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Bruce Bourgoine |
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Mon Jul 27, 2009 at 21:41:59 PM EDT |
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Mon Mar 08, 2010 at 14:48:07 PM EST
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In "How important are public schools?" by Gerald Weinand we are asked compelling and critical questions about educational funding. Our answers tend to avoid the overarching topic of school funding in favor of budget tinkering chatter. We need to understand how we arrived at this point. Public schools are under pressure financially due to three reasons:
- Repeated assault from the right to ultimately push schools into the privatization sphere where the selfish use of personal resources will determine education outcomes and a new business paradigm of education delivery will arise to create profits for investors. This privatization effort is characterized by an over reliance on high stakes testing to create winners and losers. Instead of concentrating on egalitarian success for all, there is a drive to deprive the losers of funding while funneling a lopsided amount of cash resources to the winners, presumably charter and private schools. Underlying this privatization effort is a distain for unionized workers and hence a great deal of meaningless talk about merit pay and meaningful emphasis on non-union teacher forces. In the end, should the right destroy public education, schools for the general populace will continue to exist as dilapidated warehouses for those without voice or capital, full of advertising and low cost service delivery, but profitable for some investor. Private schools will become like private colleges, expensive and out of reach but securing a network for a small upper class and the financial elites to which vouchers will be applied in part toward the cost.
- The funding of education is inordinately built on a myth of local control. In days of yore, local control meant a community building a schoolhouse, hiring a teacher, and providing financial support. This small town 19th century approach is no longer applicable because localities are so much of a part of a larger web of services that are appropriate to be delivered by government and funded with broad based taxes. Localities also had their own industries, sheriff, poor house, et cetera which became outmoded as towns became suburbs, cities evolved, and rural population percentages and jobs declined. Education's role in society became of increased interest of national and state politics. However, the national role became one of authority by issuing mandates with little funding role. States became an unreliable funding partner dependent on the ups and downs of the national economy that also issued unfunded directives. Rules, laws, and expectations have grown far beyond the scope of local control and thus the myth within local control is that it really is one of primarily local control of limiting budgets to keep at bay upset property tax payers unless it is a wealthy community.
- Education is not a priority in the United States of America. It gets much rhetorical lip service, we hear constantly about our solemn duty to children through education, and the vital importance of excellent education in a rapidly changing and increasingly competitive world. But that is where it ends; we will not place education as a funding priority. We seek ways to tinker with this enormous system to tune out a few bucks toward a goal of efficiency. We have blinders on to the fact that excellent education may not be efficient with a traditional business bottom-line. Sure, the bus routes ought to make sense, the buildings should be smartly designed, and wastefulness of financial resources that do not support or create knowledge value ought to be controlled. But the largest expense, staffing, especially if contracted is not going to improve education. Our emphasis on high stakes testing or racing to the top creation of winners and losers does nothing to establish and maintain a critical funding foundation to be placed under all students to maximize educational success on an egalitarian basis. To simplify the understanding of our priorities as a nation, one needs only to look at the portion of our budget devoted to defense versus that devoted to education. Would balancing the two or reversing the equation be of greater strategic value to the United States? This is a debate we seem to avoid at all costs to avoid costs that may in the end create the greatest costs.
We need to repel the right's assault, dismiss the myth of local control, and get on with a national debate to quickly yield solid funding for public schools as a strategic priority. Let us begin here, now.
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Wed Mar 03, 2010 at 10:39:44 AM EST
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Excerpts below from the Kennebec Journal article: Bill would allow voluntary taxation
The road to hell is paved with good intentions. A misguided proposal for voluntary taxation has reared its head in Maine as a possible partial solution to our budget challenges.
Rep. Terry Hayes, D-Buckfield, sponsor of L.D. 1785, "An Act to Bolster Maine's Social Safety Net through Voluntary Sales Tax Contributions," said in testimony before the committee Tuesday the idea is a compromise, between budget cuts that would take money out of social services and raising taxes on those who cannot afford it.
