Gone, but what price?

It's true.  Sarah Palin will never again be considered for political office in any realistic way.  She was and is an embarrassment to all women and now she is also finally an embarrassment to the Republican Party and to the narrow-minded Constitution-waving Tea Party lunatic fragment.  No group will ally itself with her and not because they don't believe the garbage that comes from her lips, but because it won't get votes.  But the way this came about is one of the biggest tragedies of our time.  I have a 10 year old granddaughter and I can hardly fathom the heartache that we would go through if she had been shot like that little girl.  I could blame capitalism, I could blame greed, I could blame racism.  I could blame a populace completely surrounded with education and information who still has no idea of what socialism or any other economic system is.  I could blame irresponsible speeches and complete incomprehensible stupidity.  I could blame a party who actually thought we were so stupid to think that 'any woman on a ticket will do' and chooses to continue to allow focus on a hate-filled person who has no idea what she is talking about.  I do blame all of these things. 

The Oil Slick and Rush

And in the category of 'I thought I had heard it all', the award goes to (you guessed it), Rush Limbaugh. He comments that 'the cap-and-trade bill, was strongly criticized by hardcore environmentalist wackos because it supposedly allowed more offshore drilling and nuclear plants, nuclear plant investment. So, since they're sending SWAT teams down there, folks, since they're sending SWAT teams to inspect the other rigs, what better way to head off more oil drilling, nuclear plants, than by blowing up a rig? I'm just noting the timing here.' Before I end this blog, I have just one question 'What SWAT teams is that bag of crap referring to?"

That guy was right--------RUSH LIMBAUGH IS A BIG FAT IDIOT!!

The Patriots Strike!

Newt Gingrich only confirmed my view of him and his so called patriotic cronies when his latest declaration was that the Republican Party would see to it that nothing would get done in Washington throughout the Obama administration. I have been told not to 'play that card' but I would bet what little money I have that all of this rhetoric simply hides the white sheets. Now they can use issues to be politically correct while thinly disguising the burning cross. What kind of Americans would expose us to 4 MORE years of refusing to do anything for fear that the issues on the table highlights their failure to address them in the last 8 years? Are these the patriots that would wish failure on their own country? Do the words treason mean anything anymore? Is the punishment still the same? Now the 'tea partiers' are saying that they are attempting to 'save the country's soul'. A country that tolerates rich people attempting to cram both their religion and their politics down everyone's throat has no soul. A country that cares so little about their citizens that they begrudge money used for health care and healthcare reform while gladly throwing money away on war has no soul. Again, as in the last two elections, churches are handing down their views of how the United States should be with Christianity in charge. The situation is already being touted as a battleground, as a war (at least that seems to be honest).


Found a great quote that I must include here since the accusation of Fascism is being bandied about by those who don't know the meaning of the word. Quite appropriate for now..........
"When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross"...........Sinclair Lewis

Alphabet Soup

Spitting fire today! If one more person uses the word recession to me, I will scream from the rooftops! We are not in a recession. We are in a depression -- yes, we can use the D word now. It may not be the perfectly defined D word with all the required criteria, but it is a depression. This is becoming more profound than the Great Depression because many people today have no idea of how to survive or the wherewithal to do it. We are lucky. As long as my husband and I can keep our jobs (not in peril as yet), we have a home and 7 acres upon which we can raise food (we actually do that for ourselves and the local farmer's market), but most people have no clue of how to survive or property to do it on. Remember, we have a lot of people who have been busy taking vacations, buying cars, hiring their yard work done and finding doggie-daycare and trying really hard to pretend not to see the problems we have (sarcasm). But, we mostly have those who have simply worked so very hard and expected the dream that their parents told them about, so that their survival knowledge base is just as lacking as Mr. and Mrs. McMansion's. I have two daughters out of work. One has already exhausted her unemployment and has a 3 day a week job. Luckily, she is getting food stamps and medicaid for her and our granddaughter. Also, luckily, my husband and I can tighten our belts and help her with her mortgage, but think of the number of people who aren't that lucky! My middle daughter's last day at her employment is Christmas day. The large pharmaceutical company that she works for sold out to another company and she and 23 others who had 3 year contracts have been let go. Of course, the company will take back their share of the 401K and allow the employees to keep what they put in. I find their generosity touching. She will begin collecting her unemployment. I asked the other day if she could get food stamps and medicaid and she told me that the rule is that 'if you are drawing unemployment so that you can possibly keep your home, (no food to eat in it), you can't get food stamps. When you get to the end of your unemployment and can get food stamps, you will have food (no home to eat it in, though). And someone said to me the other day that they could see no problem with Capitalism (the C word)! And we have a President that if I were a religious person I would pray for daily. This man is brilliant with the best of intentions and he has inherited a 2 front war and an economy on the skids like never before. Former President Bush and the puppet masters left our nation little hope, but left their cronies and themselves with lots of money. The President's own party is so afraid of the word 'socialism' (the S word) that they are willing to let pass the opportunity for us to join the rest of the industrialized world who has long known that it is imperative that people must have affordable (even free!) health care. Yes, dare I say, even a gov't ran program. This chance may never come again. The insurance companies will not run out of money to fight this because they are the richest entities in the country (that in itself should tell us something). Not a very uplifting posting today............Happy Holidays!

