Bill Pickett's Blog

Is it economics or politics? Part 3

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 21:25:00 +0000

It has been more than a month since part 2 and it is difficult for me to pull things together. The truth is, the current machinations in Washington are both economics and politics. I have to work to understand both if I am to have any chance at understanding what is happening. A few things are clear, at least to me.

First, we will all be better off if we spend less money. This applies to the government and to each of us as private citizens. We need to reduce government expenditures and increase the quality and effectiveness of government programs. I know that sounds contradictory but this is the essence of our problem. Spending more money on anything doesn't in and of itself make that something better. Surely our experience with health care is a case in point. We spend a lot more money than other developed countries--both in total and per capita--and yet have no better health system and in many cases less good health outcomes. I favor moving to single payer approach but there are other alternatives. Without question, however, if we cannot figure out how to spend less on health care no amount of tinkering with payment systems will come close to touching our problem.

Both government and individuals need to move away from the use of debt to finance ongoing consumption. Debt is important to families, corporations and government as a way of financing investments, not consumption. Debt financed consumption is what leads to speculative bubbles and the resulting collapses.

So we need to change some of the rules to reduce future spending on Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid as well as the defense industry. That will hurt, no question but there is no alternative. There is a big but. We need to increase investment in fundamental infrastructure: transportation, education, communication, and basic research. If these are reduced when we already are feeling the impact of aging and inadequate infrastructure, what will happen if we reduce these even further? While these investments must increase, we must also increase the quality and effectiveness of these basic systems. It does little good to increase debt to increase college attendance if the resulting student debt is a crushing load that distorts vocational and career choice. We cannot let the cost of education run wild just as we cannot do that in health care.

Second, we must increase tax revenues and adjust the tax code so that it is more equitable. The tax code is not going to increase or decrease job creation. We need to make sure that we have enough common resources and that those most able to contribute do so equitably. Those of us who paid federal incomes taxes from 2000 on have benefited from tax decreases that we did not seek and did not need. We have gotten a free ride for the last ten years or more. Simple equity suggests that we should now contribute more to help put the entire system back in balance.

So it is simple. Spend less and take in more. Sooner than later we will pay down the debt to manageable levels and begin to have a surplus just as we did before the drunken sailor in us got in control. As a nation we took in less money and began to spend more, a lot more. We used debt to finance the deficits. Now we simply have to spend less and contribute more to get back to go.

I have little patience with either the Democrats or the Republicans. Both parties have become so partisan that no one can simply stand up and speak the plain truth and be guided by what the country needs.

Is It Economics or Politics? Part 2

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 20:03:00 +0000

In The Origins of Political Order, Francis Fukuyama has shown that a successful society requires a coherent and potent central state government. Successful state governments over the logn run are those characterized by potency, accountability, and rule of law. As cultures and societies develop in terms of literacy, successful states must possess all three characteristics. The recent experience of the Arab Spring makes clear that simply being potent, indeed, even an all powerful dictatorship will not be able to maintain itself without accountability to citizens and a strong rule of law. Any dictatorship that thinks it can maintain itself in power while simultaneously educating its population is fooling itself unless it also understands that it must limit its power through accountability to those governed and through the primacy of law over the law giver. It is not reasonable to understand the current Occupy Wall Street phenomenon as a response to clear evidence that Wall Street elites are functionally above the law and have not been called to account for the financial debacle in which they participated and from which they profited. To the extent that politicians and policy makers are seen as complicit with this "lawlessness," they could pay a heavy electoral price.

But this argument, salient as I believe it is, is not particularly relevant to the Tea Party and other libertarian foces--mainly in the Republican party though not exclusively--who desire to continue the dismantling of the federal governing structure that has asserted itself more strongly from 1930's New Deal through roughly the mid seventies. Fukuyama points out that one of the traditional roles of a central governing authority has often been to protect ordinary citizens from powerful forces in a society, forces that if become too powerful can begin to abuse that power to advantage themselves and disadvantage those with less power. Most of us stereotypically think of a king as a person with unlimited power who abuses and enslaves the ordinary folk of his realm. Actually the real picture is different. Typically the King used his authority to counter the power and might of the nobility who often abused the serfs who lives lives of indentured servitude to enrich the nobles.

It is also true that sometimes kings became too powerful and the nobles banded together to counteract that power on their on behalf and consequently on behalf of the serfs. Often these conflict centered on the taxes levied by the crown to strengthen the central government and to defend against external enemies or wage wars of aggression and expansion. The key seems to be a system in which there is a balance of power among the various factions. It appears that inevitably when one faction becomes too powerful vis a vis others, it tends to abuse that power to advantage itself.

Americans can see this same balance of power issues played out in the formation of the United States. The central question was whether this country would be a confederation fo states or a sovereign nation with a strong central government that was not dependent upon the states for agreement with central policies especially including taxes. The early experience with the confederacy approach convinced almost all that a confederacy would not work because it was not working. A loose amalgam of sovereign states would not be able to achieve the potential of the new country and deliver on the promise of the revolution, let alone be able to pay the debts incurred in the War of Independence. All thirteen states eventually approved the proposed Constitution with its strong central government and they did so through popularly elected conventions in each state. The year long debate was often vociferous and at times rancorous but everyone eventually realized the wisdom of the central government approach. This would have been the end of the discussion were it not for the fact of slavery and the inability of the founders and framers to deal with that abomination.

The one area where the federal government was forbidden by the constitution itself from taking action was slavery. There could be no federal action outlawing this practice. As a result the question of constraining federal power was often framed in terms of preventing the central government from constraining state governments. Eventually the growing population in the non-slave states resulted in support for a federal policy of emancipation, i.e., forcing slave states to abandon their peculiar practice. It took a bloody Civil War to settle the issue, actually two issues. First, slavery was diametrically opposed to the principles of freedom and humanity embodied in the constitution. Second, the federal government exercised proper sovereignty over the nation and the several states.

To be continued.

Is It Economics or Politics? Part 1

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Sun, 25 Sep 2011 11:10:00 +0000

What is going on in Washington and in the early stages of the presidential electoral process? Are the core issues economic--deficits, entitlement over commitments, unemployment--or do they have more to do with political theory? At first I thought this was all about the economy and how to recover from the disastrous recession worsened by unbridled speculation. However common sense responses to these economic challenges seemed to gain little traction.

