Saturday, December 31, 2005

Happy New Year

It’s been a very strange year. George Bush entered his second term completely full of himself. He told the country the way it was going to be; he had plenty of political capital and he intended to spend it. Social security was going to be reformed – and I mean reformed – and anyone who didn’t like it could lump it. Democracy was going to be delivered to the people of Iraq and that success would be a model for the broader Middle East. The cat was on top of his game, and the Republicans were in charge from now till as far as you could see out on the flat West Texas prairie.

Well the year didn’t turn out as scripted. The president’s efforts to turn Social Security into a defined contribution program fell like a cow flap on that same flat land. The AARP which had been playing footsie with Bush turned on him like a scorned woman. The elderly were skittish and even the young put up `no sale’ signs. When the reaction at every road show stop was that of a herd of deer in the headlights, it became clear that the effort was going nowhere. What’s really sad is that Bush was actually in a position to strengthen the defined benefit program, but he wouldn’t hear of that.

The president got caught by Mother Nature. While the professionals were well aware of the damage potential of a major hurricane on the Gulf Coast near New Orleans, politicians had successfully put off doing what was really needed to protect the lower Mississippi for generations, Bush was the guy stuck without a seat when the music stopped. But he compounded his problems by stocking top FEMA posts with Republican `must hire’ cronies. And his personal performance and statements like, “You’re doing a heck of job,” added to his woes.

But it always gets back to his real problem. George Bush can shift and slide. He can allude to a Congressional Resolution. He can talk about other countries thinking the same thing. He can point fingers at the U.N. He can run, but he can’t hide. Iraq is his war, his and his alone. It is the responsibility that cannot be palmed off on anyone. Iraq is George Bush’s personal tar baby.

But I’ve said all that I could possibly say about it. People near and dear to me say I’m obsessed with it and that history will decide if Bush is a visionary or a failed president. My vote is that he is a totally failed utopian who bet his presidency on a long term favorable outcome in Iraq, and it is only a matter of time before the croupier hauls in the chips. But time alone will tell.

I’m going to resolve to write about this calamity as seldom as possible in 2006. There can be no doubt among my readers about my opinion. Most days I’m angry and want vindication, and I feel guilt over that. Today, I’m stepping back and hoping with all my heart that I’m wrong.

In any event, I resolve to wake up tomorrow looking for a happy and prosperous New Year for all of us, and I hope that George Bush is able to extricate our troops quickly, that Iraq’s government holds, and that our investment of blood and treasure was not in vain.

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Thursday, December 29, 2005

Kennedy Center Honors

The Kennedy Center Honors were on television this week. As many of you undoubtedly know, the Honors have become the highest and greatest reward that performing artists can attain for lifetime achievement. The event itself happens several weeks earlier than the televising and it is about the toughest ticket in Washington. (One has to be careful of hyperbole since the Redskins are returning to glory under Coach Joe Gibbs.) Since tickets ran as high as $6,250 per seat, it mattered not that I wasn’t among the anointed in attendance at the Center.

But the program was not as critically well received as in past years, and Barbara and I sat through the show with less than complete enthusiasm ourselves.

After it was over, I began to dissect the situation to try to find the reason. My conclusion is that the Honors much like many forms of media are not satisfying for a host of reasons. As newspaper readership is dropping and television ratings of news shows are down in favor of the newer vehicle, the internet, so the Honors are suffering a malaise.

One of the problems with newspapers – and cable TV and many other media - is the need to bundle. People have far less time to read morning papers and those who read them dive for their favorite sections, be it news, business, sports, style (culture), whatever. Thus half or more of the paper lies unread. Even we retired folks who devour our papers over multiple cups of coffee ignore many sections. I myself have not read half a dozen stories in the food sections of papers I’ve subscribed to over the course of my life and there are other sections that I only skim.

Newspaper companies assert that they are unable to unbundle the sections and deliver them profitably. Advertisers demand as much coverage as possible, and specialty papers covering only sports, news, etc. just wouldn’t attract the number of subscribers needed to support the venture.

Awards programs have been about specialties, albeit broad ones. The Oscars are for movies, Tony awards are for excellence on Broadway, Country Music Awards are self explanatory, and the list goes on. The Kennedy Center was looking for a niche and it found it in lifetime achievement in the performing arts, and for many years the novelty worked very well. Unfortunately, the niche was built on major league bundling, and that meant that the live audience in the Center and the TV viewers were people with the normal range of likes and dislikes.

In the early years, the unique nature of the awards made putting up with the minor inconvenience of sitting through presentations to artists whom we’d never heard of and arts we didn’t care for just a small price to pay for the larger show. But much as I hate to admit it, I’ve become an elitist who cares greatly for stage and movie actors and many types of classical music performers, but I pick and choose among the more popular forms of entertainment – arts. While I like Willy Nelson, I’m not much of a Tina Turner admirer, even though I find her act occasionally entertaining.

My problem is sitting through a two hour show while being passionately interested in only one, two or, occasionally, three of the honorees. It’s the bundling. Thus, I enjoy the acting, directing and writing portions of the Academy Awards but skip the Country Music Awards. The Kennedy Center however creative and deserving the honorees leaves me with from forty to sixty percent of the program that I could easily skip.

No matter how well they do it and no matter how great the artists, a lot of the audience doesn’t really care about some of the arts and the price in time is becoming noticeable to critics and even the audience.

That’s truly unfortunate as the idea is wonderful.

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Wednesday, December 28, 2005

Bay State Blues

I’m a native of Massachusetts, from that great old industrial city, Brockton. I moved to Washington, DC area as a young man but returned to The Bay State in retirement to that lovely town on Buzzard’s Bay, Marion, and lived there for nine wonderful years.

Almost four years ago, my wife and I returned to the National Capital Area to be near our children and grandchildren, but I maintain a keen interest in what goes in The Old Colony, indeed all of New England And many of my readers hail from that neck of the woods.

Not unique but relatively rare, I have a lot of experience with local and state government in New England and in places that organize quite differently – county v. town. I’ll post something in the near future on my take on the differences, but, today, I want to focus on a contemporary issue in Massachusetts, health care financing.

I know too many economists – family, friends, acquaintances, neighbors - and wind up chatting with more of them at cocktail parties than all other species combined. Being a shrinking violet, as my readers know well, I am at a great disadvantage in this intercourse. While these economists are often brilliant, they tend, unlike wild Bill, to be very opinionated about everything, but I find that they really do know their stuff when it comes to their specialty.

Today, I’m featuring Walt Francis who last week wrote the very helpful posting on choosing a Medicare prescription drug plan that was put up on this site. That piece drew more favorable comment than any other single posting ever.

Massachusetts is one of only three states that are losing population. The angst this has created has caused more navel gazing than anything in recent memory. About two decades ago, the Commonwealth found itself losing ground against its competitors and a popular revolt against the perceived enemy came about. Taxachusetts was the laughing stock of the nation and jobs were heading south, literally. Proposition 2 ½ put a lid on local taxes and the state recovered nicely, and, while the high tax label was never shed, the state moved down the list of heavy taxers quite a way.

Today the culprits are the high cost of living - especially housing and health care, the loss of manufacturing, and social issue – including immigration. Again the angst over loss of economic and political position is driving the residents batty.

Yesterday’s Boston Globe had a very well written argument on why state law should be changed to mandate that employers be required to cover the health care of workers. Again, while wonderfully argued, I found it to be completely without merit as a way to solve the economic and political problems that raised the issue.

Here’s a link to the op-ed piece in question:
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2005/12/27/the_health_insurance_meltdown?p1=email_to_a_friend

I asked Walt to look at the article and to give me his views. His opinion tracks mine exactly, except that he knows what he’s talking about. So I’m posting this and mailing it to my readers with known New England connections.

