The Trouble With America

Why I Am Not A Republican

2006-12-18T11:06:00.001-08:00

I said in my first post that I hate republicans. I don't really hate all republicans...just republicans who are politicians.

I understand that republicans believe in less government intervention, social conservativism (strict limits on abortion, against gay marriage, etc), and economic liberalism (ie free trade, globalization, more laissez-faire style capitalism, etc), and I understand why they would feel that way about things.

I just don't agree with any of those ideologies.

Now, since no one is really looking at this blog, I can feel free to enumerate the reasons why I disagree with republican politicians, without having to offend any of my relatives or in-laws

1. Gay Marriage - I think anyone should be able to marry whoever the hell they want (provided they want to marry a consenting person of legal age). Marriage is a religious institution, and therefore should be managed by churches, not government

2. Abortion - I don't think people should get abortions, but I'm not going to limit someone's ability to get an abortion if they were raped, a victim of incest, or simply are not ready to have a baby. I think children are miracles, but keeping someone from getting an abortion is an abuse of power. The place of government is in borders and civic programs, not in a woman's uterus.

3. War on terror - I believe that more should be done to prevent terrorism by way of education and proper trade terms and the encouragement of societal growth, not by dropping bombs, and killing hundreds of thousands of people. This so-called war on terror seems more like a payback to Bush's oil, defense, and big business friends for all that fat cash they sent his way when he was busy bankrupting corporations and sports teams. The reason that Schwartzkopf didn't take Hussein out of power during the Gulf War was because James Baker in the State Department and Dick Cheney, at the time the secretary of defense, told him it would cause a civil war. It did, in 2004.
On top of that, Afghanistan is in a real bad place right now. Opium/Heroin production is up an astronomical amount.
And the number of terrorist attacks around the world has steadily increased ever since this bullshit war on terror began. I love the troops, I hate the politicians who so readily send them to die for a deceitful, economically driven cause.

4. Globalization/Free Trade - It always astonishes me the way the super-rich are able to convince the poor that movement to a more laissez faire capitalist system is going to improve their lives. We see over-and-over again that capitalism causes poverty. Democracy is the attempt to alleviate the poverty it causes. "Trickle-down" doesn't happen. Money actually trickles up because those with money are in a better position to keep it, and in a better position to negotiate with poor who don't have it.
On top of that, globalization creates adverse terms of trade. Poor countries end up using raw materials to manufacture finished goods, which ends up causing a net defecit, because the money paid to those making the finished goods does not cover the net gain needed for an economy to flourish. Argue with that all you want, sucka'.

5. Lower taxes - I actually believe there is a lot of fat that can be trimmed by government; however, these joker-republicans in congress aren't at all interested in doing that. Any sort of tax cut that has been enacted in the last few years will end up leading to major problems down the road, because spending is so vastly outpacing government income, right now. Defecits are the highest in history right now. That's right, W. beat Reagan in that game.

6. Capital Punishment - There aren't many civilized societies that still engage in capital punishment. I think there's less than a handful. That should tell us something

7. Gun Control - I believe we should have more gun control. Over 10,000 people die in America each year because of guns. That is exponentially higher than basically all of the top 50 countries on the human development index.

8. Stem Cell Research - It's our only hope. I firmly believe that the human race is doomed without it, and Bush's whacky, wingnut ideals are putting us in a very vulnerable situation.

9. Affirmative action - The glass ceiling is real. We need to create a more even playing field for women, minorities, and able-challenged people.

10. Kyoto Protocol - Human-caused Global warming is real, and will continue to get worse. We need to do what we can for future generations.

On Religion

2006-12-18T11:06:00.000-08:00

I love that no one reads this. I can write about anything I want.

I haven't rejected Christianity. I definitely have some problems with organized religion and the effects it has on our culture, but I still consider myself a Christian.

Question
A question I wonder is: Would Jesus Christ be affiliated with Christians if he were alive as a human being in 2006?