After all the sensible approach--the one endorsed by almost all economists--is that the federal government should continue and probably increase stimulus expenditures in the short term in order to sustain demand in the economy and thus assist in the recovery from the Great Recession. At the same time, long term changes are required in terms of expenditure reduction and revenue increase so that the structural and long term deficit is reduced. Admittedly this is a tricky course of action and one that requires leadership at all levels. Never has it been more true that "everything has to be on the table" than it is right now. But to let a concern with the deficit overcome a proper concern about recovery from the recession will follow the same disastrous path taken by Japan in the 1990's, its "lost decade."

There is a focus on the jobs issue, and rightly so. As long as unemployment is at 9+%--actually probably more in the middle teens since those who have stopped looking are not counted--consumer demand, the mother's milk of the U.S. economy, cannot possibly be strong& enough to support a recovery. It would seem that the problem is how to create jobs by somehow encouraging businesses to invest in new products and services and thus hire the people needed for that investment. The problem is that in general U.S. businesses are sitting on a huge amount of cash but are unwilling to invest because there is not sufficient demand. This is the classic reason for government stimulus to create the demand that then creates the jobs that then further increase demand, but consumer demand this time. So how come we don't agree to do this?

I think the answer is that the agenda of many in Washington has more to do with political philosophy and not economics. I believe they are using the economic woes of the country to justify political actions that will materially weaken the central, that is federal government, in order to implement what they believe to be the fundamental political principles of the American experiment. Flying under the banner of "no new taxes" and "we must reduce the deficit," are a powerful and coherent group of conservative activists whose true agenda was aptly described by Grover Norquist, "I don't want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub."

To be continued...

9/11 Lesson for Politicians...and You and Me

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Wed, 07 Sep 2011 16:52:00 +0000

January 2002

We are about to remember the events of September 11, 2001...as well we should. Personally I have tried not to pay attention to the hype that began a month ago and which will reach a crescendo Sunday September 11. I am especially avoiding the speeches and comments by politicians about that day and its meaning for America.

As I reflect on what happened that day, I keep thinking about the actions of people we have come to call "first responders." These are police, fire, and emergency professionals from numerous governmental agencies and jurisdictions. Their job is to protect, serve and rescue us when we are confronted with crises and danger.

On that fateful day in 2001, thousands of first responders entered the damaged and burning twin towers to find and rescue people. They knew they were placing their lives in jeopardy but just as surely they knew what their calling was and proceeded with profound and unmistakable courage. They placed their lives in jeopardy to serve the citizens they were sworn to protect. Perhaps few of them ever thought it would come to risking their life in such a horrendous fashion but each knew that if it should come to pass their training and character would provide them the strength to fulfill their mission of service.

I am sure that there will be no end of speeches by politicians about all this. Many will praise these first responders without understanding the central message for them. We elect you to serve and protect us and the common good. Your prime objective is service not the saving of your own political lives. We have a right to expect that you will be guided by values of service and courage and not by the need to satisfy special interests, whether on the left or right, whether liberal or conservative, whether business or labor, etc. We have seen enough of politicians who play footsie with special interests of all types, especially those with checkbooks open and pens ready.

It is sometimes said that politicians are motivated by fear and the biggest fear is not being re-elected. Those first responders surely felt fear for their lives and yet they proceeded to carry out their duties to all of us. Politicians need to walk up to the fear of not being elected and proceed to do their duty to all of us without making political compromises to insure their re-election.

The lesson is clear for all of us, not just politicians. We are called to live out our lives in accord with our deepest values not in order to achieve success, high regard from others, or power. The example of those first responders can help us consider our deepest commitments and resolve to live those out in our lives. A message for all of us including politicians.

A Penny a Bit

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 23:44:00 +0000

Jaron Lanier

I have just finished reading Jaron Lanier's You Are Not A Gadget: A Manifesto. Here is what the book jacket says about him: "Jaron Lanier, a Silicon Valley visionary since the 1980's, was among the first to predict the revolutionary changes the World Wide Web would bring to commerce and culture." The book is relatively short but very heavy going, at least for me.

It is a fascinating critique of the web, especially what he calls web 2.0, and it's call for open and free architecture and content as well as the ultimate wisdom of the hive, the mass of people interacting over the internet. It is interesting to read what an accomplished technologist--and musical artist--thinks of the internet and the web. He see strong positives as well as some important dangers.

One idea that resonated with me is that the vast majority of content on the web is not new and creative but reworking of previously existing content, often "mashed up" to seem new. In the "mash up" process individual contributors are rarely identified and that is a conscious cultural norm. The whole idea is that millions of people interacting on the web are a better path to truth or at least accuracy than experts creating content based on their expertise and research. This is the "hive mind" that represents the best hope of the web 2.0 world. The problem is that it leads to a reduction to the mean. Individual creativity, spontaneity, and idiosyncrasy are worn down by the relentless drive of the "hive mind" to coalesce around a single answer or set of answers. Anonymous postings, 142 character tweets, and unverified Facebook postings are examples of what can go wrong.

This helped explain to me why I typically lose patience with cable news coverage as well as the local newspaper. When news happens, both seem to be flooded with variants of i-reporters who know next to nothing about what happened but are more than willing to share their reactions and feelings. Rather than near from knowledgeable news sources and experts, we get comments from people "like us" because this apparently is the best way to get to the reality of what happened. Wrong. The best way to get there is to listen to and read people who know what they are talking about.

This can happen because all content is free or ought to be according to the web 2.0 advocates. This is a good thing and I applaud it from one point of view. But from another, it means that I have to put up with a lot of uncreative, rehashed content. He has a simple but probably impractical idea. Everybody should pay to view content. This payment would replace current ISP monthly fees and should be calibrated to about equal those fees. The important part of his suggestion, however, is that the payment would be net of payments made by others to view your content. Thus if you view a lot of content but very few people find your content interesting or you don't really post anything other than Facebook postings and tweets, your monthly payments would be higher than someone whose content other found interesting and creative. Such a system would encourage people to create and post content that was creative and interesting. It would value actual websites rather than cookie cutter frameworks like Facebook.

I am not sure I have done Lanier's suggestion credit but I think he is on to something. Pick up the book and give it try.

Wealth gaps rise to record highs between whites, blacks and Hispanics – Global Public Square - CNN.com Blogs

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Mon, 01 Aug 2011 16:32:00 +0000

In the midst of the debt limit debate last week, a report appeared from the Pew Research Center detailing the impact of the Great Recession on American households by race. Although we would probably not be surprised to learn that the impact on household wealth was greater on Hispanic and black households, we might be surprised at the scale of the difference.

