I Feel A Liberal Breeze

by rhealitycheck

I don’t know that I believed this would be possible after my personal nightmare actually came true and Bush was elected a second time (and actually validly that time) to the White House. But I feel a wee liberal breeze sweeping through the US. It may not be a gust, it may be a little weak but it is there.

I really think the most significant thing that George W. Bush has managed to accomplish in his time as President is to have broken so many records in so many ways. He has lead us to the greatest deficit this country has ever seen. We are getting ready to rival the Great Depression with his fantastic economic leadership. And for the kicker ladies and gentlemen, he has a 71% disapproval rating, a first since the Gallop polls began. Don’t believe me? Check here.

I don’t know that I believe that this liberal wind may necessary lead us very far or last very long but I am glad it is here for the time being. And I am glad that it appears to be breaking down all sorts of barriers, race and gender alike for qualified individuals.

The Man McCain Could Have Been

by rhealitycheck

I remember when John McCain was actually somewhat of a maverick that he keeps trying to tell us he still is. When Senator McCain first ran against George W. Bush in the 2000 primaries he was a different man. He was a man that I respected whose opinions I may disagree with but someone that I would certainly consider. The Bush campaign seriously smeared McCain’s image and began it’s legacy of vicious unfounded attacks that have no base but still manage to fool the general public. Unfortunately for this country, this heavy handed smear campaign brought McCain’s first bid for presidency to an end quite quickly and sadly the next 8 years would change his views on many of the ideals that were part of his initial core campaign.

I am a staunch liberal but there was a brief moment in time when John McCain was truly a maverick and had some ideas that we had in common but I believe that time has passed. 8 years ago McCain was dedicated to fighting against loopholes in the corporate tax laws. He was against lowering taxes for the wealthiest people in the country. He believed in education reform and that it starts in the classroom, not with administrators and government officials. In fact, John McCain criticized Bush’s decision to go to Iraq but that was back when he was still a maverick. The man that stood up for those beliefs was someone that I could respect. There were a lot of issues where I did not agree with him but the fact that he did not blindly follow his party and actually had his own ideas on his own merit were things that I thought made him stand out.

Unfortunately the John McCain we see today is a completely different man. He supports the war and doesn’t even have a suggestion of when we should think about getting out. There is an absolutely hilarious clip on youtube of him singing “bomb, bomb, bomb Iran” to the tune of Barbara Ann by the Beach Boys in an interview when asked about his opinion of how we should treat Iran. He has managed to pick a completely incompetent Vice Presidential candidate (and he should know better, we all like to believe we are super-human but in the event that something should happen to him, he knows that she would have to step in and that is just simply irresponsible). He wants to make the tax cuts for the wealthiest 1% and corporations. He has cowed under the Republican whip and I’m not sure he could recognize the man he was 8 years ago. He may not have been perfect 8 years ago but at least he stood up for what he believed in. Today, I’m not sure if he knows what he’s doing anymore and that to me is far more worrisome than Obama’s inexperience. In fact he is so unrecognizable from the candidate that he was 8 years ago when he refused to slander George W. Bush (who was smearing McCain’s name in every way he could) yet this is the same man who is now running the same sort of smear campaign against Obama.

I find it unfortunate that a Senator with so much promise, who had the gumption to stand apart for so long finally bowed under the pressure to such a degree that he is unrecognizable. What would happen to such a man if he were to be elected as president? Would that pressure bend him even further into even worse decisions?

Why Not a Muslim President?

by rhealitycheck

This has been a sore point for me about the Obama campaign when the rumors first began that he might be a Muslim. And I have no problem with the fact that he isn’t Muslim and has been a Christian all his life, what upsets me is the fact that he vehemently denies being Muslim instead of questioning why we seem to believe that the President of the United States of America needs to be Christian. If I recall correctly one of main reasons for people migrating from Europe to America was fleeing from religious persecution, which is why we have laws in place that separate Church and State. Surely just because our fearless leader seems to believe that everyone should be a “God fearing Christian” does not mean that holds true with the fundamental belief system of our founding fathers and the laws that this country was built on.

