Valencia County News-Bulletin
Wednesday 29 December 2010
Opinion Section [page 4A]
Constitution doesn’t allow religious laws
The religion of Judaism prohibits eating pork or shrimp. The religion of Islam prohibits eating pork and subjugates females. The religion of Catholicism prohibits birth control and medical procedures such as vasectomy or abortion. Vegetarians prohibit the eating of meat and/or eggs and/or fish.
Each and every one of these rules is based on religious belief.
That pesky First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution says that any attempt to legislate any religious belief is unconstitutional.
The attempt to enforce by law any of the religious beliefs in the first paragraph is prevented at the federal, the state, and the local level, and has been since 1791.
The flip side is that if the beliefs of the Catholic religion are passed into law, that would then make the beliefs of the Druids, the Muslims, the vegetarians, the Flat Earth Society, Judaism and the Ku Klux Klan — all equal candidates for such legislation.
Really bad idea. No bacon? No matanzas? Burkas on every female in Valencia County? Thank goodness there is the principle of separation of church and state.
The Semi-Pro-Life crowd can promote any rules within their community that they choose. When a granddaughter turns up pregnant, any reader can counsel that child for or against any next action to take.
But what nobody can do under the U.S. Constitution is make their religious beliefs the law of the land.
G.E. NORDELL
Belén, New Mexico
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Valencia County News-Bulletin
Saturday 18 December 2010
Opinion Section [page 4A]
The Republican Party, voters are to blame
Robert Sanders writes that he has not sold out to the oligarchs. Then why does he act as the self-appointed local apologist for the fascist oligarchy, and repeat such non-sensical parsiflage and propaganda in this newspaper?
In Sanders’ world, opinions are facts and facts are opinions.
1. Case in point: There has been no discredit of the assertion that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce received money from the Chinese and handed it off to Karl Rove to purchase U.S. voters. None whatsoever. The facts are this: The U.S. Chamber refused to produce any response, they simply stonewalled and said “Not the business of the U.S. voter.”
2. The United States Constitution was cancelled and the country declared a fascist country on Jan. 21., 2010, by the U.S. Supreme Court, in their farcical Citizens United decision. (The decision is bad law and ludicrous on its face; the problem is that there is no appeal process, except perhaps the unlikely option of Constitutional Amendment.)
3. The class war is perpetual. Until the people take power back from the fascist oligarchs, their war – for a return to feudalism and aristocracy and a free ride for the oligarchs, for pollution, for an ignorant populace, for constant wars against foreign nations – continues. Workers struggle to form unions and families struggle just to feed themselves (one third of Americans live in poverty) and the next generation looks into the economic abyss.
The progressive side of this perpetual class war is for dignity and health and safety and a quality of life that died with the Reagan-Bush economic policies.
4. Susana Martinez is a carpet-bagger. The $800,000 that she accepted from the Texas oil barons will benefit Texas at the expense of New Mexico.
5. The reference to Dodd and Frank is a non-sequitur. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac collapsed during Dubya’s final year (two days after Obama became the official Democratic candidate). The entire G.O.P. economic collapse was planned from 1999 when Sen. Phil Gramm cancelled the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933, which kept the economy out of trouble between 1934 and 2002. (Gramm is now a board member and lobbyist for United Swiss Bank.)
The Republican Party is to blame; Republican voters are to blame, fascist apologists are to blame.
Need a job? Ask a Republican.
G.E. NORDELL
Belén, New Mexico
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response to my Letter of December 18 above
Valencia County News-Bulletin
Saturday 8 January 2011
Opinion / Letters [page 5A]
Saying so doesn’t make it true
When I read the News-Bulletin, I always save the best to read till the last. It’s the letters to the editor.
The letters offer a menu that ranges from the profound to the ridiculous. The latest letter from G.E. Nordell leads me to a longer than usual response.
His letters always are fun to read and even more fun to respond to.
Mr. Nordell and I obviously live in different universes. In his world, the opinions of my world become facts in his world, and facts become opinions. A neat trick. Continuing.
1. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce received money from foreigners. They did not hand it over to Karl Rove. They put the money in their general fund. That was their response.
It was not used to purchase voters. Saying so doesn’t make it true, Mr. Nordell.
You might recall the money received from the Chinese during the most recent Clinton campaign, but I’ll bet that you have conveniently forgotten about that.
2. You don’t like the decision of the Supreme Court in declaring corporations (and unions) citizens. That’s certainly your right.
I’m sure that you are an accomplished constitutional lawyer and know bad law when you see it. Saying that it was wrong doesn’t make it so.
3. “Class War” may be perpetual, but only in your mind, and in the minds of your fellow ideologs. It will, I know, hurt you to learn that the current leftish-leaning liberal minority is in fact an oligarchy. When they are in power, your 20 percent of the electorate does not qualify as anything else.
You write that one-third of Americans live in poverty. I can only justify this assertion by adding in the populations of citizens of Guatemala, Nicaragua, Venezuela and a few others. Otherwise, you are wrong, and saying so doesn’t make it true.
As to the question of the quality of life, how do you like it now under the most progressive president ever in our history? I suspect there are about 15 million Americans who wouldn’t agree with you.
4. By your own definition, Brian Colon is a carpetbagger along with Susana Martinez. Your implication is that Martinez was bought for a mere $800,000.
I’m sorry, but I think that argument is simply silly. If true, then our president, both senators and all of our representatives were bought, too, in their most recent elections. So were former Gov. Richardson and a bunch of our state legislators. Just silly. Saying so doesn’t make it true, Mr. Nordell.
