Ron Suskind, who was the senior national-affairs reporter for The Wall Street Journal from 1993 to 2000 and is the author most recently of The Price of Loyalty: George W. Bush, the White House and the Education of Paul O'Neill, has written a crucially important article for the NYTimes Sunday Magazine revealing why George W. Bush's reelection threatens the continuation of our democracy.
Without a Doubt by Ron Suskind: "Bruce Bartlett, a domestic policy adviser to Ronald Reagan and a treasury official for the first President Bush, told me recently that "if Bush wins, there will be a civil war in the Republican Party starting on Nov. 3." The nature of that conflict, as Bartlett sees it? Essentially, the same as the one raging across much of the world: a battle between modernists and fundamentalists, pragmatists and true believers, reason and religion...." <http://tinyurl.com/6ta4y>
Politics: We Have Nothing to Fear but Fear Itself
How to Run a Campaign on a Record of Failure: http://home.earthlink.net/~houval/gopconstrm.mov
Congress: Abdication of Oversight Responsibility
Congressman Henry Waxman (D-California) has made available a fact sheet on Congressional oversight, or more pointedly the lack thereof:
"One of Congress' main constitutional responsibilities is to conduct oversight to check abuses of power by other branches of government...[here is a] fact sheet detailing the Republican leadership's four-year failure to conduct investigations into allegations of misconduct involving Bush Administration officials, including:
* The role of the White House in promoting misleading intelligence about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and ties to al-Qaeda;
* The responsibility of senior Administration officials for the abuses at Abu Ghraib;
* The role of the Vice President's office in the award of Halliburton contracts;
* The role of the White House in withholding the Medicare cost estimates from Congress;
* The identity of the energy industry campaign contributors that met with the Vice President's energy task force;
* The role of White House officials in leaking the identity of a covert CIA agent;
* The influence of industry lobbyists in writing EPA regulations;
* Allegations of conflicts of interest at multiple federal agencies and the White House;
* The role of Attorney General Ashcroft in illegal campaign finance activities."
Read the complete fact sheet (pdf): <http://democrats.reform.house.gov/Documents/20041001120136-07195.pdf>
"One of Congress' main constitutional responsibilities is to conduct oversight to check abuses of power by other branches of government...[here is a] fact sheet detailing the Republican leadership's four-year failure to conduct investigations into allegations of misconduct involving Bush Administration officials, including:
* The role of the White House in promoting misleading intelligence about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and ties to al-Qaeda;
* The responsibility of senior Administration officials for the abuses at Abu Ghraib;
* The role of the Vice President's office in the award of Halliburton contracts;
* The role of the White House in withholding the Medicare cost estimates from Congress;
* The identity of the energy industry campaign contributors that met with the Vice President's energy task force;
* The role of White House officials in leaking the identity of a covert CIA agent;
* The influence of industry lobbyists in writing EPA regulations;
* Allegations of conflicts of interest at multiple federal agencies and the White House;
* The role of Attorney General Ashcroft in illegal campaign finance activities."
Read the complete fact sheet (pdf): <http://democrats.reform.house.gov/Documents/20041001120136-07195.pdf>
Trends: Fascism Anyone?
Contemplating a mixed bag of regimes from Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, Franco’s Spain and Salazar’s Portugal to Papadopoulos’s Greece, Pinochet’s Chile and Suharto’s Indonesia, political scientist and novelist Lawrence W. Britt looks for characteristics shared to varying degrees by fascist regimes. These include:
1. Powerful and continuing expressions of nationalism.
2. Disdain for the importance of human rights.
3. Identification of enemies/scapegoats as a unifying cause.
4. The supremacy of the military/avid militarism.
5. Rampant sexism.
6. A controlled mass media.
7. Obsession with national security.
8. Religion and ruling elite tied together.
9. Power of corporations protected. A
10. Power of labor suppressed or eliminated.
11. Disdain and suppression of intellectuals and the arts.
12. Obsession with crime and punishment.
13. Rampant cronyism and corruption.
14. Fraudulent elections.
"Does any of this ring alarm bells?" Britt asks. "Of course not. After all, this is America, officially a democracy with the rule of law, a constitution, a free press, honest elections, and a well-informed public constantly being put on guard against evils. Historical comparisons like these are just exercises in verbal gymnastics. Maybe, maybe not."
The rest of the story: Fascism Anyone? by Laurence W. Britt
1. Powerful and continuing expressions of nationalism.
2. Disdain for the importance of human rights.
3. Identification of enemies/scapegoats as a unifying cause.
4. The supremacy of the military/avid militarism.
5. Rampant sexism.
6. A controlled mass media.
7. Obsession with national security.
8. Religion and ruling elite tied together.
9. Power of corporations protected. A
10. Power of labor suppressed or eliminated.
11. Disdain and suppression of intellectuals and the arts.
12. Obsession with crime and punishment.
13. Rampant cronyism and corruption.
14. Fraudulent elections.
"Does any of this ring alarm bells?" Britt asks. "Of course not. After all, this is America, officially a democracy with the rule of law, a constitution, a free press, honest elections, and a well-informed public constantly being put on guard against evils. Historical comparisons like these are just exercises in verbal gymnastics. Maybe, maybe not."
The rest of the story: Fascism Anyone? by Laurence W. Britt
National Health -- Why It's Needed
In the last three and half years, during the reign of George W. Bush, the number of Americans without health care has increased by about five million. The cost of health care has metastasized at about 7% a year. That is twice the growth rate of the GNP. The longer this trend continues, the more people there will be without health insurance at all.
The injury to the economy is staggering. Already, at least 15% of GDP is absorbed by health care. Premiums for health insurance provided by employers have risen by more than 11% this year alone. Few employers can bear a hit like that, especially year after year, and many are forced to eliminate health coverage, to cut it back, or to shift the burden onto employees in the form of higher co-payments and deductibles.
Of the uninsured, more than 20 million are working full time.
The strain of covering workers also has led would-be employers to hold back on hiring, slowing the economy further.
Candidate Bush has reluctantly addressed the issue by proposing to offer tax credits to low-income people to help pay the cost of health insurance; and by calling for an expansion of the Health Savings Accounts program passed by Congress earlier this year to enable participants to put pre-tax money into savings plans similar to 401(k)s.
People using the shelter are forced to buy health insurance with high deductibles (at least $1,000 a year for an individual, $2,000 for a family). High deductibles, which shelter insurance companies from paying for routine medical care, are intended to hold down premiums (if you are paying a high premium on a policy carrying a high deductable, you're permitted to enquire if this works), but by discouraging doctor visits for minor illnesses and preventive care they end up adding to the cost of health care in the long run.
In theory, money from a tax-free savings account would be used to pay deductibles, and could build up over time, but the idea begs several questions, most notably where it is low-income people are going to get the money for their premiums, let alone how they will be able to find resources to build up savings. Bush says he wants to make premiums tax deductible as well. And he'll tackle the soaring cost of malpractice insurance with tort reform, long-sought by sectors of the business community, by for example capping awards for pain and suffering, fine unless you're the one experiencing the pain and suffering.
Bush's plan is expected to cost about $90 billion over 10 years, small potatoes compared to the cost of his war.
Candidate Kerry's proposal will cost 10 times as much or more, but it will cover 10 times as many people, as many as 27 million who aren't protected now.
Kerry would cover these expenditures by rolling back the Bush giveaways to taxpayers making more than $200,000 a year.
Kerry will create a government insurance pool to cover 75% of the cost of any individual claim that exceeds $50,000. Lower premiums for employers, it is hoped, will encourage more businesses to offer coverage, but there is no guarantee. Also, the senator would allow ordinary citizens to subscribe to the health coverage enjoyed by federal employees, such as members of Congress. And he would broaden Medicaid and the State Children's Health Insurance Program.
It goes without saying that Kerry's plan is a non-starter without Democratic control of both houses of the legislature, looking not likely as we make the turn into the home stretch of the campaign.
How much effect either plan would have on the heath care cost spiral is questionable.
The politicians focus on the price of health care, ignoring the fact that there are always more products and procedures to pay for and for much longer periods. Once upon a time, if you had hypertension, say, or high cholesterol, you lived with it -- without taking expensive drugs for decades on end -- until it killed you, that turn of events acting as a further brake on health costs.
The number of tests ordered by doctors has increased exponentially in the past decade. Whether this is because doctors are fearful of litigation for being "negligent" or because they're feathering their nests hardly matters here; the point is, the price to the consumer of the individual components of health care is only one factor affecting the cost.
If your health care is more costly but the length and quality of your life is also vastly improved, it does occur to you to wonder about the ROI. Though making health care affordable is vital to this country's continued progress, it may help to temper the tone of the debate if it is kept in mind that, given the extraordinary progress in the improvement of health care, it isn't extraordinary that it costs more than it used to.
Calculating the worth of health care is not easy. If your roof is leaking, you can figure out what it is costing you in damaged possessions or lost value, get estimates from a few reputable contractors, and make a reasonable decision about how fix it.
Most medical problems are far more subtle than a leaky rook, but even when the need is evident and immediate, as in the case of a broken leg, say, there is no way that you can be expected to shop sensibly either for the best price or even the best contractor. If you're insured you have no motivation to get the best price -- that's the insurer's problem, and they have probably made the decison about who you can hire to do the repairs.
It's clear that, in this as in most things, the enlightened and responsible choice in November is Kerry, not Bush. But it is equally clear that health care is not an issue that is going to be decided by the election. On the Wednesday after voting day, it will be time to start a new round of debate -- and, one hopes, on the part of the MoveOn.Orgs and True Majoritys a renewed enthusiasm for organizing -- on national health.
The injury to the economy is staggering. Already, at least 15% of GDP is absorbed by health care. Premiums for health insurance provided by employers have risen by more than 11% this year alone. Few employers can bear a hit like that, especially year after year, and many are forced to eliminate health coverage, to cut it back, or to shift the burden onto employees in the form of higher co-payments and deductibles.
Of the uninsured, more than 20 million are working full time.
The strain of covering workers also has led would-be employers to hold back on hiring, slowing the economy further.
Candidate Bush has reluctantly addressed the issue by proposing to offer tax credits to low-income people to help pay the cost of health insurance; and by calling for an expansion of the Health Savings Accounts program passed by Congress earlier this year to enable participants to put pre-tax money into savings plans similar to 401(k)s.
People using the shelter are forced to buy health insurance with high deductibles (at least $1,000 a year for an individual, $2,000 for a family). High deductibles, which shelter insurance companies from paying for routine medical care, are intended to hold down premiums (if you are paying a high premium on a policy carrying a high deductable, you're permitted to enquire if this works), but by discouraging doctor visits for minor illnesses and preventive care they end up adding to the cost of health care in the long run.
In theory, money from a tax-free savings account would be used to pay deductibles, and could build up over time, but the idea begs several questions, most notably where it is low-income people are going to get the money for their premiums, let alone how they will be able to find resources to build up savings. Bush says he wants to make premiums tax deductible as well. And he'll tackle the soaring cost of malpractice insurance with tort reform, long-sought by sectors of the business community, by for example capping awards for pain and suffering, fine unless you're the one experiencing the pain and suffering.
Bush's plan is expected to cost about $90 billion over 10 years, small potatoes compared to the cost of his war.
Candidate Kerry's proposal will cost 10 times as much or more, but it will cover 10 times as many people, as many as 27 million who aren't protected now.
Kerry would cover these expenditures by rolling back the Bush giveaways to taxpayers making more than $200,000 a year.
