Food Safety and Security

Factory farming methods are a huge threat to food safety and security in the United States, but so are many other things.

Jesus, the kid gets it!

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Chris Dudley, Candidate

Except for his two NBA records for consecutive missed free throws, Chris Dudley’s basketball career was remarkably unremarkable in that he utterly failed to distinguish himself as an exceptional player. He sure as hell didn’t lead the Portland Trailblazers to a comeback championship season. That begs the question, if he can’t lead a basketball team to a comeback, how does he expect to lead the State of Oregon to a comeback? It doesn’t take a genius to figure out which is the more difficult task.

Nor am I inspired by Chris’ campaign rhetoric, which consists of nothing more than the same old nonsense Republicans (Democrats have their own brand of nonsense) recycle through every election. Cutting spending will not create jobs, and cutting taxes will not create jobs, so where are all those jobs he promises coming from? Does he not understand that cutting taxes and cutting spending will further deepen Oregon’s recession? Does he not understand that the national economy has a profound effect on Oregon’s economy, and that George W. Bush was driving that particular bus when Oregon’s economy tanked? Does he even suspect that a national economic crisis must be addressed at the national level, and that anything he proposes to do at the state level is only political posturing?

Nothing I saw in the campaign propaganda available on his Web site convinces me that he even has a clue about how to fix what ails Oregon. Sure, he gets a few of the most minor things right, but he gets almost all of the major things wrong. Newsflash, Chris! Doubling down on the very policies that got us into these economic and environmental crises is not going to get us out of them. Your new ideas need to be new, not recycled Republican bullshit that’s been around since at least the ’60s.

What I find most offensive, though, are Chris’ egregious distortions and outright lies regarding former Governor John Kitzhaber’s record. The verifiable truth of the matter is that Oregon’s economy was among the fastest growing in the entire country under Kitzhaber’s leadership, and it only turned south after Bush took office.

Without apologies to Chris or anyone else, I simply don’t find in Chris Dudley a candidate I can support; too little experience, too many uncertainties, and too much bullshit.

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Gulp!

Here’s a tip for anyone contemplating suicide by drain cleaner. If you’re really serious about getting the job done, don’t smear it on your face; drink it. All of it. Then shoot yourself.

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Who's Your Daddy?

If some economists have got it right, the recession is over. It was the longest economic downturn in American history; begun on President George W. Bush’s watch, ended on President Obama’s.

Who’s your daddy, now?

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Tex Books Redux

Next week, the Texas Board of Education—whose membership apparently consists exclusively of anti-Muslim bigots already possessed of a Texas-style education—will vote on a resolution that effectively rewrites a large chunk of American religious history. The problem is that Tex Books find their way into educational systems all across the country, so that if when the resolution passes, students living far beyond Texas’ borders get to share in the ignorance and stupidity of it all—whether they want to or not.

Gee, while the bigots on the Texas Board of Education are voting on the resolution, couldn’t the non-bigots among us get together and vote Texas off the island, or something?

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Time Going Nowhere

"Too much and too long, we seem to have surrendered community excellence and community values in the mere accumulation of material things. Our gross national product ... if we should judge America by that - counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for those who break them. It counts the destruction of our redwoods and the loss of our natural wonder in chaotic sprawl. It counts napalm and the cost of a nuclear warhead, and armored cars for police who fight riots in our streets. It counts Whitman's rifle and Speck's knife, and the television programs which glorify violence in order to sell toys to our children.

"Yet the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education, or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages; the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage; neither our wisdom nor our learning; neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country; it measures everything, in short, except that which makes life worthwhile. And it tells us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans." —Robert F. Kennedy

Some things never change.

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