Third Party & Independents Archives

David,
I was expecting you to bash nuclear like you usually do.

Anyway, nuclear would address a lot of problems with a solution possibly palatable to Republicans - how else could you pull something like that off? The environmental concerns seem to be about exposure tens of thousands of years from now. We probably can’t anticipate the major problems 10,000 years into the future any better than cavemen could 10,000 years ago. Why do we try?

Schwamp, I will not be baited by your comment to enter the fray over nuclear power. It has its positives and negatives as the article points out. But, there is a larger, and vastly more important issue discussed in this article, which your comment avoids, entirely.

David:

I think we are getting closer to a better Congress. Democrats have failed to change the over all direction of the country to a positive direction as measured by the hearts and minds of the American people. So now we have both parties striking out.

Obviously it is process.

In my school board days, we were trained in interest based bargaining. You can google it for details. Basically it is a formal process that results in agreements that both sides can live with. It works.

My point is that some processes are more productive than others. Obviously our current process that has worked in the past no longer works and we need it retooled.

I think you are right when you say Americans need to stare into the Abyss. My bargaining training says that when people have the same interest they can usually come to an agreement. Fiscal survival is a mutual interest.

Now that both sides have tried the power thing, and struck out. (Well Republicans have struck out and Democrats have two strikes agains them), maybe a new approach will open up.

I think Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi need to go, just like George Bush needed to go. Their replacements (whether they are democrat or republican) will be able to create a process that can get things to the president’s desk for signiture, that have the support of the American people.

Craig, thanks for the comments and I sincerely hope you are right, about this. But, as I said in the article, I have no faith in politicians conducting their own heart surgery. I think the reform needed will have to come from the voters divorcing themselves from Party and demanding results of their representatives regardless of Party, in exchange for their vote.

I believe a vote for a politician is a vote of confidence. I also believe voter confidence in politicians has just about dried up and shriveled away for a plurality of the voters. If I am right, there will be many unanticipated election results after Nov. 2 of this year.

Don’t have a problem with building nukes as the incremental buildup around the world has changed the paradigm making the storage problem irrelevant. Approx 100 nuke plants in the US and about 120 storage facilities. 70K metric tons of waste are in storage and we produce about 2k of waste yearly. Storage integrity is good for 90 years. France has learned to recycle most of their spent fuel.
Obama cut funds for Yuca Mtn. reportedly to pay his debt to Harry Reid re the upcoming election. Obama put up $8B in loan guarantees for a nuke plant at Savannah River. $120B in loans pending and Obama wants another 130B.
Question is: Why not scrape Cap & Trade and the nuke program and install infrastructure for natural gas? The one thing the US has plenty of. And, in doing so, install a hydrogen distribution system for future use. Would save TONS of money and lessen the security and storage risk. Answer is: Big oil won’t go along with any alternative that can be provided cheaper than oil.

Roy, the storage problem is anything but, irrelevant. America is going to experience seismic activity in places which haven’t seen it for a century or more. Yellowstone is going to produce geological havoc at some point. Climate change will create floods like never seen before and in places where they have never occurred before. Anticipating these events and insuring nuclear waste stockpiles are not in the path of destruction, is a virtual impossibility, setting up the potential for massively expensive nuclear dead zones, in both dollars and lives. It is not irrelevant.

That said, it is also not impossible to devise safe methods of disposing of the nuclear waste, but, they won’t be cheap.

Obama cut funding for Yucca Mtn. because its location is a threat due its residing in a seismic activity prone area. It was a boondoggle from the beginning.

I am no expert on natural gas. But, I think if we are headed toward natural gas transportation, our ability to produce and deliver enough natural gas to also run our electric grids will create supply and distribution bottlenecks. We do have access to enormous gas deposits. But, we can’t access it all at simultaneously nor do we have the infrastructure yet to deliver it safely in large volumes to electric producing plants. There is a limit to how much natural gas we can produce and deliver today and in the foreseeable future. That is no doubt expandable but, infrastructure costs will be considerable.

Obama has the right and common sense direction here, which is to put together a comprehensive approach that meets future desired outcomes of cost efficiency, independence from energy imports, transitioning away from fossil fuels, all while insuring an unbroken stream of energy to meet conservation oriented demand as we transition.

I applaud the direction. I remain skeptical as to the actual logistics, and details, especially in the hands of lobbyist controlled Congress.

David

Re nukes - We hear that global warming is an existential threat. The problem of nuclear waste processing and storage is a less urgent problem. The analogy is that you see a burning man but refuse to use the fire extinguisher because it might include cancer causing chemicals. We have to choose which we think is the bigger & more immediate threat: warming or waste.

Re Bayh - it is hard for moderate Democrats. Soon there will be none left. The Democrats drove Lieberman clean out of their party. Bayh clearly is not happy with his former colleagues. I hear he didn’t even tell Harry Reid until just before. How angry does someone have to be to do that?

I don’t think we have the infrastructure to deliver it to transport vehicles, and building it out would likely be expensive, but I think we do have the infrastructure to deliver it to power plants and could reasonably expand it. Houston’s power IS largely provided by Natural Gas. I do worry about the price stability and manipulation of Natural Gas.

I worked on a new plant in Freeport for Dow Chemical. I learned much of the chemical industry provides their own power this way and sell the excess energy on the open market. There is also a liginite(coal) plant in Ft Bend County, just southwest of Houston. (It also produces Fly Ash, a common soil stabilizer, as a byproduct)

While much of the Northeast US uses coal, the company that built the Dow energy plant (Calpine) was started in California and the Pacific Northwest using geothermal energy production.

I’m not really sure what the sources used in the Deep South and the Four Corners are (beyond the big dams).

There’s bipartisanship, and then there’s bayhpartisanship.

Let me explain the difference. With the first, both sides are expected to make some compromises, just one. With the second, only the liberals and the Democrats are truly expected to give away the shop.

Democrats at the netroots level were quit with the Republican’s idea of bipartisanship during the Bush Administration, and they’re twice as quit with it now, now that democrats are supposed to be the Majority.

It wasn’t unrealistic in times past to suppose that the Republicans set the agenda when they were majority. The question is, why are Democrats not afforded the same privilege? Not that I am against bipartisanship. I in fact am one of the proponents of it. But it gets harder to ask for our people to bargain with the other side when every session of bargaining only achieves delay, without delivering votes or agreements.

I personally would have once favored a much smoother transition towards a more liberal Washington atmosphere, but the policy failures of the Republicans reduced my willingness to agree further with many of their policies, and their arrogant refusal to correct that policy made it seem all the more toxic to me to just let them set the tone.

Which is not to say there aren’t moderate Republicans. But it seems as the rhetoric gets more highly stylized and affected, it becomes harder to find Republicans who aren’t looking at the rest of us with a considerably distorted perspective of our policies, our ideology, and our character.

So many Democrats want some respect. They want their fairly earned majority to act, and be able to operate as one. They want the public to know them for what they do believe, what they do want, and who they really are as people, rather than be be demonized.

Evan Bayh, in many Democrat’s eyes represented the kind of Democrat who believed more in compromising with the Republicans than moving Democratic Policy. While politics and partisanship aren’t everything, no party can long tolerate people who don’t even seem to like their own party’s politics, who repeat the base falsehoods of the other side. Bayh wasn’t the worst, but he certainly wasn’t that beloved.

His unceremonious exit, especially after all the trouble he went through to make it look like he was running a third term was, in my opinion, despicable. He did not give his people time to present candidates to replace him for a primary, he had his donors raise millions of dollars that he really will never use for the original purpose, and he left making all kinds of noise about how Partisanship on the left was the problem in Congress, when in fact the Republicans are the ones going out of their way to impede things.

Evan Bayh evidently despised the party mainstream. Well, after the way he left, folks despise him right back.

Word is that Bayh will return to his roots as a lobbyist. He is shooting for Tauzin’s job at big Pharma. Tauzin is leaving that position soon. Bayh’s opposition candidate is a Republican lobbyist. Big difference.

Christine said: “The analogy is that you see a burning man but refuse to use the fire extinguisher because it might include cancer causing chemicals.”

The problem with your analogy, Christine, is you prefer a chemical extinguisher to the more obvious, faster, and non-toxic STOP, DROP, AND ROLL.

Nuclear power with its waste problem which just swaps one toxic waste for another, should be a “no other choice” last option. The fact is, we have other choices for electrical power, in most cases and areas of the country.

But, I think Obama is just laying a trap for Republicans, like the Stimulus Bill trap that just sprung, with the Wash. Times, and NY Times, conservative media, bashing Republicans for their hypocrisy of voting against the Stimulus Bill while touting what great things that money is doing for jobs, infrastructure, and local economy back home. Some are even taking photos with the Stimulus Money Checks.

This Nuclear Power plant is bait, I think. I hope Republicans vote against it, reinforcing the hypocrisy which they are becoming famous for, the world round. This is a Democratic president, after all. The political calculus is this: Democrats will still vote Obama in 2012 because reelecting a sitting president is far less risky than voting for someone else, Democrat or Republican. Independents will respond negatively toward Republican hypocrisy of voting against Obama’s comprehensive energy plan including nuclear power. And Republicans? Well, there will just be fewer of them as a result, having left for the Tea Party or Independent anti-incumbent factions.

I wonder if Obama plays chess. This is a gambit, opening move. Yes, I am sure now, he does. It’s a bitch having an intelligent intellectual person as president of the opposition’s party, who after everything imaginable has been done to undermine his presidency, remains at 50% approval rating having won the office with 53% of the vote.

If this comprehensive ‘bi-partisan’ approach to energy is for real, I am opposed to it for several practical reasons. But, if it is, as I think, a gambit to put even further distance between the public and the GOP for Obama’s second and more effective term, it is brilliant political strategy. Doesn’t get us anywhere in the short term, but, we aren’t going anywhere with GOP obstructionism anyway in the short term. In Obama’s second term however, this strategy may harvest far more effective and pragmatic reforms,
more in line with what the public hoped for in 2008, but, haven’t received due to GOP obstructionism.

S.D., Evan Bayh flat out stated, he was ineffective, as a Senator. Couldn’t get anything done. That’s as good a reason as any to leave one’s position. I credit him for his candor and choice.

I detect litmus test wishing for Democratic candidates in your comments. Really? From a Democrat? Oh, tell me it isn’t so, with an apology for the allusion in your comments as having been misspoken.

gergle said: “I’m not really sure what the sources used in the Deep South and the Four Corners are (beyond the big dams).”

Me neither, but, I suspect a lot of it is hydroelectric and nuclear. I read that there are 104 operating commercial units at 64 sites in the U.S., and 34 additional research reactors at various universities. These numbers do NOT include government reactors operated by the military or DOE. I suspect the South has a fair share of those.

Ok, that got me to googling:

http://www.nrc.gov/info-finder/reactor/

Lot’s more east of the Mississippi, that was a surprise to me.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_in_the_United_States

http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/state/

Looks like coal and gas are king.

gergle, looking at that last link, I will be a helluva lot more careful about using a lighter, match, or campfire here in Texas. I knew Texans were full of hot air, but, I had no idea so much of it was explosive.

Look at the natural gas infrastructure though. Gotta be a million miles of it. A large percentage of it would need to be upgraded to larger capacity if the country moved to gas generation of electricity. That won’t be cheap, or convenient, but, it sure would create a heap of jobs. That is one helluva lot of digging and pipe fitting and refilling and tidying up to do.

At least, it is a more original excuse and who knows, it might even be true. It sure beats the Republican standard, spend more time with the family.

Stephen makes a point about the inconvience for the party at this time but, the odds would still be against a Democrat holding on to that seat in Indiana even if Byah had announced a year ago.

Good riddance as far as I am concerned, the more the merrier. If another 50 or more Senators would do the same the people might get their government back for a little while.

jlw said: “Stephen makes a point about the inconvenience for the party at this time but, the odds would still be against a Democrat holding on to that seat in Indiana even if Byah had announced a year ago.”

That is very true. Indiana is a conservative state with quite a historical relationship with the KKK. Sorry for being so politically impolite. Of course, back then, they voted Democrat. Now they vote Republican, or, in the case of Bayh, very conservative Democrat. Not that racism has a cause and effect direct relationship with how a person votes. With so many failings in both parties, it all gets very confusing as to who to vote for. That gives someone like Bayh an opportunity to slip in across ideological party lines.

jlw said: “If another 50 or more Senators would do the same the people might get their government back for a little while.”

I disagree. Leaving of one’s own accord for something better isn’t at all the same as getting the boot by voters. The latter holds out more promise for our nation’s future.

