Is Biden Making The Same Mistake Obama Made?

  

                         Because progressives in Congress are typically far less vindictive and calculating than their conservative counter parts, progressives typically discover the error of their ways long after the error. On that note, I think it’s important for Democrats to take a moment- a moment much like the vindictive Republicans in the Senate right now, who are stalling and delaying the coronavirus relief bill.....just because, well, they can- and talk about what they might be overlooking with this "go it alone" stimulus bill they are soon to sign into law.

                 Similar to the days of ObamaCare, before, during and after the negotiations died, Democrats are still struggling and striving for bipartisanship that was simply never going to happen in the first place. Our collective efforts as a nation to recover from this pandemic will need to cover all 50 states and territories and be all encompassing even though Republicans seem to believe it can and should be highly targeted and somewhat limited. 

Or do they? 

            Why Mitch McConnell and his party have, once again, taken the posture of block everything Democrat, no matter who gets hurt, is a question only he and they can answer. 

 ONCE AGAIN  

         As it was with Obama, the challenge of knowing whether Republicans are interested in governing or obstructing is, once again, something only they can answer. Because, once again, the signs all say obstruction of any Democrat agenda, even ones both parties have in common, is in fact the GOP agenda. If limiting the president's accomplishments is, once again the name of the game, it’s time for Democrats to place all options on the table, including the filibuster. It's also time to put pressure on their own obstructers- Senators Joe Manchin (WV), and Kyrsten Sinema (AZ)- to get them to stop helping McConnell and the GOP, and start doing what’s right for U.S. by not publicly negotiating against your own party, once again. 

        Like they did with ObamaCare, some Democrats are blocking their own party's agenda by pursuing the bare minimum they can pass despite already failing in the bipartisanship efforts that warranted bare minimum thinking to begin with.  If Republicans' insist on making Democrats go it alone, and are not putting forth the time it takes to draft a reasonable alternative, doing anything less than everything WE the People need seems silly to me.

        Because I don't want to leave anyone lost over this very important subject, let me say this another way. If you are negotiating with a good faith partner, you both simply ask for what you want, and nothing more. However, if you have no faith in who you are negotiating with, you double, maybe even triple what you ask for so that, despite the give and take process of negotiating, you are still likely to arrive somewhere close to what you actually wanted originally. 

        Truth be told, some of you would negotiate with your own parents in that same manner, and personally, I'm not mad at you for it. But I digress.

        In this situation, are Republicans actually saying they are not pushing a better alternative, so they want no credit or blame for whatever happens to their own constituents in this time of need? If Republicans are truly willing to do nothing but wait the generally accepted timeline of two years for jobs to recover to pre-pandemic levels while trusting tenants and landlords in their voting district will figure it out but not hold any of them accountable, there is no way in hell I would get in their way. 

        Additionally, there is also no way I would continue to think so small or in such a conciliatory manner on a "go it alone" piece of legislation. After all, 1.9 trillion is almost the exact number Republicans gave to rich people and corporations with their "go it alone" tax cut in the height of an economic boom no less. Taking the risk of this bill not being enough and having to try and do it all over again could prove to be the same political mistake Obama made with the Affordable Care Act, more affectionately known as ObamaCare. In that scenario, strategically withheld support from Republicans and the insurance industry itself kept Obama from making healthcare more affordable even if he was able to make it much more accessible to millions.

        Although Obama was able to win a second term despite the foolishness of using the GOP plan exclusively without getting any GOP votes to pass it, it's worth considering if he might have done the same thing if he had a do-over? Or, maybe he would have opted to call his plan the Accessible Care Act instead of the Affordable Care Act knowing what he knows about the strategic attacks against the laws affordability and its' name? 

        If Obama would have thought in advance to focus the name of his healthcare plan on the only achievable goal he had an actual chance to pull off by himself, accessibility, we might still be calling it the ACA instead of ObamaCare, the name Republicans forced on us all when they were convinced they could demonize the name to help kill the law. 

        The accessibility of a cheaper, single-payer option (aka., Medicaid) along with the strict enforcement of payments that limits the value of certain procedures, will eventually drive down prices creating affordability over time. Relative to medical costs, this had been the case for years until recent years when the healthcare costs started to rise again. The increase in use of things such as requiring referrals before covering payments, Duo billing, double billing and even fraudulent billing all seem to me like the healthcare industry's somewhat recent responses to previous years in which we witnessed medical costs in the United States actually going down. 

       Like a batter that swings but misses, even if Biden doesn't intend to run for reelection, he'll be handing the embarrassment over to his VP in waiting or his party nominee if he signs a go it alone bill into law but it fails to do enough soon enough. Desperation has many U.S. citizens sounding like starving college kids, saying, 'send whatever you can, quickly', but prudence should be saying to Biden and the Democrats, do what's right the first time because doing too little, too late was already tried by Trump and it barely helped the people who needed it the most.

               What only a few Senators are mentioning thus far is, under our current scenario; a one-time check of $1400 or $2000 that takes too god-damn long to arrive, will be gobbled up in late fees alone. The only segment of America that these late arriving stimulus checks could possibly benefit is the segment of America not teetering to close to the edge the late-fee abyss that every poor person knows about oh too well. For way too many struggling Americans, two or even three insufficient and delayed stimulus checks are not at all what the doctor ordered for our current health and economic crisis, which essentially are one and the same.

            Unless this is an effort to make ourselves believe people living paycheck to paycheck never existed, I’m confused about what we hope to achieve with a $1400-2,000 check that arrives too late? Maybe this opinion seems like an opportune moment to promote former presidential candidate Andrew Yang’s philosophy of Universal Basic Income, because I am 100% Yang Gang, but I genuinely think it’s time to focus our  attention on where it matters most. Increasing access to food stamps as well as revving the engine that produces food in America is a step Biden can and did already kick into action. The other thing that matters most, keeping people in their homes so they have a place to cook and eat their food, takes a little more thinking.

