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TechnoratiMy State Legislature's Crazier than Yours. Oh Yeah?
California should just be done with it and rename the entire state "Neverland Ranch."
This serves several useful purposes. It would be the ultimate tribute to Michael Jackson, pleasing his most ardent and bereft fans. Further validate the state's Cloud Cuckoo, fairy tale reputation, thus probably promoting additional, revenue-generating tourism. Stand as an accurate metaphor for the state government's airheaded inability to cope with its current financial disaster.
On Wednesday, Governor Schwarzenegger announced that California's deficit has grown to $26.3 billion and proposed billions of additional cuts to education. He declared a fiscal emergency, triggering an automatic 45-day deadline for the state legislature to come up with a plan to cover the shortfall and balance the budget. If that fails, they're banned from considering any other legislation until they come up with a solution.
Arnold also signed an executive order forcing the state's 220,000 employees to take a third, unpaid furlough day every month. This, after weeks of failed proposals, threatened vetoes, political contortionism, suspended social programs -- a fiscal train wreck of such proportions that on Thursday the state planned on starting to pay its bills with IOU's instead of cash.
It's "an institutional breakdown," according to State Treasurer Bill Lockyer, a Democrat. Lockyer has called for professional mediation to unjam talks between legislators and Governor Terminator, and even a two-tiered budget system that would raise taxes and allot resources differently for different parts of the state.
That may sound crazy, but this is California. Besides, we in New York State are in no position to cast stones. Our State Senate has degenerated into a slaphappy free-for-all that resembles a drunken demolition derby more than anything remotely like a deliberative body.
On June 8, two Democratic state senators, both of whom are under investigation on an assortment of charges, defected to the other side of the aisle, giving the Republicans a 32-30 majority. Then one of the Democrats changed what was left of his mind and went back, creating a 31-31 split and deadlock.
Under normal circumstances, the lieutenant governor, who also serves as Senate president, could break a tie. But currently, we don't have one of those. David Paterson had the job until he was elevated to the top spot when Governor Eliot Spitzer was caught engaged in commercialized bedhopping and resigned.
Last month's legislative coup has led to name-calling, accusations, general inertia and circumstances under which, among other assorted wackiness, the guy who the Republicans say is the current Senate president has claimed that because there is no lieutenant governor, he should have two votes.
Because neither side can come up with the requisite 32 members for a quorum, the Senate disintegrated into a series of alternating, one-party sessions during which nothing could be accomplished. Although on Tuesday, when Democrats spotted Republican member Frank Padavan walking through the rear of the chamber, they seized on the moment, claiming a quorum, and started ramming through legislation, which the Republicans say was illegal. Padavan says he was just taking a shortcut for a cup of coffee.
Imagine West Side Story meets Duck Soup, with the Marx Brothers playing the Sharks and Jets, using whoopee cushions instead of switchblades, and you get the general idea. With the backing of a court order, Governor Paterson is trying to force all 62 members into the chamber for daily "extraordinary" sessions at which he hopes a deal can be cut that will get the Senate up and running again. He says he'll keep them coming right through the Fourth of July weekend. Some are refusing to attend. Watch this space.
Because, despite all the foolishness, as in California, this is serious stuff with potentially dire consequences. As The New York Times reports, June 30 "was the expiration date of more than a dozen statutes that authorize local governments to carry out their everyday duties, from planning budgets to collecting taxes. And as Democrats and Republicans in the Senate continued... to argue fruitlessly over who controlled the chamber, officials around the state were left to ponder contingency plans that they never thought they would need."
What's also infuriating is the way certain enabled individuals consciously are helping stymie any possible breakthrough. In California, it's Governor Schwarzenegger, whose veto threats, blocking of short-term loans, and refusal to raise any tax or virtually any fee have thrown additional wooden shoes into the works.
In New York, it's not the governor, who has tried to break gridlock but whose efficacy is virtually nil and popularity is south of "get lost." It's upstate billionaire businessman Tom Golisano, a gadfly who, according to the Times, helped broker the defection of the two NY Senate Democrats that precipitated the current mess. Apparently, he did so out of pique over proposed tax hikes on the wealthy.
It's all a nasty game that puts cronyism, partisan bickering, and corrupt, despicable self-interest above the needs of increasingly desperate citizens. Especially abhorrent as we celebrate the country's independence and commemorate that long ago struggle against abuses of power.
At least Brooklyn Democratic Senator John Sampson, when asked this week if he was embarrassed about the situation, had the grace to reply, "Embarrassed? That's an understatement. We're ashamed."
Indeed.
67 Comments so far
Show AllI apologize for my earlier comments on this thread. They were uncalled for and totally out of line. Actually juvenile. I have some idea why I wrote what I wrote, but nobody deserved my vitriol. Esp. not SR. Again, I apologize.
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Don't complain you elect the jackasses, a second and third time. A two party system doesn't work , nor does the electoral process, other countries call an election and parties have 40 days or so to campaign and thats it and any group can field candidates.
California after all is just a state of mind, what do you expect from the superfluous celebrity worshippers, it just leads the pack, the rest will follow some sooner others later, look at Alaska right up there with Californiai, who would have thunk it?
I love you all! Common Dreams seems to be evolving as an integral community where we respect our differences and argue them out while rejoicing in our commondreams.
I'm from Ohio though I now live a couple of hundred yards over the line, in Indiana. I work in Ohio. I lived in Columbus for several years. Back in the 80s, after "the greatest recession since the Great Depression." I lived back then for a year in a storage space. I survived by scavenging and when my car broke down I fixed it myself.
Ohio just gave itself a week's reprieve on its upcoming budget, while Gov. Strickland (D) is now bailing out of his earlier opposition to slot machines, etc. to raise revenue.
Someone needs to create a bronze statue of Naomi Klein, and set it atop a prominent place at "Wall Street" (I used to work there, at The American Banker). Perhaps near the Embarkation Line to Staten Island via the Fairies (sp?). Back in the day I could float to Staten Island for a nickel, and a slice of pizza in Manhattan cost a dime. So did a ride to work or school on the subway. I kid you not! Let's talk INFLATION.
Below her statue should be engraved, "Fill in the blank."
The shit is now hitting the fan, and Grover Norquist is laughing all the way to his bailed out investment bank,
AND, Sioux Rose I love you but you suggested that you would follow through on my love affair with pornography versus your view that it demeans femininity, and you have not done so. (Or have I missed something... ? Let's just go
Can we meet at a Motel 6 in Muncie, just you and me... I'll wear the burka! If you will wear the bikini.
