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July 29, 2004 I generally avoid entering debate on a web site such as this, but the Mark Durfee piece ticked me off. I have done something else I very seldom do: I have copied Mr. Durfee's piece and added my responses inside double-parentheses. And I corrected some of his spelling. It has occurred to me that when I refer to my esteemed opponents feeding at the public trough that WE, you and I are the slop in the trough. That not only do the purveyors of pork barrel projects that are used to secure home town votes feed off the whole of the nation but that we, the slop in the trough, are fed off of by the rest of the world. ((One can hardly disagree that taxpayers in a progressive tax system are subsidizing the nontaxpayers.)) I understand that our economy is the engine that drives the world’s economy but is it fair that we must support and ship the jobs that support the world’s economy to the rest of the world also? ((There has been a net loss of under 5000— FIVE THOUSAND—jobs overseas. A drop in the bucket. And with modern transportation and communication, the economy of the country is not isolated. It is indeed global.)) I ask this question not with my usual tongue in check but rather as a serious inquiry as to just what in the heck are we doing to ourselves by having the same Ivy League crowd rule this nation. What have we done the population of this nation that deserves such disregard by them supposedly put in an elected office to protect our interests? ((You would have to do better at explaining exactly what acts you refer to as “disregard.”)) We have a current president who has a problem eating a potato chip and sitting on the couch at the same time without choking. ((Ridiculous irrelevant cheap shot. I won’t dignify it by pointing out the other great world leaders who have had choking, vomiting, and other embarrassing episodes, none of which cast any bearing on their fitness to lead. This indicates irrational hatred toward Bush or toward the Ivy League.)) A Man whose interests have always lay towards the furtherance of wealth, particularly his own and the wealth of them who paid for his election. ((His policies have created a better economy for all, as a “rising tide lifts all boats,” to quote JFK. Black home ownership is the highest in history. Total home ownership is the highest in history. Consumer confidence is extremely high. Tax cuts stimulate the overall economy which helps the overall citizenry. Don’t spout class warfare populist propaganda and expect to be taken seriously.))We have a candidate vying for the job who also comes from that same Ivy league establishment that has skulled and boned us so often in the past. ((Finally a simple factual declarative sentence. But so what?))Make no mistake and don’t be fooled by Bushes down home “I’m sorta from Texas” routine, he is as much a part of the Eastern Establishment as any Kennedy or Kerry. ((No, he’s much more establishment. He actually earned much of his money, he has worked for a living. He does relate to ordinary people much better. What's wrong with being establishment? You would prefer, let's say, someone with no business knowledge, no work experience, no military service--a pretty big establishment there!--or someone otherwise disconnected from real life?)) I have high regard for Kerry and Bush, Kennedy and the other Bush but it seems to me the best times for the American people in the last fifty years came from them who did not come from Maine, Massachusetts or Texas (by way of Maine). It seems to me that the best times for the American people have come when a fellow from Arkansas (Clinton), Illinois (Reagan) and even a small town called Plains Georgia (Carter) led the nation. ((Jimmy Carter gave us a president who hid in the White House when our people were held hostage and who presided over 20% mortgage rates and double digit inflation. Get serious. As for Clinton, he inherited a growing economy, it having reached 4% growth in 1991 and 4.5% in the last quarter of that year under George H. W. Bush. There was a pseudo-wealth created by the dot.com stock bubble and this also falsely gave the illusion of budget surpluses and fiscal responsibility, but in fact the stock market was already collapsing under Clinton, though the media cleverly avoided noticing it until he was out of office though it was evident to anyone with a brain, including George W. Bush. He was accused of "talking down the economy" when he was just correctly pointing out it was tanking.)) Now I know that there are many instances of trouble in the mentioned administrations of the non-Ivy Leaguers, but one kicked over the threat we grew up with (Soviet domination) the other while troubled by a special prosecutor and a small impeachment thing, presided over the largest expansion of jobs the nation had seen since the great depression and the third while to most was abysmal was a model of moderation and HONESTY. ((Jimmy Carter is a great masquerader, and one can say with certainty that he talked peace a lot, was an appeaser to Arafat, helped North Korea obtain nuclear arms, and made America look weak and small in the eyes of the world. This was not good. But what is this?