Ron Paul is the sponsor of a bill to exempt industrial hemp from definitions apparently including it in the Controlled Substances Act. According to thomas.loc.gov, the bill has 10 cosponsors. Here’s a cut and paste from the search page:

H.R.1866 Title: To amend the Controlled Substances Act to exclude industrial hemp from the definition of marihuana, and for other purposes. Sponsor: Rep Paul, Ron [TX-14] (introduced 4/2/2009)

Cosponsors (10)
Latest Major Action: 4/2/2009 Referred to House committee. Status: Referred to the Committee on Energy and Commerce, and in addition to the Committee on the Judiciary, for a period to be subsequently determined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee concerned. COSPONSORS(10), ALPHABETICAL [followed by Cosponsors withdrawn]: (Sort: by date)

Rep Baldwin, Tammy [WI-2] – 4/2/2009
Rep Clay, Wm. Lacy [MO-1] – 4/2/2009
Rep Frank, Barney [MA-4] – 4/2/2009
Rep Grijalva, Raul M. [AZ-7] – 4/2/2009
Rep Hinchey, Maurice D. [NY-22] – 4/2/2009
Rep McClintock, Tom [CA-4] – 4/2/2009
Rep Miller, George [CA-7] – 4/2/2009
Rep Rohrabacher, Dana [CA-46] – 4/2/2009
Rep Stark, Fortney Pete [CA-13] – 4/2/2009
Rep Woolsey, Lynn C. [CA-6] – 4/2/2009

Apparently the text is not yet available at Thomas, though Internet searches indicate some of the major news outlets already have some information on the bill.

It is my understanding that Industrial hemp has no psychoactive properties, so if this bill attracts enough attention, and eventually passes into law, farmers could probably grow it without applying for a special license. Once that occurs, folks will probably will be able to buy hemp clothing at reasonable prices once again. It is said to be stronger and more durable than other natural fabrics. Industrial hemp is quite useful for a number of other things, including paper. It seems preferable to make paper from an annual crop, versus cutting down older trees for that purpose. My understanding is that hemp as a crop is drought tolerant.

All of these plants breath in CO2. Surely this would help some with the Global Climate Change portion that’s said to be due to mankind’s accelerated production of large amounts of CO2 that seemed to begin with the Industrial Revolution in the 18th and 19th centuries.

So if you support this bill, be sure to write to your Representatives encouraging them to sign on as cosponsors.

I plan to do that myself soon, this post hopefully will remind me. I believe it’s better to print or write the letter on paper and send it by mail. I’m not at all certain that electronic submissions even reach the intended offices. Maybe they do.

Public Knowledge has a section devoted to patent reform. One item on their list that I wanted to comment upon that I quickly scanned or read the other day:

“Raising the standard from determination of obviousness from the person having “ordinary skill” in the art to a person having “recognized skill” in the art.

Who defines “recognized skill”? One thing I’ve learned over the years is that those who recognize “pat each other on the back” and either express disdain for, or quietly dismiss, those not in their “inner circle” however they define that phrase.

I once went to a Patent Attorney many years ago, with an ugly but functional device I’d built by hand out of PVC pipe, a dish-washing device, and he tried to convince me that no one in their right mind would buy that, that consumers want something pretty, then he spent the rest of our appointment time trying to convince me to become a petition “signature gatherer”, that’s where the money was he said, and then charged me about $250 for his time of less than 20 minutes! Another time, I went to an invention submission corporation with drawings for a specialized front bicycle wheel, that another guy appeared to study carefully. While this time there was no charge, he spent some time discussing this and some other drawings I showed him which he didn’t look at closely. While we talked, he found out I didn’t have any substantial money to spend, and then said that I should contact a bicycle company (corporation).

20-years later when doing an Internet search, I recall finding that a professor at a University had recently designed and built such a front bicycle wheel as that in my drawings.

The American revolution was fought to get rid of corporations from our lives. They didn’t precisely teach us that in compulsory education, though the educators danced around that precise point skillfully. They almost connected the dot for all of us.

It seems to me that with the explosion of the Internet, and the sharing of knowledge that now seems in the public domain, patent attorneys are probably chomping at the bit to privatize the commons of the Internet and specifically the ideas that have been freely shared.

