They Did What !

There should be a law: If you don’t vote you can’t complain about the way things are going in our country.

We could establish the Complaint Police. Every time someone is heard complaining about the government, elected officials, or anything that has to do with the governing of our country, they could be asked to produce that little voter’s receipt you get after you cast your ballot. No receipt, you pay a fine. The fines could be put into a fund to promote voter turnout.

I am of course, being factitious but perhaps is worth thinking about and talking about as a way to encourage non-voters to recognize that voting is not only a privilege but a responsibility for all those who enjoy the American way of life.

Posted by Trish Purcell at 10:56 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Why would anyone equate the Berlin wall with the planned border fence? The Berlin wall was built to keep in people who wanted to leave. The border fence is to keep out people who are trying to come in illegally. The two barriers hardly seem synonymous.

This is not about the pros and cons of building the border fence, but rather about the media, that once again, grabbed a tag line and brainlessly repeated it over and over. The soon to be ex-president of Mexico made this comparison. Does that somehow make it a meaningful statement that should be reported and reported and reported ad nauseam? It was a dumb thing for him to say. It is even dumber for journalists to repeat it as though it was a profound statement.

Posted by Trish Purcell at 01:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Have you noticed the “need to be right� thing that seems to be going on at all levels of government these days? Being right appears to take precedence over finding solutions, making plans, correcting mistakes, or just generally taking care of business. Regardless of the consequences, the pursuit of this goal is a priority with our elected officials, diplomats, party leaders, talk show hosts, columnists – you name it – they all seem determined to prove their point at the expense of everything else.

This “rightiness� (second cousin to Colbert’s truthiness) paints everything in either/or terms. Either we stay the course or we cut and run. Either we agree with the war or we do not support the troops. Either we concur with everything the government does or we hate America. Everything is black or white, no grey allowed; Yes or No, with no ifs, ands, or buts about it.

The history of our country is peppered with times of dissent but with open minded debate that brought consensus, came growth and improvement for the country and the people. To believe there is only one “right� way is to believe that all people should think alike. I wonder what America would be like today if that was true?

It is possible to disagree with the course we are on in Iraq without thinking the answer is the immediate withdrawal of troops. It is possible to strongly oppose the war and still support the troops with letters, gifts and prayers. It is possible to disagree with some of the actions of our government, not because we hate America but because we love America and want it to be all it can be and has been.

Perhaps we could spend our time and energy examining those grey areas, looking at the ifs, ands, and buts, to see if we can find new and better ways to conduct our business and run our country. For starters we could demand real news instead of slogans and rabble rousing from our media. And we could elect people who are more interested in finding solutions for our problems than in proving their point. Enough already with rightiness.!

Posted by Trish Purcell at 06:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

The more I hear and read about signing statements, the more troubling the whole idea becomes. In essence, these signing statements seem to say the President is nullifying parts of laws passed by Congress.

Article I, Section 1 of the Constitution says “All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.�

Further on, in Section 7 of that same article, it lays out very clearly that the President either approves legislation, signing it into law, or returns it with his objections to Congress where they have the option of reconsidering and passing it with a two thirds majority of both Houses. No where do I find anything about the President having the power to sign a law while setting aside parts of it as he deems appropriate.

Some of what I’ve read explains signing statements as the President’s interpretation of a bill declaring that one or more of the laws it creates are unconstitutional and therefore need not be obeyed. The American Bar Association called signing statements “contrary to the rule of law and our constitutional separation of powers.�
That sounds right to me.

The Founding Fathers were all too aware of the problems inherent in having an all powerful king and they fashioned our Constitution in a way that placed checks and balances on each of the three branches of government so that no one branch would become powerful enough to continually override the others.

The more than 800 laws President Bush has challenged with signing statements sounds to me like a continual override of the legislative power of Congress. Not only has he greatly increased the use of this mechanism (issuing more than the combined total of all the Presidents before him) but he is changing the nature of its use.

An accepted and uncontroversial use of signing statements by past presidents has been to explain to the public what the likely effects of a bill will be and how that is consistent or inconsistent with the Administration’s views or programs.

A second and generally accepted use of Presidential signing statements is to direct Executive Branch officials how to interpret and apply the statues they administer. This falls within the Presidents constitutional authority to supervise and control the activity of subordinate officials within the Executive Branch.

But President Bush seems to use a signing statement as a line item veto. And the Supreme Court declared the line item veto unconstitutional when Clinton was President.

He is also furthering attempts (started in the Regan Administration), to use signing statements to create legislative history that could then be used by the courts to give weight to ascertaining the meaning of statutory language. That can be a very slippery slope because it virtually allows the President to speak for Congress instead of allowing Congress to speak for itself. Congress creates legislative history in committee reports, floor debates, and hearings and the President should not be allowed to reinterpret that record with signing statements.

