I see what e-groups is all about - very interesting -
all set up for class work - lectures group meetings - e-mail - along with
this site should make on-line instruction easy along with:
Dr. Peter E. Pflaum, Ed. M. Ph.D. & Mary Anne Watkins Pflaum, Ed. M.
225 Robinson Road
PO Box 2176, New Smyrna Beach, FL 32170-2176
904 428 9609
Thursday, May 04, 2000
Linda Dowdy, Guidance
Father Lopez High School
960 Madison Avenue
Daytona Beach, FL 32114-1889
Re: Mr. Nave
There is nothing mysterious or subjective about what we want from Mr. Nave in his written response. Then we will meet with you.
The science department should review his course outline, the quizzes and exams to see if he tests on what is to be taught. If Chapter 7 is to be taught in week 7, then the quiz should be on that material, The midterm and final should review the same chapters content. Then look at the grade book ( without names ) and see if almost everyone received poor grades. What we believe is going on is he does not cover the right chapter, the quizzes and exams do not review the material taught - wrong book, wrong chapter, wrong content so the students do poorly.
Logos, ethos, pathos
We can agree that values matter. There is great confusion about ideas, values and religion. Let us see if this helps ?
Ideas are secular, objective and human. The best guide is the scientific method properly applied. The ethics of knowledge is be able to live with reality. The reality is that teaching certificates have a error rate. Every objective use of external examination has shown that from 5 % to 35 % of certified teachers are in fact unqualified in their subjects or methods.
There is an historic conflict between religion and secular humanism. The Church look on science as an enemy, and humanist attacked religion. Revolutionaries and Communist killed nuns and priests and destroyed churches. Bishops defended the 13th century and condemned progress and the whole of the modern world. It is not necessary or useful to carry on the war between objective truth and the true faith.
Ethics are situations and depend on the realities of the culture, conditions, and traditions. Most ethical standards are common sense and practical. Beyond the mundane they depend on visions and hopes of a better world. Politics involves objective facts and ethics - concepts of fairness and reasonableness along with practical coalition building of diverse wants and needs. The faith is a guide or road map to ethics not the territory. People confuse the map with the dominion. Moral choices have to be make in the spirit not by immutable rules. The rules have to change with the times or die as obsolete regulations no longer relevant to real choices. Many are afraid of freedom and choice and prefer the illusion of certainty of ritual and traditions. The results are often not pleasant, and what is designed to be moral turns out to be evil. Much harm is done is misapplication of false principles unsuited to current realities. The defense of the faith is through faith and example not by force, legislation and police.
Education can not take place in an ethical vacuum. The ethics of education require honest application of working principles. The issue here is not abstract. Have a class outline, follow the outline, test students on material taught, and follow standard educational practice for content and methods.
The spirit is universal and eternal being a relationship between feeling - passions and connections to greater causes and concepts - it is a religion in one form or another. A love of the subject, a passion for excellence, the desire to help and guide young minds into the truth, faith and love of God, beauty, wisdom and good sense enlighten and empowers instruction.
The problems arise when facts or rational ideas are overtaken by ideologies or real ethical and spiritual maters are disregarded as unimportant or out of style, unscientific or too abstract.
For example:
Education must have values - practical objective teaching and learning about reality - math, science, English etc. The value is learning, hard work, attention to details, focus, and all learning is about doubt. Questions and answers - probing, skeptical questions.
Education is about knowledge and behavior that can best be done with spirit - a legitimate concern for truth, beauty, and wisdom. Without this love of virtue all becomes hollow and shallow.
The spirit should not overwhelm science and technology, character studies should not replace math and science, but you need the whole package such as at West Point ( a historic culture ) or many great secular or religious schools. Truth, Virtue and spirit - very difficult in the political control of public education, impossible without true professionals who embody educational values - rare indeed - and not certified.
In health care - good science with caring and holistic values - a person is more than the sum of the organic parts.
In politics rational efforts to advance civilization with a proper concern for the opinions of mankind and the practical needs of a less than perfect world.
In religion, push and pull along the roads of the spirit - without rejection of the modern world or practical affairs.
You see balance - the mind, the body And the spirit -
C. P. Snow wrote about the two cultures of Science and Humanities. Since knowledge organization in groups involves both the science and technology of specialist but also the values, growth and development of ideas and people, the social structure and community - the insights of literature and the arts, psychology and philosophy, economics and political science,
sociology, history, ethics, and the physical sciences - focused on effectiveness and results- teaching and learning, building and designing- selling and organizing as a collective activity. In this way the abstract become the concrete, the interesting become useful.
Since becoming human is a social event, correct social habits of child raising are clearly so important to human history. C. S. Lewis, in "God in the Dock" (page 116 1970 Eerdmans Publishing, Grand Rapids Michigan) put the
idea this way.
Each generation is taught by an earlier generation.
"The moment we forget this we begin to talk nonsense about education. We talk of the views of contemporary adolescence as if some peculiarity in contemporary adolescence had produced them out of itself. In reality, they are usually a delayed result -- for the mental world also has its time-bombs -- of obsolete adolescence, now middle-aged and dominating its form room. Hence the futility of many schemes for education. None can give to another what he does not possess himself. No generation can bequeath to its successor what it has not got. You may frame the syllabus as you please. But when you have planned and reported ad nauseam, if we are skeptical we shall teach only skepticism to our pupils, if fools only folly, if vulgar only vulgarity, if saints sanctity, if heroes heroism. Education is only the most fully conscious of the channels whereby each generation influences the next. It is not a closed system. Nothing which was not in the teachers can flow from them into the pupils. We shall all admit that a man who knows no Greek himself cannot teach Greek to his form: but it is equally certain that a man whose mind was formed in a period of cynicism and disillusion, cannot teach hope or fortitude."
In contrast to small schools in which most teachers and students know each other and will recognize a problem when it arises, adult control and supervision and students' senses of belonging and responsibility are not developed as readily in large schools. For this reason, it is often argued that larger schools tend to have more
discipline problems, lower percentages of students who actually participate in school clubs and activities, and more student feelings of estrangement and alienation.
Comparative Shopping:
A poem about Microsoft:
" Access violation, Abuse of power
see your systems administrator" said the Judge
Hit Any button to Continue
About windows on a desktop with icons on wallpaper -
Which is not a desktop, or a symbolic ritual object,
Window not into the holy grail or through a wall or made of paper:
but a mirror darkly - figures lie in their billions
The features of our programs are hardly more than gestures
on a mouse not a mouse
which force of habit and market power make permanent.
Nature, like the destruction of imperfect words,
like the metamorphosis of a nymph into a tree,
has arrested us in an accustomed movement.
We as captive of the dead hands of the past
habits
light as spider webs becoming chains
we are tied together in common operations
in esoteric, hermetic sealed, cryptic codes,
hidden applications interfaces,
As occult systems of symbols and rules used
as our instructions to a compute
The gods and demi-gods developers,
programmers who we neither know or understand
run power in our hair and needs in the fingers of birds
that can’t not sing, free and outside the caged sand
The core principles and ideas of this "Third Way" movement are set forth in The New Progressive Declaration: A Political Philosophy for the Information Age.
http://www.dlcppi.org/texts/pflib/progsum.htm
Americans are ready for the challenge. Most have ceased believing that the solutions to today's problems are to be found in a larger, stronger central government--a course still supported by traditional liberals. Nor do they buy the conservative argument that the federal government is the source of our problems and that dismantling it will solve them.
America needs a third choice that replaces the left's reflexive defense of the bureaucratic status quo and counters the right's destructive bid to simply dismantle government. Such a "new progressive" governing philosophy sees government as society's servant, not its master--as a catalyst for a broader civic enterprise controlled by and responsive to the needs of citizens and the communities where they live and work.
Why should anyone care about reform ?
The political parties own the rules at the national and state level, they have bought the shelf space in the media, and make people believe through very persuasive advertising in the special qualities of their products. The billions spent on advertising is spent because it works - an emotional irrational link can be created between images and feelings and products.
Spiritual qualities are ascribed to products in order to gain and maintain brand loyalty. "Republican" and "Democratic" claim transcendental meaning when there is no substance difference. The real power is in committees and their contributors. Republican committees give the same pork ( a little more ) and privileges as democratic committees. The rest is mostly hype and hope.
The problem of profits of "consumer products" from P.& G. and Unilever is that big stores and open markets corrode the "brand name" franchise they have so carefully built on advertising. If brand X is the genetic equal of brand Y, they are commodities, brand X can only get extra earning by market power - they own the shelves, such as Post and General Mills, or they create "psychological" attachments to mystic qualities of their product.
The "new economy" is not only from advanced technology and communications but more importantly it creates real competition. In telephone rates, banking and insurance, auto sales, books and records, the historic comfortable franchise and cartel rules are giving way to real price wars. Even Microsoft could face competition - and lose its market edge. The rules are changing and even the establishments feels the strong winds from new directions.
No one likes competition. Labor Unions fight free trade. The public schools, teachers and administration, school boards and teacher colleges, fight competition from vouchers and charter schools.
Elected officials fight their opposition by fixing the rules. Incumbents of both parties often face no real competition and are reelected 90 % of the time. They have the name, the money and the organization and they like it that way. If there is going to be "market opening" in the political process then there has to be at least brand X, Y, and Z and maybe even more. Brand Z is the Reform Party and the Internet. Reform is all about changing the rules so there is more competition - not specific program content. The undue influence of the money interests has concerned the republic from the beginning.
The tobacco lobby made the mistake of picking brand X over brand Y so brand Y had less interest in protecting them. ADM supports both brands and greases the media so has good protection and many special favors. The myth of new and improved, special secret ingredients, formula X23, and other marketing tools still work but more and more consumers are going for store brands and genetics. More voters are independents.
Change does not come because the GOP or DNC or any CEO, management or board of directors wake up one day and say let us be more productive even if that is painful and we have to do things in a different way. The iron law of bureaucracy and oligarchy works in all organizations. The top owners and managers gets conformable with the way things are and doesn’t think much about the way things could be. It takes a force from outside. The Internet may help those disadvantaged by the oligarchy of power to break the rules of the iron circle.
The political parties own the rules at the national and state level, they have bought the shelf space in the media, and make people believe in the special qualities of their products.
Reform comes from contravening forces. The two Political Parties act today as a cartel to keep out competition. The system protects incumbents who have the power to raise money by providing services. Reform means new market forces and new entry from outside. Committee Chairpeople control the rules, the money and the power. They spread the wealth among other to get support. They are the center of the iron triangle of money, elections and power. For example the Road Lobby - fights public transport and represents both the industry and it’s unions - including construction, concrete, oil and supplies, and state road boards.
I am reminded by Ralph Nader, who is not a socialist but a real believer in free markets and competition. ( votenader.com ) The reason the Auto Industry said for decades - "no one cares about safety" was there was no real competition. They fought safety glass, ( see Tucker, the Man and His Dream ) they fought seat belts, they fought against air bags. A few marginal companies such as Volvo pushed safety but the big three had to be dragged into the idea that safely sells and it’s a good thing the save lives and prevent injury. People always did care but didn’t have a lot of choice. There is a self fulfilling prophecy - since no one cares, there is no marketing of safety ( or reform ) so no one hears about it, so no one cares. The same was said about the budget deficit and national debt. Neither Clinton or the GOP wanted to discuss it because it required program cuts and tax increases. Parot open that market.
There has to be something beyond self interest and that is hard to sell. If enough oxen are gored then there arises a contravening force. In the case of auto safety it was the insurance rates and finally the insurance industry.
"There is something wonderful in seeing a wrong-headed majority assailed by truth." John Kenneth Galbraith proposed a theory of contravening forces. For example, The tire industry was very concentrated and had market control. Sears could enter the market or force producers to give them tires at much lower prices. A big seller could counter balance big producers because they were big enough to sponsor new competition.
The Motley Fool looks for investments where companies can make the rules. A rule maker controls a market share and can set some of the conditions for trade. This is not free market capitalism but a franchise and much more profitable. Adam Smith assumed that free markets would drive down prices and profits. They do - so many firms go under. When you get down to a few firms they naturally form cartels to control the market, prevent over-production and price competition. Almost every economist knows this.
Reform comes from contravening forces.
The two Political Parties act today as a cartel to keep out competition. The system protects incumbents who have the power to raise money. Reform means new market forces and new entry from outside.
People who want health care reform have run into the iron triangle. People who want educational reform have run into the NEA. The question is there enough interests hurt by the "system" to demand and market a really competitive product. What is not being done by those with the political franchise, who is damaged, how are the prices too high and how can the market for political ideas and power be more open ? Where is the Sears to face off against Goodyear Tire and it’s mates ? Where are the Japanese to face off against GM ?
