OKAY. NOW GET REAL

(A Note to Republicans)

Okay, now get real.
Get real about the grave problems this country needs to address.
Get real in recognizing you have been one of them.
Get real in acknowledging that Obama is not the tyrant you have made him out to be.
Get real in working with him rather than against him.
Get real in owning your part in the plight of the poor and the underprivileged.
Get real in accepting the reality of social security, and of all those programs you have disparaged as "entitlements."
Get real in accepting that basic affordable care is both workable and necessary for millions of your fellow citizens.
Get real in the recognition that our national obsession with gun ownership is detrimental to the health and well-being of thousands of our children.
Get real and find sensible ways to regulate the excesses of the financial industry.
Get real and address the deplorable state of education in this country, particularly among those where it is most needed and most poorly supplied.
Get real and assure that no child in America goes to bed hungry.
Get real about science.
Get real about the reality of climate change and the urgent need to address it, to protect the Earth for our children and our grandchildren.
Get real about the decaying infrastructure, that threatens business as well as individual Americans.
Get real about privacy.
Get real about those who languish without evidence or trial in the dungeons of Guantanamo.
And while you're at it, get real about Cuba.
And get real about the many thousands wrongly held in our own prisons.
And with the death penalty.
Get real about military power, its costs and its limitations.
Get real about the limits of American power in a radically chaining world.
Get real about how your actions are perceived in the rest of the world.
And so much more.
Just get, real, okay?  It's all we ask.

HEALTH CARE

I was much distressed, last night, by the 60 Minutes report, "On the Road With the Health Wagon." Not that I had been previously unaware, conceptually, of some states' rejection of federal money for health care in the form of the Medicaid extension offered by the Affordable Care Act.  The hatred of Obama and his policies is apparently so great that Republican Governors and Republican state governments would rather see their constituents die than join in the effort to provide them with health care.  The 60 Minutes report brought home that this was a literal--and by no means exaggerated--truth.

If you missed it, try that link.  You can't fail but be awed by the spirit of the two young women who have chosen to dedicate their lives to bringing some minimal level of health care to those most in need in the poverty-stricken hills of Appalachia.  This is America?  Where our fellow human beings are allowed to suffer from disease and neglect, some of them to die unnecessarily at an early age, simply because politicians are too proud, too angry, too ideologically blinded to accept help on their behalf from a source that they, the politicians, despise?  Where the costs of health care are compounded by the absence of simple, inexpensive preventative action?  Where patients arrive, already "train wrecks", in the words of one of the two extraordinary women who drive the "health wagon" to even the most remote of areas and bring not only medical attention but also a good measure of concern and love.

There are those, I know, who will tout the Health Wagon as a fine example of the power of the "public sector."  They should think again.  Funded only to one-third of its costs by grants from public sources, the organization barely scrapes together what it needs to function on a shoestring.  The "wagon" itself is  a wreck--although the report indicated that enough money has been raised to purchase a new one.  There are many people, many areas, surely, that still go unattended or underserved.  Basic health care should not be a charity in a country where the wealthy flourish and build unseemly fortunes; it should be, as it is in every other advanced nation, a simple right.

In anticipation of our enlightenment as a nation, I hope you might consider joining me in making a donation here.

REPUBLICANS

I need to say it: I find it hard to understand "Republicans."

I'm sad to hear myself generalize in this way--indeed, I have long resisted saying it--but it's the plain, honest truth: I find it impossible to understand them.  I'm sure that the vast majority of them individually are good-hearted, hard-working, decent people.  It's when they become "Republicans" that the trouble starts.  Since Lyndon Johnson, for example, there have been only three Democratic presidents, and "Republicans" have done their utmost not only to obstruct their every initiative, but to personally destroy each one: Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, and now Barack Obama.  The venom with which these leaders have been treated and with which their very legitimacy has been challenged is simply beyond my understanding.  For sure, I myself have been guilty of lampooning their Republican counterparts; but I like to think that I have done so without hatred and without questioning their legitimacy.  (Here I must confess to an exception in the case of George W. Bush, whose original (s)election over Al Gore by the US Supreme Court I did consider a sham.)

But it's not just about the presidency.  There's a meanness of spirit that I find hard to understand.  The recent snide comments about Hillary Clinton's illness are but one example.  The eagerness to pile on in the attacks on Susan Rice another.  It manifests in the "Republican" attitude to the poor, the destitute, the unemployed, the hungry--all fellow Americans less fortunate than themselves.  That they were so willing, in the recent "fiscal cliff" fiasco, to deprive these people of their basic livelihood speaks, to my mind, to an incomprehensible lack of simple human compassion.  That their congressional leader, Eric Cantor, was so willing to scuttle the eventual, hard-won agreement on a compromise does not speak well of his concern for the country he was elected to serve.  That their Speaker, John Boehner, acted with such contempt to refuse either discussion or vote on the hurricane Sandy bill is emblematic, in my view, of the small minds and mean spirits of his colleagues.

