Jonathan Jacobs – RI Future

September 12, 2016

Gaspee gasps for breath in attempt to attack Tanzi

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In Bob Plain’s recent post, Stenhouse attacks Tanzi and Fogarty with mailers, we learned that the CEO of Rhode Island Center for Freedom and Prosperity is using his tax-exempt, social welfare organization, The Gaspee Project, to send out literature warning House District 34 voters against the dangers of voting for Democratic Representative Teresa Tanzi. As there is no Republican candidate on the ballot in November, the anti-Tanzi lit-piece calls on people to vote instead for Democratic primary opponent Ewa Dwierzynski.

I suppose, with some effort, I can find a way to understand the strategy of a Republican – er, sorry, multi-partisan – organization attacking a progressive incumbent who represents a more affluent region of South County by supporting her more conservative, Democratic Primary opponent. However, the tactic, like so much of what Stenhouse does within the ALEC-inspired, hyper-capitalist, houses of money-worship over which he ministers, is ham handed. Take, for example, the mailer’s graphic image color scheme. It meant to inspire fear and uses a color pallette faintly reminiscent of the poster for Wes Craven’s original A Nightmare on Elm Street. Except, instead of distressed, hand- stenciled lettering for the copy, the ominous and empty cliches are typed using drop-shadowed, Trebuchet font. And, instead of finding a photograph of Representative Tanzi depicting her as nefarious, or even as maladroit, the gray-scale shot of Tanzi is her smiling General Assembly website picture, Photoshopped to look like a missing person from an episode of Unsolved Mysteries. What is more, is that the call to action – “Vote for Ewa Dwierzinski” – is in an ectoplasm shade of green, floating over the tarmac-colored background and standing out as if she is the terrifying perpetrator who allegedly caused Teresa to disappear.

However, I am grudgingly willing to overlook form, if function is excellent. If the design is not inspiring, then perhaps the content is.

Is it?

No.

The entirety of the thread of propaganda hinges on how Tanzi’s vote for tolls on trucks will somehow raise prices on groceries for your family. How? Because rigged system! No facts. No statistics. No data. No surprise here. In fact, by substituting dysphemisms for debate and saying Tanzi supports a “rigged system,” and is a part of a “corrupt special interest majority,” Stenhouse insults the electorate. The social welfare organization implies that voters are unable to follow the debate through to the end, concluding for themselves whether or not a market-driven solution for repairing roads, paid for by the special interest group most responsible for the damage done to public thoroughfares, constitutes a “rigged system” and being a part of a “Corrupt special interest majority.”

What is ironic, is that Teresa Tanzi is among a handful of Rhode Island lawmakers who prioritizes pragmatism over politics and people over profits. She puts her own agenda dead last, preferring to weigh the pros and cons of issues and voting what the outcome of her debate concludes to do the most good, while resulting in the least harm. What Mike Stenhouse calls defying the will of the people and businesses, and harming economic growth, many Rhode Islanders see as refreshingly good governing.

Representative Tanzi has survived and thrived as a progressive Democrat in a chamber led by Democrats of a more Reaganesque variety. In spite of her left-leaning convictions, Tanzi has managed to earn the respect of House Leadership even after abstaining from voting for Nicholas Mattiello when he sought the Speakership following Gordon Fox’s resignation preceding his indictment. While others who abstained faced committee reassignment or primary opponents sponsored by leadership, Tanzi was assigned a seat on House Finance.

Furthermore, her record of key sponsorship does not remotely reflect supporting a “rigged system.” House Bill No. 7080: “Permits the town of Narragansett to establish a tangible business property tax exemption for local small business owners in an amount not to exceed thirty-five thousand dollars ($35,000).” So, she supports local small businesses. House Bill No. 7152: “Allows for property tax and motor vehicle tax exemption for veterans and their spouses.” So, she supports veterans and their families. Possibly the most telling bill of which she was key sponsor, however, was House Bill No. 6066 SUB B entitled “An Act Relating to Reporting and Accountability – Taxation – Rhode Island Economic Development Tax incentives Evaluation Act of 2013. This comprehensive structure, requiring thorough oversight of corporate tax incentives for Rhode Island economic development (I assume most of you have heard about 38 Studios?), is the opposite of corruption. So, Mr. Stenhouse, if you please, just sit down and eat your cake.

Stenhouse’s tactic is weak and predictable. It fails to provoke thoughtful voting. It fails, even, to be clever. And, as one who has a modicum of experience with political wetwork, it is poorly timed. If, in fact, the purpose is to help Tanzi’s primary opponent, it should have been sent weeks ago. Never go negative late. If a campaign is going negative, it has to go negative early or it looks desperate.

Most voters do not read the fine print. They do not know that a Republican, corporate interest backed, 501c(4), social welfare organization is responsible for the last-minute, hit-piece. They do not know that this type of electioneering is borderline section 527 status group activity. The fact that this actively dissuades debate of the actual issues, while limiting factual information, invites the argument that the Gaspee Project is not promoting the social welfare of the targeted recipients of the mailer. Rather, it is promoting the welfare of the unnamed donors and corporations who fund it. The candle in this shadow-money, social ill-fare, sender of political nasty-grams, is that it is conducted so poorly, it will probably do little or nothing to affect the race in Rhode Island House District 34. What it does do, however, is further expose just how feckless Mike Stenhouse and his think-tank / campaign action group really are.

September 4, 2016September 4, 2016

Trump, Lies, and Colin Kapernick

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Donald Trump has lassoed the untamed sentiment of white tribalism in the United States and, rather than trying to break its immature spirit of self-interest in order to herd it toward a strategic destination, he instead allows himself to be led by the animal wherever, in its panicked frenzy, it happens to pull him. The response from Democrats to this bellowing bovine is some iteration of,

“This is not who we are.”

Since when?

Of course this is who we are. If by “we” Democrats (who are opposed to the racist, tribalist, hyper-nationalist message on which Trump has based his campaign) refer to Americans who place their faith in the version of American history taught from the frame of reference of the “winners” of the American Revolution perpetuated in history classrooms from sea to shining sea, then a factual account of history disputes the premise by telling the story of this being exactly who we are. America has ongoing problems both with civil rights and with admitting the truth. We need only to look honestly at the cornerstones of America’s heroes of political patriotism to see the cracks in our national foundation.

George Washington became a slave owner at the age of eleven and, as Commander in Chief of the rebels during the Revolution, ordered a revenge-driven, scorched-earth style massacre of Native Americans in Cherry Hill, New York.
James Madison compromised on composing the second amendment to the Bill of Rights in order to allay the fears of white slave owners scared of an uprising by southern black populations rivaling free, white, Americans in some states.
Francis Scott Key penned the lyrics to the Star Spangled Banner inspired by the survival of a US fort and defeat of a British force, bolstered by black slaves fighting for their freedom, in a war fought, in large part, over merchant trade routes including the middle-passage.
Abraham Lincoln was a Republican, only after flip-flopping from his previous party loyalty as a Whig.
Progressive hero, President Theodore Roosevelt, was an outspoken proponent of eugenics and is quoted referring to Africans as, “ape-like naked savages, who…prey on creatures not much wilder or lower than themselves.”
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, issued the executive order to round up over 110,000 Japanese Americans and relocate them to internment camps.
President John F. Kennedy hid his ongoing battle with Addison’s Disease from the public.

But, after all, nobody’s perfect. Han Solo shot first. He is still my hero.

What Democrats who express vocal opposition to the very idea of a Trump presidency (more commonly referred to, simply, as Democrats) should be sending as a message is not “This is not who we are.” Rather, Democrats need to honestly reflect that the truth is “This is not who we say we are.” Americans like to talk about how our nation was conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. We go so far as to prominently and with great pride display a 305 foot statue of the goddess of freedom, on its own Liberty Island just south of Manhattan, complete with a plaque inside its base describing her as:

“A mighty woman with a torch, whose flames the imprisoned lightning, and her name Mother of Exiles.”

That is who we say we are. But, America has not lived up to such lofty ideals and, perhaps, unless we prefer the isolationist, protectionist, borderline fascist nexus of Donald Trump’s dystopia, striving to behave more like the Disney version of ourselves about which we boast to other nations at global cocktail parties is the answer.

Take, for example, the recent controversy surrounding NFL quarterback, Colin Kaepernick. Because he has chosen to sit during the National Anthem, he has been cast in the pink-hued spotlight of being unpatriotic. The thinly veiled implication by his critics is that he has been allowed to earn millions of dollars for playing a game. Therefore, he is insulting those who protect that privilege by using his privilege to protest on behalf of those who suffer the violently tragic fate of inequality and oppression.

Allowed? Do we smell the big old steaming pile of bullshit yet?

A grown man of mixed race, who grew up in one of the whitest parts of Wisconsin, just northwest of Milwaukee (I have heard tell of some strife there, recently), and raised by white adoptive parents, has chosen to protest racial inequality in a time when a rich, white, major party presidential nominee is appropriating patriotism to mean white supremacy and xenophobia. And, the response is that Colin Kaepernick is being insensitive. Sit down and eat your cake.

Oh say does that star spangled banner yet wave … and smile … and slowly extend its middle finger. Maybe Colin is not so keen on the stars and bars because he has not forgotten, even though he is a star, too many people who look like him are behind bars.

Democrats’ efforts to oppose Donald Trump would do well to stop talking about who America is and who America is not. Instead, Democrats would benefit by inspiring each other to be a part of the American story and recognizing that America’s history is what created this steeply raked playing field of which I hear so many complaints. Democrats can call upon each other to help write the next chapter to coherently further the story in the direction of an epic anthology. America’s revolutionary exposition set the stage for a drama about certain inalienable rights, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The plot then took a turn toward utter antithesis and has been reading like the story of Sisyphus for nearly two and a half centuries. In this version, Sisyphus is a woman of color and the stone is made of oil, gold, and loud white men.

If the American story is the story of the bargain to experiment with civil rights, then the constitution is the codification of civil rights. Ask Khizar Khan, he carries a copy of those rights in his pocket. So do I. So should you. So far, the experiment has not been successful. It has made progress. But, trial and error takes time. That is why it is not called trial and success. Trump is not going to win this election. However, that does not mean he will not leave an indelible mark on American history. The chapter Trump submitted is entitled Give up and save your own white asses. It was actually co-written by Alex Jones and Satan. What is more, Americans already read it in 1956. Except, the earlier version was co-written by Joseph McCarthy and Roy Cohn. Yet, if Democrats can unite, accept the truth of America’s past and encourage each other to practice the great American sermon, then Trump does not get to finish his story. Rather, America can begin to write over his repetitive and hollow platitude of “Make America Great Again,” with an honest account of the steps and missteps of the great work of making America good. It is not who we have been so far. It is, however, who we could be.

July 31, 2016July 31, 2016

Donald Trump’s stream of consciousness

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The following was transcribed from two random sections of Donald Trump’s speech on July, 29th, 2016, at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs. The first section covers the first four minutes, fifty-one seconds of the speech. The second selection is from 14:38 to 21:48. The two sections equal about twelve minutes of the fifty-five minute speech.

This is why our country doesn’t work. You understand. So, we have thousands of people in a room next door. We have plenty of space here. We have thousands of people waiting outside to get in, And, we have a fire marshal who says, “Oh we can’t allow more people. It really is so unfair to the people. I’m so sorry. And, I have to apologize. But, it’s not my fault. I just came here. But, we have thousands of beautiful, wonderful, great people in the room next door, and outside, and they won’t let ’em in. And, the reason they won’t let ’em in is because they don’t know what the hell they’re doing. That’s why. Okay? Too bad.

That’s why our country has prob- Maybe they’re a Hillary person? Could that be possible? Probably. I don’t think there are too many of them. I don’t think there are too many of them.

Anyway, they set up a screen in the other room. They set up something outside. But what a- what a disgraceful situation. So … but, you people can’t be complaining, right? (applause) You can’t be complaining.

Alright. (pause) So much … So much to straighten out in this country. This is the kind- this is the of think we have in federal government also, by the way, folks. You know? And then you wonder why we’re going to hell. That’s why we’re going to hell. It’s the thought – You know what it is? It’s the thought process, right?

So far, Trump has insulted the Fire Marshal for enforcing the fire safety code, and clumsily connected that to support for Hillary Clinton and the eternal damnation of the United States of America. Good start, Donald.

So … I watched last night. I watched Hillary Clinton. (shakes head disapprovingly) What a sad … what a sad situation.

And, and, by the way, they’re going to let some of these people, I was just informed, they’re going to let some of them meander in … meander. Too bad.