The median wealth of white households is 20 times that of black households and 18 times that of Hispanic households, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of newly available government data from 2009. These lopsided wealth ratios are the largest since the government began publishing such data a quarter century ago and roughly twice the size of the ratios that had prevailed between these three groups for the two decades prior to the Great Recession that ended in 2009.

This further disturbing confirmation of the direction our country is heading. While those who have more than enough continue to desire and acquire more as they pursue their own narrow economic self interest, we are becoming a nation of extremes economically. When this is combined with an overlay of race, it presents an ugly and unsettling picture. We seem incapable of accepting the demonstrated fact that when income and wealth are more evenly distributed, life is better, safer, healthier and more fulfilling for all of us.

Wealth gaps rise to record highs between whites, blacks and Hispanics – Global Public Square - CNN.com Blogs

Stop me if you've heard this one...

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Thu, 17 Mar 2011 12:23:00 +0000

A republican administration is in the White House as well as in control of both houses of Congress. The administration is almost solely focused on economic development. It has instituted changes in tax policies which overwhelmingly favor the top sliver of society. It is actively encouraging business corporations to become bigger and more powerful. All of this has resulted in an explosively growing gap between the rich and the rest of the country. The newest economic developments are exploited mercilessly in a wildly speculative real estate bubble. Appointments to federal government leadership posts are based on party loyalty rather than competence and experience resulting in agencies headed up by glad-handing hacks. Anyone who opposes any of these policies is castigated as but a step from treason and this was all done through communication media owned and controlled by the party in power. Finally they institute aggressive changes in voting legislation and political boundaries to ensure the continuation of their power. These policies and operations resulted in an economic depression that began to develop as the succeeding administration which Democrat took office.

This sounds like the eight years of the G. W. Bush administration but, in fact, is a description of the four year administration of Republican Benjamin Harrison from 1888-1892. The Republican party of that period was in close partnership with business especially the trusts that controlled vast areas of the american economy through concerted price fixing and market division. The economic policy that the Cleveland administration was so dedicated to as a solution to all economic problems was not a continuing reduction of taxes, especially those on the rich, as was the Bush administration but rather a comprehensive system of high tariffs that allowed the trusts to operate without any effective competition. This resulted in prices for all consumer goods being higher than would have been the case with competition and in huge profits for those who owned or controlled the trusts. This meant that the income and wealth gap accelerated. The Republicans ignored all demands for tariff reform since they were convinced that increasing wealth at the top would "trickle down" (a term they didn't use but which would emerge in another Republican administration in the 1980's) to everyone else, or at least to those who were motivated to work. This, of course didn't work even for those who were able to work but it especially was a disastrous policy for African Americans in the South, Native Americans in the West, and for most of the newly arriving immigrants who seemed so not very American to the white males in power.

Even though Heather Cox Richardson does not draw these parallels in her recent book, Wounded Knee: Party Politics and the Road to an American Massacre, any reader cannot help but notice that the picture she paints is a recurring one for American politics. "The Harrison administration has wrongly been buried in obscurity, for its effect were far-reaching. Its aggressive use of rhetoric, disseminated by its own media, had frightening repercussions for voting rights. Its rosy promises for the West--and the subsequent need to make those promises come true--spelled disaster for the western landscape. Its focus on economic development doomed the Sioux to poverty, and its manipulation of the electoral map changed the dynamics of politics."

This is a fascinating study of the way in which national politics impacted the lives and caused the deaths of the Sioux people of what is now South Dakota. As one reads of the incompetence and bald political decisions of the Indian agents appointed by the Harrison administration, one can only think of those famous words: "You're doing a heck of a job, Brownie."

If you interested, here is a link to the Amazon listing for the book; I highly recommend it. http://www.amazon.com/Wounded-Knee-Politics-American-Massacre/dp/B004LQ0G6C/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1300368966&sr=1-2

Government is not the solution...but it's not the problem either--Part II

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Thu, 24 Feb 2011 20:12:00 +0000

So much has happened since I post part I that I almost thought about just going directly to the effort to undo decades of state and national legislation securing the right of labor to organize. However, I really want to get down some thoughts about why government is certainly not the problem but unfortunately it is not a sufficient solution to our problems either. I say this is unfortunate because it would be wonderful if the solutions could be found in legislation, regulations, rules, and policies. This would be wonderful because it would mean that the solutions to our problems were "out there" somewhere and not within our own selves. Unfortunately, as Pogo famously observed, "We have met the enemy and he is us." Appropriately Walt Kelly used these words for the first time on a poster for Earth Day 1970.

Sadly we are the enemy or the problem. Americans are caught within a spiral of addictive self indulgence. This is especially true for those of us who have the discretionary resources to feed this addiction but it also ravages the values and ideals of those who do not have enough but are compelled to seek more and more. If we view this in political terms, it can often become a question of who gives up their addictions first? If we could all given them together and at the same time, then no one would gain an advantage. But such concerted, communitarian action seems almost impossible short of some dramatic developments that force us to. Oil at $150 barrel might do the trick. But our experience is that this only works as long as the price of oil is high. Once it moderates, we seem to go back to all our old behaviors. Interest in hybrid cars tracks pretty closely with the price of gasoline.

The only possible answer is a conversion of values that is not dependent on external forces. Religious thought and behavior is typically the seedbed for such developments. Unfortunately most religious thought in contemporary America seems to have been co-opted by the religious right and thus focus on certain litmus tests of personal morals and ethics.

It is interesting to note that while St. Paul uses "sin" more than 45 times in the Epistle to the Romans, he uses "sins" only a handful of times. The challenge for the Christians to whom Paul wrote was not the challenge of personal morals--these, of course, are important--but rather the challenge of living a Christian life in the midst of a social-political-economic structure that he characterized as "sin" also known as the Roman Empire or the Pax Romana if you were a Roman.

If we take that insight out of a religious context, the problem for 21st century Americans becomes distressingly clear. How do we lives a full human life within an enslaving systems of consumption without falling prey to addictive self indulgence and thus perpetuating the very system which enslaves us? Coming to terms with this formulation of the problem and then living our way through it holds the only possible answer to our current mess. It seems unlikely that any politician can help us through this.

