GEDs and Lost Opportunities

Additional comments and resource links follow the seventh paragraph below, after the Big Horn County News edition of this column beginning here:

 

I have been following the latest Big Horn County saga with interest.  At least this story doesn't involve prisons, confidence men, or Gitmo (not yet, anyway).   This time we're struggling to find a way to fund a popular GED program, housed at Crow Agency.   In my opinion, this situation reflects what I've seen happen many times in the past.  We just don't seem to have a good system for locally sustaining programs when the grant funding expires.  Our default approach seems to be listing reasons why some other agency should be responsible for paying.  Beyond that we might join the naysayers trumpeting that services are not producing results at some hypothetical national level or about why certain people don't deserve a hand-up.

 

This concerns me for the future wellbeing of our community.  Is it really possible that we Big Horn County citizens can't figure out how to pool available resources to improve the circumstances of families in need?  It's clear that without a high school diploma or its equivalent, families are at significant risk for poverty and all its accompanying problems (homelessness, substance abuse, domestic violence). This places a burden on schools, on our county tax base, and on state and tribal family assistance resources, and ultimately makes prisons a big business. Many funded programs in our county are designed to target the very same at-risk families who would benefit from GED attainment.  It seems hard to believe that there is no way to allocate a small amount of resources from several family service providers and public agencies to fund a multi-agency supported GED program.

 

I wonder whether the underlying issue is really part of a worldwide wave of hostility toward the poor. We are living in times of austerity and it seems popular these days to blame the victims of the economic downturn for their misfortune.  It's all over the media and even in Big Horn County:  No more handouts for the poor.  Many of us struggle with this message from a religious, as well as social morality perspective.  

 

Righting the wrongs limiting people's access to life resources, including meaningful jobs, is at the heart of the New Testament (for more, see my blog listed below).

It was the people skills of civility, trust, accountability, and care for the common good that really differentiated the early church from the surrounding culture of the first-century Roman Empire.

 

People skills are also at the heart of what is needed to make all students more successful in life.   Academic attainment accounts for only a small portion of what it takes to complete a degree or work effectively with others in a job setting.   We've all experienced brilliant colleagues who we dreaded working with because of their clashing personalities or lack of teamwork.   Anyone who has tried to get their computer repaired has probably encountered one of those technically competent, but agonizingly patronizing young "service" technicians.  

 

Research studies on the benefits of GED programs are often misinterpreted as showing little value to these prep courses. However, many leaders in the field are far from recommending the end of GED programs.  Instead they advocate for ending our modern education obsession (from early childhood through adult) with easily tested factual-based knowledge.  Over time, we have cut way back in structures and programs that build motivational, character, and people skills.  Research has found that without these life skills, prospects for success in anything go way down. This includes both high school dropouts and GED graduates, both of whom score low in these life skills. But GED adult education programs can be taught in ways that emphasize those important social-emotional skills of civility, trust, accountability, time consciousness, respect and generosity, while students are preparing to pass the paper and pencil tests.   

 

We happen to be blessed in Big Horn County with educators who value the importance of people skill development and know how to teach these vital skills.  It would be most interesting to investigate the success of our Big Horn County GED graduates and compare those with the nationwide average.  My bet is that both our Hardin and Crow Agency centers would score way above the national average. Of course, in order to do such a study, we'll need to find a way to fund the type of instruction that actually makes a difference for our young adults. Is this really beyond our capacity?

 

This ends the Big Horn County News edition. The column continues:

 

Of course, there's a plethora of misinformation in the media quoting research proving the GED and Headstart programs are just a waste of time and taxpayer moneys.  Dr. James Heckman and Tim Kautz of University of Chicago are prominent among education researchers studying the causes and effects of the GED programs nation wide. They are currently working on a book called, "The GED and the Role of Character in American Life." Their research measures of success of young people in three categories: 1) those who graduate from high school, 2) those who pass the GED, and 3) those who simply drop out.  They found little improvement by young people who earned a GED certificate over those who simply dropped out of high school. So should we just end these programs?

 

Dr. Heckman's GED project site:

http://heckman.uchicago.edu/page/general-educational-development-ged

 

Dr. Heckman regrets that our national education system so prioritizes cognitive skills and neglects the non-cognitive.  The tests and training themselves are no attempt to measure non-cognitive skills

 

In fact, the two are related, and integrally intertwined.  And this element in itself should speak volumes to curriculum designers for our public schools, as well as the whole new emphasis on testing of cognitive skill development. 

 

 Heckman:  from his University of Chicago web page: http://heckman.uchicago.edu/

 

"I am actively working with personality psychologists, developmental psychologists, quantitative sociologists, statisticians, and neuroscientists to understand the biology and social science producing inequality in health, in labor market outcomes and in society at large."

 

The GED programs and our public high school education programs are both based on prioritizing cognitive over non-cognitive skills. 

 

But in fact, Dr. Heckman is deeply concerned that GED programs research has been quoted and used to support curtailment of GED programs.

"Investing in our Young People" A study in the variations in human life cycle skill development, by James Heckman,  University of Chicago, University College Dublin, and The American Bar Foundation.  November 15, 2006. This is available online: http://jenni.uchicago.edu/human-inequality/papers/inv-young-rep_all_2007-01-31b_mms.pdf

 

According to Mr. Kautz, his colleague:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/young-ged-test-takers-miss-out-on-high-school-experience/2013/05/12/88df6cfc-ab67-11e2-a8b9-2a63d75b5459_story.html

 

"The entire (child development) literature assumes that ability is an innate, scalar, age-invariant measure of cognitive skill. This early point of view still prevails in most quarters of economics. …. Noncognitive traits were neglected in empirical research and treated as "soft skills," peripheral to the study of educational and labor market outcomes.

 

Historically the GED is counted as equivalent to HS diplomas on the census. That's hidden a growing problem with actual graduation rates. If you don't count GED recipients as high school graduates, the graduation rate among African-Americans hasn't increased since the sixties.  "If it deludes people into thinking we've fixed social problems that we haven't, that's also a big cost. Because papering over a problem is not going to make it go away," says Kautz. 