If there is going to be "market opening" in the political process then there has to be brand X, Y, and Z the Reform Party and the Internet. They have to work on changing the rules so there is more competition -
Real Reform: Restore confidence and pride in the Institutions of democracy:
Article II - electors and electoral college - is a time bomb - and needs to be replaced by new simple language - and a national orderly rational process of federal elections. Federal elections need to be federal - not a scramble
of state rules, antique dysfunctional regulations and court decisions along with the changing results of infighting within fractional political parties. The right to control federal elections by federal law should not be in doubt - this
does not effect the bill of rights - but only the structure of the process of running elections.
In the electronic age we don’t need a horse and buggy system - it can be much fairer, faster, representative, and honest. Elections are the core of democracy - they can never be perfect but a dysfunctional system undermines the
foundations of freedom and representative government.
Federal Elections in the Constitution:
In order to assure democracy and the faith of the people in their elected representatives; federal elections shall be conducted in a brief, honest, open, and equal manner that assure impartiality to both incumbents and their opposition and limit the undue influence of money. Congress shall proscribe by law for the election of all federal officials by the majority votes of federally qualified citizens of the congressional districts for the House of Representatives, the separate states for the Senate, and of the Citizens of United States for President and Vice-president.
The certification of results, the qualifications of voters and candidates, the times and dates of primaries and elections, the certification of recognized Political parties and their candidates and the conduct of campaigns financed by publicly regulated expenditures shall be proscribed by law to assure
freedom of political speech, competition, and the free expression of the will of the people in the selection of their Government. Where no candidate has a majority a run off shall be quickly conducted.
Upon enactment, This amendment become the supreme law of the land, not withstanding any prior constitutional or other legal decisions and past circumstances.
( replaces: Article I section 2 on the House section 3 and Amendment 17 on the Senate, Article II and Amendment 12 on the President and Vice-president )
Federal Laws and Constitutional Amendments:
Congress shall proscribe the terms and conditions for citizen initiative, or congressional referendum to
be placed on the ballots of federal elections, as proposals for amendments under Article V, sent to the states, or laws to be enacted or as advisory to the states, the people and to congress.
This leaves to congress to control federal elections. I would like an election on the second Tuesday in November with a run off if necessary in the middle of November - with campaigns to start on labor day including the nomination process that could be done in 4 to 6 weeks. The primaries could be done nationally in early September with a run off in the last week of September with conventions ( not really necessary ) during October (Enough is
enough ) Federal campaigns would be publicly financed and limited in their expenditures.
IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES
January 19, 1999
Mr. HOLLINGS (for himself, Mr. SPECTER, Mr. MCCAIN, and Mr. BRYAN) introduced the following joint resolution; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on the Judiciary
JOINT RESOLUTION
Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States relating to contributions and expenditures intended to affect elections.
Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled (two-thirds of each House concurring therein), That the following article is proposed as an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, to be valid only if ratified by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within 7 years after the date of final passage of this joint resolution:
`Article--
`SECTION 1. Congress shall have power to set reasonable limits on the amount of contributions that may be accepted by, and the amount of expenditures that may be made by, in support of, or in opposition to, a candidate for nomination for election to, or for election to, Federal office.
`SECTION 2. A State shall have power to set reasonable limits on the amount of contributions that may be accepted by, and the amount of expenditures that may be made by, in support of, or in opposition to, a candidate for nomination for election to, or for election to, State or local office.
`SECTION 3. Congress shall have power to implement and enforce this article by appropriate legislation.'.
Sleeping Giant
Politics follows economic change:
From the landed Aristocracy to the capitalist bourgeois, 17th to
19th century - the Political response was the French and American Revolution
From the owners to the mangers - the Corporate State, men in gray
suits Political reaction was Teddy Roosevelt and populism and progressive
politics
From the managers and engineers, to marketing, financiers and accountants,
Political response was the New Deal, the Fair Deal, and the fight about
the war in Vietnam
The selling of the President, media politics - selling public office
like soap - the buying and selling of elections. The Political results
was to turn off voters by negative ads and clear and present use of money
to control power - the radical middle.
Now on to information technology to the Geek nation which is libertarian,
high on freedom, free enterprise, and turned off politics.
MAYBE the group think and cluttered media is wrong - the model they
all use doesn't quite apply -
The conventional model - right angry white males from the south and
displaced industrial workers, Christians and anti-abortion el at about
20 % ( 45 million ) but 35 % ( 33 million) of voters - they participate.
They are what is called the Republican base heavy in the South and West.
Left - the 20 % ( 45 million ) and 35 % of voters (33 million) -
labor, minorities, liberals, that FDR put together what is called the democratic
core - heavy in North East and Midwest .
The middle of 33 million voters that could go one way or the other
- the suburbanite and small towns whch control the middle. This group
could become 50 million - the party that gets the majority of swing
votes win. People have forgotten how this group could expanded by 20 million
votes with participation going from 50 % in 1996 to 60 % as it was in the
1960's.
Why have 20 million voters been turned off, in a richer and better
educated society ?? Because they have become the radical middle. many people
think all politiciansl stink and are a equal bunch of bums - and it doesn't
make any difference who wins. If they come to believe that
it does make a difference they can return -the
bear market in politics could become a bull market if the basic corruptions
are reduced and a hero appears.
The new voters would completely overwhelms traditional partisans.
Maybe that is what the people who benefit from the current system are really
afraid of - mass publics becoming a roused Giant :
This is what happened with Jesse in Minnesota.
Participation from 1950’s was about 63 % and dropped since to less
than 50 %. If we put back in the 12 % of nonvoter who could be motivated
to vote, it changes the whole dynamics.
February 28, 2000
Building A New Republican Majority
The media has not reported correctly again - daa surprise ? The points
are quite important - besides
the internal fight for control of the party -
The faith of his and my fathers :
We are the party of Ronald Reagan not Pat Robertson. We are the party
of Theodore Roosevelt not the party
of special interests. We are the party of Abraham Lincoln not Bob
Jones. Join us. Join us.
Join us and welcome anyone of good faith to our
ranks. We should be - we must be
- we will be -- a party as big as the country we
serve.
That is my faith; the faith that unites and never divides; the faith
that bridges unbridgeable gaps in humanity. That
is my religious faith, and it is the faith I want my party to serve,
and the faith I hold in my country. It is the faith
that we are all equal and endowed by our Creator with inalienable
rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of
happiness. It is the faith I would die to defend.
Many years ago a scared American prisoner of war in Vietnam was tied in
tortureropes by his tormentors and
left alone in an empty room to suffer through the night. Later in the
evening a guard he had never spoken to
entered the room and silently loosened the ropes to relieve his
suffering. Just before morning, that same guard
came back and re-tightened the ropes before his less humanitarian
comrades returned. Henever said a word
to the grateful prisoner, but some months later, on a Christmas
morning, as the prisoner stood alone in the
prison courtyard, the same good Samaritan walked up to him and stood
next to him for a few moments. Then
with his sandal, the guard drew a cross in the dirt. Both prisoner and
guard both stood wordlessly there for a minute or two, venerating the
cross, until the guard rubbed it out and walked away.
--
Experience vs. Pretense:
Will the real partisan stand up:
1. A fervent, sometimes militant supporter or proponent of a party,
cause, faction, person, or idea.
There is a new age. It has been coming from some time. We as a public
are less partisan, the old alliances are broken.
Politics today :
McCain’s fighting speech: Who is the Demagogue ?
1. A leader who obtains power by means of impassioned appeals to the
emotions and prejudices of the populace. 2. A leader of the common people
in ancient times.
A contrast of politics as show business and marketing technology with
the smart use of money - or as an ideological crusade dominated by ideas
and issues for the people - power to the people .
national initiative, referendum
adds a Democratic element to out limited republic of checks, balance
and dead lock also makes elections more interesting
Session 10. National I&R: Has the Time Come?
Moderator:
Craig Holman, Center for Governmental Studies
Panelists:
Professor Richard Parker, Harvard University
Wendy Wendlandt, U.S. PIRG
Mike Gravel, Philadelphia II
Get the tax code from 44,000 pages to a limit of 5,000 Income taxes
start at the median income - at 10 % and go up 2.5 % dor each decile so
it become 12.5 % at 60 % of all urban income, 15 % at 70 % of all incomes,
17.5 % at 80 % and 20 % at 90 % ( and more that half of the taxes raised
from individuals )
The National Sales tax has many advantages - Collects from everyone
- underground or not Doesn’t pick and choice and try to set economic or
social policy Evens the competition with other industrial states by transfer
of social and physical infrastructure costs to the VAT and removing VAT
for exports it removes a 10 % or more over head costs and gives a 10 %
support to exports so a net 20 % difference. Not so complex -
Dear John:
You have a dilemma ! The people have a choice - simple or not ? I gave
George advice which he has taken to his benefit - ( see below )
We all Know that many will run in a race, but ( only ) one receives
the prize?
And every man that strive for the mastery is temperate in all things
in an intemperate world.
You may obtain a corruptible crown; but remain incorruptible.
Therefore so run, not with uncertainly; and fight, not as one
that beat the air but with clear purpose of your mission and crusade, a
higher cause requires making the message clear to those where they are
and who they are, now in this real world ( so taught the teacher Paul )
see below
I know people want it this way or that - right or wrong - true or
false - good or bad - but it doesn't come that way - it's more complex
and difficult.
The two meaning of demagogue comes through loud and clear. 1. A leader
who obtains power by means of impassioned appeals to the emotions and prejudices
of the populace.
2. A leader of the common people in ancient times.
If you want to be a popular leader of the democratic masses you have
to pander to their prejudices. This has been true since ancient times -
therefore the popular leader or "demagogues" were looked down on by the
aristocracy as people without principle who bend in the wind and conform
to current fashion.
You are in the system but not of the system. If you want to do anything
you have to get elected. To get elected you have to play the game as it
is. You need money from where the money comes from. You need expert strategy
by those who know you have to drive up the oppositions negatives.
To win you have to play the game by the rules that exist - then you
can work to change the rules. Lyndon Johnson learned how to use the rules,
bend the rules, organized big Texas money and get change and progress -
but was corrupted in the process. His biography is a great lesson in working
within the rules for progress. " Means of Ascent (The Years of Lyndon Johnson,
Vol 2) " by Robert A. Caro another Caro book "The Power Broker : Robert
Moses and the Fall of New York" also shows how power comes out of the pockets
of special interests and puts you in their grasp.
That's life in a less than perfect world.
And the answer is !
Learning to really pretend - life is stage and we are all just actors
- we believe our roles are real but they are just parts - We pretend to
be as we are and try to convince ourselves and others of its reality -
but we know deep down we are not what we appear. This is the basic SUFI
message and training. To be in the world, as it is by not of the world
( not corrupted by it ) to appear to all men, as they need to go by appearances
- as the Apostle Paul said to the Jews I am a Jew - And unto the Jews I
became as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews; to them that are under the
law, as under the law, that I might gain them that are under the law; 1
Corinthians
[21] To them that are without law, as without law, (being not without
law to God, but under the law to Christ,) that I might gain them that are
without law.
[22] To the weak became I as weak, that I might gain the weak: I am
made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some.
[23] And this I do for the gospel's sake, that I might be partaker thereof
with you.
[24] Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth
the prize? So run, that ye may obtain.
[25] And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all
things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible.
[26] I therefore so run, not as uncertainly; so fight I, not as one
that beateth the air:
[27] But I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection: lest that
by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway.
Chercher le L’Argent trace the cash - both who gives and who spends
( or gets paid ) More Iron - triangles - rice bowels - and Laws of Bureaucracy
or establishments.
Why does the republican establishment dislike McCain so much ? It is
not ideology - only the campaign reform - and taxes - but that can’t explain
why they have pulled out all stops to stop him.
Where does the money come from ? And where does it go ? Political establishment
has jobs, power and position based on their ability to deliver the goods
for those who pay the piper. The golden rule is " who has the gold rules
" ! It’s about control - McCain is unreliable, he may not go along to get
along. See below -
Many groups have followed not only the iron triangle ( Interests, Committee
Chairmen, and the Legislation or agencies ) Road lobby - the Dept. Of Transportation
and public works committee- - etc. The DOD - contractors and committee
chairmen - etc.
The iron rice bowel - many people have jobs, power, and a career in
pay of some interest - The Iron Law of Bureaucracy takes over When groups
are organized the iron law of bureaucracy takes over.
"Robert Michels"
The Iron Law of Oligarchy
Michels believed that the people in this group would become enthralled
with their elite positions and more and more inclined to make decisions
that protect their power rather than represent the will of the group they
are supposed to serve. http://www.au.spunk.anarki.net/texts/places/germany/sp000711.txt
"Michels (1911) came to the conclusion that the formal organization
of bureaucracies inevitably leads to oligarchy, under which organizations
originally idealistic and democratic eventually come to be dominated by
a small, self-serving group of people who achieved positions of power and
responsibility.
