Just thoughts

on two strikes for Congress

2011-08-04T13:24:00.002-06:00

After the debate has settled down on the Debt Crisis, maybe Congress will begin to consider that it left important parts out of two pieces of legislation: the health bill and the treaty on the debt. (I call it a treaty because there was a war going on there between the corporatocracy and the people and the corporatocracy won. Someday the Supreme Court is going to have to change that more than a century ruling that makes a corporation equal to me and other individual people for political and other purposes when it is obvious they are not; people must take responsibility for their actions--corporations do not). Going back to the two strikes: On the health bill, Congress failed to include a public option. Instead, as it did with Medicare drug negotiations, it left things up to the private side of our world and we're going to get stuck with the costs. The pharmaceutical companies make big bucks on us older folks because Medicare cannot negotiate lower prices. And in the debt treaty Congress omitted raising taxes on people making more than $200,000/$250,000. What nobody seems to recognize is that taxes are what makes the government run. In the "Good Old 'Golden' Ages", tariffs paid for much of the government. Today, with free trade, tariffs don't bring in enough to do the job. (An increase in tariffs in 1930 is considered one cause of the depth of the Great Depression). So taxes were developed on income. And payroll taxes have been contentious since. But raising taxes would be less disastrous to the national economy than cutting benefits or payrolls to government employees and those who get federal tax money. To bring the economy back, we need to have people buying things. Only when the demand increases and consumers have to wait too long for service does a business person consider adding to payroll. Any business person who depends on his or her tax bill to determine when to hire and fire will be out of business sooner rather than later. We need the government spending. And if paying the debt then requires tax increases, so be it. The way it is now, only the common person will suffer as he did before the 1930s.

on more idiocy in Helena

2011-02-24T11:30:00.002-07:00

Someone would think that the Legislators meeting in Helena don't read history. Oh, that's right, they don't consider education relevant. A couple of instances

--Dating from the early days of this state, the extraction industry has proved that it cannot be trusted to regulate itself. From the Anaconda company with its pit in Butte to the coal mining companies in Eastern Montana, the extraction industry has left a mess wherever it goes. We still face cleanup from old-time mines up near Cooke City. And now one legislator wants to let new cyanide leaching miners into the state if they use two mines grandfathered in to process the ore. The industry tried once to overturn the ban we (the people) voted in several elections ago and lost. Now its going for an end around by probably paying for one legislator's campaign.
--A few years ago, a Billings legislator introduced a bill that passed during its session to lower breathing standards in his city. Excuse me, to lower the amount of ugly smelling and ugly health reactions in Billings, allowing more sulphur dioxide in the air of downtown, all in the name of jobs. It took us several sessions before we could get that law changed and be able to breathe safely in downtown Billings again. And we didn't get any jobs out of it.
--Those of us who have been around for a while don't want any more promotion of boom and bust extraction and agriculture economies. If we look back at the history of this state's economy we can see that more bubbles have burst over the years leaving open mines and wind-blown topsoil in their wakes. Housing in our bigger cities goes up when the economy does and when the bust comes people walk away from their "new" homes and head for Denver or LA.
--The legislators also don't seem to realize that cutting taxes, an easy way to claim they are doing something about any deficit (which Montana does not have), particularly the taxes of small businesses does nothing for jobs and only enables business owners to sell out and buy the biggest houses in town. Jobs come only when customers are overwhelming the store counters to the point where more hands are needed.
--And the legislators don't seem to believe that the people of this state know what they are voting on. At least two voter-approved measures are up for gutting by legislative actions this year The aforementioned cyanide lead referendum and the medical marijuana issue. Both were approved by the people by a large percentage. In fact, when one would-be miner sought to overturn the leaching ban by public vote, the percentage against it actually went up. So what gives legislators the idea that they have the right to overturn what the people have approved in this democracy? Oh, yeah, maybe the voters don't know what they are voting on. Last November they elected the scariest Legislature since the one that elected Clark to the U.S. Senate. And then they elected a leadership that believes in one case that advertising can outsell a cure to problems and another who has the brains of an ostrich and doesn't think science is a viable source of information. His only issue seems to be putting roadblocks in front of divorces. A stupid, stupid MAN.

on Montana and global warming

2011-02-20T01:10:00.002-07:00

A Montana legislator who shall remain nameless (because I don't have his name right in front of me now but who represents to a great extent the general thinking of his party in Helena), has introduced a bill to proclaim global warming a benefit to the state and would order the state to cease all effort to combat it. An in-state scientist has said, in essence, that the legislator is blowing smoke,that scientific studies have basically proved that humans are directly responsible for the current global climate. However, it is true that over the past 2,000 years there have been significant climate changes so that at one stage glaciers spread out again in Europe and in another people were able to live in Greenland and grow crops there for several centuries before the cold returned. What those people who accept that thinking are rejecting are numerous studies reported in scientific journals that point out that the carbon dioxide content of the air is the largest that has been seen in 30,000 years (from ice and ocean coring). In the middle of the 1980s, which the anti climate change people claim to have heard predictions about an upcoming ice age, I remember an article in, I think, Science 86, which predicted the actual changes we have seen in Montana, longer but drier warm periods and warmer winters. And the big question again this year is Are we out of the drought yet?

The unmentionable legislator cites global warming as having beneficial effects in increase crop growth with the additional carbon dioxide. Yet, it will. But what he doesn't say is that the bulk for the crop growth will go into the body of the plant and not the seeds and roots that are so important for human development. Scientists have made some experiments which indicated that the grain may be more plentiful but the loss of nutrient value will make that a negligible effect and may mean that that there will be even more widespread hunger than already exists in this world. The U.S. has a rather high percentage (for our wealth) of hungry people and Africa is starving in almost all its equatorial areas. But again, the people of Montana, those who have moved into the state within the past 100 years, don't seem to have enough between the ears to realize that their livelihoods may hang on curbing the warming effect. They don't seem to realize that this part of the country was so dry it was virtually uninhabitable before about the 17th Century. That's why the land was empty when the Crows, Cheyenne and Blackfeet were able to move into it.

on Rehberg and health funding

2011-02-20T00:59:00.002-07:00

Our only Congressman was on the national news recently taking a stand that would eliminate funding for the new health program. He said it was not good for Montana. Well, I'm a Montanan. Without playing the more Montana than you game, let me add that my great grandfather was in this state by 1865. He, or a relative, is apparently responsible for Pattee Canyon over in Missoula. And one thing Rehberg, who has available to him a better health plan (at our expense) than anything the bill offers, forgets is that the greatest part of his constituency that will benefit from the health plan is the farmer and rancher who now has no plan or a very limited plan at very high cost. While those in Helena are trying to axe workmen's compensation in this state, they forget that the very jobs they are trying to grow in the state--mineral extraction and agriculture--are two of the most dangerous jobs in the country and the world. So they will try to add to the toll while cutting down the benefits to those who get hurt on the job. With that little side note out of the way, I'll add one last thought on the health plan that Rehberg needs to consider The only thing wrong with it is that it lacks a public option.

And then there's Rehberg Can it get any worse?

2011-02-18T20:31:00.001-07:00

Let's stop and think about Denny Rehberg, scion of a family which has done well in Billings, Mont., so he's become the ninth richest person in Congress. But again, he's third generation and that means the blood is weakening as is the interest in his home town, witness his suit against the taxpayers of his strongest political base, Billings. For those who don't know, Denny is suing the city of Billings for leaving his land for other fires before, he says, the fire was really out. Then it flared up and took out some of the trees and sagebrush he owns on top of the Rimrocks. He is suing for damage. Since I almost set a nearby area on fire myself (by breaking a shovel handle many years ago), I am aware of about how much damage you can do up there. The land's worth very little unless there is a building on it. And some of the buildings in the area are worth very little themselves. So why doesn't he spend some of his own money to replace trees and grass instead of sagebrush instead of suing his constituents? Except for some trees, the land repairs itself in a hurry. I've seen some aftermaths of fire in the same type of land a few years later. People of Montana who would normally contribute to Denny's campaign might want to think about it. They may have to contribute to his land "repair" later if he gets an "activist" judge.

And then he goes up to the Legislature and tells his fellow stupids there that he favors eliminating activist judges. By whose definition of activist judges will he operate? I happen to think that the federal judge of a few years ago in Cheyenne (he may still be there) who bent over every time a right winger asked him to is just as much an activist as a judge who swings from the environmental side or the left wing pastures. Actually, the ones on the left may have a clearer view of the "general welfare" than the right wing. (For an explanation of the quoted material, read the preamble to the Constitution. You'll also find it in the body of that document.)

And while we're at it, let us consider the question of strict constructionists (which presumably would include those who would eliminate the 14th amendment to bring back slavery as well as the so-called tea party "patriots.") If we're going to go back to what they consider the strict construction of a document written in the 18th Century, then the Second Amendment gun slingers should beware. Seems to me (and not just me) that strict construction would limit them to the weapons available at that time.

Hello after a break

2011-02-17T18:53:00.002-07:00

Seems like forever since I've posted anything but I'll try again to see if I can come up with some "brilliant" thinking to add to this universe.

At the moment I am more concerned with the state of Montana than any other issue. With the "Code of the West", the nullification idiocy, the attacks on women and on education and human services, if any of them passes, it will take the state at least a decade to recover from this legislature.

Ladies and gentlemen in Helena, including Peterson and empty-headed McGillvary: The answer is to raise taxes. Montana has always done well in balancing its budget and, strangely enough, we are among the lower states in total tax load. Our income and property taxes may be up there but we're not facing the deadly sales tax that puts the tax load into the stratosphere. Back when we had the 11% rate on high incomes, I had to laugh when a visitor from out of state called us a high-tax state. By now, I've seen enough returns to know it ain't true. What happened in response is we lowered the tax rates and then took it back from high income people by limiting their deduction for federal withholding to $5000 ($10,000 for a couple).

Reading the reporting from the legislature, in the members' own words, is like hearing Bob Hope's one liners, if he had ever joked about stupidity. People, read the history books. Read the Constitution. The best answer possible might be to eliminate the states as France did centuries ago and create provinces. The states just get in the way of "the general welfare", the reason for the Constitution in the first place. (Read the preamble.)

on the question of time

2009-10-19T23:27:00.002-06:00

It's been a while since I posted here but let me try an idea out. I have been looking at the question of time. Not the mathematical time used by the Einsteins and other mathematical geniuses, but the time used by all the rest of us. My thought is that it doesn't exist. Time, as measured on a clock, is a false image. It is just a measurement of what we see as change and it is not always accurate as to the rate at which change is occuring. Millenia, centuries, decades, years, months and days do not exactly fit to the moments of change. And how long would a light year be if we lived on Mars?

McGillvary coming into the 20th Century?

2009-03-13T22:38:00.003-06:00

The Billings Outpost reported the other day that some of our legislators are twittering. One of those quoted was my very own man of no talent, Tom McGillvary. Of course, he would tweet. The man only has about 140 words in his mind at a time. And those 140 words may be dictated by his church since he managed to insert the "fault" divorce bill of the extreme "religious wrong" into the Legislature this time around. How can anyone with his beliefs get elected out of my district? We've had John Bohlinger, Kelly Addy, Brent Cromley and other good representatives, but now we've got an ass. Of course, we also have Roy Brown in the Senate, but he doesn't seem to be following a preacher's menu even if he is right wing business oriented.

on Republican arrogance

2009-02-04T18:13:00.002-07:00

Once again, the Republicans in the Legislature in Helena are trying to tell the people of Montana that they don't know enough to vote on an issue. My so-called representative, the empty-headed Tom McGillvary, has said we didn't know what we were doing when we voted for the child insurance program and seems to think that the earnings which will allow people to qualify are too high. However, he doesn't seem to realize, as most Montana legislators don't, that the amount is below what makes people middle class in the rest of the country. But then McGillvary is an idiot, who also thinks climate change or global warming is not human caused. He will let his opinions sway the scientific facts by saying they aren't scientific facts. However, the vast majority of global weather scientists support man-caused effects. I guess he just doesn't read science magazines, even those he could understand.

on campaigns and their advertising

2008-10-30T22:33:00.002-06:00

I just read that KTVQ and other television stations in Montana have said they will not run a television ad from the Democrats about Fox that claims he has been fired from three jobs. If the ad is inaccurate then I salute them for not running it. But what I don't understand is why they then keep running Republican ads attacking Schweitzer and Bullock. The cited source of the Bullock ad has said that it is inaccurate and asked to have it taken down, but the stations haven't stopped running it. And they are also continuing to run the nasty attack ads run by Cynthia Lummox of Wyoming which are full of big buzz words, once very upstanding words like socialism and liberalism that have become Republican buzz words. They are empty of context anymore just as the other dirty word, conservative, has no meaning any more. Essentially it seems to mean someone who watches the dollar until it blushes; but, no, it means someone who doesn't believe in abortion or gay marriage and wants to tell the rest of world how to act; but, no, it means someone who wants to go back to a dream world that never was; but, no, it means someone who is mean spirited and doesn't believe in people's right to be free to make our own decisions; but, wait, it means..... It's become a dirty word.

The National Republican Party decided to put some ads into Montana to counteract all the ads that Obama has been running. They are claiming that he has not been tested in a crisis and has no administrative experience. If they truly believe that, then they are telling the world that we will be electing a President this Tuesday who doesn't have any administrative experience and actually has never been in a position to make a President's life and death decisions: If you read his biography, McPain doesn't have any administrative experience either and has never been in a position where he has had to make a critical decision that would affect anybody but himself. Why is he a better leader for a crisis? My suggestion is that he wouldn't; he would let his emotions handle too much of his decision making. You have to have emotions working to make good decisions, but his seem awfully limited and narrow.

This election seems to me to be the most malevolent of any I've seen since I voted absentee for Eisenhower in 1956, the first vote for President I ever cast. I'm beginning to believe that not only should the regulators bring back the Fairness Doctrine for both radio and televisiion, but that they should also ban all attack ads by political candidates and force those candidates to only run ads where they tell their platforms and what they will do if elected. If they talk in generalities, then the general public may reject them. At least we would have an idea as we get this election with the Weasel and some of the legislator candidates as to how all they can say is lower taxes and create new jobs and new programs. It's inance. Or they will freeze all government spending, which didn't work the last time the Republicans tried it back in Clinton's terms when the got nasty about funding that national government.

McCain was one of those people in my mind who was a survivor; he survived Annapolis (probably only with the help of two admirals, his father and grandfather); he survived Vietnam; he survived the Pentagon; and he survived the U.S. Senate. Which doesn't make him a good candidate for President. His judgment seems to be lacking in two of the key people in the last stages of this campaign: his choice of Sarah Pain for vice president and his sudden burst of appreciation for Joe the Plumber who isn't a licensed plumber and probably will never be a small businessman making more than 250,000 a year in his own business. The odds are against him even when he buys an existing business. So much dirt is mucking up the hems of Pain's 150,000 worth of hems, etc., that she is having some problems. So I would suggest that McBush's judgment was not active or he didn't vet these two people properly before mixing them into his campaign. The first question he should have asked about both is if there was anything that could come back and bite them on the butt. But he didn't and both have a few bite marks there even though they try to pooh-pooh them.

The biggest question that exists is Pain's history and acceptance in a big way by the religious wrong way out in la la land. I have always understood that abstinence and standing away from sex until marriage was the good old religious wrong's standard for teens. But they cheer on Palin and her daughter as they hold forth with what looks as if it's a family tradition. Apparently Sarah herself had a seven-month baby and now her daughter is about to have a child before she's married. Why have the religious control freaks changed their minds on this activity? Despite what the parties and the wingnuts on both sides say about the mainstream media, they do a good job of reporting the facts. Basically, those people who are at odds with mainstream news are those who are unwill to accept the facts because they file them in a section of their brain where everyone is a villain or a loafter, etc., and want the msm to print and air the facts with that slant. They do get some hacks in news room that have political biases. A headline on the Billings Gazette this morning about Obama's 30 min advertisement on television last year obviously was written by a very biased head writer. The gist of the head was that McCain, mentioned in one small paragraph about three or four down and the last paragraphs on the end, had criticized the ad. But the bulk of the page 1 story was about Obama and the tv show and not about McBush. For those of you who are disdainful of the daily newspapers in the country, the biggest failure I see so far is to ask some of the questions I've asked before. But we've become such a lackluster news nation any more that nobody asks the really hard questions for fear of offending someone.

on the vp debate

2008-10-02T21:20:00.004-06:00

Sarah Agnew-Pain did a better job than I expected in tonight's debate but she did do what she has been doing in the interviews that she's had with news people: every time she did not to answer a question, she went off on the scripted comments she's been making for weeks about her "experience" as mayor of a small town and as the governor of Alaska, or cited her mantra of change (which the Republican ticket adopted when they realized how Obama was benefitting from its use of the word), or changing the subject when she had opportunities to say how McCain's policies would differ from Bush's, or going to the flag, motherhood and apple pie when cornered; or talking about how she's middle class when she's worth at least $1 million. I don't know many middle class people who are worth that much. At least some of the people interviewed afterwards realized that she didn't answer the questions. And I think people who said they were impressed by her insistence that she was one of the people are swayed not by the issues but by the flag waving and identification.

