Saturday, March 27, 2010

The Holy Grail of Progressive Politics

Signing
The Signing Ceremony -- Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter
On March 21, 2010, the US House of Representatives voted (by a razor thin margin of 4 votes) to approve the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act – the so-called "health care overhaul”. Democrats also referred to it as the health insurance overhaul to avoid more angry flak, by empasizing the bill's insurance reforms. They shouldn’t have been so modest; the bill was one hundred or more years in the making – way overdue considering that it was an unmet goal for Teddy Roosevelt around the turn of the last century. Just some of the highlights of the bill, which is supported by AARP as well as AMA:

· Insurance companies cannot deny coverage based on pre-existing conditions
· Insurance companies can’t put a yearly cap on coverage
· Every American must have health insurance coverage – aid is available for low earners and insurance exchanges are available for people who can’t find other coverage.
· Dependents can be covered all the way up to age 26.

There are several other stipulations which add up to an amazing piece of legislation. As a left-leaner, I would’ve preferred to have a flat-out single-payer system or a public option. I'm still very glad that the D.C. sausage factory gave something approximating universal health care. The bill that we have leaves most of our present (capitalistic) mechanisms intact – there was very little for the Republicans to really worry about.

The bill is a testament to the “carrot” provided by smooth-talking Obama and the “stick” evidenced by the aggressive Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi. Both people overcame amazing obstacles – some people likened the bill’s passage to Jesus’ raising Lazarus from the dead. When Scott Brown was elected as GOP senator in Massachusetts, many people wrote the whole deal off. Pelosi figured out the a way to pass the bill using a process called “reconciliation” where only a simple Senate majority is needed to approve a conciliatory companion bill. Of course, she reached into a GOP bag of tricks to use that approach. We have to pause and acknowledge that it took a black man and a white woman to deliver what no combination of white men has done before. Just a thing worth mentioning (and I’m a white male).

Obama captured a political Holy Grail sought by every Democratic President of the last century. If he twiddled his thumbs for the next 6 or so years, his term would still be of monumental historical significance.

Based on GOP alarm bells, you would’ve thought Godzilla was approaching as the House prepared to vote. The bill has variously been called fascism, socialism, government-takeover and robbery by the Party of “No”. Even before the ink was dry on Obama’s signature, 12+ state attorneys general (including one Democrat) prepared a joint lawsuit claiming that the bill violates “states’ rights”. Just hearing that phrase “states’ rights” gives me the willies – it harks back to the days of Dixiecrats and segregation.

How ugly did it get right after the bill was signed on March 21st? Well several Democratic party state headquarters had bricks tossed through their windows. One Texas legislator, Republican Louie Gohmert made a motion to repeal the 17th Amendment – he feels that the popular vote can’t reliably give us a good group of Senators. GOP talking heads ranted and raved about repealing the bill after the 2010 elections (unlikely to happen). Former candidate Sarah Palin did a PowerPoint of the USA, using crosshairs to show which legislators need to be “taken out” in the next election.

So what are the real, dire consequences that we Americans have to look to? The DOW financial average actually surged for the two days following the bill signing; both Obama and the Health bill’s approval ratings went up too. There will be some legal challenges, and devil is in the details of course. But one of the major, major legislative goals has been achieved – very much like the fabled pot of gold at the end of the political rainbow.

Obama also redeemed himself in the eyes of Democrats who once thought he was too professorial and aloof to move anything along. In truth, Nancy Pelosi was the bulldozer who cleared much of the path -- appeasing the likes of pro-lifer Bart Stupak as well as public option champion Dennis Kucinich to move the bill across. No matter who provided the most push, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is a once-in-a-lifetime achievement. It’s a grand, almost mythic moment which will live in our memories (and history pages) for many years to come.

© 2010 blogSpotter

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Friday, March 19, 2010

The Dallas Green Party Rules

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2010 Saint Patrick's on Greenville -- Picture by blogSpotter

by blogSpotter
You might be experiencing deja vu -- it may seem that you've already read this Saint Patrick's blog. Well faith and begorrah, maybe you have. I had it as a blip on last week's Oscar blog, and decided it deserved a blog entry unto itself, along with another photo.

East Dallas' Greenville Avenue, with its eclectic mix of bars, ethnic restaurants, flea markets, old theaters and what-not, is a worthy destination all year-round. On March 13th 2010, we had the perfect convergence of crystal blue sky, 66 degree weather, and 80,000 joyful Irish wanna-bes flooding Greeville Avenue -- making a good thing all that much better. Here briefly is a replay of that event.

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I have to point out that Dallas has its own Green Party. Nothing to do with the environment -- we’re talking a Saint Patrick’s celebration on Lower Greenville Avenue. No city (except maybe Dublin, Ireland) has a lock on Saint Patrick; many American cities have parades and parties in his honor. For some reason, the Dallas version has exploded into a Green orgy that sprawls across all of East Dallas in a crazed, beer-bust-a-palooza that goes all day and partly into the next.