Kerry will create a government insurance pool to cover 75% of the cost of any individual claim that exceeds $50,000. Lower premiums for employers, it is hoped, will encourage more businesses to offer coverage, but there is no guarantee. Also, the senator would allow ordinary citizens to subscribe to the health coverage enjoyed by federal employees, such as members of Congress. And he would broaden Medicaid and the State Children's Health Insurance Program.
It goes without saying that Kerry's plan is a non-starter without Democratic control of both houses of the legislature, looking not likely as we make the turn into the home stretch of the campaign.
How much effect either plan would have on the heath care cost spiral is questionable.
The politicians focus on the price of health care, ignoring the fact that there are always more products and procedures to pay for and for much longer periods. Once upon a time, if you had hypertension, say, or high cholesterol, you lived with it -- without taking expensive drugs for decades on end -- until it killed you, that turn of events acting as a further brake on health costs.
The number of tests ordered by doctors has increased exponentially in the past decade. Whether this is because doctors are fearful of litigation for being "negligent" or because they're feathering their nests hardly matters here; the point is, the price to the consumer of the individual components of health care is only one factor affecting the cost.
If your health care is more costly but the length and quality of your life is also vastly improved, it does occur to you to wonder about the ROI. Though making health care affordable is vital to this country's continued progress, it may help to temper the tone of the debate if it is kept in mind that, given the extraordinary progress in the improvement of health care, it isn't extraordinary that it costs more than it used to.
Calculating the worth of health care is not easy. If your roof is leaking, you can figure out what it is costing you in damaged possessions or lost value, get estimates from a few reputable contractors, and make a reasonable decision about how fix it.
Most medical problems are far more subtle than a leaky rook, but even when the need is evident and immediate, as in the case of a broken leg, say, there is no way that you can be expected to shop sensibly either for the best price or even the best contractor. If you're insured you have no motivation to get the best price -- that's the insurer's problem, and they have probably made the decison about who you can hire to do the repairs.
It's clear that, in this as in most things, the enlightened and responsible choice in November is Kerry, not Bush. But it is equally clear that health care is not an issue that is going to be decided by the election. On the Wednesday after voting day, it will be time to start a new round of debate -- and, one hopes, on the part of the MoveOn.Orgs and True Majoritys a renewed enthusiasm for organizing -- on national health.
Murals on Ocean Park
Before we had the chance to thank the Santa Monica city staff for finally cleaning up the artworks under the Fourth Street overpass on Ocean Park Boulevard -- and before the restorers could provide the paintings with protective sheathing, both works were attacked anew by taggers.
It will be a shame if again this situation is left unaddressed for ages, as it was until the city's recent effort. Leaving a couple of tags unchallenged on these murals resulted the last time in an explosion of activity that included not only dozens of assaults on the pieces themselves, but also in the vandalization of homes, walls, sidewalks, cars and storefronts throughout the neighborhood.
Already, on the murals themselves, the situation is worse than it was before the cleanup. The three or four scripts of a month ago have been joined by a dozen more, including three the size of golf carts that will be very difficult and expensive to repair. Together, these calamities might as well be an advertising billboard announcing that the neighborhood is ripe for vandalizing.
Someone -- the city, the Main Street Merchants, OPCO, art activists, this newspaper -- should take up the cause of these murals before it's too late. The work on the north side, depicting the escape of the horses from the carousel on the Santa Monica Pier, is a treasure that especially deserves protection. Let's turn photographs of the new tags into wanted posters, offer a cash reward for turning the perpetrators in. And when the little monsters responsible for these desecrations are finally caught, let's hold them -- and their parents -- responsible for the cost of restoration.Appeared as a letter to the editor in the Santa Monica Daily Press, also inspiring the paper to run a front page picture of the mural graffiti earlier the same week. (For these and other comments on the issue, visit SM Daily Press, June 26-27, 2004).
It will be a shame if again this situation is left unaddressed for ages, as it was until the city's recent effort. Leaving a couple of tags unchallenged on these murals resulted the last time in an explosion of activity that included not only dozens of assaults on the pieces themselves, but also in the vandalization of homes, walls, sidewalks, cars and storefronts throughout the neighborhood.
Already, on the murals themselves, the situation is worse than it was before the cleanup. The three or four scripts of a month ago have been joined by a dozen more, including three the size of golf carts that will be very difficult and expensive to repair. Together, these calamities might as well be an advertising billboard announcing that the neighborhood is ripe for vandalizing.
Someone -- the city, the Main Street Merchants, OPCO, art activists, this newspaper -- should take up the cause of these murals before it's too late. The work on the north side, depicting the escape of the horses from the carousel on the Santa Monica Pier, is a treasure that especially deserves protection. Let's turn photographs of the new tags into wanted posters, offer a cash reward for turning the perpetrators in. And when the little monsters responsible for these desecrations are finally caught, let's hold them -- and their parents -- responsible for the cost of restoration.Appeared as a letter to the editor in the Santa Monica Daily Press, also inspiring the paper to run a front page picture of the mural graffiti earlier the same week. (For these and other comments on the issue, visit SM Daily Press, June 26-27, 2004).
"I call it my...I-Feel-Your-Pain...Plan"
Last year's congressional financial disclosure forms reveal that among the 100 senators at least 40 admit to being millionaires (of course, these figures don't take into account those who will become rich after their internships in Washington, once they are promoted to positions as lobbyists and executives for the industries they currently are charged with overseeing).
Although the magoos are fairly evenly divided between the parties (22 in the GOP, 18 from the so-called Party of the People), the three wealthiest solons are Democrats: John Kerry, whose net worth of at least $164 million makes him the richest (and who, being married to the mega-rich Theresa Heinz Kerry, should probably be listed, rock star-style, as "number 1 with a bullet"); Wisconsin Senator Herb Kohl, who has at least $111 million; and John "Jay" Rockefeller of West Virginia, worth at least $82 million.
The House of Representatives, whose sessions also might be accomplished more fittingly at Bohemian Grove, similarly includes no fewer than 123 millionaires, or nearly a third of its 435 members. [To make a parochial aside, for those of you who have wondered why Venice, California Representative Jane Harmon so often takes positions contrary to the interests of her district, it may help to know that she is the wealthiest person in the lower body, with Kerry-esque assets reportedly worth more than 160 million dollars.]
No one begrudges these worthies their fortunes. Aside from those staked by ancestors, many worked hard to build up their car dealerships, extermination companies and mortuaries to where they could afford to retire to cushier environs.
It's just that their good fortune tends to put them at a distance from the too-much-month-at-the-end-of-the-money condition of so many Americans. That is, to take only one example, if we judge by the length of time, now more than half a century, that it has taken not to achieve a national health insurance policy (an inalienable "...right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health..." -- FDR, State of the Union, Jan. 11, 1944. See Impractical Proposals 9/2/2004).
Can we really expect stewards who have legislated themselves full health care coverage, huge expense accounts and ample retirement benefits, who work shortened weeks and only part of the year, and who have no need to balance checkbooks, meet payrolls or, for that matter, take out the trash, to effectively represent the interests of regular people?
You, too, would probably find an issue such as national health less pressing if you were similarly fixed.
There is, however, a simple reform that would transform congressional attitudes toward many of the issues that bedevil ordinary citizens: Elected officials should be paid an amount equal to the average wage of the folks who live in the area they represent.
Call it the I-feel-your-pain...Plan.
There are several ways to calculate what an average person makes.
Arbitrarily, let's take Oakland, California. According to government estimates, the median income for a household in that city is $40,055, and the median income for a family is $44,384 (we can only guess that the difference between a household and a family is children). The median income for males is $37,433 and $35,088 for females. The per capita income in the city is $21,936. 19.4% of the population and 16.2% of families are below the poverty line. Out of the total people living in poverty, 27.9% are under the age of 18 and 13.1% are 65 or older.
Whether legislative delegates receive $44,000 annually or $40,000 or $37,433 or $35,088 or $21,936 will make little difference in the overall impact of the I-feel-your-pain...Plan, especially if they have to take care of their own health costs, travel expenses, etc., out of whatever, after taxes, they take home.
Nobody is trying to be unreasonable here. It's not as though anyone is suggesting they try to live on the minimum wage.
The positive impact on public policy should be obvious. Now, under I-feel-your-pain..., when they meet to consider such issues as trade policy, the minimum wage, health insurance, child care, public safety, schools, transportation, parks and rec, etc., members will do so with an immediate not to say visceral appreciation of the effect of their actions on average lives.
How many days from the convening of the first Congress after this plan is adopted do you think it will be before the Medicare Prescription Drug Bill, say, or the Bush tax cuts are up for sober reconsideration?
The plan won't be difficult to organize administratively (although, with self-interest being the chief animator of public policy, it might be harder to enact even than national health). Upon certification of election, newly chosen pols will relinquish control over their finances to blind trusts (as you probably thought is already required, and as some indeed do). From then on, each will receive a salary equal to that of the average inhabitant of his or her district.
Nothing extra will be provided, although members will of course have the same access as the rest of the populace to food stamps, low cost hot lunches at community centers, usurious short term loans against future paychecks, and the many other advantages enjoyed by the poor.
Regrettably, new delegates to Congress will almost certainly have to move to more modest digs (they might even be forced to live in the District of Columbia!), but the experience of looking for the apartment they can now afford will offer them valuable insights when they come to legislate housing and lending policies. In fact, under I-feel-your-pain, not a few representatives will qualify for public housing, though waiting lists will in all likelihood preclude their moving into accommodations before their term is up.
Unfortunately, meager as the salaries of most congresspersons will be under the plan, a majority probably won't qualify for food stamps (to be sure will take a visit to the local Social Security office, where additional useful insights await).
Those fortunate enough to arrive in their new job already covered by health insurance will find more food for thought when they try to continue coverage with their new employer.
New members may need to scope out a way to get to the Capital by public transportation and they might want to educate themselves about the location of the nearest emergency room should, god forbid, they have an accident or fall ill.
Spouses will have to work, of course, and even members themselves may want to consider taking a second job.
It will probably be advisable at first to take a little extra time helping the kids adjust to public school.
Admittedly, for some members the transition will not be easy. Not to pick on poor John Davison Rockefeller IV (his not being responsible for the sins of the fa-, well, great-grandfather, and all), but let's say you are a senator from West Virginia. In 2002 (and wouldn't you know, you'll have to rely on figures that are a little behind increases caused by inflation), the per capita income in your state was $21,738, or $81,978,262 less than the cushion you're used to.
Going from a life of privilege to the life of the common man might take adjusting (it's possible some sort of counseling is available at a clinic in your new neighborhood, especially if a local benefactor has been found to fund it), but surely living on $30,000 a year will be less traumatic knowing you will go back to your old life when your term is up.
To take a more randomly chosen example, the representative from Illinois' 15th Congressional District will be living, like his average constituent, alas, on the district's per capita income of $19,524. In Oregon's 5th District, similarly, the per capita annual income is $22,307. Worst off will be the member from a largely Hispanic-immigrant district in Los Angeles where the per-capita income is $6,997 a year, although on the bright side the district will be rich in potential candidates among that portion of the citizenry who will perceive of the job as an opportunity to get ahead.
On the other hand, in a few cases being in Congress might not be bad at all: the member from Manhattan's Upper East Side will be raking in $41,151 per year, the average income in New York's "silk stocking" district. No doubt representatives from places like Carmel, Shaker Heights and Greenwich, Connecticut will do all right for themselves, too, or at least better than the US per capita income of $27,857 (among senators under I-feel-your-pain, Joseph Lieberman and Christopher Dodd will make the most -- $43,173 -- and Trent Lott and Thad Cochran the least -- $23,448, which seems only fair given their relative contributions to the public weal).
