Let's Dissolve Labels in a Glass of Water

From The Nation, in which a woman writes to Liza Featherstone for advice under the headline "I'm a Marxist-Feminist Slut - How Do I Find an Open Relationship?": 

"I’m a 32-year-old woman who would like to have kids and a life partner in the not-so-distant future. And lucky me! I’ve recently started dating an excellent candidate. But I can’t even pretend to think it’s possible (or desirable) to have sex with just one person for the rest of my life or even, frankly, for a few years. 
 

Monogamy feels antithetical to the type of feminism and anticapitalism I subscribe to. I am repulsed by the idea of being a man’s property. Also, monogamy—like capitalism—requires us to believe in a false scarcity: that we have to struggle for every little bit and that everything we gain comes at someone else’s expense. The kind of liberatory future I’d like to see is one of abundance and generosity and sharing. One of the few places we can experiment with that now is in our love lives. 


But ALL the decent men I’ve dated are really opposed to open relationships, while the men I’ve slept with who say they fancy the idea don’t ever stick around long enough for the “relationship” part of an open relationship. This leaves me feeling like once I find a partner, the options are: 1) cheating (crummy and unethical, also a big anxiety-inducing headache); 2) waiting for the mythical “one” who will magically make me never attracted to anyone else (I’m fairly certain this is a hoax); or 3) retire from my glorious days as a loud, proud slut and gradually wither away inside as I suffocate one of the parts of my life, personality, and politics I cherish most. Please tell me there is another option out there. 

—A Marxist-Feminist Slut
"

Dear MFS, 

I'm a 36-year-old woman who has four kids and a husband presently.  And blessed me!  We're still together after 14 years of marriage with no end in sight.  But I can't even pretend to think it's possible (or desirable) to limit yourself to only one choice of polyamory in your future, no matter how difficult you think it may be. 

Monogamy is likely antithetical to the feminism and Marxist leanings you subscribe to, just as polyamory is antithetical to the Catholic and conservative leanings I subscribe to.  But your assumption that monogamy is a false scarcity is quite untrue, let me assure you.  Let me break down the two items you highlight: 

"...we have to struggle for every little bit..."  Little bit of what?  Tapping enough booty in your lifetime, earning every dollar with some honest work, allowing failure to become the ultimate teacher and guide?  Let me tell you, if you find the right person, getting enough booty will never be a problem again.  Trust.  But I'll address the honest work and failure in the next item: 

"...that everything we gain comes at someone else's expense."  Capitalism is not a finite pie that you must grab enough of before someone else does.  Where capitalism creates opportunity for both failure and success, it also creates a space for opportunity, flexibility, and competition that puts you and me, the consumers, in full control.  Small business owners, when mostly unchecked by crippling governmental regulations and red tape, start to realize that the consumer is the one who can check and uncheck a business's success faster than any government agency could dream of.  

The government you dream of brokering abundance, generosity, and sharing is what is mythical, unlike a dude who likes sharing you with others.  Also, abundance and sharing are directly non-proportional in a socialist society (see Venezuela), and so the third quality, generosity, gets thrown to the wayside when citizens don't even have enough for themselves to live.  It leaves a vacuum where desperation, violence, and eventually rebellion are inevitable. 

As a Catholic married prude, however, I wonder if I can't convince you that a monogamous marriage has not withered and suffocated me from my life, personality, and politics.  

In the commonwealth where we were married, my husband and I didn't have to sign any document that stated I was his property.  In fact, if that were the case we'd like have found another state or commonwealth that DIDN'T have that obligation listed.  The marriage contract we entered into (recognized by my community) and eventually the marriage covenant we entered into (recognized by God) did not have anything to do with ownership.  The key here is sacrificial love.  

Yes, I gave up my maiden name and took his; it makes our family unit easily identifiable, my children a living and breathing testament to our singular unity.  

Yes, I gave up working outside the home; this enables me to provide abundance, generosity, and sharing of love in our home of my own free will.  

Yes, I gave up making choices exclusively for myself; I now practice budgeting, instruction, cleanliness, and sacrificial love for the benefit of five others.  

In return of giving myself up for the betterment of my spouse and family, my husband has done the same.  He travels extensively and I'm lucky to see him 50% of my week.  He works incessantly and tirelessly, many nights dragging himself to bed as the sun peeks above the horizon.  He makes choices not based on whether it is healthy for him to be sleep-deprived and sitting in a car or at his desk for thousands of hours a year, but for what he can do to provide peace of mind and abundance for his family's future.  

Think of a marriage as each person having a glass full of water, representing their very self, their identity, their political and religious beliefs (even lack thereof), the core of their being.  Marriage is not the exchange of a portion of that water.  It is not the exchange of an unequal portion of that water, in which one person gives more than the other; you're just going to have wet socks.  It is not instantly dropping your glass and withering away as a dependent on someone else's water.  Marriage is the free will to exchange your glass with your spouse's.  Kinda scary, right?  You're still you and your spouse is still them; yet in your hands rests the most precious part of your spouse, and in his hands, yours. 

Now, if you find that you have similar values and beliefs in politics or ethereal beings, you might see how you might treat this glass of water as carefully as your own.  Sometimes, you may get scared and try to take your glass back.  You may try to hold both glasses at the same time.  You may purposefully empty part or all of your spouse's glass.  You may break your spouse's glass, intentionally or not.  If you have kids, then you both are juggling their glasses that eventually you need to give back to them, hopefully intact and full to the brim, when they go into the world.  And yet, in the context of the relationship, the goal is the same: Observing your spouse handle the most cherished part of yourself will show you how much they love you.  

So, don't despair if you have to give monogamy a go.  My gentle final suggestion?  Perhaps you should consider practicing capitalism in your community and elements of socialism in your relationship/marriage and not the other way around.  

-- A Concerned Catholic Citizen

P.S.  Liza's lamentation that "radicals can be conservative in their personal lives" is wholly exclusionary.  There are radicals on all sides of the political spectrum, even if we don't have the fortitude to study and recognize it.  I'd take on the rest of Liza's advice to you, MFS, but frankly I don't have the fortitude to offer enough charity to that "advice columnist" this late in the day.  Perhaps another time. --CCC

Pussy Hats Galore

She's baaaaaack.

After over four years of media blackout, it's time I spoke up again.

Eight years ago, I wrote about Barack Hussein Obama, a man.  He is now a former President, and this country elected Donald J. Trump in his place.

No one is more bowled over by the fact that the SOB actually managed to get elected to the White House.  It's two months after election night and I can't believe he pulled it off (and now many more think the election was illegitimate as his opponent, Hillary Clinton, won the popular vote by nearly 3 million, and blasted the Electoral College is unfair, antiquated, racist, or a combination of the three).

