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Clinton Bush Haiti Fund: Donate Now
: ....and the Republican Beef is?
The Republicans have been on a continued warpath to circumvent Barack Obama's agenda at every turn. The healthcare debate has shown that all they are interested in an outright power grab to implement their narrow idelogical vision on the country. They are opposed to anything that remotely insures that the average person has a fighting chance. Paul Ryan's plan to replace Medicare with vouchers is just one of those extreme examples.

While the Republicans have continued to dominate the airwaves and win the public relations war, the real world goes on. There was a spike in unemployment not withstanding the 51,000 hires for the Census temporary jobs. The "real" unemployment rate stands at 16.8 Percent, on par with Spain. What Republicans should take notice of is a speech by the US Chamber of Commerce President Thomas Donohue. He spoke and made five key points:


* First, we can create jobs by doubling U.S. exports in five years.
* Second—we can create jobs by rebuilding America’s infrastructure.
* Third—we can create jobs with major investments and breakthroughs in energy.
* Fourth—we can create jobs by expanding credit across our economy.
* Fifth—to create jobs we must ease the uncertainty over tax increases as well as health, environmental, labor, legal, and fiscal policies.

What the stimulus did was to insure that all items were addressed. What he also noted was that the US Infrastructure is "running out of capacity" and has to be rebuilt to deal with 21st Century challenges. This is as China came out with growth anticipated to be around 8 percent per year because it has undertaken a massive investment to continue on the cutting edge on all fronts. The full speech can be accesssed at: Really Long Link


Mr. Pence called the current path by the Adminstration "a failure". I hope that Mr. Pence (who apparently has Presidential aspirations) to take the time to review the Chamber's recommendations and not merely hold on to the old ways of just tax cuts and more tax cuts. There needs to be a concerted effort to actually invest too. There should absolutely be a concerted effort to make sure that we deploy resources in a smart and responsible way. This should not be at the expense of creating a society of haves and have nots.

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The Give-And-Take on Healthcare Reform

February 23rd 2010 06:50
: Will Responsible Republicans Stand up?
The White House's New Healthcare Plan was announced yesterday. This is one take on the plan:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy


The GOP came out swinging by noting how it was more of the same. The US Senate Republican leader in the Senate, said that the plan should be scrapped all together and start again. To top it all, John Boehner, the House Republican Leader, blasted the upcoming healthcare summit on Thursday as a Democratic Informercial. It was quite a day!!!

The back and forth on healthcare is frankly laughable on both sides. Although healthcare reform is not dead, the fact remains that the Party of No will do whatever it has to do to stop this from coming to fruition. What is clear is that the status quo cannot be acceptable. I only wish that Mr. McConnell would truly listen to a student of mine who talked about it in a paper she wrote on Ethics in Healthcare:


I am a single parent of two children. I do not have any insurance and my children are on Medicaid. If it was not for this system I do not know what I would do for my girls. A lot of elderly people out in the world do not have insurance either and I know from experience that they will not go to a doctor because of the cost which can sometimes become deadly for these people. There are clinics in some areas that are designed to help people in these types of situations. One of these places is called Grace Hill, which is designed for people with no insurance. This place contains doctors and dentists, and individuals can come in, pay small co-pay and that is it, they would not be reliable for the bill because it is picked up by state. Now the problem with this is that the different states are running out of money to support these programs.


The "Fierce Urgency of Now" is ever more. Yet, it is clear that the "New" Republican Party has decided to make the country ungovernable. When Tom Coburn declares that he loves gridlock, it means that he and his ilk are not interested in getting anything done. Thankfully, there are sensible Republicans still left in the Republican Party. They are becoming a very rare commodity. I commend Charlie Crist when he noted that the stimulus has worked and has saved some 87,000 jobs in Florida. I also think that the Governor of California when he reminded the country that some 150,000 people were at work directly because of the stimulus. The Republican Party is truly in trouble when leading lumanries in the party are changing their stripes for the sake of political expediency. Are there any true responsible Republicans left?


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What Should We Focus On?

January 5th 2010 08:09
: Why Should we care?
A very good friend turned me on to the National Priorities Project Website. With the Continued challenges we face in America, I was fascinated by what they had done. There is a cool feature that actualy analyzes what could have been done if the monies spent would have somehow been routed towards long-term sustainable development. I realize that some will question the analysis and the rationale. But the implications are staggering:


Source: Really Long Link retrieved 1/5/2010

Taxpayers in Congressional District 48 (Campbell) will pay $2.4 billion for Total Defense Spending in FY2010. For the same amount of money, the following could have been provided:

995,079 People with Health Care for One Year OR
43,192 Public Safety Officers for One year OR
34,154 Music and Arts Teachers for One Year OR
363,340 Scholarships for University Students for One Year OR
451,900 Students receiving Pell Grants of $5350 OR
7,237 Affordable Housing Units OR
903,742 Children with Health Care for One Year OR
289,194 Head Start Places for Children for One Year OR
34,724 Elementary School Teachers for One Year OR
4,307,675 Homes with Renewable Electricity for One Year


If this is in fact true, then the question is whether America has its priorities straight or not. What I find bothersome is the number of teachers. Right now, teachers are being laid off or being asked to forgo salaries in the name of "saving money". The challenge is for us to figure out what matters in the end.

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Davos: Reflections

January 30th 2009 05:43
: Wow!!!!
The world is right now fascinated with Davos. The rich, the famous and the powerful are all there in paradise talking about the world and all the problems. There is enough being said by all pundits which will speak for itself on Davos. But, two key things occured which I wanted to note:

1) Turkey's Prime Minister Edrogan stormed out of a discussion with Shimon Peres during discusisons on Gaza. Edrogan was given a minute by David Ignathius of the Washington Post to rebute a lengthy comment by Shimon Peres. I think the gesture by Mr. Edrogan must be taken seriously by Israel. It shows the frustration with Israel and the fact that as Amr Mousa said, Israel "does not listen". I was quite disappointed by David Ignathius when he did not grant equal time during the discussions. It seems to me that Dinner could have waited


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