Defeat at the Double Cross Ranch

Hurray for Wisconsin voters! We weren't duped by the Fake Democrats that the Repubs tried to foist on us. Congratulations to all the Real Democratic winners in this round of The State That Kicked The Hornet's Ass. Perhaps we who have been educated in Wisconsin by Wisconsin teachers are smart enough and clever enough to see through lame efforts to pull the wool over our eyes. I can just hear the phone conversation with the Kochs at the Double Cross Ranch this morning...

"Mr. Koch? Is that you, sir? I am calling from the Capitol. Right, the Capitol in Madison, Wisconsin. Sorry to tell you the news, sir, but the Democrats won all their seats yesterday. Yup, that's right, all six of them. Well, I am sorry, sir, we tried mighty hard to confuse them with our cardboard cutouts of Democrats but they just didn't buy it, sir. What's that, sir? Well, yes, sir, indeed we did put pressure on voters. I had all the men workin' real hard, sir. Oh, now I don't think that's quite fair, Mr. Koch. Just because we didn't keep those Democrats from winning seats doesn't mean we shouldn't get paid. What's that? I need to tell the men that they'll have to wait to see what happens in Washington on the debt crises? Mr. Koch, that hardly seems right. Me and the men, no offense intended, don't make much money workin' for you and your brother. Heck, we barely can afford rent on this barn. And me, Larry and Moe, we get Social Security. Yessir, we'll sit tight. Yessir, I guess we could look for part time jobs. No sir, we ain't no slobs."

It's good to celebrate a victory. This one is a bit like "One small step for man..." and it may very well take that continuing kind of effort we exerted to get to the Moon and land on it forty-two years ago. It will mark a small step in the direction of regaining ground after the disastrous 2010 Mid-terms and all that happened after that. And it also points out what kind of effort, personal education and vigilance is needed to have gotten here today. From here on in, we cannot afford to relax because we know the Repubs have a plan and they are working that plan hard. Don't think that out at the Double Cross Ranch all is quiet and sad today. Far from it. They're busy over cowboy coffee and biscuits. Those outlaws are a scrappy bunch!

As wonderful and uplifting as this news is, the debt ceiling crises plods on in Washington and is frightening people everywhere. We have about two weeks before the country could, without raising the debt ceiling, go in to default on payments. Many possibilities loom if that happens including not mailing out Social Security payments to seniors, not mailing out checks to Veterans and/or not paying active duty military. I have written to Obama several times, John Boehner, and the Double Cross Ranch hand, Paul Ryan, as well as Mitch McConnell. It seems the Tea Partiers, who have just about completely co-opted the Republican Party, have determined to stand like cement statues against raising the debt ceiling. They don't seem to care an eyelash if Grandma Johnson gets her measly SS check and therefore can't pay her measly rent or if nineteen-year old Hank over in Afghanistan hunkered down in some forsaken rock pile gets his paycheck so his wife and two-year old back in Cadot, Wisconsin can buy groceries or if Arnie, who was wounded in WW II and is now very ill, gets his check so he can toddle to the VA for his treatment.

But they don't mind at all if Muffin Fitzgerald-Walker gets a bonus this year that equals eighty times the GDP of a Pacific island or that Wall Street is, well, Wall Street (they don't wear no stinkin' Sears suits there!) or that corporations, like the one the Koch's operate, make obscene amounts of money. No, that's perfectly okay. The Repubs, aka Tea Partiers, feel that the ultra-wealthy are the gas that runs the country's engines, they're the movers and the shakers, the innovators and the doers and they should continue to receive tax breaks. The TP's don't want to impede these movers from moving all the money in to their storehouses because those politicians live on hope that all that gold will eventually trickle down to them. They'll be rewarded in some way for their service to Manna. They'll get appointments to boards, jobs as CEOs, chairs on important committees, or ranch hands for the Koch Boys just like Walker did. They will be relieved that they made it out of the Common Person's life and in to the secure and beautiful life of The Rich.

