Medical Marijuana: Gov. Lynch continues his shuffle of cowardice and shame

I'm sorry, but it's a sad day when a life-long Republican such as myself continues to be more Progressive than the Democratic Governor.

That we should be discussing decriminalization or legalization of ALL marajuana use is a given: the cost of incarceration to taxpayers; the repurcussions to kids smoking a substance that has clearly been established to be less dangerous than either alchohol or tobacco; the irrefutable evidence of the failure of Prohibition and the hardened crime it causes; and the personal experience of the majority of citizens and voters born after 1950, all suggest this is a no-brainer.

But to veto a compassionate bill (and yes, my father experienced the pain of esophagal cancer as he died, and the only relief was morphine, which took his lucidity away far more than marajuana would have), that the Governor himself helped craft (pulling the same psycho-drama as he did during the Marriage Equality process) is absolutely intolerable, inexplicable, and inexcusable.

Shame on you, Lynch!

New Hampshire approves Marriage Equality, 198-176

What a LOOOONG day! Rally at the Capital Building Plaza at 9 am, and then a LOOONG wait all day in the visitors gallery in 90 degree-plus heat,until the House took up HB 73....after 3:45 pm!

The victory of 22 votes was larger than any of the previous margins. Steve Vaillancourt, a Republican who opposed the current version because of Gov. Lynch's needless dramatics, came around and supported it, as did Rep. Tony DiFruscia (Republican) from Windham. Several other Dems (including a clearly choked-up Rep. Roberts, from Keene) who previously opposed the bill changed their minds. Our Bishop, the Rev. V. Gene Robinson, was also in the gallery. Loud Cheers went up from the gallery when the vote was posted, in spite of the Speaker's efforts to tell us to keep quiet.

Immediately after the vote, supporters moved to Reconsider the bill, which they then defeated: a parliamentary tactic to avoid having the bill reconsidered 'by surprise' later this session.

Outside, on the Capitol Building steps, on this historic day for New Hampshire, I proposed to my partner Scott. And (after saying, "Are you serious?!"), he said yes :-)

Upholding Prop 8 in California: a proper decision

The California Court uphel Prop 8 today. While I don't have to like the result, I have to say that from a Legal perspective, it was proper.

This same Court once ruled that gays and lesbians could not be discriminated against in the criteria for issuing marriage licenses. They held that the California State Constitution forbid sunch 'unequal' protection.

When the citizens dont like laws resulting from Constitutional interpretation, their recourse is to amend the Constitution. That is what California citizens did when they passed Proposition 8.

Opponents of Prop 8 took that vote to court. One must be clear here that the issue was NOT should gays have the right to marry: the issue was, narrowly defined, whether or not the process used in amending the California Constitution was appropriate. And it was. Thus, the Court that initally granted Marriage Equality was forced - by a 6-1 vote - to also rule that the Citizens of California were within their legal right to overturn that decision, and that they did so according to California Law.

Of course, this battle is not over..

New Hampshire House defeats Marriage Equality 188-186

It ain't over...but here's what's happened:

The Senate approved HB 73, which were a series of Amendments proposed by Governor Lynch. The House voted AGAINST concurring by a vote of 188-186. (This, after having approved the original marriage equality bill that was sent to the Governor two weeks ago)

They THEN approved a motion 207-168 to go to a Conference Committee withthe senate to try and work out common ground.

The strongest arguement *against* concurring with HB 73 was offerred by Rep. Steve Vaillancourt, a Republican and strong supporter of Marriage Equality. As much as I want to see Marriage Equality, Steve was 100% on target.

Under the Federal & State Constitutions, and included in most of the Goevrnor's amendments, it is/was clear that religious institutions were free to marry whomever they found qualified under their own rules. And under these laws, religious groups can legally 'discriminate' against other religions when it comes to membership and services in their own operations - as it should be. However, under state law, if a religious body holds themselves out as a Business to the public, then they must serve the entire public, and not pick and choose, say, to serve whites but not blacks, or to serve Baptists and Methodists but not Pentecostals. That law prohibits organizations from discriminating based on sexual orientation when they hold out business services to the public.

Governor Lynch threw down a gauntlet: in effect, he said he'd approve a Marriage Equality bill, but he wanted an 'exception' so that businesses with a religious foundation could legally discriminate against same-sex couples engaging in marriage and 'related' services, such as receptions. In other words, if the business was held out to the PUBLIC, they could still discriminate against couples based on orientation.

This was a CLEAR STEP BACKWARDS.

Let's hope that the House and Senate can recraft the bill in a way that grants Marriage Equality WITHOUT going backwards on discrimination, and let's hope that hte Governbor actually signs the bill and stops playing both sides against the middle with his usual infuriating cowardice.

November: Equality March on DC

From DavidMixner.Com
As this Administration sits in offices plotting timeline charts on what rights they feel comfortable granting us this year, clearly it is time for us to gin up our efforts and stop waiting for them to hand us our God given entitlements. Enough. I really can't stomach any more being told 'not now'. As nice as it would be, no one is going to give us our freedom; we are going to have to continue to fight like hell for it. It is demeaning to us to be moved around on a political chess board like freedom is a move in some game.

We have to stop it.

Let's never forget that we are not talking about just another piece of legislation nor just an executive order. What is at stake is over 1,000 rights, benefits, privileges and protections granted to all other Americans and denied to the LGBT community. It is about the ability of those who choose to serve their country can do so in total honesty and freedom. That the vision of America is for our young as well as other young Americans. Finally as we work toward full equality we must halt in its tracks the efforts of a number of our fellow citizens to put in place a system of Apartheid for LGBT citizens. The stakes are way too high for them to tell us to wait until next year, or even until the next term.

Our freedom can't be negotiated in the political offices of the White House and in the halls of Congress. Our goal is not to make their path easier but to ensure that young LGBT citizens will not be beaten, denied the right to serve, have their love demeaned in some sort of separate but equal system or excluded from giving their gifts and talents freely to this nation. At this moment, there is very little movement on any of these issues in the White House and it appears that some even believe we should be happy with just hate crimes legislation being passed this year.

I adore President Obama but not enough to allow his team to delay my freedom for political convenience or comfort. It is unacceptable.

My plea is for our LGBT leaders to call a March on Washington for Marriage Equality this November and if they won't do it, I appeal to our young to come together and provide the leadership.

We need to come together in a display of powerful community unity to empower our young and to show the nation that anything less than full freedom is unacceptable. Clearly there are other issues that should be on the agenda for the march but marriage equality is the lynchpin that deals with so many of those issues. The most striking outside that institution would be the freedom to serve in our nation's military - and that weekend I think we could have a separate powerful event to highlight that.

Having organized a number of major marches in my near 50 years of activism, I don't take this call lightly. Trust me, I know that there are times when such marches are ineffective and poorly timed. Yet, I have also seen them be extremely effective both in message and building momentum within the movement. For the first time, we have the opportunity to have tens of thousands of our straight allies and straight students join us and we should organize the march to make it easy for them to be by our sides.

My experience has taught me the secret to any march is to keep the message simple and to make it easy for others to join. Of course, our best organizers must be enlisted in order to ensure that hundreds of thousands attend in an orderly and safe fashion.

Tapping into my previous work, I would suggest the following for consideration: On the Friday before the march 12,000 (approximately the number of our service people that have been dismissed under DADT) led by our veterans walk single file from the Pentagon to the White House until all 12,000 are across from the White House. Let the nation see visibly how many of our citizens have had their careers destroyed while the military allows convicted felons to serve. I would love to see 12,000 across from the White House chanting "Let US Serve."

One of the lessons from previous marches is that everyone should be on the Mall by no later than 3PM. We should not let logistics prevent people from getting to the Mall or otherwise they won't be counted. Everyone must be present before the evening news has to develop their stories. Each marcher and organizer should be told that every single person has to be on the Mall from 2PM to 3PM in order for us to have a success. How they choose to do that I will leave to the organizers.

Watching press secretary Robert Gibbs dodge and duck answers on LGBT issues while it seems almost every other group and issue is being discussed is so depressing to me. The promise of the Democrats being in control was great. They still can rise to greatness. It is not too late but they need our help in lifting them out of their own fears and into the light.

President Kennedy had to deal with a recession, the Berlin Wall, the Cuban Missile Crisis and so much more. However, when Dr. King and others filled the streets of cities around America and yes, Washington, DC, the president found the resources and time to stay by their sides. The time has come for us to remove the current administration's option of shrinking from leadership on this issue and to insist they rise to a new level of greatness along side us as we all fight together for freedom. It is the only way.

DADT, Lt. Col. Fehrenbach, and Obama's deplorable inaction

Gov. Lynch is a Coward

I'm rarely that dramatic in my headlines, but the label fits.

Two weeks ago, the N.H. legislature adopted a Marriage Equality Bill. The Speakers of the House and Senate delayed delivering the bill to the Governor, because once delivered, state law only gives him 5 days to make a decision, and he wanted more time. During that time, the state was baraged with hateful ads from out-of-state groups proclaiming the virtual end of western civilization if he signed. Two days ago, the Governor met with opposition leaders. And yesterday, he announced his decision.

He stated that he would veto the bill in its current form, but sign it if certain amendments were added. Most of these amendments are meaningless: they insure the right of religious institutions to refrain from conducting same-sex ceremonies. This is meaningless because churches already have this right under both the US and State Constitutions; For years Roman Catholic Churches refused to marry non-Catholics, and there was -and is - no legal repurcussion for this. The Constitutions guarentee them their right to conduct their ecclesiastical rites their own way. From this perspective, Lynch's amendments are simply political posturing.

However, one of his 'required' amendments is a clear step backwards.

"a religious organization, association, or society, or any individual who is managed, directed, or supervised by or in conjunction with a religious organization, association or society, or any nonprofit institution or organization operated, supervised or controlled by or in conjunction with a religious organization, association or society, shall not be required to provide services, accommodations, advantages, facilities, goods or privileges to an individual if such request for such services, accommodations, advantages, facilities, goods or privileges is related to the solemnization of a marriage, the celebration of a marriage, or the promotion of marriage through religious counseling, programs, courses, retreats, or housing designated for married individuals..."

On its face, this sounds like a statement in support of religious liberty. In reality, it is a step backwards for equality.

The proposed amendments enable organizations that own businesses (such as lakeside retreats, function facilities, etc.) AND WHO HOLD THESE FACILITIES OUT TO THE PUBLIC, to discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation.

All agree that religious institutions must be permitted to do as they wish in the conduct of their own religious life. HOWEVER, once they begin engaging in business with the public, a different set of laws apply. Under current law, businesses may NOT discriminate in the provision of services or housing based on sexual orientation. Under Lynch's proposed amendments, this discrimination would now be legal.

Lynch, once again, can claim to be all things to all people:

He will tell gays and liberals that he supports Marriage Equality.

He will tell theocrats that he supported rolling back the anti-dsicrimination laws to give them an exception.

If it passes, the Conservatives have won a right to discriminate in the conduct of Public Business.

If it fails, Lynch can blame the Legislature for "not doing a good enough job."

Governor, you are pandering the right and avoiding leadership. Whereas you could have had my unending support, you now have my unending scorn, regardless of the outcome of your political games.

NH State Senate votes to Allow Gay Marriage

By NORMA LOVE | Associated Press Writer
1:41 PM CDT, April 29, 2009
CONCORD, N.H. - The state Senate has voted to make New Hampshire the fifth state to allow gay marriage.

The 13-11 vote came after a 45 minute debate over an emotional issue that drew 500 people to the Statehouse for a hearing earlier this month.

The vote establishes a two-tier system with a civil marriage and a religious marriage license. The House now must consider the proposal, which is similar to one it rejected earlier this year.

Gov. John Lynch has said marriage is a word that should be reserved for the union of a man and a woman, but he has not said specifically that he would veto the bill.

Arlen Specter: the Real Lesson

Yesterday, Penn. Senator Arlen Specter annouced that he was switching from the Republican to the Democratic Party, and the political spin-doctors have been working overtime on what this means.

Michael Steele, Chair of the GOP, wrote in an email, "I hope Arlen Specter's party change outrages you. …He told us all to go jump in the lake today." He further referred to Specters "left-wing voting record" and alluded to Benedict Arnold.

Actually, the allusion to Benedict Arnold may be apt. Arnold was a patriot who fought for the colonies in a number of campaigns, and who switched sides only after coming to believe that the Colonies cause was doomed. In Specter's case, he has seen that the GOP has already lost. Or, to use McCain strategist Steven Schmidt's words, "The Republican Party is virtually extinct in the Northeast."

Specter was no liberal. He was a center-right moderate, who rarely received an extreme 0% or 100% voting record from any interest group. But those who do not toe the Theocratic Party line in the GOP are regularly rounded up as heretics, and Specter was simply going to be their latest victim.

Those who criticize him point to the fact that this was based on political expediency, since there has been a sfift of 200,000 voters from Republican to Democrat in Pennsylvania.

But apparently, they miss the point in revealing that very statistic.

One Republican who understands the current crisis in the GOP is Maine Senator Olympia Snowe, one of the last remaining Republican office-holders in New England. In today's New York Times, she writes,

"In my view, the political environment that has made it inhospitable for a moderate Republican in Pennsylvania is a microcosm of a deeper, more pervasive problem that places our party in jeopardy nationwide.

There is no plausible scenario under which Republicans can grow into a majority while shrinking our ideological confines and continuing to retract into a regional party. Ideological purity is not the ticket back to the promised land of governing majorities — indeed, it was when we began to emphasize social issues to the detriment of some of our basic tenets as a party that we encountered an electoral backlash.

It is for this reason that we should heed the words of President Ronald Reagan, who urged, “We should emphasize the things that unite us and make these the only ‘litmus test’ of what constitutes a Republican: our belief in restraining government spending, pro-growth policies, tax reduction, sound national defense, and maximum individual liberty.” He continued, “As to the other issues that draw on the deep springs of morality and emotion, let us decide that we can disagree among ourselves as Republicans and tolerate the disagreement.”

Oh, that the GOP in New Hampshire and Maine - and nationally - would listen to those words.

Open Letter to the New Hampshire GOP re: Gay Marriage.

My name is Thom Simmons, and I urgently want to address the imminent vote on gay marriage.

I am 49 years old and a lifelong Republican. I was raised in an ardently Republican household, and have served on multiple Republican committees in a number of states, including the Advance Team for the Reagan Presidential campaign in 1980. In addition, I have always been an active church member.

And yet, in spite of all that, I am one of those who have almost given up on our party as I see us pandering relentlessly to an extreme and shrinking(though vocal) Theocratic base. The hopelessness I feel about our party’s direction is one of the reasons we see New Hampshire lurching from “Red” to “Blue....” and why, in Steve Schmidt's words, "the Republican Party is virtually extinct in the Northeast."

I am also a gay man, and chair of the New Hampshire Bears, the largest gay men’s organization in New Hampshire. One little-known fact about our 200+ members is that of those I have personally met, the majority were once married, heterosexually, some for many years. (Myself, I was married to my wife for almost 23 years, and we have a number of adopted children)

How could a man “turn gay?’’ How could a man live all those years and decide he was “gay” after all that time?

Well, he doesn’t.

Instead, he is barraged from the time he is a child with the message that to be gay is to be abnormal, evil, sinful, wrong, weird, disgusting, and shameful. And so, many, many of us try beyond reason to be what we are not, to fit into a box that someone else built and shoe-horned us into. And after years of exhausting fights with ourselves, we finally accept who we are.

We heard the taunts in grade school, we heard the snide remarks in the locker room, we hear our ‘friends’ tell jokes at the expense of gays, and we see TV parody us as limp-wristed feather-boa-wearing caricatures.

And now, more than ever before, we see our own government telling us, “you’re equal, but not ‘the same.’ You can have water and drink from a fountain, but you can’t drink from our fountain, because you are just Different.” The same arguments that justified segregation when I was a child are now being used to suggest that “civil unions” are somehow “good enough.”
They are not.

They send a strong message that while we will be ‘tolerated’ because it is the politically correct thing to do, we will not be accepted as fellow Americans with equal rights to pursue life, liberty, and happiness.

Please end the enforced inferiority. Gay men deal with many issues as they struggle with their sexuality, and to be set aside as “not good enough” or “not the same” by government is unacceptable. Mr. Sununu's comments about this bill being "garbage," and making snide references to San Francisco, is precisely the nasty politics that Democrats, Republicans, and Independents have all rejected here in the Granite State.

As a traditional Republican, I know that it is not the job of government to impose a culture, or a theology, or a ‘blueprint for life’ on its citizens. It is the job of government to preserve liberty and establish a level playing field.

New Hampshire has always been in vanguard of freedom and liberty. Please, I beg you, take a stand that puts what is right above what may be expedient.

Thank you
Thom Simmons
11 Richmond Rd
Fitzwilliam, NH 03447

Civil War in the Republican Party: Liberty vs Theocracy....Restoring the Party of Goldwater and Reagan

Finally, after the worst electoral drubbing in 34 years, the GOP is re-examining its strategy of pandering to Dixiecrats and Theocrats. Basic civil rights - and the right of people to live their own lives - is finally finding its voice within the Republican Party.

From Christine Todd Whitman, former GOP Governor of New Jersey:

"The government should have no say about marriage, and the plank in the Republican Party platform that calls for preserving marriage between a man and a woman should be scrapped...Furthermore, the U.S. military should not differentiate between homosexuals and heterosexuals...I am somebody who believes in the separation of church and state and that the government, frankly, ought to be out of the business of marriage entirely...I just think it would make the issue easier if it was civil marriage for everybody...[Bloggers note: apparently Whitman reads this blog]...it’s [same-sex marriage] not going to threaten my marriage. I mean my 35th anniversary is on Monday. It’s not going to threaten my marriage to have a gay couple married....We can't succeed nationally as a party that only has 31 percent of the American people behind it.”

And concerning the military: “I don't care if he is straight, I care if he can shoot straight.”

And, from Meghan McCain (John McCain's daughter):

"Tonight I am proud to join you in challenging the mold and the notion of what being a Republican means...I am concerned about the environment. I love to wear black. I think government is best when it stays out of people's lives and business as much as possible. I love punk rock. I believe in a strong national defense. I have a tattoo. I believe government should always be efficient and accountable. I have lots of gay friends, and yes, I am a Republican....Most of the old school Republicans are scared shitless of that future...There are those who think we can win the White House and Congress back by being “more” conservative..."

Have YOU contacted YOUR State Senator yet?

http://www.gencourt.state.nh.us/senate/senatemembers.asp

AIG Bonus payouts was NO loophole and NO mistake...

According to an article in this morning's New York Times,

"...Democrats are mostly responsible for the A.I.G. bonus debacle, since Senator Christopher J. Dodd of Connecticut, chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, inserted language in President Obama’s economic stimulus package to exempt bonuses granted by contract before Feb. 11 from general restrictions on bonus payments."

Of course, this has nothing to do with the fact that Christopher Dodd represents Connecticut, the Insurance Industry Capital of the United States.

Schmuck.

UPDATE: (From the NY Daily News)

Gov. Paterson stuck to his guns Saturday, insisting he knew nothing about a $100,000 donation from AIG to the state Democratic Party days before his office helped save the insurance giant.

State Republicans charged the Democrats with stonewalling an investigation into the Aug. 29 donation, uncovered last week by The Associated Press.

In the first week of September, Paterson launched negotiations to save the financially strapped company.

The Democrat's "Religious Right"

Over at my fellow bloggers Joe.My.God and WickedGayBlog, there is an incessant harping on the Republican Party, and not a little antagonism towards those of us who would be gay and remain Republicans because of the Religious Right within our ranks. However, today's column by Wayne Besen ("Truth Wins Out" - www.waynebesen.com), who has impeccable credentials in the public fight against the Dobsons and "ex-Gay Movements" of the world, tells of the same problem at the higher echelons of the Democratic Party. I include parts of his article below:

Obama's Parent In The Pulpit Complex

"George W. Bush longed to escape his daddy's shadow, while Barack Obama has turned to shadowy preachers in his long search for a father figure. His filial approach to faith began with Rev. Jeremiah Wright and has now taken a sharp turn right.

The New York Times reports that the president has surrounded himself with a cadre of clerical crackpots known as the "Circle of Five." These holy men are: Rev. Joel Hunter, former head of the Christian Coalition; anti-gay Bishop T.D. Jakes; the ex-gay loving Rev. Kirbyjon Caldwell; and Jim "waffling" Wallis, a protean progressive. The only Obama shaman who isn't shameless is the civil rights era preacher Rev. Otis Moss Jr.

Rev. Jakes refers to homosexuality as "brokenness" and has claimed that he wouldn't hire a sexually active gay person. But it seems T.D. can't even keep his own son off the D.L. (down low). His "sexually broken" heir was arrested earlier this year for cruising a Dallas Park in search of gay men.

Wallis, the chief executive of Sojourners, a Christian magazine, holds "traditional" views on homosexuality and abortion, according to the Times article. Although Wallis has taken some affirmative steps on GLBT equality, he prides himself on not being a part of "the religious left."

Rev. Caldwell has endorsed Metanoia, an ex-gay ministry designed to "help homosexuals understand with God's help that 'change [is] possible." When the GLBT community worked to elect Obama, this is not what we thought he meant when he promised "change."

"Whoa, OK, so let's assume [the Obama Administration decides to release] a mealy mouthed message like 'the President does not believe in ex-gay therapy' or some such nonsense," wrote blogger Pam Spaulding. "If he doesn't, then what is he doing talking to Caldwell when there are plenty of other prominent pastors he could choose to break bread with who don't subscribe to that view?"

We must also remember that during his campaign, Obama tapped "ex-gay" gospel singer Donnie McClurkin to croon at a concert tour in South Carolina. And, this insult was compounded by the injury of selecting Rev. Rick Warren to give the Inauguration invocation.

I can live with Obama's poor Sunday choices if on Monday he hears our voices and passes landmark gay civil rights legislation. Still, it is disconcerting that such a cool and rational leader keeps returning to the theological armpit to fill his pulpit. Will spending time in the biblical backwater influence Obama's views and lead him to sell us down the river?

By embracing these conservative clerics, Obama is also setting a wretched example overseas. Last month, the State Department released a report to Congress that documents "an unfortunate crisis in human rights abuse directed against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people worldwide." Much of this violence was the result of brutal religious oppression. Yet, Obama pals around with reprehensible reverends, thus undermining his own administration's call for moderate religious leadership abroad.

...[W]e expect Obama to understand that his clerical choices do matter. It is time Obama stops searching for Daddy and becomes the man of the (White) house, by picking preachers who are not at irreconcilable odds with his human rights policies.



© 2008 Wayne Besen. All rights reserved.
Anything But Straight | www.waynebesen.com

AIG - So what else is new?

