Tag: Government

Categories
Opinion The Last Word

The Rant

Well! I just said that out loud, very haughtily, like Ethel Mertz used to do when Lucy Ricardo said something snide about her. Much to my surprise, I opened this paper last week only to read that “The Rant” I usually write was not by me but about me, written by that guy Dennis Phillippi, who called me a dissolute misanthrope and a lunatic. Some of my friends took offense to this but mainly because they don’t know what “dissolute misanthrope” means and just assumed it was something quite criminal and vile. All Dennis meant was that I’m something of a lowlife who doesn’t trust other people. Hmm. He may be on to something. But he was wrong about a couple of things. He wrote that I know my “local politics,” which couldn’t be further from the truth. I have no idea who is on the City Council right now. I can’t remember who got stung in the Tennessee Waltz, nor do I care at all what they did and what happened to them. The only local politician I’m really interested in — and he’s not that local anymore — is Congressman Steve Cohen, because he got that pet cruelty law passed that made the consequences harsher for people who throw their dogs out of car windows while driving, and he tried to pass a hate-crime bill to make the consequences harsher for people who beat up people because of the color of their skin. Or at least that’s the way I remember it, and I think he’s a good guy. The only other person related to local politics that I can recall writing about is John Ford’s ex-wife Tamara Mitchell-Ford, and that was only because I really wanted to go out drinking with her and would have loved to have been in the Jaguar when she drove into that woman’s house in Collierville. I still think that’s the coolest thing that’s happened in Memphis in a long time. I like her too. I’ll admit to being a little hooked on

Steve Cohen

national politics, but it’s not at all because I care about it. I just think it’s sometimes very entertaining, like watching a really good episode of The Chipmunks. The latest stunt that made my eyes roll into the back of my head was this past weekend’s spectacle with Barack Obama rolling out Oprah Winfrey, or vice versa, on the campaign trail in South Carolina. Ugh. Barack! I know you’re a politician and you have to get the votes, but lowering yourself to playing on the emotions of the lemmings who don’t have the brains to read a book unless the queen of daytime television recommends it? I was probably going to vote for him, but I’m not so sure now. I know too many people who have had personal experiences with Oprah and have horror stories about what a monster she really is. Speaking of Big O’s … as I write this, it is the 40th anniversary of Otis Redding’s death, and I care much more about that than anything in politics — well, short of the torture thing, which does indeed piss me off. I just get a bit hot when I have to face the fact that I live in a country that is as bad as any “terrorist nation” when it comes to playing dirty by holding people in hot cages and secret prisons for years and repeatedly torturing them without any real proof that they did anything wrong. I can’t help but think of what that must be like. I know most people ignore it and go about their daily routine blind to it, believing that the good old U.S. of A. can do no wrong, but it irritates me to have to tell people that I’m from Canada when I travel to a foreign country. But back to the real Big O. I would have voted for Otis Redding for president in a heartbeat. He grew up in a housing project in Macon, Georgia, and when he died at the tender age of 26, he had become one of the finest people to have ever lived. Think about how awesome the United States would be if we had Otis Redding for president. The quintessential soul man. The man who urged everyone to “Try a Little Tenderness.” The man who gained and showed “Respect.” Now that would have been something to write about.

Categories
News

Shelby County Officials Criticize Wharton’s Appointee Raises

When John Fowlkes was chief administrative officer for Shelby County, he helped advise the county on its ethics ordinance. Now that Fowlkes is a Criminal Court judge, maybe he needs to come back and referee a disagreement over the way his former CAO duties — and his salary — were divvied up among Mayor A C Wharton’s top appointees.

In August, Fowlkes was appointed to a vacant judgeship. His CAO duties were assumed by county chief financial officer Jim Huntzicker, who now holds dual titles of CAO and CFO. Other appointees also took on additional duties, according to Huntzicker and Wharton. A total of $44,472 of Fowlkes’ $144,600 salary was divided among nine employees, saving the county roughly $100,128, they say. The biggest raise, $14,808, went to the mayor’s executive assistant Kelly Rayne. Huntzicker got $5,500.

“It was an opportunity for the team to get together and make some changes that will enable us to advance the mayor’s agenda until the end of his term (September, 2010) without slowing down,” said Huntzicker.

He said it would have been difficult to hire another CAO for three years or less with the likelihood that the person would be replaced when Wharton’s term ends.

