Wednesday, September 12, 2012

enlistment

Why is it that those who advocate keep our country safe, and increase spending for war have neither participated in a war or encouraged any of their male or female children to enlist?

Romney has only male children. Sure they go to foreign countries on the religious Mormon mission, but what do they do to support our country? Are any of them in the armed services? I don't think so, unless they've done so secretely.

Is war a good thing as long as our Republican candidates don't have to encourage their own sons and daughters to enlist to support it? Is war only theoretically good, as long as minorities do the fighting for "our" country, even if they are undocumented?

What do say to get those living below the poverty level to enlist? You offer them the opportunity, supposing they survive the war intact, to "save" for college.

Save for college. That's the new GI bill. Save.

My husband served in Viet Nam, 3 tours. His GI bill included free tuition for college or a trade school. FREE. He contributed nothing to get this benefit. But now, they have "improved" the benefit so that anyone who serves in the military can get "matching funds up to $20,000.00". Meaning, the soldier, sailor, marine, has to save the first $10,000.00 to be able to get another matching $10,000.

So, it's good for poor people to enlist so they can get a chance to get a college education. While Willard Romney's boys, who don't need that money because Daddy is rich enough to pay their tuition, don't have to even consider it.

How many other Republican politicians have children in the military? My guess is very few.



Monday, September 10, 2012

medicare/medicaid Ladies especially pay attention if you have parents in nursing homes.

This is a very specific reason why Obamacare is important to me.

My sister is now 58, and will be 59 in December.
She had a major stroke 2 years ago while working a job at Subway. Prior to that job she held 2 other low paying jobs, but prior to that she was a nurse for 18 years. She burned out. When she was nursing all of her medical problems were covered by insurance available at her workplace. But when you are working a minimum wage job there is no coverage.

So, my sister, who had several pre-existing conditions and was at a level below poverty level, got free medical check ups and medication at a reduced rate as long as she had an income below a cetrain level.

She got a raise at Subway. Which disqualified her for free medical check ups and medicine. Her barely above minimum wage job did not allow her to afford to go to a private doctor, paying full price, and buyng her blood pressure medications. Her blood pressure was always a problem - uncontrolled even with many, many medication changes.

She went to work one day in April 2010 and fell over. She was unresponsive, they called 911 and she was taken to the closest hospital.

She had been renting a room and living with a friend from her church , in Orlando, and I live in Miami. Our parents are dead, I am her only sibling.

I was called by her church members to be told she'd been taken to a certain hospital, and would probably need brain surgery because there seemed to be a clot in her brain.

I had to give doctors verbal permission by phone before I presented them with power of attorney which she had signed years before, to operate and put a shunt in her brain to drain blood which was accumulating and causing her to have trouble staying conscience and breathing.

Then my daugher and I drove to Orlando and spent time speaking to her doctors, nurses and social workers in the ICU.

Remember, my sister is totally uninsured.

So the good people at the hospital asked me to sign a paper for permission to treat her. Fortunately I had a councelor (a lawyer from work) who told me not to sign anything. Under the pretext of signing for permission to treat came an obligation - a financial obligation to pay her medical expenses as her next of kin. I refused. That didn't mean they wouldnt care for her, they had already spent 4 days treating her before I got there. The "government" was already paying for her care.

Why didn't I sign the paper? Because at the time her bill was already was over $90,000. To collect it the hospital, had I signed the paper for treatment, would have put a lein on my house and assets since my sister had none of her own.

After she was better, she was moved to a rehabilitation center where they worked on her to bring back some of her functions back. She regained speech, but she did not regain all of her memories. She also has lost the use of her left arm and hand, she can only use her left leg with a brace and she can walk using a hemi walker. She is incapable of taking care of her own needs.

After 6 weeks of rehabilitation she was sent to a nursing home where she has been for the last 18 months. She insists she will walk out of there and be capable of living on her own, in an independemn\nt living apartemnt, but after 2 years if she has not regained mobility by now it's unlikely. The best that may be for her woudl be assisted living, which she is resisting.

