America Is Suffering Because We've Turned Our Political 'Employees' Into Aristocrats

Beneath the Spin * Eric L. Wattree

America Is Suffering Because We’ve Turned Our Political ‘Employees’ Into Aristocrats

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I often hear people complaining about how our system has broken down. As a solution they generally propose that we put term limits into place, and/or institute government-financed elections. I’m all for the latter, but I’m totally against term limits because it takes away the citizens’ right to return people to office who represent them well. I’m against any measure that takes away a citizen’s ‘right to choose.’
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But the assertion that the system has broken down begs the question. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with the system as it is. WE are the problem, not the system. We are negligently apathetic. Those of us who even bother to vote and keep ourselves informed about what’s going on around us assume that we can simply vote for the politicians we like then go on about our business and allow the politicians to run the country, but that’s not it’s supposed to work.
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The United States is a huge corporation, we’re the Board of Directors, and politicians are our EMPLOYEES, not our leaders - we’re THEIR leaders, and we’re doing an absolutely horrible job of leading. So again, the system is not the problem, we're simply an incompetent board of directors.
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Instead of staying on top of the day-to-day activities of our corporation as any competent board of directors would do, we’re choosing to remain at home watching BET, MTV, ESPN, and allowing our employees a free hand to run our valuable corporation as they see fit, and as a direct result of our gross negligence, our employees are doing what unsupervised employees are prone to do - taking advantage of the situation by giving themselves undeserved raises and perks, doing favors for family, friends, and favored associates, and generally squandering the corporation's assets.
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So we need to get a handle on this, and we can do just that very easily - and without changing one law. All we have to do is decide that enough is enough, and start firing employees. Corporation's don’t control this government, we do. But the problem is, we’re allowing corporations to control us by using their wealth to influence our thinking. That’s the one and only thing that gives money clout in our political system, it’s being used to influence our thinking. So we’re right back to square one - we’re being manipulated because we’re refusing to educate ourselves and we’re ALLOWING ourselves to be. We are, LITERALLY, allowing snake oil salesmen to come into our homes and convince us that we’re un-American if we don’t buy their snake oil.
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We’ve allowed the Supreme Court to tell us that a non-citizen head of a foreign corporation has as much of a right to the freedom of speech in OUR political system as an American citizen, and we're merely accepting that - and virtually, without even a whimper. That is patently a corrupt and ridiculous ruling. So of course the system is breaking down, because we, as the nation's  board of directors, are being stupidly incompetent and unassertive.
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Again, even if we were talking about exclusively American corporations, that ruling is corrupt and ridiculous, and we need to be taking aggressive action against it. Because the fact is, the only reason a corporation is a corporation in the first place is so its members can avoid personal responsibility, and liability, for its missteps. So the members of the corporation can’t have it both ways. If a corporation is a person, then EVERY person that is a part of that corporation should be held PERSONALLY responsible if it pollutes half the Eastern seaboard due to an oil spill, or causes an earthquake due to fracking, or causes devastating hurricanes due to heating up our environment. And another thing that makes the ruling ridiculous is EVERY member of a given corporation ALREADY has the freedom of speech as individuals, so by also allowing them to assert their will, or speak, as a corporation, is by definition, giving them more rights than the average American citizen. While we may shout, this conservative Supreme Court has given corporations, including foreign corporations, a megaphone.

So what can we do to turn this situation around?

In order to turn this situation around, we must, first, educate ourselves and change our mindset. We must make pouring tons of money into a political campaign a liability rather than an asset in our political process. If we see that any politician or political initiative is being backed by a huge political war chest of funds, we should simply assume that the politician is in the pocket of some corporation or entity that’s not working in the best interest of the people, and the same is true of any political initiative.
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If the people would simply tune-in to the fact that corporations are trying to buy the government, then vote any politician out of office who supported them, and thereafter, exact a pound of flesh from the corporations in the next congress for even attempting to manipulate the system, we wouldn’t have to change one law - even Citizens United. That is the way this system is supposed to work, and that would make money meaningless in politics. Thus, we should seek out our political information through research and grassroots sources, because ultimately, education is the key to resolving all of our problems - at least, the systemic ones.
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Secondly, we must bring the political perks and salaries of politicians back into line with the median income of the American middle class. As I continually point out, America is currently knee-deep in a class war. A study done by Princeton University declares that America is no longer a democracy; it is now an oligarchy, completely controlled by the wealthy, and easily researched facts bear that out. The top 5% of the people in this country control 82% of the wealth, while the bottom 80% of Americans only control 7% of the wealth. Once that percentage dwindles down to 5%, and then 2%, we’ll be virtual slaves. As I’ve mentioned before, the only difference between the condition we’re going to find ourselves in and actual slavery is we’ll have to provide our own housing.
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Yet, we’re paying the people who "represent" us such huge salaries and perks that we’ve elevated them into the class that seeks to enslave us. We’ve got to correct that situation, because our so-call representatives are doing so much better than we are that even if they wanted to, they can no longer identify with us, and many of them no longer even try. So we need to place a ceiling on their salaries and perks not to exceed the median range of the American middle class, and also attach them to a given percentage above the minimum wage.
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And finally, we need to reinstate the Fairness Doctrine in order to curb the flood of demagoguery and disinformation that’s completely overwhelming truth in our political system.
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The Fairness Doctrine provided that if any television or radio station in America broadcasted a purely partisan perspective on a public issue, they had to provide equal time to the opposing point of view. The doctrine’s purpose was first, to keep the American people informed, and secondly, to prevent the demagoguery that we see today on Fox News, and it served its purpose well. It provided endless public debate on every public issue, and that, in turn, served to keep the nation informed of every side of every issue. In addition, a person like Rush Limbaugh couldn’t have existed under the Fairness Doctrine, at least, not without having a liberal sitting right next to him who could challenge every lie he told. But some stations found that too combative, so they simply gave a liberal a show with equal time that immediately followed shows like Rush Limbaugh's.
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Some suggest that the Freedom of Information Act abridges a network's right to freedom of speech, but I contend that no network should have the right to corrupt the system with lies.  That's akin to shouting 'fire' in a crowded theater - or worse, because we're not simply talking about bringing possible harm to a room full of people, we're talking about bringing DEMONSTRATED harm to an entire nation.
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But conservatives found that when the people were informed of the facts, the conservative point of view always fell short. That’s why it became so important to them to abolish the doctrine, so they could spew their lies and propaganda with impunity - and that’s exactly what came to pass. Immediately after Ronald Reagan abolished the doctrine, conservative-leaning corporations began to buy up most of the media outlets across the country, effectively shutting out the liberal perspective from the American people. That monopoly, and the ability to corrupt public discourse, must be brought to an end.
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So the only thing left to discuss at this point is how are we going to get politicians to conform to our wishes. That one’s easy - we vote ‘em out of office if they don’t.
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Eric L. Wattree
http://wattree.blogspot.com/
Ewattree@Gmail.com
Citizens Against Reckless Middle-Class Abuse (CARMA)
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Religious bigotry: It's not that I hate everyone who doesn't look, think, and act like me - it's just that God does.

　

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U.S. Postal Service: Is the Budget More Important Than Employees Exposed to TB?

Beneath the Spin * Eric L. Wattree

U.S. Postal Service: Is the Budget More Important Than Employees Exposed to TB?