Even Facebook was recently in the news regarding privatizing their members communal work, a policy they reportedly temporarily reversed, after a huge outcry from their members.

So the pressure to privatize others’ work is certainly there. Hopefully, Public Knowledge will change their position on at least that one item, or perhaps I simply don’t understand the strategy behind it. I did read it very quickly and probably missed important things, and it seemed like a good time for a rant.

Perhaps patents, and the protection of devices, shouldn’t be allowed at all. If there can’t be a level and equal playing field for everyone, including insuring everyone has the money that is required to be spent to acquire a patent and its implication for the masses of human beings who cannot possibly afford (hint hint) to play that game today, then why should there be any patents? Has the primary purpose behind “Limited Time”, espoused in the U.S. Constitution, now been crossed out by Orwell’s Pigs to mean something else: continually privatize the profits, and keep socializing the losses (some are more equal than others)?

According to Wikipedia, the first capacitor was invented in 1745. After its patent presumably expired, and with respect to a society that claims to want to advance knowledge and scientific understanding, shouldn’t our current compulsory schools be teaching this now common or public knowledge of what capacitors are, how they work, what they’re used for, and how to mathematically calculate what sizes are needed in particular applications? It is a ubiquitous device these days. Wouldn’t the same go for electric motors, again according to Wikipedia first invented in 1828 or thereabouts? Don’t some electric motors often accompany capacitors? When I went to public and private schools during the compulsory years, motor-winding class was never offered, even though that’s a skill I could have used many times! Instead, I’ve had to purchase (consumer) new motors when their windings did burn out, or do without.

So it seems the purpose of allowing a patent for a limited time so an inventor could profit from it, has now somehow transformed into a perpetual obscuring to the masses of knowledge gained over past years of scientific advancement, while simultaneously saying we must go to school.

Later in our adult lives our advertising supported media skillfully encourages all of us, regardless of our educational or income level, to buy, buy, and keep buying: so much so that in the last few decades we’re increasingly asked to pay for cable to watch advertising on TV, or buy the new converter box so we can keep watching the ads fed to us, or buy a magazine filled with ads.

What does any of this do for those of us who need money to eat? The last time I was in a grocery store, they still charged money for food. Recognition doesn’t bring money with it, I’m sorry to report. Just look at the homeless. They’ve been recognized at least since the 1980s. They’ve been on TV news. They’ve been studied by scientists. They have advocates working on their behalf. They’re celebrities who are eating out of trashcans because that’s all they can afford!

Think they’re planning on getting a patent anytime soon?

I’ll let you guess where this came from:

“To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries

When one realizes the U.S. constitutional authors didn’t intend “Authors” or “Inventors” to be corporations, the extensive undermining of our society and government created by the granting of corporate personhood, allegedly done not by a judge but instead a court clerk, becomes a lot clearer.

Are these deceptive games solely so a very few (corporations only and the wealthiest of the already wealthy who own most of the largest corporations) can profit and keep profiting until the end of Time itself? Is that how “limited Times” is currently being interpreted by some? If not, then where’s the progress to the masses within a society that continually keeps making all of us pay to keep socializing the losses of a few corporations? Is the sole purpose of the masses to be consumers and underpaid (hint hint) employees in an employment system most like the Feudal Era of Lords and serfs?

If you don’t have any money, you’re only worthy of eating out of a trashcan, or counseling that you need more education and a job so a few elitists at the top of the money pyramid can profit, and after getting that job you can barely pay your bills, never mind having enough disposable income from that job to have a professional file a patent on your behalf and defend it if need be?

Where’s the so-called “Progress”?

It’s been widely reported yesterday, and the reporting is expanding today, that California Assemblyman Tom Ammiano (Democrat-San Francisco) has submitted A.B. 390 to legalize, regulate, and tax marijuana.

Once again the Marijuana Policy Project (MPP) has a quick and easy letter you can send to California legislators if you as a citizen of California support this bill, A.B 390. You can choose among several different letters, by hitting the appropriate link at the site. The California weblog page of MPP also has some information.

[addition of 03.01.09]: What to read the current version of A.B. 390? Enter “390″ in the appropriate search field and select “bill number”, and follow the onscreen promts.[end addition]

I sent mine yesterday, and this time I wrote my own (it has typos, but at this point they can’t be edited).

