Seriously, so what? I mean - what if people weren’t following the law? Then what? The CHP has issued 112,000 citations - about 6% of the total citations issued. I guess that means slightly more - but not much more - revenue for the great State of California. Obviously, it wasn’t enough of a cash infusion to make much of a difference. So, wait, why did we pass these laws? It wasn’t to generate a ton of revenue. It wasn’t a social experiment to see if people will follow new and inconvenient laws. It was to increase safety on the highways.

So, AAA, where is THAT study? Since the laws have gone into effect, has there been any significant decrease in auto accidents? In frequency OR severity? Anything? That’s the study I want to see. It’s wonderful that people follow laws (hooray for us) but the real question is whether or not the laws have done ANY good. That question remains unanswered.

I’ve known, met, even loved a fair amount of people in my life. I’ve made mistakes and some of them have made their mistakes at my expense. I regret things and I bet some others regret things they’ve done as well. But as much as we’d like to, no matter how hard any of us try - we can’t go back and fix it. I can’t go back and not do things I’ve done - or do things I’ve not done. No one can go back and unsay things. Or say things.

Sometimes I wonder if that’s why there’s so many lonely people out there. They’re just a half-step out of sync from the rest of the world. Maybe we’re almost all just slightly off from the rest of everyone. Part of the magic is finding one other person who’s arrow of time, point for point, overlaps yours. Sometimes close isn’t good enough. Sometimes, I think, maybe that’s what religion is, or even just a shared experience is - it’s a way for multiple people to choose an abstract point and say, “That - that is ours. This is where we are. This is where we’re starting from.” Everyone who agrees on it, is part of the group. Or the pair. Maybe that’s what love at first sight really is - an accident of sharing the exact same slice of time at the exact same speed. And then, that lucky pair can choose, somehow, to move forward through time at the same speed starting from the same spot.

It’s not easy. At least, it hasn’t been for me. I feel rather out of sync of everything right now. Past, present, future - I’m moving through it at my own, seemingly unique, pace. I keep crashing into to someone for a while but then, no matter how hard either of us try - we slip away from each other, on separate arrows of time. Different people. Different lives. Different worlds. Ghosts and phantoms, tangible for only a moment and then, fleetingly, gone again.

Right place at the right time. Luck, in other words. They say you make your own luck - but in my experience, luck makes you. Random chance slaps you in the back of the head like some asshole friend you haven’t seen in a while but know as well as anyone in the world. If you recognize it happening, you turn, stunned and angry, a little scared - but you then suddenly see who it is and you smile. If you are able to recognize Serendipity, kudos to you. Smile. Embrace it. Otherwise you might push it away, not share the moment and be lost once again on a different slipstream.

We all want to love and be loved. Just have to remember that we are all our own separate species, living in different worlds, different times. It’s a miracle any of us ever find what we’re looking for - and yet, it happens every day to someone.

I hope I didn’t miss my day. I hope you haven’t either, if you’re still waiting. Because we can’t go back and check - the arrow only points in one direction.

But it seems that, barely a month into the Presidency of Barack Obama, some of the starry-eyed left is finally figuring out what I’ve been saying all along - Obama is a politician, a man among us and not a man above it all. It’s been a month and he hasn’t turned the world around and revolutionized America! Panic and fear, Phobos and Deimos my friends! He’s a fraud! We’ve been hoodwinked and hornswaggled!

Hyperbole, all of it. It simply comes from unrealistic expectations. Thirty days is not enough time to make good on all campaign promises (were they really promises?). Thirty days is not enough time to ram an agenda through all of government. Thirty days is barely enough time to remember the names of the White House staff.

So the title of the article is “Liberals not pleased with go-slow approach by Obama” - well that’s because it’s simply a measured approach and too many expected too much too fast. That’s it. They are not focusing on what Obama has already accomplished. Let’s start with something that I personally feel strongly about:

“Advocates for stem cell research thought Obama would quickly sign an order to reverse former President Bush’s restrictions on the science. Now they are fretting over Obama’s statement that he wants to act in tandem with Congress, possibly causing a delay.”

President Bush exec-ordered stem cell research to stop. President Bush unilaterally decided the direction of governmental scientific research. I think that is wrong. No one man should have that power. Scientific research should not be subject to the whims of the President. There will be another Republican President someday - maybe as soon as 4 years from now - and he (or she) could simply re-reverse the decision. That is too chaotic for research that has great potential but will also take a long time to fully explore and perfect. No, while I want the stem-cell research ban lifted ASAP, I also want it done right - and Obama is doing it right. By working in tandem with Congress, he solidifies and strengthens the decision - so that it cannot be overturned again on the whim of one person. He’s doing the right thing. Too many liberals think that the Democrat majority will last forever. Guess what - it will not.

