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Sunday, August 8th, 2010
By Rich Hancock

 

TEXANS AND THE GAY PROPOSITION

Texas has been a key player in the issue of legally recognized gay marriage, even if that contribution has been reluctant. There seem to be a lot of folks in our fine state who believe that gay marriage is legally tantamount to pedophilia or bestiality--In spite of the 2003 Supreme Court ruling in the case of Lawrence v. Texas, which stipulates:

“When homosexual conduct is made criminal by the law of the state, that declaration in and of itself is an invitation to subject homosexual persons to discrimination both in the public and in the private spheres.” —Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, writing for the court majority.

Nonetheless, we are inundated by scores of legal scholars/disc jockeys on conservative talk radio interpreting the US Constitution to suit their own prejudices—in this case, against law-abiding, consenting adults who wish only to be afforded the relationship rights heterosexuals enjoy under the equal protection clause of the 14th amendment to that hallowed document.

I’m always intrigued by the political pundits and pontificators among us who fancy themselves so adept and learned on matters of constitutional interpretation that they assign personal, sometimes nefarious motives to judges and their rulings.

Such was the case when Vaughn Walker, Chief Judge of the US District Court for Northern California (nominated by Ronald Reagan, opposed by Nancy Pelosi and others as too conservative, then re-nominated by George H.W. Bush) was immediately demonized and vilified by the punditocracy as a flaming liberal “activist judge” for his decision to overturn California’s Proposition 8, a narrowly passed referendum question which reserved legal recognition of marriage for heterosexuals.

Dallas “radioactive talk radio” (KLIF-AM 570) amateur judicial scholar Chris Krok immediately went on a barely intelligible rant about how laws are all about morality, and since gays are immoral, then how can laws protect them (or some such nonsense—I confess I quit listening. Frankly the kid makes me physically ill with his constant mangling of the facts, the law, the real world…)

Even the class of Dallas’ conservative talkers, WBAP’s Mark Davis wrote in a column for, well…some other paper here in town, that Judge Walker was “constitutionally illiterate” because California voters—by a 52-48 percent margin—shot down gay Americans constitutional protections, and that’s good enough for Mark. In his own words:

“There is no function more important for a judge than the ability to set aside personal biases in reaching conclusions based on law. In this, Walker has failed miserably and does us the favor of revealing it in his central conclusion.”

From Judge Walker’s decision:

"Because California has no interest in discriminating against gay men and lesbians ...the court concludes that Proposition 8 is unconstitutional."

Davis: “This is nothing short of slander against the majorities who seek to preserve a legal preference for marriage as the institution has generally been defined throughout human history. There is not a speck of punitive homophobia in the principled wish to have law maintain a recognition that men and women are different – equal in stature in many societal ways, but not identical human creatures.”

Davis continues “Contrary to the ubiquitous use of the term, there is no such thing as a "gay marriage ban." Same-sex couples may marry at will anywhere in America. The only question is whether those unions will be viewed as the legal equal of heterosexual marriages.”

Quite true, Mark.

The problem with your argument is that it ignores the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th amendment. It ignores the 2003 decision decriminalizing gay sexuality right here in Texas, and it misinterprets the 10th amendment, which states :

“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

Sodomy laws, as decided by the Court in Lawrence v. Texas, are not reserved to the states.

The Equal Protection Clause requires each state to provide equal protection under the law to all people in that state, which precipitated the dismantling of state laws protecting racial segregation (Brown v. Board of Education), state laws barring blacks from serving on juries or state laws discriminating against Chinese-Americans in the regulation of laundry businesses, to name but a few.

My friends in the punditocracy appear intent upon making gay marriage analogous to polygamy, beastiality or pedophilia without ever considering the clear, legally established fact that homosexuality, by contrast, is not a crime.

Mark Davis’ use of the term “ubiquitous”—defined as existing or being everywhere, especially at the same time (i.e. “ubiquitous fog”) is better applied to the historical and inescapable reality of homosexual Americans, and the persistent arguments on the political right against their inclusion in our society.

 

Rich Hancock is the host of “Rational Talk with Rich Hancock” 8-10am weekdays at rationalbroadcasting.com.

