The Light To Share

Typhoon-Flood Murder: Incompetence, Corruption And Greed For Power

2009-12-01T07:12:00.000-08:00

Part I. Flood Murder: Victims Squatters –
Killers Government And Squatters Themselves

[Ist of a Series]

by Edwin A. Sumcad

Stories of death by drowning because of flood in the Philippines caused by serial storms are heartbreaking, to say the least. Actually, it was murder by flood through neglect, corruption and incompetent National Leadership.
Victims by drowning are squatters … but the murderers are the corrupt and incompetent government and its accomplices -- the squatters themselves.
There is no doubt that it is because of government neglect, corruption and incompetence that flood murder is occurring in the Philippines, and why flooding in the Island Republic has a vicious way of claiming its victims.
Authorities don’t mind poachers and trespassers of government woodlands; they have no way of understanding or too incompetent to comprehend the need to safeguard and preserve them as part of the patrimony of the nation.
Illegal logging of the green mountain forests of the country, and wanton destruction of Philippine vegetation by entrepreneurs that pay tong to corrupt politicians to mock the law and stash away their hidden profits, had caused the erosion of soil when it rains creating a flooding effect downhill … landslides of mud that turn the land and the swollen rivers below into a churning sea of rising murky waters.
Squatters murder squatters by drowning. Colonies of squatters are the number one violators of anti-littering laws; desperate, the squatters live an undisciplined and disorderly lifestyle, unmindful of hygiene and cleanliness that the neighborhood requires. They just throw their garbage in the street – their trash and refuse clogged the drainage and their shanties constructed by the side of canals and inland waterways, blocked the flow of water into the sea, thus causing flooding that kill people – mostly called “Informal Settlers” -- by drowning.
“The number of squatter families represents 21 percent of the estimated 2.6 million households in Metro Manila. One in every five squatting families lives in danger areas such as riverbanks, floodways, roads, aqueducts and under bridges …” These are the victims of their counterpart that clog up and jammed the drainage, and blocked the waterways turning towns into overnight inland seas, sometimes larger than Lake Erie – to use a metaphor -- when heavy rains come and people mysteriously disappear into the belly of dirty and angry swirling waters.
This shocker is culled from MMIAC’s report [Metro Manila Inter-Agency Committee on Informal Settlers].
“Informal Settlers” is the new deodorized name for squatters. “Squatters” is a mean-spirited term from Hell identifying invaders of private and government owned land and space making them their own permanent residence.
Opportunist politicians running the Government “tolerate” and to a certain extent even “encourage” illegal squatting because of the squatters’ votes they need during election time. Thus the Government and squatters cannot accuse each other of committing this flood murder because in this heartrending tragedy, both are in pare delicto. But there is no question that bad politics, corruption, incompetent Government and the mindless squatters themselves had sent Metro Manila’s flood victims to their watery grave.
As of this writing, a bigger hurricane code-named “Lupit” is sighted about a thousand kilometers approaching Aparri, Cagayan, Northern Luzon, Philippines, even as people are still dying across the country due to the deadly typhoons Ketsana and Parma [international names] that just took their toll of destruction and loss of human lives if not by drowning, by flood-caused injuries and diseases.
By the time this super-hurricane hits the country, our statistics of casualties and mega-size devastation shall have been updated, and plea for international donations and relief worldwide shall have intensified.
This countdown of the dead and the dying may be horrifying to contemplate when Halloween’s 31st of October is approaching … the day Evil is supposed to rule the world. Scary reports of thousands of Filipinos dead through drowning and still missing, and three hundred thousand people already displaced by the storm are choking the foreign and local Media that are currently outdoing each other in reporting one of the most ghastly news stories ever told.
On the humanitarian side, frantic calls for international relief indicated that in the squatter colonies of Metro Manila, the devastation, suffering and agony of the victims in certain stricken areas were beyond monetary estimation.
It may still surprise a lot of people to know – most likely they don’t know yet, until they get hold of a copy of PAR and read this column] that the root-cause of this regularly occurring annual Philippine catastrophe is not necessarily the deadly tempest of the angry god from above that brought whirlwind to wrought havoc to the burgeoning Metropolis and poured down torrential rain to cause rivers to overflow turning the flat land into a sea of mud and dirty waters. The real cause is a combination of the squatters’ delinquency and disorderly lifestyle, government apathy, corruption and incompetence that viciously sent victims to their watery grave.
When people are killed this way, the killing is actually murder by drowning. And the principal murderer is not the wind or the rain but the inutile National Leadership that the so-called unthinking and emotionally-driven “people power” of the street [EDSA] had installed through the use of force, threat and intimidation orchestrated by conspiring political opportunists that when in power do not only ambush the national coffer at will but also miserably lacks the required statecraft, know-how or the art of governing or managing the affairs of the state.
In governance, the National Leadership is like fish in dry land. Wanting of knowledge and lack of wisdom and having a low self-esteem, it is impossible for them to solve the problems of squatters and the eternally occurring flood that do not only kill people but also destroy the country … it is just plain, downright impossible!
Think about it this way and understand this depressing situation: The country had fallen into the Dark Side that Alfred Hitchcock’s FearNet in television and cinema specializes, catching stricken viewers spellbound who later on need to undergo a shock therapy. Typical of a shock plot that Hitchcock stories are noted for, administering the Government is nothing more than just a great opportunity to get filthy rich. Members of the presidential entourage that take control of Government through the exercise of mob power in EDSA, are self-re-enforcing partners in massive corruption. Their aim of governance is not to govern but to gobble up what’s up for grabs.
Just recently [earlier last year], China’s giant ZTE telecom corporation that won the bid for the Philippine online communication project was reportedly involved in a shady deal with the corrupt Manila Government. ZTE spokesman Howard Xue denied involvement in the $330 million contract which was overpriced by $130 million demanded by Jose Miguel “Mike” Arroyo, the president’s husband, and his accomplice ex-elections Commissioner Benjamin Abalos as “kickback”.
This “kickback” negotiation was so rotten the heady smell of it reached the nose of the Philippine Congress where investigation was subsequently conducted. When the dirty finger caught in the cookie jar was exposed, EDSA president Arroyo, visibly in panic, immediately scrapped off the deal.
This is just an example of the finger of corruption caught in the cookie jar. Other fingers that got away with it, had stolen millions if not billions of dollars at the expense of the Government run by “people power” opportunists, and woe to millions of the starving poor whose cookie jars are systematically emptied even before these are filled up by their hard earnings that go to the Government after paying their taxes.
The country loses $2.5 million to corruption every day! Think about it, even if you are about to cry with tears of blood in your eyes. The World Bank reported that this loot is one-fifth of the national budget or 3.8% of GDP. Imagine how large this is compared to the take of corruption in other corrupt countries the world over. This corruption-stricken country ranks first in the size of massive poverty that grossly committed larceny of public funds creates.
That’s how immensely colossal corruption is in the Philippines once dubbed by the nation’s national hero Dr. Jose Rizal as the Pearl of the Orient Seas because of its beauty, tranquility and rich natural endowments people of the Orient covet, and now people running the Government rob with impunity!
At the aftermath of the typhoons that ravaged the country, some P12 billion calamity funds have been currently made available – meaning public money up for grabs. Experienced crooks in the Government have to be clever enough in planning and designing ways and means on how to steal this money with the least of suspicions.
Created was this Special National Public-Private Sector Reconstruction Commission to oversee how this fund is disposed. It is staffed with prominent characters in Philippine society. It is chaired by businessman Manuel V. Pangilinan, and co-chaired by no less than Cardinal Ricardo Vidal, Archbishop of Cebu himself. He is supposed to be the vicar of God that teaches morality and exorcise the stricken country of the demons of corruption. Who would think that this Emissary of God would steal the people’s money?
That’s precisely the point why such trustworthy-looking Commission was cleverly created headed by the Holy Ambassador of God, if you happen to know what I mean.
Anyway, opportunist politicians who have such great opportunity to steal, need tons of money for next year’s presidential election. If they are going to take a heist, they have to be sure it is not a miss or a mess.
Elections of this kind are traditionally run by goons, guns and gold. Goons they already have. Guns they already have. Gold by the truckload they still need to have to buy the election as usual.
When election approaches, fingers get itchier to poke at the cookie jar. In 2004, some P728 million budgets for fertilizer easily disappeared a couple of months or so before the election. It reportedly went to President Arroyo’s political allies. She “won” the election.
Would the calamity fund also disappear and surface at the hands of the survivors and families of the flood victims that are selected “eligible” to receive for political reason? If not, then the elite calamity fund Commission gets the public’s ire. Unless the co-chairmen deemed to be above suspicion are involved in pocketing Judas’ pieces of silver before they hang themselves at a nearby tree, the crooks always get away with it.
They may be are too dumb to understand why people die by drowning when the typhoon comes or too incompetent to handle the squatter and flood problems of Metro Manila, but when comes to how government funds end up in their pocket, no … definitely they are not that retarded!
In fact they are smarter than the Sly Fox in the sad story of the unsuspecting Red Hen – prey of the wild that always ends up as chicken dinner to the wise and cunning characters of the woods, especially to predators in the precipitous if not treacherous jungle of Metro Manila. #

© Copyright Edwin A. Sumcad. PAR access November 9, 2009.

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Part II: Incompetence And Flood Of
Corruption When Typhoons Come

[2nd and final series]
by edwin a. sumcad

You read in Part I of this editorial report that in the Philippines flood is actually “murder”. The victims are squatters. Murderous criminals are corrupt politicians running the government, and their partners in crimes are the squatters themselves.
Wallowing in extreme poverty – the Philippine Smokey Mountain is in the Internet viewed worldwide – squatters lived a desperate and undisciplined way of life that breeds monstrous floods.
For example, millions of dwellers in the squatter colonies of Metro Manila and peripheral urban centers – temporary squatting settlers invading and permanently occupying government and private lands – litter the streets with garbage or throw their waste and refuse in nearby canals clogging the drainage and choking aqueducts and waterways, thus preventing the heavy deposit of rain to flow into the sea.
When torrential rains come, the flood that rises to the rooftop turns the town into swelling and swirling seas of murky waters that carry houses away and send victims to their watery grave.
There are no government flood prevention programs whatsoever. Only a river of tears for the dead and massive destruction of infrastructures accompanied by a cry for international relief are plentiful for the regular yearly visits of hurricanes and typhoons that spare no one.
The rape of the nation’s virgin forests by illegal loggers creates dangerous mudslides when the rain comes. Massive devastation and reports of high incidence of death are attributed to this menace of flowing dirt, deadwoods and mud that come down from the mountainside with the flood.
And in the case of the squatter problem, for political expediency, squatters, mostly jobless from nearby provinces are reportedly encouraged by politicians running the government rather than discouraged to come in droves to the city, in order to get their political support. Metro Manila is the center of power. Politicians that control the set of national government in Metro Manila control the whole country.
There are no government funds that the country badly needs, to address these dual major problems that occur year in and year out. And yet, worldwide news reports documented not just a petit larceny but a mind-boggling grand larceny that sucks the country dry … the nation loses $2.5 million to corruption everyday!
Observers of the Philippine scene are of this general belief – and this writer totally agrees -- that the national leadership is not that of such a standard or quality fit to govern or run the daily affairs of the state.
The fragmented Military whose loyalty is not to the country but to politicians likely to succeed in grabbing power is said to be plotting a coup d’etat and counter coup d’etat everyday. EDSA “people power” exercised by goons and mobs in the street could change the government any day. No political stability exists in the country.
Legitimate foreign investors are scared to commit a long-term investment in this ill-fated nation; they skip the Philippines and put their money in nearby ASEAN countries – Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, etc. – turning them into Southeast Asia’s prosperous NIC [newly industrialized countries]. The Philippines – where the first nuclear plant was established in that part of the world to jumpstart a turbocharger for economic development in the Far East – was left behind.
Instead, the IMF and IBRD had reported that the Philippines became one of the world’s poorest countries next to Bangladesh and similar impoverished sanctuaries of corruption.
It is not just corruption but also incompetence in governance that causes this great disappointment if not a haunting nightmare, to Filipinos disenfranchised by gnawing poverty.
There is a nagging question that swings in the pendulum of general apathy and neglect of the commonweal through faulty governance that drives millions of Filipino college graduates, young and old, to slave themselves as gravediggers, gardeners, drivers, bodyguards, “yaya”, housekeepers, servants or chambermaids to seek their employers and masters in foreign lands so that they can earn a decent livelihood and support a dying economy: What can one expect if the country is economically non-productive and barren because it is run by who-cares [?] kind of administrators, inexperienced and corrupt power-hungry opportunists?
The world sees popular actors and actresses whose Hollywood-styled careers in the cinema is deeply embroiled in politics [power-grabbers and headline-huggers], literally seductive bundles of pulchritude that charmed the crazed movie-going public into voting their screen, radio and television idols to elective public offices, including clowns and court-jesters from the entertainment world; include scions of incompetent and corrupt political dynasties that ruled the land for so long but knew nothing about the affairs of the state except in mastering their abominable expertise in the art of poking a finger in the cookie jar … out of this ridiculous if not tragic scenario, what in heavens name would the general public expect to come out of it to secure the future of the country?
There are talented and accomplished leaders from the entertainment industry that when elected to public office turned out to be great statesmen. The product of Hollywood, the United States’ President Ronald Reagan is just one of them. But unlike in the Philippines, Reagan does not have a spouse like Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s husband who advises her how to run the Philippine Government and in the process grease money passes under the table while what’s in the national treasury mysteriously disappears like how the audience sees it and sees it not in David Copperfield’s magic.
In the Philippines, the name of the First Gentleman of the Land is Jose Miguel “Mike” Arroyo -- a name that to millions of Filipinos connotes a stigma of massive corruption in government. The latest corruption he was reportedly involved in was that notorious $330 million kickback from the government award of online communication contract to ZTE telecom corporation of China.
Neither does the United States have the likes of a Joseph Estrada as president surrounded by a coterie of tong collectors advising him how to run the government and plunder the land if the reportedly corrupt Sandiganbayan itself is to be trusted in finding the former movie idol president guilty as charged.
Millions across the land believe that slugger Manny Paquiao will make a good president to replace Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo because boxing had made him an instant millionaire – meaning, Paquiao’s proof of success in pugilism is unfortunately mistaken as proof of being a great star in the predatory Philippine politics as well.
On November 14, 2009, Paquiao won his “seventh world boxing title in seven weight divisions, a feat no other boxer has achieved in the history of the sport”. Based on this extraordinary achievement in boxing, the “bakya” crowd that elects presidents expects Paquiao to be the next president of the Philippines! Elected Philippine leaders, particularly those in Congress, are political boxers anyway that do nothing except deliver punching speeches against each other. How about that for a rationale fait accompli in Philippine politics?
If Filipinos have to march again in EDSA [and I am sure any day they will march down this politicized avenue to change the government without the benefit of holding an election], there would be no doubt that “people power” in the streets -- dangerous to the stability of the region, according to former Premier Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore -- would make Manny the next president of the beleaguered republic.
If not taken seriously, this latest development is so comical to watch. It is all right for Paquiao to be an EDSA-installed president next to Arroyo so long as he is not surrounded by presidential advisers the likes of Miguel “Mike” Arroyo that in comparison would put the monstrosity of the present and previous presidents’ corruptions to shame.
There is nothing unpatriotic for Filipinos to speak out the disturbing truth of this Philippine political zarzuela that punishes the nation to penury because of massive corruption exemplified by the national leadership as a way of life. There is also nothing personal when Filipino whistleblowers need to come out of their turtle shell to talk about the painful realities within their territorial domain rather than just leave the task of blowing the whistle to outside journalists. As you can see, our butt is still exposed to ridicule when to cover up we stoop down or bend over to bury our head under the sand like what bashful and reclusive ostriches do.
This crazy thought that Filipinos should hide this national embarrassment from the eyes of the world by burying their heads under the sand because it is foolishly deemed an act of treason to talk about it is just as silly if not downright stupid as when Don Quixote jousts the windmill because the contraption is a delusional perception of a charging enemy of the state and society.
Flood of corruption, massive destruction and death by drowning when the typhoons come are symptomatic of a bigger and deeper problem the present generation of Filipinos is condemned to bear for life if not destined to be martyrs of the folly of the time much longer than a lifetime.
Suffice it to say, that so much distortion in politics that had become predatory, as well as skewed moral values ranging from corruption to wanton abuse, indifference, apathy towards the commonweal and incompetence in running the government plagued the country. It is reminiscent of Sodom and Gomorrah of which to save the gentiles or the innocent the Lord stands helpless on what to do other than decide to destroy and cleanse.
Young and new national leadership may come from military boot camps – that is if in a violent upheaval, like the proverbial Phoenix it is not destined to rise from the ashes. #

© Copyright Edwin A. Sumcad. Access PAR November 30, 2009.

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Memo On Philippine Typhoons:
What To Do And Not To Do

[Epilogue to stories of the storms in the Philippines
previously written in this column. Ed]

The EDSA brand of national leadership is a Rip Van Winkle of the 21st century still snoring in the slumber of uselessness and ineptitude in so far as facing the problem of hurricane and flood in the country is concerned.
It is sad to know that the past and present Philippine EDSA governments installed by street mobs are incapable of doing anything to divert or stop the storm from battering the country year in and year out even though this causes numerous death and massive destructions – a national tragedy of mind-boggling proportion millions of observers believed is worsened by total indifference, corruption, incompetence and criminal neglect.
After more than twenty years of languor, lack of concern or apathy since former President Ferdinand E. Marcos had put in the drawing board the first attempt to stop the storm in the Pacific Ocean before it hits the Philippines, the Rip Van Winkle EDSA-government has to wake up, pause for corruption, think and do something fast before a hurricane-caused inundation would eventually submerge the island republic in the bottom of the sea so to speak.
This unbelievable irresponsibility in governance is too extended a tedium to harp on time and time again … the needed attention of the political leadership and the necessary action to prevent typhoon and flood devastation and death by drowning have been too long overdue.
In a layman’s term, stopping the storm or altering the path of the hurricane is commonly called in one of the reference climate reports simply as a “hurricane-modification project”. It is not that kind of sci-fi space odyssey discovery or lightning and thunderbolt story seen in James Bond like movies that drop jaws from the shocked audience … it is just a method of how to conduct an atmospheric control of a brewing storm from where it has developed and progressed into a powerful hurricane -- a scientific strategy that has been tried and made successful by weather scientists, more particularly by those nascent climate specialists known as “riders of the storms” in the United States.
How does the storm develop into a deadly tempest is no longer a guarded secret in the files of modern scientific discoveries. Documented findings [1] are released worldwide. They are vital to understanding how storms are formed, especially important to countries situated in the path of deadly Pacific hurricanes, like the Philippines:
“As air warmed over the Atlantic [Pacific in the case of the Philippines] surges up to meet the cool atmosphere, its heat turns into kinetic energy, creating a violent twist of wind and rain. The bigger the temperature difference between the hot sea and the cold upper air, the more furious the storm can grow.”
It is with this important knowledge on how a storm develops that it can be “killed”, weakened or diverted away from it’s destructive path.
Weather scientists “attack big hurricanes from above or below, sapping the storms’ strength by either heating up their chilly tops or chilling their hot underbellies. [W]ell-timed interventions could diminish a hurricane by 40 percent – enough to turn a possible Category 5 storm into a mere Category 2 or 3, which would break windows and wreck trailer parks but leave most buildings intact.”
Microscopic bits of salt are seeded under the hurricane’s “lower reaches”. Water vapor would turn into droplets “too small to fall to Earth’s surface as rain.” When this evaporates, it cools down the hot air, dissipating its kinetic energy that creates a violent twist of wind and rain, thus weakening and diverting if not “killing” the storm right from its inception.
To divert the storm, the top of the hurricane is “painted black” by dispersing “tons of a special kind of soot as high as 50,000 feet …” and the storm would disperse outward messing up its course. Salt particles are also hovered up by the storm’s churn thus
affecting its path.
Silver iodide increases rainfall when seeded in the clouds. In extremely cold condition, airport fogs are seeded to turn them into particles of snow as they fall to the ground. To nudge the storm, seeded rain is “reinforced and magnified by the storm’s own internal dynamics” as it veers away or changes direction.
Ironically, in the United States, this caused several lawsuits. Politics raises hell if hurricanes are diverted to spare states on the path and others are thrown into the middle of it.
It has been reported that the weather may be good to somebody when it is bad to someone else. Fruit growers in Pennsylvania seeded the clouds “to suppress hail over their orchards”. In nearby states, farmers adversely affected went to court. The court ruled that “Stealing clouds could be legally analogous to diverting stream.”
Fidel Castro condemned the United States’ Project Stormfury “using hurricanes as a counterrevolutionary instrument of war.”

