Perspective

Now, everyone talks about a balanced budget, but here's a bit of real perspective on it.

From Chris Weigant on Huffingtonpost.com

Last year's budget, for instance, spent $3.55 trillion while it took in
$2.38 trillion, for a deficit of $1.17 trillion. [.....] Four items -- the
Pentagon, Medicare/Medicaid, Social Security, and the interest on the debt --
together add up to roughly the money the government takes in. Meaning that
everything else the federal government does would have to be cut completely --
zeroed out -- in order to balance the budget.

So, there you have it. And, umm, good luck trimming ANY of those significantly enough to make a difference. Old people vote.

This is Sad

Not having CNN, I never watched the Campbell Brown news hour. I don't know if she was a good or bad anchor. I do know the reasons she is stepping away are both noble and sad.

She flat out says she will not change her journalistic style to the frothing opinion "news" that she is slated against. And since her rating are so much lower, she's stepping away to let CNN figure out what they want to do.

Pound another nail in the coffin of journalistic integrity and get ready for even more screaming heads blabbering on cable news channels.

A Call for Real Change

While I wish I could enjoy the implosion of the Republican Party at the hands of the Tea Partiers, I can't, because the party isn't imploding, its becoming even more far-right and hardline than it was. That's a bit terrifying.

The Democrats aren't doing anything about it, attacking the radicals (for that's what they are, I'm serious, they are uncompromising radicals), pointing out their hypocrisy and racism to gain points for the November election or anything else useful.

Why? Because its becoming apparent (not that it was exactly hidden) just how bought off they have been.

There has not been a better time for serious change in the political landscape of America recently. The time for real reforms.

With incumbents in both parties at risk, passing real campaign reform laws and term limits would be brilliant.

Oh, I know, it won't happen. But unless people start demanding real reforms the same mistakes are going to keep happening over and over again as politicians continue to be bought.

The only ones who won't be bought are those too toxic in their beliefs to take much money openly. But, they'll still get plenty funneled to them as well.

This is rambling, my head hurts and I can't be coherent.

America is in ugly shape. The time for real, hard changes is during the hard times. We're quickly losing our chance to make reform.

I can dream right?

Drill Baby drill...oh shoot...

I'd love to think that if any good came out of the oil spill in the Gulf it might be someone will finally tell Sarah Palin to shut up and go home.

Drilling for more oil is not the short or long term solution to America's energy problems.

The technological marvel that is deepwater drilling is showing the dangerous side. If things go catastrophically wrong, there is pretty much nothing we can do about it quickly enough to stop massive environmental disasters.

President Obama correctly put other deepwater well's on hold until more is found out about what happened to cause this disaster and what can be done to prevent future ones.

Even if there is only a 1/10000th chance of this sort of thing happening again, can we risk it for the miniscule gain?

Don't kid yourselves, we cannot raise domestic production to levels that will make a difference. We can't drill fast enough to have any real effect on gas prices. The kicker is too, we have limited (and aging) refinery space to handle any new oil coming in. (This is a bottleneck that frequently drives up the price of oil.)

Oil is necessary, we aren't getting away from it anytime soon. But, if we keep feeding our addiction for little gain (except the pockets of large corporations) no real change is going to happen.

We MUST invest heavily in alternative fuel sources while creating incentives for people to carpool, use mass transit, or buy highly efficient small commuter vehicles.

Change is hard. But it must happen.