            In a way, it’s clear to see we knew keeping people housed during a pandemic mattered quite a bit because, immediately, city states and the federal government invoked eviction moratoriums to save people from the inevitable impact of this pandemic. For a moment, it seemed everyone understood what was at stake and was ready to respond to America’s paycheck to paycheck reality. Now, it’s as if we believe every one of those pay check to pay check people took the past year of pandemic shutdown to dig out of their old debt scenarios and get their finances totally in order.

         Without question, millions of Americans have increased their personal savings during the pandemic, many whether they wanted to or not. The challenge of not being able to go to movies or eat food at someone else's dinner table as readily as we used to has proven to be a financial benefit most never expected or had the discipline to try out. As a result, the notion that everyone is suffering the same is totally wrong. In reality, targeting does have merit, but it's difficult in the middle of a crisis to do it, and, as we learned from this pandemic, if even one percent of 330 million people get missed by the targeting approach, it means a lot of people will suffer who probably didn't have to.

        Many are doing well right now, but for million of others, the pandemic has forced them to survive off of unemployment level wages (which vary state to state) subsidized by stimulus checks mostly talked about and not actually received. In our effort to focus on economic stimulus and bailouts for so many, how is it we are invoking moratoriums while excluding support for landlords, the people most negatively impacted by that word?

        Aside from ignoring America’s paycheck to paycheck reality, WE are also behaving as if most landlords are Donald Trump and his late father, which is far from the truth. The truth is, most landlords are regular people who came into a small amount of money and took a chance on themselves via real estate so they wouldn’t have to work  for people like Donald Trump and his father for the rest of their lives. 

        While a handful of landlords are regretting the decision to get into the business right about now, all of them need to be considered as a significant focus of how we deal with the worst of this pandemic. Said another way, if we are not focusing on landlords we are ignoring them and the desperate constituents the moratorium is forcing them to house. a half of million dead people and counting is a tragedy. Millions upon millions of evictions without a plan to mitigate it from happening will be a travesty.

          I envision the time- similar to the moment when Democrats looked back on Obama care and wish they’d pushed for the single-payer option sooner, not later- when Democrats will wish they’d gone even bigger than 1.9 trillion to fix this mess as well. Although they have mentioned this bill as step one in a multi-step process, step one resulted in 11 hours of bipartisan Senate aids reading 600 pages of a bill way too many people needed yesterday, not tomorrow. If they don't see a clear enough sign of what to expect from the GOP in steps two, three and four, Democrats will have already failed during step one.

         Because courthouses are finally opening all across the land, there is a day soon to arrive in which, by legal necessity, the word moratorium will be laughed out of the courthouse. Unless Congress moves to save landlords in particular by paying them the back-dated rent and late fees that so many of US can't right now, there may not be any way to target support to save the beneficiaries or the victims of the moratoriums.

         The best case scenario for everyone involved is the House rejects the Senate changes, (especially the change that lowers the eligibility threshold to $80k per year income) and all of the Democrats decide to go big or go home realizing they look dumb has hell right now continuing to reach across the isle to make this bill fair when no one is standing on the other side to shake their hand.

        No, I'm not over here closing my eyes and holding my breath hoping Democrats suddenly wake up and realize they are negotiating all alone.  This particular motionless, lying down, eyes closed thing I'm doing right now is apparently called dreaming.

  https://soundcloud.com/silkeee1/recording-45

Immigrants Are Not Our Greatest Problem. Republicans Are.

I wouldn't beat up on Republicans so often if it weren't for the fact that they always stick their chin out every time I'm feeling politically punchy.

I consider myself "THE" Conservative Socialist because I stand firmly for the destruction of the welfare state and I love God and the Bible just like Donald Trump.  I firmly believe that proactive health care and education investments (socialism) have the power to disintegrate all other forms of social welfare since educated and healthy people rarely need welfare (conservatism). I believe we owe it to our future generations to eliminate the welfare mentality more so than welfare itself, which is actually hard as hell to get and keep these days.

Welfare is an ugly word that started in the 20's but became any ugly blight on its recipients during the politically polarized and economically challenged years of the late 60's and  early 70's.  Once Bill Clinton got his hands all over it, it got rightfully relabeled into TANF (TEMPORARY Assistance for Needy Families) .  Consequently, it is no longer the stereotypical handout that it used to be.  Those who get any services these days get them because they are American born or have American born children (anchor or whatever you like to call babies who could be our president one day).

Benefits are temporary because Bill Clinton insured that all welfare recipients return to work via services designed to connect people to jobs. Some poor folks will tell you that welfare is currently the best way for the needy to get connected to a good job because it insure access to the additional (free) training support (education) and (free) health care connections that are needed to make a the transition from welfare to work a success.

In this post-Clinton era, food stamp benefits in particular demand part time work or volunteer hours just to maintain them or get them at all in between any proven period  of absence or reduction of work.  As a result of the Clinton clamp down on welfare,  (almost no one remains on welfare for more than 5 years) because the system NO LONGER ALLOWS IT.

The challenges with getting and keeping any welfare benefit these days is immense for an actual American citizen. Any non-citizen without American born children has no access to anything accept emergency medical benefits, and this only helps to reduce overall health care increases from the proliferation of unpaid emergency care.  In other words, paying a premium for the emergency room or clinic is immensely cheaper than absorbing the entire unpaid bill on the back side.

Welfare in America does insure that American children are eating, but focuses these benefits towards the children only, so even the families who try to hang from the "Anchor" must try diligently to under report the entire household size and incomes just to avoid weighing the anchor down and losing benefits altogether.

Most poor working families that could probably use a little help with food and bills don't care to bother with the struggle Clinton created getting Food Stamps or TANF  because they are dehumanized by the challenge to constantly jump through hoops to prove you really need help.

In some ways welfare has always been dehumanizing for very proud people.
Now it is only worse.

Because of  the diminishing size of all families in America- even poor ones- the old theory of broke and downtrodden welfare recipients bleeding the system and having more and more babies is totally mythical as well.

Yet, if you listen to the current patch of republican leaders (leaders for the lack of a better word), you start to wonder if regular poor people who actually can use welfare are still the target of republicans anymore who now seem more apt to blame the ruination of this nation on the welfare state that immigrants create?

