Godless Liberal Homo

It's Time for the FCC to Investigate "Fox News" for False Advertising

2011-07-13T07:37:00.002-04:00

Now that Rupert Murdoch's neo Nazi media empire is facing controversy and criminal investigations in Britain, it's time to consider the illegal activities of Murdoch's Newscorp holdings here in the US. A perfect example of this is how Murdoch's propaganda network falsely advertises itself as "Fox News."

Here's some information on false advertising on the website of the FCC's Bureau of Consumer Protection.

What truth-in-advertising rules apply to advertisers?

Under the Federal Trade Commission Act:

- Advertising must be truthful and non-deceptive;
- Advertisers must have evidence to back up their claims; and
- Advertisements cannot be unfair.

Additional laws apply to ads for specialized products like consumer leases, credit, 900 telephone numbers, and products sold through mail order or telephone sales. And every state has consumer protection laws that govern ads running in that state.
What makes an advertisement deceptive?

According to the FTC's Deception Policy Statement, an ad is deceptive if it contains a statement - or omits information - that:

- Is likely to mislead consumers acting reasonably under the circumstances; and
- Is "material" - that is, important to a consumer's decision to buy or use the product.

Now, it isn't just the name that is deceptive. Newscorp routinely runs ads in other media outlets calling its network "Fox News" and falsely claiming that it is a news network.

The facts are quite different. "Fox News" produces fascist propaganda which intentionally misleads the viewers and which also is intended to keep viewers from knowing what is actually going on in this country and throughout the world.

A viewer watching this network knows less about the news after watching their shows than before. Yet, Murdoch's propagandists call it a "news" network.

Lack of an Obama Primary Challenger Suggests That the Democratic Party Is Utterly Hopeless

2011-07-11T23:00:00.002-04:00

The extreme right policies of the Obama administration are a rather blatant example of a much larger problem: the futility of voting for Democrats.

In a series of postings and with a bit of help, I came up with 140 examples of Bush Regime policies that this administration has continued or expanded on. And, it wasn't like I was trying to write an exhaustive list. I didn't have to do much research at all to come up with those items.

Our economy still sucks, when Democrats had the power during the last congressional term, they refused to pass real healthcare reform, lower the Social Security retirement age, or get rid of the Bush tax cuts for the rich (much less the Clinton, Reagan, Carter, and Kennedy tax cuts for the rich). Although Obama got the legal authority to lift the military ban at the end of last year, his administration keeps putting up homophobic administrative obstacles to postpone lifting the ban forever.

Neither this administration nor the Democrats in Congress have done anything to fight AIDS, pass ENDA, fight the banksters, prosecute crooked Bush regime officials, or end the wars. It's been new bosses, same old shit. Now, Barack Obama is working with his Republican allies (the "conflict" between them is as fake as the WWE) to implement the Crusade of Obama's Cat Food Commission against Social Security, Medicare, and Medicare.

Obama and the Democrats have been just as callous and unconcerned as the Republicans about the plight of the middle class and the poor in this country who continue to suffer while their wealthy donors party down with money that rightfully belongs to the rest of us. This is an administration that is so brazenly corrupt that they have chosen to give hundreds of thousands of Americans cancer just to show favoritism to some well connected airport X-Ray scanner companies.

Where is the opposition to all of this in the Democratic Party?

Where indeed!

It is disturbing that there is no real Democrat left to fight for what the party used to stand for. No one is willing to take on the rightist political elites in the party who treat everyone else like garbage.

There really isn't anyone left in the Democratic Party to vote for. These days, voting for Democrats or Republicans is throwing away your vote. The only hope, and a slim one admittedly, is to vote Green. There really is nothing left in the party that once brought forth the New Deal and Civil Rights laws.

Top Photo: jurvetson

Oppose Barack Bush's/GOP's Efforts to Attack Social Security

2011-07-09T08:53:00.006-04:00

In previous postings on Barack Bush's Cat Food Commission, I discussed how he created a "deficit commission" to advocate tax cuts for the rich and the corporations they own while cutting government programs for the middle class and the poor. Stopping the wars, raising taxes on the rich/corporations, raising tariffs, and cutting corporate welfare were "oddly" off the table.

Now that Barack Bush's fellow Republicans control the House, he is using that opportunity to go after Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. This is reprehensible, and it shows the contempt that this administration and its GOP allies have for the non rich.

It's time for some brave Democrat (if such a person even exists in that party anymore) to launch a primary challenge against Barack Bush. Barack Bush has been fucking with the middle class and the poor for far too long.

In the meantime, some progressives are fighting back, I encourage you to join them in doing so.

1) From an Action Alert by Firedog Lake:

The war on our social safety net is now fully underway.

President Obama is offering cuts to Social Security benefits in exchange for GOP support for tax hikes. Democrats in the Senate and Congress will likely be forced to walk the plank and support those cuts, despite being deeply unpopular.

We refuse to sit by and watch the political classes get away with making cuts to Social Security. Firedoglake will make it as painful as possible for any politician from any party to participate in this wholesale looting of the public sphere.

Join us in demanding absolutely NO CUTS to social safety net programs like Medicare and Social Security.

Take the pledge:
"I pledge to withhold support for any politician who participates in cutting social safety net programs like Medicare and Social Security."

2. Bold Progressives Have Their Own Pledge You Can Sign:

President Obama: If you cut Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits for me, my family, or families like mine, don't ask for a penny of my money or an hour of my time in 2012. I'm going to focus on electing bold progressive candidates who will fight to protect our Democratic legacy.

Sadly, it's looking as though the only way protect the policies and values the Democratic Party used to stand for these days is to vote Green. The Democrats are just clones of the GOP these days.

