Well, That Was Fun!

 

Right now, go to YouTube and watch any of the past Presidential Debates from 1960 to 2012. Do it now, otherwise, you will forget what a debate is supposed to be like, how candidates for the Presidency should behave, and how we once were.

About halfway through last night’s presidential debate I went out and lit the grill. It was only six forty-five, but I couldn’t take much more. After the debate, I switched back and forth between CNN, Fox News and MSNBC. I don’t know why I do that, it just churns the stomach. I proved once again that we live in two different countries. Fox was playing toddy to Trump and MSNBC was Biden’s fawner.

The debate itself wasn’t a debate. I’ve never seen anything like it and I’ve been watching these things for a long time. If there had been a chair or stool on the stage, Biden could have sat on it the whole hour and a half, said nothing, and won the debate by a landslide and the thanks of a grateful nation. My taste in national policy is fairly moderate with hints of liberalism. It’s my East Coast Republican upbringing, I guess.  I wanted to hear what President Trump’s policies for the next four years would be, and what Biden proposed for the same period. I heard neither.

What I heard was the kind of behavior you might expect from a three-year-old brat who didn’t get his ice cream cone when he wanted it. To say the least, the President’s behavior was embarrassing for the nation and a scary moment for our democracy. It was not presidential either. Biden’s call for the President to “shut up” wasn’t the best he could do and didn’t show the respect that the office deserves.

This nation is divided. We all know that. We need someone to bring us together. The nation has elements that spew white supremacy; we need someone to bring us together. The President suggested that The Proud Boys should back off, but “stand by.” You can’t get more racist than that. He didn’t denounce them: instead, he gave them legitimacy.

The validity of the election continued to be questioned, even as people are voting in some states. The broadcast was an opportunity to stop the illegitimate rant against vote-by-mail. One gets the impression that some think this is the first time people have voted by mail. Some states have been doing it for years. Some of us haven’t voted in person for decades. The most precious action a person can take in a free nation is to vote. The process is being degraded by the nation's leader, and that is not good for the union. It is the behavior seen in totalitarian countries, not free nations. Hundreds of thousands of people are marching in the streets of Minsk to protest a President who muddied the vote counting to remain in office.

We were once the leader of the free world, a shining city on the hill, a beacon for the oppressed. We are behaving like a dimly lit hamlet in a deep valley. Watch the Nixon-Kennedy debate to see the contrast, to see what we could be. The difference is stark.

Capitalism, Democracy, etal!

 

A number of years ago a priest, a friend of mine, asked if I believed in God. He said I should ask myself that question every morning. A couple of weeks ago a long-time friend asked me, “Do we want to remain a capitalist society or a far-left socialistic with big government controlling all?” I admit that I don’t ask that question every morning, but maybe I should. It is a timely question what with the election coming up and all. The simple answer for me is that I want a democratic-republic form of government with a capitalist economic system, and no bigger than necessary.  Much like deciding if there is a god, deciding on one form of government or another or one economic system or another is too complex for simple answers. It requires a little wonkiness. 

Pure capitalism and pure socialism are opposing forms of economics. One puts the means of production in the hands of private owners who try to make a profit. The other puts the means of production in the hands of the state. Both require some oversight and regulation. Democracy and Dictatorships are opposing forms of governing. In a democracy, the people run the government. The Vermont Town Meeting is a good example. The US isn’t a democracy, but a republic. In a republic, the people elect representatives who make the laws and regulate their implementation. In some countries, the people even elect their president. In the US, however, the States elect the President.[i] Big government and small government are two philosophies about how to manage government operations. Creating the government system that we want along with the economic system that we want with a manageable size sometimes proves to be harder to accomplish than creating a belief system.

