Georgie Boy

If you want to do a study of political manipulation, the best model is Ronald Reagan. His constant use of the words freedom, liberty and America, in combination with words like believe, concerned and dedication, created a kind of semi-hypnotic mantra that allowed him to get away with a lot of shoddy policies. In fact, he became known as the "Teflon President," because nothing seemed to stick to him. Now comes a president who has clearly modeled himself on Reagan, with much the same result so far, but recent indications are that the teflon is growing thin.

As well it should. Bush reminds one of a home-improvement contractor who makes a lot of promises about cost and quality, then delivers nothing even close to either. (And some of those jobs are already leaking or cracking.) To what extent he’s dishonest and/or inept is never totally clear, but his failures don’t seem to rankle his confidence; somehow he continues to carry his swagger and make even more grandiose promises of future accomplishment. Even though it’s a touch surreal, it’s this confidence that carries him over.

But after the third or fourth job he’s talked you into letting him do, say a kitchen remodeling that cost $8000 instead of $3300, and not in the color you specified, and taking 3 weeks instead of 10 days, you start to want away from him.

Then he comes to you and proclaims that the roof is in imminent danger, probably in 10-11 years, so the smart thing is to fix it now. He says he can do it for $18,000, and the whole thing will take two weeks. But since he considers the walls part of the problem somehow, his men will have to knock down and rebuild half of your outer walls too. He claims to know about a special canopy that can be put over the house at night. At some extra cost, but he’s not sure how much. "Probably not much," he states with absolute certainty.

At this point, the onus of sanity is on you. Do you agree to let him go ahead with it, or do you finally put the brakes on? Do you acquiesce to your wife when she says, "But, honey, he believes in Jesus and goes to church every Sunday?" Or do you learn from experience that the man’s promises are a sham? And if your wife then says, "Look at how sure he is about everything, dear, and he comes from such a nice family," do you cave? Or do you vote Democratic in 2006 and 2008, and clear this crew out?

Hard Truths in Tough Times

Social Security personal accounts are not that bad of an idea on several scores, but it’s not a solution if the solvency of the system (and the U.S.’s future economy in general) is in dire straits. If we were sitting on a large surplus, this would be a peachy-keen idea. But according to the Bush Administration projections, the country would have to finance the personal accounts to the tune of 5 trillion dollars over the first 20 years of full implementation. Even if that’s accurate, it’s way too much added stress on an already morbidly underfinanced economy.

But let’s remind ourselves of other Bush Administration projections. First, there was the claim that there could be a huge tax cut without creating a deficit. During the eventual eight years of this group’s tenure, that misapprehension amounts to a cool 3 trillion (3000 billion!).

Next, the Bushies confidently computed the Iraq war cost as $1.7 billion. By the middle of next year the war expenditures will pass 200 billion (9 billion of that is somehow "missing," but that’s another blog entry). By 2010, the Congressional Budget Office estimates the cost to be around 600 billion.

Another example would be the senior’s drug bill. The outlays for that will likely be triple what they swore up and down it would be -- when they were hammering members to pass it.

So, in summary, we have an administration that, like a sleazy used-car salesman or a 17-year-old on prom night, will say whatever is necessary to get you to go along with what they want you to do. The part I don’t get, though, the part I find appallingly disconnected from reality, is how the Bush Administration can be considered to still have a shred of credibility.

How Power Corrupts

I don’t think anyone not a part of politics in Washington can comprehend the intensely corrupting influence that money and power has on the elected representatives and senators. They are deluged, more like immersed, in expensive dinners and private-plane trips to exotic locales where they stay in lavishly appointed suites, and other inducements, including high-priced "escorts."

At these dinners, hotels and private resorts they meet with the wealthy and their associates, where they’re greased and oiled with the idea that they’re part of the elite, a "smart player," and "someone we can trust." It’s all legal, comes under the label of "access," and is thoroughly not in the best interests of the majority of Americans.

When people think about what corruption in high places actually constitutes, I think many of them think in terms of illegality. But the ugly fact is that most corruption is perfectly, if insidiously, legal. Countless examples abound, from these free trips and expensive meals for elected officials (provided by those looking for favorable legislation) to people serving on commissions overseeing drug and product approval who receive money as "advisors" from the industries they’re supposedly being objective about.

