Middle Class Populist

Archive for December, 2007

I am deeply saddened by the death of this brave woman. She joins President Sadat of Egypt in dying for peace. She surpasses Sadat in that she also died for democracy! Oh yes we will now be treated to the hate rant of many of my fellow Christians who just don’t want to remember the Inquisition or the Opium War! The latter fought by members of my own Anglican Church to bring the “heathen Chinese” the joys of addiction to opium in Jesus name! Does this mean I believe Jesus would sanction those scandals? Absolutely not!

I heard conservatives list some quotes from the Koran that sanctioned killing. Well let me see if I can list some here:

“A curse on him who is lax in doing the LORD’s work! A curse on him who keeps his sword from bloodshed”!

Wait the above is not from the Koran but from our very own Bible, Jeremiah 48:10! I am an Anglican (Episcopalian)! My church believes that we understand God via:

• Scripture
• Reason
• Experience
• Tradition

Those who commit barbarian acts in God’s name frequently use only Scripture! By the way ALL scriptures have their particular passages we would like to forget! Islam unlike Christianity, has yet to experience major “secularization”. All believers need to place some distance between their actions and their scripture. Observe the Bible:

Luke 14:26

26″If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters–yes, even his own life–he cannot be my disciple”. – Well there is a nice scriptural passages for a Christmas card!

Deuteronomy 20:16

¹⁶ However, in the cities of the nations the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance, do not leave alive anything that breathes.

Well now there is a nice thought! Only thing missing is a “Sieg Heil”! These are only a few of many “delightful passages” we would rather forget! Our religion is guided by “Reason” not just Scripture. We create “Theological Rosaries” by weaving the passages that suit our understanding of the Divine. Then we blank out the rest. With Christianity’s “Evolution” we have created a string of passages to form a “Theological Rosary” that is more spiritual and humanistic! – Thank God! Let’s allow the Muslims the same opportunity, after all Bhutto was a Muslim!

Now observe this passage from the Koran:

2:177 It is not righteousness that ye turn your faces to the East and the West; but righteous is he who believeth in Allah and the Last Day and the angels and the Scripture and the prophets; and giveth wealth, for love of Him, to kinsfolk and to orphans and the needy and the wayfarer and to those who ask, and to set slaves free; and observeth proper worship and payeth the poor-due. And those who keep their treaty when they make one, and the patient in tribulation and adversity and time of stress. Such are they who are sincere. Such are the God-fearing.

Yes we have to be careful about the Islamic World while they go through their evolution to secularization and liberalization from “Solo Scriptura” to the four fold method I listed above. But Christianity and Judaism are not inherently superior to Islam. We simply went through an evolutionary process that they are behind in. We went through this earlier, probably since we splintered into not just Catholics, Protestants and Orthodox, but even within the Protestant fold there were many warring fractions in close geographic proximity. We learned to live with our EXISTENTIAL ANXIETY! Don’t get the idea that Holy Wars are simply a religious phenomena to reduce EXISTENTIAL ANXIETY! Not at all! Do you remember the Soviet Union, Khmer Rouge or Maoist China? Atheists just love to say that the latter do not reflect the “real Atheists”. Well why not give the same consideration to Muslims, Christians and Jews? Let me also present for your consideration my religion website, that I admit has been neglected by myself.

www.AquarianFreeThinker.Com

Finally Pakistan, in one way, is more advanced then we are! They already had a woman as the “Head of Government”.

Conservatives have no loyality! Just look at how the Republicans and their fellow travelers in Corporate America have betrayed their former hacks in the blue collar trades. During the Vietnam War construction workers would literally “beat up” college students and others who demonstrated against the war. Some construction workers even told me they did not get a “draft deferment” but a “draft exemption” due to their union getting their jobs labeled essential to the national defense!

Look at how the Republicans have treated their former lackeys!

Now under the Chamber of Commerce’s blessing, low wage Mexican workers are displacing and lowering the wages of American construction workers and soon truckers. Vietnam still is solidly communist long after the fall of the Soviet Union. Hey but those who advocated you lose your life or limb to preserve General Ky now run to make a profit in “communist” Vietnam! Here is a little history lesson for those to young to remember. Note how many blue collar unions supported the Republicans! What did that get them?

