A very insightful article by Bryant Simon, director of American studies at Temple University in Philadelphia.

It's refreshing to see an academic see and report the truth. Here's an excerpt:

I finished writing my book just as Obama was taking office. I thought—hoped—that his historic election and the mass mobilization of voters behind it might mark a change from citizenship through consumption to citizenship through ongoing political engagement. I thought maybe Obama would revive our faith in politics and our trust in politicians. And I thought maybe he might be able to break the political model of innocence by association and consumptive citizenship. This model is based on the notion that ideas are bought and sold like goods, not to change things so much as to make us look better. When they stop doing that, we move on to another product.

But over the last few months, it seems we have learned just how little has changed.

The article really isn't a criticism of Obama. It is more a sad, succinct reflection of the state of our Union. I'd argue the "left" managed to seize upon the consumer concept far more quickly and adeptly than the "right" (and, I would argue that Bush was definitely the Dunkin' Donuts of coffeeland).

Perhaps (although doubtful) the populace will act less like consumers and more like genuinely concerned & responsible citizens next time around.

Congressional Democrats and the Obama administration have been engaged in a blatant class warfare campaign when it comes to taxes. They vilify the "rich", coddle the "poor" and in the process of inflicting more financial damage to the country than the greedy investor-gamblers who created the sub-prime mess.

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has issued a report that breaks down the 2006 tax burden and shows that the current tax system is already extremely "progressive" and has the "rich" giving roughly 30% of their income to support ineffective government programs.

In 2006, the top 20 percent of earners paid 70 percent of all federal taxes. On average, they paid 26 percent of their income to the government. The very richest -- the top 1 percent of taxpayers, with household incomes of over $332,000 -- paid 28 percent of all taxes, with an effective tax rate of 31 percent. The middle three quintiles paid rates of 10, 14 and 18 percent. The lowest 20 percent of households paid only 0.8 percent of all federal taxes -- and the bottom 90 percent of households paid only 45 percent.

Based on these numbers, it would be hard to argue that the country doesn't already have a significantly progressive tax system. (WP ref)

America doesn't need class warfare. America doesn't need more draconian tax policies. America needs real leaders who are willing to make tough decisions to cut spending & eliminate waste. This administration cannot end soon enough. The question is: will America finally be smart enough after these four, horrible years to find a worthy candidate to elect instead of another smooth-talking snake-oil salesman.

It's no secret that I'm not a fan the individual who was elected President last November. I was no fan of any of the candidates who were running, but truly believed the choice America made was definitely a wrong one. He may be handsome, articulate and more intelligent than the average person, but that does not make him fit to lead this nation.

I maintain a a chronicle I call "Obama FAIL" because I believe his followers/supporters - which includes a large portion of the media - will do everything they can to cover up all his mistakes and refuse to accept his imperfections. I also do not want history to lose the record. Thankfully, both The Daily Show and the Colbert Report (where the image captures below are from) are willing to hold Obama as accountable as his predecessor. [NOTE: Is is sad that some of the best "journalism" comes from two comedy shows]

A theme of his campaign was "Change You Can Believe In", but many of his actions since assuming the mantle in January are better phrased as:

A prime example of this is his recent attempt to make it look like he has ended the "War On Terror". While I am also no fan of George W. Bush and the havoc he wrought on this country with his "War On Terror" and draconian Homeland Security initiatives, changing the name of it to "Overseas Contingency Operation" does a huge disservice to the American people. Obama and his cohorts are just using the slick marketing techniques they employed during the campaign to make it look like they are accomplishing something. (Comedy Central gives him a hand with some additional rebranding opportunities.)

At a former job, I used to assert that the motto of the IT organization was "Redefining Success One Project at a Time". I would like to congratulate BHO on a successful "Redefinition Accomplished":

The news brings weekly – if not daily – reminders of just how terrible the next four years are going to be. Don't get me wrong: I have no love for the past eight years. There were no good choices to pick from this past November.

Because memory is fleeting for many, I will be chronicling the foibles and failures "ut accidit". Since I was forced to listen to the message of "hope" for 18-24 months, his supporters should be willing deal with his blunders of the next 24-48 months.

Evernote makes it very easy to accomplish this without cluttering up the blog. There will be a link in the sidebar (soon) for my Obama FAIL public notebook where web clips will no doubt consume the majority of my "Pro" account space.

As I said to the Bush supporters many times: "substantiated facts do not lie". Most kept the blind faith. We'll see if Obama's supporters are equally as deliberately deluded.

From Government Executive:

The Homeland Security Department has appointed an official who is under federal investigation to a key position overseeing a program worth hundreds of millions of dollars to secure computer networks across the federal government.

