Why Do Conservatives Hate Social Security?

Truth In Politics.org has an analysis of information contained in a book written by Joseph A Pechman about the tax structure in the United States.

Here's the beef:

The tax system has relatively little effect on the distribution of income. In
contrast, the transfer system has a significant equalizing effect. The transfer
system includes all transfer payments such as Social Security benefits,
Medicare, and Medicaid.

Conservatives hate ALL entitlements because they represent an effort to correct the economic and social imbalances in society. Conservatives are Social Darwinists. They believe that is OK for many, many people to remain poor, for old people to have no health care, and they don't want hard working people to have a secure if modest retirement if it's funded by Social Security payments. This really sheds a lot of light on the dark Hobbsian/Lockeian philosophical underpinnings of conservatism. Conservatives trumpet liberty above all other values. They prefer unfettered capitalism with minimal or no governmental involvement as an economic model, even though we've seen over and over again in the last two centuries how unregulated capitalism leads to excesses and abuses such as child labor, unsafe working conditions, unfair low wages, etc. Conservatives forget that there is an even older pre-Hobbsian Platonic philosophical quest: the search for a just society. Conservative skepticism about the ability of government to solve economic and social problems doesn't mean that government must remain powerless to intervene and correct the worst examples of injustice, and lessen the burden on those in society who are not in a position to help themselves. One of the most curious examples of the warped conservative viewpoint is the belief in something called "moral federalism," attributed to conservative pundit George Will by Andrew Sullivan on Sullivan's website. Will (and Sullivan) think that "moral" issues like gay rights and abortion ought to be left to the individual states to decide. What ever happened to the federal constitution and the guarantees of the Bill Of Rights? I guess we don't need them anymore. If "moral federalism" was how we governed ourselves, we'd still have "separate but equal" in the South! It's necessary to really take a hard look at what conservative thinkers say and write. It's really quite a crock.

Photo: plants, flowers and gifts are available at "Garden Grove" in downtown Cherry Grove

Jim

The Thompson Factor, Ms. Clinton, and DOMA

One of the flowers that I see here on Fire Island that I've enjoyed very much over the years is the Foxglove. This specimen I purchased at Bayport Flowers for my own garden. While you don't have to plant the Foxglove in a protected area away from where deer can eat them, I still like to have them inside the fenced garden where I can enjoy them up close. I'm hoping to establish enough plants so that they'll come back on their own each year.

In the news: the potential presidential candidacy of actor/senator Fred Thompson, a Southern Evangelical who is thought to be the darling of the Republican religious fundamentalist right wing. Just a cursory look at his voting record as a senator confirms his right wing extremist credentials. Is he another Reagan? I don't think so, but he may have enough appeal to really shake up the Republican field. He's no friend to the gay community, that's for sure, having voted against our interests on every bill from ENDA to DOMA.

Speaking of DOMA (The Clinton era "Defense Of Marriage Act,") when is someone going to ask Ms. Clinton if she is in favor of repealing DOMA and, if not, why not? Her husband signed the bill that says that gays and lesbians cannot marry all the while he was having an extra-marital affair with Ms. Lewinski. So much for gays hurting marriage.

Jim

The CGRR Is Back Running Again!

Here's something fun. After seven years of operation, I've re-engineered the Cherry Grove Rail Road so that I can run some larger locomotives. Here's a video of the new line in operation.

Jim

Andrew Sullivan: Boomers Will "Hog" Soc. Security

Today on his blog conservative Andrew Sullivan is moaning about the future tax increases that his one time hero Junior Bush has made inevitable by running up huge deficits. Sullivan also claims that he'll only get about half of what he should under Social Security when he retires because "baby boomers" will "hog" it all for themselves. This is typical of the upside down logic of conservatives.

If the money squandered on the Iraq war was combined with the reversal of the unethical tax cuts for the wealthy instituted from the Reagan era onward, Sullivan would get his full Social Security payment, we'd be able to fully fund Medicare, provide healthcare insurance to all Americans, and fix our schools. Conservatives simply have the wrong priorities.

