WASTING YOUR VOTE

I would say that if you are voting in a close race, and your vote might make the difference between electing a completely corrupt Republican like Tom Delay or a delusional paranoid like Dick Cheney or a clueless spoiled brat like Rand Paul, then you should vote for the Democrat. You should vote for the Democrat because they are heading in the direction we need to go, instead of digging our country's grave as eagerly as Dick Cheney built his Veep bunker so he could sleep at night.

Otherwise, vote for what you believe - and your vote is not being wasted. Whoever the elected politicians are, they all are impressed by people who actually voted and refused to vote for any mainstream politician. They look for opportunities to pick up those votes next time.

The best example is Ross Perot's election victory. He had been a Republican, he refused to go along with the corrupt expansion of the deficit under Reagan and Bush the Barfer, he spent $25 million to educate the American people about the dangers of running up the federal deficit.

In the 1992 election, he received almost 20 million actual votes. I don't think it's a coincidence that the next administration went on to achieve a balanced budget. Clinton and Gore showed us how to do it - restrain growth of federal spending, create only tax cuts that actually help grow the economy instead of reward political cronies, and wait for steady growth of the economy to increase revenues until a balanced budget is achieved.

I don't think this would have happened without Perot and his 19,741,065 votes.

So go out and vote intelligently for candidates that truly represent you.

Just remember Ralph "The Shyster" Nader and Florida 2000. We would not have suffered the attacks on 9/11 or any of the aftermath if Gore had become our next President.

BIG OIL

Let's not get confused here.

This debate is not about science or education or evidence or hypotheses or data.

It's about money, lots and lots of money.

Opposition to beliefs about global warming doesn't just spring up from nowhere. Global warming and especially public policies to mitigate global warming represent a direct threat to the income levels of the world's biggest and wealthiest corporations. And so we see the backlash - designed to confuse and especially to delay any effective public policies to reduce fossil fuel use.

Is there a controversy? No. It's very clear that adding components to the atmosphere that absorb infrared will trap solar energy and that this added heat will cause temperatures to rise.

Don't believe that? Try a test yourself. Park your car in bright summer sunlight with the windows open. You're now experiencing how effective 100 miles of atmosphere is at trapping solar energy. Now roll up all the windows. And wait. Even a fraction of an inch of solid glass is more effective at trapping infrared radiation than our atmosphere. It just doesn't get out. See how long you can stand it in there. (Don't take any small children or pets with you.)

Nobody knows what the long term effects will be from the energy being trapped by increased levels of greenhouse gases. Will the Arctic ice cap disappear in a few years? Probably. Its total area and average thickness are as small as human beings have ever witnessed. Will sea coast cities see more powerful storms that cause terrible destruction? Probably. Who's next after New Orleans? Will the Sahara migrate northwards to Europe and the Mojave to Sacramento? Maybe. It seems Australia is already running out of water in many places.

So the safe thing to do is to minimize fossil fuel burning and try to keep things the way they are. You might even say that was the conservative approach.

But these days, conservative means selling out to big money, in this case, Big Oil and Big Coal.

There's a better term for an unholy alliance between corporations and government, coined by Benito Mussolini in reference to the Roman fasces weapon.

How sad that one generation of Americans went to war to protect us from fascism, and that the present generation of Americans includes so many who embrace it.

AMERICA THE BOOBYFUL

During the Bush/Cheney years, the Republicans had their chance to show what their ideas meant in the real world.

The rich got richer, everybody else got left behind, the economy was destroyed by parasites from within, the Constitution was shredded, the leaders of the government used their positions and powers for the personal gain of themselves and their cronies.

Things got so bad, we actually elected a black President.

Now it's two years later. Some of the mess has gotten cleaned up. We have started back on a path to decency and strength and prosperity. But we were in a very deep hole and we have a long way to go.

But we elect Presidents, not Popes. Obama has had to work within a political system designed to have checks and balances and limits to power, against a cynical and traitorous political opposition that is PROUD of the damage they did to the rest of us because THE RICH GOT RICHER. That's who they work for after all, that's who owns the news channels and talk radio stations and bizarro right wing pressure groups.

