CleverDonkey.com …Musings, Commentary, Opinions, and Drivel

Disclaimer: the article below represents the noodlings of a dumbass who is talking about things way over his head, but which he nonetheless found interesting as a mental exercise.

There’s an old saying that ‘politics makes strange bedfellows’, meaning that the alliances and enmities that occur in politics are often highly situational and transient, resulting in kaleidoscopic political theater where it’s difficult to tell the players without a constantly updated program.

When you add money to the mix, it tends to accelerate the wackiness even further.  I think that two recent political theater productions are both ultimately being driven by economics. There’s another old saying that if you want to understand something in the political (or business) world, your best bet is to ‘follow the money’, so here’s my decode based on that precept of two recent omnipresent political issues:

Issue #1: The Sequester
Remember a couple of years ago when the US faced a debt-ceiling crisis, and ultimately the compromise was to extend the debt ceiling, with the proviso that a ‘poison pill’ called the ‘sequester’ would kick in if the Executive and Legislative branches couldn’t come up with a mutually agreeable budget by 2013? Good times.

The sequester was essentially a set of automatic spending cuts that hit at the sacred cows of all the players, meaning the Republicans put the defense budget on the table, while the Democrats put entitlements on the chopping block, etc, and if the two sides couldn’t agree on a more rational budget, these automatic cuts would trigger. The goal was for the cuts to be so painful for both sides that they’d be forced to put aside partisan bickering and actually cooperate for the good of the country.

Well, that didn’t happen, and the sequester has begun to kick in, causing budgetary pain throughout the government. Each side is loudly blaming the other, but nobody seems to be doing anything meaningful to fix things.

But stop for a moment and consider, what if this was the exact goal from the outset? Think about it – we (the United States) needed to drastically reshape our governmental spending, and it needed to cause pain for areas which are staunchly defended by either the Democrats or the Republicans (or both).

If the two sides had cooperated and jointly passed a bipartisan budget that instantiated these sweeping cuts, they could be vilified by challengers in the upcoming elections because they were ‘soft’, and ‘compromised’, and ‘sold out’ the ‘core values’ of their own constituency.

But with the sequester, the cuts are getting made by some mysterious ‘automatic’ process, while both sides get to blame the other for being obstinate. So in the upcoming elections, the incumbents can say, hey, put me back in the ring to go another 15 rounds against those evil other guys who forced the sequester by being big dummies and hating everything that *we* stand for! I’ll show ’em this time!!

That’s a pretty good story. I bet it will be very useful in fundraising and electioneering. It also allows the incumbents to have done two (and likely three) things:

1. Enact deep, painful, but necessary spending cuts.
2. Blame the other guys for the whole thing.
3. Keep your key donors, raise a war chest, and get re-elected?

I have to say, this explanation fits the facts very well. It would not surprise me if there had been backroom deals where both sides said, look, we agree we need to make cuts to these programs, but neither of us can be seen as agreeing to not protect our turf, so let’s set up this automatic sequester to do the dirty work, and then blame each other…all in favor? Ay, ay, ay, ay, ay, ay, ay…

My guess is that it is very likely that this was both political theater and political judo of the first caliber. First, the staged production of fighting the good fight, while secretly supporting the automatic cuts, then the judo of using the appearance of righteous battle against an evil enemy to raise funds and get re-elected. It’s beautiful, from a certain perspective, if true.

I’m not a betting man, but if I were my money’d be on this scenario being closest to the truth in regards to the sequester.

Issue #2: Marriage Equality
The second issue that I think is being decided, in the final analysis, by political economics is marriage equality.  At the end of the day the objections to gay marriage have primary basis – the teachings of the Bible, or more specifically, currently popular interpretations of the Scriptures.  All the other arguments (gays shouldn’t marry because they can’t produce children, gays are more likely to be child predators, etc) are only held by nincompoops (sorry, ya’ll), but the one that can’t be dismissed out of hand as idiocy is the *moral* objection, the one that says gays shouldn’t marry because it’s *wrong*.

However, “wrong” is defined by society.  Yes, some members of society are also religious and bring their beliefs and faiths to the equation, but at the end of the day the “rightness” and “wrongness” of something is decided through the accumulated opinions of the entire society.  When I was a kid in my church it was a mortal sin to eat meat on Fridays, and now nobody even thinks about as a serious transgression (if they think about it at all).  Similarly, people regularly work on Sundays and aren’t presumed to be hell-bound.

So, over time, long-held beliefs change, even those that are thought to be indelible by those who believe them.  There comes a tipping point when the changes and advances of society topple old ways of thinking.  I’m not saying that every case of this is for the better, but overall it is the nature of progress.  I think that Thomas Jefferson said it best:

“I am not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and constitutions. But laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths discovered and manners and opinions change, with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors.” – Thomas Jefferson, also inscribed on his memorial

And I think we are now at a tipping point on gay rights in this country, particularly in relation to marriage equality.  It has been a long discussion, and when I look for reasons that *now* seems to be the watershed moment I think it comes down to political economics.

First and foremost, the majority of the US population now supports marriage equality, according to almost all non-partisan surveys.  In and of itself, that doesn’t make something right.  I’m sure there was a time when the majority of Americans were against mixed-race marriages, for example, and that didn’t make that belief ‘right’.  However, it did make it politically expedient to be on the same side as the majority of Americans, because to get elected you have to have a constituency that will vote for you over the other person, and being a societal windsock is part of being a politician.

Secondly, and most importantly in my opinion, I think that those with the deep pockets have changed their outlook on this issue.  The few businesses where leaders have espoused anti-marriage-equality sound bites have found themselves mercilessly skewered for their positions, to the point where even the most vocal proponents of ‘traditional marriage’ have to be feeling the need to keep it to themselves lest they be cast as backwards-thinking, bigoted theocrats to the point that it impacts their bottom line.

Additionally, businesses want to get on with the business of business, and part of business is being able to be a competitive employer who can attract and keep talent.  Being able to legally provide full recognition of benefits to same-sex spouses allows businesses to draw from a larger pool of talent, and to retain key employees who may be tempted to leave for more rainbow-colored pastures.

In addition, in today’s economy it frequently takes two stable incomes that are joined by the legal bonds of marriage to support a typical American lifestyle.  Big things like buying a house, financing a car, planning for retirement, etc make for better business when dealing with a legally married couple, where both incomes are considered and can be held accountable for debts and/or contribute to financial nest eggs that are jointly shared by marriage.  The same is true for the littler things, like building up a household that’s based on both the emotional *and* the legal commitment that is ‘marriage’.

Lastly, I think that the engine of government can see that providing full recognition to same-sex couples allows for the kind of societal stability that it is in the interest of government to cultivate.  The business aspects described above are not only good for business, but are also a good foundation for society.  Those of us who today are part of husband-and-wife couples know that maintaining a household is work, raising a family is work, balancing work and life is, well, work, and having a dependable emotional, logistical, and financial partner can make all the difference in the stability of life by helping to share and balance the risks inherent in living.

