OK.  I need to vent and it has nothing to do with real estate:  This budget fiasco represents political grandstanding at its worst.  I’m glad they reached a tentative agreement, but it’s BS, and both parties are to blame.  These politicians aren’t my kids, my students, or my employees, but supposedly they are my representatives and I’d like to remind them of a few things:

  1. The health of women is not negotiable.  Period. The fact that so many important services are provided by Planned Parenthood and other organizations is not a bargaining chip.  Beyond the moral issues that some may profess, if the people who oppose these organizations ever did the math and figured out how much it would cost, over a lifetime, to support the children that resulted from lack of contraception or poor pre-natal health…never mind the spread of STDs….well, I’d just love to hear who they think is going to pay for it all.  Just a reminder that the majority of Americans support the work of Planned Parenthood.
  2. Effective democratic government requires compromise.  Attention Tea Party:  You think you’re going to be the underdog on the playground who gets the sympathy vote because you’re scratching in all the right budget-cut places and pushing the abortion button?…Wrong!  Don’t you see that you’re the very uncomfortable minority and even your pimp Boehner is having trouble being one with you?  There is no reliable information to suggest long-term sustainability for your platform.  Thank God.  But you’re on our radar.
  3. Get priorities straight.  In the age of tweets and instant response to everything, I’m happy that our President has chosen not to reply to every national and global fuck-up on his Blackberry.  I actually think it’s a good thing to take some time and weigh options, versus having a knee-jerk response to the media headline of the hour.   That being said however, I think he lagged on the budget crisis and considering the stakes, it would have been better if he had made this a primary agenda item several weeks ago versus allowing the opposition to push him into a corner at the 11th hour.

So, I may have gotten some of this wrong.  But from where I sit, both parties are to blame:  The Democrats for not acting more quickly to take control and just get it done; and the Republicans for being the spoilers, egged-on by the new kids in the sand box who are determined to set their stubborn little feet and prevent the game from moving forward.

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