Henry David Thoreau, in Civil Disobedience, opined, “The government that governs best governs least.”  There is your argument for a small government. He may have summarized John Locke’s ideas about governance accurately, but 2020 isn’t 1849. While we live in a country founded on the ideals of the Age of Enlightenment, the first to proclaim a nation ruled by “We the people,” the world and the country have changed. I’m a small government sort of person by nature, but complexity requires skilled people and effective management. We are a big country with big issues. We specialize in big ideas and big dreams. It takes a lot of people to make that work. California has 883,400 government employees, local and state. Florida has 424,961, Texas 563,000, and Vermont 14,680. And then there are the two million Federal employees, one for every 175 of us. That doesn’t count the postal service and the armed services. We already have Big Government! Too much I say.

I’m never sure which part of the government I want to cut. Do I want to cut the fire department or the police department? Do I want to cut the county health department or the county hospital? Do I want to cut the national park service or the local park department? Do I want to cut the FDA, the CDC, the NIH, or OSHA? No, but I wish they would do their jobs. Do I want to cut the local planning committee, the water district, the sewer district, the school district, the … well it goes on? I want less government, but how to get it will require a sea change in our expectations about the role of government.

Instead of asking governments to leave us alone to slug out a living and a future for ourselves we incrementally keep asking them to protect us from ourselves. I don’t have young children anymore, which is a good thing if you consider the skill and knowledge needed to install a car seat. The owner’s manual for my car has instructions for installing a car seat, securing a child in a car seat; the how-to starts on page 50, with small print, illustrations, and warnings, ending on page 64. The final entry instructs me to unhook the car seat before I take the kid out of the car. Those fourteen pages of instructions are included because of government regulations and related lawsuits. Whatever happened to throwing the kids in the back of the station wagon with a blanket and taking off to the drive-in movies or a cross-country trip? Do we want to do away with those laws and regulations? Probably not, but 14 pages, really? (The 13 pages that tell me how to use Bluetooth and hook up Apple Car Play, however, seem about right.)

It seems to me that our democratic-republic- capitalist system could use a tune-up every now and then; minor tweaks here and there if you will. What we have now is pretty good for those who picked the right parents or those who work their way up without a privileged life. Our Constitution calls on us to form a more perfect union, which to me means we should always be changing, trying to get better, to do better, to grasp for the wind, to keep from sliding back to the good-old-days, which were not so good for a whole bunch of people.

Let’s try to have a healthcare system that works equally for everyone regardless of economic status or a labor system that shares the profits of the company with the workers. Walmart’s 1.5 million store employees earn an average of $14.26 per hour or $29,660 for those who work 40 hours per week. That won’t pay the rent and buy food in most towns. The top 5 employees of the company made $68,000,000 last year. The company‘s net income was about $60,000 per employee. They could spread some of that around. The federal minimum wage was $7.25 per hour in 2009. The Federal minimum wage in 2020 is $7.25. Georgia still has a minimum wage of $5.15 on the books.

One percent of Americans own about 90% plus of the country’s wealth. We resemble a Russian oligarchy. Instead of lowering the taxes for middle-class people, Congress lowered the taxes for the richest cohort of the nation. Affluent people don’t contribute to Social Security beyond the absolute minimum required, so the retirement of the bottom 30-40% of the country is in danger of being underfunded in a few years.

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit earlier this year, 30 million people lost their jobs and nearly five million of them lost their health insurance. In Europe, nobody lost his or her health care insurance. Why is the US, the richest country in the world the only industrialized nation that doesn’t have universal health care or that considers healthcare an employment benefit?

Our state legislatures could stop gerrymandering Congressional and state legislative districts to favor one party or group over the other so that we have a fair representation. The expectation in a democratic-republic is that the people would choose those who represent them. In too many states the legislature chooses the people who will elect them. In the US Senate, about 80% of the Senators represent about 50% of the population which gives them enormous power to pass laws that don’t really represent the will of the majority of people.

