Tag Archives: politics

On My Watch

Posted on July 9, 2015 | Leave a comment

I was a kid just out of college and was thrown into the deep end, without the requisite note from my parents. It was such an exhilarating learning curve and I was scared to death but intrigued.

These fellow legislative analysts were my family for the next few years. I found out early on any legislation I imagined or wrote would affect millions of people. That was a frightening thought. I vowed to do the best for everyone.

My boss, who had done my job before, let me do the grunt work and he went to meetings without me, without even telling me the meetings were about my work. The legislative bill drafting group wrote up potential laws for colleagues. I wrote my own, usually after awakening at 3:00 in the morning, a habit I have decades later. For many, they said they had no changes and good job, girl.

I messed up on a few things. I didn’t see AIDS coming, neither did anyone else but I helped pass legislation on employment and housing and of course it was denied by the senate. Now we have marriages.

I helped NYC by requiring netting on all construction so people on the sidewalks were safe and workers did not fall off concrete platforms.

In the end, I was in the forefront of privacy legislation and put together a team with every committee that had an interest. Mine was cable tv back then and it was really pre-internet. Reader’s Digest killed at the last moment. The bill was 1984. Yes, I’d reserved A.B. 1984 the year before and had gifts for the people who saved that number.

There was hard work on sexual orientation but now there are marriages. Crime victims do not have to sit in the same room as the offender. People who get speeding tickets pay restitution to the state that a criminal owes. I was there near the Son of Sam Law.

Mistakes were made but my heart and brain were good. I get to go to sleep at night knowing that I made a difference in the lives of 34 million people. As a kid, figuring that out, that was and would still be a daunting task. Now I’m retired and get crosswalks and tax refunds. Ah, well, back in the day. Dee

ps My husband put a pad of paper and a pen so if I’ve one of my many great ideas at 3:00 in the morning I can write it down and go back to sleep. I love this guy.

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Scott Walker for President???

Posted on July 8, 2015 | 1 comment

In his budget, yes this Wisconsin governor who tried union-busting a few years ago to make a name for himself, is now running for president. I guess he figures a statewide recall is worth it’s weight in gold as when your name is in the papers, people know your name, good or bad.

President of what I do not know. But it may be the USA. Right now his budget includes a miscellaneous package that:

1, allows payday loan companies to sell insurance, annuities and provide financial advice;

2. eliminates the Freedom of Information Act for information on politicians;

3. changes the living wage law for people working on government projects to minimum wage (that came out but will come back next week);

4. subsidizes energy companies, provides tax benefits for government and church building projects thus melding church and state, something our founding fathers found to be wrong, and give Milwaukee’s county executive carte blanche, even letting him use a parking lot for the infamous art museum for a sports franchise investment property to build upon.

5. and sanitize any reports of police shootings. Yes, police shoot people, white cops shoot Black people. I’ve read that Milwaukee is the most racially divided city in the nation. Think Detroit, then think worse. There are Black and white beaches. Not by official designation but there are no police cars at the white beaches and two huge SWAT vehicles plus patrol cars at the others, where we like to have a burger in the summer.

I’m not even going to say what he thinks about taxes or abortion as I’ve had enough. I lived in this state last year and paid taxes for my husband working out of state and paying full taxes in two states. We were owed a large refund and I got no one on the phone many times so 10 weeks later started with local politicians and they actually gave me a working phone number. A tax guy called me back. I asked if he had any questions on our return. No. We got our IRS return in three weeks. Are there any audit flags? No.

We just don’t want to cut big checks so wait for you to contact us. Government in action, government inaction. Here’s to our next president. We will have moved to another country before he takes office.

This is is not a budget. It is a publicity stunt to get his name out there nationally for being insane and a presidential candidate and be a tea cozy for the tea party. The people who elected him paid for this ad. They pay his salary and those of his minions. He is supposed to work for the people of Wisconsin, not just himself. I require more from the President of the United States. Politically yours, Dee

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Entitlement

Posted on June 24, 2014 | Leave a comment

I’ve a tiny photo of my old cat Nathan in a frame by my desk. He’s on his bed with his name embroidered on it, and his green eyes look at me before I write. He was the first pet I had to euthanize. I comforted him, then held him after he died for a while and I felt something. I’d like to think that some of him is in me.

An angel ornament is there as well, of my first dog Chani, not that I need any reminders. I only have to go to Google Earth to see her tree in her park thousands of miles away. The other is me, standing by pine trees at probably 18 months in a pink snowsuit, showing me the possibilities of life.

