JUST A MOTION AWAY

JUST A MOTION AWAY: Our high school Economics class had us bored to tears. For a red diaper baby in the midst of the late 60's "revolution" it held little relevance. But we do remember one thing- the way Mr. Voorhies would ask questions of our equally narcoleptic classmates and, when no one raised their hands, he would rub his thumb across his other four fingers, indicating the inevitable answer to every question in economics... money.

Perhaps it has stuck with us because every time we see the Hawai`i State Legislature, or any legislative body in the country for that matter, propose some inane and out-of-touch piece of legislation- many times either in opposition to pervasive public opinion or presenting a version of the ideal that is so watered-down you can actually hear it gurgling as it goes down for the third time- we leap to the conclusion that the answer as to "why" can be summed up with Mr. Voorhies' gesture.

So when we heard that rather than ban those one-time-use, white, plastic grocery bags like Kaua`i and Maui have done, the bill streaking through the legislature aims to simply put a 10 cent fee on them- to go to 25 cents if it doesn't decrease the use significantly.

At first blush we assume it was, as usual, the "money in the system" from both the supermarkets and plastic bag makers that was the proverbial fly in the ointment.

But the reality is that the reason why the corporate media is framing any controversy over the bill as whether in fact to institute a fee and if so how much it should be, is that our own people have sold us down the river once again.

Rather than look at how incredibly beautiful the roadsides, beaches and, everything else looks on Kaua`i and Maui now that everything isn't draped in white plastic and advocate for a total ban statewide, according to Civil Beat:

Sierra Club director Robert Harris told the House Committee on Energy and Environmental Protection Thursday that a fee — which would be charged to consumers at the checkout counter — has worked to reduce plastic bag use in other areas.

Harris was among those testifying on House Bill 2260. Environmental groups, including The Nature Conservancy and Surfrider Foundation, as well as government department heads and even major supermarkets, testified in support of the bill.

The important part that tells you something is wrong is that last part- it wasn't just the environmental group but "even major supermarkets, testified in support of the bill."

Now we get the "strange bedfellows" aspect of politics. Many times we have to question our own sanity when we find ourselves agreeing on some issue with various and sundry fascists, war mongers and general all-around creeps and cretins.

But that isn't the case here.

Way too often, especially in "the Aloha State," those who put themselves out as allies in the fight to stop despoilment in the name of progress in the islands abandon the fight to enact effective legislation in favor of compromising our environment before the fight even begins.

The thought process, as we've been told in similar circumstances in the past, is that the good fight isn't worth fighting this time. We've been admonished by the leadership of the above listed groups that certain battles aren't worth fighting and scoring political points for the organization on "this one" is more important than staking out the "perfect" so that the final "good" will be just a little better when all is said and done.

The way politics is supposed to work is that you stake out your perfect position and either win over the other side or find a happy medium. But lately- whether it's the Hawai`i environmental groups or the national Democratic Party, the position taken going into negotiations is already compromised to the extent that the final measure is inevitably horrific.

It isn't the money itself in many of these situations. Rather it's the acknowledging- and therefore condoning- of the fear from legislators over the use of that money to challenge them at election time that creates the defeatist attitude of progressive organizations these days.

Yes- getting all money out of politics is the ultimate solution to our broken political system. But if we give up before we begin, we're giving that money exponentially more power than it already has.

GET REAL

GET REAL: Email was bad enough. But now that we broke down and signed up for Facebook, we're inundated with well-meaning people forwarding idiotically simplistic solutions to complex problems which they and whomever started the chain took about three milliseconds to think through.

The latest started as a bogus email chain letter that continues to circulate regarding what was called the "Congressional Reform Act (CRA) of 2011" proposing a constitutional amendment that would cull congressional salaries and eliminate pensions and benefits, essentially making recompense almost non-existent.

Bogus or not it became exceptionally popular with those who forwarded it.

So what's wrong with the content? Well let's start with a maxim that we're sure those who distributed the above will agree with- you get what you pay for.

But moreover take a gander at a recent study by the Center for Responsive Politics (CRP), a nonpartisan organization that keeps track of money in politics.

NPR reports that according Michael Beckel, a spokesperson for the CRP "244 current members of Congress are millionaires — that's about 46 percent and that includes 138 Republicans and 106 Democrats."

Now these guys and gals didn't exactly get rich by stashing away their salaries or even through corruption. They started out rich when they ran for office.

So why did we elect them and not, as the CRA folks called them, "citizen legislators (who) should serve their term(s), then go home and back to work (as) the Founding Fathers envisioned?"

Maybe it's because those citizen legislators can't just stop working and gallivant off to the state or national capitol and expect to not just continue to support their families but to have their jobs to be waiting for them when they get back.

Would your boss do that? Didn't think so.

And these CRA people want to make it worse.

We have two close friends who went into politics- just plain working folks who made for extraordinary office holders. But both are out of politics now, not because they were voted out of office but because essentially they were faced with giving up a job they had either trained their whole lives for and dearly loved doing- or at least one that gave them a steady income- for a "job" they had to re-secure every couple-o'-four years.

And in order to do that they had to raise bucketsful of cash and subject themselves to insults that people ordinarily wouldn't address to their worst enemy.

The people who took their places? In one case he's a longtime hack politician just coming off a get-rich stint out of office and working for a local developer. The other is a glad-handing TV personality whose main job in office is apparently to promote his show and every hotel on the island.