Electoral College aside, the election was a slinging mudfest of the highest order.  Many on the left side of the aisle are wailing and gnashing their teeth today, the day after inauguration, and suddenly clinging to the Constitution have decided to start protesting and paying attention to the Executive Branch, worried that the abuses that Obama exercised on executive orders and more will be used by the incoming President.  (Common sense and foresight don't necessarily go hand in hand, apparently.)

Today marks the Women's March on Washington.  As you can see from CNN, women are marching all over the globe, including DC, New York City, Chicago, London, Paris, and Berlin.  As you can also see, there's a lot of pink in those photos, mostly because leading up to the event there was a campaign to knit as many "pussy hats" as possible to wear to the event, because women can't make a statement about rights or injustices without wearing genitalia on their heads to ensure a listening audience.  I had thought those events were called bachelorette parties.

But that's not the point.  In a social media conversation yesterday, I was told that if a pro-life lady like myself wanted to march, I would not be welcomed.  I wondered aloud why the Women's March was called as such when the aims and goals of the march were only for certain classes of women:

-Non-Christian women
-Liberal-leaning women
-Pro-choice women
-Non-white women
-Women who are not cisgender or straight
-Women who are not citizens of the US

And yet, in the next paragraph:

This march is the first step towards unifying our communities, grounded in new relationships, to create change from the grassroots level up.

The social media conversation went on a little longer, and I insisted that title of the march was misleading.  This was not a march for all women.  The criteria to march was not only to own a vagina, as the title inferred.  Why not call it the Women's Rights March?  Why not Women's Choice March?  How about the Women's Equality March (because it's impossible for men to get an abortion)?  I'm not following the logic here.  Men were welcome, too, apparently, but only if they were non-Christian, pro-choice, etc. (see list above).

Unification our communities will not happen the further we divide each other into smaller and smaller bento boxes of classes.  When we slap labels onto each other, we enable others to see us as only part(s) of our whole.  Humans were actually made as more than the sum of their parts; seeing a face and calling someone by name will make them real and whole to us.  It's a lot easier to bash someone when you only see them as a meme.

Upon the close of the day, we see that Madonna thought about blowing up the White House.  Someone please remind her to check her privilege for being able to freely admit to terrorist thoughts in public.

PER: Post-Election Ramblings

If you wanted an organized post... this ain't it.  But the election did wake me from a kid-imposed reverie, so how do you do, long lost readers!

The guy I voted for didn't win.  No surprise there though - he was just trying to get 5% of the vote.  He racked up about 348,000 votes with $1 million while it took the other two major candidates over $6 billion to get elected.  Neither candidate's campaign money would have bought much, though, so we enter into another deadlocked government in which everyone's voice is heard but nothing gets done.

To wit:  There's been so much focus on the economy, and right now the only economy I would care to focus on is my own right now.  I think every generation goes through this - some precipice they feel the country is standing on, looking over an abyss of unknown, wondering where the future and elected politicians will take them.  Every era has a defining moment, and yet the sun still rises.  We've still got thousands of people living in Third World country conditions in NY and NJ after Hurricane/Superstorm Sandy and now Winter Storm Athena is setting her wintry sights on the NE seaboard.

Bush-era tax cuts are set to expire this year, and there's no indication now that they will be renewed.  For folks who have shored up their monetary resources to ensure a comfortable retirement (i.e. not depend so much on government resources at end of life), this is now a serious problem.  And with the baby boomers entering retirement age and flooding Medicare and Social Security, I see only one thing (and this I am very graphic about):  The stuck pig is about to be bled dry.  And this doesn't even include other social programs that have yet to fully come to fruition.

We're in the midst of another cultural revolution right now, which is an exciting time for many people.  The youth vote turnout is high, states are decriminalizing pot and gay marriage, the discussions about equal pay for men and women have finally been taking hold, and the racial demographic of our landscape is changing rapidly.  It's also a discouraging time for others, as discussions about women's rights and contraception are still forefront on the men of Capitol Hill.

Speaking of culture, I want to point out that American culture has always been tied to racial diversity, even if over the last generation it seems that white folks are just white folks. The Germans, Polish and Italians in my grandparents' day are today's Latinos, Middle Easterners and Chinese.  Maybe it's a matter of labeling.  But not every immigrant in this country is looking for a handout - in fact, there are many more who came here from socialist countries and found the United States to be a wide-open land of opportunity, one that was not tied down to a militaristic or socialist stronghold, where even the worst days in poverty on U.S. soil didn't come close to comparing to life in their home territory.

So what does this have to do with the Presidential election?  I think there are a few things to point out:

- Obama may have won, but by a very small margin.  If there's any hope for the Democrats to retain Presidential power post 2016, his policies must be sold better to the American public.  They are still incredibly polarizing; as we move through the months toward each deadline in Obamacare, the stakes will simply be higher.

- Note to elected officials:  Public assistance cannot be sold, voted on or based on race, skin color or age anymore.  All demographics in varying degree are now demanding it.  

- It is bad when men try to talk about women's rights.  At all.

- Duuuuuuuuuuuuude.  More tax income!

- The financial preparations my husband and I must make for us and our children are now more solidly tied to public policy than ever before.

This last point is what sticks in my mind while we move forward and hope that our three elected branches of government might work together on compromise.  And it's not just asking Republicans to stop filibustering and play nice with Obama's ideas - that is not compromise.  It means Obama and Democrats taking a step back from the left, Republicans taking a step back from the right, and stopping the pendulum from swinging so hard.

Perhaps the scariest precipice of all?  Living free.  I think a friend of mine said it best - when it comes to social justice, there's a difference between giving a leg up and being the legs.

Censored Content xxx

Oppose SOPA/PIPA.  Tell your Senator.  Tell your Representative.

Stop using this "quote" by Thomas Jefferson

"The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and and give to those who would not."

This is not Thomas Jefferson's quote.  The earliest appearance of this statement was 1986.

However, he did say this:

To take from one, because it is thought that his own industry and that of his fathers has acquired too much, in order to spare to others, who, or whose fathers have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association, the guarantee to every one of a free exercise of his industry, & the fruits acquired by it. 

If we're going to do a movement right, let's start with not inserting words into our Founding Fathers' mouths.

OWS: "You may be passionate but it is not enough to resolve the crisis"

Some dude from the UK put it best, and I think every American should be embarrassed of this.  Education is the best start to figuring out a solution, not just protesting with a vague list of demands.  The wealthy know that the middle class and poor are dumb about money and the economy (and it's true).  Once we figure this out, we can have an intelligent conversation about this and find solutions.  In the meantime, I'm getting back to work. 

