tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-182438662024-03-13T15:16:41.473-04:00What's Up Doc?Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.comBlogger305125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-13665566594990031422017-01-23T16:46:00.000-05:002017-01-23T16:50:11.115-05:00I'm Back!I'm so sorry for the prolonged absence. I have spent several years healing from the devastating results from my 25 years as a vegan that pretty much destroyed my immune system and resulted in, among other things, one symptom of immune collapse - Rhumatoid Arthritis.<br />
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I have recovered enough to be able to type again and have learned to use Android (somewhat) so I am quite encouraged.<br />
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We recently moved from Metro Detroit to Republic, Michgan. We found a house that was completely gutted and hasn't been lived in for over 30 years, so much of our energy, especially this first winter is involved in making the house habitable while living in it. <br />
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I have started offering healing services again and have many articles that have been piling up for years waiting to be written. My fingers can again find the proper keys well enough that I propose to begin writing again.<br />
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Also, though I thought the opportunity was lost forever 5 years ago, I have slowly regained the ability to play guitar (to a degree) but have not been singing, so I still have that to work on, but expect to be able soon to resume the musical portion of the ministry as well. There is currently a mostly empty YouTube page under Doc Lowrey, but will soon be a UBU Ministries YouTube page with more (and improving) content.<br />
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We are in the position for the first time since our formation in 1984 to need to ask for direct donations to support the ministry, so please consider using the UBU link at the top right of this page and find the donate page at the top right of the upper Nav Bar.<br />
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We have never taken an income from the Ministry and continue to use ministry funds for the exclusive work of the ministry.<br />
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With the recent Presidential Election I have determined it a good time to review the <a href="http://www.docloco.com/2010/06/proper-role-of-government.html" target="_blank">Proper Role of Government</a> which you can find on this blog or find a back link to on the current top post of the UBU page. (Click the UBU image at the top right of this page)<br />
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I look forward to resuming activity here and hope to share perspectives that you will find of value.<br />
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Thanks,<br />
DocRev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-82676428017047626422014-05-05T10:21:00.001-04:002014-05-05T10:21:19.971-04:00Are butter, cheese and steak really bad for you?<p dir="ltr">The Questionable Link Between Saturated Fat and Heart Disease <br>
Are butter, cheese and steak really bad for you? </p>
<p dir="ltr">By </p>
<p dir="ltr">NINA TEICHOLZ</p>
<p dir="ltr">May 2, 2014 </p>
<p dir="ltr">"Saturated fat does not cause heart disease"—or so concluded a big study published in March in the journal Annals of Internal Medicine. How could this be? The very cornerstone of dietary advice for generations has been that the saturated fats in butter, cheese and red meat should be avoided because they clog our arteries. For many diet-conscious Americans, it is simply second nature to opt for chicken over sirloin, canola oil over butter.</p>
<p dir="ltr">The new study's conclusion shouldn't surprise anyone familiar with modern nutritional science, however. The fact is, there has never been solid evidence for the idea that these fats cause disease. We only believe this to be the case because nutrition policy has been derailed over the past half-century by a mixture of personal ambition, bad science, politics and bias.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Our distrust of saturated fat can be traced back to the 1950s, to a man named Ancel Benjamin Keys, a scientist at the University of Minnesota. Dr. Keys was formidably persuasive and, through sheer force of will, rose to the top of the nutrition world—even gracing the cover of Time magazine—for relentlessly championing the idea that saturated fats raise cholesterol and, as a result, cause heart attacks.</p>
<p dir="ltr">This idea fell on receptive ears because, at the time, Americans faced a fast-growing epidemic. Heart disease, a rarity only three decades earlier, had quickly become the nation's No. 1 killer. Even President Dwight D. Eisenhower suffered a heart attack in 1955. Researchers were desperate for answers.</p>
<p dir="ltr">As the director of the largest nutrition study to date, Dr. Keys was in an excellent position to promote his idea. The "Seven Countries" study that he conducted on nearly 13,000 men in the U.S., Japan and Europe ostensibly demonstrated that heart disease wasn't the inevitable result of aging but could be linked to poor nutrition.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Critics have pointed out that Dr. Keys violated several basic scientific norms in his study. For one, he didn't choose countries randomly but instead selected only those likely to prove his beliefs, including Yugoslavia, Finland and Italy. Excluded were France, land of the famously healthy omelet eater, as well as other countries where people consumed a lot of fat yet didn't suffer from high rates of heart disease, such as Switzerland, Sweden and West Germany. The study's star subjects—upon whom much of our current understanding of the Mediterranean diet is based—were peasants from Crete, islanders who tilled their fields well into old age and who appeared to eat very little meat or cheese.</p>
<p dir="ltr">As it turns out, Dr. Keys visited Crete during an unrepresentative period of extreme hardship after World War II. Furthermore, he made the mistake of measuring the islanders' diet partly during Lent, when they were forgoing meat and cheese. Dr. Keys therefore undercounted their consumption of saturated fat. Also, due to problems with the surveys, he ended up relying on data from just a few dozen men—far from the representative sample of 655 that he had initially selected. These flaws weren't revealed until much later, in a 2002 paper by scientists investigating the work on Crete—but by then, the misimpression left by his erroneous data had become international dogma.</p>
<p dir="ltr">In 1961, Dr. Keys sealed saturated fat's fate by landing a position on the nutrition committee of the American Heart Association, whose dietary guidelines are considered the gold standard. Although the committee had originally been skeptical of his hypothesis, it issued, in that year, the country's first-ever guidelines targeting saturated fats. The U.S. Department of Agriculture followed in 1980.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Other studies ensued. A half-dozen large, important trials pitted a diet high in vegetable oil—usually corn or soybean, but not olive oil—against one with more animal fats. But these trials, mainly from the 1970s, also had serious methodological problems. Some didn't control for smoking, for instance, or allowed men to wander in and out of the research group over the course of the experiment. The results were unreliable at best.</p>
<p dir="ltr">The Saturday EssayThe World's Resources Aren't Running OutDante's Path to Paradise The New ABCs of Business The Unemployment Puzzle: Where Have All the Workers Gone? Rules for a Happy Life The Case for Nationalism The Future of Brain Implants Sheryl Sandberg and Anna Maria Chávez on 'Bossy,' the Other B-word </p>
<p dir="ltr">But there was no turning back: Too much institutional energy and research money had already been spent trying to prove Dr. Keys's hypothesis. A bias in its favor had grown so strong that the idea just started to seem like common sense. As Harvard nutrition professor Mark Hegsted said in 1977, after successfully persuading the U.S. Senate to recommend Dr. Keys's diet for the entire nation, the question wasn't whether Americans should change their diets, butwhy not? Important benefits could be expected, he argued. And the risks? "None can be identified," he said.</p>
<p dir="ltr">In fact, even back then, other scientists were warning about the diet's potential unintended consequences. Today, we are dealing with the reality that these have come to pass.</p>
<p dir="ltr">One consequence is that in cutting back on fats, we are now eating a lot more carbohydrates—at least 25% more since the early 1970s. Consumption of saturated fat, meanwhile, has dropped by 11%, according to the best available government data. Translation: Instead of meat, eggs and cheese, we're eating more pasta, grains, fruit and starchy vegetables such as potatoes. Even seemingly healthy low-fat foods, such as yogurt, are stealth carb-delivery systems, since removing the fat often requires the addition of fillers to make up for lost texture—and these are usually carbohydrate-based.</p>
<p dir="ltr">The problem is that carbohydrates break down into glucose, which causes the body to release insulin—a hormone that is fantastically efficient at storing fat. Meanwhile, fructose, the main sugar in fruit, causes the liver to generate triglycerides and other lipids in the blood that are altogether bad news. Excessive carbohydrates lead not only to obesity but also, over time, to Type 2 diabetes and, very likely, heart disease.</p>
<p dir="ltr">The real surprise is that, according to the best science to date, people put themselves at higher risk for these conditions no matter what kind of carbohydrates they eat. Yes, even unrefined carbs. Too much whole-grain oatmeal for breakfast and whole-grain pasta for dinner, with fruit snacks in between, add up to a less healthy diet than one of eggs and bacon, followed by fish. The reality is that fat doesn't make you fat or diabetic. Scientific investigations going back to the 1950s suggest that actually, carbs do.</p>
<p dir="ltr">The second big unintended consequence of our shift away from animal fats is that we're now consuming more vegetable oils. Butter and lard had long been staples of the American pantry until Crisco, introduced in 1911, became the first vegetable-based fat to win wide acceptance in U.S. kitchens. Then came margarines made from vegetable oil and then just plain vegetable oil in bottles.</p>
<p dir="ltr">All of these got a boost from the American Heart Association—which Procter & Gamble, the maker of Crisco oil, coincidentally helped launch as a national organization. In 1948, P&G made the AHA the beneficiary of the popular "Walking Man" radio contest, which the company sponsored. The show raised $1.7 million for the group and transformed it (according to the AHA's official history) from a small, underfunded professional society into the powerhouse that it remains today.</p>
<p dir="ltr">After the AHA advised the public to eat less saturated fat and switch to vegetable oils for a "healthy heart" in 1961, Americans changed their diets. Now these oils represent 7% to 8% of all calories in our diet, up from nearly zero in 1900, the biggest increase in consumption of any type of food over the past century.</p>
<p dir="ltr">This shift seemed like a good idea at the time, but it brought many potential health problems in its wake. In those early clinical trials, people on diets high in vegetable oil were found to suffer higher rates not only of cancer but also of gallstones. And, strikingly, they were more likely to die from violent accidents and suicides. Alarmed by these findings, the National Institutes of Health convened researchers several times in the early 1980s to try to explain these "side effects," but they couldn't. (Experts now speculate that certain psychological problems might be related to changes in brain chemistry caused by diet, such as fatty-acid imbalances or the depletion of cholesterol.)</p>
<p dir="ltr">We've also known since the 1940s that when heated, vegetable oils create oxidation products that, in experiments on animals, lead to cirrhosis of the liver and early death. For these reasons, some midcentury chemists warned against the consumption of these oils, but their concerns were allayed by a chemical fix: Oils could be rendered more stable through a process called hydrogenation, which used a catalyst to turn them from oils into solids.</p>
<p dir="ltr">From the 1950s on, these hardened oils became the backbone of the entire food industry, used in cakes, cookies, chips, breads, frostings, fillings, and frozen and fried food. Unfortunately, hydrogenation also produced trans fats, which since the 1970s have been suspected of interfering with basic cellular functioning and were recently condemned by the Food and Drug Administration for their ability to raise our levels of "bad" LDL cholesterol.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Yet paradoxically, the drive to get rid of trans fats has led some restaurants and food manufacturers to return to using regular liquid oils—with the same long-standing oxidation problems. These dangers are especially acute in restaurant fryers, where the oils are heated to high temperatures over long periods.</p>
<p dir="ltr">The past decade of research on these oxidation products has produced a sizable body of evidence showing their dramatic inflammatory and oxidative effects, which implicates them in heart disease and other illnesses such as Alzheimer's. Other newly discovered potential toxins in vegetable oils, called monochloropropane diols and glycidol esters, are now causing concern among health authorities in Europe.</p>
<p dir="ltr">In short, the track record of vegetable oils is highly worrisome—and not remotely what Americans bargained for when they gave up butter and lard.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Cutting back on saturated fat has had especially harmful consequences for women, who, due to hormonal differences, contract heart disease later in life and in a way that is distinct from men. If anything, high total cholesterol levels in women over 50 were found early on to be associated with longer life. This counterintuitive result was first discovered by the famous Framingham study on heart-disease risk factors in 1971 and has since been confirmed by other research.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Since women under 50 rarely get heart disease, the implication is that women of all ages have been worrying about their cholesterol levels needlessly. Yet the Framingham study's findings on women were omitted from the study's conclusions. And less than a decade later, government health officials pushed their advice about fat and cholesterol on all Americans over age 2—based exclusively on data from middle-aged men.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Sticking to these guidelines has meant ignoring growing evidence that women on diets low in saturated fat actually increase their risk of having a heart attack. The "good" HDL cholesterol drops precipitously for women on this diet (it drops for men too, but less so). The sad irony is that women have been especially rigorous about ramping up on their fruits, vegetables and grains, but they now suffer from higher obesity rates than men, and their death rates from heart disease have reached parity.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Seeing the U.S. population grow sicker and fatter while adhering to official dietary guidelines has put nutrition authorities in an awkward position. Recently, the response of many researchers has been to blame "Big Food" for bombarding Americans with sugar-laden products. No doubt these are bad for us, but it is also fair to say that the food industry has simply been responding to the dietary guidelines issued by the AHA and USDA, which have encouraged high-carbohydrate diets and until quite recently said next to nothing about the need to limit sugar.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Indeed, up until 1999, the AHA was still advising Americans to reach for "soft drinks," and in 2001, the group was still recommending snacks of "gum-drops" and "hard candies made primarily with sugar" to avoid fatty foods.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Our half-century effort to cut back on the consumption of meat, eggs and whole-fat dairy has a tragic quality. More than a billion dollars have been spent trying to prove Ancel Keys's hypothesis, but evidence of its benefits has never been produced. It is time to put the saturated-fat hypothesis to bed and to move on to test other possible culprits for our nation's health woes.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Ms. Teicholz has been researching dietary fat and disease for nearly a decade. Her book, "The Big Fat Surprise: Why Butter, Meat and Cheese Belong in a Healthy Diet," will be published by Simon & Schuster on May 13.</p>
Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-37473369621756515022014-04-30T19:11:00.001-04:002014-04-30T19:12:54.159-04:00The Beginning Of The End For Privatization<p dir="ltr">Thanks yet again to Amy Kerr Hardin of Democracy Tree.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Lawmakers and Investors Tip Toe-Away from Privatization</p>
<p dir="ltr">Posted on April 29, 2014 by admin</p>
<p dir="ltr">First some bad news, then some good news in the war against privatization.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Bad Lawmaking</p>
<p dir="ltr">Justin Jones, former Director of the Oklahoma Department of Corrections, recently wrote an editorial on the ACLU Blog of Rights slamming lawmakers for enacting policies for the sole purpose of over-incarceration at the behest of private vendors and management companies. He cites in particular a recently passed law that turned a misdemeanor into a felony:</p>
<p dir="ltr">Introducing a cell phone into a correctional facility used to be a misdemeanor in Oklahoma. Now, it’s a felony. This change did not happen for any reason other than a private prison lobbyist provided his client with a good way to make even more revenue off of people already imprisoned. Bumping this crime up from a misdemeanor to a felony means that when a person is caught with a cell phone in prison, he or she will end up staying in prison even longer; in most cases the new sentence will be added to the end of the existing one, instead of allowing people to serve time for both the crime that landed them behind bars and the cell phone infraction simultaneously. More prison time, more profits.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Jones goes on to explain that this bump from misdemeanor to felony is “not smart, evidence-based policy” and it additionally provides “zero public safety value”. He urged the powers that be not to enact the law, but the lobbyists had already appealed to the governor’s base political nature. Financial greed, it seems, is the underpinning of criminal justice policy.</p>
<p dir="ltr">The rationale behind laws elevating cell phone possession to felony status argue that inmates are using them to conduct criminal activity behind bars — which most certainly does occur. But more often, it is for the obvious reason inmates crave other contraband items, such as food and drugs — for purely personal use.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Michigan too, has a law like that in Oklahoma. It was passed in June of 2012 with broad bipartisan support. The penalties in the Michigan version provide a double-whammy of incarceration — it punishes both the inmate and the person who provided them with the phone. Public Act 255 offers the following penalties:</p>
<p dir="ltr">A violation of the Act is a felony punishable by up to five years’ imprisonment, a maximum fine of $1,000, or both.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Michigan is among a number of states that have contracted with the private vendor, Aramark, to provide food services in its prisons. Aramark has been getting some bad press recently over a number of contract breeches, including workers caught smuggling contraband into prisons, and among those forbidden items are cell phones. Under Michigan law, every inmate caught with a phone stands to increase both private vendor profits and the cost to taxpayers. Albeit, the employee is typically acting for personal gain, but their employer could certainly reap the benefit.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Prison communications is big business in itself. Public Communications Services, Inc. is a major vendor of inmate land-line phone service, and they are the only means by which calls can be placed in or out of Michigan’s prisons. Below are their current rates, minus extra fees.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Phones controversies and food providers are only part of the for-profit landscape in our nation’s prisons. Other out-sourced services, such as management, security, maintenance, and laundry are also revenue streams that private vendors tap into to turn a buck off of taxpayers.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Public Policy Slowly Turns Away from Privatization</p>
<p dir="ltr">Yet, there is light at the end of the tunnel. Even some Republican lawmakers are beginning to understand what a drain privatization has become on taxpayer dollars.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Sen. John Proos (R-21) introduced legislation (SB-909) last Thursday that would limit the number of inmates in Michigan’s prisons to 38,000, down from the 44,000 currently allowed. In a WNMU interview, Proos said</p>
<p dir="ltr">“I think the county jails have already proven that they do it for a third to half the cost – on a per-day rate – that the state of Michigan operates its prisons. That’s a significant savings to our hard-working taxpayers.”</p>
<p dir="ltr">“Every dollar saved gives us a chance to invest in schools, — gives us a chance to invest those hardworking taxpayer dollars in areas that we all know will help, in the long run, to keep people out of prison.”</p>
<p dir="ltr">Unfortunately, the bill potentially foists the burden onto local communities, and it also leaves open the possibility for the state to transfer inmates in excess of the limit to “jails and other secure facilities” – which would include privately-run lockups. The final decision-making authority would lie with the Michigan Department of Corrections.</p>
<p dir="ltr">(In related legislation, three bills advanced out of committee today to the MichiganHouse floor for a vote — all passed, and will move on to the Senate. HB-5216, HB-5217 and HB-5218 would direct the Department of Corrections to evaluate the record of a released prisoner, and issue a “certificate of employability” when appropriate, plus offer limited liability to employers, and compel licensing agencies to consider the certificate alongside the conviction. The legislative package, supported by both parties, is tie-barred — meaning it’s all or nothing.)</p>
<p dir="ltr">In the larger fight against privatization, Justin Jones offers these public policy suggestions on how to “starve the for-profit prison beast”:</p>
<p dir="ltr">Eliminate mandatory minimum sentences.Transfer severely and/or chronically mentally ill prisoners to state agencies responsible for mental health treatment.Prohibit “lock-up quota” contracts with private prison companies, in which the jurisdiction promises to send enough prisoners to a private facility to meet a “lock-up quota” or pay the company for falling short of the quota.Make probation a real possibility for people convicted of non-violent crimes.</p>
<p dir="ltr">The Atlantic ran an interesting article last week, titled The Privatization BacklashThis should get the attention of fiscal hawks: One-in-six of federal, state and local taxpayer dollars line the pockets of private industry — that’s $1 trillion a year. At long last, that trend is finally coming under scrutiny at all levels.</p>
<p dir="ltr">In states and cities across the country, lawmakers are expressing new skepticism about privatization, imposing new conditions on government contracting, and demanding more oversight. Laws to rein in contractors have been introduced in 18 states this year, and three—Maryland, Oregon, and Nebraska—have passed legislation, according to In the Public Interest, a group that advocates what it calls “responsible contracting”.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Progressives have long reviled for-profit industries taking over our public institutions, often objecting on ethical grounds, with an understanding that it just doesn’t make budgetary sense either to give-away the store. Now, Republicans are climbing on-board with arguments for fiscal responsibility. It doesn’t matter how they get there, just as long as sensible public policy results.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Industry Divests from Private Vendors</p>
<p dir="ltr">Another front in the war against privatization in prisons is being fought within the private sector. Applying pressure on secondary companies that invest in privatization is showing some promise in limiting growth in the industry.</p>
<p dir="ltr">The civil rights group, Color of Changeannounced last week that they have successfully pressured three major corporations to divest from private prison companies based on “financial, moral, and political implications”. Scopia Capital, DSM, and Amica Mutual Insurance pulled $60 million in combined investments from two private prison industry giants, Corrections Corporation of America and GEO Group. From their April 23rd press release:</p>
<p dir="ltr">“The leadership of these companies sets a much needed, powerful new industry standard: investments in private prison companies are unacceptable. What we see here is not simply a fluctuation of stock, but a conscious decision on behalf of major companies to cut ties with private prisons. That’s huge.” explained Rashad Robinson, executive director of ColorofChange.org. These companies show that divestment is not only the right thing to do, but also a smart financial decision. Today’s news marks an incredibly exciting step forward in the national movement to end for-profit incarceration.”</p>
<p dir="ltr">Whether talking to Republican lawmakers or corporate bean-counters, the argument against privatization on financial grounds seems to be making some headway.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Amy Kerr Hardin</p>
<p dir="ltr">RELATED: Frontline will be airing a series titled Prison Statestarting today. It focuses on the generational revolving door of incarceration in communities of color.</p>
Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-59716489950123214112014-04-11T18:24:00.000-04:002014-04-19T13:00:49.802-04:00What Do the Koch Brothers Want?Here is a very interesting article about the infamous Koch brothers, fossil fuel barons who aim to own America.<br />
Thanks to Bill Moyers for sharing this article from Senator Bennie Sanders.<br />
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What Do the Koch Brothers Want?<br />
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As a result of the disastrous Citizens United Supreme Court decision, billionaires and large corporations can now spend an unlimited amount of money to influence the political process.<br />
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Perhaps, the biggest winners of Citizens United are Charles and David Koch, owners of the second-largest privately run business in America Koch Industries.<br />
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Among other things, the Koch brothers own oil refineries in Texas, Alaska, and Minnesota and control some 4,000 miles of pipeline.<br />
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According to Forbes Magazine, the Koch brothers are now worth $80 billion, and have increased their wealth by $12 billion since last year alone.<br />
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For the Koch brothers, $80 billion in wealth, apparently, is not good enough. Owning the second largest private company in America is, apparently, not good enough. It doesn’t appear that they will be satisfied until they are able to control the entire political process.<br />
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It is well known that the Koch brothers have provided the major source of funding to the Tea Party and want to repeal the Affordable Care Act.<br />
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What else do the Koch brothers want?<br />
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In 1980, David Koch ran as the Libertarian Party’s vice-presidential candidate in 1980.<br />
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Let’s take a look at the 1980 Libertarian Party platform.<br />
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Here are just a few excerpts of the Libertarian Party platform that David Koch ran on in 1980:<br />
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“We urge the repeal of federal campaign finance laws, and the immediate abolition of the despotic Federal Election Commission.”<br />
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“We favor the abolition of Medicare and Medicaid programs.”<br />
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“We oppose any compulsory insurance or tax-supported plan to provide health services, including those which finance abortion services.”<br />
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“We also favor the deregulation of the medical insurance industry.”<br />
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“We favor the repeal of the fraudulent, virtually bankrupt, and increasingly oppressive Social Security system. Pending that repeal, participation in Social Security should be made voluntary.”<br />
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“We propose the abolition of the governmental Postal Service. The present system, in addition to being inefficient, encourages governmental surveillance of private correspondence. Pending abolition, we call for an end to the monopoly system and for allowing free competition in all aspects of postal service.”<br />
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“We oppose all personal and corporate income taxation, including capital gains taxes.”“We support the eventual repeal of all taxation.”<br />
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“As an interim measure, all criminal and civil sanctions against tax evasion should be terminated immediately.”<br />
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“We support repeal of all law which impede the ability of any person to find employment, such as minimum wage laws.”<br />
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“We advocate the complete separation of education and State. Government schools lead to the indoctrination of children and interfere with the free choice of individuals. Government ownership, operation, regulation, and subsidy of schools and colleges should be ended.”<br />
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“We condemn compulsory education laws … and we call for the immediate repeal of such laws.”<br />
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“We support the repeal of all taxes on the income or property of private schools, whether profit or non-profit.”<br />
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“We support the abolition of the Environmental Protection Agency.”<br />
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“We support abolition of the Department of Energy.”<br />
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“We call for the dissolution of all government agencies concerned with transportation, including the Department of Transportation.”<br />
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“We demand the return of America's railroad system to private ownership. We call for the privatization of the public roads and national highway system.”<br />
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“We specifically oppose laws requiring an individual to buy or use so-called "self-protection" equipment such as safety belts, air bags, or crash helmets.”<br />
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“We advocate the abolition of the Federal Aviation Administration.”<br />
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“We advocate the abolition of the Food and Drug Administration.”<br />
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“We support an end to all subsidies for child-bearing built into our present laws, including all welfare plans and the provision of tax-supported services for children.”<br />
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“We oppose all government welfare, relief projects, and ‘aid to the poor’ programs. All these government programs are privacy-invading, paternalistic, demeaning, and inefficient. The proper source of help for such persons is the voluntary efforts of private groups and individuals.”<br />
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“We call for the privatization of the inland waterways, and of the distribution system that brings water to industry, agriculture and households.”<br />
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“We call for the repeal of the Occupational Safety and Health Act.”<br />
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“We call for the abolition of the Consumer Product Safety Commission.”<br />
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“We support the repeal of all state usury laws.”<br />
