Who's Doing The People's Work?

In a lot of respects, the people are. We're not getting straight answers from either side of the aisle on health care reform. Oops! It's now being termed "insurance reform" which is closer to what it should be.

I'm willing to wager a lot of folks turning up at the town hall meetings have done what Hub has done. Down loaded the bill and read it. Especially those in our age group. We're the ones targeted by most of the scare tactics. And a lot of the truths being obscured.

That being said, I was surprised to see how many lawmakers are off on junkets. Maybe they feel it's safe haven. If no one can question them, they don't have to answer.

I would think the health care issue is of enough importance they could have postponed many of these trips. After all, it's their constituency asking the questions and for everyone off on a junket, there are entire districts without a source of information which can be held accountable.

Who are some of these lawmakers and where are they? According to The Wall Street Journal they're off to Europe with their wife or island hopping around the Pacific. Why? Well, the dozen that are on a 10 day trip in the Pacific are supposedly studying how immigration laws are applied in the Marianas, a U.S. territory. I don't know. I'd be inclined to pick up the phone and ask.

They are also slated to visit Samoa, Hawaii, Guam and Palau. No doubt to see if it's a suitable place to park the Uighurs still in Guantanamo. I especially like Representative Ellison Twittering his way around Africa bemoaning the fact he caught the sniffles while studying gender based violence in Kenya. Gender based violence in Kenya?

According to the 2000 census, Ellison's district had a population of 614,935. In the 2008 Congressional elections 322,081 people voted. That's a fair chunk of people not having a town meeting during this Congressional recess. Multiply that by the district populations of the others and you're getting into real numbers.

The idea that people have gotten engaged is wonderful. That it has gotten unruly is not unexpected considering the vagueness of what's being proposed paired with the fact it affects all of us.

I give a big thumbs up to those who stayed home to face their constituents. After watching Senator Claire McCaskill, D-MO, stand her ground I've gained a lot or respect for her. Her answers did not satisfy many and that in of itself is the message.

Sort it out and get it right before passing it into law. I guess the Democrats on those junkets are so sure of their majority that they feel no need to subject themselves to their constituents.

They best enjoy their tax payer funded escapades. If bad legislation is what passes they may find a "staycation" might have been the better choice.

You'd Think They'd Learn!

These two are enough to give women in politics a bad name! I had hoped for better when Pelosi became Speaker of the House and had no hope what-so-ever when Palin became the Republican Vice Presidential nominee.

It seems not thinking before speaking knows no bounds when it comes to gender. Frankly, I'm tired of all the name calling and inflammatory language that has been coming from both sides of the political spectrum. It is not helping the dialog. These political heavy weights are the ones who should be calming people down, not rousing their ire! I thought we had enough of being accused of being less than American when the Bush Administration accused any and everybody questioning the war, among other things, as being unpatriotic.

Now Ms. Pelosi, in an op ed piece in USA Today, accuses those of us who dare to question bad legislation as being un-American!

These disruptions are occurring because opponents are afraid not just of differing views — but of the facts themselves. Drowning out opposing views is simply un-American. Drowning out the facts is how we failed at this task for decades.

I'm having trouble believing she really said this. Would President Obama suggest she acted stupidly?

As for Ms. Palin, the current queen of Facebook and Twitter, hasn't helped the cause. I wouldn't go so far as to call her un-American, but I would suggest she too acted stupidly. She commented on Facebook that the health care plan is "downright evil".

The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama's "death panel" so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgement of their "level" of productivity in "society" whether they are worthy of health care.

You'd think someone who could put together a sentence like that might at least check the accuracy of it!

They sound like a couple of screeching cats. Can they sink any lower? Probably. There is always mud wrestling. Here all this time I've thought public service was a higher calling. Well. It seems to have no where else to go than up!

It Isn't JUST Health Care...

The news has been filled with stories regarding varying degrees of shout downs at the town hall meetings being conducted by our Congressional representatives. The Democrats are screaming bloody murder that the Republicans are "organizing" them. The union bullies are showing up to even the score. People are being injured and no one is really being heard.

Have you taken a good look at the people doing the protesting? Many of them are of my generation or close to it. They are scared. Period. Forget the claims that many are too well dressed to be authentic. What kind of an argument is that? Forget too that it's all political. The only side that's political are the politicians trying to sell their constituents on a bill that doesn't exist. It is of little comfort when the Secretary of Health and Human Services, Kathleen Sebelius, tells us not to sweat the details. Sheesh! There aren't any for crying out loud! That's part of the problem!

Think about the article by Christopher Leonard, AP business writer telling of the jobs people are taking because nothing else is available. Low paying, no benefit work such as working in slaughter houses, sewage plants and prisons. Not because they don't have the skills for better jobs, because there are no better jobs!

I haven't heard mention of it yet, but I would guess our citizens will soon be displacing all those illegal aliens doing grunt work in agricultural fields we'd never consider doing ourselves before now.

Bills have to be paid. Period. The body must be clothed and fed. Period. One does what one has to do. Remember the adage "if you've got your health you've got everything"? Do you suppose, just suppose that's part of the equation of fear here? Jobs are gone, homes lost and anxiety alone will take a toll on your health. Why would any right minded person think people wouldn't be afraid when told, be it true or not, some abstract group of bureaucrats are going to determine what they can and cannot do to to insure their well being?

It's not just the idea the health care overhaul bill is a bad one, it's all the circumstances we face in our everyday lives these days adding to the angst.

