A couple of comments and predictions about the upcoming elections

First I have a question: Isn't it great how the price of gasoline has dropped almost a buck from what it was a month ago? And then I have an answer: No, it isn't great, it is, I think, a premeditated move on the part of Big Oil to influence the upcoming elections. It has been well publicized that the American public was not at all happy about paying $3.00/gallon to fill up the tank of the family SUV. Since there has been nothing on the world stage to account for the rapid drop in oil prices, I have to assume that said drop is the result of decisions made in the executive suites and boardrooms of the Big Oil companies. I have a sneaking suspicion that the thinking goes, "If we drop oil prices, people will be happier with the Republicans." While philosophically I can't complain about gasoline costing more (because it is a non-renewable resource which needs to start funding its replacement(s)), I think that the recent price hikes have been more about lining the pockets of Capital and not about funding alternative energy research, and I think that the oil companies are a little worried about what the Democrats will do to those obscenely huge profits they have been amassing during the Bush years.

My second prediction is that I think that the owners of this country will do their level bests to trash the economy over the next two years should the Dems recapture the national legislature. This is especially true in that the Democrats seem to have a very dangerous potential candidate for the presidency in Barack Obama. Mr. Obama has the power, I believe, to bring a real vision back to this country, but that vision is not the one the owners want to see. Accordingly, it would be in the owners best interest to trash the economy and blame it all on the Democrats in Congress. That way, in two years, they could advance their neo-conservative successor to Bush, and his crowded coattails as the panacea most needed by the nation to get out of the "economic slump those Congressional Democrats have gotten us into...". What will be interesting is seeing if the Democrats have learned who their actual opponents are, and then how to campaign successfully against them.

"We Can't Make It Here Anymore" Part 2

A couple (two) posts ago I wrote about James McMurtry's song "We Can't Make It Here Anymore". I would like to dig a little deeper into that song because every time I listen to it, it digs a little deeper into me. I mean, it starts out with:

Vietnam Vet with a cardboard sign Sitting there by the left turn line Flag on the wheelchair flapping in the breeze One leg missing, both hands free

which tells us something about the men and women who are currently in charge. The fact that we treat citizens who pretty much gave their all for their country like disposable diapers is bad enough; that we make them beg for their food and shelter is even worse. Nevertheless, this is our reality, and it is how the self-centered neo-cons running things think.

Shit, I was going to go through this, cherry picking lyrics, but I can't do that. Instead, let me send you to the lyrics and then urge you to go out and get this song any way you can (I've gone and actually purchased one of Mr. McMurtry's cd's because I feel honor bound to pay the artist for his work. I know that most of what I paid is going to some suit who had nothing to do with the creative work that went into this, but at least something goes to the artist and that is the important thing) and listen to it while reading along with the lyrics. It is just powerful stuff...then go out and send the Bushites back to clipping coupons--or whatever other unproductive work they did before going to Washington--on November 7th.

China Drafts Law to Boost Unions and End Abuse - New York Times

It's about fucking time! One of the things that is killing this country is the nonstop exportation of our jobs. Let's face it, we all can't be rock stars, CEOs, or stock market gunslingers. Some of us won't ever make it into the jobs that pay huge salaries: the rest of us (who make up about 95% of the population) work at the millions of jobs that are both necessary and non-glamorous. So, the news that China Drafts Law to Boost Unions and End Abuse (New York Times 10/13/06) is a step in the right direction. Maybe if the manufacturing jobs start getting close in pay around the world, there will be less incentive to export them from home.

In fact, maybe it will begin to heal our huge balance of payments deficit. If we begin building the "stuff" of our lives here at home rather than in Shanghai or Chengdu, we will create jobs for our own citizens and keep some of the dollars that now flow overseas in our own communities. Also, it may chop some of the obscene profits that have been flowing into the pockets of the owners of capital and redirect those dollars into the pockets of middle class Americans. More money to the middle class means more tax revenues for the government (middle class taxpayers don't have as many tax accounts and tax lawyers sniffing out every possible loophole in the tax code like the super rich have.)

So, I applaud any move by China to improve the lot of their workers, and I would urge every other country in the world to do the same. Even if America stops importing as much stuff from abroad, the workers with their higher pay will take up some of the slack, and the fact that there will be more money in the local economies will mean that the shop owners and farmers and all the rest of the citizens in those countries will also have more money available to buy the output from those factories. Again, for our country, the best possible foreign policy is to raise the economic levels of the rest of the world to bring them closer to our own.

Yeah! Go China!!

Sometimes things surprise you...

So, my daughter sent me a link to Pandora, a "trainable" streaming music site. Basically, you tell them what kind of music you like by giving them artists and songs that you like, then they start playing stuff that is similar...and you tell them whether you like or dislike what they offer you. After a while, Pandora is pretty much playing only stuff that you like...whether it is by artists you know or new artists.

Well, a while ago, one of the other streaming music sites (Radio Paradise) played a song by James McMurtry which struck a chord with me. Now, James is the son of genre writer Larry McMurtry of Lonesome Dove fame. James is, as you might suspect, classified as a country singer, and I normally don't listen to that genre of music...but, shit, this guy writes stuff that really resonates. The latest song of his that I have discovered, courtesy of Pandora, is a little ditty titles "We Can't Make it Here" (which I have learned is my bad...the damn song has won all sorts of awards). This guy comes out of the heartland, for God's sake, and he is trashing both the conservative right and the Harvard MBA-types who have spent the last 20+ years exporting American jobs overseas. This cannot bode well for the Republicans in next month's elections. At least I hope it doesn't!