Yet when we suggest making service with both our local county council and state legislature full-time jobs with decent pay that's commensurate with the duties, instead we get crap like this CRA petition which is actually a measure to assure that the other 291 members of congress become part of the same rich "1%" against whom we're out in the streets protesting.

At the same time we'd bet dollars to donuts that "99%" of those who liked the CRA have never heard of another proposed constitutional amendment from the "Move to Amend" organization that would put the kibosh on "corporate personhood," as declared by the Supreme Court, which turned on full blast the already gushing corporate campaign money spigot. At the same time many have opposed programs for partial public financing of elections or even legislation- or if needed a constitutional amendment- ending all campaign contributions in favor of full public financing.

It's the penny wise and pound foolish of the world who scream about "paying for politicians to run for office"- as if they're not paying 100 times more on the back end as corporations buy and sell the pols and write the legislation- and would pay office holders poverty wages, who are the self-same ones that are perpetuating the corrupt system that has people's opinions of elected officials at all-time lows.

So do us all a favor- think it through before you hit that send or post button. We’ve got really important issues to attend to... like the Giants-49ers game this Sunday. Go G-men.

iGUESS

iGUESS: "Resistance is futile" they told us. And they were right. And we gave in.

Instead of what we expected- the usual "egad- Grandpa 'friended' me on Facebook"- our progeny actually forced us to sign up and waste an inordinate amount of our formerly precious time.

It was not just familial insistence- there are now people whose email accounts are so jammed with spam that they no longer open them in favor of being "liked," "shared," and "poked."

It's not all bad. For those who have been on another planet, on Facebook one can "share" practically anything on-line these days at the click of a mouse and they show up in your friends' "news feed"- although the word "news" is often a misnomer.

And who'd a thunk it? All our "friends" seem to be radical lefties who, for the last few weeks have been posting every article available on the "Occupy Wall Street" protests.

We've received slews of hand selected commentaries on corporate greed and related subjects like sustainability and consumerism.

Many of the protesters apparently bemoan our corporate culture which thrives on creating demand for products that we didn't even know we wanted much less needed until we saw the clever ads and decided that, although yesterday we'd never contemplated owning one, now we suddenly can't live without it. Then, as soon as we all own one, our corporate overlords and marketing geniuses suddenly come up with something else we never knew we needed to replace what we just bought so we can throw that "old" crap in the closet and buy the latest thing. More money for more junk, to consume more electricity- all to fill the pockets of more bazillionaires.

Then yesterday- and you probably know where we're going with this- all our radical activist "friends" suddenly took a day off from attacking unsustainable consumerist greed because they were apparently devastated by the death of Steve Jobs... the king of "acceptable" consumerism.

Although we've been one of those eye-rollers at those who pray at the altar of Apple, we're no less schizophrenic in our habit of using a computer and the internet to research and write, if not actual Luddite-themed tomes, then certainly anti-consumerist and even anti-capitalist screeds.

We're not sure why, for many, Steve Jobs sits at the right hand of god while Bill Gates works fanning the flames of hell for Satan. Is it because Jobs seemed to anticipate what we would decide we needed once he purveyed it while Gates merely filled the demanded niche before anyone else? Why is the size of Gates' wallet a topic that spurs anger from we in the new anti-corporate greed movement which is entrenched on Wall Street- and increasingly every city and town across the country- while no one even cares that Jobs left a tiny bundle upon his departure, thank you very much?

We don't own an iPad, an iPhone or an iAnything and have no desire to do so. Heck, we don't even own a cell phone and can be caught complaining to those who do about how, just as "they" perfected the sound in telephones so that voices on the other side of the world come through landlines like we're in the same room, someone went out and invented a device that make Bell's first phone sound clear as a bell in comparison.

We own a the biggest-bang-for-the-cheapest-price PC we could find and constantly kvetch about how the broadband for which we Americans pay $50 a month goes for under ten buck across Europe.

But that doesn't excuse us for the same hypocrisy as the Jobs worshipers practice.

We can remember a conversation a while back with a close friend bemoaning the way our agricultural lands were being lost to agricultural condominiumization. Then she suddenly got a tear in her eye and asked "well w-w-where's m-m-my ag condo?".

So go ahead and preach sustainability while you snatch up the the next "i" product you didn't know you needed until you saw it and then wondered how you could possibly have lived without. It's all part of being an American consumer.

And unless and until we think about it, most of us wouldn't have it any other way.

BUT WHAT'LL WE DO FOR EGGS?

BUT WHAT'LL WE DO FOR EGGS?: There's jokes and then there's jokes. Our sometimes feeble, often offensive, attempts at humor are at least fairly innocuous in the grand scheme of things.

But, as happens all too often in Hawai`i, when those who police the ethics of politicians become the foxes guarding the hen house, the political joke is on us.

Recently though, a whirling dervish of accountability has taken up residence as the Executive Director (ED) of the State Ethics Commission (EC), and those who thought state ethics laws had been suspended under former director Dan Mollway are having conniption fits.

Some of our readers may remember Les Kondo as the head of the Office of Information Practices (OIP) who fought the good fight to bad results in the infamous ES-177 case that eventually surgically removed the incisors that the legislature had apparently given the OIP.

