A societal change in sensibilities needed w/ regard to cannabis use?

Learning about a lawsuit pending against a northwest suburban school district brings up beliefs with regards to marijuana that make me question the line of logic followed by those who seriously talk about “Mak(ing) America Great Again.”

For I have no doubt that many of those who follow the Donald Trump mantra are among those who are mocking a lawsuit against Schaumburg School District 54 (and the state of Illinois) in which parents are upset school officials won’t permit their 11-year-old daughter to use the marijuana prescribed for her by a doctor.

THE GIRL IN question suffers from leukemia, and chemotherapy treatment resulted in the girl suffering from epileptic seizures.

Which is what led a doctor to prescribe the drug that some people of an ideological bent are determined to think of as some sort of “hippie freak” drug leading our society all astray.

In this case, the girl is to receive her cannabis treatment through a patch on her foot. When the patch’s dose of THC is inadequate to control her seizures, she gets cannabis oil drops containing THC on her tongue or her wrists.

Except that school officials, citing Illinois law, say they can’t administer such a drug to her, even if she has a medical prescription. I suspect it’s like many other regulations concerning distribution of medication to students on school grounds – school officials most likely don’t want to be bothered.

SO THE END result, according to the Chicago Tribune, is that there are times when the girl in question is incapable of attending class. The lawsuit contends that if something doesn’t change in the school district’s attitude, she won’t be able to continue her education.

A drop-out, at age 11! Not a pretty image.

Which the parents contend in their lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Chicago, puts the state in violation of laws where children are required to attend school through their teenage years.

So what should we do? Just what should we do!

READING THE ANONYMOUS types who like to express themselves on the Internet on any issue, regardless of whether they have anything sensible to say or not, I stumbled onto too many people who want to write off this case as another frivolous lawsuit.

Parents reckless enough to want their child to get a jolt of THC – the substance in marijuana that creates the high sensation that some people find rather pleasing (or mind-deadening).

Personally, I think it’s the latter, and a part of me doesn’t understand recreational use of the drug for that reason. I always want to be in full control of my faculties.

But this has nothing to do with recreational use. It’s about a medical use, even though I know some people’s political leanings make them want to believe there is no such use as a medical use for marijuana.

THEY’RE THE ONES who want to throw up obstacles toward the drug’s use for legitimate relief. They’re the ones who want to have the authority to ignore a doctor’s prescription.

I suppose that in their own warped minds, they want to believe that allowing use of these THC-laced patches or drops somehow sets a precedent for teenagers at the high school to be able to go “smokin’ in the boy’s room” (remember Brownsville Station?) in between classes.

Which really is nothing more than putting politics ahead of medicine. Ideology ahead of sense! If this is the idea of making America “great” again, then it truly comes across as nonsensical.

Here’s hoping the federal courts issue the injunction that would allow a school employee to store the medication on school property (in ways so that others can’t get to it for their own personal use). And that the appeals courts don’t feel the need to meddle on the issue.

  -30-

‘Twas a sad, sad day; can we just hide under the covers for a little bit longer?

President Donald J. Trump has given us the first federal budget proposal of his term, and it truly is sad.

 

TRUMP: Our source of national gloom and doom

To come up with more military spending (maybe he really wants to be a “wartime” president because he figures that’s the only way the country will unite behind him) out of the $1.1 trillion available, he has made many cuts – particularly to anything related to the environment.

SUCH AS THE demolition of the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative – a project whose purpose is to preserve the continued use of Lake Michigan and its sister Great Lakes as the largest fresh water system in the world.

Then again, maybe the Trumpites are figuring the Great Lakes are already gone, on account of those dreaded Asian Carp being on the verge of entering the lakes and mucking up its natural ecosystem.

There also were the cuts to the National Endowment of the Arts and the National Endowment of the Humanities – although conservative ideologues whose idea of “art” doesn’t extend beyond a painting of yellow daisies have been ranting on this area for so long it would have been a miracle if Trump hadn’t done something silly.

As a Washington Post report contended, the $54 billion proposed increase in defense spending for federal fiscal 2018 could have funded both arts agencies for the next 183 years. Or perhaps kept a few more of the 2.4 million elderly individuals who have to rely on Meals on Wheels workers to bring them food because they can't really cook for themselves any longer. While Chicago-area educators could be heard grousing about the 18 percent cut in funding for federal education programs -- which when combined with the delays due to a lack of a state budget will result in some serious funding issues for public schools.

NOT THAT THIS was the only negative news we had to endure Thursday.

 

MADIGAN: Telling us how bad healthcare is

Down in Springfield, an Illinois House appropriations subcommittee held hearings whose purpose was to tell us just how much the Trump-inspired American Health Care Act will wind up costing Illinois and harming our residents.

Many of whom are able to get medical coverage under the Affordable Care Act but that Republicans are all eager to repeal because, after all, it was the idea of the former president, Barack Obama.

A plan whose fate in Congress is uncertain because even many of the GOPers who openly boast of wanting to dump Obama don’t want their names being attached to this stinker.

 

RAUNER: We don't like him any better than Mike

EVEN OUR STATE’S Republican excuse of a governor, Bruce Rauner, is reluctant to come out in favor of it, and Rep. Peter Roskam, R-Ill., the most prominent Chicago-area GOPer in Congress, speaks against it.

Considering that Rauner has an approval rating of 31 percent (barely better than Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan’s rating of 28 percent, according to a study from Southern Illinois University), the man doesn’t need to do anything to dig himself any deeper.

The man still has dreams of winning himself re-election in 2018, and now the billionaire J.B. Pritzker has started kicking in his own money for an exploratory committee to see if people would actually vote for him over Rauner.

