WTF?

Calhoun's Cannons for Oct 17, 2013

Now that the Tea Party Crashers and their spineless Republican wannabe Fanboys have left the trashed building, does somebody want to tell me what the hell that accomplished? It inflicted real pain on actual real people.  Check.  It damaged our economy and cost us a bundle.  Check.  It proved to the world that Americans are a bunch of idiots for electing these fools in the first place?  Check and check.

Anything else?  Right.  Nothing.  Nothing!

But, you must admit, the semantics of this whole deal were awesome!  Real Raven-writing-desk Jabberwocky stuff. While the country teetered on the brink of financial collapse, here's what passed for Republican "dialogue:"

"Will you vote for a clean CR?"

"It's red, about 6" square, with little wheels on it."

"What? Uh, no, I asked you, Will you vote to pass a clean CR?"

"I told you, it's red, about 6" square, with little wheels on it."

"Wait, I'm asking you about the CR.  Will you vote to pass it?"

"I already answered your question. It's red, 6" square, with little wheels on it."

"WTF???" 

Confused?  Well, you shouldn't be.  We've been living in Frank LuntzLand for years, though his malign influence really came to the fore when Obama got elected. Luntz, a Republican pollster/strategist/wordmeister, is the undisputed master of corrupting language in order to deceive the rubes into believing an alternate reality, then voting, often against their best interests, for that false reality.

One example: When the Affordable Care Act was being crafted, one section included paying for an end-of-life-care discussion with your doctor or with end-of-life-care specialists, a consultation that would give patients and their families information about all treatments and options so they would be not only fully informed but be able to make choices best for them.

A needed service, you might think?  If you've faced the death of a loved one, you know well the bewildering choices you have to make, often in haste, and wouldn't it be nice to have that information before need, or at the least, have a trained, informed navigator there to help you understand the often complex options? 

Well, you'd be wrong.  In an eyeblink, in LuntzLand, end-of-life-care-options became "death panels," wherein granny would face a tribunal who would judge whether or not she would live or die. Sarah Palin loved that Luntzism and along with others, including a Republican Senator (Grassley, who knew better) megaphoned it across the land. 

Yes, it was a lie, but lies are what Luntz gets paid handsomely to produce.   So, that much needed, really helpful section of the ACA was yanked out as a result of the hysteria that particular LuntzLie produced, and as a result real patients and their families were left to suffer on their own while facing an often bewildering system with no help.

And when confronted with this lie, here was the Republican response:

"It's red, about 6" square, with little wheels on it."

During these recent ridiculous government-shutdown temper tantrums, led by Lee Atwater's spawn, those Neo-Confederate Tea Party Crashers and their wannabe Fanboy followers, we've heard a constant call for "negotiations," and "dialogue" and "frank discussions." Ah, yes, "frank discussions," surely a necessity IF we presume that we actually want the government to function properly.

But in order to have a properly functioning government, we have to leave LuntzLand, because it's  impossible to have a "frank discussion" or "negotiate" or fix anything when language itself has been corrupted into deliberately dishonest Jabberwocky. In the real world, a clean CR is a clean CR.  It isn't red, it isn't 6" square and it doesn't have little wheels on it.    

Off Base

Calhoun's Canon for June 3, 2013

There was weeping and gnashing of teeth in Comedy Land when the news came in. Oz was tumbling.  There would be no more joy in Satiric Mudville. The Queen of Crazy was abdicating. Beset with ethics investigations and falling poll numbers, Minnesota Congresswoman, Michele Bachmann, was packing her bags.  Her fourth term in Congress would be her last, which prompted certain people to ask, "She got elected four times? In Minnesota? How is that possible?"

I think it was possible because in 9/11, America had a nervous breakdown when the Twin Towers fell (just as Osama bin Laden predicted)  and a massive upwelling of darkness in the American psyche began a self-destructive flow that swamped the country in irrational fear, ugly bigotry, high-octane rage, deadly war-mongering, know-nothing unholy Apocalyptic religiosity, all of it a deadly brew that unleashed and justified America's Paranoid Style, only this time it was paranoia on steroids.

Toss in an economic meltdown and the election of a black President and for a certain segment of the population (helped along by corporate interests feeding and manipulating the fear and rage for their own purposes) it was all too much.  And so the Era of the

Republican Crazies was upon us. 

And what a crop they were. What a show of ignorance, idiocy, misogyny (Who can forget "legitimate rape?"), anti-science stupidity, mind-numbing foolishness (Birthers?  Really?  Birthers?)  and jaw-dropping demagoguery. And these folks were actually running the store (Congress and Senate) or running so they could shut down the store, or showing up in eye-popping numbers for try-outs for the little theatre production of, "I Want To Be President Just Because I'm So Wonderful!"  

A national Clown Show by and for the deranged, while outside the hallowed halls of government, citizens (ramped up, funded and run by the likes of the Koch Brothers or Republican operatives like Dick Armey, Grover (drown-government-in-a-bathtub) Norquist and Karl Rove) threw Tea Parties and frightened, distressed citizens showed up dressed in tricorn hats, guns on their hips, carrying posters with photo-shopped pictures of President Obama with a bone through his nose. And lots of befuddled, oxymoronic cries of,  "No Socialized medicine!  Keep your hands off my Medicare!"

The media loved it.  Comedians loved it.  It was party night in Bedlam, while the country bled out its wealth and sent more of its finest off to bleed out in one big endless War on Terror. The country was sick and in its deranged state, weirdly elected and re-elected representatives who would vote to inflict the maximum amount of punishment on themselves (Main Street), while administering the maximum amount of soothing salve to the wealthy (Wall Street).  It was one long self-inflicted Medean act of fury: Take that, you mooching 47-percenters! 

While the political Kings and Queens of Crazy vied to see who could grab the most headlines and raise the most funds with their "Can You Top This?" stupidities.

And now, the Queen of Crazy is folding her tent. The comedians are in mourning.  And I can only pray that soon, soon, a sufficient number of Americans will wake up, shake their heads in wonder, and ask, "What the hell were we thinking?"

And the long nightmare will be over.

   

Calling Darrell Issa

Oh, wait, Darrell’s busy flogging the Benghazi dead horse, an enterprise that’s getting more hilarious as it goes along.  Chris Mathews is having a field day hauling up Republicans and asking them, point blank, “What evidence do you have that the President was involved in “editing” those emails?” 

No reply, just a cascade of talking points designed to cover over the fact that the answer is, “None.”  So we have Issa and his cohorts gargling on about the “I” word and when cornered to offer any real evidence, they come up sputtering. They’re holding an investigation to find out if there’s anything that needs investigating that hasn’t already been investigated.

But, evidence is the last thing Issa’s interested in.  He’s after face time with the TV camera.  So he must be grinding his teeth over this.  I mean, here he is, stuck with this rotting equine that’s getting nowhere, except with Faux News Fans, when, ka-blooey, out of the blue, here comes the Perfect Storm of a Scandal! A Right Wing Republican’s Wet Dream!