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A line down the block on Goodwin Ave -- Picture by blogSpotter

Being middle-aged and a non-drinker, I’ve harrumphed at it for many years (I live in East Dallas no less). I finally decided that if I can’t beat them, I’ll join them. I went and spent three hours in “the belly of the beast”. I witnessed a man with a green beard and a green dog -- he was nothing compared to another man wearing the green thong from Borat. The overall tone was Halloween with a green theme, intersecting maybe the Dog Parade from Easter at Lee Park.

SECOND BASE

I was groped by one woman lurching thru the crowd, and invited to dine with three ladies (total strangers) at Café Brazil. I would’ve said yes, but had already just chowed down two Cheeseburgers. Later in the evening I accidentally got to second base with an Asian woman. We bumped into each other and she started to fall. I reached to grab her, afraid she would strike the sidewalk. She turned as I grabbed, and I grabbed a whole hand full of boob. I was seriously embarrassed but she was drunk and didn’t appear to notice or care. I hoped nobody saw, but someone yelled, "Get a good feel?” from a car going by. I’ll never live down the shame.

Overall, Saint Patrick’s was a lot of fun and I’ll probably be back. There is too much in the way of beer-induced debauchery, youthful exuberance and green-painted pit bulls for me to stay away any time in the future.

© 2010 blogSpotter

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Saturday, March 13, 2010

2010 Oscar Marathon

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An Iraq war movie to keep you on edge ... -- Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter
This weekend I watched a lot of movies, couch potato that I am. I watched the much-touted Hurt Locker and didn’t really care much for it. I don’t like the war movie genre, so no disrespect meant to the actors or director. It came to a tedious crawl in places and it overall had a murky, blurred presentation where I can’t follow the action very well. I also have trouble relating to a main character who’d rather do a second tour of bomb-defusing than be back in America with his wife and son.

I also watched Gentlemen Broncos, another offbeat comedy from the people who brought us Napoleon Dynamite. This movie was cute, but clearly no Dynamite -- still funny and easily worth a free viewing when it comes to Lifetime or USA network TV.

Precious
A monumental movie -- Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

Last of all, I watched Precious which I think is, hyperbolically speaking, a monumental piece of movie making. Gabourey Sidibe plays Precious Jones, a girl victimized by poverty, abusive parents and a looks-obsessed, oppressive society-at-large. Her alternative school teacher, Blu Rain and her social worker, Mrs. Weiss can both see something beautiful, creative and potent underneath the disheveled exterior of Precious. They come together to bring her out of her shell and Precious turns her life around -- winning a literacy award and breaking free from her poisonous, destructive mother (played to Oscar winning perfection by Mo’Nique). Precious stands out so well, I honestly see it as a milestone movie that people talk about decades from now. I know that some people objected to the ghetto portrayal of African Americans living on welfare, but the movie was honest in its intentions as well as its delivery. Kudos to Oprah Winfrey and Tyler Perry for helping bring it to fruition.

© 2010 blogSpotter

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Sunday, March 07, 2010

Zombies Among us

Zombieland-poster
A zombie road movie to love -- Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter
This weekend we’re having typical Texas yo-yo weather. Friday was sunny and 70, today is cold and rainy. Perfect weekend for me to catch up on some movies which I did with Zombieland (2009, Columbia Pictures) and a couple of others that were less review-worthy. One thing you can pretty much tell from the Zombieland movie posters and the fact it stars Woody Harrelson -- it’s an over-the-top comedy.

It is an over-the-top, silly comedy which made me fall off the couch a couple of times, with laughter. Note to serious people everywhere: silly is not a bad thing, sometimes it’s a needed prescription for what ails you.

Zombieland starts from a precept which is almost now cliché; a fast-acting virus has attacked the human race and turned 99% of them into slobbering, drooling cannibal zombies. The healthy remaining humans are few and far between -- they must use brutal survival skills (eg, “double tap“) to dispatch the lurching monsters. This gives us a charmingly odd quartet of people who happen into each other (each one named after a city of origin) on a road trip of sorts:

Columbus -- a shy, sweet still-virginal 20 year old college boy (Played by Jessie Eisentstein).
Tallahassee -- a mean, nasty albeit charming, gun-slinging, middle-aged man with a penchant for twinkies and killing zombies for fun (Harrelson, of course)
Wichita -- A beautiful 20-something con woman who thinks nothing of stealing cars and men’s hearts (Emma Stone)
Little Rock -- Wichita’s precocious 12 year old cohort who delivers dome of the movie’s best lines (Abigail Breslin)

This movie has something to offer everyone and it crosses thru several of my favorite genres. Men will love the bloody cartoon violence whereby zombies are decapitated, run over by cars and otherwise taken out of commission. Women will like the budding romance between Columbus and Wichita. I myself love road movies (eg, Paper Moon , It Happened One Night, even Thelma and Louise). There’s no better way to see that the journey often exceeds the destination -- maybe it is the destination.