Obama has been more of a centrist than an extremist, and it can be frustrating watching him try to work with the utterly corrupt America-hating GOP. But he is working for a better future for all of us, and we are making progress. He's right that things will get immeasurably worse if the Congress goes Republican.

Unfortunately, too many Americans are too dumb to remember how bad things were and how much worse things were getting two years ago. We like to think of ourselves as Number One, and we were for a while.

But in the end, we get the government we deserve. And if we vote for the liars and thieves and fools and bigots that populate the Republican Party these days, we will destroy ourselves and our future the way many other great nations of the past destroyed themselves.

We have a chance to keep moving forward, with Obama and the Democrats in charge. Or we can hold our noses and jump back down the rathole with the GOP. Who are we? What happens next?

Welcome to America the Boobyful?

Too bad. We had a chance to be great.

GENERATION SCREWED

Sorry, boys and girls.

You won't have what your parents had.

We could get a job. If we finished college, we could get a better job.

Even high school graduates could get a decent-paying job, marry a lovely sweetheart, buy a decent house, and raise an adorable family.

Sorry, kids.

Your jobs have disappeared, because corporate bigwigs have found ways to employ underpaid foreign workers and still sell products at American prices.

This strategy has been pouring money into their pockets for a few years now.

Eventually, foreign companies will realize that self-indulgent American executives are only parasites, and foreign competitors will take over the industries they were so kindly trained to operate.

That's good, if you want to build economies around the world and make human life better in the Third World.

It's a little scary if you are a young American looking for a job, and looking for a career that will last until you hit retirement age. Sorry about that.

Boy, are you screwed.

If you want to make a difference, if you want some hope, I have some advice.

Vote in every election, and NEVER vote for a Republican.

Good luck. You are going to need it.

THE MIDTERMS

I'm hoping that the midterm elections won't turn out as badly as some have predicted.

But the United States has already sliced its wrists and turned on the gas in the oven.

Before WWII, in the 1930's, the United States was nothing special.

After WWI, in the 1950's, the United States was NUMBER ONE in just about everything.

Europe and Asia were devastated, rebuilding their cities and homes.

The wonderfully fortunate Americans were roaring on, profiting from a hugely expanded manufacturing base.

But that's over now.

A corporate class, loyal to profits, contemptuous of national interest, has lined their pockets by shipping American manufacturing overseas. Now it's gone.

The next generation of Americans will have to ask themselves, How long can a trade deficit be financed, when do we have to pay the bill, and how in hell can we do that?

Get ready for the 21st Century.

Get ready for the collapse of the USA.

Unfortunately, the average American was too stupid to vote in his or her best interest. He and she thought TV news and TV ads were telling them the truth.

Morons.

ELECTION RESULTS

There is one reason to expect the Democrats will do better than anyone expects right now.

Cell phones.

There is also a reason to expect that things will be as bad as the super-rich hope for.

Young voters.

Young voters don't have land lines or answer them when they ring. They have cell phones, and they use them to talk and text and play goofy games while they are waiting for the bus to arrive or the class to end. What's important about this is that they almost NEVER get included in political polls.

Pollsters only call land line numbers, and talk to those few people willing to answer their questions. That process reaches many more old people than young people. So young people, and their political opinions, don't get included in polls.

Pollsters get around this by weighting their responders according to how likely they think the responders are to vote. They expect settled older people to vote, so their responses are counted as a lot of real votes on Election Day. They don't expect young people to get their act together, so their responses don't get weighted as heavily.

This is how we get right leaning pollsters and left leaning pollsters, by the weights they choose to use to massage their data.

Right now the polls are heavily weighted by the responses of older voters, many of them still deluded by the notion that Republicans are fiscally responsible instead of shameless liars and thieves.

But young voters aren't even in the polls. Pollsters can't even talk to them, because they don't call cell phones.

If young voters act like typical young voters, the GOP may get back to its usual shenanigans. If young voters actually vote, a lot of people and pundits are going to be surprised.