Most of those who were against the Vietnam War were not in sympathy with Jane Fonda. The news media, which I always believed helped the conservatives more than the liberals, created a false dichotomy of “Patriots” vs. “Politically Correct Liberals”. From a Middle Class populist perspective it is important to look at the differences between the “Politically Correct Liberals” and the “Republicans”!

These differences are no different today from years ago!

(1) Politically Correct Liberals:

They desire to “apologize” to the enemies of America. They have jettisoned the false collective guilt of being sons and daughters of Adam and Eve to now preaching collective guilt based on being white middle class Americans! You know the line we are X% of the worlds population yet we use X PLUS Y percent of the worlds resources. Mea Culpa Mother Goddess, Mea Culpa Mother Goddess! By the way I know the statistic is true but how about bringing the bottom up instead of making our lives miserable?

(2) Republicans and Conservatives:

They see the issue and the enemies of America from a completely different prospective! The Republicans do not believe in apologizing to the enemies of America rather they see the enemies of America as INVESTMENT OPPORTUNITIES! We live in an era of licentious permissiveness where CUT AND RUN CAPITALISTS shred their “American identity” to become “Multinational Corporations” sending jobs and technology to even the enemies of our way of life!

Guess who will “rediscover” their American Identity when the China that they have built up, turns against us and our military must perform a massive buildup that could have been made unnecessary? These very same Iscariot CUT AND RUN CAPITALISTS will then become “American” to make a profit! They preach “individual freedom” yet work to make the Middle Class individual renounce his own self interest in favor of the “CORPORATE COLLECTIVE”. This is no longer just a blue collar issue. High Tech college educated employees are seeing their jobs shipped overseas. Then those jobs that remain are having their salaries undermined by the importing of lower paid H1-b foreign workers. Soon the H1-b program will be expanded to all white collar fields!

The conservative idea of “freedom” is to reduce the power of the Federal Government as a referee of the market! But when that occurs the middle class individual does not see his freedom rise. Rather the CORPORATE BULLY, who preaches the Gospel of Ann Rand, now uses “government intervention” to lower the wage scale of both white and blue collar jobs by allowing CUT AND RUN CAPITALISTS an era of licentious permissiveness to ship jobs and technology out of this nation that gave them birth, succor, protection and profits! These followers of Ann Rand then use “Government Intervention” to import foreign H1-B workers to change the employment market of high tech workers. Why should a college student struggle with the difficult courses in the technology sector when his/her incentives of future employment compensation are being reduced! These same followers of Ann Rand then wonder why “ATLAS SHRUGGED”!

The Silent Majority, America’s great Middle Class, will not stand by to see our individual freedom’s subjugated to the Corporate Collective! While the BLEEDING HEARTS of the Republican Party condone corporations that dodge their tax responsibility as they make paper Corporate HQ’s in foreign lands, they label the corporate lobby contributions to political candidates as acts of freedom! No it is the money of Middle Class Americans that the BULLY is collecting from us in the form of higher product costs and/or lower wages that make these lobbyists payments possible! Bad enough that a corporate CEO makes far more than us but he expects the middle class individual to subsidize his lobbyist’s payments to the government! We indeed do live in a land of two Americas! They expect us to accept them acting in their own selfish class interest but when the middle class individual wants economic freedom in the form of health insurance and assurance that education will not be undermined by the H1-b program they call it tyranny!

Yes we Middle Class Americans want to harvest your lackey definition of freedom in our individual lives:

Freedom from economic security: Who needs economic security when you own a house and have mortgage payments to make or are raising a family! My purpose is to serve the Corporate Collective! If I had economic security I might even dare to seek higher pay or God forbid start my own business! For the sake of the Corporate Elite that is why it is so important that I have FREEDOM FROM HEALTH CARE and FREEDOM FROM ECONOMIC SECURITY.

Freedom from health care: Don’t let the government provide me with health care like every modern European nation does. Freedom from National Health Care means paying extravagant medical bills while hoping the Corporation will not fire me! Yes indeed that is the freedom I want, to serve the Corporate Collective!

Freedom from Social Security: By all means end this evil wicked program I don’t need that in my old age! By all means change it so millions of Americans can become “petty investors” while you cry for the Martha Stewart’s of the world and the big money interests. This is just a means of psychological warfare against the middle class to make us identity with the super rich. No, just owning stock does not make me identify with the Bill Gates of the world!

