American Democracy - A Response to Bush's Imperialization of the Constitution

Eight Years After, and still we don't seem to understand

2008-09-30T11:17:19-04:00

Since Bush came to power eight years ago, many and terrifying things have happened. We can all look back at our notebooks and agendas and see specific dates tied to specific events, but what we can't seem to do as a nation is to step back and take a look at the big picture and its implications.

The incorrect action (or pro-action) is always force - I didn't say reaction. If a mosquito bites my nose I will smite it (both insect and nose), but that doesn't mean I will defoliate the entire rain forest in order to find the mosquito that may or may not be carrying a virus.

When the Bush Administration invaded Iraq, it was a blunder beyond compare. The negative impact of this invasion will be felt for generations to come. It will lend itself well to the rallying cry of nationalist-fundamentalists for decades to come. And of course we will be paying the price, as will our progeny. (Sorry, Junior! No American Dream Pie for you! I'm overdrawn at the bank!).

And then there is Fear, the currency of the Bush Administration, which as we can all tell from the Stock Market doesn't really have a great ROI.

So, the Republicans have paraded out for us a war hero, whose botox-scary demeanor and quavering voice don't really convince me that he will do any better of a job. And as the rumor has it, he and his Sarahcuda are intent on invading Iran.

Meanwhile, Obama has to prove his Americaness over nad over again, in a way that no other candidate has had to do.

This is not America. This is something else altogether. The question is: What?

Are we really a democracy? Do we have the right to enforce global democracy & capitalism, even when there really isn't any of either in the places where we are "bringing it on"?

Are we an oligarchy, where one of two parties grapples for position in order to mete out the most favors?

Are we a Totalitarian lady in waiting? Is our gown for the Red Carpt event made of chainmael?

In the run up to this very important election, we don't seem to remember much about the last decade. We're in a fog. We have forgotten about the reduction of civil rights, the increases in the cost of living, the immorality of a preemptive war, the evisceration of the judiciary, and of course the pandering to fear and other very low denominators.

Tags: Bush, elections 2008, McCain, Sarahcuda

Notes on the Healthcare System in America: Shameless, Souless, Hopeless

2007-05-18T11:41:02-04:00

For anyone attempting to make an appointment with a Healthcare Provider, fill a prescription or simply find out what ails them, the labyrinth of rules, exceptions and co-pays can be overwhelming.

It is bad enough to be restricted to providers in the Network controlled by ones health plan. But it is even worse when the provider one has to settle for cannot recall details from the initial consultation, the original complaint or directions given between consultation and follow-up. Moreover, he/she is likely to be more concerned with co-payments in cash, handing out samples of recently launched pharmaceutical cures – which if all goes well he/she will prescribe - and how many more patients he/she can fit into the waiting room before tempers flare. More often than not, the patient is merely a statistic, a guinea pig, a potential lifetime user of pharmaceutical products.

If a healthcare provider is so busy that the patient’s health is worth only three minutes of valuable $300 per hour time, then there is a serious problem. Doctors have hundreds of patients. Patients have only one life to live.

This reality is especially stark in the field of mental health, which, with its already scarlet stigmata, is terrifying enough for most patients. But to have a so-called mental health expert diagnose a patient in less than five minutes, and then not even review the data on follow-up visits, is a serious breach of the trust so essential for effective patient care. For patients, the dismissive and often arrogant demeanors of the drug-prescribing psychiatric set, has the potential to cause the patient serious harm. If the doctor has no time or interest in the life of the patient, what does that tell the patient?

It is not merely the drug prescribed that has an effect on the patient – it is the entire mental healthcare experience that informs the patient.

The dispensing of drugs, particularly those elicited by an intimate relationship between doctors and pharma, has no apparent end. There is simply too much money to be made. The Healthcare and Pharmaceutical industries make enormous profits, spend hundreds of millions of dollars on advertising and lobbying, and hold the patients hostage.

My own personal story has taken me down a very frustrating road. Since my unfortunate incarceration in a psych ward, I have been diagnosed as mildly depressed, severely depressed, mildly bipolar, unipolar and so on. I have been told I will need medication for life, for a year, or maybe not at all. I have been told, “my office is very busy; I can’t guarantee there will be interruptions,” and “if you miss any appointments we will bill you anyway”, and my personal favorite “just answer ‘yes’ or ‘no’”, when asked questions of a complex nature that can never be answered “yes” or “no”.

