The military has done well with gays and lesbians in the ranks

It would appear that conservatives are walking two paths but only see one.

Many conservatives are asking that the military not allow gays in the services. They feel that having gays fight alongside straights would kill moral and cause all kinds of havoc. This has all come to the top of the issue list with the court ruling on the “don’t ask, don’t tell” rule that the military has lived with for 17 years.

The “don’t ask, don’t tell” deal was brokered by the Clinton administration with congress in 1993. It states that if the military doesn’t ask about the sexual preference of a recruit and if the recruit doesn’t tell his or her preference, everything will be just fine. As soon as someone let their preference be known, the military escorted them to the door and slammed it shut behind them.

But, someone the military had ushered out recently became defiant and took their case to court. They argued that the policy violated the First Amendment rights of gays and lesbians [because they could not speak their mind] and due process rights [because they were not charged with a crime].

The Obama administration, not wanting to cause a wake in the middle of elections asked the Supreme Court to keep a temporary injunction on the ruling. He wanted time for congress and the administration to develop a new policy that will be supported by the courts. The Supreme Court complied, for a while.

Now the issue is being addressed by congress.

But, here is the conservative’s double speak. First, for seventeen years since the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy has been in place, gays and straights have fought some of the toughest wars in memory side by side. The Gulf War, the Iraqi war and the Afghanistan war have all been well pursued. The moral of the troops and the support from the home front have been outstanding. No one can deny the military success of these wars.

Yet, conservatives, claim gays in the military would destroy moral. Well, where is the evidence?

The military response to the court rulings have been honorable. The latest statement from the military is that they can have a policy to allow gays and lesbians to serve their country by the end of the year.

Over the last 17 years the military has done an outstanding job. There is no reason anymore to deny anyone to serve their country.

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This is not a demo-crazy... not yet at least

It isn’t crime that defeats a democracy, it is the lack of getting the facts right.

Today, the country is on the verge of becoming a demo-crazy instead of being a democracy. So many people on both sides are spreading rumors and crazy theories because it supports their position. These irresponsible acts are picked up on the web and before you can find the source to check the facts, the tall tales get moving as fast as electrons can move email.

The latest is a claim by Michelle Bachmann, a conservative and Tea Party favorite. Anderson Cooper, CNN reporter and news show host, asked Bachmann how she would cut the budget. Instead of answering the question directly, she said, “I think we know that just within a day or so the president of the United States will be taking a trip over to India that is expected to cost the taxpayers $200 million a day. He’s taking 2,000 people with him. He’ll be renting over 870 rooms in India, and these are five-star hotel rooms at the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel. This is the kind of over-the-top spending.”

That sounded just a little too good to Bachmann to check the facts. It helped her get attention off what she would cut and supported her position that the Democrats and the President are just tax and spend people.

Rush Limbaugh starting talking about the cost. He said on his show, “in two days from now, he’ll be in India at $200 million a day.” Glenn Beck, not to be out done by just repeating rumors needed to embellish. It turns out to be a “vacation” for Obama that included warships, aircraft carriers, 3,000 people and one tenth of the U.S. Navy. Note that Bachmann said it was with 2,000 people. Wonder were the other 1,000 people came from?

Cooper thought that he should check on this little piece of information. Any responsible reporter should check the facts, especially one as big as this one. It does have to be asked why a representative of the United States congress didn’t ask the same questions before talking about them?

What Cooper found out is a little different then the story making the rounds. The short of it is, the story comes from an unnamed alleged Indian official from Maharashtra (a state in India) talking about the cost of the entire Asian trip by the American President. Now that is a great source.

The Pentagon press secretary, Geoff Morrell is quoted as saying to Cooper, “I will take the liberty this time of dismissing as absolutely absurd, this notion that somehow we were deploying 10 percent of the Navy and some 34 ships and an aircraft carrier in support of the president’s trip to Asia. That’s just comical. Nothing close to that is being done.” He went on to say that the entire war in Afghanistan is costing $190 million dollars a day.

Robert Gibbs, the White House secretary said that for security reasons, they don’t make detailed comments about travel plans and arrangements for the President. But, he did say that, “I am not going to go into how much it costs to protect the president, [but this trip] is comparable to when President Clinton and when President Bush traveled abroad. This trip doesn’t cost $200 million a day.” Trips by Bush and Clinton of similar size to similar destinations cost only about $5.2 million per day, inflation adjusted.

Every day we all need to make decisions about our government and the people that we elect to help operate it. Our decisions are based on the information we are provided. If we have bad information, we will always make bad decisions.

If that bad information comes from people that we place trust in, if they only repeat rumors and stories that sound too good to check, there is no hope, we will be a demo-crazy

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Justice wins in New York terrorism trial

In the old western movies from the 40’s and 50’s, when they would try to hang the bad guy, someone would ask, “shouldn’t we give him a trial?” The answer that came back was often, “Good idea, then we’ll hang him.”