Minorities rarely vote so they typically make for great political targets.  Immigrants can't vote but are assumed to be eligible for welfare so they are also an easy target for blame when a little inspirational blame becomes necessary during voting season.  Women, on the other hand, vote in droves and have exercised their voting privileges for as long as they've had them (1920).

I guess I understand the calculation of upsetting immigrants and inspiring ignorant's who think welfare and the illegals are destroying our nation; although I don't quite understand what message such an attack sends to the mass proliferation of legal Mexicans and Asians who can vote and didn't vote particularly strong for republicans last time around.

You Call This Outreach?

If there is one thing that makes me think that Donald Trump is in fact an internal plant from the Hillary Clinton campaign, it might be his single handed destruction of the republican platform promise to reach out to MINORITIES as a result of the last two presidential campaign failures; failures that Trump criticizes but is doomed to repeat without Hispanics or Asians or Blacks or Women or any strong support from minority groups.

 Among organized American minorities, women lead the power rankings list but remain at the back of the pack in the perception of way too many republicans. Say for example, those foolish republicans who are co-signing the video terror attack being leveled at Planned Parenthood.  These attacks falsely assume that WOMEN who believe choice is important also HAD NO CLUE THAT FETAL RESEARCH EXISTED IN AMERICA. Fetal research has never been a field that we hire women to have babies exclusively for research purposes, and smart women have NEVER been stupid about abortion or fetal research.

In fact, many clueless republicans all throughout the land think welfare is mostly for illegals because they actually tried to get help during these trying years; help that hardworking people who really need temporary help can't really get it anymore, so they blame immigrants for changing our job market and for our stringent temporary assistance laws.

In reality, the conservative Clinton's are responsible for welfare stringency, our job market transition (caused primarily when NAFTA forced Mexican farm workers into America), and might be responsible for finally getting that Keystone Pipeline drilled and all of those infrastructure jobs since Hillary, who's been very vocally opposed to drilling in Alaska, won't tip her hat on Keystone one way or another.  If she's shutting up about Keystone though vocal about Alaska, it's because the distorted structure of today's Super PAC's allows her to get secret donation's (10 time's more than ever before in case you forgot) that a few of her conservative oil loving friends (maybe even Trump) won't regret once she gets elected.


WE Didn't Create Capitalism Nor Do WE Control Its Advance

The Clinton's are not only neo-conservatives just like me and Donald Trump for that matter, they are Global Initiative capitalistic conservatives with a mission to expand capitalism to a universally hyper level in which the nation at the top will ultimately gain the most from capitalism's destined design.  A globalized mission is maniacal  in some ways but so is capitalism.

If capitalism's global advance is inevitable (and it is), America may as well be positioned to benefit the most, since often times WE are asked to sacrifice the most for the sake of capitalism too.

I totally support the make a buck to help me rub more backs approach that the Clinton's are using towards worldwide diplomacy because the nation who gains the most from capitalism will always be challenged by the existence and the needs of the needy.  Even Christ was bestowed with wealth though he shunned it. Because our power to perform Christ-like miracles is limited, our need for money is great if in fact we are to do greater things as Christ' suggested we will.


Make America Great Again By Redefining Conservatism

 I wish the Clinton's could help me recapture the conservative label so that it goes back to only meaning God(Grace....forgiveness...tolerance) and Country(that place made up of a bunch of immigrants) instead of  this distorted meaning of conservatism that republicans are crafting for their own purpose. I'm not sure if republicans or conservatives are driving the Trump frenzy, but I know for certain that they are not the same group of people since the same people who are voting for Donald Trump could never be willing to settle for Marco Rubio or Jeb Bush instead.

 (check out Trump's performance with evangelical's)

I would totally be on board the Hillary bandwagon if not for the Run Hillary Run prelude to this kiss. Hillary is trying to give us her best smooch while avoiding the Jeb Bush label of being dry and flat. Bush is fighting for energy because he too was encouraged into doing all of this by a crowd of normal conservatives like me who keep searching for an electable candidate while wondering why the republicans can only uncover the best of a bad bunch of options.

Now we've got the Draft Biden camp working hard to encourage another presidential run from somebody who wasn't already encouraged to be our president.  While I TOTALLY understand the hesitation to run for this job that produces Teleprompter Hillary or SuperDry Jeb, I also find myself a bit leery of anyone who is already justifiably weary.  I hope Jeb Bush survives to go head to head with Donald so us neo-conservatives can rest assured of holding office like we basically have since way back when trickle-down economics didn't stop the Bush boys from raising taxes anyway.

I am Hillary Clinton and Bill Clinton and Barack Obama and every neo-conservative socialist that appreciates immigrants and enjoys praise and worship service too much to accept that kids started struggling in school right about the same time they kicked God out the door. From the sounds of it, I am Jeb Bush too.  All of us neo-conservatives want to do something RIGHT NOW about immigration, but none of us cared for gay marriage until we discovered that our gay friends and family had been struggling to breathe for years. Abortion is hardly preferable to neo-conservatives, but we certainly accept the intelligence of both women and the Roe .v. Wade decision enough to leave that topic alone too.

The Clinton's and I are in lock step on the importance of a global economy for the sake of diplomatic outreach and for America's vibrancy over time. Trump clearly agrees, and we all know how the Bush family reacts to the word oil.  Whether we like it or not, the global economy WE resist already exists but begrudgingly, which is what creates so much counter productive competitive corporate sabotage like the Chinese did with their inflated market valuations in the hopes of helping themselves and hurting the dollar at the same time.

As we recently discovered ourselves, all balloons will eventually pop. What we are now waiting to uncover is how attached to the struggling Chinese market are WE really, and what long term impact does China's market struggles have on U.S. economic strength?

My market hunch is that our economy has inflated enough rich Americans in recent years for US to totally exploit the self off in China, of China.  Aside from cheap loans from China that our economy is fully positioned to re-pay if necessary, we are disconnected to China just enough to use them more than they use us since their citizens do the back breaking work that allows us to enjoy the benefits of The Dollar Tree, and our farmers export enough products to insure the health of the American farmer and the long term necessity of farm work in America.


Now That Oil Has Fallen, Are Cheap Workers The Greatest World Commodity?

