Thoughts

I pretty much squandered last week, but that's okay because it was technically finals week. Oh, and I did finish my JavaScript project on Wednesday which only took like five hours. This is the end result--it's nothing fancy but it's done. This week is officially spring break, and I'm going to Portland tomorrow for the PLA conference. I will probably feel incredibly underdressed in khakis and whatever I wear with all those librarians. I need to do laundry today. I also need to go shopping--maybe in Portland where there's no sales tax!

Anyway, in what follows is a long, rambling, incoherent stream of thoughts about not just the health care bill, but about our nation's political health in general. Let me be clear--these are my own nascent thoughts. So the health care bill finally passed, and I actually don't know that much about it. When I still lived and worked in Utah I listened to NPR's Morning Edition every morning and Talk of the Nation on my way home every afternoon. I will admit that I think NPR generally, usually leans left of center although NPR denies it. Still, I think they embody journalistic integrity, and when listening to NPR, I felt well-informed. At work I listened to and Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me!, This American Life, and TBTL. Since moving to Seattle I only occasionally listen to TBTL and never to NPR. I miss it a lot, but I hardly ever drive here (radio is so much better in the car!), and I'm months behind on the one podcast I semi-regularly listen to. All of this is to say that I have no idea, none whatsoever, what the current health care bill that we finally passed looks like. Still I'm excited since this means I will probably have health care one way or another, that Obama got to pass the pet issue he led and championed--otherwise he would already be a lame duck president--and also that the Democrats finally found the cojones to pass the bill.

In not knowing what the health bill comprises, I am sure I am not alone. I feel that the Republicans have been spreading a lot of misinformation and fear about the bill. Remember Death Panels? What a joke, except people actually fell for it. I respect Republicans who have a different vision for what's best for the country that differs from the Democrats' vision. However, I do not respect people, on either side of the political chasm, who participate in the xenophobic abuse we've largely seen from the conservatives: refusing to even participate in an open dialogue about issues, stonewalling every attempt, crying fowl whenever the Democrats engaged in the very same behavior that Republicans have used to their own advantage in previous Congresses, and spreading misinformation about the issues. The same tactics that have lead commentators, and the public, to believe the government is broken which stems from what? That the president is black? At one point, the health care bill looked very similar to a previous health care bill created by Republicans. Health care itself has been broken for years, so it seems only irresponsible to not try to fix it, but these tactics are even more irresponsible. If Obama and the Democrats could not pass health care, their platform issue, I think the Republicans believed they would take back Congress in the midterms and the White House in 2012. (And who knows, they still might.) So the Republicans refused to even be open to health care. It was not about responsible governing, it was about politics. It's really a shame that politics and governing go hand in hand since they're diametrically opposing forces.

Not to mention that Republicans receive a lot of money and support from big business and insurance companies. It's not the complete lack of bipartisan compromise in Washington, but also the obscene lobbying that leads me to believe our government is broken. It's going to take some serious and real campaign finance and lobbying reform in D.C. before we can have open and reasonable discourse again (so probably never). But maybe the Enlightenment principles that our country was built on, no longer work. They certainly don't apply when those in power disregard them. Perhaps the Constitution is a quaint document in the political malaise of our nuclear, information age and imperial presidency. All empires eventually fail--maybe this is the beginning of the end for us.

Still I find it bemusing, it would be more amusing if it wasn't so terrifying, that the Republicans are the populist party and the Democrats are the elite. Really? The Democrats who have been (or were, for some time) the party of women, minorities (blacks, Hispanics, homosexuals, etc.), youth, the dispossessed, the educated, and so on. While the Republicans are the party of the upper-class white male. They claim to speak for the middle-class and Middle America, but I don't think that's really true. Maybe I'm wrong. When everyone was claiming the GOP was breaking apart, I thought that eventually we might have a Republican party worth voting for again. Perhaps the dissolution is taking longer than I thought, or maybe this is the party we will have to live with for some time.

But you have the Glenn Becks of the world (and the Bill O'Reillys, Rush Limbaughs, Sean Hannitys, Lyndon LaRouches, Anne Coulters, etc.) engaging in libertarian populism (are those two philosophies even compatible?) and demagoguery as opposed to rational discourse--remember the Enlightenment principles I was talking about? Anger is the easiest emotion to appeal to, and in Glenn Beck's case I think he is using it in a highly irresponsible manner. By the way, Glenn Beck as a libertarian does not belong to either party, but I don't remember him raising the pitchfork when W. was in office. Now Americans are angry; we're living in a Post-9/11 world where everything feels a little less safe, and we're just now (hopefully) getting out of the worst recession since the Great Depression. Thanks Wall Street! Remember when the Democrats were angry at Wall Street? But Glenn Beck is angry at socialism, not unregulated capitalism. Yeah, that makes sense. I think my favorite Glenn Beck moment, covered by The Daily Show (an entertainment program that has a higher degree of journalistic integrity than FOX news), was when Beck declaimed the ills of progressivism after reading about it in books at the library, because the library is free. Of course John Stewart pointed out that libraries aren't free, they are a progressive institution paid for with tax money. Stewart goes on to note that the first public library was established in Boston in 1854. Statement of purpose? "Every citizen has the right to access community owned resources." Community owned? That sounds a lot like communism. Seriously, Glenn Beck! He makes me ashamed to be a Mormon (well ex-Mormon--my Mormonism is the subject of a whole other discussion [Also, the Mormons could really used more Brandon Flowers and fewer Glenn Becks]).

