Wow, the President sends me (me!!) email…

Dear jjmtacoma,

In this new Congress, it is not enough to talk about common ground. We must — together — seek it.

… snip!  Cheerleading deleted to save space.

Please contribute $5 or more to help the DSCC meet its goal.

…snip!  Laundry list of “big ideas” from SOTU deleted to save headaches (like re-tooling our education system to prepare salmon for green jobs while reducing the number of government agencies responsible for salmon) 

To lay the groundwork for that kind of progress, the DSCC must raise $50,000 before January 31. Chip in $5 or more to help them meet their goal.

Thank you,

President Barack Obama

Whoever wrote could have tried this shorter message:

Dear jjmtacoma,

Send us your money so we can elect more Senators willing to commit your future tax dollars to our new BFFs!

Thx!  Da Prez

Should Obama Pardon DeLay?

Today in the Washington Post, Tom Campbell  makes the case that Obama should pardon DeLay in the name of … civility! 

No one would call me a fan of Tom DeLay, but I will say that three years in prison is manifestly unfair. I carefully reviewed DeLay’s background when I ran against him, and people were only too happy to tell me of his shortcomings. But what I found in DeLay was a zealot willing to blur the line in pursuit of what he thought to be a good cause, not someone using his office to seek financial gain. There were no personal slush funds, no house remodeled by a lobbyist, no unreported vacation home. He was only trying to build our party.

(emphasis is mine)

Oh, so according to Tom Campbell,  DeLay is a “good guy” who is just mis-understood.  Of course!  If he had unreported income, well yeah, throw his ass in jail – but this is just a little money laundering among friends, what’s the big deal?

To me, it seems like the beltway has “special rules” where Congress, Staffers and even the President can use lobbyists as unpaid staff to review all those complicated bills, make recommendations and line the pockets of the party and re-election campaigns as long as they are playing on the power team or don’t do anything too obvious or embarrassing.  Of course, if any of them don’t play the right way, there is a ton of ammunition to ruin them.

…And then they get a pardon.

* I do not think DeLay should get a pardon, in fact, I think a lot more members of Congress and their buddies should be wearing orange full time.

SOTU – WORM (What Obama Really Meant)

Something struck me about the State of the Union, but I couldn’t put my finger on it.  Anytime I’ve heard Obama speak, there is a part of the speech where he says something that sounds kind of good, but left me wondering what was *really* going on.  For instance, we have heard about the Catfood Commission for quite a while and the report suggested changes for Social Security that would increase the retirement age and create a benefit structure where part of the benefit payment would be based on means testing.  Back to the State of the Union, Obama glossed over the suggestions of the Catfood Commission as a way to “save” money but then he pointed to the millitary spending as a possible place to cut. 

Strange.

We are fighting two wars and have our millitary spread all over the world, how on earth does Obama think he can get approval to cut millitary spending without ending the wars?  Here are the bits from the SOTU Transcript that worried me: 

So tonight, I am proposing that starting this year, we freeze annual domestic spending for the next five years. This would reduce the deficit by more than $400 billion over the next decade, and will bring discretionary spending to the lowest share of our economy since Dwight Eisenhower was president.

This freeze will require painful cuts. Already, we have frozen the salaries of hardworking federal employees for the next two years. I’ve proposed cuts to things I care deeply about, like community action programs. The Secretary of Defense has also agreed to cut tens of billions of dollars in spending that he and his generals believe our military can do without.

…

Now, most of the cuts and savings I’ve proposed only address annual domestic spending, which represents a little more than 12 percent of our budget. To make further progress, we have to stop pretending that cutting this kind of spending alone will be enough. It won’t.

The bipartisan fiscal commission I created last year made this crystal clear. I don’t agree with all their proposals, but they made important progress. And their conclusion is that the only way to tackle our deficit is to cut excessive spending wherever we find it, in domestic spending, defense spending, health care spending, and spending through tax breaks and loopholes.

Then I ran across this report from the Brookings Institute and realized what was bothering me!  This report explains the game about to play out in Washington DC.  First, defense spending is divided between a peacetime basic operating budget and the budget for homeland security and budget to execute the wars abroad.  The part of defense spending that is “on the table” is the peacetime basic operating budget.  The Brookings report outlines ways this budget can be reduced by as much as 10% but not touch the budgets for the wars or the budget for homeland security. 