Stable, prosperous, and happy households create a more stable, prosperous, and happy society.  Isn’t that what we all want?  Some of you may be offended by the lifestyles of your neighbors, but are you really un-offended by all your current neighbors?  Doesn’t one of them drink too much and one of them doesn’t take care of their yard and another one can’t hold down a job and another one dates women who are much too young for him and another one never pays attention to her poor kids who just want to be loved and another one’s family always has downcast eyes from the emotional abuse and another one is old and alone and sick and essentially abandoned by his family and another one is always glassy-eyed with a plastic smile from the overuse of prescription medications and on and and on and on.

Meaning, there are sinners all around every neighborhood who aren’t breaking the law and have the full rights of marriage despite their sins.  Why is this one case different?  I think that society, as a whole, has realized that it is in the best interests of society to allow the stabilizing construct of marriage to be undertaken by same-sex couples.  I also think that this has become the new reality, and the politicians who want to be re-elected are having to recognize that fact if they want to stay relevant (meaning stay in office).

There will be a few holdouts who may have some temporary success in speaking to and for the large but diminishing pool of voters who still care enough to try to obstruct marriage equality, but that’s ultimately a losing game, I think, and the money is now on the other, more fabulous, side of the fence.

So…?
Ultimately, what I write here will have little to no impact on the turning of societal events.  However, I wanted to take the time to point out what feels to be a tipping point on some major issues of our time.  Usually these are only seen clearly in hindsight, but with the acceleration of information flow brought about by the internet, it’s getting to where we can see these watershed moments after shorter and shorter intervals, to the point that we can reasonably discern when we are in the middle of an upheaval that will introduce profound changes to our society in this country, and I think that’s the case on these two issues.

For those who think I’ve extrapolated too much, too far, and/or too wrongly, you should try reading what I had to say about the potential coming coalition between Muslims and Christians.  🙂

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Note: I’m just a dumbass with a blog.  My purpose in writing this post is not to convince anyone to change their opinions, but to (one hopes) maybe have the slight effect of making sure that those who agree with, disagree with, or don’t care about my opinions will be more likely to vote next week.  Having every eligible voter vote is the key to keeping America free and strong, in my opinion, and discourse tends to motivate people.

I’m a 51 year old white male who is mid-to-upper middle class. I got my first job when I was 12 years old (paper route) and have never not worked since then. I’ve never been fired or laid off, some of which is luck and some of which is brains and hard work. I’ve lived on the West and East coasts, but have lived primarily in Texas and consider myself a Texan.

My mother’s family were Texas farmers, and she and her seven siblings picked cotton, tended the animals, and used slop buckets. I did not come from money, but I was raised with a strong work ethic, a strong moral compass, a strong family bond, and an open mind.

Through the decades I have voted for Republican, Democratic, and independent candidates. For most of my life I strove to vote for the person, not the party, with the (perhaps naive) thought that if we always select the best available candidate, that will lead to better government.

However, that only works if the elected parties are willing and able to compromise in the pursuit of (what should be) common goals. However, the American political landscape is at its most divisive in my memory.  Personally, I think the system is broken, and our voting is barely more than political theater, a show that is put on every four years to allow us to retain the illusion that We the People run this country.

Also, my take is that, by definition, any candidate for national political office is a combination of professional liar, megalomaniac, and borderline sociopath, something I talked about several years ago.  I see our choice as being between differing styles of lies and misdirection.

However, even if any of the above were true, we still do have a choice.  Politically I lean towards fiscal conservatism and also towards social liberalism.  Here are my key areas of concern for this country:

• Control of the federal deficit
• Revamp of health care
• Free and fair elections
• Maintain a strong defense and leadership of the Free World
• Strengthening of civil liberties and civil rights
• Return to technological leadership
• Improved national and global economy

I am not an expert on all of the above topics (just like 99.9% of all voters), but I do have my opinions (just like 99.999999% of citizens).  As noted in the disclaimer above, I’m just a dumbass with a blog, but my take on these key points is as follows:

Federal Deficit
I think that balancing the budget will be best achieved through both spending cuts and revenue (tax) increases.  Having a growing economy would help, but waiting for the economy to grow before attacking the deficit is a fool’s game.  If you gathered ten people in a room could you get them all to agree on the same spending cuts and tax increases?  Nope.  However, we elect our representatives to do that hard work for us, to work together for the greater good of the country as a whole.

Yes, I know that sounds naive, but bipartisan cooperation is the key to resolving our issues.  I personally look at bipartisanship as one of the key factors in assessing a candidate, because if you are dogmatic and a pure party animal, you’ll never get anything done other than perpetuating a broken system.  I also think that we need to focus on electing officials who will draft and pass a true balanced budget amendment.  Just like a household that is caught in a debt spiral, the first step is stopping the bleeding by living within your means.  We, as a country, need to do exactly that.

Health Care
Regarding health care, I might be considered an extremist, but my take is that having a for-profit health care industry is unconscionable.  I’m old enough to remember when most hospitals were not-for-profit. When the concept of for-profit hospitals came into vogue (the 1980’s in my recollection), the concept seemed nonsensical to me. The goal of a for-profit company is to maximize profits. The goal of a hospital is (or should be) to maximize the health and well-being of their patients. Those are mutually exclusive goals, and a for-profit health care system, by definition, does not put the patient first.

I’ll try to put it into simpler terms. Today, right now, the health care industry makes more money by treating illnesses over extended periods than by curing or preventing them. Also, it is their fiduciary responsibility to maximize their profits. So, this dis-incents the health care industry from pursuing cures or prevention, because it would directly impact their bottom line in a negative way. Our current health care system would be like setting up for-profit fire departments that made more money when there were more fires and those fires burned longer and did more damage. It doesn’t make any sense, and it needs to be fixed.

So, my take is that the way to improve health care for all Americans is to move away from for-profit healthcare and to couple that with a single-payer system.  Putting the profit motive into the equation, with for-profit health care companies and/or for-profit insurance companies, means that American citizens are the losers in the equation.  Also, if you think that only for-profit organizations can be cutting edge, look at the Mayo Clinic, the Cleveland Clinic, and the like for examples of how it can and should be done.

Free and Fair Elections
I wrote a bit about this in a previous post, located here.  Suffice it to say that I think that in order to restore the American people’s confidence in the government, we have to start by removing any traces of chicanery from the election process.  And I mean any.  Gerrymandering should be outlawed, no person or organization should profit from running election services (meaning you can make and sell a voting machine, but it should be run by the government), districts should be generated automatically using generic algorithms, etc.

The federal government should set up an Elections Department whose sole purpose is to institute and enforce free and fair elections across the country.  I believe that this step is unavoidable and necessary, even though it means creating another department, because the current system has been gamed and corrupted into being a farce.

Defense and World Leadership
There are two prongs here, one is that we remain strong such that nobody will f*ck with us.  Second, we maintain the moral high ground, such that those who choose to f*ck with us will be in a morally indefensible position.  You see, although I love my country, I do not subscribe to the belief that anything and everything we do or have done is 100% correct simply because we did it.

As an example, the picture to the right is from one of many spontaneous candlelight vigils by the people of Iran after the 9/11 attacks on the US.  The Iranian people (not the government) rose up with spontaneous outpourings of sadness, sympathy, solidarity, and support after the 9/11 attacks.  For their demonstration of solidarity, many were detained, arrested, or abused by their own government.