David R. Remer-
Bipartisanship without consideration of what exactly the consequences of the bargains are is not moderation, it’s a principle carried to an unjustified extreme.

I believe in a politics that is based on getting things right before fitting them to some political paradigm. There is no glory in successfully carrying a policy whose consequences for the country bring ill fortune. Republicans may win so many political fights, but to do what?

I’d almost wish for them to come right back, and once more prove how badly they suck at leading the country, just to remind people of what they voted against in 2006 and 2008.

I’d almost do so. But I’d rather Americans figure it out. I’d rather Americans realize that the answer to error is to repuditate error, not go back to it reflexively on some anti-incumbent sentiment. All we’re doing is punishing ourselves.

Bayh’s bipartisanship seems built on a reflexive rejection of his party’s left wing, rather than on a considered attitude of compromise.

For my part, if the compromise defeats the purpose of the bill, it’s too much, and should be dialed back. Unfortunately, folks like Bayh were concerned about pleasing the Republicans, even while they showed no willingness to bargain in good faith. It’s the Republicans, not the Democrats whose partisanship made his kind of compromiser little respected. How can you respect somebody who keeps on insisting on negotiating with people who are simply stalling for the sake of positioning themselves against you politically? The Republicans intentionally stalled for time, dragging out the process, making the Democrats look weak, and Bayh’s kind of fanatical devotion to splitting the difference no matter what helped them do it.

I wouldn’t mind people being able to negotiate with the other side. But I want people who have the sense, the observational ability to tell when the other side has basically declared war on us, not folks who stubbornly insist on it regardless of the circumstances.

I’m sick to death of people on all sides who can only see their political dreams and aspirations, who do not pay attention to what’s actually going on. You know me, I’ve never been a fan of one-size fits all political solutions.

Reality is too complex, and people who insist on pushing political ideology, even when the signs of its interaction with the real world don’t verify it’s truth, don’t find much agreement with me.

That’s what I hated about Bush. No matter how bad things got, he never wavered from policies that were screwing up. It seems like political willpower is overwhelming political reason, and so to paraphrase Yeats, the worst are full of passionate intensity, and the best lack all conviction.

The Center cannot hold when one party flings its weight to the far side of its caucus, and insists on staying there. I know the Republicans here will claim that’s what the left has done, but that’s a lie. If the left had done that, they’d be toast by now. They’d be a forty vote minority that got defeated every time. The sick, sad state of Washington is proof that the left’s pull isn’t strong enough yet, and the moderates are still mired in visions of the Republicans as they used to be.

The sad part about this is that the Democrats are being held accountable for being the majority, without the ability, because of people like Bayh, to actually do something positive to be held fairly accountable for doing.

I mean, how crazy will it be if the Republicans get to return, because they basically prevented the other side from cleaning up all the messes they left? In my mind, it’s always been about accountability, but not merely in the scope of one election.

I know you love anti-incumbent politics, but do you understand that the way things are going, that politics is going to essentially reinforce the terrible status quo? Hand more power to the people who mindlessly push industry and ideological lines?

We cannot win against the extremists until the political moderates in this country have a firm hold on power. But that means we got to stop voting with our hearts, which are so easily broken and twisted, and start voting our eyes, our ears, and our brains. We got to understand what we’re rewarding and what we’re punishing with any given vote, not merely punish Washington without thought of the real consequences of our votes in policy terms.

Democrats were punished, for example, in Massachussetts. But at what costs for what Democrats there really want out of Washington? Until we stop being this self defeating on our side of things, the insanity of extremism will take over, because only those who are sunk in that enveloping vision of the future are blind enough to be so unrelenting and unswerving. Blind devotion to political positions, even if it’s centrism and bipartisanship, is not moderation in my book.

The lesser of two evils rule applies, has applied for near a 100 years. What are voters to do? Their only option is to ping-pong between the two corrupted majors or vote for Ralph Nader, like I do. The corpocracy figured out long ago they don’t need to respond to the voters. So long as the politicians are clothed, fed and supported by the corporations all is well in Gotham city.
That’s why a 3rd party needs to be thrown into the mix. Rather, a 3rd party with a different political attitude, etc.

Otherwise, we have the corpocracy we deserve.

Roy Ellis-
And this third party will not be corruptible?

The Republicans were once the third party in question. Within a generation, they were corrupted.

No, what we need is an all around change in attitude.

Here is an (appropriate) excerpt from FireDogLake

Top 5 Contributors, 2003-2008

Goldman Sachs $123,750
Eli Lilly & Co $65,722
Latham & Watkins $50,300
Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe $47,816
Next Generation $46,750

Top 5 Industries, 2003-2008

Lawyers/Law Firms $1,363,171
Securities & Investment $1,005,186
Real Estate $432,200
Misc Finance $255,701
Insurance $241,748

Bayh’s little “lobbyist problem” is considered by many to be what tanked his Vice Presidential aspirations. His wife Susan earns about $837,000 a year serving on seven corporate boards, among them Wellpoint, a health insurance company for which Bayh helped secure a $24.7 million dollar grant. She’s on the board of ETrade, even as Bayh is on the Senate Finance Committee.

I just read a rather idiotic comment by Bayh in which he states if he just one job by leaving he’ll have done more than congress has. This guy has issues with the truth, apparently.

Thanks for the lobbyist info, Roy.

S.D. said: “I’d almost do so. But I’d rather Americans figure it out. I’d rather Americans realize that the answer to error is to repuditate error, not go back to it reflexively on some anti-incumbent sentiment. All we’re doing is punishing ourselves.”

Clever piece of sophistry, there Stephen. But, NO! We the people of this nation ARE NOT the Congress. We the people are the EMPLOYER of Congress, and OUR employees are not doing their jobs. Throughout the history of mankind, it has been common sense to relieve employees of their positions or punish them in other ways, who fail to do their job. And for all your sophistry, trying to equate the employer with the employees, common sense remains common sense, as it has for millenia.

Our Congress is not doing their job. We have an obligation to remove them as a result. That is, after all, what the 2006 and 2008 elections were about. And we the people must continue to replace our employees UNTIL we find some willing and CAPABLE of doing the work they were hired to do.

Democrats had other options on Health Care, than to attempt a comprehensive and massive all at once approach, KNOWING the resistance would be intense. Democrats failed in their job! They can blame the Republicans if that makes them feel better about themselves. But, we the people have an obligation to ourselves and our children to keep hiring new Congress people until we get the solutions to the nation’s problems.

I am very proud of the American people at this time, taking their common sense and voting responsibility as seriously as they are, and using their vote for the purpose it was intended, to remove from power those who will not, or cannot serve the people’s and nation’s interests in solving national problems.

Any other interpretations of the anti-incumbent sentiment sweeping the nation, is nothing but sour grapes and reactionary sophistry. The only power a citizen has against an out of control government is their vote. And their vote can ONLY be used for, or against their sitting representative in Congress. In other words, the only leverage a voter has to address a failing Congress is to use their vote for, or against, their Congress person who has been part of the problem instead of the absent solutions.`

This is not grade school where our politicians should get an A for effort. We don’t pay dearly our taxes for effort. We pay dearly our taxes for results. Results are not forthcoming from this Congress.

Stephen D. said: “The sad part about this is that the Democrats are being held accountable for being the majority, without the ability, because of people like Bayh, to actually do something positive to be held fairly accountable for doing.”

I find this statement incredible. The Democratic Party is RESPONSIBLE for the choices of candidates it puts before the Public for election. The Democratic Party CHOSE, CONSCIOUSLY, and DELIBERATELY, this big tent approach, inviting conservatives like Bayh to run under their umbrella and funding their campaigns, IN ORDER to achieve a Majority in Congress.

Well, Democrats have their Majority, as they Chose to create it. Now, the Democrats MUST live with the consequences of their actions and choices. Democrats are in COMPLETE CONTROL of the people they endorse for Congress as Democrats.

There is no credible way Democrats can dodge the Responsibility for Congress persons like Bayh and Landrieu, Nelson, and Lieberman, who now derail the people’s demand for solutions to the challenges which threaten our nation’s future.

Democrats chose this bed of hay, and cannot now blame others for their disheveled straw laden appearance and Hay Fever upon waking as the new majority unable to do the work which they were elected to do. Not completing the work which you were hired to do, demands you be replaced. That is common sense, and it is as valid today as it has been throughout the history of mankind.

Democracy is all about the voters holding their elected representatives accountable on election day for the results of their time in office. There is NO ESCAPING that fundamental foundational precept of Democracy, without abandoning democracy altogether.

David R. Remer-
We would like to believe that we are not responsible, but who elects these people?

We do. If we elect Republicans to those seats, as is the likely result of any election that goes against a Democrat, then what results?

Well, what do we know of the Republican’s behavior from the last few years? That’s what we will get.

We cannot merely view the choice as being one that punishes an incumbent. We must see it is as one that encourages whoever we elect. After all, the election is supposed to be a mandate.

Democrats did fail at their job, and I recommend we primary the folks to punish them for their failure. But Republicans failed at their job, too, and can you point to me any signs that they have redeemed themselves of their failure? No, in fact they have wallowed in it, and have executed their current political strategy of obstruction specifically so they can win back those seats without earning them back with a change of policy.

Call my argument whatever names you want, but then tell me what anti-incumbent fever did to prospects for getting a better bill out of Congress for Healthcare Reform.

We don’t just elect, as a nation, one Senator, or one Representative. As a nation, we elect a whole class of each.

We will regret it if we don’t look at the broader picture, and treat that vote as a choice for one probable outcome or another.

In this case, if the Republicans make advancements, what comes of it? Are our problems going to be solved, or exacerbated? Hate that mother******’s guts, mark him as gone if you find a better alternative, but don’t simply act like it’s a game if the son of a ***** gets replaced by somebody you KNOW is worse. When a bad politician is elected to replace a mediocre one, it’s not a gain, it’s a reward for the kind of politician you don’t want in place.

My money is on wanting the better politician in place, of any choice I have. If that’s a scumbag incumbent, well then better him than somebody worse than him. But in the meantime, I will encourage and will contribute to somebody better in the primary. I will not be like the Nader voter in 2000 who had the brief pleasure of sticking it to the centrist Democrats, and the long torture of seeing the Right-Wing fanatics run this country into the ground.

The Politics of sending complex messages through votes is BS. You have only one bit of information to send, basically, for every candidate: support or opposition.

I will NOT lend support to anybody who is worse than the person already in place-THAT simple-Because I do not expect any such message to remain ungarbled by the low bandwidth of the medium of the vote.

I am not merely voting against somebody, I am voting for somebody. I am responsible for that vote, and its consequences.

David, I agree with your comments about the Democratic Party. The Party’s choice of going this route is why I no longer consider myself a Democrat. They chose to run conservatives in conservative states and they chose to go with capital because labor can’t compete with capital in financing these politicians.

They could have chosen to push for public financing so that elections could be decided by policy rather than money but, they have chosen to go with the corporations and support the legislation that has put our country in this mess.

Stephen, there you go, John Cougar Mellencamp for U.S. Senate.

Hurray! Hurray! Obama says we dodged a Great Depression and the recession is over, except for twenty million or so.

jlw-
I fully support getting better candidates, primarying folks. But I don’t pretend to be neutral, or that taking back my party is anything but a long term fight.

But I don’t see how anybody helps things by voting the worse candidate in to punish the mediocre.

I can understand the reasoning, that perhaps the bad candidate will motivate getting the better one, but damn it, I look at the six year wait to get the SOBs out of there, and I blanche at the prospect of putting a Republican in that seat to occupy it for that time.

Stephen, The Parties have rigged the game so the people have no other viable choice on election day than to choose a Democrat or Republican. Your party has been as complicit in limiting this choice for voters as the GOP, with your joint control of the FEC, Ballot entry requirements, and qualifying threshholds for public campaign money and aired debates.

The people are not charged with the policy decisions of this nation. That is the responsibility of those they elect to that job. DO NOT attempt to argue failures in the Congress are the voter’s fault. Your Party limited the voters to choosing your Party or the GOP.

An Individual citizen has but one vote each for their 2 Senators and 1 House Representative. They therefore, have only one opportunity to exercise their vote as approval or disapproval of the results coming out of Congress.

That’s IT. The voter has NO OTHER POWER nor responsibility on election day, by Constitutional design. And the Democratic Party has left the voters with no other choice on election day in 99.99 percent of the cases, but to vote for a Democrat or a Republican in expressing their approval or disapproval of Congressional results since the last election.

