There wasn’t a single Republican standing beside him, even though the Senate bill was so heavily laced with Republican amendments and alterations that you would have thought that they wrote most of the bill themselves. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi sat off to the side and frowned through most of Baucus presentation.

As Baucus read his statement you could practically hear the air escaping from the Health Care Reform movement so earnestly promoted and supported by President Obama and progressive Democrats.

Baucus stood before the American people and presented his committee’s bill as true “reform.” However, the plan as presented was a complete sell-out to the health insurance industry.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gce7dwgDNg

The plan, still considered too radical for conservatives and far too weak for progressives who are insisting on federal government managed optional plans, supposedly meets some of President Obama’s stated aims.

According to Senate insiders, this bill offers the best opportunity for Democrats to redesign and improve the nation’s $2.5 trillion health care market.

The House has not yet voted on its own bill until they could see what the Senate bill included. Initial feedback indicates that House Democrats will likely reject the Senate bill in its entirety and force the Senate to start over from scratch. Nancy Pelosi pointed out that the current Senate bill, a ten-year $856 billion plan, delivers millions of new customers to the major insurance companies while providing no new competition in the form of any type of federal government supervised plan. All the Senate bill offers is the future establishment of non-competitive nonprofit local “cooperatives.”

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs delivered a weak endorsement of the Baucus bill late Wednesday, only referring to it as a “building block…I don’t think this is a mirror of what the president has talked about.”

Baucus claimed that his efforts to bring Republicans onboard would be successful. Instead, his comments drew immediate criticism from Iowa Republican Senator Charles Grassley, who in spite of being a major participant in the committee’s negotiations, is under intense pressure from the Republican leadership in both the Senate and House to hold party ranks and to refuse to support the bill.

The Senate’s Folly

Many American’s who watched Baucus’ speech on Wednesday must have wondered what the hell he was thinking. Did he not hear President Obama’s speeches over the past couple of weeks?

Anyone, especially progressive Democrats, who heard Baucus describe the key elements in this version of the Senate bill, would likely hope that the bill would fail to make it out of committee and not even come up for a vote. There were clearly far too many trade-offs made just to satisfy the Republicans on the committee, even though they have as a group vowed to vote against the bill.

To hold down the cost of the bill, subsidies to individuals who must purchase insurance will be drastically reduced.

That mandate would force people who don’t usually want to buy insurance policies because they think they don’t need or can’t afford medical insurance.

Baucus presented the idea of local, private medical insurance co-ops as an alternative to either a government run option or single payer plan. That idea failed to appease the conservatives, who said it would lead to “government controlled health care.” There is clearly no support for such a co-op plan among liberals.

Democrats are in control of both houses of Congress. They will bear the blame for the loss of a public option. The Republican minority will have proven that the Democrats, even with a popular president and the support of a huge majority of American voters, are weak, disorganized and ineffectual. In the end, it will be the American public that will lose and pay the price, while the hugely profitable insurance corporations will once again be the big winners.

Early Responses from the Public

Several interest groups and industry leaders offered varied responses supporting some elements of the bill while denouncing others.

One public interest group slammed the bill for leaving an estimated 17 million Americans, not including illegal immigrants, uninsured over the next ten years because they won’t or can’t afford to buy insurance.

In a report issued by the Kaiser Family Foundation, studies showed that insurance premiums would cost the average family $13,375, a 5% increase over the past year -- in spite of a general reduction in national purchasing power of 1.5 to 3%.

Major Details of the Senate Plan

The plan would cost $856 billion over a 10 years period. It would not add to the deficit because the plan includes tax increases and some major spending cuts.

The plan requires individuals by law to buy insurance. Insurance companies would be banned from denying coverage for pre-existing conditions or dropping customers when they became ill or injured.

The bill offers $463 billion in credits to help lower-income people to pay for their insurance coverage. Small businesses would get $24 billion in tax-credits to encourage them to offer insurance to their employees.

Nonprofit insurance co-ops would offer other choices in addition to current corporate provided private insurance. This plan uses cooperatives to replace the federal open public option plan that is a major part of the House bill.

Large employers would be required to offer insurance to all of their employees and would pay penalties if they refuse.

Insurance “exchanges” would offer standardized policies and allow purchasing across state lines. Access to similar exchanges would be open to owners of small businesses in exchange for subsidies for covering employees.

Medicaid expansion would allow everyone earning up to 133% of the federal poverty level ($30,000 a year for a family of four and $14,400 for individuals) access to the federal program. A new Medicare commission, appointed by the president, would recommend changes to Medicare during years when costs grow out of control.

There would be increased taxes to raise revenue by imposing a 35% excise tax on so-called “Cadillac” insurance plans costing more than $8,000 a year per person, or $21,000 a year per family.

Additional spending cuts of $500 billion would come from reducing payments to Medicare health maintenance organizations (HMOs) paid more than traditional fee-for-service plans.

The Bottom Line

Let’s face it. This plan will have absolutely no Republican support in either the Senate or the House. The lack of any real public option plan will pretty much limit its support by either media pundits or progressive Democrats.

Max Baucus tried really hard to put together a bi-partisan bill that would satisfy the three Republicans on the Finance Committee (Enzi, Snowe and Grassley), but his efforts were an exercise in futility since not one of them has expressed any indications of supporting the bill they helped put together. Senator Olympia Snowe said the bill doesn’t have her support, while Senators Charles Grassley of Iowa and Mike Enzi of Wyoming, the two other Republicans on the Finance Committee, have expressed their disappointment with the current bill and say they won’t support it.

The Democrats Only Choice

From the beginning it should have been clear that there was no way to get any Republican support for a medical insurance reform bill -- absolutely none. In spite of that obvious fact, Senator Max Baucus attempted to put together a bill that rewards the medical insurance industry with millions of new customers, who would be forced to buy insurance or face having to pay penalties for failure to have insurance, whether they can afford it or not, and without any type of effective and affordable public option.

This bill offers the public no real savings or protection from continued misbehavior on the part of insurance companies. The plan even allows the insurance companies to require waiting periods and higher premiums for many pre-existing conditions. So what has really changed?

Essentially the process in the Senate over the last four months has been a complete boondoggle, a tragic and total waste of time -- all in the name of “bi-partisanship.”

So what can progressive Senate Democrats do to pass a meaningful medical insurance reform bill that fits with President Obama’s plan for the future?

First of all, Democrats should follow the example of the Bush Administration. What’s good for Republicans should also be good for Democrats too -- right?

When President George W. Bush pushed for tax cuts for the wealthy at a cost of $1 trillion, how did the Republicans manage to pass it in the Senate? Very simply: They used Budget Reconciliation.