The Philippines Had Such A
Plan Of Riding The Storm

I was in the UN when a grandiose plan to stop the coming of the storms to the Philippines was part of former President Ferdinand Marcos’ 20-year development blueprint approved and supported by the IMF and the World Bank.
The Marcos long-term development program was hatched to make the Philippines the West’s economic star in the Far East that would compete with Japan. The first nuclear power plant in that part of the world was located in Bataan, Philippines. It was put in place to jumpstart the rapid development of this once internationally envied nation in the Far East. Southeast Asia is a region of great potential that recently became the theater of political rivalry and economic competition among the Western Superpowers including Japan and China.
Scientific studies outlined the procedure on how to at least divert the path of the storm in such a way that it would not directly hit the Philippines, and would therefore spare lives and avoid a tremendous loss of the nation’s resources that slows growth in the region. It needed a great amount of funding. To get an idea how prohibitive the cost is, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers estimated “$2.5 billion to buttress New Orleans against the next Katrina-level storm.”
The Philippines would probably need more if the budget would include kickbacks. International intervention was therefore sought for technical assistance and help of donor countries to make it as a “UN-assisted project of RP” [Republic of the Philippines] as how it appeared as an important item in the conference agenda of the UN Working Group that I have participated as Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific [UNESCAP].
In the UN, donor countries from all over the world discussed the technical assistance and funding of this Philippine weather project. Japan was one of the listed donors. Southeast Asian countries lying behind the Philippines facing the path of the storms coming from the heated Pacific oceanic stratosphere supported the plan so long as the weather engineering project would not let them catch the worse gust of wind or runaway squall.
Unfortunately, the Japanese delegation later on opted out of the project. Through the recommendation of Japanese scientists Tokyo reasoned out that Japan would be imperiled by the storm if its origin and development in the Pacific close to Japan is disturbed or altered.
Japan has always been not only a great patron but also a very generous donor of several UN and UNDP-sponsored development projects. But in a rather strange way to me, Japan, in my opinion, was well-respected by our peers in the UN circuit because of the dollar sign they visibly read in the forehead of Japanese delegates when we discussed global aid and technical assistance to countries that need them. Shortly thereafter, Japanese delegates did not only withdraw from the project but fought against it.
For the Philippines, it is a matter of survival to continue fighting for this project. Diplomacy is one of the powerful tools that can be used to gain a UN consensus to push it through. I know because I was there. But diplomats change chairs in the UN when they have to leave at the end of their tour of duty for new assignments elsewhere.
Diplomats are the same everywhere … which simply means that they have different and differing ways of dealing with diplomacy. Also much of it depends on the nature and purpose of their assignment by the home government. The administration changed when EDSA street “revolutionaries” took over the government.
Diplomacy is actually war fought in the international battlefield. As a diplomat, I cannot duplicate any of my peers in the UN, nor can I be duplicated after I retired shortly thereafter to a peaceful life.
For me, it is better to fight the storms somewhere in the middle of the ocean than to fight them at home when horrifying death tolls and massive devastations indicate that the country has no chance of winning the fight … a battle where losing to typhoons and flood is not only certain but eternal.
Today I feel sorry to say that the EDSA national leadership is not only bereft of any initiative to pursue this internationally known hurricane modification project but in fact despised it because it came from Marcos’ brain, the “dictator” they hated more than the Jews hated Hitler.
Politicians who run their EDSA kind of government in the Philippines, and to whom the riches of the nation are up for grabs, would rather hate Marcos’ legacy forever than abate the storm. To them an outburst of gale and thunderstorm or cyclone that levels to the ground anything standing and with the rising flood waters sends people to their watery grave is kinder than the thought of anything associated with Marcos.
In short, the country can go to hell if to hate the former dictator is easier to buy or cheaper a price to pay to entomb him in eternal damnation!
I hate to say this but I must write it down nevertheless: A pygmy mind sees the future through a tiny hole even much smaller than the head of a pin. That gives a clearer idea what pinheads mean.
It is indeed sad for me to articulate what I really wanted to say … that as a result of this infamy in national leadership, to appease the demons of typhoons and flood, the poor are sacrificed by drowning, in the altar of criminal neglect and apathy. #

© Copyright Edwin A. Sumcad. Access PAR December 21, 2009.

End Of The World 'Economic Crush' – Conjurers’ Greatest Baloney!

2009-04-02T14:18:00.000-07:00

by Ed Sumcad
NWS Columnist

Economic collapse, a science fiction I nominate for the next Academy Award!

It is probably only from this author in the study of monetary economics that you will read this exceptional contrary opinion ever written down in any website! No such opposing opinion is ever written either because of lack of knowledge or just due to fear of contradiction in the free market of ideas.

I listened to the whining desperation of “The Money Masters - How International Bankers Gained Control of America ” that predicted America ’s “economic crush”. The conjurers of doom are so powerfully controlling in their presentation and argument that it could force frightened ordinary Americans to flee to Timbuktu before the anticipated “crush” would turn this greatest nation on the planet into an economic graveyard!

The opening attack was against the Federal Reserve [Fed]. It made a bold statement that the nation’s national bank is NOT Federal; that it is a “private” bank! It claims that in this private bank, THERE IS NO RESERVE! It is a callous lie in both instances. The Fed is the Federal Government AND private banks operating as a government, not a private, entity! The contrary can only be told to and believed by the ignorant that because of revolt against excessive politics and too much politicking proliferate across the country.

The first thing I noticed in the google.com/video of this group of economic conjurers with a clandestine agenda was this glaring contradiction in their thesis of economic doom. You will see in the said video presentation that the revolutionary colonies would not have won the revolution had it not printed paper money to finance the revolutionary struggle for independence. It was called "colonial script" with hardly any equivalent reserve. They did what the Bank of England did, and like what the Federal Reserve had done -- exercise the power that the people had delegated through Congress to print paper money to spend for development and progress, the result of which made this nation the greatest on the planet! Borrowing is not like Medusa's head that turn everyone to stone! In this regard, only ignorant Federal Reserve hate junkies jump into an empty swimming pool of adverse conclusions heads down first.

Is there a downside to this exercise of power to print money to build the great railways and the incomparable U.S. highways that linked all states in the country, to construct our tallest skyscrapers and to create our multibillion-dollar institutional infrastructures, etc. for the good of the commonweal thus creating what this nation looks like today? Of course there is always a downside, part of the material and social capital costs -- every exercise of power has. But the Fed also administers relief as a result of unavoidable foul-ups. Besides, take note of the fact that corruption thrives in honesty, just as in corruption there can be also an exceptional honesty to corrupt and be corrupt.

Complaints of people at the edge of their wit are louder in the outback. When the economy is sick, the remedial pill the Fed prescribes is always bitter to swallow. But we must live in the real world, not in the world of the Wizard of Oz. Those who live there are those visionary attackers of modern economics who have not even gone to school to learn what the law of supply and demand mean.

One know-it-all libertarian critic from the Midwest hinterland who obviously had too much of Ron Paul under his skin, wrote his Congressman to amend the law of supply and demand! This faux pas howler is beyond redemption!

Here’s the lighthouse to look up to for guidance, to those who navigate the murky waters of ignorance before jumping into an empty swimming pool of misleading conclusion and misled belief head first: First thing to consider is, too much printing of money is too much if it is indeed too much and that is when it is beyond what is necessary. But who has the expertise to decide when is it too much, or what is the right amount that is needed?

Don’t say that it is the complaining taxi driver or the angry gravedigger who suddenly turned themselves into monetary experts. At the wink of an eye, their conjurers claim they are the righteous little ones the public should believe when they say that the sky is falling! Understandably that’s because they are the ones who get hurt first. Against this, the founders of this great nation and the wise men that came after them thought it was the Fed that has such expertise. Our illustrious forebears expressed their wisdom through the act of Congress when they created the Federal Reserve in 1913.

To the ignorant, the second important point to consider is that – and this is the most critical point to understand -- the Fed is made up of bankers AND the Federal Government. It is the people’s government acting through the President they elect, and Congress representing them that became the Fed itself by the act of the Legislature.

THE FED IS NOT A PROPERTY OF PRIVATE BANKERS as most economic hillbillies were tragically conjured to believe it is!!!

And here is the comic irony creating this tragic belief that the Fed is a private bank: In politics when a doctor of medicine who acts as a know-it-all economic pundit tells us that we are doomed if we do not revolt against the government for allowing private bankers [the Fed] to run our lives, only politically sick junkies would rush down the basement armory for handguns and assault weapons ready to shoot.

Notice a bunch of extreme revolutionary libertarians that the public mostly read in Freedomphoenix.com who are aggressive exponents of this winless campaign [they call it their own “Revolution”] against anything federal that stands between them and a society without any existing governmental authority to govern.

I am not inventing anything here. This is just citing some incredible facts about the revolt of pea-brain Winnie-the-Pooh in Hundred Acre Wood. Citing these facts as a sprinkle of literature not to spite but to spice this editorial report does not mean that I intend to demean a popular honey-crazed cartoon character or put down a website [FP.com] that I have no power to change for what it is, especially when the owner proudly claims that it is his own property and he can do whatever he wants to do with it! The fact that many enticed writer-contributors complain about this authoritarian claim of media ownership that ignores public interest and because it is selfishly motivated it trumps free expression of ideas is of no moment. These strong advocates of Austrian economics that want income tax [IRS] and the Fed abolish because of this notoriously stupid argument that our forebears created these Federal agencies to rob the American people blind, come from the beat of the drums in the street where the little knowledge of ignorant activists becomes dangerous!

The danger to guard against this threat to national security is that anger, when limited to freedom of expression is permissible, but not when rage calls to arms, incites the desperate to kill or bomb buildings and send bloodied limbless innocent bystanders to ICUs fighting for dear life. That kind of “Revolution” in the name of freedom of expression is to me a crime punishable by hanging which in comparison lethal injection is an act of mercy.

The third most important point to accept as an unimpeachable reality is that Federal Reserve policies are formulated by the American people themselves acting through Congress, and through the President they elected to office. Only the ignoramus who could no longer be helped from the quagmire of ignorance where they are wallowing now would say that it is the bankers only that decide to print money to satisfy their greed for wealth! It is “they” – the people [the Executive & Congress, acting through the Fed’s Board of Governors] not just the banker counterpart -- who decide to print money that is required to spend for national development.

By the way, it is not the “printing” of money that funded and won our historic multibillion-dollar wars that changed the world; we left the “colonial script” antiquity and embarked on the use of modern credit ingenuity, paid for our mind-boggling size of development expenditures to reach the outer space and put us on the right track of unimaginable progress where we are now compared to where we were hundred years ago … it is the expansion of modern and well developed credit system we have created and used at our own disposal that should have turned on the light for the ignorant in revolt still living in the dark ages! It is this advantage so unique in our system that we live in our modern daily lives in this millennium that now makes us lead the global economy.

Make no mistake about it. Had we have been too shy to spend beyond the combined worth of all the Gold and Silver that we have had in reserve in our bank vaults including those deposited in Fort Knox – as the ignorant argument mostly propounded by Federal “rebels” would like to blind the people with such incredible lie -- we would not have built our mega billion dollar railroads and national highways by now that tremendously expanded commerce by leaps and bounds, constructed our space program for landing in the Moon and beyond, as well as developed our defense weaponry second to none, making us the richest and the most powerful nation on the planet! This is a repeat worth restating again and again to penetrate the thick skull of ignorance and cynicism that are now dangerously leading us down the road to perdition.

We all have our gripes against the Federal Government. The bureaucracy that we are all encumbered upon is no secret to anyone, just to cite an example. Government officials that cut corners to feather their nest, is another ground for endless protests, and so are power-drunk agents of law who act like Idi Amin Dada of Uganda using the truncheon to suppress our individual liberties.

But the point I am trying to drive home here is not for penny-ante thinkers that attack the Federal Government to promote a political agenda against any rational economic deficit spending viewed not as a positive budgetary exercise but only as a negative misadventure in economics. You have to go to advance schools of economics to know that the shade of this controversial issue is gray – not absolutely pit black as the economic conjurers in the video are so obsessed about in spreading their prophesy of doom.

Let it sinks without an iota of doubt that the Fed performs a “governmental function”, not a “private” function which the angry libertarian gravediggers were coached to believe out of empathy because the conjurers thought they are the most economically disadvantaged lot in our society whose complaints heavens would hear and act to save them. The socially disadvantaged would easily pick up the hammer and sickle and rush down the street for a Bastille-like revolt. Such plot to mislead millions of less sophisticated members of our free society for whatever purpose it intends to achieve is not just a waste of time and energy but also dangerous! If as a nation we have to disintegrate by adopting President Obama’s destructive left-leaning ideology for a change in extremis, it should be for a reason and a way better than a folly like this.

The fourth question to ask [and there is a built-in answer to it] is: Since these monies printed wantonly are extravagant “borrowing”, to quantify how much is the resulting debt owed is definitely mind-boggling. Why? It is because the national debt owed is translated into a staggering amount of wealth that made this nation the greatest, the wealthiest and the mightiest on the planet!

If you are staggered by the enormous size of the wealth and power of this nation that built up throughout the years, so should you be by the debt it owes that made it what it is today! It is our system of progress we alone could congregate about as time passes by, marshal and muster it no other people of the world can. It is a dirty lie – a despicable dishonesty, to be polite about it -- for vain politicians to show the American people one side of the coin and blind them of the other side of the coin then for political and now ideological expediency. One-sided radical Liberals and Socialists led by Obama now in power caught up by revolutionary Libertarians are on this warpath of deception.

The fifth element to consider in this elementary analysis may surprise everyone: The cynical revolutionary would do a mathematical calculation to present a scenario of catastrophic fate that supposedly awaits this nation, i.e., the generations to come would be required to pay for that mind-blowing size of existing I.O.Us. That is not true and that will never happen, except in one’s unschooled imagination.

Let’s talk about reality out of the figment of a horrifying imagination in the bayou. Today you and I were the future generations of debt-fear-mongers about a century ago who opposed the building of America that required a massive spending and since there was not enough money on hand then it therefore needed a gargantuan amount of “borrowing” for future generations to pay.

Let’s hear again this broken record played throughout the ages: The giant projects of constructing highways and freeways that connected America from state to state resulting in an unprecedented national economic growth never imagined before were supposed to “burden” this present 2009 generation when viewed from the past. Did your life and mine become worse today because it was supposed to have been “burdened” by “debts” [the “borrowed” cost of development some years back], compared to life we now live today? Is it not true that when we look back a century ago our present modern transportation infrastructure today was just a wayward imagination to those who were campaigning against deficit spending?

On the contrary, did life not even become better now than it was then? We have “overspent” – borrowed then with sky was the limit] only with a government guarantee [just what the word of the Government is worth] – far beyond whatever Silver and Gold we held in the vault, and made it to where we are now. C’mon, let’s be realistic and admit it! This weird financial whining we hear today is but a spending rebellion with a cause, but not quite, as what it is pictured to be!

Sixth, here’s a reality check with a shocking neutralizing effect: Our gargantuan debts will just continue to increase and will just remain I.O.Us. as the years go by, for as long as the United States of America continues to grow. The opportunity to grow is limitless … in Genesis, it ends at Alpha X [the beginning of infinity]. Why? It is because those I.O.Us. are commonly viewed in the distant time at the wrong end of the telescope. The meaning of growing I.O.Us can only be viewed positively by those who understand what these are to the growing power of America. But these are also weapons political opportunists are using to intimidate people to vote them to office. Terror and their minions -- enemies within who are accomplices -- use I.O.Us as poison, some kind of economic nuclear devices they can explode as the launching of another 911 had become more difficult under former President George W. Bush's watch. The truth of the matter is that those I.O.Us are the material and social cost that approximate the total VALUE of a transformed United States of America – the approximate worth [assests] of this wealthiest, mightiest and the greatest nation ever seen on the planet at any given time!

Seventh, there will be no collapse of the national economy that toothless tigers pictured worse than that of the 1920s. That's fantasy in a science fiction story that I nominate to win next year's Academy Award! #

© Copyright Edwin A. Sumcad. Access NWS March 26, 2009.

The writer is an award-winning journalist. Go to NWS homepage, click on the columnist button to know more about the author or you may e-mail your comment at ed.superx722@yahoo.com.sg .

Immigration Bullyrag

2009-02-15T02:16:00.000-08:00

Statue Of Liberty: This is a nation of immigrants.

by Edwin A. Sumcad
February 15, 2009

I owe it to Felimar Blanco, a website master in his own right, for sending over this anti-immigration video for my comment.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7WJeqxuOfQ

You may find my view on this matter quite different if not rare. What is seen in the video is misleading. Control of fertility rate, re, replacement growth was applied on the pre-immigration population [the green graph] but not on the additional population through immigration [the red graph placed on top of the green graph] which shows a camouflaged bias.

Statistical manipulation of this kind cannot escape the notice of one who was once a statistician in the RP bureau of census many years ago. Statistics never lies, unless you put something into it to make it lie.

The presentation was based on the wrong premise that America’s immigration policy aims at helping the underdeveloped world lessen their population explosion problem! Pebbles in the glass jar have no relevance at all as to why this country attracts different peoples from all parts of the world.