3. Contact the White House:
It's no secret that Barack Bush is a plutocrat who hates poor and middle class Americans, but he does need our votes in 2012. It's important to contact the White House and let them know that you are outraged by the fascist policies he is proposing.

Supreme Court: Wal-Mart Is Above the Law

2011-06-20T23:46:00.005-04:00

The Supreme Court is just as guilty as Wal-Mart this time.

During the late 19th Century, the US Supreme Court was a notoriously corrupt subsidiary of wealthy and corporate interests. The current Court seems determined to match its filthy past if not surpass it. And, it didn't stop with the blatantly illegal Citizens United decision.

Now, the Supreme Court has decided that Wal-Mart cannot face a class action suit on behalf of all of its female employees who work in a misogynist corporate culture deliberately designed to promote and perpetuate discrimination. The Majority decision (with an almost as blatantly illegal concurring decision" included these enormously disturbing comments by anti American, neo Nazi "Justice" Scalia. (Iowa Independent 6/21/11)

“The crux of this case is commonality — the rule requiring a plaintiff to show that ‘there are questions of law or fact common to the class,’” wrote Justice Antonin Scalia. “That language is easy to misread, since ‘[a]ny competently crafted class complaint literally raises common question.’ For example: Do all of us plaintiffs indeed work for Wal-Mart? Do our managers have discretion over pay? Is that an unlawful employment practice? What remedies should we get?

“Reciting these questions is not sufficient to obtain class certification. Commonality requires the plaintiff to demonstrate that the class members ‘have suffered the same injury.’ This does not mean merely that they have all suffered a violation of the same provision of law.”

Scalia adds that there must be “some glue holding the alleged reasons,” in order to answer the question of why some female workers were disfavored. There is no proof, he states, that Wal-Mart “operated under a general policy of discrimination” toward all female workers, noting that the company’s announced policy bans discrimination on gender. He dismissed earlier testimony by Dr. William Bielby, a sociology expert, who pointed to analysis of the company’s social framework to show a pattern of stereotyping by Wal-Mart.

We know the ruling had no basis in law because it was written by Antonin Scalia, author of the fraudulent and treasonous Bush v. Gore decision. However, it is critical to point out certain extreme dishonesties in this rhetoric.

Scalia is perfectly aware of the absolute fact that all the women workers of Wal-Mart do share the same injury: blatant sex discrimination due to a system that deliberately disfavors women. The statistics of sex discrimination provided by the victims of Wal-Mart's discrimination prove just that beyond the shadow of a doubt. No one can honestly dispute this. Scalia's dismissal of critical testimony is a shocking example of how he works to rig cases based on the rightist outcomes he wants rather than following the law.

Even the concurring opinion was reprehensible. It claimed that there might be another basis for the class action suit, but not the perfectly reasonable, legal, and factual basis provided by the plaintiffs. This case is precisely the kind of case where middle class and poor Americans should be able to band together in class action lawsuits to address injuries they have suffered as groups at the hands of evil corporations.

One common thread in all of this bullshit was that the lawsuit was "too big." It wasn't the lawsuit that was too big. The Executive and Legislative Branches of the US government already introduced "too big to fail" as a guiding standard for dealing with crooked banks. Now, the US Supreme Court has introduced the following illegal theory into its rulings on corporations:

Too Big to Obey the Law

Some of the Venomous Homophobes AT&T Has Given Money To

2011-06-15T06:00:00.001-04:00

As many of you already know, AT&T gave money to the Tennessee Chamber of Commerce, a viciously heterosexist organization which has fought to block local LGBT rights laws in that state. Garden State Equality has withdrawn an award they gave to AT&T in response. (I would love to know why they gave an award to a homophobic corporation like AT&T in the first place, but that's another story.)

AT&T has a history of giving money to heterosexist politicians as well. Here are some of the bigots that have received money from AT&T.

Rep. Michele Bachmann

Sen. Robert Bennett

Rep. John Boehner

Rep. Roy Blunt

Rep. Eric Cantor

Rep. Darrell Issa

Sen. John "Keating Five" McCain

Sen. Rand Paul

Sen. Pat Toomey

It's sickening that GLAAD would even take AT&T's homophobic money, much less allow themselves to be bought and doing lobbying for AT&T against queer content and especially queer activist content on the Internet. The depths to which GLAAD has sunk are sickening.

Join Free Press in Opposing AT&T's Illegal Merger with T-Mobile

2011-06-10T07:40:00.005-04:00

In my last posting on AT&T's purchase of GLAAD's support of their homophobic merger with TMobile, I made an important point about who owns corporations and how that can be devastating for queers.

Remember when AT&T was broken up as a monopoly to try to increase competition years ago under antitrust laws? Well, AT&T has been buying up competitors ever since, trying to regain its monopoly status. These days, this is especially dangerous since telecommunications companies are Internet providers and so much queer and queer activist content has moved to the Internet. Allowing these kind of corporate takeovers poses a potentially existential threat to the LGBT civil rights movement.

AT&T will be able use any monopoly to censor queer activism and queer content. Given the fact that most corporate executives and major shareholders are viciously heterosexist, racist, and sexist Republicans, it would be highly surprising (actually shocking) if they didn't abuse their power, absent the prospect of losing customers to competitors.

Queers have fought so hard against the censorship of queer content. We still have a long way to go. However, it is more likely than not that AT&T will move things way backward if they succeed in their ultimate goal: establishing a total telecom monopoly.

I should also point out that rich Republicans, and the wealthy elites in general, have shown an increasingly totalitarian mindset and have been increasingly hostile to civil liberties and the US Constitution.

Of course, these critiques apply to all oppressed minorities, as well as liberals, progressives, and leftists. Corporate "news" outlets already are heavily censored by their owners. The Internet is critical for getting so much information that usually is suppressed in corporate outlets.