Some of the thoughts expressed are based upon my prior post titled San Diego County Board of Supervisors, Medical Marijuana, and Waiting to Inhale. Here’s my letter:

February 23, 2009

[recipient address was inserted here]

Dear [recipient name was inserted here],

It’s my understanding that California Assemblyman Tom Ammiano has authored a bill, A.B. 390, that will legalize and tax marijuana. Additionally, it will regulate it similar to how alcohol and cigarettes are currently regulated.

This seems like common sense legislation to me. Recently I was appalled to find out that San Diego County has been refusing to issue Medical Marijuana IDs to patients with a prescription from their doctors for its use, which either prevents them from using this medicine, or subjects them and their caregivers to the pressure of arrest. Caregivers in our county are reportedly being stormed by swat-like police teams, their property confiscated. It’s now about 15-years since Californians legalized medical marijuana, and some counties within the state are refusing to follow our laws!

I find myself wondering why state authorities haven’t arrested our County Supervisors for failing to follow California law. When any of the rest of us decide to challenge a law in court, as they reportedly have, we still have to follow the law that’s in existence until such time as a court overturns it or the legislature agrees on new laws. I understand this is a complex issue, involving federal government prohibition, but it makes a poor example when our own local leaders refuse to follow a state law passed by ballot proposition some 15-years ago.

Therefore, I’m feeling quite strongly that legalization and taxation is the next step for the people of California to take: San Diego County has refused to issue IDs to lawfully prescribed patients, subjecting them to arrest, if not prosecution, and the state has failed to arrest the real lawbreakers: the county supervisors! Therefore, to legalize, tax, and regulate marijuana makes some sense to ratchet up the pressure on the supervisors and over time, upon the Federal government through the U.S. Senate.

California just had a record budget stalemate, along with reported tax increases and service cutbacks. Think of the tax revenues that could roll in with regulated and taxed marijuana, but also remember all the otherwise good people who’ve been hurt by the insane prohibition of a weed through stiff enforcement and jail time. How much money have Californian’s been taxed to process and jail all these citizens all these past years?

Just thinking of these folks’ tragedies over the course of decades breaks my heart.

Please support A.B. 390.

Sincerely,

Ken Klaser

The recipients were:
Assemblymember Jeffries
Senator Hollingsworth

On Sunday, February 8, 2009, I attended a medical-marijuana presentation at San Diego’s Central Library. The Marijuana Policy Project showed us a documentary movie called Waiting to Inhale, and with local activists taking part, had a short talk afterwards.

San Diego County has apparently decided to not issue Medical Marijuana ID cards to patients, and it’s now been about 12 years since the California ballot proposition legalizing medical marijuana passed. F. Aaron Smith, California Policy Director of the Marijuana Policy Project, said during the Central Library presentation, that when medical-marijuana patients have an ID card, and they’re discovered with marijuana in California, they will not be arrested; while if they only have a letter from their doctors, it means they won’t be prosecuted. That’s kind of an important distinction, it seems to me. San Diego County’s decision means that patients and caregivers can still be arrested, and all the hassle that entails, even though at the end of this forceful, demeaning, and fearful process, often reportedly involving unfriendly strangers wearing black and frequently carrying assault rifles, the police victims won’t get a day in court, and presumably, no apologies either, they simply won’t be prosecuted.

So, to get their property back, they must presumably sue in civil court, and potentially wait years to see justice (if they’re dying, how likely is that?) from the greater police machine.

So much for Pursuit of Happiness.

[begin edits 2.11.09] During the open-to-the public meeting of Feb 9, 2009, one of San Diego County’s Supervisors claimed the county has won lots of awards over they years. This certainly seems to be a true statement.