I cannot describe how thrilled I was to hear (well really read because I don’t have time for tv so I just read the interviews online) Colin Powell speak out on this topic. I am glad that one very distinguished political figure has finally spoken up for very blatant discrimination. We all know that this country has problems as does the rest of the world and that discrimination of every kind is out there. But to outright assume that any Muslim person in the country would be loyal to terrorists as opposed to the US is just ignorant. It is choosing to be a bigot instead of actually considering the person’s history and merits and deciding from there where their loyalties lie.
I was also pleased to see that one of my favourite columnists Maureen Dowd actually wrote a piece on this today. What I thought was even better was that it was not her typical sarcastic snarky style that I hold so dear but it was actually something rather thoughtful that brings out the humanity of the situation. Colin Powell did not go into those details in his interview but I think it is important to remember that we have Americans that were born and raised here who happen to be of the Islamic faith. They are Muslim, they are American and they should be allowed to be proud to be both. Isn’t that what makes America unique, being able to believe in something different from your neighbor yet still being an American and still being part of a great nation? I fear that if something so small as your religious beliefs can make it impossible for you to dare to dream of being president we are losing an integral part of what makes America great. I would hope that we can do better.

The Ever Present Obsession with Losing Weight in America

by rhealitycheck

Imagine my distress as I am reading this morning in the paper about a new method of stapling your stomach where the surgery does not require cutting. I am quite serious and this appears to be quite real and if you’d like to read the article you should click here. I have always found it distressing when women (or men) want to get surgery in order to lose weight. Perhaps I am wrong but I just feel that the healthy way to do it is through diet and exercise. And I do realize that everyone’s body is different and it can be more difficult for some than it is for others which can be disheartening but I also think that it is our own responsibility to take care of our bodies. You cannot just allow yourself to balloon out and then expect a surgery to fix it.

Now I am no exception to the rule, I have my own set of insecurities about my own weight as do most women that I’ve met in the US. (Quite frankly many women from other parts of the world seem to have a healthier view of their bodies, perhaps not leaps and bounds healthier but it’s not quite as hyped up as it is here in the states, at least when I base this on my friends circle.) And I know that in recent years I have really let go and I really need to kick it up a notch but I am not going to let my hectic schedule talk me into a surgery that could possibly be damaging to my health. I mean how much do we know about “shrinking” your stomach. Somehow that just strikes me as a bad idea that could lead to all sorts of negative side effects and serious complications should you not be able to comply with your dietary restrictions.

It’s funny because I don’t think Americans have *always* been obsessed with being slender. I look back at the time of Marilyn Monroe and in those days having curves was sexy. In fact, that was the typical image of a model, it wasn’t those stick thin coat hangars that we call models these days. My theory (and I could certainly be wrong) is that this all changed when Audrey Hepburn came on the scene. No actress/model/famous woman had ever made it so glamorous or “cool” to be thin as she did. I mean let’s face it Audrey Hepburn is still an icon of class and beauty that is unparalleled. (I may be biased, I am also a little in love with her). But it saddens me to think that my most favourite icon of all time could have been partially responsible for this drastic shift in what is a beautiful body. I mean before her time women were supposed to have hourglass figures, which I will admit can also be a bit unrealistic but I think it gives a little more room for imperfection than the coat hangar look.

Don’t get me wrong I love Audrey Hepburn and I think that thin women without an hourglass shape can be beautiful too I just think it has lead to an obsession with losing weight and being thin. It would be great if we could get rid of the stigma of not being stick thin but also maintain an idea of what healthy is so that this country wouldn’t have such a problem with obesity. I believe there is a happy medium and somehow I think that we should be able to attain it.