5. Dodd and Frank set the stage for the collapse of Fannie and Freddie. George Bush, unfortunately in my opinion, bowed under the pressure from progressives and Dodd and Frank and permitted the unconscionable sale of homes to people who could not afford them.
Then, a flight of fancy about a planned economic collapse engineered by Republicans. Again, just silly. Forgot all about the recessions of 2001, 1981, etc., didn’t you? On the other hand, I finally found something I can agree with you about. Let’s re-establish Glass-Steagall.
I’m not that happy to see my bank competing with me in the market or becoming an investment bank without any dog in the fight.
I didn’t realize that I had become the local apologist for a fascist oligarchy. It is good of Mr. Nordell to point this out, but I wish he had indicated which oligarchy he was referring to. I am neither Argentinian nor Venezuelan nor Nicaraguan. Calling me one doesn’t make it true, Mr. Nordell.
I can hardly wait for Mr. Nordell’s next communiqué.
Robert E. Sanders
Rio Communities, New Mexico
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Valencia County News-Bulletin
Saturday 13 November 2010
Opinion Section [page 4A]
New river crossing should have traffic circle
Wherever the new cross-valley road ends up being, the junction of it and N.M. 47 should be a two-lane traffic circle, which will go a long way toward maintaining the bucolic nature of the area.
G.E. NORDELL
Belén, New Mexico
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Valencia County News-Bulletin
Saturday 30 Oct 2010
Opinion Section [page 4A]
Economy has collapsed with no end in sight
I am writing (and e-mailing) this letter to the Valencia County News-Bulletin Oct. 14, and have four points to make.
1. That this or other letters are not printed for three weeks is a disservice to this paper’s readers. What is needed is a 'catch up' issue or two, with as many extra pages as needed so that future letters columns print the opinions of Valencia County’s concerned citizens within a week of arrival.
2. I predict a landslide for the Democratic Party in this election in Valencia County, in New Mexico, and across America. Anything less is intolerable; the lives and livelihoods and sanity of the American people require that result. (And I cannot believe that a majority of voters are so brain-washed by the oligarchy-owned media that such will not happen.)
3. If the Republican Party and-or its attack dogs in the T.E.A. Party win any significant number of national and/or state seats in this election, then the oligarchs get their agenda fulfilled, and the United States will move even farther in the direction of feudalism.
4. The great struggle in America today is the class war, a fierce and wearying battle between those who work to restore rule as embodied in the principles of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, and the anti-constitution right, the self-hyped fear-mongers in cahoots with foreign anti-democratic freedom-hating governments. The battle is over the attempt by the oligarchs of the world to shred existing rights and liberties, the few that remain from the tattered documents of the American Revolution.
This all makes no sense to me. F.D.R. stood for the Four Freedoms, Social Security and a minimum wage and the rest of the New Deal. Kennedy stood for putting a man on the moon. L.B.J. stood for a Great Society. Obama stood for change. And all these ideals are gone or forgotten.
China donated millions of dollars to sway the 2010 U.S. elections – with what promised in return? Susana Martinez took more than $800,000 in campaign contributions from Texas oil barons in 2010 – with what promised in return?
The Republicans and tea-baggers promise McCarthy-style witch-hunts, expecting that it will get them votes. T.E.A. Party candidates promise destruction of Social Security, Medicare, ObamaCare, and the minimum wage, expecting that it will get them votes.
This cannot be characterized as mere petty squabbling – the class war is a war for survival.
The world economy has collapsed, and has not hit bottom yet. The planet is still being polluted, and human-generated carbon waste is still altering the climate.
The education system does not educate. The regulators do not regulate. Forty percent of U.S. G.D.P. comes from greedy day-traders on Wall Street, which they stash away out of the economy.
Two generations of the future are already sold into indentured servitude to pay for the last 10 (or 30) years of reckless and willful ignorance and deceit.
G.E. NORDELL
Belén, New Mexico
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response to my Letter of October 30 above
Valencia County News-Bulletin
Wednesday 24 November 2010
Opinion / Letters [page 4A-5A]
Republicans are not to blame for everything
The headline says it all: “Economy has collapsed with no end in sight.”
Mr. Nordell’s most recent letter predicts a landslide for the Democrat candidates this year. In his judgment, America is about class warfare and the feudal oligarchs that rule us.
How can one stray so far from the facts on the ground? No one is predicting anything but a rout for Democrat candidates this year. No one.
And to assert that class warfare rules us is to totally misunderstand what this nation is all about. Yes, it’s about the Constitution and the Bill of Rights and the rule of law and a freedom from onerous laws and policies and a host of other things. Not class warfare.
Mr. Nordell implies that my vote can be bought by the oligarchs of the world. Wrong.
Can anyone buy your vote, Mr. Nordell? He writes that China donated millions of dollars to sway the U.S. elections. I guess he refers to the Clinton years when it was reported that that actually did happen. The DNC has made that allegation in this election, but the press has totally discredited the claim.
According to Nordell, Gov.-elect Martinez is a tool of the Texas oil barons. Is everyone who takes any money in an election the tool of the contributor? If so we’re governed by tools and always have been.
Back to the headline. Mr. Nordell represents the best (and worst) of the liberal wing of the Democratic Party. His answer and their answer is always “tax and spend.”
It hasn’t changed since the days of FDR. Sometimes it’s the correct policy; sometimes it isn’t. Right now, “spend” makes sense for a short time to jump-start the economy. Tax doesn’t.