This is taken from the comments section of the article "Here's What the Wall Street Protesters Are So Angry About," in reference to a slew of charts depicting what the OWS are protesting (even though they don't really know it?) 

Jatin Luthia · Ealing, United Kingdom

Though the data is correct, the context of analysis is definitely incorrect. American labor has been winning compared to the rest of the world for a long time. The current disparity has largely risen from the fact that while capital has largely stayed in the US and labor has partially equalised over the rest of the world. Bear in mind though that wages in India and China are indeed less. With businesses getting more complex and global, CEOs are likely to get paid more (Though some amounts are obnoxious). It is businesses job to be competitive and make profits and it is labor's job to be competitive. If it is too costly to hire someone, economics will dictate that labor will move elsewhere. If wall street protests do make wall street dysfunctional, then capital will move away too and it will just be a double-whammy for labor as capital is a very competitive resource that US has especially as the Dollar holds out as a currency of choice. Such simplistic graphs and comments distort long-term economic realities and the result of years of trade and labour barriers followed by the developed world. Once the barriers started lifting, economic reality became different. I think more people need to understand economics than simply blame capital as capital has no direct social commitment. Its commitment to society is more indirect and derivative.

Reply ·  1 · Like · Follow Post · 15 hours ago

• Henry Harvey
  So what you're saying is that it's the job of business to be competitive and make profit, even if it means throwing out of work the people that live in the country where that business originated.
  
  
  The inherent unfairness in globalization is that a company can relocate whereas I can't realistically move my family to another country.
  
  
  I don't think one could be seen as opposed to capital per se if the wish is only to see a situation in which the people who manage corporations invest capital in the countries and the people who have helped them to get so rich and powerful.
  
  
  Much of the rage in the Occupy Wall Street movement comes from the realization that the multinational corporations and the financial institutions are selling us short, both literally and figuratively.
  Reply ·  1 · Like · 11 hours ago
  
  
  
• Jatin Luthia · Ealing, United Kingdom
  Henry Harvey Your comments are not economically driven. I am saying what incents each section of business. It is definitely the job of business to be competitive and make profits. Origination of business is very relative. Most American conglomerates earn more revenues overseas. How do you define "Origination"? Incorporation is not sufficient to define origination. You may be passionate but it is not enough to resolve the crisis. I think a matured response combining passion, economics and politics would be more useful. Otherwise, it may sound like irrational rabble-rousing and leave the US insular and lagging. The key to success of the US economy has been its adaptability.
  Reply · Like · 6 hours ago
  
  

Social Media, News, and my Shopping Habits

How about this for making news outlets flocking to social media:  I no longer get my first dose of news from a conventional journalist-type source, but from Facebook.

In the last month or so, I have found out on Facebook that:

1) Shaquille O'Neal is retiring.
2) Elizabeth Taylor and Michael Jackson died.
3) There was a tornado in MA, which hit very close to some of my family in CT.
4) The Vancouver Canucks won Game 1 of the Stanley Cup final.
5) A luxury candle company has a not-so-luxurious PR firm.

Okay, that last one just annoyed the heck out of me - I won a free candle on Facebook.  I've won a lot of other stuff online too (I got a free bottle of Clinique skin tone evener on Twitter) because I'm kind of a troll that way, but the candle did not come to me for over a month.  After speaking with the girl at the PR firm who handled it when the candle was two weeks late, still no candle by Memorial Day weekend - and I ended up copying the luxury candle company on my next email voicing my disappointment.  I got an email from who I assume was the PR firm manager overnighting the candle to me.  We'll see if it's on my doorstep for real by 3 p.m. today, but seriously?  Aren't PR firms paid not to do this crap?

ANYWAY.  The excitement in my life comes less from reading headlines and more from seeing what my friends are reporting.  I can of course get the details from other news outlets, of course, but even Shaq took to Twitter to report his big news, and you know CNN had some peons watching Twitter feeds to report anything that might be newsworthy.

Isn't it strange how slowly, surely, the media middleman is becoming a periphery to our source of gossip and news instead of the center?  I remember watching the 6 o'clock news every night with Peter Jennings when I was kid, right before Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy! came on.  Even more so, my parents would probably recall how they found out about the Challenger explosion through the TV; even back in 2001 when 9/11 happened, I heard about it on the radio first.

But not today.  A measly 10 years after 9/11 and I no longer check CNN or BBC first; it's Facebook I go to catch up first, then review the news later.  Granted, the gossipy-type news usually is filtered first through social media, not the international news or conflicts that many Americans don't choose or care to follow, but then again I have a social circle that does extend beyond the U.S., and I end up finding things that might be popular overseas before anyone here even knows about it.  Amazing.

What else does social media bring me?  A freaking ton of coupons, that's what.  Any time I sign up for something, it's because I saw it on Facebook.  ShoeDazzle, Ideeli.com, Sephora, Bluefly... this targeted ad stuff is really quite scary.  I've been eying a dress for a few days and it kept coming up on every ad that I saw, no matter what website I'd go to.  Eventually I got a coupon in my email and was able to purchase the dress for another 30% off, but still... how do you put on blinders to this stuff?  At least we had an excuse to ignore billboards when we're driving down the thruway, but you can't avoid moving ads and audio clips when you're trying to read the news.

If you don't hear from me for another four months, just make sure I didn't get sucked into another ad vortex and am drowning in email special offers.  If you'll excuse me, I need to sign up for email notifications from the newest partnership between Groupon and Expedia.

Unionize, Privatize, Budgetize

Wisconsin schools call off classes as budget protests continue

You've seen this story before - maybe in a town near you.  It's been rampant the last few years, the public workers of this country beginning to feel the pinch of their states' budgets.  It's been felt acutely in states such as California and New York, but now Wisconsin is on the national media radar with several school systems canceling classes, anticipating that several teachers will protest a bill asking them to pay more towards their benefits and take away most of their collective bargaining rights.

I've never had the pleasure of working in the public sector before (there's a touch of sarcasm there), although the benefits are quite cushy and have been for some time.  Many workers both public and private enjoy the protection of unions, formed in order to protect the rights and prevent the abuse of workers.  Low-skill workers used to be taken advantage of by deplorable working conditions and low wages.

Today, the prevalence of low pay and dangerous work conditions are mitigated by the presence of unions, and while that's all and good, unions have now shifted their focus to securing adequate pay and benefits increases on a regular basis.  For government unions, this comes at the expense of the taxpayers, of which most are in the private sector and suffering their own conundrum of their employers reducing their benefits, but with no rights to picket.  (For private unions, they usually only have one choice - keep paying out the nose until they go bankrupt and EVERYONE loses their job.  Detroit is a good example of this.)

