One was, ‘World Government, Inc.: 100, US Citizen: 0.’

Another was, ‘USA 1776 – 2010, R.I.P.’

Or simply, ‘Kiss Your Ass Goodbye.’

But ‘Kiss It Goodbye?’ seems to say it well enough, because whatever you may think ‘It’ is, whether it be your privacy, your right to own a small business that competes with the big boys, independent media, US sovereignty, or freedom itself, it just may be time to kiss it goodbye.

Because the same madmen in the Supreme Court that gave us George W. Bush back in 2000 gave away your country today to wealthy international investors.

On the off chance you haven’t heard by now — by a 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court removed all restrictions on corporate spending on political campaigns, exactly the opposite of the kind of reform that is truly needed.

The potential consequences of this decision cannot be overstated. Imagine the worst case scenario from the most oppressive science fiction movie society you’ve ever seen. Okay? Now imagine worse.

Our founders (and the overwhelming majority of our leaders ever since) believed in regulating corporations — especially in the political realm — they believed in common sense definitions of common words and certainly could not have expected such insanity as this:  that a corporation is a person and that any regulation of its expenditures on political campaigns is an abridgment of that person’s free speech.

In a society of increasing ignorance, lack of engagement, apathy… perhaps this was inevitable, but to say a corporation is a person… well, we might as well say a dog is a person and that any laws that govern where and when that dog poops, or any law that requires that such poop subsequently be removed, is a clear violation of that person’s speech.

And yes, I’m comparing a corporation’s free speech to dog poop, although I admit it probably does do an injustice to poop.

A corporation is not (even remotely) a person. Any small child of average intelligence can tell you that. It has no friends, relatives or children who must live (or suffer and die) in whatever kind of future it creates. And it has no spiritual aspirations, no moral code, and no conscience. A corporation’s sole purpose is to maximize return on investment for its investors, who are by the way, international.

The fact that so many Republican “leaders” applauded this decision is incontrovertible proof, as if we needed it, that they and their party no longer represent US interests, but World Government, Inc.

So… if you’re not ready yet to kiss it goodbye, and if you’re not quite yet ready to grab your guns and head into the streets for a bloody revolution either, then call, yell, and scream at your Congress:  it’s way past time to impeach these madmen in our Supreme Court; it’s way past time for we the people to reassert ourselves and take this country back.

Sort of.

But not entirely. What our mass media isn't telling you is that some of our "leaders" helped create this appalling situation.

Yes, this is what the pundits always call politicizing a news story, and what our mass media generally decline to do.

I could and probably should go into more detail, but as Max Blumenthal has done such a good job of that already, I'll merely point you in his direction:

http://maxblumenthal.com/2010/01/how-washingtons-plot-against-haiti-worsened-the-disaster/

http://dir.salon.com/story/news/feature/2004/07/16/haiti_coup/print.html

http://i2.democracynow.org/2004/7/20/did_the_bush_administration_allow_a

And can you believe Obama asked George W. to join in a bipartisan effort for Haitian relief? Really? After what happened (and is still happening in many respects) to New Orleans? Almost anyone, even John McCain, would have been a better choice. I guess in most ways Barack's just another politician, and the only reason I can continue to support him is that the alternatives all look to be much, much worse.

Well… heads up guys. Hope to be back in posting mode sometime soon. Have just been so busy lately… y'know?

You promised. You promised the beginning of a new era, a new way. And you told us not to expect you to do it alone, not to go home but to stay involved, to keep up the fight, in short, to help you.

And then you took office. What happened? When since have you inspired us and led us and asked us to help? You began by leaving many of the various and Constitutionally questionable policies of the previous administration untouched, and asked us to be patient. You said it wasn’t time yet to close Gitmo, and asked us to be patient. You have so far refused to pursue any significant prosecutions of the previous administration in spite of mounting evidence that such prosecutions are sorely needed, and asked us not to look back.

None of that has been very inspiring, Mr. President, but most of us have continued to give you the benefit of a doubt.