Chief Justice Roberts once wrote that the best way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discrimination based on race.[ii] An interesting observation from someone who came of age and was educated in an era when “color-blind” was devoutly to be wished but didn’t work out as hoped. So once again we need to energize our efforts to ensure that everyone treats everyone else fairly and everyone has an equal opportunity to succeed. People are in the streets protesting police brutality, poor housing, lack of good schools, redlining of real estate sales and loans, and other discriminatory actions. We need to fix these things now, not in generations. Too many generations have passed since MLK led the nation toward systemic change. We need leadership that seeks equality under law and doesn’t praise the descendants of Northern Europeans for having beautiful genes. We heard those cries back in the late 1930s and early 1940s

There is a lot more that we can do to improve the country, not because it isn’t a good place already, but because we can’t stop improving. Truth be told, however, it isn’t going to get better until we come to grips with the awful political divide, the chasm that separates us from one another. It is at such a level, that in the middle of one of the worst pandemics in a century, the wearing of a mask, to prevent our infecting other people, has become a political statement. The concept of two political parties arguing over two sets of beliefs and then compromising for the betterment of the country, a requirement in a democratic-republic, is considered capitulation. A Senate Majority leader who held up one nomination for a Supreme Court Justice for ten months because it was too close to an election now promises to ram through another nomination because “we have the votes” even though people have started casting ballots in the presidential election.  This behavior will not sustain a republic, as Franklin warned us at the inception of our experiment in self-rule.

Our instability, caused by political parties most interested in power and ideology sets us on the road of distrust of our national institutions, our expressed values, and our example to the world of how democracy works. We are losing our role as leader of the free world. Russia, a sworn enemy, attacks our campaign on a daily basis, China moves across Asia and Africa at breakneck speed building roads and ports, and Iran funds and arms our enemies in the Near East.  

Our Founders gave us our marching orders. It is up to us to improve on their beginnings.  We can make society equally available to all its citizens, not just the favored few, where everyone has a home, adequate food, and access to quality healthcare. We can be a nation that has great schools at all levels that are equal but never separate; we can have the freedom to walk the streets without fear, even at night; we can have a political system that is fair and representative of all of us and that is chosen by us. That is what democracy is all about, and none of it is what socialism is all about.

I’m going to think about that at least once a week from now on!

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[i] Constitution of the United States, Article II: Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector. The Electors shall meet in their respective States, and vote by Ballot for two persons, of whom one at least shall not lie an Inhabitant of the same State with themselves. And they shall make a List of all the Persons voted for, and of the Number of Votes for each; which List they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the Seat of the Government of the United States, directed to the President of the Senate. The President of the Senate shall, in the Presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the Certificates, and the Votes shall then be counted. The Person having the greatest Number of Votes shall be the President,

[ii] Chief Justice John Roberts majority opinion in  Parents Involved in Community Schools vs. Seattle School District, case analysis, Georgetown Law Center, 2008

Whack a Mole!

“I’m shocked, shocked that there is gambling going on in here.” The famous line from Casablanca as the head of the police force closed Rick’s bar and collects his winnings. We all recognize the hypocrisy of one of the great scenes in American moviemaking. Well, in the same vein, I’m shocked, shocked at the new revelations in Bob Woodward’s new book: Rage. I’m shocked that there is lying in the White House and other government agencies. 

Too many people just assumed that President Trump wasn’t smart enough to understand the severity of the Covid-19 virus and the death and destruction it would cause. But he did understand and chose to lie to the people so that they would not panic. Too many others didn’t care if he understood or not, they would just do what he led them to do and reveled in ignoring the “educated elite scientists” who wanted to have them wear a mask. Image that!

Rage also revealed that Trump had told Woodward that the US has new weapon systems that China and Russia can’t even imagine; and that is when the arms race started again.

A Whistleblower in the Department of Homeland Security filed a complaint with the Inspector General claiming that he was told to skew intelligence briefing material so that it more closely conformed to the President’s view of the world. Specifically, the Acting Director told him to spend more time investigating why China was meddling in our elections and less time looking into Russia’s continued interference.

