The Uncomfortable Truth

I have news for the Republicans.
If they honestly think they can win in November, they are lying to themselves.
We all know somebody who does not vote--maybe someone who doesn’t even bother to register—because either they have no interest in charade at all, or they realize the truth: there is no difference between the two major candidates. It has been said the last time we had an actual choice was in 1964—and we blew it.
According to the Census Bureau, a potential twenty million people would vote if voting were worth it. Personally, I know my vote doesn’t matter but it maintains my right to write this blog. There are untold others who feel as I do, but 20 million is a good number to keep in your head for a moment.
I am quite positive that Hillary will be nominated. This, in spite of Barack’s recent surge. She simply can get her hands on too much money to lose. If I am wrong, and the Republicans do not do something drastic—like setting off a suitcase nuke and declaring martial law—they cannot turn the tide of antipathy the last eight years have generated. Hillary will win.
Accept it.
Ask 100 people if they think there is any real difference between the candidates. How many will tell you there isn’t any? Count how many times you hear, “Yeah right, they’re all owned by somebody.”
I get the same response.
What if the Republicans put up a candidate who actually was different? What if we had an actual choice? Two candidates who were as different as night and day?
Do you think it might persuade those twenty million to get up and vote?
Forty percent of voters vote Republican. Forty percent of the voters vote Democrat. Regardless of who the candidate is (these are the brain-dead). This equates to roughly fifty million votes for each candidate. These people will vote the party line every time, no matter what. It is accepted as a truism in politics. It is persuading the other twenty percent that is the job of the tricksters, er, campaign workers.
Fortunately, for the Republicans, there is a man on their ballot this year who IS different! He is the one man that you don’t hear too much about in the popular media, but he is all over the internet where the younger—and non-poll-taking—crowd abound. What news you might hear is “that he can’t win,” “Unfortunately... it’s over for [him].”
Bull! He can’t win if you don’t vote for him.
The man is Ron Paul.
The precise reason you won’t be fed any information about him is that he is different. You have to find out about him on your own. You have to become involved. You have to make the effort.
Here is a good place to start.
The Republicans know damn well that their core forty percent will vote for him. They know damn well that those twenty million non-voters would also vote for Dr. Paul. (Why they don't want Dr. Paul is the subject of another essay.)
Do the math. That man would start out with seventy million votes against Hillary’s fifty.
If you are a Republican, educate your friends to this simple fact.
If you are a Democrat, pray the Republicans don’t get smart!

Posted by Quentin Colgan at 07:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Are you against abortion?
Forget for the moment that abortion is a “wedge issue” designed to keep us divided. Do you think Roe v Wade should be overturned? There is only one candidate for president who will work towards that end.
Ron Paul.
On the other hand, do you think the federal government has no place telling a woman what she can do with her body? There is only one candidate for president who will work towards that end.
Ron Paul.
Did your job get shipped overseas? Did you know that corporations get tax breaks to do that? Would you like to change the unfair tax codes that allow that? There is only one candidate who will do that.
Ron Paul.
Are you worried how you will weather the upcoming recession? Are you tired of making less money than your parents, while “the rich get richer?” There is only one candidate who has promised to fix our economy PERMANENTLY so we will never again have to worry how to provide for our families.
Ron Paul.
There is no more important long-term crisis facing our country that the National Debt. It is currently around nine trillion dollars and growing at 17,000 dollars per second. Most candidates for president want to borrow even MORE money to salve our current fears. There is only one candidate who will not only reduce and eliminate the debt; he will enact laws to make sure we never have one again!
Ron Paul.
Are you against illegal immigration? All the candidates but one are internationalists. Internationalists—by definition—do not believe in borders. Can you guess which candidate will secure our borders and make America safe?
Ron Paul.
In November, we will have a clear choice. We can vote for more of the same, or we can vote for
Ron Paul.

Posted by Quentin Colgan at 05:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Isn’t it rich?
Wouldn’t you say?
They’re playing games with our health;
The FDA.
Where are the clones?

Isn’t it bliss?
Nothing to lose.
Big biz is taking away
Our right to choose.
Send in the clones.
They’re sending us clones.*

Seriously though.
The FDA announced yesterday that food from cloned animals was safe.
The article I read mentioned that consumer anxiety is serious enough that several producers won’t sell products from cloned animals because people won’t eat them.
But, how can you tell if your food is as God intended?
Worry no more.
Your government—who always has your best interests at heart--has decided that you don’t need to know.
Their scientists have decided that there is no difference in the products of cloned animals, so there is no need to label them.
Uh-huh.
These are the same folks that said giving milk cows bovine somatropic hormone (BST) would have no effect on consumers.
Tell that to the parents of an eight-year old girl who is menstruating.
My point here is not whether the products are safe.
The point is that if we want to choose a different product, we are stymied.
The reason is obvious: If people choose not to buy “frankenfood,” it would hurt sales.
Can’t have that, can we?
It could hurt the bottom line!
This is not the first time that the FDA has put profit before health.
When Tylenol was first introduced, some of the people in the FDA noted that too much—especially when mixed with alcohol--would cause liver failure. They thought that important piece of information ought to be on the label. When the manufacturer noted such a label would “hurt sales,” the FDA relented. And people died. Many people.
One of them was my wife.
The fiasco with Vioxx also comes to mind.
The article also mentioned that the FDA was not alone. The Europeans came to the same conclusion last week.
Small wonder. European consumers have long-opposed frankenfoods.
In the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, (GATT) there are rules that say the signatories may not halt the shipment of foodstuffs without a good reason. In order to keep the wheels rolling, the European version of the FDA had no choice but to acquiesce to the demands of business—at the possible expense of consumer safety.
I wonder how the typical European consumer will react. They are not quite as accepting of their government’s [blather] as we are.
But then, they don’t have FOX news.
I am not opposed to doing everything one can to increase one’s profit. But there ought to be reasonable limits. Not endangering the public’s health is a reasonable limit. The folks who would feed us this stuff make a handsome enough profit already.
How much is enough?
I don’t know if eating cloned foods will hurt me or not.
I do know I cannot trust the FDA.
I also know what won’t hurt me:
Having a label on my food.