A Rift Amongst the Republicans

by rhealitycheck

I was wondering if this would ever happen since I (and some talking heads that I listen to) have noticed that the Republican party has become considerably more “right” than it was in the past. And when I say in the past I don’t even mean that long ago, just 8 years ago the Republican party wasn’t quite as into the Christian right propaganda as it is today. Obviously it has been more on the right side of the political landscape but there are several Republicans in history that have made some marked “left” moves if you look at today’s political landscape. Although at the time they were still staunchly “right”.

I think Colin Powell’s announcement to support Barack Obama is a mark of the times and just how much the Republican agenda has changed and how it is leaving it’s moderate base behind. Some are too politically uneducated to follow along and therefore blindly vote as the party tells them to but those that choose to pay attention and be involved are becoming increasingly dissatisfied. I just wonder what this means for the Republican party as a whole. Personally I would imagine that with such a wide rift there has to be some happy medium for there not to be a break in the party and then we might be headed towards a completely different landscape that will break from our dominant two party system that we have had… well if I remember my US history correctly since the founding of this nation. Now that would be interesting

Finding The Perfect Bra

by rhealitycheck

Was not something I would have considered in the realm of possibilities before today. In fact I had a lot of doubts going in to the store but a couple friends had advised me to go so I figured on a lark it couldn’t hurt and I was desperately in need of new bras. Part of my hesitation to go comes from the fact that I have a long and rather unfortunate history with bra shopping. Ever since I began developing breasts I have had a love-hate (ok, it’s really been more of a hate-hate) relationship with them.

I remember almost to the day when my mother first told me we had to go buy a bra. She and a few other adults had begun to notice that it really wasn’t ok for me to be running around playing with the boys without a bra anymore. That was possibly the worst day of my life. I simply did not want to go, I thought it was horribly embarrassing and for the most part I just wanted them (my “not-breasts”) to go away. Then again I was only 10 at the time and when we got to the department store to “size me” it appeared that the closest thing to my size was a 32B. Yes, I developed rather early and a little too much for my taste. I know most girls would kill to have a rack like that when they are just starting to approach puberty, all they want is to be “real women” and I’m sure many of my friends were jealous but that was not me. I was a kid already trying to find her way caught between two cultures and now having the added burden of having even my body shape looking completely different from my peers was not one I was ready to face. I mean I already looked different being that shrimpy Indian kid with the small bones who looked a few years younger than everyone else and whose family had tea time and all sorts of un-American traditions. I mean god forbid you speak to my mother when she got up on her British English high horse, I’d rather die than have anyone else hear that or when she would decide to start spouting German because languages come so easily to her. So imagine my dread when I now have these things attached to my body that don’t even feel like they’re mine and all they do is differentiate me a little more from everyone else.

By the time I was about 16 I was wearing a 32D and they were still a little too loose around the band and wee bit tight in the cups but honestly it’s a bit hard to go down in band size when the cups need to go up too and you’re just that small a person. By this time it had been years going to get new bras and everytime I discovered that they were getting bigger was just massively disheartening, not to mention disconcerting. Especially because nothing ever fit right and all I wanted was to be normal and have normal sized breasts, just like everyone else. I mean part of the problem is never having a mother who understands why I hated bra shopping so much. She was lucky, she had perfect 32 or was it 34B’s up until she got pregnant with me, but she was also one of those women that was like, oh it would be so nice to go up maybe a cup-size. It’s so easy to say that when bra shopping isn’t like going to Guam because you can’t find anything that fits you, let alone anything that might have actual support and not look like a “granny bra”. I think she was always trying to convince me that having large breasts is a great thing but it was coming (to me) from a completely backwards position. I mean always dreaming of large breasts and then trying to convince someone who has always had them that they’re great generally does not tend to work because you’re coming at it from two different angles. On the other hand almost 2 years ago I went off to India to train for my job and made a very good friend. And for the first time in my life met someone with the same body issues that I had, except she’s a little better adjusted to it than I am but we have nearly identical body-types, the variation is minimal. So needless to say meeting her helped change my perspective forever and also gave me a badly needed friend to talk to about such things. Now nearly 10 years later, I realize there is no such thing as “normal”. And I am so grateful to my friend for convincing me to go get fit for a bra and make sure that you get alterations done if necessary. It is the single best piece of advice I have ever received in my life. Everything else I can figure out on my own, this is the one place where I needed someone to guide me and I luckily found someone to point me in the right direction.

