View From The Third Floor Update

For thoughts from a different part of my brain.

Thanks for supporting both sides.

http://blog.lehighvalleylive.com/view_from_the_third_floor/index.html

A Response To The Godfather

This became too long for the comment section so I have devoted an entire new posting to my friend.

Bernie -

1

I watched the tea party marches on cspan and followed media coverage and the crowds were full of angry white people saying really racist and hateful things about the President. The slogan they use "Take our country back" infers that the President is not an American. Who do they want to take their country back from? The fact that they say “Their Country” and not “Our Country” is telling of their lack of respect for him and shows they don’t believe he has the right to be Our President.

The Obama administration is referred to as a REGIME, which infers that they were not democratically elected but came to power by force. They use the expression "Not my President" agree with him or not he is our President. I was critical of those on the left when they used that expression against Bush. You will find no one who opposed President Bush more than I did and yet I always referred to him as the President. Because he was my President, he was the nations President.

They make wild accusations about his background; they compared his wife to a gorilla and let’s not forget a local Catholic Church allowed his likeness to be shot at as a fundraiser.

Never has a Presidents birth come into the debate but it did when a black man was elected President.

Are all tea party people racist? No. I am sure that Jake Towne and Rand Paul are not but I need some proof and convincing that that this "anger" at Washington which did not exist when GWB was ruining the economy and busting the debt ceiling is not race based.

2

I did not say Dent was a right wing extremist. I was wondering which Charlie Dent was going to be representing us. He has been all of those things I described.

3

Dent has no real record of accomplishment; no legislation of note bears his name either in DC or Harrisburg.

4

Dent has to earn my respect back. He ran a vile and negative campaign last year. He never ran one ad that talked about his record and what successes can be attributed him. He won by destroying Callahan's reputation rather than telling us why he had earned our support.

5

Dent's votes during the lame duck session were more like the Dent of old not the Dent of the last two years spent carrying the water for John Boehner.

6

To say I would not hold my own against Dent assumes knowledge of me that you do not possess so I am curious as to where that came from.

7

I am not one of those who made those types of remarks about Condi Rice and was harshly critical of those who did. In fact I think Condi Rice was not given a fair shake because of her association with GWB. I think if she had served a more enlightened President she could have been one of our great foreign policy minds.

Racism, sexism, homophobia is wrong and I will always speak out against it no matter who the moron is uttering it.

All are welcome to follow me no matter what avatar or handle they use. His name is not one that I would choose to use but as my old Irish grandmother used to say. “To each his own”.

I have to admit it was not one of my more positive and affirming blog postings but I stand by it.

I don’t understand your wild and blind affection for Charlie Dent he seems to be the antithesis of who you are.

And, as always Bernie thank you for reading me and thank you for all you did for me in the beginning with promoting by little rant center. You will always be my blog Godfather and I am grateful for your support.

You can reach Bernie's blog by hitting the Lehigh Valley Rambling tag on the right side of the page.

A Few Thoughts and Opinions

I have been a lazy blogger as of late but that does not mean I haven’t been thinking about things. I have just been too lazy to sit down and put pen to paper (so to speak). Here are few things I would have commented on had not been such a slug.

Election 2010

*I am proud of the fact that I never voted for Arlen Specter but now that Pat Toomey is going to represent me in the U.S. Senate, Arlen is looking better. I know PA is a pretty conservative state but didn’t we just toss one reactionary out of the Senate 4 years ago? Pat Toomey is just a smarter less charming version of Little Ricky Santorum.

Charlie Dent is a harmless amiable nothing but Pat Toomey has an agenda and the intelligence to try to achieve it.

*Speaking of Charlie Dent; it turns out I was more bothered by John Callahan’s defeat than I originally thought I was. I went out to lunch on Election Day with my friend Silagh and she expressed concern over my well being if Callahan lost. I just brushed her off by saying that since my first campaign was McGovern in 1972 I was not only used to losing but immune to the negative after effects of it. I was wrong.