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On Tuesday, August 2, 2011, when the employees showed up for work at the United States Postal Service’s Los Angeles International Service Center (LAXISC), they were greeted by a note on the time clock instructing them to gather in the main conference room at 3:30 p.m. After all of the employees assembled, along with some military personnel and personnel from the Center for Disease Control, they were informed by the plant manager, a Mr. Holden, that they had been exposed to tuberculosis. They were told that an employee had contracted the disease about a year earlier and they had just been informed by the CDC.
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According to a rerliable source, Mr. Holden then went on to inform the employees that only "high risk" personnel would be tested. When asked why wasn’t everyone being tested, a repreesentative from the Los Angeles County Health Department indicated that the budget precluded them from testing everyone.  Manager Holden later went on to suggest that if the employees had any concerns they should contact their private physicians and arrange to be tested. Thereafter, they tested all of the managers and just a few of the employees that they considered high risk.
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The source also indicated that the APWU’s presence was all but nonexistent at the meeting. The source said:
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"The local president, John Driver, and none of the local officers bothered to come to the meeting. Instead, the treasurer, Darryl Brown, came and did not even ask any questions or voice any concerns about the situation. Is this what our president and local think of us whereas we are not even important enough for them to be present to see about our safety and welfare regarding an employee being diagnosed with TB that we all may have come in contact with and may even have exposed our families to?"
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Subsequently, it was found that the employee that caused the exposure died on July 8, 2011. Of twenty-six employees tested as of last week, thirteen tested positive. So here are a few questions just begging to be asked:
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1. If thirteen of the twenty-six employees that’s been tested so far tested positive (half), isn’t that cause for concern? Wouldn’t it be prudent to put budgetary concerns aside, if for no other reason than to protect the health of the employees, and their family, friends, and neighbors?
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2. Since all of the employees at that facility were potentially exposed to TB on the job, why do they have to incur the expense of going to their own physician? Isn’t that considered a job related hazard, and isn’t it the postal service’s responsibility to protect the job-related threat to the health and safety of it’s employees and their families? 3. Since all of the employees worked in one facility and the postal service has no idea how the employees came into contact with one another in commons areas, lunchrooms, restrooms, etc. How did they determine who was "high risk?"
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4. How does the postal service justify testing all of management and not the employees who are in much closer contact with one another?
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5. Where’s OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) in all of this? Don’t they have a role in seeing to it that the postal service doesn’t give their budget priority over the safety, health, and welfare of their employees?
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6. Why would the Health Department representative speak to budgetary issues?  It is the postal service's responsibility to protect both, its employees, and the public, from this deadly disease.  
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7. And where are the unions? Why aren’t they in there demanding that the postal service test every employee in that facility to ensure that they are free of a virulent disease that can kill not only them, but their children?
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This situation is a prime example of the fact that apathy on the part of the American people has allowed both the business community, and our government, to write the poor and middle-class off as expendable and secondary to profits. We see it everywhere, including on the battlefield, with the endless wars that use poor and middle-class troops as cannon fodder to promote the interests of war profiteers and oil companies. As we speak the oil companies are rushing into Lybia to divide up the spoils that poor and middle-class troops have died for while thinking they were defending the interests of our country.
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And the irony is, the children of the people who benefit most from the death of the poor and middle class troops, the rich, are no longer even expected to defend this country. Dying for this country is now considered the job of the “little people.” The job of the rich is to merely sit back and reap the benefits of our sacrifices.
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We saw the very same scenario in play when the 29 coal miners were killed in West Virginia on April 5, 2010. Hubpages.com reported:
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"29 COAL MINERS DIE in COAL MINING EXPLOSION
The Massey Energy Company of Montcoal, West Virginia ignored violations and warnings that the Upper Big Branch Coal Mine which they own, was not safe for coal miners to be working in."
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Then just weeks later, on April 20, 2010, eleven oil workers were killed in a horrific explosion on an oil rig run by British Petroleum. In the aftermath of the disaster The Daily Beast reported:
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"A document obtained by The Daily Beast shows that BP, in a previous fatal disaster, increased worker risk to save money."
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The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has known about the threat to public health of the job-related transmission of TB for some time:

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"The Occupational Safety and Health Administration is proposing a health standard, to be promulgated under section 6(b) of the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970, 29 U.S.C. 655, to control occupational exposure to tuberculosis (TB). TB is a communicable, potentially lethal disease that afflicts the most vulnerable members of our society: the poor, the sick, the aged, and the homeless. As many as 13 million U.S. adults are presently believed to be infected with TB; over time, more than 1 million of these individuals may develop active TB disease and transmit the infection to others. TB remains a major health problem with 22,813 active cases reported in the U.S. in 1995. A number of outbreaks of this disease have occurred among workers in health care settings, as well as other work settings, in recent years. To add to the seriousness of the problem, some of these outbreaks have involved the transmission of multidrug-resistant strains of Mycobacterium tuberculosis, which are often fatal. Although it is the responsibility of the U.S. Public Health Service to address the problem of tuberculosis in the general U.S. population, OSHA is solely responsible for protecting the health of workers exposed to TB as a result of their job.
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"OSHA estimates that more than 5 million U.S. workers are exposed to TB in the course of their work: in hospitals, homeless shelters, nursing homes, and other work settings. Because active TB is endemic in many U.S. populations, including groups in both urban and rural areas, workers who come into contact with diseased individuals are at risk of contracting the disease themselves. The risk confronting these workers as a result of their contact with TB-infected individuals may be as high as 10 times the risk to the general population. Although the number of reported cases of active TB has slowly begun to decline after a resurgence between 1985-1992, 16 states reported an increase in the number of TB cases in 1995, compared with 1994. Based on a review of the data, OSHA has preliminarily concluded that workers in hospitals, nursing homes, hospices, correctional facilities, homeless shelters, and certain other work settings are at significant risk of incurring TB infection while caring for their patients and clients or performing certain procedures. To reduce this occupational risk, OSHA is proposing a standard that would require employers to protect TB-exposed employees by means of infection prevention and control measures that have been demonstrated to be highly effective in reducing or eliminating job related TB infections. These measures include the use of respirators when performing certain high hazard procedures on infectious individuals, procedures for the early identification and treatment of TB infection, isolation of individuals with infectious TB in rooms designed to protect those in the vicinity of the room from contact with the microorganisms causing TB, and medical follow-up for occupationally exposed workers who become infected. OSHA has preliminarily determined that the engineering, work practice, and administrative controls, respiratory protection, training, medical surveillance, and other provisions of the proposed standard are technologically and economically feasible for facilities in all affected industries.

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"DATES: Written comments on the proposed standard must be postmarked on or before December 16, 1997 and notices of intention to appear at the informal rulemaking hearings must be postmarked on or before December 16, 1997."

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Now, in spite the stern warning of a sister agency regarding the importance of controlling the spread of this virulent disease in the workplace, we see the United States Postal Service all but ignoring the possibility that their employees could take a deadly, and possibly incurable, disease home to their families, neighbors, and friends just to save a dollar. And just as telling, the employee unions are simply standing by mute, watching this unconscionable, atrocious, and flagrant act of irresponsibility like it's business as usual. What more do we have to see to understand that it's time for American workers to stand up and retake control of their lives?
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It’s time for American workers to wake up and begin to realize that their apathy is allowing them to be written off as expendable. It's time for them to change that by using the political clout of their numbers to make themselves heard. It’s past time for them to realize that they're knee-deep in a class war that they’re losing badly.
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The idea that we can simply vote people into office and depend on them to protect our interests is a myth, and the institutions that are supposedly setup to protect our interests are actually designed to protect the status quo by giving us the illusion of justice - anyone who’s ever tried to sue a corporation for its misdeeds can attest to that. All of these institutions are myths designed to allow the few to control the many.
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History is clear. There is no example in the history of mankind where justice has simply been bestowed upon a people. The only way to obtain justice is to be strong enough to take it, and then steadfast enough in your vigilance to hold on to it. So the bottom line is, you cannot depend on politicians, union representatives, or anyone else to defend your rights without seeing to it that they have something to lose by failing to do so. Thus, the only defender of justice that we can truly depend upon is just us.
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The U.S. Postal Service is a United States government agency, so if this nation truly believed in justice, the U. S. postal service would be in the very forefront of the fight to protect employee rights. But instead, the United States Postal Service, one the few, if not the only, government agency actually mentioned in the United States Constitution, is more hostile to workers’ rights than any agency in any dictatorship anywhere in the world.
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We’ve got to bring this fact to President Obama’s attention, because as chief executive officer, he’s the head of that agency. How can we commit the lives of American troops to fight for the rights of people in other lands, while their parents are working on a plantation here at home?
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So it’s time for not only postal workers to wake up, but for poor and middle-class workers all across this country to come together and flex their political clout. If we are to survive as a nation, poor and middle-class workers must begin to understand that they will never again be secure in their jobs or their way of life until they come together to ensure that their politicians, union officials, and employers are insecure in theirs.
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Eric L. Wattree

http://wattree.blogspot.com/
Ewattree@Gmail.com
Citizens Against Reckless Middle-Class Abuse (CARMA)


Religious bigotry: It's not that I hate everyone who doesn't look, think, and act like me - it's just that God does.