But that’s not how some elected county officials see it. They say the salary money should have been put into the general fund, and raises should only be given after the county’s Human Resources Department does an analysis. The raises took effect in October, but apparently the word didn’t get out until about two weeks ago. Elected officials cannot give raises to themselves or Civil Service employees, but appointees are diffferent.

“I was appalled that they would split the salary,” said Juvenile Court Clerk Steve Stamson. “If we are all going to be conservative and try to save the taxpayers as much as we can, then we don’t need to be splitting up salaries and giving ourselves increases.”
Circuit Court Clerk Jimmy Moore said Huntzicker’s action is “wrong.”

“I told him in a meeting this week that I wanted him to teach me how to do that,” said Moore. “Appointed people already make a lot more than elected officials and more than (former mayor) Jim Rout’s people did.”

In November, Huntzicker asked for and received the resignation of Human Resources Administrator Paul Boyd, who had held the job for two years.
“He resigned,” said Huntzicker. “It does not have anything to do with this. It involves issues we have been dealing with for several months.”

Boyd sees it differently.

“It was a forced resignation,” said Boyd. “They indicated they didn’t like the way the compensation program was being run.”

Boyd called the action “malicious” because he was coping with the death of his wife six months ago. And he said he objected to the way the raises were given.

“Normally, Human Resources would do an analysis,” he said. “I think an analysis should have been done.”

On Monday, County Commission chairman David Lillard called a meeting of elected officials, Huntzicker, and Wharton. Huntzicker said the purpose was “to air questions relative to compensation studies done in the five court clerks’ offices.” Stamson said he and others brought up the salary increases from the Fowlkes fund.
“Anything that happens in county government is going to get out eventually,” he said. “You can’t hide it.”

Wharton told the Flyer that in hindsight it would have perhaps been better to notify everyone sooner, but he is pleased with the outcome and what he sees as cost savings, flexibility, and rewarding key employees who take on extra work.

“In terms of public policy, nobody else has been down this road,” he said. “I think this is one of the unforeseen consequences of term limits.”

Wharton said the salary decisions were not influenced by his flirtation with backers urging him to run for city mayor this fall. He said he has “every hope and intention” of serving the remainder of his term.

The suggestion that qualified people won’t work for the county for a few years for $144,000 a year is likely to start another mini-storm of controversy. Fowlkes came over from the United States Attorney’s office, where prosecutors make less than that. And in 2004 Wharton hired an eager state legislator as assistant CAO for slightly over $100,000. His name was Roscoe Dixon.

Categories
Politics Politics Feature

The Thin Gray Line

Though the grins were plentiful as Mayor Willie Herenton and members of his council-to-be in 2008 got together for lunch at the Rendezvous last Wednesday, the smiles may have tightened up a little when His Honor climaxed the get-acquainted event with a speech that warned of a “gray line” and of “certain areas where either branch decided to get into the other branch’s domain.”

A shot across the bow it seemed, a recap of sorts of the mayor’s troubles with past councils — most recently on council staff appointments — on matters where, as Herenton indicated, the legislative and executive branches of city government may have had conflicting ambitions.

But that was as contentious as things got Wednesday as former councilman and Rendezvous owner John Vergos, along with another former council member, the Rev. James Netters, co-hosted the luncheon in which nine newly elected members came together for the first time with the four holdover council members.

Oh, Joe Brown made special mention of “divisiveness,” and Netters referred to even worse times of the past, like the late 1960s, when he and other members of the city’s first elected council had to deal with “riots, violence, and murder” in the context of a prolonged sanitation strike and the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King.

But mostly talk was of the upbeat sort, beginning with Vergos’ mention of a Rhodes College brochure touting Memphis’ virtues and continuing with mutual pledges all around of cooperation in the new year.

Afterward, the mayor, who announced he would not hold the annual New Year’s Day prayer breakfast on which, customarily in recent years, he would issue policy thunderbolts, gave reporters a list of objectives which included such familiar (but unachieved) standbys as metro government and bringing the city school system into municipal government as such.

Herenton also pledged to resolve financial and jurisdictional disputes in the operation of the Beale Street tourist quarter. He deferred to the council on the matter of whether it should pass its own version of a County Commission ordinance on topless clubs, but it is taken for granted he wants a more lenient ordinance than the county version, which bans beer sales in such establishments and requires pasties on dancers.

Ironically enough, a wall of the basement room in which council members, staffers, and the mayor met contained a rendering of a reclining nude, sans pasties.