How does she live? She is living on the generosity of Social Security Disability and Medicaid.

Now, if Mr. Romney and Mr. Ryan have their way my sister will probably not qualify for Medicaid and since they want to change Social Security and make it more difficult to collect disability, what will happen to my sister?

Will the new Republican government and the changes to the medical care she now has, throw her out of the home by removing her eligibility? Will she no longer get help from Social Security (which she paid into for many years before she had to apply for the help provided)? If she needs to insure herself how can she? She had a major stroke. What insurance company, with a voucher, will take her on? How will she afford her medicine and medical visits? Will pre-existing conditions be covered? What care will she receive? Will I be expected, as her only relative, to bring her to my house and be her sole caregiver and financial support?

I am already 64, nearly ready to retire myself. My husband is a Vietnam Vet, who is suffering from PTSD. He is 100% disabled himself. My 40 year old daughter lives with us, because she fell on hard financial times and is just now pulling herself out of a hole. We are at an ok point here now, not great, we make ends meet but there is no big savings account to fall back on, and there are no "extra funds" to help support another person. There are some bad days. My husband couldn't tolerate another person in our home, I couldn't either. I had already had to go to a psychologist to deal with the many stresses in my life, I cannot mentally or monitarily afford to keep her.

With Obama care my sister will be cared for for the rest of her life, either under SS disability and medicaid, or under her social security retirement when she reaches retirement age, and medicare can be replacing medicaid.

So what do Romeny and Ryan offer instead? Have they been specific enough in their rhetoric?

I don't think so.

And that's why I will enourage anyone I know to vote against Romney. Because Obama care will continue my sister's care, but I have no idea if Romney will or not, and he isn't being very forthcoming in what he has to offer. One day he's for it, one day he's totaly against it. There is no rhyme or reason to his speeches, and no consistancy.

Right now it looks like under a Republican administration my sister, and many of the people now living in the nursing home with her, will be left with no support.


So what happens now?

What happens is I not only vote for Mr. Obama. I work to make sure he is reelected.

Wednesday, September 05, 2012

Bravo Sister Campbell

Sister Simone Campbell rocks. She tells it like it is and she quite succently put it out there and brought out the moral incongruity of the Republican party.

Bravo sister, Bravo.

Support President Obama for re-election.

Sunday, September 02, 2012

Something the Republicans should read (ro have read and memorized)

I think it's kind of strange that the Republicans appeal to the Christian right wingers. They must only use parts of the bible that make what they say sound really "right'.

Today in one of the readings at Mass (for non-Catholics who don't know, at every mass there are three readings from the Bible, both the old and new testament - so much for those who say Catholics don't "know" anything about the Bible)

Today's first reading was from Deuteronomy Chapter 4:1-2, This is only part of the entire reading.

"And now, O Israel, listen carefully to these laws I teach you, and obey them if you want to live and enter into and possess the land given you by the Lord God of your ancestors. Do not add other laws or subtract from these; just obey them for they are from the Lord your God."

The secord reading is from the New Testament, James chapter 1: 27 I think Paul Ryan should read this part before gutting Social Security and Medicare.

'The Christian who is pure and without fault, from God the Father's point of view, is the one who takes care of orphans and windows, and who ramains true to the Lord -- not soiled and dirtied by his contacts with the world"

The third reading is New Testament, Mark: 14-15 and 21-23. I think Mr. Romney should pay attention to the last part.

"And then Jesus called to the crowd to come and hear. "All of you listen", he said," and try to understand. Your souls aren't harmed by what you eat, but by what you think and say."

"For from within, out of men's hearts, come evil thoughts of lust, theft, murder, adultery, wanting what belongs to others, wickedness, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, pride and all other folly. All these vile things come from within they are what pollute you and make you unfit for God."

In case these quotes don't fit your bible word for word, I took mine from my personal bible The Catholic Living Bible published in 1971, Imprimatur 1976. The wording in your bible may differ, but the sentiment is the same.