Someone told me once that I was prejudiced against wealthy people. They were shocked I could be so callous because as they said, the wealthy are often philanthropists. True, sometimes a wealthy person does do good things for others. That's appropriate. I think when you have gobs of money you ought to be involved in helping others with your gifts. Also true, I am rather prejudiced against the wealthy. I admit it. The folks meeting at the Double Cross Ranch today are the uber-wealthy and their power is eye-watering. They move others about like puppets which is why we must keep close eyes on the politicians - they have strings tied to wealth and that wealth seeks to buy our freedoms and our planet.

Power To All The Common People!

Sailing Away in My Handbag

Where do titles for blogs come from? For me they happen in an instant as I write but sometimes they get handed to me with drum rolls. That's what happened today at noon.

I was talking to Andy on his lunch hour. He was telling me about a co-worker who had just returned from a trip with his wife to a Mexican swanky resort. Apparently one night at dinner they were paired with a California couple who lived a few stories higher on the food chain than Andy's co-worker. (It must have been a sweaty dinner for this guy who is a salesman for welding equipment in southern Wisconsin.) Anyway, the California wife told the Wisconsin couple that she worked for a handbag store on Rodeo Drive. (Sir Elton John is a frequent customer of theirs.) She chortled that the handbags begin in price at $50,000.00. Yes, I got the decimal in the correct place. Those are the lower priced designer bags, some go all the way up to $200,000.00. No, you say. Yes!

Andy and I exchanged peels of laughter over the phone. We had just spent Sunday detailing every last item in our apartment and what it would sell for at a garage sale for a legal proceeding that involves getting out from under debt and saving what we can before retirement. We couldn't stop laughing over $50,000 - $200,000 handbags. How ludicrous! How absurd! How awful. That isn't Common Person life. I had to ask myself when I hung up - and we are being asked in Wisconsin to accept the end of collective bargaining, to hand over Badger Care & Senior Care, to stand quietly and watch as corporations rape and pillage our lives? All so somebody can jet out to Rodeo Drive and purchase a $50,000 handbag?

I sat down at the computer after my own lunch and found this advertisement. Andy had a gift subscription to Cruising World years ago. I still get emails from them. This one seemed to be the answer to why you'd need that $50,000 handbag!

Fully-equipped monohulls currently available for purchase in the Caribbean with low down payments*:

2 Cabins / 1 Head $25,800 down

3 Cabins / 2 Heads $32,800 down

3 Cabins / 3 Heads $37,800 down

5 Cabins / 5 Heads $55,800 down

The operative word here is DOWN. That amount of money is only the beginning. And here was I running from room to room - all 5 of them - to make sure I hadn't missed anything on the list and struggling to write down a fair garage sale price for our things. Still, I'm positive you'd need a new handbag to step on to your yacht. There's a place on Rodeo Dr. you can find some great little items for a song.

I forwarded Andy the Cruising World offer. He responded with my title - "Well, if you can't afford the yacht, perhaps you can sail away in your handbag!"

Once upon a time I was accused, by someone who was posing as a friend, of being anti-wealthy person. He told me I was prejudiced against people with money and that I had no idea how philanthropic many of those folks were. He wasn't among them but was constantly focused on becoming one of them. He coveted their power and freedom through money. Maybe he was correct. Maybe I have a prejudicial attitude about the very wealthy. I understand that many people with vast amounts of money donate lots of it to charities and good works. That's great, I'm glad they do. But I have seen the other side of wealth and power and it isn't just about the obscene price tags on handbags. When I think about what has happened to The Common People in Wisconsin these past many weeks I know it is a battle between the astronomical wealth of the Koch Boys and The Common People who are teachers, nurses, social workers and street crews. Those folks don't make enough to shop at the $50,000 handbag store.