Attempting to commune with a doctor about mental illness, considering psychopharmalogical treatment, which affects the brain and therefore the very seat of perception, individuality, hopes and dreams, is not the same as having a bunion. Yet the podiatrist is much more likely to show concern, listen to questions and answers and to spend more than three minutes with a patient. It is not surprising to me that a patient, after being roughly handled by a mental health professional, will never return again, will go off medication, will take matter into his/her own hands.

This is a shameful situation. There is no excuse for the psychiatrist to put him/herself in such an elevated position that he/she can evaluate, prescribe and predict in five minutes or less. Surely, he /she spends more time planning that night’s dinner than in making a decision that will have a direct impact upon a patient perhaps for that patient’s life. Shameful.

I ask myself: Would my cousin have committed suicide if a mental health professional had had more than five minutes to diagnosis him?

Tags: healthcare providers, mental health, pharma, psychiatric care, psychiatrists, suicide, US Healthcare

Cheney - Most Hated Man in America begs BYU for Podium

2007-04-05T10:12:29-04:00

What does it feel like to be the Most Hated Man in America?

Let’s ask Dick Cheney, who if he is not the most hated man certainly is a runner-up (the winner remains to be named).

Here’s the proof: Cheney’s office sent a letter to the ultra-conservative BrighamYoungUniversity in Provo, Utah, asking that he be the key note speaker for BYU’s graduation.

What is wrong with this picture?

Obviously, Cheney’s dance card for the upcoming graduation season is not full. I bet it’s largely empty. He had to ASK to be asked. While I am sure that this is not the first time that a politician has asked to be asked, this instance of such asking so smacks of Roman Imperialism that it is actually frightening.

I wonder how the letter read……..

Dear BYU Deciders

Dear BYU Deciders,

The Vice President of the United States of America requests that you request the honor of his presence at your upcoming graduation ceremonies. Remember all that he has done for you, and when the moment comes for the undoing of these deeds, he will take into account the things done by you, prior to any undoing. He is already pleased by the extension of your heartfelt invitation.

Thanking you in advance

Dick

The best part of this story is that the students at BYU don’t even want him to come. If the students at BYU can’t stand you and don’t want you to talk to them, and have even in a very rare move requested permission to protest, how can you possibly wish to inflict yourself upon them? How can you want to be there?

I wonder what Cheney’s mirror says to him each morning…. “Hey handsome! Everyone wants you at the party!”

Tags: BYU, BYU student protests, Cheney, Cheney asks BYU to speak, Provo Portests

Email: The Achilles Heel of the Rovian Dream Team

2007-03-20T09:37:38-04:00

The Bush Spin Machine needs an overhaul. Aside from the fact the Scooter Libby has proven that being dipped in Teflon still leaves an Achilles Heel that can be sliced by the blade of Justice, we now have the Judicial Branch itself rife with scandal.

The Rovian dream of building a political machine based on sports analogies (with Bush as Head Coach, Cheney as owner and Gonzalez as Team Captain) has not set well with the American people. We are notoriously fickle when it comes to supporting a team. Do you see the kids clamoring for Chicago Bulls gear now? The only enduring franchise is the New York Yankees, a team that is a caricature of itself. But I digress.

One thing that we can all learn from this whole unfortunate political mishap is this: It is never wise to put things you really don’t want others to know about in email. (Did you hear that Esther, you harlot?) Email has been the real Achilles Heel of the Bush Administration, just as The Tapes were the downfall of Nixon.

Rove, Cheney and Rumsfeld (the real Axis of Evil), have all tried to create a Dictator in the Roman sense of the word – “The One Who Speaks” for the Senatusque Populi. In other words, with mercenaries like Gonzalez on board – loyal only to Bush and not to the Constitution –, the Rovian dream was to create an all-powerful head of state, placating the richest of Americans and the expense of the other 96% of us, just as the Caesars placated the Patricians with booty, and the Plebes with bread and circuses. The only difference is we have to pay for the bread, and the circus is called Iraq

Tags: Achilles heal, Axis of Evil, bread and circuses, Bush, Cheney, email, Esther Yoon, Gonzalez, Rovian dream

Alegra's Terrifying Journey of Loss & Betrayal

2007-02-26T10:44:01-05:00

Allegra has been off-line for a while but us now back. She would like to share her story and get some feedback.