I’ve long wondered why more of these sorts of things didn’t end up in the mainstream media, instead of just the alternate press, until I did some research and found out the logical explanation. It’s the same reason that Democrats and Republicans shy away from accusing each other of this kind of corruption; the mainstream media has itself become totally compromised in a very similar way.

Besides the elephant-in-the-room fact that the corporations finance the mass media with their advertising (let me repeat that: The corporations finance the mass media), influential journalists and executives are co-opted by being given huge fees as advisors by corporations or as speakers at their gatherings. To ask what the solution to this endemic, pandemic epidemic is ... is to elicit a howl of laughter from those at the top of this diamond-encased dung heap.

As Twilight Descends

The 20th Century has been aptly named The American Century, but not many could have predicted in 1990 how fast this American Empire would sink come the 21st Century? Sure, there were signs back then, but there was also optimism that we could turn things around, that our continued greatness was ensured by Manifest Destiny.

The Clinton years managed to forestall some of the worst trends, like our national debt, and people living in poverty. During the 90's the U.S. had a clear hegemony in the world as the one undisputed superpower and, except for Muslim extremists, enjoyed good relations with the other major and minor powers around the globe.

But how fast things can be turned around! The surpluses that Clinton left as part of his fiscally responsible legacy have been turned into mammoth deficits, now estimated at another 2 trillion over the next 3 years. (Perspective; It took almost 185 years to run up the national debt to 2 trillion, the bulk of that coming during the Reagan and Bush I Administrations.)

Since 2000, 4.3 million more Americans are living in poverty, and those without health insurance has risen to 45 million. Every other industrialized nation reports a lowering of poverty and has some kind of national health program.

Within a few years, the Baby Boomers will start retiring and combined with the fact that medical costs have not been curtailed, their combined Medicare and Social Security bill, added to the Medicaid program, has a 50 trillion dollar shortfall in the next several decades. When you factor in the massive trade deficit and falling dollar, the wisdom of banks and foreign countries continuing to buy our treasury bills (which is what constitutes the national debt) comes into question.

The main components of our economic superiority have been our aviation/aerospace and high-tech industries. Europe is superceding us in the former (Airbus and successful planetary probes) and Asia in the latter. A recent illustration of this decline occurred in the annual college competition of worldwide computer programming departments. The U.S., having won regularly until its last victory in 1997, has dropped lower each year, and our best college finished tied for 17th this year.

Two other areas of American superiority, the automobiles and bio-medical industries, are also facing into suddenly stiffer competition. Japan has taken several percentage points off of our world market share in the past few years and China looms as a super-competitor to both countries. Most of us have enjoyed buying low-cost items manufactured in China, and now they're going to use their cheap labor force and increasingly erudite populace to make cars. How will Americans react when they can buy a Chinese car for $7500 that compares favorably with a $17,500 U.S.-made car? Answer: Case closed.

As for bio-medical, the trillion-dollar market of the future (one that 5 years ago had America as its leader) is the stem-cell based disease cures and regenerative market. But due to the misguided dictates of a president catering to the fanatical right of his party, that ship has passed us by. Several countries are now ahead of us in this area, and that number will only grow in the next 3 years of this administration's tenure.

Another area, public health, while not that good in 1990, still showed signs of possible improvement, as the popular trend to diet and jog was seemingly taking hold. What has happened since then is a national embarrassment (and don’t think the rest of the world is unaware of it) as around two-thirds of adults are now overweight, and we’re spending 15% of our national income on health care to treat an ever-weaker population.

So, just now when we are facing into stiff competition from Europe, China, Asia and India for the world market, our knees are buckling from national laziness, moral decadence, an infatuation with tawdry entertainment and sports, as well as bad political decision-making. But our military is strong, right? Well, the price tag on that will be hard to sustain if the economy goes south, and we’re seeing early signs of that with all the current base closings. Add to that the way we’re overly stretched with our troops, and falling woefully short of our recruitment goals (mostly due to the mistreatment of current recruits) and even our continued military dominance will be called into question within about 10 years.

So that’s the unpleasant picture. If it’s any consolation, there hasn’t been an empire yet that didn’t fall in time, mostly from the same sort of things we’re experiencing. What’s a little shocking, though, is the speed with which we’re declining, greatly exacerbated by the Bush Administration policies.

