Hannah's Blog

LUST for POWER

Good morning! Great to have a short thread.

While I slept, the brain had two ideas. One has to do with the March on Washington, if we have one. Instead of just showing up, I think it would be good to plan ahead and invite our elected representatives to join us, not just on the march, but in their offices for substantive discussions of their records. This would be a good opportunity to assess in person who's qualified to be reelected. Must not forget that all of the House and one third of the Senate is due for an assessment.
Second, the excellent article in "Black Commentary" on the corporate media's attack on Dean suggested that people like Ted Koppel are driven by money and polls. I'd suggest that's not quite right. Money and polls are just indicators of what they are really after--power. The lust for power, obviously, is not restricted to the RNC. The DLC seems to have caught it as well.

Actually, we all like a little power--to be in control of other people as well as ourselves. But the LUST FOR POWER is different. That's because maximum power is best expressed by making others do things they don't want to and are almost certainly going to be hurtful.
If this hypothesis is correct, then it might explain a lot of things--not just wars, but carcinogenic cigaretts and SUV's. Who knows what else is being peddled to gratify the LUST FOR POWER.

Which, by the way, is what the initiates into groups like Skull and Crossbones are prepared for--to overcome the natural reluctance they might have to inflicting harm on others. And Kerry proved he'd learned that lesson when he dispatched that Viet Cong on the edge of the water.
Posted by Monica Smith at January 31, 2004 04:58 AM

OK, I've thought for a long time that this "balanced budget" business is a tricky issue. Aside from being pleasingly alliterative, this concept is practically useless, since IT IS IMPOSSIBLE to keep the income and expenditures exactly equal over time.

Indeed, the surplus generated during the Clinton administration threw the budget out of balance and provided the Republicans with a rationale for giving the money back to the people from whom it was collected.

What Governor Dean did in Vermont makes a lot more sense. He created a rainy-day fund in which any unspent income was set aside for the eventuality that it would be needed later or perhaps to pay for some emergency.

It occurs to me that since the Republicans are so anxious to invest some of the money that isn't needed right away in the stock market, we should create a rainy day fund (instead of targeting Social Security) which could be so invested. Then we can track how much better the return is on those privately invested dollars, than those deposited in government bonds.
In other words, instead of giving the money back to be privately invested, let's invest it on behalf of the public interest.
Yes, a rainy day fund is a good idea. Who knows, if proves beneficial, we might even get to the point where the federal government budget distinguishes between daily operating accounts and long range construction (capital investment) accounts, just like every other governmental entity in the land.
Posted by Monica Smith at January 31, 2004 06:14 AM

http://home.pacbell.net/dyewrks/dean4america/decision.html

http://www.blackcommentator.com/75/75_cover_dean_media_pf.html

An excellent article from Black Commentator magazine on what corporate media is up to

DLC Treachery

The Democratic Leadership Council, that group the successfully promoted the candidacy of Bill Clinton when the regular party was reluctant to try something new, has now taken a giant step back and is not only promoting the candidacy of Kerry, whom GWB is certain to beat, but is dissing Governor Howard Dean.
To see what I am talking about go to their wed site, read and weep

http://www.ndol.org/ndol_ci.cfm?kaid=131&subid=192&contentid=252351

Then call Bill Clinton and tell him what you think of this treachery.

The New York office phone # 212-348-8882

I guess we will have to wait for the pages of history to determine which was most effective, the "I Have a Dream" speech or the "I Have a Scream" speech.
At present I don't think the comparison is well intended. While another Willie Horton ad would certainly backfire at this point, the association of Dr. Dean with Dr. King may be intended as a subliminal message to certain, shall we say "antagonistic," elements in our population.

kerry before & after

Day After NH

Just lost another post because it took me too long to write it and by the time I posted my login had expired and I lost it. So, now I'm going to try composing in a text file and then copy to post.
The point I wanted to make was that it seems to me that the ?scream? made such an impression was because it was HEARD. Now that may seem obvious, but when you consider that while we tend to pay more attention to the information we get through our eyes, it's actually our ears that are providing input to our brains on a continuous basis (day and night, asleep or awake, attentive or daydreaming), you'll begin to realize that our sense of hearing is much more effective at monitoring our environment and letting us know when there's a significant change (often a sign of danger).
So, if Dean is to be juxtapposed with Kerry, it's probably just as important to contrast delivery as it is to compare the words. People know that Dean means what he says because of HOW he says it, even if they don't understand the words.
(Bush, by the way, regardless of how non-sensical his words are, has a delivery that is convincing and, even if totally annoying, increasingly not to be mistaken. People know who's speaking without having to look).
I agree with those who have complained about the Dean ads, especially the bio with the voiceover. I have heard it and can't remember a word. The only reason I know it's a Dean ad is because the 'mushy' sound caused me to look (like dead air gets your attention on the radio) and I saw Dean in that ridiculous car coat (?).
What the campaign has to be careful of now is that the candidate doesn't become too muted in response to the criticism about being shrill. Although TV is defined as a visual medium, the fact is that the most successful personalities are people with disctinctive voices that are recognized immediately--Peter Jennings, Walter Cronkite, Marilyn Monroe, John Wayne, John Madden, Katherine Hepburn, and, of course, Ronald Reagan.
It may be that some of the media animus towards Dean is a visceral response to the perception of a competitor in their own arena. It may be that they recognize that Dean has no need of their service. He does not need to be translated by the experts of the airwaves. When people hear him speak, as he does on the September DVD, for example, they remember. If the media people feel dissed, it isn't so much because he doesn't pander, but because they realize they are not needed. Reagan didn't need them either, but he got a pass because he was perceived as one of them, having been an actor.
Perhaps Dean could benefit from some voice lessons. While it is hard to see ourselves as others see us; it's impossible to hear ourselves as others hear us, unless we are specifically trained. In any event, it probably wouldn't hurt to have some training in how to use and protect his vocal chords. You don't want him becoming speechless at inopportune moments. At this point, Dean's delivery is a talent and talents have to be nurtured if they are to mature into art. Making people see and hear things they would otherwise not notice is an art.
Kerry has a well-honed delivery that tends to put people to sleep. His people need to shorten his sentences and have succeeded. So, the trick will be in any kind of debate to get him to run on and on--at least long enough for the vapidity of his message to be matched by the delivery.
Edwards thinks that his drawl will be a distinctive advantage. It obviously helped in the court room, but a campaign is a different venue. And, as Sharpton has demonstrated, a good voice by itself isn't enough either.

No kidding

This is the picture of our president on the White House page:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2004/01/20040123-2.html

Veteran Kerry

Here's the whole WSJ article mentioned above, because they are normally subscription only so I expect it will disappear after today:

Conduct Unbecoming
Kerry doesn't deserve Vietnam vets' support.

BY STEPHEN SHERMAN
Monday, January 26, 2004 12:01 a.m. EST

A turning point may have been reached in the Iowa caucuses when Special Forces Lt. James Rassmann came forward to thank John Kerry for saving his life in Vietnam. Although Mr. Rassmann, like most of my veteran friends, is a Republican, he said that he'd vote for Mr. Kerry. I don't know if the incident influenced the caucus results. But I took special interest in the story because Jim served in my unit.

Service in Vietnam is an important credential to me. Many felt that such service was beneath them, and removed themselves from the manpower pool. That Mr. Kerry served at all is a reason for a bond with fellow veterans; that his service earned him a Bronze Star for Valor ("for personal bravery") and a Silver Star ("for gallantry") is even more compelling. Unfortunately, Mr. Kerry came home to Massachusetts, the one state George McGovern carried in 1972. He joined the Vietnam Veterans Against the War and emceed the Winter Soldier Investigation (both financed by Jane Fonda). Many veterans believe these protests led to more American deaths, and to the enslavement of the people on whose behalf the protests were ostensibly being undertaken. But being a take-charge kind of guy, Mr. Kerry became a leader in the VVAW and even testified before Congress on the findings of the Investigation, which he accepted at face value.

In his book "Stolen Valor," B.G. Burkett points out that Mr. Kerry liberally used phony veterans to testify to atrocities they could not possibly have committed. Mr. Kerry later threw what he represented as his awards at the Capitol in protest. But as the war diminished as a political issue, he left the VVAW, which was a bit too radical for his political future, and was ultimately elected to the Senate. After his awards were seen framed on his office wall, he claimed to have thrown away someone else's medals--so now he can reclaim his gallantry in Vietnam.

Mr. Kerry hasn't given me any reason to trust his judgment. As co-chairman of the Senate investigating committee, he quashed a revealing inquiry into the POW/MIA issue, and he supports trade initiatives with the Socialist Republic of Vietnam while blocking any legislation requiring Hanoi to adhere to basic human rights. I'm not surprised that there are veterans who support a VVAW activist, if only because there are so few fellow veterans in politics. Ideally, there'd be many more. If you are going to vote on military appropriations, it would be nice if you didn't disrespect the soldiers. Congress hasn't had the courage to declare war in more than 60 years, despite numerous instances in which we have sent our military in harm's way. Of all the "lessons of Vietnam," surely one is that America needs a leader capable of demonstrating in himself, and encouraging in others, the resolve to finish what they have collectively started.

But the bond between veterans has to be tempered in light of the individual's record. Just as Mr. Kerry threw away medals only to claim them back again, Sen. Kerry voted to take action against Iraq, but claims to take that vote back by voting against funding the result. So I can understand my former comrade-in-arms hugging the man who saved his life, but not the act of choosing him for president out of gratitude. And I would hate to see anyone giving Mr. Kerry a sympathy vote for president just because being a Vietnam veteran is "back in style."
Mr. Sherman was a first lieutenant with the U.S. Army Fifth Special Forces Group (Airborne) in Vietnam, 1967-68.