 

But GED testing service says it's correct to count the GED as equivalent to high school. "Who determines if it's actually equivalent is the consumers, which are colleges and employers," said CT Turner, Director, Public Affairs & Government Relations for GED Testing Service. He says 98% of colleges accept the GED."

 

--
David Graber

Hardin, MT  59034

graberdb@gmail.com

Humans and Turkeys

This column is continued from the Big Horn County News May 29, 2013, at the seventh paragraph below.

 

Living with animals on a daily basis can be amazingly instructive.  I've written about my turkey adventures in the past and their lessons continue this spring, with our new brood of little poults.  I know that we humans are not turkeys, but sometimes the similarities are too close to ignore.   Like our tom, Lightning, when it comes to the common good, we often just don't get it.

 

Last week Lightning refused to let one of the hens alone after her successful brooding. Annabelle graced our yard with her brood of eleven poults, in the image of their father,  each with a lightning streak of baby fur across its tiny forehead.  As Lightning recklessly pursued their mother in his single-minded urgency, he began tramping over the little ones.   The object of his affection attempted to shelter her offspring under her wings, but this protection was short-lived, and we ended up losing two to hypothermia. I eventually separated Lightning and Annabelle between the garden fence and the yard.  Unfortunately, the poults were small enough to squeeze between the fence wires, breaking out of their captivity to explore the wide world.  To his misfortune, one strayed too long on Lightning's side of the fence.  The tom was pacing and strutting along the fence opposite Annabelle, desperate for her attention, as she protected her little ones from the harsh wind.

 

Seated at lunch, I glanced out the window just in time to witness the heartbreaking episode.  I saw Lightning pounce, peck, and grasp a fragile furry yellow lump in his beak. I dropped my turkey sandwich and rushed out after him, arms waving aggressively. He dropped his progeny, its neck broken. I briefly held the tiny dying bird. In rising rage, I found my hatchet by the chopping block and marched back, cornering the bad tom. Reaching for him with my left hand with the hatchet in my right, I froze in mid-air. How could I expect he would voluntarily extend his head over my chopping block while I held him with my left arm and wielded the hatchet with my right? I was so filled with rage that I actually considered stupidly hacking my tom to death were it not for the simple fact that I only had two hands.

 

After I cooled down for a minute, I realized the ridiculousness of my actions.  On further contemplation, I could see parallels in many of our human behaviors.   As people, we are capable of astonishing feats of self-sacrifice to protect our common good. Look at how selflessly adults have given their lives to save children in recent national disasters.   On the other hand, we can so easily let our emotions push us into socially and personally destructive choices.

 

Lightning lost it. Like him, we humans get fixated with quick perceptions of good vs. evil and our worldview takes on a rigid black-and-white formula. Under this spell, our nation's technological power to threaten ultimate destruction blinds us. Fearing the loss of our domination of the world's economy, we become oblivious to the plight of the "least of these" (see Matthew's gospel).  We often don't understand the fragile circumstances of those caught up in collateral damage, as we attempt to recreate the world as we would like it to be. 

 

This memorial week we honor those who sacrificed for our common good. The most redemptive honoring would take us away from turkey thinking and restoring our humanity with others of our species. We, after all, unlike Lightning, have the stamp of the Creator's image.  Let's learn from the sacrifices of victims on both sides of warfare waged over the past decade.     While we're praying for the soldiers and children who have lost their lives to warfare waged around the world, let's steady our own hearts and lay down our need to punish.  In that way, we can become more like the image of our Creator and less like stampeding toms.

 

The following is continued from the shorter version of this column in the Big Horn County News:

 

Here's an example of the kind of sacrifice some humans, honoring our Creator's image stamped on us, have been making to benefit our nation. It's not the kind Lightning the tom turkey lived and died for. 

 

A Christian Peacemaker Team group suffered serious injury in a vehicle crash while fleeing Baghdad in the first wave of our bombing ten years ago this spring. They desperately needed help, one with life-threatening bleeding. No one was available; there were few drivers who braved that road under bombardment. A car finally came along with Iraqis who knew the area. They stopped to help, ignoring the danger.  They took them all to Rutba, a town just off the road to Kuwait.

 

As they approached the town, they were dismayed to see the hospital in total destruction. It had been destroyed by our bombs three days earlier. But local Iraqi doctors found essential supplies and had set up in a nearby house. Using the few medical supplies and equipment that survived the bombing, they stayed and worked to save the lives of those Americans. They ignored the reality that the bombs destroying their hospital and wreaking casualties among their staff and patients were as American as these casualties, now under their care.  They gave aid and comfort to their enemy (gregbarrett.org/tag/christian-peacemakers-team/March 13). They were not like Lightning the Tom Turkey.

 

These Americans and Iraqis can inspire us to a fitting honor for those many in Big Horn County who have suffered the ultimate sacrifice for our nation. Such sacrifice is most redemptive when we as a nation can be freed from our own misguided aggression. We have so much more hope than Lightning, since we do have a real Master, Jesus, and a Book to follow, the Bible. Jesus' protective and healing mission was primarily to the "least of these" who encountered raging rejection by those who wanted to do everything by the book.

 

--
David Graber

Hardin, MT  59034

graberdb@gmail.com

Deadbeats and the American economy

You hear a lot these days about deadbeat dads, those who father children without assuming any responsibility for their wellbeing.   These guys get a lot of bad press and well-deserved public scorn.   They also take hits for contributing to a welfare state, certainly a factor in our national economic doldrums.   Many people think of large corporations as the good guys, who are taking care of American families.  Theoretically this happens through paying hard-working men and women a fair living wage, with incentives for improving skills and productivity.