Here Walt’s take:

”The details of the Massachusetts scheme are not given. A similar scheme recently enacted in Maryland would only tax employers who do not spend 8 percent of their payroll on health care, and apply only to very large employers. In fact, it is believed to apply only to one employer in the state: Walmart. Regardless, all such schemes have the same bogus justification, seek to dictate the details of employer benefit design, and generally fall under the rubric of "feel good insanity." The spurious rationale is that if workers are uninsured the taxpayer will bear the brunt. I suppose so, to the extent that the State so elects. But no deity mandated that Massachusetts or Maryland taxpayers pay for any worker's health care. By the same rationale, if workers don't have good pensions, the taxpayers will bear the brunt in Supplemental Security Income payments to the elderly poor. If workers don't have employer-funded contraceptives who knows what the taxpayers may have to pay in welfare benefits? Why not mandatory life insurance subsidies to make sure there are no impoverished widows and orphans? If workers don't have cars to drive to work, they might become a burden on the unemployment insurance system, and who better than employers to pay automobile purchase and repair subsidies? Where shall the cornucopeia end?Where it will end is in the relocation of entrepreneurs to states not seized of mandatory benefit frenzy. WalMart is perfectly capable of locating super stores on the Delaware, Pennsylvania, and Virginia borders of Maryland, to say nothing to some creative accounting for its Maryland books. Nobody forces Internet firms who hire only the youngest and brightest (and cheapest to insure) to maintain work forces in Massachusetts. Nobody forces Massachusetts firms to hire full time workers who show up on payrolls rather than to hire through contracts to temporary worker firms or subsidiaries located in other states. And nobody forces Massachusetts firms to stay in state rather than relocate to New Hampshire (where many of their workers live anyway).Where shall the equity lines be drawn? Maryland at least would exempt 99.9 percent of firms in the State. Does Massachusetts intend to require the local hot dog stand to purchase group health insurance for its owner operator? Nationally, relatively few small businesses provide employer-financed health insurance--does Massachusetts seek to impose costly new requirements on them, imposed by no other state in the union? Or is the Massachusetts proposed law aimed only at WalMart, and purely symbolic "feel goodism." Has either state bothered to consult an economist? Folks in that profession will advise them that over time the entire effect of the mandated benefit will fall on workers, who will lose essentially dollar for dollar in dollar wages the amount spent on insurance benefits. Of course, one might argue the broader social benefits are well worth overriding worker preferences. Perhaps, but some workers have insurance elsewhere (through spouses, for example), and other workers are more interested in sending dollar wages to relatives abroad who would otherwise starve. Has any legislator in either state considered that workers in the state already have the luxury of deciding whether to work for an employer who offers "good" health insurance and one who does not, and have decided, by voting with their employment applications, on the mix of salary and fringe benefits that they prefer? No one has to take a job as a WalMart greeter. It is really quite remarkable how wise are the solons in these states who know better the needs and wants of every single worker in the state than the workers themselves.Proposals like these illustrate the high cost we pay for the economic illiteracy of most legislators, to say nothing of the arrogance of those who, like the latter day czars of the Soviet Union and the Platonists among us, believe that omniscient, all-powerful government can better arrange the affairs of men than private decisions freely arrived at. One can only hope that these states will pay an economic price so high as to dissuade any others from similar folly.”

As you can see, Walt, unlike your regular contributor, is a bit of a polemicist. But he’s right and Massachusetts lawmakers really ought to look at things other than this solution to their problems.

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Tuesday, December 27, 2005

Read and Weep

In reading today’s Boston Globe online, I found an extraordinary comparison of the similarities and differences between our national calamities in Vietnam and Iraq. H.D.S. Greenway worked as a correspondent in Vietnam and now writes for the Globe, so he has more than a passing knowledge of these tragic conflicts.

The most frightening thing to me is the similarity in the mindsets of both eras – how delusional our political and military leaders become in such situations.

It is particularly saddening to realize that brilliant people like Donald Rumsfeld who were present and in a position to understand the lessons of Vietnam could be fooled by their own hubris into believing that they through sheer will power and overarching American military technology could trump human nature. How sad.

The appointed leaders must be dismissed and the elected officials leading the charge must be turned out.

Read and weep.


http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2005/12/27/how_will_the_iraq_war_end?p1=email_to_a_friend

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Monday, December 26, 2005

Grandma Said

When I was very little boy, my maternal grandmother warned me that, “Murder will out.” I didn’t understand her at the time.

When I was in the second grade, our teacher left the room, and I led a relatively harmless insurrection. We drew graffiti on the blackboards and stomped all about. It was really fun; about thirty little boys and girls having a ball. I felt great; my leadership had made it all happen.

After about five minutes, we heard Miss Dighton returning and flew to our seats; so much for that escapade.

Not so fast! While I know that thoughts of bamboo shoots being shoved under the finger nails of my classmates were what caused the calamity, it took only one question from authority to discover the culprit. “Who started this?”

That twenty-nine fingers could point so rapidly and accurately was beyond my comprehension and a beautiful circle of guilt centered on the felon. It took less than ten seconds for me to be identified, arrested, and convicted.

I drew one lesson from that fiasco that has never left me: never conspire to do anything even vaguely criminal. If I ever thought about committing felonies after that day – and I have never been convicted of any such activities – I assure you those thoughts never included partners in crime.

That’s what I learned in the second grade and when I finally understood Grandma’s warning.

When The Pentagon Papers were released and the darkest secrets of Vietnam were made public, I made a quick connection of the dots back to my second grade experience. Obviously, after the insider revelations about Tyco and Enron, it was clear that such dots were not limited to the public sector. Conspiring to suppress what bad or questionable things you might be doing isn’t smart.

Unfortunately for our president and quite a few others on his team, they led far too sheltered lives and never listened to their Grandmas or paid attention to what happened in virtually every elementary school in the history of our species. Murder will out and don’t conspire. Is there more basic advice than that?

When they played games with the NSA, it was only a matter of time before someone outed them.

I think what they did was stupid and that those big boys and girls are going to find that out. I was seven years old. They’re all over fifty. Slow Learners, I’d say.

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Saturday, December 24, 2005

Cream Puffs in the Cabinet

There was an interesting column in the Boston Globe this morning (12/24/05) by Robert Kuttner. Referring to Doris Kearns's new book about Abraham Lincoln, Team of Rivals, Kuttner opines that Bush could learn a lot in running his administration from the sixteenth president. I’ve attached the article and recommend it as solid reading.

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2005/12/24/what_bush_couldlearn_from_lincoln?p1=email_to_a_friend

But I think that Kuttner missed the opportunity to discuss something far more fundamental as it relates to our current chief executive. Mr. Bush rarely misses the opportunity to say that we are a nation at war and that his most important role is to defend us in the conflict. That said, with the exception of Defense, his key cabinet spots are occupied by cronies and the powerless: State – Rice, Justice – Gonzales, Treasury – Snow.

A nation at war requires that we all pull together. Lincoln put together a cabinet representing a wide swath of public and political opinion in the Union States. But we shouldn’t forget that often when the nation was on war footing and perceived to be in danger the president reached across factional lines and appointed key officials with different political views from his own. Franklin Roosevelt matched Lincoln with a number of key Republicans in such spots as War, Navy, and Interior.

Even when the guns were quiet but the nation was perceived to be in great peril presidents such as Kennedy reached across the spectrum for key advisors such as Allen Dulles at CIA and Dillon at Treasury who provided broader and better advice than can ever be possible from the incestuous group of insider toadies assembled by Bush.

From the beginning, Mr. Bush wanted only the advice he wanted, and he got it. The Iraq War and his assault on the defined benefit program of Social Security among many others show just how insular his presidency is.

Mr. Kuttner’s point should be enlarged and examined. Because Mr. Bush wants only good news, that’s what he gets until the cigar with the firecracker blows up in his face. Everyone in the house was supportive of what was done in Iraq, but George Bush is catching the spears. Everyone on the team was supportive of his Social Security fiasco, but he’s the one labeled stupid.

The president better broaden the sources of input, even to the level of minor discomfort. Better a small turd on the cabinet conference table than a major fiasco being reported by all of the media outlets.

Three years is a long time to go. How long does it take to learn these lessons? Too long, I guess.

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Kwanzaa, and Happy Boxing Day; I’m shutting down for a couple of days to count my blessings and enjoy my family.

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Friday, December 23, 2005

Baloney by Bush

President Bush and Vice President Cheney are making aggressive defenses of the administration’s controversial wire tapping program that has bubbled up into the public eye in the past week. Their latest push is to have the judges on the court that is supposed to evaluate the need for warrants in such circumstances briefed so that they may learn why this program is constitutional.

After they’ve brow beaten these judges, they’re hoping the controversy will go away. But since one judge has already resigned in protest, they have to limit their lashing of the others at sub torture levels. This technique worked so well on CIA analysts in the run up to the Iraq War it’s no wonder they’re trying it again. No pressure, you understand, just stand over them and glare at them till they get it.