Most importantly is FREEDOM from asserting my Individual needs over the Corporate Collective: If I should study hard to become a computer programmer by all means use “selective government intervention” to bring in foreign H1-b Visa workers to undercut my salary. The needs of the Corporate Collective come first!

John Edwards is right we do live with “two Americas”. The time has come for America’s Silent Majority – our great Middle Class to assert itself from those who would subjugate the individual to the new 21^st Century Collectivists, the unchecked CORPORATE COLLECTIVE!

Do you remember the laughs we had some years back when some Christian fundamentalists groups objected to bar codes on grocery items as this was a mark of Satan? The joke was, “They see Satan everywhere”! Well it seems NBC News saw the “Cross” in a recent Huckabee Commercial where he wishes all a “Merry Christmas”! This reminds me of the “Anti-Masonic” Conspiracy theorists who see strange Masonic symbols in the street map of Washington DC.

Brian Williams should take a nice deep breath and just relax! I am an Episcopalian not a Baptist. But I do know that many Baptist Churches don’t even place crosses on their steeples as per the anti-imagery demand of the Ten Commandments. NBC should note that book cases usually do have right angles! Yes it is true! Perhaps this is an example of the Freudian defense mechanism of “projection” and a need to “punish” Governor Huckabee for not conforming to the negative stereotype of a devout Christian. That is to say that having a book case implies that Baptists actually read! What next NBC, did you do a close look at his book case! Maybe there was a “Bible” in his living room bookcase!

Did you notice Huckabee was wearing a “Red” sweater?

• Was the red just an accident or was it because that is the traditional color for Christmas? (Oh my God).
• No wait was his sweater red because he is a Red State Republican?
• Perhaps a more cynical view is that Huckabee is a Christian Communist! After all Fred Thomson said Huckabee is a closet liberal! What better way to undermine America than to hide a communist RED wolf in sheep’s clothing?

What next NBC? Are we going to play Huckabee’s ad backwards and see if we hear a message saying “Mitt Romney is dead”! For those of you not old enough to understand this humor, back in the 60’s the Beatles produced a song, that when played backwards, produced a audio message “Ringo is dead”!

Here is an EXCLUSIVE item that the news media has not even picked up on!

Did you notice the “anti-Unitarian” twist to Huckabee’s ad? That’s right just look next to the “Cross” and you will also notice “THREE Christmas Balls” with the cross! What are they doing there? Clearly this a battle call for “Trinitarian” mainstream Christians against both “Unitarians” and even Mormons! The latter believe God also has a wife who is the “Divine Mother”. Thus Mormons are not trinitarian! Is this ad a sinister “In Hoc Signo Vinces” subliminal battle cry to Gov. Huckabee’s core Christian Right constituency? What next?

Let’s join NBC in their paranoia! What about some computer programmers who produce those notorious hidden joke messages in their programs? Now what are those things called?

Oh yes they are called “EASTER EGGS”! Oh my God a sinister Christian Conspiracy!

I believe that all valid POW’s should not be tortured and that water boarding is torture! But what about using this technique on terrorists? I believe this is a more involved issue! In regards to terrorists, Alan Dershowitz the famous liberal attorney, has stated that he believes under some conditions it is alright to employ torture so long as a special “warrant” is issued. I concur with Alan Dershowitz! Despite what the World Court has to say concerning this matter, America should reserve the right to use “torture” to break a captured leader of Al Qaeda who is in our custody! However what is the method for our society to “decide” on this issue? Simply because I believe it is a good idea does not make it legal! I would be against water boarding as a standard practice against Americans and all valid POWs.

Terrorist do not follow the rules of war! This may come as an “inconvenient truth” to some in this nation, but there are bad guys out there who want to use WMD against our cities. I believe Alan Dershowitz’s proposal is the correct method to deal with this issue. We must never water board Prisoners of War – period! What I find disturbing about the CIA’s destruction of tapes pertaining to the water boarding of several Al Qaeda leaders is that they are interfering with the decision making processes of our society! Simply because one does believe, as I do, in the limited use under special circumstances and on certain validated individuals of torture, does not mean it should occur without the decision being made by our society!