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Will The Real President Obama Please, Please Stand up?

Beneath the Spin * Eric L. Wattree

Will The Real President Obama Please, Please Stand up?

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I’ve been a steadfast Obama supporter every since the very first day he arrived on the political scene, but I must admit, it hasn’t always been easy. First, even as a candidate, he reversed his position on FISA after it was revealed that the Bush administration had been illegally spying on the American people. Then once elected, instead of allowing his attorney general a free hand to hold Bush and Cheney accountable for the war crimes committed in Iraq as prescribed both by law, and his oath of office, he sent the message to his attorney general, and the American people, that we shouldn’t "look back" on the murder of close to a million people.

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Then, instead of giving us the change that we could believe in that he promised during the campaign, he’s allowed the Republican Party to frame a completely false political debate which has given them free rein to hold the American people hostage and keep us in absolute misery. And while all this is going on, the only word coming out of his mouth is "compromise."

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Many of my fellow Obama supporters contend that the president can only do so much, which is absolutely true. But what he can do is use the bully pulpit of the presidency to educate the people, which he’s failing miserably at. The entire GOP agenda is based on flat-out lies, the blatant corruption of facts, and a deviation from reality that’s so severe that even a child could see it if someone would simply take the time to explain it. So why isn’t Obama doing that?

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President Obama should have a staff right next door to the Oval Office that’s dedicated to nothing but poking holes in Republican lies. If the White House had such a staff, John Boehner, Eric Canter, and the rest of the GOP demagogues would be afraid to tell the blatant lies that they’re telling, because they’d know that every time they told a lie, the very next day the entire news cycle would be dedicated to pointing it out.
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How much time would it take to demonstrate to the American people that it’s not the rich who create jobs? It’s the poor and middle class who create jobs by buying goods and services. It doesn’t matter how big a tax break you give the rich, they are not going to hire anyone to produce goods unless they have someone to sell them to. Is Gucci going to hire people to produce his handbags if he’s forced to sell them in a homeless shelter? Of course not, because no one in the homeless shelter can afford to buy them. Well, that’s exactly what the GOP is turning America into - a vast homeless shelter.
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The American people need to be educated to the fact that the GOP, in collusion with multinational corporations - and I now suspect, the United States government - are purposely keeping unemployment high in order to bring down the standard of living of the American middle class. In the new global economy American corporations are forced to compete with countries who pay their workers less per week than many Americans spend on lunch per day. Thus, the standard of living of the American middle class has become a liability. So the continued high unemployment rate, in spite of record corporate profits, is nothing but a ploy to get the American people accustomed to expecting less for their labor. That’s also why the GOP is engaged in a concerted effort to destroy labor unions.
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But it’s not just labor that’s under attack. Every facet of American life is under assault. It started with the abolishment of the Fairness Doctrine. That allowed corporations to turn the public airways into a propaganda conduit. Corporations are now allowed to lie to us with impunity and deprived us of all reliable sources of information in the news. And at the same time, the entertainment division of that very same corporate media is telling us what and how we should think, act, and what is and is not acceptable. The corporatists are turning us into unthinking Stepford children. Thank God for the internet, but I assure you, they’ll be zeroing in on it much more aggressively very soon.
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In addition, our schools are being corporatized. If we don’t do something about that soon, in the very near future corporations will be programming our children instead of educating them. We’re currently knee-deep in a class war, and our educational system is being used to solidify and reinforce a new class system. In the very near future, poor and middle-class children will have one of two options - either accept whatever crumbs the corporations decide to throw at them, or become cannon fodder for the military-industrial complex.
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Have you noticed that the children of the rich are no longer even expected to fight for this country? So why should they care about the endless wars that we’re engaging in? No one they love is dying, so it’s just a matter of dollars and cents to them.
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So the rich don’t pay taxes, and they don’t fight and die for the country. So exactly what is their function in society? I’ll tell you what it is – to sit back like royalty, prosper on our misery, and complain that the grandparents of the people who are dying for the country are too much of a burden on the nation. That’s it. Then, to promote their interests, the GOP is holding us hostage every chance they get, and saying, ”Let them eat cake” - and the president is talking about balance and compromise? Please!
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So yes, there is something that one man can do. The President of the United States can educate America, and thereby, save the American people from utter disaster. Because the one thing that holds this entire conspiracy together is ignorance. Without it, the conspiracy will come tumbling down like a house of cards.
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So Mr. President, at this point in our history compromise is the very last thing we need. What we need now is firm, aggressive, and uncompromising leadership.
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Eric L. Wattree
http://wattree.blogspot.com/
Ewattree@Gmail.com
Citizens Against Reckless Middle-Class Abuse (CARMA)
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Religious bigotry: It's not that I hate everyone who doesn't look, think, and act like me - it's just that God does.

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Is the GOP Manipulating Black Intellectuals to destroy the First Black President?

Beneath the Spin * Eric L. Wattree

Is the GOP Manipulating Black Intellectuals to destroy the First Black President?

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Unfortunately, the corporatocracy seems to understand Black people much better than we understand ourselves. But that’s fully understandable, since they’ve had centuries of experience in observing our behavior. They understand that since Black people are the product of the very same racist environment as White people, we tend to be just as racist toward other Blacks as any Hillbilly. That explains why we never see a drive-by committed by a person wearing a sheet. The Klan has learned, just like the powers that be, that we’re much more efficient at destroying one another than they could ever be.

That’s what makes the phrase “airing our dirty laundry” such a joke. Everyone else in the world seems to see the skid marks in our dirty drawers but us. Take the matter of Barack Obama , for example. Those who specialize in manipulating the American people clearly understand that his rapid rise to become President of the United States tends to diminish the accomplishments of Black leaders and intellectuals all over the country. Thus, many of these leaders have become ripe, willing, and enthusiastic accomplices in the effort to drag this president down, regardless of the negative consequences to Black people, or America as a whole. So the manipulators know that all they have to do is suggest reasonable sounding grounds to criticize Obama, then sit back and wait for the envious Black aristocracy to till the fields and pluck the cotton.

It’s the old crabs in a barrel syndrome. It’s a technique that has never failed in over three hundred years. It kept us in slavery, it was the foundation of CoIntelPro, and it killed Malcolm X. So it’s a technique that has been tried, certified, and true. But now, instead of slaves snitchin’ on slaves, we have so-called Black leaders and intellectuals engaging in 21st century arguments to justify 19th century thinking.

Now don’t get me wrong, every politician deserves intense scrutiny and criticism when needed, and that includes Barack Obama. In fact, my very next article is going to do just that. But my complaint is going to be clear rather than amorphous, and it’s going to address a specific issue that the president is capable of addressing. Because I see it, it is one thing to hold a president accountable, and yet another to try to drag him through the mud without clear justification, and that’s exactly what I see going on.

By now everyone is aware of Dr. Cornel West’s tirade against President Obama, so we won’t even bother to revisit that, but now Dr. Boyce Watkins of Syracuse University has written an article, “Black Unemployment Rises Yet Again: Yes, We Are in a State of Emergency,” that seems to lay the rise in Black unemployment directly at President Obama’s feet. Dr. Watkins said:

“One has to ask this question: Just how high does the black unemployment rate have to be before the Obama Administration and Congress reconsider their policies against engaging in targeted action on behalf of black and brown communities? If the unemployment rate were 20 percent, would that convince them that there is a problem? What about 25 percent? Perhaps there is some hidden law against advocating for people of color?”