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In other words, the agenda of the Koch brothers is not only to defund Obamacare. The agenda of the Koch brothers is to repeal every major piece of legislation that has been signed into law over the past 80 years that has protected the middle class, the elderly, the children, the sick, and the most vulnerable in this country.<br />
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It is clear that the Koch brothers and other right wing billionaires are calling the shots and are pulling the strings of the Republican Party.<br />
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And because of the disastrous Citizens United Supreme Court decision, they now have the power to spend an unlimited amount of money to buy the House of Representatives, the Senate, and the next President of the United States.<br />
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If they are allowed to hijack the American political process to defund Obamacare they will be back for more.<br />
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Tomorrow it will be Social Security, ending Medicare as we know it, repealing the minimum wage. It seems to me that the Koch brothers will not be content until they get everything they believe they are entitled to.<br />
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Our great nation can no longer be hijacked by right-wing billionaires like the Koch brothers.<br />
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For the sake of our children and our grandchildren, for the sake of our economy, we have got to let democracy prevail.Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-24716038662489718312014-04-02T15:47:00.000-04:002014-04-02T15:47:28.284-04:00Vegan/Paleo UpdateI've been promising an update for several months regarding our conversion to a Paleo-ish diet two years ago from <a href="http://www.docloco.com/2012/05/why-im-not-vegan-anymore.html" target="_blank">31 years of vegetarianism, the last 25 of them as mostly raw, vegans</a>.<br />
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Since my veganism ended as is reported by most long term vegans, with immune system failure - my wife and I both were hit with rheumatoid arthritis - you just wake up one day and you have it (!) - I have had trouble writing.<br />
<br />
At first I couldn't type, write or hold on to anything. So I had to hold a glass with both hands and really focus on it. Life was pretty horrible. Until my wife started having the same kind of symptoms, I had thought I had damaged a major nerve trimming trees, though there was no actual incident.<br />
<br />
I have since also had exams that have shown no actual nerve damage, so that was pretty amazing to me, especially when it started to look like it was veganism that was the culprit.<br />
<br />
So, I am sorry that I have not been able to write much and I am grateful to all the other people who have let me share their writing with you over the last few years when I could not write (or hardly think) myself.<br />
<br />
One thing that has improved dramatically since we started our experiment - mostly following the guidelines from the <a href="http://www.westonaprice.org/" target="_blank">Weston-Price Foundation</a> was that our RA started getting better instead of worse - pretty much right away and now more slowly continues to improve.<br />
<br />
Gratefully, I can type and write again. I'm not quite as fast as I used to be, but my speed and accuracy gradually has been improving really a lot - so that makes me feel more up to the job of trying to have my fingers keep up with my thoughts again.<br />
<br />
Also, I have been able to play guitar again. As a singer-songwriter who generally has played guitar 3-6 hours daily for about 30 years, it was devastating to arrive here in the Detroit area where I had an agent who had been waiting 3 years to represent me here (and promised very steady work locally) to wake up one day and not be able to hold much less play a guitar.<br />
<br />
I put all my guitars up for sale. Of course, 4 years ago the economy was still in such free-fall that everyone was selling everything they owned and the demand for used music equipment was about zero. <br />
So that period was both painful and frustrating. It's hard to let go of an instrument you love and have years of your life invested in and extra painful to then find nobody wants it.<br />
<br />
Thankfully, a few months after we started our changeover, I found that I could play a little. That was about two and a half years after I had lost my ability. I was really surprised.<br />
<br />
I still couldn't make a fist so both my fingering and picking were very slow, deliberate and most often misplaced, but after a little over two years (I usually don't count that first transitional year where we were so emotionally traumatized by our new food that we did a lot of backsliding) I can play well enough to enjoy it a bit now and I make many fewer mistakes.<br />
<br />
I really thought I would never play again, so I am very happy about this and I credit my natural diet completely.<br />
<br />
I am considering the possibility that I might be able to record or even perform again - perhaps even within the next year!<br />
<br />
Well, this was a short update. That is probably the best kind for me right now.<br />
<br />
I will be trying to write more myself here from now on and will include many more diet updates as well as my thoughts about religion and government.<br />
<br />
I know everyone will be very interested in my report on what happens to poop when you make such a drastic dietary change - I'll be trying to get up the nerve to post that sometime. <br />
<br />
<br />
<br />Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-39794823383579402962014-03-24T13:56:00.000-04:002014-03-24T13:56:15.818-04:00Gay Marriage, Abortion, Contraceptives - Some Christians Say No Love For You! So :"gay" rights are being supported all over the place recently and the "religious right" are fairly freaking out but not giving up their fight to have rights for themselves that they deny to others.<br />
Michigan, where I live, just had their marriage ban declared unconstitutional, and in spite of supporting what is right - equality - our attorney general is hot to fight against it.<br />
So, in light of all the change in the country to acceptance of recognition of equal rights for all, what is the TeaPartyChurch up to?<br />
Two cases going up to the Supreme Court have big potential to sink them or set all of us up to live under fascism.<br />
<br />
Thanks to Think Progress.<br />
<a href="http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2014/03/24/3416549/hobby-lobby-they-have-a-plan/">http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2014/03/24/3416549/hobby-lobby-they-have-a-plan/</a><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">"<em>Read This One Document To Understand What The Christian Right Hopes To Gain From Hobby Lobby</em>"</span><br />
<br />
<span>By <a href="http://thinkprogress.org/person/ian-m/">Ian Millhiser</a> on </span>
March 24, 2014 <br />
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<br />
2009 was a grim year for social conservatives. Barack Obama was an
ambitious and popular new president. Republicans, and their conservative
philosophy, were largely discredited in the public eye by a failed war
and a massive recession. And the GOP’s effort to reshape its message was
still in its awkward adolescence. If the conservative movement had a
mascot, it would have been a <a href="http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/teabonics-ridiculous-misspelled-tea-party-protest-signs-gallery-1.1918?pmSlide=1.15202">white man dressed as Paul Revere and waving a misspelled sign</a>.
</div>
</div>
Amidst this wreckage, more than <a href="http://manhattandeclaration.org/man_dec_resources/list_of_religious_leaders.pdf">two hundred of the nation’s leading Christian conservatives</a>
joined together in a statement expressing their dismay at the state of
the nation. “Many in the present administration want to make abortions
legal at any stage of fetal development,” their statement claimed, while
“[m]ajorities in both houses of Congress hold pro-abortion views.”
Meanwhile, they feared that the liberals who now controlled the country
“are very often in the vanguard of those who would trample upon the
freedom of others to express their religious and moral commitments to
the sanctity of life and to the dignity of marriage as the conjugal
union of husband and wife.” <br />
<span id="trigger-slidedown"></span>
The signatories to this statement, which they named the “<a href="http://manhattandeclaration.org/man_dec_resources/Manhattan_Declaration_full_text.pdf">Manhattan Declaration</a>,”
included many of America’s most prominent Catholic bishops and clergy
of similar prominence in other Christian sects. It included leaders of <a href="http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2013/11/19/2966331/national-organization-marriage-2012-spending/">top anti-gay organizations</a>
like the National Organization for Marriage, and of more broadly
focused conservative advocacy shops such as the Family Research Council.
It included university presidents and deans from Christian conservative
colleges. And it included the top editors from many of the Christian
right’s leading publications.<br />
Perhaps most significantly, however, the document’s signatories includes <a href="http://www.alliancedefendingfreedom.org/about/leadership">Alan Sears</a>, the head of one of the two conservative legal groups litigating what are <a href="http://www.adfmedia.org/files/ConestogaMeritsBrief.pdf">likely to be the two most important cases decided by the Supreme Court this term</a>. Indeed, the Manhattan Declaration offers a virtual roadmap to understanding what religious conservatives hope to gain from <em>Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby</em> and <em>Conestoga Wood v. Sebelius</em>, two cases the justices will hear Tuesday which present the question whether a <a href="http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2014/03/23/3417404/when-religious-liberty-was-used-to-deny-all-health-care-to-women-and-not-just-birth-control/">business owner’s religious objections to birth control</a> trump their legal obligation to include it in their employee’s health plan.<br />
<h4>
The Roadmap</h4>
“[F]reedom of religion and the rights of conscience” the Declaration
claims, “are gravely jeopardized by those who would use the instruments
of coercion to compel persons of faith to compromise their deepest
convictions.” In the eyes of the Declaration’s signers, liberal forces
had captured the arms of government and they were now prepared to use
their political dominance to force conservative Christians to betray
their own moral values. And the signatories were particularly concerned
about two items — abortion and gay rights:<br />
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<blockquote>
We see this, for example, in the effort to weaken or
eliminate conscience clauses, and therefore to compel pro-life
institutions (including religiously affiliated hospitals and clinics),
and pro-life physicians, surgeons, nurses, and other health care
professionals, to refer for abortions and, in certain cases, even to
perform or participate in abortions. We see it in the use of
anti-discrimination statutes to force religious institutions,
businesses, and service providers of various sorts to comply with
activities they judge to be deeply immoral or go out of business.</blockquote>
Remember last month’s fight over <a href="http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2014/02/21/3317071/good-come-arizonas-awful-license-discriminate/">whether anti-gay business owners in Arizona could invoke “religious liberty” and get away with denying services to gay people</a>?
Look no further than the Manhattan Declaration to find the intellectual
origins of the bill that would have given those business owners that
right.<br />
Similarly, while the Declaration refers explicitly to “abortions,”
the document calls for a vision of religious liberty that extends to
birth control as well. According to Hobby Lobby’s brief in the Supreme
Court, the company filed its lawsuit because it objects to “four drugs
or devices that can prevent an embryo from implanting in the
womb—namely, Plan<br />
B, Ella, and two types of intrauterine devices.” Hobby Lobby’s owners
believe that these drugs and devices “risk killing an embryo,” and that
providing a health plan which covers these services “<a href="http://sblog.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/13-354-bs-1-copy.pdf">makes them complicit in abortion</a>.” <br />
It’s should be noted that Hobby Lobby’s concerns are <a href="http://sblog.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/13-354-BRIEF-OF-AMICI-CURIAE-PHYSICIANS-FOR-REPRODUCTIVE-HEALTH-et-al....pdf">not grounded in science</a>.
As a brief filed by multiple health provider groups — including the
American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists — explains, “there
is a scientific distinction between a contraceptive and an abortifacient
and the scientific record demonstrates that none of the FDA-approved
contraceptives covered by the Mandate are abortifacients.” So Hobby
Lobby isn’t just claiming the right to object to abortion, it is
claiming the right to label many common forms of birth control a form of
“abortion” and object to those as well — even though drugs and devices
don’t actually cause abortions.<br />
The Manhattan Declaration, in other words, predicts both of the major
fights over “religious liberty” that confront the nation this year.
While the Declaration warned about “anti-discrimination statutes”
forcing business owners to take actions they object to on religious
grounds, one of the leading lawmakers backing the Arizona bill admitted
that it was intended as a response to instances in other states where
anti-gay business owners were “<a href="http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2014/02/21/3317071/good-come-arizonas-awful-license-discriminate/">punished for their religious beliefs</a>”
because they denied service to gay customers in violation of those
states’ anti-discrimination laws. Similarly, where the Declaration
speaks of conservative Christians being forced to “participate in
abortions,” Hobby Lobby claims that the law is making it “complicit in
abortion.”<br />
<h4>
The Firewall</h4>
In case there is any doubt, the Manhattan Declaration is a stunningly
radical document. It opposes not just abortion and marriage equality,
but also “non-marital sexual cohabitation” and “the discredited idea of
unilateral divorce.” The Declaration also ends with a pledge to openly
defy the law. “[W]e will not comply with any edict that purports to
compel our institutions to participate in abortions . . . nor will we
bend to any rule purporting to force us to bless immoral sexual
partnerships [or] treat them as marriages or the equivalent[.]”<br />
Shortly after Gov. Jan Brewer (R-AZ) vetoed the Arizona bill,
however, one of the nation’s most prominent social conservatives
explained that conservative objections to reproductive liberty and
marriage equality do not necessarily need to end in civil disobedience.
Marriage equality, the <em>New York Times</em>‘ Ross Douthat claimed, is
inevitable. Yet, when it comes, Douthat also hoped for a world where,
if “a Mormon caterer or a Catholic photographer objected to working at a
same-sex wedding,” the rest of the country would allow them to <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/02/opinion/sunday/the-terms-of-our-surrender.html">“opt out” of any legal obligation to comply with anti-discrimination laws</a>.<br />
Douthat framed this kind of arrangement as the terms of social
conservatives’ “surrender,” although it is a weird kind of surrender
that allows the losing side to dictate terms to the victors at the
moment that society has recognized many of their longstanding views as
abhorrent. If <em>Brown v. Board of Education</em> had followed
Douthat’s logic, it would have said that segregated schools violate the
Constitution — except that whites-only schools are fine in Alabama and
Mississippi.<br />
Nevertheless, Douthat’s column provides a helpful window into the kind of reasoning that animates the <em>Hobby Lobby</em>
litigation, the bill Brewer vetoed and the Manhattan Declaration. The
logic of all three is that religious conservatives must comply with the
law — but only up to a point. When the law asks employers to cover
abortions that aren’t actually abortions, or when it asks them to treat
gay men, lesbians and bisexuals as if they are human beings entitled to
the same dignity as straight men and women, then the Christian right
must be given a special right to defy the law. And if the courts won’t
give it to them, then the Manhattan Declaration calls upon conservative
Christians to refuse to comply with the law regardless.<br />
If Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood lose, then it remains to be seen
whether either of them will actually take up this call for disobedience.
