American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009

This is the very quick email that I sent to my congressman this morning: “I urge you to vote “no” on H.R. 2454, the Waxman-Markey “American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009″ (aka the “Safe Climate Act”). While I agree that we must protect our environment for generations to come, this is the wrong bill at the wrong time. In this economic crisis, our families and businesses simply cannot afford higher taxes and higher utility prices. More than ever, this is the wrong time to pass legislation that will very likely reduce the GDP. With the consideration of your constituents back home, please vote “no”, Congressman.”

Julia

I recently finished reading “Julie and Julia” by Julie Powell. I had not heard about the blog, or the book, until I read an article about the upcoming movie in Entertainment Weekly. I have to admit that I am fascinated by the concept of Powell’s Julie/Julia Project:  to cook all 536 recipes from Julia Child’s “Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume I” during the course of one year (all while working a stodgy office job and living in a cramped New York apartment). And yes, I have to admit that I am until I picked up this book I did not really know Julia Child. I knew of her, of course, (who doesn’t?) but I did not know much more than that she was a tall, hunched over, rather awkward and well, manish, woman who cooked on PBS once upon a time.

After “Julie and Julia,” I read “Appetite for Life” by Noel Riley Fitch, a biography of Julia Child. What a vibrant, unique, inspiring woman that Julia was!  Never mind that she worked for the OSS in Cyclon and China during World War II – she attended the Cordon Bleu in Paris at a time when women did not (especially not 6 foot-tall American women) and went on to change the course of American cuisine. And she did it all with a great sense of humor and no fear of making mistakes.

Because I had never seen any of her tv shows, I borrowed the French Chef on DVD from my local library and thoroughly enjoyed them, gaffes and all. I also borrowed “The Art of French Cooking, Volume I” from the library and have enjoyed flipping through it and playing around with randomly picked recipes like Sauce Velouté and Gateau de Crêpes à la Florentine. In retrospect, creating a “cake” of layers of crêpes stuffed with creamed spinach and covered in a sauce Mornay is not the brightest idea when you’re home alone with a toddler, but it was fun trying. But I digress.

I savored the idea of “Julie and Julia” a lot more than I actually liked the book, but I am thrilled about having been introduced to the unforgettable Julia Child.  I can honestly say that I love Julia Child. I can’t wait for the Julie & Julia movie to come out, but first I want to read “My Life in France.“

Tea Party

My husband and I attended our local Tea Party today. Here are a couple photos:

The First 30 Days: Yes You Did

Today marks the end of President Obama’s first month in office and oh, what a month it has been. As the gleefull chants of “Yes we can!” changed to “Yes we did!” the media prepped us to expect a truly historic administration (in more ways than one): the end of politics as usual, a new era of bipartisanship, economic recovery, regaining our prestige in the eyes of the world, etc.

But we haven’t exactly seen the moment when the “rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal.“

Without a doubt, the biggest challenge facing the nation is the economy. Candidate Obama, on his campaign website barackobama.com, stated that he  “has offered a detailed plan to get America’s economy back on track, by creating new jobs and easing the burden on hardworking Americans by offering middle-class tax cuts three times the size of McCain’s.”

President Obama signed into law the $787 billion economic stimulus package (that Mike Huckabee has referred to as the Congressional Relief Action Plan). The promised tax cuts to 95% of Americans turn out to be $675, or  $13 a week starting in April 2009 and $8 a week starting in January 2010. Change we can believe in.

Candidate Obama promised transparency in government, including Sunlight Before Signing: “Too often bills are rushed through Congress and to the president before the public has the opportunity to review them. As president, Obama will not sign any non-emergency bill without giving the American public an opportunity to review and comment on the White House website for five days.” The above mentioned stimulus bill, all 1100+ pages of it, were rushed through Congress at break-neck speed and voted on literally within hours of being finalized. Granted this it fell under the emergency column and therefore did not qualify for Sunlight Before Signing, but never mind that the public did not have a chance to review the bill: there was not a single member of Congress that read the bill before voting on it!

The emergency bill was voted on Friday night and apparently some of the emergencyness fizzled out because the president waited until the next Tuesday to sign it.

The promised increased transparency was meant to cover lobbying, too. President Obama announced to ban ex-lobbyists from working for the agencies that they had lobbied within the last two years. But that was before he appointed William Lynn, William Corr, Mark Patterson and Eric Holder. The deputy secretary of defense was a lobbyist for a defense contractor, the deputy secretary of health and human services was a lobbyist for the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, the chief of staff for the secretary of the treasury was a lobbyist for Goldman Sachs and the attorney general was a lobbyist, too. Change you can believe in.