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Mon Mar 01, 2010 at 14:25:51 PM EST
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Maine has never fully met its financial commitments to education despite repeated messages about the priority of education. Our nation has not given priority to financing education despite platitudes about competing in a rapidly changing world. For all the talk about education as a prime priority, paying teachers well, and caring for the next generation, this state chooses broken promises over rational tax policies and this country chooses tax cuts over education. Both foist upon us unfunded mandates and unpredictable curtailments that essentially abandon education funding to local property taxing which in turn unfairly divides us. Both allow a myth of local control to morph into merely local control over devastation.
We ought to have a great deal of empathy for individuals on fixed income who are confronted with high property taxes. How we are being forced to pay for education at the local level is fundamentally unbalanced and unfair. This is precisely why the State of Maine and the Federal government need to honor commitments made and put money to their message of the vital and strategic priority of educational excellence.
There are also plenty of detractors those who want to reduce educational costs regardless of the funding sources. They tout concerns about federal financial deficits but ignore future impending deficits of knowledge. They are fretful about the outmigration of young people from Maine but not to the degree of investing in attracting people to our state using a reputation of commitment to educational excellence. These voices seem to believe that the inadequate is acceptable and their claims of representing "silent majorities" are suspect; yet we generously allow them to rule our politics.
In my own school district, RSU 38, we will lose over $1,000,000 in our 2010/2011 state allocation. Even worst in the following year, an additional $435,000 that is in the currently proposed 2010/2011 budget also goes away in stimulus funds. The stark reality is that we will be forced by the abdication of State and Federal commitment to education to implement a budget that is not one of "trimming fat" but rather "slashing muscle". Even if the economy improves, the hole to fill will be exceedingly deep and great damage will have been done. We are making short-sighted choices right now that a second grader in need of reading assistance will not get it, that a middle school student will not be introduced to the benefits of another language, that another high school sophomore will drop out, and that access to higher education will be out of reach for a young person.
When my family made the choice of locating in this district, we did so because of the school system. We were not seeking a tolerable education for our daughters but an excellent one. We came with history. We came from a neighboring state that did not fund public kindergarten; we lived initially in a Maine town that refused to deal with an overcrowded school. My children have now graduated but I still want and am willing to pay for in local, state, and federal taxes for a vibrant education system that produces knowledgeable citizens, enhances my community and state, and produces highly educated, skilled, and compensated workers in this country that add to the foundations of our society.
Thus I ask again of candidates for governor to publically comment here:
A pathway to having a renewed discussion on education and an emergence of leadership for educational excellence lies within this year's Maine gubernatorial race. A broad state conversation on establishing a genuine vision that meets our aspirations for the forthcoming generations could be best facilitated by a candidate for governor willing to lead on this issue with a focus on excellence and a willingness to forthrightly address the revenue commitments necessary to meet the investment challenge. Please step forward.
Yes, we must live within our means. Properly funding education is within our means in Maine using an appropriate revenue path: 1 temporary cent on the sales tax with a sunset provision, a choice with which we are experienced. And not properly funding education today will destroy our future ability to provide the means for our livelihood.
See also see a related prior post: Aspiration or Abandonment.
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Tue Feb 23, 2010 at 14:47:18 PM EST
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When the town clerk cannot handle an item or when standing in line in a state vehicle registration office or when arguing about federal deficits, one is bound to hear a low muttered growl that "Gov'mint ought to run like a bees-nest". This same sentiment seems always to echo throughout political campaigns when some candidate picks up the mantle of "business-person rescuer from evil government inefficiency". Yet after dealing with the countless business inefficiencies that pervade our lives from clueless big box employees to filling out convoluted insurance claim forms to witnessing the outright thefts of our retirement nest eggs do we ever pause to consider that government will not really benefit from "business therapy".
The fantasy that government can be run like a business is a simplistic notion designed for populist appeal and is at best naive. It is a "loss leader" diversion that ignores a fundamental role of government: rendering essential services that private markets can not, should not, would not, and ought not to deliver because the elements of absolute fairness, regard for personal dignity, and the greater common good are key components of government services expectations and not those of business markets. In addition, government services need to be driven by need that is not contingent on financial class or ability to pay and is ideally independent of the outside financial interests of businesses in particular. The incentive in government is to do right and the profit motive may occasionally do incidental right but is by and large blind to justice and egalitarianism ideals. Governments and business serve different masters and therefore have greatly different roles in our society.