The presenter forgot what the meaning of the Statue of Liberty is – we are welcoming people of the world that seek freedom -- it is not about helping countries where they come from get rid of or lessen their overcrowding population!

This is a huge fundamental error in the understanding of the objectives and goals of the U.S. Immigration policy. It is a subtle distortion of statistical results out of a skillful manipulation of data indicating that immigration is being politicized.

The Republicans can never win on this immigration issue since they have reached the end of the rope. The nation is in total agreement that we have to guard our borders against illegal intrusions of aliens, and hardly is there any opposition to the need to establish a system to legalize undocumented immigrants. But it is a long and slow process. The Republicans were running out of patience in 2006. As a result, they lost control of Congress. Out of frustration, their ultimate solution was to criminalize some ten million undocumented immigrants in the country, and as criminals hunt them down like animals, arrest each one of them and gather them in a huge camp and deport them one by one – that is if they don’t shoot them dead in rage like ordinary criminals for resisting arrest.

The hunted will challenge authorities for their own survival and for the survival of their families and love ones … when authorities look down on them as criminals, deprive them of social legislations, i.e., without medical services for their children and families who will spread diseases in the community; without benefit of education that would turn them and their offspring into social outcast, and eventually in control of the streets as hoodlums and criminals; starve them, etc.

The problem Rednecks have is that they cannot see any farther away to where their extended nose ends. The cost to carry out this de-immigration of America will make what we spend now for them look like a penny-ante in a high poker game. And this is not a game for sonar bats to play.

Why would that be even more costly? For one we have to build detention camps all over the country to house some ten million of them, and with attitudinal murder in mind, spend huge sum of taxpayers’ money like crazy hunting them down like animals, for policing and feeding them until they get deported, and the like.

We cannot cut corners on deportation due process … they have rights under the Constitution and that means years before a single deportation out of the ten million immigrants gets through the legal process – we de-Americanize America in the eyes of the world if we deprive them of their right. And to do it right means we have to amend our Constitution on judicial due process.

How much that would cost? Billions of dollars, amidst the funding of many battles in Congress for political leverage, and the cost of opportunity losses in passing critical legislations needed as a result of unwanted diversion that decapitate the time, energy and resources of the nation. The cost of this disabling collateral damage to the nation is beyond monetary estimation.

We have to create and maintain an Army against some ten million of them. It is a retarded speculation for anyone to assume that they will not go underground and declare their war against the government as a matter of survival.

Add to this dollar cost, deaths and/or casualties as a result of civil strife. How much would this underground civil war cost us? Billions over billions of dollars not to speak of destructions an underground rebellion is expected to create. In 1861–1865, the nation almost went bankrupt at the end of the Civil War with more six hundred thousand Americans dead. In dollar, the losses this nation sustained cannot be accounted for.

Al Qaeda will be looked down as a tamed group of Katzenjammer Kids in comparison that cause certain mischiefs. The cost of the destructions they create would just be a joke in size. Remember that these immigrants illegal or not, are now living here for some time, raised their families here, and there is no doubt at all that they love this country too, like all Americans do – they think it is their fatherland too, like you and I do, after living here over the years like any other immigrant, and if their wives and dependents they love, the children and families they care so much about are kicked in the ass in a manner that brings forth the painful memories of the Holocaust, it will be so stupid for anyone to think that they will not fight.

These realities of de-immigration does not justify burying our heads under the sand intentionally to give bent to our anger that an alien across the border is subverting our immigration laws. Several options are open to us in dealing with this problem without becoming a monster that we need not be or ought to be.

We cannot think like how Skinheads think, and act like what Supremacists do, putting this country to shame. They killed Joseph Ileto, a postal immigrant worker who supported his family in the hard struggle to one day realize their American Dream, to serve notice to the world that immigrants should stop coming to this country and “steal” their own jobs.

http://www.afroarticles.com/article-dashboard/Article/Immigrant-Hatred-Kills--The-Real-Problem----Ileto-Murdered-For-Taking--American--Jobs/189

No one condones any violation of our border laws or any transgression of our sovereignty. Anyone that walks the earth doing this kind of intrusion has to pay a high price. Yet that should not deter this nation from becoming humane in the treatment of immigrants, documented or not, nor should it be interpreted to mean that we are encouraging foreigners to enter into our territorial domain in willful violation of our immigration laws.

http://www.afroarticles.com/article-dashboard/myarticles/Edwin-A--Sumcad/212/Immigration/363

Speaking of social expenditures vis-à-vis illegal immigrants, right now, the cost of their being here, and the social ameliorations they received from the government, are almost equal [in some studies they take less than what they contribute to the economy] the benefits derived from the “underground economy” created as a result of their presence in the country. This will stop the moment they are hunted down as criminals. If this underground contribution to the economy is ten billion dollars to the State of California, then California will lose this bonanza and we have to put up this amount to maintain the economy at least in the same level at a certain time.

The video presenter was talking about the cost of immigration – nobody in the captive audience dared to ask him what would be the cost if we stop immigration and we all turn ourselves into mean-spirited Republicans who are going after them hammer and tong.

The presenter looks like he is a white descendant born to immigrants from Europe some hundreds years ago. He should have presented his video when his forebears were starting to “crowd” this country as immigrants many years ago. Then we would not have this “immigration problem” we have today as the presenter sees it.

The argument against the cost we carry on our shoulder for immigrants that came here legally or illegally is the most stupid selfish argument I have ever heard for the first time in a long time. This donor country spends billions of dollars “for charity” when it responds to deserving countries across the oceans year in and year out that are badly in need of “international aid” or “humanitarian aid”.

These local tightwads embarrass me when I hear them say with unconcealed pride that this benevolent nation is the richest and the mightiest on the planet! I want to slap the ignorance out of their system by telling them that misers did not make this country the wealthiest on the planet.

To deprive a baby born to immigrant undocumented or not of medical services in a downtown hospital and let the toddler die because we could no longer allegedly afford the cost, and yet proudly throw away billions and billions of our tax money for countries abroad in the name of charity, is not only inhuman but also a misguided thinking … a detestable hypocrisy.

I just said that the Republicans’ twisted mean-spiritedness cannot sway reasonable Americans on this critical immigration issue in their favor. Millions of immigrants in the country see the Liberals as their knights in shining armor. Die-hard Republicans are anti-government, whereas dye-in-the-wool Liberals and Democrats are for government, the exponents of welfare in this country for so long.

If I have to criticize the influx of immigrants in California, it is because it could lead to the demise of the two-party system. New comers to California take their oath of allegiance when naturalized as U.S. citizens. Eight out of ten register as Democrats. Exercising their right to vote will vote Liberals to office, and those who cannot vote will support the Democrats. It is from them where their welfare comes from.

I live in California to know this like I know the back of my palm. The number of my kind – conservative Americans loyal to established American values and traditions -- is a vanishing breed. Only scandals and abuses in extremis will make a Liberal candidate lose an election in California.

And to see California as the face of the nation, this is undeniably alarming. Soon there will only be a Liberal or Democratic Party. Liberals and Democrats will contest the election amongst themselves. The fundamental law on political party system is overwhelmed, and we go back to the fundamentals of reconstructing the Constitution and/or amending pertinent election laws to recreate a new political system in America.

In doing all these, we will have more cost to bear than just spending for our social capital infrastructures for this nation’s immigrants. But intolerant minds in agony are too limited to include this cost while they kick the bucket in their emotional nationwide protest.

But in so far as this anti-immigration video is concerned, it is just an old bullyrag. It exhibits a terrible amnesia of what America – the country of immigrants -- is all about. #

The writer is an award-winning journalist. Know more about the author by reading his published editorials and feature articles or you may e-mail your comment at ed.superx722@yahoo.com.sg

Part III. Economic Recovery By Hanging

2009-02-12T11:39:00.000-08:00

by Edwin Sumcad
Date: 02/10/09
Subject: Depression

Image Caption: Hang “war criminals”
for economic stimulus.

If we hang all “war criminals”, economic recovery will be easy and swift. But it is not the way you think it is.

First we must establish by what criteria are we to judge who those “war criminals” to hang are. Second we must determine what legal maxim are we to use to “investigate” the subject before hanging if found guilty.

The Obama administration is going after President George W. Bush for alleged “war crimes” committed whether or not it is real or even if imagined, but better if it is real. He stands accused as a “war criminal” after allegedly committing “crimes against humanity”.

Since thousands of soldiers who obeyed the orders of their Commander-In-Chief are the ones who committed those “war crimes” for Bush, they fall under the category of “war criminals” if we use the mandate of law Obama’s legal hatchet men rely on.

Our former still living presidents have been accused of “war crimes” and “genocide”, and they too may be “investigated” as “war criminals” no different from Bush if such is the case.

The legal maxim adhered to in this investigation campaign is that anyone who violates the law must be prosecuted and if found guilty must be punished to the fullest extent of the law.

This applies to “war crimes”. Since war crimes are high crimes, the punishment “to the fullest extent of the law”, is hanging by the neck until dead [Ref Saddam Hussein, War Crime II].

All of these are discussed in details in War Crime I [read also War Crime II at FP. com’s homepage banner stories]. Let’s identify all of these merely as Ref for brevity. http://www.freedomsphoenix.com/Feature-Article.htm?InfoNo=045432 http://www.freedomsphoenix.com/Feature-Article.htm?InfoNo=045435

In the above-stated Ref you read, the number of “war criminals” to hang if found guilty is huge. They include members of Congress and the military as “Bush’s accomplices” [Ref]. Since death by hanging is massive, the rope manufacturing industry and the funeral homes and funeral services industries are greatly benefited.

Recorded highest number of U.S. troops in Iraq during the Surge was162,000. The shipment value of hanging ropes needed would rise by about .02% -- $8.1 million by rounding the figure.

Funeral homes and funeral services have an annual total receipt of $10.0 billion. This will increase to $11.62 billion.

But the economics of dying nationwide is estimated worth the staggering amount of $641.62 billion per annum after adding those to die by hanging. A total of 264,633 jobs were created.

All the above job and dollar figures of the industries cited were collated from the results of the national 2002 economic census.

Assume that Obama needs Congress to approve a $850.0 billion bailout package for economic recovery. The combined total amounts of money created in rope manufacturing, funeral homes and funeral services industries alone if we hang “war criminals” that the Obama-Pelosi Dobermans in Congress had so far identified, 75.5% of the financial infusion needed is already fully subscribed.

One of the fastest means for economic recovery is by hanging. The campaign to investigate Bush for “war crimes” is not just what anyone thinks it is! #

The writer is an award-winning journalist. Know more about the author by reading his published editorials and feature articles or you may e-mail your comment to ed.superx722@yahoo.com.sg

---------------

This also appears in Freedomsphoenix.com:
Part III. Hanging For Economic Recovery
by Edwin Sumcad
02/10/09
http://www.freedomsphoenix.com/Feature-Article.htm?InfoNo=045453

II. War Criminals To Hang: The Choking Cerries

2009-02-12T07:47:00.000-08:00

by Edwin Sumcad
Date: 02/10/09
Subject: Death by hanging.
Image caption: The rope around the
neck of many war criminals to hang.

It cannot be denied that the hunt for “war criminals” is vastly rich of preys to go after. It is not an “anemic” hunting game with only Bush in the rifle sight to shoot at and bring home to adorn the wall as a prize trophy.

Hundreds of thousands of intelligence and homeland security officers and soldiers obeyed their Commander-In-Chief’s orders to commit “war crimes”. To me there was no doubt that those guys in uniform were patriots; they put their lives on the line, enough to make cynics realize that they are ready to die for the fatherland, but to Obama-Pelosi Bush hunters and based on the legal philosophy they publicly announced in print and on television shows – those “willing participants” actually committing Bush’s “crime against humanity” must be prosecuted and if found guilty must be punished to the fullest extent of the law.

Many Americans have their tongues hanging out in total disbelief as to why in this time of financial scarcity and economic hardship one of the Obama administration’s priorities in uncontrollable spending spree is for the creation of armed militia in black and detention camps across the country. These are to be used in times of “emergency”.

Think of members of the U.S. Armed Forces, homeland security officers, agents of FBI, CIA and covert search-and-destroy commandos with no names, that one way or another, are going to be hunted down as Bush’s conspirators in committing these abominable “crimes against humanity”. Indeed, we have a horrifying “national emergency” if they are to confront Obama’s fully armed peacekeepers eyeball-to-eyeball. Those who blink first are going to be casualties of this civil war that looms darkly in the horizon.

But I bet that our still living presidents may not cause trouble to this administration’s covert law enforcers. These living presidents had also led wars and accused of “war crimes” and “genocide”, but I think being old now they would just go voluntarily and peacefully straight to any nearby detention camp lead by Obama himself who will also be “investigated” as active participants and conspirators for the alleged commission of “war crimes”, and when tried and found guilty hanged by the neck until dead.

And if this is to become the main preoccupation of the day under the Obama administration, the rope and lariat industry will perhaps be the only businesses that will experience “an economic boom” in the midst of today’s 1920s gloom and doom.

For, indeed, there will be pervasive multiple hangings in all parts of the country. The demand for a hangman’s noose made of abaca rope and synthetic threads or materials will create a nationwide Keynesian aggregate demand that would arrest the economic downturn and trigger the much needed recovery.

Is this a pundit’s joke? Not at all if there are those who believe that the rope economic incentive is a much better alternative to this on-going trillion-dollar robbery where the people’s tax money goes to the pockets of criminals who committed egregious “economic crimes”. Their necks actually more than deserved the hangman’s rope.

But here comes the “kill joy”. In the House hearing committee, CIA director nominee Leon Panetta assured Congress that no intelligence officer would be prosecuted for “war crimes”. Only the heads of those who “ordered the war crime” are in the chopping block. They are only after Bush, the top dog of “war crimes”.

And that was the first remarkable message of Obama’s CIA director-to-be to terrorists in behalf of his administration. Under this new liberal-socialist regime, the Panetta doctrine of political hot pursuit aptly called “Panattasm” means the Obama administration is only after Osama bin Laden, the head of terrorism, not those cutthroat assassins under his leadership command who did the criminal act of mass murder and wanton destruction, just as they are only after Bush, not those who committed the crime under his order as Commander-In-Chief.

This latest development in the political front forced me once again to climb the belfry to ring the bell of alarm: Every American must prepare for “dirty bombs” that could blow up Los Angeles or New York to kingdom come. For, under the Obama regime, “Panettasm” sees to it that terrorists are legally free to do their worst. If arrested, they would not even be prosecuted.

Panetta had already announced this assurance in Congress to all and sundry. He spilled the beans of what lurks behind the campaign to get Bush. In effect this legal excuse behind the “hang-Bush” campaign applies to the “get-Osama-bin-Laden” campaign… they are only after Osama bin Laden who orders the carnage those Islamic assassins and terror hirelings commit. It may sound sickening, but that’s the mentality of the power that governs.

How about this sing-along legality that those caught violating the law must be prosecuted a.k.a. persecuted to the fullest extent of the law? Well, they spit out the exception when they swallow hook and sinker what they said about the dictate of the law as a reason to tenaciously pursue the investigation of those who commit “war crimes.”

The other day, I had this one of the most terrifying scares of my life. I watched a 3-year old baby swallow a mouthful of cherries with all the seeds that almost choked the little toddler to death.

What came back to me in split seconds was that vivid picture of Saddam Hussein … turning blue and breathless while hanging and struggling at the end of the rope like a hooked fish in dry land.

Luckily, after less than a minute or so of contorted bodily struggle which seemed to have lasted longer than eternity, the baby discharged the choking seeds out of his mouth. I couldn’t forget this incredible smile of relief as if he was saying to everybody that what he had coughed out was the exception to what he had scooped into his mouth that could not and should not be swallowed for the sake of survival.

Dying of asphyxiation by choking is, like hanging by the neck at the end of the rope, not only painful but also in the eyes of God, a disgraceful way of ending life. Judas hanged himself in a nearby tree. The stigma of betrayal and treachery is never looked at with favor even in the afterlife.

Obama’s legal centurions who do not leave any single stone unturned in their quest for a presidential investigation to hang President Bush swallowed hook and sinker the mandate of the law that anyone – anybody regardless who that might be -- violating the law must be prosecuted to the fullest. But they are spitting out the legal exception: At least CIA agents that actually committed “war crimes” for Bush, will not be prosecuted.

The Obama cult in power has introduced a new legalese I just described – “Panettasm”. This emerging mentality in legalism may be difficult for the layman to understand but it is there ready to be used to political advantage. To the eyes of rabid followers now known as “Obamaniacs”, the new pro-people liberal-socialist government must always appear politically correct. That would induce smiles in the faces of those who voted for Obama in the last presidential election that are getting trite, corny and sour as the days roll by.

This roaring segment of the American public waving a sea of flaglets for change in front of TV cameras loves Panetta as the cry baby who choked up with cherries.

As CIA Director [only to become the CIA Director at this writing], Panetta will survive any character assassination attempt within Obama’s treacherous mutual admiration club the moment the political sailing turns from calm to rough while his boss – Obama himself – hangs with the rest of the presidents who were all in pari delicto in committing “war crimes”.

For the final ingredient to this menu of absurdities I just broiled to feed those joining this presidential hanging expedition, I would like to add a spice of immortality borrowed from John Wayne’s cliché -- war is tough, but it is a lot tougher to those who are deliberately stupid. #

The writer is an award-winning journalist. Know more about the author by reading his published editorials and feature articles or you may e-mail your comment to ed.superx722@yahoo.com.sg

--------------------

Also published in Freedomphoenix.com
II. War Criminals To Hang: The Choking Cherries
by Edwin Sumcad
02/10/09
with inside title II. War Criminals To Hang: Panetta Assures Underlings Committing War Crimes Cannot Be Prosecuted, at http://www.freedomsphoenix.com/Feature-Article.htm?InfoNo=045435

Part I. War Criminals To Hang: Those Hunting Them Fry On Their Own Lard

2009-02-12T07:05:00.000-08:00

by Edwin Sumcad
Date: 02/10/09
Subject: Criminal Justice System

Image: The end of the rope.

They have committed “war crimes” according to Obama’s legal hatchet men. The main target was former president George W. Bush. But based on the legal criterion they are using to identify what a war criminal is, the hunt goes beyond Bush.

The legal benchmark of pursuit has been publicly announced: Those accused of “war crime” or “genocide” must be investigated and if found guilty must be punished to the fullest extent of the law.

Based on that publicized legalese, “war criminals” to be investigated are identifiable. This may shock the public. There are 373 of them in Congress, plus six still living presidents of the United States which includes Bush and Obama himself.

The number explodes beyond one’s wildest imagination if those who committed “war crimes” by following the orders of their Commanders-In-Chief are included.

Under this classification of “war criminals” based on the new administration’s legal jargon [legal guideline], are those who actually committed the crime: Officers of our intelligence community, homeland security personnel and thousands of members of our U.S. Armed Forces that committed “war crimes” by order of their Commander-In-Chief.

This legal pursuit of “war criminals” to hang will fry Obama and his underlings in their own lard.

