More than half of the population of Syria is displaced, with over four million refugees outside of the country and eight million displaced within the country. They want peace, they need peace. Lebanon and Jordan, with millions of Syrian refugees, want peace. Who totally rejects the idea of peace? ISIS. Who is, at best, ambivalent about peace? Seemingly every other country in the world, including the US, Israel, Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia.
It is very difficult to overcome our obsession with war and its tools. As Pope Francis said to the U.S. Congress, “Sadly, the answer, as we all know, is money, money that is drenched in blood, often innocent blood. In the face of this shameful and culpable silence, it is our duty to confront the problem and to stop the arms trade.”
The media’s images of humiliated, exhausted refugees have left the screen for the moment, replaced by images of Russian warplanes. Rather than pretend our hands are clean and demonize the Russians, this is the opportune moment for a renewed call for a peace conference of all Syrian factions and all involved countries. “Assad must go” is not a precondition. “Assad must stay” is not a precondition. The voices of those who want peace must be heard – that is the precondition.
The US and Russia must decide they want peace and use their influence to get all parties to the table, and those that refuse to come will be isolated and face a united front.
The exchange between U.S. Senator Ted Cruz and Sierra Club president Aaron Mair during an Oct. 6 Senate judiciary subcommittee hearing was a brief flash in the news cycle. Was it also a debate about climate change?
The subject was to have been the impact of federal regulations on minority communities. The junior senator from Texas turned it into something else — a desultory grilling of Mair in which he brought out some old sawhorses from the climate denial tool shed. Here is the exchange:
Sierra Club board member Donna Buell posted this on Facebook after the hearing:
Mair was quick to reply on behalf of the Sierra Club:
View the entire two-hour hearing if you have the stomach for it here.
Cruz asserted in an Oct. 7 press release he “proved, contrary to liberal assertions that man-caused climate change is ‘settled science,’ that there is still a healthy and vigorous debate about the causes and nature of climate change based on the data and scientific evidence.”
So does Cruz picking a fight indicate debate? Decidedly not. In fact, as Mair pointed out in his video response, Cruz’s claims during the hearing have been debunked by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, an agency over which Cruz has oversight in his role as chair of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation.
What’s this about?
It is about the attempt of right wing politicians like Cruz to hijack reasonable discussion among people with differing opinions in favor of a personal agenda.
On Oct. 12, I was part of a Sierra Club panel of presenters in which I suggested attendees could continue the discussion Cruz and Mair started by bird dogging Cruz in Washington, Iowa Wednesday morning.
Miriam Kashia, a veteran of the Great March for Climate Action, raised her hand and said, “I’ve done that.”
She reported the incident in an Oct. 13 guest opinion in the Iowa City Press Citizen,
Then, during a media interview with Sen. Ted Cruz speaking about the terrorist threat, I jumped in and asked him, “What is your response to the fact that the Pentagon tells us that climate change is the biggest threat to America’s security?” His response, “You don’t have the right to ask any questions, because you’re not a member of the media.” The media, meanwhile, was not doing its job.
Statements by Cruz and his ilk so often go unchallenged. People agree with him, and in Texas helped elevate him to power in 2012. His supporters are vocal and much of what is said serves the conservative agenda or it doesn’t get heard. I don’t doubt there is a Cruz community that buys into his world view, even though it appears to be based in something other than reality.
What becomes clearer each time people like Cruz are examined is nothing is behind the verbiage but vapidness. Sarah Beckman pointed this out about Cruz in an Oct. 13 post on Iowa Starting Line.
If you spend enough time with Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz, you start to get the feeling that there is something “off” about him. His long pauses, his forlorn looks out into the audience, his deep crescendos and trailing whispers, his odd pop culture references. They all paint the picture that Cruz is maybe not as honest and authentic as he lets on while campaigning.
Never is Cruz talking about what we have in common, about how we can live better with each other, or how we solve the greatest problems of our time, like mitigating the causes of global warming.
Elections matter, and when the electorate elevates people like Cruz to positions of power over NASA, NOAA and the government’s scientific bodies, we are doing ourselves no favors.
If readers plan to move to Texas to sort out this mess, and elect someone who will enter the arena to fight for all of us, then God bless. I don’t see that happening.
Cruz gives us reason enough to engage in politics. Leaving important political work to others helped produce Senators Cruz, Ernst and Grassley, and the troubled time in which we live.
There is a better way, and it’s up to us to find and follow it.
(1) Mouthpieces for the establishment; (2) Repetition; (3) Context (lack of); (4) Character assassination; (5) Concision (sound bytes only!); (6) False balance (trying to appear balanced, giving equal, undeserved exposure to arguments not backed by facts).