In reality, rich Americans are perfectly positioned to take full advantage of Mexicans or Asians, including the one's who stay in America on visa's and are now working illegally all over America as we speak.  Since the common immigrant flies into America, none of them will be stopped by Donald's big wall or Donald's big rhetoric that keeps placing the most valuable assets in the American economy in full opposition to the republican party and its fence building, gobble up and deport, change the 14th Amendment and, oh yeah- defund Planned Parenthood agenda. (did I miss anything)

Donald Trump might be really good at pretending that he doesn't call anyone a bimbo except Rosie O'Donnell and Megan Kelly (via retweet), but the rest of the republican field is not so good at this media trick.  They will be held to account for the direction that the lead polling republican candidate took the entire party when it comes time to really address immigration instead of temporarily using it just to drive primary poll numbers.

These same republicans are currently being asked to own the false fear that they've created of immigrants on welfare just like they are being asked to own the unsubstantiated fear they created of ObamaCare; a fear that they mysteriously refuse to address now even while a few of those fear mongering republican governors gave in already and adopted the very program they denigrated.

A real conservative would have quickly taken advantage of the opportunity to receive federal financial support for the vital duty of providing health care access to the people who need it the most and who elected officials are duty bound to serve.  A real conservative would never accept poor schools that don't offer EVERY American citizens the best of America's educational opportunity.  Most importantly, a real conservative would never give a man a fish, or not share one, when he could feed that man while teaching the skills to acquire a good job in the fishing or food processing industries.


Republicans Are Not Necessarily Conservatives

I'm drawing the lines between those republicans and US conservatives because I want to make it clear that creating free benefits to insure life long healthy and educated Americans who don't need welfare or excuses makes me much more a conservative than socialist. Once Hillary comes clean on Keystone,  I will probably decide to join her in support of the Keystone Pipeline because creating really good pipelines that don't actually burst open and spill everywhere will someday minimize the environmental impact on our roads and railways- that just so happen to need to be rebuilt as they've become human death traps. These bills have long since been jammed together as one.  Both need to move forward and get Americans back to work.
        _______________________

Trump Supports Rebuilding Roads & Bridges Too (does he know about that jobs bill that republicans jammed up in Congress over the Keystone pipeline?)
      _________________________

Continuing to destroy our roads and rails with oil transport won't be a great way to fix or maintain our infrastructure,  or achieve cleaner air, an initiative we've promise to lead the world in as well.

Why do we have droughts in California at the same time we have
floods in Colorado?  Can't one problem address the other?...
..and whatever happened to that jobs bill to fix our roads and bridges?
Are republicans using the Keystone Pipeline to get people killed?

In the long run, increasing oil production to the point of extreme saturation is the best way to devalue the price of the commodity and usher in the era of alternative fuels and the era of alternative thinking. Smart companies who currently produce oil, have already anticipated the coming change and are transitioning into the future of alternative fuels,



Being A Conservative Is A Good Thing.

My greater vision relative to alternative thinking is the day when we consider the greater good of people and the economy as mutually achievable; when we embrace conservative sensibilities like pipeline technology for its value and its worth instead of run from it and never use it to mitigate the impact of oil transport or the floods in Colorado at the same time we deal with droughts in California.

Or when we realize that you don't have to agree with climate change to recognize the value of destroying the grip of oil and dominating the alternative energy industry at the same time we minimize the emissions
causing this debate.

It seems plausible to my small brain that people who are dying to carry humans into space or dirty oil across risky pipelines could also transform floods from immigrants or water into resources and not problems.

There will probably come a time when we have no choice with either.

GOP Must Improve Their Own Health Care Law

You need an answer to what created Donald Trump?

ObamaCare created him.  Well not directly but indirectly with all of the constant promises from republicans that kept telling us all how horrible it was for America and how much they promised....promised to rid America of the mistake the first chance that they got.  To date, while popular in consumption, ObamaCare still does not poll well in popularity which is primarily due to the smear campaign that republicans used to help them win a majority in both houses of congress during the last election.

Republicans have not won much against Obama during his presidency, so the past election victory represented a milestone opportunity to stick it to the man who had stuck it to them so many times before.  Since winning that election, Obama has stuck it to republicans more than ever before with an assist from the Supreme Court who decided that language created for ObamaCare was not intentionally designed to dismantle it at the same time.

Those who sold their republican constituents a bill of goods relative to dismantling ObamaCare had to know that they would be asked for a respectable alternative that has yet to be suggested.  Republicans point to a number of bills that died in the House and Senate designed to repeal and/or replace ObamaCare, but none of these bills would ever gain the support of a wide swath of congress who remained hesitant to incorporate universal health care prior to the election of Barack Obama, and still remain afraid of the blood they will bear if somehow paying for a healthy America goes bust.

Has the ObamaCare scare turned in the favor of Obama?

The only reason America realized the impossible dream of universal health care is because the president who signed it into law chose a plan crafted and proven by republicans themselves.  If America had endless possibilities to the trials that challenge our social conscience and direction we would pick them like wild flowers in the field.  Universal health care, like all socialized measures, took so long because it needed to for the sake of proper considerations and trial runs like Mitt Romney and Massachusetts offered with their version of the same system we all use now.  Romney knew at the time of his running for the presidency that RomneyCare needed a couple of basic tweaks in order to operate more smoothly but he couldn't offer them up freely in fear of supporting the cause of Obama.

Those basic tweaks are still required yet on a national scale now since RomneyCare got gobbled up by ObamaCare and federal inefficiency.  The benefit is guaranteed solvency at the state level thanks to federal support.  The detriment is everything we expected from the insurance industry who currently operates with embedded financial protections and old behaviors that have caused them to game the system instead of trusting that more customers is better in the long run than milking the few you have.  Competition will eventually drive these scammers away from the market place, but probably not without a little support from congress, possibly with the threat of, or an actual single payer health care system to correct old insurance habits.

