So after many months of being nagged to blog on his fabulous site and listening to all the fantastic things my husband has had to say in his blogs, I fianlly am popping the cork on blogging rhodesnetwork style.

In all that has been going on in politics in the last few months, the one thing that has really rocked my boat and has me ready to try walking on water, is the idea that George W and his Wall Street CEO turned Treasury Secretary buddy would even suggest that we should foot the bill for bailing out the failing financial firms on Wall Street.

If you know anything about business, you know that businesses fail.  Sometimes really big businesses fail.  This happens everyday.

When a manufacturing business in small town, podunk nowhere fails and takes down the whole city with it you don’t see the government swooping in with the fraction of the money it would take to repair the damage.

When the housing market crashes and takes down 100,000 families with it month after month, the Bush administration swoops in to “rescue” the coorporation that made the bad loans in the first place in stead of the American people for whom  they are supposed to be working.

The other thing to note about business is that NOTHING happens by suprise.  This did not happen overnight and you can bet the Wall Street numbers junkies saw it coming years ago.  They spend millions of dollars every year tracking every cent of their profits and losses.  Even if they were cooking the books for the public, they knew damn well what was happening AND THEY LET IT HAPPEN.

I think the timing is just a little too convienient.  The Republicans see that they are losing the election and offer up a ridiculous plan in the middle of the night and attempt to bully those even in their own party into voting for it with out proper discussion.  All this to create so much debt and crisis that the newly elected Democratic President would have no choice but to raise taxes. Then they could point to the Democrats and say look…they raise taxes every time! Only because the Republicans make such a mess of our country  they have to come in and clean it back up.  But they are in for it with Barack Obama… the corporate giants and wealthy are the ones who will suffer.

So, if we don’t bail them out, what should we do?

Our elected officials in Washington who are busy predicting fire and brimstone should be focused on legislation to protect the American people from the repercussions of letting the businesses fail not trying to stop them from failing.  Let them fail! 

Their responsibility is to the majority of the population not to the shareholders of major corporations and banks and their executives.

First of all, I want to take a minute to talk about the negative ads.  While it’s true that I’m an Obama supporter and that I argue that McCain’s ads are far more insidious than Obama’s, I have seen a disturbing trend as both candidates continue to go more and more negative.  I’ve been frequenting two web sites (PolitiFact and FactCheck) who are offering what I think is good information on how candidates and other supporting organizations have been misleading.

The key to this issue is this.  These kinds of ads are produced because they work!  If we as Americans choose not to pay attention to this tripe and choose to educate ourselves, these ads won’t work and won’t affect the poles thereby removing both campaigns’ motivation for producing them.  This is something we as Americans can influence.  So we need to get educated and vote in November.

Ok.  Now on to the second thing.  I just heard the news that Senator McCain is suspending his campaign because of this economic crisis and because “it has become clear that no consensus has developed to support the administration’s proposal.”  I recognize the importance of this issue and very strongly support the Senators’ return to Washington to be part of the solution.

But my gut reaction is that this does not in any way necessitate the suspending of campaigns nor the postponing of the debate.  To be even more blunt, I really think that Senator McCain is using this issue as a political tool to change the timing of the debate because the current economic crisis is harmful to his campaign.  In other words, I think this is a smokescreen.  I’m tired of political games.  To me, this is the same-old-same-old.  I’m done with Bush politics.  I want real change, and that’s not John McCain.

I wish I had more time.  I wish I had more time to expound on my ideas on this election season.  I really and truly think that Senator McCain pales in comparison to Senator Obama.

In the issue I think is most important today, Economics, John McCain subscribes to the trickle-down philosophy made “popular” by Ronald Reagan.  The idea is that making business cheaper for businesses will cause those businesses to create more jobs and reduce prices for their products.  The assumption this makes is that these businesses will go this route instead of keeping the profits!!  As an example, let’s look at the Oil companies and their record profits as the American consumer continues to struggle with gas prices that were under $1.50 / gallon eight years ago.  So is continuing the Bush tax cuts (that have been in place for years now…  How’s it going so far?) really a very good idea?

Of course, John McCain says that Barack Obama will raise taxes.  Wrong again.  Independent sources say that taxes will be cut for roughly 80% of Americans.  Who is it who stands for change?  And who is it who claims change while giving up his campaign to some of the same lobbyists who (arguably) are responsible for our current economic mess?

And don’t get be started on Governor Palin…

Alright, I’ll be brief.  She says she has executive experience including command over Alaska’s National Guard.  Then why is it that the head of that National Guard spoke luke-warm about Palin at first.  Suddenly he reversed course followed within days by (surprise!) a promotion directly from Governor Palin.