Yet now, most recently, on health care and climate change, you have refused to draw a line in the proverbial sand and state unequivocally what is and is not acceptable — and even while failing to fight for a public option in a health care “reform” legislative battle (that now appears to be the war-time equivalent of providing free armaments and ammunition to the enemy), you pronounced an abysmally inadequate agreement in Copenhagen a great success.

During all of this, when did you inspire us? When did you ask us for our help? When did you take a stand, a specific stand, a real and unequivocal stand, and say to us, I will not turn, but I cannot do this alone, I need your help, I need you to come forth with the passion you had during the campaign and make your will known in terms that our detractors cannot mistake, and cannot deny, and cannot overwhelm with mere propaganda?

The sad fact is that that moment never came.

Yes, you have had a very full plate. Your predecessor left you with a daunting job, and I don’t mean to be ungrateful or harsh. But I and my friends have put ourselves on the line, and some of us may have endangered the future of our own careers, our own health care options, and otherwise, by taking a stand, publicly and honestly and dangerously. Because we believed in the cause and because we believed in you. Should we have just stayed silent?

Maybe you remember, or maybe you don’t, but I told you one time, several months ago, that if you wanted things to be easy, especially now, at this extraordinary time in history, then you’d had no business running for president, even less persuading us to believe in you, and even less actually being president.

If these were ordinary times, and if you were an ordinary politician, I very likely would chalk up all that has transpired this year to “politics as usual.” But these are not ordinary times and you are not an ordinary president. You encouraged a whole new generation to be involved, and you inspired many more to believe in possibility one more time. You promised change we could believe in.

Yet having begun with the potential to be one of this country’s great leaders and one of the best things to ever happen to this country, you are now at risk of becoming one of the worst. Not just because you never drew a line and stood your ground, not just because your fine words and speeches seem so much more empty of substance today than they did a year ago, but because your apparent inability to draw that line and stand that ground risks poisoning a whole new generation with the cynicism and apathy that has plagued this nation, and this world, for far too long.

I am still hoping that you are smarter and more clever and more courageous and more committed than I am giving you credit for, that somehow, like a magician, you will pull rabbits out of a hat, or better, cause elephants to disappear before our eyes, and we will ooh and ahh and be amazed at your strategy and gape in wonder at the change that has finally come, the change we really can believe in.

But it is beginning to feel as if the hour already is getting very late, and any and all evidence of that hypothetical, brilliant strategy has yet to show itself.

Mr. President, you are clearly a very intelligent man, clearly a very thoughtful man; you are charming almost to a fault, you speak well and have your way with words, often deliver your oratory almost without flaw, and are understandably concerned about your legacy.

But Mr. President, throughout the various battles this year, we didn’t need just your intelligence, and your thoughtful consideration, and your charm, or just your beautiful words, and we are very selfishly more concerned about our own futures and the future of our country and the world than we are about your legacy. We didn’t need talk. We needed walk.

What we needed was for you to take a stand and fight and refuse to turn even in the face of defeat. That would’ve inspired us. We would’ve stood with you and together we probably would’ve won, but if necessary, gone down in defeat with you, and come back again to fight again, knowing that the battles were right.

What we needed was — what we still need is — your leadership.

I suppose my first instinct was correct, that you guys probably don't want to read all about my wonder and shock and disgust in the first place, but I can't say I'll never do it again because I care, and I do get disgusted sometimes and let things slip; but I should've been at least fair enough to acknowledge that conservative (faux) Democrats are much of the problem, too, when it comes to getting anything worthwhile out of this health care "reform" effort.

I guess I just don't believe in it. I want to, but I just don't. To me, after having voted for Obama, after having promoted health care reform in various ways, what has happened merely clarifies just how corrupted and corporatized our system has become. It looks to me like the will of the people is not even a contender in the contest to run this country anymore, and when so many seem incapable of separating fact from fiction, and allow so many of the decisions that affect all our lives to be made in the dark, or behind closed doors, and so rarely hold the liars and criminals and corrupted political leaders to account even when they are caught red handed, well, maybe the people's will shouldn't be influential.

