Failing America

First Amendment

2007-10-27T15:23:00.000-04:00

This week FEMA, our governmental hero and savior, held a staged press conference in reference to their outstanding performance in dealing with the California fires. FEMA employees asked a series of questions in a posed press conference that was carried live on FoxNews and MSNBC (link).

FEMA set this up as genuine press conference. They only gave fifteen minutes notice to reporters, and would not allow questions via telephone. They intended for it to be aired, and thus suppressed freedom of press by having federal government employees pose as journalists.

This seems to be accepted by many because FEMA is being praised for doing a much better job than it did with Hurricane Katrina. The two incidents have little in common. Katrina was a multi-state disaster that caused millions to lose their homes over a few hours. Also, Katrina happened in a location that is mostly poor, and thus the residents cannot "self help" as easily. California is a wealthy state. Individuals have more money, and the state has more money. The number of people without a home is a fraction from Katrina, and the duration is much sorter: days versus months and years for most involved. So the California job was much easier for FEMA.

The control of the press is not new. Armstrong Williams, a syndicated radio personality, was paid $241,000 via the Department of Education to promote the No Child Left Behind Act as part of a public relations campaign (link). Control of the press can also be attributed in my previous post, Public Domain.

Public Domain

2007-10-21T09:00:00.000-04:00

This is an amazing story. A Phoenix newspaper has been subpoenaed because of four specific articles it published. The truly amazing part of the subpoena, is that the IP addresses of the readers of those articles is requested. The four articles referred to in the subpoena can be found here: (1, 2, 3, 4).

I am not familiar with the ins and outs of the local politics in Phoenix. But what seems to be the larger issue here, on the side of the local government, is that this newspaper published the address of Sheriff Joe Arpaio. The address of the sheriff is public record due to his financial disclosure statement when he ran for office. But it is illegal to post the address of a law enforcement officer on the Internet in the state of Arizona and most other states. However, I did a trace route on the IP address of the web site that has the sheriff's Financial Disclosure Statement in PDF, and found it be be recorder.maricopa.gov. So the local government itself has his address posted on the Internet, and this is where the newspaper retrieved the information.

Whether or not these journalists can actually be prosecuted for posting pubic information on the Internet is a matter in itself. When the IP addresses, browser information, and operating systems of individuals accessing the news web site is requested through the court, there is an abuse of power. It is intimidating and threatening to request information on readers of a web site. In countries such as Iran and China, many people justifiably access news web sites using proxy servers so the government cannot censor and/or track what they are reading for fear of legal repercussion.

Two Party System

2007-09-29T11:29:00.000-04:00

Since Ross Perot ran for president in 1992, I have heard the argument that we should not vote for someone who does not have a chance of winning. I find this argument absurd. Most of the elephants and jackasses are funded and kept by the same zookeepers. And doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result is insanity.

This two party mindset has allowed for a handful of states to select the president through the presidential primaries. And I think that movie with Eddie Murphy is a good example of how our representatives are elected: by name recognition, party lines, or random selection.

I vote for who I believe is the best candidate on the ballot no matter the amount of media coverage. And if I am not comfortable voting for any of the choices, I write one in.

We are not limited to Ken Blackwell and Sherrod Brown. Nor are we limited to Hillary Clinton and Rudolph Giuliani.

And when the vice president (Cheney) goes hunting with a supreme court justice (Scalia) for a few days, or the President (Clinton & Bush) has selected justices to the White House for dinner, this government fails.

And it has been failing for a long time, because the people are no longer involved.

A Republic, If You Can Keep It

2007-09-15T12:35:00.000-04:00

The Republic is lost. I believe it started with the 17th amendment. Before then elected state officials selected the senators to represent the state in Washington. This provided a checks and balances between the federal government and the state government. With the 17th amendment the people selected three representative to congress instead of one. To me this is where we as a nation shifted toward a democracy.

During the Great Depression the government tried to satisfy its people with the welfare system. More and more complained and more and more received this welfare. When the industrial boom after WWII began to cool off the government tried to satisfy businesses through tax breaks. These tax breaks became corporate welfare.

The government also began nation building after WWII in Germany and Japan. This is now commonplace. Our military now acts as World Police instead of protectors of the United States of America.

Today I struggle to recognize the government set forth by the constitution. It was set up to be a republic. But the Republic no longer exists. Democracy no longer exists. What exists is a government controlled by money. Lobbyists control the votes in congress. The president goes unchecked, and the Supreme Court seems to be almost irrelevant except in cases such as eminent domain.

In a country where only 54% vote during a presidential election and about 40% in midterm elections, it is no wonder our government does what it wants. And mass media does its damnedest to select the presidential nominees and most other elected officials.

I don't know of a sure solution, but I believe the only way things can change is through the people discussing their opinions. Not to get into arguments and scare people away or cause them to shut down, but to learn where we agree and where we can stand together to make changes.