I can also say I’ve known a lot of great people over the years that I’ve lived here, quite nice, generous people. [end edits 2.11.09]

Recently I watched a good friend and neighbor in home-hospice care slowly die of cancer. While he said it was legal for him to use marijuana (I don’t know all the details), he was concerned about using marijuana. From what I could tell, he never did try it, though I do remember telling him it was probably worthwhile to see if it helped. He was probably part of the Reefer Madness generation, and likely his mind had been conditioned against its use by our many generations of Authoritarian overlords. His wife, who’s still alive, said they got some Marinol pills, synthetic THC, the active ingredient in marijuana, and she said each pill was billed $30 by the pharmacy! (hmm, seems some folks are getting rich selling those, that’s a ridiculous amount of money for one pill!) On a recent visit of mine to see her, a hospice nurse was also visiting at the same time, we got to talking for a few moments, and this nurse claimed that many patients didn’t react well to the synthetic pill form of tetrahydrocannibinol.

The movie, Waiting to Inhale, claimed that with marijuana, patients are able to modulate their own dose much better than a single pill of a fixed dosage, and further, impurities in the plant may contribute to its better outcomes, and therefore general acceptance, among patients using it. The movie had a short scene that asserted patients actually feel a difference between Indica and Sativa varieties of Cannabis, clearly this is not something a single pill based upon a single-synthetic chemical could provide patients, regardless of its alleged highway-robbery retail-price.

While it’s just a guess and logical aside, I’d bet a $20 bag of marijuana would probably last most patients several days, if not longer.

During the meeting, two caregivers, who claimed to be medical marijuana dispensary operators or possibly growers (their precise function was unclear to me from the brief presentation), said that local police had been targeting caregivers, claiming that they themselves had recently been arrested. One claimed the police had taken all their property in the process, and the other that the local news media simply wasn’t covering these stories, or their frequency of occurrence. Both of them were clearly angry: so much for their pursuit of happiness and human desire for harmony.

A local activist, Rudy Reyes, said that San Diego County residents could show up at weekly meetings of the County Board of Supervisors in support of the patients and caregivers who are following the laws implemented since the passage of Proposition 215, in order to pressure the County to begin its issuing of ID cards, and to stop the harassing of dying and sick folks, and their caregivers.

From the Board of Supervisor’s meeting calendar:

A regular meeting of the Board is held at 9:00 a.m. on Tuesday and 9:00 a.m. on Wednesday of each week in the North Chambers (Room 310) or Conference Rooms (Rooms 303 or 335-A), located at the San Diego County Administration Center, 1600 Pacific Highway, San Diego, California.

Perhaps showing up at the local television media stations would also get some attention paid to the police raids. Perhaps the FCC should be required to rule that local TV stations are themselves required to cover all police actions in their own jurisdictions (not one locality covering another’s) as a condition of their licensing, the police should separately be required to video tape all arrest and confiscation actions and further be required to routinely forward all police audio-video to the local TV stations, to insure the local populace is fully informed of the truth of their own local Authoritarians. Perhaps local TV News stations need citizen review boards to filter through all this police video and to further have the authority to tell the stations what particular pieces they’re required to air. That could insulate the reporters and talking heads from the ire of advertisers.

It seems The Supervisors are on the wrong side of the law. Can you imagine a few ten thousand or even hundred thousand local folks (why not dream big!) showing up there on one of those days when The San Diego County Board of Supervisors are conspiring against the ill and their caregivers? Maybe then they’d listen to the people they’re supposed to represent, instead of promoting an ideologically-driven political-agenda that seems to represent a minority view.

According to the the Wall Street Journal, referenced in the freepress.net e-newsletter regarding grants for high speed internet services, telecom carriers will be getting government grants to expand Internet access into underserved and underdeveloped areas:

“The Commerce Department’s Internet buildout grants carry several conditions, including a contentious requirement that Internet networks built with the government grants be open to all devices like cell phones and laptops, regardless of the manufacturer or provider.

CTIA, an association of wireless companies, sent a letter to committee leaders Wednesday asking that the “vague, undefined, and unnecessary ‘open access’ obligation” be removed. CTIA said carriers will be reluctant to apply for the grants if they are uncertain of their open access obligations.

Rep. Anna Eshoo (D., Calif.), an ardent proponent of an open Internet principle called “net neutrality,” brushed aside the carriers’ concerns. “These are public dollars. Networks built with this funding should be open,” Ms. Eshoo said.

While the above grants are said only for underserved areas, one has to wonder if areas already served by a few big providers couldn’t use a little more competition.

