Hyperbole aside, what's really happening to welfare.

Hello! We all know my political leanings, or we all think we do, but in the interest of knowledge I'll try to keep this as objective as possible. If I fail.... eh, who cares. 

Ok so...

In the coming campaign it seems we're going to hear a lot about President Obama attacking welfare reform and seeking to return us to a welfare state. We're probably not going to hear it in the debates, or on headlines, but we'll hear it from your friend at the bar, who heard it from his cousin, who posted something about on it facebook from a link he saw on redstate.com. (that site makes my brain hurt. Why do all conservative websites have such shitty design). What you will hear is some variation on this theme;

"President Obama passed a law in July that guts welfare reform

 by getting rid of the workfare requirement"

Like I said, there will be variations depending on where you are, who is speaking, and how racist they are, but the above sentence will be the essence. Now, Is It True?

Yes.

But not how you think. Here is what's actually happening. History first. In 1996 then Congressman and now Governor John Kasich introduced H.R. 3734 into the house (look at that number! Look how high it is! God I miss the days when the house actually, ya know, did stuff...) to combat abuse of the welfare system. Now, whatever you think about abuse of the welfare system, it passed the house, the senate, and the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act, or PRWORA, was signed into law by Clinton in the fall of 96, right before he went onto to grind Bob Dole to a pulp beneath his boots. No coincidence, I'm sure. 

Now, one of the things, the thing relevant to what Obama did in July, that made PRWORA (In my mind this sounds like a dog drinking water from a high pressure hose) so Prwopular(!!) was the work to welfare requirements, which did more or less exactly what you'd think they would. This was specifically handled by a section of the bill called Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, or TANF(Also known has the sound Nightcrawler makes when he teleports. #selfhighfive) 

How it works is like this. You have a fixed time to recover from whatever hard knock forced you on the welfare rolls, then you'd better have a J.O.B. if you wanted to get with me, me in this instance being defined as more welfare. This is federally mandated, so it's an across the board 50 states solution. Exposition: We all know how well the GOP likes federally mandated across the board solutions. 

So, we did that, and everyone was happy, and everyone got re-elected from it and then we all spent the next 4 years caring waaaaaaaay too much about Monica Lewinsky. Then fast forward to February of 2011. President Obama releases a memorandum to HHS, asking them to look for regulatory roadblocks they think they can remove to streamline things, his "We'll go line by line through the budget and eliminate waste" campaign pledge. When people at the HHS started asking around they found there was already a following of sorts for state level control of TANF regulation.

George Sheldon, Assit. Secretary of Health and Human Services: "During those consultations, many jurisdictions expressed a strong interest in greater flexibility in TANF and indicated that greater flexibility could be used by states to improve program effectiveness. We also heard concerns that some TANF rules stifle innovation and focus attention on paperwork rather than helping parents find jobs."

Normal Speak: PLEASE GIVE US STATE CONTROL OF OUR WELFARE REQUIREMENTS NOW PLEASE AND THANK YOU.

It is again important to note that the push to give TANF control to the states dates back to the early aughts and came largely from Republican Governors. Here is Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad, more or less saying exactly that while Skyping with Chuck Todd and stabbing himself in the brain repeatedly.

Tommy Thompson, the guy he's crediting with asking for this process to be done, is a Republican, a former Governor, as well as the former HHS Sec. under Bush. It's safe to assume that, as the former head of the dept in charge of TANF, he is familiar with the inner workings of it. And he is not the only one who expressly petitioned for this! In 2005 a letter was sent to then Senate Majority leader Bill Frist by a group of GOP governors asking for more or less this exact thing. A lot of the people you will see accusing Obama of gutting welfare reform signed this letter. Haley Barbour. And Rick Perry. And Tim Pawlenty. And Mike Huckabee. And Jeb Bush. And Mitch McDaniels. And MITT ROMNEY. 

Remember that. 

That's important. 

This thing that Obama did in July; when Mitt Romney was Governor of Mass. 

he asked for exactly that thing. 

Annnnnnnnnnnnywho, based on the input from state agencies, the HHS concluded that, "States are running less-effective programs than they might be, because they are so driven by performance measurement as it’s set forth in the federal law."  So this July they released a memorandum stating that states could apply for waivers to bypass the work requirements in TANF in order to pursue state level solutions. 

Solution soluted, right? Hardly. This is an election year, after all. By August the GOP starts attacking this move as undermining welfare as we know it. On August 6th Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell wrote an op-ed in the Richmond Times entitled Obama decree guts bipartisan consensus. Politifact called it as "false"  

The next day the Romney campaign released this video

Politifact called this one as "pants on fire"

President Clinton, the man who initially passed the law and is praised in this commercial, responded with the following written statement, emphasis mine: 

Governor Romney released an ad today alleging that the Obama administration had weakened the work requirements of the 1996 Welfare Reform Act. That is not true. [...]

The recently announced waiver policy was originally requested by the Republican governors of Utah and Nevada to achieve more flexibility in designing programs more likely to work in this challenging environment. The Administration has taken important steps to ensure that the work requirement is retained and that waivers will be granted only if a state can demonstrate that more people will be moved into work under its new approach. The welfare time limits, another important feature of the 1996 act, will not be waived.

