Lies and More Lies

            Is it any wonder people keep the media in such low esteem. The announcement of Paul Ryan as Romney's choice was met with an immediate trashing by TV pundits and newspaper editorials. Now, I don't mind others having a position on issues. What I do mind is parroting outrageous lies without questioning their veracity.

            Exhibit One: My daily paper, The Virginian-Pilot wasted no time in publishing a Herblock cartoon portraying Paul Ryan as a person who would end Medicare.
            Exhibit Two: On 8/16 it published a vicious slander from the pen of longtime leftist icon Maureen Dodd of the New York Times. After slicing and dicing Ryan with her acerbic tongue, she concludes in her inimitable fashion, "Ryan should stop being so lovable. People who intend to hurt other people should wipe the smile off their faces." How gifted is Ms. Dowd in being able to divine another person's malevolent intentions!
            Exhibit Three: A short letter to the editor from a Virginia Beach moron who declared his decision to vote for Obama because "Ryan wants to cut all entitlements for the middle class and elderly, including Social Security and Medicare." This is the kind of guy who would have drunk Jim Jones's Kool-Aid, no questions asked.
            Why do people buy into the outrageous lies spewing from Obama's campaign headquarters? On Medicare alone, any person with an ounce of critical thinking would know by now that Ryan's plan would preserve Medicare as is for anyone 55 and over and that Obama's plan would take over $700 billion from Medicare to fund Obamacare. But repeat lies loudly and often enough and some people will swallow them whole.
            Because he cannot run on his record of failure, the only strategy left to Obama is a smear campaign  featuring  lies accusing Romney of being a felon, not paying income taxes, poisoning children, murdering women, and now, according to Vice-President Biden, putting blacks back in chains. These reckless, unsubstantiated accusations are McCarthyism at its worst, and none of them have been repudiated by the president. To update South Dakota Senator Karl Mundt's question at the McCarthy hearings:
            Have you no sense of decency, Mr. President?

I Remember

            Obituaries on August 14 celebrated the lives of two people I knew and admired.

            The first was Johnny Pesky, the veritable icon of the Boston Red Sox. I started following the Red Sox in 1948 when Pesky was the Sox third baseman and continued admiring him as he became coach, manager, and all-around ambassador for the team he loved. After admiring him for sixty plus years, I felt I knew him. I especially remember the time the Red Sox were staying in Detroit's Pontchartrain Hotel, as I was, and Pesky was entertaining a group of younger players in the lobby with stories of Ted Williams and Bobby Doerr and the glory days of the 40s and 50's. I stood and listened in awe. He was a truly special baseball man and an even better person. He will be missed.
            The other was Helen Gurley Brown who revolutionized women's magazines during her years as editor of Cosmopolitan Magazine. I knew Helen personally while working for Hearst Magazines in the 70s. Even though she was a fabulous success and a great star in the magazine world, she was a lovely person who cared for and appreciated every person around her. I was one of those people.
            One morning in 1970 Kate MIllett and a band of feminist extremists moved in and occupied Helen's office at the corner of 57th Street and Broadway in protest of an article in Cosmopolitan they had found offensive. Hearst Magazines President Dick Deems burst into my office and asked me and a co-worker to get over to Helen's office to take control of the situation. My colleague went up to her office, but I stayed outside the building's entrance, because Deems had said that Helen had not arrived yet and, for her safety, should not be allowed upstairs.
            Sure enough, I caught sight of her heading in my direction along 57th Street. I hurried over to her, swung her around, and told her she shouldn't go to her office because of the occupiers. While I was explaining the situation to her, we realized we were being followed closely by a rather large woman who had been posted at the building's entrance, ostensibly watching for Helen as I had been. Reacting to the threat, Helen took us into a building on the corner of 57th and 7th Avenue where, she said, she knew the people at the MCI radio station on the third floor. The tail followed us into the elevator and stood behind us as we rode up.
            The elevator doors opened to MCI's floor, and Helen walked out into a mass of people, including several New York City police officers. I found out later that the police were there to provide protection for a Saudi prince who was being interviewed on radio. Perfect. I blocked  the tail to prevent her from following Helen. The doors closed. Helen was safe, and the threat fizzled.
            The next day Helen's secretary came to my office with a package for me. In it was a bottle of wine and a note. It said, "To my favorite bodyguard. Helen." She had not forgotten.
            Neither have I.

Maine Cuts Medicaid

            Some news items just don't seem to get the coverage they deserve. At the very bottom of page 2 in the 8/2/12 edition of the Wall Street Journal was a short piece by Christopher Weaver that really grabbed my attention. In it, Weaver says that the state of Maine has moved to strip about 30,000  Medicaid patients from its state-run health program.