By comparison, the current salary for rank-and-file members of the House and Senate is $158,100 per year. The leaders of both houses do better, $176,600 except the speaker who gets $203,000. A cost-of-living increase takes effect annually unless Congress votes to not accept it (here's another comparison: the purchasing power of the aptly named minimum wage peaked in 1967). In addition, by their own hands Members of Congress receive generous retirement and health benefits. They can retire with 80% of their salary at 50 if they've served at least 20 years, and they can retire anytime after 25 years in office or their 62nd birthday.
This is not to single out the legislative branch. No part of the government comes near mirroring the economic makeup of the country. The Bush cabinet is the wealthiest in history, over 80 percent millionaires and nearly half with fortunes of more than $10 million, according to the Guinness Book of World Records. The members of the Supreme Court are not shopping at Wal-Mart, either.
Having demonstrated its efficacy at the highest level of government, the I-feel-your-pain...Plan can be applied to all elected offices: the Governor of Mississippi, for example, would earn $21,120 per year, a far cry from the next Mississippi ceo's $125,500. Being mayor of sunny Long Beach, California might seem like a pleasant enough job even at $19,040 per annum until you realize the current mayor gets $93,283.93.
Of course it can be contended that the I-feel-your-pain...Plan will discourage America's best and brightest from public service. But it can be argued with equal force that the proposal will make running for office more attractive to idealists and the public spirited. In any event, the point of I-feel-your-pain is not to address the sagacity of elected officials (there is an abundance of intelligence at every level of society), but their compassion (not so much); less about the qualities of governors, more about the integrity, the righteousness, of governance.
Although the magoos are fairly evenly divided between the parties (22 in the GOP, 18 from the so-called Party of the People), the three wealthiest solons are Democrats: John Kerry, whose net worth of at least $164 million makes him the richest (and who, being married to the mega-rich Theresa Heinz Kerry, should probably be listed, rock star-style, as "number 1 with a bullet"); Wisconsin Senator Herb Kohl, who has at least $111 million; and John "Jay" Rockefeller of West Virginia, worth at least $82 million.
The House of Representatives, whose sessions also might be accomplished more fittingly at Bohemian Grove, similarly includes no fewer than 123 millionaires, or nearly a third of its 435 members. [To make a parochial aside, for those of you who have wondered why Venice, California Representative Jane Harmon so often takes positions contrary to the interests of her district, it may help to know that she is the wealthiest person in the lower body, with Kerry-esque assets reportedly worth more than 160 million dollars.]
No one begrudges these worthies their fortunes. Aside from those staked by ancestors, many worked hard to build up their car dealerships, extermination companies and mortuaries to where they could afford to retire to cushier environs.
It's just that their good fortune tends to put them at a distance from the too-much-month-at-the-end-of-the-money condition of so many Americans. That is, to take only one example, if we judge by the length of time, now more than half a century, that it has taken not to achieve a national health insurance policy (an inalienable "...right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health..." -- FDR, State of the Union, Jan. 11, 1944. See Impractical Proposals 9/2/2004).
Can we really expect stewards who have legislated themselves full health care coverage, huge expense accounts and ample retirement benefits, who work shortened weeks and only part of the year, and who have no need to balance checkbooks, meet payrolls or, for that matter, take out the trash, to effectively represent the interests of regular people?
You, too, would probably find an issue such as national health less pressing if you were similarly fixed.
There is, however, a simple reform that would transform congressional attitudes toward many of the issues that bedevil ordinary citizens: Elected officials should be paid an amount equal to the average wage of the folks who live in the area they represent.
Call it the I-feel-your-pain...Plan.
There are several ways to calculate what an average person makes.
Arbitrarily, let's take Oakland, California. According to government estimates, the median income for a household in that city is $40,055, and the median income for a family is $44,384 (we can only guess that the difference between a household and a family is children). The median income for males is $37,433 and $35,088 for females. The per capita income in the city is $21,936. 19.4% of the population and 16.2% of families are below the poverty line. Out of the total people living in poverty, 27.9% are under the age of 18 and 13.1% are 65 or older.
Whether legislative delegates receive $44,000 annually or $40,000 or $37,433 or $35,088 or $21,936 will make little difference in the overall impact of the I-feel-your-pain...Plan, especially if they have to take care of their own health costs, travel expenses, etc., out of whatever, after taxes, they take home.
Nobody is trying to be unreasonable here. It's not as though anyone is suggesting they try to live on the minimum wage.
The positive impact on public policy should be obvious. Now, under I-feel-your-pain..., when they meet to consider such issues as trade policy, the minimum wage, health insurance, child care, public safety, schools, transportation, parks and rec, etc., members will do so with an immediate not to say visceral appreciation of the effect of their actions on average lives.
How many days from the convening of the first Congress after this plan is adopted do you think it will be before the Medicare Prescription Drug Bill, say, or the Bush tax cuts are up for sober reconsideration?
The plan won't be difficult to organize administratively (although, with self-interest being the chief animator of public policy, it might be harder to enact even than national health). Upon certification of election, newly chosen pols will relinquish control over their finances to blind trusts (as you probably thought is already required, and as some indeed do). From then on, each will receive a salary equal to that of the average inhabitant of his or her district.
Nothing extra will be provided, although members will of course have the same access as the rest of the populace to food stamps, low cost hot lunches at community centers, usurious short term loans against future paychecks, and the many other advantages enjoyed by the poor.
Regrettably, new delegates to Congress will almost certainly have to move to more modest digs (they might even be forced to live in the District of Columbia!), but the experience of looking for the apartment they can now afford will offer them valuable insights when they come to legislate housing and lending policies. In fact, under I-feel-your-pain, not a few representatives will qualify for public housing, though waiting lists will in all likelihood preclude their moving into accommodations before their term is up.
Unfortunately, meager as the salaries of most congresspersons will be under the plan, a majority probably won't qualify for food stamps (to be sure will take a visit to the local Social Security office, where additional useful insights await).
Those fortunate enough to arrive in their new job already covered by health insurance will find more food for thought when they try to continue coverage with their new employer.
New members may need to scope out a way to get to the Capital by public transportation and they might want to educate themselves about the location of the nearest emergency room should, god forbid, they have an accident or fall ill.
Spouses will have to work, of course, and even members themselves may want to consider taking a second job.
It will probably be advisable at first to take a little extra time helping the kids adjust to public school.
Admittedly, for some members the transition will not be easy. Not to pick on poor John Davison Rockefeller IV (his not being responsible for the sins of the fa-, well, great-grandfather, and all), but let's say you are a senator from West Virginia. In 2002 (and wouldn't you know, you'll have to rely on figures that are a little behind increases caused by inflation), the per capita income in your state was $21,738, or $81,978,262 less than the cushion you're used to.
Going from a life of privilege to the life of the common man might take adjusting (it's possible some sort of counseling is available at a clinic in your new neighborhood, especially if a local benefactor has been found to fund it), but surely living on $30,000 a year will be less traumatic knowing you will go back to your old life when your term is up.
To take a more randomly chosen example, the representative from Illinois' 15th Congressional District will be living, like his average constituent, alas, on the district's per capita income of $19,524. In Oregon's 5th District, similarly, the per capita annual income is $22,307. Worst off will be the member from a largely Hispanic-immigrant district in Los Angeles where the per-capita income is $6,997 a year, although on the bright side the district will be rich in potential candidates among that portion of the citizenry who will perceive of the job as an opportunity to get ahead.
On the other hand, in a few cases being in Congress might not be bad at all: the member from Manhattan's Upper East Side will be raking in $41,151 per year, the average income in New York's "silk stocking" district. No doubt representatives from places like Carmel, Shaker Heights and Greenwich, Connecticut will do all right for themselves, too, or at least better than the US per capita income of $27,857 (among senators under I-feel-your-pain, Joseph Lieberman and Christopher Dodd will make the most -- $43,173 -- and Trent Lott and Thad Cochran the least -- $23,448, which seems only fair given their relative contributions to the public weal).
By comparison, the current salary for rank-and-file members of the House and Senate is $158,100 per year. The leaders of both houses do better, $176,600 except the speaker who gets $203,000. A cost-of-living increase takes effect annually unless Congress votes to not accept it (here's another comparison: the purchasing power of the aptly named minimum wage peaked in 1967). In addition, by their own hands Members of Congress receive generous retirement and health benefits. They can retire with 80% of their salary at 50 if they've served at least 20 years, and they can retire anytime after 25 years in office or their 62nd birthday.
This is not to single out the legislative branch. No part of the government comes near mirroring the economic makeup of the country. The Bush cabinet is the wealthiest in history, over 80 percent millionaires and nearly half with fortunes of more than $10 million, according to the Guinness Book of World Records. The members of the Supreme Court are not shopping at Wal-Mart, either.
Having demonstrated its efficacy at the highest level of government, the I-feel-your-pain...Plan can be applied to all elected offices: the Governor of Mississippi, for example, would earn $21,120 per year, a far cry from the next Mississippi ceo's $125,500. Being mayor of sunny Long Beach, California might seem like a pleasant enough job even at $19,040 per annum until you realize the current mayor gets $93,283.93.
Of course it can be contended that the I-feel-your-pain...Plan will discourage America's best and brightest from public service. But it can be argued with equal force that the proposal will make running for office more attractive to idealists and the public spirited. In any event, the point of I-feel-your-pain is not to address the sagacity of elected officials (there is an abundance of intelligence at every level of society), but their compassion (not so much); less about the qualities of governors, more about the integrity, the righteousness, of governance.
Election Fun: The "Give Bush a Brain" Game
Funny, frightening and addictive!
<http://www.beatgreets.com/view.pd?i=178792028&m=1361&rr=y&source=bg999>
<http://www.beatgreets.com/view.pd?i=178792028&m=1361&rr=y&source=bg999>
I'm just saying...
If you're a true Republican, you'll vote for Kerry (headline, article by Pete McCloskey, San Jose Mercury News, 2004-09-10).
Reform: Progressive Democrats of America
From a position of powerlessness at the Democratic Convention springs this proposal:
"We are committed in word and action, both personally and politically, to justice and democracy at all levels, and to the preservation and restoration of natural ecosystems in America and worldwide....We are specifically committed to the realization of new models for achieving local, national and global security that redirect the current wasteful and obscene levels of military spending toward the uncompromising and effective funding of: health and education programs; an end to discrimination; the provision of full and meaningful employment; and an end to poverty for all people....To achieve these goals, we dedicate ourselves to work within the general framework of the Democratic Party and with sister organizations to create a new, democratic, grassroots-based, nationally federated organization." -- from the website. <http://www.pdamerica.org/>
"We are committed in word and action, both personally and politically, to justice and democracy at all levels, and to the preservation and restoration of natural ecosystems in America and worldwide....We are specifically committed to the realization of new models for achieving local, national and global security that redirect the current wasteful and obscene levels of military spending toward the uncompromising and effective funding of: health and education programs; an end to discrimination; the provision of full and meaningful employment; and an end to poverty for all people....To achieve these goals, we dedicate ourselves to work within the general framework of the Democratic Party and with sister organizations to create a new, democratic, grassroots-based, nationally federated organization." -- from the website. <http://www.pdamerica.org/>
Contact Kerry-Edwards
The Kerry campaign can probably use your advice. To send them a message, go to
<http://www.johnkerry.com/contact/>. In a box on the right, look for "Policy and General Campaign Comments." The campaign is well-organized, so you should get a quick answer about Kerry-Edwards positions on your issues, and you can tell them what they might do better. There is list of offices for most states, and you can also write/call the national campaign at Kerry-Edwards 2004, Inc., P.O. Box 34640, Washington, DC 20043; 202-712-3000 (voice), 202-712-3001 (fax).
