Newtown Massacre

December 26, 2012

Newtown massacre: What do we do now?

As the nation continues to share the suffering of the Newtown, Conn., victims and their families, the debate on how to prevent recurrences of similar tragedies expands.

As usual, much of the mainstream broadcast media fan the flames of another tragedy to gain viewers, ratings and revenue. And, as usual, not having actual facts hasn’t prevented them from sharing imagined ones. This tragedy again shows many TV reporters spending excessive time expressing their personal opinions instead of reporting the facts as known. And, once again, our elected leaders pander to their loyalists instead of uniting in taking the best actions for our nation.

As expected, the gun control debate has reignited. Those favoring controls plead for limiting firearm ownership by private citizens as the only way to prevent recurrences. On the opposite side, some in the pro-gun crowd support the notion of all teachers and staff in schools being allowed to carry firearms in order to deter attacks and even possibly to fight back and reduce carnage.

This important debate, which should be held, must include a broader perspective than just controlling gun ownership if we hope to prevent this slaughter of the innocent from happening again.

We visited our grandchildren during Thanksgiving. My 10-year-old grandson was playing a game on his Xbox that involved killing as many zombies as possible. He asked me if real zombies existed. I asked why he wanted to know. Now, following Newtown, the answer he gave is chilling: “I would like to kill some real ones.”

Much of the blame for gun violence must be aimed at parents of children and society at large. Our movies too often depict mindless violence, and too many parents allow their children to see these shows because, as adults, they know it’s not real. Too many children and the mentally ill may not see it the same way.

We need to rate movies containing violence the same way we do for pornography. We must find ways of preventing our impressionable children from taking pleasure in killing other humans as the objective of video games so often used to keep them occupied.

We must provide armed security for our citizens in any venue (including schools) where we gather in sufficient numbers that could possibly attract a mass murderer. Surely using some of our military funding in this manner would make more sense than playing the role of the world’s police force.

We must find better ways to identify and treat the mentally ill and make certain they have absolutely no access to firearms. We must find ways to reduce firearms sales by anyone not licensed to sell them. Nearly half of all weapons are sold by private individuals who bypass the background checks required by licensed firearm sellers in most states.

I have had a concealed carry firearm permit for many years in order to protect my family. Here the permitting process is quite thorough. Applicants first take a gun safety course from a licensed provider. This involves viewing a video on gun laws and safety, then passing a written test, and proving the ability to hit a stationary target.

Next is a trip to the county Sheriff’s Office to be vetted. Fingerprints are sent to the FBI to verify no criminal record. Then the Sheriff’s Office staff sends letters to the applicant’s personal physician and the county mental health department to verify no record of treatment for mental illnesses.

If every gun purchaser had to go through a similar vigorous background check, we would drastically reduce gun possession by the wrong people. Why not consider using the concealed carry permit process for anyone who wants to purchase firearms and ammunition? Why wouldn’t law-abiding citizens support a gun ownership permitting system, just as we have for driving?

Government officials at all levels need to massively expand gun buyback programs in order to remove some of the millions of unneeded weapons from circulation.

What about so-called assault weapons? I don’t own this type of weapon and honestly can’t figure out a reason for anyone else to, but I’ll wait to hear others’ opinions on that issue. Frankly, many modern semi-automatic handguns can hold up to 18 rounds of powerful ammunition. The two handguns the Newtown killer had were more than sufficient to have accomplished his fiendish aims even if he didn't have access to the rifle.

I do not believe we will or ever should completely ban private citizens from owning firearms. Too many really bad people out there do have guns, and they have repeatedly proven they can and will use them against honest citizens. My wife tells me I would never get to one of my guns in time if needed. I always answer that I certainly could not if I did not own one.

Gun control supporters should remember that Connecticut has some of the most restrictive gun control laws in the nation. What good did they do? Gun control laws will never stop crazy or evil maniacs!

These are my opinions. What do you think?

Mike Tower
miketower@bellsouth.net

I hope you will take time to read what a good pal of mine thinks at:  Lee's Political Opinions, and also visit the site for an organization we co-founded called:  Citizens Against Politics As Usual.

America--What if we had an extra 100 million citizens?

December 16, 2012

What if America today had 400 million-plus citizens instead of 300?