All the preceding is not meant to argue that wisdom, careful accounting, occasional selective business practices, and seeking good efficiencies should not be applied to government spending. Indeed, the opposite is true. While transparency is a buzzword now in political discourse, its desired effect - the honest accounting of tax dollars for services rendered, how to best provide excellent delivery of services, and the relationship of those services to the improvement of our social welfare should always be clearly and honestly communicated to citizens. And government needs to be responsibly responsive to an expectation of avoiding wastefulness and applying appropriate efficiencies in service delivery. There is nothing wrong with a bit of "Yankee" expectations or challenges to spending after the goal of a service is determined as essential by a reasoned and fair political process.
The road we decide to travel decides where we end up. If we wish to run government like a business, we may get big box style price slashed tax rates but in turn we will receive more marginalized members of society in desperate situations, shuttered schools that failed because of underfunding, puddles of pollution, and a profoundly unfair society that caters to a very few with the misleading efficiency of business. Challenge our candidates for governor to address good governance and not erect false business idols.
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Tue Feb 16, 2010 at 11:40:28 AM EST
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New York Times: Tea Party Movement Lights Fuse for Rebellion on Right
"Peaceful means are the best way of going about it. But sometimes you are not given a choice."
(Article also referenced in today's open thread.)
populist
noun - a supporter of the rights and power of the people.
adjective -of or relating to populism or its advocates: a populist aversion to business monopolies.
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Sat Feb 13, 2010 at 11:05:08 AM EST
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About a decade ago I started a small business career and in the initial few years of start up, cash was tight. All the kitchen table calculations with the checkbook were undertaken. Unnecessary expenses were cut and others were trimmed. The resulting budget essential for supporting good health and nutrition, education investment, and our housing would cost a bit more than start up and my spouse's income alone could cover. Thus, for a few years as many a Mainer has done, I hopped in my car each night and moonlighted at L.L. Bean seasonally working during their "peak" Christmas season to boost our income a bit temporarily. It made a big difference and required some sacrifices by all but invested in our family especially as my daughters entered their college years.
Why will Maine not moonlight? We suffer cash shortfalls and have had the equivalent of a number of "kitchen table" calculations. Long ago we cut unnecessary expenses and have trimmed and slashed more. We see what is essential, especially for the educational investments and essential safety net services to serve our citizens. Yet our only answer seems to be more cutting and curtailment orders. We seem willing to go beyond the pale in addressing expenses and pretend that no income possibilities can ever be entered into our checkbook on behalf of Maine citizen critical needs. Raising some revenue requires sacrifice but we appear determined to not examine how we might moonlight with reasonable shared sacrifice. Worst yet, with our present expense only approach, we are shoving the burden and damaging effects of budget cuts onto local communities.
Arguing for budget cuts alone is the same as proposing tax increases solely as our solution. Balance is needed. Our budget shortfall for the next two years is projected to be over $200 million dollars per year and that number will see-saw based on actual revenues. If our projected sales and use revenues for 2010 and 2011 are projected to be $1 billion dollars each year, how come a penny on the sales tax raising the rate from 5% to 6% with a reasonable sunset provision is not on the table? This temporary 20% increase on 1 billion dollars has the potential to raise $200 million a year. Sure, the math is not perfect and there would be adjustments needed but the conversation is not even happening. We have sensibly and temporarily raised and lowered the sales tax in the past. We need to have shared sacrifice; Maine needs to moonlight.
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Sun Feb 07, 2010 at 08:44:12 AM EST
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Perhaps it is a consequence of our time that "we the people" allow our politics and elected representatives to desert a core service to our society. Public education in the United States is a failure and it now primarily exists in a netherworld of directionless drifting and woeful defunding. A lack of commitment with an articulated vision is not expressed nor supported by any current stakeholders. American education is a ship of cut spars, with failing systems, anchorless, and drifting just prior to sinking.
