[Newspoetry] Bit-partisan

[DL Emerick]

Pelosi speaks of the times = http://www.truthout.org/022009R.
I'm no Pelosi fan, for many reasons  -- but she's a better Speaker than her
predecessor.

Speakers in my life time (1948+):
Joe Martin and Sam Rayburn
John McCormack, Carl Albert and Tip O'Neill
Jim Wright and Tom Foley
Newt Gingrich and Dennis Hastert
Nancy Pelosi

Ms. Pelosi opines that she is Speaker of the whole House.
A strange idea, that.

No one ever doubted that every previous Speaker spoke and acted for the
Majority Party -
Not Sam or Joe, John Carl and Tip, Jim and Tom, Newt nor Dennis.

Indeed, Wikipedia says just that: "the Speaker of the House is a position of
leadership in the majority party and actively works to set that party's
legislative agenda."
See
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speaker_of_the_United_States_House_of_Represent
atives.

Yeah, I know that P Obama calls for an end to the era of bitterly divisive
partisanship --
But, truly speaking, that has to do with the modality of partisanship --
We don't need hyper-accusations from polemic people like Ann Coulter,
Amplifying the distortions in Phyllis Schlafly's haranguings (A Choice, Not
an Echo),
or those of Joseph A Stormer (None Dare Call It Treason).

But, what do we do to counter such distortional hyper-nonsense?

Do we pretend that we are not of different opinions about how the world
should be governed?
We most certainly do disagree -- and partisanship is proper on that basis.

Only rarely is national unity necessary to the nation.

The question is, is this one of those times?
P Obama thinks so.  I do not.
Yes, the nation (or the world) is in extremely dire financial straits.

But, all this was caused by the most contemptible government we have had,
In decades and centuries.

What was contemptible was the neo-con ideology of naked greed, avarice and
lust,
Deployed in Christian rag-tag gatherings,
where chumps, marks, suckers -- all the usual snake-oil victims -- were
fleeced.

America was bankrupted by Thieves in High Places (Jim Hightower book).

Strangely, more partisanship, not less, is the cure for bitter divisiveness
--
So I believe.

When the GoP is reduced to one seat in each House of the Congress,
I shall still think their current brand of false Conservatism is
over-represented --
for they refuse to learn from the last two elections -- or to look at the
facts --
Of how badly their party governed America these last 8+ years.

They have served America badly:
Wasted US national security assets in pointless wars,
Lessened American influence in the world,
Tortured some, bombed many, in reckless Jingo adventures,
Borrowed fortunes from abroad and promoted trade imbalances,
Destroyed the American economy and its financial institutions,
Catered to every greedy schemer for external diseconomies,
Furthering the wreck of the environment and global climate --
Devaluing the quality of living enjoyed by the people.

And, now, the day of reckoning is upon us.

Less partisanship?
No, this should be the era of a new accountability --
Let us continue to make clear to the American people this fact:
they have been poorly served, without exception by the GoP --
who used the honorable mask of conservatism to advance their naked greed.

There is and always shall be room for true conservatism in the world,
And in American politics, too ---
Indeed, in my extreme libertarianism, I am truly a conservative --
For I believe in the great Freedoms, those in the Bill of Rights, for
instance,
The ones that GW Bush so airily and emptily promised and promoted, and
totally disserved.

But, none would know this, as long as the regnant conservatism defrauds us
--
And tells us its lies, dragging the good name of conservatism into the
gutter,
By demagoguery and other popular deceits.

Pelosi needs to get with the times -- to denounce wrongful kinds of
partisanship,
And to announce standards for what might be rightful ones --
But, most of all, she needs to grasp that she leads the Majority, thus only
leading the House.

In Britain, I might note, getting the Opposition on Board
would be regarded as just plain silly stuff, stuff that twits might pursue.

The American people would prefer the expression of honest differences ---
And that requires all good Republicans to ask themselves,
What is it that the people want and what is it that Government should do?
If the GoP answer is "nothing", as in the past, may they never hold office
again.