More New England Notes

Fonda, Kerry and Photo Fakery (washingtonpost.com)

It says all too much about our country that lies, in both words and pictures, have come to take on a serious life of their own, as if they were true. They represent a fear of the truth. We take something and "spin" to conform to what we want and we don't even call the results "lies". No one seems to lie anymore.

Greenspan Urges Cuts to Social Security to Rein In Deficit

Not let me get this right. Greenspan, not exactly what one would call a "left leaning, up-against-the-wall, man of the people", said to Congress that Bush's plan to "grow ourselves" out of his, and now our, feder deficit, just will not wash. More to the point, he wants millions of boomer folks like me, or in Buckey's phrase, "PLUs" as in "People Like Us" to have their Social Security benefits experience a "trimming" (nice word, that) to help keep the Feds out of a complete economic melt down.

Thanks Alan. Just what us working stiffs needed to hear. Instead of hitting up the rich now, let's hit up the poor and middle class later.

Now what does old George think of this? No doubt, like everything else, he's got a plan and we just have to wait.

Welcome to the White House

If the president really wanted to do so good by changing the constitution, he would push for an amendment that would bar anyone from become president who received fewer votes than another candidate.

But the real question is why he, and all too many others, are so upset about two people who love each other and wish to be married? Don't we have more important things to think about?
pjr@newenglandwow.com

Nader for President - www.voteNader.org -

Why do I suspect there are cries of joy in the White House today? I think it is safe to say that Bush and the people who pulls his strings, fully understand that his election, which only last year was going to be a walk in the park, is far less secure, even with the ten of millions kicked into his campaign by red, blooded Americans. While he is, by any standard you wish to use, save for reduced taxes on the rich, a rotten president. But at least Bush is true to his background, nature and base. He does what is best for where he came and who he is.

Not so for Ralph Nader. While his efforts will by no means insure that Bush is reelected, he may provide that margin of error that worked so well for Bush in 2000. And to what purpose? To be elected president. Not in the cards. By raising issues that would not come up during a campaign without him in the race? He could do very well on the sidelines, just like the rest of us.

No, I think it has something to do with his ego and needing a hobby to fill the summer and fall months. Some people settle for having new business cards printed. Nader seems to like to see his picture and name up in front of everyone while he runs for president.

But the problem for us is that as fine as his service has been to the country, he has done some wonderful things, we should not allow him to inflict Bush on us and the world for another four years. Even if he had a real chance of beating Bush and winning the election, the concept of a working government under Nader is just a stupid idea.

No. Ralph is running for Ralph this time. Even the Green Party understands that.

And it is too bad. A good man with good ideas just carried away with himself. And the country be damned.
pjr@newenglandwow.com

An Open Letter to Ralph Nader

From The Editors of the Nation

Ralph, please think of the long term. Don't run.

Sincerely,

The Editors

While running for president is fun, (who wouldn't like thousands of adoring fans singing your praises in all sorts of neat places, month after month), it can also be a heartbreak as Dr. Dean knows. He was a serious candidate and Ralph, while you are a nice guy and have done some wonderful things, a serious candidate you are not.

I'm willing to bet that George W. Bush is holding his breath in the hope that you will throw your chads into the ring. (Remember chads?) and as the saying goes, show me your friends and I tell you what you are.

So let me join a few others and suggest that a grand statement about what is wrong with America and both major political parties should fit the bill just nicely. Spend a few months holding feet to the fire and making everyone with a vested interest in the way things are feel the heat. But come November, when things really matter, keep your name on a list of voters and keep it off the list of candidates.

As is all too clear from the 2000 election, divide and conquer worked very well, although it did take a little work on the part of the supreme Court.

Ralph, for all our sakes, don't run.

Howard Dean for America: Home

While I never sent in any money to the Dean campaign and never actively supported him, (in fact, up until a visit to our family in Vermont nearly two years ago, I'd never heard of him) I have to admit that I admire the man. He did much to get so many people off their collective duffs and start thinking about the country and where it is going or more to the point, where it could be going.