The president is also aggressively moving to defend the program by indicating that his most solemn duty is to protect the country. I came across a letter to the editor of the New York Times that deflates that notion far better than I ever could. Mr. Jeff Bialik of San Rafael, California gently points out that Mr. Bush’ most solemn responsibility is to uphold his oath to “preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of The United States.”

I was then going to rip Mr. Bush for his false logic in defense of his position, but here too I found someone who had already done the job better than I ever could. Ellen Goodman in her column, Bush’s False Choices, in today’s Boston Globe strips back the false logic and shows the president for what he is: a president infected with grandiosity. I invite you to click on this clear eyed analysis.

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2005/12/23/bushs_false_choices?p1=email_to_a_friend

Enough said for today!

Blog on!

Wild Bill

On Rereading

I golf using what one company selling a playing method it calls, `Natural Golf.’ I don’t play often – about once a week during the warmer months – or very well. But I have been using this method for several years. What I learned from reading their book - which is pretty good - is that by following their instructions, practicing a little and trying to employ their techniques as carefully as possible, I could improve. That isn’t earth shattering but it’s true.

What I’ve learned is that by rereading the instructions in a reasonably good how to book, you can better understand what the experts are driving at. Again, this is no big deal. More important, I’ve learned that by rereading other kinds of books one can gain new insights into what the author intended and, unless one is very well versed in the subject, rereading is an extraordinarily valuable technique.

I’m very interested in Existentialism – me and ten million others. Over the years, I’ve read quite a few books and articles on this subject and only became vaguely familiar with the intricacies of the subject. Using my little golf book as my guide, I began a systematic review and rereading of the thousands of pages of the books and articles on the subject that I own. The results are clear to me; by going over the material twice or even three or four times I have gained many insights into what some of the leading thinkers meant.

I’m no Camus, Sartre, Nietzche, or Kierkegaard and never will be; that was never my goal. But I do think that I understand – at least somewhat better than I did - and had even hoped until the last few years. I am neither a serious thinker nor scholar of Existentialism or anything else, but I think I’ve learned something useful. Repetition makes for a far greater understanding of whatever you’re interested in.

By repetition – or rereading – I don’t mean the kind that is required in school; that is of reading and going over material until you have it down for a test. What I’m driving at is going over material after extended periods of digesting it and after what was read is nearly cleared from memory. I’m rereading a book on Existentialism that I read and semi-enjoyed and understood about a year ago. In the interim, I’ve gone over a lot more material on the subject but still felt only marginally competent on the matter – again that's at my own very amateurish level.

But As I reread this book, many of the passages that were forgotten, obviously because they meant little to me earlier, came alive. I think that I understand what the author was driving at and it is making this rather difficult book a much more pleasant experience.

The purpose of this posting is not to interest you in Natural Golf or Existentialism – they’re not exactly out of the same course catalogue – but rather to encourage my older friends not to simply read and move on but to go over books about subjects they liked but which proved somewhat difficult the first time. There may be gems ready for mining the second time around. I’ve found this with how to, nonfiction and fiction.

Most of you may have known this all along. Indulge me, I’m a slow learner.

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Thursday, December 22, 2005

The Nation Mourns

By now everyone in Red Sox Nation has heard the word. Johnny Damon will not be patrolling center field for the old town team. Johnny served the nation with honor and played a huge part in winning the World Championship in 2004, and club management should be standing barefoot in the snow seeking the forgiveness of all of the citizens for permitting this travesty.

The nation can look back with pride and know that that the lads have accomplished goals barely dreamed of during the past century. We can be proud that the club is the only American League East team to win a world championship in this century, indeed in this millennium. Our hated rivals – and you know who they are – are basking in past and fast fading glory and in the joy of having stolen not only our great center fielder and lead off hitter but one of the leading intellectual lights of the Hub of the Universe. Best selling author Damon’s wondrous Transcendentalist book, Idiot: Beating “The Curse” and Enjoying the Game.

But all is not lost. Could Samson perform without his locks? It is reported that that Johnny will be introduced at a press conference later today, sans beard and hair. Can a proud `Dirt Bag’ find happiness in the perfectly pressed garb of a bourgeois uptight financial manager from Midtown? Never!

So it is unlikely that our poor lost son shorn of his hair will ever perform as well as he did in the Friendly Confines. To think that the poor boy will be required to shower before every road trip must be causing him great anxiety. How can he be expected to bat with that awful fact racking his lucre fevered brain?

I can’t imagine that the poor lost boy will ever find happiness in the Bronx. Showering, shaving, clean uniform, shiny helmet, and clean underwear every day; the thoughts of it must be giving him pause at this very moment. None the less, he signed the horrible paper.

And what else has he lost? Who’ll ever recognize him in New York? In Boston he was a real somebody. And his book, that’s the end of sales for that literary marvel; they say he was making ten thousand a year from that.

All that for George Steinbrenner’s cheap silver; I wish the hapless man well with the Evil Empire, and for just $52 million. Idiot!

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Wednesday, December 21, 2005

Rites of Spring - and a Mystery

Today, as the afternoon warmed, I felt a distinct change in the day. Low and behold, it’s the first day of spring. You remember how in a previous blog, It Might As Well Be Spring, posted on November 27, I abolished winter and summer, so it is indeed spring and even the red maples are showing signs of color in last year’s new branches and buds. I checked and the astronomers and climatologists confirmed the good news.

As promised in that earlier blog, at the appointed hour, I went into my garden and cavorted naked as called for in the primitive rites of spring. It was glorious feeling. The sun will return. There is hope for us.

A few minutes after returning to the house, I heard sirens. Apparently there were calls for ambulances to the neighborhood. It is sad that on such a joyous day not all are as healthy and happy as their aged neighbor, Wild Bill.

Shortly thereafter, another neighbor told me that the two young housewives, both barely of retirement age, who live in the properties flanking mine had collapsed nearly simultaneously for reasons unknown. They were taken to the hospital, treated and, thank goodness, released.

The mystery continued when the local Homeland Security people came by and asked nearby residents, including me, if we’d seen or heard anything unusual or blood curdling. Naturally, I was disappointed at not being to help but told them I was in my garden at about that time and observed and heard nothing out of the ordinary.

The young women were so traumatized by whatever they’d seen or heard that neither of them could recall anything about what had caused their anguish and physical collapse.

In any event, all’s well that ends well. It’s spring and they’ll be fine. Tomorrow, I’ll drop in on them with chicken soup. I’m certain that they’ll be pleased to see me; they always are.

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Tuesday, December 20, 2005

Odds and Ends - Big Ones

The president’s approval ratings are up…among his base supporters. It appears, however, that his major PR push over the last several weeks has paid off only with the faithful. Among Democrats and Independents there have been almost no positive changes in the ratings.

The revelation that the president authorized wiretapping of Americans without court orders is blowing up in his face. In today’s Washington Post, even conservative George Will was on his case and the only sign of support was a column written by neoconservatives.

The issue is ridiculous. According to The Boston Globe, the court in question has denied warrants in only four out of more than 5,200 requests over the past four years and, if it’s an emergency, the executive doesn’t even have to ask in advance. The agency simply does it and then asks for an ex post facto warrant; so much for the president’s ridiculous argument that the need for speed led to his order.

It’s very clear that members of this administration look not upon the Reagan Administration for its ideal as they so often indicate; they look to Richard Nixon’s relentless grasp for executive power as their example of how to restore the imperial presidency.

I’ve said it before there were things I liked about Nixon. He was the only president in my tenure that had some clue and inclination for managing the federal bureaucracy. Naturally, that positive led to a thousand negatives and ultimately to his less than happy departure into the setting sun.

As Nixon overreached then so is Bush now. The only thing I’ll say in his favor, he seems not to be exhibiting the obvious psychological strains that Nixon did when events started to spin out of his control in 1974.

Early results in the Iraqi election are going against the U.S. party line. Religious and ethnic parties seem to be the early winners. We were doing all we could for Interim Prime Minister Allawi and his buddies so now I guess Dubya is going to have to explain that electing mullahs was his plan all along.

Why on earth would anyone want to be president? I guess that’s why we get so few that exhibit signs of normalcy.

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Consignment – Bit Parts, B - Movies

Franklin Roosevelt once confided to Orson Welles that they were the two best actors in America. Many occupants of the White House recognized that the presidency was the greatest role on the largest stage in the world, and FDR was simply the first to spin it out in a stage whisper for all to hear. More than a generation later, the most accomplished practitioner of thespianism in the history of La Casa Blanca, Ronald Reagan, entered stage right, and his time in the role exceeded even Franklin’s at least for sheer show business acumen.