Now, admittedly, I’m no scholar so maybe I’m missing an important detail here, but it seems clear to me that the Obama Administration and the congress are far from one entity, and there is absolutely nothing that President Obama can do to force a private corporation to hire workers if they choose not to. It is also clear that corporations have a vested interest in making sure that unemployment remains high - especially among Obama’s base. By doing so they enhance the chances of the GOP regaining power in the 2012 election, and thereby, reestablishing the status quo, a laissez-faire business environment where businesses have free rein to do whatever they like to increase profits.

In addition, the Republican Party has done everything in their power to ensure that the American people remain miserable, divided, and angry until the 2012 election. Rush Limbaugh gave them their marching orders early in Obama’s presidency. Limbaugh said, “I don't want this to work . . . I hope he [Obama] fails." And the Republicans have been on a single-minded mission to ensure Obama’s failure every since.

From that moment on, every initiative that President Obama has put forward to improve the economy and create new jobs has been met with fierce Republican opposition. They don’t care that America is suffering. They want America to suffer - the more the better. All they care about is making absolutely sure that President Obama doesn’t succeed in bringing relief to the misery they caused the American people under eight years of George W. Bush.

To that end, the Republicans in congress have engaged in a record number of filibusters in an attempt to block every initiative that Obama has put forward to rescue the American people. Their determination is so fierce in that regard that any Republican who fails to go along with their strategy is in dire jeopardy of being banished from congress.

And even those initiatives that did manage to miraculously survive were being blocked from implementation by Republican Governors across the country, under the pretense that rescuing America constituted “wasteful spending.” But their concern over the budget deficit didn’t prevent Republicans for a minute from holding the unemployed hostage to extend the Bush tax cut for the rich which, to a large extent, is what brought us to this point in the first place

The Houston Chronicle reported Texas governor, Rick Perry, as saying, with regard to federal money to assist the unemployed,

“The money would come with too many strings attached. Taking the half billion would require the state to assist qualified out-of-work residents seeking part-time jobs, an idea that Perry said the state has rejected before, partly because it could discourage them from seeking full-time employment. The federal money injection would also make Texas extend benefits to more low-paid workers, and Perry said the overall expansion would force business to make higher unemployment insurance payments.”

Yet, after initially turning down federal money targeted at creating jobs, Perry eventually took the stimulus money. But instead of using it to create jobs and bring relief to the poor and middle class, he used it to plug his budget shortfalls and save his “rainy day fund.” CNN Money reports the following:

"Texas, which crafts a budget every two years, was facing a $6.6 billion shortfall for its 2010-2011 fiscal years. It plugged nearly all of that deficit with $6.4 billion in Recovery Act money, allowing it to leave its $9.1 billion rainy day fund untouched . . . Now that the stimulus money has dried up, state lawmakers last week unveiled an austere budget for the 2012-2013 fiscal years that cuts $31 billion in spending. Schools, colleges, Medicaid and social services for the needy will be hit especially hard."

Republican governors are showing the exact same kind of disregard for the poor and middle class all over the country, yet we have these Black academics pointing their collective finger at Obama. This carefully selected criticism among many Black scholars is quite curious to say the least. While this seeming inability, or refusal, to connect the dots is understandable with Cornel West - he’s essentially a Harvard anointed preacher - it is quite disheartening among scholars like Dr. Boyce Watkins. His Ph.D. is in the area of economics and finance, so one would expect much more insight from him.

On Your Black World, Dr. Watkins’ own website, he quotes Ursula Burns , chairwoman and CEO of the Xerox Corporation, and the first African-American woman to head Fortune 500 company, as saying, “Families and our schools have failed in preparing [our young people] to compete.”

Dr Watkins goes on to point out that in an interview with CNN’s Soledad O’Brien Ms. Burns indicates that “She is ‘panic stricken’ by the lack of qualified applicants coming out of American schools. She isn’t just speaking about black and brown children, but all young people. She goes on to say, ‘We have jobs open ... we can find better candidates in other nations and other places than we can here.’”

So why are so many Black scholars continually pointing their finger at Obama instead of addressing these issues in the community? One doesn’t need a Ph.D. to whine. A high school dropout can do that. We need Black scholars to address the issue of the aversion to knowledge that pervades not only the Black community, but the nation as a whole. We, along with the corporate media, have produced a generation filled with mindless hedonists, and that's an issue that's hemorrhaging to be addressed.

But instead of closing ranks to address this life or death issue, many Black scholars are using all of their intellectual resources to justify trotting out one after the other, and arm-in-arm with social bigots, to engage in America’s most beloved and enduring game - “Bring down the uppity nigga.”

Eric L. Wattree
http://wattree.blogspot.com/
Ewattree@Gmail.com
Citizens Against Reckless Middle-Class Abuse (CARMA)

Religious bigotry: It's not that I hate everyone who doesn't look, think, and act like me - it's just that God does.

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Citizens Against Reckless Middle-Class Abuse (CARMA)

BENEATH THE SPIN • ERIC L. WATTREE

Citizens Against Reckless Middle-Class Abuse (CARMA)
It's Time to Fight Back

It is time for poor and Middle-class workers to start fighting back. The corporate community has become increasingly prone to take shortcuts on safety, create hostile work environments, undercutting and even stealing wages from gainfully employed workers in the name of grossly obscene profits.

These unconscionable practices in the name of ever more profits are not only having a negative impact on the quality of life of the poor and middle-class, but often, literally, sacrifice their very lives, as we've seen in an increasing number of cases, as in the coal mine disaster in Kentucky that took the lives of 29 coal miners, and the oil rig explosion in the Gulf of Mexico less than a month later, that took the lives of 11 oil workers.  Both of these "accidents" were avoidable, and due to reckless penny-pinching by the corporations.

What the corporate community is calling "unfortunate accidents" are not accidents at all. They're actually the corporate community's reckless response to the new global economy - and it's having a devastating impact on the American middle-class standard of living, and an even worse impact on the poor.

What we once thought of as American corporations have now become international in scope. They have no loyalty to any one nation, nor do they have any respect for any geographical boundary. They're now competing with countries that pay their workers less per week than many American workers spend on lunch per day. As a result, the American middle-class standard of living has become a liability and is under an aggressive assault by both the corporate and governmental establishment.

Something has to be done, so in response to this attack on our quality of life I've recently become associated with three gentlemen who share my belief that it is essential that the middle-class beat back this assault by every means at our disposal. These gentlemen include the following:

• 
  
  Lewis Maltby: Attorney, author (Can They Do That?), and former president of the worker's Rights Division of the ACLU. Lew is also current president of the National Workrights Institute.
• 
  
  Dr. Steve Musacco: Therapist, author (Beyond Going Postal), occupational psychologist, and 30-year veteran of the postal service, retired. Steve was involved in the development and implementation of both the Voice of the Employee Program and the Employee Assistance Program for the U.S. Postal Service.
• 
  
  Rick Owens: Publisher of the Postal Employee Network. Rick's publication reaches the workforce of the postal service's 600,000 employees.
• 
  
  My name is Eric Wattree. I'm an author (A Message From the Hood), and I write a political column called Beneath the Spin. My column is carried in the Los Angeles Sentinel, New York's Black Star News, and several other publications in America's heartland. I'm also a staff writer for Veterans Today - a publication that is global in scope.

We've come together to establish a non-partisan organization called CARMA (Citizens Against Reckless Middle-Class Abuse). We're currently in the process of developing a database to increase our numbers. We intend to consolidate and flex the political clout of poor and middle-class workers in a way that will be impossible for politicians, unions, and the corporate media to ignore. We also intend to use our clout to address the reckless assault on the poor and middle-class through both political action, and in the courts.