Rule: Facts don’t matter; perception does.
Politicians say whatever the hell they want because they know the media will be obedient stenographers and repeat whatever they say, no matter how obviously incorrect or outrageous (e.g., The false narrative that President Obama wasn’t born in the U.S. The media encouraged endless arguments over this fake issue throughout a large portion of Obama’s presidency, even though the fact of his birth in Hawaii was easily proven false). The rest of us then are forced to waste time and resources attempting to correct the record.
The first Democratic presidential debate is tonight and CNN is taking your questions!
We pushed the Republicans to weigh in on Internet issues during the last two debates. Now’s our chance to do the same for the Democrats.
Here’s how you can submit a question:
Instagram: Post a video question to Instagram and tag it with #DemDebate and #InternetVoter.
Facebook: Leave your question as a comment on this post.
Just last month Jeb Bush came out with a policy platform that kicked off with an attack on Net Neutrality. We can expect to see more statements from the candidates over the coming months, so we need to do everything we can to make sure they stand up for the open Internet.
Here are some questions we want answers to:
• Internet access costs too much. How will you increase choice & lower prices for all?
• We have a right to privacy online. What will you do to end unchecked surveillance?
• We need the Internet to participate in our democracy & economy. How will you expand Internet access?
• Is building a fast, open & affordable Internet an important part of upgrading essential infrastructure?
So what’s your question for tomorrow night’s debate? Submit yours and let’s hold the candidates accountable now.
Thank you for all that you do—
Candace, Mary Alice and the rest of the Free Press Action Fund team Internet2016.net
P.S. Don’t miss your chance to speak out about Net Neutrality, privacy and other Internet issues during the Democratic debate!
If you live anywhere in Iowa, I appeal to you to stand with landowners fighting to stop Big Oil and its allies in Big Government in their accelerated push to build the Bakken Pipeline. For breaking developments, visit Bakken Pipeline Resistance Coalition and No Bakken Here.
On today’s Fallon Forum:
– We talk with Tim Dwight about challenging the presidential candidates to support powering the U.S. economy with 50% clean energy by 2030. Read Tim’s recent opinion piece here: Why Clean Energy is Necessary for a Sustainable Future.
– Author John Massaro joins us to discuss his book, NO GUARANTEE OF A GUN: How and Why the Second Amendment Means Exactly What It Says. The book’s premise is not that guns are bad and all guns should be banned. It is simply that gun control is a public-policy issue and not a Constitutional one.
– Des Moines being the Cultural and Culinary Crossroads of America, we talk with Billy McGuigan about his Beatles band and “Yesterday and Today,” an interactive concert happening this week at the Des Moines Playhouse.
– In this week’s Caucus Buzz, we talk about the Trump campaign rally in Waterloo that I got thrown out of, the obscene amount of money already being spent by a few presidential candidates on tv ads, and tomorrow’s first debate among Democratic presidential candidates.
Join us live every Monday from 11:00-12:00 noon CDT on KDLF 1260 AM (Des Moines) and online. Call (515) 528-8122 to add your voice to the conversation. The program re-broadcasts Wednesday on KHOI 89.1 FM (Ames) at 4:00 p.m. and Wednesday on KPVL 89.1 FM (Postville) at 7:00 p.m.
We the People Are More Powerful Than We Dare Believe: A Community Rights Workshop with Paul Cienfuegos
100Grannies For A Livable Future and local coalition Environmental Advocates present a FREE and public introductory workshop with National Community Rights Educator Paul Cienfuegos. In this 4-hr workshop you will learn:
– Why counties and communities can’t keep out harmful activities (like CAFOs, pipelines)
– Why corporations are “people,” with MORE rights than human beings.
– Find out how we can change the system so community rights take precedence and the rights of nature can be protected
– How 200 communities in nine states have already passed legally binding, locally enforceable laws that ban harmful corporate activities and rein in the “rights” of corporations; and we can do it too!
Be inspired and empowered, meet like-minded and socially engaged people in the community, and get informed on the issues! Be the change you wish to see in the world!
Paul Cienfuegos, National Community Rights Educator will give an introductory workshop on corporate vs. community rights and how to take back the power!
Governor Branstad takes one tiny tiptoe forward with the Anti-Bullying Proclamation but then takes ten big stomps backward.
FIRST, this week, Gov. Branstad proposed new rules (instead of legislation) allowing his administration to give $37 million dollars in tax exemptions to big corporations because we “have the money” all while vetoing $57 million for our Iowa school kids because he doesn’t believe we have the resources. We should put kids before corporations.