I really don't think so. Christianity, overall, is a good concept, and I believe that many Christians are doing good for the world, but there are just so many wingnuts who believe they have some sort of monopoly on the meaning of Christianity. In Christ's name, they engage in televangelism, blow up Muslim countries, engage in oppressive capitalism, and influence lawmakers to make laws to give them taxbreaks.

Sure, they're not acting out of the interests of Jesus Christ, but they sure are quick to say they are.

Regardless, I'm so f*cking sick of these mental-case wingnuts, that I don't like being affiliated with them.

Reconciling Science And Religion
One of the other troubles I have with Christianity is that no one in the upper eschelon of any Christian chuch seems to be able to reconcile science with religion.

Big Bang
For instance, the big bang. I'm certainly no expert on this, but from what I understand, the universe is constantly either expanding or contracting, and when it gets to be as big or as small as it gets, it goes bang, and a lot of things happen to re-randomize all matter within the universe. This is the general concensus of most scientists who are actually reputable.

And yet, if it doesn't have the names "Adam" or "Eve" in the context, Christians say it is not the truth.

Dinosaurs
Another example is dinosaurs. Some idiots actually say that dinosaurs were created on day 6 (same as humans, from what I remember from Genesis). In terms of bible timeframe, that would mean that dinosaurs were alive around 6000 years ago (which, anthropologically speaking, was 4000 years after Native Americans crossed the channel to Alaska). I fail to see how geological and archeological evidence fails to convince some that we're talking more like 60 million years ago. Then a meteor crashed into the Gulf of Mexico, and 59 million years later, you have humans.

Evolution
Then of course, there's the human evolution issue. Modern scientific dogma states that we had the Australopithicines, Homo Habilis, Homo Erectus, Neanderthals, and then humans. There is a huge amount of archeological evidence that all these species came before us, and yet, fundamentalists say that we were put here in present form.

It's absurd, and anyone with half a brain can tell you that.

The conclusion to which we must come is that historical analyses in the bible are wrong. Obviously, the universe was probably made to be in its current state by a big bang, the world is more than 6000 years old, dinosaurs were here before any primates, and we're related to chimpanzees. We can't come up with answers that make any more sense than that.

But that's ok. That doesn't mean Jesus Christ was not the son of God, and it doesn't mean that God doesn't exist.

What does it all mean?
It simply means that the men who wrote the bible were fallible. They weren't particularly educated, by present standards, and they didn't understand the nature of the universe or of the earth. They never looked at the sky through a telescope. They probably never travelled more than a couple hundred miles away from their birthplace. They didn't understand anything about microbiology, quantum physics, nanoscience, or anything of the sort. They didn't have computers to help them do billions or trillions of calculations per second.

If there were a scientist alive today who fit the above description, we would call him, at best, a lousy scientist. And that's what the writers of the bible were...lousy scientists.

Spin Doctors

2006-12-18T11:05:00.001-08:00

Whenever my remote control leads me to the likes of Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity, Tucker Carlson, et al, I can't help but chuckle at the puppet-like loyalty they show to the Bush administration and the far-right, conservative agenda.

I wonder why it is that so many rabid viewers love these spin-doctors so much. I also wonder why stations like Free Speech TV fail to garner such loyal viewership.

I've actually been thinking about that sort of thing a lot, recently, especially considering Clear Channel Radio is dropping Air America, the liberal talk radio show, from many of its markets.

Is it that the average American is more conservative than one would predict? Is it that the above mentioned are such good "journalists" that people want to see that talented group? Is it that liberal ideas are just not as good as conservative ones?

These are questions that come to mind. I think the first step in evaluating the state of America is to objectively analyze what's going on.

Then I consider shows like "The Daily Show" and "The Colbert Report."

The Daily Show hosts a very evident liberal bias on the part of Jon Stewart, and parodied conservative views by the correspondents of the show.

The Colbert Report is a parody of the likes of Sean Hannity and cohorts.

Liberals love these shows, even though they're not ramming ideaologies down our throats the way the conservative spinmeisters are.