Note that now that this option is available to the Democratic majority in the Senate, Republicans are already crying foul!

Senate Republicans are such hypocrites. They object to the procedure when the Democrats threaten to use it, but they mastered its use during the eight years of the Bush Administration. Republicans used Budget Reconciliation to pass the following Bush backed bills:

• The 2001 Bush Tax Cut
• The 2003 Bush Tax Cuts
• Tax Increase Prevention and Reconciliation Act of 2005
• The Deficit Reduction Act of 2005
• Republicans used the Reconciliation Act to allow domestic drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in 2005.

Congress used budget reconciliation during the administrations of other presidents, including Clinton and Reagan, and when either party had a majority.

The Republicans also used Budget Reconciliation to pass through the major provisions of their “Contract with America” (heavily promoted by House Leader Newt Gingrich) during Bill Clinton’s Administration. Now Gingrich is implying that should the Democrats try to push medical insurance reform through the Senate by using budget reconciliation, that it would be “unfair” and “possibly unconstitutional.”

Time for the Democrats to Act

The Democrats should give up on any idea of trying to make medical insurance reform a bi-partisan act. If they don’t pass this reform bill now they will suffer dearly at the polls in 2010. They need to remember who voted them into office -- and why -- in 2006 and 2008.

The Democrats need to rewrite or create a new bill and present it for a vote in the Senate under the rules of Budget Reconciliation. They need to remember that if there is no public option in the bill, both President Obama and the American public will consider the bill a failure and a waste of time. They might just as well do it right or not do it at all.

Whatever the Democrats do, whether they revise, rewrite, or start over from scratch, they need to realize that they will receive absolutely no Republican support. They need to remember that all they need is 51 votes and they can pass the bill that their president and their constituents want and need without Republican consent.

The Democrats need to stop being intimidated by the Republicans. Can we really let a minority party that panders to mostly southern white evangelical regressive neo-Confederates take over Congress and stop the changes that our President (and most Democrats) promised to deliver during his first term?

My guess is that if the Democrats simply ignore the Republicans and just get on with the nation’s business, that the Republicans will do nothing but sit and sulk and whine on Fox News and continue to call the President nasty names and accuse the Democrats of being unfair.

I’d rather see forty Republican Senators have their feelings hurt than the American public have to continue to suffer under the tyranny of the medical insurance oligarchy. Let them go back and explain to the voters why they would not support a comprehensive medical reform bill that would benefit everyone in their state.

The voters can give us the answer as to whether the Congress made the right decision, whatever it might eventually be, in November, 2010.

I’m sure they will -- in spades…

Click on the link below if to read the Senate Finance Committee’s “Markup” copy of the Health Care Bill. You’ll find 223 pages of technical and legal text that really “hides” the facts and critical details of the plan. You’ll probably know less about the plan after you read it than by simply looking online for a brief synopsis.

Americas Healthy Future Act (Senate Finance Committee -- 09/16/2009)

Our teacher, Mr. Robert Phillips, a man whom I admired greatly then and remember fondly now, stood before our class and made a statement that I still recall quite well. After he was finished, everyone in the class sat quietly in their seats. All of us there that day were either confused, scared, or just plain angry when he finished his little speech to us. He did not ask for comments and did not entertain any questions. He simply went back to supervising the production of the next issue of our school newspaper, the “Poly Spotlight.”

Because of its particular timing and its warning of trouble ahead for America, I think what Mr. Phillips said to us that day might be instructive and of interest to the readers of Just One Opinion.

Please realize that it’s been nearly fifty years since I heard Mr. Phillips give this speech. I have trouble remembering what someone said to me yesterday -- so trying to recall exactly what was said in my high school classroom forty-nine years ago will not be the easiest thing for me to do. But I’m going to try my best to present his words as accurately as I can, while preserving his message and intent. It’s true, I can’t remember exactly every word he said, but I sure remember his message. Here it is paraphrased to the best of my ability:

Mr. Robert Phillips addressing the students of his Journalism class, Riverside (CA) Poly High School, November 9, 1960 (reconstructed from memory):

“You know me -- I don’t usually bring up politics in this class except as part of your training on how to present a subject when you write a news article. You know that I believe in being fair and impartial as a reporter, and that I tend to grade you harshly whenever I see your personal bias or opinion sneaking into one of your assignments.

“But this is a sad day for me because I think that it is a sad day for America. As you know, John F. Kennedy was elected to be our next President last night. I have nothing against Catholics and I know that many of you belong to that faith, as are many of my own friends and some of my relations. That’s not the point.

“My point is that Democrat John Kennedy is young and immature and comes from a very dedicated Roman Catholic family from liberal Massachusetts. As our President, I can not see how he can serve both his religion and his country at the same time.

“What choice will he have if the Pope tells him to take a particular stand or orders him to do something that would favor the Catholic Church over other religions in this country? How can he possibly say ‘no’ to the head of his church?

“We’ve always had Protestant presidents in this country and there is a reason for that. Protestants don’t answer to one man in the Vatican. John Kennedy will have no choice but to do what he is told by the Pope or face excommunication from the Catholic Church.

“Yes, he’s young and good looking -- he’s very bright and has written a best seller (Profiles in Courage), but he hasn’t faced the real test of leadership in America. Do we want America to become a Catholic country like France, Spain or Italy? Do we want the Inquisition to be instituted in this country like it was in Europe for over 300 years? Do we want the Catholic Church to become our national religion like it is in Mexico?

“That, my students, is what we face in the next four years. Maybe not -- he may play it safe his first four years and then allow Rome to take over and dictate our future during his second term. I don’t know how it will happen -- but I know that our country is in deep trouble and we have only seen the very tip of the iceberg.

“Richard Nixon had more votes than John Kennedy. By all rights he should be our next President. But Kennedy manipulated the system so that he only had to win the Electoral College votes, not the vote of the people. Richard Nixon could be the greatest president in this country’s history if he ever gets the chance. He is honest, a good Quaker from California who believes in religious freedom, and an active anti-Communist who loves America. He served under President Eisenhower, so he has been trained by the very best President to serve in your lifetime.

“Kennedy is a good looking man with a pretty wife and cute little girl. He could become very popular among those who like movie stars but don’t really care about what happens to America. My guess is that after four years, if he doesn’t set up a Roman Catholic dictatorship in America during his first term, that he will be voted out of office and the Pope will find someone else to try and take over America.  If good Americans stand up for what is right, John Kennedy will not be reelected and instead will become just a footnote in our history as the first -- and hopefully the last -- Catholic to be elected president in our country.”