But, I watched her last night giving a speech … that was so average. And, I watched last night as the network said, “It was alright. It was good. It was fine.” And, then I watched this morning. “It was so wonderful.” It wasn’t wonderful, folks. And, then I read a report that just came out, I can’t believe it, in Politico. I can’t believe that. And, they wrote something all cliches. All just written by a – by a scriptwriter. And, it was all clichés, you know. They used a little tweet one on me about tweet. And, she said something about the campaign. “Donald Trump doesn’t know how to campaign.” Something like that. I just beat sixteen people and I’m beating her. (pause)

A scriptwriter writes scripts. While it is unclear to which of the several articles Donald refers, it appears from his repeated use of the word “cliches,” he is referring to the Politico piece by Jeff Greenfield. One which was not particularly flattering to Clinton’s speech. Greenfield is a journalist, holds a law degree, and served as a speechwriter for Robert Kennedy. To the best of my knowledge he has never written a script for the stage or screen.

As of July 29, 2016, Trump is not beating Clinton in polls. In her speech, she did refer to Twitter, which (one can imagine) is to what he referred when he said “They used a little tweet one on me about tweet.” Yes, she did say something about the campaign. Had she discussed deli meats in her speech it would have been surprising. As, however, both you and Sec. Clinton are running against one another for President, it is standard to discuss the campaign during an acceptance speech for the Democratic nomination.

I mean … I’m watching it – I’m watching it … Oh, and by the way, this is very important. So, the Nielsen ratings just came out. These aren’t polls. These are for television, much more important than polls. You know, television – these guys (points out over the crowd) – they don’t care about ra- they don’t care about polls. They only care about ratings. And, the Nielsen ratings came out. So, it’s Trump against Clinton. And, you heard about how wonderful – ’cause I’ll tell you what. I liked the Republican convention better. I did. I liked it better.

Television ratings are more important than polls to network executives and advertising executives. People who watch television are not necessarily likely voters. And, one would hope you liked the Republican convention better. You were there. You are Republican. And, at the convention, you were named as the Republican party’s nominee for President.

I liked it better. I thought we had a far more beautiful set. Not even a contest. How about the first night. They had no American flags up on the stage. Second night, I started saying, “No American flags up there.” And, they put so many American flags up – it’s called overkill. It’s called incompetence. They put so many American flags up there (gestures) you didn’t know what to do. You didn’t know what to do.

Voters who are going to decide for whom they vote based on the convention’s set, then they probably think that Applebee’s has a great decorator. Furthermore, If – wait a minute. What is that? Oh … great scott! AH! Flags! Everywhere! What do I do? I’m calling 911! Everybody into the bunker! FLAGS! Oh,

And:

-66937c718b7ef057 — Democratic convention first night

But lemme just tell you. So, Thursday to Thursday. That’s the big one, right? Thursday, we beat her by millions on television. Millions. MILLIONS! We beat her by a lot. They both did good. We beat her by a lot. But honestly, the numbers were incredible. Which tells you … which tells you, isn’t it good to have Trump running for the presidency?

Notwithstanding Donald’s insistence that television ratings are the superior measure of electability, they are more indicative of his apparent inability to perform simple arithmetic. While true that night four of the Republican convention had more viewers than the corresponding night of the Democratic convention, it was a difference of approximately 800,000. Not millions. It was the only night the Republicans had more viewers. And, over the course of four nights, the Democratic convention had approximately 117.1 million viewers compared to the Republicans convention, with 100.7 million.

(14:38)

So … a lot of things happen. Now, I found last night interesting. ‘Cause we’re gonna’ get a lot of Bernie supporters, I think. And, Bernie made a big mistake. The mistake he made – and, this is the beauty of doing speeches like this and I saw it and she was thanking Bernie and talking about Bernie and he’s sitting there, like, glum. Did you notice? No smile. His wife pats him on the back and she pulled her hand away. Whoa, huh, huh, huh. Whoa! Did you see that? “A pat on the back, darling. I love you” And pulls it back. And, uh, she was a little bit concerned there.

Are you a marriage counselor, Donald? Go on.

But, he was angry. And then a second time they showed him, and he was angry. And, you know what. Honestly, he made a big mistake. Because, we have the best movement of all. We have far more people than anybody. We have the most important – I tell people, Bill O’Reilly said the greatest single phenomena he’s ever seen in politics. This is us. All of us. All of us. You. You. You. You. You. All the people outside. Man! They had people lined up in the driveway, all the way up.

I personally feel that, “Best movement of all,” and “far more people than anybody,” are the emptiest hyperbole in the universe … ever. Oh. and there is no such thing as “single phenomena.” Go on …

But-but-this is one of the greatest movements in the history of our country. Our movement is much better than Bernie. By the way, I’ll tell you why Bernie blew it. He sold his soul to the devil. He did. He had a great thing. I was so surprised. ‘Cause, he was, like, a tough guy. He was like tough, tough, tough. And, then, in the end, he folded. And, I said yesterday. And, it’s true. He wanted to go home. He wanted to go to sleep. Okay. That’s what it was.

Finally, Donald reaches some political analysis. Perhaps “blew it” is not the right phrase for the Sanders movement, but … wait. What the f*** did he just say? Did he just say Senator Bernard Sanders was not the Democratic nominee for president because he sold his soul to Satan?

But, you know, had he not folded. And his people haven’t folded. ‘Cause his people were angry.

Donald, you just chastised Bernie for being angry. But now you are saying that his supporters’ anger gives them strength, but his anger is … what, evil? Exhausting?

Now, just to show you how unfair it is, if that would have happened at the Republican convention, they would have said, “catastrophic evening.” People are screaming. Did you see when they had the moment of silence for the police? And, by the way, the only reason the police were up there on that stage on the fourth night was because I was complaining they don’t have any police up there. Right? They put the police up because thy were getting a lot of heat. But, they don’t mean it. The difference is, I mean it. Okay? We’re gonna’ be law and order. And, I mean it. We’re gonna’ be great. We’re gonna’ be great.

What people are screaming? Are the flags back? The flags for which you are responsible, much it seems, like the police. As far as law and order are concerned, they do not apply to fire safety codes which, according to you, are the cause of the national trajectory to hell … where we will, of course, find Bernie Sanders’ immortal soul.

But, did you see what happened when they had the moment of silence for the police? Tough situation. Tough situation. Not good. Not good. And, then you have Bernie, and he makes the deal. And, they pick a vice president that’s exactly the opposite of Bernie, okay? He believes in TPP – which is a disaster, by the way, we’ll never approve it. They’ll approve it.

For the love of god, please tell me what happened when the had the moment of silence for the police! Or, are you asking. Yes. I saw it. Would you like me to tell you about it?

And, how about when Terry McAuliffe, the Governor of Virginia, comes out and said, “Don’t worry. Hillary will approve it after the election? See, that’s the way it is. And, it will take your jobs away almost as bad as NAFTA, which was approved by Bill Clinton. Right? NAFTA. A disaster. NAFTA has cleaned out so many states in this country. I – you know – look at New York state. You look at New York state. You look at New England. You look at Pennsylvania. What NAFTA has done to Pennsylvania with these companies moved to Mexico.

You chose a running mate who has expressed support for the TPP. Your suit contains labels bearing both your name and “made in Mexico.” Go on …

A friend of mine is a builder. He builds plants. Plants. Big, big plants.

What does he build?

Big, big plants. One of the biggest. Maybe I’ll use him to build the wall. What a good idea. Got a lot of smart people. Somebody shouts out, “Let him build the wall.” (crowd starts to chant, “Build that wall.” Or, maybe, “Kill them all.” Hard to tell) We have smart people. But, this guy builds big, big plants.

So, sorry. Didn’t catch that.

Automobile plants and, uh, computer technology plants. That’s what he builds.

Plants, you say?

He builds plants. One of the biggest. Maybe the biggest. One of the biggest.

If this guy can build plants (He can build them in a box. He can build them with a fox, etc.) but, he would not know where to start building an apartment, what makes you think he could build 1,989 miles of wall? Please, go on.

And, he started off building plants in the United States years ago. And, he’d build plants in the United States. So, I see him the other day, and I said, How’s it going? “Good.” How’s business? “Unbelievable” I said, great. I thought that was good for the United States, right? I said, how many plants you building? “Many,” he said. “You’ve gotta see what’s happening in Mexico.”

Now, by the way, this guy’s better than a consultant. If I hire a consultant, I hire some guy that, you know, is terrible, to tell me what’s happening. Right? They’ll charge you a million bucks. They’ll give you a report in seven months from now. They have to take a long time, otherwise they can’t charge as much. This guy tells me in two minutes – in one minute! I learned better from him talking to him about how’s business than I can learn from some phony consultant. Because, if he was any good, he would have been the one building the plants, right? You know? So … so, an amazing thing. An amazing thing. So, I said, so what’s going on? He says, “You gotta’ see Mexico. It’s the eighth wonder of the world.”

Great Pyramid of Giza, Hanging Gardens of Babylon, Statue of Zeus at Olympia, Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, Colossus of Rhodes, Lighthouse of Alexandria … Mexico.

He said, “We are building the biggest, the most sophisticated, the most incredible plants all over Mexico.” I said, well what about the United States? “Not so good.” Like, who cares? And, actually, he’d much rather build in the United States. But, not so good. He said, “Not so good.” And, I said, well what does that mean? He said, “Well, we’re doing a little work. But not much. But, Donald, you have to see Mexico.” I say no thanks. But, he goes – he goes – he goes, “What we’re doing there is incredible.” How stupid are we, folks?

I … don’t … know.

How stupid are we? Our companies are moving to Mexico and other places. While crooked Hillary Clinton – who is as crooked as a three-dollar-bill – while crooked Hillary Clinton sits there and makes up stories. “Donald Trump didn’t do well in his campaign.” I said, I just beat eighteen people or seventeen people. Whatever. No. No. It’s all written by … It’s all written – what!? By a Politico. I can’t believe I’m talking about Politico. ‘Cause Politico is terrible to me. But Politico write all cliches. Not good. Okay. But, somebody wrote it. She probably didn’t notice it. But, I’m being recognized for having done one of the most legendary campaigns in the history of politics in this country.

I can no longer even attempt to follow your logic, Donald. It is like ‘Clinton-squared times Mexico plus the square root of Politico divided by sociopathy equals Batman symbol over eggs.

And (holds for applause) … and she puts in her thing right after the tweet. “If somebody tweets, he gets upset.” I get upset? I don’t get upset. I don’t get upset. Somebody wrote that. You know, it was a nice little sound bite, right? You know, they just announced I have over 22 million between Twitter and Facebook. I don’t get upset. If somebody Tweets, I do what I do. Who cares? I think – I’ll tell ya’ – I think I have the best temperament, or certainly one of the best temperaments, of anybody that’s ever run for the office of president.

July 24, 2016July 24, 2016

Don’t vote your conscience

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As the landscapes of media and communication continue to evolve, the lines between news, opinion and entertainment are blurring quicker than society can vet facts. Thus, there seems to be confusion over what is unsafe and what is uncomfortable. While the two concepts are not mutually exclusive, it is imperative to understand that neither are they the same.

While the two concepts are not mutually exclusive, it is imperative to understand that neither are they the same.

Politics and (some) Violence

In the United States, politics was established as the means by which problems can be addressed without violence. This places faith in a system, regulated by layers of redundancy in its checks and balances, to decide what measures to pursue that reflect the vox populi. One can guess that when the founders were composing the fundamental document to establish our government, they were still reeling from the echoing concussions of revolution. These men did not feel safe.

Rather, the founders probably felt correspondingly unsafe with the prospect of a disproportionate amount of power allocated to either the central government or the state governments. They felt unsafe with the potential uprising of a population of people who were kept as property based on their race. They felt unsafe due to the enormous financial debt incurred by the colonies for the economic costs of war. So, they designed such constitutional measures as separation of powers, the second amendment to the Bill of Rights, and a fractional reserve system of banking. What worked to preserve their safety at the time was, perhaps, shortsighted.

Two-hundred-thirty or so years later, our nation, devised in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal, has risen to a peak in global prowess that demonstrates the success of the system born of revolution, as well as showcasing its many flaws. History shows us that, when diplomacy fails and compromise is not pursued, violence fills the vacuum. While the argument can be made for the causes of political breakdowns to be many and complex, the most notable of them have been over race, war, and money.

Last Place Aversion in (presidential) Politics

The social phenomenon happening today has been increasing in frenetic urgency every four years, showing itself in the form of presidential campaign rhetoric. Fears are stoked and false equivalencies are pedaled. Now, as the locomotive of the Republican Convention barrels into the station as if driven by Casey Jones, the strategy has become clear. Donald Trump has tapped into the ugly effectiveness of the last place aversion paradox. Last place aversion is, to put it in extremely simplistic terms, the concept of relinquishing power to those with more, if it means preserving that power from those who have less. Following Donald’s speech, now more than ever, for Democrats to win this election against the nativist, hyper-nationalist, downright racist messaging of the Republican nominee’s pro-wrestling-style cheap-pop, they must focus all their campaigns -presidential and otherwise – on civil rights. In fact, all issues must be rooted in civil rights. That is an uncomfortable truth.

