Catching up with July

Tabby turned 9!  She had a fun birthday party with Amber & Ella.  Becky took them to Ashwaubomay Park, they came home and played some party games, did some crafting, ate burgers & hot dogs and choreographed some dances with sparklers.  Oh, and played with Tabby's mice.

Mice!?  That's right, Tabby's fish died.  Tabby asked if she could replace him with mice for a pet.  So we got two, Cornflower and Springald, named after mice from Brian Jacques Redwall stories.  We quickly figured out that mice are messy.  Unsanitary.  But they are adorable.  We just keep a bottle of hand sanitizer around all the time.

Ben took a week long kayaking trip up by the Apostle Islands with the young men from church.  They had a great time.

We spent last Saturday at Eau Claire Dells for Ryan Chadderdon's graduation party.

We have some cool news.  This school year we will be hosting a foreign exchange student from Spain.  His name is Santiago and he'll be senior at Ashwaubenon High School.  He actually lives in Paris, has for a few years, but was born in Barcelona.  His father's career took them to Paris.  We are really excited.  Should be a fantastic experience for our family and, I hope, for Santiago as well.

Other than that it's just been entertaining watching the election.  I have stopped being shocked by what Donald Trump says.  It's just too absurd.  I tell myself he's too much a buffoon to win.  Then I remember that after watching GWB be a bad president for four years, we still reelected him.  I guess maybe we get the president we deserve.  I just hope we're not so debased that we deserve a Trump presidency.

The only thing that's really driving me nuts is Libertarian Candidate Gary Johnson trying to pass himself off as some sort of centrist alternative for both disaffected Republicans and Democrats.  His line is that, "If everyone who says he doesn't like the major party candidates voted for me, I'd win."  Which may be true, but makes the pretty big assumption that everyone who doesn't like Trump or Clinton would like him.  Which is not true. Disaffected Democrats would find themselves very unhappy with a Libertarian President.

His social policy isn't liberal, it's laissez-faire.  His foreign policy isn't liberal, it's isolationist.  His most convincing argument to attract disaffected Democrats is "Dude, we'll let you smoke weed!"  I'm not even sure that's really a liberal issue anymore and I kinda' hope my fellow Democrats want more from their president.

I do think Johnson is a good, viable alternative to Donald Trump for disaffected Republicans.  Johnson's view on the proper size and role of government jives really well with theirs. Which shouldn't be a surprise. Johnson is a Republican, just running as a Libertarian after running as a Republican didn't work out for him.

I like Hillary Clinton for President.  She's just a very capable politician.  I think she'd do the job well.  I'm a Democrat because I like the Democratic view on the role of government and that means electing Clinton.  Tabby is thrilled that a woman might get elected president and I think that's pretty awesome, too. That shouldn't be THE factor in electing her, but it could certainly be A factor. During the last school year on a bad homework day, Tabby actually told me she didn't have to worry about her math homework because "Math is for boys.  Art is for girls."  I guess that's the societal stereotype.  Unintentionally, we reinforce that in our home and it is so limiting for Tabby to really believe that.  It struck me how important social role models are.  I want so badly for Tabby to see strong, successful women in every field.

I started reading Brandon Sanderson's second Mistborn trilogy.  Finished Shadows of Self and The Bands of Mourning.  I really like them.  I'm looking forward to book 3 as soon as he writes it.  They read like noir detective novels with steampunk elements.  And the heroes and villains have superpowers. They're fun.  And well written.  With cool characters.  This trilogy takes the same characters from Sanderson's Alloy of Law, a book he wrote because he wanted to write a Western.  But he brings the characters out of the wild frontier and into an industrial revolution age city setting.

Pictures will be forthcoming.

Flint, MI

Once you shrink government to the size you can drown it in a bathtub, apparently you get to drown it in lead laced water.

Scott Walker Doesn't Care

If the Supreme Court agrees that in states using the Federal Exchange their citizens aren't eligible to receive federal subsidies, nearly 170,000 Wisconsinites will lose their subsidies.  Scott Walker doesn't care.  It is so tempting to point to that and say, "Wow, what an absolute ass."  But let's face it, that's what I think about the guy regardless of his opinion on this case.

No, the more important point is that he's right.  He doesn't have to care because the case is an absurd one to begin with.  It's just Republicans grasping at straws to damage the Affordable Care Act and he knows it.  Providing subsidies to all citizens to help purchase insurance which they are mandated to buy was a very basic assumption back when the ACA was being debated.  It is a cornerstone of the individual mandate.  It was back in the 90s when Republicans proposed it as the loyal opposition to the Clintons' health care proposals and that did not change when Obama coopted the idea from Mitt Romney.