The talking heads said she didn't make any mistakes, but she did make at least two in foreign policy. At one point she seemed to equate Al Quaida with the Shiia as terrorists when Al Quaida is actually mostly Wahabi, which is a fundamentalist Sunni sect. A moment later she linked Al Malaki, the current leader of the government of Iraq, which we support with the Taliban, the ousted government of Afghanistan which has apparently joined with Al Quaida on the Pakistan/Afghanistan border. She also seemed to say that Israel should have a blank check when dealing with Iran. And on another note, she created a funny point that no one seemed to catch when she talked about the Obama/Obiden ticket. People praised her for standing tall and seeming sure of what she was saying. But she also did that when she bungled news interviews so badly. And she keeps smiling when she has nothing to smile about.

But Pain refuses to answer questions. Even when she seemed to agree with Biden, as on the gay marriage iissue, she still waffled. Will she allow civil rights for same sex couples? She never answered that. She mentioned contracts which is basically dodging the issue. Will she support enabling same sex couples government support for their unions? I would suggest that her refusal to answer questions is part arrogance and part ignorance.

One other item that I almost forgot: She also repeats the same red herring about Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Yes, they were doing things that perhaps they should have been more careful about, but they were also doing the job they were set up to do which is to provide a secondary market for mortgages. And blaming the laws against red lining for the mess is just ridiculous. Under the law, banks couldn't red line any part of a community, but they still could use sound banking practices in making loans.

on brown and mcgillvary

2008-10-02T21:05:00.002-06:00

The weasel, Roy Brown, came out with his first television ads this week. As expected, he attacked his opponent without citing anything about his own role in the Legislature or about what he would do for the state except for very general statements. The problem with his ad is that he did say Montanans don't like liars, so why does he expect that they would vote for him? The weasel is probably one of the biggest liars in state politics. He will stand and lie to you with a straight face but if you watch him he will look to the left and crinkle his eyes in such a way that you know he is aware that what he is saying is not truth. He will tell you that he favors funding education in the state but his actions in the Legislature do not prove that and he knew several years ago that the state had not fully funded education. He told me that it had but two years later, or less, the state Supreme Court ruled that it hadn't. If you really want someone who won't tell you the truth and who will vote against the interests of the people of Montana vote Brown. Remember his tax cuts, as are most Republican tax cuts, will not benefit most of us, including small businesses, but they will benefit out of state firms operating in Montana.

At the same time as his tv ads, Brown also started posting signs around the city. In my area, they are mostly accompanied by signs supporting an incumbent who, beyond a doubt, is one of the lesser lights in the legislature, Tom McGillvary. Now Tom says he is supported by groups who say he has one of the "best" records in the Legislature of voting against government spending, something of which he should ashamed, not proud. He told one of his constitutents last time that he would cut taxes. When that constituent asked him what programs he would cut to do that, the only one he could come up with was one that spends less than $100,000 a biennium to pay counselors so that parents adjudged to be possible dangers to their children can visit with those children in a chaperoned milieu. Do we want to deny those parents visits with their children? He actually did vote in the last legislatu, twice, against expanding the child health insurance program to more Montana children. And while his campaign literature says he wants to be a force in the legislature for bringing people together, he actually voted against any compromises, including the one that finally ended the special session. I am ashamed that my neighbors elected both of these men.

again on the bailout

2008-09-29T21:16:00.002-06:00

The talking heads have been yakking all afternoon about the failure of the U.S. House of Representatives to pass the bailout and about how the Republicans failed to follow their glorious leader or even the Lone Ranger of the Presidential Campaign, John McBush. Perhaps the most surprising comment came from a Republican supporter who actually seemed angry that we were blaming free market capitalism when, he claimed, it had never been tried, that there still had been too much government interference in the markets. Dumb as a box of bricks. Free market capitalism, like Libertarianism and other far right economic schemes, are just pie in the sky. I would like Libertarianism, except we had a little example of that back in Medieval days where the strongest ruled. Now, it's the economic strongest who are ruling us. Someone once said that business destroys itself by its excesses under Republican governments and only gets well again when the Democrats are in control with regulations that keep business from eating its own tail. I think that is not only well said, but correct. Those who support such plans don't seem to take into consideration human nature. A little power, be it financial or political, leads to a desire for more. In the markets it creates greed and that, in turn, destroys any trace of free markets. We see that happening with the death or purchase of industries other than banks until just a few are left in a kind of business oligarchy.

For those who are so against a bailout of any kind, and I have all kinds of concerns about giving this Administration so much unfettered ability to wheel and deal in the financial markets, we have to remember that it will not be the fat cats who have made the decisions that led to the economic crash who will feel the pain. Most of the working people that I have come in contact with in Montana have employer sponsored retirement plans that they invest in the market in several ways including buying stock or buying mutual funds that in turn invest in stocks. Each of them has lost a bit of the $1 trillion that the markets reportedly lost today. Not a pretty picture for those who may retire in the next 10 years, says Suze Orman. Paulson, I admit, scares me. I expect he's pretty ruthless when he wants something. After all, he was CEO of Goldman-Sachs, one bank that seems to not only be surviving but growing in this financial meltdown. Yet something has to be done if the stores down on Broadway and on Grand Ave and other Billings shopping areas are going to be able to continue. They may be in great financial shape, yet it has been the rule for farmers and business to borrow operating capital that is later paid off when goods and products are sold. If credit locks up, they may have to lock their doors. It is a conundrum.

on the failure of the bailout

2008-09-29T13:54:00.002-06:00

The bailout went down in the House this morning with enough Democratic votes against with the Republicans. It is rather amazing that the Montana echo in the House, Denny Living-off-the-taxpayer Rehberg, did not follow his esteemed leader's position but voted against it. Maybe it was for the best. At this point I would suggest that the Congress now look at other ways to unlock the bank credit lockup without having to bailout the Wall Street wealthy for their gambling. One way may be to look at making credit and money available to those banks that now can't get money and actually make the loans to keep businesses and farms operating. Seems to me that's what we are really looking. The U.S. can actually get away, I think, without the big stock markets as long as trades can be negotiated between brokers on line. It seems to me that putting the markets on line without a central point to amass gambling wealth they could be made more transparent and more easily regulated. If we were to bypass Wall Street, it might really be the best thing for the country and would help the Main Street far better than the bailout. I've really changed my mind on this since watching Paulsen on 60 minutes last night. He's scary.

Several people said on radio that Republicans and Democrats who are in close contested races are wary because their constituents are angry about the bailout of the rich. Certain minority caucuses came down against the bailout, possibly because of the number of far right comments concerning the laws that demanded that banks take chances on mortgages in more rundown areas or areas considered more risky. That was a no brainer then, and a no brainer now. If banks are going to take a chance they should be required to use the same standards in measuring a risk as they do in other areas. No wonder the minority caucuses and members voted no. They may have been afraid that the racists would prevail.

on more of the bailout

2008-09-28T22:37:00.002-06:00

Saw Scott Pelley interview Sec. of the Treasury Paulsen on 60 Minutes tonight. It was almost enough for me to decide to abandon the whole idea of a bailout. Paulsen, former CEO of Goldman-Sacks who got into government after people began to see the future, was just a bit scary. Pelley did a much better job of pinning him down to specifics than he did McBush last week, but there were still some pretty hazy statements. I can understand that if we don't unlock the money flow between banks, the ability to pay bills and provide loans could become a crisis and is a crisis. What I don't understand is why we should reward the money men for getting us into this crisis in the first place. They know that in the daily operations of business companies and farmers borrow money to fund operations until the items produced begin to get paid for. The fear is that the collapse of the banking system will shut down those loans, shut down production and shut down jobs. But, maybe, giving it to Wall Street and the money world is not the best response. Maybe we should give it directly to the companies who need loans for operating capital on Main Street and by-pass the idiots on wall street, the gamblers in particular. In particular, I would like to know how Treasury came up with this plan and the costs, given all the uncertainties that Paulsen has. It smells like a dead Rainbow.

I have read one very good article calling for a return of the CCC, the Civilian Conservation Corps, of the 1930s to help rebuild our infrastructure. It would certainly provide jobs as it did then and with 700 Billion of infrastructure work we might be able to stop fires, build roads and bridges, fix up schools that spend maintenance money on textbooks and work on adequate medical facilities for all. It would also provide a culture of community service. A rather good idea and one I would support. (My dad was in the CCC and while he didn't talk about it a lot, he did seem to have some feeling for it.) The insurmountable problem with the bailout, as it was with the response to 9/11, the Iraq boondoggle, and the Iran nuclear conundrum is that this administration seems to be as in a rush to "cure" the financial collapse as it was to create Homeland Secuirty with the Patriot Act and that was bollixed up pretty badly, a result seen not only in the Katrina aftermath but in following the two big hurricanes this year. Maybe this fix is too quick and there's a more thoughtful answer out there.

on the bailout

2008-09-28T13:27:00.002-06:00

Congress is supposed to be in agreement, finally, on the proposed $700 Billion bailout of the big banks and of Wall Street. The devil, however, is in the details and I haven't seen the final elements. However, I think these should be included: help for the middle class mortgage holders; ownership of at least part of any firms that obtain money through the bailout; oversight of the Secretary of the Treasury who will oversee how the money is used; elimination of salaries higher than the U.S. President's for the CEO of any company that takes the money; and limiting the blank check to $250 Billion now with control of the remainder to come later. NO TAX CUTS. The GOP minority in the House can have a stipulation that the secretary can sell insurance on bad debt to firms who prefer to go that way rather than give up their bad debt to the government, but NO TAX CUTS FOR THOSE FIRMS.

And whomever the next president is, we need to regulate the stock markets to prevent this from happening again. One of the basic elements to consider is forcing the markets to return to their essential job: making it possible for people to sell their securities and for other people to buy them when the time comes. The casino players should be told to go play the games in Lost Wages, Nev., or in Atlantic City, N.J. It seems to me that both in 1929 and now, the problems in the market occurred because people were playing games with stocks to the point where the money was not in the market to the extent that it had to be and speculators were driving the boards up and down. Back in, I believe it was, 1968, Big Blue, IBM, had one quarter during the inflation of Guns and Butter when it didn't earn more money than it had the previous quarter. It didn't earn any less, either. But its stock took a tumble.

I have claimed for some time that we have two economies in this country: the great national economy centered on the stock and futures markets and the Main Street economy that most of us spend our money in. From my observations, I would suggest that those economies are represented in the stock markets in two ways. What I'm about to say may seem more general than it should be and some players may be active in both markets, but I think we can break out, at the minimum, two categories. The first is the Main Street investor who has a 401K with his employer and/or an IRA who puts his or her money into stock or mutual funds with the intent to watch them build up over the years until he or she is ready to draw them down for some special need such as education or a first home or retirement. The second is the gambler (the most notorious were the day traders who lost a lot of member in the first years of this administration). These are the people who sell short, buy puts and calls and derivatives with no intention of hanging onto them more than a few minutes or a year plus one day (if they want to get capital gains tax rules on their increase or decrease). These are the people who make the markets risky. Another word for them is speculators. And until their role in the stock market declines we will keep having this problem.

on the presidential campaign

2008-09-28T12:57:00.003-06:00

In the past week I've seen McBush and Obama on television twice, once on 60 minutes a week ago today and again on the debate last Friday. I think McBush is fading and I am not referring to the polls. He seemed weaker in the 60 minutes interview and more general than I had expected. He couldn't seem to focus on the issues with any specificity. Part of that may have been that interviewer Scott Pelley (sp?) did not conduct a particularly good interview. His first question was what McBush as president would have said to the American people as the financial crisis became so clear. McCain started to give some details including saying he would have told the people the cause and Scott cut him off before he could amplify his remarks. And Scott did not then ask him to get specific about the cause. It may have been more of the blame game of greed and corruption and lack of regulation but I would have liked to have heard an answer even if I am obviously not enamored of McBush. Overall, however, I felt that Obama had a much more reasoned approach and had much better details in his plans.

The same thing happened during the debate. McBush cited his experience in foreign policy, but it seemed little more than having been to some of the trouble spots without citing anything he learned there (except for the terrain, in one instance) or what influence he had there. He also spent a great deal of time citing Gen. Petraeus' views on Iraq and Afghanistan without mentioning that as president he would be the one to make the strategic decisions. And, as David Crisp said earlier, he didn't seem to have a good hold on the difference between strategy and tactics. In my opinion, McBush did not do as well against Obama as he was expected to in the debate on foreign and one of his weaknesses was his feeling that if we leave Iraq whatever happens there will be our fault and we will lose that war. I respectfully beg to differ with him. The "war" was won years ago when Saddam fell; now we are trying to nation build to our specifications without realizing the tribal and ethnic realities of the country. We can drive out El Quaeda but the chances are much more than 50% that we will have a civil war between Shia and Sunni no matter when we leave with the Kurds staying out of it if they can. John McBush is defending the things that have led Baby Bush into a very bad relationship with U.S. citizens as far as Iraq is concerned. His daddy knew better and should have spanked him on day 1 of the invasion. And McBush really didn't say anything about the financial crisis that indicated he understood that the middle class has been in crisis since at least 2001 and maybe longer while the business fat cats have been padding their bank accounts and shortchanging the rest of us on their taxes. One thing we have to wonder is why, as Left in the West asks, does McBush hate Montana? Once again he has questioned the "earmark" that helped lead to the delisting of the grizzly bear with the resulting opening up of some Montana land to exploitation. Maybe it's because our senators are Democrats rather than the Republicans whose "pork" is for buildings named for themselves and highways in Texas that no one wants?

Obama has seemed much more reasoned and much more aware of what's going on with the average American than McBush. There is none of the tired rhetoric of a wholesale plan to "cut taxes" as if that will solve the problems of our economy. Both of the candidates are pushing a tax cut: Obama for those making under $250,000 a year and McBush for everyone. According to a tax checking group, a married couple with two children making $100,000 a year would see their taxes go down about $50 under McCain's plan and down about $500 under Obama's. A single person could expect his or her taxes to go up about $10 under McBush's plan and down about $500 under Obama's. I also felt that Obama was stronger on his emphasis on going after the terrorists rather than shooting our entire wad in Afghanistan. McBush seemed to support him in this by citing Petreaus' support for putting more troops in Afghanistan. But without pulling them out of Iraq where are they coming from without conscription (i.e., a draft)?

One other note on the debate: We found out for sure that Sarah Agnew-Pain is really following the script set down by the McBush campaign when he used, in the discussion of Iran, a phrase identical to the one that she used in her interview with Katie Couric. And, a question: Was Katie working to keep from laughing at the end of that interview? One other point that I haven't seen mentioned elsewhere but Biden, the Democratic vice presidential candidate, was asked for his opinion on who won, but Palin did not appear. I wondered until I read online that CNN and NBC (and probably the other major networks) had asked to interview her but she was unavailable.

on earmarks

2008-09-16T10:55:00.002-06:00

Earmarks have become one of the big issues in this current campaign, so let's talk about them. First, what are earmarks? Answer: they are money approved by Congress at the urging of individual Senators and Representatives at a point in the spending process where they are not subject to the usual reviews. They amount to a little over 1 percent of the Federal Budget, but seem to have more press and more consideration than does the lack of oversight of the Iraq peace-keeping spending. (Iraq has not really been a war since the fall of Saddam.) Second, who dislikes earmarks? Generally, no one if they put money into my Congressional District (in this case, Montana). In fact, it may prove detrimental to a Congressperson who does not support such money for his constituents. I recall back in the bad old days when the pundits said a very conservative Montana representative (Orvin Fjare) lost the 1960 election to a Democrat (and we came close to having the heavens fall on us back then) when he did not support money for Yellowtail Dam. So earmarks are bad only when they are in some other jurisdiction. Afterall, Montanans have cheered the Bozeman library money and the funds spent on Taxpayer Acres (otherwise known as Dehler Park).