We know the huge telecom ISPs don’t seem to care nearly as much about service as profit. Today’s example is from an article titled Cox . . .  BitTorrent Users with More Slowdowns:

“In February, Cox will trial a brand new throttling scheme that aims to slow down so-called “non-time sensitive” traffic when the network is congested. This includes all P2P, FTP and Usenet traffic. Although Cox announced the trials – which will start in Kansas and Arkansas – on its website, details are scarce.
. . . 
Ben Scott, policy director of Free Press, is also concerned with Cox’s new plans. He said in a response to the news, “The lesson we learned from the Comcast case is that we must be skeptical of any practice that comes between users and the Internet.” Indeed, network neutrality is at stake – again.

While I don’t generally use bittorrent, I do use FTP quite a bit when working on the websites, and I used to love Usenet, particularly the astrology channels, some 15 years or so back. Unfortunately, the astrology Usenet groups seemed to get taken over by activity which, for me at least, was distracting, though I know I’ve read recently that some still love Usenet, and if true, why should they be “slowed down”?

On the momentary topic of “slow downs”, recently I did some maintenance work for an old friend that required room & board (to keep commuting costs down) for a few weeks. This was in a BIG Southern California city, one with well-developed broadband markets! I took my laptop, as the residence had cable-delivered Internet and a router. Wow, what a slow down it was that occurred in the evenings, slow downs on webpage requests, and this was so-called premium Internet service! Very irritating. I was able to fix the issue on my computer by wiring around some of their systems, but how many of their customers just figure that’s the way it is and nothing can be done about it? Much better if people watch TV in the evenings is possibly the big-company “incentive” of intertwined interests we’re talking about here.

Could local public school districts provide Internet service to their surrounding communities at a competitive cost to that of the current broadband ISPs with sufficient incentives provided by the Federal government to do so? It seems the path of local school as ISP has been done in the past (link dated 1999) with dial-up Internet service:

“Although the Williamsville Community Unit School District already received Internet access courtesy of the state, reselling this access was not an option, explains Marty Benner, a board member in the district. Instead, the district installed a leased satellite system to acquire additional Internet access that could be resold. After an initial investment of $33,000, the district began selling the Internet access to the community last April. “That’s really why we did it,” Benner says. “It was not meant as a money-maker, but rather as a service to the community.”

As long as our government continues to grant corporate welfare to the largest telecom providers (privatize profits and socialize risks), it seems the likely answer is that local schools could not offer the service competitively. Can public schools receive federal government grants so they can be just as competitive in the ISP arena? If so, this might be something that schools could do to help fund their goals of educating the local community’s children, without needing to take more money from those of us without children, instead we could choose to purchase Internet access from the them.

I’d bet a lot of folks would LOVE to get high-speed broadband from the local schools, but it would have to be competitive price wise with current cable and DSL providers in order for this model to be successful. You can bet the corporatist would fight this one: ahem, only going for “underserved” areas, such as that reported by the WSJ’s article linked above. The more corporate welfare telecoms can get, the less competitive local ISPs, such as schools, could be.

Can you imagine the economic stimulus for local communities if tax monies taken by the federal government were given back to local communities as services for the commons?

It is undoubtedly true that the schools of the future will be much different from the recent past and presumably current model of Absolute Authoritarianism or Prussian methods.

Is this white paper a glance at the future of the new schools of the 21st century?

“As important as it is for physical structures to be adaptable, “it is even more important that class time be elastic. Instead of assigning a certain amount of time for teaching one subject per day, teachers need the flexibility of bigger and more adjustable time slots to truly impact learning,” said Charles Fadel, global lead for education for Cisco Systems. “There must be a renewed focus on increasing the quality of teaching by [giving] teachers more time and opportunities to plan, collaborate, and work with advanced technology systems.”

Local public schools as broadband ISPs, perhaps wireless to the local surrounding community, could be an incremental step in that direction, though it would have to be applied not only to undeveloped and underserved areas, but also to already developed broadband markets.

What better way to learn computers is there than to have students help maintain the technology infrastructure alongside true computer engineers and professional teachers?

“Dear Ken Klaser:

Yesterday — with the leadership of the Department of Justice in flux while Attorney General-designate Eric Holder awaits confirmation by the Senate — Bush administration holdovers raided a medical marijuana dispensary in South Lake Tahoe, California.