So Walker doesn't have to care about what if the Supreme Court ends those subsidies.  That isn't going to happen.

King v. Burwell

I gotta' get this one out of the way before posting the fun one I intended to.  This is just what I've got on my mind after listening to the news this morning, and I've got to say it to get it off my mind.

I try to be fair about politics.  I try to recognize that people are not generally stupid.  They make what they believe to be the best available choices given the information and circumstances they have to work with.

Even today's absurd Supreme Court case over Obamacare.  We all know that subsidies were intended to be given  to anyone in the US who needed them to afford health insurance.  That was one of the basic assumptions of the whole individual mandate debate.  We can (and should, IMO) continue to debate the specific parameters of "need" and "afford" ... but to try and argue that the law intentionally shut out people in states that opted to use the Federal exchange is absolutely absurd.  Republicans are totally grasping at straws.

Even still, I recognize that the parties on the Republican side of the case are simply representing their constituents.  They have a responsibility to try whatever they can, even just dumb procedural moves, to achieve what their constituents want to have done.  I would expect Democrats to do the same were the roles reversed and a law I found offensive was championed and passed by Republicans.

Having said that.  At some point don't you just have to admit that you lost this one, man?  Obamacare isn't going away.  I think we can all agree it's not perfect.  We live in an imperfect world, run by imperfect human beings just trying to do their best.  We're not going to get a perfect law.  Couldn't your time be better spent working with your fellow Congressmen (maybe even find common ground with someone across the aisle, crazy as that sounds) to improve Obamacare rather than trying, and failing, time after time after time after time after ... you get the idea ... to repeal or somehow ruin the law wholesale?

Gun Control Soap Box

I've got to admit, I don't think a background check should be performed on every gun sale. I mean, I understand how it could be a hassle for small, private transactions. Sometimes it really isn't worth it. If I just want to sell an hunting rifle I inherited to my neighbor, for example. That should be a simple, private transaction.

No, I think that instead, background checks should be done when you get your license to use a firearm. Then you simply produce the license when you register any firarm you purchase and, voila, you have verified that you already passed the background check.

You know, there have been a couple of high profile incidents recently that demonstrate the NRA isn't always lying. They make the argument that if an evil person wants to hurt people, he will. Regardless of access to firearms. He will grab a knife or a hammer or a car or whatever he can to use as a weapon and he will hurt people. Incidents last week when a guy drove his car into a Wal-Mart in California and this week at a community college in Texas demonstrate the truth in that.

In both cases people were severely injured. They were serious crimes and the perpetrators should face serious criminal penalties. It should be noted, though, that in neither case was anyone killed. I would argue that if the criminals had brought a gun, that would likely be different. I understand that's not necessarily true. I don't have a crystal ball, "would have beens" and "could have beens" are always, really, just conjecture. However, given the many, many documented incidents of gun violence, I feel pretty safe saying that criminals' access to guns, or lack thereof, makes a significant difference in their crimes. And I hate, hate, hate the NRA for how hard it works to make it easy for anyone, anyone, to get almost any type of gun and take it anywhere they want.

Joe Biden is absolutely right. Bring the gun control legislation to a vote. Make legislators put their official yay or nay on the bills in question and then hammer the bejeebers out of them over it when they come up for reelection. Air commercials with pictures of kids from Sandy Hook next to the plots where they're buried and ask the question, "How did your legislator respond?"

Wrap up

The overall impression I got from the rest of the debates was that, sure enough, we have politicians running for the nation's highest office.  I don't think any of them are dishonest, as portrayed by their opponents.  Well, maybe Paul Ryan is.  Or maybe I just think that because I really don't like him.  However, what they all repeatedly demonstrated is that they will cherry pick statistics and anecdotal cases to support their views.  That's not a good way to make a strong logical argument, but strong logical arguments are not really what politicians do anyway.  They want to present us with a vision of what they hope to accomplish.  Preferably, a vision that distinguishes them from their opponents, but most importantly a vision that will attract a majority of voters.

Personally, I think that's awesome.  I don't agree with the negative stigma attached to being a politician.  It is irritating to hear candidates run on the "I'm not a politician" platform.  Really?  Not a politician?  Are you sure you want us to hire you to do a politician's job?  As if somehow "businessman" will do a better job at running the country?  I can't imagine anyone accepting the converse - that perhaps a politician would do a better job running a company than someone with business expertise.  That's absurd.  As an aside, it's the primary reason I don't support term limits.  Can you imagine being required to change professions after you've finally been in it long enough to become an expert?

