My only question is, when are we going to march on Washington?

Oh hell. Out of retirement already.

I just have to post this. For all those “progressives” that think Barack Obama is playing some kind of 11-dimensional chess on Social Security, he’s not. He’s wanted to do this for years. From the very beginning of his presidency.

2011

Every time I think I can’t get any more disgusted

2010

I wasn’t the only one who caught this.

At some point, these people will wake up and smell the coffee. A supposedly liberal/progressive/Democratic president would not be so ignorant of his own party’s history (or his country’s history, for that matter) and parrot conservative talking points, let alone believe them.

The “steal our retirement commission”

Social Security was never going to be killed at the hand of a Republican. Nope, it appears that it will take a “Democrat.”

2009

Beyond Discouraged

Obama: Social Security is most definitely in play (Lambert again)

[OBAMA] Now, I will tell you that Social Security disability has gone up significantly during this recession. Some of you may have read in the last couple of days that Social Security — the Social Security trust fund is worse off now because of the recession than it was. We were already having some issues with Social Security, and so we’re going to have to do some significant reforms of Social Security.

Sigh

Remember in 2004, when GWB won a great “mandate” by running on terra, terra, terra, and then after the election out-of-the-blue immediately went on a national barnstorming tour to “reform” Social Security? Remember how the Dems beat that one back?  What are they gonna do  now?

President-elect Barack Obama pledged yesterday to shape a new Social Security and Medicare “bargain” with the American people, saying that the nation’s long-term economic recovery cannot be attained unless the government finally gets control over its most costly entitlement programs.

That discussion will begin next month, Obama said, when he convenes a “fiscal responsibility summit” before delivering his first budget to Congress. He said his administration will begin confronting the issues of entitlement reform and long-term budget deficits soon after it jump-starts job growth and the stock market.

“What we have done is kicked this can down the road. We are now at the end of the road and are not in a position to kick it any further,” he said. “We have to signal seriousness in this by making sure some of the hard decisions are made under my watch, not someone else’s.” (WaPo)

The thing is, this isn’t out-of-the-blue. Obama’s been signaling this all along.

We tried to tell you.

Link to all my posts about Social Security

Farewell

Ya know. I think I’ve just about run my course here…

It’s been fun, but I’ve neglected this blog so much especially in the last year. What used to be a regular hangout for me has become full of dust and cobwebs. Family, work and photography get all my attention now.  I just don’t have the energy or want for this blog any more.

It’s been a good run. Maybe I’ll revive Blue Lyon at some point (or better, start a new blog), but for now it is good-bye.

You can keep up with me on Facebook or keep an eye on my photography over at The Neophyte Photographer.

Thanks for sticking with me through the years.

I haven’t forgotten

“Shame on us if we’ve forgotten. I haven’t forgotten those kids. Shame on us if we’ve forgotten. Tears aren’t enough. Expressions of sympathy aren’t enough. Speeches aren’t enough. We’ve cried enough. We’ve known enough heartbreak. What we’re proposing is not radical. It’s not taking away anyone’s gun rights. It’s something that, if we are serious, we will do.” ~ President Obama, speaking today.

I haven’t forgotten, and so, knowing that I’m likely pissing into the wind, I will be contacting my Congress Critters.

But shit.  92% of us are in favor universal background checks and yet, Republicans are vowing to filibuster anything. I despair.

And honestly, I don’t understand this at all.

Doing nothing would be akin to pissing on the graves of those little children and anyone felled by gun violence, and spitting in the faces of those left behind.

(And no, I’m not allowing comments on this post. I just had to get this off my chest and have no fucking interest in getting into another gun debate.)

This has to stop

Reblogged from Gardens For Goldens:

I am angry.

Let me preface this with the understanding that this is a personal blog. When I speak here, I speak as an individual, not as a representative of the organization I volunteer with and love. With that out of the way…

There is a tremendous sense of fulfillment that comes with rescue. Blessings surround us daily. I heard a saying recently - “hard is hard”.

Read more… 416 more words

Please, go read. And share.

Cross-Post: How I Spent My Sunday

Cross-posted from The Neophyte Photographer (Originally posted on Monday, March 18, 2013)

Long-time followers know that I photographed the first ever Medical Outreach Response Event (MORE) last year as my final project for my lighting class.   They held the event again this past weekend and I volunteered to shoot the event. They already had a photographer for Saturday so I showed up yesterday.  Sunday wasn’t as busy as Saturday, but there was still plenty of need.   There are no medical services to speak of in our town. Many of these people are working poor, or disabled, and there are so many hurdles for them to jump over and so many cracks for them to fall through, that the problem feels insurmountable.

Here are just a few shots.

Attendees starting the process at intake.  The clients were screened here and directed to the various areas, depending on their need.

They might need dental work, vision care, help with obtaining affordable insurance or low-cost prescription assistance.  Or all of the above. There was also an immunization clinic to get people up-to-date on their shots, mental health screening, three dental vans, and the Mammovan was there to provide breast cancer screening.

 People shouldn’t have to get their health care in the middle of a high school gymnasium or get their teeth fixed in the parking lot. My country has its priorities all screwed up.

They shouldn’t have to wonder if there is something . . .  anything . . .  they can afford.

A young boy attempts to read the eye chart as the Lions Club volunteer looks on.

Immunization clinic.

She’s a bit nervous.

But she came through with flying colors.

More to come.

Loving the Awesomeness

You Might Want To Sit This One Out… | Raising My Rainbow.

William Rivers Pitt and Moral Geometry

When I listen to “my side” defend the indefensible, rationalizing that which they would be howling about if it were the “other” side doing it, I want to scream, and often do.

When what is moral is whatever our side does, then we have cut ourselves loose from our moorings.

William Rivers Pitt: Waking From My Moral Coma

I am finished with the moral geometry that says this is better than that, which makes this good. This is not good; this is, in fact, intolerable. Allowing the perpetrators of war crimes – widely televised ones at that – to retain their good name and go on Sunday talk shows as if they had anything to offer besides their ideology of murder and carnage is intolerable. Entertaining the idea that the billions we spend preparing for war cannot be touched, and so the elderly and the infirm and the young and the weak and the voiceless must pay the freight instead, is intolerable.

The pornography of America’s global killing spree is intolerable, and, by the by, I am sick of hearing about drones. A child killed by a Hellfire missile that was fired from a drone is exactly, precisely as dead as a child killed by a Hellfire missile fired from an Apache attack helicopter, precisely as dead as a child killed by a smart bomb, precisely as dead as a child killed by a sniper, precisely as dead as a child killed by a land mine, or by a cruise missile, or by any of the myriad other ways instant death is dealt by this hyper-weaponized nation of ours.

Exactly, precisely as God damned dead, and the blood is on our hands regardless of the means used to do the killing. The issue is not the drones. The issue is our hard, black hearts, and the grim fact that the debate in this country right now is not about whether the killing is wrong, but about the most morally acceptable way of going about that killing. Drones are bad, but snipers are better, because you don’t hear the buzzing sound in the sky before your lights go out forever. Or something.

It is the killing, it is the permanent war, it is our deranged national priorities. It is the system we live under which requires the serial deaths of all those innocents to maintain our economic health that should appall us. We sup upon the blood and bonemeal that is the byproduct of the idea that is America, and we sleep. And we sleep.