Government is not the solution...but it's not the problem either--Part I

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Sun, 30 Jan 2011 11:00:00 +0000

Ronald Reagan famously observed, "Government is not the solution; it is the problem." He then proceeded to preside over the beginning of a bipartisan effort to dismantle the federal role in American life so that we would experience a new "dawn." This disassembling of government focused on domestic policy while the government role, i.e., expenditures, in military defense expanded. While de-regulation--as it became known--was a clear success in the airline industry, it was destructive in other areas, especially the regulation of the financial industry.

There is a long list of examples of the way in which reducing the regulatory role of the federal government has not improved life but has been destructive: the savings and loan crisis, Enron and the Enron-like corporations looted by their managers, credit card debt over expansion, a speculative housing bubble, the economic meltdown of the Great Recession. There is no better example of this than the bipartisan repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act in the closing days of the 2000. This effort to repeal this New Deal regulatory law was supported by Republicans (Phil Gramm) and Democrats (Charles Schumer) and was signed into law by Democrat Bill Clinton. Its passage was little noted by the general population but it became the swamp out of which most of the economic woes of the Great Repression slithered.

Glass-Steagall was originally passed to create an unbreachable firewall between banks and investment firms because it had been the entwining of these two entities that had led to the speculative crash of the 1929. By the late nineties, however, this firewall was preventing some powerful organizations from making even more money. The merger of Citibank and Travelers to form Citigroup in 1998 was a clear violation of this regulation but the repeal changed all that. The rest, as they say, is history.

So government is not the problem in financial regulation. It is not the problem in national defense, in education, in health care, in environmental protection, consumer protection. For example, does anyone seriously think that we would be better off in any way if an unfettered market mechanism allocated health care to our citizens? Even a somewhat regulated system had left 40 million Americans outside any effective health care insurance system.

But government is not the answer either. Regulation and rules are not enough by themselves. Rules often create new opportunities for those who want to game the system to get into new mischief. This came home to me several years ago when my youngest son transferred to a new college and ran afoul of NCAA regulations on athletic eligibility. He was told that he should have read the NCAA rule book and thus should have known that he was violating a recently changed, somewhat obscure, rule. This was the occasion for me to see the NCAA rulebook. That is when it struck me, "If rules were the answer, NCAA Division I athletics would be clean as a whistle." The fact that is is not and seemingly never will be points to deeper issue than just creating more rules and better rules to stay ahead of the outlaws.

Transformation Church

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Mon, 17 Jan 2011 15:24:00 +0000

This weekend I was in Charlotte visiting Liam, Marcie, and the kids. On Sunday we went to church at Transformation Church. When Marilyn and I were down last April, we went there as well. I was impressed then and still am. It has long been known that you plant a new church by focusing on three aspects: music, preaching, and hospitality. Transformation certainly does all three of these very well. Go here to see Transformation Church website.

Transformation Church Overflow Room

What impressed me, however, was the way in which the pastor, Derwen Gray, has articulated the mission of the church as UPWARD, INWARD, and OUTWARD. The UPWARD dimension speaks to our relationship to God who loves us and reaches toward us to change us in fundamental ways. The INWARD dimension speaks to the way in which we make our response to God's offer of love. It focuses on a healthy regard for our true self as loved by God. The OUTWARD dimension extends us out to the world to announce the good news of Jesus Christ and to work with Jesus in the salvation of the world. Theologians could, and do, come up with sophisticated language and structures to say the same thing without adding anything meaningful for the vast majority of us. You won't find those words in scripture but they capture the essence of the message.

While I have had some familiarity with some congregations that focus on music, preaching and hospitality, I was impressed with Transformation's emphasis on the outward dimension, discipleship to the world. Too often this music, preaching, hospitality results in a comfortable Christianity without the cross. Transformation's approach does not make this mistake. I also noted that they have what they call transformation groups, small groups, that meet in people's homes and are led by trained facilitators. These serve to educate and to deepen commitment.

All in all this is an impressive church from which Catholic parishes could learn much.

A Spirituality for Our Times

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Wed, 12 Jan 2011 12:17:00 +0000

I just finished reading Archbishop Oscar Romero: A Disciple Who Revealed the Glory of God by Damian Zynda, a friend of mine in Rochester. This a creative approach that seeks to develop a spirituality of conversion which is apt for our post-modern age. She uses Romero's life, the theology of Irenaeus, and the insights of psychotherapy to explicate this spirituality. Many of us know of Oscar Romero and his heroic stand for the ordinary people of El Salvador but few of us know of his life long struggle to respond to the call to discipleship, particularly within his obsessive compulsive personality disorder.

Again and again she makes the point that we are called to respond to the presence of God in our lives exactly as they really are, with all the enormous possibilities of human existence and with all the wounds that inevitably are part of our lives as well. It is surprising how apt the thoughts of Irenaeus--the second century pastoral theologian--are to our contemporary existence.

The final chapter presents her conclusions about a contemporary spirituality of conversion. It might be tempting to just read that chapter but one needs to work through the biography of Romero, the insights of Irenaeus, an understanding of the impact of his diagnosed OCPD, and Romero's spiritual journey, all contained in the first four chapters. Only after that work does the final summary have its full impact.

Following Irenaeus, Zynda views conversion as a process of growth toward full realization of our humanity and autonomy. It is not a one-time event but an ongoing, life-long process of becoming who we already and really are. It is important to understand that this growth and the response to the call to conversion from God takes place within the actual realities of humanity, warts and all. Thus the traditional view of conversion as a movement from sinfulness to holiness is not a helpful or accurate stance. It is a movement toward wholeness and authenticity.

A spirituality that supports such a conversion would be very different from the spirituality that most of us were taught or have heard of. It is not a spirituality built around formal prayers and religious practices but rather around more interior processes. The final two paragraphs summarize her conclusions:

Because it has relevance to postmodern Christians, a spirituality of conversion is a dynamic path to holiness. Formed through personal contemplative payer and communal worship in the liturgy of the Word and Eucharist, an asceticism that promotes solidarity with those who suffer, and the constant discernment of spirits with and among the loving community disciples, a spirituality of conversion transforms disciples into the likeness of the Son of God. Embracing the struggle to be obedient to the grace of conversion, we are, throughout life, nudged deeper into the vision of God and the fullness of our endowed potentials.

Thus, in the fullness of our humanity and divinity, we too reflect, as did Oscar Romero, the glory of God.

