Some 2013 Stats

Happy holidays, I haven't posted anything for so long, I have been busy with family obligations during this time. Here are some numbers, I thought interesting about this year. Forgive me for the jumbled post.

Unemployment rate:7%
Obamacare enrolment: 1.1 million
Budget bills passed: 1
Marriage equality states: 18 (Utah was definitely a surprise)
Days of government shutdown: 16
Obama approval rating: 39%

If you have any thoughts on these numbers post them in the comments below, guest post are allowed. If you have any suggestion on what i can make better or what I should cover the coming year, post it in the comments or email me at generalpoliticshh@gmail.com

John Boehner Woke Up and Grew Some Balls

'Are you kidding me?' 'Frankly, I just think they have lost all credibility.' Those are words that came from the mouth of Rep. John Boehner, Republican Speaker of the House, he was talking about the conservative outside groups like the Heritage Foundation, Club for Growth etc. This was in relation to the budget deal that was passed overwhelmingly by the House and that was ferociously decried by those organizations. Why, you ask is it surprising or noteworthy? Well John Boehner ever since he got the Speaker's gavel in his hands has been more of a follower than a leader in his caucus, he allowed the crazy Tea Party members of his caucus backed by those groups he slammed earlier, to have a powerful voice that overtook everyone else and made the entire House GOP look like a bunch of right wing crazies.

Washington Did Something Last Night

I should have written about the mini scandals and happenings on the budget deal, but hey, witting about government incompetence all the time gets boring and tiring, this however, is different. Last night the House of Representatives passed a 2 year budget deal that would fund the government until October 2015. The bill was a compromise crafted by Senate Budget Committee chairwoman Patty Murray (D) with Rep. Paul Ryan (R), the House's own Budget Committee chair. In a bipartisan move that has become very rare on Capitol Hill, the House passed the bill 332-94, the Senate is to follow suit and the president has promised to sign the bill into law as soon as it reaches his desk.

Something is happening in Kiev

It may have gone under reported in the news but for the past two weeks a revolution, or at least a massive uprising, is happening in Kiev, the Capital of Ukraine. Their president, Victor Yanukovych, refused to sign accords that would have created closer economic ties between the Ukrainian Republic and the European Union in favor of keeping a closer relationship with Russia. You might ask yourselves is every country in Europe supposed to join the EU sooner or later? Or what is wrong with a president not wanting his country to enter in an organization that has proven how perilous it is in the past year? Well the answer is the people.

Remembering Nelson Mandela.

I just learned that Nelson Mandela, former South African President, has passed away. Nelson Mandela has always been the greatest inspiration in my life. As a black man, he truly stand as the embodiment of what you can accomplish under so many hardships, his legacy is gigantic and he stands  as, and will always be, Africa's father. His greatest accomplishment will always be the creation South Africa as a democratic, free, and rainbow nation.

A break for Francois Hollande

After getting battered in the polls, dealing with and unruly government, a charmless Prime Minister and a very down spiraling country, the president of the French Republic received good news. The unemployment rate dropped down 0.6% in October to 10.5%, the first time since Hollande has Occupied the Elysee. This is actually even better news because, it is also the first time that Hollande and his government have kept a promise that they made, they had promised a drop in unemployment for the month of October and they delivered, for politicians it does not get better that than. This of course will help his every deflating fortunes at home and show France and the rest of Europe that Francois Hollande means business, increase his credibility and strengthen his voice in European matters (against the formidable Angela Merkel). The great news are of course are only a small part as France still has many problems, the deficit, and unemployment rate that is still high and a radicalization that is increasing at a fast rate. Hollande of course still has his challenges set up for him as he still deals with his unruly government, and it remains to be seen when Jean Marc Ayeraul will be dismissed. This is definitely a step in the right direction.

HealthCare.gov's small step in the right direction.

If you have an internet connection and you live in the United States of America, you have read the awful coverage that the Affordable Care Act has been getting. Most of the coverage was geared towards the faulty and very malfunctioning website, people were unable to sign up or pick plans, the site froze and generally was awful. That coverage of the glitches was giving the entire law a very negative image, and was reviving the Republican party that had been pretty decimated by the debt ceiling showdown. With his approval ratings in free fall and the threat of the Democrats losing the Senate in 2014, President Obama and his administration announced that they had given themselves a November 30th deadline for the website to be close to fully functioning.

Gobble, gobble, gobble!

To all my American readers have a happy Thanksgiving! I hope you all have a day filled with turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, stuffing and family. Thanksgiving is my favorite holidays and I hope you guys have a good one!

