Vote Erik Williams For Amarillo City Commission

I have not lived in Amarillo for long, but I am really starting to like living here. In that spirit, I wish to endorse Erik Williams for City Commissioner - Place 4. I doubt if enough Amarillo residents read this site to be any real help to Erik in the upcoming May 12th election, but I've never been known to let little things like that stop me.

One of the main reasons I'm supporting Erik Williams, other than the fact that I've met him and like him a lot, is the fact that he supports the single-member district concept for the City Commission. I must admit that I was rather shocked to find that Amarillo does not have single-member districts. This is a concept that has already been established in most cities of Amarillo's size (and larger). Single-member districts are the only way to assure that all parts of a large city receive equal treatment.

Here is what my candidate, Erik Williams has to say on the subject:

Single Member Districts are the future of political representation for our city. We need a modern system of citizen participation in government, one that recognizes a century of growth and diversification in our community’s population. Representation by a member from our own district is a fundamental organizing principle of republican government.

The defeat of single member districts at the ballot box did not happen because most of Amarillo wanted it defeated. Most of Amarillo does want single member districts. Only one area of Amarillo seems to want to keep things as they are, and having managed to turn out more voters, has told the rest of Amarillo how it will elect its commissioners.

The system may not be broken but it is starting to break, and that has been recognized by some. I believe Mayor Debra McCartt has done well moving the commission from its chambers to its meetings out in the community. But personalities alone cannot solve the problem inherent in a century-old institution. In time the easy path will lead them back to council chambers and the historic neglect of our neighborhoods.

We are often reminded of how important it is that only someone from our region can represent the interests of the Panhandle in Austin or Washington, not someone from across the state in Houston or across the country in Oregon. Yet we are told someone from well across town can represent our neighborhood. It only takes a phone call. But isn’t it just as easy to call someone living in Houston or Oregon?

Our commissioners cannot just represent the few who contribute or vote. In a democracy the interests of the many must be considered. We should have commissioners in our own neighborhoods that can assure us of direct and fair representation.

Other issues supported by Erik Williams are the revitalization of the downtown area, and the modernization of vital city services. If you also believe in fair representation and a vital and growing Amarillo, I urge you to consider voting for Erik Williams on May 12th. For more information, drop by and visit his website.

Water Bill Leaves Out Worst Offenders

Last year, water use became a serious issue in Parker and several other North Texas counties, when it was learned that ground water levels are dropping in the Trinity and Pawluxy aquifers. It has gotten so bad that some residents are reporting that their water wells are drying up.

The Texas Commission on Enviornmental Quality thinks the issue is critical enough that they recently included Parker county in a "priority" area with 13 other counties. They threatened state action if the counties didn't create water districts to regulate water use.

Phil King, the Republican representative from Parker county, has taken action - sort of. He is sponsoring a bill to create a water district that would include Parker, Wise, Montague and Hood counties. This would be a step in the right direction if it didn't exclude some of the worst water use offenders from regulation.

Under King's proposal, the oil & gas industry could continue to waste millions of gallons of ground water while the residents and other businesses in these counties would be subject to water use regulations. It shows how powerful the oil & gas industry is in Texas. King's legislative aide, Clinton Quisenberry, said the measure would not pass in the legislature if oil & gas interests were included in the water monitoring.

This is a serious matter. Many parts of Texas are starting to experience water problems, and with the greenhouse effect starting to cause global climactic changes, the problem will only get worse. According to the U.N. report released yesterday, Texas will be subject to increasingly hotter summers, with longer & more severe droughts.

With the rapid growth of business and population, it will not be long before Texas as a whole faces a critical water shortage. Sadly, our Republican state government, having sold out to the oil & gas industry and other corporate interests, is doing little to solve the water problems of our state.

We must find new sources of water. But we must also regulate the use of the water we currently have. Allowing corporate interests of any kind to waste our precious water resources, while regulating the water use of citizens and small businesses, cannot be tolerated.

