Just Say Why

Whatever Shall We Do With The Spitzer Scandal?
by
David Schlecht

By now we’ve all heard about the prostitute-engaging Governor, Spitzer. I’m sure we’ve all heard the Republican smear machine trying to make this into something serious. But let’s look at this in perspective.

I’m not about to try to defend Spitzer. If he has any defense, then I’m sure it’ll come out. But in all reality, where does this rank in today’s  events? In the news, today, Bush’s lie-of-a-war is continuing to kill hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children this and every year in childhood related illnesses. This is just plain and simple, murder by lies. Where does the murder of hundreds of thousands of children rank along side employing a prostitute?

The Bush administration has destroyed our economy to the point that the majority of economists are worrying about another Republican Great Depression. Already there are millions of Americans losing their American dream, their homes, their livelihoods, their life savings, all due to either Bush’s gross mismanagement or just plain old greed and Chronyism. Explain to me how this ranks with prostitution services.

We have the most dangerous Republican congress members of all time. They have repeatedly demonstrated that they will follow a hitler-esque leader, lock, step, right into Armageddon. If that’s isn’t enough to scare the daylights out of you, then you’re not paying attention. Now, how does this compare with a prostitute scandal?

Our country is slipping back into the dark ages with constitutionally illegal state-based black magic for sex education, teaching black magic as facts while requiring text books to say evolution is “just a theory”.  We are purposely teaching our kids to discount facts and reason for magic and ghosts. How does that compare with this scandal?

Okay, so we all agree that it’s a bad, bad thing that Spitzer did, even worse than causing tens of thousands of unwanted pregnancies and STDs through the teaching of black magic, then how do we deal with it?

Should we force him to resign and put a lock-step Nazi in his place? Well, Rush and his poison perspectives would certainly make you think so. Look into the good things Spitzer has done and then think about what more good he may do. Then think about the alternative of more lock-step Republicans in office. Which would you prefer? Which would be better for our country?

And, I can’t leave this issue without bringing to light just one more scandal in today’s news that, like all the rest of the Republican crimes, totally obscures anything like a sex scandal. The politicization of our country’s legal system. It has been commandeered by the Republicans to illegally wire-tap sex talk of Democratic politicians, while letting Osama bin Laden go free.  We know they’re illegally tapping our phones, now we know what they’re looking for. Re-election. No need for them to worry about the security of the country, by God, the Democrats are talking about SEX!

A Health Care Story
by
David Schlecht

Surveys show that the majority of Americans know there’s a health care crisis, but less than half consider their coverage unacceptable. Why is that?

A little research of my own seems to indicate that the surveys are asking the wrong questions. Let me tell you a little story.

My wife and I have good friends, a married couple, Sally and Tom, who were happy with their health coverage, too. They are in their late 30s and until recently, quite healthy. Sally had a little trouble with Asthma when she was in her 20s but it went away.

Recently, she had an asthma attack that put her in the hospital.

You probably already guessed, but I’ll tell you, any way. Their insurance refused to cover the costs because it was a “Pre-existing condition.” In fact, since they failed to report a pre-existing condition on their application, the carrier decided it was a good time to drop their coverage, entirely.

The medical costs have destroyed their life savings and they have had to take loans out against their retirement accounts. Tom is in the software business and had a pretty good retirement nest-egg started. Right now, they’re wondering if Social Security will be around when they retire as they will be working the rest of their lives just to pay for their medical.

In order to get coverage for Sally, Tom left his job and went to work at a government agency where he could take advantage of a health-coverage co-op. The insurance is still shockingly expensive and even though Tom is making less money, at least they have the feeling that they’re secure in their health coverage.

Recently, Tom has been complaining of recurring headaches. He has a spot at the top of his brain’s right hemisphere that causes excruciating pain from time to time. Tom exercises regularly and is quite fit. His blood pressure is great and has no problems with his vision.

So, what is Tom going to do about his headaches? He knows that if he goes to a doctor and nothing shows up, and some time down the road he finds he has a tumor or aneurysm he knows that any new insurance covering them would immediately drop him just like they did Sally.

Would Tom and Sally say they were happy with their current insurance. Probably yes.  Should they be happy with their current condition. Of course not, but at least Sally is covered and if Tom has to go to the hospital now, at least he is covered.

Are you happy with your coverage? Would your insurer drop you like they did Sally if you come down with an expensive ailment? It’s obvious the only solution to this problem that all Americans face is to take the insane profits out of the Medical Industry, and the only way to do that is with a national health care.