Democrats have until NOV 2. to earn the voter’s approval of their majority status in Congress. Your party would do well to quit wasting time trying to find excuses and blame for having been ineffective, and spend that time instead, examining their own approaches for failures, and amend those approaches.

In 24 HOURS, Democrats could put a small and limited Health care reform bill on the floor of BOTH houses and pass it, and the people would applaud the result overwhelmingly. That bill would simply address exclusions for pre-existing conditions and termination of coverage due to cost limitations by the insurance companies.

Republicans would belly ache, but, COULD NOT POSSIBLY vote against this measure in lock step to defeat it, without many of their own members committing political suicide at the polls in Nov. IT would therefore, pass. The people of America would be better off for it. And Democrats would have accomplished something worthy of citizen’s votes in Nov.

So, why, is this not the Plan? Because Democrats elected to Congress will reject it, and in so doing, they reject the demand of the people to get something done on their behalf and for THEIR improvement in dealing with the insurance companies, choosing instead to halt all progress in favor of pushing some other agenda which won’t pass. That is incompetence. Clear and simple, Stephen, and a great many voters will respond to such incompetence in the only way our Constitution affords them a legal opportunity to.

This is not rocket science, Stephen. It requires only a very basic and rudimentary understanding of what precisely democracy and democratic elections and governance are as a system. And apparently, enough Democrats in Congress are unaware of, or are willfully ignoring, these foundations underwriting their position in Congress, and will get from voters what they deserve for their ignorance, willful or not.

It is the obligation and duty of every voter to use their vote as statement of approval or disapproval of the results coming from THEIR representative’s tenure since the last election. The Constitution DOES NOT give them the power to vote on any other State’s Senators, or any Other district’s representative. Only their own.

Your Party will either Embrace or Reject that reality and be rewarded or dislocated accordingly. One cannot rail against the orbits of our Solar System in protest of the seasons, and achieve any good end. Embracing reality allows one to adapt to the seasons. Rejecting the reality will suffer the consequences of failure to prepare for them.

David R. Remer-
Voters bear full responsibility for those they vote into office. Or, at least, they should treat it that way, because, you know, the people they select do write the laws that rule their lives.

Politicians are not fire and forget weapons. They don’t necessarily lock onto what we want when we don’t give them constant feedback and guidance. If we forget to, the Lobbyists and villagers in Washington won’t.

Just shuffling them in and out won’t work, especially not with Senators, whose terms can outlast the brief flare-ups of national outrage.

If you keep up with Daily Kos, you’ll see what Democrats are trying to do. You’ll see the contentious arguments that they’re having, the desire to reform the party, the thirst in the liberals there to do much of what you’re saying. If you wonder sometimes why I don’t necessarily take your criticism about how Democrats in my party aren’t doing this or that, then looking at just one page of what I keep up with on a daily basis might show you why I am not so hard on my folks.

And just how hard Democrats themselves are on the folks who are failing them in Washington. We’re not waiting for the next election to hold them accountable. We’ve been holding them accountable since day one.

But what can we do if every Republican votes against us in the Senate on cloture votes? Absolutely, bloody, NOTHING. With 41 votes, even if we make it public, it’s just Public Obstruction, and we’re still in the same boat.

And what are the Republicans going to say, every time one of them gets elected?

It’s a vote for the filibusters. I know different, you know different, and many who read the polls know different, but people don’t necessarily know what their neighbor knows. What they hear is the Republicans resurgent. And that gets turned into Democrats being weak, despite the fact that for most of the last three or four years, we’ve faced this same inpenetrable barrier of obstruction.

Who needs to be held accountable? Not merely Republicans at a lower level, but the party in general. My sentiment is that they can’t be allowed to get away with it. That it bodes ill for America to be governed this way, ad nauseam, into the future.

It’s not merely about my party’s ability to govern, it’s about anybody’s ability to govern in the face of a concerted minority, the very undermining of majority rules Democracy. What’s the point of kicking out bad incumbents if their party can just turn around and castrate their replacements?

Stephen said: “Voters bear full responsibility for those they vote into office.”

False! Not when the TWO parties control the candidate selection. And they do. The voter cannot be held responsible when the only choice on the ballot is tweedle dee and tweedle dum. Tweedle is their only choice, except to not vote at all.

The parties control the ballot choices, and even effectively preclude any third party choices as a practical matter, by various barriers and hurdles put before third parties and independents by the duopoly Party.

Your apologetic argument simply does not hold water.

Stephen, my daughter for years used the argument in defense of failure, that she tried. We cut off her allowance, stopped driving her to friends houses, until she succeeded. Guess what, no more apologies for failure were necessary because she began succeeding at her efforts.

This is precisely how voters must treat the duopoly Party. And increasingly, that is precisely what voters are doing. Embrace the reality or suffer the consequences of responding to illusions.

David R. Remer-

Your apologetic argument simply does not hold water.

What I have to say is simple: You are responsible for your choices. You are responsible for the messages you send, not merely at the ballot box, but thereafter.

It fits rather well into your scheme of things, as well as mine, because ultimately the problem of voters voting in irresponsbile incumbents is one of people simply not being aware of what their favorite congresscritter is doing, or being complacent or jaded about it.

If voters need not exercise any responsibility, if they can just blame the parties for having to choose between tweedledum and tweedledownrightstupid, then voting doesn’t matter. There’s no point. There’s no way, even gradually, in increment, to get better representation.

Without hope, people simply become passive, inactive, and uncaring about what their votes actually do.

I have the benefit of a lifetime’s perspective, as I saw politics become nastier, more partisan, and ultimately, psychotically broken from reality.

So I say to people: elections have consequences. Even if your choice is bad, it’s still a choice, and one for you will be worse than the other. If you don’t decide for yourself, somebody else might decide for you, and you might not like the answer they come up with.

I cannot, for the life of me, come up with a single damn reason why there is any point whatsoever to not paying attention to what the people are for, what they are doing, and what they are promising to do.

We will make mistakes, but the idea is not to quit because of the mistakes, but to forge on and do better.

We must look at that vote as our taking our life in our hands, because we literally are.

You know, I like Bernie Sanders. He’s not a Democrat, but he at least has some good sense about him. I would not mind more people like that getting into the game. I really wouldn’t. I don’t mind third parties at the end of the day, and maybe it would be good for us to have some competition coming from both ends, to break up the party gridlock.

But I still have the beliefs and the loyalties of a Democrat. However, my sensibility, and my hope, is may the best politician win. That, actually is part of the reason I hate what the Republicans are doing with the filibuster. In essence, they are cheating, gaming the system to get the failure that Democrats would not necessarily inflict on themselves, if not every vote was a sixty vote showdown requiring unanimous agreement.

Good points David. Right you are that the voter has no choice in the candidate. They do at the local level but not for Rep’s and Senators, where the power resides. Voters can only react to the candidates/incumbents put forth by the corpocracy. You may want to compare the lobbying dollars spent on you county commissioner and opposed to your local Senator. Voters can ping-pong between the majors forever and that will be just fine with the Corpocracy as they have a nickel on each number. The way voting districts are sliced and diced even the two parties are locked in as to who can get on a ballot.
Only thing I can see different between the two parties is the source of their Corpocratic $$. For instance, look above to Bayh’s supporters. Finance,lawyers, etc. Pull up a Republican and you will see big oil, big manufacturing conglomerates, defense contractors. That’s the only difference between the two majors as I can tell.

No end to this, no solutions, no reforms until we can carry out campaign finance reform. Check out Republic Sentry Party on how to proceed to solutions.

Otherwise, we have the Corpocracy we deserve.

Stephen D. offered the following Straw Man argument: “If voters need not exercise any responsibility, if they can just blame the parties for having to choose between tweedledum and tweedledownrightstupid, then voting doesn’t matter. There’s no point. There’s no way, even gradually, in increment, to get better representation.”

First, I already outlined in detail what the voter’s responsibility is, and they do have one. To assent or dissent against the results of government since the last election with their vote for or against their own representatives overseeing governance in that interim.

By voting against their representatives and for their challengers to register their disapproval of Congressional results, in enough numbers, they force the PARTIES to change their priorities, both in terms of candidate selection as well as policies legislated.

Why are the Parties FORCED? Because the Parties are ALL ABOUT POWER, acquiring it and keeping it. If the voters make the Party’s incumbent reelections closer to a toss of the coin probability, the Parties will find those odds UNACCEPTABLE, and therefore, change their candidate selection criteria and policy priorities or process, in order to improve those reelection odds.

Your straw man argument that voters have no responsibility, or, that voters are responsible for the Party’s actions after the elections, goes no where, logically. The Parties are responsible for meeting the demands of the majority of the voters. Failing that, it is the responsibility of voters dissatisfied with Congressional results, to vote for a challenger, not an incumbent.

That is the power of the vote, as it was intended to be used from its conception. To vote FOR RESULTS voters can approve of, or AGAINST RESULTS, they cannot approve of; not for Party excuses as to why there aren’t results the voters can approve of.

This concept of voting for or against results, is the heart, soul, and power of democracy, and it appears from the polling data, that American voters are rediscovering it in growing numbers, even if the Party leadership has lost sight of it, or never learned it in the first place.

The Parties still believe elections are about the power of money to buy marketing and advertising persuasion through the media. For a long time, America lost the heart and soul of its democracy, as ROY points out, replacing it with corporate oligarchy and plutocracy, instead. Voters in growing numbers however, are rejecting that in favor of returning to democracy, again. It is a very positive and hopeful development for America that the voters are turning against BOTH parties, for the plutocratic reasons just mentioned.

First, I already outlined in detail what the voter’s responsibility is, and they do have one. To assent or dissent against the results of government since the last election with their vote for or against their own representatives overseeing governance in that interim.

I have no problem with that part, but only AS a part. People should respond to the conduct in office, to what has happened in the past.

They should also, though, figure out what the various stances and likely policy directions mean for the future. After all, they are hiring the next guy to fill the job. Just because you get rid of the last employee, doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t look at the next potential applicant before you give them the job.

Why are the Parties FORCED? Because the Parties are ALL ABOUT POWER, acquiring it and keeping it. If the voters make the Party’s incumbent reelections closer to a toss of the coin probability, the Parties will find those odds UNACCEPTABLE, and therefore, change their candidate selection criteria and policy priorities or process, in order to improve those reelection odds.

Unfortunately, given the way the filibuster is being used, the coin gets lost down the grate when it comes time to figure out who actually gets to exercise power.

Nobody’s going to intepret it as pure chance. Everybody’s going to have their theories, and the Republicans, mark my words, will say that the reason Democrats are getting kicked out is that their policies are too liberal.

If the Republicans get kicked out in turn, they still interpret it as being a result of folks not being conservative enough, or some other trash. and if the margins in the senate are close enough, or in their favor, they’ll run roughshod over the ability of the other party to legislate, or just shut them out utterly. It is naive, given recent history, to expect any other outcome. You yourself have noted this.

I would simply ask that people see the way things are actually running in Washington, and not reward the Republicans with anything less than a clear slap in the face for anything they’ve done to make things that way.

But, while we’re at it, there are quite a few Democratic politicians who need good slaps in the face. Democrats want better representation, and you’d know that much if you kept track of what Democrats like myself were saying.

Stephen said: “But I still have the beliefs and the loyalties of a Democrat.”

Which puts you in the minority, Stephen, during a sea change in American politics evidenced by registered Independent voters outnumbering either registered Democrats or Republicans. Cling to the past if you will, but, the future belongs to the Independents who have no loyalty to the Parties which have killed democracy, replacing it with plutocracy by legislating open doors to the wealthy special interests to craft and influence the legislation that the people will have to pay for.

Stephen D. said: “However, my sensibility, and my hope, is may the best politician win.”

Standard duopoly Party propaganda designed to divide the people and keep them manipulatable. If voters vote for the candidate or Party, instead of Congressional results, the plutocracy put in place by the duopoly party FLOURISHES for the benefit of the Parties and wealthy special interests funding their bids for power, NOT THE PEOPLE.

United by disapproval of Congressional results, the voters can address the plutocracy which ended democracy. Divided by party, they cannot. As a Party Loyalist your focus is on your Party’s bid for power, first and foremost.

As an Independent, my focus is on restoring democracy to the people such that incumbents and freshman alike in Congress are rendered compliant to the majority demand of the people for positive results in their favor, NOT the favor of the corporations and wealthy minority special interests and their lobbyists, which prevent this country from solving the nation’s challenges.

As I wrote previously, Stephen, until their is systemic political reform, no other effective and sustainable reforms are possible. The Do Nothing Congress from 2007 through 2010, is living proof of this now documented fact of history. The two Parties have no inclination to change the system. That makes BOTH parties the enemy of the majority of the people in this country, who find grid-lock and partisan deadlock on resolving problems, which are costing the public trillions of dollars now, and for decades into the future as inherited debt by their children.