So that brings me to the issue of the Bridge to Nowhere which is raising a big stink in the campaign because Agnew-Palin is saying that she told Congress no on the bridge. I ask, what difference does that make? She may not have supported the bridge (the evidence says she did up until Congress said no) but as governor of Alaska she took the money and has distributed it to other projects in the state. So is she telling a lie when she says she said no to the Bridge to Nowhere? Maybe not, but she took the money and has spent. So what is the issue here: the bridge or the money? By my reading of the attacks on earmarks it's not necessarily the projects (some of which are rather criminal in nature or at least very unusual) but it is the money. So is it a lie or a rather slippery notion of facts? I would suggest that morally, she lied.

on "reform" vs. "change"

2008-09-14T23:10:00.002-06:00

We all know that Washington must change. What we may fully understand is that our view of the world must change as well. There is no room left in today's world for the shibboleths of the past. If we don't fully grasp the world in which we live, then we will be doomed to lose it. Some of us may say we already live in a two-tiered world: people like John McBush who believe that we can ignore the technology, ignore the changes forced upon us by technology, ignore the changes that will occur when global warming creates a world without us, ignore the changes in biology that the next century will bring. We already, for instance, have medical technology that will enable many of us to live longer and put more strain on medical and financial worlds, while not really having a much better life in the long run. But even more so, as I've said before, we face significant changes in homo sapiens over the next century: gene manipulation for certain traits and to cure genetic diseases and other things too strange to come to mind. What will happen when the people living in the coastal areas of the U.S. move to the central cities, when Denver becomes the capital because politicians don't want to have to wear scuba masks to move in D.C.? What will happen when the island nations in the Pacific become unlivable? When New York is underwater so far that Wall Street has to move out? When the people of Bangladesh and other Monsoon countries find themselves having to move out of their national boundaries or drown? What about those things that change that are unexpected? I was born before computers and television, before jet planes and super highways, before instantaneous communication around the world, before cell phones and photo exchanges on the Internet, and long before the Internet. Many of these things were not even thought of when I was born. This is not the world of 1900. It is a totally different world and yet we like to react to it the same way. Now we have the great tunnel in Europe that may tell us about the origin of the universe. And we have some people who still don't accept evolution although there is no other scientific argument.

Now we have a presidential race in which "change" has been a key issue. Obama and the Democrats realized for the start that this was the world we would need, a changed world. Now McBush has picked it up. But recently he seems to have been modifying that with "reform." You can reform the current system which means changing the atmosphere but not the policies or you can change the system which means accepting more meaningful symbols. For instance, McCain and Agnew-Palin keep talking about tax cuts for everybody, but as is usual with the Republicans, they mean tax cuts that will give most of us a few hundred dollars, but give the wealthiest thousands. This is change? If a person doesn't know how many houses he has, what can we think of him? He didn't say five, omitting rentals, which would be reasonable. He said he didn't know. He thinks you have to have $5 million to be rich. He seems to think that life is for the rich. And he would continue to send our disposable government income to Iraq. I'm not sure this is either reform or change.

On Agnew Palin's homecoming

2008-09-11T09:35:00.002-06:00

I think we now know what we'll be doing the rest of this campaign: watch Sarah Agnew Palin's concern about her son in Iraq. It seems to me that her son should be treated by our military in the same manner that Prince Harry was by England: keep him out of harm's way. I know we're not supposed to talk about family in this election, but what would be the rebound effect ont he election if he gets hurt or killed in Iraq? Or captured? Keep him home.

In her homecoming speech, she once again attacked the "pork" that Congress pours into member's individual districts like the half million for Taxpayer Acres here in Billings, the $4 million for Bozeman's library and money coming in for Shiloh and Airport roads, among others. Let's remember that, except for curmudgeons who hate all government money, one person's pork is another person's long-awaited ball park or library. Congress may not be well like in the polls but most individual congressmen will be re-elected this fall. And most of those re-elected will have as part of their re-election plank the money they brought home to their district.

And what is this change that she says McBush is offering? In his list of programs I see neither a long list of reform or a long list of changes in D.C., exept for going after earmarks which make up but a small portion of the federal budget, about 1%. What about the big spending on the Iraq war which we should never have been involved in. We can leave Iraq anytime we want to: we won the war. It was over when Saddam fell. What we are doing now is empire building. And because of Iraq we now have a tough job to cleanup in Afghanistan.

on the Palin speech

2008-09-05T14:06:00.002-06:00

I guess I'm in the minority. I got a chill down my back watching Agnew Palin's speech the other night, only it was one of fear. First, I though that my high school and college speech teachers would not have given her more than a C for the talk despite the choreographed responses to it. It was flatly presented, without a great deal of inflection except for slyness she interjected with the way she moved her head and smiled. Besides having eyes just a bit too close set, often the sign of a fanatic, she looks as if she has a mean streak. That's not unusual for Republicans who often seem to feel that people are not worthy of their attention unless they are executives in oil companies or other big multi-national firms. I also thought it unworthy of her to parade her pregnant daughter (who didn't show the signs of pregnancy) on the stage when the fact of the pregnancy indicates that her family values are not particularly high. I hope she does better by a younger daughter than teaching her to depend on saying no in the heat of a moment. And I hope 18-year-old Levi knows what he's getting into and the limits that will place on his future. I've known several shotgun marriages that lasted and a lot that didn't and the kids suffer. But what I don't understand is how this is a "family value" after what the Republicans have been pushing with the "silver ring thing." And I wouldn't vote for Palin, even if she was a Democrat (which she never would be) because she's mean. It's in her eyes. It's a sign, just like Baby Bush was lying every time he leaned forward on his left forearm. She's doing the same thing when she turns her head to her right.

what's happening to the election?

2008-09-02T11:05:00.003-06:00

Oh, boy, the sleaze is hitting. At first, I thought the selection of Sarah Qaylin or Sarah Agnewlin (take your pick) was a cynical choice to try to take from Obama the former Hillary supporters who supported her only because she was a woman. Now it looks as if she was selected because, if elected, she will help continue the ruthless political basis of government in Washington that the current administratiion has pursued. And her 17-year-old unmarried daughter is pregnant and is expecting to be married to the father. Shades of the bad old days. We used to call that a shotgun wedding (formal if the shotgun was silver plated). A lot of people's lives went in different directions because of that back before the pill and more open access to contraception. I wonder if Agnewlin thought to tell her daughter about contraception or did she rely on just saying no? Obama is being nice to say a politician's family should be sacrosant as far as criticism after his own wife has been attacked. I seem to remember other family members coming under scrutiny in the past, including the brothers of a couple of Democratic presidents.

I suggest that John McBush may have made a mistake in his selection and that someone did not look at the impact of what's coming out about Agnewlin now. Are we going to have a makeover in this convention? Remember, the selection is not final until the convention makes it so, usually just a formality. And so McBush can still change his mind.

on the candidates

2008-08-30T14:55:00.002-06:00

So now we know how the political season will shape out on the national scene. On one hand we have a career politician whose major claim to fame is his wartime experiences and who was rejected by his own party a few years back in favor of a man who had no war experience, no foreign affairs experience, and no intelligence and whose administration is the worst in the history of this nation. Now that makes him eligible to replace the stupid. On the other hand we have a man who is a self-made individual coming out of what is today's equivalent of a log cabin who knows what has made this country great. The racists say he's "black." But he's also "white" by the same degree. He's running on change, change for a corrupt Administration, change for a political world in which even when we elect people we hope will make changes (congressmen who say they will vote for impeachment, for health care, for getting out of the war in Iraq), we don't get those changes. We need to take on the big industries and business men who corrupt our very society away from its roots.

John Bush is not a self-made man. He is a son of privilege; perhaps not quite as privileged as the current spoiled brat in the White House, but his entrance into Annapolis was surely greased by having two admirals in his background. He's primarily a candidate because he is a war "hero", although I didn't know they gave medals to prisoners of war. As a military man, he attacked his enemies from hundreds or thousands of feet in the air without warning. That's not quite what we talk about when he talk about warriors. But his biggest problem is that he doesn't seem to have any idea about foreign policy. He supports Baby Bush in Iraq, which is the biggest mistake we've made in the history of this country, and he made the statement after Russian tanks rolled into Georgia that "we are all Georgians." Silly! We are not all Georgians. Look at that country. It is not a nation like ours. It is more like the dictatorships that the "sainted" Ronald Reagan (who began the moves that led to today's teetering stock market) supported. Yes, Russia needs to be pulled back but that sort of rhetoric has more to do with the memory of the Cold War than the world of today. Domestically, McCain doesn't seem to understand the America of today: $5 million before you're rich? Not knowing he owns and probably pays taxes on 7 houses? Not understanding that other people who have had his medical problems in this country would probably be bankrupt or dead by now because they can't afford health insurance that probably wouldn't pay enough of the cost anyway? Not understanding that keeping the tax cuts for the rich does nothing but keep this country sinking deeper into the red? And then he cynically chooses a woman, Sarah "Quayle" Palin, from a smaller state than Montana where the political system is corrupt to be his vice presidential candidate hoping to draw Hillary supports who vote vagina rather than issues. McCain is not good on those issues: He's anti-life. (Being in favor of population growth in today's crowded world is anti-life.) Palin supports creationism in science classes, despite the opposition of the scientific community (the argument is only religious and political). To me, the Republican candidate, who is one year younger than I, has turned into the typical codger who thinks yesterday was great and the good old days actually existed. The past is gone. It is over. We have a future that will change the order of this country forever and we have to hope that it will be better than the past. We cannot live on the glory of the past, but must carve a future that keeps this country as great as it has been.

on being a crackpot

2008-05-11T12:20:00.002-06:00

I love science (and science fiction). In SF authors frequently drift into time travel through worm holes or other means and thus create a paradox (two physicians walking down a corridor) that threatens the real world. And I read claims made in scientific magazines or books that mathematically it should be possible to go back in time just as we can go forward in time. But I'm a crackpot. So I don't think it should be possible to go back. And we go forward in time, not because time exists, but because we and the universe around us are constantly changing. We may not be aware of it, but the I who existed five minutes ago is not the I that exists as I type these words. I have changed. What we think of as time is only a measurement of the rate of change. Thus it is possible to use time as a hypothetical mathematical construct without it actually existing. Time is a function of the human brain. It measures change, which occurs in a wave across the universe. When we see the light of distant stars in the now, we are seeing it when those light waves reach us, but the star itself may be long gone in the real present. Or if it hasn't died, it has moved on to some other location from which its light may not yet have reached us. We are, then, I think, on the leading edge of a big bubble of change and that is why we cannot go back in time. Nothing exists in the center of the bubble.

on the use of the word "war"

2008-05-09T13:11:00.003-06:00

I am getting tired of the use of the word "war" as it has been used by the current and previous Republican administrations. We have a "war on drugs" that has been used to hassle other countries and to curtail the freedoms of people who prefer to misuse something besides alcohol. We also have a "war on terror" which is no more a war than the war we didn't conduct against the Mafia and the Cosa Nostra. The "war on drugs" never was a war. It was an action against criminals and it has backfired on us in that we still seem to have as many drugs as ever (looking at the most recent busts) and those who deal in them make higher profits than the tobacco and alcohol industries (except when alcohol was prohibited).

And then we have the "war on terror." It, too, is not a war. We had a war in Afghanistan and may be having another since we didn't finish the job the first time and we had a war in Iraq that ended after our invasion squashed the army of Saddam and toppled his government. That was war. What we have now is the aftermath of our failure to perceive how we would be greeted by the Iraqis and the insurgency that would follow. What we now have is a training ground for terrorists and an effort to create a country as we would like it, including privatizing its oil so Exxon Mobile and its cohots will get 80% of the profits from Iraq's oil rather than the government and the people of Iraq. That's part of our "conditions" that the Iraqis haven't fallen for and most people in this country don't realize. Iraq had no ties to those who created 9-11 and no WMDs. It apparently had not violated the U.N. resolutions, either, although it hadn't admitted that. What I really can't understand is the mindset of those in the beltway who didn't know that there were no WMDs in Iraq in the first place. It was obvious from this distance. Anyway, the point is that the only thing that makes it a "war" in Iraq is that we are using soldiers instead of policemen to track down criminals.

on losing our freedoms

2008-05-09T12:53:00.002-06:00

A couple of weeks ago, I flew to Seattle for a weekend and came to the conclusion that those who think that fear is not curtailing our freedoms are just plain out to lunch. At both ends, we had to take off our shoes and empty all our pockets. I had to take my night breathing machine out of my carry-one (I don't check it for the same reason I don't check my medications) so they could wand it, going over it with some device in such a way that it looked as if they were putting a magic spell on it. I had to empty my pockets, take my belt off and hold up my pants with one hand while taking my watch off, and walk across a dirty floor in my stocking feet. Maybe I left some athlete's foot fungus on the floor for the people following. It was much more complicated than the last time I flew. That is fear caused by the possibility that a terrorist will get on a plane and bring it down, killing me and all the others on board. Did it make me feel safer? No, it didn't. Airplanes crash and much more frequently than terrorism brings them down. I'm also used to the fear of being killed on the highway or by the food I eat. Being killed by food, on the highway or by a fault in an airplane or a pilot probably has lower odds than being killed by terrorist activity. I realize of course that it is always a massacre to the person who is killed, but what is this wiilling surrender of freedoms for a fear of something that has killed a very small number of American citizens. We've had more people killed by other means in a year than we had die on 9/11. Before you say I have no empathy, let me tell you I feel the terror that the people who died on that day and the pain of their survivors. I also remember Oklahoma City where about a tenth of the same number, many of them children, were killed by home grown terrorist. But it is not rational to let our leaders curtail our freedoms, that we have held dear for more than 200 years, because of our fears that we will die in something much rarer than the risk we take each day when someone runs a stopsign or a stoplight, or drinks and drives. We are not very good risk calculaters.

on the dumbing of Tom McGillvary

2008-05-07T16:57:00.003-06:00

I just received the second mailing this go-round of Tom McGillvary, who claims to represent my district in the Montana Legislature. I say "claims" because I can't believe my neighbors are as far out to lunch as he is. In this latest mailing he says he doesn't believe humans are to blame for global warming, despite the vast number of scientists who say it is. He must be quoting Exxon Mobile, the biggest liars on this issue in the country. They are in bed tactically with the tobacco manurfacturers who lied to us for so long on the cancer issue. I wonder what his sources are? Then he puts in a survey that is full of loaded questions. Do you want more taxes? Do you want to pay 100% or more for clean energy? What a brain floating in a mass of jello.

Just a couple of other things: He said in his first mailing that he wanted to be a mover for good feelings and positive approaches to the legislative process, but in last sessions Special Session he voted against a compromise. Unfortunately, he doesn't read blogs which might really help him understand what is going on in the state. But then he doesn't really care. He's an ideologue. Hey, Tom, let's tax churches.

on stimulations

2008-02-04T19:06:00.000-07:00

A few years ago we all received an advance payment on our income rebate that was intended to stimulate an economy during the first Baby Bush recession (funny how all his tax cuts and other "outstanding" economic moves have led to two recessions in eight years, although I would suggest that the "people's" economy, as I've heard it referred to has only had one for most of the past eight years. But we'll have another excuse to cut taxes for the well off and coupon clippers while giving the rest of us an illusion of having money that will create an upward bulge in the economy that will disappear as fast as the last one. And our dear Sen. Baucus, while having the guts to come up with a plan that will help those of us on Social Security with no other earnings and veterans, wants to lower the amount we get and let it go to people with much higher incomes than most of us.
The higher incomes will probably just bury the money in their IRAs and the economy will go flat again. If we need economic help, and we do, let's put a freeze on home foreclosures, bring the troops and our money home from the near east, and put that some money into bridges, sewers, highways, etc. I have supported Max since his first statewide race for the Senate, but I think he's off base and thinking election-year here rather than the country's economic needs.

on this changing world

2007-11-03T13:25:00.000-06:00

As I start to cull out some of the older books in my north side library, I've been reading some of them that I bought for my wife years ago and never got time until now to do so. It is startling to think how many of those books are now outdated, not just because many of them deal with the now-defunct Cold War. Many of the lead characters and other good people in those novels smoke, chain-wise. There are no cell phones. Where today's heroes get calls all the time on cell phones and use computers without heistation, those of 15 to 20 years ago had to find pay phones on corners to answer their pagers and were computer confused in some cases. The web wasn't around. We were still talking about single data bases, if that, and there had been no thought of terrorists in most cases. It really was a different world, even then, although not as different as the world I was born into back in the 14th (it seems) Century. What kind of values must we develop in this new world that calls for a re-evaluation of many of the things that an agricultural and then an industrial world had to believe in?

on the Turkish involvement

2007-10-23T12:29:00.000-06:00

Back in 1991 a number of us believed that if the U.S. invaded Iraq to take out Saddam Hussein we would destablize the whole Middle East, including bringing on a war involving the Kurds and the Turks. Some of us also made the same predictions when the U.S. planned to invade Iraq in 2003 when it was obvious there were no WMDs and no threat to us from that place. So we been involving the Saudis, the Sryians, the Iranians, the Lebanese and the Isrealis in a general hot porridge in that area now (admittedly, the Isrealis and their neighbors were involved before the invasion) involving the Saudis (to some extent), the Iranians (to a larger extent), the Pakistanis (to a much larger extent) and the Afghans. We took on the defense of our country by attacking Afghanistan. Then we withdrew most of our troops from the punishment detail (that should have been only a quick strike taking out the Al Quaida camps and maintaining a continuing pressure on the group) to put them iinto an Iraq which has led to more and more destablisation in the entire area. And now, with the Turks crossing Iraq's northern border to take on the Kurds, the final domino may be falling. How soon will the Kurds in the former SSR and in the north western Iran begin to get involved in this new aspect to war? What bothers me the most is that no one seems to take in the context that we are involved in a war that started in August 1914 and has remodeled the entire world we live in. How soon will we begin to realize that the world of 1913 is not one we can find a home in anymore? That world is as gone as the medieval times. When will we ever learn?

