Interesting footnote

Actually, should be headlines, not a footnote.

For all the ballyhoo among those trying to become the GOP standardbearer -- with one of the big issue being challenging Obama's health care reforms -- let's look at the record.

Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney signed into law the most comprehensive state health care plan. The Democrats take great delight in saying, apparently quite rightly, that it served as a model for the Obama plan. But that's not popular in Republican rallies, so Romney is trying to live it down, saying what is probably the only conceivable defense: it was good for Massachusetts but it's not right to impose one plan on the United States. It should be left to each state. No matter how good it is, the Tea Party crowd and hangers-on don't want government telling you what to do, no way, no how. It's socialism, Obama-care, bad, bad, bad.

The firebrand cowboy from Texas who is giving Romney a run for first place status likes to tout his successes in Texas on many fronts. He emphasizes more the economic success, which they call "The Texas Miracle." Turns out Rick Perry's miracle is not as great as first claimed.

So now the facts, Ma'am.

The state with the highest percent of people covered by health insurance: #1. Massachusetts.

#2. Vermont. #3. Minnesota. #4. Connecticutt. 5. Hawaii. 6. Pennsylvania. 7. Wisconsin. 8. Maryland. 9. New Jersey. 10. Delaware. Notice the color is mostly blue.

The state with the lowest percent of people covered by health insurance: #50. Texas.

#49. Mississippi. #48. Alaska. #47. Florida. #46. Oklahoma. #45. California. #44 Lousiana. #43 Arkansas. 42 North Carolina. #41 Georgia. Mostly red, with some blue CA and purple FL.

That should be good for a few questions at the next debate.

Ralph

A test for Perry

Rick Perry left the Pametto Forum in South Carolina yesterday to go home to tend to the Texas wildfires. This means he skipped out on a major event for those who are trying to out-do each other in pandering to the Tea Party --

My first thought was this was a convenient excuse for him to avoid the intense scrutiny of the one-to-one interviews before a Tea Party audience, with Sen. Jim DeMint and the head of National Organization for Marriage asking the questions. One HuffPost headline referred to it as "Stepping into a mine field."

DeMint is Mr. Tea Party in the Senate; and the NOW man is also a constitutional scholar who is pushing the 14th amendment dodge on abortion, as well as the anti-gay marriage campaign. Plenty of potential traps there for anyone who has made less-than pure ideological statements in the past and now being grilled one at the time.

But this does seem to be a real state of emergency in Texas. Perry was quoted tonight as saying the fires are "as meaning-looking as I've ever seen."

So . . . here is the real test for him now. The Republicans in Congress are saying "no disaster aid" without offsetting cuts elsewhere. That, of course, at best, means long delays while they fight it out. And Ron Paul has even called for the abolition of FEMA.

Now, when Texas is going to need a lot of help, what's a governor to do when he also wants to win the favor of the most conservative voters, and his opponents are out-T-ing him?

Perry has a history of complaining loudly that FEMA wasn't giving them enough relief on disasters in 2008 and 2010. So he can't claim long-standing opposition to federal disaster aid.

Ah, politics . . . Ain't it fun to watch the other side sizzling in the hot seat !

Ralph

Upholding the Constitution #2

Wow !! The Constitution came in for bashing today in S.C.'s Palmetto Forum.

All except Romney said they would challenge the constitutionality of Roe v. Wade and defy the Supreme Court's decision by invoking Section 5 of Amendment 14, which says that "no state shall deprive any person of life . . . without due process."

They claim that this gives Congress the right to defy the Court to protect the life of those unborn people. Of course, this depends on defining an immature fetus as a person. They invoke this sweeping right for Congress to carve out certain areas that the Supreme Court cannot overrule the "will of the people" which is, supposedly, wielded purely by their elected representatives in Congress.

I thought that was the whole purpose of our checks and balances -- to give the Court jurisdiction over interpreting the Constitution. Now, it seems, they can only interpret those sections that Congress decides they can. Which really means that they are not co-equal branches.

Romney showed himself to be the only moderate in the crowd (Huntsman didn't take part in the Forum) by saying he would not provoke such a confrontation. He explained that this would then open the possibility of Democrats defying the Court on decisions they didn't like.

Even Newt jumped on the bandwagon of pandering to the anti-abortion crowd. Duh . . . what did I expect? This was South Carolina, Tea Party Country.

Ralph

Upholding the Constitution

Those who shout the loudest about "upholding the Constitution" seem to know the least about what it actually says. The same ignorance exists about the actual history of its writing and ratification.

The latest example: Conservative columnist Matthew Vadum wrote an op-ed in The American Thinker, which he titled "Registering the Poor to Vote is Un-American":

"It is profoundly antisocial and un-American to empower the nonproductive segments of the population to destroy the country -- which is precisely why Barack Obama zealously supports registering welfare recipients to vote. . . .

"Encouraging those who burden society to participate in elections isn't about helping the poor. It's about helping the poor to help themselves to others' money. It's about raw so-called social justice. It's about moving America ever farther away from the small-government ideals of the Founding Fathers."

Vadum hasn't quite gotten over his hatred and contempt for ACORN and its effectiveness in registering people to vote. He helped destroy ACORN. The spate of state voter ID laws are cut from the same cloth -- contempt for poor people and the wish to discourage their voting.