Research from the Guttmacher Institute and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show American women had well over 50 million abortions in the past 40 years. If those aborted had been born and reproduced at normal birth rates, today we would have an additional 100 million citizens. Imagine our nation, facing today's economic challenges, with this many additional citizens requiring food, shelter, education and health care.

Perhaps the additional population might have provided some benefits for our nation. Some to consider: (1) Our government might have attempted to actually stop illegal immigration over the past three decades if we already had a supply of low-cost workers in this hypothetical population boom. (2) We would have had an almost endless additional supply of volunteers for our military, allowing our politicians to "build" even more nations. (3) This over-supply of labor would have drastically lowered U.S. wages, resulting in fewer jobs being shipped offshore. (4) We wouldn't have the coming shortage of FICA-paying workers to fund retiring boomers' entitlements.

Truthfully, despite the remote possibility of benefits, I could foresee mostly tragic results. Our nation already hovers on the brink of failure. Current economic conditions wouldn't be just slowly crushing our middle class; it would have already been annihilated!

To me, though, 50 million-plus abortions seem unimaginable. I can't help wondering why, during this time span, with so many other effective and relatively inexpensive birth control options readily available, so many choose abortion. The pill, for example, is 99 percent effective if taken as directed, and the cost for the two most commonly prescribed versions is between $8 and $12 per month through almost any chain pharmacy. Many county health departments (including ours) supply both the pill and condoms at no charge.

The average cost of a non-hospital, first-trimester abortion is around $500, but this does not include the costs for treating possible side-effects, the main one being infection. Nor does it include the costs for treating the inevitable increases in sexually transmitted diseases resulting from unprotected sex. Remember, we all pay higher taxes and health insurance premiums to fund these expenses.

I support the right to an abortion in cases of rape or incest. I can even understand when a woman who has tried diligently to practice birth control might choose abortion over an unwanted pregnancy. However, rape, incest, failed diligent birth control efforts, and other birth control options being too expensive cannot possibly precipitate most of these 58 million abortions. In fact, researchers only attribute about 2 percent of all abortions to the first two reasons.

The underlying demographics of those receiving abortions seem to expose the truth. These data show women under 24 receive more than half of all abortions, single women account for 75 percent, and 50 percent have had previous abortions.

Few issues have been more passionately debated than abortion since Roe v. Wade became the law of the land in 1973. The extremely passionate opposing sides of pro-choice and pro-life remain diametrically locked in battle against one another, and I doubt it will ever change.

Personally, I don't think the abortion debate should continue to be based only on morality or women's rights. Instead, society should acknowledge that the most important issue to be dealt with is the significant population of uneducated or careless couples who too often allow abortion to serve as their primary birth control method —and developing viable strategies to change this behavior.  

I do not think the government should interfere with women's rights to determine how they use their bodies. However, I do wish more of this subset of our population would make the choice to use less expensive pregnancy prevention options. While we cannot afford a population explosion, we can and should find ways to prevent abortion from being the primary birth control method for so many.

Awareness of options, education and inexpensive birth control must become much more readily available. Most developed nations sell the pill over the counter. Why not here? Surely if we could find effective ways to increase the use of other options, most on either side of this debate and society overall would be the winners.

We see a constant barrage of ads for erectile dysfunction drugs. Why not a series of ads promoting best practices for prevention of pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases? If I were the parent of younger children, I would surely prefer to have a discussion with my kids about the latter than I would about EDS drugs.

Mike Tower

Please visit the blog of a good pal of mine:  Lee's Political Opinions, and the website for an organization he and I co-founded:  Citizens Against Politics As Usual

America already over the fiscal cliff!

December 9, 2012

The fiscal cliff: How close are we?

We keep hearing we are rapidly approaching the edge of the "fiscal cliff." Most of us (and our leaders) seem to take comfort in the word "approaching," as if this means we have a chance to avert disaster.

"We're so far gone, we're over the cliff," said Ron Paul, R-Texas, who will retire this year after serving 12 terms in the House, "We cannot get enough people in Congress in the next five to 10 years who will do the wise things. We have to prepare for having already fallen off the fiscal cliff."

This D.C. insider believes we will never see actions to avert the crash. I agree and think we need gigantic cushions and parachutes — and we need them now! We need to stop deluding ourselves by thinking gradual changes in direction will work. We need immediate actions to either stop the spending madness, or to make the crash landing survivable for as many of us as possible.