Zombieland has our travelers going (somewhat randomly) from Garland, Texas to Los Angeles via a black Escalade and then a stolen yellow Hummer (found with only arms clutching the steering wheel -- one must assume that zombies feasted on the rest of the owner’s body). I like any movie with a southwest flavor. Due to the travel trajectory of this movie, we get some Willy Nelson, progressive country music backdrop, Indian casinos and southwest artifacts along the way. (Tragically, some of the artifacts get deliberately smashed to pieces).

Bill Murray has a hilarious cameo midway, and Tallahassee makes it clear that he’s an ultimate Murray fan. Well, I’m a Woody Harrelson fan so we’ve got almost a hat trick going here. Another of my favorite things are “movies within movies” and movies that pay homage to other great movies. Zombieland is a grab bag of movie references (not the least of which is the main characters watching and reenacting Ghostbusters at Bill Murray’s LA mansion). This isn’t a satire (like the Scary Movie series) but rather a clever mixing and matching of motifs for an altogether original and funny picture.

MODERN FAMILY ET AL
I’ve exhausted my creative energy on Zombieland so now I’m becoming a zombie myself. However I must mention that Wednesdays on ABC have become the new must-see television night. With The Middle, Modern Family, Cougar Town and Ugly Betty, there’s an unstoppable comedy train coming through on ABC. Last week’s Modern Family had the adoptive gay fathers being horrified that their infant daughter’s first word is “Mommy”, said to a woman babysitter. “She can tell you have (uhm) breasts and other lady parts. You’re her new mother. (beginning to sob) She‘s made her choice”. Elsewhere on the show, Manny and his step-dad are both afraid to go on the big roller coaster. The mother, totally disgusted that she must ride alone says, “Here is my purse, here is my fluffy hat, and there’s the lady’s room if either of you guys needs to go to the bathroom”. Two laugh out loud moments, one TV show. It’s hard to do but they did it.

The rain has let up a little and it’s near dinner hour, so I’ll sign off now.

© 2010 blogSpotter

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Monday, March 01, 2010

A Two-Bit Blog

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Nary a quarter for my thoughts? -- Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter
Hello, readers. I’m now contemplating the unsung fifth anniversary of this blog, Strange Fascination. SF’s birthday was January 5th but there was (sadly :-( ) no party thrown for it. Here are but some of the slings and arrows that have befallen our favorite blog:

1. Fewer articles because the author has been absorbed with job and family issues over the last year
2. Reduced hit count and readership due in large part to the previous item
3. Reduced ad revenue due to the economy and the incredible ubiquity of blogs (everybody writes one)

Speaking to the first bullet, blog-writing is a lot of work and I really must have the “free cycles” to devote to it. I just quit doing my “marketing-oriented” blog, Avenue G – it was on a very uninspired autopilot for the last two years and it wasn’t very successful. Time to pull the plug on that one.

Now I’m thinking of Frank Romano (the father on Everybody Loves Raymond) -- he was played by the late and very talented Peter Boyle. In one of the earlier episodes, Frank gets a joke published in Reader’s Digest. He’s so emboldened by that, he decides that he's a witty editorialist and keeps trying to get his son Raymond (a sports writer for the local paper) to show his work to the editor. The editor doesn’t want to publish articles about toilet paper or paint drying (Frank’s milieu) – Raymond has to tell Frank tactfully that he stinks as a writer.

The show is from the mid-1990’s and it’s funny that they approached the whole topic with “old media” (no blogs or Internet) and yet the truth of it certainly persists… Frank Romano is a talentless blow-hard who needs to refrain from writing; sometimes blogSpotter has to wonder if he isn’t another Frank Romano. I did blog about toilets back in 2005.

I’m fairly liberal (both fiscally and socially) and vote as a Democrat. I’m also theistic but theistic outside of organized religion. It’s really ironic that the handful of people who read me regularly are religiously and politically conservative and several are coworkers to boot. Have to say, I haven’t been as forthcoming or “out there” as I could be given the fact that work cohorts and possibly even bosses might read the blog. I used to send out tickler emails to friends and coworkers when I first began with Strange Fascination – that probably served to confine me as things moved along.

A blog idea I keep kicking around is one in which I blow past some of the conventions that constrain me here. In so doing, I’d create another URL and not post it to any direct acquaintances. Hello, total strangers. (Regular readers, feel free to advise me whether this is a good idea or not).

I’m not really to that point yet, and the “muse” would still need to return. Right now, the muse has left the building (hopefully just to stretch its legs) and I’m awaiting his return.

© 2010 blogSpotter

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