Posted by karen anne at January 26, 2004 08:19 AM

One day to go

The Charles I am responding to is Charles Riggs III who has a unique way to recalculate ALL the significant polls that come out. This morning he sees a significant shift that started Saturday and he expressed puzzlement as to why. My answer:

Good morning, I've only just recently gotten up so have a lot to catch up.
But, Charles, are you being intentionally dense? If you've been reading anything about recent brain studies, you know that it takes the brain a while to process new information, preferably during a good night's sleep.
Those of us who have been following the campaign since last May or June have had the chance to process everything many times over. There are all kinds of sorting categories in place, making the process faster.
Many people are meeting Dean as an idea for the first time. There is nothing to compare him to in their brain. Which is why all of that publicity about the scream was like mana from heaven. First there was name recognition, then there was specific information that was personally non-threatening and therefor aroused interest to find out more. Then people were presented with more information, most of which contradicted the first. Which meant that all of it had to be resorted.
Computers can do all this more efficiently--once the soft-ware has been written, tweaked, tested, and the information has been correctly submitted.
Once it gets going the human brain is much more efficient, but the initial steps have to be followed and a lot of "noise" and "clutter" has to be eliminated.

Not to mention that, much as we might like it, people do not react directly to an imput of information. Indeed, their reaction is just as likely to be indirect--a hated neighbor's dislike of Dean, for example, might speak in Dean's favor. Perhaps even louder than any thing Dean says himself. Sometimes people are motivated by events that have nothing to do with the object against which their behavior is directed. (We all know that some support Dean because they can't abide GWB)

The media response to Howard Dean is also a good example of the latter. While some of his positions may well be perceived by the media as threatening to their power base, at this point he has no power what-so-ever and the journalistic meme flows almost entirely from habitual behavior and ties to their corporate affiliation. Indeed, even when he is elected, the legislative changes that might directly affect corporate media interests will remain in the hands of their legislative minions. The only thing the executive can do is propose and carry out/or not legislative directives. The Bush administration is a good example where foot-dragging and specious interpetration are being used to resist doing what legislative directives have demanded. Redefining the components of industrial emmissions as non-pollutants is a recent example.

I think we are making a big mistake when we posit that the shrub doesn't know what he's doing. The administration is doing exactly what was promised to its supporters. People think bureaucratic jargon is mushy because they don't understand it. In fact, the jargon is very precise just because it is well understood that people will always be inclined to get around doing what they've been told, if they don't like the instructions. Everybody strives for autonomy, but that's no way to run a country.

Since I've run on so long anyway, let me just throw out a question I've been asking about the Patriot Act. Given its complexity and the short time between its presentation to Congress and its passage, what I want to know is by whom and when was this monstrosity actually compiled?

One of the generally overlooked but most negative consequences of our legislators' pursuit of finances to fund their next election is that they have no time to pay close attention, much less develop legislation. Not only do they not read what they are voting on most of the time, they don't understand the law's implications. If they don't know what they are doing, they obviously can't give direction to the executive. Thus the very foundation of our system of government is undermined, not because the legislators are beholden to the people who give them money, but because they do not know what they are doing and are therefor incapable of representing ANYONE effectively.
What do you want to bet that the Patriot Act was in the works just as long as the attack on Iraq--i.e. from the very beginning of the current administration. Executive privilege may keep us from finding out the time-line of the planning for war. The legislative history of the Patriot Act should be available to any legislator who asks.
Posted by Monica Smith at January 26, 2004 05:07 AM

ABC takes a look

This morning's Globe reminds me of something I neglected to mention yesterday from the New Castle venue.
Along with Latenight and a couple of other media teams, there was one from ABC who was looking for "someone from here, not from (California, Baltimore, Denmark, Russia--noted by myself) elsewhere." When he finally glommed onto a little lady in a bright yellow jacket, he was not only enthusiastic but positively gleeful because in her statement she said that she "STILL supports Dean," implying that she has questions and may change her mind. That, by the way, was his explanation to his associates after they were done with the interview and the lady had gone on her way.
In other words, the fellow had a mental script and he was looking for someone to verify it for him.
Think of someone writing a script for a movie or play and then auditioning people to fill the parts.
Why do journalists to this? Why do they become journalist? Because they want to influence how other people think and behave. Which, of course, is what motivates most politicians as well. The latter are just more honest about it.
It used to be said that "those who can, do and those who can't, teach." In reality, those who can do and those who can't watch.
Posted by Monica Smith at January 25, 2004 08:09 AM

Federal Reserve

The Governor's questioning of the Federal Reserve's recent policy decisions may actual sit well with the financial community. At best, the Fed's lowering of interest rates is based on the assumption that if people aren't buying (no demand), the thing to do is to lower the price. Whether or not the assumption is correct (my experience in real estate suggests it isn't; whenever a house I was trying to sell didn't move at the starting price, I RAISED the price and it did), treating money like any other commodity doesn't seem rational to me.
In any event, making money cheaper can not have been good for the financial sector. I know the miserable little adjustable rate mortgage ($70,000) I pay on, to Bank of America, now earns them $200 a month less than it did two years ago.
At the same time, people who followed the call to be prudent and save and put their money into CD's have seen their return fall from 5% to 2% or less.
So what if the income tax owed on their capital gains is less? Which would you rather: to pay Uncle Sam $25 out of a hundred or $4 out of $40?
Would you rather have $75 left or $36?
Reducing taxes on earnings you ain't getting doesn't make a whole lot of sense, does it?
Of course, if the rate hadn't been cut and you owed Uncle Sam $10 out of those $40, then perhaps the Fed's games with the interest rates wouldn't have gone largely unnoticed.
On the other hand, if money is really like any other commodity, who buys something they don't absolutely need when they think it's going to cost less if they wait? Certainly not people who usually invest in dollars, as is evidenced by the fact that the value of the dollar has fallen over 25% in the last couple of years.
How does that affect the price of things we HAVE to import--like oil? Don't even ask.

While it may make us feel good to think that our current leadership in the White House is inept, I suspect that the MBA he got from Harvard is not coincidental to the fact that our economy is going to hell in a handbasket. To a large extent, economic theory is based on "received wisdom" rather than practical experience in actually managing physical resources and assets. In my book, if it isn't validated by experience, "received wisdom" is just another prejudice.
See up thread for my take on that.
Posted by Monica Smith at January 25, 2004 06:36 AM

Good morning carol in santafe:

Not meaning to be picky, I'd like to suggest a change in the order of those three words--experience, judgement, courage. The order in which we do things is very important. If, for example, we make a judgement BEFORE we have any experience, if we are "prejudiced," then we are likely to mis-understand the lessons of our experiences, leading to mistakes which no amount of courage can fix.
Of course, being open to experience without prejudice takes a considerable amount of courage in itself. Prejudice makes us fearful, almost unable to act on our own, easy targets for people who thrive on telling others what to do.

On another matter: An old friend in Germany (actually a homosexual pediatrician who treated my tonsilitis, whooping cough and chicken pox when I was a kid) observed in a phone conversation the other day that his country is in a desperate state because "when George Bush sneezes, the rest of the world catches cold." I reassured him that we were doing our best to fix it, with Doctor Dean's help.
Posted by Monica Smith at January 25, 2004 05:06 AM

Newcastle

Just got back from the venue in Newcastle. Didn't get to see or hear the Governor though I waited in the overflow crowd for a while. There were just too many people.
The Latenight crew were in the lobby, doing silly interviews of the guy selling Dean cards, the alternative energy crew dressed in orange jump suits and yours truly trying to sell some Dean Plates.
The young woman doing the interviewing had the most annoying laugh, but a cute baby she used as a prop. I asked the husband if the baby was a permanent fixture and he said he hoped so.
During my interview the young woman wanted to know if Dean would kiss her baby. I told her I thought not, because as a doctor he knows such close contact with strangers should be avoided, especially in the winter. (Doubt that will get on Latenight). For some reason this person did not seem to know that the candidate is a doctor, nor that his wife is one as well. Perhaps it was just an act, but I'm afraid that even media people are not very well informed. At one point the baby was encouraged to scream/growl but was drowned out by her mom's laugh.
I sold three plates. One to a gentleman from Denmark. Another to a man who'd been at the rally in Philadelphia and the third to a young woman who'd come up from Baltimore for the weekend to stand on street corners and hold signs.
I don't think people are going door to door. For one thing, it's just too bloody cold. Also, they don't seem to have been issued any special head gear. There were a few people with those orange caps from Iowa around, but not a whole lot.
Nobody left early as far as I could tell. The crowd in the hotel lobby stayed a pretty constant size. One staff person said that a lot of undecideds had been invited, but most people had either Dean buttons or stick-ons when they left.
I did have a long chat with a graduate student from the Fletcher School of Economics who told me that his goal was to make sure the United States retains its superiority over the rest of the world. I couldn't help myself from wondering if his severe stammer had anything to do with his need to be part of the most powerful nation, but I argued the merits of his antagonism (to the United Nations, for example) in good faith.
The Governor had some competition in the lobby from Chris P. Carrot who is being promoted for President by the PETA people. Chris P. Carrot and Kernel Corn were in appropriate costumes. (They will probably appear on Latenight).
As you may have guessed, the campaign scene has a bit of a circus atmosphere.

The plates, by the way, are available from:
http://www.americatakingaction.com/HD/
Posted by Monica Smith at January 24, 2004 05:09 PM

Dean re-mixed

Download this if you want to hear the real Dean:

http://annatopia.com/pics/dean/iowa/caucus/remixed/Faulkner__Howard_Dean_Remixed.mp3

Good morning! It's so nice to have something exciting to get up for every morning. I would have posted earlier, but I really got hooked on the media thing.
In comparison, my own observations are pretty tame. But, for the record, we finally got a DVD player yesterday so I had a chance to look at those Dean DVD's we got back in September. And, lo and behold, there was the Governor and, probably because the audiences were a LOT smaller, he was only hollering when he came to the end of his spiel, not yet yelping! And just think, even this many months later, when the phrases have been repreated ad infinitum, the cadences are still affecting.
If the national media were surprised by the Governor's passion, it was just because they hadn't been paying attention. Though I would bet they didn't miss his announced intention to dissect media monopolies.

Question of the day: What is the difference between corporate capitalism and communist capitalism? If you think the latter is impossible, you're wrong. It's what China is involved in.
Posted by Monica Smith at January 24, 2004 04:33 AM

Here's an example of Kerry's campaign material sent out in New Hampshire while he was being "positive" in Iowa.