From a Free Press email promoting their Action Alert which addresses other aspects of the issue:

Back in the 80s, AT&T’s power was near absolute. That’s why government regulators stepped in to break it up and protect the American people against abuse.

Now, with AT&T’s planned $39 billion takeover of T-Mobile, we’re reaching the danger point again.

Tell the FCC: Step in Now to Stop AT&T’s Mega-Merger

Unless the FCC rejects this merger, Americans stand to lose control over the future of communications.

That's why so many have already flooded the FCC with comments since news of this outrageous merger became public. And that's why we need you to speak out again today.

We can’t let just two companies – AT&T and Verizon – control nearly 80 percent of the mobile marketplace. If the FCC rubber-stamps this deal, we’ll be giving these companies unchecked power — at our expense.

That means you’ll be paying more to have AT&T drop your calls; and access to popular applications like Skype, Slingbox and Google Earth will be limited even further … if AT&T lets you use them at all.

Keep in mind that AT&T eventually will try to buy Verizon.

Take Action Now!

AT&T Buys GLAAD's Betrayal

2011-06-04T19:59:00.005-04:00

Photo: trader_john

I was involved in the LA Chapter of GLAAD to a certain extent early on, when GLAAD still fought against heterosexism in the media. GLAAD has gone way downhill since. In recent years, they actually were run by a homophobic Republican.

I had hoped that GLAAD would get less heterosexist after that clown left, but it's just doesn't get better.

Remember when AT&T was broken up as a monopoly to try to increase competition years ago under antitrust laws? Well, AT&T has been buying up competitors ever since, trying to regain its monopoly status. These days, this is especially dangerous since telecommunications companies are Internet providers and so much queer and queer activist content has moved to the Internet. Allowing these kind of corporate takeovers poses a potentially existential threat to the LGBT civil rights movement.

AT&T will be able use any monopoly to censor queer activism and queer content. Given the fact that most corporate executives and major shareholders are viciously heterosexist, racist, and sexist Republicans, it would be highly surprising (actually shocking) if they didn't abuse their power, absent the prospect of losing customers to competitors.

In full knowledge of all of this, GLAAD issued a letter to the FCC supporting the merger. After the controversy became public, GLAAD issued a statement including bizarre rationalizations that insult the intelligence of anyone with an IQ over 60. Some people were asking why GLAAD did this. The answer is readily available in another press release on their site.

GLAAD Receives $25,000 Grant from AT&T

AT&T is a major donor that gives amounts of money to GLAAD that are small to the multinational corporation and large to the faux media activist organization. AT&T has been able to buy GLAAD's betrayal, and GLAAD hasn't exactly lost sleep over the heinous thing they have done because they stopped giving a shit about the queer community well over a decade ago.

Living in a corporate police state would be just fine for AT&T, but it is deadly dangerous to oppressed communities like queers. We need to fight back when groups that claim to speak for us throw us under the bus so they can overpay their executives.

Note: I want to thank the guys at Feast of Fun for alerting me to this issue by putting up this news story and discussing it on their podcast. Their podcast is quite entertaining, yet it also includes important news, information, and insights. The only people that will make GLAAD and the HRC even act like they care about the queer community are dedicated podcasters, bloggers, and grassroots activists.

Eric Alterman's Disgusting Excitement Over Cold Blooded Murder

2011-05-24T07:19:00.007-04:00

In a recent Nation blog entry, extreme right columnist Eric Alterman accuses Noam Chomsky of lying about him. Let's look at Alterman's rant first.

So Chomsky uses exactly one example to demonstrate his joint contention regarding both “America’s obsessive belief in capital punishment” and its “rejoicing in the manner of Bin Laden’s demise.” Regarding the death penalty, I do not support it and never have. Regarding “rejoicing,” Chomsky purposely ignored the sentence that followed the very one he chose to quote. It reads: “But it should not be occasion for joy. The Talmud tells the story of angels dancing and singing as the waters of the Red Sea close over the heads of the Egyptian troops after the Israelites have safely crossed over, only to be rebuked by their God: ‘How dare you dance and sing as my children drown in the sea?’”

This would sound convincing if one didn't bother to read Alterman's reprehensible commentary on bin Laden's extrajudicial murder. I should point out the fact that the very title of the piece, "Bin Gotten" rejoices in that murder. (Bolding and italics mine.)

The killing of Osama bin Laden was a just and necessary undertaking; just because he had the blood of thousands of innocents on his hands, and necessary because his continued escape from justice was an inspiration to others to try to follow in his footsteps. But it should not be occasion for joy. The Talmud tells the story of angels dancing and singing as the waters of the Red Sea close over the heads of the Egyptian troops after the Israelites have safely crossed over, only to be rebuked by their God: “How dare you dance and sing as my children drown in the sea?”

So, Alterman drools over the killing of bin Laden in the first sentence and the name of the essay, yet he admonishes people not to do exactly what he is doing. This nonsense is as self contradictory as the Bible, and equally irrational.

Let's look at some other things that Alterman said about this illegal, extrajudicial killing.

"Barack Obama’s solemn announcement of this tremendous achievement hit the perfect note."

"the president’s cool, calm decision-making and demeanor—coupled with the peerless professional execution of the operation—can only impress world opinion with the mature and steely determination of America’s post-Bush leadership."

Sick, sick, sick.

Chomsky is correct. Alterman was rejoicing.

In the italicized text, I noticed out a huge problem with Alterman's and the Nation's fact checking, assuming there actually is any by either party. Alterman makes the highly questionable claim that "he had the blood of thousands of innocents on his hands."

