I hear that a bunch of American voters (of course that's only 40 % of us) think Secretary Clinton is not trustworthy. Well, if that were a requirement for public office, the halls of government would be empty. There are just degrees of trustworthiness. Those folks who trust D.J. Trump probably believe a used car salesperson when they tell you "this car was only driven on Sundays by a little old lady. Trust me." As far as wanting an outsider, Washington is a very difficult place to do business. You must know your way around the system. Electing an outsider President is like asking your bartender to do brain surgery. Another thing. You can't run the country like a business. That's apples and oranges. The first tenant of business is to turn a profit. Government's role is much different. How would Mr. Trumps businesses ( you know he mostly just sells his name to others to give their project an air of whatever - look it up!) do if he had to provide health care, provide police, fire protection, fund the educations, make sure food was safe, etc., etc., and etc., for his employees? Oh, one more thing. Never accept any statement given as a fact without proof. Never.

I Want My Country Back (who's country?)

A lot of people are spending a lot of money and a lot of time trying to ‘get our country back.’ If all these folks would simply focus on one thing they could probably do just that. And that one thing is campaign finance reform.

Our political leaders, those people elected to represent us, spend the majority of their time raising campaign funds to finance their re-election. Unfortunately, most of this money comes from large donors --big business, wall street, big banks, big drug companies, millionaires and billionaires, who expect a return on their investment.

If the people who elect these politicians expect fair representation, then it must be they who finance these campaigns, not deep pocket special interests.

Everything else is a waste of time.

Prostate Biopsies Can Really Hurt, but they don’t have to

Every man over 50 should absolutely, positively have a PSA done. The PSA is a blood test used to detect prostate cancer. A positive test does not necessarily mean prostate cancer, an enlarging prostate can result in a false positive, but the only way to be sure is to have a biopsy.

Now, I’ve have three of these, all negative, and the first one really hurt. So, for the other two I asked for a pain medication. The doctor wrote a prescription for two Vicodin. They made all the difference.

Don’t be afraid to ask. Pain is not character building and biting on a bullet only works in westerns.

Here's Hoping

Reading time 20 seconds

This may sound strange coming from a Democrat, but I’m kinda hoping the Republicans win the House of Representatives. Why? Because now they’d have to actually come up with a real plan to handle the massive debt they caused during the Bush years.

No longer could they kibitz from the bushes, they would now own the debt and have to come up with some real cuts the American people will tolerate. It’s a real problem because around 87 per cent of the debts are entitlements that can’t be touched, doesn’t leave them much to work with.

Let’s see how they trim what’s left by the four trillion they’d need to cut.

Tea Party You’ve Got the Right Idea, Just the Wrong Target

Reading time 20 seconds

There is little doubt the loose amalgamation of folks called the Tea Party has a lot of energy, it’s just too bad it’s misdirected. Throwing the bums out just gets you a different bunch of bums. In a revolution, one dictator is usually replaced by another, who may be worse.

The real problem in Washington isn’t the politicians; it’s the money behind them. Huge amounts of money are poured into Washington to influence politicians, who are for the most part decent Americans, who truly want to help. But, it is hard to turn down special interest money if your opponent in the next election accepts it.
If you want to bring change to Washington, Tea Party people, go after campaign finance reform.

That will be change you can believe in.

Who Needs the Middle Class?

Reading time 40 seconds

Why doesn’t the Republican Party care about the Middle Class? Because the Big Business interests they represent don’t need us.

Globalization gives Big Business access to a huge market outside the U.S. for their goods and services and cheap labor, so American Middle Class consumers and workers aren’t as important as they were.

As jobs for Americans become scarce, because more and more jobs are outsourced, Middle Class American workers will work for low wages they would never have accepted in the past. And there is little American workers can do to protect themselves, because since the Regan administration the Republican Party has worked to destroy the labor unions. Now workers are on there own and can no longer look to their unions to protect them from the predatory practices of Corporate America. So, not only can Big Business do with fewer American workers, jobs are so scarce they will work for less and less money and benefits than in the past. So, it is a win, win for the Big Business interests the Republicans represent.

The irony is that the Republican Party not only aids Corporate America, it gets the very people their policies hurt to help them do it by flat out lying about what they are really about. Brilliant!

Coincidence?

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was approved by about 7% of Southern Democrats, known as the Dixiecrats. From that time on into the 1990’s the South, which had once been primarily Democratic, became predominantly Republican, with many of the Dixiecrats joining the Republican Party whose Southern members had overwhelmingly opposed the Act.

Today the hard right wing of the Republican Party is dominated by Southern Republicans. Draw what conclusions you will.