I really like Mayor Callahan and think he would have been an excellent Congressman. I agreed with his positions, I think his personal story is admirable and I find the joy he takes in campaigning, politics and governing quite engaging. I still believe his future is limitless and he will go on to great things and higher office if he so chooses. I look forward to assisting him in future campaigns.

*Which Charlie Dent will we see during this next term? The John Boehner lap dog. The arch Conservative suck up. The do no harm nice guy who has no serious legislative accomplishments. The social and fiscal moderate. Let me know what you think and the person closest to the reality will win a super terrific prize.

*I wonder if the tea bagger crowd will be as impatient with the GOP controlled house as they were with the Democrats. I will always believe that much of the impetus for the tea party movement is race based. If this President looked more like me I don’t think the anger would be as fierce.

*Now the GOP leadership must lead instead of just saying no. I look forward to see how the GOP in the Senate deals with the bills coming out of the GOP House of Representatives.

*In Pennsylvania the Republicans own it all. I wonder if the right wing fringe will hold them accountable or will they give them a lot room to maneuver.

The United States Senate

*This formerly august body is the home of 100 of the most egomaniacal, ponderous, lazy, self involved nit wits ever to have graced the planet. These people to a person believe that they are entitled to privileges far greater than they are worthy of or have earned. They accomplish very little, they don’t work hard and they think every word that comes out of their mouths is a pearl of wisdom. They don’t care about the greater good they only care about their very narrow view of the world. Granted the Senate has always had some of these types but now they are the overwhelming majority. Even those with whom I share political views are intellectual light weights.

When the founding fathers created the Senate they planned for its members to be more deliberative and thoughtful and to take a more national view of issues. The founders expected the states to send to Washington their most honorable and distinguished citizens to sit in the Senate. That didn’t really work out to well did it? I find myself humming “Where have all the Statesmen gone?” to the tune of “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?” You know they have to be an awful bunch if the Chief Justice has taken the unusual step of criticizing them in public.

John McCain

*Speaking of the Senate, the biggest disappointment has been the unforgivable behavior of John McCain. He has become such a bitter and cranky old man I am having a hard time remembering the McCain we were all fond of in 2000 and how he stayed above the race baiting fray during the 2008 campaign. He was the nominee of his party, he will be in the history books and yet he acts like a hack politician. I understand the pain of defeat and not having your dream achieved but his behavior will leave him as little more than a foot note in history.

When Teddy Kennedy lost to Jimmy Carter and he realized that he would never become President he set about to become the best Senator in the business and he died with his reputation restored and as a beloved figure in the country. When Jimmy Carter was defeated he created the Carter Center and has set out to bring peace and democracy around the world. When Richard Nixon was tossed out of office he wrote a series of serious and thoughtful books and at the end of his life was treated as and elder statesmen. When Hubert Humphrey lost in 1968 he returned to the Senate and continued the fight for social justice and was beloved by all of his colleagues. When Al Gore was denied the White House he set out to clean the world and in course won a Nobel Prize and an Oscar. But, John McCain has become a snarky and petty critic of this President, he has changed his mind on many key issues of the day and has lurched so far to the extreme right, I doubt even his 2008 campaign manager would recognize him. I would feel sad for what John McCain has become but he has made the choice to take the low road at the end of his career. Charles G. Dawes will be held in better regard by history then John McCain will be.

Wiki leaks

*What did we learn?

The President of France is thin skinned, self absorbed and has a huge ego. Shocking

The Arab leaders want us to do all the dirty work and shut down Iran. Shocking

Col. Gaddafi hangs out with sexy European women. Shocking

Prime Minister Putin is the real power in Russia and is a control freak. Shocking

Chancellor Merkel is efficient, proficient and fairly humorless. Shocking

There were many more shocking revelations but on the whole it all seemed to be much ado about nothing. Many of the things probably should not have been marked top secret in the first place.

Just as the New York Times needed to be protected when they published the Pentagon Papers the Wiki leak people need to be protected now. The First Amendment to the US Constitution trumps all other issues. If US troops were put in danger then I would be concerned but they were not. Perhaps our diplomats should be more diplomatic in their communications.

