Rep. Wolf calls it as he sees it

Rep. Frank Wolf, from my district in Virginia, bravely attacked Grover Norquist on the floor of Congress this week. As far as I know, this is the first Republican to speak out against Norquist and the anti-tax pledge he sold to the GOP. The pledge has helped paralyze Washington and delayed any economic recovery. The idiots who cling to the pledge should be thrown out of office for not performing their sworn duties. Their allegiance to Norquist, instead of their constituents, makes them unfit to govern.


Wolf, who has actually read this blog and who I have met while I was the editor of a local newspaper, is a relatively honorable politician, which is quite a contrast from Eric Cantor, another Virginian Republican who is such a conniving brat that it makes me ashamed to be a part of the Commonwealth whenever I hear him speak. Of course, Cantor is a Norquist supporter.


Hopefully, other Republicans will follow Wolf's lead and not allow Norquist to drag down America any further. We elect our politicians to vote in our best interests, not to take pledges to a single man who no one elected to any public office. Whether you believe in Norquist's ideas or not, it is a dangerous thing for politicians to limit their own abilities to negotiate solutions for the country by aligning themselves with a single individual or organization.

For what it's worth

I was listening to as much conservative talk radio as I could stomach today. The Wall Street protesters were being criticized by all the usual suspects on the right. It reminded me of the days when Vietnam War protesters were taking the heat from a similar-minded establishment crowd who thought there was absolutely nothing wrong with America.

Ultimately, the anti-war movement proved to be a just cause, similar to the environmental and civil rights movements born in the same era. I suspect history will one day credit the corporate greed demonstrators with helping to change the system for the better. I am grateful that so many Americans are beginning to voice their opinions again. Staying silent usually solves nothing in life, and there is too much wrong with this country for the masses to remain inactive.

An appreciation for history isn't a strength of modern-day conservatives. They still blame "socialist hippie" protesters for our losing the war. Heck, they probably still think Vietnam, like every war, was a noble way for us to sacrifice American lives and spend taxpayer money. In right-wing land, what's good for corporate America is also good for waging war and winning elections.

This new generation of hawks and greed monsters must be called out for their bad behavior over the last several years. Invading countries, using our money for bailouts to bolster executive bonuses, threatening our Social Security and busting unions just can't continue. If government is going to side with Wall Street and not Main Street, then I expect these protests will spread. If corporations are going to turn their backs on the unemployed, then they will also hear from us.

Sadly, righties like presidential candidate Herman Cain think unemployed people are to blame for not having jobs. Yup, that's what he said in a recent interview. That's how out of touch he and the Republican Party have become. And by the way, Mr. Cain, your pizza is as terrible as your politics.

I hope Americans grow weary of sacrificing their sons and daughters, their paychecks and their homes to a political ideology that has done nothing but provide advantages to people who don't need help. Granted, not every social or economic policy from the left works, but at least the intent is usually good. Can you really say the same for those who are protecting oil companies?

It seems to me that all great ideas -- great music, art, innovation and righteous causes -- of the last 40 years, did not come from hard-line, close-minded conservatives protecting the status quo. The iconic moments, movements and inventions in recent history have almost always been sparked by those with a more inclusive, liberal, out-of-the-box approach to life in general. People with empathy who can relate to the struggles of the poor or the decline middle class. They see a need and try to fill it. People daring to make a difference, like a Steve Jobs, who grew up among the hippies and embraced many liberal principles. And while those progressive principles were being formed and ignited, there was always a group on the other side of the room, stuck in wanting to protect themselves from change while remaining on top of the economic and social ladders. This left-brain, right-brain battle has probably been going on since the beginning of time, but it has now reached a boiling again because the do-nothings won't even provide us with a ladder to climb anymore.


Companies can't continue to grow massive profits while driving their employees into the ground and claiming they don't have the cash to hire some help. They used the recession and layoffs to expand profit margins and, I guess, thought no one would notice the accumulating pile of cash sitting in the corner office. Well, we've finally noticed.

Corporate America, you should resume hiring. You can provide help to your employees who are stretched thin and, at the same time, put some unemployed Americans back to work. You only have to do one thing to accomplish this: Reduce your greed. You don't have to wait for the recession to end or for the 2012 elections. You don't have to necessarily have more customers. Your profits are at a record rate now. Burning out your employees and not getting more money into the economy by expanding your workforce might help your quarterly reports for the short term, but it won't do much for your business in the long run.

I remember a scene from the Godfather II film where a young and upcoming Michael Corleone is meeting with other mafia bosses on a balcony overlooking Havana in the 1950s. He mentions that he saw some rebels while traveling to the hotel. The other established, older mob bosses told Corleone not to worry about the silly rebels. They were no threat to the powerful government of Cuba, which was in bed with the mafia. Still, Corleone felt that people willing to demonstrate, get arrested and even die for a cause were not people to be overlooked. Within days of that conversation at the hotel, the revolutionaries overthrew the government and the wealthy mobsters had to grab their riches and flee the country. Maybe one day Rush Limbaugh will be forced to vacate his Florida compound the way the mobsters had to leave Cuba.

