Failure to prosecute: why Obama is having trouble passing health care reform

By Don Smith

President Obama apparently believes that prosecuting Bush Administration officials for torture and other crimes would be a “distraction” from more important matters, such as health care reform.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

The reason President Obama and the Democrats are having so much trouble passing health care reform is that they failed to hold conservatives accountable for their many misdeeds. The Democrats thereby empowered conservatives to continue their ample mischief. (I write “conservatives” rather than “Republicans” because some Democrats are amongst the conservatives who promoted harmful policies.)

Conservative misdeeds range from the unspeakably evil — such as torture, rendition, lying about the reasons for going to war, and the deaths of up to a million or more civilians — to the merely despicable — such as politically motivated prosecutions, reckless deregulation, suppression of evidence, tax cuts for rich folks, stolen elections, inadequate response to Hurricane Katrina, dirty tricks, and rampant corruption.

Had Democrats pursued impeachment early on they would have exposed the many lies, crimes, and dirty tricks of the conservatives to the light of day. Democrats would have even bigger majorities in Congress, and the ability of conservatives to influence public opinion would have been greatly diminished.

Instead, the Democrats, and President Obama in particular, have tried to be “bipartisan”.

What a stupid policy!

Conservatives in Congress have no intention of compromising on health care reform or on any other substantive issue. They continue to defend Bush Administration officials and policies in order to protect themselves and the GOP. This was discussed in Bipartisanship porn and Obama’s Trust Problem, where Paul Krugman writes:

It’s hard to avoid the sense that Mr. Obama has wasted months trying to appease people who can’t be appeased, and who take every concession as a sign that he can be rolled.

Indeed, no sooner were there reports that the administration might accept co-ops as an alternative to the public option than G.O.P. leaders announced that co-ops, too, were unacceptable.

The Democrats will continue to have trouble passing a reform agenda until they decisively confront the misdeeds of the recent past by rejecting bipartisanship and pursuing prosecution of Bush-era officials. This will have the triple effect of (1) bringing criminals to justice, (2) exposing the truth to the public, and (3) weakening the influence of conservative politicians and ideology.

Alas, failure to prosecute may not be the main reason why Obama and the Democrats are having trouble passing health care reform. There is evidence that the Democrat leadership never intended to pass real health care reform. This grim conclusion was sketched in Squandered Opportunity and Follow the Money. The Democrats may be too corrupted by money and power to follow through on their promises.

Progressives’ impatience with Obama is reaching a boiling point, not just over accountability but also over the bailouts, health care reform, militarism, and other issues. As Paul Krugman observes, “A backlash in the progressive base — which pushed President Obama over the top in the Democratic primary and played a major role in his general election victory — has been building for months.”

Indeed, we progressives have power over Obama. We are his base. If we turn against him — or, better yet perhaps, just threaten to turn against him — the news media will pick up on the story and Obama will be in trouble. Let us use that power wisely. If progressives appear too pushy, the effort might backfire. Recall that Congress voted to condemn MoveOn.org in 2007 when the group published their ill-fated New York Times ad questioning whether Gen. David Petraeus would “betray us” (MoveOn.org ad controversy).

For years progressives have been criticizing Democrats for appeasement. Maybe it’s time for progressives to follow our own advice and hold Obama accountable by saying, basically: either you stop protecting these torturers, stop continuing Bush era policies, and stop compromising on health care reform, or we on the left will withdraw our support and condemn you too. Progressives need to tread carefully, lest they be dismissed as radicals, but they need to demand their due.

“I want you to hold our government accountable. I want you to hold me accountable” — Barack Obama (September, 2008). Let us hold him accountable. Let us do our part to get the word out about how America is being screwed. And let us do our utmost to ensure that progressive Democrats such as Dennis Kucinich and brave independents such as Bernie Sanders prevail.

We use to execute them for waterboarding!

The atrocities of the Bush and Cheney years know no limits, yet they continue to defend THEIR actions and try to rewrite our history, AGAIN!

