Snarked on Net Neutrality

I've written before about Net Neutrality, and probably a quarter of my tweets relate to the issue. The FCC's Net Neutrality rules just went into effect, and Free Press is one of several entities to file suit against the FCC. The rules, you see, don't provide for true Net Neutrality; while they address the issue where land-based computers are concerned, they don't for wireless.

It's hard to get a handle on how much profit Verizon, AT&T, and Sprint make per cellular customer, but enough is never really enough, is it? AT&T recently eliminated the ability to buy a limited number of texts in favor of a $20.00 option for unlimited texts. I believe wireless companies make approximately a 10,000% texting profit. Another example: When I tried to change our existing plan to less than 700 minutes, I learned the 400 minute option—which would have worked for us as our daughter does most of her talking at night and on weekends— had disappeared. Like restaurants charging more for ever-larger plates, cellular providers are closing out less expensive options in favor of larger profits. And as there's so little competition, who's to stop them?

Free Press, a national, nonpartisan group working to reform media, sends out daily emails about media-related news. Many of those news items these days relate to the activities surrounding the proposed AT&T/T-Mobile merger (different filings made by AT&T as various items have leaked surrounding costs and jobs, lobbying money spent on Congress, unions, and corporations to win their support, and the recent Justice Department's Anti-Trust filing) to the fight for and against Net Neutrality.

I spend a lot of time reading articles linked to by Free Press in newspapers, magazines, online journals, The Huffington Post, etc., because the issue of Net Neutrality is important to me as a writer and former web publisher. You can imagine, then, that I was more than a little perturbed when I read the following headline yesterday on the Techland blog for @Time by @MattPeckham: Net Neutrality Proponents Sued by Net Neutrality Proponents? Though Peckham eventually cuts to the chase, it's not until four paragraphs in that he addresses the issue; until then the suit is made to sound frivolous and nonsensical. Here's the lead-in that follows the headline:

The folks who just officiated over net neutrality Internet regulations, the Federal Communications Commission, are being sued by—yep, the folks who fought to make net neutrality happen. Net neutrality's advocates suing net neutrality's enforcers?

True story.

Again, Peckham eventually makes Free Press' case, along with the FCC's response, but to me the article's headline, that snarky lead-in, and the lack of context related to the issue frustrated me. What's ultimately at stake is what the creators of the Internet envisioned, not a two-tiered system that cellular providers have already begun to force on customers.

It's clear that corporate interests already have a disproportionate impact on legislation, but articles like Peckham's do nothing to dispel the idea that corporate interests now infect journalism. The media bias I fear comes from corporate America, and that's what I worry filtered through into this particular article. "He said, he said" doesn't provide readers with the information they need to understand what's going on, any more than allowing politicians and their spin-meisters from making lies without being called on their bullshit because we've so perverted the concept of equal time that lies and reality now share the stage.

Yesterday I tweeted my displeasure and early today Matt Peckham answered me in a tweet. And then he snarked me by posting about a #Superficial #Reader" and linking back to his article on the Techland Blog. Ouch!

Snarked on Net Neutrality

Bad Logic

Yesterday morning as I flipped through the channels, I heard Senator Lindsey Graham expound the Republican talking points on why raising taxes to pay for infrastructure repairs won't fix the unemployment problem. See, it may work in the short run, but it won't work in the long run. Here's why he's wrong.

Right now we're in danger of a double dip recession because of high unemployment, which feeds low consumer confidence. Low consumer confidence means we aren't spending enough money to cause businesses to hire new employees.

Regardless of how "short term" the results might be in terms of hiring people to rebuild our quite literally crumbling infrastructure, all those newly working people would lower the unemployment rate. They would be paid real money, which they would then spend, pumping money into the economy. The result of lowering unemployment for a period of several years and the accompanying pumping of money into the economy would undoubtedly raise consumer confidence, which would pump more money into the economy, raising the demand for goods and services, thereby giving business more reason to expand their businesses.

And that, my friends, is the "long term."

Bad Logic

Republican Autism

Earlier today I read about a link between autism and anorexia. Anorexics often display behavior that those who understand the Spectrum might recognize, including rigid thinking that revolves around rituals. Which made a great deal of sense a few moments ago when I read a piece by Roger Lowenstein in the new issue of Newsweek that as a result of the Bush tax cuts of 2001 and 2003, "the government has suffered from self-induced anorexia."

Think about all those wacky Republicans who signed Grover Norquist's No New Taxes...Ever pledge, and the "magical thinking," as Fareed Zakaria calls it, they exhibit, in believing the deficit can be reduced entirely by cutting spending. If the U.S. is suffering from anorexia, it seems to me that these no-tax Republicans (ie, just about all Republicans, btw), are exhibiting Spectrum behavior. Full blown autism or simply Aspergers? That I can't say, but I sure wish I could shake a snow globe and make it all go away like a bad dream.

Republican Autism

We the People Do Not Consent to the Great Depression On Purpose

I just sent this letter via the Coffee Party's letter-writing tool to my two senators, congressman, and the White House via email. I realize my congressman would just as soon go down in flames, but my senators are not quite as ideologically insane.

