What's In It for Me?

Corporations and their right-wing patsies have figured out that the way to win is to make it all about us, even though it's really not.  They make all their pitches about what we have to gain, and more important, what we have to lose, if we don't vote for them.  Those of us who don't vote often believe that it won't make a difference, that both parties are the same, that nobody represents them.  When we Democrats fail, it is often because we waffle about our principles so that we don't offend anyone, or we talk about them too broadly so they become meaningless to people who are struggling with day to day problems.

There are a lot of differences between the parties and the candidates, and they are not abstract.  They reflect the issues we are struggling with every day.  Who gets elected in November is going to determine in very real terms whether our lives will get better or we will just get by.  This election affects dramatically every person of every age.

So here it is, the pitch:

College graduates:  Republicans are opposed to allowing the refinancing of student loans, forcing graduates to carry high-interest rate loans for years.  This means being strapped with debt before they have even been able to make their way in the workforce.  The high interest loans involved are either owned or guaranteed by the federal government, so this is money that our government is making from what should be an investment in a student's future.  Debt from everything from mortgages to credit cards can be refinanced.  Big banks are allowed to borrow at 0 percent from the government.  Why are students forced to pay exorbitant rates on their loans?  Because the Republicans do not want to increase taxes on the millionaires and billionaires that fund their campaigns.

Women:  Oh, so many issues are so critical for the well-being of women in South Carolina.  Our state and federal legislators continue to force votes that would prevent women from accessing affordable birth control.  Preventing women from having family planning will result in not just unplanned pregnancies, but the stress involved with not being able to control decisions about college, jobs and marriage.  It will result in job insecurity.  Men should be outraged that legislators would remove from the family decisions that so directly effect emotional and financial well-being.

Parents:  School choice is the pseudonym for privatizing.  Basically all the many schemes offered provide inadequate financial allotments to most while the wealthy can continue to send their children to the expensive private schools. This false promise also drains money from a public school system that has never been funded adequately here in South Carolina.

Seniors:  Republican fear mongering about Social Security and Medicare is also all about privatization.  Back in the '80's, social security cuts were enabled by the promise of IRA's, which were supposed to herald in a future of wealth and prosperity, but actually just made us all vulnerable to the greed and speculation of Wall Street.  This false promise also allowed corporations to bargain away our pensions.  Cuts to Medicare have and will continue to damage a system that was once a great safety net, forcing seniors to spend more on health care at a time when they should not have to worry about whether they will be able to pay to survive.

So many issues:

Food Stamps:  Too many people are working and not earning a living wage.  Food stamps not only feeds the poor, but keeps dollars flowing in our communities.

Medicaid:  Not wanting everyone to have health insurance is just plain cruel.  But it is also stupid.  Even without the panic over Ebola, the inability to treat a medical problem before a contagion spreads, or a treatable illness becomes terminal, is costly as well as inhumane.  And again, providing health care also provides jobs to our communities.

Minimum Wage:  All the arguments against raising the minimum wage are really about not wanting to raise the wages of those who are making more than minimum.  Because Republicans really do know that a rising tide lifts all boats.  What they really don't want to see is all wages rise in response to the raise in the minimum wage.  Greedy and stupid?  Sure, but these are the politics we have been suffering under since the 80's.  If you are not working for minimum wage, and you're still struggling, you should be fighting -- and voting -- for raising the minimum wage.  And again, raising the minimum wage puts more dollars into the pockets of those who will spend it in their communities.  So if you are a business person, you too should be wanting everyone in your community to be making a living wage.

Voting Rights:  We all know people who won't be voting because they are afraid they will be confronted (and embarrassed) at the polls.  Let's get out there and vote to protect everybody's rights and elect people who will not need to use intimidation to win.

Gun Control:  Those who are most vulnerable in general tend to live in areas where there is more danger of gun violence.  The Second Amendment argument is pure nonsense.  But the mostly republican lawmakers who refuse to make the streets safe for all our citizens need to be voted out of office.  Our police officers should be voting for legislators who support reasonable gun controls; their lives are on the line as well.  And with shootings by officers in the news, we know that the more guns on the streets, the more stressful the job, and the more likely they will have to live (or die) based on a split second decision.

I could go on and on.  There are so many issues that really do affect us every single day.  I urge our candidates to talk to people not about issues that don't seem relevant to them, but to relate the legislation they would pursue to what it means for each of us, every day.  And when we talk to others about the upcoming election, if we talk about how each issue ripples out to affect us all, we might just motivate people to get out and vote.