This perhaps is less about yet another picketing school system than more about what needs to be done, first starting at the national level and encouraging states to follow suit.  The bigwigs in Washington are going about this in the wrong direction:  By pushing more costs onto the taxpayer and borrowing money that doesn't exist, we are creating a hole from which our children and grandchildren may never escape.  In other words, the Big Government is trying to do this all on their own, instead of seeking out private companies to assist when budget cuts strike - programs for the elderly and disabled, for example.

I fear that more people will start looking upon unionized workers with scorn.  I think people have a fundamental right to living with enough income, but at the same time, why shouldn't they cough up a little more dough to cover their benefits?  Pay raises are great and should be given when deserved; but here I am, having been down the road where our benefits disappeared and had to pay for insurance entirely out of pocket, and  my income is slowly being cut, not raised.  And they're protesting that they need to help balance a budget that they are a part of?

No.  If we're going to get out of this mess, start protesting for something that makes sense.  Let's back up and look at how the private sector can help balance budgets.  Start finding organizations to supplement the after-school programs, programs for those with learning disabilities, and sports.  If teachers want the extra pay and full benefits coverage, then they need to see the bigger issue at hand:  Not that unions are being unfairly targeted, but that the government just doesn't know how to run itself, and that nothing short of a creative solution will have the most benefit.  

Here's some point by point commentary on the CNN article above:

• Today 24,500 students missed school because the Wisconsin Education Association Council asked people to "stand beside your neighbors, family and friends and help our voices be heard."  Well, that's just selfish now.  It's MY VOICE, I WANT TO BE HEARD.  Not everybody else.  Not everyone else who is suffering from budget cuts, JUST ME.  What kind of "collective bargaining" is that?!
• The deficit in Wisconsin is in the billions over the next two years.  Billions!  That's nine zeros to deal with!  How can we demand fiscal responsibility and expect states to operate on a budget (just like most average Americans do) without everyone feeling the pinch?  Call it a job hazard.  Don't protest and leave the students hanging; figure out how to use your unions to target irresponsible spending and find results that work, starting with finding legislators who will do such a thing, and vote for them.  More than ever we need properly educated children to compete against other first-world economies, and whether you like it or not, China is right there with us and owns most of our debt. 
• WI governor Scott Walker says he understands the legal protests, but wants "taxpayers of Wisconsin [to] have their chance to have their voices heard."  Bingo and bingo.  Peaceful protesting makes this country great, but if I'm paying for teachers' salaries and benefits, let's make sure the money is going to the right place.  That's my right as a taxpaying citizen.
• Okay, and now teachers have to pay more of their pension.  What is a pension and how can a self-employed businesswoman like me get in on that?  Oh, wait.  Never mind.  
• Pay raises limited to inflation - sensible, and again, living within their means.  Unless the government can get (legally) creative in balancing the budget, this is what it should be limited to for now.  
• At least they still have some collective bargaining rights.  If they were to completely do away with that (which I don't think is legally possible), then you'd see the entire state shut down.
• Bryan Kennedy, president of the AFT-Wisconsin, states that the bill is a "smokescreen" and that the debate is "not a financial issue.  It is about worker rights."  Uh, Mr. Kennedy, if you're on someone else's budget, then it is a financial issue.  You can't just set the education budget off to the side and let everyone else suffer the cuts.  If government refuses to resolve the problem by making sweeping changes to the way they do business, then everyone needs to take part of the fall.  
• A video of one union worker states that "If Wisconsin [collective bargaining] falls, so does the nation."  ORLY?  When did you get so damn important, since you won the Super Bowl?  (Just kidding.)  Seriously though, if setting a precedent is their concern, then set the right one.  Don't picket again and expect a different outcome.  Isn't that defined as insanity?
• Ah, and absent teachers this week would be docked pay if they didn't have a doctor's note.  Good for them. 
• A voice of reason:  Superintendent Daniel Nerad is asking Walker to re-bargain collective bargaining, but also acknowledging that their "no. 1 responsibility is to instruct students."  Yes, that's exactly what should be happening.  

Look, I understand we all need to live.  We all want and need something that our government can't provide us, and in this great country, we can usually find a way to get it.  It's not ever easy but in this day and age, we can do it.  That's why I wonder why we place so much power into the government, including our money, without pushing for some sensible resolutions to these shortfalls.  The private sector is dying for jobs and cash flow; private workers are poised to spend their money again if only they can get the job.  It's all there and we can't connect the damn dots!   And instead, the government insists on getting bigger to handle the problem when they don't have the tools to deal with it.

Well, we can hardly blame them; the majority voted in a democratic majority two years ago, and now we have a Republican majority in the House with a Democratic President and Senate, and bipartisanship is less chivalrous than traitorous.  We know that red and blue don't make purple, they make war.  

And while unions work to keep their workers safe and paid, who knows what will happen if people start to wonder why union workers keep getting their higher-than-normal benefits at the expense of corporations (private) or taxpayers (government)?  Could corporations simply lay off their workers and hire some other folks who agree not to join the union?  Of course they can.  There are people desperate enough out there for ANY job that they'd do it.  And if the government started thinking that way, they'd be able to find folks out of work who'd do anything - including a promise not to unionize - just to get that job. 

A Christmas Irony

While hunger is a very real problem in this country now (an estimated 1 out of 7 of us are on food stamps), I need to pick another bone with - who else - our eminent news source, CNN, about its choice of finding the right words, or in this case pictures, to accurately describe the situation of, well, anything.

In brief:  Don't use an overweight kid to describe starvation.  

But why?  Don't fat kids get hungry, too?  

Of course.  I'm not belittling the fact that while more of us are going hungry, there's even more of us with expanding waistlines, becoming the fattest nation on the planet.  Out of this abundance, we are still worried about our kids having enough to eat.  I must also point out that, perhaps, overweight kids are probably in more danger of being both fat and hungry at the same time, since cheap food is also quite fattening.  How easy is it to spend a few bucks off the Dollar Menu at McD's and feed your entire brood for less than ten bucks?  Yup, that easy.  When money is tight and you need to feed a lot of mouths, the options diminish quickly.

But most folks can't get past the meaning of the picture of a fat kid:  Fat equals full.  Skinny equals starved.  When you're coming down to advertising your product, as CNN must do like all other businesses, we are being presented with an irony, even if it may turn out to be true.  Fat kids in need of more food?  Isn't there something better out there than a stock photo of a child sitting in front of an empty plate, probably looking at the buffet just behind the camera crew?  