I hesitate to draw too many conclusions from the above examples, because when one speaks of TV viewership, considering dozens of aspects of demographics is in order.

But a conclusion to which I personally have come is that I don't think it is in the nature of liberals to need to have their ideas reiterated to them, over and over again. Most liberals I know are able to entertain a wide spectrum of ideaological ideas. I personally get bored hearing my world views projected to me every day. I like to hear differing opinions.

That's why I think Air America and Free Speech TV do not do as well: their core demographic are liberals, and they're not reporting the news in a way stimulating enough to them.

Just my $0.02, though.

Sick of Catch Phrases

2006-12-18T11:05:00.000-08:00

"War on terror" - Working real well, isn't it? Terrorism is actually up, world-wide, and climbing.

"Liberate Iraq" - Sure seems liberated now. They are in the midst of a civil war that all this "liberation" caused. 61% of Iraqis actually support the insurgents. 71% of Iraqis want the US completely out of Iraq, now. By the way, how do you think revolutionaries in America in the mid 1700s would feel if France felt inclined to liberate them from the evils of the British empire?

"Cut and Run" - Per Wikipedia: To "set up a straw man" or "set up a straw-man argument" is to create a position that is easy to refute, then attribute that position to the opponent. I don't want the US to "cut and run," but it's a quagmire that the US alone is not equipped to solve. The solution is a multi-lateral diplomacy effort -- perhaps cutting up Iraq into different sections for each segment of people who hate each other. Then maybe they won't be so inclined to blow each other up. Very complicated subject that "cut and run" does not adequately describe.

"Tax and Spend" - This has been the republicans' characterization of democrats (and other left leaners) for years. Have you looked at the republicans spending lately? The difference between republicans and democrats is what they'll spend the same amount of money on. Republicans, I think, are more inclined to give fat contracts to their multi-billion dollar defense and oil buddies. Democrats, I think, are more inclined to give fat contracts to their multi-billion dollar corporate buddies, too...just not as much to defense and oil.

Why do these catchphrases work so well? One could conjecture that it has something to do with the sheepishness of the populous, but I think that equally so, it's just good marketing. It's the same concept as slogans such as "I'm loving it," "Every Kiss Begins With Kay," and "Always Low Prices" incorporate. Say it over and over again, and it becomes true.

The trouble is that when statements are fallacious (based on a fallacy), they ought not be taken too seriously; and yet, pundits, party loyals, and even the regular media goes around spreading these fallacies. And America listens.

Myth of Meritocracy

2006-12-18T11:04:00.000-08:00

It's not something that gets mentioned much in mainstream media. The myth of meritocracy is, as McNamee and Miller put it (http://www.ncsociology.org/sociationtoday/v21/merit.htm), "...a gap between how people think the system works and how the system actually does work."

It is a commonly held perception by white, social conservatives that the reason they are in the social position they occupy is because of the quality of character, work, etc that they exhibit. This myth is the reason why the likes of George W. Bush can say the things they say, while still keeping a straight face.

However, this notion that the elites "pulled themselves up by their bootstraps" is inconsistent with in-place institutions in our society. There are hierarchies in place that makes it all but impossible for minorities and women to make significant advances, as a group. That is not to say that individuals are not able to make advances; however, we commit the composition fallacy when we say that African Americans, Latinos, or Women can advance in our society: just because individuals can advance does not mean that a whole can advance.

So what factors are at play?

First of all, consider the current wealth structure (at least as of 2001):

Wealth Group Share of Net Worth
99-100th percentile 32.7%
95-99th percentile 25.0%
90-95th percentile 12.1%
50th-90th percentile 27.1%
0-50th percentile 2.8%
Total 100.0%

According to McNamee and Miller, "These tables show that the distributions of income and especially wealth are highly skewed. The top 20 percent of American households, for instance, receive a large portion of the total amount of available income (49.7%) while the lowest 20 percent of American households receive a much smaller portion of available income (3.5%)." They go on to write, "any of the arguments suggesting that "merit" is behind the distribution of income and wealth also make the case that merit is distributed "normally" in the population. That is, that the shape of the distribution of merit resembles a "bell curve" with small numbers of incompetent people at the lower end, most people of average abilities in the middle and small numbers of talented people at the upper end. The highly skewed distribution of economic outcomes, however, appears quite in excess of any reasonable distribution of merit. Something that is distributed "normally" cannot be the direct and proportional cause of something with such skewed distributions."