Whatever the fix, the fix must happen to ObamaCare because it is a proven model that lives.  Any real replacement requires transition and further change towards something that is frankly unknown. What remains is a pretty good idea created by republicans who have allowed a democrat president to steal it away from them.    Obama would hardly care if republicans reminded us who created ObamaCare or fight the claim since he's not up for re-election anyway, though his legacy is tied to the future solvency of his signature health care legislation.  My approach (are you listening Jeb Bush) would be to reclaim it as a republican ideology that was implemented poorly by a democrat who stole the idea in the first place.

Is the Trump craze being lead
primarily by angry white men?

In fact, that is exactly what it is.  Furthermore, the lack of repeal or attack against it at all is the singular reason why republicans are pissed off enough to actually be voting for Donald Trump.  In reality, only the angry republicans are holding up Trump right now and his polling shows that he must capture a wider segment of republican voters to even continue on his primary path, which is likely the reason for his third party considerations.  Currently, he has sucked up the air that was supposed to be breathed by Rand Paul and Chris Christie, notorious blowhards who are sucking wind with the rise of Trump.

Republicans could really help themselves by pissing off Trump just enough to hasten that third party move he's considering, and then move to recapture the health care law that they created in the first place.  Until they do that, the Obamacare scare  that they also created will continue to haunt only one side of this fight.

SCOTUS Decision Could Hurt ObamaCare. Will Hurt Republicans

I hate all welfare because I believe that people who are healthy and educated rarely need welfare.

In the absence of healthy systems of education and healthcare comes the necessity for every other system of welfare that we know.  Much like those potholes during icy winters, we will only be forced to repair damage from the gap for those who fall into it. Every person we save from disease and ignorance becomes a de facto soldier in the battle towards welfare's ultimate cure.

If ObamaCare had any other name, it would be more successful.

American's who were supposed to be proud of republicans in congress because they typically represent the most educated and wealthy of the land should recognize the similarities and the differences between the words wealth and health.  While wealth might gain you access to health, you still better go see the doctor.

Doctor Phil could help with republican refusal to tell their constituents that kynect (Kentucky's anti-ObamaCare health exchange) or Louisiana Health Connect are the same as ObamaCare, and ObamaCare is the same as RomneyCare.  That might seem like a liberal jab at a former failed republican presidential candidate, but its actually a recognition to the success of Romney the governor.  Thanks to the wisdom of his former ways, Massachusetts healthcare has experienced some of the weakest growth in the percentage of people who have health insurance- because they are the only state that has had an exchange for years and didn't need ObamaCare to fix their access issue. Since  Massachusetts did experience some growth in covered citizens, Kansas was actually the only state in America (2014)  that did not have growth in covered Kansan's.  Kansas state officials eventually allowed healthcare.gov/ ObamaCare, but shunned medicare expansion based on principles that the Supreme Court upheld, but no one quite understands anymore, since medicare recipients- even in Kansas- represent the most needy of Americans.

Kentucky Connect = kynect, not ObamaCare.

Americans that got all riled up about ObamaCare during 2014 elections realize that his godforsaken name is still attached to it all, so it must be bad.  At least, that's what their congressman told them in order to gain their vote. Currently, that same congressman CAN NOT step forward and tell the truth about ObamaCare because the 2016 elections are at stake and republicans already sent the ObamaCare overthrow lawsuit to be heard by the Supreme Court.

ObamaCare is Bad....so vote for me. 

That's right. Despite the fact that ObamaCare has created more covered citizens in every state except Kansas, republicans are forced to press forward with the same distorted rhetoric that they used to scare their constituents into the voting booths in 2014.  Any attempt to step away from their  majority- and not stick it to Barry- would not be well received back at the red state watering hole.  In essence, republicans have cornered themselves into a place that someone else must rescue them from.

Established By The State

Their hopes are that the Supreme Court will quietly (5-4) override their lawsuit against the words "established by the state" which  republican's claim represents illegal confusion in ObamaCare's  implementation.   I wrote that last sentence, and even I am still confused by it all. The best hope for republicans is a Supreme Court that protects the spirit  and intent of the law and not the conservative attempt to weaken the post of the presidency, a post that they seem unlikely to ever win again.  Without placing a republican in the white house, conservatives will perpetually gerrymander to block presidents or actually work to write good laws that some democratic president might get the credit for.  Good laws like ObamaCare.  Republicans could totally fix ObamaCare (even the name), but at the risk of adding to the spirit and intent of the law and to the legacy of their most hated rival.

This matter is somewhat complex, so let's review again. Republicans, even in Kansas, are allowing their citizens to access ObamaCare subsidies, yet they  want to snatch insurance coverage from the same citizen who needed a subsidy to finally get insured in the first place.  Although health insurance coverage is mandated by law, use of the subsidy only happens when someone signs up on an insurance exchange to make it happen.  Nationwide, healthcare subsidies (welfare) are happening just as ObamaCare intended because healthy and educated people are the hallmark of a truly healthy nation, and only stupid people would intentionally live without healthcare coverage.


Republicans are both well educated and wealthy enough to have access to healthcare, but they are not immune to falling into gaps. Their icy war against Obama and his Care has left behind potholes that threaten to damage us all if reasonable repairs are not made.  Whether or not the Supreme Court will choose to make the repair with a concession of semantics is what we are waiting to discover.

Conservative judges on the high court would love to slap Obama upside his healthcare head by striking down this four word confusion and forcing congress to fix the problem with proper wording or a  better law that republicans prefer.  Problem is, republicans don't have anything better than what is already fixing healthcare as we know it.  If they did, Romney would have used it as a governor and we would have long since heard about it.  The only real alternative that republicans have for ObamaCare involves strengthening it for the rest of time, or screwing it- and themselves, just because their majority says they can.

Maybe our health disparity is causing an education pothole as well.

Changing VA Will Take Inspiration. (Inspired By My Grandfather...and my mom)

I am a self confessed ultra politico.  I indulge in politics to the point of saturation. At times I get a bit confused by the fact that America is generally tuned out to the stuff I eat up regularly. In the spirit of this idea I write this letter to America anyway.

The travesty of the Veteran's Administration has inundated the mainstream and social media sphere's, yet I refused to comment on the topic until recently when Eric Shinseki chose to step down from office.  To me, repeating the refrain that the VA has been a mess carried minimal inspiration for me to write.  Even the angle of who is responsible and what should be done seems odd when the only fix demands bi-partisan agreement which is a bigger problem than the VA.  My commentary on the Shiseki resignation was my reflection on clear evidence of internal meltdown within the administration of the coolest president on record.