How the money is spent makes all the difference. Spending for pork-barrel projects to create jobs is ridiculous. Spending for “shovel ready projects” that don’t exist is equally so. Tax relief, assistance to businesses in raising capital does help. Reducing, rather than increasing onerous regulations helps, too.
Mr. Nordell doesn’t think the Republican Party has a best side. If he thought otherwise, it would be difficult or impossible to blame Republicans for everything.
It also makes it easier to overlook the Chris Dodds and the Barney Franks and the Fannies and the Freddies and the rest of the gang for their unsavory contribution to our economic situation. Easier to blame the banks alone, isn’t it?
Once again, thank you Mr. Nordell. Your letter does a great deal to clarify things for us.
Keep up the good work.
Robert Sanders
Rio Communities, New Mexico
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Valencia County News-Bulletin
Wednesday 13 October 2010
Opinion Section [page 4A]
Republicans only offer ridiculous policies
Robert Sanders is entitled to his own opinions, but he has no right to manufacture his own “facts”.
Obama ended the Iraq debacle at the end of August. The “Repair The Bush Economic Meltdown” stimulus worked and is working (though watered down by Republican intransigence).
Truly, 95 percent of taxpayers are today receiving a lower tax rate in their current paycheck.
And all that the Republicans have to offer – still – are the same ridiculous policies that created these messes.
G.E. NORDELL
Belén, New Mexico
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Valencia County News-Bulletin
Saturday 4 September 2010
Opinion Section [page 4A]
Republicans willfully poisoned the economy
The response to my July 21 letter is rife with non-sequiturs, persiflage, distortions, and outright lies.
Republican propagandists have yet to provide here any actual solutions to the still-worsening worldwide economic crisis, with its too-evident local effects. Belen no longer has any auto dealers, more storefronts around Valencia County are papered over, and city and county budgets slashed to the bone again.
1) Deficit is not the same as debt. Letter writer Sandford needs remedial training in diction and/or in economics. The Republican national debt is $25 trillions, the deficit is an annual event. (Bill Clinton is the only president in the last 30 years to provide Congress with a balanced budget, i.e. a budget with no deficit.)
2) The Social Security program, which celebrated its 75th anniversary, was specifically designed not to be mixed with general funds. That Reagan-Bush-Bush stole those funds from the people was and is a prosecutable crime. In summary, Sanford is completely wrong about Social Security.
3) The annual deficit in the Medicare program started just this year, largely due to carry-over from policies passed in recent Republican Congresses, such as Part D. Obama’s Health Care Reform package goes a long way to reducing that problem, which is why the Republican Party and Big Pharma spent so much money trying to prevent that solution.
4) None of the auto industry bailout money went to any workers union nor to any workers pension fund. Sanford is wrong.
5) Whatever the government figures are on unemployment, so many Americans are not counted that a realistic “street” figure can be had by doubling the official statistics. That puts some areas of the U.S. at unemployment rates approaching figures from the ’30s. The oligarchy is well on its way to achieving their goal of feudalism as wages for virtually every worker in America have been drastically decreased in the last year, and have been steadily dropping since Reagan was elected in 1980. Meanwhile, the income of the oligarchy doubled in the last year. There is barely any Middle Class left to make up for the oligarchy’s self-mandated tax cuts, and to pay for recovery from the G.O.P. Economic Meltdown.
6) “No” is not a solution. The filibuster is not a solution. The Republican minority of the 110th Congress doubled the previous all-time record for filibusters, then beat that record last year, and are well on their way to another all-time record this year.”No” is not a solution.
7) Keynesian economics is very good. Chicago economics and feudalism are bad.
All that the Republican-fascist propaganda parrots have to offer is the same stupid Reaganomics, the abject failure that created the G.O.P. Economic Meltdown — by definition not any kind of solution.
The Republicans willfully and intentionally poisoned the economy of the 21st century, and continue to rant and rave with illogic and lies that what America needs is more Republican poison.
President Obama offers solutions that work (even after being watered down by Republican intransigence), he has so far kept all of his campaign promises (though the work is not yet done), and the Republicans hate him for it.
G.E. NORDELL
Belén, New Mexico
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response to my Letter of September 4 above
Valencia County News-Bulletin
Wednesday 22 September 2010
Opinion / Letters [page 4A]
Republicans don’t like over-reaching Obama
Mr. Nordell is back with more of his attacks on those who disagree with him. Once again, it’s repetitive of past letters both in tone and in content. Since it’s already been rehashed more than once. I’ll choose only to comment on his last paragraph:
“President Obama offers solutions that work…, he has so far kept all of his campaign promises…, and the Republicans hate him for it.”
Mr. Nordell, you must be ecstatic over the success of President Obama’s jobs program. He kept unemployment below 8 percent, just like he promised. And, now we’re on the way to better things: Unemployment up to 9.6 percent. (By the way, the president’s newest jobs approach is one of the old tried-and-true Republican solutions: a tax holiday. We can’t say that though, can we?)
Moving on. The president has kept all of his campaign promises. Closed Gitmo. Cut taxes for 95 percent of taxpayers (and raised them with his other hand). Pushed hard for bipartisan support (while shutting off any Republican ideas at the source). We could go on and on, but to what purpose? It is what it is.
Finally, we Republicans don’t hate the president, Mr. Nordell. What we hate are his over-reaching, spendthrift, ill-conceived and ill-timed social engineering programs and policies.