Should they win, however, there should be no doubt what the Christian
right’s next move will be. The Manhattan Declaration lays out two foes:
reproductive liberty and gay rights. <em>Hobby Lobby</em> asks the Court to take care of the former. The next lawsuit will <a href="http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2014/02/28/3347081/upcoming-supreme-court-case-impose-arizonas-anti-gay-entire-country/">target the latter</a> — and it will be able to cite <em>Hobby Lobby</em> as a powerful precedent supporting anti-gay discrimination.<br />
<em>Ian Millhiser is ThinkProgress’ Justice Editor. You can follow him on Twitter at <a href="https://twitter.com/imillhiser">@imillhiser</a>.</em>Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-44494285377567638772014-03-16T16:31:00.000-04:002014-03-16T16:31:59.620-04:00Right Wingers Are Broken, Frightened Creatures - CIA Torture?So I am reading this really interesting book titled The Authoritarians.<br />
It is by a social scientist at the University of Manitoba, Bob Altemeyer, who has been studying Authoritarianism in Canada and the USA for about 40 years.<br />
<br />"Authoritarianism is something authoritarian followers and authoritarian leaders cook up between themselves. It happens when the followers submit too much to the leaders, trust them too much, and give them too much leeway to do whatever they want--which often is something undemocratic, tyrannical and brutal. In my day, authoritarian fascist and authoritarian communist dictatorships posed the biggest threats to democracies, and eventually lost to them in wars both hot and cold. But authoritarianism itself has not disappeared, and I'm going to present the case in this book that the greatest threat to American democracy today arises from a militant authoritarianism that has become a cancer upon the nation.<br /><br />We know an awful lot about authoritarian followers. In one way or another, hundreds of social scientists have studied them since World War II. We have a pretty good idea of who they are, where they come from, and what makes them tick. By comparison, we know little about authoritarian leaders because we only recently started studying them. That may seem strange, but how hard is it to figure out why someone would like to have massive amounts of power? The psychological mystery has always been, why would someone prefer a dictatorship to freedom? So social scientists have focused on the followers, who are seen as the main, underlying problem."<br />
<br />
As it turns out, he also had something to say in 2006 about a current item of news today - CIA Torture.<br />
<br />
"If some day George W. Bush is indicted for authorizing torture, you can bet your bottom dollar the high RWAs will howl to the heavens in protest. It won’t matter how extensive the torture was, how cruel and sickening it was, how many years it went on, how many prisoners died, how devious Bush was in trying to evade America’s laws and traditional stand against torture, or how many treaties the U.S. broke. Such an indictment would grind right up against the core of authoritarian followers, and they won’t have it. Maybe they’ll even say, “The president was busy running the war. He didn’t really know. It was all done by Rumsfeld and others.”<br />
<br />
This easy to read, fascinating book can be downloaded free from the author as a PDF <a href="http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~altemey/" target="_blank">here</a>.<br />
<br />
Why should you read this book? I'll let the author tell you.<br />
<br />
"But why should you even bother reading this book? I would offer three reasons.<br />
First, if you are concerned about what has happened in America since a radical right-wing segment of the population began taking control of the government about a dozen years ago, I think you'll find a lot in this book that says your fears are well founded.<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(check out this fulfilled prophecy!) </span><br />
As many have pointed out, the Republic is once again passing through perilous times. The concept of a constitutional democracy has been under attack--and by the American government no less! The mid-term elections of 2006 give hope that the best values and traditions of the country will ultimately prevail. But it could prove a huge mistake to think that the enemies of freedom and equality have lost the war just because they were recently rebuffed at the polls. I’ll be very much surprised if their leaders don’t frame the setback as a test of the followers’ faith, causing them to redouble their efforts. They came so close to getting what they want, they’re not likely to pack up and go away without an all-out drive.<br />
<br />
But even if their leaders cannot find an acceptable presidential candidate for 2008, even if authoritarians play a much diminished role in the next election, even if they temporarily fade from view, they will still be there, aching for a dictatorship that will force their views on everyone. And they will surely be energized again, as they were in 1994, if a new administration infuriates them while carrying out its mandate. The country is not out of danger.<br /><br />
The second reason I can offer for reading what follows is that it is not chock full of opinions, but experimental evidence. Liberals have stereotypes about conservatives, and conservatives have stereotypes about liberals. Moderates have stereotypes about both.<br />Anyone who has watched, or been a liberal arguing with a conservative (or vice versa) knows that personal opinion and rhetoric can be had a penny a pound. But arguing never seems to get anywhere. Whereas if you set up a fair and square experiment in which people can act nobly, fairly, and with integrity, and you find that most of one group does, and most of another group does not, that’s a fact, not an opinion. And if you keep finding the same thing experiment after experiment, and other people do too, then that’s a body of facts that demands attention.<br /><br />Some people, we have seen to our dismay, don’t care a hoot what scientific investigation reveals; but most people do. If the data were fairly gathered and we let them do the talking, we should be on a higher plane than the current, “Sez you!”<br /><br />
The last reason why you might be interested in the hereafter is that you might want more than just facts about authoritarians, but understanding and insight into why they act the way they do.<br />
Which is often mind-boggling.<br />
How can they revere those who gave their lives defending freedom and then support moves to take that freedom away?<br />
How can they go on believing things that have been disproved over and over again, and disbelieve things that are well established?<br />
How can they think they are the best people in the world, when so much of what they do ought to show them they are not?<br />
Why do their leaders so often turn out to be crooks and hypocrites?<br />
Why are both the followers and the leaders so aggressive that hostility is practically their trademark?<br />
By the time you have finished this book, I think you will understand the reasons. All of this, and much more, fit into place once you see what research has uncovered going on in authoritarian minds." Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-14359640282835300842014-03-08T10:15:00.000-05:002014-03-08T11:05:53.924-05:00When Christians Promote Intolerance and WarIn a Pastor's Group discussion on whether "Christians" should take up arms in Ukraine;<br />
I am always impressed at both the hostility of so many pastors and how
they seem to prefer "the canon" of scripture over the teachings of Jesus
and cannot reconcile his "turn the other cheek" philosophy to "an eye
for an eye" - kill the unbelievers; which apparently to them is ok
because unbelievers are to them somehow, "antichrist".<br />
These pastors
actually think that Jesus' message is just wrong (and say so) - but
they claim to be "Jesus Christians" and teachers of Jesus' message!<br />
Obviously that bothers me.<br />
It's just amazing to me how the Old Testament idea of Dominionism is so
popular, meaning that Christians (so called) should make all their
ideas legally binding on everyone else and kick out (or worse) of the
country anyone who won't accept their version of Jesus. (the
hater-Jesus, that is)<br />
It turns out (not surprisingly) that all the
"carry a sword" talk in the NT did not originate with, nor was spoken by
Jesus, but added later by people with a somewhat different agenda.<br />
But I did appreciate a portion of a comment by one pastor that I wanted to pass on.<br />
<br />
<blockquote>
"This is easy for me to say when foreign troops aren't mounted against me as they are for you and your people.<br />
So the passages I'm passing on to you are from Christians who faced the
real threat of violence, beginning with Martin Luther King who in a
sermon entitled 'Loving your enemies" said:<br />
<br />
'To our most bitter
opponents we say: “We shall match your capacity to inflict suffering by
our capacity to endure suffering. We shall meet your physical force
with soul force. Do to us what you will, and we shall continue to love
you. We cannot in all good conscience obey your unjust laws, because
noncooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as is cooperation
with good. Throw us in jail, and we shall still love you. Send your
hooded perpetrators of violence into our community at the midnight hour
and beat us and leave us half dead, and we shall still love you. But be
ye assured that we will wear you down by our capacity to suffer. One day
we shall win freedom, but not only for ourselves. We shall so appeal to
your heart and conscience that we shall win you in the process, and our
victory will be a double victory."<br />
<br />
"When Jesus disarmed Peter, he disarmed every Christian." Tertullian<br />
<br />
"I've been thinking about A.J. Muste, who during the Vietnam War stood
in front of the White House night after night with a candle. One rainy
night a reporter asked him, "Mr. Muste, do you really think you are
going to change the policies of this country by standing out here alone
at night with a candle?"<br />
"Oh," Muste replied, "I don't do it to
change the country, I do it so the country won't change me." taken from
Anne Lamott's 'Plan B - Further Thoughts on Faith'<br />
<br />
"People are unreasonable, illogical, self-centred<br />
... love them anyway.<br />
If you do good, people will accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives<br />
... do good anyway.<br />
If you are successful, you win false friends and true enemies<br />
... be successful anyway.<br />
The good you do today may be forgotten tomorrow<br />
... do good anyway.<br />
Honesty and frankness will make you vulnerable<br />
... be honest and frank anyway.<br />
People love underdogs but follow only top dogs<br />
... follow some underdog anyway.<br />
What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight<br />
... build anyway.<br />
People really need help but may attack you if you try to help<br />
... help people anyway.<br />
If you give the world the best you have, you may get kicked in the teeth<br />
... but give the best you have<br />
... Anyway."<br />
- A poem Mother Theresa hung in the Calcutta orphanage "</blockquote>
<br />
Jesus promoted a pretty radical philosophy that asks people to go
against nature - and while it is very hard for people to carry that
cross, so to speak (I'm not a cross guy) there have been some good
examples of people who appear to have taken that seriously. <br />
Weirdly, they are often so busy serving others most basic needs, that
they have no time to preach - and the others, the preachers - have all
kinds of time to find all the scriptural ammunition they need to promote
hate, fear, greed and murder.<br />
Jesus set a high, perhaps impossibly
high bar for us to aspire to and it seems to me that he would be much
more comfortable in the company of Buddha, Lao Tsu, etc. than with
(practically any) "Christians", who for the most part just want to love
their enemies - dead.<br />
I can understand how easy it is to just wish
everyone who frustrates you would just get dead (in a hurry) - and that
is the natural way; the idea of rising above animal instinct still being
purely individual and experimental.<br />
We may aspire to be "good" but should likely never think that we have actually arrived there. <br />
If we are of the people who claim to believe Jesus, we might consider
his claim (Mark 10:18), And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me
good? there is none good but one, that is, God.<br />
He still encouraged the rest of us (along with him) to try. (If that appeals to us)Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-19989772056208361832014-01-21T12:25:00.001-05:002014-01-21T12:25:47.239-05:00Martin Luther King? What's The Fuss?If you were using social media yesterday, (MLK-observed) you were surely inundated, as was I, by tributes to Rev. King.<br />
<br />
It seemed everyone, even rabid anti-social politicians were bending Rev. King to their cause.<br />
<br />
I had determined I was going to stay out of that mess and was, I admit, a bit annoyed.<br />
<br />
But today I decided that I really would like to share also; a glimpse into what kind of things he said that made him so revered by all people who believe in equality, liberty, justice and the Golden Rule that those values represent.<br />
<br />
Thanks to the <a href="http://www.nj.com/times-opinion/index.ssf/2014/01/opinion_martin_luther_king_jr.html" target="_blank">NJNEWS</a> and <a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/" target="_blank">Project Gutenberg</a> for this excellent brief sample:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<br />
<br />
The good neighbor looks beyond the external accidents and discerns
those inner qualities that make all men human and, therefore, brothers.</blockquote>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear.<br />
</blockquote>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects
revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is
love.<br />
</blockquote>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to
think critically. Intelligence plus character — that is the goal of
true education.<br />
</blockquote>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men.<br />
</blockquote>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
One’s dignity may be assaulted, vandalized, cruelly mocked, but it can never be taken away unless it is surrendered.<br />
</blockquote>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.<br />
</blockquote>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of
comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and
controversy.<br />
</blockquote>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
At the center of non-violence stands the principle of love.<br />
</blockquote>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.<br />
</blockquote>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the
final word in reality. That is why right, temporarily defeated, is
stronger than evil triumphant.<br />
</blockquote>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful
words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the
good people.<br />
</blockquote>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
If you can’t fly, then run. If you can’t run, then walk. If you can’t
walk, then crawl, but whatever you do, you have to keep moving forward.<br />
</blockquote>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its
place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s
will. And he’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked
over, and I’ve seen the promised land.<br />
</blockquote>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.<br />
</blockquote>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
We may have all come on different ships, but we’re in the same boat now.<br />
</blockquote>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable. ... Every step
toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering and struggle;
the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals. </blockquote>
<br />
Can we be those tireless, passionate and dedicated individuals? Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-68110800500885621422014-01-06T12:27:00.000-05:002014-01-06T12:31:36.787-05:00Gov. Snyder (MI-R) – Caught Between ALEC and a Dark Place<h1 class="entry-title">
<span class="meta-sep" style="font-size: small;">by</span><span style="font-size: small;"> Amy Kerr Hardin<span class="meta-prep meta-prep-author"><span class="author vcard"> </span></span> </span></h1>
<h1 class="entry-title">
<span style="font-size: small;">
<a href="http://www.democracy-tree.com/gov-snyder-caught-alec-dark-place/" rel="bookmark" title="7:33 pm"><span class="entry-date">January 2, 2014</span></a> </span> </h1>
<span style="font-size: small;">It’s
been two weeks since Gov. Snyder announced his new energy plan for
Michigan, and sides are already being taken, but this time there appears
to be a middle ground — a phenomenon of which, like Brigadoon, appears
magically only every four years.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">The governor carefully qualified his policy initiative with no
promises that any positive relentless action would occur anytime soon. <a href="http://www.mlive.com/business/index.ssf/2013/12/michigan_snyder_renewable_ener.html">MLive reports</a>:</span><br />
<blockquote>
<span style="font-size: small;">Snyder said he hopes to have legislation in place in
2015, which is when the state’s current renewable energy and energy
efficiency programs end. He said it’d be difficult to pass a
comprehensive energy policy in 2014 since it’s an election year.</span></blockquote>
<span style="font-size: small;">In his pre-Christmas policy statement,
Snyder told the press that he intends to emphasize renewable energy and
a curtailment of the state’s reliance on coal. Ironically, he also
emphasized the importance of the stability of the power grid and a
policy goal for the reduction in the number of, and duration of power
outages — just hours before the state’s <a href="http://www.democracy-tree.com/gongwer-news-service-blasts-state-officials-handling-power-outage/">capitol was plunged into darkness for a hellish week of cold and misery</a> while the governor enjoyed a safe warm holiday with his family. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Lansing residents are in no mood to hear about a 2015 solution.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">A huge sticking point will be Snyder’s support of fracking in the
state. This issue is an absolute non-starter for many clean energy
advocates. They gnash their teeth when they hear the governor claim that
Michigan is <i>“a role model for fracking done right”</i>. Even a
modest centrist would have to admit that the Great Lakes region is the
worst possible place to test the long-term effects of the latest
fracking technologies. The risk is simply too great.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">However, it’s not all doom and gloom. It is likely that, not by sheer
coincidence, just a few hours prior to the unveiling of the new energy
policy, Wolverine Power Supply Cooperative announced they were scrapping
a proposed 600 megawatt coal-fired power plant in Rogers City. They had
been fighting for the plant since 2006, making the “clean coal” sales
pitch — a claim which makes even the most mild-mannered environmentalist
want to hurt somebody real bad. <a href="http://elpc.org/2013/12/17/press-release-wolverine-pulls-the-plug-on-rogers-city-mi-coal-plant">The Environmental Law & Policy Center</a> expressed relief that the project was canned, citing the dirty truth about “clean coal”:</span><br />
<blockquote>
<span style="font-size: small;"> According to the plant’s air permit, Wolverine would
have added 995 tons of particulate pollution, 1,344 tons of SO2
pollution, and 2,647 tons of NOx pollution annually. The company also
proposed releasing 46.8 pounds of mercury pollution, which will end up
in area lakes and rivers; 700 pounds of lead, and more than 6 million
tons of greenhouse gases including carbon dioxide.</span></blockquote>
<span style="font-size: small;">Okay, so our air will be that much less polluted…</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Yet, will centrist Republicans ever again be able to attract the kind
of support necessary for a meaningful energy policy? Or are the <a href="http://www.democracy-tree.com/snyder-squanders-millikens-legacy/">golden years of Bill Milliken </a>never to be revisited by the Michigan GOP?</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://www.democracy-tree.com/gov-snyder-caught-alec-dark-place/mich-conservative-energy-forum-fb-page/" rel="attachment wp-att-10591"><img alt="Mich. Conservative Energy Forum FB page" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-10591" src="http://www.democracy-tree.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Mich.-Conservative-Energy-Forum-FB-page-300x177.jpg" height="177" width="300" /></a>Claiming
the center ground on energy policy will not be easy for conservatives.