Now, sure, we’ve all heard the propaganda put out by the insanely profitable health care industry how it would be just terrible if we went that route. After all, someone somewhere came to America to get an operation that their national health care didn’t cover.  Someone somewhere. Sounds like deceptive propaganda to me. After all, why would the industry not fight to keep their insane profits? They could spend billions on deceptive ads every year and still make insane profits, and that’s just what they plan to do.

The Hillary, Lieberman, McCain Ticket
by
David Schlecht

Let’s get the nonsense out of the way at the start. I will gladly support either of our wonderful Democratic presidential candidates. Anyone who says they’ll vote Republican, or not vote at all (it’s the same thing, folks) if their favorite doesn’t get the nomination has no clue how important this election is for America. Either candidate will make a great president but both will require continued pressure from you and me. It’s not over after the election, it’s just beginning.

With that said, I would like to review some of the changes I’m seeing in the Hillary campaign. With the straight 7-state loss, Hillary knew she needed to change tactics and get more aggressive in her campaigning. Suddenly we are seeing a side of Hillary that concerns almost all of us, even her strident supporters.

First came her “I’m a Republican” ad with the 3 AM phone call advertisement. What on Earth was she thinking? Trying to get votes by scaring us is so, oh I don’t know, Republican. How stupid. How un-Democratic.

Then came her comments that only she and McCain would make good Commanders-in-Chief. This one almost knocked me off my chair. What is she doing implying that if we don’t get her as a candidate that we should be voting Republican. What is wrong with this candidate? This is way beyond stupid. This is the kind of things you would expect from Lieberman. It’s like she’s saying, “I’ll do anything I have to in order to be president, even if that means hurting the party or the country.” Hillary Lieberman. If she misses the Democratic nomination will she join the Republicans and become McCain’s running mate, like Lieberman?

I can’t believe we didn’t see the Lieberman facade when he was running for vice-president. I wonder if we would see the same tendencies in Hillary if she’s another Lieberman. It seems pretty obvious that she is demonstrating some very unhealthy characteristics for a president.

We have seen some negative campaigning from Obama, so I’m not saying either is better. I’m just pointing out that we Americans hold our elected officials to a higher standard than we are seeing in Hillary. In fact, we are seeing Republican standards coming from her campaign.

This is not the time for our candidates to start picking each other apart, it’s time to start picking apart McCain. At this point, we all realize how similar our Democratic candidates are and the vast majority of us would vote for either candidate.

This means we need to know who would be best campaigning against McCain. It’s time for our candidates to show us who would be a better opponent to the Republican smear campaign and not who is more like a Republican. Campaign against McCain, not each other.

There’s a Storm Coming
by
David Schlecht

We are standing on the edge of the abyss, looking a long way down to pain and suffering for generations to come. It a long and destructive fall and we see it as clear as day. The past 28 years of Conservative rule in America has almost destroyed this country. You know this isn’t an exaggeration because you see it around us every day.

We have seen our economy destroyed, and we’re at the point that many financial experts are even saying the words Great Depression. American workers are making less in spendable income than any time since the Great Republican Depression, working conditions are worse than they have been for decades, our food supply is filled with poisons, our environment is crumbling, even our airplanes have cracks in them. All because of the past 28 years of Conservative rule.

Let me explain that I am not for or against either of the front-runner Democratic presidential candidates. I believe that either of them would make a great improvement over what’s we’ve seen the past 8 years and with continued encouragement from us can do wonders for our country.

Let me explain why it’s been 28 years of Conservative rule. Reagan began the process of destroying our working class by busting the unions and by refusing to enforce labor laws. This was just the beginning of the decline of the working class.

Then came Bill Clinton and the Republican Congress. He wasn’t as bad as Reagan but he advanced many Conservative issues with the help of the Congress. Clinton saw continued decline in  the quality of life for the working class by continuing to hurt the unions, by refusing to undo the destruction done during the Reagan years, and most terribly by promising not to pursue Free Trade and then turning around and passing it. Free Trade. What a name. The only thing free about it is it gets America’s working class to compete with almost free labor in other countries.

Nobody thinks dropping our tariffs has helped this country in any way. In fact, our tariffs  helped this country become the super power it was before the past 28 year decline. We need our jobs here at home. No more free labor to compete with the American working class. Sorry Clinton, but you were a Conservative in many important ways.

