PRESIDENT OBAMA'S SPEECH ON HEALTH CARE TO CONGRESS, 9 SEPTEMBER 2009

(President Barack Obama speaking on health care before a joint session of Congress at the United States Capitol on 9 September 2009; behind him are Vice President Joseph Biden and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. Official White House photo by Pete Souza.)

President Barack Obama
Remarks by the President on Health Care
September 9, 2009
To a joint session of Congress at the U.S. Capitol
Washington, D.C.


THE PRESIDENT: Madam Speaker, Vice President Biden, members of Congress, and the American people:

When I spoke here last winter, this nation was facing the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. We were losing an average of 700,000 jobs per month. Credit was frozen. And our financial system was on the verge of collapse.

As any American who is still looking for work or a way to pay their bills will tell you, we are by no means out of the woods. A full and vibrant recovery is still many months away. And I will not let up until those Americans who seek jobs can find them -- (applause) -- until those businesses that seek capital and credit can thrive; until all responsible homeowners can stay in their homes. That is our ultimate goal. But thanks to the bold and decisive action we've taken since January, I can stand here with confidence and say that we have pulled this economy back from the brink. (Applause.)


I want to thank the members of this body for your efforts and your support in these last several months, and especially those who've taken the difficult votes that have put us on a path to recovery. I also want to thank the American people for their patience and resolve during this trying time for our nation.

But we did not come here just to clean up crises. We came here to build a future. (Applause.) So tonight, I return to speak to all of you about an issue that is central to that future -- and that is the issue of health care.

I am not the first President to take up this cause, but I am determined to be the last. (Applause.) It has now been nearly a century since Theodore Roosevelt first called for health care reform. And ever since, nearly every President and Congress, whether Democrat or Republican, has attempted to meet this challenge in some way. A bill for comprehensive health reform was first introduced by John Dingell Sr. in 1943. Sixty-five years later, his son continues to introduce that same bill at the beginning of each session. (Applause.)

Our collective failure to meet this challenge -- year after year, decade after decade -- has led us to the breaking point. Everyone understands the extraordinary hardships that are placed on the uninsured, who live every day just one accident or illness away from bankruptcy. These are not primarily people on welfare. These are middle-class Americans. Some can't get insurance on the job. Others are self-employed, and can't afford it, since buying insurance on your own costs you three times as much as the coverage you get from your employer. Many other Americans who are willing and able to pay are still denied insurance due to previous illnesses or conditions that insurance companies decide are too risky or too expensive to cover.

We are the only democracy -- the only advanced democracy on Earth -- the only wealthy nation -- that allows such hardship for millions of its people. There are now more than 30 million American citizens who cannot get coverage. In just a two-year period, one in every three Americans goes without health care coverage at some point. And every day, 14,000 Americans lose their coverage. In other words, it can happen to anyone.

But the problem that plagues the health care system is not just a problem for the uninsured. Those who do have insurance have never had less security and stability than they do today. More and more Americans worry that if you move, lose your job, or change your job, you'll lose your health insurance too. More and more Americans pay their premiums, only to discover that their insurance company has dropped their coverage when they get sick, or won't pay the full cost of care. It happens every day.

One man from Illinois lost his coverage in the middle of chemotherapy because his insurer found that he hadn't reported gallstones that he didn't even know about. They delayed his treatment, and he died because of it. Another woman from Texas was about to get a double mastectomy when her insurance company canceled her policy because she forgot to declare a case of acne. By the time she had her insurance reinstated, her breast cancer had more than doubled in size. That is heart-breaking, it is wrong, and no one should be treated that way in the United States of America. (Applause.)

Then there's the problem of rising cost. We spend one and a half times more per person on health care than any other country, but we aren't any healthier for it. This is one of the reasons that insurance premiums have gone up three times faster than wages. It's why so many employers -- especially small businesses -- are forcing their employees to pay more for insurance, or are dropping their coverage entirely. It's why so many aspiring entrepreneurs cannot afford to open a business in the first place, and why American businesses that compete internationally -- like our automakers -- are at a huge disadvantage. And it's why those of us with health insurance are also paying a hidden and growing tax for those without it -- about $1,000 per year that pays for somebody else's emergency room and charitable care.

Finally, our health care system is placing an unsustainable burden on taxpayers. When health care costs grow at the rate they have, it puts greater pressure on programs like Medicare and Medicaid. If we do nothing to slow these skyrocketing costs, we will eventually be spending more on Medicare and Medicaid than every other government program combined. Put simply, our health care problem is our deficit problem. Nothing else even comes close. Nothing else. (Applause.)

Now, these are the facts. Nobody disputes them. We know we must reform this system. The question is how.

There are those on the left who believe that the only way to fix the system is through a single-payer system like Canada's -- (applause) -- where we would severely restrict the private insurance market and have the government provide coverage for everybody. On the right, there are those who argue that we should end employer-based systems and leave individuals to buy health insurance on their own.

I've said -- I have to say that there are arguments to be made for both these approaches. But either one would represent a radical shift that would disrupt the health care most people currently have. Since health care represents one-sixth of our economy, I believe it makes more sense to build on what works and fix what doesn't, rather than try to build an entirely new system from scratch. (Applause.) And that is precisely what those of you in Congress have tried to do over the past several months.

During that time, we've seen Washington at its best and at its worst.

We've seen many in this chamber work tirelessly for the better part of this year to offer thoughtful ideas about how to achieve reform. Of the five committees asked to develop bills, four have completed their work, and the Senate Finance Committee announced today that it will move forward next week. That has never happened before. Our overall efforts have been supported by an unprecedented coalition of doctors and nurses; hospitals, seniors' groups, and even drug companies -- many of whom opposed reform in the past. And there is agreement in this chamber on about 80 percent of what needs to be done, putting us closer to the goal of reform than we have ever been.

But what we've also seen in these last months is the same partisan spectacle that only hardens the disdain many Americans have towards their own government. Instead of honest debate, we've seen scare tactics. Some have dug into unyielding ideological camps that offer no hope of compromise. Too many have used this as an opportunity to score short-term political points, even if it robs the country of our opportunity to solve a long-term challenge. And out of this blizzard of charges and counter-charges, confusion has reigned.

Well, the time for bickering is over. The time for games has passed. (Applause.) Now is the season for action. Now is when we must bring the best ideas of both parties together, and show the American people that we can still do what we were sent here to do. Now is the time to deliver on health care. Now is the time to deliver on health care.

The plan I'm announcing tonight would meet three basic goals. It will provide more security and stability to those who have health insurance. It will provide insurance for those who don't. And it will slow the growth of health care costs for our families, our businesses, and our government. (Applause.) It's a plan that asks everyone to take responsibility for meeting this challenge -- not just government, not just insurance companies, but everybody including employers and individuals. And it's a plan that incorporates ideas from senators and congressmen, from Democrats and Republicans -- and yes, from some of my opponents in both the primary and general election.

Here are the details that every American needs to know about this plan. First, if you are among the hundreds of millions of Americans who already have health insurance through your job, or Medicare, or Medicaid, or the VA, nothing in this plan will require you or your employer to change the coverage or the doctor you have. (Applause.) Let me repeat this: Nothing in our plan requires you to change what you have.

What this plan will do is make the insurance you have work better for you. Under this plan, it will be against the law for insurance companies to deny you coverage because of a preexisting condition. (Applause.) As soon as I sign this bill, it will be against the law for insurance companies to drop your coverage when you get sick or water it down when you need it the most. (Applause.) They will no longer be able to place some arbitrary cap on the amount of coverage you can receive in a given year or in a lifetime. (Applause.) We will place a limit on how much you can be charged for out-of-pocket expenses, because in the United States of America, no one should go broke because they get sick. (Applause.) And insurance companies will be required to cover, with no extra charge, routine checkups and preventive care, like mammograms and colonoscopies -- (applause) -- because there's no reason we shouldn't be catching diseases like breast cancer and colon cancer before they get worse. That makes sense, it saves money, and it saves lives. (Applause.)

Now, that's what Americans who have health insurance can expect from this plan -- more security and more stability.