So anyway, in my opinion the debates did exactly what they needed to do.  They presented us with a vision.  Winners & losers?  Hard to call and probably influenced by subjective political beliefs anyway.  What's important is that at the end of the debates, regardless of specific details about whatever plans the various candidates could propose we know basically the direction they're going on any issue.

Well, that and the debates were fun to watch.  More combative.  I understand that turns a lot of people off who would prefer to see a civil exchange of ideas.  You know what though?  This is a high stakes contest that is so much larger than just the two men on the stage.  The candidates had better be willing to go to the mat for it.  They each have of millions of supporters counting on them.

I've got to admit I mostly watch the debates for entertainment value.  That's why I went to hear Joe Biden speak, why I went to see the President Thursday when he was here at Austin Straubel Airport.  When my Mom was up she asked if I planned to go to any of the Republican events or hear any of the Republican candidates speak.  "Why?" I asked.  "Because you're a smart open minded individual who wants to know what they have to say," she answered.  Well, yeah, okay.  I like to think that about myself, too.  The thing is, I already know what they have to say.  Nothing any of the candidates said in any of the debates was a surprise.  At least not if you've been following them for any period of time.  I can't imagine they'd say anything I don't know about them at a rally event.  But it's fun to watch, man.  Big picture democracy in action.  They're good speakers (something politicians have to be and businessmen don't, btw) and good speakers are wonderful to listen to.  Unless what they say is sending your blood pressure through the roof.  So yeah, I'll continue to stay away from Republican events.

What this election comes down to for me is two big issues.

(1) Obamacare.  I like Obamacare.  There may have been a time when adequate health care was a luxury, but we've come farther than that. One of the tag lines from Obama's first big DNC speech, like 8 years ago now, that really touched me was something along the lines of "It is a shame that in richest, most technologically advanced country in the history of the world people die because they can't get a pill they need.  That's unacceptable."

I'm willing to believe Obamacare has flaws.  I mean, it's legislation crafted by imperfect people compromising among each other to get something done.  Obamacare moves us in the right direction, though.  It can be modified as needed by future legislation.  Within a market based system, I think it's about as good a solution to health care access as we're going to get.

It drives me absolutely bonkers to hear it portrayed as a government take over of health care.  Hogwash.  In fact, early in Clinton's administration when he was tackling health care reform and people were really concerned that a government take over was on the table, it was Republicans who proposed the individual mandate that is central to Obamacare.  "We want health care coverage to remain in the market place, so let's just require everyone, by law, to participate in that market place and buy insurance."  At the time it was Democrats who shot it down.  "Are you serious?  Give insurance companies carte blanche to hike rates as high as they want!?  No way."

Turns out that it really can be done in the market place as long as there are good, reasonable regulations in place.  It's what Romeny did as Governor.  It's kind of funny to hear him go back and forth now on Obamacare being either an offensive government take over of health care or just a good idea that's more appropriate to implement at the state level.  Politician, you know.  Nothing wrong with the equivocation.  The details of how his various statements fit together are less important than the overall vision.  He wants to repeal Obamacare.

(2) Iran.  Above all else I want to not go to war in Iran.  I mean, I've got 3 sons age 13, 15 and 19.  Our military has been through the ringer for a decade now.  How unreasonable is it to worry about a draft?  But you know, even if there is not a draft, every young man considers the military as an option.  At least every young man in America that I've known has considered it and most of them at least talked to recruiters.  I did.  Jackson did.  I will be surprised if Sam and Ben don't.  I have real mixed feelings about that.  I mean, I would be incredibly proud of my sons if they became soldiers.  However, as a parent, it would be a nerve wracking choice to watch them make even if the country were at peace.

Regarding Iran though.  Both presidential candidates say the right things they have to say about war being on the table, but being a last option to deal with the threat of a nuclear armed Iran.  However, we have seen how Obama approaches international issues for four years now.  I think it's the right way.  I've read it described as "leading from behind".  He builds coalitions of international allies acting together on common interests.  I trust that Obama really will resort to war with Iran only as a final option.  Just as importantly, if it does come to that, we will have a broad range of international support.

I can't say that about Romney.  It bothers me that he's hired many of the same advisors Bush had when he took us into Iraq.  I worry that the Project for a New American Century people haven't given up on their regional hegemonies vision and they've just adjusted in the Middle East.  "Iraq hasn't turned out like we hoped. Maybe we should try Iran."  Whenever Romney talks about Iran I hear the same drumbeat Bush was sounding as he built up popular opinion against Iraq.  Maybe Romney really is serious about avoiding war with Iran if at all possible.  But I trust Obama to do a better job at it.