SECOND, Gov. Branstad also closed our two Mental Health Facilities without a good plan for the care of sick, dual diagnosed Iowans forced to move.
THIRD, he is also pushing his own privatization plan for Medicaid, which could start as soon as January, without legislative oversight and once again putting private corporation profits before the basic care needs of sick Iowans.
This is not good policymaking. There are three branches of government to maintain equal in power in Iowa. The hard work of sitting down to gather ideas from everyone, working through problems to form policy with solutions moving the state forward is hard work but worthy of this great state. Forcing policies through, vetoing at the last minute, and moving legislation by rule-making may be fast and dirty work for the short term, but Iowa overall is not better-off. I and others will continue to do what we can to move this state forward. We have to do better!
Domestic Violence Hotline Phone Number Changed
The following information is an excerpt from an Iowa Domestic press release: The Iowa Domestic Violence HelpLine (formerly the Iowa State Domestic Violence Hotline) has changed its phone number to: 1-800-770-1650.
The statewide HelpLine will have advocates available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week to assist victims and survivors with the resources and shelter they need to escape an abusive situation. It is also available for friends, family or concerned citizens to call for assistance and guidance if they have witnessed or suspect intimate partner violence is happening to someone they know. For more info: www.survivorshelpline.org.
Governor’s Plan to Privatize Medicaid Moves Forward
There are big changes coming to Medicaid as we know it in Iowa because the Governor has decided to push Iowa to privatization.
The Governor moved on his own to make these changes and unfortunately the Iowa Legislature has no ability to stop or slow the process between the Governor and the federal government (CMS). The federal government is the only way to stop or slow down the Governor’s privatization plan at this point. My concerns include giving a private company (which has been plagued with problems handling health services in other states) the ability to collect administration fees that are much higher than our current state administered plan. That, coupled with smaller amounts of money appropriated for Medicaid, can only lead to reduction of critical healthcare services for Iowans.
To learn more or to voice objections to the privatization of Medicaid in Iowa consider attending a few public meetings listed in the link below. You have to be registered to attend meeting, so please check out https://dhs.iowa.gov/sites/default/files/IAHealthLink_Kick-Off_Meetings_Flyer.pdf. The “IA Health Link Kick-Off Meetings” will host two Linn County meetings:
Friday October 16, 2015 9:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m. and 2:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m. Kirkwood Community College – Hotel Kirkwood Ballroom A & F (7725 Kirkwood Boulevard SW Cedar Rapids, IA)
Other meetings throughout the state can be found at the link.
Editor’s note: Iowa Senate democrats will be holding listening posts throughout the state on the Medicaid prioritization. A list of listening posts is here
Home Heating Assistance Available
Winter is coming soon. Iowans who are at least 60 years old or are disabled and meet certain income guidelines can apply for assistance for their home heating bills starting October 1. All other persons, with certain income restrictions can apply starting November 1.
Contact your local Community Action Agency (CAA) for more info: https://humanrights.iowa.gov/dcaa/where-apply or call 515-281-0859. This assistance called LIHEAP (Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program) is limited to Iowans whose income is below $20,597 (single) or $27,878 (couple). This program goes until April 30, 2016 for those who are accepted. If a household qualifies for LIHEAP, they are automatically qualified for the weatherization federal program. This program uses federal funds to assist homeowners with winterizing and could include insulation or even a new furnace. For more info contact your local Community Action Agency (see website above).
Office of Bullying Prevention Created
The Governor has signed an executive order creating the Office of Bullying Prevention at UNI. The executive order assigns administrative functions under current law for the Office of Bullying Prevention, but also directs the Office to work with the Department of Education (DE) to address other bullying issues.
Those issues include:
• Resolving inconsistencies in the reporting of bullying incidents by schools.
• Developing guidelines on cyberbullying.
• Giving schools greater authority to address bullying incidents off school grounds.
• Ensuring access to training (available electronically or other means).
• Promoting an existing 24 hour hotline.
• Working with the DE to develop parental notification procedures.
• Creating a taskforce to look at the issue of allowing students previously subject to harassment or bullying to open enroll and participate immediately in varsity interscholastic sports.
• Promoting of a student mentoring program.
The Governor has indicated that his budget request will include funding for this newly created Office of Bullying Prevention. To read the actual proclamation check here.
Seems like about once a week the Republican Party suffers a small earthquake within itself. My recollection from a geology class in my distant past was that a huge earthquake is preceded by several smaller quakes. We have some very strange early quakes going on in tea party land especially in the leadership area. Totally inexperienced people leading the parade of presidential candidates and no one seeming to want to be Speaker of the House have the earth quivering at the moment.