I repeat without fear of contradiction, that President Obama and Speaker Pelosi’s barking Dobermans in Congress that smelled blood and now want President Bush hanged as a “war criminal” may fry in the simmering oil they themselves boiled.

Let’s help them jump into their frying pan the most helpful way we can.

I would like to restate this action baseline for clarity: Their legal ding-a-ling is that those accused of committing “war crimes” must be persecuted – I mean prosecuted and if found guilty must be punished to the fullest extent of the law.

Since “war crimes” are high crimes punishable by death, the ultimate punishment is usually hanging by the neck until dead.

The “monster” in human clothing that recently had a terminal date with the hooded hangman fashionably dressed in black in celebration of death, was the infamous dictator of Iraq Saddam Hussein.

This war criminal head of state reached the end of the rope, and died immediately without a chance of growing his dreaded mustachio like Hitler’s, the Holocaust war criminal who took the law into his hand and ended it all.

Nose-leading blood-thirsty Dobermans in a Bush-hunting Safari in this manner, it is imperative that we must first call their attention to the fact that without this war on terror and the war in Iraq, there would be neither “war crimes” to speak of nor “crime against humanity” to level off against Bush in the first place.

Bush is currently hunted for allegedly committing “genocide” in Iraq. War crime hunters premised this rather obsessive belief that Bush is a “war criminal” on and because of what he did in Iraq [to America’s enemies that joined forces against U.S. in the Iraq war], and what he did to captured terrorists and those caught on the act, to protect Americans from Islamic terrorism – save us from enemies of the state who were surreptitiously conducting their clandestine operations right here in the homeland.

The alleged criminal acts -- real or imagined -- were speckled and wide-ranging, but the intensity of the charges narrows down to “waterboarding” or “torture”, which Obama’s hatchet men in black toga claim is a serious “crime against humanity”.

But this is what they forgot, or if not, are trying to ignore. Facts are facts nonetheless, and they need facts to carry in their luggage in this expedition to hunt down “war criminals” to hang.

There were 373 “war criminals” in Congress who were “Bush’s accomplices” if such is the case. We are presenting this proof to them in their own language. On October 10 and October 11, 2002, Congressmen and Senators voted for the “Resolution of Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq …” -- the power they gave to Bush to commit those alleged “war crimes” in Iraq.

296 co-conspirators in the House of Representatives and 77 co-conspirators in the Senate voted for what those who voted now call “misadventure” in Iraq, seeing to it that Bush commits the “war crimes” they have authorized him to commit.

We call upon those Senators and Congressmen as witnesses to fry in their own lard. We take as evidence their statements on record that the war powers they gave to Bush are “unconstitutional, felonious and treasonous”.

Most if not all of these “war criminals” are now in Obama’s Cabinet. Obama himself is an accomplice. He voted at least 11 times since 2003 to fund “Bush’s war” … the “war of mass murder, maiming and torture” as the put it without batting an eyelash.

As Bush’s war crime accomplices, they also voted several times for those several amendments of the Patriot Act that created the Military Tribunal to try terrorists, and on top of that conspiracy to commit “war crimes” they authorized by law the use of military Information Interrogation Technique [torture] to extract information from the captured enemy of the state to save millions of American lives that the discovered plots had targeted to wipe out.

It has been said that only a fool can fool a fool more than anyone else.

As it is illustrated in this editorial piece, the imagery is pithy and forceful, its headiness sharp and pungent: The fool who cut off the fellow’s head that lay asleep, and hid it, and then waited to see what this guy would say when he awaked and missed the head-piece, was right in the first thought, that a man would be surprised to find such an alteration in things since he fell asleep; but the head chopper was a little mistaken to imagine the man could awake at all after the head was cut off. [Tatler] #

The writer is an award-winning journalist. Know more about the author by reading his published editorials and feature articles or you may e-mail your comment to ed.superx722@yahoo.com.sg

------------------
Also appeared in Freedomphonenix.com:
Part I. Hunt War Criminals And Fry On Your Own Lard
Date: 02/10/09
by Edwin Sumcad
Subject: Criminal Justice System
http://www.freedomsphoenix.com/Feature-Article.htm?InfoNo=045432

Hanging By Public Acclamation: Are We To Hang All Our Presidents?

2009-02-12T06:53:00.000-08:00

C'mon,Baby, Hang
by Edwin Sumcad
Date: 02/08/09

I raise this question if we must hang our presidents after run-of-the-mill government stalkers in Congress pressured President Barack Hussein Obama to investigate Bush and VP Dick Cheney of the alleged “war crimes” they have committed while in office, and if found guilty, to be hanged by the neck.
My real concern is not on the political aspect of what appears to be a vengeful “witch hunt”. Politicians can fry on their own lard for all I care. But hundreds of thousands of our intelligence agents and homeland security officers nationwide not to include the entire U.S. Armed Forces, obeyed President Bush’s order as their Commander-In-Chief, and kept us alive to this day while the war on terror intensified. They willfully participated in this alleged “crime against humanity” to defeat terror and keep us alive.
Obama’s ax-wielders in black toga and Nancy Pelosi’s political Dobermans in Congress – by the way, one of the most ferocious of them all that smelled blood was Cong. John Conyers, Jr. of the House Judiciary Committee -- stand on the rock of this legal maxim they touted that those who violated the law must be persecuted ... I mean prosecuted and punished to the fullest extent of the law.
Does this mean then that those thousands of intelligence and homeland security officers and all the soldiers that participated in this alleged “war crimes”, must also be “investigated” and if found guilty must be hanged by the neck until dead?
The legal premise advocated in going after Bush -- the 43rd President of the United States -- is that he is accused of committing “crime against humanity”.
And this is where I am worried to death: We have fought so many wars. Winning them shaped our destiny. U.S. presidents – the Commanders-In-Chief, if you may – who led those wars have been accused of committing “war crimes” and “genocides” both by external enemies we have vanquished and by the enemy within who thinks that the Federal Government is actually Al Qaeda, and President Bush was actually Osama bin Laden in disguise behind the “Conspiracy Theory” who engineered the 9/11 infamy!
Does this also mean then that U.S. presidents who are still alive today, together with former presidents Bill Clinton, Jimmy Carter, Bush, Sr. and George W. Bush, must also be “investigated”, and if found guilty, must be hanged by the neck until dead?
If not, why not? Those who violate the law must be prosecuted and punished to the “fullest extent of the law”, isn’t it?.
Tell me if for the first time in history, we will see for the first time, the hanging of presidents under Obama’s socialist regime of change … a change, indeed [and please help us understand] I know not what and where, it is leading us to.
The best venue to tackle these disturbing questions, is Freedomsphoenix.com. This is one of the freest online publications in the Internet today! It is here where we get entertained and get educated at the same time even if bucket kickers resort to name-calling so long as we hear the cracking sound of the grinding ax, like the hanging by the neck, for entertainment purposes. #
© Copyright Edwin A. Sumcad. Access FP.com, February 8, 2009.
The writer is an award-winning journalist. Know more about the author by reading his published editorials and feature articles or you may e-mail your comment to ed.superx722@yahoo.com.sg.

---------------------------------------------------------------
Appeared in Freedomphoenix.com under the title “C’mon Baby Hang”
2/08/09 at http://www.freedomsphoenix.com/Feature-Article.htm?InfoNo=045295
with comments.
---------------------------------------------------------
Comment by: Lolo Send Email
Entered on: 2009-02-08 11:34:19
Upon review, the Author pointed out a typo error. The first line of the last paragraph you just read, should read: "The best venue to tackle these disturbing questions, is Freedomsphoenix.com." Comment by: Oyate Send Email
Entered on: 2009-02-08 12:03:25
------------
Has anyone actually made a case for hanging by public acclamation? Especially here? I mean, that sounds a little "democratic" for this crowd.
Comment by: Lolo Send Email
Entered on: 2009-02-11 07:14:16
------------
Oh, boy, you are right for this crowd … you are saying it smartly! Hope not too deep for this crowd.
Public Notice: In this Forum the materials you read may be harmful to adults…prohibited to10 years old and above, otherwise discretion of juvenile guardian ad litem 10 years old and below strongly recommended.

War Criminals: 373 Plus U.S. Presidents Still Alive Bush And Obama Himself Are To Hang

2009-02-12T06:19:00.000-08:00

Written by Ed Sumcad
by Ed Sumcad
NWS - Columnist

Obama will fry on his own lard if he orders this ill-advised Bush investigation of alleged "war crimes".

President Obama and Speaker Pelosi’s barking Dobermans in Congress that smelled blood and now want President Bush hanged as a “war criminal” may fry in their own lard.

Let’s help them jump into their frying pan the most helpful way we can: Their legal ding-a-ling is that those accused of committing “war crimes” must be persecuted – I mean prosecuted and if found guilty must be punished to the fullest extent of the law.

Since “war crimes” are high crimes punishable by death, the ultimate punishment is usually hanging by the neck until dead.

The “monster” in human clothing that recently had a terminal date with the hooded hangman fashionably dressed in black in celebration of death, was the infamous dictator of Iraq Saddam Hussein.

This war criminal head of state reached the end of the rope, and died immediately without a chance of growing his dreaded mustachio like Hitler’s, the Holocaust war criminal who took the law into his hand and ended it all.

Nose-leading blood-thirsty Dobermans in a Bush-hunting Safari in this manner, we must first call their attention to the fact that without this war on terror and the war in Iraq , there would be no “war crimes” against Bush to speak of in the first place.

Bush is currently hunted for allegedly committing “genocide” in Iraq . War crime hunters premised this rather obsessive belief that Bush is a “war criminal” on and because of what he did in Iraq [to America’s enemies in the Iraq war], and what he did to captured terrorists and those caught on the act, to protect Americans from Islamic terrorists who were surreptitiously conducting their clandestine operations right here in this land of the free.

The alleged criminal act narrows down to “waterboarding” or “torture”, which Obama’s hatchet men in black toga claim is a serious “crime against humanity”.

But this is what they forgot, or if not, are trying to ignore. Facts are facts nonetheless, and they need facts to carry in their luggage in this expedition to hunt down “war criminals” to hang.

There were 373 “war criminals” in Congress who were “Bush’s accomplices”. We are presenting this proof to them in their own language. On October 10 and October 11, 2002, Congressmen and Senators voted for the “Resolution of Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq…” -- the power they gave to Bush to commit those alleged “war crimes” in Iraq .

296 co-conspirators in the House of Representatives and 77 co-conspirators in the Senate voted for what those who voted now call “misadventure” in Iraq , seeing to it that Bush commits the “war crimes” they have authorized him to commit.

We call upon those Senators and Congressmen as witnesses to fry in their own lard. We take as evidence their statements on record that the war powers they gave to Bush are “unconstitutional, felonious and treasonous”.

Most if not all of these “war criminals” are now in Obama’s Cabinet. Obama himself is an accomplice. He voted at least 11 times since 2003 to fund “Bush’s war” … the “war of mass murder, maiming and torture.”

As Bush’s war crime accomplices, they also voted several times for several amendments of the Patriot Act that created the Military Tribunal to try terrorists, and on top of that conspiracy to commit “war crimes” they authorized by law the use of military Information Interrogation Technique [torture] to extract information from the captured enemy of the state to save millions of American lives that the discovered plots had targeted to wipe out.

The hunt for “war criminals” is vastly rich of preys to go after. It is not an “anemic” hunting game with only Bush in the rifle sight to shoot and bring home to adorn the wall as a prize trophy.

Hundreds of thousands of intelligence and homeland security officers and soldiers obeyed their Commander-In-Chief’s orders to commit “war crimes”. To me there was no doubt that they were patriots but to Obama-Pelosi Bush hunters – those were “willing participants” who actually committed Bush’s “crime against humanity”.

Many Americans have their tongues hanging out in bewilderment as to why in this time of financial scarcity and economic hardship one of the Obama administration’s priorities in uncontrollable spending spree is for the creation of armed militia in black and detention camps across the country. These are to be used in times of “emergency”.

Think of members of the U.S. Armed Forces, homeland security officers, agents of FBI, CIA and covert search-and-destroy commandos with no names, that one way or another, are going to be hunted down as Bush’s conspirators in committing these abominable “crimes against humanity”. Indeed, we have a horrifying “national emergency” if they are to confront Obama’s fully armed peacekeepers eyeball-to-eyeball. Those who blink first are going to be casualties of this civil war.

But I bet that our still living presidents may not cause trouble to Obama’s covert law enforcers. They too had led wars and accused of “war crimes” and “genocide”, but I think being old now they would just go voluntarily straight to any nearby detention camp lead by Obama himself who will also be “investigated” as active participants and conspirators for the alleged commission of “war crimes”, and when tried and found guilty hanged by the neck until dead.

And if this is to become the main preoccupation of the day under the Obama administration, the rope and lariat industry will perhaps be the only businesses that will experience “an economic boom” in the midst of today’s 1920s gloom and doom.

For, indeed, there will be pervasive multiple hangings in all parts of the country. The demand for a hangman’s noose made of abaca rope and synthetic threads or materials will create a nationwide Keynesian aggregate demand that would arrest the economic downturn and trigger the much needed recovery.

Is this a pundit’s joke? Not at all if there are those who believe that the rope economic incentive is a much better alternative to this on-going trillion-dollar robbery where the people’s tax money goes to the pockets of criminals who committed egregious “economic crimes”. Their necks actually more than deserved the hangman’s rope.

But here comes the “kill joy”. In the House hearing committee, CIA director nominee Leon Panetta assured Congress that no intelligence officer would be prosecuted for “war crimes”. Only the heads of those who “ordered the war crime” are in the chopping block. They are only after Bush, the top dog of “war crimes”.

And that was the first remarkable message of Obama’s CIA director-to-be to terrorists. The Obama administration is only after Osama bin Laden, the head of terrorism, not his cutthroat assassins who did the criminal act of mass murder and wanton destruction, just as they are only after Bush, not those under him who committed the crime under his order.

It is my reason for climbing the belfry to ring the bell of alarm that every American must prepare for “dirty bombs” that could blow up Los Angeles or New York to kingdom come. Under the Obama regime, terrorists are legally free to do their worst. If arrested, they would not even be prosecuted. Panetta announced this assurance in Congress to all and sundry. They are only after Osama bin Laden who ordered the carnage.

How about this sing-along legality that those caught violating the law must be prosecuted a.k.a. persecuted to the fullest extent of the law? Well, they spit out the exception when they swallow hook and sinker what they said about the dictate of the law as a reason to tenaciously pursue the investigation of those who commit “war crimes.”

The other day, I had this terrifying scare of my life. I watched a 3-year old baby swallow a mouthful of cherries with all the seeds that almost choked the little toddler to death.

What came back to me in split seconds was that vivid picture of Saddam Hussein … turning blue and breathless while hanging and struggling at the end of the rope.

Luckily, after less than a minute or so of contorted bodily struggle which seemed to have lasted longer than eternity, the baby discharged the choking seeds from the mouth. I couldn’t forget this incredible smile of relief as if he was saying to everybody that, what he had coughed out was the exception to what he had scooped into his mouth that could not and should not be swallowed for the sake of survival.

Dying of asphyxiation by choking is, like hanging by neck at the end of the rope, not only painful but also in the eyes of God, a disgraceful way of ending one’s life. Judas hanged himself in a nearby tree. The stigma of betrayal and treachery is never looked at with favor in the afterlife.

Obama’s legal centurions who do not leave any single stone unturned in their quest for a presidential investigation to hang President Bush swallowed hook and sinker the mandate of the law that anyone who violates the law must be prosecuted to the fullest. But they are spitting out the exception. At least CIA agents that actually committed “war crimes” for Bush, will not be prosecuted.

The public loves Panetta as the cry baby who choked up with cherries. But he will survive while his boss – Obama – hangs with the rest of the presidents who were all in pari delicto in committing “war crimes”.

As a final ingredient to this menu of absurdities I just broiled to feed those joining this presidential hanging expedition, I would like to add a spice of immortality borrowed from John Wayne’s cliché -- war is tough, but it is a lot tougher to those who are deliberately stupid. #

© Copyright Edwin A. Sumcad. Access NWS February 09, 2009.

The writer is an award-winning journalist. Know more about the author by reading his published editorials and feature articles or you may e-mail your comment to ed.superx722@yahoo.com.sgThis e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

Published also in

War Criminals: 373 Plus U.S. Presidents Still War Criminals: 373 Plus U.S.
Presidents Still Alive Bush And Obama Himself Are To Hang [Nws, 02/09/09] http://nationalwriterssyndicate.com/content/view/875/2/
http://nationalwriterssyndicate.com/ [headline]

Written Editorials Are Opinions – Suggestion To Differentiate Is Ridiculous … Ill-Advised

2009-02-05T14:01:00.000-08:00

To The Editor: [Freedomphoenix.com]

In your comment re, 2009-02-02 15:43:53, I find the suggestion to change the ‘title’ “Editorial” to ‘Opinion’ in editorial writing quite whimsical and capricious. Behind this unfortunate editorial advice are the following justifications that are too outlandish for me to explain:

[a] The first reason for the change was ridiculous. Of course a written editorial is a written opinion of the editor of the publication. In Freedomsphoenix.com, writers classified as “editors” write opinions for this online publication. But according to this editorial advice, an editorial written by a contributing guest editor, “… misleads readers by implying that the respected editor, Ernest Hancock, vouches for the journalistic skills and integrity of the author.” Thus it is hard to believe there is this ludicrous recommendation to rename the editorial to “unsubstantiated opinion of …” [the writer is named].

[1] What in the light of me is the connection of this editorial paranoia to opinion writing? This is the first time I hear that the Editor “vouches” or guarantees any editorial piece published in his online publication. Anyone who “implies” that the Editor “vouches” or guarantees someone’s point of view must be ignorant of the meaning of a disclaimer to any written opinion, which legally insulates the Media from liability as a matter of editorial policy. [Let us bookmark this super-doper ignorance in the practice of journalism].

[2] What is the relevance of the “journalistic skills and integrity of the author” that in this precipitous recommendation the Editor is supposed to guarantee whenever any written editorial appears in Freedomsphoenix.com? Did anyone hear or see this editorial requirement or did it just pop out of someone’s pretentious if not heavily biased mind?

[3] As a defense against liability, were those “skill” and “integrity” requirements disclosed to the public as an “Editorial Standard” to be met before a written editorial piece should be downgraded [?] from the higher category of “Editorial” down to merely an “unsubstantiated Opinion” just because the one who recommends this change has a different opinion to what has been written? If this website agrees to the recommendation and takes action, are we not looking at censorship that rears its ugly head?

[4] Such arbitrary downgrading could damage the reputation of a writer because when reclassified downward it casts aspersions to his “skill” or ability to write, as inferior, as well as attacks his “integrity” as one that is questionable.

[b] Second reason in this recommendation for an Editorial-Opinion switch: It stereotypes editorial writings with such bizarre bias as "The Unsubstantiated Opinion of _____" “Or perhaps, just "Opinion" because “ *anyone* can publish any sort of inaccurate drivel and have it billed as an "editorial."

