Happy Days - Recovering from the Recovery
February 25, 2009
©Bryan Zepp Jamieson
Why is Obama suddenly starting to sound like Herbert Hoover?
He’s talking about cutting the annual deficit in half by the time he leaves office. Even assuming he’s in office until 2017, that’s a pretty ambitious undertaking.
Hoover, of course, thought the same thing, and took a really nasty recession and deepened it into the Great Depression. FDR became alarmed at the size of the debt, and in 1936, under pressure from the right, tried balancing the budget. The economy was largely recovered from the Great Depression (despite RW propaganda, the GDP was 100% recovered by 1935, and unemployment, while still elevated, was one third what it was when he took office), and trying to balance the budget in 1936 led to a nasty, but brief recession in 1937.
In his weekend address yesterday, Obama said, “[Monday,] I will convene a fiscal summit of independent experts and unions, advocacy groups and members of Congress to discuss how we can cut the trillion-dollar deficit that we’ve inherited.” Now, he -did- say that this was going to be based on the premise that there was going to be an economic recovery first. The man hasn’t lost his marbles. Read more
Words Are Important
February 17, 2009
by Jerry Lobdill
Words are important. That was never more apparent than in the 2004 Democratic primary race for the presidential nomination. George Lakoff tutored us all in this concept in his writings about framing. But we didn’t learn our lesson very well, it seems. We are now being bombarded with frames that bid for our belief like, perhaps, never before, and we seem to just let them stand.
A frame is a clever use of subliminally lurking concepts that have somehow been vetted erroneously by our conscious thought and which no longer possess nuances that we recognize as needing to be considered each time we hear the words of the frame. For example, take the word, “freedom”. I could write an entire essay on what a fine word this is for those who need to frame an odious proposal in such a way that we will buy it. But the point is that words like this stimulate warm positive feelings in us that lull us into accepting whatever else is said. Read more
Neo-Dubya-Conservatism Kept the Lid On, and NOW Look!
February 16, 2009
by George Thomas
In these trying economic times….
The main difficulty I have with our loyal (harrumph) opposition’s harping on the feast of jackals they expect after Obama’s agenda fails, is that not one of them has yet articulated any alternative plan that would prevent the country (and the entire industrialized world) from dribbling down the figurative toilet.
Even the standard social evolutionary models that our oddball neoconservative friends cite, do NOT promise a painless recovery. The conservative do-nothing Hooveresque strategy involves very deep and very long descents into economic depression. True, any recovery of some form of Western Industrialism would possibly be quite adaptive, and many improvements could come with this fine package. Trouble is, it will require a wait of about, oh, say, years numbered in three figures. Until recently, the only scenario of this kind of civilization-collapse I could envision involved nuclear war followed by centuries and perhaps millennia of starting over, with imaginative Classical Florescences and Dark Ages parallels in some far future. I don’t think any of us alive wish to wait that long to fulfill plans we made in 2007 to buy that yacht, or that third mansion. Read more
Republicans Giving Civic Lessons?!!!??
February 14, 2009
by Robert A. Letcher, PhD
Like most WE! readers, I rarely have anything good to say about Republicans. But I have to give them credit for the civics lessons they’ve taught us over the years, amidst the flat-earth ideology, self-righteous hypocrisy, and obstreperous obstructionism. After all, it was the Republicans who taught us that the Constitution’s requirement for impeaching a President – “high crimes and misdemeanors” – extended to getting a blow-job in the Oval Office when a Democratic President occupies it, while not extending to blowing-off the Legislature with signing statements when the President is a Republican ([idiot] who thinks it’s OK because he has his fingers crossed). And what have Democrats contributed to this civics lesson? How about Bill Clinton’s fine point: “what the meaning of is is”? Read more
Happy B-Day, Chuck - The science has evolved, but not the people
February 14, 2009
by Bryan Zepp Jamieson
Gallup ran a poll this week, asking, “Do you, personally, believe in the theory of evolution, do you not believe in evolution, or don’t you have an opinion either way?”
First off, it’s an idiotic question. I saw the poll over on Think Progress (39% “believe” 25% did not “believe” and 36% had no opinion either way). One of the bloggers over there, nymed 5th Estate, wrote “This kind of question irks me no end. How about ‘are you satisfied that evolution is the most satisfactory explanation thus far of the diversity of species?’ Or… ‘do you believe that the earth is 6,000 years old and that all dinosaurs were vegetarians and co-existed with humans and can you explain why the dinosaurs then disappeared and when?’ Or how about, ‘do you believe that airplanes are supported in flight by angels and that the engines are there just for show?” Read more
Poverty in America - The hidden cost of the meltdown
February 9, 2009
by Bryan Zepp Jamieson
Any idea what the poverty rate is right now?