President Obama vowed repeatedly during his campaign to stop such raids if elected, and we have every reason to believe he will make good on that promise. However, four top positions at the DEA are still filled by Bush cronies, who are attempting to undercut the president’s pledge.

Would you please take one minute to use MPP’s easy online system to e-mail the president and ask him to get his new leadership in place at the DEA quickly, so that these cruel and outdated policies finally end? Visit http://control.mpp.org to e-mail the president.

President Obama has promised that arresting patients and raiding clinics in states where medical marijuana is legal won’t be acceptable on his watch. Getting political appointees in place takes time, but yesterday the Bush holdovers showed that we must move swiftly.

[snip]

Thank you,

Rob Kampia Executive Director Marijuana Policy Project Washington, D.C.”

Dear President Obama,

RE: Medical Marijuana IS LEGAL in California!

On January 22, the Drug Enforcement Administration raided a medical marijuana dispensary in California for the first time since you took office. During your campaign, you pledged to put an end to this unconscionable practice, saying, “I would not have the Justice Department prosecuting and raiding medical marijuana users. It’s not a good use of our resources.”

This raid is only the most recent in a string of nearly 100 raids on medical marijuana dispensaries operating legally under state law. Would you please move swiftly to bring an end to these medical marijuana raids, as you vowed in the campaign? As president, you could start by appointing new leadership in the DEA and making it clear to the Department of Justice that this practice is no longer acceptable.

Last winter, the American College of Physicians issued an endorsement of medical marijuana, which, along with stating scientific support for marijuana’s medical efficacy, pointed out that “a clear discord exists between the scientific community and federal legal and regulatory agencies over the medicinal value of marijuana.”

Please help bring our government back in line with the scientific community by ending these raids. No one should suffer criminal penalties simply for using a medicine that works for them.

Sincerely,
Ken Klaser

From MPP’s letter to me:

“P.S. As I’ve mentioned in previous alerts, a major philanthropist has committed to match the first $2.35 million that MPP can raise from the rest of the planet in 2009. This means that your donation at http://control.mpp.org will be doubled.”

This morning I noted a news item from Human Resource Executive Online, the article is titled: National Health Reform Begins. In short, the Obama Administration will begin very soon (if it hasn’t already by the time I press the publish button), and rising health care costs, as well as lack of health care for many, are on everyone’s mind. A paragraph “jumped off the page” while reading the article:

. . . along with the question of whether or not employers should be required to “play or pay” — that is, employers must either provide a certain level of health insurance or pay the government so that it can provide insurance-premium subsidies for low-income households. Two recent reports from the Congressional Budget Office are “must read” material for employers that want to understand what might happen, why it might happen and how it might affect their health programs.

This is a serious issue, with repercussions to last many generations into the future.

It seems common knowledge that health care in the United States is more expensive than in any other country, and it’s failing to provide the best health care (a point subject to debate) and universal coverage for everyone. Don’t believe it? An older health-care cost report from from the University of Maine circa 2001 (*.doc). When reading this, remember the inflation that has occurred over the last 8 years. Another health care report from the Common Wealth Fund, circa 2006, says:

Equity: Nine measures from the two surveys gauged the extent to which patients’ income affected their ability to access care. The U.S. scored last on seven of the nine measures of low-income patients not receiving needed care and had the greatest disparities in terms of access to care between those with below-average and above-average incomes. With low rankings on all measures, the U.S. ranked last among the six countries in terms of equity in the health care system. The U.K. ranked first, with no or negligible differences in terms of patients’ access to care by income. The U.S. is the only country surveyed with large numbers of uninsured, and this contributed to its low rating for equity in the health care system. But even among above-average income respondents, the U.S. lagged considerably behind their counterparts in other countries.

Not to make too fine a point regarding my own bias, Representative John Conyers authored H.R. 676. It has now attracted 78 cosponsors.

While I haven’t read the two Congressional Budget Office reports linked in the Human Resource Executive Online news item, I fortunately see that Medicare For All (see the PDF, page 13) is mentioned:

Provide individuals with coverage under, or access to, existing insurance plans such as the Medicare program, either as an additional option or under a “Medicare-for-all” single-payer arrangement.