Looking back at history, Mr. Phillips, in his soft-spoken but deeply felt rhetoric, got one thing absolutely right:

No other Catholic has been elected President since John Kennedy. Surprisingly, Joseph Biden is the first Catholic ever to be elected to the office of Vice-President.

But Mr. Phillips also misread the course of both John Kennedy’s presidency and the next fifty years of our country’s history:

John Kennedy did not take any action to give the Catholic Church an advantage within United States politics or culture.

The first Pope to make an official visit to the United States was Pius VI in October, 1965 during the term of President Lyndon Johnson (Disciples of Christ).

Pope John Paul II was was invited six times to visit the United States: the term of Jimmy Carter (Baptist); Ronald Reagan (Presbyterian) -- three times; and Bill Clinton (Baptist) -- twice.

President Kennedy’s administration was noted for effective management of the federal government, for taking on both the Mafia and the corrupt Teamsters Union, and his intelligent dealings with European and South American countries. His general popularity among all groups, except for extreme southern state right-wing Republicans, continued to rise until his assassination in 1963.

Richard Nixon, despite landslide victories in 1968 and 1972, mishandled the economy by freezing wages and increasing taxes, allowed the Viet Nam War to continue for another five years, and abolished the gold standard. His popularity evaporated quickly after his second election among all voter categories. He completely destroyed his reputation and presidency by lying and trying to cover-up the scandal of the Watergate break-in. He only avoided sure impeachment by resigning during the second year of his second term. Even his hand-picked Vice President, Spiro Agnew, was forced to resign in disgrace to face criminal charges in his home state of Maryland. In spite of some impressive diplomatic gains with Europe and especially China, Richard Nixon’s presidency is generally considered to have been scandalous and badly mismanaged.

After I graduated from high school in 1961, I only saw Mr. Phillips one more time when I happened to see him several years later while shopping in a hardware store. He was still as friendly and soft-spoken as I remembered him and he seemed truly happy to see me again. It never occurred to me to ask him if he ever changed his mind about John Kennedy.

I don’t know if Mr. Phillips is still alive, but if he somehow happens to read this, I hope that he understands that I was pretty much a conservative Republican for many years because of what he said that day. I also want him to know that I understood that his words were supposed to help us to understand his view of our country’s direction at that particular moment in time and that he did not mean any disrespect to the office of the president.

History seems to repeat itself, no matter our good intentions. Some of the same attitudes that Mr. Phillips expressed about John Kennedy are now being directed toward President Obama.

It is clear that the far right in the United States is doing everything it can to paint Obama with the same broad brush of slanderous lies and rumors. They say that he is trying to overthrow constitutional American government, steal our freedoms away from us, and that he is really a Muslim in disguise. They assert that he is trying to turn our government into a communist or socialist state -- some even claiming that he is a “Manchurian Candidate” born in Kenya, trained in Indonesia, and put into power by New Age, One World Government, Priory of Sion internationalists who want to make slaves out of “freedom loving true Americans.”

www.youtube.com/watch?v=_K1iYEobR6I

The sad thing is that so many patriotic, god-fearing Americans -- and others like Mr. Phillips in 1960 -- sincerely believe these lies and false rumors to be true and are afraid of what might be in their future. Fear makes people take shameful and self-destructive actions that would not normally be a part of their daily lives. The far right-wing element in this country is doing everything they can to fan those flames of fear -- just as they did during John Kennedy’s campaign and presidency.

How will those sincere, but deluded Americans feel about Obama after he leaves office in eight years? All I can say is that I hope to live long enough to be able to answer that question.

[Read a followup article about Mr. Robert Phillips. Click here...]

If we want energy security here in the United States (I think we need it) and not remain dependent on foreign oil, then why do we appear to be overlooking natural gas?

These questions beg for a logical response. Natural gas is far more cost effective than either oil or coal, and America’s known resource base exceeds 100 years of supply based on current U.S. consumption levels.

My son Keith is a chemical engineer and plant manager for Total Petrochemicals in Houston, Texas. He recently shared with me what I think is a thought-provoking lecture from Keith Rattie, president of Questar Corp, one of the fastest-growing producers of natural gas in America. You can read his speech in its entirety HERE.

This ten-page transcript of Rattie’s lecture is loaded with lots of irrefutable facts about our energy needs. In my opinion it makes an overpowering case for using natural gas—a significantly cleaner fossil fuel—to help wean our country away from gasoline and coal.

Unfortunately, many of the kernels of wisdom could be lost in the misinformation Mr. Rattie also cites about the ice cap in the Arctic and a “green” Greenland, along with some of his assertions about global warming (I prefer “climate change”). And the messenger does not help the cause with his subjective forecast for alternative fuels.

Perhaps that’s how he thinks the game is played. There is currently no accountability system existing to challenge hard-core environmentalists who willingly or naively misrepresent the facts or use doctored-up pictures to garner support for their doom and gloom views. Many Al Gore clones have successfully demonized everything and everyone associated with fossil fuel industries by using these methods.

Far too many in the public treat oil companies like the enemy, forcing them to defend themselves needlessly and to spend their valuable time and resources to satisfy poorly thought-out regulations. Yes -- and it doesn’t help oil people when their cause is championed by Dick Cheney or radio personality Rush Limbaugh, someone who has turned the use of misinformation into an art form. But it also doesn’t invalidate what the “ditto heads” know to be the truth.

And so it is with Mr. Rattie. His use of misinformation doesn’t change the enormous opportunity for America to use more natural gas as an energy source. We’ll make a huge mistake by minimizing our staggering, 24-hours-a-day dependency on fossil fuel producers who are supporting our standard of living. Nor should we fantasize about how simple it would be to completely replace petroleum with energy from the sun, wind, and other natural resources.

Natural Gas: Pros and cons as a fuel for automobiles.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGaA7r2Y70I

I for one am grateful for Mr. Rattie’s motives. I feel that if he wants to make a case for natural gas -- a really good one -- a case that will be supported by the majority of the public and key politicians, then he needs to limit his speech writing to areas in which he is supremely qualified. Rattie isn’t a scientist, but I think he’s a damn good salesman who understands the potential for natural gas. And, I like his tenacity.

Alaska is a land of mystery, and a state that is the subject of as many misconceptions as there are people who have not spent a considerable amount of time there. Now people know something about Alaska’s governor, and a little about the oil industry in Alaska, because of the current focus on the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, better known as ANWR.

In the last few years, I’ve spent several months of every year outside of Alaska. The things I hear from people I’ve encountered convince me that very few of them know the truth about either its governor or ANWR. Whether you are interested or not, both issues are, or may be, of national significance.

This is not a story about Alaska’s governor – I’ve already done that. This is a story about drilling for oil in Alaska. I worked in the oil industry in Alaska for thirty years. I went from the drill floor to the boardroom, and I did it during the dramatic growth of the oil industry in “The Last Frontier.”