Robert E. Sanders
Rio Communities, New Mexico
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Valencia County News-Bulletin
Wednesday 21 July 2010
Opinion Section [page 4A-5A]
Republicans piled on the national debt
Letter writers Sanders and Spiers again attempt to rebut prior letters, but since they provide no facts whatsoever, the attempt only displays their role as deniers of reality.
To counter their specious opinion is an exercise in futility, but for the other readers who might be interested in verifiable facts, here are a few.
First, the Social Security Trust Fund stands today at just over $2.7 trillion. But that is on paper only, because George H. W. Bush and his son both traded the actual money for paper I.O.U.s, and those funds are now part of the gigantic official Republican national debt.
If those notes were magically paid back, the Social Security program is solvent until 2042 or 2047, depending on how the economy recovers. But paying back those funds will require raising taxes, so the Republican Party just says No. (The near-criminal sleight-of-hand by the Republicans amounts to embezzlement; part of George W. Bush’s malfeasance was spending a total of $1.37 trillion of Social Security surplus during his eight years as president.)
Second, denying that the Republican National Debt exists is no help to the economic woes of the citizens of New Mexico and of Valencia County.
Reagan took office in 1980 with $1 trillion in national debt, which included the entire Vietnam War. George Bush 41 left office and handed Bill Clinton a quadrupled national debt, partly due to the hidden theft of the Social Security funds.
Bill Clinton is the only president in the last 30 years who delivered a balanced budget.
George Bush 43 handed the $25 trillion Republican National Debt to President Obama in January 2009.
The $25 trillion Republican national debt owed by the oblivious U.S. taxpayer consists of:
The official 12 trillion dollar national debt;
$5 trillion for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (September 2008);
$3 trillion that Bush refused to spend on maintenance of the crumbling U.S. infrastructure;
$2 trillion to bail out Wall Street (October 2008);
$1 trillion to bail out Detroit automakers (December 2008);
and, $2 trillion never budgeted to finish the wars in Irag {sic} and Afghanistan.
Some of the bailout money has been repaid, but the minimum new interest charges on that debt during Obama’s first year in office is another trillion dollars, so the total has not been paid down.
Readers who really want to increase the Republican national debt should vote Republican. Fiscal suicide, of course, but in a democracy, they have a right to vote for economic collapse and a return to feudalism.
Readers who are horrified at the economic and environmental messes created by 30 years of Reaganomics will be voting Democratic.
Readers who do not vote are as bad as the Republicans and Tea-Baggers and corporatists.
Meanwhile, neither Sanders nor Spiers provide any solution to the catastrophic economy, nor to any other Republican-caused crisis.
They just say “No.”
G.E. NORDELL
Belén, New Mexico
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response to my Letter of July 21 above
Valencia County News-Bulletin
Wednesday 11 August 2010
Opinion / Letters [page 4A-5A]
Tax increases would change unemployment
Once again, Mr. G.E.Nordell aims for a target with a water pistol, but forgets to fill it before he shoots.
Now he has managed to redefine the deficit so that even President Obama and his economic advisors wouldn’t recognize it. He continues to write of a deficit of $25 trillion. Which deficit is he talking about?
The U.S. national debt a few minutes ago was more than $13.2 trillion. The budget deficit was more than $1.4 trillion. Total unfunded liabilities are now more than $109.6 trillion of which Social Security amounts to more than $14.4 trillion; prescription drug benefit deficit is now more than $19.1 trillion and Medicare deficit totals more than $76 trillion.
These numbers come from the gutless Congresses since Franklin Roosevelt who have chosen to continue the party like the best days of Rome. Some of it came from George W. Bush. A lot more came from Roosevelt, and even more from Lyndon Johnson.
Mr. Nordell, it took five minutes to gather the facts and put them on paper. These are the facts you describe as “no facts at all”.
Let’s examine your 'facts' for a moment. First, the Social Security Trust Fund. The trust fund has always been a few pieces of paper held by the Federal Reserve. It has never been 'actual money'. The taxes collected simply go into the general fund to finance government operations.
The official national debt is more than $13.2 trillion, no matter how you want to redefine it as the Nordell national debt.
If, as you suggest, these notes were “magically paid back,” the program is solvent till 2042 or 2047.
You would do it by raising taxes to buy back the notes. It would take $9,000 from every man, woman and child in the country. Since 40 percent of workers pay no taxes at all, the amount due comes to about $15,000 per taxpayer. Every taxpayer, not just rich taxpayers.
Want some more fun? Let’s do the same with the Medicare deficit: $76 trillions divided by about 300 million people — 76 x 10 to 12th divided by 3 x 10 to 8th, or $250,000 for every man, woman and child in the United States. Applying the same factor to represent the non-taxpayers and children we get $416,000 per taxpayer. You want to do that now, too?
Now, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac contributed $5 trillion to the $25 trillion deficit. Thanks to Chris Dodd and Barney Frank, who engineered the debacle by pressuring Bush into a disastrous risky financial operation: no down payments, cash back beyond the mortgage, no documents. Thanks, Congress!
Then, “the $3 trillion Bush refused to spend on the infrastructure.” How can not spending add to the deficit? Please enlighten me.
And, “$2 trillion to bail out Wall Street.” The Democratic Congress apparently went home to play in the sand while this went on. And, “$1 trillion to bail out Detroit automakers.” Somehow, I thought that was to bail out union retirement funds and union jobs. Managed to destroy the meaning of bankruptcy, didn’t it?
And, finally the claim from Mr. Nordell that Republicans don’t have any solutions for the economic crisis.
I know you must be happy with the outcomes of the solutions provided by Obama and his economic team. You must be happy with continuing unemployment hovering at 9.5 percent.