The Romney ad is especially disappointing because, as governor of Massachusetts, he requested changes in the welfare reform laws that could have eliminated time limits altogether. We need a bipartisan consensus to continue to help people move from welfare to work even during these hard times, not more misleading campaign ads.

So, to sum up. 

• We have regulations for Work to Welfare at a federal level.
• States don't like that, they want state level control of those requirements
• Conservative Governors, including Mitt Romney, start a campaign to get those controls. 
• Health and Human Services issues a memo saying that states can apply to get exactly that, state level control. 
• White House agrees to cede federal control of TANF to the States if they can show proof of an alternative program. 
• The GOP attacks with accusations that are generally viewed as the opposite of true.

So, that's about it. Hate Romney. Hate Obama. But it seems that this memo is going to be a talked about thing in this campaign, so you should at least know what it actually does before you or someone you know gets enraged about it. 

Keep it classy, gay hating Louisiana!

So, while Louisiana is expanding charter schools and using tax dollars to fund private education it is at the same time loosening regulatory restrictions and making it easier for those private schools taking tax dollars to deny admission to students who are gay and/or 'furiners'(The exact language specifies students with the 'inability to speak English' and we all know what that's fucking code for, don't we?)


Bullet points.

-Jindal passes education reform in Louisiana.

-One part of said reform is expanding charter schools and instituting voucher programs for low income families to attend these charter schools.

-Certain schools, upon requesting government money to teach poor Louisiana kids, balked at being forced to sign contracts stating they will not discriminate against gays or foreigners. Their argument is that "State law currently forbids discrimination on the basis of race, religion, national ancestry, age, sex or disability" and that being asked to also not ban gays and mexicans is the executive branch (represented here by the LA Dept. of Education) imposing it's will on Louisiana private businesses.

-Louisiana conservative politicians rushed to create legislation to insure that these private businesses could take public money without having to offer the same discrimination protections that public institutions have to.

Got that? Private schools have a problem with "big government" telling them Specifically that they cannot ban gay or mexican kids. Please note they have no problems taking big government's money, and if asked I'm sure they would publicly state they have no problem with gay or mexican kids, it's all really a principled stand against executive branch overreach.

Nope, sorry assholes! You can't have it both ways. You can either have your lilywhite catholic private schools, funded by outrageous tuitions and a constant whoring after your alumni (Side note: Fuck You, St. Paul's. Setting aside the bullshit fact you expelled me on a trivial technicality 2 months before my graduation, you had the defensive football coach attempt to teach me Shakespeare and an evangelical extremist in charge of the drama program. Until you show at least a modicum of respect for the liberal arts you don't get a single red fucking penny from me. Not. One. So stop pestering my parents with mailers.) 


*DeepBreath*

Orrrrr... You have to let in all the horrid Others with their gayness and other languages and all those horrible things that Republican Jesus hates. But you can't do both.


Oh, who I am kidding! This is Louisiana, the state that almost elected the head of the KKK as governor, OF COURSE YOU'LL DO BOTH!

Liberals are eggheads, Conservatives are assholes.

So, I use an app called Zite. For those who don't know it, it's like Pandora for news. You tell it a category, and it aggregates articles that you can then 'like' or 'dislike' to further acclimate your magazine to your needs. I chose Politics as one of my sections, but didn't specify anything beyond that. Not liberal or conservative, didn't blacklist any outlets or pick any favorites. Because of that, I get equal portions from sources like huffpo and addictinginfo.org, but also from redstate, drudgereport, and brietbart nation. After reading/skimming these with equal weight over the past month, I have come to the following conclusions.

Both sides are obviously biased. No secret but the blatantness of their bias is so overt only the dumbest would mistake them for non partisan. The really interesting part is How these biases are manifested, and what it says about the personalities that are attracted to either end of the political spectrum. 

Liberals are consistently outraged and shocked at the behavior of conservatives. They honestly cannot understand what they perceive to be ignorance, cruelty and hypocrisy. They start from the position of intellectual superiority, and however justified that position might be, it leads to a pretty thinly veiled smugness that does a fantastic job of destroying any chance they have of changing anyone's mind.

Conservatives, on the other hand, are most always meaner towards liberals. They are the ones to resort first to insults and sarcasm to prove their points, and to use those tactics even louder when they have points that can't actually Be proven. When a counter argument is presented, the conservative tends to react more like a schoolyard bully then an educated pundit, using name calling and demeaning word play to distract the reader from any logic the liberal side may have.

While both sides can be obnoxious, the argument that both sides are equally counterproductive to any kind of discourse is total bullshit. A popular political comedian once said, "I'm not saying all Republicans are racists but, in this age, if you Are a racist, you're probably a Republican." And I don't think anyone would disagree with that. But that template holds true for a lot of things, because our two party system has been distilled enough that (D) consistently gathers one set of personality traits while (R) consistently gathers another set. "I'm not saying all Democrats donate to PETA but, in this age, if you donate to PETA, you're probably a Democrat" 

You get what I mean. And those A types, the super driven, pull up your bootstraps, I got mine so Fuck you, win whatever it takes, there's no prize for second place.... those type of people, what party do you think they identify more with? I'll give you a hint, it's not the party that wants universal health care for all people at taxpayer expense. 