Photo: We lost two sets of beach steps and a ramp to a Nor'easter in April. As of Memorial Day the Brookhaven Town Highway Department had only replaced one stairway leaving an unsafe situation for holiday crowds. Apparently, work resumed yesterday on the other stairway. Our Property Owner's Association was basically gutted a few years ago and replaced by a feel-good but ineffective Community Association. In addition, a private group funded replacement stairways in past years, so the town got used to being able to ignore Cherry Grove's needs. This is going to be a difficult situation to rectify.

Jim

Britney Hits Rock Bottom

I put the above headline up to highlite how the media in the United States is taking a giant shit on the psyche and intellect of the American People.

I put the art my daughter created to the left to show that there is actual hope for the future of our children and our children's children.

Every major newswire is carrying info on possibly the most unimportant person in the world; far less important than any bottom caste street sweeper in India or poor family in Appalachia. Both of the aforementioned groups are far more important to me than anything Britney Spears or Paris Hilton does or says. And as much as I like Rosie (I liked her better as a comic than a talkshow host), I absolutely do not want my inbox or prime time news filled up with gibberish about a spat.

Let's call this for what it is: a distraction, an affront to our basic sensibilities. For many years news organizations have dabbled in entertainment. I do remember Walter Cronkite and Mike Wallace actually attacking issues that mattered. So what happened? And what happened to Mike's son at Fox News? Didn't he take him aside and have the "big boy" talk with him (as in big boys don't work at Fox News)? Distractions abound and real newspeople would see them purely for what they are. Carnage and grist are to keep the peasants busy while the aristocratic Neocons have dinner at their club. Britney, Elizabeth and Paris are what I lovingly refer to as "irritainment". Irritation and entertainment now intermingle in a wondeful collage of vomit.

War for oil is also a distraction. The Democrats rolling over on a war spending bill is a distraction. Why?

Because it turns our attention away from important problems that have no easy answers. Schools, Healthcare, Social Security, Infrastructure and finding long term solutions to stop energy independence and the like are all more important than Iraq, Iran and all the oil put together.

If you want to read what the war is REALLY about, Greg Palast paints the picture better than anyone in Armed Madhouse. For you Republicans out there that actually have the balls to read and think rather than speak, go to Amazon or B&N and pick up Greg's book. He's one of the top five investigative journalist of the 21st Century and he has the guts to tell it like it is in the tradition of writers and journalists that can think and report while chewing gum and walking all at once. It's $9 used on Amazon. And for Pete's sake, please stop telling me Bush is a leader that has just made some "bad choices". His choices are carefully planned and are designed to benefit a few and take from many.

Lest we also forget, our media, the same one's hyping Britney's latest revelation are also treating 76% of America as a fringe group. CNN has labeled the 76% "The Antiwar Crowd". Are they kidding? One of my colleagues told me she only watches Fox news for a half hour in the morning and she gleans all of the news she needs to know about the world from her half hour exposure. She's not stupid, she is kind and decent and they are very good marketers. Check out the scoriating articles Brit Hume has penned lately against good people like Nancy Pelosi and Cindy Sheehan.

Distractions. Distractions from our loss of civil liberties, diversions from our hard questions about why our government is operating like a poorly run business. Government is not about business or to make money; it's about providing for the common good of the people.

Speaking of common good and the little pearl of art shown up above, lawmakers across the land are considering cutting arts programs. Art can be a distraction, typically one that expands minds; that's not good for the other Britney's out there looking to move people away from the real questions.

As asked before by ink slingers that can write much better than I can; is this really for the common good?


M

Cherry Grove, Our Summer Home

Here are a couple additional shots of the Cherry Grove downtown commercial area. The recently built "Island Breeze" restaurant overlooks the Great South Bay and, by all accounts, is serving tasty food, much improved this season. This restaurant sits on the site of the old "Michael's," which many of us still miss very much. The proprietor of "Michael's," "Rocky," was a kind man who, along with his family, ran a friendly restaurant that was a social hub in the Grove for many years. "Pasta Night" was my favorite night to go to "Michael's." We'll also never forget the wonderful end of the season parties that Rocky always had "on the house" with the entire community invited, usually at the end of October. Rocky died a year or two ago but he's still in the thoughts of many.

"Floyd's," named after Bret's dog Floyd, is a busy breakfast and lunch venue with outdoor tables and counter. It's a great vantage point to do some serious people-watching.