Don’t expect this to be an article that preaches to you about supporting drilling in ANWR. This is a presentation of the truth as I know it. I simply would like for people to hear something other than blatantly distorted anti-development dogma. I worked in the oil industry, but I am an Alaskan who cares about responsible development of our natural resources.

Early on, I want to state that very few people in the world have any idea of how much oil there is in ANWR. Most estimates are generally in the neighborhood of 10 billion barrels, making it one of the last and biggest “elephant” oil fields (100 million barrels or more) left in the U.S.

With special permission from Congress, Chevron was permitted to drill the “KIC No. 1″ well south of the village of Kaktovik on land owned by a Native corporation in the winters of 1985 and 1986. It is the only well that has ever been drilled in ANWR and the results of that well are still a closely guarded secret. Because Chevron, in partnership with BP, owns the only leased acreage inside the 1002 Area of ANWR, and they have zealously (and legally) protected that information for over twenty years, oil insiders assume it is an elephant -a very big elephant.

In a light-hearted bar conversation, I once asked Tom Cook, Chevron’s longtime Alaska Exploration Manager, how much he had been offered for what he knows about ANWR over the years. He politely batted my question aside, and I quickly realized what a serious subject that would be to anyone in his position.

Have you bought a case of bottled water lately? The case I just bought had twenty-four sixteen ounce bottles of water in it (three gallons), and it cost me four dollars. That equates to fifty-six dollars per oilfield barrel for water – for water! An oilfield barrel equals forty-two gallons, and right now oil is trading for around fifty dollars per barrel.

From a barrel of oil, we get gasoline, diesel fuel, fuel oil, liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), naphtha, kerosene, jet fuel, asphalt, engine oil, other lubricants, plastics, synthetic fibers, synthetic rubbers, detergents, fertilizer, perfumes, insecticides, and up to four thousand other byproducts. From a bottle of water we get “water.” Okay, I agree that comparison is not exactly “apples to apples,” but it may mean something to you after you read what follows.

My first trip to Prudhoe Bay was on January 6th, 1975. When I arrived it was around fifty degrees below zero. I was a “worm,” an oilfield term for somebody brand new on a drilling location. The plane was unloaded using a Cat 980 front-end loader, and the pallets with our bags on them were set on the ground outside the terminal. The small space inside the terminal was crowded with serious looking men who were bundled up in heavy parkas and insulated coveralls. All of them were wearing bunny boots and insulated hats with ear flaps. It was a surreal scene to a nervous “worm” – and I knew I looked like one.

Not knowing any better, while waiting for someone to pick me up, I was there long enough that everything in my bag was frozen solid – even my toothpaste.

It takes big men and big iron to drill wells in a hostile environment like the one that exists on the Arctic North Slope of Alaska – and lots of money. It’s a fascinating industry, driven by extreme competition and extreme diversity. The possibilities for huge financial losses are every bit as real as are the possibilities for huge financial gains.

Beginning in 1975, I worked as a mud engineer on drilling rigs on the North Slope and all over Alaska – but that is another story for another time. By the time I retired, I was the manager of one of the largest oilfield service companies in Alaska, giving me a very broad look at the oil industry in Alaska.

I know we have to develop alternative sources of energy, and the quicker we do that the better. I also know that we will need oil for the foreseeable future, and we need to use it responsibly during the considerable length of time it will take to fully develop viable new sources of energy. I can’t visualize jet airplanes flying on something other than jet fuel for many years to come. It should concern everyone that we are doing tremendous damage to our economy by sending hundreds of billions of dollars to foreign countries for oil. Many of those countries are actively using our money to try to undermine our success and our way of life. We are also forcing U.S. oil companies to drill ultra-expensive deepwater wells while we neglect easily available onshore prospects like ANWR.

I know about drilling in the Arctic environment and I know about ANWR. Well funded environmentalists and anti-development activists have done a masterful job of portraying ANWR as a pristine place with beautiful mountains and trees and wild animals cavorting everywhere. There is a part of ANWR that actually looks like that, but it is a long way from the coastal plain, and 8 million acres of it have already been designated as a Wilderness Area.

The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge covers 19 million acres on the northern edge of Alaska. The area on the 1.5 million acre coastal plain where the oil companies want to drill is as flat and barren as a tabletop. There will never be vacationers visiting this part of ANWR. In the summer it is so mosquito infested that you can barely breathe, and in the winter the temperatures (during the fifty-six straight days of darkness) can often reach over 100 degrees below zero with the wind chill factor. There is nothing that a tourist would want to see, and there never will be.

Because of advanced technology in horizontal drilling, the oil industry is only interested in using four thousand surface acres on the coastal plain of the 19 million acre Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. That is like looking at a tiny dot on a sheet of letter-size paper. A very short pipeline could tie ANWR production into the Trans Alaska Pipeline easily.

Developing ANWR should be a no-brainer in today’s economy, but stubborn, anti-development factions often have their positions presented by famous people who have never visited ANWR. They are convincing the American public and politicians, including our new President, that developing ANWR is the wrong thing to do.

Some common arguments against developing ANWR are:

• “Drilling in ANWR cannot produce enough oil.”  The idea that ANWR, or any other oil find in the U.S., is going to satisfy all of our energy requirements is ridiculous. On the other hand, potentially adding 1.5 million barrels a day to U.S. oil production speaks for itself.
• “It would harm the environment.”  All resource developments impact the environment. The modern oil industry is probably the safest, most environmentally responsible, and most regulated industry in America. The impact of development on four thousand acres of the most remote, most barren land in America would be minimal.

The National Audubon Society has earned over $20 million by allowing the oil industry to safely drill wells in the Rainey Wildlife Sanctuary in Louisiana using many of the technologies that were developed on the North Slope of Alaska.

The population of the Central Arctic caribou herd near the Prudhoe Bay oilfield has increased sevenfold since development began in the mid-1970s.

• “It would not result in lower oil prices.”  This is probably a valid argument because the price of oil is controlled by world supply and demand. Gaining a little more independence from foreign suppliers is the salient factor.
• “There are other places to drill.”  With the exception of the recently discovered oilfield in North Dakota, other places to develop in and around the U.S., particularly deep-water locations, continue to become more challenging and more expensive to drill.

And when compared to the price of the water I bought. . . Just something for you to think about.

Here are Sunny’s responses:

“We are in a Depression, and this period of chaos will lead to new social and economic behaviors that will morph into the next equilibrium. They will look quite different than the ones we have just given up. I do not know how this new model will look like but I do have some thoughts:

“The new model will be global. The distribution of wealth will narrow. Uncontrolled free markets and corporate behavior will be regulated to a greater extent. Geographic boundaries will continue to shrink.