A few examples of the causes and proof of our financial trouble:

First, we have overspent for our military for the past few decades. I read recently we spend more for military goods and services than the next 27 developed nations— combined. Also consider: We borrow all funds for this expense because every dollar of our nation's revenue is already committed by law to fund other expenses. Military spending is purely discretionary. How can a nation, with less than 5 percent of the

world's population, continue borrowing and spending this way, especially when we are already so deeply in debt? When we were the wealthiest nation in the world, perhaps we could reasonably police the world, but we can't afford it any longer.

Second, America spends nearly double for health care per capita than any other developed nation, and yet we rank No. 32 or worse in health outcomes. Within our ineffective and unaffordable health care system, the global pharmaceutical industry garners the vast majority of its profits — all from our tiny proportion of the global population.

How can this be? It's quite simple — all other developed nations in the world have universal health care systems with their federal governments paying for all expenses. This is often referred to as "single-payer health care." These countries all tightly control expenses, including having pharmaceuticals restricted from use unless they are absolutely unique and offer significant benefits over the lower-cost generics. In cases where the same product is available from more than one manufacturer, the low-price bidder wins all the business.

The pharmaceutical industry certainly doesn't favor one-payer systems, but for decades it has been able to rely on the American health care system to subsidize global profits. This industry has continually and successfully lobbied lawmakers to prevent them from implementing a single-payer system here. America has been the "golden goose" for this industry for decades as the dramatically higher prices we pay for prescription drugs ends up subsidizing the costs of drugs for all other

developed nations.

This is why I disagree with Obamacare. A noble idea for sure, but all it does is expand an already too expensive and ineffective health care system. Our leaders allowed the lobbyists for the pharmaceutical, insurance and legal industries to write the laws. The exact same thing happened under President George W. Bush when he and the Republicans led the fight for the Medicare Prescription Drug Plan.

Finally, and most importantly, our nation now has more than $121 trillion in promised but unfunded future health care benefits for boomers over the next several decades. Think about this number! We worry about a $16 trillion national debt but see our leaders continually unable to reach agreement on how to reduce this growing debt by a paltry $1.6 trillion — over the next decade. Clearly Mr. Paul believes they will never find the courage to confront the many times more significant unfunded entitlements coming due.

As the rational head of any business or family knows, you cannot continue to massively borrow and spend forever without grave consequences. Our nation is way past the edge of the cliff, and we now face a financial crash that will affect every citizen in our nation beginning sooner than we might think. Our leaders and citizens deny these facts at our nation's peril.

Don't bother putting helmets or elbow and knee protection on you or your kids —the height from which we fall will result in a catastrophic crash. 

Maybe the best advice is the old line about preparing for an airplane crash by placing your head between your knees — and kissing your a-- goodbye!

What will our last thought be? I hope it won't be "Why didn't somebody warn us?"— because Ron Paul certainly tried.

Mike Tower 

Please visit a good pal's blog:  Lee's Political Opinions  Citizens Against Politics As Usual, and the site for an organization we co-founded:  Citizen's Against Politics As Usual

                     

Obama Mandate...or not?

December 4, 2012

Post-election debate has quieted down

It has been interesting, post-election, to watch the pundits trying to explain why Barack Obama won and Mitt Romney lost.

The two most common words being used in the aftermath have been “demographics,” as in Romney lost because he couldn't get the votes from blacks, Hispanics, single women, gays and Jews. And “mandate,” as in Obama and his administration now have a clear mandate from the voters to move on with his Democratic Party policies, which include raising taxes on the wealthier Americans.

The third most frequently uttered thought is how those currently receiving entitlements overwhelmingly voted to keep Obama in office in order to keep the troughs filled with their necessities.

It’s all a lot of utter nonsense.

Nearly 75 percent of eligible voters who bothered to vote were white. Romney was never going to gain the majority of black, Hispanic, single female or gay votes. However, even without them, he still could have won if he had been able to appeal to the larger white majority. He did not and he lost.

I hear many say the poorer among us who are partaking from the welfare systems voted for the party most likely to continue to supply their needs. However, the poorer actually have the lowest voting participation in national elections. Among the poorer who did vote, most voted for Obama, but they still had the lowest voter participation rate.

We know 95 percent of all African-Americans voted for Mr. Obama. I ask you: If you were a black American, who would you likely have voted for? If you were Hispanic and one party had repeatedly stated it was going to deport all illegal immigrants, who would you have voted for? If you were a woman who strongly believed in women’s rights, and one party had taken a strong anti-abortion stand, who would you have voted for? If you were gay, it’s pretty clear who you would most likely vote for.