on "justice thomas"

2007-10-01T22:18:00.004-06:00

Here it is October and I haven't posted anything since August and now I have two thoughts brimming over. One I've just posted. The other has to do with the great justice thomas of the U.S. Supreme Court. I lower case his name because that's the respect I think he deserves. From the reviews I've seen that the few comments of his interview on 60 minutes that i saw last night, I think it has to be the most self-serving piece of cow manure to come out of Washington lately, and there have been large numbers of cow pies around that city in recent. From his decisions, whether they are in the majority, or most likely in the minority, thomas is so strict a constructionist that he apparently does not believe that the Constitution should ever have been amended, although he might give a passing approval to certain of the Bill of Rights. But he obviously opposes those changes that outlawed slavery and that made the Bill of Rights pertain to the actions of states as well as those of the federal government. He seems to think that state governments should still be allowed to have a state religion even though the Constitution denies it to any government. And his statement that he made his own way is as much crap when he says it as when anyone says it. Any person who makes it in this society does so because the society makes it possible for him or her to do so. Most people who deny the role that society plays in creating the adult them are whistling in the wind. Until professional sports got to be so pupular that they enabled the payment of huge salaries, the type of people who gain the most from them last played a major role in society during the days of yore when knights were bold. And it wasn't clarence thomas who got trashed in those confirmation hearings; it was Anita Hill.

on Tarzan and Jane

2007-10-01T22:03:00.000-06:00

Ed Kemmick, of the Billings Gazette, wrote a delightful column about the efforts in Austria to get a chimpanzee considered as a human. But it also contained one of the great canards of modern "literature." He said that Tarzan and wife Jane had a common law relationship. Heaven forbit that her father, a Methodist minister, would have allowed that. Unfortunately, what most people who think about Tarzan today may know is what was in the series of rather bad, Z movies made in the thirties and forties, that never showed the origin of Tarzan. As someone who read the books something a gazillion years ago before I had quite reached puberty, it is my proud awareness that Jane's father married them on the station platform as a small town in Wisconsin just before they boarded the train to begin the return to Africa. It is the final scene in the book, "The Return of Tarzan," the sequel to "Tarzan of the Apes." Their son, Jack, then was the star of the third book, "Son of Tarzan." And you thought the constant sequels of today were something new. Then Burroughs turned to the stock effect of turning out pot-boiler adventures for his ape man and that was a different sort of thing. Incidentally, he also had a series that started with John Carter of Mars and went on for a number of books that were much more in the way of a continuing series than the Tarzan books. He also did a series based on Venus that were never quite as popular and don't seem to be on the horizon of most science fiction fans of today, although you may be able to find them in book stores in paperback. Sorry, Ed, but it was a good, entertaining column, even if you misspelled Cheetah.

on scary God's Warriors

2007-08-25T11:17:00.000-06:00

CNN aired a three-part series last week by Christiane Amanpour called "God's Warriors." It dealt with the religious fanataics of the three major western religions: Judaism, Christianity and Islam. It was downright scary. Believe it, there are people in this world who believe that every one must accept their approach to life without exception and they will kill to achieve that goal. The first segment, two of the six hours, dealt with God" Jewish Warriors. Amanpour talked and researched citizens of Isreal who claim that the West Bank, one of the territories disputed by the Israelis and Palestinians, was promised by God to the Jews and they are right to claim it. They are hard-liners and their desires will keep the sores open in that nation. It has led, she said, to the death of at least one Israeli prime minister at the hands of one of the warriors.

The second two-hour segment covered the God's Muslim Warriors. It was much scarier than the first segment, because it made it plain that the Muslims will be content only when the entire world is wrapped in Muslim extremism. But it did give some of the history behind the Shiite-Sunni differences, although both of them have warriors based on their faith (Al Queda is an extreme view of the Sunni side). The Shia want the rule of Sharia, the very strict religious rule of the Koran that includes stoning of women involved in adultery or pre-marital sex. And even one of the prominent women of Iran seems to believe that stone of young women is fine if it is called for in the Koran. More importantly for us in the west, the people she interviewed who were hard-line religious fanatics of both groups attacked the culture of the west and called for the much more stringent code of the Muslims, which is something similar to the 19th Century western code (which didn't have stoning, but did have ostracism of women who transgressed). What the segment made plain, was the for many of the common Muslims, it is western values that they resent. However, I would suggest that if we weren't over in the Middle East our values would not be causing so much dissent.

The final segment was on the Christian right in this country: God's Christian Warriors. They weren't the same in that they don't go out and, except in small ways such as attacks on abortion clinics, bomb and kill people. But in that way, they are even scarier. They are trying to use our own civilized methods to bring us down and create a state of fanatics. What I don't understand about them is that they seem impervious to facts and to reason. They cannot see that the book they get their faith from has to be interpreted in the context of its times and that it is, perhaps, a spiritual history and folklore of a people, but it is not a factual history. They claim that any deviation from belief in the Bible negates their concept of God, which cannot be allowed. They don't realize that a fundamental belief in the Bible as fact is but a fragile support for their beliefs. But they are trying to make the rest of us accept and adhere to their systems and their ways of the world, which are rather realistic. One of the persons Christiane interviewed extensively was Jerry Falwell before he died. He was frightening. And the only good thing about him was that, at least in one poll I saw, more people thought he had a bad influence on this country than those who praised him. Robert Heinlein in one of his earlier books, wrote about a religious dictatorship set in about the year 2000, about the spying that went on between neighbors and the repressive rule. It didn't work among us because we are two set in our freedom loving ways and the dictatorship was overthrown. Heinlein set the story at the time of the revolution because he said that writing the first part of the history was too depressing.

I come down to one final thought: What kind of thinking makes other people think that they have the right to make us follow their beliefs, which we don't share? Why do they feel that they must force the rest of us to believe the way they do? If their car is going to be empty (bumper sticker I saw) when the Rapture comes, what difference does it make to them that ours will not?

on some people's education

2007-08-25T11:04:00.000-06:00

I've been spending a lot of time lately on other websites, most notably those of the Billings Gazette. Some thinking is really starting to get me down. I wonder where some people picked up what little science they know and why they believe what they do about a category of knowledge that has led to the world which we know: computers, smart phones, electronic date books, digital television, and a host of other things. With the reactions to such thing as global warming, they seem to indicate just how ignorant they are about the processes of science. Let's take evolution for instance. Science calls it a theory. So people say, with a shrug: "it's just a theory." And that's correct. But they don't understand that a theory in science is something with a heavy weight of discovery and thinking behind it. A theory is one step from being a law, but science now recognizes that there are so few conditions in the universe without some exceptions that they don't offer many laws. Even the so-called Law of Gravity only is a law in very limited circumstances. Outside of something as limited as the solar system, gravity seems to take on all kinds of not well understood aspects.

Then, let's look at global warming. Yes, there are some heretics out there who seem to think that humans flooding the atmosphere with greenhouse gasses don't play a significant role in global warming. One cited by Discover Magazine a few months ago blames changes in the sun. Yet, the vast majority of scientists have come to a conclusion that we are facing extensive changes in our world with the warming trend, no matter what's causing it. And if greenhouse gasses are playing a role, even a minor one, we need to do what we can to curtail their production and exhaustion into the atmosphere. How are you and I going to react when the people of countries like Bangladesh and China and India and Florida and California begin to move away by the millions from their flooding homelands? Do you want to own beach front property in southern Montana?

Creationists and IDers particularly say about evolution teaching in schools: Let's teach the argument! That's echoed to some extent in slightly different terms not having to do with the schools by Exxon and other global warming antis. What they don't seem to recognize is that there is no SCIENTIFIC argument in either case, particularly evolution. The evolution argument is about the political aspects, not the scientific ones. Without an understanding of evolution, all science collapses. The arguments about global warming also seem to be mostly political, although people always want to toss in the economic aspects and talk about a balance between saving the earth and saving jobs. And that particular argument is discussion apples and oranges. If there is not earth, there are no jobs! Money does not count in the global warming situation. And so-called free markets or free enterprise answers won't work either.

on compensating ranchers

2007-07-19T12:34:00.000-06:00

I was looking at the poll numbers on the Gazette web-site and became amazed at the number of people who don't believe ranchers whose herds are "depopulated" because of brucellosis should be compensated. They obviously don't understand the cause of the depopulation in the first place. This was not a rancher-friendly activity. Back in the days when it started, ranchers were not happy with it. They could take the loss of a heifer's first calf better than eliminating an entire herd. That's probably true today. The whole battle over brucellosis began as a public health measure, not a cattle health measure. The disease in cattle is that same as undulant fever in humans which is one of the milk fevers that used to prevent so many infants from making it to their first birthday. It also carried off a few of us older folks. And it cost the meatpackers a bundle so that those workers on the killing floor of the packing plants were compensated against their chances of getting the disease. It is an intra-cellular disease, as I understand it, that acts somewhat like malaria in that it hides for quite a while and periodically recurs. Modern medicines can treat the outbreaks to some extent, but they can't prevent the recurrences. It seems to me that we pay for modern public health services, such as the outbreaks of tb that occur, but don't give a thought to diseases that are "old" fashioned because we have dealt with them to some extent (pasteurization of milk prevents limits most of the occurrences of the disease to vets and others who deal with the reproductive systems of cattle.) It's as if there was still some wild smallpox out there, but it was so limited that we didn't get vaccinated until an outbreak had already killed a number of people. Brucellosis (undulant fever) is still out there; it still has the possibility of killing babies who come in contact with brucella bacteria; it is still a public health menace, although not as great as it once was. The effort to eliminate it is a public health effort, so cattlemen should be compensated for losing their herds. And the Park Service should make an effort to control it in bison and the forest service should make the effort to get a handle on it in elk.

on the "war on terror"

2007-07-17T22:46:00.001-06:00

Scary news on television tonight. The intelligence community (one of the spokesman shown on the screen was from the CIA) issued a report saying that Al Qu'aida (that's how they spelled it) is stronger now than it has been since 9/11 and that it really wishes to pull off a major attack on us. I thought the idea of the Afghanistan invasion was to go after the Al Qu'aida bunch and destroy them. Wasn't what our baby president told us? So what has happened? Oh, yeah, efforts to destroy the terrorists got side tracked into Iraq which had nothing to do with 9/11.

on global warming arguments

2007-07-17T02:32:00.000-06:00

I've been looking at the comments on the Gazette website following the Bill Ballard anti-global warming guest editorial the other day. It seems to me that the arguments over there are mostly the same old conspiracy and paranoid theories. The Gazette has a rating system in and some of the most reasoned and calm comments get the worst ratings.

I have a lot of objections to the Gazette comments. The biggest one is that they let people attack other people rather than talk about the issues. The regulars get on and bloviate on their particular political pet horse and when someone posts something rational, they do their best to attack the person, not the issue. On global warming, it is pretty obvious that those who have read the least on it have the strongest opinions for some conspiracy bringing it on. They cite "a lot of scientists" without giving who they are, their qualifications or saying where they've published.

They attack the number of years of knowledge we have on climate without realizing that the ice core samples from Greenland, Antarctica and Siberia all seem to agree that this is the worst warming problem in thousands of years. Some posters there even state that it's a big government conspiracy without realizing that the biggest government we've ever had, this administration, has fought curtailing greenhouse gases from day 1. They also argue about the big gun right now on global warming, Al Gore, and claim he's making tons of money and advantage out of it. If Al Gore is a hypocrite, and I don't believe for one minute that he is, that has nothing to say about about whether his facts are straight on warming.

I also think that people need to follow the money. Who benefits if we refuse to take any efforts and let the warming get away from us? First, if no one acts to stop the accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, then the big oil companies, auto companies, and their ilk benefit and continue to rack up super profits. If the effects of global warming occur as scientists think they will, but we don't take any steps to prepare for it and limit it, then the big corporations will also benefit because they will be the ones who will be receiving aid from governments to help people who have to move away from rising seas, like the natives in Alaska. We know how our money is being spent in Iraq and in New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. I urge people, if they have doubts about who's doing things on global warming out of altruism or out of greed, follow the money.

on species

2007-07-15T12:29:00.000-06:00

I've been wondering as I look at the world if species, like individuals, go through the stages of growth sort of like the seven roles of man that Shakespeare listed? We know, for instance, that although the dinosaurs lasted for millions of years as a group, the individual species changed and developed and died out. Are the present species of this earth of ours doing the same thing? We've seen species that have died out for one reason or another: climate changes, they begin to decline and humans killed them off (mammoths and giant sloths), they were superseded by environmental conditions such as the increase in forests in Ireland that destroyed the huge antlered red deer of that island. I wonder, however, if species don't start out young and lively, become more sedate in a kind of middle age and then slowly fade out into the sunset like the sabre toothed tiger and the dire wolf. If that does happen, what does it mean for us? I sometimes think that we humans as a species are in either late childhood or early adolescence with not fully developed inhibiting centers in our brains. It would explain our need for gods (parents) and our inability to get along on the playground.

on the 7 wonders of the world

2007-07-09T12:05:00.000-06:00

In case you missed it, the new list of seven architectural wonders of the world was announced in Sunday's Gazette and, I imagine, in other news sources that I missed. They included Rome's Colosseum; the Great Wall of China; India's Taj Majal: Peru's Machu Picchu, the long hidden last city of the Incas; Brazil's Statue of Christ the Redeemer that reigns above Rio; Jordan's ancient stone city of Petra; and Mexico's Chitchen Itza pyramid. It seems to me that most of this list is invalid. Although it was voted on by over 100,000 people there seems to have been little concern for how the items are now used and how old they are. The only ones on the list that have anything but tourist use today are the Rio statue. When the Egyptian pyramids, Babylon's Hanging Gardens, the Colossus of Rhodes, Alexandria's lighthouse, the great Mausoleum, and the others (two of which I can't remember off hand) were listed as ancient wonders, they were still in business. The ones reported yesterday are mostly non-functional. So I suggest a really modern list, leaving in the Rio statue, but including the Eiffel Tower, the Statue of Liberty, the Sydney, Australia, opera house, perhaps the J Paul Getty Museum, the magnificent tower that's currently the world's tallest in Bangkok(?), maybe the Sears tower in Chicago, perhaps the Space Needle in Seattle, Westminster Cathedral, New York's Cathedral of St. John the Divine or St. Patricks, or Notre Dame. In other words, make a list of the seven great architectural wonders still in active use and relatively new today, not something that was built 1,000+ years ago and is now a ruin. (And then this evening I stumbled on the full list of the original seven and the two I had forgotten where the temple of Diana at Ephesus and the great statute of Zeus which was recently in the science news with an article on the temple itself and where he sat.)

on Iraq...again

2007-07-06T23:20:00.000-06:00

I think I keep repeating myself on this subject time and again, but here I go still again. We are not fighting a "war" in Iraq. A war is between two uniformed armies facing each other on a battlefield or in the air. We had that kind of war when we invaded Iraq and toppled Saddam Hussein and closed out his army. Since then it has been an insurgency that has turned into a civil war fought by terrorists. However, the definition of terrorists does not seem to fit some of the people we see on television who do wear a form of uniform and thus are soldiers by definition. But they do not seem to be fighting us as much as they are fighting each other. I think our involvement in a war is over. We are basically trying to keep peace between warring factions, some of whom we basically seem to support (with exceptions) and some we don't. Thus Al Sadr keeps his army except when it sticks its head out a little too far in our direction and so do some of the Shias in the government and some of the Sunni sheiks who are on our side. In Vietnam we kept dealing with people who knew that the U.S. and ROK troops owned the day and the VC and the North owned the night. So there was a real day and night difference. In Iraq it seems to be that we own the time we spend in the various neighborhoods when we're there and the other side owns them after we're gone. So I don't think this is a war on our part, although it seems to be a mixture of covert civil war and terrorist activities (defined as actions done by those who are not part of a uniformed army).

The other thing I don't think that we realize is a nation is that we are essentially dealing with the 93rd year of a 100 Years War. We admit that we have few people in the military in Iraq who know the history of the country and, more importantly, speak the language. We here at home are even more ignorant. A year or so ago, I read for the first time (somehow I missed it when it came out), Barbara Tuchman's Guns of August, a history of August, 1914, the first month of WWI. In hindsight, it is possible to read into what she relates the international history of the world for the remainder of the 20th Century and the beginning of the 21st. In that month of August 1914, the Russians broke up the Balkan empire of Austria-Hungary; the Germans defeated and stymied the Russian advances leading to a stagnation that brought down the Tsar and led to the rise of Soviet Union and the Cold War; the French and English stopped the German drive to capture France and thus led to the treaty of Versailles and resultant depression in Germany that led to the rise of Hitler; and brought the Ottoman Turks into the war on Germany's side and led to the rigid control that empire exerted on the Middle East and led to today's mishmash of tribal and religious unhappiness.