The Nation should know better than to publish unsubstantiated claims in defense of government murder. There still hasn't been a credible, independent investigation of 911. The "911 Commission" was a cruel joke. They didn't demand all of that illegal regime's emails, memos, etc. They didn't subpoena people.

Even worse, Bush spoke to that sham commission, not under oath, while Dickless Cheney was present. That is absolute proof that he and other Bush regime officials were lying about 911. That "911 Commission" did nothing about those lies.

There certainly is evidence supporting the theory that Bush regime officials knew that attacks were coming and deliberately allowed the attacks to take place. However, there also is evidence strongly suggesting that the 911 attacks were committed by the Bush regime itself. The most damaging evidence is that fact that all the amateur video footage of the attacks was stolen by the Bush regime under "national security" grounds. That footage has yet to be made public. (Gee, I wonder why.)

The most any professional journalist can say about bin Laden is that he is alleged to be the mastermind of the 911 attacks, and that the allegations are rather weak.

I am so sick of incredibly evil politicians like George W. Bush and Barack Bush shitting on our Constitution and our nation's values. I am equally sick and tired of their gleeful enablers like Alterman.

The killing of a man without trial in a legitimate civilian court is murder, cold blooded murder. The lack of convincing evidence of guilt only makes the crime more heinous. How can a "liberal" magazine like the Nation allow someone like Alterman to post disturbing, fascist nonsense on their website?

Is it any wonder why The Nation is always begging for money and subscriptions? They have become such partisan Democrats that they have gone to shocking lengths to pander to an extreme right President like Barack Bush. If that magazine wants more liberal and progressive supporters, then they should fire the shills for this corrupt, rightist administration and hire some real liberals and progressives to write for them.

Ted Rall is absolutely correct about The Nation when he discusses their censorship of writers criticizing this execrable administration from the perspectives of the left.

I was merciless to Obama. I was cruel in my criticisms of Obama’s sellouts to the right. In my writings and drawings I tried to tell it as it was, or anyway, as I saw it. I thought—still think—that’s my job. I’m a critic, not a suck-up. The Obama Administration doesn’t need journalists or pundits to carry its water. That’s what press secretaries and PR flacks are for.

Does Obama ever do anything right? Not often, but sure. And when he does, I shut up about it. Cartoonists and columnists who promote government policy are an embarrassment.

But that’s what “liberal” media outlets want in the age of Obama.

I can’t prove it in every case. (That’s how blackballing works.) The Nation and Mother Jones and Harper’s, liberal magazines that gave me freelance work under Clinton and Bush, now ignore my queries. Even when I offered them first-person, unembedded war reporting from Afghanistan. Hey, maybe they’re too busy to answer email or voicemail. You never know.

Other censors are brazen.

Even if The Nation didn't specifically target Rall, their censorship of genuine liberal and progressive views about Barack Bush is so blatant one cannot help but notice it.

Yet, a rightist like Alterman is published regularly by The Nation. It's truly reprehensible.

Psychology Today Really Is Junk

2011-05-23T19:08:00.005-04:00

I got an email from The Color of Change with an Action Alert about someone who has a blog on the Psychology Today website which was truly disturbing.

Nearly 20 years after a black parent documented how hard it was to hear, "Mommy, I want to be white,"1 Psychology Today reinforced the false and hurtful sentiment that Black women aren't attractive.

Last week they published an article claiming it to be scientific fact that Black women are less beautiful than women of other races,2 penned by Satoshi Kanazawa, who is notorious for hiding behind pseudoscience to promote discredited racist and sexist ideas.3

By giving Kanazawa a platform and validating his ideas, Psychology Today dehumanized Black women and girls everywhere. After widespread public outcry, they removed the article from their website.4 But that alone won't erase the damage they've done by validating these discredited ideas — the editors need to apologize, explain how this happened, and let us know that it won't happen again. Please join us in demanding they do so immediately, and then ask your friends and family to do the same:

http://act.colorofchange.org/sign/psychtoday

Kanazawa's article is flawed from top to bottom.5 Using a dataset from an unrelated study of teenagers, he draws the obviously false conclusion that Black women are "objectively" less attractive than women from other racial groups.

Kanazawa has a long history of hiding behind pseudo-science to express racist and sexist views. He once wrote an article asking "Are All Women Essentially Prostitutes?" and another suggesting that the US should have dropped nuclear bombs across the entire Middle East after 9/11 because it would have wiped out Muslim terrorists.6

So why does Psychology Today continue to give him a platform? Black women constantly face both subtle and explicit messages that they are valued less than women of other races — messages that are especially damaging to Black girls. Now Psychology Today has served as launching point for yet another attack, this time in the name of science.

Almost as if to cover up the racism inherent in his piece, Kanazawa says that black men are, "if anything more attractive" than their counterparts of other races because of "greater testosterone."7 But even here Kanazawa relies on the same pseudoscience to describe black men in familiar terms — brutish, hypermasculine, oversexed, exotic. And that's dangerous, too.

He uses a modern-day version of the faulty logic used to dehumanize blacks as inferior for hundreds of years, from the social Darwinists and eugenicists of the 19th century to The Bell Curve just 15 years ago. Psychology Today has a responsibility not to give such false logic a stage, nor validation.

To undo the damage it's done, Psychology Today needs to explicitly reject Kanazawa's ideas. Please join us in demanding that their editors apologize, explain how this article was published in the first place and what they'll do to ensure it won't happen again in the future. It takes just a moment:

http://act.colorofchange.org/sign/psychtoday

I certainly encourage people to join me in signing the petition.

I started to look at their website, having never read the magazine. One thing I noticed was that the quackery Kanazawa spewed in the removed posting was not a unique occurrence. One of his postings was entitled "If Barack Obama Is Christian, Michael Jackson Was White," which was wildly irrational and showed a complete lack of understanding of Evolution despite the bio referring to him as an "evolutionary psychologist."