I suppose the justification is that these individuals fall outside of the constitutional rights of suspects. I do not know that to be the case. I do agree with the three times it was used but the tapes should not have been destroyed! It is the ultimate decision of our Courts and Congress if it was proper! The President is the “Executer” of decisions made by our society via our Congress and Courts, he is not the “Great Decider”. We cannot allow “Reichstag Fire Enabling Acts” in a democratic nation! The Constitutional use of water boarding must be specific and “above board”! What next the water boarding of Nancy Pelosi?

If this technique is needed to fight terrorists it must be done under the law! What our nation does not need is those who believe they “own” the law. The President and his Cabinet are NOT the Government of the United States. Our Government is comprised of three co-equal branches!

The news media is actually showing Pro-Conservative News Media Biases by terming the “Administration” as the “Government”. It is not but only a part of our Government.

Just because an idea is a good idea, and I think the torture of the three captured Al Qaeda leaders was a good idea, does not make it legal! Nor does a good idea allow the President to decide for this society. That is why we have a Constitutional Government of President, Congress and Judicial! If the military acted in good faith then they must testify to Congress. Failure to do so constitutes criminal obstruction of justice! We must not allow the “feels good” approach to govern our laws! If the water boarding of the three Al Qaeda leaders was correct then these acts by the Administration must be open to Congressional and Judicial investigation!

PC Liberals would argue that water boarding should never happen even to terrorists. Because this President was wrong on Iraq and Iran there is a tendency to believe all is well in the world. This is not true. Bush has got America side tracked in Iraq while we are losing the war on terror in Afghanistan! I believe both the PC Liberals and Neo-cons are wrong. I would hope that our Administration would be accountable for it’s use of water boarding while at the same time hoping that it’s limited use would be approved against terrorists. We must not allow either side to use fear to advance their agendas!

Both the Neo-Cons and the PC Liberals have dangerous agendas and I really mean what I say below!

NEO-CONS: They believe WMD is everywhere with a mushroom cloud ready to pop up over our cities unless we fight endless wars that don’t address the real enemies! If it does occur it is God punishing a morally decadent America!

POLITICALY CORRECT LIBERALS: They believe that there really is no danger of a terrorist nuclear attack against our cities. They resent even the usage of the word “Homeland” to define America. If such an attack did occur they would believe it is the Law of Karma punishing a consumerist decadent Bourgeoises America!

The time has come for America’s Silent Majority – our great Middle Class, to take our country back from these stupid agendas!

Mitt Romney gave an excellent speech in Iowa concerning the relationship of Church and State. In prior posts I was critical of his political flip flops and still am. However in this post I want to focus on his speech concerning religion and freedom. Romney’s speech was beyond excellent in this 60’s hippie’s opinion! I am not an atheist but still break out the old 1960’s style incense and practice meditation! Like Romney I am religious but not mainstream! But there are issues here to be addressed.

When I was a teen in the 1960’s prayer was banned from our schools. In my senior year in high school we used the auditorium for the whole senior class as our home room. Our high school principal went around the prayer prohibition by making us say (not sing) the words of the last stanza to the song “My Country tis of thee”. As this occurred, almost every day it seemed, some in the class refused to rise but sat during the recitation. They would then be literally dragged out screaming and kicking to the words below! Somehow the word “freedom” in the prayer below just did not seem right!

Our father’s God to thee.

Author of Liberty to thee we sing.

Long may our land be bright,

With freedoms holy light

Protect us by thy might

Great God our King!

My religious beliefs are anything but conservative. I have a separate website (rather neglected) concerning my liberal off beat religious beliefs.

www.AquarianFreeThinker.Com

With the above in mind, even though I never want any atheist to have to endure alienation at school or in the political sector, I believe this nation needs to retain some sense of “Divine Providence”. This is a term that I feel is traditional yet free of particular churches. The problem is if you throw God all together out of public life you make the nation “atheist”. Like Mitt Romney, I follow off beat religious beliefs and his speech moved me greatly! If you did not hear it you can see it below.

Some commentators did not like Mitt Romney’s saying that he believes in separation of Church and State while he also added, “I will not separate us from God who gave us liberty.” If you listen to the You Tube video above you will note he believes that religious symbols should not be removed from the public square especially for holidays. Mitt Romney also spoke how some in this nation want to throw the Divine out of all aspects of public life.

