Don’t blame Obama.
Not with this do-nothing Congress.
Some folks just like a mess. Especially one of their own making.
Tag: Money
WHEN YOU WIPE OUT HOPE
I keep thinking about that negative reaction to Barack Obama’s promise of positive politics – that red bar and circle over the word HOPE. And then all the destructive backpedaling from those deriding any outlook of hope – their refusal to work together for any real solutions to the issues facing the nation or world.
Or their blatant cry of NOPE!
Doesn’t that make theirs the party of No Hope? The party of Despair? Or even the party of Hate?
That’s how it looks from here, even before we add Trump’s tyrannical bluster.
Well, I’d welcome a similar red circle and bar over their campaign posters and ads in the fall. Along with a bold proclamation: NOPE! NOT THIS ONE! OR ANY OF THEM!
Just to be fair.
A FOOTNOTE OF SORTS
Many of the Red Barn’s Woodpecker Reports, you may have noticed, are rooted in the years of the George W. Bush administration. Contrary to recent public opinion and propagandists, it was a dark period that launched a very expensive and unjustified war and nearly crashed the country into another Great Depression. Toward the end, there were moments we were only hours away from global financial collapse.
Barack Obama deserves praise for his drastic efforts to turn from that fate, even if he can – and should – be faulted in restoring the banking system rather than rebuilding it on a new foundation far more open to the American people.
Despite steering the nation back to economic health as far as Wall Street goes – something that has yet to take hold for the nation’s working families – and of inheriting two wars that defy true resolution, Obama’s legacy stands tainted by the GOP’s bitterly partisan control of the House of Representatives, severely crippling any effort to move forward on many critical issues. A party intent on obstruction and destruction rather than acting as a loyal opposition deserves far more blame than it’s been given.
In its own failure to proclaim this burning message, the Democratic Party, in turn, has no justification in being baffled by its own current state of wreckage.
So where do we go? Where do we turn? How do we move forward from this mess?
NOT EVEN NATIVE TO AMERICA, IT’S AN OFFAL MASCOT
There I was, driving behind a vehicle that had a GOP elephant logo when the random thought hit me: pachyderms generate huge amounts of offal. (I read it in the Wall Street Journal, a big piece about the job given the last guys in the circus parade, in fact, if I remember right.)
And then I realized how much of our current political mess was created by previous Republican administrations. (If we can’t afford X, Y, or Z now, remember how much was squandered on the meaningless Iraq war, for starters.)
The fact I want to focus on, though, is the question of whether an elephant is an appropriate mascot for an AMERICAN political party. It’s an import that’s ill-suited for much of the continent, and it consumes tons of food, no matter how mighty it can be as a workhorse in the jungle. It’s definitely not something for the masses, and definitely not something we’d want as one for every household.
A donkey, in contrast, is a very efficient workhorse, and stubbornness can be a useful quality, at times. One per household’s not that far off the mark as a historic American ideal, either.
If I were a Republican strategist (gee, banish the thought), I’d be pushing for a new critter to identify with. But nothing that comes to mind at the moment is anything they’d want to consider.
MEDICAL SYSTEM RX FROM ANOTHER PERSPECTIVE
In the heated objections to health-care reform in the United States, I never heard a recognition that in many places we already have a single-provider system. Almost unseen, the local hospital has bought up the physicians’ practices and much more – capped by high-paid executive officers and maybe interest dividends. Moreover, the hospital itself may be owned by an out-of-town corporation.
The national plan we came up, however, seems to have ignored this shift, even while keeping the insurance companies in the game.
With a single provider, though, I’m left wondering: Where’s the real difference for the individual compared to a single-payer approach?
Or even something along the lines of the Lakeside method of public services, where a municipality shops around for its providers from a variety of possible sources, rather than relying on just itself?
THAT THIRD-PARTY ALLURE
Count me among those who’ve long felt there’s a place for a viable third party in America. Or maybe even a fourth. Some place my positions won’t immediately be lost in tactical compromise. Some place I’d feel more identity than I’ve long sensed in the so-called representatives serving in most of the places I’ve lived.
To date, though, what I’ve observed is that most of the minor-party advocates and candidates have cast their eyes exclusively on the biggest prizes – the White House, especially, or perhaps a governorship or U.S. Senate seat. If you consider the scope of the Executive Branch and the number of qualified appointments to be filled, however, you soon realize there’s no way these individuals are prepared to take on that level of leadership. These are things that come out of big party organization and contacts.
At the other end of the spectrum, the reality is how rare the two-party dynamic is in most locales – it’s usually long-term control by one or the other – meaning the national parties are really just coalitions of 50 state parties. I happened to grow up in a state where regular sweeps of the state offices, from one party to the other, tended to keep things clean, especially in the voters’ welcome of mavericks.
Even closer to home, though, is the reality that getting candidates to run for local office is often a challenge. They don’t even have to be good – just a name willing to attend the meetings, if elected. Yet this is the bedrock of democracy and community.
Party affiliation – apart from ideology – can soon disappear in the practical decisions of garbage collection, fire protection, and street repairs. A Socialist city councilor did a top-notch job for our district, as is the plumber we keep reelecting.
An effective third party, then, would need to be built from ground-level up, not top-down. And that, I assume, would also mean region by region.