Even with all of these constituencies going against him, Romney still could have won if only he had not made so many dumb mistakes. The editorial in the Wall Street Journal in which he stated he would have allowed the auto industry go under cost him dearly. His 47 percent remarks were beyond dumb and he paid for them dearly. Even at the end of the race, his claims about Jeep production all moving to China proved false, but his campaign kept repeating this lie until the very end.

Perhaps the most important issue surrounding the election was the fact that only about 50 percent of eligible voters even bothered to vote. Think about this for a moment. Many Americans considered this to be the most important election in recent history, and half of us who could have voted didn’t bother.

If you analyze the voter breakdown for president, you will see that Obama received about 51 percent and Romney 49 percent. However, that translates into each of them only getting about a quarter of all eligible votes. This translates into Obama at 25.5 percent and Romney at 24.5 percent, with half of all eligible voters not bothering to support either candidate.

This is incontrovertible proof that Obama did not receive any kind of mandate from the majority of Americans. The real question about this election is why so many Americans couldn’t be bothered to vote. Or do these nonvoters actually get it — neither party is actually any different in its actions? Maybe these nonvoters understand that both parties work for the same lobbyists. If low voter participation in national elections is our reality for the future, why are we spending such outrageous amounts of money for campaigns. Let’s apply the money to pay down our debt and just flip a coin to determine our next president.

Maybe the nonvoters have it right. Think about how much less stress you would have in your life if you felt the same way. Think about how much less dough the TV network news shows would make as their viewership dwindled. Think about how much more enjoyable life would be if you tuned in to more reality TV and learned to play video games. Think about how much life would be improved if you never, ever received another robo/opinion poll phone call again.

A few things are clear: Romney did not lose because of demographics. Most of the poorest Americans did not leap on the Obama bandwagon to seek more from the wealthy. And Obama certainly does not have a mandate from the majority of Americans — not by any measure!

These are my opinions. What do you think?

Mike Tower

Please visit a good pal's blog:  Lee's Political Opinions, and the site for an organization we co-founded:  Citizen's Against Politics As Usual

American jobs gone forever

December 2, 2012

Evidence shows job losses are permanent

Twice in the past five years, my wife and I drove to Southern California for a winter retreat. Each time we traveled on I-10 out west, we saw trainload after trainload of cargo containers bearing Asian names headed east and west for hundreds of miles.

Most of the eastbound trains were obviously loaded with imported Asian-made goods. I wondered what was in the containers heading west. Remembering the huge losses of American manufacturing jobs over the past few decades, I thought maybe they were empty.

Recently two television documentaries on Netflix answered this question, and provided chilling implications about a job-creating economic recovery anytime soon in the U.S.

The first show featured the port of Savannah, Ga. The video showed a steady stream of huge cargo ships arriving, laden with goods manufactured in Asian countries. Giant warehouses surround the dock and serve as temporary holding sites for these goods awaiting shipment throughout America.

The documentary next highlighted one of the area's largest warehouses and said it was full of the only American products to be loaded onto the cargo ships for their return voyage to Asia. The products being exported back to Asia — the only American-made product, mind you — were giant rolls of paper. When the paper gets there, most of it would be converted into cardboard for use as packaging for additional goods to be exported to America!

The second show described the operations of the huge port of Los Angeles, which accounts for one-quarter of all Asian imports. It, too, showed a steady stream of arriving and departing super-cargo carriers. The docks operate 24/7 unloading containers to be shipped via road or rail to other parts of America. The narrator asked the dock manager about return cargo. He replied that every cargo ship left the port loaded with recyclables and food grains.

We all know America has lost millions of manufacturing jobs to automation and nations with lower labor costs over the past few decades, but when we see the actual evidence of these massive trade imbalances, all of our guts should twist into knots. In just a few generations, our nation has gone from the world's dominant manufacturing economy to one trading our recyclables, trees, grains, dollars — and jobs — in exchange for lower-cost goods. This trade disparity proves these millions of jobs have disappeared forever.

Newly employed foreign workers now often work for American companies which have strategically outsourced jobs in order to increase profits and improve financial performance for their shareholders. I wonder how many of our lawmakers understand that we will soon have insufficient American consumer dollars from our collapsing middle class to support this one-sided trade situation.