Yes, it’s the IRS “targeting” Conservatives!  It’s the perfect fake talking point that combines several conservative bet noirs – The Evil Government, in the form of the agency that collects those Evil TAXES, and the conservatives’ most cherished, dark belief that the Evil Government IS coming for them in the black helicopters.  A perfect conflation of their most cherished beliefs come true.
It will offer delicious opportunities to crank up the base, get lots of face time on TV decrying the organization that everyone loves to hate – the tax collector – and, most important, permanently deflect and cover up in a cascade of outrage, the REAL danger here.

It isn’t the IRS.  The folks who screwed the pooch on this one will be booted out the door. What will be buried in the ballyhoo is the genuine threat to our democracy.  It isn’t the IRS, it’s the Supreme Court ruling declaring money as speech as well as Citizens United.

Most of the public didn’t understand what that money-speech ruling meant.  Karl Rove wasn’t one of those people.  He knew and acted quickly to set up 501c4s, those fake non-profit PACs that declare themselves to be a “social welfare organization,” while, in reality, they’re a political action committee in disguise engaging in political activity under the thinnest veil of laughable deniability.

Steven Colbert also caught on really quick and formed his own PAC in order to satirize and illustrate just how corrupting this whole thing had become.  In short, any crackpot political organization could now pretend to be a non-profit “social welfare organization,” apply to the IRS for a non-profit status and the IRS was charged with trying to follow a deliberately vague law defining “social welfare.”
I mean, can you imagine the rolled eyes in the Cleveland IRS offices when agents had to equate Meals on Wheels with Karl Rove’s clearly, blatantly political operation disguising itself as a “social welfare organization?”  Like Karl was doing social welfare by handing out baloney sandwiches to the poor? But, God Bless them, the IRS closed their eyes to the obvious and did just that and Rove’s group is now on a non-profit par with Meals on Wheels. So are all kinds of “tea party” groups mushroomed prior to the election, all of which that galloped in right behind Karl. (And, need I add, fake left-wing groups as well, all equally phony?)

Laughable?  Yes. And the laughability became so obvious, even to a corrupted Congress, that they felt they had to at least make this rot look good so they charged the IRS to closer scrutinize groups that simply didn’t pass the smell test, though the bar was already laughably low. And it has been reported (at this point) that almost all the fake 501s that were scrutinized were issued their non-profit status. That’s the kind of wink-nudge stuff a wholly owned Congress comes up with when money is speech and money talks.  

While the result in this case will turn out to be a foot in mouth operation, its ultimate value to Corporate America is this:  The perfect  opportunity for Corporate America and their handmaidens to permanently  shut down any and all inquiries into exactly how the  IRS determines eligibility of these 401s, and exactly how the law is written to determine that status, and whether the definition of “social welfare” needs to be better clarified. 

And it will stop any attempt by Congress to change the laws, to tighten up the rules, to force the fox to nail up the holes in the chicken coup.  It will also shut down any attempt by Congress to take a closer look at how money-is-speech is playing out in the real world of politics, how corrupting these fake PACs are (on both sides of the political fence) on the body politic. 
To Corporate America, this IRS bungle is a gift from heaven.  And is bound to get great TV face time to whoever gets to chair the investigation committee.

Which is why poor old Darrel must really be miffed.  He took the starring role in a Grade B movie and lost out on the chance to star in a blockbuster.  Rats!  

Bill 'Em, Dano

The bar fight trial of John Ryan Mason, accused of beating the crap out of his friend Jory Brigham in the men's room of Pappy McGregor's Bar & Grill in SLOTown ended in a mistrial.  8-4 in favor of an acquittal for Mason, which is a complete miscarriage of justice since both men are guilty of Walking While Drunk & Stupid and should have been punished accordingly.

On the other hand, maybe justice was served after all.  There they were, forced to go public with their ridiculous cranks, their petty squabbles, their messy sex lives and infidelities and childish behaviors spilling into the courtroom and splashed all over the headlines day after day. Complete fools, one of whom -- a SLO firefighter, no less -- clearly has serious alcohol, self-control and anger management issues. (Anybody what that guy on the line in a crisis situation when your house is burning down?)

All of which has cost the taxpayers of this fair burg a bundle.  It's not known if the DA will refile or let the verdict stand.  What I do know needs to be done is that both men should be billed for all the court costs of this trial, fired from their day jobs (You want those guys working for ya?) and sent on their merry way.

Feh.

There's a Word for That

For years, first in stealth mode, carefully planned, then loudly public, Republicans have been pushing through legislation in states throughout the US that were disguised as "secure, Voter ID registration laws" in order to stop massive voter fraud!! that nobody could find when they bothered to look. It was a solution in search of a nonexistent problem, but did, in practice, end up having the (intended) result of disenfranchising the poor, the young and people of color. You know, "democrats."

Slowly, some of the back-room beans were leaked out and people started to pay attention to what was going on and many of the new Voter ID laws were derailed into the courts for the the smell test, which many of them are failing to pass.  Then, not content with the laws they had put into place, some folks took it to another level.  A group of tea party members calling itself the Ohio Voter Integrity Project started actively removing 2,100 names from voter rolls in that swing state. Including one woman who had lived at the same residence for seven years.  They yanked her off the rolls because her home was listed as a commercial property, not a residential building.  I guess to tea party officials, living in a commercial property now disenfranchises one?  Especially if one is black and might vote Democratic?

And then, the Republican National Committee abruptly dropped their ties to a get-out-the-vote company in Florida which has been repeatedly suspected in all kinds of  voter fraud in the past.  Sproul & Associates has had a long smelly history, yet the RNC keeps hiring the company -- a company which has been operating under different shell-corp names so people wouldn't get suspicious until the damage had been done.

All the while hollering at the top of their lungs, Voter Fraud!  

There's a word for that kind of behavior:  Projection. It's Karl Rove's signature political tactic.  And so far it doesn't seem to be working too well in these cases, though it's not for want of trying.  Poor Karl and the GOP; when you're bankrupt of both morals and ideas, I guess projection, misdirection and flat-out stealing the vote is about all that's left.  We'll see if it works like it did last time.

Uh, Ya Wanna 'Splain That To Me Again?

O.K, so PG&E is going to conduct high-energy seismic studies off our coast which is supposed to find unknown earthquake faults and damage an unknown amount of marine life while doing it. I get that.  But what I don't get is this:  Nuclear power plants are basically insured, past a certain point, by the taxpayer.  I mean, if there's a minor problem (a small melt-down, let say) the PG&E stock holders will get the bill.  But if there's a major problem (a big melt-down and tsunami and a meteor strike all at once) then the taxpayer is left to clean up the mess.  So nuclear power plants are never required to be built to absolute fail-safe standards, only fail-sorta-safe.  Which Diablo Canyon is.  Sorta-fail safe.

But now, for some reason, PG&E is getting antsy about its liability and it's fail-safeness and apparently suspects that maybe it's not up to snuff against an unknown fault that could cause X amount of damage.  So it's going to blast a lot of critters out of the water to see if it can get better risk-assessment info, after which it will do . . . . what?

Is Diablo seriously considering shutting down?  Why should it?  Even if they find some one-in-a-gazillion fault, I find it improbable that that would cause a shut down.  After all, NO nuke is 100% fail-safe, so why should Diablo be?

If PG&E thinks they could add some things to the plant to buffer the effects of some unknown one-in-a-gazillion fault, they can do that now without testing, since nukes need only be sorta-fail safe.  And Diablo can be made that right now.  No need to test. 