As I write I look at these reminders every day. When I hear that a US Senator’s son allowed 20 dogs to die under his care, and then blames the dogs for their deaths and packs them, dead and dying in a shed… I am suspicious.

I’ve never seen a setup as is online now where the dogs stayed, it’s as if they’re locked in a laundry room. If a dog chewed a wire and cut off the A/C that wire should never have been open in the first place. This is human error, and I’d say cruelty. My dog has stayed on a farm before with 15 acres and cows and she got dirty but a bath was part of going home.

When Zoe came home from the vet she ran to us and was needy. From the farm, she was paired with an older dog to teach her manners and also secret things to make her humans do what she wants, yes the latter part was a success. I went there, worked with them on a spay/neuter project and Zoe was a favorite there and when clean from mud et al joined them in the office.

TO: Dog Owners in Maricopa County

Do NOT go to Green Acres to board your dog unless you want it to turn up dead and the Senator’s son say it was your dog’s fault.

Thank you, and so sorry to all the families who lost their dogs due to at the very least, negligence. I know a great lawyer in UT who can get you a class action suit. Dee

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Willing and Able

Posted on May 14, 2014 | Leave a comment

Making it a lifelong quest I choose to be able and willing to take care of any situation that comes along.

That was the case for most of my life. Now I take care of a husband and he takes care of me. In a hurricane I pack clothes and dog and he takes care of electronics and drives because he knows I’m freaked out.  We are willing and able to take care of each other.

He and dogma also slept 10 hours during a Cat 5 hurricane and I blogged it by the windows until the power went out, and every place around us was hit but ours. Unable to get food or water for ourselves (we’d stored some water) we gathered what the local shelters were looking for and used precious gas to get there and deliver the items. Blankets, towels, toothpaste, shampoo………

That week we had to use the rest of our gas to get to the airport to spend a week at hospice with my mother. Every time I saw a gas pump I wanted to turn in but we had a full tank in that state and not at home. Do what you can. Be willing and able to make a difference.

As to others, inability is not an issue. Ability and unwillingness to address a situation is intolerable. I’ve been bullied, unfairly judged, sexually harassed and merely tolerated by loved ones.  I forgive them for their errors and hope they forgive me for mine.

Willingness to address whatever situation is important to you is another matter. It usually appears when you have a problem and no-one will help solve it. It takes gumption, chutzpah, and a willingness to get your problem solved despite the ones unwilling to do so.

I didn’t know that years ago. I thought politicians were champions of the people and that lawyers and doctors were knights on white horses. For a while I wanted to go to law school, and chose not to do so. Dad always said I should be a politician but nothing about that or law school appeals to me. The law is another matter that I cherish.

Today I see people who know they have the power to do something but do not do so because of unwillingness to do the right thing or go against the grain. Usually they are concerned that  their power base will be undermined or career derailed.

These people don’t understand that there are folks in the world that only care about justice and fairness in the world. They don’t go to your pricey fundraisers but help neighbors and save the stray cat. They don’t get money from lobbyists and fight to make a fair wage to take care of the family.

I am willing and able to take on a challenge whether it be a lost dog or whatever the community needs from me.

Unwilling is not an option for me and should not be for anyone. Decide if you care for your family, community, life, liberty, freedom and do something positive to correct anything you are able to do. Pick up the phone. Cheers, Dee

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Business as Usual

Posted on September 21, 2013 | Leave a comment

No matter what party has the majority (today it’s Senate and President) in election years politicians of every stripe pick at any sores the opposition might have and try to drive the message home.

Unfortunately the Tea Party Republicans have nothing to do but try to de-fund their constituents from getting health care. I have worked in politics and do not now but I can say this is the equivalent of shooting oneself in the foot, politically.

In case I need to remind Congress, we live under a Constitution in a representative democracy.

For years I’ve never seen elected person representing or working for me or my neighbors, only for themselves to make them more powerful and have more money.

This Republican/Tea Party offensive to keep the elderly and poor and those with pre-existing conditions from buying health care is offensive and driven by insurance and health care lobbyists.

What is business as usual is that they use issues like this so they can bargain down and get pork barrel projects in the federal budget. This, and a supreme health care package for life, is what you elect Congress to do for their “constituents.” Oh no, we can’t get their health care package. We have to deal with what we get from employers, who are already cutting back.