Both political parties continually promise job-creating changes right around the corner. Our president keeps touting the millions of private-sector jobs created under his watch; he fails to add that these new jobs have barely kept up with population growth.

My question is: What new economic miracle will cause the massive job creation needed to adequately employ our expanding population? Is it even possible to reverse the twin forces of automation and lower foreign labor costs that have killed so many American jobs and caused so much wage stagnation?

Have our elected leaders taken every action needed to protect our nation's citizens from this tragedy? The evidence is pretty clear — they have not! Instead, they primarily serve their personal need to retain power by partnering with the special interests instead of those they were elected to serve — our people.

American auto companies like General Motors brag about Chinese demand for their cars, especially the Buick brand. They fail to add Chinese laws require that these Buicks must also be made in China. Why don't our lawmakers demand that foreign goods be made here in order to be sold here? Why don't they wage war against useless regulations at all levels of government that delay and prevent businesses here from expanding or starting up — and creating new jobs?

Leaders from both parties remain frozen in a phony war against each other instead of joining to take viable actions to foster a job-creating environment in America. As the green-energy fiascos demonstrated, government cannot create jobs, but its past actions, or lack thereof, have contributed to the massive loss of employment opportunities in our nation today.

Our elected officials could, if they wanted, take desperately needed actions to get us out of this terrible mess. It only requires them to unite and actually place the best interests of American citizens first. Maybe instead of our leaders and citizens uniting to fight this common enemy, we should divide further and escalate the war against all those in the dreaded opposite party. Just because it hasn't worked doesn't mean it never will — does it?

During World War II, if we had acted the way we do today, we would all be speaking German or Japanese. Is our coming economic collapse any less of an emergency than the war? Our people have always magnificently confronted any national emergency. However, until our leaders publicly and collectively acknowledge our present awful danger, our fear will never escalate enough to unite our nation's people.

These are my opinions. What about yours?

Mike Tower

Please visit the blog of a good pal:  Lee's Political Opinion, also the website for an organization we co-founded:  Citizens Against Politics As Usual

I lost a friend

November 15, 2012

I lost a friend last Sunday

In 2011 I met a remarkable man who I quickly became proud to call my friend. Our friendship began after he responded a few times to the question I always close my columns with: "What do you think?". He shared his opinions candidly and didn't always agree with me. He was always respectful...even when his feedback sometimes began with: "you're full of baloney" (while using another word). I learned to value his opinions whether he agreed with me or not because he always made me think more deeply about the issue at hand. He even made me change my mind a time or two...which is a real achievement:-) He called one day to invite me to his home for a general discussion meeting with he and a few of his friends on a topic I had recently written about.

He told me the names of the other invitees, all of whom I knew. I called one of them and asked about him and this meeting. I was told my soon to be new friend was severely disabled with Muscular Dystrophy and was no longer able to get out. As a result of his desire to stay connected intellectually he liked to get a few friends with different perspectives together in his home to debate ideas of mutual interest.

I accepted the invitation, and I remember leaving my home on the day of the meeting feeling sort of proud of myself for so generously sharing my time. Little did I know just how wrong I was because it turned out he was the generous one for sharing the little energy he had remaining to allow others to be exposed to his passion and wisdom.

I walked in the front door of his home and met my soon to be friend. He was completely wheel chair bound and only had a little use of his hands. He welcomed me with his gravelly sounding voice and big smile and I almost instantly forgot he was disabled. It was obvious his mind was clear and he was very smart. He sat at the head of the dining room table and asked me as the newly invited guest to sit at the opposite end. Four others joined us that day and the discussion began. My friend orchestrated the discussion in order to draw divergent opinions out of all attendees. What he did not want, it became quickly clear, was some polite politically correct banter. He wanted to see and hear passion for positions backed up with credible facts. BS was quickly detected by him and called out. The two hours or so flew by and I remember leaving his home feeling personally enriched in ways I couldn't have imagined as I left my own home earlier that day.

Thus began a friendship mostly shared by computer and phone for the next year or so. He initiated most of these interactions via telephone or email to provide feedback on one of my recent articles. Sometimes he liked what I wrote and sometimes he did not...and either way, he said so as directly as possible. I learned very quickly to never discount his criticism because almost always, in retrospect, if I had thought of things from his perspective I would have written a better article. I even began occasionally to send him draft copies of articles and asked for his thoughts. Again, he was the prefect foil. He read every article carefully and told me his immediate reactions. I deeply valued both his ideas and perhaps even more, his candor.