My hair dresser charges $27.00 for a wash, cut and style. We understand each other. We're from the same strata with the same frame of reference for things. When I tell her about the handbags on Rodeo Drive, she's going to fall over. She complimented me on my own handbag last time I was in - a darling number from Target on sale for $24.99. She'll get it. We'll talk about the behavior of the wealthy, everyone has stories. And underneath I will remember the women who started a blouse co-operative in Mexico - not that far away from the swanky resort - to feed their children. And the teachers in Wisconsin who are losing their jobs this summer. And the men who plowed our 16" snowfalls this past winter. On a day when we remember those who have died for fashion and greed, this perversion of wealth is truly terrible.

Choices matter whether they are about how much to spend on a purse or who we vote for and support. I don't think my heart would allow me to spend $50,000 on a purse. I hope my Common handbag doesn't spring any leaks when I sail away!

Power To All The People!

Where Does The Money Go?

Back home. Home meant mail from a week. In the stack of usual sale ads and internet provider specials, I found a mailing from our local peace and justice group. These dedicated folks have been promoting peaceful resolution to conflicts from local to national and international. Often their monthly gatherings host someone who has returned from a trip abroad, many from war-torn countries where U.S. presence has added a dangerous level of complexity and incredible loss to the lives of The People. The newsletter noted that Kathy Kelly would be speaking at the next meeting this month. Kathy is a co-coordinator for Voices for Creative Nonviolence which is a campaign to end U.S. military and economic warfare. She has recently been in Afghanistan and is planning on sharing her first-hand information on the conditions faced by ordinary people in Afghanistan. The Common People. The newsletter noted that Wisconsin has paid $18.5 billion for war since 2001. You can check this out at costofwar.com. What about the money we are spending to fund oil/resource wars abroad? What if that money were spent at home in Wisconsin to do any number of things?

Early on, as the struggle began in Wisconsin, a friend sent me an email sharing with me that her husband had been in conversation with a GM union man. This gentleman told her husband that the local GM plant had accepted $3 billion for plant renovations which then never happened. The plant closed and the community lost a major employer and thousands of jobs. Where is that money? Why can't that be paid back to the state and used to balance the so-called "budget crisis"?

A good friend used to tell me that the questions are always more important than the answers. Once again, we must ask some cogent and important questions of the people who are in a position to do damage to support structures. Don't accept the premise that Wisconsin is "broke". Ask questions that dig deeper into where our money goes. What do we want to spend our money on, where do we want it to go? Are resource wars too costly? Is this what we see as a priority in our state, in our country? Are we willing to cut back on education to fund this chronic violence to which we send our youth? Are we willing to forgo critically needed infrastructure repairs? Can we live with the knowledge that more and more of our neighbors and friends will fall in to poverty or live without medical care all so we can continue to bleed for oil? Are we comfortable living with those specters?

Wisconsin is not the only state gathering in the streets. Have you seen The People in Michigan? In Ohio, New Hampshire, Indiana? What questions are needed when this apparent concerted effort rises before us? Remember, as you frame your questions, that the Citizens United decision has blessed corporations with person hood. A corporation has now been granted the full measure of freedoms before only afforded to actual human beings. What does that mean? It may well mean, as we are seeing, that corporations are formulating plans and writing policies at all levels of government that will determine where the money goes - in to their coffers - and who will carry their banners - very conservative people like Scott Walker.

I don't know about you but I am clear that I want my money to go to helping The People, to educating our children, to repairing and maintaining our roads, parks, communal spaces, to greening our environment, to encouraging alternative energies, to fostering peace and economic justice in our country and the world. I am clear that I do not want it to go to fighting, killing and dying. I am clear that I wish for my friend who teaches kids to have a good work environment, to make a good living and to get the things she needs to do the best job she can for the children. I am clear that I wish for fire fighters and police to make a good living and be able to bargain for the things they need to do their jobs. I am clear that I want a governor in Madison who is willing to hear the needs of The People, to sit down and negotiate, to listen, to offer solutions and not build walls. I am clear where I want my money to go.

Power To All The People!

p.s. Vote tomorrow!