McCain, No Friend to the Middle Class

I don’t get it. John McCain spent 25 years in the Senate voting against government controls over business. That is part of the conservative definition; keep government out of private business. He, like other conservatives, believes that private business will do just fine on its own. He echoed those thoughts on Monday when he said that the economy was just fine.

Then the roof fell in. Lehman Bros. went bankrupt, Merrill Lynch was bought out, AIG was bailed out with money from the government (money our middle class taxes will have to pay back). Now, all of a sudden, on Wednesday McCain is for the little guy, now all of a sudden he wants the controls he so abhorred before.

How can any middle class worker fall for this? How can anyone believe a turncoat? How can any middle class person, whatever the color, gender, faith, possibly vote for him?

Obama and Israel: Dennis Ross Speaks at Temple Beth Hillel-Beth El in Wynnewood

Last night I went to hear Dennis Ross, Obama’s Senior Midle East Policy Advisor at the Temple Beth Hillel-Beth El. He was engaging and amazing, leaving to a standing ovation amidst a filled auditorium.

He began by telling us about his initial meeting with Barack Obama. Obama had read Ross’s lengthy and detailed treatise on mid-east diplomacy and invited Ross to a policy-information session in Illinois in 2005. Ross met first with Obama, who questioned Ross meticulously. Ross was impressed with Obama’s ability to frame questions based on answers given by Ross. Obama could think quickly, and learn more by this give and take communication. Furthermore, in the public information session, Obama deftly left party politics out of the forum, allowing only question and discussion about policies, past and present, effective and ineffective and why.

Ross then went on to describe his own journey from diplomat working for President Reagan, to George H.W. Bush to U.S. Special Middle East Coordinator and Ambassador to Israel under President Clinton. How could he work for Republicans and Democrats alike? Ross stated that diplomacy needs to be removed from party politics for it to work effectively, so until now he had done his best to remain apolitical.

The current administration has so politicized diplomacy, however, that he deems it necessary to become political now to elect a president he feels will restore American diplomacy to the realm where we can once again become respected leaders of the world. He believes that Obama is the candidate to do that. While originally a Clinton supporter, his experience with Obama in 2005 and the political leanings of his family made it easy for him to move into the Obama camp.

When Obama asked him to join the team, he did not hesitate. Ross went on to describe his trip to the mid-east with Obama. As he dialoged with heads of state, he prefaced all conversations with the warning that America has one president, it was not he, and that this exchange was just information-gathering for Obama. The same questioning that had so impressed Ross in 2005 was apparent throughout the entire mid-east and European tour. As Obama gathered information, his quick and intelligent brain made connections and possible solutions that he would voice. Ross was impressed with his insight. Ross pointed out the actions Obama suggested, actions that Bush could have taken to secure a stronger and safer world for Israel and all of us. Instead, Bush has limped along doing nothing or exerting ill-advised force and we are less safe now than ever.

For example, Iran’s ability to enrich uranium has multiplied exponentially during the Bush Administration. Options to squash that initiative were either ignored or invisible to Bush. Ross then went on in some complex detail to describe the how weakened energy infrastructure in Iran leads to an internal sense of vulnerability which is quite the opposite of its imperious external image. Iran depends on energy resources from outside of its border, such as Saudi Arabia. Therefore, the complex relationship between Saudi Arabia, China and other European countries can be a tool to set the stage for pressure upon Iran to alter its threatening behavior. When all of that behind the scenes diplomacy is manipulated, it would be possible to sit down and engage Ahmadinejad in negotiations to halt his potentially deadly uranium misadventure.

I could only think to myself, “And McCain’s solution is to stand on stage dancing and singing, ’Bomb, bomb, bomb Iran.’” The thought of him as president strikes fear in my heart.

Ross also addressed at great length Hezbollah, Palestinians, and more. He addressed difficulties exacerbated and opportunities missed, particularly by the present administration. He went on to say that Bush has left an extremely difficult job for the next president, regardless of who wins.

Bush had his chance to make the world safer couldn’t even see it. Obama gets it, and he needs a chance to try to get us out of danger. Ross strongly urged all of us to give Obama that chance.