We intend to take no prisoners, nor give any group a pass based on political concerns, be they corporations, unions, or politicians. So we urge every American worker to become part of this important effort to defend poor and middle-class workers. If maintaining or enhancing your standard of living is important to you, please contact the e-mail address below and become a part of our database. If you're already a part of our database, please distribute this message to your family, friends, and neighbors.

We don't need one voice speaking for millions; we need millions speaking with one voice.

Eric L. Wattree
wattree.blogspot.com

Ewattree@Gmail.com

Religious bigotry: It's not that I hate everyone who doesn't look, think, and act like me - it's just that God does.

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Democrats: I'll Resume My Donations When You Resume Fighting Republican Trickery?

BENEATH THE SPIN • ERIC L. WATTREE

Democrats: I'll Resume My Donations When You Resume Fighting Republican Trickery?

The one factor that contributed most to the downfall of the Democratic Party during the seventies and eighties was allowing conservative Republicans to seize control of the political rhetoric. The Democrats simply sat back and allowed themselves, their constituency and their agenda to be redefined in the eyes of the American people by conservative "spin doctors" without rebuttal. As a direct result, they've allowed the term "liberal" to become a bad word in the political lexicon.

When you consider how methodically the conservatives went about mounting their assault on the liberal agenda you can't help but recognize that it was a stroke of genius. Ironically, the conservatives took the Democratic Party's strength and made it a political liability. First they took the party's penchant for being concern with the plight of the downtrodden and coined phrases such as "bleeding heart liberals" and "tax and spend Democrats." They then played on the frustration of the middle class by tying civil rights legislation, welfare, and crime into one neat bundle as the source of middle class woes; then they attributed all of these problems to what they called the Democrat's tendency to be " bleeding heart liberals". Once the connection was made between minorities, welfare, crime, and the liberal agenda, it was just a matter of repeatedly hammering the message home.

In addition, conservatives used such tactics as spitting out the word "liberal" as though they were saying rapist. In this way they not only implanted a negative attitude toward liberalism in the mind of the voter, but it was said in such a way that the implication was made that it went without saying that all the negative stereotyping of liberalism was true. In other words, their attitude seems to suggest, "I could substantiate what I'm saying about liberals, but I don't think it's necessary since we all know what they're like." And in the election that spawned the "Republican revolution" the voters said, yes, we do.

Through these strategies conservatives accomplished three goals with one ingenious stroke -- they defined minorities as slovenly criminals, they define liberal Democrats as "soft on crime", and they allowed themselves the freedom to place these thoughts in the American psyche without having to substantiate their facts. Moreover, they accomplish all this in every sound bite, and without seeming to be racist, with the use of just one word, "liberal." In fact, conservatives have been so thorough in their disparagement of liberalism that at this point the word "liberal" is treated like vulgarity, and simply referred to as "the L word."

One would think that Democrats would be up in arms in defense of their liberal tradition. It would seem that they would be falling all over one another in an attempt to debate this issue. But instead, these people are falling over one another trying to put distance between themselves and the liberal tradition. Where are their backbones? Where is that one Democrat willing to say, wait a minute! Read your history! It was the "bleeding heart liberal" policies of Franklin Delano Roosevelt that brought this country back from the brink of disaster.

*******

In 1921 -- eight years before the great depression -- Republicans took over the helm of this nation for 12 years. During that time there were three Republican administrations, the first of which was the administration of Warren G. Harding. History remembers Harding's administration for one thing more than anything other -- scandal. It was during Harding's presidency that the Teapot Dome Scandal erupted. His administration was considered the most corrupt administration in the history of the United States -- until Nixon's, then Reagan's, and finally Bush's.

Next, in 1923, came Calvin Coolidge, the president that Ronald Reagan is said to have most admired. Coolidge's policies of large tax cuts, allowing business a free-rein, and his encouragement of stock speculation contributed greatly to the impending stock market crash and the great depression that was to come.

Then in 1929 Herbert Hoover came to power. During his administration the stock market crashed, starting the great depression. In spite of the fact that by 1933 the unemployment rate was at 33.3% with 16 million people out of work, the Republican, Hoover, just sat, thinking that the economy would eventually rejuvenate itself. During Hoover's administration 15,000 WWI veterans marched on Washington demanding that they be paid what they were owed by the government. Hoover responded by calling in federal troops to throw these ex-servicemen off government property.

Finally in 1933 Franklin Delano Roosevelt, a liberal democrat, was elected overwhelmingly. He immediately surrounded himself with a group of the finest minds in the country, including Columbia professors Adolph A. Berle, Jr., Rexford G. Tugwell, and Raymond Moley, known at the time as the "Brain Trust." After assembling these men and others he went about the business of developing a" New Deal" for the working class people of this country.

The New Deal had two components -- one to help the economy to recover from the effects of the great depression, and a second component to give relief to the American people and to insure that they were never be placed in a position of total destitution again. To help heal the economy Roosevelt created programs that regulated business, controlled inflation, and brought about price stabilization; to bring relief to the people he signed The National Labor Relations Act which guaranteed workers the right to collective bargaining, and he created the Social Security Administration to guarantee workers some sort of income once they became too old to work. He also signed the Fair Labor Standards Act which protected workers rights and set a minimum wage for workers.

With his New Deal in place Franklin Delano Roosevelt, this "bleeding heart liberal", not only led this country out of the worst, Republican generated, crisis that this country has ever faced, but went on to lead the free world in victory over Hitler in WWII. He then ushered in the most sustained prosperity that the world has ever known.

One would think that conservatives would have seen the light, but their passion to further enrich the wealthy at the expense of the middle and lower classes seems to supersede all logic. Therefore, from the moment that the New Deal went into place, conservatives have been determined to dismantle it. The closest they've come to succeeding started during the Reagan administration with Supply-Side Economics, or, "Reaganomics" -- and the battle is currently raging in Washington D.C. as we speak.

Supply- Side Economics was a scheme hatch by U.S.C. economist Arthur Laffer and the Reagan crowd which was supposed to cut the deficit and balance the budget. The theory behind Reaganomics was ostensibly, if you cut taxes for business and people in the upper tax brackets, and then deregulated business of such nuisances as safety regulations and environmental safeguards, the beneficiaries would invest their savings into creating new jobs. In that way the money would eventually "trickle down" to the rest of us. The resulting broadened tax base would not only help to bring down the deficit, but also subsidize the tremendously high defense budget. When the plan was first floated, even George Bush, Reagan's vice president to be, called it "voodoo economics."

Reaganomics, for the most part, sought to undo many of the safeguards put into place during the Roosevelt era and create a business environment similar to that which was in place during the Coolidge Administration. What actually took place, however, was even more like the Coolidge era than planed.

 Instead of taking the money and investing it into creating new jobs, the money was used in wild schemes and stock market speculation. One of these schemes, the leveraged buy out, involved buying up large companies with borrowed funds secured by the company's assets, then paying off the loan by selling off the assets of the purchased company. This practice cost the citizens of this country its industrial base. In addition, the bottom fell out of the stock market. On Monday, October 19, 1987 the Dow-Jones Average fell 508.32 points. It was the greatest one-day decline since 1914 - 15 years before the Great Depression.

And what about Ronald Reagan's promise to balance the budget and lower the deficit? By the time he left office he was not only the most prolific spender of any president, but he also added more to the deficit than all of the other presidents from George Washington to his own administration combined. And what does the Republican Party propose to do about that? One of the Republican proposals was their "contract with America," a capitol gains tax cut -- for the rich.

Due to the continued freewheeling fiscal policies of conservative Republicans, between 1986 and 1989, spanning the presidencies of Reagan and Bush Sr., the FSLIC had to pay off all the depositors of 296 institutions with assets of over $125 billion.

Then in 1988 Silverado Savings and Loan collapsed, costing the taxpayers $1.3 billion. It was headed by Neil Bush, brother of George W. The investigation alleged that he was guilty of "breaches of his fiduciary duties involving multiple conflicts of interest." The issue was eventually settled out of court with Bush paying a mere $50,000 settlement.

