The Blue Agenda » unknown

NOH8 Campaign

bdskip — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 18:19:38 +0000

Pretty interesting stuff going on over at NOH8Campaign.com. The pictures tell an amazing story and give hope to those who desperately need their full rights.

Get out the message!

Bailout gone amuck

bdskip — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 18:04:01 +0000

So I was not a big fan of the U.S. bailout of the financial institutions to begin with. My objection is squarely based on two basic questions:

1) Is it cheaper in the long-run to allow major institutions to fail than it is to continually bail them out?

2) Where does it end?

I’ll leave number one up to those with far more experience than I have in understanding global financial markets and all the ancillary industries that go along with them. But question number two will become increasingly important and germane to our national conversation as time goes on. Already we have seen two rounds of bailout funding for the automotive industry, now we have the government pledging $5 billion to the auto parts industry, Larry Flint wants bailout funding for the porn industry, homebuilders want help, and list goes on and on and on.

Now comes news of the uproar created by AIG’s payment of bonuses to 70+ employees. Are we, the taxpayers, pissed? You bet. Are we, the taxpayers, calling our leaders in Congress to do something? You bet. But that does not mean Congress should act. Not now at least. We pay our leaders to lead. The minute we passed the first bailout package in October we sealed the fate of news programs like 60 minutes for the next 20 years — giving them tons of material to report related to misappropriation of bailout funds, corporate scandals, and government waste. It is the nature of the beast. Our leaders failed to give much thought to the bailout plan, which should have contained elements of control in the package, ahead of time. Mismanagement was bound to happen. But creating a 90% tax bracket for bonuses paid is absolutely ridiculous. The recent talks of tax brackets for those working for bailed out institutions is not conducive to fixing our problems.

Government never works well when it hastily crafts legislation for a specific and urgent cause. This feels a lot like the post 9/11 legislation that allowed our phones and emails to be tapped without cause, or the rush to judgement to go to war in Iraq, or the attempts to write laws to help a coma victim live or die in Florida. It’s not right and Congress should stop threatening legislation and do what it does best — make a public spectacle of AIG and allow the free market to punish the company as it will.

Which leads me back to question one. Aren’t our free markets capable of supporting those institutions that are vitally important to our economy? Is failure of portions of our Economic system not a natural process that we should allow to happen instead of interfering?

Shrinking Middle Class Income

bdskip — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 02:05:35 +0000

For all the talk about tax rebates and the great Bush tax cuts, the middle class is facing increased pressure from a constant barrage of increased fuel and food prices. Last Saturday the Wall Street Journal had a nice piece on how the effective income of middle Americans has declined over the years.

Every administration and congress in the last 40-50 years should be ashamed of themselves, regardless of party affiliation and politics of the day. The voters of this country entrusted their future and the future of their children to people who were supposed to protect and serve them. Instead, elected officials, in general, have served their own greed and shafted those that elected them.

Just one more primary…

bdskip — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 01:26:19 +0000

Have you noticed that the media keeps telling us how ‘the next primary’ will determine everything. Yet, if you look at the delegate numbers remaining in the all primaries over the next +/- 6 weeks, there is plenty of play left and this thing will drag on until at least June.

Shame on the media for continuing to put the spotlight on the delegate race, and shame on the media for sensationalizing this primary process. Shame on Democrats for making this into a circus. I don’t think the party is damaged (yet) by this process, but I can see where a prolonged and contentious delegate fight could easily divide the party. Democrats must realize that this race is theirs to lose.

Time Warner Reducing Bandwidth to iTunes Store?

bdskip — Sat, 02 Feb 2008 23:25:32 +0000

“I noticed yesterday the iTunes store had become very slow, so I posted on Apple’s support forums. Turns out other people are having this problem too, and they are all Time Warner Cable Customers in Texas. ”

I have heard it said that any action by an ISP to limit the usage of their services is completely within their rights under their own terms and conditions for using the service, but let’s be fair here:
1. Let’s assume you use AT&T for your landline phone provider and AT&T got into a pissing match with Wells Fargo Bank. Would it be fair for AT&T to block your calls to your bank? NO!
2. I realize that Time Warner Cable/ Roadrunner has a commodity-type product (there is a finite level of bandwidth), but quite frankly why don’t you level with people (even your own customer service reps) and TELL them what you are doing.
3. The FCC and Congress should have addressed the issue of multi-media organizations entering the utility industry in this country. How do you think Congress would react if Time Warner (parent of Time Warner Cable /Roadrunner and CNN) suddenly restricted access to FOX News websites because they are competitors?
4. From first-hand experience I can tell everyone that Time Warner Cable/Roadrunner has been one of the worst customer service experiences of my life. I think the company is poorly managed and frankly enjoys the position of not responding to customer complaints. And why should they? If 25% of Americans (and I suspect the number is MUCH greater) are in the same position I am — there simply is no alternative, TWC has a lock on forcing their customers to suffer and pay a premium for the pain.