I do not want to divest atheists, nor require a religious test for them to run for public office. However I applaud Mitt Romney fully! I am tired of the “more rational than thou” attitude by some of my own fellow liberal Democrats! I am tired of atheism being asserted as our national religion! I would not require anyone to pray but I do support nondenominational public prayer when Congress and the Supreme Court start their sessions.

Now I am really going to do it folks. Yes I even support the recent act by the Governor of Georgia to publically pray for rain! So long as the prayer is inclusive I support it. What I do not support is Governor Huckabee talking like Pat Robertson! I get scared when I hear folks say “The Lord told me…….”. Cool aide anyone?

One final thought by this Non-PC liberal Populist Democrat who was a 60’s college hippie and should know better but:

Have you noticed that as our society took God out of the public square and out of our class rooms the drug pushers and drug addiction came in?

YES THIS IS A LIBERAL TALKING FOLKS. Back to Mitt Romney! Beyond excellent speech Gov. Romney! Now do you believe water boarding is torture? No that is not “just” a political question but also a religious one!

I do not believe there should be a “religious test” to be President of the United States. But then some in the Christian might say otherwise! I find the news media is treating Mitt Romney’s religion with kid gloves! If the Christian Right find religious doctrines to be important to their vote then let’s supply them with the relevant data!

Being a psychology major from the 60’s when Transactional Analysis was popular let me remind my readers of a neurotic “game” that Eric Berne listed in his book, “Games People Play”. That game was called “Let’s you and him fight”, where someone would set two other people up to fight. Well I don’t like those who flip flop on abortion and Gays in the Military just to win elections. Nor do I like the Christian Right for labeling denominations whose services I attend as cults! While I am a liberal Episcopalian I also attend services of Unity and Religious Science! So I suggest we wage Psychological Warfare on the conservative block by getting the Evangelicals and Mormons to go at one another. Oh yes Merry Christmas!

Here are some “talking points” concerning Mormons vs. Christians.

• Mormons believe that God has a Divine Wife who we will meet in heaven.
• Mormons believe that the reason marriage is so important is because those who achieve an ideal Mormon marriage go on to become the Gods of new universes.
• God and his Divine Wife were once not Gods but mortal humans like us in another universe. There in that other universe, the God we worship today (and his Divine Wife) served another God and his wife.
• This gives a new dimension to the latest cosmological theories of the “MULTIVERSE”.
• Christianity, while the true religion and Mormonism the only true Christian Church, is none the less only the valid religion of THIS UNIVERSE!

Again Mormon Theology is none of my business! But since both Mitt Romney and the Christian Right seem to want to drag religion into politics I believe they should deal with the consequences. Show the above “talking points” to your Christian Right friends! Mitt Romney flip flops and was for abortion and Gays in the Military when he ran for election in liberal Massachusetts! Now that he is running in the national Republican arena his values have changed. He says he is “PRO-LIFE”! Well below is a video that someone posted to You Tube that shows how devoted he is to the quality of life when it conflicts with dogma!

This poor guy has no relief from pain except with doctor approved marijuana. Yet our pro-life hero will not even answer his question.

Mitt Romney is the Republican rival to Hillary Clinton. Romney is the King of Flip and Clinton the Queen of Flop! But that is not the only thing they have in common! They both have developed a “Theme Song” for their respective campaigns! I was going to examine all of his flip flops but this post would be too long. Hence I will give follow ups. But for this first one let’s examine Mitt Romney’s new campaign theme song listed below. You have to play it to understand it! Very appropriate theme song.

The boy above is NOT the star character of this clip who comes in a few seconds. Can you just imagine Mitt Romney’s face on the star character in this video clip who you meet in a second after the boy leaves! This would be a great political ad for a rival! Great Theme Song for Mitt Romney!

I am a Non-PC Populist Lou Dobbs Democrat! Mitt Romney has flip flopped with an “election relative” morality on:

• Abortion
• Water Boarding
• Gays in the military

However in addition he as also done so concerning the Bible. While that does not bother me as a religious liberal, the so called liberal news media gave him a free ride by not informing his core Christian Right constituents of this flip flop! This core constituency of Mitt Romney holds the Bible very seriously and Mitt Romney does not share their values. Interesting is that the so called liberally biased news media gave Mitt Romney a free ride. To treat this and all of Mitt Romney’s flip flops in one post would make this post too long. But I will list follow ups.