THE GENIUS OF IMPEACHMENT

Cheney has been the De Facto President since he and Bush were elected. He put himself in charge of NORAD two months before 911. The first time in history that Norad was in the hands of a civilian, rather than a general? The GANG OF FIVE, CHENEY, BUSH, RICE, ROVE, AND GONZALES, and the Corporate World want continual fighting and bloodshed because it generates the greatest profits. They have gotten the political representatives to adhere to this philosophy and the scared public to follow along. Making threats more ominous than they are create a public that doesn’t question anything; as a result our Bill of Rights has been suspended by the worst Act ever passed by the United States, the Patriot Act. The most influential leader for the demise of Democracy is George W. Bush. An individual that ignores all advise except that of the Corporate lobbyists who insist that holding on to Iraq is the only viable option for maintaining World Domination and a foothold onto the oil riches of the middle east. The United States has built 14 PERMANENT BASES over there as of this date. There is no intention of ever getting out of Iraq! General Petraeus (the General in charge over there at the moment) said last week, “It will take decades to bring about peace in Iraq”.  The Corporate World dictates what we do abroad as well as what we do here; ask why do we want to grant amnesty to 12 million illegal aliens? Is this in the best interest of the United States? Is losing our loved ones in a Civil War in the Middle East and wasting billions of dollars over there in the best interest of the United States, while our borders are no more secure now than when 911 occurred? My fellow Americans, we can get our Nation back, but it will be difficult and it will be a long process. We must start at the top and work our way down. Bush has acknowledged that “money trumps peace”; with his acknowledgement we must recognized his true agenda, a new World Order!

George W. Bush’s first administration was notable for including a number of veterans of previous Republican administrations, including Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld. But if Bush’s early cabinet members and advisors had considerable government experience, they, like others before them, could also boast of extensive corporate connections. Bush, the first president with an MBA degree, appears to be following a similar course in choosing the cabinet for his second term.Bush himself is a former Texas oilman. His company, Arbusto, was on the verge of bankruptcy when it merged with Spectrum 7 in 1984. Harken Energy bought Spectrum in 1986, and Bush was given a seat on Harken’s board. He went on to become managing general partner of the Texas Rangers baseball team before entering politics. Vice President Dick Cheney was the CEO of Halliburton, the world’s largest oil field services company, until he joined the Bush ticket in 2000. Halliburton’s activities in the Middle East have drawn scrutiny. The company’s European subsidiaries sold spare parts to Iraq’s oil industry, despite U.N. sanctions. Halliburton and its subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root have reaped huge profits from the rebuilding of Iraq following the U.S.-led invasion of the country in 2003. Critics charge that Halliburton has received preferential treatment in the awarding of government contracts in Iraq. The company also has faced trouble at home. It agreed to pay $4 billion to settle myriad asbestos and silica-related lawsuits, and is facing a class-action suit alleging accounting fraud.Below is a list of corporations with connections to people in the Bush administration. In cases where no corporate connections exist, the chart’s company field has been left blank.

The Bush Cabinet
Cabinet Position	Cabinet Official	Corporate Connections*
Agriculture Secretary	Mike Johanns	®  ®  ®  ®
Attorney General	Alberto Gonzales	®
Commerce Secretary	Carlos Gutierrez	®
Defense Secretary	Robert Gates	®    ®
Education Secretary	Margaret Spellings
Energy Secretary	Samuel Bodman	®  ®
Health and Human Services Secretary	Mike Leavitt
Homeland Security	Michael Chertoff
Housing and Urban Development	Alphonso Jackson	®
Interior Secretary	Dirk Kempthorne
Labor Secretary	Elaine Chao	®  ®  ®
Secretary of State	Condoleezza Rice	®  ®  ®
Transportation Secretary	Mary Peters	®
Treasury Secretary	Henry Paulson	®
Veterans Affairs Secretary	Jim Nicholson