However, today, there is much saber-rattling around the US invading Iran.  I am no geopolitical or warfare expert, however judging from the recent past, the US invading another country does not necessarily result in us being greeted as liberators by their people.

Unfortunately, with a conventional invasion the despots in control wield enough power to use their own people as human shields and/or cannon fodder, such that the result of the US invasion is death, deprivation, and hardship for all citizens of the country, regardless of their original opinions of the US.

Instead, I think that actual invasion/warfare should be a last resort that is limited to only the most extreme cases, such as a conventional attack on our borders, or those of our closest allies.  So far, I’m a fan of the current US tactics of crippling sanctions coupled with crippling cyber-warfare.  I would begrudgingly understand the need for surgical drone strikes on key facilities, if it comes to that.  However, I would hate to see us repeat the debacles of Iraq and Afghanistan by doing the same thing with Iran, particularly given that the Iranian people, for the most part, identify with Americans and our values.

So, from my perspective, we need to remain strong on defense, and we also need to remain strong with regards to doing the right thing.  In some cases defining ‘the right thing’ can be complicated by factoring in ‘American interests’, which in the Middle East typically refers to energy companies, and while I support the need to secure our energy requirements as part of the national defense, I do NOT support securing the profits of energy companies as part of that strategy, and too often our actions make it indistinguishable as to what ‘interests’ we’re actually serving.

Also, energy is key to our national security, and I’m going to talk about energy and the environment together, because from my perspective these two issues go hand in hand since they have so much direct tension between them.  I think that true energy independence will only come from new or alternative fuels.  My take is also that development of new and alternative energy sources cannot simply be left to the free market.  For-profit companies have to focus on the best sources of near-term profits, and in energy those profits come from increased exploitation of existing energy sources (e.g. fossil fuels).

However, exploitation of those resources comes at an increasing environmental cost.  At some point the damage we are doing to the environment (and, by extension, ourselves) in pursuit of fossil fuels will outweigh the short-term benefits of ever-more-harmful exploitation methods.  I think we have reached and passed that inflection point.

That means it is up to the government to foster the pursuit of new and alternative energy soures, while penalizing the use of fossil fuels.  There is no other way.  Waiting for the ‘free market’ to make such a dramatic change would mean no change during our lifetimes, in my opinion.  Any and all progress on alternative energy has come from the government investing in and/or fostering such research and development, and this needs to be accelerated dramatically.  Note that I’m not some tree-hugging purist, and I personally think that true energy independence for the US will include some form of nuclear power, as discussed in more detail here.

Civil Liberties and Civil Rights
Although I have an unblemished record of staunch heterosexuality (to quote George Costanza), I think that the advances in equal rights for homosexuals is fabulous.  I can usually see both sides of most arguments, but on this my take is that those who oppose this progress are on the wrong side of history, period.

Similarly, I continue to be alarmed at the erosion of our rights as a free people, including draconian laws related to the war on drugs (e.g. asset seizure without trial), the war on terrorism (e.g. x-raying our ‘nads at the airport in the interests of national security), the war on copyright violators (e.g. that’ll be $25,000 for downloading a song), the war on non-whites (e.g. show me your papers before you can proceed), and all the other various ‘wars’.

As another example, the infuriatingly named Patriot Act should be repealed immediately.  Actual Patriots from the times of the Founding Fathers would have risen up against these types of infringements of our rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.  There is always a balance between freedom and safety, but in my opinion we have swung way too far towards the side of safety, as an instinctive reaction to 9/11, and we need to start rolling those reactionary policies back, immediately.

Technological Leadership
America is losing our mojo when it comes to leading the world in science and technology.  There is plenty of blame to go around, however I think the key factor is inability of America, as a whole, to allow science to be science and allow religion to be religion, and never the twain shall meet.

I make no claims to any knowledge about the deeper meanings of life, but I also know that you don’t know, either.  Given that there is a spiritual/mystic realm within which there is no reasonable hope of universal agreement among peoples of good faith, my take is that we need to accept the fact that we need to live and let live in that area.  And that, to me, means taking any and all religious overtones out of public education, and very specifically out of science education.  Period.  End of story.

That is a necessary prerequisite for returning America to a leading role in the brains department.  We’re still good, but we’re slipping, and we need to stop the decline.  We can continue to build improvement by returning teaching to being a noble and desirable career path, instead of having it continue to morph into resembling minimum security prison guard.

If I had the magic bullets to make that happen, I’d let them fly, but I don’t.  I think part of it is going to be cooperation between teacher’s unions and school administrations, such that both sides reduce the bureaucracy that stifles real improvements in education.  Teaching to state-mandated tests is an experiment that has failed, in my estimation, and we need both sides to work together to allow teachers the flexibility to teach with passion and creativity, while also giving school administrators the ability to manage teachers based on something other than seniority, to use two simplistic examples.

And, frankly, none of the above helps without the engagement, interest, and support of parents.  Improving the school environment will go a long way to engaging parents more fully, but we as the shepherds of our own future need to be sure we focus in a positive and constructive way on the education of our children.

Improved Economy
What else is there to say other than we need a stronger, more vibrant, more resilient economy?  Again, if anybody has the secret to making this happen, they’re not sharing.  Any candidate who says they know how to make it happen is a bald-faced liar.  What they mean is, they know what they would try in an attempt to make things better.  When it comes to the national and global economy, it comes down to whose strategy do you personally have more faith in.

To me, our strategy has to focus on the root cause of our current economic climate, and to my unlearned eye, it appears that the recent troubles were set in motion back when the Glass–Steagall Act had key portions ‘repealed’ by the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act in 1999.  This set us up for a meltdown of the financial industry.  If looked at from one perspective, it’s comical to see that back in 1929 we had the unregulated practices of financial institutions result in the Great Depression, and in response we passed Glass-Steagall in part to put some controls around those risky practices.

Then in 1999 we repealed those controls, even though they had served us well for almost 70 years, and then less than a decade after the repeal, we experienced an eerily similar financial meltdown.  You know, when you’re a child and you touch a hot stove, you remember it for forever, and you don’t purposely touch hot stoves again.  I guess our leaders are not as smart as kids around hot stoves, because we did the exact same thing with the exact same results.  Both sides contributed to it (Gramm, Leach, and Bliley were all Republicans, it passed the House in a bipartisan vote, and was signed by Bill Clinton, a Democrat), which magnifies the foolishness and/or unscrupulousness, in retrospect.

Were there other contributing factors?  Absolutely.  For example, from a business perspective, while I think a ‘free market’ is overall a good thing, it can’t be completely free.  Similar to ‘free speech’, there have to be limits.  For example, while I think that companies should be free to move jobs or money offshore, I also believe that they should lose advantages and/or be penalized to some extent when they do that.  Meaning, if you are going to take an economic engine out of the US, you should have to pay a price to do so.

I’m sure there are more areas for improvement, but you have to start somewhere.  Having worked in the business realm for all of my adult life, I understand the chilling effect that over-regulation can have.  But I also understand the catastrophic effects that unregulated commerce can produce, as well.  A corporation is a sociopath with one goal, profits.  By design, it has no ethics or morals other than what is imposed on it, and even then the natural order is to try to skirt or dodge those controls.  So, we as a people have to decide where the limits are, and my take is that putting fail-safe controls back in place over our financial institutions and discouraging the offshoring of jobs and capital is the right first step.