Pretty bad time for this to be happening with a potential default on our debt coming up shortly and another closing of government in the offing. As the earth quivers, let us hope that the country doesn’t get harmed in the explosion. Well, as Richard Nixon once said, “How can a party that can’t govern itself, govern the country?”
Were you paying attention last week?
1) We alluded to this in the intro today. Who withdrew his name in the race for Speaker of the House Thursday?
2) According to HuffingtonPost what percentage of Americans know someone who was killed by a gun – a) 25% b) 40% c) 50%?
3) School shootings #46 and #47 for 2015 happened Friday on what university campuses?
4) What man would have been 75 last Friday. No politician or world leader, but his music still influences people, especially the song “Imagine”?
5) Flood waters are still receding after historic rains in what state?
6) The ‘i’s were dotted and the ’t’s finally crossed and negotiations came to an end on what trade agreement Monday?
7) In the midst of the Watergate hearings what VP resigned quietly on October 10,1973?
8) Still no butts in jail. What corporation has finally been fined a record $20.8B for its oil spill in 2010?
9) Doctors Without Borders called what a “war crime”?
10) If your are reading this, you must have survived what that was supposed to have happened Wednesday?
11) The cornerstone of the White House was laid Oct. 1792. What is the approximate market value of the White House today, according to Zillow?
12) Who is the only remaining original member of Pres. Obama’s cabinet?
13) The highly regarded Harvard debate team made news last week by losing to a debate team from where?
14) Ruppert Murdoch tweeted that Ben Carson would be what, thus igniting a a tsunami of reaction?
15) In an interview Wednesday on public radio’s Marketplace, what Republican presidential candidate embarrassed himself with a total lack of understanding of the debt limit?
16) What Republican state senator announced his candidacy for congress in Iowa’s second district?
17) One of American’s great sports has been hit by a cheating scandal. What emerging industry based on football has been rocked with stories of insider cheating?
18) The Nobel Peace Prize was won by a group that helped what country transition from a revolution to a democratic government?
19) Declassified documents showed that what dictator had assassinations carried out in the US in 1976?
20) Republican senators say they plan to use what process in order to avoid a filibuster on a bill to cut funds to Planned Parenthood and end Obamacare?
The end of the world may come when the Cubs win the World Series. You have been warned.
Answers:
1) Kevin McCarthy
2) b) 40% – pretty high
3) Northern Arizona University and Texas Southern U.
4) John Lennon
5) South Carolina
6) Trans-Pacific Partnership
7) Spiro Agnew in response to bribery charges
8) BP
9) the US’s bombing of the hospital at Kunduz, Afghanistan
10) the end of the world
11) just short of $400,000,000
12) Tom Vilsack
13) Eastern New York Correctional facility (prisoners)
Iowa is an older state. By the numbers we are 5th in percentage people over 65. Thus a potential rise in the cost of Medicare to beneficiaries could have consequences in this state.
There has been some scare mongering on this issue. Kiplinger seems to have the best most straight forward information on this hike. Looks like the hike will be announced later this month. It appears that there will be no rise in Social Security benefits due to a flat CPI on which the cost of living adjustment is based.
From Kiplinger:
The actual rates for Part B (which covers the costs of doctor visits and outpatient care) will be announced in October and take effect Jan. 1. The boost may be 15% for all participants or a whopping 52% for some, depending on whether Social Security recipients see a cost-of-living raise for 2016.
If Social Security checks are increased, everybody will pay more for Part B, bumping the monthly premium from $104.90 to $120.70 to cover higher expenses. That’s the scenario for a 15% increase in costs.
But without a raise in Social Security benefits, higher Medicare fees couldn’t be charged to most folks. So the larger increase would apply to about 30% of Medicare beneficiaries:
those who enroll in Part B in 2016,
people who don’t have their premiums deducted from Social Security payments,
individuals with annual incomes above $85,000,
and people eligible for both Medicare and Medicaid
The pending sharp premium increase, reported in August by The Fiscal Times, was prompted by a strange twist in the law that effectively penalizes wealthier beneficiaries and others any time the Social Security Administration fails to approve an annual cost of living adjustment. This will be only the third time since 1975 that Social Security will not increase the cost of living benefit, simply because the Consumer Price Index used by the government has remained relatively flat.
Medicare Part B and the Social Security trust fund are intertwined, and most seniors on Medicare have their monthly premiums deducted from their Social Security checks. Because the federal law for various reasons “holds harmless” about 70 percent of Medicare recipients from premium increases to cover unexpected rising healthcare costs, the remaining 30 percent of Medicare Part B beneficiaries suffer the consequences by being made to pay higher premiums.
