What I can’t figure is how on earth the people that actually follow this doctrine have made it so far. They must’ve had to actually hold down jobs, speak English, and balance their checkbooks from time to time. Logic tells us that if you cut your income, you must cut your spending (unless you have multiple plastic cards to charge against). That’s all well and good but the same public wants the government entities -- city, county, state and federal -- to provide lots of free services. Police and fire protection; adequate schooling for our children; Social Security; jobs; cheap gas; good roads; recreation sites; etc. But, they think this should all come from somewhere else but their pockets. Where, I might ask? Doesn’t all government income come from taxes?

It eludes my sense of logic that these same people who want government “out of our face” really want government “in our face,” or at least, in our bedrooms, computers and telephones. Listening in to personal telephone calls or checking out their library records they are in lock step (just as long as it is fellow neo-cons who are doing the listening). They are enamored with the Bush Administration’s total disregard for the Constitution and support their secrecy of actions that we’ve seen these past 8 years. They also want the government to keep plugging money into agricultural and oil subsidies; want them to take over the airlines so they can have cheap air fare with Champaign service and plush seating; keep wages high and prices low; and make sure the drug companies have continued record profits (at their expense). They want house values to double every three or four years, interest rates to stay around 4%, and have China and India import lots of cheap foreign goods but decry the exportation of jobs so that these cheap items can keep flowing in. They definitely want the government to ban abortion because “killing is bad,” but go ahead and bomb Iran because “killing is good!” They want to stop those “damn Mexicans” from coming across the border, except to provide them cheap labor for something agricultural and domestic services. Then its “let them in; let them do the work; and as soon as its done, kick their butts out.”

In his essay, The Fall of Conservatism, George Packard writes, “Now most conservatives seem incapable of even acknowledging the central issues of our moment: wage stagnation, inequality, health care, global warming. They are stuck in the past, in the dogma of limited government.” Limited government is great if you don’t demand anything of it. But, that’s not what working-class America demands. Basically, when talking about those who have less than they, the attitude is “if they can’t make enough, they should just die…unless, of course it’s me, then send the unemployment check to my house” philosophy that pervades the neo-cons. They seem to base this philosophy on “prayer will heal the righteous,” thus those that die probably weren’t. Biblical tales such as The Good Samaritan and seem to fall on deaf ears unless it’s the government who is designated the “Samaritan.”

History shows us that our American government was formed by the most learned and educated class of men of that time. And, whether you want this brought to your attention or not, the richest. And these were just not a little bit richer, they were rich in a time when there was a huge monetary and educational gap between them and the common folk. These were the elite of the elite. One has only to look at history to see that Washington, Adams, Madison, Monroe, Jefferson, Hamilton, Franklin and most the others who signed the Declaration of Independence were of well above average means and most had college education. Most were lawyers. One might say they were the educated elite. Yet today, if someone seems to have more education and/or better diction than the average laborer, they are branded as an “elitist” and are trashed at every opportunity.

And then we have the “Disgruntled Hillary Supporters for McCain.” Can there be anything that shows the complete disregard for solving problems in this country more than this group? Like a bunch of spoiled children they’ll forego the changes Hillary wanted to make (get out of Iraq; affordable health care for everyone; reforms on taxes and spending; etc) just to spite those who didn’t believe Hillary was the best choice. As Obama supports all those issues, it is pretty obvious that personality, race and gender are the primary interests of these people. Forget about making this a better country…that’s immaterial! If you wear a pants suit, you get my vote; if you wear a Brooks Bros suit, I’ll fight you to the bitter end. Stupid, stupid, stupid!

No…it’s not over. The trash talk; the innuendos; the purposeful misinterpretations; and the out and out lies will continue to grow. And, there are a good number out there that will believe and repeat. As a line in an 1876 nonsense poem by Lewis Carroll states, "I have said it thrice: What I tell you three times is true." And they call us a “civilized” society!

To begin with, I have been a staunch supporter of the Endangered Species Act since its inception in 1972. Most of my professional career has been directed at trying to recover wildlife, fish and plant species in jeopardy of extinction. That being said, I have also been a long-time critic of the application of this act, particularly the use of it for other agendas. Let me be specific: The act was written to preserve and recover species that had been depleted -- primarily through human activities -- to the point of near extinction. It was not designed to set aside wilderness; not meant to stop economic, social, or human population growth; not meant to quell pollution; and not designed to punish development. In many cases these all may be effects of enforcement of the Act, however these are its ancillary effects, not its objectives. More than once have I been contacted by a potential client who asks if I can survey some area “to find an endangered species” so that a project they find undesirable can be stopped. I tell them I can survey but my objective is to assess what is there, not find something that isn’t. That quite often costs me the job.