Census Reports

2007-09-13T16:52:00.000-04:00

Having done some genealogy research, I appreciate census reports. For years and years the Census Bureau conducted surveys every ten years to determine the demographics of the United States. For the most part these were non-specific questions. The Census Bureau now conducts surveys every two years. The 2008 questionnaire is quite long and the questions are very specific. It asks for information on utility bills, vehicles driven, mortgage amount, income, disabilities, level of military service disability, recent absence from work, and the questions go on and on (Link).

The most surprising, at least to me, is that the Census Bureau has hired Draftfcb of New York for “an estimated” $200 million to help reach a larger audience for the 2010 census (Link). What larger audience is the Census Bureau seeking? This is absolutely unsatisfactory. And who is Draftfcb? Well, I looked them up. Draftfcb is a marketing company. They do advertising for Kmart, Yum Brands, Nabisco, Dow Chemical Company, Honda, Kraft, Toyota, Lego Group, and now the federal government (Link).

It is an Orwellian tactic to conduct these in-depth surveys. The information collected by the Census Bureau should be non-specific. In the 2008 questionnaire, most of the questions are simply none of its business.

Iran

2007-09-12T10:04:00.000-04:00

We need to go to war with Iran! No, we don’t. But there are Iranians fighting us in Iraq...

There are Saudis fighting us in Iraq (Link). There are Chinese weapons being used against us in Iraq. There are Russian weapons being used against us in Iraq. Should we attack China, Russia, and Saudi Arabia as well? No. Well maybe we should have attacked the latter six years ago since 15 of the 19 hijackers were from Saudi Arabia, but not now. We've waited too long to do what needed done from the attacks in 2001. Osama bin Laden is more than likely in Pakistan. And we seem to have given up on him.

A war with Iran would be a disaster. Every country in the Middle East would turn against us. And We would once again try to act as a police force and not a military force. And where would Russia and China stand? Recently Russian bombers have been flying near Guam and the U.K. as they did during the Cold War. Will that bring in North Korea? Where would our allies stand? England has withdrawn almost all of its troops from Iraq. And since we can't take on the world, no matter what some may think, we mustn't attack Iran.

Six Years

2007-09-11T09:38:00.001-04:00

Six years ago today my stove was repaired at around 10AM. Normally that would not be a memorable event. What I learned while it was repaired, I will never forget. I saw the headline on Yahoo and clicked on the link, but the request timed out. Every major news website timed out. I turned to fark.com and AM radio for information. At the time I did not have cable television and only picked up PBS, so the TV wasn’t an option for me.

I felt a plethora of emotions as most everyone did throughout that week and since. I felt sorrow, excitement, anger, more anger, and hatred. Those feelings are still there. Nearly three thousand American citizens were killed. A list with profiles can be found here. Take time to remember the victims.

Attack of the Chinese

2007-09-05T21:28:00.000-04:00

It is just about impossible to find clothing not made in Asia, Central America (including Mexico), and the Middle East. Of course most comes from China. And as we have learned eighty percent of all toys are made in China. Chances are your computer desk/table is made in China. In the six months since the initial dog food recall, Washington has done nothing to fix the problem. And the problem is getting bigger. Millions of toys have been recalled. Toothpaste with anti-freeze ingredients, deadly tires, poisoned fish, the Chinese inspectors taking bribes to look the other way. Of course the Chinese play it off as one guy (Zheng Xiaoyu, whom they executed), but there is no way it is just one guy.

The United States is also very slow to recall these products. Nicaragua recalled Chinese toothpaste in October/November of 2006 (Link). Australia recalled Barbie products in May of 2007 (Link), while they were not recalled in the United States until three months later.
Why is the United States so slow? The probable answer is big business. Billions of dollars have been lost due to the Chinese recalls. You can contact your congressional representatives in the House and Senate, but I fear they will do little to actually fix the situation. (Though you should still do it.) They will hold committee meetings and release a report that says, "Shame on China," but don't expect import/export laws to change. I fear our representatives care more of what their campaign funding lobbyists say than constituents. We need to take to heart where our products come from. I'm not saying buy only American. But make an effort to protect yourself and your family and not buy Chinese made products that are consumed or that kids may come into contact with. Buying a Chinese welcome mat for your front door is probably okay. Buying Chinese fish... well, that's stupid. The only way to ensure policies are changed is to affect the financial statements of these companies.

So we have to be proactive. Our passive attitude of "Someone else will fix it," or "It's not that bad," has to end. No one is fixing it, and it is that bad. The Chinese military hacked the Pentagon computers (Link), British government computers (Link), and German government computers (Link). Hello, is anyone there? We've waited a long time to take action. It's not going to get easier. It's time to make a stand.