What does that bode for the future? In her other most famous book, A Distant Mirror, Tuchman actually wrote a history of the 100 years war and she pointed out that it led to the breakdown of the feudal system and the beginnings of mercantilism, the rise of the middle class and the beginning of capitalism as well as the Enlightenment that brought new demands for the rights of individuals in a society in which rigid castes evolved and most people lived in slavery or near slavery. I would suggest at this point that the current many-years war has brought us to another transition point in the history of the world. Even in the less than a century that I have been alive, the world has gone from simple radio and no computers or television to a place where a popular writer claims the world is flat and to where I carry more computing power in my pocket daily than existed in the entire world the day I was born. My father in law was born in 1900. The year he was four, bank robbers fleeing his home town put a bullet through the door of his family home as they went out of town on their buckboard. If we go back farther in time, it was only about 200 years ago that manufacturing began and the nuclear family became the cornerstone of society. Today we are facing a variety of computer driven choices. I carried my first computer of 24 years ago out of the basement the other day. It was so heavy I damn near dropped it. I'm typing this on a computer that I can carry under my arm. We have seen a tremendous number of changes. A few years ago the cell phone came on line so we could talk to each other without having a solid, cable connection. Now we have the Iphone that seems to be combining photography, calculating, teletype, voice and I don't know what else. What's next. The point of this whole paragraph is that the last 100 years have changed earth and its societies so the our founding fathers would not recognize the United States that they put together. Nor would our great-great grandfathers recognize our homes as the same types of shelter as theirs. Our lives have gone topsy turvy in the last century particularly. Taking them back will, I suspect, require new arrangments of society, new forms of thought and new aspects of living (even the prospect of extending an individual's life span). We must talk about the future, not the past and come to a new agreement so that we may continue to meet the changes that we have lived through and that we will see ahead.

on anger in the country

2007-07-05T23:06:00.000-06:00

As I read the comments on the Gazette stories and on other web sites, I am struck by the anger shown in this country toward those of opposite points of view, most strikingly by those on the right, but also, though less so, by those on the issues on the right. It seems to me dangerous. It isn't the firm positions, but rather the way in which people attack others and hurl names and other perjoratives at those who disagree with them. It isn't over issues as much as it is distrust. And I wonder what the situation is that creates such anger; surely those who call others names must realize that they have indicated they have lost the argument so they resort to personal attacks.

More importantly, where does all the anger come from? People seem to hate many things: social changes, people different than they are, caring about the welfare of the society in which they live, paying for the society in which they live, believing in the things this nation was built upon and numerous other things. It mystifies me, yet I can see the source of some of it, I think. One thing strikes me first: a lot of the anger is a politicians and is based, I think, on the idea that you vote for the person not the party. What people don't seem to realize is that there is strength in community, weakness in going solo. This lack of understanding on the part of people in the strength of community efforts is what has led directly to the passage of good jobs out of this country to minimum wage workers in other parts of the world. The unions may have overreached themselves, but they also got this country the highest wages in the world.

In the current political arena, there are constant calls for a new party because the two parties we now have are so closely related. This, I think, is a false conclusion. Yes, they have similar goals in certain areas such as free trade and borders open to goods from other countries. But on the issue of human rights and humanity, they are far apart. I think most people see the ties to the corporations that both parties have and look at that rather than the human issues. When people vote the party, they mostly vote for their own pocketbook and their own survival. When they vote the nominee, they don't know what they are getting. In this world of political double speak, I may use the same words on education, or war in Iraq, or economic health as the politician coming to my front door. But because we use the same words does not mean we are saying the same thing. How do we plan to reach those goals? I told Roy Brown a few elections ago that I wanted education fully funded. As an incumbent he said they had done so. I knew better. The kindest thing I can think of is that we were saying the same thing but meaning something entirely different.

A new party won't change anything. In Great Britain, at one time in the 20th Century, they had three parties: Tory (Conservative), Liberal, and a very weak Labour party. The Liberals had some of the early prime ministers of the century. But it began to fade and the Labour party to grow, particularly after WWII and the Liberal party has virtually disappeared in the interplay of that nation's politics. No matter how often people claim there are many choices we can make, most of us come in a bi-lateral form and that carries over to our choices. We don't see the third choice as viable. More than two parties may be good in a parliamentary system, although Great Britain's example may negate that. But in this country, we have almost always (except at the beginning) had two strong parties. In some cases, the Independent, the Free Silver, the Know Nothings, the Anti-Masons, the Progressives may have had an effect on elections, but they haven't lasted beyond one or two votes.

Is there an answer to what we feel about our political system? I think so. It is to get involved. If we are to make changes in the political parties each of us must get involved in making changes within them. Right now we have conservative Democrats and liberal Republicans. Maybe the liberals should be in one party and the Conservatives in the other. And the religious wrong shouldn't be in any of them.

on Montana Law Review

2007-06-05T00:56:00.000-06:00

I just came across an on-line copy of the Montana Law Review published by the Montana School of Journalism (winter 2007) edition and I'm steaming. The lead articles proclaimed "Intelligent Design Will Survive" by three members of the Creationist-founded Discovery Institute and it attacked the just in the Dover, Pennsylvania, court case in which the judge threw out ID as a viable scientific endeavor. The three centered their attack on things they claim the judge omitted but should have been left in. One of their major arguments was that the judge should have not ignored the scientific "peer reviewed" papers of Discovery institute "scientists" most of which were reviewed by and published in the Institute's own publications. Not what I would call a proper peer review at all. They also proclaimed that the judge didn't need to rule on whether ID was science; all he had to do was to find that the attempt to teach it in the Dover schools was not constitutional. But as Peter Irons said in his rebuttal, he had to find ID not scientific but religious in order to make it illegal to teach it in science classes. Let's face it, the ID advocates have never been able to put forth any creditable evidence that they are scientific. The vast majority of the scientific community has rejected it. ID proponents suggest that there has to have been a designer in creating the universe and humans because there is too much that looks like design and something that's designed always has to have a designer. They point to the idea of a Boeing 737 arising out of a junkyard struck by a windstorm. But they forget to mention that a Boeing 737 is not capable of reproducing others like it which living creatures can do.

But to get back to my gripe: Why does the Montana Law Review accept for publication articles like these? To compound it, the edition also includes an article by the lawyer who once ran for governor in Montana, Rob Natelson. Since he's an instructor for these students, I'll bet his article is not selected on its merits.

On Bush's Global Warming plan

2007-06-01T23:57:00.000-06:00

Let's see, now. Baby Bush nixed the Kyoto Treaty. Then he refused to go along with the German prime minister's efforts and now he wants to become the leader of a battle against something he didn't believe in a week Ago? Are we doing to have another surge this time, a storm surge? But it'll probably be something like the Clean Skies Act, all smoke, or the Save the Forest's Act, something without a cutting edge.

on being tough on Iran

2007-05-25T00:45:00.003-06:00

Heard the President make some comments on CBS news tonight that scared the beejeesus out of me. He's talking the same way about Iran flouting the U.N. resolutions as he did about Iraq in the months leading up to the invasion of the latter. Is he about to do the same to Iran in an effort to try to cure his problems at home by opening a new front? It seems to me that we need to be a little concerned about all this. His rhetoric seems to me to be "been there, done that, let's do it again for the same ill-advised reasons.

on immigration laws

2007-05-24T12:56:00.000-06:00

It seems to me that we have got the whole immigration issue wrong. Instead of building walls to keep people out, let's let them in. It seems to me that if we are going to let Mexicans build our cars and toasters that can come over our borders with no barriers, then the people who make them should be able to come across as well. It may seem that we are opening ourselves up to invasion, but that invasion will continue to come one way or another, unless we seal our borders so tight that nothing comes in (goodbye Wal-Mart deals) and nothing goes out including trips to Stonehenge, Jerusalem and the Vatican. It seems unfair that we can buy cheaply made products from outside our borders and gain no government (read that tariffs) from the goods coming in and live well, while others who want to come to this country to live better are walled out. This seems to me to be a real oxymoron concerning immigration law. In addition, if we allowed people to come across the border freely, but with constraints such as the old European Economic Union had where you came across at checkpoints, we would be better able to control the prospect of terrorists getting into this country. Of course, the argument that illegal immigration fuels the possibility of criminals coming in and bombing another site such as the Twin Towers (9/11) is preposterous. All of the bandits on the planes that went down that day were in this country legally, at least to start.

Of course, there is also another possible answer. Let's have a plebiscite in Mexico as to joining the United States. We could add a whole bunch of new states to tax and end the argument about fencing a long border. If we still wanted to put up a fence the southern border of Mexico is much shorter. I can't take credit for this idea, but it sounds as if it might work better than a $5000 fine, going home for a year and taking a chance on being let back in.

on limiting scholarships

2007-05-24T12:46:00.000-06:00

At coffee yesterday, the subject of the firing of the MSU football coach came up, and one of the members present brought up a great solution: have the Montana Board of Regents limit sports scholarships at all state-supported schools to Montana residents. Out-of-state players would have to come into the state and establish residence for at least a year before they they would become Montana residents and eligible for sports scholarships. That certainly will not sit well with the sports fans in Montana, although there are indications that out-of-state recruiting may have cut into support for the Montana State University Billings Yellowjackets in previous years.

More importantly, it might bring a better level of understanding about the role sports plays in academia. Right now, at many schools, the tail is wagging the dog. Athletics is what gets the boost from alumni. Even at the high school level, the big play is getting money from Wendy's or some other big business for a new field, but we don't hear that many of those companies are donating for new textbooks, or supporting science studies in the schools. Somehow there is a problem here.

We can also say that there has been a tremendous emphasis in recent years on celebrity. Are so many of our lives so dull that we have to live vicariously on the lives of athletes or movie/TV stars? What is the matter with us that we cannot enjoy our own lives without having to drool over Julia Roberts having a baby or Anna Nicole Smith's affairs that led to her leaving a baby behind? Is this our equivalent of the Roman bread and circuses?

on the end of the Legislature...

2007-05-15T13:54:00.000-06:00

The Gazoo reported on its website that the Legislature finished the budget and adjourned. They did not pass the small business equipment tax cut, which is a relief for the rest of us. But they did give us the $400 one time cut. Wonder how that will come down. Also decided on a way to trim taxes for future surpluses. And they did pass a budget which may give relief to Montanans who need state help. Of course, the Republicans of the idiot persuasion such as Mendenhall from Billings and Tom Mcgillvray and Roy Brown, who supposedly represent me, voted against it. My two are a pair of the biggest light weights and know nothings in the two houses. Mcgillvray proudly says he doesn't take time to read blogs, he's too busy trying to come up with a "compromise" in the Legislature. From the way he voted during the special session, he might as well have stayed home and read blogs. He certain made no efforts at compromise. After adjourning, the Republican members of the House voted to dump Michael Lange as Majority Leader and replace him with Himmelberger. It might have been a good choice if Himmelberger wasn't worse than Lange and if they'd done it for the right reason. But they dumped Lange because he did compromise with the Democrats despite his snortin' agin the gov. (Wrong name called to my attention, so I fixed it.)

on economic sustainability...

2007-05-13T16:44:00.000-06:00

Last night, CBS news reported that Russia is encouraging women to have two children in order to provide enough inhabitants to keep its economy sustainable. That made me wonder if an economy that is sustainable only because of an increase in population, no matter how caused, is really sustainable at all. Especially considering that the world would be a better place if the population was smaller.

And a conundrum: How come depictions of the 10 Commandment plaques supposedly handed down to Moses sometime about 1000 BCE, usually show Roman numerals from I to X?

on Patriotism

2007-05-11T23:53:00.000-06:00

With the battle over funding the effort to put down the Iraqi insurgency in full throttle in DC, it seems as if we're hearing a lot more about people aiding the enemy and not supporting the troops. So far, the idea that such people are not patriots seems to be about, but muted. But lets examine patriotism. What is it besides standing for what your country stands for. i suggest the truest patriot is, again, one who examines what his country is doing and takes issue with it when it is not following its own ideals. We keep saying about the U.S., that we are a country founded on ideals, not just because a bunch of people were living in the same area, but people who founded a government based on certain principles. Essentially those principles come down to the idea that people should be free and that the people are the government. What we call the government is made up of people we elect and appoint to make sure the engine of government runs properly. It is a combined effort by all of us to ensure that we get the life that we want. A person who follows those ideals is the true U.S. patriot, not those who blindly follow a blind man into the future of war and of limiting our Constitution which is the source of our ideals along with the Declaration of Independence. (I would suggest that if someone were to stand on a street corner and start reading the Declaration of Independence out loud, he might find himself carted off in a paddy wagon as a subversive.) So, as to our current situation, I suggest that the actions to take on Al Quaida and the Taliban in Afghanistan were within these parameters since they had either attacked us or aided and abetted the attackers. But I would suggest that we were not told the truth, and were fed lies for some unknown reasons on Iraq. It was evident from the U.N. searches and from our spy flights that Saddam had neither weapons of mass destruction nor the means of delivering them if had had small amounts. So who is the patriot? The person who opposed and opposes that war or the one who insists on curbing our liberties to fight it?

on the war in Iraq

2007-05-10T23:11:00.000-06:00

I think Bush is finally getting it. Today, CBS News and perhaps others announced that he is willing to begin accepting benchmarks for the Iraqi government to step up to the plate. As this was his solution several months ago in, I believe, his State of the Union speech or something similar, it's about time he went public with a willingness to accept it. The fact of the matter is that although we keep referring to the Iraq "war" we have no war there. The war ended back when he said the Mission was Accomplished. We won the war. What we've been doing since then is creating a mess that may not be stabilized during the lifetimes of most of us living in the U.S. today. We forgot what we were there for (if anybody ever knew) and abandoned Afghanistan to its warlords when we should have finished that job. Papa Bush knew enough about the Middle East to know to leave Saddam on his throne as long as his own people could stomach him. The idiot now in the White House went in with head held high and empty of anything but his own desires and those of the neo-cons who elected him. We need to support the troops by getting them out of a hot spot we had no business in. And we don't have a war on terror going on in the world, we have a battle with organized bandits with no sense of human empathy. Let's quit acting as if they are something special and treat them as the criminals they are. And that means getting those who are terrorists out of Gitmo and putting them on public trial, then throwing them in a secure penitentiary if they are found guilty.

on the school levy passing

2007-05-09T11:52:00.000-06:00

The Billings school levies passed for the first time since 2002. Absolutely great. It means the know nothings who inhabit our city took it on the chin again. It also means that I can vote yes again on some levies I support but wouldn't vote for until a school levy passed. One thing that always gets me is that the anti-school levy anti-taxers always say it goes for the teachers. Well, it seems to me that we can't have anything good happen for the kids until we have good, well-qualified teachers and we can't have them if we can't compete with other states. If we read the article a few days ago in the Gazoo about the job fair at Eastern (ooops, MSUB), we know that other states pay more and may offer some other, more exciting surroundings. And what are new textbooks if not for the kids? Some of these people apparently have not bought a hard cover book in more than 20 years because of what they want to pay for new texts. I can't figure them. Always putting the lie to people who go out on a limb to help keep our system alive and well. They are the people we shouldn't trust.

on more of Denny's votes

2007-05-07T23:52:00.000-06:00

Let's see...last week Denny voted against overturning the Bush veto of the so-called Iraq war. Guess he wants to turn our victory into defeat since we won the war and are now afraid of turning the insurgency over to the Iraqis. But then Denny Rehberg has been the tail on the Bush dog since the beginning. He also voted for two forms of discrimination. In the first he voted against a bill to make crimes against gays a federal civil rights hate crime. In the other he voted to allow church-run Head Start programs to discriminate on the basis of religion. In other words, even though they are publicly funded and open to children of all faiths, he voted to allow the religious bigots to hire only their own to force their faith into young minds. And we keep electing him.

on Denny's votes

2007-04-29T12:48:00.000-06:00

Let's see how Denny Rehberg voted on key issues this week. Not a good week for him, I think. He voted against funding for the troops because he is Baby Bush's tail and wags against ending a war that we've already won. Let's face it, the war is over and won. The insurgency is up to the government of Iraq. Even without Denny's vote, the House passed the bill that should light some intelligence under Baby Bush's butt. Also Denny voted for letting people around the world eat our wild horses. Wonder if he likes horse steak? And then he votes to curb spending (?) by wanting to limit the amount the government could spend on controlling horse meat. Wow!!! Good shot Denny. Hope the Montana ranchers appreciate that.