Consider the following interpretation of Marx (http://humanoidinterface.wordpress.com/2006/10/29/on-meritocracy/): "In this age of universal capitalism and consequently of widening economic disparities, this myth has gone a step further. Corporations use 'Meritocracy' to rob the poor in the very name of poverty, i.e. because they are poor. It is through the exploitation of labour by the corporations that the economic gap is widened. Capitalism itself is an inverse meritocracy. One only needs to look closer at how capitalism functions—who does the work, who gains the wealth and how that wealth is being accumulated. In a capitalist society, social advancement is based on the exploitation of the members of society who actually perform the work and who therefore create all value.[5] The myth of meritocracy neutralizes the two diametrical opposites, capitalism and social advancement according to value, or merit."

I think this characterization of capitalism is a good one. It is, as the writer describes it "inverse meritocracy." Since America is capitalist, and since capitalists operate under the notion that they earned their status, we see that American capitalism produces the myth of meritocracy, therefore, American capitalism is a system of inverse meritocracy.

Comparing Hussein and Hitler

2006-12-18T11:03:00.000-08:00

I find it interesting that the Bush administration likened Saddam Hussein to Adolph Hitler so often; yet, in recent days when people started to take notice that the occupation of Iraq has lasted longer than the amount of time it took to defeat Germany during World War II, the Bush administration was so quick to outline what different situations the two are.

Of course, Iraq and World War II Germany are different; completely different. But when one doesn't want two things compared to each other, they should not liken them to one another. BushCo (as many people call the Bush administration) wanted to make Saddam Hussein out to be the evil dictator that Hitler was. Obviously, Hussein is and was a bad guy.

But he was the same bad guy when:
1. The CIA was funding and aiding in the strategy of the Ba'athist revolution and subsequent 1968 coup (http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0420-05.htm)
2. Iraq was lowering its oil prices to the US in the mid 70s (following the 1973 US oil crisis),
3. Iraq was increasing output of oil by nearly 58% from 1975-1980 (http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1622264/posts
4. The US was supplying Iraq with intelligence, economic aid, and weapons (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_Iran_War) in the 7 year+11 months war between Iraq and Iran.
5. Ronald Reagan refused to back sanctions against Iraq after reports of the Kurdish genocide surfaced in 1988 (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5690032)
6. James Baker (secretary of state) issued a statement that the US would not invade Iraq if Iraq were to launch hostilities against Kuwait in 1990 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_War) - an almost certainty at the time, given that Kuwait was exceeding its OPEC output quota

The 6th is explained at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_of_Kuwait :

Kuwait had heavily funded the 8 year long Iraqi war against Iran. By the time the war ended, Iraq was not in a financial position to repay the $14 billion which it had borrowed from Kuwait to finance its war.[1] Kuwait's reluctance to not pardon the debt created strains in the relationship between the two Arab countries. During late 1989, several official meetings were held between the Kuwaiti and Iraqi leaders but they were unable to break the ice between the two. After the failure of talks, Iraq tried repaying its debts by raising the prices of oil through OPEC's oil production cuts. However, Kuwait, a member of the OPEC, prevented a global increase in petroleum prices by increasing its own petroleum production. This was seen by many in Iraq as an act of aggression, further distancing the countries apart.

It all kind of works together as part of this bullsh*t rhetoric that is so typical of republicans in power right now (and many democrats, as well). Everyone wants to come up with these bold-sounding analogies that do more for effect than actually making true statements.