The real story regarding the VA is that we all have been complicit as we've sidelined this issue and refused to scream as loud as some are yelling right now.  I, for one, take full ownership for realizing the reputation of the VA hospital and not developing nausea prior to now.  Now, you might ask, what can one anonymous blogger do to fix the problems with the VA?

What's better than doing nothing?....Almost anything!

Up until now, we....me, have done nothing about poor care for the caretakers of freedom.  Sure, I say thanks to vets all the time, but thank you  didn't keep the vets who died while waiting from dying while waiting.  Thanks didn't help my grandfather much either when he was dying in the VA with cancer.

When Shinseki resigned and I finally got compelled to write about the VA, my number one reader responded with a common opinion about the VA.  Mom My number one reader wrote:

Charlene Mozee Harris The V.A. has been a problem for quite sometime as we all know. Firing Shinseki is a Band-Aid approach to a gaping wound. Sometimes it is better to work on the problem without major changes until the source of disease is identified. From experience when my father was ill and a patient at the V.A. Hospital, staffing was a serious issue. A shortage of nurses inspired my second career in nursing. The entry level pay for nurses was a cause for concern when I was offered a position at the V.A.

What made this response common for me was partially the familiar depiction of the VA nightmare, but it was also the recollection of childhood memories.  In a moments notice I felt like a patient on the couch being asked to talk about your memories of the men in your life...like your grandfather.

My grandfather, Elmer Eugene Mozee Sr., was a wonderful man.  He was a valuable example of the potential of black men at a time when perception did not hold us in the best of regard.  He was not only a well educated man, he was bilingual and spent lots of time talking only in Spanish when visiting my mom and our family.  He did not remain with my grandmother, with whom he fathered three children, but he remarried and raised another family and always kept in contact with us.

As I grew older, my maternal family often compared me to him (which I don't recall as words of love).  I could remember staring at him secretly and observing his mannerisms and features to see what in me did they recognize from him.  Kids seldom got to "sit up under adults" back in the day, so I had to sneak my peeks, but I remember them and him like it was yesterday.

I also remember when he stopped visiting.  When he was sick, my mom did like most mom's would do.  She kept it from us as much as humanly possible, but I remember the pain of the process.  Losing your father slowly to cancer while struggling with the VA to give him the best care possible is not something anyone can do with perfect grace.  However, mom did well enough for those memories to disappear.....until today.

We are probably never going to fix the problem with the VA without spending more money and potentially creating more problems as the journey to efficient care will undoubtedly be messy and costly.  We all pretend to be advocates for our veterans, but we can't agree on spending or oversight to insure that we care for them after they serve.  In the short view, only the soldier loses while we wait to decide what represents proper care.  In the long view our military becomes less and less attractive when those who serve cry for the treatment they deserve.

When I think of my grandfather, I am always inspired towards the same kind of selflessness that inspired him to serve this country.  Social commentary can feel fruitless when you realize how few people care to read and even fewer care to change.  Yet, if Ghandi had taken such a position then the world may have never known Martin Luther King Jr..  Every movement began with the inspiration of one who moved and inspired others.

My mother inspired me to write.  She wrote all the time when I was growing up, and when I learned to write and could copy her I did.  The pain of watching my grandfather get less than what he earned as a soldier of this nation inspired my mother into nursing. It undoubtedly inspired her to write on occasion so the VA might have inspired us both towards our passions. Years later, the shortages in healthcare professionals hasn't changed much at all, and as my favorite reader tells it, even she couldn't take a job at the VA when she became a nurse, because our lack of commitment to our soldiers is evidenced in  poor entry level nurse pay at the VA.

Spending more is a must.  Spending more, more efficiently is equally necessary.  I believe that our hesitance to fix this mess is connected to our own healthcare issues.  America is a nation starved of the benefits from preventive healthcare.  Healthcare is primarily expensive because it is primarily delayed until the state of emergency.  Even with health insurance, America has to develop the habits of healthy people which includes consistent preventative healthcare visits.  People who refuse to visit doctors have limited sensitivity to those who require consistent care.  We don't care about caring for our soldiers because we hardly care to take care of ourselves, until we have no choice.

What I do know about America is this.  We might sacrifice our health, but we are ALL all-in on this freedom thing.  If I can't compel anyone to consider the value of healthy soldiers then I will seek to inspire this nation with the vision of freedom compromised.  The care of our veterans is directly related to the future of freedom as we know it.  Simply walk outside and take a breath of fresh, FREE air and then do your part to make life better for our vets.

........or keep pretending that this is someone else's problem.  Soon enough, we will have no choice on this.

Shinseki Resigns, Carney Follows Behind. Wolves Complain That It's Not Enough

I'm not sure who's sad about Shinseki, but I can tell you who is not.

Eric Shinseki is out and Jay Carney has chosen to follow close behind.  I've heard of lame duck, even roasted lame duck, but Republican's are burning this Kenyan water foul (by way of Hawaii and Illinois) to a crisp.

After weeks of attempting to stand firmly behind his buddy "Rick", Obama had to pull the plug and give the wolves what they were demanding, as Shinseki, who serves at the pleasure of the president, is no longer serving or pleasing this president. The official line is that he is stepping down as requested by the hunters who demanded someone be held to account for the VA failures of late.

If you know anything about hunting, you never let go of a trail until you lose the sent.  Once you've committed, shifting gears represents a significant loss of the time that you've already given.  As long as the wolves continued to smell the aroma of lamb, they wanted a sacrifice.

In the end, Shinseki was sacrified but Carney is another story; possibly a book that we shall read in the near  future. Carney could call it,  If You Can't Stand Roasted Duck Get Out Of The Kitchen".  Hopefully we won't read it before Obama is done.  While losing press secretaries is common, especially within the waning months of a lame duck presidency, this one smells foul (pun intended)
and will be the subject of much speculation going forward.