Social Media Nibbles Back, Spits Out

Remember how I closed my BofA account?  I wrote a semi-snarky letter and did my homework, copying the appropriate executives and feeling immensely satisfied about taking my drip in their wages out in one swipe.  Well, apparently it got someone's attention.

A peon from the CEO's office called me back and left a message on my phone.  I was curious now - someone had actually called me?  Amazing.  I wondered what they wanted.  I called them back at 4:35 p.m. on a business day; already gone for the day.  Left a message.  Peon called again the following morning while I was running errands.  I finally called him back again and got him in person, and here's what eventually transpired:

Peon:  "Mrs. LaDow, we received your correspondence and I am in the process of closing your account."

Me:  "Thanks."

Peon:  "There's just a few details we need to take care of.  When you closed your account, you did it five days into the new cycle.  Therefore, you accrued some interest on that balance, and you'll need to pay that balance before we close the account."

Me: "... Oh-kaaaay."

Peon:  "So if you just go ahead and do that, then we can take care of all this for you, all right?"

Me:  "Yeah, GREAT.  Thank youuuuuu."

Peon:  "Goodbye."  Click.

They think of all the details, don't they?  Accruing interest on a daily basis instead of a monthly basis is super convenient.  I bet he was sitting there in his satellite office somewhere in North Carolina, happy to get another several dozen dollars out of my pocket before bidding my business adieu.

At least they got the hint and spared me another sales pitch.  I'm sure they'd be able to find the transcription of my phone calls with them a few months ago when their "customer service" branch refused to work with my astronomical APR and thought I needed credit counseling.  Of course, once they transferred me to their choice of credit counseling services and the service found out about my spotless payment record and income, I wasn't approved for the service even if I had wanted it.

Yes, take a bite out of BofA if you can, but spit it back out.  Quickly.

Proofreading, An Ancient Art

Okay, okay.  No more caps lock.  But there really, truly has to be some college grad with a chip-head degree that can publish this without looking like:

Seriously.  Why is there a job shortage in this country when so many of the things we consume (yes, this includes online information) is wrong, doesn't work, or breaks on the second try?  Shouldn't there be a market for quality control somewhere?  Oh wait.  Yes, there used to be.  It's too expensive to maintain, I guess.  (Hence the reason why I'm starting to love Etsy and other individual proprietors:  They still have the ability to plan, design, make and check their work by hand.  Love and care in every step!)

Anyway.  You need a lot of hands in the process when gleaning national news, I understand.  Things won't go right all the time.  But every. single. day?  They're going too fast for their own good and driving me nuts in the process.  I used to be in this business, and I would have gotten demoted if our weekly newspaper had these kinds of errors in it week in, week out.  It's hard to take back a printed edition, yes.  That's an understatement.  However... isn't it just easier to do it right the first time around?  No one will notice if you take the extra 10 seconds to check your HTML code and your dictionary.  

The English version of al-Jazeera does better than this, CNN.  Get with the frickin' program.  

Proofreading, A Lost Art

What I can't figure out is why SI.com can't find a couple of good proofreading peons out of college to tell them the following:  

1.  Irks = To irritate or annoy.  Urks = Steve Urkel. 

2.  The word "attempt" once in a sentence will suffice, thanks.  

The fact that I have to refer to proofreading as an art disturbs me even more.  For the love of God, you "professionals!"  IT'S CALLED PROOFREADING AND/OR SPELL CHECK.  I hate going all Kanye on it, but seriously... urks?!  

Social Media Bites Back (Well, A Nibble)

When the going gets tough... you post it on your blog.  This is popular media as a vehicle for my meager (yet very real) complaints about what's wrong with the companies I am hopelessly tied to because of their business practices.


I like how I have to close my account in writing to some random office in Florida, too.  No addressing mail to a real human any more (well, unless of course you're part of the executive team, in which it goes to an assistant to the assistant to the BIP [Big Important Person] in their castle in North Carolina.)


If I get a response, I'll let you know.  In the meantime, a person with a "very good" credit score is not being screwed over by carnivorous, greedy shareholders and CEOs who kiss their butts to make them and their bottom lines happy every quarter.  As a drop in the BofA bucket, this is merely a cathartic way of expressing my displeasure instead a means to a specific end (hence why I did not ask for a lower APR, or wish them to burn in Hell, or any other ridiculous requests that one sees with angry letters).  Nope, taking my business elsewhere with a snarky letter left behind will do just fine, and whether they respond matters not to me.  *washing hands*


I have written to Bank of American thusly:

August 14, 2010

Rebecca L. LaDow

My Road

New York

Account Closure

FL1-300-02-07

4109 Gandy Blvd.

Tampa, FL 33611-3401

RE:  Account xxxx

Dear Account Closure:

I am writing to ask you to close the account referenced above, effective immediately.  You will be receiving a check for the full balance due. 

As a customer of Bank of America for greater than a decade (by extension first an MBNA customer), I am disappointed with how my APR has been handled over the years, especially since Bank of America acquired MBNA.  The income generated from the 19.98% APR applied to a five-figure debt is quite respectable for your bottom line, but for my household, we now choose not to support your business practices. 

Bank of America has a long way to earn any of my trust or business back.  Perhaps my influence is not as high as you’d care about, but I will not recommend Bank of America to my family, friends or children as they reach an age where they can open a line of credit. 

I hope Mr. Brian Moynihan will guide Bank of America into better business practices during times of famine without alienating the customer base.  To ensure that my voice is heard, I have copied the executives below on my correspondence, as well as placed this letter on my blog for my admittedly meager fan base. 

Unfortunately, I must continue my business with you through another line of credit I have open, which is now “dead” credit as the APR will double up to approximately 14% if I ever use it again. 

I wish you the best of luck in pleasing your shareholders, and hope that one day your customers’ satisfaction becomes a priority.

Sincerely,

Rebecca L. LaDow

cc:

Brian Moynihan, CEO

Charles Noski, CFO

Joe Price, President, Consumer, Small Business and Card Banking

ESL Credit Union


p.s.  I have enough crap in my life to worry about than working overtime to pay 20% of a debt to ANYONE.  In the meantime, LET'S DANCE:

"it takes control and slowly tears you apart"

CNN Needs Copywriters, Part 2

Grammar police?  Grammar Nazi?  I don't care what you think of me.  This is basic Grammar 101, people.  Peta is not a word.  PETA is an acronym and should be capitalized as such.  Peta vs. Pita?  That organization would probably love to be confused with a meatless food that is dipped in all types of vegan-friendly hummus and Baba Ghannouj.