How I’m Voting
In my head, when I factor all of the above into the decision, I see Barack Obama and the Democrats as the clear choice when compared with Mitt Romney and the Republicans.  I freely admit that a lot of the above is opinion, but who of us out here among the hoi polloi truly has indisputable facts?  So, we all must assess reality through our own set of filters.

Do I see Obama as an infallible leader with all the right answers?  Absolutely not.  In fact, four years ago I lamented the selection of Barack Obama as the Democratic Presidential nominee (article here). My primary concern was that he was a blank slate, with no significant record to indicate how effective he would be as president. I also said that if he proved to be a great president, I would come back and post a retraction.  That’s not what this is.

From my perspective, we got just about what I was expecting, which is that Obama was first and foremost a politician, and only secondarily a public servant and statesman. This makes him no different from any serious presidential candidate during my adult lifetime, with the possible exception of Ross Perot, and I’m not sure exactly what he was, in retrospect.

I previously posted my opinions about recent presidents here, stating that all post-WWII presidents have essentially been crazy (in my opinion), because only a crazy person can undergo the metamorphosis from a normal human into a presidential candidate.  Fortunately (or unfortunately), Barack Obama has proven to be no different.

Given my choice of all potential qualified candidates, would I pick Obama? No. But I don’t get to do that, I only get to pick between him and Romney, and in that two-horse race, I pick Obama. Why?

First, he pushed for universal health care, which I think is a no-brainer for an economic powerhouse like the United States. Every single other first world country has some form of universal health care – every single one. Think about that for a moment. I believe that America is great, however I do not believe that it is great for us to have a for-profit medical industry that profits on the misery of others.

Second, Obama inherited an economy that was a plummeting lead ball, and he has managed to keep it from splatting into a second Great Depression, and he did it with the near-universal obstructionism of the opposition. Are things great? No, they aren’t. Are they horrible? For some, yes, for many, no. Could a different strategy have made things better faster? Possibly, but in matters that involve the entire US (and global) economy, anybody who says that they are certain that different actions would have led to better outcomes is a liar and/or an idiot.

Third, it was on his watch that Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell was decommissioned, and that was representative of his administration’s effectiveness in removing the specter of homophobia and the surrounding hate. Are things perfect? Of course not. Some people passionately believe that homosexuality is wrong. I think that they are wrong, and hope that their form of bigotry is on the wane, and I’m happy to see the government moving in the direction of making things better in this area.

Fourth, it was on his watch that we got Osama bin Laden. Did he go in and fire the fatal bullets? Of course not. However, his administration built on the groundwork that had been laid previously under President Bush, and when it came time to make the go/no-go decision, he said go. Complain all you want, but if you’re going to blame a President when things go wrong (like Carter and the Iranian hostage rescue attempt), you also have to give them credit when it goes right.

There are things about Obama’s administration that I’m ambivalent about, as well. For example, the use of drone strikes on high-value targets. In some cases, these targets are American citizens, not charged or convicted of any crime. Essentially, the administration says, “Go and kill this guy because we think he’s bad.” That’s a disturbing precedent. However, if the choice is between drone strike or invasion, I’ll take the drone strike every time.

Then there’s the ongoing renewal of the Patriot Act, and the fact that Gitmo is still up and running, the seeming increase in crackdown on personal marijuana use, to name a few. He has not been a perfect president, for me. However, it’s unlikely that any president ever perfectly meets the expectations of their supporters, except perhaps for the partisan hacks who think everything the president does is, by definition, correct because he belongs to their party.

Also, there is no way to prepare to be POTUS other than being POTUS.  Obama now has four years of experience.  Think about anything that you’ve done full-time for four years – weren’t you better at it than when you started?  So, my take is that Obama’s existing experience as president is also a compelling factor.

There are those who say that a Republican should be president, because the House will likely have a Republican majority, and it will be easier for the president to get things done.  Another way of saying this is that if the Republicans don’t get their guy elected, they will obstruct progress in the name of being petulant, and will be the the jerk who says, hey, if you guys won’t play by my rules I’m going to take my ball and go home, neener-neener.  Nobody likes that douchebag, and if your argument is we should elect Mitt Romney because otherwise the Republicans will purposely sabotage America, well, then you’re talking crazy.

Do both sides use obstruction as a political weapon?  Yes, but the current Republican hierarchy has turned it into a disturbing performance art – it’s hard to look away, but only because what you see is both revolting and attention-grabbing, like the aftermath of a highway accident.

Mitt Romney
And where to start with Mitt Romney? He’s from a less popular religion, but the truth of the matter is that his beliefs are no stranger than those of religions with more adherents, if looked at from a purely objective perspective. He’s rich, but I don’t hold that against anyone in and of itself. He has civil leadership experience as a Governor. He certainly looks like a President.

And yet, for me the pieces don’t fit together with Romney. For example, if the Mitt Romney that was Governor of Massachusetts was the same Mitt Romney that was running for President, I might consider him seriously. However, he’s basically having to repudiate a lot of what he did in that state that was good (in my opinion) in order to run against Obama.

That says to me that one of two things is true – either he governed Massachusetts according to his principals, but is abandoning those principals for the sake of winning the presidency, or he governed Massachusetts in direct opposition to his principals in order to use it as a stepping stone. In neither case do I see the disconnect between Governor Romney and Presidential Candidate Romney to be resolvable in any way that would lead me to vote for him.

And don’t get me started on Bain Capital. Don’t get me wrong, I think that it is an acceptable, if evil, necessity for companies to exist that make money by ruthlessly building on the concept of survival of the fittest. But I don’t want the leader of a pack of economic vultures/carnivores to then become the shepherd of my country. It doesn’t fit. A president governs for the greater good of every single citizen. A CEO manages with the very narrow goal of ensuring that his side wins (profits) and if the other side loses, well, that’s just business.  That’s not how to run a great country.

With regards to Romney’s tax returns, I think he should just release them and be done with it. If they show something illegal (which I doubt) then they’re going to come out eventually anyway. My personal SWAG (stupid, wild-ass guess) is that they will show nothing more or less than that Romney effectively exploited all legal avenues to minimize his taxation, and that his low effective tax rate would serve to derail the key Republican campaign theme that the ‘job creators’ are overtaxed.

So, I have been singularly unimpressed with Mitt Romney.  Also, even if he had somehow wow-ed me personally, I would still hesitate to vote for him because he represents the Republican Party, and I am not ready to have that party in its current form regain executive power.  So, Romney, by virtue of being a chameleon who has to run against his own record as Governor, and who holds up his business experience as preparing him to lead the US as President and yet won’t reveal the details of his taxes to confirm he did it on the up-and-up, is out, for me.

For the record, the only Republican candidate that I would have seriously considered is Hunstman, and he was out almost immediately. I hope he runs again in 2016 and gets the backing of his party, because he’s the only recent Republican contender I’ve seen who I wouldn’t classify as a clown or a nut.

Democrats versus Republicans
I have voted for Democrat, Republican, and third party candidates over the years. If you were to ask me my political beliefs, I would not say “Democrat”, because my politics is more nuanced that a party platform can address. I don’t think the Democrats are right about everything or that the Republicans are wrong about everything.