Around the world, our positivity rating in polls has gone from the 65% to 90% range after 9/11 down to 10% to 35% currently, the latter numbers being from Great Britain. Nowhere in the world are we viewed well by a majority of the people. What this means in practical terms is that whenever they have a chance to grease the wheels of our decline, they’ll do it, whether in what they buy or the policies and politicians they support.

Just the Facts

Let’s look at the big picture trend of the U.S. economy, to see what all the whining is about. The income going to the richest 1% in the U.S. has gone up almost 350% in real terms in the past twenty years. But how much did that rising tide raise all the little boats? Answer: the income of the poorest 40% went up by only 12%.

Put another way, twenty years ago, The top 1% received just 7.9% of national income, compared to a whopping 16.7% in 2003, a pure doubling. The share of the poorest 40%, in contrast, declined from 18.8% to 13.2%.

Compounding the problem for the lower 40 is the fact that health care costs, whether in the form of health insurance or out-of-pocket expenses for the 45 million without insurance, has risen over 250% in that same span of time.

Faced with these facts, the Republican-led Congress, at the behest of the man from Texas, has slashed hundreds of billions off the tax bills of that affluent 1%, while doing nothing about out-of-control rises in healthcare and medical insurance. This has led to untold stress and misery on the part of those struggling Americans trying to protect themselves and their families from the wolf at the door.

In a short number of years, when this situation is reversed (and it will be, when the public finally wakes up), the people will look back at this period as the shameful, unconscionable aberration that it is. But an even stronger emotion will be their own embarrassment that, in a democracy, this dereliction of the public trust was allowed to go on for so long.

A Friday the Thirteenth Reflection

In 20 years, when historians debate what the greatest failure of the GWB presidency was, some will opt for the fact that he cut taxes and raised expenditures just as we entered the era of entitlements overload, and while conducting an expensive foreign war. Others might consider the rupturing of the separation of church and state, and the consequences that befell the generation that followed. But the one that my money is on is the failure of the non-proliferation contingent of the Bush foreign policy.

By his recklessly calling Iran and North Korea part of the "Axis of Evil" along with Iraq, then attacking Iraq, Bush pushed those two countries over the edge into nuclear bomb-building. It can’t be put any truer or simpler. Neither had any nuclear bombs, then they were threatened by the world’s one superpower, then they proceeded to get the bomb.

To step back into the present imbroglio over John Bolton for a moment, the spin doctors of the Bush Administration have been touting Bolton these past few weeks by saying that the non-proliferation aspect of the U.S. foreign policy, headed by Bolton, was perhaps the most successful prong of our State Department, citing Libya’s stepdown as the glowing example of that policy success.

The fact is that the two nations in the world that we least want to have nuclear weapons, North Korea and Iran, have announced in the past week that they are moving irrevocably forward with their programs. As for Libya, as a condition of negotiation with Colin Powell, Libya insisted that Bolton not be present at the table. So even Libya saw him as an intolerably boorish bad actor.

To stay with the Bolton thing a moment, the spin surgeons are now all saying that a tough guy like Bolton is "needed at the U.N. to clean it up," as if his job is to be the U.N.’s new boss. An arrogant speechifier like him will not only be shunned at that establishment, he will further alienate Europe, China and the rest of the world – the other 96% of the planet.

Now, to bring this full circle, if we had been properly diplomatic (think Clinton, with Madeline Albright and Jimmy Carter as two main envoys) we could have gotten Europe to stop Iran’s program, as Iran has a large economic relationship with Europe. (Of course, not scaring them to begin with would have been the best thing.) But Europe no longer cares to do our bidding; they in fact express their animosity to this White House by doing the opposite when possible. If Iran goes nuclear, and sells some bombs to terrorists, those bombs – according to Europe’s probably faulty thinking – would be aimed only at America, and not Europe.

As for North Korea, if China wanted to stop them, they could at any time, as they are single-handedly propping them up economically. But they too are antagonistic towards us, and wouldn’t mind if something bad happens to damage us. This is also probably faulty thinking, as we’re a huge trading partner of theirs, and if North Korea has bombs, Japan, Taiwan and South Korea will need to have them, which exponentially makes the world a more dangerous place.

