On the Contrary

Another week where the crazies become more empowered by a media that can’t do critical reporting and sift fact from fiction.  To wit:

• In a report in the Washington Post on health care reform, unnamed White House officials were quoted as saying:  “I don’t understand why the left of the left has decided that this is their Waterloo.  We’ve gotten to this point where health care on the left is determined by the breadth of the public option. I don’t understand how that has become the measure of whether what we achieve is health-care reform.”  I never thought of myself as left of the left and our dear President made the point that the Public Option was critical to a level playing field.  Oh I don’t know, maybe it is the fact that we can save 30% by taking profit out of the insurance industry that has got us all head-up.  They do live in a bubble, they operate on group-think-speak, and it will be their downfall.
• In another report in the Washington Post Presidential spokesperson Robert Gibbs defended the right of citizens to be packing guns at presidential events.  Here again we have pandering to the extreme right that just weakens the progressive agenda they were elected to carry out.  I have three guns either inherited or bought to deal with coyotes that ate one of my dogs.  But I know that taking guns to public debates is insanity.  I would not pander for the rights of these fruitcakes.  This whole gun-carrying-in-public phenomenon is an attempt to take law and order into your own hands.  It has never worked and if this White House cannot stand for anything including responsible public behavior, they will not be in office long.  I don’t know what they are thinking.  The fruitcakes are never going to vote for them and the rest of us are appalled.
• A couple of recent polls pointed out a wonderful fact.  The majority of people against health care reform watch Fox News.  These same people, when polled about some of the outright lies about the health care plans being considered, 3 out of 4 of these viewers believed these lies.  Isn’t it great that most of the opposition is deluded about what is in health care and from this basis of misinformation, real debate cannot occur.  Congratulations Republicans and your noise machine.  You have done a great job of dumbing down the nation.  Onward to lower expectations and even smaller results!
• John Stewart, the only guy I think that is still in the real news business, showed us on Tuesday night how far the “real” news media has fallen in their coverage of real issues in order to attract ratings and be trendy.  The trouble is, as he so humorously points out, is that they are trivializing the debate on serious issues.  Maybe that explains the morons at the Town Hall Meetings.  Watch the video at the Huffington Post.
• Speaking of Town Hall Meetings, there was an op-ed piece in the New York Times Monday (Town Halls by Invitation)  that brought some rational thinking to these obvious failures to gather the real sense of a Congressman’s District as they are packed with the fruitcakes.  What he proposed is to get a real sample of the District invited so that the Congress person could get a real sampling of the opinion, not a biased one.  As the author put it, “scientifically selected microcosm of a lawmaker’s constituents under conditions conducive to thinking about issues”.  The author described the process as follows:  “When the (participants) first arrive at the deliberative poll, attendees answer a confidential questionnaire assessing their positions, before being divided up for small-group discussions. This is key: in the current town hall format, shrill voices can easily silence the rest. But during a deliberative poll, trained moderators make sure that every voice is heard and that the group carefully and thoughtfully narrows in on its most pertinent and pressing policy questions. When all the participants finally assemble with the lawmaker, the result is a serious and productive conversation well beyond what we’ve seen in town halls lately.”   Gee, a debate based upon fact.  Is that the American way?
• Today starts the voting in Afghanistan.  As several area experts have opined, the outcome may not be good for the United States (Afghan Vote Carries Big Risks for US).  I don’t see how any outcome can be good unless they elected a slate of women and that is exactly what they are not going to do.  Afghanistan is a backwards-tribal society based upon a backward religion.  Standing behind a theocracy that treats women as property so we can “win the war against al-Qaeda” seems rather hollow to me.  Are we really willing to spend trillions of dollars and who knows how many more lives over about a 20 year period to bring this country into the 20^th century (unlikely they will reach the 21st for about 50 years)?  Not me and I think if they become a stronghold for al-Qaeda we actually have a model for how to deal with them.  It worked back in 2002.
• Scottish Justice Minister Kenny MacAskill said he had informed the families of the victims that he had come to a decision about what to do with the terminally ill  Lockerbie bomber Abdel Baset al-Megrahi, the only convicted conspirator in the terrorist  plot to bring down the 747 in Lockerbie, Scotland (Lockerbie Bomber to Go Free).   Apparently this decision is to release him to die at home in Algeria.  Needless to say the families of the passengers on that ill fated 747 are outraged.  But I would ask them this:  What good does revenge and hate do you?  Are you more in tuned with the New Testament or the Old?  We can act like the terrorists and continue blood feuds forever or maybe we can teach them something about compassion.  Easy for me to say?  I lost a daughter to a drunk driver and I learned a long time ago you have to let your hate go.  It would be nice if the so called Christians could practice their own religion.

Another week where we just continue to backslide after so much hope and promise from the 2008 election.  I have to listen to music more and start reading fiction.  Glass of wine anyone?