And here's a positive image of the Dean campaign:

Picayune Pundit

Brian McGrory is a picayune pundit. But that doesn't change the fact that his current offering is a good example of why so many of these pundits are so unbearable. They're so disrespectful and rude.
Now, there are some people who are deserving of disrespect--liars and cheaters and war-mongerers come to mind. But an up-front fellow who offers to take on one of the most unpleasant jobs in the world?
What call is there to denigrate him with terms such as "unhinged" and write him off before a single vote has actually been cast. (Remember that Iowa was only choosing how many delegates , and for whom, they would be sending to the Democratic National Convention).
What call is there to refer to a two-term Vice President of the United States as a "has-been'?

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2004/01/23/dean_down_kerry_up/

Funnies

Why did the chicken cross the road?

Wes Clark: She was just following orders
Howard Dean: She wanted to take her country back
John Edwards: She was optimistic about crossing over
John Kerry: Because the real deal was on the other side
Dennis Kucinich: To get the US troops out and the UN troops in
Joe Lieberman: Because the other side was more conservative
Al Sharpton: To stand up for fundamental chicken rights
Posted by Oscar In Louisville at January 23, 2004 05:30 AM

And here's a contribution from old friends Anna and Axel (he gave me away to my spouse) in honor of the Chinese New Year, the year of the monkey.

The Punchy Dean & Judy Show

For those of you who missed it, here are Howard and Judy being interviewed by Diane Sawyer.

Actually stayed up to watch it "live" but couldn't make it to Letterman. Yesterday was a long day since I awoke before 2:00 AM and got hooked on the Dean blog.

Big news here is that Winnie the Deanmobile is back from surgery--got a rebuilt transmission and right front drive shaft. She drove OK but I must admit I'm a bit leary after she just fell apart on Rt. 101. Will be doing driving to the polls on Tuesday.
Durham has moved the polling location to an out-of-the-way industrial park because the evangelical church where they voted last time demonstrated some homophobic tendencies. The High School isn't available for some reason. The spouse says that voting interfered with student parking. Even here the school buses we maintain are not in favor. Why is it that we cannot make public transportation attractive even at the school bus level? Somehow I don't think it's the buses; more likely it's the social atmosphere (or lack thereof).

Brain Waves

The brain is really a marvelous instrument when you let it do its thing. It recognizes patterns that aren't apparent and then provides new insights, almost automatically.
To show what I mean, I have to go back to some observations about the Omi that I only became aware of quite recently when she announced, once again, that she was done sewing for ever. The project which prompted this conclusion was a knitted cashmere tube dress she had bought at a used clothing store, taken apart, and then fashioned into a sweater which, after a year or so. had to be taken apart because the sleeves were too short. Since it isn't at all unusual for her to "rip" clothing and start over, I didn't pay too much attention, at first. But then I noticed that, probably because her thinking is not quite as clear as it was, she was actually cutting the ends off the sleeves and trying to make them wider. Then, after some frustration having to do with not seeing to thread needles and not having a yarn to finish the edges, she put it all together and was quite pleased with herself.
That's when it dawned on me that what she really enjoyed was the process of "taking apart" and "fixing." That the end product was no better (actually worse) than the original was not a concern.
Then, yesterday, as I was researching John Edward's law practice I came across a couple of articles outlining the malpractice cases that had won him big fees. They had to do with babies who suffered brain damage during a lengthy birth or delayed Caesarean and would now have to be sustained and cared for god knows how long. The awards to the caretaking parents seemed appropriate, even though the percentage claimed by the attorneys could be questioned.
Then some more random searching led me to the Illinois Civil Justice League which is increasingly concerned that some counties in Illinois are losing their doctors who can no longer afford the insurance rate increases because of so many high awards.
John Edwards' associates in this enterprise naturally are resistant to having the awards capped. They argue that medical malpractice can only be halted if the malfactors are punished.
But, while that might be a logical argument, this process obviously hasn't worked so far. If anything, there seem to be more and more examples of careless or negligent behavior. Not to mention that the futures of these infants (most brought back to "life" by machines) is just horrendous, for them and their families.
Why is that? Was is it that medical practitioners seem increasingly careless? Or is it just that the expectations of patients are too high? I don't think so. The outlines of the cases I read did seem to indicate gross carelessness, if not negligence.
This conclusion is to a certain extent supported by various recent studies which suggest that fully 60%-80% of hospital admissions are the result of mistakes or infections resulting from previous treatment. Hospitals, it would seem, have become dangerous places--almost as dangerous as our highways.
Why is that? Why is it that the better we get at doing things safely and fixing things that need to be fixed, the more things need fixing? Could it be that a whole lot of people are like the Omi and so enjoy the process of "fixing" that they actually consider (perhaps subconsciously) prevention a negative? That things have to be broken so they can be mended? That cities have to be destroyed so they can be rebuilt?

From DFA blog

But this has been passed around our GenDean group and needed to be shared...

Why did Howard Dean scream?
He screamed for the 2 million unemployed workers
For the 500 US Soldiers dead
For the 10000 US soldiers who have been evacuated from Iraq for wounds, sickness, or mental distress
For mounting violence between the Palestinians and Jews
For America's credibility abroad
For the 2 trillion dollar deficit
For the $7 billion that is missing from the No Child Left Behind Bill
For the 'Clear Skies Initiative' that allows more pollution into the air
For the 41 million people in this country who go to bed without healthcare
For the $120 million Bush has collected in special
interest money
For the hope that is slipping out of our democratic system...

The real question is, why was he the only one screaming?

I, for one, am screaming with him.

Day After Iowa

Guest Critic: Cole Campbell on the Day After Iowa
Who created the frontrunner dethroned in Iowa for a new front runner? It was the campaign press. But on the morning after, the campaign press pretends it does not exist. Cole Campbell, former editor of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, comments.

Innocent in Iowa
by Cole C. Campbell

In today’s simultaneous coverage of politics and coverage of coverage of politics, we get discordant signals about the role of political journalists in our political discourse. The discord is evident everywhere, but it is particularly apparent in The Washington Post’s coverage of the results of the Iowa caucus – and its coverage of the coverage.

In Tuesday’s Post, the paper’s political writers paint a dynamic picture of an exciting upset of Howard Dean by John Kerry. They use bold, declarative statements to make sense of this political turn of events. But these statements cite few, if any, expert sources and offer few, if any, arguments to justify the claims offered. It is a heady blend of sweeping characterizations based upon unstated, taken-for-granted assumptions.

Meanwhile, the Post’s Howard Kurtz, a reigning lord of press criticism and commentary, scolds his colleagues across the news media for making a big deal about the supposed dramatic surprise of John Kerry’s showing, noting “it was mainly a surprise because the press for so many months had been trumpeting a Howard Dean-Richard Gephardt showdown.” The press had focused on Dean’s money and volunteers and Gephardt’s union backing, but paid no attention to factors that led to Kerry “roughly doubling Dean’s vote total,” Kurtz notes. “To put it mildly, you didn’t read it here first.”

In other words, just about everything you heard and read about the Iowa caucuses in November and December was wrong. Particularly those endless pieces about the importance of strong grass-roots organizations. The press would have done better if all the reporters had taken a long vacation.

You’d think journalists so clearly in error would sober up, reflect on their misfeasance and offer cautious summaries or humble hypotheses about what happened in Iowa. Nope. Instead we get the same sweeping characterizations about the new set of political facts.

Dan Balz, in his Page One piece for the Post, says Iowa voters “dealt a serious blow to the once front-running campaign of Howard Dean … and to predictions that the Democratic presidential race might end as quickly as it began.”

Dean's vaunted grass-roots movement, which fueled the former Vermont governor's rise to the top of the Democratic field with money and energy in 2003, failed its first test at old-fashioned politics, falling far short of the bold claims of its architects.

Dean now has a week to regroup for what will be a critical test in next Tuesday's primary in New Hampshire, where retired Gen. Wesley K. Clark has been gaining ground on him and where Kerry will now be a major factor in the outcome.

Organizational prowess, considered the hallmark of the caucus process here, proved no match for the messages and momentum that built behind the candidacies of Kerry and surprise second-place finisher Sen. John Edwards (N.C.) as voters began to take a more serious look at all the candidates in the last two weeks.

In another Page One story from the Post, John F. Harris describes Dean as having been “dethroned … from the near-invincible position he had seemed to enjoy at the start of the year.” While Dean’s “insurgent candidacy … seemed to dominate the Democratic contest, the Iowa results amounted to a validation for two polished and more conventional candidates.”

These characterizations beg several questions. Who enthroned Dean and named him the front-runner? By what criteria can journalists claim he has been dealt a serious blow or dethroned? Who vaunted his grass-roots movement, and who characterized his position as “near-invincible”? (By what criteria of invincibility?) Who decides that New Hampshire is a critical test for Dean, but not others? Who will decide whether Dean passes it? Who pitted Dean’s organizational prowess against Kerry’s and Edward’s “message and momentum”? Who says – and exactly what does it mean to say things this way – that voters “began” to take a “more serious look” at “all the candidates” in the last two weeks? (What had they been doing in earlier weeks? Looking facetiously, or at only some candidates, or not at all?) And who has the prerogative to describe the candidacy of a former governor as an insurgency and the candidacy of a first-term senator, taking on the same political establishment, as conventional politics?

We know the answer: The campaign press corps. But the campaign press corps’ stories citing all these factors, causes, dynamics and developments never mentions the centrality of the campaign press corps in picking what counts and doesn’t count in explaining--or explaining away--political reality. The campaign press corps pretends it doesn’t exist, except to observe and explain. It pretends it is a political innocent.

Howard Kurtz points out that the press, on its own terms, paints a portrait of politics that may or may not – not, in this case – comport with reality. And he suggests that Dean’s front-runner status – bestowed by the press – became the justification for intensive press scrutiny in recent weeks (the same time voters “began” to take the candidates seriously). Will Kerry and Edwards falter under similar strip searches?

Balz and Harris, meanwhile, shake their Etch-a-Sketch clear and start drawing a new portrait without in any way acknowledging that the portraiture is based on their own terms-- deciding who is a front-runner, who deserves to be presented as an underdog, what counts as political savvy, what’s worth being vaunted, and on and on.

