Sounds good to begin with, no discrimination on the basis of religion from government benefits, BUT the last part opens the door to government funding of PRIVATE, RELIGIOUS schools, etc.

No on this one.

This one I am tending to favor because of the provision to fund public schools.  More if I find out more information.

This ballot initiative looks like it provides a close for the veterans who were combat injured, now live in Florida, but were not Florida residents when they went into the service.  So repair the problem and let these veterans have the same benefit of property tax discount as other veterans in Florida.  I approve and will vote yes on this one.

CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT
ARTICLE I, SECTION 28
Health Care Services
Proposing an amendment to the State Constitution to prohibit laws or rules from
compelling any person or employer to purchase, obtain, or otherwise provide for
health care coverage; permit a person or an employer to purchase lawful health
care services directly from a health care provider; permit a health care provider to
accept direct payment from a person or an employer for lawful health care services;
exempt persons, employers, and health care providers from penalties and taxes
for paying directly or accepting direct payment for lawful health care services;
and prohibit laws or rules from abolishing the private market for health care coverage of any lawful health care coverage.

So, lets analyze this.  It seems to me that this is an attempt to preempt any federal requirements under the PPACA (Affordable Care Act) that would require the purchase of health insurance.  It also seems to be a preemptive strike at insurance pools and at ANY attempt on the part of the state or the federal government to institute a Medicare for all plan or any single payer plan.

At this point, unless I can be persuaded that this is not the case, I will vote no on this change to Florida’s constitution.

The place I wonder about with those two is Vietnam.  But I know from my history studies that the first “advisers” in Vietnam were sent in under Truman and the first American casualty from that was in 1949.  So Republican or Democrat, we were so determined on one level to stop the spread of communism that we would have been in that.  After all, it was Johnson that escalated and Nixon who despite his “secret plan to end the war’ that invaded Cambodia.

The place where things could have changed, I believe, is the 1972 Nixon/McGovern election.  Nixon, with his fears, set up Watergate and the subsequent pardon by Ford guaranteed that the powers that be would never really be held accountable, leading up to Iran/Contra and the clear crimes of the Reagan/Bush administration.

Reagan, however, is a different situation.  I do not know the veracity of the secretary I heard tell the story of that campaign’s deal with the Iranians to hold the hostages to insure the defeat of Carter.  I do think it perfectly possible.  I do hold him responsible for the demonization of minorities.  His “welfare queen” code talk that I am hearing thirty years later. He was a better actor than I was crediting him.

The appointment of George W. Bush by the Supreme Court followed in less than a year by the tragedy of Sept 11 set up the destruction of the Constitution that I had known, loved, and taught.  The expansion of the military/security/homeland espionage network has eroded any real civil rights.

The use of social issues to frighten people who are afraid enough of the modern world erodes again more rights.  We now heard how only victims of ‘legitimate’ rape deserve the opportunity to have an abortion.  And yet, I can guarantee, that the powers that be will use every medical opportunity to guarantee that their daughters and granddaughters do not have be bear unwanted children.

Frightened seniors are being deluded into thinking the Affordable Care Act had cut their Medicare benefits when it has only cut payments to hospitals and has increased the prescription benefit.  They hear that the Ryan plan will not affect them, yet the cuts to Medicaid will cause many seniors to have to either leave long term care facilities or use less desirable ones.

If these fanatics win in November, I seriously want my children and grandchildren to emigrate to somewhere that women are considered full human beings, that medical care is a right not a priviledge, where education is focused on High Order Thinking Skills and not biblical superstition.

Let us follow this to its logical conclusion.  Health insurance is part of the wages employees have contracted to have as a condition of employment.  If my employer can dictate that I cannot spend part of that compensation on something to which he or she disagrees religiously, then can that same employer insist that I cannot purchase a bottle of wine for my Thanksgiving dinner?  Can he or she insist that I cannot purchase a cheeseburger because he or she is keeping kosher, and that is not just for observing Jews?  What about any other way in which I want to spend the money I have earned?

One reason the economy is in the dumps is because we are not going out shopping, consuming enough.  We consumers.

But we are citizens first.  When we allow ourselves to be portrayed solely as consumers, consumers of goods and services, consumers of government, then we are allowing ourselves to be placed outside of things, passive.

The Constitution of the United States begins “We, the People;” the Declaration of Independence using phrases like “when one people dissolve.”  People, citizens, not consumers.

I remember when the department in a business or college that dealt with employees was the Personnel Department.  Think about what the term Human Resources means.  A resource is something one uses and discards when no longer useful.  Employees who are just resources do not need lunch breaks, pensions, sick leave, parental leave.  They are things to be used and discarded.  Employees who are personnel, on the other hand, do need these considerations.  They are joint creators of what the plant, school, factory, farm, produces.

I pledge to never again refer to a Human Resources Department.  It is the personnel department.  Anyone join me?

I remember the now comical school drills of hiding under the desk with hands over our eyes.  I was in Washington DC during the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, attending a seminar at the Library of Congress Folger library just a few blocks from the Capitol.  The constant awareness that death could come at any time and that we at that conference would not know made the poetry and discussions especially poignant.

Since September 11, 2001, our people, politicians, country has reacted to the sudden attack with hysteria, security theater, overreactions.  We are the people who faced down Joseph Stalin and Khrushev.  What happened?

Under the Northwest Ordinance, Congress set out how to divide the territories into townships, and set up the organized settlement of Ohio, Illinois, Indiana.

But the best thing that this law did was to prohibit slavery in those territories.  The later disputes over moving slavery into new territories applied to the land we got under the Louisiana Purchase and the Mexican War.

We were in the Cold War, almost two years after fighting ceased in the Korean Conflict.  The Interstate Highway system was passed and the next couple of decades saw the construction of one of the best ways in which our commerce and economy thrived.

Having the interstate allowed companies to transport goods and supplies quicker and with less cost than regular travel.  If you have an doubts about the value of that system, drive from Miami to Jacksonville only using US 1.  Thank you no.

That system was proposed sixty years ago.  What are we doing today that will help commerce and still be as vital in 2072?

We are not repairing the infrastructure we have;  how will we cope when more bridges fail?

I hear talk of privatization, states which have sold or rented tollways;  we tried that way once.

I hear talk of reducing government and governmental services.  Scranton just slashed pay for police and firefighters to minimum wage, no negotiation, just a unilateral cut in pay.  Do we really want a society in which these functions are private?   Remember the reports the last couple of years about a fire department that simply allowed houses to burn because the homeowners had not paid the private company. If you rent, what about depending on your landlord to pay that fee? Societies have been there before.

We, as a society, created certain occupations and facilities as governmental functions because that was what worked best for all of us.