Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Court Jester

With his votes against veterans, children and their healthcare, Native Americans, unions, public education, voters’ rights, and lack of support from his own party the question remains, “Why do the Arizona and National Democratic Party organizations continue to support Republican fundamentalist, Trent Franks by refusing to fund viable candidates that oppose him?” This seems to make no sense. His ties to Tom Delay and Jack Abramof are well documented, his useless and ineffectual anti-abortion rhetoric has accomplished nothing, and his recent vote against ten vital water projects for Arizona is a matter of congressional record.

Thirty years ago in West Virginia, the Republican Party refused to put any candidate up against perennial Congressman Ken Heckler. Look at his record. As a political science teacher with no money he went door to door and got himself elected. He voted for every spending bill that came across his desk unless it involved the military. He championed every liberal cause regardless of cost or impact. Yet he never faced a challenge organized by the Republican Party. According to sources in West Virginia at the time, “Ken Heckler’s outspoken opposition to fiscal responsibility and extreme liberal views were the Republican Party’s best asset. Why would we want to remove someone from office who makes us look so good?”

Sound familiar?

The Democratic Party protects Trent Franks for the same reason; he’s an example of everything negative in the Republican Party. His opposition to minorities, obvious support of corporate interests at the expense of his constituents, and total inability to make any progress on his personal ideological agenda make other Democratic Party candidates look good. All Trent Franks needs to make his value to the Democratic Party more obvious is a pointy hat with bells and a clown suit.

Saturday, November 10, 2007

Religious Bigotry

Defending the freedom of legal religious bigotry, Trent Franks, Arizona’s Grand Dragon, remained loyal to Bush and voted against allowing gay American citizens protection from discrimination. His “reasoning” is that religious groups should be allowed to treat any gay citizen of the United States as subhuman. In a statement issued by his office, Franks-in-stein stated that ENDA fails to protect the prejudicial hiring prerogatives of faith-based organizations including some religious schools. In other words, conservative religious organizations should be exempt from Civil Rights Laws. Religious bigotry has a long historical tradition; from the inquisition to the Holocaust to segregation.

Justifying segregation, Buckner H. Payne, a Nashville publisher and clergyman who wrote under the pseudonym Ariel, insisted in 1867 that the tempter in the garden was a black man whose interaction with Eve was the first cause of the Fall. Writing at the height of Radical Reconstruction, Ariel concluded his argument by reminding his readers that "a man can not commit so great an offense against his race, against his country, against his God, in any other way, as to give his daughter in marriage to a Negro or to take one of their females for his wife."

The liquidation of six million Jews and other “enemies of the state” was caused, D. B. Red explained in his pamphlet Race Mixing a Religious Fraud (c. 1959), by the sexual "mingling" of the Jews, who suffered what Red represents as God's final solution to the miscegenation problem: "Totally destroy the people involved." Here, surely, was proof that segregation was "divine law, enacted for the defense of society and civilization.”

Franks statements reflects these sentiments. “The provisions of ENDA would subtly erode the ability of states to protect the most fundamental building block of Western Civilization, the institution of marriage and family. It would serve as a building block for judges to argue that the government has no rational basis to continue discriminating in the area of marriage.” Gee, if ending legal discrimination of any class of citizens is such a threat, he should have trotted out his old picture of a fetus to scare people.

Franks summation of his position is, “Religious liberty is the cornerstone of human freedom, and the legislation put forth today would inevitably undermine that right;” which makes perfect sense as long as humans are defined as ‘straight, white heterosexual people’. If you are not part of that group, do not walk into Franks’ church; you are not human and have no rights as a citizen of the United States.

Monday, November 5, 2007

Inmates in Charge

The Bush administration’s support of the economic rape of America by selfish business interests continues with no opposition by the officials we elected to look out for our interests. Good jobs are so hard to find that a woman recently took out an ad to sell her breast milk.

In a transparent attempt to divert attention from the country’s economic decline, increasing home foreclosures, and rising food and gasoline prices, the U.S. Department of Labor bowed down to the Bush propaganda machine and announced Friday that employers added 166,000 jobs to non-farm payrolls in October, the most since May. Meanwhile, the jobless rate held at 4.7%

If you are scratching your head wondering, “Huh?” you are not alone.

Here is what they do not tell us; Chrysler announced it plans to nearly double the 13,000 job cuts it announced in February, now targeting the elimination of more than 25,000 hourly and salaried workers, or nearly one-third of its workforce. Add the Chrysler cuts to the expected job cuts -- at least 137,400 of them -- already in the works at General Motors Corp., Ford Motor Co. and its ACH unit, and Delphi Corp. and the total American job reductions just in the manufacturing sector rise to about 150,000.

Net gain zero? Not so much.

Let us look at what jobs the Labor Department is talking about. 99% are in what is euphemistically termed the “service sector.” That means janitors, bedpan orderlies, hotel maids and temporary employment workers making minimum wage. How many of those new jobs do you think went to American citizens laid off from $20 and hour jobs with benefits who are losing their homes? How many $5 an hour jobs with no benefits went to illegals?