I suppose we all can hope that we can somehow continue to escape into fantasy indefinitely… but in actuality, I think we all know we can't, and if this means we'll have the corporations in charge from now on… well, let's just say Anya's altered reality of Cordelia's world without Buffy may actually look attractive one day by comparison.

That's right. I'm saying, if this is how things are going to be from now on, sooner or later, it will end badly. Very. For all of us.

But hopefully I'm just being way too negative. If you haven't figured it out yet, let me clue you in: I'm kind of a moody guy.

Back to the original intent of this post — mea culpa folks. Next time out, I'll try to talk more about Buffy.

I mean, I could say something about Prejean and Palin. I could say to them, it isn't some left wing media conspiracy, it isn't anyone trying to silence you or shut you up or what McCain and his folk did to you, it isn't about being beauty queens or speaking out against gay marriage or because you're women or any other notion that may come to mind.

You're just deluded morons. That's all it is. You represent the exact opposite of female empowerment, the exact opposite of anything that could be remotely associated with a blog devoted to Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Now Sarah, Carrie, don't give us that look. You know it's true. Er, well, being deluded morons, I guess maybe you don't.

And I could say that it was mostly idiots and sociopaths that took the reins of power as the Roman Empire fell, and that anyone in this country could seriously suggest Palin or Carrie (or George W. Bush, for that matter) for any political office — at least any national political office — ought to give us all pause about what lesson we might want to learn from that ancient empire.

And I could say I'm none too sure about how this health care reform is shaping up. It looks like the standard Republican playbook, i.e., if you can't kill it, maim it in the hope that it won't work once implemented; and then you can go home to your constituents and say, 'see, I told you that dog won't run,' without ever mentioning to their ignorant faces that it might've run, and even howled at the moon, if you and your party hadn't insisted on maiming it first.

And then I could mention that that is essentially what happened to the stimulus, isn't it? The Repugs maimed it as it moved through the Congress, and now their pundits come on the TV and post on their blogs that it didn't work? And then I could ask out loud, 'how many times are the Demos gonna fall for this? Will the Demos never learn?'

Or I could say that, y'know, maybe I don't know what's happening. That's very possible. Maybe it is worthy reform, or will become worthy before the end, and not just a give-away to the insurance industry, and maybe it's gonna work, and maybe if it doesn't work too well, the voters will still give the Demos another chance or two to improve it.

Yeah? I could say that. Maybe so.

Or maybe I could just forget all attempts at political relevance and just blog about Buffy. Yeah. Maybe I could.

Well that's coming soon.

I hope.

The hawks, like John McCain and Joe Lieberman, advocate escalation — tens of thousands more troops. But others advise caution, and argue for a nimbler, counterterrorism approach.

As per usual, the war-mongers are questioning not just the strategy, but the motives and patriotism of those who disagree with them.

What’s the old saying about the man with a hammer thinking everything is a nail? It seems to me that’s how the right-wing and much of the Republican leadership think. Just about everything we’ve touched lately, we’ve smashed with that hammer, and their answer to cope with the increasingly failed result is a bigger, badder hammer — at a time when maybe we can’t even afford it anymore.

What I truly understand about the Afghanistan war could be handwritten on a post-it note, probably with room left over, but — since I occasionally like to delude myself into believing you or a member or your staff read this blog from time to time — I’d nevertheless like to add my puny little voice to those who are saying maybe it’s long past due for a little more nuanced approach: thoughtful, intelligent, and with an understanding that we have, and have always had, other tools at our disposal besides Olaf’s big ol’ hammer.

Please provide that leadership, Mr. President.

Obviously though, I can’t cover everything, so I will stick to the big topic of the moment: health care reform.

As you all know, some evil hell gods who cannot be named have done everything possible to derail health care reform in the US, and as I hope you also know, they have done so not through serious debate, but by fanning the flames of hatred and ignorance.