E-mail address is rich@rationalradio.org. Also check out archived programs on UStream.tv, or follow him on Twitter, Facebook, yadda, yadda, yadda…

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Monday, June 28th, 2010
By Rich Hancock

 

WHAT’S HAPPENING IN RADIO? DON’T ASK RADIO PEOPLE…

 

I work for a broadcast media outlet without a home on the terrestrial radio dial—which means I work for a radio station without …ya know, a radio station.

D/FW’s AM 1360 is a 50,000 watt powerhouse signal --stretching north and south from Ardmore Oklahoma to Waco, Texas and just as far from east to west—that is, in the daytime. But the Federal Communications Commission requires AM frequencies to power down at night, meaning that AM 1360 and others go from being powerful transmitters to the equivalent of a string between two soup cans at sunset, and until well into traditional morning drive time. I must have received hundreds of e-mails from listeners complaining about missing a guest or a caller or some other segment on the show because “I couldn’t hear you yet!”
So when the time came to renew our contract with AM 1360’s owner, Multicultural Radio Broadcasting, we decided to go away from the traditional broadcast platform and try something different.

Rational Radio 2.0 is internet-based, with real-time streaming video accessible from UStream.tv linked to our home page, rationalbroadcasting.com.

We have expanded to include Twitter, Facebook, Skype, YouTube and podcasting capabilities on a totally revamped homepage (again, rationalbroadcasting.com—gotta get that in there a couple more times!) with archived broadcasts of every show just a mouse-click away. If you missed something, you can always go back and check it out.

The move has reinvigorated those of us who stayed on board—no offense to those who didn’t, like Pugs and Kelly or my dear friend Jack Bishop—and the expansion into alternative platforms has already yielded a new cadre of listeners who were already exclusive internet users.

But radio people scoff at a station without a stick (an insider term for a signal, like AM 1360.) “There’s only one way to do radio,” an old friend said to me recently, “They find you on the dial, and they keep you on the dial,” which might have been true when it was, in fact, a dial. I have only one radio left which has a dial as opposed to a digital signal indicator, and that’s my in-case-of-emergency battery-operated Sears brand TV/radio combo that I keep in my tool shop.

When people in electronic media tell you that there is only one way to do things, feel free to express your skepticism and point to the nearest laptop or PDA. Everything from podcasts on your ipod to live streaming radio apps on your smart phone to new wi-fi accessible notebooks, internet access in every new make of car to satellite radio indicates that everything in broadcasting is changing constantly... Everything.

Consider the case of that corporate broadcasting giant Citadel, which we know in D/FW as the parent company of WBAP. One of the first things people said to me when the Rational Broadcasting Company left AM 1360 was, predictably, “I told ya so! Liberal talk radio will never make it in Texas!”

Well, a Citadel-owned station is the home of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Mark Levin and Laura Ingraham (just to name a few) and they are bankrupt. Just to show I’m not merely picking on our ideological adversary, there’s my old employer, CBS Radio in D/FW,  which goes through almost monthly firing purges of their on-air and technical talent because they are hemorrhaging money—and they are the home of some of the top-rated stations in the market!

The point is that broadcasting is changing almost daily. I’m nearly fifty now, and most of the time I just want to find the game or the movie or the news in the same old places I used to…but I can’t.

Do you remember that old battery-powered TV/radio I mentioned? That relic illustrates my point rather well because, you see, the old black and white TV is analog, and almost all of the channels are now digital. So it’s really just a radio.

So, while we are still considering various locations on the terrestrial radio “dial” to call home, progressive talk in Dallas/Fort Worth is alive and well and “livin’ on the air” at rationalbroadcasting.com.
Why? Because we are still “The Talk You’ve Been Missing.”

 

Rich Hancock is the host of “Rational Talk with Rich Hancock” 8-10am weekdays at rationalbroadcasting.com.

E-mail address is rich@rationalradio.org. Also check out archived programs on UStream.tv, or follow him on Twitter, Facebook, yadda, yadda, yadda…

 

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Monday, June 28th, 2010
By Rich Hancock

 

He was my Kennedy...

 

It has been a weekend which would ordinarily have been filled with college football previews, yard work, pennant races, and NFL preseason games. But on this weekend, I have been inexorably drawn to the coverage of remembrances, and the funeral of Senator Edward Moore Kennedy.

I guess everyone from Massachusetts has their own story of this Kennedy, so here's mine.