And now, as the new ED of the EC, Kondo has upset the cushy apple cart of one of the most repulsive of unethical practices- one that calls lobbyists "stakeholders" and appoints them to these "task forces" to essentially write legislation regarding the same subject upon which they lobby.

We've written extensively about our Kaua`i County Charter provision 20.02(D) which prevents anyone from "(a)ppear(ing) in behalf of private interests before any county board, commission or agency" if they sit on a board or commission- or presumably a "task force"- regardless of the subject matter.

The state law does the same if there is a nexus between the job of the lobbyist and the board or commission's kuleana.

But although the law is supposed to cover all bodies appointed by the governor or legislature, whereas Mollway looked the other way, Kondo has now included these "task forces" in the same category as any state appointed body- which of course they are.

And guess what? Shockingly, politicians don't like it.

According to Derrick Depledge's Political Radar blog

State Senate President Shan Tsutsui and House Speaker Calvin Say have asked state Attorney General David Louie whether the state Ethics Commission is correct in defining members of task forces as state employees subject to the ethics code.

In their letter the two wrote:

If individuals from the private sector who participate in these panels are now to be considered “employees” of the State for the purposes of the Ethics Code, we are concerned with the chilling effect on both the Legislature’s ability to gather information and on the constitutional right of these individuals (and their actual employers) to petition government.

This stupid argument has been going on for a week or so in the press and the blogs but no one can come up with the obvious and simple solution to the quandary.

On Kaua`i we had some board and commission members- as a matter of fact some members of the ethics board itself- lobbying the county council for money for their non profits while others were representing developers seeking zoning and zoning permits before the council and planning commission respectively.

And then they'd turn around and rule on the ethics of activities of those granting them their requests.

And just like with the state, they argued that their "rights" to petition the government were being violated. But that ignores the elephant in the room- that sitting on a board commission or task force is not a "right" but a privilege and you can simply step down from your position and let someone who does not lobby other government bodies take your place.

But nooooo. For some reason these pustules on the butt of democracy have been permitted to shed their crocodile tears without anyone telling them to get their asses out of government if they are coming to the government, hat in hand... especially if the subject matter of their appointment is the same as their lobbying, as is true in the case of the state ethics law.

Do we really need to give the guy who is being paid to lobby an extra boost in his efforts by allowing him to skew the actual report upon which the legislature will depend to write legislation?

What- massive campaign contributions aren't enough? Is your bundling finger broken? Did the manapua store close and now legislative staffers are stuck with crummy donuts?

It's simply amazing in this state how politicians, who've been getting away with murder for years, react when a new sheriff that is apparently not on the take actually tries to enforce the law. Why you should have seen them (if you missed it) when Kondo told them they couldn't keep accepting expensive tickets to events if the event didn't have a nexus to their legislative jobs. You'd have thought he was ripping the lollypops out of their lyin' pie holes.

It's bad enough when, as is the case, corporate America has placed its greedy boot heel on the throat of the democratic process. We don't have to have to actually open wide- or bend over- and allow them to place the whole boot where they can do their damage from the inside out.

TOO SMALL TO FLAIL

TOO SMALL TO FLAIL: The things that piss off the electorate really baffles us sometimes. Perhaps it’s the ease with which we fall for the misdirection ploy. Maybe it’s that when a scam is of the MEGO (my eyes glaze over) variety people go back to something they can understand rather than spend the extra time to figure it out.

But whatever it is it seems that the masses prefer to worry about getting a Woolworth’s Funereal (being nickeled and dimed to death) than receiving a full walletectomy.

That may explain why we generally get up in arms over the pennies our elected officials receive for their services instead of the legal- and not so legal- bribery system that is democracy American style which cost us untold riches on the back end.

A perfect example is Honolulu Advertiser columnist/blogger Dave Shapiro’s seemingly never ending crusade to mention the pay raise the legislature received a couple of years back at every opportunity as if it alone were at the root of all economic miseries.

But what Dave fails to mention other than occasionally and in passing is that the low pay for “part time” legislators has led to a system where the nature of the outside employment of most legislators is a direct result of the power of their positions.

It takes a special “boss” to let their employee spend three months away from their job as well as a slew of time between sessions. Just go down the list of legislators’ outside jobs and you will more often than not see “consultant”- usually with firms whose profits rise and fall with the actions of the legislature.

Combined with those direct bribes known as “campaign contributions” we’re stuck with a system that cost us billions in tax credits and special interest legislation often actually written by corporate crooks and cronies doling out the moolah..

But while we’re worried about the actual salaries that the reps and sens are being paid, keeping them low is what actually causes this fraudulent system to thrive.

In order to be a state legislator either you play the “consultant” game and ply the rubber chicken circuit or you’re independently wealthy. There’s no in-between and no opportunity for the citizen-legislator we all cite as ideal.

We’ve spoken to literally dozens of people over the years, ones who everyone wishes would run for office but don’t because they simply can’t afford it. Yet Shapiro and his mindless adherents want to keep the salaries at a low enough level to keep the current system in place.

And it’s the same nationally. This week we’ve noted four copies of a “chain letter” email we first started receiving about six months ago but has gone viral on the local progressive “lists”, entitled “An idea whose time has come”.