On March 9, after the Obama administration announced it would increase the US Taxpayer subsidy of AIG to 80% by pumping in another 30 billion, I wrote in this blog:

"...With all this cash, could AIG actually lose money? Well, friends, they just reported quarterly losses of 61 billion...The appropriate action is to allow AIG to fail, and distribute their clients to well-run companies. There are plenty of healthy, responsible Insurance companies who could and would benefit from taking on AIG's clients..."

Bush and Obama have both been shovelling dollars to AIG. Why? So they could be stabilized in the face of 61 billion losses per quarter? In spite of their best intentions, neither Bush nor Obama "get it." Government intrusion into the Marketplace always creates inefficiencies, always burdens the taxpayer and consumer, and always carries unintended consequences. This time, those consequences were highly visible: Millions of dollars in "bonuses" that were 'contractually mandated.'

Of course, if AIG was allowed to go bankrupt, as I have suggested multiple times before, those contracts would have been voided...and we wouldnt have the mess we have today. But far be it for Obama to listen to an Economist like me....

End Prohibition, End Drug Wars, Reduce Crime...

Reprinted from the March 7-13th edition of The Economist:

A HUNDRED years ago a group of foreign diplomats gathered in Shanghai for the first-ever international effort to ban trade in a narcotic drug. On February 26th 1909 they agreed to set up the International Opium Commission—just a few decades after Britain had fought a war with China to assert its right to peddle the stuff. Many other bans of mood-altering drugs have followed. In 1998 the UN General Assembly committed member countries to achieving a “drug-free world” and to “eliminating or significantly reducing” the production of opium, cocaine and cannabis by 2008.

That is the kind of promise politicians love to make. It assuages the sense of moral panic that has been the handmaiden of prohibition for a century. It is intended to reassure the parents of teenagers across the world. Yet it is a hugely irresponsible promise, because it cannot be fulfilled.

Next week ministers from around the world gather in Vienna to set international drug policy for the next decade. Like first-world-war generals, many will claim that all that is needed is more of the same. In fact the war on drugs has been a disaster, creating failed states in the developing world even as addiction has flourished in the rich world. By any sensible measure, this 100-year struggle has been illiberal, murderous and pointless. That is why The Economist continues to believe that the least bad policy is to legalise drugs.

“Least bad” does not mean good. Legalisation, though clearly better for producer countries, would bring (different) risks to consumer countries. As we outline below, many vulnerable drug-takers would suffer. But in our view, more would gain.

The Evidence of Failure

Nowadays the UN Office on Drugs and Crime no longer talks about a drug-free world. Its boast is that the drug market has “stabilised”, meaning that more than 200m people, or almost 5% of the world’s adult population, still take illegal drugs—roughly the same proportion as a decade ago. (Like most purported drug facts, this one is just an educated guess: evidential rigour is another casualty of illegality.) The production of cocaine and opium is probably about the same as it was a decade ago; that of cannabis is higher. Consumption of cocaine has declined gradually in the United States from its peak in the early 1980s, but the path is uneven (it remains higher than in the mid-1990s), and it is rising in many places, including Europe.

This is not for want of effort. The United States alone spends some $40 billion each year on trying to eliminate the supply of drugs. It arrests 1.5m of its citizens each year for drug offences, locking up half a million of them; tougher drug laws are the main reason why one in five black American men spend some time behind bars. In the developing world blood is being shed at an astonishing rate. In Mexico more than 800 policemen and soldiers have been killed since December 2006 (and the annual overall death toll is running at over 6,000). This week yet another leader of a troubled drug-ridden country—Guinea Bissau—was assassinated.

Yet prohibition itself vitiates the efforts of the drug warriors. The price of an illegal substance is determined more by the cost of distribution than of production. Take cocaine: the mark-up between coca field and consumer is more than a hundredfold. Even if dumping weedkiller on the crops of peasant farmers quadruples the local price of coca leaves, this tends to have little impact on the street price, which is set mainly by the risk of getting cocaine into Europe or the United States.

Nowadays the drug warriors claim to seize close to half of all the cocaine that is produced. The street price in the United States does seem to have risen, and the purity seems to have fallen, over the past year. But it is not clear that drug demand drops when prices rise. On the other hand, there is plenty of evidence that the drug business quickly adapts to market disruption. At best, effective repression merely forces it to shift production sites. Thus opium has moved from Turkey and Thailand to Myanmar and southern Afghanistan, where it undermines the West’s efforts to defeat the Taliban.

Al Capone, but on a global scale

Indeed, far from reducing crime, prohibition has fostered gangsterism on a scale that the world has never seen before. According to the UN’s perhaps inflated estimate, the illegal drug industry is worth some $320 billion a year. In the West it makes criminals of otherwise law-abiding citizens (the current American president could easily have ended up in prison for his youthful experiments with “blow”). It also makes drugs more dangerous: addicts buy heavily adulterated cocaine and heroin; many use dirty needles to inject themselves, spreading HIV; the wretches who succumb to “crack” or “meth” are outside the law, with only their pushers to “treat” them. But it is countries in the emerging world that pay most of the price. Even a relatively developed democracy such as Mexico now finds itself in a life-or-death struggle against gangsters. American officials, including a former drug tsar, have publicly worried about having a “narco state” as their neighbour.

The failure of the drug war has led a few of its braver generals, especially from Europe and Latin America, to suggest shifting the focus from locking up people to public health and “harm reduction” (such as encouraging addicts to use clean needles). This approach would put more emphasis on public education and the treatment of addicts, and less on the harassment of peasants who grow coca and the punishment of consumers of “soft” drugs for personal use. That would be a step in the right direction. But it is unlikely to be adequately funded, and it does nothing to take organised crime out of the picture.

Legalisation would not only drive away the gangsters; it would transform drugs from a law-and-order problem into a public-health problem, which is how they ought to be treated. Governments would tax and regulate the drug trade, and use the funds raised (and the billions saved on law-enforcement) to educate the public about the risks of drug-taking and to treat addiction. The sale of drugs to minors should remain banned. Different drugs would command different levels of taxation and regulation. This system would be fiddly and imperfect, requiring constant monitoring and hard-to-measure trade-offs. Post-tax prices should be set at a level that would strike a balance between damping down use on the one hand, and discouraging a black market and the desperate acts of theft and prostitution to which addicts now resort to feed their habits.

Selling even this flawed system to people in producer countries, where organised crime is the central political issue, is fairly easy. The tough part comes in the consumer countries, where addiction is the main political battle. Plenty of American parents might accept that legalisation would be the right answer for the people of Latin America, Asia and Africa; they might even see its usefulness in the fight against terrorism. But their immediate fear would be for their own children.

That fear is based in large part on the presumption that more people would take drugs under a legal regime. That presumption may be wrong. There is no correlation between the harshness of drug laws and the incidence of drug-taking: citizens living under tough regimes (notably America but also Britain) take more drugs, not fewer. Embarrassed drug warriors blame this on alleged cultural differences, but even in fairly similar countries tough rules make little difference to the number of addicts: harsh Sweden and more liberal Norway have precisely the same addiction rates. Legalisation might reduce both supply (pushers by definition push) and demand (part of that dangerous thrill would go). Nobody knows for certain. But it is hard to argue that sales of any product that is made cheaper, safer and more widely available would fall. Any honest proponent of legalisation would be wise to assume that drug-taking as a whole would rise.

There are two main reasons for arguing that prohibition should be scrapped all the same. The first is one of liberal principle. Although some illegal drugs are extremely dangerous to some people, most are not especially harmful. (Tobacco is more addictive than virtually all of them.) Most consumers of illegal drugs, including cocaine and even heroin, take them only occasionally. They do so because they derive enjoyment from them (as they do from whisky or a Marlboro Light). It is not the state’s job to stop them from doing so.

What about addiction? That is partly covered by this first argument, as the harm involved is primarily visited upon the user. But addiction can also inflict misery on the families and especially the children of any addict, and involves wider social costs. That is why discouraging and treating addiction should be the priority for drug policy. Hence the second argument: legalisation offers the opportunity to deal with addiction properly.

By providing honest information about the health risks of different drugs, and pricing them accordingly, governments could steer consumers towards the least harmful ones. Prohibition has failed to prevent the proliferation of designer drugs, dreamed up in laboratories. Legalisation might encourage legitimate drug companies to try to improve the stuff that people take. The resources gained from tax and saved on repression would allow governments to guarantee treatment to addicts—a way of making legalisation more politically palatable. The success of developed countries in stopping people smoking tobacco, which is similarly subject to tax and regulation, provides grounds for hope.

A calculated gamble, or another century of failure?

This newspaper first argued for legalisation 20 years ago (see article). Reviewing the evidence again (see article), prohibition seems even more harmful, especially for the poor and weak of the world. Legalisation would not drive gangsters completely out of drugs; as with alcohol and cigarettes, there would be taxes to avoid and rules to subvert. Nor would it automatically cure failed states like Afghanistan. Our solution is a messy one; but a century of manifest failure argues for trying it.

Cheshire Co., New Hampshire Republicans offer opinions on the GOP's direction

This afternoon, Republicans in Cheshire County, NH were invited to an open meeting in Keene to voice their opinions about the future of the Republican Party. To be sure, there were many opinions.

Jennifer Horn, last year's unsuccessful candidate for Congress, served as the MC. Those who attended were quickly divided into groups to discuss issues such as voter outreach, party logistics, ranking issues by importance, media relations, etc. Oddly, attendees were not invited to join the work sessions of their choice, but were assigned topics haphazardly depending on their seats. Your truly, of course, defied the established order and participated in two groups: Voter Outreach and Issues. At the end of the hour or so meeting, summations were offered, and some short general discussion ensued.

The results were mixed, I think. Some members clearly understood the need to be technologicaly adept. Others were stuck in the 1950s, believing that phone trees were important, and that telling College students that Republicans supported Civil Rights in the 60s (over 40 years ago!) would somehow win them over...

I spoke up, of course. I believe that the Republican Party needs to do some real soul-searching. Unfortunately, the Elephants appear to be terrified of The Elephant in the Room: the stranglehold on the party by Religious Conservatives.

In spite of Jennifer Horn's stated belief that the GOP does not need to rebrand itself, she is terribly, terribly wrong.

An entire generation of new voters came to the polls believing that the Bush administration and Rush Limbaugh represent Republican ideals. Republicans spent eight years defending sickening deficits, exploding budgets, and “big-government” programs that they would have railed against had they been proposed by a Democratic Administration. We were inexcusably silent as America, the great hope of the world, became represented by images of torture and Guantanamo Bay. Republicans should have been outraged…but instead, we defended “our guy” in the white house, and earned the public’s disdain. They grew tired of the Bush administration’s vision of America.

The GOP must articulate in clear terms positive, pro-active solutions for the problems and concerns that the American people have. Access to health care and secure retirement provisions are national concerns: We cannot simply be ‘against’ universal health care or social security, we must present clear, pragmatic, appealing alternatives.

As these proposals are formulated, we must be careful not to fall prey to the idea that we must choose to side with either the “moderates” or the “conservatives” within the Party. A lukewarm, “me-too” version of the Democrats is not a solution, but neither is cliché-ridden pandering to a shrill religious right. Rather, Republicans must forge a new path, a path that is consistent with both the Republican philosophy and the American spirit, and which resonates with voters of all stripes: we must combine fiscal conservatism and responsibility with social tolerance and liberalism. The Republican Party claims to be the party of small government and maximum personal freedom. It’s about time we reclaimed that heritage in a consistent manner.

As we present our alternatives, we must eradicate the mean-spiritedness, the innuendos, the mud-slinging, and the anger from our speech. We must offer vision, hope, and a future to all. If we want young people, minorities, and immigrants in the party, then we need to really want them, not just tolerate them and accept their contributions.

At the gathering, numerous snide remarks were made about the 'liberal media,' lawyers, teachers, and liberals in general. "Immigration" - a complete non-issue to anybody in Cheshire County, New Hampshire - somehow emerged as an important 'issue' to address. At my table, one religious conservative insisted that gay marriage and abortion were leading us to Socialism (I can't even begin to explain the twisted logic here...) On a positive note, I would say the majority at my table was tired of being the reloigious rights bludgeon.

I stated openly that we need to stop blaming immigrants, young people, gays, and the 'liberal media' for our problems, and was cut off by Horn, who insisted that the party does not 'blame' those groups for anything. And yet, that appears to be more of a political 'talking position' (the media was present) than the reality, as understood by the millions of Independents - and Republicans - who abandonned the GOP in the last election.

To be sure, there was a definite contingency present who agreed enthusiastically with me. We will not go away. But it will be a long hard fight - a fight that the GOP leadership seems very, very eager to avoid at all costs. But if they do not address it, one of those costs will be their own electoral success.

More Funds for AIG...

The U. S. Treasury Department announced today that another 30 billion dollars would be headed for troubled Insurance giant AIG. This is on top of the 150 billion already sunk into this Insurance Titanic, including 26 billion in loans from the Federal Reserve Bank.

This would put the US Government ownership of AIG at 80%.

It also would convert the stock that the US Government (Read: U S Taxpayers) has in the company from Preferred to Common Stock: and that means that if the company loses money, the U. S. Taxpayer gets socked first.

Now, with all this cash, could AIG actually lose money? Well, friends, they just reported quarterly losses of 61 billion.

The appropriate action is to allow AIG to fail, and distribute their clients to well-run companies. There are plenty of healthy, responsible Insurance companies who could and would benefit from taking on AIG's clients: companies like Guardian Life, New York Life, and the American Financial Group, all of whom have refused taxpayer bailout funds because they have operated their companies responsibly and profitably.

Which are the companies that are taking taxpayer funds?

- Banks that sold and traded in irresponsible sub-prime mortgages (required by Democratic President Carter, to 'help' low-income areas, and strenuously enforced by Democratic President Bill Clinton).

- Insurance Companies that invested in subprime mortgages and irresponsible banks after Banking Deregulation (signed by Democratic President Bill Clinton in 1999) permitted it. (See a pattern here?)

Meanwhile, healthy insurers that should be the focus of the public's purchases are put at competitive disadvantage by having the Irresponsible Government Favorites kept afloat with tax dollars. We are rewarding the inept, and hurting the wise.

Why? Why would Obama want 80% government control of an insurance Company?

Ah, lets just wait for his new Health Plan Initiative Wouldn't it be amazing if AIG suddenly became the US Government-funded Universal Health Insurer?

Hmmmm....

District of Columbia representatives: an Entirely Unconstitutional Process.

This country continues, at breakneck pace, to destroy its Constitution and eviscerate the Rule of Law. Under Bush, it was done in the name of "National Security." Under Obama, it's done in the name of Populist Mob Rule.

The House of Representatives has voted to permit the non-voting representative from Washington, DC to have full voting rights as a member of Congress. It is argued that it is unfair that the District of Columbia's 592,000 people have no voice of their own in Congress.

I do not argue that point. However, granting these citizens a Representative requires more than Congressional Mob Rule in a fit of moral outrage: it requires a Constitutional Amendment.

Article I, Section 2 of the U. S. Constitution states:

"The House of Representatives shall be composed of Members chosen every second
Year by the People of the several States, and the Electors in each State shall have the Qualifications requisite for Electors of the most numerous Branch of the State Legislature.

No Person shall be a Representative who shall not have attained to the Age of
twenty five Years, and been seven Years a Citizen of the United States, and who
shall not, when elected, be an Inhabitant of that State in which he shall be chosen."

The Constitution is clear that STATES have voting representatives in Congress. Not Districts, Not cities, Not territories.

If Washington DC, with 592,000 people, why not New York City with 8.3 million people? Why not Puerto Rico, with 4 million people?

When the District of Columbia sought the right to vote in Presidential elections, everyone understood that the Constitution only permitted Electors from the States to cast ballots for President. Appropriately, the nation adopted a Constitutional Amendment (the 23rd Amendment) in 1961 to permit DC residents to vote for President.

This is no different. If the residents of DC want to be represented in Congress, there is a clear process: Amend the Constituion, don't just ride roughshod over it.

Barack Obama as Eva Peron Reincarnated...

I really wanted to like this President. But from an Economic perspective, the man is an unmitigated long-term disaster.

As I listen to his speeches, and observe his techno-proficient crowd of groupies, entertainment-style pop-star performances and class-warfare compatriots, I could not help but think of Eva Peron. And being a Broadway nut, I googled a few phrases from the musical "Evita' to get them right for this entry. And in the process, I found someone who had the exact same thoughts as I did. So, rather than reinvent what has already been said quite well, I present Jim Boulet Jr's take on Obama and Eva, from www.americanthinker.com:

"When it comes to Barack Obama, fans of "Evita" have seen this show before.

Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber's popular musical, "Evita," tells the story of how Eva "Evita" Peron rose from obscurity to become the first lady of Argentina.

Remarkably, many of the lyrics of "Evita" apply equally well to Barak Obama, beginning with the Messianic adoration neither discouraged: "I'm their savior, that's what they call me," sang Evita. Or as the children's choir sang to her (just like they do for Obama):

"Please, gentle Eva, will you bless a little child? For I love you, tell Heaven I'm doing my best I'm praying for you, even though you're already blessed"

Evita was all about inspiring emotions and creating moods, not describing policy details:

"Instead of government we had a stage,
Instead of ideas, a primadona's rage
Instead of help we were given a crowd
She didn't say much, but she said it loud."

Similarly, Obama supporter David Frum said of Obama's July European tour: "Obama has risen to power by using a soothing cloud of meaningless words to conceal displeasing truths and avoid difficult choices." Evita was not ashamed of taking money from the wealthy and giving it to the needy:

"I promise you this:
We will take the riches from the oligarchs
Only for you, for all of you. And one day, you too will inherit these treasures."

Since Argentina's rich were not a limitless source of funds, Evita seized considerable sums from the middle class in order to sufficiently spread the wealth around:

"Eva's pretty hands reached out and they reached wide
Now you may feel it should have been a voluntary cause
But that's not the point my friends
When the money keeps rolling in, you don't ask how
Think of all the people guaranteed a good time now...."

"And the money kept rolling out in all directions
To the poor, to the weak, to the destitute of all complexions
Now cynics claim a little of the cash has gone astray
But that's not the point my friends
When the money keeps rolling out you don't keep books
You can tell you've done well by the happy grateful looks
Accountants only slow things down, figures get in the way
Never been a lady loved as much as Eva Peron."

ACORN will love Barack Obama for the same reason Evita was loved: he will be the man who will keep their nest well feathered.

Both Evita and Obama proved willing to use intimidation tactics in order to ensure their nation benefitted from their leadership whether a majority agreed or not:

"How annoying that they have to fight elections for their cause
The inconvenience, having to get a majority
If normal methods of persuasion fail to win them applause
There are other ways of establishing authority"

When the National Rifle Association attempted to run television ads in Ohio and Pennsylvania accusing Barack Obama of wanting to ban certain guns and put a tax on others, the Obama campaign sent out a letter threatening to challenge the FCC license of any station which dared broadcast the NRA's ads.

Evita reached high office on the basis of style, not substance. Similarly, Barak Obama's resume is remarkably short for a potential U.S. president. Yet if the polls are correct, Barak will soon join Evita as "high flying adored." But "for someone on top of the world, the view [will not be] exactly clear."

Jim Boulet, Jr. owns all three versions of "Evita."

Right on Jim....here's one more quote to add, as Che describes the results of Eva's folly:

"What's new Buenos Aires? Your nation, which a few years
ago had the second largest gold reserves in the world, is
bankrupt! A country which grew up and grew rich on
beef is rationing it! La Prensa, one of the few newspapers
which dares to oppose Peronism, has been silenced, and
so have all other reasonable voices! I'll tell you what's
new Buenos Aires!"

I'm so glad I'm not the only one who sees Obama's "Plan" for what it is....

GM, Chrysler, Homeowners: they all want MY money.

Frederic Bastiat, writing two centuries ago, said it best:

"The law has come to be an instrument of injustice....the law defends plunder and participates in it...The present day delusion is an attempt to enrich everyone at the expense of everyone else; to make plunder universal under the pretense of organizing it."

Today's News item #1: "General Motors Corp. and Chrysler LLC summoned the prospect Tuesday of their collapse unless they get $7 billion in federal aid within six weeks -- part of a dramatic plea for a total of up to $39 billion to survive the worst economic crisis in the history of Detroit's signature industry."

(This, of course, is 14 billion more than they ASSURED us all that they needed a few months ago)

Today's News item #2 (With breaking details from ABC news, who, apparently, claims an 'in' with Democratic policy makers): "...Government subsidies for lenders to modify loans to homeowners who are struggling to make payments. The government would subsidize the difference.... A program through Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac for homeowners to refinance their mortgages if they owe more than their homes are worth..."

So, in a nutshell:

1) *I,* (like the majority of Amertican consumers) chose NOT to buy GM or Chrysler cars, but to purchase cars that met my needs as a consumer. Because I chose better cars by better manufactureres that offered me what I needed and wanted at a price I could afford...my government will now force me, via taxation, to keep afloat poor competitors whom I specifically did NOT choose on my own to support.

2) *I* chose to purchase a tiny house that i could afford, and refinanced when appropriate, to make sure that I was a responsible homeowner. Eight of us lived in an affordable two-bedroom house. I subdivided the living room to create a third bedroom. When my teens needed more room, i moved to sleeping on an unheated porch - because it was the responsible thing to do.

However, for all those who bought houses beyond their means, who threw caution to the wind in terms of adjustable rates, who lied on their applications...and for all the banks who make money on these loans...these people will keep their houses and their banks will continue to make money...because my government will now force ME to subsidize THEM through taxation.

Yes, I'm disgusted.

Attack on Free Speech in Los Angeles...

Jonathan Lopez, a student at Los Angeles City College, was in the process of giving a speech in a speech class when he offered his opinion that, based on his religious beliefs, marriage should be reserved for heterosexuals. He was cut off by the instructor, who justified his actions because two students were 'upset.'

Ooh, poor babies....This is COLLEGE folks...people dont lose their right to free speech when they walk in the doors of a college! (And for those who suggest this was 'hate speech,' save your breath. There is no such thing. That speech which is MOST offensive is precisely that speech the first amendment is meant to protect.

As the the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) stated in its Dec. 31, 1994 paper "Hate Speech on Campus" :

"The First Amendment to the United States Constitution protects speech no matter how offensive its content. Speech codes adopted by government-financed state colleges and universities amount to government censorship, in violation of the Constitution. And the ACLU believes that all campuses should adhere to First Amendment principles because academic freedom is a bedrock of education in a free society...

Where racist, sexist and homophobic speech is concerned, the ACLU believes that more speech -- not less -- is the best revenge. This is particularly true at universities, whose mission is to facilitate learning through open debate and study, and to enlighten. Speech codes are not the way to go on campuses, where all views are entitled to be heard, explored, supported or refuted..."