Grandma's "Worst Time"

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Fri, 17 Dec 2010 20:07:00 +0000

My grandma, Nancy Campbell, had a hard life. She was born in 1891 in Kansas City Kansas. Her mother and father split up when she was little. She was raised as a step child in Orr household resulting from her mother's second marriage. She had a number of step brothers and sisters, most of whom she took care of as the "Nannie" of the house in more ways than one. She left school after the fifth grade and eventually continued her work as a housekeeper and nanny in the homes of families wealthier than her working class one.

When she was 18, she married a man 12 years older than she and quickly had two little girls. He left the family within three years and Grandma had to fend for herself with her two little girls. She continued her domestic work, often living in the homes of her clients. Sometimes the girls (one of whom was my other) would be with her but not always.

She remarried eventually and lived a typical life, if a life was typical during the depression and the war. Shortly after the war, her second husband died and she returned to work, again as a housekeeper and mother's helper in the homes of wealthy families in Kansas City Missouri. In her later years, she took care of her younger sister and their mother until their deaths. She died in 1986 at 95 years old. She was a blessing to all of us in so many ways.

This is all by way of background to recount a story my sister Anola told me when I visited Kansas City in early December. Her son, Gerry, had a school assignment to interview someone old; who better than grandma? He interviewed her in what must have been a highly professional fashion--he is now a highly accomplished professional journalist and editor. He asked the obvious question--at least the one I would have asked--and perhaps like me he would have an expectation of what the answer would be.

His question: What was the worst time you ever had? Her answer was quick, short and to the point. "I don't know. I never had a worst time." Oh, how I hope that gene has found its way into me and through me to my children and grandchildren!

Health Care Tax

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Tue, 14 Dec 2010 19:06:00 +0000

I admit that I can be a bit dense about some things but I was shocked when I finally figured out about the health care tax. No, I don't mean the Medicare payments. And I don't mean the federal tax general revenue that goes to pay for other health care. That would be simple. However, alone among the developed countries, we in the United States have decided --well I don't remember deciding but I guess someone did--to make health care a market-based service and to rely on employer provided--assisted, at least-- health insurance to finance it. The result is that virtually every time I buy something made in the United States, a portion of the purchase price is used to pay for employee health benefits. No wonder foreign goods are usually less expensive.

Health care is not like, say an automobile. When I buy a car, I buy the car; the rest of you get yours. When health care is provided and paid for, we all pay for it either directly or indirectly through insurance, either ours or that provided to the people who make everything we buy. The point is that health care like education should not be a private economic good but a public service, one that we all pay for directly through the common resources of federal taxes.

This would have at least four advantages. First of all, it would be less expensive because we would take the profit margins of insurance companies out of the equation. Phased in over a three to five year period, this elimination of insurance would reduce health care costs, everything else being equal. Second, the price of goods and services produced in the United States would become less expensive and thus more competitive globally. Third, given the efficiency and effectiveness of Medicare, employers would pay less in taxes than they currently pay in insurance premiums. Likewise the individual would also pay less in federal taxes than they currently do in insurance premiums. Fourth, the rationing of health care--necessary in either approach, would be more humane and responsive. Government health officials responding to well established professional norms and to standards set by political authorities would treat clients more fairly than corporate officials responding to individuals and corporate financial incentives to increase revenue and reduce health care expenditures in order to maximize profits.

No wonder the rest of the world does not follow our approach. They probably cannot understand why we continue with this broken system that only seems to advantage corporate and financial interests rather than serve people. But then why should they care? They are the also advantaged by our blindness. The rest of the world is keeping its eye out for the next world leader since the United States cannot sustain the flawed economic and health policies that seem to be entrenched.

P.S. Oh, yes and if would eliminate the legislative provision that forbids Medicare from negotiating drug prices as the Veterans Administration does, we could immediately save even more.

The end is near; pay no attention.

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Sun, 14 Nov 2010 10:48:00 +0000

Normally we expect something like "repent and be saved" after we hear "the end is near." But the lectionary readings for this Sunday present a different thought to us, one that is more authentically Christian.

The passage from the Book of Malachi contain a stark and threatening picture of the end of time and final judgment:

See, the day is coming, burning like an oven, when all the arrogant and all evildoers will be stubble; the day that comes shall burn them up so that it will leave them neither root nor branch.

The reading from Luke recounts the words of Jesus about the end times: wars, insurrections, earthquakes, famines, plagues, etc.

We face these realities in our own life. As we contemplate our individual death, we understand more fully the meaning of annihilation; we face the complete destruction of who we are, or at least it seems like that. At the end of the passage from Luke, Jesus gives us a clue about what our faithful stance should be: "By your endurance you will gain your souls."

In other words, as disciples of Christ, we are to live our lives, not in light of what will happen at the end, either of our lives or the end of all existence. Rather we are to live out the reality of who we are as believers: sons and daughters of a loving God. Our lives are to express that reality rather than express our fear of what might happen at our death if we don't.

Amenable Mortality

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Fri, 12 Nov 2010 21:53:00 +0000

Now here is a concept for you! "Amenable mortality" was an health analysis term developed in the 1970's to measure the effectiveness of health care systems in developed, industrialized countries especially. Amenable mortality measures the deaths that occur before age 75 that could have been prevented by timely and appropriate medical care, in other words, conditions that were amenable to health care but went untreated.

A study by the Commonwealth Fund showed the following results:

U.S. Ranks Last

Between 1997–98 and 2002–03, amenable mortality fell by an average of 16 percent in all countries except the U.S., where the decline was only 4 percent. In 1997–98, the U.S. ranked 15th out of the 19 countries on this measure—ahead of only Finland, Portugal, the United Kingdom, and Ireland—with a rate of 114.7 deaths per 100,000 people. By 2002–03, the U.S. fell to last place, with 109.7 per 100,000. In the leading countries, mortality rates per 100,000 people were 64.8 in France, 71.2 in Japan, and 71.3 in Australia.

The largest reductions in amenable mortality were seen in countries with the highest initial levels, including Portugal, Finland, Ireland, and the U.K, but also in some higher-performing countries, like Australia and Italy. In contrast, the U.S. started from a relatively high level of amenable mortality but experienced smaller reductions.

The U.S. ranks last even though we spent more money per capita that the other countries. In fact, we spend about twice as much as the average of the other countries. It is also important to realize that the other countries all have universal health care coverage, unlike the U.S.