Why don’t we all run against these guys and gals and get our own supreme health care package for life? Sounds like a plan to me. Enough. Dee

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Judy Garland

Posted on September 9, 2013 | Leave a comment

helped me get my first solo apartment.

I was up at four this morning, and turned on a documentary about Prop 8 in California and how the Mormon church in Utah drove that debate, spent $22 million dollars (divulging only $2,000 in in-kind gifts, to the IRS), bankrupted church members, and caused many young people to commit suicide.

It was heartbreaking what they did to strong-arm and fund a coalition to change the Constitution in another state that has nothing to do with Utah. The parents of one boy who killed himself wrote a book telling of how much at peace they were after he was gone. Ugh. I would never place any church hierarchy above my children.

Many years ago I hated my new roommate who moved in with me. She was always ironing and telling me how smart she was and how much smarter she was than all of us on staff. Plus she never changed the litter box, only stuck deodorant things on the wall, but said box was next to the frig. Ick. Eating there was a problem, even though I liked the cat, and going out was expensive.

Years later I had cats and dogs but no-one who ever entered my home ever knew it by smell because of two litter pans, unscented litter, scooping all the time and dumping, scrubbing and bleaching every 48 hours.

Regarding the incredibly offensive roommate, an appointment was made for a lovely small 1-bedroom a few doors away. The owner, a young man, met me on the sidewalk and said it had already been rented 15 minutes prior. I was desperate and desolate.

I asked to see it anyway to see what else was going for that rate and he agreed to spend ten minutes showing it to me. I walked in, it was immaculate and on the windowsill was an 8×10 of Judy Garland. I knew right then he was a “friend of Dorothy” and he asked where I worked (politics) and his father was the chief judge in the state and he said: you have the place. It’s yours. I’ll call the other prospective tenant and say it didn’t work out.

The next week I moved in with huge windows and sills, fold-in blinds that made cabinets, seven huge windows including one in the bath, and hexagonal tiles on the bathroom floor. It was freezing in the winter but I loved having freedom and privacy and no roommates!

There is nothing Judy Garland cannot do where rainbows are concerned. She and her friends have helped me often over the years and I like to think I return favors to friends and shared causes. Wishing you well, Dee

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Job Descriptions

Posted on September 5, 2013 | Leave a comment

In under ten words tell me your job description. Not that you’re an engineer or psychiatrist. Tell me, in a nugget, what you do.

This is conjecture so take it as such:

Thomas Jefferson: Assure freedom.

Ben Franklin: Where’s my key?

Eleanor Roosevelt: Human Rights Worldwide.

Rosa Parks: Equality.

MLK Jr.: I Have a Dream.

Gloria Steinem: I’m a Writer, Get Your Hand off that Tail.

Oprah Winfrey: Billionaire who makes careers, also drinks for fellow campers.

Phil McGraw: Oprah made me famous.

Rachael Ray: Te Hee

Jay Leno: I have cars.

David Letterman: I have attitude.

Julia Child: Bon Appetit!

Padma Lakshmi: Pack your knives and go.

Any James Bond: Shaken, not stirred.

The Godfather:  My father made him an offer he couldn’t refuse.

Tom Cruise: I feel the need…. the need for speed!

Han Solo: May the Force be with you.

Me? I would say: Change a life every day.

Age and wisdom can be dangerous things and should be used sparingly. This week I want to help kids on a school bus and next week it’ll be someone else. I’ve been bullied as a child and want to help the bullied kids survive and thrive. Figure out what you do in ten words or less and do it better now that you are focused on your future. Dee

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Names

Posted on August 20, 2013 | Leave a comment

Years ago I was staff to a committee with myriad responsibilities. It included everything from legislative ethics (an oxymoron) to veterans, cable television, Native American land claims, pre-ADA, fire codes, sexual orientation et al.

It was a huge committee and I was glad they brought in a Vietnam vet to create his own committee and take that off my back. No, not to take it off me but give veterans more due than I could with my work load. Thank you for your service to our country.

I was also responsible for flag law (raise the flag briskly and lower it ceremoniously) and for naming days of commemoration. We did not try to make these days into holidays, except for Martin Luther King Day when friends from the office drove to DC overnight and we heard Coretta Scott King speak and we all sang “Freedom” in the AME church.