So looking back 20 years from now, those historians will probably agree that the current Bush Administration’s failed non-proliferation efforts were the worst of its many sins, and they’ll undoubtedly show a picture of GWB together with John Bolton, both with their crooked fat-cat grins, in the years before the several "incidents" where millions of civilians died by nuclear bombs made in North Korea and Iran.

Trillions and Trillions ...

The Treasury Department was asked to do a study showing how much in unfunded liabilities (entitlements above projected revenues) the country was facing over the next half century. It came back with a report that said 51 trillion, and the White House declined to publish it. If you're wondering how much 51 trillion is, if you take 51 billion -- a nice chunk of change -- and multiply it times a thousand, you have your answer.

In the face of this overwhelming reality, the multi-faceted disgrace known as the Bush Administration is cutting taxes for the rich and for big business, putting forth the super-expensive Medicare Drug Bill and Energy Bill programs (both multi-billion dollar giveaways to the corporations), proposing a Social Security "fix" that would require borrowing a few trillion dollars, and engaging itself with nation-rebuilding overseas. Some among the very cynical (I’m almost there with them) have suggested that the Bushies believe that the Second Coming will occur before all this hits the fan, so they don’t sincerely care about it.



One of this country's dirty little secrets is how many of our brightest engineers and scientists are not native born, but hail instead from India, Taiwan, Singapore, etc. Every year sees fewer and fewer Americans graduating into the ranks of these technical careers, and the ones who do are generally lower in their class than these foreign-born whiz kids. (Facts of the matter: China is graduating four times the number of engineers that we are, and expanding their programs rapidly; Japan is graduating double the number of engineers that we are.)

As their home countries establish computer, bio-tech and other such industries, an increasing number of these wunderkind are heading back to work in their native land. This 21st Century Brain Drain is made worse by the present administration's ignoring of the situation, and made even worse yet by cuts in agencies like the National Science Foundation (as part of the Bushies' war with the country's intelligentsia).

Further compounding these dire straits will be the upcoming regulations which will make corporations expense their stock options, thus eliminating much of them from being given as incentives to high-output techies. Many of these engineers and scientists will heed the prospects of stock option bonuses being offered from their home countries and vacate the U.S. in even higher numbers.

What a Week!

I'm sorry I haven't written more in my blog, but it's been a very busy week keeping up with all the juicy news. First, there was the Runaway Bride story, and I had to stay glued to the tube for all the latest twists and interviews (like, they were even able to get someone who was on the plane with her to talk on camera about what that was like), the Paula Abdul Idol scandal, more stuff about Brad and Angelina, the Pat O'Brien/Dr. Phil faceoff (I taped that and have had to watch it three times, it was so good), the ongoing Paris and Nicole tiff, the new romances between Tom Cruise/Katie Holmes and Renee Zellweger/Kenny Chesney, the Demi/Ashton pregnancy (It's a boy!), the rumors that Ben and Jen II might be doing the same, hot testimony at the Michael Jackson trial, and absolutely all the latest installments of Bachelor, American Idol, Extreme Makeover: Home, Survivor, Lost, all the CSI's and Law and Orders, Amazing Race and Desperate Housewives. (Almost not to mention a great lineup on Oprah, Ellen and the Tony Danza show.) So it's been a super week, with lots of terrific shows and big stories to follow online and in the chat rooms, but I'll be blogging again soon.

The Rabid Religious Right

When it comes to the Rabid Religious Right in this country there is a very great danger (and it can still go either way) that this 30% slice of American citizenry can effectively dominate the U.S. (and, by extension, the international) political landscape. Through their hard-working zeal, fueled by their belief that they are doing God’s work in the biblical End Times, the nation is perilously close to losing its very valuable separation of church and state, and having it replaced by a de facto theocracy. And like the Muslim theocracies, one that believes itself to be the One True Religion and on a mission to impose that religion on the entire world. Very, very, very dangerous, not only for the 70% who will be forced to live by their precepts, but for the inevitable Christian/Muslim wars which would ensue.

Some of the changes which would be promulgated by this contingent would be wide-ranging censorship of books and mass media, textbook changes on evolution and other matters, the criminalization of all abortions, the outlawing of stem-cell research, a re-ascribing of women’s role as that of a glorified domestic servant and child-raiser, and a zero-tolerance policy aimed at homosexuals.