The people are paying the cost of the Parties’ warfare with each other. That is UNACCEPTABLE! And both Parties are complicit in maintaining this costly status quo. We the people don’t want your excuses for why you can’t get problems solved. We the people want them solved, so we can stop paying for this incompetence and partisan warfare at our expense.

Stephen D. said: “Unfortunately, given the way the filibuster is being used, the coin gets lost down the grate when it comes time to figure out who actually gets to exercise power.”

That is no more than an apologetic excuse designed to defend Democrats lack of results, Stephen. It is an excuse, not a solution to solve the problem. The voters are tired of excuses. They want solutions.

Stephen D. said: “and the Republicans, mark my words, will say that the reason Democrats are getting kicked out is that their policies are too liberal.”

And they will suffer the consequences of that hubris and ignoring of the reality message being sent by voters. The independent voters don’t like either Party, and will reject both, until one or the other Party takes steps to address the systemic political reforms needed to end this unresponsive and corrupted plutocracy, supported and invited by BOTH parties.

Charlie Rangel, Wm. Jefferson, Tom DeLay, Harry Reid, Abramoff, and hundreds more are responsible for the plutocracy having replaced democracy. Reid and Pelosi had it in their power to acquire relief from the corrupt practices of the health insurance companies for the American public.

They chose instead to promote an omnibus agenda supported by the plutocracy’s special interests, and black mailers like Nelson, Landrieu, and Bayh, insurance corporations, labor unions and trial lawyers. As a result, a year of the public’s taxes have been spent paying for the salaries and activities of a Congress which failed to deliver anything of benefit to the American people drowning in health care cost inflation.

Damn your Democratic Party. Its heart is as black and corrupt as the GOP. It exists to play power games with the GOP, not to act on behalf of the American tax payers and public, except in cosmetic appearance. This fact and reality has become ACUTELY obvious to Independent voters. The Democratic Party had the opportunity to serve the people. They didn’t. And now through their party loyalists, they provide excuses for failure to be disseminated in the public forum.

We growing anti-incumbent voters aren’t buying the excuses, anymore. We want results and solutions, and will vote anti-incumbent until they become a reality. Do with that what you will, but, we will not be deterred any longer. We are mad as hell and we are NOT going to take it anymore. Cliche’ as it is, it accurately reflects the mood and position of the rising independent voters. Your Party can change itself to appease our frustration, or suffer the consequences of ignoring our simple demand.

All right! Get down, David! Stand up there Corpocracy and take yer licks! Biff! Bam! And, would you believe? Some of the State’s are actually standing up for their rights. Manna from heaven! Va. passed a bill to exempt the State from HC mandates. VA. Tx. and Al are challenging the Fed’s authority to regulate carbon emissions, cap and trade, etc. Some 29 states have recently passed 10th amendment laws.
The GOP signed a ‘basic principles statement’ at Mt. Vernon today. TEA party signed also. And what the hell does it matter? Who trust the GOP or Dems to do the right thing? In the 21st century why would a business expect a customer to go it on trust alone? Beyond ignorant, plain stupid! Until a NEW party gets established in some rules making the money influence off limits for eternity, provides oversight for their elected/appointed officials and spells out their agenda in very specific language I’ll keep voting for Nader. Why Nader? He is the only party out there working to abolish corporate personhood. We cannot have government reform until corporate personhood and money is free speech is abolished and campaign finance reform enacted. From there, all is possible.
The GOP signing is just so much asswipe, IMO.

Roy said: “Some of the State’s are actually standing up for their rights. Manna from heaven! Va. passed a bill to exempt the State from HC mandates. VA. Tx. and Al are challenging the Fed’s authority to regulate carbon emissions, cap and trade, etc. Some 29 states have recently passed 10th amendment laws.”

This is not good news, Roy! That old saying immediately comes to mind…’United we stand, divided we shall surely fall.’

I voted for Nader in several elections, until it became obvious he lacked the charisma and salesmanship to garner any kind of substantial following outside the egghead minority. He is one of the most intelligent people I know about the mechanics of why our nation is failing. Regrettably, he does not know how to make a sale on a plan to prevent failure.

I don’t fault him for that. Neither do I.

Congress is where good ideas go to die.
Congress is too busy giving itself a raise.
But the majority of voters have what they deserve.
Rewarding failure simply begets more failure.
This will be a anti-incumbent election year, but not anywhere as anti-incumbent as it needs to be.
As a result, those repeatedly rewarded for failure will continue to promote failure.

I do believe the government operated very well while respecting states rights up until about the time the discovery of oil and the corporation came along. United, but didn’t fall as history indicates. Operated the way the Founder’s intended. Now, it’s upside down. The FED calls all the shots.
Certainly not looking for Nader to gain any traction. Just that as long as he professes to the abolishment of CP when others do not he will continue to get my vote.

Roy:

Va. exempt from HO mandates. Who’s rights did you say they standing up for. their citizens or the HC providers?

Va. Tx. and Al. challenge government authority to regulate carbon. Is this in their citizens best interests or Big Oil and other corporations?

Actually the government did well with states rights until the sent the nation guard in to free a large portion of the population from the clutches of Jim Crow.

We talk a lot about the corporate induced corruption in Washington but, we should not forget that the corporations have their claws in many state governments as well. In my state of Ohio, it is utility companies and insurance companies among others. AEP is asking for a 37% rate increase. PUCO will probably say that is excessive and give them a 23% rate increase.

Nader will be the best choice again in 2012 and I will vote for him again even if he is dead by then.

Obama’s NASA budget is enough to cost him my vote.

Stephen D., if you and the people at KOS are becoming frustrated, think what it must be for old progressive Democrats like myself. I remember well what it was like when Clinton won. Finally the Republicans are out of the Whitehouse and we can get on with the suspended Democratic agenda. Then I found out that Clinton might as well have been a Republican. I watched my party sell out to the corporations.

I tried to deny it for a decade. I voted for Gore. I voted for Kerry. I voted for a Democratic Congress in 2006. After seeing what they promised and what they actually did, I was done with the Democratic Party.

I still consider myself a Democrat but, the Democratic Party that I supported doesn’t exist anymore.

I like you have doubts about the effectiveness of Vote Out Incumbents but I will work with it with one exception, I will not vote for any Republican, incumbent or not. If my only choice to vote out an incumbent is a Republican I’ll just not vote.

Saw this AM where folks calling 911 are charged 3/400 dollars for the response. A residence was charged $28k to have a volunteer fire co. put out their house fire. Charged for bottled water, oxygen for the tanks, etc. Va. is looking to cut education by $730M and HC , by $300M in trying to work on a $2.2B deficit. Same around the country.
The US sold $53B less debt in December. China debt is now $755B and they bought $34B less of our debt. Japan now numero uno holding $768.8B and they bought less by $11.5B as well. The FED is holding $5.1T of our debt. Greece debt is 113.4% of their GDP. EU has stripped them of their right to vote in EU. And, by EU rules, they can’t return to their old sovereign nation. Bummer, or perhaps anarchy.
Our schools and work place overrun with foreigners, illegals with many using taxpayer funds. The US population growth is driven by immigration numbers rather than natural birthrate.
You gotta love this one. The FCC is considering upgrading the Internet to 100 megabits for US homes. US is behind other countries like S. Korea where they are set up for fast video downloads and video teleconferencing.
Pick any topic and you can point to a failed government relating to that topic. Here we are in a crisis, sitting on top of much of the worlds natural gas and no way to deliver it. An oversight? By design? Same for the electric grid. Yet they seem to be able to build 12 lane NAFTA highways to get cheap S..t from China in here. Saw where China is bitching about catfish inspections being xferred from the FDA to the USDA. Would you buy a walmart fish product from Asia? I would buy pharmaceuticals, US approved, from foreign markets, but in this free trade market you can’t do that. How about HC insurance from foreign entities? Nope, not quite that free I’m afraid.
Jlw, on State’s rights, which takes priority under the Constitution, state’s rights or the HC industry? On Cap & Trade. Rather than put another onerous tax on us during a depression why not spend the stimi to install natural gas distribution and include hydrogen delivery in the same ditch. Way cheaper than building nukes, no security probs, reduces oil dollar outflow, ad infinitum. And, yes, power companies were given the government nod a coupla years ago to raise prices. Allegheny, in my area, went up by something like 30% recently, reflected in my first bill.
We are still maybe two years away from the real pain relative to the depression and this failed government. When firetrucks start collecting dust, there’s your sign!

Otherwise, we have the Corpocracy we deserve.

DR
Bayh is a dick. He could have left enough time for the Dems to mount a decent campaign in the primary. I wonder what they had on him.Or as Ezra Klien put it,”Evan Bayh has decided to retire. He said he wants to spend more time scolding his family for moving too far to the left.”

I think that federal support for nucs is yet another attempt to make us a SOCIALIST NATION!!! ,by God, and destroy,yes I said BY GOD, our precious bodily fluids.We must make sure that ONLY RICH PEOPLE benefit from these projects.
For real. Just watch how the Reps try and remove Taft/Hartly worker protections from the proposal.

Christine
Oh,yeah. I suggest we put all these wonderful .absolutly failsafe, contraptions in Virginia along with all the people removed from New Orleans.Work for you?
OK,free marketer,if nuclear power plants are such a great deal,why does the federal goverment have to garuntee loans,agree to provide security,agree to take care of the waste,and cover the liability?

Roy
The troubles started before BIG OIL. PLease,Please read THE PEOPLES HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. Howard Zinn. Its acedemic history, but you will like it and its prespective.You ditto,C&J.

Ah bills, don’t make us read a boring bland book just to make a point on corporations. I remember taking a home study course in engineering. I finished it with an ‘A’ but to receive certification you had to complete a course on ‘management’. Never could read the first page, para, sentence, line, or word. Thus, I didn’t get certified. Be the same way today. I read a book about a year ago with an exciting title, “The Tyranny of Oil”. Maybe I can eek enough from that to address your point.
Gist: In 1882 JDR’s Standard Oil became so corrupt that the State of NY abolished his charter. After the State of Ohio dissolved Standard Oil of Ohio, JR formed the Standard Oil Trust of Ohio. JR was head of the Trust, charged with general supervision of the 14 wholly owned and 26 partly owned companies of the trust. He made people believe there was competition where none existed. Instead of one giant monopoly he wanted the world to see several distinct companies; instead of one corporate chieftain, he wanted the world to see dozens of separate executives, a pleasant coincidence that the businesses happened to work in harmony. Of course, others followed. Between 1898 and 1904 trust companies quadrupled from 82 to 319 while swallowing approx 5300 previously independent businesses. Published in 1942, Allan Nevins and Henry Steel Comager produced ‘A Pocket History of the United States citing problems then that reflect problems with today’s megacorporations. “Local industry dried up, factories went out of business or were absorbed…created a system of absentee ownership…centered power in the hands of a few over the fortunes of millions, greater power than many monarchs. It created new aggregations of capital powerful enough to influence policies of state and even the national legislators, foreign as well as domestic. There were 200 times more millionaires in the 1890’s than there had been in the 1840’s, from fewer than 20 to more than 4k. in 1890 more than half the wealth was held by just 1 percent of US families compared with about 29 percent in 1860. By the 1870’s the US experienced vast income inequality stretching across the nation, massive and unprecedented wealth accumulation by a small industrial class, and the emergence of a PLUTOCRACY….
“As for the Ohio legislature, one newspaper wrote, “the whole democratic legislature was made rotten by the money that was used to buy and sell the members like so many sheep…. From New Hampshire to Calif, from N. Mex. To Montana, legislators were up for auction, declares the Pocket History. “Everywhere the corps had the lobbyists engaged in shameless bribery or, where that failed, in blackmail.” “A Missouri grand jury around 1900 noted that for twelve years corruption had been accepted in state legislation “without interference or hindrance.” A textbook of the times, “Leading Cases Simplified”, warned students “Do not pay much heed to the decisions of the Supreme Court of Penn for the past ten or fifteen years. The Penn RR appears to run that tribunal with the same success that it does its own trains. Penn Petroleum Producers Union in describing the state legislature in 1878; “Our present lawmakers, as a body, are ignorant, corrupt and unprincipled;…the majority of them, directly or indirectly, under the control of the very monopolies against whose acts we have been seeking relief….”
Woodrow Wilson in 1912 “The trust are our masters now”.
“The seven sisters, from 1918-1970 … the most significant and successful example of anticompliance conduct in history, realigning world power, destabilizing economies and toppling governments” said J. W. Cuneo, Dir. Am. Antitrust Institute.
Through mergers, today, the seven are just four: Exxon Mobile, Chevron, BP and Shell. For more than 60 yrs, successive administrations allowed the U.S. members of the cartel to act as a de facto international agency of the U.S. government while dictating the economic development of nations the world over.”
Bills, that should give you a flavor for the problem to which I refer. Corpocracy, Plutocracy, Oligarchy. We are it. Not a dem thing, or a rep thing. It’s a corrupted government thing. A failed government that needs to be torn down, thrown out and replaced. First and foremost, 3rd party with a diff pol. Attitude, Corp Personhood and MIFS has to be abolished, campaign finance reform carried out. Then we can began a government in earnest. Until then, fringe changes a la Obamanomics and Reganomics trickle down.
Nukes vs nat. gas: cost, security, dollar outflow to foreigners.
Guaranteed loans: to whom? Foreign companies, foreign workers, mandated union laborers? Is that in the Constitution that the FED guarantee loans? Too much democracy for me.