More information about HR 676 can be found here, should you choose to and are able to help. From their front page:

• Every resident of the US will be covered from birth to death.
• No more pre-existing conditions to be excluded from coverage.
• No more expensive deductibles or co-pays.
• All prescription medications will be covered.
• All dental and eye care will be included.
• Mental health and substance abuse care will be fully covered.(1)
• Long term and nursing home services will be included.
• You will always choose your own doctors and hospitals.
• Costs of coverage will be assessed on a sliding scale basis.
• Tremendously simplified system of medical administration
• Total portability – your coverage not tied to any job or location.
• Existing Medicare benefits for those over 65 will remain the same or be vastly improved in many cases.
• No corporate bureaucrat will ever come between you and your Doctor to deny your care

While the Obama Administration and Congress struggle with the many problems currently facing our nation and the world, few can argue that health care is not one of the higher priorities to average folks, along with putting food on the table and keeping their homes if they’re lucky enough to have one. A Single-Payer Medicare for All (universal) plan would take some financial stress off small and large businesses alike, while improving health care access for all, including homeless folks.

It’s important for citizens to understand these issues facing us, think about them, then communicate with others, your neighbors certainly, and particularly your Representatives and Senators, as well as President Obama, regarding what you’d like to see happen in the future in regards to the health care proposals being discussed. You can bet the insurance corporations’ executives are doing so, but their past systems have failed some of us, while enriching themselves and their shareholders, creating the most expensive health-care system in the world that fails to cover all of us.

It’s time for us to take back our power as citizens and create a brighter, more equitable, and healthier future.

Alternate title: My first experience of voting on a Direct Recording Electronic or DRE device.

On Nov 7, 2006, upon arrival at the polling place with completed sample ballot in hand, unfamiliar voting machines were visible from the doorway. I asked the poll workers if paper ballots were available. They were! They asked me if I would like one. No, I decided, I wanted to experience the computerized system first hand.

Most elections I’ve participated in over the years have used the punch card machine, the one made infamous by the hanging chads of the presidential contest of 2000 between Bush and Gore. Since that time, our district of San Diego County has sometimes used a paper ballot and pen that was optically scanned as a last step before the voter left the polling location. This time, and for the first time, our district used DRE machines made by Diebold.

I don’t intend to vote using one again. (more…)

The hypocrisy of the Executive Branch and their legislative cohorts is stunning. They want secrecy and privacy for their actions, but are unwilling to grant privacy to others. They seem to want citizens to have the perception of privacy, without the reality of privacy. They seem to want corporations to collect extra customer cash from the value added by customer-perceived privacy, but they want corporations to give them free customer data. They seem to want the private sector to be somewhat more transparent, more like the public sector, but with funding by the so-called choice of consumers instead of by the mandate of taxpayer funding; while simultaneously seeming to want government to be less transparent, more like the private sector, more secretive, and to maintain the mandate of taxes to pay for it.

A curious pattern of common hypocrisy emerges: Beside the collection of money, corporations and government both seem to want loyalty from the worker, customer, taxpayer, and citizen; but both seem unwilling to be likewise loyal to the citizen. (more…)

On Monday, while testifying at a congressional hearing investigating the Executive Branch’s authorization of without-a-warrant wiretapping of U.S. citizens, Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales said, “I gave in my opening statement, Senator, examples that President Washington, President Lincoln, President Wilson, President Roosevelt have all, uh, authorized electronic wiretapping.”

I watched this on CSPAN, live, as the statement was made, and was truly surprised there was no audible laughter emanating from the television’s speakers. Immediately after hearing the statement I burst out laughing, it was the best joke I’d heard all year.

What makes Gonzales’s statement so ridiculous is that the electric telegraph was patented in the U.S. in 1837, this was shortly after electromagnetism was discovered by scientists in the 1820s or thereabouts. Since George Washington was the first U.S. president, holding office from the years 1789-1797, it seems impossible that “electronic wiretapping” could have been performed during his presidency.

Many of us have heard or read of the story about Ben Franklin flying the kite in a lighting storm which lit up a key when the kite was struck by a bolt of lightning, and which, as the tale goes, marked the discovery of electricity. That reportedly happened in the mid 1700s sometime, according to Wikipedia, if in fact it is a true story. Static electricity was known of much earlier, but I digress.

