GOVERNING BY GREED

The Rev. Dana Prom Smith, S.T.D., Ph.D. (1/29/06)

The Republicans know how to win elections, but they don’t know how to govern. They deceive and lie to win. They confuse public service with greed to govern.

They have not done well. As a matter of fact, they have done badly. We are worse off for Republican governance than we were before the sorry lot came to power.

The economy is doing badly for the middle classes and the poor. They are earning less money than before the toadies to the rich came to power. The rich are getting richer. Everyone else is getting poorer. The only boon is for the rich and the global corporations. Corruption in rampant in the corporations. Wages are being cut, pensions eliminated, and medical benefits cheapened. We’re in hock up to our ears to the Chinese Communists.

The Bush foreign policy is a mess. Bush said he wanted to democratize the world with the blood of the bravest. So far, the Iraqi’s have chosen an Islamic state in an atmosphere of ancient mutual hatreds. The Palestinians have elected an Islamic terrorist organization to lead them. The Iranians chose a government that wants to wipe Israel off the map. If elections were held in Pakistan, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia, they would probably become fundamentalist Islamic states. All this for over 2,000 American military killed.

The Bush Administration has acted as though they were surprised that Hamas won the parliamentary elections in Palestine. No one else was. Bush’s intelligence was just as pathetic as it was with his WMD. The conclusion is that the Bush Administration is both stupid and ignorant for not anticipating the obvious. Hello!

Medicare is a mess. The Republicans have developed a plan for medications that not even the bureaucrats can explain. Since it was written by lobbyists for the benefit of drug companies, the principal beneficiaries are the drug companies, not those on Medicare.

The Republicans in the Senate and the House are corrupt to their bones. They have sold themselves out to corporate interests for golfing junkets. I would not want any of my children to marry a Republican politician for fear they might spend their Christmases at Leavenworth Federal Penitentiary visiting their inmate spouses for the holidays.

The price of energy has shot through the roof, and all this from oil men from Texas. Bush can’t act decisively with Iran because we need its oil. His answer to Hamas in Palestine is what he won’t talk to them. His posturing resembles an impotent, inept adolescent.

The clincher is that the Bush Administration cannot protect the country. Katrina showed the Republicans to be inept. Katrina was not a covert operation by some hidden and cunning terrorist enemy. It was a hurricane for which there were several days notice. If the Bush Administration cannot cope with a known, visible threat, it shouldn’t be trusted to protect the country from an invisible threat.

The underling theme in all this ineptitude is greed. Greed is the vice of the lazy and stupid. A noted criminal defense attorney once said of criminals that they are both lazy and stupid because they either don’t want to work or are too stupid to earn money legitimately. If I were a Republican, I would be ashamed of myself.

The Republicans have sold their political birthright for a pottage of greed.

Copyright (c) Dana Prom Smith 2006

LIMPING REPUBLICANS

The Rev. Dana Prom Smith, S.T.D., Ph.D. (1/27/06)

With a maladroit series of political maneuvers the Republicans in the Arizona State Legislature have made asses of themselves, largely because they don’t know where they stand.

One the one hand, the claim they want to protect the border, and, yet toadies to corporate interests that they are, they do nothing really effective to protect the border. The reason is simple. Their corporate masters want cheap labor even if it risks American security. The result is that they vote their masters’ pocket books rather than their patriotism.

And then these maladroit Republicans claim to foster English as "English Only." If they really wanted English only, they would’ve supported Governor Napolitano rather than fight her with outlandish schemes to favor their corporate masters. They try to serve two masters, and Jesus has told us already what happens to those who try that folly. Bad Time at Black Rock. It’s time they start serving their real masters, the people. Joshua asked the children of Israel, "How long will you go limping between two different opinions?" Corporate welfare or the welfare of the people?

Finally, the issue of life’s sacredness scars them. Sometimes, they don’t give a damn about life, craving execution as a policy of the state, and then they want to protect it in their opposition to abortion. Consistency, not a Republican virtue, seems beyond their grasp as though knee jerk reaction rather than clear thinking is their substitute for thought and policy.

Would anyone want to buy a used car from these turkeys? Right now, the Republicans are a sorry lot, limping along, saying one thing, doing another, false to the people.

Copyright (c) Dana Prom Smith 2006

CORPORATE IMMIGRATION

The Rev. Dana Prom Smith, S.T.D., Ph.D. (1/15/05)

Recently, Alberto Gonzalez, the United States Attorney General, directed that the immigration court system be comprehensively reviewed. Gonzalez said he was concerned about the "intemperate and even abusive" conduct by immigration judges. He added that their "work must improve." He went on to say that immigrants be "treated with courtesy and respect." It takes no wit to figure out that the directive comes from the White House and President Bush.

Since "courtesy and respect" aren’t hallmarks of the Bush Administration and most illegal immigrants come from Mexico, Gonzalez’s high sounding memo appears at first a crassly political appeal for the Hispanic vote. However, since the Bush Administration is the handmaiden of global corporations, Gonzalez’s chilling directive aims to loosen further our borders to illegal immigrants from Mexico by intimidating the immigration judges.

