Reading at the Crossroads

Reading at the Crossroads is an archive for columns and letters which appeared in the Terre Haute Tribune Star. I also blog here when my patience is exhausted by what I feel is irritating, irrational and/or ironic in life. --gary daily

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Location: Terre Haute, Indiana, United States

The material I post on this blog represents my views and mine alone. The material you post on this blog represents your views and yours alone.

Friday, October 29, 2010

Know Your Local Rightist --Vote Democratic Tuesday

Unemployment
Rightists think the world works in some magical, solid, and mechanical way. Free markets self-regulate, the Constitution is written in stone for all time, and their violence is always provoked and justified.

Let's apply Newton to the Bush Depression, specifically on unemployment:

I. Every object in a state of uniform motion tends to remain in that state of motion unless an external force is applied to it.

We may be ready to follow that great (Not!) Republican and "Just say no to drugs." That’s it, however.  A constructive, helpful response to the Bush Depression calls for more than just saying “No!” to personal  suffering and “No!” to social-economic decline. Thank you Democrats for providing the needed "external force" that is starting to reverse the conditions created by Bush and the "No!" boys.

Americans should vote Democratic on Tuesday because "Just saying "No!" to needed change" only takes you, your family and your friends backward into the selfish grasp of Bush robot thinking.

Debt
Scrooge McDuck's and the Rightist camp are constantly harping on "more debt." Yes, the U.S. has a debt problem. And yes the U.S. will need to deal with this debt problem--IN THE COURSE OF TIME.

Our country plans on being here long after the 2010 election, long after the the 2012 election, in fact long after we, our children and our childrens' children can no longer rise up and vote. This means our debt as a nation is not the bill we get from our credit card company each month. (And by the way, thank you Obama and Dems for passing consumer protection legislation that at least starts to muzzle the loan sharks running those companies.) Nations work on different time scales than mere mortals.

This means now is not the time for austerity, it's the time for investment. Interest rates are low and unemployment is high. Borrow the money and put people to work. People working are a good thing. Paying low interest charges on investments in people and badly needed infra-structure (roads, bridges, power grids, computer grids, etc.) are a good thing. And collecting taxes from people put back to work is also a good thing.

Rightists are short-sighted and selfish when it comes to planning for the nation. Too much ME and not enough US--as in United States!

Vote Democratic Tuesday and invest in yourself AND your nation.

Government
Rightists want us to fear OUR own government. So much so that they go apoplectic if you call our nation a "democracy" and not a "republic." As if our REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRACY is some kind a shadowy enemy, a cabal planning to steal our freedoms and liberty rather than assure and protect these wonderful fruits of our still growing, still developing nation. I know, I know, Glen Beck doesn't see it this way. But Glen Beck is an entertainer not an historian; a rich demagogue not an unemployed citizen.

Yes, it's a big government, but this is a big country. Yes, government requires many laws and many workers, but we're a complex and growing society, we can't operate by getting together at the local bar and deciding what we should do about, say, clear cutting in our National Forests or  tasting the drugs we’re sold in order to decide if they’re safe or poisonous.

"No!" is not a policy, it's an excuse to ignore problems and run way from citizen responsibilities. "No!" sneers in our faces, saying, "I got mine, you get yours." "No!" is not the best of America.

Vote Democratic on Tuesday remembering it is OUR government and OUR government works for us.

Video:       'Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck' Tribute

1 Comments:

Blogger Unknown said...

Hi Gary. Glad to see you're still around. My life has gotten very strange in the years since I last saw you (with Susie) in downtown Bloomington. Wishing you the best -- Ellie

7:21 PM  

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