I learned my new friend, now in his 80s, had been a very talented artist for his entire life...this despite first beginning to suffer from MD in his early thirties. He worked as a commercial artist in Chicago for most of his career after emigrating to America from Belgium as a young man . His home was filled with beautiful paintings he had created. After one look at his work it didn't take an art critic to understand how talented he was.

I only went to his home for a few of these gatherings but every one was a pleasure. Then about two weeks ago I received a phone call from my friend to inform me he did not expect to be able to communicate much longer. He told me he could no longer even use his hands and had to take so much pain management medication he could no longer function mentally. He was quite lucid that day and I can only imagine he had to skip his medication in order to have our last conversation. He ended the conversation by telling me goodbye and thanking me for our friendship. I cried to myself but never let him know it because he would have called me a sissy!

My good, kind, smart, and talented friend, I know you are now in warm sunshine with a few of your favorite disagreeable pals, and canvas and painting supplies close at hand. I hope you have a glass of Belgian beer and some of those great Belgian cookies on the table beside you. You are greatly missed pal.

To: Al Van Cleven who is free at last from the shackles of MD, and his loving wife Bonnie, who inspired all who knew them with her loving care. Nobody could have have done a better job of taking care of a loved one.

Mike Tower

Congratulations Mr. Obama

November 11, 2012

Election 2012: To the victor go the spoils

Dear President Barack Obama:


Congratulations to you and your supporters for your victory Tuesday.

I did not vote for you because I do not agree with many of your past actions.

I speak primarily of my disappointment in your inability or unwillingness to

reach across the table to attempt to develop bipartisan solutions for our

nation's many problems. I clearly remember you responding to Eric Cantor's

attempt to have the GOP participate in the development of what came to be

known as Obamacare. You said: "Eric, you lost, we won ... get over it." This

was the defining moment in which you drew a line in the sand that

essentially said no Republican ideas would be accepted.

Of course, the Republicans didn't help in any way to encourage uniting our

nation's leadership, either. The GOP leaders in both houses, as well as the

tea party, made it quite clear their only ongoing purpose was to make certain

you were a one-term president. The tea party and its no-compromise, no-

new-taxes battle cry served only to exacerbate the resulting gridlock.

So we stand as a nation much deeper in distress today than we were four

years ago. Nearly $6 trillion has been added to our future generation's debt,

and we continue to borrow nearly 40 percent of all we spend.

Under your leadership, our nation has created millions of new private-sector

jobs. Unfortunately, this new job creation has barely kept up with population

growth. We still have between 23-25 million Americans either unemployed or underemployed. Meanwhile, in our weakened economy, and

understandably, the numbers of Americans receiving Social Security

disability benefits and food stamps has reached staggering new levels.

My main reason for writing this is to point out to you and your followers, to

Republicans and their followers, and even the wingnut extremists in both

parties, none of you has been given an overwhelming mandate by your

fellow citizens to run the nation your way.

President Obama, you received slightly more than 50 percent of the overall

votes, and your opponent, Mitt Romney, received slightly less. However,

when you remember only about half of eligible voters bothered to vote, each

candidate received around one-quarter of the support of all eligible voters.

Think about this: Nearly 75 percent of eligible voters either voted against

each candidate or didn't bother to express an opinion with a ballot.

This is a long way from being handed a mandate in which you, President

Obama, once again will be tempted to say to the opposition in D.C.: We

won, you lost, get over it.

The Republican lawmakers and party leadership must understand that they

also did not receive a mandate. Certainly those in the tea party who have

tried so hard to take control of the Republican Party must learn that they

have even less of a mandate from their fellow citizens.

Mr. President, it is the wish of the vast majority of Americans that you

actually stand up and provide critically needed leadership to foster a true

spirit of bipartisanship in Washington during your last four years in office.

Please remember that even though you have no majority mandate, you

have been entrusted with the responsibility to lead by encouraging both

sides to join together to take the actions that are so desperately needed by

all Americans.

The vast majority of Americans are very worried about their families' futures.

They are worried about the staggering debt and continuing borrowing, our

lack of jobs, stagnant wages, increasing prices for everyday staples, and

most of all about the frozen dialogue among our elected leaders, which

provides no helpful solutions.