All in all, it was one of those days where we’re better off if we keep ourselves clueless as to the happenings of the news. The only problem is that those happenings take place even if we try to ignore them.

AS IT TURNS out, even the ideologues amongst us are feeling peeved – there’s that judge in Hawaii who struck down Trump’s second attempt at imposing a ban on certain foreigners who might have desires to travel to the United States. They’re already spewing the nonsense that Judge Derrick Watson in Honolulu consulted with Obama just prior to issuing his ruling. We’ll have to endure their paranoia.

Which means our only chance of self-preservation is to keep ourselves informed. There might be one group that benefits – psychiatrists, if we all wind up having to go for therapy to help us cope with the chaotic times our society now faces.

So on this gloomy day, I can’t help but think this lesser-known recording of Chuck Berry somehow captures the spirit of sadness we’re feeling.

Enjoy!!!

  -30-

Will GOP eagerness to play partisan politics start Obama uptick to re-election?

When I hear the new Republican majority of the House of Representatives go on and on about how it will repeal the healthcare reform measure that is a significant part of President Barack Obama’s legacy, I wonder how short-sighted they truly are.



OBAMA: Is the 'daylight' in sight?

Not that I expect the healthcare reform measure that was meant to provide some sort of medical coverage to many of the 47 million people in our country who currently go without. The Senate remains Democrat-controlled.

SO EVEN IF the GOP uses its majority in a purely partisan vote to “approve” a repeal or significant overhaul of the law that would gut its intentions, it is very unlikely to get through the full Congress.

Even if for some reason Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., were to see some political advantage to letting something pass, Obama himself would use his “veto” power to kill it off. And nobody these days has a veto-proof majority to override the president.

So healthcare reform (or if you insist on using the nit-wit term, Obamacare) isn’t going anywhere during the next two years. Any rhetoric we hear about the issue (and we’re going to hear a ton of such talk) is about pure partisan politics – all geared toward the notion that Obama himself should be a one-term president.

Excuse me for thinking that these newly-elected officials who got sent to Congress by voters spewing Tea Party-type rhetoric are so uncompromising and so strong-arm in their approach to government that I fully expect they’re going to handle this thing in such a manner that will turn off the true majority of our nation.

MAYBE IT’S BECAUSE I still remember the budgetary negotiations for the federal government’s 1996-97 fiscal year. It was just months earlier that the GOP had taken a majority in both the House and Senate, and under the leadership of now-former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., was determined to implement their own partisan version (the “Contract with America”) of what federal government should be.

That is what inspired them to take a hard-line toward budgetary negotiations and refuse to compromise even slightly. So when the deadlines passed and the federal government was forced to shut down all non-essential operations until a budget was in place, GOP officials figured that then-President Bill Clinton would be blamed.

After all, everything was Clinton’s fault. Just as now everything that goes wrong with the government must be because of Barack Obama.

A national populace that had been inclined to listen sympathetically to the Gingrich rhetoric was so turned off by what it heard and saw in this case that Clinton wound up gaining the moral high ground. It was the beginning of the process by which Clinton cruised toward re-election the following year.

IS THAT WHAT could happen if GOP types start going overboard with all their talk of dumping healthcare reform, and anything else they think can be tied to the idea of an Obama administration being wasteful?

Let’s not forget that 47 million figure – as in the number of people who don’t have any kind of healthcare coverage, and whose reliance on hospital emergency rooms for routine treatment is a major financial burden on the medical system.

If they’re not careful, they risk being the people who are willing to leave a significant number of people with nothing. Similar to another report I read Tuesday in which the governor-elect of Wisconsin (a Republican who went overboard on the government waste rhetoric during his campaign) is insisting he does not want a high-speed railroad line developed in his state between Milwaukee and the state capital in Wisconsin.

He’s going to claim he’s saving the federal government money by avoiding lengthy studies to develop the kind of inter-city railroad system that is necessary if we’re ever to get people back onto trains for their travel.

WHAT REALLY COULD happen is that all the surrounding states could wind up taking Wisconsin’s share of the federal funds for the project, and Wisconsin gets left behind its Great Lakes states. Illinois officials already are saying they’ll take Wisconsin’s money and put it to use on improving the railroad line between Chicago and St. Louis.

Could Scott Walker’s stand on high-speed rail wind up helping Illinois to develop further ahead of Wisconsin? Could the resulting loss of jobs for Wisconsin because of not having a piece of the high-speed rail project wind up coming back to hurt the GOP electorally in 2012?

I couldn’t help but notice an MSNBC analysis of the Electoral College Tuesday morning that figured both Obama and any Republican candidate already have in excess of 200 electoral votes, and that there are only eight states that truly are up for grabs by either candidate.

One of those states was Wisconsin. Could these “principled” stands wind up offending enough people that Obama winds up following in Clinton’s footsteps in terms of re-election?

ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE. Because I couldn’t help but notice the Gallup Organization, which came out with a new study this week that says Obama’s popularity is on the rise in recent days – which is surprising to them because they would have expected such overwhelming losses in last week’s elections to cost him a few points.

But Obama went from a 43 percent favorable rating on Election Day to being up to 47 percent now (with the number of people who disapprove of his performance dropping to 46 percent).

It’s not a great performance rating. But it certainly could be worse, particularly compared to the studies prior to the election that showed the favorable rating for Congress ranging around 22 percent.

Which means those GOP partisans who want to think the whole country hates Barack Obama had best consider that people were always more disgusted with Congress than with the president. If they try to overstep their political play, they could find that the essential equation remains – and that they will be the ones who get dumped in Election ’12, rather than the president.

  -30-

Gov. Pat Quinn will manage to tick people off, no matter what he does w/ budget

It is one of the quirks of following Illinois government – at a time when most people are thinking Independence Day, fireworks, and maybe even the Taste of Chicago, we are hearing “Auld Lang Syne” playing in our heads.