Now, if you're one of the tens of millions of Americans who don't currently have health insurance, the second part of this plan will finally offer you quality, affordable choices. (Applause.) If you lose your job or you change your job, you'll be able to get coverage. If you strike out on your own and start a small business, you'll be able to get coverage. We'll do this by creating a new insurance exchange -- a marketplace where individuals and small businesses will be able to shop for health insurance at competitive prices. Insurance companies will have an incentive to participate in this exchange because it lets them compete for millions of new customers. As one big group, these customers will have greater leverage to bargain with the insurance companies for better prices and quality coverage. This is how large companies and government employees get affordable insurance. It's how everyone in this Congress gets affordable insurance. And it's time to give every American the same opportunity that we give ourselves. (Applause.)

Now, for those individuals and small businesses who still can't afford the lower-priced insurance available in the exchange, we'll provide tax credits, the size of which will be based on your need. And all insurance companies that want access to this new marketplace will have to abide by the consumer protections I already mentioned. This exchange will take effect in four years, which will give us time to do it right. In the meantime, for those Americans who can't get insurance today because they have preexisting medical conditions, we will immediately offer low-cost coverage that will protect you against financial ruin if you become seriously ill. (Applause.) This was a good idea when Senator John McCain proposed it in the campaign, it's a good idea now, and we should all embrace it. (Applause.)

Now, even if we provide these affordable options, there may be those -- especially the young and the healthy -- who still want to take the risk and go without coverage. There may still be companies that refuse to do right by their workers by giving them coverage. The problem is, such irresponsible behavior costs all the rest of us money. If there are affordable options and people still don't sign up for health insurance, it means we pay for these people's expensive emergency room visits. If some businesses don't provide workers health care, it forces the rest of us to pick up the tab when their workers get sick, and gives those businesses an unfair advantage over their competitors. And unless everybody does their part, many of the insurance reforms we seek -- especially requiring insurance companies to cover preexisting conditions -- just can't be achieved.

And that's why under my plan, individuals will be required to carry basic health insurance -- just as most states require you to carry auto insurance. (Applause.) Likewise -- likewise, businesses will be required to either offer their workers health care, or chip in to help cover the cost of their workers. There will be a hardship waiver for those individuals who still can't afford coverage, and 95 percent of all small businesses, because of their size and narrow profit margin, would be exempt from these requirements. (Applause.) But we can't have large businesses and individuals who can afford coverage game the system by avoiding responsibility to themselves or their employees. Improving our health care system only works if everybody does their part.

And while there remain some significant details to be ironed out, I believe -- (laughter) -- I believe a broad consensus exists for the aspects of the plan I just outlined: consumer protections for those with insurance, an exchange that allows individuals and small businesses to purchase affordable coverage, and a requirement that people who can afford insurance get insurance.

And I have no doubt that these reforms would greatly benefit Americans from all walks of life, as well as the economy as a whole. Still, given all the misinformation that's been spread over the past few months, I realize -- (applause) -- I realize that many Americans have grown nervous about reform. So tonight I want to address some of the key controversies that are still out there.

Some of people's concerns have grown out of bogus claims spread by those whose only agenda is to kill reform at any cost. The best example is the claim made not just by radio and cable talk show hosts, but by prominent politicians, that we plan to set up panels of bureaucrats with the power to kill off senior citizens. Now, such a charge would be laughable if it weren't so cynical and irresponsible. It is a lie, plain and simple. (Applause.)

There are also those who claim that our reform efforts would insure illegal immigrants. This, too, is false. The reforms -- the reforms I'm proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: You lie! (Boos.)

(President Barack Obama addressing a joint session of Congress at the U.S. Capitol on 9 September 2009; official White House photo taken by Laurence Jackson.)

THE PRESIDENT: It's not true. And one more misunderstanding I want to clear up -- under our plan, no federal dollars will be used to fund abortions, and federal conscience laws will remain in place. (Applause.)

Now, my health care proposal has also been attacked by some who oppose reform as a "government takeover" of the entire health care system. As proof, critics point to a provision in our plan that allows the uninsured and small businesses to choose a publicly sponsored insurance option, administered by the government just like Medicaid or Medicare. (Applause.)

So let me set the record straight here. My guiding principle is, and always has been, that consumers do better when there is choice and competition. That's how the market works. (Applause.) Unfortunately, in 34 states, 75 percent of the insurance market is controlled by five or fewer companies. In Alabama, almost 90 percent is controlled by just one company. And without competition, the price of insurance goes up and quality goes down. And it makes it easier for insurance companies to treat their customers badly -- by cherry-picking the healthiest individuals and trying to drop the sickest, by overcharging small businesses who have no leverage, and by jacking up rates.

Insurance executives don't do this because they're bad people; they do it because it's profitable. As one former insurance executive testified before Congress, insurance companies are not only encouraged to find reasons to drop the seriously ill, they are rewarded for it. All of this is in service of meeting what this former executive called "Wall Street's relentless profit expectations."

Now, I have no interest in putting insurance companies out of business. They provide a legitimate service, and employ a lot of our friends and neighbors. I just want to hold them accountable. (Applause.) And the insurance reforms that I've already mentioned would do just that. But an additional step we can take to keep insurance companies honest is by making a not-for-profit public option available in the insurance exchange. (Applause.) Now, let me be clear. Let me be clear. It would only be an option for those who don't have insurance. No one would be forced to choose it, and it would not impact those of you who already have insurance. In fact, based on Congressional Budget Office estimates, we believe that less than 5 percent of Americans would sign up.

Despite all this, the insurance companies and their allies don't like this idea. They argue that these private companies can't fairly compete with the government. And they'd be right if taxpayers were subsidizing this public insurance option. But they won't be. I've insisted that like any private insurance company, the public insurance option would have to be self-sufficient and rely on the premiums it collects. But by avoiding some of the overhead that gets eaten up at private companies by profits and excessive administrative costs and executive salaries, it could provide a good deal for consumers, and would also keep pressure on private insurers to keep their policies affordable and treat their customers better, the same way public colleges and universities provide additional choice and competition to students without in any way inhibiting a vibrant system of private colleges and universities. (Applause.)

Now, it is -- it's worth noting that a strong majority of Americans still favor a public insurance option of the sort I've proposed tonight. But its impact shouldn't be exaggerated -- by the left or the right or the media. It is only one part of my plan, and shouldn't be used as a handy excuse for the usual Washington ideological battles. To my progressive friends, I would remind you that for decades, the driving idea behind reform has been to end insurance company abuses and make coverage available for those without it. (Applause.) The public option -- the public option is only a means to that end -- and we should remain open to other ideas that accomplish our ultimate goal. And to my Republican friends, I say that rather than making wild claims about a government takeover of health care, we should work together to address any legitimate concerns you may have. (Applause.)

For example -- for example, some have suggested that the public option go into effect only in those markets where insurance companies are not providing affordable policies. Others have proposed a co-op or another non-profit entity to administer the plan. These are all constructive ideas worth exploring. But I will not back down on the basic principle that if Americans can't find affordable coverage, we will provide you with a choice. (Applause.) And I will make sure that no government bureaucrat or insurance company bureaucrat gets between you and the care that you need. (Applause.)

Finally, let me discuss an issue that is a great concern to me, to members of this chamber, and to the public -- and that's how we pay for this plan.

And here's what you need to know. First, I will not sign a plan that adds one dime to our deficits -- either now or in the future. (Applause.) I will not sign it if it adds one dime to the deficit, now or in the future, period. And to prove that I'm serious, there will be a provision in this plan that requires us to come forward with more spending cuts if the savings we promised don't materialize. (Applause.) Now, part of the reason I faced a trillion-dollar deficit when I walked in the door of the White House is because too many initiatives over the last decade were not paid for -- from the Iraq war to tax breaks for the wealthy. (Applause.) I will not make that same mistake with health care.

Second, we've estimated that most of this plan can be paid for by finding savings within the existing health care system, a system that is currently full of waste and abuse. Right now, too much of the hard-earned savings and tax dollars we spend on health care don't make us any healthier. That's not my judgment -- it's the judgment of medical professionals across this country. And this is also true when it comes to Medicare and Medicaid.