EVERYONE should be subject to water regulation, including the oil & gas industry.

12,000 More Troops To Be Sent To Iraq

It looks like the "troop surge" of over 21,000 new troops sent to Iraq is not working out as Bush told us it would. He had told us that these extra troops would only be needed for a few months, and would allow him to control the violence in and around Baghdad. He was wrong on both counts.

The violence in the sectarian Iraqi civil war is nowhere near being under control, even though Republicans are doing everything they can to create the illusion that it is. Recently John McCain went to Baghdad and did a photo-op in the market area, supposedly to show how safe the area really was.

But they didn't tell us the truth about McCain's photo-op propaganda. The truth is that before McCain went to the market, the area was flooded with American troops. These troops created an artificial "safe zone" for McCain. Merchants in the marketplace said this was nothing like normal conditions in the market. It's sad that McCain, who was once known as a straight-shooter, is now just another Republican liar and Bush apologist.

Things have not gotten better in Iraq. People still die every day, including American troops. Defense Secretary Gates recently warned that putting limits on Bush's war could lead to "ethnic cleansing". Who's he trying to fool? The ethnic cleansing has been going on for quite a while now, and we are powerless to prevent it.

Now, we learn that the temporary troop surge is becoming permanent. NBC News has recently learned that the Bush administration is planning to send another 12,000 National Guard troops to Iraq in 2008, in order to bolster the troop surge that was supposed to end sometime this summer.

Is it any wonder that 70% of the American people now oppose Bush's war? Bush lied to get us into the war, and has continued to lie about it since then. Isn't it time to act in defense of our own soldiers and get them out of the middle of this civil war?

It has long-since become clear that we cannot impose our wishes on Iraq through military power, even if we had the right to do so (which we don't). The Iraqis must find their own solution, and it will probably be bloody - civil wars usually are. But keeping our troops in the line of fire between the opposing factions, can accomplish nothing except to delay the inevitable.

The only sane course of action is to bring our troops home now. Not next year, NOW!

More Religious Nonsense In Texas Legislature

Evidently some Texas legislators think they were elected to further their own religious beliefs. Yesterday, we discussed the ridiculous idea of Rep. Chisum to force Texas schools to teach a course on the Bible. Today we learn of another instance where a legislator want to force her own religious beliefs on Texans.

Rep. Debbie Riddle (R-Tomball) wants to pass a law that would put the phrase "state under God" into the Texas pledge. That would make the pledge read:

Honor the Texas flag; I pledge allegiance to thee, Texas, one state under God and indivisible.

State law has required Texas students to say the U.S. and Texas pledges in school since 2003. I don't have a problem with having students say the pledge as it currently stands. It's kind of a silly sounding pledge, but it doesn't hurt to have the students pledge allegiance to the state in which they live.

However, I do have a big problem with Rep. Riddle interjecting her religion into the pledge, and then requiring students to recite it. Texas students should not be forced to pledge allegiance to any God, christian or otherwise - but that's exactly what the revised pledge would entail.

And don't even bother telling me that students could opt out of the pledge with a note from their parents. A family tried that in Lewisville, and it resulted in their son's suspension from school. This is really ridiculous. We send our children to school to get a secular education, and not to have some religious bigot force her own weird religion on them. If you want your child to be taught religion in school, send them to a religious school, but don't force your religion on others.

One commenter said since he was muslim, he would have to substitute Allah for God in the pledge. That opens up a real can of worms. If that substitution is OK, can a satanist substitute the word Satan? Can a hindu substitute Krishna? You can see the problem that would ensue.

As the pledge currently stands, all students (with the exception of adventists) can say the pledge without compromising their own beliefs. But after Riddle makes the pledge a christian one rather than a Texas one, there will be many who could not in good conscience take the pledge.

Doesn't it make more sense to have a pledge for everyone, rather than just a pledge for christians? I realize that christians are a majority in Texas, but this should not give them the right to force their beliefs on others. In a free country, all citizens should be free to practice whatever religion (or lack of religion) they feel is appropriate.

