“The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works — whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified.”  – President Barack Obama, Inauguration, 1/20/09

And that has been Obama’s and the Progressive mantra – size of Government doesn’t matter but if it “works”.  Progressives have placed all of their belief into the [misbegotten, from my standpoint] view that Government is full of non-partisan experts that can run our Society in an efficient manner.  Remember, Progressivism began in the Industrial Revolution, when machines were mechanical, big, and wondrous things.  They reasoned that Government should be so – and in charge of the even larger machine of Society.  Which, as I have said before, reduces the rest of us to mere cogs in that machine – and they are OK with that.  But is that machine working?  No, because after all, we ain’t cogs.

When I went over to Newsbusters (quoting a National Journal piece) and saw this, I nearly plotzed when I read this:

“Questioning why the Veterans Affairs Department hadn’t been overhauled months ago as promised by Obama (actually that was seven years ago, plus six other times, Ron — Ed.), a senior White House official conceded privately to me, ‘We don’t do the small stuff well. And the small stuff is the important stuff.'”

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Last Fall, when I heard that the TV show COSMOS was coming back, I was a bit excited. I enjoyed the original, way back when, and was hopeful for the reboot.

But the first episode of the new COSMOS wasted no time demonstrating that axe-grinding propaganda would be part and parcel for its entertainment experience. “Science” would be at the beck and call of the writers, who proved themselves to be liberals, likely funded with money from liberals, who were going to use the show to promote ideas that secured funding for liberal mythologies rather than unbiased science.

I turned it off and walked away. I already know about liberal ‘science.’ It is all politics and little else. Revisiting it with splashy CGI would not make it less the lie.

I am not watching COSMOS, but as an observer of culture and media, I am still aware of the show, and it continues to use its claim at being about science, to lie to the public.

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In our quest to keep you connected to the New media GraniteGrok is always looking for ways to make content delivery seamless.  We want you to have options.  That is why we made our podcast available on iTunes, iHeart, Stitcher, TuneIn, iTunes, Spreaker, and of course here, at GraniteGrok.  It is why we live stream, why we use Ustream, YouTube, and Blip.tv.  And it is why we just tried to optimize the site for mobile O/S (again).

Our last attempt got buggy, like sitting in a lawn-chair watching a New England sunset in May (assuming it’s not too damn cold).  Black flies, mosquitoes…you know, buggy.  (Swat!)

Not a reason to give up.

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When our “Meet the New Press” radio show was around, that was an oft said saying as a take off of what Massachusetts pol (and later US Speaker of the House) Tip O’Neil used to say “All politics is local”.  We extended it as it seemed that all of the political problems we talked about locally about our hamlet and surrounds, we also heard about in other areas.  Also, we have seen the Democrat model replicate itself: what happens in DC is tried locally in Concord (especially if the Progressive Dems can’t pass the desired legislation in DC).

Well, our original mantra still holds true as we see, once again, politicians unwilling to make the hard decisions that we send them to Concord and to DC to do.  Remember a few months ago when everyone in Concord was wailing that our Highway Trust Fund was running out of money and that we had to raise more money to fix our “failing bridges and roads”?  I do, and it was clear that Progressive politicians (both Democrat and Republican) were unwilling to make the hard decisions we expected and failed to seal up the leaks that stole money from that Fund. 

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Reason why?  Scott Brown brought has it upon himself (we merely talk about it):

• Scott Brown keeps emphasizing that he looks forward to working with Democrats again
• He voted for Romneycare (Obamacare before the steroids hit) as a “good thing”

Oh year, the news:

UnitedHealthcare to cut doctors for Mass. seniors.

“National insurance giant UnitedHealthcare plans to cut up to 700 Massachusetts doctors from its physician network for seniors enrolled in its private Medicare plan as a way to control costs, according to company officials.

For elderly patients enrolled in the plan, the cuts mean they will have to find a new doctor or eventually switch to a new health plan that covers their current doctor.”

And of COURSE, we hear the faux outrage from Democrats who can’t stand the idea that the private sector providers are merely following the Law

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