For decades, the primary focus of education has not been improved evolution of the delivery of knowledge to propel our society forward but rather the shedding of educational concerns to pare down to a focus on the mechanics of funding. This is not to say that there has not been lip service and limp action using the language of caring about education; there is a wealth of such activity and some of it is genuine in its concern. But by and large all the talk about concentrating resources in the classroom, no child left untested, charter schools, and other varied "pop" education chatter have been driven by a desire to live (fund) within our means that we have decided, by the manner in which we prioritize our expectations, as being meager. We are starving education and are talking as if it were not so. "Putting our money where our mouth is" appears not to be a challenge we willingly rise to meet.
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Sun Jan 24, 2010 at 21:39:06 PM EST
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Last week's Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United v. the Federal Election Commission will have consequences that will affect future elections on all levels in a damaging way for citizens because it attacks the core essence of representative democracy: one person-one vote yielding equal representation for all. Our country has an injurious relationship with corporate power and this decision may well allow the final solidification of dominating corporate influence over how we are governed. Essentially, corporations will be able to spend ever more freely and directly to influence elections and their decisions will be based on ignoble "return on investment" analytical equations.
One misleading argument that is being trotted out by conservatives is: "hey, we are just leveling the playing field against big labor and liberal elitists". This assertion is deliberately disingenuous and easily foisted upon the naïve that have had the constant drumming of markets ideology preaching on their televisions and radios replace their will for self governance. On a purely tactical level, any reasoned evaluation of the financial resources available will show beyond a shadow of doubt that corporate spending power for political influence is a factor in the hundreds of times of that for labor and for every individual of wealth of liberal persuasion, there are plenty of conservative elitist moneyed interests to outspend them.
But our core concern ought to go beyond mere spending tactics; it needs to be sharply focused on the effect on our representation. Citizens in this republic have standing; corporations ought not to be entitled to any representation whatsoever and therefore ought to be severely restricted from influencing the republic's government in any manner. Corporations are a business device to be governed and regulated in the best interests of society. From both a liberal "of the people" sense and a conservative "individual rights" tenet, checking corporate power ought to be rigorously pursued. Representation of human being individuals is maximized through the rule of law made by human being individuals. Laws made by corporate forces, made up of interests both domestic and foreign, may assist some selected class of individuals on occasion but never all society and hardly ever a majority.
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Wed Jan 20, 2010 at 22:26:25 PM EST
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Many will draw many different lessons from the Massachusetts Senate election that sends Republican Scott Brown and not Democrat Martha Coakley to Washington. Both gloating and gnashing of teeth will echo across radioland, the blogosphere, and among the spinning-talking heads.
Consider the essential elements that all the opinion rendering and reporting regurgitation is excitedly racing toward en masse: Democrats are being repudiated for multitudes of reasons, a referendum with negative results for President Obama has occurred, health care reform is being rejected as a failure, fickle independents are but Republicans-in-waiting, and the evil forces of socialistic liberalism are in serious decline because true Americans are taking their country back. The spinners further offer the prescriptions that Democrats need to "dial it back", abandon health care reform, and figure out how to best respond to polls cited by the same spinners to retain meaningless seats of powerlessness.
Perhaps this ought to be the key question we reflect upon: Is the significance of electing Scott Brown to the US Senate a repudiation of the seat's former holder, Senator Edward Kennedy?
No.
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Sun Jan 10, 2010 at 22:09:28 PM EST
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From the Wall Street Journal:
Perhaps it's not that America spends too much on health care, but that other nations don't spend enough.
This the conclusion of an opinion piece penned by Dr. Mark B. Constantian, a plastic and reconstructive surgeon from New Hampshire declaring that we have great health care by singing the same tired conservative hypnotic hymn:
Certainly some goes to inefficiencies, corporate profits, and costs that should be lowered by professional liability reform and national, free-market insurance access by allowing for competition across state lines.
The subhead on this opinion piece asks, "Isn't 'responsiveness' what medicine is all about?" The author seems to say that if we can deliver on one selective segment out of the vast array of health care performance indicators, and this one is dubious when it comes to results, then cost, quality, and other factors are minor matters. Perhaps all we need is a talented plastic surgeon to put a better face on US health care.
In Maine one has access to the full text of current and past articles in the WSJ. If the above online link is "locked", use Maine's virtual library: MARVEL ,to access articles with a state library card or by registering online.