As the terrorist threat looms, the Bush Administration fails to protect our borders and does nothing to stop illegal immigration from Mexico. It’s seeming ineptitude and the pathetic gestures of a hapless Senator Jon Kyl confirm the assumption that the Bush Administration and the Republican Party aren’t concerned about the threat of terrorism posed by illegal immigration but are concerned about the supply of cheap labor for global corporations.

Gonzalez’s icy directive fits hand and glove with Bush’s desire for a guest worker program in which illegal immigrants will be baptized as legal immigrants to supply cheap labor for corporate interests. Corporate types try to reassure Americans that illegal immigrants from Mexico are filling jobs that Americans won’t take as though the jobs were inherently unappealing.

Their reassurance sounds plausible when Americans see many illegal immigrants washing dishes in restaurants, hauling rocks, picking up trash, and cleaning out cesspools. These corporate types and the Republicans don’t mention the jobs taken by cheaply paid illegal immigrants in the construction and manufacturing industries. American craftsmen are disappearing not because their work is unappealing, but because they are being priced out of the market by the cheap wages paid illegal immigrants.

As Marxists, Bush and the Republicans believe the only reality in life is economic. Any other values are dismissed as impediments to economic progress, which translated means bloated corporate profits and lewd salaries for corporate types along with the reduction of the middle class. The final result will be a two-tiered American society, corporate nobility and serfs.

In ancient Greece the lowest class were called idiotes. Serfs without a vote, they were Marx’s lumpenproletariat. If Bush’s economic and social policies achieve realization, middle-class Americans will become idiotes.

Copyright © Dana Prom Smith 2006

TAINTED HANDS

The Rev. Dana Prom Smith, S.T.D.. Ph.D. (1/11/06)

Just like Pontius Pilate, the Republicans are trying to wash their hands of the taint of corruption. Rep. J.D. Hayworth of Arizona has returned nearly $13,000 from the notoriously venal lobbyist, Jack Abramoff, to two tribes who underwrote his five-time use of skyboxes at the MCI Center in Washington. One wonders how hockey and baseball games helped good ol’ J.D. represent the citizens of Arizona and the welfare of Native Americans. He may give the money back, but the ink still stains his hands.

And then there is Rep. John Shadegg of Arizona who wants to replace good ol’ boy Tom Delay, the disgraced Republican House leader from Texas. Cleanup Shadegg returned nearly $7,000 to one tribe and several charities. One of the contributions was undisclosed for five years in violation of federal law. Rep. Jeff Flake of Arizona is touting Cleanup John to replace the stigmatic Delay. Instead, how about a Republican with clean hands if one can be found?

Perhaps, the champion "returner" is Republican Senator Conrad Burns of Montana. He’s trying to wash the ink of $150,000 off his hands. Clearly, the Republicans haven’t heard that bank robbers are frequently caught because ink from their stolen money has besmirched them. Giving the money back won’t work in a court of law for bank robbers or the court of public opinion for politicians.

Rep. Rick Renzi and Rep. Jim Kolbe, both of Arizona, do not plan to return any of their ill-gotten gain, apparently believing, like Caesar’s wife, they are above the ink of corruption.

Senators John McCain and Jon Kyl said they are sending their Abramoff money back claiming with straight faces that they were unaware of its origins. Senator McCain received the tainted money all the while he was investigating the corruption. Senator Kyl has long been opposed to tighter controls on lobbyists and their money like Jack Abramoff.

My wife received an unsolicited cashier’s check for several thousand dollars in the mail from a group in Regina, Saskatchewan, promising her more money if she would first send them money. Straightaway, she reported the offer to the F.B.I. Clearly, Senators McCain and Kyl either don’t have my wife’s smarts or aren’t straightaway types.

Surprise, surprise, these Pontius Pilates Reduci all come from states with large Native American populations, the people on whom Jack Abramoff preyed. These Republicans have stolen their good names and the citizens’ trust while crucifying the nation.

Copyright © Dana Prom Smith 2006

ON LOSING GROUND (1/2/06)

The Rev. Dana Prom Smith, S.T.D., Ph.D.

George Bush is constant. He speaks in slogans, "stay the course," "not cut and run," and "stand with the Iraqis. " As a consequence, his words have little meaning. The word "victory" drops from his lips. Even some Democratic senatorial weenies call for "victory."

No one has defined "victory." Does it mean insurgents and terrorists will be vanquished as in a World War II unconditional surrender? Does it mean free elections in Iraq? A stable government? A tranquil society? A prosperous Iraq? An end to killing? Acquiring Iraqi oil? Without a definition of victory victory is impossible.

His fuzzy thinking has turned "victory" into a nonsense word without meaning. Nonsense is not a cause for which anyone should fight, much less kill and maim the best of our youth.
We should only fight when the fight’s crucial and on grounds where we can win. We know by now that the Bush-Republican War in Iraq isn’t crucial to our national interest. Wellington defeated Napoleon at Waterloo because he chose ground on which he could win. In Iraq Bush failed to choose winning ground.

A war that actually strengthens our enemies is self-defeating. Our best hope is a gradual withdrawl from the field. We aren’t on winning ground. Without a clear purpose there can be no victory.

Copyright (c) Dana Prom Smith 2006