In fact, I want to speak directly to seniors for a moment, because Medicare is another issue that's been subjected to demagoguery and distortion during the course of this debate.

More than four decades ago, this nation stood up for the principle that after a lifetime of hard work, our seniors should not be left to struggle with a pile of medical bills in their later years. That's how Medicare was born. And it remains a sacred trust that must be passed down from one generation to the next. (Applause.) And that is why not a dollar of the Medicare trust fund will be used to pay for this plan. (Applause.)

The only thing this plan would eliminate is the hundreds of billions of dollars in waste and fraud, as well as unwarranted subsidies in Medicare that go to insurance companies -- subsidies that do everything to pad their profits but don't improve the care of seniors. And we will also create an independent commission of doctors and medical experts charged with identifying more waste in the years ahead. (Applause.)

Now, these steps will ensure that you -- America's seniors -- get the benefits you've been promised. They will ensure that Medicare is there for future generations. And we can use some of the savings to fill the gap in coverage that forces too many seniors to pay thousands of dollars a year out of their own pockets for prescription drugs. (Applause.) That's what this plan will do for you. So don't pay attention to those scary stories about how your benefits will be cut, especially since some of the same folks who are spreading these tall tales have fought against Medicare in the past and just this year supported a budget that would essentially have turned Medicare into a privatized voucher program. That will not happen on my watch. I will protect Medicare. (Applause.)

Now, because Medicare is such a big part of the health care system, making the program more efficient can help usher in changes in the way we deliver health care that can reduce costs for everybody. We have long known that some places -- like the Intermountain Healthcare in Utah or the Geisinger Health System in rural Pennsylvania -- offer high-quality care at costs below average. So the commission can help encourage the adoption of these common-sense best practices by doctors and medical professionals throughout the system -- everything from reducing hospital infection rates to encouraging better coordination between teams of doctors.

Reducing the waste and inefficiency in Medicare and Medicaid will pay for most of this plan. (Applause.) Now, much of the rest would be paid for with revenues from the very same drug and insurance companies that stand to benefit from tens of millions of new customers. And this reform will charge insurance companies a fee for their most expensive policies, which will encourage them to provide greater value for the money -- an idea which has the support of Democratic and Republican experts. And according to these same experts, this modest change could help hold down the cost of health care for all of us in the long run.

Now, finally, many in this chamber -- particularly on the Republican side of the aisle -- have long insisted that reforming our medical malpractice laws can help bring down the cost of health care. (Applause.) Now -- there you go. There you go. Now, I don't believe malpractice reform is a silver bullet, but I've talked to enough doctors to know that defensive medicine may be contributing to unnecessary costs. (Applause.) So I'm proposing that we move forward on a range of ideas about how to put patient safety first and let doctors focus on practicing medicine. (Applause.) I know that the Bush administration considered authorizing demonstration projects in individual states to test these ideas. I think it's a good idea, and I'm directing my Secretary of Health and Human Services to move forward on this initiative today. (Applause.)

Now, add it all up, and the plan I'm proposing will cost around $900 billion over 10 years -- less than we have spent on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and less than the tax cuts for the wealthiest few Americans that Congress passed at the beginning of the previous administration. (Applause.) Now, most of these costs will be paid for with money already being spent -- but spent badly -- in the existing health care system. The plan will not add to our deficit. The middle class will realize greater security, not higher taxes. And if we are able to slow the growth of health care costs by just one-tenth of 1 percent each year -- one-tenth of 1 percent -- it will actually reduce the deficit by $4 trillion over the long term.

Now, this is the plan I'm proposing. It's a plan that incorporates ideas from many of the people in this room tonight -- Democrats and Republicans. And I will continue to seek common ground in the weeks ahead. If you come to me with a serious set of proposals, I will be there to listen. My door is always open.

But know this: I will not waste time with those who have made the calculation that it's better politics to kill this plan than to improve it. (Applause.) I won't stand by while the special interests use the same old tactics to keep things exactly the way they are. If you misrepresent what's in this plan, we will call you out. (Applause.) And I will not -- and I will not accept the status quo as a solution. Not this time. Not now.

Everyone in this room knows what will happen if we do nothing. Our deficit will grow. More families will go bankrupt. More businesses will close. More Americans will lose their coverage when they are sick and need it the most. And more will die as a result. We know these things to be true.

That is why we cannot fail. Because there are too many Americans counting on us to succeed -- the ones who suffer silently, and the ones who shared their stories with us at town halls, in e-mails, and in letters.

I received one of those letters a few days ago. It was from our beloved friend and colleague, Ted Kennedy. He had written it back in May, shortly after he was told that his illness was terminal. He asked that it be delivered upon his death.

In it, he spoke about what a happy time his last months were, thanks to the love and support of family and friends, his wife, Vicki, his amazing children, who are all here tonight. And he expressed confidence that this would be the year that health care reform -- "that great unfinished business of our society," he called it -- would finally pass. He repeated the truth that health care is decisive for our future prosperity, but he also reminded me that "it concerns more than material things." "What we face," he wrote, "is above all a moral issue; at stake are not just the details of policy, but fundamental principles of social justice and the character of our country."

I've thought about that phrase quite a bit in recent days -- the character of our country. One of the unique and wonderful things about America has always been our self-reliance, our rugged individualism, our fierce defense of freedom and our healthy skepticism of government. And figuring out the appropriate size and role of government has always been a source of rigorous and, yes, sometimes angry debate. That's our history.

For some of Ted Kennedy's critics, his brand of liberalism represented an affront to American liberty. In their minds, his passion for universal health care was nothing more than a passion for big government.

But those of us who knew Teddy and worked with him here -- people of both parties -- know that what drove him was something more. His friend Orrin Hatch -- he knows that. They worked together to provide children with health insurance. His friend John McCain knows that. They worked together on a Patient's Bill of Rights. His friend Chuck Grassley knows that. They worked together to provide health care to children with disabilities.

On issues like these, Ted Kennedy's passion was born not of some rigid ideology, but of his own experience. It was the experience of having two children stricken with cancer. He never forgot the sheer terror and helplessness that any parent feels when a child is badly sick. And he was able to imagine what it must be like for those without insurance, what it would be like to have to say to a wife or a child or an aging parent, there is something that could make you better, but I just can't afford it.

That large-heartedness -- that concern and regard for the plight of others -- is not a partisan feeling. It's not a Republican or a Democratic feeling. It, too, is part of the American character -- our ability to stand in other people's shoes; a recognition that we are all in this together, and when fortune turns against one of us, others are there to lend a helping hand; a belief that in this country, hard work and responsibility should be rewarded by some measure of security and fair play; and an acknowledgment that sometimes government has to step in to help deliver on that promise.

This has always been the history of our progress. In 1935, when over half of our seniors could not support themselves and millions had seen their savings wiped away, there were those who argued that Social Security would lead to socialism, but the men and women of Congress stood fast, and we are all the better for it. In 1965, when some argued that Medicare represented a government takeover of health care, members of Congress -- Democrats and Republicans -- did not back down. They joined together so that all of us could enter our golden years with some basic peace of mind.

You see, our predecessors understood that government could not, and should not, solve every problem. They understood that there are instances when the gains in security from government action are not worth the added constraints on our freedom. But they also understood that the danger of too much government is matched by the perils of too little; that without the leavening hand of wise policy, markets can crash, monopolies can stifle competition, the vulnerable can be exploited. And they knew that when any government measure, no matter how carefully crafted or beneficial, is subject to scorn; when any efforts to help people in need are attacked as un-American; when facts and reason are thrown overboard and only timidity passes for wisdom, and we can no longer even engage in a civil conversation with each other over the things that truly matter -- that at that point we don't merely lose our capacity to solve big challenges. We lose something essential about ourselves.

That was true then. It remains true today. I understand how difficult this health care debate has been. I know that many in this country are deeply skeptical that government is looking out for them. I understand that the politically safe move would be to kick the can further down the road -- to defer reform one more year, or one more election, or one more term.