The following examples will give you an example of what laces the recent
trichinosis attacks.
Giant agri-business companies receive $500million a year in ethanol
subsidies.
They give over $4.5 million in soft money
Publicly owned digital television spectrum wasdistributed to broadcasters
for free. Expertshave placed the value of that spectrum at $70 billion.
Television broadcasters gave $5 million in soft money.
Oil and Gas companies received 800 million in tax credits from a single
provision in the 1999 tax bill.
Oil and Gas companies gave more than $19 million in soft money.
These represent just a few of the thousands of examples of soft money
influence over decisions about your tax dollars. We must end the perception
of this influence by eliminating soft money.
The list of pork goes on and on. . .
As long as it takes money to win and the government can offer services
for supporting constituencies - there will be great power for the moneyed
interests. Public finance will have a marginal effect, the current proposals
for control of soft money are mostly symbolic.
Quick review of American Political History:
Anti-Government and Southern regionalism really started with the Scottish and Irish resentment of the English.
They brought a big chip on their shoulder to the new world. Separation from Great Britain then from the "United States" go back in Irish and Scott ( and Welsh ) history. In the United States to Calhoun’s NULLIFICATION
put down by Andy Jackson in the name of the union - and really put down by Lincoln for the same reason. .
Those rebels who still fly the battle flag over the state house in South Carolina, now are associated with a Religious right as part of an anti-government conservatives movement. This new right contains the old
confederate and remaining State rights movements. The remains of Segregation. Old southern politics was anti-
Yankee, Anti-foreign, anti- catholic, anti- semantic - know nothing - populist - also anti- big business - wall street, corporations - the national bank - so reflected in the KKK and Bob Jones University.
The Populist - anti-government rural movements were against railroads, the robber barons, wall street, and urban corrupt culture. Bible Belt and Midwestern populist have been democrats under Bryan, William Jennings, in 1980 many became Reagan republicans.
At the 1896 Democratic national convention Bryan made his famous "Cross of Gold" speech in defense of FREE SILVER. ( low interest rates for debt plagued farmers vs. Wall street capitalist and bankers ) He was nominated for president but lost to MCKINLEY ( who died and was replaced by Teddy Roosevelt - a progressive Republican who did begin to heal the wounds and close the divide, a model used by John McCain )
The 1896 election year which has been called the most ideological and bitter election in American History. He ran again against TR and lost because TR had moved to the middle; in 1908 Byran lost again to W.H. TAFT a conservative republican . In 1912 he helped to elect Woodrow WILSON, who won because Roosevelt as a progressive could not get along with the establishment of the GOP and formed a third progressive party.
Social Conservatives and populist have a complex relationship with the economic conservatives - and they both have a difficult time with REFORM.
Hamilton and his supporters, who were known as Federalists were conservative unionist, and supported the traditional economics of balance budgets, limited government, tax cutters and reducing government interference with free market capitalism. Anti-communism held this group together during the cold war. Ronald Reagan, who made anti-communism into a business, reflected in his election this complex grouping of the Christian right, some populist, economic conservatives, big business ( he worked for GE ) and Newt and his colleagues in 1994 Newt in 1994 turned it into a very successful electoral combination.
There is more anti than positive program on the right - ( just listen to Rush Limbaugh their talk radio leader ) The right is much more clear about their enemies than their program: ( smaller government, less taxes,
guns, anti-abortion, less regulation, freedom and individualism, anti affirmative action, etc. )
They have a clear enemy - liberals ( socialist ) that would regulate business, nationalize health care, labor unions that supports worker rights, health and safety, environmental controls, and anti-trust.
They believe liberals ( democrats ) cause high taxes from the rich to benefit the poorer constituencies of the left - they hate the counter-culture, the liberal media, the soulless entertainment industry - intellectuals, artists, and
some other parts of the modern world. They supported the Vietnam war - our country right or wrong - and hated the anti war movements as anti- American and socialist.
Democratic Party of James Madison and Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, wanted to advance democracy by including more of the masses - has become the Democratic party of FDR, LBJ and Clinton with some of the populism of reform. After being defeated by the Republican - Populist - Christian Right combination - Clinton moved right of center - ( to the right of Tony Blair ) with a clever combination of financial responsibility and limited social aims along with a general populist outsider appeal.
;Political wizard Karl Rove ?
Rove is considered the top political consultant in Texas and the brains
behind the Governor's political career. Although Mr. Rove has had considerable
success in Texas, some political observers question whether he's ready
to be general consultant for a national race, something he has never done
before.
As the Republican governor's chief political adviser, nothing in Mr.
Bush's escalating presidential bid happens without Mr. Rove's knowledge
or assent. Not the blueprint for winning the early primaries. Not the configuration
of the campaign team.
He is a set of contradictions - a practitioner of take-no-prisoners
politics whose candidate preaches moderation, inclusiveness and "compassionate
conservatism."
The British parliamentary system with short election cycles, public
use of the airwaves, and central party control of candidates, platform,
and techniques reduces the power of cash.
No real reforms will happen without initiative - because the system
can not reform itself. Initiative can not happen with a constitutional
convention called by the states. Under Article V - two thirds of the states
call the convention and the amendment has to be ratified by three fourths.
The amendment would be to add to the ways laws and amendments themselves
are enacted the use of initiative and referendum. ( As it exists in many
states ) Then there is a way to true reforms and one true door for democracy
to actually work. We are not now a democracy - but a limited republic.
Many do not really believe in democracy for good or bad reasons.
Balance of power and checks and balances ( designed to protect the rich
minority from the more numerous poor as well as unpopular ideas from the
dogmatic majority ) requires undemocratic structures ( the Supreme Court
and U.S. Senate ) are all well and good if they are in fact in balance
- with controlled democratic forces i.e. the will of the people - the power
of the masses.
Because of the use of money and modern election technology - ( a worse
case of faction or partisanship that the founders could have imagined )
the system is not in balance but way out of kilter. Money and experts can
elect almost anyone vs. The peoples candidate without money or access.
fiery political rhetoric
Pretense has always been important in politics. Kings and rulers pretended
to be gods, leaders have always been a mixture of demagogy and the skill
of being sneaky, artful, CUNNING politicians. The advent of new expensive
technologies of marketing has made pretense and demagogy into a science.
The use of mass media and scientific research into the motivations of mass
publics has worked.
Campaign standards of conduct are defeated by marketing methods that
work. Scientific marketing methods have become the cornerstone of political
systems in the modern world. Thus the need for money - in Germany, Israel,
everywhere - Get the cash, hire the experts, follow their advice and win
by pretense called technique:
The act of pretending; a false appearance or action intended to deceive.
2. A false or studied show; an affectation: a pretense of caring.
3. A professed but feigned reason or excuse; a pretext: under false
pretenses.
4. Something imagined or pretended.
5. Mere show without reality; outward appearance.
6. A right asserted with or without foundation; a claim. See synonyms
at CLAIM.
7. The quality or state of being pretentious; ostentation.
Pretense Vs. Experience:
1. The apprehension of an object, or an emotion through the senses:
the difference between an idea and an experience, between thought and feeling.
2. a. Active participation in events or activities, leading to
the accumulation of knowledge or skill: a lesson taught by experience;
a carpenter with experience in wall and roof repair. b. The knowledge or
skill so derived.
3. a. An event or a series of events participated in or lived
through. b. The totality of such events in the past of an individual or
a group.
A country bigger than its’ divided parts.
Certainty VS. Skepticism
Will the real bigot stand up ?
Everyone is a bigot, everyone is prejudiced - the real problem is denial and refusal to acknowledge our limits and faults. I will now show you mine -
I agree with the governing class. The elites believes the "people" are not paying attention, are uneducated and uninformed. The masses are trapped in a culture of greed, commercial exploitation of every crude passion and desire. True Culture is defined as proper behavior according to traditional rules. Democracy should be limited, therefore, to representative institution the ruling class can control and popular government should be tied up in checks and balances to avoid mob rule and the tyrants the demigods of the masses can become.
I think of Evangelical Christian churches as believing in the sole authority and inerrancy of the Bible, in salvation only through regeneration, and in a spiritually transformed personal life. I think they are zealots, enthusiast, fanatic, bigots with out a proper understanding the mystery of faith. They and the Populist believe the culture is a tool of secular humanism, wall street, and the media - science and intellectuals - arts and culture - by which they mean most of the modern world- except it’s material benefits. The Roman Catholic Church agrees in the criticism of humanism and is unconformable with democracy, civil rights and many features of the modern world since the 14th century.
The political alliance between the traditional governing class and evangelical Christians creates a new set of prejudices - against crass materialism ( while promoting a small salesman, independent business capitalist message of self help - the parrotry, echoing, emulation of the Rush Limbaugh form of Nightingale’s power of positive thinking self motivated thinking ) The symbol is the right to life - imposing civil law on the bodies of women.
They are united by their dislike of- hippies, new age, environmentalist, the media, and liberals all as tools of a Godless society and agents of the devil. Bill Clinton falls into this category and is despised.
Since we must form opinions without complete knowledge and act on the basis of risk, we are uncomfortable. That is the human condition and there is no way out of our humanity. Since we are all the products of a society, of our history, of external pressures to conform, we all form false impressions and there is no way to avoid our human culture . Since we are human in construction, since we have spiritual and physical limitations, we must form ideas quickly, ideas based on programmed experience and biological necessity - what we think we see and experience is filtered by assumption, prejudice and bigotry.
We are in a darken house, walking as if in sleep, responding to ghosts and shadows. When we become fully aware of our being and understand our dreams, monsters, and illusions then we maybe able to turn on the lights. Enlightenment is the term for the rationalist, liberal, humanitarian, and scientific trend of 18th-cent. It is a historic and personal method of getting beyond prejudice, superstition, and false ideas and ideologies.
The core of the bigots is their rejection of history, science, logic and reason. The real problem is holding stubbornly and often unreasonably to one's own opinions as a system of belief. It is the confusion between ideas, passions, position, needs, wants, desires, and external reality - people who hold to their wishes beyond a reasonable doubt.
Therefore doubt, wise in one's own: uncertainty, doubt, dubiety, skepticism, suspicion, mistrust. "Doubt is part of all religion" (Isaac Bashevis Singer).
vs. Religious certainty has been the curse of the centuries. Belief is a mystery with the TRUTH and judgement made by GOD and only by God. When people and institutions that upon themselves the role of GOD - it is ideology. Conceited, dogmatic, opinionated, swollen-headed, puffed up, too big for one's boots, bigheaded, bumptious, cocky, smart-alecky, smart-ass, INSOLENT people in the name of a political, religious cause feel themselves empowered to ignore reason, and condemn those who disagree.
One who is strongly partial to one's own group, religion, race, or politics and is intolerant of those who differ.
[French, from Old French.]
Word History: A bigot may have more in common with God than one might think. Legend has it that Rollo, the first duke of Normandy, refused to kiss the foot of the French king Charles III, uttering the phrase bi got, his borrowing of the assumed Old English equivalent of our expression by God. Although this story is almost certainly apocryphal, it is true that bigot was used by the French as a term of abuse for the Normans, but not in a religious sense. Later, however, the word, or very possibly a homonym, was used abusively in French for the Beguines, members of a Roman Catholic lay sisterhood. From the 15th century on Old French bigot meant "an excessively devoted or hypocritical person." Bigot is first recorded in English in 1598 with the sense "a superstitious hypocrite"
prejudiced
1. a. An adverse judgment or opinion formed beforehand or without knowledge or examination of the facts. See synonyms at PREDILECTION. b. A preconceived preference or idea.
2. The act or state of holding unreasonable preconceived judgments or convictions.
3. Irrational suspicion or hatred of a particular group, race, or religion.
4. Detriment or injury caused to a person by the preconceived, unfavorable conviction of another or others.
verb, transitive
1. To cause (someone) to judge prematurely and irrationally.
2. To affect injuriously or detrimentally by a judgment or an act. See synonyms at BIAS.
[Middle English, from Old French, from Latin praeiúdicium : prae-, pre- + iúdicium, judgment (from iúdex, iúdic-, judge).]
VS. Skepticism
These nouns all refer to the condition of being unsure about someone or something. Uncertainty, the least forceful, merely denotes a lack of assurance or conviction: I regarded my decision with growing uncertainty. Doubt and dubiety imply a questioning state of mind that leads to hesitation in accepting a premise or in making a decision: Skepticism generally suggests an instinctive or habitual tendency to question and demand proof, as of truth or merit: "A wise skepticism is the first attribute of a good critic" (James Russell Lowell). Suspicion is doubt as to the innocence, truth, integrity, honesty, or soundness of someone or something; the word often suggests an uneasy feeling that the person or thing is evil: "I had rather take my chance that some traitors will escape detection than spread abroad a spirit of general suspicion and distrust" (Learned Hand). Mistrust denotes lack of trust or confidence, as in a person's motives, arising from suspicion:
The art and craft of marketing is to segment the population into fragments
- by income and taste, region and styles. One segment for the GAP or Old
Navy - another for Target or Sacks Fifth Ave. One market for religious
conservatives, economic liberals, urban, rural, educated, illiterate.