HOWEVER, in today’s American political climate, I think that there are clear and compelling differences between the Democratic and Republican parties, which lead me to lean towards the Democratic side in most cases.

The primary issue, for me, is that the Republican party has allowed itself to be taken over by nutbags and hypocrites – there’s just no other way to put it. The examples are too numerous to delineate here, but I will share the highlights, from my perspective.

First, the Republican party acts in ways that are direct opposition to their stated goals. They say they are the party of smaller government, but what they mean is they want less government interference in business and fewer government programs for the needy, while also wanting expanding military budgets and a whole lot more government interference into our personal lives.

They say they want to reduce fraud in our electoral processes, but they then go about it by purposely attempting to disenfranchise legitimate voters in key swing states. They say they want a stronger America that’s more competitive in the global economy, but then turn around and want to gut our fact-based educational system and replace it with anti-science, theocratic mumbo-jumbo.

They cry out about religious freedom, but only as long is it’s Christian and not Muslim, or, God-forbid, atheism or agnosticism.  Many churches enjoy tax exempt status, but then their leadership politicizes their sermons, and almost always in support of Republican candidates and viewpoints.

And, finally, at each inflection point, the Republican tendency is to side with the haves at the expense of the have-nots.  In fact, from my perspective, the mainstream Republican stance is to blame the have-nots for what they don’t have.  I heard a description of this that has stuck with me, which is that ‘liberals’ want to  prevent bad things from happening to people who don’t deserve it, and ‘conservatives’ want to prevent good things from happening to people who don’t deserve it.  Is that an over-simplification?  Sure, but in a black and white, soundbite world, it sums it up for me.

If any of you have read this far, I doubt that you will have agreed with all of the above, because they are simply my opinions.  They are complex and diverse, and it is doubtful that anybody would share my exact takes on all these issues.  That makes me unique in my views, just like everybody else.

My sincere hope is that most, if not all, of us have grown tired of the divisiveness and lack of bipartisanship on the part of our leaders.  Even though I currently lean Democratic, I don’t demonize all Republicans.  I have fundamental disagreements with the current leadership and platform of the Republican party, and would like to seem them return to fiscal conservatism and actual liberty and freedom, not just freedom for those whom they consider to be ‘right-thinking’.

I would like to see us have a system where the opposing viewpoints are represented in a constructive manner, and where compromise to achieve goals is the name of the game.  Will voting for Obama magically make that happen?  Nope, but given the choice between Obama and Romney, I think that President Obama will move us closer to that ideal, even if it will only be baby steps.

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Mourn the dead, honor the heroes, fight injustice, embrace freedom, celebrate life, and, on today of all days, forget to hate.

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Peace.

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It may come as a surprise to some of you who know me to hear that I am in favor of Voter ID.  I think that having a standardized method of identifying valid voters, and limiting those voters to a single vote, is a great idea.  I don’t think we have much of an in-person voter fraud problem in the United States, but I’m a big believer in being better safe than sorry.

However, my objection to the current spate of Voter ID laws is that, from my perspective, they have been designed for no purpose other than to disenfranchise Democratic voters in Republican-controlled states during the upcoming 2012 elections.  You can quibble with this if you like, but given that there is not an in-person, voter identity fraud problem in this country, these laws are not designed to fix something that’s broken.  As they stand today, they are designed solely to limit the ability to vote for those who do not currently have a proper photo ID and who would have difficulty in getting one in time to vote, which are primarily poor/Democratic voters.

I currently live a lifestyle such that having a valid, acceptable form of photo identification is not something I ever have to think about.  I have a drivers license and a passport, and although they aren’t always 100% current (because I’m lazy and/or forgetful), I can easily afford the time and costs involved to keep them up to date, and have easy access to all necessary supporting documentation.

However, that has not always been the case for me, and isn’t the case for many, many Americans.  These Americans still have a right to vote, however, even if they have not navigated the myriad processes necessary to obtain an acceptable photo ID and to keep it current.  Again, for those of us of a certain means, it may sound ludicrous to state that having a valid photo ID is a burden, but it is for a large number of people.

As an indicator, current estimates indicate that 6% of Americans don’t have broadband internet access today.  To those of us who are ‘connected’, it’s difficult to conceive of someone living a disconnected lifestyle.  Some of the disconnected simply choose not to connect even though they have the means, but many of them do not have the wherewithal or circumstance that allows for digital connectivity.

Now picture a disconnected person trying to get a photo ID.  How do they even learn the process?  Go down to the DMV? What if they don’t drive and there isn’t mass transportation where they live?  What if they work a job where getting away during municipal office hours is difficult or impossible?  What if they don’t have a copy of their birth certificate?  What if the cost of getting their birth certificate and/or photo ID comes down to a choice between feeding their children or getting an ID?

Consider not only the costs for documents, but the lost income from taking off of work, and the potential of being let go if they start spending hours away from work to duel with the faceless, uncaring paperwork bureaucracy.  Consider that if they choose to risk precious time away from work, they might have competing priorities, like taking themselves (or their children) to the doctor.  Consider that they might have to bum a ride from someone to get to the government offices – but may have to choose between burning the favor to help with getting an ID versus getting a ride to the grocery store or clinic.

This paperwork burden and time investment can prove difficult for someone of limited means to undertake.  I know that for those of us of a certain economic level it may be difficult to relate and/or easy for us to sit in our ivory towers and say that the right to vote is sacred and that these people should prioritize paperwork above everything other competing need.  But in the heat of living a life where you hang by your fingernails from day to day, that’s a difficult choice to make.

However, I think this problem should be addressed, once and for all.  I think that after the current election, there should be a national, bi-partisan movement to setup a single, national Voter ID standard, and that acquisition of that ID needs to be 100% absolutely free of cost, require absolutely minimal in-person presence, and have options available for any necessary commuting/travel.  There should also be a concerted effort to educate and inform all voters of all means as to what this free process entails.  This avoids the ‘poll tax’ problem, and starting it after the upcoming election gives everyone enough time to address their ID problems before the next election cycle.

I think this needs to be done at the federal level, because my take is that if it is left to the states then Voter ID will continue to be a partisan voter-disenfranchisement tool rather than a voter-enablement tool.  Also, I think having a single Voter ID authority will set the stage to allow for voting to move into the 21st (or at least late 20th) century, such as by creating an infrastructure that could be leveraged for online voting.

So, I am very much in favor of a reasonable and fair Voter ID system, setup in a non-partisan way, that does not impose a ‘poll tax’, and which is instituted with enough lead time such that all potential valid voters will have the time to navigate the process.  Let’s enfranchise *and* identify all valid voters, because there’s is nothing more American than a free and fair election for all.

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I will start this post out with the disclaimer that I am just a dumbass with a blog, noodling on things that interest me.

After Mitt Romney became the presumptive Republican nominee, I became very curious about who he would select as his running mate, and am surprised that he picked Paul Ryan.  Picking Ryan doesn’t make any sense to me because, as far as I can tell, Ryan will primarily appeal to folks who would have voted for Romney anyway.  So, from that perspective, it seems to me that picking Ryan was ‘preaching to the choir’, in a sense.