Then there was the Lincoln Savings and loan scandal in 1987, involving John McCain. The scandal was very similar to the one that is currently playing out on Wall Street. He was one of a group of senators dubbed "The Keating Five" involved in a scandal by the same name.

In 1976 Charles Keating moved to Arizona to run the American Continental Corporation. In 1984, shortly after the Reagan era push to deregulate the savings and loan community, Keating bought Lincoln Savings and Loan and began to engage in highly risky investments with the depositors' savings. In 1989 the parent company, which Keating headed, went bankrupt, and it resulted in over 21,000 investors losing their life savings. Most of the investors were elderly, and the loss amounted to about 285 million dollars.

After having received over a million dollars from Keating in illegal campaign contributions, gifts, free trips, and other gratuities, the Keating Five--Senators John Glenn, Don Riegle, Dennis DeConini, Alan Cranston, and Sen. John McCain--attempted to intervene in the investigation into Keating's activities by the regulators. Later, they were admonished to varying degrees by the senate for attempting to influence regulators on Keating's behalf. Charles Keating ended up being convicted for fraud, racketeering and conspiracy, for which he received 10 years by the state court, and a 12 year sentence in federal court. After spending four and a half years in prison, his convictions were overturned. But prior to being retried, he pled guilty to a number of felonies in return for a sentence of time served.

Then came the George W. Bush administration that caused close to a million people to die uselessly in an illegal war in Iraq, robbed the American people blind, whose fumbling ignited the longest war in American history in Afghanistan, and whose greed came very close to sending the nation into yet another depression.

Now, after all of their repeated efforts to deplete the national treasury, they're unanimously voting against every piece of legislation that the Democrats propose to repair the damage they created, and to bring relief to the American people. Then they have the audacity to claim that they're doing it because they're concerned about deficit spending.

They're against affordable health care for American families; they're against any kind of spending to put Americans back to work, and they're against extending unemployment insurance to relieve the burden of America's unemployed. What's particularly telling, however, is they're also against any kind of strong legislation to prevent the financial community (them) from being able to rob the American people in the future.

The fact is, what they really want is to maintain the status quo, and make damn sure that the American people suffer until the 2012 elections so they'll have a chance to regain power and raid the treasury again. That's their one and only agenda - period.

History is clear. The conservative Republicans don't mind spending money, they just don't want to spend it on those who need it -- us. Remember, they're the party of Alexander Hamilton, one of this country's founding fathers who believed that only those who owned property should even be allowed to vote. He also said:

"All communities divide themselves into the few and the many. The first are the rich and wellborn, the other the mass of the people.... The people are turbulent and changing; they seldom judge or determine right. Give therefore to the first class a distinct, permanent share in government. They will check the unsteadiness of the second, and as they cannot receive any advantage by a change, they therefore will ever maintain good government." Debates of the Federalist Convention (May 14-September 17, 1787).

So, let's set the record straight. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, that "bleeding heart liberal", not only brought the nation back from the Great Depression and saved the world from Hitler during his life, but his "New Deal" for the American people gave us the greatest prosperity we've ever known, and allowed him to reach back from the grave to save the nation from Ronald Reagan 50 years after his death.

That isn't to say that the liberal Democratic philosophy corners the market on what is in the best interest of the nation -- it is clear that both parties have had illustrious moments in the past -- but rather, this is one of those defining issues in American politics that determines whether this is to be a government of the people, by the people, and for the people, or a government where the citizens or nothing more than disposable resources for big business.

In the past the Democratic Party has always been there to draw a line in the sand on this issue, but in recent history the liberal philosophy has been distorted to the point that even Democrats are distancing themselves from their own political philosophy.

But what makes America great, are those dramatic moments in American politics when that one individual has the courage to put everything on the line to defend, protect, and save the American people from disaster. And the annals of modern American history will clearly show that during those moments, it was a "bleeding heart liberal" that stepped up to the plate. First FDR, then Bill Clinton, and now Barack Hussein Obama.

Thus, future historians will record that there is nothing more honorable in American politics than a bleeding heart . . .  because their hearts bleed for America.

Now if we can just find a few.

Eric L. Wattree
wattree.blogspot.com
Ewattree@Gmail.com

Religious bigotry: It's not that I hate everyone who doesn't look, think, and act like me - it's just that God does.

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Gross Hypocrisy: The Greatest Threat to American Security

BENEATH THE SPIN • ERIC L. WATTREE

Gross Hypocrisy: The Greatest Threat to American Security

As the mainstream media continues to engage in its endless distraction over Senator Harry Reid stating the ridiculously obvious, New York's Black Star News is running an otherwise completely overlooked little story about the firing of Eric Amankwah, a 28-year-old Ghanian, by Delta Airlines for reporting a serious breach of security.

Amanakwah alleges that on January 2, a mere eight days after the Christmas Day attempt on Flight 253 over Detroit, he was instructed by his supervisor, Yvonne Green, to circumvent JFK security and deliver an unattended suitcase to an out-going flight without inspection. When he protested over the breach of security, he was advised by Ms. Green that he shouldn't worry about it. It was done routinely. If the suitcase missed its connection Delta Airlines would be fined.

After carrying out Green's instructions, when Amanakwah returned Green was waiting for him with a second supervisor, Mohammad Taj, to which Ms. Green reported, "Eric completed the job." Taj then said, "Good," then left.

According to the Black Star article by Milton Allimadi, after discussing the matter with other Delta employees, Mr. Amanakwah began to have second thoughts about what he had been instructed to do, so he sent an e-mail up Delta Airline's chain of command, including one to Delta's CEO, Richard H. Anderson, expressing his concern over the matter. The following Tuesday he was fired.

Black Star News followed up on the story by publishing a request for any other airline employees with similar stories of security breaches to come forward. In response they were contacted by Ms. Mary Stewart-Joyce. She indicated that she was hired by Delta Airlines on May 8, 1997. She goes on to say:

"After completion of the new hire training I was assigned to the Federal Inspections Area at JFK. The lead supervisors were Mavis Thomas, Joseline Lucas, Alix Laincy and Danny Cronin: Mr. Cronin was my assigned supervisor.

"I was not signed up for the Port Authority security class and therefore was forced to work in FIS without the proper Port ID pass. This was a violation of Federal Law. I was told to turn my building access swipe card around and to wear it lengthwise behind my Delta ID so that it would 'look' as if I had a port ID."

Ms. Joyce indicated that she was finally sought out and detained by the customs office for failing to have the proper I.D. She was informed by the customs officer that they were told to find her on the floor and hold her so that Delta Airlines could be fined for breaching security. Later she was informed by a customs supervisor that he was the one who had ordered her picked up and held because he was "sick of Delta's total disregard for security."

Ms. Joyce goes on to relate other breaches by Delta Airlines. She says that she knew many of the things that she was instructed to do were a breach of security, but there was very little that she could do about it, because as a single mother, she feared termination. But at this point, she says, she's not only willing to come forward, but sign a deposition.

As dangerous as this kind of irresponsible behavior is to the flying public, the arrogance of corporate, social, and political entitlement represent a much greater danger to America as a whole. Gross hypocrisy and the entitlement of power have become indelibly ingrained in the very fabric of America. That makes lying, deceit, and the routine manipulaion of the American people just a simply matter of doing  business, by both corporations and government alike.

What's in the best interest of the American people has become secondary to the corporate pursuit of the dollar.  This fact is clearly demonstrated by this multi billion-dollar airline's willingness to put the lives of its passengers in jeopardy just to avoid a fine that amounts to pennies. And many of the government officials that we depend on to protect us are just as corrupt. Washington has become filled with politicians elected to represent the people, who have become nothing short of government-paid lobbyists for big business - Joe Lieberman is an obvious case in point. He's willing to throw 67% of his constituents under the bus for his own personal gain.

So while Al Qaeda undoubtedly poses a threat to America, it doesn't come close to the threat posed  by the corruption, self-service, and total disregard of American ideals by the ever-growing bunch of demagogues that we've casually allowed to gain control of our lives - and even as I write this sentence it's becoming progressively worse. They've seized control of the media, virtually destroyed our educational system, and have left us all but helpless to even grasp what's happening to us.