Lopez, is appropriately, suing.

Bishop Robinson and Gay Marriage in NH

This past Sunday Bishop Gene Robinson officiated at my home parish, St. James Episcopal Church in Keene, NH. It was the first time I had met the man, and he proved to be everything his supporters claimed, and more: warm, scholarly, humorous, articulate, spiritual...I am proud this man is my Bishop.

Afterwards, we had some time to chat with him. He had recently testified before the NH State Legislature concerning the issue of marriage...and, just as I had suggested in my own testimony several years ago, he asked for a seperation of the civil 'rights' from the ecclesaistical 'rites.' In other words, he asked the state to grant 'recognition' (and you can use any word you'd like for that) to any two people desiring state recognition, while the churches would issue their own blessings (or not) based on their own traditions and canons. The distinction between the civil and the ecclesiastical is precisely what I have been arguing for all along here.

We forget that two different processes are happening because they 'collapse' into one at most wedding ceremonies. The Bishop has proposed that churches within his diocese lead the way for making this clear: He has suggested that a Justice of the Peace perform the 'civil' ceremony at the back of the church for all couples (gay or straight), and then have the couple proceed to the altar area where the ecclesisastical rites are engaged.

Makes a heck of a lot of sense to me.

"Stimulus."

$13.00 tax cut per paycheck.

Spending bill cost, with interest: $17,000 per person.

YOU do the math.

Michael Phelps...what I wish he would have said...

So Michael Phelps was caught by some moron with a camera taking a hit of pot at a party, and felt it necessary to broadcast it to the world. Kellogg's acted in predictable knee-jerk, Neo-Puritan fashion and dumped him from their ads (3 Cheers for Subway, who's keeping him). And As equally expected, Phelps issued the expected apology, complete with phrases like , "regrettable,” “youthful,” "inappropriate,” and “it will never happen again."

Here's what i would have liked to have heard him say:

"Dear Muckraking Hypocrites in the Media,

Go to Hell. Yes, I smoked some pot, just like a majority of the generatiion currently writing about me did. Yes, I inhaled a substance that Presidents and Corporate Executives and Policemen and Politicians of all stripes before me have. Yes, I used a substance that is demonstrably less dangerous to anyone than liquor, which is legal in all 50 states and a multimillion dollar industry for both the private sector and the government that feeds off of its taxes.

I did not apply for the position of "role model," and did not ask to be under your microscope. I worked my ass off, and did what no other athlete before me has done, and you loved it and made it 'your own' because I was on 'your team,' even though your only contributon was to sit on your fat asses and watch the television.

Of course, you delight on creating drama, in elevating heroes to God-like stature, and then pulling them down in the excitement of scandal. It's a time-honored American tradition to provide fodder for the intellectually-challenged who thrive on gossip to titillate them while they down grease-soaked fries and make excuses for their mediocrity.

Yes, I smoked pot. Go find some other item of equal importance to fill the pages of your news magazines...like aliens abducting Oprah's secret twin or something..."

Yeah, I'd like to see someone take a swat at a public and a media that insists on crucifying its heroes, that loves the bloodlust of pulling down the great. Maybe, someday, someone will tell us to go to hell - and it will be overdue and well-deserved.

Obama's Stimulus: in the end, a disappointment that will make matters worse.

(Actual picture of a woman heating her home with a wheelbarrow of Deutschmarks. The German financial collapse that precipitated WW2)

When the new White House first let glimpses of the Stimulus Plan out to the media, I was cautiously optimistic: the cornerstone appeared to be tax cuts and spending on infrastructure. Tax cuts always help (if they are across the board and accompanied by spending cuts); investing in infrastructure is a tool that has long-term benefits and payoffs in terms of more efficient movement of goods and services throughout the economy.

My hopes have faded into nothing. Less than 5% of the bill is for highways and bridges

What has emerged is a free-spending "give-away" that will cause more harm than good. The $800-$900 billion spending pacakge will actually cost an additional 347 billion in interest alone according to the Congressional Budget Office.

The largest single chunk of these funds - $252 billion - is for "transfer payments" - $81 billion for Medicaid, $36 billion for expanded unemployment benefits, $20 billion for food stamps, and $83 billion for the earned income credit for people who don't pay income tax. While this may sound "good" because it helps poor people who are struggling, it is still a one-time dumping of money that is not going to create jobs, increase employment, or ramp up our GDP. Bush tried thsi twice with no effect.

You may argue that in this economy, helping those in need is a worthy end in itself: but at what cost? Obama claims that 95% of Americans will get a tax cut as a result of this Stimulus Package. But the reality is that we are not getting free money from the government: we will be getting money that the US Government is going to borrow, and then we will have to pay it back with interest. In other words, Uncle Sam is forcing us to take out a loan, and forcing us to repay it, whether we like it or not. It is not a give-away, although it will appear that way.

We are not in a Liquidity (credit) Crisis. We are in an Over-Indebtedness Crisis, which has resulted in a liquidity problems, and this will exacerbate the problem. How many times can you shore up a collapsing dock with duct tape and baling wire before the entire structure collapses?

When inflation hits - and it will - we will be in worse shape than ever. If losing 40% of your 401K is bad (which is what happened to many of us in the last year), think how bad it will be when those funds can't even cover the cost of a used car.

Spending vs. Saving: Washington's attempt to cure a Hangover with more Booze

The current economic recovery proposal before Congress is a mixed bag, and attempts to use Reagan's formula: marry Supply-Side tools (which appeals to Republicans) with Fiscal Policy Tools (appealing to Democrats) in order to forge a grand coalition to pass the legislation.

Fiscal Policy liberals have traditionally relied on spending borrowed government money like a drunken sailor. The idea is that if the government spends money on projects, it will employ people, putting money into their hands, and enabling them to purchase goods...which in turns increases factory orders, and increases employment. The problem with this, of course, is that when government borrows money, it borrows from HUGE institutions that have HUGE amounts of dollars to lend: Credit Suisse, Lloyds of London, China, the House of Saud, and other wealty entities. As American citizens pay the interest on these borrowed funds (now amounting to 20 to 25 cents per tax dollar paid), we transfer our wealth from the American citizens to these huge institutions.

Supply Siders have traditionally felt that the way to stimulate the economy is to help businesses directly, the notion being that these businesses can then afford to hire people, pay them, and kick-start the economy from the business side.

Thus, investing in infrastructure improvements appeals to both sides: Fiscal Dems love spending money on projects, and Supply Side Reps like making the transportation of goods and services less expensive for business. Hence, Obama's initiative in investing in Infrastructure.

Meanwhile, both sides are negotiating tax cuts, tax rebates, and money giveaways for consumers and small businesses.

Now...I am 100% in favor of tax cuts, too. But the problem here is that Washington is favoring tax cuts for all the wrong reasons.

Current thought is that if "the people" have more of their own money, they will spend it freely, thus stimulating the economy. But this is like attempting to cure a hangover by encouraging the drunk to drink more alcohol: yes, it may deaden the pain, but it doesnt cure the problem, and in fact, only makes it worse.

For years, "savings" has been a dirty word to Fiscal Keynesians. In fact, in economic jargon, they call savings "leakage," because it represents buying power that 'leaks' from the economy.

Let me suggest that one of the root causes of our current problems is the attitude that consumers must buy more, more, more and not save.

Consumers, with the encouragement of Washington politicians and the Federal Reserve, have purchased homes and cars on credit, with reckless disregard to their ability to repay. During the recent credit crunch, a spokesman for Detroit actually cried, "People can't get loans to finance cars!"

And just when did the ability to get a loan become an inalienable right?!

People have bought beyond their means, used credit unwisely, and bought into the 'buy-buy-buy' notion. The average American now spends more than they earn each year.

Yes, we are in a recession. Yes, it is deep, and will get deeper still. Yes, it's going to hurt. But it's not unprecedented: we have had 26 recessions in the last 150years. It is a naural downturn in the business cycle. Rather than insisting that Americans continue to drink at the well of non-stop consumption, it is time for us to bear the hangover and come out stronger.

It is time to begin saving again for our futures.
Time to increase pre-tax 401 K contribution limits.
Time to make Pre-Tax Medical Savings Accounts available to ALL Americans, not just the self-employed and government workers;
Time to value savings and individual nest-eggs over constantly spending and then asking the government for help when the funds run out.

"Bad Bank?" Bad Idea.

SCENARIO 1: I tell my son that if he washes the car, he can use it on the weekend. Will he be more or less likely to wash the car?

SCENARIO 2: I tell my son that he can NOT use the car unless he washes it first. He never washes it because he gets wrapped up in video games. So, I wash it for him, and then hand him the keys and tell him he can use it since it's clean. What lesson is learned there?

People respond to incentives, and people generally prefer to pass burdens on to others if they can get away with it. Why are these simple economic lessons so difficult for our thick-skulled politicians to understand?

On Wednesday, U.S. Treasury Secretary-designate Timothy Geithner suggested creating a so-called "bad bank" which would buy nonperforming loans. This bank would buy the worst loans that banks made, infusing cash into those banks (thus rewarding the financially wicked) and taking ownership of non- and under-performing real estate loans. Most estimates are certain that this will be a net cost to the taxpayers, with some estimates to the tune of $3 trillion to $4 trillion.

So, if I get this right, Banks made insane loans to non-credit-worthy people, lied about asssessed valuations, and engaged infraud; and then, sold them to other reckless banks in a grand game of hot potato. Speculators in the financial industry played the game, and many got caught with an awful lot of bad loans.

Geithner's proposed response? Let taxpayers absorb that loss, and give the banks a 'free ride.'

How is this different than Scenario 2 above?

This proposal permits banks and financial institutions to walk away from their own misdeeds, and pass the full burden on to innocent taxpayers. Instead, we should consider the OPPOSITE approach: Require banks to hold the loans that they make.

Suddenly, it will become very apparent who the prudent investors and lenders are, and who is out to play Roulette with taxpayer money. If Banks are forced to bear the burden - and enjoy the success - of their own practices, it will be a long time before we see a repeat of the current debacle.

San Francisco Wrong to Tax Roman Catholic Church

In San Francisco, Tax Assessor Phil Ting has decided that the Roman Catholic Church owes over 15 Million dollars in taxes because the Archdiocese was restructured and consolidated a number of properties seven months ago. Each of the properties was technically incorporated seperately, as would be expected when a Church operates schools, family centers, day cares, hospitals, monestaries, church buildings, etc. Since, claims Ting, this consolidation involved the transfer of "separate legal entities," a real estate transfer tax applies.
Nonsense.

There are those, of course, who are cheering: anyone who has an axe to grind with the Roman Catholic Church is applauding the fact that San Francisco is going to 'take the churches money:' many gay activists mad at the Church's support of Proposition 8, those who have left the RC Church because the Church did not bend their theology to their own ideas, those who dislike "organized" religion, those with an imaginary view of history and RC atrocities somewhere in the past, those burned by the clergy sex abuse scandals. But disliking an institution is not an appopriate basis for deciding to use the coercive force of government to confiscate its assets via taxation.

Ironically, this flies in the face of a recent court decison in the same state.

On January 5, the California Supreme Court ruled that breakaway Episcopal parishes do not have the right to keep church property if they secede from the national denomination; they held, quite strongly, that all the various properties of the Episcopal Church belong to the national Episcopal Church, not the local congregation.

This was an appropriate ruling, as the Episcopal Church - like the Methodist, Orthodox, and Roman Catholic Churches - is, in fact, "Episcopal" in government, meaning that the local congregation is really an administrative unit of the National Church. If a local congregation secedes, they can not take the church building or property with them. (This is the opposite of "baptist" and "Bible" Churches, which hold that the ultimate authority resides in local congregations.)

So here is the incredible - and disingenuous - contradiction:

On the one hand, the California Court has stated that all Church Property belongs to the Larger Church when that Church has an episcopal governing structure.

On the other hand, the City of San Francisco (or at least Assessor Ting) has stated that all of the units under the administration of an episcopal-governed Church are independent, so any 'consolidation' is a transfer of real estate from one entity to another, and, therefore, taxable.

These positions are mutually exclusive. It's one or the other, and the California Supreme Court has spoken.

As usual, Liberals are being inconsistent: they are cheering the decision in the Episcopal Church case, because it helps liberals within the Episcopal Church structure. But they are also cheering the San Francisco action, because it gets the 'big bad ctaholic church' (Isn't that the church that operates more hospitals, orphanages, and aid services than any other in the world? Oh, yeah...)

In other words, the sides being chosen in the battles are based on who people want to win, rather than what is good law.

The Episcopal Church case is correct, and good solid law with much precedent behind it. The San Francisco action is a raw abuse of government power.

Perhaps thats why non-profit organizations - such as churches - are not normally taxed in the first place: the power to tax is the power to destroy, and once government has 'authority,' it uses it UNEQUALLY to punish those it dislikes and favor those who are its friends.

There are those who support taxing the Roman Catholic Church because of its supposed 'political involvement' in conservative ballot issues. I wonder if these same persons would support revoking non-profit tax status for all of the churches that ran the civil rights marches in the 1960s....or revoking the tax status of HIV Service agencies who reguarly lobby for an increase in federal funding?

Best to keep the arms of government taxation far away, and not let them near non-profits of *any* kind.

"Big 3" Auto Bailout? How many mistakes can one Congress make?

A step back in History:

It's 1979, and Lee Iacocca, Chairman of Chrysler, has successfully convinced Congress to guarantee 1.5 billion in loans to the corporation, with taxpayer dollars, because this would help revive the all-American Corporation. There was even a specific plan - Chrysler's "K-Car" would catapult the company into profitability forever, and an american icon would be saved.

Wrong.

Today, the so-called "Big Three" - GM, Ford, and yes, Chrysler...are seeking billions more in assistance, using the same tired arguements and promsiing the same eventual victories if they could just get "a little help."

It is one of those cases where if you say things often enough, people believe it. "Big Three?" You can find this phrase repeated over and over in the media.

But here are October's auto sales figures:

GM: 168,719 units sold
Toyota: 152,278 units
Ford: 132,278 units
Chrysler: 94,530 units

Some Lessons:

1) They are NOT "the Big 3." Consumers have clearly spoken, and they've been saying "Toyota" for some time. Congressional action to prop up Ford is tantamount to using taxpayers dollars against the taxpayers themselves. We have already spoken: Toyota has given us what we wanted, at a price we want. Don't force us to bailout the companies we did NOT choose.

2) GM is the largest auto manufacturer world-wide. Since when does the Government seek to bail out the largest company in a competitive field? If GM can not make a profit when it has more car sales than any other company, it is time for them to radically change: split up, reorganize, bust the UAW - but dont seek tax dollars for "same old same old."

3) Ford, GM, and Chrysler ceded the small car market to Honda and Toyota. They lost, folks. That's what business is all about. In the 1500s, Spanish Monk-Economist De Albornoz wrote that "when businesses experience profit and loss, and since when they make a profit, they keep it, they must not transfer a loss to the people."

The Market has clearly chosen. Congress, the UAW, and the so-called "Big-3" don't like the results.

Too Bad. Live with it. Capitalism doesnt guarantee success, and neither should Congress.

Social Security - A Bad idea, getting worse....

If the Social Security System is such a good deal, why are thousands of federal and state government employees exempt from being involved in it? Why have they chosen federal and state pension systems, and private retirement options instead?

And until now, why haven’t the rest of America’s workers had that right? If we can cut through the political rhetoric, we might just be able to give our kids and grandkids better choices than we have had.

Social Security is a financial time bomb as a natural result of changing demographics. And the single biggest problem is how it is funded: current workers pay for current retirees. When today’s worker pays social security tax, it does not go into a ‘safe place’ to be held for his future retirement; rather, it is used to fund the checks of current retirees. As the Social Security system currently operates, that means that today’s workers will have to rely on their grandchildren’s taxes for retirement income.

When this system was devised more than seventy years ago, there were forty working people for each retiree. Today, as family size shrinks, that ratio is approaching only two young workers for every retiree. In the 1930s, the average life expectancy was only sixty-five; today, we have two generations of retirees living into the eighties and nineties. That means that as originally conceived, forty young people supported one senior for a relatively short period of time. It was seen as a caring social responsibility. But in today’s world, that means two young workers will need to support themselves, their family, and a retiree for almost twenty years. That’s not ‘caring’ or ‘socially responsible.’

In fact, it is the opposite: it is socially irresponsible because we are turning our grandchildren into indentured servants with a tax burden that can not be sustained.

In 1937, only 2% of an employee’s income went to fund social security; today, some have suggested that 17% will be necessary to fund the growing deficit. The greater tragedy is that the Federal Government has been borrowing money from the social security trust fund, with the promise of paying it back, with interest. But who will be paying that interest? Once again, the American worker, through his income tax. It is an incredible scheme: Americans actually pay interest on the very money they loaned the government in the first place! And that means that the cost to American workers is even higher than the published tax rates.

One of the most distressing trends in America right now is the growing wealth disparity between the wealthy and poor. The Federal Reserve has found that the difference in median net wealth between the richest and poorest jumped 20% between 1998 and 2001. The gap between whites and blacks has grown 21% . And the social security system plays a significant role in that widening gap. 52% of Americans invest privately, but the poorest, after paying for clothing, housing, food, and medical care, have little or nothing left to invest. Yet, they are forced to pay 12.4% of their income as a social security tax. This worker may pay this tax for 40 years, but if he dies without minor children or a spouse over 65, none of that money passes to his heirs. In essence, the current system robs the poor of their ability to get ahead. One in three African-American men will die without ever collecting a cent of social security, and with no inheritance to pass along, in spite of paying a compulsory retirement tax his entire life.

Private accounts are the answer to these inequities. A privatized account system would permit people to invest their own money, long-term, in their own accounts. Retirement would be something that people worked for and saved for during their own lifetime, not a tax on the next generation. In spite of what some fear-mongers have stated, no one is suggesting that people place all their retirement funds in a single gamble (the “Enron” scare tactic.) Rather, investments could be made in a highly-diverse, broad basket of stocks, bonds, and mutual funds that easily survive even should one company have trouble – precisely the plan that I, as a Commonwealth of Massachusetts employee, have the right to do.

Yes, the market has ups and downs. But no one planning to retire in 2009 begins by investing in 2008. Long-term investments in the market have always yielded significant results, and retirement is a long-term process.

Those who would seek to ‘save’ the current system always choose to accomplish that task through using the coercion of government: they would tell you when you may retire, what your benefits would be, how much you would pay in taxes, and how much you would receive and on what schedule when you retire. In other words, it presupposes that government can somehow decide what is best for you. In a nation like Chile, workers decide how much they will put aside, when they will retire, where and how their money is invested, and what payment schedule they would prefer upon retirement. If they should pre-decease their retirement, their account still belongs to their estate, and their family is not left at the mercy of government payments. Returns on Chilean workers’ money has averaged 13%, far more than Americans can ever hope to make back on their social security contributions.

No wonder government workers have permitted themselves to opt out of Social Security. Perhaps its time they gave that right to the rest of America as well.

The Republican Party - Which Way Now?

The Republican Party – my party – has just been delivered a well-earned knockout punch. Reliable “red” States in the west and south have been taken by Democrats. Here in New England, there is not a single Republican Congressman and only one Governor left. And in New Hampshire, once a Yankee Republican bastion, you can count on the fingers of one hand the number of state or federal Republican figures left.

Republicans did not lose simply because of large numbers of young people and African-Americans voted. In fact, as a percentage of the total electorate, African-Americans and young people made up almost precisely the same percentage of the electorate as they did four years ago. No, Republicans lost because average Americans from all walks of life, especially self-described moderates and independents, and even some lifelong Republicans, turned to the Democrats.

Where did the GOP go wrong? And what must we do to rebuild?

The party needs a clear philosophy and vision. An entire generation of new voters came to the polls believing that the Bush administration represented Republican ideals. Republicans spent eight years defending sickening deficits, exploding budgets, and “big-government” programs that they would have railed against had they been proposed by a Democratic Administration. We were inexcusably silent as America, the great hope of the world, became represented by images of torture and Guantanamo Bay. Republicans should have been outraged…but instead, we defended “our guy” in the white house, and earned the public’s disdain. They grew tired of the Bush administration’s vision of America.

We must articulate in clear terms positive, pro-active solutions for the problems and concerns that the American people have. Access to health care and secure retirement provisions are national concerns: We cannot simply be ‘against’ universal health care or social security, we must present clear, pragmatic, appealing alternatives.

As these proposals are formulated, we must be careful not to fall prey to the idea that we must choose to side with either the “moderates” or the “conservatives” within the Party. A lukewarm, “me-too” version of the Democrats is not a solution, but neither is cliché-ridden pandering to a shrill religious right. Rather, Republicans must forge a new path, a path that is consistent with both the Republican philosophy and the American spirit, and which resonates with voters of all stripes: we must combine fiscal responsibility and social tolerance. The Republican Party claims to be the party of small government and maximum personal freedom. It’s about time we reclaimed that heritage in a consistent manner.

As we present our alternatives, we must eradicate the mean-spiritedness, the innuendos, the mud-slinging, and the anger from our speech. We must offer vision, hope, and a future to all. If we want young people, minorities, and immigrants in the party, then we need to really want them, not just tolerate them and accept their contributions.

In 1980, Ronald Reagan articulated a clear vision, and spoke in positive terms of hope and freedom for all. Americans responded, as disaffected Democrats and independents swelled Republican ranks. In 2008, Barack Obama rode to victory on those Reaganesque concepts. It should serve as a wake-up call to the party to reclaim its heritage of individual liberty and prosperity for all, delivered with clarity and compassion.

Why the Bailout is wrong.

Listening to some of our nations top political leaders, one gets an uneasy feeling that The Great Depression II is right around the corner, unless we entrust the federal government to engage in a massive 700 billion bailout plan that will ultimately save ‘main street’ from Wall Street’s mess. But if that’s the case, why have over 200 leading economists from Harvard, MIT, Northwestern, the University of Chicago, and other respected institutions signed a petition opposing rapid passage of this bailout?

In basic English, the argument in favor of the bailout goes something like this: banks and other financial institutions have purchased mortgages which, for many different reasons, are now worth far less than their purchase price. As a result, banks have lost money buy purchasing them, and they can’t convince anyone else to buy them. If they can’t sell their ‘paper securities,’ they can’t raise cash. This, in turn, means they have no money to lend, and credit markets will be so tight that ‘Main Street’ will grind to a halt: businesses will not be able to borrow funds to meet payroll or expand their enterprises, and consumers will be unable to purchase homes and cars or pay their college tuition bills.

This line of reasoning scares many Americans (as its meant to), but is faulty for several reasons.