This train wreck gets more spectacular. Kanazawa actually refers to his blog as "The Scientific Fundamentalist," oblivious to the fact that such a thing is an oxymoron. He also wrote a review of some other wingnut's book. The review was entitled "Why Liberals and Conservatives Are Both Wrong about Evolution." In it, Kanazawa claims that liberal policies go against Evolutionary principals. once again showing he knows about as much about Evolutionary Biology as the Creationists.

How did this quack get a blog on that website?

Well, I did some more browsing of the Psychology Today website and found just how vacuous and bizarre that magazine really is. "The Four Types of Female Friends to Avoid" article showed less insight, scientific or otherwise, than the typical boilerplate advice articles in womens' magazines. There was another article called "Could Crime Rates be Influenced by No NFL Season?" with speculation about as intelligent and relevant to peoples' lives as Access Hollywood.

The sad thing is that I'm sure some people turn to Psychology Today in hopes that it would actually help them deal with problems in their lives. The best outcome they can hope for would be a waste of time. I sure wouldn't take any of the articles I saw on the website seriously. It is truly reprehensible that a magazine that covers a really serious area of subject matter is so airheaded and is run by people with such execrable editorial judgement.

At least I know that I didn't make a mistake by not bothering to buy the magazine in the past.

Sigh.

Note: One thing I should point out about the Action Alert mentioned in the beginning is that the "Social Darwinists" were completely ignorant of Darwin's writings and Evolution. Evolutionary Biology gets way too bad of a reputation because some racist quacks attached their visceral prejudices to science that completely went over their heads.

Photo: SanFranAnnie

The Christian Taliban Is Still Warning Us About May 21, 2011

2011-05-22T09:12:00.003-04:00

Yes, I know. You are shocked, yes shocked, that the world didn't come to an end yesterday evening. Imagine a fundamentalist preacher being completely full of shit. Who would have thought?

Anyway, the militant, anti American fundamentalists at the deceptively labeled "Family Radio" may believe in lots of things. Updating websites is not one of them.

I just checked, and their zany website is still warning us about May 21, 2011.

However, there is one thing that might be worthwhile on the page. They have an image of "2012" with the no symbol around it. After all the obnoxious campaign ads we will be inundated with that year, I bet people will be making similar graphics for entirely different reasons.

Happy May 22, 2011!

Music For the End of the World

2011-05-20T21:47:00.000-04:00

Sickening Racism From Gillibrand, Weiner

2011-05-20T07:46:00.003-04:00

I've been a swing voter between the Democrats and the Greens for years, but voting for Democrats keeps getting more difficult. This latest incident of morally repugnant racism from New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand and Rep. Anthony Weiner.

From CBS News New York 5/19/11 where Gillibrand attacked Obama for calling on Israel to accept its internationally recognized borders.

“Steps toward a lasting peace, with real security, cannot start with pre-existing conditions on Israel, said New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand.

Of course, a vicious bigot like Gillibrand would say that Israel cannot be forced to stop illegally occupying Palestinian land. She actually thinks that the US is obligated to support territorial claims of a racist government that is guilty, guilty, guilty of ethnic cleansing of the indigenous Palestinian people in Palestine and which systematically oppresses and discriminates against Palestinians living in their native lands in Israel. Obviously, she thinks that it is perfectly OK for Israel to have nuclear weapons that were obtained by a terrorist attack against the USS Liberty, yet she pretends that it faces a real security threat to its actual, legitimate borders.

I can't say I'm surprised. Nothing a bloodthirsty, NRA/KKK gun extremist like Kirsten Gillibrand could do would ever disappoint me. A pro robbery, rape, and murder politician like her is completely beneath contempt.

Anthony Weiner couldn't help but join in on the racismfest either.

“The Palestinians have said in 1967 and every year since that they want Israel not to even exist. That’s the problem,” added Rep. Anthony Weiner.

“I think the fundamental philosophy of the United States should be trying to help our ally in the region, to help democracy and freedom. That means being an ally of Israel. The Palestinians have made it clear again and again they prefer violence to peace.”

Never mind that Israel has never recognized the right of Palestinians to exist either.

Israel cannot be represented as a democracy when its political system blocks participation by Palestinian parties in governing the country. Most land in Israel is owned by a foundation that openly excludes rentals to anyone who isn't Jewish. So much for "freedom."

Weiner also is perfectly aware of the absolute fact that Israel regularly commits far more and far deadlier acts of violence against the Palestinians. Weiner also is perfectly aware of the absolute fact that Israel's political and military leaders are guilty of ethnic cleansing of Palestinians on the West Bank and in Gaza. He also knows that Israel is guilty of a military siege against Gaza, which is another crime against humanity.

Horror of horrors that Obama even pay lip service to getting Israel to accept its internationally established borders. No decent, honorable, moral person supports Israel keeping on square inch of territory it has stolen. Yet, Weiner's venomous racism against Arabs won't tolerate keeping Israel within its own borders.

Of course, this isn't the only example of slimy, dishonest behavior from that rightist Phonycrat. He pretended to champion the Public Option only to gleefully throw middle class and poor people under the bus and vote for Barack Bush's wealthcare plan for the HMOs, health insurers, and Big Pharma. The man has absolutely no personal or public integrity whatsoever. Weiner is the epitome of a bought politician. He's as much of a habitual liar as he is a venomous racist.

Incredibly rightist and bigoted politicians like Gillibrand and Weiner are far from exceptional in the Democratic Party. Heinous bullshit like this is why I'm finding it more and more difficult to support any Democrat ever again. These two de facto teabaggers are incredibly strong arguments for the Green Party.