You have been elected by a small minority of citizens as the leader of

America for all Americans. It is my prayer and plea that you will stand tall

now and do your job. I believe most Americans will honor you and the office

you hold, however, you will have to earn our respect, and your place in

history, by your actions and results — not just your inspiring rhetoric.

You and your party cannot adequately repair the many problems we face

unless you find a way to engage and unite both parties in a shared quest to

patch up the good ship America we all sail on together. 

Good luck, and may God bless you, Mr. President, and all of the citizens of

the United States of America.

These are my opinions. What do you think? 

Mike Tower

Please visit:  Citizens Against Politics As Usual

American Red and Blue Monkeys or frogs

   
   October 29, 2012

   They're adept at controlling the loyalists

Recently I read about an experiment in behavior conditioning using monkeys as test subjects. Researchers place five monkeys in a room. A banana is hung from the ceiling on a string and a strategically placed ladder allows the monkeys to reach the banana.

Almost immediately, one of the monkeys will attempt to get the banana. As soon as this happens, cold water sprays all of the monkeys, causing the ladder climber to quickly abandon the attempt.

Soon after, one of the four remaining monkeys will make another attempt, and again they are all sprayed with cold water. After the second or third attempt, the other monkeys will protect themselves from being drenched in cold water by not allowing any other monkey to climb the ladder.

Researchers then replace one monkey with a new one. The new monkey almost immediately tries to get the banana and is attacked by the other monkeys. This process repeats until every one of the original monkeys is replaced. Interestingly, from then on, no monkey will ever attempt to get the banana again, even though none have been sprayed with water. They have been conditioned!

For some reason, this reminded me of extreme party loyalists from either side, who find it impossible to compromise and probably don't even know why. Many of them cling desperately to their party loyalty without stopping to honestly examine the actual behavior of those they elect.

Their elected officials proclaim that they rigidly follow their party's professed values, even while evidence suggests otherwise. To maintain loyalty, they simply conduct endless polls to learn what their followers want to hear, and then make certain that all answers and rhetoric match up with the polling results.

One strategy both parties share is to inflame the passions of loyalists by waging war against the opposite party. Loyalist "monkeys" will then fight to the death defending their party without a shred of reasonable valid evidence.

Many likely don't even remember when or why they chose their party affiliation. They say they are Democrats because they are for the small guy/middle class and against the wealthy, etc. Or they say they are Republicans because they believe in smaller government and freedom for all citizens to either succeed or fail on their own, etc.

Meanwhile, the elected officials from either party all work for the exact same special interests.

Of course, it's easy to see how we arrived at this frozen partisan impasse. The special interests, and our elected officials trying desperately to remain in power, have developed the perfect strategy to control their loyalists. They spin their web of deceit by playing on all Americans' shared fear for their families' and nation's future. Both parties have become experts at deflecting this fear into ineffective anger at the other party's leaders and followers.

Meanwhile, the American economic decline, which actually began nearly 60 years ago, is slowly and relentlessly crushing the middle and lower classes, and our nation's future.

Politicians know that admitting the severity of our challenges and both parties' culpability will kill their chances of retaining power. Instead, they choose their self-serving strategy of denying responsibility, blaming the other party and dividing our citizenry.

This may help explain the behavior of some who actually bother to vote in national elections. However, what about the 45 percent or so of eligible voters who, for decades, have chosen not to bother exercising this sacred privilege?

This astounding lack of participation reminded me of a fable concerning frogs. As the story goes, you can place a frog in a pot of cool water and slowly bring it to a boil, and the frog will just allow itself to die rather than try to get out.

Like the frog, nonvoters choose to simply ignore the many problems our nation faces. They let others worry about such things. It seems easier for citizen "frogs" to occupy space in our shared pot of slowly heating water until our nation dies rather than bother getting involved.

Imagine a giant pot of water occupied by all Americans sitting on the steadily growing fire fueled by the many problems that we face. Frogs, oblivious to the danger, are in the center relaxing on their floats. The extremist red and blue monkeys, on opposite sides of the pot, are egged on by their leaders to spend all of their energy uselessly blaming "those others" for the fire raising the temperature of the water. Meanwhile, the rest of us, in the same pot, wonder what it's going to take to get us to unite and put out the fire before it's too late.