Last place aversion happens when uncomfortable is confused with unsafe. Self-preservation and self destruction look alike. The rest is just dressing one’s decision with self-serving justification to make it more palatable. Often such justification is fed to people by campaigns who would have people believe that politics is something worthy only of being the butt of a joke, or effective only when threatened with the barrel of a gun. This is thinly veiled by pundits and surrogates who use the word “establishment” with negative connotation, as if when they say it they want to laugh or spit. Just as familiarity breeds contempt, so does being an outsider fill voters with a sense of honesty and purity.

The Obama Coalition, consisting in large part of the growing minority population that makes up a reliable and vocal block of voters, ready to mobilize, and for whom this election is far too important to stay home, will be organizing and voting for the Democratic nominee. That, for some, is also an uncomfortable truth.

Trump in the Garden of Good and (mostly) Evil

Donald J. Trump has campaigned by exaggerating issues that make many people uncomfortable, thereby creating the illusion they are unsafe. Race in America is an uncomfortable conversation. Immigration is an uncomfortable conversation. Terrorism and religion is an uncomfortable conversation. Yet, by harnessing the manipulative aspects of the behavioral psychological phenomenon of attribute substitution, a process thought to underlie a number of cognitive biases (including stereotypes), Trump has tipped the scale away from many of these uncomfortable conversations. If addressed bravely and honestly by Americans, perhaps communicating on these issues would make the nation a safer place in the long run. Instead, Trump scapegoats the populations statistically facing the most real danger, painting them as the causes of danger for those who are likely to harbor biases and discomfort.

Described by Daniel Kahneman in his book, Thinking, Fast and Slow, attribute substitution is best explained as:

“When faced with a difficult question, we often answer an easier one instead, usually without noticing the substitution.”

Kahneman goes on to clarify the concept:

“An easy question (How do I feel about it?) serves as an answer to a much harder question (What do I think about it?).”

Many Americans prefer not to think about “it” at all. In spite of the fact that the average (white) American is far more likely, statistically to die of heart disease than by Islamic terrorism, he is still more likely to stare suspiciously at the Middle Eastern-looking gentleman at the ballpark, while eating a second hot dog and drinking a 32 ounce Mountain Dew. That same person may complain about “Mexican illegals” taking American jobs, after leaving his empty cup and hot dog wrapper on the ground to be cleaned up by a tax paying, undocumented, Ecuadorian immigrant – a job the average (white) American would never accept. Then, he may confidently drive home, in excess of the speed limit, knowing if he gets pulled over, he will be able to afford the speeding ticket. The average (white) American takes for granted that, were he stopped, he would not be shot by the police officer.

It was to an audience, made almost exclusively of this average (white) American, to whom Trump addressed his speech, describing a thousand points of darkness. In the city in which Tamir Rice was killed for holding a toy gun, Trump talked about being the law and order candidate. Simultaneously, white nationalists and open-carry enthusiasts brandished real firearms absent of police interference. Because, the problem, according to Trump, was everyone except his audience. To call on his audience to look within themselves and discern whether or not they enjoy privilege that others lack, would make them extremely uncomfortable. The only ask he made of his audience was to vote to put him in charge and let him speak for America. Because, only he alone can solve the scourge of lawlessness which he blames on everyone except himself and his supporters. That is not only wholly illogical, it is decidedly unsafe.

(not) Voting Your Conscience

Come November, Americans will vote their individual consciences. One might argue that, based on the collective conditioning of attribute substitution and its influence on people’s cognitive biases, people who “go with their gut instinct” are just as often wrong as they are right. Yet, just as likely is that voters have already made their decisions and are simply seeking justification for the choice that makes them most comfortable. Another quote by Kahneman goes:

“We think, each of us, that we’re much more rational than we are. And we think that we make our decisions because we have good reasons to make them. Even when it’s the other way around. We believe in the reasons, because we’ve already made the decision.”

Voting one’s conscience makes one feel comfortable. Perhaps it may be better to truly weigh the facts and the potential consequences before voting.

Of course, this unsolicited advice is not directed at you. I’m certain your choice will be weighed, measured, and not be found wanting for that which is best overall for the nation’s most vulnerable and the longest and most balanced period of peace and prosperity.

Politics is not the enemy. It is the process by which America solves its problems, albeit slowly and uncomfortably, without resorting to violence.

April 26, 2016April 26, 2016

Zen and the art of progressive politics

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You support Bernie. I support Hillary. An ancient quote attributed to Jalal al-Din Rumi goes, “Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing there is a field. I’ll meet you there. When the soul lies down in that grass the world is too full to talk about.”

The deeper I travel into the chaotic and complex realm of American politics, the more I strive to practice simplicity. I suppose I am considered a progressive Democrat by most standards. My thoughts on most issues have evolved to adapt with an ever-changing world, both without and within myself. At one time I would have been called a liberal Democrat. Now, it is classified as progressive. This is just one reflection of the only constant in life that I can guarantee: impermanence.

Yet, while the mind strives to categorize and classify and quantify, the label by which I am identified is not of particular importance any more than a maple tree cares whether or not it is called a maple tree, or whether it is called shade from the sun, or a place from which to hang a child’s swing, or one part of the forest. To cling to a belief is to ignore so many other things that are right here, right now. Reference points matter. The roots of that same tree will experience the world in a very different way than the branches. The leaves, from buds to green to red to fallen, have a very different perspective than the trunk, growing only an inch or two with every passing of another year.

How, you are probably asking, does this have anything to do with politics? Politics, and political campaigns in particular, are often about filling people with the expectations of that in which they they believe can be delivered by a candidate, if he or she is elected, thereby altering the uncertainty and suffering of now and making tomorrow a better forever. They point to the past as proof of their qualifications and the lack thereof in their opponents. The truth, however, is that the past and the future are both escapes from this moment.

I get angry. I want to fight to be right. Yet, to be angry with another for his or her political beliefs, when so much of what connects our ideas outweighs their differences, blinds me with my own assumption that another’s beliefs come from a place of hate, whereas mine come from a place of love. Thus, it becomes so easy to delude myself into believing that my anger is righteous and another’s is petty. In a self-defeating manner, I react angrily, foolishly expecting my righteous anger will somehow reinforce my own beliefs by changing the hearts and minds of others. It never has. I have convinced myself to expect that my perceived adversary will die when I, myself, drink poison.

I expect. That, in itself is the root of much suffering. To feel pain is perfectly acceptable. Suffering, however, comes not from feeling pain, but expecting that right now should be any different than it is. If the candidate I support wins, then she wins. If the candidate you support wins, then he wins. But, all I can control are the ways in which I am this person, right here, right now. Regardless of the outcome of the election, it will do no good to reflect, with perfectly clear hindsight, the ways in which I was cheated, or what mistakes were made, or what I could have done differently. That is merely resentment or self-aggrandizement. I am still not going to have the power to change time. I still can only exist right here, and right now. To constantly be in the act of avoiding the moment by dwelling on what could be or what might have been, I would be, as master Joshu described, “like a ghost clinging to bushes and weeds.” Someone once told a master of zen, “I want happiness.” To which the master replied, “Remove ‘I’ and remove ‘want’ and all you are left with is happiness.”

I can breath. I can understand that my emotions are valid and true, but, impermanent. I feel this way now. I will not feel this way until I die. I do not have to act to disconnect myself from the rest of my fellow humans by acting in such a way as to sever the ties to those with whom I share the same air, and sun, and land, and compositional stardust.

Even if people possess everything they desire, people are still unsatisfied. To desire is to dwell in the fantasies of the future and to cling to the illusions and resentments of the past, never truly being present. I enjoy politics. I do. But, what I enjoy about politics are the steps along the path. Paths can lead in different directions. They can lead to dangerous places. They can lead to wonderful, unexplored terrains. And, many paths can take different routes to arrive at the same destination. I am choosing to walk with anyone who wishes to join me on the journey. I ask only that we practice as great a compassion as possible, doing our best to abandon expectation in favor of the simple experience of the steps themselves.

I choose to practice transmuting my passions that may otherwise tear us apart, into the right art of holding onto what connects us as progressives and as people; and not becoming a ghost, lost in resentments. I have not always been good at this. I am trying to do better. The world is flawed. Politics is flawed. Each and every one of us is flawed.

The Buddha said, (supposedly), “Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared.”

You support Bernie. I support Hillary. Breath. Smile. We’re okay.

December 10, 2015

The thin lead line: Guns and the Second Amendment with law professor Carl T. Bogus

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“I believe the Second Amendment was written to ensure states had armed militia to protect themselves,” said Carl T. Bogus, a professor at Roger Williams University School of Law and a prolific writer of scholarly material on Second Amendment history. “The history and wording of the amendment, by James Madison, was to ensure they would remain armed irrespective of what congress wanted to do.”

The professor was generous enough to grant some time on December 8 for an interview to provide expertise on the subject of constitutional law and the history of the ever controversial Second Amendment. A conversation via Skype revealed and explained fascinating truths behind American gun culture.

Insurrectionist Theory

“Throughout the history of the republic, until about 1960, as a matter of law, the right to bear arms was a collective right and not an individual right,” said Professor Bogus. He explained that the 1963 assassination of President Kennedy as a crucial moment in gun rights history, noting that Lee Harvey Oswald purchased his rifle from a mail-order ad in American Rifleman, an official publication of the National Rifle association. “Afterward,” said Professor Bogus, “there was a fear of significant gun regulation. The NRA was overtaken by right-wing political extremists.”

Of course, this version of history does not compute with the lofty rhetoric commonly used to espouse the right to bear arms as promoted by the NRA. Rather, one hears broad and abstract statements about the how the Second Amendment guarantees a fundamental right that belongs to all Americans. For example, according to the Rhode Island Second Amendment Coalition website,

“… our very liberty is in jeopardy at the hands of misinformed, and/or over zealous anti-gun legislators who don’t understand or respect the systems put in place through the wisdom of our Founding Fathers. Let’s not forget this; without the 2nd Amendment, the entire Constitution is nothing but unenforceable words on paper. The 2nd Amendment is the only thing that separates us from every other country that has confiscated the privately-owned firearms of the public – turning them into ‘subjects’ as opposed to ‘citizens’.”

Relatively new, this interpretation of the language of the second amendment is referred to as “insurrectionist theory,” and has been developed, in no small part, through NRA grant funding. In The Hidden History of the Second Amendment, a 1998 publication in the UC Davis Law Review, Professor Bogus writes that, “insurrectionist theory is premised on the idea that the ultimate purpose of an armed citizenry is to be prepared to fight the government itself.” But, in this self-contradicting concept, the wise framers of the constitution, whose foundation for American democracy is praised for its unique freedoms, expresses enough mistrust to require the need for citizens to arm themselves with sufficient deadly force and vehemently contested regulation to risk unparalleled levels of collateral damage. The Hidden History points out that insurrectionist theory would have one believe that all of the other Constitutional components designed to prevent the abuse of government power are insufficient and the ultimate guarantee of freedom comes from the barrel of a gun.

Well Regulated Slave Patrols

The popular, contemporary association, however, of armed individuals being the thin, lead line standing between liberty tyranny is not supported by the history of the “founding fathers.” Furthermore, it ignores the very language of the :

“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

When asked whether individual citizens can be considered the de facto Militia necessary to the security of a free State, Professor Bogus said, “Not according to the framers. Militia is defined in the Constitution. Article 1 Section 8. There was a concern at the Virginia Constitutional Convention by George Mason and Patrick Henry, in 1788, that if congress declared, they could disarm the militia. There was a large dispute over what militia ought to be. There was talk of every white male able body. Madison wrote the second amendment to solve that problem, irrespective of congress.” Professor Bogus is, of course, correct. Notwithstanding the lack of an immutable definition of who actually composes a militia, well regulated or no, the article in the main body of the Constitution gives Congress power over the militia.

And, according to Bogus, at the time, state militias had only one job: controlling slave insurrections.

By the middle of the 18th century, in the South, militias and slave patrols had become synonymous. In Virginia, by the time the delegates convened to debate ratification of the evolving Constitution in 1788, over 40 percent of the population were non-white slaves. For all intents and purposes, the “well regulated militia” was a vast, industrial police system. Therefore, by that logic, the founding fathers’ intent by writing into the document delineating the supreme law of the land language that spoke of an armed militia as necessary to the security of a free state was, in practical terms, to preserve slavery. “Even during the revolution,” said Bogus, “the south refused to commit state militia because of slave insurrections.”

