12-28-2019

 

My Take on Speaker Pelosi

 

Coming from a political family, she began as a volunteer and rose in the party ranks, serving as a California representative to the Democratic National Committee from 1976 to 1996. She won a special election for California’s Eighth District in 1987.

 

Historically and as a Democratic Party politician Pelosi began breaking ground becoming the first female Democratic leader of the House and the first female Speaker of the House in 2007 and again in 2018. She is currently Speaker of the House, making her the most powerful female American politician.

 

Pelosi opposed George W. Bush, aligned herself with Barack Obama and prided herself as fighting for the people, working to lower health care costs, increase workers’ pay through strong economic growth and rebuilding America, and clean up corruption to make Washington work for all. She was inducted into the National Women’s Hall of Fame in Seneca Falls, the birthplace of the American woman’s rights movement.

 

Pelosi spent 31 years representing San Francisco’s 12th District in Congress. She led House Democrats for 16 years and previously served as House Democratic Whip. Under her leadership the 111th Congress was called “one of the most productive Congresses in history” by Norman Ornstein. Obama called her “an extraordinary leader for the American people”. The Christian Science Monitor wrote: “….make no mistake: Nancy Pelosi is the most powerful woman in American politics…”

 

Under Obama, Pelosi led the House passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act in early 2009 to create save millions of American jobs, provide relief for American families, and provide a tax cut to 95 percent of working Americans. She continued to focus on the need to create jobs in America and prevent them from being shipped overseas.

 

She was the architect of the landmark Affordable Care Act which guaranteed protections for all Americans with pre-existing medical conditions, ended annual and lifetime limits on health coverage, and provided affordable health coverage for tens of millions more Americans while lowering health care costs over the long term.

 

She lead Congress in passing strong Wall Street reforms to rein in big banks and protect consumers as well as the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act, which expands educational opportunities and reforms the financial aid system to save billions of taxpayers’ dollars.

 

Additionally key legislation passed into law like the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act to restore the ability of women and all workers to access our judicial system to fight pay discrimination; legislation to provide health care for 11 million American children; national service legislation; and hate crimes legislation. In late 2010, Pelosi led the Congress in passing child nutrition and food safety legislation as well as repealing the discriminatory “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, which prohibited gays and lesbians from serving openly in the military.

 

As Speaker, Pelosi made energy security her flagship issue, enacting comprehensive energy legislation in 2007 that raised vehicle fuel efficiency standards for the first time in 32 years and making an historic commitment to American home grown biofuels. In 2009, under her leadership, the House passed the landmark American Clean Energy and Security Act – a comprehensive bill to create clean energy jobs, combat climate change, and transition America to a clean energy economy. The legislation was blocked by Republicans in the United States Senate, but sent a strong signal to the world about the United States’ commitment to fighting the climate crisis.

 

A leader on the environment at home and abroad, Pelosi secured passage of the “Pelosi amendment” in 1989, now a global tool to assess the potential environmental impacts of development. In San Francisco, Pelosi was the architect of legislation to create the Presidio Trust and transform the former military post into an urban national park.

 

In continuing to push for accountability and transparency in government, under Speaker Pelosi, the House passed the toughest ethics reform legislation in the history of the Congress, including the creation of an independent ethics panel, and increased accountability and transparency in House operations, including earmark reforms. As Speaker, Pelosi led the fight to pass the DISCLOSE Act in the House, which fights a corporate takeover of U.S. elections and ensures additional disclosure.

 

Additional key accomplishments signed into law under the leadership of Speaker Pelosi include: an increase in the minimum wage for the first time in 10 years; the largest college aid expansion since the GI bill; a new GI education bill for veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars; and increased services for veterans, caregivers, and the Veterans Administration.

 

As House Democratic Leader, Pelosi wrested critical legislative victories out of the GOP majority. In the 114th Congress, she spearheaded a historic bipartisan agreement to strengthen Medicare, ending the cycle of expensive “Doc Fix” patches and transitioning away from a volume-based system toward one that rewards value, ensures the accuracy of payments and improves the quality of care. Following the Iran Nuclear Agreement, Leader Pelosi orchestrated the effort that secured the votes to uphold a possible Presidential veto of Republicans’ effort to disapprove the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.

 

Pelosi’s strength at the negotiating table has consistently delivered significant funding increases for key Democratic priorities. In the FY 2016 omnibus, Pelosi won the permanent authorization of the World Trade Center Health Program and a massive five-year extension of expiring wind and solar renewable energy tax credits. In the FY 2018 omnibus, Pelosi won significant increases in vital domestic investments, including a $3.2 billion increase in opioid epidemic funding, a $3 billion increase for NIH medical research, and the largest single year funding increase for Child Care Development Block Grants in the initiative’s history.