Thanks to the neocons, led in essence by Newt Gingrich and RadioMouth Fatso, nearly all of the institutions we have built up over many decades---even centuries, such as the right of Habeus Corpus---are collapsing.
When centuries-old Institutions fail, while those who said they would restore civility do not, what does that say about us?
We need to stop being merely cerebral, and ACT, by any means that is not self-destructive.
You know who you are. You know what you mean.
See you in Muncie SR!!!
Just kidding.
I am not a troll. I am just a human being who thinks too much.
And Sioux Rose, I want to FUCK your eyes out.
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Sioux Rose
OLE MAN: I think your last line was uncalled for!
I did answer your pornography comment. I asked that you read Robert Jensen's book, "Getting Off." For the past year or so I have dated a much younger man who is very LOW in consciousness. Hanging out with him was a sort of Dianne Fossey anthropological research project that has allowed me to understand how the blue collar worker, the American male who identifies with simplistic warrior concepts like "we're number 1" comes to his beliefs. TV is a HUGE influence. In any case, my companion related that the violent car crash scenes and general explosions have had their antes upped incresingly. It's as if the audience constantly needs more intensity to "get off." And that is the analogy I would make to porn.
I love sex (with someone I feel that connection with), and I am certainly no prude. I have gay friends and I can even appreciate the aesthetics of same sex coupling. But when a woman is gang banged by 50 men, when she is ejaculated upon by a series of men, when she is penetrated in every entry point by a few men then YES I find that profoundly offensive! In fact, I find it homo-erotic. The men are really too cowardly to screw eachother, so they have a form of contact through the female who serves as nothing but an object of entry. I find this incredibly damaging to relationships between men and women. These images, particularly if they are "consumed" on a regular basis, POLLUTE the consciousness.
Did you know that before India had any Christian influence there were symbols prevalent in TEMPLES of genitals merged. The symbol, known as the Shivalinga, was considered worthy of worship! And that's because in Tantric sex, each person becomes the doorway to the other's capacity to raise consciousness. Rajneesh explains how in the West everything is oriented towards the goal, toward the "race to get there," i.e. orgasm. Tantric sex is about being INSIDE an experience, that is not about a physical release so much as an energetic raising of pure frequency.
At a time when so many women are battered, when rape is prolific and a staple of warfare, when the U.N reported that 50% of women will know some form of abuse during their lifetimes, when young females are sold into sexual slavery... as a woman I find it CRIMINAL that images like the ones you forced me to relate (above) are being sent round the word. Porn is a huge multi-billion dollar industry, and professor Jensen did research to find out what the "big titles" were.
If sex was about pleasure for both parties, or even three parties, and if there was RESPECT and it was about seeing the Light in other, rather than casting them to the equivalent of biological GARBAGE container, I would see it very differently, In short, this is not your father's porn. It's DESTRUCTIVE. And it does play into the same dehumanization that makes for torture. There was plenty to suggest as much.
And please, anyone who wants to respond stating they personally like porn... how about considering what the net effect is on society? We are NOT a balanced society, nor a loving one. The focus on weapons, arms, and the ejaculatory powers of blast-off ordnance in my view reflects enormous levels of repressed anger. People ache for love, and love cannot exist where abuse and degradation do. Our nation is sick on too many levels, and the symptoms all seem to feed off one another. Lack of respect for the Divine Feminine figures prominently into the CAUSE of this disorder. Porn makes it FAR worse. Degrading one's partner is like defecating on the canal through which LIFE arises. That zone should be SACRED as opposed to absolutely DEBASED. It is a CRIME against women, Mother Earth, and the Divine feminine; and like all my rants about Mars rules, notice that as porn rises so do violence levels. Without a BALANCE between Venus and Mars, our earth has veered off course. And do you not find it rather poetic in its symbolic value that earth happens to be placed in an orbit between Venus and Mars, that we learn to LIVE and embrace the significance of that position by emulating the law of balance?
"People ache for love, and love cannot exist where abuse and degradation do."
Exactly!!
Sioux Rose,
I could hardly believe what I was reading -- and your response is so intelligent! I have little to add.
Your writing kept reminding me of Marion Woodman's work, and her concerns that the gap between the masculine and feminine seems to be widening, rather than narrowing.
You also brought to mind William Blake, from The Marriage of Heaven and Hell:
No bird soars too high, if he soars with his own wings.
Prisons are built with stones of Law, Brothels with bricks of religion.
Joys impregnate. Sorrows bring forth.
Always be ready to speak your mind, and a base man will avoid you.
The eagle never lost so much time as when he submitted to learn of the crow.
Expect poison from the standing water.
Damn braces. Bless relaxes.
If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, infinite.
For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro' narrow chinks of his cavern.
The man who never alters his opinion is like standing water, and breeds reptiles of the mind.
Sioux Rose
KAY: Thank you for the support. Sisterhood is STILL powerful! Just as so many White persons are out of touch with their innate racism (I'm sure I have some shadowy traces although I have definitely worked to overcome any hidden prejudice), many men are so accustomed to the ubiquitous sexist aspects of society that they barely notice their existence, or their complicity with these insidious elements!
The poem is profound. Thank you for sharing it.
I am protesting this 4th by NOT watching as the "rockets red glare, the (pseudo, via fireworks) bombs bursting in air." Too many have died or lost their homes & livelihoods to America's celebration of a cruel, unapologetic, continuous tribute to MARS. The fact that militarism advances at a suicidal marching rate even when the money is needed to feed the hungry, house the poor, heal the sick, and educate tomorrow's children... THAT says it all. Our nation like an arrogant aging warrior ingests Viagra while falling on its own sword. Genius? Hardly.
I, too, am protesting by not watching the fireworks, or attending the so-called celebrations -- for exactly the same reasons.
"Our nation like an arrogant aging warrior ingests Viagra while falling on its own sword. Genius? Hardly."
You probably know that Pfizer is planning to supply men with Viagra -- free of charge, if they have lost their jobs, savings and health insurance.
I e-mailed them to ask if they were also planning to supply free birth control pills, condoms, etc. to women. I received no reply.
Sioux Rose
KAY: It's ALL too appalling for words! The suppliers will no doubt be first to clamor against women's reproductive rights. Like out of work guys with nothing to do but artificially pump up to inadvertently pop out new babies (mouths to feed) makes any sense at all? I have noticed so many pregnant women and babies lately. I wonder why these souls are all coming in at this time? Perhaps they want to witness the finale, the big bang of a long-prophesied Transition of enormous magnitude?