So no, because of who's at the wheel it's not an equal proportion of partisan distortion. The Right naturally attracts more people who want to win, no matter what. They honestly believe their argument is best but, unlike Liberals, they feel no need to convince others, not when it's faster just to beat them and do what they want. So they do whatever is necessary to win. And liberals can't do that, they aren't wired that way. 

Which is something I suppose I've known, but this month long experiment in non partisan news browsing has certainly proved it to me beyond any shred of doubt.

I would have facebooked the shit out of that!

I'm just going to start posting all my facebooky blurbs here and just post this after Easter. Sure it maybe cheating, but F you.


-So, they say celebrity deaths come in threes. Well....  goodbye  Andrew! I've got Rush Limbaugh and Michelle Malkin rounding out my trifecta here, can I get like an Agent 47 or a Mr. Pink to get working on that? Please?

-I have started taking adderal. I have also given up online video games. I don't know if it's one, or the other, or some combination, but this apartment just got the shit reorganized out of it.

-Half of Africa is broke. Not monetarily, well.. not Just monetarily, but functionally broke. Armies made of children isn't a new thing, these guys alone have been making this documentary for a decade. And it's not a secret, people have been reporting this for years. If we want to actually fix the problem of a broken continent, it's going to take a sustained global effort, and it's obvious that's not a place we're at. So... get rid of Kony, ok. But don't think that fixes anything. In Africa, there's thousands of Kony's waiting in the wings. And don't think that simply reposting a status update or tweeting #StopKony means you did your part.

-Taking adderal on a day off makes me feel like Bradley Cooper in Limitless.

-Just managed to fit into my wife's pajama pants. One more marital Rubicon crossed.

-It seems I'm trading WoW for the NYSE. This can't end well. (Later note: Seems my first purchase on the NYSE...? The company that makes WoW.)

-Dollarshaveclub.com  Ok, I'm sold.

-Tying a four in hand with sash cord in a public place sure gets you a lot of funny looks.

-Did you know pornos have trailers? Did you know those trailers are on youtube?

-Recent polling seems to indicate Alabama and Mississippi GOP primary voters are not educated. Like... at all. Also.... pretty racist! Exit poll interviews showed waaaay too many "I voted for Santorum, but I'd vote for anyone. It can't be Obama." "Why not?" "It just..... just can't."

-Hey, guess what! Fresca gives you asparagus pee.

-325 west 15th st = the location of the hospital you're having your surgery at. 325 West 14th st. = the location of a funeral home. Guess who accidentally went where for his 8:30 am appointment?

-Unless something game changing happens, I have a feeling that Peter Dinklage is just gonna keep racking up Emmys till this thing goes off the air.

-Laying facedown, bound, awake, and able to listen as the surgeon guides the learning resident through the steps required to stitch your skull closed for the THIRD time because he failed the first two is an.....   unsettling experience.

-SWSX '12..... So, you took some homeless people, gave them a job and a chance to not be invisible for a day, and the national takeaway is that it's bad because it made self absorbed 20 something's uncomfortable?

-Ok, so any of you who have ever used the term "Massive Obama Conspiracy".... Know that you sound like a massive fucking idiot when you say it. Massive. Fucking. Idiot. Do not take any comfort from the fact that the people around you when you said it nodded in agreement, or maybe added similar words to it. All that means is that they are also massive fucking idiots. Massive. Fucking. Idiot.

-Is on the search for the perfect pair of what I'm calling 'Andy Yost' pants. (This joke is meant for a limited group of people that include anyone who's attended a family gathering of my in-laws held outside in 70+ weather). 


-That moment when the Vicodin kicks in when you're typing mid sentence and you realize your hands are Huuuuuuuuuge.

-I wish I could get on facebook tonight and find out which terrible choice my unenlightened kinsfolk voted for today.

-Creepiest thing ever overheard on the street: Grown man with (greasy)hair in pigtails, wearing overalls, obviously on drugs, staggering down 44th street in the middle of the afternoon while talking on the phone: "I just wanna have sex, if you get pregnant just get another abortion....."   I think I just saw what Rick Santorum thinks every Democrat looks like.

-Only the stupidest and most gullible of people believes that the president has fuck all control over the price of a barrel of crude oil.

-You know what lowers the price of gas, not poking Iran with a stick to jack up voter turnout in the heartland.

- Highlight of my workday was watching a 5'3 female electrician haul a VL-1000 from the back of the house all the way up two flights of stairs to it's hanging position by herself while her 4 male co-workers stood around the empty box looking confused at what was happening.

-Holy shit, Avon Barksdale is on stage!

-According to wagist.com, in what has to be one of the ugliest examples of "whatever Obama is for, I am therefore against" from someone who is clearly white and Clearly out of touch, Trayvon Martin was a racist because his twitter handle had the word "nigga" in it. Also, he was brute and a thug because he had a tattoo.

-Ok so, that picture they keep showing of "Gangsta Trayvon" is not Trayvon. I know all black people look alike, so it's an easy mistake to make. But that picture of the 'scary black guy' is a TOTALLY DIFFERENT PERSON. Way to go, racist America. Again.