But that is not what the moment calls for. That's not what we came here to do. We did not come to fear the future. We came here to shape it. I still believe we can act even when it's hard. (Applause.) I still believe -- I still believe that we can act when it's hard. I still believe we can replace acrimony with civility, and gridlock with progress. I still believe we can do great things, and that here and now we will meet history's test.

Because that's who we are. That is our calling. That is our character. Thank you, God bless you, and may God bless the United States of America. (Applause.)

(First Lady Michele Obama embraces Vicki Kennedy following address to a joint session on Congress on health care by President Barack Obama, 9 September 2009; official White House photo by Pete Souza.)

[From White House Gov.com]

[Cross-posted at Group News Blog.]

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KEEPING CLEAR OF THE POD-PEOPLE: AFTER LAST NIGHT'S SPEECH

(Ant With Acorn from Tugboat Printshop)

I was once friends with someone who is a direct descendant of Edmund Ruffin. For those of you who don't recognize the name, Edmund Ruffin is the South Carolina slaveholding farmer who is credited with fining the shot which began the Civil War. My friend was, among other identities, an anti-racism activist. She spent a great deal of personal energy coming to peace with her family history, her white Southern identity, and her owning class roots.

According to my friend, her family's version of events is that Ruffin was definitely a fierce advocate of slavery and secession, but he was not a nutjob. In particular, they claim the men around him got him liquored up and then convinced him the Yankees were attacking in order to persuade him to be the first to fire. After the war, Ruffin committed suicide, and his family believed it was because of shame rather than an inability to adjust to a changed world.


But believing in slavery, advocating secession, and choosing suicide are all clear indicators of an inability to handle reality. They all exist on the continuum of crazy. So, alcohol aside, Ruffin was living in a particular zone of denial which won't allow his actions the excuse of an unforeseen accident. Any more than Republicans can claim there was no warning Al Qaeda would attack the U.S. in 2001 using domestic airplanes.

Richard Blair at All Spin Zone has a post up today which begins "It’s hard to believe the 'lone gunman' theory of Joe Wilson’s (R-SC) outburst yesterday evening during the president’s address to congress. Someone put him up to it. Low level hit men in crime families don’t freelance."

I agree with him. The larger point is that while there is a solid 30% functional delusional segment of our population (see my post of yesterday), there is also an organized, highly orchestrated effort being made by the Republican Party, their mouthpieces on hate radio, and the corporate elite who fund them to persistently exploit that Crazy 30% to keep change from occurring. They used fake terror alerts and trumped up wars during Dubya's tenure. Now they're relying on more "grassroots" means to scare the shit out of the rest of us and immobilize us enough to keep their dominion going.

What happens in a democracy when nobody listens to each other any more? What happens when guns and camouflage are commonplace sights in public settings? What happens when you can shout absolutely anything at an elected official? This is not protecting or promoting freedom of speech, this is tyranny by the few at the expense of information reception by the many.

And, let's be clear, the Right will be thrilled if the progressive response is to start putting curbs on public expression, because those laws will be enforced by the status quo and will not come down in our favor. (Just like hate crime laws, which I oppose because they are overwhelmingly be used against poor and/or nonwhite people rather than the most flagrant perpetrators of hate.) I think the best reaction is going to be one which comes from us, the masses, rather than through courts or g*d forbid taser-wielding SOA trained urban cops.

The tools at our disposal are education, thinking on our feet, humor, community, common decency, and, most importantly, our liberal belief that respect for the individual trumps blind adherence to authority.

There's a joke among lesbians of my generation that when you came out to your family, a day later it was as if you'd said nothing at all -- not through acceptance, but because the news was so disturbing to them, they blocked it from family consciousness. This would occur simultaneously with someone, usually your mother, saying "All right, but don't tell you're father, it'll kill him."

Alix Dobkin, famous singer/songwriter, became intrigued with this notion of lesbian as a word that is so powerful it passes by without registering and concurrently can strike men dead. As a result, she wrote one of her most famous hits, "View from Gay Head", which uses the word lesbian 22 times. The rollicking chorus goes
Lesbian, lesbian,
Let's be in no-man's-land
Lesbian, lesbian
Any woman can be a lesbian.

Thus, one mechanism of oppression is preventing certain words or kinds of speech from occurring -- though not all restriction of speech is oppression. Oppression, remember, has to be part of a systematic and institutionalized imbalance of power, not simply reflecting a difference of opinion. Another mechanism is ignoring reality, such as how the corporate-controlled media is simply not reporting on the large numbers of people currently meeting for/organizing around their need for a public option in health care reform. On a daily level, this plays out in households when someone can reel off sports statistics in minutiae going back decades but cannot recall how to load a dishwasher or separate laundry. Such deliberately obstructed learning and listening is common currency to Republicans, and if it can be linked to an underlying vein of culturally-embedded oppression -- sexism or racism, for example -- it seems "normal" enough to often not be challenged as attempted domination.

Here's a few immediate actions you can take regarding the extreme disrespect and obstructionism displayed during last night's speech on health care reform by our President:

(1) Progressive Change Campaign Committee has launched a petition asking Congress to censure Rep. Joe Wilson: "Enough is enough. On an issue as critical as health care reform, it's time to stop the lies, the misinformation, and the uncivil disruptions. Rep. Joe Wilson went way over the line by yelling 'You lie' during President Obama's speech, and Congress should censure him immediately." You can sign it by going here.

(2) Since Joe Wilson's outburst on the House floor his Democratic opponent, former Marine Rob Miller, has received over 11,000 individual grassroots contributions raising over $414,000. If you want to contribute, you can go to his Act Blue page here.

(3) Make sure this is not simply attached to Rep. Joe Wilson, but that it is linked to the overall Republican effort to bring down Obama and stop ANY reform from occurring. Alex Koppelman, writing for The War Room at Salon.com, in his post Joe Wilson Wasn't The Only Disrespectful Republican points out: "There's video of Rep. Eric Cantor, R-Va., the Minority Whip, on his BlackBerry during the speech, for instance...When Obama addressed the charge that he plans 'panels of bureaucrats with the power to kill off senior citizens,' someone on the GOP side shouted out 'shame!' The president went on: 'Such a charge would be laughable if it weren't so cynical.' 'Read the bill!' someone shouted back. Obama mentioned those who accuse him of a government takeover of health care. 'It's true,' someone shouted back .... Even as Obama delivered a tribute to the late senator Ted Kennedy, Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga), a leader of House conservatives, perused his BlackBerry. Shortly before the speech ended, Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.) walked out to beat the rush."

Call your Member of Congress today at (202) 224-3121 to express your outrage.

Longer-term, it's important to keep naming what's going on for what it is. Identify crazy when it is crazy, and don't let them shout you down that you're not being fair. The ability to scream at a President while s/he is speaking to Congress is not a right granted by the rules of that body. The assumption that this long-standing rule could be broken is NOT DIVORCED from the fact that the President in question is African-American and the Representative in question has been a member of Sons of Confederate Veterans. As researched by Dave Neiwert at Crooks and Liars, the Sons of Confederate Veterans is a white supremacist organization tracked by the Southern Poverty Law Center which, among other things, defends slavery as a benign institution. What Wilson was calling a lie was Obama's denial there would be health care coverage for undocumented immigrants, a key recruitment issue for the Republican Party's white supremacist base.

It's also important to keep our eyes on the prize, which is not simply countering their terror, nor is it Obama's appeasement path (doomed to fail).

Our goal is No more loss of life or livelihood because health care is currently rationed by profit-obsessed death panels (called insurance companies) rather than being acknowledged as a basic human right.

[Cross-posted at Group News Blog.]

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SEEING WHAT'S BEEN BROKEN FOR CENTURIES

Rick Perlstein absolutely nailed it last month: "In America, crazy is a pre-existing condition."

I want to take this extremely useful reminder one or two steps further. We need to ask ourselves (1) When dealing with manifest mental illness, what is an effective and humane form of behavior that doesn't make things worse, for us or for them? and (2) Let's be explicit about what kind of crazy we're facing here.


