Last Gasps

A masked thief robs a convenient store after beating up the clerk with the butt of his gun in front of several witinesses. The police show up just as he is gunning his pickup truck out of the parking lot. The police give chase and after a 100 mile per hour race the "suspect" is aprehended. The official reports and media refer to the "suspect" having "allegedly" committing the afore described felony. The "alleged" thief is booked and provided with legal aid: a public defender; a lawyer to protect his rights.
A large and powerful United States corporation with far reaching global interests uses a loosely configured tax code with generous loop holes to deposit huge amounts of their gross profits in off shore banks, thus avoiding income and corporate taxes otherwise owed to the US Department of Internal Revenue. This is not illegal, but considered by many as unethical and inequitable to the spirit of the law and everyone's civic responsibility. The government decides to close those loopholes and subject those "tax havens" to considerable scrutiny in order to retrieve taxes at a rate commensurate with the law as it applies to onshore companies. The corporations balk at any suggestion that they are cheating or obfuscating on their tax obligations and that any attack on the existing system would seriously affect their bottom line and share holders. They employ very expensive lawyers to argue their case in court even though the U.S. Treasury and IRS have compiled substantial evidence of how these corporations manipulate their finances to avoid taxation of any kind even though they operate under the protection and profit as a United States company.
We live in a Constitutional democracy and that means that all those constitutional rights, privileges and protections apply to the bad guys as well as the good guys.
Law enforcement has the above mentioned thief dead to rights and in a few other countries would be punished on the spot and not even get a brief hearing. That would be too harsh for our sensibilities and there may be mitigating circumstances to be considered by the court. Nevertheless, there is no excuse for breaking the law. I will make civil disobedience the exception. Yet, we are so cautious about individual rights that we condemn no one until they are finally convicted of their misdeeds.
There is no excuse for shirking one's obligations in contributing to the common good in the form of taxation in order to enjoy the benefits of living in the world's most affluent and advanced democracy. Because of political indulgences provided by past administrations with self interest at the heart of decisions regarding the tax code, individuals and corporations have been allowed to accumulate enormous wealth beyond reason at the expense of other businesses and the public at large. No one suggests that companies curtail their global aspirations. They should be encouraged. But they must also realize that the United States provides them with a broad range of services at home and abroad. International relations and policies that allow them to operate in foreign countries, access to US embassies, trade agreements and protection provided by our military all at tax payer expense.
The Republican Party, desperately searching for a new direction cannot resist repeating their mantra of more than a century. Allow the free market to operate without interference and ease the tax burden on vested interests and all will be well. Alexander Hamilton might agree with them, but modern day economics to serve the greater good cannot. The Republicans claim they simply want to preserve the American Way. It is apparent to me that what they really want to do is protect the old American Capitalism and prevent its certain demise. There is nothing wrong with making a lot of money. A great idea, determination and hard work deserve the fruits of labor and taking risks. It is also incumbent on those who take advantage of their opportunities to realize just how and where those opportunities came to be.
American businesses resist any and all attacks on their profit margins. What they so often fail to recognize is that improving the common lot increases their potential customer base and increased profitability.
The United States is a great place to do business and should be. To keep it a great place, business and particularly large corporations who may mistake their size for an excuse to dismiss their citizenship, all have to adhere to a fair share of taxation. As mentioned in my very first blog entry, this is not going to be your father's capitalism.

The Republican Reversion

There is one simple truth the modern Republican Party cannot fathom. The Constitution of the United States of America is not a business plan. The United States of America is not a business and cannot be run like a business. The United States is a nation of many peoples, a nation of ideas and ideals and still a nation of great hope for the rest of the world. The Republicans attempt to reduce the founder's vision down to the plebeian polemic of a tradesman is pathetic. Listen to the arguments forwarded by traditional Republican supplicants. Do they speak of America's proven resilience? Do they speak about the urgent need for alternative energy? Do they offer a plan for investments to rebuild our national infrastructure and provide quality education for the next generation? Do they have a definitive approach to an affordable health care system? They don't. What seems to terrify them today is a looming deficit in the trillions for which they see no solution. They cannot see beyond the confines of a quarterly report. For them it's a"bottom line" world. The solution is in the American gut and spirit. The solution is in the innovation and industry of our people. The solution is in the imagination and determination that spawns new business and commerce that will yield the revenue streams to replenish our national coffers. By the time 2012 rolls around, today's doubters and naysayers will be rendered silent and the United States of America will recover its place of leadership in the world.

