Thursday, July 29, 2010

Hard Hat Area

"Obama lacks leadership," my friend said, and it was not a criticism so much as it was a statement of dismay. "Where is he?"

That's a fair question. Not an hour has passed without our nation's 44th president being assailed like no other before him, in every form of media available, and from our Republican elected officials as well. There hasn't been one decision that has been met with anything so positive as a shrug. No matter what he does, it's either too much for one side or not enough for the other.

That's not exactly an environment conducive to grand-marshaling a national parade. There's also the matter of style to be considered. Barack Obama has proven to be a bit aloof, above the fray, cool and calm when others feel as if their heads are about to explode. That's just how he is.

Look at the situation in Arizona, where a federal judge has gutted the infamous SB 1o7o. This is one of the biggest stories in the country; why hasn't Obama come down here to see it for himself before having his Department of Justice throw Arizona into the defendant's chair?

Finally, decades after he left the scene, it seems as though Americans are pining for Lyndon Baines Johnson. His penchant for Capitol Hill skullcrackery was legendary. Everyone assumed that, because BHO came out of the rough-and-tumble political junkyards of Chicago, this president would be an ass-kicker along the lines of LBJ.

Even conservatives seem taken aback by his unwillingness to pull the gloves off. They are enboldened by his lack of bloodthirst. If leadership is measured by the same metrics as accomplishment, Obama is right up there with Kennedy, Roosevelt and Roosevelt. If it's measured by his left jab, then he's left his own base wanting.

Again, using Arizona as an example, just ponder for a moment what LBJ would have done to any state guilty of pushing a stick into his eye. Punishment would have been swift and certain and terrible. From civil rights to Medicare, he built a legacy that no Democrat since has wanted to rival. Can't we all just get along?

Were Obama to channel Johnson, the retribution would be righteous and personal. First, he'd head off these crazy Arizona confederates - sorry, conservatives by granting outright amnesty to every undocumented immigrant in the United States. It could be called the "Ronald Reagan Memorial Taxpayer Creation Act".

(He could embellish this properly by imitating George W. Bush's WMD farce, looking under the rostrum and saying, "Nope, no illegals there!")

Then he'd announce that Luke Air Force Base is no longer needed, because the F-16 is an obsolete fighter plane, and that we can just outsource the training to whatever countries have already purchased most of our F-16s. Davis-Monthan Air Force Base would be relocated to New Mexico, because they need the jobs more, and have more available land to boot. He could call it the "John McCain Honorary Base Re-alignment Act".

After that, he might consider laying federal hands on the Colorado River, nixing the Central Arizona Project Canal (which brings water from the river all the way to the Valley of the Sun). This only makes sense - the "American Riparian Conservation Act".

Closing the Grand Canyon would be the next logical step. It's expensive to operate such a vast national park. The 'Zonies can't say anything, because Jan Brewer and the GOP-led legislature have already closed most of the state parks. This would be known as the "Size and Scope of Government Reduction Act".

In fact, all federal funding could be halted, since Arizona has long been home to such conservatives as John McCain and Jeff Flake, who rail against earmarks as if they really mean it. As a result, we're already last in federal spending per capita. Call it the "This is What You Ingrates Can Expect Act".

Then, if President Obama were truly to channel President Johnson, he'd have Governor Jan Brewer audited by the IRS. Extensively. Same goes for Russell Pearce. And Cindy McCain.

As it stands, LBJ would probably be proud to see an African-American in the White House, no matter how he pulled the levers of power. His legacy stands, even against the kinds of stiff racist winds blowing today in places like Arizona.

It's been too long in coming for the man who had the decency to neither seek nor accept his Party's nomination in 1968: Hail to the Chief. It's just that... Where did he leave that billy club?

pH 7.29.1o

Saturday, July 24, 2010

Letter to the Duh

I just got an e-mail, from someone who loves me, depicting a local Letter to the Editor. The tag line went, "What Has America Become". It was drearily predictable right-wing screed, hardly deserving of a response, but that's never stopped me before. So I replied.

***

Hey. I got your e-mail containing the hysterical rant about "what has America become", and just thought I'd take the time to refute some of this paranoid crap. To wit:

"If we lie to Congress it's a felony and if Congress lies to us it's politics."

Bank executives were less than forthcoming in Congressional inquiries about the ways in which they bankrupted our economy. Then they took bonuses straight from the taxpayer purse. BP's ability and willingness to dissemble has also been on recent display. But if we think our representatives are lying to us, we can easily un-elect them.

"If we dislike Blacks we're racist, but if Blacks dislike us it's their First Amendment right."

Blacks have historically not been merely disliked, but also enslaved, whipped and raped. Harry Truman desegregated the military in World War II; the South didn't follow suit until 20 years later, and only then under the gentle supervision of the National Guard. Blacks are routinely sentenced to longer terms of incarceration than Whites who commit identical crimes. By the way, Native Americans aren't so fond of us either, so maybe it isn't a Black thing after all.

"The government spends millions to rehabilitate criminals while doing nothing for victims."

Every single state has victim compensation laws, and has had them for decades. California's was enacted, for example, in 1965. We also have the highest incarceration rates, and recidivism rates, in the free world. Much of our prison system has been turned over to private-sector profiteers, who donate heavily to the GOP at election time.

