‘Tis the Season…
Greetings and salutations from the sand, sun and surf of Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard and the cool, sunny, festive island of Nantucket! Great to be with ‘ya’ll on this Wednesday morning, the 4th day of December, 2013, a nice seasonable day outside our studios here on the Hyannis waterfront, with visibility being no problem–searching out our favorite lighthouse, or one of them, adorning Hyannis Harbor, a twin if you will, to Brandt Point Lighthouse on Nantucket, only 27 nautical miles south/southeast of where I write these words. With Thanksgiving in the rear view mirror, the nation looks to a few issues keeping the beltway media alive and well, with “Obamacare” taking top billing. It seems the website has cured 90 percent of it’s ails and is signing up tens of thousands from California to Kentucky, the states whose exchanges and acceptance of Federal Medicaid monies have proven that the Affordable CARE Act is not only here to stay, but that it truly does offer millions of Americans the FREEDOM to not only have health care that an employer cannot take away or use as a carrot, but to pay a whole lot less for it, without preexisting conditions getting in the way of true health insurance, not to mention a lack of life time limits. Children can stay on their parent’s plan and seniors are getting that doughnut hole filled saving millions. It is also bringing the cost of medical care in this country down to historic lows, simultaneously reducing the deficit. In time, this program will become as popular as Medicare and Social Security, and many republicans will finally come around to the FACT that it was their party’s idea to begin with, via the think tank “Heritage Foundation” in the early 90’s, and thus open up their states to accept that Medicaid money, thus insuring millions, 4.8 million Americans from sea to shining sea (26 states do not currently accept said monies from the Federal government, monies guaranteed for at least the next three years). Of course, this means nothing to the likes of the irrelevant, but damn funny, Sarah Palin, a crazy ‘ole gal from Alaska who follows the folly of tea party poster boy Texas Senator Ted Cruz, who has been strangely silent about the “evil” Obamacare, all while explaining the big picture to a national audience of sad hostages who have to listen to her screech on and on in that horrible accent (50 percent of the American people watching FOX NEWS or listening to the hate radio equivalent like Rush Limbaugh whose job it is now to critique the Pope’s message of the world wide capitalism out of control idolatry of money and the dangers of the fraudulent economic LIE called “trickle down” economics, voo doo economics, where the rich get richer–as of right now the top one percent take in 20 percent of the nation’s income–and global indifference rules the day while millions starve and many become refugees (Syria) from wars reflecting and promoting this very dangerous fiscal philosophy) and tragically believe the nonsense that spews from what I assume is a mouth. She represents the cartoon caricature that embodies this entire new republican party, a party, like much of the country, that has been hijacked by billionaire plutocrats, I’m lookin’ at you David and Charles Koch!, whose only goal is to–and I quote the famous “tax quack of the hill”, the very dishonorable Grover Norquist–”shrink the government down to the size where we could drown it in the bathtub.” Nice… and Merry f#$king Christmas to you too Jackass! Just ask the millions who will see their food stamps get reduced by 40 billion dollars, if the House has their way, what they think of the republican platform of cut programs to the poor? Ask the seniors who get vital nourishment from the program ‘meals on wheels’, or the children getting ready for their futures with the program “Head Start”… Go ahead and ask. I’ll bet they would LOVE to tell ya what they think of you Paul–you and your heartless austerity dressed up like happy little policies–or better yet, your gosh darn sin. Let’s ask the employees striking all over the country, full time employees working at Walmart, barely making it on eight bucks an hour, a little above the Federal minimum wage of 7.25 an hour, hardly a living wage, yes, ask them if they think congressman Paul Ryan (R-WI) and the rest of the extremist nut jobs on the right are for real? Ask them if they think those republican ‘leaders’ representing them are morally viable when they say, for instance, that raising the minimum wage is a bad idea and it would lead to job loss with no increase in economic output (both false). Yes sir, let US continue as we have for the past fifty years or so, since 1960, with the top one percent’s income going up 271 percent in that period of time while the bottom 90 percent seeing it’s wages inching up by 22 percent or in another word, stagnant. There is no doubt that this abomination cannot continue if we want to remain the great democratic nation that we are. Our democracy dies a little bit every time we rig an election with “corporate speech”, restrict the vote, take away rights from women, remain blind to our need for better education, well, you fill in the blank. The story remains the same, but it does not have to. Globalization may be the new norm, but so to is social media and the FACT this nation is getting browner, not whiter. Food for thought Mr. Speaker, food for thought. Have a nice day folks! PRESERVE THE WILDERNESS! Peace~M