 

In the face of the all out-Republican onslaught against Americans’ health care, Leader Pelosi held House Democrats united through dozens of votes to repeal or undermine the Affordable Care Act – mobilizing a massive nationwide campaign to block House Republicans’ monstrous “Trumpcare” legislation. Under her leadership, House Democrats also unanimously opposed the GOP tax scam for the rich.

 

What I don’t understand is how someone so politically savvy obtaining a tremendous amount of political power could drift so far outside the realm of reality? In her quest to demonstrate her power against President Donald Trump, she has tolerated and violated the very ethics she was instrumental in establishing within the House.

 

During the Obama presidency (2008 – 2016) Speaker Pelosi did not object the unconstitutional executive order establishing Delayed Entry of Childhood Arrivals (DACA), yet has fought vigorously President Trump who suggested Congress fix DACA and make it constitutionally viable.

 

Pelosi did not initiate action, nor seek solutions to the illegal immigration issue that caused Obama era Border Patrol to setup the cages to detain illegal border crossers, yet has fought President Trump’s efforts to stop the flow of illegal entry by pushing for comprehensive immigration reform and constructing a more effective barrier wall.

 

Of the many attempts by deep state operatives to take down the sitting President of the United States, it would appear that Speaker Pelosi has become obsessed with the illusion that removing the President by impeachment, and possibly the Vice President would lead to her breaking ground as the first female President of the United States. A goal Hillary Clinton failed to achieve in 2016.

 

I don’t begrudge Speaker Pelosi for her groundbreaking accomplishments in politics, but it is my personal opinion that career politicians such as her, should never remain in political office as lifetime politicians. It has been said that “Absolute power corrupts absolutely” and biblically speaking power and money are never enough. The love of money IS the root of all evil and the Ten Commandments were written as a lifetime guide for everyone to follow.

 

There is a right way and a wrong way to achieve fame, fortune and political power, but now we know there is also the Pelosi way! – I am the Real Truckmaster!

 

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12-8-2019

Democrats Party of the People?

To my Democratic Party friends (both of you) I ask you – How can the 2016 “Party of the People” spew such hatred against fellow Americans and forget the words outlined in this 2016 Party Platform which is pledged to be re-affirmed in 2020?

 

I’ve tried several times to read and understand how this translates into what we see in the media and in Congress? It’s obvious to me and anyone with a truly open mind that these words mean nothing when it comes to the Oath of Office taken by these career politicians, many who have been in Congress since the days of Richard Nixon?

 

America deserves better than what I see from members of Congress. They band together like a bunch of drunken sailors teetering on the edge of utter despair. They have turned the First Branch of Government into a circus for all to see, yet they themselves fail to grasp the consequences of their actions.

 

I am reminded of in the book of Proverbs where they will reap what they sow.

 

Proverbs 22:8
He who sows injustice will reap disaster and the rod of his fury will be destroyed.

 

Read below or follow the links to read for yourselves and tell me you believe what is written below. – I am the Real Truckmaster!

 

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The 2016 Democratic Platform

https://democrats.org/where-we-stand/party-platform/

[Emphasis added]

 

Every four years, the Democratic Party puts together our party platform, the ideas and beliefs that govern our party as a whole.

 

What follows is our 2016 platform — our most progressive platform in our party’s history and a declaration of how we plan to move America forward.

 

• Democrats believe that cooperation is better than conflict,
• Unity is better than division,
• Empowerment is better than resentment, and
• Bridges are better than walls.

 

This party platform was voted on and passed by our membership at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia in 2016. The platform will be updated and re-approved at the 2020 Democratic National Convention.

 

PREAMBLE

 

https://democrats.org/where-we-stand/party-platform/preamble/

 

In 2016, Democrats met in Philadelphia with the same basic belief that animated the Continental Congress when they gathered here 240 years ago: Out of many, we are one.

 

Under President Obama’s leadership, and thanks to the hard work and determination of the American people, we have come a long way from the Great Recession and the Republican policies that triggered it. American businesses have now added 14.8 million jobs since private-sector job growth turned positive in early 2010. 20 million people have gained health insurance coverage. The American auto industry just had its best year ever. And we are getting more of our energy from the sun and wind, and importing less oil from overseas.

 

But too many Americans have been left out and left behind. They are working longer hours with less security.

• Wages have barely budged and the racial wealth gap remains wide,
• While the cost of everything from childcare to a college education has continued to rise.
• And for too many families, the dream of homeownership is out of reach.
• As working people struggle, the top one percent accrues more wealth and more power.
• Republicans in Congress have chosen gridlock and dysfunction over trying to find solutions to the real challenges we face. It’s no wonder that so many feel like the system is rigged against them.
• Democrats believe that cooperation is better than conflict,
• Unity is better than division,
• Empowerment is better than resentment, and
• Bridges are better than walls.