And I wonder how Wyoming feels about not being represented so often in the House when Barbara is not there for votes. Doesn't she have an opinion on anything?

on apologies

2007-04-26T13:40:00.000-06:00

I asked my representative Tom McGillvary if he would abandon his fearless leader who has added to the embarrassment Montana has had to suffer because of the freemen, the montana militia and the bomber and this is his reply.

" Montana Rep. Lange apologized for his inappropriate remarks regarding the governor and the language he used. I can't and won't condone or defend the inappropriate language.

I accepted his apology and I believe Rep. Lange is truly remorseful.

tm"

Somehow I don't think Tom really reads people well. Why is he in Helena? Did Lange apologize to the people of Montana for embarrassing them or to the governor?

Addendum: Tom has sent me a new e.mail saying that Lange did apologize to the people of Montana and the governor. Great, it's only about a day late after someone reading the on-line comments and the blogs told him about the uproar he caused. Tom also asked me if I had trashed him on the blogs. I said I said the same thing here that I've said to him in e.mails. And I do hope he was one of the people who deserted his party to vote for CHIP. After writing that, I went back to look at the vote and he voted no on second reading against CHIP. Yep, he's a lightweight typical of the Billings Republicans. And apparently he doesn't read the internet or he'd have some idea of what's happening and what's being said out here about his party.

on the legislature

2007-03-22T16:20:00.000-06:00

It seems to me that the Republican legislators are bringing fiscal irresponsibility to new heights. They are refusing to fund key programs to help Montanans and listening to the idiot from the west end of the state, Jore, who has apparently not read either the state or federal constitutions and refuses to accept his responsibilities to Montanans, except for perhaps a few who thing this state is not responsible for the welfare of any of its citizens, wealthy or not. Anyone who wants to give small business a major break on the taxes they pay by earning income, when I have to pay taxes on property that earns me nothing, doesn't seem to me to have much of my happiness or health in mind. Small businesses do offer jobs, but they seem to hire more people than they can afford to pay a good wage. Restaurants, for instant, get all kinds of federal tax breaks and credits, want more, but don't want to pay the people they hire a living wage. Let's get responsible people in Helena; not people with no level of responsibility.

about an inconvenient truth

2007-03-20T23:26:00.000-06:00

Caught all but the opening minutes of Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth on television the other night. He was preaching to the choir. What I don't understand is why more people such as Gore and others trying to warn us about global warming don't talk about the history of the Middle East, northern Africa and Easter Island. All three of those areas were once very productive parts of the globe and had rather large populations of well-fed people. The Cedars of Lebanon mentioned in the Bible and in the Gilgamesh Epic were real, not just metaphors. Then they were cut down and the environment deteriorated. North Africa was once heavily forested, but when the trees were gone, the land turned for the worse. The people of Easter Island destroyed their trees and the economy and the population of the island went with their forests. We're doing the same thing on a worldwide scale. And our burgeoning population is not making things easier but putting pressure not only on the environment but on the sheer numbers of their neighbors. We're going crazy.

on health care

2007-02-15T12:29:00.000-07:00

The new proposal for health care by the Bush Administration is just foolish. It is foolish because it depends on insurance and insurance still leaves a lot of people out of the loop. And it's foolish because there is a lot easier way to enable people to get a tax break on medical costs: Remove the 7.5 percent deduction from health costs on the 1040 Schedule A. It makes more sense than giving people a $15,000 tax deduction. That would help more people on the lower end of the scale than the president's proposal. He doesn't seem to understand that most people have real problems with health costs and they get no deduction for them because of that limit. Even insurance usually doesn't take them over 7.5% of their adjusted gross income. I think government programs such as those in Europe are the only solution to our problems. Maybe the governors will take a major step in this direction in the bell wether states and force the federal government to take that step, too.

on the Bush "Surge" in Iraq

2007-01-10T23:22:00.000-07:00

I listened to Baby Bush's speech tonight citing his plan to enable us to withdraw from Iraq. He says it has become the new haven for terrorists and so we have to clean it up before we can leave. We virtually left Afghanistan long before the mission was completed and the Taliban (allies of Al Queda in case you've forgotten) are making a come back in the mountains. Now if we leave Iraq it will become a haven for terrorists which it wasn't before we invaded. Saddam may have been a minor level promoter of terrorist projects but it was mostly by mouth with few weapons or financial help.

But, tonight, for the first time I was able to watch a Bush speech. He was subdued, there was no doubt about it and he appeared smaller and less forceful than in previous efforts. I noticed, however, that he did not use the body language or the gestures that he has in previous speeches, nor did he lean forward dipping his left shoulder and extending his left arm in the recurrent gesture that he has used in the past to try to convey sincerity that is insincere. This time he stood behind the podium and spoke without moving around or shifting his body. He was like a small boy facing the principal, knowing he has done wrong and will pay for it.

As an addendum, I suspect we have seen the Bush method of getting out of Iraq. Can the current Iraqi government meet the demands he placed on it? If not, and I doubt it will happen, we're out of there.

on ed butcher

2007-01-08T00:06:00.000-07:00

Ed Butcher, the reactionary know nothing from Winifred, has put his feed in his mouth again, believing, he says, that the way he used "chief" to refer to a fellow (Native American) legislature was a positive not a negative. He doesn't understand that the tone in which he says something is as bad as an intended insult. But, then, it's Butcher. If his toes were as flexible as his fingers he could play piano on his teeth.

About Saddam's hanging

2007-01-01T14:09:00.000-07:00

Everyone's had their revenge now. The horrible ogre is dead, hung by the neck with a new rope (I suspect). And I wonder what difference it will make in Iraq. I think those who expect the insurgency to die a rapid death at this point are whistling in the dark (to use old coin). We won the war when Saddam fled. We made sure it was over by capturing him. The war is over. Make no mistake about that. We are not fighting a war in Iraq; the term Iraqi war is a misnomer. What we are trying to do is to prop up a government that we hope will be able to give us the back protection to get out of there. After messing up an economy and going into an area where we didn't know what we were doing for reasons that have proved to be lies, the only thing we can hope for is to come out of it. The death toll of American troops is over 3,000 now and rising daily. I support the troops and they need all the support they can get in dealing with poor leadership fighting a situation which had and has no bearing on the defense of their country. The war is over. What should we call what we're doing now?

on the election

2006-11-14T12:41:00.000-07:00

Various thoughts on the election one at a time:

Thought 1: The Democrats are in control of Congress. Maybe they will return to checks and balances with a Republican President. Our country would be better served by an impeachment of the current President in order to undue the damage he has done to the Constitution. His actions in declaring the terrorism situation as a war and then refusing to treat terrorists as soldiers is a shame. His signing statements that let him ignore the will of Congress is a crime. His denial of our liberties through the illegal wiretapping schemes and bypassing individual rights in our courts all deserve condemnation. More importantly, they need to be denied to future presidents.

Thought 2: The Democrats cannot get us out of Iraq without the danger of more claims of "cut and run." But we must deal with the facts over there. First, we should never have been there. The American people bought a bill of goods (as Rice {not Condy} puts it "the greatest story ever sold") and doesn't really want to change its mind. But we ignored Afghanistan, where the real danger was, and went after a dictator whose people would probably like him back if we weren't pushing his death sentence. We did win the second Iraq war when we overthrew Saddam's government. But we are now in a lose-lose situation because we are trying to build a government that is an unnatural one for that location. I suspect that however we leave, when we are gone the government will tumble and will be replaced by a Shia theocracy unless the Sunnis win again and make it a Wahabi theocracy. Secular government is done in Iraq. We will lose no matter how we exit.

Thought 3: With the Democrats in charge, perhaps we can get back to considering our own people who are victims of the economy and the increasing debt. We need a single-payer system for health care so we can get our lives and personal finances back from the health system, particularly the insurers. We keep believing in this country that insurance is the answer to health care when, in fact, it is part of the problem. We also need to start rebuilding our bridges and other infrastructure. We need to worry about the minimum wage. I saw a person on television last night crying alligator tears because she's going to have to pay more to her employees. She talked about affiliated costs like unemployment and FICA increases, but she didn't mention that if her employees earn more than the minimum wage, she gets a bigger business credit for the amount over that wage she pays.

Thought 4: Montanans once again bought into the Republican lies. I'm not sure where this comes from. The lair Roy Brown got elected in my district along with the nonentity Tom McGillvary. They claim they will do a lot of things they didn't do when they were in charge for 12 years, but I'll bet the only thing they will try to do is once again to cut taxes. Thanks to Sam Kitzenberg of Glasgow for saying what many of us have thought for years: the current Republican party in Montana is no place for moderates. Tax cuts are irresponsible when we need schools and tuition cuts for colleges and roads, etc.

on our world situation

2006-11-07T11:03:00.000-07:00

For various reasons, the last few days I've spent a great deal of thought on the concerns of the world as of 2006. Why is the world so divided? Why are we having such crises of religion, of politics, of life? I like to look back at the past to see if there are any answers and I give a basis for at least some of my thinking to several books by Barbara Tuchman: The Guns of August and the Distant Mirror. If we could conceive of reading one of our fairy tales, such as Hansel and Gretel, to a small child used to today's world, we might be asked: if they were lost, why didn't they call someone on their cell phones? Actually, I suspect even teenagers watching some of the old black and white movies might wonder why the actors didn't take advantage of the various electronic marvels that we have available. We could make an enjoyable movie a few years ago called "You Have Mail" (II believe that's right) and before the cast has time to grow old it is old hat.

When I was born, radio was still in its early days. Hoover had made the first nationwide radio broadcast by a president only eight years before. Television was there, but most people didn't know much about it, if anything, even after it went to public at the 1939 New York World's Fair just four years after I was born. World War II was fought with planes using propellers. Air travel was in its infancy; most people still traveled cross country by car, train or bus. And car travel had only become truly a major part of our lives in the thirties. Teams were still used on most farms before WWII. For many years, humans had a relatively calm existence. We had the usual wars and plagues and other outbreaks, but life was much the same with slow changes that many people never saw in their lifetimes. It did not affect them. Then came the Industrial Revolution. Many, many people made the trek to cities. Today's "traditional" family of dad, mom, and the children formed. it was something that few people had conceived of before then. We'd always, most of us, lived near enough to each other to have the extended family with similar beliefs and traditions. That began to hit shallow waters of disruption.

In the 19th Century, the changes speeded up. Eventually we reached the point where new inventions were almost obsolete before the first ones produced had sold out. Life speeded up. We wanted to resist change, but we also wanted to take advantage of change. We hit snags. Life move so fast that for many of us the traditional ways make no sense. Knowledge of ourselves, our world and our universe changed so rapidly that the old standards no longer worked. To continue the river analogy, we had hit the rapids, the cascades, the world turning and spinning in the rivers of change. So now we come to 2006. We face a world in which science is changing again. In the next half century, if their are no interruptions, I suspect we will see changes in control of genetics where we can determine the sex and brain capacity of our children at the time of conception. We might be able to create soldiers and athletes with double-muscled bodies so that steroids are no longer an issue. We may be able to expand our brain power through direct connections with computers. We may create artificial intelligence that will once again change our views of what it means to be human.

And these changes will be resisted. The traditionalists, the old order, will try to hang onto a past that they conceive of as perfect, the golden ages of many mythologies. And many of us will rush headlong into the future without thinking it through and come up with a successful way to approach it. And, in the end, those in the middle will eventually come to grips with the changes, if we survive global warming and other stresses and come up with a new morality that enables us once again to live with some definition of what and whom we are.

on religion

2006-11-07T10:47:00.000-07:00

I'm positing a new approach on religion after reading a number of negative reviews on Richard Dawkins new book, The God Delusion. I haven't read the book, only the reviews. However, knowing Dawkins from previous books, I'm sure that some of the reviews contain some elements of accurate criticism, mostly because it is really hard to prove a negative such as the concept that gods do not exist. (I say gods, because in this country their are 100s of christian gods promulgated from various pulpits, although Time Magazine recently broke them into four main groups.) However, some of the reviews cite the old Scholastic arguments as proof that Dawkins doesn't know what he's talking about. I'm not including the question of "how many angels can dance on the head of a pin" when I cite scholasticism. What I'm talking about is the claim that since we can conceive of a perfect being, that perfect being has to exist. That is a tautalogical argument, no matter how many ways you try to refine it. Saying something exists because we can conceive of it doesn't make it true. It makes as much sense as saying that because I can conceive of little green men from Mars, they exist. No matter how the theologians build on that claim the foundation thesis is false. If you believe this, build me a brick house on a cloud.

My approach, that I haven't seen a great deal written on, is to start from the basic approach: what has a belief in god, a religion, done for humans that wouldn't have happened otherwise? The quickest claim believers would make, I believe is that a belief in god led us to morality. I doubt that. From all the history and prehistory I've read, morality may have led to a belief in gods, not the other way around. I suggest that morality is nothing more than the human adaption to its need to live together in groups and to be able to survive and be happy in those groups. Long before gods became more than shamanistic spirits in rocks and volcanoes and storm clouds, people had to learn to live together, in small family and clan groups at first, eventually in cities, then nations, and now the world. The gods were developed in the early cities when the kind needed a kind of external, all-seeing power to spy on the miscreants.

A second claim is altruism. Why do some people say people want to help others. Over the years, developments circling around the prisoners' game and similar game plans have shown, indeed, that altruism, in many species, is the key to survival. It is genetic, not religious, although some believers seem to think their altruism comes from their belief in an outside spiritual force.

And, finally, for this post, I think that spirituality as people like to call our concern with the mental impact of a beautiful picture or a meditation is nothing more than various functions of our brain going through a process of healing and of soothing.l

on taxes

2006-11-07T10:32:00.000-07:00

The campaigns are over now along with all the bitching about taxes of one kind or another. But one of the Burns' ads caught my eye during the last couple of weeks. It was the one where the small business owners like Bob Keenan and others were complaining that Tester raised their taxes. Actually, he didn't, nor did the state of Montana, it just left in place a tax that was already there from a number of years so long ago that no one probably knows without a lot of research who first put it in place. I was really caught by the farm wife, who in her non-Montana voice, said "We'll be paying thousands of dollars we shouldn't have to." Why shouldn't they? Any farmer or rancher who has to pay income tax needs to get a new accountant. They claim to pay a lot of property taxes but if you compare their bills with those of us who live in cities, it doesn't seem that much for all the land they own. Why shouldn't they pay taxes on some part of their livelihood just as the rest of us do?

We also hear a lot of talk about the tax cuts saving the economy. I don't believe that the tax cuts, except for the increase in the child tax credit (which I didn't get because all my children are gone), did that much for the economy. The child tax credit increase produced a peak in spending which showed across the board. But all the tax cuts did was to produce a much larger deficit and, while modern economists want to downplay the role of a deficit, they can't deny that in classical economics and in practical economics deficits usually produce a rising economy, usually an inflated one. We don't have inflation now because the extra money and debt is being siphoned off outside our borders. What will we do when the bills come due?

And further, all the anti-taxers out there are forgetting a few points. They say this country was founded by efforts to stop taxes. They don't seem to realize that it was actually founded by "taxation without representation" not anti-tax per se. They also seem to forget that not paying taxes is irresponsible when their are services they want. The usual answer to that is, "I don't want some of the services." Tough. There are some services I don't want either and I can't choose which ones I want to pay, and not just at the federal level. My county tax, for instance, includes a few dollars a year to fund a business attraction group. I don't want to pay for that; new businesses have never done me any good, particularly when they get tax breaks so they don't have to pay for services.

People have short memories. They don't realize and history doesn't teach them that the last time we tried to pay for guns and butter (the Vietnam era), both guns and butter suffered. Now, the Republicans can't wait to turn their guns on social security and medicare. I paid enough for them over the years that if they halted them now, I'd join a class action suit in a New York minute.

on the campaign ads

2006-10-25T11:02:00.000-06:00

Now we know. The Billings Gazoo, this morning, showed where the money that Burns supposedly has brought to Montana has gone. His ads say it came to Montana. Actually, the bulk of it came to companies headquartered in Montana rather than to the Montana public. Yes, he got money reportedly for the Lockwood water and sewer and I'm not sure that Lockwood has ever taken advantage of it. He also got money for a new library in Bozeman while Billings was struggling to pass a tax to pay for a new library. He's also bringing Bob Dole out, I understand, to visit PAYS stockyards as if that is Billings. Who's paying for that visit? So we can take his campaign ads with a grain (maybe a sack) of salt.