Consider the spectacle of this past election.  The "Republican" candidates were vicious in the rhetoric they directed not only at Democrats but at each other.  They struggled to outdo each other in sheer vitriol and smug self-certitude.  They castigated whole segments of the American public and felt free to insult women with misogynistic glee.  Without embarrassment, they embraced the ignorance of those who deny overwhelming scientific evidence in favor of religious fervor, in order to appease a "base" of right-wing extremists.  They continue to heap contempt and scorn on the United Nations, and act as though no other country in the world is worthy of American consideration--let alone aid.

And don't tell me that it's the same on both sides, that it's politics as usual.  It's not.  Consider, for example, the clear evidence of our current President's generosity of spirit and readiness to compromise, to the point that he is willing to risk the wrath of his own party and expose himself to Republican attacks for his lack of leadership.

I'm sorry, it's not nice to generalize in this way; and the Buddhist principle of "right speech" requires us to moderate the way in which we speak of others.  It does not, however, forbid us from speaking the truth, and the truth is that these people have simply been behaving badly as human beings.  They value their rigid principles more than their humanity.  They are unkind in word and action, both.  As I say, I find it impossible to understand them.  I send them metta in the hope that a significant number of them will return to the spirit of reasonable compromise and the path of moderation and compassion.

ANIMOSITY

In the daily metta practice with which I start my meditation, I reiterate the wish to be free from animosity. It's easy enough when it comes to those I like, and with whom I generally agree; the hard part is with the people I dislike, and those with whom I disagree. They include, most recently, the politicians who have in my own view seemed bent on destroying this country. The dharma teaches me, wisely and I think correctly, that the animosity that arises serves only to introduce toxin into my own veins. It certainly does nothing to change those against whom it is directed.

These thoughts were stirred in part by the comment to my entry in The Buddha Diaries yesterday. I was writing about gratitude, concluding with a note about the surprise and plucky appearance of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords to cast her vote on the debt ceiling bill in the House of Representatives, and my gratitude to her for reminding me of the importance of the vote. Not a word about Obama. But my entry somehow triggered the response you'll find if you check in the comments section, filled with anger directed at "Obama the Eunuch."

I was aware of my own distress as I read and re-read the comment. Some of it came from that part of me that is uncomfortably close to agreement with the content of the writer's argument. It's clear that Obama has been weakened by the unmitigated hostility and adamant rejection with which every part of the agenda on which he was elected has been opposed. It has been relentless and unappeasable, from his first day in office. In my view--perhaps incorrectly--there are many of his supporters who have allowed themselves to be swept up in that hostility, too readily co-opted by the powerful tide of rejectionist action and propaganda. With the erosion of support on his own side, he becomes still more exposed and vulnerable. As I've written before, we on the left, who have learned to distrust authority whatever its source, are prone to the heady delights of king-killing.

That's my view. I find that I hold on to it even more tightly when I myself feel the beginnings of mistrust in it; or, particularly, when I feel it under attack. I pull back in, defensive. Intended or not as such, my correspondent's initial sarcasm and subsequent anger felt like personal animosity, and I withdrew into my shell to mull over its implications. This morning, as I suggested, I paid more than usual attention to my own animosities. I did my best to observe them and then let them go, along with the anger that accompanies them.

I was wondering aloud, at the Buddhist Geeks conference just a few days ago, whether anger ever serves a useful purpose. I believe it can, when it is directed with clear intention and used skillfully; to do so, I must understand what part of the anger is about me, and what part is genuinely about the injustice or malpractice that aroused it. Warrior energy is a necessary part of political action--see Sun Tzu's "The Art of War"--but used indiscriminately and tainted by personal animosity, it can be counter-productive.

The image of a solitary Obama signing a bill which clearly fell far short of his objectives--and equally short of my own sense of what is needed in our current economic crisis--filled me with sadness for both the man and the country that he seeks to serve. He is the target of so many millions of deeply divisive projections that he can scarcely hope to live up to more than a handful of them. There are those, of course, many, who wish him nothing but ill. And there are those, many, who feel that he has let them down; that he is not the man they took him for. I'm only surprised that he manages to tolerate with a semblance of grace the generous heapings of scorn that are dumped on him from both left and right.