<http://www.johnkerry.com/contact/>. In a box on the right, look for "Policy and General Campaign Comments." The campaign is well-organized, so you should get a quick answer about Kerry-Edwards positions on your issues, and you can tell them what they might do better. There is list of offices for most states, and you can also write/call the national campaign at Kerry-Edwards 2004, Inc., P.O. Box 34640, Washington, DC 20043; 202-712-3000 (voice), 202-712-3001 (fax).
"Rain is the best policeman." - Police motto
Memo to Kerry Campaign:
Buy up available supplies of galoshes, rainhats and umbrellas;
hand out to voters as part of the "get out the vote" effort.
Seed the clouds over the red states on election day.
Buy up available supplies of galoshes, rainhats and umbrellas;
hand out to voters as part of the "get out the vote" effort.
Seed the clouds over the red states on election day.
Be All That You Can Be
"Besides, since [Jenna and I] graduated from college, we're looking around for something to do for the next few years." -- George W. Bush's daughter Barbara, addressing the Republican Convention. GoArmy.com
Quote: "...the excuse presidency..."
"His (Bush) is the excuse presidency -- never wrong, never responsible, never to blame ... no, it's not our fault; no, there's nothing wrong; no, we can't do better; no, we haven't made a single mistake." -- John Kerry (spotted on the energetic political blog, "I'm just sayin'..." <http://krupsjustsayin.blogspot.com/>)
Economic Bill of Rights
proposed by Franklin Roosevelt
In his State of the Union message to Congress on January 11, 1944, at a time when we were a much smaller country in terms of population and economic strength and were in the middle of fighting a world war, President Franklin D. Roosevelt called for an “Economic Bill of Rights.” 
It is difficult to imagine a "serious" Democratic leader (i.e., not a Kucinich or a Sharpton) making such a policy address today:
"It is our duty now to begin to lay the plans and determine the strategy for the winning of a lasting peace and the establishment of an American standard of living higher than ever before known. We cannot be content, no matter how high that general standard of living may be, if some fraction of our people -- whether it be one-third or one-fifth or one-tenth -- is ill-fed, ill-clothed, ill-housed, and insecure.
"This Republic had its beginning, and grew to its present strength, under the protection of certain inalienable political rights -- among them the right of free speech, free press, free worship, trial by jury, freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures. They were our rights to life and liberty.
"As our nation has grown in size and stature, however -- as our industrial economy expanded -- these political rights proved inadequate to assure us equality in the pursuit of happiness.
"We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. 'Necessitous men are not free men.' People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.
"In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all -- regardless of station, race, or creed.
"Among these are:
"The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation;
"The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;
"The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;
"The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;
"The right of every family to a decent home;
"The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;
"The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;
"The right to a good education.
"All of these rights spell security. And after this war is won we must be prepared to move forward, in the implementation of these rights, to new goals of human happiness and well-being.
"America’s own rightful place in the world depends in large part upon how fully these and similar rights have been carried into practice for our citizens."
Source: The Public Papers & Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt (Samuel Rosenman, ed.), Vol XIII (NY: Harper, 1950),
12 How. 152: “Necessitous men,” says the Lord Chancellor, in Vernon v Bethell, 2 Eden 113 (1762), “are not, truly speaking, free men; but, to answer a present emergency, will submit to any terms that the crafty may impose on them.”
I am grateful to Gary Gordon of The Fictional Times for drawing attention to this document. 40-42.
See, also: “One Third of a Nation”: FDR’s Second Inaugural Address
It is difficult to imagine a "serious" Democratic leader (i.e., not a Kucinich or a Sharpton) making such a policy address today:"It is our duty now to begin to lay the plans and determine the strategy for the winning of a lasting peace and the establishment of an American standard of living higher than ever before known. We cannot be content, no matter how high that general standard of living may be, if some fraction of our people -- whether it be one-third or one-fifth or one-tenth -- is ill-fed, ill-clothed, ill-housed, and insecure.
"This Republic had its beginning, and grew to its present strength, under the protection of certain inalienable political rights -- among them the right of free speech, free press, free worship, trial by jury, freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures. They were our rights to life and liberty.
"As our nation has grown in size and stature, however -- as our industrial economy expanded -- these political rights proved inadequate to assure us equality in the pursuit of happiness.
"We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. 'Necessitous men are not free men.' People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.
"In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all -- regardless of station, race, or creed.
"Among these are:
"The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation;
"The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;
"The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;
"The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;
"The right of every family to a decent home;
"The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;
"The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;
"The right to a good education.
"All of these rights spell security. And after this war is won we must be prepared to move forward, in the implementation of these rights, to new goals of human happiness and well-being.
"America’s own rightful place in the world depends in large part upon how fully these and similar rights have been carried into practice for our citizens."
Source: The Public Papers & Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt (Samuel Rosenman, ed.), Vol XIII (NY: Harper, 1950),
12 How. 152: “Necessitous men,” says the Lord Chancellor, in Vernon v Bethell, 2 Eden 113 (1762), “are not, truly speaking, free men; but, to answer a present emergency, will submit to any terms that the crafty may impose on them.”
I am grateful to Gary Gordon of The Fictional Times for drawing attention to this document. 40-42.
See, also: “One Third of a Nation”: FDR’s Second Inaugural Address
Christmas in Cambodia
Let me see if I have this straight.
The issue of the day is not about lying to the American people to justify an illegal, unnecessary, wasteful, destabilizing, murderous war.
It's not about the use of American power. Not the abrogation of civil liberties by the Justice Department. Not the assault by the administration on health, safety and environmental protections it took generations of political struggle to put in place. Not the multi-billion dollar faith-based antiballistic missile program. Not Senator Kerry's lackluster legislative career. Not big business dominance of both parties. Not national health. Not jobs.
Even limiting the debate to the candidates' military records, it's not about Bush's reliance on family juice to score a cushy spot in the National Guard and avoid going to 'Nam nor that he couldn't be bothered to show up as required for his already minimal service obligation.
No.
The most important issue of this political campaign is whether John Kerry exaggerated or mis-remembered exact details of his sojourn in Vietnam 35 years ago.
Even granting that Kerry invited this brouhaha by making his short stay in Vietnam the centerpiece of his campaign, a responsible, self-respecting, professional media would never allow a minor story of little import to mushroom into a central focus of a presidential race.
Be thankful the sideshow is showing signs of running down (if anyone is interested in the facts, they can be found in a long investigatory piece in the New York Times (Friendly Fire: The Birth of an Anti-Kerry Ad, 2004-08-22) and on the Annenberg Public Policy Center's FactCheck.Org <http://www.factcheck.org/>), although now, having raised doubts with whomever they can about Kerry's heroism, the president's minions can proceed to the next phase where the senator's antiwar activism will be used to attack his patriotism. The first blast came Sunday from former Senator Bob Dole (Et tu, Bob?) who, while complaining that Kerry's exit pass home from southeast Asia was undeserved because his wounds were "superficial," added that it was past time for Kerry to apologize for telling Congress about alleged atrocities in Vietnam (CNN).
It remains to be seen whether this folderol will fool enough of the people enough of the time to affect the outcome of the election, but for now the Republicans are unchallenged at controlling the parameters of the political debate.
Both sides are spending all their time looking backwards, Kerry to Vietnam, the White House to 9/11 and the tiffany tax cuts. The Democrats' bid to be the war party isn't playing very well and there isn't much time to redirect the campaign to the future -- to health care and jobs and safeguarding the environment -- before election day. Hope may well be on the way, but it's looking like it may arrive too late to help Kerry.
The progressives, meanwhile, are in their usual prone position, demanding nothing in exchange for their energies on Kerry's behalf, and pretty much assured of getting nothing if he is elected.
The issue of the day is not about lying to the American people to justify an illegal, unnecessary, wasteful, destabilizing, murderous war.
It's not about the use of American power. Not the abrogation of civil liberties by the Justice Department. Not the assault by the administration on health, safety and environmental protections it took generations of political struggle to put in place. Not the multi-billion dollar faith-based antiballistic missile program. Not Senator Kerry's lackluster legislative career. Not big business dominance of both parties. Not national health. Not jobs.
Even limiting the debate to the candidates' military records, it's not about Bush's reliance on family juice to score a cushy spot in the National Guard and avoid going to 'Nam nor that he couldn't be bothered to show up as required for his already minimal service obligation.
No.
The most important issue of this political campaign is whether John Kerry exaggerated or mis-remembered exact details of his sojourn in Vietnam 35 years ago.
Even granting that Kerry invited this brouhaha by making his short stay in Vietnam the centerpiece of his campaign, a responsible, self-respecting, professional media would never allow a minor story of little import to mushroom into a central focus of a presidential race.
Be thankful the sideshow is showing signs of running down (if anyone is interested in the facts, they can be found in a long investigatory piece in the New York Times (Friendly Fire: The Birth of an Anti-Kerry Ad, 2004-08-22) and on the Annenberg Public Policy Center's FactCheck.Org <http://www.factcheck.org/>), although now, having raised doubts with whomever they can about Kerry's heroism, the president's minions can proceed to the next phase where the senator's antiwar activism will be used to attack his patriotism. The first blast came Sunday from former Senator Bob Dole (Et tu, Bob?) who, while complaining that Kerry's exit pass home from southeast Asia was undeserved because his wounds were "superficial," added that it was past time for Kerry to apologize for telling Congress about alleged atrocities in Vietnam (CNN).
It remains to be seen whether this folderol will fool enough of the people enough of the time to affect the outcome of the election, but for now the Republicans are unchallenged at controlling the parameters of the political debate.
Both sides are spending all their time looking backwards, Kerry to Vietnam, the White House to 9/11 and the tiffany tax cuts. The Democrats' bid to be the war party isn't playing very well and there isn't much time to redirect the campaign to the future -- to health care and jobs and safeguarding the environment -- before election day. Hope may well be on the way, but it's looking like it may arrive too late to help Kerry.
The progressives, meanwhile, are in their usual prone position, demanding nothing in exchange for their energies on Kerry's behalf, and pretty much assured of getting nothing if he is elected.
Christmas in Cambodia (continued)
The U.S. Census Bureau reported yesterday that in 2003, for the third consecutive year, there was an increase in the numbers of uninsured and impoverished Americans.
"Real median household income remained unchanged between 2002 and 2003 at $43,318," according to the agency. "At the same time, the nation’s official poverty rate rose from 12.1 percent in 2002 to 12.5 percent in 2003. The number of people with health insurance increased by 1.0 million to 243.3 million between 2002 and 2003, and the number without such coverage rose by 1.4 million to 45.0 million. The percentage of the nation’s population without coverage grew from 15.2 percent in 2002 to 15.6 percent in 2003."
Those who did get jobs were faced frequently with accepting scaled-back benefits and pension plans. Many workers did not receive cost of living increases.
That neutral sounding 12.5%, by the way, means that 35.8 million people were living in poverty. That's 1.3 million more than the year before. Adding to the pain, about 800,000 children made up more than half the increase, and the child poverty rate rose to 17.6% from from 16.7% a year earlier (the government's definition of poverty conveniently leads to an undercount -- the feds think two people are poor if they make less than $12,015 a year; the cutoff point for a family of four is $18,810).