Backing off for a wider perspective, we can see a fractal pattern emerge here.
Wikipedia definition: "A fractal is generally a rough or fragmented geometric shape that can be split into parts, each of which is (at least approximately) a reduced-size copy of the whole, a property called self-similarity."
Thus, the States described in this thread are but one level of magnification in a replicating pattern of psycho-social disintegration that progresses from individual to family unit, community, municipality, state and national levels - and beyond.
While the pattern of a fractal has a certain mathematic inevitability, the dynamic itself may be self-limiting, as in the formation and ultimate dissipation of a cloud.
The CD community reporting here are like distant sentinels observing the degenerative failure of societal coherence rooted, arguably, in pandemic systems overload.
There are simply too many of us. Soon there will be fewer. If any.
The cloud grows.
The storm breaks.
The sky clears.
* * * * * *
And in an eon to come, a more sentient species discovers evidence of ancient homo sapiens. Their research reveals that, despite many resources and advantages, that race expired for two reasons:
1. They put assholes in charge.
2. They crapped where they ate.
Suh, ah take umbrage at y'all's suggestion that there is another state more dysfunctional than the Republic of Texas. Ah want y'all to know that we here in the great Republic take the backseat to no one when it comes to flat out wingnuttery and blatant nincompoopery in the state house. Not only do we have Gov. Goodhair as exhibit A, we also have his predecessor Gov. Shrub as exhibit B. Then we have the plethora of intellectually challenged numbskulls such as Rep. Barton and God knows how many state reps and senators with only a tenuous grasp on reality. We have the worst public educational system in the US. The most pollution of any state. We have sold off our highways to some Spanish/Australian conglomerate to charge tolls for the next 75 years (did I mention their noncompete contract that forbids the state from repairing any roads that run the same direction as the toll roads?). We have a town that, except for one person, is actively soliciting a nuclear waste dump just outside city limits on the theory that it will somehow increase employment.
No, suh. We will defend to the death our claim to being the state with the biggest bunch of fools as Congress critters in the entire US of A.
You win, Texas Aggie. If that can be called winning. But Molly would be proud of you.
At least Oregon holds the distinction of parents selling their blood to pay for teacher's salaries when the Legislature refused to pass bills to pay them. We even managed to make international headlines over that.
Tom Larsen I apologize for repeatedly misspelling your name. It took me awhile to catch up to that.
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
"At least Oregon holds the distinction of parents selling their blood to pay for teacher's salaries when the Legislature refused to pass bills to pay them."
That's sad that your state would end up with such a sacrifice. If the voter turnout on OR state elections were improved, parents wouldn't have to go through this trouble. Plus, the healthcare costs in OR would most likely be lower. What is the voter turnout in OR state wide elections on average? If it's as low as I suspect it is, then there's the problem. But I will say to these independent parents HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY.
maxpayne, voter turnout is actually quite high due to our mail in ballot system. The problem is you can't find an honest politician due to corporate money and it isn't just at the national level.
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
Well, could always try Wisconsin's plan: Throw the poor out the door, hand your wallet to the rich,and the wealth will trickle down. Pardon? You say this is how we got into this mess in the first place? Oh. Never mind.
max payne you are again 100% right. tip o'neill once said
that all politics are local.from starting to take control of your state pols you can then force them to take control of
federal issues by having the state exert pressure on
washington.i live in nassau cty. ny.when the republicans
ran this county. their clout was such because this is one of the richest counties in the us that reagan would have to beg
to get a sit down with local govt. !that's juice! local guys
got WHATEVER their whims were in exchange for votes at the national level during pres. campaigns.perhaps we ought to visit their state offices maybe 2 3 hundred people to refocus
their attention and remind them who they work for. its
easier to unelect local guys. it takes much less money
its people who are close to you that can help with the
leg work and local contacts.
One thing I forgot to mention was that the Internet media outlets, or at least some of them, can be used to broadcast local politics. One example is youtube.com. For all the national politics choking up the bandwidth on that site, state and local politics could be given a chance and I'm not just talking about NYC and San Francisco.
I would like to ask all of you in this forum who are complaining about your state legislatures being horrible a simple question. What is the voter turnout on those state level elections? I know my state of VA is mixed but even then, I think that it is time all of us complaining asked ourselves what our state legislatures would be like if we all concentrated on improving voter turnout and participation rather than having to get negative about it? I paid attention to my gubenatorial primaries and voted for Brian Moran over Creigh Deeds on a number of issues including the issue of mountain top removal. How many of you have paid any attention to your state election primaries? We can all write and beg our pols in Washington but believe it or not, we have better control of our state pols than we do of the ones in Washington. I don't want to sound like a preacher here but I strongly suggest that all of you find ways to improve voter turnout and participation. You'll have better chances of getting progressive legislation such as state wide single payer healthcare and better worker protection legisation passed that you will in Washington. The more states are encouraged to compete for who can be better progressive, the more we can improve our odds of changing Washington as well. I have plenty to complain about the VA legislature too but I'm not giving up fighting for better pols where I can. If I can do it, so can you so stop complaining and get to work !
In my state, most ballots show only one name - running unopposed. Maybe because there are so many conservatives here, and they're the only ones who vote. I tried to talk to poor people, but they weren't interested in wasting time on voting since they couldn't see how it would make any difference anyway. And all the ads - in people's yards, on posts, or even billboards - do not identify any party. I couldn't even find any information on the local PBS channel about which party a politician was representing, let alone their views on important issues. With the media so completely controlled by the corporate (fascist) element, I gave up voting in local elections myself. It's just too difficult to find out any information about those running - that is, those few who actually have opposition. So starting on a local level is, well, a non-starter. And I've been pursuing this for years.
In my former states (Minnesota and Oregon) politicians changed parties as often as underwear - mostly over single-issue items overblown in a particular election-cycle. Or, as in the case of Oregon, you got sold out by whoever was elected, since they ALSO were in the pocket of corporate (fascist) lobbyists. And don't even bring up Illinois - the original home of political corruption. The political machines control local politics just as effectively as they do state and national venues - that's what happens when corporations have power. That's why fascism has never worked - and never will. And why ordinary people just give up - it's hopeless.
"I tried to talk to poor people, but they weren't interested in wasting time on voting since they couldn't see how it would make any difference anyway."
First, I would say don't give up. Don't let them look at this in a political view. It is tricky but possible to discuss the issues with them in non-political ways and eventually get them to feel proud that they make a difference.
"I couldn't even find any information on the local PBS channel about which party a politician was representing, let alone their views on important issues."
