(I'm sharing what I submitted on the Obama website.)

Michelle, as a mother of two, I'm sure you'd say your births were very significant events in your life. Unfortunately for many US women, birth is traumatic and terrifying because of a health care system that does not honor women.

California is coming together to work on health care for everyone. We have Assembly Bill 1X which would provide health care for all Californians. This bill is a significant move in the right direction, but this morning I was called to asked my Assembly member to vote no.

The people responsible are not being transparent. Details on the flip.

I just got a call from one of the dem presidential campaigns asking for money. As soon as I answered the phone, the person started their schtick, so I interrupted and said, "I cannot donate now, but--" but I was interrupted.

Can I offer some advice in the form of a rant? If you're one of these callers, read on the flip.

I teach at a university. I talk with my students and my collegues about current events.

I know some of you will say that today's youth don't pay attention. While I think that's generally true, I think it's mostly because we 1) let them, and 2) make them struggle to get educated (ie working to pay high tuition and living expenses combined with a bad overall educational system). My collegues also suffer from over work, struggle just to make ends meet.

What's surprising? Today I asked my students for comments on the Scooter Libby trial. Who, they said. You know, the Valerie Plame scandal/trial/indictment/conviction? Nope. Never heard of it...more on the flip.

I haven't seen a diary in a while that specifically covers the national debt. I hope to put some of this debt into perspective.

Earlier tonight, I was reading an article about one of the world's billionaires and I wondered, how many of the world's richest people would it take to pay off the US National Debt? More than I expected...flip...

Today after the Wallace interview of Clinton, Fred Barnes casually says that everyone knows al Qaida grew the most during the 90s--as if to say we can blame Clinton for 9/11 because he let al Qaida grow.

While I do fault Clinton (and world leaders) for doing little when the Taliban took over Afghanistan, I cannot find any evidence that al Qaida grew more in the 1990s than they have after 9/11.

I'm finding it nearly impossible to find any statistics or information on how many members they have. I can find some info saying they grew "a lot" after 9/11, but I have no numbers. So, does Mr. Barnes have access to some info I can't readily find, or is he, in typical fashion, make up shit?

I teach at a metropolitan university. I have a group of freshmen for a GE lit class. This week we came across a passage that said war demands more decency than times of peace. I asked them to think about that in light of what's been going on in Iraq and Afghanistan.

I got blank stares.

So I said, you know, specifically Abu Ghraib. Can someone comment on that? More on the flip...

By now you've heard about the ruling by Detroit U.S. District Court judge Anna Diggs Taylor saying the NSA wiretapping is unconstitutional. On the flip, I give you some choice quotes from her ruling. Oh this is fun...

I'm feeling a deep sadness for Israel.

I despise what Israel is doing to Lebanon. I despise how the US media is playing up their actions as necessary. (The US is the only country supporting Israel now that Blair has finally come out against the Israelis' actions.) I despise the activities of Hezbollah. But what I despise most of all is what Israel has become.

I'm going to have nightmares over this NY Times story.

In another development, an Israeli military official claimed that Iranian Revolutionary Guards were involved on some level in a missile strike that badly damaged an Israeli missile ship off Lebanon's capital Beirut...
Israel's military initially said the ship was hit by an unpiloted drone aircraft packed with explosives. But the military revised its assessment on Saturday, saying the ship was hit by a radar-guided, C802 missile supplied by Iran that was fired from the Lebanese shore.

Although Bush is later paraphrased as saying he asked the Syrian leader to calm down Hezbollah (what about calming Israel, too?), I think he'll use this as an excuse to enter Iran.

The fighting could escalate, and then the US will be called in to help the Israelis fight the terrorists. And we'll see more military officials claiming that Iran is supplying weapons to terrorist organizations.

Voila. Bush will have his "reason" to bomb Iran.

I just hope I'm wrong and the fighting stops now.

I'm traveling in the UK and I find I'm getting very angry at the toll roads. I don't like the principle of them. First the country taxes gasoline so that well over half of the price goes to tax. Then the government goes and builds a road using public lands. Plus add in all of the city streets that had to be rerouted or built to connect to the toll road, and then the signs everywhere pointing to the toll roads, and people to work the toll booths. You pay about $5 to drive on the road ($12-15 for trucks), combined with the taxes from the gas you're already burning, and you see the government is taxing you twice for the same service. I don't like the idea of using public resources to benefit the few--those who can afford the toll roads. But what if we didn't pay a gas tax?

I thought I'd share that for the first time in my life, I put up a political sign in my yard. I haven't done them in the past basically because I felt I might alienate neighbors.

Bill Frist has been touting SMART grants at colleges. The purpose of these grants are for "national security", but Frist says publically they are to make America competitive with China and India.

With the "reform" of Pell grants, SMART grants look like a "smart" way to funnel students into military and defense jobs.

More on the flip.

There's a horrible email making the rounds for the last few months. It even has a Snopes entry. I tried ignoring it, but finally I had to comment on the implied racism and classism in this, especially since I've seen it republished this week in a HAM radio newsletter by people who likely didn't see the racism implied in it. On the flip...

Bush says some funny stuff today.

The security of our country is directly linked to the liberty of the Iraqi people -- and we will settle for nothing less than victory. Victory will come when the terrorists and Saddamists can no longer threaten Iraq's democracy, when the Iraqi security forces can provide for the safety of their citizens on their own, and when Iraq is not a safe haven for terrorists to plot new attacks against our nation. There will be more days of sacrifice and tough fighting before the victory is achieved. Yet by helping the Iraqis defeat the terrorists in their land, we bring greater security to our own.

Analysis on the flip...

I informed some friends about the current national debt reaching and exceeding the current debt ceiling of $8.18 trillion. Some young Repubs replied that it was because of Democrats' spending on social services. Bollocks! Let's look at the US Government's stats with links to the sources in gov't that show SSI/Medicare have been paying for themselves and the deficit and debt come from other fed spending, including interest payments.

I went to the IRS website and found a great excel sheet that lists all of the government's income:

http://www.irs.gov/taxstats/article/0,,id=96380,00.html

I added a simple formula that calculates the percentage of total income taxes (excludes employment and estate taxes) that comes from corporations versus individuals.