“A host of social norms will develop to counteract the pain of the coming rise in unemployment and the criminal behavior it will spawn.

“Religious extremism will have to give way to the more communal needs of survival in the developed economies.

“The human mind and our DNA for survival will foster the consumption/production equation that Jon is concerned about. Remember the ‘rats in the tub’ story (see inset at end of article). The key issues are when and how.

“I believe that risk management is critical in a period of chaos until the new paradigms emerge. Many of our past behaviors will not work in the emerging situation, and new behaviors will have to be validated by society before they can get traction as a norm.

“Strategies for portfolio management are no different. A broad index is likely to underperform as only a ‘few boats will rise on this tide.’ The needs for validation and constant performance feed-back are critical as conditions change; ‘Buy and Hold’ will not work in many instances. A strong intellectual curiosity and need to validate new trends and behaviors will be a key component to success in this endeavor.

“If you are concerned about where you should invest your money, you will have to think ‘outside the box.’ We live in a dynamic world, none more so than today. Those who wisely invested in cash over the last six months will soon have to reconsider where they want to invest their savings.

“A clear picture will not emerge for sometime. It’s more important to focus on actions to be taken now till the clarity of a new paradigm eventually emerges.”

It is in the DNA of man to survive—even more so in the nature of mankind. The more battle-tried we are, the better our survival instincts and the stronger our confidence in our cumulative ability to succeed. One veteran financial advisor put it this way:

“During World War II, German U-boats operating the Atlantic ran unchallenged, sinking merchant ships and leaving survivors stranded in lifeboats, sometimes for weeks, without rations or water. Inexplicably, the youngest and fittest sailors in those lifeboats were often the ones that didn’t survive. For years this phenomenon remained a mystery, until it was realized that the veteran sailors survived because they had been through earlier crises. The younger, inexperienced sailors perished because they saw themselves as trapped in a hopeless situation, often jumping overboard into the cold North Atlantic.

“In the 1970s, researchers tested the survival theory by immersing mice in a tub of water. They found that the mice would swim for a brief time, then give up and drown. However, if they were “rescued” and taken out of the water before drowning, when they were returned to the tub they would swim for hours. The difference was that they had hope.”

“Why don’t you call Sunny Bal?” Eric suggested. I’d known Sunny informally for the past five years. He owns the bridge club where Eric and I play. I also knew that Sunny was a successful, upbeat, self-made business man. I soon realized that I didn’t know the “real” Sunny Bal.

I called Sunny and asked if we could get together because I was in need of some financial advice. He immediately invited me to join him the next day at his finely appointed home perched high on the south side of the Catalina Mountains in Tucson, Arizona.

When I arrived at his house late in the afternoon, I was greeted by Sunny, still wearing a long sleeved dress shirt and a tie cinched tightly over the top button of his shirt. He was accompanied by Baxter, his three-year-old security guard—a one hundred pound, crotch sniffing, playful bundle of energy. He directed me to his office where we enjoyed an excellent bottle of Francis Ford Coppola red wine paired with dainty tomato and cucumber sandwiches. The first fifteen minutes passed quickly.

But I was on a mission and it wasn’t to make small talk. I wanted to get deep into Sunny’s head and perhaps hear some pearls of wisdom. He didn’t disappoint me.

I hope you will find his sound bites on the current economic problems, our potential for recovery, and his general philosophy, as insightful as I did: 

• The current economic meltdown that we are experiencing was a long time in building with a successive series of deregulations fueling the excesses of financial and real estate speculations. There’s a lot of blame to go around, shared by financiers, governments, and investors alike. The fact is that we are here and our focused attention should be centered on asking and answering the question: What do we do? Traditionalists take a militant view that we should “let them fail” and then go in afterward and clean up. That is tough medicine that could kill the patient. The cost of doing nothing is too much to bear: Economic misery for the have-nots could lead to social unrest or worse. These very problems have already started in Eastern Europe. Let’s pray we don’t get infected too.
• I believe we need to arrest the “domino effect.” This will require that people work in concert, not at cross purposes. We need to give our young, charismatic President our support in this tough challenge. President Franklin D. Roosevelt tried many things, keeping what worked and discarding what didn’t. We find ourselves in similar but uncharted waters. Extinction is not an option – evolution to the next level is!
• Fred Mishkin says, “If Wall Street falls apart, Main Street collapses.” I believe Ben Bernanke and the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury have it right by trying to stabilize the financial system to prevent it from seizing up. I only wish they had started several months ago.
• The stimulus package will have a powerful effect in stemming our weakening economy. I do believe it is the right medication for a very sick patient. I only question if the dosage is sufficient. The credit markets are thawing rapidly. Capital markets all around the world are regaining their footing and the banks are lending again. If we can find solutions to the foreclosure crisis, we will have made considerable progress in getting back on the road to recovery. Survive we will!
• It is in periods of chaos that great opportunities are frequently born. Fear leads to panic selling. The market has been cut in half over the last eighteen months. Great stocks have been thrown down with the bad. In the meantime, a flight to safety has also driven Treasury, Money Market, and CD yields to less than 1% for short-term maturities, well below the cost of inflation. The price of all this stimulus spending, financed through borrowing and the copious printing of money, risks future inflation when the economy finally recovers. Survive we will, but the price we pay could be higher inflation.
• I believe “efficient markets” are a myth. The efficient market hypothesis is based on critical assumptions that human behavior is “rational” and that the markets are “free.”  In fact, neither assumption is even remotely accurate. Any study of the behavior of crowds will show that human behavior is anything but rational and competent. Advertisers and public relations consultants have developed and practiced the skills of being able to quickly and decisively alter our impulses and opinions. While our markets are supposedly “free,” the regulations that were designed to keep them free and fair are often thwarted because regulators are frequently seduced by the regulated.
• The need for security is almost always driven by fear. Fear of both the known and unknown; fear that can be rational or irrational. Fear clouds our judgment, stifles creativity, and prevents us from serving mankind; it makes us suspicious of the motives of our neighbors. Security comes from the will of society at large. You can keep your wealth only if society lets you. When the very rich flaunt their wealth or abuse their power, the will of the majority soon acts to deprive them of both. True security cannot come at the expense of your neighbor, but through a collective feeling of well-being. Thus to preserve wealth, and the security it offers, you have to share it.
• Each individual is responsible for living his own life and for finding himself. If he persists in shifting this responsibility to somebody else, he fails to find out the meaning of his own existence. Bill Moyers says, “When you get to be older and the concerns of the day have been attended to, and you turn to the inner life—well if you don’t know where it is or what it is, you will be sorry!”