And they aren’t off to an impressive start. They launched their social
media in mid-December and are struggling to gain a following. Their
facebook page, titled <a href="https://www.facebook.com/michiganconservativeenergyforum">Michigan Conservative Energy Forum</a>,
isn’t exactly catching fire with 88 “likes” as of this writing. Their
mission statement sounds reasonable enough though, yet it will certainly
garner detractors from both the left and the right.</span><br />
<blockquote>
<div>
<span style="font-size: small;">The MCEF is a newly formed organization of MI conservatives who
believe that the state must transition to clean, renewable energy
sources.</span></div>
<div>
<div>
<span style="font-size: small;">MCEF Mission Statement: “Create and sustain an organization to
facilitate a clean energy dialogue among CenterRight leaders and
activists. By depoliticizing the issue we will then have created the
capacity and credibility to educate and advocate for clean energy policy
among conservatives and lead to a more cohesive political environment
in which to pursue both state and federal future clean energy policy”.</span></div>
</div>
</blockquote>
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">The Michigan League of Conservation Voters, a <i>“non-partisan political voice for protecting Michigan’s land, air, and water”</i>, is willing to give them the benefit of the doubt for the time-being. In a <a href="http://www.michiganlcv.org/news-press/news-archives/news-story-2013-12-19-14469">press release</a>, the MLCV refers to the governor’s plan as <i>“an encouraging starting point that needs to be supported by legislative action at the start of the 2014 session”</i>.
They know the political realities will make it a tough row to hoe, and
the governor hasn’t exactly gained their full faith and credit having <a href="http://www.michiganlcv.org/how-green-governor">earned a “C” grade</a> from the organization over his prior environmental and energy policies.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Amidst the political upheaval of an election year, we can expect ALEC
to get involved in the battle over Michigan’s energy future. At their
recent <a href="http://www.hillheat.com/events/2013/12/06/states-nation-policy-summit-day-three">States and Nation Policy Summit</a> held
a month ago, Some new model legislation was unveiled, included among
the expected attack on EPA regulations of greenhouse gases and the Clean
Air Act, was a <a href="http://www.hillheat.com/files/ALEC_Updating_Net_Metering_Policies_Resolution.pdf">pre-written resolution</a>
for states to allow energy companies to charge “net metering” customers
for their share in the upkeep of the power grid. Net metering is a
practice where customers who produce a portion of their own energy
through solar and wind generation are permitted to sell-back excess
power to the utility in exchange for a credit.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Just a few months ago, the <a href="http://detroit.cbslocal.com/2013/08/29/mpsc-report-shows-55-increase-in-michigans-net-metering-program/">Michigan Public Service Commission reported</a> an uptick of net metering in the state:</span><br />
<blockquote>
<span style="font-size: small;">Since 2008, when Public Act 295 required the
establishment of a statewide net metering program, net metering has
increased by 1,277 customers.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">The report noted that the number of net metering customers increased
from 1,015 in 2011 to 1,330 in 2012. The total size of the net metering
program increased 55 percent to 9,583 kW in 2012.</span></blockquote>
<span style="font-size: small;">Public interest, along with a push for renewable energy by centrist
forces, combined with the irresistible forces found in an election year,
will most certainly pull the trigger on a full-scale ALEC push on
Michigan GOP lawmakers. While the ALEC-like bills and resolutions may be
introduced from the far right, they don’t stand a chance of passing,
and Snyder would never sign them into law…at least not prior to the
first Tuesday of November, 2014.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">After that, all bets are off.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><b>Amy Kerr Hardin</b></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Updated at 8pm on Jan. 2, 2014</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><b><span style="color: blue;">Read more about ALEC and net metering in Arizona <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/gabe-elsner/the-campaign-against-net-_b_4297678.html"><span style="color: blue;">here</span></a></span></b>.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><b><span style="color: blue;">Find a list of Michigan lawmakers with ties to ALEC <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Michigan_ALEC_Politicians"><span style="color: blue;">here</span></a></span></b>.</span>Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-50585743045624206162013-12-27T10:15:00.000-05:002013-12-27T10:17:57.857-05:00Asset Seizure Out-of-Control in Michigan<h1 class="entry-title">
<span style="font-size: small;">Piracy in the Great Lakes State – Asset Seizure Out-of-Control in Michigan</span></h1>
<div class="entry-meta">
<a href="http://www.democracy-tree.com/piracy-great-lakes-state-asset-seizure-out-of-control-michigan/" rel="bookmark" title="7:45 pm"><span class="entry-date">Amy Kerr Hardin</span></a></div>
<div class="entry-meta">
<span class="entry-date">December 26, 2013</span> <span class="author vcard"></span> </div>
<br />
<b>Police Departments Run Wild</b><br />
We’ve all seen those news reports about drug busts in our
neighborhoods where local law enforcement, often working with federal
agencies, boast about the seizure of money, vehicles, guns, knives and
electronics, along with a modest amount of a controlled substance
intended for sale.<br />
From the over-sensationalized reporting, one would think the cash,
computers, cars, and weapons are key elements to an enormous criminal
drug trafficking operation and that’s why they’re being confiscated — as
an urgent matter of public safety.<br />
Not always so though. Increasingly, it’s the cops and prosecutors who are truly breaking bad.<br />
The seized items more accurately fall into the category of trophies,
booty, spoils, loot — to be split among agencies, and they may be used
for most any purpose, not just for fighting the “war on drugs”.<br />
In a recent report, <a href="http://www.michigan.gov/documents/msp/2013_Asset_Forfeiture_Final_427690_7.pdf">Michigan State Police Annual Asset Forfeiture</a>, we
learn some of the numbers, but not all. Although mandated by law, 56
agencies failed to disclose their takings in 2012. Of those that
complied, a total seizure of $26.5 million in private assets was
reported last year which, after administrative costs, left a tidy $22.4
million to be divvied-up among 286 agencies, most of them small local
police departments, but Detroit area law enforcement hauled in over 1 in
5 dollars taken in the state.<br />
The MSP report explains:<br />
<blockquote>
“The primary goal of asset forfeiture is to deter and
punish criminals by taking away the goods, property, and money obtained
through illegal activity.”</blockquote>
Sounds fair enough. But in practice, that reassuring claim stretches credulity in numerous ways.<br />
First, under current law, agencies may seize and liquidate assets
without a conviction, and in some cases, without charges ever being
brought. Michigan is not unique in this legislatively codified abuse of
power, but it is one of the states where the practice has become
rampant. With public sector budgets being slashed under the Snyder
administration, law enforcement agencies have turned to increasingly
creative means of revenue enhancement. Asset seizure loot is rapidly
becoming a growing portion of the budgets of many agencies. Needing a
steady revenue stream, they manage to find funding by any quasi-legal
means – MSP makes no bones about it:<br />
<blockquote>
“Due to the unpredictable nature of forfeiture levels and
trends, asset forfeitures will never replace state and local law
enforcement appropriations. However, these funds serve as an important
supplement and adjunct to enhance ongoing enforcement programs.”</blockquote>
<b>The Fix</b><br />
In an ideal world, to prevent the abuse of authority by these
modern-day privateers, law enforcement budgets would be uncoupled
entirely from asset seizure revenues. That is an unlikely policy
initiative. At the very least then, Michigan must halt arbitrary
forfeitures where no crime has been proven.<br />
<a href="http://www.democracy-tree.com/piracy-great-lakes-state-asset-seizure-out-of-control-michigan/jeff-irwin-2/" rel="attachment wp-att-10474"><img alt="jeff irwin" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-10474" height="348" src="http://www.democracy-tree.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/jeff-irwin.jpg" width="352" /></a><br />
On
Jan. 8th, Rep. Jeff Irwin (D-53) will be introducing HB-5213, an
amendment to Public Act 368 of 1978, to require a criminal conviction
before property can be forfeited. Although the proposal is expected to
enjoy broad bipartisan support in the legislature, Irwin told Democracy
Tree he anticipates vigorous challenges from law enforcement agencies
who are dependent on forfeiture revenues.<br />
Irwin explained “Asset<i> forfeiture is a tool they want to use, to have in their arsenal.” </i>He characterized the practice of seizure without a conviction as a <i>“dangerous incentive inherent in the system” </i>and a <i>“violation of the fundamental principle of innocent until proven guilty.”</i><br />
The lawmaker described increased abuses by law enforcement agencies
in Michigan that are aggressively confiscating equipment and assets of
medical marijuana growers who are acting perfectly within the law. These
individuals are afraid to challenge a seizure because they’re already
feeling overwhelmed by threats of criminal prosecution. Indeed, the MSP
proudly reports that agencies across the state have generously donated
79 plant growing lights and 81 weight scales to public school science
classrooms in 2012. (Note: they didn’t share any of the cash taken.)<br />
<b>A Dangerous Incentive</b><br />
Another serious problem with the current law is the recently expanded
allowable usage of funds obtained through asset forfeiture. The change
incentivizes all departments within an agency to support the unchecked
marauding practice of a few bad actors. Money is used to meet payroll
and overtime demands. It buys vehicles, supplies and equipment.