Where has Alegra been? On a terrifying journey of loss, betrayal and lies.

For the past seven years, Alegra has been married to a man whom she deeply loved and whose artistic life she supported both emotionally and financially. They were a loving and caring couple, sharing many happy moments together and expressing love and concern and respect for one another. They had plans for the future, for the art and music that was possible. They were a team.

That is what Alegra saw, or wanted to see. She believed in love and in building a relationship, making it stronger over time.

Unbeknownst to Alegra, her husband was filled with doubt – doubts about his talent, his love for her, his path in life. What kept him there, with her, if his heart was truly so filled with doubt?

In the shadow of her husband's doubts, Alegra became depressed, part of an undiagnosed clinical condition that ate away at her. In her depressed mind, her husband’s artistic block and inability to achieve his goals was somehow her fault. He complained to her that she talked too much, that she was oblivious to other people’s feelings, that she didn’t understand art, that she did not know herself. She believed all the things he said and took them to heart, isolating herself, trying to give him as much space possible so that he could focus on his art.

Then came the day her husband told her that he “didn’t want to share his life with her” any longer. Alegra was devastated. She broke down, unable to sleep or eat. Her world was crashing down around her ears, the taste of debris in her mouth.

Her husband had her committed.

The humiliation of being committed to a mental hospital – stripped naked and inspected by strangers, medicated, monitored – shocked Alegra into a new reality.

When she was released from the hospital she began to take stock of her life and what had led her along a path of destruction.

And there it was, in front of her eyes and she saw it clearly. Yes, it was the old cliché, the 7 year itch, the midlife crisis, the husband straying. Yes, he had begun an affair with one of his students, and together the two of them had conspired to commit Alegra to the mental ward. Yes, it was easiest, wasn’t it, if the “crazy wife” were labeled thus. He would get so much sympathy for his years of suffering, and would be free to explore “all the experiences” that his life with her had kept him from. And his lover would benefit from the belief that he was justified in the affair, and in the treatment of his crazy wife.

Was this just his doubt about the uncertainties of life and love? Was this simply a mis-match? Or is there a darker side, one where a man and his lover can commit his wife to such a cruel place? Is this a man who will ever find happiness, living as he does with a personal philosophy is so bleak that it allows the uncertainties to dominate even the most intimate of acts, so bleak that joy becomes colorless?

Alegra must forever live with the specter of a betrayal so profound and so cruel that it defies description. She had no voice, no say no choice in the way that her world came crashing down, the tragedy in which she now plays such an unenviable role.

Tell me, who deserves such an end to seven years of a marriage where never once were harsh words exchanged, never once were insults thrown in anger? How can a human being so cruelly discard another?

Ah, but this is not a new story; the world is full of such tragedies and stories of exacting pain. But Alegra has learned a valuable lesson. We can never really know what is in another human being’s heart, no matter how much we might believe that we do.

Tags: betrayal, cruel, depression, infidelity, mental hospital

Legislating Gender – The Logic Of Law As Pertain to Biology

2007-01-11T19:37:52-05:00

The Massachusetts so-called gay marriage legislation has brought up many interesting points.

First, what is a Man and what is Woman? If one has a sex change operation, is he/she prohibited from marrying? What about inter-sexed people? Can they marry? Will there be a chromosome test to see who is the x and who is the y? Will childless couples be re-classified? Will the infertile be disallowed the right to matrimony?

Biology tells us that gender is not a black and white thing. Inter-sexed children are not as rare on you might think. In my family, we have three individuals who at birth were deemed male, but who have latticed chromosome structures (male and female) and whose reproductive organs are mixed. If the doctor said they were male, does that make it so? Or does one ovary mean female? And who can they legally marry?

And what about the brain, the real “decider” when it comes to gender. All embryos have the potential to be male or female. The nascent organs of reproduction are awaiting instructions as the embryo develops. Sometimes, things go slightly wrong, and the results can cause consternation in a world where everything is either the One or the Other, Black or White, Right or Wrong, Christian of Heathen.