She’s not a fiscal conservative.  As both a Mayor and Governor, she turned surplus into massive debt.  And she hired a lobbyist to bring in the highest amount of earmarks (that’s “pork-barrel spending” kids!) per capita in any state in the US.

No, she didn’t say “thanks but no thanks” to the Bridge to Nowhere.  She supported it in her gubinatorial campaign and only flip-flopped after it became a political no-winner.  But she kept the $230 million.  I’m pretty sure that was an earmark.

She didn’t sell the jet on Ebay.  She listed it, but it didn’t sell.  She sold it to a campaign contributor.  At a loss.

Ultimately, regardless of what I have to say, please check out the candidates for yourself.  Check out their websites.  Read the specifics on each site about the candidates’ position on issues.  Watch the debates.  And most importantly, VOTE!!

I was listening to the radio yesterday and a talk show host named Johnny Wendell shared another interesting idea related to our current energy woes.  First he tossed out some figures, so let’s go over those and assume that they’re correct (’cause I’m not gonna take the time now).

He says that one-in-six Americans work in some way for the Government, either Federal, State, County, City, etc.  When we do the math, that’s roughly 22 million Americans.  Wendell’s idea is for all Government personnel who work in an office-type setting (so, this rules out critical jobs like police, fire, etc.) to be required to work from home one day per week.

Using my own calculations at this point, that would be roughly 17% of our population using roughly 20% less gas immediately!  By my math, that’s a reduction on average of 714,000 barrels of oil per day or about 3.4% (assuming 21 million barrels of oil per day consumed).  With oil today trading at $126 per barrel, we could save almost $90 million per day, to say nothing of the environmental benefits.

So that’s another interesting idea.  Again, it’s worth conversation.  Let’s get talking!!

Watching the news today, I saw an add from a guy named T. Boone Pickens saying that he had an idea about energy and the way we use energy in the U.S.  I couldn’t resist checking out his website, and I have to say that it’s a very interesting idea.  Click the image here to link to his site.  I’m not saying this is “THE Answer.”  I am saying that this is interesting and worth conversation.  So let’s get talking!

Bring your sense of humor for this one!  This is from a website called “I’m Voting Republican” and is loaded with satirical humor…

You can visit their website by clicking here.

The church of which I am a part holds a conference each year where pastoral and lay (non-pastoral) leadership gather together to celebrate ministry and deal with various administrative issues as well as ordain new clergy.  This isn’t just one church, but representation for roughly 400 churches in Southern California plus several Pacific Island locations.  All of us are part of a larger world-wide Protestant denomination.

I’ve been a lay member at this conference for several years running, and since I hope to be ordained I hope to attend this conference for years to come.

A major discussion took place related to the recent State Supreme Court decision in California that struck down the ban on same-gender marriage, allowing that all persons regardless of sexual identity have the right to be married (see the court’s decision here).  Because the US constitution recognizes contracts between states and because the state of California has no residency requirement for wedding licenses, this became a big deal very quickly.

This can be a dramatically divisive issue, and persons of great faith and intelligence have long argued both sides of this issue.  I have long known where I see myself in relation to same-gender marriage, and even then there were two stories that were especially moving for me.

At one point, a clergy-woman who is confined to a wheelchair joined in the dialogue.  She shared that when she was younger she met a young man who was Catholic and was also confined to a wheelchair.  They began a relationship that they eventually came to experience as one of great value for them.  They decided that they wanted to get married!  However, when they approached her fiance’s Priest, he explained that they would be unable to get married.  He told them that marriage was for procreation only and that since they were both confined to wheelchairs and physically incapable of procreation (she affirmed this in her telling of the story; the Priest wasn’t making an assumption with this part), marriage was not an appropriate expression of their relationship.  They are a man and a woman, confined to wheelchairs through no fault of their own.  Needless to say, they were devastated.  Then they got married through a Protestant church!

A couple of days later, another clergy-woman told a story about her daughter.  It seems that her daughter is a lesbian and is experiencing a call to ministry and wishes to pursue her call.  Her mother told her that the Protestant denomination of which they are a part does not ordain gay or lesbian persons, nor do they offer or even allow same-gender marriage.  She suggested that her daughter consider ordination in another denomination.  Then she asked this question:  Even if we acknowledge that homosexuality is a sin (which she categorically denies) why is this one sin singled out as making one ineligible for ordination or marriage?

Finally, I would like to offer a faith perspective on homosexuality.  Many have heard or even read various biblical scriptures that appear clear on this issue.  Justin R. Cannon has put together an interpretation that seems very well thought out.  It can be read here.