So what are their objections?

Well, to listen to them, you would think their problem is that Obama wasn’t born here, or that he wants to kill off Republicans or old folks or women with breast cancer or disabled children or something, or that they don’t like socialist fascism or fascist socialism (and if you can equate those two ideologies as easily as they do, it is very doubtful you even know what either one of them is), or something.

But these are just distractions, the kind of thing passive-aggressive adolescent boys would do, angry little boys who are simply and metaphorically poking a larger sibling in the ribs with snide remarks because they’re afraid any authentic confrontation would result in the sibling out-muscling and overwhelming them.

No. The only real objections that make any kind of sense are that they are afraid it will lead to them having to pay more taxes, that they have this usually religious-based logic about imposing the harshest conditions on their fellow citizens as being good for their moral character, that they believe when the government helps people it diminishes their reliance on the rich and extremely religious, and that, for all the foregoing reasons and more, they are very much against what they call "the redistribution of wealth."

So let’s look at all that for a second.

1.
Could they wind up having to pay more taxes? Well, sure. If the program doesn’t do such a great job of increasing efficiency and of reducing costs (and it might not by the time the real Democrats get through trying to appease the Republicans and the faux-Democrats). But given the ever-rising costs of medical care and medical insurance, is it likely that their taxes will increase so much as to offset any benefits of health care reform? If they are very wealthy, perhaps. But then, if the very wealthy righties would back the plan and see to it that it does increase efficiency and reduce costs, probably not. So that doesn’t hold up very well.

2.
Is imposing harsh conditions on your fellow citizens good for their moral character? Perhaps. But some of us think life itself often does a pretty good job of that as it is without needing a push from the we-believe-we’re-morally-superior-so-screw-you citizens brigade. And even if not, is it really the intention to argue that it is the duty of some to ensure a tough life for others, on moral grounds? Is that really what Jesus would do? And I’m pretty familiar with both the old and new testaments, and as I recall, ensuring life is tough is God’s work and God’s curse, not man’s — so what are they trying to do? Be God?

Well, then, as Spike might say, I’m all for lots of suffering and melodrama, so long as it’s not mine, or just on the telly. (Spike was a fan of Passions, you know.) I am, after all, a novelist, or a dramatist, if you will, and without all that suffering and melodrama, and silliness and absurdity too, what would folk like me have to write about? But how about let’s let God be God? I’m sure He can dish out whatever harsh conditions He likes without their petty help.

3.
When the the government helps people does it diminish their reliance on the rich and the religious? Well, yes and no. Obviously, the rich will always have influence, and history suggests so will the religious. If the question is, does it reduce an average person’s reliance on very specific rich persons, yes, it probably does. If you mean does it reduce an average person’s reliance on monied people, of course not. As for reliance on the extremely religious? Well, er, since when can those guys be relied on? One day one of those guys is a straight anti-homosexual tele-evangelist and the next he’s a homosexual paying for thrills from male prostitutes, or, well, let’s not go into all the examples. That would fill a multi-volume encyclopedia. Maybe what they mean is they want people to rely on the church, and on charity. Okay. But what that really means is they want more control over people, and they want it through their favorite institutions of social control, institutions which have proved themselves woefully inadequate to the tasks, both of providing adequate care for those in need and of benevolent social control, for several centuries now — at least. So, hey, if some come to the conclusion that the real motivation here is simply to accumulate and augment their own status and power, well, aren’t you smart?

4.
And finally, for all the foregoing reasons and more, surely I can’t challenge that they are very much against "the redistribution of wealth?" I mean, that’s just their position, their ideology, their raison d’etre — just something they believe in and adhere to, right?

Actually, this is the most laughable of all, and as such, deserves special attention.