Two major takeaways from this issue:
1) Despite what the Consumer Price Index (CPI) says, living costs have risen quite significantly, especially for drugs which affects seniors more than other groups generally.
2) How much longer will Americans continue to settle for a crazy patchwork quilt that is our health care system. A single payer system that covers all Americans similar to all other industrialized countries is long past due. It is time for America and Americans to stand up and face the issue of taking care of our single most precious resource behind the earth itself – the health of our citizens.
We have a health care system that would not have been adequate in Revolutionary Era America. Why do we as a country accept it now? Because we are afraid that some group we hate will get something free? Single payer would be far cheaper for two simple reasons. First we would cut out a 30% middle man fee that insurance companies now get for doing basically nothing. Second we could stop the spread of disease much more quickly if all Americans would be able to access health care at the first signs of illness. Therefore less sick days that cost America dearly.
Beyond that, products made in America would not have add on the price of health care into the price of their products which would make American business more competitive in the world market.
Have you ever considered that in our current system a person who works for an insurance company and knows nothing about medicine is making decisions on what kind and how much health care you will get? Would that be how you would design a good, solid health care system?
Well, Terry the Terrible is at it once again. Looking down the barrel of not being quite the governor that luminaries such as Scott Walker and Bobby Jindal are, Branstad pulls a tax cut for businesses out of nowhere. Being a founding member of ALEC carries with it a lot of responsibility to turn everything over to the profiteers and bankrupt the government. It’s embarrassing to see upstarts stealing your thunder.
Sometimes a Governor just has to go it alone and screw the laws and rules about how government is supposed to run. That stuff just gets in the way. It slows down the profits you know. Makes a governor look weak.
When a juvenile home needed shutting, Terry did it without listening to anyone; when the mental health hospitals needed to be shut down, Terry did it, damn the laws; when a business needs a couple of bucks or maybe $110 million, Terry ponied up our money; when there’s some money to be made scamming the Medicaid system through administrative costs or bogus co-pays, Terry can do it; declaring poverty when faced with funding schools or helping out food banks for the poor, Terry is there with the sad story of a poor state.
If he can’t do it himself he enlists a duke — er — I mean an appointee like Bruce Rastetter to do the job. Wrecking Iowa’s University system? On its way. That’ll teach for graduating folks like Branstad and Rastetter!
The one big target, I mean goal, is to dismantle the public unions. That is probably on tap for next year. Once dismantled, Branstad can step aside and give the throne to Kim Reynolds. That way she will be an incumbent for the 2018 election. That way the people of Iowa will keep electing her just like we reelected Branstad over and over. Iowans hate to change politicians no matter what they do or how bad they are for our state. Just look at Chuck Grassley.
Branstad scoffs at the legislature. Who do they think they are anyway? Representatives of some group of people or something. Branstad acts as if he is more than just a governor – more like a king, beholden to nobody. If Iowans don’t hold him accountable for his outrageous actions by dismissing him at election time or calling him on his actions, he might as well act as the king he seems to think he is.
Kings seldom act in the best interest of the people but act in the best interest of other nobles like themselves. A group of Americans recognized this in the 18th century. But if we don’t keep a wary eye on our leaders they will grab every advantage they can.
Next Tuesday, October 13, the Legislature’s Administrative Rules Review Committee will consider this issue. The committee can delay or reject the proposed change.
Here’s how you can help keep valuable and limited tax dollars available to invest in local schools: Send a public comment opposing ARC 2178C.
1) Send an email message with the subject line: “Public comment on ARC 2178C”
2) Address it to: victoria.daniels@iowa.gov of the Iowa Department of Revenue and jack.ewing@legis.iowa.gov of the Legislative Services Agency.
3) Explain why you oppose this effort to massively cut corporate taxes without a vote by the Legislature. Points you might address include:
a. Why have a Legislature if the Governor can give away almost $40 million without vote.
b. How will education ever be affordable if the priority is corporate tax cuts.
c. The economic benefits of strong local schools.
d. Crowded class sizes, teacher layoffs, and reduced course offerings due to lack of investment in local schools.
Your comments will become part of the official record and will shared with every member of the committee.
Let me add that if you could, please sign this petition calling for the legislature to stop Branstad’s unilateral move.
Governor Kim Keynolds: (515) 281-5211 U.S. Capitol Switchboard: (202) 224-3121 Iowa Members of Congress - Rep. Randy Feenstra (R) - Rep. Ashley Hinson (R) - Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R) - Rep. Zach Nunn (R) Iowa US Senators - Senator Joni Ernst (R) - Senator Charles Grassley (R)