Marco Rubio, Hope Gone Sour

At his election in 2010 Marco Rubio looked like hope for the Republican Party. A well-spoken, Latino man, beloved by the Tea Party and supported by the Republican establishment. Whispers of a second Barack Obama were heard and even the future Republican presidential candidate, Mitt Romney, campaigned for him. The Republicans needed a high profile Latino and the well-spoken Rubio certainly was it.

Martine Aubry, Prime Minister.

Well, it seems that the shoe has dropped for Jean Marc Ayerault, after one of the MPs of the PS called for a change of the head of government on public television, the path to his dismissal began. After a fruitless meeting between Ayeraut and the PS MPs, to try and end the current intra-party rift, shocking news were revealed.

The sad saga of Francois Hollande

The president of the French Republic is certainly a person to pity and feel for. He took over a country that was in a bad economy, a crisis exasperated by the fact that the entire European continent is doing wrong. His promised change and reform have yet to materialize.

Philippines

Typhoon Haiyan has wrecked and caused a lot of damage in the Philippines. 11 million people were affected by the typhoon, 660,00 people are homeless and thousands are dead. The country is struggling with crisis on all sides. They have displaced people, destruction, a rising death toll and a public health emergency, words words cannot express how terrible of a situation the country is in or the suffering on the ground. People are hungry, people need shelter and they also need medication. Pray for them an please make sure to donate for the various charities that are helping on the ground. It is in times like this that we should all come together as citizen of the world and help one another.

Here are organizations you can donate to:

Philippine Red Cross
International Medical Corps
UNICEF

Veterans Day!

Today we celebrate the people who served in the United States Armed forces and honor their service. The members of United States Armed Forces fought and are still fighting to preserve our safety and the freedoms that we enjoy. They are heroes and the work that they do is remarkable! Keep them in your prayers today and may we as a nation take better care of them!

Legalized

Illinois is now the 15th State in the Nation to have passed marriage equality laws. The lawmakers have passed the law and the governor has pledged to sign it. Illinoid joins a growing list of States that achieved marriage equality this year like: Minnesota, Rhode Island and Delaware and New Jersey. States that are sure to join this momentum are: Hawaii, which has the measure already passed by the State Senate, and Nevada, with a pending lawsuit in the State's Supreme Court.

It is stunning to see the reversal that has happened in the past few years. It was not to long ago that States all around were implementing same sex marriage bans in their constitutions, as matter of fact 30 states passed those laws, but it seems that the momentum has ended, the direction this country is heading in is definitely more positive towards gay marriage, as many of the teenagers who couldn't vote are growing up and polls continue to show their overwhelming support for marriage equality. So the support is likely to continue increasing.

I would also like to add that since the supreme court stroke DOMA down, marriage equality is the defacto law of the land. The federal government will recognize marriages that were conducted in marriage equality states and provide benefits even if the couple in question resides in another state. There is also the fact that federal law supersedes state laws. The rest is really all semantics, this country is firmly in the path for full marriage equality in all the land and it will not go back.

The UK economy bears good new for Cameron

The Office of National Statistics had good News for Britain today, the growth for Q3 was 0.8% percent, the country strongest growth in three years. This is the second quarter in a row that the UK has grown its economy, taking them out of recession and on the path of finally leaving behind the 2008 crisis behind.

The audacity of Saudi Arabia

So apparently Saudi Arabia has decided to pivot away from America, so the rumors go. Those rumors leaked from the Saudi government, and it was enough to scare John Kerry into hurrying to meet the Saudi Foreign Minister, prince Saud Al-Faisal. The reason, that the United State did not strike Syria and that the country is not giving enough aid to the Rebels.

The unlucky president

Francois Hollande, president of the French Republic has once again had a bad week, a very bad week. It all began with the arrest early last week of Roma school girl Leonarda Dibriani, she was arrested on a class trip and deported to Kosovo with her family that has been illegally residing in France since 2009.

To the readers.

For those who have checked out my blog regularly (I know you are there!). Feel free to email me at generalpoliticshh@gmail.com, to give me feedback: what you liked, what you didn't like, areas that can be improved on. I am new at this and would love to be better. Thank you all for taking time to read my ramblings.

The glitches that could doom Obamacare

 debt ceiling and shutdown drama, the roll-out of the Affordable Care Act or as it is commonly called Obamacare, on Oct. 1st has been a very big failure for the government. The website that was supposed to help people in 36 states register, has been plagued by glitches that have not allowed visitors to sign up or select plans. Originally the plan was for every state to set up their own healthcare exchange websites, but the conservative states governors refused setting up their own exchanges forcing the government to create one website for those states, heathcare.gov.