For Wednesday is the final day of 2010, as in the state government fiscal year. A whole new year with wonderous opportunities (heavy sarcasm intended) begins Thursday.

AMONG THE PEOPLE who definitely don’t view the “new” year with joy are Gov. Pat Quinn.

For it seems that the Illinois General Assembly is never going to do what Quinn had hoped for – return to the Statehouse for another day or two and approve some sort of borrowing plan that would give state government some extra money to work with for the fiscal year 2011.

The Illinois House of Representatives did approve something to authorize borrowing to help cover the money owed to bring the state pension programs back under control (a step in the right direction), but the state Senate never even tried to do anything along those lines. And even if the Senate were to approve something of its own, there’s an excellent chance that any momentum in the Illinois House to reapprove such a concept is long gone.

Which means this year’s financial “crisis” is going to be resolved by Quinn himself. Because the budget proposal that the Legislature did approve for the new fiscal year was unbalanced, but also gave authority to the governor to make whatever cuts are necessary to bring state spending under control.

IN SHORT, IT’S all in Quinn’s hands now. His aides say he plans to make an announcement Wednesday to let us know exactly where the cuts will occur, and how severe they will be.

I know for a fact that many school districts across the state are bracing themselves for cuts in the funding they receive from state government, which is going to translate into cuts in teachers and educational programs and maintenance of their facilities. The State Board of Education already has announced $300 million in cuts to public education programs for the upcoming year.

Could there be more? Pat Quinn’s name is already being taken in vain by educators across Illinois. To use the old cliché, his name will soon be “Mudd” among many differing interest groups.

Now I’m not claiming Quinn is blame-less. One of the drawbacks of his apparent lack of a political backbone at times is that the individual legislators don’t exactly fear his wrath. When he made grand statements during the spring claiming there would be severe harm caused to various state programs if he was forced to rely only on spending cuts to balance out the budget, nobody seemed to care.

ACTUALLY, THEY DO care.

But they don’t want to have to make the hard choice themselves.

The real solution to the state’s financial problems is a combination of some new revenue, along with some cuts. Not that we have a lot of fat in state government (what many people claim to be “fat” is really just programs that bother them ideologically), but I accept the fact that tough times can cause worthwhile programs to get slashed – no matter how much good they accomplish for our societ.

I also accept the fact that, since it took Illinois several years to get itself into its current financial mess (aggravated by the economic struggles that are impacting the nation as a whole), it likely will take several years to return to financial solvency.

INSTEAD, IT HAS all been dumped on Quinn. Our individual legislators have decided they would rather dump off the financial problem on somebody else, instead of trying to address it. After all, they could screw things up even worse if they took it.

Better for their re-election desires come November to let Quinn deal with the issue. Let him take the blame if somebody winds up dying if their particular program (particularly in the area of health care) that their lives had come to depend upon was suddenly slashed – if not outright anihilated.

For the record, Quinn has said his cuts to be announced Wednesday will focus on “bureaucracy.” Which means administrative expenses. Which sounds nice, in theory. Cut the “guys in suits” instead of the actual services.

Yet the problem is that a certain amount of administration is needed to run programs. One person’s pointless bureaucrat is someone else’s needed administrator. No matter how much one wants to deny it, it simply is not possible to cut this many billions of dollars (don’t forget we’re talking about a potential $13 billion deficit for the state, not all of which can be addressed this fiscal year) without whacking at some worthwhile services.

AS FOR THOSE individuals who have ideological concerns about many social services programs and are pleased to be able to use these financial struggles to knock out programs they never wanted in place to begin with, it just seems to me to be a callous means to get one’s way.

Which in many ways is building up my resolve to want to see Quinn get his own full term as governor come the Nov. 2 elections.

I’d hate to see the same legislators who were weak-willed enough to dump the state’s financial problems in the governor’s lap try to claim his Election Day defeat as some sort of victory for themselves.

-30-

Betting on the Senate campaign in Illinois is for suckers – Kirk is not the invincible man

To listen to the Republican rhetoric these days, some of which I receive directly from the party on a daily basis in my e-mail, Alexi Giannoulias is toast. As are his Democratic Party colleagues on the ballot with him for the Nov. 2 elections.

After all, Giannoulias is involved with a failing bank that did shady business dealings with corrupt people. Most people are going to hear that political trash talk, assume there might be a bit of truth to it, and will not bother to try to find out for themselves what the real story is.

BUT THEN, I listen to Giannoulias’ Republican opponent and realize that the GOP has its own problems, and that anybody who presumes that Democrat-leaning (because it’s so heavily Chicago-dominated) Illinois is going to see a massive electoral turnover is using some seriously illicit narcotics.

At least that is the impression I got after reading the reports that came out of Illinois’ capital city, where Kirk admits that his talk of wanting to repeal the health care reform proposal that is a significant part of President Barack Obama’s legacy is a whole lot of hooey.

Not that Kirk, currently a Congressman from the North Shore suburbs of Chicago, thinks much of the health care proposal. It’s just that he realizes that anyone who seriously uses their time and political clout to push for repeal is wasting their time – while also driving themselves closer to a nervous breakdown.

“We lost, and we don’t have the votes,” Kirk told reporter-types during a recent campaign appearance in Springfield.

ON A CERTAIN level, Kirk deserves to be commended. He was speaking honestly. He was speaking realistically. He was speaking truthfully. Yet that is about the last thing that anybody – particularly the ideological opponents of Barack Obama – wants to hear when it comes to health care reform.

The way that Kirk is going to get the hard-core ideologues whom the Republican Party is counting on to turn out in droves to seize back control of portions of Illinois state government is to continue the poltiical trash talk.