 

As I listen to the pundits these days, I can't help but wonder whether big businesses are that different from deadbeat dads.  In fact, it seems like they're working pretty hard to keep lots of children living in poverty.  The big business drive to increase profits at all costs looks a lot like the company store.  

 

It's nothing new.   Back in 1972, with three kids in diapers and strong teaching credentials, I persuaded my good wife to follow me west. We headed for Boise, Idaho, where I could not land a teaching job. I fell back on my farm boy experience and soon was a welder's helper, hired to construct a steel building for Morrison Knudsen. Coincidentally, this building would be used to assemble coal-handling equipment for the Sarpy mine, here in Montana. I had no idea my farm boy work ethic was anywhere unique. I was confident in my initiative to work for a living, instilled by my parents and grandparents.

 

Soon I found myself working as the ad hoc leader, under an experienced company foreman. My team of ten worked efficiently. The building was almost completed as we approached a month of work. We were ahead of schedule. Our foreman said he was being ordered to Iran to build CIA listening stations soon. Meantime, he was recommending us all for welding training and mentioned that union benefits would start on our 31^st day of service.  For me, this meant doubled wages and medical benefits for my family.

 

I'll never forget my 31^st day on that job. The MK general manager met us at the shop door with "Good job boys, your work is done." He handed us our final paychecks.  I spoke up, "Our foreman said this job would lead us to union wages and benefits. Where do we apply for union membership? And where's our foreman?" We were informed that our foreman had been transferred to another job because this one was nearly completed. MK's steel workers--we were kept separate from them-- would complete the job. He encouraged us to "Step right in line to fill out a new application."

 

I hung out with my buddies in line and we visited with the fresh job seekers. Most had already worked several thirty-day stints, only to be laid off on day thirty. I finally understood what they were saying. We were part of a pool of skilled temporary workers doing the same work as the professionals but without the wages and benefits. They really liked us. Our unwitting financial contribution raised MK stock and incentive bonuses to CEO's. I left the line of my working peers and wished them well. All of my fellow laborers were hard working people, who accepted their responsibilities and wanted to earn an honest living. I went on my own to the National Labor Relations Board at the state capital and asked for advice. They said there was nothing I could do, it was all legal, and all too common.

 

Unfortunately, my story is not unique.  Since those years in the '70's, workers' income continues to be redistributed upward, to those who generate no income working with their hands. This creates more need from the growing pool of working families who cannot make ends meet. Welfare distribution increases to the poor, and the myth grows into reality of financially strapped people who want more stuff. We seem to be moving back to the days of sharecropping, which should be long past us. Meantime, congressmen and CEOS prodding more production from real work increase their wealth concentration and stigmatize the rest of us as freeloaders.

 

When I hear about the abhorrent salaries CEOs are receiving for bankrupting their companies, I can't help but think about all the American tax dollars that were used for those bailouts.   I wonder, how many hours of real labor did it take to pay for one hour of bad decision-making at the top?   Who are the real deadbeats here?

 

(Following is the continuation of my column from the Big Horn County News, after further editing)

 

Taxing the Rich would not solve the problem.

 

The problem is clear: President Obama's economic recovery didn't work for us in Big Horn County. Sure, the government bailed out Wall Street and GM. But the average net worth of the 7% wealthiest rose $800,000 from 2009 to 2011.  And the 93% rest of us, including most of us in Big Horn County, lost $6,000 (Pew research released April 23).  This year, 80 percent of Americans have 7 percent of the nation's wealth, while 1 percent of Americans have 40 percent of the nation's wealth. It's continuing to spiral out of control, and we in Big Horn County continue to fund our deadbeat dads' nest eggs.

 

Making off with the largess of our great American economic vitality, only a minority of the small group at the top believe the rest of America's families are also part of their responsibility as American Citizens.  It's called greed in the Bible.

 

Not long ago our nation's families were much more able to thrive with a government-overseen economy that worked. Retracing our steps far enough, we find a government surplus. There was no debt when the Bush-Cheney administration came into office after President Clinton. They quickly turned the surplus into a national debt, and Obama has imitated Bush with bailouts of Wall Street. Little trickled down to Big Horn County.

 

 

Unprecedented wealth disparity in the United States.

 

Of course government debt is a serious problem. But it also makes a convincing false ploy. Our sold-out pundits tell us how we got into this malaise. But it's misleading. They blame the bottom 47% for just wanting more stuff. This answer hides the deadbeats' tracks to the casinos.

 

Much of the unprecedented disparity between the few wealthy and the 90% rest of us has been attributed to natural free enterprise.  This is far from the truth. The amount of disparity is directly related to a distortion of the "golden rule:"

"Them that's got the gold make the rules." Here's an entertaining informative video on the true extent of wealth disparity in America:

 

http://mashable.com/2013/03/02/wealth-inequality/

 

http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2013/04/23/a-rise-in-wealth-for-the-wealthydeclines-for-the-lower-93/

 

http://www.alternet.org/economy/rich-have-gained-56-trillion-recovery-while-rest-us-have-lost-669-billion?akid=10398.144927.mrg7cP&rd=1&src=newsletter834900&t=3

 

Two Harvard Economists Repudiated

 

Making the poor and middle class bail out the deadbeats at the top is most revealing in this story about two Harvard economists.

 

"Since 2010, the names of Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff have become famous in political and economic circles. These two Harvard economists wrote a paper, "Growth in the Time of Debt" that has been used by everyone from Paul Ryan to Olli Rehn of the European Commission to justify harmful austerity policies. The authors purported to show that once a country's gross debt to GDP ratio crosses the threshold of 90 percent, economic growth slows dramatically. Debt, in other words, seemed very scary and bad.

 

Their historical data appeared impressive, as did their credentials. Policy-makers and journalists cited the paper to convince the public that instead of focusing on the jobs crisis that was hampering recovery, we should instead focus on deficits. The deficit hawks jumped up and down with excitement."

 

The foundation of the entire global push for austerity and debt reduction in the last several years has been based on a screwup in an Excel spreadsheet and poorly constructed data.

