State of the Union Address: Pandering To Moderates and Conservatives

Do any other liberals feel “blah” over last night’s State of the Union Address by President Obama?  The SOTUA was, to me, too Republican and too conservative.  No liberal agenda (not that I expected one, not from our milquetoast president), hell, not even a token liberal concept.  It was a pep talk for moderates and conservatives not for liberals.

Though he didn’t bash liberals, as he has done for three long years for not supporting him more, he didn’t even attempt to acknowledge us.  It is almost as if, for this election, the President and his advisors have decided that liberals aren’t needed to win.  That if the President panders entirely to moderates and conservatives, no Republican can beat him this November.  And that is the problem with his entire Presidency.

This isn’t a new strategy.  His entire presidency has been about pandering to the moderates and conservatives and saying a big “fuck you” to liberals.  And where has pandering to moderates and conservatives gotten President Obama and the rest of the nation?

We still don’t have universal single payer health care.  Hell, we don’t even have the option to purchase Medicare as our health insurance provider but we do have the mandate to purchase private health insurance.

The prison at Guantanamo Bay is still open and none of the detainees can be brought to the States to be tried in civilian courts.  The Patriot Act was renewed as were the Bush era tax cuts.  Our nation’s bridges, roadways and dams are still crumbling with no plan or funding to fix them.

We still aren’t building palaces of learning and the President is pushing for more “school choice”.  Homeowners are still sinking under the weight of their mortgages while it appears the banks are going to get a sweetheart deal regarding mortgage fraud from the Department of Justice and several states’ attorney generals.

Instead of comprehensive immigration reform we have record numbers of deportations and Sheriff Joe Arpaio is still performing his living while brown “crime suppression sweeps”.  The voters of state after state are approving medical marijuana yet the Department of Justice is raiding dispensaries allowed under the individual state’s laws.

So it comes as no real surprise that President Obama didn’t even offer us liberals a trinket in the speech.  Why should he have?  He seems very happy pandering to moderates and conservatives, which is too bad for our nation.

President Obama Proposes A Republican Plan To "Save" The USPS

There is no denying that the United States Postal Service is in deep financial crises.  What has been overlooked by the vast majority is that this "crises" was formulated in 2006 by a Republican Congress and a Republican President.  The USPS, in seeing fuel prices rocket, went to Congress hoping to get more flexibility in raising prices.  Of course, Republicans being Republicans, saw this as an opportunity to cripple and possibly even destroy the USPS and by extension, the union representing USPS carriers.

So, Republicans enacted a law that gave the USPS nominal flexibility to raise prices, but also saddled it with a mandate to fully fund their employee pension plan to cover the next 75 years.  That's correct, the USPS had to fund their pension plan to not only fully cover current employees, but also employees who haven't even been hired or born yet.  To make matters worse, the law required the USPS to fully fund those 75 years in only 10 years time.  That means that the USPS has had to make yearly payments of over $5 billion into their pension plan, payments that eat away at its financial stability.  It should be noted that no other entity, private or public, within the United States is required to fully fund their pension plans for the next 75 years, only the USPS.

Because of that yearly payment, the USPS has been posting major operating losses in the billions, since 2006.  Instead of being able to raise prices, it has had to borrow against the Republican imposed $15 billion "credit line" with the Treasury Department, which is almost depleted.  So, while incurring monumental operating losses due to its requirement to fully fund their pension plans, unable to raise prices enough to meet expenses, the USPS has also incurred a massive debt to Treasury.  Only now, it can't make its Republican imposed yearly pension fund payment, because it doesn't have the cash to do so.

The Post Master General, Patrick Donahoe, has asked Congress to give him the ability to break the contracts the USPS has with its union employees which would allow him to fire over 200,000 postal employees, to end Saturday service and to opt for a different pension plan.  Congressman Darrel Issa (R-CA) appears more than eager to go along with Mr. Donahoe's proposal, thus achieving a major goal of Republicans in 2006.

Now in steps President Obama with his plan to "save" the USPS.  The "plan" is at its very heart, a Republican "plan", which encompasses restructuring the pension pre-funding, to sell non-USPS products and the elimination of Saturday service.  No proposal to get rid of the Republican imposed full pension funding.  No proposal to give the USPS even more flexibility to raise rates.  Nope, just as with the "job's package" from a couple weeks ago, President Obama has proposed only Republican ideas to "save" the USPS.

Mr. President, the Republicans don't want to save the USPS.  They want it gone, period and they will do whatever it takes to see that mission accomplished.  Why the fuck are you helping that process along?  Why aren't you firing the Post Master General for proposing to fuck over the carriers?  Why aren't you fighting for the carriers instead of once again doing the Republican's dirty work for them?  Why don't you propose that junk bulk mailers pay more equitable postage rates?

There are better proposals than sending 220,000 more people to the unemployment lines and cutting Saturday service.  But since they aren't Republican proposals, I am sure President Obama has no use for them.

Wil Cardon, Republican U.S. Senate Candidate, Surprisingly Wants To Run Government Like a Business ... No, Seriously He Does!

Why do the vast majority of Republicans believe that government should be “run like a business” or manage its finances the same way the “average American family” does? Which brings up the broader question: Why are the vast majority of Republicans so hell bent on destroying our government and yet fight so hard to be part our government? It seems that a day doesn’t go by without some Republican lecturing the rest of us on the evils of government and the saintliness of American corporations.