It seems to be the nature of we mortals, that the more power we have the more we want and the more we tell ourselves we are entitled to. It’s called rationalization and it is the product of our adaptability which in turn, is a large part of our ability to survive. As with many things, it starts out as a good thing – the ability to survive – but like a coin, it has two sides. The other side is that it allows us to adapt to things that are not good or right, and it uses rationalization to put a good face on it. And we then easily reach the stage of believing that the end justifies the means.

It seems a good rule of thumb that when we are sure we know what is best for others; it is a pretty sure bet we really don’t.

Posted by Trish Purcell at 02:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

About Proposition 86 - Tobacco tax increase.

Yes! say children’s advocacy organizations as well as the American Cancer Society, the American Heart Association, the American Lung Association and the California Public Interest Research Group (CALPIRG)

NO! say the tobacco companies.

About Proposition 87 - Clean Alternative Energy Act

YES! say Environment California, American Lung Association, Sierra Club, Public Citizen, Natural Resources Defense Council and CALPIRG.

NO! say the oil companies.

Says a lot about who will benefit and who will not, if these propositions pass doesn't it!

Posted by Trish Purcell at 02:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Proposition 89 may not be perfect but it is a much needed start. This proposition:

Provides that candidates for state elective office meeting certain eligibility requirements, including collection of a specified number of $5.00 contributions from voters, may voluntarily receive public campaign funding from Fair Political Practices Commission, in amounts varying by elective office and election type.

Increases income tax rate on corporations and financial institutions by 0.2 percent to fund program.

Imposes new limits on campaign contributions to state-office candidates and campaign committees, and new restrictions on contributions by lobbyists, state contractors.

Limits certain contributions and expenditures by corporations.

WHO WILL BENEFIT IF PROPOSITION 89 IS DEFEATED?

DRUG COMPANIES have contributed $2 million to Democrats and Republicans in California in the last 2 years. They fought to dilute the prescription drug discount bill and to constrain the law when it goes into effect this January. It will be up to the discretion of the next governor to exercise the provision in the law that would eliminate from the program any drug company that doesn’t offer meaningful discounts. Industry attempts to stop the law will leave the “fight or fold� decision up to the governor. Both Angelides ($30,000) and Schwarzenegger ($1 million) have received a lot of money from the industry. Makes me wonder how hard they will fight for the law. Proposition 89 would stop big money from influencing the political process.

INSURANCE COMPANIES have contributed half of the dollars against Prop 89 to date. The insurance industry sees the anti-89 contributions as insurance against any change in the status quo in Sacramento. (www.latimes.com) Doesn't say much for our current legislature! Blue Cross contributed $95,000 to the campaign against Proposition 89 according to campaign finance report filings. Blue Cross was fined in California for illegally canceling a woman's policy because she did not disclose corrective surgery she had 23 years earlier and reform to stop such denials is in the works. Proposition 89 would stop insurance companies from using their cash in elections to stave off reform.

FINANCIAL SERVICES INDUSTRY as a whole has given $12.2 million to Schwarzenegger since 2003, second only to real estate and development companies. The industry also contributes freely to the Legislature. What has been the result of these contributions? Maybe they were a factor in the death this year of a bill to protect financially stressed active-duty military families from the so-called "payday lenders." The industry pressed for amendments that gutted the bill and blocked a 36% annual interest cap on such loans to military members. Possibly they have something to do with the lack of consequences when credit card companies fail to protect customers' data. Could be those contributions are the reason we have to take the time to “opt out� instead of being asked for permission to share our names and financial data - an issue that has been killed more than once by lobbyists. (www.arnoldwatch.org) Proposition 89 would end industry's ability to decide which laws are passed and which are not.

AT&T wrote a bill that Democratic Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez sponsored. This bill does away with local cable franchises and establishes state-wide cable and video franchises. The new franchises are devoid of consumer protections. AT&T spent more than $18 million lobbying for the telecom deregulation bill. It also pre-thanked Nunez in May, as the bill was pending in the Assembly, by sponsoring a Pebble Beach golf tournament/fund-raiser that brought in $1.7 million in contributions, under Nunez' name, for the Democratic Party. On the Republican side, Governor Schwarzenegger received $284,940 from AT&T, SBC and Verizon -- the main beneficiaries of the bill. The California Cable and Telecommunications PAC contributed $54,600 to Schwarzenegger. (www.watchdog.org) Proposition 89 takes away special interest control over Sacramento, and eliminates this kind of anti-consumer legislation.

This is just a small representative sample of special interests at work in our government. With this and everything else I read, a YES vote on Proposition 89 makes sense to me. However, if, after all this, you still believe the repeated claims by elected officials that their votes are not influenced by contributions, then you should vote No.

After that, give me a call, I have a bridge you might be interested in.

Posted by Trish Purcell at 08:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)