The Feb. 1 appointment of Scott Charbo, Homeland Security's chief information officer, to be deputy undersecretary for the national protection and programs directorate, drew immediate criticism from House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., who was familiar with Charbo's past.

In a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, Thompson said an investigation conducted by his committee last year showed Charbo failed to properly address computer security breaches within agencies housed at department headquarters, along with incompetent and possibly illegal activity by private contractor Unisys.

The incidents included the exfiltration of information from Homeland Security Department networks to a Web-hosting service that connects Chinese Web sites, according to Thompson's investigation.

The security breaches that occurred under Charbo's watch and the work by Unisys are now under investigation by the FBI and the Homeland Security Department inspector general, according to Thompson and congressional aides.

We can just hope that the individual that takes over next January (provided Bush doesn't declare martial law before then) strives to just be a little less inept and corrupt than the current leader of the weakest currency in the civilized world.

This is what's in store for our country if folks keep using a religious test for their political leaders. The fact that Romney and The Huckster have gotten this far still scares me, but at least there's little chance, now, of them going all the way.

Then again, the folks that want Romney & Huckabee in the White House would probably like to establish a religious/morality police force. To those folks I repeat my warning that eventually we will have someone who is not from a Judeo-Christian background in the oval office, so be careful of the power you wish to grant your candidates since it may come back to haunt you or your children.

And, finally, insert-rant-on-the-uncivilized-and-backward-cultures-of-the-middle-east here.

If Huckabee was sincere in his desire to spread Christianity via the presidency, he would have used real, Christian candy canes instead of these pagan ones on his campaign Christmas pamphlets. (Note the lack of just three small, red stripes)

If a candidate is going to shill his faith to get the votes he/she needs to get it right completely. This just proves how insincere he and his followers really are.

Full disclosure: I'm a Christian who wants a moral, sane, intelligent person in the White House (haven't had one of those since 1^st term - and only the 1^st term - Reagan). I do not care what the personal religion of a candidate might be since I certainly do not want them using the way they interpret the principles of their faith as their sole means of governing.

The odds are good that we will have a Muslim or outspoken atheist (that's a religion even though they won't admit it) as president some day. Just taking what we've seen as to how seriously bad the Koran can be interpreted by followers, there's no way I want to set a precedent now.

(Photo brought to you by Yahoo! News/Reuters)

NOTE: this is definitely a rant... all of this has just been really getting under my skin lately...

Let's see, we stop manufacturing "things" , let education standards go right down the drain, outsource all our jobs overeas and now we're left with one bunch of rich, white guys getting so greedy that they sell junk mortgages and need to get bailed out by the Chinese and another bunch fighting over revenues from crappy music. Then, there's the other bunch who won't share (Wikipedia link, apologies) the ludicrous amount of money they make off of cruddy television & movie content with those who write it, partly because of how afraid they are of the new media distribution methods. They fein ignorance of the new the web and digital distribution mechanisms but the reality is that they know how terrible the content is and that consumers will finally realize it as well and only pay the small amount it's truly worth.

All this greed is just killing us and the majority of folks are just too busy trying to survive each day to notice, care or do anything about it.

From Xinhua:

Japan starts to fingerprint foreigners_English_Xinhua: "OKYO, Nov. 20 (Xinhua) -- Japan's new Immigration Control and Refugee Recognition Law took effect on Tuesday, authorizing the government to fingerprint and photograph all foreigners aged 16 or over upon entering Japan at 126 ports and 27 airports.

The law made Japan the second country following the United States to fingerprint and photograph foreigners.

During inspection of Tokyo's Narita International Airport on Monday, Japanese Justice Minister Kunio Hatoyama said the law could help block terrorists and repatriated foreigners from entering Japan.

The procedure is to affect up to 7 million of the 8 million people entering Japan annually. The electronic system will send the information to the Justice Ministry's host computer, which will then check against a blacklist based on the Interpol and other institutions."

Before you go to Japan, you might want to ask how they are storing your biometric data (if they are storing it) and what the procedures are to have it deleted.

I wonder how long we can keep our dollar low enough to keep attracting visitors before it becomes completely worthless.

I'm ready for a change in Washington if only to give someone else a chance to royally screw up our economy, foreign policy and energy strategy. The problem is that there are really no candidates out there who seem to have any ideas how to make it better.

Good article from The Seattle P-I summarizing the issues surrounding the Proposition 1 ballot initiative (dealing with traffic/transportation problems in the greater Seattle area). As with many things here in the northwest, this topic has far more than two sides and there is no clear answer to the overall problem.

It reminds me of the I-78 mess in NJ and the Route 22 mess in PA. I take public transportation here and can get work done on the way to/from the office, but even the HOV lanes grind to a halt at times. There has to be a solution to this traffic problem. Telecommuting is great, but not a option for the service sector, which is the growing workforce of America, especially in the cities. I wish I had the magic bullet to kill this beast, but I have even fewer ideas than I did for the situation back east.