-Facebook is brilliant at shining a spotlight on who the most gullible people you know are. 

-And in other "you don't practice what you preach so don't get offended when I call you hypocrites" news, why aren't any libertarians or tea party conservatives getting outraged at what's happening in Michigan? Oh, right, because the Cato institute never told them to care because it's happening to black democrats and being done by people financially in bed with the Koch brothers.

-If I was the candidate who was fighting the impression that I was grossly wealthy and out of touch with common men, I would probably cancel work on the building of a FUCKING CAR ELEVATOR in my new beach home....   Rodney's communication director has got to be an alcoholic by now

-Yeah, if I was Santorum I would have called that bullshit as well. It was and he was right not to take it. You're the New York Times, have some goddamned respect for your paper. Senator Ass-Juice doesn't need your help to make him look nuts.

-Day 3 of tech. Scene 1. 

-STELLLLLLLAAAAAAAAAAA!!! 

-Creepiest thing ever overheard on the street, take 2. "Is it too early to start the countdown clock on Sally Draper's 18th birthday?" 45th and 9th.

-No, Republicans didn't vote down the facebook law because they're evil and want corporations to spy on you. They voted it down because it's an unnecessary law. When employers ask you for your password they are already breaking the law by forcing you to violate the ToS agreement you signed with facebook. Also, asking the FCC to regulate it when it's clearly a Dept. of Labor issue is stupid. This was clearly a case of politicians introducing an unneeded law so they could make headlines with it.

-Conversation had outside the stage door this morning;
 Other stagehand: How far you guys get so far?
 Me: About ten minutes into act two, so not so bad. We're about on schedule, I think.
 Other stagehand: Jeez, what's taking so long? I used to work soaps and we'd bang out 5-6 episodes a  week, these guys are still learning their lines.
 Me: Well, in fairness to them, this is Tennessee Williams, on Broadway. The bar is a little higher.
Other stagehand: (Obviously not convinced) Ehhhhh, words is words.

-Hey, I have an idea! How about, instead of spending our money giving near zero interest loans to banks and corporations, in the hopes that they will increase small business loans and not just deleverage themselves, which is exactly what they've spent the past 3 years doing.... How about we spend that money to FIX OUR GODDAMNED ROADS AND BRIDGES AND SHIT.

- No, New York Times, the vote to end oil subsidies did not "Fail 51-47". It Passed 51-47, then got filibustered. Can we please, please, please, pretty please not just accept that it requires 60 votes to pass legislation? It takes a majority to pass, and it takes 60 votes to override a filibuster. and every time a filibuster gets used it needs to be pointed out that that's what's happening.

Otherwise in a very short time we'll have 'educated' adults thinking that it's Senate rules that require bills to garner a minimum 60 votes to pass, and not some shitbag senator in bed with oil companies.

-So, remember that debate in florida when Ron Paul was asked a hypothetical about health care costs for someone who was deathly ill and had no health insurance? Sure you do.

                                         
Yeah....... So! Remember how the republican defense of that zealous cheering for the philosophy of, "He's sick with no insurance? Fuck him, I got mine!" was to discard it as nothing but a vocal minority?

Yeah... well.... Antonin Scalia, a justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, basically just said the SAME FUCKING THING in oral arguments regarding the individual mandate, saying that the costs forced upon hospitals forced to give care to sick people with no insurance could be handled by just, oh, not... caring. Ya know, fuck em.

-I know I'm a snob but... seriously BAM, hire an audio engineer who understands mixing for a mezzanine, and a light board operator who can at the very minimum count time. Embarrassing.

-Riding home last night on the D train. A group of about a dozen black teenagers get on the train through the door nearest us. The middle aged Asian man sitting next to us flees the train instantly. The Midwestern tourist couple sitting across from us are clearly terrified. The boys are as well behaved as you could possibly hope any group of teenage boys could be. The one who sat down next to my wife apologized for bumping into her, I'm pretty sure he called her Ma'am. He was wearing a navy sportscoat with gold buttons on the cuff. And a mohawk, but whatever. Half the kids had oxfords and boat shoes on. All were clearly emulating Andre 3000. Midwestern couple remained on the verge of a full on Zimmerman until we changed to the A.   

This stupid fucking bikini picture.

Ok, I told myself I wouldn't say anything unless this kept popping up, but it keeps popping so....

I hate this picture. Hate it. For starters, let's talk about the message. Most people I've seen post it seem to walk away thinking that the message is anti anorexia moderation, but it ain't. It's clearly 4 skinny chicks on top, and 4 not skinny chicks on bottom, and one group is supposed to be hotter then the other. The captioning doesn't state "let's all have a confidant body image!" It clearly says "When did these skinny bitches grab the spotlight from us curvy women!?" The only thing you're changing is Which image insecure women obsess over. You go from having women living on pure carrot diets in order to hit a size zero to women getting Fix-a-Flat injected into their ass in order to have curves. Yes, this actually happened. Nothing in this image changes the problem of women obsessing over how men see them, the obvious robotic distortions post production and photoshop put on every single model and magazine cover actress. It just says SKINNY BAD, NOT SKINNY GOOD.

