I recently responded to a letter by Pam Geller, a conservative blogger who has gotten a lot of press in the past year. If you know of anyone would like to read (or needs to read) some rational thought, please pass this on. My response is on top, with her Letter to America below:
Dear Pam,
I don't live in a library, and my head has not been buried in books my whole life. I am a student of living, of people, and of what I believe to be a pretty humanistic philosophy of doing what's right. I took the time to read your letter to America, so I hope you'll extend the same courtesy to me.
Firstly, I don't believe in bank bailouts any more than you do. When it comes to money, I'm pretty much a free market conservative. Yes, I said it...conservative. I don't want the government to give my money away, and if they're going to use my money to make loans, I would like to know who the recipients are and what the repayment timetables are. But before we blame the big spending liberals for stealing our money, we should take a look at the policies of the last administration (after all, it was Bush who started this whole bailout business, remember?). Under President Bush, nearly a trillion dollars was spent in Iraq under the guise of protecting us from WMDs, which we know (and they knew) didn't exist. Among other things, our money went to torture - which the administration flatly lied to us about, and which violated the Geneva Convention. Our money also went to secret prisons, which no one ever told us about until a leak occurred. All of this was for an agenda across the ocean that really didn't pose a threat to the United States. And now you have the gall to criticize the federal reserve for giving out loans to try to stop the worst economic downturn on American soil in 65 years. Well Pam, I am scared too. I'm scared because the money I spent on torturing Iraqi bread vendors who provided false information just to stop the pain could have been used to give teachers higher salaries, or stimulate US jobs in technology and manufacturing, but instead has increased our national debt by 71%. I'm scared because some people think it's acceptable to hand a blank check over to a president who drank his way through college and wasn't actually elected by a majority, but the same trust is not given to a black man who has achieved more personal, intellectual, and professional success than most Americans, ever. Yes, I'm scared.
The "corrupted" process that you mention - the one in which judges allow gay men and women to legally wed - is no less corrupt than the institution of marriage that conservative christians insist on protecting. If straight people can lie before a priest, physically and emotionally abuse their spouses, commit adultery, enter into marriage for the wrong reasons, and then divorce 50% of the time, then please tell me how else one could possibly harm this institution? As far as the judges are concerned, our founding fathers created a division of power called checks and balances. They did this to ensure that no majority who wins control of one branch of the government can unfairly wield it's power to take rights away from any minority. The specific process you mention - called Judicial Review - was established in 1803, while Thomas Jefferson was President. There is absolutely nothing un-American or new about this process. The only reason you and others have a problem with it is that it is causing conflict with your religious beliefs, which I am certain are not supposed to have a place in the formation of laws and policies.
Regarding your discussion of Presidential qualifications, Kennedy was never a town mayor, never ran a dairy queen, and served in the Senate for less than a decade before being elected the youngest President ever. Ronald Reagan was a Hollywood actor. Politicians with established track records, like Nixon and the most recent Bush, turned out to have miserable presidencies and policies. You and I agree on one point for sure - that we aught to learn from history.
I want to address one final point. In your letter, you liken the holocaust to the democratic election of a President who is trying to rebuild an economic disaster that fell in his lap as a result of republican rule. You liken the holocaust - the persecution of minorities - to equal rights of citizens, regardless of race, sexuality, gender, or disability status (could any comparison be more absurd?). To suggest that the holocaust is anything like our lives today is an insult to the 11 million people who needlessly died at the hands of Nazi soldiers. It is an insult to the 1.5 million children who died in concentration camps, it is an insult to the true students of history, and it is an insult to me for having taken the time to read what you have to say.
Sincerely,
Chase Maggiano
*************
>
>
> Wake up America !!!
> by Pam Geller
>
> I am a student of history. Professionally, I have written 15
> books in six languages, and have studied history all my life. I
> think there is something monumentally large afoot, and I do not
> believe it is just a banking crisis, or a mortgage crisis, or a
> credit crisis. Yes, these exist but they are merely single
> facets on a very large gemstone that is only now coming into a
> sharper focus.
>
> Something of historic proportions is happening. I can sense it
> because I know how it feels, smells, what it looks like, and how
> people react to it.. Yes, a perfect storm may be brewing, but
> there is something happening within our country that has been
> evolving for about 10 - 15 years. The pace has dramatically
> quickened in the past two.
>
> We demanded and then codified into law the requirement that
> our banks make massive loans to people whom we knew could never
> pay back? Why? We learned recently that the Federal Reserve,
> which has little or no real oversight by anyone, has "loaned"
> two trillion dollars (that is $2,000,000,000,000) over the past
> few months, but will not tell us to whom or why or disclose the
> terms. That is our money. Yours and mine. And that is three
> times the $700B we all argued about so strenuously just this
> past September.
>
> Who has this money? Why do they have it? Why are the terms
> unavailable to us? Who asked for it? Who authorized it? I
> thought this was a government of "We the People," who loaned our
> powers to our elected leaders.. Apparently not.