We are at a crossroads where one group of people sees the folly and injustice of continuing to do the same abusive thing over and over (giving tax cuts to the rich and protect Wall Street), while the other side holds on tightly to its accountants, lobbyists and country club memberships. One side is seeking the truth. The other side is trying to cover it up, even when the truth spills all over the Gulf of Mexico or steals the jobs of once hard-working citizens so that outrageous bonuses can be paid to executives whose main value is in their willingness to eliminate jobs.

One side is trying to educate us, the other is selling us something that simply doesn't work for most people, much the way PCs didn't operate as well as Macs, yet PCs were shoved down our throats by big business their marketing branches.

Even the wealthy are divided. The rich on one side want to be taxed in order to help solve our problems, while the rich on the other side never offer an extra dime of their money for anything that doesn't involve them getting even wealthier.

Both sides claim to be for the middle class, but is there anything in the record on the far right that indicates we really matter to the top 1 percent? Put aside the flag-waving, country music festivals and Tea Party nonsense and what do you really have on the right that is of any use to those of us trying to build or maintain middle class life? I am not interested in false patriotism that is based on emotions more than facts. I am interested in truth and solutions.

As these protests continue, people are going to feel compelled to support or reject the demonstrations. I hope folks will base that decision on the message and not on the interpretation of the message from those on the right with a hidden agenda. The Eric Cantors of the political world are not your friends. They are not on your side. Don't help them support the 1 percent. Help yourselves by uniting with those who are fighting for you.

While the mobsters thought that an increasingly corrupt Cuba was safe for their criminal enterprises to continue forever, people with nothing left to lose often have a very different opinion. Whether you're a college student worried about finding a job or a mid-career victim of layoffs, you intimately know something that some Americans still don't realize. The deck is stacked against us. No matter how hard we work or how well educated or trained we become, we can't claim our fair share of the pie if the pie is taken off the table by the 1 percent of elitists and antiquated tricksters in Washington. That needs to change. That is what these protests are about.


Unemployed from variety of backgrounds join protest.

The man made great products

Like most people, I didn't know Steve Jobs personally. But I do know a thing or two about his products, having worked with them professionally for years.

Everything Apple makes works. While some folks marvel at the company's innovations, I appreciate the fact that anything Apple is intuitively easy to use and functions as advertised. That says a lot about the former head of the company who died tonight.

From the design of the packaging to the development of software, Apple products gave people the impression that Jobs ran a different type of business. In this day and age where CEOs know much more about corporate profits than they do their own products or employees, Jobs was a breath of fresh air. You could feel his hands-on passion for perfection in every iPhone, iPod or Macintosh computer.

While Jobs was also a marketing genius and great pitchman, Apple products spoke for themselves. He didn't wait for the recession to end before pursuing his visions.

And, oh yeah, Apple became one of the most profitable companies in America at the same time other companies were cutting corners, laying off thousands of employees and providing services and products that no one wanted.

Jobs deserves a lot of credit for being the anti-CEO CEO and for creating a business model that a lot of other company leaders could learn from if they could put aside their shortsightedness and greed.

Buddhism and Steve Jobs.

A cause that deserves some play

This is the top of the CNN.com home page today. As you can see, there is a picture of unemployed people (mostly mid-career white guys) standing in line to apply for jobs. Next to that picture and story is a photo and article about the growing protests against Wall Street, our gridlocked government and a variety of other social and economic issues.

As I mentioned in my previous post, I support any movement that is going to shine some light on the gross unfairness of what has become a corrupted, rigged-for-the-rich system -- a system that has led to catastrophic unemployment rate and the loss of the American Dream. I also support the media coverage.

While the Tea Party on the far right seems to focus only on one or two issues -- abolishing taxes and supporting gun ownership -- these protesters on the left have a broader sense of what has really caused the collapse of America and what it will take to restore hope. And it isn't more guns or less government intervention.

I applaud this coverage and high-visibility display by CNN and hope other media outlets will give these current movements as much publicity as they gave to the Tea Party and protesters abroad.

Along with the 99 percent finally waking up, maybe the mainstream media has also awakened to the fact that they don't have to go overseas to cover chronic injustices. Perhaps the media will put a little less time into covering one American girl's battle to beat a murder rap in Italy and place more prominence on what is becoming massive movement that addresses issues that impact virtually every citizen of this country.

As prudent news judgment and smart story selection continue to slide, the media has been late on a lot of important and relevant stories in the last decade. Underplaying and overplaying stories is an epidemic in more and more newsrooms and is a factor in creating fertile ground for abuse of power to grow in government and society in general. Missing the boat on the unemployment crisis is quite ironic for an industry that has been as hard hit as any in terms of job loss. I often wonder if a more responsible, competent news media could have prevented a lot of economic pain, not to mention two wars, if it had concentrated more on watchdog journalism instead of pouring limited resources into what is essentially fluff.

Perhaps if editors, news directors, writers and photographers would return to covering news that matters most to our way of life -- to our very existence as a nation -- they would not only help inform an apathetic or often misinformed public, but they would help themselves in restoring the once-positive image of journalism.