The Militant Moderate

There is little doubt that immigration is a hot button political issue this season, and it is likely to continue to be so during the 2008 elections.

A recent poll on the website of the Enid News-Eagle found that this was the principal issue of concern to some 35% of those completing the survey. This compares with roughly 20% for the Iraq War, and about 15% each for the economy and for health care as the single most important issue.

We are not sure of the relative importance of abortion and gay marriage, the perennial red herring distractive election issues pandering to the religious right wing constituency.

Several times previously, this writer has warned democrats to be politically cautious about the immigration issue. Repeatedly there have been signs that the democratic leadership in Congress does not understand the thinking of a large proportion of the public regarding illegal aliens. At times they appear to be as deaf as Mr. Bush.

In spite of all the ills brought on the nation by the republicans in power during the past seven years, the democrats could very well fall prey to a well-orchestrated and well-financed campaign casting them as weak on protecting America from an invasion of illegal immigrants. They could lose this election on that hot button issue, just as they have lost other elections based on the emotions surrounding abortion and gay rights.

HB 1806, the Oklahoma version of immigration control, was pushed by the republicans in the legislature, and then supported by most democrats after some of the more offensive and inhumane provisions were dropped. Although it is encountering negative reactions as it goes into effect, it would probably poll 70% support from Oklahoma citizens.

Republicans appear to be just a little too pleased with the attention this law brings to them and the state. They are fortunate that it was moderated somewhat from its original form. Yet the present law has some flaws which may rise up to bite its sponsors.

H.B. 1806 provides for criminal prosecution of “good Samaritans,” and this has never been acceptable to the average Oklahoman or American. Our Bible tells us to care for the stranger and sojourner in our midst. A number of churches follow biblical teachings to care for the needy and the oppressed. This law will make criminals of those giving shelter and sustenance to needy immigrants here illegally.

We doubt that part will be enforced. If so, it may well bring grief upon its sponsors, as well as its enforcers.

Americans demand control of their borders. They want also to see illegal aliens documented as temporaries, tracked, and sent home when their time expires. They think that some path toward citizenship is appropriate for only a limited number, and these must meet screening conditions including Americanization.

Rightly or wrongly, Americans are increasingly intolerant as they perceive their country awash with a mass of seemingly uncontrollable, lower class, foreign speaking, culturally different people challenging this nation’s schools, laws, medical facilities, social services, law enforcement, values, traditions, loyalties, and the flag with stars and stripes. This is the common view.

Yes, this will indeed continue to be a political issue, and both parties had better study, understand the problem, and propose acceptable solutions.


Dr. Edwin E. Vineyard, AKA The Militant Moderate

Quoted in the Enid News-Eagle account of the send-off ceremonies at Noble Center, one mother spoke for many of us when she said: “I have mixed feelings about this war. I would rather be welcoming them home from war, rather than sending them off.”

That whole solemn occasion was disturbing to some of us. We have such strong conflicts. These are our young men and women we are sending into an enduring nightmare of danger. We care about them and their welfare. We support them, but many of us oppose the war they are being sent to fight.

We know the casualty counts – approaching 3,900 killed and at last estimate 82,000 maimed or wounded. New stats show that post-war, psycho-neural damage haunts 59,000 Iraq veterans with post-trauma stress syndrome, and a total of 100,000 have need of psychological care.

This war has already had a terrible cost in human sacrifice. We decry this.

Two-thirds of Americans think that there is and/or was something badly wrong about the Iraq War. Only one-third of all Americans (but two-thirds of republicans) support the decision to go to war in Iraq and stay the course. Those opposed to this war are often trashed as unpatriotic.

As we approach the 2008 election primaries, all leading republican candidates support a continuation of the war in Iraq. Two of the three leading democratic candidates want a phased withdrawal of “combat” forces, while one advocates redeployment immediately without residual. Oklahoma’s congressional delegation supports the war.

Just as we were saying farewell to 2,400 young people in military uniforms, the Enid News reveals that another large group from the Enid area will be deployed to Iraq. This issue will hit home to many more of us before the 2008 elections.

We’d like to bring them all home to their families intact physically and mentally – if not right now, then in 2009. Oklahomans should think before they vote.

Dr. Edwin E. Vineyard, AKA The Militant Moderate

According to the Washington Post, the recent GOP debate on cable television was “a chorus singing the praises of free trade, less regulation, private health care, and reduced spending.”

Well, at least the newspaper writer did not refer to the republican debate as a “Burger King” affair, i.e. one whopper after another, although such might have been appropriate.

The issues of trade, regulation, health care, and spending are certainly worth exploring. It is too bad that the candidate chorus sang the same old songs in addressing these. Let us examine their position.

The candidates praise free trade, almost unconditionally, in the face of clear and incontrovertible evidence that their kind of “free trade” is not working. Trade imbalances are draining our capital and sending it to China.

China holds a huge share of our bonded debt, yet we continue imports unabated. They now have the power to destabilize our currency, put our debt on the open market, and disrupt our entire economy.

It is quite obvious that we desperately need different, less “free,” trade policies. We must stop the loss of capital and jobs out of this country.