 

http://www.peri.umass.edu/236/hash/31e2ff374b6377b2ddec04deaa6388b1/publication/566/

 

http://www.alternet.org/economy/meet-28-year-old-student-who-exposed-two-harvard-professors-whose-shoddy-research-drove

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/30/opinion/debt-and-growth-a-response-to-reinhart-and-rogoff.html?_r=0

 

Ms. Reinhart and Mr. Rogoff have published several other papers, including a 2010 academic article, "Growth in a Time of Debt." It found that economic growth was notably lower when a country's gross public debt equaled or exceeded 90 percent of its gross domestic product.

 

The most important insight for anyone following this debate, and one that Ms. Reinhart and Mr. Rogoff acknowledge, is that there is no evidence supporting the claim that countries will consistently experience a sharp decline in economic growth once public debt levels exceed 90 percent of G.D.P. Although the two of them partly backed away from that claim in a 2012 paper in The Journal of Economic Perspectives, they have now done so more definitively, saying the 90 percent figure is not "a magic threshold that transforms outcomes, as conservative politicians have suggested."

 

Medicare and medicaid fraud

 

Right in here Montana we have Medicare fraud. Not the usual thousand-dollar cheats, but again, unlike the usual drivel blaming the poor, deadbeats are at the top.

http://www.kpax.com/news/2-mt-hospitals-to-pay-millions-in-medicare-fraud-settlement/

 

Two Montana Hospitals, St. Vincent in Billings and Holy Rosary in Miles City, Agree to Pay $3.95 Million to Resolve Alleged False Claims Act and Stark Law Violations

http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/2013/May/13-civ-495.html

 

http://billingsgazette.com/news/state-and-regional/montana/billings-and-miles-city-hospitals-to-pay-m-over-referrals/article_049a886a-4b8e-5752-8a91-e01098e199bd.html

 

 

Cheating workers out of their wages

 

Most of us with friends in the oil boom east of Sidney know of at least one roughneck whose wages were stolen when a startup wildcat company CEO heisted the till and took off to the Caribbean, letting his company go bankrupt and a million in wages unpaid. This and my experience with Morrison Knudsen are symptoms of a much larger problem of wealth transfer from the poor and middle class to the rich.

 

http://economichardship.org/do-wage-theft-laws-allow-wagetheft/

 

http://www.alternet.org/labor/when-your-boss-steals-your-wages-invisible-epidemic-thats-sweeping-america?akid=10374.144927.8Yn4Tz&rd=1&src=newsletter831565&t=3&paging=off

 

Americans like to think that a fair day's work brings a fair day's pay. Cheating workers of their wages may seem like a problem of 19th-century sweatshops. But it's back and taking a terrible toll. We're talking billions of dollars in wages; millions of workers affected each year. A gigantic heist is being perpetrated against working people: they're getting screwed on overtime, denied their tips, shortchanged on benefits, defrauded on payroll, and handed paychecks that bounce like rubber balls. A conservative estimate of unpaid overtime alone shows that it costs workers at least $19 billion per year.

 

Wage theft happens when employees cheat workers out of their wages. There are many ways employers intentionally do this. Sometimes workers are pressured to work uncompensated overtime and to pay for safety equipment which should be provided by the employer. Some employers keep workers' tips and some simply pay less than the worker has earned. Sometimes workers are paid less than the minimum wage and sometimes workers are not paid at all. In her recent piece "Preying on the Poor," Economic Hardship Reporting Project's Barbara Ehrenreich cites an estimated $100 billion are stolen from low-wage workers in the U.S. each year.

 

Prisons for profit

 

Prisons for profit are no longer just in China. Our burgeoning prison industry reaps and enormous windfall from our tax dollars, purporting to keep us safe, but that's not nearly all.  Even more is gained from the capable young men trapped in the system, far out of proportion to the racial balance of our nation. More blacks, for example, are now in prison than were in slavery just before emancipation. Many of them are employed at a pittance in industries like meat processing. In fact, many of the meals served in Big Horn County Schools include meat paddies from our prison meat processing industry.

 

http://economichardship.org/scroogian-return-of-debtors-prisons/

Quote of the Day, April 25, 2013, excerpted from "Making Poverty A Crime" by Jim Hightower in the Standard-Examiner and through OtherWords:

"Ohio's Civil Liberties Union recently issued a report documenting the Scroogian return of debtors' prisons after finding that municipal courts in that state are jailing poor people unable to pay court fines. Last summer, a suburban Cleveland court threw 45 people in jail because they couldn't come up with the money for fines they were assessed, and the Sandusky Municipal Court imprisoned 75 down-and-outers for the same "crime."

 

Besides the fact that jailing indigents for debts cost the courts way more than the fines they owe, it also violates the U.S. and Ohio constitutions. But what the hey — on to Georgia, which has enhanced the debtor prison experience by privatizing it.

Say you roll through a stop sign. Uniquely, the Peach Tree State counts that as a criminal offense. Now, say you can't pony up the full fine. Suddenly, you're in the clutches of a for-profit, private probation corporation. It charges probationers a $15 "start-up" fee, a $25 photo fee, and a myriad of other fees — on top of the fine they owe. Fail to pay, go to jail. Want to post bond? It's a new nationwide industry, centrally managed for profit.

 

http://economichardship.org/scroogian-return-of-debtors-prisons/

 

http://www.justicepolicy.org/news/4389

 

http://www.standard.net/stories/2013/04/24/making-poverty-crime

 

Ebenezer Scrooge, the Dickens character, perfectly personified the nasty rich. For example, when asked to make a charitable donation for people trapped in poverty, Scrooge curled his lip in contempt and snarled: "Are there no prisons?"

Blessedly, our American society has progressed well past such heartless disdain. Unless, of course, you happen to be poor in Ohio. Or Georgia. Or in the nationwide utopia envisioned by Newt Gingrich.