My Dad and I actually have a bet riding on Iran.  He thinks we'll be at war there within a year of the election regardless of who's elected.  I think we will be if Romney is elected, but not Obama.  I guess it's not entirely clear how the bet will play out in a situation like what if Romney is elected and we don't go to war . . . but the important thing is that next time my Dad and I get together we're going out for a steak dinner.  We'll figure out who pays for it later.

So anyway.  It's pretty clear that with those two issues being most important for me, Obama is my candidate.

Mitt Wins!

This debate. At least, he won the "debate" portion of it. I mean, he didn't convince me to vote for him, but he gave the better presentation last night. I've got to admit I missed a good chunk of the debate while putting Tabby to bed, but I imagine he did as well during that portion I missed.


My overall impression is that, sure enough, we have two politicians running for president. But at least they both seem competent.

Romney had a good point that he really can't give the level of detail everyone expects him to. The president's role is to establish broad principles and then legislators hammer out the details. I still like President Obama's broad principles better.

DNC

Watched the DNC coverage tonight.  Saw Jill & Joe Biden and Barak Obama.  Fun times.  The best reason to give Obama a second term came from Joe Biden.  He's been saying it for months precisely because it captures it so well.

Osama Bin Laden is dead and General Motors is alive.

Joe Biden

Joe Biden came to Green Bay and we skipped church to go see him.  I did anyway.  We left the kids home.  Becky skipped church to stand in burning sun and 80-something degree temps in a security line while they filed 500 of us through a single metal detector, stand in the waiting area of the Railroad Museum for another hour or so listening to a soundtrack of oldies the college kids behind us joked must have been piped in straight from Joe's iPod, then listened to a couple of people runnning for local offices (Dave Hansen, Tammy Baldwin), then go back to waiting for Biden.

That's when Becky got tired of waiting.  So she left.  Of course, she found out from security as she tried to leave that Biden was arriving right at that same time.  They couldn't allow her to be walking around the grounds unaccompanied while the VP was coming in, so she waited another few minutes with security.

I'm glad I stuck around for Biden's speech.  He is an incredibly good speaker.  Fun to listen to, dynamic, convincing.  The Green Bay Press Gazzette described it as, "Biden connected with the crowd."  That was a good way to put it.  He did.

He made a convincing argument to vote for Democrats, especially for he and President Obama.  I mean, he had a very receptive audience, right?  I was already convinced.  He still made a couple of really good arguments that were worth hearing.

He pointed out the absurdity of the current debate over which party was destroying Medicare.  The program is a Democratic party baby.  We made it, fought for it, and have kept it funded over Republican objections for 40 years.  And they now want to argue that we're just tossing it aside?  They want us to believe that after Republicans spent 40 years fighting to get rid of it, to defund it, shrink it to the size that they could drown it in a bathtub, this year they suddenly think its wonderful?  How stupid do they think we are?  Or maybe gullible is the better adjective.

Biden pointed out that Barak Obama brought home troops from Iraq with overwhelming support and it was the right thing to do.  Yet Mitt Romney says it was a mistake.  We are part of a UN coalition of 50 nations in Afghanistan which unanimously agreed it was time to set a date to turn over security to the Afghans.  Mitt Romney says the coalition is wrong.  President Obama is wrong to work with the coalition.  In both cases our Iraqi and Afghan allies have agreed that it was time for the US to step down and Mitt Romney believes we should stay there over their objections.

I understand part of that may simply be Romney can't admit the President is doing anything right.  It's just part of campaigning.  When I see him hiring on the same people who crafted Bush 43's Iraq policy, though, I worry about going back to the go it alone cowboy style he exemplified.  I am still absolutely horrified at the hubris and warmongering my country glorified during those years and I would hate to see it return.

As expected, Biden addressed the recent GOP convention.  He mentioned the talking point flying through the liberal web-o-sphere about Paul Ryan condemning President Obama for not acting on the recomendations of the Simpson Bowles commission.  Of course Ryan left out that he sat on that commission and was among the Republicans who sucessfully blocked sending its suggestions to the President to be acted on!

Biden talked about Ryan's claim that people should be judged by what they do for those who stand most in need.  Biden's comment was that his own father had a policy:  "Don't tell me your values.  Show me your budget and I'll tell you your values."  So he talked about the budget Ryan had authored, its tax cuts and its cuts to social programs.  He contrasted that with the Office of Budget Management's suggestion that for every $3 of cuts we ought to increase revenue by $1 and Romneys claim that he wouldnt even raise $1 for every $10 in cuts.