A jury in New York yesterday convicted Tanzanian Ahmed Ghailani of conspiracy and sentenced him to 20 years to life. He was a Guantanamo Bay detainee that is said to have helped plan the bombing of United States government buildings in 1998. He was moved to a civilian court in an attempted by the Obama administration to demonstrate that “terrorist” could be tried in civilian courts. They acquitted him of more than 280 other charges.

Representative Peter King, a New York Republican, said that a light sentence like that and acquittal on the other charges will not happen again because “the Republicans are now in charge” after the recent election. King is about ready to take over the chair of Homeland Security Committee.

It sounds like the old western again. “Oh, ya, will give him a trial then hang him.”

Keep in mind this wasn’t a jury selected from Chicago or Kansas City that haven’t felt the brunt of “terrorism” like New York City. [I will continue to use the word “terrorist” for a little longer, but these aren’t terrorist, they are common criminals that have been given a glorified name that makes them out to more than they are.] The jury was selected from the people of the city that has had the most trouble with terrorism. All New Yorkers that were alive when the towers were attack remembers the deep fear and anger that exploded inside of them on that day. But yet, they found him not guilty on a slew of charges. If anyone would want to simply give him a trial and then hang him, it would be them.

Could it be, it is daringly asked, Ghailani could be innocent on the other charges? Could it be that the government hadn’t made a strong enough case? Representative King said that the rest of the Gitmo detainees should be tried in a military court. Is that because he is just looking for a hanging and not justice?

The “terrorist”, to be called criminals from here on out in this post, win the most converts to their cause when the United States operates in secrecy. When the country does hold trial in private, all kinds of stories can be weaved about what is “really” happening. To hold trial in an open civilian court with all to observe, it is much more difficult to weave the tales.

But, even deeper as far as our culture and community are concerned, it is justice. In countries that do not hold true to the trilogy of justice; laws made by consensus, enforced by an independent executive and judged by an independent court system; open trial doesn’t and can’t happen. We only need to look at what happen in Iran in the past couple of months. Three people were held captive and not given the opportunity to challenge their case in open court. We all condemned the Iranian government for not properly holding hearings and presenting their case. How is it we can condemned them for actions that we might take on our own?

Just because Ghailani was acquitted on all but one of the charges, doesn’t mean the United State’s court system isn’t the right place for these common criminals. He is going to spend 20 years in prison. New York City wasn’t attacked as many said it would be. There wasn’t an attempt to break him out of prison.

In an honest and open system like ours, there is risk. Risk that someone may get off. But that is a far better risk then giving the enemy more ammunition by holding the trials in secret prisons far from any kind of justice.

The prison at Guantanamo Bay must close. Yes, that message is for all the Peter Kings of the country, but also for President Obama.

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End earmarks

The abolishing of earmarks is an issue that is supported by the Tea Party and President Obama. With the election of many candidates that were supported by the Tea Party, it is now becoming a hot issue.


Here is a definition of earmarks:

"Provisions associated with legislation (appropriations or general legislation) that specify certain congressional spending priorities or in revenue bills that apply to a very limited number of individuals or entities. Earmarks may appear in either the legislative text or report language (committee reports accompanying reported bills and joint explanatory statement accompanying a conference report)."[3]

That is the formal definition. But, the common definition is when a representative’s or senator’s vote is gained for a certain piece of legislation by directing some – if not all – the money allocated in the legislation to the home state or district.

Sounds to me like a kick back to certain projects that supported the legislator during the elections.

In balance, we all expect our representatives and senators to bring back the bacon. They are our representatives and not others. We all want them to vote for the things we want them to and support our community the best they can.

But, if all things were fair and we attempted to keep politics out of any spending process, a mix of market and need should determine where money is spent on any project or program. To “earmark” (to use the term in the definition) money directly in the legislation is to subvert the market and need distribution process.

That point was driven home by Senator Mitch McConnel. He said that he supported a proposed ban on the addicting habit of directing money to a specific district. President Obama has criticized the process as increasing the budget deficit. This places many in congress between the White house and the Capital. [ In this after election climate, between two very hard places.]

If we as a community believe something needs to be done then we should allocate money. Then a need assessment should be conducted to be determined where the money should be spent. Where the need is most, a competitive process based on the market should be implemented. By “earmarking” money in the legislation this fair and equitable process is damaged.

End earmarks.

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A person's faith shouldn't be attacked

Soon after accepting victory as senator elect for Kentucky, Rand Paul, who was supported by the Tea Party, said, "I think that you shouldn't attack a person's faith.” This was in response to an attack ad aired during the campaign by his opponent, John Conway. In the ad, Conway asked if Paul was a true Christian based on Paul’s association with a group a number of years ago.