Given the political worldview defined by this kind of pressthink, several reflexes kick in and take over coverage this time of year. Two of the most obvious leap out in the Iowa caucus coverage.

1. Candidates are slotted into pre-scripted categorical roles: These are the BIG WINNER, the BIG LOSER, the SURPRISINGLY STRONG FINISHER and DEAD MEAT. The candidates’ objective in any early test is claiming not delegates to the nominating convention but the (temporarily) coveted crown of FRONT-RUNNER. Hence Calvin Woodward writes in his Associated Press account:

With a decisive victory in Iowa, John Kerry reclaimed the high expectations that ushered in his presidential candidacy, staggered Howard Dean and moved on to New Hampshire as the newly minted front-runner.

Kerry, a four-term Massachusetts senator and decorated Vietnam War veteran, and North Carolina Sen. John Edwards buried Dean in third place Monday night in the Iowa presidential caucuses … For [Richard] Gephardt, it appeared the battles were over..

2. In the early primary season, the point is not winning or losing as defined by party nominating rules, but meeting, exceeding or blowing expectations. Bryan Keefer lays it out in the Columbia School of Journalism’s new Campaign Desk blog that Iowa and New Hampshire “are the playing field on which reporters set the bar for the expected performances of the candidates. Exceed these expectations – as John Kerry and John Edwards did in Iowa – and the press is positive; fail to meet them, and the press warms up the funeral dirge for your chances, as Howard Dean is finding discovering.”

These two elements of pressthink are so obvious, routine, ritualized and repeated year in and year out it almost seems trite – it is trite – to trot them out again. But it is important to connect them to the third axiom of the press in the early primary season. Political candidates must fill certain roles for campaign narratives to work. Political candidates must be sorted, and expectations are a great device for sorting. Who better to assign roles and evaluate expectations than the uninvolved, politically innocent press?

3. The press is the central player in politics to political insiders – not the candidates, not the voters – and insiders acknowledge it even while maintaining as orthodoxy that the press is innocent of influence.

Consider how the candidates immediately positioned themselves after the Iowa caucus results were in. They began talking about themselves in terms entirely shaped by expectations and degrees of separation from front-runnerdom. Howard Dean took refuge in the only safe haven for failed front-runners – reclaiming his year-ago status as underdog. “If you had told me a year ago that I was going to finish third in Iowa, I would have been delighted,” he told Larry King. Kerry cast himself as “Comeback Kerry,” positioning himself as the Seabiscuit of American politics, front-runner and underdog rolled into one pint-sized horse with heart.

The candidates are trying to reposition themselves in the idiom of the press, capitulating to pressthink’s assignment or roles and expectations in order to improve their standing in the eyes of the press or to induce the press to transmit and reinforce this new positioning to prospective voters. But they never blow the whistle on the press’s centrality. When John Kerry notes that “not so long ago this campaign was written off," he doesn’t add “by the news media.” That would break protocol by acknowledging the unacknowledgeable centrality of the press. It’s okay to bash the press for doing its job poorly; it’s not okay to explain how much space the press occupies in your every calculation of politics. That would make you appear calculating (when in fact you are simply being realistic).

And so the press covers new developments without acknowledging the actors and agents truly responsible for these developments-- journalists themselves. “Conventional wisdom was turned on its head tonight,” NBC's Tim Russert said during Monday night’s broadcast coverage of the Iowa caucus.

Russert never owned up to who the keepers of conventional wisdom are-- he and his colleagues. The press tells itself that it is not implicated in the politics it molds and shapes. It presents itself as a campaign innocent. But everyone involved knows better.

Note to Sister Jere

Re: the Dean yell Sister Jere wrote,

>It was a discouraging display.

My response:
Well, I'm glad that you are concerned and paying attention. I personally don't care much for people who shout (including Oprah whenever she introduces a special guest), but this was a rally of campaign workers who needed to be reassured that their efforts were not wasted. I think what got the media going is that Dean refuses to be penitent and abase himself for their approbation.

Just in case I have to vote for Edwards, I spent a couple of hours this morning researching his record on Google. What I found was not reassuring. Not only did he speak out in support of the Patriot Act when it was first passed (lawyers of course make money when people have to be defended), but he sponsored legislation setting up a national ID system, including biometric information.
While we all know he made a lot of money as a malpractice lawyer, it doesn't seem as well known that 63% of his early contributions came from what the Illinois Civil Justice League calls "Learjet Lawyers" or that a lawfirm in Texas was bundling contributions from low-level employees and promising to re-imburse them. Those contributions were returned by the campaign.
Edwards says that he "has never taken a dime from lobbyists." But, he set up a PAC which does take money from lobbyists. Also, when he was selling his house in DC, he took a deposit from a lobbyist for Saudi Arabia who offered him 1.3 million more than he had paid and .5 million more than it eventually sold for and, when the deal fell through, Edwards retained the $100,000 deposit in escrow. Asked it he would return it, he explained it would only be a conflict of interested that had to be reported, it he kept it--i.e. he was thinking about it.
What we seem to have here is another fellow who tells you the opposite of what he's actually doing. I don't expect he and his friends who are into medical malpractice law are too keen to have a doctor in the White House. Edwards' PAC was buying computers for Iowa long before Dean had made much of a splash.
So, no, I don't think I'll be supporting Edwards.

State of the Union

MoveOn.org has a new ad to go along with the State of the Union speech:

https://www.moveonvoterfund.org/donate/sotu.html?id=2275-2547676-sgo2yuHMI7RgUp.b7Mg6vg

Old friends

I was speaking with an old friend in Virginia last night and the talk eventually turned to politics as it so often does.

Of course I asked him if he had given any thought to the upcoming election and his reply was a quick "Anybody but Bush!".

He then went on to say he was glad in a sense to be a Republican since he doesn't have to involve himself at this stage and simply stands ready to vote for whomever we should put up against him.

An awesome responsibility, I'm not sure I really want so much power.

My friend in Virginia, should you see this, even as a Republican you can Swing the Bat.

Day After Iowa

The Governor has a couple of problems that are going to be hard to deal with.
First off, having put himself forward as the candidate who tells the truth, he's particularly subject to being accused of lying. Run of the mill politicians are expected to lie, or at least fudge the truth and when they "appropriate" an opponent's positions, it's not called flip-flopping; rather that's a "normal" strategic shift.
Secondly, everyone has certain "prejudices" when they confront new information. That is, they've made up their mind about something and when the new information supports what they've been thinking, they call it "true" and when it doesn't, they call it "false." Which is how you can have "the one, true faith" that isn't based on any fact at all.
Another way of saying this is that people believe what they want to believe. And they like people who give them what they want. People actually like being lied to. That's why so many of them voted for the man who promised "dignity" and a new "moral tone" and less responsibility ("lower taxes")--none of which imposed any obligation on them.
That there were obligations and that they are now being paid by their dead relatives in Iraq, the hungry in the street and sick children in the schools is another matter which may well not affect how they vote the next time. Because, if they even come out to vote, a change in their vote is an admission of having been wrong the last time. And that's not something that most people are particularly keen to do.
In any event, these are not problems that can be solved by the candidate. Howard Dean is not responsible for what Iowans did or did not do.
What is going to count again now is what his supporters are going to do. It's not just the vote that counts, it's the voters. Though you can't tell them that.
What to tell them is for people smarter than me to figure out.
Posted by Monica Smith at January 20, 2004 05:44 AM

waiting for caucus

I actually think it would be a lot easier knocking on doors in Iowa than sitting here in NH waiting for what happens next.
Be that as it may, the report on Cheney's speech in which he prognosticates a decades long war against "terrorism" or evil forces, or whatever, needs to be recognized for what it is: a strategy of generating unity among disparate people through what I refer to as "shared antagonism." The targets of this often irrational sensation may or may not be real. It doesn't matter. Antagonism, being a sensation, an emotional experience, doesn't need a real target to be activated. That's what makes it so useful. The sharing of this sensation is a satisfying end in itself--sort of like the feeling of brotherhood experienced by all those who hate broccoli. Indeed, uniting people in rejecting something is basically a cost-free strategy--at least to the participants. Which is what makes it so attractive.
It only becomes expensive when the targets of antagonism take umbrage and determine to seek revenge--not likely when the target is broccoli; more likely when the targets are proud Arabs.
"Shared antagonism" is different from "uniting against a common enemy" in that the latter presupposes that the enemy is real, that there is some evidence of aggressive action or intent.
Now, while it is true that America has suffered aggression, the proof that the Bush administration is trafficking in "shared antagonism" can be found in the fact that the so-called "war on terrorism" is NOT directed at the actual aggressors or their surrogates. Rather, it is directed anywhere but the source--i.e. where the suicide hi-jackers actually came from, Saudi Arabia.
No, Saudi Arabia is our friend; even though it failed to protect our soldiers from being bombed in their residential compound and continues to insult our female military personnel with sexist restrictions. What can the Bush Administration be thinking?

Posted by Monica Smith at January 19, 2004 03:15 PM

New Directions

Here's my early morning post to the Dean blog:

Ok, though there aren't very many of you here, let me suggest another direction.
The reason the country is in the pickle it's in is because Florida messed up in 2000. The reason Florida messed up is because NOT ENOUGH ATTENTION WAS PAID. Let's not make the same mistake again.
When I went to the link suggested yesterday for info on all state elections
http://www.dcpoliticalreport.com/stbyst.htm
I noticed that Cliff Sterns in the 6th District of Florida seems to have a viable Democratic challenger this time around. As far as I can tell, David Broderly ran last time and lost. He's asking for money for phones and flyers on his web site
www.bruderly.com
Although Sterns won with 65% of the vote last time, if Democrats had been doing their job all along, he shouldn't be sitting there at all.
Sterns is from Ocala, somewhat of a backwater on the edge of horse country. The real population center is Gainesville where the major industries are education and health care, both of which should be natural consituencies of the Gov.
That this community is represented by a Repub can only be explained by the fact that the local politicos just aren't interested in the national scene.
In any event, if Bruderly were to get a modest infusion of money via this blog, it would provide publicity for the Dean campaign, somebody to visit when the Gov visits north Florida, and to do so on the cheap.