Responsible Adults vs. The Playboy - the present vs. The future
We save and invest - they spend and give away - Tax cuts vs. Reduce
the debt and pay on retirement for the future Substance of reform vs. The
fiery political rhetoric of reform :
1. a. The art or study of using language effectively and persuasively.
b. A treatise or book discussing this art.
2. Skill in using language effectively and persuasively.
3. a. A style of speaking or writing, especially the language
of a particular subject: fiery political rhetoric. b. Language that is
elaborate, pretentious, insincere, or intellectually vacuous: His offers
of compromise were mere rhetoric. 4. Verbal communication; discourse.
Usage Note: The word rhetoric was once primarily
the name of an important branch of philosophy and an art deserving of serious
study. In recent years the word has come to be used chiefly in a pejorative
sense to refer to inflated language and pomposity. Deprecation of the term
may result from a modern linguistic puritanism, which holds that language
used in legitimate persuasion should be plain and free of artifice—itself
a tendentious rhetorical doctrine, though not often recognized as such.
But many writers still prefer to bear in mind the traditional meanings
of the word. Thus, according to the newer use of the term, the phrase empty
rhetoric, as in The politicians talk about solutions, but they usually
offer only empty rhetoric, might be construed as redundant. But in fact
only 35 percent of the Usage Panel judged this example to be redundant.
Presumably, it can be maintained that rhetoric can be other than empty. http://cbs.marketwatch.com/archive/20000209/news/current/msft.htx?source=blq/yhoo&dist=yhoo
"Microsoft has designed (Windows 2000) in a way which may permit it to
leverage its dominant position in PC operating systems into operating markets
such as server operating systems and e-commerce," Monti said. --
the EU competition commissioner, told journalists that several competitors
had complained that Windows 2000 would give Microsoft (MSFT: news, msgs)
a dominant position in the software market. --
Monti said the Commission is acting on allegations that Microsoft has
bundled its Windows 2000 operating system with its own service software
and other Microsoft products in such a way that only Microsoft products
are thoroughly interoperable.
Network operations are currently divided into three technology families,
code division multiple access (CDMA), time division multiple access (TDMA),
and global system for mobile communication (GSM).
If we gave you 800-kilobit packet-data service as a user, we could fit
100 voice calls into that same bandwidth,"
Japan's NTT DoCoMo doesn't have the same concern, one reason why it's
not hesitating to jump into 3G. Japanese and European operators running
out of bandwidth can license new spectrum for 3G; U.S. operators cannot.
Eventually, the goal is "third generation," or 3G, devices (digital
cell phones were the second generation) that will deliver data rates of
up to 2 Mbps. Just for comparison, current cellular-network transfer rates
plod along at 9.6 Kbps or 14.4 Kbps, at best, which is OK for e-mail and
some of the new Internet services being lauded by cell-phone carriers.
Phone.com's (PHCM) Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) microbrowser is
helping squeeze the Web into these pipes, but that's a stopgap measure.
Wireless data is hot. You can't open a magazine without reading about
microbrowsers on cell phones or turn on a television without seeing an
advertisement for the Internet-in-your-pocket.
Japan is blasting away, with all jets driving, toward the new wireless
Internet. As far back as October 19, 1998, NTT Mobile Communications Network
Inc. (NTT DoCoMo, Tokyo), Japan's leading mobile operator, piloted a cellular
network that joined together the cell phone and motion video.
Expected to launch commercially in March 2001, the network and others
like it will give birth to a new wireless-communications era. For NTT DoCoMo's
3 million "i-mode" cell-phone subscribers (roughly 10 percent of the company's
total customer base), for example, it will mean wireless high-speed Internet
news, banking, video streaming, travel reservations, Web radio, and a slew
of other services.
"Whoever gains dominance in the software service market gains dominance
in electronic commerce, too," Monti said. --
The engine of economic growth - the decline of hubris
hubris Overbearing pride or presumption; arrogance: insolence, arrogance,
haughtiness, loftiness, PRIDE - that comes with success and power -
The European and their cousins in North America dominated World Civilization
for centuries. The growth of free markets and military technology created
a ruling mentality of natural superiority.
Among the greatest of these were industrial empires that spanned the
Globe. The Seven Sisters in Oil, DuPont and ICI in chemicals, the Generals
- motors, electric, and International Business Machines and now the extreme
hubris of Microsoft the worlds most valuable company.
As in all empires there comes hubris - a justified pride that becomes
arrogance and rigidity of a ruling aristocracy. The results of institutionalized
arrogance is declines in technological innovation, worker relations, client
and customer satisfaction, productivity, and slower growth in such mature
economies. Slow growth in big advanced societies was an article of faith
among the rulers of such enterprises, their financial backers, and the
economic community. Only the radical supply-side really believed in growth.
Politics is the mirror of the ruling style and culture - status quo
- pride from power and imperial position - creates customer ( voter ) dissatisfaction
but there is still a lack of real competition and alternatives.
The advent of really surprising technological change not controlled
by empires has forced those that would survive to change. The common wisdom
now is adapt and move quickly or die. For the fact was that dinosaurs were
warm blooded and fast on their feet - but they did have small brains with
centralized management and ecological limitations. The theme of decentralized,
fast and user friendly grew in England who experience the pains of hubris
and the sun set on empire. Vietnam did something to reduce Yankee arrogance,
and that of Harvard maybe. Public Schools, Universities, Churches, and
political institution seem immune to the forces of change but their time
will come.
Therefore, THE engine of economic expansion in a mature economy is internal
and external pressure that forces a culture of change, adjustment, innovation.
Most of our economic growth was first from rich natural resources and market
expansion due to better transportation. Then science and technology applied
by scientific management, innovation, and new markets. These factors are
still with us and important but a new culture of fast, where only the paranoid
( fear of someone getting ahead of you ) survive. If you don’t do it, someone
will, and they will be ahead on the learning curve, and you may not be
able to catch up. Most of economic growth is cultural - human capital and
enterprise - scientific knowledge - technical competence - good work habits
- honesty and efficiency.
Many ( most ) firms ignored the Internet, intranet, e-commerce, modern
inventory business to business supply systems, customer relations technology,
employee relations, and every other productivity tool that has come alone.
They did not want to be pioneers - it was too risky - there was too great
a fear of making mistakes. If you don’t make mistakes you are not doing
enough new stuff.
If you don’t abandon mistakes quickly or have success too quickly you
are not moving fast enough.
This is a new culture and explains a lot of the increases in productivity.
Many ( most ) firms ignored the Internet, intranet, e-commerce, modern
inventory business to business supply systems, customer relations technology,
employee relations, and every other productivity tool that has come alone.
They did not want to be pioneers - it was too risky - there was too great
a fear of making mistakes. If you don’t make mistakes you are not doing
enough new stuff. If you don’t abandon mistakes quickly or have success
too quickly you are not moving fast enough.
This is a new culture and explains a lot of the increases
in productivity.
In James Shreeve's "The Neanderthal Enigma" (William Morrow, 1995) he
quotes Allan Wilson, who headed the team of human DNA mitochondrial research
that produced the "Eve" theory. The theory suggests that all existing people
came out of Africa as a single strain of modern homo sapiens. We all are
descendants from this historic "Eve" mother who was transformed from archaic
humans, sometime in the last 300,000 years.
"Ultimately it all came back to molecular mutations. In the brain there
must be a mutation for the ability to "catch on", to detect fellow creatures
who have discovered something and imitate it as good." Among the population
those groups made up of members who had "better" brains and "caught-on"
faster reproduced at a higher rate creating a positive feedback loop generating
ever-faster evolution. ( page 123 )
Catch-on factor. the new politics and long term economic growth:
There is no more important idea to explain sustained growth and political
change then the "catch-on" factor. New politics can raise money and energy
from the new economy. The new economy of fast change and learning has increased
to a quarter of all people and forms a powerful group. The new ideas include
how we manage our public affairs and a shift of power from "established"
institutions to temporary groups and fast moving ideas and values.Learning
and change ( catch-on) is a genetic determinant of the behavior of our
unique species and the reason for the 30,000 years of human progress. The
fact is that we can learn - pay attention to what works and why.
( Except in the public school system - which has not learned anything
or forgotten anything in more than a century - every other institution
- well maybe also the Catholic Church and Congress almost everything else
has changed beyond recognition in the last century - Interesting how they
manage to do this ? Lack of standards and competition is most likely .
Schools simply have little idea how to do what they are expected to do
- teach, Congress is tied to a obsolete election system, the church has
failed to tie the spirit to practice )
Now the Internet has quicken the process of information transfer
and learning. The investment community has shifted to venture capital and
new and powerful forces are loose in the land. It is very different from
tradition large bureaucratic power structures that have dominated industrial
society since the beginning of the second industrial revolution at the
end of the last century. Smaller private owner run enterprises were rationalized
into combines and cartels. The decline of GM, GE, IBM, and other mega firms
is reflected in the decline is political establishments and power structures.
New politics can raise money and energy from the new economy.
There is and has to be a balance to change - tradition, habit, bureaucracy,
hierarchy, Emotion, religion and proscribed morality sacerdotal order,
priesthood, secular and regular clergy, so there is a conflict between
learning and progress with traditional belief systems. The enemies of the
"modern secular order" always have been religious conservatives who saw
the danger less in pure science but in the freedom of choice of what to
believe, learn new and "dangerous" ideas and question establishments of
all kinds.
Since our economic welfare and the longest expansion in history is
dependent on learning, change, freedom of thought and trying new things.
The balance has shifted to the new and experimental from the tried and
true. The new politics reflects the new realities. Now the vast majorities
of Americans believe in "new ways", change, and doing things differently
from the past.
Staff Size: About 50 full-time staff members. Manager: Rick Davis, deputy campaign manager for Bob Dole in his
1996 presidential campaign. Political Director: John Weaver, led George Bush's general election
presidential campaign in Texas in 1988 and was national field director
of Senator Phil Gramm's presidential campaign in 1996. Strategic Consultant: Mike Murphy, a political strategist from Virginia
who worked for Lamar Alexander and later for Dole in 1996. Treasurer: Max Fose Prominent Advisers: Former Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger
and Jeane J. Kirkpatrick, the former chief United States delegate to the
United Nations, on foreign policy; Lisa Graham Keegan, superintendent of
public instruction at the Arizona Department of Education, on education;
Kevin A. Hassett of the American Enterprise Institute on fiscal and tax
policy. Advising on politics are Kenneth M. Duberstein, a former chief
of staff to President Ronald Reagan who is now a Washington lobbyist and
Vin Weber, a former congressman from Minnesota.
Campaign Staff for Bush
Staff Size: 185 full-time paid workers. Manager: Joe Allbaugh, has never
guided a national effort. Chief Strategist: Karl Rove, a veteran Republican operative. Communications Director: Karen P. Hughes, has been Bush's spokeswoman
since his successful race for Texas governor in 1994. Media Strategist: Mark McKinnon, a former Democratic operative who
joined Mr. Bush for his 1998 re-election campaign. Treasurer: David Herndon
Prominent Advisers: Chief foreign policy adviser is Condoleezza Rice,
a former provost of Stanford University who was a Russia specialist on
the National Security Council under Bush's father. Chief domestic policy
adviser is former Mayor Stephen Goldsmith of Indianapolis. Chief economic
adviser is Lawrence B. Lindsey, a Harvard-trained, supply-side economist
who worked under Presidents George Bush and Ronald Reagan. Bush is also
close to several other Republican governors, particularly Tom Ridge of
Pennsylvania, John Engler of Michigan and Marc Racicot of Montana.
Advice to George W. Bush
It is hard to say anything useful - maybe just doing what is the common
practice these days will work for you with time and money - but maybe it
will fail - and a better idea is out there - for you, for the party and
the country. It is called style and grace -
If you follow the advice of the political and media consultants:
- Establish your persona, the role that you assumes or displays in public
or society; one's public image or personality, as distinguished from the
inner self.
Second - find the policies that reflect what sells - the cycle of talk
up a subject - get the press to cover it - then poll and use focus groups
to discover they care about the subject - which then you push - and around
and around you go
The old themes:
less government more freedom, cut taxes: liberals are the ENEMY that
want to impose socialism, right to life, fundamentalism, and other ideas
that conflict with the modern world and the pattern of our times .
Third - you attack your opposition for the negative votes that are quite
common.
OR how about the vision thing ?