Perusing that law this evening, it shows no bounds. I remember that over six of my years there we designated three: Haym Solomon for funding our Revolutionary War and gaining the USA independence; Raoul Wallenberg for his extraordinary efforts against Hitler’s world domination; and Taddeus Kosckiuzsko who made his mark in Poland and Belarus and came to us to save us during the Revolutionary war.

Many names save me every day, mentor me, try to hurt me or just make me strive to be better, but these names I had engraved in legislative whatever, so that they’re in the books but no one will know them. You can even look them up online now. Imagine that. Back in the day I had to write everything on paper and have it typed.

I hasten to say that during my years there were no women mentioned. Now there seem to be a few, including Susan B. Anthony, go girls! Dee

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Texting and Sexting

Posted on August 1, 2013 | Leave a comment

OK. I don’t text so certainly don’t do the other. I’d never take a sunrise or sunset photo from my phone though there are beautiful scenes.

Today, as a native New Yorker I question two candidates for office in New York City, a city I lived in briefly and visited from time to time. OK, my brother lives there and tons of my relatives are buried there.

One mayoral candidate seems to spend much of his time alone, taking photos of himself and sending them to women. Another is a client on a DC madam’s list.

Do voters really want to spend their tax dollars to fund these ambitions? It’s a big city, there’s a lot to do, and if these men only think about themselves they are wasting taxpayer dollars.

It’s gotten to the point that we all should run for office. With people thinking that only moneyed candidates will win what do we have to lose? Certainly not our self-esteem, our knowledge that this is a representative democracy and we will do our best for our people.

Sort of like sports figures, people we elect should be given certain deference, but only if they represent us fairly and keep us foremost in their minds.

I’ve tried to make a better world through politics and volunteerism. If elected against my will I will not serve. Perhaps I’ll not serve anyway, ’tis the Irish in me. Dee

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Men and Dogs

Posted on July 30, 2013 | Leave a comment

Last week my issue to solve was that of a utilities billing error that was rendered 100% in our favor and it didn’t cost us a cent, except 18 phone calls/emails and much research. That doesn’t cost a thing. I’m a wife so my time is not billable.

In this post in no way do I assume that men and dogs are incompatible. Certain dogs are bred in certain neighborhoods to scare people. Many other dogs are loving family companions and that is my goal.

We currently live in a tower. This evening, I was in the lobby taking my 31 lb. Australian Shepherd dog mix out for a walk. A group of people walked by, four couples. The men went to the other side of the lobby, the women came by my and another woman’s dog and said hello and one petted Zoe.

When we got outside they were awaiting transportation and I picked up Zoe, who would let a 2 year-old steal food from her bowl and just look up at me with sad eyes. The men recoiled, one woman petted her and asked her name, which is the same as her dog. One of the men said “She’s not like the dogs in my neighborhood.” He reached out and petted her back while I was holding her.

This is only part perception, mostly reality. If Maddie’s Fund and ASPCA and the Humane Society want to really stop animal abuse and irresponsible breeding and dog fighting rings our human culture must change. Not just for the dogs, for the people. Just as our business model is, you do what you do to go out of business and have people fend for themselves.

Twenty years ago one of the first programs to shelter dogs from abuse was a beacon to me as a behaviorist and humanitarian (petarian?) as they took in animals and held them without threat of euthanasia where the spouse/children were abused and in an anonymous shelter. They knew that abusers start on small things (pets) and graduate to children and spouses.

I would go a step further and allow families in domestic violence shelters to keep their dog or cat or fish as a symbol of family stability during a crisis. In hurricane Katrina no pets were allowed to be saved and even the inept government rescue agencies have changed that policy, so should domestic violence shelters.

Getting the abusers off the streets is paramount, but education is the key. One does not need to breed aggressive dogs to fight each other or attack humans in order to gain dominance in society.

How can we do it? Unless I was Mother Teresa (I’m not) as an old white lady there’s no way I can go into gang neighborhoods. As an engineer my husband does not like top-down solutions and would rather create from the ground up.

That’s how this must be done. I once read a story of a gang neighborhood with regular drive-by shootings into homes. The ladies installed speakers and played opera music very loudly and the gangsters left. If I could find these ladies, we’d have a solution today. Cheers, let’s hear your solutions, Dee

ps Yes stop drugs, gangs, cock fighting, dog fights, animal abuse, child abuse, spousal abuse on a continuum. If we don’t nip it in the bud, we end up with people who hold girls for years aka A. Castro. Up the ante in jail time for animal abusers and you’ll have your people abusers at bay. Case closed.

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