Whites, blacks and Asians saw no significant change in median household income, but the income of Hispanics went down slightly. Though male worker's earnings held steady, wages fell for women age 15 and older working full-time year-round, the first annual decline for this category since 1995.
Swift boats. Millions in poverty. You decide.
"Real median household income remained unchanged between 2002 and 2003 at $43,318," according to the agency. "At the same time, the nation’s official poverty rate rose from 12.1 percent in 2002 to 12.5 percent in 2003. The number of people with health insurance increased by 1.0 million to 243.3 million between 2002 and 2003, and the number without such coverage rose by 1.4 million to 45.0 million. The percentage of the nation’s population without coverage grew from 15.2 percent in 2002 to 15.6 percent in 2003."
Those who did get jobs were faced frequently with accepting scaled-back benefits and pension plans. Many workers did not receive cost of living increases.
That neutral sounding 12.5%, by the way, means that 35.8 million people were living in poverty. That's 1.3 million more than the year before. Adding to the pain, about 800,000 children made up more than half the increase, and the child poverty rate rose to 17.6% from from 16.7% a year earlier (the government's definition of poverty conveniently leads to an undercount -- the feds think two people are poor if they make less than $12,015 a year; the cutoff point for a family of four is $18,810).
Whites, blacks and Asians saw no significant change in median household income, but the income of Hispanics went down slightly. Though male worker's earnings held steady, wages fell for women age 15 and older working full-time year-round, the first annual decline for this category since 1995.
Swift boats. Millions in poverty. You decide.
Reagan Currency
(Los Angeles, California) Ron England has amassed 3.6 tons of copper in his garage in the Los Angeles suburb of Granada Hills after making a bet with his brother 30 years ago that he could collect 1 million pennies. But neither the U.S. Mint, the U.S. Comptroller of the Currency, coin collectors nor the local bank is interested in cashing in his stash — at least not without a charge. (Reuters)It is proposed that Ronald Reagan be remembered -- in addition to having roads and bridges, parks and airports in every county named for him -- by placing his likeness on a denomination of federal currency. The one drawback to this idea is that all the spots on U.S. cash are already taken. Putting President Reagan on a coin or bill would require eliminating a personage already there.
However, the desire to commemorate the former president by having his likeness on legal tender need not be achieved at the expense of earlier heroes, such as Alexander Hamilton and Andrew Jackson. Partisans of these worthies (even of Samuel P. Chase) are digging in their heels already for what promises to be a nasty fight. It would be regrettable to have the memorably cheerful chief executive associated with unnecessary unpleasantness when there is an alternative plan that will not only salute President Reagan, but also help the nation to solve a pressing problem: namely, what to do about the costly and nearly valueless one-cent coin.
Penny-anti campaigns have foundered in the past largely because those Americans who most frequently come into contact with the specie -- convenience store workers and others in primarily cash businesses -- have been found in studies to be confounded by the concept of rounding off. Rather than subject 7-11's customers to endless arguments over the amount of change due them, the government has chosen to keep the coins circulating, this despite the fact that, as the tragedy of poor Ron England reveals, no one wants them. Besides, as inflation continues its relentless course even in the best of times, soon enough there will come a day when pennypinchers will begin fingering the "useless" one dollar bill instead.
A Reagan currency presents an unparalleled opportunity to pay tribute to the popular leader in a way that honors him as a creative and forward-looking chief executive while achieving the fix for the penny problem that has eluded federal accountants for decades. In addition, this proposal will forever hang the president's portrait on the wall of innovation: The Ronald Reagan $14.99 bill.
Reagan paper will be a boon in the retail marketplace (what to call it -- the gipper? the ronnie? -- must be left to the collective decision of its users). For merchandise that has a sticker not matching the denomination, buying higher-priced items will be simple and mathematically fool proof: for $19.99, add a five; $24.99, add ten; $34.99: hand over a Jackson and a Reagan. No muss, no fuss and, most important, no change. For items less than $10, the gipper (for now) would be even more consumer-friendly. Use a gipper for an item priced at $9.99, get a fin back; use it to buy something costing $4.99 and get a sawbuck as change.
Besides lessening the reliance on pennies, which have become so useless that store owners leave bowls of them by cash registers and they can be found in stacks by pay phones, the gipper would save countless employee hours now consumed by making change and tallying, reconciling and wrapping Lincolns at end-of-shift. As gippers become more common, retailers will be encouraged to convert more prices to the $**.99 standard, further extending its benefits. Once the gipper's usefulness is demonstrated, in those jurisdictions where sales tax is a fact of life many merchandisers will be inspired to include the levy in the price of goods, conveniencing consumers even more.
Of course, not everything can be priced $**.99, and the gipper is not proposed as a total solution to the penny problem. But if it does its job, the need for pennies will be vastly reduced. Who knows, someday the Lincoln copper coin might be so rare it will be worth something again.
Your Picture on the Dollar Bill
Facing what it says could be budget gaps of more than $1 billion in the coming years, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the keeper of the region's mass transit system, is exploring selling naming rights to its subway stations, bus lines, bridges and tunnels. (New York Times 2004-07-27)
Governments at every level are thinking creatively about revenue enhancements.
More needs to be done, however, if the goal is to be achieved of liberating all Americans from all taxation for all time.
Kudos to the U.S. Mint, therefore, for its very profitable 50 State Quarters® program. As the agency points out, "the cost to manufacture a quarter is about 5 cents, providing a profit of approximately 20 cents per coin. Mint profits go to the general fund of the U.S. Treasury to help fund U.S. Government operations, reduce the need for new or higher taxes, and reduce the Federal Government's debt."
Taking nothing away from the 50 State Quarters® Program, but despite its $1 billion plus annual profits the Mint is missing some serious revenue opportunities by not being equally creative with paper money. It costs 5 cents to issue a quarter. It costs 6 cents to print a bill. You do the math.
Collectors, with their high level of passion, would go wild for new bills. Don't think they're passionate?: Look how excited they got when their favorite commodity made its biggest headlines in decades last fall by going peach in an effort to thwart counterfeiters.
As a beginning, action by the Mint could help to head off the fight over whether Ronald Reagan should replace Andrew Jackson on the ten dollar bill. Since the only really important thing about money is its value, no one really cares whose mug is next to the number. Why not put them both on the same bill thus creating an instant collectors' item?
Or have split runs, and not only between Jackson and Reagan: Share the $10 among all the presidents. Imagine what the Treasury could rake in on a 43 President Bills® series: "43 unique $10 bills. Collect them all!"
It'd make the quarters look like small change.
In fact, the U.S. Postal Service has been busy demonstrating what can be achieved with products aimed at collectors. In the face of declining demand for postal services, due mostly to the rise of e-mail and other electronic means of transmitting information, the post office continues to exist primarily as a publisher of stamps. And if Zora Neale Hurston and Buckminster Fuller can motivate people to purchase stamps, think of what they will do for a commodity that, PayPal not withstanding, still has utility.
The late Senator Everett Dirksen would have been right if he actually had said that "a billion here, a billion there, pretty soon it adds up to real money": the potential for truly dramatic increases in revenue resides not in selling a few billion dollars in collectors' editions, but in the vastly greater sums that can be generated by advertising.
Think, for example, of what it would be worth to the Dollar Store if a dollar bill carried a list of all the things that could be bought there. Imagine the impact on the boutique coffee market if $10 bills became known not as sawbucks but as starbucks. Or a twenty dollar bill could be printed to resemble a voucher from Loews, where it would be good for an admission, a medium popcorn and an Endless Cup.
Possibilities are endless here, too. Microsoft may be motivated to lease distribution rights to the $100, if only as a first step to copyrighting it. People with enough dough will surely want to rent space on bills as a variation on vanity license plates. As a contest come-on, "Your Picture on the Dollar Bill" would be irresistible. Short, colorful, carefully timed runs inevitably will be used to promote movies, television shows, albums and -- combining marketing ploys -- Presidents' Day sales.
The Treasury might even be able to make a little extra income on the side by selling, at a premium, advertising-free currency to people outraged by the whole idea.
In short, the government is uniquely positioned to reinvigorate an old adage by revising it into a slogan: 'it makes money to make money.'
This article was published by The Citizen Journal.
Bush-McCain
The Dems should count themselves lucky that the Bush team is devoid imagination or wit, native and otherwise. Under normal circumstances, the incumbent would be seeking to anoint his successor. Replacing the irascible and ailing veep is not possible this time, however (leaving aside the question of who'd be running the country if Cheney stepped down), because the desired candidate is the president's brother Jeb. Even the Republicans know it would be unseemly to run siblings simultaneously for the top jobs.
Senator John McCain offers the perfect solution. Extremely popular with the independent voter who has been chosen to decide this election, he would enhance the GOP's likelihood of being returned to office; too old to run himself in 2008, he wouldn't get in the way of restoring primogeniture as a factor in succession at the next turn of the election wheel. John Edwards' most obvious advantages would be neutralized if he wound up debating Grandpa Walton instead of Darth Vader.
Fortunately for Kerry and Edwards (and the nation), the Bush Leaguers are too mired in their ways to contemplate a Bush-McCain ticket. Even if it becomes necessary to replace Cheney, whether for health reasons (it's damp and drafty down in that bunker) or because he is indicted in one Halliburton mess -- Iran, Nigeria -- or another, and even if the royalists follow the same logic pursuant to Jeb's inheritance, they'll necessarily elevate some presentable but undistinguished backbencher -- Orin Hatch would fit the bill nicely -- to keep the seat warm.
We'll be told that Bush and McCain don't like each other. But personal enmity rarely stands in the path of victory. Did Jack like Lyndon? Did Dick want to hang with Spiro? Did Ford (what the heck was his first name anyway) care for Nelson? Did Ronnie have any respect for George? Nah. But McCain is another story. The senator won't be selected not because he and Junior don't get along but because he is perceived by the Bush team as outside the box, and outside the box is not a place they like to be.
The country dodged one bullet when McCain turned down Kerry's offer of the vice presidency, a move that had it succeeded might have reassured a few independents but would have further irritated many in his already itchy base. It will dodge another when the Republicans reject an opportunity to make their ticket stronger by picking McCain.
Senator John McCain offers the perfect solution. Extremely popular with the independent voter who has been chosen to decide this election, he would enhance the GOP's likelihood of being returned to office; too old to run himself in 2008, he wouldn't get in the way of restoring primogeniture as a factor in succession at the next turn of the election wheel. John Edwards' most obvious advantages would be neutralized if he wound up debating Grandpa Walton instead of Darth Vader.
Fortunately for Kerry and Edwards (and the nation), the Bush Leaguers are too mired in their ways to contemplate a Bush-McCain ticket. Even if it becomes necessary to replace Cheney, whether for health reasons (it's damp and drafty down in that bunker) or because he is indicted in one Halliburton mess -- Iran, Nigeria -- or another, and even if the royalists follow the same logic pursuant to Jeb's inheritance, they'll necessarily elevate some presentable but undistinguished backbencher -- Orin Hatch would fit the bill nicely -- to keep the seat warm.
We'll be told that Bush and McCain don't like each other. But personal enmity rarely stands in the path of victory. Did Jack like Lyndon? Did Dick want to hang with Spiro? Did Ford (what the heck was his first name anyway) care for Nelson? Did Ronnie have any respect for George? Nah. But McCain is another story. The senator won't be selected not because he and Junior don't get along but because he is perceived by the Bush team as outside the box, and outside the box is not a place they like to be.