[1] Such labeling or editorial intervention is not what the “editorial knife” intends to accomplish, and passing judgment on a written editorial as nonsense because it was written by an opponent, is pure nonsense itself, poppycock not within the purview of editorial supervision and control. That judgment belongs to the readership – for the readers to judge if a written opinion they are reading is in fact “substantiated” to be appreciated, or “unsubstantiated” to be rejected as a written nonsense. Any ignorant kibitzer has no business in interfering into an editorial policy that gives writers the right to let the readers pass judgment on their writings.

[2] How would the said editorial advice consider an editorial piece an “inaccurate drivel”?. Who says that it is “inaccurate”? Who passes judgment and on what criteria is it based, that it is a “drivel” of abominable proportion and should be condemned as such? Is it when any written view is unpopular? Or when it is an opinion that questions Libertarianism? Socialism? Capitalism, and the like? Where is this Freedomsphoenix.com’s declaration of principle, quote: “… the encouragement of alternate views being represented here on FreedomsPhoenix …”? Let’s not forget even in the heat of the moment, that FP.com is a free online publication it purports to be that encourages as its guiding principle, the publication of different and differing views of the American public.

[c] The Third reason why the editorial piece “The Idiocy of Conspiracy Theories” written and published by Mike Renzulli on February 1, 2009 in this website
should be labeled merely as “unsubstantiated Opinion” of _____ … because “This _greatly_ encourages know-nothings and the reason-impaired of all stripes to **go ahead and publish.**”

[1] Who are those “know-nothings and the reason-impaired of all stripes” editor-contributors that this suspiciously motivated editorial advice is referring to? And how – and on what standard --were they categorized that way? Are we talking of a “perfect, faultless editor-contributor” here that Ernest knows but is not telling us about his hidden flawless talent in stereotyping writers including myself that he doesn’t like and whose opinions are very much opposed to his views?

Here is the problem that I hope I can discuss with you in all honesty and good faith based on experience and from what had been learned in the academe:

The layman – anyone who has no formal education in Journalism or “newspapering” particularly in editorial writing – has this notion that editorial and opinion writings are two different things. Before the above-mentioned suggestion deserves our attention, there should have been a showing first of what is the difference between a written editorial and a written opinion that the public should know. Without this, the suggestion is misleading because in the printed press, an editorial is an opinion, a viewpoint or a position of the writer over a given issue or subject-matter under public scrutiny.

Let us not forget that Contributors of written pieces to Freedomsphoenix.com come in four categories: Participants in Political Forums, Reporters, Writers and Editors [see FP.com About Us link]. An editor writes opinions or editorials. Editors that write in FP.com are “guest editors” of FP.com whose writings are considered “guest editorials” for all intent and purposes. They joined FP.com as such. They are submitting editorial or opinion writings to, writing in, and writing for, FP.com in that category vis-à-vis other online publications. THUS TO CHANGE OR SUPPOSEDLY DOWNGRADE THE EDITOR’S WRITINGS FROM “EDITORIALS” TO “OPINIONS” IN FP.com IS SUPERPLOUS, IF NOT RIDICULOUS!

In the preparation of the “dummy” of print publications [a daily newspaper or publication is a good example] the layout [format] editor sees to it that all written opinions fall in the editorial page/s. In print publications, rarely does an editorial piece lands in the front page or elsewhere.

In online publications, this is hardly distinguishable. Websites are formatted differently, as one may see how FP.com appears to the readers. But an editorial/opinion write-up is written differently from a news report or press release. Among others, it has no 4-W-umbrella and it is not written as standard inverted pyramid news stories are.

To differentiate it from a news item, an editorial piece is comparable to a composition or an essay, although there are “styles” or techniques in editorial writing that makes the contents of say, an editorial column outstandingly different and powerfully persuasive.

p> Bottom line is, a printed story is an opinion if it is a viewpoint, point of view, perspective, standpoint, a position on issue/s, judgment, estimation, etc. of a given issue.

Lastly, may I call your attention to your approval statement of the suggested change that appears somewhat disturbing. I quote what you said: “I'll continue to review our policy about the encouragement of alternate views being represented here on FreedomsPhoenix, but I'm likely to lean towards allowing those I disagree with the ability to subject themselves to the beatings they might deserve here for my entertainment and continued education.“

You are in favor of allowing those whom you disagree with … “those with the ability to subject themselves to beatings they might deserve…” for your “entertainment and continued education.”

I have called the attention of the editorial management to those repeated wanton violations of your guideline, viz: prohibiting those who are in disagreement with the views of others from indulging in personal attacks. Mr. Renzuilli, the author, was attacked on his person, not on the issues he raised, as “someone being paid by the government” [infiltrator!], “brain dead”, “idiot”, “clown” just in one sweeping libelous paragraph [you can read those vitriolic comments to the above-mentioned written editorial].

Sumcad, another author, was also attacked in the same manner for writing views on esoteric subjects such as development economics, monetary economics and fiscal policy, which they have no capacity to understand and therefore they are very unforgiving when their shortcoming is exposed. They try to cover up this inadequacy by resorting to name-calling. But we know it doesn’t work. Their short stock of knowledge although they are abundant of hearsays easily mouthed in public as “facts” or “the truth”, are still very much exposed.

In your above-quoted approval statement, you described the victims of those personal attacks in this website as those “… with the ability to subject themselves to the beatings …” for your “entertainment and continued education”.

When I read your above-quoted reply I was speechless because on record, I have always been in total agreement with the light of wisdom you share with those in the dark. But this time I disagree. And this is easy for me to explain why.

Let us assume just for a moment, that I am Renzuilli, or Sumcad, or anyone of their kind who is no doubt good in the writing trade as a chosen field of discipline, for purposes of this explanation why I disagree. We have a reputation in writing to protect … It took us many years to scratch the ground to find the name we have nurtured and cherished as a hard-earned legacy; we tiptoed the line when we chose what to write, because we saw to it that no shenanigan would throw mud and soil that treasured harvest of our labor.

As you know we are writers who responded to your published invitation to submit their intellectual contributions after working hard for each and every submission they make. In the choices you offered what any contributor would want to be if we accept the invitation, experienced editors chose the “editor” category because in writing, that’s were they are good at. Proof is, let us say, a consistent recipient of several excellence awards in journalism on record all those years.

Having said that, I don’t think their injury after being attacked with implicit approval or tacit editorial endorsement is a fair excuse for the entertainment and continued education of anyone, especially when it is at their expense.

I am now talking of Media responsibility and liability here when there is a showing of inferred approval of such wanton abuse.

I am a dye-in-the-wool defender of any editorial policy that protects anyone from scurrilous personal attacks. I am a Minute Man defending Sumcad and others like him, and now Renzuilli who is under attack because he wrote an editorial that is not to the liking of his attackers. As responsible members of the Media, I firmly believe that we should always be vigilant against any form of suppression of anyone’s right to freedom of expression.

Be that as it may, I would hate to see FP.com – the astonishing product of your long years of hard work … a treasured legacy as dear and precious as it is, similar to my own -- destroys itself when anyone is allowed even implicitly to turn it into a smear machine just for entertainment purposes.

FP.com’s classification of four kinds of participating contributors considering the nature of the writings they want to contribute, is to me, perfectly fine, wisely designed, highly preferred and recommendable.

Under this format, we the Contributors, have a given voice in choosing what we want to be in FP.com, so that we can only submit our intellectual creations as writers at our own chosen level where we can be very good at. We get the space, and FP.com gets the expertise.

This is the nature of this implied contract long observed and practiced in the Media, with the imprimatur of and sanctioned by the long standing practice existing in the Fourth Estate.

My final words to you are, if we are to remain guest editors in your site, and considering that the suggestion in question was clearly made out of spite [he didn’t like the written view of author Renzuilli because it is different from his], and considering further that the suggestion to change your format is forcing you to classify without any set of criteria and therefore grossly arbitrary, the standing of editors according to their “skill” and “integrity” which is unprecedented in the history of Media editorial management, and finally having been duly established that such change proposal is clearly ill-advised, I strongly recommend that this editorial tampering be ignored.

Sincerely,

Lolo

Healthcare: Obama Must Stop Talkathon Go To Work And Save Dying Patients

2009-02-03T11:49:00.000-08:00

Healthcare: Obama Must Stop Talkathon Go To Work And Save Dying Patients

by Edwin Sumcad [also at www.opednews.com]

Millions of Americans without health insurance or with medical insurance but with inadequate and fraudulent coverage are dying everyday. Patients not yet dead but about to die, are being victimized by overcharging vultures in the medical profession.

If a patient is without health insurance, or with insurance but the coverage is almost good for nothing, service providers are like competing barracudas on the hunt for prey. Pricing of dental services for example is out of control.

An elderly who had his fourteen teeth extracted was charged $240 per tooth, and in addition, he has to pay approximately $3,000 for his new temporary and regular lower denture. This does not include $500 for anesthesia. Upon inquiry, the explanation was [a] it was not an ordinary teeth extractions – it was a “surgery”[?!], [b] the patient was elderly and diabetic, [c] the denture was “special”, not covered by insurance.

That was more than a year ago. The patient is not even half way in paying the money he borrowed to pay for this scalping.

We know that the poor fellow had been had. But his only remedy is to go to court. He is too old and too poor to do that.

This aging patient cannot even write a letter of complaint to his insurer that happens to be part of the conspiracy to suck the patient’s blood dry to the bone.

Every time this patient would contact the insurance people who obviously are also on the take, to protest the overcharging, they would just shoo him away telling him that the denture and the dental services “specialists” had provided were outside of the provisions of his health insurance contract. It was a pocket-cost he must bear.

The victim -- and millions of his kind all over the country -- needs President Barack Hussein Obama to save him. It is time to stop those self-selling talks to get the votes he needed to become president. His non-stop oratory will not save those victims of insatiable greed for profit.

I call upon Obama to put his claim as a Messiah for Change, where his mouth is. For reference of the action he might take, Obama and his advisers must read the research-backed Dental Rip-Off I published.

The much ballyhooed “Obama Health-Care Express” is a hustle-bustle in the wind. The problem was seen by those who are viewing the precarious situation in our healthcare industry from the distance at the wrong end of the telescope.

While it is true that this nation is short of primary-care physicians, the real problem is the pricing of medical services without limit when insurance is nil or inadequate.

Look … don’t argue with me that competition in a free enterprise system will level the price the market would bear. This theory is valid only if it has a premise to stand on, and that is, provided that [a] goods sold are “elastic”, and [b] there is no monopoly, [c] there is no conspiracy among the dominant players to cabal in pricing and sharing of profits. [See J. von Neumann’s and O. Morgenstern’s “Theory Of Games” in a situation of mixed conflict and cooperation where players may cooperate to increase their joint pay-off.]

We must increase the number of service providers to meet the nation’s medical need. At the same time, we cannot countenance this bizarre incentive that in order to attract service providers into practice the few who are now serving the public is encouraged to bill patients without limit [i.e. Dental Rip-Off], putting them at the mercy of insatiable greed for profit.

This strategy does not only distort the market but also increases the number of patients dying because they cannot afford the cost of insurance that will cover their need for survival.

The worst part of this conspiracy is the existing collusion between caregivers and those who control the industry. The latter dictates what to cover, and the rules they also formulate for coverage are against the patients … all designed in favor of the insurance companies.

For instance, when patients appeal for a rejected coverage, it is almost 95% sure the insurer will deny the appeal. The idea is to save the money that the insurance company would otherwise spend to save the patient’s life, and later on distribute the pool of money saved, to caregivers in the form of “bonuses”.

In the graph, we may picture the financially-disadvantaged patients’ rate of survival going down while the medical vultures’ fortune is rising up. In the year 2007, fraudulent overpricing estimated within the range of $3-10 billion was lost to dental vultures [Vultures Exposed].

It is almost like opium to be addicted to Obama’s attractive oratory when he declared that healthcare is a “right” that his administration guarantees to every American.

I think he forgot that healthcare is a dire need, and victimized patients are dying. #

The writer is an award-winning journalist. Know more about the author by reading his published editorials and feature articles here and the Internet or you may e-mail your comment at ed.superx722@yahoo.com.sg

Shall We Hang Our Presidents For “War Crimes” -- Real Or Imagined?

2009-02-01T21:04:00.000-08:00

It sounds sadistic but the deafening cry of the socialist Left and their radical Liberal satellites to hang the former Republican president and vice president for alleged “war crimes” is reaches far beyond Bush and Cheney themselves. The sword of anger is drawn not only to get them but also to strike down all U.S. presidents living or dead accused of genocide by foes abroad and by the enemy within.

Let us clear this confusion generated by victorious socialist Democrats who are now publicly perceived as intoxicated by their newly found power since Obama won the last presidential election.

The radical Left and their socialist Liberal colleagues are even more angry and restless now that Bush has left office because I think in his absence, they have to look for another punching bag. But if anyone thinks they have forgiven Bush of his alleged “war crimes” -- real or imagined -- that would be an embarrassing assumption.

Obama’s legal hatchet men who are in many ways declaring that vengeance is ours and sweet, argue that Bush and Cheney violated the law against “torture” and must be persecuted – I mean prosecuted -- because it is the law, and if found guilty hanged by the neck … but was not torture called “waterboarding” which they claimed is a crime against humanity justified on record under the dicta of the military tribunal also created by law?

When those apprehended terrorists detonate their dirty bombs, would anyone very much dead and buried under the ground care about violation of their human rights? A realist once copy-furnished me a copy of his e-mail addressed to what he thought were terrorist human rights coddlers in this country: Save me first by not being killed by your terrorists, before you talk to me of “torture” in violation of the terrorists’ human rights!

To prevent any emotional reactions to this very controversial issue from turning into a vitriolic word war, let’s define and confine this accusation of “war crime” only on “torture” and “who” were tortured if such is the case, for public discussion purposes. Outside of this perimeter, reactions like attacks on personalities would be irrelevant.

For example, in responding, let’s not react by simply saying that Edwin Sumcad who is bringing up this matter for public scrutiny “is in the payroll of President Bush” or “Edwin, we know who is paying your bill” kind of childish shenanigans and immature stuff that distract us from focusing on the problem.

These delinquent biases are too retarded to carry as a personal baggage into print, and will not produce any intelligent discussion in this Forum.

The problem is more serious than it is seen in the surface. Our homeland security and intelligence officers, let alone the entire U.S. Armed Forces, knowing pretty well that to obey the command orders of the President of the United States who is their Commander-In-Chief, were in fact willingly participating in committing crimes against humanity – as Bush’s accusers want the American public to believe.

Shall we round up thousands of them who actually did it, be investigated together with their Commander-In-Chief as accomplices in committing “war crimes”, and if found guilty should also be hanged by the neck until dead? Whose vengeance is sweet in this regard? We need to clear this absurdity if indeed it sounds like insanity.

One last reminder: If you think “torture” was conducted solely for the amusement of sadistic and sick individuals in the military, move over I am joining your protest against it.

If the government is doing this for fun as you think it is, the Libertarian in us although I am not a Libertarian, will find the likes of me in the forefront of the campaign against this atrocious violation of our liberty and freedom.

Unfortunately “torture” strictly for fun as a crime against humanity is not the subject of discussion.

So there we are. The perimeters within which we may debate this problem are clearly drawn. Let’s do it for the interest of the American public, and for the commonweal.

Let’s consider it a duty of every American citizen to clear up this absurdity – if indeed it is – of investigating past presidents who one way or another have been accused of “war crimes” by enemies outside of our borders that in the past we have vanquished and some of them we are still vanquishing in today’s on-going wars, together with Bush and Cheney who were accused by the enemy within of having committed not only “genocides” or crimes against humanity but against the people of the United States.

We have fought many wars the results of which had shaped up our destiny. Since in fighting those wars U.S. presidents living or dead have been accused of genocide by foes abroad and by the enemy within, this precedent that has no parallel in history about to be created and established under the Obama regime, may make the hanging of a U.S. president possible within the vortex of a promised change in the coming of an African-American Messiah. #

The writer is an award-winning journalist. Know more about the author by reading his published editorials and feature articles or you may e-mail your comment at ed.superx722@yahoo.com.sg

Let Us Welcome New Year 2009 By Sharing Light Of Knowledge With Those In The Dark

2009-02-01T16:52:00.000-08:00

At New Year’s Eve, it is the best time to welcome the incoming year. From STRAIGHT LIGHT to everyone: HAPPY NEW YEAR …!

Straight Light is my editorial column in this popular website --freedomsphoenix.com [FPC]. It is actually me talking to you … thanks to Ernest Hancock for sharing with me his light of knowledge when I was in the dark trying to get into Freedom Phoenix.

FPC is one of Internet’s numerous lamplighters through which the light of knowledge could be shed to those in the dark who longed to see the light.

While many of us in the world of the quill and the ink share their lights of knowledge with others, straight light is only what I could give out for others to share.

So it comes to pass that at the end of the year, I thank all the blessings that had come my way, and to take note of so many things I could learn from, and even improve where there is a need for improvement.

The most important thing to note is that the light to share always gives room for improvement. In the editorial I wrote on December 28, 2008, we need a lot of light-sharing:

Editorial • Future Predictions -- Straight Light

If you read the comments on this editorial piece at this link Abolish, the praise and pillage, not necessarily on what is written but on the person of the author, badly needs enlightenment.

The author was called unprintable names. Just because in this editorial piece I mentioned outgoing president George W. Bush who was leaving a legacy of his own -- a bequest that changed the political dynamics of the Middle East and that he had embarrassed the radical Left by putting Al Qaeda terrorists on the run since 9/11 – to be judged by history, a resentful bucket kicker thought I am probably on the payroll of President Bush!

The first thought that comes to mind: Does this also mean that this angry guy who hates Bush is in the payroll of Obama and Bill Ayers, the rich socialist American bomber who wants to change America?

As we can clearly see, the logic comes from another planet. It is dark and apparently, retarded. It needs light, and as written in a song, in summer the roses need rain to bloom.

This hostile attitude is jumping on stage only recently. The public had a bad impression of the Media that the Left had taken over in the last election. It trumped objectivity and supported a change for America to take the road towards a socialist democracy.

But not all free journalists were routed in this tsunami of political bias towards ideological change generally believed to be good for the country, although it may be only delusional. Although they may be few, still there are journalist who are holding the forth of free journalism. I share the flak for being one of them throughout the years [more than 45 years]. In this regard, I don’t blame those in limbo who are swinging their swords of hostility in the dart pit of ignorance. The reading public can see this in the comment posted in this link Abolish.

This Straight Light to share is never so critically needed before than it is now, as in this case while we close the year with so much lessons to learn from.

In the comments [again click on Abolish] Lolo ably defended the definition MV = PQ out of Fisher Equation’s MV = PT against the attacks of those who are obviously pretending to be learned economists in this perplexing subject of economics. It is hard to deny that only genuine economists that specialize on fiscal and monetary policies are able to do this.