Apparently the present tenant of the Executive Mansion doesn’t realize some of his more illustrious predecessors were play acting and that when they said their lines many of them were for effect and not really carved in marble. FDR and the Gipper, for example, were among the most resolute of leaders and uttered among the strongest of proclamations. But lost on Bush 43 was the flexibility of Roosevelt and Reagan – and others; they were able to turn on a dime when it was warranted – or they were forced - and their ability to hide from their left hands what the rights were doing was sufficient to dazzle their audiences – if not their critics.

Watching Bush knuckle under to Senator John McCain on the torture issue and in other cases we see just what an amateur actor this president is; he fools no one when he claimed that it was his idea all along that torture should never be practiced in our names. This president is both rigid in his touch and incompetent in his ability to make the forced change in course to have been his, the captain’s, idea.

This president is also clumsy in presenting his arguments. For example, in Sunday (12/18/05) night’s speech he pounded his opponents for defeatism for thinking that the U.S. cannot win in Iraq. The number of his critics in Congress who are calling for immediate pullout is very small and his awkward attempts to lump those who are pushing for the fastest possible withdrawal from Iraq consistent with a reasonable chance for Iraqi success with extremists on the left just isn’t working. The majority of Bush’s critics – especially in Congress - of the war aren’t saying we can’t succeed at some level; they’re saying the price we’re paying for not getting out as quickly as possible is too high.

All of his efforts to cow his opponents for defeatism fail essentially because a greater number of people are coming to realize that he’s talking about the wrong subject. We attacked a country that was not a mortal threat to us or our friends, and we’re stuck with the president’s bad decision. Most of those opposed to the war are not calling for immediate pullout; we’re going along with him and those in Congress prodding him to get the troops out ASAP. His bad decision and his lack of presence are the reasons he can’t seem to pull this off.

And, of course, most of us opposed to what he’s wrought are fighting – apparently successfully – to keep the eyes of the voters on the calamity that the president created with his war. He didn’t keep his eye on the War on Terror, and down the pike many of those in Congress who continue to claque for him will be getting discharge papers from that conflict.

Maybe acting lessons would help. Na!

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Monday, December 19, 2005

Medicare Drug Benefits

Dear readers,

My friend Walt Francis is perhaps the foremeost authority on health insurance and health care financing in all of these United States. He has put together the following email and the attached analysis of the new and (at least to me) very confusing Medicare program on prescription drugs.

After reviewing it, I concluded that it was the first explanation of the program that I could understand. And you know that if I get it anyone can.

Walt sent this to his large mailing list of friends and encouraged us to pass it on to ours. I'm very pleased to send along this really valuable tool so that those of you on Medicare can make an informed decision and so you can forward it to others who are confused by the program.

I think this is a wonderful thing for Walt to have put together and thank him for all of you.

Wild Bill

Walt writes:

"Friends:I'm sending this out out most of my email list as a Christmas present to you and your family, friends, and neighbors. Deciding what to do about the new Medicare prescription drug benefit is really quite easy. It is not confusing and it is not complicated compared to things we do all the time, like buying a new car or deciding what book to read. No one should try to master the details of dozens of plans; just let the www.medicare.gov web site do the work for you.Please pass this on to persons on YOUR mailing list, to your neighbors, and to your family. (Yes, I know most of you are not 65 yet, but what about the folks next door?) The local help lines are badly backed up, but going online is simple, fast, and effective. And for those seniour without Internet savvy, what are friends, neighbors, and relatives for except to help?The attached file is a Microsoft Word file. It is two pages long. Just find the one or two paragraphs that apply to you, and get on with it! No more procastination!Walton Francis"


"The Simple Two-Page Guide to Medicare Part D Prescription Drug Insurance
Expert advice from Walton Francis, million selling book author of health insurance advice for Federal government employees and retirees--December 14, 2005 version.

The way for people on Medicare to deal with Part D is to sort themselves into the right category, and then start doing their homework.

If you have former employer coverage of drugs that is as good or better than Part D (like Federal retirees), or get your drugs from TRICARE or VA, you will waste money if you join Part D. If you have private employer coverage, you will probably lose it if you join Part D. With good coverage you can ignore Part D. However, if you are not sure whether that coverage is as good or better, read the "creditable coverage" letter from your former employer. If you are still not sure, call your former employer or the insurance plan. Be careful not to lose benefits!

If you are on Medicaid, the program that covers most low-income elderly, and most nursing home residents, you will be automatically enrolled. You can, however, still change from one plan to another. If you are in a “State Pharmaceutical Assistance Program” for limited-income persons you will probably be able to keep it and use it to supplement your Medicare benefit.

If you have a Medigap drug plan (H, I, J, or grandfathered), run, don't walk, to drop Medigap drug coverage and join a Medicare Advantage or Part D plan. Medicare drug coverage saves you about a thousand dollars a year compared to any Medigap drug plan. (The government pays three fourths of the Medicare premium, and you pay the whole Medigap premium, just for starters.) Some smart consumers will join new Medigap plans called K and L; these are better insurance deals than other Medigap plans for hospital and medical bills.

If you are already in a Medicare Advantage plan that combines filling in the holes in Medicare with drug coverage, it probably is getting better next year. But do check its details and consider shopping for an even better deal before you relax.

If you have a drug discount card, it is almost certainly either expiring, or dropping people with Medicare. Regardless, joining Medicare Part D is essential for anyone with expenses high enough to have needed a discount card.

If you don’t have drug coverage, you should join a Medicare Part D prescription drug plan, even if your drug costs are low. It is cheap insurance and there are premiums at $20 a month or less in every state. In one State there is a plan that costs only about $4 a month! Many cost $10 a month or less. Cancer and other dread diseases with high drug costs don't wait until the next Open Season to strike, so everyone should have current drug coverage "just in case." That is why it is called insurance. The very best thing about Medicare Part D is that it guarantees that you will never spend more than $3600 for drugs. The so-called “donut hole” is best understood as a guaranteed limit against financial catastrophe. Almost everyone can buy true insurance and peace of mind for under one or two hundred dollars a year.

If your income is limited (below about $15,000 a year) and your savings low you can get extra help and your Part D coverage will be almost free. Almost-free coverage even makes sense for someone with “creditable coverage” in a good retiree plan, unless you lose other benefits. Eligibility checking is simple at www.ssa.gov or a local Social Security office.

To join up you should use the prescription drug plan comparison tool at http://www.medicare.gov/ to pick the best plan(s). Use the link to Compare Medicare Prescription Drug Plans. You type in your Rx info, drug by drug, and it tells you which plans give you the best deal on annual costs. If you don't already use the Internet, find a friend, neighbor, relative, librarian, or Aging Agency person to give you help. It takes about a half hour if you have your prescription drug information handy (copies of your drug receipts from pharmacies have the key details). Or you can have the government run the computer program for you by calling 1-800-MEDICARE. You can find the least expensive plans—taking into account both premium and coverage—and pick the one that is most convenient to you.

Also consider joining a Medicare Advantage plan. Most of them give you not only drug coverage but also pay most deductibles and coinsurance for “zero premium” extra. They now include not just HMOs, but also Preferred Provider (PPO) plans and even some fee for service plans. Most of them are great insurance deals if you are willing to accept some restrictions on provider choice. If you don't know which one to pick, an easy strategy is to narrow your choice by asking your physician which plan(s) he or she participates in. One good source for finding best buys is at www.medicarenewswatch.com.

The best publication is the one everybody on Medicare gets for free, Medicare & You 2006. It is totally revised to deal with the new benefits and plans. There are also some handy summary tables at http://www.medicare.gov/ for both Medicare prescription drug and Medicare Advantage plans. But don’t try to study the details of many plans. Use the drug plan comparison tool to simplify your choice!

Join right away. If you join by December 31st, 2005, your coverage starts on January 1st. You can wait as long as May 15, 2006, but you not only lose valuable coverage but also may have a last minute “senior moment.” Don’t put it off! (You can even change your mind later, so you lose nothing by signing up now.) There are penalties for late enrollment, but the big cost is giving up insurance savings. You can join on the Internet, by calling the plan number, or at 1-800-MEDICARE.
That is it. Nothing really confusing and or hard to figure out if you use the Internet and your common sense, with a little homework. There are many more details but most seniors don’t need to focus on those. And you can always call 1-800-MEDICARE for additional details, or for help in signing "

Saturday, December 17, 2005

The Free Market Lives

Most of the time, I hold myself out to be a moderate in politics. On days when I’m somewhat more full of myself, I proclaim that I’m an Edmund Burke Conservative. But when the Busch and my more combative streaks are in full flower, I announce that I’m a poor man’s Tom Paine. Those points given, I usually take other pundits at their word about what or who they are. They are almost all hard right or left; otherwise, they couldn’t draw listeners, readers, or viewers and their audiences would be the size of mine. No offense, dear reader!