My other problem is the 4 chosen women on top. The "wrong" women who have somehow mistakenly been perceived as hot, but who really pale in comparison to the ones underneath them. Nicole Richie and whatever the name of that other half plastic moron is, I can't speak for them, but 2 of those women, I'm pretty sure, are just naturally skinny. I'm not Dr. Oz, but I'm pretty sure when you're severely underweight and you wear a bikini, you show off ribs, not a six pack. Also, looking at Kirsten Dunst I just see someone who's skinny. Not anemic, or sickly, or anorexic, just really skinny.

"But Brett" you say, "How can you relate to this, being a male, and a big male at that." Well, this big male is married to someone who clocks in closer to Kirsten Dunst then any of those other women, and I think she's pretty hot. She has the added bonus of a strong body image and a lot of self confidence, which helped her a lot during her teenage years when people often mistook her, quite rudely and to her face, as someone with an eating disorder. I have to assume that, when you're a 13 year old girl, being frequently told you're too skinny is just as uncomfortable as being told you're not skinny enough.

And make no mistake, everyone of those teenage and pre-teenage girls, everyone of them who is naturally skinny, who has a high metabolism, They all see this picture on various facebook feeds and they all identify with the top 4 girls, they all identify with Kirsten Dunst and Kiera Knightley and the implication of this image that there's something Wrong with that.

This picture doesn't strike me as liberating, or empowering, it really strikes me as women who are not skinny hating on women who are. That's not fixing the problem that everyone who shares and 'likes' this picture seems to want to fix, it's just trading it for another problem.

How's ya mama an em... an dey politics, dawlin'

I recently went back home to the deep south for the holidays, and had a number of interactions that had me both defending and preaching my political beliefs in dinner party after dinner party. A usual holiday occurrence, if a somewhat heightened one every 4 years, for obvious reasons. In my family all the political junkies are known, and we go into gatherings well warned by our spouses to ‘just f*cking behave’. To my credit, I did not pick any fights (this time), but they got picked and discussions were had. There’s nothing rare about this, I’m sure it happens in families across the country every holiday season. Probably the only noteworthy thing is, in my families’ case, all parties involved actually love each other and are respectful of each other’s feelings, if not all their opinions.

I tend to, and this might surprise some people who read my stuff, bite my tongue a lot during these conversations. I frequently find myself being the one who seeks common ground and shies away from the conflicting opinions. A prime example of this is a dinner I spent acknowledging the smart policy positions of Ron Paul, someone I find to be clearly delusional if not outright insane. Now, it’s not that I was lying in that conversation, I just did the thing grown ups do when faced with opposing viewpoints, you find common ground in the name of civility (Congress would do good to take note here).  Also, had the two parties involved in the conversation ceased being civil well, things would have gotten ugly

There's no doubt in my mind who is who here. 

I think this is an important thing here, this bi-partisan civility. For example, both myself and my aunt are readily acknowledged as political junkies, both outspoken, both extremely opinionated, and on polar opposite ends of the spectrum. All our family, who are of some varied stripes but mostly typical southerner “I learned everything I need to know about liberal politics from Rush Limbaugh” Republicans knows this and I think were awaiting some kind of Ron Paul V. Obama showdown. You could see them watching my aunt and I out of the corner of their eyes during our conversations, with a mixture of nerves and hope that the uppity transplanted yankee would get what for(I might be stretching the truth here)  And make no doubt, such a showdown could have been had. I feel in terms of loud, abrasive yet persuasive debate styles, we’d be fairly evenly matched. But we both realized that’s not the reason for the season so that’s not the conversation we had.

This note of civility was later in the week paid back to me tenfold when I basically sat and lectured a cousin on the wrongness of his opinion in front of his 9 year old daughter. Rather then do the normal (and correct) thing, which would be to chastise me for my tone, he listened patiently and earnestly, and in the process taught both his daughter and his bullish cousin a valuable lesson on being an adult. We then proceeded to find common ground, because that’s what grown ups do.

Again, you doofuses could take note.

So, I guess my one takeaway from the holidays is that, after having discussions with a Ron Paul delegate/Right wing AM radio show host, a Rush Limbaugh Republican, and a Fox News devotee who’s normal has been knocked so far out of whack he thinks CNN is left wing propaganda..... is this. That if you grow up, realize your relationships with people are more important then ‘winning’, you find common ground. And it’s ALWAYS there to be found.

I understand on some issues you have to fight for what you believe is right, but the people up there have to realize they represent everyone. They represent spinach eating liberals and swamp fishing coonasses and every last damn one of us in between. 2012 needs to be the year of growing the fuck up and compromising. And, more importantly, we need to let that be ok. Congress is hovering around 5% in their approval rating right now, which is bullshit. Congress is doing exactly what we tell them to do, it's us who are failing. Every time we refuse to elect some moderate in favor of an outspoken ideologue, every time we threaten an incumbent with a far right/left primary challenge we send the message, loud and clear; 

"SUIT UP, FUCKER, IT'S WARTIME!" 

And then we get shocked when they refuse to compromise.

I only regret that I have but one filibuster

to give for my rabid constituency.