Once I was having dinner with an old friend who had retired to a rural area for a while after an extended, messy break-up. She was back in town and we were catching up. She looked much brighter and happier than she had when she'd left town, and I was relieved to see it. Before we got to dessert, however, she confided that she'd finally gotten over her heartbreak after having visitations from aliens -- she could name the planet and galaxy -- who let her know she'd been born there, not on Earth, and she would always have problems relating intimately to Earthlings. I broke into giggles, but she was dead serious. She had come up with a way to cope, a narrative which worked for her, and I had about twenty seconds to figure out what to do.

That sort of situation, once the shock passes (take several sips of tea), is not so hard to handle. Ask questions, stay kind, remind yourself what they -- any of us -- really want/deserve is love and interest. Easy to remember when it's your friend. She didn't have any children she was responsible for, she was clean and eating well and driving okay, and she wasn't going around telling everybody she was from Planet X, only the folks she trusted, so she wasn't about to get locked up. Functionally delusional.

I'm thinking, at this point in America, about one out of every three people is functionally delusional. I think we've always had more than our share because of the nature of our immigration here -- folks who can healthily adjust to and remain in their home communities don't leave those communities. And being persecuted doesn't mean you haven't also become pretty messed up along the way.

On top of that revisitation of the great American myth, I also believe that white supremacy, woman-hating, class exploitation, and child abuse are all concrete forms of mental illness. They are interlinked, they have for millenia been fostered and supported by European governments and the Christian Church, and they are the bedrock upon which our country was founded. When Che said he envied us because we live in the belly of the beast, the point is not whether he was being sarcastic: The point is that living in the belly is a very poor strategic position from which to fight the beast unless you first acknowledge all your sustenance is coming from the beast.

To put it another way, if you say you are not a racist, you most definitely are. Racism is a core value in our culture and nobody escapes the conditioning. And the basic tenet of racism is not that "there are differences between the races" or whatever Websterian bullshit semantic game you want to trot out: The basic tenet of racism is white supremacy. If you are not white, you are second-class (on a good day). You are the Other. You are a risk to the American Way of Life.

Yes, some white Europeans got labeled not-quite-white or The Other for a while, but that merely proves the point. You can lose your position of safety in a system built on racism by associating with/defending/or becoming not-white. It keeps white people in line, this risk; most especially working-class white folks who are already on thin ice.

So, because of a brilliant campaign in which one of the subliminal messages was "I'm not entirely black, I'm not black like Jesse Jackson or Jeremiah Wright, I've picked up enough class polish to not embarrass you like Dubya, and I will NOT make America deal with its bedrock racism", we've elected an African-American to the Presidency. I'm not saying those are the only reasons Obama was elected, but for too many white people who cast the deciding votes, I believe the hope that we could simply side-step racism and Just Be Together made Obama someone they voted for.

Plus: The mess about to handed to the next President was godawful. Who do we get to clean up our messes for us in this country? The really terrible messes, the ones that make you need to gag? Women and/or People of Cullah. Goes without saying.

But for that 30% who are functionally delusional, part of their functionality vanished when the Presidency didn't go to a white guy. They simply cannot cope with what has actually occurred. They are, to use jargon, decompensating. I happen to believe the impact would have been just a great if Hillary had been elected, and if there's one bright lining in all these, it's that I'm not having to listen to the non-stop woman-hating jag that would be going on if she'd been elected. Not Sarah Palin, because she is a Real Woman, according to the delusion, which means she's under the thumb of a man. But in comparison to all the horrifying racism that has bubbled up to the surface (didn't have far to go, let's be honest), if it were Hillary as target, it wouldn't just be the Right. It would be all our nice liberal boys who get twitchy at the mention of her name.

You'll see their flecks of spittle start appearing in the comments as soon as I post this. Until I delete those comments for being unhingedly off the point, that is.

Thus, the racism that was always there, always running the show, has been unmasked for a lot of white people, and we can't live in the same comfortable pretense that we had before. Even those of us who have other labels which make us pitchforks-and-torches targets -- dykes, fags, Jews, crips, poor and not upwardly mobile -- have had a jolt, seeing how much crazy is pouring from the seams. To quote Madge, "We're soaking in it."

And the only way to clean it up thoroughly is to scrub down to bare wood. Otherwise, we'll keep having what we've got.

It won't be Obama and his inner circle who does this work. It's going to be so-called progressives (which is not a cohesive, clearly defined community, either) who will help steward our culture from about to self-destructive Crazy to admitting-we-have-a-problem-and-maybe-we-can-work-on-it Crazy. What I've promised myself in this process is to not lie just because what I'm criticizing Obama and his crew for may remind me/us of the hate pouring from racism. I have to remember, I voted for him, I want him to succeed, I want him to find a way to live up to ideals that he may have only mouthed for political expedience, but people can change.

And here's a few thoughts I've had over the last couple of weeks.

(1) The Birther insanity is code for "There is no such thing as a legitimate black birth." Admitting that black children can be born with as much legitimacy as white children strokes a sledgehammer blow at white supremacy. ESPECIALLY if it's the result of miscegenation, which was still illegal in this country for a chunk of my lifetime.

(2) The school speech "controversy" is code for "We don't let our children see or hear black people who speak well and with pride." This is no joke: Families built around authoritarian principles don't let African-American images in television come into their homes, unless they are being arrested by cops, clearly poor and/or "know their place", or the parents are there to make sure the kids hear non-stop racism instead of noticing the black people look/sound like people. White people who have been raised with this kind of isolation and deliberate poisoning are all around us. Continuing that practice is the real point of not letting their kids hear Obama speak in a non-racist, public setting. Contagion, you know -- if they find out they can be lesbians, their daughters will never choose men, and if they find out black people can be smart and powerful, they'll insist on living in a world where that's the case.

(3) Having lots of people openly carry guns makes public settings extremely unsafe for everybody present. Statistics have proven it over and over again: Add a gun to a crowd, and the odds of somebody innocent dying go way up. The point of having armed presence at public forums is to scare away the non-crazies, to get us used to further militarization of our discourse and community environments, and to have weapons handy in case somebody goes off the deep end and DOESN'T HAVE ONE OF THEIR OWN TO USE. "Hey, I was just carrying for self-defense, how was I to know that lunatic would snatch it from my holster and fire at the President?"

(4) Recruitment and glomming together of the deranged can be subtle. During the 1980s, the activist group I worked with finally figured out how come the Klan and Nazis kept having rallies in places where they were absolutely going to be shouted down by the opposition. They didn't hope to persuade any of us to change our minds, and they knew they were pissing off the neighborhoods they intruded upon. But because of that antagonism, they had to be surrounded by cops two or three rows deep, cops who were facing screaming commies, Jews, lesbians, and POC. Those cops were the Klan's recruitment target. These days it's cops plus the military.

(5) If somebody says, in any translation, that they cannot handle what is actually occurring -- and we're hearing that now, 24/7 -- we need to point out over and over again that THEY are the ones with a problem. Crazy people seldom admit they are crazy.

(6) You don't argue with crazy people. We go on with our work, and if they interfere, we say "Nope, I don't have time to help you right now with your emotional imbalance" and MEAN IT.


[Cross-posted at Group News Blog.]

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R.I.P. (updated)

No, not Michael or Farrah: Habeas corpus (1215-2009).

The idea that we are citizens instead of subjects. The rule of law instead of Presidential whim.

ProPublica reports that the White House is considering an "executive order that would reassert presidential authority to incarcerate suspected terrorists indefinitely".

Citing "three senior government officials with knowledge of White House deliberations", the ProPublica article states Obama's administration has turned away from the option of creating a national security court "to supervise the incarceration of detainees deemed too dangerous to release but who cannot be charged or tried". The reason give for this decision is that "legislation establishing a special court would be both difficult to pass and likely to fracture Obama's own party."

No shit, Sherlock.

If you have legitimate grounds to detain someone in prison, you have enough grounds to charge and try them. At least, that used to be the way things worked, under habeas corpus. Even in 1215, they grasped the justice of this principle.

I hope this article is wrong, utterly wrong. I hope it's the work of Washington Post reporters who are in the pocket of the Religious Right, who would LOVE to see the gains insured by the Magna Carta rolled back to further their chances of restoring theocracy. I hope Obama and his power-hungry, manipulative terriers are not even considering such a step. But I'm starting my mourning now, because it looks bleak.