Then came the Bush years. What can I say? With the Conservatives in complete control of our country, we saw the fastest decline in everything that matters to this country. Spendable income fell through the floor, the economy is on the brink of collapsing as is our environment. The most corrupt government this country has seen, exceeding even the best hopes of 3rd world tyrants. The polar ice caps are melting around us and the Republican are still plugging their ears and yelling la la la la la la la la I can’t hear you.

We are standing on the abyss and another 4 years of Conservatives with their foot on the gas will plunge us into a darkness that this country and this world has never seen before.

Sure, we may be able to weed many of the rabid Republicans out of our government, but there are still many Conservative Democrats in Congress. This can be seen by our inability to get few meaningful things passed even with a 51% majority. We need more than just a few more Democrats. We need a whole lot more and a lot more progressive ones at that.

Look at Kansas. The Conservatives have done a remarkable job of getting their ilk in politics. All the way down to the lowly school boards, the Conservatives are poisoning our country. It’s time for us to get them out of our government. The only way to do that is to get out and participate.

Join a school board, run for city council, send $5 or $50 or $500 to local politicians, start a website, talk to friends and neighbors. Do something, no matter how small or insignificant. Every little bit helps. Then, next time, maybe you’ll realize how good it feels to be part of the solution and will actually look forward to helping more.

Look at what we’ve seen in the Bush years and multiply that by the “fanatic” factor of McCain and imagine what this country will be like in one year, or four or 10. The Conservative dream come true. No public schools, education only for the elite, no Social Security, no social programs where we can contribute our tax dollars to helping each other out, no USDA to protect our food or medicine, no more environmental controls, no limits to corporate control of our information, our lives, and our government. Yes, the Conservative dream is closer than you know.

Then, look at what this will look like in four years with a Liberal presidency and a strong majority in Congress. Clean air, clean water, decent jobs, predatory trade policy protections, safer work places, public health care, improved schools, separation of church and state. It’s a long row to hoe to get there from the abyss but it’s possible, but only with a strong majority and only if YOU get and stay involved. Even a Democratic government won’t give a hoot what you think or want if you don’t make at least as much noise and the lobbyists. Get involved! Do it today. Do it now!

The Urgent Need for Campaign Finance Reform
by
David Schlecht

Back in the 90s when Hillary Clinton was working so hard to put together a national health plan, she was blown out of the water by millions of dollars in negative ads. The American sheeple (no, not just the Republicans) took the health industry media, hook, line, and sinker. May of us were not so sure if this was the right thing. That’s how successful the unethical Health Industry media campaign was. That’s what millions of dollars in misleading advertising will buy.

No only are unethical industries infecting our media, they have infected and all but destroyed our government.

There is not a politician that can win election without taking bribes from the “Free Market”. These bribes don’t come unattached. They have strings — big string attached. If these politicians want to stay in power, they must continue to take these unethical bribes or they’ll be out on their ears come next election.

It’s not just the unethical Health Care Industry, it’s all the major politically-contributing industries. There’s the Health Care Industry, the Defense Industry, the Corrupt Corporate Media, there’s the Mega Telecoms, the churches, you name it, and they’ve infected our government.

The only, let me repeat, ONLY way we can take back our government is to get big money out of the political process, and the only way to do this is to write to and send letters to your politicians and to your local newspapers bringing this issue to the forefront. If we make this an issue from today, forward, we’ll have political reformers in office in short order and will have a campaign finance reform that gets the unethical big businesses out of our government.

Only then, will we be successful at getting our oversight agencies back in place and only will we then be able to protect America.

Campaign Finance Reform, Now! Right after the Bush Impeachments, of course.

Only 99 years, 10 months, 19 days More in Iraq
by
David Schlecht

I got an interesting and amusing e-mail from James Carville, today. He did a good job of explaining the Republican perspective on Iraq, only 99 more years:

That’s how long we have until American troops can leave Iraq according to John McCain’s recent comment that we could stay at war for “maybe 100 years.”  McCain also said such a ludicrously long timetable “would be fine with me.”

The thing is, John McCain isn’t the only Republican senator who doesn’t have a clue on Iraq.  At least four of the DSCC’s top targets have a long and sordid history of blindly supporting the Bush-McCain status quo.

You can see just how lockstep they all are in the latest DSCC web video.  We match the records of four top Republican targets with John McCain and George Bush point for point and quote for quote.
…
John McCain and the rest of the Senate Republicans may be fine with continuing Bush’s failed policies for the next 100 years, but most Americans couldn’t disagree more.  They want real change, not Senators who echo the Bush status quo in their quotes and their votes.