I noticed that those who were commenting negatively on the editorial I wrote with anger written between the lines, are clearly in the dark on this subject. When they resort to name-calling, we know how and what they complement their argument with, when they ran short of what to say. In this sense, I do not hold them entirely blameworthy for the simplest of all reasons that they actually need help.

My old man once made it clear to me when I was starting college, that when someone falls in a snake pit, the snakes will always fight to get the first bite. That wisdom brings into focus when the author becomes a prey to a feeding frenzy.

But I am here to share a straight light, not to talk about snakes especially when they refer to people outside the art of euphemism and cordiality. I do not welcome the New Year this way.

In the comment box, Lolo already projected what I have learned as a development economist-cum-journalist. The onus of proving it is now on me. Before the bar of public opinion, I am pretty much obliged.

I would like to share what I learned by demonstrating how Quantity Theory of Money works with Ag. D. [the symbol I used in graduate school] as key determinant. This may be denominated as a “Classical Economic Equation of Exchange”. This equation is MV=PQ.

M =Money in the hands of the public. V = Income velocity of money. This is commonly mistaken as “velocity of money” which is not accurate. P = Average price level of output, and Q = Total output of goods and services.

If we want to find V [how many times a $1 component is spent in a year], then we have V=PQ/M. In figures, this is how it looks like:

Suppose we have the following data as an example [B=Billion]:

[1] Q = $10 billion (10B) units of output purchased in the economy.

[2] P= $2 average price per unit.

[3] Thus PQ= $20 billion (20B) [total spending Ag.D]

[4] If M= $5 billion (5B) [money supply], then we arrive at:

[5] V=PQ/M or in figure, 20B/5B = 4B. It means then that we know that the $1 component of the average price per unit was spent 4B times in a year. This is how you find V.

Suppose we want to know M = money in the hands of the public.

Then the definition is: M = PQ/V or = 20B/4B = $5 billion (5B). [It checks out par. [4] above.]

Suppose instead we want to know PQ = Total Ag.D. Then we have this formula: PQ = V x M or 4B x $5 billion (5B) = $20 billion (20B). [It checks out par. [3] above.]

To summarize: PQ = P x Q; Total spending is PQ = V x M; V =PQ/M; and M = PQ/V. #

Thanks for knowledge-sharing.

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL!!

The writer is an award-winning journalist. Know more about the author by reading his published editorials and feature articles or you may e-mail your comment direct to ed.superx722@yahoo.com.sg

II. Federal Reserve And I.O.Us.: Let’s Not Be Extravagant In Exposing What We Hardly Know

2009-02-01T16:37:00.001-08:00

There is always a self-styled “guru” attracted to our financial debacle so generous in giving public statements of “facts” in monetary economics. Hardly are those established as facts but only theoretical assumptions!

It started with Joe the Plumber. It is only proper that we respect his negative opinion on President Barack Hussein Obama’s wealth distribution plan. However, Joe tips those prone to go over the edge with nothing to contribute but mistaken assumptions. A carpenter or auto mechanic mistakes the “given” as hard fact or assumes that his personal conclusions are “facts”.

For example, it is proclaimed with so much bravado, that the Federal Reserve is at liberty to “print money to destroy the economy”. This is not a statement of “facts”. It is an intentional “misdeclaration” of assumption, probably to air out a personal grievance or to incite the public to stage a general protest against some Treasury and Fed officials or even against anyone or anything only God knows.

First, it is the Department of Treasury that prints money, not the Fed. The Fed “creates” money. Unlike the Treasury, the Fed does not use a printing machine – it uses the computer. The Fed buys a “bond or mortgage-backed security” from banks. In return, the Fed issues a “credit” to the banks’ accounts. The banks would then lend this Fed-backed credit to generate more money!

In effect, money is created in the form of credit. This is all done through a computerized network of financial transactions.
Second, the National Treasury prints money when new money is required by the government, i.e., to replace old notes and to stabilize the financial system, while at the same time the Fed sees to it that the functions to print, create and use money do not destabilize the system and destroy the economy.

The Federal Reserve is a private institution, comes another declaration with so much audacity based on perception. It is supposedly owned by the 12 regional Federal Reserve banks, which “each in turn owned by a combination of regional banks, commercial banks, foreign banks, and miscellaneous individuals …” This is fiction, not “facts”. It is rather a convoluted presentation of facts if at all.

The facts: Fed is the Federal Government AND the participating private banks. The Federal Government [the Fed] is a composite of the Executive branch of government and Congress. The American people dictate the operation of the Fed through their representation in Congress and the president they elected to office that decide on what banking policies to formulate and implement. They all act through the Board of Governors.

The 12 regional banks do not own the Fed. The law does not say so. Rather these are the Fed’s regional arms. The Fed performs a governmental function, not a private function, and the participating bankers in the region are not there to enrich themselves in any way they want and anytime they like.

When a nosey face diagnosed the ills of our financial system at an arm’s length and faulted them all on the Federal Reserve, it presents a problem because hardly out of the "facts" discussed by "street experts" so far, were relevant to central banking, much more related to the role of the United States Federal Reserve in the national economy.

The problem here is that it reminds us of this old adage that “little knowledge is dangerous”. There is no space to explain this in details to those who need to know. The uninitiated has no fear of contradiction and will invade any territory of knowledge to cover up the absence of knowledge. Just like when the blind is fearless when crossing a busy street.

The blind can only feel but cannot see the danger ahead. If you believe the blind who tells you that he sees no danger ahead every time he crosses a busy street, you just missed the point -- the guy is blind!

Another reality check: Our gargantuan debts will continue to increase and will just remain I.O.Us. as the years go by, for as long as the United States of America continues to grow and grow. In this capitalist free enterprise society, the opportunity to grow is limitless … in Genesis, it ends at Alpha X [the beginning of infinity].

And why some people are shocked by the immensity of our national debt? It is because the educated guess of how “big” is this existing I.O.Us. is usually exaggerated. The conclusions derived from those exaggerations are viewed in a distant time at the wrong end of the telescope.

Even prices in a certain basket of goods and services that are centennial old, are compared to today’s CPIs to drop one’s jaw and create an alarming distress among the worrying segment of the population – our propensity to spend “beyond our means” is going out of control and we are navigating our future down the road to perdition!

We need to be disciplined, no doubt about that … to be frugal and parsimonious in the way we live our Starwar lives. But we must not also be extravagant in exposing that which we hardly know. It is obviously ludicrous if not appalling for limelight-huggers to mislead the public how bad we Americans had become – a conclusion which when compared to grandma’s gritting teeth is definitely neither normal nor true!

Those I.O.Us. are the material and social capital cost of what the United States of America had become to this day – the approximate worth of this wealthiest, mightiest and greatest nation ever seen on the planet at any given time.

In monetary measurement, the United States of America is now worth $63 trillion of consumer “investable” assets and/or total assets alone. Total wealth in the United States is published by the Federal Reserve in a report titled, Flow of Funds.[81] At the end of fiscal year 2007, total wealth of all U.S. households and non-profit organizations was $57.718 trillion.

This neither includes intangibles and limitless potential callable capital resources that jump out of the book of accounting, nor does it include immeasurable natural endowments that are untapped on the surface and those that lie beneath.

There will be no collapse of the economy that toothless tigers pictured as worse than that of the 1920s. This gigantic U.S. economy is “unsinkable”, given what we have already gone through.

This preposterous claim that the national economy will go under may be categorized as a fantasy, a science fiction that if it persists to grind in the rumor mill may be filmed and nominated for this year's Academy Award! #

The writer is an award-winning journalist. Know more about the author by reading his published editorials and feature articles or you may e-mail your comment at ed.superx722@yahoo.com.sg

Federal Reserve And The National Debt: Caretakers Of Doom Bury Them In The Graveyard Of Cynicism

2009-02-01T16:23:00.000-08:00

When the Fed and the national debt are pictured as a terrifying bogeyman, the kids among us are so fearful they tend to wet their chinos and security blankets. But it is not really what one may think it is.

There is this accusation that the Federal Reserve “abuses” its power to print money. The use of the term “abuse” may be delusional. That the Fed’s purpose of printing “fiat” money is to satiate greed for self-enrichment, instead of say, bailing out the economy in trouble, may just be an imaginary conclusion that torments a disquieted mind.

I understand the anguish behind all these, and the need to share the light so that those in the dark could see has indeed become more compelling.

Printing a “fiat” money is not always objectionable as it may appear to the uninitiated. In the past, our cash-strapped revolutionary colonies would not have won the revolution had they not printed paper money with hardly any equivalent gold or silver reserves to back it up. This was done to facilitate trade and enhance commerce as well as to finance and continue the struggle for independence against the Crown of England. In short, it is “fiat money” that brought us to where we are now.

The hard-pressed colonies then did what the Bank of England did, like what today’s Federal Reserve had done and still doing. The Fed is just exercising the power that the American people had delegated to it through Congress … it is the people’s power to print paper money to spend for development and to revive the economy from a devastating financial crunch and economic meltdown created by conspiracies of events, unlikable virtues such as selfishness and greed and/or similar human weaknesses, if not so designed by intervening natural causes.

That power of the people to print their own money which was delegated to and exercised by the Fed is what made this nation the greatest on the planet!

Is the delegation of such power unconstitutional? It is not and has never been and will never be. People who think it is, tells a funny joke that even the ignorant are deprived of the opportunity to laugh at because the insinuation angered them. The best proof that this doubt is foolish as Don Quixote, Literature’s public clown, is that the Fed is still around since its creation in 1913, and it is here to stay.

Since the printing of money represents debt of the national treasury, “government borrowing” in this sense is not like Medusa's head that turns everyone to stone!

In this regard, for becoming too judgmental, only those who make rush conclusions with undefined intentions if not total ignorance, bang their head and break their neck when they jump into an empty swimming pool without looking.

Is there a downside to this exercise of delegated power to print more of our national currency like what the colonies did of their “colonial script” – “to borrow” to finance our wars for freedom and liberty far across the ocean and historically reaching the four corners of the globe, to build our biggest airports in the world and to construct our modern air travel infrastructure, to put up our great railways and expand our incomparable highways linking all states in the country, to erect our tallest skyscrapers and create our multibillion-dollar institutional infrastructures, and now to keep our beleaguered economy from tilting over the edge, etc. … in short for the good of the commonweal and to see to it how this nation would look like today – is there really something here we have left to be desired or something that botched us off to a permanent ruin? This is what cynics think of the Fed and our national debt which in their aching mind threatens our future.

Let’s start from what “they” think of the Fed. Of course there is always a downside to this delegated power to print our monetary medium of exchange to the Fed … a part of the over-all material and social capital costs of all what we have today. Every exercise of such power has a negative aspect, a snag if you may.

The delegated power to print/mint money emanates from one of the major responsibilities of the Fed to regulate the supply of currency and coins in order to run a stable economy. Too much of it would blow up the economy, too little of it would ground the economy. Either way, it is 9/11 the Fed guards against, just like how we look over our shoulders to spot an economic saboteur about to blow up our economy to kingdom come! It is not what the Fed would do out of vanity for “bankers” to get rich as ill-willed cynics would want the public to believe.

The Fed also administers relief to unavoidable economic foul-ups. The organization is run by less than perfect human beings. For instance, take judicial notice of the fact that corruption thrives in honesty, just as in corruption there can be also an exceptional honesty. But the system’s check and balance structure make the function of the Fed almost ideally perfect for all intents and purposes. So that operationally, it is more real than just apparent that there is nothing left to be desired when the Fed is viewed in its rightful place.

Any curious but neutral monetary specialist that studied the U.S. Federal Reserve from the academe who have no ax to grind would admit and say the way I do without any second thought. Count out politicians and followers whose delusional economics is based on hugging the limelight for political expediency. We are all in for a public debate over the importance or irrelevance of the U.S. Federal Reserve to our national economy, but not to encourage a public lie against it to foment a revolution so that a precipitous politician can rise from the ashes.

Notice carefully that the complaint of the people at the edge of their wit is louder in the outback. When the economy is sick, the remedial pill the Fed prescribes is always bitter to swallow they would rather be sick than take it. But let's live in the real world, not in the world of the Wizard of Oz.

First, too much printing of money is too much if it is indeed too much and that is when it is beyond what is necessary. But who has the expertise to decide when is it too much, or what is the right amount that is needed? Don’t say it is the complaining taxi driver and the angry gravedigger who incited to join a mass protest suddenly turned themselves into monetary experts and believed that indeed they are! It is this nation – the people themselves who thought it was the Fed that has that expertise when they collectively said so through the act of Congress … and to no one else.

Second, now what is the Fed? Is the Fed not the bankers AND the government? It is the people’s government acting through the President they elect, and Congress representing them – these are the structural components of this entity called the “Federal Reserve of the United States”.

Third, who makes the policy? It is the people themselves through Congress and the President they elected to office. By law this function goes to the Federal Open Market Committee of the Fed that directs the nation's monetary policy. Only those with insuperable doubts and precipitous intentions would say that it is the banker-party-component alone that decides to print money to satisfy their greed for wealth.

It is “they” – the people [the Fed, the Executive branch of government & Congress, not just the banker component] who decide to print the amount of money that is critically needed, acting through the Fed’s Board of Governors, thus the Fed performs a “governmental function”, not a “private” function as erroneously perceived. But the fired-up/misled angry gravediggers would want the public to believe that bankers conspire in private and decide on their own how to get filthy rich by printing a lot of useless money and lend it to brainless pigeons from whom they pirate a truckload of revenue in the form of interests! That perception of reality about the Fed is Alice in Wonderland!

In this metaphorical portrayal, the readers can see clearly that the gravediggers are cited merely as an example to represent our society’s economically disadvantaged. The sympathy to hear their grievance and to act accordingly to save them from their misery – real or imagined -- has a stronger appeal than the lie that they wittingly or unwittingly were made to believe, which in turn made them active advocates against the Fed.

At a certain point, they were even convinced that the Fed is a private institution run by “thieves”! That’s how distant the lie drew them out of reality.

Fourth, because these printed monies are “borrowing”, the quantified debt owed is definitely mind-boggling. Why? It is because the national debt owed has been translated to a staggering amount of wealth that made this nation the greatest, the wealthiest and the mightiest on the planet!

Fifth, the cynics would do a mathematical calculation to present a scenario of doom, i.e., generations to come have no future; they would be the ones to pay that mind-blowing size of existing I.O.Us which as of today reaches more than $10 trillion. It sounds serious, but this is just more apparent than real … such burden of payment will never occur. It will just remain in its nominal infamy – a “burden”.

Again notice carefully that you and I were the future generations of the debt-fear-mongers about a century ago who opposed the building of America to what it is today because in doing so it required an enormous budget available revenues could ill-afford. The alternative to budgetary shortfalls was a massive financial program of “borrowing” that could only be paid by future generations … today that’s you and me …!!

Again back to the giant projects of constructing national highways and freeways that connected America from coasts-to-coasts which resulted in fantastic economic growth never imagined before, that were supposed to “burden” this present generation when viewed from that distant past.

Did your life and mine become worse today than it was many decades ago because it was supposed to have been “burdened” by “debts” [the “borrowed” cost of development]? Compare yourself to those who lived life in the past riding on horseback because our present transportation infrastructure then was just a figment of the imagination. Did this so-called “burden” turn us into fish on dry land as cynics would want us to believe?

Or on the contrary, did life not even become better now than it was before? We must be realistic to admit that cynics could be deadly wrong as their ancestors have been in such a grave error when they propagated the “truth” out of a lie that the world was flat. #

The writer is an award-winning journalist. Know more about the author by reading his published editorials and feature articles or you may e-mail your comment at ed.superx722@yahoo.com.sg

Shall We Hang Our Presidents For“War Crimes” -- Real Or Imagined?

2009-02-01T15:29:00.000-08:00

It sounds sadistic but the deafening cry of the socialist Left and their radical Liberal satellites to hang the former Republican president and vice president for alleged “war crimes” is beyond Bush and Cheney themselves. The sword of anger is drawn not only to get them but also to strike down all U.S. presidents living or dead accused of genocide by foes abroad and by the enemy within.

In the title of this editorial, I am posing the question for one purpose only: To get the answer and clear the confusion victorious socialist democrats publicly perceived as intoxicated by their newly found power, had generated in the mind of the American public.

The first accusation was “torture” reportedly committed by our intelligence and security officers and the military under Bush as Commander-In-Chief.

To prevent any emotional reactions to this important query that usually turn vitriolic and irrelevant, let’s define and confine this accusation of “war crime” only on “torture” and “who” were tortured if such is the case, for public discussion purposes.

Furthermore, it is not that kind of commonly understood “torture” that forces us to kick the bucket in protest – it is “torture” allegedly committed -- and watch this carefully -- on captured terrorists that mass-murdered innocent Americans and bombed buildings to smithereens or those who were about to blow up structures in crowded areas and kill more Americans and innocent children had they not been discovered and caught, and when captured were given the courtesy of living in prison and fed by the taxpayers’ money.

These are the fundamental questions from which the main query in the title of this editorial was based. We want to know:

1. How many hundreds more after 9/11 – thousands may be million American lives [?] – would have been lost had it not for this “torture” of captured [not war combatants but …] savages of “war” that has neither name nor boundary? [And maybe you and I who are against it are six feet below the ground by now had it not been used on those murderous barbarians … nothing serious, just thinking!]

2. After those apprehended terrorists detonated their dirty bombs, would anyone very much dead and buried under the ground care about violation of human rights? A realist once copy-furnished me a copy of his e-mail addressed to what he thought were terrorist coddlers in this country: Save me first by not being killed by your terrorists, before you talk to me of “torture” in violation of the enemy’s human rights!

3. Obama’s legal hatchet men who cry vengeance is ours and sweet, argue that Bush and Cheney violated the law against “torture” and must be persecuted – I mean prosecuted -- because it is the law, and if found guilty hanged by the neck … but was not torture called “waterboarding” which they claimed is a crime against humanity justified on record under the dicta of the military tribunal also created by law?

4. Was not Bush, the Commander-In-Chief, likewise merely executing the law in protecting Americans lives from terror? [a] Read the Constitution. [b] Read the Patriot Act, as amended, passed by Congress. Under those amendatory acts of Congress the Commander-In-Chief was empowered to do what was necessary – including the creation of the military tribunal where I.I.T. was deliberated upon and justified together with the rights of incarcerated terrorists wanting protection of law equal to the rights of civilians they murdered. I.I.T. is “torture” we are referring to in this discussion -- Intelligence Interrogation Technique -- used by the military in war.

5. Under what time and circumstances was this alleged “torture” committed? Was not this country at war with faceless terror whose conduct of war, atrocities and slaughter of civilians, are outside the ambit of the Vienna Convention? The enemy is not a regular combatant – just savages sworn to kill Americans and destroy America. When the enemy operates outside the international rule of law of war, what is the rationale in talking about our alleged violations of human rights in favor of – not against -- this kind of enemy that cannot be defined under the civilized world’s articles of war? Wouldn’t extraordinary circumstances require extraordinary measures for the safety of all Americans and the survival of this nation? I am not justifying … don’t get me wrong. I am just wondering.