So, tell me again why a bunch of sea critters have to die or be terrorized or harmed when the end result will be zip or something that can be done now without the sonic blasting?

The United States of Wonderland

Calhoun’s Can(n)ons for August 31, 2012

The demagogue is one who preaches doctrine he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots.

        H.L. Mencken

             Are you kidding me?  That’s all I could think of as I watched hour after hour of the brain-scrambling Republican convention.  Are you kidding?

            True, when someone starts out with a lie, it’s always fun to see where they’re going to go from there without constantly stepping in it, unless they’re a Republican and stepping in something as mundane as a “lie” has apparently ceased to be a concern anymore.

            But three days of cynical mendacity combined with collective amnesia turned the convention into one long Saturday Night Live Emily Latella skit.  You remember Emily, Gilda Radner’s loopy old lady who kept getting things wrong, but that didn’t stop her from steaming off into outrage about some misperceived topic, like “violins in the street.”  When corrected that it was “violence, not violins,” she would squint unrepentantly at the camera and blithely change the subject.

            Only the Republican Party is no loopy, addled Emily.  Instead, what was on tap was a convention cynically built around a lie – the repeated and deliberate misstatement of a reference made in one of President Obama’s speeches.  In that speech, while the President lauded individual enterprise, he also pointed out the obvious:  Success isn’t strictly singular, that businesses benefited from communally built infrastructure and the “that” in “you didn’t build that,” reference was to “bridges, roads, etc.” which were built by taxpayers. 

            True, it was an awkward sentence, but the meaning was absolutely clear to anyone not language challenged.  Or a political party willing to disgracefully take that clear meaning out of context, twist it into a lie, brazenly plaster signs saying “We Built It,” all over the convention center and make that lie the singular leitmotif on the lips of almost every speaker at the podium. And even though they had to know it was a lie, they spoke it anyway. Which raised an awful question:  Who could possibly trust anything those guys say?

            But that wasn’t the worst of it.  What became truly creepy was the collective willingness of everyone to go down the memory hole. (It’s the internet age: does no one google FactCheck anymore?) This signal amnesia wasn’t just hypocrisy, like Delaware businesswoman, Sher Valenzuela, who lauded her “I Built It” successful business but “forgot” to mention it was aided by $2 million in (government funded) SBA loans and $15 million in (government funded) contracts.  Or the parade of  “I Built It” governors crediting their state’s recovery on their own singular efforts while ignoring the GM taxpayer bailout and all those Washington stimulus checks they happily cashed. (Talk about a gaggle of serpent-toothed ingrates chewing the hand that fed them.)

            No, this was not run of the mill hypocrisy at work, but a profound disconnect from the historical record, the factual narrative.  Listening to speaker after speaker spin their tales was like reading a complex historical novel from which Republicans had redacted any reference to their role in that story.  Down the memory hole they went, bemoaning the terrible state of affairs while utterly ignoring their part in creating the crisis and/or making the crisis infinitely worse.   There is a reason this Party-of-No, Do Nothing, Republican-led Congress is so loathed by the voters.  On day one of Obama’s election, Republican Senator McConnell clearly stated that his party’s one over riding goal wasn’t jobs or helping American workers retool or working across the aisle to set things right, but to get rid of Obama – throw the bum out of the bar, in the inelegant parlance of Speaker Boehner.  And it was the lock-step Republicans, monkey-wrenching Tea Partiers and a gaggle of Democratic hacks that brought pointless pain to millions of ordinary Americans caught in the crossfire of their spite, their destructive policies, fantasy math, and the overriding political strategy that keeping the country in dire straits would mean a guaranteed Republican win in 2012.

            All of which went missing for three nights of astounding amnesia and false narratives. That’s not normal hypocrisy, that’s pathology. And while you can campaign on lies and rabbit hole history, you can’t govern that way.

            Which is why, when Paul Ryan, the fresh-faced Leave It To Beaver veep nominee stood before the American people and repeated that foundational lie, a lie he had to know was false, then fell down the memory hole of “fake facts,” and Mitt Romney slid from a sweet, smiley-faced wish list of unsupported platitudes and into irresponsible, bellicose war-talk, and we were left with Anne Romney telling us we should “trust Mitt,” well, my only response had to be, “Are you kidding me?”

            Then my head exploded.

                        .

.     

A Fool and His Gun

Calhoun’s Cannons for April 13, 2012

The past is never dead.  It’s not even past.

                                    William Faulkner

             On that dark rainy night, The Neighborhood Watchman didn’t watch.  He didn’t have to. He had a gun, you see, and when you have a gun you don’t have to just watch.  Especially when you live in a shoot-at-will, stand your ground state.  So just watching wasn’t part of the dramatic script unreeling in his head.  He could be Shane and save the neighborhood from a suspicious black kid in a hoodie. The police dispatcher told him not to get out of the car.  To wait and watch until the real police could arrive.  But a man with a gun does not wait.  He doesn’t have to.

            On that dark rainy night, The Kid was walking back from the store to his Dad’s place, which was located in a townhouse community that felt it had a need for a formal Neighborhood Watch program.  The Kid was walking while black, after dark, in a “gated” community, in a shoot-at will state and had unthinkingly compounded his peril by wearing a hoodie.  Worse, he was armed with a bag of Skittles and a can of iced tea.  In America, that can be a lethal combination.  The Kid noticed the Watchman following him.  He called his girlfriend.  He was worried.  He told her he thought he was being stalked, followed, and threatened by the man with the gun. Was he frightened?  Surely, he was frightened. Then something bad happened.

            And for weeks, the authorities did nothing. Why should they?  They had a Watchman armed with a gun in a shoot-at-will state and a dead black kid in a hoodie.  Case closed.       

                        And from those events, amplified by the hungry media, there soon rose the sounds of an old American anthem played on the black and white keys of a country that has never come to terms with its dark history. And buried deep in that anthem is the call and response hymn of the terrified white slaveholder, outnumbered by his living property, always hearing the muffled footfalls in the kudzu vine the jungle music of Nat Turner and his sharpened cane knives coming to the big mansion in the night.  

            It’s found in the ubiquitous racial dog-whistle music, the theme song of an unreconstructed  south, north, east and west, the unacknowledged original sin whose stain permeates everything even though no one dares speak its name.  The fear is America’s crazy Uncle locked up in the attic whose mad song can always be heard beneath the blare of the God Bless America ooompah band. Or slyly amped up enough to be heard while still remaining ingenuously deniable by unscrupulous political demagogues feeding the dark beast to get their votes. Or ratings.  Or the whispered reasoning behind shoot-at-will, stand your ground laws:  A chicken in every pot, a gun or two or five in every home, because America is a place filled with dark shadows and who knows what is lurking in that kudzu?

            A black kid in a hoodie, for one.

            And so the song continues.  We elected a black man as our president for the first time and pretended we were living in a post-racial world.  But with Obama’s election, gun sales skyrocketed, because, well, you know.  Unspoken, but sizzling on the internet was the belief that Nat “Obama” Turner is coming to the big house to get your guns.  And your women. It was subconscious dog whistle music happily manipulated by the unholy alliance of the NRA and ALEC, and it fueled the spread of shoot-at-will laws into twenty-two states, all urgently needed because there is no problem, no sick, irrational fear in the American heart that cannot be solved or soothed with more guns.    