Abstinence Teaching

2006-05-24T09:55:00.000-07:00

The Trouble With America is that we are so hung up on the idea that teaching abstinence in the classroom is the best way to prevent preganancy and the spread of sexually transmitted diseases. I simply disagree.

Teen sex is not a new phenomenon, and is certainly not the result of MTV or popular culture. In the 1770s, according to Cate and Lloyed in 1992, pre-marriage pregnancy in America hovered at a rate of around 30%.

Sex is natural of the human condition. It's just one of those things you can say about human behavior (along with the need for food, water, and socialization).

The result of teaching abstinence in the classroom is a teen population that is misinformed, resulting in dangerous behaviors. Teens will not stop having sex, no matter how much abstinence is preached.

Regardless of background, teen sex happens.

One of the interesting facets of American culture is that Red States (ie states that traditionally vote for republican or conservative candidates -- typically those who more strongly equate religion with culture) have a significantly higher rate of teen pregnancy (See Here).

In my opinion, the most pointed arguments for teaching abstinence is that, parents who teach abstinence in their homes have the right to have a consistent message sent to their teen son or daughter, while parents who opt for teaching their son or daughter to be more informed about sex can convey that message, regardless of school intervention.

However, the ironic thing about that is the abstinence issue is, teens who are taught solely abstinence will be more likely to either get pregnant or contract a sexually transmitted disease, and healthcare costs paid for by the part of the taxpayer will likely increase -- a phenomenon which, if repeated, raises taxes for tax payers - a phenomenon which conservatives fiercely object to.

On top of that, fiscal conservatives also object to having their taxes raised to pay for sex education. It's kind of a double edged sword, don't you think?

We're All A Bunch of Chimpanzees

2006-05-18T11:01:00.000-07:00

The Trouble With America is we're all a bunch of chimpanzees.

As studied by The Harvard Medical School in Boston, there is much genetic evidence that man interbred with Chimpanzees for thousands of years.

If you can get past the "Ewwww, gross" factor, it's actually kind of an interesting discovery.

According to the article in Nature magazine:

If such a hybrid population really did exist, the question remains as to whether it died out, or whether modern humans or chimpanzees (or both) are its descendants. It's very difficult to say, admits Reich. "The fossil data suggest — very tenuously — that it may have been humans who are descended from the hybrid population."

If you ever took an anthropology course, or are interested in the evolutionary process, you'll know that the single greatest obstacle facing anthropologists is determining what the missing link was. This study sheds new light that may lead anthropologists to reconsider fossil evidence and be able to say one species exhibits characteristics of a missing link.

I'm no anthropologist, but that's what I think, anyway. Feel free to call me a complete idiot if you disagree.

Frustrated? Take it out on the penguin

2006-05-12T07:54:00.000-07:00

Click Here

One more thing on the phone database

2006-05-12T04:14:00.000-07:00

The Trouble With America is that we have politicians like Trent Lott.

Not only has Lott, in the past, demonstrated his overt racism (with his affiliation to the Council of Conservative Citizens and his cheerleading of Strom Thurmond's old political party, the Dixiecrats) by statements and voting record, but he shows a very worrisome support of Bush's phone database program (you know, the one where all phone calls made by all Americans are being tracked and traced -- called by one spokesman "the largest database ever assembled.").

Lott characterizes his feelings on the program as this (reported by CNN.com):

"What are people worried about? What is the problem?" asked Lott, a former majority leader. "Are you doing something you're not supposed to?"

That's not the point, asshole. The point is that I have a God-given right to communicate without constant worry that my privacy is being stripped from me. Every American does. And if the government wants to wiretap me, they should have to get a fucking warrant to do it.

There is a whole court (United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court) whose specific job is to authorize wiretaps. If you want to wiretap people's phones, get warrants.

Terrorism exists. It is in America, and I believe that terrorists will continue to try to attack the US and its interests. That, however, does not give our government carte blanche to impede on any civil liberty it sees fit.

Time for censure

2006-05-11T11:10:00.000-07:00

The Trouble With America is that the political landscape has a double standard.