It reads:

For too long we have been too complacent about the workings of Congress. Many citizens had no idea that members of Congress could retire with the same pay after only one term, that they didn't pay into Social Security, that they specifically exempted themselves from many of the laws they have passed (such as being exempt from any fear of prosecution for sexual harassment) while ordinary citizens must live under those laws... The self-serving must stop....

This is the same congress that has not just allowed but perpetuated the fiscal system, bailing out Wall St. and the banks while people are being thrown out of their houses after being scammed by the self same crew- a crew that refills congressional campaign coffers like it’s a 7-11 refilling your 87 ounce Dr. Pepper.

Yet there’s no real regulation even proposed at this point for the banks or campaign finance. Instead the email proposes a:

28th Amendment to the United States Constitution

"Congress shall make no law that applies to the citizens of the United States that does not apply equally to the Senators and/or Representatives; and, Congress shall make no law that applies to the Senators and/or Representatives that does not apply equally to the citizens of the United States ".

Are you freakin’ kidding? This is what gets your panties in a bunch? Not constitutional amendments denying the demented recent Supreme Court ruling confirming “corporate personhood” or the 30 year old “money is speech” ruling than makes public financing of elections a Herculean task if not an absolute joke?

Parenthetically that’s another tangential idiocy- people who say “I don’t want my tax dollars financing these politicians campaigns”. For every dollar we’d spend taking money out of political campaigns we’d be saving literally millions doled out to those that pay the legal bribes under the current system.

For instance we are now faced with a give-away to insurance companies instead of a single payer Medicare-for-all that would save us trillions because congress actually admits they are too controlled by campaign contributions to get it passed. It’s just one example of the cost of privately financed campaigns.

It’s the same stupid mentality that has people claiming the “moral hazard” of helping their neighbor payoff the impossible mortgage the bank scammed them into while thinking the trillions given out to “too big to fail” institutions was done in order to “save the financial system”.

It’s the same idiotic cut-off-your-nose-to-spite-your-face “pay cuts for the legislature” mantra that actually makes sure that they have to live a shady existence to survive and serve at the same time.

Get off it folks. While we argue with the teller over the quality of the free toaster they’re giving out in the front of the bank the CEOs are shoveling cash out the back door.

We’re just too distracted by our own petty jealousies and craven covetousness to notice the fixed nature of the game of three-card-Monte being played out on the corner.

ASKIN’ FOR IT

ASKIN’ FOR IT: It hasn’t just been a kick we’re on lately- that of examining laughably lame and confusingly contentions, slanted statements from bumbling bureaucrats designed to amply appeal to our guileless gullibility.

But it certainly isn’t just here on little Kaua`i where a post plantation populous is too busy beachcombing and bathing to understand unctuous utterances from corrupt capos and cronies.

Behold the corporate actions in the case of the runaway Toyotas whose corporate overlords have apparently set up their own demise by just replacing the gas pedals.

We’ve spent the past few days asking our more mechanically inclined acquaintances, car mavens and repair people who have been following the story and not one- not a single one- believes that fixing the gas pedal alone will stop these cars from having a mind of their own.

One and all believe it has to be the electronic “brain” that they put in cars these days so that any repair at all starts at $1000 and can only be done at the dealership.

In that sense it was inevitable that those chickens would come home to roost and they would become so complicated that even they can’t figure out what’s wrong with their own Frankencoupés.

If you’ve been following this debacle you’ll know that Toyota has spent months- actually years now- trying to figure out why on occasion their cars accelerate but then won’t stop doing so.

First they said it was the floor mats, then it was something with the gas pedal. Meanwhile most who independently looked at it concluded that it had to be something in the computer electronics that control acceleration.

But when the feds told them to fix it NOW, in a “that’s our story and we’re sticking with it” manner they’ve settled on putting in new gas pedals in millions of cars and denying that it’s anything more in a move seemingly destined to destroy any future for the company when it continues to happen.

The hastily concocted explanation for what’s supposedly wrong with the pedal mechanism doesn’t even make sense. It basically says that due to “wear and tear” the mechanism sticks where two pieces come together, But if something “wears” it wears down not up and its not going to stick, rather it’s going to become looser, according what a couple of engineers told us last night after the “explanation” was given by Toyota.

So why should we care if corporate malfeasance brings down a car company other than the gazillion of manufacturing jobs?

It’s simply the other side of the corporate personhood that’s on many people’s minds after the US Supreme court humanized them for purposes pumping more money into elections.

Because while this personhood extends to elections it doesn’t extend to corporate wrongdoing and responsibility. Don’t forget, it’s people who are making the decision to do this without regard to the fact that it will almost assuredly blow up in their faces in a year or so once the crashes continue and we figure out that the “fix” fixes nothing.

But don’t expect anyone to be punished for that. If anything happens to Toyota it will be because no one will buy one, not because the company is arrested and tried for murder.

But by the time anyone figures it out the same executives that made the decision to do this will no doubt have passed the hot potato to another ambitious young executive, received their golden parachute and gone on to bigger and better corporate criminal capers.

If you live on Kaua`i and own a newish Toyota and are headed down to the dealership for your “fix” and are then planning on driving off as if nothing is wrong you’re probably the same person who believed that the new alignment of the bike path isn’t going to be on Wailua Beach and that the $7.5 million the county paid in the Ka Loko Dam tragedy settlement wasn’t due to culpability.