            And soon the ugly spirit of the Know-Nothings that has always infested the American psyche became a lively talk-radio back beat.  Rush Limbaugh called the President a “thug” (Yes, Harvard is known for graduating thugs and gangstas.), while candidate Gingrich declared that he was the “food stamp president,” wink-nudge (Ah, the eternal Welfare Queens in their Cadillacs.  That one never gets old.), and Tea Partiers waved a poster of Obama with a huge Afro and a bone through his nose, Har-har-har. 

             And now America has another O.J. Simpson moment, a 24/7 televised trial, an over the top media-fest that will let us pretend that we’re having a national dialogue about race.  But it will be another phony conversation.  It always is.  The self-inflicted wound our Founding Fathers brought down on this nation has never been healed or cleansed.  It festers still.  One hundred and fifty years after the Civil War and Jim Crow, fifty years after the civil rights marches, black parents are still giving their sons “The Talk.”  It is a speech that Emmet Till would have understood perfectly: If you’re a young white man, copping attitude will get you an eye-roll.  If you’re black, it may get you a bullet.  Be careful of what you wear, how you walk, how you stand.  Guard the expression on your face.  Don’t run, be respectful, say Yes sir, No sir, Yassir, Yassir. 

             That’s the Black American Anthem, playing still on the black keys.  It’s a song you need to understand if you want to survive if you’re black in a world of Watchman who don’t watch, a country of shoot to kill laws written by scared, ginned-up, armed-to-the-teeth citizens who perceive their world as a terrifying place filled with kudzu and the clink of the cane knives in the dark.

            And all it takes to start the music is one damned fool.

            And his gun.             

And Why Am I Not Surprised?

Recent Op/Ed in the New York Times cited the update of an original 2006 study of political attitudes by David Campbell and Robert Putman of Notre Dame University. The pair “returned to interview many of the same people again this summer. As a result, we ca look at what people told us, long before there was a Tea Party, to predict who would become a Tea Party supporter five ears later. We can also account for multiple influences simultaneously – isolating the impact of one factor while holding others constant.”

Among their findings: The Tea Party’s “origin story,” is fake. They were portrayed as “non partisan political neophytes,” when, in reality, they were highly partisan Republicans long before the Tea Party was born,” and,write the authors, “. . . past Republican affiliation is the single strongest predictor of Tea Party support today.”

Further discoveries: Tea Party members weren’t created as a reaction to the Great Recession. While many Americans suffered from financial problems, “they were no more likely than anyone else to support the Tea Party.” And a wish for smaller government and balanced budgets weren’t a predictor either.

Note the authos, “So what do Tea Partiers have in common? They are overwhelmingly white, but even compared to other white Republicans, they had a low regard for immigrants and blacks long before Barack Obama was president, and they still do.

“More important, they were disproportionately social conservatives in 2006 – opposing abortion, f or example – and still are today. Next to being a Republican, the strongest predictor of being a Tea Party supporter today was a desire, back in 2006, to see religion play a prominent role in politics. And Tea Partiers continue to hold these views: they seek ‘deeply religious’ elected officials, approve of religious leaders’ engaging in politics and want religion brought into political debates. The Tea Party’s generals may say their overriding concern is a smaller government, but not their rank and file, who are more concerned about putting God in government.”

Which makes the Tea Party’s professed reverence for the Founders (and the wearing of tricorn hats and the dragging around of muskets) while yakking about following the constitution hilarious. The founding fathers were clear on that: Separation of church and state and no religious tests for officeholders.

As for the racial dog whistle music, well, that comes as no surprise. That was present from day one. (As was the fake “grass roots” “origin story” which was, in reality, funded and fueled by huge infusions of cash from Dick Armey’s Republican PAC, among other conservative donors, Fox TV personalities, and “think tanks.” Nothing “grass-rootsy” about any of it.)

What may come as a surprise are the authors’ conclusions: “Given how much sway the Tea Party has among Republicans in Congress and those seeing the Republican presidential nomination, one might think the Tea Party is redefining mainstream American politics.

“But in fact, the Tea Party is increasingly swimming against the tide of public opinion; among most Americans, even before the furor over the debt limit, its brand was becoming toxic. To embrace the Tea Party carries great political risk for Republicans . . .” because “On everything but the size of government, Tea Party supporters are increasingly out of step with most Americans, even many Republicans.”

And, irony, irony, the authors go on to point out that the there are parallels with “the anti-Vietnam War movement which rallied behind George S. McGovern in 1972. The McGovernite activists brought energy, but also stridency, to the Democratic Party – repelling moderate voters and damaging the Democratic brand for a generation. By embracing the Tea Party, Republicans risk repeating history.”

As someone who thinks the Republicans now running the Congress have proven themselves unfit to govern, the crash ‘n burn of a party that’s driven itself off the cliff can’t come soon enough.

I mean, Michelle Bachman? Rick “Yosemite Sam” Perry? Really?

Oh, Give It Up Already

Matt Fountain had an article in this week’s New Times on a proposed medical marijuana facility for Oceano. “On May 25, Grover Beach resident Tammy Murray applied with the county’s Department of Planning and Building to open a facility in unincorporated Oceano, she said, because despite several attempts by others, local qualified patients by and large remain without a place to get their medicine.

“According to Murray’s minor use permit application, the 5,500-square f-foot facility would be located in an industrial area on the 1400 block of South Fourth Street in northern Oceano, fitted with security cameras and staffed by a full-time guard.”

Oh, Dear. Poor Ms. Murray will now be subjected to the following:

1. Various public officials and politicians, including the Board of Supervisors, will chest pound about how they’re four-square in favor of “compassionate” use of “medical marijuana,” that nobody is more compassionate than they are, blah, blah, blah.

2. Various planning commissioners will scrunch their brows and earnestly pour over the submitted plans, niggling, snipping, adding, and forcing the applicant through all kinds of expensive hoops.

3. The sheriff will piously state that he will follow the law as written.

4. At public hearings, half the audience will stand up to tell horror stories about suffering people who can only get relief with medical marijuana while the other half will stand up to decry the evil weed and start screeching about SAVE THE CHILDREN!

5. When the matter finally comes before the Board of Supervisors, they will restate their profound compassion. Indeed they’ll vie with one another as to how much more compassionate they are than the other guy, then, with a huge sigh and crocodile tears flowing down the aisles, will, reluctantly vote the matter down.

6. IF by some miracle the dispensary does get voted into being, within a few months, the sheriff will head up a posse of federal agents who will raid the place, slap the owner into federal custody, drag him/her down to L.A. for trial, bankrupt him/her to pay for legal counsel, then he’ll/she’ll be found guilty under federal law and be slapped in prison for years.

Then everybody will go home, smugly satisfied that while, yes, yes, it’s unfortunate, that people suffering from cancer will have to suffer more, the community will be protected from the awful prospect that somebody somewhere might be getting high on “medical” marijuana.

And Now, The Question

Ah, the stock market is dropping like a stone.  Guess who makes money when the stock market drops like a stone?  Guess who makes money buying up tons of blue-chip stocks cheap when the market drops like a stone, then waits for the market to return and thereby makes pots more money?