That doesn’t account for the unemployed workers who have ceased job hunting, does it?
The Obama solution has been a typical Keynesian prescription: spend. He has done it mightily to grow government.
Unfortunately, government doesn’t produce food, or autos, or software, or anything else of value to consumers. Furthermore, the appropriations which were directed at “shovel ready projects” somehow got sidetracked into pork barrel activities which gutted the effort.
The money would have been far better spent to create real jobs that have a chance of continuing after all the stimulus is removed.
Basically, that means jobs in private industry. More funds to SBA would help. A temporary tax holiday for workers would help greatly. A temporary subsidy for new businesses and new hires would also help.
At the very least, a hold on new regulations that cost businesses money and jobs. The nanny state won’t help right now.
Next on the administration’s agenda is the question of “the Bush tax cuts.” Keep them? Eliminate them? Keep some and get rid of others?
One thing I can assure you of, Mr.Nordell, is that a tax increase now (eliminating the Bush tax cuts) would change the unemployment picture, and it wouldn’t be a pretty picture.
Envision 11 percent, 13 percent, 15 percent unemployment. To my way of thinking, at least a postponement is in order. We can argue about the future of taxes later after the economy begins its slow climb back to health.
I could go on, but Mr. Nordell and others like him probably aren’t listening. It’s their way or the highway.
Unfortunately their highway leads to disaster. President Obama is between a rock and a hard shoulder. He needs to raise money (taxes) to pay for the profligate ways of his predecessors and himself.
But, he needs to continue to spend to kick-start the economy. Will he and his advisors finally face up to the fact that their policies haven’t worked?
And, that some of the “failed policies” of his predecessors actually do work? Probably not. One can only hope.
Robert E. Sanders
Rio Communities, New Mexico
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Valencia County News-Bulletin
Saturday 26 June 2010
Opinion Section [page 4A]
Bush and Cheney ran country into the rocks
Howard Stansell wallows again in the Republican quagmire of denial.
The U.S. “ship of state” was run onto the rocks by Bush and Cheney and by a complicit Republican Congress.
President Obama was charged by the people to rescue the country from Republican malfeasance, and the ongoing Republican-independent-Tea Bagger propaganda-spill does nothing to stem the life-threatening messes that are Bush’s legacy.
Anyone who votes Republican is voting for dead pelicans, toxic wetlands and beaches, bankrupt government, triple-cost health care and a fascist U.S. Supreme CourtSupreme Court.
Obama asks that we man the metaphorical pumps, and Republicans continue to spit on the Constitution.
G.E. NORDELL
Belén, New Mexico
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Valencia County News-Bulletin
Wednesday 26 May 2010
Opinion / Letters [page 5A]
No Republican has given a good idea
Back and forth, back and forth. Republican lies versus objective facts, and back to Republican/fascist propaganda.
Mr. McKenzie’s recent letter mixes up so many terms, and his message is confused between the Republican national debt and the federal budget. (His comments about Social Security are just plain wrong: “The Social Security trust fund is projected to show a surplus of close to $100 billion in 2010 and will remain in the black until after 2020.” per Dean Baker, Campaign For America’s Future – today)
President Obama was handed a national debt of $25 trillion on the day that he took office, virtually all racked up by Republican presidents and GOP-dominated Congresses. (The only president in the last 30 years who delivered a balanced federal budget to Congress was Bill Clinton.)
Since January 2009, some of the Republican bailout money has indeed been paid back, but a mere 4 percent interest accruing on that $25 trillion in debt amounts to a minimum $1 trillion in interest per annum, which is essentially extortion money paid to the oligarchy each year.
The budget deficit is the difference between expected revenue (taxes, etc.) and expenditures (the federal budget).
The national debt handed to President Obama is all the IOUs run up by scared and greedy politicians and sold to people with money, such as the oligarchy, the oil sheiks and the Communist Chinese government.
The Reagan-Bush administration quadrupled the national debt in 12 years. Democrat Bill Clinton produced a budget surplus. Dubya borrowed and spent nearly $20 trillion (with a T, folks) in just eight years.
Barack Obama so far seems to have contained the Bush meltdown crisis (he put out the metaphorical fire) and all that our local Republicans can muster is to whine because the furniture is wet.
All that the Republicans ask from America is to let the fox back into the henhouse, along with its partner-in-crime, the skunk of corporate campaign funding, i.e. bribery via lobbyist.
Not one Republican here has presented even a lousy idea for solving Valencia County’s many fiscal woes. (Democrats have a list of solutions, locally and nationally, but spend far too much time and effort responding to fascist propaganda parroted by Republicans.)
The Republican Party sold out long ago to PNAC and to the Federalist/fascist conspiracy. The Tea Party people are mostly rabble. Anybody who does not vote is as bad as they are. So the only choice with any chance of stopping the avalanche that is Reaganomics is the Democratic Party.
What Reagan-Bush-Bush gave Valencia County is layoffs and cutbacks, rising prices and disappearing wages. Half the people in Valencia County and New Mexico are either out of work or under-employed or working part-time.
No voter who has received this heartless 'benefit' from the Republicans should ever vote Republican again. The disgusted Republican voters of Valencia County need to stop berating Obama’s rescue efforts and change their voter registration forthwith to Democrat – and thus demonstrate their loyalty to the U.S. Constitution – for the June primary and for the November general elections.