Also, it seems to me that if the selection of Ryan is going to have any impact at all, it will be to alienate swing voters, who tend to be moderate.  Based on current polling numbers it seems that Romney needs as many of those voters as he can get.

So, why would Romney pick such a polarizing running mate?  I offer five theories below, in order of likelihood from least to most (with a bonus sixth theory that is probably the most likely of all):

Theory #1: Romney doesn’t want to win, and has picked a running mate that will insure that he loses.

It is not possible for me to know why Romney wouldn’t want to win, and there is no evidence of it that I’m aware of (other than his selection of Ryan).  But, because he has picked a running mate that I think he knows will hurt his chances, we have to at least consider this option.  I speculated along these same lines in 2008 when McCain picked Sarah Palin.

Theory #2: Romney knows that he is going to win, so he picked whoever he damn well pleased.

How could Romney *know* he’s going to win?  It could be that he has an ace up his sleeve that he knows will be devastating enough to win the election (dirt on Obama, etc).  It could also be that there is some currently-hidden aspect of Ryan that will emerge and swing the election for him.  It could also be that the power brokers have arranged things such that a win for Romney is the most likely thing.  In any case, if Romney felt supremely confident that he was going to win regardless of his selection of running mate, he may have gone ahead and selected the running mate who will most boldly represent the Republican strategy, and that’s Ryan.

Theory #3: Romney knows that he isn’t going to win, and so picked a running mate for politically expedient purposes.

In this scenario, Romney has realized that there’s no way he can win for whatever reason (polling numbers, tax return issue, etc), and so he picked his running mate in order to maximize whatever positives there are that can be gleaned from a losing presidential bid.  For example, it may be that the Republicans wanted Ryan to get some national press, and have the opportunity to present his budget proposal more directly and clearly to a more attentive audience than has previously been possible.  Running on the presidential ticket will give Ryan a lot of exposure, and perhaps groom him for future runs (Senate, Vice President, maybe President, even?).

Theory #4: None of the acceptable potential candidates said ‘yes’.

As with all recent elections, there was a list of potential running mates for Romney, which at times was rumored to include Colin Powell, Paul Ryan, Condoleezza Rice, Chris Christie, Marco Rubio, Bobby Jindal, Tim Pawlenty, Rob Portman, and Michele Bachmann, among others.  Several said no very publicly (e.g. Powell, Rice), some were (I hope) too unacceptable (e.g. Bachmann), and that left Romney with a short list of candidates who were both acceptable and who also said ‘yes’.  It could be that the resulting list had only one name on it – Paul Ryan.

Theory #5: Romney is throwing a haymaker.

It could be that Romney knows that he’s being outboxed and losing the fight on points, and that only a knockout punch can win the fight for him at this point.  Picking a safe, moderate running mate would have been a jab that didn’t knock anybody out, so he’s going with the low-percentage knockout punch, knowing that if he misses, he would have lost anyway, but at least this gives him a fighting chance to go down swinging.

Bonus Theory #6: Dumbasses with blogs don’t understand the question.

This is the most likely scenario, which is that I don’t have enough understanding to realize why the selection of Ryan makes sense.  I have no credentials in this area, other than having been a lifelong resident of and intermittent voter in the United States.

So, there you go, five theories (and a bonus theory) about Romney’s selection of Ryan.  I’ll be watching the polls closely to see the effect of Romney naming Ryan as his running mate.  Or, to state it more accurately, I’ll be interested to see Nate Silver’s analysis of the polls over at his FiveThirtyEight blog.  His early analysis doesn’t show much impact from Ryan being named, but it’s still early in the game.

If I were a betting man, my money would be on Obama at this point.  We’re three months from the election, so we’re heading into Double Jeopardy, where the scores can really change, so things could still swing in either direction.  However, I think the selection of Paul Ryan was a risky one, and is likely to cost Mitt Romney any chance he had at winning in November.

 

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2012-08-12 Final Sunday Update

This year we once again tracked Olympic Power Rankings for the 2012 Games in London.  For reference, the 2008 final rankings are located here. The purpose of this chart is to look beyond raw medal count – who cares if countries with hundreds of millions (or even billions) of people win a lot of medals?  They should win a lot of medals, right?  The big question is, which country is kicking ass, pound-for-pound?  The answer is in the table below.

This table creates a weighted medal score by giving every country three points for each gold medal, two points for each silver, and one point for each bronze.  The country’s Power Rating is calculated by determining how many weighted medal points each country wins per 10,000,000 in population.  And to factor in economics, the population only includes those living above the poverty level (according to CIA poverty estimates).  Also, to eliminate the impact of outliers, countries with excessively large populations are capped at 300,000,000 and countries with exceedingly small populations have a floor of 2,000,000 for the purposes of calculation.

Below is the Sunday update, reflecting the final standings.  Congratulations to Hungary for taking the title of the most powerful Olympic nation, pound for pound.  The rest of the top ten are rounded out by Australia, Great Britain, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Cuba, Jamaica, Belarus, the United States, and the Czech Republic.

Well, that wraps up another Olympics, be sure to check back in four years because we will (probably) be tracking them again!

 

 

 

[Table=28]

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Disclaimer: the article below represents the noodlings of a dumbass who is talking about things way over his head, but which he nonetheless found interesting as a mental exercise.

James Buchanan was the first bachelor US President.  JFK was the first Roman Catholic President.  Richard Nixon was the first to resign from office.  Barack Obama was the first African American President.  That leaves some interesting milestones still ahead of us, such as first female, first (openly) gay, and first (openly) atheist/agnostic.

I think there’s a good chance that we’ll hit all of those milestones, at some point, and that it’s just a matter of ‘when’.  I also think we’ll hit them in that order (female, gay, secular).  And I also think that as we hit each milestone, it will create a greatly increasing disturbance among conservative US voters.

The first milestone, female, will not have any overtly negative reaction at home or abroad.  There have been plenty of female heads of state, and anybody who publicly takes issue with that will be nearly universally condemned as a backwards nincompoop.

However, the next one (first gay) would set up the beginnings of a political holy war, as the groups who are anti-gay are really committed to being anti-gay.  These are people who put the behavior of same-sex consenting adults in the same category as child molestation or bestiality.  They will see a gay US President as the beginning of the end of the world, and will fight against it appropriately.

But the last one (first secular) would potentially set up an actual Holy War (notice the caps).  There was a recent survey that showed that people of faith trust atheists to the same level that they trust rapists.  Yes, really.  And a group with that outlook is going to work diligently (to say the least) to prevent it from happening.

Just as an exercise (not a prediction), I could see the future of Presidential politics progressing thusly (major party candidates, unless otherwise specified):

2012 – Obama re-elected, possible female VP (Clinton)
2016 – female President
2020 – gay VP nominee
2024 – gay Presidential nominee
2028 – secular serious 3rd party Presidential candidate
2032 – gay President, secular VP nominee
2036 – secular President

Yes, that goes 24 years into the future, and that seems like forever.  But consider if we were to look backwards, 24 years ago was the election of George H.W. Bush.  Not that long ago, for some of us.  Again, that is not a prediction as much as one possible future outcome, the likelihood of which is open to debate.