Working people?  Poor people? Middle class people who are out of work and underwater on their mortgages, their 401K's shreds?  Why, Nooooo.  Not them. They lose their jobs as multi-national companies dump them and move those salary-savings (and the jobs) offshore.  Speculators?  Really, really rich speculators?  Like Wall Streeters? 

Ah, yes. Lots of quick money to be made when economies crash.  Lots of money to be made by, uh, helping economies to crash, too. So, let's all give a big shout-out to the Tea Party who were instrumental in getting this Wall Street party started in the first place. Yippee! Yo, Michelle Bachman, you were right.  Claiming defaults and downgrades would be harmful to our economy were all a big Democratic lie. Rich people, who are the only ones that count, are gonna get richer and if regular people get hurt?  Talk to the hand.  

In America, "regular" people don't matter any more. They're not the demographic American business is looking for.  Brazilians are.  Brazilians, for example, are in an expanding economy, having lots of babies, setting up households.  Lots of money to be made by American companies who move their operations (and jobs) offshore to focus on their new customers and grow their new business.  And those new customers aren't Americans. Who are broke and so not buying what American companies produce any more. So the hell with them.

Unless, of course, Americans can be turned into non-union, cheap-wage sweatshop workers hired by multi-national American companies to produce products for, say, Brazilians. Hey, maybe the tag "Made in America" will once again mean something.  O.K., maybe that wouldn't quite mean what it used to mean, but heck.  In a third-world country like America, a sweat shop job is better than nothing. 

Meantime, happy days are here for the big cash-boys.  Mo' money, mo' money.  Let the good times roll and God bless the child. . .

Nope, Republicans Reeeely, Reeeeely Aren't Fit To Govern, Nope, Nope, Nossir.

Poor John Boehner.  Stuck herding crazed extremist Republican/TeaParty right wing batshit crazy feral cats.  Crazed extremist Repbulican/TeaParty right wing batshit crazy feral cats funded by AstroTurf groups financed by folks like the Koch Brothers and voted into office by addled, misinformed and frightened voters who have been unhinged by 9/11,  by the horror! the horror! of having a black president (OMG), and with their final mental meltdown arriving with the bursting of the economic Wall Street bubble. Unhinged!  So unhinged, old grampy, grumpy John McCaine went on the floor of the Senate to crankily point out that the Tea Party mentality was now residing in "Lord of the Rings" fantasy land.  Which is perfectly illustrated by Presidential candidate, MoonBeam Michelle Bachman, blandly declaring that defaulting is no big deal, nothing will happen, don't worry, it's all a liberal lie, thereby proving that she is unfit to govern whatever office she's running for. 

So here we are: a nation unhinged, angry, bellowing like a blind bull, but still held hostage by elected crazed extremists -- economic terrorists if you will -- funded by corporate interests, a country self-destroyed by fake Republican "trickle-down" economics, fake "job creation myths," our wealth gutted out by outsourcing multinationals, the massive profits moved up into fewer and fewer hands -- America the Oligarchic, from sea to shining sea.  All supported and voted into being by the American people, the most astonishing suicide pact the world has seen.  An immolative auto de fe set alight when the twin towers fell.

Yee, haw!

Talk about Dumbth

Last night I attended another of the multi-part lecture series on Islam in SLOTown.  It was, as usual, wonderfully informative and was attended by about 300 people.  These are people interested in educating themselves about a topic they likely knew little about.  By contrast, take a look at the link below and watch the UTube video.  There's the face of  a pretty good part of America: It's a face filled with malice, hands full of flags, heads full of Stupid, all dangerous as snakes.  Oh, and did I mention, fully supported by various elected Congresspeople. Disgraceful?  Yes, and, sadly, but the tip of a very large iceberg, I'm afraid.

http://www.sandraoffthestrip.com/2011/03/03/tea-party-spews-hatred-against-muslims-in-orange-county/

Just Another Day

Calhoun’s Can(n)ons for January 14, 10

The shooting was nothing special. Just another unbalanced, angry young man with a gun. A rapid-fire Glock-9 with a 30-round clip that can kill a great many people in a very short amount of time. In this case, six people, including a 9 year-old girl. Nothing special in a country awash with gun deaths.

Except for Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. That was a bit unusual. But not enough to make a real change in how easy it is for unbalanced angry young men to get rapid-fire guns. This particular shooting took place in Arizona, the Tombstone state, a state with one of the most lax gun laws in the nation, a state where armed citizens no longer even need a permit to carry concealed weapons. And Arizona likes it that way. It has even proposed a law that would allow college students to carry weapons to school. And the Congresswoman herself had a Glock-9 and noted that she was “a pretty good shot.”

Since it was a Congresswoman who was shot, the talk turned immediately to the possibility that this unbalanced young man’s anger had been fueled by the angry political rhetoric sloshing around in our polarized, angry nation. Clips and sound bites of “reload,” and being “armed and ready,” “blood of patriots,” “the Second Amendment remedy,” “if ballots don’t work, bullets will,” and Sarah Palin’s now infamous web page showing gun-sight “targets” zeroing in on various contested congressional races, including the Arizona district where Congresswoman Giffords was running for election. Indeed, a few weeks before the shooting Ms. Giffords herself was on TV complaining about Ms. Palin’s “targets,” saying that rhetoric like that was likely to result in “consequences.”

For Congresswoman Giffords, it certainly may have. A bullet through the brain. And six dead.

But Americans love their toxic talk and both sides of the political spectrum got busy pointing fingers at the other, though by sheer sound-bite numbers, the right wing won that contest. You can’t beat TV clips of armed “tea-party” folks showing up at political rallies wearing weapons and carrying signs lauding blood-spilling “patriots.” And those targets on a map, about which, Palin’s spokespeople spent a great deal of time explaining they weren’t, uh, gun sights, no, they were just “target marks” like you would use on a survey map. Thereby illustrating that the Palin camp must think Americans are truly dumb because nobody with any sense was buying that story. Not from the Moose-shooting Mama with her own “reality” show featuring her blasting away at furry animals for her cook-pot. If a person knows what a gun sight looks like, it’s Palin.

So, no, it was a lock ‘n load gun sight and part of the “armed and dangerous” right-wing rhetorical meme: We’re angry, aggrieved and armed and we’re gonna target and take “our” country back from, well, all those people, and if we have to use bullets instead of ballots, so be it. But that didn’t stop our Sarah from going on Facebook to play the appalling inappropriate “blood libel” victim card in response to left wing finger pointing. Then everyone ran for cover, pretending they knew nothing about anything.

So that discussion will soon fade from the airwaves and it’ll be back to attack-dog business as usual. Toxic, poisonous, raging talk radio is both popular and highly profitable to the sponsors and stations that carry it, and to the stations’ corporate owners. Asking people like Limbaugh or Beck to “tone it down” might cut into the bottom line, so that won’t happen. Rage sells. Fear sells. And paranoia is the American Style.

Lost in much of the partisan rhetoric was the mentally unstable young man. Speaker of the House, John Boehner has stated that America has the finest health care in the world. But I suspect that the shooter, the unstable young man with voices in his head, found that in his America, his finest health care in the world likely didn’t cover treating mental illness. Few insurance policies do and state-run mental health facilities are under-funded, or broke and failing. This is in part because in finest-health-care-America, we have the odd notion that somehow the mentally ill “choose” to be mentally ill and while completely insane have the right to refuse treatment, have the right to live under bridges, and the right to starve in the streets while talking to non-existent people. And, of course, the right to buy guns.