6. If command responsibility is the reason Bush and Cheney should be held accountable for the alleged “war crimes” committed by intelligence officers and soldiers under them, shouldn’t all American presidents be held similarly accountable and prosecuted accordingly for leading our wars abroad where crimes against humanity have reportedly been committed by them worldwide?

7. And finally, our homeland security officers and military personnel – not to speak of, and to include, the entire U.S. armed forces -- knew fully well that they were committing “crimes against humanity” as those who are after Bush and Cheney put it, when these guys followed command orders down the line, and yet they participated willingly. Does this mean that they too should be investigated and when found guilty, hanged by the neck? It is the law, isn’t it? Obama power-wielders stumped their feet on the ground – we must investigate and prosecute because it is the law!

In responding to these seven premise-questions, the ground rules have been laid down. Please do not react by simply saying that Edwin Sumcad who is writing this editorial is “in the payroll of President Bush” or “Edwin, we know who is paying your bill” kind of childish shenanigans and immature stuff that distract us from focusing on issues raised.

Also I am not a member of this website’s editorial staff who is outrageously mistaken by the narrow-minded as a “shill” in a propaganda drive to promote a Libertarian agenda. These delinquent biases are too retarded to carry as a personal baggage into print, and will not produce any intelligent discussion in the Forum of Freedomsphoenix.com.

If you think “torture” was conducted solely for the amusement of sadistic and sick individuals in the military, move over I am joining you against it. If the government is doing this for fun as you think it is, the Libertarian in me although I am not a Libertarian, will find me in the forefront of the campaign against this atrocious violation of our liberty and freedom.

Unfortunately that is not the purpose of “torture” which we suspect was committed as crime against humanity. Insanity of individuals is not the subject of discussion.

So there we are. The perimeters within which we may debate this bannered issue are clearly drawn. Let’s do it for the interest of the American public, and for the commonweal.

Let’s consider it a duty of every American citizen to clear up this absurdity – if indeed it is – of investigating past presidents who one way or another have been accused of “war crimes” by enemies outside of our borders that in many wars we have vanquished and some of them we are still vanquishing now, together with Bush and Cheney accused by the enemy within as having committed not only “genocides” or crimes against humanity but against the population of this country. #

The writer is an award-winning journalist. Know more about the author by reading his published editorials and feature articles or you may e-mail your comment at ed.superx722@yahoo.com.sg

Dental Rip-Off: Obama Where's Your HealthCare -- Save Those Victims ... Now!

2009-01-31T07:36:00.000-08:00

Expose’ 3 of 3: Dental Rip-Off: Karl Marx Scores A Point
Written by Ed Sumcad
by Ed Sumcad

Dental rip-off is a form of cancer nobody wants to cure.
It is the shock of the time for this country’s ailing
healthcare system.
------------

Dental rip-off concludes this expose’ of the country’s greed-ridden healthcare system. It is a form of cancer that nobody either does not have the willingness to know or the courage to cure [Expose’ 1 and 2. Part 2 has a Prologue where the importance and purpose of this satirical essay are written down for the benefit of the readers.]

Bannered news:: Cancer is an epidemic so pervasive it had surpassed heart disease as the number one killer of Americans under age 85. [1] Currently on record, “98.4 percent of the population is under the age of 85.”

But this is arguably old news. The real shocker of the time about cancer let alone our sick healthcare system is this lethal form of cancer called dental rip-off. The bug that causes it is greed.

This cancer is incurable for the simplest of all reasons that nobody in the healthcare industry or in government wants to treat this multi-billion-dollar profit-making malady.

When one has a bleeding periodontal problem, the patient does not only have a bleeding gum but also a bleeding pocket.

Notice carefully … dental insurance plans in this country say you are covered. What that means is that you are covered to pay your own bills [see the ADA Code “NTCV” opposite the rip-off bills the patient is sentenced to pay].

In the “dental benefits” manual, the public is warned that “American Dental Associations [ADA] codes not listed in this document are not covered benefits.” This gives dental clinics an absolute power to charge helpless patients scandalous sky-is-the-limit fees based on their own codes under the category “not listed” for insurance coverage.

Clever? No … just profit-crazed conjurer in actual practice of their nefarious trade! Patients have just been had. The dangled “dental benefits” is a misnomer, in reality an advertised punishment meant to look like an attractive carrot. It is not “dental benefits” but “dental cheats”!

According to medical studies, the bleeding gum is caused by “immune cells” [2] causing bone loss in periodontal tissues. The accompanying pocket bleeding is caused by human cells immune to public scrutiny in their practice of pick pocketing.

They also pull your legs, not just your teeth, in one of the most excruciating rip-offs a human being could possibly endure.

In hard numbers, there are 80 million Americans suffering this dental disease all over the country. Researchers at The Forsyth Institute, issued an alarm [Dr. Toshihisa Kawai, D.D.S., Ph.D. at http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/08/060828074634.htm

Health insurance, notably HMO [a glutton that gobbles up monthly Medicare benefits], dental insurance and practicing service providers, are in cahoots robbing the public blind.

Go to the dental clinic to get a treatment, and they swoop down on you like winged predators from the sky and bleed you dry.

In Google, Rip-Off Report floods the Internet with complaints coming from all parts of the country. You will be shocked to find out if you engage them at this point of reference --[http://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/0/129/ripoff0129296.htm]

It is more cruel when you happen to be in the dental clinic with a severe toothache. You cannot drive vultures away by punching them in the nose when the insuperable pain of an abscessed tooth numbs your limbs and paralyzes your will to protest much more mentally and physically resist the dishonesty, shiftiness and crookedness of a dip-pocket wringer.

With a swollen mouth, you can even hardly say no, or cry out loud enough to be heard with an “oh, God help me” screech, after they verbalized the bill that you are going to pay. In timing, this usually occurs right after they sit you down on the dental electric chair. It is an electric chair because that’s where they electrify first and then electrocute patients with a huge dental bill to pay.

If you are this unlucky guy seated on that electric chair, you realize soon enough that you are a victim of a hold up, reminiscent of what exactly those dirty-looking horse-riding varmints of the Old Wild West armed with six shooters do to rail and coach travelers.

The truth is, inside the dental clinic, you are at their profiteering environment, in their own element, in their own moment of money-making. As a victimized patient, you have no control whatsoever, like a fly caught in a spider web ready to be devoured alive, especially when you just have but one thing in mind and you don’t care about anything else anymore … just to get that god dam killing tooth out of your swollen jaw.

Some patients are more enduring of pain and more venturesome with their pride and decide to fight a dental rip-off. They have to decide whether to escape from the clinic with an abscessed tooth and catch an infection and pay the whole nasty experience with their life, or just pay the killing dental bill out of their wallet. Sometimes wise value-counseling could save a patient from this tragedy. To be on guard is worth more than just a pound of cure.

I would like to share with you the wisdom my old man bequeathed to me the day I left the small hometown for the big city. There are only three people close to you who could hold a few seconds of your life in their hand and put you completely under their mercy, in which case you are totally helpless and could do nothing about it. So be nice to them, my old man warned. These people are your food server who could spit on your food they served, your barber who holds a razor close to your throat, and your dentist who could pull a nerve and inflict such pain that you wish you are better off dead.

Down the years I came to know what my old man really meant when he warned me of dental pain that I should guard myself against: yes, I realized, it was that hurting toothache and periodontal problem that troubled most Americans out of personal neglect of their health, and no I didn’t realize until lately, that my old man was also referring to this severe pain in the wallet that most if not all of us are now suffering due to the rising cost of healthcare that kills rather than cure the medically afflicted.

Some of us can survive a killing toothache, the wallet pain many of us might not outlive, because of justifiable rage that causes HBP and eventually stroke or cardiac arrest.

Some of us might even live to a hundred years without seeing a dentist. Centenarians of the Hmong tribes in the remote mountains of the Golden Triangle of Laos, Thailand and Vietnam fight tooth decay by chewing a specially homegrown tobacco, conquer pain by smoking an arm-long weed pipe, and just be their own doctor and dentist.

Rising blood pressure due to heartaches over dental robberies occurring everyday is a registered killer. It is heartache caused by toothaches that kills a lot of Americans, more so when HBP rises in tandem with the skyrocketing prices of oil, prescription drugs, health insurance and medical services.

And here’s more … it is not really bleeding gums but bleeding hearts that caused a great number of Americans to dial 911 for quick appointment with emergency doctors in the ICU. Records show that in this country, millions die of financial hemorrhage. Usually, in bankruptcy, a gun in the temple squares it all.

The dental gang that robs the public blind has no conscience. Probably that’s because the way it is done is very disarming.

For example, when you visit a dental clinic, the desk girl in the counter is normally young, pretty and gracious. She greets you with a disarming smile. That’s because you are being prepared for the slaughter.

The dentist appears cool and coy when asked how much he/she is charging you for his dental service. You normally hear this: I am sorry. I wish I know so that I could tell you. I would even give you a discount if the cost worries you, if I only know how much the clinic is charging per patient for what I do here, but I don’t.
And the conversation normally ends with a rude statement: I just work here.

At this point of your rising wonderment, you get a sympathy dental look and a pat in the back for you to stay calm … no, I did not say a stab in the back [that’s for you to find out].

What you just heard from the dentist, of course, is all baloney! Don’t fall for this innocent crap, much more jump into their trap. Before the kill, they refer you first to several specialists because your case is allegedly not just for the ordinary dentist to handle – just to be sure, you are told, and for your own safety! Each of these attending specialists charges you separately with sky-rocketing fees.

They operate as a group! They do this as an SOP [standard operating procedure], especially to patients whose dental insurance does not cover referral to specialists where billing sky is the limit.

While in the dental clinic, the voices of comfort you hear could be that of a ghoul that your wallet attracts, or that of a serial killer as far as financial murder is about to take place, right before the throat is cut horizontally or brutally fang-punctured, or before the ax is dropped on the jugular vein of your bank account. Financial vampires normally aim for the jugular vein, suck the blood out of your billfold and, if you are paying monthly, the life of your savings slowly ebbs away. That’s how health insurance which includes those so-called “dental plans”, grows fat and fatter everyday, 365 days a year this year, and in the next, and in all the years thereafter. This explains why the industry is larger than that fabled ogre in the story of Jack and the Bean-Stalk. You are Jack that the Giant cut down to pieces, not the bean-stalk.

Healthcare rip-off was $60.0 billion in 2004 according to an astonishing study, actually based on the confession of conscience-stricken Aaron Greenvald [2], a hardworking doctor who took part in healthcare’s legalized “swindle”. The figure had more than doubled to outstanding proportion, since the “swindle” was recorded four years ago.

What is alarming about this dental “swindle” is that, teeth clinics lower their cost by rendering poor quality service to the consumers, to maximize profit. If scams are bad to your health, this one is beastly, and the taking is animalistic.

It is a crime to humanity to encourage and promote this craze modus operandi for quick profit, risking the lives of patients for financial reward. This is the notorious case of Western Dental of California with some 115 dental centers serving some 350,000 Californians. [3]

For repeated abuses of this nature, WDC received a stiff fine of 3 million dollars, the Department of Corporation reported. The culprit was temporarily derailed, paid the fine, and presto [!] is now back on the road. It is that simple.

Corporate predators have accumulated enough profits that they could pay any amount of fines anytime even if willful violations are repeated and paying fines continues till hell freezes over. The money they pay does not come from their account but from the pockets of the public they duped and skinned alive.

Culprits of greed the likes of WDC, can go bust or hang themselves in a nearby tree for all we care. But the onus of our disgusting concern is simply this: For as long as greed can buy out punishment for dental rip-offs, our sick healthcare industry is a permanent host of this type of cancer in the system.

Karl and the country’s radical Left would rather abolish greed for profit by making healthcare the sole responsibility ofgovernment, giving it all free to the people. After all, the struggling class has already paid for it from the fruits of their hard labor, so the Left correctly claims. However, the common denominator to make this possible is more public funding via heavier taxes, which to me in the long haul is rather a higher cost for buying greed out of the system the other way around.

What greed in Capitalism am I talking about? I will talk economics to answer this question. It is an expectation of more than you as an investor, by economic law, is entitled to; it is Adam Smith’s driving free market force that becomes so all-consuming that all rational analysis is left at the back door for happy time to steal it away from you while you exit the front door in a state of abundance and euphoria.

But my objection to Karl Marx’s opposition to Capitalism is that capitalism is mistaken as greed itself. It is not. Capitalism working through free market access is the most efficient tool for wealth creation ever known to man. Radical socialists and Leftist liberals are terribly wrong as usual in their faulty calculus about how man lives in the real world.

I am writing about the theory of compassionate Capitalism in the draft of my book where wealth is channeled not solely to the benefit of the privileged few but to the betterment of society’s dispossessed, as well as to the disadvantaged in life.

The only problem with Capitalism is that it hosts parasites with insatiable craving for wealth.

For example, in the capitalist world, parasites like those in the insurance industry generate a higher cost of Capitalism in terms of loss of life and human suffering. Think of the over-charging dental clinic in your community and its kind all over the country. Think of rich conglomerates that wallow in wealth that because of greed are still running after the pockets of wage earners who work for them as in the case of the Safeway employees that staged a nationwide strike when their chain of rich corporate employers tried to deprive them and their families of health insurance coverage.

Notice carefully that people are dying in this land of abundance, affluence and prosperity because healthcare is unaffordable [?], is a very weird phenomenon if not a high crime abated by public apathy. It is an ugly result of the industry’s profit-propelled abuses of helpless consumers combined with the government’s intentional neglect.

This situational problem is a total disgrace to mankind, more so when this country is ironically known to the world as the most compassionate donor of billions of dollars annually to the oppressed, the poor and the needy everywhere, not just being admired and emulated as the mightiest and the wealthiest nation on the planet!

To human beings the world over who love and worship God, this aberration of mind-boggling proportion is so frightening a wrong to contemplate, so outrageously maddening to even think about it -- absolutely contemptible, unforgivable, despicable and condemnable.

And yet, consider the weakness and vulnerability of our free enterprise society that succumbs to greed. While we kick the bucket in protest of this endemic failure of the system, all the cordial and polite learned can say is that the tragedy is so abhorrently regrettable but at the same time disgustingly understandable!

Attacking all the pretenses of Capitalism, whether facts or fiction does not matter, Karl Marx scores a damning point that even I, the writer of this painful expose’, hate to admit. #

[This ends this 3-part expose’. Readers may comment or react accordingly.]

The writer is an award-winning journalist. You may e-mail your comment at ed.superx722@yahoo.com.sg. This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Most Despised GOP Presidential Aspirant Used By Haters Of America To Air Chips On the Shoulder

2009-01-13T09:39:00.000-08:00

By Edwin A. Sumcad
Appeared in American Chronicle
June 30, 2007

It is hard to argue against medical findings that once hatred is puked out of the system, it relieves a chronic disorder. This disorder is some kind of anxiety or OCD [obsessive-compulsive disorder]. Obsession may take the form of “repetitive ideas, thoughts and impulses [that] may focus on violence …” [1] Imagined threats make hostile aggression compulsive.

There are some readers who reacted to my article using that means of relief. The published article The Politics Of Solitude And The Economics Of The Cave In The Age Of Starwars [11] appeared in the American Chronicle June 27, 2007. It drew an OCD release from incorrigible haters of America and from congenital bangers of whatever America represents who found a common interest with Ron Paul, GOP presidential aspirant whose politics of isolation and economics of the cave were exhaustively exposed in the said editorial report.

The presidential wannabe referred to is considered an oddball because he is arguing for and in fact defending the 9/11 terrorist attack, by finding a plethora of faults in our foreign policy, and in the way we handle the war on terror here in the home front and in the Middle East which he believed justified the terrorists’ attacks killing thousands of innocent Americans.

The oddity of this runner for Republican presidential nomination is that he exudes with an overabundance of rhetorical venoms that sting and daze his opponents in public debate, and spits his philosophical toxins to knock out his prey in public, i.e. “cockroaches” in Washington, D.C., or maybe the greedy, light-fingered “globalist United Nations”, if not the U.S. policy makers in government; he accuses, convicts and hangs the government by the neck out of a litany of slipups and blunders real or imagined of which he is at the same time the accuser, the judge and the executioner.

Paul’s rhetorical arguments in the campaign trail had caught up with haters of America. In one of his follower’s published articles, the government is referred to as a fat “pig” that dipped into the pocket of wage earners in a fiscal robbery called “taxation”. Because of his aberration towards the Federal Government’s revenue-making role in the funding of public expenditures allegedly at the expense of the American people being robbed of their hard-earned income, Republican presidential tax caucuses and forums had started to exclude him and his mouthpieces from their group; in my honest observation and objective assessment of what’s happening, it’s like Republicans are now avoiding him and his handful of noisy supporters the way social lepers in the Bible were shunned and avoided. With haters of America behind them, they are very toxic to American voters who abhor them; without any iota of doubt Paul and his small but hyped yet unacceptable supporters would drag the Republican standard bearer down with him in defeat in the coming 2008 November election.

At this writing, a recent news release made an important announcement that The Iowans for Tax Relief and Iowa Christian Alliance are going to host a presidential candidates forum this coming Saturday, June 30, 2007. Ron Paul was not invited. [2]

The public was not surprise at all by this deliberate omission. In fact the American public was if my pulse reading is correct, even expecting that Paul would drop out of the race sooner than later, and spare disquieted Americans the agony of his relentless attacks on government policies and of his aggravated abuse of the government that emboldens terrorists to launch an attack. First it weakens the Republican Party with the national election just lurking around the corner. Second, terrorists are assured with the feeling that once they attack, Congressman Ron Paul who is aspiring to become President of the United States will be there to blame the government and the American foreign policy makers for the carnage.

It is an aggravated abuse of the government because Paul works for the government and paid the salary of a congressman plus all of the emoluments he receives appurtenant thereto, all paid for out of the tax money that the government had raised which he attacked. The image he projects to angry Americans as an “oddball” that has risen from the catacomb of Hell is never held in doubt.

His exclusion from the Iowa presidential forum was to the American pubic, poetic justice. For at the same time it really explains among others why Paul is the most despised GOP presidential aspirant in the beltway. Since he hits the government hard short of calling it stupid in provoking the terrorists’ 911 attacks, haters of America only use him and his anti-government hang up, in ventilating their anger towards America to relieve their chronic anxiety or OCD as stated in the early part of this editorial insight.

If we examine the reactions of pro-Paul haters of America to the published article I have mentioned, we find no brain, only emotional kicks -- just this emotional release described.

To illustrate citing an example: It is an established premise in the article that nations looked up to the United States as the leader of the world, and no longer when out of his politics of isolation and solitude Paul will return life back to the cave when he is President. That U.S. world leadership is not questioned needs no proof. It is of global knowledge. Yet reacting to the article, haters of America scoffed at it and attacked it hammer and tong calling it “a neo-con rah-rah garbage”!! To them this is not real, much more understandable …!