That's true and even the video sites on the Internet such as youtube.com are not being used effectively for local and state politics.
"With the media so completely controlled by the corporate (fascist) element, I gave up voting in local elections myself. It's just too difficult to find out any information about those running - that is, those few who actually have opposition."
That's what the elites want you to do. If all else fails, you can still find out how to contact your local candidates and ask them about the issues. I do agree that 9 out of 10 times, nobody even knows that a local election is even coming up except when they see a yard sign in the middle of traffic and then one has to look up that person's name and do a little search work. As a soldier, I thought you would never think of giving up like that. But now that you mentioned it, I'm more determined than ever to come up with and hopefully share some strategies that might work. When I gave up voting for Nader and switched to Obama because I knew that the system was too stacked against Nader, I promised myself to see what could be done on the local and state levels and I was surprised and disappointed in the greater voter apathy going on when it came to elections closer to home.
"The political machines control local politics just as effectively as they do state and national venues - that's what happens when corporations have power."
That may be true but corporations attained power from the ground zero on up starting on the local levels and slowly but steadily spread. It is easier to control the political machines on the local levels without waking up the sleeping giant than it is to get the pols in Washington to listen. Time, cooperation and unity, and some good management will be needed to make it happen but let's not give up.
It's a nice comment, but I would bet that the ones staying home here in Texas are even even bigger nincompoopers than the ones actually voting.
Well, there's something that's keeping them from voting and that needs to be corrected. Out here in VA, despite the fact that the state was Republican entrenched, we never fully gave up year after year. Four years ago, Hampton Roads, VA was safe and solid Republican but after John Kerry paved the way for turning the Northern VA suburbs and exurbs from solid Republican to leaning Democrat, Tim Kaine and Jim Webb managed to do the same in the Hampton Roads suburbs into swing in 2005 and 2006. Last year, Obama continued that streak. A lot of this had to do with voter turnout in general. The Democrats should have also visited your state last year. TX would have been closer to blue just like IN, VA, NC, and MO (well, almost). The trick is going somewhat moderate on the social issues while trying to swing the economic issues from libertarian to populist leaning. Some of the Democrats in VA are populist in even the suburbs but we have a long ways to go. In the meantime, we can still try rattling some of the Republicans to give up their failed rightwing policies.
maxpayne: I agree with you to an extent about the importance of voter turnout and participation, but doesn't it kind of depend really on which voters you turn out on what issues? Religious fundamentalists turned out incredible numbers of voters in 04 and helped in the reelection of a failed Bush presidency. Black voters in 08 turned out in incredible numbers and helped elect Barack Obama who, in so many ways, has acted as President in ways contradictory to the self-interest of blacks. (And I just caught a program on NOW about the Mexican border fence which Obama is pursuing in spite of the hopes of so many---and the big voter turnout---of Hispanics who had hoped for an enlightened immigration policy rather than more-of-the-same Bush fence building). So by all means progressives should work first of all to register from that great apathetic mass of people who believe (correctly) that their views "don't make any difference" to decision makers. What I'm saying is that, unless our turnout effort (and our efforts to promote participation by masses of people in non-electoral public affairs) have a well-defined populist focus, they will not have the effect of promoting desired progressive outcomes.
" I agree with you to an extent about the importance of voter turnout and participation, but doesn't it kind of depend really on which voters you turn out on what issues?"
Yes, higher voter turnout can be a mixed blessing and 2004 showed us that. Still, I don't think that the progressives ought to give up at all. Since I've worked with not only application maintenance as a programmer but also some IT management, I have a different way of looking at this. We can't always win but we can minimize the losses as much as possible. Obama by the way is getting to be more beyond me, not that I expected anything much of him despite my very reluctant vote for him. I have witnessed over the last two decades how state conservatives in VA where I live mobilize their base and keep at it election after election. The idea of giving up just because it looks like we've won is the biggest mistake progressives and liberals are making. That may be why it makes it too easy for voters to think that their views make no difference. Well said on populist focus too by the way. Certainly, the opposition(s) can and will do anything to make progressives lose their focus and thus the cause. We cannot afford to let that happen.
You think CA legislatures are the worst? Come on over to SC and it ain't just about the governor. There's plenty to hate about state politics in SC !
Since I sort of started this pissing-contest for the craziest legislature with my lead off nomination of my home state of Florida, I feel a little compelled to reflect on the range of other nominations offered in the comments so far. Maybe rather than there being any "craziest" legislature, state governments are afflicted by essentially the same problems everywhere: trying to do more public services with less with which to do it; the corporate control of the legislative representatives who only nominally represent the people; their factionalism based on the different worlds and mentalities of the urban and the rural; and so on: perennial "crazy-making" factors that make government anywhere difficult in any of these 50 un-united states. If there is any generic remedy for these generic ailments, maybe it's in some kind of national movement to promote progressive agendas in all state legislatures, to counteract the organization that attempts to do that for other ideological constituencies like that for blue dog Democrats: that meanest of all animal critters.
Excellent analysis! I will like to also add that the culture of corruption that have permeated the nation even before Bush/Cheney, but definitely given a green light by Bush/Cheney, is also a major impediment to establish sensible policies. For example, single-payer will save tons of monies, but the greed-mongers of the health care industry are able to buy their votes.
don't fret, pet. we're making other plans.
The Pennsylvania State Legislature is also a sinkhole of petty, partisan, self-serving mediocrities and plutocrats.
It's true enough that Pennsylvania politics is Philadelphia to the east, Pittsburgh to the west, and Alabama in between. To PA residents outside those metropolitan areas, the cities might as well be named Sodom and Gomorrah.
So the legislature mostly bickers and points fingers over how the decadent and greedy Big Cities are trying to monopolize all the funding, and support preposterous issues like "gun control" and public transit, rather than keeping taxes and niggers down in God's Country, as the Good Lord and ignorant voters created politicians to do.
Meanwhile, they sedulously feather their own nests.
IS there such a thing as a relatively responsible, civic-minded State Legislature?
New England, maybe; at least they've shown some enlightenment and integrity on controversial civil rights issues.
· Yr Obd't Servant
A nation that advances the notion of SELF interest and only SELF interest, where Greed is seen as good, should not be surprised when its legislators act only out of SELF interest.
This takes on all the appearances of a system in Collapse wherein the powers that be are trying to grab all they can for themselves .
There is plenty of wealth inside the United States of America and the economy can still generate plenty of wealth without having to start wars the world over or steal anothers resources.
The people just have to recognize that WEALTH is being improperly measured and that it is not being distributed equitably.