How about another issue close to me:

“Critics of Bush’s faith-based initiative thought Obama had promised to end religious discrimination among social service groups taking federal money.

But Obama, in announcing his own faith-based program this month, said only that the discrimination issue might be reviewed.”

Look, if we don’t want religious discrimination by our leaders, we need to STOP MAKING RELIGION AN ISSUE. Stop pressing candidates for their religion and their views on it. Stop making hay over what religion they are (or aren’t). Stop. Just stop. By forcing the issue to the forefront, that has made it so that a leader must profess his religion AND act upon that when in power. So, Obama has professed his religion (and been unfairly forced to prove it over and over) and is now still acting to prove to people that he is a friend of the religious. And that means faith-based programs (which I am very skeptical of, personally). He will review the discrimination issue - great! - but that doesn’t mean he’s going to stop it. Anyone who thought he would while being forced to profess his faith over and over was deluding themselves.

Some further discussion:

“The anxiety is also being felt in the labor movement, one of Obama’s most important support bases. Some union officials and their allies are frustrated that at a crucial point in negotiations over his massive stimulus package, Obama seemed to call for limits on “Buy American” provisions in the bill aimed at making sure stimulus money would be spent on U.S.-made materials. “

If the labor groups thought Obama would blindly do whatever they said, they were fools. They missed one of the lynchpins of Obama’s campaign - one that I believe in strongly:

“Obama has long said his administration will be driven by competence, not political ideology.”

This is a huge promise that I am glad to see Obama working on. Look, I’ve said before that the Buy American rules are feel-good but ultimately hurt the economy. Badly. And now is no time for that. This is not a Dem-Rep issue. It is not ideology. It is the prevailing view of nearly every economist - protectionism is bad, bad, BAD. Look up the lesson of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act and learn. This was a Republican supported bill that Democrat FDR opposed during his campaign. Economists all over opposed it. And guess who was right? The opposers. It was a disastrous decision.

The article continues to detail hedging on campaign promises. Did anyone really expect Obama to be perfect on that? What politician ever has been? And that’s the problem - too many believed that Obama wasn’t a politician, but a messiah, above the fray. He’s not. It is my hope that he will eventually fulfill promises to the best of his ability - but I never expected them all to unconditionally happen in 30 days. That is insanity.

But it’s also clear that these folks are completely out of touch with what most of America sees. Their PR departments must have been laid off. For example, see the Detroit Auto Exec debacle, when they all took private planes to DC to beg for money. Now, I’m not going to say that was wrong - that’s what company jets are for - BUT they should have been aware, or made aware, of how that would look. It’s like taking a limo up to the local food bank and begging for food while wearing a tux.  Stupid. Same for these bailout companies who say they’re losing money and laying off jobs - then have their execs go on a corporate retreat to the Carribbean. Now I’m not saying that was necessarily bad - but it was horrible timing from a PR perspective. That’s “our” money, America is saying. We are giving it to you to help - not squander on luxury and greed. And that’s a fair thing to feel, I think.

But let’s make sure we know exactly who to be angry at. I don’t praise these CEO’s, I think what they have done with their bailout cash is - for the most part - rather offensive. However, I’m not going to go as far as Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO) and call for the CEO’s income to be capped at $400K (the President’s salary). Putting a salary cap - especially one that is relatively (RELATIVELY of course, I’d love to make $400K for running a company into the ground) low - is a mistake and ill-advised. We have to remember that we want CEO’s to strive for bonuses, to do the best they can, to make a company a success. We want them to aim for the stars. We would not want to take a job that is all about running a profitable company for minimum wage. Not that $400K is - but it’s still a cap and once you get there, where can you go? Why work harder? Why not leave for some other, more lucrative, position? We might end up with not the best candidates running our companies. It suppresses competition.

That doesn’t mean I don’t think the system is somewhat broken. The gap between CEO salaries and average salary in the company has grown wider and wider.

In 1970, CEO salary and bonus packages were typically about $700,000 - 25 times the average production worker salary; by 2000, CEO salaries had jumped to almost $2.2 million on average, 90 times the average salary of a worker, according to a 2004 study on CEO pay by Kevin J. Murphy and Jan Zabojnik. Toss in stock options and other benefits, and the salary of a CEO is nearly 500 times the average worker salary, the study says.

