republican nominee for President of the United States.  One fact seems to be clear, based on the past results of the Iowa Republican caucus, the one thing these mostly white evangelical Christians do decide is who will probably not be the next President of the United States.  While Romney has long been considered the most electable of all the candidates, that fact has little if anything to do with: 1. whether he secures the nomination; or 2. whether the 75% of Republicans who want anybody but Romney will show up at the polls and vote for him. 

I do not think we have a true two party system because Democrats like winning at whatever cost and Republicans like to prove a point.  This is a good reason why we need a third and maybe a fourth party.