—Ivy League penis envy?)) Both Bush’ took us into wars that for one had a lot of the stink of a put up job (Desert Storm) ((Helping an invaded country was not right and proper, and Bush did not invade Kuwait--Saddam invaded Kuwait.))and the other just plain and simple lies foisted on us to further a (in my opinion) personal goal of a man who would be king. ((There is no evidence that George W. Bush lied about anything. He believed exactly what every other leader of the world and Kerry and Clinton and others believed. Being wrong is not equivalent to lying, even if it turns out Bush was wrong, which is still an unresolved question. You are, by repeating that Bush lied without any evidence of that whatsoever, wrong and possibly lying yourself, since you seem intelligent enough to be aware of the events which transpired.)) And lest you call me for harping on the Republicans let’s not forget the Bay of Pigs and the Cuban Missile crisis of the Kennedy brothers and the Vietnam war, also escalated by JFK (then Johnson a non [way non] Ivy Leaguer). ((I thought you said non-Ivy Leaguers would be good presidents!)) And throughout it all the world fed off of the American people’s largesse and pocketbook. To what end? ((Possibly to the end of the greatest economy in the world, the greatest economic growth in the world, the greatest future potential in the world? Is that end enough for you?)) To the end that our middle class jobs have been exported to other places, ((No they haven’t. You cannot document such.))to the end that the Chinese and the Japanese which are our biggest trade competitors still feed off of us by tying their currencies to ours so that they float in exact lock step with ours. ((That is bad? Why?))In the end the easiest way to say it is we support not only ourselves but 2,000,000,000 or more Chinese citizens on another continent. ((Is this some sort of anti- Asian, anti-Ivy League psychotic rant? It is hard to see whom is bearing the brunt of your anger the most. )) I know of a woman, living in Massachusetts, near on eighty years old who just received notice that she is to be cut off from her states health coverage for the elderly because she made ONE HUNDRED AND SIXTY NINE DOLLARS too much last year. ((That is a good argument for privatizing Social Security, such as was done in Galveston, where even the lowest-wage employees have retired on 5000 dollar a month checks!)) First off, she shouldn’t have to be working at seventy seven years old, but she can’t seem to live on her seven hundred and fifty three dollar a month social security check ((Exactly! So privatize social security so she could have retired wealthy!!))so she got a job working for Meals on Wheels. ((None of this indicates that she would be any better off with a different president or if any policies you seem to be suggesting were implemented.))We support Iraqi gasoline ((We do? How?))so the Iraqi’s only pay a nickel a gallon for something they do not produce, yet we take away health coverage from an old AMERICAN woman because she worked to feed herself a little better. At 77 years of age. Maybe she should have gone to Harvard instead of marrying a fisherman. ((Privatize Social Security!!)) Where is the justice? This person like all average Americans spent her youth and more productive years being fed off of by the rest of the world, she paid her taxes and got up in the morning and went to work anyway, yet now for a hundred and seventy dollars she can’t get the state sponsored health insurance. They told her to buy private insurance, insurance that will cost her in the neighborhood of ten times as much as the money that got her kicked off of MassHealth. ((So it is somebody else’s responsibility to pay for this lady’s medical care? Besides, it isn’t INSURANCE! Insurance is pooling of money to cover catastrophic events. You are talking about pre-paid medical care, which is a different kettle of fish altogether. Calling it insurance doesn’t make it insurance. “You can put your boots in the oven, but that don’t make them biscuits.” -- Attributed to George W. Bush)) What is it we are thinking putting these boobs in office, do we believe that they are anything more than of average intelligence; that because they come from the Harvard yard that they actually will do better for us, the average trough fodder? I for one am disgusted by all of the folderol and am growing contemptuous of them all. They have not the interests of them that put them in office where they secure for themselves benefits far and above any the average American can hope for. None of them, not a one of them care for anything other than their own ego and pocket book, they worry more about their “place in history” than they do about an old lady who as of August Third 2004 will have no health insurance. A woman who just like you and me is fodder for the trough they feed at. ((Citing one incidence of hardship hardly proves that it is institutional, that it could be prevented by any policy you seem to be advocating such as economic isolationism, jingoism, disdain for Asians, and disdain for the Ivy League.)) As you might have noted, the rant has ticked me off, Mr Durfee. ------------ About the author: 62-yr-old physician, still practicing, retired from 41 years intermittent military service as of June 1, 2003. Just write for the fun of it. Currently writing a novel. Email Brooks A. Mick: brooks15@cox.net ------------ |
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