 

It’s a simple but powerful idea: we are stronger together.

 

Democrats believe we are stronger when we have an economy that works for everyone—an economy that grows incomes for working people, creates good-paying jobs, and puts a middle-class life within reach for more Americans. Democrats believe we can spur more sustainable economic growth, which will create good-paying jobs and raise wages. And we can have more economic fairness, so the rewards are shared broadly, not just with those at the top. We need an economy that prioritizes long-term investment over short-term profit-seeking, rewards the common interest over self-interest, and promotes innovation and entrepreneurship.

 

We believe that today’s extreme level of income and wealth inequality—where the majority of the economic gains go to the top one percent and the richest 20 people in our country own more wealth than the bottom 150 million—makes our economy weaker, our communities poorer, and our politics poisonous.

 

And we know that our nation’s long struggle with race is far from over. More than half a century after Rosa Parks sat and Dr. King marched and John Lewis bled, more than half a century after César Chávez, Dolores Huerta, and Larry Itliong organized, race still plays a significant role in determining who gets ahead in America and who gets left behind. We must face that reality and we must fix it.

 

We believe a good education is a basic right of all Americans, no matter what zip code they live in. We will end the school-to-prison pipeline and build a cradle-to-college pipeline instead, where every child can live up to his or her God-given potential.

 

We believe in helping Americans balance work and family without fear of punishment or penalty. We believe in at last guaranteeing equal pay for women. And as the party that created Social Security, we believe in protecting every American’s right to retire with dignity.

 

We firmly believe that the greed, recklessness, and illegal behavior on Wall Street must be brought to an end. Wall Street must never again be allowed to threaten families and businesses on Main Street.

Democrats believe we are stronger when we protect citizens’ right to vote, while stopping corporations’ outsized influence in elections. We will fight to end the broken campaign finance system, overturn the disastrous Citizens United decision, restore the full power of the Voting Rights Act, and return control of our elections to the American people.

 

Democrats believe that climate change poses a real and urgent threat to our economy, our national security, and our children’s health and futures, and that Americans deserve the jobs and security that come from becoming the clean energy superpower of the 21st century.

 

Democrats believe we are stronger and safer when America brings the world together and leads with principle and purpose. We believe we should strengthen our alliances, not weaken them. We believe in the power of development and diplomacy. We believe our military should be the best-trained, best-equipped fighting force in the world, and that we must do everything we can to honor and support our veterans. And we know that only the United States can mobilize common action on a truly global scale, to take on the challenges that transcend borders, from international terrorism to climate change to health pandemics.

 

Above all, Democrats are the party of inclusion. We know that diversity is not our problem—it is our promise. As Democrats, we respect differences of perspective and belief, and pledge to work together to move this country forward, even when we disagree. With this platform, we do not merely seek common ground—we strive to reach higher ground.

 

We are proud of our heritage as a nation of immigrants. We know that today’s immigrants are tomorrow’s teachers, doctors, lawyers, government leaders, soldiers, entrepreneurs, activists, PTA members, and pillars of our communities.

 

We believe in

• protecting civil liberties and
• guaranteeing civil rights and
• voting rights,
• women’s rights and
• workers’ rights,
• LGBT rights, and
• rights for people with disabilities.

 

We believe America is still, as Robert Kennedy said, “a great country, an unselfish country, and a compassionate country.”

 

These principles stand in sharp contrast to the Republicans, who have nominated as the standard-bearer for their party and their candidate for President a man who seeks to appeal to Americans’ basest differences, rather than our better natures.

 

The stakes have been high in previous elections. But in 2016, the stakes can be measured in human lives—

• in the number of immigrants who would be torn from their homes;
• in the number of faithful and peaceful Muslims who would be barred from even visiting our shores;
• in the number of allies alienated and dictators courted;
• in the number of Americans who would lose access to health care and see their rights ripped away.

 

This election is about more than Democrats and Republicans. It is about who we are as a nation, and who we will be in the future.

 

240 years ago, in Philadelphia, we started a revolution of ideas and of action that continues to this day. Since then, our union has been tested many times, through bondage and civil war, segregation and depression, two world wars and the threat of nuclear annihilation. Generations of Americans fought and marched and organized to widen the circle of opportunity and dignity—and we are fighting still.

 

Despite what some say, America is and has always been great—but not because it has been perfect. What makes America great is our unerring belief that we can make it better.

• We can and we will build a more just economy,
• a more equal society, and
• a more perfect union—because we are stronger together.