G.E. NORDELL
Belén, New Mexico
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responses to my Letter of May 26 above
Valencia County News-Bulletin
Saturday 19 June 2010
Opinion / Letters [page 5A]
Factual errors are plain nonsense
Garbage in; garbage out.
Mr. Nordell’s recent diatribe is an overwhelming hodge-podge of misrepresentations, factual errors and just plain nonsense that it is difficult to answer in a rational way.
Dean Baker of the Campaign for America’s Future is reported by Mr. Nordell to be saying that Social Security is projected to have a surplus in 2010 of some $100 billion and that it will be in the black until after 2010.
His organization is, of course, a far-left group funded in part by George Soros’ Move-On organization, which is even further to the left of rationality. I suspect that the O.M.B. and even President Obama would decline to accept this number.
It’s just plain wrong, of course. I like Mr. Nordell’s use of “just plain wrong.” It applies almost pari passu to everything in his letter.
But, I digress. “President Obama was handed a national debt of $25 trillion on the day he took office.” Wrong again. Still haven’t bothered to check the facts?
He continues: “quadrupled the national debt in 12 years…Dubya borrowed and spent nearly $20 trillion dollars in just eight years.” No, wrong. Check the facts.
However, your friend Obama is on track to do just that: $20 trillion deficit in eight years. But I digress again.
Getting into the swing of things, Nordell goes on a rampage against the Republican Party, the Federalist/fascist conspiracy, the Tea Party people, who are mostly rabble, the skunk of corporate campaign funding (bribery via lobbyist), fascist propaganda parroted by Republicans, Reagan-Bush-Bush…layoffs and cutbacks, rising prices and disappearing wages.
You can almost hear Dean Baker’s voice in the background spouting further nonsense, distortions, half-truths and misrepresentations. Soros is in the Amen corner.
I guess Mr. Nordell finally ran out of words; but not out of vitriol. Republicans are the source of all evil. Democrats are all things good. They are bringing us plenty of good jobs. They are cutting taxes for everyone but the rich. They are bringing us cost-free health care. They will tax the rich (i.e, everybody but Mr. Nordell). They will clean up the oil spill in the Gulf because they have the technology and know-how to do so.
I’m sure that Mr. Nordell will once again claim that he has checked the facts. His source is undoubtedly that sterling organization “Campaign for America’s Future” where “facts” are what they want them to be at any moment and have no necessary relation to anything recognizable as a fact.
Keep up the good work, Mr. Nordell. Your letters always make my day.
Robert Sanders
Rio Communities, New Mexico
Social Security is not in surplus
Having just read letters from Laura Sanchez and G.E. Nordell, published in the News-Bulletin on May 26, I worry about how far adrift from reality partisan politics can push otherwise sensible folks?
For example, Ms. Sanchez’s fuzzy sense of reality with respect to the “politics” of renewable energy. In this regard, I believe certain political and environmental groups stand to profit handsomely at our (the public’s) expense.
Otherwise why would they be pushing so hard to burden us with a system that is far more expensive and far more cumbersome than a simple switch to nuclear or gas-fired systems?
I would recommend Ms. Sanchez obtain a copy of the Heritage Foundation studies on renewable energy. This study is available through McClachy-Tribune Information Services. This study establishes an additional cost of $300 per household each year.
In the same confused partisan way, G.E. Nordell bandies around some confused statistics attempting to show that Social Security is fiscally sound and further that all our debt problems were caused by the spending habits of Republican presidents.
In the first place, G.E. Nordell should realize that our Social Security system is not in surplus; all of the trust funds have been spent on other programs. The current system simply relies on enough workers paying in to meet outgoing expenses. Also, we must face the fact, our present entitlements cannot be sustained; therefore, reduced benefits will be necessary.
Our burden of debt did not happen because this or that president did so and so. Our national credit card is maxed out because every politician from F.D.R. on has used our tax dollars to pay for schemes to gain votes. They have added debt after debt without regard to cost or need.
I applaud the sensible folks who have gathered under the 'Tea Bag' banner. Those folks have a grasp for the fundamental fact that a financial crisis is at hand and must be abated. The government must call a halt to spending until our fiscal house is back in order.
Don Spiers
Los Lunas, New Mexico
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Albuquerque [NM] Alibi free weekly newspaper
Thursday 20 May 2010
Letters Section [page 6]
SB 1070 and Unemployed Lawyers
Dear Alibi,
Sure hope that the new Arizona immigration law is declared constitutional.
Then New Mexico can solve its direst problem, that of the hordes of unemployed lawyers in New Mexico. If any law officer suspects someone of being a lawyer, they will run a radio check, and any lawyers will be handed over to Homeland Security and sequestered in those concentration camps built by Halliburton.
Solve a lot of problems that way.
G.E. NORDELL
Belén, New Mexico
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Valencia County News-Bulletin
Saturday 10 April 2010
Opinion / Letters [page 5A]
Republican national debt made history
So many local folk continue to deny reality.
Robert Sanders, for example, misstates the history of the Republican national debt.
When Ronald Reagan became president in 1981, the national debt was a mere $1 trillion dollars, which included the full cost of the Vietnam War.
By the end of the 12-year Reagan-Bush administration, the Republican national debt was quadrupled, to $4 trillion.
President Bill Clinton reduced the increase to 25 percent in his first term, and in his second term, enacted balanced budgets and left office with a fiscal surplus.
Then President George W. Bush squandered that surplus in the first year and increased the Republican national debt from $5 trillion to $25 trillion – in only eight years.
Republican President George W. Bush holds the record for creating the most debt of any human being in the history of mankind.