One of the things that has really astounded me is how LITTLE money the fat cats contribute to get their hooks into our representatives. $2,000 to $5,000 is nothing to people who pick up another car for $30,000.
Boswell isn't kidding when he expresses gratitude for the $60,000 we dropped on him. That's still a big chunk of money for the backwater races. North Forida is a lot cheaper than South. A few dollars there would make a big splash.
By the way, although I lived in Gainesville for 17 years, I do not know Bruderly. However, the groups he claims to be affiliated with are, by and large, good guys. The environmentalists are a bit radical but that's largely the result of frustration.
Florida could really benefit from some serious community building. So many of the newcomers don't like each other very much and the "natives" just wish the outsiders would leave their money and go away.
Posted by Monica Smith at January 19, 2004 04:02 AM

Bush news

Two items of interest from the Dean blog this morning. First, a Sage cartoon from the Atlantic

Second, here's a report from the Globe and Mail to demonstrate the Shrub's bullying ways. Focusing on personal appearance (which an individual cannot easily change) is an almost unfailing recipe for intimidation. Its prevalence may well account for the epidemic of plastic surgery and other image modifying behaviors we are seeing in our children. What a fine example from the Shrub!

Bush prefers our pretty boy to his pretty boy

By JANE TABER

UPDATED AT 1:42 AM EST
Friday, Jan. 16, 2004

OTTAWA -- This is the tale of the two Scotts -- one American, the other Canadian. One is dark-haired, the other blond. Both are 35 and both work for the most powerful men in their respective countries.

Scott McClellan is the press secretary to U.S. President George W. Bush; Scott Reid is the senior strategist to Prime Minister Paul Martin.

But, according to Mr. Bush, Mr. Martin has the prettier Scott.

Indeed. Welcome to a new era of "pretty face" Canada-U.S. relations.

This is what happened:

Mr. Bush met Mr. Reid earlier this week at the summit in Monterrey, Mexico, just after the President's breakfast with Mr. Martin.

Mr. Reid was not initially in the hotel room where the two leaders and their closest advisers met, but was called in to brief the Prime Minister at the end as the group waited for the media.

Mr. Bush wandered over during Mr. Reid's chat with the Prime Minister. Mr. Reid introduced himself and shook hands with Mr. Bush.

"Well, what do you do for this guy?" the President asked as he pointed to the Prime Minister.

"Well, you know, sir, I can't really say," Mr. Reid said. "It's not that I don't want to. It's just that, you know, I don't really know from day to day."

This is true. Mr. Reid handles a number of files and performs a number of different duties, depending on the issue and the day.

The President chuckled. "Well, you got a pretty face," he told the surprised Mr. Reid. He wasn't done. "You got a pretty face," he said again. "You're a good-looking guy. Better looking than my Scott anyway."

This is true. His Scott has a receding hairline and is on the chubby side, while Mr. Martin's Scott has a full head of hair and is quite fit.

For the first time in his life, Mr. Reid had no reply. "I didn't know what to say," said Mr. Reid, noting later that he wished that Mr. Bush had referred to him as a "rugged-looking young man or something.

"But I'll take what I can, I guess," he joked. "When a Texas Republican says you've got a pretty face, then I guess there is just no way around it."

http://www.globeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20040116/REID16/

I am sorry Canada. But when Dean is 44 we will make it up.
Posted by AJ at January 18, 2004 02:25 AM

Dean news

The topic of the over-night thread on the Dean blog was bias in news reporting. While many contributors seem to have a hard time staying on topic (OT), I didn't have much trouble with this one.

Look, journalists or media people can be just as power hungry as anyone else. Maybe more so, since they get into the business in order to influence other people, to direct their actions, and "help" them make choices.
What many of you may not be aware of is that the process of formulating an editorial endorsement is in no way objective. Candidates for political office have to be "interviewed." That means they have to ask for an appointment with always busy editors who only have time for the most important, influential or "viable" in any race.
The failure to seek such an appointment is itself seen as a negative, even if the lowly candidate rightly anticipates that he/she will be refused.
Candidates who do not prostrate themselves and beg for support--not to mention those who don't have enough money to take out ads--don't get interviewed, don't get endorsed, and stand a good chance of getting dissed.
Since it's early in the morning and there are probably not too many bloggers trying to post, let me just add that what's happening now is actually not new. When I was trying to research some community leaders in the South after the Civil War--people whose names I had found in municipal records--I discovered that the newspapers of the time (those that are still extant) didn't report on the doings of those leaders if they were black (which a good number were).
The only thing the newspapers reported about black people back then was when one happened to be a perpetrator of crime.
The consequence of this "selectivity" is that the historical record as recorded in the history books used in our schools does not accurately reflect what actually happened. That's because the "resources" historians rely on to write their tomes are news reports. If there's nothing in the paper, it didn't happen.
Posted by Monica Smith at January 17, 2004 05:09 AM

Response to Peter Canellos in the Globe:

Mr. Canellos:

The credibility of your report from the fields of Iowa is undercut by your concluding paragraphs. While you find that the supporters of Howard Dean perceive "thievery" in the behavior of his oponents taking over his issues, you characterize his reaction as "child"ish and his verbal objections as "clamoring for attention" and "shooting rhetorical spitballs," drawing a decidedly unpleasant picture of a measured response. After that you define a verbal response as an "attack," again playing into the "official line" that the Governor is angry and aggressive.
Taking something that doesn't belong to you is aggressive. Objecting to the thievery is, if anything, a moderate response. Perhaps you should pay more attention to who's actually doing what.
Posted by Monica Smith at January 17, 2004 06:12 AM

Mr. Canellos' response:

"I've seen the governor and he's been quite aggressive. I don't know if you're
out there, but he's been very fiery at his events. But i thought by pointing out
their "thievery" it would make clear why he's been so aggressive.

Dobie hates Dean

In a previous post Greg from TN called a piece in the Nashville Scene by Bruce Dobie to our attention. The following is my response to the editor:

Yes, Bush is a "regular old boy" who intimidates the members of the
press by giving them nicknames. He sure did learn that in the South.
Your columnist doesn't know what he's writing about. He's responding to
his own prejudice.
I've met Howard Dean, shaken his hand, heard him speak directly three
times and so don't have to rely on sound-bites filtered by the media.
If I ever get sick (I haven't had to see a doctor for anything in twenty
years, thank God), I'll be grateful for the manners he displays away
from the bedside.
Since Dobie hasn't heard a speech in person, it's no wonder he can't
offer a valid critique. As for lacking "human examples"--that's because
Dean respects the privacy of his supporters. No doubt that's a holdover
from his medical practice. Some habits are just hard to lose.

As regards the bike path that got Dean started--it was one of those
train tracks that the railroads abandon and then expect to be paid for
by the state, regardless of the fact that they were given the right of
way for nothing to begin with. The conversion of railbeds to bike paths
provides a quick study of how corporate subsidies work. (If the parts
of town through which trains ran in Vermont are pretty compared to those
in the South, it just means that the "wrong side of the tracks" is less
significant in Vermont).
Why exactly is it that Southerners are entitled not only to talk about
and judge "yankees" but the rest of the country is not allowed an
opinion about this perennial back-water? Moreover, considering that the
Bush now in the White House never did a lick of work that would actually
turn his neck red, it's more likely that His sojourn in the so-called
"oil patch" was a "hobby existence"--and one he wasn't very good at, at
that.
I lived in the South for twenty five years, until I couldn't take it any
more. One of the main things I couldn't take was the presumption that
one's beliefs and ideas, not to mention one's personal relations, were
open to judgement by every tom, dick and harry in the street. The
concept of privacy and discretion seems to be entirely lacking. It
always amazed me that people could be so rude as to ask personal
questions of people they'd hardly met.
Southerners prejudge. They don't watch what a person does and then make
an assessment; they inherit templates and then judge whether or not a
person fits. So what they've got is a society based on prejudice. It's
not something they develop; it's what they're raised with. And, though
they don't know it, it's what makes them uncomfortable.
Let's hope Mr. Dobie and others like him can get over it.
Posted by Monica Smith at January 16, 2004 02:19 PM

-12 degrees--no record

Good morning from frigid New Hampshire. The temps outside are not as low as predicted. The empty guest bedrooms are down to 45 degrees and our own bedroom is at 60. The Mac does not seem happy with that number--refuses to load its programs.
The washing machine in the cellar doesn't want to work either. The hose seems to be frozen.
The dog is going to be encouraged to relieve herself down there, since at these temperatures it seems imprudent to take the long walks she usually needs. We'll see if a not-so-young dog can learn new tricks. She has learned that it's no fun being outside.
So much for the weather report.

The big issue on the Dean blog overnight was the negative media spin to which he has been subject and which has now been verified by an "independent" analysis of the major news sources.
After reading the New Yorker article on the White House relations with the press, it occurs to me that Dean is being used to compensate for the fact that there is very little unscripted "news" coming out of the Administration. So, in addition to providing "balance" for every critical report that covers his competitors in the Democratic primaries, Dean is the counter-point for "stories" about Bush.
If that's the case, then it's not surprising that there are so many negatives--one Dean for every Bush, Kerry, Gebhardt, Edwards, Clark, and Lieberman (Kucinich, Sharpton, and Braun having been virtually written off).
I'm not inclined to subscribe to the left- or right-wing bias theory, if only because a structural problem in the journalistic process could actually be fixed, while bias tends to be largely intractible. If it can even be proved.

Disrespecting Dr. Steinberg

Re: Maureen Dowd's disrespectful column

HAVE YOU NO SHAME, NEW YORK TIMES?

Health Care--Who Cares?