Stop holding our nation hostage to pander to extremists.

We do not consent to the world's first Great Depression On-Purpose. We demand a balanced approach to solving our fiscal problems that will not put the entire burden on the poor and middle class. We see through the ransom demands from radical extremists and representatives in Congress who have pledged their loyalty to a rigid ideology instead of the American people.

We will not stand by quietly and bear the entire burden of solving problems that were caused by irresponsibility in Washington and on Wall Street. If you ignore our phone calls and emails, expect to see us in your local offices and at your town halls. One way or another we will be heard and our nation's interest will be served, or, you will lose the privilege of representing us.

Click here to send your own letter.

We the People Do Not Consent to the Great Depression On Purpose

Rogue Elephants

I've already linked to this from google+ and twitter, but can't stop thinking about it, so I'm going to write about it here. There's an op-ed piece in today's @nytimes by David Barash entitled Washington's Rogue Elephants. In it he writes of the current debt ceiling stand-off between the President and the Republicans. Please click the link and read it for yourself, but here's what interests me, and following that, my question about it:

Barash writes about the metaphor we all seem to be using these days, that it is a classic game of chicken which will end with one side swerving out of the way. The swerver loses, but the crash is averted. But, he wonders, what if the current stand-off is not being played under traditional assumptions? His answer?

"Here’s where elephants come into play. To achieve their mating goals, male elephants will sometimes play games of chicken, with one individual essentially giving the impression that he is crazy and has become an irrational player in a game premised on shared rationality and predictability."

He adds that this tactic tends to work because male elephants "can become temporarily "crazy." When in musk bull elephants "ooze a weird, foul-smelling, greenish glop from glands near their eyes," and behave "with violent abandon, taking risks and defying the basic rules of pachyderm propriety (and also giving rise to the term 'rogue elephant')."

So, what does one do when confronted by a rogue elephant? Brasher suggests avoiding it or shooting it. Avoiding it means no more negotiating, and instead refusing to play the game.

Okay...in theory I get this, but how would President Obama do this in reality?

Rogue Elephants

Back to the 80s

Although I didn't vote for this particular video at Save the Internet.com as regards the possible AT&T/T-Mobile merger, it makes the point I can't imagine needs to be made again.

I lived through the 80s, when there was a telecommunications monopoly, when "Ma Bell" was the only option for telephone and long distance service. I also remember that when the Trust Division of the Department of Justice busted the monopoly, prices went down, particularly for long distance. No longer did family and friends "save up" to make the occasional phone call that actually didn't cost all that much, we could call throughout the country at competitive rates.

Obviously I'm against the merger, because anyone with a fraction of a brain realizes that the fewer companies in competition with each other, the higher the price consumers pay...well, except where Apple cuts in so they can screw with the competition all the while screwing the consumer. But because corporations now write our legislation and have thoroughly co-opted regulatory agencies, I think that the merger will likely go through, particularly now that AT&T has bought off progressive groups. But here's a couple of cautionary tales from my personal files...

1) Not long ago my daughter's cell phone died, and we needed to buy her a new one. She was not up for an upgrade, but Verizon had always worked with us in the past because we've been long-time customers and sent business their way. Well, the times they have changed. Forget that there's no longer actual tech support at their company store; I already knew that. But nobody was willing to help me out when we went in to buy her a new phone. Even though they'd just locked us in to another two years service for her a few months ago, we ended up shelling out full price on a phone that would have cost a new customer a fraction of the price. Why? Well, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that Verizon, AT&T, and t-Mobile together control the vast majority of the mobile phone market. A few years ago, when we did quite a few deals with Verizon, it was a different picture. So now, higher prices, less customer assistance...how great is that?

2) We've long been users of DSL; Southwestern Bell, which at one time was part of AT&T, and is once again part of AT&T (funny that, no?) and we live in a major metropolitan area. And yet, for the entire period of time we've had DSL, our service has sucked. Why? Because "we're at the edge" of a service area. For the same period of time we've heard that SWB/AT&T is "upgrading in our area," yet it's never happened. How do I know this? Well, yesterday, after trying to watch yet another buffered video (about the Dale Chihuly installation at the MFA in Boston), I called tech support. I was told: "Your DSL is as fast as it's going to be because you're at the edge of a service area, but we're upgrading in your area." If we lived in the boonies, this would make sense, but we don't.

Think about what the telecom companies have done: They charge tremendous amounts for basic cell service...much higher than you pay for a land line...for diminished quality, and the possibility of brain cancer. Does it really cost them as much as it does to provide service? Well, we know that text messaging represents pure profit to wireless providers, and that's just one service for wireless users. The wireless bill for our three-person family now includes three data plans for three smart phones in addition to a special text fee for Rachael who, like her college pals, texts almost exclusively. I'm thinking Verizon makes a bloody fortune from us, and I can only be happy that we signed her up for a data plan when we a couple of months ago because now Verizon, like the other carriers, has set in place tiered usage fees. They're also trying to eliminate the ability of users like my husband to toggle his phone to his laptop to avoid yet another data plan. They sold us the phone with that as a major feature less than a year ago, yet now they want to reneg on it.