Now strange as this sounds the thought of letting some stranger see me half-naked… or well with my top off just sounded a little upsetting. The reason I say it’s strange is that for anyone who knows me well knows that I get a full body wax every 3-4 weeks and well that requires a whole lot of naked around what could be a complete stranger. I started that about a year ago but the women I have gone to see have been consistently the same person in each state. There was one woman I went to in CT who was ok and my waxer here in Chicago is amazing, I just love Jane. She runs her own little shop called <a href=”http://www.alittlespa.com”>A Little Spa</a>. And I really started waxing by accident (it’s a long story) and this is just different. I think it is partially that I have simply been so uncomfortable with my body for so long it just seems like an invasion of personal space and that most of my body issues come from being uncomfortable with the way my breasts look/feel/are.

At any rate I just had a fitting at INTIMACY OF CHICAGO • Intimacy on Michigan • 900 N Michigan Avenue • Chicago, Illinois • 312.337.8366 with Rochelle (who I recommend to everyone). And it was possibly the best thing that could ever happen to me. I never believed that a bra could change your life but if you ask me right now I would say, “A bra can change your life”. It has only been one day and I feel 10lbs lighter, I look a million times better and my clothes have begun to fit me correctly! The best part is they don’t use measuring tapes they have a holistic method to picking out a bra and Rochelle is simply amazing. She took one look at what I was wearing and said, “Hmm the band looks right but… oh yeah we need to go up in the cups” and came back with absolutely the perfect size on the first try! The first try! So now I wear a 34H and I feel incredible and I even got a couple of really cute but yet super supportive bras out of the whole ordeal. And yes I spent a decent bit of money on it but let’s face it bras are expensive (especially if you aren’t in the A-C cup range because they aren’t as common). Honestly I believe that finding the right bra can change your life, it gives you more self confidence and it feels better. It is absolutely incredible to wear a bra that actually feels good. It’s actually a first for me and I don’t care how much money I have to spend, I’m never going back.

Why Not Try To Balance The Budget…

by rhealitycheck

instead of making false promises? Like our two candidates currently are. I mean don’t get me wrong, I like some of the things being proposed like putting more money into education but I think that we also have to look at the bigger picture. Our entire economy is struggling. Severely. I simply cannot respect candidates who cannot prioritize which programs may not make it with a modified budget. I mean $700 billion just went to bail out our banks. If that isn’t significantly increasing our deficit I don’t know what is. Not to mention the pointless wars that we’ve been funding for the vanity of an under-educated over-funded egotistical maniac who cannot admit when he is wrong. Unfortunately for us he is also happens to be President of the United States and therefore we are not allowed to question him (now whatever happened to that wonderful first amendment giving us the right to free speech? Silly me, I forgot the Patriot Act, drawn up by his “servants”, severely limits those rights). But I digress, this is supposed to about the two men who are trying to replace the current misplaced ninny.

What really gets me is that neither one of them can let go of all the promises they are making. Typical politicians we would rather lie and stretch the budget into something unbearable rather than admit that some things are simply not possible and that we need to prioritize.