The Right Wing claim that marriage is defined as a contract between a Man and a Woman and that it has always been that way, is erroneous. It is willfully ignorant to stand before the Nation and make such a proclamation. Marriages have been between a man and more than one woman, two families, and not at all. The real purpose of Marriage has always been to define Paternity. We all know where the baby comes from, but we don’t always know how it got there – we have only the woman’s word, and if there are no rules in place to keep her little basket of tricks under control, then we will never know who the real father is.

And what about the actual Brain itself? Recent studies have shown that male & female brains behave differently. Should we have two sets of laws? And what about inter-sexed people? Should we have a third set of laws governing them?

All the brouhaha about so-called gay marriage skips over what most people believe to be the reason couples enter into such a contract: Love. Love, it seems, is only for those with reproduction on their minds. That is the way the laws will go if the Religious Right have their way. We will be not be considered good, upstanding citizens if we do not dutifully re-produce under carefully controlled conditions.

Tags: gat marriage, heathens, inter sexed, reproductive rights, transgendered

Pat Robertson Prognosticates about 2007 - And so do I!!!!!

2007-01-03T15:06:08-05:00

Pat Robertson, the deliciously insipid and self-proclaimed Evangelical Leader of America, has once again issued his Fatwah – oops! I mean Prognostications – after communicating with His God. Apparently, the rest of us are praying to someone else’s god and therefore do not get Divine Messages. Our messages must then by default be Profane.

He claims that God told him a bunch of things (it’s really wishful thinking on Robertson’s part – things he would love to see so he can say, “you see? I am as good as Jeremiah. I’m a hair’s breadth away from being God.”). He seems to be setting himself up as the Next Great Profit – get the printing presses ready, boys, we’re going to have to amend the Holy Book.

Well, God talks to me, too, and here is what God has told me will happen in 2007 (although many details might be tangential only, I will nevertheless be able to connect all dots to my straight line):

1.Obesity will continue and will be accompanied by much flatulence; the flatulence will be blamed for an overall increase in Methane Gas in the upper atmosphere.

2.The US will have storms, tornados, earthquakes, colds & flu, lightning and hail, in various places, but not all at the same time.

3.There will be more scandals, but all in the judicial area.

4.A famous US statesman will die.

5.Women will have prominent roles in politics and culture.

6.We will all continue to hate the things we hated in 2006.

7.American public school students will continueto use weapons to killeachother, because it is their right to bear arms and a grudge at the same time.

8.We will discover life on another planet, and then deny it because it is not mentioned in the King James Version of the Bible. Related to that, there will be a split among Evangelicals who are growing tired of the “literalist” movement and of Pat Robertson spouting off ugliness about important world leaders.

9.The Pope will continue to do Popish things and will be both loved and hated for those things. He and Pat Robertson will meet on-line in a Holy Chat Room, each posing to be the other.

10.The Godless and Misled of the world will continue to be so as long as Pat Robertson defines them as such.

11.Somewhere in Indiana, a budding young artist with much to give to the world will be crushed under the weight of peer pressure and public humiliation because of daring to be a free thinker, and none of the rest of us will ever know what a loss it really was.

12.It will be expensive to rent an apartment in NYC, and there will be lots of statistics used to back up the proclamation – which at least can be backed up, unlike most of what we read.

13.Pat Robertson will continue to pray against people he doesn’t like, willing them to drop dead in their tracks, go bald, or suffer a tax audit.

14.Things in the West Bank will be a grim as ever, and we will continue to withhold aid while funding weaponry.

15.I will worry about getting fat.

16.Bush will herald the next Republican Candidate for President as “the New Gerald Ford”, although that person will be unrelated to and share nothing in common with the dead Gerald Ford.

17.Cheney will continue to be a fat bag of wind – a rich, old fat bag of wind who shoots his friends in the face and pays his enemies under the table. What a sport!

18.The majority of the wealth in the country will continue to the hands of the richest 2%, leaving not a lot of Malthusian pie for the rest of us, who will be blamed for our poverty, ignorance and liberalism.

19.The word “liberal” will continue to be a Republican synonym for “Godless foreigner-loving, welfare taking, out-of-wedlock-child bearing, gun-hating, socialist”. But fewer of us will care about that as we march on Washington.

20.The cable news programs will continue shouting at us, trying to find a way to de-activate the mute button.