 

Ohio's Civil Liberties Union recently issued a report documenting the Scroogian return of debtors' prisons after finding that municipal courts in that state are jailing poor people unable to pay court fines. Last summer, a suburban Cleveland court threw 45 people in jail because they couldn't come up with the money for fines they were assessed, and the Sandusky Municipal Court imprisoned 75 down-and-outers for the same "crime."

 

Careless abuse of the planet we all live on

 

http://www.alternet.org/environment/slaves-our-stuff-creative-vision-break-away-consumer-cultures-destructive-grip?akid=10374.144927.8Yn4Tz&rd=1&src=newsletter831565&t=9

Need a creative way to fight fears of our planetary demise? A new book by Billy Talen prophetically titled, The End of the World (OR Books), may be just the trick. Talen, also known as Reverend Billy, and his Church of Stop Shopping, exposes the socio-political structure of consumerism and the commoditization of the earth with songs, impassioned preaching and theater events. Talen has been arrested 70 times along with members of the Church for their acts of civil disobedience in banks and other places of corporate mediation. Their decade-long collaboration, under the direction of Savitri D, has brought them to communities throughout the U.S. and internationally where they have built a performance institution of communities of action with songs and uplifting protest spectacle on the streets and in concert halls. Talen and the Church's inspiring and engaging performances ask us to take action on behalf of our home on our rapidly dying planet.

 

--
David Graber

Hardin, MT  59034

graberdb@gmail.com

Extrajudicial killing and our constitution

The portion of this column omitted from the print edition in Big Horn County News begins, with links and sources, after the seventh paragraph below.

 

So far the public response to the Boston terrorist attacks is a narrow, limited focusing on our breakdown in intelligence and debating over Miranda rights. Moral dimensions are ignored. Yet in the late 1780's one nation mustered the moral courage to compose the strongest document any nation had forged up to that point in history in order to face down great evil. That's our nation, and that's our constitution. It still stands, a model for other nations, asking us as American citizens to be ever mindful of the rights of all people.   

 

Our forefathers knew firsthand the evil inherent in a nation where the government condones extrajudicial killing. They knew the fear that stalked the citizens of such a society. Citizens of thirteen colonies came to an agreement. They successfully ended the targeting homes for break-ins after midnight, false arrest and indefinite incarceration without trial, and execution. That's why they enshrined guarantees in our constitution to "…life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness…" To make the dream reality they set up an unprecedented model of republican democracy for themselves and their children, including us. That's why we have the right to vote. That's how our government is beholden to us instead of to an elite few who think nothing of trampling on the rest of us. That's how extrajudicial killing of citizens by King George's government was stopped in the United States of America.

 

Historically, it has not been easy to ensure equal protection for all citizens under our Constitution.  Our ideas about who deserves civil rights have changed over time.   We have also suspended application of this great document out of fear in times of national crisis. Although our history is mixed, it seems that, overall we have made strong strides forward in realizing the provisions of our Constitution. We wouldn't have made this progress without active concern and involvement of US citizens.

 

This reminds me of an experience I had back in 2003. I accepted an invitation to conduct a workshop on appropriate heritage language and song for religionists at San Solano Mission in Topawa, the Tohono O'odham reservation near the Mexican border of Arizona. In a palm-shaded open courtyard I shared songs and stories of the Cheyenne and Crow. I listened to responses of the Euro-American pastors and teachers. In the back under a portico colonnade sat elders of the village, quietly listening to our songs and dialogue.

 

Our conversation was interrupted with a deafening blast jolting deep into our bodies. Windows and doors rattled. The blast was followed immediately with a roar that rose so loud we could not keep our hands from our ears. It quickly ceased, and the elders under the portico were hard pressed to comfort us. Surprisingly, they were accustomed to such occurrences.

 

At lunch I sat with my Tohono host and asked him for details about this rude jolt. He told me about children unable to sleep at night for fear of the boom, about families moving out of town, about livestock aborting and large windows broken. He told me the village of Topawa had been made a target for mock bombing runs by our military. I asked him how this happened. He said he thinks the government wants us Indians farther from the border, and would rather do this than tell us.

 

I was shocked that this type of intimidation of tribes can exist in our modern day.  The elders discouraged their tribe from bringing this situation to public attention because they were so grateful to the government for finally giving them the right to vote in 1965.  Then following my visit Arizona's "Proposition 200" came up and became law, placing an imposing barrier to the right to vote for many elderly in that community, being without birth certificates (they birthed at home), drivers licenses (like Crow country), and other paper identification.

 

First the Bush and now the Obama administrations have supported extrajudicial execution of citizen suspects. The Obama administration has now even executed American citizens by drone attacks, a practice previously limited to foreign suspects. Sneaky lawyers have constructed legal justification for this. The language is still secret, not available for public inspection. How can we stand for this? Our outrage should be commensurate with the conviction of those who wrote our constitution almost three centuries ago. They saw the abomination of a government reserving for itself the right to arrest and execute citizen suspects with no effort to apply appropriate judicial process.

 

Think about the implications. Powerful government interests in our country have taken upon themselves a power to abuse and even kill previously relegated only to the Divine. King David in the Bible had a long struggle with this. His repentance is documented in scripture. I predict that American carnage will continue to escalate as we move more into extrajudicial killing and our children follow the example of the powerful. If we want to change this, I propose we do what King David did: repent, and turn from our evil ways. This can start in Big Horn County.

 

The following is exclusive to this blog, not in this column as published in the Big Horn County News April 2:

 

That's how extrajudicial killing of citizens by government was stopped in the United States of America way back with the first 13 colonies.  Things have changed, and it's troubling. We have fallen victim to emotional paranoia leading us into compromises with our constitution that have not and will not help us toward more safety for our children and our families. As extrajudicial killing increases, it will increase among our citizens and children as well.