The right and left (or at least what we have been taught to think of as the left) — and almost without exception — have been redistributing wealth in this country for decades now, to the tune of trillions of dollars. That redistribution has all been from the bottom (from the relatively humble) up (to the very, very rich). The most obvious and recent example of this, and one the righties bring up quite often of course, are the recent corporate and financial industry bailouts, but a couple of others the righties hardly ever mention are the wars now going on in Iraq and Afghanistan. Oh, and just about everything that came before. Say what you will about the necessity of these or any other wars, but one thing that is undeniable is that some of the wealthiest interests in this country always make out like bandits. Money, money, money, with most of the expenses always, always being paid for by the average taxpayers and the lion’s share of the profits always, always going to the richest stockholders of our various military and high technology corporate contractors.

And this is not recent. This went on throughout the entire Cold War as well. Average taxpayers paid for all the weapons and technology research and some of the wealthiest interests in this country made a killing (literally). Sure, there have been benefits along the way for average people, not the least of which have been lots of jobs and to live in a country that has rarely been challenged militarily, but there has never been any effort to give those average taxpayers an even stake in that investment. The money has simply been sucked out of the working and middle class, while most of the profits from huge government contracts go to the wealthy and wealthier. That’s just the facts, and that is redistribution of wealth my friends, from the have nots to the haves, and if not for decades, it has at least recently gotten way out of control.

So all the right-wing Republican monsters and liars and zombies should just shut up about being against redistribution of wealth, because that’s not what they are against at all. Not any more than the Democrats are. What they are against is giving any of it back. What they are against is giving up a little of the wealth that the average schmucks in this country helped them accumulate so that anyone who is sick or sickly, or growing poorer by the minute, might have a little better shot at a little better life. What they are against is being part of the community that helped them and, in some cases, their ancestors, amass their great fortunes in the first place. What they are against is the larger community of the United States.

Okay, does anyone think that’s harsh? They probably say they love their country, and maybe in some sense, some of them do. And of course they want to protect their wealth. That’s only natural. Of course they don’t want to give it up if they don’t have to.

But does their concern about being impoverished by health care reform so that who they perceive to be the less-deserving members of this society have a little relief really hold up to scrutiny?

Let’s look at it. Before WWII, before FDR, over 90% of the old in this nation died in abject poverty. Before WWII, before FDR, if an average working man experienced a serious illness in the prime of his life, his productive life was essentially over. Because such an illness could be so psychologically and financially devastating in addition to the normal course of the illness, there was very little opportunity to get back on his feet again and go back to being a productive worker.

After WWII, after FDR, a lot of that changed. Gradually, social security, along with GI benefits, allowed people to survive without being such a burden on their children, allowed veterans an opportunity for an education, allowed workers to get a start, and although times were still very hard, allowed some to even get back on their feet again and become productive workers again after recovering from a serious illness. And in spite of all the propaganda from the right, the truth is FDR’s economy grew 58% from 1932 to 1940 in 8 years of peacetime, and then grew 56% from 1940 to 1945 in 5 years of wartime, and overall during his administration, in terms of the percentage of GDP, the gross US federal debt decreased. (It also decreased under Clinton and Carter and increased under Reagan and both Bushes.)

By the 1950’s, the United States dominated the world economically to an extent never seen before in the history of the world. A factory worker, on a single salary, could not only own a home and feed a family of four, he could send at least one, if not both, of his children to college, and still put money back for retirement.

Gosh, is there anybody out there who thinks all that economic productivity, and all that economic dominance and all that affluence could have had anything to do with all that "socialism" the right hated so much then and now? Where do you think the wealth in this country came from, you righties? It came from the hard work and productivity of average American workers who helped build companies based both on innovations and government funded research and development. It came from satellites, computers, electronics, jet planes, cell phones, nuclear power plants, hydroelectric dams, even the Internet — absolutely none of which would have ever come about if not for the "socialist" programs of FDR. His programs built those dams, his approach to government gave people the opportunities to become and remain productive workers and to have hope that they could better their own lives and the lives of their children. His administration and those who followed him built this country and its economic dominance on the principle that taxes for all and investment by the government today means profits for all tomorrow.