When folks start seeing these mistakes on the front page of a "dependable" news source's website, it means it's okay for us little people too.  Details, shmetails!  YOU KNOW WHAT I MEANT, RIGHT?  (No, I don't.)

Finding typos should not be this easy (or fun).

CNN Needs Copywriters, Part 1

I find a typo every day on this damn site.  CNN, please get someone who knows the difference between by, buy and bye.  It's really not. that. hard.

Quick Hitters

We are in the middle of some record-breaking temperatures right now.  It was just our "luck" that we are now living in a house with no air conditioning, and we're trying to figure out creative ways to rotate the sticky air.  I wouldn't say this is without its benefits - for one thing, I'm not spastastically afraid of spiders any more.  Still afraid, but I can kill them without shrieking.  For another thing, it has forced me to become closer to nature by using some of her cooling methods rather than my own, which is of course cheaper and somewhat greener, though we are using several fans 24/7 to cool the house at night.  We've also been trying to push the cold air from the basement and garage up to the living room/office area, which presents quite the challenge with a 1-year-old toddler who loves to climb stairs.

Anyway, between this heat and working on a hot laptop in the unbearable afternoons, I haven't wanted to sit and type more.  It's 10 p.m. and 79 degrees outside.  However, I will give you some quick hitters that have been bouncing around in my head for a while - some guilty pleasures, some not so guilty:

• Raise your hand if you're happy not to read about LiLo's crack tweets for the next 180 days while she's in jail/rehab.  Did you see that she manicured the phrase "f*** you" on both her middle fingernails?  Someone snapped the photos while she was at her hearing and being sentenced.  Judge Marsha Revel's no-nonsense haircut and pursed Mom lips dished a "f*** you too" right back to her.  
• Who else said "Praise God!" when that little 4-year-old girl who was found alive after being kidnapped from her front yard in Missouri?  You almost never see it end that way.  Unfortunately, the person of interest in the case shot himself when approached by police.  The mystery may never be solved, but a family and community is rejoicing tonight. 
• Speaking of other celebrities I want to go away:  LeBron.  Seriously.  SI.com has a LEBRON WATCH going right now.  Kind of like the tornado warning that hit my hometown last weekend, only a lot more annoying and no one caring.  Check off another reason why I avoid anything that has to do with the NBA like the plague.
• Super bummed about the Steelers' season already.  Big Ben = Big Butthead, and now Willie Colon and Limas Sweed are both out for season with Achilles tendon injuries.  Better than Randle El will be there to fill in as WR.  
• The Pirates are just a laughingstock right now.  I think the media cares about them as much as they care about my husband taking the trash out.  At least our trash doesn't stink as much as the Buccos.  PNC Park is just a beautiful ball park - no bad seat in the house.  Shameful.
• Continuing on Pittsburgh's professional teams:  Kind of like what the Pens did during free agency.  The loss of Gonchar was a bummer, but as a friend pointed out to me, his leadership skills were great - his defensive skills, not so much.  He was also injured way too much.  Pens put a ton of money into the defense and I hope it works out. 
• Where else other than Facebook can you have a conversation with buddies across the nation about The Goonies and dry shampoo in 24 hours?    
• Ju$t found out why we only get profe$$ional photo$ done every five year$ or $o.  

Time to rock out to some Gaga remixes and catching up on my celeb gossip.  Good night, dear readers.

To breathe: What were you doing at 25?

Today CNN featured an article about a 25-year-old Canadian woman who had cystic fibrosis and blogged about the entire experience, even up until two days before her death on March 27.

The article opens the headline "Death at 25:  Blogging the end of a life."  That's why I initially clicked on the link.  But then when the page loads, there is a photo of a beautiful, young woman lying in a hospital bed, a breathing tube wrapped under her nose and around her ears, a slight smile on her lips, her eyes radiating love and exhaustion.  Her name is Eva.

I scanned the article and found the blog, called 65 Red Roses.  It was named such because when she was first diagnosed, she could not pronounce cystic fibrosis, and instead pronounced it more like "65 red roses."  It is colorful.  It has hearts.  There is a lot of red. Pictures of Eva and her family and friends love, love, loving, the breathing tube a constant companion.  She takes pictures of herself in all sorts of stages of life, of sickness:  Joy. Exhaustion.  Friends.  Nausea.  Mom.  Despair.  Boyfriend.  Kisses.  Style.  It makes you catch your breath.

I went through a few entries and found a video of a speech she gave for the Toronto Gala, which she recorded because she could not do it in person.  She tells of her struggles with the breath, sickness, and her adventures in love and hope.  And she tells her viewers of that epitome of hope:  A double lung transplant, hope rising out of another's tragedy, life and death holding hands, one not existing without the other.  She tells of walking up steps.  Road trips.  Falling in love.  Dancing.  And in the next breath:  Her body is in chronic rejection.  Her body is rejecting the new lungs.

Now, why would I be sharing this story with you?  I don't have cystic fibrosis.  I don't think I know anyone who does.  But I do know someone who struggled with breath.  I do know someone whose lungs were chronically rejected at the end of life.  I remember a man who loved his wife and his children, and for my entire life I remember not the sound of his voice, but his wheezing.  His puffers.  The assumption of chronic asthma.  I remember his salt-and-pepper stubble and his three-word sentences between breaths.  I remember Christmastime when someone in the family received a play microphone, and watching him hold it (was it a photo I saw?) and knowing he couldn't pretend to sing a ballad into it.  And in a cold, dark winter in 1993 when there was only hope left, my grandfather's body rejected his new lung, and I can still remember my father's car in the driveway, home from work early when I came home from school on December 3, knowing that my grandfather was gone.  I was 12.  He was (just shy of?) 60.

These are the details I remember.  Some of them may be hazy.  I remember watching my mother lose her father from a genetic disease and tears.  My grandmother's exhaustion at caring for him for over a decade, years spent in San Antonio living near the hospital where they would do the transplant, if or when the lung came for him.  I remember seeing him lie in his coffin, not breathing but at such ease.  Grandma looking at him and seeing peace, not death.  I cried in ragged breaths when the Catholic church cantor sang of him flying like an eagle, rising again.  I remember the wake at my grandmother's house, hushed, lots of food, TV on in the living room where Grandpa's recliner might have been.  Perhaps bowling was on that day. Could have been football.  And relief.  Relief, relief, relief.  Everyone took a huge sigh of relief.