And in fact, limiting CEO salaries has been tried before - and there’s always loopholes. How did this happen though? Easy - Congress - the same crowd that is now angry at the bailout misuse - never put any restrictions on the bailout money in the first place. What did they expect? Did they even get a pinky swear that these guys would use it as Congress and the American public wished? No - they just handed over the greenbacks. And now we’re suffering the consequences - rampant misuse. Now, I’m not saying it’s been 100% misused, but I am saying that a significant portion has. Even President Bush said he didn’t want this money to go into CEO’s pockets - though he did nothing to put provisions in to stop it either. If someone gave you $1M and said “go use it to help your business out, but no restrictions or oversight on that” wouldn’t you give yourself a little bonus? I bet you would. So while we may condemn these executives for their greed, we should also be condeming Congress for their shortsightedness.

I’ve discussed this with a friend who knows economics far better than I do and I don’t always agree with his ideology, he does usually illuminate how some practical matters play out. And I agree that I don’t want C0ngress running these businesses. But I do think there should be more oversight, more transparency and - above all - more accountability. These companies should not be getting huge lump sums, they should be getting the money on a system that calls for multiple reviews and accounting of the monies. Congress should not be judging them so much on pure business decisions - but they should be saying, “Look, if you’re just going to give your CEO’s bonuses, fiddling away like Nero while Rome burns, we’re just not going to give you more money.” And that would be fair. And we’d all know why and what they’ve done.

But don’t cap salaries. Not at a number that simply doesn’t make sense for a multibillion dollar company. We want the best in those positions. It’s been corrupted by the greedy who reward themselves no matter what, true, but we still want to attract individuals who will strive for the top because the summit is so high - but also be of the character that if they do a bad job, or if the company is failing, the company comes first. Not their own bank accounts.

But I am not unsympathetic - nor disagreeable - to people who may not have reacted so thankfully to the acknowledgment. Example, one Greta Christina and her recent post. She was not pacified by the crumb thrown to atheists starving for respect and recognition by the American Government. I could post almost her entire entry, there’s so much to agree with. She does not reject Obama’s acknowledgment, let that be clear.

I was watching the Inauguration, with pride and hope and history and joy and relief. And the message I kept hearing was, “We are one country. This country belongs to everybody in it. Everybody has a voice. Everybody has a part to play. Everybody’s experience matters.

“Everybody — except you.

“Everybody except you and the roughly 15% of Americans who don’t believe in God.

“Not you. You’re not part of this. This isn’t for you.”

Yes, yes, I know. I know what you’re about to say. Yes, Obama said the word “non-believers” in his speech. He said, quote:

“For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus — and non-believers.”

And yes, that was pretty neat. As far as I know (does anyone know for sure?), this was the first time that a President’s inaugural address said anything about non-believers in a positive, inclusive way. I’m not going to underestimate that. He said it, and it was pretty darned cool. A milestone, even.

But, she continues on to show how that statement was a solitary island of respect in the great sea of religious fervor.

He said it once… in a speech, one of a series of speeches over the inaugural ceremony, that over and over again hammered home the message, “This is God’s country.”

She goes on in great detail to show exactly how often a god is invoked during the ceremony. If you are a religious person, you probably don’t realize just how often it happens. How pervasive it is. And how exclusionary it feels. Greta minces no words:

Look. You can’t spend all day talking about how God’s grace is upon the nation, and how everything that happens comes from God, and how equality and freedom and opportunity are promised to us by God, and how the elected leader of a democratic country is God’s servant, and how forgetting God is a sin that requires forgiveness — and then mention once that some of the people making up the strong patchwork of this country are non-believers — and call that real inclusivity and recognition of non-believers.

And I happen to agree with her. As excited as I was, I hold no illusions that suddenly the atheists and agnostics are welcomed with open arms. There is a long, long, LONG way to go before atheists are no longer considered unelectable by over 30% of the general population - higher than pretty much any other group. Greta goes a little further in her frustration than I do:

I’m done with it because, when Presidents and other official representatives of our country and our government insist that this is God’s country, the implicit — if unintentional — message is that, if you don’t believe in God, this is not your country.

Screw that.

This is my country, too.

But I totally undersatnd her feeling. It is a very difficult thing to take. Very. I have hope that things will improve, but I’m also prepared for letdowns. This is my country too - I sincerely wish the majority of my countrymen, my “representatives” agreed.