Oh, really? A person’s faith should not be an issue?

Paul said that while:

People are fighting the building of a Mosque in New York;

A church in Holly can’t hold service where it wants;

The President’s declaration of his faith is doubted;

A man running for office in Minnesota was attacked by the Tea Party for… well, his faith.

American has trouble with religion, either too much of it, the wrong faith or lack of it. We forget that this is a nation built on many freedoms including the freedom of religion. A person’s faith is as basic as the right to free speech and due process. All three, and more, are guaranteed in the Constitution. Yet, have the wrong religion, lack of or don’t act like you are expected and you get attacked.

You should not be judged because of your faith but by your action. It matters not what religion you are. No right is absolute, so even if your religion did require you to take anti-social action you still have a choice to act or not. If you do act in violation of the law, you should be held responsible as a common criminal, not as a zealot of your religion.

Let’s move away from this attitude that religion has anything to do with your action. No matter your religion, you are still obligated to act in balance with the best interest of the community.

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The death penalty should be put to death

It can’t be said that we as humans are perfect. So why do we occasionally take action that is based on being perfect?
The death penalty assumes that we have the absolutely correct answer. That we are certain about the crime, the evidence and the person who committed it. Yet, as humans, we know we can be mistaken.

It has been demonstrated many times over that our justice system is not perfect. After the trial and the appeal process ends, many groups from around the country examine the evidence, the process, the lawyers, prosecutors and witnesses only to find different results. The convicted is freed from a crime that everyone was certain he committed.

Even after evidence is found and presented that may prove the innocence of the convicted person, prosecutors continue to fight the new evidence. Sometimes technology has advanced since the crime was tried. It can then be used to demonstrate the innocence of the convicted. Sometimes it is witnesses that changed their story. Other times, it is the lawyer that was at fault.  Even here in the state of Michigan, Kym Worthy, the prosecutor of Wayne County, is asking the state courts to stop appeals after one year.

Kym Worthy is asking the courts to stop considering appeals after one year at the same time that Dwayne Provience contested his own conviction and won his freedom. He was convicted in 2001 of killing Rene Hunter on a crowded intersection in northwest Detroit. There were plenty of witnesses at the time of the shooting. One of the witnesses was even an off duty police officer. None of the witnesses were called by Provience’s lawyer, who has since been disbarred. A memo in police files that pointed to a drug gang as the likely killers wasn’t discovered until 8 years later, then only by accident.

It is likely, that if we had the death penalty in this state, Provience would have been put to death. If the evidence had surfaced after his death, what chance would we have to make restitution to this man?

A community needs certainty in its justice system. The kind of certainty that comes not from the blind belief that we are correct, which, if we know anything, we can’t always be. We need the certainty that comes from doing the very best we can to balance the need to keep our community safe by removing those that intend to do harm and rectify it if we are wrong.

The death penalty should be, well, in a phrase, put to death.

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Fear and hate in the campaign

This election season has been most fatiguing. Everyone is disgusted with the lack of decorum and reason in the process.


Both sides of the aisle are pursuing a no holds barred campaign that vilifies the opposing candidate. The attack ads illustrate the extreme case scenario of the position with the most horrific pictures of the candidates and the scenario they can find. Many, especially from the extreme right, have taken a very racist position to cast the left in this election as the devil himself.

Reason has been left in the gutter. Not because it has been pushed aside and fell there, but because both sides went to the gutter for their ideas. Arising from the sludge to deliver the messages they found, reason was left because they didn’t have enough arms to carry the crap and still carry reason – just in case they needed it.

People are being detained and hand cuffed. Others are being pulled down and their head stumped as police look on. Violence is beginning to seep into campaigns like sewer water that leaks through a crack in the pipe. If a Hans Brinker doesn’t find his way to the crack, more sewer will surely break through. Is it so hard to believe that with open carry laws that gun fire will find its way into the fight?

Money and hate are driving this. An unrestrained, if not hesitant this time through, flow of cash to those that hate have done all the research. The research was not on seeking the truth but on how to fire up the extremes with the sharpest rhetoric. Focus groups, surveys and observation has instructed the creators of the campaign slogans and hate ads of how to strike deep into the darkest fears of likely voters.

This is the reason this blog has not taken a position on candidates, because it isn’t the men and women that are running for office that is important. It is ideas and reason that we should examine. But, we can’t find it because slander and hate has blocked the view. Reason, at least this time around, has no place in the process. Bring up an idea that may work and ask for each side to discuss it and the extreme positions of both will come out immediately.

Those that develop and create the ads that spread hate and fear think it works. They have built an environment where the extreme has become so institutionalized that to propose ideas from a position of reason seems suicidal. If they carve out a reasoned and thoughtful position, it will be destroyed by fear and hate.

Beware, because the destruction of every culture has been driven not by reason but by fear and hate.

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