How to Fix the User Interface Mistakes in Firefox 4

2011-05-15T09:37:00.003-04:00

Have you upgraded your Firefox to version 4 and regretted it? Have you been stuck with a user interface as execrable and thoughtless as the terrible one in Google Chrome?

This excellent article shows how to fix the three biggest defects in the FF4 user interface: the tabs being too far from the content, the missing Status Bar (which is critical for many addons), and the missing menu bar (Mac users didn't get screwed over like PC users did on this one because every program has a menu tied into the way the OS is designed.)

This is not to say that Google Chrome is all bad. It has the best JavaScript engine of all the browsers, making the full featured version of Yahoo Mail run much faster. But, there's an axiom that every program designer should keep in mind.

Google is great at tech stuff under the hood, but Google knows absolutely nothing whatsoever about interface design.

In this case, Google started a bad trend in browser design by taking usability research that applies only to e-commerce sites that are visited seldom or occasionally as if that research was applicable to all software design. That research isn't even valid for web sites that are visited regularly by users or sites where users aren't performing simple, linear tasks.

If you are going to use a program or website regularly, you are going to want a variety of features readily available to you. You don't want to dig, and dig, and dig through convoluted menuing systems for something you do regularly.

It's comical that other browser developers are emulating Google's user interface, the one aspect of Chrome which is by far the most pathetic and mindless. The people at Mozilla should be focusing on improving their JavaScript speed rather than damaging their user interface.

More Heterosexism From the USOC

2011-05-12T07:14:00.000-04:00

The US Olympic Committee's (USOC's) choice of Peter Vidmar as its representative raised serious concerns, given his attendance at neo Nazi hate rallies organized by the Mormon hate church in favor of Proposition 8 in California. Vidmar's membership in a notorious racist, sexist, and heterosexist hate group like the Mormon Church also raised serious, legitimate concerns.

Vidmar pulled out after the controversy came up, but the whole thing reminds me of the vicious, heterosexist history of the USOC. Here's a good summary from Instinct Magazine (4/29/11):

Outsports reminds us that this is not the first time the USOC has made an anti-gay move, with contributor Jim Buzinski writing, "When Dr. Tom Waddell started an international multisport event for LGBT people in 1982, he wanted to call it the 'Gay Olympic Games.' But he was successfully sued by the USOC, which hounded him for $96,000 legal fees as he was dying of AIDS. The event was renamed the Gay Games. The USOC at the time had no problem with there being events called the 'Rat Olympics' or 'Dog Olympics.'"

This is one of the reasons why I will never give a dime to the USOC or buy any product that is an official sponsor of that organization.

The odd thing about this whole thing is that when I saw Vidmar doing gymnastics, the way he walked, his facial expressions, and the way he talked all caused my gaydar to go off the scale. It would be so bizarre if he really were straight.

"USA! USA!" Chants at Bin Laden Death Celebrations Have Their Origins in Pro Wrestling

2011-05-04T07:11:00.000-04:00

Like many gay and bi men, I watched pro wrestling as a child, instinctively seeing it for what it really is: softcore gay/bi porn. So, I couldn't help notice with amazement the "USA! USA!" chants at the bin Laden death parties that have been happening in this country.

Those voice on the radio today remind me of how that chant started. Pro wrestling promoters would dress people up as foreigners from countries that the US ruling elites were in conflict with. The "foreigners" would do all sorts of dastardly deeds, and the American wrestlers would fight back while the crowd would chant "USA! USA!"

This country gets more and more bizarre.

During the Olympics in Atlanta (a hotbed of pro wrestling), I noticed how American crowds kept chanting "USA! USA!" They had no respect for athletes from other countries. All home country audiences are somewhat nationalistic, but other host audiences showed appreciation for athletes from other countries, which is a huge part of what the Olympics are supposed to be about.

I am convinced that this rude behavior is part of why NYC and Chicago lost their Olympics bids, though perfectly reasonable opposition in those cities played a huge roll too. (I still haven't forgiven Mayor for Life Bloomberg for misappropriating city money for political ads trying to get New Yorkers to support a hugely inappropriate Olympics bid in a city that just can't handle the disruption.)

Now, with people using chants from pro wrestling to celebrate the killing of an unarmed human being outside of the rule of law, I can't help but think that our country has become a cheesy parody of itself. We largely wrote the international laws that the Bush and Obama regimes have routinely violated, but we also have written the pro wrestling scripts that their acolytes have played out in surreal death parties.

Maybe Linda McMahon will be President someday.

BTW: Here are the real names of some of those eeeebilll "foreign" wrestlers.

Abdullah the Butcher: Larry Shreeve
Boris Zhukov: Jim Darrel
Ivan Koloff: James Parris
Kamala: James Harris
Killer Karl Krupp: George Momberg
Kwang: Juan Rivera
Mongolian Mauler: Peter Miller
Mongolian Stomper: Archie Gouldie
Nikita Koloff: Scott Simpson
Papa Shango: Charles Wright

Now, Can Obama Stop the Wars?

2011-05-02T07:25:00.003-04:00

The world's biggest excuse is dead.

We still don't know who was responsible for 911. There never has been a credible, legitimate, and politically independent investigation of 911. However, our political and media elites have insisted that the 911 attacks were orchestrated by Osama bin Laden and have tried to marginalize and demonize anyone who questions any aspect of the officially sanctioned conspiracy theory to explain those horrific attacks.

We still are in an illegal and insane war in Iraq. There are roughly 47,000 of our troops still stuck in Iraq, occupying that country. There are over 60,000 mercenaries still in Iraq. That's right. Occupying forces are at over 100,000 in a war that the corporate media pretend isn't even going on.