Sears needed to learn from Wal-Mart on distribution systems and computer
technology - GM learned from Japan - either you learn and change or bye
bye birdie - ( not under par by a stroke )
To appear real you might be real -
to promote a vision you might have a vision -
2. Unusual competence in discernment or perception; intelligent foresight:
a leader
of vision.
3. The manner in which one sees or conceives of something.
4. A mental image produced by the imagination.
To be in fact or actuality; having verifiable existence:, not ghosts,
false feeling; focus on real problems; founded on practical matters and
concerns:
2. Genuine and authentic; not artificial or spurious:.
3. Being no less than what is stated; worthy of the name:.
4. Free of pretense, falsehood, or affectation:
5. Not to be taken lightly; serious:
This is something that must come from the soul -
if it’s not there then you can fake it but that is quite difficult.
So what are the real issues - what is the true vision -
The image is a successful high technology global society - safe policies
- don’t rock the boat - financial conservatives pay down debt -
The historic themes of our civilization is Liberty - less regulation
- limited governmental power - free enterprise competition. This is the
tradition conservative platform - Tax reform will work but only within
the context of freedom - from the IRS and how it impacts on lives and economic
activity.
equality of opportunity or limits on class privileges - one country
which binds its people together - so forget the race card it will distort
you because it is evil and wrong - stand up for principles, social justice,
open society. You are a product of class - ( and everyone knows it ) and
need more than the good fellow well meet image - you have to do what Robert
Kennedy and his brother did in forming a genuine attachment to and passion
in the people - Are they going to hang your picture on the wall ?
Visit the poor and dark - backwoods and beyond - prisons and hospital
- be a follower of Jesus - in his footsteps ( a little ) not of theology
and theory - Christian practice is kind, loving, forgiving, kind, etc.
You won’t loose the country club set and will gain your soul and victory.
brotherhood ( sisterhood ) fraternity or union, united for common purposes
One nation under GOD - being all you can be - vision of a high tech city
on the hill - special mission to humanity - global role - We hold these
truths to be self evident - baldness, plain words, words of one syllable,
home truth, unembellished tale, undisguised meaning, unambiguity, true
statement, honest truth, sober truth, TRUTH - the system stinks and is
out of control - The president must hold the high ground - REFORM comes
from the inside out - --
The enemy of my enemy is my friend:
The more the "RIGHT" attacks John McCain the more I like him. The more
they get excited about his campaign and other reform ideas the more I think
the reform might be for real.
The more Rush Limbaugh goes Anti- McCain in response to the right wing
party line - the more I can come to support McCain despite three generations
of die hard liberal democrats looking over my shoulder.
The real dangers to the republic are ideologies, the Grandchildren to
anti-Communist of the Joe McCarthy era, anti-intellectuals, anti foreigner,
protectionism, know-nothings, America First of the Pat the Buccaneer style,
they are so sure of themselves that think they have the right to call their
fellow liberal citizens anti-American and fellow travelers, those who believe
they have a direct pipeline to GOD have no doubts of the "right" and the
"wrong" - The Republicans have been suckering of these "true believers"
and fundamentalist to support programs against their own self interest.
Since they have not delivered on the "social agenda" nothing that counts
there is some disillusion with the crying game.
It worked in the 1980 to build a Republican majority, and again with
the Contract on America, called the southern strategy of Lee Atwater. A
temporary and fractious majority was patched together by the slick talk
of consultants employed by the economic imperialists (G-PAC) and their
use of Reagan the Happy Actor in a role he enjoyed but never understood.
This group know what it is against, abortion, environmentalist, gun control,
big government, high taxes, liberals, welfare, integration and affirmative
action, uppy women, the culture and media, but is not for anything except
the status quo and tax cuts for the rich that put up the money. The coalition
included Western fascist, southern racist, and other extremist in the pursuit
of an Ayn Rand objectiveism, unclouded 19th century individualism, nationalism,
military contracts, foreign adventure, and other wacky ideas such as Voodoo
economics.
Maybe more important the control of events by moneyed interests causes
people to loose faith in the government and therefore their own fate and
future as a collective social system. The change in congress only means
which committee chairmen get the most power to raise cash.
Teddy Roosevelt drew the wrath of the moneyed classes and many of the
same groups in the Republican Party that hate McCain and overall was a
good President. They hated FDR,that cripple in the White House, and the
way he saved them from themselves, and FDR clearly was The great President
of modern times. Lincoln had the most wonderful enemies - who still fly
the confederate flag and screw up everything they put their hand to.
The enemy of my enemy is my friend - from Winston Churchill agreement
to make a pact with the devil ( Stalin ) to defeat Hitler. I will agree
to McCain's conservative ( he is a really Barry Goldwater conservative
) in order to defeat the moneyed interest and being back the loyal opposition
into the mainstream.
The first rule of politics:
As "they" say it’s winning, winning, winning. You
can’t do anything if you don’t win. I think the votes will care who can
win in the general election.
McCain appears to have an advantage with Democrats and Independents
and therefore a path to victory. Since character matters - he has a big
jump on Bush. The Bush camp has attacked McCain as being less than a pure
Republican. -In making true believers an issue is shooting themselves in
the foot and beginning to aim higher.
The system is broken and needs repair before some important things can
be done ( or much can be done at all ) moves me to support real reform
- The main stream - Bush and Gore are unlikely do do anything interesting
or different. It is time for a change. I would hope for a Democratic Congress
to balance the conservative President. He is moderate on taxes, wants to
pay down the debt, so is OK on economics ( no voodoo ) He is so out spoken
on Corporate Welfare, special privileges, and getting power back into balance
that is important in establishing trust and hope in public affairs.
Ideological ( or principled ) groups don’t win. The only way you win
is to have a big tent and a short set of ideas reflecting the social needs
and aspirations of a majority of voting individuals, groups, a classes,
and cultures. Political research has shown over the last 50 years that
publics in the US do not have defined philosophies. They vote on the basis
of tradition, region, family, union association, religion, and other roots
from the past. As the population has changed and become more mobile the
roots are torn up and they are more "independent".
The lesson is clear, only the center maters, in getting elected. Primaries
were run by the faithful - the small minority that thinks it has strong
economic or ideological reasons for political action. Less than 2 % of
the votes contribute money and are activist. They do matter in this special
case but have no where to go after the party moves to center.
Independents and those who cross party lines have a lot of clout. Bill
McInturff, Mr. McCain’s pollster, explains how. If independents cast a
third of the votes and Mr. McCain wins them by 40 percentage points, as
he did in New Hampshire, that gives him a 12-point margin overall. To overcome
that, Mr. Bush has to win the two-thirds who are registered Republicans
by more than 20 points. This is a formidable task if voters start thinking
of the race as a contest of equals as they are now doing. So the main questions
about the primary season are becoming: How many independent voters are
there? And can Mr. McCain prevent Mr. Bush winning big among registered
Republicans?
In California, says Bernd Schwieren, 21% of voters are independents,
up from 12% in 1992. Among those registering for the first time, independents
outstrip Republicans three-to-one.
This suggests that Mr. McCain might just might be able to win Michigan
and even California. But both races are likely to be close, and strongly
influenced by South Carolina. Here, the opinion polls suggest that no fewer
than 37% of voters are independents a motley bunch including ex-servicemen
(the state has proportionately more of these than any other state) and
retired Yankees (who outnumber native southerners on the coast, says Mark
Sanford, the congressman who represents most of that region). Yet, at the
same time, a third of voters describe themselves as religious conservatives,
twice as many as in Michigan or California. This was the only group of
Republican voters that Mr. McCain lost in New Hampshire.
All - right thinking - Americans Republicans, Democrats and Independents
- want their country to be prosperous, main the peace by being strong and
have a government as good the dreams of the past
The people believe in our country. They want their land to be not
only strong economically, supporting a strong national defense, but with
a leadership of high moral character. Our nation yearns for a political
system as good as the noble aspirations of generations past. A politics
that responds to the needs of ordinary people not the special interests.
Three point program:
FINANCIAL RESPONSIBILITY
n prudent management of public expenditures - balance the budget
- pay down the debt - reform and secure Social Security and Medicaid, and
simplify and radically change the tax code. We need a non-partisan
expert commission to study way of reform Social Security and Medicare (
I know it’s been tried and failed but still remains a useful method ) and
the use of the VAT - consumer taxes in replace of income taxes. By using
consumption taxes everyone pays - criminals and tax dodgers, it increase
our competitiveness with Europe, and make it easier and more fair to raise
need revenues. It also limits special interest lobbying and influence peddling
since the tax code is the mother load of special interest and privilege.
TECHNOLOGICAL SUPERIORITY:
· The future of the economy and our security is all depended
on high technology. We must have a smaller, highly trained, highly
equipped, highly mobile, highly flexible, cost effective modern military.
This means good pay and working conditions for a selective force of professionals.
In order to have a effective modern military - a world class civil
service - a economy that grows and expands and includes more and more people
in modern wealth production. We need a modern work force, a creative
labor pool, an up to date cutting edge educational and training system,
advanced apprenticeships, universal adult education, vast expansion of
remote and distance education, more cost effective health education, expanded
support for professional development, more institutes for science and engineering.
We need a almost universal understanding of math and science, computers
and technology, economics and business in our population. The rewards
of the job market and private enterprise is doing and will do a lot.
SOCIAL JUSTICE:
· The public sector should get with it " do the walk as well
as the talk " with 21st century schools for a 21st century society.
There is no greater cause of continuing poverty, discrimination, crime
and social tension, than an failed public school system. Those who are
left behind can’t catch up. We know how to measure schools that fail -
now we have to be sure about what works and do it - http://www.wiredbrain.com/answer.htm
NOW, WE HAVE ECONOMIC PROSPERITY. OUR GROWING WEALTH IS BY VIRTUE
OF THE EVERYDAY HARD WORK OF ORDINARY PEOPLE IN COMMUNITIES ALL ACROSS
THE NATION. PEOPLE OF ALL RACES, COLORS, RELIGIOUS BELIEFS, FAMILIES THAT
COME ALL THE NATIONS OF THE WORLD - MEN AND WOMEN, YOUNG AND OLDER, WORKING
FASTER AND SMARTER.
Old and new enterprises, big and small, mature companies and fresh
start ups, are using new tools, new systems of higher productivity, business
is getting faster and more flexible. Our society has a new burst of creativity.
Our industry is more competitive and connected to global markets, with
customers, suppliers, distribution all connected to each other. Wal-Mart
and Amazon.com have shown how better service and smart technology can provide
consumers lower prices and more selection.
Computers have twice the capacity at half the cost every few years.
Communications using optic fiber, wireless, wideband, is responding to
a huge demand for broadband services. Communications hardware is
expending over a billion dollars a day on global systems. New tele-communications
possibilities touch millions of lives a day.
The convergence of computers, computerized switches and filters,
high speed and mobile communications, telephone, television, cable, satellites,
and extremely high capacity communications is generating an era of scientific
and technological expansion of vast possibilities. Our defense and
space industry has made many vital contributions to our technology. The
Advanced Research Project from the Dept. Of Defense funded the system that
became the Internet. NASA created the satellite communications that made
cable TV practical. Government support of basic science in biology, medicine,
physics and space exploration will make new wonders possible for ourselves
and our children.
But not everywhere is there great prosperity. Where we are rich there
are smart people working hard with new tools and techniques using their
great skill and knowledge. Where there is poverty people lack the skills,
knowledge, tools, and capital, they are not connected to the computer economy.
THE ROLE OF GOVERNMENT
The Government can do more to improve the knowledge and skills of
all the people so that everyone can be more productive, our country more
competitive in a global economy and the benefits of prosperity spread more
widely.
Our public sector - local, state, and federal - from Fire and Police,
to transportation and social services can and must participate in the productivity
revolution made possible by technology. Some of the best and brightest
must work for the public sector and have a climate which is innovative,
flexible, smart and fast. This is not our idea of the "bureaucracy"
but must and should be. The post office must get out ahead of the communications
curve, and be first in customer service. Not our idea of the old
Post Office, but it should be.
POLITICAL REFORM
In an age of rapid communication it is ridicules to have political
campaigns longer than 8 weeks. The season should begin about Labor
Day and end on the first Tuesday in November. We no longer go to conventions
in covered wagons or have trains to carry our messages. That would
cut the cost and some of the problem of the need for big money. The
political voluntary check off on your Income Taxes should include a few
more bucks for public finance and free air time for congress and the Presidential
offices. For those who accept public support in campaigns will agree voluntary
to limit total expenditures. Contribution limits should be ties to the
real value of money so some old limits should be raised to reflect current
value of the dollar. There need to be controls on organized labor is there
is going to be reform it has to cover the use of union resources in partisan
politics.
Symbolic schizophrenia, in which the country exhibits two or more disassociated
personalities, each functioning as a distinct entity sometimes as a split
personality.