If it were me, and I were in Obama’s shoes, I would say, I’m sorry everyone, I think education is extremely important it *is* our future but if our children cannot be healthy, they cannot think. If their parents cannot afford to give them nourishment, their brains will suffer. If our country goes into a recession and children drop out to help their families pay the bills, pouring all the money in the world into our education system is not going to fix that. We need to start with basics. We cannot cut social security and I am not sure we can add to it, which would be the ideal but let’s just leave it as is for now until we get a better idea of budget. We can pull in the purse strings around the war and we will. We will be bringing our troops home and start focusing on more internal problems. And yes, I will raises taxes on the upper class because our middle class is struggling not to mention the lower class that I’m not even sure is barely making it. We need to start taking responsibility for ourselves at home, right here, right now. This is the time to act, this is the time to make a change for the better. This economic crisis is just the wake up call that should tell Americans that greed is not the answer, that we must work for the benefit of the whole in order to stand up as a successful society. Now is not the time to let the wealthy just waltz off into the sunset with their offshore accounts and avoiding taxes. Taxes are what afford us the first-world lifestyle we are accustomed to and it is not solely the responsibility of the middle and lower-classes to have to pay it because the upper classes have the benefit of loop holes.

If I were McCain, I would say, I’m sorry my friends, I know that I call all you corporations my base but unfortunately we are in an economic crisis and I cannot give you tax cuts. Do you want to know why? I’ll tell you why, those taxes just bailed your irresponsible, greedy selves out of poverty. So you will have to live with taxes for a few more years, if for nothing else than to give back what we have given to save you.

Well ok, so the pseudo McCain compromises are pretty easy for me because I don’t believe in tax cuts for the rich. But the pseudo Obama compromises are actually quite difficult for me to think of because I was a teacher and I hugely value education. And I believe that we should have nationalized health care. There are a lot of things that I think are important that should have more funding, such as medicare and the aforementioned education and health care but I also think that in hard times you have to make hard decisions. And so I leave you with the thought, if you were the candidates what promises would you make compromises on?

Is It Really “No” Child Left Behind?

by rhealitycheck

Because really, I think it seems more and more like every child has been left behind as we keep letting this ineffective measure remain in place.

This morning as I was riding the train to work I was expecting the financial markets to still be all over the headlines of my paper and sure enough they were but hidden away at the bottom right of the front page there was something else that caught my attention. There was a piece titled Under ‘No Child’ Law, Even Solid Schools Falter. Now having been a public school teacher, education still holds a special place in my heart (I just don’t have the patience to be able to deal with public school administration to continue in the system).

So the title of this act is just phenomenal propaganda but it doesn’t actually address any of this issues plaguing our public schools such as the budgets continually being cut. (Unless of course you are fortunate and live in a wealthy neighborhood where parents will rally and raise money for the local schools themselves out of their own pockets). But really the only thing this act has done is require more testing in the schools. Personally I don’t think that standardized tests are always a great measure of what people know. I happen to test well and yes they do reflect that on some level I am smart but I have friends who are just as smart as I am and who generally perform better in class than I do who test horribly. In fact when these standardized tests are so heavily weighted because of funding there is a lot of pressure to teach to the test from the administration (and no I’m not making this up, I actually worked in a school and was told to teach to the test). When you teach to the test you miss a lot of material that is just as important but because it’s not on the test teachers will just skip it. Especially new teachers who are being pressured. I mean these could be very innovative inspirational teachers yet they are being given instructions to expect the worst from their students and often times given nearly impossible goals. Not to mention students lose from these measures too. It is much more important to instill some joy in learning, what joy is there when you are constantly under pressure to pass a test. These days they even have exams in grade school, which I know did not exist when I was growing up (thankfully). I think it is absolutely ludicrous to think that some exam will miraculously mean that suddenly American public schools will perform better. Also how on earth do you call it no child left behind when every single state has a different standard. You cannot make unreasonable federal regulations when you choose not to help out the states. That is irresponsible and unjust. I dearly hope that whoever wins this next election will reconsider the state of the nations educational systems and try to create a system that may be a little less dysfunctional instead of continuing to make demands of the school system without giving them any support.

On a bright note I am supremely proud of Chicago for approving a gay friendly school for teens that are at risk of dropping out due to harassment.

Alan Greenspan & the Credit Crisis

by rhealitycheck

So I was just reading this article yesterday on the way to work and I was really surprised by what I was reading. Granted for the better half Greenspan’s term as head of the Fed I was still a kid and had a shady understanding of politics let alone how the economy was run. Now, that I’ve grown up I do like to try to understand economics a little bit but I’ll certainly admit that my understanding is still rather foggy.