It was not principally Heller

When asked whether the primary shift in contemporary public opinion was the Supreme Court Decision laid out in D.C. vs. Heller, Professor Bogus said, “It was not principally Heller. They (the NRA, the gun manufacturing lobby) sold the view that guns signify freedom and the fear that people may need to go to war with their own government. Heller is the fruit of the long campaign to sell these views. Heller made it the law of the land. The culture here is a greater obstacle.”

To what culture does he refer? Is it the culture that flies the flag of the armed minuteman, but ignores the armed slave owner? Is it the culture that places its trust in the men in government who cry loudest that government cannot be trusted? Is it the culture that creates a campaign to stamp out every single cause of gun violence except for the guns? Or, is it the culture that calls itself the greatest democracy the world has ever seen, but only if the provisions of the doctrine that enable those ideals it holds in such high regard – life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness – are held at gunpoint?

November 29, 2015November 29, 2015

The great gun giveaway: Or, how easy is it to get a gun online

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The firearms industry and the consumers who rally against the notion of gun-safety measures do so using a public face of constitutional nobility. The rhetoric is one of rights and revolution as well as self defense for gun owners and their families. Yet, recently I was inadvertently given a glimpse into the world of the irresponsible marketing of guns and, in my experience, it is anything but noble.

Approximately six weeks ago, I was using the internet for its intended purpose: arguing with strangers about social policy issues while simultaneously binge-watching the latest Netflix series and shopping for the best online deals for boxer-briefs. During my bandwidth frenzy the social media debate in which I was engaged turned to the issue of gun laws. It must have been in the recent aftermath of one or another mass shooting. With the frequency of such occurrences, I cannot recall which one.

I made a comment concerning the relative ease of purchasing a firearm and was met with a strong opposing statement about how difficult it is to buy a gun. I believe I had said that peanut butter is too dangerous to bring on to school property, but certain lawmakers want to allow concealed firearms. I followed that up with something comparing the simplicity of buying a gun to that of buying peanut butter. Admittedly, this was not my best case argument to date. But, I was testing an angle. I decided to try an experiment.

Opening yet another browser window on my laptop, now hot to the touch due to the number of running applications, I typed into Google, “buy a gun online.” I clicked the first response that popped up. Six and a half minutes later, I had located a 9mm semi-automatic handgun, completed the background questionnaire, and been approved. I requested a hold for delivery to a nearby gun shop for pick up within six days. I also checked to see how long it would take to buy peanut butter online. For the record, ordering peanut butter for in-store pickup was quicker and easier by a good two or three minutes.

Also, for the record, I had no intention of actually purchasing a firearm. Nor do I plan on owning a gun. I rely heavily on statistics for most decisions and the numbers point to a much higher probability of something irreparably traumatic occurring to me or someone for whom I care than of requiring such a device for protection. I feel no need to repeat the statistics that have been accurately expressed ad nauseum by other sources. Suffice it to say, they all strongly suggest that more guns result in more shootings.

It was after I went through the online registration with the site that acted as the broker for my gun purchase that never was, that I started to receive the almost daily promotional e-mails from Gallery of Guns, a site that prices and deals in firearms. I had gone through something that called itself the Gun Genie. The primary address for the operation is in Prescott, Arizona. Yet, I also noticed a secondary address in Greensboro, North Carolina. I have no knowledge of Arizona. I did, however, live in Greensboro, North Carolina for six years. I went to college there. And, I cannot say that I am at all surprised that such an operation would exist in Greensboro.

But I digress. Below are some of the highlights from the e-mails that I have been receiving.

Then there was a bit of a shock when I was offered aan opportunity to enter for a chance to win not one, but two guns. Mind you, these are not just any guns. The Jericho 9mm is a nearly indestructible, polymer sidearm; and the Tavor is a unique, bullpup design, with a similar barrel-length and muzzle velocity to an AR-15 assault rifle. However, the configuration allows it to be more compact and maneuverable in close-combat situations. You know, like close-combat deer hunting and close-combat target shooting. Both are Israeli-design and versions are used by the Israeli military. I will be sure to let you all know more about their design characteristics if I win the “Great Gun Giveaway.”The last promotional e-mail is the real class-act. One might think that the day following the November 27 Colorado Springs Planned Parenthood siege, in which a gunman killed three and wounded four over the course of a six hour standoff, it would be in good taste to refrain from sending advertisements for military-style firearms. However, one would be wrong to think so. Advertised as a special for this weekend only, the ever popular AR-15 type weapon, touted here as the best gun for WSHF/WROL (without forward assist). If you do not know (I had to look it up) that stands for “when shit hits the fan,” and “without rule of law.” So, I suppose this is the one you would want to buy if you found yourself trapped by police after invading a women’s health facility and opening fire on unarmed, innocent civilians.

I cannot pinpoint exactly what to take away from my own story. I suppose the issue worthy of discussion is this: If guns are tools of either survival or of sport, why are they being marketed so hard. As soon as I provided one single point of contact, I have been bombarded with a barrage of marketing that has showed me a glimpse of the culture of the firearms market. These are instruments designed to maximize the efficiency with which a human being can cause life threatening injury or death to another living thing. When there are cries of guns getting into the hands of the wrong people and discussions of responsible gun owners, limiting access to convicted felons, or (the most recent scapegoat) the mentally ill, it holds even less weight than before I became aware of all the savings, deals, promotions, and shameless advertising tactics for tactical weapons.

This experience has further validated my suspicions of an industry and a culture that speaks out of both sides of its mouth when it promotes rights and responsibilities and then acts in such a sensational and classless manner, offering deals on AR-15 rifles the day after a national gun-related tragedy. And, as for the “Great Gun Giveaway,” yes, they have indeed given it away. But not just the gun. They gave away the whole scam.

May 19, 2015

A rebuttal to ProJo’s editorial on under-paying tipped workers

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Recently the Providence Journal published a piece panning the proposed legislation to raise the minimum wage for tipped employees, over time, to reflect the standard minimum wage for non gratuity-based wage earners.

Perhaps informing the public is no longer the point? These days, readers and residents can easily see through the truth-bending, mean-spirited talking points of the Providence Journal’s editorial section. The change in editorial tenor seems driven not by shrinking staff but rather by a unflinching desire to align with business and corporate interests.

Then again, maybe informing the public with informed opinion was never the point.

A friend recently told me about the editorial offices of the ProJo, in which are displayed the evidence of the newspaper’s record of having been on the wrong side of public opinion since shortly after dinosaurs made their final appearance on our earth. Even under their newest ownership, the newspaper’s editorial section retains consistency in choosing the wrong side of the debate. Here is why.

Though Rhode Island’s economy has shown some slight improvement, it remains sluggish. In this environment, the General Assembly should be encouraging growth, rather than making it more difficult for job-creating small businesses, including the state’s famous restaurants, to stay alive.

That is why the Assembly should reject a proposal, backed by a national lobbying effort, to massively increase the minimum wage for those who receive tips.

Decades of economic trial and error should have, by now, taught anyone and everyone who claims to have an interest in encouraging growth for more than just his or her own bank account, that economic growth requires an expansion of, not just small business, but also consumer purchasing power. In a business landscape reliant on discretionary expenditure, such as the restaurant industry, increasing the non-essential spending power of the workforce that helped to make the state’s restaurants “famous,” would be taking a page from Henry Ford’s book by allowing the workforce responsible for helping to produce a profitable product the financial empowerment to afford the product they help produce. Translation: if you want to know what actually trickles down, ask a plumber. I guarantee she will not say prosperity.

Additionally, the national lobbying effort has done very little to earn the support of the vast majority of Rhode Islanders polled as to whether or not they believe gratuity based employees should be paid more than $2.89 an hour by their employers. That support was earned by virtue of common sense.

Currently, the minimum wage for such workers is $2.89 an hour. Those seeking a change note the wage has not gone up a cent since 1996, and they argue for the wage to be brought up by 2020 to the level of the state’s minimum wage, currently $9.

What they leave out is that that $2.89 is not really the worker’s wage. Under state law, tips must make up at least the difference between that number and $9, or the employer must kick in the difference. Rhode Island follows the example of most states and the Internal Revenue Service in considering tips to be earned income.

As elusive as the Holy Grail, it appears we have found the one thing on which the business community and the IRS agree. Gratuities are earned income. But they are not paid by the employer. Therefore, if the majority of income earned by tipped restaurant employees is not paid by the employer, this appears to be skirting wage and hour laws pertaining to classification of employees.

Let us call gratuity based employment what it actually is: a sales job with profit based on voluntary commission. Normally, in a commission-based industry, commission is a contractually negotiated percentage of the sale of a good or service, paid by the employer or contractor. However, in the employment world of gratuities, that commission is paid directly by the consumer. Furthermore, it is voluntary and subject to the fancy of the consumer.

In most cases, the tips, keyed to rising prices, come through. According to Census data, Rhode Island’s tipped employees report they receive $12.12 an hour, 35 percent more than the minimum wage. And they may make more than they report. Research from the National Restaurant Association, a business lobby group, shows that, on average, tipped employees make between $16 and $22 per hour — well beyond Rhode Island’s current minimum wage.

Consider the source and the reference bias that comes with accepting a report from a business lobby group called the National Restaurant Association, while rejecting evidence by a national lobby for working people. Furthermore, after making the statement that employers must “kick in the difference” between the minimum wage and the actual earnings of the employee, the opinion writer then offers up the accusation that Rhode Island’s tipped employees are under-reporting their earnings by upward of ten dollars an hour.

The argument of the employer investing only $2.89 per hour because of an unsubstantiated claim of tax evasion by an undisclosed percentage of gratuity based restaurant staff while blindly assuming that all restaurants are complying with the regulation to compensate the difference between what they pay and the minimum wage is, at best, an abstract justification. At worst, it is a call for further regulation.

That is why most servers, asked whether they would prefer a $2.89 per hour minimum wage with tips or a flat $15 per hour wage, would go for the tips, says Dale Venturini, president and CEO of the business-funded Rhode Island Hospitality Association.

Most servers could very well mean six out of ten servers chosen, not at random, by “the business-funded Rhode Island Hospitality Association.” It could mean that forty-nine out of one-hundred servers refused to answer a question asked by counsel for representatives of an organization comprised of the owners of the restaurants for which the servers work. It is hardly compelling evidence to substantiate such a statement.

We are sympathetic with the struggle of unskilled workers to earn a living these days. According to an organization pitching a higher minimum wage called the Restaurant Opportunities Center of Rhode Island, some are not able to lift themselves out of poverty through such work. Tipped workers in the state, the center reports, receive about $638,000 in food stamps every month.

But would they be better off without jobs?

No. They would be better off without a condescending and thinly-veiled threat. They would be better off with an acknowledgement that what they do is a skill. They would be better off in an industry that does not boast one of the highest turnover rates. They would be better off exercising their right to organize and demonstrate by walking out, mid-shift on a Friday night rush because, while they are offered the opportunity to earn money for selling the restaurant’s dining experience to patrons, it is the patrons and not the restaurant that are investing the vast majority of the money to insure prompt service. To Insure Prompt Service = TIPS. Would they be better off without jobs? If someone pees on your shoe, should you appreciate that he or she did not stab you in the neck?

Many restaurants operate on very thin margins, and many go out of business. Tripling the cost of labor in five years would have the obvious effect of making it much more expensive to run a restaurant. Since businesses with small margins cannot afford to see profits shrink, they would have to respond by slashing costs (the quality of food and/or service) and/or by raising prices. Such changes would make people less likely to eat out, driving restaurants out of business.

I worked in the restaurant industry for 13 years. I was a front of the house, service-staff employee in every capacity. I was a server, a busser, a bartender, a bar back, a host, and a manager. The reason I left the industry was because there was no consistency of income. As a manager, I knew that I could over-schedule my waitstaff and “flood the floor” with servers in order to ensure potentially busy shifts would never result in the unlikely, but possible, event of getting slammed with too many guests at once.

Eighty to ninety percent of the time, that kind of rush did not happen. The restaurant would fill. But rarely would it be the maelstrom for which I over-prepared. Servers would have to “turn and burn” tables in small sections in order to make enough to make the aggravation worthwhile. Understandably frustrated servers would often give poor service and, as manager, I would take a dose of attitude from servers. But, at $2.89 per hour, it cost the restaurant very little to flood the floor.

Costs are going to rise and fall with the prices and availability of corn, gas, water, tomatoes, taxes, milk, bread, or window cleaner. Restaurants are still going to purchase these items. If a french restaurant encounters a hike in butter prices, they are not going to switch to canola oil. They probably will not go out of business. The restaurant will pay for butter because French cooking needs butter.