The country dodged one bullet when McCain turned down Kerry's offer of the vice presidency, a move that had it succeeded might have reassured a few independents but would have further irritated many in his already itchy base. It will dodge another when the Republicans reject an opportunity to make their ticket stronger by picking McCain.
Wanted -- A Republican Nader
While Republican pundits and apparatchiks* make gleeful sport of the opposition for venturing another presidential campaign with an independent progressive poised to nip off with the margin of victory, many Democrats are not entirely unhappy to have an alternative at hand should their nominee tack too far to the right in the name of electability.
Ralph Nader stands ready as a reminder to John Kerry that a passionate embrace of corporatism may not be what every Democrat expects of the party's champion. It can be hoped that the sight of Nader's admonitory finger will be a sufficient brake on Kerry's apparent eagerness to trade favors for contributions.
Democrats unfazed by Nader's quixotics argue that there is little risk from his candidacy. No Democrat will vote for the consumer advocate, they believe, if so doing might result in four more years of Bush and Cheney. They have a point: though he may be as inspiring as one of those 508 varieties of American dirt on the endangered list (and what, by the way, is he proposing to do about that?), and though there may be an issue or two in which he is not quite in step with his party, Kerry is in no danger, as apparently Al Gore was, of being mistaken for the cozener currently garrisoned in the Oval Office. If we have nothing else to thank George Bush for, at least we can be grateful that his presidency has had the effect of putting to rest forever the contention that all politicians are created equal.
On the other hand, Nader's self-serving argument that third party candidates draw mainly from the incumbent party's vote doesn't hold water. The happy circumstance of Ross Perot's siphoning ballots away from Bush I in 1992 will not be repeated this year, the more so without a charismatic like Bill Clinton on the Democratic line. And, while he is correct in saying that many conservatives are dissatisfied with Bush and might look favorably on a suitable replacement, Nader is being disingenuous to suggest that he is it.
Republicans need a Ralph Nader of their own.
It's not as though conservatives don't have plenty of reasons to be unhappy with Bush. From the Medicare drug "giveaway" through "reform" of agricultural policy to amnesty for illegal aliens and "No Child's Left Behind" -- to say nothing of the Mother of All Deficits, there is plenty to rue for Republicans young or old. What better way to keep the president from straying too far from GOP scripture than to provide the party's fundamentalist base with a palatable alternative. The intention of such a candidacy will not be to defeat the president, of course, any more than Nader really wishes to help elect him; rather the purpose will be to inject the fear of, well, God into him, or at least the fear that the party faithful will transfer their allegiance to a different shepherd should the president's sermons become too larded with heretical celebrations of diversity and compassion.
The Republican Party was once the roost of birds who wished to be both Right and right. A Democrat, used to watching his leaders accommodate power, could envy the conservatives their commitment to principle. Even now, despite the outward display of unity, you suspect that only by the imposition of Prussian discipline on reactionary backbenchers and neocon intellectuals does the White House keep a challenger from rising from their midst.
Who might this paladin be? In truth, there are plenty of choices. It is forty years since the Right began systematically training intellectual gunslingers behind the ramparts of Cato and Free Enterprise and sending them in posses to hunt down and string up any candidate of either party who expresses doubt that protecting the power and profits of big corporations is the lord's work. And while you or I might find it vexing to be forced to choose one Republican we prefer above all others, surely those who have accepted Alan Greenspan into their hearts would jump at the chance to anoint a pastor more eloquent than the president at preaching the gospel of limited government and an unfettered marketplace. Four years ago, did you imagine missing Allan Keyes and Gary Bauer? And where is Patrick Buchanan when he might finally serve a purpose?
Taxing though it may be to audition possible alternatives to Bush, it is a job that must be done if the Right is not to lose ground to centrist promises during the campaign. If it didn't seem so obvious, an outsider wishing to be helpful might be moved to offer a suggestion: Rush Limbaugh.
The talk show host is the ideal casting on the right for the role Ralph Nader is so ably filling on the left. Like Nader, Limbaugh would be taken just seriously enough along the party's margins to keep the leading candidate in some kind of check without attracting a single vote from the undecided and moderate middle that will choose the next president. Again like Nader, Limbaugh has no stature or position within the party to lose; he is not a Bill Frist, say, or a Tom DeLay, who, however much they covet the job, know they would risk their already considerable influence over policy if they were to make a grab for the presidency at the wrong moment. Finally, and alas unlike Ralph Nader, when preaching to the choir Rush Limbaugh is a forceful and articulate spokesman for the positions he advocates.
Would he do it? After his drug bust, the talk show host could use a little rehabilitation; "former presidential candidate" makes a more positive resume item than "former drug-abuser" or "ex-con." Besides, if Rush Limbaugh won't die for our sins, by golly who will?
* Although, pace A.Coulter et al, is that better rendered apparatchicks?
Ralph Nader stands ready as a reminder to John Kerry that a passionate embrace of corporatism may not be what every Democrat expects of the party's champion. It can be hoped that the sight of Nader's admonitory finger will be a sufficient brake on Kerry's apparent eagerness to trade favors for contributions.
Democrats unfazed by Nader's quixotics argue that there is little risk from his candidacy. No Democrat will vote for the consumer advocate, they believe, if so doing might result in four more years of Bush and Cheney. They have a point: though he may be as inspiring as one of those 508 varieties of American dirt on the endangered list (and what, by the way, is he proposing to do about that?), and though there may be an issue or two in which he is not quite in step with his party, Kerry is in no danger, as apparently Al Gore was, of being mistaken for the cozener currently garrisoned in the Oval Office. If we have nothing else to thank George Bush for, at least we can be grateful that his presidency has had the effect of putting to rest forever the contention that all politicians are created equal.
On the other hand, Nader's self-serving argument that third party candidates draw mainly from the incumbent party's vote doesn't hold water. The happy circumstance of Ross Perot's siphoning ballots away from Bush I in 1992 will not be repeated this year, the more so without a charismatic like Bill Clinton on the Democratic line. And, while he is correct in saying that many conservatives are dissatisfied with Bush and might look favorably on a suitable replacement, Nader is being disingenuous to suggest that he is it.
Republicans need a Ralph Nader of their own.
It's not as though conservatives don't have plenty of reasons to be unhappy with Bush. From the Medicare drug "giveaway" through "reform" of agricultural policy to amnesty for illegal aliens and "No Child's Left Behind" -- to say nothing of the Mother of All Deficits, there is plenty to rue for Republicans young or old. What better way to keep the president from straying too far from GOP scripture than to provide the party's fundamentalist base with a palatable alternative. The intention of such a candidacy will not be to defeat the president, of course, any more than Nader really wishes to help elect him; rather the purpose will be to inject the fear of, well, God into him, or at least the fear that the party faithful will transfer their allegiance to a different shepherd should the president's sermons become too larded with heretical celebrations of diversity and compassion.
The Republican Party was once the roost of birds who wished to be both Right and right. A Democrat, used to watching his leaders accommodate power, could envy the conservatives their commitment to principle. Even now, despite the outward display of unity, you suspect that only by the imposition of Prussian discipline on reactionary backbenchers and neocon intellectuals does the White House keep a challenger from rising from their midst.
Who might this paladin be? In truth, there are plenty of choices. It is forty years since the Right began systematically training intellectual gunslingers behind the ramparts of Cato and Free Enterprise and sending them in posses to hunt down and string up any candidate of either party who expresses doubt that protecting the power and profits of big corporations is the lord's work. And while you or I might find it vexing to be forced to choose one Republican we prefer above all others, surely those who have accepted Alan Greenspan into their hearts would jump at the chance to anoint a pastor more eloquent than the president at preaching the gospel of limited government and an unfettered marketplace. Four years ago, did you imagine missing Allan Keyes and Gary Bauer? And where is Patrick Buchanan when he might finally serve a purpose?
Taxing though it may be to audition possible alternatives to Bush, it is a job that must be done if the Right is not to lose ground to centrist promises during the campaign. If it didn't seem so obvious, an outsider wishing to be helpful might be moved to offer a suggestion: Rush Limbaugh.
The talk show host is the ideal casting on the right for the role Ralph Nader is so ably filling on the left. Like Nader, Limbaugh would be taken just seriously enough along the party's margins to keep the leading candidate in some kind of check without attracting a single vote from the undecided and moderate middle that will choose the next president. Again like Nader, Limbaugh has no stature or position within the party to lose; he is not a Bill Frist, say, or a Tom DeLay, who, however much they covet the job, know they would risk their already considerable influence over policy if they were to make a grab for the presidency at the wrong moment. Finally, and alas unlike Ralph Nader, when preaching to the choir Rush Limbaugh is a forceful and articulate spokesman for the positions he advocates.
Would he do it? After his drug bust, the talk show host could use a little rehabilitation; "former presidential candidate" makes a more positive resume item than "former drug-abuser" or "ex-con." Besides, if Rush Limbaugh won't die for our sins, by golly who will?
* Although, pace A.Coulter et al, is that better rendered apparatchicks?
Turn Yards Into Parks
There is little in urban life more dreary than the sight of a lawn. Even when well-tended, their uniformity is deadening to the spirit; thus, they are well-suited to the tedium of suburbs but inappropriate to the more bracing landscape of the city. More often than not, a yard is not the verdant meadow that was intended, luxuriant and enticing, but a tufted and scrabbled wasteland, like the carpet of a fleabag hotel.
In the southern California community where I live, concern over the "pedestrian experience" has expressed itself in the harassment of homeowners, miscreants who use high hedges and lines of trees as shields from noise and fumes on busy thoroughfares. Although some of this shrubbery has been in place for decades, property owners suddenly face, without the benefit of public discussion, at least not in this century, of the desirability or not of such vegetation, the possibility of costly fines or expensive removal.
The lifestyle police argue that their intervention is required because high hedges are antisocial, creating areas of private space that are, well, too private. Although there must be reasonable limits on private property rights, it isn't clear that the hedge row is the place where the line should be drawn. In pursuit of the vaunted pedestrian experience, why should an ugly four foot copse be permitted while a beautifully designed and cared for twelve footer is criminalized? Doesn't any fence have the effect of confining the passerby to a narrow ribbon of concrete? And is there any legitimate lifestyle exigency (there may be safety concerns) that requires regulating the height of barriers other than those that actually intersect the public's space? If I don't want to look in my neighbor's window or permit her to peek in mine, is that anyone's business but ours?
Here are two proposals that, if adopted, would not only improve the pedestrian orientation of residential streets, but also offer additional benefits in water conservation, improved air quality, protection for native flora and fauna, and greatly expanded public space. Either scenario could be realized by means of tax incentives, cash payments, abatements, zoning exemptions, or similar forms of positive reinforcement:
Turn lawns into parks and native plant refuges.
Imagine, if you will, a street in your neighborhood, perhaps the one you use to walk to the market or take your daily constitutional. Instead of crabgrass and sandpits, each yard features a garden of native plants: here cacti, there succulents, the occasional lemonadeberry or manzinita, beds of chinese houses and fiesta flowers beyond.
In addition to inducements favoring such uses, the city could offer the assistance of gardeners, nurseries, publications, free compost, etc., to assure that even those with limited means, time or experience would be able to provide the community with beautified walkways. Where there was interest, neighborhood groups might be able to facilitate and coordinate block-long conversions.
Similarly, in the few cases where a building is set back deeply from the street, a landowner might be moved to offer the front yard as a park, a municipally maintained dell being preferable to the typical sunbaked expanse rendered inhospitable by the reek of dog urine mixed with feces flakes. If such a facility were carefully designed to encourage contemplative uses and were limited to daylight hours, with the right incentives what landowners wouldn't be pleased to have the responsibility for their troublesome and demanding front yards taken over by the parks department?