First of all is the cost. What is not being revealed to the American public is that over the last 5 months, the Federal Reserve Bank has already provided over 1.1 trillion dollars to financial institutions, in exchange for paper securities, in order to inject cash into the banking system. The 700 billion bailout is in addition to that which has already been injected – with an accompanying bill of over $17,000 per American household before this is over.

Second is the risk. I asked a spokesperson for the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston why Washington Mutual didn’t take advantage of the Federal Reserve’s Bank’s cash offer over the last few months. I was told that there were financial criteria that needed to be met in order to obtain that funding: in other words, the less credit-worthy, the less stable institutions were unable to partake. That means that the 700 billion Congress is about to authorize will be used specifically for those institutions whose paper is the most worthless, leaving the US Taxpayer with nothing in return for its “loan’ to these inept banks. Some commentators suggest that in reality, the taxpayer will make a profit on this paper, but if that was a realistic possibility, there wouldn’t need to be a government bailout: some enterprising institution would have purchased that paper already.

Third is the Moral Hazard created by helping the inept. No one is guaranteed success in a market economy. In the rough and tumble of competition, some win and some lose. If the most ineffective, negligent, inattentive and even fraudulent activities are rewarded by a bailout, what message does this send to the banks who were prudent in their decision–making over these years? The well-run banks ought to profit, and ought to be stronger and inept banks close; instead, we, the taxpayer will be helping the most irresponsible institutions stay afloat, and will pay interest for the ‘honor’ of so doing.

Fourth is the unfounded fear that credit will completely dry up. The fact is, banks do not lend their own money; they lend their depositors funds. Institutions may crash and burn, but their depositors funds are insured by the FDIC, and those depositors will simply place their funds elsewhere. Keep in mind that when Merrill Lynch was subsumed by Bank of America, there was no catastrophe: there was simply an efficient movement of resources. The Market worked without a taxpayer bailout. Similarly, when Washington Mutual ‘collapsed,” they opened the next day as part of JP Morgan. Not one depositor lost money, not one customer lost their line of credit – and not one dollar of taxpayer was required.

The Bailout is an unnecessary, expensive return to Feudal Britain, where the “Crown” owned title to all the land and used tax money to keep its favorite business partners afloat. This is precisely the time to allow the Marketplace to weed out poor investment firms and negligent banking facilities – and allow the rest of us to enjoy the prosperity that can be gained by resting secure in the knowledge that the best and brightest firms have been allowed to carry on financing activities

Christian singer Ray Boltz Comes Out....

Popular Christian Singer Comes Out by Kilian MelloyEDGE Contributor

Monday Sep 15, 2008

Gospel singer Ray Boltz has come out of the closet.The singer gave and interview to the Washington Blade, which posted an article on Boltz’s disclosure on Sept. 12. Boltz, the article said, has had a devoted following within the Christian community, having sold around four and a half million copies of his recordings over a two-decade career. The article said that Boltz, who came out to his family in 2004, began to emerge from the closet more publicly last Christmas." I’d kind of had two identities since I moved to Florida, where I kind of had this other life, and I’d never merged the two lives," Boltz said in the interview.

For a long time--33 years--Boltz lived as a married man, a husband and father; the cost, however, was depression, even a suicidal turn of mind, the article said.Said the singer of his gay identity, "I thought I hid it really well."Added Boltz, "I didn’t know people could see what I was going through, the darkness and the struggle."After I came out to my family, one of my daughters said she was afraid to walk in my bedroom because she was afraid she’d find... that I’d done something to myself."And I didn’t even know they’d picked it up."Finally, in 2004, Boltz told his family his secret. As it happened, he came out to them the same day as a catastrophic tsunami was in the news.Said Boltz, "I thought, ’Well, I can just do what I always do and hide the truth or I can take a risk and be honest.’"Added the singer, "That day, with the tsunami, has become very symbolic in our family."Boltz sketched out a life of struggle and secrecy, saying, "I’d denied it ever since I was a kid."I became a Christian, I thought that was the way to deal with this and I prayed hard and tried for 30-some years and then at the end, I was just going, ’I’m still gay. I know I am.’"And I just got to the place where I couldn’t take it anymore... when I was going through all this darkness, I thought, ’Just end this.’"Continued Boltz, "You get to be 50-some years old and you go, ’This isn’t changing,’" the Washington Blade article said."’I still feel the same way. I am the same way. I just can’t do it anymore.’"Though he never officially engaged in any "ex-gay" programs, Boltz reckoned, "I basically lived an ’ex-gay’ life--I read every book, I read all the scriptures they use, I did everything to try and change."The Blade article said that Boltz’s inner turmoil came through in his songwriting.Acknowledged Boltz, "It’s there on every single record."Continued the singer, "That struggle of accepting myself and my feelings. There’s a lot of pain there and it connected with a lot of people. "They weren’t struggling with the same thing necessarily but we all suffer with our humanity."Boltz’s professional career as a Christian singer was only helped by a 1997 appearance before a crowd of over a million men who had gathered for a Promise Keepers event, the Blade reported.As a Christian married man himself, Boltz said, his family life was based on genuine love."Sex was based on the fact that we loved each other and I wanted to make her happy," he told the Washington Blade. "I had sexual drives as well. You know, it’s like I never had to talk myself into having a relationship with her or that I was going, ’Oh God, here we’re going to bed again’--it wasn’t that. "I loved her and we had a very full life; it’s just that inside, deep inside, it really wasn’t who I was."And that had an impact: said Boltz, "[H]ow can you truly be intimate with someone when you don’t know who they are, when they won’t reveal themselves to you[?]"Added the singer, "I thought, ’If I can’t say this to the people I love, then what kind of life is this?’"After he came out to his family, Boltz and his wife separated; he went to Florida, and that’s where the latest chapter of the singer’s story picks up.Said Boltz, "I had a lot of questions, but at the bottom of everything was a feeling that I didn’t hate myself anymore, so in that sense I felt closer to God."Added the singer, "If you were to hold up the rule book and go, ’Here are all the rules Christians must live by,’ did I follow every one of those rules all that time? Not at all, you know, because I kind of rejected a lot of things, but I’ve grown some even since then."Continued Boltz, "I guess I felt that the church, that they had it wrong about how I felt with being gay all these years, so maybe they had it wrong about a lot of other things."Eventually, Bltz found himself performing once again for Christian audiences, bringing his personal and professional lives full circle.However, "I don’t want to be a spokesperson, I don’t want to be a poster boy for gay Christians, I don’t want to be in a little box on TV with three other people in little boxes screaming about what the Bible says, I don’t want to be some kind of teacher or theologian," Boltz said."I’m just an artist and I’m just going to sing about what I feel and write about what I feel and see where it goes."The article pointed out that Boltz is the most successful Christian musician to come out, leaving it an open question how the demographic that once embraced him would respond to any future recordings.Said Boltz to the Blade, "This is what it really comes down to: If this is the way God made me, then this is the way I’m going to live. "It’s not like God made me this way and he’ll send me to hell if I am who he created me to be."Added Boltz, "I really feel closer to God because I no longer hate myself."Kilian Melloy reviews media, conducts interviews, and writes commentary for EDGEBoston, where he also serves as Assistant Arts Editor.

Palin, Pregnancy, & Puritanical Sexism

So Sarah Palins 17 year old daughter is pregnant.

So what?

Maybe I've been blind all these years, but I have never seen such a shrill marriage of Puritanism and Sexism in the media like I have in the last few days.

There are some who question whether she can properly divide her time between her family's needs and her Veep duties. I wonder how many men running for VP or President would be questioned that way?

Worse. I think, is the hand-wringing and scandalous gossip and telling and retelling the story of the "unmarried and pregnant." And the meda are using words like "scandal," and "revelations."

Well, I got news for you folks.

First, human beings have sex, and reproduce. Thats why there's several billion of us on the planet.

Second, at the age of 17, hormones and plumbing work well. In every human, everywhere around the world.

Third, No-Sex-Befre-Marriage is a nice, puritanical ideal. I challenge every individual reading this to guess just how many people (a) wait until marriage before having sex and (b) have sex with one person, for life. Everything we know about humanity tells us that a very, very, very tiny percentage of people can claim that. Why do we require some mythical, super-human standard of perfection from others that we don't requre (or desire) in ourselves?

Furthermore, what family in America can claim NOT to have a relative who has been in this situation?

Give it up, folks...all this proves is that Sarah Palin is just like the rest of us.

There is an old bit of prose about how the Nazis came for the Jews, the Gypsies, gays, the handicapped, etc., and when they finally came for 'me,' there was no left to help me.

I have been vigilant in this blog about pointing out the eradication of free speech and civil liberties in this country. Earlier this year, 400 children were kidnapped by the government in Texas, and the 'outcry' was little more than ho-hum. After all, they were polygamists, so "it doesnt affect me."

Well, right now, in Minnesota, hours before the Republican convention, there is a wholesale trashing of the Constitution taking place. Will anyone care? Or does it not concern people because the victims are young, protesting, liberal college students?

The full, breaking, and constantly-updated story (with video) can be found at http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/

But the crux of the matter is this: 25-30 officers, in riot gears, stormed houses, forced residents to the floor, confiscated computers, and handcuffed and detained people for 'fire code violations,' all because they had planned to protest the Republican National Convention. Using an obscure, never-used law against conspiracy to start a riot, the government has found an effective law that basically preempts any protest or speech it doesnt want to hear.

Is this Beijing? Tiannamen Square? Does anyone remember the Chicago Police Riots of the 1969 Democratic Convention? The Kent State debacle? Have we learned nothing?

I call on McCain, as the Republican candidate, to forcefully condemn what is happening in Minnesota.

NOW, Today. And I call on my fellow citizens to stop yawning, since it isn't 'them' being carried away.

The Reasons for Rebellion: July 4, 1776

What follows is a partial list of the reasons set forth in the Declaration of Independence for our dissolution of the bands which connected us with Great Britain. They speak for themselves. Read them with Abu Ghraib, the Patriot Act, the Alphabet Soup Bureaucracies, anti-immigrant xenophobia, the suspension of habeus corpus, Guantanamo, Judicial litmus tests, Cuban embargoes, the WTO, the raid on ElDorado, IRS confiscatio of property, Kelo, the replacement of common law with stacks of rules, and military tribunals in mind.

Chilling Indeed.

"...He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people..."

Cyndi Lauper's "True Color Tour:" Great performances and clueless commentary

Yesterday I jumped in the car with my partner and drove down to Jones Beach Theater on the south shore of Long Island to see the True Color Tour. Headliner Cyndi Lauper was joined by the Indigo Girls, the B-52s, and Rosie O'Donnell (who was actually tender and poignant throughout, but then blew it as we exited the theater...more on that later). It was a great outdoor concert on the ocean with balmy summer breezes and fun performances. From a musical perspective, it rocked: Lauper jumping into the audience to sing, people dancing in the aisles as the B-52s wailed on Love Shack and Rock Lobster, and a lot of 'nostagia' as we sang along with the Indigo Girls.

The purpose of the Tour was to raise awarness of GLBT issues, and to encourage involvement in the political process to secure rights. From that perspective, the evening took on even more significance. Lauper should be congratulated for her heartfelt approach to the issue, which she did in a professional, non-partisan way that delivered a powerful message.

Unfortunately, not everyone was as professional as Lauper.

The Human Rights Campaign, a sponsor and strong presence on the Tour, states the following as its mission:

'The Human Rights Campaign is the United States' largest gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (GLBT) civil rights organization with more than 700,000 members and supporters nationwide. HRC works to secure equal rights for GLBT individuals and families at the federal and state levels by lobbying elected officials, mobilizing grassroots supporters, educating Americans, investing strategically to elect fair-minded officials and partnering with other GLBT organizations. "

Taken at face value, thats a noble mission statement. But to listen to the night unfold as emceed by Carson Kressley....well, they might as well admit to being an Anti-Republican Propaganda machine. And this is where HRC and the Pink Mafia just don't get it.

Kressley is annoying in his own right. The fashion guru on "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy," few men have so single-handedly reinforced the public's stereotype of gay men as flamboyant, arrogant, self-centered limp-wrists than Kressley. I admit I am no fan.

But fan or not, Kressley's 'jokes' in between each musical act were like nails on a blackboard. No fewer than four times did he make Republicans (or those who would dare to support them) the object of his ridicule. At one point, he was speaking of the diversity within the gay community, and mentioned various subgroups...and the punch line was that he mentioned the existance of "the Gay Republican." Yeah..singular....and he said it twice for emphasis. As he rolled along with his humor, he made it very clear that there was no room for Republicans in the Tour. Not once did he refer to Hillary, or Obama, or ridicule Democrats (who, he forgets, gave us "Dont Ask Dont Tell). He found a way to cheer California's court decision permitting gay marriage, (but conveniently forgot to mention it was a Republican court). At the end of the evening, as we were leaving the theater, Rosie O'Donnell belted out her final thought, as she shouted "Hey, DONT vote for John McCain!," a completely intrusive and unnecessary bit of partisanship.

The HRC just doesnt get it. Gay rights need to be won in millions of places: in town halls, in state legislatures, in county administrations...and there are lots of Republicans out there. You do not win your arguement by vilifying those you need to win over. The constant anti-Republican intimidation, along with a strange insistence on using the "F-word" for no apparent reason, and the needless jokes at the expense of straights (Kressey's reference to straight people as 'breeders' did *not* elicit the laughs he expected), do not help the cause, they hurt it, as they continue to isolate gays into a small 'corner' of the political spectrum.

Get this, HRC: There are Gay Republicans, Gay Independents, Gay Conservatives, and Gay Libertarians. We do not, and will not, march to your required drum. We do not all embrace every liberal cause under the ozone. And we *do* need to work with politicians and citizens of all persuasions if we are to win equal rights.

GREAT Concert. Cyndi, you're awesome!

POOR politics. Kressey, find someone else to represent. PLEEZE.

Shame on Dunkin' Donuts

I have been a Dunkin' Donuts junkie my whole life. Living across the street from one (on several occasions) helped develop and solidify my coffee addiction.

But this week's spinelessness has really made me second-guess patronizing them. In fact, I found myself driving right past THREE of them today, because I am so outraged at their lack of guts.

The above picture was an internet ad for Dunkin' Donuts, featuring Rachael Ray standing in front of cherry trees and the Oregon State Capitol Building. And oh my gosh, imagine this - she was actually wearing a Scarf!

Enter the Right-Wing Xenophobe wackos. Some bloggers (not to be edified by having their names repeated here) decided that this was an ad that glorified Palestinians, world wide jihad, and terrorism. The Oregon capital was questioned as an appropriate background (looks too much like a minaret, I guess). The Scarf was seen as Islamic (even though the pattern is Paisley, about as old-fashioned-American-Grandpa as you can get).

And Dunkin Donuts pulled the Ad.

Shame on them, and shame on the right-wing bloggers, for assuming terrorist symbolism. Perhaps some of these neanderthals need a lesson in Fashion.

Shame on them all for assuming that even if the actor was Arab, in Palestinian garb, that that is somehow an improper message. There are thousands of Americans of Arab or middle eastern descent, and they are just as much american as someone of German or African or Korean or English descent, and their traditonal garb *adds to* the smorgasboard that is America.

Shame on Dunking Donuts for caving in to racist, xenophobic hate-mongers.

I hope you can depend on these morons to buy your coffee.....because I will not.

The Tyrant State runs Amock....

It just keeps getting worse.

Over 400 children, ripped away from their mothers and fathers and homes, and placed in foster homes.

No Charges filed against any of the parents.

No accusations of any of these particular children being abused.

No trial, no guilty verdict.

Nothing.

Just 400 children ripped from their homes because these people "aren't like us."

And the media spin begins. One imbecile on TV stated that the children were 'rescued' from the compound. Really? Rescued from what? What cedible accusation has been filed against any of their parents? What evidence of abuse has been put forth on any of these children.

Like the rounding up of American Indian children a century ago, we are witnessing another tragedy, and no one seems to care. And I don't understand why.

Raid on El Dorado & Government abuse of power: State-sponsored Kidnapping & Fishing Expeditions

400 children have been forcibly removed from their homes in ElDorado, Texas. Members of a Mormon-breakaway religious sect called the Fundamentalist Church of Latter Day Saints, they lived in a compound isolated from much of the outside world.

They're polygamists. Men have many wives. They exile young men to keep the competition down. They live an extremely closed lifestyle. Their days are filled with Bible-reading and quoting. Their women are subservient and wear plain clothes. Their beliefs are weird.

So?

You don't have to like their beliefs about God, marriage, gender, or mainstream America. If you want to think they're nuts, fine. But under the U S Constitution, people have the right to be nuts, unmolested by government. They have the right to say things that are screwy, worship false Gods, and associate only with their own kind. All three of those rights are enshrined in the Bill Of Rights.

"But wait!"," you say, "There was sexual abuse going on!"

Really? All 400 women, boys, and children removed were abused?

It seems to me that the media has reported officials saying, "we have to find out if anyone was abused." In fact, there was *one* report, by a 16 year old woman who accused a man who has admittedly not been in ElDorado for a year. And the woman who made the report is mysteriously missing..and evidence now suggests it was a hoax call.

Does a single charge by one person mean an entire community can be raided, "just in case?"

Generally, as a society, we dont like fundamentalist polygamists. But lets' pretend instead that rather than a call from a Mormon camp, a girl placed a phone call to NY authorities claiming abuse. And lets say that that girl lived in one of the Hasidic Jewish summer compunds surrounding Ellenville NY. Let's even say that an ex-Hasidim claims that they saw a man spank his child. All in a fenced compound, where men wear black clothing and unshorn beards, where kosher law is kept, and women wear uniform housecoats)

Can you imagine the outrage if NY authorities decided that they should round up hundreds of Hasidic Jewish children, "just to see if they were all right?"

Or let's say that a report comes in from Pennsylvania Dutch Country, that a man abused a teenaged girl. What would the reaction be if PA authorities rounded up all the members of the local Amish community, "just to see if they were all right?"

Or suppose, after multiple complaints against the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston for sexual abuse, Massachusetts authorities had descended on the Catholic Churches in Boston and left with all of the children "just to see if they were all right."

It is *possible* that the authorities in Texas acted with much more evidence than they are making public. But so far, the stated facts are thay they have no victims, no charges but a single one against a man who is not there, and they have used this as an excuse to rip almost 400 children away from their homes.

The Director of Texas' child protective agency proudly stated, "Since Thursday, authorities have been searching the 1,700-acre compound 40 miles south of San Angelo from house to house ... and we're getting close to being finished."

House to house? Government searching house to house, and stealing away any chidlren they find there? Just WHO is a greater abuser than the government itself in this case?! How horrifying and Nazi-like for people to be in fear of the government searching every house to take their children!

The most valid evidence they have are the existence of fifteen year old mothers. So why are mothers much older than that being taken from the compound? And why is that the majority of 15-year old mothers in America, who do NOT live in this compund but live among us, are not 'rounded up," along with their children and families?

Which is worse, living in a closed society, or being ripped apart from the safety of home by Government?

Yes, they may be wackos. They have the right to be wackos. And governent has no right to force them into comformity unless they are committing crimes. And so far, this seems more like a fishing expedition that a judicious use of government authority.

New Powers for The Federal Reserve?

The Federal Reserve System is arguably one of the most powerful (and least understood) institutions in America. Treasury Secretary Paulson's recent suggestions that "The Fed" should be granted even more power is a dangerous step.

And what's even more scary is that so many editorial writers are saying that Paulson's plan does not go far enough...so the 'debate' so far has centered on whether we give the Fed "New Power," or "Lots of New Power."

I would suggest we give it NO new powers at all, and reign in some of the power it currently wields over our lives.

By way of background: There are many tools available to an administration to jump-start or safeguard an economy. Over the years, the federal government has tried direct government spending (FDR's Civilian Conservation Corps), borrowing (every adminstration since then), giving tax rebates and cuts to consumers, deregulating business, cutting business taxes, increasing direct aid to low-income people (Bush's extension of unemployment benefits, Social Security) and building transportation infrastructure. Some presidents have attmpted policies that were dismal failures (Nixon's gas rationing in the 1970s). And of course, it is certainly arguable that Government should *not* attempt to regulate the economy at all, but should get out of the way and stop messing it up natural markets.

What all of the above approaches have in common is that they are *highly* political. They require the chaos of Congressional, Presidential, and Bureaucratic action to happen. They involve log-rolling, and compromise, and committees and all sorts of political machinations. And if you're looking for results, that's not a very effective way to run an economy.

The Federal Reserve System was designed to function quite differently.

The philosophy behind the Fed is to masage the economy through a professional banking system. The Feds, rather than responding to voters, have historically responded to numbers, and made objective decisions. This is the body that sets the Discount Rate (the interest rate at which they lend money to member banks, thus influencing general interest rates). They determine the ratio of deposits that banks must keep on hand in case of a 'run' on the bank. And in New York, the Fed buys and sells government bonds in order to inject cash into the economy or withdraw it to slow down easy credit. By all accounts, The Fed is a conservative, staid, professional group of bankers that responds to bottom lines, not the whims of voters who want goodies for their district or the passion of politicians seeking reelection.

In fact, the Fed is very, very insulated from politics. Their 7 member Board of Governors is appointed by the President with the consent of the Senate, but they each serve 14 year terms. One is up for reappointment every 2 years, which effectvely means that even a two-term president can not realistically change the makeup of the majority of Governors. Even if he could, it wouldnt matter that much, because the Regulatory functions of the Fed reside in something called the "Open Market Committeee," which consists of the 7 Governors plus 5 regional, private Fed Bank presidents (there are 12 District Fed banks. Each is a private bank, with its own Board of Directors). By design, there is NO Federal Reserve Bank in Washington, DC. All in all, it is a very decentralized system, independent from most government oversight, which operates within the banking community. Unless there is a crisis, they only meet once every 6 weeks (which they did during the Great Depression, and right after 9/11)

Under Ben Bernanke, the Fed has taken some 'wild' steps. In one case, it called two meetings only 3 days apart from each other. It has dropped the discount rate precipitously. It has stepped in to private markets to arrrange a takeover of Bear Stearns by Citicorp at a price of $2/share, destroying shareholders values (and their pensions). Fortunately, that deal that is unravelling now that Morgan Stanley has offered $10 a share. Bear Stearns is a private investment house, not a bank, and the Fed had no direct authority in the matter. .

And now, Secretary Paulson has made some 'minor' suggestions to give the Fed more such authority. His proposal would give sweeping new authority to Fed to collect data and regulate private investment houses in prder to 'stabilize markets.'

But the Fed was designed to stabilize the value of *currency* by regualting member banks. It was never meant to make decisions about business practices of non-banks, or regulate private stock transactions or financing instruments.

And that's a big, big change, and a problem for a country that calls itself a democracy.