            That is stunning news. It seems that the Supreme Court's June ruling on Medicaid might have released states from the law's ban on striking current Medicaid enrollees. The article suggests that other states have taken notice and are planning similar cuts.
            Why is this big news? Because one of the reasons Medicaid has become such a budget buster is that its rolls are inflated with hundreds of thousands of recipients who shouldn't be there. We're not talking about removing the safety net for children or the indigent. Nobody is arguing for them to be bumped off the rolls. On the other hand, Maine is targeting some people, for example, who earn up to 133% of the poverty line. That's just about $30,000 a year for a family of four. Should the safety net really be meant for them?
            There's more. Under Obamacare, an estimated 30 million people who  claim they can't afford medical insurance would be added to the Medicaid rolls. And that's in addition to the ones already on Medicaid. Remember when  Obama promised that costs wouldn't go up? It's no wonder states are refusing to take them on.
            Maine's move is being challenged, of course, by Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary of Health and Human Services. The nanny of HHS, like her boss, has no interest in seeing a reduction in the number of people who are dependent on the government.
            Heck. Adding another trillion or two to the federal deficit is no problem... Just as long as the people who are happy being slaves to the government continue to vote.

Palestinian Culture

            During his visit to Israel, Mitt Romney attributed the backwardness of Palestinians to their culture. For that, he was branded a racist by his critics. But did he have a point? Instead of a personal attack on Romney's character, the discussion should be on the merits of the issue.

            Romney certainly has a point when you look at the huge differences in material and economic success in Palestine and Israel. A case can be made for blaming Palestinian lack of success on the Palestinian culture of repression, corruption, and terrorism. But is that really "culture" in the traditional sense?
            Webster defines culture as "the totality of socially transmitted behavior patterns, arts, beliefs, institutions, and all other products of human work and thought characteristic of a community or population." In that sense, Palestine culture is dominated by Islam. Is Islam, therefore, the cause of Palestinian failure? Is Judaism the key to Israel's success? In either case, I think the answer is both yes and no. The key to success or lack of it is, in my view, not just cultural, but also political.
            Turkey is perhaps the most successful Islamic country in the Middle East. It is governed by a secular regime that does not let religious beliefs interfere with economic policy or democratic institutions. Unfortunately, it is quite alone in that respect.
            In the last two years Islamic countries of the Middle East and North Africa have been swept by political revolution. The so-called Arab Spring has seen despots ousted from power in Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, and Iraq. Syria is not far behind. It's not clear, however, that despotism is being replaced by something better. Western hopes for the emergence of democracies are not likely to be realized everywhere, if anywhere at all. Instead, we will probably see Islamists grab control, and Islamists have not proven to be terribly fond of democracies. But at least there's a chance that they will adopt some democratic institutions to mitigate the effects of Islamic thought and practice.
            Palestine is a different story. There the government is dominated by Hezbollah whose sole, all-encompassing motivation is the extinction of Israel. As clients of Iran, Palestinians are controlled by jihadists who use terrorism as their principal method of advancement. This is not culture: it is madness. And as long as this madness persists, Palestinians can never hope to achieve the success of Israel, the only true democracy in the region.
            We are now faced with terrible questions. Will Israel strike Iran? If it does, as is increasingly likely, will the Islamists who have newly come to power stand with Tehran or will they stand aside? Will the United States, with a president who has openly declared his Islamic faith and is irresolute in the face of Iranian threats,  back Israel?
            I fear we will know the answer. And it won't be before very long.

Troubled and Afraid

            I'm troubled and I'm afraid. I'm troubled by what is happening to our country under the present leadership. I'm afraid it's only going to get worse if we don't make a drastic change in November.

            Candidate Obama promised he would bring fundamental change to this country. Hardly anyone knew what kind of change. Now we know.
            We know that President Obama does not like America and feels he has to apologize for it. He dislikes capitalism because it relies on the individual rather than the government; he despises the rich and successful and seeks to tax them to death; he disdains the entrepreneurial spirit and the freedom that makes it possible; and he does not believe in our nation's exceptionalism. He prefers European-style Socialism, the redistribution of wealth, government solutions for every perceived ill, and a New World Order to override our Constitution.
            Another four years under this president will be catastrophic. Some have called it the Imperial Presidency. I call it simply tyranny. Obama aspires to despotism, a system of absolute power where he alone decides what's good for the country. He has already shown how little respect he has for the law and for court judgments in,  for example, his rewriting of immigration laws and his refusal to abide by court directives to lift the drilling moratorium. Now he has gutted the work requirement of welfare law with complete disregard for Congress. He continues to spend billions of taxpayer dollars on green enterprises after so many of them have failed, while at the same time doing everything he can to prevent an increase in our supply of fossil fuels.
            Having already proven how Congress is powerless and marginalized, he will continue to spend money he doesn't have, driving us further into debt. He will continue to choke our free enterprise system with increased regulations and crushing taxation. He will drive even more Americans into the slavery of dependency. He alone will decide who benefits from his largesse. He will continue to fly around the country on Air Force One to smile and to tell adoring fans how well we are doing. And they will believe his lies because he, after all, is taking care of them.
            Meanwhile, Iran will have nuclear weapons, Israel will face destruction alone, and the United Nations will govern the seas and the environment, while mouthing platitudes about peace among nations, even as jihadist genocide spreads its plague around the world.
            How can I be anything but afraid for my country. More than afraid, I am terrified.

