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.

Antonin and Me

Some of us are up in arms at the Supreme Court ruling that it is a-okay to take DNA swabs of suspects  and use them to search databases of open crimes.

I do hate to be on the same side of a fight as Justice Scalia, and I can't say I agree with his weird "we should continue to live in the 18th century as the Founding Fathers would have wanted it" philosophy.  But still.  One does have to ask, "Where does it end?"

In the debate following the decision, some have said it would not be amiss to swab at birth, and have the data right there in a national database.

Now, don't go all panicky just yet.  Think of all the data our government already has on us.

Some were outraged when the government began to require we all have social security identification cards.  Back then it was illegal to use those identification numbers for anything other than social security.  So imagine the panic when colleges began to use the number as student ID.  Now imagine not using the number as an ID for nearly everything.

To be honest, even though I was of the generation when by the time you had finished applying for college, you'd be very likely to have your SSN memorized, it truly chills me that this number has become the ID that follows us throughout every stage of our lives.  While we are encouraged to develop computer passwords that will be so complicated no one can break in, including ourselves, that one nine-digit number links us to every important thing we do.

And then there is the fingerprint.  My fingerprint went into that creepy database when I took the licensing exam for psychology, because what greater security need is there than to keep track of those licensed professionals?

Being a lifelong underachiever, and having been minimally employed since I walked away from a psychology practice that was being governed by the bottom line of managed care rather than the interests of the patient, I have no idea what other high status positions require fingerprinting.  My guess is, more than you or I would imagine.

And then there are drivers' licenses, which, as with the social security card, were met with distrust by those individuals who felt that living in a free country meant that our names and photos should not be on file.  Of course, it is becoming commonplace to require photo ID to vote, and to not carry such an ID, which is maintained by the state and might as well be considered a national database given the technology, has nearly become unfeasible.  The fact that its original purpose was to be as proof of the qualification to drive a car is ancient history.

So what is the big deal about just collecting that DNA?  Don't fight it.  It's just a matter of time.

And RFID, those little electromagnetic chips that are in the tags on the clothes you buy to prevent shoplifting, are also being used to track inventory.  And -- why not? -- your purchase history.  In fact, those of us who are annoyed at having to carry around so many cards for ID, to charge purchases, to borrow library books, might just step up and volunteer to have one of those chips put right under our skin.  If you don't mind the fact that you can be followed by your cell phone signal, why would you care about a chip under your skin?

So we have here the inevitable creepy centralized tracking of us.  And most of us don't mind.  But there is one exception, and I just have to wonder why.

Those same folks who brought you voter ID, who believe the ability to track us all will keep us safe from terrorists, will fight to their death (actually, to your death) for the right to bear arms without ID, license or registry.

Go figure.

Conundrums

It's true; the republicans are speaking in riddles, and if we don't figure out the right answer we'll be paying for sure.

When they say, "We will work to create jobs," they have actually left out a couple of steps.  What they really mean is, "We plan on giving lots and lots of money back to the really, really wealthy, and we are absolutely sure that eventually they will create jobs with that money.  But not necessarily in America, because, well, that wouldn't be good for corporate America, and they are, after all, the job creators."

When they say, "We want to protect your Social Security and Medicare," they don't add, "for now," but that's what they mean.  In a great moment of honesty, they have begun to add that Social Security and Medicare are safe for those of us over 55.  Then they tap dance around what's going to happen to those of us under 55.  It's kind of bizarre, that they are reassuring some of us that we'll be okay, and not realizing that the end of that thought is that the rest of us are screwed.

When they say, "We are determined to improve the lives of our children," well, they really mean that.  They want to improve the lives of their children.  Not yours or mine.  And how will they do this?  They will make sure that every penny that they own (whether earned by them or not) passes down to their heirs, never being sullied by taxation or obligation.

So listen carefully, folks.  The riddle is in the promise.

PS:  Well, I had drafted this piece before I went on vacation, and came home to find out that Mitt had been caught being honest.  We can all be thankful that he is really a terrible politician.  While they are regrouping, let us all enjoy that brief respite from the Orwellian campaign machine.

Another Great Idea that Will Never Happen

I just read an email about my hero Bernie Sanders "new" idea about raising the cap on the payroll tax in order to fund social security.  Here are the usual reasons that this will never fly:

We don't tax the rich in this country, because it is unfair to them.  It is unfair to them because they are the people that make this country great.  They are the job creators, the investors, the innovators.  We, on the other hand, are the folks who ride on their coattails, and we should be grateful for it.

The people who keep getting elected are the ones who are trying to kill the government.  They have been doing it, one program at a time, and if they can't strangle social security this year, they'll try again next year.  And they have the means, and the moral compass of a squid, so they surely will keep trying.

No matter how much Democrats are giving lip service to saving social security, they are mostly in the pockets of the wealthy and nearly as deeply as the republicans.  If they were as convinced about the need for the haves to pay more to raise the rafts of the ever-sinking middle class, they would be shouting as loudly, and being heard as clearly as the Tea Party.  Regardless of the media's fondness for highlighting the crazies.