My commute is longer than I wanted and it's not like I live that far away (Lynnwood/Brier/Kenmore is a scant 12 miles from the city proper). We tried to live closer, but it's way too expensive and the choices were few and far between (for houses & properties that fit 6 people and a dog in an area with decent schools). Other families face the same issue and it's even expensive for individuals & couples (want a nice downtown condo for a mere $2 million USD?)

Once we clear the boxes away, I plan on cycling a couple of times a week (at least I live close enough for that, and the Burke-Gilman trail makes it a much less harrowing experience than it might otherwise be). Between cycling and busing I can say that by moving here we did not become part of the problem.

One thing I do know is that tolls and gimmicks are not going to fix the gridlock – that will just put cash in the hands of the politicians.

Good article over @ the Foreign Policy blog on Ron Paul. He's *everywhere* you turn here in the greater Seattle area, and was hugely popular in the Fremont district (where I lived for a a while). It was nice to think that I may have had some choice for the 2008 debacle, but the more I read about the guy, the more I'm forced to think about nominating a piece of wood just to have some peace and quiet for four years.

It's time for Ron Paul's 15 minutes to be up | FP Passport: "Ron Paul is a seductive mistress. His popularity on MySpace and YouTube  is  now legendary. It  helped  him raise more than $5 million in the third quarter of this year's fundraising cycle. Even some among the media elite — on both sides of the aisle — can't resist his charm. Conservative blogger Andrew Sullivan gets downright giddy over Paul. And liberal Hardball host Chris Matthews  (who cut his teeth under big government, East Coast  Democrat Tip O'Neill)  has declared  of the libertarian from Texas: 'He's my guy! I love Ron Paul!'

But do people understand what Paul really stands for? Like every siren song,  his policies are fraught with danger."

Definitely give the whole thing a read. It's short and very informative.

You can also see how devoted his followers are over at this Ars Technica article (they seem to be creating illegal spambot networks to promote his campaign).

As I e-mailed to a few folks, I'm *really* glad "we" managed to convince the public that they are qualified to do stuff like this and then scared them into thinking they have to...

Belt buckle causes short-lived scare at airport: "Security gates at Sea-Tac Airport were temporarily shut down Wednesday afternoon after a woman reported seeing a gun in someone's belt buckle, spokesman Perry Cooper said.

But the sighting, which occurred behind security gates and was reported about 12:30 p.m., turned out to be an ornament within his belt buckle, Cooper said. 'It was harmless,' he said.

Security gates were closed for about 12 minutes so Port of Seattle police officers and Transportation Security Administration officials could investigate."

Are we sure we can't hold elections sooner?

WCSH6.com - National Guard Troops Denied Benefits After Longest Deployment Of Iraq War: "1st Lt. Jon Anderson's orders, and the orders of 1,161 other Minnesota guard members, were written for 729 days.

Had they been written for 730 days, just one day more, the soldiers would receive those benefits to pay for school.

"Which would be allowing the soldiers an extra $500 to $800 a month," Anderson said.

That money would help him pay for his master's degree in public administration. It would help Anderson's fellow platoon leader, John Hobot, pay for a degree in law enforcement.

"I would assume, and I would hope, that when I get back from a deployment of 22 months, my senior leadership in Washington, the leadership that extended us in the first place, would take care of us once we got home," Hobot said."

The current regime just cannot catch a break these days: pathetic energy policies, the "Blackwater" debacle (I try not to blog on Iraq) and now they can't even protect of our nation's most vulnerable citizens from an ill-conceived scheme that many of us thought (now correctly) was just a sneaky way to make "health care" executives richer.

Medicare Audits Show Problems in Private Plans - New York Times: "Tens of thousands of Medicare recipients have been victims of deceptive sales tactics and had claims improperly denied by private insurers that run the system’s huge new drug benefit program and offer other private insurance options encouraged by the Bush administration, a review of scores of federal audits has found."

(ever notice the recurring theme over the past ~7 years – find ways to put tons of our tax dollars into the hands of people that are already rich and then never do anything about the fact that the United States doesn't seem to get any real benefit in return?)

For the record, my mom has experienced much of what the NYT article reports; the claims are not exaggerations. Your administration can't seem to run anything properly.

Please, people, get rid of as many of these self-serving idiots in office as you can over the next few election years. Show them that you actually care for a change and aren't just falling for the rhetoric and voting on one issue you're passionate about. It will be easier in your local and state elections. Unfortunately, the whole presidential (I can't bring myself to capitalize that word anymore) nonsense in '08 will be difficult since there are so many problems on all sides that we may be better off putting a magic eight ball in charge for a while.