He’s going to have to get people stirred up into a frenzy into thinking that Democrats are the evil spawn created by the merger of Obama and Blagojevich. Kirk being the guy seeking federal office gets to dump on the Obama legacy, while gubernatorial hopeful William Brady and the other GOP candidates focus on Blagojevich.

If they don’t do this, they take the risk of turning off the hard-core elements of the Republican Party, which would depress the voter turnout and make it all the more likely that the hard-core voters of Chicago whom the Democratic Party counts on to be the base of its vote in Illinois will be sufficient to win many elections and keep significant control of Illinois government.

THE PROBLEM FOR Kirk, compared to his Republican colleagues running in many other states, is that Obama remains popular in his home state. While the Gallup Organization on Friday gave Obama a 50 percent “approval” rating (compared to 43 percent “disapprove”), various polls that break their results down by states show that Illinoisans generally support the president with approval ratings anywhere from 56 to 65 percent (depending on whose study one consults).

In short, using the hard-core rhetoric to trash-talk health care is not going to play in Illinois. It will only serve to drive voters away from Kirk, and from the rest of Republican candidates for 2010. Turning this election into a forum on health care reform would only serve to help Giannoulias because it would remind many Chicago-area voters that Kirk is somebody who is counting on political support from people whose interests go counter to so many of our (as in Chicago’s) own.

But if he doesn’t resort to some of the trash-talk (let me concede that every candidate for every political office engages in some trash talk) on health care, he’s also going to turn off his own political base. He has the potential to lose similar to John McCain for president in 2008 – many people may not have wanted an Obama victory, but they didn’t trush McCain to be any better for what they desire out of a public official.

It is why I honestly believe that in the campaign for the U.S. Senate seat from Illinois being abandoned by Roland Burris, both candidates have sufficient weaknesses that virtually cancel each other out. It is why I think it is absurd for anyone to say they think they know who will win this particular election.

I CAN VERY easily envision the collective conservative nausea that will occur in January 2011 at the sight of U.S. Sen. Alexi Giannoulias, D-Ill. Then again, I’m not ruling out the possibility that Kirk will succeed in moving “up” from the House of Representatives to the Senate.

But I also think there’s a good chance that the Republican success in Illinois’ elections this year will be limited to smaller Democratic majorities in the state Senate and Illinois House, and the return of Judy Baar Topinka to a political post.

Not that I’m betting any money on that last statement. At this point, only a fool would do so.

-30-

EDITOR’S NOTES: Mark Kirk is backing away from his past political rhetoric about repealing the (http://nwitimes.com/news/local/illinois/article_69cbfdb0-95f4-5912-a00c-a9a1d745d400.html) health care reform proposal signed into law recently by Barack Obama. Will this help him avoid irritating Obama’s Illinois (http://www.startribune.com/politics/national/senate/89809667.html?elr=KArks8c7PaP3E77K_3c::D3aDhUec7PaP3E77K_0c::D3aDhUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUU) fans, or will it tick off Obama’s Illinois critics?

Alexi Giannoulias is trying to score a few political points (http://www.suntimes.com/news/politics/2136609,CST-NWS-kirk02.article) off the fact that Kirk is speaking more realistically these days about the issue of health care.

Where have you gone, Paul Simon? Our state turns its lonely eyes to you. What’s that you say, Mrs. Robinson? The bow-tie man has left and gone away (http://senatorpaulsimon.org/). With apologies to Paul Simon, the singer and song-writer, the sentiment of who we’d really like to have as our state’s senator in Washington seems to fit.

If Obama was the uncompromising hardliner his critics claim he is, maybe we’d have health care reform by now

Barack Obama is the public official who’s so determined to pass something that he can claim reforms the way in which health care is paid for in this country that he’s willing to compromise on so many points that his so-called allies are now getting disgusted with him.

Which is why I find it comical whenever the “right” insists that Obama is some sort of socialist who is out to undermine everything they stand for.

ONE CAN MAKE the very legitimate argument that he’s so willing to give in to his critics that they ought to be satisfied. Not that I expect they ever would be. Because their rhetorical rants were never about discussion of serious issues.

They are about denying an Obama administration anything that could be seen as an accomplishment. It probably angers them enough that they couldn’t seriously knock down his choice for a Supreme Court justice, so killing off health care reform is what they’re going to be willing to settle for.

Because as things stand right now, I’m not sure what to think of the reform effort – other than to say anyone who thinks Howard Dean has a clue what he’s talking about on the health care debate.

Dean is the one-time presidential dreamer and Democratic Party head who thinks the president should just give up the fight for now, and introduce a new bill in 2010. In short, start all over.

MAYBE IN A theoretical world that would be possible, but not the one in which we live.

Because if Obama were to do that, it would embolden his partisan opposition to the point where they would feel even less of a need to listen to the president in future debate.

Obama aides are correct when they say this issue needs to be kept going, because there’s a good chance that if this particular bill (in whatever form it winds up being amended to) does not get passed into law, then nothing on the issue of health care reform will ever get approved.

And this is an issue too serious to dawdle around with. The Clintons tried to pass something in 1994, only to fail and we had to wait until this year for another attempt. Personally, I don’t think the nation has the ability to wait another 15 years (for the administration of President Lisa Madigan, perhaps?) for a new reform effort.

IT COMES DOWN to the fact that I see the 47 million uninsured as a problem that can drag us all down. We need to deal with finding ways to cover the cost of their health care. Doing nothing, which seems to be the Republican preference, ought not to be an option.

Yes, this ultimately comes down to partisan politics. I think the officials who object about abortion, or Medicare or any other aspect are merely using them for rhetorical reasons. They want to deny an accomplishment that Obama could use to claim he did something worthwhile, thereby justifying the faith of those who voted for him and makes those hard-core opponents look quite a bit foolish.