With overwhelming feedback from readers who want to hear more from Fred, I decided to create a forum for him to comment about today’s world. Since Alaska is truly at the “Top of the World,” the title gives a sense of Fred’s ability to overview the world and make comments.

Fred is a pretty salty guy, so I have edited his language from what it is in Saylor’s Triangle. He also tends to be brutally honest. His unedited comments will be featured on the SaylorsTriangle.com and CraigBieber.com websites and blogs on an ongoing basis.

Fred Longcoor – From the Top of the World

Fred says: “Obamination?”

This is all just too bizarre to ignore. If it looks like creeping socialism, and it sounds like creeping socialism, it probably is creeping socialism.

I’m trying. Even though I thought Barack Obama was a silver-tongued messiah, with little substance to back up his hypnotic words, I am tying to support the fact that he is the President of the United States. It is very early yet, but me and my buddies just can’t get our heads around the things that are happening now. If you understand them, maybe you can answer the following questions:

1. Do you know that government will become an unprecedented 31% of the U.S. economy with the Obama programs that have been initiated and proposed? I’m not sure that even includes the $410 billion spending bill from out of nowhere that the Dems are trying to ram through congress right now.
2. “Stand back, ‘cause I don’t know how big this thing is going to get.” – Fred Longcoor (from Saylor’s Triangle). Can you wrap yourself around a $787 billion Economic Stimulus Package that comes on the heels of the $350 billion in TARP money that is gone without anybody knowing for sure where it went? Do you think that a pork-loaded…excuse me, earmark-loaded, package with things in it like $650 million for digital television converter box coupons is the proper way to stimulate the economy? Is that $650 million spend acceptable to you because you are comforted by the fact that the Obama led congress made the all important move of changing the date for the conversion to digital television signals from February to June?
3. Here’s a goat-roping in the making. Do you know that much of the Stimulus money will be spent at the discretion of state governors and city mayors? Can you imagine the chaos that will create?
4. And then, there is the $75 billion (or possibly up to $275 billion) Housing Plan. How do you feel about the fact that you have built a life of financial responsibility and worked your butt off to provide for your future, and now you will have to sit back and watch the government (with a lot of support from your tax dollars) bail out the fools and the freeloaders who couldn’t manage their own lives? Who says there aren’t any free rides?
5. My buddies and I apparently don’t understand the concept of bi-partisanship. Is it significant to you that only three Republicans supported the Economic Stimulus Package?
6. All my money’s in a sock right now, but have you noticed how the financial markets have reacted to the new programs? Stocks have recently plummeted to eleven year lows, and our country is going to have to count on financing from China, who recently enacted an
   economic stimulus plan that actually works.

   Time Magazine says of the top twenty-five people responsible for the current economic crisis, Bill Clinton is number thirteen, and George Bush is number fourteen! Second on the list is Phil Gramm, who, under Bill Clinton, pushed through the repeal of the Glass-Steagall act, which is widely blamed for opening the door to all those shady credit swaps.

7. Nancy Pelosi, Barney Frank, and Harry Reid? Not Obama’s fault, but this sad comedy team as a major part of the face of the Democratic Party is just too much for me to take.  Stay tuned for what Nancy’s hairdresser has to say. There is no real question here, just wonderment.
8. Bill Richardson, Rob Blagojevich, Tim Geithner, Judd Gregg, and Tom Daschle?  Can you say, “Rookie mistakes?”
9. Is there anybody out there other than me who would like to know what would have happened if the government had stayed out of this economic crisis?

*          *          *          *          *

• Let’s see, some big financial institutions would have failed, bringing rise to many of the eight thousand smaller, strong, non-corrupt and successful financial institutions. Some big financial institutions that have already received billions of dollars from the government are probably going to fail anyway.
• Lots of people who signed silly loans would have lost their homes. They would have had to rent for a while as they rebuilt their financial reserves. Eventually, they would be able to buy one of the millions of available and reasonably priced homes that would be on the market. Kind of sounds like the good old days.
• Millions of people would have lost their jobs – millions are losing their jobs anyway. The money dedicated to TARP and the Economic Stimulus Package could have gone to un-employment payments and then it would have found it’s way into the economy.
• GM and Chrysler would have had to file for bankruptcy protection. Maybe they would figure out that instead of producing dozens of car models that nobody can identify, that offering a few quality built models would actually help them compete with the foreign auto makers. Maybe they would learn that making Jeeps look like Hummers, and Hummers look like Jeeps makes no sense. Most importantly, maybe the UAW would learn that an old fashioned work ethic on the assembly line at a fair cost would also help the US automakers compete with the foreign automakers. Maybe the Big Three could bring their $70+ an hour labor cost in the U.S. in line with Toyota, Nissan, and Honda’s $48 an hour labor cost in the U.S. Maybe they could also get rid of the UAW’s ridiculous and expensive Jobs Bank; several of my buddies, and a couple women I know, would love to have one of those $31 an hour jobs that pay you for not working.
• Maybe, with all of this going on, a “sleeping giant with a golden hammer,” a strong sense of loyalty to our country, and a real understanding of the issues would begin to stir. The  Baby Boomers have made this the wealthiest generation in history. Maybe, with a generational sense that we need to work and fight for what is best for the country, the $33 trillion dollars of wealth that they have accumulated would begin to flow into the economy! That’s “trillion” - with a T!
• And this is a huge stretch – but maybe we would begin to react to the fact that we can’t continue to spend billions of dollars taking care of illegal aliens and people who have made a career out of accepting handouts from the government for doing nothing!.

America is a place where all things are possible. All things of significance are draped in responsibility, tempered by circumstance, and measured by performance.

There are millions of voters who found their way to the voting booths last November – many for the first time – and they are now waiting for the payout. I don’t know what the unidentified foreigners who put millions of dollars into the campaign for change are waiting for, but they may be getting it. The malleable millions who wore their cloaks of righteous indignation to the polls need to throw them aside and take a hard look at where we are heading.

I may be the first one to say this, but is it possible that we may not be witnessing the end of the Republican Party, but the beginning of the end of the Democratic Party?

“There’s a smell in the air, and it isn’t sweet. There’s a cloud in the sky, and it isn’t bringing rain. There’s a stir in my soul, and it isn’t soulful…and there’s a fear in my gut that we have created a regret.” - Fred Longcoor (from Saylor’s Triangle).

The fears of nationalization are based on the premise that most Americans don’t want Washington bureaucrats running our major corporations, especially banks and energy companies. The general consensus is that having banks like Bank of America and oil companies like Exxon managed by the government will remove any incentive for both industries to invest their own money toward innovation and modernization. Private industry (translation=”big corporations”) is always viewed as being far more efficient and more friendly to its clients (translation=”we the people”) – and therefore can do a better job than government.