The entire complement of the 2008 council membership was on hand, with the exception of new member Reid Hedgepeth. Mayoral and council aides also attended.

Continuing in its get-ready mode, members of the council will be holding an all-day retreat next week.

• Local Republican chairman Bill Giannini became the first candidate to throw his hat in the ring for the 2006 county election by filing last week for the office of Shelby County assessor. Other potential GOP primary candidates are John Bogan, Betty Boyette, and Randy Lawson. Cheyenne Johnson intends to run as a Democrat, as might Jimmy White.

• One of the bona fide movers and shakers in the local political world (and the civic and financial worlds) is Bank of Bartlett president Harold Byrd, who reports that he expects to make a “full recovery” from a recent operation for colon cancer.

Byrd, a former state legislator and candidate for Congress and county mayor, has legions of friends from all points on the political spectrum and has been well-wished by most of them of late.

Just now, Byrd is trying to organize a charter flight for the University of Memphis Tigers’ appearance at the New Orleans Bowl on December 21st. Given that the basketball Tigers are playing a big game against Georgetown at the FedExForum on the 22nd, that’s no cinch, but, as Byrd points out, taking the flight, which goes and returns on the same day, is a surefire way of taking in both events.

• From a Standing Start, former Republican governor Winfield Dunn‘s political memoir, drew a good crowd for a recent book-signing at Bookstar on Poplar.

Among other things, the book contains some amusing anecdotes at the expense of Dunn’s vanquished Democratic foe in 1970, John Jay Hooker.

But there is an aura of good will in the book, as there was at the signing. When someone mentioned the Hooker reference to Harry Wellford, who managed Dunn’s 1970 efforts, the former judge nodded and said, “But they’re good friends now,” then smiled and added: “And that’s as it should be.”

Categories
News The Fly-By

Time’s Up

CREDIT: MILOSLUZ | dreamstime.com

With City Council committees already running late, Myron Lowery issued a strict edict at last week’s planning and zoning meeting. “My commitment to everyone is that we will end, on time, at 3 o’clock,” he said. “Any item we don’t finish won’t be finished.”

It was an all-too-common reminder for the council that it is running out of time.

Come January, nine members of the 13-member City Council will be gone. Longtime members Jack Sammons and Tom Marshall didn’t run for reelection. Neither did E.C. Jones, Brent Taylor, Edmund Ford, or Dedrick Brittenum. Carol Chumney lost her bid for mayor. And mid-term replacements Madeleine Cooper Taylor and Henry Hooper ran for, but didn’t win, their current seats.

Which means if the council wants to do anything, it needs to do it now.

In October, Marshall, the current chair, proposed 11 items the council should undertake before the year ended, including a tourist development zone around Graceland, an anti-blight initiative, a redevelopment plan for the Fairgrounds, and a revision to the city’s billboard and sign ordinance.

But the billboard and sign ordinance was one of the things that got caught in the crunch last week.

Duncan Associates consultant Eric Kelly was ready to present the proposed changes to the current sign ordinance when Brittenum made a motion to delay the item until it had been heard by the Land Use Control Board. Brittenum read a section from the current zoning regulations that stipulated any changes have to be heard at Land Use before coming to the council.

“My contention is that this matter cannot be heard until the Land Use Control Board hears it. Who knows what Land Use is going to say?” Brittenum said. “If we do it this other truncated way … I’m telling you, we’re subjecting ourselves to legal action.”

But waiting didn’t sit well with other council members.

“It doesn’t say anywhere it cannot be submitted to the council,” Marshall said. “We’re doing it in tandem with the Land Use Control Board.”

The changes are scheduled to come before the Land Use Control Board at its December meeting. The ordinance and Land Use’s recommendation will then be heard by the council December 18th, the last meeting of the year, and for most council members, probably their last meeting.

And since each ordinance has to go through three readings (and be approved in the meeting minutes), that puts the sign ordinance outside the realm of the current council.

“I put in hours of time with [the Office of Planning and Development] and the consultant. The consultant is here today to talk about this thing and to afford this council honest discourse on the subject,” Marshall said. “To simply throw that away because of some sort of bureaucratic glitch … We’re the anti-bureaucracy up here. We’re the guys who are supposed to break the bureaucratic red tape and deal with things, not find reasons not to deal with them.”

But the committee decided against hearing the consultant’s presentation. It will wait for the recommendation from Land Use.

“If there was some urge to get the sign ordinance finished, why didn’t we get it started early enough so that it could go in the proper order?” Brittenum asked.

