Barbarian Peanut by CHS.

What has struck me forcefully about the so-called "health care debate" is how little actual issues debate there has been.  And how much orchestrated noise from paid operatives has been ginned up to distract the public from the real prize: real reforms.

Bill Moyers has a profile up on Dick Armey’s Freedomworks astroturf extravaganza that needs viewing far and wide.

It illustrates a fundamental political operative truth: sowing dissent, even based on outright falsehoods, is a means to an end in a public divide and conquer strategy.  Something folks like Armey use to their moneyed clients’ advantage whenever possible because it is the way they earn their multi-million dollar Beltway living.

How so?

Think about the interests involved and their objectives for a moment: maintaining the status quo in health care means that the people making the money continue to rake it in, which means they can continue to dole it out on the Hill. People like Armey bring access on the Hill to the halls of power and that translates into valuable legislative inroads, for which moneyed interests pay handsomely.

In exchange for said donor largesse, keeping the angry public — who are clearly well and truly tired of feeling screwed these days — on the fringes of the discussion had to be a strategic priority.

The best means of doing that? Sow dissent that keeps the public’s eyes off the real ball, thereby throwing any chance at unity of purpose among the public out the window.

Why?  Because a unified public pushing for reform is what drives any substantive change this country ever sees.  It’s what gave FDR the ability to push through New Deal legislation and Wall Street regulations.  It’s what eventually forced an end to the Vietnam War.  It’s the engine that has driven major changes through our entire history.

And the forces of the status quo know that, fear it, and undermine it at every turn. 

Status quo means profit.  Change means instability which makes things tough to control or outright loss of profit, and that is not acceptable, now is it? (more…)

So many dreams shattered.

So many families with empty arms.

So many loved ones with aching hearts.

Still.

How fragile we all are.  How much stronger we all are together.

In memoriam. Requiescant in pace.

English garden robin via canong2fan.

The first time I ever read The Secret Garden, I was hooked. The little robin drew me in and then Dickon sealed the deal.

There have been any number of books and gardening seasons since then.  But I find myself always returning to contrary Mary’s plea for a "bit of earth to call my own."

Something about the renewal of that promise of life and growing things that calls to me.

So when I stumbled on an article in the July 2009 issue of Family Circle on backyardharvest.org, I was intrigued:

…With recent requests from Portland, Oregon, and Milwaukee, Wisconsin, for information on starting local chapters of Backyard Harvest, Amy hopes that communities from coast to coast will follow suit. The group has also partnered with the city of Moscow to allow families to use food stamps at the area farmers’ market to purchase fresh produce. "When times are tough — and they certainly are right now — there’s no easier way to give people nutritious meals and let them know someone cares," she says. "There’s a special look in people’s eyes when they receive food from others who’ve planted and harvested it with their own hands…."

I’ve been planning all along to donate any surplus we get from our little garden plot to the local soup kitchen. But I’m seriously going to have to plan to make a surplus happen for next year after reading this. What a great idea!

For more than a year, our family life has been a little chaotic. Between multiple parental hospitalizations, the passing of my mother-in-law last October, and then the home health care we took on for my father-in-law shortly thereafter, it’s been a wee bit crazy here, to put it mildly.

Mr. ReddHedd is attending a conference in NYC, and The Peanut and I tagged along for the ride.

For those who might like to hang for a bit this morning — Friday, June 19th — I’m planning to grab a cuppa at the Starbucks in Rockefeller Plaza around 11:30 am ET.

NYC Starbucks via dgphilli.Mr. ReddHedd has to attend a conference in NYC this coming weekend, and The Peanut and I have decided to tag along for the ride.

For those who might like to hang for a bit on Friday, June 19th, I’m planning to grab a cuppa at the Starbucks in Rockefeller Plaza around 11:30 am ET.

For NOLA readers, am planning to be at Cafe du Monde, 1039 Decatur Street at 10:30 am for cafe au lait and beignets.

The first YearlyKos in Las Vegas was such a hoot, mainly because I got to meet so many of the people I’d been conversing with for months on end on FDL. It was such a great family moment at our first FDL gathering.