The American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) sent us a flyer the other day urging support for Dr. Dean's campaign for the Presidency because, as a medical doctor, he knows the country needs an affordable national program of health care. And yesterday Oprah's show was concerned with the risks to the health of very young teens. But, while I fervently support the effort to sweep the Shrub from the White House with a Brush (Howard BRUSH Dean, that is), those two events set me to thinking along somewhat contrarian lines.
I don't want national health care and I certainly don't want to pay for it. Affordable or not (?affordable? is a word that cries to be dissected all on its own) ?health care? is one of those bureaucratic terms which hides more than it discloses--a term intended to make people think they want something that they don't.
Children need care. Old people need care. The ill and injured need medical attention. Healthy people do NOT need care.
On the other hand, and the word ?hand? is very appropriate here, while I do not want to pay for other people's health care, a program of ?re-education? is certainly called for. It's amazing how quickly what one generation has learned can be forgotten when we don't pay attention. I'm referring here specifically the condition of people's hands--where they've been to, what they've touched, and when they were last washed.
Since the mouth is a very sensitive organ, it's only natural that young humans use it to assess their environment. But that's exactly why it used to be common practice, at least for people who cared about the well-being of their children, to teach children to keep their dirty fingers, as well as other body parts (their own and others'), out of their mouths; unless they knew for certain that these appendages had been well scrubbed, and recently, with soap and water to wash away those ?germs? and ?nasties,? the general designations of all the tiny and sometimes invisible critters whose sole object in their existence is to make humans very ill or die. While we have learned to categorize the worms, viruses and bacilli, who knows how many others a good scrubbing will keep at bay.
So, while I don't want to pay extra for education that should be a basic component of child care, I will do so anyway. Just as I'll pay for universal medical care because an ill or injured person affects and may even ?infect? all the people around him. That's also why I'll support a universal program of medically necessary care and attention, even for people whose personal behavior (speeding cars, smoking tobacco, abusing alcohol and drugs) causes them injury and disease. Things that are broken should, if it's possible, be fixed up and that includes people. Though I won't want to, I'll pay for that.
What I won't pay for is maintaining bodies hooked up to machines just so they can be shown off, like those mummified saints displayed behind glass in some European churches. If all the systems are broken and can't be made to work on their own, it's not good for the patient being "maintained" and it's not good for the people who man the machines, when their skills could be better applied to what can be fixed.
So, if it looks like we're going to have a President who actually knows something about illness and disease, we're going to need a frank discussion about what people actually need. They don't need ?healthcare? and they don't need more people pushing paper (or buttons on computers). They do need childcare and eldercare and medical care for the ill and injured. They also need educating in prevention and in knowing what goes into and comes out of one's mouth, and what shouldn't!
If the focus is on medically necessary care and education in prevention, a rich nation like ours can surely afford it.

Good News

New World Order

When Saddam Hussein sent his army into Kuwait in order to control the oil lying under that land, it seemed to me that he just made a simple mistake; had failed to recognize that there is a new world order in place.
This new world order is not based, as some would argue, on the military and economic might of the United States, but on the principle that when someone wants what someone else has, even if those someones are nations, one doesn't just take what one wants by force, like some primitive predator; one makes an exchange and returns fair value--i.e. one pays.
Paying for the things one wants that another lays claim to is what civilized people do. That is, they recognize other people's rights and values and structure their transactions accordingly by exchanging goods and services of equal value.
The role of money in this process is merely to facilitate the transfer over distance and time, as well as to extend the network of exchange to overcome the problem of only one of the parties to a transaction wanting what the other has. (For example: Since a truck driver is unlikely to want potatoes as fuel, if a potato farmer wants his potatoes hauled to market, he's going to have to pay the trucker some money.
A transaction mediated by money obviously isn't completed right away. That's why it's important that the money have more or less the same value from one day to the next. And that's one of the main functions governments perform. They issue currency and implicitly guarantee that the value expected will actually be received when the money is turned in for goods.
Indeed, if people can't count on a country's money retaining its value, they simply refuse to accept it. Or, in order to compensate for the loss in value they have come to expect, they demand more of it.

That, it seems, is what is happening to the U.S. dollar. While the dollar used to be so well respected that its use was virtually universal and people all around the globe saved dollars as a hedge against an uncertain future, just in the last few months it has lost twenty-five percent of its value.
When the European Union brought out a common currency, the Euro, there was much handwringing because it's initial value was some ten percent less than expected. Now, the tables have been reversed, so to speak, and it's the dollar that has dropped. And why? Because the European Union has proved more trustworthy than expected and the U.S. is trusted less.
There are many reasons why confidence in the United States, and therefor its currency, has decreased precipitously. Not only have we abrogated a number of significant international agreements having to do with weapons, pollution, energy and trade, but , in attacking another nation without provocation, we have ignored our commitment to the rule of law.
To those who might argue that our commitment to rebuild what we have destroyed in Iraq is an implicit recognition of the obligation to pay for what one takes, I can only respond that when the taker defines both sides of the equation (the value of what is taken and what is returned) , there is no valid exchange. That's extortion, pure and simple. If the transaction isn't voluntary, it's not an exchange.
What must be really frightning to the rest of the world is how quickly we have been transformed from a nation that deals fairly to one that resorts to extortion to get what it wants.
No wonder the markets reflect a sharp drop in confidence. Who would have thought our democracy could be derailed so easily? That predation would trump the new world order in a matter of months.

Brrrrrr....

-11° on the good old fahrenheit scale this morning here in Greenville.

Even if you live in Minot, ND that is COLD. Maybe I'll move to Florida....

Nah, been there, done that, ain't going back ;-)

DNC Address

Address to Democratic National Committee Winter Meeting
Friday February 21, 2003

Washington, D.C. (February 21, 2003)

(Edited Transcript)

First, let me thank my wonderful, loyal advance team. Don't they deserve a hand? And did you enjoy the maple syrup and cheese?

What I want to know . . . is why in the world the Democratic Party leadership is supporting the President's unilateral attack on Iraq?

What I want to know . . . is why are Democratic leaders supporting tax cuts? The question is not how big the tax cut should be -- the question should be: Can we afford a tax cut at all with the largest deficit in the history of the country?

What I want to know . . . is why we're fighting in Congress about the Patient's Bill of Rights when the Democratic Party ought to be standing up for health care for every man, woman and child in this country?

What I want to know . . . is why our folks are voting for the President's No Child Left Behind bill that leaves every child behind, every teacher behind, every school board behind and every property tax payer behind?

I am Howard Dean. And I'm here to represent the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party.

If you want young people to vote in this country, and if you want 50% of the adults that do not vote in today's elections to go to the polls, then we had better stand for something because that is why they're not voting.

Let me tell you what I want to do for America -- and what we've done in Vermont:

I want to balance the budget.

There has not been one Republican president that has balanced the budget in this country in 34 years. And if you want someone who can be responsible with your money, to take care of your tax dollars, then you had better elect a Democrat because Republicans cannot manage money.

In our state, I served long enough so that I had the privilege of serving through two recessions, not one recession. And when all that money was coming in between the recessions -- between the Bush recessions -- when all of that money was coming in during the good times thanks to Bill Clinton, who balanced the budget without a single Republican vote -- we gave some tax cuts, but we also saved money in a Rainy Day Fund and were able to pay back a quarter of our debt.

Today, not only is the budget balanced in these very difficult times, but my successor does not have to cut health care, does not have to cut higher education, and does not have to cut K-12 education.

I'm the only Governor running for President. And I'm the only one that's balanced the budget - including George Bush because in Texas the Lt. Governor balances the budget.

In our state virtually every child under the age of 18 has health insurance. We made Medicaid into a middle class entitlement. If I become President, with your help, the first item of business on the agenda is to do something that Harry Truman put into the Democratic platform in 1948. We're going to bring health care to every man, woman and child in America.

I'm the only Doctor in this race, and I've done it.

I want an environmental policy in this country that respects and preserves public lands against drilling. In our state we've preserved hundreds of thousands of acres, which will always be available for hunting, fishing, trapping, hiking and canoeing, and will never be developed. The Vermont I left as Governor in January will be the same Vermont a hundred years from now because we have been solid stewards of our natural resources. This President would like to drill on our natural resources.

We can do better.

Let me tell you something else I'm going to do. One of the things I thought was terrific about Bill Clinton was that when he became President in 1992, he said that his Cabinet would look like the rest of America -- and he did it. He did it.

I want all of our institutions of higher learning, - our law schools, our medical schools, our best universities - to look like the rest of America. I thought that one of the most despicable moments of this President's Administration was three weeks ago when, on national prime time television, he used the word "quotas" seven times. The University of Michigan does not now have quotas, has never had quotas, and "quota" is a race-loaded word designed to appeal people's fears of losing their jobs.

I intend to talk about race during this election in the South. The Republicans have been talking about it since 1968 in order to divide us, and I'm going to bring us together. Because you know what? White folks in the South who drive pick-up trucks with Confederate flag decals on the back ought to be voting with us because their kids don't have health insurance either, and their kids need better schools too.

We're not done yet.

Most of you know that six months before my last re-election I signed a bill into law that made Vermont the first state in American to guarantee equal rights to every person under the law - EVERY person under the law. That bill was called the Civil Unions bill. And it said that marriage is between a man and a woman, but same-sex couples are entitled to the exact same legal rights as I have - hospital visitation, insurance, and inheritance rights. All Americans are equal under the law in our state.

This bill was at about 40% in the polls when I signed it ? 60% were against it, six months before the election. I never got a chance to ask myself whether signing it was a good idea or not because I knew that if I were willing to sell out the rights of a whole group of human beings because it might be politically inconvenient for a future office I might run for, then I had wasted my time in public service.

I looked in the mirror, and I knew that if my political career were about myself, then I would not have signed that bill. But my political career has never been about getting elected. I didn't even seek the governorship. I became governor because my predecessor died in office twelve years ago.

My political career is about change. And this campaign is about change. What we're going to do here is, we're first going to change this party because this party needs to look in the mirror and ask itself: Is this party about the next election or is it about changing America?

This party needs to be about changing America, because only by changing America will we win back the White House.

I want a party that stands unashamedly for equal rights for all Americans.

I want a party that stands unashamedly for health care for every single American.

I want a party that stands unashamedly for balanced budgets and taking care of poor kids and voting together and healing the divides instead of expressing the divides and exploiting them the way the Republican Party has so shamelessly done since 1968.

I need your help.

We're going to change this party, and then we're going to change this country, and we're going to take back the White House, and we're going to balance the budget, and we're going to have healthcare for everybody, and we're going to have an America with its best institutions - right up to the Capitol - that looks, once again, like America.

We're going to bring hope to America, jobs to America, peace to America.

We're going to bring pride to the Democratic Party.

I need your help. Let's go get it. Let's go do it. Let's win the White House in November 2004.