Such an arrangement would need clear boundaries to protect both the property owner and the city, but there is no reason to think the obstacles couldn't be overcome, as they are routinely for office and apartment buildings.
In the southern California community where I live, concern over the "pedestrian experience" has expressed itself in the harassment of homeowners, miscreants who use high hedges and lines of trees as shields from noise and fumes on busy thoroughfares. Although some of this shrubbery has been in place for decades, property owners suddenly face, without the benefit of public discussion, at least not in this century, of the desirability or not of such vegetation, the possibility of costly fines or expensive removal.
The lifestyle police argue that their intervention is required because high hedges are antisocial, creating areas of private space that are, well, too private. Although there must be reasonable limits on private property rights, it isn't clear that the hedge row is the place where the line should be drawn. In pursuit of the vaunted pedestrian experience, why should an ugly four foot copse be permitted while a beautifully designed and cared for twelve footer is criminalized? Doesn't any fence have the effect of confining the passerby to a narrow ribbon of concrete? And is there any legitimate lifestyle exigency (there may be safety concerns) that requires regulating the height of barriers other than those that actually intersect the public's space? If I don't want to look in my neighbor's window or permit her to peek in mine, is that anyone's business but ours?
Here are two proposals that, if adopted, would not only improve the pedestrian orientation of residential streets, but also offer additional benefits in water conservation, improved air quality, protection for native flora and fauna, and greatly expanded public space. Either scenario could be realized by means of tax incentives, cash payments, abatements, zoning exemptions, or similar forms of positive reinforcement:
Turn lawns into parks and native plant refuges.
Imagine, if you will, a street in your neighborhood, perhaps the one you use to walk to the market or take your daily constitutional. Instead of crabgrass and sandpits, each yard features a garden of native plants: here cacti, there succulents, the occasional lemonadeberry or manzinita, beds of chinese houses and fiesta flowers beyond.
In addition to inducements favoring such uses, the city could offer the assistance of gardeners, nurseries, publications, free compost, etc., to assure that even those with limited means, time or experience would be able to provide the community with beautified walkways. Where there was interest, neighborhood groups might be able to facilitate and coordinate block-long conversions.
Similarly, in the few cases where a building is set back deeply from the street, a landowner might be moved to offer the front yard as a park, a municipally maintained dell being preferable to the typical sunbaked expanse rendered inhospitable by the reek of dog urine mixed with feces flakes. If such a facility were carefully designed to encourage contemplative uses and were limited to daylight hours, with the right incentives what landowners wouldn't be pleased to have the responsibility for their troublesome and demanding front yards taken over by the parks department?
Such an arrangement would need clear boundaries to protect both the property owner and the city, but there is no reason to think the obstacles couldn't be overcome, as they are routinely for office and apartment buildings.
Lulu's Alibi, West Los Angeles
Some people come into the world with silver spoons in their mouths. Kids are born wearing, among other things, greasepaint, red diapers and chaps. If your blankie is your destiny, the dynamo behind Lulu's Alibi was preordained to create the "best damned coffee house restaurant in Los Angeles."
Growing up a "red booth baby" in the Las Vegas restaurant business, it is no surprise that Lulu followed her parent's career paths, spending 17 years as a professional waitress and bartender before creating Lulu's Alibi (1640 Sawtelle Blvd., West Los Angeles, 310-479-6007).
Opened in 1990, Lulu's -- Home of the Blueplate -- was an immediate and huge success. Jammed from early evening to early morning with a crowd of writers, painters, musicians and patron's from the nearby Nuart movie art house, the rest of the day Lulu's has a steady clientele made up of celebrities, tourists, bands from nearby recording studios, and loyal Angelenos drawn by perfectly brewed coffee, hearty breakfasts, healthy soups and sandwiches, a satisfying selection of entrees (like the Big Slab O'Mom's Oven-Baked Meatloaf), and memorable specialty desserts like Lulu's famous deep-fried Twinkie (served "naked" or blanketed in chocolate or caramel with vanilla bean ice cream).
Lulu wanted to create a place that would be a home away from home for disenfranchised Angelenos. Lulu's Alibi realizes the dream of offering a haven of community to a population that tends to spend its days isolated in offices and cars. "People want union and unity," Lulu says. "The coffee house is a place where you can hang out, meet friends, read, write, listen music."
From the beginning, Lulu's has been a multi-faceted space, a venue for AIDs benefits and earthquake relief events, for poetry readings and music performances and art exhibitions. Lulu's walls are an ever-changing gallery of paintings and fine art photographs. When Ozzy Osbourne announced the upcoming exhibition of his own drawings and paintings, there was no place other than Lulu's that he considered for his first public showing ever. Lulu's Alibi website.
Growing up a "red booth baby" in the Las Vegas restaurant business, it is no surprise that Lulu followed her parent's career paths, spending 17 years as a professional waitress and bartender before creating Lulu's Alibi (1640 Sawtelle Blvd., West Los Angeles, 310-479-6007).
Opened in 1990, Lulu's -- Home of the Blueplate -- was an immediate and huge success. Jammed from early evening to early morning with a crowd of writers, painters, musicians and patron's from the nearby Nuart movie art house, the rest of the day Lulu's has a steady clientele made up of celebrities, tourists, bands from nearby recording studios, and loyal Angelenos drawn by perfectly brewed coffee, hearty breakfasts, healthy soups and sandwiches, a satisfying selection of entrees (like the Big Slab O'Mom's Oven-Baked Meatloaf), and memorable specialty desserts like Lulu's famous deep-fried Twinkie (served "naked" or blanketed in chocolate or caramel with vanilla bean ice cream).
Lulu wanted to create a place that would be a home away from home for disenfranchised Angelenos. Lulu's Alibi realizes the dream of offering a haven of community to a population that tends to spend its days isolated in offices and cars. "People want union and unity," Lulu says. "The coffee house is a place where you can hang out, meet friends, read, write, listen music."
From the beginning, Lulu's has been a multi-faceted space, a venue for AIDs benefits and earthquake relief events, for poetry readings and music performances and art exhibitions. Lulu's walls are an ever-changing gallery of paintings and fine art photographs. When Ozzy Osbourne announced the upcoming exhibition of his own drawings and paintings, there was no place other than Lulu's that he considered for his first public showing ever. Lulu's Alibi website.
Some primary recommendations
President: John Edwards
LA County DA: Steve Cooney
Judges:
Office 72: Judge David Wesley
Office 95: Judge Dan Oki
Proposition 55: No
Proposition 56: Yes
Proposition 57: No
Proposition 58: No
John Edwards: As long as the media see the primaries as a horse race, they will continue to cover the contest, giving the Democrats more opportunities to make their case against Bush. While votes for Dean, Kucinich or Sharpton might be emotionally satisfying, only a vote for Edwards will keep the campaign alive.
Prop 55 is the $12.3 billion school bond issue. While the goal is admirable, this is the wrong time. If it fails tomorrow, it automatically reappears next November when the state's financial picture will be in better focus. Wait until then. Vote no.
Prop 56 is the most important item on the ballot. The so-called "budget accountability act" is just that. It restores functionality to a failed system that has resulted in chronically late budgets, huge deficits and finally now borrowing on a unprecedented scale to meet operating costs. The current process gives a proportionately bigger vote to the legislator who wants to disrupt the deliberative process than to those trying to make it work; it's undemocratic, a classic model for the tyranny of the minority. Before Prop 13, tax increases passed or failed by majority vote, as they do in all but two other states. The system worked fine. Now we have a nutty system that, for example, allows a tax loophole to be created by a simple majority but requires a two-thirds vote to get rid of it. It is time to make all the legislators equal again. Also, for 14 out of the last 17 years, the state began the fiscal year without a budget. Prop 56 requires the Governator and the members of the Legislature to forfeit their salaries and expenses every day the budget is late, and the legislature won't be permitted to go home until a budget passes. And the referendum creates a "rainy day" reserve that can't be tapped to increase spending. The two-thirds rule hasn't stopped ballooning deficits and it has caused malformed budgets, lowered credit ratings, and unnecessary and costly borrowing. Vote yes.
Props 57 and 58 ought to be the "incumbent bailout act." Under 57, the state goes into hock to the tune of $15 billion to meet current operating expenses. This is not borrowing for capital improvements; this is taking on massive debt in order to avoid making hard choices about what to cut from the budget and what to keep and raise taxes to pay for. 58 requires a balanced budget, again hamstringing legislators. If 57 fails, it won't be the end of the world. For one thing, there is already in place a fallback loan that is smaller and pays off sooner at a lower rate. For another it will force the state's political class to straighten out the mess now rather than drive us deeper in debt. Vote no.
LA County DA: Steve Cooney
Judges:
Office 72: Judge David Wesley
Office 95: Judge Dan Oki
Proposition 55: No
Proposition 56: Yes
Proposition 57: No
Proposition 58: No
John Edwards: As long as the media see the primaries as a horse race, they will continue to cover the contest, giving the Democrats more opportunities to make their case against Bush. While votes for Dean, Kucinich or Sharpton might be emotionally satisfying, only a vote for Edwards will keep the campaign alive.
Prop 55 is the $12.3 billion school bond issue. While the goal is admirable, this is the wrong time. If it fails tomorrow, it automatically reappears next November when the state's financial picture will be in better focus. Wait until then. Vote no.
Prop 56 is the most important item on the ballot. The so-called "budget accountability act" is just that. It restores functionality to a failed system that has resulted in chronically late budgets, huge deficits and finally now borrowing on a unprecedented scale to meet operating costs. The current process gives a proportionately bigger vote to the legislator who wants to disrupt the deliberative process than to those trying to make it work; it's undemocratic, a classic model for the tyranny of the minority. Before Prop 13, tax increases passed or failed by majority vote, as they do in all but two other states. The system worked fine. Now we have a nutty system that, for example, allows a tax loophole to be created by a simple majority but requires a two-thirds vote to get rid of it. It is time to make all the legislators equal again. Also, for 14 out of the last 17 years, the state began the fiscal year without a budget. Prop 56 requires the Governator and the members of the Legislature to forfeit their salaries and expenses every day the budget is late, and the legislature won't be permitted to go home until a budget passes. And the referendum creates a "rainy day" reserve that can't be tapped to increase spending. The two-thirds rule hasn't stopped ballooning deficits and it has caused malformed budgets, lowered credit ratings, and unnecessary and costly borrowing. Vote yes.
Props 57 and 58 ought to be the "incumbent bailout act." Under 57, the state goes into hock to the tune of $15 billion to meet current operating expenses. This is not borrowing for capital improvements; this is taking on massive debt in order to avoid making hard choices about what to cut from the budget and what to keep and raise taxes to pay for. 58 requires a balanced budget, again hamstringing legislators. If 57 fails, it won't be the end of the world. For one thing, there is already in place a fallback loan that is smaller and pays off sooner at a lower rate. For another it will force the state's political class to straighten out the mess now rather than drive us deeper in debt. Vote no.
John Edwards for President
On Tuesday, Democrats -- in California, Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, Ohio, Rhode Island, Vermont, Georgia and Minnesota -- will decide whether George Bush will be returned to office in November. The party rank and file has a rare opportunity to nominate a candidate who is not only committed to progressive ideals, especially to the struggle for economic justice, but to choose one who is also undeniably electable.
John Edwards is the best campaigner in the Democratic Party: Bubba is back, but without all the personal baggage.