As a result of less regulation, we have toys imported from China and distributed by American companies endangering the health of our kids. We have rampant food poisoning because of too few inspections by poorly financed, impotent food and drug regulators.

We have mergers in industries concentrating the supplies of materials, books, and communications into the hands of a few super corporations operating in each or several arenas. Yet merger after merger continues -- to the disadvantage of the American consumer and even the very democracy in which we live.

It is obvious that the welfare of the people, and the survival of our democracy, demand that the government regulate and maintain rules for the environment in which our capitalistic system functions.

The private health care system, with or without tax incentives, as extolled by GOP candidates, is an unholy mess. Forty-seven million have no health insurance, many more are under-insured, and the freedom of America’s insured to seek and choose providers is largely a myth.

What voter in his/her right mind would think that the health care problems of the lower classes could be solved by private tax deductible health accounts for the upper class? How many in low-paid or part-time jobs would find a bonanza in tax incentives to encourage purchase of private health insurance?

The question of reduced spending always revolves around the question --- for what?

Republicans dislike “entitlements” and want to reduce spending on programs that benefit people -- like school lunches, school aid, aid to towns for infra-structure, health care, scientific research, public television, environmental protection, social security, veterans’ care, regulatory agencies, aid for dependent children, pensions for government workers, aid to law enforcement, and aid for the aged and disabled.

Republicans finance the Iraq War with a deficit, give tax breaks to the rich, give tax breaks to business and industry, give tax breaks to hedge funds, give aid to rich farmers, and give subsidies for industries to produce things like sugar and ethanol. They continue tax breaks for deep oil wells, although the price of oil is four times that when breaks were adopted.

America cannot survive another eight years of flagrant republican spending on erroneous military adventures combined with tax cuts and tax breaks which add to the concentration of income and wealth in the top 1%.

The Reagan and Bush-1 years of tax reductions, corporate welfare, and soaring deficits were interrupted by the Clinton years, culminating in a balanced annual budget. These further years of fiscal irresponsibility under Bush-2 have added more to the debt than accumulated under all previous presidents in history combined.

We cannot afford more of these policies echoed by that candidate chorus.


Dr. Edwin E. Vineyard, AKA The Militant Moderate

The British are coming! The British are coming!

We imagine that these words were shouted by Paul Revere, as he rode through the night to warn his fellow colonists of peril.

In fact, Paul probably did not shout these words, but had as many as forty comrades helping to pass the word. There was likely no shouting of warnings, but rather knocks on doors and whispering of the news. Further, Paul Revere did not watch for the lanterns in the Old North Church tower, but it is more likely he hung the lanterns himself.

Longfellow’s poem, written 85 years after the event, does not say that Paul Revere ever shouted the words, “The British are coming!” We wonder from whence that came.

Little wonder that most scholars of the health care system in America give little credence to the crescendo of warnings, “Socialized medicine is coming! Socialized medicine is coming!”

This was said of the Medicare program for seniors, but just look at its success! We have “fee for service” payments made to doctors and hospitals at a level which controls health costs, and payments are made through private contractors from a central government agency. It’s not perfect, but it is working.

It was said of the early efforts to cover the indigent. If we used health care at all, we were all paying their unpaid bills indirectly. Now, the indigent poor, public welfare clients, are covered for basic health care.

Then we found that parents on welfare could not afford to go to work at low wage jobs because they would lose their health care and that of their children. They could not afford insurance for their families. So, coverage for the working poor was begun.

Coverage for children in families in poverty is given through a special program called SCHIPS.

It is this SCHIPS program for children that will now be terminated unless Congress overrides President Bush’s veto. His veto was given with the shouted message, “Socialized medicine is coming! Socialized medicine is coming!”

Senators Inhofe and Colbert support and echo the president, as do Congresspersons Fallin, Cole, Lucas, and Sullivan. Congressman Boren supports the SCHIPS health care program for children. Ms. Fallin has pronounced publicly that it is “socialized medicine.”

As is all too common, Mr. Bush has not been completely truthful in his veto statements. He says this will extend coverage to children of workers up to $86,000 in salary, not the poor, and that this is socialized medicine. Like some of the details of Paul Revere’s Ride in Longfellow’s poem, that message distorts the truth.

The legislation vetoed would allow all states to go beyond basic poverty guidelines up to 250% of poverty level, as a few states are already doing. For a single mother and one child, poverty is defined in 2007 as $1140 a month or $13,690 a year. For a family of four, poverty level is $1720 monthly or $20,650 per year.

While many states use the basic poverty tables, some go beyond poverty levels by 50%. A few allow more.

Now, if Mr. Bush were entirely truthful, he would have said that the $86,000 figure he quotes is the highest possible anywhere, and it is BASED UPON A FAMILY OF EIGHT in California WHICH ALLOWS ELIGIBILITY FOR CHILDREN OF FAMILIES UP TO 250% OF POVERTY LEVEL.

While Mr. Bush may not be lying in using that figure, he is at the far outside edge of the improbable zone. Certainly, he is misleading the public and members of his own party.

Some of us are not surprised by Mr. Bush’s lack of whole truth or candor, but one would think that members of Congress would know the facts.


Dr. Edwin E. Vineyard, AKA The Militant Moderate