And then there is the mainstream media.  The media who reports on the screamers, but fails to point out the disinformation that they spread.  We will no more hear on NBC than we will on FOX the facts about social security; if they report on Bernie Sanders' plan to raise the cap on the payroll tax, it is only so they can quote some republican patsy whining about "class warfare" and how we are trying to stifle the "job creators".

Sorry, Bernie, I wish I could be more optimistic.  And I wish we had a country where your ideas could truly be heard without being twisted, so the voters might have a shot at electing more like you.

Et Tu, AARP?

When our democratic President began his health care fight by inviting the industry to the table and not including advocates of single payer, we knew there was trouble ahead.


When, in December, the President supported caving on letting tax cuts for the wealthy sunset, in trade for the smallest of tax cuts for the rest of us, he claimed it was because we Americans were being held hostage.  If only we were being held on a ship by pirates, he might have shown some courage and conviction, and fought for us instead of giving us up.


The message of this administration is, and has been from day one in office, that you can't beat them, we might as well join them.  He is them.  And he has let us know that we are powerless against the moneyed and corporate interests that own him as well as Congress and our courts.


So who was surprised to learn that AARP is caving in its defense of Social Security?  AARP has not, for a very long time, been about the average American.  With its increased lobbying power, AARP, like President Obama, grew away from the people who, in retirement, try to juggle expenses as the cost of living rises faster than Social Security benefits.


AARP will no longer defend those who work too many hours on their feet, teachers and Wal-Mart cashiers, police and construction workers, those who by age 62 will opt for partial benefits because they physically can no longer handle the stress of the workplace.  They have joined the chorus of those who chant, "Don't worry, it won't affect you."  They propose to let the coming generations, our children and grandchildren pay with their old age.


And they are counting on the greed and insecurity that has bred in this country to sell us out.  That we will allow the next generations to suffer more years of hard work for less benefit.


Because it is not the AARP executive or the lawmaker that will suffer those extra years in the workplace.  It is those people who are worn and tired, wishing they had time to spend with loved ones before they die, hoping they are not too sick to be able to eventually enjoy retirement.


Why?


Because we refuse to tax the wealthy and powerful, refuse to compel the greedy corporations to care for the country that feeds them.  The corporate powers that brought us Tea Party health care reform rhetoric about killing grandma is not only seeking to block the health care reform that would care for grandma, but is controlling the debate on a budget deficit they care not a fig about, and convincing our leaders, and the powerful organization that once claimed to support us, that our children should pay for their wealth with their old age.


This is why, today, I am quitting AARP.  They no longer speak for me.


I suggest you follow suit, and let them know when you do, that it is because they no longer support middle class Americans in our fight against the wealthy and powerful.


Rather, give your support to organizations like the Alliance for  Retired Americans, and other organizations made up of people like us, who still speak for us.

Bad Business

The Post and Courier's editorial department put in their two cents on February 3, regarding the Progressive Change Campaign Committee ad that I starred in.  I felt a burning need to respond, and so sent a letter to the editor, the text of which follows:

Dear Editor:

As the ad by the Progressive Change Campaign Committee was about me, I would like to respond to the editorial "Hard Entitlement Reality" in the February 3 Post and Courier.

I was a bit surprised at the defensiveness of the writer; he calls the ad an "attack" on "our senior senator".

Excuse me, but it seems to me that as one of Lindsey Graham's constituents, it is my right to speak to the Senator regarding the issues on which he is voting.  I was surprised that this editorial implied that Graham is allowed to express his opinion nationally, but it is "an attack" on Graham if someone debates those opinions.

Don't take it personally, because Senator Graham probably is taking it in stride.  It is his job.

Now to the issues.

I heard a lot of talk last fall about how essentional it was to not leave the huge budget deficit to our children.   And then Congress voted to continue the outrageous tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans.  And then I heard our President brag on how he was putting more money in middle class pockets by the deal he brokered with Mitch McConnell et al.

That money that the President and Congress put in our pockets did indeed take money from our children, because it came from the payroll tax through which we contribute to social security and medicare.  Trying to "destroy" social security?  Whether that was the goal or not, those tax cuts certainly added a nail to the coffin.

I have heard far more about the likelihood of increasing the retirement age to 70 than I have heard about raising the cap on income subject to payroll tax.  And yet there is no reason that one who earns more (and will receive more upon retirement) should not pay more into the account.  Yet we keep coming back to the retirement age.

My ad talks about people who over the course of 40 years or so earning a living very often have body trauma as a result of the daily job requirements.  Those of us who are in the service sector, on our feet, loading shelves, will no doubt have a few more of those aches and pains than the esteemed writer of the editorial.

The statement that Senator Graham is not proposing the elimination of Social Security Disability was just an insult and a total lack of understanding of the problem.  First of all, most of us do not want to collect disability.  Secondly, people far more disabled than I have been rejected, often more than once, before being approved, and many don't bother.  I had the option, one year ago, to continue to work full time until I was far more disabled, and then stop working and attempt to collect disability.  I chose to work part-time instead, with the dramatic cut in an already low salary, in order to try to retain my health.