But then again, if Obama gives in so much that a health care reform proposal passes that does little to nothing to change the status quo, we could make the argument that Obama’s presence made no difference.

As much as I like the ideal of bipartisanship, I’m realistic enough to know how much partisan rhetoric and activity has tainted the process. If anything, Obama is going to start behaving more like a Democrat – rather than some Dem who’s too comfortable among Republicans.

WHAT’S THE OLD Texas cliché? “You dance with them who brung you.”

That is what much of the “liberal” complaints these days about the health care debate is about.

I’m curious to see how this issue plays out. A week ago, I would have thought something would pass. But now, I’m wondering if the GOP and the “blue dog” Dems who for whatever reason don’t just convert political party status will succeed at stalling the issue long enough.

Such motivation was behind their tactic on Friday of refusing to support a bill funding the military efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq. If that issue got stalled, it would force postponement of any more health care reform – probably until after the Christmas holiday break.

REPUBLICANS SEEM TO think that Democratic officials will return to their home districts and hear an earful from constituents who don’t want health care reform. That might be true if those Dems visited their GOP colleagues’ districts for the holidays. But there are also the masses who see a serious problem and aren’t willing to wait any longer for a fix.

Some Dems, meanwhile, are still pushing to at least get a Senate vote on a health care reform proposal so they can claim they acted before the holidays. Then, it becomes the “conference committee” responsibility to figure out what will happen (since the House of Representatives already has approved a similar – but not identical – measure) on the issue.

I’m not predicting what will happen in coming days, other than to say that Obama himself will have a lot on his mind when he and the First Family take their traditional annual holiday trip to Hawaii.

As for those of you who want to complain that he’s not spending Christmas in Chicago, I’ll agree it would be nice to have Obama back in town next week. But then again if it were possible to get a couple of days of sunshine, I’d probably take advantage of the opportunity as well.

-30-

EDITOR’S NOTE: Much of the complaining these days about Barack Obama is coming from his “allies” (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/18/health/policy/18liberals.html?hp). At least the president gets a couple of days in Honolulu to recover from partisan headaches.

What warrants the Peace Prize, and what do the next three years hold for Obama?

Two years ago, Barack Obama was an obscure Illinois official who some people argued should not be considered a legitimate candidate for the presidency of the United States.

Now, he's the president who has escalated a war in Afghanistan who some people argue should not be considered a legitimate recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize.

THE SAME PARTISAN criticism that came up a few months ago when the Nobel recipients were announced is going to recur Thursday, as this is the day that Obama is in Oslo to receive the gold medal and the prize worth about $1,400 in U.S. currency (he says he's giving the money to charity).

To people who don't like to have to think very much, Obama's circumstances make him an oddity to receive a peace prize -- even though Obama himself has justified his recently announced increase of troops by 30,000 in Afghanistan as part of an effort to end U.S. involvement in that conflict against extremists who claim to be motivated by Islam by the year 2011.

If Obama truly can pull off the idea of a brief increase followed up by a withdrawal of troops within two years, then perhaps we'd have to acknowledge that he really did bring an end to the war triggered by George W. Bush's desire to be a "wartime" president.

But as I have written before, I don't think this conflict is going to end so quick. I wouldn't be surprised if troops remain on Inauguration Day 2013,.

SO WHAT SHOULD we think of Obama as we listen to him give a speech acknowledging receipt of the medal with the image of Alfred Nobel engraved on it?

The Washington Post reported earlier this week that Obama fully intends to use his speech to address the so-called paradox of a man who escalates a war effort receiving a prize meant to reward world peace.

Obama's press secretary, Joe Gibbs, told the newspaper that he will address the issue head on, although he wouldn't say what would be said by Obama -- in large part because those words may very well be worked on and polished literally up to the moment Obama gives the speech in Oslo.

I'm wondering if Obama's address is going to amount to some sort of explanation that war and conflict are occasionally necessary in order to bring under control some force that threatens the peace of people at-large on Planet Earth.

IN SHORT, DEFEATING the Taliban, Al Qaida, or any force that believes the Koran justifies the violent means often employed by these groups to try to bring some sort of Islamic image to their society could be some sort of higher moral concept that should be supported.

I don't know how much I agree with that idea, although I will be the first to admit that if such forces ever did gain support or control within the United States, I'd probably be one of the first people to want to oppose them in large part because of the extent to which they try to control public thought (and rein in opposition).

But we have to keep in mind the fact that the people who voted to give Obama the Peace Prize did so in large part because they want to give him the moral high ground as he tries to impose his "vision" of a better society.

Could it be that that gives Republicans and Al Qaida something in common? Both have their qualms about what Obama would like to accomplish, and would gain politically if Obama were to fail.

A FUTURE OBAMA success would wind up making those Nobel people look like geniuses. And if he were to fail, it would set the stage for his opponents to get much of the blame for shooting down a vision that could have brought about a better society for all.

I will be waiting for word Thursday of what Obama has to say to justify his prize in part because it wouldn't be his only success of recent days.

Just this week, Democrats in the Senate made it known that they think they have reached a deal on a bill related to health care reform that they could vote on and approve in coming days.

That would then set the stage for the "conference committee," the process by which a House of Representatives' version of health care reform that was approved last month would be matched up with the Senate version, and the differences between the two would be ironed out.

THAT WOULD THEN result in a final version of health care reform being approved by Congress, and sent to Obama for his final approval.

In short, the partisan tactics of the Republicans would have failed to prevent Obama from getting something enacted into law that would try to significantly reduce the number of people living in our country without some form of health insurance.

When combined with the fact that he got a Supreme Court nominee of his choice approved by the Senate, and also received that Nobel Prize, it could turn out that the first year of an Obama presidency was somewhat successful.