The Fed has always walked a fine line: It's greatest strength is that it is non-political, so it can be an effective and efficient institution in protecting the economy. But its greatest weakness is that it is undemocratic, and unresponsive to the voters. It exists on its own, high above the fray. Therefore, it was given very limited authority. Paulson's plans destroy that balance.

First, it takes an institution which is the nations *only* non-political approach to the economy and drops it squarely in the middle of the political arena by giving it regulatory authority over private businesses outside of its own banking system. The political pressure on the Fed to 'save' certain companies 'assets' at the expense of others will be enormous.

Second, it gives increased regulatory authority over private transactions to an institution that is essentially unanswerable to the political process. In other words, we are creating a new branch of government, with power and authority, that is not answerable to voters, or to congress, or to any democratic process whatsoever; the Fed would become Power without any check or balance, Authority without any accountability to the citizens.

If Investment houses need to be regulated, an agency (The Securities and Exchange Commisson) is already in place. If Predatory lenders need to be more tightly regulated, all 50 state legslatures have the authority to do that, and Fraud statutes exist that can be used or strengthened through the legislative process. If poor business decisions cause a business to go under, taxpayers should not be forced to prop it up (Why is it that failing businesses always want taxpayer money to help them when they fail, but they never feel that their profit should be distributed to taxpayers when theymake a profit? Hmmm........)

Paulson's plan is not a 'small step.' This is the continuing eviscerating of the Republic's Constitution.



But then, we should have come to expect that from this administration.

NY Governor Eliot Spitzer and a Prostitution ring....

I have never liked Eliot Spitzer. The Governor of New York was too much of a crusader, the kind who dribbles saliva from the mouth as he's torturing Evil Opponents. And for Spitzer, going after anyone who traded Securities or had a large bank account was his passion. He was dubbed "Mr. Clean" for being the Knight in Shining Armor. But no one knew the Knight was riding around bareback with the courtesans of the land.

His is, ironically, a common story.

- Governor Spitzer, "Mr. Clean," found paying a prostitute over $4,000 for a four hour session.

- Ted Haggard, president of the National Association of Evangelicals and anti-homosexual crusader, found paying for gay sex for over three years.

- Paul Crouch, founder of the world's largest Christian broadcasting outlet, the Trinity Broadcasting Network which also espouses a Gay-is-Evil message, currently locked in a tiff with the Reality Show "Lie Detector," as a former employee, Enoch Ford, submitted to a polygraph regarding a supposed gay sexual relationship witn Crouch...and revealing a $425,000 payment made to him after he was fired from the Network.

- Roger Clemmons, baseball hero, dogged and hounded by congressmen determined to know if he used steroids of HGH during his spectacular career.

- Cicero (Chicago area) Police Commander Wesley Scott, a 21-year veteran of the force who sent up many a young man for illegal drug possession, is himself charged with burning a marijuana joint (and a whole bag of the weed) after being stopped by another officer. (The department was kind enough to let him take four personal days before adminstering a drug test, to give him time to clean out his system. The Blue Code lives...)

There are *so many* issues to look at here:

1) WHY are we so obsessed with creating heroes that are unrealistic? "Heroes" are NOT perfect. They are human and fallible. Give me a movie hero who is uncertain, imperfect, and flawed, and you've got a real hero. Give me some self-righteous, pontificating know-it-all, and I want to throw up. Dubbing Spitzer, "Mr. Clean" was an impossible standard to throw at him.

2) WHY are those who are so damned strident in their crusades so often hiding the very vices they appear to want to eradicate? Do they believe that if they ruthlessely pursue all the 'other' bad guys, that they will not have to admit to themselves that, they, too, engage in the same activities?

Find me a man who is strident in his hatred of gays, and who knows every Bible verse condemning them, and is obsessed with preaching it, and I will show you a drowning man who is desperate to avoid the truth of his own orientation.

3) WHY do we revel in disaster? Why do we *love* it when the media build someone up to a point of being worshipped, and then enjoy the gossip, innuendo and tales that accompany their eventual destruction?

Thiry years ago, folk singer Phil Ochs wrote these words in his song, "Crucifixion:"

"And you say you can't believe it,
It's a sacriligious shame,
Now who would want to hurt
such a hero of the game?
But you know, I predicted it,
I knew he had to fall.
How did it Happen?
I hope is suffering was small.
Tell me every detail,
'Cuz I've got to know it all,
And do you have a picture of the pain?"

4) But most of all, maybe we should be looking *not* at the hypocrisy of these guys, or the Build-them-up, Tear-Them-Down sport of the media....but at our own expectations and requirements.

This country has been affected by a knee-jerk Puritanical streak since our inception. We put people in stocks and made them wear scarlet "A's," not because they hurt anyone, but because we didnt like their personal choices and to expose them to public ridicule.

Spitzer didn't steal anyone's money or property. He didnt assault, maim, or hurt anyone. Outside of his family relationships (which is his own private matter), who has been hurt by his dalliance with a prostitute?

No One.

Should Spitzer resign? No.
Should Clemmons lose his place in history? No.
Should Officer Scott go to jail for smoking pot? No.

Instead of pointing at their hypocrisy, maybe we should point at our own: We are a nation where a majority of a generation has smoked pot, and yet we put people behind bars for smoking pot. We are a nation where the majority has had multiple sexual partners, yet we consider it a 'disgrace' when it is brought to light.

Time to cast off our Puritanical ball and chain. Legalize recreational drug use, legalize prostitution, legalize all activities that hurt no one.

And then decide that its none of our business anyway who someone sleeps with or what drugs they take, and move on to more serious issues.

Re-thinking jails, prisons, and crime....

News Items:

"...More than one in every 100 American adults are in jail or prison, according to a recent study by the Pew Center for the States, which also found that about half of released inmates return to jail or prison within three years..."

"...The U.S. prison population, the world's largest, has grown nearly eightfold over the past 35 years and now costs taxpayers at least $60 billion a year..."

"A stunning one in nine black males between the ages of 20-34 is behind bars... Prison culture has become a norm in some urban neighborhoods, with more than 600,000 people a year returning home from prison and jails. They come back poorly educated, lacking job skills, and socially and legally disabled by felony records. One in 14 African-American children has a parent who is incarcerated..."

What should we conclude from these news reports? That Americans are law-breakers? That society has fallen apart and everyone is a thief and a murderer? We've gone to hell in a handbasket? How is it that there are more people living behind bars in America than in bigger authoritarian regimes like China?

Perhaps it has less to do with the activities of our citizens than with a societal inclination to 'throw away the key.' In other words, its not "them," it's "we" who are the problem.

From the earliest colonial days, we have had a penchant for making an example of others and punishing them for life choices. From sitting in the stocks for playing games on Sunday to wearing a scarlet letter for committing adultery, there has always been an undercurrent in American society (often based in religous belief) that

(1) 'Punishment' is the appropriate response to "bad actions;" and
(2) Morally "bad" choices are bad actions that must should be punished.

The circus surrounding the steroids-in-sports hearings is a prime example. There are no 'victims' if any of these guys used steroids, but many feel that such a 'moral outrage' must be investigated, dissected, and broadcast, and the users 'brought to justice.'

In the last decade, 6.5 million Americans have been arrested on marijuana charges alone. In 2006, 738,915 Americans alone were arrested for simple marajuana possession (constituting 81% of drug arrests), not some major hard-core mob operation. Even the Justice Department has determined that people sentenced for drug crimes accounted for 21% of state prisoners and 55% of all federal prisoners.

As states grapple with ever-expanding prison needs (and budgets), surely it is time to look at WHO is being incarcerated, WHY they are being incarcerated, and the RESULTS of that incarceration.

Have we created a situation where the costs of imprisonment outweigh the benefits?

And even worse, are the dangers to individuals an society from rampant imprisonment worse than the dangers from the "crime" committed?!

The criminal justice system is broken NOT because its 'too easy,' on criminals, but because

(1) It doesnt compensate real victims;
(2) it destroys the life of the defendent and his/her family;
(3) it jails those who have not hurt anyone simply because we want to impose morality on them (drugs, prostitution);
(4) it teaches amateur thieves how to be professional criminals,
(5) It burdens taxpayers with an enormous tax bill for prison construction and operation
(6) it has created a vested interest group (prison workers, and private and government-run prisons with vested interests in maintaining and expanding the system);
(6) It dumps men and women out on the street after their jail terms with NO skills, NO money, and a criminal record, virtually guarenteeing their inability to re-integrate into society.

A better system?

(1) No victimless crimes. It is time to end imprisonment for drug use and related crimes. A New Hampshire House subcommittee just voted 13-1 to recommend decriminalizing marajuana. If it passes, New Hampshire would become the 13th state in a growing movement to take this step. Interestingly, Rep. John Tholl (R-Whitefield), the police chief of Dalton, chaired the subcommittee and voted in favor.

(2) Where there is a clear victim, resurrect the old notion of BondService where appropriate (OK, "community Service" and "Working off your crime" sounds better. But its the same thing). The BondService "company" (this could be a private or a public entity) would pay the victim restitution up front; in return, it would assume 'ownership' of the criminals labor, and assume responsibility for his/her living conditions (a 'company' apartment, for which rent is charged, or house arrest are both options). This avoids taxpayer housing and prison construction expense. The 'company" would then train the convict in a skill, put him to work, and in the end release him with a skill and start up money. Since the victim is automatically compenstated in such a system, it may reduce the number of civil suits attempting to collect the same, this reducing backlogs in courts.

Sound pollyana?

Not if you've seen the Maine State Prison System's furniture outlet store in Thomaston, where inmates are trained in woodworking and other craftwork and earn money towards their keep while establishing a savings account for their own use upon release.

Not if यू've seen Norways system, which routinely combines home arrest and work-release training programs.

In other words, elements of this system are already in place and working. But we continue to lock up people that we think are 'bad'...and forget about them and the consequences.

Every prisoner is someone's son or daughter. And often someone's mom or dad. They are people, not refuse. The goal should be to safeguard society - and no one is 'safeguarded' by locking up a young man's father for 10 years for an offense that hurt no one. The 'remedy' now creates more probems than the crime, as we create a fatherless generation of children and an embittered generation of middle-aged 'criminals.'


__________________

The Hallmark/Westland Meat recall: Blind Hysteria

To date, 37,000,000 lbs of meat, sold in 36 states, over the course of 2 years, has been recalled।
That's a lot of meat. Meat used in school lunch programs, meat sold in supermarkets. The largest recall in US food history. And I have just one question:

Why?

Of the millions of pounds in circulation (most of which has already been consumed), not one person reported getting sick.

Not one of the thousands of cows that entered the slaughterhouse was ever diagnosed with an illness that is transmissable to human beings through consumption.

So why the hysteria and recall?

Nasty videotapes. Videos that upset us, because cows were shown to be lame, or being dragged or pushed with forklifts. For anyone with a heart for animals, the tape was upsetting.

But that doesnt mean that the public is at danger.

Every serious economist knows that Perfection is not an option in any endeavor. In huge corn silos, an occasional mouse will turn up and ground up along with the corn. In fields of broccoli, an occasional worm might get ground up with the veggies before being thrown into the frozen food aisle. That is the reality of life; and while it might make us squeamish, it is not a legitimate reason for society to incur enormous costs in an effort to 'make the icky go away.'

Even if the video showed 100 lame cows, that is a drop in the bucket compared to the volume of meat processed at that plant over the years. Even if the cows were diseased (as opposed to lame), there is no evidence that they carried diseases that could be contracted by humans. And two years after the incident, no one has reported any outbreak of illness attributable to this plant or lot of meat.

Slaughterhouses are not pleasant places. They smell awful, and are pits of blood and hair and warm organ smells...and generally pretty sickening places to the uninitiated. But our revulsion at them should not be the basis of sound decision-making.

The costs of this recall are astronomical, and widespread: the meat company is not the only one incurring those costs. Retail outlets and wholesalers must scour their product and pull them from the shelves. Schools must do the same. And as the stock of meat decreases, you an expect all consumers to end up paying more for meat becasue of the constricted supply.

And the benefit of all this?

Well, you can't say that the benefit of the action is to prevent human sickness...since there wasn't any human sickness, or even a likelihood of it, to begin with.

The only benefit is that we get to assuage our consciences at brutal slaughterhouse practices. We get to 'make the icky go away..'

Politicians will beat their breasts and call for stronger government regulation and inspections, and we will once again hand over power to the federal government to Make Things Right.

And once again, we will value Style and Symbol over substance.

On Kosovo Independence Day - Happy Birthday, Kosova!

My first 'contact' with Kosova (the Albanian spelling) came in the form of its people. As a teacher, I had a very diligent, hard-working, polite young man in my class who was a recent immigrant to the United States. He was struggling through the language barrier to work full-time and get a college degree while supporting his sister and parents. I learned that they had fled from Kosova into Macedonia as refugees. And I listened to his stories of the horrors of ethnic cleansing that forced his family to flee.

It is indeed an unexpected nexus of forces: the United States and Europe, both societies with Christian roots, have been protecting a small enclave of Muslim Kosovars against the political claims of Christian (Orthodox) Serbians, during a time when Muslims are often seen as the enemies of western civilization.

I have been interested in the region for several reasons. First, as a teacher, I was invited to teach summer courses at the University of Pristina in the capital city. Secondly, as an Orthodox Christian, my 'church circle' consisted of Balkan peoples: Serbs, Greeks, Romanians, and Russians, many of whom passionately criticized NATO, the EU, and the US for being involved in helping the ethnic Albanians (and Muslims) of Kosova. I spent a lot of time on the internet, on chat boards, and in actual conversations trying to sort through the hate and passion that would flare every time mention of an independent Kosova would be mentioned.

One of the 'constants' in these conversations was the reflexive attempt by Serbs and Serb-sympathizers (who want continued Serb domination over the region) to go back to medieval history, and wax eloquent about the Ottoman Empire, the birthplace of Serbian nationalism in the Kosovo region, the fall of the Byzantine empire...and any other historical facts that could be mustered from 700 years ago to cement a claim to the land.

Internationally, only Putin's authoritarian (and Orthodox) Russia supports this approach. It is laughable on its face: In what other international conflict would anyone seriously consider the events of the medieval era? Should Britain have a claim to Normandy? Should Switzerland be divided and given over to a Neo-Swabian empire? Should the Vikings re-assert claims for the Scottish Isles and coastal Ireland? Should the Teutonic Knights be given title to Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania? The notion of asserting political claims by resorting to medieval land claims is preposterous anywhere in Europe...and yet, for many Serbophiles, memories last verrrrry long. The reality is that in present history, the Serbs dominated other ethnic groups in the now-defunct nation of Yugoslavia. With a penchant for fascist authoritarianism, Serbian leaders have carried out atrocity after atrocity against non-Serbs, especially Bosnian and Albanian Muslims. One million ethnic-Albanians have fled for their lives...and 11,000 were murdered and dumped into mass graves which dot the countryside. Over three dozen such graves have been located.

No wonder Democrat Bill Clinton and Republican George W. Bush have both sided with the NATO forces in support of the Kosovars. The Serbian fascists were no less brutal in their extermination of Kosovars than was Saddam Hussein in his attacks on the Kurds. And its scary to note that the extreme nationalistic Serbs *still* receive up to 40% of the vote in Serbian elections...and they continue to hide war criminals and defend the actions of Serb paramilitary death squads.

The Orthodox Churches, which have been vocal in the United States in opposing military action, are oddly silent on the militarism of their Serbian branch. The most extreme reaction came from the head of the Serb Orthodox Church in Kosovo, Bishop Artemije, who denounced the Serbian armed forces for doing nothing."Serbia should buy state of the art weapons from Russia and other countries and call on Russia to send volunteers and establish a military presence in Serbia," he said.

(It should be noted that Serbian Orthodox monks have stood out as lights of conscience as they have helped hids and protect Muslim Albanians during this time).

As I discussed these recent historical events online, I obviously upset some Serbs. They emailed me pictures of severed heads to show me who I was fooling around with.

But I am not intimidated that easily.

It is widely expected that Kosova will declare independence in less than 24 hours. Good for them....whenever freedom wins, it is a win for all of humanity. Happy Birthday, Kosova!

How Ron Paul blew it in New Hampshire

I will vote for Ron Paul on Primary day here in New Hampshire. I have been a Ron Paul fan for a very long time. But he and his supporters have snatched defeat out of what could have been a stunning showing, and its a shame.

The Republican Party has lost its principles and its soul. The GOP used to be the party of low taxes, fiscal responsibility, states rights, and a small-is-better philosophy when it came to the federal government. The Bush Empire has turned all that on its head, running up fantastic deficits, enacting Steel Tariffs, imposing No Child Left Behind on the states, and strengthening the power of the federal government to unprecedented levels through the Patriot Act and related provisions. Surely, somewhere, some Republican must be willing to stand up and declare that the Good Guys have actually morphed into the Evil Empire. For his entire career, Ron Paul has stood squarely in the true liberty-loving tradition of the Republican Party. And for that reason, I will cast my vote for Ron Paul in the Primary.

He has raised mind-blowing amounts of cash on the internet, drawing on the passion of the younger generation that tends to live on the net. But his numbers are not catching on much past the 10% mark in polls, even here in libertarian New Hampshire. Why is that?

Its not because of a media blackout. It's not because of a conspiracy against him.

It's because with all the issues he could have chosen to seize on, he chose the wrong ones: Immigration and The Federal Reserve System.

Someone needs to inform the political operatives that no one here in New Hampshire cares much about immigration. It's a virtual non-issue. New Hampshire is about as far from Mexico as you can get and still be on American soil. The immigrants who do arrive are by and large French-Canadian, and have been part of the New Hampshire social fabric for several hundred years. Further, all of the Republican candidiates are tripping over themselves trying to be the most mean-spirited, anti-immigration candidate...and no one here cares. Worse, Ron Paul is unable to differentiate himself from the pack on this issue. And even more troublesome, is that his position represents a retreat from the libertarian notion of greater freedom and less government.

Worse still is the near obsession that Dr.Paul and his followers have surrounding the Gold Standard and the Federal Reserve System. Dr. Paul has called for the abolition of the federal Reserve and a return to the gold standard. The more I hear him talk about this issue, the more convinced I become that he truly does not understand what he is talking about:

Dr. Paul has staked out this position because of the deblitating effect that inflation has on household savings. And he is correct: inflation destroys savings and value. What he doesnt seem to understand is that the United States has not seen high inflation in generations, and that is due largely to the effectiveness of the Federal Reserve Bank.

Every industrialized nation in the world has a "Central Bank." Most third world countries do NOT. Nations with these central banks experience low inflation (rarely double digits). In fact, the US inflation rate has been a mere 2% to 5% over the last few decades. (The seventies were an exception). Meanwhile, third-world nations without a central bank regularly experience inflation of 30%, 80%, 100%, or more.

The Role of the Federal Reserve System is to control inflation. They have done it, admirably. Authority for the System lies in the Constitution's clause giving the Federal Government the right to coin money.

The falling value of the US Dollar (which Dr. Paul has lamented) has been GOOD for New Hampshire: it means that the Chinese, and the Europeans, and next-door Canadians can now afford to purchase US goods, helping the manufacturing, retail, and tourism sectors upon which the New Hampshire economy is based. Ron Paul's lament about the falling value of the US Dollar carries little weight here: Retailers saw more Canadians crossing the border to buy US goods than ever before, *because* of the falling US Dollar.

And no one gives a crap about the Federal Reserve except college-aged idealists. Yup, that's right. Here in New Hampshire, people are concerned with fuel oil prices, health insurance, social security and pensions, jobs, and taxes.

Ron Paul could speak powerfully to Granite Staters about issues that are important to them. Instead, he has been sidetracked by non-issues.

And as a result, pragmatic New Hampshire voters will select John McCain (who is *not* seeking to be THE anti-immigration candidate), and who's frank talk about REAL issues resonates well with this state.

Once Again...Steroids and Baseball in the News. (When will the Neo-Puritans give it a rest/)

According to the New York Times, “…Former Sen. Mitchell's 300-plus page document on performance-enhancing drugs in baseball, 21 months in the making, claims that nearly 90 players -- most notably Roger Clemens, Andy Pettitte, Barry Bonds, Gary Sheffield and Miguel Tejada -- are guilty of using some form of PEDs.” [Perfomance Enhancing Drugs]

Yeah...so?

When Mark Magwire was hounded by the press for using Androstendione ( a substance that was legal and sold over the counter in Golds Gyms, GNCs, and Drug Stores across America), it was easy to point the finger an “One Bad Guy.” When Barry Bonds was fingered as a steroid user, the writers at Sports Illustrated (sports nuts who cant play, but who delight in the catty process of creating legends and then destroying them) frothed at the mouth, issue after issue, because they could crucify One Bad Guy.

But, now it appears that steroids have appeared in major league baseball across the spectrum of teams. Surprise, surprise.....

TWO YEARS AGO I wrote about the prevalence of steroids in sports, and also proposed that it really is Not a crisis in need of ‘fixing.’ I know I went against the flow by writing that. But I maintain my stand, and repeat what I wrote then:

“…Sitting on my shelf is a bottle of ProLab ThermaPro, a thermogenic designed to raise metabolism and help burn fat. I used this (same basic ingredients as the old Hydroxycut and Xenadrine) several summers ago, while running in the hot Dakota sun every morning while trying to lose weight and tone up (mission: successful!). Ah, but this product contains ephedrine!!! [crowd gasps in horror in the background.] When I used it in 2002, I was using a sports supplement. When the FDA banned it last year (in 2004), I became the possessor of an illegal substance. When the Court overturned the FDA ban, I was an upstanding citizen again. Then the FDA declared that my 20 mg ephedrine was greater than the amount in the court case, and was illegal, and presto-chango, I’m a criminal again.

And this has been the history of steroids and sports supplements. The non-steroidal Androstendione which was available in every health and vitamin store a few years ago, all of a sudden disappeared because the FDA arbitrarily decided that since it was only “one step away” from a steroid, it is now illegal. However, DHEA, which is two steps away from a steroid, is still OK (for now…stock up while supplies last….)The steroids that Jose Canseco mentions being used in MLB were by and large completely legal in 1980. Many of them are still legal in much of the world, including industrialized nations such as Germany and Holland. Some (Fina) can be made of 100% legal substances in your kitchen. Others are legal as veterinary substances.

The history of Sports is the history of going the extra mile and being slightly better than anyone and everyone else. Athletes give up much of their personal lives and incur a great personal cost in training. They regulate what they eat. They take vitamin supplements such as Calcium. They take Glutamine to prevent muscle breakdown. They take Milk Thistle and ALA to keep their livers healthy. They take Glucosomine to help repair their stressed joints, and if they’re in trouble, they get shots from their doctors. Some take “stacks” to raise metabolism and speed weight-loss (like my illegal aspirin-caffeine-ephedrine stack). They use Creatine as a muscle volumizer and NO2 to increase muscle pump, while downing extra-heavy whey-protein isolate shakes to increase food to muscle cells. Somewhere along the line Congress is going to find out that many use insulin to increase food nutrition entering the muscle cells as well. Some use 2-step-away prohormones like DHEA, others used 1-step-away-prohormones.’