Electability alone might provide justification enough for supporting Senator Edwards; it's all the reason that most Kerry supporters offer to explain their choice. For anyone looking for more than the un-Bush, however, Edwards has demonstrated the political savvy to have devised a brilliant primary strategy and the toughness of mind to have stuck with his plan through the ups and downs of a grueling campaign, a contest that at one time or another caused every other leading candidacy to fall at least temporarily into disarray.
Is he the greatest thing since croutons? Of course not. But he has a core of optimism that is remindful of Democratic heroes like Franklin Roosevelt and Hubert Humphrey, a characteristic that one FDR biographer called "a first class temperament."
Edwards is right to say that economic justice is the most important issue facing this country. And, though he may be lucky that his sunny disposition matches his program, he is also right that Americans are ready for a leader who can simultaneously communicate pride in his country and the determination to make it a better place.
What, on the other hand, aside from the untested assertion that he can win, has made John Kerry's nomination "inevitable?" Can he really beat Bush in November? If various Democratic constituencies are holding their collective noses as they pull the lever for a candidate for whom they feel no passion, how likely is it that come November the voter who is less single-mindedly anti-Bush will do the same? And while we'd like to think that on election day no one in his right mind will hesitate to choose any Democrat over Bush, why the rush to settle on Bush's replacement now? We have several months until the convention to decide what kind of leader we desire in his stead.
Does labor, for example, really wish to stand behind a candidate who favors free trade? Do gun control advocates really support a hunter who resists the idea of registering and licensing handguns? Will citizens worried about corporate greed and corruption really find their champion in the Senate Democrat who has never been happier than when sucking at the corporate teat? Do voters who think that economic injustice is our most fundamental wrong really believe that he and they are reading from the same account book? Will blacks warm to him? Will Hispanics? Will gays, if he continues to equivocate on the equity issue?
Even the groups who should be happiest with Kerry, environmentalists and death penalty opponents, must wonder in their darkest hours whether the Senator's rambling, passionless addresses and careful middle-of-the-roadism will best advance their causes.
Will peace advocates really feel properly represented by a candidate who offers as the chief guarantee of his electability the fact that he personally has killed people? Do those who favored Dean because of his pugnacity and his unequivocal position on the war in Iraq really see Kerry as the man to lead the battle against militantly right-wing majorities in Congress? For that matter, do they and others most aggrieved by U.S. militarism really look to Kerry to rein in Pentagon spending and bring the boys and girls home?
Although Kerry holds a substantial lead in the delegate count, the race is far from over, or it needn't be if progressive Democrats use their power to extract stronger commitments from the Massachusetts Senator on the issues they care about. Even though he faces an immeasurably tough fight against Bush, Kerry is already exhibiting a Mondale-like caution. When forced to, for example by the initial eruption of enthusiasm for Dean's anti-war rhetoric, Kerry can be made to take a strong position. Mostly, though, since winning in Iowa and New Hampshire, he has kept his nose to the yellow stripe down the middle of the road, the final destination of dead skunks and most Democratic presidential nominees.
You also have to worry whether, despite his vaunted war record and his undeniable courage in opposing the Vietnam war when he returned home, Kerry has the grit to stand up to the current strain of GOP ruthlessness and cynicism. In Wisconsin, he allowed mild criticism from Edwards to unsettle him. How will react to whatever Karl Rove has up his dirty sleeve?
The Kerry campaign naturally hopes the race will be wrapped up with a big win on Tuesday. But is this really the best potential outcome, for the party and especially for progressives? One benefit of the longer-than-usual primary campaign, especially now that the negative Dean, Clark and Lieberman candidacies have been silenced, has been to encourage the news media to focus, however reluctantly, on Democratic alternatives to Bush. The longer the race is undecided the longer before television news can turn its mondaine eye fully to errant nipples and car chases. With the two leading Democratic candidates concentrating their fire on Bush instead of on each other, the President is not getting the free ride usually afforded the incumbent at this stage of a campaign. And the longer the Democrats take to decide on the target they will offer, the longer will it take the Republican artillery to concentrate its fire.
Some progressives, especially those most galled by the war or gulled by his New Age palaver, plan to vote for Rep. Dennis Kucinich. Ironically, this "protest" vote will be cast by many of the same illuminati outraged that a few apostate Democrats might "throw their votes away" on Ralph Nader. Others, disheartened by Dean's withdrawal, are planning to cast their ballots for the former Governor anyway. All to the good. Non-Kerry delegates to the convention are more likely to fight hard for strong planks in the party platform on issues such as economic justice, militarism, minority rights, health care, corporate responsibility, gun control, etc., than are either cautious Kerry or the party regulars who by the time the donkey-train arrives at South Station will surely once again have the party machinery gripped tightly in their dead hands.
There'll be plenty of time after the convention to unite behind the nominee. Now is when we have the final chance to make the party understand that it must be the embodiment the nation's aspirations if it is to prevail.
More than votes for Kucinich or Dean, an endorsement of Edwards will secure real change in the party. If he wins even a few states, the campaign goes on. Were he to win a lot of them, the race would be transformed. A negative, fearful throw-the-bums-out undertone would be replaced by the upbeat cadence of a political crusade, marching into battle for a better America, not just for one that's less bad.
Even though the likelihood of Edward's overcoming Kerry is slim, the chance remains alive and should not be casually abandoned. Win or lose, a vote for Edwards sends to the Kerry campaign the message, as would ballots cast for Kucinich and Dean, that this time Democrat voters want more than business-as-usual.
Come November, we can vote against the President. Tuesday we still have time to voice our support for a leader, one who has made economic justice the center of his endeavor, a great campaigner who can make the most hardened observer of our political enterprise believe in a better, fairer America, who connects with something in each of us that makes us feel good about ourselves as Democrats and citizens, and...and we all agree this is the crux of the matter..who can win.
John Edwards is the best campaigner in the Democratic Party: Bubba is back, but without all the personal baggage.
Electability alone might provide justification enough for supporting Senator Edwards; it's all the reason that most Kerry supporters offer to explain their choice. For anyone looking for more than the un-Bush, however, Edwards has demonstrated the political savvy to have devised a brilliant primary strategy and the toughness of mind to have stuck with his plan through the ups and downs of a grueling campaign, a contest that at one time or another caused every other leading candidacy to fall at least temporarily into disarray.
Is he the greatest thing since croutons? Of course not. But he has a core of optimism that is remindful of Democratic heroes like Franklin Roosevelt and Hubert Humphrey, a characteristic that one FDR biographer called "a first class temperament."
Edwards is right to say that economic justice is the most important issue facing this country. And, though he may be lucky that his sunny disposition matches his program, he is also right that Americans are ready for a leader who can simultaneously communicate pride in his country and the determination to make it a better place.
What, on the other hand, aside from the untested assertion that he can win, has made John Kerry's nomination "inevitable?" Can he really beat Bush in November? If various Democratic constituencies are holding their collective noses as they pull the lever for a candidate for whom they feel no passion, how likely is it that come November the voter who is less single-mindedly anti-Bush will do the same? And while we'd like to think that on election day no one in his right mind will hesitate to choose any Democrat over Bush, why the rush to settle on Bush's replacement now? We have several months until the convention to decide what kind of leader we desire in his stead.
Does labor, for example, really wish to stand behind a candidate who favors free trade? Do gun control advocates really support a hunter who resists the idea of registering and licensing handguns? Will citizens worried about corporate greed and corruption really find their champion in the Senate Democrat who has never been happier than when sucking at the corporate teat? Do voters who think that economic injustice is our most fundamental wrong really believe that he and they are reading from the same account book? Will blacks warm to him? Will Hispanics? Will gays, if he continues to equivocate on the equity issue?
Even the groups who should be happiest with Kerry, environmentalists and death penalty opponents, must wonder in their darkest hours whether the Senator's rambling, passionless addresses and careful middle-of-the-roadism will best advance their causes.
Will peace advocates really feel properly represented by a candidate who offers as the chief guarantee of his electability the fact that he personally has killed people? Do those who favored Dean because of his pugnacity and his unequivocal position on the war in Iraq really see Kerry as the man to lead the battle against militantly right-wing majorities in Congress? For that matter, do they and others most aggrieved by U.S. militarism really look to Kerry to rein in Pentagon spending and bring the boys and girls home?
Although Kerry holds a substantial lead in the delegate count, the race is far from over, or it needn't be if progressive Democrats use their power to extract stronger commitments from the Massachusetts Senator on the issues they care about. Even though he faces an immeasurably tough fight against Bush, Kerry is already exhibiting a Mondale-like caution. When forced to, for example by the initial eruption of enthusiasm for Dean's anti-war rhetoric, Kerry can be made to take a strong position. Mostly, though, since winning in Iowa and New Hampshire, he has kept his nose to the yellow stripe down the middle of the road, the final destination of dead skunks and most Democratic presidential nominees.
You also have to worry whether, despite his vaunted war record and his undeniable courage in opposing the Vietnam war when he returned home, Kerry has the grit to stand up to the current strain of GOP ruthlessness and cynicism. In Wisconsin, he allowed mild criticism from Edwards to unsettle him. How will react to whatever Karl Rove has up his dirty sleeve?
The Kerry campaign naturally hopes the race will be wrapped up with a big win on Tuesday. But is this really the best potential outcome, for the party and especially for progressives? One benefit of the longer-than-usual primary campaign, especially now that the negative Dean, Clark and Lieberman candidacies have been silenced, has been to encourage the news media to focus, however reluctantly, on Democratic alternatives to Bush. The longer the race is undecided the longer before television news can turn its mondaine eye fully to errant nipples and car chases. With the two leading Democratic candidates concentrating their fire on Bush instead of on each other, the President is not getting the free ride usually afforded the incumbent at this stage of a campaign. And the longer the Democrats take to decide on the target they will offer, the longer will it take the Republican artillery to concentrate its fire.
Some progressives, especially those most galled by the war or gulled by his New Age palaver, plan to vote for Rep. Dennis Kucinich. Ironically, this "protest" vote will be cast by many of the same illuminati outraged that a few apostate Democrats might "throw their votes away" on Ralph Nader. Others, disheartened by Dean's withdrawal, are planning to cast their ballots for the former Governor anyway. All to the good. Non-Kerry delegates to the convention are more likely to fight hard for strong planks in the party platform on issues such as economic justice, militarism, minority rights, health care, corporate responsibility, gun control, etc., than are either cautious Kerry or the party regulars who by the time the donkey-train arrives at South Station will surely once again have the party machinery gripped tightly in their dead hands.
There'll be plenty of time after the convention to unite behind the nominee. Now is when we have the final chance to make the party understand that it must be the embodiment the nation's aspirations if it is to prevail.
More than votes for Kucinich or Dean, an endorsement of Edwards will secure real change in the party. If he wins even a few states, the campaign goes on. Were he to win a lot of them, the race would be transformed. A negative, fearful throw-the-bums-out undertone would be replaced by the upbeat cadence of a political crusade, marching into battle for a better America, not just for one that's less bad.
Even though the likelihood of Edward's overcoming Kerry is slim, the chance remains alive and should not be casually abandoned. Win or lose, a vote for Edwards sends to the Kerry campaign the message, as would ballots cast for Kucinich and Dean, that this time Democrat voters want more than business-as-usual.
Come November, we can vote against the President. Tuesday we still have time to voice our support for a leader, one who has made economic justice the center of his endeavor, a great campaigner who can make the most hardened observer of our political enterprise believe in a better, fairer America, who connects with something in each of us that makes us feel good about ourselves as Democrats and citizens, and...and we all agree this is the crux of the matter..who can win.
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