The republican controlled congress of the late 1990s had impeachment trials for Bill Clinton for getting a little sloppy with a White House intern, but refuse to do anything about the domestic wiretapping of millions of Americans -- a real crime.

One unidentified person said that "It's the largest database ever assembled in the world." By trade, I used to be a database programmer. So it is very staggering to me that someone could have the gall to say something like that, because there are some pretty unfathomably large databases.

All I can say is: Russ Feingold for president.

One can hope.

Thanks NSA

2006-05-11T08:18:00.000-07:00

The Trouble With America is that we are living in a country with an increasingly paranoid government.

See http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/05/11/nsa.phonerecords.ap/index.html.

If we live in a country where our government has this much control over us, our phone records, and our right to privacy, then what are we trying to protect?

Can we have liberty without privacy?

Can we have freedom without a right to communicate with each other about whatever we want?

Should a government really have that much power that it can listen to what anyone is saying?

If you say that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are/were just, and you say that the reason for the wars was to spread and perpetuate freedom, then the question I have is: is this freedom?

$10 / gallon? Let's do it!

2006-05-10T13:57:00.000-07:00

Check it out

High Ranking Judge Takes Boeing Job

2006-05-10T13:07:00.000-07:00

Is anyone else concerned about former high profile judges who are getting hired by Boeing to play integral roles in their day-to-day operations?

Is it disconcerting that multi-billion dollar defense companies have such chummy relationships with judges that they decide to bring them into their inner loop?

Is it troubling to anyone that these judges who can exert an enormous influence in our legal system are being courted by defense companies?

Or is it just me?

Legalize Marijuana! Now! Do It!

2006-05-10T09:24:00.000-07:00

The Trouble With America is that possession of marijuana is illegal.

I'll preface by saying this: I do not smoke marijuana. I don't think smoking marijuana is a good way to spend one's time or a good way to live one's life; however, I do not shun people or think less of them for using it.

That being said, I feel like it is morally and ethically disgraceful to outlaw possession of marijuana. The reason I think this is because a product from the marijuana plant is hemp. Hemp, in case you weren't a stoner at any time of your life, is the fibrous stalk of the cannabis plant. The hemp component of the plant can be refined to make a number of usable products.

Hemp can produce, cheaper than most other resources, paper, clothing, food (for various animals), fuel, soap, and hundreds of other products. In fact, paper that can be made from hemp is higher quality than tree paper. And you don't have to chop down forests to get it.

Hemp is not illegal to possess. You can have all the hemp you want, legally. The catch is that, since to grow hemp you must possess marijuana, that the growing of hemp is illegal in America and most other developed countries.

So, we miss a golden opportunity to cause less environmental damage than we presently are.

To me, this is unacceptable. We must reduce the impact we are making, and we must begin now. One of my solutions is to legalize marijuana for the purpose of manufacturing hemp. Woo ha.

America and Violent Crimes

2006-05-09T11:17:00.000-07:00

The Trouble With America is there are an estimated 1 million sexual predators. 1 in 3 women (and possibly more, according to http://www.gmu.edu/facstaff/sexual/brochures/WorldStats2005.pdf) in America will be sexually assaulted (in one way or another) in their lifetimes. 1 in 7 men will be sexually assaulted, as well.

You may say that this is the case everywhere, but that is simply not the case. According to the above link, Brazil has numbers closer to 10% (for women).

So why the deviation in America? What is it that makes Americans so much more likely to produce sex offenders?

In my opinion, it's a combination of things.

Certainly, the hypersexualization brought on by the media, particularly focused on young girls (ie Lindsey Lohan, Paris Hilton, Britney Spears) that has been going on for years must play some factor. One thing that I find interesting is, while watching old horror films (the Friday the 13th series, Halloween, etc), is that following almost all of the sex scenes was a scene of violence against women. That's just an interesting tidbit, that I'm sure sociologists are able to comment on much more articulately than I can.