Chaos theory, to oversimplify, is often illustrated with the notion of a butterfly’s flapping its wings will set in motion airwaves that cause a hurricane half-way around the world; random really isn’t. The result of not wanting to panic Americans about the virus, and mocking those who did try to get the truth out and observe scientific protocols set in motion billions of ideas, thoughts, and actions that caused tens of thousands of people to die needlessly. Total deaths have surpassed 190,000 souls. 

In normal times the simple act of holding back information of the virus and lying about it, in addition to total fiasco-level mismanagement of the pandemic would be cause for a President to resign in shame. To tell a reporter about secret weapons systems would ignite Congressional investigations, hearings, and possible impeachment proceedings, or a simple resignation.

The last week or two has seen a new shocking revelation nearly every day. It’s whack-a-scandal time in DC.  We are so accustomed to the daily chaos that by Monday these events may all be forgotten. 

These revelations are not Democrat or Republican issues. They speak to competence, to reliability, to honesty, to the American Spirit. We deserve better.  

The Table is Set!

Law and Order and Protesting Anarchists. Socialism and Character.  Coastal Elites and Middle America. Control COVID or Open Schools and Businesses. We’re Good, they’re Bad. Both political parties held conventions in August. We pretty much know what the next few weeks will be like, so buckle up.

Candidates always say that the coming election is the most important in their lifetime. Sometimes they mean it, sometimes they believe it. This time I think they are correct. I know it is the most important one since I had to choose between Nixon and Kennedy.  

Biden told us that this election was about regaining the soul of America. Trump said this election was about maintaining the America we love. My gut says it’s going to get nasty, real nasty before it’s over.

Once upon a time, law-and-order meant law-and-order. Missing from that exhortation was which laws and whose order. Today it’s a dog-whistle. Most Americans can tolerate protestors filling the streets to bring attention to disparate treatment and injustice. What they won’t tolerate is rioting, looting, and vandalizing. White folks need to understand, however, that law-and-order has come to mean keep-the-Black-folks-under-control. It also applies to other minorities. It’s a trigger related to bigotry. The people who protest in the streets need police protection. Those who destroy other people’s property need jail time. Besides, the media always spends more time and money on the rioting and looting than it does on the message of the protest.

The police killings this spring and summer brought, once again, a wellspring of historical mistreatment and a depth of despair percolating to the surface. This has been going on for years, but now anybody with a phone can record the mistreatment, put it on social media, and watch it travel the world in a nanosecond. The technology made it impossible to deny brutal treatment and killings by rogue police officers: Trevon Martin, Stephon Clark, Breonna Taylor, and George Floyd, to name a few. We see the poor maintenance of the rental property, lack of textbooks in poor neighborhoods. Inequality is now in full view. People finally said that enough is enough and took to the streets. Black people particularly have too long had to endure a society in which the playing field wasn’t even close to level. They know that police kill Blacks more often than anyone else; 7.13 per million vs. 3.48 for Latinx, 2.91 per million for white people, and 1.34 for Asians. They know that their schools aren’t as good as white schools; they know that they have a harder time getting a good job and moving up than other people. The data proves it, and it leads people to demand systemic changes in our laws and in our culture.

Socialism will be a popular chant in this election cycle. It always is when people demand change, especially massive changes to society and core beliefs.  Truman told us that any change that benefits all the people rather than a favored few is always called socialism. To be clear, America would never tolerate descent into socialism because that means that the government would take over the means of production and distribution of wealth. Britain tried it several times with massive failures; we saw how well it worked in USSR, some South American countries, and some Asian countries. It is a losing proposition.

Well then, why do we label so many things socialism, when they aren’t? For one thing, it is a quick and easy way to get people to oppose the change because too many people never took Econ-101. Think about some ideas considered socialism when they were proposed, but are now just part of our life: Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, the TVA, the national parks and forests, and national public health agencies to name a few. The “big lie strategy" will be used extensively during the campaign.