Everyone, from the janitor to chief of police, including the local
prosecutor, stand to benefit from increased forfeitures.<br />
The American Civil Liberties Union <a href="https://www.aclu.org/criminal-law-reform/civil-asset-forfeiture">concurs</a>:<br />
<blockquote>
<span style="font-size: 16px;">“In many jurisdictions,
the money can go to pay for salaries, advanced equipment and other
perks. When salaries and perks are on the line, officers have a strong
incentive to increase the seizures, as evidenced by an increase in the
regularity and size of such seizures in recent years.”<br />
</span></blockquote>
In Michigan, based on reported spending patterns, we can see where
law enforcement priorities truly lie. Among multiple allowable uses of
forfeiture dollars, only 19 agencies bothered to invest their bounty in <i>“crime prevention and outreach”</i> programs, while 46 agencies used it for <i>“informant fees”</i> and 74 spent it on <i>“buy money” </i>for the
undercover purchase of drugs. The bulk of the money went to buy
equipment, primarily newer technology — 170 agencies reported upgrades
to their gadgetry from their loot money.<br />
<b>Short-cuts to Bypass the Courts</b><br />
In 2012, fully 89 percent of Michigan forfeitures were administratively <i>“streamlined”</i>
— meaning they flew under the judicial radar because the asset value
did not exceed the $50,000 threshold which triggers court oversight.
Michigan agencies availed themselves of this provision 9148 times last
year. The MSP report indicated that few of these seizures were
challenged, and further made the outrageous leap in reasoning to state
that this was due to presumed guilt:<br />
<blockquote>
“Drug dealers do not contest many of these cases, as they
often do not have a sufficient legitimate source of income to have
legally obtained the property seized.”</blockquote>
Among the 1177 cases which exceeded the dollar threshold that were
adjudicated, only 678 were concluded according to the MSP report.<br />
<b>It’s About Color</b><br />
In terms of actual dollars, most of these types of seizures are small
potatoes, and they often occur along racial lines. From marijuana to
other controlled substances, <a href="https://www.aclu.org/billions-dollars-wasted-racially-biased-arrests">police disproportionately target non-whites</a>. The ACLU <a href="https://www.aclu.org/criminal-law-reform/civil-asset-forfeiture">frames the abuses as a civil rights issue</a>:<br />
<blockquote>
<span style="font-size: 16px;">Asset forfeiture practices
often go hand-in-hand with racial profiling and disproportionately
impact low-income African-American or Hispanic people who the police
decide look suspicious and for whom the arcane process of trying to get
one’s property back is an expensive challenge. ACLU believes that such
routine “civil asset forfeiture” puts our civil liberties and property
rights under assault, and calls for reform of state and federal civil
asset forfeiture laws.</span></blockquote>
<b>Yet, the IRS Remains Colorblind </b><br />
Asset seizure has a certain equal opportunity aspect to it for the
taxman. Fair is fair. Running a business that operates primarily on a
cash-only basis is plenty enough reason to look suspicious to the feds.<br />
<span style="font-size: 16px;">Michigan is fast becoming the Somalia
of the United States — a place where asset piracy is the norm. Smelling
blood in the water, the IRS, acting under expanded powers found in the
Patriot Act, can now seize bank accounts on a mere whiff of suspicion
that money is being laundered. The Bank Secrecy Act requires financial
institutions to report cash transactions in excess of $10,000, but now
the IRS is looking at lesser amounts claiming the accused is attempting
to skirt the law with multiple smaller deposits. Earlier this month </span><a href="http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20131203/OPINION01/312030001" style="font-size: 16px;">The Detroit News editorialized</a><span style="font-size: 16px;">
on IRS overreach in Michigan. They found that, in one year, the IRS
seized about $500 million in deposits from Michigan residents. Several
cases of bank account forfeiture recently made the news when the court
ordered the return of the money, but the victories were won on a
technicality, and did nothing to strike down the widespread practice of
unwarranted seizure.</span><br />
While the state may not be able to halt federal abuses, they certainly should get their own house in order.<br />
Michigan lawmakers must reign-in local and state law enforcement —
they certainly don’t seem to be able to control themselves. Irwin
suggested that it’s time for the state to examine new revenue models for
financing our public sector so they aren’t forced to rob those they are
entrusted to protect.<br />
If these abuses were occurring in another country, our media would
report them as an outrageous affront to personal liberty. Not so here in
America, where reporters applaud these seizures under the guise of
successful law enforcement and a false sense of protection for our
communities.<br />
<b>Amy Kerr Hardin</b>Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-35267279788022596202013-12-14T15:25:00.000-05:002013-12-14T15:25:29.480-05:00Big Problems In ObamaCareLand<span class="fb_recommend"><span style="height: 20px; width: 429px;"></span></span>Everyone is aware of the problems with the roll out of ObamaCare, the ACA (Affordable Care Act) and how the Federal website just didn't work right and all.<br />
<br />
Everyone can be happy now because the website works well. We tried it today and it was a snap.<br />
<br />
What everyone seems not to recognise is that the Federal site only was available to cover the people in those States that refused to comply with the ACA and set up their own exchanges.<br />
So all the problems were in GOP governed states. The states that set up their own exchanges had success from day one, with a few minor politically motivated obstructionist burps.<br />
<br />
I am a proponent of single-payer health care aka Medicare For All, but we don't have that.<br />
<br />
What we do have is a plan that pretends to provide for the poor specifically - those who could not afford or otherwise qualify for health insurance.<br />
<br />
The ACA however has it's "plans for the poor" designed by rich idiots I guess.<br />
<br />
There is no way a poor person can afford the premiums on even their most basic plan, much less the co-pays and $10,000 per year deductible.<br />
<br />
This article in the Detroit Free Press explores this a little further. <br />
<h6>
<div class="ody-arttime">
<h6>
<span style="font-size: small;"> </span></h6>
<h6>
<span style="font-size: large;">Affordable Care Act won't solve all our health care problem</span></h6>
</div>
<div class="ody-arttime">
<br /></div>
</h6>
<div class="ody-photo-land ody-photo" id="ody-mainphoto" style="position: relative;">
<div class="ody-land-nonfullwith">
<div class="ody-bottomdiv">
<img alt="Part of the HealthCare.gov website is photographed in Washington on Nov. 29, 2013." src="http://cmsimg.freep.com/apps/pbcsi.dll/bilde?Site=C4&Date=20131214&Category=OPINION05&ArtNo=312140018&Ref=AR&MaxW=640&Border=0&Mary-Ellen-Howard-Affordable-Care-Act-won-t-solve-all-our-health-care-problems" />
<div class="ody-buypic">
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="ody-photo-land ody-photo" id="ody-mainphoto" style="position: relative;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Part of the HealthCare.gov website is photographed in Washington on Nov. 29, 2013. / Associated Press</span></div>
<div class="ody-photo-land ody-photo" id="ody-mainphoto" style="position: relative;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;"> </span></div>
<div class="ody-photo-land ody-photo" id="ody-mainphoto" style="position: relative;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;"> <br />By Mary Ellen Howard<br />December 14, 2013 <br />Detroit Free Press guest writer<br /></span></div>
<div class="ody-photo-land ody-photo" id="ody-mainphoto" style="position: relative;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;"> </span>Many people in the community — even those close to our clinic —
are asking what will be the effect of the Affordable Care Act on the
Cabrini Clinic and other providers of charitable care around the state.
Some wonder whether we will continue to be needed, and whether they
should still support us.</div>
<div class="content-wrap" style="float: none;">
<div class="gel-content">
<div class="gel-pane gpagediv">
There are a lot of myths out there about
health care reform. But here are some facts. In 2014, the ACA will offer
two new opportunities for insurance coverage:<br />
■ One is to
purchase insurance through the exchange. Small businesses and anyone
whose income is below 400% of the federal poverty level may receive a
tax subsidy to help them buy coverage. However, most of our patients at
the Cabrini Clinic are too poor to take advantage of this option.<br />
■
The second is Medicaid expansion, and that is more likely to affect the
uninsured people served by free clinics. Up until now, many have been
excluded from Medicaid, not because they have too much income, but
because they are childless adults. Under the ACA, childless adults
become eligible for Medicaid. In Michigan, this take effect in April.<br />
Michigan
is one of the 25 states where the legislature voted for Medicaid
expansion, albeit reluctantly. Statewide, it is estimated that more than
400,000 of Michigan’s 1.3 million uninsured will people become eligible
for Medicaid.<br />
I was hopeful that about 80% of the uninsured
patients we see at Cabrini Clinic would be among them. However, the
Michigan Legislature asked the U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services for waivers on the program that it is calling Healthy Michigan.
Federal approval is required because the Michigan plan varies from the
Medicaid expansion outlined in the Affordable Care Act.<br />
For the
uninsured poor, these waivers will pose barriers. They require enrollees
in Healthy Michigan to establish a health savings account from which
the state will deduct an income-based monthly premium for those earning
between 100 and 133% of the federal poverty level.<br />
The premiums
can be reduced through healthy behaviors. The plan also requires co-pays
for basic services. These premiums and co-pays will be a barrier to
poor people who need care. I wonder how many will actually sign up. I am
beginning to think that my 80% projection was wildly optimistic.<br />
To
make matters worse, Michigan plans to seek a second waiver in the
future, imposing a soft cap on coverage at 48-months, at which point
recipients would be cut off from Medicaid for life.<br />
Michigan still
has not received a ruling from the federal government on the waivers,
so we are stuck with a lot of unanswered questions.<br />
What if the
feds say “no” to Michigan’s requested waivers? Do we become the 26th
state to refuse the opportunity to expand Medicaid? Enrollment is to
begin in April. Now is when we should be educating the 1.3 million
uninsured Michiganders regarding Medicaid expansion — what is coming,
what it will mean, who is eligible, what do I have to do to enroll and
what will it cost? Instead, we have no answers.<br />
There are many
unknowns, but the future of free clinics for the uninsured is not one of
them. In fact, it appears that we are needed more than ever.<br />
</div>
</div>
</div>
<i>Mary Ellen Howard, RSM, is executive director of St. Frances Cabrini Clinic of Most Holy Trinity Church in Detroit.</i>Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-50111869785423685592013-12-10T18:02:00.000-05:002013-12-10T18:03:36.382-05:00Empathy vs. Sympathy (3 min video)I really appreciated this simple, straightforward video that really asks us which critter we see in ourselves?<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/1Evwgu369Jw" width="560"></iframe><br />Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-14604531564871239842013-12-01T23:46:00.000-05:002013-12-01T23:47:23.684-05:00I've Been To The Mountain Top- Martin Luther King - at UBU This article is over at UBU Ministries.<br />
Click the link below to go there. <br />
<a href="http://www.ubu-ministries.org/2013/12/ive-been-to-mountain-top-martin-luther.html">http://www.ubu-ministries.org/2013/12/ive-been-to-mountain-top-martin-luther.html</a>Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-12016123428649247672013-11-22T15:40:00.004-05:002013-12-01T15:52:13.191-05:0021 Ways the Canadian Health Care System is Better than ObamacareSingle Payer Insurance or Medicare For All is the only reasonable and rational way to provide health stability to our communities. Everything else we do just makes more profits for corporations at the expense of public health and economy. There is a link at the end of this article that will tell you more about Single Payer.<br />
<br />
Often people consider the Golden Rule to be too simplistic. It's not.<br />
But on some occasions, Jesus decides to extrapolate on the application of this perspective that He says must underlay all the Law and all the teachings of the Prophets.<br />
<br />
<span class="text Luke-10-25" id="en-KJV-25389" style="font-size: small;"><sup class="versenum"> Luke 10:25-37 </sup></span><br />
<span class="text Luke-10-25" id="en-KJV-25389"><sup class="versenum"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">King James Version (KJV)</span> </sup></span><br />
<br />
<span class="text Luke-10-25" id="en-KJV-25389"><sup class="versenum">25 </sup>And, behold, a certain lawyer stood up, and tempted him, </span><span class="text Luke-10-25" id="en-KJV-25389">saying, Master, <b>what shall I do to inherit eternal life?</b></span><br />
<div class="passage version-KJV result-text-style-normal text-html ">
<span class="text Luke-10-26" id="en-KJV-25390"><sup class="versenum">26 </sup>He said unto him, <b>What is written in the law? how readest thou?</b></span><br />
<br />
<span class="text Luke-10-27" id="en-KJV-25391"><sup class="versenum">27 </sup>And
he answering said, <b>Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart,
and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy
mind; and thy neighbour as thyself.</b></span><br />
<br />
<span class="text Luke-10-28" id="en-KJV-25392"><sup class="versenum">28 </sup>And he said unto him, <b>Thou hast answered right: this do, and thou shalt live.</b></span><br />
<br />
<span class="text Luke-10-29" id="en-KJV-25393"><sup class="versenum">29 </sup>But he, willing to justify himself, said unto Jesus, <b>And who is my neighbour?</b></span><br />
<br />
<span class="text Luke-10-30" id="en-KJV-25394"><sup class="versenum">30 </sup>And
Jesus answering said, A certain man went down from Jerusalem to
Jericho, and fell among thieves, which stripped him of his raiment, and
wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead.</span><br />
<br />
<span class="text Luke-10-31" id="en-KJV-25395"><sup class="versenum">31 </sup>And by chance there came down a certain priest that way: and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side.</span><br />
<span class="text Luke-10-32" id="en-KJV-25396"><sup class="versenum">32 </sup>And likewise a Levite, when he was at the place, came and looked on him, and passed by on the other side.</span><br />
<br />
<span class="text Luke-10-33" id="en-KJV-25397"><sup class="versenum">33 </sup>But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was: and when he saw him, he had compassion on him,</span><br />
<span class="text Luke-10-34" id="en-KJV-25398"><sup class="versenum">34 </sup>And
went to him, and bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine, and set
him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him.</span><br />
<br />
<span class="text Luke-10-35" id="en-KJV-25399"><sup class="versenum">35 </sup>And
on the morrow when he departed, he took out two pence, and gave them to
the host, and said unto him, Take care of him; and whatsoever thou
spendest more, when I come again, I will repay thee.</span><br />
<br />
<span class="text Luke-10-36" id="en-KJV-25400"><sup class="versenum">36 </sup><b>Which...of these three,...was neighbour unto him that fell among the thieves?</b></span><br />
<br />
<span class="text Luke-10-37" id="en-KJV-25401"><sup class="versenum">37 </sup>And he said, <b>He that shewed mercy on him. </b></span><br />
<span class="text Luke-10-37" id="en-KJV-25401"><b> Then said Jesus unto him, Go, and do thou likewise</b>.</span><br />
<br />
<span class="text Luke-10-37" id="en-KJV-25401">Single Payer Health Care is nothing more or less than putting this teaching into the practice of governance.</span><br />
<span class="text Luke-10-37" id="en-KJV-25401">Taking care of our neighbors just makes sense. </span><br />
<br />
<span class="text Luke-10-37" id="en-KJV-25401">Doc </span></div>
<br />
<div class="node-header">
<span class="submitted">
Published on Friday, November 22, 2013 by <a href="http://www.commondreams.org/">Common Dreams</a>
</span>
<br />
<div class="node-title">
<h2 class="title">
21 Ways the Canadian Health Care System is Better than Obamacare</h2>
</div>
<div class="author">
by <a href="http://www.commondreams.org/ralph-nader">Ralph Nader</a> </div>
</div>
<img alt="" border="0" class="image-full" src="http://www.commondreams.org/sites/commondreams.org/files/imce-images/ways.jpg" style="height: 324px; width: 540px;" /><br />
<i>Dear America:</i><br />
Costly complexity is baked into Obamacare. No health insurance system
is without problems but Canadian style single-payer full Medicare for
all is simple, affordable, comprehensive and universal.<br />
In the early 1960s, President Lyndon Johnson enrolled 20 million
elderly Americans into Medicare in six months. There were no websites.