*Sorry, Mr. Sondheim. I couldn’t resist

Posted by Quentin Colgan at 06:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

If I told you that there was a government behind our government, you would probably dismiss me as a conspiracy theorist. If I told you that the goals of this shadow government included nullifying the Constitution so they might establish their “New World Order,” as well as worldwide financial dominance, you might call me paranoid—or insane.
That’s OK, as I would be in good company.
Felix Frankfurter, Justice of the Supreme Court said, "The real rulers in Washington are invisible and exercise power from behind the scenes."
In a letter to an associate, President Franklin Roosevelt wrote, "The real truth of the matter is, as you and I know, that a financial element in the large centers has owned the government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson."
Paranoia is defined as being delusional. If the threat is real, you are not paranoid. I know I am not delusional. Neither were Messrs. Roosevelt and Frankfurter.
The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) was founded in 1921. My telling you about them would be a waste of time. If you Google “council on foreign relations,” you get over 4.8 million hits. Explore some of these. You’ll find that the economic policy of this country is in the hands of people who are accountable to no one but themselves.
Did you ever wonder why there was never enough money to lift this country out of the Depression, yet when WWII came, the cash was flowing like water?
Read up on it.
Have you ever wondered why, no matter who you vote for, nothing changes?
Read up on it.
You want to know the truth behind the current mortgage crisis?
Find out!
If you go to the CFR website, they will tell you they are not political.
Really?
Every president since Eisenhower has been a member of the CFR. With the exception of Barry Goldwater, every major-party candidate for president in the last fifty years has been a member.
Most every candidate running this year is a member of the CFR. The two you don’t hear too much about, including the leading fund raiser of the last quarter—and winner of every debate he has been allowed to participate in, are not members. When you consider that the heads of the major media in this country are all members, then that makes sense.
The Presidential election is the greatest show on Earth. The CFR-controlled media will turn this election into a circus. If you listen to them, you might think a candidate’s religion was the most important issue; or the death penalty, or abortion. You won’t hear much discussion of the nine trillion dollar debt we face. Hell no! Guess who we owe the money to?

Our country is being taken over.
What are you going to do about it?

Posted by Quentin Colgan at 06:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

By now, we have all heard about the tragic case of Nataline Sarkisyan.
In case you haven’t, she is the young lady that died recently after her father’s insurance company refused to pay for a liver transplant.
The company, CIGNA, said the transplant was experimental. After a flurry of protests, the company relented, but by then it was too late, and Nataline died.
Enter Mark Geragos. The fame-seeking attorney of Michael Jackson has filed suit against CIGNA, and has tried to get the District Attorney to file manslaughter charges against them.
It is one thing to file a suit for a breach of contract, but the way this story—and all stories similar to this one--is being portrayed, it’s as if CIGNA denied health care to this young woman.
Let’s be clear here: CIGNA is an insurance company—they do not provide health care. Sometimes—if we are lucky—insurance companies pay for health care.
Again, the way these stories are often presented, it’s easy to forget that.
We shouldn’t.
The hospital denied health care to Nataline. For them, money was more precious than her life.
That is the problem with health care.
There is no incentive to control profits. Of course not. We live in a capitalist society. However, that doesn’t mean that “socialized” medicine would be any less expensive—in this country anyway.
What would be so wrong with non-profit medicine?
I have never had a doctor tell me he or she was in it for the money. I have never heard a nurse say that either. It seems though, that everyone else associated with the field is.
Have you ever thought about that?
Have you ever pondered the idea of making millions, nay, billions off the pain and suffering of others?
Think about it, if pain and suffering are profitable, then where is the incentive to reduce either?
In fact, there is a strong incentive to create new diseases for which expensive new medicines can be marketed.
I’m just spitballing here, but if diabetes is a 350 million-dollar-a-year business, could that be why “Big Pharma” and their minions in Congress do nothing to outlaw the diabetes-causing high fructose corn syrup?
Are profits the reason the AMA opposes using marijuana as medicine? This position is 180 degrees from where they stood when it was outlawed in the first place. A ton of money would not be made if this easy-to-grow medicine were allowed to compete on a level playing field. I studied this ten years ago. For example, the cost of an anti-nausea regimen was 1,800 dollars a month versus zero dollars for homegrown medicine.
We will never solve the “health care crisis” in America until we change the paradigm.
When we, as a society, decide that human life is more precious than money, we will have true health care reform.

Posted by Quentin Colgan at 07:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)