Building a fully functional website for the use of millions is no small challenge even when given around two years to build and sustain, but the failure of the administration especially the Health Department, was abysmal. Glitches are to be expected and growing pains are usual but complete shutdown mode and utter inefficiency are inexcusable. The taxpayers forked around 100 million dollars to create that website and being told that it has been shutdown for 42 hours, as was the case yesterday is upsetting and does not go a long way in getting people to like the law, a law whose popularity was actually on the rise during the debt crisis. The reporting on Obamacare is mostly centered on the glitches instead of the many benefits that the law offers like kids staying on their parents insurance until they are 26, no more preconditions and government subsidies for those who cannot afford health coverage.

The government has said that around 476,000 people have signed up for the law, an underwhelming number, and around half of those come from states with their own exchanges. The government is planning on giving the full number in November giving us a clearer picture. States exchanges websites, have shown to be much more functioning and have only suffered minor glitches. The target for the administration is to have seven million people enrolled in the program by March and going by these number form Oct. 1st, that goal seems impossible to achieve. The situation will only generate bad press for the law and give republicans ammunition to attack the law.

What this glitches are doing is completely overshadowing the content of the law. The Affordable Care Act, with its many imperfections, is still away to deal with the health care crisis that the country has and make sure that everyone gets a change to have heath coverage. Just because acquiring it is proving to be a problem does not mean that the product itself bad. Hopefully, the administration will find a solution to make the website even remotely functional and give people health care, like the law intended.

The difficult road to the White House for Christie

Today is my birthday! Speaking of cake, it's an ideal day to talk about Chris Christie, lame joke! Back in 2010 Christopher Christie entered American political consciousness when he rode the anti democratic wave of that year into the governor's mansion in New Jersey.

Deal

After their aborted attempts of throwing a wrench in the Senate deal, the House GOP leadership has declared failure. Their plan even suffered the backlash from conservative power bases like the Heritage Foundation and the Chamber of Commerce. In the morning today Speaker(?) John Boehner announced that the House will take on the Senate deal and will even vote for it first so that the process can be expedited and pass the Senate before the Midnight deadline. The hashed out dead between Senate Party leaders Harry Reid and Mitch McConnell is one that shows the complete and utter loss that the GOP suffered in these two weeks of shutdown.

None of the Houses previsions on Obamacare will make it to the final cut on the bill. Its a clean CR that opens and funds the government until Jan. 15 and also lifts the debt ceiling until Feb. 7. The only sort of concession to the GOP is that there is income verification on those who are receiving subsidies on their insurance. Gone are the one year delay, the two year delay of the medical devices tax and the removal of subsidies from Capitol Hill staffers and administration officials. This is a total victory for democrats in the House, the Senate and the White House who remained united throughout the stand off while the republicans couldn't even figure out what their endgame was.

Hopefully this marks the end of the GOP using the default on the US obligation in their crusades to cut spending. There are far more ways to bring democrats to the table than using the entire US economy as bail. Hopefully this in January and February while we are back to this we will not be back to this mess again.

Obama and democrats - 1
GOP - 0

Valls vs Hollande?

In my previous post I mentioned that French president Francois Hollande was suffering horrible poll numbers, his latest at 24% approval ratings. Things have looked really bleak for him recently. This is how we come to his Minister of the Interior, Manuel Valls who has been recently anointed most popular politician in France.

The craziness of the House GOP

On Thursday, at midnight the Treasury is set to reach the debt ceiling limit and economic havoc unleashed on the global economy. Signs late on Monday morning were all pointing to a deal coming close in the Senate.

Update

I haven't posted anything about the happenings in DC, as it looks like the shutdown is about to end.  But an unfortunate situation happened, I lost a friend, it was very unexpected and very sad. I am attending his funeral tomorrow. Please pray for him and his family as they are going through this difficult time. He was only 21. Gone too young and too soon. Rest In Peace.

Nicholas Sarkozy is free!

In my last post on Nicholas Sarkozy, I expressed hope that he would be found innocent in the Bettencouurt case, a better thing happened. Today court dropped all charges and there is no longer a case against him in the justice. This clears the path for a definite political comeback and is the stuff nightmares are made from for French president and Sarkozy arch-rival, Francois Hollande. I look forward to an interesting political scene in France. Will Sarkozy butt heads with UMP president and aspiring 2017 candidate Jean Francois Cope? What about Francois Fillon? What will be Hollande's reaction? All these scenarios and question are popping in my head and surely in the heads of many French citizen. The race for 2017 is on and it will be an unpredictable and possible crazy. Bonne chance, tout le monde!