Ain't the lack of competition grand?

Back to the 80s

New at H&H: Me Again...on Pr0n This Time

In my first entry for today, I mentioned dashing off a quick piece in response to a tweet from Megan yesterday. It's just been posted online at Heroes & Heartbreakers.

I wrote about so-called Lady Pr0n in response to an article on a website for an NBC affiliate in Utah. Historical context always matters, and given that when I ran AAR we went through a similar controversy way back in 1999 that led to an article in Salon.com, I wanted to add my two cents, in an updated way.

As always, I'd love some feedback on H&H after you read my piece. Even though I had a fabulous, confidence-inspiring birthday yesterday, the lack of comments to my H&H articles, let alone the usual dead-silence here, feeds my insecurities. I can't help it; I need lots and lots of validation!

New at H&H: Me Again...on Pr0n This Time

Let's Not Forget the Forgotten

A close friend of mine has a son who joined the armed services straight out of high school rather than going to college, not because he and his family were gung-ho hawks, but because he wanted to serve his country and because he thought it would help him become a man. He chose to become a grunt in the Marines; if he was going to do it, he was going to "do it right" by being on the front lines. He was injured yesterday in his second tour of duty in Afghanistan by IED attack. His injuries were considered minor, but the injuries of one of his buddies were far graver.

I think I've written before about the emotional dangers facing our soldiers, and that they seem to increase exponentially with each deployment. That's outside of the physical danger they face daily, and the unbelievable conditions in which they live. I remember the first time I saw this photo—these guys are sleeping, not dead—and having it hit home in a visceral way how brave these young (some as young as 18) men and women are; it's frankly unfathomable to me, in my air-conditioned suburban home surrounded by beautiful flowers and the ability to bathe and/or shower at will.

These "forgotten" wars of ours shame me, not only because we continue to fight them when the true enemies are elsewhere, but because they are forgotten. I continually wonder why we aren't exposed to these wars on a daily basis, on television, in newspapers, on online news outlets and blogs. Because of modern techniques more and more soldiers survive horrific traumas to their brains, psyches, and bodies that would previously have left them dead on the battlefield or in field hospitals. And yet most of us don't realize their survival comes at unimaginable costs to their long-term quality of life.

And now, I guess it's time to go shopping in order to support our troops this Memorial Day weekend.

Let's Not Forget the Forgotten

Gotta Love the Free Market

I just read that the U.S. lags behind other many other developed nations in terms of broadband access and speed. That according to the FCC, which, as we all know, is not exactly a market-neutral entity, as most recently evidenced by the so quick the revolving door gave me whiplash career change for Meredith Baker, who just a few months ago voted for the monopolistic merger of Comcast and NBC, only to have announced last week she'll be working as a lobbyist for Comcast.

Every day I read something that infuriates me, that makes the case that "we, the people," no longer are. Whether it's Net Neutrality, the wives of investment bankers getting bailout money, or the sale of our infrastructure to foreign interests, monied interests are not looking out for you and me...they're looking out for themselves, but have convinced many of us that it's government that's the problem, that taxes are awful, and that the free market can solve anything.

It's as though there never was a Great Depression, trust busting, or any ability in our minds to understand how credit inexorably links Wall Street to Main Street. Or that if we cede control over legislation and regulation to business, they come out on top at our expense.

We blame Obama (not entirely blameless), rather than remembering what he inherited. We refuse to pay for our wars by raising taxes, and believe ridiculousness like 90% of funding to Planned Parenthood is for abortion, 15% of our budget funds the NEA, and that foreign aid accounts for a quarter of our spending.

The "government is evil" bunch hasn't got it entirely wrong, but that's only because government is in so deep with big business that I believe this picture says a thousand words.

Gotta Love the Free Market

Education, Short-Sightedness, and Child Labor

It's hard to imagine, but less than a year ago I posted A Rant of Major Proportions, in which I theorized just how far back the lunatic right-wing fringe would like us to move. Thanks to a Facebook friend, it's as I suspected: FDR's New Deal and the umbrella of laws and regulations it encompassed.

My friend linked to an article today from her Facebook feed that required further investigation. The explosive headline of the linked article reads: Missouri GOP Wants to Repeal Child Labor Laws. Because the article is posted on a non-neutral website, I decided to look into it further, and went back to the beginning to remind myself that laws put into place at a federal level which govern the minimum age of employment date back to the 1930s. Does anyone outside of the lunatic right-wing fringe think the supposed "nanny state" began in the 1930s...really? I won't even go into the fact that this same group of patriots believe woman are too imbecilic to be responsible for our own health decisions and that the government must step in to "help" us.