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Bridge and Gypsy

The thermometer went all the way up to forty degrees yesterday so the Omi went to bridge and Gyspy went for a run. Sad to say, the fun one was having ruined the fun of the other.
Instead of coming back within an hour or so, Gypsy took off after a chipmonk (drawn out of his hole by the surprising warmth?) and then down to the woods and still hadn't come back when Omi headed out to play bridge at the Episcopal church.
Not knowing that her dog was safe at home really spoiled Omi's fun. It drove away her good cards and put her in a bad mood.
Meanwhile, the weather took a turn. Snow started to fly and created white-out conditions, followed ten minutes later by the reappearance of the sun. Gyspsy still didn't return. Finally, about three hours later, there she was loping along the path through the field.
This time of year her grey coat makes a nice contrast against the white snow. But I found it strange that she was following the line of the summer path when she could have easily run anywhere in the field at all.
Maybe it's because she's such a good tracker. I've noticed that she has to check out every foorprint in the snow along the side of the road--sniffing like it were some aphrodesiac. Deer hoofprints almost drive her to total distraction.
Anyway, once on her way to the house, she made straight for the back door and then her water bowl. Guess the ponds and creeks were still too frozen to drink. Or, she just forgot.

The Dean blog website has a new "create your own post-card facility." So far, it hasn't worked too well. But here's the picture I intend to use:

Media vs. Dean

My comments to blogforamerica.com this morning:
Haven't read all of the previous thread, but let me just observe that a certain amount of journalistic bias is a consequence of "standard operating procedures."
First off there's the fact that the headlines or titles of stories which signal their topic to the reader are NOT created by the reporter or writer of the story. They're generated by a headline writer whose reputation depends on how many people read the story but can't be held accountable for whether or not the title fits because nobody in the public even knows who he or she is.
Second, there's the fact that stories have a three part structure. Past, present and future. That's why there is always a recitation of what was said or happened before the present "news" and why, usually at the end of each story there's a prediction of what will happen next. Since predicting is easy (no facts to check and no accuracy possible) that part of the story tends to predominate.
What to do about this? Change the way journalism is taught and practiced. That, obviously, has a slim chance of happening--in part because the practitioners are comfortable with their "craft."
In a later post I'll try to demonstrate these points with an analysis of Peter S. Cannelos piece in this morning's Boston Globe.
Posted by Monica Smith at January 13, 2004 05:42 AM

Ok, regarding Canellos' piece:

The title is "Outrage sets Dean apart from the pack"

This is historically consistent. However, for this piece, a more accurate head would be "MORAL Outrage. . ." Perhaps the font would have had to be a bit smaller, but otherwise the size of the headline is not a valid consideration.
Indeed, if you are not put off by yet another reference to Dean's anger or temper or whatever, and actually force yourself to read the piece, you'll find that it is a very fair assessment. Goerge Lakoff's assessment that Dean's message is "'I'm listening to you. I care about you. And I'm going to do something about it,'" could hardly be more succinct or better. (Note how it conveniently provides the reporter with a prediction for the future).
I do however disagree with the tag line. Dean is not a "Daddy (who) still wants to take care of you." Howard Dean is a physician who knows that one sometimes has to hurt in order to heal. That's what he means when he talks about "removing the buck-shot from his butt."

By the way, there's a new line making the rounds about Dean being "lucky" to account for his surge in the polls, which seems to assume that being President of the United States is a good thing. It will surely be good for the country to have Dean as President. Speaking personally, I wouldn't want that job for anything.
Posted by Monica Smith at January 13, 2004 06:15 AM

Black Commentary

Here's something a little different to consider:

http://www.blackcommentator.com/72/72_cover_serpent.html

Fate of Iraq

While we were in transit from the island to Durham, somehow our New Yorkers got lost and are only now catching up.
There's an article in the November 24th issue by a George Parker, a letter from Baghdad which doesn't seem to have gotten the kind of national attention that it ought.
You may be wondering, after hearing Paul O'Neill assert that the decision to remove Saddam Hussein from office was made as early as ten days after the Bush Administration came into office, why there wasn't more planning about what would be done after the removal of Hussein by force had been achieved. Parker's report asserts that, indeed, plans for the aftermath were drawn up; they just weren't accepted, approved and followed.
One official is reported to have suggested that the reason Pentagon officials with expertise in postwar reconstruction were excluded from the planning process was because of “the fear. . .that such people would offer pessimistic scenarios, which would challenge Rumsfeld's aversion to using troops as peacekeepers; if leaked, these scenarios might dampen public enthusiasm for the war.”
“Public enthusiasm for the war.” That phrase is chilling. Who thinks that way?
In any event, Parker's observations just reinforce my suspicion that the reason the project in Iraq is in such disarray, is because Iraq is not the issue for the Bush Administration. The destruction of Iraq doesn't matter. Indeed, since the purpose of the Iraq adventure is to set an example for all those other nations who might be tempted to resist U.S. demands, the greater the destruction, chaos, and suffering, so much the better.
The fate of Iraq is to serve as a deterrent. Success will not be measured with statistics of improving health, education, welfare and the guarantee of human rights, but by whether or not its neighbors in the region apply the lessons of Iraq to their own behavior. And, as Drew Erdmann, now serving the National Security Council as Director for Iran and Stragetic Planning observed, “if the Iraqis don't hate us.”
I don't know about you, but I think that's shameful.

California News

Here's some news from the Dean blog for the California contingent of our family:

CALIFORNIA GETS ON TRACK FOR HOWARD DEAN!!

In 2 days, 21 people will be boarding the train for Iowa. They range in age from 18-82 and come from as far to the north as Redding Ca and to the south as Tehachapi. They are all converging in Emeryville to begin their journey to the center of the political universe to TAKE THEIR COUNTRY BACK.

You could not find 21 more excited people to be embarking on this adventure. The dedication of each and every traveler is pure inspiration.

It's been fun to pull these people together and it will be more fun to get to know them all and work together with a common purpose. Every one of us, willing to do whatever it takes to get this job done.

I was just on the news in our area, being interviewed during the debates tonite about why I'm going. My response was.... I want to take my country back. Our country has lost it's moral focus and we're tired of the lawless barons that run our country. (Which is why we'd never even THINK of doing something illegal like voting in the caucuses, as Gephardt has accused). I had my 2 minutes of fame and while it's very exciting, it's so much more important to me that I put out a message that might resonate with even ONE PERSON!

Some people who have to stay behind have created a team page. If you're interested in donating on behalf of all those going from sunny California to frrrrrreeeezing Iowa, click my name. It will be a grand way to show support from wherever you are for those of us that can do this trip.

GO DEAN!!! GO DEAN PEOPLE!!!!
Posted by Vicki in CA at January 12, 2004 02:54 AM

And here's a funny:

Portsmouth Report

The following is my morning contribution to the DeanforAmerica blog:

Eileen McNamara reports on the Portsmouth rally for the Boston Globe:

"the 900-plus voters who turned out for the candidate's midday appearance on Friday were electrified. . .

Where his rivals hear anger, Dean's audiences hear hope for real change. What his rivals perceive as rashness, Dean's supporters see as boldness. When he tells them that he does not have the power to change the country, that they do, these voters believe him and, maybe for the first time, think the political process belongs to them, not the candidates hungry for their votes.
It is an intoxicant, the empowerment that Howard Dean is peddling in New Hampshire. He keeps proving he can bring the state's voters to their feet. Now he needs to get them to the polls."
Posted by Monica Smith at January 11, 2004 07:03 AM

For those of you who aren't familiar with

http://www.blogforamerica.com

here's the address to go to for all the latest campaign news and comments from avid supporters as well as trolls (supporters of other candidates who aim to make mischief)

Dean Plates

The Dean Plates, fabricated by Makit Products of Dallas, Texas are now in production. i received the first set today. They are really neat. And, considering that NASCAR sells photoplates for $39.95, these plates at $12.95 for one are a real bargain. The whole set of six comes to $69.95 from

http://www.americatakingaction.com/HD/

If you order 10 or more you can get a bulk rate price.

My favorites are:

Letter to Iowa

Since this weekend is probably the last time it will be worth writing and mailing letters to undecided Iowa voters, that's going to be my major task today and tomorrow.

I haven't yet decided if I should give in and just print them out, instead of writing them by hand, but I've come up with a pretty concise letter that you might use, if you're tempted to get some names from

http://www.blogforamerica.com

Dear (Mr./Ms) name from "Letters"

You may have heard from neighbors and friends that they've gotten notes from Gov. Dean's supporters urging them to attend their precinct caucus and vote for Gov. Dean. Well, that's what this is.

Living here in New Hampshire, I've seen Dr. Dean in person three times. After today he's going to be in Iowa and, hopefully, you'll have a chance to hear what he says as well.

Just in case you don't, let me tell you that the main reason I want Howard Dean to be our next President is because he's really committed to "government of, by and for the people"--not the wealthy or corporate interests, but every individual person.

And when you go to caucus, if the candidate you favor isn't Dean and doesn't have enough people to stay in the running, please step over to Howard's side.

Best Wishes,

Monica Smith

Minus 9 but heading up

As promised, it's colder today. Minus 9 when we got up but now that it's time to take out the dog it's up to minus 5.
Our two wood stoves are keeping most of the house comfortable. The living room stays at about sixty, when closed off from the kitchen. But the bedrooms above have dropped to 45 with the doors closed.
When the Dean people come, guess we'll have to turn on the electric heat--unless they're from Alaska.
Don't know what I'd wear if Clif hadn't brought that super warm Aran sweater from Ireland for me. Living in Florida and Georgia the last 26 years really depleted the winter wardrobe. My reluctance to buy new clothes doesn't help.
I actually ordered a pair of warm water-proof boots before we came up, but, as usual, they didn't fit. Couldn't get my high arches in. Just one of the things that makes living in the north a little more complicated than living in the south.

It's -5 degrees

It's minus five degrees--more ice than snow:

No WMD? who cares?

So, another group of OUR analysts has determined, agreeing with Sadam Hussein and the UN weapons inspectors, that there were NO weapons of mass destruction in Iraq when the United States attacked. What do you want to bet Rummy is unimpressed?