Of course, both sides have errors in their ads. Burns is claiming that the Gazoo says he never "endorsed" what Tester says he did: the big sales tax. But it also said he took a look at with some interest and that should be a non-starter for him given Montanan's attitudes toward a sales tax. I would say that is about even in lying. And Tester's ads are wrong in saying that "18 years in Washington have changed Senator Burns." There was no change. Conrad is the same Conrad that went back to Washington 18 years ago, saying he would only serve two terms.

on the Iraq "war"

2006-10-19T16:19:00.000-06:00

I think it is time for someone to take a really rational look at the Iraq "war" in the context of language. What we would call a typical war is the head to head face offs of uniformed troops in a declared situation. Or it can be the head to head conflict of bands of people with other bands of people, whether uniformed or not. I believe that given those ideas, the situation does not seem to be a war. There are few, if any, direct fire fights between troops. Mostly it appears to be roadside bombs, suicide bombers, snipers and death squads attacking defenseless people. It seems to me that Iraq stopped being a war back when we had gained control of the country from the forces of Saddam Hussain. That war, Gulf War 2, ended at that stage. What we've been doing over there is national building. Bush and Burns both say we have to win. But what can we win? We are not fighting anything that resembles a winnable war, anymore than we did in Vietnam. What we are trying to do is keep some kind of lid on while two or more Iraqi cliques attempt to win power through killing rather than elections. Saddam did that. Will we support a strongman in an effort to regain that nation? The point is, if this is a war it is one we cannot win. Iraq may, but we are in a lose-lose situation. We can't win because there is no standard for winning, no basis for it, if you will.

on the effect of tax cuts

2006-10-19T16:16:00.000-06:00

Cheap Denny Rehberg is reported to have said that the federal income has gone up a bunch over last year because of the federal tax cuts. Well, I want to know how different the federal income would have been without the tax cuts. Would our budget have been balanced? And Denny, you, of all people, should know that it wasn't the tax cuts that have moved the economy, but the deficits. Or didn't you study economics?

on not being anti-taxers

2006-10-12T14:32:00.000-06:00

At last night's meeting, one of the people supporting repeal of the public safety mill levy in Billings is report to have said, in part, "we're not anti-taxers." To him and all of them, I say: Forget it; the only rational you have is anti-tax. There is not other reason to vote on the levy again. And anti-tax is an irresponsible response, almost without exception.

on liars and damned liars

2006-10-08T16:27:00.000-06:00

There's a big hullabaloo in the Gazoo this a.m. about the Public Safety mill levy. The article points out how we don't have available reserves as the anti-tax people claim the city does (I use we because I am a citizen of this city), they are primarily capital assets which, if we were to sell them (my point and not the city elected and appointed leaders) we would wind up paying some private person the cost of the services plus a profit while he pays his employes a minimum wage and builds a big house in Ironwood or outside the city limits. What I don't understand about the anti-tax, anti-tax people is why they think it is all a big conspiracy and everyone is lying to them. Is that how they would do it if they were in power?

on today's weather

2006-10-07T13:55:00.000-06:00

We are getting what the TV predicted could be as much as an inch of rain today, the seventh of October. An inch of rain in Odtober? Back in the 14th Century when I was a kid and walked to school in 20-below weather through two feet of snow uphill both ways, I can't remember that we ever got rain in October. It seems to me that we had our first snowfall in early September and if we got any precipitation after that it was snow that then lasted, at least in the corners of the fences and the south side of gullies, into the spring. Or maybe it's just a bad memory.

on political literature

2006-09-29T15:40:00.000-06:00

I've been getting some political literature lately from the candidates in my legislative districts. One of them, Roy Brown, in particular, likes to promote the Republicans' so-call Handshake with Montana. It promises lower taxes, better support for education and coconut cream pie every Sunday. I hope the people of Montana remember that none of this got done during the 12 or so years that the Republican party ran the state. Mark Racicot was all hat and no cows; Judy nosmartz was a total washout so busy selling property and reminiscing about her glory days as a skater to do anything for the state, and the legislature was giving away tax breaks for the rich and talking out of both sides of its mouth. Now Brown wants us to believe they will help education. Right. Brown stood on my front porch one day and told me that the Republican legislature had fully funded education when it was pretty obvious to anyone who looked at it that it hadn't. Either he lied to me or he didn't have the slightest idea what is going on in Montana.

Tom McGillvray has one good idea: enabling us to put locks on our credit reports, something that his party should be doing at the national level. Otherwise he's a total loss. He brags about being ranked 15th of 100 for "fiscally responsible" representatives but doesn't say by whom. I would guess that it was the Montana Taxpayers Association, which means, essentially, that it is an irresponsible position. It is irresponsible to promise to give back the surplus or to promise to cut taxes while we still need state services. I understand that one of the items he considers a waste would eliminate a few thousand dollars to fund chaperones so that parents can visit with children that they are in danger of abusing. That's a waste?

Last night, at about 8:34 p.m. I got an automated phone call from a computer who said it was taking a poll. If it was a poll, then I'm the tooth fairy and I haven't put money under anyone's pillow since my youngest lost his last tooth. The questions were so slanted that they meant only that you would be a fool voting for Jon Tester. They kept asking me if I would vote for Conrad (_____ ______) Burns. I said absolutely not, never, no way, never, under no circumstances. The man is an embarrassment to the state of Montana. But the call was definitely illegal.

And finally, I got a mailing today from the supporters of the Constitutional Amendments to limit spending, stressing that the courts were taking away my right to vote. Actually, I think they took away my rights by bringing in and paying people to gather signatures. I've been on the stump a time or two for signatures and I would never pay people to gather them. I suggest that if they can't get volunteers to collect the signatures, then they don't have enough people who have enough interest to cost us what it takes to put it to the vote. Get real!

on bushwa

2006-09-01T13:23:00.000-06:00

Baby Bush has resurrected his "fight them in Baghdad or fight them in New York" rhetoric. It was stupid the first time and it remains stupid. Fight them in London maybe. Perhaps fight them in Saudi Arabia, maybe. But in Iraq? Saddam, for all of his iniquities committed on his own people was not connected to 9/11, he had no WMDs, and he had, from our findings on his ground, had not violated the U.N. resolutions to any extent. He kept saying he had no weapons and we haven't found any, no matter what the wingnuts are claiming based on the discovery of antiquated and unusable relics.

I go on the comment sections of the Gazette articles and on the blogs out of Montana and I wonder where all the idiots came from who are supporting Burns because he "knows how to fight fires" and how to support the president and one of the bigger lobbyists in D.C., who is taking the rap for a political system gone out of control. Montana used to have a good school system that taught people to think for themselves, but I'm seeing a lot of people out there who haven't turned a screw in their brains since birth. They remind me of a new model for a real life cat: no moving parts.

on SETI

2006-08-30T10:13:00.000-06:00

One of the magazines I subscribe to carried an article two issues ago on the Search for Extraterrestrial life (SETI). The next issue, which I just finished reading, contained a lot of comments, pro and con, on the concept that if life is common in the universe we could have expected to have been contacted by an elder race by now. There were a lot of comments made on the chances that life does exist on many worlds. But I didn't see anyone mentioned what to me is the scariest scenario of all: We are a life form that arose on a planet surrounding a late third generation (at least) star. If that's what it takes to form life, maybe we are the elder race, the first one to rise fully formed on a late blooming star full of third generation elements.

on mission accomplished

2006-08-23T11:37:00.000-06:00

Well, Baby Bush announced yesterday that we need to stay in Iraq until the mission is accomplished. But didn't he proclaim the mission accomplished several years ago? Seems to me he was wearing a flight suit and standing on the deck of an aircraft carrier... But what do I know?

on warrantless wiretapping

2006-08-18T14:52:00.000-06:00

reaction to judge's decision: it's about damn time someone made that decision.

on Rehberg's mailings

2006-08-16T11:54:00.000-06:00

Republican political hacks (and maybe Democrats as well although not so blatantly) must really believe Montanans are really, really dumb. I received two of Denny Rehberg's mailings recently that had been franked and sent free (or at taxpayer expense) out of D.C. They contained absolutely no information that I was not aware of so they weren't a congressman's report to his constituents. They were absolutely campaign pieces. They provided no information of use to anyone, but they promoted concepts that Rehberg supposedly promoted although I didn't remember seeing any of those in the weekly congressional report in the daily papers. They were blatantly political—here's what our good ol' boy who's so blah he never makes a wave did for you. If that's not campaign material, I don't know what is. It was so blatantly a campaign ploy that I doubt if any of it's believable. It is just what Rehberg is: get the taxpayer to pay his expenses whether it's living in his office in D.C. or paying for his campaign mailings. And I would suggest it shows the depths to which political self-praise has fallen to when the congress didn't call this an illegal act. Luckily for Rehberg, he got the mailing in before the 90 day blackout. Or was that a plan. It came out so close to the deadline that it must have been a deliberate of getting around the laws. Isn't that illegal?

on backing terrorists

2006-08-14T13:50:00.000-06:00

Cheney and Lieberman are attacking Lamont, who beat Lieberman in CT for wanting us to pull out of Iraq, saying such statements support terrorist. I respectfully disagree. It seems to me that the money we have spent in Iraq, which even the President admits, had no ties to the terrorists of 9/11 or other dates would be better spent in defending our transportation and shipping facilities from terrorist actions. Iraq has only created new terrorists for us to be concerned about.

on having standing

2006-08-13T15:51:00.000-06:00

I think that the coverage of the Dawson execution was far overblown. I've often thought that if a family member had been slain a long time ago, I might never get over it, but the wound would be refreshed with all the coverage so much later. But what really amazes me is that members of the public are not considered to have standing to take the death penalty to court. Whether you agree with the penalty or not, the fact that your government is committing the act of killing a person seems to me to give us standing to challenge that in court.

on mainstream media

2006-07-28T15:10:00.000-06:00

It seems to me that a large number of Americans are deliberately courting ignorance by refusing to consider the value of the mainstream press. When they ignore the mainstream press because they think it is biased or omits important items, they are leaving themselves vulnerable to the voices of those who are decidedly biased: those publications on the right or the left. We need the mainstream newspapers and television news to keep up with the facts of what is going on. Maybe it takes more than one source. I usually read three or four mainstream newspapers and magazines a week or more and a lot of science and general interest news as well. I also read some of the more radical (on both sides) publications and I realize that those who adhere only to those sources, even if they agree with every word, are really not getting what they need to make an objective decision about what is going on in the world. I think it may boil down to a refusal to think. And when the mainstream press attampts to provide a balanced report of the consequences of an event the non-thinkers who don't agree fail to see what's behind it and take on the "balanced" view of one wing or another. It may be the most serious moral problem this country faces: the refusal of the electorate to become informed on the issues.

on danger

2006-07-12T13:36:00.000-06:00

Wow, according to the Dept. of Homeland Security, we Montanans are in serious danger, much more than some of the more populated states. According to a New York Times story, Montana, which ranks low in population has 1,538 possible terrorist targets. They don't name them; too busy citing the sites in Indiana which has the most of any state. But I would guess, the Western Days Parade, the St. Paddy's Day Parade, First Intestate Bank and Wells Fargo Bank buildings are on the list. What else? And to think I was smug enough to think that the only time I faced danger from terrorists was when I flew to California. It only has a bit over 3,000 sites.

CORRECTION: Dyslexia strikes again. I reread the Times article again today and the figure is 1,358. I got the right numbers the other day but in the wrong order. And it does make me feel safter.

On morality

2006-07-07T13:30:00.000-06:00

With the political thunderstorms around the questions of morality or lack of it, let us consider that question for a moment. Those who would assert that morality exists only from an outside figure, such as a God, obviously have not take a very good look at what morality is. If we look at the last eight of the 10 Commandments, for instance, we get a clue, particularly when we compare them with similar rules from other religions. (I'll come back to the first two in a moment.) Jesus is reputed to have said, in essence, that morality is treating others as you would want to be treated. And in that statement, I assert, lies the birth of morality among humans.

Humans are a gregarious people, as are most of the primates. If we look at the primates to which we are related, we see that they have various rules that organize their groups. I won't call them morals, exactly, but they do enable the group to live in relative peace. Humans descended from the same ancestors as other primates. We have, from all the paleontological findings, existed in groups of various sizes since our earliest times, unlike animals such as big cats who are solitary except when mating. To enable us to live together, we adopted a set of rules. Originally, I'm sure, they developed much like the rules of other primates: a power struggled where the strongest dominated the weakest and the weakest curried favor with the strongest (we see that in government and group action even today).

Originally, humans lived in small groups where the leaders kept the members of the group in line and fought or negotiated with the leaders of other groups. The rules that deposed unsuccessful rulers were based on strength and human activity. Although the groups propitiated the spirits of the storms, the volcanoes, the falling trees, the rocks rolling down the hills and the dangerous animals, they did not worship them or believe that death and disease were necessarily tied to anything but, in some cases, the spirits that each object carried. Those spirits were not worshipped. Only when groups became much larger and settled in larger units such as towns and, later, cities, did it become necessary to develop an enforcer. I suggest that the morality of the gods arose from this need. That morality was what was necessary to enable us to live together without killing each other, to live together successfully. The first gods we see in history were often animals, such as the cat Bast and the bull. Then they developed with the heads of humans and the body of animals, or the reverse, as in Egypt, and only toward the beginning of the first millennium BCE did they become fully human. And gods became the source of morality.

I suggest that if we look long and hard at this origin of god-centered morality, we can find ways to return to the basic premise: Morality consists of those actions which enable us to live together successfully, not just those postulated by some real or imagined enforcer who follows a hard-line. Morality should be based on the real-world, not a fantasy world.

on being Liberal

2006-07-07T13:13:00.000-06:00

It amazes me that the goppers have successfully managed to demonize "liberals" in politics. They are trying to label Jon Testor as a "liberal" in hopes that it will shake his support in this "red" state. It is beside the fact that by all definitions, Testor is no Liberal. He may be slightly to the left of the Democratic center but no more than just a degree or two. I would have hoped that he would have been much more liberal than he is.

Let us look at some of the presidents in the 20th Century who might be classed as "liberal." The first one would be Teddy Roosevelt, the great trust buster, who went after the companies that were feeding us bacteria and poor medicine. Then we might (questionably) place the Wilson of pre-WWI days in there until he began his subversive laws and imprisoned liberals for being against his war. FDR was a major liberal providing a Depression-era jobs and establishing the social security program which has kept many of our older folks from living in poverty. JFK and LBJ combined were also liberal and provided other assistance to the poor and the downtrodden. Since then we've probably had no true liberals as president, although Clinton tried to be one with his health plan that was shot down by the lies of the medical insurance profession.

What then is a liberal? A liberal is one who believes that the government should spend its resources on "butter" rather than "guns". It should help provide a safety net for those who cannot be successful in this competitive society. And before anyone jumps on the bandwagon of everybody has an even chance let us be aware that every society is doomed to have its failures. There were serfs in the middle ages who couldn't hold a candle to the knights for one reason or another. The knights lasted until gun powder changed the societal equations. In emperial China, the intellectuals ruled the country while the merchants were second class citizens. In the mercantile days the merchants ruled in the west but they have been ousted by the managers as the big cheeses of this world.

In the future it may be the scientists, particularly the biologists, that will rule. The point is that every society has those who profit from their ability to deal with it and every society has those who cannot. Should we let those who cannot fit within this society fall by the wayside to be buried in unmarked graves? We go on as if this nation is going to continue as it is through our lives and those of all our grandchildren. Yet, if we look at history, only one great culture has lasted longer than a few hundred years and that was ancient Egypt, And it had its interregnums and other pains. Society exists to protect its citizens, not to balance itself on the least successful.

on bad examples

2006-07-01T12:46:00.000-06:00

This weekend we've got a lot of Harleys in Billings, the big motorcycle rally, with folks spending money, supposedly, like they own the mint. Bartenders, motel and restaurant owners and souvenir shop operators are cheering big time. But I wonder if they've looked at the example being set by a large number of the rally riders. Last night I ate dinner in a restaurant on First Avenue North and watched the motorcycles pass. About one in 10 of the riders wore a helmet. I don't think that's a very good example to set for young people who may be taking up the practice. I don't care if the Harley riders who don't wear helmets do an accident properly and kill themselves in a single vehicle accident. But I don't want them to turn into public assistance vegetables or give someone else a lifetime of guilt because they were in a minor accident with a car but bumped their head on a curb and died.

on GOP ads

2006-06-17T16:25:00.000-06:00

The Republicans are out playing their dirty politics again. A man from whom I would not buy a used car comes into Montana and tells us that we all trust Montana's carpetbagging senator from Missouri. Another carpetbagger. And then the republican national committee (lower case since you only use capitals for proper nouns) pays for a sleazy barber ad attacking Jon Tester. As a sidelight, I really wish that it was totally illegal for anyone to make any kind of calls for political or charitable purposes as well as commercial. Sometimes I wonder just how dumb the Republicans think we are in Montana and then I remember that we elected Conrad three times, Racicot twice and Martz once. I think that the current ad supposedly featuring Tester's barber could be actionable. Not by Tester (unless he wants to challenge its accuracy) but by Tester's barber who is made to appear mean-spirited and tight. The last line by itself says he's a money-grubbing person and could be inaccurate as well. Oh, how I hate carpetbaggers who have no knowledge of our state's history and think today's conservatism is in any sense part of our past.

