On the Two "State" Speeches Last Evening

A few brief notes on the two State speeches last evening--Kansas' Governor Sam Brownback's State of the State speech and President Obama's final State of the Union speech.

What got me about Governor Brownback's speech is that he spent so much time attacking President Obama.

??

First thing---why?

Why would a governor from a state in the United States attack the leader of the nation? Why spend any time at all attacking the president?  Isn't it assumed he's on our side? Isn't it assumed he wants what's good for the nation? Isn't it assumed he wants more jobs and a stronger nation?

I don't remember another State of the State speech by any governor in the nation where that governor attacked the president in their speech.

It seems clear Governor Brownback is doing what so many Republicans in the last many years have done and are still doing and that is, putting their political party and their success and their interests ahead of the interests and success and successes of the nation when the nation should come first.

Additionally, here is this Kansas Governor, taking time in his speech to attack a President when his own policies have put his state in the very likely position of having a $200 million deficit in the coming year? How do you do that?

And then he went on to attack Planned Parenthood.  If that isn't demagoguing a topic for partisan, political purposes, nothing is. Planned Parenthood's status is surely, for most Kansans, a side issue. The main issue is the state's financial and economic status, something he can no way brag about after what he and the Republicans in Topeka have done and been doing the last several years. Not once in his speech did he mention the State's budget shortfall they've all created. There's a shock, huh?

Other details:

--The Guv said he would fight to keep President Obama's prisoners from Guantanamo out of Kansas. Again, not a terribly huge concern. There aren't that many and since when can't America handle prisoners?

--He called for more funding for schools. Seriously. Not once did he say from where the state could or would be able to find this funding, given the fiscal shape they're in, thanks to him and the Republicans over there.

I think the Star clearly had it right in today's op/ed piece on it:

Gov. Sam Brownback’s State of the State had it all: braggadocio,scare tactics and bad ideas

In sharp contrast, President Obama's speech started out with a little light humor and then pointed out his and the nation's actual successes over the last 7 years. He went on to call on Americans to pull together, work together, not operate on fear and to work for better days, never once attacking anyone else.

Media host Michael Smerconish last evening asked a great question on Facebook:

If the Dow, unemployment and gas prices were the same as today but with a President Romney, would people not be saying wow, what a success he is?

It's hard to disagree with that. 

In summary, the two speeches last evening were the dark and the light, the negative and the positive, the hopeful and the pessimistic, frankly.

Sorry, Kansans but you did bring this on yourself.

Link:  Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback proposes cuts to highways, children's programs to close budget gap

One of the Best Things Democrats Have Going for Them Between Now and November 2016

And all they have to do is let it sit there.

Not Close the Guantanamo Prison?

We really want to be in this company?

President George Washington, On Torturing Prisoners

A story the Star needs to do

I read in the Kansas City Star today that a local soldier died in Afghanistan this past Wednesday:

Liberty soldier drowns in Afghanistan

May 17
BY RICK PLUM LEE
The Wichita Eagle

A soldier from Liberty, Mo., died this week in Afghanistan after drowning while attempting to cross a body of water during combat operations, the defense department announced Friday.

Sgt. 1st Class Trenton L. Rhea, 33, drowned Wednesday in Kandahar. He served with the 200th Military Police Command, U.S. Army Reserve, in Belton, Mo.

Rhea was on his second tour in Afghanistan. He had previously served a tour in Iraq and at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp.

He is survived by a wife, Leah, and three daughters.

He grew up in the small western Kansas town of Oakley.

Now, what should happen, what hopefully will happen, is that someone down at our local newspaper will get inspired and realize this is a story they should cover. Up to this point, for that matter, all they did was take a story off the AP wire, from the Wichita Eagle Beacon, and repaste.

This is a story right in our own back yard coming, as it does, out of Kansas and now Missouri, nearby Liberty, for one thing.

Second, we're right here, in May, virtually right on top of Memorial Day. The timing is right for that reason, too.

Third, I don't believe they've done any local stories on any soldiers from Missouri or Kansas in these wars for quite some time, if they ever did one.

Fourth, look at all this soldier has been through and done. He was from Liberty, he was out of the Army Reserve in Belton, he had been in Iraq and at Guantanamo and served two tours of duty in Afghanistan. If anyone's life might tell what we've been doing out across the world for the past decade, it looks as if this soldier's story would.

Finally, the fact that he leaves a wife and three daughters deserves this story be told, if they, the family, would and will allow.

I hope they would and I hope the Star does it.

I don't think enough of us here in America know what our soldiers have done and are doing for our country. This might just be the perfect time and place to tell one of those stories.

Here's hoping.