>
> We have spent two or more decades intentionally de-
> industrializing our economy. Why?
>
> We have intentionally dumbed down our schools, ignored our
> history, and no longer teach our founding documents, why we are
> exceptional, and why we are worth preserving. Students by and
> large cannot write, think critically, read, or articulate.
> Parents are not revolting, teachers are not picketing, school
> boards continue to back mediocrity.. Why?
>
> We have now established the precedent of protesting every
> close election (now violently in California over a proposition
> that is so controversial that it wants marriage to remain
> between one man and one woman. Did you ever think such a thing
> possible just a decade ago?). We have corrupted our sacred
> political process by allowing unelected judges to write laws
> that radically change our way of life, and then mainstream
> Marxist groups like ACORN and others to turn our voting system
> into a banana republic. To what purpose?
>
> Now our mortgage industry is collapsing, housing prices are in
> free fall, major industries are failing, our banking system is
> on the verge of collapse, Social Security is nearly bankrupt, as
> is Medicare and our entire government. Our education system is
> worse than a joke (I teach college and know precisely what I am
> talking about.) The list is staggering in its length, breadth,
> and depth. It is potentially 1929 x 10. And we are at war with
> an enemy we cannot name for fear of offending people of the same
> religion who cannot wait to slit the throats of your children if
> they have the opportunity to do so.
>
> And now we have elected a man no one knows anything about, who
> has never run so much as a Dairy Queen, let alone a town as big
> as Wasilla , Alaska .. All of his associations and alliances are
> with real radicals in their chosen fields of employment, and
> everything we learn about him, drip by drip, is unsettling if
> not downright scary (Surely you have heard him speak about his
> idea to create and fund a mandatory civilian defense force
> stronger than our military for use inside our borders? No? Oh,
> of course. The media would never play that for you over and over
> and then demand he answer it. Sarah Palin's pregnant daughter
> and $150,000 wardrobe is more important.)
>
> Mr. Obama's winning platform can be boiled down to one word:
> Change...radical change Why?
>
> I have never been so afraid for my country and for my children
> as I am now. This man campaigned on bringing people together,
> something he has never, ever done in his professional life. In
> my assessment, Obama will divide us along philosophical lines,
> push us apart, and then try to realign the pieces into a new and
> different power structure. Change is indeed coming And when it
> comes, you will never see the same nation again.
>
> And that is only the beginning.
>
> I thought I would never be able to experience what the
> ordinary, moral German felt in the mid-1930s. In those times,
> the savior was a former smooth-talking rabble-rouser from the
> streets, about whom the average German knew next to nothing.
> What they did know was that he was associated with groups that
> shouted, shoved, and pushed around people with whom they
> disagreed; he edged his way onto the political stage through
> great oratory and promises. Economic times were tough, people
> were losing jobs, and he was a great speaker. And he smiled and
> waved a lot. And people, even newspapers, were afraid to speak
> out for fear that his "brown shirts" would bully them into
> submission.
>
> And then he was duly elected to office, with a full-throttled
> economic crisis at hand [the Great Depression]. Slowly but
> surely he seized the controls of government power, department by
> department, person by person, bureaucracy by bureaucracy. The
> kids joined a Youth Movement in his name, where they were taught
> what to think. How did he get the people on his side? He did it
> promising jobs to the jobless, money to the moneyless, and
> goodies for the military-industrial complex. He did it by
> indoctrinating the children, advocating gun control, health care
> for all, better wages, better jobs, and promising to re-instill
> pride once again in the country, across Europe , and across the
> world.
>
> He did it with a compliant media - Did you know that? And he
> did this all in the name of justice and...change. And the people
> surely got what they voted for. (Look it up if you think I am
> exaggerating.) Read your history books. Many people objected in
> 1933 and were shouted down, called names, laughed at, and made
> fun of. When Winston Churchill pointed out the obvious in the
> late 1930s while seated in the House of Lords in England (he was
> not yet Prime Minister), he was booed into his seat and called a
> crazy troublemaker. He was right, though.
>
> Don't forget that Germany was the most educated, cultured
> country in Europe . It was full of music, art, museums,
> hospitals, laboratories, and universities. And in less than six
> years - a shorter time span than just two terms of the U. S..
> presidency - it was rounding up its own citizens, killing
> others, abrogating its laws, turning children against parents,
> and neighbors against neighbors. All with the best of
> intentions, of course. The road to Hell is paved with them.
>
> As a practical thinker, one not overly prone to emotional
> decisions, I have a choice: I can either believe what the
> objective pieces of evidence tell me (even if they make me
> cringe with disgust); I can believe what history is shouting to
> me from across the chasm of seven decades; or I can hope I am
> wrong, close my eyes, have another latte and ignore what is
> transpiring around me.
>
> Some people scoff at me; others laugh or think I am foolish,
> naive, or both. Perhaps I am. But I have never been afraid to
> look people in the eye and tell them exactly what I believe -
> and why I believe it. I pray I am wrong. But, I do not think I
> am.