 So we start at the top and begin the process to remove the GANG OF FIVE, Bush, Cheney, Rice, Rove, Gonzales. The founding fathers were astute and actually devised a system of government that has worked for over 200 years. It is only when attempts to tear down that system does the government fail us, the people. And the GANG OF FIVE has been doing that ever since they got into office! Once they are removed than we go to work on the Congress who have fallen in step with the executive branch in demolishing our system of government. The first step is impeachment, view the video below: MUST SEE AND HEAR PART TWO:

Lobbyists, Property Taxes, Homestead Exemption, Homeowners Insurance, SMOKE AND MIRRORS

The citizens of Florida and most of the country have been pawns of politicians who represent Corporate America, rather than their constituents. Although it has been a slow and drawn out process, it has been highly effective. After all, Corporate America has a long history of trial and error to draw from, from the early industrial revolution where cheap labor and child labor were brought in to do the tasks of big industry in the cities, to the company mining towns in Virginia and other mining states. In both cases, the industries have used their work forces as necessary means to an end, and the end being their greed and bottom line; PROFIT. In the big industrial cities and the small mining towns, the companies not only owned the work industry but they also owned the banks, built the homes and ran the stores, and just about everything involved in the life of the common man and woman. There was only one thing missing, the ability for wide scale communication and mass media; to subliminal manipulate thoughts of the people. Thought manipulation victims are not aware of it and that’s the point of it. Over time, 40, 50 years, or more, along with society’s natural ¹ethnocentrism brings people to believe their thoughts, are their own!

Today it is worse! ²Just a few corporations own most of the media sources and if they don’t own the rest directly, they own them indirectly as holding companies. They now own, not only the industries of society, but also the means to convey their ideas of a perfect society. Corporate America’s idea of a perfect society is analogous to that of a bee hive. Author 3Tammy Horn points out that we are drawn to bees because bee society is perfectly engineered. There is no waste; honey bees utilize time and space to perform specialized tasks that preserve a highly structured social system. Horn argues that honey bees’ natural behavior reflects American virtues and values, finding them embedded in our cultural symbolism from colonial times to the present. The problem with the perfect society is that it is not a Democracy. The Queen Bee, Corporate America, determines what is best for the hive, society, which does not translate into what is best for the drones, the people!

This accounts for the dramatic changes in the 4mores and beliefs of our people. The breakdown of the family unit, which was the cornerstone on which this Nation was built, continues to crumble because of economic necessity and media manipulation. Economic necessity requires both Mother and Father to work, sometimes multiple jobs, in order to make ends meet. Media manipulation shows what is important in our society, Reebok’s, Nike’s, gangs, basketball, hate, distrust, etc. While the economy is flourishing for the few, it is hardly doing that for the many who must juggle which bills to pay first, the electric, the house payment, or the Doctor’s bill? Without role models in the home the young are left with T.V. and video games in which to learn their values and we have witnessed the disasters that have resulted, Columbine and the Virginia Tech tragedies, are just a few to mention. The hatred present in our society is a direct result of the mass media’s agenda to propagate hatred toward any who would disagree with their views, to vilify them to the point of second class citizenry. Corporate America learned a long time ago that it is much more profitable to promote hatred and warfare, rather than friendship and peace.

The political pundits who have been brought into power by the lobbyists, in the past, had to try to hide their debt payoffs to the lobbyists in the details of legislation that rarely was reviewed by the masses, much less reported by the media. However, over the course of time, and the successful ability of their mass media to manipulate public opinion, they no longer try to hide their payoffs; in fact, they openly profess them as public policy which will benefit everyone. The privatization of former governmental responsibilities to private industry is an open, brazen, payback of debts to lobbyists. The duties that have been taken over by private industry have cost us, the taxpayer, a thousand times more, than when they were performed by the government. We have all heard about the toilet seats that have cost $500 or the hammer for $1000! Let’s not forget the 5Blackwater Corporation in Iraq, the private military machine whose average pay is $215,000 per year. President Bush so eloquently put it, when he said, “6Money trumps peace”.