Allowing the poor an even smaller cut of the pie is exactly the wrong formula.
Sioux Rose
GW NORTH: Thank you. As usual a well-nuanced analysis.
Being from Texas, like Kivals, I was going to claim #1 for the worst state government-- and there is alot of evidence for that claim. But looking at these others posts here, it's obvious that we're in quite a pissing match on that one.
And certainly, Kivals (another Texas resident) cut to a core issue with the relationship between governance and oligarchs.
And there's this too: the U.S. Constitution and U .S.history run contrary to rational state (provincial) governance of any kind.
Let's face it. The South pretty much won the Civil War. Slavery morphed into Jim Crow and is now institutionalized as segregation bolstered by an expensive and large prison system.
And the other big Civil War issue, so-called "states rights" has been pretty much decided in favor of the states' rightists in the courts and our generally provincial population in practice.
What we call "federalism" in the U.S. is pretty much hatred of any kind of national government at all (except when it involves things military).
Yet, if you look at states, there is little rhyme or reason to them. They are disparate collections of regions, peoples, cultures and forms of governance with arbitrarily-drawn boundaries.
How many states, for example, are California or Texas (both of which were mostly Mexican not too many years ago and collections of indigenous peoples before that)?
Politically, the Confederacy or "Solid South" has controlled our national governement (as a minority), imposing economic, political and cultural backwardness on the rest of us -- and much of the world.
So as we see state governments crumble into absurdity before our eyes (largely because of right-wing imposed "low-tax" schemes and constitutionally-mandated balanced budgets), we need to understand that we are looking at symptoms that reveal a larger national moral rot.
Try to laugh a bit at the circus, as destructive as it is.
I never thought I would find myself calling the Oregon legislature "staid", but it pales compared to California and New York. I do have to give the prize to New York although California's disaster is more calamitous. It's just that New York's is more unbelievably ridiculous.
Tom Larson, Madison and Jefferson were in direct opposition about what this country should be. And here we are today, in the same quandary.
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
RE: Tom Larson, Madison and Jefferson were in direct opposition about what this country should be. And here we are today, in the same quandary.
In case you are referring to me, Tom Larsen, I am unequivocally FOR democracy, which puts me at odds with Madison and to lesser extent Jefferson. What my post below was about was not to argue for an oligarchy or plutocracy, but rather to be more honest about our own history. The US was never created to be a democracy. Everyone from James Madison to George W. Bush says laudatory things about democracy, but that is just propaganda to maintain our illusion that we live in one.
The American revolution was distinct break from the past. It was a revolution that replaced feudalism with capitalism. No small thing, but it was not and is not democracy.
If we continue to flail about blaming this or that politician or failed policy, then we will never see the systemic nature of the problems we face. And, if that's the case, we will never make any real progress.
As the Marxists say: a capitalist democracy is nothing more than democracy for the capitalists.
Tom Larson, I never meant to suggest you were opposed to democracy. In my view, Jefferson came closest, being a creature of his time.
The Marxists had it right, as many will discover to their dismay.
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
Off topic, but Israel seized the humanitarian boat The Spirit of Humanity the other day, why is there nothing on Common Dreams about it?
I can just here Al Jolson singing, " California there it goes/ Right back down that toilet bowl..."
Sioux Rose
Perhaps the law of karma could be better expressed as that which is inevitable following as a result of piss poor actions & priorities.
This nation has SQUANDERED its fortune on the cultivation of a grotesque militarism; one that went about the world seizing whatever assets it found desirable. Always masked by patriotic songs and powerful slogans, this theft-fest has brought our nation to the brink of poverty & despair.
We all know that some of these conditions came about under Reagan, but the insidious conservatives who hate persons, but fall to their knees before dictatorships (today these evidence themselves through an uscale elite "ownership" class) have engineered the ideologies and policies that have spent money on prisons, policing forces, and spying on citizens; but nary a commensurate sum to support HUMAN beings and their genuine needs. Instead these spiritual misfits who masquerade as the nation's leaders and thinkers see fit to cut education, fundng for basic communal infrastructure, defrauding the air waves/open media, corrupting the meaning of representative government, and turning health care into a commodity to be brokered by the for-profit baboons of Wall St.
Arnold is the perfect metaphor. I mean Hollywood could not have cast a more appropos hero to signify the failure of that golden state if it tried. For all his muscles and worship of THE oily muscle (as Nietschze termed it), he has a woeful disregard for PERSONS. He, that terminator, is the living "Exhibit A" of what happens when a nation-state worships force above all else!
We all know that if $ was not spent on giving tax breaks to the rich, on 800 plus bases around the globe, on prisons and tax breaks to the worst offenders (those polluting our rivers, air, water, mountains, and BODIES with all kinds of grotesque chemicals), then the funds would exist to keep states solvent. The folly is such that any psychiatrist worth his education would have to term it a SEVERE case of mental illness.
When traders on Wall St who produce NOTHING and cull the cream off the blood, sweat and tears of laborers are richly rewarded, along with the world's most unconscionable offenders (Blackwater, Monsanto, the coal operators in WV) just because they bribe congress members so that honest people are left to suffer, the entire life equation is insulted. Many are becoming ill through exposures the EPA ought be out-lawing, and they can't even get their insurance to cover the medical treatment! On a domestic scale citizens are facing the fate of those soldiers who return with DU exposure and are told it's all their imagination. Thirty years later the military will ALLOW the truth to be known. Another replay of Agent Orange.
This government of ours has been taken over by those who ONLY love money and it shows in 1000 different ways. The entire nation needs a spiritual colonic to clear away its toxic overload. As services citizens count on disappear while the rich tool around in their fancy cars, violence will erupt in unexpected places. I suppose this is why the Pentagon recently issued a report stating that the new warfare would be based in urban centers. Planned (like the fruits of Disaster Capitalism) or prescient?
Sioux Rose!It staggers the imagination how much history you put here and with a little prophecy thrown in!All too true.Tony
"This nation has SQUANDERED its fortune on the cultivation of a grotesque militarism"
Au contaire. The macroeconomic model is simple: money is bullshit, gold is bullshit. The only, the only measure of wealth is oil. The middle-eastern despots have got the oil. So the US sells security to them - that is, protection for the oligarchs from their own population - in exchange for oil. This is done by the price of oil being denominated in USD, which the US bankers simply print. The wars in Kuwait and Iraq were essentially advertisements for the US product.