Okay, back to child labor laws. A Republican state senator from Missouri wants to amend the state's child labor laws...effective at the start of the next school year...so that children under fourteen can work more than three hours a day during the school week and more than eight hours a day on non-school days. Further, if this bill passes, inspectors could not monitor workplace compliance over remaining child labor laws.

Child labor laws weren't enacted by an out-of-control government under the "liberal" administrations of the last twenty years. Hell, they weren't enacted by an out-of-control government under the "liberal" administrations of the last forty years. Laws governing minimum ages were enacted more than seventy years ago.

Given the existing drop-out rates and how badly Americans compare to other developed nations in terms of education, do we really want middle-school students working more than three hours a day during the school week? Do we want them working before seven in the morning or nine at night?

My husband and I recently talked about Governor Rick Perry's odd views on public education. Given that Texas currently ranks 47th in education, that Perry took federal money earmarked for education but then cut state education funds in the same amount to effectively pocket the money, and that he plans to cut even more money from education (and libraries), I've concluded that Perry's braggadocio about not raising taxes and how terrific that is in luring businesses to come to Texas is a big load of smelly horse shit. Do companies want to relocate in order to create high-paying jobs that require educated people to fill them in a state that doesn't produce educated people? The logic doesn't track. On the other hand, if Texas is spitting out people fit only for low-wage jobs that don't require much learnin', we are in great shape.

Last year, the Houston Chronicle reported that "Texas' unhappy mix of dismal eduation achievement and high poverty" may have disastrous results, such as almost a third of the work force not having high school diplomas by 2040. This downward trend in education...and the poverty that goes along with it...is not only of concern to statisticians; Texas business executives also worry about their future work force. And for those who question the bias of that statistician, he worked in the Bush administration as head of the Census Bureau.

Among those quoted in the article is the CEO of the Texas Association of Business, who warns about the long-term results of short-sighted policies like those currently in vogue in Texas. According to Bill Hammond, "The only way we will turn around public education in Texas is for the business community to realize that their future is at stake." He fears for the future of Texas in terms of economic competitiveness, and adds, "Much of the state's leadership looks like me [Anglo] and do not understand that in 20 years time, their children are going to face a bleak future in spite of the fact that they have a college education because there are not going to be enough educated workers to move the economy ahead."

By all means, let's ensure a strong work ethic in our young by allowing middle-schoolers to spend their free time working rather than learning. It'll be like the good old days.

Education, Short-Sightedness, and Child Labor

Texas Libraries

Dear Library Supporter,

Take action now and click on SAVE LIBRARY PROGRAMS to send an email to your legislators. You can customize your message to describe the negative impact of budget cuts. The time for action is now!

Ask your friends, neighbors, support groups, and everyone you can think of to send messages as well. Distribute this call to action through social media and any other tools at your disposal. We need tens of thousands of messages to go forward, and we need your help getting this message to our stakeholders across the state.

As you may already know, the proposed state budget:

• Eliminates Loan Star Libraries (direct aid grants to public libraries)
• Eliminates all state funding for TexShare databases
• Eliminates the K-12 Database Program
• Eliminates the Library System Negotiated Grants Program
• Eliminates state funding for statewide library development
• Eliminates state funding for the state depository program and TRAIL program
• Assumes an overall loss of over $8 million in IMLS funds (Note: federal funding is the source of funding for the regional library systems, the TANG program, and interlibrary loan.)
• Eliminates the Technology Allotment at TEA
• Eliminates funding for the State Law Library

Without a restoration of library funding, Texas will have no state infrastructure for library services. Compounded with massive cuts proposed at the local level throughout the state, Texas libraries are in danger. We need you and every single library supporter in Texas to write elected officials to oppose cuts to libraries and urge the restoration of funding for library services.

Gloria Meraz

Texas Library Association

Texas Libraries

Griftopia by Matt Taibbi

Griftopia: Bubble Machines, Vampire Squids, and the Long Con That Is Breaking America

Matt Taibbi

Grade: B+

"Follow the money" has long been my mantra, and Matt Taibbi's cogent reporting does the best job describing various economic crises of the last fifteen years of any that I've read, peeling away each level of complexity in a way that the layman reader can easily understand our world turned upside down as a result of greedy financiers and their collusion with the government. He details the creation and bursting of the dot.com bubble, the 2004 energy crisis, and the 2008 economic collapse, and like the prosecutor in a Mafia trial, lays out a scathing indictment of Wall Street and those who set monetary policy in the U.S., starting with Alan Greenspan, whose Ayn Randian views continue to pervade economic policy long after her death in the early 1980s.

Read this Amazon Vine review in its entirety at Amazon.

Griftopia by Matt Taibbi

We Are Becoming Wylie E. Coyote

John Avlon writes in today's Daily Beast something I've long suspected given that I started working at Barnes and Noble almost immediately after the 2008 presidential election: Anti-Obama screeds fill our shelves in unprecedented numbers.

According to Avlon's article, at this point in Bush's presidency, just five anti-Bush books had hit the shelves. So far the tally for anti-Obama books stands at a whopping 42.

Let that sink in...and think about it. For a country led around by a liberal media, how is this conceivable?