For me, Rush is a weak minded but great entertainer with an extraordinary grasp of how to milk an audience and run a mike. Too bad, but I also find him to be mean spirited. The others of his stripe on both sides of the issues get even less respect from me. As far as leading newspaper pundits are concerned, these I grant a little more honor but never forget they are whores. They’re paid to represent some sliver of the political spectrum and most deliver what they advertise.

After all this sophisticated analysis, I must admit to being naïve. I’ve taken all these people to be relatively honest in their positions. But over the course of the last year, I’ve come to realize that some of the whores do not have hearts of gold beneath those hard edged exteriors. Here I thought they meant what they said – at least a little – and all the while they’ve been two timing their pimps and regulars.

Federal money! My goodness, federal money, that ultimate aphrodisiac, has worked its magic far more effectively than I ever thought possible. Conservative pundits have been singing the virtues of a whole host of government programs, but more than a few have been paid to do it. For a few pieces of federal silver they’ll tell you the virtues of No Child Left Behind or most anything else in the Republican cupboard. Woe is Bill!

At least my faith in Arab traders was restored, a number of first class journalists in Iraq glommed onto the Iraq War supplemental budget and wrote stories in local papers proclaiming the benefits of living under American occupation. Those poor wretches were vastly underpaid and at least learned how to put bread on the table for their families.

That’s about where I stood until the past few days. I had a pretty good fix on the hookers and on which corners each belonged. All was right with the world, and I was not a complete cynic.

Above these street walkers was a class of escort services whose integrity was unassailable. Sugar daddies from both sides of the spectrum set up houses that were pure as the driven snow. South paws could be sure of the Brookings Institution, and starboard hurlers could have complete faith that the stables at The American Enterprise Institute and The Cato Institute were above reproach. But it’s not true!

The papers are full of how Bill’s been two timed. It seems that lobbyists with fists full of lucre were able to buy the services of at least one of the fellows and have him place articles extolling the virtues of the lobbyist’s clients. Go for it, capitalist baby!

Poor Bill’s now learned that beyond the money paid to these fellows, they are generally free to sell their services elsewhere providing they keep their sugar daddies informed of what they’re doing. So while they should be studying and thinking about the great imponderables, they are often typing - as Bill is this minute for free – for additional heavy metal.

Even sadder, it appears that some of people in the best houses may be subject to the siren song of federal or even private money. How awful is that?

Well at least we that what happens in Washington stays in… No, what happens in the Capital often leads to Las Vegas.

The free market lives!

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Friday, December 16, 2005

DNA Not Required

President Bush broke the law. He broke a very important law that prohibits domestic spying by Federal agents. He broke the law almost certainly with full knowledge that he was doing it; White House Counsel certainly gave an opinion that what was proposed was illegal and improper. That is scary!

Agents are permitted to spy on citizens within the country if they can convince appropriate courts that national security violations are taking place. The president signed an order directing a federal agency to carry out surveillance on activities outside the scope of the law. That is very scary!

What is most frightening to me is not what I have just written but rather that high federal officials would agree to carry out such illegal activities if the president would agree to sign off and take responsibility.

I served in the military, honorably if not spectacularly, and spent most of my adult life working for the federal government, including two times in different elements of the Executive Office of the President, The Council on Wage and Price Stability and The Office of Management and Budget.

The army drilled into us that we were never required to obey an illegal order. Indeed we were told that if we obeyed such an order, we would be guilty of whatever crime we might commit in doing what we were told. While as a civil servant I do not remember being explicitly trained that the military concept of following illegal orders was correct, I felt throughout my career that that was the case and was never disabused of the notion.

Having known of many cases where federal employees did violate this concept under pressure from superiors, I am not shocked that the National Security Agency has itself in a pickle over this. What is most amazing is that Bush signed the directive. That’s stupid!

Presidents wanting to have illegal actions taken in the past did it with a wink and a nod. When they wanted the IRS or the FBI to do things they weren’t supposed to, they just hinted. Mr. Bush has apparently signed a document authorizing on his personal authority the NSA to spy – illegally. How dumb can you be?

This may all go away. No one really wants to impeach the president for wanting to defend the nation, but, my God, this is stupid and scary.

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Thursday, December 15, 2005

Be a Blogger

Do you have opinions? Strong ones? If you share them with family and friends, what’s your reach?

Just who the hell is Rush Limbaugh? Al Franken? What gives the New York Times the right to sole possession of your thoughts? The Wall Street Journal? USA Today? Do you always agree with the fair and balanced FOX News? You mean you agree with everything Lou Dobbs says about immigration and globalization? How about that local talk show host, does he speak for you? And that lady with the local cable access show, does she always have it right?

Of course you have thoughts and Constitutional right to express them. Sure you’ve had coffee and doughnuts with the same six people for the last twelve years. They know your opinion on everything and you know what they have to say about Bush, Iraq and Social Security. But who are you influencing?

While you’re mouthing off at the Dew Drop Inn, your State Rep and Congressman are letting lobbyists tell them what’s good for you. Do you suppose that’s really in your best interests? While you’re sipping java and banging your gums with Fred and Mildred, your Congressman’s sending your tax dollars to a thousand and one places you don’t want them to go.

A year and a half ago, I decided to fight for what I thought was right. Free Blogs became available, and while I’m a technical klutz, I decided to do battle. It took a little work and more than a few errors, but now I’m a blogger. I was always a writer of letters to editors and succeeded in getting quite a few missives printed – even in some big papers. But they can’t print everything you write; they have to spread the wealth and, besides, they’re paying people to follow their lead and think for you.

After these months, dear readers, I’ve worked like a dog to influence you and to change if you think I’m wrong – if I agree with the assessment. Blogging isn’t easy. If you don’t write regularly, your readers drift away. Without an editor, you’re bound to make mistakes – lots of them – and look like an ignoramus. But over time, if you try to be reasonable and consistent, you can spread your views. How far? How influentially? It’s impossible to say. There are a few clues to guide you. Every once in a while, Google – which supports my blog for free – tallies up the number of people who have explored my site, not just landed on the blog on purpose or by accident. A month or so ago, the number of people who read my profile came in at just under 500. I’m pretty sure it’s more than that by now, but Google doesn’t hurry even when major milestones are just waiting to be met.

I also put a counter on my blog to see how many people landed on it, but that’s imperfect since, among other things, it counts my own checks – several a day – to see if people are reading. I also have a fairly substantial list of folks to whom I send selected articles, so they often read the postings without being counted. Then there folks who get my writings automatically; they’re far too technically advanced for me and leave no finger prints.

So, after all this hand wringing, how many people read this blog? I don’t know. But with all the clues above and several others, it’s probably in the range of fifty to a hundred; double that is possible but that would be miraculous. Not a lot huh? For all the work thinking about a topic for the day and committing it to electronic pulses, that doesn’t seem like much.

But I’m a cup half full kind of person. My friends and I share our views and frustrations on a wide variety of subjects, and I’m sure there is some outside fertilization as a result of our regular interactions. But my – their - collective reach and influence on topics of interest and importance to me and us is extremely limited. Besides, I like writing my thoughts. Francis Bacon was correct when he said, “Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man and writing an exact man.” Truly, forcing one’s self to write and publish positions on matters of controversy makes one as careful, precise and exact as possible. It clears the cobwebs of the mind.

So please dear readers, think about joining me in this venture. I’m quite sure that you either agree with almost all of my positions or are unalterably opposed to the content of my blog. Either way, by blogging along with me, the level of public discourse can be improved and expanded, and, even though in only a limited manner, our influence on those who would like to make us think correctly – as they see it - will be there and they willhave to account for us.

Blogging is far easier than most people believe. Start!

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Tuesday, December 13, 2005

Goodbye Tookie

Tookie Wilson is dead – no big deal. From all that I’ve read in the past several days, he was a very bad person, and the only redeeming things to be said about him are that in prison he tried to tell young people that the outlaw way will not lead to a productive life. Perhaps his death will reinforce the lesson.