Basically all three readings concern being worldly and lying and being deceitful and wanting what others have. So how can someone in the business of destroying companies for a living say he's living by the bible? I can't reconcile his actions and his supposed beleif. Sorry, maybe it's jsut me. Maybe someone can tell me about the plank in my eye while I point out the splinter in his (another bible reference) but I doubt it.







Saturday, September 01, 2012

business = government

OK so if you own a business what is the purpose of your business? You want to make a profit, right? What do you do with your profit? Do you share it and help others? Do you improve conditions for others who don't work for you? Do you provide health care and elder care and chaild care and medical care for those who don't own your business? No, you keep your profit.

And if you are a manager of a corporation you try to make a profit for your shareholders, right? Do you help other businesses with those profits? Do you share profits with your workers? Do you provide for their "general welfare" as our Preamble to the US Constitution says our government is supposed to or do you make sure you make money for only the people who have "invested" in your company?

Well, what's the answer?

If the answer is no, then why are we considering a background in business a recommendation for becoming president of the United States?

Does Romney have a background in law? Does he know the limits of government? Does he know that being President is only 1/3 of the government? Does he realize it's not like being a CEO and it certainaly not like being the spiritual leader of a religious organization.

So maybe that's what's wrong with Romney. He doesn't know how to run a government, he expects to make a profit. My question is at whose expense will that profit be made?

a distraction? Really Clint?

As much as people roll their eyes and say what a farce Clint Eastwoods performance at the RNC was I don't for a minute it was unscripted.

I think it was a calculated set piece to take everyone's mind off the fact that the Republicans have said "NOTHING" about their plans to fix our economy and our government.

As Romney and his pals all claim it was unscripted you see that much of the talk post convention was about Clint Eastwood's stunt, and there was nothing of substance said about the man who would be president.

No plans were laid out, no carefully spelled out legislation, no policy initiatives, no comments about actually politics came out of that convention. It was a "here I am, and he's what a nice guy I am, now you can feel comfortable voting for me".

Sorry Williard, it's not going to happen.

I want facts - not spin doctored rhetoric chosen to fit your agenda of discrediting President Obama.

What Mr. Romney fails to tell people is that he's a BISHOP in his Mormon Faith. Now, I don't know what the duties of a Bishop might be, but I do know that the title means he is a man of power and influence in his church.

I wonder if he will resign from his "ministry" if he takes office, or will he split his duties with his elected ones? I also wonder if a Bishop being president doesn't violate the separation of church and state rules of our constitution.

I hope we never have to find out, but personally, if he is elected I may join a law suit challenging him on that.





find and read

It's too long to post here:

Rolling Stone
Sept 13, 2012

Mike Tiabi "Greed & Debt: The true story of Mitt Romney and Bain Capital".

He's running on the basis of his "business background" Before you vote for him find out what kind of "business" experience it is and ask yourself if that translates to good government?

Thursday, August 30, 2012

facts dodn't lie but Republicans apparently do

So there is still a fuss about Paul Ryan's comments about the GM plant closing. He says it's a fact that theplant was closed by Obama. There is even a photo on the internet of the last car that rolled off the line, complete with a banner and some workers saying the car was being delivered to a charitable organization in December of 2008. That "proves" it happen when Obama was president.

Yeah, well he failed to mention that GM decided to close the plant in June 2008 BEFORE Barack Obama was elected. And that final car off the line was done by men who volunteered to go back to the plant to make that vehicle. The plant was already closed.

Ya know the younger generation tends to believe that what they read on the internet is fact. And they believe that if a politican tells you about something that happened before you paid attention then they must be right.

Well dears, I will be 64 in 3 weeks. So my short term memory is sometimes faulty, but the good thing is that I have an excellent LONG TERM memory. So when some Gen X-er goes live on TV and tells me stuff I KNOW didn't happen the way he says it did is that I remember that history.