Restaurants should value investing in their ambassadors to the public as one of their most vital ingredients. After all, what a restaurant really sells is service. The opinion expressed in the Providence Journal editorial is one of antiquated greed and should be placed on the wall of the editorial office at the Providence Journal with the impressive collection of evidence of having opined on the wrong side of public opinion.

March 11, 2015March 11, 2015

Dear Rhode Island, try Hope

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Is it possible to restore hope to Rhode Island?

The state’s economy is stagnant. The government is shadowed by reports of corruption. The physical landscape is only just showing signs of
what lies beneath the greying piles of snow and ice, and revealing an infrastructure pockmarked by craters in the roads and residual grit and slime from salt and sand trucks that dominate the narrow roads. Has the last year of blame and struggle and polarization and polar vortex broken the spirit of our small and weary state? Or does Rhode Island have what it takes to rekindle the dying embers of hope?

It is so much easier to be cynical than to be hopeful. Cynicism is immediately gratifying and triggers a feeling of superiority. It also hedges one’s emotional wager. If one proclaims expectations of only the worst, one is rarely disappointed. Rhode Islanders have become cynical. All too often, when sifting through the opinion section of a local news source, one reads a commentary on an instance of corruption, written with the air of “Expect nothing less in Rhode Island,” and “Of course so and so did such and such. That’s Rhode Island for you. And nothing will ever change.” It is not long before even those who have demonstrated intentions and actions that are altruistic, honest attempts at being good and true are labeled as foolish, false, and doomed.

This dark cloud is not without merit. The chicken and egg debate of cause versus symptom aside, Little Rhody has more than its share of stains on our white collar. Most recently, the light shed on Gordon Fox’s poor moral and legal decisions has forced the deep-rooted shoots of contempt to grow upward through the frozen ground and the mountains of snow blanketing the state. This comes on the heels of a state representative copping to tens of thousands of dollars in misappropriated campaign finances, a twice-convicted felon running for a third term as the capital city’s mayor, vicious primary and general election cycles, the timeline of the 38 Studios fiasco … the list goes on and on.

Some readers will remember the 1980s. The eighties were also a time of economic decline; of manufacturing abandoning the state for elsewhere and recession teetering on the brink of depression. In 1982, there was an ad that ran on television for Rhode Island: The Biggest Little State in the Union. Some may remember the jingle and the miniature hot-air balloons rising in front of the State House. It was a dedicated campaign to try and instill pride in Rhode Island. It was schlocky. It was self-contradictory. But it was hopeful. The most interesting feature of the ad campaign was that it only ran in Rhode Island. It was not a national tourism commercial. It was an attempt to remind Rhode Islanders how great Rhode Island is. Or, at the very least, remind them to laugh at themselves and spend some Rhode Island dollars in Rhode Island, on Rhode Island-made goods.

This is not to suggest a repeat of the ‘Biggest Little State’ campaign. However, even self-deprecating humor is more productive and less poisonous than angry contempt. Moreover, pure sneering negativity, of the sort spreading like a virus through the social media networks that connect people to sources of news, and subsequent spite, faster than ever before, passes down through generations and hurts the chances of anything ever changing. Repeating the idea that nothing ever changes in Rhode Island, reinforces the probability that nothing ever changes. It is the textbook example of the self-fulfilling prophesy. By passing down a misanthropic and forlorn image of Rhode Island through generations, cynicism is dooming the state.

The economy is not Rhode Island.

The government is not Rhode Island.

The potholes are not Rhode Island.

The people are Rhode Island.

The Rhode Island state flag does not bear the motto “money.” The license plates (nope, none of them) are embossed with the phrase “the know-a-guy state.” The Ocean State flies a flag with the state motto: Hope. Should the state change the flag, change the license plates, or should the state – the people of Rhode Island – change their prevailing sentiment from one of resignation to the worst case scenarios, to one that assumes the overwhelming power of the ocean and floods the population with hope?

A population filled with hope is a population that can attract success, retain success, and create success. While Rhode Islanders most certainly disagree on their definitions of success, most can agree that what Rhode Island is currently experiencing could be better. Yet, the rhetoric reported by so many says it simply cannot. A people who can hope are a people who can also dream, innovate, and change the course of their own history.

“another tradition to politics, a tradition (of politics) that stretched from the days of the country’s founding to the glory of the civil rights movement, a tradition based on the simple idea that we have a stake in one another, and that what binds us together is greater than what drives us apart, and that if enough people believe in the truth of that proposition and act on it, then we might not solve every problem, but we can get something meaningful done.” Barack Obama, The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream

Rhode Islanders have a right to be upset with politics, the economy, the weather, and each other. But so too do citizens have a choice to either wallow in self-indulgent blame and acceptance of powerlessness, or seize hold of a collective hope for an environment in which generations to come can thrive and proudly call home. Whether one supports the President or detests him, his point in the quoted passage with regard to having a stake in one another is what can give Rhode Islanders hope. What binds us together as citizens of this smallest of states is greater than what drives us apart. There will always be strife, disagreement, crime, and disappointment in Rhode Island. Yet, just as the state’s collective history has built its character, it is how people react to such adversity that reveals character.

Let our character be bound together not by defeatism, but by hope.

January 31, 2015February 18, 2015

Stay, Warren, stay

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There is a strong movement among the liberal base of the Democratic party encouraging Senator Elizabeth Warren (D – MA) to run for President. With social media pages like Run, Warren, Run popping up, and local gatherings organized by Democratic fund-raising powerhouse MoveOn.org, it seems that, in spite of the Senator’s own vehement denial of Presidential ambitions at this time, popular pressure might have built momentum too strong to abate.

I, for one, do not want Senator Warren to run for President.

I am a Senator Warren devotee, bordering on being zealot. I organized field for her in 2012 as a canvass-team leader in Fall River, Massachusetts, in a joint effort of SEIU and the Coalition for Social Justice. I had the honor of meeting her twice. Once as a candidate and then as Senator. I have followed her from the Obama apointee to head the Consumer Protection Bureau, blocked by Republicans, to her vindication as the now senior Senator from Massachusetts, to her current role as the polestar of the liberal (or progressive … whatever) wing of the Democratic party.

I have cheered as she has publicly shamed usurious banking cartels and corporate plutocrats for the economic imbalance that they caused with their collective greed. I have watched her verbally eviscerate the entire fallacy of supply-side economics in just over a minute, while speaking before leaders of AFL-CIO, championing the resurrection of the middle class and the empowerment of working families.

Why then, one may ask, do I not want her to run for the highest executive office in the nation?

From her legislative office as a high-profile Senator with a mobilized following, she is able to maintain her liberal ideology and focus on very specific issues without having to compromise the very values and agendas that make her so laudable. To run for president, I fear she would have to water-down her principles and move to the center. No longer would she need only to appeal to her constituents in the very blue and historically liberal state of Massachusetts when seeking re-election as an incumbent. Rather, she would have to cater to a much broader audience on a carefully coordinated national path, including key battleground states where Democrat is often defined quite differently.

From a Democratic primary perspective alone, pitting Warren against the far more centrist Hillary Clinton, would not only showcase Warren’s relative inexperience in foreign affairs as compared to the former Secretary of State, but would factionalize a party that needs to rally behind a unified message that spotlights sanity and pragmatism as a stark contrast to the Republican theatre of the absurd that is currently staging its primary play with a cast of thousands.

Well then, one may say, can she do both? After all, since her six year term as Senator in Massachusetts is not up until 2018, she would not be appearing twice on the ballot. Therefore, she can run for President without sacrificing her seat if she loses.

Running for President is an exhausting, time-consuming, and expensive undertaking that would expose her to a level of public scrutiny against which she has not yet had to defend, forcing her to take positions on issues that may not be within her realm of expertise. It is one thing to cast a vote as one one-hundredth of a chamber in a bi-cameral legislature. It is quite another to have to explain a position on which you may be expected to speak on behalf of your entire party and, potentially, lobby support of the nation and even multiple nations. Additionally, the level of fund-raising needed to run for President in the era of Citizens United may very well force Senator Warren to accept contributions from groups that would compromise her integrity and contradict the very values that she wields as her populist arms.

Clinton, on the other hand, (and I use her only as an example because it is a certainty that she will run and she has a prior presidential campaign history with which one can compare) is far more economically conservative and seasoned at fund raising. She is a far more corporate-friendly political pragmatist and, therefore, more likely to attract the kind of money necessary to compete against the nearly $900 million the Koch brothers alone have pledged to a Republican Presidential victory. Clinton also has the advantage of her skeletons being publicly aired ad nauseum, and a husband who spent eight years as Commander in Chief and still boasts a higher approval rating higher than our current president even after a decade and a half out of office.

Does the idea of a centrist Democrat in the White House make me squeamish? Somewhat, yes. But not as much as the idea of Bush 3, Mitt 2.0, Ted Cruz, or any of the radical right wing Republicans vying to be tied to the marionette strings of Corporate America. And, to those who find little difference between a centrist Democrat and a right-wing Republican overseeing social security, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, and the most frightening military the world has ever seen, you and I will have to agree to disagree.

Then there are those who think that Senator Warren, herself, is hypocritical in her economic progressive rhetoric. Unfortunately for you, Alexander Supertramp has no plans of running for elected office.. But, I digress.

I do not believe Senator Warren would win a presidential election. That does not make me respect her or support her any less. But, from a political strategy perspective, it is a distraction from her current job at which she is excellent and, in which has a responsibility to her constituents and supporters to continue performing to the best of her abilities. Running for president would not make her a better senator for the next two years. One does not run for president to make a point. One runs for President to be President.

I do not know if I am “Ready for Hillary.” None of us know, for certain, who all will be running for the 2016 vacancy. In that time, my mind may change … multiple times. For now, I do know that I hope Senator Elizabeth Warren decides to continue devoting 100 percent of her efforts to her role as senior senator of Massachusetts, fighting for a level playing field, speaking as the voice of the working families, promoting policies that restore economic equity, and doing what she does best: legislating for a better future.

Stay, Warren, stay.

October 3, 2014October 3, 2014

Lefty swings back: A response to Frymaster

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I’m going to ignore the deliberately inflammatory language that condescendingly labels those who believe that working to change a broken system by not compromising one’s integrity makes one naïve and foolish. I understand that Frymaster enjoys setting people on fire and then walking away saying he illuminated them. It’s his style.

That said, to say the entire point of electoral politics is to win is an opinion I do not happen to share, The entire point of NFL games is to win. The entire point of the Price is Right is to win. The entire point of prom king and queen is to win. The point of electoral politics is to get a job serving the constituents. If the point of election-based, representative government was just to win, we would simply give the elected official a gold ring and a trip to Disney World. Instead we give them executive or legisltive powers to architect and implement the policies that shape our economy, society, and community.

Now, Polly here, is not naïve enough to believe that this is what happens. I understand that elected authority often leads to a puffed up sense of entitlement when it should result in responsibility. Yet, to condemn those who believe that losing with integrity is something of which to be less proud than winning by ethical corrosion is to akin saying that Congressman John Lewis of GA was a sucker for believing in a non-violent march to Alabama as a means of generating change.

“Hey, John. Sure you lived your truth and upheld your authentic integrity. But you probably wouldn’t have gotten your ass kicked half to death by the cops if you slipped a .38 special in your pocket and popped off a few rounds at the staties.” That may be true. But the code upheld in the face of immediate harm ultimately helped to shift the paradigm of who was the hero and who was the villain in the struggle for civil rights. Perhaps Frymaster would like to take a swing at Congressman Lewis to see if Lefty can take a punch.

The concept of “winners” versus “losers” is an American ideology to which I do not subscribe. In fact, it originated in western, free-market culture and is the ideology of choice of those who daily ask the question favorited Ayn Rand, “who is John Gault?” The philosophy goes something like: if there are winners, it is because they did whatever was necessary to deserve that status. Likewise, if there are losers, they are equally as responsible for their own failure. I’m a bit surprised that Frymaster, the self-proclaimed “dot-commie,” would adopt such a cowboy-capitalist mentality as pertains to our selection of elected officials.

I respect strategy. I believe in the value of hard work. I also, however, believe in Paul Wellstone’s famous quote:

“Politics is not about power. Politics is not about money. Politics is not about winning for the sake of winning. Politics is about the improvement of people’s lives.”

Sometimes sacrificing a win for the sake of creating a movement is worth the sacrifice. Sometimes it’s okay to be right and lose. Hell, it worked for Jesus. Right? I admit, his message has been more than a bit twisted by over two millenia of selfish appropriation. But I am fairly certain nowhere in the sermon on the mount does he say, “Blessed are the winners, for they get the entire point.”