Why is this falling apart now? Because the USA has been losing its wars against insurgents. It is obvious to everyone (who matters) that the US military "product" is no damn good. Oh, they can smash up your country and leave you nominally in charge of a ruin, but that's about it.
The problem isn't the squandering on militarism - it's that the militarism just doesn't work. Indeed - war, war *as such* - just doesn't work anymore.
http://www.users.bigpond.com/pmurray
http://www.paulmurray.id.au
Sioux Rose
PAUL: I am not one who thinks it EVER "worked" since I value human life more than the pocket change elites can count. I don't find your response convincing since the lion's share of U.S. money is still being directed at the military, and wars are still being escalated in foreign lands. Until the folly is really understood, hopefully before America becomes as broken as Ancient Rome, the money that should go towards education, greening our infra-structure, developing renewable energy technologies, investing in health-care, and supporting the arts/public good is instead being squandered, as I said!
The greatest allies the oligarchs have are:
1. Disension among "We the People" that keeps us constantly divided and fighting among ourselves so we never identify what we all have in common including especially our greatest common enemies.
2. Distraction designed to strain the emotions, titilate the senses, deaden critical thinking, and keep people from reaching out to one another.
By now nobody in California has any excuse for not understanding the source and perpetrators of their dilemma. In New York, if the people weren't so stupified and dumbed down they would be grabbing torches and heading for that billionaire's tangible assets to "liquidate" them the way he is trying to liquidate the State's stability.
Then, the voters who voted for the two turncoats would do whatever it took to recall them and hold a new election for someone who more accurately reflected the desires of those districts. For the rest of us in states other than New York or California, we need to realize if these fascist forces can turn this Shock Doctrine trick there, then nobody is safe from their mischief anywhere.
Poet
Right on Poet.
Sioux Rose
POET: I think the "Disaster Capitalism" initiative IS underway. How would one otherwise account for the $ given to bankers and an INCREASE in the military budget JUST WHEN funds are needed for universal health care and states on the brink of fiscal collapse (even if poor judgment calls are a factor in that status)?
For a nation that loves movies, we're all going to soon star in our own homegrown horror film. I can't see things improving until the momentum on the "getting worse" side exhausts itself, OR people, like a gigantic elephant stampede, at last simultaneously chant: Enough! Americans are accustomed to so much stuff, and a high comfort level. Many who are losing their status at least still have family to count on. We are not like the people in India who never had anything to lose. The paradigm of what may cause a gigantic mass protest is so different; and it would seem the rules/laws that have been passed to block protests and marginalize dissent were done to pre-empt the inevitability of this very thing.
it would seem the rules/laws that have been passed to block protests and marginalize dissent were done to pre-empt the inevitability of this very thing.
Sioux Rose, BINGO! The bumps you foresee will be hard indeed.
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
Great post SR.
The ONLY thing fat Americans can count on is their military. And how far would their military go without oil?
Sioux Rose
EZE: Thank you. Between the bombing of civilians in Afghanistan, the mountain tops being blasted away full speed ahead, and California dreamin its own nightmare, my tolerance meter has expired. I know I've spent all of my adult life working for causes, writing articles, giving lectures to produce diametrically opposed outcomes; but the voices of greed and dark disregard for life in all its wondrous expressions were first to grab control of media and manufacture, if not a consent, then certainly enough confusion to get on with their agenda. And here we are, the fruit of EVIL manifest in every policy decision emerging from our already-bankrupt nation. And the suffering here and abroad! Sometimes it overwhelms me. I am not one who can just nourish my own peace of mind when so much is being undone to so many sacred contracts and living beings all at once. And it's done in the name of defense! Of protection when it's unraveling the very wellsprings of LIFE! Any awakened soul that sees all this and can remain cool is either heavily medicated or a traitor to their own Holy Spirit (that spark that dwells within).
RE: "This government of ours has been taken over by those who ONLY love money and it shows in 1000 different ways."
"(H)as been taken over"?
HARDLY, it was set up for and designed to benefit only, "those who love money".
Here's Noam Chomsky talking about founding father James Madison:
It should be recalled that the American Republic was founded on the principle that there should be a democratic deficit. James Madison, the main framer of the constitutional order, his view was that power should be in the hands of the wealth of the nation, the more responsible set of men who have sympathy for property owners and their rights. And Madison sought to construct a system of government that would, in his words, “protect the minority of the opulent from the majority.”
Sioux Rose
TOM: I learn from persons like you in this forum. Although I was enrolled in advanced history courses, 90% of what gets exposed in this forum in the way of American history is alien to anything I ever learned in school! I cannot debate your points about the Founders intentions, but what I do know is this: the truth of my own experience. When I was growing up I never heard of hospitals turning persons away. Somehow America seemed a land of abundance with people ready to share. We always had underground CIA clandestine operations, but was torture ever brought out into the open, the public's conscience massaged away via TV shows like "24" so that it became a viable staple of American foreign policy? Were protests treated like anomalous events, cordonned off into zones off the beaten track that no one would pay attention to?
There has always been the dark influence of elites, but there were countervailing forces that stood up against them. Whether inroads against the likes of Boss Twead or the initiatives of the New Deal, there was the sense that enough persons of good conscience were prepared to fight for ideals! Not so today. Yes, we still have Nader and a few good men and women; but somehow the seductions of Mammon have proven stronger than the call of the Spirit, that portion of the human being that calls upon us to serve something greater than personal ego. And the nation has absolutely fallen to worship martial shows of force, from Hollywood to war at no genuine cause or provocation. If things were always "rotten in Denmark," the stench hardly reached this high to heaven. The monster is loose. Perhaps it has its roots in the causes you cite, but I think it's been aided and abetted by a media that's under thrall to Mammon and Mars, and Americans have had Truth and compassion beaten and/or conditioned OUT of them. And that's where the depravity lies.
The best way to learn compassion is through personal suffering. I predict lots of that descending upon the land of the not-very brave.
"persons of good conscience were prepared to fight for ideals! Not so today."
I tend to think nothing is exceptionally worse than many other times in US history. We don't have the Trail of Tears or Sand Creek anymore. Instead of Baldwin-Phelps and Pinkertons we now have Blackwater. Militarism has been part of the US for centuries via Manifest Destiny but instead of continent wide it's been global since at least the Spanish-American war if not the Barbary Wars. Instead of Emma Goldman and Mother Jones we have ladies like Amy Goodman, Laura Flanders, Cindy Sheehan, and the ever so wonderful women of Code Pink. We had Samuel Clemens and Upton Sinclair whereas now we have good men like Glenn Greenwald and Jeremy Scahill.