I was 18 years old on an early November day in 1979, while sitting in the campaign office of Lowell, Massachusetts City Council candidate Tom Casey, who had just won a big race (in local terms), and the talk had turned to Kennedy's expected bid for the Presidency in 1980. I have found that one fundamental truth in life is, in politics--just like sports--everyone has an opinion, everyone has either hunches, power points, trends, or historical precedents to back up their assertion, and everyone is positive they are right. Remember, most recently in 2008 everyone--in both parties--was absolutely positive Hillary Clinton would be nominated by the Democrats. Not merely sure. Positive.

So, as if it were a big game coming up, the handful of local pols assembled in the office of the newly-elected councilor were asking and, of course, answering the question; "Can Teddy do it?"

Responses ranged from the old-time party regulars who regarded the act of opposing a sitting president of your own party as an act of treason, to the young liberals who saw Jimmy Carter's mounting list of failures and concessions as a clear invitation to break the old rules, just as Bobby Kennedy and Eugene McCarthy had when they challenged Lyndon Johnson in 1968.

The back-and-forth discussion finally came around to Michael Earle, my high school biology teacher who, in later years, would become my friend. Mike looked somewhat Kennedy-esque, always in a suit and tie, hair styled to look as close to JFK as possible, with his inexplicable affinity for an expensive-looking pipe which, for such a young guy, looked more like a prop than anything else.

Mike was, by contrast to the rest of the assembled local political gentry, somewhat reserved and deliberate in his manner. When he spoke he said simply "When Ted Kennedy announces for the Presidency this week at Faneuil Hall, I will be there for him, just as he has been there for every working man and woman in Massachusetts since 1962."

No prediction. No speculation. Just a simple declaration, which I took to heart.

So much so that I went to Boston that day in November of 1979 as well, and followed my former teacher and friend to New Hampshire to campaign for the man who was always simply referred to as "The Senator".
As a college freshman, I began spending every weekend "on the campaign" in Manchester, NH, and eventually declared to my parents that college could wait, I had more important things to do. My folks reluctantly went along--not so much my Mother, but my Dad had been a long-time fan and supporter of the youngest Kennedy. Perhaps it was the inescapable parallels--both born in 1932, both shockingly handsome football players in their youth, both married to women named Joan in the same year, 1958, and both very much a product of their environment. For Kennedy, that meant a future in politics, for my Pop, a future earning a union wage to take care of his five kids.

My father told me that our choices define us in life. He took a union card over a football scholarship to Boston University because the union meant security, and financial security for people who lived through the Great Depression meant more than anything. His father, my grandfather, was among the elite few who had a college degree in the 1920's, which meant precious little after the financial system crashed in 1929.

Ted Kennedy chose a personally difficult path after his brother became President in 1960. Perhaps not as physically difficult as driving a truck or operating a crane, but difficult for a young man thrust into the harsh spotlight of high-stakes politics.
Make no mistake. Everyone knew that the interim appointment of Kennedy family friend Benjamin Smith to JFK's vacant senate seat meant that is was being held for the special election in 1962 for brother Teddy. It was viewed as a shameless power grab which, of course, it was. Teddy would be villified by the elected Democratic party regulars in Massachusetts for his audacity in seeking a U.S. Senate seat as his first elective office. He would be called "a joke" by his Democratic primary opponent, Eddie McCormack, but by the general election Republican George Cabot Lodge II, wouldn't dare make that mistake. The campaigning skills of this Kennedy were soon apparent to everyone, and he easily won the seat.

Those who believe this to have been an easy path for Teddy know nothing about being an effective legislator. The new young senator started on the bottom rung, in the shadow of his older brothers. But a career in public service was an honorable one in the Kennedy family, and the youngest brother was willing to do the hard work.

In this, Kennedy's choice was perhaps riskier than my Dad's, except that the risk of losing a campaign wouldn't mean any fewer hot meals for Teddy.
So in the winter of 1979, with my father's blessing and my mother's grudging acceptance (It took her Dad, my Grandfather, to convince her that I should be allowed to go), I began a nine month adventure across America as a small part of "Kennedy for President in ‘80". It was a special time, and I was part of a youthful, enthusiastic band, campaigning everywhere from Connecticut to New York City, Philadelphia to Cleveland, Ohio. I made friends along the way, like Charlie Duncan and the late Joe Tully, and one of my dearest friends, James Michael Shaw of Lexington Massachusetts, who I found one day sitting at my desk in the Cleveland, Ohio headquarters, and the late, great Michael Ventresca, a Boston lawyer and veteran of Bobby's '68 campaign, who became my political mentor along the way.