It’s a fair question. Marshall has been a member of the council since 1986, or for the mathematically challenged, more than 20 years. His term is old enough to drink.

Sammons has spent a combined, though not consecutive, 16 years on the council. Jones and Taylor have both been council members for more than a decade.

But government is a slow business. Not only does each ordinance take three meetings before it is enacted, there are also countless hours of research and discussion. The ordinances get sent back to committees for more discussion; they get deferred when committees are too busy talking about something else. And that’s how it should be.

But a ticking clock can be a powerful motivator: Think about alarm clocks, bombs, Captain Hook.

With time running out, there seems to be a rededication on the part of the council to getting things done. That’s not to say that what they’ve accomplished before doesn’t count or took too long. I just haven’t seen this much urgency in a while. Frankly, it’s a good argument for term limits.

But, then again, what do writers know about deadlines?

Categories
Opinion The Last Word

The Rant

CREDIT: Chan Vargas | dreamstime.com

A Florida man says that his son was taken advantage of by a Florida Panhandle strip joint. Seems the father gave his son his credit card to celebrate his graduation from Georgia Tech, and the boy ran up a $53,000 tab. This appears to be a case where the strippers were the ones who got a “happy ending.”

I guess the young man, catapulted to an undergrad degree at the tender of age 24, did not learn the economics of real life in school — chief among them is to never give strippers a free shot at your credit card, no matter how drunk you are.

Much like their brethren the lawyers, strippers quickly size up a potential client for how much they can fleece from them, based on how much money they have and how stupid they appear to be.  

I have always supported honest entrepreneurs, especially when pitted against the stupid. It is good for society when money is not left too long in the hands of idiots. It is God’s way of getting money into smarter folks’ pockets. For the less religious among us, I call it economic Darwinism, and it often happens one crumpled $5 bill at a time. As the old saying goes, “A fool and his money are soon parted.” In this case, a fool and his dad’s money were soon partying.  

I do understand these men who spend silly amounts of money in strip clubs. I have had friends whose longest female relationships have lasted two table dances. Men go to these clubs to make themselves feel important because they are lacking in self-esteem or personal affirmation. They are paying for the illusion of being a big shot, and they convince themselves that these women actually think they are attractive. They usually get buyer’s remorse when the stripper’s cooing and ego-stroking ends, which invariably happens when the guy’s money runs out. Who knew?

Surprisingly, the government, which likes to wet its beak in all vices, has yet to devise a way to muscle in on the strip-joint business. They’ve done better with our other bad habits. The feds pay farmers to grow tobacco, then tax cigarettes, and then push lawsuits against cigarette manufacturers. Governments are also into gambling big-time now, sponsoring their own state lotteries (akin to running numbers) and licensing casinos. And of course, there is booze, where government takes an inordinate cut via taxes on alcohol sales. It is best to view the government as a mob boss without the protection racket — or moral consistency. 

I don’t go to strip clubs, but it’s not because I have any ethical opposition to them. The average stripper is doing the best she can with the assets she has to make money and provide for her famiy. And I respect that — especially her assets. Basically, I don’t go simply because I am too cheap.

As for the Georgia Tech grad, it sounds like he got a master’s in finance that night — for $53,000! Welcome to the real world, son! Pain is an excellent teacher, and often, in a society that makes excuses for bad behavior, it can be the only teacher. Of course, ridicule helps, which is what I do. It is my way of giving back.

Experience is how we learn life’s lessons. Experience delivers certain harsh truths to us Homo sapiens (and straight sapiens, too). This incident taught a young man the most valuable lesson in life: Don’t be an idiot.

See, everyone has a role in our society, even strippers.

Ron Hart is a columnist and former resident of Memphis.

Categories
Opinion Viewpoint

Less Government is More

“Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys.” — P.J. O’Rourke

I promised last week (The Rant, October 18th issue) to propose a solution for the competing desires of the liberal Vermont Republic and conservative League of the South to secede  from the union. So here are my ideas for what we really can do to make this  work:

First, let’s face it. We live in a divided country. Every recent national election has been close to 50-50 splits, and we are also split on how we want to run the ever-expanding federal government. As European countries such as Great Britain and France become more conservative and pro-capitalist, we in the U.S. seem poised to elect Hillary Clinton and the Democrats, who want to expand the  powers of Washington into healthcare and beyond. It will not work.