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Sun Jan 10, 2010 at 21:44:12 PM EST
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The Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting debuted this week with an in depth article detailing the unseen politics behind the tax reform legislation that led to the controversial exclusion of sales taxes on ski tickets and dropped a proposed transfer fee increase on homes selling for more than a half million dollars. The report is by John Christie, former publisher of the Kennebec Journal and Morning Sentinel, who is now the Center's Executive Director and Senior Reporter.
The ever onward march to bottom-line corporatization devouring family newspapers with strong community connections and senses of obligation has created a perilous information void. Having personally observed two decades of reporting cuts at New England daily newspapers, it is heartening to see a solid attempt to develop the means to undertake the type of in-depth investigative reporting that is essential in a democracy. This initial report does not paint a pretty picture for Democrats but so be it, shining a light into dark institutional recesses lends empowering knowledge that is beneficial to society.
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Wed Jan 06, 2010 at 11:41:53 AM EST
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This morning A.J. Higgins reported on MPBN that the glut of candidates in the gubernatorial race threatens to drain Maine's Clean Election Fund. One privately funded Democratic candidate commented that now was not the time to ask taxpayers to cut back on essential services in order to give money to political campaigns. This viewpoint presupposes an erroneous choice. Trying to score a political point by insinuating that properly funding clean elections will take away money from schools and nursing homes and hand it over to political operatives (i.e. opponents) is not a fair assessment of what public financing of elections are about.
Public financing of elections needs to take place in times when the state is flush with funds and in lean years to meet the goals of clean elections. Reducing moneyed interests or private funded campaign machine advantages to give wider opportunity for non-wealthy voices and office seekers to address the issues that affect our lives is not a luxury. Clean election funding is about protecting our democracy from unspoken quid pro quo expectations and providing equal access to the electoral processes. It is something that Democrats ought to stand behind through thick and thin. It is about leveling the playing field.
Maine has built a clean election model to be proud of with broad popular support and it is an essential service to Maine's citizens that deserves to be protected in concert with many other essential services. We should be pleased that we have a large number of clean election candidates committing themselves to the reduction of money interests in the race for Governor. And we acutely need public financing in lean times to protect our elections from being bought during moments of economic weakness.
We need to reject the myth that Maine has bloated budget full of faceless bureaucrats and frivolous expenditures to hack away at to save taxpayers from being gouged with nothing in return. Maine has a both a temporary revenue challenge and a long term need to address revenue structuring. It is time to recognize that government is not a business nor at the unreasonable sole service of business but is a collection of vital public services, including public financing of elections, that deserve our creative energies and investment.
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Tue Jan 05, 2010 at 23:47:06 PM EST
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Here is a hypothetical concept - a US Chamber for Consumers, an interest group allied with and fighting on behalf of consumers. But how would we accomplish it? Would we randomly gather on the paved acres in front of BigMart, all join the CCC (Concerned Consumer Cranks) or found the Church of the Conscience Consumer?
Obviously the answer is none of the above because government action and governmental regulation is the appropriate and only truly powerful hand that can protect consumers. The great wisdom and efficiency of the free market touted by the never ending über-conservative mantra of "no, no, no regulation" and "bind not our hands" only needs the illumination of the latest economic disaster that is devastating middle class security and wreaking punishing pain upon the poor to refute that obnoxious chorus.
The appropriate need for financial regulation is evident and one important step is the forthcoming possible creation of a Consumer Financial Protection Agency (CFPA) to protect citizens from the scams and games engaged in by high finance. Who would be the leaders in the battle against this? Drum roll...the US Chamber of Commerce has waded into the battle on behalf of big finance, hefty size banks, the credit crunch industry, and the "too big to fail" crowd.
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Wed Dec 23, 2009 at 20:13:45 PM EST
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This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental. Any individuals suspecting that any character is a composite of them with another's traits or an exaggeration of their persona is incorrect.
My immediate family will travel to the big city to celebrate Christmas with our extended family. The real journey begins upon our arrival and is comprised of a maze of political traps and social issue ensnarement. You see, we comprise the tiny minority liberal contingent headed into the family sanctum of unabashed conservatism. I envision the tale of the Christmas yet to come...
