Social Security Scam and Equity

I'm not saying anything that everyone shouldn't already know. Bush cries "Social Security is a crisis" and everyone is expected to jump. You'd think we'd be wiser after he cried "wolf" on weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. His backers are even sending in the Swift Boat dogs to smear AARP, despite their (ill advised, IMHO) support of Bush's disastrously expensive prescription drug plan. And he says Social Security is a crisis (40 years from now). If he wants a crisis, try climate change. There will be more fiscal costs to that than Social Security. Actually, if the federal government paid back what it has borrowed against the Social Security Trust Fund, it would be solvent into the distant future.

While Kerry was defined by his opposition (and even supporters) as a flip-flopper, how did Bush escape the same label over something more important, like why we attacked Saddam Hussein's regime in the first place.

A cousin forwarded me this comment:

The Democrats' mistake was thinking that a disastrous war and national bankruptcy would be of concern to the electorate.

The Republicans correctly saw that the chief concern of the electorate was to keep gay couples from having an abortion.

I have to really wonder about our gullibility if not downright stupidity to not see what is right in front of our faces.

Warms the heart

From the unbelievable chaos of the tsunami disaster came an incredible tale from Jim France of the Pavilion Hotel Group in Bangkok.

At a resort on Phuket, one of the most popular attractions is (was) elephant rides. As many as eight people on one elephant, first into the surrounding forest, then down to the beach, to lunch at a fresh water lagoon, then back to the hotel. The elephants (nine) were kept chained to in-ground posts, not because they needed to be, but because it made the mothers feel better because their children seemed safe from a tromping when feeding the beasts.

About twenty minutes before the first wave hit, the elephants becamse extremely agitated and unruly. Four had just returned from a trip and their handlers had not yet chained them. They helped the other five tear free from their chains. They all then climbed a hill and started bellowing. Many people followed them up the hill. Then the waves hit. After the waves subsided, the elephants charged down from the hill, and started picking up children with their trunks and running them back up the hill; when all the children were taken care of, they started helping the adults.

They rescued forty-two people. Then, they returned to the beach and carried up four dead bodies, one of a child. Not until the task was done would they allow their handlers to mount them. Then with the handlers atop, they began moving wreckage.

Many super-human and super-sentient capacities were being exhibited through these wonderful elephant beings, including Divine Love for one another and their fellow humans through the transitions they were going through.

Guru Bandhu Khalsa

Alaskan independence?

Thanks go to Alaska State Reps Woodie Salmon, Sharon Cissna, Les Gara and Beth Kerttula for showing some independence and guts in coming out against House Joint Resolution 4 last week. This resolution is the annual down-on-the-knees begging Congress to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling.

I'm not surprised but saddened other intelligent reps didn't join them. Kind of like refusing the ethanol pledge that Presidential candidates are supposed to take in Iowa. We Alaskans aren't as independent as we might like to think we are.

If we put as much energy (pun intended) into trying to get better mileage on our vehicles, we'd save far more oil than ANWR would produce. How about a resolution requesting Congress to close the loophole on SUVs and the CAFE standards? Better mileage "would reduce our nation's future need for imported oil, help balance the nation's trade deficit, and significantly increase the nation's security" as well as save our constituents money at the pump, while indirectly reducing our insurance rates.

Sound familiar? It can sound as mom and apple pie (Alaska style) as HJR 4. As was said more than once since the boom of the Prudhoe Bay-Valdez oil pipeline, "Oh, God, please grant us another pipeline. We promise not to piss it away this time". Sure thing.