And yes, some use steroids.

Yes, the bar is constantly raised. In the effort to be bigger, better, stronger, greater. And if anyone thinks that taking steroids means you take a pill and you’re suddenly Hulk, they are sadly misinformed. Guys who take steroid injections and just ‘wait’ for the effects find themselves fat and tired. An athlete who has chosen to use steroids will be working his butt off 5-6 days a week in grueling workouts. There is no ‘free ride’ by using steroids.

It is amazing, isn’t it? If someone goes to Beverly Hills and forks over $10,000 to a surgeon to have 40 pounds of lard sucked out of their gut in a two-hour operation, that is not only legal, it’s indicative of being One of the Beautiful People. But if you work your tail off during a 12-week steroid cycle to reduce your body fat from 15% to 6% through arduous workouts, well…..”that’s illegal! That’s immoral! That’s just not right!!!! We must punish baseball players!”

Actually, it seems a hell of a lot more honest to me.Of course, why stop at baseball players? Does anyone really believe thatfthe models on the cover of Mens fitness magazines get that way from situps and spinach? Have they asked the Governor of California how he got that big? Wake up, folk: when you outlaw a substance, you don’t make it go away….you make it go underground. Anyone remember Prohibition?

What’s more important, is that no one has been able to tell me just who is so harmed by an individual athlete’s choice to juice that it requires federal robocops. Have these sports figures killed anyone? Assaulted anyone? Robbed anyone? Maimed anyone? Can you point to any damage they have caused? ?

There are those who will say that when young people emulate these guys, they are hurt. But that’s like saying that NASCAR should be responsible for kids who drive fast , that McDonalds should be responsible for obese slobs who sit and eat Big Macs every day, and that Clint Eastwood should be responsible for a kid who shoots someone.

If the Players are upset, or the union, or the fans, or the owners, they have immediate remedies and avenues. If they have chosen not to pursue them, perhaps Congress should realize they’re barking up the wrong tree.We don’t need Congress to decide who should be and shouldn’t be our sports heroes. We’ll do that for ourselves, thank you..”

Massachusetts Highway Bureaucrat is Clueless...

My award for the most ridiculous, petty, ivory-tower Fiat pronounced by a Bureaucrat goes to Louisa Paiewonsky, the Massachusetts Highway Commissioner, who has determined that signs, flags, ribbons, and sheets welcoming troops home must all come down from highway overpasses.

The welcome-home signs have sprung up all over Massachusetts (as well as other parts of the country.) Home-made and heartfelt, they are a visible reminder of the Human connection between troops serving halfway around the world and the communities and families that anxiously await their return.

But, according to Ed Abell of the MHD, "Homemade signs and other items posted on overpasses pose a potential safety hazard to vehicles on roadways..."

Yeah, well deer crossing the road, branches blowing off of trees, and distracting commerical signs 'pose a potential safety hazard.' But Perfection and Utopia are not options. "Safety" is NOT the issue - everyone agrees that highways should be safe. The question is, "How much safer will the highway be by taking this action...and at what cost?"

MHD has yet to offer a *single* instance of a yellow ribbon, or a flag, or a sign flying off the overpass and causing an accident. By contrast, many instances of deer crosing the road and falling/blowing tree branches *have* caused accidents. By MHDs reasoning, the trees along the Highways should be leveled - because after all, they are a 'potential' safety hazard. (I'm sure that would go over well with the Executive Office of Environmental Affairs....)

And its not surprising that these welcome home banners have stayed put - after all, the people placing them there have a vested interest in making sure they are readable, secure, and can withstand the elements. They *want* the signs to remain and be visible. No one pours their heart and soul into one of these signs and then does a half-ass job affixing it to a fence on an overpass in a haphazard manner.

The degree of bureaucratic presumption - and cluelessness - is best displayed by the MHD's own suggestions for 'alternatives.' They have offered to place Generic, state-approved signs in Rest Areas.

MHD specifically opposes 'home-made' signs - suggesting, with incredible arrogance, that the State can somehow do a better job of making a "Welcome Home, Daddy!' sign than a soldiers' family. It also completely escapes them that the purpose of the sign is NOT simply to convey Formal Information ("Have Your Passports Ready, Please take your LapTop out of its Case, and Welcome Home Soldiers...') Rather, it is a human expression of hope and thanks and wishfulness and prayer and longing...something no Bureaucracy can even begin to express.

You would think that with the crazy placement of a traffic light on Rte 2 around a blind bend near Fitchburg, multiple lane crossings at the merger of Storrow Drive Eastbound and Interstate 93, A Pandoras Box of forks on Soldiers Field Road, and a minefield of jersey barriers on any given block in Worcester, that Mass Highway would have something real to worry about.

Guess they'd rather pick a battle they think they can win.....

Emotion and Bad Law: The Snyder v. Westboro (Phelps) verdict

So, the US District Court (Baltimore) has awarded Albert Snyder $10.9 million dollars. The verdict came against the Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka Kansas, a fundamentalist cult operated by the Fred Phelps family. Phelps is well-known for his anti-homosexual rantings, which he takes to an extreme: in the current case, he and his church members protested outside the funeral of Lance Cpl. Mathhew Snyder, a young soldier who died in Iraq in March 2006. Phelps and his minions regularly protest around the country carrying signs that proclaim, "God Hates Fags" and "God Hates America." They believe that the carnage in Iraq is God's condemnation on the United States for this country's toleration of homosexuality. The dead soldiers father (Albert) sued for emotional distress, and won.

Emotional issue. Terrible Verdict.

I agree, Phelps is a madman. A raving lunatic. An obsessed crusader. His antics are disgusting. His mere appearance at these funerals is disgusting, despicable, heartless, and mean-spirited. His theology is off the wall.

It is also protected by the US Constitution.

That speech which is most abhorrent is precisely that speech that must be protected.

If we begin to punish speech which is heartless and meanspirited, we have started down a slippery slope. Does that mean that members of the US Nazi party should *not* have the right to parade, if it upsets Jewish residents or holocaust survivors? Does it mean that racists should no longer have the right to give political speeches if it upsets a black citizen who remembers the days of southern lynchings?

Lets take it further: Does it mean that cities should be able to ban Gay Pride parades and festivals because it deeply offends its religious citizens? Think about this, folks.....do we really want to punish and ban and fine speech that is found to be 'offensive?'

Once we say that offensive speech is not protected speech, we have destroyed the very concept of Freedom of Speech. What Phelps does is repugnant, and he is properly vilified in the media for his nonsense. Frankly, I wouldnt even mind if someone decked him. I might even be tempted to deliver the blow myself....

But the government must not punish offensive speech - or we *all*in trouble - especially those of us who find ourselves in minority communities.

The verdict does not mean that the Snyders will receive compensation. the Church and the Phelps' will assuredly hide most of their assets, if they have any. But it does cast one more dangerous precedent that will come back to hurt us all. 9/11 became an excuse for chipping away at civil liberties.. We now readily engage in the very activities we used to chide the Soviet Union for (warrantless wiretaps, secret prisons, torture, passports requirements, Real ID). The banning of 'offensive' speech is simply one more step down the road towards a totalitarian society.

A Random Collection of my Favorite Quotes

"Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming, "Wow - What a ride!'"

"Forgiveness is usually easier than permission"

"There's only now, there's only this, forget regrets, or life is yours to miss..." (from Rent)

"They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security" (Ben Franklin)

"The Market will always prevail over the Law."

"I'm a Libertarian. I'd like to get the Republicans out of my bedroom, and the Democrats out of my wallet."

"The only difference between guys in jail and us is that they got caught and convicted."

"In all numerous assemblies, of whatever characetr conposed, passion never fails to wrest the sceptre from Reason." (James Madison)

"But what more oft in Nations grown corrupt, and by their vices brought to servitude, Then to love bondage more than Liberty, Bondage with ease then strenuous Liberty."
(John Milton; Samson Agonistes,1671;lines 268 - 271 )


If I Was Inside Out
Barnes & Loudboy

If I was inside out
Would you love me like you do?
If I was inside out

If you could see my heart
And the Truth was in plain view
If I was Inside Out

I peel back the layers and lies and disguises
Open my soul to the light of your eyes

CHORUS:

If you enter to the very heart of me
Would you understand the ugly mess you’d see?
See my anger, feel my passion
Burning raw like the sun deep inside

I was Inside Out
If you looked into my face,
Would you have to turn away?

Would you know what I’m about?
Could you stand and swallow truth?
If I was Inside Out?

I peel back a lifetime of lies and disguises
Open my heart to the light of your eyes

[CHORUS]

All my Skin & bones,
Every silent scream
If I was Inside Out
Every choked back word,
Every strangled dream
If I was Inside Out

If I was Inside Out
So could you see my heart
Would you love me?
Could you love me?

If I was Inside Out
And you could see my heart…

[Chorus]

If I was Inside OutIf I was Inside Out
My Naked-Ass Truth kickin’ you in the balls

Would you hold me?
Would you love me?
Could you love me?
If I was Inside Out?

Sen. Larry Craig and the Real Crime...

OK, so Senator Larry Craig, a long-time conservative politician and family man from Idaho, was caught and pleaded guilty to a most chilling crime:

He tapped his foot in a mens room stall.

Well, OK, it was probably a signal to see if the guy in the next stall was interested in giving or getting a blowjob. As far as I know, no patron was scandalized, no one's money was swiped, no one is bleeding, no one was hurt, no one was in any way impacted by it. But the howl from the media and politicians on both the left and right have to make one stop and pause.

Here, to me, are the real crimes:

That a man who is innately homosexual must spend his life deeply closeted and hiding it.

That society can so quickly turn on a man who's sexuality is 'different.'

That a man grows up loathing himself, ashamed of himself, and struggles his whole life. That he is reduced to furtive, secretive trysts that only drive him deeper into shame and dangerous sex.

That Republicans can be so self-righteous and hypocritical (conservative leadership, PR men, and pundits have always been rife with homsexuals at the highest levels) as to turn so quickly. That they can be so beholden to an ignorant and shrill right-wing base that they will shoot their wounded and never examine their own consciences.

That liberals will stand by and gloat, because 'he's not one of us.'

That gays will join in the blood-letting, because revenge is so much more exciting than teachable moments.

And lastly, that Larry will swear to his dying day that he is 'not gay," (or worse, that he's been 'cured), because he just can't accept himself.

The longer the closet door stays shut, the more the suffering will go on.

The sooner we put on army boots and smash that damn door to splinters, the easier it becomes for the next person to live the life they are meant to live without daily fear and anxiety.

The best reason to come out, Larry? To make sure the kids in the next generation dont live through the hell you have.

New Hampshire enacts Civil Unions

Today, New Hampshire became the first state in the country to adopt civil unions for gay couples without a court order or a pending lawsuit against a marriage statute. And the bill even uses the term, "spousal union" to describe gay relationships. Once again, the Granite State stands in the vanguard of liberty for all.

Two years ago, state lawmakers held a series of "information gathering" meetings around the state. I attended the meeting held in Keene, NH, at the Keene Public Library.

The 'agenda' was set from the beginning. The overflow crowd of residents who had come to make their opinions known were told they would have to wait until the 'special guests' got to speak. The 'guests' were anti-civil union activists from Massachusetts.

That's right, New Hampshire legislators came to gather public opinions...but the residents of New Hampshire who took the time and effort to stand up in public and offer their opinion were delayed until the out-of state, non-resident, non-voting 'experts,' chosen by the panel itself, could tell us all what a disaster civil unions would be.

As the panel then turned to the audience, we were warned over and over that any disruption or impoliteness would result in the panels getting up and leaving. (Now there's a great example for lawmakers to set, huh?) Mere objections to allowing out of state testimony were promptly classified as disruptions, and people who's voices were shaking with nervousness at their first 'public hearing' were nastily shot down by the panel chair.

Predictably, the panel recommended a ban on same-sex unions.

Appropriately, the residents of New Hampshire threw them out at the next election.

Throughout the national media, one hears tales that New Hampshire has gone from 'conservative' to 'liberal' in one election. In actuality, nothing is furter from the truth: New Hampshire never *was* conservative. New Hampshire was, is, and remains, a libertarian state. In the area of taxes, firearms rights, and government regulation of business, the Republicans were the guardian of libertarian values. But today, as big brother Federal government pokes it nose into our library reading lists and our bedrooms, the Democrats are our best bet for guarding our liberties.

The average Granite Stater doesnt care who their neighbor sleeps with. And they dont care to have the government telling them what to do. For years, we relied on Republicans to carry the torch of liberty. Now, the Democrats have their chance....and this was another step in the direction of liberty.

And some more Ink (yes, it's addictive...)

My newest addition...a Tribal Tattoo.

No, it doesnt have a specific meaning, except for the images one conjures up when one thinks "Tribal" (instinctive, ancient, mystical, community, warrior)

And now, for something completely (well almost) non-political...

My Bear Paw Tat, courtesy of Gina at Mom's Tattoo Studio in Keene, NH:

General Pace and "Don't Ask, Don't Tell."

Well. This will not have to be a long post for me to make my point.

By now we have all read comments by the Marine Core's General Peter Pace in support of the Military's "Don't ask Don't Tell" policy . He stated,

"I believe homosexual acts between two individuals are immoral and that we should not condone immoral acts," said the General, and "I do not believe the United States is well served by a policy that says it is OK to be immoral in any way."

Now, in response, many in 'Gay Leadership' (HRC, GLBT Task Force, the usual Pink Mafiosos) went ballistic, and, in an almost habitual self-defeating way, went after the *wrong* issue. They immediately jumped on *what* he said, in proclaiming homsexuality to be immoral, instead of faulting his illogical reasoning as to how it relates to the Policy.

Like it or not, a lot of Americans agree with him on the 'it's immoral' issue. It is not a crime to think differently, or have different opinions abut 'morality,' no atter how odious they might seem. If we focus on the issue of whether or not homosexuality is 'immoral,' we become bogged down in an unwinnable arguement. People will believe what they want about sexual morality.

No, friends, the greater point is this: the good General proclaimed that it is necessary to keep any 'immorality' out of the military: "I do not believe the United States is well served by a policy that says it is OK to be immoral in any way." And this was his arguement in favor of DADT.

Let's be frank, General: soldiers don't have affairs, right? They don't visit brothels. They don't sow their oats when given a pass off-base. They wait until they're 21 to get drunk. They never smoke pot, or send drugs home. Those sailors-in-port stories are just that - stories. The army never talks to its soldiers about STDs or provides condoms, and never treats syphilis. Nope, never happens.

General, would you favor dismissing every soldier who visited a whorehouse? Smoked pot? Got drunk? Had sex with someone not his or her spouse? After all, if immorality is bad for military personnel, why not get rid of all the sinners in the armed forces?

Get off it, General. The most glaring point here is that there is a double standard: we wink at the boys who are off getting their rocks off when they're so far from home...we excuse it - even expect it - from red-blooded American soldiers. But God forbid one of those soldiers might have different inclinations - THAT's immoral, and they must be kept out of the army.

On it's face, the policy is riduculous, and must fall.

Mitt Romney: Like Nailing Jello to a Wall....

Mitt Romney's interview with George Stephanopoulos this morning was a remarkable study of a Teflon Candidate who spoke passionately about having strong convictions about many issues, while leaving the viewer in total confusion. From abortion to the federal role in education, Mitt seemed to be all over the board, each sentence contradicting the one before. But my favorite part of the interview was his internally inconsistent and thoroughly illogical perspectives on gays in the military and gay marriage (which, I guess, could be expected when you're the Mormon Governor of the most Liberal state in the union).

His comments on these issues, with my own comments added, are these:

Concerning Gays in the military, Mitt said:

"Well, "don't ask, don't tell" has worked well. "

"I must admit, I was somewhat uncertain as to whether that would work and I was skeptical as to whether that policy would work. "

"I don't have a policy posture as to allowing gays in the military to serve there openly."

(So, if I have this right, Mitt, you didn't think it would work, but now you think it has worked, and you don't want gays to be 'open')

Mitt continued: "But I can tell you that I'm against discrimination against people who are gay and lesbian."

OK...you don't want Gays in the military to admit to any soul in the military that they are gay. But you are against discrimination. So, it would be OK to admit you are Catholic, Democrat, or of Croatian ethnic heritage; you could admit to being heterosexual and discuss in lurid detail your exploits with those of the opposite sex in the barracks; you could wolf whistle at the strippers in the club and place dollars in their g-strings...as long as it was a dancer of the opposite sex. So tell me again how you are 'against discrimination against people who are gay,' but believe that gays and ONLY gays must be silent about their lives to remain on the job?

And for what its worth Mitt, "Don't Ask Don't Tell" has NOT worked...at all. But we will save that issue for a separate blog entry.

Then, on marriage:

"...I do favor and have always favored traditional marriage and oppose same sex marriage.
..... I've felt marriage is between a man and a woman and not between people of the same gender. "

'....two people can enter into a partnership, whether they're people who love each other or whether they're just friends. They can enter into a contract and have contractual relationships with one another. ... But that doesn't require a sanction by the state and so that's a decision each state would have to make. I wouldn't seek to impose, at the national level, a prohibition on contractual relationships between two people...But my view is, at the national level, we should define marriage as a relationship between a man and a woman..."

Whooa! "It's a decision each state would have to make" and "I wouldn't seek to impose, at the national level...," followed by, "At the national level, we should define marriage."

Mitt, old boy, do you see any contradiction there? Appealing to individual contractual rights and states rights on one hand, and supporting a national policy on the other hand? All things to all people, buster? Or Nothing to Anybody?

But here's the real exciting part:

"... And this isn't about adult rights. A lot of people get confused that gay marriage is about treating gay people the same as treating heterosexual people, and that's not the issue involved here. This is about the development and nurturing of children. Marriage is primarily an institution to help develop children and children's development, I believe, is greatly enhanced by access to a mom and a dad. I think every child deserves a mom and a dad, and that's why I'm so consistent and vehement in my view that we should have a federal amendment which defines marriage in that way..." My view is that the right model for the nation and the right standard for the nation is marriage is between a man and a woman and a child deserves a mom and a dad.."

Well, Mitt, you have pretty clearly stated that marital rights are about 'the development and nurturing of children." So if that's what marital rights are all about, I have some questions for you:

Does that mean you would revoke marital rights for heterosexual couples who are unable, or choose not, to raise children?

Would you revoke marital rights for couples once their children are grown and out of the house?

Would you make adoption by single parents illegal?

If marriage rights and benefits are predicated on the notion of raising children, then by your own standards childless couples should not have these rights. If you favor the adoption of a child by a single woman, how could you logically oppose the adoption of that child by a single woman and her partner? Further, under your own standard, if a state permits gay couples to adopt...wouldn't they have a stronger claim to marital benefits than a heterosexual couple with no children?

At some point, Mitt, you will need to stop sticking your wet finger in the wind while whispering contradictory sweet nothings into three different ears at once. And when you do, then we'll examine your stands on the issues. Until then, we'll give you some time to think about the logical conclusions of some of your 'positions.'

Courage and Independent Thinking in Wisconsin

Lately it's been refreshing listening to politicians out of Wisconsin. Both Democrat Sen. Russ Feingold and former Republican Governor Tommy Thompson have staked out positions on Iraq that place them at odds with their respective parties - positions that show both the courage of their convictions and pragmatism.

The Democrats took control over state legislatures and Congress largely on a wave of public dissatisfaction with the Iraqi mess. But Democrats can not just point the finger at the Bush - they, too, went along with most of this program, and gave been voting to continue it. This week, Democrats tried a lame resolution in Congress - one that passed the House but is stalled in the Senate. The Resolution disagrees with Bush's troop escalation, but does nothing about it. Even if passed, it's merely as if they are children saying "I don't like this!," but nothing happens as a result. It is a mere 'opinion' with no force or effect.

Russ Feingold is a Democrat who insists on 'walking the talk.' Rather than just offering non-binding opinions, Feingold is pushing for Congress to cut off funding for the Iraq war. While the President is the Commander-in-Chief, the House holds the purse strings. That is part of the checks and balances that the Founding fathers built into the Constitution.

If Democrats really want to stop the war, they can support Feingold. I suspect that what they really want to do is *complain* about the war, but not actually stop it. And for that reason, Feingold's bold proposal will probably not be supported.

Then there's Tommy Thompson's approach to Iraq. Thompson shows himself to be the ultimate realist when he sees Iraq not "as we want it to be," and not "as it ought to be," but as it truly is. And in so doing, he has called for the division of Iraq into three separate states rather than trying to hold it together as a single nation.

From the late 1200s until World War I, the land we call Iraq was under the control of the Ottoman Empire. And during the time, there were three states in the region: Mosul, Baghdad, and Basra. That's a long time, folks. After the defeat of the Ottoman Turks in WWI, the European victors tried to create a sovereign nation - Iraq - out of these disparate pieces. One of the casualties of carving up the Ottoman Empire was the separation of the Kurds across four nations: Iran,k Iraq, Turkey, and Syria.

Since then, the Kurds have been one of the most harassed people-groups on earth. In 1925 Turkey suppressed the Kurds, and outlawed their language and cultural expressions. In 1961 the Kurds began rebelling against the Iraqi government, and fighting has continued in fits and starts since then. In 1979, when Islamic Fundamentalists took over Iran, Kurds fought the Islamicists and were brutally suppressed in that nation. In 1988, Iraq engaged in "Al-Anfal," ('The Spoils of War'), and slaughtered thousands of Kurds. One and a half million Kurds fled to Turkey, which, at the time, was the lesser of four evils. During the first Persian Gulf War, the Kurds supported the US invasion and rebelled against Saddam Hussein. Their reward was to be slaughtered when Saddam was permitted to remain in power. Throughout the 1990s, Kurds were subject to raids by Turkish forces crossing the border into Iraq. Finally, in the most recent Iraqi engagement, the Kurds steadfastly opposed Saddam (after thousands had been maimed, killed, and gassed with toxic chemicals by his regime), and assisted the American and European forces.

Since that time, the Kurdish region of Iraq has been stable. The sectarian violence that plagues the Shiites and Sunni Muslims in Baghdad is practically non-existent in Iraqi Kurdistan. While the Kurds live in relative autonomy right now, it came at a price: they still have no homeland of their own, and the oil-rich lands around Kirkuk and Mosul - traditional Kurdish cities - have been wrested from them and given to the Sunnis & Shiites who continue to be engaged in a civil war with each other.