 

Just last year the policy permitting extrajudicial killing of American citizens by drone attack was given approval, retroactively endorsing the assassination of Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, a 16-year-old US citizen born in Denver. In October of 2011 he was breakfasting with friends at a campfire beside a trail in Yemen on a mission to locate his father. Unbeknownst to him, his father, also an American citizen, had already been eliminated by an American drone, in a sudden blast totally destroying the automobile in which he and a friend were driving. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anwar_al-Awlaki.

 

From Salon / By Andrew O'Hehir, April 13, 2013

How Boston Exposes America's Dark Post-9/11 Bargain

Why did this story drive the whole country nuts? Because we traded rights for "security," and didn't get either.

 

"Those who would give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety."  —Benjamin Franklin, at the time of the ratification of our constitution.

 

The following has some common sense approaches to breaking our cycle of mass violence worldwide.

http://colorlines.com/archives/2013/04/rinku_sen_boston_marathon_explosions.html

 

In the Bible, violence in any form becoming acceptable is connected with lawlessness, unrighteousness, and evil. Read in the Old Testament what was happening that God regretted creating human kind, just before Noah's flood.  Then read what's happening in India and in this country regarding rape:

http://www.alternet.org/school-principal-discouraged-teen-girl-reporting-sexual-assault-because-it-would-ruin-attackers

http://rhrealitycheck.org/article/2013/03/13/as-steubenville-rape-trial-opens-victim-blaming-begins-in-court-of-law-and-public-opinion/

 

This blog post uses some strong language with sources cited to disparage our loss of constitutional rights for no gain in security for our children and our families.   See the entire blog post on line:

http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/how-boston-exposes-americas-dark-post-911-bargain?akid=10351.144927.3x2SMi&rd=1&src=newsletter828346&t=4

 

Following are web sites detailing the Tohono O'odham nation's struggle with our government including voting rights, and the unfortunate drift back into vote suppression from 1965 when they won the right to vote as mentioned above. 

 

http://www.hrusa.org/indig/reports/Tohono.shtm

 

http://www.nativevillage.org/Editorials/Oodham%20to%20National%20Guard.htm

 

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/news/articles/2009/11/22/20091122BMGRruins.html?nclick_check=1

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machita_Incident

http://www.protectcivilrights.org/pdf/voting/ArizonaVRA.pdf

 

--
David Graber

Hardin, MT  59034

graberdb@gmail.com

www.greenwoodfarmmt.org

Self Loathing

A lot of things have changed since I grew up on a Midwest farm back in the 40's and 50's.  Sure, I love the internet and modern conveniences that make my life easier. Yet sometimes I really miss that general sense of pride and support for our American system of government. It almost seems quaint to remember how we had a quiet confidence in our democratically elected representatives.   We often disagreed on which party or policy was best, but most of us believed that county, state, and federal government would act in the interests of all of us, protecting the general public against the greed of the wealthy and powerful few.

 

It seems like our ongoing love/hate relationship with government has become all about hate these days. Unfortunately, much of the angry and destructive rhetoric has become directed against real people, including those in need of public assistance and public employees who meet those needs. The recent sequester points out a real division in how we think about our responsibilities for helping others. It seems that in the minds of many people it is much more acceptable to use public money for building weapons of mass destruction or supplementing incomes of wealthy Americans than for helping children born into poverty.  

 

To get a positive take on our system of government, we almost have to leave the country. It was in China spring of 2002 when I discovered people who have the old-fashioned belief in American government like I remembered as a teenager. My Chinese post-graduate students frequently expressed admiration of the American government. I helped one practice his pronunciation of Lincoln's Gettysburg Address in preparation for an English recitation contest. I helped a group of four arrange a choric reading of Martin Luther King's "Letter from the Birmingham Jail."

 

The faculty members in my Wednesday evening informal English Conversation Class spoke with amazing honesty about their own government. They quickly drifted into a role-changing pattern of debate between a minority who still supported Central China Communist Party (CCCP) and a majority who wanted American-style free enterprise to transform the fertile agricultural Mien Jiang River Valley draining the eastern massif of the Himalaya uplift into the fertile "Red Basin" just twenty miles west of our campus where Dujiangyen nestles against the foothills.

 

My students were amazed by images of American production agriculture. They were captivated by the capacity of modern harvesting and planting technology, as well as techniques for managing fertility and plant genetics.  A majority of my English conversation group believed that subsistence farmers in the Mien Jiang river valley above Dujiangyen should be replaced with modern American agriculture practices.  We never settled the question of what would happen to 500,000 displaced farmers, but it's a question that I believe is at the heart of a truly democratic society. How do we maintain technological efficiency and effectiveness while still supporting the people who have spent their lives working in non-technology related fields like manual labor and the service industry? Can we help people without hating them and our government when our progress cuts them out of access to a livelihood?

 

We have continued to cut the safety net for ordinary Americans, while failing to address billions of dollars in government handouts being distributed to those who can afford the most lobbyists.  People living in poverty have become a useful scapegoat in misdirecting attention from these real issues of fraud and abuse.  I've had my own anti-government rants, but now I try to remember that many of my friends and neighbors are public servants. They are real people whom I admire and respect and they're doing great work in our community – protecting us from potential dangers, teaching our children, and conducting agricultural research that will benefit us all. When we despise our government of the people, by the people, and for the people, who are we really hating? 

--
David Graber

Hardin, MT  59034

graberdb@gmail.com
www.greenwoodfarmmt.org

The foolish ferocity of turkey toms

Sheila and the Turkey part II.

The portion of my column not published in the BHCNews March 27 is continued eight paragraphs below

Montana's militant segment is bent on turning down Medicaid expansion for the rest of us in Montana. These politicians are acting in blind rage to block access to reasonable medical care, access we already paid for with our premium payments, otherwise known as payroll deductions for federal taxes. What turkeys.