McCain, Women and Lies

Today, distressed by recent poll results, I went to the Obama office and volunteered. I don’t get it. I fail to see how adding a former beauty queen to the ticket has pummeled McCain up in the polls. I fail to see how women can support McCain, whose treatment of women has always been less than stellar. Check out these stories:

• http://www.womenforbarackobama.com/McCain.html#LOCATION2
• http://www.sptimes.com/2008/03/09/Opinion/Why_McCain_should_wor.shtml
• http://www.americablog.com/2008/02/john-mccains-trophy-bride.html

Don’t people research the truth before making electoral choices? Don’t they see the lies? For example, Palin claims to have stopped the “Bridge to Nowhere.” Yet, she originally supported it, then later opposed it. But, by the time she became governor, the government she criticizes so had stopped the bridge from being funded. She had nothing to do with it. Proof:

• http://www.reuters.com/article/vcCandidateFeed7/idUSN3125537020080901

McCain looks people in the eye and says that Obama’s tax increases will hurt all of us. Well, not me, honey. I am not in the top 1% of taxpayers. Only the top 1% will be hurt. Under Obama’s plan, the rest of us will get back about $1,000, whereas under McCain’s plan the rich dudes will get back lots of money and the rest of us will only get back $350. He lies eyeball to eyeball, and people believe it.

We all need to work harder to expose the McCain/Palin lies.

Middle America for Obama

Most of us are middle class main street Americans. Whether we come from bowling with beer in Pittsburgh PA or skiing with cocoa in Stowe Vermont, Bar Mitzvahs in Sacramento CA or Bible Studies in Wilson North Carolina, listening to blue grass in Richmond Kentucky or listening to a rap concert in New Haven Connecticut, we are the brothers and sisters in the broad main street middle. We have lost jobs overseas and someone else at the top of a business is reaping the profit. We have less or no health care and someone else at the top of the heath care industry is raking in the profits. We are emptying our pockets to pay four dollars a gallon for gasoline and someone else at the top of Exxon Mobile is raking in the largest profits ever in the history of America.

There is nothing that those someone else’s would like better than to see the “we’s” from main street America divided, viewing ourselves as “us vs. them.”. If the main street of Pittsburgh sees the enemy in the main street of Stowe then some one else has won. If the middle of Kentucky resents the middle of Connecticut then we have all lost to someone else, who will continue to get richer and richer, while all of us in the middle have less and less.

Obama has been in the heartland, that is where his mother is from. He has been from the inner city streets. He has lived in middle main street America from Hawaii to California to the midwest to the northeast. His Harvard education may have rendered him aloof at times, but he has been more “one of us” over the years of his life than Hillary, who was raised by a wealthy self-made businessman Republican father.

I have a lot of respect for the guttsiness of Hillary and would vote for without a moment’s hesitation if she were the nominee. However, I feel that Obama has the better chance of uniting middle America.

"Black Gold", a Play with a Message

I recently saw the play, “Black Gold,” by Seth Rosin at the InterAct Theater in Philadelphia. While billed as a hilarious satire, it is a darkly serious play on multiple levels.

Primarily, it depicts the greed of our nation for oil, the deep rooted ties of the oil industry to the President’s office, the abuse oil magnates heap upon all of us, but particularly the poor and oppressed inner city largely black population. It also shows the insidious push by credit card companies to take advantage of people short on cash coupled with the constant unrelenting bombardment of the entire American population to buy, buy, buy. The futile efforts of the Black church to curb the appetites of its poor constituents for the wealth that surrounds them are poignant. In the end, an entire neighborhood of poor black Americans is destroyed by the swirl of multiple evils around them.

Interlaced in the American drama is the continual hatred of different races and faiths for one another. The racial and ethnic hatreds are exacerbated by the drive of everyone to procure material comforts for themselves and their families. Furthermore, the insidious advertising and credit businesses feed on human aspirations for comfort and wealth and turn aspirations into greed.

The play offers little hope for all of us in this evil consumer driven downward spiral. The one glimmer or flame of hope portrayed at the end of the play, however, is in cross-cultural friendships between young people. I left the play feeling that is one flame we all must fan.