Do the math; the net loss to the economy and the tax base by those who contribute nothing to America comes to billions of dollars. The inmates are running the asylum and you and I are screwed.

Friday, November 2, 2007

Church and State

Ever wonder why churches get away with paying no taxes? Well, there is an IRS rule (not law) that states: “Churches are granted a tax exemption because they serve the public and do not participate in or intervene in any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for public office." How does that work in the real world? Great, if you are an evangelical corporate church that supports republicans.

In Ohio, the World Harvest Church and Fairfield Christian Church, huge corporate churches with thousands of members, held political rallies and were active in President Bush's narrow Ohio win in 2004. According to IRS complaints filed by other churches in the area, these churches violated their tax-exempt status by pushing the candidacy of J. Kenneth Blackwell, who is the favored candidate of Ohio's religious right. In addition, the pastors of these churches made political speeches from their pulpits and allowed the Republican Party to solicit signatures and funds from church members during services. So far, the IRS has ignored the complaints.

However, in Pasadena, Calif., the IRS is examining the tax-exempt status of All Saints Church because its former pastor delivered a sermon that criticized Bush on the Iraq war and Republican conservatives on social policy two days before the 2004 election and the NAACP is also under IRS investigation for political participation.

Ain’t selective enforcement grand? I guess it depends on how our Fearless Leader, Herr Bush, calls the shots.

This is not only happening in Ohio, friends, Arizona’s corporate churches have a long history of flaunting the rules with impunity. Our Fuhrer’s number one supporter, Franks-n-stein, regularly visits these churches to make political speeches and solicit donations. Every two years, these churchs circulate his election petitions gathering the signatures he needs to qualify for the ballot.

I guess going door to door like every other candidate is required to do is too much work. Besides, after lying to Sun City residents about opposing Medicare Part D, blocking federal highway funds needed to upgrade the valley’s crumbling transportation system, and endlessly shouting his useless anti-abortion rhetoric to hide his lack of awareness of the real concerns of his constituents and this country, people would slam their doors in his vacuous face anyway.

Why should he bother doing things the legal way when he does not have to?

Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Happy Halloween

You have to admire the consistency of the christian fundamental religious right. After 2,000 years of ‘borrowing’ then demonizing aboriginal belief systems, they have come full circle celebrating the Celtic holiday Samhain with a supposedly traditional harvest festival. Let us look at some history.

In order to covert the middle eastern mainstream, the early christian propaganda machine changed Jesus’s birthday to December 25th to match the celebration of the birth of the older deity, Mithras.

When attempting to make inroads in western Europe, church strategists were confronted with a intricate and well-established belief system; first by demonizing the old gods and goddesses where possible, then by using Mary to replace the traditional Mother Goddess. Local holidays were used as well. The spring fertility festival of Ostara with its symbols of eggs, chicks and rabbits was given the name of Easter and linked with the resurrection story. Other celebrations were stolen as well. The Sabbath of Imbolic was renamed the Feast of the Purification of the Virgin Mary.

In the 1500’s when reluctant locals still refused to abandon their traditional beliefs, the christian church orchestrated the executions of as many as 300,000 people, most of them women, to bring the rest of the population under control. Over the last few years, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have been killed for the same reason. What do you expect from a religion that uses a Roman execution device to inspire hope?

The christian church has a long history of such deception, murder, and duplicity. Hard to imagine how a religion based on these principles managed to make such inroads into mainstream American politics, …or is it?

Wake Up, America!

Florida Governor Jeb Bush, brother of our Fearless Leader, has endorsed legislation that would grant driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants. Hawaii and Kansas already have granted similar privileges and Arizona may follow suit. My simple question is. “Why?”

What does an illegal immigrant, whose very presence on American soil is a felony, need a driver’s license for anyway? So he can get to work? It is a crime to employ illegals in the first place. Laws already exist that expressly state that anyone employing an illegal is committing a crime. Okay, maybe it is not about getting to work (yeah, right).

Maybe it’s just to allow the illegal to take his children to school. Yeah, that makes sense. Thousands of children that don’t speak English entering the public school system to further distract teachers from their important job of imparting the skills that enable American children to enter society as productive citizens and further dilute the already scarce resources of our public education system. That will help make this country strong.

Maybe it is not about employment or education. Perhaps an illegal needs a driver’s license to take his wife to the hospital to wait in the parking lot until her water breaks. Already in Arizona fully one half of hospital resources are squandered on illegals. Emergency rooms are choked with the consequences of the continuing infiltration of undocumented, illegal aliens. American citizens and immigrants here legally are finding their access to adequate healthcare reduced significantly by these atrocities. And, the hospitals themselves are losing enough money on these non-payers that they are in danger of bankruptcy.

Do not misconstrue what I have said here. The illegals are not at fault. We pay them to come here. We give them free healthcare. We put up signs that say, “Free Ride, Come on In!” The people we elect to make and enforce the laws already on the books refuse to do so and we wonder why we have this problem.