It is true that the budget Biden criticized was Ryan's, and Romney has said his will be different.  However, Romney doesn't say how it will differ, has said his basic principles are the same, and will be working with a House which has already approved that budget.  At the very least it's a good guide for the type of policy to expect.

Finally, I have to admit I got a kick out of Biden's description of the Republican party.  "It's changed, man.  It's not your father's Republican party.  It's not even Mitt Romney's father's Republican party."

Silly Republicans

There is a house near Edison Middle School with this sign its front yard:

I saw that and laughed myself silly. Mostly, I have to admit, because I think "Recall Santa" is a losing slogan and am tickled pink to see Republicans slapping it on their lawns and bumpers. Also because the analogy is so totally ludicrous.

Scott Walker is not Santa Clause and Santa Clause is not a government office. At least, not here in Wisconsin. Maybe, maybe, if Santa had taken office and torn apart the Christian community, threatened future Christmas celebrations, by busting up elf unions . . . maybe then the analogy would have some merit. Since that's not the case, the slogan speaks more to the myth centered politics of those who use it than it does to what's actually happening in Wisconsin.

I can't even think of a good title

I thought this only happened as part of an apocalyptic future in sci-fi books/movies/games.

Idealism

I had a great conversation with Sam in the car on the way to his friend's house the other day. Paraphrasing:

Sam: Dad, does the government have a fund to help in disasters like Japan's earthquake?

Me: Sure, Sam. There's an agency called FEMA that gets tax funding for exactly that kind of thing here in the USA. If we want to help other countries, we often send in military resources like ships and manpower to help with rescue and cleanup. Or Congress can authorize 'special appropriations' to send money. Someone just writes up the proposal and they vote on it.

Sam: If I were in charge, like the President or something, I'd just have everyone chip in one dollar every month. That would be, like what? $300 million per month? For a fund that would help so much. And it's hardly any cost. Just one dollar per person.

Me: Well you know, $1 dollar a month for our family would be an extra $72 a year in taxes.

Sam: Yeaahhhh . . . but if you spread it out to just a dollar a month, no one would mind paying it. That's like nothing.

Me: I'd support you, Sam. I think it's a great idea. I think there's a lot of people you'd have to work real hard to convince.

Sam: No. They'd support it. If they knew it was for such a good cause.

I had to bite my tongue to keep from going on a diatribe about the tea party being the latest incarnation of that selfish ilk that would reduce the size of government until you can drown it in a bathtub. Sam was just so sincere about the ability of government to help. I think that's great.

The next day I read this in Newsweek. And I'm kinda' torn. I think reading it would provide Sam a fuller context of political challenges, which is a good thing for him to see. However, I worry that it might push his wonderful, youthful idealism towards early cynicism about human nature and democracy.

Walker

I've heard Scott Walker say on several occassions something to the effect of, "Hey, why are you all so surprised? Why so upset? I told you during the election that this is what I was going to do. This is what you elected me to do." As if it were really that simple.

I don't doubt there are people who elected Walker to bust up unions. And there were probably people who elected him to devestate government programs. Then there are those who elected him to get strict concessions from the unions, like he said he would, but aren't quite willing to go along with Walker legislating the unions' concessions for them and killing their ability to recover from the economic downturn once it's over. There are those who might have thought getting localities to cut costs was a good idea during the campaign, but think maybe Walker is going too far when he not only does that, but also cuts state aid to localities and prohibits them from raising revenue. Ever. And of course there are people who voted for Walker for no reasons related to economics at all. Maybe simply because he wasn't the other guy. I personally know at least one guy who voted for him only because he promised he'd let us carry guns in public.

Kind of a funny tangent. I've been to one Democratic party organization meeting in the past. Yep, only one. At that one was also the head of a union at a local aluminum rolling mill. He claimed that he could convince every one of his union members to vote for Democrats if he could just make them believe Democrats weren't really going to take their guns away. So 2+2 = maybe Walker should rethink pissing off unions then telling their member to go ahead and carry their guns wherever they want.

In any case, it seems somewhat disingenuous of Scott to keep telling us, "This is what you elected me to do!" when #1, he really hadn't told us the details of what he planned and most importantly, #2, in light of recent polling indicating that people are thinking, "Dude, if we'd known you were going to totally destoy public unions and starve government into inefficacy, we'd have voted for the other guy!"