Not only are the Republicans in Congress continuing in lock step with the failed Bush president, they are so sure thatAmericans are too stupid to realize they are ALL voting party over the good of the country that they even follow lock step behind Bush’s worst decisions, such as the Telecom Amnesty Bill, misnamed as Protect America bill. How stupid do they think we Americans are? Obviously they think we’re pretty darned stupid.

The most amazing thing is that Bush and the rabid Republicans party has managed to keep all the Republican presidential candidates in lock step behind the Bush failures, even though Bush is the most hated president in American history.

Other than stealing elections, again, how would a misguided party like this ever expect to win any races in a country they hate so much?

The organization started and intent on helping women and couples deal with family planning issues is under unrelenting attacks by the “Forced Pregnancy” arm of the Conservative Radicals. Without our help, another pillar of our free, informed society will fall, women will be lied to by the Heritage Foundation and their liars and America will suffer for generations to come.

Can you spare $20? $100? Do you have 10 minutes to write a letter or make a phone call? They need our help. Here is their statement:

Family Planning is under attack in Washoe County.
Nevada women need your help.

The Washoe County Board of County Commissioners and the Washoe County Board of Health have scheduled meetings to discuss the process for distributing Title X funding (America’s family planning funding for low-income women). When Planned Parenthood Mar Monte received a two-year grant to run Street Smart, a program for HIV/AIDS outreach for youth in our area, several commissioners raised questions about the Health Department budget and grant program. There is a chance they may recommend the Title X funds not be accepted by the County.

Take action now! One minute of your time will make a big difference - please write an email to the County Commissioners and the Department of Health to show your support of Title X funding and access to family planning.

Use one or more of these points in your message:

• Washoe County should not refuse to take Title X funds.
• I value family planning and comprehensive sex education and outreach as the best way to protect women, family and teen health.
• Preventing unplanned pregnancies saves Nevada taxpayers - every dollar spent saves $4 in Medicaid costs for pregnancy and newborn health care.

Washoe County Commissioners:

Bonnie Weber, District 5	bweber@washoecounty.us
Jim Galloway, District 1	rlencioni@washoecounty.us
David Humke, District 2	dhumke@washoecounty.us
Robert Larkin, District 4	rlarkin@washoecounty.us
Kitty Jung, District 3	kjung@washoecounty.us

Washoe County District Health Department:

sbfisher@washoecounty.us

Report Back: Email renopa@ppmarmonte.org with “I took action” in the subject line to let us know that you sent your email in!

In addition, the Washoe County Board of Health is proposing to cut family planning funding 90% over a three-year period. This means the county may no longer provide family planning services or the Teen Health Mall program. If this happens about 700 women a year will go without family planning services - this is in addition to the 44,000 in Washoe County who already can’t access family planning they need for breast and cervical cancer screening, sexually transmitted disease testing and treatment and affordable birth control.

Other ways you can take action:

• Call the County Commissioner’s office at (775) 328-2005 to voice your opinion. Call the Washoe District of Health’s office at (775) 328-2400.
• Go to the joint meeting on 2/26: Commission and Board of Health at 1pm, Commissioners Chambers in Bldg A, 1009 E Ninth St, Reno NV 89502.
• Go to the Board of Health meeting 2/28: The Board of Health meets at 1pm, Health Department, South Auditorium, 1009 E Ninth St, Reno, NV 89502.

P.S. Thank you for your support! Learn more about Title X.

Where Do You Get Your Morals?
by
Paul Johnson

Let’s start by considering two people who we would agree are moral and two who we wouldn’t consider moral and see what shakes out.

Mike and Marv are two moral people. Mike goes to church regularly, and has been brought up getting his morals from the church. It’s the Golden Rule and the 10 Commandments that he lives by.

Marv goes to church regularly and feels that his morals mesh well with the church-taught morals, but feels that it’s important for him to know “why” some things are moral and others are not.  He says that understanding “why” helps him better decide the morally correct decision in areas not so well defined by the Bible.

Mike says that his Bible tells him what he needs in order to make decisions, and if he can’t find it, he can always seek guidance from elders in his church. He would never consider deciding on his own without considering his religion.