As for Shinseki, he came just short of being Isaac in this story.  Though Obama held the knife aloft for as long as he could stand, he eventually did not get the reprieve that he hoped time would offer.  In the old days, stand by your man politics was a winning proposition.  Eventually the wolves would tire of chasing down a fruitless trail and would move on to more pressing matters. With Benghazi sounding like the punchline of way too many political jokes these days and ObamaCare well on its way to becoming nothing more than another one of those social programs that we pay for, VA overload has taken front and center.  Whether the meal is one that these wolves will ever consume is secondary to the pursuit.  In the end, this bone has meat and ObamaCare and Benghazi are drying carcasses.

The wolves have gotten their lamb, but this meal will remain elusive to the carnivores who are pursuing it to satisfy political hunger because only the blameless get to eat of it.  No matter how hard you dig for answers on this one, the truth is that we have long since had problems with EVERY aspect of our care for our returning soldiers of war.  Digging will only reveal all of our complicit behaviors.

Obama might have felt the need to do the politically expedient thing, but attempting to satisfy hungry wolves is never politically expedient. Once you feed any wild animal you will probably have to euthanize them because they will turn you into a source of food.  As we speak, Speaker John Boehner is declaring the firing of Shinseki an appetizer to the VA meal he and his cohorts hope to enjoy.  If Shinseki was not enough, than surely no one below him will satisfy this hunger. Boehner and the boys are on the trail of Moby Dick and Jack Mackerel simply won't cut it.

Stubbornness in the face of opposition is a double edged sword, but if you stand on the side of justice you need not be concerned.  In firing Shinseki, Obama either acknowledges a wrong doing or is simply caving in to the opposition because he has felt the other edge of that sword much too closely for comfort.

Both answers should be concerns to Obama supporters and critics alike.

If Race Is our #1 Issue, Should It Be Our #1 Conversation?

Electing Barack Obama not only represented the beginning of Hope and Change, it allowed America an opportunity to ease long standing guilt.  The White House of only white men  gave race critics plenty of room to complain.  When president Obama moved his family in to the White House, he ushered in a term called post-racial America; an America where race no longer is the limiting stigma that it used to be.  The America that asks, "how did Oprah and Obama happen if America is so racist"?

Whether you chuckle at the very notion of post-racial America, or you believe that we can never move on until we simply move on, America is constantly making a topic out of matters of race while simultaneously running from any genuine conversation about it.  

The truth about the Obama presidency is that Obama has closely followed Clinton's moderate, to right leaning policies, so it seems reasonable to expect that republicans could find as much common ground with this President as they did with Bill.  Shunning the single payer option for a Federal version of RomneyCare  is as right leaning as is the TPP (Trans-Pacific Partnership), Obama's NAFTA equivalent.  To many black people (including me), going through life answering to the name "Barry" instead of Barack is a sign of Barack's propensity towards anglo assimilation instead of the black power persona given to him via connections to Jeremiah Wright or My Brothers Keeper.

Barack Hussein Obama, who has family roots from Kenya, was always going to have a hard time bridging the racial divide in America.  I have a hunch that Barry Obama, the Harvard Graduate who deports more Mexican's than Bush ever dreamed of, might have been received in a different way by those still hung up on his skin tone. During the Bush year's, the KKK was dying into a marginalized group.  Under Obama they are alive and kicking and a group that is back on the move. The fear that white America is becoming a minority speaks to the ear of many  white Americans, even if extremism isn't how they express this concern.

As Black America evolves politically, we remain largely unified on the idea that we have yet to reach the place that Martin Luther King Jr. had dreamed of for America.  Even Herman Cain, once seen as a republican front runner for the presidency, cried racism when seedy stories from his past curtailed his run at the white house. For every moment that we feel progressed as a nation relative to matters of discrimination, we are constantly taken back by stories of voter suppression and of states who've flipped their "white only" signs around in order to write the words "heterosexual's only"

Not every apparent racial debate is naturally divided along racial lines.  Voter suppression, immigration, entitlement reform (which now includes the ACA) are all matters of public policy that do not differentiate on racial lines but  have been primarily drawn on lines of social status (the givers versus the takers).  Yet, when you separate the masses and look at the faces, race can not be ignored as an obvious element within these stories too.  Nancy Pelosi says that immigration reform would have already been signed if the said immigrants were Irish. The difference of course has much to do with the opened border we share with Mexico versus Ireland, but many people would say that Pelosi is right.

Race has conspired against America from the day that it was allowed to be a dividing line between its citizens. Yes Mitch McConnell.  The opposing party to a seated president has always fought the good fight of legislative give and take.  Never have they done it using kamikaze warfare.  To educated observers, the end game of this republican power play will resemble that of Jim Jones during the Jonestown massacre.  It is virtually impossible to explain away your "true motives" when your end game seems to disregard your own safety.  Wallowing in the mud just to get a little of it on your enemy might be a way to cloud the waters on Obama's legacy, but at what cost.? Republican's have always opposed Democrat policy,...... just not like this.  Are they truly attacking the left, or are they left with no other explanations for their intense focus on the failure of America's first brother?

If it is fair to say that the race of Barack Obama has conspired to grind politics (immigration, ACA repair, entitlement reform) to a halt, then it is probably fair to say that race remains our number one issue.

While no one wishes to be labeled a complainer, only unresolved complainers get offended by the label.  (I am personally a classism complainer ) No matter how right you think you might be,  the challenge is to find a way to address issues that matter to you without sounding like a complainer, even when complaining is your only recourse.  Martin Luther King Jr. complained about the nature of this nation and his complaining got him memorialized. Yet, even Dr. King saw the lines between poverty and color blur as he pressed towards a better America for blacks, who's primary challenge was the impact of racism (poverty) and not simply  the viciousness of hate.

There are black people who will falsely tell you that minorities can not be racist' (by definition) because racism is an act of powerful people against weaker ones. Whether the crime is racism or bigotry, there are plenty of examples of how we all let stereotypes of race taint our image of the world, leading to our abuse towards the people in it. As a result, we all expand racism and classism in our own way.  In effect, no one cares to address something that everybody practices.

With as much as we discussed these things in grade school, why is America still full of  racial stereotypes?  

