One-Issue Decision? Not This Year

by muon

I made a list last night of all the issues, off the top of my head, that seem to hinge on this election. I'm sure I forgot something. Here's my list, in no particular order:

Unemployment
Education
Energy independence
Climate change
Renewable energy
Equal pay for women
Middle East, terrorism, war, national security
Healthcare
Women's healthcare, including contraceptives, abortion, and Planned Parenthood
Medicare and Social Security
Immigration
FEMA and crisis management
Infrastructure
Welfare, food stamps, other poverty issues
Science, Arts, PBS
Deficit
Gun control
Citizens United
Supreme Court appointees
Banking/mortgage industry problems
Foreign and Domestic Trade
Wealth imbalance

For all of you still undecided folks out there (if any), really, all you have to do is go down this list and decide who you trust to make policy for you on these issues, at the Presidential, Congressional, State and Local levels. For instance, if you're hit by a natural disaster in the next 4 years, do you want someone who acted the way President Obama, Governor Christie and Mayor Bloomberg acted this week, or say, the way President Bush acted during Hurricane Katrina? Do you want a president who'd shut down FEMA and tell the states to handle disasters themselves, even when their infrastructure is completely compromised?  You might say, oh, but I don't live in a natural disaster prone area. I thought so, too, until Hurricane Sandy.

These issues are the main reasons I'm voting, not only for Obama, but for all the Democrats on my ballot.  I say main reasons because there are others.

I refuse to vote for a party that condones and spreads the blatant lies of its presidential candidate. This week Mitch McConnell and other GOP leaders pressured the independent Congressional Research group to suppress a report showing that tax cuts for the wealthy do nothing to help the economy. I won't vote for anyone who has such a contempt for truth.

GOP leaders have gone out of their way to make voting more difficult this year. Voter ID laws, voter roll purging, laws restricting registration drives, reduced early voting in many states, and intimidation measures aimed at African-American and Latino voters are all forms of voter suppression. For the first time, the UN has sent monitors to the US to observe our elections. I'm not voting for the party that made all this happen.

Legislation in this country shouldn't be influenced by anyone but the voters. Many Democrats are in the pockets of lobbyists as much as Republicans, but the worst offenders right now--the Koch Brothers, Grover Norquist, the NRA, far-right religious fanatics, and Big Oil--are GOP cronies.

So that's the election in a nutshell for me. You're on your own.

Turn the Poor over to the Churches and Charities?

Line at a food bank

by Ruth A. Sheets

Back in the 1930’s during the Great Depression, my grandparents depended on several churches for their survival.  I say several because the amount any one church could give to a family was so small that my out-of-work grandfather could not feed his family on it.

With the advent of the food stamps and general welfare programs of the Federal and State Governments, poor people no longer had to go from church to church to seek help through their hard times.  They did not always have to beg at the church door.  They no longer had to sit through worship services that did not necessarily meet their needs in order to receive the pittance churches could afford to hand out.  Some of the stigma was removed from being poor.

Unfortunately, the removal of the stigma rubbed a lot of people the wrong way.  Being poor should be at least a little humiliating so people won’t want to remain in that condition.  The “haves” liked being able to reach down and give a little in order to receive the gratitude of the have-nots. 

It doesn’t matter that in order to receive welfare of any kind, individuals must be nearly in abject poverty.  Married couples have a hard time getting such help because it is assumed that if a man is in the household, he is working and earning enough to support his family or he’s a moocher. 

Many Republicans and Libertarians have chosen ending or severely (even more severely) limiting welfare and food stamps as one of their causes, saying that our nation can’t afford it anymore.  This is at a time when large companies are making record profits but bearly hiring.  This is at a time when many, if not most of the jobs companies are creating are mimimum wage jobs, which as anyone who has ever earned minimum wage knows, is not enough to live on.

I recently heard a report on NPR which included an interview with a truck driver for a food bank.  He told the interviewer and all of America that he thinks helping the poor is the job of the churches and charities and not the Government. 

I know that food banks, thrift stores, and other charitable organizations do a great good in our society.  They can sometimes take the edge off the pain of poverty.  What they cannot do is offer dignity to those who need their services.  They cannot provide a shared experience of conducting one’s life as one chooses:  going to the supermarket, buying new clothing for the kids, using things that are not other people’s discards.  They cannot provide these services on the scale needed in America at this time.

It is ironic that the folks who have the most, resent the commonwealth for trying to level the field for those who have not been as lucky.  I wonder how many of the lucky do their best to avoid paying taxes, but also give as little as they can to the charities that serve the poorest among us.  If they do give anything, it has to make a big splash in the media, “wonderful me giving to those less fortunate than I.”   

It is fascinating that those who earn the least pay the largest percentage of their income for charities, but it is the wealthiest who are celebrated for their largess.

Even if there are a few moochers  around, I’d rather take the chance to provide my fellow citizens with welfare, if needed, and food stamps, if needed, than know they have to go from church to charity to receive enough to survive, as my mother’s family did 75 years ago.

Are You a Racist? Take This Quiz and Find Out

by muon

I was told last week that suggestions of racism among Romney supporters is highly offensive. I was told this by someone who was more of an Obama non-supporter than a true Romney supporter. He stomped his foot and shrieked while making his point, so I know he was sincere.

Okay, I agree, generalizing is never a good idea. Thus I invite everyone, no matter whom you support, to take this quiz, add up your score, and see how you do.


A) I believe President Obama was born

1-  in Kenya, and is therefore not a citizen and not qualified to be President.
2-  possibly outside of the US, but he has an American mother, so it doesn't matter (as in the case of George Romney, Mitt's dad, who was born in Mexico, yet no one questioned his citizenship when he ran for president)
3-  in Hawaii, and he should have been believed even before producing 2 birth certificates, but now that he has produced them, get over it.

B) I believe President Obama

1-  is a Muslim, and that's a bad thing.
2-  might be a Muslim, but in a country where we have freedom of religion, what does it matter?
3-  is a Christian, specifically, a member of the United Church of Christ, like more than one million Americans.

C)  I believe

1-  candidates for president should have American-sounding names.
2-  if a candidate has an odd name, it doesn't mean he wouldn't make a good president.
3-  that all Americans have American-sounding names. It's that melting pot thing.

D) I believe Mitt Romney's welfare ads

1-  show that lazy black welfare recipients have been released from their work requirement by Obama, and are taking tax money right out of the pockets of hard-working white people.
2-  not sure what the ads show, but I'm sure not all welfare recipients are black and not all workers are white. Even if they were, shouldn't we help those in need?
3-  are proven lies. Work requirements have not been dropped, only moved to the states, which is what states requested (including Republican governors). The states in turn have to meet a set of federal regulations to keep their right to make their own reforms. Moreover, as of 2011, nearly the same number of white and black families (about 38%) were receiving welfare. The remaining 20-some% went to other minorities.


If you scored

12 -  You're not a racist and are well-informed to boot.
8-11 - You're not a racist; your heart's in the right place. You just need to get your news from reliable sources and don't believe everything you hear. Go to factcheck.org, which checks statements and ads from BOTH sides.
5-7 - Try the reliable sources mentioned above for two weeks and take the quiz again. Put all political ads and right-wing talk shows on "mute."
4 - Sorry, you're a racist. No getting around it. If this offends you, think of how much more you offend me.