As I described in my last column, with the onset of spring our turkey tom has begun to attack our dog whenever he sees her. He doesn't see, or doesn't seem to care, that his beak and spurs are no match for Sheila's quick slashing fangs. But even when injured and bleeding from gashes in his chest, he continues attacking, driven by a blind and instinctual drive to protect his hens. At this point, his injuries are so severe that we are concerned he may not live to fertilize eggs for our summer poultry crop. His life and the future of his potential offspring are at stake.

The same turkey politics in Helena threatens health care for thousands of Montana citizens. Like our turkey tom, our elected representatives don't seem to get it either. They, too, seem blinded by some sort of instinctual, ideological rage.

Don't these lawmakers see that we already pay for Medicaid through our taxes? If we don't expand Medicaid here in our state, then we'll be exporting our Montana dollars to pay for Medicaid expansion in other states. How does that make any sense? Some argue that Medicaid traps people in cycles of poverty. Medicaid doesn't trap people in poverty—lack of money traps people in poverty! Can't they see that most Medicaid recipients are hardworking taxpayers, who simply don't get enough income from their jobs? Don't they realize that the income threshold for denying Medicaid to families is so low that without expanded Medicaid—even with the subsidies that will be available through the health insurance exchanges in 2014—tens of thousands of Montanans will be left uninsured? Don't they recognize that we have more uninsured veterans per capita than in any other state, and that expanding Medicaid is the only reasonable way our tax dollars can be returned to serve some 7000 currently uninsured Montana veterans? What a scandal to refuse care for those who fought and paid in blood for all of us!

Some of our legislators claim that expanding Medicaid expands federal government involvement in health care. But don't they understand that Medicaid is health insurance, not health care? Health care gets provided in the exact same way, by the same hospitals and doctors that provide care to those who have other types of insurance. Furthermore, Medicaid is administrated at the state level, not from Washington: local Montanans taking care of their own.

Don't the folks in Helena know that as a form of health insurance, Medicaid is a whole lot more efficient than the commercial forms of insurance? Since Medicaid doesn't spend money on advertising or trying to deny coverage to people like the private companies do, more of the health care dollar gets spent on providing care! And do they not realize that extending this form of health insurance to 70,000 more Montanans is good for the local economy, too? A recent U of M study revealed that thousands of new jobs would be created with Medicaid expansion.

Perhaps our legislators forget that if we don't cover these Montana citizens, we'll still be paying for their care—only the care will be more expensive, and not as effective. That's because folks without insurance still get sick or injured, and eventually wind up in emergency rooms. Now that's expensive. And who pays for that waste? We do. The cost of their care now routinely is shifted to all of us through higher premiums—$1000 per year per family in Montana, and growing. Why don't our militant Helena legislators address this waste?

Maybe they are looking to states like Arkansas, who are thinking about using Medicaid dollars to buy health insurance from private insurance companies, who will pay doctors to provide care to beneficiaries. How free is enterprise with a law requiring a middleman? Rather than simply paying the health care providers directly, what they really want is pork barrel politics at its worst. Isn't it bribery to require us to buy from private companies who use our money to buy votes from politicians needing more money for their next campaign to make sure they are all on the take from the rest of us? Who is in whose pockets for what?

So when it comes to expanding Medicaid in Montana, I see a lot of turkey toms in Helena. With foolish ferocity, they are leading us down a path to a very questionable future. I suppose we can always hope that they'll come to their senses before it's too late.  

The following is continued from the incomplete edition of my column in The News.

Nearly all media commentary is pro big business, and plays down the cynicism of this push to deprive care and make profit. Here are two of few exceptions, unfortunately:

Sam Hall quotes extensively from a NYT column by Paul Krugman, with nationwide Medicaid economic data:

http://blogs.clarionledger.com/samrhall/2013/03/04/medicaid-expansion-and-the-private-sector/

 
Here's Paul Krugman's article in the New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/04/opinion/krugman-mooching-off-medicare.html

Which I quote:

Conservatives like to say that their position is all about economic freedom, and hence making government's role in general, and government spending in particular, as small as possible. And no doubt there are individual conservatives who really have such idealistic motives.

When it comes to conservatives with actual power, however, there's an alternative, more cynical view of their motivations — namely, that it's all about comforting the comfortable and afflicting the afflicted, about giving more to those who already have a lot. And if you want a strong piece of evidence in favor of that cynical view, look at the current state of play over Medicaid (click on the above link to the entire article).

 
--
David Graber

Hardin, MT  59034

graberdb@gmail.com

www.greenwoodfarmmt.org

Sheila, a turkey, and defense of marriage

See the 9^th paragraph below for the rest of the column not included in the newspaper edition.

Marriage is being redefined across the nation. We in Big Horn County are swept into the fray because proponents on both sides confuse the secular and religious implications of law and the Bible. These should have been kept separate. The confusion creates sticky legal and ethical dilemmas. Even the sanctity of marriage is blurred. What business does our secular government have redefining a sacrament already defined and established by God? At the same time, how can government authority impose a religious standard limiting civil rights and important legal protections for some American citizens? Such are the tactics of the Taliban, and hardly American.

Recently twenty states have or are in process of legalizing adult domestic partnerships or civil unions. The pressure to give reasonable space for such to exist won't stay away from Montana. The situation reminds me of a recent development out on the farm.   

Sheila is our Australian Shepherd who normally only defends us from marauding deer at night. I came home from school the other day and found her cowering in my pickup. I opened the door, and she wouldn't come out. I failed to notice the numerous turkey feathers scattered around. After returning home from a meeting later that night, I drove around to the garage, and there was our big turkey gobbler, Lightning, roosting low on a sawhorse beside the door. I wondered why he wasn't up with our two hens in the barn rafters where he belonged.

Next morning we opened the door to check on the animals, and as usual, the turkeys came running and stood their ground for handouts. Sheila romped around the corner of this scene, expecting her usual tidbit. In no time feathers were flying. It took both Bonnie and I to separate them. I laid a full body grip on Lightning and he proceeded to clamp my gloved finger in his beak. He kept his death grip with his body stiff, so I looked him over. The broken wing feathers on one side–he leads with his right–clearly explained his reduced ability to fly.