Next, some bullet points of things that I was adult enough to not say at the time, observations I made, and a prediction for the next year.

• “That Bitch Rachel.” Whatever you think of the facts she brings, you cannot deny that she always comes loaded to the hilt with facts. And you can guarantee that she would Never refer to you as a bitch.

• If you are of a voting age and don’t know what the terms NDAA and SOPA mean, make no mistake, you are part of the fucking problem. A massive part of the problem. Pick up a goddamn paper.

• The new Black Keys album is seriously fucking amazing, y’all.

• Every tolerable position that Ron Paul has is one that only seems radical because of the ‘R’ next to his name. The legalization of weed, the end to the war on drugs, the not really caring about who marries who, all of these will be mainstream before this decade is done. Just because Paul’s Libertarian fantasyland coincides with that reality doesn’t mean it’s his war against them being waged. If Ron Paul is leading on those isues, it’s from behind and as a by product.

• On the flipside. He’s right to back away from Iran, he also is more right then wrong on his position via Israel. We’re now basically paying Israel to wage unilateral war on an entire region of people who are increasingly only united by their hatred of Israel. There’s no way that path ends well for anyone and Palestinians know damn good and well that it’s US tax dollars paying for the bombs that blow up their schools.

• But on the flip flip side, his foreign policy in the middle east is right for the wrong reasons. It’s not that we have to retreat behind our borders and pull back from international conflict. It’s that the middle east no longer has a strategic value to us. We need to pull out from that region and re-invest our military resources for the conflicts of the 2012. That can’t be done from behind a wall of noninterventionism(because that’s a fucking word) and if you think those conflicts will just go away because retreat from our foreign bases you’re a loon. The fight for resources in this next century will be epic, and by resources I don’t mean oil, I mean food and water. I don’t know about you but I personally want America to win those fights.

• On a final note about Ron Paul, his domestic policy is great, in the way a Norman Rockwell painting is great. He’s running in the wrong century. His ideas, his core economic ideas and governmental structure ideas will simply not work. Isolationism is no longer an option on a planet that is instantly interconnected at every level. And pulling our power from a federal position to a state position only weakens us in every trade arrangement we enter into. Instead of having 50 separate states trying to lure businesses by undercutting the other 49, we need one unified stick to wield when brokering deals with other nations.

• Every government regulation that personally inconveniences you is not a bad regulation. I don’t mean to say that every government regulation is an awesome one, but before you instantly dismiss government oversight as evil, stop and question why that specific regulation exists. It might be helping others more then it’s harming you.

• To my family that watches Fox News, and listens to Rush Limbaugh; Stop. I love you. Stop. You make yourself dumber every minute you do that. And I’m not whistling dixie here. Non partisan studies have shown that people who watch only Fox news are less informed on factual matters then people who watch NO NEWS AT ALL. Just to repeat that, in all bold underlined font. Studies have proven that if you watch FOX you are actually less informed then if you watched nothing. I understand the validity of people having different opinions based on their own life experiences, but you reach a point where facts are facts. And when it comes to facts, Fox lies to you, either with a grin and a nod, or by omission entirely. Make no mistake, Hannity, O'Reilly, Kelly, Van Susterenerenrern, these people are there for one reason; to make you angry, and loyal, in that order. Education is not one of their goals, nor is journalism. They are not homegrown, like you. They are NYC pissy elitists, like me. They broadcast from the heart of midtown manhattan, each lunch at 100 dollar a plate restaurants, and go to bed chuckling at how easily all of you are duped into voting and campaigning against your own interests.

 Mom and Pops good ole' fashioned media empire.

If you want conservative news, real conservative news, here are some people and outlets you should be following.

The Wall Street Journal
George Will
The Washington Post
David Brooks
The Economist
David Frum
Peggy Noonan
And is you must follow Fox News, I think Shepard Smith still has a shred of credibility left.

These are conservatives, thinking conservatives. I sometimes disagree with them, but they know what they’re talking about. Before we parted ways, my cousin acknowledged I know more about this stuff then he does. And he's right, by a country mile. Cars, forget it, I know where the key goes. Football... eh, the basics, but I'll never run a fantasy team and I lose interest very quickly once we stop talking about The Only Team That Matters.

Tears. Still. To this day.

But this shit. C-Span, minority whip, early primary poll results, policy decision ramifications... I eat this shit up. I know as much about the Congress as most Louisiana men know about LSU football. So, when I tell you that FOX news is lying to you, it's not because I want you to believe my politics, it's because it's the goddamned truth. And when I suggest other conservatives to read and listen to, it's not because they're secret liberals, it's because if you choose to be a conservative, I want you to be a smart conservative. 

• You better goddamned believe I’m for the end of tenure status and the insitution of merit based pay for teachers. I think the concept of a voucher system is a terrible idea, but I am 110% for the idea of merit based pay in our education system.

• I still maintain that, based on their respective policy records, I see zero difference between a Romney white house and an Obama white house.  I’m also noticing that my spellcheck has a conservative bias, as Romney clears but Obama gets redlined.

Seriously. All summer long, brace yourself for it. 

• RINO is a stupid term. Stop using it. What you call a RINO is someone smart enough to realize that if you don’t compromise on anything you lose on everything. Reagan would have been a very large RINO.

