The Death Of C. S.

Lori appeared on Glenn Beck this week. She's a woman with her finger on the pulse of the country and, alas!, the world. Click her name below to see the original on her site or to see her other writings.

© Lori Borgman| Sunday, March 15, 1998

Three yards of black fabric enshroud my computer terminal. I am mourning the passing of an old friend by the name of Common Sense. His obituary reads as follows: Common Sense, aka C.S., lived a long life, but died from heart failure at the brink of the millennium. No one really knows how old he was, his birth records were long ago entangled in miles and miles of bureaucratic red tape. Known affectionately to close friends as Horse Sense and Sound Thinking, he selflessly devoted himself to a life of service in homes, schools, hospitals and offices, helping folks get jobs done without a lot of fanfare, whooping and hollering.

Rules and regulations and petty, frivolous lawsuits held no power over C.S. A most reliable sage, he was credited with cultivating the ability to know when to come in out of the rain, the discovery that the early bird gets the worm and how to take the bitter with the sweet.

C.S. also developed sound financial policies (don't spend more than you earn), reliable parenting strategies (the adult is in charge, not the kid) and prudent dietary plans (offset eggs and bacon with a little fiber and orange juice).

A veteran of the Industrial Revolution, the Great Depression, the Technological Revolution and the Smoking Crusades, C.S. survived sundry cultural and educational trends including disco, the men's movement, body piercing, whole language and new math. C.S.'s health began declining in the late 1960s when he became infected with the If-It-Feels-Good, Do-It virus.

In the following decades, his waning strength proved no match for the ravages of overbearing federal and state rules and regulations and an oppressive tax code. C.S. was sapped of strength and the will to live as the Ten Commandments became contraband, criminals received better treatment than victims and judges stuck their noses in everything from Boy Scouts to professional baseball and golf.

His deterioration accelerated as schools implemented zero-tolerance policies. Reports of 6-year-old boys charged with sexual harassment for kissing classmates, a teen suspended for taking a swig of Scope mouthwash after lunch, girls suspended for possessing Midol and an honor student expelled for having a table knife in her school lunch were more than his heart could endure.

As the end neared, doctors say C.S. drifted in and out of logic but was kept informed of developments regarding regulations on low-flow toilets and mandatory air bags. Finally, upon hearing about a government plan to ban inhalers from 14 million asthmatics due to a trace of a pollutant that may be harmful to the environment, C.S. breathed his last.

Services will be at Whispering Pines Cemetery. C.S. was preceded in death by his wife, Discretion; one daughter, Responsibility; and one son, Reason. He is survived by two step-brothers, Half-Wit and Dim-Wit.

Memorial Contributions may be sent to the Institute for Rational Thought. Farewell, Common Sense. May you rest in peace.

_______________

Note: This piece was first published March 15, 1998 in the Indianapolis Star. It has since been published in newspapers and magazines around the world and is a favorite of radio talk show hosts. This month, a Yoga magazine in Spain, a high school in Idaho, a writer in Ireland and retired teacher in Australia (among a slew of others) have asked to reprint it.

The column is somehow more relevant today than when I wrote it 11 years ago. It is circulated widely on the Internet, often "edited' and "adapted" and sent to me several times a year. Imagine my surprise to see it attributed to some guy named Anonymous.

You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.
You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.
You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
You cannot lift the wage earner up by pulling the wage payer down.
You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred.
You cannot build character and courage by taking away people's initiative and independence.
You cannot help people permanently by doing for them, what they could and should do for themselves.

..... Abraham Lincoln

Common Sense

Date: Friday, June 12, 2009, 6:14 AM

I may be foolish but I posted this here. Thanks. These complaints about Congress have been the song I've been singing for sometime now.

I am increasingly frightened by the amount of unchallenged power this guy is amassing. He has the banks, the money printer, transportation, the largest corporations, the military, the media, the education system, most of organized religion, and the voting public by the short hairs and now he's working on the system by which we keep and sustain our health, actually our lives. There will be no medical help for those that THEY determine to have less than 6 months, or 1 year, or 5 years to live--it'll be up to the czar in charge, I'm sure. We know nothing about what he's doing. He says he's transparent and then he is not. Everything he says is directly contradicted by his actions.