Right now there’s a big push to list the polar bear, an obvious casualty of global warming. And what will listing of this species do to stop its decline? Well, it will allow environmental organizations to sue the government for allowing release of greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere and to sue private companies who are doing it. How will this help the polar bear? Technically, if greenhouse gas emissions are stopped there will be an eventual climate reversal and the arctic ice will reform, bringing back the polar bear habitat. How long will this take? Maybe a couple thousand years, or much more. How long before the polar bear becomes extinct? Maybe only a few decades, the way things are going. How long will this be in court? Probably a couple of decades or more. Who will benefit? Primarily, the lawyers.

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m all for immediately stemming the release of greenhouse gasses into our atmosphere and to do otherwise jeopardizes not only the polar bear, but hundreds of species including Homo sapiens. Yet I don’t see the effort being put into the listing of the polar bear as being a positive or effective effort in achieving this objective. If we get another Neo-con Bush-thinking Whitehouse they’ll simply ignore the science, the law and the courts, and go merrily on their way. Let’s put the effort into voting those out of office who oppose the Kyoto Accord and support big oil...like Wally.

But, having he reviewed and analyzed the “facts” the President indicated not only had he had come to opposite conclusions of federal and private economists, scientists and other world leaders, he could fix things in a heartbeat. What is even more telling is that simultaneously, Dick Little, columnist for the Paradise Post, ardent supporter of President Bush and all his policies, and antagonist of anything that is done to protect the environment or keep the rich from becoming richer, came to exactly the same conclusion. So, when two outstanding minds -- one national and one local -- conclude that our failure to drill in ANWR is the crux of our recession, it obviously must be true.

The problem is that most of us are not astute enough to review the facts and read between the lines as can these two intellectuals, thus our conclusions are faulty and often vastly different from theirs. Even those professionals employed by our government and responsible for analysis of these issues continually mess things up and it has taken Bush and Little to effectively analyze the situation. Case-in-point: In a report published by the Energy Information Administration (EIA), a branch of the U.S. Energy Department in 2004 it was concluded that “The opening of the ANWR 1002 Area to oil and gas development is projected to increase domestic oil production starting in 2013. In 2025, the coastal plain of ANWR is projected to reach 0.9 million barrels per day under the USGS mean oil resource case, and 0.6 and 1.6 million barrels per day under the low and high resource cases, respectively.” So, using this available (but obviously faulty) government-generated data, we can easily see that with our current domestic oil use of 20.7 million barrels of oil/day (of which 10.1 billion barrels are imported), that adding ANWRs 0.9 billion barrels maximum output (that would not even begin for about 10 years and not reach maximum until 2029) would result in an expected price impact that “might reduce world oil prices by as much as 30 to 50 cents per barrel.” Now as there are 42 gallons of crude/barrel and that refines to 19.5 gallons of gas, we can expect a potential price drop of ($0.50/19.5) a whopping TWO CENTS A GALLON!

Wow, not only can we have an immediate effect in reducing the price of gas at the pump, increasing jobs, and eliminating home foreclosures, but with a windfall such as this we might go a long way to resolving world hunger. And, let’s quit worrying about the escalating releases of methane trapped in the melting arctic permafrost. According to the Arctic Council, the last methane “burp” 55 million years ago only caused “rapid warming and massive die-offs,” not nearly as the one 251 million years ago that “came close to wiping out all life on Earth.” Certainly this must be directly out of Grimm’s Fairy Tales.

Nope, let’s get with it and go after the black stuff -- all of it -- and use it up just as fast as we possibly can. As should now be obvious, science-based estimates and figures are always wrong. Since both Bush and Little have either an apparent supernatural ability to foretell the future or a direct contact with their creator on the “real facts,” why aren’t we all following them like a herd of sheep? Could it be it is because…THEY’RE IDIOTS?

Considered to be the "Father of the Constitution", Madison was the principal author of it and was primarily responsible for writing the first ten amendments. Yet, doesn’t it seem odd that today, those conservatives supporting the continuation of our war and occupation of Iraq and are standing on the Constitution as their platform, choose to ignore the words of the person who was most responsible for the document our country was based on.

Let’s face it, our economy is staggering. This is partly from the opulence of our life styles; our wasteful utilization of natural resources; and our “if it feels good, do it” philosophies. However, as Pulitzer Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz has determined, the war, if it lasts another year, will ultimately cost us 3 to 5 trillion dollars. (In case you can’t comprehend five trillion dollars, if the dollars were put end to end they would go to the moon AND BACK almost 100 TIMES). And, it is this cost and the debt it has incurred that our great-grandchildren will be paying back (maybe in yuans since we’re borrowing from China to keep this thing going).