If you haven’t seen or heard Gonzales’s statement, one video clip can be downloaded at Intoxination, via Crooks and Liars.

In a (mostly) unrelated bit of trivia, Western Union recently sent its last telegram, and this was said to have completed the company’s transition from communications to financial services. Here are some fair use snippets from the article, the emphasis on year dates was added by me:

“Effective January 27, 2006 … Western Union will discontinue all Telegram and Commercial Messaging services. We regret any inconvenience this may cause you, and we thank you for your loyal patronage.” … “The peak of Western Union’s telegram business was 1929, when the company and its army of uniformed messengers delivered 200 million telegrams worldwide — almost 550,000 a day.” … “Strictly speaking, the telegram — by definition, a message sent by telegraph — died a long time ago. In the mid-1960s, Western Union began sending its customers’ messages wirelessly using microwave radio beams instead of wires strung on poles.” “Western Union was first on many fronts: It built the first transcontinental telegraph line in 1861, it introduced the first stock ticker in 1866 and was one of the first 11 stocks tracked by the Dow Jones Average.”

I wrote above that this financial news item was mostly unrelated to this article’s main topic of warrentless wiretapping. However, the dates are curious:

• 1861 was the start of Lincoln’s Civil War, it was also in the mid-1800s that saw the beginning of Corporate Welfare.

“Charter revocation became less frequent, and government functions shifted from keeping a close watch on corporations to encouraging their growth. For example, between 1861 and 1871, railroads received nearly $100 million in financial aid, and 200 million acres of land.” (read more as PDF…)

• 1866 was during the American period known as Reconstruction.
• 1929 was the year President Hoover took office, the infamous stock market crash occurred which marked the end of the Roaring 20s, and about one month later, Hoover told Congress that (paraphrased) the economy was doing great and the American people had regained confidence in it.
• mid-1960s was a time of much technical innovation, one of which related to a precursor of today’s Internet, Darpanet if I remember correctly.
• 2006? What will the historians tell us in the future about now? We should know most of the possibilities by the end of the year. Perhaps the historically most significant event will be warrentless wiretapping, perhaps it will be something else more serious.

The connection in my mind between the two seemingly unrelated items is primarily due to the term Gonzales used in his testimony, “electronic wiretapping” and, paraphrasing, that the Executive Branch had done this broadly in various administrations. The news item about Western Union I’d noticed a few weeks ago relates to the telegraph, one of the first uses of ‘conductive wires’ for ‘electronic communication.’ Connecting the dots to a wider corporatist consipiracy seems tinfoilish, but is it all that hard to imagine when considering Abramoff, Cunningham, Enron, Worldcom, Arthur Anderson, et al? I guess corporate crime still pays.

EFF’s Class-Action Lawsuit Against AT&T for Collaboration with Illegal Domestic Spying Program

The investigation and turning of the wheels of justice down the road of wiretapping without-a-warrant or illegal domestic spying will require a firm grip on events to avoid slipping into hasty judgements that may be wrong turns if driven by a lack of meticulousness. If one views AG Gonzales’s statement, the one that seems so ridiculous on its face, as an admission to the public that our government has historically spied on its own citizens in spite of a 4th Amendment protection against unreasonable search and siezure, then it certainly explains why there was no laughter in the hearing room. In this case, Gonzales’s statement is definitely not ridiculous.

Twelve scholars wrote:

“Dear Members of Congress: We are scholars of constitutional law and former government officials. We write in our individual capacities as citizens concerned by the Bush Administration’s National Security Agency domestic spying program, as reported in the New York Times, and in particular to respond to the Justice Department’s December 22, 2005 letter to the majority and minority leaders of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees setting forth the administration’s defense of the program. Although the program’s secrecy prevents us from being privy to all of its details, the Justice Department’s defense of what it concedes was secret and warrantless electronic surveillance of persons within the United States fails to identify any plausible legal authority for such surveillance. Accordingly the program appears on its face to violate existing law.” (read more of the scholars’ legal reasoning…. Scroll to the bottom for their names, academic qualifications, and experience.)

It appears that the FISA law, passed by the Legislative Branch and signed by the President in 1978, was violated by the current Executive Branch.