I held out hope in 1994, when the Republicans swept into a majority in Congress. They did force a few good things, such as welfare reform and  lower taxes. But over time the Republicans preferred power over principle, and they have been a bitter disappointment.

The federal government provides us with one important service, which is national defense. Lately, to let us know how important they are, the feds have been using our military in wars of choice that never  seem to turn out well. In fact, it is no longer “defense;” rather, they seem to take pleasure in deploying our troops for offense — while  confiscating 38 percent of our incomes in taxes to do so. Congress also run up trillions in deficits because they have no collective sense.

On the other hand, our state and local governments take much less of our income, and they balance their budgets, because they have to. They then provide us with services we actually use and count on: schools, roads, libraries, trash pickup, parks, airports, police, and  fire protection. They tend to do so in a manner that suits local priorities. And if you do not like what they do, you can simply move to another state.

The federal government, on the other hand, seldom does anything that pleases locals. It is more concerned about preserving and expanding its powers. Realistically, most of us can’t move to another country if we don’t like what the feds do. Movie stars sometimes threaten to do it. But most don’t follow through, which was a pity in the case of Barbra Streisand and Rosie O’Donnell.

So my solution to the unworkable-yet-appealing idea of secession is to grant more powers to the states and fewer to Washington, D.C. It is, after all, what our founding fathers intended in the first place. If you read the Federalist Papers, you will realize that they never intended for our national government to be expansive and overbearing. They wanted the states to be in charge. That way, if, for instance, you want an abortion on demand, then you move to a state that allows it. If you want to smoke weed, then you go to a state with liberal pot laws. If you think that we should pay for everything for people on welfare, you go to a state that provides flat-screen TVs and offers an assortment of French cheeses that are both delicious and  presented in a pleasing manner.

The basic reason that we fought for our independence is so we could do what we damn well please as long as it doesn’t harm others. Yet at every turn, the federal government seems to want to make us do as they think we  should, whether it comes to using windmills, driving a Prius,  or being forced to join the Hillary Healthcare Plan. (It’s interesting to me that the Democrats, who complained loudest about the  inept federal response to Katrina, are now advocating a federal takeover of  healthcare.)

The U.S. government spends our  money to make us increasingly dependent on the U.S. government’s programs.  Unfunded mandates, (which is not Larry Craig going to the bathroom without his wallet), are not good for states either. They not only waste federal money, they waste states’ money, too, with legislation that forces states to implement programs without providing funding to run them.

The Republicans did it with the expensive prescription drug-benefit giveaway. When a product that the private market should sell, such as prescription drugs, is taken over by the government, the first thing — and perhaps the only thing — that the drug companies need to buy are congressmen.

Our free-spending federal government officials think they are filled with enough hubris to believe that they should even tell other countries what to do. They call it “foreign policy.” The real answer to fixing foreign and domestic policy is allocating less money and power to the federal government and more to to state and local governments.

Ron Hart is a Southern libertarian who writes political satire. He lives  in

Florida and is an investor. His e-mail is

RevRon10@aol.com.

Categories
Politics Politics Feature

Corker Says Constituents and “Common Sense” Come Before Political Loyalties

CREDIT: jb

In a visit to Shelby County Wednesday, Bob Corker, the
Republican who was elected to the U.S. Senate last year over Democrat Harold
Ford Jr. in a tight race that drew ample national attention, made it clear that
partisan issues are the least of his concerns.

Both in a luncheon address to Rotarians at the Germantown
Country Club and in remarks to reporters afterward, former Chattanooga mayor
Corker emphasized a “common sense” approach in which “I strive to make sure that
everybody in the state is proud of the way I conduct myself…to understand issues
as they really are, devoid of some of the rhetoric that surrounds these
issues…[and] the political whims of the day.”

Take his response when asked whether embattled GOP senator
Larry Craig, busted in the infamous “wide stance” airport-restroom case, should
resign for the good of the Republican Party:

Corker said Craig’s predicament was a matter for the
“people of Idaho” and the Senate Ethics Committee. “I don’t try to get into all
the political ramifications of this or that. The way to get a whole lot more
done is to focus on issues.” Somewhat disdainfully, he added, “There are all
these messaging amendments that we do, all about making one side look bad and
the other side look good. Democrats do it, and Republicans do it. It’s a total
waste of time.”