Now let’s consider Billy and Bobby. Billy is devoutly religious and knows that he’s doing the wrong thing but just “can’t help” it when he’s doing immoral things. He knows that being gay is wrong but he can’t help his homosexual inclinations, though he suppresses them as best he can. He also knows that the man is the king of his domain and his wife better just succumb to his demands or he has the support of God in his brutality.

Bobby was raised in a religious family but feels that his church is persecuting him and his friends for being gay. He says if God made them gay, then the church has no right to condemn him.  He wishes he wasn’t gay but he feels he is who he is and is healthier for accepting the facts.

Which of these people would be better able to make moral decisions and which would have difficulty?

Obviously, Mike admits that he is unable to “make” moral decisions on his own and must rely on moral decisions defined thousands of years ago and rewritten countless times. Mike has never exercised his moral decision making process. What kinds of decisions does he make on a daily basis? Basing his morals on his book, how often does he apply the wrong moral to a situation? Of all the Mikes I’ve known, there aren’t any that I would trust to make a moral decision on their own.

Marv would certainly do better at making moral decisions as he has demonstrated a desire to understand the issues and has a demonstrated experience at making moral decisions.

How about Billy the wife beater? He can justify every awful evil thing he does by following the letter of the religious laws while not understanding or caring about the intent. How would you feel about having someone like Billy on a jury?

How about Bobby? Does his religious upbringing make him better at moral decisions? Since he has abandoned them, I’m inclined to say no.

How about if we take someone who is really awful and who confesses to not having a religious moral compass? Stalin comes to mind. He was responsible for millions of deaths and murders. We certainly wouldn’t want him making moral decisions for us. We know who he is.

Mike, on the other hand, frequently makes moral decisions involving people around him. Mike may even be a president of some third world county. Then again, so may Billy. Their religious decision making process is not only broken but outright destructive. We would be less inclined to accept Stalin but could be worse off still with either Mike or Billy.

The defining difference between someone good at making moral decisions and someone bad is the obvious criteria, knowledge and experience.  Dogmatically following a religion’s moral decisions makes us really lousy at making moral decisions. Only when we understand the premise of the morality we find in our religions or elsewhere, can we be good moral people.

In other words, you don’t become more moral by going to church, but you certainly could be less moral.

Capital Punishment and Justice
by
Paul Johnson

So, it’s just a coincidence that the Bush Administration has decided to wait until now to prosecute bad guys #1, #2, and #3, all responsible for 9/11. (By the way, I thought Bush was responsible for failing to protect us from 9/11, but that’s another story.) So, if we ignore the unreliable nature of tortured confessions, and ignore the totally unethical and deceptive Bush Administration, and ignore all the questions about how Saddam (oops, I mean Osama) has gotten EVERYTHING he demanded from the US, ignoring all these things, if we find the bad guys guilty and everyone really believes it, how do we punish them?

On another note, there has been new evidence discovered around the finding of the latest dead victim of the Nevada UNR serial rapist. The charity fund to help find the poor missing girl is now redirecting their efforts from finding the girl to exacting “justice”.

In yet another news story, there have been hundreds of deaths every year caused by greed in the medical industry. Back when our country was young, and for thousands of years before that, when someone killed or crippled a friend or neighbor or customer through greed or stupidity, we felt obligated to ensure that the victim and his family were taken care of.

So, what is justice? I should remind you that justice is not, in any way, the same as revenge. Revenge is a lousy moral trait. No amount of killing or suffering will ever bring back someone’s ability to walk or live and breath.

What is capital punishment? It’s nothing more than revenge, plain and simple.

Electrocuting someone to death doesn’t bring back loved ones, it only causes more pain, suffering, and death, and not just for the hopefully correctly convicted convict, but for his friends and family as well. And why should we care? Because we’re better people than that.

The Death Penalty does not exact justice, but only revenge.

Pay attention to the number of people on death row and in lifetimes of incarceration who have recently been  found innocent. Imagine how many have already been put to death who were also innocent. In these cases, the “justice” in the form of revenge, has become murder, cold blooded murder on our parts. That’s not something we want to be a part of.

So, what is the purpose of our penal system if not for revenge? I suppose everyone can answer that. Our penal system is supposed to serve two purposes, first, it acts to discourage wrong-doing through fear of the consequences, and the second is to protect society from the bad apples.

In the first case, the term penal system is incorrect. What we really need to call it is a re-education system. The best way to ensure that convicts, innocent and guilty alike, turn to crime when they leave the penal system is to fail in our efforts to rehabilitate or re-educate them.

In the second case, the penal system isn’t intended to reform or re-educate criminals, but to prevent them from doing further harm to society.