That's not really the point, though...and I'll cop to it being a bit of a cheap shot. Avlon's actual point is that these "fear-mongering" books written for "personal and partisan profit" won't end with this election cycle. He argues that because politics tends to follow "the lines of physics - every action creates an equal an opposite reaction," welcome to the "new normal."

I'm going to take Avlon's argument further than he does, though, especially after viewing the actual book titles he lists. I've shelved them all at the bookstore and watched our conservative readership gobble them up during the past nearly two years, but seeing them listed one after another takes things to an altogether new level of crazy. Because we live in the Information Age, as these (please, please, please follow the money) screeds become the new normal, we risk inciting ourselves out of our "can-do" spirit and into a nation of cartoonish behavior wherein we become the Wylie E. Coyote of the First World, always searching for ways to "get" the metaphorical Roadrunner, but being unable to accomplish that - let alone doing the things that really matter - out of impotence. If you're looking for something to be scared about, I suggest worrying about this instead of a secretly Muslim, socialist president who wants to send our kids to the gulag.

We Are Becoming Wylie E. Coyote

Gay Marriage

It may be hard to believe, but sometimes I actually get fired up about something as a result of watching a show like The Real Housewives...

I turned on Thursday's episode of the D.C. series earlier this evening and watched Stacie and her husband struggle with the idea that gay people should have the right to marry because their religion teaches them that marriage is between a man and a woman. When the gay marriage issue became a big deal as a result of the California proposition, I asked my husband what he thought of gay marriage. He answered that he had no problem with civil unions, but that marriage should be unique to a man and a woman. I don't recall that he had a particularly stellar argument to back up his belief, but he's entitled to his opinions.

I have no problem whatsoever with gay people marrying like straight people do. Two consenting adults should be allowed to marry if that is what they so desire. What interests me is the vehemence against this simple, straightforward, democratic concept. My question to those who decry the concept of gays marrying is this: "How does the marriage of two men or two women hurt you?" Since, obviously, it doesn't do anything real other than perhaps offending sensibilities, why does it matter so very, very much?

We don't live in a theocracy; I'm allowed to be a Jew just as my neighbor is allowed to be a Christian, so why should somebody's religious beliefs effect somebody else's rights and liberties? If you believe a marriage should only be between a man and a woman, that's fine, but why should your beliefs take precedence over other people's beliefs if laws are not being broken, nobody is being hurt, and there is consent? If two adult men want to marry, why is it anyone else's concern? Mind your own business, I say. Or, if you must, turn the other cheek.

This is no slippery slope; two men or two women who agree as adults to enter into marriage does not mean that next year it'll be chill for the guy at the CVS to marry a goat...or a minor. Marriage isn't doing so great as an institution these days with only straight people allowed to partake that somehow gay people will "ruin" it. It's not as though we force divorced people who have broken God's Holy Sacrament to wear scarlet embroidered "D's" on their clothing, nor do we force childless couples to break up because they're not pro-creating.

Just because something is a tradition doesn't make it right. Separate but equal never works, and there's always discrimination behind it.

Gay Marriage

Shine On

Question: What separates us from every other member of NATO besides Turkey? If you can't figure it out, try to answer this one: What do the Israelis, Germans, Russians, and members of the armed forces in the UK have in common?

Answer: Why, those pussies allow openly gay people to protect their countries through military service.

Today the Republicans managed, because we now apparently live in a nation for which 60 (rather than 51) of 100 constitutes a majority in the Senate, to table a vote on the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell. The final vote was 56-43. According to the Los Angeles Times, blocking the bill also blocks passage of the "Dream Act," a route to citizenship for illegals who nonetheless protected our country by serving in the armed forces.

Yet another shining moment in U.S. history.

Shine On

Islam

When the "WTC Mosque" protests began, my thoroughly American side came out. First Amendment freedom of religion? Natch. Melting pot? Sure...give me your huddled masses. And when the "let's burn the Quran" crowd came out, I was disgusted, although for once glad it wasn't a Texan making news for intolerance.

Throughout America's history, we've had this push-me/pull-you attitude toward religion and diversity. All of us learn in elementary school that those who settled the U.S. did so partly to escape religious persecution. But it didn't take long for certain Christian sects to be persecuted. The Puritans, after all, for anyone who's ever read The Scarlet Letter, weren't known for tolerance, and visitors to Williamsburg are told that church attendance was mandatory during the colonial period.

Being a Jew in the U.S. today, while certainly better than in the past, remains a difficult proposition. Ours is the only religious country among educated, wealthy nations. All around me I hear about Christianity Under Attack, the War on Christmas, and that the Founding Fathers were misunderstood. Earlier this year the Texas Board of Education grudgingly decided to add Thomas Jefferson back into its list of important thinkers after first removing him for not being sufficiently Christian - that whole separation of church and state thing.