Our True Colors

Before we began our journey to establish affordable and available healthcare reform, I must have lived a very sheltered life. I had no idea that so many American people were selfish, hoarding, non-caring, lying, gullible, and plain didn't know anything about the difference between an economic system and a governmental system. Besides the fact that to support no healthcare reform must also mean they are fantastically wealthy and do not know anyone who has lost their home, their jobs and their health insurance (if they had health insurance which is as good as not having any) due to one catastrophic illness. Or they are not acquainted with any of the 45,000 per year in this country who die because they have no health insurance and so were not treated or were not treated to the fullest potential if they chose to be. The rest of the industrialized nations have seen the light and at least PRETEND to care about their people. Yes, it costs them a bit more in taxes, but not as much as health insurance premiums that protect very little. The world is watching and we are failing miserably. Our true colors are showing and I am very ashamed.

Evil on a Saturday

Yesterday, on two separate occasions, I came in contact with what I perceived to be evil. The first was when I opened my computer to news that Mike Huckabee believes that if we had had the 'Obamaplan' for our health care system, that Senator Ted Kennedy would have been encouraged to end his life earlier. What rude garbage--and this from a Baptist minister! Only proves the saying that the Lord (his lord, I presume--not mine) moves in mysterious ways! The second occasion was very close to home. Sitting in a lawn chair watching a soccer match (granddaughter is 9 and on the team) with my husband, two daughters, one of my daughter's best friends and husband and the father and mother of the best friend's husband. Stay with me here. The opposing team has a little boy named Victor on the team. Victor is about 9 and knows his soccer. He plays his heart out and he is a joy to watch. I noticed that the father of the best friend's husband is upset and keeps saying that the boy is doing something wrong (amazingly, the ref's just don't see it like this guy does). Then he gets up and walks around to my husband and I and says 'That's all those people know how to do, you know--just sports. I work with them and they don't work. They are lazy. I am not prejudice (this statement always brings up red flags!), but I work with them.' I am simply staring at him, aghast, but find my voice to say, Yes, I can tell you aren't prejudiced (sarcasm dripping). He is talking about Victor whose family is Hispanic (and, by the way, sitting close enough to hear). Victor is a beautiful little boy with a very supportive family (who, by the way, speaks perfect English). His mother was cheering the way all mothers do, but she happened to be cheering in Spanish and that really ticked the bastard off! Anyway, when he did not get the required agreement from my husband and I (or anyone else within earshot), he stomped off only to return a few minutes later to say to his wife (who either must be used to the ass or has kow-towed all of her life) and said gruffly 'Are you ready to go? Let's go' and stomped away. I guess we didn't join his little hate group and he was mad. Probably thinks we are some of those bleeding heart liberals who think he is upset because his poor, little white male world is crumbling and he has to have someone to take the blame. Yup!

Decent, Affordable Health Care -are you rich enough to deserve it?

I have had no time to blog since gardening and our farmer's market went into full swing, but I am taking this time today because I have not been so enraged at my own people since we allowed President Doofus to invade Iraq. I have never seen so much absolute crap come out of the propaganda mills as I have seen concerning one of the most important issues of our time--health care reform. Garbage from 'pulling the plug' on grandma (who we would obviously rather see starve since we don't care that she won't be able to pay for health care AND food) to 'standing in line for medical care like those foreigners in Europe who have (oh my god, dare we say it) SOCIALIZED medicine'. Like we don't stand in line now! The difference is that when Frenchmen and Englishmen stand in line they know that at the end of the line they can get good health care that will not throw them into a foreclosure if they can't pay for it (never mind if they insurance or not. I have insurance and I know better than to think that my deductibles will save me from the streets). We don't have that luxury. Here in the rural areas, we don't even know if we have a doctor within 20 miles, let alone at the end of the line. And here is the real clincher---even those of us with insurance have deductibles and out of pocket expenses that we can't afford. So, besides the fact that millions of our people cannot afford health insurance, the issue is not making sure everyone has insurance, but making sure that we can even afford the insurance that we might be 'lucky' enough to have. In the past month, I have heard on 2 separate occasions that people in high places (generally means people with money who think that somehow they have worked 'harder' for their money than those with less money) have blatantly said that 'poor people do not DESERVE good health care'. That by virtue of the fact that these fat cats were in the right place at the right time OR inherited well that somehow that makes them DESERVE good affordable health care. And of course, the appeal to the ordinary American who doesn't know socialism from raisin pie that somehow government supported health care would be the undoing of all of our freedoms-- not wanting to recognize that Social Security and Medicare are government supported programs, pretending not to know that military health care insurance and health care insurance for members of our Congress (by their own admission, the best in the world) has always been government-run.

I really don't want to believe that there are those in my country of supposedly humanitarian values (dare I say 'Christian' values--their true colors are showing), with the opportunity at least of self-education would let a bunch of rich right-wing idiots tell them that somehow decent, affordable health care--the kind that every other industrialized country in the world recognizes is important for their citizens-- is somehow not important for themselves and their children and would be too expensive to 'waste' on the common ordinary citizen. But I've seen us do some pretty stupid things--see 1st sentence in this blog issue--and use a whole lot more money. Would this venture into 'the right thing to do' be more expensive than an immoral war that has run on for 6 years? I think not.