Then I understood. Now that spring is approaching, the turkey-breeding season is upon us. As Sheila approached the vicinity of the three turkeys, Lightning had forgotten all about possible corn handouts.  He ran at Sheila, courageously trumpeting his version of Garryowen- defending his dominance over our two turkey hens as well as his potential posterity with them. Sheila also stood her ground, defending her right to exist on this farm with full access to sustenance and protection.

We were alarmed.  No doubt this was headed for a fight to the death.  It seemed there could be no middle ground. Gone were the peaceful mornings of opening the back door with handouts to both dog and bird. If we left them to their vices, we feared we would end up having to terminate one or both of them.  What to do?
The final solution was separation: turkeys are sequestered behind an electric fence, free to be turkeys, while Sheila is left to guard the rest of the farm.  I no longer fear we will have to deploy our termination plan.

Perhaps the same wisdom could apply to debates on domestic partnerships.  If the government stays out of the business of redefining marriage, it can focus on protecting citizens.  Any two adults should, for whatever reason, be allowed to form a contractual agreement to share a household and to designate the other as next of kin.  And the Church can maintain its prophetic role to protect marriage and to proclaim freedom in Christ from the bondages of sin and moral depravity decried by Paul in the Bible.  As Jesus advised, "Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's."  Let the government have legal contracts, and the church have marriage.

It's hard for us today to imagine the Greek/Roman cities in the time of Paul where sex and the sword were used interchangeably to enforce human bondage. Rape was non-existent, simply because normal consensual marital sex was not valued.  St. Paul's references to abominations become clearer in the actual Greek words he wrote down. English terms such as effeminate and homosexual in the original Bible language referred to bondage, domination, fear, violence and depravity that tore families apart and caused sickness and death. This is far from the respectful, faithful, caring lifelong relationship God intends for bonding in the human family.

 

The following is continued from the newspaper

 

To Paul, normal human bonding was intended from Creation, where Jesus was present. So in the human community of Christ-followers there was to be none of the huge power differences usually implicit at that time in sexual bondages, slavery, religion, race, politics, and wealth disparity (http://politicaljesus.com/2013/03/06/wealth-inequality-political-power-and-the-bible/?utm_source=wordtwit&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=wordtwit).

 

Paul learned this from Jesus. Implicitly or literally, Jesus' parables address human bondages and exclusions justified by Pharisaic literal interpretation of Old Testament law. Almost all of Jesus' healings directly destroyed a legally endorsed physical barrier to life, and welcomed an individual to leave bondages and become bonded with (follow) Jesus for life. It's the salvation to which first Christians were called, who "turned the world upside down," as noted by Paul's enemies in Thessalonica

  (http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Acts+17&version=NKJV).

 

The intimidation system of sex and the sword was obvious. Caesar's empire was destined to crumble. Roman law was no better than Old Testament law, and both were transcended by the power of Christ and his new Commandment (http://bible.cc/john/13-34.htm). Paul explains specifically that laws cannot enforce the relational elements of "neither male nor female, Jew nor Greek, slave nor free" (http://bible.cc/galatians/3-28.htm). The oneness in Christ to which Paul refers is not an intellectual agreement, but a oneness which law cannot enforce: "love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, patience" (http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Galatians+5%3A22-23&version=NASB).

 

Much modern Christian agenda follows a philosophy of deontology, where simple unquestioning obedience "as unto God" sets aside Jesus' one commandment in which all the details of the Old Testament law are fulfilled. From the Creation story to the Ten Commandments to St. Paul's institution of communion, abusive bondage power of the other gods is rejected in favor of building human bonds of mutual trust with food and other means of life, in real time and place.

 

We are on the cusp of good changes in the legal system to separate the religious from the secular in the institution of marriage. Montana needs this change. It can happen with respecting the diversity of opinion and practice, without the imposition of religious law by secular government.  Those among us who strongly oppose gay marriage would be relieved from demanding our government to enforce our Bible-based sin definitions. The religious function of exclusion would be relegated to religious institutions, not the secular government.  On the contrary, those whose Bible interpretation asks government to issue marriage licenses to gays would no longer have the power to force religious institutions to allow use of their facilities for gay marriages.  The government would not be marrying gays; marriage is the job of religious institutions. Government would have the job of protecting and recognizing legal human bonding, defining with public consensus such parameters age, mental capacity, and criminal history which can be clearly demonstrated to uphold the common good.

 

In New Hampshire, debates over gender in this sacred institution can continue to take place, but within the religious community instead of in government. This also gives back to God the right as Jesus advocated, "What God hath joined together, let not man put asunder."

 

The Roman standard of peace through the violence of sword and sex is all over the Middle East's ancient history sites. Unfortunately, some art historians tend to see nudity in Roman/Greek times as freedom from our Victorian prudery. It's not. It was riddled with bondage, with fear, rape and bloody violence to all those (male or female, bond or free) who would oppose that bondage, through and through. It was not lifelong bonding of trusting equals, but rather, imbedded in some of that art itself, I sense a cry to break from bondage. Our whole Bible advocates freedom for faithfulness, trust, lifelong, respectful human bonding.  In fact, these are precisely the characteristics of the Father Jesus came to emulate, and asks us to do the same. This came vividly apparent to me in our 2013 Lent reading of the Gospels.

 

We in Montana should take note. We also, let alone our Washington legislators, do not need one more ounce of our emotional energy drained on either side of the gay marriage debate (Legislators, check my blog for document links).

 

The government in Montana now has a monopoly on marriage, and government-sanctioned marriages have been disintegrating for years— just look at the divorce rate in the United States. Since all 50 states issue no-fault divorces, it's sometimes easier to end a marriage than it is to end a corporate partnership. Doesn't the above make more sense? Make it a private contract between two individuals. That's where defense of marriage makes sense.

 

--
David Graber

Hardin, MT  59034

graberdb@gmail.com