Lost in Space

I have come to the time

when losses outstrip gains

when the losses, tangible and

not, are my daily friends

and though some of them

are dearer than others

one or another are constantly and

consistently in my company

There is a sweet sadness in the

never agains, there

is a sweetness in remembering

those times I would forget

A first kiss, a run taken

a worry free moment, a walk

in the field, a summer

unburdened and limitless

The fact that I didn’t –

I couldn’t – notice their passing

makes their leaving sadder

but closer to my soul

Maybe there will be another love

another carefree walk, another

time without regrets. My heart

says yes, but my head

says otherwise

                          Jeff Miles November 2010

Rand Paul and Conservatives in La La Land

Harry Truman said that Richard Nixon talked out of both sides of his mouth, lied from both of them.  Now that the election is over, note the “subtle” shift in approach by Rand Paul, newly elected Senator from the great state of Kentucky. The following is from Rand Paul’s website (http://www.randpaul2010.com/2010/02/rands-contagious-conservatism/) from before the election:

Rand Paul appreciates Republican Senator Jim DeMint introducing today a one-year ban on earmark spending and a balanced-budget amendment. Rand strongly supports both initiatives and has made them centerpieces of his campaign for limited government, including his signing of the Citizens Against Government Waste “No pork pledge.”

Mathew Kaminski, of the Wall Street Journal, noted the following from an interview with Paul last weekend:

In a bigger shift from his campaign pledge to end earmarks, he (Paul) tells me that they (earmarks) are a bad "symbol" of easy spending but that he will fight for Kentucky's share of earmarks and federal pork, as long as it's doled out transparently at the committee level and not parachuted in in the dead of night. "I will advocate for Kentucky's interests," he says.

So you're not a crazy libertarian? "Not that crazy," he cracks.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704353504575596591626268782.html?mod=WSJ_article_related)

So, we’re OK with pork as long as the hogs are raised in the bluegrass state?

Almost as disconcerting (but frankly quite a bit funnier) is this from an article by Jackie Calmes in today’s New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/10/us/politics/p10spending.html ). She noted that a Republican “study group” pledged to save $ 25 billion over 10 years by cutting a part of President Obama’s stimulus package, the part that consisted of an emergency welfare fund. The problem with this is that the fund ceased to exist September 30. So we’re now going call cutting a non-existent program a spending cut? Aside from the math (and I can’t help but think of Jethro from the Beverly Hillbilly’s saying “naught times 10 is naught) there is a bit of what color is the sky in your world? Representative Jim McDermat noted “what’s next?  Claiming savings for cutting New Deal work programs that ended 70 years ago?”. 

Here’s a news bulletin: EVERYBODY is against “wasteful government spending”. Who could be for such a thing? But as you get to particulars (something the Tea Party and cohorts are loath to do) the question becomes “who’s ox is getting gored here?,” and if it is a program that hurts a specific group, they’re going to deny it’s wasteful. If you want to cut the budget in any real way it needs to come from four:  Health and Human Services, Social Security, Defense, or the Fed. No one (from either party) will touch Social Security, the Fed is payment of interest of bonds, etc., cutting defense while we have boots on the ground in Afghanistan is unpalatable to conservatives, and in this down economy the amount of human suffering that cutting Health and Human Services would be unspeakable. But now is put up or shut up time – the Republicans and Tea Party  am who came to power looking for less government needs to come up with real numbers, cut real pork all around (if they are going to do it), and come up with cuts to programs that actually exist.

Lo! thy dread empire, Chaos! is restored;
dies before thy uncreating word:
thy hand, great Anarch! lets the curtain fall;
and universal darkness buries all.

Alexander Pope

I am concerned for the body politic, for I see  that days of non-rationality and proud anti-intellectualism are going to prevail. I hesitate to term the tea baggers the "far-right" in that I see no coherent message other than fear (and I've got mine, I don't care about you). I have too much respect for conservatives (true conservatives, in the class of Russel Kirk and William Buckley) to want to take the party of Palin seriously, but I think we must take them seriously, as one would take a dread disease seriously.

It feels as if we are entering a period of darkness, but perhaps this is all a function of the economy, and frankly of racism. My only real hope is that a strong victory by Palin's crew today will likely insure Obama's re-election. The Republican party will have to go further and further to the right to nominate an candidate acceptable to the Tea Party (or someone will need to morph into something far enough that direction), and while that candidate will thus have deep support at the right, they will become too far right for the majority.

I think the source of much of this anger was health care, and I find it amazing and repugnant that people oppose extending health care here, unlike every other 1st world nation. I don't know that I would argue it is a constitutional right, but I would argue that extending health care to all is the right thing to do.

Grey Days

It is rainy and grey here in Elk Rapids, and yesterday I was reminded of this great poem by Anne Halley.

Dear God, the Day is Grey

Dear God, the day is grey. My house

is not in order. Lord, the dust

sifts through my rooms and with my fear

I sweep mortality, outwear

my brooms, but not this leaning floor

which lasts and groans, I, walking here,

still loathe the Labors I would love

and hate the self I cannot move.

And God, I know the unshined boards,

the flaking ceiling, various stains

that mottle these distempered goods,

the greasy cloths, the jagged tins,

the dog that paws the garbage cans.

I know what laborings, love, and pains,

my blood would will, yet will not give:

The knot of hair that clogs the drains

clots in my throat. My dyings thrive.

The refuse, Lord, that I put out

burns in vast pits incessantly.

All piecemeal deaths, trash, undevout

and sullen sacrifice, to thee.