I would say the percentages of egalitarian and altruistic people in the US may be smaller than any other point in history. And now it appears most our radicals are right wingers whereas in the past many were leftists. I'd much rather live today than in the Guilded Age of the late 19th century but it is very distressing how much things are deteriorating.
BTW, I thought your original post was excellent and I enjoyed it. Thank you.
Sioux Rose
FZ: My lifestyle somewhat resonates with HD Thoreau. I find that biking into the forest or having the pleasure of being completely surrounded by deer and trees enhances my thought process profoundly. With that being said, recently I was pondering this very thing. Has evil increased in our world--certainly violent spectacles of its evidence are ubiquitous, or is it the same percentage echoed through a much larger population?
And then the thought came that the true spiritual teachers return again and again, and it is always the SAME lesson(s) that they bring. Mankind evolves it would seem at a snail's pace; but if we are immortal beings, than our education owns the luxury of eternity to work out the kinks! The Tarot, which is an ancient oracle, expresses the battles that flesh is heir to. I believe the upper 22 cards constituting the Major Arcanum represent the Initiation that every soul must face, and the lesson plan ensues over numerous lifetimes. Its essential teaching is that the lower self, that which is motivated by raw self-interest, must be integrated with the higher self, that which recognizes itself AS love, as a tiny flicker of the body and spirit of the Divine. When we come from that understanding, it is much easier to place self-interest aside.
I am perhaps a "bad" business woman because I usually look for ways to give a little extra to "the other side." I happen to now rent two properties (having traded inherited stock for very nice mobile homes on large pieces of land, properties I fix up quite nicely to make them comfortable homes at affordable prices for others) and seeing how one renter ran up quite a tab on his electric (it's been very hot here), I paid a portion of his electricity this month. I did it because I know he's struggling. On the other unit, I paid for the gas refill. I know that when we do for others, suprise others by not putting profit first, we move their spirit and feel a surge of Light infuse our own. Some call this "paying it forward."
I remember when my marriage broke up and I was introduced to a top psychiatrist in Puerto Rico. She had been widowed and felt compassion for my circumstance. She rented me a lovely home for well under its market value. I consider her a saint. It is very beautiful to be on both the receiving, as well as giving end of human kindness. I think we meet Divinity there (in such transactions). It's clear to me that today's amoral "leaders" exist in absolute internal vacuums, that they demand more and more from those who have least. I think when they pass out of their current bodies, their horror will be to hear the screams and agony from those they brought to anguish.
I wandered a bit here, but my main point is that evil & violence are part of the human condition; but it is for leaders & teachers to do what they can to expedite the evolution of all persons. This is where lessons from the Tarot prove timeless and priceless. If only mundane leaders had to pass the tests of Initiation before assuming office or influence. If we survive the next 20 years, I believe societies will coalesce around some form of implementation of this principle. It represents the greater security for the longevity of said tribe. Any who profess to own leadership abilities must first prove their SPIRITUAL integrity!
RE: history courses
I didn't major in history, but I did take a history course once. First day of class students were asked "why do we learn history". The answers offered were decent, like Santayana's famous warning. But what was the correct answer? "Noooo", the instructor said. "We learn history because it is interesting." I dropped the class.
I am currently reading and I HIGHLY recommend, Lance Selfa's,
"The Democrats: a Critical History". You'll never trust a Democrat again!
In solidarity,
Tom
Tom, thanks for the suggestion -- Lance Selfa's book. However, I have to be honest, for most of my life, I haven't trusted the Democrats. In the last election, I voted for Ralph Nader.
I don't think I really began to learn much about the actual history of this country until I began to read history on my own -- away from the classroom. The text books and teachers seemed to add a glossy sheen to our history, smoothing the wrinkles so that the United States always appeared as the good guy. In addition, none of the teachers/professors invited questions or discussion.
However, I did have a few awakening moments during my junior high and high school years -- sometimes due to the music on the radio, such as Tom Paxton's "Lyndon Johnson Told the Nation." He wrote and sang, addressing Lyndon Johnson and the war in Vietnam -- "Have no fear of escalation, I am trying everyone to please -- though it isn't really war we're sending 50,000 more to save Vietnam from the Vietnamese." As I recall, Judy Collins sang the song on the floor of the Rhode Island legislature, creating quite a stir. She was denounced by the members of the legislature.
Buffy St. Marie, too, taught me a little about Native American history when she wrote and recorded a song about blankets filled with small pox being given to the Indians -- to wipe them out. I was completely stunned. I bought some of her records, and listened to the song again and again, at first, believing that I must not have heard the words correctly. We certainly didn't learn this is school, nor did I learn about this history in college, either. Who can forget her masterpiece, "Universal Soldier?"
He’s 5 foot 2 and he’s 6 feet 4
He fights with missiles and with spears
He’s all of 31 and he’s only 17.
He’s been a soldier for a thousand years
He’s a catholic, a Hindu, an atheist, a Jain
A Buddhist, and a Baptist and Jew.
And he knows he shouldn’t kill
And he knows he always will
Killing for me, my friend and me for you
And he’s fighting for Canada.
He’s fighting for France.
He’s fighting for the USA.
And he’s fighting for the Russians.
And he’s fighting for Japan
And he thinks we’ll put an end to war this way.
And he’s fighting for democracy,
He’s fighting for the reds
He says it’s for the peace of all.
He’s the one, who must decide,
who’s to live and who’s to die.
And he never sees the writing on the wall.
But without him,
how would Hitler have condemned him at Dachau?
Without him Caesar would have stood alone
He’s the one who gives his body
as a weapon of the war.
And without him all this killing can’t go on
Then, when I was about 14 or 15, on the evening news, I caught a segment on one of the three networks that showed a Vietnamese mother holding her dead child in her arms, sobbing. The image is seared into my brain. I have never been able to forget it. Regularly, the propaganda machine spewed the myth that "the other," the Vietnamese, didn't have the same respect for life as we do here in the United States. That day, I learned that mothers, everywhere, feel the same love for their children. At that moment, to me, the spin became unconscionable. Finally, the stories of torture began to float around, albeit somewhat nebulous, until Seymour Hersh uncovered the My Lai Massacre in November of 1969.
I identify with Sioux Rose and her feelings about all of the killings in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan -- civilians, attending wedding parties and funerals, etc. Every day, I get up with a heavy heart. Some people I know are able to disconnect themselves from the truth of what's happening "over there," but I can't seem to do that. Every death pierces my very being.