Sometimes in the same person - Rockefeller, the Kennedy’s, Bill Casey,
Bush
A civic religion - bring order out of chaos
The whole life of an American is passed like a game of chance, a
revolutionary crisis, or a battle. Alexis de Tocqueville ( between greed
and morality )
The winning theme is " Making Americans feel good about
their country ".
The American President is an elected democratic monarch. The king
is the representative or embodiment of GOD - Gods bring order out of chaos
and uncertainty.
The character issue is a royal function - but often seen as simple
morality.
The patriotic disposition in America is a complex of hope, idealism,
trust, altruism, and provincialism, xenophobia, arrogance, with a passion
to get everyone to conform to the current dominant materialistic culture.
Reform, therefore, is equally complex. Reform in American is very
marginal affair compared to the radical and revolutionary radical politics
elsewhere. The slogan " Time for a Change " means renewed hope in a cleaner,
better, honest, more open political system with less "bums", " Throw the
bums out " is forever popular. It does not imply any real change in the
real world.
We know it's the system, stupid !
What is most important for democracy is not that great fortunes
should not exist, but that great fortunes should not remain in the same
hands. In that way there are rich men, but they do not form a class.
Alexis de Tocqueville
It is very American:
The whole life of an American is passed like a game of chance, a
revolutionary crisis, or a battle. ( between greed and morality )
It is the dissimilarities and inequalities among
men which give rise to the notion of honor; as such differences become
less, it grows feeble; and when they disappear, it will vanish too.
Alexis de Tocqueville (1805–59), French social philosopher. Democracy
in America, vol. 2, pt. 3, ch. 18 (1840).
The American President is mostly a figurehead, in his main role of
a democratic monarch, head of State. He reigns but does not rule. . The
federal government is formed around a set of committee and sub-committee
chairmen and the over 3000 interest groups - ( roads, weapons, regulation,
subsides, supports, breaks, privileges many were set up as trade association
for the public purpose of war mobilization by Barnard Baruch in WWW I )
with the agencies and programs they support being the other sides of the
IRON
TRIANGLES or molecular government or feudalism on the hill, in the
executive departments and the media: who all respond to the same set of
power brokers ( such as ADM, GM, GE, Insurance, real estate, defense, et
al ) .
McCains quotes incorrectly. Special Interests mean money and votes
= for committee members money means assumed reelection = and agencies,
laws and programs are the outcomes of the deal struck among interests for
the benefit of those interests. Government by the special interest, for
the privileged, of the few and powerful. You can get yours as long as I
can get mine - log rolling and swaps. One can loose your taste for sausages
or respect for the law, or belief in the news - by seeing how they are
made.
Changing bodies will have a minimum effect on systems operation.
In other words the new heroes become bums once they are sucked into the
whirlpool of money, politics, campaign technologies and consultants - media
contortionist .
We are captives of history. We know and expect a rough edge to reality.
We know chaos and rather like some disorder and flexibility. There is no
limit to the ability of people to whole conflicting ideas - desire for
law and order - ( on someone else ) and lots of room for maneuver . As
often what people say and do does not have close correlation . --
The White House is cut out of most of the action but serves a useful
purpose in distracting attention.
The symbolic president has to be a strong patriotic model and healer
( makes people feel good ) but also a dealer ( delivers the goods) - FDR
did both beautifully, Lincoln and even Jefferson knew how to make a deal,
Clinton is most admired as "Slick Wily" for his political skills, and so
was "tricky Dick" , LBJ was a genius at practical politics - getting something
done by getting others to go along, get out of the way, be be defeated
or so he could cut a deal a majority could accept with side payments or
could not defeat.
As one digs deeper into the national character of the Americans,
one sees that they have sought the value of everything in this world only
in the answer to this single question: how much money will it bring in?
Alexis de Tocqueville (1805–59), French social philosopher. Letter,
9 June 1831 (published in Selected Letters on Politics and Society, 1985).
In America the majority raises formidable barriers around the
liberty of opinion; within these barriers an author may write what he pleases,
but woe to him if he goes beyond them.
I know of no country in which there is so little independence
of mind and real freedom of discussion as in America.
Trade is the natural enemy of all violent passions. Trade loves
moderation, delights in compromise, and is most careful to avoid anger.
It is patient, supple, and insinuating, only resorting to extreme measures
in cases of absolute necessity. Trade makes men independent of one another
and gives them a high idea of their personal importance: it leads them
to want to manage their own affairs and teaches them to succeed therein.
Hence it makes them inclined to liberty but disinclined to revolution.
Alexis de Tocqueville (1805–59), French social philosopher. Democracy
in America, vol. 2, pt. 3, ch. 21 (1840).
In democratic ages men rarely sacrifice themselves for another,
but they show a general compassion for all the human race. One never sees
them inflict pointless suffering, and they are glad to relieve the sorrows
of others when they can do so without much trouble to themselves. They
are not disinterested, but they are gentle. Alexis de Tocqueville (1805–59),
French social philosopher. Democracy in America, vol. 2, pt. 3, ch. 1 (1840).
Scarcely any political question arises in the United States that
is not resolved, sooner or later, into a judicial question.
The best laws cannot make a constitution work in spite of morals;
morals can turn the worst laws to advantage. That is a commonplace truth,
but one to which my studies are always bringing me back. It is the central
point in my conception. I see it at the end of all my reflections.
The main business of religions is to purify, control, and restrain
that excessive and exclusive taste for well-being which men acquire in
times of equality.
Consider any individual at any period of his life, and you will
always find him preoccupied with fresh plans to increase his comfort. Do
not talk to him about the interests and rights of the human race; that
little private business of his for the moment absorbs all his thoughts,
and he hopes that public disturbances can be put off to some other time.
The surplus is less than you think
Much of the Projected Non-Social Security Surplus Is a Mirage: Vast
Majority of Surplus Rests on Assumptions of Deep Cuts in Domestic Programs
that Are Unlikely to Occur http://www.cbpp.org/7-12-99bud.htm
The government is getting smaller and the debt relative to GNP ( GDP
) is declining rather quickly and the % paid in interest to the public
on the debt is under the magic 3 % of GNP ( 250 billion / 5,694 billion
= 4.3 % rate because the government doesn't pay itself interest ) which
the EU thought was safe to join the euro. ( The government holds a lot
of it's own debt )
Now it's interesting that the Republican Goal of small government and
less taxes and high growth has happened more since the Democrats have had
the white house than under the Republicans.
1960 1970 1980 1983 1988(b)
Total expenditures as % of GDP 18.5 20.2 22.4 24.1 1988 22.3
NOW down projected to decline to about 17 % ( I can't find the reference
for current figures - I had them and can't find them )http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa045.html
federal Government was 22 % of GNP when Reagan started and when he left
it was 22 % the size of government then declined to 19 % under Clinton
- because of tight spending limits and a fast growing economy.
Public debt as percentage of GNP Gone from 66 % ( 4 trillion over 6
) to 60 % ( 5 over 8 ) and projected to decline below 10 % in 10 years
- you notice that the GNP ( GDP ) increased while the actual debt is about
the same.
Current
02/07/2000 $5,693,618,340,748.18
12/31/1982 1,197,073,000,000.00 *
12/31/1983 1,410,702,000,000.00 *
12/31/1984 1,662,966,000,000.00 *
12/31/1985 1,945,941,616,459.88
09/30/1986 2,125,302,616,658.42
09/30/1987 2,350,276,890,953.00
09/30/1988 2,602,337,712,041.16
09/29/1989 2,857,430,960,187.32
09/28/1990 3,233,313,451,777.25
09/30/1991 3,665,303,351,697.03
09/30/1992 4,064,620,655,521.66
09/30/1993 4,411,488,883,139.38
09/30/1994 4,692,749,910,013.32
09/29/1995 4,973,982,900,709.39
09/30/1996 5,224,810,939,135.73
09/30/1997 5,413,146,011,397.34
09/30/1998 5,526,193,008,897.62
--
So much for voodoo economics:
Government spending as a share of the economy would fall to 18.3 percent
in 2001, which is down from 18.7 percent in 2000 and the lowest figure
since 1966,
The Republican mantra in the 1980’s was to cut government and they seem
stuck on those dying themes. Rush is fighting a brave re guard action but
is outnumbered and surrounded. . They never did reduce the size of the
federal government as a percentage of GNP. This simple fact ( that voodoo
doesn't work ) and a real surplus over and above the social security extra
money shows the importance of rational management. rather than slogans
and simply wrong but popular ideas. President Bush tax and budget agreement
( which cost him the election ) and Clifton's deal a few years latter (
which cost a number of members their seats ) - cut costs by setting real
limits, raised income and was key to our current success.
Clifton's budget projects the Social Security system will generate $2.2
trillion in surpluses over the next 10 years, and the rest of the budget
will generate $746 billion in surpluses.
No good budget deed goes unpunished
A different stump speech
Health care for all Americans is no big deal. Almost, every other industrial
society has some sort of plan that covers everyone - insurance from work,
insurance from unemployment, insurance from retirement, and a safety net
of local, state and federal programs for the rest. That was the plan developed
in Germany over a century ago - a blend of federal, state and local services
and support. There has to be a budget and cost constraints - since you
can’t pay for everything for everyone.
Managed care is the way we have chosen to set those constrains. Public
subsidy of those who need it to pay for basic insurance is the way to get
universal coverage. Free clinics is another because of the complex paper
work can take up to 20% of the health dollar - more than drugs and often
more than doctors fees. Prepaid plans such as Kaiser are a lot more cost
effective. Many HMO are not for real but are varieties of preferred providers
insurance schemes which are a much more complex conflict prone system.
A international standard of education is no big deal. ( except the schools
will have to actually learn to do their job of teaching ) Every other progressive
country has clear performance standards. If a child is having trouble they
get extra help, goes to summer school or tutoring, but is not passed on
to frustration and failure in higher grades. An college worth anything
doesn't accept students who can’t do the work. ( except if they play sports
) You don’t hire someone who can’t do the job. It is no favor to anyone
to put them is a clear situation where they will most certainly fail.
Hand guns should be controlled - of course - political pork limited
by removing items not cleared by the substance and appropriations committees
- social security put on a sound footing - etc.
These simple, prudent and rational steps can not be done in this country
because of money in politics.
You have to work on both the supply and demand side. What can be done
to reduce the need for money in getting elected. What can be done to reduce
the control of benefits or reduce special favors - What can be done to
reduce the power of individual members to those grant favors. Otherwise
of real structural reform, public finance with spending limits and free
television will help but not much. Money will take the form "independent
committees and issue committees". Doing away with much of the tax code
( largely ) and replacing it with a VAT would take a lot of special interests
money off the table. And VAT would help the economy and help in international
competition. Party discipline of committee chairmen and members so they
can’t sell to the highest bidder. In fact committee members should not
take any money from their area of jurisdiction.
America's government is a fossilized colossus, so hung about with lobbyists
and special interests (read: interests of ordinary Americans) that it is
well-nigh unchangeable, except at the edges. It is a bold or naïve
man (Bill Bradley, John McCain) who suggests reforms to any of the larger
workings of government. And even these men stop at one issue each, health
care and campaign finance respectively.
This tenderness for root-and-branch surgery is a result of two debacles
in which Mr. Clinton starred. The first was the loss of his dream, health-care
reform, in 1993: a reform that was just too big, and against which every
special interest in Washington eventually took up arms.
The lesson drawn from this was that it was better to think smaller.
And after the Democrats’ election drubbing of 1994, the lesson was underlined:
the president was forced to think very small indeed.
Mr. Clinton’s proposals since then have mostly been for poll-tested
micro-initiatives that even Republicans would like: parental leave, school
uniforms, a ratings system for videotapes. The key word is "incremental".
Forget the contentious, large-scale stuff: promise lots of little things
that may actually get done, and make sure they come with a photo-opportunity
attached. Mr. Bush half-endorses this technique; Mr. Gore proclaims it
wholeheartedly. He has learned from hard experience, and he has also learned
at the feet of the master.
If an elected official takes $1000.00 bills in a envelope left on his
desk it is bribery and illegal. If he submits bills that have the sole
and only purpose of shaking down some individuals industry it’s politics
as usual. If he takes the $1000.00 as a reported campaign contribution
is politics as usual. If he takes the money to add some provision to a
bill that gives the donor special privileges, business or advantages it
is politics as usual.
The elected official then takes these ill-gotten gains hires a professional
political consultants, who hires media people, PR people, strategists and
gets re-elected. As long as he is not caught doing something unusual or
especially nasty the game goes on as usual. The $1,000 have become millions
and the people in office have all the tools they need to stay there. Any
change in the system will threaten incumbents and they don’t want that
- and will find as good excuses as they can to stop it.
Corrupt political systems can’t reform themselves. Local political machines
that lived on patronage, kick backs, contract rigging, and other money
making enterprises were only reformed by reformers form outside and great
national movements. The other party ( that was closed out by the system
) gain control of the suburbs, state legislatures, and national assemblies.