Otherwise, we have the Corpocracy we deserve.

bills, I did review Wiki’s summarization and another url’s summarization of the book. My response is the same. 3rd party w/a diff attitude, members oversight, abolishment of CP and MISFS then on to camp fin reform.

Otherwise we have the Corpocracy we deserve.

jlw-
I’m not denying where my party has gone. I’m siding with those like me who want to deny it the opportunity to stay where it is. I have no patience for just standing around, expressing my frustration. I want to do something about it.

David R. Remer-

Stephen said: “But I still have the beliefs and the loyalties of a Democrat.”
Which puts you in the minority, Stephen, during a sea change in American politics evidenced by registered Independent voters outnumbering either registered Democrats or Republicans. Cling to the past if you will, but, the future belongs to the Independents who have no loyalty to the Parties which have killed democracy, replacing it with plutocracy by legislating open doors to the wealthy special interests to craft and influence the legislation that the people will have to pay for.

Imagine a collection of three sets of people, Republican, Democrat, and Independent.

See me over there, waving at you with a stupid grin? That’s me. I tend to smile like that, when I do. I’m there because of my beliefs, my honest beliefs. I look at my party’s platform, and find myself in agreement with much of what they believe.

If you want to berate me for making that choice, of where I stand, insinuating that it represents an acceptance of corruption and all that, that’s your choice.

But the truth is, it’s part of what I’m fighting, and what many on DailyKos fight everyday. When folks were fighting the Social Security Reforms of Bush, they were organizing daily on that. They organize on healthcare, and are constantly raising money for candidate, for Liberal causes.

They’re working for many of the things you yourself support, and they don’t have much patience with the Democrats as they are now.

Neither do I. I view them as an impediment. The worst of them disgrace us, the ones that aren’t so bad, I despise for the help they give to the Republicans in stalling things. Believe me, Lieberman’s dead to me.

But keep that in mind: I didn’t join the Democrats because I favored the politics, half so much as I favored the policies.

Let’s crane and zoom back out, get a look at those millions of people divided up into those categories.

The thing is, those categories are like a search filter. You know what I mean? If you were to visualize it, geographically, you might see a complex web of political loyalties. Those loyalties shift over time. What might be winning one year might not be winning next.

Let those folks go back to their separated crowds, lined up according to political loyalty.

If you take a certain issue, will the views on that subject necessarily filter people out in complete line with the the divisions of party or non-party, be that as it may?

No.

Let’s keep those people together in their groups, but perhaps organize clusters of social relationships within those categories, then lets shade the color of those people’s beliefs on those issues.

I think if we did that, we would see an almost fractal structure of views, of those who hold them, and to what degree, and those issues would not necessarily cluster merely along the lines of party.

You talk of duopolies. I would talk of people who can’t really splinter without undermining their ability to win a majority. Majorities rule, or are supposed to rule.

Now what I would point out here is that there is much overlap in terms of certain sets of beliefs, the clusters I was describing before, but not always, and there are plenty of issues where plenty of people among both parties and among the independents agree, making the structure of such political discourse different than issues that mainly cluster among the partisan populations.

Visualize those clusters, not necessarily partisan, spreading out like tree roots among people’s minds. They may not necessarily admit it to themselves, but they have something in common with other people.

Or maybe they’ve got the piece of an insight that they might not have the logic to hook up together, In that case, the fractal boundary of an issue might not merely run between different clusters of people, they might run between the clusters of thoughts in people’s heads, a debate in microcosm.

Whether it’s connecting people who already have a certain belief, and discouraging their inhibition of their cooperation, or appealing to people with logic that plants the seeds of agreement by connecting the dots for them, my aim is not to sit self satisfied with my party’s superiority. My purpose is to reach out to people.

When you talk about duopolies, I groan inside. If you understood things the way I understood them, you would see that whether there are two parties, one party, or many parties, people will always cluster together, and against one another.

The two party system has persisted since almost the beginning of the Republic, and there’s rarely been deviation from it for a reason: majority rules. Even if we get more fragmented, the coalitions will tend towards the same sort of organization, for the same reason. If, say, the Greens split off people from the left, and the Republicans saw Libertarians or Tea Partisans split off from the right, or if some midway party clustered together, I would bet you that you would soon see those cluster form coalitions, however permanent or temporary, and something like the two party system would come back into play.

Why? Because majority rules, and with majority rules, however many nominal parties there are, there are really just two effective kinds of political organization: majority, and minority.

No rule really says that any majority must be permanent. Politics can create odd bedfellows, of course. See Libertarian Bob Barr and Civil Libertarians among the Democrats, for example. This is part of what makes wedge strategies effective, what leads people to to vote against interests.

It’s not partisan warfare that’s the problem, it’s that at least one of the parties is so hidebound altogether as one big cluster, that you don’t see the natural majorities and minorities develop as they should. In short, the Republican’s party-line behavior is entirely unlike normal political behavior over time.

My focus is policy, and always has been. I’m willing to throw a bone to corporations, but mostly just to keep them off the ass of necessary legislation that gets things moving in the right direction. I subscribe to a certain punctuated incrementalism, or in other words, long periods of gradual, small changes, and when the opportunities present themselves, large leaps forward.

That is no more than an apologetic excuse designed to defend Democrats lack of results, Stephen. It is an excuse, not a solution to solve the problem. The voters are tired of excuses. They want solutions.

I am more interested in the party on the ground level, and its expression, by successive elections, up in Washington. You try, with your sometimes excessive rhetoric, to pin me as some defender of the Washington Status quo. I’m not. I’m far from it. But I’m a strategic thinker. I’m not a hair on fire demagogue.

The years of decadence in Washington have left their mark, and the people there will not change easily. Meanwhile, we still have to make sure good gets done for the country.

Well-intentioned politics can sometimes get out ahead of its means to make forward progress, over extended like an unbalanced punch or stab with a sword. My politics is based on having a sold stance.

The decay of generations does not have an easy or quick solution, whether or not we’re talking third-parties, or anti-incumbency movements, and meanwhile, the people we elect make policy.

This is a complex problem, and we need folks to get more focused on basic issue.

You can rail at my party and at people like me all you want to. If you don’t add us to your cluster, your ambitions get nowhere. And if your ambitions don’t work towards a positive policy end, they are pointless. Sorry to say that, but it’s the blunt truth. I don’t trust simplistic political panaceas, the movements that claim they can fix everything, because everybody I’ve seen claiming those things has screwed something up, or not understood the nature of the problem to begin with.

The government, the politics, and the society both reside in work on complex levels, some so complex no one person can run it properly. I trust more the people who can lay down the posturing and everything, and just talk about the subject in questioning, respecting the complexity of the topic. All kinds of folks on all sides think they can reduce things to political slogans, talking points, and beliefs systems held dear, stubbornly adhered to, even in the face of being proved false by events.

Folks can let their imagination run away from themselves on all sorts of counts, and when an entire nation or party lets that happen to themselves… Well, the results are never pretty.

I don’t want delusion, I don’t want politics overwhelming good sense. I want a political system that makes sense on a human level. My fight in my party, which I’m not alone in, is to have my party make that kind of sense, and stand up for the values we believe in.

I just wish the Republicans would do the same, and by that, I mean the grassroots of the Republican party. Unfortunately, it seems that the group that’s taking the party on its current ride is just a different version of the same insanity that afflicted Bush era-Republicans, minus the moderation of actual responsibility. I just wish they’d wake up and realize that the party members in Washington are badly in need of replacement.

But if your “anti-incumbent” voters don’t vote their interests, they’re no better, and doing no more good than the bamboozled Democrats and Republicans you despise. Truth of the matter is, voting is a choice, and it’s a choice for a certain set of policy beliefs, as much as its a choice against another. If we simply vote randomly, if we don’t select for a certain mix of policy, whatever that may be, we may never truly see a closer return to sanity in Washington.

I vote with purpose, with a mind to certain policy and making just those compromises I believe will bring what I want to see in Washington faster.

You can damn the black heart of my Democratic party as melodramatically as you see fit. I can barely manage to be offended, that line is so ridiculous. But the truth is, political institution are evolving institution, and the Democrats in Washington are quickly finding out that there’s nothing in the middle of Washington’s road than yellow stripes and dead armadilloes.

Stephen D. said: “If you want to berate me for making that choice, of where I stand, insinuating that it represents an acceptance of corruption and all that, that’s your choice.”

Since when it stating a fact about a person belonging to a minority group of voters, berating? I never implied that you ‘ACCEPT corruption and all that’. You support a Party which has participated in the corruption of American democracy. Whether you accept those actions by your Party or not, is NOT for me to say. I am no mind reader.

It goes without saying, that a Party Loyalist finds enough positive in their Party to warrant their loyalty. This does not mean Party Loyalists necessarily agree with everything their Party does or puts forth. I worked within the Democratic Party for a short time, because I subscribed to some of their ideals and objectives.

People are joiners. People like to belong to groups larger than themself. Even if there were no political causes, people would join groups. Its in our DNA. There are a host of political groups in America. Most everyone identifies with one or another, whether they officially join or not. I do not condemn people.

I will condemn their actions or ideas if they reveal hypocrisy. I have condemned my own hypocrisy from time to time. The plutocracy the Democratic Party actively supports and takes financial sustenance from is in direct contradiction to the very NAME of the Party.

A Republic, and Republicans, acknowledge in the very name of their Party opposition to democracy, choosing instead to put their faith in elites to govern for the best interests of all. As Caucasions become ever more a minority in our society, the name of their Party becomes truer with the passage of time. White, wealthy, male, mainstream Christian, preferably with a business background and close ties to the business and corporate world, is the more trusted ideal leader amongst Republicans. They won’t confess this directly as it would not be politically correct. But the sociological measures of their Party subscribers and history bare the reality out. It is entirely consistent for the GOP to advocate for and take quid pro quo favors from the elites and corporate world in return for legislation that supports that relationship.

The Democratic Party subscribes to this very same relationship with only some differences and lines drawn which they won’t cross. President Obama was acting the consistent Democrat when he blew his stack at Geithner and Summers late last year for their actions resembling Republicans, favoring the corporate world at a cost to the American people at large. Yet, a very large number of Democrats in Congress subscribe to the same relationship to the elite corporate world as Republicans do and their legislative actions demonstrate this caving to the pressures of Wall St. at a cost to the average working American and their family.

This kind of corruption of the democratic process is what is fueling the growth of registered independent voters and anti-incumbent voters. Why it is that so many in your Party are blind to this, or worse, outright condone and defend it, is hypocrisy in my view and that of many others.

If you are a Democrat who is remaining with the Party to change it toward the better part of its namesake, then your action is to be commended, because the Dem. Party really needs some major change from within if it is ever to garner the majority support of the people on a protracted basis again.

The Democratic Party failed me as a supporter and member. I finally woke up one day when a Dem fund raiser called for donations and made the pitch to me that the Dem. Party is so much better for the American workers and their families than the Republicans, that we cannot allow the Republicans to buy the elections. That struck me square between the eyes flashing them both wide open.

The irony and hypocrisy inherent in that sales pitch was the crossing the line for me, such that I could not see a whole lot of practical difference between the two Parties anymore. And the more I critically examined the Democratic Party’s actions and structure and leadership, the more disillusioned I became.