Helping The Med

As to how that even-handed outlook affected his stand on
issues, Corker was explicit. He talked of applying pressure on the
Administration, especially on recent health-care issues he considered urgent for
his constituents. “I know for a fact that I played a huge role in this [latest]
TennCare waiver thing. I have to say I had to put a hold on the Bush
nominations to make it happen. I thought it was important for our state.”

And there was his vote and enthusiastic support recently to expand SChip (the
federal State Children’s Health
Insurance Program) so as to increase funding for Tennessee by $30
million and to permit Medicaid payments for patients at The Med from Arkansas
and Mississippi. Both Corker and Tennessee GOP colleague Lamar Alexander
strongly supported the bill, which passed but was vetoed last week by President
Bush.

“I was glad to have worked out these issues
that have plagued the Med for so long. It’s ridiculous that people from Arkansas
and Mississippi have used the facility for so long and don’t pay for it. What’s
the logic in that?” Corker said, vowing to try to get the Med-friendly
provisions re-established in a veto-proof compromise measure yet to be
fashioned.

Corker made a pitch for the Every American Insured Health Act,
a bill he has sponsored that, he said, would modify the tax code so as to
guarantee universal access to private health insurance “but would not add a
penny to the national deficit.”

Contending that “what I’m trying to do is to add to
the equation a real debate, a real solution,” the senator said his proposal had been
“slammed” on the same day by both a conservative columnist and a liberal
columnist, leading him to conclude, “I’m pretty sure we got it just about
right.”

Corker said that executives of key national corporations,
saddled with large health-care costs for their employees, were “waling the halls
of Congress trying to get us to move to a government-run system so they can
alleviate. that expense which makes them non-competitive.” Without some
alternative form of universal access, he said, such a government-run system was
inevitable.

With 800,000 Tennesseans and 47 million Americans lacking
health-care coverage, there was also a “moral obligation” to make coverage universal,
Corker stressed.

Relations with Iran and Syria

As a member of both the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee
and the body’s Armed Services committee, Corker says he is focusing hard on
issues relating to war-torn Iraq, a country he has visited twice, and
neighboring Iran, subject of much speculation these days concerning possible
future hostilities between that country and the U.S.

Here again, the senator stressed his determination to
maintain independence of judgment. “I’ve had some very tense moments with this
administration – in the first two months I was up there [in Washington]
especially. There were some underwhelming meetings.”

Corker is dubious about the current political leadership of
Iraq {“things cannot go on as they are”) but supportive for the time being of
the current military strategy of General David Petraeus, with whom he stays in
contact.

On Iran, Corker said there was “some concern in the
Senate that the president might take action” and emphasized that “he [Bush]would have
to have Senate authority to do that.” Corker reminded reporters that after his
election he had said on CBS’ Face the Nation that diplomatic negotiations
with both Syria and Iran were necessary.

“We don’t want to overplay our hand in Iran,” he said.
“There’s a group of people there who want to be our friends. If we move into
Iran unilaterally others [in the region] will step back from being our friends.”

Corker, who was a construction executive before entering
politics, related the current diplomatic situation to his experience in
labor-management negotiations in Tennessee. “If you don’t talk with your enemies
they remain your enemies. There’s a lot to be learned just to be in somebody’s
presence,” he said.

Categories
Opinion The Last Word

The Rant

CREDIT: AP Photo/Eric Draper

Well, gosh darn. Shoot. Heck yeah. Finally.

Believe it or not, the Bush administration military is saving you

some money! That’s right, just when you thought you’d heard all you could possibly hear from those cowardly, whining liberals about the government spending all of your money on an illegal war