I personally think that this would be a good time for us all to take a thoughtful look at our projections: if we think of Obama as the mirror, what is it that we see about ourselves when we look at him? The projection of blame is too easy an answer for our troubles. We have our own share of responsibility for the dreadful mess in which the country finds itself. As another correspondent wrote to me in an email today, "I'm highly disgusted with what's going on in Congress right now, [but] I have to keep reminding myself that we DO live in a democracy, don't we?"

We do. Well, I sometimes think rather that we live in an oligarchy that survives by successfully disguising itself as a democracy (I first typed "demoncracy"!) But, yes, we do. So we do not further our cause by trying to wish away or ignore the existence of the deep and powerful strain of conservatism that has been changing the balance of the American political system, not just in Obama's time but, with increasing power, these past several decades. Like it or not (I don't!), it's impossible to move in any direction without taking it into account. All very well to stand by and jeer at Obama's perceived lack of leadership from the sidelines. He's trying to quarterback a team that plays by the rules of human decency and fairness against bunch of steroid-powered thugs who don't care what tactics they use--or how many injuries are incurred--so long as they dominate the game. (Is this animosity? Or simple realism?)

I know that I'm in a growing minority in a cacophony of voices noisier and I'm sure far more effective than my own. I suspect, though, in a less demonstrable way, that I may be a part of a new "silent majority" that continues to support the President despite the ferocity of the attack. I will not yet surrender the "I Back Barack" bumper sticker on my car. Nor will I cease sending daily wishes of good will to both him and his opponents. And the same to my "anonymous" correspondent, whom I thank for challenging me to think again, again. I send out metta in full consciousness of the adverse circumstance, if only to preserve my own health, and sanity, and self-respect! May all beings be free from animosity...

Stand Up

Sorry, friends. It's my bleeding heart. Today, another jeremiad... There are times one has to say what's on one's mind.

Do you think there are enough among us willing to stand up, like those good people in Wisconsin, in the face of bully conservatism? I mean, enough to make a difference? Can America be saved? I really think it’s time to ask that question.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Hillary Clinton was right. She was widely mocked when she raised the specter, in 1998, of a “vast right-wing conspiracy,” but subsequent events and trends have only confirmed her suspicions. What we boast to the world as our “democracy” has been appropriated by the avatars of power and money. It is now being used exclusively to their advantage, and at the cost of the people of this country.

Okay, so call me a conspiracy theorist. I have always distrusted people who hide behind the accusatory “they,” but I’m going to use it because I am convinced that this “they” does in fact exist. They inhabit the boardrooms, the penthouse apartments and the country estates where excessive wealth prospers and multiplies with virtually no hindrance. They have disposed of everything that could once have regulated their insatiable appetites. They gobble up power wherever it exists like gourmands at the table, leaving none for others. They are the American oligarchs, unrecognized as such because they wear the camouflage of respectable conservatism, hiding in plain sight without fear of discovery.

The most effective weapon of this cabal is fear, and they have used it to suborn every institution and value. They have persuaded vast numbers of people that up is down and down is up, that right is wrong and wrong is right. They have bought our politicians and dictated our politics. They have co-opted those in political power to assure a “permanent majority” favorable to their purposes, in part by gerrymandering congressional districts, in part through the use of promotional and advertising dollars to disseminate half-truths and lies. The electoral system—indeed, the electorate itself—has become theirs to manipulate at will. Their efforts have created a Republican “base” that can be relied on to think, vote, act—and of course, consume—in accordance with their wishes. And their representatives engage in open-handed lobbying, exchanging munificence for votes.

They have succeeded in suborning the judicial system. The Supreme Court of the United States is now in their pocket, for possibly decades to come. It was their Supreme Court that assured the election of their minion, George W. Bush, in the 2000 election; it was their Supreme Court, in Citizens United, that further empowered them to manipulate elections with their money. It is to the Supreme Court they will appeal to overturn the hard-won health care bill that entitles a further 30 million less privileged Americans to access to affordable medical attention; and as I see it, given the Court’s track record of partisan decisions, there is a chance they will succeed.