That's the one side of it. The other is that everyone assumes if you are Jewish, you must be pro-Israel...if you are Jewish, you used Blacks "like stepstools to zoom up throughout American society" and "exploited the black civil rights movement" for your own benefit. I can't tell you how embarrassed I was when Jewish Bubbies and Zadies in Florida were shown to be as bigoted as any Texas redneck during the 2008 presidential campaign. I cringe whenever I remember this one old woman who thought Michelle Obama had a horse face and an old coot obsessed over the size of Michelle Obama's backside because, you know, All Blacks Have Junk in Their Trunks.

Let's go back to the pro-Israel assumption. It is quite possible to be Jewish while at the same time not agreeing with Israeli policy regarding settlements and the larger Palestinian question. On the other hand, it's hard to forget the Arab armies that tried to invade Israel upon its creation, during the Six-Day and Yom Kippur Wars, all wars of aggression against Israel simply for existing.

Which brings up Arabs and Islam, and Islam and the Jews. It's true that Mohammed, who initially didn't focus negatively on the Jews, eventually changed his mind when the local tribes didn't convert to Islam, resulting in the slaughter of three Jewish tribes. But he wasn't particularly thrilled with proselytizing Christians either. In fact, it could be said that the current anti-semitism among Arabs actually grew out of proselytizing Christians, but not those of the 7th century. Instead, Europeans who came to the Middle East in the 19th Century brought their own, home-grown anti-semitism with them.

All of which is an interesting historical tidbit, but not my point...sorry. The fact of the matter is that among Muslims in the Middle East, anti-semitism is de rigueur. So how do I mentally compute my American need for acceptance of Islam when as a Jew I am fearful of the growing anti-semitism throughout the world today?

When I was in high school, I went to Israel on vacation, and one day went sight-seeing with a wonderful old man whose grown son worked for my father in the U.S. The man had survived the Holocaust and now owned orange orchards in Israel. He was a lovely old man, and his son, raised in Israel but educated in the U.S. where he still lives, is the biggest mensch I've ever known. He handles my mom's finances and is a genuinely kind, gentle, and nice man who actually finished first.

He came to visit my mom when I was in California in July, and he spoke about a cruise from which he and his family had just returned. Their very small ship had docked in Turkey and Spain, among other ports, and while he loved Turkey, he was very concerned about what he viewed as growing Islamist influence. Then he went on, shocking me as he spoke about the "loss" of Europe to Islam and his concern about the rise of Islam in the U.S.

Jews are known as being Deep Thinkers. We may have big noses and bad hair, but along with the pretty eyes come some great intellects. Me, though...all I get when I try and resolve these conflicting thoughts is a headache.

Islam

Damn, I'm Pissed!

How ridiculous is the person who, after I post reviews at Amazon, immediately swings by to vote "not helpful?" I thought it was particularly hilarious this last time as the book won't even be released until next month, and given that it's among the launch books for a new fiction imprint for a publisher previously best known for the Chicken Soup books, it's not as though readers the world over have been holding their collective breath for reviews to surface.

Speaking of ridiculous, that's the term I'd apply to yesterday's Glenn Beck march. Beck chose the anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s I Have a Dream speech to ask that his Tea Party followers "turn back to God," and focus on what we've accomplished in this country as opposed to our failures. Ironic much?

I was in a foul mood for most of yesterday, but it wasn't until dinner that I realized my mood was based on this march. Watching video clips of person upon person upon person decry how the U.S. has become socialist and that we need to "take back" this country, I wanted to shout at all of them, "You are nothing but a puppet on a string!"

How did we get to a place where so many people believe "We're socialist because Obama wants to spread the wealth"...ah, I think I understand now.

We can start with Rupert Murdock, who has used his Fox News Network (and I use the term very loosely), to promulgate his far-right agenda. I'm not name-calling here; I'm not particularly happy with anyone at end of the political spectrum. But even if you are not among those who believe the "news" they see on Fox is "fair and balanced," you may not know about the brothers Koch. Their combined wealth is surpassed only by Bill Gates and Warren Buffett in the U.S., and they have quietly bankrolled the "grass-roots" effort of the Tea Party by spending $100,000,000 so far to convince people that our president wants to destroy our way of life. Their efforts are not benign, and they most assuredly are not out to help the "little guy," whose strings they are silently pulling. In other words, moneyed interests, once again, have somehow managed to set themselves up as the champion of the working class when their true agenda is more basic: It's my money, and I will do anything to keep it. I don't want you to have any of it, but I'll do whatever must be done to convince you that I'm out to protect your interests.

The Koch brothers are particularly dangerous in that they combine greed with down-right scary beliefs, such as the abolition of public schools, the FBI and CIA, federal regulatory agencies - such as the EPA - and Social Security. Why? Because funding any of this causes them to pay taxes...or limits their business profits. For instance, they are working to prevent the EPA from classifying one of their products - formaldehyde - as a "known carcinogen."

The view that government is the root of all evil and business is the natural protectorate of the people has gained a great deal of traction since George Bush became president. It's as though the world turned upside down and we forgot what led us into the financial crisis we see today.