Sioux Rose
KAY: Sometimes this forum is cathartic, isn't it? A few of our Yang guys want us to get out there and DO, but some of us find it our sacred mission to THINK and SEED others' thought processes. Then they may take action. It's that yin/yang thing... just like breathing, in and out. One cannot exist without the other, nor can there be music without the complimentary rest beats.
Thank you for sharing your story. I recently related that I learned almost NOTHING regarding history in school as contrasted with things learned in this forum thanks to a few "luminaries" who are well-read on the topic. I confess it has seldom been an area of interest as too often the very relating of history is done through a constant recitation of this battle, or that one; and it's always about "the winning team." Those who posted that had the Nazis won WW II, America's crimes would have stood before a similar Geneva Conventions Court. Without this arbiter, America learned to make full use of weaponry to a deadly and diabolical degree.
Women, particularly when we have nursed babies, appreciate life in a way not enough men seem to. Certainly I have known cold women (I made it clear they resonate with the mythological archetype of Athena, and I think Condi Rice could be her poster child) and caring men. On a soul level we are composed of many facets, and I believe we change genders when we reincarnate. Therefore if we look at earth as a time share vacation that we are going to come back to "next year," it makes sense to improve it. And of course I am speaking about improving the LOT of its people. That killing is given the highest status, and it IS given evidence of the military budget (insane when we do NOT have a viable enemy, although Bush's policies of empire have certainly done their utmost to make sure there will be enemies in the near future). Not every relative of the unjustly deceased is going to, as Obama might suggest, put this behind him. The U.S. is in the process of losing its confident sense of impunity, and as the karma of destruction we have wrought on other lands returns home (hello, California!), out of our own suffering an understanding will eventually emerge. It did not have to come to this, but too many allowed themselves to be seduced by darkness, and evil made good on its most potent tool, deception, in order to deliver. We must be strong as it will fall on many of us to learn to pick up the pieces, and find the vision to build again.
>>And Madison sought to construct a system of government that would, in his words, “protect the minority of the opulent from the majority.”
Bingo.
What allowed the system to work from Madisons time on was that free land for the taking to the west of the 13 colonies. The masses of poor could simply take it and call it their own. That it was inhabited by another people was of no concern to them.
This all but ended by the early 1900's.
Just like the rolling blackouts in California turned out to be an Enron (and GWB) scam to defraud Californinans and unseat their governor, which worked, at some point in the not so distant future we will learn that Schwarzenegger (and cronies as yet unnamed) engineered the bankruptcy and selloff of California. And, as with Enron, the major players will avoid being held accountable while some underlings will eventually take the heat. We're only at the end part of the opening gambit on this, but just watch as the summer progresses.
Chatting at local news forums here in Northern California, I noticed a remarkable concensus among citizens who normally differ on every issue -- we all plan to vote out the incumbents as soon as possible. 100% agreement on that. So, see, Californians can agree on something...
Opinionated: well, people will almost always express agreement on a desire to "throw the rascals out" but when push comes to shove in an election, what you want to make a bet that they'll vote out the Gentleman from Pitchfork who, by virtue of his seniority, "could get so much more" for Pitchfork than might his challenger?
As a proud citizen of Texas I have long been confident that my state's legislature stood out more than virtually all others, at least all the other large or populous states, but lately I have seen some serious competition. Still, allowing Tom DeLay to decide that Texas should redistrict mid-decade and create four hundred mile long congressional districts that look like long skinny irregular fingers, sometimes only a mile or two across, was quite a feat. And that was one of many.
On a broader note, it appears that the oligarchs are giving the little people a choice -- (1) the total chaos and decay that comes from completely dysfunctional and inoperative government; or (2) a corporatist-fascist system that maintains order, an order in which the few have virtually everything and the rest have just enough to serve as worker bees for their betters and nothing more.
Well said kivals
Luckily some folks are going for option 3...earn less, grow more food, participate with "the system" less and less. I'm sure a t some point soon our fearless leader will declare people who choose this option to be "economic terrorists" because we don't shop for useless slave-manufactured crap from China, or eat the poisonous corporate crap being sold as food.
kivals: That's a tough choice there, pardner, but I reckon it may be the very choice that Americans in general have about a number of things, including their health care "system." Do we allow it to continue in its current "dysfunctional and inoperative" mode; or do we replace it with something with so much complexity and so many controls on who gets what and who pays how much, that the little guy just screams and says to the health czar (yes, we actually have one): YOU guys decide for me!
Oh Yeah? Well the Connecticut legislature, with its veto-proof majority of Democrats, can't agree on a budget with the governor of Connecticut (it will be a cold day in hell before I ever call her my governor), and they are demanding furlough days and cuts to services, too.
Actually, that doesn't sound as crazy as California. But yesterday, this Gov. M. Jodi Rell vetoed seven bills, including one "requiring health insurance companies to cover numerous medical treatments, including, prosthetic devices, hearing aids for children, wigs for cancer patients and ostomy supplies," according to CTNewsJunkie.com
While the Constitution state may not be treading Arizona's road of zero educational funding, we are certainly walking the line of what is insane - a legislature with a veto-proof majority trying to piecemeal mandate health insurance coverage instead of single payer and a Republican Governor who doesn't want impoverished deaf children to hear.
That maybe puts the Nutmeg State in the top 10.
I'll take a little craziness over the entrenched depravity and imbecility of the Georgia legislature any day.
q
Is that the sound of laughter I hear, coming from Lenin's grave?
I don't know but that sure as hell made me laugh.
The new Arizona Governor zeroed out the ENTIRE education budget. We're talking 100% of state funding for education - out. Obviously a game of chicken with the legislature -- but she refuses to talk to Dems and her fellow Republicans are so off the wall with the corporate give-outs and slashing funds for vital services for handicapped, elderly and children that she just couldn't stomach their budget. How's that for crazy? Thanks, Oblabla for stealing the best governor this state has ever had (Janet Napolitano, Secretary of Homeland Security). It is July 3 and we still have no budget. Discussing possible government shut down.
Well of course, being from Florida and being that we pride ourselves on being #1 on some things, I'll have to protest that "mine" is probably the craziest of all legislatures. Besides trying to keep our House Speaker out of jail for blatant corruption, the state has reacted to the horrible over-development of the state that has led the way to the nation's housing bust with a whole Santa basket of presents to the developer community in terms of relieving them of "concurrency" requirements to help pay for the social services that their developments generate. There are other qualifications for the honor of craziest that I could put forth, but other writers will want their turns at advancing the candidacies of their legislatures, as there are certainly many to challenge of hubris of the California claim.