That said; I’m unalterably opposed to the death penalty. First and foremost, there is and always will be the chance that we will execute innocent people. If you believe that then you have to accept that the Tookie Wilsons of the planet – and there are more than a few of them – will have to be spared.

I don’t want to blame Governor Schwarzenegger for his call. I don’t know anything about the law in California, but capital punishment is the prescribed penalty there and only if the case in point overtly fails to meet the requirements then can sending a person to his or her death be set explicitly at the governor’s door step. I read the governor’s statement on the case, and he seems to have genuinely tried to give full consideration to the total Tookie Wilson. The governor was, however, under pressure from his conservative base and politics is always part of the process

This morning while running errands, I listened to a local right wing talk show and was appalled. Wilson’s death was treated by many his callers as an event of joy. The host parodied an old time popular song by singing “Took, Took, Tookie, Goodbye.” This barbarism was mighty callous for a person who holds himself out to be a civilized person.

It is possible, even likely, that Wilson was every bit as evil as the callers indicated, but I cannot understand why the death penalty is the answer. If innocence is possible, how can we send people to their deaths and be unable to make amends should it ever come to light that a mistake was made?

Capital punishment is certainly not a deterrent to offenses warranting the death penalty. California has had the remedy for years and still people are murdered in heinous manners. Texas has taken the lives of killers in huge numbers and still grisly murders take place there. The same can be said for my State of Virginia which has executed more than its share of killers and probably innocent men and women. In each of these jurisdictions the murder rate is significantly higher than in some other states that have abandoned the ultimate penalty.

How much greater penalty is execution than life in prison without the possibility of parole? I read the account of the Wilson death, and he got on the gurney without any sign of struggle. Most of the people facing execution do so with stout hearts – or at least resignation. Years on death row seems to have steeled them against their fate. In some cases there is probably a release; it’s over, so be it. Besides some perhaps most of them are guilty as sin and accept the need for society to seek its punishment, and most of them are not trained ethicists.

I’ve read and do not doubt that it costs far more to carry out capital punishment than to incarcerate convicted killers. Clearly, California with the longest appeals process in the country with average terms on death row of a quarter of a century spends far more than would they would by simply locking them up and throwing away the key.

In every controversial case, the family of the victims is trotted out and they claim that they will not get closure until the beast is killed. While I know that I would make the same type of statement were I the father, brother, husband or friend of someone murdered in cold blood, it should be the role of the state to seek justice in the name of all of the people – not just those who loved the victims – and not to cater to the bloodthirsty needs of those left behind. Besides, my – and their – need for revenge could possibly be misplaced; it has happened that innocent people have gone down to the savage satisfaction of those loved ones still alive. An apology and a `too bad' just don’t hack it in such circumstances.

Why then are so many people, especially those committed to the sanctity of life, filled with joy when a fellow human being is put to death?

The fault lies not exclusively with the politicians – although they owe us leadership in such circumstances – but with us all.

Blog on!

Wild Bill

It's Time for a Change

The media seems to have concluded that we should ignore the president’s defiant proclamation that knowing what he knows today he’d still order the invasion of Iraq. Things said under pressure often come out quite differently than we’d have liked. I’ve said more than a few things in this life that I’d like to take back, and I’m sure that you, dear reader, have done the same. But then we’re not the President of the United States.

In this case, we must parse Mr. Bush’s words very carefully. Although uttered in response to what was clearly a hostile query in Philadelphia yesterday, the question (Now that we know there were no WMDs and that Saddam and al Qaeda were not cooperating to join forces against us, do you have any regrets for having invaded Iraq?) has been asked a thousand different ways in the media, so we cannot give the president the point that he answered without time to reflect on all of the ramifications of his response.

The sum and substance of his statement leads me to conclude that he wanted to invade Iraq regardless of what the intelligence showed. Long before the invasion, Mr. Bush asserted that his goal was to enforce United Nations mandates designed to assure that Iraq not inflict upon its neighbors attacks using weapons of mass destruction thought to be in his arsenal. In retrospect, it is absolutely clear that Iraq was no longer to be feared from a WMD point of view and UN sanctions were indeed working to contain Iraq.

Another argument used by the president and his neocon buddies was that Iraq was conspiring with al Qaeda with the probable intent of providing Osama bin Laden with Iraqi WMDs to use against his enemies of which the U.S. is clearly number one; we are the Great Satan. That argument too has been debunked. The main source of the information was a suspected al Qaeda operative who was tortured in Egypt to provide the tidbit.

So, we, the U.S., no longer press the case that there were WMDs in Iraq and that Saddam was in league with al Qaeda. Of course, under political pressure, Vice President Cheney still broadly hints he has special sources that assure him that that is still the case.

We have to conclude that our rationale for the invasion to enforce UN resolutions, to prevent Saddam from using WMDs on us or our allies, and to prevent transfer of these weapons to al Qaeda was wrong, wrong, a thousand times wrong!

Since those revelations have become public knowledge and the weight of public opinion has swung against us, the United States, the president trumped up new reasons for the invasion. These include making the US safer by spreading democracy throughout the Middle East and indeed the world, and that Iraq was the best place on the planet to start the quest. He also is intent on spreading democracy throughout the Muslim world during the remainder of his term, although not necessarily by means of military invasion. Further, he says that by fighting the terrorists in Iraq we won’t have to fight them here. That, despite the fact that killed and captured insurgents in Iraq are almost all Iraqis, is always going to be unprovable.

In addition to this litany, the right wing, including the president, is abusing our troops by continually saying that they support the mission and by having soldiers state for the record that things are improving in Iraq and that they want to finish the mission so that their dead and wounded will not have sacrificed in vain. The questions for these poor young folks are: What is the mission? What have your comrades sacrificed for? How long will we have to stay? How much more blood and treasure will be expended? For what? Etc., etc., etc.

As I see it, the American ground troops are overstretched; too many tours have been served by too few soldiers and marines; there are or were too few of them to occupy the country; they weren’t adequately equipped; our attention was diverted from the war in Afghanistan where the Taliban and al Qaeda were on the run; we really don’t have a mission in Iraq for which these troops were prepared; China is taking advantage of our position to gear up as a rival in the Pacific; we are neglecting our own hemisphere and problems are proliferating; The billions being wasted in Iraq could have been used to heal the problems that the president is ignoring on our own Gulf Coast.

I could go on and on but I believe my points are made. The President is unrepentant and plays to his base on a daily basis. The government has been in the hands of a single party and their power and hubris have corrupted it and its elected officials.

It’s time for a change!

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Monday, December 12, 2005

Houston, We Have A Problem

A few minutes ago, I heard the President state categorically that despite the absence of weapons of mass destruction and a complete absence of evidence of cooperation between Saddam’s government and al Qaeda he would still order an invasion of Iraq. That is mad statement!

More than 2,000 American deaths, 15,000 wounded and injured, many of these permanently disabled and disfigured, tens of thousands of Iraqi deaths, a quarter of a trillion dollars spent on a war for the idea that Iraqis could vote in an election that may well spell the end of Iraq as a nation and weaken our strategic position in the Middle East. What is this man on?

The president has lost complete touch with reality!

Do not vote for those supporting this man.

Blog on!

Wild Bill

President Clinton - Hilary That Is

Hilary Clinton has found the third way on Iraq, and I agree with her – mostly. At this juncture, she joins Wesley Clark as the only two national Democrats who seem to understand what the American public – other than the extreme liberal base of the Democrats and the hard core right of Bush supporters – really want in Iraq: a quick end to the carnage with a chance that the Iraqis can pull off some reasonable form of self government. Only these two candidates – are too! – recognize that the Democrats better get on the correct side of national security issues and stop pandering to peaceniks past.

Here’s today’s Washington Post article on the subject for those beyond the ordinary reach of the paper:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/11/AR2005121100846.html?referrer=emailarticle

The president’s misuse of prewar intelligence has provided ample room for Senator Clinton to finesse her vote in support of the resolution permitting the president’s finding of a need to attack Iraq. Frankly, I’d feel more comfortable if she would be more aggressive in denouncing the original decision, but that’s nothing compared to the rush to the left by Pelosi, Kerry, and Dean et al.

For years, I felt that Senator Clinton was merely a derivative candidate identified far more closely with the left wing of the Democrats than her husband and carrying baggage far too heavy for independents and moderates of both parties, but her years in the Senate have shown her to be an able politician able to move to the center of the body. Her husband, what’s his name? – continues to show his genius by not being seen as the gray imminence behind his spouse.