Tim Scott's Road to Success

Our own Tim Scott was on a panel at the American Enterprise Institute.  It was fun to listen to Tim parrot the words of his right-wing heroes.  It was also obvious that he was better rehearsed than, say, George W. Bush.  It's also obvious that he believes what he's preaching.  And why shouldn't he?  It's worked pretty well for him.  It's worked well, not in the sense that the nonsense he is spouting works, but the fact that he is a believer has brought him lots of goodies.

But hold your nose and listen more closely to the words (Tim's words of wisdom are about 27 minutes in):

Introduced as a "guy who thinks for himself," Tim proceeds to preach from the right-wing prayer-book.  He and his fellow panelists agree that they are there because they care about the poor.  The moderator and president of the AEI, Arthur C. Brooks, jumped into W's murky pool of "compassionate conservatism," and it is obvious that he is proud to show Tim off, just as he is sure to bring up Marco Rubio, both of whom are proud right wing-nuts with lower class minority roots.

Scott talked pretty up there on that panel.  You can tell he has been well groomed.  He is even coming up with his own nifty sound bites.  My favorite is that the poor are "assets, not liabilities."  He pretends to be offended that kids growing up in poverty are called "high risk kids," and adds that that is an "awful label for a kid."  He prefers that they be called "high potential children."

Because the government doesn't need to help "high potential children."  In fact the solution to the problem we have with these "high potential children" is -- drum roll -- local control and giving parents more choice.

And what he means by local control and giving parents more choice is:  privatizing schools, with the help of groups like the American Legislative Exchange Council.  Right wing groups have over the past decade come to realize that the important fight is not so much in the US Congress, which they already own, but in the local elections.  And who better to speak to that than Tim Scott, who came up through local elected positions, earned his Tea Party wings and was gifted with the Senate seat by right wing-nut Nikki Haley.

He proudly talks about failing in public schools, and then blames the government for his failure.  And he believes that the private sector is the way to success for failing schools.  Of course, just as with prison privatization, the money comes from the federal government.  But those private companies can do it cheaper -- because when they do it cheaper there is more profit for them.  And when big business is happy, they are happy with Tim Scott, and that makes Tim Scott happy.

Choice is going to mean whatever private enterprise is able to sell to local governments.  Local governments won't be able to afford high teacher salaries and schools a child can be proud to attend.  We are likely to see more kids sitting in front of computers, at home or at school.  Vouchers will of course come from the government, which will have no say in determining where that money goes.  Parents will no longer turn to education experts to decide how best to educate their kids; they will look to advertising, and cost.  Those with greater income to add to their vouchers will send their kids to better schools.  Religious schools will pick up a lot of the slack.  And poor schools will take in the rest.  If that sounds familiar, look around.

It doesn't matter how pretty and inspiring are Tim Scott's words.  The fact is, with educated leaders and enough money funding public schools, it is the absolute best way to educate our children.  Scott's own struggle with getting educated happened because people like him refused to pay for good education for minority children in low income neighborhoods.

Compassionate conservative Arthur Brooks, after Tim Scott's heartfelt words added,

"The reason for free enterprise is not the rich.  The reason for free enterprise is the poor."

Look around you.  Look at the people in this "right-to-work-cheap" state who would be forced to choose mediocre private schools because their vouchers don't pay what it takes to attend a good private school.  Ask yourself why people like Tim Scott are happy to have the government pay a private company to do what he won't let the government do.  Could it be that supporting private corporations over the government is Tim Scott's real road to success?

A Corporate Thanksgiving -- Or Not

I had been planning on writing today about Thanksgiving v. greed.  When I checked my emails, I found that someone, somehow, has deleted the blog I had posted on The Charleston Patch on Monday.  The article was about shopping on Thanksgiving, and about choosing to give our holiday business to those who respect their employees enough to give them a living wage and time to spend with family.  It may have been an error, but I am tending to think that I ruffled some feathers, and that the feathers didn't belong to a Thanksgiving turkey.

As I get older I am tending to focus ever more on the quality of my remaining years.  I am more likely to want to spend time reading a good book than cleaning house.  Although I have to pinch pennies, I am glad that I am retired and no longer under the control of a boss.  I am very happy to finally have the time to write, and the internet and blogosphere where I can share my thoughts with others.

The shame is just how much time we are forced to spend trying to make ends meet.  Jumping through hoops to keep a job.  Paying more and more for things that provide less -- less quality of life, less security, less peace of mind, less joy.  The greed that grows each year as corporations continue to get fatter and more powerful is a tragedy.  It is wrong that so few can control so many, and do so in their own interest.  Our health care is driven by the profit motive, and the movement to privatize and profit is continuing to encroach and jeopardize the ability to enjoy the best education available.