When the COVID-19 hit our shores and the country shut down, thirty-three million people lost their jobs, 14.7% of the workforce. Nearly four million of them lost health insurance for their families at the same time. Suggesting that health insurance should not be tied to employment isn’t a socialist idea, but a rational step in providing healthcare for all people and how we pay for it.  Too often healthcare and health insurance are used synonymously.  They aren’t. In any case, the notion that healthcare is a human right isn’t socialism, no matter how many times you hear it.  

We tell people that if they work hard, and get a good education they can be whatever they want to be, the American Dream. It is both the clarion call of our nation and its muffled myth. It works best if you have some privileges: live in an affluent community, have good neighborhood schools, have parents who dote on you, a little bit of luck, and are white. Too many in our society don’t have those advantages. Too many were denied those advantages and the dream. Too many live with the reality that over the years the system was rigged against them, designed to limit who can live the dream and who can’t.

An interesting anomaly about American culture is that if you do attain the dream, get that good education, become successful, become what you want to be, you are labeled elite. Then you learn that the only thing worse than the elite is the educated elite. It gets worse still, you could be an educated coastal elite. When an expert on healthcare testified before congress a couple of months ago, a Representative from Ohio asked why he should listen to experts: “What do they know?” Much of today’s malaise is put at the feet of the coastal elites. In the process education is degraded, effort is degraded, and opportunity for all is degraded.

The diaspora from small-town Middle America to the coasts and inland large cities is ongoing. About forty percent of Americans live in a county that touches a coast. Their states represent over 300 of the 538 Electoral College members and account for the third-largest economy in the world. California alone is the fifth-largest economy in the world. Good low-skill manufacturing jobs that surged the growth of the middle class across the country for decades now fade in the shadow of technology that can do the work at a lower cost and with more accuracy. Basic manufacturing jobs now require the ability to code AI. The pandemic is changing the world of work, perhaps for a long time.

Companies and their employees are questioning the need to commute hours each day to get to an office with a computer when they have a computer at home. This phenomenon also is changing the commercial real estate market. I wonder what we will do with all those empty high-rises. The outlook is grim for those who don’t possess modern-day work skills or can’t move to the expanding job markets. Both parties will address the jobs issue for inland America, with few options to offer them.

The push is on to open schools and businesses. The pressure to survive for small businesses particularly must be overwhelming. You have to feel sorry for someone who spent twenty years or more building up the mom-and-pop shop and then be forced to close it overnight for months on end. The millions who were left jobless need to earn money to pay the bills. Kids need to get back to school. As a nation, we failed at the first shut down a few months ago and then rushed to re-open the states. The number of cases increased and we perilously close to needing another shutdown. As schools open across the country cases continue to rise. College campuses are Petri dishes for the virus as social distancing and mask-wearing suggestions are ignored. Many parents are refusing to send their kids to school. Most schools are offering distance learning, but the effectiveness hasn’t been measured. Home-schooling is becoming more popular, but that means that the parent or parents have to work their job all day, teach their kid/s all day, keep house, and shop. The possibility of becoming tired is not out of the question. One party will say that we need to open schools and workplaces, period. The other will say we want to do it, but safely, and each will likely change their position several times before the election to assuage the populous feelings of the time.

There is a good possibility that the protest marches will go on for some time and will become fodder for the campaign. The President’s Chief of Staff, Mark Meadows, said on one of the Sunday morning news shows that the people in “Trump’s America” would not put up with the anarchy of the Democratic cities. So get ready for anarchy to be the buzz-word of the month.

I’m convinced, well who isn’t, that Fox News is a reactionary supporter of Trump, and that MSNBC is a radical supporter of Biden. They and other media do their darndest to exploit the nearly 50-50 divide among the population and build support for their favored candidate.

Yes, it is possible that this campaign will get nasty, very nasty, before early November.