Meeting Senator Kennedy for the first time was a surreal experience. We were out in the bitter cold of New Hampshire in January of 1980, holding signs near the door of an event at a Senior Center. Having travelled north for the weekend on an unseasonably warm Friday, and I had not packed for the cold front that followed. I had no gloves, a corduroy blazer with the collar turned up, dress shoes and no hat to fend off the biting wind. I stayed there because the Advance Team organizers told us that "The Senator would be here in 5 minutes."

That was an hour ago.
I was freezing, miserable, and would probably have cried were there not so many girls around (warmly dressed girls, I might add) when, finally, he arrived. He emerged from the back of the limo in a dark blue pin-striped suit. He was taller than I'd imagined, nodding his giant head (Yes, it was GIANT. The largest head I've seen on a human, before or since!) repeatedly saying "Thank You, thank you very much, thanks..." in a cadence that suggested he'd done this thousands of times before, briefly shaking hands and making his way toward the door, and me. When he got to where I stood, his face changed to a somewhat quizzical look and he asked me, almost accusatorially, "Where's your coat?"

"Forgot it back in Lowell!" I said.

He looked around at his aide, Rick Burke, who wasn't much older than I, and pushed me toward him. "C'mon," Burke said. He took my sign and handed it to someone else, and spirited me along with the TV cameras, print reporters and staffers, right into the hall. I watched him speak to a group of senior citizens about health care, his family's commitment to their needs, and his vision for the future. Unlike my first in-person encounter with him, from a hundred yards away on the day he'd announced his candidacy, this was personal and heartfelt. I became a believer that day, and I remain a believer today.

My future encounters with the Senator were more direct and personal. I've never been or claimed to be any kind of Kennedy Insider, but I have been one of the lucky people to have known his kindness, experienced his inspiration, and joined the causes he's championed over the years.

My last personal experience with Ted Kennedy came in 1994 when he was fighting for his political life in a senate race against Mitt Romney. The slick, well-financed Romney was leading Kennedy in certain polls, and I decided to get involved once again with the efforts of my senior Senator. I was reunited on the campaign trail with my old friend Mike Earle, and at a rally we'd organized among the historic textile mills in Lowell, Massachusetts' Urban National Park, I was recognized by Senator Kennedy for my efforts on behalf of the campaign from the podium. I got to see him briefly as he was leaving the event (unlike that cold day in 1980, this time he was more than 2 hours late!) I said hello, introduced him to my brother and then my fiance', and said goodbye, good luck, and thank you.
He put a large paw on my shoulder, almost balancing himself against me as the ravages of the campaign were clearly talking their toll on his once-broken back, and said "No, my friend, Thank You."

I may not have personally gotten as close to the greatness that was Senator Edward Moore Kennedy as many others, but at the very least, I take pride in the fact that the last words I spoke to this wonderful man were "Thank You."

Rich Hancock
rich@rationalradio.org

 

Rich Hancock is the host of Rational Talk with Rich Hancock on RationalBroadcasting.com weekdays from 8-10AM.
EmaIl Rich Hancock: Rich@RationalRadio.org

 

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Monday, June 28th, 2010
By Rich Hancock

 

Why do they think we need uniform textbooks?

Ask Don McLeroy.

This week the White House is calling for uniform textbooks for public schools across the country, and one of the biggest reasons has to be the Texas State Board of Education.

As a casual observer of the capital in Austin, I’ve heard tell of some of the wacky happenings at the SBOE—like teaching abstinence-only sex education to the exclusion of even mentioning the importance of contraception to prevent sexually-transmitted diseases and pregnancy (because we all know, when teenagers take a pledge not to give in to their raging hormones, they really mean it!), or teaching the bible in the public schools in spite of the legally established restrictions of the practice.

I was one of those foolish souls who believed that things like this would be laughed at by legislatures and government agencies who actually knew better than to throw away established scientific, educational and legal precedent.

I was wrong.

