Topic: U.S. Senators Kennedy and Kerry.
Are Massachusetts residents better off with these two politicians in the U.S. Senate -- or is it time for some new blood?
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posted by G.M.Heller at Wednesday, March 30, 2005
4 Comments:
RE: Low approval ratings for the Democratic Congress...Mayor Bloomberg for President?
Dear Berkshire Bloggers, Pols, News Media, & the People:
As you all know, I love to watch and read all about politics, and I found out this past weekend that the Democratic Party's Majority in the U.S. Congress currently has a lower approval rating than the U.S. President, George W. Bush.
I find this interesting for the following reasons:
(a) The Democratic Party's Majority in the U.S. Congress has not accomplished many of their promised goals. The only major achievement is a paltry hike in the national minimum wage, which is only symbolic because the state government's set their own minimum wages at an average higher rate than the national minumum wage floor.
(b) The Democratic Party's Majority in the U.S. Congress did NOT succeed in de-escalating the current Iraq War.
(c) Moreover, special interests, lobbying groups and corporate elite executives are at record high levels of influence on Capitol Hill. Speaker Pelosi held a fundraising event where the minimum campaign contribution was $10,000 and up this past Spring 2007.
(d) The Democratic Party's agenda sounded grassroots last year during their sweep into national political party, but that was proven to be only hype. The Democratic Party's real agenda is the same as the Republican Party's agenda: To fill their campaign coffers with as much money as they can get their filthy hands on from the wealthy and high income upper class known to the rest of us "have nots" as the Corporate Elite.
This past Saturday, June 23, 2007, Alan Chartock published his weekly Berkshire Eagle political column where he shared his views on the failings of the two party system that selects the two choices most people don't agree with for president. He praised the current Mayor of New York City, Michael Ruben Bloomberg, billionaire businessman turned politician, who is also a native of Massachusetts, for his ambitions for The White House. While I don't view Mayor Bloomberg as a grassroots, working class, common man candidate, he also did not start out with a huge trust fund like John Forbes Kerry or William Floyd Weld or George Walker Bush either. Mayor Bloomberg has lived his life across the spectrum of American class and status. I concur with Alan Chartock that Mayor Bloomberg's Independent run for The White House in 2008 will only bring positive results to our democratic system of national governance. Our nation is in desperate need of positive political changes. I am not endorsing Mayor Bloomberg for U.S. President (yet), but I would like to see him run for U.S. President next year. He may be our only hope since the Democratic Party's majority in U.S. Congress is failing to live up to its campaign promises and now has a lower approval rating than the sitting president!
Sincerely,
Jonathan A. Melle
P.S. Did you catch the 6/25/2007 edition of Newsweek's "Conventional Wisdom Watch: Let's Get Whacked Edition"? (WILLARD MITT) ROMNEY: (DOWN ARROW): Claimed epiphany converted him to pro-life overnight, then tape surfaces of later pro-choice statement. Ouch. WHAT A PHONY!!!!
Dear Boston Globe:
Your newspaper is 0-2 with me today. Congressman John Olver is earmarking federal funds for many important projects in his legislative district, and you are taking him to task for it.
Well, look in the goddamned MIRROR! The "Big Dig" in Boston is the most expensive, wasteful, dangerous, and the like, single public works project in the history of the United States of America. There is nothing more pork barrell that the $15 Billion of wasted public dollars, including billions of federal dollars, spent on Boston's "Big Dig"1
Below, please find Stan Rosenberg's report of State Government. Like his best political friend, John Olver, State Senator Rosenberg backs a project that spends tens of millions of public dollars on the "Massachusetts Broadband Incentive Fund" that will primarily benefit the screwed over communities in the Western Massachusetts region. Boy, you Editors at the Globe must be fuming at public dollars not be wasted on the "Big Dig"!
I must take the time to dissent against Rosenberg's report on PENSIONS. Sen. Rosenberg states that the new law directs the assets of underperforming local pension systems into the state's pension fund. That is utter BULLSHIT! If the state assumes the local system's assetts, they should also assume their pension liabilities (or debts, too). This is like the county government state takeover redux all over again. It was O.K. for the state to mismanage the "Big Dig", but not for local or county governments to have inefficieny performance results. It is totally unfair!
In Dissent (again),
Jonathan A. Melle
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GLOBE EDITORIAL
One man's pork
August 9, 2007
THERE IS a lot to like about the ethics reforms the US House passed in the frenetic hours before taking its summer recess this week. Motivated by the bipartisan scandals that have badly tarnished Congress, the House under the new Democratic leadership of Speaker Nancy Pelosi set out to "drain the swamp," in her words, and clear up the infestation of special interests in Washington.