The proliferation of pornography, combined with young boys' access to it (via the Internet) can't help, too much, either. Pornography in America is a mega/multi-billion dollar a year industry, and it's growing more rapidly than ever before.

But there's something else about America that is very unique, in terms of developed nations. We seem to have a much more violent culture than almost anywhere in Europe, North America, South America, and Asia.

The number of gun-related deaths in America is up to 100 times greater in America than in almost any developed nation in the world. Upwards of 30,000 gun-related deaths in 1999, according to The National Vital Statistics Reports of 2001. Murders in 2003 accounted for over 17,000 deaths in America (http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hestat/finaldeaths03_tables.pdf#2).

I don't really know why America is so violent. I'm sure a lot of people have very good ideas about it. Dougles Morris, author of "It's a Sprawl World After All" presents a very insightful reasoning for it, linking the single-use zoning (along with less investment in public transportation) that became so prevalent after World War II (thanks to big oil and the auto manufacturers) to the breakdown in communities that left families on their own, resculpting the economic environment to favor those who had the means to afford transportation on the highway (ie cars). Everyone else was out of luck. You can go to Morris' website at http://www.itsasprawlworld.com.

Laissez Faire Capitalism

2006-05-08T11:37:00.000-07:00

The Trouble With America is that many Americans have bought into this idea that Laissez Faire capitalism is a great solution to social and economic problems. I'll definitely have more to say on this matter in future blogs, but a case in point is an article posted at phillyburbs.com (Pro-Choice Clinton: “No More Coke for You”).

In the article, the author (who I don't know who he is or what he has to say about anything else) suggests that it's problematic for government intervention to 'fix', or otherwise save the 'stupid and incompetent' kids from themselves by legislating soda companies out of schools. He goes on to call it 'government control of personal behavior' and suggests that 'i t’s not the soda but the lack of physical exercise causing childhood obesity.' He also states that Clinton and liberals 'have helped dismantle the old “gym” classes that helped keep kids trim.'

It's not that the above statements are stupid, per se. It's that they suggest that laissez faire social and economic conditions are best for America, and that this is simply a fundamental axiom.

It wasn't liberals who underfunded schools, forcing them to find alternate sources of income. It was the conservative movement of smaller government, lower taxes, and personal responsibility for kids who are no longer being taught what that means.

It wasn't liberals who dismantled physical education, brought thousands of hours of advertising for happy meals, sugar-laden softdrinks and sweets, and video games to America's youth. It was conservativism and the corporate hegemony that permeates our culture.

It wasn't liberals who created an economic environment that prevented parents from maximizing the amount of time they could spend with their kids, thereby causing television to raise a generation of our nation's youth. It was corporate greed and the systematic, government involved repression of collective bargaining that reduced wages, forcing the majority of 2-parent households to have both parents working 40 hours per week, which creates such a large amount of 1-parent households in America.

In a word, it's capitalism. Capitalism, supported by the preaching that laissez faire is the best form is in part, destroying our culture, wrecking family life, and making kids fat, misinformed, and fighting to keep it that way.

Worthless News

2006-05-05T07:44:00.000-07:00

The Trouble With America is that we rely on worthless news. On CNN.com today (5/5/2006), some of the top headlines were: Nicole Richie: 'I know I'm too thin', Randy Quaid drops 'Brokeback' lawsuit, and Vaughn talks (sort of) about Aniston.

Is this what our news should be? Is this the kind of news that a news dynamo like CNN should be reporting? Is this the kind of news that makes for an informed population/electorate/nation?

The answer appears to me to be 'No,' but this kind of fluff news seems to be permeating the mainstream news outlets.

The question is "Why?" and the answer is simple. It's what consumers are demanding. America is not demanding to know about the human rights violations in Indonesia, Sudan, Sierra Leone, etc. They don't want to know about tax breaks our elected officials are giving to the mega rich. They don't want to know about the 5000 people who die of AIDS everyday in Africa. They don't want to know the lies our government is spreading about Venezuela, or the healthcare and hope Hugo Chavez is giving to the Venezuelan people. They'd rather hear about Britney Spears, Paris Hilton, and whichever celebrity presently has the most clout in popular culture.