The state of Texas, and our schools, should not be in the religion business.

The Bible Is Not A Textbook !

Sometimes I wonder if Rep. Warren Chisum (R-Pampa) has any brain function at all. The bills he introduces certainly don't show any evidence of it.

Chisum has now authored a bill that would mandate school systems to offer an elective course on the Bible. Chisum said the course would be taught "from a secular point of view", would need no books other than the Bible, and the teachers would need no training. What a bad idea!

First, just who's "secular" point of view is the course to be taught from. I seriously doubt he would want it taught from the secular point of view of an atheist, showing the Bible as an evil force that has caused much bloodshed and hindered the progress of mankind for centuries. But his bill as it is written would allow just that, along with a thousand other interpretations.

Surely he doesn't think that everyone believes in his own interpretation of the Bible. The huge number of different sects of christianity shows that the Bible can be twisted to justify thousands of differing beliefs.

While Chisum's bill would mandate the book be taught from a secular point of view, it is obvious that an untrained teacher would be poorly prepared to do that. Instead, they would teach it from their own, very probably religious, point of view. This would be guaranteed to irritate parents in nearly every school district, and probably produce a rash of lawsuits.

John Ferguson, a Howard Payne constitutional scholar and Baptist minister, gets it right when he says, "Without the training, without the financial support they need (for training), school districts across Texas are going to be riddled with lawsuits. Everyone would rather you spend your money on textbooks and teachers rather than attorneys and court fees."

School boards are doing a poor enough job of educating our youngsters without throwing lawsuits and religious roadblocks in their path. We need to concentrate on teaching secular subjects like math, science, geography, literature, history and political science. Leave the religious instruction to families and the religious institution of their choice.

Chisum needs to start thinking these bills through before offering them up. He was not elected to shove his own religious views on his fellow Texans. He is free to practice any religion he likes, but he needs to keep his religious beliefs out of our schools.

U.S. Supreme Court Denies Human Rights

In a 6-3 decision, the United States Supreme Court has said it will not rule on the constitutionality of the anti-terrorism law that allows Bush to incarcerate prisoners indefinitely and without a trial at Guantanamo.

The court says these 385 prisoners, most of whom have been imprisoned and tortured for over five years, do NOT have the right to appeal their imprisonment in the U.S. court system. What was the legal reasoning behind this denial of basic human rights? It was pretty flimsy in my opinion.

The Court said they did not have juristiction because Guantanamo was not U.S. soil. That's an odd statement, because all other embassy and military bases everywhere in the world are considered U.S. soil as long as they are occupied and controlled by the United States. What makes Guantanamo so different?

There is only one thing that makes Guantanamo different. It's because Bush and Cheney have decided they don't want these 385 human beings to have any rights. In the over 5 years of illegal imprisonment and torture, there has been only one trial. Last week, Australian David Hicks pled guilty after realizing that was the only way he would ever get to leave. He received a 9 month sentence to be served in Australia.

This is the very definition of denial of human rights. If we have evidence of the guilt of these 385, we should give them a fair trial. If we don't, we should release them.

As for Guantanamo not being U.S. soil - whose soil is it? Is it Cuba's? If so, that would make the 385 prisoners subject to the court system of Cuba (and the U.S. military should evacuate Cuba's soil. I can assure you that would make Cuba very happy.) But it is not Cuban soil, and Bush will not allow Cuban courts to intervene.

That is because as long as we have a base there, it is really considered U.S. soil. Bush knows it, and so does the Supreme Court. They just needed some excuse, however flimsy, to deny basic human rights to the 385.

The rest of the world is watching, and it is becoming obvious to them that the United States has turned its back on the Constitution and basic human rights. Why should anyone trust us after this?

I'm not trying to defend the actions of the prisoners. Some of them are pretty bad people. But EVERYONE deserves a fair trial! That is a basic tenet of a free country. If your government can deny a fair trial to ANYONE, then you don't live in a free country.