Almost feel the heat of emotional binge the way it was expressed or thrown up?

One reaction was out of this world “esoteric”. There was a repetitive compulsive objection to having a Federal Reserve. This very daring guy [I admire his tenacity to venture into an area of discipline where others maybe too embarrassed to tread] labored to convince me that he was qualified to argue the macroeconomic role of the central bank [the Fed in U.S.] in development economics. I was mortified. I knew that little knowledge they say is dangerous. He thought that the only function of Fed is to rob people of their money by charging interest…! He asked where is the “reserve”, and answered it himself that it was all stolen. It takes hillbillies a spur of the moment to think that they had become Keynesian experts in macroeconomics overnight while it takes not less than six years for schooled economists to master the trade. If at all, he has his OCD relief. However,ignorance saturated the air and it was suffocating.

“Ron Paul wants us to leave Iraq because we have no business being there… there is no purpose …” said another e-mailing hater.

Is there any brain here anyone can see? The thoughts expressed in those lines are in biology, abiotic. The worth of our business in Iraq is already reaching a hundred billion dollars if not today, tomorrow, and some 4,000 dead American soldiers, and still counting. Think about what they know and how they look at the war in Iraq and understand what kind of people we are dealing with here.

Another fan of Paul thought Paul was the smartest candidate because unlike the other candidates, to defeat the enemy, he wants to study and know first the enemy. No, talking of who is smart and who is not, he is not even a shadow of his nemesis Rudy Giuliani. A scatterbrain does not compare to Giuliani who is surging ahead in the polls without looking back. Sorry to disappoint a rabid fan.

After Paul knew that the enemy who attacked us in 9/11 was Al Qaeda, then what? What did Paul do to defeat the enemy since he knew who it is? It is now six years since we were attacked … since Paul knew who Osama bin Laden is, up to now he still remains a loquacious windtalker and no action, just yakking-yakking, boasting about his mouth formula, re, how to defeat the enemy. Are we to believe that he is competing against President Bush for public lynching in this area?

Empty rhetoric makes the American public hates this presidential pretender even more. He is a talker of strange words with a philosophical obsession as strange as his politics of isolation and solitude for Americans, and for the country, his bizarre economics of the cave; he was in fact picturing the best life for Americans in the United States in the age of Starwars, as one comparable to that of the first Homo Erectus with a club.

Another confused hater apologized for and in Paul’s behalf, trying very hard to make me understand that his extraterrestrial idol does not hate or blame the American people, only the American government. If you disparage this government of the people, by the people and for the people, whose nose are you punching to spite the face? If the government is not the American people, from what planet did this hater come from?

Finally, delusion of popularity has caught up with Paul’s equally obsessed followers. One wrote: “[P]opularity [Paul’s] has skyrocketed … that reality is in extreme contradiction with your article.” In this case, attention is called after the fact, viz, since in the polls Paul remains in the status of a nuisance candidate for nomination, desperation on the part of his small group of campaigners is turning to be the mother of lies.

Paul is publicly rejected and unranked that he does not even have a Chinaman’s chance to break into the nomination list of Republican presidential aspirants. Go to the Gallup Polls, June 11-14, 2007 the latest at this writing, of PollingReport.com at http://www.pollingreport.com/wh0rep.htm.

The leading frontrunners are Rudy Giuliani [by a comfortable margin], Fred Thompson, John McCain, Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich in that order. Paul’s name is even hardly found in the bottom of the list of nuisance presidential wannabes. This popularity-preference line-up is consistent. It hardly changes.

A handful of Paul’s converts could be conducting their own kangaroo polls, i.e. text voting in FoxNews. Said RightWinged on May 15, 2007 at 11:56 PM time of posting in the website: “Ron Paul has a bunch of nutty supporters who think they’re going to make some statement by wasting their time and money voting in this stupid thing. It’s like when the Kos Kids flood online MSNBC polls and ‘prove’ that 95% of the country wants to impeach Bush.” [3] It was not a funny joke! It was pulling the leg of the public in a shameless way.

The public cannot be fooled. “Here are 2 on-line polls that haven’t been totally hijacked by the Ron Paul kiddies … Wearetheright.com and Thevirtualvideomapblog.” DannoJyd on May 16, 2007 at 1:06 AM. [Refer to Note (3)] “The nutroots are hijacking the text poll…losers.” SouthernGent on May 15, 2007 at 11:24 PM. [Refer to Note (3)]

Angry comments in the Web indicate the possibility of public lynching. I will just pick up at random a couple or so of public abuses heaped on Paul that under the ethics of journalism may be salvaged to make them printable.

“How can you tell a Ron Paul supporter from a left wing truther? You can’t.” liberrocky on May 16, 2007 at 12:20 AM [Refer to Note (3)].

All that follows came from the same angry website: “ ‘Ding Ding’ was an appropriate sound effect for ding dong Ron (Puke) Paul.” kevcad on May 16, 2007 at 12:20 AM

“So, the hostages were our fault, too? He’s beyond stupid. He’s insane.” amerpundit on May 15, 2007 at 11:29 PM.

“Ron Paul is a nut-case. Why the hell is he running as a Republican?!? I just listened to him in Hannity and Colmes. This guy makes Ross Perot look normal.” Talon on May 15, 2007 at 11:46 PM

And here’s the scambug: Among the GOP presidential nomination contenders, Paul claims to be the only enforcer of the U.S. Constitution. His followers are duped into believing that he is. He is not – he is a defiler if not a violator of the Constitution.

As Congressman, Paul have been trying to pass a law but to no avail providing that the “United States end its participation in the corrupt UN entirely …” to use his undiplomatic language. [4]

Notice carefully what I have to say to this: Our entry into the UN is by documented special agreement under Article VI on Treaties of the U.S. Constitution. “… all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land …” [5]

It is also in Article II Section 2, Clause 2 of the U.S. Constitution, which specifies Agreements Under the United Nations Charter. This corresponds to Article 43 of the UN Charter under which by special agreement categorized as “treaty” -- the supreme law of the land -- the United States, being a member of the United Nations, is required to provide when called for, “armed forces, assistance, and facilities, including rights of passage, necessary for the purpose of maintaining international peace and security.” [6]

The United Nations Participation Act of December 20, 1945, implements these provisions as follows: “The President is authorized to negotiate a special agreement or agreements with the Security Council.”

Note that under this Act, our financial obligations to the UN, the sending of troops to troubled spots in the world at the call of the UN are, among others, mandated by the Constitution.

Does Paul respect this constitutional covenant with the United Nations as provided for in the Constitution? This is what he said: “The United Nations remains determined to rob from wealthy countries [especially the United States] and, after taking a big cut for itself, send what’s left to the poor countries.”

The mandate to honor our financial support and “assistance”, among others, to UN, is a constitutional covenant. And what is it to Paul … a robbery committed by the UN …!!

Not only that … Paul wants to end the United States’ participation in or connection to the UN by passing a law that violates the Constitution…! His politics of isolation speaks louder than words.

Be that as it may, in my humble opinion, Paul badly needs to learn by heart the rudiments of protocol, diplomatic niceties and international leadership [to refine his language as a congressman who wants to be President of the United States], as well as legal advice and supervision, at least from a UN diplomat and a lawyer. I will help colleagues in those particular areas of discipline who would stand by him in seeing to it that he gets a special make-over, especially with reference to his vulgar public persona, including his other shortcomings.

Amend first the Constitution before you can “protect your [taxpayers’] hard-earned money from the greedy hands of the globalist United Nations,” to use his raw language for a start in this learning process.

My initial advice to him at this distance and I hope his handful of followers will get it too is, don’t be a glutton for public scorn even if you thirst for public accolade as champion of the taxpayers by attacking the United Nations in violation of the Constitution.

It does not make a hell of sense. #

© Copyright Edwin A. Sumcad. Access June 29, 2007.

The author is a veteran diplomat-journalist and for more than 45 years a recipient of numerous excellence awards in journalism. His editorial insights appear in other publications and published in several websites. A brief comment may be e-mailed to ed.superx722@yahoo.com.sg.

Notes (1) to (6) are available for reference but not printed for space.

The Light I Share With The New President: Stay In The Middle Of The Road Where You Are Safe!

2008-12-27T19:57:00.000-08:00

We may have a dagger of irreconcilable differences to strike down Barack Obama in the gladiators’ arena while we debate our fate in the next four years or so, but no American in his right mind would want the president to fail in a hostile freaking world where when the United States fails means at the end of the rope we hang ourselves dead by the neck.

We have such a damning reason to share our individual light of wisdom with this new president that he may not stumble in the dark. I cannot speak for others with a free mind of their own, but I am sharing mine with him right now: Mr. Obama must know that there is a trapdoor of advocacy between Liberalism on the edge and Conservatism in extremis. Once a diehard with a one-track mind is trapped, there is no way out!

Obama cannot be or should not be a leftist revolutionary president for change that he had been drumbeating to the world during the last election campaign that scared the hell out of millions of Americans.

Now that he is president, Obama can no longer be an ideological crusader for socialism the way Bill Ayers is or has been, nor can he be a conservative extremist in the shoes of Timothy James McVeigh or Theodore Kaczynski whose passion for reform is anchored on hate and violence.

Remember the spiteful ideologues of the extreme Left battering this nation not too long ago? America was a victim of the violent activities of the Weather Underground. The leader, Bill Ayers notoriously known as “the radical American bomber of the violent 1960s” vehemently opposed the war in Vietnam. He is a former associate of the president-elect when he was a community organizer in Chicago; and Ayers is now in the academe actively campaigning to turn America into a socialist state.

You may recall also the very angry right-wingers represented by the Oklahoma City bomber and the Unibomber that terrorized the nation. Their violent revolution for change clashed with that of the far Left in intensity turning us all into a bunch of losers in the eyes of the world.

Those extreme forces in the opposite sides of the great divide have one thing in common: Their deep passion to change the world – their kind of “rebellion” or “revolution” comes from the dark side … a place of choice that we free people all have, but too scary for the president of the United States to be!

So my concluding advice to Obama is, when the opposite dark contenders in the great divide battle their cause to win the spotlight to change America, for him the safe way is to stay in the middle.

That having said with a careful ounce of caution than a pound of reckless indifference, still I would like to climb the belfry of concern and ring the bell of alarm for Obama so that he would be careful and watchful of all his decisions and actions, in behalf of and for the good of the American people, whether or not they voted for him in the last presidential election.

One of the most telling conservatisms my ever-continuing research on this subject had ever stumbled upon that could divide and in the long run destroy the nation, was one espoused by Sen. Phil Gramm. It appeared in the “International Herald Tribune” on May 8, 1995. The Texas Senator attacked the New Deal and the Great Society on welfare that created the nation’s “social safety net”, as “… a hammock that is robbing the country of freedom and virtue.” This crusading thought for political expediency is totally devoid of human compassion for the poor whose fault is not indolence but of malfunctioning equal opportunity.

The “safety net” allegory reflects on the image of a citizen who is having a hard time in life thus figuratively speaking, is walking the tightrope. This tightrope is a narrow and perilous moral path, and walking on it means that the citizen is working hard with skill and dedication, yet all but the most skilled are bound to fall. Without a net to catch those who fall, we have a nation of the homeless, let alone a general feeling of homelessness in an otherwise affluent society.

Just think of those who are off the high rope, temporarily or permanently socially disconnected when they lost their job for many reasons … when becoming disabled, for having a severe health condition that forfeits the ability to earn, when different kinds of misfortune strike one’s life, and so forth and so on … you name it.

Welfare is not really contemptible but compatible to those taxpayers whose concerns for the commonweal are not only in their purse but also in their heart. We become a government of relief and assistance to our citizenry and to the world when the need arises and we can still afford it.

Internationally, our commitment is a matter of foreign policy written in stone since our founding fathers signed the document of our nationhood with their blood. We erected an everlasting monument to it as a national pledge to humanity – the Statue of Liberty.

In the local scene, temporary support is provided by the government’s social programs until the unfortunate and the economically disadvantaged pull up again and get back on the tightrope, while assistance in many forms is provided to the disabled. To disengage from being a humane society even to animals let alone to human beings by condemning this socially decreed “safety net”, as “a hammock that is robbing the country of freedom and virtue” is to our wounded mind, similar to if not worse than that extreme Rightist Oklahoma City bombing that terribly injured this nation and forever left an ugly scar in our living memory.

Stereotyping those who live on welfare manifests a high degree of lack of empathy, and when viewed philosophically, extreme narrow-mindedness. Tightrope walking is caused by many situational factors other than just laziness [this poverty-cause-factor is almost an insignificant percentage of the whole welfare recipients], mostly misfortunes that befall on one’s life.

I can never forget the case of this hardworking colleague professor who for some reasons his wife and two children had left him to live alone in his house. He lost his fortune in a protracted family lawsuit, and his industry was cut short when he caught a terminal cancer.

Until the end, this scholar was figuratively “lying in the hammock” of social legislation, piteously dependent on public succor. Devoid of empathy, heartless Conservative extremists would have written in this man’s epitaph the following: “Up to the end, here lies the lazy man on Gramm’s hammock”. For me it is a tearful memory of a friend who would have died out of a radical Conservative mean-spiritedness.

On the other hand, the rejection of extreme liberalism on moral grounds is plain commonsense. But when one is also compulsively addicted to hating conservatism, it is as hard as when junkies struggle to stay away from drugs.

Most often than not, radicalism of the Left is abhorrently odious. Street protests are too vulgar and violent to be publicly acceptable. Spitting on veterans while demonstrating against the war in Iraq the protesters thought was “illegal” as what happened in a nationally televised January 27, 2007 leftwing organized protests in Washington, D.C., is even more unwarranted and loathsome than when our standard societal mores are violently scandalized.

We are mesmerized by this façade of politically dedicated Liberals fighting intolerance and inhumanity to others, and for a government that would willingly stand up for, not abscond, social responsibility. However, jumping over the edge in extremis is as contemptible as the Oklahoma City bombing of the extreme Right. It is as objectionable because the conceptualized freedom to act is so distorted and recklessly misplaced that the danger to society is deceptively insidious to prevent.

No less than President Bill Clinton demonstrated this to himself. The right of teenagers [the experience of his younger years] “to sniff” or “to smoke a little bit of marijuana” just to find out what it is all about, was one of Clinton’s painful public crucifixion in his version of individual freedom. It is similar to trying a poison on one’s self to prove if it works.

It’s like jumping naked over a mile-deep cliff of the Grand Canyon, just to find out if you can fly, or if you would die when you hit the rocks at the bottom and wonder if your body will break into pieces.

This freedom to be just curious and to sample the essence of tragedy in order to be wiser is neither advisable nor acceptable. Nobody has more than one life to spare to validate the folly of such experiment.

On personal discipline, Bill Clinton’s political graveyard is his failure to give priority attention to social morality and responsibility which happened to be admirable, rather than to selfish individual morality and responsibility, which when it goes out of hand, is despicable. The material witness to this catastrophe was Monica Lewinsky. Too much freedom of the libido can defile the Oval Office.

Obama must keep in mind that feminism and gay rights are sticky issues for a liberal make-over to rationalize their cause for public acceptance. Gays have rights as ordinary person like that which you and I have. What makes them different from us is their sexual orientation. As long as their sexual behavior does not harm anyone in particular, and the public in general, they have their equal rights to pursue their own peace and happiness.

What is probably troubling to many is the absolute freedom of gays to practice legalized “gayism” in an altruistic society where tolerance of a unique exception becomes the general societal norm.

An example of the objectionable of which about 65% of American majority abhors as a moral distortion is when marriage in the civil code is redefined to be no longer exclusive between man and woman only but also between the same sex.

This was recently defeated in California when Californians voted for Proposition 8.

The problem is, this freedom of the Liberals to do what one sees fit, could lead to one marrying anyone else regardless of blood relations or marrying something else. I don’t think that for the moment, our civilized world is prepared to absorb the shock of these free-for-all distortions of marriage.

I recall I have read in the Internet sometime in the past an old rich widow who lived alone in another state by herself, proudly announcing to the world her support for legalized sexless marriages – she wanted to marry her cats! Of course it turned out to be a joke to me, although it was actually happening in the real world.

Although the motive behind the exercise of free choice in the extreme of liberalism is heretofore unknown, the general public deserves a warning – especially President Obama -- that the road to perdition is paved with good intentions.

Again the problem with liberalism in extremist is not just credibility but also coherence. Conservatives are known to be systemic; they are organized as a solid force to peddle their values to the American public.

But don’t fault the truth of this statement by saying that the Republicans lost in the last presidential election because they were not “a solid force” in selling their American values to the voting public. Take note of the fact I am referring to the Conservatives, not to the Republican Party which was so weak and politically fragmented.

It was impossible for the Republicans to win in the last presidential election because their candidate, Republican maverick John McCain and the Democrat Party were both attacking the Republicans. The only Conservative candidate in the last electoral contest was Alaska Governor Sarah Palin. But she was not a Republican candidate for president.

Notwithstanding all these, President Obama must not forget to remember the important lessons of the last election. What has been written about the Liberals in moral leadership is that, the progressive hierarchy misunderstood its own politics as a coalition of interest groups.

The truth is, the Liberals are as disjointed and scrappy as the Republicans are. With the extreme Left and the moderate Liberals pulling each other in different directions, arguing their platform in public is an uphill struggle that makes their cause hardly credible.

I have written an editorial about the Liberals’ shotgun criticisms of the United States’ intrusion on world affairs under the title U.S. Meddling: Don’t Shoot Bullets of Ignorance that appeared in the websites of American Chronicle and affiliates on July 14, 2005. It was critical of the Liberals’ directionless party leadership.

Unfortunately, hard core Liberal activists had taken over AC’s editorial management staff and this important published report read by millions nationwide and worldwide was too much for their cause, and was removed from the sites at the height of the then coming hotly contested November 4, 2008 presidential election. However, the original copyright copy is retained and it is currently on file.

Conservative and Liberal extremists are competing cutthroats in the suppression of free speech. There is no doubt about it.

Just recently politicized members of the left-leaning Media held free journalism hostage in the quest for power. We were flabbergasted witnesses to how they suppressed Sarah Palin’s free speech before they cut her down to pieces making her looked like a lost Katzenjammer Kid in the comic strip.

If Obama chooses to stay in the middle, he should brace himself for this powerful pull of gravity from his Liberal counterparts in the far Left and their restless entourage of street activists. He could not afford to let those forces from the dark side win the misguided into their fold. Their way leads to the gate of Hell.

It is my hope that this editorial memorandum to President Obama is not an insurance deductible that covers the hazards of militant Liberalism we must all pay in the ledger of moral accounting.

Now that President Obama is behind the wheel armed with the people’s power, he should take the middle of the road when he drives us all to this nation’s written destiny. #

The writer is an award-winning journalist. Know more about the author by reading his published editorials and feature articles or you may e-mail your comment at ed.superx722@yahoo.com.sg