Remember when Joe Biden said that paying more in taxes is patriotic? Apparently, Obama’s vetting team didn’t get the memo. Obama’s pick for the secretary of Health and Human Services, former Senator Tom Daschle, and the nominee for White House chief performance officer, Nancy Killefer, withdrew their names from nomination after news broke that both failed to pay income taxes. Daschle didn’t pay more than $101,000 in taxes for the use of a private car and chauffeur (a gift from a friend) and did not report $83, 333 of consulting income (yes, this is the same Daschle that said in may 1998, ” “Make no mistake, tax cheaters cheat us all, and the IRS should enforce our laws to the letter.”) Killefer didn’t pay employment taxes on her household help for a year and a half.

But the icing on the cake is Obama’s Secretary of the Treasury, Tim Geithner, the man whose responsibilities include heading the IRS, failed to pay more than $34,000 of Social Sceurity and Medicaid taxes between 2001 and 2004. Even though he was reimbursed by the International Monetary Fund (where he worked at the time) for those taxes. And even though an audit in 2006 brought his mistakes to light and he corrected them for 2003 and 2004, he didn’t correct the errors for 2001 and 2002 until after Obama picked him. Turbo Tax fail, apparently.

And let’s not forget that the first Obama cabinet pick to withdraw was New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson who the president wanted as commerce secretary – apparently a little thing called a federal grand jury investigation into allegations of a pay-to-play scheme involving lucrative state contracts and political donors.

Is it really that difficult to find qualified appointees who are not marred by scandal?

So let’s recap:

A $163 billion increase in the national debt? Yes you did!

Mere lip service to increased government transparency? Yes you did!

Hypocrisy when dealing with lobbyists? Yes you did!

A tax cheat for Secretary of the Treasury? Yes you did!

Thirty days down, at least 1, 431 to go…

Michael Pollan

I have just finished re-reading Michael Pollan’s “The Omnivore’s Dilemma” and reading “In Defense of Food.” I greatly enjoyed both books – I love the subject of food and food politics and Pollan is a gifted writer. In Defense of Food, in particular, I found to be a thought-provoking (i.e. is a corn-fed steer from an industrial feedlot “whole food”?) common sense approach to eating. Both are inspirations to avoid processed “food” like the devil it often is. I highly recommend both books to anyone interested in food, the environment and our role in the food chain.

Requiscat in Pace Redux

My grandfather was laid to rest today. The reality of his passing did not really hit me until this afternoon when I saw the first funeral photos (due to having an infant daughter, I was unable to make the trans-Atlantic flight). At the first the news left me in a bit of a daze – I wandered through the grocery store as if in a fog, unable to think or focus. I cried, of course, on more than one occassion but I felt strangely calm and at peace about it – I thought that knowing, for quite some time earlier how ill he was must had prepared my psyche for this sooner or later inevitable outscome. But seeing the photographs of his coffin, his obituary notice, my grandmother made it all too real. And with that horrible heart-gripping, nauseating pain, I finally, consciously, realized that I will never see him again.

The obtinuary notice says in part, “Dear husband, dad, grandpa and great-grandpa. Honest person of a noble heart.” That about sums it up. I will miss him tremendously.

Requiscat in Pace

My grandfather died on Sunday, about a month and a half shy of his 91st birthday. He had lived a long, and I hope mostly happy life. He was our family’s patriarch, calm and constant, reserved yet resolute in his faith and his convictions. He was patience personified, a champion of chivalry and tradition. 

Separated by the Atlantic, I regret that I was not blessed with the opportunity to spend more time with him, but what truly pains my heart is the realization that my infant daughter will never meet this great and humble man. She will never listen to his stories or learn from his example – except in that I (that we) am a better person for having known him. In many ways he shaped the person I have become and hope that as he lives on in my memory, my daughter will in some small way come to know him and the values that he imparted in me. 

Through the years I have learned so much from him. All those childhood trips to cathedrals and castles have kindled in me a love of history. His precision and meticulous organization have often times inspired my moments of near obsessive-compulsive alphabetization. He instilled in me a profound passion and respect for knowledge and books – to this day I shudder at the thought of underlying a word or dog-earing  a page. He stressed the importance of being aware of what is happening in the world around us – as a child he allowed me to be as boisterous as I wanted to be, except when the nightly news was on – which I’m sure had some role to play in my news addiction. 

But above all, he taught by example the virtues of compassion to all of God’s creation (including to the spiders that he never once killed but always set free and to the flowers and trees that he taught me not to pluck lest I prevent another passerby from admiring their beauty), forgiveness, faith, love and patriotism. He embodied the Golden Rule.