The Koch brothers don't like paying taxes, they don't like government impinging on their bottom line, and they think government regulations and safety nets are for pussies. Who needs unemployment protection? If you give somebody unemployment protection, he'll stop looking for work. Public health? I pay my own way...why the hell shouldn't you, even if you earn a subsistence wage? Global warming? Believe us when we yell Poppycock...even though we're in the fossil-fuel business! And so on and so on.

People with such one-sided belief systems used to be known as the "fringe." Not so anymore, if you consider the popularity of Sarah Palin, Rand Paul, that nut-job Sharron Angle, not to mention the perpetually orange John Boehner, who once handed out money on the floor of the House from tobacco lobbyists. No spending because it'll increase the deficit...but by golly, let's cut taxes. No more money for the unemployed, even though the "official" unemployment rate stands at 10% and doesn't include those who have been unemployed so long they've given up looking for work, the bums! Hold BP accountable for the mess in the Gulf of Mexico? So sorry, I apologize for so much as thinking of it.

Were the Koch's to have their way, those such as the man directly implicated in the recent outbreak of salmonella poisoning, long considered a habitual violator and forced to pay fines in the millions of dollars over the years, would go blithely unchecked.

I can't wait to see what they'll come up with next...abolishing child labor laws, perhaps?

NYT columnist Frank Rich writes that the brothers Koch "must be laughing all the way to the bank knowing that working Americans are aiding and abetting their selfish interests." He doesn't let Murdoch get away unscathed, though. While his network lambastes the "Ground Zero Mosque" and points fingers at a Saudi Prince said to be contributing to it, that same prince is "not only the biggest non-Murdoch shareholder in Fox News' parent company (he owns 7 percent of News Corp.) and the recipient of Murdoch mammoth investments in Saudi Arabia but also the subject of lionization elsewhere on Fox." As I like to say:

Just
follow
the
money.

Before I sign off, just one more depressing item in the news. The Republicans, who smell victory in November, are preparing to launch a series of investigations against the White House similar to those which occupied most of the Clinton presidency. An aide to one of the congressman overseeing the groundwork has already mentioned impeachment. In a nation where 41% of Republicans believe Obama was "probably or definitely born outside the country" and roughly one-third think that Obama is a Muslim (so what if he is, and I ask this as a Jew?), anything's possible.

Damn, I'm Pissed!

Business as Usual?

In another sign that our nation is veering headlong into corporate facism, both the FCC and Congress are engaging in closed-door meetings with ISP's to re-write telecom law, most likely to limit effects of Net Neutrality. Net Neutrality, for those of you who have heard the term but are uncertain as to its meaning, is precisely what it says: that there be no restrictions used by those who provide the "pipes" for the Internet. In other words, An ISP must be neutral in allowing content through its pipes and cannot slow down access to or prevent users from access to online content.

Let me give you some personal, historical perspective. Years ago when AOL was still preeminent, AAR was not available to all of AOL's users. There was nothing as a content provider I could do about it. Indeed, I remember being stunned after speaking with somebody at AOL who told me, "We are not required to provide access to all websites online." Several years later, when a router in the Mid-West broke, AAR became unavailable for a good chunk of the country and the company that provided that router was not required to fix the break. Instead I was forced to pay AAR's host to create a fix around the break, and in the interim weeks, we lost untold thousands of users temporarily...and the number of users who simply thought we'd gone offline permanently remains unknown.

Let's jump to the future now, where Time/Warner exists and NBC and Comcast may be merging. Without Net Neutrality, when owners of the pipes that bring us content also own companies that generate large amounts of content, they can, quite legally, either slow down or stop the competition. In a case brought by Comcast against the FCC earlier this year, a federal appeals court stated that the FCC lacked the authority to require Net Neutrality, leading both the FCC and Congress scrambling to create some level of authority by regulation or law.

As public agencies do when preparing to enact regulatory changes, the FCC asked for public comment regarding Net Neutrality. Although 85% of respondents asked for Net Neutrality, these closed-door meetings signal yet another Obama administration deal limiting real change. Similar opaque, revolving-door meetings on Capital Hill - where nearly 3/4 of telecom lobbyists are former federal employees - are yet another sign of business as usual.

While I understand that changes are incremental and evolutionary rather than revolutionary, it pains me to say that Barack Obama's efforts to avoid conflict and create compromise too often benefit the industries in need to regulation. It's one thing to hold meetings with telecom companies, but closed-door meetings stink of back-room deals.

Where's the sunshine?

Business as Usual?

Blogging Barnes and Noble

For the last two nights we've been slammed at the bookstore, which is a good thing. And last night was particularly fun in that, right off the bat I sold the Phoenix Chronicles quartet, and not much later, convinced a woman already buying Leila Meacham's Roses into adding Mary Alice Monroe's Sweetgrass to her purchase.

Later on, though, I was presented with a dilemma: A returning customer asked me to look at what she planned to buy and give her my advice. I went through her stack after she added Sebastian Junger's War at my suggestion, and in it I noticed Yann Martel's Beatrice and Virgil, which to my knowledge has not been well-received by critics.