The Republican Party and the propaganda-tainted independents have no clue, they have no plan, and they have no honor until all of the Republican national debt is paid off.
If the Republicans do not do this, then your grandchildren will have to pay the tab for 30 years of intentional Republican incompetence.
G.E. Nordell
Belén, NM
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Valencia County News-Bulletin
Wednesday 3 February 2010
Opinion / Letters [page 4A]
Blaming Obama for the debt is unproductive
Mr. James Crawford has not been paying attention, either in these pages or in the real world.
Blaming President Obama for the national debt of $12 trillion that he inherited on the day that he took office is typical Republican persiflage. Having no ability to devise any plan or program, the Republicans simply blame Obama for the gigantic mess created by Republican incompetence.
The Republican national debt, however, is actually $25 trillion, all racked up by Dubya and Republican predecessors at the behest of the oligarchy. (The last balanced budget and surplus was during Clinton’s second term.)
Today’s Republican National Debt consists of:
• The official national debt, which has a ceiling of $12 trillion; it will soon be reached and then raised by Congress
• The $5 trillion paid to rescue the banks involved in the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac debacles
• The $2 trillion for the Wall Street bailout
• The $1 trillion of the Detroit auto makers bailout
• The $3 trillion for maintenance not performed on America’s crumbling infrastructure during Dubya’s term — falling bridges, pot-holed roads, cracking dams and levees, etc.
• The $2 trillion that it will cost to bring our military home from the pseudo-war in the Middle East, for which necessity Dubya budgeted zero dollars
And then there are many trillion dollars that are necessary to fix the failed economy that was dumped in Barack Obama’s lap.
George 'Dubya' Bush ran up the most debt of any person in the history of mankind, and the Republicans are responsible for paying that debt off.
Dividing by the (dwindling) number of Republicans, that comes out to $400,000 dollars for each and every Republican in Valencia County (and across the nation), and they — individually and as a group — have no political honor until that debt is paid.
G.E. Nordell
Belén, NM
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Valencia County News-Bulletin
Saturday 9 January 2010
Opinion / Letters [page 4A]
Right-wingers have no interest in the facts
The recent letter from Mr. Bovee proves that he has done no homework regarding the serious problem of climate change.
He merely repeats the right-wing propaganda from – you guessed it – the right-wing propaganda machine. (Fox News is an oxymoron.)
The criminals who hacked the U.K. e-mails proved nothing. The climate data is peer-reviewed, the e-mails were internal and about writing the report, and Mr. Bovee did not read any of the hacked and posted e-mails. One university’s internal memos changes nothing of the scientific evidence for the dangers of global warming.
Of the last 10 calendar years, nine were the hottest years on record. The last decade is the hottest on record since – oh, my – the decade just before it, which was the hottest since accurate weather data began around 1850.
The government of the Maldives Islands is buying land elsewhere to relocate its citizens [to], because the Indian Ocean is rising and many low-lying islands in the Maldives are already submerged due to climate change.
Half the glaciers in the Andes Mountains are gone. Greenland is melting. Ice chunks the size of Connecticut have broken off of the Antarctic ice shelves and are melted away already. Penguins there can no longer swim to feed on the krill in the South Atlantic because the ice is not there. The krill are now hundreds of miles from shore. The penguins are starving, and will die off rapidly.
And citing a book that was written 5,000 years ago as proof of anything, is ridiculous. The world will be a better place when Republicans and other Christians start to obey that pesky commandment not to bear false witness.
The right-wing sheeple have no interest in facts; the propaganda machine tells them what to say so that they do not need to think.
Reason is the only frontier left.
G.E. Nordell
Belén, NM
Valencia County News-Bulletin
Wednesday 13 January 2010
Opinion / Letters [page 5A] {scroll to bottom}
Fight continues from last century
What a juxtaposition! G. E. Nordell v. James Crawford – the fight of the century (continued from the last century).
Nordell is especially productive: Fox News is oxymoron, right-wing propaganda machine, false witness, and, my favorite, right-wing sheeple.
Not to be completely outdone, Crawford counters with corruption, extortion, tax evasion and whore mongering.
Keep up the good work, boys!
In full disclosure, I admit that I’m a sheeple and unreconstructed believer in free enterprise, capitalism and individual responsibility; unlike my leftish brethren.
Robert Sanders
Belén, NM
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Valencia County News-Bulletin
Saturday 31 October 2009
Opinion / Letters [page 4A]
Propaganda machine lied about panels
The recent blather of Valencia County GOP chairman Garza and others says nothing of substance and takes a ludicrous stand for preserving some imaginary “American Way” of health insurance.
All that the GOP (Greedy Oligarchy Partisans) have to say is endlessly repeated propa- ganda talking points handed down from headquarters via radio and TV talk shows, all of which are designed to interfere with the democratic process.
The Republicans intend to preserve the extortionary profits of the misnamed U.S. health care industry because the Republican Party long ago sold out to the robber barons.
But bilge can be countered with facts:
The United States pays 16 percent of GDP for rotten health care (47th in the world for quality) and one third of the citizenry can not get coverage at any price. (South Korea pays 5 percent of GDP, and every person in the country gets excellent health care.)
Nobody in Canada or Europe or Japan has to worry about losing their home or life savings because a member of the family gets cancer or another terrible disease; their health systems take care of the people, not the robber barons.
The national and local GOP insist that profit-based health care corporations should continue the practice of devastating further lives of the hundreds of thousands of patients caught in a health crisis each year.