Though I understand that he had weakened a great deal towards the end of his illness, both in body and in mind, he shall forever live in my memory as the grandfather who would spend hours with me going through boxes of old photographs and sharing stories of days gone by. The grandfather who had an encyclopedic knowledge of Krakow, the city he loved. The grandfather who relished his independence and walked home to my parents house from the Syracuse zoo. 

I can’t help but feel awe at the thought of what had lived through and what he had experienced in his many decades on this Earth. He had lived through three hot wars, and one cold one and saw the birth of nations and death of empires.  

He was born on March 4, 1918 while the Great War still raged across Europe. Just one day before, the leaders of the Central Powers and Soviet Russia signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk ending Russia’s involvement in the War. Charles I still sat on the Hapsburg throne as the last Emperor of Austria, the last King of Hungary. 

At his birth, my grandfather was a subject of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Eight months later he became a citizen of the Second Polish Republic, newly reborn after more than a century of partitions.  

He was a twenty-one-year  old college student when Nazi Germany invaded Poland and spent a good part of the war in hiding taking care of his ailing father. I remember standing with him in Auschwitz, his gaze lost on the horizon, and his voice soft and quivering ever so slightly, “I came so close…”

And I will never forget standing at the Tomb of the Unknown Solider in Warsaw with him, his hand pointing to one of the many, many battle sites carved into the stone and him proudly exclaimed “I fought there.”

The good Lord called a just and humble man, His faithful servant, home in the early morning hours of Sunday, January 18. In my heart of hearts, I know that my grandfather is in a much better place, hopefully in the company of his family that went before him: his parents, brothers and sister. But I do grieve for our loss, for although our lowly company cannot begin to compare with his just rewards in the Hereafter, our world will forever be that much dimmer and sadder without him. 

Requiscat in Pace, Dziadku.

Inauguration Day

President Barack Obama was inaugurated today. As I watched the pomp and circumstance, I felt like I had slipped into the Twilight Zone. Perhaps my cynicism is showing, but I am amazed at the level of glee surrounding this event. I just don’t understand the phenomenon that is Obama. Yes, of course, I recognize the historic nature of today and recognize the right of his supporters to celebrate (even though I am disgusted that in this economy, President Bush had to declare an emergency in order to pay for the all the hooplah). But I just don’t get the seemingly contagious gushing over a man that hasn’t had a chance to prove himself yet. Let’s see what the next four years bring…

Living Wholly and Consciously

Yesterday I wrote that I resolve to live more wholly and consciously in 2009. I’d like to try to expand on that idea a little bit. As I resolve to live more wholly, I have a nebulous idea of what that means. I believe that a person should always live out his values and beliefs. I know that my personal ideals and ideas form a cohesive outlook on life, even though they seem contradictory at times. Like a giant spiderweb of somehow inter-connected ideas, a la John Forbes Nash in A Beautiful Mind, in my gut I know that my conservative political and religious convictions are related to my progressive ecological thoughts. Everything is connected. Living wholly and consciously to me means exploring these interconnections and being more mindful of the interdependence of my physical, spiritual and intellectual development.

Welcoming 2009, Or On New Year’s Resolutions

Another revolution around the sun, another ball drop in Times Square. And so we welcome another new year – hello, 2009. The year that just passed was a big year for me: my husband and I bought our first house and we welcomed our first child. But the coming year promises to be significant, too. A.D. 2009 will be the year that I will turn 30.

It is a milestone birthday and for the most part I am looking forward to it. Turning 30 is like finally stepping into the world of adulthood. Yes, my 20s have encompassed many adult achievements: college graduation, law school graduation, marriage, career, homeownership, motherhood, but I’ve often looked at these grown-up benchmarks with disbelief. Entering my 30s is a shift to a more mature and well, adult adulthood. Or at least that is what I envision about turning 30.

Therefore, as I finish my champagne in the wee hours of the first day of the new year, I do not want to succumb to the temptation of making a same-old New Year’s resolution. Yes, I still want to lose those 5 (or maybe 15) pounds. Yes, I still want to be more organized, perform more random acts of kindness, write that novel. But, yawn, been there, done that. I am a touch shy of a year from the Big 3-0. This will be a monumental year and it calls for a monumental resolution.

As I’ve been pondering what to resolve today, the thought that has come back to me again and again is that when I enter Adulthood with a Capital A, I want to be fully comfortable in my own skin and live in greater harmony with the world around me. Part of that is exploring what it really is that I believe and why; part of it is living wholly and consciously; and part of it is putting it all together and savoring the moment.

So this year I plan to embark on a twelve month journey of self-discovery and I hope to develop a coherent, comprehensive  personal philosophy. I resolve to count all the little blessings along the path.  I hope that this time next year, I will be confidently able to write: “this I believe…”

Cheers and Happy New Year!