Tags: 2007 Predictions, King James Bible, Malthusian pie, obesity, Pat RObertson

What is Parsing? Or, how to REALLY understand what Bush is telling you

2006-12-28T17:30:42-05:00

The word “parsing” is one used by linguists, grammarians, Scrabble players, and those of us who have studied ancient languages.

It means simply “to cut up” a sentence to reveal meaning or to clarify understanding.

If you have ever muddled your way through a Latin or Greek exam, you know that parsing is a way to approach meaning, or even to force ambiguity to take sides.

That said, many people are now parsing everything that Bush has ever said about his administration and its strategies and tactics.

Before parsing begins, there are few things that Americans must be able to admit about themselves, otherwise parsing is pointless and amounts to a nerdy pastime.

Americans do not like to be criticized – not in Kindergarten, not in Secondary school, College or in the Workplace. We especially do NOT like to be criticized by Foreigners (especially those Canadians!).
We think we know more and better.
We react swiftly, before thinking.
We use words that we do not always understand, because someone else used it first.
We like our information in small bites; we want it pre-digested, and with pictures.
We would rather watch a scandal involving Brittany Spears accidentally showing us her cunt than listening to a well-though out argument for or against a particular policy.

How can I say these things?! How rude of me! How simply un-American!!!!

Wrong. The first thing about being an American is to remember that we all have a responsibility to participate in the processes that govern us.

Here are some examples to match the above:

Bush rejected all criticism against his plans and referred to his naysayers as “activists”, “terror-friendly” or “partisan”. In school these days, it is the child who rules the room, not the teacher. Bad behavior is medicated rather than described and addressed, and failure is not acknowledged – we just move them right along so that one day they too can become President nad invade a smaller, weaker nation.
Because our Pop culture is admired in almost as many places as the American Express card is accepted, we believe it means that EVERYTHING about is equally admired. Actually, many people are laughing at us, and we don’t seem to get it.
It is more likely that an accidental bump on the train will lead to a fistfight than a “pardon me”, kids resort to knives and guns rather than teasing or group shame, and bullying is a prized activity.
Bush likes to let fly words like “Islamo-fascists”, even though he would be hard-pressed to define either; likewise, those who believe they know the meaning of these double-talking words repeat them. “I should have stood in bed.”
Unlike our appetite for fast food fries, burgers and soft drinks, we can’t stomach super-sized facts. Give it to us in small bites. Iran bad. US good. Kill Iran.
Let’s face it, even Google admits that Brittany’s cunt gets more hits on the old search engine than does Bush’s policy.

When listening to Bush, it is wise to remember than many of the words planted in the text he is reading are placed there to elicit emotion, draw attention away from other words, and to lead the subconscious language sectors of the brain to a pre-directed conclusion.The people who write Bush’s speeches and policy are not politicians or policy makers or those educated in history or statesmanship. They are marketing people, and their job is to sell to you, whether the product is Fast Food, Fast Cars or Fast Double Talk.

Listen carefully and use your own brain; don’t rely on a marketing team to tell you what to think and how to vote.

Tags: Brittany Spears shows cunt, Bush on Iran, medicating kindergarteners, Parsing Bush Talk

Bush Visits Red States To Boost Blood Cells for His Anemic Platform

2006-11-06T13:09:36-05:00

Our beloved leader has racked up the frquent flyer miles on Air Force One this last week by flying back and forth across the red-middle of the nation. He is lowering the landing gear today in Topeka Kansas, a place that was once so red that purple and orange were not allowed (except for prison jumpsuit and terror alert orange). Now, he's there trying to pump himself up with shouts of approval rather than groans of dismay. Even Kansas just isn't Kansas anymore.

Is this election worth it?

The Democrats want to win more seats than they lose in this election, which is a distinct possiblity, given the stench of the stinking fish head that permeates our Capitol's air. But it remains unlikely that the Dems will win enough seats to achieve much of anything, setting themselves up for failure once again. But wait, you say. The Nation's capitol is a mess - rife with scandals, emails and gladhanding. Yes. That is true. But, while scandals of the pecuniary type blanket DC, these are not the kinds of scandals that last too long - we voters seem to have short memories when it comes to how easily we were ripped off. Maybe we are just too embarassed to admit that we had a little much to drink and left the keys and ingition. Can we help it if Congress crashed the car into the wall?