In fact, the hard-core engine of the religious right (e.g., the sponsors of these recent nationwide political events piped into the churches) has as some of its central beliefs a return to the Hebrew Mosaic Laws, which includes public stonings of homosexuals, blasphemers and adulterers, and wives forced to walk several paces behind their husbands. To point out what should be obvious about these extremists, there are distinct similarities across the board with groups like the Taliban, the Iranian mullahs and the Wahabi Islamists of Osama bin Laden.

Is This Thing On??

So not only does GWB have fewer press conferences than any modern president, but he doesn’t want to answer follow-up questions? Of all the presidents of modern times, he’s the one that most needs to have follow-up questions asked, as he evades and obfuscates so many of his answers.

And all the while during these castrated media events, Dubya is smirking and (even while standing still) strutting for the cameras, enjoying his dominance over all the reporters, most of whom he resents as intellectuals.

But don’t forget how high on his horse Nixon was riding at the beginning of his second term, and he actually had a landslide victory under his belt. Like Bush now, he was bending the government to his personal will, perverting traditionally independent agencies to his partisan ends, making in-your-face appointments and conducting petty wars with his perceived enemies in the press and Congress.



Faced with the threat of overthrow from radical Islamists, Saudi Arabia made a "deal with the devil," funding the Wahabi schools (which teach extreme fundamentalism and anti-Americanism) in exchange for these radicals not inciting terrorism or revolution in Saudi Arabia. This is how 15 of the 19 9/11 hijackers happened to be Saudis; they were the products of these fanatical schools.

A second deal with the devil, one that was made decades ago but reaffirmed by the current Bush administration, is our "eternal friendship" and military assistance to the House of Saud, in exchange for them continuing to feed our addiction to their petroleum.



How is it possible that during the 2004 presidential campaign, so little was said about Social Security reform, and here it is the crown jewel of the administration’s New Deal overhaul. Shouldn’t that have been front-and-center in the 2004 campaign? A few weeks before the election, the Kerry campaign claimed – correctly as it turned out – that the Bushies were planning a "January Surprise" of private accounts, which was roundly denied. Why didn’t the mainstream media jump all over this 3-Card Monte game of prevarication?

Speaking of that election, Bush is acting like he has this LBJ-sized or Reaganesque mandate to significantly alter the social and economic fabric of the country when in fact he only just squeaked by in Ohio to tip the election in his favor.

Marshall McLuhan Was Right

The latest example of (words don’t seem strong enough but I’ll try) the appalling abrogation of cable news’ journalistic integrity was in the handling of the "runaway bride" story by CNN on Saturday. They went wall-to-wall for hour after mind-numbing hour, endlessly repeating the pathetic and ultimately personal story of a stressed-out young lady who got cold feet before her wedding.

(I can’t speak for certain about FOX News’ coverage of this story, as I find it too angrifying to watch much of their transparent shilling for the religious and corporate right wing -- programming ridiculously touted as "fair and balanced." But whenever I flipped over to FOX, they were also giving some breathless report on this gal's escapade.)

It seems that CNN’s dream scenario is to handle one juicy story at a time, preferably one that is simplistic enough for them to attract an extra several ratings points away from the entertainment shows – never mind their responsibility as broadcast journalists to inform the citizenry of issues and events of social and geopolitical importance.

Their absolute heaven on earth – and I refer now to all the broadcast and cable outfits -- was the OJ trial, where they went long-term wall-to-wall (no doubt saving a lot of money on all that pesky and expensive reportage that their profession usually entails). Other examples include Princess Di’s death, the Bill Clinton blowjob saga, Terry Schiavo's struggle, the Scott Peterson case and the arrest of Robert Blake.

Saturday, for instance, there could/should have been some in-depth reportage of a rare presidential news conference, as well as the shockingly sharp increase in the Iraq insurgency bombings just as the government there finally turned the corner on its own formation. Plus other things, many other things, all more significant, albeit less "juicy" than the runaway bride story.

I swear that sometimes it seems like a Saturday Night Live or Mad TV sketch, when the news organizations pretend that they’re covering the most important thing in the world, a 9 on a 10-scale event, and in reality it's only a 1 or 2. But by so doing they make it important; something to do with "The medium is the message."