So, when I watched Eva confess to Toronto that her body had rejected her lungs, I cried horribly again, just like I did at my grandfather's funeral.  I remember the sound of air being sucked into lungs that refused to work correctly, the body trying to force the air out, exhausted from every effort just to live.  What killed my grandfather was not cystic fibrosis, but a disease called alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency, which basically destroys the elasticity in your lungs.  Your lungs expand and shrink with every breath, but with alpha-1, your lungs expand, expand, expand.  You wheeze, you cough, you gasp.  Every breath is abnormal.

After that day, when I took my driver's test and passed, I checked the organ donor box.  So did my husband.  Eva asked that of her following.  I knew I had to after watching a stranger's generosity in death give some life back to my grandpa, even if it was for a little while.  I remember a picture of him, white dressing gown, white compression stockings, holding a white teddy bear after the surgery, waving and smiling.  I imagine snow-white breath flowing in his new lungs, if only for a short time.

My parents were tested for alpha-1.  My father is not a carrier.  My mother is.  This means that my sisters, brother and I will not get alpha-1, but some of us may be a carrier.  One day when I can afford it, I will get tested for alpha-1.  If I am not a carrier, then my husband won't need to be tested; my kids are safe.  If I am positive, my husband will need to be tested.  Some days I wonder, wonder, wonder.

To answer my own question:  At 25, I was married, a mother to a daughter, and working as a project manager in Rochester NY.  My husband and I were on the verge of a move to California, an adventure with risks, questions and no map.  I was violently ill from the anxiety.  I dropped 20 lb. that summer.  My mother and sister came to pack my entire kitchen the night before the movers came.  In a moment of anxiety, my memory sharpened, smells remembered, songs on my iPod that play to this day and whip me back to that moment.  I was living.  I lived.

In yoga we are taught to mind our breath.  The practice revolves around, depends on the breath.  To open, to shine, to fill yourself up, to enable your body and mind to practice.  The breath follows the muscles' movement:  In to expand, out to contract.  When I labored with my daughter Sela last year, my husband driving 80 mph down the highway to get to the midwife clinic in time, I turned up the Red Hot Chili Peppers and let my breath in and out wild, groaning, screaming from the pressure, feeling the warm Sunday morning air whip through the car.  I was living.  My baby was living.  I lived.

Do you realize how much your life is centered around breath?  When we do not mind our essence of living, we neglect to mind that which can kill us.  I read about Eva's life centered around breath.  Her struggles with cystic fibrosis and my grandfather's struggles with alpha-1 embraced breath, no matter how hard it was to suck in one more liter of oxygen.  While my practice in yoga is a choice, theirs was necessity.  A disease pulled them into their very cores of their lives, of their bodies, and forced them to be aware of every breath, every cage-rattling, painful, wheezing, drowning breath, forcing them to examine every detail of it.  It is what yoga asks of the yogini, to examine every detail of the breath  in connection with the body, to realize that they are not separate but one, breath and movement locked together, one not existing without the other.

And so it is with life and death.  If we live, we die, and yet we cannot die if we do not live.  I imagine Eva and my grandfather, beautiful souls intact, dancing and singing, perhaps raising their hands in the air, saying Lord let's fly, leave unto the Earth what belongs to the Earth and take all that belongs to you.

Today when you pray, or when you approach your mat, or when you are discovering positive energies, remember these two people.  Pray for them.  Dedicate your practice.  Do what you do to mind your breath and your life force in memory of them who so painfully did the same.

Eva Dien Brine Markvoort
James DaValle

Edited at 5:29 p.m.:  One of Eva's friends featured in the documentary "65 Red Roses", based on Eva's fight against cystic fibrosis, is a woman named Kina who lives in Girard, PA, just down the road from where I was born and raised.  Many of my family, classmates and friends from that area know Girard well.

Dr. Nonflow, Urologist

Dear readers - It's been a very long while since I posted, and I do apologize.  You've all been hanging in there with me and I hope to let the writing bug drive me to the computer more often.  Between sickness, Easter and more life-changing events in our household, I've been neglecting the more fun things in life!

Now, on topic:  This is why social media is a benefit, especially when presented on the Internet.  I found this link through a Facebook friend who is also an MT, and when I say I laughed 'til I cried, it means that you should get thyself a potty break before reading.  

Horse on a Mattress is the medical transcriptionist's answer to Cake Wrecks or Regretsy.  Sometimes in speech recognition software, you get a lot of nonsense that the MT has to edit and fix to match the dictation.  But sometimes you get some kick-ass doctor's names, among other bloopers.  Read and enjoy!

What do you want to hear?

Good morning, dear readers!  I have a nine-hour work day ahead of me, so alas, I must be brief.  But what I found while ambling along my normal news outlets (yes, even someone like me writing about current affairs gets stuck in a rut... stuck in a rut... stuck in a rut) made me pretty darn upset, and I must share with you before typing the day away.

U.S. figure skating Olympian Johnny Weir was mocked by some French-Canadian announcers during his short routine in Vancouver, saying that he might have "lost points due to his costume and body language," suggesting he should take a gender test, and also suggesting he should compete in the women's competition.  They go so far to suggest that his demeanor sets a bad example to other male skaters and that they'll "end up like him."  They later issued an apology.

These comments are bad enough from a pair of national announcers broadcasting to the entire world, but what enraged me were the quotes from Johnny's response that CNN and People.com decided to publish.

I first read about the controversy at Celebitchy, which is one of my favorite gossip blogs - they write smart, they're witty, and they're not nasty and defacing pictures with grade-school MSPaint like Perez Hilton does.  The comments that Celebitchy published were taken from Entertainment Weekly, and Johnny was quite gracious in his response to the "jokes."  He didn't even ask for an apology or for their firings and says he believes in free speech.  The quotes used on the gossip blog showed him to be a well-spoken man.

However.  I opened CNN.com today and saw the headline:  "Skater responds to mockery."  Hey, CNN picked it up a day later!  I opened it up and started reading, and was sorely disappointed in the quotes that CNN chose to take from People.com's article.  In addition, the hyperlink provided to the original article was broken, and that just ticks me off - a lack of attention to detail on a national news outlet.  It's just as bad as misspelling something on the front page, which CNN does quite often, I might add.  But here's the quote that finishes off the article:

"It wasn't these two men criticizing my skating, it was them criticizing me as a person, and that was something that really, frankly, pissed me off," Weir told reporters. "Nobody knows me. ... I think masculinity is what you believe it to be."

Doesn't he sound like a whiny kid now?  What gives?  Sure, we've all heard the nickname "Johnny Weird" for his flamboyant style and Lady Gaga gestures, but he's also a fine skater and a decent human being, and what was quoted might lead you to believe that he's calling for those broadcasters' careers on a shiny, fabulous silver platter.  All I know is, the man handled himself just fine, and taking two quotes from the press conference shed two very different lights on him.