The health care reform plan enacted this year does need to be amended but certainly not undone. It needs to be strengthened if we are to achieve any like comparable results as do the other industrialized countries.

I also note, with some dismay, that in just a little over five years, my mortality won't count, whether amenable or not.

The Important Role of Scapegoats

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Mon, 08 Nov 2010 14:39:00 +0000

Scapegoats was a necessary part of any political process that seeks to disenfranchise some segment of society. Here is how it works. First you manipulate the political process, usually in more or less secret ways, to bring about disenfranchisement. Those who are so disenfranchised eventually realize that and get angry about it and want do do something about it. Scapegoating becomes central, not to defuse the anger but to point it in a direction away from those actually responsible.

Here is a current example. For the past thirty years, the middle class in the United States has suffered economic stagnation with almost no growth if any in real income. This is despite more people in the family working and everyone working more hours. The middle class turned to consumer credit and then to home equity, expanded beyond all reason by a speculative bauble. Eventually the bubble burst; the credit markets dried up; consumption and thus economic growth declined; and unemployment skyrocketed.

The anger and frustration of the middle class as a result of these developments seek a target. Who or what is responsible? Who or what can be blamed, punished or reformed? It would not be productive if this anger and frustration would actually end up focused on those who have actually gained income and wealth during these same thirty years. The top five percent of American households have done very well during this period; the top one percent, even better; the top .5 percent, best of all.

Rather than have the middle class come to that little conclusion, it serves someone's purposes a lot better if that anger and frustration can be pointed at other targets. What could be better targets than illegal immigrants and poor people. Under the rallying cry of illegal immigrants taking jobs from American--nothing could be further from the truth in reality--immigration reform has been stopped dead in its tracks.

But the significant outcome is not that but rather that all that justifiable anger and frustration is diverted away from those who actually have a lot more to do with the root causes of the current economic stress of the American middle class.

More Evidence on the Inequality Front

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Mon, 01 Nov 2010 14:45:00 +0000

David stockman was Budget Director for Ronald Reagan. On 60 Minutes last night he took both Republicans and Democrats to task for saying that somehow taxes can be reduced on anybody without disturbing our current pattern of spending. He was particularly on point when he talked about a one-time 15% surtax on the wealthiest Americans. On the surface that sounds a little unfair until you hear the facts about the growth in wealth of the top five percent of American households.

"In 1985, the top five percent of the households, wealthiest five percent, had net worth of $8 trillion, which is a lot. Today, after serial bubble after serial bubble, the top five percent have net worth of $40 trillion," he explained. "The top five percent have gained more wealth than the whole human race had created prior to 1980."

In other words, the taxing and deregulation policies over the last 30 years have generated tremendous wealth for the wealthiest Americans while leaving the rest of the population to struggling with stagnating wages and massive debt. This tremendous wealth was not generated because the top five percent were smarter or harder working that the rest. It was generated because the top five percent convinced the rest of the population to reduce taxes on the rich, treat capital gains differently than earned income, deregulate, i.e., get government regulators out of the way of financial speculation and mismanagement.

Whatever happens in the 2010 elections, the U.S. economy has an inherent inequality that must be dealt with. A return to past policies will only worsen this fundamental problem and continue to build the wealth of the top five percent while the rest of us languish. Eventually that top five percent might come to the realization that they cannot continue to build wealth if the rest of us cannot buy goods and services and thus increase demand. Of course, they could simply ignore that and look to foreign markets for their easy money.

Is there a Zacchaeus in my life?

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Sun, 31 Oct 2010 10:00:00 +0000

The gospel reading for October 31 is the story in Luke about the interaction between Jesus and Zacchaeus, the head tax collector Jericho. For a variety of cultural and political reasons, those who collected taxes for the Romans were considered "sinners" by the Jews and thus Zacchaeus would have been an egregious sinner indeed. Zacchaeus was at least curious about Jesus, this itinerant teacher since he was trying to catch a glimpse of him. Since he was "short in stature," he ran ahead and climbed up into a sycamore tree above the crowds in order to see Jesus. His tactic worked; he saw Jesus and Jesus saw him. What happened next was unexpected and life changing.

When Jesus saw him up in the tree, he asked him to come down and then Jesus invited himself to dinner at Zacchaeus' house. This fraternization with a public sinner was scandalous to the crowd but was life changing for Zacchaeus. This acceptance of him as a person struck him to his core and he immediately responded by committing to give away half of his fortune to those less fortunate and to redress any injustice or fraud he had perpetrated on those with whom he dealt. His life changed, not because his "sins" were condemned as well they might have been, but because he was accepted as a human being.

If we Christians are to be the light of Christ to the world, are we not called to the same interaction? We are not called to condemn but to love others, especially those who are different from us. The challenge for most 21st century Americans is that we live, work, and play within tightly homogeneous groups. In order for us to model that acceptance displayed Jesus, most of us most of the time have to seek experiences outside our normal life spaces. It is there that we will find those, who like Zacchaeus are different perhaps even to the point of being condemned by society. It is these we are called to love with the same life-changing love and acceptance displayed by Jesus in this gospel story.

Redistribution is the name of the game

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Sun, 17 Oct 2010 10:15:00 +0000

We all knew that when Joe the Plumber labeled Obama as a "redistributionist" that he wasn't saying anything that wasn't true of all U.S. politicians. The issue is not whether to redistribute income or not but rather how income should be distributed. Robert Reich in his new book, After-Shock: The Next Economy and America's Future, opens with the single most important statistic for the current political debate: "In the late 1970's, the richest 1 percent of the country took in less than 9 percent of the nation's total income. After that, income concentrated in fewer and fewer hands. By 2007, the richest 1 percent took in 23.5 percent of total national income. It is no mere coincidence that the last time income was this concentrated was in 1928." (page 6)

This "redistribution" of income into the hands of the richest Americans was the work of both political parties but it began with Reaganomics and was accelerated by the Bush tax cuts after a period of some moderation under Clinton. The Tea Party profoundly misunderstands the dynamics of this redistribution in its calls for reduction of government spending and what it calls "confiscatory" taxes. There is an essential problem with rich people getting richer, even a lot richer. The problem is that they got richer by impoverishing the middle class. The middle 60 to 80 percent of Americans whose incomes in real terms have steadily declined since 1980.