How else do you think it would shake out?
BOTTLED UP EMOTIONALLY
Laboring behind the scenes in the subculture of daily journalism (Newspaper Traditions) meant bottling up a lot of my own feelings. My talent took place in near anonymity, advancing others and hoping to help the wider community and broaden the readers’ vision.
It was like being a teacher without any of the affection or apples. I suppose it took its emotional toll, too.
At least, I’m in the rush of a sensation of release now, even if so many of my recent postings look like history. Just remember, it’s unfinished history.
If you want to see what it was like inside the newsroom, especially in the escalating pressures of budget cutbacks, I’ll invite you to my novel, Hometown News. No matter how surreal the action turns, it’s not that far from the bigger impact of multinational conglomerates on local communities like the ones a daily newspaper covers. Or at least did.
~*~
For the novel, click here.
WE’RE HAVING A SHARE IN THE CATCH
This summer we’re participating in a program that’s introducing us to varieties of fish caught off the New Hampshire coast. Once a week we trot down to the natural foods store in town to pick up our delivery – our location gives us a three-hour window – and we return with a pound of very fresh seafood. Every week it’s a different variety (11 are likely over the season), and we get an email earlier in the week notifying us what will be on the way, allowing the cook in the household to begin considering menu options. Or we can go to their website for links to suggested recipes.
It’s not cheap – you pay when you sign up, in our case for the 15-week program – about twice what we’d normally shell out for what’s featured at Market Basket, but there are other factors to weigh in. For one thing, living in the Seacoast Region of the state, we’re very aware of the plight of the once vital fishing industry across New England and the struggles to sustain both a way of life for families and communities and the fishing grounds themselves. While we’re not militant local-harvest activists (it just isn’t economically viable for our part of the world, not with its long winter), we are inclined toward small-scale economics wherever possible (just consider the banks, for starters). So we feel good about our token support for our neighbors. In a way, it’s like a farmers market, except that we’re committed to taking the week’s delivery, the way you are in a community-supported agriculture (CSA) setup.
That leads us to another consideration, the fact that the program itself arises in an attempt by the commercial fishermen sailing from Seabrook, Hampton, Rye Harbor, and Portsmouth Harbor to counter the negative impacts of a practice begun in 1976 that directly sold the local harvest in international auction. Rather than having their fishing practices driven by global market pressures, they wanted a more sustainable alternative, a strategy to better manage marine resources and fish more selectively. In response, four years ago the harvest coop they organized was given an ownership right to collectively manage the federal groundfish fishery. In other words, there’s a strong environmental component here, including a more efficient use of high-cost fuel along the way. As they say, their fish catch hasn’t been sitting on the boat for a week – it comes to port the same day it was caught. Good for them!
Of course, all of that still needs to come together at the dinner table. This isn’t charity, after all, but a win-win deal we’re looking for. We can start with a sense of adventure as we explore previously unknown types of fish. (Acadian redfish, anyone? Or dabs? Or dayboat dogfish shark?) Let me rave about the monkfish on that front – as I ate, I kept thinking this could be lobster tail. So what else is swimming in the same water with me each summer? My curiosity is heightened. What they’re delivering isn’t everything in the local catch, but it is a way of supplementing their income and providing more balance in their cash flow.
We’ll admit this is our splurge, the way our weekly wine tastings were, back when I was duly employed, or the half-pig we ordered from a farm in Maine, two other examples that allowed us to learn more of the range in taste and satisfaction in our world. Admittedly, we couldn’t do the fishery program when the kids were still living in the house – they can be picky that way, with one easily upset by the mere whiff of fish cooking. Oh, my.
Initially, too, I thought a pound would be on the skimpy side when it comes to our dinner, but we’re finding the enhanced freshness in flavor satisfies in smaller portions – we can serve three and still have a bit left over. Actually, it’s about what we’d get in a restaurant while spending much more.
Reading the profiles of the participating fishermen on the website has me wondering how long I’ll go before making a list of their boats, just so I can identify them when they pass by in the water or tie up at dock. They seem like nice guys, too. Maybe we’ll wave. It does change my perspective, doesn’t it.
Now I’m wondering about similar alternatives being developed around the world. Pipe up, if you wish, along with your own growing awareness.
~*~
New Hampshire Community Seafood is a cooperative of fishermen and consumers that has 18 pickup locations with deliveries spaced from Tuesday through Saturday.
REBUILD THE WORK ETHIC … WITH DECENT PAY
All those big-oil tycoons, hedge-fund managers, global conglomerate executives, and their lackeys who have contempt for paying workers a livable wages are murdering the work ethic that built America.
Protest all they want, they’re anything but conservatives.
Real conservatives would battle to save the covenant that assures all who labor will earn a livable return – shelter, food, decent clothing, health care, education, enough to raise a family, and time for rest and worship. That’s what real conservatives would pursue rather than greedy oppression or re-enslavement.
NOT JUST SOCIALISTS
And we always assumed anarchists were all Socialists? Think again! The Tea Party’s full of ’em.
Now, tell me: Are anarchists all destructive, leaving nothing but destruction in their wake?
The right’s rife with ’em.
Sounds like a fit, the anarchists, matching everything they’ve been fearing.
Jnana's Red Barn 