Some machines and southern rural bosses never the less continue to this
day only slightly constrained by the law.
So how do we escape from the "history trap" being tied down by the actions
and inaction of our predecessors. As the federal government had to deal
with the corruption, racism, and incompetence at the local level - the
states have to deal with the failure of the national government. Only the
states have the power of reform because it will take a restructuring of
the electoral system and congress will not reform itself. It will take
the states to call a convention to rewrite the electoral process ( leaving
the bill of rights alone ) .
Otherwise public finance with spending limits and free television will
help but not much. Doing away with the tax code ( largely ) and replacing
it with a VAT would take a lot of special interests off the table. Party
discipline of committee chairmen and members so they can sell to the highest
bidder. In fact committee members should not take any money from their
area of jurisdiction .
His plan would use the entire Social Security surplus and half of the
remaining surplus to repay the federal debt.
The president also would pour $432 billion over 10 years into the Medicare
system. Some $299 billion of the anticipated budget surpluses over the
period would go to extending the financial health of the system to 2025.
His prescription drug plan would cost $160 billion over 10 years, and
the president proposed a separate $35 billion program to cover`` catastrophic''
drug costs for patients.
The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the
non-Social Security surplus could reach $1.9 trillion over 10 years if
spending were frozen -- thus giving Republicans more room for tax cuts
than Clinton sees. But the White House has said a spending freeze is unrealistic.
Human evolution since the beginning of modern people has been by cultural
advantages. All new technologies are tools of cultural evolution:
Stage I: ( 70,000 years) hunter gathers become farmers and herders;
THE AGE OF CLANS, tribal territory, the dreamtime.
Stage two: ( 7,000 ) improvements in irrigation, transportation, sailing
and navigation, public administration and the money creates "civilizations"
cities and empires; THE AGE OF EMPIRES, myths, kings and churches.
Stage III, (700 years) cannon boring, joint stock companies and insurance,
money and banking, printing, creates the nation states, imperialism and
the first industrial revolution, the federalist papers and the U.S. Constitution,
Newton, Kepler; THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION, iron and coal. The age of reason.
Stage IV, or III b: (70 years ) mass production, the modern corporation,
public schools and universities, Plank, Einstein, and going to the moon
and back, all are examples of "catching-on" to better methods. THE MODERN
Period, The AGE OF OIL ( Chemistry and electricity ) The materialist, bottom
line, structured world we come from and know.
As we layer into Stage III c, IV or V: ( 7 years ) the catch-on is to
smaller warm blooded flexible cultural grouping that search for niches
in a global economy. THE AGE of INFORMATION: negative feedback means the
end of the age of dinosaurs mass production organizations and causes down-sizing.
Positive feedback the "Gold rush" on the Internet. A world we don't know
- some of us "catch- on" faster than others. Some organizations learn faster
than others.
We looked at Fiber to the home FTTH at a base charge of under $ 15 would
wipe out other services - who don't work very well and are too expensive
where they exist. The common carrier model would allow competition for
services - cable - interactive - The $13.50 gets you wired - then you buy
network services including the NC - nexum ( http://www.wiredbrain.com/nexum.htm
) Up to 30 utilities are looking at the idea- http://www.siliconinvestor.com/stocktalk/msg.gsp?msgid=12726470GS3
at 2 to 3 Mbps would do most things except live TV ( could use a real radio
type quite well ) but not HDTV or anything like cable - maybe "good enough"
and not need all the wires -
(Come ON, U.S. cell phone companies -- one global standard
would be a boon for everyone's business, considering that IGI Consulting
anticipates 830 million wireless Internet access devices by 2005, and "...more
people... accessing the Internet by mobile phones than by PCs" as early
as 2003!
http://www.emarketer.com/estats/012400_wire.html
) Europe, with its common GSM standard, will likely usher in "3G"
technologies (with their 2 megabit/second data to pockets) years before
it happens in the U.S.' fragmented cellular environment. And fast wireless
data will surely usher in many new Opportunities. - http://www.pathfinder.com/fortune/technology/2000/01/24/ega.html
Last week, Ephraim Schwartz scooped me on the secret SpectraDyne
consortium (see "Consortium to power up broadband," Jan. 24., page 1).
He revealed that Sierra Pacific Power Company ( www.sierrapacific.com )
has been installing fibers along its rights of way to residential customers
in Southern Nevada.
Sources say that this summer, which would be a lot sooner than eventually,
Sierra Pacific (along with Hewlett-Packard and Oracle) will roll out FTTH
Internet at 10Mbps for $13.95 per month -- way faster and way cheaper than
CTMs and DSLs. http://www.siliconinvestor.com/stocktalk/msg.gsp?msgid=12726470
Telephone, television, and videoconferencing would be offered
for additional fees based on routing and connection time. Initial provisioning
would be at 155Mbps. Some 30 other public utilities are now in discussions
with the group. http://lw.pennwellnet.com/home/home.cfm
It's interesting that a power company -- also a residential
copper-based monopoly -- is installing local-loop fiber. And public utilities
are the last companies I think of as dynamic competitors. But let's hope
that at least half of this Sierra Pacific FTTH secret is true.
Ownership issues, not technology, are pacing deployment of FTTH,
says Brian Reid at Lucent's Bell Labs in Palo Alto, Calif. His solution
is not to leave FTTH to cable, telephone, or power monopolies, all of which
Palo Alto has, but to have Palo Alto or perhaps some independent agency
operate a new FTTH monopoly, giving citizens open access to competitive
Internet services.
In 1947 it was the transistor. Today it is photonics. Called the second
silicon revolution, optical fiber systems are in an explosive state of
development, reminiscent of the earlier days of the electronics industry.
Over the past two decades, since fiber-optic communications first began
to appear, the carrying capacity of fiber has increased at a faster rate
than Moore's law. Now the wavelength-division multiplexing revolution has
accelerated that capacity even more, while introducing the flexibility
of wavelength-based routing. Forged from an interdisciplinary mix of semiconductor
diode lasers, micromachine technology and fundamental advances in optical
glass technology, terahertz networking has arrived well ahead of schedule.
Fiber Optics to the Home
Fiber optics has helped push the telecommunications system into hyperdrive. But only when fiber connections reach all the way into the home will the technology’s promise be fully realized.
It's a major revolution riding on a broad-based industry serving the
fundamental human need to communicate.
"A length of fiber long enough to circle the globe three times is produced
every day, and if you extrapolate current trends to 2010, every one of
the 6 billion people on earth will have a bandwidth capability equivalent
to high-definition television," said Alistair Glass, director of photonics
research and development at Lucent Technologies Bell Laboratories. Arriving
at Bell Labs in 1967, Glass' career spans the development and implementation
of fiber-optic communications systems.
Major breakthrough
"When I arrived, the major breakthrough was the first continuously operating
laser, and it didn't run for very long-only a few minutes," Glass recalled.
"This was the time of the early hero experiments and the demands kept
increasing and increasing on these devices. There was always that pressure,
but the interest in the marketplace represented a dramatic change."
There was always a strong demand to increase the performance of any
device.
At first the research arm of AT&T, Bell Labs enjoyed a special status
after its founding in the 1920s. Because of the monopoly granted AT&T
by the government, in the interests of standardizing the telephone system,
the lab could both be part of a commercial operation and play the open
role of a national laboratory.
"At that time, there was not much connectivity with business- it was
very much intellectually driven. We wanted to be leaders in all the fields
relevant to communications," Glass said. But in the early 1980s two developments
dramatically accelerated photonics research: commercial long-haul fiber-optic
systems began to be installed commercially, and AT&T's monopoly was
dissolved by the government, with parts of Bell Labs spun off into other
companies as part of a complex divestiture of the telecommunications giant.
"We were suddenly handed the mandate to develop commercial products out
of our research efforts," he said.
The lab responded with a broad attack on optical communications systems.
Innovations in the basic fiber, laser diodes to power them, and integrated
optoelectronic components to interface with electronic data systems followed.
"Since then, particularly with the founding of Lucent Technologies, optics
has been accelerating at an incredible rate," Glass said.
For transporting data over long distances, fiber systems proved to be
irresistible. Large bundles of copper wire could be replaced by slender
silicon fibers in a process of "demassification" usually associated with
the electronics industry. While the debate continues over whether optical
interconnect is a viable alternative to electrical wiring inside of computers,
the issue has been definitively resolved for long-distance communications.
But optical interconnect inside the box may eventually succumb to a long-term
trend. Recent developments in metropolitan-area networks suggest that fiber
optics is riding a scaling law similar to the shrinking VLSI circuit, and
the scaling rate appears to be steeper.
The rapid deployment of fiber optics received an even bigger jolt with
a repeat of the '80s scenario in the 1990s. Bell Labs was again transferred
in 1996 to another entity-Lucent Technologies-and made the centerpiece
of a startup with considerable economic resources. Also brewing in photonics
labs was a revolutionary technology called dense wavelength-division multiplexing
(DWDM), which has allowed the carrying capacity of optical fiber to ramp
up at an astonishing rate. "In the mid-90s it became a fever. We went from
eight to 16 to 32 wavelengths on a single fiber and our latest products
use 400. Now we have just demonstrated 1,000 wavelengths," Glass noted.
DWDM uses individual segments of the optical spectrum to multiplex signals
on a fiber. The idea is recent, considered at first to be a laboratory
curiosity since practical systems were already multiplexing channels with
a time-division technique. Such synchronous optical networks (Sonet) had
been able to extend the capacity of optical fiber and were a welcome development.
The wavelength-division multiplexing route has turned out to have far more
potential: Bell Labs researchers recently demonstrated a DWDM transmission
system capable of sending a terabit of data per second down a fiber. "That
represents the entire world's Internet on a single glass fiber," Glass
said.
The DWDM revolution has been extremely swift. When Lucent Technologies
was established, DWDM was still at the laboratory demonstration stage.
While the idea is simple, turning it into practical optical communications
systems required a multifaceted development. Multiple-wavelength laser-diode
systems and new types of fiber able to carry the multiple wavelength signals
without crosstalk had to be developed. And some means of collectively amplifying
multiwavelength signals had to be invented. While those problems were effectively
solved in a short time, it wasn't easy. Indeed, one outstanding problem
has never been solved: how to regenerate multiple wavelength signals.
Large areas
One consequence of that missing solution is the fact that DWDM can only
be implemented on campus-wide or metropolitan areas. By doping fiber with
the rare-earth element erbium, it is possible to build a simple light amplifier
that is essentially a laser. When a multiple wavelength signal is passed
through an erbium fiber loop and optically pumped, it emerges unchanged
except that it is at a higher energy level. One nice aspect of this operation
is that the actual content of the wavelength channels is irrelevant to
the amplification process. Unfortunately, to recondition optical signals,
it becomes necessary to decode their content and relaunch them. Thus signal
regeneration, which is essential in long-haul networks, is still unavailable
to DWDM.
Balancing this deficiency in very long transmissions is a new wave of
all-optical switching elements that are able to add or remove a wavelength
channel from a fiber. These add-drop multiplexers offer a high-speed switching
function that could not be duplicated with electronics, and have made metropolitan-area
networks into a unique flexible, high-throughput communications medium.
This essentially new form of photonics technology is spawning an industry
in optical switching components. "Now people can invent a novel device
that relites to communications and it will find its way into products extremely
rapidly-less than a year," said Glass. "We are now in a situation of 'invent
on demand' where as soon as a problem is perceived, someone immediately
comes up with a solution."
This explosive growth poses a formidable challenge to electronics technology.
"If you compare the speed of silicon chips versus the capacity of optical
fiber communications, fiber optics is going significantly faster than electronics,
and where the fiber ends-that becomes a significant bottleneck." Glass
is convinced that fiber to the home office and then fiber to the home are
just around the corner. "We have a demonstration project going with Bell
South where we have wired up a suburban neighborhood with little fiber-optic
network units on the side of each house," he said.
Dealing with the high volumes of data that are coming off optical fibers
will present a big challenge to electronics. Fortunately, wavelength-division
multiplexing eases that task since each wavelength can be processed simultaneously
by different circuits. Ultimately, electronics and optics technologies
offer complementary abilities: "Optics is ideal for transporting data from
point A to point B, but it is weak in the area of logic and switching,"
Glass pointed out. "That is where we will need electronics."
Copyright c 2000 CMP Media Inc. By Chappell Brown
The world economic summit is less interesting because the big and powerful
are less interesting.