about oil and commerce and hiring those monstrous, over-charging companies like Halliburton and Blackwater to march in and help the peace process going on with Operation Iraqi Freedom, your United States military has figured out a way to cut costs so that your tax dollars aren’t spent so frivolously. Did you ever think that would happen? I didn’t. What with all of the billions and billions of dollars that have been spent on the war so far to keep us all safe here “on American soil,” I really couldn’t figure out a way for the government to shave some of that spending without really making us more and more vulnerable to attack here at home again. That kind of protection does really cost a lot of money, you know. But they did it. They found a way. There’s been a little coverage of it on some of the cable news networks but not really all that much, so I figured I would at least do my part in congratulating them. Have you ever heard of the Minnesota National Guard or, as they are sometimes called, the Red Bull Brigade? Well, just in case you haven’t, they volunteered to serve and help out during crisis situations in their own state, like most National Guard units. When the war with Iraq busted loose and they were needed, they did their duty. And they did so longer than most anybody who’s served over there yet. Most of them were there for an unprecedented 22 months. They were there in the middle of all that hell, fighting on the ground, never knowing from one minute to the next if they were going to be blown to bits and they stuck it out — ALMOST until the bitter end. Luckily, the military let them come home a little early. While some of them were home in May of this year, Vice President Dick Cheney was so moved by their service — you know what a nice man he is! — he went up there and gave a speech. He was so impressed with his words, he put the speech on the White House Web site: “America is also deeply grateful to the men and women of the Red Bull Division — the 34th Infantry Division. Your recent missions include operations in Bosnia, Kosovo, Egypt, and Honduras. And you have mobilized and deployed in the global war on terror. You’ve sent in units as part of Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom, and right now soldiers of the 1st Brigade Combat Team are on the ground in Iraq as part of the largest overseas deployment of the Minnesota National Guard since World War II. Our nation owes an incalculable debt to all branches of the armed forces, and to the Guard and Reserve units all across the country. It is impossible to overstate how much they’ve done to make this nation safer, and to bring freedom, stability, and peace to a troubled part of the world.” That was really sweet of him, wasn’t it? And really sweet of the military to let them come home early. Yes, it was just one day early, but still. And now there are some left-wing nuts out there who are angry because it has come out that the reason they let them come home one day early is because that way, they don’t have to give them as much financial aid to go to school as they would have if they had stayed there in hell that extra ONE DAY. See, if they had stayed the extra ONE DAY, the government would have to give them roughly $800 a month in education benefits. But since they brought about half of them home ONE DAY early, they have to pay them only about $200 a month. And that is where the army is saving you, the taxpayer, a lot of money! See, it was a really smart move on the Army’s part. Oh, yes, some of the soldiers think it stinks while some of the others, who are just a bit more patriotic, say they think that the decision to bring them home a day early could possibly have been just an oversight or a fluke. Shame on those soldiers who are complaining about being treated this way for their service in the war in Iraq. It’s not like they really did all that much. So what if they had to live through that nightmare for almost two years of their lives and lose jobs and be away from loved ones and all that? Don’t they know the government and especially its military chiefs have to show some fiscal responsibility? In fact, they just did it again. Get this from CBS News: “The opening of a mammoth, $600 million U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, which had been planned for last month, has now been delayed well into next year, U.S. officials said. The Vatican-sized compound, which will be the world’s largest diplomatic mission, has been beset by construction and logistical problems. ‘They are substantially behind at this point’ and it would be surprising if any offices or living quarters could be occupied before the end of the year, one official told the Associated Press on Thursday.” Now then. See? I bet if they just cut out the $200 in benefits altogether, rather than giving these veterans the ridiculously high sum of $800 a month in benefits, they might just be able to go ahead and get this construction project finished. I bet if this building is for the top officials in the army, it will be really swell.

Categories
Opinion The Last Word

The Rant

CREDIT: AP Photo/HO,Warner Bros

The American government has come to resemble the characters in The Wizard of Oz. We have the Cowardly Congress, a president without a brain, and a foreign-policy establishment without a heart.

Our politicians are still trying to play the empire game long after the age of empires has ended. Blinded by arrogance, they cannot see that with every passing day, the world needs us less and less and hates us more and more. We are passing through that phase when the grandeur of the empire exists only in the minds of politicians who have insulated themselves from reality.

A friend of mine, a classical scholar, sometimes tells his students, “No one woke up one morning in 476 A.D. and said, ‘Gee, I’m in the Dark Ages.'” The transition from the heyday of Roman power to a stage of barbarism was a gradual process. We are in a process of change. No one is going to announce on TV that the U.S. is no longer a superpower.

Nevertheless, the signs are there if you look for them. A nation that was able to help crush the Axis powers in three and a half years hasn’t won a war since then. We have had four years of struggling with an insurgency in a small, poor, and broken country. Our economy is shaky under mountains of debt. Half of our people make less than 42,000 inflated dollars a year.

Where we were once the arsenal of democracy, today there is hardly a major weapons system that doesn’t rely on imports of one kind or another. Much of the industry that is left is foreign-owned. Japan, which once lay prostrate, dominates the American automobile market. It is extremely difficult to find anything today that is not made in China or some other cheap-labor country.

In the meantime, the cowardly Congress doesn’t have the guts to tackle any of the major problems confronting the American people. Our president continues to embarrass us practically every time he opens his mouth in public. The foreign-policy establishment is riddled with aging draft dodgers agitating for more wars — against small countries, of course.