In my job as a medical transcription, one of the best pieces of advice was to question.  Question what you are hearing.  Listen to it again and again and be sure you are typing what the doctor is saying.  If he's saying something that doesn't make sense, research the heck out of it and alert medical records if there is an inconsistency.  If a doctor puts in an order for a surgical note but starts dictating a consultation, I don't format it as a surgical note - I would format it as a consultation.

This is probably the best advice I could give the general public about approaching what they read and see in the media.  Question.  Question it from all angles before passing judgment - or even if you pass judgment at all.  Don't assume you know something just because they wore a pink tassel on a skating costume and assume they're hermaphrodites (which, incidentally, Lady Gaga was also accused of "tucking," to which she wouldn't even deign a response to that rumor. Good for her.)  It's these little jokes that start as a drop in the pond, but grow to bigger waves as they pass through the general population in so many ways... what if a kid listened to those announcers and thought it was funny to question someone's gender every time they didn't fit society's definition of a male or female?  Even though they thought it was funny, they should have saved it for the comedy club open-mic night, if at all.

One-dimensional musings

On the cusp of another snowstorm (that's four inches of snow down here in Canonsburg - I know you Erie folks are giggling about it, as do I, but there really is a lot of snow here that they don't know where to put because of the mountainous hills), I've realized that it's been a month since I last blogged.  That's breaking the cardinal rule of blogging:  Blog on a regular basis.  Keeping it up.  Keeping it fresh.

Yet every time I think about it, I think the media has burned me out.  I've been constantly listening to family, friends and the media complain about the state of this country, why Republicans are crazy, why Democrats are socialist nutjobs, and quite frankly, I've become tired of it.  Maybe not tired:  It's a word that my younger readers would appreciate, and that is "meh."  I like me a good drama in the news, but ever since Obama was elected, the shouting on both sides of the American political spectrum is louder than ever, and no one seems interested in getting anything done except firmly planting the blame of the state of the American economy on the shoulders of either political party.

With full disclosure, both my husband and I are independents.  We made that decision after moving back from the West Coast, with me doubting every potential Presidential candidate who stepped up to a podium in front of the media.  We are finding that both left and right "ideals" are often contradictory, selfish, and downright unhealthy for a decent political debate.  We often had the best debates about politics with a dear friend of ours, who is Canadian and knows truly what socialism is, after he'd been traveling the globe.  Disenchanted with Cheney and Big Oil, angry with manipulative unions, watching the debt ceiling raised higher than ever, and pretty faces (Palin) blurring partisan shortcomings, I threw my hands up in the air and suggested to Spence that we leave both parties and let them figure out how to get our votes.  It was the only way I could think of to demonstrate my displeasure with the Left and Right political discourses.

As it is, American politics are sorely one-dimensional:  Do you swing left or right?  Blue or red?  Conservative or liberal?  To which I started asking back:  Are politics only meant for swinging between two points, one single line?  I really don't care that the Independents don't have many promising candidates:  Running on an Independent platform is what I like to call slippery dipping:  You can pick and choose your values, and yet in putting together your political agenda, leaving yourself to the mercy of a media who likes to paint you "more conservative" or "more liberal," perhaps to translate your oddities to an American public who only know the way forward is to go left or right.

Does it seem like a political dead end?  Does it seem too much for a person who wants to step outside The Line, to explain to others that it's okay to be pro-life and demand equal pay for women in similar job positions?  Is it okay to be a member of the NRA and endorse affordable health care?  Can rich people endorse welfare?  Can poor people endorse lower taxes for the businesses?

If rich people understood that there are people in society who truly need the help of the village, as it were, to survive, then they'd be more amenable to paying more taxes into a welfare system that helps the elderly, disabled and hungry, while at the same time finds the freeloaders and stops supporting them.

If poor people understood that businesses create jobs, they would understand that lower taxes for businesses will help their businesses grow and keep more jobs in the United States.

If women and men understood that fertility is an equal responsibility between them, then it would be easier for men and women to support equal pay for equal work.

If understanding that the reason we are not physically invaded by a country is because, on average, every man and woman in this country has at least one firearm in their home, then we understand that basic health care is a right, not a privilege:  Basic rights of self-defense of our country should include basic rights of self-defense of our bodies, whether we have chronic or acute conditions.  (Whether you endorse a public option or shopping across state lines for health insurance is a completely different conversation, however.)

And that, dear readers, is only a few of the many reasons why I can't read a newspaper, online or otherwise, without my eyes crossing and my soul delving into a deep state of indifference.  Politicians are afraid of "reaching across the aisle" without thinking about their competitors accusing them of waffling in the next election, so they hold fast to a single line between two points.  The dominant parties are in a state of turmoil, what with Obama's favorable ratings plummeting to Earth and the loss of Mr. Kennedy's Lion Seat to a Republican, and with Palin a Presidential hopeful in 2012 while endorsing a Tea Party with no clear agenda and fractured factions.  Less voters are asking important questions about how the government as a whole will help them, and instead asking for their piece of the pie, and perhaps it is in this way we are led to a government stuffed and obese with pork and special interests.

Perhaps - and this is a theory - it is not so much the politicians' fault for trying to grab federal funds, but our own.  Perhaps our indifference to letting the same people try to steer this country is the reason why no one can agree on Capitol Hill.  Perhaps it is us, the People, the voters, who need to find their voices again and appoint better people to find that middle ground that could make this country even greater.  Politics don't have to be complicated, you know.  Don't let anyone tell you that you're committing heresy by changing your party affiliation as much as you like.  In fact, the idea that anyone would accuse me of a grave religious sin based on my party affiliation is insulting:  I should be able to move freely between political parties, because my God doesn't swing left or right.  Voicing your political distaste doesn't have to start and end with your vote, as I have so aptly learned:  the Independent vote is just starting to become a bigger slice of the pie, and I'm willing to let the politicians figure out just how to earn that vote.

Edited at 10:08 p.m.: CNN is reporting that yet "another" centrist Democrat will not seek re-election due to his disgruntlement with Congress, left bloggers and partisanship. There are five open seats for Dems and six open seats for Republicans for the upcoming November elections.

Edited at 10:15 p.m.:  Just noticed the homepage title of the above-quoted article reads thusly:  "Too tough for a centrist?  Bayh retiring".  You betcha.  Instead of being favorably described as bipartisan or compromising, centrists are frequently viewed as weak, waffling and/or floaters in the unforgiving political arena.  The most liberal and conservative wings of each party should tread lightly - if this kind of walk-out continues, what will the fractioning of the two dominant parties do to American politics?