They have undermined the power of the presidency. The people-oriented Carter was replaced by the business-oriented Reagan, whose powerful kitchen cabinet of business executives took advantage of his malleability to promote their own agenda of corporate advancement, along with the disempowerment of working Americans—and particularly the unions. When Clinton succeeded in becoming too successful and too popular they set out to destroy him, even though he had embraced a centrist agenda that alarmed his supporters to the left. Failing to achieve their purpose ideologically, they made it personal, resorting to a specious impeachment process to discredit him and weaken his political standing. Now, lacking any rational or personally scandalous basis on which to attack the elected President, they spread lies about Obama’s very identity and his religious affiliation—and with apparent success in some quarters: a recent poll shows that, contrary to all factual evidence, over 50 percent of Republicans believe the President to be a Muslim, and that he was not born in the United States. In this way, they seek to undermine the very legitimacy of the current presidency.

Clearly, they could not do this without the cooperation of the media. One of their more successful strategies has been to paint the media as “liberal,” even while assuring its steady movement, over thirty years, to the right. Even the “mainstream” media today, perhaps for fear of being denounced as biased, is constrained to give “equal time” to the most absurd and extreme of radical conservative views, as though their arguments had equal standing. And the extreme right wing media and talk radio hosts are given free rein to promote the lies and distortions that serve to misinform and inflame their public.

Worse, perhaps, than all this, because it runs so deep, has been the subtle co-option and reversal of those values that truly made this country “great”: a sense of fairness, justice, opportunity for all; a willingness to lend a hand to those in need or trouble; a respect for community and shared responsibility; a long, sometimes difficult struggle to assure equal rights for all its citizens. Success, these days, is too often a matter of ruthless competitiveness; it is judged by the pile of money a person can amass.

The clamor in Wisconsin, as I see it, is a revolt against all of this. It’s a plea for common cause, for respect and recognition for those who serve the greater community, a sense of mutual responsibility for the well-being and proper functioning of the social system in order to ensure that it works for all and not just for the favored few. I admire these people for their determination to stand up against the mindless march of radical conservatism.

Anyone with half a brain and the ounce of good sense needed to apply it must know that the nation’s financial woes will not be solved by window-dressing budget cuts aimed at those who can least afford it. Nor by slicing away at vital necessities like education, justice and other public services, or international relations. This is the time, as Obama says, for an adult conversation about who we are and where we’re going. It has to be one in which people on all sides of the table are prepared to make significant sacrifices. Civil servants will certainly be among them. But it is absurd to declare in advance, as Republicans persist in doing, that spending cuts alone will be sufficient. Railing against taxes may appeal to popular sentiment, but it is not responsible argument. Unless thoughtful consideration of the revenue side of the equation becomes part of the discussion, we will get nowhere.

So how many of us are prepared to stand up to the would-be oligarchs and the right-wing bullies who are their willing, if unwitting tools? Are we ready to follow the example of Wisconsin, if necessary—and those brave protesters in the Mideast!—and take to the streets to demand the conversation that we need? I think of the missed opportunity of the Jon Stewart “Rally for Sanity” with regret. There, people did show up, in massive numbers. That we stood up and were—literally!—not counted, at least not accurately by the media, serves only to show us how much work is to be done. That we stood up and were fobbed off with a glib distortion of the reasons for which the vast majority of us came was even sadder. We came—I came—to show my anger and frustration at the continued domination of our political system by the wealthy few, and by the suppression of the voices of genuine humanitarian concern.

We have been meek and passive for too long. I say, with the Boss, Rise Up! Our city is in ruins…

Don't Ask...

... me what goes on inside the heads of those Republican senators. Their lockstep vote rejecting the repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" can be understood only in terms of petty, revenge politics. With large majorities even of their own supporters backing the repeal, they once again chose the path of "No" to anything proposed by those whose vestigial hold on "power" they seek to grab. This decision clearly had nothing to do with the will of the American people, nothing to do with what's best for the country or even its military forces; it had nothing to do with simple common sense or reason. Spite, I think, would be a good word for their action.

That not one senator on the Republican side was willing to think for him- or herself (at least, alas, a couple of Democrats did!) speaks to a cynicism about their role which in turn reflects poorly on the responsibility with which they address the work they are elected to do. I can find no motive in their action other than the obsession with a defeat of the Democrats and return to power. Unless, of course, they imagine that undisguised homophobia will garner them the even more enthusiastic support of their extreme right-wing base.

I was surprised to hear the media response, that this should be read as a further political setback for Democrats. Admittedly, they lost the battle of Don't Ask, Don't Tell for now; but they may find themselves in a better position to win the war. Well, at least the current war--the November election. I tend to think--or hope, let's say--that this new act of political spite will turn into a defeat for Republicans. At some point, surely, they will overstep the bounds and alienate not only every voting moderate in the country but even the most reliable of their supporters. Such blatant and irrational partisanship is no way to move forward with the country's business.