True, we still have lots of nuclear weapons, but do you think any American president would want to get into a nuclear shooting match with China or Russia? Look at how we reacted to two airplanes crashing into two office buildings. What do you think we would do if San Diego, Los Angeles, and San Francisco became radioactive ruins with millions of casualties? We are not prepared mentally, spiritually, or materially to deal with a nuclear war.

We are like all empires in their final stages. We have grown soft. We like our comforts. We don’t wish to be inconvenienced. We like poor Mexicans to do our stoop work and poor Americans to do our fighting, provided they do it far away so we won’t be disturbed by explosions and screams. We enjoy our decadence, and there are always people in the media who can rationalize anything, no matter how sick and revolting it is.

As for trying to understand the world, we are just too busy being amused and following the adventures of Britney Spears and other celebrities. We like to let the TV and the politicians do our thinking for us. It saves energy. They tell us whom to hate.

The only way to avoid a bad end is to find some realists and put them in public office. We need a brave Congress, not a pack of cowards. We desperately need a president with a brain. We need to retire the warmongers in the foreign-policy establishment. Otherwise, we will join the other third-rate countries, once empires, on history’s discard pile.

Charley Reese has been a journalist for 50 years.

Categories
Opinion Viewpoint

A Bully Puppet

Iraq’s prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, is rising a notch in my estimation. He’s begun to snap back at his American critics. Bully for him.

Arrogant American politicians, in calling for his ouster, shed all pretense of any interest in democracy. Clearly, they see themselves as imperial overlords dissatisfied with someone they consider an American stooge. American generals even now are starting to talk about the need for a dictator, though they don’t use that term. Maybe, they are telling journalists, democracy for Iraq wasn’t such a good idea after all.

Nevertheless, al-Maliki is the legitimately chosen head of a legitimately elected government. It’s not up to American senators and presidential candidates to decide who should be prime minister of Iraq. These empty-headed windbags wouldn’t dream of calling for the ouster of the British prime minister. That they so readily do so in the case of Iraq simply shows you how they disdain the democracy they claim to support.

In fairness to al-Maliki, it should be pointed out that the much-publicized hand-over of “sovereignty” to the Iraqi government was and is a sham. Iraq’s army has to answer to the Americans, not to the Iraqi government. Iraq has no intelligence agency. The intelligence agency was set up and is run by the CIA. The U.S. is still the occupier of Iraq, and there is relatively little freedom of the Iraqi government to set its own policies.

Add to that the fact that the Iraqi government, regardless of who leads it, is stuck with a country that we “bombed back into the pre-industrial age,” to use the boastful phrase of General Norman Schwarzkopf during the first Gulf War. Then, with our singularly inept attempt at occupation, we fired its government and its army.

If every member of the Iraqi parliament had a genius IQ, they’d have a hard time digging themselves out of the hole we dug for the country.

The Iraqi fiasco is a black comedy — black because of the tragic loss of life and suffering it has caused, but a comedy nevertheless because of the Three Stooges-type antics of American officials, beginning with President Bush.

The president has misled and continues to mislead the American people in an attempt to rationalize his failed policy. His pathetically juvenile claim that the terrorists would follow Americans home if the U.S. withdrew from Iraq is laughable. Al-Qaeda declared war on us long before we did it the enormous favor of invading Iraq, thus both reinforcing al-Qaeda’s propaganda and providing it with a new recruitment and training ground.

Bush’s ill-fated war has not only increased the stock of the world’s terrorists, it replaced a Sunni-led government with a Shiite-led government that is close to Iran. You couldn’t screw this situation up any worse than if you had let Osama bin Laden plan the invasion. I have never seen such a stupid administration as this one.

And make no mistake — there is no easy solution or way out of this morass. Just as so many knowledgeable people, both here and in the Middle East, warned the president beforehand, Bush has set loose the wild dogs of war — chaos and havoc in a previously stable region — and he doesn’t have any idea at all of how to round them up.

I long ago predicted the end result of this blundering around would be a new dictatorship, because a brutally strong central authority is the only way Iraq’s feuding factions can be controlled. This time, however, it likely will be someone allied to Iran.

Iraq’s misery and difficulties remind me of a quotation from a Turkish officer, who said, “The trouble with being an ally of the United States is that you can never tell when it’s going to decide to stab itself in the back.”

Amen.

Charley Reese has been a journalist for 50 years.