Now, Frymaster leaves being right to the churches and that’s fine. And I am certainly not using my new testament analogy to evangelize Christian ethics. Rather, I’m trying to make a point about the power of messaging even in the face of loss. Frymaster pans Pell and his supporters for believing in why as much as what his campaign meant. We ran a campaign that stood for something rather than standing on the backs of others. We lost. But we lost with integrity. We lost knowing that we could sleep at night having not carpet-bombed the reputations of other candidates and their families. And we proved that an effective campaign by a first time candidate could be run without lobbyist contributions or corporate PAC money. Not a winning campaign, this time around. But an effective campaign, nonetheless.

“If we are marked to die, we are enow
to do our country loss and if to live,
the fewer men the greater share of honor …
… That he which hath no stomach to this fight,
let him depart. His passport shall be made
and crowns for convoy put into his purse.
We would not die in that man’s company
that fears his fellowship to die with us.”

– William Shakespeare, Henry V

We lost an election. But we started a movement in Rhode Island politics. That, in my humble, polyanna-ish opinion, is the point of electoral politics. Call me naive for believing that electoral politics is worth more than just winning. Call me a loser for supporting a candidate in whom I believed to be the best, not merely the most popular. Beware, I’ll probably do it again. But, what I will not do is swallow my inspiration and fear my fellowship with those who might not win. Just as I am always willing to make amends for and admit when I am wrong, I will not fold in the face of fear of being right simply because standing up for what I believe in as a left leaning Democrat might result in an electoral loss. This is not the last election. I, too, can take a punch. And, through the courage of my conviction, I can stand, raise my hands, and fight again with honor.

July 11, 2014July 11, 2014

Mystery Facebook hater revealed as candidate for Warwick mayor

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When I initially reported on this social media altercation with an individual who chose to cast at me unwarranted and hateful slings and arrows in the dead of night with regard to my previous post on the Senate Finance Committee hearing on a supplemental excise tax on guns and ammunition, I chose to withhold the identity of the individual. I did so because, at the time, this person was to me, a anonymous stranger.

I was wrong.

The person who incoherently and arbitrarily started a fight and threatened me via late-night Facebook messenger out of nowhere was Stacia Petri, candidate for mayor of Warwick.

It continues on like this, and one needs only refer to the previously recounted exchange to see the extreme lengths the Warwick Republican mayoral candidate went to insult, berate and disparage me and anyone who shares my socio-political viewpoint.

She continued by telling me she was a lobbyist for taxpaying citizens (albeit, an unregistered lobbyist) and that she would “see me at the state house, asshole.” When I asked her directly if that was a threat, she responded by asking, “do you feel threatened? Good.” She then went on to insinuate that only illegal aliens, as sanctioned by “idiot liberals” could be drug addicts. when I expressed confusion at this statement and told her I had no idea who she was and nobody cared what she thought, she assured me that they would.

It was only recently that I came across a Facebook-noted press release announcing her candidacy for mayor of Warwick. According to the release:

“Warwick has always been a special place to live—a place to raise a family…a place to retire…a place to call home, but it’s all changing for the worse.”

She continues, as quoted in the release, to say:

“The condition of our city and our schools speak for themselves. If Warwick continues on the Mayor’s reckless approach, the urban decay will only grow worse. My administration will set a new direction by listening to the concerns of Warwick citizens and identifying the issues that are most problematic to them. I will confront these issues directly and propose solutions so Warwick is prosperous for all residents.”

Is that all residents? Or is that all residents except for “idiot liberals” or “illegals” who are encouraged by those liberals to be intravenous drug users? The press release goes on to say:

She was also brought to tears watching the elderly beg and plead to stop the double-digit increases in water and sewer rates when they barely have enough to spend on groceries.

But let’s remember, this was the woman who, after reading an account of another mayoral candidate, this one a Democrat for the City of Providence, using the legislative process to propose a sensible means by which to fund non-violence education and implementation statewide that, in no way, shape or form infringes upon one’s second amendment rights, insinuated that I needed a copy of the Cliff’s Notes to Constitution for Dummies. Yet, we’re to believe she weeps for the elderly.

My sense is that anyone who randomly spits venomous verbal assaults on strangers via Facebook messenger in the dead of night for exercising his right to opine on legislative hearings in an informed manner, may not have the temperament to handle the highest executive office of Rhode Island’s second most populous city.

Voters, do you feel threatened? Good.

July 7, 2014July 7, 2014

The Rhode Island Progressive Democrats of America condemn SCOTUS ruling on Harris vs. Quinn

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The Rhode Island Progressive Democrats of America (RIPDA) expresses strong opposition to the recent ruling by the Supreme Court of the United States with regard to the case of Harris vs. Quinn.

RIPDA firmly believes in the right of workers to organize and views organized labor unions as a crucial means by which to promote fair wages, safe work environments, and a truly democratic method of giving voice to working men and women. Further, RIPDA opposes any variation of “Right to Work” and supports closed shops or, when necessary, “fair share” or “agency fees” for any and all employees that profit from the bargaining units who negotiate on behalf of the employees of an organization.

While RIPDA recognizes differences in all sectors and workplace environments, and understands fully the need for local bargaining units to negotiate based on conditions specific to the shop, we stand in opposition to any and all permitted limitations of the resources necessary to support collective bargaining. It is our firm belief that there should be no such “free rider” articles ruled against the organizations designed to advocate for the workers, by the workers and of the workers. Such limitations allow for an unfair advantage of management and administration over rank and file workers and open the gates for an overall reduction in the value placed on bargaining unit workers.

Specifically, in the case of Harris vs. Quinn, the restriction of a union’s ability to require dues or agency fees for a class of employee that is not viewed as being a “fully-fledged” public sector employee, (in this case personal home health aides) works only to disenfranchise a class of workers whose negotiated contract improves overall compensation, and raises the standards of service provided by requiring quality and training levels on par with increased pay and benefits.

On a national scale, this opinion of the court diminishes the ability for unions to grow their memberships in the sector of unionized numbers with membership percentages high enough to enact democratic change in the workplace: public service. By distinguishing between “fully fledged” public sector employees and quasi-public employees, and subsequently setting precedent limiting the requirement of dues or agency fees of publicly funded union members not considered “fully fledged,” the public sector is incentivized to outsource traditionally government functions to private, for-profit corporations and using taxpayer dollars to produce corporate profit at the cost of fair wages, safe work practices and regulated standards of service

The successful initiative of the court’s five to four ruling in favor of limiting the public sector’s ability to mandate dues or agency fees for union representation and contract negotiation by designating an arbitrary distinction that favors strongly the incentive for profit-driven ventures to replace government workers for publicly funded jobs was promoted by the wealthy, corporate-sponsored Right to Work lobby. The RIPDA sees the decision as an extension of Right to Work’s agenda of eroding on a national scale, union participation and the middle class economy that unions ensure.

For these reasons, the RIPDA strongly opposes the opinion and ruling of the Supreme Court of the United States on the case of Harris vs. Quinn.

June 29, 2014

Smiley vs. Cianci: a bully meets his match on the political playground

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Former Providence mayor, Vincent A. Cianci, is a bully. He is not “just what Rhode Island’s capital city needs.” He is not the man who “never stopped caring about Providence.” He is an indomitable ego with a history and a talent for prioritizing power over people and results over integrity.

“I challenge Mr. Cianci to a debate,” said Democratic mayoral candidate, Brett Smiley, “at the time and place of his choosing — on questions of ethics, government accountability, and the cost of corruption to our city’s reputation and economy. We are still recovering from the damage inflicted by the widespread and systematic corruption that defined Buddy Cianci’s tenure as mayor.” A debate is not an unreasonable request among political candidates in a land that calls itself a democracy. It is a civilized discussion between individuals who seek the same office, but hold different opinions on how to perform the job. By leveling the playing field and offering a public forum in which to support their respective claims, a civil discourse can be staged to allow the people to determine which man or woman best suits the values and abilities of the future that the majority of the people want. Smiley even offered to give Cianci home-field advantage by allowing Cianci to choose both the time and place.

But bullies of the Cianci variety are rattled by having to relinquish even the slightest control. Their egos overpower their capacity to reason when they, themselves, do not call the plays. Possibly best represented by RIPR’s political reporter Ian Donnis, in a now classic Cianci story, Donnis, at the time reporting for the Phoenix, had scheduled an interview with then mayor Cianci on two topics: the mall and police. Cianci flew into an unwarranted rage, pounding the desk and crying that his staff had approved only one question and, “I’m the one who sets the rules here, not you!” He then proceeded to discuss the second question to Donnis’s satisfaction. This typifies the Cianci-style bully. The first time I heard Donnis tell this story, he went on to discuss an unprompted anecdote about Cianci’s show of force against the unionized sanitation workers by hiring private workers to break the ranks and placing shotgun-wielding police on the trucks to protect the scabs. “What the unions didn’t know was that the guns weren’t loaded.”

I know something about bullies. Growing up, I was always the small-framed, intellectual child. I was picked on. I was sensitive. I was artistic. I was the stereotypical victim for the stereotypical bully. Maybe it was just to make those like us feel better about ourselves or maybe, at the time, people actually believed the explanation that bullies were really more insecure than any of us and acted out as a means of overcompensating for their own, perceived insufficiencies. Now, however, studies have shown this not to be the case. According to Jaana Juven, a professor of developmental psychology at UCLA and an expert on bullying, “Most bullies have almost ridiculously high levels of self-esteem.” Furthermore, they are often viewed by their peers, not as pariahs, but rather as popular, effective and untouchable.

But what I learned growing up was that the best way to shake up a bully is to steal his or her feeling of control. Don’t back down. Call the person out. Steal his or her spotlight by turning the tables of his or her audience.

And that is exactly what Brett Smiley did. Brett called him out to the metaphoric schoolyard on the very issue that is the foremost concern of anyone who considers Cianci a viable candidate: ethics, government accountability, and corruption. And, predictably, Cianci responded by taking a cheap shot at Smiley’s late father in law by making a disparaging joke with regard to Brett’s husband’s father being part owner of a locally well known exotic dance nightclub. Brett’s husband, James DeRentis, for the record, is one of the most generous, kind, talented and intelligent people I know. For Cianci to make a mean joke about the late father of the spouse of a political opponent as a response to a request for political debate shows that there are still few moral levels to which Cianci will not sink. Brett asked for a civilized discussion and Cianci made the circumstantial equivalent to a “your momma’” joke.

Ethics, government accountability, and corruption. According to the Brown Daily Herald, “Patronage, bribes and city employees being required to buy tickets to Cianci fundraisers were all investigated, leading to the indictment of 24 city officials and the jailing of 19, including several top Cianci aides.” But Cianci has the gall to try and insinuate that Brett’s late father in law’s partnership in an exotic dance nightclub somehow equates to multiple felony convictions for criminal acts while in the office Cianci held when convicted.

Cianci won’t stoop to debating a Democratic primary candidate. This is the same cowardly style he uses on his radio show guests: charm them until they leave the studio and then take cheap shots when they can’t swing back. I deviated from his audience-demographic of “get off my lawn! Kid’s these days … when I was young!” crowd to tune in to his talk radio program a few times. I know how he operates. There is a part of me that’s relieved that he won’t have to be torn apart in a public forum by someone who can actually separate the facts from the fiction and the myth from the man who still rubs the sore spots where the handcuffs rubbed his wrists.

I will fully disclose that I help with Brett Smiley’s campaign. I work with Brett because he is, without a doubt, one of the most honest, authentic and genuine people I have ever met. Brett wants to win. But he would rather lose with integrity that win dishonorably. Brett lives his truth. My job is to promote him as a candidate. But I would lay down in traffic for him as a person. He inspires me. I work with a number of elected officials and candidates for office. But none have taught me as much about uncompromising ethics within politics as Brett Smiley. Yes, he’s “the man with a plan.” But, as much as I am invested in what he plans to do, I am even more inspired by why he plans to do it. He loves this city. He wants to make everyone love it as much as he does and he just happens to be skilled and driven enough to do it … honestly. For the record, neither he, nor his campaign, solicited me in any way to write this. In fact, I may incur some repercussions for “going rogue.” But, had Cianci not taken such a cheap shot at a man in whom I believe, and his family. I would not have penned a word.

So, the line has been toed. Cianci has been weighed. Cianci has been measured. And, maybe, he’s just plain scared of stepping into the ring with someone so far above his moral weight-class. If I were Cianci, I would be too.

June 1, 2014June 1, 2014

Attacked on Facebook by an alleged lobbyist

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Early Sunday morning (about 1am), I received an unsolicited Facebook-Messenger attack. I can only imagine it was a response to my most recent opinion piece on the hearing befor Senate Finance on the 10% supplemental excise tax on guns and ammunition. Although, I cannot be certain. What I am certain of, however, is the remarkably angry tone and insensitive absence of logic, slung at me by a complete stranger was completely unprovoked.

