Senator Kennedy

The passing of Senator Kennedy saddens me, as does the death of anyone; but his death touches me especially, because I think he overcame much tragedy in his life, while his work and accomplishments are intimately linked in my mind with great social events.

A few short years before his brother, John F., became president, the Supreme Court ruled that separate, but equal, social facilities, were anything but equal, and were illegal. This judgment was responsible for the unleashing of a popular groundswell to make the judgment a fact of life. Citizens lost their lives directly because of these efforts, and who is to say whether the assassinations of John F. and Robert F. Kennedy, as well as of Martin Luther King, were not linked to their work for social equality.

Senator Edward Kennedy's eforts were embedded in a notably successful, life-long Senate career devoted to the well-being of society, and especially of those within it who were unable to make their voices and needs known.

When President Kennedy, and everyone else working for justice has died during my lifetime, I have been saddened, not only for the loss of them personally, but because they had not accomplished their goals. It is only now, when I see President Obama in a position to carry the work of all of his predecessors forward, that I realise none of them have failed. The process is an ongoing one, and I thnk we are making remarkable progress, because of the standards these men have set before us.

Afghanistan

I listened yesterday to news reporting on the Afghanistan presidential elections, and I thought of the national structures there which appear to me to be corrupt, to a greater or lesser extent. It made me think of an article, written by a Frenchman, I think, three or four years ago, which seemed to me to make a lot of sense, in which he suggested that the effort in Aghanistan should be geared to promoting traditional agriculture.

He explained that the country's true economic base is agriculture. The problem is that Afghanistan also has the capacity to grow enormous quantities of 'recreational' drugs, ninety percent of the demand for cocaine and heroine, I think. The war-lords need the drug money in order to maintain their private armies, and there are no doubt many others who profit handsomely from the drug proceeds. The British were, once upon a time, smart enough to know where the value of force ended, and The Russians, very recently, admitted defeat in Afghanistan. Now America is spearheading a war effort costing billions, and many innocent lives, even with their recent history in Iraq and Vietnam

Is it impossible to conceive of an attempt to introduce an agricultural alternative to cultivating drugs? It would have to be piecemeal, I understand, and would require military protection. The concept makes sense to me.

Hooray for Obama!

There is an intriguing battle being waged in America just now. There are no bodies in the streets, nor are there cities blighted by bombing. President Obama is fighting to provide health care for everyone in the United States, where 50 million people do not have such protection, although there is a similar amount of money spent each year on medical care as Great Britain's total annual gross national product. The amazing thing is that the President is already fighting other major wars, some, such as his determination to bring peace to the Middle East,which others have quietly stepped around, just as they have with health care.

The problem is essentially very simple. Many of the people who have health care protection do not want to help others acquire it, because they will have to contribute to the cost. As the President points out; neither he, nor members of Congress need a national plan: they already have an exceptionally good plan. The people who do not have protection are those whom President Obama has championed as his special constituency: those who are too poor to make their voices known, but to whom the President is striving to give a voice.

The people who will decide whether there is a plan, and what it will be, are the members of congress, representatives and senators. Representative have to seek re-election every two years, and senators every six years, so that all the members of the House will be up for re-election next year, as well as one third of the senators. Elections in America are expensive, and one source of funds is the lobbyists who represent clients with an axe to grind, and there are many who feel that Presiedent Obama's plan will mean that they make less money. The representatives and senators do not represent homogeneous districts. Some representatives come from affluent districts, whose voters worry about laws which will cost them more money. Even senators have such problems, if they represent states which do not have significant percentages of under-priviledged voters.

My hat goes off to this man who could have had a very comfortable and successful life, but chose to fight for the opportunity to help, not just in one area, but everywhere he thought he might make a difference.