Across the Great Divide

Shelter Report: Iowa and the Day Center Caucus.

In the world inhabited by the Republican presidential candidates I listened to last night, there's no room for people who don't "take responsibility" and master the universe without any help from others — especially the government.

Should one of these candidates prevail, some magical combination of American self-reliance, God and the free market, defended by our young men in uniform, will take care of everything, and I'll have to find something else to do with my Wednesday mornings.

For now, though, the people I'm serving at the Day Center can use the help.

From the outside, our guests all belong to one simplistic class — the homeless —and you could find among them some people the Republicans would be quick to put on their End Welfare poster. But you'd also find a lot of them used to be our young men in uniform.

And you'd find Charley.

Charley comes in to the Day Center for a shower because the hot water in his trailer doesn't work. He's not technically homeless now, but he used to be. He's employed by a nearby company that provides traffic signs, safety barricades and flagmen for construction sites. He gets laid off when construction slows in the winter.

Today, he spent a lot of time on the phone. One of the calls was to Rhode Island where he is slowly paying off an old DUI fine that encumbers his drivers license. (The conviction goes back to 1987, he says.)
When he learned he only owes the court $115 more, he was so happy, he called his mother.

"I'm a different person now than I was then," he said.

He has a different life now, too. Here in Grand Junction, he lived in a shelter until he was able to save enough money to buy a car he couldn't drive. "I moved into my car. Then I bought a truck."

The truck sat until he could afford to buy a 27-foot trailer, which he towed to its present location. Then he parked the truck. "One step at a time," he said. "I can hardly wait to drive again. My boss says he'll make me a supervisor."

Once he finishes paying off the fine, the license restriction will be lifted, which means he'll be eligible for more work. So far, he's only been able to take flagging jobs reachable by bus, competing with other workers who have the same limitation. And of course, if the government doesn't do many road projects, he'll have less work, so you could say he's still dependent on the government.

When you start to look beyond the "responsibility" rap against the homeless and actually talk to them, you'll find people slowly working themselves back from addictions, struggling with mental illness, looking over their shoulders for abusers, trying to go back to school and stick this time, working their way through the parole and probation systems, and contending with physical disabilities.

Today, for example, I noted among our 63 guests:

• A man with his leg amputated at the knee
• A man carrying an oxygen tank and taking medications for his heart, lungs and kidneys
• A man whose right side is limp from a stroke
• A man with a dent the size of a soup can in his skull
• A man missing his right hand
• Many men and women misssing teeth
• A man with a plate in his head and facial scarring
• A veteran whose first nervous breakdown came in 1972
• A man whose sister claims he has brain damage
• A woman with a black eye
• A man with a black eye patch
• A woman who's deaf
• A woman who's morbidly obese
• A woman who's been sexually abused by family members.

I'm sure I don't know the half of it.

It's easy enough to generalize, to label people by their address or lack of one, by their dress or the look in their eyes. If you stand far enough away — in an Iowa Pizza Ranch, for example — you can look at the folks who filter through the Day Center and decide they're not worthy. You can wonder why they don't get some gumption and stand up on their own two feet (or foot, as the case may be). You can convince a crowd that keeping their tax dollars for themselves is best for everyone.

You can celebrate success and praise freedom and call yourself God's chosen.

But I don't think it's so.

 

 

Reluctant Governor's Fave Founding Father.

For Sarah Palin, founding fathers are sort of like newspapers also.

BECK: Who is your favorite founder?

PALIN: You know, well, all of them because they came collectively together with so much diverse...

BECK: Bull crap. Who is your favorite?

PALIN: So much diverse opinion and so much diversity in terms of belief, but collectively they came together to form this union.

(CROSSTALK)

PALIN: No, and they were led by, of course, George Washington, so he's got to rise to the top. Washington was the consummate statesman. He serves, he returned power to the people. He didn't want to be a king. He returned power to the people. Then he went back to Mount Vernon, he went back to his farm. He was almost reluctant to serve as president, too. And that is who you need to find to serve in government, in a bureaucracy.