In retrospect, I probably should have completely ignored it. In the future I will refrain from being baited into such pointless exercises. Maybe it was exhaustion or simply my own lack of self control, but I foolishly engaged in the dialogue and was so shocked by this person’s incapacity for civil discourse that I had to share it.

As a disclaimer, I am a progressive political operative. I make no attempt to hide the fact that I prioritize people over profits. However, I am far from radical. I tend to work within the system and, while my progressive values and personal integrity prevent me from keeping still and silent when I feel strongly about an issue, I make every attempt to accept opinions that differ from mine.

But, in the dead of night, when my smart phone chimed with unwarranted vitriol, spewed from a complete stranger who, like any well practiced bully, picks a fight by finding sensitive pressure points, I took the bait.

Here is the actual Facebook Messenger conversation. I added some personal commentary and removed the name of the individual to maintain privacy. I also blurred the photograph. However, everything else is copied, unedited, as it occurred.

The stranger’s voice appears under the blurred photo. My voice appears in bold face type. Commentary is in italics.

The Constitution has been clear for 227 years. Maybe you should grab a copy of “Constitution For Dummies” (cliff note version) …maybe Barnes and Noble could special order you one.

The Constitution has not been clear for 227 years. If it had been, we would not need a Supreme court to interpret and render decisions. Pick up a copy of a GED online, since you haven’t bothered to pay attention in civics. Don’t contact me again.

Every decision protects what it stands for

You can write all the garbage you’d like….

I know. See amendment # 1.

Yes unfortunately we have to tolerate nonsense

I addition to all the corruption in this state

No. I can block you. Bye, psycho.

Yeah I’ll see you at the state house

Asshole

Is that a threat? If so, I will contact the state police.

I’m a lobbyist for tax paying citizens

If this person is a lobbyist, he/she is not registered as such with the Secretary of State in Rhode Island.

Do you feel threatened?? Good

So am I. The police have been contacted. Please wait by your door.

So, I lied here. I did not contact the police. I was tired and trying to express that communication of threats is a crime.

Whatever

Excellent argument.

Can’t debate with an idiot liberal… They start whining

When you want to have a real debate id LOVe to

Can’t argue with crazy. I’m busy organizing.

The classic response

You know crazy you walk through it’s doors every day . Night

Okay, put the needle down and seek some rehab, sugar.

I got mean here. I shouldn’t have insinuated that the person was an intravenous drug user. I’ve known many who suffer from addiction and their condition should not be minimized by using it as an insult.

That’s for the illegals to take care of

You know you give them the ok….

I don’t even know what your talking about. Can you please stop typing and crawl back to the cave you came from. I don’t know you or care what you think. I’ve never heard of you. I don’t want to hear from you again. Please cease and desist your unsolicited harassment of me. Nobody cares about your ideas or opinions.

Can’t wait to share this

Nobody cares. Grow up.

Oh, they will.

At this point I made good on my threat to block the person.

I am trying not to form generalizations based on this encounter. My hope is that this incident does not represent the majority of right-wing, conservatives. I assume this person to be a right-wing conservative only because of the disparraging description of me as an “idiot liberal.” He or she does not appear to be liberal, so I do not think he or she thinks of his or herself as a smart liberal and is simply pointing out my stupidity. I also hope that this person is not actually a lobbyist for taxpayers. I pay taxes. I don’t want to be represented by an unregistered bigot.

However, the ominous (or hilarious) church bell finale to the conversation left me wondering if this is the sort of red flag that should be noticed prior to an incidence of domestic terrorism. I’m going to choose to laugh this one off. But, one never knows.

May 30, 2014May 30, 2014

Senate Finance scoffs at ‘guns and ammo tax’

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The members of the Senate Committee on Finance had already made up their minds to dismiss any potential value offered by the proposed legislation long before Senator Gayle Goldin, the bill’s prime sponsor, explained it.

Senate Bill 2318 would impose a 10% supplemental excise tax on firearms and ammunition to be distributed to city, town, or municipal police chiefs (or the highest ranking municipal official) for the purpose of grant funding of nonprofit organizations whose mission includes a commitment to reducing crime and violence.

Committee Vice Chairman Walter Felag (D-Bristol, Tiverton, Warren) made it clear he had little respect for the bill and it’s sponsor when he repeatedly said that every senator is entitled to a hearing of his or her bill, but that doesn’t mean anyone at the table supports it. He also chastised Senator Goldin, in absentia, for leaving the hearing after explaining the bill, in spite of the fact that half of the members of his own committee were absent to work on budget issues.

Out in force was the usual shoot ‘em if ya got ‘em crowd, including 2nd Amendment Coalition lobbyist and unemployment insurance attorney Frank Saccoccio, NRA lobbyist Darin Goens, talk-show radio host Daria Bruno, Cranston Mayor Allan Fung and relentlessly obnoxious member of the tin-foil hat press, Dan Bidondi.

Saccoccio started his testimony by positing that the most important part of any legislation is the language that is not there. I’m no lawyer but I am fairly certain that the most important part of legislative language is, more often than not, the language that is there. However, Saccoccio chose to focus on a list of hypothetical scenarios having nothing to do with the actual bill or its potential merits.

“What if the police chief chose to give the money to an organization that spent 10% on a billboard and 90% on administrative costs and taxpayers’ money was wasted? What if, in a state with such high unemployment, gun dealers were forced to go out of business because everyone purchased their guns in Massachusetts?”

Well, I suppose the displaced workers could go to work for the nonprofits who are spending so much money on their staff. But, unfortunately, logic did not have a seat at this table, in spite of the many vacant chairs.

NRA lobbyist, Goens, said that he’s seen, “literally thousands,” of gun control bills and that “this was in the top five of the worst he’d ever seen.” I, myself, am a lobbyist. I understand the craft. Hyperbole is not usually the friend of the lobbyist. Furthermore, I am willing to bet that Goens has used this very phrase on literally hundreds of the literally thousands of gun bills against which the NRA stands. He then went on to give the not-so-subtle impression that, even though he represents the NRA and not the gun manufacturers (wink, nudge), if the bill passed, gun manufacturers might just stop selling guns and ammo to security or law enforcement in Rhode Island. I wonder if he submitted written testimony or a ransom note.

Fung testified that he was the only candidate to stand up for Rhode Islander’s second amendment rights. He’s Alan Fung and he approves this message. Lock, Stock and Daria Bruno went so far as to call the bill blatantly racist because it disenfranchises poor people of color who most need guns for self-defense. I know. I’m dry heaving too. And Bidondi … well, he just yelled from the gallery at anyone who testified in favor of the bill.

And we few … we happy few. We band of brothers (and sisters) who testified in favor of the bill were raked over the coals by the members of the committee. We were cross-examined as if we were proposing a bill to seize and sacrifice the first born child of every family. Or tax their guns.

Senator David Bates (R-Barrington, Bristol), showing blatant disrespect for his fellow Senator Goldin, asked her whether we should have a knife tax too? Senator Goldin kept her composure. I would have pointed out that nobody has, to my knowledge, assassinated a president from a grassy knoll by throwing knives. Also, one very rarely hears of a drive-by knifing.

Providence Mayoral Candidate Brett Smiley, (for whose campaign, in the spirit of full disclosure, I consult) was questioned by Senator Edward O’Neill (I-Lincoln, North Providence, North Smithfield) about whether Rhode Island should start taxing alcohol too? (Nobody tell Representative Malik he said that!) O’Neill went on to ask why legal gun purchases should be taxed when it is stolen guns that result in gun crimes. Smiley answered that every gun begins as a legal sale. Gun manufacturers do not manufacture guns for illegal sale. By taxing at the point of sale, funds could be collected. The point that Senator O’Neill refused to acknowledge was that funding streams for violent crime prevention was very difficult to come by if one only taxed stolen guns.

The overwhelming arguments revolved (and revolved, and revolved) around a premise that this was a tax that punished law abiding citizens, simply executing their second amendment rights, rather than addressing the real issue, which is criminals who steal guns. However, my own testimony addressed the fact that this did not infringe upon anyone’s right to keep and bear arms. It merely requires that those who make the choice to do so also invest in a responsible future. Taxes are not punitive. Taxes are a civic responsibility and an investment in community.

I was given a fair amount of eye rolling when I listed just a few incidents from the past three days, involving a 70-year old Ohio woman accidentally shot by her husband of 50 years; a three year old in Arizona who accidentally shot his 1 ½ year old brother fatally in the head; a 10-year-old in Texas, who accidentally shot his 4-year-old cousin in the leg. All of these tragedies made possible by legally purchased firearms. Perhaps a funding stream, at the discretion of law enforcement leadership, could be dedicated to educating the public on responsible gun ownership. Or, would that too be considered an infringement on one’s right to keep and bear arms?

This bill has, for all intents and purposes, died in committee. But it is an excellent idea. Take the bill out of judiciary and make it a tax issue before finance. Do not control guns. Rather, fund nonviolence at the legal point of sale. Yet, the Dan Bidondi mentality seems to have permeated the General Assembly. The Senate, anyway, did not entertain the potential for trying something different to achieve a better result. Instead they simply cried “Why do you want to punish law abiding citizens? Why do you hate the second amendment?” I, for one, don’t. I want to honor the preamble to the Constitution, which includes the phrase: “promote the general welfare.”

April 21, 2014April 21, 2014

Clay Pell shows selfless support for mental health

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Clay Pell showed true depth of character this weekend in support of National Alliance on Mental Illness RI (NAMI RI).

On Saturday night, at the Rosario Society in Providence, close to 200 people packed the hall to support NAMI RI at the non-profit, community-based mental health support organization’s first annual “Pasta Gala” fundraiser. As NAMI RI’s newly recruited, pro-bono government relations coordinator and communications consultant, I did my best to spread the word and, with a fantastic collaborative effort amongst members of the Board, the event hall was overbooked. And thank goodness for that. NAMI RI was recently written out of the Governor’s FY 15 budget proposal. Without the funding from BHDDH, this vital education, outreach, counseling and crisis response organization would not be able to survive.

The event was well publicized through social media, press release, letters and emails of invitation and word of mouth. It was packed. Senator Frank Ciccone, a stalwart ally from the beginning, was in attendance. Candidate for General Treasurer, Seth Magaziner, was there too. Representative John Carnevale, who has been a strong supporter of the organization’s efforts to secure necessary appropriations, was only unable to attend because he was forced to ride the train back from Boston due to the car in which he was supposed to ride being (it’s funny, but it’s not) stolen.

However, it was Clay Pell, along with his effervescent wife, Michelle Kwan, who were truly present in their support of NAMI RI.

I had contacted Clay when seeking a public figure to say a few words during the speaking program portion of the evening. There had, unfortunately, been some miscommunication as to who would be securing a person of political influence to fill that slot. At an organizational meeting on the Monday prior to the event all eyes fell on me and the question was asked, much to my surprise, “So, who will be speaking?” Rather than stumble through an argument or make an excuse, I did what any good consultant would and diverted by smiling and confidently saying, “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of it.”

And I shuffled furiously through my i-rolodex. And I reached out to Clay Pell.

Within hours I heard back from the man himself, saying he would very much like to attend but, given the Easter holiday as well as other family obligations (the passing of his grandmother, Nuala Pell) he would have to check with his scheduler. And, yet, in spite of these very valid and personal concerns, Clay followed up by asking what time he should appear, how long he should speak and how many people were expected to attend?

Having worked with a number of candidates for political office, I know the routine all too well: make an appearance, shake as many hands as possible, pose for some photo ops, hand out business cards and then make a quick exit to repeat the process at the next event. But not Clay and Michelle. They spent time at the door, engaging anyone who wished to speak with them. They perused the silent auction and the raffle. When he was called, Clay spoke briefly about the organization and it’s importance and made mention of a close friend who had struggled with mental illness. Instead of making a beeline for the exit after the applause had dwindled, he sat back down next to Michelle and took his wife’s hand while they both listened to the stories told by those affected by mental illness. Given the amount of time I spend with candidates and elected officials, such a moment felt surreal in its humanity. Clay wasn’t there for himself. He wasn’t there for his campaign. Clay and Michelle were there for the cause. There was selflessness, vulnerability and a depth of humanity to Clay Pell that, if it was only for show, deserves an Academy Award for a brilliant performance. But I, for one, think it was absolutely genuine.