The public isn't the villain in what's taking place, no matter what their party affiliation. It's politicians trying to force one more abysmally incomplete piece of legislation on us when we've already been beaten into the ground.

Maybe Ms. Sebelius doesn't want us to concern ourselves with the details because that's where the devil is. He also occupies another place I would prefer not to experience and it's probably even worse than being forced into a job where you cut diseased and damaged flesh off chicken carcasses.

Is It Always OUR Job?

A Presidential election is scheduled in Afghanistan for August 20. The country is currently without one since Karzai's term expired in May. We are engaged in war with the Taliban who are trying to regain power. Most of what we've heard from Karzai of late is complaints about how many civilians we've been killing in fighting a battle he cannot or will not. I think most people familiar with the situation would agree Afghanistan needs new leadership.

I watched Fareed Zakarias interview all the candidates over the past several months and find the challengers worthy of a good look. Especially Ashraf Ghani who, again, articulated his vision along with his past accomplishments in today's Wall Street Journal.

In light of the fact he has had success in reshaping various aspects of Afghan society through his positions as a government official, I wonder if it may be prudent to await the election results before moving forward with our new tactic for eliminating the opium trade. According to an article by the Washington Post's Karen DeYoung, we, along with the British, plan on spending millions over the next two months trying to persuade farmers not to plant poppies.

I think the plan is flawed from the get go. The Taliban provides the seed for the farmers and the money is good.They get loans, if needed, from the drug traffickers who buy their harvests and repay them at that time. Our intention is to get them to buy wheat seeds and fruit saplings by selling them cheap and offering low interest credit. On top of that they want to entice the farm workers to shift their labor to building roads and irrigation ditches.

While the intent is noble I don't see it being accomplished within a couple of months. We're dealing with a practice that has been their livelihood for generations. They know and are comfortable with the players. It is so much a part of their culture, any change would most likely take years to incorporate.

That being said, Mr. Ghani has similar goals for his people. I'm wondering if such effort would be better coming from their own government rather than the Americans and the British?

We can't do it all. I have no problem with our forces, since they are already in country, trying to keep the Taliban and the drug traffickers at bay while Afghan security forces are being trained, but this additional effort is big brotherism much like we tried and failed at in Iraq. Resentment built rather than being quelled.

I'm just skeptical that we can win the hearts and minds of the people while waging a war no matter how many seeds and sapling we offer up at bargain basement prices. Some efforts are more easily embraced when they come from their own government rather than outsiders.

August 20 isn't that far off. Might Karzai lose? If he does there is a chance of success. If he wins all bets are off for he is little more than "mayor" of Kabul running one of the world's most corrupt and failed regimes. The end result will be another quagmire from which the US will have difficulty extracting itself and too many more of our military will die.

Meanwhile our own domestic problems are bogged down in a quagmire of their own. What is our priority?

My Congressman Is A Blue Dog

In this very red state of Idaho we sent a Democrat to Congress. Of course his predecessor was from a planet so foreign from ours, even his own Republicans couldn't support him for another term.

I like Walt Minnick and I voted for him. I will again even though challengers are coming out of the woodwork because they smell blood. Kimberly Strassel wrote an excellent piece in The Wall Street Journal about the challenges facing these Congressmen in 2010. Mainly the Rahm/Nancy pressure cooker of partisan agenda.

I don't agree with every vote Minnick has made nor do I expect to in the future. What I do respect is the fact that he has a good solid background in business and also understands not only his state, but the people who populate it. He is also his own man to the point he's willing to think things through and voice his opinion even when the party bosses wish he would just go away. He won't. He has the tenacity of a Jack Russell digging for a gopher.

Two things are troubling me. One is that one of his challengers is a veteran who is trying to link him more to his "boss" Pelosi than to his stand on issues. For obvious reasons. What bothers me is not that he is a veteran; for his service he should be applauded loudly and strongly. It does not automatically qualify him for a seat in Congress. I need to be shown more than Republican talking points and that fact.

The other, and larger issue, is the Rahm/Nancy pressure cooker. This has been a sore spot with me since the onset of the Obama administration and I don't give Obama a pass on allowing it. It's interesting to me that a federal jury has ruled former Louisiana representative William Jefferson must forfeit $450,000 in bribery receipts. You remember him; the one who had $90,000 stashed in his freezer.

He was convicted on eleven counts, including bribery, for using his influence to broker business deals in Africa. I see little difference between his case and the influence lobbyists have on congressional representatives. Rather than outright taking cash and stashing it in their freezers as Jefferson did, they take it in the form of campaign contributions.

The hyprocrisy of Congress is mind boggling. Rahm is the strong arm. Nancy knows where her bread is buttered. Sometimes their hutzpah amazes me. They are now planning to to spend $550 million to buy eight jets to accommodate their taxpayer paid junkets.

Fly commercial like the rest of us? Not a chance. They'd then have to look into the draconian practices of the TSA. Would they consider the used jets they forced the auto execs to give up? Used? Heavens no!

Do you really want this group revamping our health care system? I do not. Everything they've touched so far has unintended circumstances that are devasting to some segment of the population. Even cash for clunkers. Think about what it's doing to the used car business and those charities who take clunkers as donations as just a couple of small examples.

What this country needs is a whole lot more Blue Dogs. If the Republicans want to call themselves Red Dogs, that would be fine with me.