The easy answer is that we forgot the lessons we learned.  We  limited our conversation to those mandatory classes, and forgot to reinforce that, while stereotypes are generally true, they are viciously dangerous to employ.  Our teachers always told us that there are no stupid question because they knew that the height of human ignorance is a question unasked. By asking questions about geometry we indirectly master the language of the craft.  

Race is no different. Without a healthy conversation surrounding race, we do not have the strength of vocabulary needed to further the discussion. In the absence of the proper words for discussions of race, most of us mess up when seeking to learn about others.  Eventually we came up with a term called political correctness (which means the other guy is simply way too sensitive) and refuse to go down that road ever again.

Political correctness has been the fuel to the growth of racial division, but now it is high tide. We must link arms and test these waters for change.  Change is necessary because we take way too much comfort in our stereotypes. Absent of our stereotypes, we are forced to do the work it takes to get to know people independent of their persona, which is largely driven by race and class.  

When it comes to genuine discussion, our reluctance to "go there" as it relates to race is because it is a sensitive scab that just doesn't heal quickly.  Some say that our problem is that we won't leave the scab alone long enough for it to fully heal and fall away.  Some believe that in time, racial division might heal itself because technology has joined people together in a way that removes the ignorance, and thus the fear that we have towards one another.  Unfortunately, this method of racial progress demands the death of several generations of ignorant people who continue to proliferate racial division by breeding the same fear that was bred into them.

President Barack Obama has been extremely aware of the presence of the racial extreme's in America.  Obama needed a significant turnout from his base, so he has tried to be as cool a black man as he knows to be without being a President of just the black people.  As a result, he has offended many of those who voted for him to represent their unheard voices, while simultaneously offending those who generally oppose cool black guys.

It is hard to ever say that 'the time is now' to have this discussion because it is not easy to get any one of the races to embrace their role towards change.  What is an obvious reality is that the Obama family forces everyone (even other blacks) to see black people in a different light.  Before the Obama's, it has been nearly impossible for America to see any black man as smart and passionate and articulate enough to outshine the white guys who have dominated the white house.  Now that the Obama family has come along, the world has an opportunity to see black Americans in a much less monolithic way.  We are more than entertainers.

It is also very hard to gain an understanding about someone else when you start with too many preconceived notions (stereotypes).  Every action that a person does when cast beneath the shadow of a stereotype is darkened by that shadow. Even your positive traits can be rationalized away by someone who generally see’s you in a negative light.  Whites and blacks and all races do this to each other; holding securely to our stereotypes until we meet someone who forcefully snatches them from our grip by defying them all, and then we simply count them as an exception to the rule as we continue to discriminate against the rest. 

Obama has shattered many stereotypes of black people, but he has not removed common questions. Barack Obama has unsettled dust that had long since found a comfortable resting place. He has been a steroid to the leadership journey that  other black leaders started years ago.  Sometimes, their is a legitimate curiosity as to what a black man might do in the face of leadership. Other times, people just want to see what your hair actually feels like. In the end, we haven't given enough black leaders a fair chance to know what the data will show, and we haven't given enough white people a chance to touch our hair. One day we might finally discover that black leaders succeed and fail just the same as others.  One day we might realize that the only true difference does lie in the skin tone and hair texture.

The Obama’s are cool and smart and composed and charismatic and black.  They are the Huxtables who made it to the very top of the mountain.  They make many people have to observe and rethink their impressions of all blacks because if there is one family  like this, there has to be two.   Most importantly, while they help us to accept that we have come a long way, they remind us daily of how far we have yet to go. Especially with matters of race.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 
When is the right time to stage an intervention?  

The time is ripe for this debate that we have long since tip-toed around.  We are more polarized than ever because those who are most benefited by divisions of race and class are afraid of what happens when these institutions fall.  The KKK was able to thrive for years by feeding off of the contrived fear that had been developed against blacks and Jews.  As that fear dissipated, so did their power base.  Racism and racist organizations survive from fear. Fear is a funny thing because the less man fears God, the more likely we are to become fearful of one another stifling the quality of our conversation.  In my mind, racism grows because it continues to be fertilized by fear and watered by ignorance.

When race is implicated as a contributor or an impediment to social class, minorities develop class envy breeding a widespread inclination for unhealthy consumerism (keeping up with the Joneses) that only increases the class divide.  Classism is the ugly institution that feeds off of our pursuit to afford an unhealthy version of the American Dream.  Classism thrives from our inability to define the dream for ourselves and not succumb to a force fed dreamlike illusion.  In the end, classism wins if it convinces anyone of us that what I lack is directly related to what you have.  When you then associate this same notion to skin color, you create a destructive convergence which some are describing as the most intense polarization of modern history.

We first allowed fear to polarize us, but now we are letting the fear of our dying familiarity (aka stereotypes) overwhelm the fear of impending change. Our stereotypes are not only easy and familiar to us all, they keep us safe from the unknown and the uncomfortable.   Every black man you once feared isn't necessarily your opponent anymore.  Some of them are like Herman Cain and a few are like Spike Lee who both moved away from city folks when their money elevated their class, but are probably  similarly stereotyped by the suburbanites who they call neighbors.  

Racism may not be gone, but it finds a way to temper itself when confronted by wealth. For people without money, racism seems the same as it ever was.  For those who have money, racism is a taboo topic that most will shun within every environment that money controls.   A person's color might influence our initial impression, but a keenly purchased watch or pair of shoes can offer a sufficient head fake.  Thanks to black conservatism, electing a black president and nice watches and shoes, racism is no longer painted on the face of America even if it remains in our bloodline.

So is racism a legitimate problem worthy of a legitimate conversation, or is the alleged abuse of Barack (because he's a brother) much to do about nothing?....and what do black people's hair actually feel like? 

Who know's because we just won't 'go there.  In order to get a check up, you have to be willing to visit the doctor.  When it comes to getting a checkup on racism, America has yet to make the appointment.

What I know for certain is this.

When you seek to find common ground, you quickly discover how easy it is for any two people moving towards each other to close the gap between them. My hope is for the death of fear and the hope of change wherein lies the conversations of a brighter tomorrow.