What troubles me about this article and the way the economy has been going is that it seems that we have completely forgotten about why there were so many regulations on banks in the first place. I know that we have new financial instruments and that in theory the market will regulate itself and so we do not need to have regulations in place. But it seems to me that this follows the same path as much of Marxist philosophy.

Should we believe the best in people then communism/socialism would work beautifully because everyone would be living equally and all contributing to society. Now in real life, that is not the case. For one, many people believe that they deserve a bigger piece of the proverbial pie than everyone else, which is why capitalism exists. For two, there are people who are leeches on society who choose not to work (yes, they actually choose not to work… trust me I didn’t believe it until I saw it with my own eyes). So while I am a big proponent of socialism, I just do not think it is possible implement well in a pure sense. Therefore we have to work around human nature.

In the same sense the financial markets should regulate themselves and should those people working in the financial markets never take higher than necessary risks or advertise falsely then we’d be great. Essentially if we could eliminate greed then it’d be perfect. But let’s face it, why do most people work on Wall St, I assure you it is not because they are do-gooders and think economics is fascinating, I would hazard a guess that even the most philanthropic Wall Streeters have at least a small greedy streak. If you truly loved the theory of economics I doubt you’d be on Wall St, you’d much more likely be a professor teaching and researching the theories.

That being said, I find it flabbergasting that Greenspan can still support essentially complete deregulation of the financial markets. Especially with financial instruments such as derivatives now being seen as rather controversial as far as deregulation goes. I mean just looking back at history regulations were put in place so that we could avoid the financial catastrophe that is occurring now. I mean just look at what the after effects have done to Iceland.

Another thing I would like to mention is that Greenspan fought for deregulation not for a small period of time but for the entire time he was in office. Granted, I would like to blame this whole thing on the Republicans (being the good little liberal that I am) but it’s not entirely their fault. I will say that they hold a large share of the blame but I don’t see any Democrats that were crying “wolf” when they should have been. We, as a country, were far too greedy for far too long and these are simply the consequences – depressing as they may be. I surely hope that we can finally learn from our mistakes and that the economy will smooth out sooner rather than later.

Another Look at Palin

by rhealitycheck

I just love this op-ed by Thomas Friedman on Palin’s patriotism. I feel like someone has finally pinpointed some of the little bitty things that she says that just crawl under my skin and stay there irritating it but I just can’t always find the words to express them. Thankfully every once in a while I find a more eloquent political columnist who does just that.

I love that Friendman discusses how Sarah Palin statement “You said recently that higher taxes or asking for higher taxes or paying higher taxes is patriotic. In the middle class of America, which is where Todd and I have been all of our lives, that’s not patriotic.” is really a contradiction on many levels. And I agree with him wholeheartedly that paying taxes is patriotic. Perhaps I wouldn’t have used that phrasing because I don’t think in jargon but I do believe that taxes are necessary to preserve our standards of living and basic human rights. I would like Sarah Palin to answer how on earth without taxes we would have come up with the $700Billion bail out that is saving our economy. And how without taxes we could afford to send our troops to Iraq? And without taxes just how exactly does she get paid?
I understand taxes may not be the most pleasant thing to think about. And I understand that it stings when it comes out of your paycheck. But I also believe very strongly in the greater good and in social responsibility. And if being socially responsible isn’t patriotic well then I don’t know what is. In fact, I would like to question all those people out there who think taxes should be eliminated completely and ask them how exactly they would like our military to function? Not to mention our government and economy? Because really if we were to eliminate taxes altogether that bailout never would have happened. And while I may not be a fan of the bailout, I can tell you right now that Dubya’s wonderful legacy of taking absolutely no social responsibility has left many millions of Americans in the lurch right now.

So I think I’ll take the taxes and be socially responsible, even if that means I’m not patriotic.