"Schools can teach that homosexuality is OK, but they can't mention God in the process."

The Pledge of Allegiance is still recited in schools, and it still includes the phrase 'One nation, under God, indivisible'. The Declaration of Independence, also part of the curriculum, begins by saying that all men are created equal, and that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights. It does not say, 'unless they're gay'.

"You can kill an unborn child, but executing a mass murderer is wrong."

We are one of the only civilized nations that still executes people. For instance, Christian conservative Timothy McVeigh (the Oklahoma City Bomber) killed a good many born children, and was executed shortly thereafter. Beyond that, the state of Illinois had to put a moratorium on the death penalty because of the shocking number of innocent people found on Death Row. Meanwhile, pharmacists are allowed to refuse to fill prescriptions for birth control (because it offends their morality), resulting in obviously unwanted pregnancies.

"We don't burn books in America, but we re-write them."

Conservatives, actually, burned Dixie Chicks CDs when that group disagreed with the Bush administration's misguided and illegal invasion of Iraq. Meanwhile, in Texas, schoolbooks are being written by conservative school boards that do not mention the name Thomas Jefferson. Wonder why.

"We got rid of Communist and socialist threats by renaming them as progressives."

Our trade deficit with Communist China increased tenfold under the Bush administration, which granted them Most Favored Nation status. This was long after Mao Tse-Tung had rid his country of artists, teachers, scholars and the like. Stalin killed over 30 million of his own people, chiefly through starvation. He also turned Siberia into a prison-state. Progressives tend to build HUD homes, give health-care to people, stuff like that. See the difference?

"We can't close the border with Mexico, but we protect the 38th Parallel in Korea."

The Mexican-American War ended with the Treaty of Hidalgo, in which we awarded ourselves the states now known as Utah, Nevada and California. Nevertheless, Mexico remains one of our biggest and most important trade partners. The Korean War never ended, but resulted in an armistice. North Korea (which developed nuclear weapons in the Bush-43 era) routinely threatens the U.S. and its allies in the region, and in March torpedoed a South Korean battleship, killing 46 sailors.

"If you protest Obama's policies you're a terrorist, but if you burned a flag or George W. Bush in effigy it's your 1st Amendment right."

Again the disdain for the First Amendment... Anyway, no protestors of President Obama's policies have been charged, to date, with terrorism or anything like it. Bush protestors, however, were penned up miles away from his public appearances in what were laughably called 'Free Speech Zones'. Many were arrested, and some were shot in the face with rubber bullets.

***

I could keep going, but reading this rote, redundant missive makes my forehead feel fat. Suffice it to say that he made absolutely not one single point, good or otherwise, but did reinforce the widely-accepted notion that conservatives are uninformed, backward, bigoted morons.

There's a lot to be said for the company you keep.

pH 7.24.1o

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Long Hot Summer Nights

It's summertime, and the living's easy. This is especially true in Arizona, where the brutal desert heat actually wafts through your transom like a comfortable breeze compared to the hot air that erupts regularly from our public officials.

State Senator Russell Pearce, in between social engagements with white supremacists, remains active in the only game in town (immigration). The architect of the infamous SB 1o7o now trains his sights on newborns, to whom he would deny birth certificates if their parents happened to be undocumented aliens.

Got that? They would literally remain in the ranks of the unborn - the only form of childhood that seems to concern any conservative.

I know... The Fourteenth Amendment states very clearly that anyone born in (and subject to the jurisdiction of) the United States is an American citizen. Pearce apparently either cannot read or cannot comprehend the words at which he stares with slackened jaw; flip a coin.

He and other local right-wing yokels argue that, for all this time, we've just been misinterpreting that particular section of the Constitution. Those Framers who wrote it, they opine, did not intend to bestow citizenship upon the offspring of illegal immigrants.

I suppose they believe that. So what if the Supreme Court has historically disagreed? Chasing down their scattered logic, one might present the same case against much of the Bill of Rights.

The Second Amendment should be limited to flintlock muzzle-loaders, because the Founding Fathers could never have predicted the obscene power of the machine gun. The First Amendment should be scrapped, as well, because someone who merely discovered bifocals and electricity could never have envisioned the spectacle of the Internet.

The Fourth Amendment can go out the window, because hey, the signers of the Declaration didn't know squat about wiretapping. The Fifth Amendment, well, that just mollycoddles these obvious criminals in a manner unforeseen. And we don't need any of the other Amendments, either, because we're just too stupid to understand them.

This explains, in advance, why SB 1o7o will be found un-Constitutional in the coming days by a judge reviewing numerous claims against the State. We'll say she's an activist jurist. We'll say she doesn't understand. We'll say she's a liberal. And we'll devise a solution that ventures even further off the charts - Latino concentration camps, something.

The only jewels to be found in all of this garbage can be found in our demographics. A decade from now, hundreds of thousands of loony white-haired bigots (we've built entire cities in which to house them) will be dead. Replacing them at the poll booths will be young Hispanic voters, who will have grown up watching this ugly stage play.

Slow or not, it's suicide on the part of the Republican Party, and they don't want to be bothered while they're doing it. Let's all do them a big favor and oblige.

pH 7.2o.1o