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Sunday, August 30, 2009

Madison 9-12ers: 10 Things "We" Disagree On

I've listed the points where Madison's Glenn Beck fans and I can agree; now let's see where we disagree. (Again, "we" is a loose term, referring to other folks at last night's Madison picnic.)
  1. We need Congressional term limits. Actually, the Glenn Beckers themselves may disagree on this one. Ben Elliott voiced support for this idea and won some nods. Others suggested it takes too much effort to amend the Constitution. I suggest term limits are crass elitism: if you think you're smart enough to see that the incumbent is corrupt but that the general electorate isn't and that you thus need to impose a rule from above to limit choices at the ballot box for the electorate's own good, you're an elitist.
  2. John Thune should answer his own phone calls. Madison neighbor Jerry Heckenliable takes the position that a United States Senator who has 1000-page bills to read does not need any staff to respond to the phone calls of 800,000 constituents or carry out any other functions. In other words, Jerry wants Jon Lauck fired. So do I... but I intend to achieve that end by voting John Thune out of office in 2010, not by the absurd assertion that Senators need no bureaucrats (a.k.a., support staff) helping them do their jobs. ON what planet does Jerry get his news?
  3. Tim Johnson is disabled and should resign. Oh. Planet Mean, I guess. Jerry H. said this to me with a bit more bitterness than I find comfortable. Hmm, let's see: this year, Senator Johnson has missed 12 Senate votes (4.4%), all during a four-day period at the beginning of May.
  4. We need to get the government out of Social Security. No, Jerry, Social Security as a specific program and a general principle, is exactly what we build governments to handle.
  5. Bills in Congress are written by college-graduate staffers who've been told exactly what to write by their Marxist professors. No, Sibby, bills are written by corporate lobbyists acting as anarcho-capitalist tools.
  6. Brown is a good color for political t-shirts. Does no one in Madison understand marketing? Brown shirts don't stand out. Brown shirts are also an invitation to blog mockery. You might as well hang a piñata and hand me the stick. (The Sioux Falls Glenn Beckers at least went with red.)
  7. "I hate politics." Madison Glenn Beck fan club organizer Jason Bjorklund all-caps-shouted this in his big MDL ad. Jason, you're doing politics right now. That's a good thing, an admirable thing. Keep at it.
  8. Health insurance should be like car insurance. Jason didn't get to finish this thought—there were a lot of conversations brewing last night!—but he's wrong. Health care is not auto repair. People are not cars. Different rules of economics and morality apply.
  9. The Founding Fathers started with a model that gave more power to the states. Actually, that statement by itself is correct. As a states' rights argument, it's ill-chosen. That starting system was called the Articles of Confederation. It didn't work. The Founding Fathers scrapped that plan in favor of a stronger federal system... something Glenn Beck's ancestors likely would have called a dangerous step toward fascism... had the word actually existed in 1787.
  10. Montana has all the shale oil America needs. Yeah, and Mars has a lot of iron, but I'm not seeing the business model yet. Capitalists aren't stupid. If they wouldn't go broke drilling and transporting the Bakken shale oil, Exxon et al. would already be there in full force. Evidently the Bakken shale oil, which might have recoverable reserves equal to maybe twenty year, maybe less than one year of U.S. oil consumption, won't get pumped until oil prices jump back above $100 a barrel, the kind of prices that pushed Bjorklund to shutter his trucking business last year.
As you can see from this list and my preceding list of agreements, the Glenn Beckers have a lot of different issues on their minds. They aren't even of one mind or one clearly uniting philosophy. For a Saturday evening salon, that's engaging and enjoyable. For an effort aiming at taking back Washington, that could be a problem. More to come....

5 comments:

  1. Steve Sibson8/30/2009 12:07 PM

    "Bills in Congress are written by college-graduate staffers who've been told exactly what to write by their Marxist professors. No, Sibby, bills are written by corporate lobbyists acting as anarcho-capitalist tools."

    Cory,

    The wealthy plutocrats control both, the Marxist professors and the corporate lobbyists. And what there are doing is not free market capitalism. Free Market capitalism would foster many small players. The current system fosters "bigger is better". Note Jason, a small operator is forced out of the market and is now employed by one of the big players. The banking secret elit who run the Federal Reserve are not free-market capitalists. They are financial tyrants that any good government would put a stop too. Instead the leaders of both parties support these guys.

    More more on how college professors created this system, see the "brain trust", who created and controlled FDR's misguided economic policies.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Term limits - we have them every election cycle. If you are the better man or woman prove it in the primary and then the general election.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I've had a lot of professors, as have most people. Has anyone actually had a Marxist professor?

    Also, go Alexander Hamilton!

    The incumbent advantage in Congress is huge. But that is not necessarily a reason to have term limits. The people must like the victor that won in the first place. And it also makes sense for a state to re-elect officials because the longer they serve the more power they wield for their state. (Unless someone loses an election for buying a house.)

    ReplyDelete
  4. My profs at SDSU: Mary Haug, David Nelson, Kent Kedl, Jan Vandever, Janet Johnson, Anthony Lis, Dan Kemp, Rodney Bell... can someone tell which of them is a Marxist? Can anyone find a Marxist on the entire SDSU campus? As far as I can tell, SDSU is run by a capitalist who makes more money serving on a corporate board than he gets from the state of South Dakota.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Steve Sibson8/31/2009 11:48 AM

    Cory,

    You are one professor who used Marx to argue for government health care. And you have yet to respond to the FDR "brain trust". You are they?

    ANn your SDSU example is not "free market" capitalism. Public/private partnerships are fascist/socailist. But you slick-talking college professors like to mislead. That is why you can't stand truth-sayers like Jason.

    ReplyDelete

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