Charlie Rose, the most erudite, urbane, and courteous interviewer on the planet, is for me, going from great to grate. He interviewed Milton Friedman this week. The esteemed nonagenarian prattles on about how great the economy is doing and how surprised he is that anyone could write anything negative about it. So what does Rose do? He follows up with more polite, softball questions. Does he ask Dr. Friedman about the 45 million Americans without health insurance? What about record consumer indebtedness and negative savings rates? (Probably a plus in Friedman-think.) The third of the rising number of personal bankruptcies due to medical castastrophes? No, nope, nada. Rose similarly coddled Karen Hughes of the Bush administration recently (see previous post).

My gas bill this month is $335, a three-fold increase over previous cold weather amounts. This while the oil companies reap record profits. What's my state government doing about it? They vote out the one local hero who's been fighting for consumer rights for ten years.

Voting record for the confirmation of former Citizen's Utility Board head Martin Cohen for Illinois Commerce Commissioner. From Eric Zorn's blog in the Chicago tribune.

22 Against Cohen- 13 Republicans, 8 Democrats, 1 Independent

James Clayborne (D) -2006
James DeLeo (D) --2006
Arthur Wilhelmi (D) -2006
Iris Martinez (D) --2008
Donne Trotter (D)--2008
William Haine (D)--2008
Rickey Hendon (D)--2008
Emil Jones (D)--2008
---
Larry Bomke (R)--2006
Bill Brady (R)--2006
Dan Cronin (R) --2006
Kirk Dillard (R)--2006
Wendell Jones (R)--2006
John Millner (R)--2006
Ed Petka (R)--2006
Peter Roskam (R)--2006
Todd Sieben (R)--2006
Frank Watson (R)--2006
Carole Pankau (R)--2008
William Peterson (R)--2008
Christine Radogno (R)--2008

James Meeks (I) -2006

9 voting present in practical opposition to Cohen, all Democrats

Jacqueline Collins (D)--2006
Debbie Halvorson (D)--2006
Terry Link (D)--2006
Edward Maloney (D)--2006
Antonio Munoz (D)--2006
George Shadid (D)--2006
Gary Forby (D)--2008
John Sullivan (D)--2008
Lou Viverito (D)--2008

28 For Cohen, 14 Republicans, 14 Democrats

Cheryl Axley (R) -2006
Adeline Geo-Karis (R)--2006
John Jones (R)--2006
Chris Lauzen (R)--2006
Dave Luechtefeld (R)--2006
Steve Rauschenberger (R)--2006
Dale Righter (R)--2006
Dale Risinger (R)--2006
Dan Rutherford (R)--2006
Dave Syverson (R)--2006
Richard Winkel (R)--2006
Pamela Althoff (R)--2008
Brad Burzynski (R)--2008
Gary Dahl (R)--2008
---
Maggie Crotty (D)--2006
John Cullerton (D) --2006
Deanna Demuzio (D)--2006
Don Harmon (D)--2006
Mattie Hunter (D)--2006
Mike Jacobs (D)--2006
Kimberly Lightford (D)--2006
Kwame Raoul (D)--2006
Carol Ronen (D)--2006
Martin Sandoval (D)--2006
Jeff Schoenberg (D)--2006
Miguel del Valle (D)--2008
Susan Garrett (D)--2008
Ira Silverstein (D)--2008

So much for the Democrats as the party that protects the average person against big-money business interests.

Did you see the Karen Hughes interview on Charlie Rose? Is this woman out of her gourd? It seems to me that the entire concept behind her office (Under-secretary of State for Public Diplomacy) is that the rest of the world is basically like a bunch of red-state idiots that can be told that America is "Good". As if the
Arab "street" has no recollection of our support of the Shah, Saddam, the House of Saud, the dictatorship in Egypt, Israel, or the invasion of Iraq. And Charlie Rose doesn't even bring this up! These are absurd times--to say the least. (My apologies to any red-state idiot reading this.)

Fifteen percent of the U.S. GDP goes to health care with only 85% coverage. In western countries with universal health care, 9% of their GDP goes to health care with 100% coverage. They have lesser rates of infant mortality, heart disease, etc. The solution is obvious, isn't it gentle blog reader? The right-wing resorts to anything to forestall the inevitable solution just to protect wealth, entrenched power, and bigotry. Wouldn't it be nice if we could just drop kick the contemptible yahoos responsible for prolonging our current health-care catastrophe out of Washington, D.C.?

Self portrait.

Here's my charcoal rendition of everybody's favorite liberal.

As for "Bring them home safe". Not only is it bad grammar, it's yet another blatently false sentiment from chicken hawks. Start the demobilization now.

I saw a great magnetic yellow ribbon sticker on a car the other day. It read "Go Bears". It's about time we buried the "Support Our Troops" line. Let's face it. It's become a cheap lie. Of course I support the troops. (Don't worry, we're not going to dump on the troops; some of us learned something from the Vietnam War.) They are the only real heroes in this whole thing. They're putting their lives on the line to protect our big, fat, sorry, reality-TV-watching asses. And we're simply not worthy. Why not? Because we shouldn't have put them in harm's way in Iraq in the first place. Don't get me wrong. I'm not a 100% pacifist. I think our retaliation against the Taliban in Afghanistan is justifiable. As we're all painfully aware, the political environment in that failed state served as the launching pad for 9/11. I can see only two valid positions: if you're for the war then volunteer to fight it, otherwise you must protest it. Putting a "Support Our Troops" magnetic yellow ribbon on your gas guzzler is the apotheosis of dip-shittedness.

On the bright side, the White Sox did win the World Series. Sweep!

Haven't posted much lately. Back now. Stream of consciousness. What's up America? Is it just me or has anyone else noticed how we seem to be silently freaking out? We've been conned into invading another country by our dubiously elected leaders and somewhat take it in stride; we're at the head of the class when it comes to handing over more of the world's resources to the wealthy; we're at the forefront of global-warming advocacy (and proud of it!). How long can this center hold? I think the breakdown is manifesting in pathological ways: rampant petty rudeness, vast underemployment that's recognized but barely acknowledged, the thoroughly sold-out and compromised fourth estate knowingly complicit in selling the Iraq War. For the world's foremost superpower, we're acting awfully insecure. In some ways the Iraq invasion is a lot like jail house psychology: find the weakest, most defenseless punk and beat him mercilessly to show everyone else how bad you are.