(Friday, Feb. 20, 2009) It has been reported that Senator Christopher Dodd, chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, suggested that the Obama administration wants to avoid nationalizing U.S. banks, but that certain banks might have to be nationalized for a short time. According to Bloomberg and other sources, Dodd stated that he didn’t welcome that possibility, but could see that it was possible and might actually happen.

In reality, many banks and major corporations have been nationalized to some degree in the past, albeit with mixed results.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt took over the banks and declared a “bank holiday” in 1933 to stop the disastrous mass withdrawal of funds due to public panic. The banks were released back into the private sector in a short time, but were forced to carry and pay for government insurance for all accounts under $100,000 (now $250,000) to the FDIC to protect their depositors. Roosevelt’s action is credited as being the first step toward ending the “Great Depression.”

During World War 2, 90% of major industry in the United States was effectively “nationalized.” Giant corporations that included the automobile, steel, and petroleum industries were still run by their civilian managers, but the federal government told them exactly what they would manufacture, how much and how often they would produce, and told them exactly what they would be paid. Thanks to this approach, America was in and out of the worst war in human history, one we fought on two major fronts on a world wide basis, in less than four years.

So it is with our current banking crisis. Wouldn’t it be better to have competent banking executives, those with reputations untarnished by recent scandals, volunteering to work to achieve an industry turnaround situation for reasonable compensation packages? Instead of forcing them to work under the very CEOs and directors that managed these big banks into bankruptcy, let them work under the guidance of government officials like Federal Reserve Chief Ben Bernanke and Secretary Tim Geithner and be directly responsible to the President. Above all, let there be transparency to what they are doing, so that the American public can be reassured that progress is being made toward an ultimate solution instead of a bunch of already wealthy fat cats making themselves richer using taxpayer money.

Nationalization would absolutely require tighter regulations from Congress, closing some banks and having them operate under the supervision of the FDIC, and having the entire industry under the direct supervision of the Federal Reserve, Treasury and General Accounting Office. Above all, the American public and members of Congress should be informed at specified intervals as to how taxpayer money is being used and what results are being achieved.

Nationalization may not be the right solution for the entire banking system, and in many cases it simply would not be needed. Small locally run banks and most credit unions seem to have weathered the crisis well because they have maintained conservative lending and investment approaches in their daily operations. Whether any of these financial entities should be included in a government takeover would need to be made on an individual basis, based on their demonstrated performance.

Any government bank takeover plan should be viewed as temporary. If and when the banking system stabilizes, then a carefully programmed return of these institutions to tightly regulated private ownership should occur, similar to what happened to the country’s major manufacturing industries after the World War.

For now, however, the viability of most of the major banking institutions in this country is doubtful. When you have banks like Washington Mutual and Wachovia disappearing almost overnight, and Bank of America and Citigroup trading on the stock exchange for just pennies, you have to acknowledge that the government must step in and take decisive action.

Should big banks be nationalized? Lindsey Graham says we might…

www.youtube.com/watch?v=fREe1rZev7g

We also have to realize that it is inevitable that some major banks will not survive in spite of the government’s endless stream of band aid measures. As the process progresses, some will need to be taken over, some declared bankrupt and closed, and others forced to merge.

The real question is how much time, effort, and taxpayer money will have been wasted before someone with the power (read the Federal Reserve, the Treasury, or the President), uses that power effectively to stop the destruction of our nation’s financial system. It has been admitted that the possibility that the Obama Administration may need to nationalize some financial institutions and the issues have been discussed at some length in and out of the White House.

The fear is that the highly charged political nature of just the mention of the word “nationalization” will create an initial policy by the Obama Administration of almost any action except nationalization. Politics aside, the urgent nature of this problem requires immediate action and any delay in stabilizing the banking system could set the stage for a complete and irreversible meltdown of our economy.

The current Treasury plan tries to tackle the banking industry problem using several different approaches: buying up or insuring toxic loans, injecting more capital into the system, and promoting more lending to consumers.

At this stage, the injection of more capital using taxpayer funds appears to be the administration’s choice for the near future. The trouble with capital injection is that funds are being given to banks with no control over their use to the same managers who drove those banks into near bankruptcy.

The process up to this point hasn’t been in any way transparent as promised by the Bush Administration. The public is beginning to feel that the Treasury is being looted by the same shameless financial opportunists that created the very situations and management decisions that created the current banking crisis. There aren’t any positive signs of stabilization to date, but rather an apparent deeper slide into financial hell and the rest of us are forced to follow behind.

Bank of America and Citigroup have received nearly $100 billion of the TARP funds, and yet they are both closer to the brink of complete collapse than when the TARP bill was passed. They have become the most likely candidates for immediate nationalization or FDIC takeover – or both.

So now what do we do? If we need to, do we use the bitter pill of nationalization to stop the disease before it spreads any further? Or do we just let these big financial institutions die and let their rotting corpses infect other healthy companies and corporations, pulling the entire system down into the depths of hell with them?

The current situation reminds me of an old childhood game that forced a choice between two unimaginable but equally horrific options. “Would you rather (a) slide down a mile long razor blade, or (b) swim in a river of burning gasoline?”

At the moment it feels like our government is faced with similarly distasteful options in dealing with the banking crisis.

There are good words that speak to truth, inspire us individually, and bring people together.  Words can make us think, make us laugh, and sometimes even bring us to tears of wrenching sadness or joyful emotion.

There are bad words that promote lies, destroying people and communities as they create divisions between families, nations, and cultures.

On Tuesday Barack Obama will need to use many “good words” when he’s sworn in as our 44th President, words that will inspire, heal and bring together the American people during a fearful time of deepening economic crisis, the continuing threat of terrorist attacks, international war, and apocalyptic climate change.

Obama has clearly proven that he is a gifted orator. There are high expectations that during his inaugural address he will successfully reassure a worried nation, firmly define our government’s guiding principles for both home and abroad, and outline an optimistic course for the near future.

It won’t be easy.  Most inaugural addresses have been forgettable, especially those given during the past five terms. But there are a few from our nation’s past that Obama can use as templates for his own speech on Tuesday, speeches that have stood the test of time and still inspire us decades later.

Obama’s call to unity in previous speeches echo those of Thomas Jefferson’s 1801 inaugural, who after a very tough and heated political battle with his friend and co-patriot John Adams, tried to heal the nation by saying, “Every difference of opinion is not a difference of principle.  We are all Republicans! We are all federalists!”