But is this a vast right-wing conspiracy? I was told no. Could this all really be happening because of the whims of a tyrannical Aggie dentist from Bryan, Texas?

At the forefront (at least according to the Texas Freedom Network) was that same bible school teacher so many have come to fear and disdain. You see, I had yet to experience the full measure of Don McLeroy’s fundamentalist Christian cheerleading zealotry.

I should say Don was a Texas A&M “yell leader”, but however you label the bald, mustachioed, evangelical--he is a politician with an ultra-conservative ultra-Christian agenda.

I was wrong, in fact, because this revisionist historian--who wants the Reagan-era fairytale of “Morning in America”, the virtues of Phyllis Schlafly and Jerry Falwell of the Moral Majority, and Newt Gingrich’s 1994 Republican Contract with America to be required textbook reading in the public schools—but Ted Kennedy’s impact on American history should be ignored.

McLeroy explained his evaluation process for history textbooks in the public schools this way:
“…we are a Christian nation founded on Christian principles. The way I evaluate history textbooks is first I see how they cover Christianity and Israel. Then I see how they treat Ronald Reagan—he needs to get credit for saving the world from communism and for the good economy over the last twenty years because he lowered taxes.”

So what “Christian nation” is Dr.McLeroy talking about? Thomas Jefferson said:
“Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law.”

John Adams was a Unitarian, but his thoughts on religion in the business of governing are clear:
“The government of the United States is not in any sense founded upon the Christian religion”

George Washington was an Episcopalian, but his thoughts on the church and state were also obvious:
“Of all the animosities which have existed among mankind, those which are caused by difference of sentiments in religion appear to be the most inveterate and distressing, and ought most to be deprecated. I was in hopes that the enlightened and liberal policy, which has marked the present age, would at least have reconciled Christians of every denomination so far that we should never again see the religious disputes carried to such a pitch as to endanger the peace of society.”

So, I guess Don McLeroy doesn’t know what he is talking about. He doesn’t know what he is talking about when he attempts to debunk the theory of evolution, and he certainly doesn’t know what he’s talking about when, faced with expert testimony before the Texas State Board of Education, he declares “Someone has to stand up to experts!”

Yes, Don…experts have to stand up to experts, not you. It’s called scientific peer review, and it is the difference between experts like Dr. Eugenie C. Scott (PhD, Executive Director of the National Center forScience Education) facing contradiction from another scientist with a degree in physical anthropology—or contradiction from an Aggie dentist who believes Darwin was wrong because his bible study group said so. McLeroy explained his myopic view of the world in this lecture to the Grace Bible Church in College Station in July of 2005

“There were only the four really conservative, orthodox Christians on the board (who) were the only ones who were willing to stand up to the textbooks and say that they don’t present the weaknesses of evolution. . . . And the more I look back on it, I believe if we would have challenged the naturalistic assumptions that nature is all there is with our fellow board members and challenged these people that were talking about it a little bit that brought up testimony, possibly we would have gotten a few more votes because a lot of these dear friends of mine on the State Board of Education are good, strong Christians that are active in Young Life and other activities. But they were able to totally not even worry about the fact that evolution’s assumption that nature is all there is in total conflict with the way they live their lives?”

How do you address comments like “stand up to the textbooks” and that evolution is in total conflict with a Christian’s way of life? Don’t tell that to the Christians in Great Britain who have fully embraced Darwin’s theory of evolution. There is an old saying that you can’t put God in a test tube. Methodological science is limited to testing ideas in the natural world. This does not assume that there is no God, or that nature is all there is, nor does it assume that “To say nothing of God is to say God is nothing.”

During the 81st legislative session, at least fifteen bills were filed by Republicans and Democrats alike to limit or eliminate SBOE authority over textbooks and curriculum. Maybe they realized that an ideological zealot like Don Mcleroy setting the curriculum makes all Texans look stupid.

Rich Hancock is the host of Rational Talk with Rich Hancock on RationalBroadcasting.com weekdays from 8-10AM.
EmaIl Rich Hancock: Rich@RationalRadio.org

 

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Wednesday, February 3rd, 2010
By Rich Hancock

 

Dallas Rep. Jeb (or Jim?) Hensarling
has a “D” next to his name---D’oh!

When Dallas Republican Congressman Jeb Hensarling was given the final question last Friday for embattled President Barack Obama, he probably thought he was going to be a star.

