Friday, September 03, 2010

Why am I not surprised

that the medical insurance that's provided by employers--a staple of the fake "insurance reform" passed by Congress last spring--is costing employees more and is providing less coverage. It's all a fraud, this Obama-Care package; it plays directly into the hands of those who have no interest in cost-containment. The insurance companies simply increase their premiums to employers, and the employers simply pass those increases on to employees, as well as increasing the percentage of premiums they require employees to pay. This isn't universal health care: It's government funding of insurance companies, pure and simple.

Wednesday, September 01, 2010

A new beginning?

I'm looking into the possibility of starting a new political party named, inoffensively, The Progressive Party. I realize it wouldn't be the first party so named, but Teddy Roosevelt's central theme--populist reaction to corporate dominance of American politics and economics--ain't a bad idea, given the current state of affairs in the US.

And the idea of rolling back the multi-national corporate (and political) war on the working classes by means of international trade unions to challenge the power of international corporations ain't bad either.

I even have a slogan--a catchy one: "Workers of the world, unite!"

Telling it like it is

This piece by Christopher Cooper (his "bio" appears at the bottom) is brutally frank about Obama's position in history, and cleverly composed. I wish I'd written it.

Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Obama analyzed

I'm no Obama-lover, not any more. He, and his party, have disappointed me too often, and too seriously, for me ever to relent (or is it repent?) from my disgust at their governance. I will, however, refer readers of this blog to this month-old Frank Rich review of Jonathan Alter's book about Obama (Promise) because Rich (and, if I cared to read the book, Alter) do capture what's wrong with Obama's presidency and why, in my view, it's doomed to consist of but a single term of office.

The flaws they see in Obama--read the review--are, it seems to me, too ingrained in the man to be fundamentally changed. Obama's a creature of his culture--as varied as "his culture" at first blush appears--which holds to a view of America as historically blessed, fated to succeed by history and chance. He is too young, too immature in perspective, to see that America is no such thing. It's just another national gathering of folks who, like all such gatherings in history, are stupid, selfish and mean--doomed to be replaced by a later such gathering. He's too grounded in process--in political minutia and manipulation--to reach for the only chance he (or we) have to survive the present slide into the "dustbin of history." He is, after all, just another smart fellow, another fine politician. And that, my friends, just ain't gonna cut it anymore.

Monday, August 30, 2010