Subject to change based in circumstances yet unknown, the Democrat field has been narrowed to two – Clinton and Clark, with Clinton holding a decided edge with me.

That a woman can be president is obvious. That senator Clinton has taken yet another giant step toward that office is clear.

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Sunday, December 11, 2005

Cut the Baloney

I am now pulling for President Bush to pull off whatever the hell it is he’s intent on in Iraq over the next three years. If he has to `win’, so be it. We’ve just got to get out of there and stop losing American and Iraqi lives.

He and Joe Lieberman deserve each other; maybe Joe can be the VP candidate on the Republican ticket in ’08.

Bush keeps comparing his war in Iraq with that of Roosevelt’s in W.W.II and the problems of the Iraqis with that of the Japanese in the Post War era. What the hell is Dubya smoking?

The whole world was in danger in 1941. The Japanese attacked us and the Germans declared war on us. How in God’s name can an analogy be extracted from that pile of manure? We imposed democracy on Japan – on a defeated enemy government, nation, and people.

Bush was the guy who defined the Saddam government as the enemy and the Iraqi people as our friends. How the hell do you impose a form of government on friends without them being at least a little resentful? If the Japanese didn’t like it, they could lump it, and we had the occupation army in place to make them lump it.

The comparisons of these wars and occupations are so ridiculous that they’re hardly worth writing about, but he just won’t stop with the high minded bovine waste. So what can I do?

Please, Dubya, cut the crap! Just get us to hell out of that hole ASAP with our forces in the best shape possible!

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Saturday, December 10, 2005

Ask One for the Gipper

Since the guardian angel of all things Republican and conservative these days is the soul of the Gipper. Shouldn’t we be trying to determine how the acolytes are measuring up to the standards of the guy in the sky?

A reasonable starting point might be Saint Ron’s basic question: are you better off now than four years ago? Shouldn't we ask that not only about ourselves but about the nation itself?

How could the building blocks of the question be framed? Are we dealing with the real problems of our time? Have we advanced the nation’s well being by invading Iraq? Is our strategic position better now than on the day prior to the invasion? Is Iran as frightened of an attack today as they were prior to the occupation of its neighbor? If the grand dream of toppling Saddam and being greeted by united Iraqis strewing flowers before our troops had come to pass, would the Mullahs be more amenable to talks about their nuclear ambitions? Would the Syrians be more cooperative about helping close their border?

How about at the other end of that great land mass, would the North Koreans be as obdurate about their WMDs if we could really rattle our sabers at the 38th parallel?

Would we be struggling with our foot soldier recruitment program without the insurgency that is? Is the morale of our soldiers and marines as great as we hear in the face of third and fourth rotations into Iraq?

How about Afghanistan? Where would we be in the fight against the Taliban and al Qaeda if we weren’t starving that front of the resources required to actively pursue our acknowledged enemies in the mountains outside of Kabul?

How’re our two trainee democracies going? Are those stories out of Iraq about the Shias using the security forces to settle old scores with Sunnis correct? Is it really true that foreign fighters in Iraq are really a very small percentage of those fighting in the insurgency? Is Iraq likely to break into three almost nations that despise each other? Will we be better off with three autonomous regions without a centrally controlled and reliable military to face up to the Mullahs of Iran?

Who’s that commie thumbing his nose at us from South America – you know, the guy with all that oil? Are we really paying as much attention to what’s going on in our hemisphere as we should?

Oh, and what’s the name of the commie country with all those nickel an hour workers that is stripping us of our manufacturing base? You know, the guys that we owe our grandchildren’s lunch money to – the guys who’re building all those nuclear subs and now aircraft carriers who’re gearing up to challenge U.S. supremacy, at least in their part of the pond? But it’s getting hard to talk human rights with those cats with our non-torture policies and mini-prison scandals, isn’t it?

Are we better off having abandoned the chance to make the Social Security program work for future generations? Was approaching it from the point of view of destroying it as a defined benefit program and turning it into a defined contributions program the best way to go? Now, instead of having faced up to the task, are we better off by forgetting that we ever brought up the subject?

What do you think Reagan’s answers might be?

Well, that’s enough brain strain for one day. Questions on budget and trade deficits, how we’re going to deal with the natural calamities and human misery on our Gulf Coast, and whether the president encouraging the study of competing theories in biology was useful to Kansas students will have to wait another day.

But I think we can safely assume that the number one resident of the White House has positive answers to each of today's queries.

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Wednesday, December 07, 2005

Howard and Nancy

Leave it to the Democrats to screw up a royal straight flush. George Bush has led us into a preventive war of aggression in Iraq. The voters are beginning to understand what has happened and are demanding an end to it. How do our friends, the Democrats respond? By taking a hard left turn in front of a host of speeding eighteen wheelers. A mixed metaphor it is, but you get what I mean.

Howard Dean: “We can’t win!” Of course we can win! It depends on how you define the term. Obviously, the Republicans baited the Vermont Bad Boy with a poor term, `win' instead of `succeed', but Dean walked into the haymaker. Whether we can win has never been the point. Now Howard and company put me in a position where I have to defend Bush; how bad is that? Success can be defined as the point at which we have a relatively stable government in Iraq that is capable of defending itself against enemies foreign and domestic and that at least respects some reasonable rights for all of its citizens. Come on Howard!

All opponents - and even the supporters - of the war want the troops out as soon as possible. But the House Minority Leader beats the drums for sending in the troop ships – now! Come on Nancy!

None of us, supporters and opponents, want atrocities committed in our name. By saying that American troops are terrorizing Iraqi civilians by breaking down doors in the night, John Kerry provides ammunition to those on the right who say opponents of the war are against our troops and against a strong national defense.

Bush is on the ropes and his principal opponent – the Democratic Party – drops its guard and juts out its chin daring him to bop it. Come on Democrats!

After a long war in which the United States and its allies demanded unconditional surrender, Harry Truman defined victory in W.W.II as not necessitating the overthrow of the Emperor of Japan; that was a condition. Of, course we can win! Get with the program Democrats!

I am a Democrat – now! I paid my dues and answered my questionnaire. Unfortunately, my answers seem to have ended up in the trash can as statistical anomalies. Keep a light on for me my friends in the GOP, the prodigal will have to return someday.

Odds and ends. The hard right is at war with the 9/11 Commission. Vicious Ad hominem attacks on Richard Ben-Veniste and, especially, former deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick, combined with unrelenting attacks on the American Civil Liberties Union are herrings trying to draw public attention away from Bush administration and Republican Congressional failures to make the nation as secure as possible against future terrorist attacks. I heard a local (Washington, DC Area) right wing talk show host blame the ACLU for the government’s failures in aircraft security. I guess blaming judges legislating from the bench is too mild in this case.

I can’t tell you how much I admire Ramsey Clark. I watched him being interviewed last night. He came across to me as the most idealistic person I have ever seen. He did not defend any of Saddam’s crimes – he’s a consultant to the defense team – but he dared to accuse Bush of international crimes for starting a war of aggression against Iraq. The poor fellow seems to have believed all the pap about ideals and justice that must flashed across the dinner table in a house headed by a Supreme Court Justice. Now he travels the planet telling the absolute truth as he sees it and prophesizing like a Cassandra and, like her, he is doomed to be ignored and reviled.

Over the past two decades, I had established myself with family and friends as an Edmund Burke Conservative, but George W. Bush has damaged that image and many readers now put me in the company of Dean and Pelosi. These folks make it very difficult to say we should be voting for them in ’06 and ’08, but remember we are punishing the atrocious behavior of taking this nation into an unjust war and losing sight of the war on terror that we were fighting so effectively in Afghanistan before we invaded Iraq. We are not saying that we want the Democrats; we are turning out the Republicans.

P.S. Remember Pearl Harbor and 9/11.

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Monday, December 05, 2005

Remember Pearl Harbor

Last Pearl Harbor Day I described the event from the perspective of an eight year old boy. While not comprehending the attack as the adults around me, I knew that something very profound had occurred. I must be among the youngest people in the world who have personal memories of the date that will live in infamy.

It’s nice to be among the youngest at something. While a child, I was often the youngest to do this, that or the other thing, but with a white mane comes the honor of being the oldest at most tasks or anniversaries.