They did it with index cards!<br />
Below please find 21 Ways the Canadian Health Care System is Better than Obamacare.<br />
Repeal Obamacare and replace it with the much more efficient
single-payer, everybody in, nobody out, free choice of doctor and
hospital.<br />
<i>Love, Canada</i><br />
<b>Number 21:</b><br />
In Canada, everyone is covered automatically at birth – everybody in, nobody out.<br />
In the United States, under Obamacare, 31 million Americans will
still be uninsured by 2023 and millions more will remain underinsured.<br />
<b>Number 20: </b><br />
In Canada, the health system is designed to put people, not profits, first.<br />
In the United States, Obamacare will do little to curb insurance
industry profits and will actually enhance insurance industry profits.<br />
<b>Number 19:</b><br />
In Canada, coverage is not tied to a job or dependent on your income –
rich and poor are in the same system, the best guaranty of quality.<br />
In the United States, under Obamacare, much still depends on your job
or income. Lose your job or lose your income, and you might lose your
existing health insurance or have to settle for lesser coverage.<br />
<b>Number 18:</b><br />
In Canada, health care coverage stays with you for your entire life.<br />
In the United States, under Obamacare, for tens of millions of
Americans, health care coverage stays with you for as long as you can
afford your share.<br />
<b>Number 17:</b><br />
In Canada, you can freely choose your doctors and hospitals and keep
them. There are no lists of “in-network” vendors and no extra hidden
charges for going “out of network.”<br />
In the United States, under Obamacare, the in-network list of places
where you can get treated is shrinking – thus restricting freedom of
choice – and if you want to go out of network, you pay for it.<br />
<b>Number 16:</b><br />
In Canada, the health care system is funded by income, sales and
corporate taxes that, combined, are much lower than what Americans pay
in premiums.<br />
In the United States, under Obamacare, for thousands of Americans,
it’s pay or die – if you can’t pay, you die. That’s why many thousands
will still die every year under Obamacare from lack of health insurance
to get diagnosed and treated in time.<br />
<b>Number 15:</b><br />
In Canada, there are no complex hospital or doctor bills. In fact, usually you don’t even see a bill.<br />
In the United States, under Obamacare, hospital and doctor bills will
still be terribly complex, making it impossible to discover the many
costly overcharges.<br />
<b>Number 14:</b><br />
In Canada, costs are controlled. Canada pays 10 percent of its GDP for its health care system, covering everyone.<br />
In the United States, under Obamacare, costs continue to skyrocket.
The U.S. currently pays 18 percent of its GDP and still doesn’t cover
tens of millions of people.<br />
<b>Number 13:</b><br />
In Canada, it is unheard of for anyone to go bankrupt due to health care costs.<br />
In the United States, under Obamacare, health care driven bankruptcy will continue to plague Americans.<br />
<b>Number 12: </b><br />
In Canada, simplicity leads to major savings in administrative costs and overhead.<br />
In the United States, under Obamacare, complexity will lead to ratcheting up administrative costs and overhead.<br />
<b>Number 11:</b><br />
In Canada, when you go to a doctor or hospital the first thing they ask you is: “What’s wrong?”<br />
In the United States, the first thing they ask you is: “What kind of insurance do you have?”<br />
<b>Number 10:</b><br />
In Canada, the government negotiates drug prices so they are more affordable.<br />
In the United States, under Obamacare, Congress made it specifically
illegal for the government to negotiate drug prices for volume
purchases, so they remain unaffordable.<br />
<b>Number 9:</b><br />
In Canada, the government health care funds are not profitably diverted to the top one percent.<br />
In the United States, under Obamacare, health care funds will
continue to flow to the top. In 2012, CEOs at six of the largest
insurance companies in the U.S. received a total of $83.3 million in
pay, plus benefits.<br />
<b>Number 8:</b><br />
In Canada, there are no necessary co-pays or deductibles.<br />
In the United States, under Obamacare, the deductibles and co-pays
will continue to be unaffordable for many millions of Americans.<br />
<b>Number 7:</b><br />
In Canada, the health care system contributes to social solidarity and national pride.<br />
In the United States, Obamacare is divisive, with rich and poor in
different systems and tens of millions left out or with sorely limited
benefits.<br />
<b>Number 6:</b><br />
In Canada, delays in health care are not due to the cost of insurance.<br />
In the United States, under Obamacare, patients without health
insurance or who are underinsured will continue to delay or forgo care
and put their lives at risk.<br />
<b>Number 5:</b><br />
In Canada, nobody dies due to lack of health insurance.<br />
In the United States, under Obamacare, many thousands will continue to die every year due to lack of health insurance.<br />
<b>Number 4:</b><br />
In Canada, an increasing majority supports their health care system,
which costs half as much, per person, as in the United States. And in
Canada, everyone is covered.<br />
In the United States, a majority – many for different reasons – oppose Obamacare.<br />
<b>Number 3:</b><br />
In Canada, the tax payments to fund the health care system are
progressive – the lowest 20 percent pays 6 percent of income into the
system while the highest 20 percent pays 8 percent.<br />
In the United States, under Obamacare, the poor pay a larger share of their income for health care than the affluent.<br />
<b>Number 2:</b><br />
In Canada, the administration of the system is simple. You get a health
care card when you are born. And you swipe it when you go to a doctor or
hospital. End of story.<br />
In the United States, Obamacare’s 2,500 pages plus regulations (the
Canadian Medicare Bill was 13 pages) is so complex that then Speaker of
the House Nancy Pelosi said before passage “we have to pass the bill so
that you can find out what is in it.”<br />
<b>Number 1: </b><br />
In Canada, the majority of citizens love their health care system.<br />
In the United States, the majority of citizens, physicians, and
nurses prefer the Canadian type system – single-payer, free choice of
doctor and hospital , everybody in, nobody out.<br />
For more information see <a href="http://www.singlepayeraction.org/" title="http://www.singlepayeraction.org/">Single Payer Action</a>.<br />
<div class="copyright-info">
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License.</div>
<div class="author-image" style="float: left; padding: 1px 15px 15px 0pt;">
<a href="http://www.commondreams.org/ralph-nader"><img alt="Ralph Nader" class="imagecache imagecache-author_photo" height="123" src="http://www.commondreams.org/sites/commondreams.org/files/imagecache/author_photo/ralph_nader.jpg" title="Ralph Nader" width="90" /></a> </div>
<div class="author-brief-article">
<a href="http://www.nader.org/" target="_blank">Ralph Nader</a> is a consumer advocate, lawyer, and author. His latest book is<i> </i><span class="title"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0062083538?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creativeASIN=0062083538&linkCode=xm2&tag=commondreams-20" target="_blank">The Seventeen Solutions: Bold Ideas for Our American Future.</a></span> Other recent books include, <span class="title"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0062210645?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creativeASIN=0062210645&linkCode=xm2&tag=commondreams-20" target="_blank">The Seventeen Traditions: Lessons from an American Childhood</a></span>, <span class="title"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1567514065?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creativeASIN=1567514065&linkCode=xm2&tag=commondreams-20" target="_blank">Getting Steamed to Overcome Corporatism: Build It Together to Win</a></span>, and "<a href="http://www.amazon.com/dp/1583229035?tag=commondreams-20/ref=nosim" target="_blank">Only The Super-Rich Can Save Us"</a> (a novel).</div>
Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-51589255492283113992013-11-18T16:39:00.001-05:002013-11-18T16:39:33.733-05:00Spy Fans and Chineese PornAwhile ago I reposted from True Activist a post called 10 Signs You're Fully Awake.<br />
Ever since, my page visits have gone from about 80/day to about 360/day!<br />
I expected all the extra traffic was going to be from China.<br />
All the pornographers love me in China apparently.<br />
They often leave me a nice, cryptic comment and a soft-porn link.<br />
But I was surprised to find that while I still get lots of visits from China, the big increase was from the USA.<br />
So, it only stands to reason, considering the type of article (the govt. is out to get you) that my new onslaught of readership must be all NSA, FBI, Homeland Security, etc.<br />
It appears then that I am enjoying a growing popularity among computers who seem to understand and appreciate me much more than people ever have.<br />
Yay technology!<br />
And to all my fans in China,<br />
I still love you.<br />
Please don't crash my site.Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-80715855484836868932013-11-12T10:05:00.000-05:002013-11-12T10:05:30.533-05:00Anal Probe for a Traffic Stop?<div class="field field-type-filefield field-field-blog-image">
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<a href="https://www.aclu.org/blog/criminal-law-reform-free-speech/anal-probe-traffic-stop" rel="bookmark" title="Anal Probe for a Traffic Stop? ">Anal Probe for a Traffic Stop?</a></div>
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By <a href="https://www.aclu.org/blog/author/allison-frankel">Allison Frankel</a>, Criminal Law Reform Project, ACLU </div>
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11/07/2013 </div>
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David Eckert was pulling out of a Wal-Mart parking lot when
police officers pulled him over for failing to stop at a parking lot
stop sign. Police ordered Eckert to step out of his vehicle, and that's
when he committed the highly suspicious act of "clenching his buttocks."
The officers' natural reaction? This man must be hiding narcotics in
his anal cavity.<br />
Being pulled over for a minor traffic violation is never a pleasant
experience, but these Deming, New Mexico police officers took it to an
atrocious new level, forcing Mr. Eckert to undergo a colonoscopy, anal
probes, and defecation in a search for drugs. Yes, you read that
correctly: the War on Drugs is being waged on minor traffic violators
with enemas and sedatives.<br />
After pulling Mr. Eckert over, officers obtained a search warrant for
an anal cavity search and drove Eckert to a Deming hospital. In the one
act of sanity in this insane saga, doctors at that hospital refused to
conduct the search, saying it would be unethical. Undeterred by such
ethical concerns, police then took Eckert to Gila Regional Medical
Center, where, over Eckert's objections, doctors performed an x-ray of
Eckert's cavity, three enemas, a colonoscopy, and several cavity
searches, as well as forced him to defecate in front of them. No drugs
were ever found.<br />
As egregious as the police conduct here was, sadly this case is only
one of many examples of police overreach in fighting the failed War on
Drugs. This August, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit <u><a href="http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2013/08/27/2531931/federal-appeals-court-police-paralyze-search-body-drugs/">held</a></u>
that police could not use drugs discovered in the buttocks of Felix
Booker, a Texas man who was pulled over for driving with expired tags
and, upon being suspected of having marijuana, was strip-searched,
sedated intravenously, intubated, and subjected to an anal probe.