We're being brainwashed into thinking that these people are important.

The result: a nation full of people who are misinformed, shallow, and stupid.

But we can change this. We can change this by getting informed, staying informed, and being active in our communities by focusing on problems or issues that need our attention: poverty, the healthcare crisis, the war in Iraq, and the many other issues that are confronting us.

Go Stephen Colbert

2006-05-04T13:21:00.000-07:00

The Trouble With America is they don't know how to take a joke. Take for instance, Stephan Colbert's roast of President Bush at The White House Correspondents Association dinner (See Free Video Blog).
At it, Colbert jokingly nudged at Bush's poll numbers, and suggested that "reality" has a liberal bias -- an obvious poke at the right wingers who, for some reason, seem to think that just about every media outlet (outside of Fox News) has a liberal bias. The reason for the uproar is because Bush was no more than 10 feet away from Colbert while he had the floor at this high profile collection of rich celebrities and high status media members.

I suppose some people say that it is sacreligious to skewer the president while he is in the room, while others would suggest that it is simply unpatriotic to criticize the president at all.

My opinion is that Colbert should be commended for his satirical wit. The president represents over 290 million people in the world, and in the majority of Americans' opinions (see Polling Report), he is doing a bad job at it.

It is not only our right to criticize the president when we think he is fouling everything up, but it is also our patriotic duty.

The Trouble With America

2006-05-02T20:07:00.000-07:00

The Trouble with America is that there are a-holes like me. There are people who want the unfettered truth, not simply refined, homogenized, filtered pseudo-truths that serve to advance some agenda or political ideology. People like me don’t want to be CNN’d or Fox News’d (are those even words?).

I want to know about the toxic smoke that the refinery down the street is putting in the air, which in turn is giving me cancer. I want to know about the corporations that hire 8 year old kids and put them to work in their plants in Indonesia and Thailand for 14 hours a day, 7 days a week. I want to know what billion-dollar companies my elected officials are taking money from (in the form of skiing trips, boats, $1000 bottles of wine, and whatever else the mega-rich can afford to buy for influential people in our government). I want to know that the oil industry and the auto industry paid off government officials in the 40s and 50s to destroy our communities and put highways in our back yards. I want to know how much money the drug companies gave our politicians to get the no-bulk-discounts medicare deal through the house and senate. I want to know why American oil companies’ yearly profits have quadrupled from the time the Iraq war started until now (5/2/2006), why fuel efficiency standards are basically the same as they were 21 years ago, and why over 2000 Americans, and between 30,000 and 100,000 Iraqis have died because of it.

I want to know it all. And I want everyone else to know, too. That’s why I’m starting this blog, The Trouble With America. It is for the purpose of taking the most raw of facts from major news outlets and independent media sources, and lay it out, as I see it. Without any particular bias, besides that of a person who is f**king fed up with corporate America owning America.

You may have concluded by the above remarks that I am probably ‘left of the spectrum.’ If you have, then you my friend, are caught up in the silly political divisiveness that is infesting America. We’re not all that divided, really. Sure, there’s the Iraq thing, the immigration thing, the abortion thing, and a host of other things, but that’s true of all countries – there’s always going to be differing opinions. That is the nature of free thought. It is innate of the human condition to disagree about things that matter to us. And I’ll spare you the suspense: the disagreements will continue.

This differing of opinion, however, is exploited by the politicians. They want us divided. They need us divided.

Politicians work for corporations, just like corporations work for shareholders. Since politicians work for corporations who give them millions of dollars (legally and illegally), they need to keep us occupied with red herrings, while corporations do the real damage, under the radar (think Halliburton, Exxon, Enron, and Walmart).

The above is a menagerie of thoughts. They’re not organized or particularly professional. They’re just the random thoughts of an American, who is proud to be an American, but is not proud of the politicians and corporations who represent him in the world. They’re f**king America up. That’s the Trouble with America.