What should you do? (1) If you are one of the nonvoting "frogs," get off your butt, become informed, and vote. (2) Don't ever tell a political party what you want to hear by participating in a poll. (3) Kill the power of the parties by changing your voter registration to independent. (4) Vote out all incumbents in every primary and general election for the next few cycles.

We know our Founding Fathers never worried about a little cold water when going after the "bananas" of freedom, and they sure didn't just lay around on their floats. If they had done either, we would have never become the once great nation America used to be.

These are my opinions. What do you think?

Mike Tower   

Please visit: Citizens Against Politics As Usual

Reach me:  Mike Tower

America's Declaration of Independence

November 4, 2012

Our Declaration of Independence

When was the last time you read our Declaration of Independence? More importantly, when did any of our elected? I recently carefully read this amazing document which details how and why our founders created America as a sovereign nation over 236 years ago. Reading it caused me reflect on who wrote it, what the words really meant to the writers...and what they should mean to us today.

Obviously the Declaration of Independence lives up to its title as notice to Great Britain stating the people of America intended to withdraw from English rule. Growing friction between the Colonies and Great Britain developed over many years, mainly because the British Parliament collected taxes from the colonists without allowing them any representation, thus leading to the famous: "No taxation without representation".

Following almost a year of fighting between the 13 colonies and crown soldiers, the Declaration of Independence, written primarily by Thomas Jefferson, was approved by the Continental Congress on July 4, 1776.

According to Wikipedia, some scholars consider the second sentence in this historical document to be one of the best-known sentences in the English language, containing the most potent and consequential words in American History. "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." 

No less than Abraham Lincoln stated the Declaration of Independence to be the foundation for his political philosophy, and he argued the Declaration is a statement of principles through which the Constitution should be interpreted. Of course, one only has to look at how long it took to overcome the horrors of slavery and women's rights to see that our nation's leaders didn't come close to following the equality principles for everyone for a very long time. Even Thomas Jefferson, who died on the fiftieth anniversary of the Declaration's enactment, maintained significant slave ownership at his death. However, it also seems clear, the easily understood promises of this sentence would attract millions of future immigrants to America. This famous sentence was clearly the basis for what became known throughout the world as the "American dream".

Have you ever carefully considered the real meaning of the words in this famous sentence? It seems easy to understand the rights to life and liberty; however, the pursuit of happiness is more complicated and often subject to different interpretations. More extreme liberals interpret this to mean we are all born with a divine right to be happy with our life no matter what, and only a large central government can ensure this outcome with a safety net to catch those who fail, or even fail to try. Extremist conservatives on the opposite pole, view it as absolutely only promising the right to pursue happiness. If one succeeds that is great. However, if he/she fails...that's just too bad.

As I wrote in an earlier article, most of the people I interact with, whether self-labeled as Democrats or Republicans will say they are fiscally conservative and socially progressive. When pushed for further explanation, most will say... and I believe it represents the vast majority of Americans...they don't want our nation to waste any money, but neither do they want to abandon the truly needy.

From what I learned from other writings of several of our founding fathers, it seems clear they intended the more conservative view. It seems apparent they only promised the right for individuals to have the freedom to pursue whatever activities might bring them happiness. If you failed that was simply too bad. You remained legally free to repeatedly seek rewards required for your version of happiness. However, failure which might be accompanied by unhappiness, was to be borne by the individual. Our founders promised no safety nets.

I tend to support the more conservative views because any attempt by man to institutionally protect others from their own failure always seems to have unintended consequences. When one has a safety net he/she can count on, history has proven many will make reckless and foolish attempts to achieve success, because they are protected from failure's consequences. Or even worse, many will simply not even bother trying. The net result for the latter is often "generational poverty/welfare" in which children learn from the actions of their parents it is easier to accept welfare than make an attempt to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. I grew up dirt poor (as they used to say) in the 1940s and 50s. We had no government welfare programs. The only lesson most impoverished parents of my generation taught their children was...if you want more than we can provide, find a way to earn the money, or learn to do without. Should we have safety nets for the truly needy...absolutely. Should we though, provide those same benefits for those too lazy to try? I think our founding father's intended words, carefully interpreted, would say emphatically no.

Please take the time to read the Declaration of Independence our brave founding father's wrote over 236 years ago. Then ask yourself...have America's leaders somehow gone astray from the original intentions of this critically important document?

These are my opinions. What do you think?

Mike Tower

Contact Me:  Mike Tower

Please Visit:  Citizens Against Politics As Usual