Our forefathers knew this - that's why they gave us a Constitution and a Bill of Rights. But Bush doesn't care as long as he gets his own way. However, the Supreme Court should know better.

This is a shameful day for America - the day the Supreme Court stopped believing in basic human rights.

The picture above is courtesy of Mask of Anarchy.

Is Iran Daring U.S. To Attack ?

The other night on the Daily Show, John Stewart did a very funny aside to the rulers of Iran. He asked them if they knew what they were doing, and reminded them that while we may not be very good at "nation-building", we are the very best at "nation-destroying".

One of the reasons the piece was so funny is because it contained a lot of truth. Bush has been an abject failure at building a new democracy in Iraq, but we completely destroyed the country in record time. We truly are the world's best at doing that.

It's no secret to anyone that Bush and his White House henchmen would like nothing better than to unleash our destructive capabilities on Iran. He has already sent several carrier groups to that part of the world. He also has Pentagon plans already drawn up for an attack on Iran.

The only thing that has made him pause in his plans for an attack on Iran, is the overwhelming unpopularity of his war in Iraq. That's why I must question just what the leaders in Iran think they are doing. Are they daring the United States and Great Britain to attack?

The taking of British hostages and parading them before the world, even trying to use them for propaganda purposes, seems designed to provoke Great Britain. Are Iran's leaders completely insane or just suicidal? After seeing Iraq totally destroyed, do they still not understand the destructive terror that Bush and Blair could unleash?

It has been hard enough to keep Bush from attacking Iran. Now it may be impossible to stop it. Now Bush can claim he is just defending our "best" ally - Great Britain.

We are closer than ever to a war with Iran. They must release the hostages immediately, or prepare to be bombed back to the stone-age.

It might already be too late.

Electric Companies Should be Consumer Owned

For years now, we have heard conservatives tell us how much better the private sector can do at providing services than the government can do. They have tried turning over many government functions to private concerns, and most of the time these are disasters which wind up costing ordinary citizens even more.

They tried it with the Department of Human Services here in Texas, and we wound up with a mess that we're still trying to solve. We were also told a few years ago that electric deregulation would show how efficient the private sector was and would result in lower prices for consumers. This was nothing but a huge lie told by Republicans so they could funnel windfall profits to their corporate buddies!

Anyone who really thought deregulation through could have seen it for the lie it really was, but the Republicans were smooth talkers and were able to convince most people that black is really white. Now there is proof of the lie.

The private companies who were deregulated here in Texas are now charging some of the highest electric rates in the nation. Meanwhile, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram tells us that government and consumer owned electric companies are charging significantly less for the electricity they deliver. These companies were not deregulated because they are not "for-profit" companies.

Let's look at some prices being charged consumers. TXU is charging its customers 13.8 cents a kilowatt-hour (kwh). But the consumers in Denton, which has a municipally-owned power company, are paying only 8.6 to 9.7 cents per kwh (depending on the times of year). The average of 6 North Texas co-operatives and municipally owned plants was 10.2 cents per kwh, and none of them came close to the rates charged by the private companies.

Why are the 150 municipal and co-operative power providers charging their 6 million customers less than the private companies? It's pretty simple. They don't have to turn a profit - they just have to cover their costs (and those costs don't include multi-million dollar salaries, thousand dollar-a-night hotel rooms, or private jets).

It's pretty clear that deregulation of private electric providers has not worked. In fact, consumers get the best deal when they are the owners - whether through their government or through a co-operative.

This is one of those functions that could probably be done better by government. You need only look at the deregulation in Texas to see that the private corporations will squeeze every nickel they can out of their consumers. At the very least, we must re-impose regulation on the private electric companies. They have proven they cannot be trusted with deregulation.

The private sector doesn't do it better, thay only charge more to do it.

In Honor Of Cesar Chavez

We at jobsanger would like to pay tribute today to a great American - Cesar Chavez. He spent his life sticking up for the poor and downtrodden. He gave power and dignity to victims of discrimination. He is a true hero.