Well, don’t feel bad. Neither do I. The most recent one I could find was for 2006, when an average of 12.6% of the general population were below the poverty level. [Zeppnote: a few days after writing this, I saw a column by Gene Lyons that placed the official poverty level at a stunning 17%] Read more
All about the love - Glendale’s ‘Love Your Self’ program has something for every woman
February 8, 2009
by Ellen Snortland
The week before Valentine’s Day there’s an event in Glendale to help women be their own sweethearts … or at least their own best friends.
On Feb. 7, 50/50 Leadership, a locally based nonprofit, is sponsoring a “Love Your Self” program that includes speakers, products and services in numerous styles and flavors. I don’t know about you, but there are many things I am curious about. But, like a lot of people, I’m often too nervous — or too cheap — to just take the plunge and improve my professional and personal life.
Since I’m a volunteer speaker at this event, I’ll use myself as an example. I’ll be speaking about self-defense because I firmly believe it’s a basic human right for all people to know how to set a boundary, and then protect that border physically, if push comes to shove. My particular mission in life is to educate women and girls in physical self-defense, mainly because they are often convinced they can’t protect themselves. I know a lot of females from all backgrounds who agree that they should have self-protection training, but many don’t really know why. Some don’t know what questions to ask or where to start. Read more
Three Little Words
February 8, 2009
by Mary Lyon
“I screwed up.”
Sounds like a simple, ordinary, and harmless little thing to admit, unless of course you’re the President of the United States. We haven’t heard the likes of this in at least eight years. No wonder everybody in the media is almost literally erupting about it. They can’t believe their ears. Seems THAT is a little misplaced, too. By about eight years and a whole lot of Texas Two-Steppin’ around the truth, both inconvenient and uncomfortable.
In just a few days in office, President Obama has made it stunningly clear that the infantile, cowardly, deceitful, and recklessly incompetent (almost to the point of pride) Bush/Republican Way of doing things is OVER. With those three little words, “I screwed up,” he’s already provided us a new template of what a REAL president, a REAL man, a REAL adult, does when something goes wrong on his or her watch. As one TV commentator put it – “he manned up.” The last time I got to thinking about this, I wondered what I myself was going to do now that the changes had happened. Seems everyone’s grappling with that, now. We’re just not used to this.
The “loyal opposition” certainly doesn’t know what to do – they’re even more in the dark than I am. In a previous column, I ruminated about not being sure, anymore, how to behave in this new political climate. President Obama had set a new tone for political ops, one of reaching out, blissful and productive bipartisanship, open hands versus clenched fists. The GOP, in seems, only gets part of this – the part with the clenched fists. Read more
MORE sorrow and dying
February 8, 2009
by Harlan Bennett, PhD
I’ve been away from here for a while, for which I apologize. It’s not that I didn’t have anything to say (when did a red-head EVER not have something to say?), it’s that someone sent me this LOVELY gift about a month ago: A specialized virus, written JUST for me, that ate my registry, part of my BIOS, and was extremely friendly in re-re-repeating its incursions regardless of whatever was done to stop it. I’ve now got so much security on this computer, plus half-daily sweeps of OTHER security measures that I’m astonished that I can get ANYWHERE at all - but it’s worth it for the peace of mind that I have at this point.
Be that as it may - and I hope that I’ve truly seen the last of that nasty virus - I’ve been following the news with a great deal of interest, particularly since the Israelis FINALLY got fed up with being attacked from Gaza and decided to do something proactive about the situation. I’ve been saying ever since the Israeli Government started the Palestinian appeasement process that there was going to be serious bloodshed over that decision, even if it was one that was forced on them by world opinion. While I applaud the Israeli Government’s decision to at least try and find a political solution to the twin problems of Gaza and the West Bank, to say nothing of the basically captive and pretty much helpless Palestinians that reside in those two places, there is a lot of history behind what’s going on now that everybody seems to be ignoring. Following is part of a column that I wrote back in June of 2006. Read more
A Way to End Partisan Gridlock in Washington
February 7, 2009
by Robert A. Letcher, PhD
With every passing second, I find myself growing increasingly upset over gridlock in Washington. I’m tired of Nero McConnell fiddling the same song while so many jobs burn as Nero W fiddled while he was starting the fire. And I am seriously bummed that most of the current Nero’s helpers are members of what more and more people have begun to refer to as a “rump regional” party. I mean, it’s bad enough to get your—ummm—rump burned, but it’s even worse to have it done by a rump full of Neroes, especially when that big, fat, cigar smoking, oxycontin popping, Rush of a Nero is playing first fiddle.
I have an idea about what to, but I’ll have to write it indirectly, as I am afraid of violating the Sedition Act if I were to write it explicitly. Fortunately, I have three personal stories to help describe what I have in mind. Read more
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Bob's Bail Out Plan by bobl-tlm
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How Do You Like Deregulation Now? graphic politics by Dicky Neely