Obviously, your experience with the Democratic Party is not the same. I don’t condemn you. I will continue to rightly and justly condemn the hypocrisies of the Democratic Party as I do with the GOP. The integrity of my country and my Daughter’s future in it, are being grossly undermined by both the major Parties, and we are swimming in a sea of the evidence of this objective fact. Elective unnecessary war, Too Big To Fail banks getting even bigger at the hands of Congress, from uncontrolled entitlement deficits as far as the eye can see to the decades of losses in real wages for working Americans, from the S&L debacle to the most recent banking and mortgage sector collapse, we live in a sea of evidence that the Democratic and Republican Parties are failing the American people, and my daughter. She never did anything to your Party or the GOP, but, she her future is being punished by these Party’s actions and prorities, and that, Stephen, is UNACCEPTABLE!

Your Party deserves as much condemnation as the GOP. The Gramm Leach Bliley Act, the absence of oversight and resistance to the invasion of Iraq, the failures in addressing al-Queda BEFORE 9/11, the illegal immigration nightmare and inhumanity, and much more are blood on the Democratic Party’s hands. My daughter’s future requires a pro-active government, not a reactionary government.

Her future requires being a higher priority in the eyes of lawmakers than the continuation of this widening canyon in wealth underway, leaving less and less for the majority to live on, or even hope for.

Yes, Stephen, I damn your party and for the soundest, most objective, and documented of reasons. Your Party constitutes a THREAT aimed at my Daughter and her future in America as an American citizen. If that offends your sense of loyalty, then perhaps the time taken to write this has not been wasted.

bills asked the most fundamentally correct question to be asked about nuclear power plants: “OK, free marketer,if nuclear power plants are such a great deal, why does the federal government have to guarantee loans, agree to provide security, agree to take care of the waste, and cover the liability?”

Another is: If nuclear power plants are such a great economic choice, why haven’t we built any in 30 years? The answers to this question will reveal why we should be seeking other alternatives going forward. Like war, as a short term boost to manufacturing, nuclear power is a long term expense to great to justify unless, there is no other option.

We should be seeking more cost effective options.

David R. Remer-
I see my party as a work in progress. My loyalty is to the progress, not the current version. Though my views could be described as centrist on policy, I would say my inclinations are progressive.

My basic belief is that too many people of decency and good judgment have left the major organizations of our society, leaving them to be controlled by the more cynical or the more partisan. That is a trend that I would like to see reversed. I would like the Republicans, in Washington and at their homes to become less separated from their fellow Americans, less scared, less cocooned in fear and loathing of us.

I have no illusions about the basic corruption of my party, it’s evolution into just another part of the system that pushes the ideology I so dislike. But I do not see some magic fairy coming down and making it different, nor a third party whose beliefs match mine enough to deserve my vote.

So I am left with a bit of a quandary here. Do I support the redemption of what is a deeply flawed party, or do I fade back into the woodwork, disillusioned?

My choice has been made. If am to be a bitter partisan, it’s going to be in the interest of putting public interests more front and center in my party’s agenda. I’m not going to abandon my nation’s future, nor my party’s to the cynics or the corrupt who would be the residue of a mass exodus. I’m not inviting people back to the Democratic Party merely to support it. I’m inviting them back to take it over.

As for seeking more cost effective options, we are. Billions are being spent on Solar, Wind, and Renewables, as we speak. That, in part is a result of the effort of people like me to get Obama elected. The Democratic Party can be a force for good, we’re just going to have to force a lot of the good out of it grudgingly and with great effort. But it will be better than trying to squeeze it like blood out of the stone that is the Republican Party.

Many of the people that gravitate towards centers of power and wealth are often the kinds of people that shouldn’t be allowed near those centers.

Bills

Virginia gets around 35% of its power from nuclear. The current governor would like to put in motion plans that will push that up to 75%. Bring it on. I would much rather have that than coal.

jlw

The same goes for politics.

Stephen D. said: “But I do not see some magic fairy coming down and making it different,…”

Right. That is for the voters to do. By rejecting the Party’s incumbents, voters can force the Party to promote and select candidates who will demonstrate performance in office, which those same voters can finally approve of, by a majority. That is the foundation of the concept of democracy.

Far too many of your Party’s Congressional representatives rely instead, on propaganda mailings to their constituents, misinformation based marketing and advertising on the campaign trail subsidized and aligned with wealthy special interests, and that long favored underminer of democracy, gerrymandering of districts. Just exactly the same as Republicans. Two wrongs don’t make a right, and in this case, two parties doing the wrong and undemocratic thing has a multiplier effect that is destroying this nation’s future.

You said: “If am to be a bitter partisan, it’s going to be in the interest of putting public interests more front and center in my party’s agenda.”

Therein lies the source of power the duopoly Party has over this nation, and the reason both parties have devolved taking the people’s government into the depths of chaos and inaction, fiddling as Rome burns, so to speak.

With enough support from loyalists, the Party has no incentive to change its ways. Look at the GOP for pete’s sake. They are an incredible minority today, booted from power, splintered into pieces internally, and yet, with polls showing between 27 and 30% support by the public, they can find no incentive to get their Act Together along the democratic path of earning the confidence and trust of the people to solve this nation’s problems.

For all the GOP’s loss of power, their loyalists are sufficient to keep them in the game of competing for power without changing, one iota, their hypocrisies, anti-democratic ways, priorities to better represent the majority, or answer effectively the challenges that beset the nation.

I see the same thing in the Democratic Party. Universal single payer health care insurance with incentives and promotions for non-profit health care delivery is precisely what our nation’s future demands in order to keep from going bankrupt. The numbers are very clear on this matter. Where were the Democrats?

What the nation requires in health care reform was abandoned by Obama, Pelosi, and Reid before public discussions even began. And why? Resistance from corporate America lobbyists and special interests making that option untenable for passage, purportedly.

Democrats chose instead to BEGIN negotiations with a compromise on our nation’s future with the Public Option, and ended up with a bill in the Senate that would not address Medicare bankruptcy of the nation, at all. These actions of the Democratic leadership were nothing less than a complete sell out to their corporate patrons. The Democratic Party, exactly like the GOP, made herself available to the highest corporate bidders and did their bidding in approaching health care reform. All the rest was just honey added to the mix to make the intolerable and distasteful more palatable. Some poisons just can’t be masked however.

And the American public, still holding out for reform that will rescue their children’s future in America, know well the poisonous nature of these grotesquely compromised bills from the House and Senate.

They know two things about these bills. They are expensive, and will not eliminate the entitlement bankruptcy of the nation going forward. And that Stephen, is all they need to know to guide their vote toward anti-incumbency.

Your Party needs to dramatically improve its leadership, such that real solutions to real problems, with real costs for Americans today which, avoid even greater costs to their children tomorrow, are proffered and defended on its own merits. The majority of people have a way of knowing when they are being fed compromised bullcrap, and when the truth is being told them about real solutions in their best interest.

The reality about the current political landscape despite all the rhetoric to the contrary is that: Most Americans are doing fairly well in America today. The majority are still employed, putting their kids through school, and living in homes of their choosing. For these Americans, the majority, policies which will salvage the future for their children at a moderate cost to them today, will be overwhelmingly welcomed and assented to.

Yet, neither Party has been willing to put forth that kind of policy proposal for this majority’s approval and assent. Instead, they offer compromised solutions which don’t even begin to solve the problem their children will face, and tack a very high cost to it for present tax payers to boot. And they scratch their heads wondering why the people don’t rally in support.

Your Party has as desperate need of new leadership as the GOP. But, to acquire the right kind of leadership, the Party must first establish an appropriate selection criteria to insure the best kind of leadership is drafted into the Party. Wealth, position, and name recognition ARE THE WRONG CRITERIA, Stephen, guaranteed to reproduce the deplorable policy approaches being pedaled today.

Government of, by, and for the people, Stephen. Not government of, by, and for the corrupt insiders who are practiced at preserving the status quo in process and product. Americans are increasingly feeling like the Colonialists did under the rule of King George.

One American committed suicide today with his plane in a terrorist like attack on buildings in Austin, Texas, to protest his loss of faith in America, her government, and her future. We can chalk this up to mental instability, or take it as the foreshadowed warning it really is. The Timothy McVeigh’s in this country are growing in number, and the broken political system is their Raison d’être.

The anti-incumbent option had better yield results in forcing one of the Two parties to get back to common sense basics and solutions, because today’s event in Austin, is the other option.

Special commission to provide a plan to balance the federal budget by 2020. Well, I’m willing to just sit back and wait on that one, aren’t you. The Corpocracy term for commission is political cover. President’s put commissions into effect via XO’s so congress doesn’t have to take the heat. NAFTA is a good example. So is this deficit planning thing. Walker, ex-GAO, says we have a couple of years left before it hits the fan. Another prominent which I can’t remember says less than 5 years. This commission is like working up a 5 year plan on how to get a sinking Titanic back to shore. Just more busting up the middle class as I see it. By hook or crook the middle class has to come to accept $4-5/hr jobs so we can compete in the global economy. The Corpocracy has sucked all the easy money out; 401k’s, home equity, savings. Now they will work on increasing taxes, inflation and more job losses to get the job done. Interest on the debt went up 1.49% today. Insurance companies raised premiums by 30-60%. Must be a quid pro quo there somewhere. Pharma’s raised prices to offset the $80B they promised O’ in HC reductions. My electric just went up 30%.
Beck is telling folks they should be preparing, buying extras for the food pantry, getting rid of debt, etc. But, there is only so much one can do to save themselves. The admin has reserve TARP money and 2/3rds of the stimulus money they could use for debt reduction but, alas, they will pursue busting up the middle class and spend it, IMO. They can keep folks afloat by extending unemp. Insurance for a few more years. And finally, at some point people will sign on to those $5/hr jobs and be glad to have one. We have strayed so far from the Constitution. Should we have expected something different? We are just like the rest of world, IMO.

David,

I only skimmed the section of your article on Obama and will only say that for today I am leaning pro-nuclear. It is a complex issue and I reserve the right to change my mind in light of new information.

Scientifically, the best near term solution to nuclear waste storage is breeder reactors that can turn it into fuel and use it to produce power. That is not what kind of reactors they want to build however.

The second best long term solution to nuclear waste is short term (50 to 200 years) on site dry cask storage which is what they are already doing.

Why is short term storage the best long term solution??? Because; spent nuclear fuel contains many short half life actinides… Short half life’s mean that they rapidly break down into less dangerous elements. Short half life means that they are highly radioactive. It also means that they are hot. The heat and extreme radiation greatly complicate handling and long term storage. Further storing the material on site preserves the highly valuable material in easily accessible locations for the day when we pull our heads out of the dark place and decide to reprocess it into new fuel.

Most of the short half life actinides will be gone in 50 years and virtually all will be decayed in 200 years. What will be left is uranium and plutonium both of which have long half life’s, are relatively cool, and tend to be solids that will stay where they are put…

Now the first part of your article…

Bayh’s timing seems to be calculated to turn his seat over to the Republicans which will not help grid lock. I think that what seems to be his attempt to help the Republicans may backfire…

The Republicans are the cause of the grid lock. The Democrats have moved toward Republican positions on every bill without getting a single Republican vote. Tax cuts were put in the stimulus bill for Republicans. We compromised. How many votes did we get. Have you got a hand with no fingers - count em. No Medicare for all in the health care bill - not even a watered down public option… How many Republican votes? You won’t need any fingers on your hand for that either. Republicans have made fingers obsolete.

How many Democrats voted for Bush’s Leave the Children Behind Education Bill? How many Democrats voted for Roberts and Alito who just gave the unlimited right to buy our elections - yet has the Republicans even allowed Obama to get his low level appointees approved??? - even security officials??? - even as our country faces terrorist threats at home and abroad??? How many trusted Bush and voted for the wars??? How voted for or at least voted to allow a vote on Bush’s tax cuts for the rich??? The list of recent Democratic cooperation with Republican rule is endless.

Personally, I think that the Dems were too cooperative, but they did not create gridlock.

There is no list of recent Republican cooperation with Democratic rule. None!

David R. Remer-
I believe in making my messages targeted. I want there to be clear policy reasons why a person is lagging behind in the polls.

I am willing to grind down through many classes worth of these politicians. But I want to have both a carrot and a stick. I want them to know what I’m encouraging them towards.

Maybe you don’t have enough dogs in the fight to have some preferences, but I have the issues I want to win on.

I am not going to wait for the political situation to clear up to start pushing for the right policies. In fact, I’m going to make those pushes where the policies provide me with the leverage to push out the unworthy.

You think in broad terms about incumbents, but Most people don’t. They think in terms of concrete actions of their own. It is easier for me to challenge people like this if I have an issue that puts them on the defensive.

And, as a matter of fact, its those who don’t deal with different issue right that ultimately we need to get rid of anyways. Kill two birds with one stone.