What The Hell Happened In Atmos Energy Case ?

When are Texans going to get tired of being screwed by the Republicans in our state government? This time it's the Texas Railroad Commission (TRC) doing the screwing.

Not long ago, the TRC's own hearing examiners found that Atmos Energy was trying to pass on expenses such as $800-900 hotel rooms, limo rides, cases of expensive wine and high-dollar meals at resturants, to their customers by using a fee tacked on to their gas bills. The fee was supposed to be used for new construction (and only for that purpose).

But I guess if you've got Republican buddies elected to the TRC, then you can break all the rules you want to and get away with it. The hearing examiners had recommended that Atmos be forced to cut their rates by $23 million to compensate for their misuse of fees. Instead, the TRC is allowing Atmos to raise its rates by $10 million. The new higher rates will begin in April.

But the bad news for Texans doesn't stop there. In addition to letting Atmos abuse its customers, the TRC has voted to shift more of the burden onto residential and commercial customers, and give the huge industrial users a break. This means that while you and I will pay more for our gas, industrial users will be paying significantly less.

I guess this shouldn't surprise any of us. Republicans have been stealing from ordinary Texans and funneling the money to the large corporations for years. This is just Republican business as usual.

But it does bring up this question. Why are they doing this? I can only think of two possible reasons - they are either incredibly stupid or they have been paid off. I don't think they're that stupid.

Gates Says Guantanamo Should Be Closed

It looks like some in the Bush administration may finally be figuring out what a public relations disaster the torture facility and illegal prison at Guantanamo Bay really is. Defense Secretary Robert Gates is now calling for Guantanamo to be closed.

But don't confuse his call for "Gitmo" to be closed with any desire for justice or fair play. He just realizes that the facility's existence is stark proof to the rest of the world that the United States does not believe in justice for anyone who is not an American.

Gates thinks that if the facility was closed down, we could go on mistreating people and no one would be the wiser. He obviously thinks the leaders of other nations are as stupid as he and his boss. He wants to destroy the symbol and continue the injustice. He says at least 100 of the prisoners would need to be incarcerated "forever".

He's even gone so far as to say Congress needs to pass a new law to "address the concerns about some of these people who really need to be incarcerated forever, but that doesn't get them involved in a judicial system where there is the potential of them being released."

How much clearer could he be? He wants Congress to pass a law that would deny any kind of fair trial to these people. Evidently, he thinks that even the rigged military tribunals are not unfair enough.

Didn't we stage a revolution in the late 1700's because we were not being treated fairly by the British government? What would Jefferson, Washington and the other founding fathers think of passing a law specifically to deny a fair trial to anyone? I think they would be shocked at the unfairness of the Bush administration! I think they would use words like "scandalous", "traitorous" and "unconstitutional".

Our forefathers understood that if you can deny a fair trial to anyone, then you can do it to everyone. They established our system of justice because they believed that even the most villainous among us deserved a fair trial. Now Bush and his henchmen are doing their best to destroy that system of justice.

Closing Guantanamo will not make the world think we are wonderful (even though it does need to be closed). They will still judge us by how we treat our enemies. The rest of the world is well aware that if we mistreat these prisoners now, we could do it to them tomorrow.

By the way, Guantanamo now holds about 385 prisoners. If only about 100 are truly dangerous to us, why are we still holding the other 285?

Democrats & Republicans Both Wrong On Iraq

A couple of days ago Senate Democrats followed the lead of House Democrats and placed a date to get out of Iraq into a military funding bill. Now they're busy patting themselves on the back for "opposing" the war. What a joke!

What they did was vote to continue the war for another year! I suppose when that year is up, they'll vote to continue it to another deadline. This is not opposition to the Iraq war. It's just a wimpy version of the Bush policy.

I hate to agree with Senator McCain, but he's right when he's says if you really want to oppose the war, why continue it for another year - get out now.