• Finally, before you champion one politcian or make another a pariah, start paying less attention to what they tell you they’ve done, or what other people tell you they’ve done, but figure out for yourself. Every politician in Washington a single term casts enough votes to be accused of both raising taxes and cutting taxes, so take that accusation with a grain of salt. And pay closer attention to Who’s telling you about politicians, and what They want.

*Paid for by people who stand to make a lot of money 

if someone other then Newt Gingrich wins

• One thing I have noticed that everyone overwhelmingly agrees with, is that every member in power right now, on both sides of the aisle, is bought and paid for. And the people buying aren't us.

• One last thing, which will probably be my next blog post. If you thought 2011 was the year of internet activism, you ain’t seen nothin yet.


Happy 2012, Y’all!

Long answers to sirius bizniz questions.

Exposition;

I've been following Buddy Roemer for a while now, in part because I remember my father speaking highly of him, and working with him, when he was Governor of LA, but mainly because of coonass loyalties, and because I'm a nerd about these things. 

This means I've also spent the past months watching the GOP electorate neglect a perfectly reasonable candidate in favor of an empty suit, a boot stomping buffoon, and a menagerie of people who are either flat out crazy or obviously using the race to boost their personal fortunes. 

I've also watched the absolutely disgusting media blackout against a candidate who dares to challenge the money in the system.(If you have any doubt that your media is bought and paid for, question how a former Congressman and Governor is derided as 'fringe' while someone like Herman Cain is propped front and center.). 

So I've watched Buddy. I enjoyed his initial message, but was really turned on by his reaction to, and interaction with, the OWS movement, which I think goes to the very core of what's wrong with this country. So, as I was watching the debate last night in one browser window, and watching Gov. Roemer's twitter feed in another, I felt compelled to start talking about both things on my soapbox of choice, my facebook feed. I got a couple of responses from people I don't usually get responses from, my hunch being they were intrigued that the filthy NYC liberal was speaking positively about a republican candidate. One of them mentioned he sees Gov. Roemer around the bayou on occasion, and should he pass on a message. Then he asked me, in all seriousness, what three issues I thought were the most important to our country. And to list my valid solutions, as easily I as I do my opinions. 

Well, Challenge Accepted, Tony, so long as you understand that these suggestions are just that, suggestions. They are also very, very broad strokes. 

Meat; 

Issue 1: Money in Politics. 

This has more heads then a Hydra, and each one of them is ugly as sin, but the root of the problem, in my opinion, is this view of "Politician" as a career path, a view we've all accepted. The simple fact that Politician is a job, and not an act of service, creates a whole host of problems. It leads to people so busy moving up that they pay little to no attention to the local and regional matters that are actually their responsibility. On the opposite side of coin you have people so entrenched in their positions that they've lost all touch with the country they're supposed to be governing. Their primary concern is maintaining their own power base, and waging war against whatever rival faction they've been feuding with for decades. A prime example of this would be my own Democratic Congressman, Charlie Rangel, who I futilely but gleefully vote against every chance I can.

This would be somewhat allowable if that was the extent of it, but the problem is the salary for the job position 'Politician' isn't paid by us, it's paid by corporations, and interest groups. It's paid in the forms of gifts, bribes, donations, issue ads from PACS, more bribes. It's even paid in the form of job security when they are eventually voted out, just look at Louisiana's own Billy Tauzin. And the worst of it, I'm sure, happens below the radar of the politician, at the staff level. 

Politicians are no longer representing us, they are representing themselves, doing for the whole country what is in their own best interests. So, that being the issue, my solutions? 

• Every interest group(lobbyist) must register with a non-partisan federal agency. Yes, it's more government. Deal with it. This agency would handle lobbying requests by those groups, and schedule them with the congressman's office. Each member of congress is required to set aside a certain number of hours a week to meet with interest groups. Not staffers, the actual representative. Employees of groups registered with this agency would be barred by law from any part of drafting of any legislation. They could not be on special committees, could not be asked to consult on wording. Violation of this would carry serious penalties, such as revoking the offending member's lobbying privileges, and banning the group entirely on subsequent infractions.
• Every member of congress will, upon taking the oath of office, be legally restricted from being employed by any group registered with this agency, either as a direct employee OR has a freelance consultant. This restriction would never expire. The general sense being that you served your country, now go home. 
• Term Limits. And that limit is 1. You would offset the brain drain by extending the duration of that term, say 5 years for congressmen and 8 years for senators. But that's it. No exceptions. No one should ever be thinking of re-election when they are casting their votes. This would also extend to the white house. Winning the presidency gets you one six year term.
• 100% direct public financing of every federal campaign. No opting in or out. No exceptions. If citizens feel extremely patriotic about the election process, they can donate to the public financing budget which would be distributed evenly among candidates. If they feel extremely patriotic about a certain person well..... they can go door to door volunteering. This is not capitalism, this is democracy and every voice should be given equal weight here. This would, of course, require a constitutional amendment overturning the ruling of Citizens United.
• And this, "Congress shall make no law that applies to the citizens of the United States that does not apply equally to the Senators and Representatives; and, Congress shall make no law that applies to the Senators and Representatives that does not apply equally to the citizens of the United States ". 