But it only takes a couple of minutes in the national spotlight to come away looking like a doofus.

When Obama accepted last week’s invitation to the Republican Caucus’ gathering in Baltimore—a challenge many thought was intended to be “for political style points only”-- folks like Dallas Rep. Pete Sessions, who runs the national GOP congressional campaign committee and Texas Sen. John Cornyn, who holds a similar post for the Senate Republicans, probably thought they were going to be the beneficiaries of billboard material for this year’s campaign to take back control of the congress. You can just imagine them thinking “If he doesn’t show, he’s chicken—and if he does, we’ll nail ‘im!”
The President surprised the minority leadership by accepting their invitation…So now what!?! 

They knew they couldn’t boo and hiss, or shout “You lie!” as Rep. Joe Wilson did in an address to congress last year. That would look bad, and the press cameras would be rolling.

With the mid-term congressional elections coming in November—and the early boost provided by winning a seat in the Senate formerly held by liberal icon Senator Ted Kennedy, republicans have been riding a wave. It has been a wave of fear and confusion over health care reform, anxiety over the budget deficit, animosity over John Edwards’ infidelity and frustration over the lack of jobs created by the stimulus bill.
A chance to emasculate the man who had trounced their party just one year ago was too good to pass up, but the only way for republicans to win the media battle was to be civil--something congressional republicans are not particularly good at--or by winning the war of ideas. The good old days of former House Majority Leader Tom Delay, the Sugarland, Texas pit bull who never seemed to care how his heavy-handedness was perceived in the media, were gone. To invite the President, and then openly attack him, would have defeated the purpose.

The GOP caucus attendees certainly were civil, giving the President every opportunity to speak his mind, and they soon found that this was not working out in their favor.

Obama was without teleprompter, and without equal in a room where he chastised republicans for gratuitously demonizing him and the democrats in the debate over health care reform, reminding them of their culpability in the enormous deficit spending of the Bush Administration and generally taking them to the political woodshed—so much so that FOX News cut away from the live broadcast with twenty minutes left to begin their in-studio right wing spin cycle before Obama could do any more damage. This was not how it was supposed to be.

Enter Our Hero, Dallas Republican Congressman Jeb Hensarling;
This Young Turk of the ideological right was given the last question for Obama—the last chance to nail him to the wall on his evil “tax-and-spend” ways—and poor “Jim”, that’s what the president called him (several times!) was not quite up to the task.

Hensarling started out by reminding the President of a conversation they shared last year about their young children, and how they didn’t want to saddle their kids with an enormous federal deficit in the future. But before the Darling of Dallas’ Democrat-haters got around to an actual question—and we’re talkin’ three minutes and change of right-wing filibuster, chuck-full of fudged factoids and electioneering—Hensarling was gently cajoled by Obama with the helpful suggestion “I know there’s a question in there somewhere…”

Hensarling settled on a question which didn’t live up to the hype—and how could it?—and Obama handled it as deftly as he had the entire hour of give-and-take with his ideological adversaries.
It was so bad that Fox News’ three top shows, The O’Rielly Factor, Hannity, and Glenn Beck, spent about four minutes combined talking about the entire event that night. If Jim or Jeb came out of this event as anybody’s hero, they weren’t making a lot of noise about it.

So, will Jim—I mean, of course, Jeb Hensarling bounce back?

History shows us that presidential candidate and then-Texas Governor George W. Bush survived numerous attacks on his intellect, including a scathing interview in which a Boston TV reporter named Andy Hiller found that Bush couldn’t name a litany of foreign leaders, and that didn’t stop ol’ Dubya from going all the way.

Bill Clinton was practically booed off the stage after a painfully-long speech to the 1988 Democratic National Convention, and he won it all in 1992.

Will this stop Jim/Jeb Hensarling from finding a spot on the national stage?

As a lifelong democrat, I certainly hope so.

Rich Hancock is the host of Rational Talk with Rich Hancock on RationalBroadcasting.com
EmaIl Rich Hancock: Rich@RationalRadio.org

 

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Friday, January 22nd, 2010
By Rich Hancock

 

We the People, Inc…
Or maybe, “Soylent Green” or “RollerBall”?