I appreciate American political speeches for their art and for their own sake. But often, the imagery doesn’t speak directly to me. Often they talk of God - no particular religion, but definitely referring to a deity. Those parts do not inspire me beyond the most abstract of ways. And because there has never been any positive recognition of atheism or agnosticism, or notable absence of religion, in a major political speech, I’ve not really felt “represented” or “spoken to” by speeches. Often, non-believers are derided by public officials and have been for some time. But yesterday, that changed.

The Obama speech definitely enthused me on a political level, but finally, FINALLY I felt personally acknowledged positively by a major elected official. This was “Change” that actually referred to me on a personal level. I was shocked, astounded but absolutely happy. Because I am an American and proud to be one - and for the first time I felt like maybe America is proud to have me as well. So for that, Thank you, President Obama. Thank you.

The moment:

For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus–and nonbelievers. We are shaped by every language and culture, drawn from every end of this Earth; and because we have tasted the bitter swill of civil war and segregation, and emerged from that dark chapter stronger and more united, we cannot help but believe that the old hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller, our common humanity shall reveal itself; and that America must play its role in ushering in a new era of peace.

Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath.  The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace.  Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms.  At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbearers, and true to our founding documents. (more…)

Glenn Morrison - Contact (Air Illusions remix)

Peter R. Henriques discusses the evidence (or lack thereof) for Washington adding those words in a recent HNN article. Some major points -

“The first clearly documented case of a President adding the words, “So help me God,” was recorded — when Chester A. Arthur took the oath in 1881.”

“Moreover, it would have been completely out of character for George Washington to have tampered with the constitutional text in this way. He presided over the Constitutional Convention held in Philadelphia in the summer of 1787, and he took the Constitution produced there very seriously. He was, in many ways, a Constitutional literalist. Would such a man, during the very act of becoming the nation’s first President, alter an oath that had been decided upon and written into the nation’s fundamental charter? It is far more likely that his political philosophy, and not his religious beliefs, shaped his actions in this incident.”

“Taken together, the complete lack of contemporary evidence, George Washington’s political philosophy of strictly following the Constitution and the concurrent debate over the proper wording of oaths under the new Constitution make it virtually certain that George Washington did not add the words “So help me God” to his inaugural oath.”

Read the article for more. In fact - the “explainer” people at CNN should read it too.

 Rick Warren gets plenty of attention through his books and media appearances and has every right to promote his religious views. But he doesn’t need or deserve a position of honor at the inauguration of a president who has given hope to so many Americans by rejecting the politics of division and emphasizing his commitment to constitutional values.

I’m sorry, but the fact that Obama is acknowledging someone who adamantly disagrees with him shows just how strongly he is rejecting the politics of division. He is saying, “I understand that there are a large number of Americans who agree with this man - I disagree with you and him, but I know you are there - let us find some common ground.” That is politics of inclusion. Warren’s are politics of division - I have no doubt in that - but that doesn’t mean he should be rejected wholly given his large following. The large following and high profile of Warren is why this move is a smart one and should not be compared to choosing say, David Duke.This is a chance for Obama to take the high road and he has done so.   And the crowd that is so upset over this should remember that Obama has not renounced any of the things he disagrees with Warren over. This isn’t about that.

Those on the left, we should also remember that there is room for common ground with those who think like Warren and we should not be afraid to join with them on those issues. For example, Warren is on board with fighting Global Warming, something that is uncommon for the far right and religious evangelical community. That’s common ground right there - and that’s an example of speaking to a group from within their frame of reference. I don’t believe we should save the earth for the same reasons they might - but I do believe we should save the earth. Let’s not argue over why, let’s just do it. Other issues that Obama could benefit from Warren’s supporters would be AIDS and poverty.

I am no way defending Rick Warren here. I am not fond of him. There are those who speak against him with little respect, as does Christopher Hitchens, as well as those who dissent with respect, like Dan Dennett. I’m probably somewhere in between the attitudes of these two men. And I’m not crazy about him speaking so prominently, because I disagree with him. But I will not condemn nor will I protest Obama for the selection. It’s politically shrewd - and Obama is proving to be a shrewd politician. Those on the left have been shut out of most major decisions for 8 years now - and look what happened? The right has suffered a backlash of nearly epic proportions because of their political divisiveness. They have shrunk their support base. They have alienated too many. The left, now that it has a unified front in Congress and in the White House, would do well to note this lesson. The more people we include and talk to and treat with respect, the longer we may hold power. And I think Obama knows that. I hope it works out well.