This redistribution had two negative effects. First, it concentrated more and more money in the hands of people whose consumption was already at the maximum and thus rather than spend their increased wealth in consumption--the mother's milk of the American economy--they sought to get even richer. If they had actually invested that money in strong fundamental economic activity, we would have all benefited. What they did, however, is what they always do: they speculated. Too much money chasing too few investment opportunities simply drives up prices in a speculative frenzy: think dotcom bubble; think housing bubble. Eventually these bubbles burst and in the last case that almost brought down the entire economy.

The second impact fed into the first. Even though the American middle class had less and less real income, it continued to respond to the essential need to keep consumer demand high. This, for better or for worse, is the fundamental dynamic of the American economy. But if incomes did not keep pace with demand, what would predictably happen? The middle class would use consumer credit to make up for that income loss and when that reached exhaustion, it would use home equity which was ratcheted up by the speculation. Eventually that reached a predictable limit and the middle class was unable to continue to expand demand; the economy slowed and then descended into the Great Recession which was immeasurably worsened by the speculation and the associated abuse.

Government needed to step in and bolster demand lest the Great Recession become another Great Depression. If federal deficits had not become bloated with unneeded war expenditures and unwarranted tax cuts for the rich and if the excesses of the speculation had not required massive bailouts, the central government could have increased demand within acceptable deficit limits since recovery would mean increased federal revenues and the opportunity to pay down the debt. This happened during the Clinton administration but the resulting financial strength was expended on the above tax cuts and the military adventures of the following administration.

The problem now is that a recovery which does not address this maldistribution of income simply will not work. Private demand from the middle class will not develop to take the place of government demand--always meant to be a short response. The 17 percentage point gain in national income held by the rich must be reduced back to its 1980 levels. This redistribution will mean that the middle class will once gain be able to play its role in the American economy. While the richest one percent will have a smaller share of national income, the fundamental economic system will be sound and stable.

In other words, the previous tax cuts for the middle class should be made permanent but the tax cuts for the rich should be allowed to expire. To do otherwise could be disastrous beyond our wildest nightmares.

Health Care Reform...as if I needed any more reasons!

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 15:02:00 +0000

Here are opening paragraphs describing the Harvard study obn death rates among uninsured Americans.

Nearly 45,000 annual deaths are associated with lack of health insurance, according to a new study published online today by the American Journal of Public Health. That figure is about two and a half times higher than an estimate from the Institute of Medicine (IOM) in 2002.
The study, conducted at Harvard Medical School and Cambridge Health Alliance, found that uninsured, working-age Americans have a 40 percent higher risk of death than their privately insured counterparts, up from a 25 percent excess death rate found in 1993.

“The uninsured have a higher risk of death when compared to the privately insured, even after taking into account socioeconomics, health behaviors, and baseline health,” said lead author Andrew Wilper, M.D., who currently teaches at the University of Washington School of Medicine. “We doctors have many new ways to prevent deaths from hypertension, diabetes, and heart disease — but only if patients can get into our offices and afford their medications.”

This number is roughly equivalent to the number of people killed in automobile accidents in the U.S. each year. Over a ten year period, we are talking about almost 500,000 largely preventable deaths. This fact alone should be enough to demonstrate the failure of our current private enterprise based health care and insurance system.

Health Care Reform

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 14:52:00 +0000

We are at a historic moment for the financing of the American health care system. In the 44 years since the establishment of Medicaid and Medicare, we have never been closer to fundamental reform that can have systemic impacts on the financing and quality of American health care. In this discussion, it is important to keep certain facts in mind:

Among developed, industrialized countries (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) the United States spends vastly more than any other country.

16% of GDP which is almost double the OECD average.

Highest per capita with $7290 which is two-and-half times the OECD average. (Adjusted for differences in purchasing power)

Despite this large difference in effort, 45 million Americans are not covered by health insurance

Health outcomes (life expectancy and infant mortality) are far from the best.

There are fewer doctors per capita than in most other developed countries.

Most other countries spend substantially less than the U.S. and provide health care with at least equal and in some cases better health outcomes.

As a nation we have been clear that a market mechanism—while obviously superior in terms of the economic production—was not an effective or just method of allocating resources the fields of education, national defense, police and fire protection, and criminal justice. However our free market ideology has led us down a path in which market mechanisms and private ownership have been the determining structures of our health care system. After 40 years, I think we can conclude that this has only added cost without benefit to a health care system. We need to move away from a failed ideology and move toward an approach that every other industrialized country has found both efficient and effective.

However, simply changing the financial and institutional structures of the health care system will not solve the more fundamental problem: the deteriorating health of American citizens. When Medicare was established, 13 percent of adult Americans were obese; today 32 percent are. Fully two-third of all adult Americans are overweight or obese. In 2008 $147 billion in health care costs were spent on health issues related to obesity. This is 9 percent of all expenditures. There is nothing to suggest that these trends will not continue.

It is well established that Americans consume substantially more of the world’s resources than our share of world population. While this over consumption has provided us with a comfortable and easy life style, it is now becoming apparent that this very over consumption—whether of oil or of food—carries costs that we simply cannot afford. Sooner than later we need to reform our health system in ways that effectively incentivize health and wellness rather than treating chronic diseases caused by our life style. If we do not address both issues, it is hard to see how an unhealthy and bankrupt America can provide the political leadership the world desperately needs.

Mt. Irenaeus

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Mon, 25 May 2009 12:28:00 +0000

Last weekend I went on retreat with members of the men's spirituality group of which I am a member. We went to Mt. Irenaeus a ministry of the Friars at St. Bonaventure. The following is the final entry in my rpayer journal for that weekend.

Just back from an hour’s walk in the woods. As I walked I kept repeating to myself that I just needed to trust myself. It seems so simple. Why haven’t I done it? I began to think of all the people who saw me as fundamentally good: Grandma, Marilyn, Paula, Fran Blighton, Sr. Therese, Tim, Richard, Tom, Anola. There are so many; why didn’t I hear them? Why did I think I had to be different, had to have some kind of agenda for change? It was because of my attachments, beliefs, fears just as De Mello writes. Where did these come from and why were they and are they so powerful that I distort myself in light of them? De Mello is right in the sense that they come from culture, society, family. Sometimes these are innocent and unavoidable; sometimes they are intentional and diabolical. Why would a five year little boy think that people were trying to poison him except for the fact that he sensed there was something wrong with the way he was.