At least I was born into freedom.


UPDATE: Digby at Hullaballoo has two posts today I recommend reading. The first is Transparent Obscurity, where she speaks of seeing clearly through the "haze of hopenchange" to understand "The irony, of course, is that the man who ran on transparency is actually turning out to be less transparent than the president he excoriated on the campaign trail for his secrecy."

This is a follow-up to her post Legacy, where she directs us to The Nation's article reporting on and validating the ProPublica/Washington Post report I quoted above, Obama Courts Disaster With New Detention Plan.

In each post, Digby refers us to Glenn Greenwald, first to his fact-bearing report Overwhelming majority oppose preventive detention without charges. The second link is to his updated and definitive Obama contemplates Executive Order for detention without charges. Read 'em and do WHATEVER YOU CAN to stop this man's continuation of The Worst of Bush.

[Cross-posted at Group News Blog.]

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REVIEWING MY PRESIDENTIAL WISH LIST

(Five Paths, sculpture by Richard Long 2002 at New Art Centre, Roche Court, England)

Let me be up front: Lesbian/gay marriage is not one of my top 10 issues. Nor even in my top 20. I support it, as I support all human rights causes, but I don't believe marriage represents the ultimate expression of love and commitment, and I'd rather the state get out of the marriage business altogether except for a few basic rights accorded in civil unions for EVERYBODY.

The problem with the recent DOMA brief is three-fold for me, none of which really are about supporting lesbian/gay marriage. First, written into this brief is hate: Hateful lies and arguments which will be used by the Right for possibly decades to come. Second, either Obama is not in charge of policy decisions on a hot-button issue or he's lied in a major way about his intentions. Third, the alleged "Constitutional expert" is flat-out wrong on this issue, where law has been perverted to support politics in order to keep one segment of the population separated from Constitutional rights everyone else enjoys.

Believe me, if this kind of language and stance had been taken with regard to any other population in our country, I'd be just as outraged. More to the point, so would be a lot of people who are currently trying to explain it away as either an accident or some kind of "President's sekwet pwan to whip inflation".


In the bigger picture, for all of you screaming about how it's only been four months, this is one of a series of failures in this new Presidency that are far, far more serious, failures which could easily have gone the other way while he had political capital and intense support to make the Change he ran on. Back when I decided what the key issues were for me in choosing a Presidential candidate, here's what I came up with, in order of importance:

Restore habeas corpus. (This includes closing GITMO.)
Stop and reverse unitary executive expansion. (This includes halting the use of signing statements except occasionally for Constitutional issues and releasing access to documents such as who visits the White House.)
Stop torture. Period.
Enact public health care for all (you bet socialized medicine -- insurance not tied to employment or private companies.)
Halt all illegal domestic spying and reveal what has been done in this area over the past eight years.
Rely on foreign policy that uses military force (or the threat of it) only as a very last resort, and which removes the use of nuclear weapons from the table altogether.
Support unions and working people instead of the economic elite. (This means throwing strong support behind EFCA, ending corporate welfare, and penalizing companies who send American jobs overseas.)
Get us out of Iraq fast.
Appoint Supreme Court justices who are not reactionary.
Prosecute the crimes of the former administration. (This would include releasing torture photos and tapes.)
Immigration reform that involves paths to citizenship, increased work visas, and no more imprisonment of families with children.

(Oops. I guess I forgot I was supposed to be "driven by identity politics" or a PUMA when I was writing this list.)

Now let's rate this Presidency according to actual performance, not Obama's speechwriting ability. The red items are where he has ALREADY failed. The green items are where he has lived up to either progressive hopes and/or his own campaign promises. And the yellow items are where he could still take positive remedial action.

From 11 main items I looked for in a Democratic Presidency, Obama has already gone the opposite direction entirely on five main items, mostly or partially failed on two more, delivered on only one main item, and left three with room still for Hope and Change.

What upsets me most is that I felt we had one slim chance to stop the power grab Cheney set into place, a power grab begun under Reagan (may he rot in hell), but Obama has gladly clapped onto his head the laurels of Imperial Presidency. Which means it will be that much harder for any future ethical Democrat to roll it back, if we ever get one elected, but the more likely scenario is future Republican Presidents will find it a short hop to dictatorship and theocracy.

All this refusing to assign responsibility or correct insanity eddying around us has not won Obama a single ally or vote from the opposition. It will not grant him kind words in future biographies. I think a more accurate description comes from Jill at Brilliant Hussein At Breakfast, who in her post You Don't Have To Be Gay For This To Piss You Off says "There's Barack and Rahm, still trying to win over the very same Christofascist Zombie Brigade that's been calling Obama a Muslim and a terrorist and appearing all over Fox Noise to whip gun guys into a frenzy." You don't deal with domestic terrorists by going appeasatory on them, and I say that as a Quaker. You also don't reason with authoritarian-based hydrophobia. You do the principled thing and keep going.

Jill, by the way, identifies a large part of the problem as Emanuel Rahm. I can't pass up this quote from her: "Note to the President: Jettison Rahm...the sooner the better. Because he is an albatross around your neck.. He thinks his political instincts are great, but he's just another cheap, glad-handing sack of shit who schmoozes and strongarms and thinks that's what's important. Perhaps you are too. But if you don't want to be thought of this way, get rid of this guy. Because he is going to steer you wrong every damn time."

Whatever the source of the infection, we have to diagnose its effect on our system and cry for a halt. We'll have to seek remedy in Congress short-term, and be honest with one another in public as often as we can. Because we believe in the rule of law, not personality.


(Hat-tip to Distributor Cap for inspiration for this post.)

[Cross-posted at Group News Blog.]

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HOWARD DEAN TALKS WITH RACHEL MADDOW ABOUT OBAMA'S DEEPLY OFFENSIVE DEFENSE OF DOMA (AND OTHER UPDATES)

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Quotes from Governor Dean in this interview:

"Of all the things that were done during sort of the anti-gay period, the electioneering period engineered by Karl Rove and Newt Gingrich and people like that, DOMA was probably the most offensive. And this, I think most people believe, never should have been signed. The language in this brief is really offensive, and it really is a terrible mistake. I doubt very much the President knew this was coming. I don't think for a minute this represents the President's position. But he is now going to have to dig himself out of this, because people are really upset about this, and they -- not just in the gay and lesbian community, but in the community of people who are interested in equal rights."

"You cannot talk about gay Americans the way that gay Americans were talked about in this brief."

"I do think it's bad that this kind of language was used in a Justice Department brief, presumably without the President's knowledge. That is really -- you just can't do that. You can't -- It is true that the Attorney General has the obligation to defend the law of the land whether the law of the land they agree with or not. But there are some times when the law of the land is so noxious -- This is not a bill to legalize same-sex marriage. That's not what this does. If DOMA gets repealed, that does not legalize same-sex marriage in places like Alabama and Texas which may not want to have same-sex marriage. But it does recognize the constitutional reciprocity of contracts from one state to another, and that is a basic Constitutional right."

Also appearing today, as the mainstream media wakes up to this issue: From today's New York Times editorial A Bad Call On Gay Rights:

The brief also maintains that the Defense of Marriage Act represents a “cautious policy of federal neutrality” — an odd assertion since the law clearly discriminates against gay couples. Under the act, same-sex married couples who pay their taxes are ineligible for the sort of federal benefits — such as Social
Security survivors’ payments and joint tax returns — that heterosexual married couples receive.

If the administration does feel compelled to defend the act, it should do so in a less hurtful way. It could have crafted its legal arguments in general terms, as a simple description of where it believes the law now stands. There was no need to resort to specious arguments and inflammatory language to impugn same-sex marriage as an institution.

In times like these, issues like repealing the marriage act can seem like a distraction — or a political liability. But busy calendars and political expediency are no excuse for making one group of Americans wait any longer for equal rights.

The Wall Street Journal's Kate Meckler has today printed an article on this story, Gay Group Slams Policies of President. For an excellent analysis of this article and other implications, read the post just up by John Aravosis at AmericaBlog. Among other things, AmericaBlog is making the link between these policy choices and the decision to have Rick Warren deliver a prayer which marred the Inauguration ceremony, and they are also suggesting lesbian and gay leaders boycott the DNC fundraiser planned for the 40th anniversary of Stonewall.