In neither of these cases is “Penal System” the correct solution. No wonder it doesn’t work.

So, we seem to have a pretty good handle on what “Justice” is not. But what, exactly, is it? How, exactly do we reform our penal system into a correctional system?

Looking at the three examples in the beginning of this essay, we have three overlapping solutions to three very different crimes, and yes, malpractice is a crime.

#1. Will fear of death prevent religious zealots from trying to infect the rest of society? I guess that’s pretty obvious, but needs to be stated. Punishment, especially the death penalty, does not discourage the mentally unstable. This is true not just of religious fanatics, but applies equally well to any crimes done out of emotion. In other words, the only crime that punishment will discourage is crimes done by high-society aristocratic spoiled kids getting their kicks. This will not discourage emotionally driven people, and will obviously not discourage desperate people.

Putting to death religious zealots will only breed more religious zealots.

#2. What is justice for the doctor who is performing so many operations that he can’t keep them straight and ends up cutting off the wrong limb? Just as in the past, this greedy doctor should be responsible for the victim and his dependents for life.  What about cases where the perpretator has no means of supporting the victim and family? Then a life of servitude is in order. Serve that family in any way you can, and if that means going door to door begging for food for the victims, then get to it.

Will a million dollar punitive damage settlement be fair justice? Perhaps, if that’s what will make the victim feel fairly compensated for the loss of his sight, or hearing, and if the family will feel fairly compensated for the loss of a loved one and the loss of decades of care, help, and income. But, really, would you trade your eyesight for a million dollars? How do you put a price on something like that?

Keep in mind, that this corrupt industry is trying their best to limit their need and inclination to provide restitution to those they’ve harmed. This is immoral in so many ways. Yes, we need to reform our medical industry.

#3. The serial rapist currently preying on the girls and young women of Reno’s UNR campus is not discouraged by fear of death. He is encouraged by his belief that he will not be caught. I guess if we had the cops that are currently busting people for smoking pot, or watching adult movies, or prostitution out there on the streets dealing with real crime, then the criminal would be much less inclined to rape and kill, but he would still yearn for it and would eventually succumb to his weakness.

When caught and convicted, will the correction system be able to rehabilitate him? Was Willie Horton on the path to rehabilitation? I’m not a psychologist, but I know that some people are not able or willing to rehabilitate. Can a jury decide this? I suppose not. Since I’m not a psychologist, I couldn’t decide, and nor could all but a very few jurors. However, many jurors are driven by emotions, especially in cases like this. Decisions based on emotion, are what got us in this mess, it’s obviously not the solution.

In cases where the bad apples must be separated from society, rehabilitation should still be a regular part of the incarceration, but keeping the bad apples out of society has to be the primary focus in these cases. For those who we are unable to keep out of society should then be considered candidates for a more permanent solution. Is that solution Capital Punishment? I don’t think so.

In conclusion, what do we do with the people responsible for 9/11? I suggest we start with impeachment. If we fail to impeach, will that encourage criminal behavior by future presidents? Maybe in some cases, but it’s not a solution in itself, either.

What do we do with the three 9/11 suspects delivered by Bush? Maybe we could start by apologizing for being so un-American and torturing them and refusing them legal council. Then, if they truly are guilty, we could rehabilitate them and use them as poster children on anti-terrorist propaganda to broadcast to religiously fanatical groups here and abroad.

More Telecom Insanity
by
David Schlecht

Can anyone believe that our Congress is still pussy-footing around with the Telecom Amnesty bill? Nobody believes that this debate has anything to do with our security or safety. Nobody is that insane. Our elected officials are trying to find a way so slime this one under the table and protect their high-paying Telecom donators from prosecution.

The voters have been watching this very closely and it’s not so easy for Congress to slime it away without being caught, so they’re trying to make it look like they did everything they could to save us but the president and the Republicans scared them and they made a little oopsie.  The Senate has failed America. Now it’s up to the House to do their duty.

The Blue Dogs are sure to side with the enemy — all except a few that are afraid of being caught.

We don’t need a more divided Congress, but as long as the anti-American Republicans are voting in lock-step, the only alternative is for the majority of America to vote in lock-step and vote them out — all of them. Look it up and see if you have a Blue Dog in your area and  write a letter to your newspaper, call a radio talk-show, and, at the very least, write them a letter explaining what they need from Congress and asking if we can get it from them. If not, the answer will be obvious come election day.