So we’ve just gotta ask you – what are you, a freakin’ idiot?

LAPPIN’ IT RIGHT UP

LAPPIN’ IT RIGHT UP: Intellectuals and philosophy mavens can spend hours in sophomoric sophistry asking each other the question “if a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it does it make a sound?”.

Let us clue you in- of course it freakin’ does... what are you a freakin’ moron?” (it seems to be that kind of week).

The ease with which people are bamboozled and bewildered comes to mind because what nobody seems to want to admit in light of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision allowing corporations to flood elections with cash is that if Americans weren’t too-stupid-to-live and as easily swayed as the mythical soundless trees they wouldn’t be influenced by all the bogus, distracting advertising bought by company capital.

So which is it? Are “American voters are smart enough to see though all the nonsense” as some suck-up pols suggest? Or is it that “you can never underestimate the intelligence of the American voter.”

Only the silent tree toppling proponents could pick the former.

But what can you expect from a country that can’t tell that a “person” is a flesh and blood human being and not a piece of paper with the words “corporate charter” written on it?

Corporate personhood goes back to an 1886 Supreme Court Case, Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad and this absurd notion is behind yesterday’s Orwellian “free speech for those who can’t speak” piece of true fascist flack.

Many in the progressive movement are busy today promoting a narrow constitutional amendment dealing with banning corporate cash in elections but a small cadre including Howard Zinn, Bill Moyer, Tom Hayden, Jim Hightower, Medea Benjamin and dozens of others have put together a “Move To Amend” web site and petition to “firmly establish... that human beings, not corporations, are persons entitled to constitutional rights”.

But then again to think that a constitutional amendment under what passes for democracy in the USA Inc. is in the realm of reality probably means joining that confederacy of dunces who debates noiseless arboreal thickets.

HYDROPHOBIC HYSTERIA

HYDROPHOBIC HYSTERIA: Back during the waning days of the reign of Crawford Texas’ village idiot most of the brain dead, consumerist, greedy, self absorbed Americans figured out what the wise knew in 2000- and Bush’s “popularity” hovered at about 20%.

Most progressives saw this as an encouraging development in that three-in-five of the US’ ditto-headed, brain-dead fat-tubs-of-lard that pass themselves off as human beings had wised up after being been beaten silly for almost eight years due to their own actions at the ballot box.

But really it the most astonishing part of the poll was that there were still 20% of hard core dim-witted knee-jerk “too stupid to live” left tucked away in mega-churches and mini-malls of America the country.

“Who are these people?” we wondered but more importantly “where are they?”

Well we found them this month- the hard core, “don’t confuse me with the facts”, chest-pounding twits- raising gorilla dust at the various health care reform town meetings held recently.

And even though they probably represent only half of those die hard knuckleheads that argued among themselves whether Bush was “a great president or the greatest president”, the media- in their typical “’both’ sides of the issue” coverage- still cling to the notion that this “movement” is really about health care and not just a diminishing clique of white people who see their majority status in the land they stole from brown people slowly disappearing and want to wrest back control of “our” country back from the hands of a black president.

Perhaps the thing that baffles the pea-brained pundits most is where are those 80% of Americans- as polls indicated earlier this year- that demand real health care reform?

Well what the press hasn’t grasped is that those of us who understand that the only form of reform that can demonstrably be launched fully formed- the single payer “Medicare for all” format- gave up on true heath care reform months ago when it was conveniently taken “off the table” by the president and congress.

The noisiest of squeaky wheels have not only gotten the grease they’ve provided the context for lazy, simplistic, easy-answer-seeking reporters to file stories defining the “opposition” as those shrieking drivel in the non-sequitor, talking-point Hannity/ Limbaugh/ Beck echo chamber, as they spew high decibel inanities at their cameras.

The corporate media refuse to think through why there is seemingly little of no support for the “single payer is off the table” non-reform that we’ve been offered.

With their Hobson’s choice loaded-question, in true corporate governance bought-and-paid-for style, it’s just a matter of how much they will allow the insurance industry to continue to screw us in the butt, essentially asking us whether we want our sh-t sandwich on white or wheat.

And they expect us to enthusiastically show up and fight the “keep the government away from my Medicare” crazies for, at best, a kinder gentler insurance industry (yeah, that’ll happen).

The fact is, unless you’re still one of those among the delusionally naive Obama-as-messiah sycophantic minions- a group whose numbers are shrinking daily as they meet the new boss’ war-mongering corporate-kow-towing style- you’ve given up on the centrist Democratic Party’s “bend-over” opposition to the slack-jawed, wing-nut creationist, gun-toting Republicans.

The ribbon placed on the repackaging of the old-boss is but an illusion that we who’ve long since rejected the duopoly warned of when, as always, Tweedledum ran against Tweedledumber.

Health care reform is dead. It died when all the members of congress decided we couldn’t have the only reform that would and could be fair, affordable and cover everyone as we detailed last month because the other 534 corporate lackeys had been bought off by the insurance and pharmaceutical companies.

Don’t expect us to stand up and defend the insult to our intelligence that the Democrats are trying to substitute for basic human right to heath care we all want deserve and could have had.

THE BITE

THE BITE: We’ll leave the unethical culture on Kaua`i on the back burner today as we take tongue to glue and mail off our fare share to sustain the U.S. bombing of brown people across the world until they hate us so much they’re willing to blow themselves up in our midst.