The key bit in the Brookings report is this:

So the minute that someone says, well, defense is the top constitutional obligation of the federal government and therefore it should be protected regardless, and we should make our deficit reduction out of other accounts. If we start a conversation in those terms, then a big constituency is going to come up and say let’s protect Social Security, or let’s protect college loans for students because that’s our future after all. Or let’s protect science research or infrastructural development, and you get the idea pretty soon you’ve lost the spirit of shared sacrifice that I think is essential if we’re going to have any hope of reducing the deficit in the coming years.

 So that’s the basic motivation. We’re not probably going to reduce the deficit effectively, and therefore strengthen our long-term economy and the foundation for our long-term military power, if we don’t establish a spirit of shared sacrifice.

Here is my prediction:  the peacetime operating budget for defense will be cut by some percentage and the next thing “on the table” will be SS and Medicare in order to “share the sacrifice” because, “See?  The defense budget was cut and now it is time to look for other “sacred” budgets to cut”.

Starve the Beast

Back in the day, a key feature of Reaganomics was the idea of “Starving the Beast”.  What this means is the government enacts tax policies that reduce revenue to force operating with less money – or they have to deficit spend.  Obama is a huge fan of Reagan, by his own admission.  Does this mean he also subscribes to “Starving the Beast”?  It would seem so, considering the extension of the Bush tax cuts combined with the reduction in payroll taxes for Social Security.  This plan also had the added benefit of hurting the lowest paid in the economy by doing away with the “Making Work Pay” tax credit.  The “Making Work Pay” tax credit was aimed at the lowest earners in the form of a tax credit of 6.5% of earnings, for those earning up to $75,000 per year and was funded through the stimulus. 

The next phase of starving will come with budgeting of constrained resources and looking for ways to “save” money.  The republicans will tell us we HAVE to reduce the “entitlements” to “live within our means”.  Obama will pretend to be all for (so called) progressive ideals and “stuff” (you know, like “we will make stuff and invent stuff” ). 

Meanwhile, the media will provide cover for Obama doing what Obama wants to do by blaming republicans Washington Informer: 

Republicans in the House and Senate, borrowing a page from Ronald Reagan, plan to stifle President Barack Obama’s domestic agenda by using recently-enacted tax cuts as an excuse to reduce federal spending. 

Yeah, go team.

Feeding the Poor

 I am a Christian, but I am absolutely FOR freedom of religion in whatever form it takes.  This is a highly individual choice and we are all moved in ways that others might not understand.

I attend an ELCA Lutheran church (that is Reconciling in Christ) and I buy extra food almost every week for a small foodbank/soup kitchen that is supported through “my” church.  The foodbank is run out of a Four Square church basement that is located in an area called Hill Top in Tacoma.  If you know your Christian religions, Lutheran and Four Square couldn’t be more different.  To me, the mission of feeding the poor and homeless is the most important part.  

The food I buy is not organic.  It is not the most healthy either.  Homeless people don’t have kitchens or pots or pans, but they can get hot water.  Cup-of-noodles, ready to eat soup, instant oatmeal, tuna, beanie weenies and other “heat and eat” foods work well.  For families, I send large cans of baked beans, boxed cereal, pasta and pasta sauces (with meat), canned vegetables and boxed dinners like macaroni and cheese.   Some of the families who use this foodbank have kids making food for themselves or parents with very little time to fuss over a multi-course meal.  The parents have to work multiple jobs or they have addictions or just can’t face what life has become and don’t have the energy.  It doesn’t matter – the kids need to eat and so sending easy to prepare foods is important. 

Supporting families “in need” is a passion for me and I share this passion with several other families who also happen to attend the same church as me.  Another family started a community garden in the backyard of our church.  It is a true community garden where anyone can rent a space in the garden for $25/year and they don’t ever have to step foot in our chuch – unless they need to use the bathroom.  If the renter is willing, any extra fruits or vegetables can be harvested for the little food bank in the Four Square Church basement.  

What if “we” didn’t support this foodbank because “we” object to the conservative nature of the church serving the food?  Trust me, they are much more conservative than the church I attend. 

Do all causes, no matter how worthy, need to be rejected while we wait around for something perfect?