But is the election worth it? Will anything get done? Will anything change? Will our lives be better? Will be credit card debt be lowered? Will I get a raise? Will my job be outsourced?

Red State Re-Dux

The red states still like Bush, even if they are not happy with him. They like him because they find the blue states so easy to hate. This election comes down to regionalism, city-mouse v. country-mouse, industrial v. countryside, and most of all, which congressmen get more earmarked money for their home stes. The conundrum is that our Congressmen have been in bed with Lobbyists for so long that they forget they are married to their home states. Feeling guilty about their promiscuity, they send a few dozen roses home from time to time, telling the state "I love you" with a couple million dollars for this foundation, a nice swimming pool, or that highway project.

But the fact remains that our Congressmen love their live-in lover Lobbyists more than they love the states that have made them what they are. They are bad parents, bad leaders, bad ambassadors of the country. They make us all dysfuncitonal.

So what about that Right Wing Christian Conservative rhetoric that lambasted Clinton for the blow job? Where are they when their own Congressmen are up to their eyeballs in the sludge of corruption? Is it okay, just becuase a Congressman votes against stem cell research, if he pockets Abramoff's money, hides unaccetable email from oversight, trades public money for campaign contributions? Does the fact that a Congressman voted for the Flag Burning Ammendment make his sins palatable? If that is not a deal with the devil....

Iraq up the debt....

And all that pork-barrell cursing of the Congress back when the Republicans had to SHARE power. Have they been moaning at all lately about the truly impressive debt they have managed to rack up because of Iraq, and their earmarked monies? Nope.They just keep on spending it like the yellow dog Deomcrats they claim to hate so much.

Vote Anyway

Even though things look dim, you should vote anyway. The reason we are where we are is that less than 40% of eligible voters actually vote. And almost no one tries to hold his/her Congressman accountable.

Tags: Abramoff, American voting, Bush, Congressional scandals and the voter, Iraq, mid term elections

Deviled Eggs, Deviled Politics and the Devil as Pop Icon

2006-09-28T09:46:30-04:00

Lately, mouthpieces from all around the globe, including anyone from talk show host to world leader, have become increasingly dependent on the Devil for garnering ratings and support.

Deviled Eggs: We’ve all heard about the controversy over women and their frozen eggs, and how lawyers are bedeviled about just what society should do with these man-made wonders from God’s hand. The Religious Right, who once declared in vitro fertilization the work of the Devil, is now running amok like a Keystone-Cop-Swat-Team trying to “save the lives” of every egg in the deep freeze.

Girls of the World – please, keep your ovaries in line and don’t let any eggs get out unless you mean for them to become fertilized, preferably in your own womb. You may be committing a crime otherwise. And God knows we do not want any legislation regulating menstruation. Or do we?

Deviled Politics: Oh, those simpler times when politicians could sling mud instead of a cat-o-nine tails. Pat Buchanan can claim that Hillary Clinton is worse than the Devil (how hubristic is that?), Chavez can claim that Bush is the Devil, Bush can call sovereign states “the Axis of Evil” and question their very right to exist, Ann Coulter can call Liberals “Godless” and “evil”, and so on and on and on.

Salem, get ready for another round of Witch Hunts and Trials – we have stepped so far backward that we have left the Age of Reason and have returned to the Middle Ages and the belief in Ghosts, Goblins, Visions, Evil Spirits and the Devil walking among us, his cloven hooves sheathed in Bruno Magli special orders.

The Devil is so Hot…: The Devil has now become a pop icon that we can conjure up to cast aspersions on those with whom we disagree. With a big Scarlet Letter D, we can ruin careers, effect excommunication and ostracism, take to court, and rip to shreds any decency that we might have had left in our hardened hearts.

While we toss around the words “Devil” and “Evil’ with childlike abandon, we have a much stronger reaction to “Hitler” and “Fascism”, which Bush has recently tried to inject into the notion of “What is Islam?” Reactions to invoking the horrors of WWII are mixed, while the continual resurrection of Witch Hunting as a sport seems to have the desired effect.

Why is the Devil the hottest thing on the Political Tour? Simple. The Republicans can easily energize their base and in fact grow it with injections of pure fear and loathing. Goering knew this. Hitler knew this. Himmeler knew this. Who is the Devil now?

Tags: Bush, Devil, in vitro, what God wants, Witch Hunts