Rummy made it clear some time ago that ?Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.? This is a logically correct or ?true? statement. What it means is that the inability to see (hear, smell, taste, feel) something doesn't PROVE that something isn't there. It's quite possible that one's senses have gone bad.

What is equally true, however, is that it isn't possible to prove that something ISN'T, ever.
The negative cannot be proven. Which, of course, is why our system of justice presumes that an individual is innocent--i.e. hasn't done something--until it has been shown that he did. This isn't a matter of bending over backwards or giving someone the ?benefit of the doubt.? It's simply a matter of logic. There is no way for an accused person to prove he didn't do something. We do what we can.

If you're thinking, ?Du..h!? at this point, bear with me for just a little longer. I just said that our system of justice presumes innocence when dealing with an accused. It's what we are taught in school and it's what we are led to believe. But in actual practice that's not how the system behaves.

How do I know? From personal experience and observation, going back over twenty years. As Dr. Phil would say, ?a changing day in (my) life? happened when my spouse and I were arrested--he because he refused to give his height and weight (which they could judge for themselves) to a couple of campus cops who had come to our house, ostensibly to complete a complaint WE had filed the evening before; I because I objected rather vociferously to this blatantly illegal assault.

Of course, we hired a lawyer and after some back and forth the charges against us were dismissed. The eye-opener came from the lawyer who was moved to explain, for some reason I didn't comprehend at the time, that he had ?never had an innocent client before.?
Since he was relatively young, though not inexperienced in the criminal law, I assumed it to be a factual representation of his practice, peculiar to him; not that we were an exception to the general experience of his profession. He was not, however, moved to return the substantial retainer we had paid him. Perhaps he felt entitled to be compensated for the hours he had spent fruitlessly trying to persuade us to plead guilty.

So, in addition to feeling violated by the cops, I felt we had been cheated by the system and that perhaps I should take a closer look--consider the money it had cost us not as wasted, but as a down-payment on an education. I became a court watcher. And I soon discovered that, regardless of the supposed presumption of innocence, the general consensus in law-enforcement was that ?everyone's guilty of something.?

Whether this is a conclusion derived from experience or a prejudice arising from one's religious beliefs (in Original Sin), the consequence for the legal system is, to put it bluntly, sloppiness. Because, if everyone's guilty, then they obviously deserve to be punished, regardless of whether their guilty of the particular misbehavior or crime they are charged with. And if that's the case, then it doesn't really matter if those who run the system do a good job or not.

What does this have to do with the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq? Everything, I would suggest. The fact that they haven't been found is irrelevant because Sadam Hussein was clearly guilty of having, using, and/or wanting them in the past, so he deserved to be punished. That a lot of ?innocent? Iraqis, not to mention American soldiers, have suffered the ?ultimate penalty? (meaning that they can no longer be punished because they are dead) is just too bad.

Or rather, given that ?everyone is guilty of something,? they too probably got what they ?deserved.? Besides, there's always the ?deterrent effect? of the system of justice to fall back on. This is the belief that all punishment is preventive in the sense that the example of one person being punished will keep another from doing whatever that person did to ?deserve? it, even if they didn't do anything. Which, of course, cannot be proven.

It is this belief, for which there is no support in fact, upon which the Bush administration's so-called Doctrine of Preemption is based. Preemption in this case is actually a component of prevention. The intent is that the attack on Iraq will be seen as an example by other ?bad actors? in the region (or even the whole world), and that they will thereby be deterred from doing their own thing. In other words, though it would be impolitic to admit it, especially since it conflicts with our supposed principles of justice, the assault on Iraq was actually intended to influence the behavior of someone else--someone who is almost certainly stronger and more likely to fight back. Which suggests that the people who die, ?innocent victims? or not, are being sacrificed to satisfy some ulterior goal. Not because of what they or their government did, but because of what OUR government wants others not to do.

Which, of course, is exactly the strategy employed by terrorists--target the uninvolved and powerless in order to influence the behavior of those who are!

Head shots

A precious shot of Dean and Bradley at the announcement of the latter's support.

Omi casts a vote

The Omi has done her civic duty and cast har absentee ballot for the primary. She thinks a 96 year old woman should bring the candidate luck.

Of course, she had to vote for the one to whose campaign she had made the first contribution ever in her life.

That she now has to wait until next November the see the final result is a bummer. She was so hoping to depart to her reward before then.

Dean 2004 Meetup

find out more at dean2004.meetup.com

Last night I attended my first meetup for Dean. There were eight scheduled in the Dover-Portsmouth area, including Durham, but I chose to attend the one in Newmarket.

There were eight of us, including one Dean staffer and two interns (from New York and Ohio) and our task for the night was to get an update on future events, sign and address letter to undecided Democratic voters and commit ourselves to future work. I agreed to do "comfort driving" on election day. That is, to drive people needing a ride and bring poll workers food.
Hopefully, Winnie the Deanmobile will be back on the road by then.

It was getting close to 10 degrees when I headed out. When I came out of the bookstore/cafe, it had begun to snow and blow. It's not quite light enough yet to see how much we got, but it's sure to be pretty.
The Omi has finally realized that "we are having a REAL winter." The house is toasty, with two wood stoves going and her room continues to maintain a steady 70 degrees with the electric strip. The room is so small, the charges hardly make a dent in the overall electric bill.
Time to deliver the morning pils. So, more later.

I am hoping to get the Dean plates later this week.

Pay not Tax

OK. I like the analogy suggested in an earlier thread of Bush putting $300 in my front pocket while he slips $500 unnoticed out of my back. BUT, I'm sure gonna notice when someone else comes to take my last $300 too. So, this characterization of the tax issue doesn't really work.
What we have to do is change the topic from TAX to PAY. After all, what's the easiest way to get a tax cut? A cut in pay! So, the message to every high earner that's concerned about paying too much in taxes is to take a cut in pay. It doesn't have to be as drastic as those taken by Ken Lay and Koslowski's (who probably didn't pay a fair share of their take in taxes anyway), but anyone whose six figure income has gone up by , let's say, 25%, just ought to give some of it back. By increasing the pay of their hourly workers, for example, who can then pay the tax. And do so gladly.

Perhaps what we need is a 25 % solution. That seems like a good number. 25% is pretty close to the increase the Congress men and women have voted for themselves, not including whatever benefit they got from the tax cut they then agreed on.
Nevertheless, 25% is also by how much the value of the dollar has dropped since Bush came into office. Which, of course, means that everything we buy from overseas (because it used to be cheaper and why wage workers didn't need an increase in pay) is suddenly 25% more expensive.
That's why economists are worried that there's inflation up ahead--when all those bills have to be paid to Europe and Asia in worth-less dollars.
On the other hand, by manipulating the interest rate on the money banks lend to each other, the Federal Reserve has made borrowing money a lot cheaper and savings accounts that used to grow by 5% a year have shrunk down to 1%. And that, my friends, is a cut of 80%! (Percentages are funny things whose size varies, depending on whether they're going up or down). I guess 25% doesn't mean much when we're considering how much income traditional savers, the people who rely on banks to keep their money safe, have lost. Whatever the size of the tax cut, 25 percent or a 100, it's irrelevant if there's no income.
And that's also true for the three million people who have been put out of work. (To say they have ?lost their jobs? is really unfair since it implies that they are somehow at fault.)
They got a tax cut of a 100 percent. So, you see, it isn't just the people at the top of the income ladder who pay less. The number of people at the bottom who pay nothing is steadily increasing! Just think of that--a tax cut for everyone whose pay is cut. That must be why the Department of Labor is advising employers on how to avoid paying employees more. God forbid their taxes should increase!

Question of the day: Why do some people want something for nothing and resist paying (giving fair value) for the services they get? Because an exchange of value represents a transaction between equals and some people want nothing more than to be superior.

Dean Plates

This is my favorite of the Dean Plates.

On the ground in NH

The following are observations from someone on the ground in Portsmouth, NH who's obviously not yet a supporter and may never be. I'm sending it on because I think it's important that we not spend too much energy singing to the choir or gazing at our navels.

"No, I am still staying neutral on the candidates. (My wife) has posted a Dean sign in our front yard, so she has definitely come out as a supporter. As for how I will vote, I must admit that I am torn between Dean and Clark. I will probably not make up my mind until the day of the election.

(My wife) hosted a book discussion group tonight. The participants are all marine docents who desired to do more than just docent work. I became enmeshed in a political conversation with them before their meeting began. Every single one of them expressed concern that Dean might not be able to beat Bush, even though they were leaning towards him. (Well, actually one liked Kerry, but all the rest liked Dean). That question of electability seems to be arising more and more as this primary winds down. I am not sure why it is coming up now. The fact that Dean's campaign has been around in New Hampshire for so long might have something to do with it. (I think that it was last February when I first heard him speak!) His voter base may be developing faint hearts vis a vis the ruthless Bush machine. But, whatever, I sense a softness developing in his strength here. Well, we shall see. I have never been noted for how good my political predictions turn out. Usually just the opposite, in fact."

I can attest that the writer of the above is genetically disposed to be pessimistic. That said, I think he provides an unvarnished description of the event in question.

We are up so early because my lucky spouse is getting ready to have breakfast with the Gov in Manchester! So, I have to walk the dog, etc.
Women do the work and men get all the glory!
Posted by Monica Smith at January 6, 2004 05:28 AM

Omi's Bacon

When people get to be 96, like the Omi, their condition tends to be, as the doctor says, "variable." Which means that every day is likely to be different, including new experiences--like noticing that one dreams, for example.
Believe it or not, the Omi has only recently become aware of dreaming. Last night was another first--she actually talked in her sleep! Except for the fact that she doesn't like bacon, the command coming to me out of the speaker, that I make up some bacon sandwiches for her great grandsons sounded reasonable enough-if you ignored the fact that it was the middle of the night and the boys haven't been here in over a week.
I did get up to check on her and found her sound asleep. But a bit of prompting this morning did let her recall her dream and accuse me of "letting her down" by refusing to cook the bacon.
It's all my fault, of course, because yesterday I teased her by asking if she wanted a bacon sandwich. Shouldn't have done that. On the other hand, the dream bacon gave her something to laugh and talk about.