12-6-2019

 

Agents of Change

 

There has and is so much information and disinformation about President Donald J. Trump and former President Barack H. Obama III that it’s almost impossible to ferret out the truth.

 

In 2009 I was asked by a 12 year old African-American boy who was the best president? It was a natural question since Barack Obama had just been sworn in as the first African-American President of the United States (#44). It was clear that this single event gave this boy and so many others immense pride.

 

His question was a simple one to answer. I told him that every president is the best and the worst president depending on who’s talking. Almost everyone will say the outgoing president is the worst and the incoming president is the best.

 

However all that changed with the presidential campaign cycle of the 2016 election. I attribute that change to a couple of factors, one of which was #44. Barack Obama was a community organizer, a lawyer and appointed to the Illinois state senate where he spent 8 years, before launching his bid for US Senator from Illinois and a mere 2 years later his run for the Democratic nomination against Senator John McCain in 2008.

 

What Barack Obama promised was change, like we’ve never seen before. He managed to keep his campaign promise to fundamentally change the nation constitutionally or by force.

 

Working with the House speaker and with the Senate majority leader the ramming of the Affordable Care Act stands out as a perfect example. “We must pass it before we can know what it says” was what Speaker Pelosi had said. At one point she locked GOP representatives out until after the critical vote.

 

Another was Fannie Mae – Freddie Mac where low income citizens were enabled to purchase homes they could not afford. Many homes went into foreclosure.

 

Remember Cash for Clunkers where owners of gas guzzlers were told to turn in their “clunkers” and by fuel efficient cars? We were even told that Barack got rid of his Chrysler 300 (we were not told it was replaced by “the beast” – the presidential limo).

 

There were other “programs” like flooding the nation with unvetted and undocumented aliens by the thousands which was a major open borders project and Delayed Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) that usurped the US Constitutional powers of the office of the President and allowed illegals into the nation without recourse.

 

Mix in some international fiascos like the planeloads of cash to Iran; the Uranium for Russia; Arms to Syria and of course Benghazi where blaming a video was to excuse no response for repeated requests for help by a US Ambassador along with 3 others who were murdered in the Annex compound.

 

Yes I’d say that Barack Obama brought change to the nation. Then began orchestrated the taking down of his successor President Donald J. Trump with an attempted Coup de taut because handpicked Democratic candidate Hillary R. Clinton lost the 2016 election.

 

During the campaign Presidential Candidate Donald Trump promised to “Drain the Swamp” and get rid of the “Deep State” entrenched within the United States Government. It seems that over the past 3 years of the Trump presidency there has been a real need for anger management by those on the left and RINO’s from the right because that still cannot accept the fact that Donald Trump is President of the United States (#45). If it were not so serious it would be comical to see the circus environment and antics of House and Senate Democrats as they attempt to prevent the duly elected President from executing his office under the Constitution.

 

What makes them angry is the fact that with all the roadblocks being thrown out before the president, Trump still manages to get the Southern Border Wall built section by section without congressional support. There are so many vacant judgeships that are being filled. Many of the edicts and regulations enacted by Barack Obama are being overturned or eliminated altogether.

 

Trump’s foreign policy decisions are continually second guessed by House Democrats who seem to forget that under the Constitution it is the President who sets foreign policy without any requirement for Congressional approval and withdrawing troops from war zones is better than continuing to fight eternal wars.

 

Trump’s economy decisions have lowered taxes for workers across the nation and so many more have become employed as factories and companies across the country are gearing up putting people back to work. Tariffs are working to stabilize trade imbalances with trading nations and Congress has not had an active part in it, by their own choice.

 

Trump is the first President in our lifetime working without a salary, choosing instead to donate his salary to various government agencies. By law the president cannot receive outside finances and his billionaire status has shrunk considerably over the past 3 years. On the contrary Barack Obama is the first president to leave office with more finances in spite of the constitutional restrictions.

 

Congress has wrought changes to the nation as well. Rather than working for the health, safety and welfare of all American citizens, Congress has chosen to become so mired down in this impeachment coup, that they have lost the confidence of many American voters. It is apparent that lifetime members of Congress have forgotten their oath of office which is to protect and defend the Constitution against ALL enemies, both foreign and domestic.

 

The upcoming 2020 election is less than 11 months away and voters have to decide if Congress has taken their collective eyes off the ball and lost sight of what is really important to American voters. It’s time for a change in the business as usual in the Capitol Building or a change in electing members of Congress. Voting should never be a Democratic or a Republican “thing”. Voting is a great responsibility and one of the rights of citizenship guaranteed in the Constitution. – I am the Real Truckmaster!

 

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