So much for those whose ideological beliefs are such that they want us to believe that Obama has been a failure as a president.

IT MUST ALSO seem like quite a hectic year for Obama, considering that just two years ago he was the Illinois legislator who some people thought couldn't win a single primary -- considering that he was going up against names such as "Clinton," "Edwards" and "Richardson." Even I must confess to wondering in those days before the Iowa caucuses whether the Obama campaign was merely the 21st Century equivalent of Paul Simon's bid for the presidency in 1988 (taken seriously nowhere except Illinois).

It makes me wonder how chaotic the next three years will be -- and if things will be crazed enough to make this first year seem downright tame.

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GOP’s strategy towards Obama: Lets use it on him before he uses it on us!

I have been to enough rallies and events as a reporter-type person in which the conservative opposition to Barack Obama vents its views that I have repeatedly heard how the incumbent U.S. president is “Hitler-esque.”

Now, it would appear that the right is coming up with another label, one that will make Obama’s supporters shudder. They’re saying the president is “Nixonian.”

AT LEAST THAT was the impression I got from learning of Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., who made remarks Wednesday in Washington that imply Obama and his aides are developing an “enemies list.” That tactic literally was used by former President Richard M. Nixon, who put together a literal list of people he considered to be the opposition, with the idea that the federal government would single them out for abuse (an IRS audit, anyone?)

Anyone with sense will realize how ridiculous this tactic is, because it is coming from the people who ideologically were sympathetic to the Nixon administration, and probably had no problem with the idea of a list that singled out certain Democratic political officials, labor union executives and several news media editors and commentators.

About the only way using this tactic makes any sense is if it is viewed as a distraction. Getting political pundits to spend a few days debating the issue of “Is Obama Nixonian” will shift the focus away from the political hardball that Republican political people are playing with their opposition to health care reform.

For the record, that is the issue upon which Alexander says Obama is using such “Nixonian” tactics, and may very well be putting together an “enemies list” of people who won’t back his goal of trying to do something about the 47 million people in this country who currently have no health insurance (and therefore, no way to pay for medical treatment, should they need it).

DOES THIS MEAN that Republican opponents fear they are going to lose this political fight, and now they’re trying to set things up so that anything bad that happens to them in the future can be blamed on partisan politics?

Considering that the country as a whole is split on this issue, it probably is completely appropriate that the debate these days is messy. Take the latest Gallup Organization poll, which on Wednesday said that 50 percent of the populace wants a health care reform proposal with a public option (which in my mind is kind of the whole reason for even bothering with reform).

Also, while 58 percent of the people surveyed (25 percent for and 33 percent against) have made up their mind – another 39 percent (a rather significant total) want to see exactly what is in the final proposal before deciding whether to support it or not.

Now I’m not going to lie. Despite possessing some ideals about a Better America, I know better than to think Obama is “Saint Barack.”

HE MAY BE Hawaii-raised, but this is a man who learned his electoral politics in Chicago and at the “Statehouse in Springpatch.” This is a man who was mentored by former Illinois Senate President Emil Jones, D-Chicago, who wasn’t a “goo goo” by any means.

Heck, this was a guy who got elected to his first electoral office by playing political hardball and getting his incumbent opponent kicked off the ballot (remember Alice Palmer?).

Barack Obama isn’t a political virgin.

I don’t doubt that he and his people are capable of engaging in political tactics meant to hinder the opposition in order to try to get measures they want passed into law. That is what electoral politics is about.

IN A SENSE, I don’t really blame the Republican opposition for the tactics they are using these days to try to stall action (if not kill it outright) on a healthcare reform measure. That also is what electoral politics is about.

Would we really rather have a government where officials just impose actions by issuing statements, rather than have to engage in the give-and-take of politics? That give-and-take, by definition is what Democracy is all about.

Government by pronouncement is something more in line with fascism – and I don’t think many people in this country seriously want that approach.

Now I’m not calling Alexander a fascist. That would be ridiculous.

BUT I FIND it equally ridiculous that he’s trying to blame Obama for trying to fight back against his health care opponents, who have been blasting him for months for bringing the issue up in the first place.

Could it be that this latest round of attack about an “enemies list” is something that should be dismissed as nothing more than political whining?

Or is this just a matter of conservative officials who know how to use dirty political tactics automatically assume that the whole world plays the political game the same way they do?

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EDITOR’S NOTES: By his own admission, Lamar Alexander knows about “enemies lists” (http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2009/10/obamas_enemies_list_lamar_alex.html) because he was a low-level aide in the Nixon administration.

The latest thoughts of the American people on health care reform (http://www.gallup.com/poll/123782/In-U.S.-39-Say-View-Healthcare-Depends-Details.aspx) from an organization that says Barack Obama has a “favorable” rating from 50 percent of the public.

Could Copenhagen be a needed break from health care reform trash talk?

When President Barack Obama insisted he could not be present in Copenhagen on Friday to learn whether his adopted hometown gets the 2016 Summer Olympic games, the claim was always that he was so busy trying to reform the way health care is paid for that he couldn’t spare the time.

But with the absurdities to which the health care debate has sunk these days, could it be that the real reason Obama decided that he could fit a few days in Denmark into his schedule was that he needed a break from health care?

I’M SURE THE Obama loyalists will contend that he’s merely standing up for his country by going to Copenhagen to try to awe the International Olympic Committee with his presence.

But I wouldn’t blame him for a bit if he figured that being away from Washington was good for his sanity. Going to a place for a couple of days where he can focus on the idea of being able to walk from his home to the Olympic Stadium in Washington Park could offer a breather.

How ridiculous has the health care debate become?

The real scarlet “A” (for abortion, not amnesty) has crept up into the debate.