A Little More Class, Please

            It may not qualify as a major gaffe, but it certainly showed a lack of class. We are now reminded of it nearly four years later by none other than Mitt Romney.

            On his recent visit to London, Romney told the Brits that he would be happy to have the bust of Winston Churchill returned to the White House. He was referring to one of the first actions Barack Obama took after his inauguration as President of the United States: he ordered the bust of Churchill, a gift from Great Britain which had been in the Oval Office since Nixon, to be returned to the British. The reason, it was rumored, was that it was in retaliation for the treatment of Kenya by the British during the colonial era. True or not, the action was a gross insult to our greatest ally. And it showed an utter lack of class by the president.
            Reminded now of the gaffe, the White House scurried to deny it, saying that the bust was still in the White House, that it had never been returned. This proved to be false. The bust had indeed been returned and is now in the British embassy in Washington.
            It has been clear from the beginning of his term that Obama does not stand with the country's closest allies. I recall another slap at the British when the White House telegraphed his preference for Argentina's position on the Falkland Islands by calling them the Maldives, Argentina's appellation. To top it off, Obama himself displayed his ignorance by referring to the islands as the Malvinas. Not as bad as calling the Marine Corps the Marine corpse, but just as embarrassing.
            Romney's next stop was Israel, an ally that Obama has never deigned to visit. Indeed, he bypassed Israel on his first trip abroad to bow down before a Saudi prince. He has preferred to insult Prime Minister Netanyahu in the White House, all the while siding with the Palestinians by insisting on a return to the pre-1967 borders.
            Speaking of the White House, which we Americans rightly feel is Our House, this president has been photographed again and again with his feet up on the furniture, including the Oval Office desk used by President Kennedy and President Reagan, among others.
            He has also been photographed covering his crotch during the singing of the National Anthem, while others around him saluted the flag.
            Do we not have the right to expect a little more class from the leader of our great country?

Cries from Woonsocket

            I was born in Woonsocket, Rhode Island, an old mill town astride the Blackstone River in the northeast corner of the state. The city once had the greatest percentage of French-Canadian immigrants in the country. It had a French newspaper, a French radio station whose theme song I can still remember, and many churches where only French was heard from the pulpit. In 1950 Woonsocket was designated an All-American City. It had good schools, a thriving Main Street, and full employment in the many wool and cotton mills that stood like giant red cliffs along the fast-flowing river that supplied their power. But then the textile industry moved south to more favorable economic climes, and Woonsocket gradually became a shell of its former self.

            The city of my birth has never recovered. With high unemployment, an aging population, and a shrinking tax base, Woonsocket can no longer fulfill its long-term contractual obligations and is now facing bankruptcy. Downriver Pawtucket is also close to declaring bankruptcy, while nearby Central Falls already has.
            These are but three of the many troubled cities that are popping up like mushrooms all over the nation's map. Already In bankruptcy are Stockton, San Bernadino, and Mammoth Lakes in California alone. Not far behind are San Diego and San Jose, as well as Las Vegas and Reno next door in Nevada. Even Chicago, Los Angeles, Detroit, and New York are experiencing daunting fiscal crises. And, closer to home, our northern neighbor Norfolk is not in such great shape either. Can we imagine the outcry if the mayor of Norfolk reduced all public employee salaries to the minimum wage like the mayor of Scranton did?
            These cities are but a microcosm of what is happening on the national level with unbridled entitlements exploding the national debt by over $4 trillion in just the last three years. Yet all attempts at reform are met with accusations of pushing grandma off the cliff or starving the poor. Heaven forbid! And while we're at it, let's add on another trillion for Obamacare. The country can't go bankrupt. All we have to do is print more money and borrow the rest from China. Anybody else want food stamps?
            Can't our leaders smell the rot in the system they've created? Haven't they seen the disastrous consequences of Socialism in Greece, Spain, and Italy? Can they not hear the moans of despair from Woonsocket?