For over 700 years, Iraq existed as three states. Today, the Kurds have suffered at the ends of Iraq and the surrounding states, bore the brunt of Saddam's cruelty, have assisted the west in every endeavor, and have shown themselves capable of peaceful and effective government - and yet, their reward is still to be a people without a homeland, in an Iraqi nation with make-believe borders imposed by Britain after WWI.

It's time to listen to Thompson, give the Kurds their own homeland, and let the Shiites and Sunnis fight their own battles with each other. And time to listen to Feingold, and not just talk about ending a war and whining about it, but actually doing it.

"As Maine goes..."

Starting in about 1840, Maine became known as a political 'bellweather' state, largely because Mainers voted for Governor and Congress in September, not November. With a two month jump on the rest of the country, pundits jumped on the Maine vote to look for voting trends, and indeed, Maine appeared to be a reliable predicter of the national mood up until the FDR years. Somewhere along the line, someone coined the phrase, "As Maine goes, so goes the nation."

Let's hope not.

In the name of political correctness (from the liberals), fighting terrorism (from the neoconservatives), and moral propriety (from the social conservatives), Free Speech is dying an ugly death throughout the state.

The University of Maine at Presque Isle’s Residence Hall Guide contains a policy that prohibits harassment. Part of that policy reads: “Even if the harassment is unintentional, it still occurs and will not be tolerated.”

Excuse me? You can now harass someone, and not even know you're doing it - and be punished for it?! Since when did people gain a right to never be offended by someone? I guess if you're not enlightened in matters of the latest politically correct words, you may be punished simply for plain-speaking. You are guilty if someone doesnt like what you said, no matter what your intention was.

As the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education states on their webiste, "...As a public university, UMPI cannot prohibit speech that is protected by the First Amendment. The U.S. Supreme Court has defined what schools may legitimately prohibit as harassment: conduct “so severe, pervasive, and objectively offensive that it effectively bars the victim’s access to an educational opportunity or benefit.” By definition, then, an unintentional, off-hand comment or joke cannot be harassment, making this policy legally untenable. This policy is also completely ridiculous. How can a college prepare its students for the real world if it shields them from even the most mild offense? Society is full of people with different personalities and different viewpoints, and being offended is a part of everyday life. It is a disservice to lead young adults to believe they can breeze through life free from offense, because that simply does not reflect reality."

But Maine's assault on free speech is not rrestricted to the campus.

In Portland, Tom Connolly faces charges of terrorizing, reckless conduct, and criminal threatening. Why? Because on Halloween he dressed up as Osama bin Laden, and even carried a plastic squirt gun.

Oh my, imagine that. For 5 years Osama has eluded world wide military scrutiny, and there he was, sauntering down the street in Portland Maine. Yup, I would have believed that he had just flown in for a glass of wine in the Old Port District.... Might the costume have been in poor taste? Yup. Is poor taste illegal? Nope. Have we become so obsessed with terror that now we arrest people playing dress-up on Halloween? Was thatscarier than some of the blood-dripping, eye-ball festering, razor-tooth masks worn at Halloween? Perhaps Maine could outlaw all offensive Halloween costumes, even if they offend unintentionally..that would be consistent with the campus rules, at least...

But the latest blow to free speech came when a British Beer Company attempted to sell "Santa's Butt" in Maine. The label shows Santa from behind, sitting on a Butt (a barrel used in beer fermentation) hoisting a glass of ale.

The Maine authorities prohibited its sale in the state. The Maine Bureau of Liquor Enforcement said the label was considered "undignified and improper."

Since when is "Undiginified and Improper" a legal reason to stifle speech? I can think of many political rants that are both 'undignified and improper.'

The point is, it really shouldnt matter whether someone considers something 'undignified and improper.' That speech which is MOST offensive is PRECISELY that speech that needs to be vigilantly protected under the US Constitution. If it wasn't offensive, it wouldnt need to be protected! Someone may feel that espousing Nazi or Eugenicist philsophies is offensive, and so be it, they are. But it is still protected speech.

NO ONE HAS A RIGHT TO "NEVER BE OFFENDED." Deal with it, Mainers....

In a twist, Maine and other states (notably New York) have realized that they really can't prohibit something because its in 'poor taste.' Now both states are changing their tactic, suggesting that having Santa on the label would 'attract children' to drink it.

Nice try, guys...but there are already 12 Christmas-themed beers in both of those states, including Sam Adams "Old Fezziwig's Ale" and Anchor's "Merry Christmas" Ale. Other brands shows elves. And what 6-year old, enamoured of the picture of Santa, is going to saunter out of the grocery store with a 6-pack under his arm?

The problem here, as always, is that someone with the power of the state behind them believes it is their solemn duty to protect the rest of us: to protect us from being offended, upset, mislead, or scandalized.

Well, that's not your job, buckos. Get off your high horse and let the market determine whether Santa's Butt has a place at the table. We're adults, we can make our own decisions, and don't need you to make them for us.
Santa's Butt

When will the Right stop pretending to be Holier-Than-Thou?

Mark Foley is not the first conservative to have been 'exposed' as a homosexual. And it is sad that his lawyer immediately tried to explain' his situation by revealing that he was sexually abused as a child, an deffor aimed at calming the fears of the militantly loyal (and righteous) religious right. After all, the right has 'tolerated' Dick Cheney's daughter (hey, after all, it is DICK CHENEY'S daughter, right?).

But what about the parade that has preceded this little scandal currently unfolding?

Anyone remember Mel White, press seceretary to Jerry Falwell and behind-the-scenes political operative for a dozen religious right politicos? He not only came out, he smashed the door down and pubished a book about it- "Stranger at the Gate."

And then there was Art Finkelstein, the pollster who enabled the Nassau County Republican machine to maintain its grip on the elctorate for a decade or more, and who propelled Alphonse D'Amato from a Town Presiding Supervisor to a U S. Senator.

How about Bob Baumann, former conservative darling and congressman from Maryland?

And now lets really reach back..back when I was a mere twenty-something, and Terry Dolan was the Chairman of NCPAC (the National Conservative Poitcial Action Committee) that propelled Ronald Reagan into the White House. I knew Terry, and worked on campaigns with him at the YAF headquarters at 25 Jane Street in Greenwich Village. A young man, Terry died in the AIDs crisis that exploded in the 1980s...and had the courage to come out as a gay man at that time.

No, my friends, there is nothing new about Gay Men who are otherwise conservative, hiding in the closets of their parent organizations, lest they be exposed, ridiculed, and shunned. Perhaps this Boston Globe editotial by David Link says it best:

"The inability to deal straightforwardly with gay people leads to other kinds of truth-avoidance when things go south. But that's what comes from not wanting to know something, and going out of your way to remain ignorant.

We've come a long way since homosexuals had two basic options: the closet or jail. But a good portion of the electorate, most of them Republican, still seems to long for the good old days when we didn't have to think about ``those people." Both Libertarians and, generally, the Democratic Party have withdrawn their official support for the closet over time. States, too, are seeing what a losing battle this is, and allowing homosexuals to live their lives in conformity with, rather than opposition to, the law.

But that leaves Republicans and the religious right trying to live a 1950s lie in the new millennium. As Foley prepared in 2003 to run for the Senate, newspapers in Florida and elsewhere published stories about his homosexuality. But you'd never hear any of his colleagues saying such a thing. And Foley himself refused to discuss the issue, until his lawyer acknowledged Wednesday that the former congressman is indeed gay.

But what can one expect from denying grown men -- and women -- a normal, adult sex life? Whether the denial of adult intimacy comes from religious conviction or the ordinary urge toward conformity, people who run away from their sexuality nearly always have to answer to nature somehow. For people who fear abiding and mutual love, the trust and confusion of the young is a godsend. Add to that the perquisites of power, and a degenerate is born.

...the Republican Party in Washington guarantees its own future calamities in its enduring and steadfast habit of pretending that, unlike heterosexuality, homosexuality can be either denied or suppressed."

Foley

The "Federal Marriage Amendment" - once again, Christian Conservatives look to the Beast for help...

Much was made in Enquirer-like circles of the fact that this week started with the date "06/06/06," a reminder of the "Mark of the Beast" in the Book of Revelations. It is a symbol that the End-Times Crowd has often warned about - and so it is increasingly ironic that many of the same Christian Conservatives and Republicans went running to the Beast this week in order to 'preserve' marriage. The Beast, of course, is how I refer to the Federal Government.

For decades, the Republicans have been telling us that they stand for smaller government, for limited government, for local control rather than federal fiats imposed on the states. This was one of Ronald Reagan's key mantras in the 1980s than helped propel him to two unprecendented landslide victories.

But do the Republicans really believe what they are saying?

In the last few years, this "small government" crowd has overseen the largest expansion of federal power since the Civil War - even more so than the much-derided New Deal under FDR. The Patriot Act, telephone surveillance, the development of a national ID card (REAL ID), warrantless searches, secret prisons and detainees held without bail or charges are not the actions of a "small government" crowd.

Of course, some try to tortuously defend all this by claiming we are at war. And yet, that doesn't explain the intrusive "No Child Left Behind" Act, the efforts by the Food & Drug Administration to regulate herbal supplements and fight state laws on medical marajuana, the efforts by Congress to interfere in major league baseball policy, the bloated budget, tariffs on steel and textiles, a government-expanded medicare boondoggle, or the abysmal deficit. These are not the acts of "small government" or "local control" thinking, and they can not be excused as temporary "war-time" acts. What they are is an unconscionable and unconstitutional expansion of Federal jurisdiction over the rights reserved to the States and to the People themselves (See your 10th amendment to the Bill of Rights).

And amazingly, the footsoldiers of Republicanism - the supposedly anti-big-government rank-and-file social religious conservatives - are in the vanguard of supporting the administration that has achieved the largest expansion of federal power in history.

And then comes the Federal Marriage Amendment.

Oh sure, it's great political hay. The Republican leadership can 'energize' its base by appealing to their emotion on the issue of 'gay marriage' and 'activist judges.' This is a formula that regularly works for the Republicans. And to be sure, many judges are activist, and inappropriately so. But a Federal Marriage Amendment is quite possibly the last leg of a journey whereby the lemmings chase each other off the cliff.

The Federal Government has NEVER had jurisdiction over 'family' issues. These issues have ALWAYS been the province of the states.

Indiviual states decide what the criteria for marriage are. Residency, minimum age, and blood tests vary from state to state. It's a state right, not federal.

Individual states decide what the criteria for divorce is. Abandonment, residency, cruelty, irreconcilable differences, alcoholism, impotency, imprisonment, and a host of other causes of action for divorce, as well as alimony terms, are different from state to state.

Other issues of Family law, such as adoption regulations, the legal status of private adoptions, teenage emancipation, and the legal definitions of abuse and neglect - are ALL individual state laws.

And somehow, we have always left these issues to the states, the states have always had conflicting and different standards, and civilization did not fall apart because of it. Rather, we are stronger for it: the genuius of our Constitution is that it recognizes that one size does not have to fit all, that Alaskans do not have to run their towns the way Floridians do, and that the sensibilities of Mexican immigrants in Arizona might be significantly different from tenth generation Maine Yankees.

By running to amend the Constitution, the religious right is doing precisly that which they supposedly fear: they are running to the federal government to impose a one-size-fits all solution on the entire nation, and, in so doing, seeking to hand over yet more jurisdiction over individual families to Federal Power.

It doesnt matter whether you favor gay marriage or not. This is the wrong approach, and is yet anoter examnple of how the 'small government' Republicans are using emotional scare tactics to amass even greater authority and jurisdiction in Washington.

Sincere apprecition must be expressed to the New England Republicans - Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe (Maine), John Sununu and Judd Gregg (NH) and Lincoln Chaffee (Rhode Island) who bucked their own party to vote against this nonsense.

Federal Marriage Amendment

Time for Patriots to stand firm: NO National ID Card!

"I will reject a REAL-ID-compliant NH drivers license/National ID but
only if 199 other NH residents or soon-to-be residents will vow to do
the same."— BikerBill, NH Freedom Fighter

Deadline: Election Day, November 7, 2006

On May 11, 2005, the Orwellian, unconstitutional, unfunded legislation known as the REAL-ID Act, having been snuck through the US Congress without any debate or public scrutiny, was signed into law by a President who believes he is above his country's laws.

On May 11, 2006, a day that will live in NH history as either the start of the revolution or the true beginning of death throes for liberty, sovereignty and representative government "of the people, by the people, and for the people" in NH (and coincidentally the same day the massive NSA phone records database story broke), the NH Senate decided to defiantly, arrogantly and repeatedly disregard the Constitutions of the US and NH, the NH House, Gov Lynch, the Concord Monitor, the Manchester Union Leader, its own study committee and its laughably lopsided
testimony, as well as its rather vocal NH constituency, not to mention international press and organizations as disparate as the Cato Institute and the ACLU.

The New Hampshire House voted to defy the federal national ID card mandate.

But the NH Senate killed the bill sent to them from the House.

Rather, they chose illusory safety over essential liberty. They sold out their constituents, rejected HB1582, and embraced Federal unconstitutional authority in giddy anticipation of $3M in taxpayer-funded "sucker money."

They thus failed their duty, their oath, their citizens, their state, and their country. They are a true and bitter embarrassment to the Founding Fathers and the historic "Live Free or Die" culture of NH.

Let this message of jealously guarded liberty be sent to the NH Senate in no uncertain terms by their similarly defiant bosses (that's you) by Election Day, 2006.

Pledge to Refuse a Real ID

Real ID

My new Celtic Armband Tattoo

This was my first Tattoo, and I am totally jazzed about it. It took 4 1/2 hours start to finish. On a pain scale of 0-10, it was mostly only a 1 (less painful than a mosquito bite) for the outline on my upper arm. As we got to the second or third layer of color on the underside of my arm near my pit, it was more like....er....ripping off strips of flesh and then exposing the remaining raw arm to an open flame...LOL! Actually, I may be hooked on the Pain..heh, heh, heh....

In all honesty, the artist and the parlor were great, professional, friendly, upbeat, and better than all my expectations. Major league thanks to Chris Molloy, the artist who designed the band, and Moms Tattoo parlor in Keene, NH (www.MomsTattoo.com)

Celt
Tattoo

Frihed...

A Tale of Two Cities: Copenhagen and Washington

This time, there is nothing "rotten in denmark," to quote Hamlet. In fact, tiny Denmark is standing as a beacon of freedom and civilization against a backdrop of intolerant Islamic fundamentalism and spineless American hand-wringing.

Last fall, the Jyllands-Posten, a Danish newspaper, published 12 cartoon caricatures of Mohammed. Denmark has a long tradition of guaranteeing freedom of the press, and the cartoons immediately caused an uprising among Islamicists. Palestinaians have rioted in Gaza. Arab nations have withdrawn their ambassadors. Muslim spokesmen have requested UN intervention. Muslim states have embarked on a campaign to boycott all danish products. Even Denmark's fellow European states are hedging their bets and trying to make excuses and find a 'middle ground.'

The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), representing 57 Muslim states and territories, issued a memorandum on January 1 accusing the Danish government of "indifference" after Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen declined to intervene in the dispute. It should be noted that more than three-quarters of his fellow countrymen agree with his stand. His parties foreign affairs spokesman, Troels Lund, stated "It is important to stand our ground and say that we have a separation of powers in Denmark and something called freedom of expression."

Well, bully for the Danes! This is the same small state whose Christian citizens, when overrun by Hitlers'armies in WWII, rose in solidarity with their fellow Jews and wore yellow Stars of David. Today - when Islamic Fundamentalism seeks to silence any human expression it deems offensive (art, movies, music, prose, poetry, theater, even news) - Denmark is an example of freedoms that western civilization has always held dear. What a statement it would be if the free world would join the "Anti-Boycott" and purchase Tuborg Gold and Carlsberg Beers, and Havarti Cheese and Danish Butter Cookies in solidarity with Denmark's government.

A petition to support Denmark can be found here:

http://new.petitiononline.com/danmark/petition-sign.html?

Meanwhile, in Washington, the State Department has joined with the Islamicists, stating that the cartoons were 'offensive' and that freedom of the press must be balanced with 'responsibility.' In other words, if your message is anything but bland, it shouldn't be protected. As a practical example of this eradication of First Amendment rights, anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan was arrested for wearing a shirt with an anti-war message to the State of the Union speech.

It's a sad day when the US government claims to be fighting Islamic terrorism while adopting their mentality...

Denmark
Jyllands-Posten
Anti-Boycott

Impeach Bush....Now.

In the 1950's, far too many Repubicans stood around in silent assent as Joseph McCarthy engaged in planned character assasination. Then, as now, the country feared an outside power, and it took a stong backbone to stand up and say "enough!."

That backbone came in the person of Margaret Chase Smith, (R-Maine), who delivered her now-famous "Declaration of Conscience" Speech on the floor of the U. S. Senate. The McCarthy juggernaut was finally put to rest because of the courage of one woman.

Do we have any statesman ready to stand up today?

Understand that your Blogger voted for Bush - twice. My ancestors arrived in Nieuw Amsterdam in the 1600s and were New York GOP activists for as long as there has been a Republican Party in the Empire State. My break with the party of my heritage has been a long, drawn-out and painful process, but has accelerated as I have watched the Bush administration and its supporters turn the party of 'limited government and liberty' into one that has turned our Federal Government into an all-powerful police state.

My call today for Bush's impeachment is based on three very simple items, which, taken together, form a pretty solid case:

Item #1:

“The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.” (U. S. Constitution, Amendment IV)

Item #2:

[The President shall] take the following Oath or Affirmation: - “I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of the president of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

Item 3:

“President Bush acknowledged on Saturday that he had ordered the National Security Agency to conduct an electronic eavesdropping program in the United States without first obtaining warrants, and said he would continue the highly classified program because it was "a vital tool in our war against the terrorists." (New York Times, 17 Dec 2005)

Surely these actions are far more grevious than Clinton's dallying with an intern, and have a far greater significance. It's time the Republicans acknowledge the rot within their own ranks.

impeach bush

Pat Robertson is an Embarassment to Christianity

In yet another outburst that leaves sensible people shaking their heads, Televangelist Pat Robertson has ranted against the town of Dover, Pennsylvania, where voters recently ousted all 8 members of a school board that had required "Intelligent Design" instruction.

Robertson stated, “I’d like to say to the good citizens of Dover: if there is a disaster in your area, don’t turn to God, you just rejected him from your city. And don’t wonder why he hasn’t helped you when problems begin, if they begin. I’m not saying they will, but if they do, just remember, you just voted God out of your city. And if that’s the case, don’t ask for his help because he might not be there.”

Where does one begin?

Well, as a Christian, I feel I must begin by asking people *not* to think that Roberston represents any semblance of theologially sound Christianity when he pulls these political stunts. Please do not associate the majority of us with this lunatic.

Next, I guess I have to ask Pat, "How do you know what was in each voter's heart as he or she cast their vote?"

No doubt some voters rejected this board because their town was plunged into an expensive unresolved lawsuit and they are unwilling to fund it with their rising property taxes. Perhaps some agree with intelligent design but found the board members too acerbic. Perhaps some agree with Creationism, but reject the specific line-by-line precept approach many Intelligent Design advocates have developed to explain the disappearance of dinosaurs, the ice age, tectonic plate movements, rain, etc. Perhaps some are devout Christians who believe in the evolution of species, but the special creation of Man.

Casting a vote is a highly personal and complex decision. I have voted for candidates with whom I have disagreed philsophically because "my" candidate had poor ethics. I have voted "against" candidates rather than "for" candidates. I have weighed differences and voted for the 'lesser of two evils.' It's not as cut and dry as you would have us believe, Pat.

But most outrageous Pat, is your arrogance in proclaiming that you know how God operates, and your telling people not to call upon Him in their times of need. To suggest that God will take His toys and go home because your candidates lost is juvenile. In fact, it reminds me of Eliphaz, Zophar, Bildad, and Elihu sitting around arguing with Job, each insisting that they knew God's ways and explaining just why Job was suffering so.

In the end, even Job attempted to explain God's interaction with man, and, when God answered him out of the whirlwind, Job finally understood when he said:

"...I put my hand over my mouth. I spoke once, but i have no answer - - twice, but I will say no more....Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know" - Job 40:4b-5, 42:3b [NIV]

I think Job has some sound advice for you, Pat....

pat

Economic Illiteracy in the Pulpit

It is now quite fashionable in many Christian circles to be an “Environmentalist Christian.” Terms like “Creation Care,” and “Social Justice,” and “Environmental Justice” seem to roll off tongues like other media clichés. Caring for the grass and the whales is getting more attention in some church circles than clothing the naked and feeding the hungry.

Now, don’t think that I’m one of those callous earth-haters. On my little hilltop farm, I bred Jacob Sheep precisely because they were a rare and endangered species. Our garden is strictly organic, and I can spend hours sitting in a meadow, walking through the woods, or canoeing in a marsh. I have a great deal of respect for the cycles of the seasons and the rhythms of the year…yes, I do have a few drops of mystical Celtic blood in me...

But that doesn’t mean that in the passion of environmental exuberance I should cast all other important aspects of life to the wind. I still have financial and family responsibilities. Political and economic issues surround us all in a hundred ways every day. Issues of the very soul go deeper still…and yet, some of our religious spokespersons, in their genuine excitement for a reawakening of environmental consciousness, have gone so overboard as to overstep their expertise, preach a false and dysfunctional message, and mislead their flocks. I would suggest that the Ship of the Church is currently listing about eight points to starboard due to unevenly distributed ecological ballast….

I was used to this, of course, in some evangelical circles. “Creation Care” magazine and the social justice crowd there and at Eastern University offer a veritable smorgasbord of animal rights, anti-business socialists dressing up their philosophy in theology. As a participant in last years' "Microfinance and Environment Conference" at Eastern, I witnessed the fervency with which some other participants embraced feminist agendas and global warming hysteria. Fortunately, due to the fractious, decentralized nature of Protestantism, they can be ignored. It is more difficult when these views come from hierarchical leaders with Roman Catholicism and Orthodoxy.

On October 1, St Vladimir’s Seminary in Crestwood, NY (the seminary of the Orthodox Church in America) held their annual “Orthodox Education Day.” The Rev. Thomas Hopko, Dean of the Seminary, gave a lecture geared for the clergy that I attended (and no, I am neither clergy nor a candidate for said position…). He declared that the problems of society could be summed up by the values embodied by the god “Nike.” On the whiteboard, he identified those ‘problems’ as being characterized as the “P’s,” writing a long list of words beginning with the letter “P” that were problematic. Among these were “Pornography,” “Power,” and “Prestige.” Then of course, he added the filthiest P-word of them all: “Profit.”