Those who you know will serve for the right reasons because they're reluctant to get out there and seek a limelight and seek power. They're doing it for people. That was George Washington.

BECK: He is my favorite for that reason as well. He was the indispensable man. That's why I say I'm waiting for George Washington to appear. Someone who doesn't want to serve but will because he must. And someone who is so beyond question that he can bring people together and say look we have to do this. This can be hard.

PALIN: That's exactly what we need to seek in a candidate. Someone -
- I'll repeat this — almost reluctant to serve. Someone who will not prostitute themselves and say what they believe a voter wants to hear at that time in order to get elected but someone who the people find and ask, will you sacrifice, will you do this for our country to get us back on the right track?

BECK: That is why I think you're on the most admired list. Because some people find you to be that. 

George Washington, of course, didn't sign the Declaration of Independence and as president, presided over the Constitutional Convention but did not participate in the debates.

He was reluctant to serve, though, and that's enough.

A President, Arrested.

A sort of valentine for Obama, from Peggy Noonan in the Wall Street Journal, no less.

He is appreciative of his staff's efforts. "When you're working hard for your country and you know [he cares] it is huge." How does he show his thanks? "It's a little like a basketball game—'Thanks for that, I know what you did.' It's not a note or a pat or a call, it's a guy-to-guy thank you, 'That's cool, that's good.' You think, 'My coach got that I worked my ass off.'"

"As a person he is just an incredible human being who you can't help but love."

Pawlenty and the Economy: Saying No Works.

Good news on the Minnesota economy.

The state gained 2,000 jobs in November, according to figures released Thursday that also contained a revision of October's results that showed twice as many jobs were created that month as originally thought.

The Strib story quoted economists and the commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development, but not Governor Pawlenty.

This is the moment to drive home your message, governor: Saying No Works. Do Nothing, Reap the Rewards. When Governors Leave the State, Businesses Don't.

It could be he is just being modest, looking at the data conservatively, or simply couldn't be reached as he hurtles around New York, South Carolina, Washington, Iowa and New Hampshire.

I suppose his quote from the Granite State — "We need to reward politicians who are willing to say no, instead of rewarding politicians who are willing to say yes." — could be taken as back-patting himself and other Republican advocates of do nothingism. But since he just finished praising Chilean Socialists for their fiscal restraint and economic policies, it's difficult to know for sure.

Pawlenty Leaves a Gut-Shot Minnesota.

In the Strib story about the deer hunting opener, DJ Danielson sees parallels between Gov. Pawlenty's performance as governor and his hunting ethic.

After wounding a small buck

Pawlenty had to leave for Iowa, where he was headlining a Republican Party fundraiser.

Before leaving, he told reporters, "they're looking for it and they're hopeful they can find it," according to news reports.

Yes, "they" are following the blood trail through the brush, while he runs to catch his flight, and we are hopeful we can salvage something from the carnage.

Pawlenty's Stock: Headed Underwater.

Politics is the only profession where it's considered okay to badmouth the competition. And if you're out looking for another job, you don't tell your boss you have a dentist appointment — you go on television.

Silly me. I used to think being a governor was an executive job.

If I was still running a company and it was having trouble, I'd find a way to get to the office each day and spend time with my management team. When I went out, it would be to talk to my customers and buck up the people doing the work under tough circumstances.  

Even if I was planning to jump ship, I certainly wouldn't be spending all my time talking about what a crappy job my colleagues had done, and then take credit for their accomplishments that I'd tried to stop. As Gov. Pawlenty has noted, after all, there's Google.

But our Gov. Pawlenty has been going the other way — slamming the cities he's shafted, taking credit for good stuff he opposed and canceling funding that doesn't exist. If state government were a private, a hostile takeover would be under way by now. Sell advisories would be issued. 

But recall is for Californians.