FOR IT TURNS out that the anti-abortion activists who figure that since they can’t make the termination of a pregnancy a criminal act, they will do the next best thing and make it as difficult for a woman to obtain as is possible are now turning to the health care debate.

If it turns out that purchasing plans are created to make it possible for people without insurance to actually buy an affordable health plan, the activists want to make sure that obtaining an abortion is not among the medical procedures covered.

The New York Times reports that such actions have the abortion rights crowd scared, in that they fear existing insurance plans that do cover the cost of an abortion may very well be altered to quit paying for the end of a pregnancy.

The end result is that abortion would become one of those elective medical procedures, similar to obtaining cosmetic surgery. It definitely would become something that most women would not be able to afford to do, even in cases where their physical well-being is better off by ending a pregnancy.

THOSE WHO WANT to claim the abortion supporters are somehow being paranoid, all I have to say is that I doubt it. Because the reality of most insurance policies is that they are written in ways to justify covering as little as they absolutely have to.

To an insurance company, the perfect client is the person who makes their monthly payment on time always – and never files a claim.

It is part of the reason why so many people currently do not have insurance – the old standby of pre-existing conditions. People who need health insurance to cover the cost of their treatment will have trouble getting it because the insurance companies know they will have to pay claims.

Now I know there are some people who naively feel sympathy for insurance companies, claiming that the payment of claims costs everybody money. Of course, I’d argue that the only reason to have insurance is so that it will cover the cost of treatment.

SO IN A time when insurance companies are looking for reasons to cut back on what they have to cover, I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised to learn that this abortion quandary could stick.

It also does not help clarify the issue in that Obama himself has tossed out some rhetoric expressing some sympathy for the anti-abortion proponents, claiming he would not want to force for payment of elective abortions. I guess he thought such rhetoric would sway some social conservatives to his side.

All it has done is gotten worked up the people who want to think that all abortion is somehow elective, and that their partisan rhetoric about sticking up for life always seems to place a premium on the life that does not yet exist over the one that is here and now and ought to get our priority.

With the health care reform issue tainted by abortion, it might be blatantly obvious that a switch to Olympics mode might be a nice change of pace.

OF COURSE, THERE he faces the nasty rhetoric from the critics of Chicago’s bid to bring the Olympics here. Those people picketed outside of City Hall on Tuesday to express their belief that city officials can’t be trusted to ensure that the games don’t go ridiculously over budget – which they say has the potential to bankrupt Chicago city government.

A part of me has always considered their rhetoric to be a bit over the top and somewhat shortsighted (there are long-term municipal benefits to be derived from hosting an Olympic games here, if they are handled properly).

But I have never doubted the sincerity of the people who have spent the past few months trashing the thought of the Olympic flame working its way around the world to – in the end – pass through Washington Park to kick off the games seven years from now.

I also have wondered how many of those people who trash-talk a Chicago Olympiad were among those who were Obama supporters in last year’s presidential elections. I would suspect many of them were.

WHICH MAKES ME wonder if they feel as betrayed by Obama’s support for a Chicago Olympiad similar to how some of those abortion rights proponents feel about Obama, wondering if his reform plan is going to put at risk the ability of a woman to obtain what basically is a medical procedure.

I guess there are times that a president just can’t make anybody happy.

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EDITOR’S NOTES: Abortion has crept its way into the nasty debate over (http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2009/09/29/Abortion-politics-enter-healthcare-debate/UPI-60011254226734/) health care reform.

Where does Barack Obama go when he needs a break from the health care reform and Olympics (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/28/AR2009092801150.html) debates?

President’s health care video contest has the potential to ask for trouble

How many of you remember the Chicago Sun-Times’ attempt a couple of years ago to have some fun at the expense of Sam Zell and the Chicago Tribune by organizing a contest asking people to put together videos explaining why Zell should never consider changing the name of Wrigley Field?

The Tribune managed to undermine that contest by having one of the newspaper’s interns enter, and she won. The Sun-Times’ attempt to poke fun at the competition would up making them look a little foolish.

I HAVE TO admit that remembering this stunt from early ’08 was my initial reaction to learning in an e-mail sent to me recently that the political followers of President Barack Obama are seriously resorting to a contest – asking people to put together amateur videos in the form of a commercial.

The message to be delivered?

Explaining why we, the people of this great nation, need a reform of the way in which health care is paid for in this country.

Why do I suspect that some social conservative outfit that wants to deride anything that comes from Obama as being “socialist” is already putting together some parody of what they consider to be the president’s “message.”

THEY’RE PROBABLY FINDING some youthful conservative to be the equivalent of Katie Hamilton (the Tribune intern who posed as a Cubs’ fan in the contest-winning video).

Then, if they manage to win, they will make their own announcement in an attempt to show just how “stupid” the Obama-types are in trying to use such a tactic to tout health care reform.

We’ll get to see their message as a parody that takes hidden shots at the concept. And worse, the Obama people are saying they will use the winning video on national television.

So the social conservatives may very well get airtime for THEIR message, paid for by the president’s followers.

ADMITTEDLY, BACK IN early 2008, Barack Obama was already pretty intense on the campaign trail. So perhaps he should not be expected to remember that particular Sun-Times contest gaffe.

But with all the Chicago-types who have gone to Washington to run the federal government in our city’s image for the next few years, you’d think there’d be at least one person who would remember this 21st Century example of one of the oldest games in the newspaper racket – rival papers trying to dump on each other.

And when applied to the national debate taking place these days over what form, if al all, health care reform should take, it is perfect.

For the health care reform proponents “win” if nothing happens at all.

SABOTAGING AN OBAMA video contest would fit well within their tactics.