Elizabeth Edwards

*I was saddened to learn of her death she was an eloquent spokes person for health care reform and she appeared to be a class act. But during the media coverage of her death and as many placed her on a pedestal I went back and read the John Edwards campaign section of Game Change. It was not very flattering, she comes off as manipulative, controlling and the real brains behind the campaign. The book also contends that she knew of the affair before the campaign really took off and chose to hide this damaging information from the campaign staff and volunteers. She was the chief enabler to a very superficial John Edwards. Having said that I think if she had lived she would have become a leader for Liberal causes in her own right and possibly a cabinet member in a future Democratic administration.

DADT

*The Presidents approach was right. Congress wrote the law and for the change to be embraced more fully by the citizens Congress had to change the law. Had it been left up to the courts the reaction would not have been as positive. The courts moved the civil rights movement along faster than congress did but once congress acted with President Johnson’s support the majority of the American people came along. In order for our system of 3 equal branches to work fully laws must come from the people’s representative not from the courts or executive order.

Sarah Palin

*I am not going to waste your time by commenting on this fame whore. Charlie Dent has more substance.

Truth, Justice and The American Way

Yesterday the United States Senate voted to void the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell law. The House did it earlier in the week and now it heads to the desk of the President for signing. Once the law is implemented the young men and women who put their lives on the line daily for my right to blog and your right not to read my blog will no longer have to hide their true nature.

I want to thank Senator Specter and Senator Casey for voting yes.

Which brings up the question.

Should we be thanking people for doing the right thing?

Or, should we just expect them to?

Either way the law was changed yesterday by the people’s representatives and not the courts, which is the way it should be.

Now.

Can I please get married?

Ambassador Richard Holbrooke

I learned about the death of Ambassador Richard Holbrooke from Martha Stewart. I was reading my Twitter time line and it was her tweet that gave me the news that we all sensed was coming. I don’t mean to turn the death of Mr. Holbrooke into one of those “Where were you when you heard the news” moments and I don’t mean to mock the death of this American hero but it is somehow fitting that Martha Stewart would be break the news to me.

Ambassador Holbrooke lived in the rarefied world that is the inhabited by “The Elites” and I am not using Elites as a derisive term the way Sarah Palin refers to anyone with an education or influence or who has read a book. A great culture needs it’s elites for those geeky history buffs from small cities in Pennsylvania to admire and aspire to become.

Richard Holbrooke was born and raised in New York City the child of Jewish parents who fled the Holocaust but chose to raise their child as a Quaker in order to expand his world view. He is a graduate of both Brown and Princeton. A few weeks after his graduation Mr. Holbrooke answered the clarion call from his generations most shining light, John F. Kennedy. Mr. Holbrooke entered the Foreign Service and within a year he was fluent in Vietnamese and sent off to that hot-spot. Within 6 years he was participating in the Paris peace talks. During the early 70’s he left the Foreign Service and became the managing editor of the very influential Foreign Policy magazine and contributed to Newsweek. During the Carter administration he served as Assistant Secretary of State. Bill Clinton then appointed him Ambassador to Germany and then promoted him Assistant Secretary for Canada and Europe. There is a revolving door in the foreign policy business and Mr. Holbrooke left to return to the private sector and think tanks. He was called back to service as a civilian special envoy to the Balkans. It is in this role that Mr. Holbrooke earned his place in the history books. He was the architect of the Dayton Peace Accords which led to a lasting peace in what was Yugoslavia. In 1999 he was appointed to be the 22nd Ambassador to the United Nations.

Throughout all these years Richard Holbrooke could also found going to the best parties, attending fundraising galas and was often seen on the Society Pages of the New York Times. He was invited to dinner with Brooke Astor, gave insightful interviews on PBS, wrote policy papers that transformed the way governments around the world treated each other and was the toast of highest echelons of Washington, London, Paris, Tokyo and Beijing society. His widow is the frequent Vanity Fair contributing writer Kati Marton who was the third ex-wife of ABC newsman Peter Jennings. Holbrooke traveled in that rare world of money men, trophy wives, power brokers, media types, great authors, TV stars and academics. He was profiled endlessly by the reporters of NPR, The New York Times, The Washington Post and the great newspapers around the world this week will note his passing with 1,000 of words of commentary. Brian Williams tonight gave his passing an entire segment between commercial breaks on the NBC Evening News.