(cue seasonal music...wavy video... building to crescendo of full throttled Trans-Siberian Orchestra hard rock reached as the picture comes into focus)
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Tue Dec 22, 2009 at 07:14:25 AM EST
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Posted by Bruce Bourgoine who also writes opinion at Kennebec Blues
No comment nor investment advice on this sad state of affairs reported by Huffington Post:
The rise in stock prices has been particularly striking in the period since Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) said on October 27 that he would filibuster a Senate health care reform bill if it included a public option - a threat that caused Senate leaders to cave without much of a fight. Here's a quick breakdown of major health insurance company stock performance from Oct. 27 to Friday's market close:
Coventry Health Care, Inc. is up 31.6 percent;
CIGNA Corp. is up 29.1 percent;
Aetna Inc. is up 27.1 percent;
WellPoint, Inc. is up 26.6 percent;
UnitedHealth Group Inc. is up 20.5 percent;
And Humana Inc. is up 13.6 percent.
By comparsion, the Dow Jones Industrial Average is only up 2.3 percent during that time; the NASDAQ Composite is up a (relatively) paltry 1.4 percent.
Thanks Joe. (CT-I*)
* Insurance Party
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Tue Dec 22, 2009 at 00:49:12 AM EST
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From drinking milk to diligently exercising to following doctors' prescription drug advice, many women are fighting the possible onset of osteoporosis. However for Merck, the osteoporosis market was a bit too small. In a ground breaking twenty-three minute report on All Things Considered, NPR exposes how Merck sought to create a profitable market for its drug Fosamax with a new diagnosis rather than deliver a medication to serve a condition in need of treatment identified by the medical profession.
"This is the story of how pills for osteopenia ended up in Benghauser's medicine cabinet, and in the medicine cabinets of millions of women like her all over the United States. But more broadly, it's the story of how the definition of what constitutes a disease evolves, and the role that drug companies can play in that
evolution."
In studying the NPR piece and the timeline in the written report, it is apparent that Merck intentionally worked every angle to take Fosamax from $281.8 million in 1996 sales to a blockbuster level of over $3 billion by 2004. But, according to CNN Money, Fosamax sales were headed for a significant decline in 2008 when the patent for it expired.
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Mon Dec 14, 2009 at 06:41:19 AM EST
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Saturday morning's Wall Street Journal's lead headline "House Strikes at Wall Street" was followed by a typical report that while attempting to present itself as neutral had a background "woe to us" hum:
The House of Representatives, in a display of anti-Wall Street sentiment, passed sweeping legislation Friday that rewrites the rules governing financial markets, aiming to restrict the operations of big banks and the powers of the Federal Reserve.
At the core of the story is the real threat to Wall Street:
For consumers and individual investors, the bill gives shareholders an advisory vote on executive compensation and creates a new Consumer Financial Protection Agency.
The new federal agency would write rules and examine banks for compliance with consumer protection policies on mortgages, credit cards and other products.
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Fri Dec 11, 2009 at 13:46:27 PM EST
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(From the diaries - promoted by Gerald Weinand)
Posted by Bruce Bourgoine who also writes opinion at Kennebec Blues
This is an uncomfortable situation we are obliged to not evade. The creative-destructive course of war, its spoken and silent rationales, its unflagging financial private interests and public demands, its vested intensification in rigid political perspectives, its ensnarement inside rationalization upon rationalization, its receding impact on everyday consciousness, its continual appetite for greater and longer commitment, its subtraction of resources from common good, its manufacture of ever new enemies, its ever changing shifting alliances, and its very violence in our name, lays forth the obligation to declare our intentions.
Wars, undeclared but authorized, dispense with the obligated powerful declaration of intention. Objectives are obscured, taxes are not levied, and commitments are shallow. Blank places in geography, budgets, mission and our souls are inscribed upon without premeditated and reasoned reflection. Definition of enmity evolves as required to nourish war and violent visitation upon innocence becomes tolerable even as it intensifies ill will in reaction. The avoidance of intention and review in authorization moves wars from leadership to management enabling transcension of administrations. Declaration demands compelling moral force; authorization seeks amoral evasion and leads to immoral consequences.