We are in a war in Afghanistan that is primarily focused on establishing a natural gas pipeline going through that country. The natural gas will end up being used in India to outsource US jobs and to switch US jobs that had been outsourced to China over to India, where labor costs have not increased as they have in China.

Osama bin Laden has been used as a pretext to keep us in hugely expensive and murderous wars that have even killed more Americans than were killed in the 911 attacks. That excuse is dead.

It's time to push harder to end these deadly and costly wars that create profits for evil corporations and the rich, but screw the rest of us over.

Time to Boycott Trump Resorts, Hotels, Etc.

2011-04-29T21:50:00.002-04:00

Setting aside matters of policy, the last thing we need is another spoiled rich scumbag trying to buy another office.

People Say Why They Are Against the Wars

2011-04-15T03:45:00.001-04:00

Liberation News: Anti-War March NYC Sat April 9th from PSLweb.org on Vimeo.

I've been busy with things in my personal life, but I thought people might be interested in some voices of the underrepresented from last weekend's big anti war protest in NYC.

The Koran Burning Kerfuffle Shows the Irresponsible Nature of Religion

2011-04-03T09:44:00.004-04:00

It's amazing that so much angst and anger are being wasted over something so trivial. A militant, Christian fundamentalist did what most fundies want to do. He burned a Koran. I find it amazing that he found that bullshit book "guilty" while not even putting the Bible on trial. That is spectacular hypocrisy.

Not to be outdone, militant, Muslim fundamentalists have reacted in a way that is far worse, engaging in violence and murder over such an incredibly petty offense. I don't favor any book burning on principle, but the notions that religious texts should be given some kind of privileged status would be as comical as it is bigoted if people weren't being senselessly murdered over it.

Note to religionists: You have no legitimate right or reason to get upset if someone disrespects your religion. Your religious beliefs apply to you alone. You have no right to try to apply them to anyone else under any circumstances. You don't have any business trying to get other people to respect your irrational, childish, superstitious, and preposterous beliefs. No matter how upset you get about it, two plus two will never equal twenty two. It will always be four.

The misogyny, racism, heterosexism, fascism, anti intellectualism, greed, corruption, rape, and murder of religion should be enough to make any sane person start questioning her or his religious beliefs. And, anyone who honestly and rationally questions religious beliefs ends up abandoning them. At some point, that person will wonder how they ever could have believed in anything so outlandish.

The sense of religious privilege and entitlement among the small Florida fundamentalist church and the multitudes of fundamentalist rioters is disgusting and inexcusable.

Corrupt Cuomo Gloats Over Bought Budget

2011-03-29T20:42:00.005-04:00

Andrew Cuomo

If his name sounds familiar, it should. Andrew Cuomo was the corrupt Attorney General who refused to go after the multitude of Wall St. crooks because he was chasing after their big money campaign contributions.

Now, New York's mini me version of Scott Walker has just gotten through a budget with draconian and completely unnecessary cuts to attack public workers, the middle class, and the poor. That piece of walking garbage even pushed through a tax cut for the rich.

Cuomo's sleazy 3/28/10 press release should give you an idea of what he's really about.

"I have said that New York is at a crossroads – one road leading to further dysfunction and decline, the other towards fiscal responsibility and government efficiency. I believe this budget puts us on the right path," Governor Cuomo said. "This budget makes tough choices, which is what you sent me to Albany to do. It closes a $10 billion dollar deficit with no new taxes or borrowing, redesigns government to force it to cut waste and inefficiency, and finally delivers real results for hard-working families across New York State. I applaud and thank Majority Leader Skelos and Speaker Silver for working together to reach this agreement."

Let's look at the facts.

1) The deficit was one entirely manufactured by corruption and easily could have been resolved without cutting the state budget at all. The amount of money handed to back to Wall St. in the stock transfer tax rebate would be more than enough to balance the budget. Nothing epitomizes the pay for play environment in Albany than the stock transfer tax rebate, a Wall St giveaway, and Andrew Cuomo is one of its most strident and uncompromising supporters.

2) Cuomo massively cut taxes for the super rich in order to reward big money campaign contributors.

3) Cuomo's cuts were far from "waste and inefficiency." Cuomo cut HIV/AIDS funding, public K-12 education, funding for public universities, medical care for the poor, foster care, and mental health care among other vital services. Obviously, Cuomo thinks that it is "a waste" anytime anything goes to anyone who isn't a wealthy donor of his. Cuomo is such a spoiled, elitist, classist jackass who will do anything his rich and corporate bankrollers tell him to do.

4) The "real results for hard-working families across New York State" Cuomo is touting are lost jobs, lost services, daughters and sons who cannot afford college, and slower economic growth in the state. The results for his rich contributors will be..........Ka-ching!

No one can seriously claim to be moving "towards fiscal responsibility" while cutting taxes for the rich and continuing a huge, corrupt Wall St. giveaway. A fiscally responsible governor would have raised taxes on the rich considerably, given that tax rates for wealthy parasites have been cut over and over again.

Remember, any time any politician supports a tax cut for the rich or insists on keeping tax breaks for Wall St, that is absolute, irrefutable proof of corruption.

The reality is that Andrew Cuomo is an incredibly evil person with absolutely no personal or public integrity whatsoever. He may pretend to be a centrist Democrat, but he's really an extreme rightist whose real agenda is scarcely different from that of Scott Walker, Rush Limbaugh, Sarah Palin, or Karl Rove.

The rest of the Democrats who went along with this inexcusable budget deserve nothing but contempt as well. I don't know how I could ever vote for a New York "Democrat" again after this. The New York "Democrats" are as sleazy and as far to the extreme right as Texas Republicans, when you look at what they do instead of what they say.

Bush Regime Policies Obama Continues to Support 121-140

2011-03-28T19:00:00.008-04:00

Note: This is not a prioritized list.