Good for you Howard and keep at it. But for now, take a few days off and take five. You've earned it.

http://newenglandwow.com

Howard Dean for America: Home

http://newenglandnotessmallbutton767704.jpg

While I received many emails from the Dean Campaign, most from Vermont, I never sent in any money and never actively supported the campaign. I don't feel bad about not doing these things but rather feel good about the "movement" that Dean was able to find, and mold. In truth, he never had a chance in the traditional sense. Even if he had won the nomination, and everyone save the cover of Time magazine people, thought he was interesting but not a "really" serious candidate, he stood no chance in beating Bush in November.

But you know, sometimes interesting is just fine. And one thing that must be said about Dean, he got people involved and thinking. We're a country that does all too little of either. He rocked the boat and I hope he will continue to do so. We could all use a little constructive boat rocking every so often.

Good for you Howard.
Keep up the good work.
Stay in it and keep on rocking.

It is not often that William Safire and I agree on anything but he has repeatedly been against the move of big media to control everything we read, hear or see on TV or on the big screen. It is a danger that we are beginning to see this election year with the coverage of the Bush White House that is all too soft.

Op-Ed Columnist: The Five Sisters

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The New York Times
February 13, 2004
Dear Mr. Herbert,

Thank you for today's column. It hit home with me and I suspect the issue of Bush's service is in the back of many men's minds who avoided service in Vietnam.

I am a little younger than Bush. I graduated college in May of 1972 and shortly thereafter received the first of many letters from the Selective Service System.

My father was a real estate broker in the Park Slope section of Brooklyn, so while I was fighting the draft notice I went to work in his office that summer. While we were far from wealthy, my Dad did have a few connections in the community that he had lived in for many years.

After passing the medical and intelligence tests, I got my draft notice in September. To avoid being drafted, one had thirty days enlist in one of the services or join the Guard or Reserves. I had opposed the war and while it was coming to a painful and slow end, the last thing a middle class, white kid-just out of college-wanted to do was go into the Army.

Using my Dad's connection-interestingly, he supported the war-I was able to join the National Guard in October, razing my right hand at the Armory between 6th and 7th Avenues in Park Slop. The unit was "over-manned" but they found a slot for me. Although I didn't have drivers license, they called me a truck driver.

The draft ended on December 31, 1972 but as a member of the Guard, I reported to Fort Jackson for basic training in January 1973. My basic training company was largely composed of other guardsmen who were caught between leaving college and the end of the draft. Although we were bitter about how we ended up in the Army, each of us was very happy that we avoided the war.

Service in the Guard was a joke. You could wear a short hair wig during drills, covering your long hair. Most of my unit, an artillery battalion, was composed of men who were city employees-fire, police, public works, teachers-who also received city pay for their drills. It was a gold mine for them but few had any clue about actually firing our 155mm howitzers.

Missing drills and "making them up" was a common. Sign in on a Tuesday night and watch TV for a few hours and you've made up for the drill you missed over the weekend. While it was no fun giving up time in the armory, it had Vietnam beat.

Everyone understood that the reason they were playing soldier was because they had the connections to avoid service in the Army in Vietnam.

But unlike the president, I enjoyed my service in the active army. After a few years of playing soldier in Brooklyn, I transferred to the real army. I left in 1985-they made me a recruiter-as a staff sergeant after serving in this country and Germany. I never saw combat.

While I'm proud of my service, I also know that my days in the Guard-like my college deferment-was a legal "out" available to well connected white guys to avoid the Vietnam War.

Like thousands of others, I did everything I could to legally not to fight in it. I accept this fact. President Bush did exactly the same but unlike me and other former guardsmen, he wants Americans to believe that his service in the National Guard was something more than the joke it really was. He, and we, played the game. But the joke is really on us.