I never say a word or so much as change facial expressions when customers buy right wing screed after right wing screed. I don't know if it's just our location in conservative Plano, Texas, but it never ceases to surprise me when I walk through our Current Affairs section to see all the far right books from authors including that 15-year-old "wunderkind" Jonathan Krohn, Michelle Malkin, and multiples by Glenn Beck and Bill O'Reilly. I'm going out on a limb here, but unless liberals start hammering out books by the dozen, they will never be able to counteract what's floating around out there.

But I digress...

The point I'd begun to make before rudely interrupting myself is that while I'm easily able to suggest additional books for customers to buy, I try to refrain from comment when it comes to books they're already planning to buy. I will admit that some months ago I convinced a guy not to buy that Diana Palmer bargain hardcover - he had no idea what it was, and I could tell that he didn't - but we're a bookstore, we're here to sell books in order to make money, and telling people not to buy books doesn't accomplish that.

There's a gray area, though, when it comes to providing what I think is good advice and strong customer service. If a customer comes up to me as cashier with a $30 hardcover when I know we also sell a $15 trade paperback, I'll ask them if they know they have a choice. Sometimes they do...they just prefer hardcovers...but when they don't and they're amenable, I arrange for them to buy the cheaper version. I don't know what a manager would say if witnessing me do this, but I figure that the customer will remember we saved them money and treated them well and will return because of it. Sometimes it even allows me to sell more, as with the woman not long ago who planned to buy three of the four Twilight books. She didn't realize that two of them were available as mass market releases as opposed to the trade paperbacks in her hands. I convinced her to switch those two out and add the fourth, hardcover-only book, and she walked out a happy customer. She'd spent oh-so-slightly more than originally planned, but left with the entire series in her hands rather than settling for part of it.

So the question for me was: Do I tell my returning customer that I've read only ho-hum or downright negative reviews of Beatrice and Virgil or do I tell her I haven't read it and can't advise her one way or the other? Because she'd asked for my opinion due to a level of trust we'd built in previous transactions, I decided to tell her what I'd heard. She did not buy Martel's book as a result. On the one hand, the store made more money on Junger's book than it would have on Martel's and I don't think she would have bought both, but on the other, I talked a customer out of a book she'd considered buying. In the end I'm not sure I made the right choice, but I think I did.

I asked my husband about it this morning, and this was his response: "Suppose you went to the butcher and bought an expensive cut of meat and told him you planned to boil it. What if he didn't say anything and you actually boiled it? Wouldn't you be angry that the butcher didn't stop you?" While I'm not quite sure that's the same thing, he and I are obviously on the same page...but then, he doesn't work retail.

Blogging Barnes and Noble

Thanks to MediaFail

A week or so ago I joined the twitter feed for @mediafail and this morning clicked a link to the NYT, which I browse through daily anyway. The alert was for an article entitled 2010’s Debates Still Trapped in the 1960s, and though I am more a product of the 1970s than the 1960s, I was appalled at the lack of fundamental understanding about history's effects on the present exhibited by this article's author. I don't know how old Matt Bai is, but his argument reminded me of many an argument I've had with women younger than myself about feminism.

To say that race issues are nuanced today obliterates the fact that it was anything but nuanced in the 1960s. Had people not died for civil rights throughout the South in the 1960s, nobody could make the Tiger Woods and/or Barack Obama arguments about nuance that appear in Bai's article. To cavalierly say that times are different now not only fails to recognize the sacrifices made toward equality today, it also fails to paint an accurate picture of the country we would live in had the struggle not taken place.

When businesswomen in their late 20s or early 30s tell me that they are not feminists, I want to call them, as my friend Ellen would, "asshats," but as a civilized Coffee Party member, I'll refrain. I was lucky enough to have joined the professional workforce in the mid-80s, after the first wave of women had paved the way. Even so, I still contended with men who refused to take me seriously. I remember transforming a program at the City of Dallas from what previously had been a clerical dead-end into an extremely successful program that added hundreds of thousands of dollars into the City's coffers (that would otherwise have never been collected), and yet, until I practically threw my master's degree diploma at the face of the City attorney I'd be working with, he thought I was just "another female clerk."

For many the road had not only been paved but re-surfaced by the time they started their career journeys upon it, yet because their path has been smoother, they can't or won't recognize that they are living the lives of feminists, bought and paid for by the women that came before them. Whether it's complacency or they've bought into the "Femi-Nazi" trap, it's worth remembering that women still don't earn as much as men for doing the same job.

So please, Matt Bai, Rand Paul, and all you others who would have us believe that we live in a nuanced world today and need to change our worldviews in acceptance of it, please stop trying to dupe me. The fight by women and African Americans is still being fought. Yes, the world has changed and we no longer deny black men lunch-counter seats or chase women around desks, but the fight must continue. Women still make, on average, 79 cents for each dollar earned, on average, by men, and in the South, 47% of the population does not believe our president was born in the U.S. When that changes, come back to me and we'll have this discussion again.

Thanks to MediaFail