Surprisingly, although support for this war is only advocated by 39% of our citizens, half of the voting population is still likely to support John McCain who has promised to continue this war indefinitely. On the flip side, half will support Hillary or Barack who promise pie-in-the-sky fixes to current woes (health care, economics, immigration, etc.) but never mention how they’re going to pay for the projected 5 trillion war debt. Taxing the rich is o.k. with me but I fear there are not enough rich folks to cover national health care, refurbishing of our failing infrastructure, stemming global warming, fixing Social Security, dealing with immigration, AND the 5 trillion in war costs. McCain says he’ll do it by cutting government “pork” (but, of course maybe add another 5 trillion in continuing the war).

What scares me is that the voting public seems more concerned about what Barack wears in his lapel or what the minister in his church may have said 2 years ago; whether Hillary should have divorced Bill for infidelity or whether she has real emotions; or whether McCain was really a war hero or why he went through a divorce many years ago. Well, my vote will be based on a lot of factors but none of those will be in the top 1,000. I plan to consider whether my grand-children will have opportunities for college and a profession or whether their children will have any educational opportunities; whether they’ll be obligated to 2, 3, or 4 tours in Baghdad; whether global warming will drastically change (if not eliminate) our way of life; or whether I’ll need to put bars on the windows of my home to keep the immigrants out.

Now is the time for us to get out of our self-serving rut and begin to seriously look at the future. Do I think we’ll do it? Nahhhh!

This month’s National Geographic shows a map developed from satellite photos of the dramatic decrease in the Arctic ice shelf in the last 8 years and the unprecedented “opening sea routes usually limited to ice-breakers.” Oh…right, we can blame the liberal editors of NG for doctoring up these photos just to fool us into thinking these changes were factual. His editorial indicates “record levels of ice in the Antarctic sea,” but just maybe it actually read “record levels of ice are breaking off in the Antarctic Sea and he just “accidentally” left out a couple of words.

What this points to is the dangerous mind-set our society has worked itself into. The predicted effects of global warming are not pleasant, nor are the societal changes necessary to reduce and defray some of the effects. It’s like the smoker saying, “I’ll wait until I get cancer, then I’ll quit.” Sorry…that’s usually too late. Our overriding problem appears to be that whether it’s global warming; gun ownership; cancer from smoking; creationism; obesity; fuel costs; or religious fervor, the prevailing attitude ignoring it is “Because I don’t want it to be, therefore it isn’t!” And regardless of what highly educated and experienced scientists might say, if it doesn’t fit with their agenda (or even results in the slightest inconvenience), it’s considered liberal BS to be chastised and ignored.

Someday I may have to explain this to my great-grandchildren. I wonder what will I tell them?

Later, things eased a bit and we were actually able to buy a house and a car. Those were the only things we put on the cuff as my Dad had cautioned me that paying interest was the bane of society. Later, I put two kids through college. But, things got even better and towards retirement we were actually putting money into IRAs and other investment funds.

But from that meager beginning to now there were some pretty simple principals I’d learned to follow. They were that if you were spending more than you were making you really had only 3 choices. You could somehow make more money; you could cut back and spend less; or you could borrow. It still seems so logical to me. Now, as I said, my Dad had explained that the borrowing option was only for cars and homes…nothing else. So, I applied that logic and lo and behold, I currently own my home, own my car, and have some money sitting in IRAs if I should need it. In all, I feel pretty financially secure.

Then, here come the politicians! They all tell me that they can give me more services (health care, infrastructure refurbishing, all the toys I can conceive of; etc.); return to cheap gas; have jobs for everyone; and cut my taxes significantly. And, in doing this they will balance the budget and pay off the National Debt, maybe even in the week after inauguration! Well, that just blows me away since it’s exactly opposite of the lessons my Dad taught me. In simple terms they promise to make less, spend more, and yet, have no red ink on the balance sheet. And you know what? There’s a lot of Americans that believe this crap! And, if you’re one of them…Shame on you!

The time has come that when you get your silly rebate check you should pay off some debt. Don’t go out and buy a new IPod made in Korea to replace last-year’s IPod made in India that’s now obsolete. Don’t buy a lot of gas to drive your SUV to Disneyland and pay for a cheese sandwich what you’d pay for a 4-course meal at a nice restaurant. Don’t splurge on a trip to the tanning salon or the spa. PAY OFF YOUR DAMN DEBTS! Yeah…I hear you, it’s not as fun and anyway, whomever we get for our next President is going to spend more, tax less and everything will be cool. Right?