The United States Supreme Court has ruled in a 5-4 decision that corporations deserve the same rights as individual citizens in federal election campaigns.

Why?

According to the decision, it is because restricting the rights of corporations to flood election campaigns with private advertising in favor of, or in opposition to, a candidate for federal office constitutes infringing on their 1st amendment right to free speech. They must be allowed to speak!

But who are the “they” in question? Are they the chairmen of the board? Nope. Their right to buy advertising to say what they want with their own money is already protected under existing law.  Is it the shareholders? Nope. Maybe it’s the board members? No.

So, whose individual rights are being infringed upon?

Not one single soul’s—and that is precisely the point. The Supremes decided that incorporated entities are people, based on...ummm—well…nope. That’s where I’m stumped.

Let me go on record as saying that I do not regard corporations as “evil”, but I do regard them as immortal and immoral.

I say they are immortal because a corporation does not have a life expectancy, unlike every living thing. Corporations live on in perpetuity, or until the money runs out—and they are immoral because they function independent of any specific moral compass like “Thou shalt not kill” or “Do unto others as you would have others do unto you.”, or even “Hey! Don’t dump that sludge in the river!!!”

I’m not saying that corporations don’t do anything one might consider benevolent or humane, I’m just saying they are not human.

So, how is it that an entity which is immortal and immoral is regarded by the Supreme Court as deserving of the rights of a person?

That just beats the hell out of me…might it have something to do with our former corporate lawyer/chief justice?

John Roberts’ tenure on the court may very well be replete with these kinds of decisions. He’s been making them for a long time on his road to the big bench. Besides, who knew that rich people and their corporate entities were so beaten down by the man? Wait a minute—they are the man!

T. Boone Pickens spent tens of millions of his own private dollars trying to convince us that natural gas, wind and solar were the answer to the foreign oil problem. He lobbied the congress, made his commercials, and spent lots of money out of his pocket. He was free to do so. If he had tried to spend from his corporate holdings to do the same thing, he would have violated the law, because corporations are made up of lots of people, and the law that stood since Teddy Roosevelt said that you couldn’t spend their money on what you wanted to do. He was even free to spend from his considerable personal fortune to finance the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign, tailor-made to destroy the reputation of Senator John Kerry during the 2004 presidential race. He was free to do that—but not with corporate money.

Now we see that a future full of paid advertising on behalf of—or in opposition to-- The Corporation’s Candidates will rule the election cycle.

The movie buff in me wonders which depressing, fatalistic corporate-driven future nightmare my kid can look forward to: “Soylent Green” or “RollerBall”?

Both portray a world where individuals mean nothing, and the corporation is everything. Both characterize the futility of an individual’s desire for justice…and one suggests that when the food runs out, the corporations will happily feed us to each other.

Remember, “Soylent Green is People!”, and Soylent Green Inc. will gladly serve it up.
Bon Apetit.

Rich Hancock is the host of Rational Talk with Rich Hancock on RationalBroadcasting.com
EmaIl Rich Hancock: Rich@RationalRadio.org

 

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Wednesday, January 20th, 2010
Posted by Sean Compton

On today's show we spoke with Rodney Anderson about Information on the Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009‏ (H.R. 3421). This is a bill that will help people's credit by not holding medical bills that have gone to collections against them when it comes to making large purchases (like a house). While the consumer does still have to pay the debt (what, you thought you would be able to get away with it), it will allow thousands of potential home buyers get approved for home loans. Rodney Anderson himself sent us an email thanking us for having him on the show and included some links to videos and news stories on the subject.

If you would like to write your representative, CLICK HERE for instructions on how to find out who represents you in the House Of Representatives.

Be sure to visit Rodney Anderson's Website while you are here!

Scroll down and enjoy!

Sean Compton

 

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From: Rodney Anderson

Date: Wednesday, January 21st, 2010

 

Rich,

Thank you so much for allowing me to be on your show. I will be sending a couple of different emails outlining the bill.


One year ago I publicly launched an effort to highlight the plight of consumers caught in the legal web of medical debt debt that had been sent to collection. Under current law if a an error is made on a consumer's account on medical debt and goes to collection and is paid off that derogatory information on a credit report stays on the consumer's report for 7 years. I have monitored thousands of mortgage applications and found that small medical debts in collection can result in big problems for the consumer: higher fees, higher interest rates or ineligibility to purchase.