Addiction

We are all addicts to one thing or another. Most addictions are harmless such as my addiction to football or adamantly following news and current events on television. Think of those baseball fanatics who actually keep play-by-play records of games long past and collect those useless baseball cards commemorating players long forgotten. But, don't tell them their pastime is useless.
Others are addicted to work and become agitated when they are not busy doing something they perceive as useful. One of my pet peeves has to do with anyone who cannot sit still or remain silent for an extended period of time. That has a lot to do with my avoiding youngsters who cannot contain their energy for even the briefest moment.
Cleanliness, anal organization, chocolate or food in general, bulimia, saving string or rubber bands, jogging and a host of "addictions" are common and at times bemusing aspects of the human condition.
There are, however, addictions that our society has deemed immoral, dangerous and illegal. Alcoholism and illegal drugs (substances) are the addictions that are viewed as a plague in the United States. No doubt that alcoholics have caused emotional and physical trauma among friends and family and killed countless thousands on the road. Prohibition was tried and utterly failed as people sought out the relaxing elixir at some speak-easy or in the privacy of their own homes.
The apparent solution was to legalize alcohol, control its manufacture and tax it heavily benefiting public coffers and devoting a small percentage of those revenues toward treating alcoholism. Yet, we persist in our "War on Drugs" without facing the fact that we will never win that "war." A recent article in the Economist points out how after nearly a century of effort and at great expense, drugs flourish throughout the world and human beings in pain or for pleasure will seek out their drug or hallucinogen of choice at any cost. Cocaine and heroine are insidious and ultimately devastating to the human condition. They take over the senses and cement addictions that are most difficult to expel. Those drugs and their derivatives should be put in a class with morphine and strictly controlled.
Marijuana, "magic" mushrooms and other herbal hallucinogens are far more benign and not necessarily addictive. They are recreational substances; not drugs. There is no record of anyone dying because of marijuana. However, like alcohol, I would favor of going beyond decriminalizing Cannabis and legalize the harvesting of hemp for all its commercial benefits and it flowering marijuana buds for recreational use. Marijuana, like alcohol, would be closely controlled, regulated and heavily taxed and as is alcohol, prohibited from use for those under the age of 18.
Hemp or Cannabis, has been so useful in our history that farmers who did not cultivate hemp in 1765 were breaking the law. The first and second drafts of the Declaration of Independence were written on hemp paper. The best rope for seafarers was made of hemp. Hemp is a superior fiber that resists mold and mildew, is easy to grow needing very little water and has a resistance to natural pests. Sturdy burlap and long lasting linen are made from hemp. All those virtues and in addition the plant blossoms with marijuana. Better that tobacco farmers switch to growing hemp instead of their deadly nicotine bearing leaves.
This proposal will come up to challenge the logic of Congress in the near future and to be sure arouse spirited debate. Eventually, the general use of marijuana and other herbal hallucinogens will become accepted and a large tooth will have been pulled from the jaws of drug dealers and drug lords now creating havoc with law enforcement and reaping the wealth of nations.

Something For Nothing

There is no such thing as blasphemy. Blasphemy specifically is decrying and disgracing God, Allah or whatever other false idols are revered by religious sects. Since there is no empirical proof that any of these entities ever existed, blasphemy is irrelevant.
Sacrilege is another obsolete term since nothing is sacred. What some hold to be sacred is as relevant or profound as Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny. These non-sequiturs bound to one superstition of another will eventually fade away under the glare of superior science.
For today's policy and decision makers, alluding to either of these concepts as a consideration or reason for action does nothing but extend the fallacy of an ancient hoax devised by tyrants, kings, popes and mullahs.
The Bible, Torah, Quran and other religious tomes are compendiums of anecdotal recollection and biased interpretation. The original audiences for these stories were childlike in their mentality and vulnerable to the idea of something much better in an afterlife compared to the squalor and suffering they endured in this one. Those fables were lessons in behavior that served their masters well in keeping the rabble from disturbing their sumptuous serenity. Their most absurd claim, accepted by the masses, was their divine descent from the gods themselves and ergo, the heredity of power.
The wars, struggles, painful and tragic confrontation of peoples in the name of some religious belief are a sham. Territorial and economic imperatives have always been at the root of all disputes between sovereign and not so sovereign states. The feverish rants of the masses are encouraged by their masters who manipulate a perceived offense to the faithful for their own purposes. Even in today's "civilized" society, that so many are enraptured by the idea of heaven and hell speaks to the dependence of human being on something out of nothing.
When the Vatican becomes a hospital and sanctuary for the hungry and homeless, I may begin to believe in the indomitable spirit of human kind. I do believe in a greater presence beyond this life, although not those illustrated and hallowed figures of bearded saints floating above the clouds that were conjured by the limited imagination of their congregants. My sense suggests something much larger, much more vast and disinterested. The cosmos demonstrates the concept of free will in every moment of time as stars are born with a fury of elemental ignition and ultimately collapse into the vortex of a black hole. That design, as far as we know, is true throughout our universe. A very similar pattern of existence to our own limited lives. Between birth and death, we choose our own way from one end to the other and as in the cosmic pattern, we become a part of that eternal scheme as do all things. If we are moral and loving, it is because we have recognized that those qualities serve us best in life; that anger and hate are non productive and self destructive. If there is such a thing as a soul, it is the resonance of the universe that makes up our entire being, hearkening us back to the beginning.