So there it all was. The usual suspects. Guns. A toxic, angry culture. A mentally disturbed angry young man. Lousy mental health care. Nothing special. Nothing unusual. It was just another day in America. Nothing has changed and nothing will change.

Except for six people, including a 9 year- old girl.

Git Out The Bait, Fellas

Calhoun's Can(n)ons for November 3, 2010 

The country’s 24-hour political pundit perpetual panic conflictionator did not cause our problems, but its existence makes solving them that much harder . . . If we amplify everything, we hear nothing.

                  Jon Stewart,”Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear” 

            Well, Jon, you could have fooled me.  These past months have been a time of creeping horror.  Angry, oddly uninformed, frightened people put a tri-corner hat on their heads, a gun on their hips, scribbled a Hitler moustache on a photo of  President Obama and called it a national political movement, unaware it was really little more than a useful corporate, lobbyist-fueled, Astroturf political tactic. Until it became clear it might backfire against the Republicans who sought to use its ramped up fear and anger. At which time the likes of Karl Rove sniffed and sneered and started backing away. But it was too late.  Frankenstein’s monster was loosed in the land and was running amok, knocking out “sane” conservative candidates and substituting extremist wackos babbling about headless bodies in the desert and declaring they weren’t witches.

            Meanwhile, the airways filled with hideous images and scary voices promising Armageddon should one politician or another get elected. Poor mailmen fell to their knees under the weight of glossy campaign flyers. Insanity roared through the land, terrorized people hiding under their beds, fingers stuck firmly in their ears, eyes scrunched shut against the bray.

            Except for brave Oklahoma.  Those courageous Sooners took a stand against the growing tide of terror.  Their Republican state Representative Rex Duncan authored a constitutional amendment initiative to ban Sharia law from being implemented in Oklahoma.  Says Mr. Duncan, “Oklahoma does not have that problem yet, but why wait until it’s in the courts.” Indeed!  There’s nothing more uselessly soothing than pre-emptive strikes against non-existent threats.  What’s next, a law making it illegal for flying dragons to use Oklahoma airspace?

            Well, why not.  That kind of silliness is what we Americans do when we get scared.  Theatre for children.  But now the election’s over, it’s clear that the worst of the games are over and now the terribly serious business of actually governing has to begin. 

            In California, the voters elected a “public servant,” over a wealthy CEO.  Perhaps  they understood there’s a world of difference between the two.  Plus, this particular “servant,” is a Pol’s pol, and not only knows where the bodies are buried, he’s swum with the Sacramento sharks so it’s likely he will know how to get something done in a state that’s been self-derailed and gridlocked. Maybe.

            Nationally, Republicans regained control of the House and will soon understand the dictum, “Be careful what you wish for; you may get it.”  For two years, they’ve had the supreme luxury of sitting on the sidelines like sulking children, lower lips out, pouty-eyes glaring, threatening filibusters and saying, No-No-HELL NO!

            That won’t cut it any more.  They now have the fishing pole, they have the bait, and they now have two ways to go: Get serious and work with Democrats to actually make critical changes. Or, focus their time and energy in setting up impeachment proceedings against our Kenya-born, Muslim-terrorist, illegal-alien President.  Oh, and waste time on the non-starter of rescinding the heath care plan so that people can once again get thrown off their policies, be refused coverage for pre-existing conditions and remove the provisions that insurance companies must spend at least 80% of your insurance dollars on actual health care, versus spending it on CEO bonuses.

            And, of course, totally ignore any commitment towards a sustainable green energy policy, even though a lot of corporations and individuals tinkering in their garages are just waiting for the signal from Washington that will give them the go-ahead to do what America does best – innovative investments in a future. 

            But that kind of commitment requires a government and a people that actually believes it has a future and is willing to work together to make that future real.

            Which makes this truly a fish or cut bait moment. And begs a question:  Why did it take two comedian/satirists to clarify the choices we face: Restore Sanity or Keep Mindless Fear Alive?

            And to remind us, as Jon Stewart did, that “The image of Americans that is reflected back to us by our political and media process is false.  We hear every damn day about how fragile our country is, on the brink of catastrophe, torn my polarizing hate, and how it’s a shame that we can’t work together to get things done.  The truth is, we do.  We work together to get things done every damn day.  The only place we don’t is here [Washington] or on cable TV.”

            Amen. Now, it’s time for our Pols to get back to work. And this time, let’s see if both parties can focus on what’s best for the country as a whole, not just on payoffs for the fat cats what brung ‘em.

No, I'm Not Kidding, Don't Answer That Phone, Part Duh

Boiiiinnnggg! goes one of those fake peanut brittle cans that actually has spring-coil fake snakes in it and when you open it, Boiiinnngggg! the snakes fly out all over the room and everyone shreiks. 

So, Virginia Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, leaves a phone message for Anita Hill, asking her to apologize and 'splain her testimony about Clarence Thomas inappropriate behavior during his Supreme Court nomination hearings some nineteen years ago.  Then the whole kerfluffle hit the media like those fake flying snakes (with some critical points missing, of course) and everyone looked around and asked themselves, WTF? Why would Ms. Thomas open THAT can of peanut brittle after all these years?

Then, in all the flapdoodle, here comes Lillian McEwen, yet ANOTHER woman who knew Thomas long ago.  Reports The Washington Post,  she's "a retired administrative law judge who said she dated Clarence Thomas from 1979 through the mid 1980s," who "told The Washington Post, 'The Clarence I knew was certainly capable of not only doing the things that Anita Hill said he did, but it would be totally consistent with the way he lived his personal life then.'"

Then everyone groans.  And in the focus over "women" that a young fellow may have behaved, uh, inappropriately towards years ago, what's getting lost is the really serious issue:  Mrs. Thomas + Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas + Liberty Central + $500,000 donation (undisclosed, unaccountable) + Tea Party + Freedom Works + Dick Armey + Chamber of Commerce, all framed by the Supreme Court case, Citizens United, that her husband ruled on.

So cozy.  So cozy.  And Ms. Thomas claims that she and her husband aren't "Washington insiders."

Boiiinnngg,! Bwa-hahhahahah.

Dear God, Don't Answer That Phone

Has the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas lost her marbles? Doing some drunk dialing?

Virgina Thomas left a Saturday morning 7:30 a.m. phone message on the office answering machine of Anita Hill, asking her to apologize and ‘splain her testimony against her husband’s court conformation hearings some 19 years ago. Ms. Hill called the campus police and the message was investigated and confirmed as coming from Ms. Thomas.

Now, of course, the question remains: WTF???

But what’s so interesting to me is that nowhere in the news stories recapping the hearings and the whole amazing he said/ she said controversy, did I hear the name Sylvia Wright. In the book, “Capitol Games,” by Timothy Phelps and Helen Winternitz, Ms. Wright, who, if memory serves, was a television reporter in Florida, and yet another woman with a similar story to tell, had been vetted and were standing by ready to testify that, yeah, Clarence Thomas had made totally inappropriate remarks to them as well. For whatever political or strategic reasons, they were never called. Which was a shame because had they been allowed to testify, the narrative would have been he said/ she saidshe said/she said. Which is a very, very different story.