I think at this point, we are grudgingly getting the lesson taught on my side of the aisle that Democrats have a base, too, and it’s going to be very tough to win, having displeased them for the purposes of trying to appeal to people who don’t vote for them anyways.

Ray, good to hear from you.

Your position on nuclear has one flaw. Economics. In America, economics which benefits the private sector with total abandon of the public sector’s requirements if need be, governs.

You allude to this in your acknowledgment of the absence of breeder reactors in the plan. It is one thing to let economics determine policy over trade agreements. It is quite another to let private sector economics determine policy over toxic substances. The massive multi-trillion dollar need for environmental clean up after the private sector stands as testament, and the multi-billions of dollars already allocated to the SuperFund toxic environmental cleanup project stands as testament to the truth of what I am saying.

With so many areas of American subject to seismic activity, vulcanism, and climate change, surface storage is, in reality, a potentially very dangerous option. A flood, or seismic activity that disperses those radioactive materials into underground water tables, in a highly populated area served by those water tables for drinking water, is a disaster waiting to happen, of potentially enormous and costly proportions.

Nearly all of America’s most threatening challenges to our future today stem from going for the gains and worrying about the liabilities, later. With nuclear waste, it is illogical in the extreme to move toward creating ever more waste, without having FIRST developed a safe, and cost-effective plan for insuring the waste never pollutes soils and water supplies in America.

And if there are no safe and cost-effective ways of dealing with waste stockpiles, then increasing those stockpiles is nothing short of criminal intent to harm for profit, as I see it.

As for Democrats, their leadership sucks. Why didn’t Democrats revise the cloture vote requirement to 51 or 55 when they potentially had the 60 votes to make it happen? Bad leadership lacking in priority skills. Why didn’t their leadership either go for the one plan to solve the Medicare multi-trillion future deficits, single payer, or, alternatively, piece meal the legislation in ways that would cause the public to rise up against Republican obstruction? Very, very poor leadership skills.

What good are politicians to voters and tax payers if they lack the leadership and priority skills needed to solve the nation’s and people’s problems? Democrats had the largest majority in Congress they are likely to ever see. Blaming the Republicans for legislative failures is politically expedient, but, utterly and completely fails the American people, nonetheless.

Stephen D. said: “I believe in making my messages targeted. I want there to be clear policy reasons why a person is lagging behind in the polls.”

I hear in this statement losing sight of the forest for the trees. Single issues are meaningless if the process is so broken as to prevent practical and effective issue answers from becoming reality.

The process is broken. The process is owned and maintained by BOTH the Democratic and Republican Parties. There is no logical or rational way of dodging this simple and fundamental truth and obstacle to our nation effectively dealing with the challenges that threaten it. Any attempt to dodge it is fundamentally flawed and deceptive. And deceptive and flawed practices NEVER solve real world problems, they only compound them.

America needs leadership which can grasp the fundamental challenges standing in the way of progress, and effectively address those. What we have instead is akin to the Generals in WWI whose answer to trench warfare was to throw ever more bodies into the trenches, on both sides, for years. In practice, we are doing the same things over and over which created the problems, expecting repetition to solve them.

Neither Party is going to change their criteria for candidate selection. Therefore, if the kind of leadership that can and will solve problems is to ever get elected, it is the voters who will have to force that change. Voters have but one tool to make that happen, their vote for, or, against an incumbent party or politician.

When the only tool one has is a hammer, one’s choice is simple in addressing the problem. Hit it with the hammer, or not hit it. The latter choice renders the only tool one has, useless.

Incumbents are responsible for the mess, we the people as a nation, are in. Hitting them with the vote hammer is the only Constitutionally legal tool in the public’s toolbox. The alternatives of letting the problems destroy our future, or war against out government, are unacceptable, as long as the vote hammer has not been put to full use, first and shown to be ineffective.

David,

While I completely agree with your premise that incumbents are the problem I have to believe the reason incumbents are the problem is because the people don’t really know what they want. I have long favored term limits, to the dismay of people on both sides of the aisle, not because I think running lots of people through a limited incumbency will necessarily improve the quality of governance, but because I think it will change the focus of office-holders’ use of power from nest-feathering to educating their constituencies.

If the longest time any one person can devote to public office is severely truncated the effects of their actions on the private sector will mean something to them. They will be forced to live there soon enough.

They will also understand how an informed electorate benefits them, both in their brief tenure in office and in their coming life in the wild spaces of the private economy. In campaigns we here the same pseudo-issues over and over again. They tell us far more about the state of politcal science than they tell us about the state of the world. Office holders want control. These pseudo-issues are designed to deliver them control, not to inform us.

Modern politics is not about doing good. It is about using our prejudice to convince us to put ourselves in chains.

Roy said: “The admin has reserve TARP money and 2/3rds of the stimulus money they could use for debt reduction”

The single greatest cause of our current deficit level is the loss of tax revenues caused by the Great Recessions shrinkage of economic activity. Using those funds to bring down the deficit answers a small portion of the deficit this year, but, DOES NOTHING to improve the economy and increase revenues going forward.

Beck is an idiot on this issue, because he IGNORES the overwhelming consensus of economists that the most prudent path forward in addressing debt and deficits is to first restore economic activity. America cannot afford to be myopic here. We have to have our solutions address BOTH present and future objectives. Taking care of today and to hell with tomorrow is precisely the kind of thinking that took place on Wall St. to create this Great Recession in the first place.

It is imperative that we use what resources are at our disposal to restore economic and consumer activity to sustainable and balanced levels, which in turn, will re-employ those workers who lost their jobs at the hands of those myopic politicians and Wall St. execs during the Clinton and Bush Administrations.

I cannot think of a single president since the 1960’s who would not do exactly as Obama and the Congress is now doing, in borrowing the resources needed to restore economic activity, which is the single most effective action that can be taken to restore jobs, increase government revenues and reduce deficits, and invest in our economic infrastructure for a more robust economy down the road.

Everything else said on this topic is politics at its worst which ignores the numbers, and variables at play in this recovering economy. And it is recovering in no small part due to the Stimulus and TARP resources used to date. Even a majority of conservative economists now agree on this point.

Be very careful about Beck. He does not know what he does not know, and that means he will make a logical argument for audience suicide if he thought it would help his ratings. He is an entertainer, not a scholar in economics, nor even politics or history. In fact, his entire College education consists of one theology class, “Early Christology,” after which he dropped out of college never to return.

Beck has worked in the radio and TV business all his life. Beck is an ignorant entertainer. Ignorant of history, economics, the Constitution, political science, and every other academic pursuit except TV and Radio entertainment.

Be very careful about taking Beck seriously when he talks about subjects he has no academic footing in. Beck has a talent for pushing people’s emotional buttons, and doing so in a Radio and TV environment. Beck is a successful Radio and TV entrepreneur. That is the extent of Beck’s resume.

Lee said: “I have long favored term limits, to the dismay of people on both sides of the aisle, not because I think running lots of people through a limited incumbency will necessarily improve the quality of governance, but because I think it will change the focus of office-holders’ use of power from nest-feathering to educating their constituencies.”

I can only find one flaw in your comment above, Lee. Term Limits is something the Incumbents themselves would have to vote on and approve. That is like asking a hunter to give up his firearms and go back to hunting with clubs, for the sake of fairness to the animals he hunts. Ain’t going to happen.

It is time Americans grew up to their responsibilities as voters in a democratically elected government, and impose their own term limits based on the results of the government they receive. That is the essence of democracy and the primary motivation behind the vote in our Constitution, to give either the people or their representatives the power to remove any would be King George’s from office, going forward, without having to engage in another Revolutionary War.

I agree with your astute comment: “In campaigns we here the same pseudo-issues over and over again. They tell us far more about the state of political science than they tell us about the state of the world. Office holders want control. These pseudo-issues are designed to deliver them control, not to inform us.”

David, I suppose you don’t believe Beck or Dobbs would be a good candidate for political office. I’m not here to defend Beck or Dobbs. They are just one more source of information to be considered. Thus far, I’ve not found Beck to be putting out erroneous information.
As for the economy, everybody has an opinion there. You know mine. The corpocracy has spent 30 years busting up the middle class so that we may COMPETE in the global economy. $4-5/hr wages, etc. We ain’t there yet so the corpocracy will continue to destruct rather than construct. There has to be a way lot more jobs lost, real estate defaults, SS and medicare cut backs, and people living on the street before folks will accept defeat and take the $4 jobs.
Sure we can limp along for a while on borrowed taxpayer money building nuke plants, electric grid, infrastructure, etc. That will work so long as China/Japan pick up the tab. But, there are very few real jobs, other than the service sector, where Americans can produce a product that can compete in the global economy. Will be difficult, even with $4/hr wages. I think Obama turned populist a couple of weeks ago and had a job summit or spoke on jobs. Alas, I, and millions of others must have missed it. Tiger Woods is making a speech today which I probably will miss as well.
Beck has the right idea. People need to think about survival, putting away extra food and minimizing bills. Get rid of that second TV line, second phone line, call waiting and caller ID, take the basic plans, etc. We are indeed going to experience a transformation of ‘our’ world.

Two things required: stop spending and create jobs. Just the opposite taking place, as we ain’t to $4/hr yet.

Otherwise - -

David, test the spin put on whether illegals should be allowed to work in the US. This excerpt from a website purportedly teaching the Constitution.

“By job we mean employment, or exerting our physical labor or mental capacity to earn money (and other benefits). In brief we provide some kind of work (service) to produce or market something in exchange for this world’s goods. If this were a God-given right then we would have to conclude that we are bound to live in one class or another and that we could not progress from class to class. That is to say that the worker class was created by God and the owner (employer) class was also created by God–that they are forever separate and that the worker cannot become anything but a worker. To the contrary. The revealed word of God tells us that “In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return to the ground…” (Genesis 3:19). But God also gave the resources of the earth to Adam and Eve and to their posterity including each of us. We each have the opportunity to work and to struggle, to save and to spend, to secure our present status, and to build for ourselves a future.

The scripture also says that God sent Adam to till the ground. Does that mean that we must all be farmers? I do not interpret it that way. That is however the way things started out. Adam was able to use his mind and his toil, time, and effort to build a life for himself and his family. You might say he was self-employed. I am not saying that we all need to be self-employed either. I am saying that unless you are self-employed, the job is not the property of the employee but rather the employer. How then can you have a right to something you don’t own? One of the basic concepts of the right of property is that you can use, manage, acquire, or dispose of your property at your will. Shouldn’t the employer have the right to hire the employee of his choice to fill the position that he creates?”

Now that’s the kind of guy you need to be wary of, IMO. Teaching the Constitution while ignoring same!

Roy said: “David, I suppose you don’t believe Beck or Dobbs would be a good candidate for political office.”

Correct. There is a difference however, between these two. Beck doesn’t know what he doesn’t know. Dobbs is very aware of what he doesn’t know, and that permits him to rationally state, he has no interest in running for politics. He knows he is a very good TV personality with a talent for making populist rational argument. And like all folks who are aware of the Peter Principle and accept its validity, Dobbs will not permit himself to travel down that path.

I vehemently disagree with Dobbs on a number of issues, and agree with him just as strongly on many others. I do however, enormously respect his integrity. Beck, IMO, has no integrity - he will float whatever arguments will increase his ratings and profits as an infotainment personality.

I disagree you when you say: “Beck has the right idea. People need to think about survival, putting away extra food and minimizing bills.”

That is a defeatist position which leaves no motivation or incentive for addressing the challenges at hand. All human remedies and solutions must, a priori, begin with the hope and belief that some action toward those ends will be fruitful. Beck, as usual, is appealing to people’s weakest and worst side for ratings, not the better potential of their natures that underwrites mankind’s best accomplishments and solutions.

I would think espousing a survivalist position would render me a defeatist as well, David. Yet, how does that square with my trying to get a 3rd party off the ground and calling for revolution? Perhaps, I too, am afflicted by what I don’t know. Must be a fairly common phenomena.

Roy said: “I am saying that unless you are self-employed, the job is not the property of the employee but rather the employer.”

You can say that, but, it would not be true. The employer owns the capital equipment and resources to conduct business. The relationship between employer and employee is contractual. The employee can steal from the employer and the employer can cheat the employee of pay for hours worked. Government and its laws set the parameters for this contract such that neither the employee nor the employer can take advantage of the other without negative legal consequences attending that behavior.

When employers own the jobs, they also own the employees who fill them, and that is called slavery. Been there, done that. Resolved by the outcome of the Civil War and Civil Rights legislation of the 1960’s. No need to revisit the resolved issue.