Get that GOP? Stop lying. We old folks, who vote more often and in higher numbers than the younger generations REMEMBER what really happened and we aren't afraid to say so.

Get your heads out your ass , or better still perfect anal cranial impaction, it suits you.

are you a baptized Mormon?

Maybe you aren't aware of it, but you very well may be.

It was confirmed to me today that the rumor I have heard is true. Somewhere in Salt Lake City is a group of Mormons who take the name of a non Mormon, briefly, and is then baptized into the Mormon faith. Why? Well to save us all of course. Remember only Mormon Christians will be saved.

Why do you think the Mormons keep such exhaustive and detailed ancestry records? Those records aren't just for their own Mormon brethern, they are for everyone.

Yeah, they got in a little trouble when the Jews found out that the Mormons took names of those who died in the Holocaust. Apparently they were upset that Jews were postumously baptized and made "Christian".

So ok, tell me. Is using someone's name without their knowledge to "convert them" without their concent a form of identity theft? I would think so, but hey what do I know. I thought I was Roman Catholic, that's what my baptisimal certificate says, but maybe I'm a Mormon too.

Wednesday, August 29, 2012

George W. Bush was the Education president, and he did a bang up job of nearly screwing things up royally.  He was good at unintentional dublespeak,  But Regan was the king of doublespeak.

In my educational career I was poor, but intelligent, so I qualified for "financial aid".  That meant that I got money from the government - in my case the state government, also  from a private scholarship AND the Federal Government.  When I said got money I mean that I was "given" money.

Given money.

Given.  Got that much?

They were called GRANTS.  Grants are money you get that you don't have to repay.  Radical concept that the Democrats of the Lyndon B. Johnson era had.  If deserving young  people needed money to go to college it was given to them, with only one restriction. You keep a 2.5 GPA and graduate in 4 years.  I did, I got a BA in English literature and I actually owed NOTHING to anyone when I was finished.

Radical concept right?

Well when the Republican savior "Ronald Regan" became president he "improved" that system.  He said any deserving student could go to college, the government would give them money, with a bit of a difference.  The government would "guarantee" a loan that you had to apply for from a private source, usually a bank.  So you could go to college if you BORROWED the money.  So now it wasn't a gift, it was a loan.

Now students incurred debt, and banks got rich.

From what I have come to read about Romney he want to make sure that only "deserving" kids get the opportunity to go to college.  So he's arranging things differently again.

Deserving seems to mean "rich".

Is that what kind of president we want?  Someone who limits educational opportunities?


Why can't someone explain it so even the Republicans can understand it?

The republicans, especially Paul Ryan, have called Social Security and Medicare "unsustainable.

Why?
Because people aren't paying into the system as much as they are taking out of the system.

OK, let's think about this logically.

Big businesses have been told it's ok to take jobs oversease so they can make a bigger profit.  They pay foreign workers less.  And those foreign workers don't pay a penny into FICA, and they don't pay local, state for Federal taxes on the little money they make.  They don't get pension benefits, or health insurance benefits and often they don't even have any kind of coverage for accidents on the job, like worker's compensation.  They may pay taxes in their own country, but not here.

So, we have business making money, Americans without jobs because they have been replaced by foreign workers who make less money and pay nothing into the Social Security system.

Now, jobs are hard to find.  So peoole who can't get jobs after an exhaustive search, and who are eligible to retire, take the option of early retirement.  They too don't pay into the system, they take out.

So what's the solution?

How about bringing jobs back to US soil?  How about hiring US citizens to do those jobs?  How about those people pay their FICA and state, local and Federal taxes returning money to America.
How about taxing US businesses every time they remove manufacturing jobs so they can pay into the system?

If I, in my limited ability to reason things out, can figure this out why the hell don't the Republicans?

They like to bring up Ronald Regan in the GOP as a role model and compare "Mitt Romney" to him, thinking that suave good looking face will resonate with the voters who "loved" Ronald Regan.

Hum, we must not be remembering the same man.