Instead, these two additional women have fallen down history’s memory hole and even now, when the media’s recapping the history of the hearings, no mention is made of them. That’s how America gets half a story which then becomes “truth.” Yes, “truth” with important parts missing.

Uh-Oh, Better Hide Grandmaw, Again

Remember when Republicans were scaring Americans about “Obamacare?” How the government would soon be dictating treatment and that’d result in Grandmaw getting killed off by “death panels” who decide her treatment was too expensive and they wouldn’t pay for it?

Ah, well, it’s now coming true! Only it isn’t the Government sitting on those panels, it’s the for-profit insurance companies.

The New York Times reports that “UnitedHealthcare plans to announce on Wednesday a one-year project with five oncology practices, offering doctors an additional fee. The new fee is meant to encourage doctors to follow standard treatments rather than opting too often for individualized and unproven courses of therapy, which can include the most expensive drug combinations. By proposing a different type of payment structure, companies hope to lower doctor’s dependence on a system that generates substantial sums for cancer specialists who routinely favor top-of-the line treatment.”

And, “Aetna is now working with about 250 doctors in Texas and says it plans to expand the program next year to include even more cancer specialists in its network. In California, Blue Shield joined with Hill Physicians Medical Group to treat a group of state workers in Sacramento.”

So it begins. The for-profit insurance companies will be setting treatment policies that will financially reward doctors for choosing cheaper cancer care options because the present system we have is simply financially unsustainable.

To date, I haven’t heard a single Republican screaming about Blue Cross killing his grandmaw. Hmmmm, double standard going on here?

In truth, new treatment protocols for all medical issues need a complete overhaul because our present system is simply unsustainable. Worse, we pay more for our healthcare than any “civilized” country and we have worse outcomes. And in large measure that’s because of the way we’ve set our system up – no affordable universal “basic care” to catch problems early-on, followed by often unlimited but scattershot fee-for-service specialists that’s too often disconnected from any coordinated treatment plan which would avoid duplication and would follow proven treatment protocols. All of which leaves us with a bad system that’ll soon totally collapse from the sheer cost.

So whether reform comes from government guidelines and treatment/payment plans or for-profit insurance company guidelines and treatment/payment plans, Grandmaw – and all of us – need to get honest and proactive in making some tough decisions about our health care and how we pay for it.

Two Years of Sheer Fun Ahead

I know a lot of progressives and liberals and Democrats are wringing their hands and shuddering in contemplation of Republicans, including a handful of Tea Pot Crazies, getting elected to Congress. As for me, I can’t wait!

I mean, consider some of the wilder and wackier of the Tea Potters showing up in Congress to demand an end to Social Security and Medicare! Or, even more fun, a whole gaggle of conservatives all declaring “We’re fed up! No more spending!” who will be handed a long list of things to cu, so they start cutting and then the shrieking will start.

It’s one thing to run against wicked tax and spend “gummint” until you realize that “gummint” spending includes a job-generating weapons plant smack dab in the middle of YOUR district. Shut that plant and now you’re a job-killer who hates America and wants the terrorists to win

So far, the Republican party has been the party of NO. That’s easy to do when you’re sidelined. But if you’re in the game, which is very likely come Nov, you can’t sit on the side vetoing or filibustering everything. You’ve got to actually come up with and write bills, with all their attendant devil-in-the-details, then convince the child-like American people – who want free pudding but don’t want to pay for it themselves, and demand that whatever you’re proposing will work immediately and will magically make everything better in a week or less! If it doesn’t, the plan will be declared a failure and you’ll be branded as a socialist who hates America and wants the terrorists to win!

To which I can only say, well good luck to ‘em. Our manufacturing base is gone, shipped off to China so a small handful of Wall Streeters can become gazillionares, we’ve swallowed the mantra that Privatizing everything is Good and the Commons are Bad, so infrastructure investment is now labeled as evil “socialism,” and taxes used to pay for the infrastructure investment are Bad, Bad, Bad, that tax cuts for the rich will trickle down without ballooning the deficit, and that Mexicans and Blacks and Poor People are to blame for all our ills, and if we just get rid of all government regulation we can live happily ever after.

I can’t wait for the show to begin.

It’s True. Zelig LIVES!

Some time ago, when Lt. Gov. Able Maldonado was punching his political ticket and weaseling his way up the Republican hierarchy, every time I picked up the paper there was a picture of the Gov. Aaaahnnold. And stuck to his side, like a remora to a great white shark, a smiling Abel. Just like Zelig, Woody Allen’s film character who seemed to appeared everywhere throughout time and space. Whenever there was a photo-op moment, there was Able, grinning at the camera.

It was kinda creepy, but funny, and I kept thinking, How does he do that!

Well, Zelig’s back. Democrat Gavin Newsom was holding an L.A. campaign rally at a Los Angeles café and there, in the back of the room, having a coffee and a muffin, was . . . ABEL!

Yes, Zelig lives!

Be All You Can Be, But Not Right Now, Maybe Later


If you’re gay and are serving in the military or are thinking about joining up, congratulations. You have entered the equivalent of a Zen koan or The Mad Hatter’s Tea Party, and you’re forgiven if you’re getting tennis-match neck whiplash; Yes, No, Yes, No, Wait, Come Back Later.

DADT is now in limbo, again. So pity poor former Army Lt. Dan Choi, an Iraq war veteran, a West Point graduate, who was tossed out of the army for declaring on Rachel Maddow’s show, that he was gay. During the most recent ban-lifting, when the Army said they were now accepting applications from openly gay recruits, Choi showed up to reinlist in the Army.

What’s not known is what poor Mr. Choi was supposed to put on his application at that point since shortly thereafter the stay was un-stayed some more and once again gay soldiers were told to shut up and Don’t Tell, again, unless they did, in which case, well . . . who knows.

Is this any way to run an Army? Don’t think so.

Song Cycle

Calhoun's Can(n)ons for September 10, 2010

I hear America singing . . . Somebody hand me an aspirin. My ears hurt.

We want major health care reform! But don’t change MY health care policy. Stop socialistic government-run health care! But keep your hands off MY Medicare. No new taxes! But fix the roads in front of MY house and hire more teachers for MY kid’s school and put more policemen on MY beat. Don’t raise the deficit! But get ME a stimulus-money job. No government regulations! But make sure MY breakfast eggs are safe. Reform Social Security! But don’t change MY benefits or costs. Bring our troops home, the war’s bankrupting us! But let’s bomb Iran! Shut the border down! But don’t deport MY gardener. America welcomes all religions! But not Muslims, so let’s get a bunch of Christians together and threaten to burn Korans in a true Bonfire of the Stupidities.

It’s an old, old song heard whenever Americans get unnerved by events. It’s incoherent and filled with fear-generated divisions, long simmering resentments and bone-deep religious, racial and economic hatreds. While the song comes from the American heart – hypocritical and a-historical to the core, the knives always there just under the carefully burnished, smiley-faced surface – it is always roused into full voice by opportunistic political choirmasters and master demagogues manipulating the singers and the song for their own profit and power.