The WSJ Journal article concerns the letter just sent by Joe Solmonese of the Human Rights Campaign to the President, the text of which may be read here.

So, the question is: Did President Obama allow policy decisions concerning human rights to be made without his knowledge by Bush-holdover dobermans, or has Toto now pulled back the curtain to show us the administration's actual beliefs in action? Either way, I'm having Clinton vu.


(Hat-tip to Alison Bechdel and commenter Alex K at Dykes To Watch Out For for some of these leads.)

[Cross-posted at Group News Blog.]

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LESS HONORABLE THAN A MODERATE

(Del Martin and Phyllis Martin at home in San Francisco, 1989; photo by Robert Giard.)

I find I do not (yet) have anything to add to John Aravosis's reaction to yesterday's decision by the Obama administration to not only decide to defend DOMA (in stark contrast to campaign promises), but to heap wood on the fires used to incinerate the human rights of my people. Read his initial post Obama defends DOMA in federal court. Says banning gay marriage is good for the federal budget. Invokes incest and marrying children. and later follow-ups at America Blog, including reactions from other progressives.

In his reaction above, John says "It's pretty despicable, and gratuitously homophobic. It reads as if it were written by one of George Bush's top political appointees." Bingo: John was right. He later discovered that "one of the three Obama Justice Department attorneys who wrote and filed the anti-gay DOMA brief last night is W. Scott Simpson, a Mormon Bush holdover who was awarded by Alberto Gonzales for his defense of the Partial Birth Abortion act."


And now, today, is an additional post I want to recommend from Joe Sudbay, also at America Blog, A Word About Barack Obama And The Lawyers In Our Midst.

For some, the decision whether to defend or oppose DOMA is purely a legal exercise...It's shocking how many people viewed yesterday's DOMA discussion through their own purely intellectual, legal lens. The condescending tone from some of the legal types, both straight and gay - all Democrat - was insulting, demeaning, and horribly out of touch (with their own humanity). Gay Americans lost rights last November in California. We had fundamental rights taken away by an election. Think about that. When was the last time that happened in this country?

Yesterday, a Democratic President of the United States of America, in the year 2009, and an African-American child of inter-racial parents no less, gave his lawyers the go ahead to compare our marriages to incest on the same day that 42 years ago the Supreme Court ruled in his parents' favor in Loving v. Virginia. And these people, along with our President, are suggesting that the appropriate response is to shrug our shoulders and go home, since, after all, the law is the law?

[Cross-posted at Group News Blog.]

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LOSER ICE CREAM E-MAIL

[Yet another entertaining e-mail making the rounds out there. Thanks to AB for making sure I get these!]

Ben & Jerry created the "Yes Pecan!" ice cream flavor for Obama. For George W., they asked for suggestions from the public. Here are some of the responses:


- Grape Depression

- The Housing Crunch

- Abu Grape

- Cluster Fudge

- Nut'n Accomplished

- Good Riddance You Lousy M ...f... Swirl

- Iraqi Road

- Chock 'n Awe

- WireTapioca

- Impeach Cobbler

- Guantanamallow

- imPeachmint

- Heck of a Job, Brownie!

- Neocon Politan

- RockyRoad to Fascism

- The Reese's-cession

- Cookie D'oh!

- Nougatlar Proliferation

- Death by Chocolate... and Torture

- Freedom Vanilla Ice Cream

- Chocolate Chip On My Shoulder

- Credit Crunch

- Mission Pecanplished

- Country Pumpkin

- Chunky Monkey in Chief

- WMDelicious

- Chocolate Chimp

- Bloody Sundae

- Caramel Preemptive Stripe


[Cross-posted at Group News Blog.]

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"I REJECT THOSE THEORIES." SO DID WE ALL.

(On 10 November 2008 while visiting the White House, President-elect Barack Obama waves while walking with President George W. Bush. Photo by Tim Sloan/Agence France-Presse.)

QUOTE OF THE DAY:

At a press conference yesterday, President Obama pointed out Who Won The Election, you morons, and who didn't (why is ANYBODY quoting McCain's comments on the economy? why not dig up Pat Paulsen and ask him that he thinks?)

"In the past few days, I've heard criticisms that this [stimulus] plan is somehow wanting, and these criticisms echo the very same failed economic theories that led us into this crisis in the first place, the notion that tax cuts alone will solve all our problems, that we can ignore fundamental challenges like energy independence and the high cost of health care, that we can somehow deal with this in a piecemeal fashion and still expect our economy and our country to thrive.

"I reject those theories. And so did the American people when they went to the polls in November and voted resoundingly for change."

Even Letterman worked this into his monologue. Keep it up, President O.

[Cross-posted at Group News Blog.]

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CALL THE SENATE: SHOW OUR NUMBERS

(Vice President Joe Biden and President Barack Obama attend the Middle Class Working Families Task Force event in the East Room of the White House in Washington, January 30, 2009. Photo by Larry Downing for Reuters.)

The Senate is not listening. I'm willing to bet they never will, really. We have to replace them.

In the meantime, we have work to get done. And instead of doing that work, the Right is in lockstep to send our new President into Fail as soon as possible, no matter who goes down with him. (They have their money and protection already, thanks to Bush, and it will take more than short while to actually get them out from behind their gates.) While people all over this country are without heat or light, not eating reliably, being evicted and foreclosed on, losing jobs and not qualifying for ANY kind of assistance except the sporadic "faith-based" kind, giving up on college, sliding into disability and death because of no health care, afraid to eat peanut butter or spinach or (fill in the blank this week), worried about dams and bridges and overpasses -- while we are under SIEGE because of failed conservative policies, Republicans and some idiot Democrats are filling the corporate-controlled airwaves with bleating about how the economic stimulus package must not be passed for this or that reason.

The real reason behind their opposition is to strip President Obama of the power which we, the masses, awarded him in this election.



The stimulus package is definitely not a perfect bill. It definitely doesn't address the core issue, which is that the foundation of our economy has to change completely in order to meet the needs of this century. President Obama was stupid enough to toss out family planning funding with no gain at all as a result, and he may concede more until he learns that They see compromise as weakness.

But if we let him get hamstringed this early in his administration (think Clinton and health care), if we act like we as progressives can get people elected but not show up for the complicated issues afterward -- if we let the Senate think they represent anything more than a small minority of Americans -- well, it can and will get worse.

So, I'm asking you, despite your (and my) reservations about this bill, as a matter of principle, let's get it passed and, from that show of strength, gain increased leverage in the future. Call your Senators and tell them you want them to vote yes. No screwing around, just pass it. The Senate switchboard number is (202) 224-3121. If you can't get through or would rather send an e-mail, you can look up your Senator's contact information and web form at the Senate.gov site.

Many, many progressive groups are asking their members right now to call the Senate, including the AFL-CIO, Campaign for America's Future, the Center for American Progress, Health Care for America Now, MoveOn, and USAction. If you've already responded to one of their pleas, thank you right now. If you have your own blog, please consider posting on this issue today. Pass the word. At this point, the Right is logging more calls than we are, despite their much fewer numbers.

Just because they haven't been listening doesn't mean we can shut up.


[Cross-posted at Group News Blog.]

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KADDISH

(Image by Driftglass.)

I keep remembering the early 1980s, when Reagan broke faith with the world by beginning to talk about a "winnable" nuclear war, and everyone who didn't have a bunker to retreat to realized we were at a heightened risk for destroying the planet. Sting responded with

In Europe and America, there's a growing feeling of hysteria (...)
There is no historical precedent
To put the words in the mouth of the President
There's no such thing as a winnable war
It's a lie that we don't believe anymore
Mr. Reagan says we will protect you
I don't subscribe to this point of view
Believe me when I say to you
I hope the Russians love their children too

How can I save my little boy from Oppenheimer's deadly toy
There is no monopoly in common sense
On either side of the political fence
We share the same biology
Regardless of ideology
Believe me when I say to you
I hope the Russians love their children too




String tried to sidestep some of the attacks he'd receive for writing this fuck you to Reagan by naming the song "Russians", but we all knew of course the Russians loved their children, as much as Reagan claimed to love his. That wasn't the point, really. The point was, Reagan is out of control and it's up to someone else to stop the insanity.