Don’t think so? Every major high tech industry in this country, in fact pretty much in the world, got its start because the US federal government invested in research and development in areas the average business interests and investors considered to be too high risk, either because the technology was just a theoretical concept at the time, or because the technology was in its infancy, or because they had little incentive to spend their corporation’s money to develop some technology that would have been just as advantageous to their competitors (who didn’t pay for it) as it would have been for them.

So what does all this have to do with health care reform? Because since Ronald Reagan, wealth distribution in this country has gotten out of hand, i.e., the kind of wealth distribution the right wingers secretly like, and hope the rest of us are too dumb to notice. There is now not much of a middle class left. Many estimate it to be less than half of what it was before Reagan, and experts say it is still shrinking, that the US is becoming more and more a nation of the very rich and the relatively poor with fewer and fewer in between. Having seen with my own eyes various people I’ve known for the last 30 years or so, I have very few doubts it is true. I have seen many, including some in my own family, become nearly destitute. And I have seen a few others strike it rich. But what I have not seen very much of is very many who have been able to maintain any kind of steady, predictable middle-class lifestyle.

So what does all this have to do with health care reform? It has to do with the wealthy stupidly shooting themselves in the foot and taking the rest of us out in the process. Stupid, wealthier-than-God, morons! How do they think this nation, or even this world, is going to continue to produce anything? How is this economy going to work if there is no hope? How are the rest of the world’s economies going to fare without their biggest customer? If there is no reason for US workers to get up and be productive because there is no hope, why shouldn’t they become criminals and terrorists? You’ve got to give people a chance to improve their lot. This is, or at least was, most of the basis of capitalism according to many of the righties’ intellectuals, which they all seem to have forgotten now. And don’t they know what happens to countries where it is nothing but the rich and the poor and there is no hope? Don’t they know? In the long run, it often doesn’t turn out any better for the rich than it does for anyone else. They often get overthrown in revolutions, they often get shot, or dragged through the streets, or blown up, or have their kids kidnapped, or get kidnapped themselves, and see the quality of their own lives go down and down and down.

Most of those "socialist" Europeans the righties love to hate have learned this. Maybe it’s because of their longer history. But why can’t we learn it without having to go through everything they went through? Why?

Okay. I didn’t make the coherent, level-headed, point-by-point argument I set out to. I guess I just had to vent.

But it just seems to me, except for the special interests and the very wealthy and very unpatriotic, if any of you righties are even half as intelligent as some of you seem to think you are, you should be able to consider the possibility that you are being manipulated, and I challenge those of you who are still capable of acknowledging facts to research and think about all this for a few days, and ask yourself exactly how did this country become the economic powerhouse it did, and don’t settle for some simplistic explanation that doesn’t require any thought on your part; look at the whole picture. And then, if you want to come back and prove to me how wrong I am, fine, power to you. I’ll appreciate the education, because I am open to facts (just not the right-wing funded think tank manufactured and made-up ones).

But otherwise, I suggest everyone find the most radical leftist supporters of health care reform they can and give them as much of your money and help as you can reasonably afford, and take to the streets and put the fear of God into the extreme political right, support health care reform, support the public option — Hell, support a single payer system! It is in the best interest of the rich as well as the poor as well as the middle class as well as the economy as well as the national security as well as the future of this country and this society. And since this sometimes militaristic country is likely to do little else but spiral downwards, morally and otherwise, if we keep on our current path, it might even be in the best interests of humanity.

Buffy saved her world, a lot. And people, it’s no exaggeration to say this may be our last, best chance to save ours.

Although, prior to the attacks I would never have thought I would ever say such a thing, it was in some respects, a far more innocent time. In those more halcyon days, most of us I suspect thought that an American — with only the rarest exception — was simply an American, a US citizen simply a citizen, some of course better, far more responsible citizens than others, some to the political left and some to the political right, but nevertheless, a more or less given that, left or right, we were held together in as many ways as not by a common thread of understanding.