So this holiday season, I will continue to ask that you do not shop at those stores who do not pay a living wage and who force their employees to work on that day that has up till now been left for the freedom to enjoy one's family, or just a day of rest.

And finally, I am glad that, despite whoever banished my words from the Charleston Patch, I am able to send them to you here.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Privatizing the U.S.

When I hear our president speak about helping business do its work, I get chills.  When he refers to "small business" incentives, I wonder if he is talking about a mom-and-pop, or about a subsidiary of Blackwater – I mean Xe.

If you haven't read Naomi Klein's The Shock Doctrine:  The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, run to your library, that is, if you still have a library, and check it out.  It's approaching Halloween season, and there is no better time for this scary read.

We have been lured and duped by the wealthy and powerful into hating the government for its incompetence and waste.  If we stopped to think at all about this, we would see just how absurd are both the premise and the argument.

The great waste and inefficiency of our federal government is due, not to federal workers and federal programs, but to the private industries, their lawyers and lobbyists, with which our government's representatives shares its bed.  And its dollars.

The secret to the success of the raping of this country is in scaring people too busy, undereducated, gullible and apathetic to understand that they are being duped.

They say things like, "It is regulation that is killing business", "Raising minimum wage will strangle the free market", "People need to be free of unions so that they can earn a living."

Absurdities.

But people who will never make a living wage without union or government intervention scream about those unionized workers who do, rage at the waste caused by the regulators (that try to keep the mercury out of our food and pharmaceuticals from killing us), and worry themselves about the minimum wage worker who is preventing them from getting that raise.

Nonsense.

But it works.  On MSNBC, during the recent republican debate, I saw an ad, featuring a young, handsome, quite sane looking and sounding individual talking calmly about illegal aliens, and ending in the punchline that we need to do something to stop LEGAL immigrants NOW.

And during that republican debate on MSNBC for gods' sake, where were the ads with the progressive messages?

I know: our side doesn't have the money and the incentive to fight as hard and as long.

So read The Shock Doctrine.  At least be educated as to the extent of this fight.  It didn't start with Ronald Reagan or George W. Bush, and people like Barack Obama, in the name of compromise, are furthering the cause of disaster capitalism every time they speak of government aiding business rather than helping people.  And we need to understand it in order to stop it.

Batten Down the Hatches

Batten Down Your Hatches

I don't have any hatches, but I've had to batten down a lot of things lately and I feel that way a lot of the time.  Something important is going to break, or go wrong, or just not work.

We’ve all gotten used to it in this country.  We don’t expect to have electricity during the mildest of storms, and I am not even surprised when the power goes out for an hour or two on a beautiful day.

Now, don’t go blaming the government.  Government services suck because you  get what you pay for.  At least where government is concerned.  From Amtrak to the power grid, the people with all the money just don’t want to pay for quality for the rest of us, and they just keep convincing us voters that they shouldn’t have to.

And the next verse to that tune is that businesses would do a better job than government.  So look around you.  Where do you get better bang for the buck?

At the airport, the airlines got government to foot the bill for security when they were unenthusiastic about paying for a job that did not immediately and positively impact their bottom line, and then they cut staff at the customer service lines so they could make an even bigger buck by not offering customer service.

If you like your private health insurance better than Medicare, it just may be because those people you voted into office on the platform of cutting the fat out of government managed to cut the budget out of government health care while siphoning off our tax dollars to the private insurers.

And you may not remember the days before ObamaCare, but they are unforgettable if you or a loved one had a pre-existing condition, or you had or were a jobless college graduate that fell ill, but it will all come back to you when the Republicans get the Supremes to repeal that nasty old socialist health care law.

And why pay government employees, when our tax dollars can pay a corporation, say, Halliburton or Blackwater (Xe, for goodness sakes), to pay employees, and we get to pay their wages as well as a tidy profit for the shareholders and CEO’s.   And an extra added benefit to that is, there is absolutely no governmental control over the quality of the job done.  Remember Abu Ghraib?

Sell off our highways, and then hit the government up for repairs as an incentive for "job creation"; privatize our prisons rather than provide the government the funds to better our communities.

Our internet, which should be free, but is actually free to all who can pay for it, is the next mountain for corporate America to conquer.  Because a well-informed public would also want to be a well-educated public.  And a well-informed and well-educated public would not be led around by fear, and would see the contradictions in the rhetoric of privatization and deregulation, and would know that government should be for us all, and not just the wealthy.

And then we would insist on a dependable electrical grid, and attractive schools that children would be proud to spend the day in, with well-paid teachers that are respected for the important job they do for our children.

And we would know that a good, honest government would do this gladly, and then we would only need to batten down the hatches in a rare emergency, and not every time it rains.