Richard Holbrooke will be remembered as a great diplomat, a great thinker and a man who could make things happen. He brought warlords together and forced them into peace, he mobilized the global business community to join the global fight against AIDS, TB and Malaria. He was a board member for some of the greatest institutes and think tanks as well as the Museum of Natural History.

Most significantly Ambassador Richard Holbrooke never lost sight of his reason for entering government service in the first place, John Kennedy’s call to service. Richard Holbrooke served his nation well; he served it with dignity, class and sophistication. John F. Kennedy’s peers, the men and women he brought into government with him are often referred to as “The Best and Brightest”. Richard Holbrooke was too young to be considered one of them but he was certainly one of the best and brightest of his generation. He has left his nation stronger. He solidified this nation’s role in the world and he brought peace, stability and hope to large sections of the globe.

Take a moment this week to learn more about the remarkable man and one of my hero’s.

The Cloture Vote On Defense Spending

Here is today's roll call vote to allow the Senate to debate the Defense Funding bill that included repealing the Don't Ask Don't Tell law. Keep in mind that this was not a vote on the Defense Funding bill or the repeal of DADT but this was a vote just to allow debate and then a vote. In the U. S. Senate you have to vote yes or no as to whether you are going to be allowed to vote on the real issue. You need 60 Yea votes before a vote will be held.

This is the worlds greatest Democracy?


U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 111th Congress - 2nd Session
as compiled through Senate LIS by the Senate Bill Clerk under the direction of the Secretary of the Senate
Vote Summary
Question: On Cloture on the Motion to Proceed (Upon Reconsideration, Motion to Invoke Cloture on the Motion to Proceed to S. 3454 )
Vote Number: 270 Vote Date: December 9, 2010, 03:33 PM
Required For Majority: 3/5 Vote Result: Cloture on the Motion to Proceed Rejected
Measure Number: S. 3454 (National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2011 )

Measure Title: An original bill to authorize appropriations for fiscal year 2011 for military activities of the Department of Defense, for military construction, and for defense activities of the Department of Energy, to prescribe military personnel strengths for such fiscal year, and for other purposes.
Vote Counts: YEAs 57
NAYs 40
Not Voting 3
Vote Summary
By Senator Name
By Vote Position
By Home State