I believe "someone else" did stop the insanity then. I absolutely do not believe Reagan's actions or bluster or sleepwalking performance in any way created a safer world for us, any more than Dubya's criminal war has kept America from being attacked again.

I do believe one of the things which made a huge difference in that generation's approach to peace, in particular to the anti-nuke movement, was Deena Metzger. Deena is a writer and activist who first came to my knowledge with the poster she made of her mastectomy scar, her bare chest exposed with one side bearing massive jagged evidence of cancer interrupted, her arms outstretched in sheer joy for life. It was a radical act, that celebration of self-love, and it got all our attention.

During the 1980s, Deena traveled around speaking about the imminent threat of nuclear holocaust represented by the leaders then in our government -- many of whom repeated their roles in Dubya's regime. She gave us grim details of what nuclear winter would actually do, but then, like the rebbe I think of her as being, she offered a way out of despair: She urged us to grieve. Right then, standing or sitting in crowded rooms listening to her, she asked us to let our feelings out, release them with one another and to g*d if we believed in g*d. And we did, weeping, wailing, begging for help, hanging onto one another. She explained that our unexpressed grief and terror stood in the way of intelligent, effective action against the threat we faced. Old ways of doing things would not work. We had to find new ways, and we had to hack through the thickets of old betrayal, fear, and doubt to discover that path.

I believe it worked. Enough people found clarity to make a difference then, to guide action and maintain our direction in progressive circles. It's easy to look on the ascendancy of the Right as a failure of the Left, but it's more complicated than an either-or description. Reagan offered enough people an easy out that his influence is still among us, even on the Left. He wasn't only a bad wizard, he was a very bad man who launched the unraveling of American decency and responsibility.

We're now at another crossroads. In 24 days, Bush will walk out of an Oval Office he has trashed beyond description. I honestly cannot imagine the mindset of someone who wants to take on the job of being primarily in charge of scrubbing away Dubya feces from hallowed walls. I've thought about it a lot. I've been a community organizer and activist my entire adult life, and I do share Obama's frustration with how hard it is, how slow the road, the ethical dilemmas and corruption and lack of stability one encounters in that life. And, in my 30s, I engaged in magical thinking, imagining myself Queen of the Universe and coming up with What I Would Do to change things with a wave of my hand. I even petitioned for the job with friends, offering ready solutions to some of their personal problems if they would only vote for me. They took it as a joke, and it was. Mostly.

A number of events came along to push me in the direction of giving up wanting control, and in my case, it's been an extremely good thing. I'd rather work cooperatively than run the show, most of the time. I don't think I have all the answers, and I know I'm not healed enough to always recognize the truth when it bites me on the ass. I know what works for me, today, and that's enough. Tomorrow I may grow into a different approach, and that's as I want it to be.

So, that's one profound psychological difference between me and Obama. Another is that I never pursued upward mobility and if I had, it might not have worked for me. Contrary to the myth, it doesn't work for most people. Think Hoop Dreams, how many gifted young black basketball players never make it into the NBA. It's not a good ambition to hold out to them, unless you want to keep them locked into despair and self-doubt. Hero worship of the few who "make it" is deliberately promulgated by corporate consumer overlords to keep us from pursuing more rational means of bettering our lives.

Here we are now, having elected a President who talked to us constantly of hope and change, without ever having a definitive discussion about how change will be defined. It obviously doesn't mean the same thing to all of us. For instance, I don't consider the replacement of Joshua Bolten with Rahm Emmanual to be Change of a definitive sort. Indeed, Obama's choices for those who will lead with him are as Clintonesque as if, well, a Clinton had been making them. But I knew he'd do that all along, I knew the difference between him and The Other was hysteria created by an emotional reaction from several factors (CDS, untreated disappointment, dislike of powerful women who don't do the Girl Thang, etc.) and exploited by his campaign because, well, why not exploit it? It's what politicians do.

He wasn't my first or second choice. Neither was a Clinton. I'm a radical, I wanted at least a bona fide liberal in the position. I know he's going to disappoint, too, as much as Bubba did, and I'll take it to therapy if it starts keeping me from thinking clearly as an activist. My job is to think and listen, not to use my colleagues as unpaid counselors.

Even so, even as I expected him to do most of the things he's done, I admit I was thrown by the Rick Warren choice for inaugural prayer. I've said before, it's a clear mistake, a painful mistake. As one friend of mine commented, "It's obvious whoever is helping Obama think about such things, there are no gays or lesbians in that inner circle." Indeed. But it goes beyond that, because I'm hearing distress from all manner of progressives, not just lesbians and gays. It will do no good whatsoever, and it means for many of us (pretty much everyone I've asked) that the inauguration ceremony will have this nasty bit in the middle, a taint we can't ignore.

I believe it actually hinders the efforts of responsible Christians to restore balance to our culture, to separate church from state and pursue ideology not bent on conversion and dominance. I know many Christians who are those kinds of moral people, and Rick Warren is not who they want speaking for their faith. He's a huckster, as all evangelicals are. You don't rise in that field unless you (a) believe you have a g*d-given right to forcibly convert others and (b) lying is all right in the service of bringing souls to Jesus. Warren panders not just to queer-hating but woman-hating, class exploitation, child abuse, apocalyptic nihilism, and white supremacy. Within a few years, he will be brought down by some seamy scandal (probably related to gay sex) and his brief validation on an international stage will be revealed for the sick joke it is.

In the meantime, however, he and his ilk operate from the developmental level of five-year-olds and talking about "tolerance" has no real meaning to them. If your five-year-old throws a screaming fit because she wants more cookies, you can sit her down and have a long talk with her about nutritional balance, but if you then give her one more cookie for participating, she will take away from that the lesson "if I throw a fit, I can get more cookies". Somebody has to be the grown-up with these people. They are not a majority, they are not even that powerful, it's all a house of cards. I want a President who will move in the other direction, away from giving them more room in our public discourse. I'm sick of turning on TV and seeing a preacher talking, aren't you? And, as pedophiles exist with arrested development, evangelicals (whom I'm sure have a vastly higher percentage of pedophiles in their ranks than any group of queers) believe if you don't fight them loudly and assertively, you are secretly liking and wanting what they do to you. They serve Jesus instead of sexual gratification but that difference is irrelevant here.

Thus, I'm confronted with a massive blind spot in the vision of our President-elect. I already knew he had little to no comprehension of how to include lesbian/gay rights into a big picture of human rights, and that this extends to being unable to surround himself with adequate numbers of powerful women. (Uneasiness with queers psychologically goes hand in hand with difficulty seeing women as human beings identical to men.)

As disturbing, I'm seeing some of the enchantment fall away from his former most ardent fans. I know I'll be in the paradoxical position of defending him from his prior rabid supporters, those folks who always shouted me down as a Hillary supporter because I never hated her guts, as the next few years unfold. I'll do it because it is my responsibility to speak out against emotion-based attacks on the leaders of my party. As it becomes clear he's just a right-of-center politician who has lived in academic and beltway insularity as much as anyone else, and as he uses ego to back his pragmatism instead of relying on a larger vision, the Right will whip up froth against him into the same sort of condemnation they've successfully sewn onto Clinton heels like Wendy trying to give Peter back his shadow.

In the meantime, I intend to keep grieving the larger damage done, the death being distributed worldwide in our name, the loss of species and islands and schools and oxygen-making forests. Buddha once said the only rational response to the world's illusion as we live it is grief. I'm a poet, I'm adept with the catharsis of elegy. On the other side is release, and an intellect less burdened with remembering betrayal. You have the remainder of this holiday: Go outside and give up your lamentation to whatever you believe listens to you best, even if it's the other half of your miraculous brain.


(Montreux Pop Festival, 1985 -- Sting performing "Love Is The Seventh Wave")


[Cross-posted at Group News Blog.]

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