P.S. For the connoisseurs of French politics, you guys know that Nadine Morano will be all over the JTs, and that is always a good thing

The Government is still shutdown

It was unbelievable when the government shut down seven days ago and it's still unbelievable now. The government closed because the House refused to pass a clean CR bill that would have funded the government until early December while they worked on compromise for raising the debt ceiling. Unfortunately for all of us the Tea Party hijacked everything a decided to attach a de-fund of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) measure as condition for funding the government. The White House and Senate predictably refused. The House offered a delay of a year, the Senate and the administration still refused. The shutdown happened.

Merkel, Merkel, Merkel

This is late since the election happened on September 22nd but I have always wanted to write something about this election cycle. I have always and will always be fascinated with Angela Merkel, the girl from communist East Germany who grew up to become the most powerful woman in Europe and in the world.

What is wrong with this picture?

The house republicans posted this picture in an attempt to show that they were willing to negotiate with the democrats on passing a Resolution to this government shutdown and that the democrats were unwilling as represented by the empty chairs. It's a ridiculous piece of theater, considering the fact that they democrats have asked for conference many times in the previous weeks, and were given no as answers. Now with the government shut down and the GOP realizing it was a bad strategic move (really, John Boehner was afraid to lose his speakership) they are asking for the same conferences they denied the democrats.

Nicholas Sarkozy and the perpetually stalled political comeback.

                                                       Nicholas Sarkozy

If you follow French politics, you are aware that Francois Hollande, the current president of France is very unpopular. His government elected under the motto le changement c'est maintenant  meaning change is now (echos of Obama 2008) has not delivered on its promises.

The government is shut down

It happened, It actually happened, for the first time since 1996 the United States Government is shut down. Up until the final hours of Monday I held on to the hope that there would be a stop gap resolution passed, the Mitch McConnel idea, but that was shut down by his own caucus members. Nancy Pelosi offered the support of the democratic caucus to John Boehner, that coupled with true GOP moderate could have had a clean CR bill passed, but Boehner as spineless as he is bowed to the pressure of his more conservative caucus members (ahem, the Tea Party). So what have here is, the government has shut down, 800,000 federal workers, are going without pay, and Obamacare, the reason of this whole shutdown is still being implemented. I don't get why the republicans are still pushing this, polls have shown that they will take the blunt of the blame (Quinninipac, CNN/ORC) so the democrats are being bold and letting this happen. It's a game of political interest that has very real causalities and consequences, but the bubble of  DC is preventing those lawmakers from seeing. It will be really interesting to see how the GOP will operate after they capitulate to the democrats and pass a clean CR, it's only a matter of time before it inevitably happens as no one can afford a long shutdown. However, real people are suffering the consequences of this foolishness and my heart is with them.

The government is failing us.

In few hours our government will be out of money. They have had several weeks to do this, but here we are in the last few hours and what have we got? Nothing. Never mind that our resurgent economy can be dealt a heavy blow by the shutdown. Never mind the fact that many government employees will go without pay with families to feed. That is nothing to our politicians, their political games will always come first. If tonight by midnight we don't have at least a shot gap, one week spending bill to keep the government running (an idea floated earlier in the day by Mitch McConnell), our elected official will have failed us. Government is for the people by the people isn't it time our government remembered that?

(Edited for minor typos and added picture)

The shut down is looming.

So on Monday if there is no spending bill passed by the Congress the government will shutdown. What does the shut down mean? It means that millions of government workers will go without pay, public parks and buildings will be closed, and the marketS will fall down. Of course those government workers who will be struggling to pay their bills will not include the members of Congress who are really at the origin of this mess.

So Obama called Rouhani

It was the phone call heard around the word, president Barack Obama of the United States gave a call to Hassan Rouhani, the newly elected Iranian president. It's the first time in 34 years that both head of states of those two country have spoken directly to each other. The Obama administration is obviously trying to work some diplomacy as John Kerry was busy meeting with the Iranian foreign minister Javad Zariv in New York today and more talk scheduled in early October in Geneva. For the United States the idea is to make Iran stop making nuclear weapons and for Iran to get those severe economical sanctions lifted.

