Reading the News Is Bad for My Mental Health

I raise my head up for a moment from an extended family extended holiday visit (how did all those nieces and nephews get so old, so smart, so tall?) to check out the Voice, read the news in the sidebar (all the news I've had a chance to read in the past several days) - only to discover that the members of the House passed the Defense Appropriations bill I wrote about last week. The one with the provision for drilling in the Arctic Wildlife Refuge tacked on in a last desperate attempt to work their will against the wishes of the American people, while keeping their benefactors in Big Oil fat and happy. From the Forbes article:

House lawmakers opened the way for oil drilling in the Arctic National
Wildlife Refuge as one of their last acts of an all-night session Monday
bringing their legislative year to a close.

The ANWR provision was attached to a major defense bill, forcing many
opponents of oil and gas exploration in the barren northern Alaska range to vote
for it. The bill, passed 308-106, also included money for hurricane relief and
bird flu preventive measures.

Attaching such a measure to a bill that had to be passed - money to support the troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, not something many lawmakers could vote against - was quite simply a despicable act. My disgust with the Republican House majority has reached a new high. Or low, I'm not sure which. In the same article, House Opens Way for Oil Drilling in Arctic, a couple of paragraphs quite clearly reveal the way it all functions. In talking about the 40 billion dollar "deficit cutting bill," there is this:

"Tonight the Congress will renew our commitment to the principles of fiscal
discipline and limited government that minted this majority," said Rep. Mike
Pence, R-Ind., who leads a group of House conservatives.

Republicans originally put the savings at $41.6 billion, but that
figure was later reduced to $39.7 billion with restoration of Medicare payments
for oxygen patients, a late concession to lawmakers with interests in the
durable medical equipment industry. (emphasis mine)

Were the payments for oxygen restored for the benefit of the patients who needed oxygen? No indeedy, my dears, they were restored for the benefit of the lawmakers who would profit from them. This is how our government operates. This is the principle driving this Congress and this Administration to wreak havoc on the environment and the economy and the lives of its citizens. For the benefit of lawmakers with interests in the x, y and z industries. There is very little holiday spirit in my heart right now. I am watching a long slow trainwreck, and all the kids I love are riding on that train.

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