It is the sort of denial that seems almost a requirement to live in this post-post-postmodern age (or whatever), and it was naive, and perhaps in some ways it really was innocent, yet most of us I suspect know and have nearly always known that the edges of our society have always been raw with the rampant and the rabid, but that understanding nevertheless did not require very many of us to acknowledge the extent to which the half-cocked and half-crazed were waiting for their opportunity to pounce.

And suddenly, with the attacks, came that opportunity at last.

Suddenly, a man who was inarguably one of the most deeply flawed and unqualified to ever inhabit the house at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, toward whom most Americans, judging by the polls, had already lost much of their initial good will and faith, became, overnight — primarily it seems because he could use a bullhorn and make a few terse comments — our Great Leader.

So we were told.

For many months — and to a slightly lesser extent, even years — after, to offer criticism of that particular president became tantamount to being unpatriotic, of offering solace to the enemy, of being un-American, of being treasonous.

So we were told.

As nasty as American politics had been in recent decades, it had rarely seen this sort of opportunism, this sort of vitriol, obsession, or sheer, mindless indecency. Suddenly, anyone who did not agree with the deeply flawed policies of our deeply flawed president had the choice of being silent or of being attacked by a propaganda machine with the sole intent of threatening, bullying, silencing, and blacklisting all comers.

Fortunately, enough fought back, and passions gradually cooled enough, so that that machine did not achieve the total political and media dominance to which its operators aspired. (At least some of us think it was fortunate.)

And yet.

Here we are today, still caught in the aftermath of a political tsunami in which it has become acceptable, even heroic to many, for an elected leader in our Congress to heckle the president of the United States in the middle of his speech, in which it has become acceptable, even heroic to many, to openly carry and display firearms into venues in which the president is scheduled to speak, in which it has become acceptable, even patriotic to many, to simply make up your own "facts" on any subject whatsoever, to attribute a statement to your opponent that is exactly the opposite of what your opponent actually said, to lie about everything, to give one’s loyalty only to one’s political party, or team, to concern yourself with winning only, and for your side only, and to treat any concerns about the actual future of this society as inconsiderable and beneath contempt.

It has been said, by many on the right, and on many occasions — in utter denial of all the damage that has been done — that we should all just shut up and be appreciative that the Bush administration protected us from further terrorist attacks. And I am willing to admit, despite mounting evidence to the contrary, it may well be that Bush, Cheney, et al, did protect us, that some of their policies were far more effective than we know, or are, apparently, allowed to know.

But even if all of that is true, if we should ever be attacked similarly again (or worse) there is still one question that has to nag incessantly at anyone in this country who still has a mind, who can still think a semi-coherent thought, who still cares: who or what will protect us from the fully-cocked and the fully-crazed, the rampant and the rabid, who are now orgasmically frothing at the lips at the thought of when their opportunity may come?

In short, who will protect us from ourselves?

Shouldn’t Republicans be supporting the public option on health care?

For nearly 30 years, since the "Reagan revolution," all we have heard out of most Republican leaders and operatives is that government is no good for anything, and that private enterprise is so much more competitive and so much more efficient than government can ever be.

So guys and gals, this is your chance to prove it. Why not support the public option and let the insurance companies prove your point once and for all? If private enterprise is so much better, more competitive and more efficient than government, if government can’t do anything right, then you should jump at this unprecedented opportunity to prove what you have been saying for at least the last 30 years.

In other words, why not put your private enterprise system where your mouth is?

Well, I’ll tell you why you won’t support it. Because you don’t really believe what you claim to believe. You are afraid to death that a government public option would work, that it would eventually force some of your biggest political contributors out of business. In other words, because you are and have always been full of hot air, not just unable to prove your philosophy is valid, but unwilling to take the chance that attempting to do so might backfire — just a bunch of greedy hypocrites who are willing to do anything for your corporate masters.

Oh yeah, you all talk tough, you all act tough, but when the rubber hits the road, when you really have the chance to prove what you have been pushing on this country for decades, you don’t have the spine for it. Cowards.