And then you have the LaRouche demagoguery comparing Obama to Hitler. If I wasn't so scared of talking to a rabid person, I would ask a LaRoucher to explain just how Obama is Hitler. Seriously! Democrats: next we need to fix that other progressive institution--public education--so we can educate our children about what Hitler was actually about and what the Nazis actually did. Painting a Hitler mustache on anyone is a cheap shot to start with, but it also lessens the actual atrocities committed by Nazis. Not cool. People hurl intellectual elitism at the liberals, and I'm sorry, isn't intellectualism a good thing? When did anti-intellectualism become chic?

So the Democrats finally passed a bill without Republican support (at least I don't think there was any Republican support), which frankly I didn't think the Democrats had in them. We've taken years of xenophobic abuse, and like an abused puppy we keep coming back for more, and to top it all off, we're scared to upset our Republican "allies." When the other party keeps bullying you, you can't just keep cowering and handing over your lunch money. Eventually you have to take a tough stand. I think politics would be much better if we could reach bipartisan compromise through rational discourse (pesky Enlightenment), but partisanship isn't always such a bad thing. I can't quite remember all the way back to my American history class, but I think the Federalists believed the Framers may have had partisanship in mind. Of course, I may be completely off. The Framers did believe in the educated elite governing the country. We also tend to forgot that America is not a democracy, it's a republic. We elect the people who govern, and who hopefully represent the people who elected them. Otherwise, we elect somebody else the next time, or if the elected abuse their power, we may impeach them. Still, in 2008 the people spoke choosing a Democratic president and a Democratic majority. And the elected have spoken in passing the health care bill. This year we will speak again in the midterm elections. Perhaps we have changed our minds.

In either case, if you haven't seen your Facebook home page today, go check it out. It's pretty funny, but also frightening in its implications. Those who have made a comment concerning health care are either 100% for or against it. And the comment sections are sometimes fraught. And these people are our Facebook friends! The country has been politically polarized and people are discussing politics in highly emotional states. I would hope at least are leaders could discuss politics in a more dispassionate manner. But after all the Enlightenment (logic) was succeeded by Romanticism (emotion). While this is a rant in its own way, I hope I'm open for a rational debate. I may have been harsh on conservatives, but I don't think I have been unfair. I certainly haven't compare anyone to Hitler. But if you disagree let me know. It's also on the Internet, a great shield for people to hide in anonymity and forget civility. You know who I am, you know I'm a liberal, and I hope I've been civil.

I think that's all I'm going to say on that for now, so if you want to jump straight to the comments, go ahead. However, in the meantime, I want to tell you how disgusting silver tequila is. My first experience with tequila was a bad one, and I've never really cared for it since. However, I do like a good margarita every now and then as well as a long island iced tea, two cocktails which use tequila. The only two cocktails in my mind that make a case for tequila's existence. So I was a caipirinha kick, and they are delicious, but then I started to make some long islands. The perfect long island iced tea recipe, courtesy of Dale DeGroff, is as follows:

1/2 oz vodka
12/oz gin
1/2 oz (white/light) rum
1/2 oz (silver) tequila
1/2 (triple sec) Cointreau
3/4 oz fresh lemon juice
1/2 oz simple syrup
top with Coca-Cola (3-5 oz)
So you shake all the ingredient, except the cola, with ice, strain into a large glass filled 3/4 full of ice, top with Coke, and throw in a lemon wedge.

So basically it has four liquors and one liqueur, but is still delicious by combining them in small and equal portions, and surprisingly tastes a little bit like iced tea. So I had some 1800 reposado tequila, which is rested tequila. But all my cocktail books call for silver tequila in cocktails, which is not aged at all. And in the long island the vodka, gin, and Cointreau are clear, and so it calls for a white rum and a silver tequila to keep things equal. However, I was using my reposado and it worked just fine in margaritas and long islands. But then I used my last bit. So I went to the liquor store and decided to try silver tequila, buying 1800 brand 100% blue agave silver tequila. Huge mistake. The resting period of the reposado takes the edge off the silver tequila which is vegetal, peppery, and terrible. I made a silver margarita and it was the worst margarita I've ever had. So then I made a long island where you can't really taste any of the liquors since they're all mixed together. Except, through the vodka, gin, rum, Cointreau, lemon juice, simple syrup, and Coca-Cola, I could taste the 1/2 oz of silver tequila, and it almost ruined the long island--it's definitely not as good as with reposado. So here's my advice: avoid tequila always except for a margarita or long island, and then only use reposado tequila. I now have a big-ass bottle of silver tequila that I will probably have till the end of time.

Time to get ready for Portland!