The solutions to the social security crisis that Senator Graham proposes, and that your editorial writer defends, demean the hard-working, aging workforce.  And, because the Senate would not attempt to make the change immediate, it will not affect me, but it will affect the generation coming up, and it will affect my children.  Remember, it's the children we don't want to punish for our spending?

And, in fact, by forcing people who are ready to retire to continue to work, we end up with a work force that will cost more in sick leave and injury, while holding positions that could be given to the younger citizens, those who are now collecting unemployment.

Bad business all around.


Yes, it is.

The More Things Change

I was disheartened by the time I finished reading The Wrecking Crew by Thomas Frank.  It is an amazing history of the political right-wing, going way back, but especially since the Reagan years.  Apparently, the crazy, incoherent philosophies of people like John Boehner have all been choreographed by movement ideologues for decades.  It is no accident that the goal of the last Congress was to say no, and halt the movement of the Congress.  And it worked.


A party united is what the corporations that own our politicians paid for, and Frank documents the intricate relationship that has developed among corporations, lobbyists and members of Congress.  The Gingrich House exists today, Boehner's contract on America an echo of that penned by Gingrich.


If it seems strange that the Boehner promises, from transparency to jobs, have fallen by the wayside, and after the symbolic death of Obama's Affordable Health Care Act our House is now tackling issues like abortion, that is also a part of the plan.  While their social base is getting fired up about issues like abortion and gun rights, the fact that jobs are not being created is left for the upcoming election, when Obama and the Democrats will be blamed for the failure.


We all laughed when, after the 2008 landslide, the republicans, as united as ever, insisted that it was their agenda demanded by the American people.  But it worked.  Tossing out the words "socialist" and "nazi" can still get you mileage when the voters are too scared and exhausted to know better.


After I finished reading The Wrecking Crew, I decided to go back to Molly Ivins' collected essays on the Clinton years, You Got to Dance with Them What Brung You.


What I most remember from my first reading of this collection at the end of the 90's, is that it wasn't funny.  Molly Ivins, who made us laugh with the riotous stories of the Texas lege, wasn't laughing.  That Bill Clinton caved and compromised on so many issues critical to the welfare of the American people, I believe it broke her heart.


Making deals to benefit the corporations while cutting benefits to the poorest and youngest Americans.  Paving the way for those corporations to take jobs and dollars overseas, while slashing salaries and benefits for their workers back home.  Downsizing.  Increased productivity.  Record salaries for CEO's.  Record profits for Wall Street.


I supposed it's fitting reading for January, when our President has just allowed cuts to the payroll tax that funds Social Security and Medicare while continuing the huge tax cuts for the top one percent of American earners.  Talking about extending social security retirement age being on the table, while the very wealthy (top 1/2 of one percent) maintain the right to pass millions of dollars, untaxed, to their heirs.


What would Molly say if she were still with us?  Maybe she would just shake her head and again say, "You got to dance with them what brung you."

A Cold-Blooded Debate

When I saw my PCCC ad against extending the social security retirement age on YouTube, I was dismayed at the first crazy mean-spirited comments.  Basically, a couple of idiots contended that I should stop whining and get a job, and that I was just lazy.  Amazing that they could even write, given their listening skills.

I knew, from my son's comments regarding a recent Rachel Maddow YouTube video, that there is a vast membership of idiots in YouTube; apparently the anonymity allows them to do the internet equivalent of crank phone calls.  What a riot, showing the world how stupid we are, they must think.  Let's publish really ugly things about people and then laugh like crazy.

I recalled that Maddow has a wonderful healthy attitude about all this, making wisecracks on her show, once saying something like she felt flattered that the insult involved her actual political philosophy and didn't involve calling her a man.

But then there was the Keith Olbermann interview with Jonathan Alter on Countdown.

It was amazing that I was there, not just on national television, but on Countdown, in the middle of an analysis of the battle to make changes to social security.  I have great respect for Alter, and in fact his comments regarding what Obama might say Tuesday night and why were thoughtful and made a great deal of sense, although I hate the politics that are controlling this discourse.

I was stunned, though, when he made it personal.  "That woman in the ad...she made it sound as if Lindsey Graham wanted to take away her social security."

Well, no I didn't.  I actually said, "...people like me just won't make it."

And in fact, whether it be next year (which the republicans dare not even propose) or in forty years (which they will), people like me will still exist, and will be in great pain when they retire, whether it be at age 62 (when when they wouldn't even be eligible to collect full benefits) or age 70.

Alter failed to hear the real argument, because he works up in the stratosphere where health care is plentiful and affordable, and you take taxis if you don't feel like walking, and when your job makes you tired, there is no one there making sure you punch in and out and take no more than your allotted 15 minute break.

One of the snarky comments either on YouTube or one of the online articles about the ad was that I should quit and go on disability (which, according to other snarky comments, would make me one of those people sucking the government tit, regardless of the tax dollars I put in to the disability fund).

As ugly as the comments of the anonymous internet cranksters are, I am far more offended by the personal tone to Alter's criticisms.

Because, you see, I know that Lindsey Graham is not going to take away my social security.  What he will do, however, is make my children pay by working longer for less.