However, regardless of the actual dates and progression, I think we’ll eventually see female, gay, and secular presidents in the US, and that that progression of events will stir ever increasing ire among conservative Christian US voters.

Interestingly enough, there is another group whose reactions would, in my estimation, parallel those of conservative Christian US voters – namely, Muslims.  I am not Muslim, nor am I a student of Islam, but my lay-person’s understanding of Islam is that they generally hold that women should be subservient to men, that homosexuality is unacceptable, and that the faithless can be subject to persecution and even death.

Also, I’ve seen estimates that project the Muslim population will double or triple over the next 20 years in the US.  One thing that has been consistent throughout US history is that while immigrant populations may retain a lot of their cultural heritage, they all usually end up ‘going native’ and seeing themselves as Americans, not as displaced immigrants in a strange land.

So, let’s project to a point 24 years in the future.  There’s a larger, fairly well assimilated Muslim population in the US, and an increasing presence of openly gay and secular candidates on the national election stage.  Both the conservative Christian base and the growing Muslim-American community would have significant opposition to these types of candidates.

And there’s nothing, and I mean *nothing*, that unites groups like having a common enemy.  Politics makes for strange bedfellows, and although in today’s terror-focused, post 9-11 world it seems unlikely that Christians and Muslims would form a political alliance, time heals a lot of wounds.  Arguably, Muslims and Christians believe in the same God, and there are a lot of overlaps in their faiths, as well as a lot of differences.  However, in the face of a common enemy, and a heretical enemy at that, historical differences tend to be de-emphasized, and commonalities highlighted.

So, am I sitting here as a Nostradomus-like seer laying out prophecies?  No, it’s more of a mental exercise, and quite frankly started as a lark, but the more I considered a potential Christian-Muslim coalition, the harder it became to rule it out completely, and the easier it became to consider it as a realistic potential outcome.

How likely is this outcome?  I don’t know – as stated in the disclaimer at the top of this article, I’m just a dumbass with a blog who is noodling on things far outside my area of expertise.  America’s Jewish population and/or our alliance with Israel could be a wildcard.  The non-dogmatic US population could refuse to accept gay and/or secular candidates for a lot longer than is being speculated here.  And it could also be the case that both conservative Christian and Muslim US voters would have an equally vehement opposition to gay and secular candidates, but without forming any sort of alliance.

Dumbassery aside, however, I think it is at least plausible that, if faced with the prospect of an atheist/agnostic US President, the US Christian and Muslim communities could form an alliance to fight against such a candidate.  I’m not hoping this happens, I’m not saying I know it’s going to happen, and I’m not saying it should (or shouldn’t) happen.  However, what I am saying is that as implausible as a Muslim-Christian coalition seems today, I would not be surprised to see it happen in the future.

And just how unlikely is a Christian-Muslim coalition?  Well, consider that, today, the United States’ closest ally is Great Britain, and in the decade after the Revolutionary War I’m sure that would have seemed like an outlandish prospect.  The US also counts Germany and Japan among our closest allies, and that would have seemed unlikely in the decade after WWII and Pearl Harbor.  Think Russia after the Cold War, or China after Korea.  All are now our allies, or at least our economic partners, and such alliances and partnerships would have seemed ludicrous to contemplate in the time period just after the hottest hostilities.

And that’s part of the historical context here.  I can look back over my lifetime and see the birth, growth, and death of many conflicts.  For example, my grandfather was a WWII vet.  In the 60’s, he gave us our first color television, and we couldn’t have been more excited the day it was delivered and set up.  However, my grandfather checked the labels on the back of the set, saw it had been made in Japan, and angrily returned it because he had clearly indicated he would not purchase a TV from our WWII enemies.  However, my father’s and my generation defined material success, in part, as having a Walkman, a Betamax, and an Accord, meaning that my grandfather’s grudge didn’t even last a full generation.

As I continued to grow up in the 60’s and 70’s, I experienced the tail end of the civil rights movement.  I did civil defense drills in school, hiding under my desk in preparation for the nuclear holocaust that was surely coming as we faced down the godless communists during the Cold War.

Then there were the weekly, sometimes daily, reports of violence and terrorism in Northern Ireland.  There was the rise of Japan in the 80’s, when they were an economic powerhouse that was going to take over the US, both economically and culturally.  Today it’s the terroristic threat of ‘radical Islam’ and the economic rise of China that are threatening our way of life.

But, these, too, shall pass.  Old conflicts and enemies fade away, sometimes to be forgotten, sometimes to become friends and allies, always leading to a new reality in the future.  It’s the way of the world.  Does that mean that a Muslim-Christian coalition will definitely come to pass in the US?  Of course not, but it means that, to me, it is a distinct possibility, and I’ll be interested to see how events progress.

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A day in the life of a typical American:

Your alarm clock rings, having been powered through the night with an uninterrupted flow of electricity generated by a power company that is a regulated monopoly.

Your alarm clock didn’t catch fire overnight, nor did any other product in your house, because their safety is regulated by consumer product watchdog agencies and federal trade regulations. 

However, if you had somehow had an accidental fire, you could have picked up your phone (regulated monopoly) and called 9-1-1 (municipal service) and had the fire department (municipal service) on site within minutes saving your home and possessions.

As you move through your morning routine in your house, which is still standing because it has been built to meet building codes, you turn on your television and watch the news and weather channels, both controlled by the FCC.

You get an accurate weather forecast from the NOAA, which has gotten detailed satellite imagery from NASA, and see that today will be rainy.  Fortunately, your drive to work will be unimpeded because the local flood plain has been scrupulously mapped and flood control reservoirs and runoff controls have been established to protect you from all but the most egregious conditions.

You eat your breakfast, which doesn’t kill you because of FDA controls, and maybe take your medicines, which also don’t kill you.

You get in your car for your commute, secure in the knowledge that your government-mandated seat belts, air bags, and anti-lock brakes will help protect you from the weather, and your tires meet the government codes for handling on slick streets – as do the tires of all the other cars on the road.

The roads do not wash away in the rain because they are built to meet government codes for roadways, and you check the clock – which is 100% accurate because it is synchronized with the atomic clock at the US Naval Observatory via the nationwide radio signal – and see that you’ll make it to work with time to spare.

You drop your kids off at public school, then you stop for gas, secure in the knowledge that the gasoline is free from impurities and meets the operating requirements of your vehicle, and will be delivered via a mechanism that is 100% compatible with every vehicle on the road by virtue of governmental standards.

You live through the work day in an office that meets OSHA standards, and have your lunch in a cafeteria where the food is safe by virtue of regular inspections and staff training mandated by the government.  You get your paycheck, as guaranteed by law for the work you have performed, and head for home.

Your drive home is not interrupted by criminal activity or civil unrest, because the local police officers, sherrifs, constables, and guard forces ensure the peace and tranquility of society.  Also, when you arrive home, you find that your house has not been ransacked, nor has it been confiscated by a foreign government, thanks to the protection of our armed forces.

When you get home you see you got a couple of birthday cards, and then spend a few minutes leafing through new magazines, all delivered by the US Postal Service.  You take your dogs for a walk on publicly maintained sidewalks down to the public park and walk around the public walking trails, and stop to drink water from the public fountains and let your kids play on the public playground equipment.