Among the changes -- adopted by a lopsided vote of 411 to 8 -- are requirements that lobbyists disclose campaign contributions, both individual and "bundled," and post them on a public, searchable website. Gifts of meals or trips from lobbyists would be banned. Lawmakers convicted of bribery or perjury would be denied congressional pensions -- too late to deny one to Duke Cunningham, maybe, but an overdue fix of this taxpayer rip-off.
But one reform adopted earlier this year may have had unintended consequences: requiring members to disclose sponsorship of legislative earmarks. These special projects in appropriations bills, often considered pork, include the notorious $230 million "bridge to nowhere" in Alaska. Rather than serve as a disinfectant, however, the sunshine now cast upon the practice has in some cases caused it to blossom, as members compete for bragging rights over who can bring home the most.
In Massachusetts, the undisputed earmark king is John Olver, Democrat of Amherst, the bookish former chemistry professor who is in his eighth full term. Olver personally tagged $34.7 million in earmarks in the current budget cycle alone, according to an analysis by the group Taxpayers for Common Sense. This is largely due to Olver's role as a member of the House Appropriations Committee and one of its "cardinals," so-called for the power they wield over the budget. Not all of Olver's earmarks are for his district, but he does get to distribute the funds.
Here is where one man's pork becomes another man's daily bread. Olver's earmarks include $6 million for improvements to the Fitchburg-to-Boston rail line; $1 million for downtown streetscapes in Pittsfield; $150,000 for repairs to the William Cullen Bryant homestead, a national historic landmark, in Cummington; $275,000 to renovate the Berkshire Music Hall; and $1.5 million for the Silvio Conte Wildlife Refuge. Each of these expenditures is important to somebody.
Olver's committee chairman, David Obey of Wisconsin, has pledged to cut earmarks in half this year, so they will constitute just 1 percent of the federal budget. And in an interview Tuesday, Pelosi insisted most earmarks are not "the corroding kind of giveaway." If they are, she adds, "the world will know because now they are transparent."
Disclosure may weed out the worst abuses. Still, a system that doles out billions for pet projects is a big reason Congress's approval ratings are nearly as low as President Bush's. It's nothing to write home about.
8/31/2007
Dear President Bush, et al:
U.S. Representative John W. Olver's criticisms of your threat of war against Iran is valid because you should be convincing Congress to vote on the matter, not making speeches that only serve to strengthen the extremist Islamic Jihad groups in the Middle East region.
I am not an expert on the Middle East. Here is what I understand. Iran is predominately Shiite Muslim. Iraq's majority population is Shiite, too, with a concentration in the Southern region of the nation. However, Iraq's old guard was Sunni Muslim, and the Sunni's were terrible to the Shiites. In the 1980's, the Iran v. Iraq War saw Iraqi lead Sunni forces fighting Iranian lead Shiite forces. The Shiite Muslims want revenge against the Sunni Muslims once the U.S. Occupation ends. That will lead to an Iraqi Civil War, which will lead to the Iraqi Sunni Muslims being victims of a government sponsored GENOCIDE. BUT, about 80% of the Muslim World in Sunni Muslim--just not in Iraq and Iran. The Sunni Muslim States would then protect and take vengeance on the Shiite Muslims, which would lead to the Shiite Muslims being victims of another GENOCIDE. The Islamic World would then be almost al Sunni Muslim.
The problem for the U.S. Government and its Big Oil Corporate Elite wealthy businesses is that Saudi Arabia, which is the largest oil producer in the World, is Sunni Muslim, while Iraq, which is the second largest oil producer in the World, and Iran, which is the third largest oil producer in the World, are Shiite Muslim. If Saudi Arabia, et al, takes out Iraq and Iran, then you have a dramatic drop in the production of the World's OIL. The U.S. Government and its Big Oil businesses will lose huge amounts of MONEY as OIL supplies drop and prices skyrocket. It is an issue of economics: Diminishing Supply equals higher Energy prices.
I do not believe that the U.S. Government is a democratic body due to the fascist powers of the Corporate Elite in both America and Europe. The Corporate Elite sets the AGENDA, and the power to set the political agenda is the power to rule the World. Moreover, I do not believe that U.S. Government is in the Middle East for Human Rights, Democracy, and Global Equity for the "have-nots". I do believe that the Corporate Elite AGENDA in the Middle East is to produce as much OIL as possible while keeping the peace through military force. If that means running the risks of multiple GENOCIDES within the ISLAMIC Faith's divisions, then the U.S. Government and Big OIL is willing to run that risk for the benefit of the Corporate Elite's growing profit margins.