No matter how deep and how strong, these are lessons that can be unlearned but awareness and understanding. No program of change will accomplish anything other than reinforcing the attachments. Joyce’s description of a retreat in Portrait of an Artist as Young Man struck home to me and my classmates because it was exactly our experience. We were told that we were bad, yes basically bad and that we needed to change. Discipline was the key and it carried within it the seed of destruction. Nothing ever worked, at least not for very long. It could never work but it kept us in an inferior position. Unfortunately the Church has used this approach and continues to use it.

We begin in a blessed condition because of that fundamental existential relationship to the Divine. We are not sullied or wounded with original sin. The world is wounded in that way and it is the world that wounds us, not the other way around. Our struggle is to keep the world from distorting that fundamental relationship and the freedom and life that come with it. That is the human task. That is my task.

I stood before the wooden cross at the end of trail and spoke to Jesus. He knows exactly what I go through; he faced the same human condition. It is not original sin as personal but original sin in the world. He kept himself free from that or understood his circumstance in a way that freed him. It was that world that crucified him, not me and my sins as we were taught. I asked him to help me follow his same path, not by following a set of rules but by freeing myself as he freed himself, by taking up his cross which is really no cross at all but radical existential freedom. Surely this is the meaning of grace, divine life in me. I heard him tell me that he and I were in exactly the same situation. The divine life at the core of his being is the same divine life at the core of mine. I am to become like him. The divine deeply desires that I be so and sends me a superabundance of life through that relationship. All I have to do is be open to that life by freeing myself of attachments, beliefs, and fears. I have gained a deeper appreciation for the meaning of sunder warumbe.

What now? I desire to be more faithful in my prayer and reflection. An hour a day is not too much to ask of myself. I would spend the hour reading scripture and works that feed this understanding: Meister Eckhart, De Mello, Fox and others I am sure. I can do this each morning as soon as Marilyn leaves for work. It is quiet and peaceful.

All this puts the Church in a difficult position for me. It has been and continues to be a source of my problems. How can it be otherwise? It is part of this sinful world that seeks to control me and distort my view of who I really am. Have not most of those who have written in this vein been punished or excluded by the Church? How can this be? It is part of the human condition and must be seen in that light. Salvation does not lie in the Church. My involvement with the Church must be such that it sustains this life in me. Every reform movement in the Church began with similar insights, namely that the relationship with the divine is central and happens outside the structures and institutions of the church.

I must be a Very Unimportant Person

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 15:51:00 +0000

On March 10 I joined 1,000 Catholics from the eight dioceses in New York State in Albany to lobby our state senators and assembly members on the public policy issues important to Roman Catholics in the state. I had gotten up at 4:00 am in order to board a 5:00 am bus with 50 other people from the Diocese of Rochester. When we arrived at the Albany Convention Center, we went to the registration tables where our name tags were arranged alphabetically. I easily found mine and picked up a packet of materials for the day.

That's when I noticed a table at the end with a large sign that said: "Bishops and VIP's." Although I wasn't sure how a VIP would know he or she was one, I knew immediately that I wasn't one...even though I and the 1,000 other volunteers were there to do the work of lobbying. Frankly, I found it to be offensive and unchristian. Why create classes of people? Surely even Bishops and VIP's were not alphabetically challenged. Surely they could find their name badge just as easily as I did. It can only be that Bishops and VIP's are different from the rest of us, special, and in fact better and thus deserving of special treatment rather than being treated like the rest of us.

This may seem like a small thing but I think it speaks volumes about the problems with a church that creates status levels to no good purpose and in contradiction to the words and actions of Jesus Christ. "You know that those who are recognized as rulers over the Gentiles lord it over them, and these great men make their authority over them felt. But it shall not ge so among you. Rather, whoever wishes to be great among you will be your servant. Whoever wishes to be first among you will be the slave of all. For the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many." (Mark 10:42-45)

Those who have ears to hear, let them hear!

Do Republicans think we are all idiots?

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 13:45:00 +0000

I know we elected and then re-elected George W. Bush president. (OK, I know we elected Al Gore the first time but the Democrats didn't have the right lawyers in the right state.) But really, do they really think we have any interest in listening to the people who put us in this financial quagmire as they mumble on about the economic stimulus plan. Don't they understand that the American electorate rejected their policies of reckless foreign wars, overt militarism, monumental deficit spending to fund those wars as well as tax breaks for the rich, undermining the Constitution, and general incompetence due to decisions based on political ideology? Apparently not.
The Republican Party happily stood by as the economic disparity in this country reached historic levels. Republicans thought it was just great that the credit system was manipulated to extend an economic expansion in an irresponsible manner. They cooed approvingly as government oversight was emasculated so that even the SEC could find it appropriate to ignore specific warnings about Ponzi schemes, of all thing. They thought it wonderful that political rather than professional qualifications were used to appoint FEMA directors, U.S. attorneys, and God knows how many others. Ordinary Americans--the middle class--benefited not at all from these policies and schemes.

Last fall these ordinary Americans continued the protest that started with the Congressional elections of 2006: Enough is enough. Stop it with giving even more money and advantages to those who are already obscenely wealthy. Start worrying about us...because we are drowning out here beyond the beltway in all those ordinary places that the Republic media masterminds have portrayed in "patriotic" ads.

So when the man we elected to do just that along with his team says this is the direction in which we need to go, get out of the way. Sure make constructive suggestions; I don't agree with everything in the stimulus package. But don't pontificate political ideology. WE NEED HELP AND WE NEED IT NOW even if NOW will take two to three years.

Oaks of justice

noreply@blogger.com (William Pickett) — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 11:56:00 +0000

The Hebrew scripture reading for the Third Sunday of Advent is from Isaiah 61. When I read the beginning of that chapter, I was struck by a verse that is not included in the reading although its substance certainly is.

They will be called oaks of justice,
planted by the Lord to show his glory. Is 61:3

Isaiah is telling the people that God will rebuild Jerusalem after its destruction and the removal of Jews to Babylon. He will reestablish his eternal covenant with them and the preeminence of Jerusalem, but this preeminence will be based on justice and mercy rather than worldly domination.

An oak is truly a magnificent tree: slow growing, solid, long lasting, large, and imposing. It stands as a monument to perseverance and strength as well as the peaceful shelter of its shade. What if each of our lives were such a monument, a clear sign of justice for all. This is how God desires to demonstrate God's power and glory. A group of people tried to be those oaks in front of the Border Patrol Office in Rochester. See the story in the Rochester Democrat & Chronicle. View photos.