Hassan Rouhani ran on a very moderate platform and won hugely, even against Jalili (Ahmadinejad previous nuclear negotiator) who seemed to be backed by the Ayatollah. His platform sounds reasonable, attractive to both the extreme liberal in Iran and the moderate conservatives. I should be more excited about this, but really Rouhani is just a smoking screen, the ultimate power concerning matters of nuclear power is Khamenei and I don't believe his stance have changed. Him and the Revolutionary guard are very conservative and anti american that no progress will really be made. Talking to Rouhani while a good thing, is giving legitimacy to the whole Iranian establishment and establishment that isn't too keen on chance.

However, the president and John Kerry might have more tangible proof that maybe Rouhani has the authority to make some changes. Ahmadinejad always seemed like a Khamenei puppet to me, and I really expect no less of Rouhani despite his talks of change. So Good look to Obama and Kerry, I will be observing this process with skeptical eyes.

The State of the Republican Party

This is one of my favorite subjects right now and it is fitting to post it as my first post. After the 2012 election in which Barack Obama won, the consensus was that it was all about demographics. After all, Obama lost the independents but nonetheless he won the election. It was as clear as water that the GOP had a demographic problem and that needed to be dealt with before the 2014 midterms. Here we are in less than a year away and has the GOP made inroads to solve their problems?

Immigration was supposed to be the biggest deal. After all that was a deciding issue in swaying the Latino vote. Romney’s draconian positions on Immigration in the primary (see self-deportation) and the party whole immigration platform, made him lose the vote 27% to 71%. As the fastest growing minority in the country, those were devastating numbers and surely the GOP would try to change something after the election? The initial chatter immediately was that yes, the GOP needed to change its platform, support the DREAM act and some way of giving proper documentation to those who were already in the country illegally. Most people, me included were thinking that immigration would be among the first things that would be tackled by the new congress. How wrong were we all proven! After initial attempts, the senate could not come close to a deal and everything looked dead in the house. The bill that was passed in early July was unsatisfactory to both sides. But the Senate republicans, to their credits (Mostly McCain, Corker, Rubio and Co.) understood that it would be very hard to win national elections without a hefty slice of the Latino vote. Their counterparts in the house however, do not seem to have that foresight. As most of them are backed by strong majority of whites in their conservative districts, they have nothing to gain and everything to lose by endorsing immigration, being primaried being their chief fear, so they all cling to the old platform. John Boehner (R), Speaker of the House, however can see that it will be difficult to ever win a national election again without an immigration bill, but his own internal problems are stopping his action. Were he to immediately bring the senate bill to the floor, I am sure it would pass with the vote of all democrats and republicans in moderate districts. But due to his fear of his own caucus, the speaker will not bring up the bill until it has a majority of republicans (his own words), which is pretty much impossible. So essentially, the GOP is trapped between a rock and a hard place. Marco Rubio and his failure to lead on that issue deserves his own essay.

Women’s issues were also a big deal in the election. In 2010 as in 2012 the majority of Governor’s mansion and state legislatures are held by the Republican Party. In 2011 and early 2012 despite being voted in on the basis of jobs, jobs,jobs, they passed bills with limits and restrictions on abortion, the de-funding of planned parenthood, because that is what the base of the party was clamoring for. While the very base of the party will turn out more than casual voters or supporters in the mid-terms, the general public tends to only focus on the presidential elections. The base that skyrocketed the republicans in the Governors’ mansions, state legislatures and the House was very pleased with those policies; however the General public being always on the moderate side was generally spooked by such measures. That coupled with the Democrats already strong record on women’s issues increased the margins with which Obama won (55% to 44%). So of course you would expect that the stance of the party would soften as to be able to level the field so the GOP could compete with those women vote with the Democrats. But no after such disasters like Todd Akin and Richard Murdock costing the GOP a Senate majority, republican led states are still passing basically the same laws restricting birth control access and abortions! That might keep them in power in the states and in the House of Representative but what about the national election of 2016? Will those women who voted solely democratic on the basis of their rights and health issues suddenly switch to a party that hasn’t changed its platform and ideals? With the independent voters’ hold on deciding victory dwindling is that something that the GOP can afford to do? I don’t think so.

Hello World,

This is my first attempt at serious blogging, and I am very excited. This will mainly be a blog for me to writabout my politics, be warned, they tend to be rather on the left side of things. I am not only interested in US politics, so there will be some random pieces about french, Israeli, British and even some Greek politics. Politics is not my only passion so there will be pieces here and there of general knowledge. I am excited and I hope this is a fun and exciting adventure.