And, in all likelihood, it is this very same depth of character and level of humanity that is the gubernatorial candidate’s Achilles’ heel. Clay has taken a bit of a beating with the press. Due to his reluctance to pander to local media’s overwhelming appetite for a never ending feast of content, those in media have seen fit to punish him by tongue-in-cheek coverage of his stolen Prius. They have filled the void of no controversy with speculation and fluff. One local, political opinion surmised that Pell had a very short time to introduce himself to Rhode Island’s voters and earn their trust. I beg to differ. I see Pell only having to avoid earning their distrust.

He and Michelle stayed to the very end. On a holiday weekend, in the midst of the Pell family (and the state) mourning the passing of his grandmother, Nuala, he took the time to support and learn from a few hundred people fighting to raise a few thousand dollars to keep from closing the doors of an organization that saved their lives and gave them hope. The Pells spoke with anyone who approached them and Clay didn’t just glad hand the crowd. Rather, he listened – truly listened – to each and every guest with whom he engaged. Some just wanted a photo with the man. Others just wanted a photo with his gold medal Olympian wife. But both stayed, even after the last balloons had been handed off to willing takers, and listened to the concerns of the non-profit, mental health community.

There were no members of the press present.

February 25, 2014February 25, 2014

Raimondo gets her ‘Groov’ on with gun-parts manufacturer

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No one will argue that jobs-growth and economic development are crucial topics to be addressed by the state’s gubernatorial candidates. However, Gina Raimondo’s recent choice of companies with which to publicly associate shed light on her lack of authentic integrity.

Gina Raimondo, Rhode Island general treasurer and one of the Democrats running for governor, has yet again, demonstrated an opportunistic approach to campaigning by touring Groov-Pin, a Rhode Island company that manufactures parts used in guns. This comes on the heels of a financial maneuver, successfully persuading the Rhode Island Investment Commission to divest retirement money from firearms companies. Madam Treasurer’s contradicting priorities multiply with her stance on “common sense gun laws.” Raimondo has publicly spoken about restricting access to assault weapons in Rhode Island. But, of all the Rhode Island companies Madam Treasurer could have exploited her high public profile to promote, she chose a manufacturing company that produces parts used in guns.

Groov-Pin Corporation is a Smithfield, Rhode Island-based design and manufacturing company that produces application components used in many mechanical devices. However, some of the components that ship from the company find their way into guns as firing pins, magazine releases, rail mount hardware and other inner workings for guns. Candidate Raimondo has marketed her Smithfield origins. She has also emphasized her father’s occupation as a factory worker (he was a metallurgist) at the Bulova watch company.

What seems glaringly obvious is Raimondo’s lack of regard for her own convictions. There are plenty of choices in Rhode Island of companies that embrace her purported core values and platform proposals. She could have chosen a green energy start up. She could have toured a tech company. Instead, she pandered to concerns over public outcry at pension investments in gun companies but played politics to numbers when it came to advertising her image as a manufacturing job creator and a student of successful business practice.

Reality check. Rhode Island leads the nation in manufacturing job decline. Between 1990 and 2013, manufacturing jobs dropped by 56.4% from almost 93,700 to 40,400. Manufacturing is a valuable resource where it still exists, but it is not an industry with hope of expansion as Rhode Island’s answer to its labor market woes. Raimondo may push her common sense gun laws but she is not demonstrating common sense concerning economic growth. Rather, she is once again proving her deficient progressive values by exchanging integrity for opportunism and placing political profit over people. Her gun reform position was one of the few remaining progressive policies to which left leaning Democrats could still cling. But the Treasurer’s decision to publicize a company whose profits come from the manufacture of firearms components shreds any semblance of her dedication to anything but her own rise to power.

If Gina Raimondo wants to demonstrate a commitment to authentic integrity and commitment to Rhode Island’s well-being, she should would do well to promote businesses that model upward economic mobility as well as her own agenda of divestment from profits derived from gun sales. But that isn’t really what she wants. Is it?

January 5, 2014January 8, 2014

Providence Journal: Poor Richard Riordan and Eli Broad

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In Saturday’s edition of the Providence Journal, Richard Riordan and Eli Broad contributed an opinion piece typical of the declining editorial quality of a decaying news source. Called “It Isn’t A Sin To Be Rich,” the pair penned the argument against the rhetorical criminalization of affluence.

While everyone is entitled to an opinion, not all opinions are equal. Opinions that are condescending, uninformed, and pedantic tend to hold less water than those that contain actual evidence, substance, and argue a point that actually exists outside of the consciences of the interlocutors. What people want is tax equity. Equality and equity are distinctly different. Equality would be like a circle of people all removing their shoes and tossing them in the center. Equality is then handing out the shoes randomly until everyone has two, regardless of size, type or match. Equity is giving everyone a matching pair that fits his or her needs.

What these authors fail to provide is any evidence to back up their opinions. They quote Janet Yellen and the President, but other than that their only evidence is anecdotal. The only historical precedent given is not even from this country. Income tax rates on the upper percentages of income earners in America were, for the biggest portion of America’s rise to world economic benchmark, between 70%-92%. Then they dropped considerably in the 80s – 28% – and briefly rose again to 39% during the Clinton years. Bush 2, however, dropped them back to 35%. It is also the 80s that marked the tipping point in the systematic elimination of America’s middle class. The demonization of labor unions and deifying of Wall Street traders was a paradigm shift in the American zeitgeist.

The authors refer to the wealthy as the job creators but discuss the uncontrollable factors of globalization of manufacturing and automation as the real culprits. If the wealthy are the job creators, where are the jobs? The argument against “socialism” in favor of “voluntary charity” is as deplorable as the reference to tax equity as “punitive.” Certainly charity is appreciated. However, charity would be less of a necessary component of the American economy if the so called job creators actually created jobs. And not just subsistence level or below, part-time or less, or mis-classified contract work. Worker productivity has increased by 80% since the 1970s but wages have stagnated in spite of cost of living increases.

The question is, if the workers are not seeing profits of the maximization of productivity, who is? Are the job creators responsible in that circumstance? Furthermore, charity increasing “in spite of the halting economic recovery” falls short of mentioning the record-setting stock market. The authors’ Janet Yellen reference, previously mentioned, pointed to the fact that more and better earnings-potential was directly linked to post-secondary education.

Many Americans who “decide” not to go to college do so because they are unwilling to make a loan investment of thousands of dollars when there are so few jobs after graduation. Furthermore, with cuts in federal aid, increasing tuitions, and higher competition for grants and scholarships, college is less likely to be attractive for the children of today’s economy. Overall, this editorial reads like a bad advertisement and those of us who are not educated enough or have not worked hard enough or were not born lucky enough to reach the lofty heights of the authors’ fiscal standards, cannot afford to buy the bridge they are trying to sell. Rather, the opinion should be directed to fellow victims of the supposed demonization of the wealthy. They are better comforted by the flowery rhetoric and carefully lain blame. Being rich is not a sin. Yet one does well to remember the Beatitudes when thinking of what is and is not a sin. Especially those as described by Luke:

Woe to you who are rich, for you have already received your comfort.

Woe to you who are well fed now, for you will go hungry.

Woe to you who laugh now, for you will mourn and weep.

Woe to you when everyone speaks well of you, for that is how their ancestors treated the false prophets.

December 20, 2012December 20, 2012

Has the DLT Given Up?

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Rhode Island has an unemployment problem that has no quick solution. One of the lessons learned from the rhetoric and subsequent results of our most recent election cycle is that an economic rebound and resultant hiring hike is not going to come in the form of a vertical jump on the line-graph.

Nor should it.

Such sudden upswings tend to be followed by equally as drastic drops creating the shape that coined the phrase “spike.” The state doesn’t need a spike. What is needed is a long term solution that builds a real and diverse economic foundation rather than a quickly constructed house of cards.

It seems that every conversation that occurs about the subject turns every individual involved into an expert with his or her own take on the matter. There are currently about 60,000 different theories of how to solve Rhode Island’s economic mire. This purely hyperbolic number of proposed solutions has a margin of error of 50,000 in either direction.

In the meantime, jobless individuals still need a safety net. And businesses around the state still money coming in to keep their doors open and their staff working. But it seems as if the DLT administration has given up. Due to major cutbacks last summer based on a sunset on federal stimulus funding for operations and a lack of initiative to locate funds at a state level, the department, by their own admission, is understaffed.

Recent reports by the Providence Journal as well as local NPR discussed long wait-times and insufficient technology to keep up with high claimant volume on busier days. And, at some point in the future, sources report contact by telephone will no longer be an option. Official spokesperson, Laura Hart, said, “The department now has 123 workers assigned to unemployment insurance, Hart said, down from 151 before the layoffs.”

But, keep in mind, that does not represent an accurate number of staff assigned to answering phones. That number includes the Central Adjudication Unit whose sole function is to fact-find and render decisions on entitlement to benefits based on separation issues. They don’t process claims. They determine, by law, who gets to collect. When administrators decided which classifications to cut when initial lay offs were being conducted back in July, that job classification was completely protected, whereas, those who answered phones and provided front-line, customer-service was initially reduced by close to two-thirds. Some have since been recalled through specific grant funding designated to technological improvements.

Granted, long term unemployed will no longer be a concern as Emergency Unemployment Compensation (Federal Extended Benefits) will be completely cut off at the end of the year. And State Extended Benefits have been triggered off for over six months. So, where the average length for lack of full time work in the state is forty weeks, the period of full payments of weekly unemployment benefits is not to exceed twenty-six weeks. That is a three and a half month period with no income.

Having no income tends to make it more difficult to find suitable employment. No means by which to pay phone bills, internet bills, rent or even laundry means employers are less likely to see an individual as an attractive or reliable candidate for employment.

Furthermore, not only does that mean that jobless individuals will no longer have any income to keep up with bills, mortgage and car payments or grocery bills for themselves and their families, but those recipients of such payment will lose them. Insurance companies, grocery stores, etc., will have less income as businesses and will, subsequently, reduce their own workforce. This is basic Keynesian recovery tactics breaking down due to turning off the stimulus tap. When this happens before the drain is plugged, the basin dries up. Unemployment levels will rise and Rhode Island’s recession will continue … or worsen.

On a more basic and human level, if the claimants who need assistance but have no access to internet, will be even harder pressed to find a means by which to make communication with the department for general inquiries, re-files, or basic new claims filing. Previously, the neWORKri locations would offer computer services for those without home access, but with Pawtucket and Middletown locations both closed and Wakefield only open a few days a week, that disenfranchises a significant percentage of claimants from access to entitlements in a timely fashion. Even libraries, those that are still operational, have long waits for use of internet ready computers.

And what is to happen to the employees who work in the call center when the call center is no longer a call center? Are they to be laid off, some of them for the second time in a year? All that is known for sure is that they will not be eligible for more than twenty-six weeks worth of benefits. But for all those who are left jobless from the state, the taxpayer is, once again, on the hook for their unemployment compensation benefits due to the state’s status as a direct-reimbursable employer, rather than a contributory employer.

So, jobless Rhode Islanders will be hung out to dry even more than they are now. State taxpayers will be on the hook for benefits to any and all laid off from the state. The economy as a whole will suffer from lack of benefits stimulus. The question stands: has the DLT given up? The Assistant Director of Income support – the man who actually directs and implements policy for Unemployment and TDI and is well known for his draconian, micro-management techniques and demoralizing promotional decisions – has announced his retirement.

Governor Chafee will have a hard fight ahead of him if he chooses to run again in 2014 and that means DLT Director Charlie Fogarty (a gubernatorial appointment) may no longer retain that position. Have they given up? If they are no longer focusing on providing much needed income support, are they focusing on programs to increase or improve the state’s labor conditions? Are they providing adequate training? In today’s competitive job market, where a bachelor’s degree is now what a high school diploma was thirty years ago, are they providing tuition waivers or assistance for masters programs or post graduate certification? This particular author, a former employee of the DLT’s Unemployment Insurance sector, asked the Administrator in charge of tuition waivers whether or not a tuition waiver would be possible for a masters program and was told, flat out, no.

Mark Gray of Ocean State Action affiliated Where’s the Work wrote an article callled Don’t Push Rhode Islanders off Fiscal Ciff, both inspiring and complimenting this one about pushing for the re-institution of Emergency Unemployment Compensation benefits. It is recommended reading. To further that agenda on a state level, Rhode Islanders need to push the DLT to be held accountable for their mission to provide aid in Labor, Training, Income Support, Regulation. Furthermore, until Rhode Island’s lawmakers are able to create and implement successful legislative programs to restore economic stability to the state, the DLT is the state agency responsible for helping its citizens maintain economic and business stability in the labor market? The DLT is the first line of economic safety for the state and is responsible, by any means necessary, to prevent Rhode Island’s citizens and businesses from sliding further into the economic abyss. They can’t defer responsibility and they can’t give up.

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