Calling the search "one of the greatest dignitary intrusions that could
flow from a medical procedure," the Court ruled that the forced
procedures violated Booker's Fourth Amendment rights. In two separate
incidents in Texas this August, police officers <u><a href="http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2013/08/05/2415191/texas-police-pull-over-three-women-and-search-their-vaginas-for-marijuana/">probed</a></u>
the genitals and anal regions of four women suspected of possessing
marijuana during routine traffic stops (you can see the horrifying video
footage of the searches <u><a href="http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/troopers-texas-probe-genitals-women-traffic-stops-article-1.1414668">here</a></u>). No drugs were found during the cavity searches.<br />
Minor traffic stops should not be pretexts for invasive, degrading, and needless medical procedures. Eckert has <u><a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/181730326/Traffic-Complaint-pdf">filed a lawsuit</a></u>
against the City of Deming and its police officers for their outrageous
conduct, including arguing that the search went far beyond what was
permitted by the warrant. His lawsuit, and the media coverage of the
indignity to which he was subjected, should serve as yet another wake-up
call to police departments and politicians around the country that the
War on Drugs – which has trampled constitutional rights and overcrowded
our jails and prisons – must end.Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-54509540160400391632013-11-09T13:18:00.001-05:002013-11-09T13:18:19.385-05:00Love Is All - Playing For Change <iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/q4T37EaW4eU" width="560"></iframe><br />Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-2225644503604462013-11-06T15:01:00.000-05:002013-11-06T15:01:31.680-05:00Lenka - Live Like You're DyingLenka has a good message for us all.<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/6epU7CLYuk8" width="560"></iframe><br />Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-82198643192452350522013-10-30T15:35:00.001-04:002013-10-30T15:35:32.670-04:00BANCO SABADELL - Som Sabadell flashmob I'm generally not that big a fan of this number, but this one is so well done it made my heart swell and my eyes water. (alot) I sat here being slightly embarrassed - thankfully unobserved. This is really beautiful.<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/GBaHPND2QJg" width="560"></iframe><br />Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-59543276875206867072013-10-24T11:06:00.000-04:002013-10-24T11:06:21.284-04:00Cash for Kids...Hmm....Isn't There Another Word For That?<div class="main">
From Democracy Now</div>
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If you'd rather watch the video, click this link.</div>
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<a href="http://www.democracynow.org/2013/10/23/cash_for_kids_firms_behind_juvenile">http://www.democracynow.org/2013/10/23/cash_for_kids_firms_behind_juvenile</a><br />
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<span class="show-date">Wednesday, October 23, 2013</span>
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"Cash for Kids": Firms Behind Juvenile Prison Bribes Reach $2.5 Million Settlement in Civil Suit</h1>
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We turn to the
latest news in the so-called "kids-for-cash" scandal in Pennsylvania, in
which judges took money in exchange for sending juvenile offenders to
for-profit youth jails. In 2011, former Luzerne County Judge Mark
Ciavarella was convicted of accepting bribes for putting juveniles into
detention centers operated by the companies PA Child Care and a sister
company, Western Pennsylvania Child Care. Ciavarella and another judge,
Michael Conahan, are said to have received $2.6 million for their
efforts. Now the private juvenile-detention companies at the heart of
the kids-for-cash scandal in Pennsylvania have settled a civil lawsuit
for $2.5 million. The state has also passed much-needed reforms aimed at
improving its juvenile justice system and ensuring such abuses are not
repeated. We are joined in Philadelphia by Marsha Levick, chief counsel
of the Juvenile Law Center, which helped expose the corrupt judges and
represented the families’ class action suit.</div>
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Transcript</h2>
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This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
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<strong><span class="caps">NERMEEN</span> <span class="caps">SHAIKH</span>:</strong>
We turn now to the latest news on the so-called "kids for cash" scandal
in Pennsylvania, in which judges took money in exchange for sending
thousands of juvenile offenders to for-profit youth jails. In 2011,
former Luzerne County Judge Mark Ciavarella was convicted of accepting
bribes for putting juveniles into detention centers operated by the
companies PA Child Care and a sister company, Western Pennsylvania Child
Care. Ciavarella and another judge, Michael Conahan, are said to have
received $2.6 million for their efforts.<br />
Some of the young people sentenced under their watch were jailed over the objections of their probation officers. In 2009, <em>Democracy Now!</em>
spoke with one of the young people who spent almost a year in one of
the juvenile detention centers after being sentenced by Judge Ciavarella
as a first-time offender. This is <a href="http://www.democracynow.org/2009/2/17/penn_judges_plead_guilty_to_taking">Jamie Quinn</a>.<br />
<blockquote>
<strong><span class="caps">JAMIE</span> <span class="caps">QUINN</span>:</strong>
I was about 14 years old, and I got into an argument with one of my
friends. And all that happened was just a basic fight. She slapped me in
the face, and I did the same thing back. There was no marks, no
witnesses, nothing. It was just her word against my word. My only
charges were simple assault and harassment. And I didn’t even know that
charges were pressed against me until I had to go down to the intake and
probation and fill out a whole bunch of paperwork.<br />
</blockquote>
<strong><span class="caps">AMY</span> <span class="caps">GOODMAN</span>:</strong>
I asked Jamie Quinn in 2009 about the action Luzerne County Judge Mark
Ciavarella took in her case after taking bribes to do so. This was her
response.<br />
<blockquote class="collapsed-hide">
<strong><span class="caps">JAMIE</span> <span class="caps">QUINN</span>:</strong>
It just makes me really question other authority figures and people
that we’re supposed to look up to and trust. I mean, Ciavarella has been
a judge for a long time, from what I know, and a well-respected one, is
what I thought. And obviously not. It just really makes me question and
not trust other people. I mean, if someone like Judge Ciavarella could
do this, then it makes me believe that anyone can betray the law and—I
don’t know.<br />
</blockquote>
<div class="collapsed-hide">
<strong><span class="caps">AMY</span> <span class="caps">GOODMAN</span>:</strong>
Well, now the private juvenile detention companies at the heart of the
kids-for-cash scandal in Pennsylvania have settled a civil lawsuit for
$2.5 million. The state has also passed much-needed reforms aimed at
improving its juvenile justice system and ensuring that such abuses
aren’t repeated.</div>
<div class="collapsed-hide">
For more, let’s go to Philadelphia to Marsha
Levick, chief counsel of the Juvenile Law Center, which helped expose
the corrupt judges and represented the families’ class action suit.</div>
<div class="collapsed-hide">
Welcome back to <em>Democracy Now!</em>,
Marsha. Just lay out this latest settlement, which follows an earlier
one a few years ago, and just the horror of this. These two judges who
were found guilty of bribing are in prison now?</div>
<div class="collapsed-hide">
<strong><span class="caps">MARSHA</span> <span class="caps">LEVICK</span>:</strong>
The two judges are in prison. The latest settlement is a fairly
straightforward settlement, as you described it: $2.5 million that will
provide further compensation to the juveniles. I really think that this
is an opportunity, obviously, to close another chapter on what happened
in Luzerne County.</div>
<div class="collapsed-hide">
And I would add, I think, really listening to
the story leading up to this about the private for-profit centers
elsewhere, it’s really important, I think, for us as a country, I think,
for your listeners, to know that while we can talk about what happens
in private centers, some of which, frankly, are not-for-profit, the same
kinds of abuses can occur in state-run facilities, as well.</div>
<div class="collapsed-hide">
<strong><span class="caps">NERMEEN</span> <span class="caps">SHAIKH</span>:</strong> What do you see, Marsha Levick, as the wider implications of the settlement that was reached?</div>
<div class="collapsed-hide">
<strong><span class="caps">MARSHA</span> <span class="caps">LEVICK</span>:</strong>
I think that the wider implications are for us to continue to shine a
spotlight on how we, as a country, treat children who are convicted of
crimes. We treat them harshly. We—I think that this notion of whether or
not private centers are providing the same services as public centers,
we need to ask ourselves: What kind of services do we want to be
providing for children?</div>
<div class="collapsed-hide">
In Pennsylvania, I think that by exposing what
happened with the judges scandal, we’ve also had an opportunity to
achieve great reforms. We have really changed statutory policies in
Pennsylvania with respect to children’s right to counsel, with their
ability to obtain appointed counsel on their own, presuming that they in
fact don’t have financial resources to do that. We have eliminated, for
the most part, shackling in Pennsylvania courtrooms. We have provided
and required that judges give a statement of reasons. So when judges in
Pennsylvania commit children to public or private-run centers, they need
to have an explanation for why they’re doing that. And I think the
kinds of stories that we’re hearing about what might be happening in
Florida or California, for example, we don’t have the same kinds of
protections. We don’t have the same kind of transparency in place.</div>
<div class="collapsed-hide">
<strong><span class="caps">AMY</span> <span class="caps">GOODMAN</span>:</strong>
In 2011, Sandy Fonzo confronted former Judge Ciavarella outside the
courtroom after his sentencing. Fonzo’s son, Edward Kenzakoski, was
sentenced by Ciavarella to a youth jail and then a four-month boot camp.
Edward committed suicide in June of 2010. Confronting Ciavarella, Sandy
Fonzo blamed the judge for her son’s death.</div>
<blockquote class="collapsed-hide">
<strong><span class="caps">SANDY</span> <span class="caps">FONZO</span>:</strong> My kid’s not here! He’s dead, because of him! He ruined my [bleep] life! I’d like him to go to hell and rot there forever!<br />
</blockquote>
<blockquote class="collapsed-hide">
<strong><span class="caps">SECURITY</span> <span class="caps">GUARD</span>:</strong> Ma’am, come on.<br />
</blockquote>
<blockquote class="collapsed-hide">
<strong><span class="caps">SANDY</span> <span class="caps">FONZO</span>:</strong>
No! You know what he told everybody in court? They need to be held
accountable for their actions. You need to be! Do you remember me? Do
you remember me? Do you remember my son? An all-star wrestler? He’s
gone! He shot himself in the heart! You scumbag!<br />
</blockquote>
<div class="collapsed-hide">
<strong><span class="caps">AMY</span> <span class="caps">GOODMAN</span>:</strong>
That was Sandy Fonzo, whose son committed suicide after being put away
by Judge Mark Ciavarella. She was yelling at him right outside the
courtroom after he was convicted. Marsha Levick, we just have a minute.
Do you feel that justice has been done in this case?</div>
<div class="collapsed-hide">
<strong><span class="caps">MARSHA</span> <span class="caps">LEVICK</span>:</strong>
Oh, I think we’re still in process. There are a couple of defendants
whom we are still litigating against. I think that we have achieved
remarkable progress. I think that the settlements, I think that the
convictions of the two judges and their current incarceration are all
putting pieces of the puzzle together. But I think—again, I think as the
story leading up to our conversation this morning illustrates, there’s
much more to be done across the country. This is a national story. It’s
still a national problem. And I think that these conversations,
hopefully, are wake-up calls about the kinds of reforms that we need to
continue to be thinking about for our kids.</div>
<div class="collapsed-hide">
<strong><span class="caps">AMY</span> <span class="caps">GOODMAN</span>:</strong>
What’s happened to those prisons for kids in Pennsylvania, the ones
that were involved with bribing the judges who are now in jail?</div>
<div class="collapsed-hide">
<strong><span class="caps">MARSHA</span> <span class="caps">LEVICK</span>:</strong>
They continue to operate. And they—the litigation was not about
conditions within these facilities. They continue to bribe—to provide
services. This was really about—really, primarily, the action of the
judges, their behavior in the courtroom, and how they were so willing to
remove children from their homes with really very little due process
and very little regard for their rights or interests.</div>
<div class="collapsed-hide">
<strong><span class="caps">AMY</span> <span class="caps">GOODMAN</span>:</strong>
Marsha Levick, we want to thank you very much for being with us,
co-founder, chief counsel of the Juvenile Law Center based in
Philadelphia. The Juvenile Law Center helped expose the corrupt judges,
is now involved in the families’ class action suit.</div>
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Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-47289380866009511972013-10-20T15:05:00.003-04:002013-10-20T15:05:53.010-04:00Playing For Change - Higher Ground<br />I have really been enjoying lately this band - Playing For Change - and wanted to share their cover of this great song today.<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/3hGSqqhhokE" width="560"></iframe><br />Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-76018724698409192772013-10-10T12:21:00.000-04:002013-10-10T12:21:42.680-04:00Profiteering Off The War On Families (er....drugs)The blatant appeal to greed and irresponsible approach to what is crafted to "sound like" a good thing (the war on drugs) is doing something essentially similar in your town too.<br />
<br />
Putting a bounty, bonus or property seizure ahead of genuine public service has only made a new super-class of "justice" and "law enforcement" CROOKS! <br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/0t1oVWOlnk8" width="420"></iframe><br />Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-37371676337781937472013-09-29T13:47:00.000-04:002013-09-29T13:47:35.790-04:00Gimme Shelter - Playing For ChangeNo kidding. <br />
This kicks ass.<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/GJtq6OmD-_Y" width="560"></iframe><br />Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18243866.post-11467028932858207532013-09-28T17:51:00.003-04:002013-09-28T17:52:54.818-04:00War - No More Trouble - Playing for Change<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/fgWFxFg7-GU" width="560"></iframe><br />Rev. Gregory "Doc" Lowreyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15089788054132919739noreply@blogger.com0