America needs to understand that the time to become actively engaged in our own welfare has all but passed. We're already waste-deep in a class war. Hyperbole? Just take a moment to consider how far we've declined since WWII.

They tell us we're involved in a "war on terror."  But who's fighting that war, and making all of the sacrifices? When America went to war during WWII, all of America was at war - the rich and poor, Black and White, young and old. But now, the only ones sacrificing for this so-called "war on terror" are the poor and middle-class. The rich hopes it goes on forever, because they're benefitting from it greatly.

Then they tell us, "Oh, no! It only looks unfair. The difference between now and WWII is that now we have a 'volunteer military'."

'Volunteer military?'  Let's take a look at that: Our so-called 'volunteers' are made up of poor and middle-class young people who are there in lieu of a job so they can try to get an education, or feed and insure their young families. One volunteers as an act of patriotism, not as an attempt to survive.

Clear evidence of my contention is the enlistment rate of the rich. If our 'volunteer military' is indeed built upon patiotism, the children of the rich certainly can't have much love for America, because they're volunteering in piss-poor numbers. As a direct result of the poor enlistment rate of the rich and privileged, our troops have to take up the slack by placing their lives on the line for two, three, and four tours of combat duty - then these very same slackers are reluctant, and even resistant, to enhance military benefits, even as they pay the personnel of their contractor cronies three and four times what they pay our troops.

Thus, calling our troops 'volunteers' is no more accurate than calling your trash man a volunteer. He didn't volunteer to collect the trash. He's doing the very same thing as our brave troops in Afghanistan and Iraq, simply trying to feed his family. He just doesn't have to die to do it.

So America needs to wake up before it's too late. We're no longer living in the America we once knew. We're not safe; we can no longer trust what's in our food and water; our young people are being taught that it's 'un-American' to put family before corporate profit; and the country is brimming over with demagogues, tycoons, and self-serving politicians having wet dreams over the prospect of personal windfall - in both money and power - of another attack on America.

There's a reason why Cheney continues to insist that President Obama say "War" when he mentions terror -  because "war" means money.

Correction

I was contacted by Ms. Mary Stewart-Joyce regarding this story. She indicated that she wasn't actually detained by the customs officer for not having the proper I.D. She was warned by the official that they had been instructed to locate her on the floor without the proper I.D. so Delta Airlines could be fined. Thereafter, she took it upon herself to sit out the remainder of her shift in the Arrival Control Office.


Eric L. Wattree
wattree.blogspot.com

Religious bigotry: It's not that I hate everyone who doesn't look, think, and act like me - it's just that God does.

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Healthcare: There was a 3 a.m. Call to the White House, and No One Answered

BENEATH THE SPIN • ERIC L. WATTREE

Healthcare: There was a 3 a.m. Call to the White House, and No One Answered

President Obama is in trouble. How do I know? Because as one of his biggest supporters, even I'm beginning to wonder if I got too caught up in the hype. While I'm still excited over the historic significance of his presidency, the gathering threat that he may be remembered as an ineffectual kiss-up to the Republican Party is beginning to tarnish its luster.

That should come as very bad news to the president, because if a supporter of my unfettered loyalty has begun to wonder about him, that means that tens of millions of others are thinking along the same lines. And based on his atrocious handling of both the Republican Party and the healthcare debate, he only has himself to blame.

In the real world, it's not enough to have good ideas and the eloquence to express them, one must also have the backbone to wield power in order to bring those ideas to fruition - that's the reason for seeking power in the first place. But the president doesn't seem to have the capacity to do that - wield power, that is. He seems to yearn for a utopia in America where everybody is holding hands singing Kumbaya. We need a little realism here - make that, a lot of realism.

The president seems to harbor this burning desire to be loved by everyone. If that's all he wanted he should have become an entertainer instead of a politician. In politics, the people are looking for a father figure who is fair, but also bad enough to protect them from harm, and President Obama is not demonstrating that capacity. In fact, from what he's shown so far, he seems to be more adept at taking the coward's way out. Everyone knows the type - the kind of guy that's always running up to the bullies trying to become their best friend so they won't get beat up.

No one wants a president like that, no matter how much they like him. The people want someone that makes them feel secure and protected. Sure, Obama is very intellectual and contemplative, but you can't think your way out of an ass wiping when a bully's determined to do it - I know that for a fact, because I've tried it with very little success.

The irony of Obama's presidency is that if he fails in his first term - and if he continues the way he is, he will - it's not going to be because he wasn't cultured enough, or intellectual enough, but because he's not ghetto enough. Just turn on your television and try to find a show without someone being busted in the head. You can't do it, because Americans respect people who are willing to fight for what they believe in.

If he had just a little more ghetto in him he would have thrown Lieberman to the wolves thirty seconds after he took the oath of office. If he'd done that, the other Liebercrats who are currently blocking healthcare reform would have had second thoughts about the consequences of bucking his initiatives. Americans don't want to be led by Jimmy Stewart; they want John Wayne, a benevolent bully.

The people want the kind of president who's willing to tell congress what he wants, draw a line in the sand, then make it clear to every legislator that they buck the will of the American people at their own peril - then setup a special task force in the White House dedicated to nothing but educating the people with facts and figures about the self-serving motives of the legislators trying to circumvent their will.

Why shouldn't the people know about the connection that Joe Lieberman and his wife have with the insurance industry? Provide the people with that information, then let him go before the cameras and try to look sincere. If the White House had that kind of operation, Liebercrats and Republicans alike would have to check their closets before they decided to buck the president.

But instead, Obama's acting like that Black cop that we in the Black community know so well - the one who's so sensitive about being accused of coddling Black people that he goes out of his way to be more insensitive than his colleagues. That's exactly what Obama is doing to his base. He's so fixated on appeasing the Republican base that he seems to be totally ignoring his own. As a result, he's turning a blind eye to why he was voted into office in the first place.

But what's so unfathomable is that as intelligent as Barack Obama is, he seems to be forgetting that, unlike that Black cop, he has to come back to the community to be reelected - and if he doesn't spend the next three years undoing the damage that he's done to his image, never mind the possibility of losing to a Republican, he may even lose the right to run again in the primaries.

The president seems to working under the assumption that being an aggressive advocate for the people is bad politics, so he's adopted a strategy of trying to win by not losing. That explains why he's pointedly avoided specifically identifying what he wants in a healthcare bill. He seems to feel that by drawing a line in the sand, every element of the bill that's shot down thereafter constitutes a personal lost to him.

The fact is, that's true, but that's what's called having the courage of your convictions. That's why you fight, and fight hard. But he seems to have adopted a strategy of if I don't fight, I won't have to bear the embarrassment of losing, which by definition, fails the people who elected him.

This is not the time to indulge in political vanity - save that for the next election season. This is where the rubber meets the road. Now's the time to put all the pretty rhetoric aside and fight for the people who believed in him, and gave him their vote in the belief that he would fight to protect their interest. But I'm very sorry to say, that he's failing to do that, to the sincere disappoint of millions. He promised "a change that we can believe in," but what we're getting is the same old status quo that we thought we voted out of fashion - politicians first, then the people . . . maybe.

Mr. President, I have never dreaded writing any article more than I have this one. All of my instincts are screaming for me to hang in there with you, but the facts won't allow it. Every time I go to write a sentence trying to justify you're actions, I think about an email that I received from a young lady regarding my column. She simply said, "I really hope you're researching the stuff you say in your column, because I don't know much about politics, so I rely on you for my information." So while I would love to give you the benefit of the doubt, Mr. President, my first loyalty must be to people like that young lady.

So, you need to man up, Mr. President, as we say in the 'hood. You're looking weak and indecisive: You're allowing people from your own party to thumb their noses at you, you're putting thirty thousand of our troops in harms way in order to chase one hundred Eastside Crips in Afghanistan, and you're fighting to pass a healthcare bill that forces the public to by in, but without a public option. That, in essence, constitutes paying a windfall ransom to the insurance industry in order to protect your image.