Thanks again and my best regards,
Peter Roberts
New London, CT


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Peter J. Roberts
Editor and Publisher
Newenglandwow.com

Big Questions Put Bush on the Defensive

Dear Mr. Krauthammer,
The Washington Post
February 13, 2004

You're theory that the other shoe hasn't dropped because of the courageous and determined efforts by the President reads well. But like so much connected with this presidency, the theory fall apart on closer examination.

Leaving aside the fact that we've moved plenty of new American targets closer to the source and felt the brunt of concerted efforts to kill and harm Americans by the terrorists and others, you could credit prior administrations for their efforts because attacks on our soil were relatively few, minor and largely home-grown prior to September 11.

It is entirely possible, and one hope so, that the attack was a one shot deal to disrupt American society. It that, it was enormously successful.

Our military is strapped. Our free society is now much less so. Spending on the wars and homeland security is well on the way to breaking our long-term economic outlook. Many of former friends overseas see us a new enemy. Our national government, while not in paralysis, has been so preoccupied with the aftermath of September 11 that urgent domestic problems have received ill-considered attention or lip service. Defense and security spending has forced state and local government to increase taxes and cut public services, to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars.

But more important and despite the glowing predictions or "stay the course" rhetoric, few of these conditions are likely to go away anything in the near future. The attack transformed American and not for the better.

The other shoe may not have dropped because there may not be one. In this case, one shoe was more than enough to do the job.

Best regards,
Peter Roberts
New London, CT
---------------

Peter J. Roberts
Editor and Publisher
Newenglandwow.com

Which is it?
Après moi le Déluge or Morning in America

The first quote is attributed to Madame de Pompadour and or to King Louis XV of France. (same church, different pew)

Pompadour was one of the King's mistresses, he had many, and Louis himself is best remembered for disastrous foreign wars that lost France most of North America and India and his spending and taxing policies that bankrupted French economy. He died in 1774 setting up the Ancient Regime for the Revolution of 1789. Thus, so the story goes, we hear from the King on his death bed, Après moi le Déluge. After me the deluge.

The line "Morning in America" is a little more familiar. It is the title of a 1984 TV campaign for Ronald Reagan and of a film played at the Republican Convention that year. It's message was one of simplicity, hope, courage and a national optimism that comes with the rising sun and with President Reagan's steady hand at the helm.

Well, the French didn't have to have their deluge. They could have, with some difficulties, transformed their county and avoided the social and political bloodbath of the Revolution. They didn't, giving the King or his mistress, their remarkable powers of ominous historical prophecy.

While we tip toe around the former president's persona, Reagan record is better than the King's. He spent a lot of money, cut taxes and while the economy was better than under President Carter, that isn't saying a whole heck of a lot. Still, he made many Americans feel good about themselves. He was forgetful, had a management style that was all too much "hands-off" and he put off a lot of problems in the hopes that the "free market" would handle things.

But it was Morning in America and that was good enough.

Fast forward to today. It's 2004 and an election year. There may be some middle ground in the electorate but if so, it is numb and minuscule. We may not be as divided as we were during the Vietnam War-perhaps because there's no draft-but we're pretty darn close.

We're at war.

One side says it was right and just that we invade Iraq and topple Saddam. Another says that the war was a colossal blunder that's costing lives and billions with no end in sight. There no middle ground and both point to President Bush with praise or condemnation.

We're broke.

Some say that the economy is picking up speed and that the president's tax cuts and spending plans are the right things to do. We'll get past these bumps in the road they say and everything will be just peachy. Many others are less happy with the economy. They point to historic deficits, chronic unemployment or under-employment and see much worse things to come. Again, there is no middle ground.

The earth is warming. No it ain't!

Schools are rotten. Let's send them all to private school.

Money would help as would a few more parents who actually cared about education.

Do you see where we're going? We're becoming two nations residing in the same place. Everything is for political position and little for the common good.

What are we becoming? Who is to blame?

Perhaps all of us better take a look in the mirror.

Which is it? The sun rising on a grand morning or the end of the great experiment.


Peter J. Roberts
Editor and Publisher
February 10, 2004