Thouights about the latest photo-op

2006-06-15T15:37:00.000-06:00

So Baby Bush made another surprise visit to Vietnam (oops, I meant Iraq) this week. Wonder if the American people will buy into another effort to hide his failures with a photo-op. Wonder how the U.lS.-installed head of the Iraqi government felt about being dropped in on? It's probably less effective than the promised visit to Korea that the sainted Dwight Eisenhower made that helped get him elected in 1952. As a strong conservative then, I knew it was a farce.

Thoughts on school funding

2006-06-15T15:21:00.000-06:00

A good letter in the Gazoo last Monday (june 13) concerning the strange way that Billings residents voted to pay to play but won't pay the bills for the public education that they continually bitch about. All kinds of specious arguments are used, including abusing the Montana Education Association, the administration and poor teachers. Killing the union won't do anything but lower the quality of teachers, since candidates will be able, even from Billings, to go to another state at a higher pay scale. We are below average pay in this state, down about 47th or lower in pay. At one time even Mississippi paid more than we did. People who complain about a bloated administration obviously have never run anything bigger than a mom and pop store in their lives. I remember when the state would decide the administrators needed to be trimmed at good ole Eastern Montana College. They'd trim the administrative staff and then several years later they'd have to rehire for the same positions because the auditors did not like the way the money was being counted. When the only thing keeping teachers in our state school systems is either the amenities Montana offers (fewer and fewer of them) or that a spouse has a better paying job we're lucky to have the quality education we have in this state.

I like Gov. Schweitzer, but I think he's wrong on the school suit issue. We haven't put enough money into the school systems. If the limits on raising taxes gets on the ballot and passes this fall, we'll be in even more trouble, as Colorado discovered. We need more money for schools at all levels or we're going to be living in a society of ignoramuses. (From some of the arguments I see to justify voting against the school levy by the anti-taxers who don't want to pay for the services they want, we may not have had the system we need for several decades unless, like Sen. Burns, they are all from Missouri.) And the Republicans are laughable. The great party spokesidiot from Billings, Roy Brown, stood on my front porch one afternoon back when he was running in my legislative district and swore until I threw him off my lot, that the Republican legislature had fully funded education. Now, he says they will fully fund it again. Wonder if the court will agree if they get another chance at their mismanagement of the state?

Different thoughts in immigration

2006-06-15T15:18:00.000-06:00

In conversation the other day, I heard a new, previously—until now—unmentioned possibility to end the immigration hassle. If the Mexicans want to become U.Sl. residents so badly, why don't they ask us to annex the country. Then we can deal better with the drug lords and they can pay our taxes.

On the Marianas

2006-06-09T09:32:00.000-06:00

Somehow, I can't believe that our anti-immigration Montana Senator from Missouri, Conrad Burns, is that dumb. If his staff got him the best information on the Marianas issue, then why did he vote against immigration reform and standards? It is true that in his early years, his staff was not the smartest on the block, particularly on Montana. Maybe they haven't gotten as much better as I thought.

Primary thoughts

2006-06-07T23:33:00.001-06:00

The primary is over and the surprises are settling in. Tester won the Democrat primary for the U.S. senate race and will face Montana's senator from Missouri, Conrad Burns, in November. I think that the margin in the Democrat primary was the big surprise. I thought it would be closer. I would suggest to Burns, however, that that margin may have been entirely anger at the way he has conducted himself in D.C. and the morality involved. I understand that Burns would not think he has done anything immoral in taking Abramoff $150,000 because he would have essentially backed the companies against the laborers in the Marianas. In the first vote, he didn't care enough to make an issue of it. In the second vote the money from Abramoff gave him a good reason to vote no. And supporting Abramoff's Indian clients didn't hurt anybody because they were far away from Montana and his votes didn't affect his constituents and did affect his war chest. Good reasons??? I don't think so, but then I don't like anything else he's backed. After all, he's not a Montanan; he's from Missouri, a carpetbagger from the dull Midwest.

And then we have Lindeen moving into the race against Rubber-Stamp Denny, who lives on the taxpayer in his D.C. office and doesn't spend any of his own money on housing in the most expensive city in the U.S. And if baby bush stops to soon, he has to pick Denny out of his colon.

Then there was the so-called anti-obscenity vote in Yellowstone County. I couldn't believe that enough immoralists voted for it to make the race close on the obscenity issue and to pass the zoning issue. I wonder if I could get the county commission to vote against putting a church in my neighborhood on the grounds that it might make an obscenity of my Sunday mornings?

And then there was the tax increase for the roof on the obscenity at the fairgrounds called the Metra. I have to admit I wasn't upset that it passed, but I did cast my protest "no." I don't intend to vote for another bond issue, except for public safety, until the city of Billings passes a school levy again. Since so many people protest the school levy, I suggest that I should be able to protest other taxes that I might otherwise support. But if we can't support our schools, then we can't support anything else, it seems to me. And I wonder if I could get a petition signed to take that little bit of taxes we pay to support the trade port or some such thing, which does me no good, off my tax bill?

Thoughts about morality

2006-06-03T21:12:00.000-06:00

We seem to have entered an age when every discussion of morality begins and ends with what goes on between a person's belt and his knees. It strikes me that people with this sense of morality have a very small sense of what it really means to be moral. Morality has more to do with how people treat each other in our continuing efforts to live together than it does with how we sleep together. I suggest that morals actually preceded any religious thought. It became evident very early in the human social order that rules were needed about such things as personal health, safety and property if we were to be able to live together and prosper. In small group society, those rules were needed just among the small group; all others could be cheated, raped and killed. As the groups got larger, the rules came to encompass more people. Today, we have a concept that maybe all humans belong to one group as far as social order is concerned; that our moral compass is the entire world.

I would suggest that gods developed as rulers attempted to provide their ruled with a type of all-seeing eye that would perch on each person's shoulder and ensure that he or she did what he or she was supposed to do and act toward all others as he or she was supposed to. We know that people developed rules, called morals, that enable them to live together. We also know that the concept of gods is basically only about 12,000 years old, if that.

Star Trek had its prime directive: Let a culture develop as it is supposed to. In other words, do not interfere with another person's right to exist as he or she wishes to exist extended to a culture (Native Americans take note). That's what the so-called "moralists" in today's world are forgetting. They want each of us to exist as they wish us to. I think that is the worst type of immorality.

Thoughts on ACLU awards

2006-06-03T21:04:00.000-06:00

My wife and I were in the audience tonight when the ACLU presented its Jeanette Rankin awards to the Rev. Vern Klingman (who, incidentally, married us almost 40 years ago) and KEMC's Marvin Granger. Klingman is the retired minister from First Methodist Church who is a frequent writer against and critic of the religious wrong's effort to claim this is a Christian country and should be theocratically controlled. Granger is the manager of KEMC who has put together a string of National Public Radio stations and transmitters across the state from the headquarters at Montana State University-Billings. I have had my differences at times with both men, but overall believe they are among the quality people in the city of Billings.

Vern received his award for his outspoken defenses of the First Amendment and the separation of church and state that is spelled out in the U.S. Constitution (no matter what some people say). Granger received the award for promoting the excellence of public radio in fostering intellectual discussion in its audience. The Jeanette Rankin award is given in memory of the activist from Montana who voted against both world wars in Congress and was a member of the first ACLU board when it became active after the repressions of liberties during WWI.

People who oppose the ACLU are, with some few exceptions, those whose particular ox has been gored or who feel that people should be punished for speaking their minds or not buying into the fallacies of the majority.

More thoughts on Conrad of Missouri

2006-06-03T20:56:00.000-06:00

I have just sent an e.mail to Conrad Burns, Montana's senator from Missouri, asking for an apology and a retraction for the slander he has put upon me and some other long-term residents of Montana by claiming in a heavy-handed tv ad that his stance on immigration is "a Montana value." As someone whose roots in Montana go back as early as 1864, I resent being given that label. I would rather that he side with the President on this issue (as much as I find it difficult to believe baby bush sincere about anything).

It seems to me that Conrad is not cognizant of the history of Montana if he thinks that this is a true Montana value. It was not a Montana value in the 1800s when our first state constitution was adopted and the flood of immigrants from Europe kept the mines rolling in Butte and later in Roundup and Red Lodge, among others. Nor was it a Montana value in 1972 when we adopted our second constitution. I think our unesteemed senator should get his head out of his colon and learn something about his adopted state.

More thoughts about the U.S. Senator from Missouri

2006-05-30T09:38:00.000-06:00

I was thinking about the money that people are claiming that Conrad Burns of Missouri is supposed to have pork-barreled into Montana. Of course, I've never really seen any of it, so I wonder if it's true or just a myth he's trying to sell. And then I realized that the continuing flow of tourists through Montana, when they could get other places faster if they took other routes, may (possibly) be credited to him. They want to see how we can be so dumb as to elect him in the first place and then re-elect him.

And I think Ben Steele is correct: if we lose Conrad we'll never be able to replace him, thankfully.

Thoughts on medical insurance

2006-05-23T14:11:00.000-06:00

I still don't get it: why do so many politicians and others in this country think that health insurance will solve the problems of lack of health care? I have good insurance, particularly good drug coverage, yet every time we get a new prescription that is unusual or mixes up drugs in a way that the insurance company doesn't want to accept, the doctor has to write a statement of medical necessity and send it to the drug company. It seems to me that a prescription is already a statement of medical necessity. So my conclusion is that the insurance company is just jerking us around.

And medical insurance doesn't mean that you have all the coverage you need. The insurers force the doctors and hospitals to cut their costs so they make up the difference with the uninsured. At the same time, the insurers will force you to justify every medical expense and limit your access to some medical procedures or at least hassle you so they can keep the money longer and make more interest.

The only insurer I've not had major discussions about coverage with is Medicare. So, if a government-run program is so bad, why is medicare so successful at helping people pay for their medical costs?

Thoughts on Immigration

2006-05-17T20:23:00.000-06:00

I never thought I'd say this, but it seems to me that baby bush finally has something in the works that will work, although he is probably aware that it will not pass congress because of the likes of the usually follow-the-president, Denny Rehberg. He is, I think, deserting the ship. As is Conrad Burns of Missouri.

But baby bush has a plan that will work for those who want the cheap labor from the south and for those who want to close the border to illegals. First, let me recall to you how in the 1990s, the meat packers closed down the immigration service when it started checking papers at meatpacking plants after only one state found itself short of workers. Then, let me remind you that the standard of living of many people in states with large illegal populations will go down if they lose the cheap labor that does their yard work, baby sits the kids, and cooks their meals.

What would be far more effective than a Texacal wall, would be an easier way for temporary workers to come into the country. It should be far easier then to capture and handle the illegals who come across the border with mayhem in their minds and do it by continuing to sneak across.

Thoughts about our trip

2006-05-15T11:36:00.000-06:00

My wife and I just got back from a 4,000 mile trip in our little Subaru, which got between 27 and 36 miles per gallon at Interstate speeds. One of the eeriest parts of it, in some respects, but rewarding, was visiting the grave of the almost-14-year-old Charles Rightmire in Superior, Mont. He was my father's brother and none of us had visited the site in years so it took us most of the morning to find the grave. What surprised me was that in the county courthouse in Superior I received a copy of his death certificate in about 30 minutes or less and it cost only 50 cents. I don't think that would have happened in one of our larger counties.

We also had lunch in the Space Needle and saw a unique art show in Seattle, met a horse in San Jose, had a joint birthday party with my wife and 4-year-old granddaughter in Santa Barbara, and had another in San Juan Capistrano while waiting for my oldest son to run a boat race from Newport Beach to Ensenada, Mexico.

We also had dinner one night on the way back on the sidewalk cafe (Las Vegas Blvd.) in the Paris Casino in Las Vegas. I only lost two dollars in the casino before they called our seating. We were across the street from the big fountain that went off three or four times while we were there. We watched the tourists roam the streets, mostly in touristy-type clothing and enjoyed the food which wasn't anymore expensive than eating at a much less fancy place in Billings.

All in all, it was a good trip, although I had not realized until now just how empty central Wyoming is. I think it's emptier than most parts of Montana (although I wouldn't take a bet about the area south of Fort Peck lake).

Thoughts on today's newspaper stories

2006-03-12T11:41:00.000-07:00

Seems to me that the votes mentioned in today's Gazoo indicate some of the real beliefs of our Republican members of Congress such as Dumb Denny Rehberg and Sen. He-Didn't-Influence-Me Burns. Maybe Dumb Denny should be called Cheap Denny. Not only does he live on the cheap at taxpayer expense by camping out in his office, but now he's leasing an SUV (SVU as I prefer to call them, following the television show of the same name) for something like $8,000+ a year. Then he votes for a bill that would allow lower-standard federal food laws to overturn higher state laws. Would that stop our Country of Origin labeling? He also votes against exempting stricter state bio-terror laws from that bill. What's he doing? To be fair he did seem to support protecting our civil liberties from the "Patriot" act. But then that might just be another smokescreen name for a bill.

And then there's Conrad. He's talking about ethics, but then he voted against a bill that would have curtailed lobbyists access to senators in a big-time way. Oh, that's right, it was a Democrat bill and would have broadened the senate rules to let the minority party more access in legislation. Let's hope that if he's elected this fall, that he is in the minority for the rest of his career in D.C.

And, finally, there's the state Republican Party. They can't provide the schools enough money, although they will bare-faced lie about having done so, and they criticize providing money to the schools following court orders. They may be right that it isn't enough as yet, but they could have made sure it was enough while they were in power. And now they are unhappy because the State Board of Education wants to provide a standard to prevent bullying in schools. So they voted against a similar bill in the last legislative session, apparently because they are so fundamentally involved with religious ridiculosity (is that a word) that they turned away good because the bill mentioned sexual preference. Seems to me that means the baby is long gone as well as the dirty dishwater. As someone who was bullied by school teachers who made us sing from a church hymnal, I think it's long past time that their is a strong anti-bullying policy in place and enforced, no matter what the cause of the bullying. Mostly is just pecking order and power in play rather than real issues anyway.

Thoughts on the opinion page

2006-03-08T14:12:00.000-07:00

David Crisp over at the Billings Blog pointed out the other day that the Gazoo seems to have some uncertainty about certain issues it talks about on its editorial page. I agree. The other day they had quite an essay (too long for an editorial) on the Rimrock Foundation's plans to put a fourplex up in the North Park area. They pointed out the laws and the issues and came down squarely on the belief that the plans need to be looked at again. That may be seen as pro Rimrock Foundation, but they really didn't say what the editorial board believed in so many words. The content hinted at the idea that the fourplex should be approved, but in the end there was no clear cut statement as to that. Sort of a Charley Brown wishy-washyness that the Gazette has had over several years. Why bother with an opinion page if it doesn't have any opinions?

Thoughts about Conrad

2006-02-01T11:41:00.000-07:00

I am really enjoying Conrad Burn's ads trying to rebut the Democrat's attacks about his ties to Abramoff. First, I think he needs to understand that the basic questions are not coming from the Democrats but from the national press covering the Abramoff situation and reporting that he received the most money from A's clients of anyone in Congress. Second, he is not denying that he changed his vote on the Marianas situation after the money came into his campaign fun. Third, if anyone knows what is spread in feed lots it is Conrad, who has probably shoveled it for real and has been doing it in vicariously ever since in his political messages. He certainly does know BS.

I would suggest, however, that Conrad really does not think he has done anything wrong. He or one of his aides probably sat down with one of A's people and decided that his vote on the Marianas didn't mean anything to his constituents, so why not take the money. In addition, he was vulnerable because his basic thesis is pro-business and not for the working man. Why not vote against a minimum wage in a far off area? This doesn't mean I support his doing so, but it does seem to me to explain why the man was vulnerable and should be replaced as a senator of Montana for the big cattlemen and the big businessmen versus the low income wage slaves who work two and three jobs in this state just to earn enough to be a middle income in other parts of this country.

A few comments derived during coffee

2006-01-18T11:15:00.000-07:00

This morning I drove through the heart of downtown Billings for the first time in a long time. It only took me three stop lights to go three blocks since they have turned it into two-way streets with no turning lanes. I also saw one driver who started to back out of the asinine angle parking just as someone was driving down his side of the street. No collision, but I wonder how often it does happen. I also wonder, after that mess, just who wants to set up another tax increment district to use money that should be going to schools, streets, superstructure to serve all the people they want to bring in to fill the new jobs? Diversion or subversion?

Another thought: can someone explain to me why a dollar spent for toothpaste is more valuable to the economy than a dollar spent for a new street or a policeman's salary or a new school? The toothpaste money goes out of the community faster than the superstructure dollar I do believe.

Do we now have an idea of the direction the court is going? The new chief justice, who managed to dodge all the tough questions during his nomination hearings by invoking legal privilege, which didn't apply, in my opinion, voted with the idiot Clarence Thomas and the very activist Antonin Scalia on the Oregon case. We probably also have another stealth candidate in Alito, who seems to be using open field running with blocking to evade solid answers. Even lawyers should know that when someone is on trial they have to answer yes or no.