You spend the rest of evening watching television on a system made up of completely interchangeable and compatible components, because the government sets the standards to ensure interoperability.  Later you surf the internet, which was developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Administration (DARPA).

You put your kids into their flame-resistant pajamas, adjust the temperature of your home HVAC system, secure in the knowledge that it will not poison your family with fumes or gases due to the safety regulations developed and imposed by the government on such appliances.

As you sleep, your money sits safely in a bank earning interest, and your principle is guaranteed by the government.  And you know that tomorrow your currency will be accepted anywhere and everywhere as legal tender for all debts public and private, a guarantee backed by the government.

But keep the god damned government out of health care, I don’t want them intruding into my life because they can’t do *anything* right!!!

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“As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our founding fathers, faced with perils that we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience’s sake.” – excerpted from President Obama’s inaugural address

 

The United States is a country of breathtaking highs and soul-crushing lows.  One of the lowest low points in American history is the tragic reality of the Guantanamo Bay detention area, also known as Gitmo.  For over one hundred years the US Navy has maintained this base on the southern tip of the island of Cuba.  The proximity of the base to the US mainland coupled with its location in a country with whom we have no diplomatic relations has made Gitmo a unique asset for the US government.

The fact that it was not on US soil means that the laws of the United States did not apply.  The fact that it was located in a country where we have no diplomatic relations means we did not have to care about what the host country thought of our activities there.

The Bush administration took advantage of these facts to create a specialized prison to hold what were called “enemy combatants”, which they defined as anybody the President said was involved in terrorism against the United States.  Think about that for a minute – all it took to be sent to Gitmo was the President stating that you were an enemy combatant.  No trial.  No jury.  No lawyers.  No hearings.  No rights.  No Constitution.  No Geneva Convention.  Nothing.  Just imprisonment by Presidential fiat.

Sounds like the old Soviet Union to me, doesn’t it?  Remember those days, when the USSR would throw comrades into prison for political reasons and just make them disappear?  Remember how outraged we were by that?  But with the dawn of the “War on Terror” we ended up with our own American Gulag.  Now, we did not imprison millions at Gitmo, only hundreds, but that doesn’t make it any less wrong.  Picture a serial killer who murders 25 people and compare him to a dictator who causes the genocide of hundreds of thousands.  Do we forgive the serial killer because of the smaller scope of his crime?  Of course not.  The nature of the crime is so heinous that scale doesn’t matter.

And such is the case here.  We, the United States of America, took foreign nationals from foreign soil and imprisoned them with no rights or due process, with no method to appeal their case, without even a sentence to mark the time – just open-ended imprisonment until such time as we decided we wanted to do something with them.

Quite frankly, my opinion is that Bush and Cheney didn’t realize the magnitude of their fuck-up until Gitmo was well-established and publicly known, and then they realized that there was no way to un-fuck it.  Gitmo was filled with a mix of innocent people, people who were not necessarily innocent but for whom there wasn’t enough evidence to try and convict, unquestionably bad people for whom the only evidence was obtained through illegal and/or immoral means (like torture), and the few very bad people who we could legitimately charge and convict of crimes using the standards of any acknowledged court.

So Bush and Cheney looked at their options and realized that the best course of action was to defend the existence of Gitmo, and then leave the mess for the next administration to clean up.  The good news is that even as the administration tried to exercise imperial prerogative, the checks and balances of the American government tried to rein them in.  When the case of a Guantanamo Bay detainee reached the US Supreme Court, the majority ruled in his favor, and their opinion included the following:

“The laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times.”  – Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for the majority, affirming that detainees at Guantanamo Bay have rights

And President Obama is acting on that precept and cleaning up the Bush/Cheney debacle.  On his first full day in office he announced that Gitmo would be closed within a year.  There are enormous complications surrounding the clean-up of this mess, such as what to do with people whose home countries won’t take them back?  What do we do with guys we know are our enemies but who we can’t convict with any legitimate evidence?  How do we stop the inevitable stories of abuse and torture from becoming public and further shaming the United States?  The answer is that these questions have no easy answers, but that does not mean that we keep Gitmo open because it is inconvenient to close it.  This is a wrong that needs to be made right, the fact that it will be hard to do doesn’t change that fact.

Obama also announced that, beginning immediately, all further interrogation and treatment of Gitmo detainees would conform to the US Army Field Manual.  So, not only will the American Gulag be closed within a year, but the maltreatment of the prisoners there will stop immediately.

But what about the safety of the United States?  Bush administration defenders love to trot out the “ticking bomb” scenario in attempts to justify torture, by saying that if a hidden bomb is set to explode and a prisoner knows the location of the bomb, we are justified in setting aside any rights of the prisoner and any morality that we hold dear and torture the prisoner in order to save the lives at risk from the bomb.  But a true “ticking bomb” scenario only happens one in a million times – and there were (and are) hundreds and hundreds of Gitmo detainees…were (or are) there hundreds and hundreds of ticking bombs, with their flashing red LED clocks counting down to tragedy, while the foreboding musical ker-thunks from the show “24” serve as a dramatic flourish?

No, there isn’t.  Are there groups who hate the United States and want to strike at us and murder our innocent civilians on American soil?  Yes, there are.  But, to me, the reason that attacking the United States is such a heinous act is because of what we stand for – freedom, justice, morality, opportunity – the pursuit of happiness, if you will.  But if we reject our principles in the defense of our way of life, what will we have gained?  And what will we have lost?

One of the greatest statesmen in American history said it best:

“They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety” – Benjamin Franklin

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I’m a 47-year-old, white, male, upper-middle-class Texan.  And tonight I am proud to be an American.  We have lived up to the fundamental precept of this country – all men are created equal.  As a country, we make mistakes, we follow ill-advised paths towards unwarranted goals, we stick our heads in the sand about the large issues while simultaneously wailing and gnashing our teeth about unimportant bullshit.  But we also self-correct.  We blink our eyes, shake our head, stand up, look around, assess, re-evaluate, and take action.  So far in our history it’s been two steps forward for each step back, meaning we keep making progress, even if we get off track for short periods.

I don’t love or hate Barack Obama, I don’t love or hate John McCain.  Neither are angels or devils.  Neither would have been my first choice, but neither were horrific.  I don’t know if Barack Obama will be a good president, and I don’t know if he’ll be a bad one.  But I know he’ll be different, and different is what we need.  We needed to break cleanly and clearly, unequivocally, from the last eight years.  We needed to show the world, and ourselves, that we had enough guts and wisdom to admit our mistakes and change course.

And we did.  Barack Obama will be our next president.  A black man.  The fact that I’ve lived to see the first black US president fills me with pride and emotion.  And patriotism.  And optimism.  I hope to live long enough to also see the first woman, the first gay, the first atheist, the first Jew, the first Muslim, and first of every other wrongly oppressed minority get a chance to occupy the Oval Office, as long as they are qualified patriots.

I look forward to seeing the next phase for America under our new president.  I hope, and actually expect, that we will be able to set aside our petty differences, quibbles, and dogma and come together with President Obama to do less of what we’re doing wrong and do more of what we’re doing right…in order to form a more perfect union.

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