I clearly remember a man with dementia calling soldier's uniforms "costumes" in a press conference.  I remember a man who listened the the astrologers his wife broought into the White House to make important decisions.

I remember Mr. Regan being credited with the breaking down of the Berlin Wall.  But I also remember his faux pas in Mexico when he said at a gathering of Heads oif State that he was late to a meeting because of "Montazuma's revenge" and making the Mexicans, who hosted the meeting, quite unhappy. Nice bit of diplomacy there, eh?

Let's see, Regan was for less government and cutting federal spending.  So why was the government LARGER  because of new departments he created and the budget larger when he LEFT office than when he began?  Deficits, he was good at creating them, not shrinking them. More government and more spending is what he left us with, not the cuts and triming he promised and said he'd bring to America. So if Romney is so much  like Regan will he do the same?

I remember a Union busting president who caused air traffic controllers to be fired and replaced by untrained workers, or they could return to work at reduced pay and benefits.  Romney likes those Tea Party people who all fight government workers and government pensions.  I guess only congressmen are entitled to health insurance and pensions for life when they resign from office.

I seem to remember the "trolls" in California.  Trolls, that was the name the people gave to those who were made homeless by the policies of the Regan Administration.  There were tent cities outside the White House, all people driven out of work and denied jobs by Regan's austerity measures.

How about window washers at street corners?  They didn't exist until the Regan administration. Men approaching your car with a spray bottle of window washing cleaner, "offering" to wash your windows for a "donation".  That was one step up from street begging, but hey, where else could they make a buck?

The theory of "trickel down economics" was supposed to mean that if the top money earners (businesses) got breaks they would share the wealth with those below them.  The money would trickle down to the mean peons.  Instead people who had money got more money. Remember Dallas?  Remember the opulence?  Remember the yaghts and the silk dresses and the furs? They drank champagne while pissing on those who did without.

In Regan's presidency they tried to "reform" school lunch programs - another cost cutting measure.  The Regan represenative went before the House of Represenatives and Senate to tell them that they could cuts costs of school lunches  by declaring ketchup as a vegetable.  Luckily, Senator John Heinz, of Pennsylvania, and a member of the H.J.Heinz family who makes so many of our foods, including ketchup, made sure that the president was aware that ketchup in no way shape or form is a vegetable, and since his family's company manufactured it they ought to know.

So if that's the kind of president Romeny admires, what do you think his ideas of less government and cutting the spending are going to be like?


Good grief, the GOP is at it in Tampa.

Where do I begin the debunking?

OK, let's just start with Mitt as a Mormon.

I have had two friends/acquaintences who are practicing Mormons or who are former members of the LDS church.

The current member told me some interesting things about their beliefs.  Yeah, they believe in Jesus Christ as the savior of the world, just as Willard "Mitt" Romney said.  But what he left out is that Mormons belive that they are the only Christians who will get to heaven.

How?  The more you have on earth, the higher your place in heaven.  In other words, the guy with the most toys wins. So they work hard to make money and share it with other Mormons

Also from the former Mormon, who just happened to be a female, I was told that women/girls/females can't get to heaven if they are unmarried.  Apparently God doesn't consider women worthy of heaven on their own, they have to be "saved" by a man.

Now isn't that an interesting fact considering how the GOP has accepted the anit abortion plank of their platform?

Do you think a man who is devoutly religious ( as is claimed) and who was actually a Bishop of his church actually (his Ward, they don't have churches, they gather to worship in groups called Wards)isn't going to bring that religious belief into his way of thinking?

Women are unworthy.

Makes sense if you want to "punish" a woman who allowed herself to be raped by making her carry a child created by that rape to term.

And I guess if you are a daughter who "tempts" her father sexually, and is the object of insest then it's her fault too and she should bear that child of shame for her sins.

Maybe Hester's Scarlet A will be issued to all unmarried pregnant women. Who knows.  I'm not an expert, but I see a connection here.  Morman's and women, the GOP and women.  Maybe it's a stretch .But maybe it's not.


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