Florida has had a long history of lobbyists and paybacks and the privatization of government responsibilities has resulted in overwhelming costs when the fraud and corruption that resulted from such privatization is considered, i.e.: 7In July 2004, three top social service officials resigned after acknowledging they took favors from lobbyists. The same month, errors forced the state to scrap a felon voter list a company was paid millions to compile; Two months later, the Jeb Bush Administration canceled $176-million in technology contracts after discovering a former official may have improperly communicated with a vendor, prompting an ongoing criminal investigation; But none of those problems compare to a single contract that threatens to undermine Bush’s six-year legacy of hiring companies to do government work. The rollout of the People First personnel system, run by a Cincinnati company called Convergys that had never had a government contract before, has caused paycheck and benefit problems for thousands of state employees – including legislators who sit in judgment of Bush’s agenda. Now when the issue of Property Taxes and Homestead Exceptions arise in Tallahassee let us not assume that the legislators are reacting to the immediate concerns of the citizens, rather, let us be realistic and acknowledge that their immediate concern is for the lobbyists who represent the building industry of the state. After all, Homestead Exemption has been protecting those who reside in Florida as permanent residents since 1993. These residents have not had to face the dramatic increases in property taxes over the years because of the 3% cap on the assessed value of their property. But because 2005, which was an aberration from the norm, when property sales in the state rose astronomically, and as a result the building industry overextended itself and subsequently could not afford to pay their dramatic increase in their land development property taxes (after sales dropped off in the following years) the lobbyists rush to Tallahassee to ask the state to relieve them of this burden by initiating property tax reform which will ultimately shift the burden of their entrepreneur adventure to that of the people. This is not to say that the homestead exemption should not be adjusted in ways that would alleviate families in certain situations from being penalized if they decide that with old age or smaller families’ requirements they no longer need to stay in their present homes. Making Homesteads portable would afford the opportunity of permanent residents to relocate in the state and not lose their savings from previous homesteads. But do not tear down the system that has proved to be effective over the years for permanent residents of Florida in order to offset loses experienced by the building industry due to their over extension, shifting the burden of their mistakes to the unaware taxpayer. The fact remains if they do adjust the homestead exemption law, they would still have to address the 8Florida Statute which states that even if market trends indicated a lower value, and the Property Appraiser was able to reduce the value assessed accordingly, the taxing authorities are authorized by this law to raise tax rates to get the same revenue they had the prior year without calling it a tax increase! It is the old smoke and mirror game that politicians have been playing forever. Let’s face it, politicians do not react quickly to the people’s concerns, in fact, usually it takes decades to rouse them from their functionary tasks for the lobbyists. It is only when the lobbyists get involved do you ever see a political body show life and then it’s for the wrong reasons.

The homeowner insurance problems are directly related to the lobbyists of big insurance. These insurance companies have been making huge profits over the years from Florida residents and now that they have had setbacks, they want to bail out. 9The year 2005 was the insurance industry greatest ever with more than $40 billion in profit. 2006 was even better, with more than $50 billion in profit. I would tell them that if they want to continue to sell profitable insurance policies in the state, policies such as, annuity, life insurance and car insurance, they must still provide homeowners insurance. These insurance companies are national corporations and they should not sacrifice the people of central Florida when they are just a portion of their bigger national picture. The smaller home owners are being sacrificed by the insurance industry primarily because of the tremendous costs involved in replacing the mansions that are built along the coastlines. ENOUGH.

Unlimited growth is not an end unto itself. Citrus, Levy, and Hernando counties have grown in leaps and bounds over the last 30 years. A certain amount of growth is good when it creates more jobs, a better infrastructure for the welfare of the people, but when it continues unabated all of its benefits are nullified because of the unfair burden it puts on local government in terms of the costs in maintaining that infrastructure. I do not want Citrus, Levy, and Hernando counties to become another, Miami-Dade, Hillsborough, or Broward County. Our tax structure naturally inhibits growth. If we dramatically change that, we can look forward to the peninsula becoming a vast playground for the wealthy while the people who live and work here year round bear the cost of Corporate America’s profiteering.