Nothing is voted upon and we have russian style czars coming out our wazoo! Yet no one says there's anything wrong. The survival of Israel is becoming frighteningly endangered. I do not believe he will allow the US to stand with Israel now against Iran's nuclear threats. We are duck soup. I truly do not know why everyone isn't marching in the streets.

Am planning to attend a 4th of July tea party here in NJ but wouldn't it be the time to march our tea parties on DC right on down to the White House or the Capitol?

We say no and he goes forward with every spending and power grabbing plan on his agenda. Oh yeah, and now you can't even use conservative opinion in public discourse without becoming the butt of ridicule in the mainstream media (Palin and her 14 year old daughter and Carrie Prejean to name two recent examples). What's next for us "potential dissenters?"

Yep, I'm mad as hell and I'm not gonna take it anymore! Damn this usurper for singlehandedly undermining this country and its future! As I said before, is there any other President who got away with sealing every document in his past and still got away with being elected president? No, the answer is: there is not..

The rant is now on hiatus. Thanks for your ear.

Open Letter to Michael Steele

Yes, yes, yes. All your points are true points. The most important point, however, is not listed in your quest for money, and the point to which I refer is that OUR party does not recognize that the corruption of the Dems and many Republicans is the proximate cause of WHY our elected official ignore us. They are perpetuating their own existence as JOB ONE, and lining their pockets at our expense--and are pretty much ignoring us while they are doing so.

Michael, there's no difference between the parties anymore--they are looking to me like two teams going to the same school (and on the same payroll). Believe me, I'd love to support your efforts. I like you. And I like you in this role as leader of the party. But we need to do better. And I'm not going to pledge one dime to the GOP until we address this honesty issue. Dishonesty with "the people" is rampant and it's just like that elephant standing in the room that no one will admit seeing.

On the other hand, I LOVED Jon Voight at the GOP dinner--his talk the other night was genius--he was wonderful and the selection of him as speaker has encouraged me.

But it's our candidates, not the voters, who need to be sold on the importance of their actions being responsible to WE THE PEOPLE. They need to understand that this party rubber stamp is over. We're picking out candidate to support, individually, in the meantime. You need to know this. I hope you hear from others who feel as I do.

You know what we need to do to clean out the bad apples. If you don't get this job done, we are going to be a completely anarchist country by 2010. We will have no wealth, HE will have it via our banks. HE and his buddies will control everything. They really already do and here we stand capitulating about mundane issues. This is truly the future of our country at stake. I want--no need--you and the rest of our guys to stop "playing" the game of politics and start acting like this is life or death for us all.

36 Congressmen Ask White House to Return Authority Over Auto Bailout to Congress

36 Congressmen Ask Obama to Return Authority Over Auto Bailout to Congress--But White House Says Its Not Over-Reaching Its Power

Friday, May 29, 2009
By Fred Lucas, Staff Writer

Link: http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=11668386
White House (CNSNews.com) - A bipartisan coalition of 36 members of the House of Representatives--including 30 Republicans and 6 Democrats--has sent a letter to President Obama asking him to return to Congress its constitutional legislative authority to oversee the bailout of the auto industry.

In December, Congress failed to pass a bill authorizing a bailout of Chrysler and General Motors. President Bush and now President Obama, however, proceeded with a bailout process even without legislative autority. That process has cost the taxpayers billions of dollars and given the Executive Branch unilitaral and unprecedented authority to control what happens to the two major auto companies.

“While we are mindful that time is of the essence, we are respectfully requesting that you return the Auto Task Force to its important advisory role to you and your Administration, but also return the Congress’ Constitutional legislative prerogatives before it further disrupts the lives of people who work at Chrysler or live in communities that depend on it,” says the letter.

The White House is defending the work of the President’s Auto Task Force and is insisting that the president has not seized unconstitutional authority over the matter.

The bipartisan coalition of congressmen who signed the letter to Obama are worried about the practicial economic consequences of the steps he has taken in the auto bailout as well as the constitutional implications for the role of Congress.

“We are grateful to you and your administration for the leadership demonstrated. However, decisions being made by the Auto Task Force, and in the bankruptcy proceedings in New York, are more than troubling,” the letter said, referring to the Chrysler bankruptcy proceedings.

On Thursday, General Motors reportedly reached a deal with bond holders and the Treasury Department to go into bankruptcy.