Wake up, America! Bad decisions do not fix the consequences of other bad decisions. Allowing the idiots to remain in charge of the asylum is not working.

Monday, October 29, 2007

Congress for Sale

If you watched the 2007 Le Mans auto race you may have noticed that the first five place finishers were diesel-powered 1.5 liter engines that averaged over 200 MPH while getting 117 miles per gallon. This event could not have been more public, but, for the benefit of Archer-Daniels-Midland, and the powerful farm lobby, Congress chose to ignore viable solutions and back a boondoggle initiative to promote and subsidize alcohol-based fuels made from corn. Let us look at the facts. Growing corn is an expensive process requiring tons of environmentally unfriendly chemical fertilizers that leach into the water table unless expensive treatment methods are used to neutralize the soil every other year. Further, the process of converting corn to alcohol requires more energy than the corn produces. In addition, the corn diverted to fuel production drives up the price of animal feed resulting in the sharp increases we have already seen in the prices of milk and meat.
How has Congress decided to pay for all this? Congress voted to raise the taxes on oil companies – 61 billion dollars so far.

Never in the history of commerce has a business failed to pass along increased costs to consumers. Look at the headlines: “Costly oil exploration drives up prices” “Motorists feel the heat of ever higher refinery maintenance costs” “The 40,000% markup you pay for prescriptions cover the cost of research and development” The list goes on.

Can you say, “Stupid?” I knew you could.

Here is a fact for you; hemp refining produces four times the alcohol of corn without the high costs (no pun intended). It requires no costly chemical inducement to grow in poor soil unsuitable for other crops and adds nothing to the price of food.
Between the technologies already demonstrated successfully at Le Mans and cost-effective alternative fuels why would Congress choose the most expensive and least beneficial method? Because, Democrats and Republican alike, they are paid to make those choices. Who bought your Congressman’s vote?

Population Control?

According to the Census Bureau, within a few years seniors will outnumber the population of American workers. While this does not bode well for government programs designed to protect seniors, it does seem there is a plan in place to deal with the problem.
Our friendly neighborhood Congress has designed a program to force our seniors to choose between healthcare and food called Medicare Part “D.”
What a wonderful program! After helping seniors begin treatment for debilitating diseases and conditions of old age, the plan has a built in safety valve popularly known as the “doughnut hole” to pull the healthcare rug out from under our seniors when they need it most.
This “doughnut hole” begins after the senior and the plan together have spent $2,400 in total yearly drug costs. At this point seniors will pay 100% of their discounted prescription drug costs until they reach $3,850 in yearly true out-of-pocket drugs costs. True out-of-pocket costs are the senior’s share of the prescription drug costs in a Medicare Part D plan; such as deductibles, copays (If applicable), and the amounts paid in the coverage gap. It does not include monthly premiums.
Medicare Part D has been a financial windfall for the pharmaceutical industry. A report, released by the Democratic staff of the House of Representatives Government Reform Committee, found prices for Pfizer Inc.’s pain reliever Celebrex, Merck Inc.’s cholesterol drug Zocor and eight other top drugs offered by 10 major plans rose during the controversial program’s first seven weeks. In some cases, drug prices rose 10 percent
Another big winner is the insurance industry. They benefit from the subsidies paid to private insurance companies to cover Medicare patients in Medicare HMO’s, which typically cost more than the government program to provide health care coverage.
Now millions of low-income seniors are finding themselves making choices between needed medicine and food, utilities, and housing. Great going, Congress, good plan! Kill off a bunch of seniors to reduce federal spending so you can vote yourselves another raise.
Don’t you just love them?
P.S. Guess who’s vote made this all possible, mister family values himself, Trent Franks.

What's Up With This Guy?

Local politician Trent Franks joins his Fuhrer, Bush, in once again denying poor, non-republican children healthcare with his NO vote on S-Chip. What is up with this guy?

After sneaking into office during a heated and vituperative confrontation between two powerful republican candidates, every year since he has used his contacts with the fundamentalists churches, unproductive and ineffectual anti-abortion rhetoric, and the same phony signs covered with the faces of anonymous children (who must be teenagers by now) to pretend to support family values.

What family?

He has never held a real job, has never had nor raised any children, has no personal investment in the future of the country, Franks office regularly turns down requests for help from constituents asking for help with government bureaucracy, refuses public debates over his poor decisions, turns down federal money for highway improvement in one of the fastest growing areas of the country, wants to privatize Social Security to line the pockets of private companies, supports the Blackwater money laundering operation that reputably funnels government money into the Republican party while building his Fuhrer a huge private army, and even voted to repeal the Voting Rights Act.

Here are his credentials:

He moved here from a toxic waste site in Colorado to grab the coat-tails of then-governor Evan Mecham who was impeached for obstruction of justice and misuse of government funds after canceling the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday, blaming working women for raising the divorce rate, and attempting to defend his right to use the racial slur, “pickaninny.”

Franks, you are known by the friends you make. It is time to leave.