Apparently, it never occurred to him that the reason he was able to put on a pair of eyeglasses that morning was because someone earned a profit examining his eyes and making the frames and cutting the lenses. He didn’t stop to think that the whiteboard on which he wrote was made available for his use because the company that manufactured it made a profit. He didn’t quite explain how the enormous book sale taking place in the tent on the lawn outside the class was kept stocked with hundreds of titles without the mechanism of “profit.” Nor did he quite explain how a seminary could survive in high-priced Westchester County, New York without benefactors who make donations out of the profit made by their personal labor.

I am sorry to sound so sarcastic, but I am just so tired of clergy who insist on pontificating on economic topics, though they may be clueless on the subject. A roomful of young, impressionable black-robed students, clergy and clergy candidates sat nodding their heads in agreement…and I noted that St. Vladimir’s does not even offer any courses in business or economics. What half-baked notions will these men bring with them to their future homilies?

Last weekend I attended a different event, “Wealth and Poverty in Early Christianity," sponsored by the Pappas Institute at Holy Cross College (this being the Greek Orthodox Seminary in the US). A wide range of speakers from both secular and sacred backgrounds presented a truly wonderful program – the best ‘professional development’ opportunity I have ever attended, in fact. Unfortunately, the scholarship was compromised by the presence of the Roman Catholic President (and treasurer) of Boston Catholic Charities, the Rev. J. Bryan Hehir. Riding the “Social Justice” train, Rev. Hehir proceeded to criticize those who oppose taxation and programmatic largesse to help the poor. He stated that the philosophy of the [Roman] Catholic Church is such that one need not rely on the Church for implementing the church’s programs, but that other institutions – including Government – are appropriate and even necessary agents to achieve the Church’s goals. He defended Government taxation and wealth redistribution, because, (and I wrote this quote down)

“otherwise, the poor would be at the mercy of the generosity of individuals.”

Ummmm…..yeah? And? Who would you have them at the mercy of, Rev. Hehir? Of bureaucrats? Of Systems and Instructions (not that you have a vested interest in that, would you?) Of those who make their living by insuring the continuity of the poverty-relief system? Of those who take a cut of every offering made and give what’s left to the poor? How does a ‘man of the cloth’ take such a dim view of voluntary Christian generosity? Are you jaded because the world has not given to your institution as mush as you believe you need?

If I am ever destitute, I pray that I am held in the mercy of real people, of caring neighbors, of people with eyes to see and arms to hug - and not a waiting room and interminable lines at government institutions.

I should not end this without giving praise and credit where it is due. His Eminence Archbishop Demetrios, Primate of the Greek Orthodox Church in North & South America, also spoke. But the Primate’s talk consisted of a series of stories – vignettes of real people, how he has seen individuals helping individuals, even poor people assisting other poor people during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. And the overwhelming sense he conveyed was that of our individual responsibilities to our fellow man and woman.

That is a breath of fresh air. I’ll continue to promote the importance of profit and economic expansion, and the need to voluntarily support the poor around us. And I think I’m in good company, according to the writer of Proverbs 31:10-31

10 Who can find a virtuous woman? for her price is far above rubies. 11 The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he shall have no need of spoil. 12 She will do him good and not evil all the days of her life. 13 She seeketh wool, and flax, and worketh willingly with her hands. 14 She is like the merchants' ships; she bringeth her food from afar. 15 She riseth also while it is yet night, and giveth meat to her household, and a portion to her maidens. 16 She considereth a field, and buyeth it: with the fruit of her hands she planteth a vineyard. 17 She girdeth her loins with strength, and strengtheneth her arms. 18 She perceiveth that her merchandise is good: her candle goeth not out by night. 19 She layeth her hands to the spindle, and her hands hold the distaff. 20 She stretcheth out her hand to the poor; yea, she reacheth forth her hands to the needy. 21 She is not afraid of the snow for her household: for all her household are clothed with scarlet. 22 She maketh herself coverings of tapestry; her clothing is silk and purple. 23 Her husband is known in the gates, when he sitteth among the elders of the land. 24 She maketh fine linen, and selleth it; and delivereth girdles unto the merchant. 25 Strength and honour are her clothing; and she shall rejoice in time to come. 26 She openeth her mouth with wisdom; and in her tongue is the law of kindness. 27 She looketh well to the ways of her household, and eateth not the bread of idleness. 28 Her children arise up, and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praiseth her. 29 Many daughters have done virtuously, but thou excellest them all. 30 Favour is deceitful, and beauty is vain: but a woman that feareth the LORD, she shall be praised. 31 Give her of the fruit of her hands; and let her own works praise her in the gates.

As the Free State grapples with gay marriage...

Last night, a committee of New Hampshire legislators held an open hearing in Keene, NH, soliciting testimony as to how the state ought to deal with the issues of ‘civil unions’ or ‘gay marriage.’ An organized effort by both gay-rights groups and evangelical churches insured that the room was packed to overflowing, and that battle lines were drawn. Each speaker was limited to three minutes.

The discussion over the possibility of extending marital rights to other domestic partnerships was defined by positions which were mutually exclusive of each other. In addition, each of those positions also fell short of a solution to the many issue that were raised. No matter which ‘option’ is chosen – the current arrangement, gay marriage, or civil unions (as currently defined), someone loses and the arguments will continue.

On one hand, those who wish to maintain the current definition and rights inherent in heterosexual marriage saw attempts to change that as an attempt to change the social, cultural, political, and religious sensibilities to benefit a small minority. Those who would expand and those who would retain the current definition of marriage are asking the State to interfere in what is primarily an ecclesiastical rite. The fact that New Hampshire has chosen, like most states, to define marriage at all (even heterosexually) means that it has already stuck its toe into ecclesiastical waters.

At the same time, the development of a parallel universe of Vermont-style “civil unions,” as popularly conceived, is wholly inadequate. If it’s the exact same thing as marriage, then it is merely a semantic subterfuge. Regardless, it creates a ‘separate but equal’ status for gay couples, and still fails to address to rights, responsibilities, and needs of other households that are not based on sexual activity at all.

What I proposed last night tonight was a different approach that affords protection to all who seek it. What follows is part of that testimony:

“…I do not think that that State ought to have any role in defining the boundaries, purposes, or roles in marriage. Marriage is an Eccelesiastical sacrament, and should come under the purview of the Church and the Church alone - not the state, and not the Church-as-agent-of-the-State. When left to the Church, the sacrament maintains its integrity as a sacrament - not a tax status or organizational tool. If a Church wants to marry two gay men, so be it. If a Church wants to prohibit gay marriage and condemn homosexuality, so be it. Get the State out of the Churches entirely, and let them operate according to their own doctrine and consciences.

On the other hand, the State and society *does* have a vested interest in maintaining stable households. Throughout history, these households have taken many forms - and many of them have not been actively "sexual" at all. The "Mom-Dad-Kids" household is a recent product of the 1950s. Prior to that, households often included an aunt, a grandma, a neighbor's kid, etc. Colonial and pioneer families were more likely to be extended families - including those of no blood relationship whatsoever - than "nuclear" families. Between the Revolutionary and Civil Wars, the majority of marriages west of the Appalachians were common-law marriages that existed without formal state approval at all. Certainly, whenever such people make a commitment to each other, the state ought not to interfere. Rather, they ought to recognize and encourage the arrangement as a private contractual agreement to share rights and responsibilities. The application of intestacy statutes, hospital visitation rights and medical decisions, and responsibilities for debts incurred are normal and natural aspects of household life, and the state need not be in the business of deciding that some households should have those rights while others shouldn’t.

So what am I getting at?

1) Take Marriage away from the legislatures and the courts all together. Let the issue of marriage revert to being a sacrament administered by Ecclesiastical bodies alone, under their own rules without state interference or definitions.

2) Let the State acknowledge a new kind of Civil Union, which is based on Economic Stability, not sexual relations. Under such an arrangement, an elderly brother and sister (think of Marilla and Matthew in Anne of Green Gables) could just as easily be a "civil union" as a husband-wife couple, a single woman and her grandma, two gays, or two best friends who happened to live in a non-sexual house after retirement. Churches would grant marriage certificates under their own rules, and the State would issue Civil Union decrees which simply acknowledge the intent of people to live, love, and be responsible for each other, efficiently granting them a full set of rights in law.

In such a situation, The Church maintains the integrity of her Sacraments. The State recognizes - and grants security - to the many forms that households take. And, it all occurs without Christians or gays or secularists or social workers or politicians or anyone else using the State as a tool to impose a particular view of society.

Kelo v. New London: Mob Rule and Might-Makes-Right

In what will go down in history as perhaps one of the most significant nails in the coffin of American Liberty, the U. S. Supreme Court today, by a 5-4 vote, expanded the right of a city (New London, CT) to take any private property it wants so that ‘private’ development which has some ‘public good’ (such as increased tax revenues) may proceed.

In this case, the private property consists of people's homes. Never mind that one family lived in the same house for 60 years. Never mind that one man sold sandwiches for 21 years to buy his house.

The City Planners decided that they would prefer an upscale, tourist-and-shopper retail experience, and decided to take these homes by eminent domain – and in the process, enrich favored city developers. And they decided that "the people" – acting through their elected officials – have the right to run roughshod over the property rights of the minority simply because they were (1) numerous or (2) powerful. Oh, and yeah, (3) Because They Wanted It. (I weaned my children of the notion that they can take something simply because they want it when they were about three years old...)

Might Makes Right. The Mob Rule (and Reign of Terror) of the French Revolution is here.

Frederic Bastiat explained this over 150 years ago in his treatise, “The Law:”

“… the fatal tendency that exists in the heart of man to satisfy his wants with the least possible effort, explains the almost universal perversion of the law. Thus it is easy to understand how law, instead of checking injustice, becomes the invincible weapon of injustice. It is easy to understand why the law is used by the legislator to destroy in varying degrees among the rest of the people, their personal independence by slavery, their liberty by oppression, and their property by plunder. This is done for the benefit of the person who makes the law, and in proportion to the power that he holds….”

…imagine that this fatal principle has been introduced: Under the pretense of organization, regulation, protection, or encouragement, the law takes property from one person and gives it to another; the law takes the wealth of all and gives it to a few — whether farmers, manufacturers, ship owners, artists, or comedians. Under these circumstances, then certainly every class will aspire to grasp the law, and logically so.

…As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose — that it may violate property instead of protecting it — then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious. To know this, it is hardly necessary to examine what transpires in the French and English legislatures; merely to understand the issue is to know the answer.

….how is…..legal plunder to be identified? Quite simply. See if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them, and gives it to other persons to whom it does not belong. See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime.

Then abolish this law without delay, for it is not only an evil itself, but also it is a fertile source for further evils because it invites reprisals. If such a law — which may be an isolated case — is not abolished immediately, it will spread, multiply, and develop into a system.

….Do not listen to….sophistry by vested interests. The acceptance of these arguments will build legal plunder into a whole system. In fact, this has already occurred. The present-day delusion is an attempt to enrich everyone at the expense of everyone else; to make plunder universal under the pretense of organizing it. “

Would that we would listen to this man.....In the meantime, perhaps a boycott of New London might be a response for those who still believe in Liberty...

Kelo

Calling Interference on Congress....

OK, easy quiz: Which of the following words or phrases does not belong:

“Ground Rule Double, Pitcher, Yankees, Shortstop, World Series, Dugout, Congress.”

Hmmmm….that was hard, wasn’t it? Actually, for the self-appointed Inquisitors looking into the steroid ‘crisis’ in Baseball, that is a hard question. Somehow our friendly politicians have decided that only they can determine the rules and penalties under which baseball is played, thus saving the sport from itself.

God help us. Next they’ll be dictating the temperature at which Apple Pies must be baked.

The Congressional Breast-Beaters believe that they are the only solution to whatever perceived problem there is concerning ‘roids. What they have never understood, and still don’t understand, and I guess never will, is that Free Markets are always a more effective and efficient arbiter of ‘problems’ than Congress is.

Long before Congress started holding committee meetings to decide what to do about the Enron scandal, the Market had already reacted. Shareholders and investors pummeled Enron in a matter of days, punishing the company for its transgressions. While Congress talked and argued, the Market decided that Enron should die for its shenanigans. We really didn’t need Congress to say, do , or legislate *anything.*

In an effort to be ‘tough on drugs” and appear in a glamorous setting with sports superstars, the McCarthyesque drama began with an attempt to tear down Mark McGwire. Congress insisted that there was Trouble, Big Trouble, and that starts with T and that rhymes with P…..ooooops, sorry, wrong demagogue…...They insisted that the American Public needed protection from the druggies, demanded honesty from the players, and were outraged at the prospect of steroid use in professional sports.

But how did “we” the public actually feel? How did the Market react? Quite frankly, the McGwire-Sosa rivalry is credited with bringing Major league Baseball back into popularity after fans became disgusted with MLB after the players strike. In fact, the Market has sent the message that it likes Baseball. While Congress may see some Phantom of disgust, the fact is that fans are attending MLB games in increasing numbers.

If the Fans, or the Players Unions, or the Players themselves, or anyone else thought there was a problem, or unfairness, surely all of them have mechanisms to already to address those issues. Since when does Congress need to poke its nose in?

“Ah, but those are America’s heroes! Children are watching them!,” counter our politicians, those Paragons of Virtue and Heroism. “Since children watch them, they need to be held to a higher level!” they say.

Well, when I was a kid, statesmen were my heroes. I read about Lincoln and Jefferson and Washington and a host of politicians. If Congress is so intent on setting a good example, why not concentrate on their own house?

Ah yes, the makeup of the Steroid Scandal Committee is quite interesting.

There’s Tom Davis, who introduced legislation to prohibit government auditors from examining contractors billing records (I’ve never quite figured out how you conduct a fair audit under those conditions.) Or Tom Lantos, the hit-and-run driver who ran over a kid in Massachusetts and sped away in spite of the pleas and shouts of the crowd. Or Jim Bunning, who refused to recuse himself from considering his sons appointment to an appellate judgeship (the American Bar Association expressed “serious doubts” over his appointment). Or Henry Waxman, who strenuously opposes tort reform (for the public good, of course), but whose #1 contributor is the membership of the Association of Trial Lawyers.

Ah, yes, upstanding committee members who set an example for today’s youth, huh? These fine men have suggested that a Baseball player should be forced to sit out 50 games in the event of a ‘steroid’ use, since the youth of America is looking up to them.
Do they think the youth of America does not see what its elected officials do as well? Perhaps each time a Congressman does something that sets a poor example for America’s youth, we should make them sit out the next 50 votes. Or the next 50 elections……

Sitting on my shelf is a bottle of ProLab ThermaPro, a thermogenic designed to raise metabolism and help burn fat. I used this (same basic ingredients as the old Hydroxycut and Xenadrine) several summers ago, while running in the hot Dakota sun every morning while trying to lose weight and tone up (mission: successful!). Ah, but this product contains ephedrine!!! [crowd gasps in horror in the background.] When I used it in 2002, I was using a sports supplement. When the FDA banned it last year, I became the possessor of an illegal substance. When the Court overturned the FDA ban, I was an upstanding citizen again. Then the FDA declared that my 20 mg ephedrine was greater than the amount in the court case, and was illegal, and presto-chango, I’m a criminal again.

And this has been the history of steroids and sports supplements. The non-steroidal Androstendione which was available in every health and vitamin store a few years ago, all of a sudden disappeared because the FDA arbitrarily decided that since it was only “one step away” from a steroid, it is now illegal. However, DHEA, which is two steps away from a steroid, is still OK (for now…stock up while supplies last….)

The steroids that Jose Canseco mentions being used in MLB were by and large completely legal in 1980. Many of them are still legal in much of the world, including industrialized nations such as Germany and Holland. Some (Fina) can be made of 100% legal substances in your kitchen. Others are legal as veterinary substances.

The history of Sports is the history of going the extra mile and being slightly better than anyone and everyone else. Athletes give up much of their personal lives and incur a great personal cost in training. They regulate what they eat. They take vitamin supplements such as Calcium. They take Glutamine to prevent muscle breakdown. They take Milk Thistle and ALA to keep their livers healthy. They take Glucosomine to help repair their stressed joints, and if they’re in trouble, they get shots from their doctors. Some take “stacks” to raise metabolism and speed weight-loss (like my illegal aspirin-caffeine-ephedrine stack). They use Creatine as a muscle volumizer and NO2 to increase muscle pump, while downing extra-heavy whey-protein isolate shakes to increase food to muscle cells. Somewhere along the line Congress is going to find out that many use insulin to increase food nutrition entering the muscle cells as well. Some use 2-step-away prohormones like DHEA, others used 1-step-away-prohormones.’

And yes, some use steroids. Yes, the bar is constantly raised. In the effort to be bigger, better, stronger, greater. And if anyone thinks that taking steroids means you take a pill and you’re suddenly Hulk, they are sadly misinformed. Guys who take steroid injections and just ‘wait’ for the effects find themselves fat and tired. An athlete who has chosen to use steroids will be working his butt off 5-6 days a week in grueling workouts. There is no ‘free ride’ by using steroids.

It is amazing, isn’t it? If someone goes to Beverly Hills and forks over $10,000 to a surgeon to have 40 pounds of lard sucked out of their gut in a two-hour operation, that is not only legal, it’s indicative of being One of the Beautiful People. But if you work your tail off during a 12-week steroid cycle to reduce your body fat from 15% to 6% through arduous workouts, well…..”that’s illegal! That’s immoral! That’s just not right!!!! We must punish baseball players!”

Actually, it seems a hell of a lot more honest to me.

Of course, why stop at baseball players? Do they really think that that high school kids are dealing in ‘roids because of Baseball? Have they considered WWF? Do they think the models on the cover of Mens Fitness go that way from situps and spinach? Have they asked the Governor of California how he got that big? Wake up, gentlemen: when you outlaw a substance, you don’t make it go away….you make it go underground. Anyone remember Prohibition?

What’s more important, is that no one has been able to tell me just who is so harmed by an individual athlete’s choice to juice that it requires federal robocops. Let us *assume* for the sake of argument that Mark McGwire used steroids.

Has he killed anyone? Assaulted anyone? Robbed anyone? Maimed anyone? Can you point to any damage he has caused? (Of course, Congress is probably collectively guilty of all these things). So why the witch-hunt?

There are those who will say that when young people emulate these guys, they are hurt. But that’s like saying that NASCAR should be responsible for kids who drive fast , that McDonalds should be responsible for obese slobs who sit and eat Big Macs every day, and that Clint Eastwood should be responsible for a kid who shoots someone.

If the Players are upset, or the union, or the fans, or the owners, they have immediate remedies and avenues. If they have chosen not to pursue them, perhaps Congress should realize they’re barking up the wrong tree.

We don’t need Congress to decide who should be and shouldn’t be our sports heroes. We’ll do that for ourselves, thank you.

Time to Scrap Social Security....

If the Social Security System is such a good deal, why are thousands of federal and state government employees exempt from being involved in it? Why have they chosen federal and state pension systems, and private retirement options instead?

And until now, why haven’t the rest of America’s workers had that right? If we can cut through the political rhetoric, we might just be able to give our kids and grandkids better choices than we have had.

Social Security is a financial time bomb as a natural result of changing demographics. And the single biggest problem is how it is funded: current workers pay for current retirees. When today’s worker pays social security tax, it does not go into a ‘safe place’ to be held for his future retirement; rather, it is used to fund the checks of current retirees. As the Social Security system currently operates, that means that today’s workers will have to rely on their grandchildren’s taxes for retirement income.

When this system was devised more than seventy years ago, there were forty working people for each retiree. Today, as family size shrinks, that ratio is approaching only two young workers for every retiree. In the 1930s, the average life expectancy was only sixty-five; today, we have two generations of retirees living into the eighties and nineties. That means that as originally conceived, forty young people supported one senior for a relatively short period of time. It was seen as a caring social responsibility. But in today’s world, that means two young workers will need to support themselves, their family, and a retiree for almost twenty years. That’s not ‘caring’ or ‘socially responsible.’

In fact, it is the opposite: it is socially irresponsible because we are turning our grandchildren into indentured servants with a tax burden that can not be sustained.

In 1937, only 2% of an employee’s income went to fund social security; today, some have suggested that 17% will be necessary to fund the growing deficit. The greater tragedy is that the Federal Government has been borrowing money from the social security trust fund, with the promise of paying it back, with interest. But who will be paying that interest? Once again, the American worker, through his income tax. It is an incredible scheme: Americans actually pay interest on the very money they loaned the government in the first place! And that means that the cost to American workers is even higher than the published tax rates.

One of the most distressing trends in America right now is the growing wealth disparity between the wealthy and poor. The Federal Reserve has found that the difference in median net wealth between the richest and poorest jumped 20% between 1998 and 2001. The gap between whites and blacks has grown 21% . And the social security system plays a significant role in that widening gap. 52% of Americans invest privately, but the poorest, after paying for clothing, housing, food, and medical care, have little or nothing left to invest. Yet, they are forced to pay 12.4% of their income as a social security tax. This worker may pay this tax for 40 years, but if he dies without minor children or a spouse over 65, none of that money passes to his heirs. In essence, the current system robs the poor of their ability to get ahead. One in three African-American men will die without ever collecting a cent of social security, and with no inheritance to pass along, in spite of paying a compulsory retirement tax his entire life.

Private accounts are the answer to these inequities. The President’s plan would permit people to invest their own money, long-term, in their own accounts. Retirement would be something that people worked for and saved for during their own lifetime, not a tax on the next generation. In spite of what some fear-mongers have stated, no one is suggesting that people place all their retirement funds in a single gamble (the “Enron” scare tactic.) Rather, investments could be made in a highly-diverse, broad basket of stocks, bonds, and mutual funds that easily survive even should one company have trouble – precisely the plan that I, as a Commonwealth of Massachusetts employee, have the right to do. (That is not to say, of course, that the President's plan is "good enough." In the interest of political horse-dealing, he is only suggesting that we be permitted to invest a mere 4% of our social security tax. It is but a mere small step in the right direction...)

Yes, the market has ups and downs. But no one planning to retire in 2006 begins by investing in 2005. Long-term investments in the market have always yielded significant results, and retirement is a long-term process.

Those who would seek to ‘save’ the current system always choose to accomplish that task through using the coercion of government: they would tell you when you may retire, what your benefits would be, how much you would pay in taxes, and how much you would receive and on what schedule when you retire. In other words, it presupposes that government can somehow decide what is best for you. In a nation like Chile, workers decide how much they will put aside, when they will retire, where and how their money is invested, and what payment schedule they would prefer upon retirement. If they should pre-decease their retirement, their account still belongs to their estate, and their family is not left at the mercy of government payments. Returns on Chilean workers’ money has averaged 13%, far more than Americans can ever hope to make back on their social security contributions.

No wonder government workers have permitted themselves to opt out of Social Security. Perhaps its time they gave that right to the rest of America as well.

Tully