Because of decisions made by the task force, the letter says, 9,000 workers at Chrysler plants will lose their jobs and 789 Chyrsler dealers have been slated to shut down. Rep. Steven LaTourette (R-Ohio) who wrote the letter, said the GM bankruptcy could lead to 100,000 dealership-related jobs nationwide and the closing of 14 GM plants.

“The president is being ill served by the auto task force. They’re making decisions that I think are making a tough situation much worse,” LaTourette told CNSNews.com. “Now the president has off-loaded it and delegated it to this unelected and inexperienced – at least as far as the car business is concerned – automobile task force.”

“For a bunch of folks who say they don’t want to be in the day-to-day operation and don’t want to manage the old Chrysler and the new Chrysler into bankruptcy, they sure seem to be doing that – telling them how much they can spend on advertising, rejecting opportunities to avoid bankruptcy for both Chrysler and GM,” he said.

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs responded that the task force is not making direct decisions on employment, and said that 75 percent of auto dealerships remained open.

“These are decisions that are made by companies about what it is they believe is the best path toward renewed viability for their company,” Gibbs told reporters Wednesday. “If it weren’t for the task force on autos, and if it weren’t for the president's intervention, a hundred percent of those dealerships would be gone, a hundred percent of those plants would be closed.”

The letter states, “While we are mindful that time is of the essence, we are respectfully requesting that you return the Auto Task Force to its important advisory role to you and your administration, but also return the Congress’ constitutional legislative prerogatives before it further disrupts the lives of people who work at Chrysler or live in communities that depend on it.”

The Bush administration initiated the federal bailout of the auto industry with $17.4 billion in bridge loans going to Chrysler and GM in late 2008. Congress had rejected an auto bailout, so the Bush administration tapped the $700 billion Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP), even though Congress had only authorized those funds to be used for financial institutions such as banks and credit unions.

Earlier this year, President Barack Obama expanded the program to include at least $1.1 billion toward covering the cost of Chrysler and GM warranties during the restructuring.

But members of Congress are concerned because the task force sets viability standards, allowing it to dictate terms to the auto industry. Rep. Thad McCotter (R-Mich.) said shutting Congress out leaves a worse deal for the taxpayers.

“In the 70s, we had the Chrysler bailout where the taxpayers were paid with interest because at the legislative level you had people representing all these interests bringing them together and forging a workable plan,” McCotter, who signed the letter, told CNSNews.com. “What you’re seeing with the Auto Task Force is what was once an advisory group is now in the process of driving the entire process, deadlines, and bankruptcies for Chrysler and with GM the increasingly likely bankruptcy. Who do they answer to? They do not directly answer to the citizens.”

McCotter is also displeased that the auto restructuring is being supervised through TARP, but said the law is so wide, he sees no legal conflict in using the TARP money. “It was wide as the Grand Canyon to allow the executive branch to do what it’s doing,” he said.

Gibbs said that the administration does have “a major role to play.”

“I think we are playing it in a way that is preserving and protecting as many jobs as possible, protecting as many communities as possible, and hopefully restructuring -- working to restructure an auto industry that has fallen on vastly hard times, and that we're doing all that we can to move that in a different direction,” Gibbs said.

Still, members of Congress faulted the president for saying that the Chrysler bankruptcy would “not disrupt the lives of people who work at Chrysler or live in communities that depend on it.”

“The White House auto task force seems to be pursuing policies that export the manufacturing base of the American economy,” Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) said. “Our economic strength and our national security are dependent on the automobile, steel, aerospace and shipping industries. We must protect and strengthen these vital industries.”

Further, the letter stated that employees made concessions across the country without knowing their plant would be closed.

Gibbs said Congress clearly has input in helping to revive the auto industry.

“Congress certainly is involved in auto decisions, obviously as it relates to setting fuel mileage standards that the President worked on last week, as well as proposals to create tax incentives to trade in older cars that aren’t doing as well on fuel mileage, to both increase auto sales and reduce our dependence on foreign oil,” Gibbs said.

“But I think the vast majority of members I think are appreciative of the efforts of the task force each and every day in order to keep as much as we possibly can in a viable auto industry here in America.”

I have accepted a seat in the House of Representatives, and thereby have consented to my own ruin, to your ruin, and to the ruin of our children. I give you this warning that you may prepare your mind for your fate.

--John Adams