War by the Numbers (from The New York Times)

Published: September 8, 2011 6,204 American military personnel killed in Iraq and Afghanistan operations. 141 Military women killed. 2,300 American contractors killed. 144,000 Service members in either country as of Aug. 25, 2011. 1,192 Foreign coalition forces killed. 18,678 Iraqi and Afghan security forces killed. 102,339 Minimum number of Iraqi civilians killed, including by other Iraqis, according to Iraq Body Count. 172 million Meals Ready to Eat (M.R.E.’s) sent to personnel in Iraq and Afghanistan. $1,645 Monthly pay for an Army private, with $225 additional for combat. 779 Detainees at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, since 2002. 14 Percentage of former Guantánamo detainees who returned to terrorist activity. 1 Former Guantánamo detainees who have been tried in the United States. My own addition: 3.7 trillion dollars Cost of Iraq and Afghanistan wars at least $3.7 trillion (and counting)* Links: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/08/us/sept-11-reckoning/index-war-abroad.html http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/29/us-usa-war-idUSTRE75S25320110629

(Easy?) Change we expected with this president

Sure, Sarah "The Quitter" Palin can deride President Obama when she asks "How's that 'hopey-changey' thing going for you?" and I'd respond "Pretty darn well, thank you very much."

Not perfectly, by any means but we saved General Motors--the whole company and all those jobs, working directly for them and all the associated companies and jobs involved--the economy is turning around, we got SOME health care reform, anyway, and the very discriminatory "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy was done away with, along with a lot of other good reforms (for a long list of more, see:   http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/11/19/805925/-90-Accomplishments-of-Pres.-Obama-Which-The-Media-Fails-to-Report)

But, admittedly, there are a few things I thought we'd get and that, I must admit, I thought we'd get long before now.  They are:

--Closing Guantanamo.  First, he said he would (and yes, I believed him) and second, it just doesn't seem it would be that difficult to do.  There were--what?--267 inmates at this thing?  I never believed for a minute that the United States of America could not or cannot handle 267 inmates of one kind or another.  We have to be that strong;

--Returning habeus corpus back to our political system.  The previous--George W. Bush--administration handily did away with this cornerstone of our Republic and our laws and I think, strongly, we should get it back.  I thought, being the law student and professor he was, that President Obama would see to this poste haste.  Far from it.  I thought he would do this one evening on the way to putting Sasha and Malia to bed one night, it would be that easy.  (Definition, for those needing it:  Habeas Corpus, literally in Latin "you have the body" is a term that represents an important right granted to individuals in America. Basically, a writ of habeas corpus is a judicial mandate requiring that a prisoner be brought before the court to determine whether the government has the right to continue detaining them. The individual being held or their representative can petition the court for such a writ.
According to Article One of the Constitution, the right to a writ of habeas corpus can only be suspended "in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety." Habeas corpus was suspended during the Civil War and Reconstruction, in parts of South Carolina during the fight against the Ku Klux Klan, and during the War on Terror.)

--I thought we'd get back "due process of law" (the principle that the government must respect all of the legal rights that are owed to a person according to the law) fully restored, too, with this president, particularly as relates to the people held in Guantanamo, at minimum.  More than anything, what I mean here is, if we're going to hold the prisoners at Guantanamo, we should file charges.  If we're not going to file charges--or can't--then they should be released.  We either have something on them or we don't, it's simple as that.  Or it was, before that last president.  To date, no such reclamation;
 
--Finally, I thought we would have seen the end of "signing statements" like those created under, again, former President George W. Bush.  The whole idea that a president could, yes, sign legislation into law but then make these "statements", before, during or after the signing, making it clear he (or she, one day) was going to disallow some portions of the legislation just signed seems anti-thetical to our government.  It wrests far too much power away from at least one other branch of government--the legislative--if not two, with the judicial branch, too, unless and until they ruled against this procedure. 
 
According to The Daily Kos today, President Obama is, in fact, going to issue a "signing statement on Guantanamo restrictions." 
 
When "Dubya" issued "signing statements" originally, when signing laws, I was incensed, it was such a clear power grab.
 
That President Obama would continue the practice stuns and disappoints me greatly.
 
Hopefully this Right-wing, extremely conservative Supreme Court will rule on these statements and forever banish them from our government, if that's what's necessary to rid ourselves of them.
 
In the meantime, I still hope we get the above four issues handled.
 
And as soon as possible.
 
Links:  http://americanhistory.about.com/od/americanhistoryterms/g/d_habeascorpus.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Due_process
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2011/1/4/933248/-Obama-to-issue-signing-statement-on-Guantanamo-restrictions?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+dailykos%2Findex+%28Daily+Kos%29

Still wrong. Grossly wrong

I agree with the President and his decision to not release additional pictures of tortures over in Iraq, going against his earlier declaration that he would, in fact, release them.

He's right this time--putting out more pictures now would only further stir up more animosity and anger and who knows what. It would be of no benefit.

I also think the President is correct in shutting down the Guantanamo Prison. There are only approximately 240 prisoners there and Montana alone has publicly announced they would take 100 of those prisoners. That would leave 2.85 prisoners, left to be distributed to the other 49 states.

And we can't handle that, as a country?

Nonsense. Of course we can.

Where I don't agree with President Obama is that he has declared there are some prisoners at Guantanamo right now who we will simply continue to hold indefinitely without any charges filed and without any trial.

And that's just wrong.

That is not what the United States is about or has ever been about.

That makes us no better than the old Soviet Union or China, even today.

We have always acted with our Constitution and laws and said that you cannot be held without charges being filed, without trial and without facing your accusers.

Are we not, any longer, any better than some South American "banana republic"?

We always used to think we were.