Alphabetical by Senator Name
Akaka (D-HI), Yea
Alexander (R-TN), Nay
Barrasso (R-WY), Nay
Baucus (D-MT), Yea
Bayh (D-IN), Yea
Begich (D-AK), Yea
Bennet (D-CO), Yea
Bennett (R-UT), Nay
Bingaman (D-NM), Yea
Bond (R-MO), Nay
Boxer (D-CA), Yea
Brown (D-OH), Yea
Brown (R-MA), Nay
Brownback (R-KS), Not Voting
Bunning (R-KY), Nay
Burr (R-NC), Nay
Cantwell (D-WA), Yea
Cardin (D-MD), Yea
Carper (D-DE), Yea
Casey (D-PA), Yea
Chambliss (R-GA), Nay
Coburn (R-OK), Nay
Cochran (R-MS), Nay
Collins (R-ME), Yea
Conrad (D-ND), Yea
Coons (D-DE), Yea
Corker (R-TN), Nay
Cornyn (R-TX), Not Voting
Crapo (R-ID), Nay
DeMint (R-SC), Nay
Dodd (D-CT), Yea
Dorgan (D-ND), Yea
Durbin (D-IL), Yea
Ensign (R-NV), Nay Enzi (R-WY), Nay
Feingold (D-WI), Yea
Feinstein (D-CA), Yea
Franken (D-MN), Yea
Gillibrand (D-NY), Yea
Graham (R-SC), Nay
Grassley (R-IA), Nay
Gregg (R-NH), Nay
Hagan (D-NC), Yea
Harkin (D-IA), Yea
Hatch (R-UT), Nay
Hutchison (R-TX), Nay
Inhofe (R-OK), Nay
Inouye (D-HI), Yea
Isakson (R-GA), Nay
Johanns (R-NE), Nay
Johnson (D-SD), Yea
Kerry (D-MA), Yea
Kirk (R-IL), Nay
Klobuchar (D-MN), Yea
Kohl (D-WI), Yea
Kyl (R-AZ), Nay
Landrieu (D-LA), Yea
Lautenberg (D-NJ), Yea
Leahy (D-VT), Yea
LeMieux (R-FL), Nay
Levin (D-MI), Yea
Lieberman (ID-CT), Yea
Lincoln (D-AR), Not Voting
Lugar (R-IN), Nay
Manchin (D-WV), Nay
McCain (R-AZ), Nay
McCaskill (D-MO), Yea
McConnell (R-KY), Nay Menendez (D-NJ), Yea
Merkley (D-OR), Yea
Mikulski (D-MD), Yea
Murkowski (R-AK), Nay
Murray (D-WA), Yea
Nelson (D-FL), Yea
Nelson (D-NE), Yea
Pryor (D-AR), Yea
Reed (D-RI), Yea
Reid (D-NV), Yea
Risch (R-ID), Nay
Roberts (R-KS), Nay
Rockefeller (D-WV), Yea
Sanders (I-VT), Yea
Schumer (D-NY), Yea
Sessions (R-AL), Nay
Shaheen (D-NH), Yea
Shelby (R-AL), Nay
Snowe (R-ME), Nay
Specter (D-PA), Yea
Stabenow (D-MI), Yea
Tester (D-MT), Yea
Thune (R-SD), Nay
Udall (D-CO), Yea
Udall (D-NM), Yea
Vitter (R-LA), Nay
Voinovich (R-OH), Nay
Warner (D-VA), Yea
Webb (D-VA), Yea
Whitehouse (D-RI), Yea
Wicker (R-MS), Nay
Wyden (D-OR), Yea

Thank you Senator Casey and Senator Specter for voting Yea

Don't Ask Don't Tell

President Obama has been pretty clear in his support for changing DADT. Do I wish he was more passionate about the issue? Yes, but that is not really his style. Do I wish he would be working the phones and pressuring members of the Senate to vote for repeal? Yes. Do I wish he would be out there every day trying urging the American people to rise up and force the Senate to do the right thing? Yes.

But, the President can only do so much. It is up to the people who have been impacted by this issue to tell the story of why DADT must be repealed. It is up to the GLBT community to lead the fight to secure our full and equal place in society. We have to convince the Senator’s that asking someone to die for their country while living a lie is wrong. We have to tell the Senator’s that asking someone to defend the concepts of freedom and liberty around the world and yet not have them fully in their own country is hypocrisy at its worst and it is certainly not a very moral position. We must be willing to lead the fight for our own battles before we can ask our friends to assist us. I ask my GLBT brothers and sisters; how many phone calls to Senator’s have you made? How many letters to the editor have you written? How many petitions have you either signed or circulated? What have you done to affect the change you know is right? What have you done in the name of your own freedom, in the name of justice and liberty for you and for all?

I am an old liberal warhorse and I have been through many a political and social justice battle in my time and I am getting tired of fighting but I am also getting sick and tired of waiting for full citizenship. I am getting sick and tired of seeing kids go through the same type of bullying that I went through 40 years ago. I am sick and tired of seeing the best and the brightest this country has to offer being kicked out of the military while we are fighting two wars and sabers are rattling in other hot zones. I am sick and tired not having my relationship of 27 years seen as having the same value as Newt Gingrich’s three marriages.

I am sick and I am tired.

I know that we must continue the fight and we must call on our friends to fight with us. Don’t Ask Don’t Tell is un-American and it is a moral blight on the reputation of the great republic.