President Bush appeared to launch a political attack against Presidential hopeful Barack Obama and his Foreign Policy statement that he was willing to be in dialogue with any nation who was willing.  Bush said:

Some seem to believe that we should negotiate with the terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along.  We have heard this foolish delusion before.  As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared:  “Lord, if I could only have talked to Hitler, all this might have been avoided.”  We have an obligation to call this what it is — the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history.

Air America talk show host Thom Hartmannfound exception to this, especially after a caller today affirmed that the Democratic party was taking America down the same road that the Nazis took Germany in the 1930s.  Hartmann said:

As you can see, the formula is simple.  Identify real problems within a society, such as crime, poverty, and unemployment.  Invent a conspiracy responsible for these problems, say it is led by a specific group, and hyperinflate a few anecdotes to make the conspiracy seem vast and powerful.  Say they are trying to destroy the nation by weakening its defenses and corrupting its morals, thus causing the economic pains felt by the average person.  Rally the people behind you in self-defense to restore military strength, moral clarity, and empower great wealth and corporations to “create jobs again.”

As Leo Strauss – the mentor of the Neoconservatives currently controlling much of Washington, DC – pointed out, it’s not even necessary that the so-called enemies of the nation really be enemies.  The myth of national Victimhood, when wrapped in the language of morality, will elevate a politician to power just as surely as will true national victimhood.

It was the formula Hitler used, and it still works today.  It is, in fact, the most consistently reliable way for demagogues to gain power.  It works because it’s gradual but relentless, and progressively absorbs – and then intimidates or co-opts – both government and the media.

Hartmann then does something silly.  He uses history.  He quotes Milton Mayer’s book, They Thought They Were Free:

What happened here was the gradual habituation of the people, little by little, to being governed by surprise; to receiving decisions deliberated in secret; to believing that the situation was so complicated that the government had to act on information which the people could not understand, or so dangerous that, even if he people could understand it, it could not be released because of national security…

Sound familiar?  It gets better:

This separation of government from people, this widening of the gap, took place so gradually and so insensibly, each step disguised (perhaps not even intentionally) as a temporary emergency measure or associated with true patriotic allegiance or with real social purposes.  And all the crises and reforms (real reforms, too) so occupied the people that they did not see the slow motion underneath, of the whole process of government growing remoter and remoter…

To live in this process is absolutely not to be able to notice it – please try to believe me – unless one has a much greater degree of political awareness, acuity, than most of us had ever had occasion to develop.  Each step was so small, so inconsequential, so well explained or, on occasion, “regretted,” that, unless one were detached from the whole process from the beginning, unless one understood what the whole thing was in principle, what all these “little measures” that no “patriotic German” could resent must some day lead to, one no more saw it developing from day to day than a farmer in his field sees the corn growing.  One day it is over his head.

Hartmann’s full article can be found here.

Now, will I be so bold as to compare any American or group to the Nazi party?  No, I won’t.  What I will say is that we must consider history, we must remember, and we must be active in order to prevent the repetition of horrible acts lest we again relive the consequences.

For your consideration, I humbly offer the play “Biedermann und die Brandstifter” (“Biedermann and the Firebugs”) by Max Frisch.  In the play, a town is beseiged by arsonists who literally talk their way into peoples homes and set about with destruction.  The main character, Biedermann, is convinced that this could never happen to him.  And yet almost immediately a stranger appears and talks his way into spending the night in Biedermann’s attic.

Should we be ever vigilant?  Should we say loudly that this will never happen to us?  Should we be blinded by arrogance?  Should we be cautious and intentional in our dialogue?  Should we be active?  Alarmist?  Should we be loud?  Should we keep quiet, “good Americans?”

Ok, so for my first real “political” blog (’cause the other one I’ve posted is just excitement about voting) it’s important to know something.  My ideas about our government and how it is run swing decidedly to the left.  I’m not going to put stuff up here in any way to persuade anyone else that I’m right and that everyone who disagrees is wrong.  This is more about dialogue for me.  I would very strongly encourage any who wish to add thoughtful comments.  However, any rudeness or name-calling (or any of the ways we can diminish intelligent dialogue) will not be tolerated.  All comments are moderated!

With that in mind, I offer this link to MSNBC’s streaming video of Countdown with Keith Olbermann from last night.  He’s clearly angry at President George W. Bush for comments made during a recent interview.  Here’s the video.  Enjoy!

I’m so excited.  I just can’t hide it!  Voters are turning out in record numbers all across the country.  And now that it’s the middle of February, long past Super-Duper-Ali-uper-Tuesday, record numbers of voters are still turning out for their own primaries!!  We as faithful citizens of this great nation are making ourselves heard.  I’m so excited.

If you haven’t voted and your primary has yet to be held, make sure you do this.  It’s important.  It’s vital.

If you didn’t vote in your primary, we have a major election in November.  Vote.  It’s important.  It’s vital.