And when the last note dies, the result of all the sound and fury is almost always a nation filled with self-inflicted bullet holes shot through a great many feet, loud wails of anguish, and a HUGE transfer of wealth into the bank accounts of the select wily few. Which sets us all up for the song cycle to repeat itself, the problems unsolved, the lessons unlearned, the connection between words and music a complete blank.

But the run-up to this particular election is not without its delicious moments – little operatic solos and riffs and delicious subtexts and wrong notes.

Consider the ironies of multi-gazillionaire (EBay) Meg Whitman running for California governor on a platform of business know-how and fiscal-prudence while spending like a drunken sailor --$104 million of her own money so far. This to buy a chance to govern a financially busted state polarized by gerrymandering and locked into a furious refusal to seriously change the way the state taxes, budgets and spends its money. Or Carly Fiorina, who, as CEO of Hewlett-Packard, downsized and outsourced 30,000 jobs before getting fired and walking away with a big fat bonus. She’s now running for senator as a job-creating business leader. And while the Koch brothers (oil and gas) are pouring money into opposing a California green alternative energy ballot measure, Exxon Mobil (oil and gas) just invested $300 million in a San Diego green alternative fuel company that will benefit from that same ballot initiative. Does anybody have a program here? How do you spell cognitive dissonance, anyway?

And then there’s the richness of the subtexts and symbolism of the leading notes of this song cycle. Take Joe Miller from Alaska, the newest tea-party-ish darling du jour. Is that carefully clipped quasi scruffy semi-unshaved permanent five o’clock shadow the result of careful two-day-growth manscaping like the macho undercover actors in the new TV series “Dark Blue?” Or an overdose of testosterone that keeps him running around the northwoods in big-check flannel shirts hauling moose antlers by the armload?

Well, no matter. In the upcoming Fox Noise/Republican/Tea Party 24/7 FearFearFear! congressional campaign – Nonexistent headless bodies in the Arizona Desert! Deadly Killer Mosques at Ground Zero! Black helicopters coming to kill your Grandma if ObamaCare comes to your town! Communism creeping over America that can only be stopped by Glen Beck who’s now speaking for God while raking in the filthy lucre of mammon! (Buy gold, now!) – what better subliminal message can a candidate project in these ginned-up scary times than an image filled with moose antlers, five o’clock shadows, the whiff of chain-saw engine oil and buffalo check plaid? Photo shoot, styled-up Momma and Poppa Grizzlies coming to protect us. Yes. America is saved!

And if nobody wants to seriously talk about choices and consequences, if nobody has the patience or foresight to work for long-term goals or put in place real reform that actually results in, well, real reform, if nobody will support efforts that will lead to a transformative payoff in the future by changing parts of a system that simply aren’t working anymore, then style over substance, image over content is about all that’s left.

So, here it is. The word to fashionistas --Flannel. Better stock up now.

Jimmy's Ear

Calhoun’s Can(n)ons for Sept 18, 09

Former President Jimmy Carter’s recent remarks to NBC’s Brian Williams was a welcome breath of fresh air in what too often has turned into a weird psycho-socio-political, Jung/Freudian chthonic brew that’s been swirling around legislation that’s supposed to be about “health care reform.” As with most things, the health care debate too often isn’t really about health care.

Here’s what it’s really about: fear, money, power, class, hypocrisy, race, status, politics, subtext and “morality,” the usual suspects in a country constantly in denial about its history and its ongoing reality. In short, all the usual suspects that we are taught from an early age NOT to discuss honestly in polite company.

Here’s what Carter observed, “I think an overwhelming portion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barak Obama is based on the fact he is a black man, that he’s African American. . . . I live in the South, and I’ve seen the south come a long way, and I’ve seen the rest of the country that shared the South’s attitude towards minority groups at the time, particularly African Americans. . . . And that racism inclination still exists.”

Here’s one of the signs carried by some “tea party” participants: “I want my country back.”

Here’s the subtext of that Cri de Coeur: Bring back the good old days of the white, Anglo Saxon power structure, the days when uppity minorities knew their place and a poor working class white man could feel he was better than . . . well, somebody.

And here’s the missing reality that nobody wants to honestly discuss in polite company. For at least 20 years, The American Dream World has been slowly turned upside down. The working class has been gutted, well paying manufacturing jobs have moved offshore, to the benefit of the corporate bottom line. America doesn’t make very much any more; it just consumes what others have made. That’s not a sustainable model for any society. Meanwhile, the middle class has been systematically diminished as the nation’s wealth (and tax breaks) were deliberately moved to benefit fewer and fewer groups at the very top. The consolidation of Corporate America, the rise of “Wall Street,” the marriage of corporate and congress has given us an unbalanced wealth distribution not seen since the days of the Robber Barons at the turn of the century. Toss in an economic collapse, add in a racial demographic shift, with “minorities” soon to be the “majority” in a few years, and you have the makings of a revolution.

But what kind of “revolution,” will depend on how honest we can be with one another about what has happened to this country while we were all in a trance shopping at the Mall. That’s why Jimmy’s ear for subtext is so valuable. A son of the South, he, better than most, hears what may be inaudible to many others. He knows the code, the wink-nudge, the unspoken look. He knows too the hidden fears, the dark heart, the history.

And it isn’t just a “southern” history. It’s American. It’s Apple Pie. And it is dangerous.

President Obama, in his address to Congress, set the discussion about “health care” into terms of “morality,” and “character.” What kind of nation are we that we continue to allow millions of our fellow Americans to sicken and die because they can’t afford proper medical care? No other “civilized” country does that. Only in America.

And we do that because we haven’t had an honest national dialogue about the real meaning of the founding documents we pretend to cherish, you know, all that stuff about all men being created equal, or equal justice under law, or equal opportunity or level playing fields or promoting the general welfare, or all of us being Americans and being in the same boat. All nice sentiments, useful for rhetorical flourishes on the Fourth of July, but the reality is this: In America, wealth, power, class and status are what we value, not “equality.” The rich powerful citizen is of value; the poor citizen is not. That’s the American “character” as it is lived in real time.

And it is of supreme irony that so many of the millions of people who have been systematically devalued and dismissed are the very people who voted for politicians and policies that devalued and dismissed them. And so they show up with signs about getting their country back from some illegitimate, black socialist commie Hitlerian usurper, not realizing that the old system they want back was the one that kicked them to the curb in the first place. And the only way they have any hope of hanging onto their piece of the American Pie is to understand that promoting the general welfare is meant to include them. But that will only happen if they insist that those who live on Main Street have as much, if not more, value than a corporate entity known as “Wall Street,” that lifelines have more value than bottom lines, and that the citizen is first in line, not under the stairs hoping for a few patronizing scraps.

Because we ignored that simple idea, we’ve brought ourselves to a crisis in search of solutions. Which means we can recalibrate, we can change directions, we can reassess our values and priorities so that we can change the way we treat one another and change the way America does business. But we can’t do any of those things unless we understand more clearly the meanings of the messages we are sending to one another, messages full of history, text, subtext, myth, reality, all being picked up by Jimmy’s finely-tuned ear.

And in those messages are some critical questions: Exactly what is it that people think they “want back?” Just what do we really value? What are our priorities? Is the country we have we created at this point really the one we want to live in and leave to our children?

If not, then it’s time to start working to form a more perfect union -- One honest brick at a time.