Now we expand warfare within a country with our war without borders. The peoples and factions in the host neither identify with it nor desire its disruptions across their lands; it lacks appreciable constructive consequence to their condition but jeopardizes their very lives. It is professed to be a war on an ideology but is instead a war upon a tactic. We invoke terror, terrorists, and terrorism in a struggle that ought to be precise but is far too indifferently expansive for any realistic confident outcome. It seeks punishment and prevention of heinous crimes that we battle with inconsistent tactics. It thrashes about in elusive searching of justification. It is a limited war of limited objective in name only; it now transcends administrations, with limited check.
President Obama is wrong to expand this war under his administration. We especially, his hopeful supporters, along with those desirous of but cautious of change, must make our exception known.
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Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 11:25:44 AM EST
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(From the diaries - promoted by Gerald Weinand)
Posted by Bruce Bourgoine who also writes opinion at Kennebec Blues
I do not pay much heed to Sarah Palin's personal journey from failed politician to personal enrichment and celebrity as she attempts to become a successful politician. That is because I think she's a side show possibility that would doom her party to a Goldwater thumpin'. However there are times I think we need to be cognizant of the flawed concepts that are central to her attractiveness to a significant minority and are squarely at odds with American values.
As reported Friday in an AP wire piece regarding her recent visit with Billy Graham:
She said the United States has been "touched by God" because the nation's early leaders dedicated the country to God.
This represents a strand of religious American Exceptionalism with both domestic and international implications that is based on a fictitious interpretation of our country's founding and is as misguided and as suspect as Iran's Islamic Revolution. A comparison of Sarah Palin's (who emerged on the United States' national stage as a little know novice hardliner) and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's (who emerged on Iran's national stage as a little know novice hardliner) populism roots would be an interesting exercise. All fundamentalists share in the common denominator of unbending self-righteousness that has dangerous potential.
Back to my opening "paying heed" note: I do hope that she fades away soon because I'm not adding Palin to my personal spellchecker dictionary
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Sat Dec 05, 2009 at 11:01:01 AM EST
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Posted by Bruce Bourgoine who also writes opinion at Kennebec Blues
Friday's lead Wall Street Journal editorial perpetuates the illusion that social spending is anti-national security by posing the tired argument that entitlements are granted to citizens only at the expense of military superiority. Accordingly...
The overlooked culprit here is the rise of the modern welfare state. Since World War II and especially from the 1960s, Europe has built elaborate domestic income-maintenance programs, with government-run health care, pensions and jobless benefits. These are hugely expensive, requiring high taxes and government spending that is a huge proportion of GDP.
Overlooked is any understanding that personal security from catastrophic health disasters, grinding poverty, or educational impoverishment represents a societal strength. Is it not a "good life" that we are supposed to be protecting? Perhaps the Journal opinion writers believe we, the poor and declining middle class, are supposed to exclusively tithe for common defense so US corporate interests can produce grab-and-run paper profits in their international manipulation of esoteric market capital flow.
For many Democrats, this is precisely the goal. Many Europeans, such as those at the Financial Times, will also welcome America's relative decline. But we doubt the American people fully understand what such a gilded entitlement cage means for our national vitality, or for our ability to defend U.S. interests at home and abroad.
The tendency of conservatives to actually charge that a weak defense is the deliberate liberal goal is galling. It is simply their blindness to the fact that their world vision from the lofty towers on Wall Street do is not the same as those with other viewpoints and experiences who care about the quality and dignity of American lives.
Add the stimulus, ObamaCare, a new entitlement for college and other Democratic plans, and the defense squeeze will only tighten. Higher taxes and borrowing may allow guns and butter to co-exist for a while. But over time, the welfare state will defeat the Pentagon here, as it has in Europe.
President Obama's domestic agenda may well mean that his successors lack the option to deploy 100,000 troops to Afghanistan, or to some other future trouble spot. This is the way superpowers lose their superiority.
In the end, it is the same old drum beating for military superiority so that our policies of American Exceptionalism for corporate interests can stay place. But in the end, we must ask: Does this approach to the world protect a way of life that is worthy of protection?
In Maine one has access to the full text of current and past articles in the WSJ if the online link is "locked". Use Maine's virtual library: MARVEL to access articles with a state library card or by registering online.
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