Pawlenty's greatest accomplishments over the past three months have been to make ex-Gov. Palin look like she has integrity for resigning and make Rep. Michele Bachmann look like a normal Minnesota Republican.

*****

Norwegianity reads about efforts to block middle- and lower-income people who might receive federal insurance subsidies from using the money on health care plans that cover abortion and has this to say:

This is not about abortion, it’s about control freaks legislating their religious twaddle. Next will be AIDS exclusion (unholy lifestyle, etc.), then STD exclusion in general. Then they’ll go after the obese. It’s almost funny to see how the right uses that one both ways: Obama will force you to be healthy (nanny state) vs. Why should I have to pay higher rates because some people choose to be fat (laissez fuck-u-ism).

Anything to slow down the eventual bill because the entire Republican party has become little more than the Gotta Obstruct Party.

It’s like Middle Eastern terrorism. First you set off a small bomb, then you set off the bigger bomb when the ambulances arrive. Republicans break everything, then snipe at the repair crews.

Do as I Say, Not as I Do.

At the Michigan state Republican leadership conference on Mackinac Island Saturday, Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty said people living in traditional Democratic strongholds such as Detroit often hold the cliched view that the GOP is a party of elitists.

Um, no. They just hold the cliched view that Republicans don't care about black people.

But never mind that. Pawlenty thinks the GOP needs to reach out to inner city voters — sort of like he has in Minnesota.

Our Absentee Governor at Work.

Gov. Pawlenty, who has hardly been able to drag himself to Minnesota, let alone to his desk, unleashed a flurry of productivity yesterday, telling Management and Budget Commissioner Tom Hanson:

By this letter, I am directing you to stop all state funding to ACORN unless the state is legally obligated to provide such funding.

As Polinaut reports, however, ACORN and its affiliated organizations receive no funding from the state of Minnesota.

Look for future directives to stop all state funding to Cuba, the Dallas Cowboy's new stadium, Body Worlds, the Rolling Thirties Bloods, French health care, the Teamsters and Margaret Anderson Kelliher's gubernatorial campaign committee.

The Speech They Don't Want Their Kids to Hear Tomorrow.

“The thing that concerned me most about it was it seemed like a direct channel from the president of the United States into the classroom, to my child,” said Brett Curtis, an engineer from Pearland, Tex., who said he would keep his three children home.

“I don’t want our schools turned over to some socialist movement.”

– "Some Parents Oppose Obama School Speech," New York Times

Here's an excerpt from that hideously manipulative presidential speech:

Now I’ve given a lot of speeches about education. And I’ve talked a lot about responsibility.

I’ve talked about your teachers’ responsibility for inspiring you, and pushing you to learn. 

I’ve talked about your parents’ responsibility for making sure you stay on track, and get your homework done, and don’t spend every waking hour in front of the TV or with that Xbox. 

I’ve talked a lot about your government’s responsibility for setting high standards, supporting teachers and principals, and turning around schools that aren’t working where students aren’t getting the opportunities they deserve. 

But at the end of the day, we can have the most dedicated teachers, the most supportive parents, and the best schools in the world – and none of it will matter unless all of you fulfill your responsibilities. Unless you show up to those schools; pay attention to those teachers; listen to your parents, grandparents and other adults; and put in the hard work it takes to succeed. 

And that’s what I want to focus on today: the responsibility each of you has for your education. I want to start with the responsibility you have to yourself.

Pawlenty Needs Some Bachmann Lessons.

On the radio, Pawlenty said he understood the address would encourage school children to write to the president. 

"There are going to be questions about -- well, what are they are going to do with those names and is that for the purpose of a mailing list?" the governor said. 

— Star Tribune

Our absentee Governor really missed an opportunity on this one. If he wants to become a national right wing quote machine, he has to ditch the innuendo and go straight for the craziness.

Of course President Obama doesn't want a mailing list of nine-year-olds. He wants to send agents to the homes to recruit them to spy on their parents!