Day: February 20, 2011

Do Senate Democrats Really Have 53 Votes? Don’t Be So Sure! :(

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It is often pointed out that the Senate has 53 Democrats, and that there is no chance that the Republican House can get the majority of the Senate to go along with massive budget cuts or repeal of the Health Care legislation.

But when one examines closely the situation that truly exists with the upcoming Senate races of 2012, one wonders!

There are at least four Democrats, who are not retiring, as four have already announced (Joe Lieberman, Kent Conrad, Jim Webb, and now Jeff Bingaman), but are likely to be willing to work with Republicans more than one would imagine.

These would be newly elected Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia who must run again in 2012, along with two Senators elected in 2006 and facing tough fights in 2012–Claire McCaskill of Missouri and Jon Tester of Montana–and veteran Ben Nelson of Nebraska, who also faces election in 2012.

If all four worked together with the GOP, there goes the Democratic edge, so the next two years will be interesting as a reality check of what it means to have a Senate majority, and yet maybe NOT have a Senate majority! 🙁

John Glenn, A True Hero After 49 Years: A Lost Concept

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On February 20, 1962, the author was a senior in high school, and the nation witnessed a true hero, a role model for young people, display great courage as he accomplished what was regarded as the greatest moment in the history of flight since Charles Lindbergh flew The Spirit Of St. Louis from New York to Paris in May 1927.

John Glenn was the first American to orbit in space on the Friendship 7 space craft on that day, and he also went into space at the age of 77 in 1998, as he was retiring from four terms in the US Senate from Ohio, a record for the state.

Glenn was a good will ambassador for the space program, and his private life mirrored his public life, and he is now nearing 90 years of age.

We need more true heroes today, but sadly, they are lacking, and young people cannot easily find anyone to use as a role model in the public sphere.

But this date is worthy of recognition, and a salute to John Glenn is well deserved!

The GOP War On Women and Children: Despicable And Disgraceful! :(

Ronald 1 Comment

Associate Justice Antonin Scalia, appointed by President Ronald Reagan 25 years ago, and arguably the most conservative Justice in more than half a century, recently stated that women were not protected in the Constitution.

That shocking statement seems to be working itself out in the attack of the Republican Party, in Congress and in the states, on the rights and freedoms of American women and children.

Witness the following:

Republicans are trying to reduce women’s access to abortion care, and have been also trying to redefine rape, so as to lessen the opportunities or reasons for abortion.

A South Dakota legislator proposed a bill to make the murder of an abortion doctor justifiable homicide.

The party in Congress is trying to eliminate one billion dollars aid, including food, to low income pregnant women, mothers, babies, and children.

The party in Congress has proposed that hospitals be able to reject an abortion for a woman in danger of dying as a result of medical problems from the pregnancy.

Head Start, started under President Lyndon Johnson nearly fifty years ago, has been marked for a billion dollar cut in funding, eliminating spots for 200,000 children.

The Republicans want to cut spending on employment services, meals, and housing for senior citizens, with two thirds of them being women.

The GOP called on Friday for elimination of all federal funding for Planned Parenthood health centers, which promotes responsible family planning.

And this series of actions against women and children are sponsored by people who profess to be “good Christians”, religious people who demonstrate absolutely no concern for life once it is born, and are mean spirited and nasty in their vicious attacks on women’s rights! 🙁

The Republican women in Congress, as a group, make one wonder how women could be so uncaring and lack compassion for those less fortunate, whether poor, young, or elderly. In many ways, they are actually worse than the Republican men! There is no way that Jesus Christ would approve of these “true believers”, who he would consider hypocrites in the extreme! 🙁