Copyright 2008. All rights reserved.
"Common Sense Dictates"
The Blog of the Thomas Paine Project
An open forum to explore the challenges facing the United States, and to propose practical solutions to address those challenges.
There has been much controversy surrounding what we call our current wars. What was once the "War on Terror" (short and simple, reflective of President Bush) has morphed into "The International Struggle Against Violent Extremism" (long and incomprehensible, reflective of the current President). The Obama Administration even has difficulty in naming our enemies. "Terrorist" is out, as is "Terrorism". The official White house jargon is "man-made disaster". That terminology seems to equate 9/11 with the BP spill, ...
<< MORE >>It is often commented on that political discourse is so poisoned that it is impossible for there to be any meaningful discussion on nearly any topic of importance facing the United States. We have examined the phenomenon before, and have found that while 80 % of the population does not consider themselves to be either extremely conservative nor extremely liberal, it seems to fall to those very extreme elements to define the debate for the rest of us.
... << MORE >>"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among them are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their powers from the consent of the goverened. That whenever any form of government becomes destructve to those ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to ...
<< MORE >>The Education of Barack Obama
We like to do pop culture references in our titles - this one is a bit dated, but for those of you with a longer memory will remember the scene from the film classic "The Graduate". The line is
uttered by a surprised, incredulous, but eager to believe young Dustin Hoffman, as he walks in to find Mrs. Robinson (Anne Bancroft) reclined on the bed in lingerie and removing a stocking. We at TPP
are identifying a bit as we look ...
Senator Robert Byrd (D-WV) lies in repose in the Senate chamber. His death this past week brings to an end a 57 year career as the longest serving member in the history of the country. The Senate is holding heatings debating the fitness of Elena Kagan as Supreme Court justice. Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) is the chair and arrived in the Senate in 1972. Hearings confirming General David Petraeus as field commander in Afghanistan was chaired by Senator Carl Levin (D-MI) who arrived in the Senate in 1978.
We're seeing a trend, and the trend seems ...
<< MORE >>Hi. It's Joe again. I wrote a piece on how the economy is affecting my family last October. Bob wanted me to do a follow-up, so here goes.
To re-cap, I work in the technology sector. It's a good living and I'm pretty much bullet-proof as far as keeping my job. My wife was in a long term layoff from her job in education. We have three kids and own a home. We play by the rules and don't ask for anything other than to be able to provide a comfortable life for our family. We aren't ...
<< MORE >>The Thomas Paine Project strives for reasoned debate. We have avoided the BP oil well and the 24/7 disaster coverage eating up the airwaves since then because we felt that we had little that we could offer in the way of informed comment. That has not stopped anyone else though. The magnitude of the idiocy flowing out of all of the involved parties dwarfs the flow of oil fouling the gulf waters. The mainstream media has been joined by ...
<< MORE >>This week we will be revisiting the Arizona immigration law.Our original article received great reader interest, and sparked a lot of passion from both sides of the argument. Link at: http://blog.thomaspaineproject.org/2010/05/02/law--order-arizona.aspx The view taken by TPP was routinely praised and heatedly condemned. We stand by our original assessment in favor of the law, but as we do from time to time we would like to go back to address specific concerns ...
<< MORE >>The Constitution has emerged as a central argument of national debate in the current election cycle.To hear some tell it, the Constitution is the sole possession of the right or of the left. The right is cast as a bible-thumping, gun-toting horde of the unwashed and uneducated. The left have been portrayed as elitist snobs bent on a totalitarian regime to destroy freedom and to subjugate all before their vision of a socialist utopia.
In truth, ...
<< MORE >>Healthcare reform is once again on our minds. It is moving onto the front burner again as reports come out as to costs actually moving beyond the trillion dollars price point that was so important to President Obama. Limitations of the coverage, delays in implementation, and the specter of premium costs increasing by 30 - 50% as corporate health plans renew in January, are all bubbling back into the new media, and even occasionally into mainstream media.
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First there was Disneyland - the “happiest place on earth”. Tommorowland, Frontierland, Adventureland – sanitized versions of history and the future seen through rose-colored glasses. Designed to entertain while not quite informing, but oh you feel good in there. It wasn’t real, but you wanted it to be because it was better than the real thing.
In the 1970's the major brewers - Miller and ...
<< MORE >>We decided to chew on that new Arizona law. We know that you’ve heard about it - SB1070 by name. It allows police officers to inquire about the immigration status of people being questioned when stopped in the course of an investigation. This provision has been added if the police officer suspects that the subject being questioned may be in the country illegally. The screaming on both sides is not useful. Educating oneself on the issue is. We hope to help ...
<< MORE >>Well, this one snuck out of left field, and we are paying attention. The House today voted on a bill allowing for a referendum to be held in Puerto Rico to determine if it would like to change its status with regard to it's standing in the federal governement. Normally one would expect somewhere requesting to apply for statehood would make a headline or two. We'd have to hire on someone to add a star to the flag. ...
<< MORE >>Who would have thought that when Rick Santelli had his on-air meltdown broadcast over the mortgage bailout live on CNBC that a political movement would gush forward? The date was February 9, 2009. The setting was the Chicago Board of Trade. His rant examining the non-sensical economic policies ultimately leading to our current economic crash was for a while the leading You Tube download. His rallying cry "Where are the tea parties?" (referring to the Boston Tea Party of the American ...
<< MORE >>President Obama entered hostile territory this week at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. His plan was to address panic that was setting in at NASA on news leaking out of the cancellation of the Constellation program to return to the moon. It was a project initiated by the Bush administration to both jump start our space program and to revive the excitement of the Apollo days when people were proud and excited about space exploration. It was thought to be a ...
<< MORE >>In the segue from healthcare to jobs the Obama Administration is looking to put some luster on it's diplomatic efforts by a visit to nuclear armageddon. The President is currently hosting a nuclear non-proliferation conference being attended by 47 heads of state or senior ministers. It's aim is focused - securing nuclear material so that it will not fall into the hands of terrorists. No controversy here. Of the many groups making an effort at protest, none are advocating that it ...
<< MORE >>With all of the focus on the turf wars in DC, we've noticed one of the looming figures of recent history
notably absent. We ask, where's Hillary?
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has been trotting the globe. She has handed out aid in Haiti and satellite phones in Chile. She's spent time dressing down the leaders of Israel, Afghanistan, Pakistan and ...
<< MORE >>In media, it is often said that a reaction, either good or bad, is better than being ignored. By that principle, we at TPP must be doing something right. We have again been called out by a reader, this time Shannon from California, who believes that we have strayed from the reservation with regard to our last posting on the healthcare bill recently signed into law by President Obama. As is our policy, we go back to review our positions when ...
<< MORE >>“Clueless” was a 90’s comedy film that poked fun at the well-off youth of the 90210 set. The premise that just because someone has money, fame or perceived power, possession of that attribute does not guarantee any actual superiority of that person – whatever the possessor may think. It is a theme that typically repeats itself generationally to assure the “common folk” that the upper crust really isn’t anything special beyond surface ...
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