But demilitarization isn’t what’s on the minds of the handful ditto-heads and mindless, sociopathic, so-called “tea party” participants.

There was this fat Rush clone on CNN this morning who was bedecked with an “Obama is a fascist” poster with a photo-shopped Obama-as-Hitler mock-up and when the reporter asked three of four times “why is Obama a fascist” the guy kept screaming “because he’s a fascist”.

And he was the most articulate of the crowd.

What she should have asked was “how did you get here today?. Was it in a car subsidized by taxes or on the road taxes paid for. Perhaps you flew in to a tax-supported airport?”

He sure was standing on a taxpayer built sidewalk and the police presence that surrounded and protected them was paid for by... well, you get the point.

Funny you never hear that type complain about the tax money thrown down the rat hole of “defense”- a fancy ironically-opposite euphemism meaning violent imperialism.

Nope they complain about “welfare queens” and the waste of money on social programs and the safety net they are presumably one or two pay checks away from.

But at least most of these creeps are, if too dumb to live, consistently wrong about everything. What really bothers us when we hear normally rational people demand lower taxes saying “I’m a fiscal conservative and a social liberal”.

Oh, you mean you’re a thief. You want everything the government provides but don’t want to pay for it.

Actually through a strictly progressive taxation scheme the 90% of the people who have 10% of the money could go tax free if we properly taxed the 10% who have 90% of it.

But these folks aren’t talking progressive taxation. As a matter of fact they apparently have a stake in making the rich richer thinking in their own demented way that they will become one of the rich despite the telling sign of the intellectual bankruptcy of their world view.

But why single them out? Today’s news portends that the folks at the legislature aren’t exactly Einsteins or brave enough to progressively raise taxes more than a smidgeon and are apparently rather intent on passing tax increases that hurt the poor the most with increased taxes on goods like tobacco, alcohol and fireworks along with a proposed sales tax for the counties and even a raise in the state excise tax.

All this got us thinking about what exactly happened to the progressive taxation scheme and the social “safety net” the government provided with the taxes it collected until about 30 years ago.

It all started with the “privatization” of government services and the reign of the real fascists, by definition, under Ronald Regan, when the state and corporate worlds began to merge as never before.

Instead of spending money directly serving those who were in need they began to set up private corporations, many of them non profit, to take on these services- and they fully funded them.

The premise was that no one was giving the government money voluntarily so let’s leverage the money by giving it to an organization that can also fund-raise and thereby get more bang for the buck.

But what actually happened- something many of us foresaw at the time- was that that government funding was the first thing to be cut whenever the war machine and the service of corporate agendas demanded more and more and more.

In addition every time there was one of these “financial crises” the first place the corporate sycophants in office looked to for a cut was those now private non-profits who were by then taking on the lions share of social safety net programs.

After all- they could always raise more private funds.

Meanwhile the real wages of the working class were slashed to the point where, while one person working one job used to be enough to support a family, now two people working two jobs doesn’t cut it.

All the while, due to increased production with no recompense for the workers who produced the wealth, that 90%-10% ratio we mentioned above was pushed to more like a 95%-5%. Workers were seen by that 5%, not as essential to their business and the fiscal health of the economic system but as an expendable burden on their quest to move the ratio to 99%-1%

If we shirk off the chains of the fascist corporatization of government and cap the financial bottomless pit of an insatiable saber-rattling, war machine we’d have plenty left to provide living wages and even provide health care for all without paying another nickel in taxes.

And if we collected taxes only from those with the ability to pay we’d get that “free lunch” the “fiscal conservative yet social liberal” wants so badly.

Put that tea in your pipe and smoke it.

A GOOD RAP ON THE SNOUT SHOULD DO IT

A GOOD RAP ON THE SNOUT SHOULD DO IT: Our over the top tirade in defense of Larry Geller against a personal attack by Ian Lind- apparently because Ian thought Larry “personally attacked” someone- was met by an ”ouch” from Ian today, saying

Whew. I’ve got pretty thick skin, but that was pretty harsh.

We just wanted to show what a personal attack really is and obtusely question the prevalent practice of personally attacking humorous ridicule by calling it a personal attack.

Actually our attitude is that using the English language to its full descriptive potential is not a personal attack and the only sin in poking- or even stabbing- fun is if it’s not funny... even if an especially unconventional sense of humor is required to find it such..

Larry’s sin was presumably a chart showing money bags as check marks for those legislators who support more corporate money in politics and smiley faces on those who would kill the measures in HB 539

And yesterday, after excoriating House Judiciary Chair Jon Riki Karamtsu, the poster child for corporate cash and the author of the now dead, HB 539, for holding an apparent corporate fundraiser- in session, downtown (not in his blue-collar district), and for $150 a pop- Geller warns us that though HB 539 was killed on the floor of the house, some reps aren’t giving up on opening the spigot further instead of banning corporate contributions by inserting the meat of HB 539 in HB 215..

But this morning Lind continued to defend corporate cash still deriding those who would try to take advantage of the fact that the legislature is at present dealing with a flawed law that is currently in the courts. Depending on how you look at it, the law either limits corporate money to $1000 a corporation or takes the caps off entirely.