Now as ought to be clear from my past commentaries published here, I am generally a supporter of the president. I also am a firm believer that some change needs to be made with regards to health care.

This is not an issue where doing nothing is acceptable. Of course, it wasn’t an issue where doing nothing was acceptable back in 1993 when then-President Bill Clinton put first lady Hillary R. on the job, only to see her fail to accomplish any change.

As far as I’m concerned, that means we have gone the past 16 years with a serious problem in our nation’s midst. That is something we ought to be ashamed of, but I am realistic enough to know that there are probably some people who worked against the Clintons’ health care reforms who consider the fact that nothing happened to be the highlight of their political career.

WHAT A HIGHLIGHT – they did nothing!

I don’t want to see nothing happen again. And I definitely don’t want to see any stupid gaffes that detract attention from seriously-needed reforms in the way health care if paid for – a problem so severe that roughly 47 million people in this country have no way of paying for medical treatment when it is needed.

So I’d like to have delusions that somehow, someone with ties to the president’s people will read this and be reminded of the need to be extra wary of the entries in this contest they are promoting.

Let’s be honest. This contest is less about coming up with serious public policy talking points and is more about reinforcing the image that this president is of the 21st Century and fully appreciates the ways in which the Internet can make personal messages about policy more easily accessible to the public.

I’M SURE THE person who puts together the winning video will consider it one of the most significant accomplishments of their lifetime.

Let’s just hope it becomes a significant accomplishment because it helps sway the health care reform debate, and not because it made the president and his people look like vacuous nitwits.

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EDITOR’S NOTE: Can you deliver a serious message in 30 seconds? If so, Barack Obama’s allies (http://my.barackobama.com/videochallenge/) would like to see your video vision by Oct. 18.

Where’s the health care middle ground?

One moment I remember from Ken Burns’ early 1990s documentary “The Civil War” was listening to the late Southern historian Shelby Foote talk about how the conflict was caused by a failure of the American people to reach a compromise, when it is our ability to compromise that historically made our nation capable of achieving such grand goals.

The issue of slavery and to what degree the federal government ought to have any say over it ultimately resulted in bloodshed.

NOW I’M NOT saying we’re anywhere near to going to war over the issue of health care reform. But I can’t help but wonder if the great failure of this issue (which has the potential to leave some 47 million people without any form of medical coverage) is that very same inability to compromise.

For it was blatantly obvious to me on Monday that the factions on this issue have entrenched themselves. Nobody is going to give, no matter how much impassioned rhetoric is spouted by anyone.

For this is one issue where everyone is convinced they have the moral high ground.

For every person who thinks it is abominable that we could have a system where people are left uncovered in the event of a medical emergency, there are others who have a moral thought process that believes it to be absolutely wrong for the federal government to get involved in this issue.

WHETHER IT’S BECAUSE they legitimately don’t think a government agency could provide proper medical care or they just don’t want to have to think about health insurance for anyone besides themselves, they’re not budging.

I got to see one side of the issue on Monday. A Labor Day rally held at the Pullman state historic site in the (obviously-named) Pullman neighborhood was packed with people who are determined that the federal government (in the form of Congress and President Barack Obama) pass something into law that allows for a government-managed health care option for people who for whatever reason do not have health insurance.

“We elected you, so step up to the frickin’ plate,” said Cindy Fee, a pop singer who performed a number of labor-oriented folk songs as part of the Chicago rally.

Expressing a similar thought was state Rep. Al Riley, D-Hazel Crest, who said he thinks the side of the story of people who need health insurance but cannot get it through what has become the traditional means (your full-time employer provides it for you as a benefit of your job) is being distorted.

OR, AS HE so bluntly put it:

“We can’t let our story be distorted by the ‘wing-nuts’ you see on television. We’ve got to tell our story.”

Yet I can already hear those “wing-nuts” engaging in a rant about being called “wing-nuts.”

They’re going to want to claim that they represent the mood of America, and I will concede they do represent a portion of the country that has gone out of its way to isolate themselves from people who aren’t more or less exactly like themselves.

SO PERHAPS THEY aren’t exposed to the people who need a health care plan because they are out of work (an aftershock of increased unemployment due to the economic struggles the nation has faced in recent years), or maybe they’re really just callous enough that they don’t care.

But there were a good 10,000 of them present in southwest suburban New Lenox on Monday. Considering that the whole town’s population is only about 24,000 people, that many outsiders coming in caused serious traffic backups and chaos for local cops.

Reports indicate that traffic was backed up for about two miles in each direction from New Lenox along Interstate 80 at one point.

That Will County town was the site of the latest “Tea Party” tax protest, where social conservatives use the imagery of the American Revolution (they particularly seem to love the “Gadsden Flag” – the one with a snake and the slogan “Don’t Tread On Me” underneath it) to claim that “reform” of health care is just another issue where government has run amok.

NOW I MAY think these people are misguided. I may even think they are somewhat callous in their outlook on our society.

But the one thing I never will mistake them for is lackadaisical. They care about this issue, and they’re not likely to let it go.

And in one sense, they have the easier outcome to achieve. They “win” if nothing happens.

They don’t have to push for any type of legislation or a program, whereas the reformers not only have to come up with a proposal and pass it, that plan had better succeed.

OR ELSE IT will fall to the critics to use it for their propaganda purposes and try to turn it into a campaign issue come 2012 – Obama failed at what was supposed to be one of his biggest goals, so why give him a second term.

The fact that the goal was completely worthwhile and that the ultimate loser in this struggle is the American people (since having so many uninsured threatens to drag down the nation as a whole) won’t matter.

They win if we the people lose.

But trying to find that middle ground that figures out a way to cover the 47 million (which is about the equivalent of Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin and part of Iowa) in some fashion could be the way in which we all win, because it’s going to have to happen some day.

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