Those who ignore the lessons of history are destined to repeat the mistakes of the past. Employers DO NOT own the jobs. They own the facilities that require people to manage and make functional for the employer, which makes the employer as dependent upon employees as employees are dependent on their employer. Hence, a contract must be struck, and to be advantageous and not counterproductive for both employer and employee, that contract must contain prohibitions backed by the force of government and law, against taking unfair advantage of each other’s dependency upon each other.

Of course, laws do not guarantee contractual obligations will be met. It can only mete out consequences for failures to uphold the terms of the contract.

Roy, a third party initiative is anything but defeatist.

As a practical matter however, which you already alluded to, survivalist measures are impractical and limited if our economic system fails. The anarchy that will ensue will reduce people to their animal substrate, and as we know from studying the nature of prey and predator, parasite and host, who is eaten and who does the eating, is as much a matter of luck as any inherent skill or adaptation or preparation. All predators are subject to becoming prey. The bacterial and viral microscopic world insure that.

In a post apocalyptic event, individual survivalists will become prey to predatory bands and groups. Who in turn will become targets of even bigger associations of prey banding together, like wild razorback pigs tearing a pack of coyote’s to pieces.

If America’s economy fails, everyone loses, from the very wealthy to the very poor. Some will lose more than others, but, everyone loses their previous quality of life supported by a relatively peaceful social order to the exchange of goods and services, on which we all depend.

Obama is on TV in Nevada trying to hold up Harry. One lady said she was working for a free clinic and would Obama’s poiicies help them out. Of course he replied in the affirmative. Socialism on the move. Tooo much democracy. Noted he said the FED was buying back foreclosed houses and putting them on the market.
Also, that a nuke plant in Vt. has a slow leak of tritium (waste product) as has been noted in 27 of the 104 plants. Was found in a river in Il. but ‘taken care of’. Not sure if its in the river in Vt. yet.
On survival, those who prepare, geese, dog, gun, neighborhood security, foodstock, etc, are likely to fare bettter than those who continue to be couch potots in American’s meltdown, IMO.

Obama just pulled a ringer out of the crowd behind him and the ringer asked what he was going to do for, hold yer breath, ‘tourism’ in Nevade. Wonder of wonders, O’ noted that he and Reid had just discussed that on the plane and so he gave the mike to Harry. Harry noted that the US was the only country that didn’t promote itself and he had introduced a bill that would promote tourism in the US, saving tens of thousands of jobs.

This politics is becoming more entertaining than Comedy Central. Git er Dun Harry!

David, my 293959 is an excerpt from some dude TEACHING the Constitution. Relates to our discussion on being wary of folks like Beck and others. Your response, 295942, implies that I was in agreement with the excerpt. No, I was just trying to show that this is the stuff put out there that one needs to be wary of.

Otherwise, what can we debate? I cut a downed cedar this AM and put a load of clothes in to wash. Then there’s this census thing coming up. Going to cost us some Billions of dollars for S.E.I.U to round us up and take a count. A very good suggestion on an O’Riley email last evening. Suggestion was to pay the Postal Office to conduct the census. The PO is struggling with debt, soft business model, etc. The employees know where the people are located and skeletons buried. Probably get a way more accurate count as the PO doesn’t have an axe to grind in the numbers. I suppose it couldn’t be done as ‘it’s not in the charter’, etc.

The fellow that targeted the IRS with an airplane was upset over the complexity of the 1040 form. I completely agree with him. I spent 4 hours trying to figure out how to complete the AMT form and gave up in disgust. And, I’m pretty sure that when I get it near completed there will be a line or two to add, subtract, or divide that tells you you don’t have to complete the form anyway.
Why can we not have a flat tax? You could do away with 95% of the IRS, save wads of money, and keep people from crashing planes into buildings. Big expense there.
Not to be with the duopoly. They want to create yet another Agency. Consumer Protection. (derisive laughter)
Federal employees now making about twice what the private sector makes. I believe it NY state that has a retirement system based on 3-50. Over a career an employee pays in something like $125 grand and recoups something like $3M over an average lifetime. Works out to comething like 95% of their high 3 years salary. Toooo much democracy. People have figured out how to democratically vote themselves pay raises. Happening all around the country, not just NY. Obama has dropped $53B in his recent travels around the US. ‘Just let me know what you need and I’ll take care of it’. Going down in flames, I do believe.

Otherwise - -

Roy Ellis-
Your typical plane is made from lightweight material. I doubt the fellow remained in one piece once that airframe struck the side of that building.

I can understand the 1040 form being overly complex, but I think it’s probably a much less intractable problem than trying to sew yourself back together from the pieces that would be left from running yourself into a building with a Cessna.

As for why we don’t have a flat tax, it’s because of something called marginal utility. Plainly put, the richer you are, the less you have to pay of your income to keep yourself afloat. Any tax that would levy enough of a percentage to pay for everything we need to pay for would be a great burden on the poor and middle class, and much less of a burden on the rich.

The poor and middle class already get hit by their taxes pretty hard, paying about a third of their income to various state and local governments. They also have to spend more of their money simply to live.

So we face a problem here: either we set taxes too low for their sake, or set them at different levels for different levels of income so that the burden is kept higher on those who can afford to pay more, and lower on those who can’t.

The flat tax we’re talking about, by the way, was first brought up by billionaire Steve Forbes. That should tell you something about who benefits.

Agree Stephen, the plane is probably made from material and fasteners from China.

Here is some info relative to a flat tax from www.one-simple-idea.com. The tax code is clearly progressi

“The Flat Income Tax Percentage system (above) would be better than what we have now, which is a severely abused, overly complicated, tax-everything (sometimes, more than once) system, full of gaping tax loop holes, tax shelters, exceptions that are unfair and give rise to a multi-billion dollar industry just to calculate taxes, mostly benefits the wealthiest, and is hardest on the poorest. For instance, consider the unfairness of taxing earned labor income at a higher income tax rate than capital gains? Why not tax all things at the same flat rate?

Also, any new tax system has the dilemma of the possible necessity to drag portions of the old tax system along too (i.e. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, etc.).

Also, here’s a very interesting point. One question about any tax system that is continually asked is:

Will everyone (excluding the poor) pay their fair (or equal) percentage of tax related to income ?
Interesting isn’t it? What does that tell you? It seems many people still want the end result of any tax system to be that everyone pays their fair (or equal) percentage of income (excluding those below the poverty level, which would pay zero tax).

So, if we are continually tasked with proving that any tax system, in the end, must fairly tax income the same percentage (excluding the poor who pay zero tax), then why not simply retain the income tax, except make it a flat tax rate of 17%, eliminate all loop-holes, deductions, subsidies, which will also mean little or no changes for accounting for Income tax, Social Security tax, and Medicare tax.

Thus, all income is taxed the same 17% (i.e. all income above N times the poverty level), no more abused loop holes, deductions, subsidies, or other clever over-complications designed to evade paying taxes”.

David,

You wrote:

As for Democrats, their leadership sucks. Why didn’t Democrats revise the cloture vote requirement to 51 or 55 when they potentially had the 60 votes to make it … piece meal the legislation in ways that would cause the public to rise up against Republican obstruction? Very, very poor leadership skills.

Democrats had the largest majority in Congress they are likely to ever see. Blaming the Republicans for legislative failures is politically expedient, but, utterly and completely fails the American people, nonetheless.

The Democrats don’t have, never had nearly as big of a majority as it appears. This country moved far, far to the right after 911 - too far. The Democratic party followed the country to the right.

We recruited the Blue Dogs - a good move for gaining committee Chairmanships - but the Blue dogs are moderates at best - Republicans in Democratic clothing at worst.

The Republicans also tracked to the right with the country some to the point of becoming extremist - extremist particularly to America was pre 911 and they are being complete obstructionist. They are deliberately trying to take this country down for cheap political gain - and it is working.

This is a slightly more malevolent version of what they did by crippling the Clinton Presidency with investigations over who was licking Clinton’s cigar for him. You can paint a dog with spots - but it is still a dog.

With 59 or 60 Senators the country understandably expects Democrats to be able to govern. When we mange to get 60 votes on healthcare it means that we are reaching across the aisle within our own party. Anything beyond that is a stone wall.

Our party is the centrist party and includes moderates and even solid conservatives. So the liberals in our party are working with and compromising with moderates and conservatives.

Many Republicans just want to destroy this country in a racist backlash against this President and their elected officials are supporting their agenda for short term political at the peril of our countries future. Where is their political courage? Where is their leadership?

The filibuster is an important part of our political system. The Republicans are using it as a tool to attack America so we probably do need to modify or eliminate it.

Gotta go for now.

Ray, one of the many roles of Party leadership in Congress is to fashion legislation that will both pass, and meet the needs of the nation and people.

The House bill comes closer on meeting the people’s short term needs, but failed utterly to even be approximated in the Senate. They bit off a far larger chunk than they could chew. That is not effective leadership.

The people’s fear of having no insurance or losing what they do have, was the opening gambit on HC reform for Democrats to gain the trust and confidence of the people for making more reforms down the road. The Democratic leadership failed to recognize that political reality and take advantage of it. What they ended up with was very poor statesmanship.

President Obama is i’m positive forward thinking on this matter David R. and Roy and all, We haven’t built any new plants since what 1978 their all so old and running on their last legs and many have gone way past their designed life cycles, The new Westinghouse and GE power plants are much smaller and much more efficient than the old stick built reactors, IMHO their thinking of replacing many of the existing reactors on the same sites with the smaller and safer new reactors they are factory built and a modular design that way they can just tap into the existing infrastructure of electrical connections and water and also add more electrical generation capacity to many sites by installing two or more new power plants where their is one old GIANT sized plant .

http://www.ap1000.westinghousenuclear.com/ap1000_glance.html The AP1000 is the safest and most economical nuclear power plant available in the worldwide commercial marketplace, and is the only Generation III+ reactor to receive Design Certification from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC).

The AP1000 features proven technology, innovative passive safety systems and offers:
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•Economic competitiveness
•Improved and more efficient operations and •45% less seismic building volume Read link..

Rodney,

Your comments and position entirely IGNORE the central issue of nuclear power. Which is, the nuclear waste - and the many costs and risks of dealing with it. It does not long term good to replace one toxic waste (CO2 emissions) with another (nuclear waste stockpiles all over the country, whose safety cannot be guaranteed for the life of its toxicity).

Breeder reactors add substantially to the cost of new nuclear power stations, (a hidden cost as these are not included), if they are to be built at all, to help shorten the toxicity life of nuke power plant wastes. Nuclear is by far, one of the most expensive of our alternatives, and trading one environment waste threat with another, is just plain dumb and short-sighted.

David we quite know your position on nuclear power, short sighted is doing what we have been doing to those ancient nuclear plants by operating them way past their designed operating life spans, That is complete chaos and nonsense and inviting a disaster to happen, You speak of climate change and of floods and other anomalies of nature fair enough then how about wind patterns and shifts that could completely wreak and stop the windmills generating electricity dead in it’s tracks, They also are inefficient and dangerous and require vasts amounts of Maintenance and shut down when the winds exceed 30-40 mph and kill thousands of birds and take up valuable land and must be set back a mile or more from houses and buildings because they are so loud and do not and will not reduce the costs of electrical generation one bit in fact they will add to the costs, These new plants built on existing sites produce half the waste of the old plants and are half the size, The real crying and short sighted crime was letting the waste build up all these years and not trusting nuclear scientist’s like France does and the newer technologies that can recycle and reuse much of it , Agendas and egos and stubborn ideologies and name calling are also very short sighted and illogical.

Rodney,

You have not addressed the, not my, fundamental objections to creating new nuclear waste producers, which were very specific.

When breeder reactors are added into the cost, along with stockpiling the rest of the waste safely and permanently, nuclear is the most expensive option of all.

Wind turbines can be moved, Rodney, if prevailing winds shift. Some extra cost, sure; but, nothing compared to nuclear. The total cost estimate for Yucca Mtn. storage facility now rests as 96 billion dollars, and the facility may never be used due to the fact that the the Yucca site is seismically and volcanically active, porous, and incapable of geologically containing the waste.

I am not opposed to nuclear power. I simply ask the reasonable and intelligent request that before anymore tax dollars are spent, cost effective and safe permanent solutions to nuclear waste first be proven, and full disclosure ensures that all costs are calculated into rate payer’s costs.

Then, and ONLY then, can an objective decision be made as to whether nuclear power is a safe and affordable option compared to all others.

In my opinion, short sighted and ignorant is defending nuclear without having met these requirements, first!