This is more evidence that we have a profound schism about the basic principles upon which this country was founded, the principles upon which this "experiment in democracy" was crafted.

These are the same people, usually, who insist that the country was founded on Christian principles. In fact, it was more the principles of the Enlightenment that shaped the Constitution. It's true that many of the Founders were Christian, some of them specifically identified themselves as Deists, not Theists, however. But they were careful to write the Constitution to be a secular document.

These conservatives just don't want to believe that is true. It doesn't fit with their preferred myth.

Later, when Rick Hanson, who writes the Election Law Review blog, called Vadum to task for wanting to deny poor people the right to vote, he squealed that he had been misquoted.

Admittedly it's a fine point. I suspect most people missed the difference, as I did. Vadum doesn't say that it's un-American for them to vote; just un-American "to empower them" by helping them register to vote.

Here's a question for him: Is he opposed to any kind of social justice or just the "raw" kind?

He says helping them register to vote is "raw, so-called social justice." What's the difference in "raw social justice" and ordinary social justice? If the "raw" kind is bad, is the cooked variety also bad? Or is that all right?

Do you eat sushi, Mr. Vadum, or is raw fish also bad?

These are scary times.

Ralph

A few positive signs

Amid all the bad news, the negative political posturing, and the just plain dumb GOP primary battles going on, there are a few positive signs that should be mentioned.

1. Having already picked up the spontaneous endorsement of the Massachusetts Nurses' Association, Elizabeth Warren is now seeing labor unions in the state coalescing around her anticipated run for the senate against Scott Brown.

Besides being terrific to have her voice in Senate debates, it would take back one seat from the Repubs.

2. Increasingly, the Repub presidential candidates are flocking to see who can out-pander to the Tea Party crowd. Romney, of all people, recently told a N.H. newspaper: "The tea party isn't a diversion from mainstream Republican thought. It is within mainstream Republican thought."

Just keep it up, guys; the more you paint yourself with those extremist views, the harder it will be for your eventual nominee to pivot for the competition with Obama.

3. Some pundits are now saying that Rick Perry has finally lit a fire under the liberal Democrats, who are getting worried. So maybe we'll begin to see more active support for Obama from the Dem Left.

4. Sarah Palin is obviously not going to get in the race, despite her continued coyness. This Labor Day weekend was her last chance before the train has definitely left the station. She'll try to extend her spot in the media craze as long as possible to keep the speaking engagements and TV appearances coming, and she will still draw crowds; but her poll numbers continue to sink of those who would actually vote for her.

5. The McClatchy News Service reports on a survey it did with randomly selected small business owners, asking how they thought taxes and federal regulations were affecting their business prospects (a main talking point of Repubs trying justify their call for tax cuts and slashing regulation).

At least in this sample, all interviewed said, in short, taxes and regulations are not what's hurting their business. It's the overall economic situation: people without money to spend because they don't have jobs or they're losing their mortgage.

This fits too with polls of the people -- whose top concern is not taxes, not the deficit, but JOBS.

Ralph

Listen up, McCain, Graham, and Lieberman

The abominable three-some, John McCain, Lindsey Graham, and John Lieberman, loudly criticized Obama for not going into Libya with guns blazing. He wisely didn't listen to those hawks.

We provided massive airstrikes, surveillance, intelligence, money and probably other kinds of assistance, while letting the French, Italians, and a few Arab nations lead the war. It's been referred to as "leading from behind."

Somehow those hawks think that's shameful, that it is demeaning to America and is another example of how Obama is letting our once-imperial nation go into decline.

But consider this: So far, anyway, the Libyan rebellion has been successful -- without the loss of one single American life, and very few if any loss of life other than Libyans. We gave them a lot of help, but they fought it and won it themselves. It is very clearly Libyans taking back their country from a tyrant.

Yesterday, the New York Times columnist Nichols Kristof reported from Tripoli at how the Libyans he encountered felt about this. Over and over again, people on the street tell him that they regard us as heroes. When they learned where he is from, they "fervently repeat variants of the same phrase: "Thank you, America!"

Further, he stated, "there has been almost no looting, and little apparent retaliation against the families of loyalists" to Qaddafi. "Pro-Americanism now is ubiquitous," and Kristof was particularly struck when one young man asked about hurricane damage in New York wondered how he might help.

Contrast this to the anti-American feeling in Iraq and Afghanistan. Could it be that people resent us "invading" and "occupying" their country, even when we got rid of an oppressive regime?

Is that so hard to understand? Apparently it is, if you're blinded by that imperialistic, "We've got to be the leaders of the world" mentality.

Maybe President Obama has more wisdom, listens to wiser counsel, and has more sense than the trio McGraBerman.

Ralph

Slowdown

It's been a few days since I posted anything here. Been very busy winding up loose ends as my administrative job at Emory came to an end on Aug 31.

Besides, there was nothing happening in the news that didn't seem like just more silly polemics and partisan squabbling.

Except Irene, of course. New Yorkers, in their "we're the center of the universe" mentality, were petulant that their mayor's extensive preparations turned out to have been a bit more than necessary when the storm lessened before it hit the city. This news should not obscure the fact that Irene wreaked major damage in other places -- the cost way up in the billions, with scores of lives lost.

More later.

Ralph