In school we all memorized Abraham Lincoln’s short but stirring “Gettysburg Address.”  But in 1861, during his first inaugural, Lincoln appealed to the nation heading destructively into civil war to reach out to “the better angels of our nature.” Four years later, he promised to heal the wounds created by a war that was still continuing in the south by establishing a policy of “malice toward none, with charity toward all.”

In 1933 Franklin D. Roosevelt faced a time of crisis much like Obama, only far worse because the Great Depression had the country in its grip. Only those physically at the Inauguration could see the determination on his face and his fists pounding the air as he spoke, yet the majority of Americans living at that time will never forget the words that came over their radios that day.

“…This great nation will endure as it has always endured, will revive and will prosper,” Roosevelt reassured the nation, “…it is my firm belief that we have nothing to fear but fear itself — nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.”

More importantly, Roosevelt followed up his words with action. Although the road was long and tough, within five years the economy had begun to improve, the nation’s infrastructure was being expanded, and optimism had replaced the public’s gnawing feeling of failure. 

Many of us living today remember President John F. Kennedy’s 1961 declaration that “the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans.”  Then, as his speech was drawing to a close, he called upon all Americans to support and to serve when he said, “Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country.”

Obama is a student of World and American History and has been reportedly studying all prior Presidents’ first years in office and their inaugural addresses.  He can certainly learn much from listening to Roosevelt’s fireside radio chats, honest but calm reports about the Great Depression and the state of the nation. Roosevelt also publicly outlined his plans to restore the economy that would lead to a promised happier future for Americans.

A look back at memorable Presidential inauguration speeches

www.youtube.com/watch?v=EeCmjwklHOU

President Barack Obama’s Inaugural Speech of 2009 should clearly install confidence in the ability of the American people to meet any challenges the country might face and in his administration’s ability to lead the way.  He must call all of us to service not only for our own benefit, but also for the good of the entire country.  His speech must be full of “good words” that bring all Americans together without regard to their political parties, religious affiliations (or lack thereof), sexual orientation, ethnicity, or economic status. 

If Obama manages to give a speech that will make us all feel good and if he uses phrases that we’ll all be quoting for weeks afterward, then he will have had a very impressive first day as President of the United States.  

Good luck, Mr. President!

His advice might apply more to the Republican Party in some ways more than it ever did to me. The most prominent members of the GOP still seem to want to promote the eight years of the Bush Administration as taking the country in the “right direction” while it actually lead us over the steep falls of war, economic failure, and a near destruction of our Constitutional rights.

I would like to think that all is not lost for the Republican Party and that last November’s disastrous election will not really mark the end of their influence. This country needs all the checks and balances available to it, especially in Congress, but unless the GOP changes course it is likely to find itself irrelevant for years to come.

For Republicans changing course will require a complete autopsy on their election losses and in some cases giving up long held positions that have been both divisive and destructive to the progress of the country. In some cases this will mean moving away from the direction that they have taken in the past and becoming a more centered party – even taking positions that they would have considered “left leaning” or “socialist” in the past.

At the moment, this change of philosophy and direction doesn’t look like something the Republicans still in power are willing to do. They not only choose to ignore the clear voice of the electorate, they also want to ignore the failings of their party leaders and the criminal acts of so many of their members.

Republican pundits and supporters seem to feel it is OK to punish a woman and her doctor for performing an abortion, but see nothing wrong with their own members of Congress who have been charged or convicted of criminal acts while in office – running for reelection (Ted Stevens, Randy Cunningham, Larry Craig).

Republican politicians and pundits are still promoting their position that the United States is actually a “center-right” nation that distrusts so-called “progressive” policies.

The real problem, according to them, is that President Bush and his administration abandoned the GOP’s philosophy of “limited government” and began to act like “big spending, pork barrelling Democrats.”

Let’s face it: If America was truly “center-right” in its preferred politics, then the candidacy of “center-right” Senator John McCain should have been more competitive – and possibly even successful.

Center-right: that’s what John McCain is, or has claimed to be. In his attempt to win the Republican presidential nomination, he was forced to swerve toward and embrace the Right that he disliked and that disliked him. As soon as he began to accept the support and created an uneasy alliance with the southern evangelical far-right – and especially after selecting Sarah Palin as his vice-presidential running mate – there was no way McCain could wrap the wide cloak of the “center” around his candidacy.

Many Republican conservatives feel their future superstars will be Sarah Palin and Jeb Bush. Unless Palin matures and gives up her mid-western vaudeville act and evangelical dogma, she will never be taken seriously as a leader by either the general public or Republican power-brokers. Former Florida Governor Jeb could eventually become the GOP party leader because of his great skills and experience – but he will forever be haunted and held back because of his being perceived as “another Bush.”

At the moment our electorate seems to be following its 200-year historical pattern of leaning between center-right and center-left. Since 2004 it has been clearly moving more to the left in response to Bush’s policy failures and Republican intransigence on some issues.

If President Obama and the Democratic controlled Congress is active and even somewhat successful in stimulating the economy by rebuilding our infrastructure, returning responsible regulation to Wall Street, ending the Iraq war, restoring Constitutional rights, and increasing our national energy resources using “green technologies,” the electorate will continue to abandon the Republican Party and continue to identify with progressive Democrats and centrist Independents.

My fear is the Bush era spendthrift and pork-barrel loving Republicans in Congress will suddenly remember that they are supposed to be supporting spending cuts and smaller government – throwing up their opposition to budgets and massive spending programs that will be needed to prevent our current recession from turning into another historic depression.

If they do – and the odds are high that they will try to stop Obama and Democrats at almost any cost – they are likely to find themselves out of a job or a part of a shrinking minority with little or no representation outside of southern intra-state politics. The Grand Old Party of Lincoln will continue to become disreputable and irrelevant unless and until it finds a new voice and new leaders with fresh ideas and a changed outlook.

The Republican party leadership seems to support a platform is so far out of touch with the rest of country on many of the major issues. Their stand on three issues, aside from the economy and the war in Iraq, seem to put them at odds with a vast majority of Americans: abortion rights, stem-cell research, and universal medical care.

The GOP has a few rising African-American office holders, but very few. Local Republican party organizations take pains to avoid supporting black or Hispanic candidates, so very few ever make it to the national stage. Those in the party that do have some skill and enjoy a small level of success are treated as “tokens” by the national leadership. By their own actions, Republicans have virtually written off two of the fastest growing voter populations for the foreseeable future.

I’ve voted for Republicans for most of my life, including George Bush in 2000. But Bush and the current crop of GOP party leaders and supporters have ruined it for me. I doubt, with the few years I have left, that they will ever get another vote from me – or a lot of other Americans.