Lind describes the legal situation quite well but first he says:

To be honest, I don’t think I qualify as a reactionary corporate stooge for trying to deal with some of the complexities of the campaign law and for pointing out where the public debate has gone off track. Nor do I apologize for taking the position that an assessment of risks and rewards should be a natural part of political strategizing.

What is clear is that how people view the proposed “limits” on corporate campaign contributions that were part of HB 539 depends a great deal on how you understand the status quo.

In describing the “status quo” Lind only expounds on the judicial case and the Campaign Spending Commission ruling that caused the circuit court to put the kibosh on the commission’s interpretation until a higher court decides.

But the core of his contention is an argument of misdirection. The court case might be the only “status” that counts if the legislature made the ambiguous law and was refusing to do anything about it.

The real “status quo” is that the people who made the law are at this very moment trying to deal with any “flaw” in the current law and in dong so are deciding the future of corporate money in Hawai`i politics.

And whatever they decide during this session it’s highly unlikely to be changed again any time soon

The broad view shows that as we write some are trying to flood the system with a massive moolah infusion from special interests instead of serving the public interest and just banning it completely, as 22 other states have done.

Does it really matter what the law currently says when the actual status quo is that the legislature is in the process of changing it? And if they are changing it should we sit still for legitimizing what, as Geller points out, is the virtual lifting of all limits by allowing unlimited numbers of $25,000 chunks to go to any number of political action committees as HB 539 would have done?

We and Geller- and dare we say just about anyone not greasing or getting greased under the current system- think that even one corporate dollar to one corporate PAC is one dollar and one PAC too many. But Lind says any limit- apparently even if it’s a fake one- is better than none at all and for some reason he thinks that that precludes any attempt to fully ban corporate money because he seems to think we won’t ever get a ban.

Well, you certainly won’t if you don’t demand or even ask for one.

Even in the name of the political expediency Lind cites, supporting a certain amount of corporate cash instead of a ban makes no sense. You don’t start bargaining over the amount an armed mugger will take from you by offering him five dollars when he wants it all.

It reminds us of the old joke that ends with the punch line “we’ve established what kind of girl you are, now we’re just haggling over price”.

Corporate cash in elections- and corporate influence in general- is actually the result of a uniquely American concept that is cited by many as the root of the dysfunction of not just the US campaign finance system but that of democratic capitalism in general

Its called corporate personhood and can be traced back to a somewhat bizarre ruling - and some say corruptly-divined misinterpretation of the constitution- by the US Supreme Court in 1886 called , Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad.whereby corporations were given the same full consttional rights as actual people whereas previously corporate rights were limited to those of “articifical persons”.

Check out the wilipedia entry linked above if you want to know what’s at the core of the corporate takeover of the country.

But in the absence of an unlikey reversal of the decisions (actually the infamous “Buckley v Vallejo” is based on it in part) or some sort of legislation or constitutional amendment one thing we can do is to eliminate the legalized bribery that is pervelnet in 28 states including Hawai`i.

As we tried to point out in our origianal piece if you start with a “we’re defeated already so we’d better get behind something that sucks” .attitude you may well be a “reactionary corporate stooge”- although we would never stoop to that kind of name calling since reactionary is much too strong to be accurate

No matter what the current law says you can help put a cork in corporate infuence by sending an email to reps@capitol.hawaii.gov telling them to stop the madness and chuck any bill, including HB 215, that doesn’t ban corporate cash in elections into the same trash can onto which they threw HB 539.

TASTES LIKE IT- GLAD WE DIDN’T STEP IN IT

TASTES LIKE IT- GLAD WE DIDN’T STEP IN IT: Well it’s all over but the pooping as the Council reportedly made it official yesterday passing a law saying that the bike path is now the apparently the “Bryan Baptiste Memorial Dogcrap Repository”.

And as Joan Conrow reported this morning, county spokesperson Mary Dauber confirmed what we suspected Tuesday- that Bernard Carvalho will be “sidestepping” the bureaucratic dog pile he created and doing it at taxpayer expense by taking vacation time from the job he will no longer have when he returns.

But in another of those “only on Kaua`i” laws the council passed a provision saying that dog walkers must “visibly carry” a bag to clean up after their pets.

Now presumably owners will somehow be pinning their little plastic bags to their lapels although how to attach them without putting a hole in them might be somewhat of a challenge.

And woe be to the owner who only brings one bag because presumably they must always wear a crap-carrier even after their animal’s done their business.

We just can’t wait for the parade the dog-doody-bedecked citizenry. Perhaps a whole new line of pine-scented-aloha-shirts will spring up as the dog-poop-clad-denizens dance by the dog-poop receptacles in search of another carrying-container for fear of a $500 fine

Why Hilo Hattie’s may offer a free clothes pin with each perfumed mu`umu`u.

Who said the county isn’t creating new jobs.

But speaking of dogshit is there anyone who hasn’t smelled the stench coming out of Denver this week?

In case anyone missed the real story, the Democratic Party has apparently “grown up” when it comes to corporate teat-sucking as attendees lapped up the bribes just like Republicans.

Some of the alternative press such as reporter and “Official Hawai`i Democratic Convention Blogger in Denver” Ian Lind have mentioned the excesses for the privileged such as breakfasts for the Hawai`i delegates “complements” of Lockheed and Boeing.