But you still have time to change your course of action. You have nothing to lose, and everything to gain. The Republicans are not going to like you regardless to what you do, but by deciding to go for broke in defense of the American people you might still have time to salvage your image in the eyes of your base.

But your window of opportunity is very narrow indeed. At the rate your image has declined in this first year since you took office, if you don't do something fast - and I mean very fast - by this time next year you're gonna be typecasted as a weak and ineffectual president, both at home and abroad. At that point you'll be no more than a caretaker for the next two years until you can be voted out of office. Because believe me, none of your base, including myself, is going to support having a president kiss up to the Republicans for another four years.

Mr. President, I'm convinced that you're a good, intelligent, and well-meaning man so I'm still pulling for you. But what I've related to you here is what many of us call, the actual factuals.


Eric L. Wattree
wattree.blogspot.com

Religious bigotry: It's not that I hate everyone who doesn't look, think, and act like me - it's just that God does.

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The Filibuster: A Platform for Prima Donnas to Obstruct Democracy

BENEATH THE SPIN • ERIC L. WATTREE The Filibuster: A Platform for Prima Donnas to Obstruct Democracy It's time to get rid of the filibuster in the United States Senate. The filibuster is a senate rule where if there is less than sixty votes on any issue, any one senator can hold up the people's business by blocking the issue from coming to a vote before the full senate. The movie "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington," with Jimmy Stewart, portrays the practice in its most charitable light. There, Jimmy Stewart's character uses the filibuster to prevent legislation from being enacted against the people by a corrupt political machine. But in reality, the filibuster is virtually always used to obstruct legislation beneficial to the people in favor of a corrupt or malevolent status quo. In 1957 Sen. Strum Thurmond (Sen., S.C.) filibustered to obstruct the 1957 Civil Rights Act. Then in 1964 a group of Southern senators mounted a filibuster in an attempt to obstruct a vote on the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which included anti lynching legislation. And just recently Sen. Joe Lieberman threatened to filibuster to prevent healthcare legislation from coming to a vote in order to protect the greed of the insurance industry - and that was in spite of the fact that a full 68% of the people who voted him into office stood firmly in favor of healthcare reform. The filibuster is symbolic of the many ways that Americans are being manipulated by the encroachment of an increasingly insidious class system. Thus, the time has long since past for the American people to rediscover the necessity of keeping tight reins on governmental power. It is absolutely incumbent upon us to strip individual politicians of the tools to hold badly needed legislation hostage for their own personal interest. Not only is it undemocratic to allow one senator to override the will of the people and the majority of the senate, but recent history has clearly demonstrated that politicians are much too self-serving, irresponsible, and corrupt to be vested with such tremendous power. In an article in Slate.com, it was pointed out that Joe Lieberman's opposition to healthcare reform came only one day after the insurance lobby released a report attacking it. Slate also pointed out that Lieberman's home state of "Connecticut is home to 72 insurance companies, including Aetna, a major player in the health-insurance industry whose PAC and employees have this year given Lieberman $65,200." As a result, Lieberman didn't blink an eye before throwing his constituents under the bus. So while Joe Lieberman didn't follow through with his threat to filibuster healthcare legislation, it certainly wasn't because he prayed over the issue and suddenly found God. Lieberman didn't follow through with his threat for the very same reason that seems to generally motivate his machinations - self-interest. First, he wants to keep his chairmanship of the Homeland Security Committee in the senate, which the Democrats allowed him to keep even after he turned on them in the 2008 election. And secondly, the pressure for him to fall into line became much too intense for his cowardly heart to take. His threat to filibuster the legislation was designed to pull other Democrats onboard, but when he failed to do so, he lacked the character to stand alone. President Eisenhower pointed out in his speech on the military/industrial complex that "Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together [emphasis added]." That also applies to every other area of American governance. But due to the under funding and concerted attack on our educational system, we're rapidly losing that essential characteristic, which is absolutely necessary to maintain the viable democracy that was established by this nation's founders. Over the years America has become increasingly hostile toward education and the pursuit of knowledge in general. In fact, many of our politicians have started to actively demonize education in much the same way that they demonized the term "liberal" in the sixties. The educated members of our society are now often referred to as "elitist." The hostility of our politicians toward education stems from the fact that the demagoguery of control and manipulation cannot thrive in a knowledgeable society. A knowledgeable society would immediately recognize that one man should not be able to obstruct public policy. So they've mounted a brutal attack on our educational system by trying to starve it to death. Those who are entrusted with the nation's most valuable asset - the intellectual development of our nation's youth - are denigrated, paid like paupers, and relegated to among the lowest tiers of our society, when they should be at the top. And while other countries are guaranteeing a higher education to all who are qualified, the children of the poor and middle class in the United States are being arrested for demonstrating against college tuition being raised far beyond their ability to pay. This is not by accident. Our educational system is being purposely undermined so the American people can be easily trained, like Pavlov's dog, to respond to emotional cues rather than rational thought. In that way, corporate manipulators like Joe Lieberman, Fox News, and the Republican Party are left to define, for the people, what's in their best interest. It allows the likes of Rush Limbaugh or a Glen Beck to instruct them in when it's appropriate to become outraged. That leaves the nation in a very precarious position, because now, instead of loving America, and American ideals, the people have been conditioned to vest their love and loyalty in individuals. We currently see the effect of that in the people's response to Sarah Palin on the right, and President Obama on the left. While certaintly not equating the president with Sarah Palin, the point is, many people have confused their love for individuals with patriotism, and the character of that "patriotism" is determined by the character of the individual. That's extremely dangerous, especially since these people lack the education to reflect back on WWII. The problem is, in order for American citizens to truly love America, they have to know what it is about America that's worth loving. But due to the attack on our educational system, we've spawned a generation of Americans who know absolutely nothing about American traditions, nor ideals. That's why they so easily accept torture, and the invasion of privacy as though it's business as usual. That's also why they so casually accept the fact that there's a class of people who are obviously above the law. That's what they see in American life, and they have no other frame of reference or educational background to inform them that having a class above the law is un-American. As a result, we have a constant chipping away of American values. While part of President Eisenhower's warning was "make no assumptions," those of us who do have a knowledge of American ideals have made the false assumption that a knowledge of America's traditions are so fundamental that it's common to all Americans. But the fact is, it's not. There's a large segment of our population who don't know what it means to be an American. Thus, it's not necessary for corporate controllers to take away our rights, we've become so ignorant as a people that we're fighting one another to give them away - and don't make the mistake of thinking that applies to only the least of us. Our military personnel all get a crash course in what it means to be an American, but what of the corporate and political class? The politicians tell us that we're at war. That used to mean that the entire country pulled together to sacrificed equally to defeat the enemy. But how many sons and daughters of the political or corporate class have died in this war? That's right - not one. Yeah, I know. We have a volunteer army. But if America is in such a life and death struggle, why aren't the rich and political class urging their children to volunteer in the name of patriotism? I'll tell you why - because the pride of the founding fathers has become so remote that the rich and powerful now see patriotism as pedestrian. These people have learned from their parents - Dick Cheney, for example - that the pride of patriotism is nothing more than a tool to manipulate the masses. Why isn't the super-patriotic Liz Cheney driving a truck in Iraq? The simple answer is, because she sees it as beneath her station. She feels that there are "little people" to do that sort of thing. Her job is to be a cheerleader. Thus, we've become the victims of our own ignorance, and it's time to set that straight before it's too late. And the only way that we can restore ourselves as "we the people," is by reasserting ourselves over the lofty and arrogant by stripping then of their political power. And the very first step in that process should be regaining control of congress, and stripping these prima donnas of the right to filibuster the will of the American people. 　 Eric L. Wattree wattree.blogspot.com   Religious bigotry: It's not that I hate everyone who doesn't look, think, and act like me - it's just that God does.

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