This year, remembrances of Pearl Harbor will bring back many memories and much soul searching. Being extraordinarily angry with President Bush for leading us into a preventive war against Iraq, I’ve tried to analyze what he has done and evaluate it with how his predecessors acted under at least vaguely analogous circumstances.

Franklin Roosevelt under severe pressure from Isolationist Republicans – and more than a few Democrats – saw Western Civilization enter a period of extreme danger that was bound to involve the United States. He saw clearly the dangers posed by National Socialism, Soviet Communism, and Japanese Militarism, and under extreme political pressure he had to ready the nation yet not act precipitously in the face of external threat. His great leadership and political adroitness saved America, helped destroy Nazism, stopped Japanese imperialism, rescued and revived Western Civilization, and prepared the way for containing Soviet expansionism.

The attack on Pearl Harbor and Hitler’s hubris in declaring war on us permitted Roosevelt to exert his greatest powers of leadership and propelled the nation to the forefront in the world.

Truman, despite personal fieriness was ever thoughtful as president, acted in Korea after our ally had been attacked. This, the Marshall Plan, and his measured response to the encirclement of Berlin assures his place in the pantheon of presidents. He acted forcefully when it was called for and with restraint when required.

In trying to evaluate Vietnam, I believe that the slide into the morass was far less blameworthy than what has befallen us in Iraq. Eisenhower and Kennedy got caught up in the problems of France, a valued ally. Johnson, who bears the greatest burden of blame in that war, was well drawn in before realizing the full extent of the problem and the difficulties of extracting our forces with any semblance of honor. The war destroyed what might well have been one of the great presidencies. Nixon and Ford worked hard to make the best of a bad situation. Clearly, the fears of a domino like fall of nations before the communist onslaught were never realized, and our understanding of a megalithic world communism were laid to rest forever.

George H. W. Bush (Bush 41) was faced with the invasion of Kuwait by the armies of Saddam Hussein. Bush and other world leaders demanded that Saddam withdraw from Kuwait and threatened military action if he did not. Saddam refused, and Bush shined by developing a true international force supported by the vast majority of the nations of the world and the voters of this country. The allied forces triumphed in short order and restored the government of Kuwait to power. Bush 41, clearly understanding the mood of the coalition allies and the likely problems with occupying a Muslim nation, stopped his forces when the objective of restoration had been achieved.

Going back even further in American history we can see the difficulties of such presidents as Wilson and Lincoln in leading the nation into war. Wilson’s case was difficult, but he had the sinking of American vessels to fall back on in his arguments for entering the fray. Lincoln, of course, waited for the Confederacy to fire the first shots in South Carolina.

To give Bush some small cover – which is not my purpose – it is clear that presidents have acted preemptively in many cases. Our war with Mexico has never granted us much pleasure and our actions in Panama and Grenada might fool some into seeing comparisons with Iraq. But these are false. Our actions in the Western Hemisphere going back to our earliest national history when President Monroe acted to defend the New World from old world aggression deserve a special sphere of consideration.

This leads us directly to George W. Bush’s war in Iraq. There can be little doubt that Saddam posed little threat to us or our allies in the region. It is evident that the nation was led into a conflict at the head of a phony coalition under false pretenses. George Bush will never be able to worm his way out of this indictment.

His only way to redemption is to fix what he has broken. He has to patch together something akin to a government in Iraq, arm its police and security forces, provide some protection from international intrusion - especially from Iran, withdraw most all of our troops from the country, and to create – as suggested by Congressman John Murtha and others – a force that can intervene in the region if things go terribly from our interests in the region.

It’s sad, but Bush has almost no wiggle room, and we have little choice to support him.

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Sunday, December 04, 2005

When Johnny Comes Marching Home

In yesterday’s posting, I beat the Washington Post to the punch. In today’s paper, Jonathan Rauch of The Brookings Institution and The National Journal proclaims that we can issue the sheet music to When Johnny Comes Marching Home to every local brass band in the country. He argues President Bush will have no choice but to begin a serious drawdown of American troops in Iraq. His insightful article, All Over but the Pullback, is tagged for your own evaluation. In one of the most devastating sentences I’ve ever read about Iraq, Rauch demolishes the effort with, “The public will not support a military operation that it has come to regard as social work on behalf of Iraqis, rather than security work on behalf of Americans.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/02/AR2005120201409.html?referrer=emailarticle

Rauch compares and contrasts Bush’s position with that of my favorite but fatally flawed Republican president, Richard Nixon. I still lament that Tricky Dick was over the top with paranoia; ah, what I can I do about madmen of the past?

So, like Wild Bill, Rauch sees little alternative for Bush but to start the strategic withdrawal. And like WB again, Rauch sees the Republicans trying to deflect blame for the fiasco that is the cancer in Iraq. In the fourth paragraph from the end of the piece, the author hints at the arguments likely to be propounded by the White House to blame the Democrats for any resulting problems. It isn’t too far from the `Stab in the Back’ argument used a thousand times in the past that I’ve written about in a previous posting. (I heard Rush Limbaugh use it almost word for word the other day.)

As I argued yesterday, we must not let red herrings draw us from the fact that this is George Bush’s war. The neocons dreamed it up, and he bought it. First in line at the sales counter were the Republicans in Congress. No matter how hard they try to squirm out of this calamity, Republican legislators must be punished by rational independents and moderates of both parties.

Do not be drawn from the trail! Vote Democrat in ’06 and ’08!

What? You’re a Republican moderate! Hold your nose and vote Democrat in ’06 and ’08. Do not lose focus.

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Friday, December 02, 2005

Focus Like Lasers

Let’s get real!

The president and most congressional Democrats now agree on quite a few things about Iraq. Among the most important, it’s broke and withdrawing our troops immediately would be bad for Iraq and for the long range interests of the U.S. Now that they’ve agreed to dance, we constant critics of the war have to keep the pressure on while not completely boxing them in.

The one thing we must not lose focus on is accountability. The hubris of George Bush and the Republicans must not be forgotten even as we seek to help them ease out of the problem. Even those of us who once supported Bush and the Republicans must turn on them in the next two elections. We must work to elect as many Democrats as possible in ’06, and we must do everything possible to have a Democrat taking the salutes of the marchers in the Inauguration Day parade in 2007.

Keep in mind – and in your hearts – the Democrats we elect are simply politicians who will push too hard in other directions and will soon develop that same arrogance that is destroying the Republicans. Steeling ourselves, we’ve got to realize that we’ll be switching back to the Republicans not too many years down the pike.

It has taken me many years to realize that both parties satisfy their bases at the expense of the vast majority of citizens, so those of us in the middle have no choice but to turn them out whenever they lose sight of the middle classes and the political center. In the present case, the Republicans by serving those who worked so hard for their election and elevation to power, big business interests, neoconservatives, and Evangelical Christians, have turned their backs on manufacturing workers and the middle classes. They must be punished at the polls – regardless of how they change their spots over the next three years.

So it will be with the Democrats when they worship at the altar of public employee unions and others seeking to switch too many federal dollars to their advantage at the expense of centrist Americans. But we can’t punish them until they do their dirty deeds and that won’t be for several years after we propel the present bums into the ranks of the unemployed.

Blog on!

Wild Bill

Thursday, December 01, 2005

A Thing of Beauty

One of the most impressive accomplishments in the history of art is Rembrandt’s annual self-portrait series. Each year the great painter looked in the mirror and imparted on canvas just what he saw, unflinching and authentic in the extreme. I’ve seen a few of the paintings and photographs of most of the rest; it was a stunning lifetime performance by one of the world’s geniuses.

This week, I prepared to apply for a passport renewal by having my picture taken for the document. I sat before a plain white screen and the photographer snapped the shutter. This was not a portrait in which the camera operator tilted my chin, adjusted the lighting, and used a slightly out of focus lens to dampen a few furrows; this was Wild Bill raw - as he really looks.

Without the aid of a magnifying glass, I was unable to grasp the impact of the photo until I got home and compared it under glass with the image on my expired permit taken some eleven years earlier. My goodness, the new passport will bear the likeness of an old man! Surely, there’s been a mistake! When peering into the looking glass each morning, I see what some great wag observed so long ago when describing all aged male homo-sapiens: `a thing of beauty and a boy forever.’

Surely, it cannot be that `All men are mortal. Socrates is a man, therefore Socrates is mortal’ obtains in the case of Wild Bill – and his readers?

Maybe I should ease up on George Bush and his sycophants; I may have to answer to a higher power in the near future.

Nah!

Blog on!

Wild Bill