The GOP propaganda machine lied all summer about death panels (never proposed, except by GOP), mandatory abortion (GOP fantasy only), and the fear-mongering “government takeover” of the current health care cesspool because they are paid to do so. And it works because Americans are too busy working two or three jobs per household to have any time to seek out the truth.
Basic health care premiums have gone up 20 percent in each of the last several years. Did your paycheck go up twenty percent?
America needs single-payer health care, both for its own sake and to be competitive in the global markets, and America needs election reform so that elected officials of any party are no longer swayed by the “campaign donations,” i.e. bribes from corporations who get that cash by rejecting life-saving medical procedures and by raising premiums to extortionary levels.
G.E. Nordell
Belén, NM
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Valencia County News-Bulletin
Saturday 11 July 2009
Opinion / Letters [page 4A]
Belén overpass elevator idea is a 'boondoggle'
The proposed $3 million grant for elevators to and from the Reinken overpass will not be enough.
The top of the overpass is a blind spot, and confused tourists will be crossing the road in the winter dark (if not the occasional rain and snow), and local speeders won't be able to stop in time.
Plus, any injured pedestrians will have to be driven by ambulance 30 miles to the nearest hospital, since Valencia County has no emergency facility.
So the big cost – the real cost – is going to be the wrongful death and medical liability lawsuits against the city of Belén.
This entire elevator proposal is a boondoggle and a bad idea.
G.E. Nordell
Belén, NM
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Valencia County News-Bulletin
Saturday 30 May 2009
Opinion / Letters [page 4A]
Obama is working to restore Constitutional law
Recent writers of letters in the local newspaper avoid certain facts, because objective reality is their enemy.
1. Barack Obama won the election for President in November 2008. That an African-American won the popular vote is a major accomplishment (in this racist country), and the landslide in the electoral college is equally important. The people are now back in power.
2. The Japanese surrendered in 1945, but the permanent opposition to the people did not surrender in November. Those seeking to render the U.S. Constitution worthless continue to spew their propaganda, as regularly appears in local newspapers across the country (including this newspaper), as well as on national hate-talk radio and on the faux TV news channels
The Party of No – no facts, no rights, no health care, no accountability, no security, no jobs, no education – is made up of the Republicans, fascists, racists, Federalists, Wall Street barons, members of P.N.A.C., all the unindicted traitors and criminals of the Bush Admini- stration, [the] war profiteers, and just plain demagogues plotting together and separately to reverse the intent of the Constitution and to further destroy the Nation. Their evil job is not done.
3. The Republican national debt today stands at $25 trillion. If – and that is still a very big if – Barack Obama and his team saves America and the world from suffering the decade-long Second Republican Depression that looms on our horizon, then he will have done a greater thing than F.D.R. did, because President Obama has only eight years to rescue the country. The matter is extremely urgent.
4. The economy of America and the world has not yet reached bottom. We have yet to go through the turmoil that awaits from the credit card crisis. If President Obama makes the right choices and his plans get enacted in time, then the economy won't get too much worse. If what needs to be enacted is faulty or is blocked or watered down by the Party of No, then the Republican Great Depression of 1929 to 1938 will look like a picnic in the park in comparison.
5. A recent national poll by ABC News found that only 21 percent of American voters will admit to being registered as Republicans. The Party of No has lost power because their lies are both the cause and the result of believing their own propaganda.
Barack Obama and his team are the only chance that America has to restore Constitu- tional law, to survive the Republican economic meltdown, and with a little luck maybe even prevent your grandchildren from living as slaves to the oligarchy.
G.E. Nordell
Belén, NM
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Valencia County News-Bulletin
Wednesday 8 April 2009
Opinion / Letters [page 5A]
Problem dates back to Republican years
County Republican Party Chairman Daniel J. Garza complains about the urgency of the Economic Recovery Act, legislation that might correct some of the economic damage caused by eight years of the Republican Party's misguided policies, an urgency required due to Republican malfeasance (and to 28 years of Reaganomics).
Mr. Garza complains of the "staggering debt" from the Recovery Act, which is nothing compared to the debt put on the books from Reaganomics — he never complained about that debt. The disaster of the Republican National Debt now stands at $25 trillion, and there is no one who can or will bail America out. It must be paid down. Your grandchildren will be paying off the Reaganomics disaster for their entire lives.
Divide the present full Republican National Debt by 300 million citizens and residents and that is $85,000 for each and every man, woman and child in America — including each and every man, woman and child in Valencia County. But there is no reason that Democrats and Independents owe this debt nor are responsible for paying off the cost of the Republican Party's crimes. So divide by the number of U.S. voters, it comes to about $160,000 each; then double the figure because half of November voters mindlessly voted for the McCain-Palin loonie ticket, and that makes a $320,000 share for each and every Republican in Valencia County.
Mr. Garza and his disreputable party ... should keep their individual and collective mouths shut until they produce and make public their plan for paying off their personal share of the Republican National Debt.
When each Valencia County Republican pays his/her $320,000 share to the U.S. Treasury in full, only then will that person's political honor be restored.
G.E. Nordell
Belén, NM
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Op Ed News postings for 2009
Open Letter to the Attorneys General [9 January 2009]
click here to read
Reason-Based Taxation (Redux) [23 March 2009]
click here to read
The 2012 Hoax [11 April 2009]
click here to read
The Evil of Dick Cheney [18 May 2009]
click here to read
The Party of No [29 May 2009]
click here to read
The Festival of Stupid [24 June 2009]
click here to read
www.working-minds.com
author / philosopher / revolutionary G.E. Nordell lives & works in rural New Mexico
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