Wil Cardon, Republican candidate to replace the quitting "retiring" Senator Jon Kyl, is just the latest example of a Republican who thinks that government should be run like a business. The only problem is, that Mr. Cardon doesn’t truly want government to be run like a business otherwise he wouldn’t have written his Op-Ed in the Arizona Republic. Mr. Cardon states that government, in order to run like a business must do the following:

1. Enact A Balanced Budget Amendment
2. Cut Taxes
3. Cut Spending

First off, I know of no corporation that desires not to make a profit. A Balanced Budget Amendment would also forbid the government from running surpluses, requiring government to cut taxes to meet lower expenses. Name one American corporation that doesn’t love profit. Name one American corporation that would cut revenues because they outpaced expenses?

Second, I know of no corporation that cuts revenues at every possible turn, hoping to starve itself into oblivion. Hell, I know of no “average American family” that intentionally cuts its income in order to make their selves irrelevant. This is the major problem with the Republican’s concept of running government like a business. If you want government to run itself like a business, you need to allow it to raise taxes to meet expenses and to pay down debt.

It is not quite true that Republicans hate all taxes. They just prefer “user fees”, “sales taxes” and “value added taxes” instead of income taxes based on progressive rates. They like to sell these as a “fair tax” as even the poorest have to pay it. Never mind that government reliant on such taxes see their revenues fluctuate wildly with the overall economy. The State of Arizona is a huge example of what happens when a government relies heavily on use taxes and fees when the economy falters.

Third, corporations can cut expenses so far. I know of no American corporation that has been able to survive on cutting expenses only. At some point the corporation’s quality of service and/or product suffers and their revenues drop even more as customers seek better services and/or products. Thus, governments can’t cut their way to non-deficit spending.

If you want government to run like a corporation, it must be allowed to raise revenues to meet the expenses of the nation. It must be allowed to invest its revenues in education, infrastructure, new technologies and the general welfare of the American people, including government provided single player universal healthcare.

As I said though, the majority of Republicans, such as Mr. Cardon, don’t want government to run like a businesses or the average American family. They want government to be hampered by a false “balanced budget” requirement, the inability to raise revenues while allowing only cuts in existing revenues and the inability to invest those revenues for the future generations.

This is a recipe for disaster, a disaster that only an elite few will survive and benefit from. Too bad Mr. Cardon doesn’t realize that he most likely won’t be one of those elite few.

Phoenix Mayoral & Council Election 2011

Tomorrow, Tuesday, the voters in Phoenix go to the polls to choose a new mayor and five council members.  As with all elections, this one is very important.  Unlike other elections, this is the first mayoral and five council election in which someone has identified themselves as a "tea party" candidate for mayor.

In the mayor's race, Governor Brewer would like us to vote for ethically challenged and former councilwoman Peggy Neely.  The Arizona Republic would like us to have as our next mayor lobbyist Wes Gullett and the various public unions would like us to elect the only registered Democrat in the field of six, Greg Stanton.  Anna Brennan, Claude Mattox (*Warning* website has automatic audio) and Jennifer Wright are also on the ballot.

I myself support Greg Stanton for mayor.  Not because he is a Democrat or supported by the unions, but because he has a vision for Phoenix that doesn't include privatizing everything in sight.  He understands that if you want qualified people to work for the city, you need to treat them with respect and pay them a decent wage.  He also understands that Phoenix needs a good public transportation system, including light rail and that services for the poor and working poor are just as important as services for the elderly and the wealthy.

I have already voted for Mr. Stanton for mayor via my mail in ballot.  I hope the majority will and have done so as well.

And the 2012 Republican Presidential Nominee is...

As much as some very vocal people on the right would like, the 2012 Republican Presidential nominee will not be Sarah Palin, nor will it be Mike Huckabee, Newt Gingrich, John Kasich, Jim Demint nor Mitt Romney.  The nominee will be the scariest person that the Republicans can find, even scarier than former Vice President Dick Cheney.  The nominee will be known for his fiscal and social conservatism as a former governor.  His candidacy for the Republican nomination will suck all of the oxygen out of any pretense of a “race” and will dry up the coffers of Palin, Huckabee, Gingrich, et al.

He will be the only one of his siblings not to have failed miserably in business.  He will be the only candidate to have a Hispanic spouse.  He will have been intimately involved in the Terry Schiavo case.  He will be the son of the former director of the Central Intelligence Agency.  He will be John Ellis Bush.

Yes, I am calling Jeb Bush as the 2012 Republican Presidential nominee.  Once his name is announced, the other Republican contenders will fold up their tents and rally around their party’s best hope.  Jeb can solidify both the microwaved social conservative base now known as the “Tea Party”, the country club Republicans and the Grover Norquist wing of the Republican Party.  He will have access to untold amounts of monies to run his campaign and at this point in time, I don’t see a Democratic challenger (not even President Obama) that can beat him.

Let’s face it: Jeb has been groomed to be president for most of his life.  Everything in his adult life has led up to the moment he becomes the Republican Presidential nominee and the only person standing in the way is Jeb Bush himself.  Sarah is a joke.  Mike is nice enough, but I think the moderate Republicans would prefer someone who isn’t a former minister.  Newt, well, let’s just say that his past is his worst enemy.  Mitt flip flops so much that the party leadership never knows where he stands from moment to moment.  John I can see as Jeb’s running mate.  And Jim, well, he enjoys being the firebrand in the Senate too much and he would like to Majority Leader at some point.

There are very few things regarding politics that I have been wrong about, but in this, I honestly hope that I am.  We cannot afford a continuation of the Bush Family Dynasty.  Former President H.W. Bush wasn’t too bad, but former President W. Bush was a walking disaster.  If Jeb does run and wins the presidency, theocratic fascism will take a giant leap toward being the legitimate form of American government.

I never want to see a sign that reads: Jeb Bush for President, 2012.