Jim

A Soldier Asks Why Are We in Iraq?

Photo: A quiet moment in "downtown" Cherry Grove.

It's the day after a really beautiful holiday weekend here in Cherry Grove. By all accounts, it was a busy weekend for the business community with bars and restaurants hopping. Dan and I joined our good friend Ed for dinner at Jumpin' Jacks on the beach Monday evening. It was busy and our waitress indicated that she had been kept real busy all weekend. I guess this is a good thing, although I feel as though we're overwhelmed here at times by the crowds. As far as I know everyone had a good time and no one was hurt.

I just read an essay written by a soldier serving in Iraq. This articulate young man questions our reasons for being on Iraq:

My name is Donald Hudson Jr. I have been serving our country’s military actively for the last three years. I am currently deployed to Baghdad on Forward Operating Base Loyalty, where I have been for the last four and a half months. I came here as part of the first wave of this so called "troop surge", but so far it has effectively done nothing to quell insurgent violence. I have seen the rise in violence between the Sunni and Shiite. This country is in the middle of a civil war that has been on going since the seventh century. Why are we here
when this country still to date does not want us here? Why does our president’s
personal agenda consume him so much, that he can not pay attention to what is
really going on here?

Read the rest of Donald's essay here.

I hope he stays out of harm's way and that he pays no price for his forthrightness. Because there are no good answers to the questions he raises, I'd like to get him out of Iraq and bring him and his fellow servicemen and service women home NOW.

Jim

Happy Memorial Day!

There's nothing like the beach on a beautiful Memorial Day weekend!








The Arts Project of Cherry Grove (APCG) has their annual Memorial Day season opening party and selection of the Cherry grove Homecoming Queen event each year during the Memorial Day weekend. There were four contestants for Homecoming Queen this year...and the winner is Lola Galore!




Event co-hosts Bella and Panzi whooped it up!

2006 retiring Homecoming Queen CoCo Love poses with her successor.













A reader asks why I mentioned (unfavorably) Ellen DeGeneres in my critique of Mary Cheney yesterday. The word is that Ellen agreed to keep her mouth shut about gay issues as a component of her TV contract. Watching her show in recent years, it's like she no longer has a sexual orientation of any sort, she's become a neutral. This, after her ground breaking coming out on her sitcom, is, to say the least, a great disappointment to me. She could be a such powerful voice for social justice. I'm much happier with Rosie O'Donnell, who continues to publicly fight the good fight against the right wing.

Here's a dangerous situation on the beach here in Cherry Grove. I hope someone is not injured before the town highway department corrects this.

Jim

Mary Cheney = Collaborator

Queer Sighted blogger Richard Rothstein asks if as gays have an obligation to fight for our rights or if we should just be left alone to lead "normal" lives. But that's precisely the point: we can't lead normal lives given the oppression directed against us. VP Cheney is a MAJOR oppressor. Why shouldn't I expect Mary Cheney to reject him and his complicity in our oppression just like I had to reject my own family's refusal to accept me as a gay man? To me Mary is a collaborator, and represents the lowest gay life form out there. As long as we have courageous gay men and lesbians fighting openly, I have zero tolerance for the Mary Cheneys, Ellens, or whomever else goes along with the program of hate, discrimination, and second class citizenship directed at us.

Photo: Henry Sterling oversees his annual deck sale

Jim

A Benefit For The Animals

One of the signature events early in the season in Cherry Grove is Henry Sterling's annual deck sale, a benefit with proceeds this year going to PAWS, the Pines Animal Welfare Society. Here's a picture of PAWS organizer Valerie with photos of some of the kittens that need homes. The weather was beautiful and the turnout for the sale was good.

On a sad note, one of the Grove's most colorful figures, Bill "Violet" Silver died in New York City yesterday. Bill founded the garden club, hosted "High Tea," and published a newsletter listing a calendar of community events. The Grove won't be quite the same without him.

The news this morning is not good. The Taliban are launching an offensive in Afghanistan; eight more U.S. soldiers are dead in Iraq; Israel is involved in more fighting; Iran continues to thumb its nose at the world; etc., etc., yet Junior Bush behaves as if all is well. I guess all IS well for him in his make-believe world.

Jim