What I never understood about Saddam Hussein's tenure as Iraq's dictator is that the U.S. Government was complicit in his rule. In the early 1960's, the U.S. Government via the CIA put him back in Iraq after he was exiled to Egypt, which is another Sunni Muslim country. During the 1980's, the U.S. Government supported Saddam's War against Iran, and when Saddam committed "Crimes against Humanity", the U.S. Government was still Saddam Hussein's ally. The culpability for Saddam Hussein's rule lies on the Corporate Elite's complicity in his rule! After all, the U.S. Government, France, and then-West Germany all armed Saddam Hussein's military, which he then used to kill his own Peoples.
The only way I would support military action against Iran is if they threatened Israel with another Holocaust of the Jewish People. If I were president, and Iran threatened Israel, I would take out Iran with many Nuclear Bombs! Otherwise, I would go through the U.S. Congress as John Olver and others have suggested if military action was needed.
In closing, I find President Bush's Oil Wars to be hypocritical. The president's wars are for just that: Big OIL!
In Dissent,
Jonathan A. Melle
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Olver blasts Bush for threatening stance on Iran
By Evan Lehmann, Transcript Washington Bureau
North Adams Transcript [Online]
Friday, August 31, 2007
WASHINGTON — Massachusetts Congressman John Olver expressed concern Thursday about President Bush's threatening stance toward Iran, saying the president is making "exactly the same arguments" as he did to gain support for the invasion of Iraq.
The Amherst Democrat was referring to Bush's statements this week, including an assertion that Iran is striving to put the Middle East "under the shadow of a nuclear holocaust."
"There's a great many people who are concerned about (an American attack on Iran)," Olver said in an interview. "A great number of people in Congress and a great proportion of the American population is concerned about having another war with another large country in Islam. And yet he goes ahead and continues the saber rattling."
The assessment came one day after Bush accused Iran of "sending arms to the Taliban" in Afghanistan and providing 240-millimeter rockets, explosives and training to Iraq-based insurgents. The pace of Iran's interference is increasing, he warned.
"The Iranian regime must halt these actions," Bush said Tuesday in a speech to the American Legion. "And until it does, I will take actions necessary to protect our troops. I have authorized our military commanders in Iraq to confront Tehran's murderous activities."
Bush said the U.S. is working with the United Nations to impose additional economic sanctions on Iran. But he also struck tones similar to his warnings five years ago that Iraq posed an imminent threat to the United States.
"Iran's actions threaten the security of nations everywhere," he said.
Olver dismissed the president's claim that Iran is arming the Taliban, comparing it to the administration's assertions before the Iraq war that Saddam Hussein was collecting materials from Niger for the development of nuclear weapons and that Iraq had an operational relationship with al-Qaida.
Both assertions were rebuked.
"There he is making exactly the same arguments," Olver said. "It's the same sort of thing of misdirection that has gone on from the very first of this process of the Iraq war."
He added that the allegation of Iran arming the Taliban "cannot be substantiated."
U.S. Sen. Bernard Sanders, I-Vt., introduced a non-binding measure in February affirming that the president should seek congressional approval before attacking Iran. It hasn't been voted on. Olver said he supports a similar measure in the House.
"There's no question it's very threatening to Iran," Olver said of Bush's rhetoric. "It's quite remarkable, given we don't have troops were he to decide he has the power to attack Iran or the need to attack Iran."
"I suppose he could do it by air power. But we have no troops."
Dear People, Pols, & the News Media:
John Olver is hosting an annual campaign event in Pittsfield this coming Saturday morning.
As I understand the situation, many politicians, including Andrea F. Nuciforo, Jr. and Denis E. Guyer will be in attendance. Please see the public invitation cut and pasted below.
If anyone hears of any more vicious rumors against me or those in relations to me, please call, email or write to me about what is said by whom against me. I appreciate people being my eyes and ears while I live with my family in Southern New Hampshire.
We should all care about each other!
Thank you,
Jonathan A. Melle
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15th Annual Berkshire County Breakfast In honor of Congressman John W. Olver
Start:
Saturday, September 15, 2007 - 8:30am
Location:
ITAM Lodge, Waubeek Road, Pittsfield
15th Annual Berkshire County Breakfast
In honor of Congressman John W. Olver
Chairman, Appropriations Subcommittee
on Transportation, HUD, and Related Agencies
Saturday, September 15th
8:30 a.m. – 10:00 a.m.
ITAM Lodge
Waubeek Road, Pittsfield
$25 Guest, $100 Patron, $250 Sponsor
Reserve in Advance: 413-446-2209
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