Medical debt is unique in two ways: it is most often involuntary and is subject to third party payers who often cause errors. 

Representative Mary Jo Kilroy has become the congressional champion for the Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009, H.R. 3421. Since Rep. Kilroy introduced cin July there have been 70 Members of the U.S. House of Representatives who have signed on to her bill as co-sponsors. H.R. 3421 has been referred to the House Financial Services Committee for consideration. 

16 members of the House Financial Services Committee are co-sponsors of H.R. 3421. Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-IL), Chair, Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit Subcommittee, Financial Services Committee is a co-sponsor of H.R. 3421. It is expected he will hold hearings on H.R. 3421 early in 2010. H.R. 3421 has attracted bi-partisan leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives including the current and former chairmen of the House Small Business Committee, Rep. Nydia Velazquez (D-NY) and Rep. Don Manzullo (R-IL). 

Other House leaders include:

Rep. John Conyers, Jr. (D-MI) Chair,House Judiciary Committee

Rep. Howard Berman (D-CA), Chair, House Foreign Affairs Committee Rep.

Bob Filner (D-CA), Chair, House Veterans' Affairs Committee

Rep. Pete Forney Stark (D-CA) Chair, House Health Subcommittee, Ways and Means Committee

Rep. Jim McDermott (D-WA) Chair, House Income Security and Family Support Subcommittee, Ways and Means Committee

Rep. John Lewis, (D-GA) Chair, House Oversight Subcommittee, Ways and Means Committee

Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-OR Chair, Highways and Transit Subcommittee, Transportation and Infrastructure Committee

Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD) Chair, Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation Subcommittee, Transportation and Infrastructure

Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton (DC) Chair, Economic Development, Public Buildings, and Emergency Management Subcommittee, Transportation and Infrastructure Committee

Rep. Steve Cohen (D-TN) Chair, Commercial and Administration Law Subcommittee, Judiciary Committee

Rep. Jerome Nadler (D-NY) Chair, Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties Subcommittee, Judiciary Committee

Rep. Yvette Clarke (D-NY) Chair, Emerging Threats, Cybersecurity, and Science and Technology Subcommittee, Homeland Security Committee

Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX) Chair, Transportation Security and Infrastructure Protection Subcommittee, Homeland Security Committee

Rep. Joe Baca (D-CA) Chair, Department Operations, Oversight, Nutrition, and Forestry Subcommittee, Agriculture Committee

Rep. Leonard Boswell (D-IA) Chair, General farm Commodities and Risk Management Subcommittee, Agriculture Committee

Rep. John Olver (D-MA) Chair, Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies Subcommittee, Appropriations Committee

Rep. Solomon Ortiz (D-TX) Chair, Readiness Subcommittee, Armed Services Committee

Rep. Ruben Hinojosa (D-TX) Chair, Higher Education, Lifelong Learning, and Competitiveness Subcommittee, Education and Labor Committee

Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-CA) Chair, Workforce Protections Subcommittee, Education and Labor Committee

Sincerely,

Rodney Anderson

LINKS:

PDF - PDF version of H.R. 3421 explaining the bill...

Video - Original Credit 911 Medical Collections Petition 11/25/08

Article - Medical Collections killing refinance frenzy? Article on TheTruthAboutMortgage.com 12/8/08

Article - An article about The Doctor’s Visit that Can Ambush Your Credit 7/27/09

Article - Here is an article from CreditCardGuide.com by Eva Maria Norlyk on 12/04/09

Blog - Ashley Baxter writes about you and H.R. 3421 on SpendOnLife.com on 10/19/09

Press Release - A press release on 12/09/09 talks about you on MortgageMag.com

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Contacting Your Representative

As a Side note for this post, we would like to foward you the opportunity to contact your Representative on this matter. To find out who your Representative is you will need to have your nine (9) digit zip code. If you do not know what the full nine (9) digits are, go to the United States Postal Service website, enter your information and write it down, you will need it for the next step.

Once you have your full zip code, go to the House Of Representatives website to locate and contact your representative.

If you already know who your representative is, then simply go to the House Of Representatives website to locate and contact your representative.

Thank you for taking the time to read this blog and helping in this great cause. By supporting the Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009 (H.R. 3421), you are supporting the American economy and helping families to realize their dreams.

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