But sitting through hour after hour of 37 TV channels of breathlessly-identical sycophantic-fluff was getting to be way too much to stomach until last night when a piece from ABC News– a whole three minutes and twenty seconds of it- appeared.

The must-see Brian Ross segment “Money Trail: The Democratic Elite” details how the “Pelosi 100” – those who raised more than $100,000 for the party- were wined and dined in private suites and fancy restaurants, clubs and hotels, day in and day out, throughout the week.

After showing us telescopic lens views through the window of a few of the venues the piece showed how the Denver police joined in the fun by roughing up a segment producer who dared to try to film it from a public sidewalk, replete with a stogie-smoking cop choking the newsman and arresting him for trying to take pictures of those attending one of the corporate sponsored galas.

Finally it juxtaposed the ring of luxury suites at the mentioned-once-every-four-second “Pepsi” Center, sipping champagne and dining on a hot buffet while a Georgia delegate downstairs in the lobby had to buy a $7 hot dog because “it’s all there is”.

But the fact that the Democrats have caught up and taken the lead in the race to sell our government to the highest corporate bidder is but a precipitating factor in explaining why they have gone along with every bit of constitution-shredding, war-mongering, corporate-theft that’s come down the Republican pike since 2001.

We’ll leave listing the crimes to the best candidate running for president, the Green Party candidate Cynthia McKinney, who in 2006 as Georgia Representative to the US House introduced the first Bush-Chaney impeachment motion.

From funding the war to supporting the Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act and from supporting the Gitmo gulag to caving on the telecom immunity bill the Democrats have been complicitous and have not just taken impeachment off the table it aided and abetted the Republicans by using their pen hand to support what their mouths bemoan.

How anyone can vote for these swine is beyond us but we suppose people have been eating their horseshit because at least it isn’t dogshit... and doing it for so long it’s beginning to “taste like chicken”

We’ll leave you with McKinney’s article in Counterpunch Magazine yesterday that- in case somehow you forgot- lists the Democratic eight-year efforts as partners-in-crime.

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It's Time for Real Change
How the Democrats Helped Bush Hijack the Country

By CYNTHIA McKINNEY

CounterPunch, August 27, 2008

Our country has been hijacked and the Democrats have proven themselves to have been in on the plan. When it came to the Constitution, the Democratic leadership showed us that aiding and abetting illegal spying on us was more important to them than protecting our civil liberties.
When it came to war and occupation, the Democratic leadership showed us that financing an illegal and immoral war, based on lies, was more important to them than the people's desire for peace.

And when the people, hurting from the financial mismanagement of this country, called for accountability for the crimes that have been committed against the people here, against the global community, against nature, itself, the Democratic leadership took impeachment off the table!

Grassroots Democratic Party activists want a livable wage! A "Medicare-for-all" type of health care system, repeal of the Bush tax cuts that have ushered in the greatest income inequality in this country since the Great Depression. But the Democratic Party has shown itself to be incapable of providing even a semblance of the values even of its own activists.

The Democratic Party's national leadership didn't even mention Hurricanes Katrina and Rita survivors in their Congressional agenda for the first 100 days.


The Democratic Party's national leadership gave us the Iran Naval Blockade bill, the Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act, and telecom immunity. They continue to fund war and occupation to the tune of $720 million a day while our children graduate from college tens--or even hundreds--of thousands of dollars in debt. Entire cities are going into receivership while the Democratic leadership in Congress gives the Pentagon one half trillion dollars annually with no accountability, no strings attached. That's over and above spending for war.

Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo are the hallmarks of the new U.S. gulag Democrats are helping to create.

They want us to believe that China and Russia are our enemies, in addition to the 60 countries on Dick Cheney's list. They want us to believe that workers, who come to this country to support thier families after Democratic leadership in the country saddl3ed workers with NAFTA, are our enemies. But we are here today to declare that we know who the real enemies are: those false patriots that George Washington warned us of, who wrap themselves in the flag while betraying our values.

We are the true patriots!

We know that the strength of this country lies in the way it countenances dissent. And we are here to dissent. We are not deterred by reports of sleek, new detention facilities or recently-acquired taser guns that kill. For we come to dissent in peace. Indeed, we dissent for peace.

Today, we declare our independence from conformity and "go-along-to-get-along" politics. We declare our willingness to be radical in pursuit of peace and in our hunger for justice. We can see clearly now who the real stickup artists are and that's why we're in Denver!

Our actions here this week begin the disarming of the hijackers. We no longer are afraid. And we won't be deceived. We know that a vote for the Democrats is a vote for more war in Afghanistan and other parts of the world.

But today, we are now free.

Free to stand on the four pillars guiding our political engagement: environmental wisdom, peace, grassroots democratcy, and social justice. And finally, we know our power. We know the power of the people. We know that true power rests in the hands of the people. People who are willing to take a stand.

We need look no further than Haiti, Code, I'voire, Spain, and India to see the power of the people at the ballot box. No further than Brazil, Venezuela, Chile, Argentina, Ecuador, Bolivia, Nicaragua, and Paraguay to know that if they can do it, so can we.

Provided our elections are fair!

And if the Democrats cave in, in the face of fraud, disfranchisement, and theft, then we will be there to demand election integrity!

All over this country, the signs are there. People from New York to Florida, Washington State to California, Colorado to Texas are liberating themselves. We must not stop! Our country is worth it! Let's take our country back! Power to the People!