The rate of technological has multiplied on itself because computers
can work faster and communications are better therefore computers and communications
becomes faster and faster. My guess is that optic fiber to the door will
make on-air or cable broadcasting uneconomic - video on demand will replace
it - the program producers will distribute directly to the consumer - like
in MP3 - the video store goes on line - The move producer - such as Blair
Witch could be sold directly - same with any show or news or whatever -
so there goes networks - maybe even magazine writers with direct sales
-
Wireless systems can get up to 400 kps to a million somehow - http://www.wiredbrain.com/symbian.htm
for a lot of applications that is fine - and OS chip technology will make
greater use of less and less with less energy and heat - more light and
lighter -
code division multiple access (CDMA) technology.
HP is investing $2 million in New Media Venture Partners (NMVP)
and will provide up to $15 million in debt financing to help the company
fund and incubate e-commerce start-ups. In return, subsidiaries of NMVP
will use HP products and services.
If I were a high technology company - in information systems, computers,
communications or any part of the 25 % of the economy - and almost all
the growth sector - now including networks - broadcasting - publishing
- entertainment - music - video - electronics - service - I would have
a venture capital connection so I could send people out and find out what
is going on. The battle for the airwaves is not just about broadband but
the content - software and services. If you put a few hundred thousand
in interesting technologies you gain access to information. There is almost
a certainty that something will come from left field and change all the
rules again.
Cable is too slow and greedy. The telephone companies too slow and bureaucratic.
Both have shown a preference for short term gains rather than long term
survival. Microsoft is showing the same brain arthritis - inflexible -
such as IBM was - GM and other big and rich - missed every important technology
- but could buy it after it had been proven. That may or may not be possible.
.
http://www.wiredbrain.com/nano.htm
The most common wireless transmission standard, GSM, which stands for
Global Systems for Mobile communications, is particularly prevalent in
Europe and Asia. According to market research firm Dataquest, nearly 157
million GSM-based mobile phones will be shipped worldwide this year, compared
with shipments of about 43 million CDMA cell phones.
But many industry observers say CDMA, strongest in North America, is
more efficient and can handle Internet-based transmissions better.
There is also time division and dense systems - I do believe the key
is China - the PLA and post telegraph - along with the EU will set the
standards.
Futures, forecasts, and fantasy :
re: ORCL, HP team with Utilities in Consortium to Fiber the
Last Mile
DDoS problem is an acute threat to both the Internet in general and
for Internet connected enterprises worldwide.
No organization or Internet segment can currently withstand such an
attack.
This one if for real and most likely will take a reworking of
basic protocols before it can be controlled -
Now that several real, crippling and costly DDoS attacks have been
perpetrated, the Internet community is experiencing a responsible amount
of concern. ICSA.net believes DDoS attacks will both become common and
continue to cause very public, significant interruption of service for
large or critical Internet services, companies, geographic regions, or
other Internet segments. When these attacks occur, as is the case currently,
there will be essentially no viable defense, and the target will simply
cease to provide service for the length of the attack.
What Can be Done? not much !
Several organizations have extensively analyzed the problem, including
David Dittrich at the University of Washington, the Sans Institute, CERT,
and others. ICSA.net has held several meetings of world-class experts,
including meetings among Firewall vendors, backbone ISPs, Intrusion Detection
product vendors and others in late 1999. ICSA.net also held special public
meetings on the DDoS attack in January 2000 at the annual RSA Conference,
and on February 7th at the North American Network Operators Group (NANOG)
conference.
These analyses and meetings have come to essentially the same
conclusions. Because there is no current defense an organization can pre-implement
that will protect its systems from a DDoS attack, the burden of solution
lies in eliminating opportunities for enslaving potential attack systems.
There are essentially three levels of potential solutions, none of which
involve protection installed at or near the target systems: --
"...taking advantage of the deregulated telecom industry, the small,
tightly knit consortium will initially offer digital voice, TV, and Web
hosting over fiber, under the name SpectraDyne Services. It includes Sierra
Pacific Power Company, Hewlett-Packard, Oracle, and TelecommUnity Systems."
The following image need to be firmly in mind to understand the AOL/
Time Warner deal - and the frenzy going on in telecommunications and computer
industries. The time frame is about 10 years - the impact comes first in
Northern Europe - Singapore - parts of the states - parts of Hong Kong
and China - Japan - Taiwan - South East Asia - Australia ( already with
system under construction )
There is optic to the door provided by the utility company. It is a
common carrier providing:
TV programs on demand on a big flat screen digital high definition
system - programs are recorded and played as you desire, when you desire
on any of the screens around the wired house you desire. There is no need
for program schedules - movies and other video content are downloaded on
demand from world wide services. Some charge fees some are free with or
without ads. You can watch the BBC news or CNN or C-span type programs
any time. There is no need for movie or music channels since you can order
anything you want anytime.
The same with music, either rented for a limited number of replays,
or purchased and transferred to CD or DVD - The same with interactive media
- games and educational services for the wired " smart" house - When you
leave the security system goes on - with complete radar monitoring of any
motion with recording of motion, the heat or AC is turned down, when you
click from your cell phone that you are returning home - the lights and
heat or AC is reset, the music turned on and the doors unsecured.
The cell phone - palm pilot - personal digital assistant works at 400
kbPs to 4 Mbs with GPS, e-mail and other web content, fold up or screen
keyboards, long life batteries, high gain reception of dense multiplex
time division wideband GS3 codes. Europe, with its common GSM standard,
will likely usher in "3G" technologies (with their 2 megabit/second data
to pockets) years before it happens in the U.S.' fragmented cellular environment.
And fast wireless data will surely usher in many new Opportunities. - http://www.pathfinder.com/fortune/technology/2000/01/24/ega.html).
The home terminal - NEXUM - provides wireless ( bluetooth ) connection
to the mobile elements, TV, music, games, information systems with voice
commands. You say " Write a note" and dictate as it appears on the big
screen. You correct with the portable keyboard that is used for interactive
TV. The master computer works within a network "master server in the sky"
to provide services you need or enjoy. Shopping, banking, tele-communities,
video conferences, design and research, games and social activities, travel
and adventure, and tuned to your interests and desires. The master server
bills for usage in micro pennies for "extras" but charges a flat fee for
"basic services". Several master server companies compete for services
on the common carrier -
The services are not tied to the wire - optic cable - so there are two
bills - one for connection services - the wireless and wired ( optic )
and another from the service company that passes along charges for rentals,
fee for service charges, software licenses, communications on and off net,
as we do today with local and long distance phone services and premium
cable services.
Where is the money made ? Optic fiber hardware - mobile hardware, utility
company right-of-way and network services, the "general utility service
company" maybe AOL, Microsoft, NOISE group ( Netscape, Oracle, IBM, Sun
Microsystems and everyone else ) Amazon, or others which provides the interface
between the user and service providers - banks, insurance, finance and
markets, shopping, software and music and games and movies and communications,
and entertainment, security, smart home management, and on and on... The
super on-line service using optic fiber to the door.
While I would like to support McCain in the primaries because of
his reform program. I think he would return "power to the people" but..
what about the rest - he wants to be a financial conservative - again a
major factor is our new found prosperity - but .. maybe if there is real
structural reform then education, ( really a state and local issue ) health
and other national issue could move forward ?
Should I change ( if I can ) my registration from Democrat, a family
and regional tradition, to Republican which whom I don’t agree with when
they hang right - from Goldwater to the contract on America.. Otherwise
they are the same middle of the road party as the other one . http://www.wiredbrain.com/reform.htm
I guess I am a liberal libertarian - a prudent liberal - like Tony
Blair - The issue was and maybe is a rational budget policy. The use of
entitlements - services and benefits to buy votes and hold power will bankrupt
any state over time. Balanced budgets are a key to economic health and
growth. Since Alan Greenspan and almost everyone knows that reducing the
debt is better than tax breaks - it will be impossible to sell tax cuts
as a central theme of a party platform.
McCain draws from a very wide spectrum -that is the road to victory
! The establishment hates McCain with a passion - reform would hurt the
Republican Right which believes it needs it's money as the road to power
- actually it will make very little difference - he also call them by name
to account - Some of his behavior in the Senate is quite radical in going
into who took what then did what for whom.
Just as important, Mr. McCain will be able to draw independent voters
towards the Republican Party. This was the key to much of his success in
New Hampshire. Registered independents now account for 15% of America’s
electorate. The Jesse Ventura phenomenon, ( As Ross Parot before him )
whereby another celebrated anti-politician was elected governor of Minnesota,
shows that they have power. But they are not inevitably opposed to the
two main parties: given a candidate who shows spirit and piques their interest,
as Mr. McCain does, they will vote for him despite his Republican label.
http://www.economist.com/editorial/freeforall/current/index_ld5140.html
And win the election in a time when people want CHANGE - but not
much -
He is also a conservative Republican, lest that be forgotten, with
a perfect voting record in the Senate on issues dear to conservatives’
hearts. Although voters may not particularly care to notice, Mr. McCain
is the antithesis of Mr. Clinton not just in terms of character, but on
issues such as deregulation (fiercely for it) and abortion (guardedly against
it). He differs markedly on foreign policy, too. Where Mr. Clinton, at
least until the past year or so, had to be prodded to take a reluctant
interest in what the outside world was doing,
I enjoy seeing the Republican establishment come apart as the Bush
people are trying to make McCain into a liberal ? Even Rush Limbaugh is
coming to pieces as he tries to hold on the a party line that doesn't have
one except an old mantra Less Government, More Freedom - lower taxes -
social bla-bla doesn't work anymore and George W. is no Ronald Reagan that
can turn almost nothing into something that sounds good. !
As we all know there is REAL power and money involved. There is a
real threat to the real permeate establishment - well maybe ?
Message from Bill Bradley-- On to the National Race
As for the Democrats - does it matter ? After a remarkable turnaround
in New Hampshire, where we overcame a 17-point deficit to finish in the
closest Democratic primary in that state's history, my campaign is now
preparing for the critical battle ahead. A staggering 29 states will hold
primaries or caucuses during the week of March 7-14, including California,
New York, Florida, Ohio, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Georgia and Michigan.
Government should be limited to public goods - I favor educational
vouchers ( because it is good for Public Schools to have competition )
- and private free markets and competition - free trade - capitalism when
ever possible. But in public goods an active and clever state action on
common interests that can not be left to private interests - parks, zoos,
museums, and planning land use growth control, environmental regulation,
national health plan using free market methods. Government is part of the
solution not the enemy. The reform that is needed is making a firm connection
between elections and policy. I like the British system - you elect a government
and they do what they promised, if you don’t like it, elect the other side.
In America we have a strange and screwy system - maybe because we are a
strange and screwy country - or because we are stuck in a history trap.
The American people aren't Stupid. They know that money matters.
They feel that "special interests" and their paid lobbyist control what
happens or doesn't. This was the core of the Parot reform party uprising.
The first issue is REFORM - some change in the SYSTEM where the majority
feel they have a fair chance to realistically participate in the collective
decision that effect their lives. For 50 years there has been a clear desire
for national health care - but the outcome was controlled by the AMA for
decades, now the insurance industry. What McCain says is basic reform in
Taxes, Education, ( a state and local issue ) Health can’t be done because
of veto groups and their money.
"The influence of money is corrupting our ability to address the
problems that directly affect the lives of every American. Without reining
in soft money and reducing the role of money in politics we will never
have a government that works as hard for the average American as it does
for the special interests."
His speeches in the Senate have detailed contributions and the votes
of his colleagues so they are more than unhappy with him. He has been very
specific on the last tax bill and billion dollar favors grated as quid
pro quo for money paid. ( The bill was designed to go no where but be a
fund raiser ) He has done the same on the Communications bill, the Banking
Bill, the Defense appropriations bill.
"Nothing breaks down trust in our democracy as much as big money.
Money is like a wall between elected leaders and the people, preventing
leaders from hearing voters' hopes and concerns."
The ideas on the table may help - may not - the history of reform
has tended to make things worse. If there is money that wants to go into
politics, and their are politicians that need money the two will get together
- Independent Committees can not be banded under our First Amendment to
the constitution.
The Germany experience is a case in point. The only way to remove
money from politics is party discipline - the individual members don’t
have a lot of choices in following the party program - become back benchers
rather than independent businessmen and women and the pie is removed -
simple tax systems, fixed budgeted requirements - remove members pork and
provide free TV with a short campaign season .
The Iron Triangle is made up of committee chairmen in Congress, the
real focus of political power in this country - what Wilson called "Congressional
Government" at the end of the 19th Century. The other arms of the triangle
is the interest groups - over 3000 organized constitutes and business groups
that employ a large group of lobbyist and give money at the fund raising
events. The third arm is the Agencies and Departments which make up Federal,
State and Local governments. The military industrial complex is only one
of these families of interests.
A traditional model would be the road lobby - the transport committees
and the appropriations subcommittees, the dept. of transportation, state
road boards - concrete, construction equipment, auto and trucking interests,
gas and oil companies and the unions in these industries. A one point in
the last 50’s and 60’s a fifth of the GNP was involved with gas run road
transportation.