Issue One = Money & Politics is Bad. 

Solutions = Transparent, monitored lobbying; term limits; and extreme campaign reform. Amending the Constitution for the 28th and 29th time. 

Issue 2: We are in a global trade war, and we are losing  

We have destroyed our manufacturing base. Worse then that, we have destroyed the desire in most Americans for a domestic manufacturing base. We all want to have good wages with nice benefits, but we still shop at Wal-mart, and we can't, as a country, reconcile those two ideas. We are in a trade war and we refuse to admit it. It's killing us, killing the middle class, which is killing our tax revenue base. 

Add to our trade war with other nations the fact that we are at war with ourselves. 50 States, each vying for corporations. When Rick Perry says he created one million jobs in Texas, he's also saying he killed one million jobs in other states. We are, state by state, racing to the bottom of what an American job is worth. It's a race where the only winner is China. 

As the earth gets flatter, the challenges of maintaining first world conditions while competing with a third world labor market, a market that we fuel at the expense of our own livelihood, creates an irreversible decline of the American middle class. If that's the issue, my solutions?

• If China won't adjust the value of their currency to reflect reality, make it increasingly difficult for them to sell to Americans. We're in a trade war, we might as well start fighting back. If that's tariffs, then it's tariffs. If it's stricter regulations on products that can be sold in America, then it's stricter regulation.
• Tax incentives for stores that sell strictly American made items, and tax incentives for people that Buy items made in America. 
• Increased Domestic Energy Exploration.(This would be tied to a stipulation regarding issue 3)

A lot of this is changing the culture. We view clothing, tools, electronics, as almost disposable, so of course we don't mind buying cheap knock offs from Wal-mart. Made In America shouldn't be a niche item, or a special bonus, it should be something we go out of our way to make sure we do as much as possible.

Issue Two = Trade War

Solution = Fight It.

Issue 3: Capitalism isn't a religion. 

 I don't blame corporations for the income inequality gap in this country. They did what they're designed to do, make a profit. And, generally, I'm a fan of that, seeing as how I live on someone else's discretionary spending, I like it when people have profit to spend. No, I blame us, for not watching them like hawks, for letting them get away with it. 

See, Americans love capitalism, but it's an unrequited love. Capitalism loves money, and that means that it doesn't always function in America's best interests. Sometimes it does, and sometimes it doesn't. Our problem with capitalism has been that we haven't been there to stop it when it does something bad for America. Like..... destroying our environment in the quest for cheap power, or shipping millions of jobs overseas for increased profit, or systematically replacing our manufacturing sector with an imported one from a country we are at war with. 

I don't hate capitalism, but I do recognize it for what it is, and I'm not foolish enough to mistake it for a religion. It's a system of economic freedom designed to chase the money towards the most profit and it's succeeded spectacularly in doing that. Americans failed America by not stopping capitalism when it got out of hand, primarily because the people in charge of stopping it were being well paid to make sure it succeeded. 

Capitalism is like your young child. It's great, in your eyes the best of all it's peers, but it can still burn it's hand on the stove or shove a PB&J in the VHS player if you're not watching it. So if that's the problem, what are some of my solutions?

• Reinstate the Glass Steagall Act
• A tax applied to all stock transactions, small but more sizable then the one currently being discussed. 
• The restructuring of the SEC into a collaboratory relationship with the FBI, with the FBI holding the reigns for a 10 year period. The SEC has the skills needed for regulating the financial sector, but little interest or motivation.
• However, I would couple that with gradual but considerable compensation increases at the SEC across the board, to make the jobs there more attractive to financial professionals
• Prohibit the selling of debt as a commodity. If I get a mortgage from BoA, they wouldn't be able to turn around and sell it to someone else. This, of course, gets the government out of the mortgage industry, where it had no business being in the first place. 
• Across the board 10-1 Leverage cap on all financial institutions. 
• Restrict salary to compensation, which you can then use to buy stocks. CEOs should be motivated by long term business growth, not short term stock growth.
• Massively increase both the size and scope of the EPA. If we want to seriously pursue domestic energy creation our only option is to heavily police that exploration, because the private sector has proven time and again they are incapable of self policing. 
• End government subsidies for any entity showing a consistent 4 quarter profit.
• A complete audit of the Federal Reserve, and the replacing of the chairman with a 6 person committee, all of whom are subject to congressional approval via majority vote (this is of course a Congress built with the rules I laid out in issue one)
• A strong and well funded Consumer Protection Agency.

I think the overlap on the Venn Diagram of OWS and the TPP is much larger then most people think it is, and it will be a really interesting moment in our history when those groups both figure that out. Where the TPP and I differ is that I don't think Government is bad, I think THIS Government is bad. The solution isn't to throw out Government. That's Somalia. The solution is to throw out THIS Government, and that brings us back to Buddy. 

So far, of all the candidates, Barack Obama included, Buddy Roemer is the ONLY one I see speaking out firmly on all three of the issues I just listed. Registered independents can't vote in the New York Primary so I can't vote for him as a Republican, but, as of right now, he'd have my vote if he ran as an Independent in November. 

Hope that shed some light, Tony.