Personally, I was hoping the Democrats would show some real courage, and stop the war now. What do they hope to accomplish by letting it drag on for another year? Do they really think things will be better a year from now? Do they really think the current Iraqi government will survive if we continue the killing for another year?

The current government in Iraq was installed by us, and won't last a minute longer than when our troops pull out. And don't even try to tell me how it was a free and open election. You don't have a free and open election when all candidates must be approved by an occupying power. The Iraqis will dump this government as soon as we leave, and install a government of their own choosing. This will happen whether we leave tomorrow, a year from now, or ten years from now.

The Democrats know things won't be better a year from now. They have simply joined the Republicans in playing politics with innocent lives. Both of them are wrong, because both would allow the killing to continue even though they know it will accomplish nothing.

There is only one sane option - pull our troops out now. Get them out of the middle of this civil war, and let the Iraqis determine their own future.

Gay Foster Parent Ban Defeated

Sometimes the victories for equal rights come from the places we thought least likely. Today, the state of Arkansas struck a blow for freedom and equal rights.

Don't get me wrong, I love the state of Arkansas. I went to school there for three years, and I believe it to be one of the most beautiful states in the U.S. But you have to admit, it has not exactly been a leader in the fight for equal rights for homosexuals - until today.

In 1999, the Arkansas Child Welfare Board instituted a ban on Gays becoming foster parents. It was a sad day for children in Arkansas who desperately needed decent foster care. Evidently, the idiots on the Board believed homosexuality was contagious, and could be passed from parent to child. They never bothered to see the many heterosexual parents who raised children who turned out to be Gay, and the many homosexual parents who raised children who turned out not to be Gay.

Last year, the Arkansas Supreme Court struck down the ban on Gay foster parents. They said the Board had no right to impose such a ban through regulation.

This year, a right-wing nut-job in the Arkansas Senate sought to reimpose the ban through legislation. His bill even went further. He wanted to ban both Gays and unmarried heterosexuals from being foster parents or adopting needy children. He thought it was better for children to do without a loving set of parents, if those parents didn't live up to his own weird religious views.

But today that nut-job, Republican Senator Shawn Womack, seems to have lost his bid to legislate inequality. Although the bill had passed the Senate, it could not get out of the House Judiciary Committee. Not a single member of the Committee would move for its passage, and later they killed the bill on a voice vote.

The Committee members were skeptical over how the ban would be enforced and over how an applicant's sexual orientation would be determined. The governor was clearer - he believes the bill was not constitutional.

Devon Bearden, 15, testified before the Committee (about being raised by her lesbian grandmother). She told them, "I've lived in both types of homes, one with a mother and a father and one with my nana, and in my experience the best one was the one with my nana. I think the home a child goes into should be based on who can best take care of the child." This 15 year-old seems to be smarter than a majority of the Arkansas Senate.

Thank goodness for the Arkansas House Judiciary Committee, as their actions not only struck a blow for the good of Arkansas' needy children, but for the equality of all Americans.

Amarillo Has It's Share Of Nuts

As you may know, my family and I just moved to Amarillo a couple of months ago. I like the city a lot so far, but I'm beginning to learn that Amarillo has it's share of nuts just like most places. All you have to do is read today's edition of the Amarillo Globe News to learn this.

The first story concerns a man who shot himself accidentally with his own shotgun. He shot himself in the thigh. It seems that he had tucked a sawed-off 12-guage shotgun into his waistband, and it went off. You have to be a nut to tuck a loaded 12-guage into your waistband!

The second story concerns a would-be robber who got more than he bargained for when he tried to rob a dry-cleaning establishment at gunpoint. Evidently, he thought the dry-cleaners would be easy pickings. He was wrong. He was attacked by customers and employees, who grabbed not only the gun, but anything else they could get their hands on - including his shoes, shirt, pants and underwear. When he got loose and ran from the establishment, he left his gun and all his clothes behind, running outside butt-naked and jumped into his car. Serves him right! Maybe he should find a new line of work - he's not very good at this one.