121) Refusing to respect any treaties with the indigenous population of this country.

122) Demanding the "right" to assassinate US citizens.

123) Continuing the Bush-era policy of opposing the return of Haiti’s ousted former president, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who was overthrown in a 2004 U.S./France/Canada-backed coup.

124) Supports government Internet ID to spy on Americans.

125) Sicking a grand jury on peace activists.

126) Pushes a salary freeze on federal workers.

127) Votes against ending Cuban trade embargo at UN.

128) Rebuilding a Pentagon database that was shut down three years ago after it was found to have been used to monitor US peace activists.

129) Deploying Special Forces to over 70 countries.

130) Supports mountaintop removal mining.

131) Siding with Cheney and Rove in Plamegate lawsuit.

132) Trying to slash Pell Grants.

133) Trying to cut heating assistance to poor people.

134) Supporting another rigged election in Afghanistan, keeping the widely loathed Karzai in power.

135) Refuses to support taking "In God We Trust" off of US currency.

136) Continuing to endanger the food supply by approving genetically modified crops, including alfalfa which is fed to cattle and sugar beats that are refined and put into many processed foods.

137) Censored reporters covering military tribunals at Guantanamo. (Thanks to Christopher of From the Left for reminding me about that one.)

138) Trying to put in place an "Internet Kill Switch" similar to the efforts by dictators to shut off the Internet when they face popular unrest. (Thanks again to Christopher of From the Left.)

139) Starting yet another war for oil in Libya.

140) Taking the necessary steps to ensure technical and legal obstacles to warrantless surveillance are removed.

Some of the items in this entry were from a list by St. Pete for Peace.

Got more? List them in the comments section so I can add them.

It Will Be Too Dangerous to Vacation in the Poconos If Management Wins This Battle

2011-03-22T23:30:00.003-04:00

Folks from other parts of the country may not know that the Poconos in Pennsylvania are a favorite vacation getaway for people living in the NYC area. The Poconos also is the site of a major battle between an evil for profit hospital corporation and its workers. From Labor Notes 3/18/11:

Members of Service Employees Healthcare Pennsylvania, the workers walked out March 15 to show unity against management attempts to impose an “open shop” in contract negotiations. The strike follows an earlier one-day strike February 9.

Unionized nurses in the hospital (members of the Operating Engineers) have been speaking out in support of their co-workers, joining rallies and holding a picnic for the strikers. Other SEIU locals from Pittsburgh, Ohio, and California have sent donations.

The 550 PMC workers voted in a union four years ago and have been negotiating their second contract, which expired in October. Management has been trying to push the “open shop” poison pill into the contract, in which workers could get the benefits of the union without paying dues.

These hospital workers had to fight hard to even get a union representation election in the first place, one that they won by a 2-1 margin. Now, an evil corporation is trying to divide the workplace and weaken the union by pushing a blatantly unethical "open shop" provision in contract talks.

It takes a lot to organize a union in the face of employer opposition. Working conditions and patient care conditions at the hospital forced the employees to fight against the odds and unionize.

Let's say that the fascist corporation wins the battle. Let's say that the workers get totally screwed. What will be the impact on healthcare?

- Nurses and other employees will go to work understandably angry and resentful.

- Many of the best nurses and other caregivers will find work elsewhere.

- The employees making up the slow exodus will be replaced by people who are incredibly desperate for jobs in the high demand nursing field. Most of the new people will be incompetent and dangerous.

- All the employees will be working under highly distracting, stressful conditions.

Now, what happens if you get sick or injured on vacation to the Poconos? Do you really want your ambulance to take you to that hospital if management gets to flush quality healthcare down the toilet in favor of corporate greed?

I'll vacation elsewhere. Yes, it will be partly out of solidarity, but it will mostly be out of self preservation.

Bush Regime Policies Obama Continues to Support 101-120

2011-03-21T19:00:00.004-04:00

Note: This is not a prioritized list.

101) Continuing ethanol subsidies (corn based ethanol in the US takes more fossil fuel based energy to grow than it actually produces) instead of shifting the money to public transportation.

102) Continues to keep hundreds of thousands of Americans on no fly lists.

103) Continues operating the kangaroo courts known as "military tribunals."

104) Blocking efforts by clean government groups to get access to Bush regime emails.

105) Supports Bush's 11th hour directive to allow concealed firearms in national parks

106) Refuses to condemn Israel's nuclear arsenal or demand compensation for the attack on the US Navy vessel that gave Israel its nuclear capacity.

107) Refuses to prosecute Ratzi or other high level Roman Catholic officials for obstruction of justice in child molestation cases.

108) Opposed shifting target of TARP bailout from banksters to homeowners.

109) Exempting global warming from protections afforded polar bears by the Endangered Species Act.

110) Continuing the Bush administration's exclusion of Alaska's Tongass rainforest from roadless protections.

111) Got the House to drop family planning funding from stimulus bill which they had added to his original proposal.

112) Pushing tax cuts for corporations.

113) Refuses to do anything about homelessness, even during the Great Recession.

114) Continues bowing and scraping before the fundamentalist, terrorist regime in Saudi Arabia.

115) Refuses to condemn Israel for their apartheid policies against the indigenous population of Palestine.

116) Continues providing economic and military aid to Israel.

117) Continues arms sales to Saudi Arabia.

118) Opposing a windfall profits tax on Big Oil.

119) Pushing the myth of "clean coal."

120) Treating African Americans as if they don't even exist.

Please put other items in the comments. I've already done more of this list in posts scheduled in the future, but there is room for new items at the end.

Obama and Clinton Block Entry of Afghan Women's Rights Activist to US

2011-03-19T21:30:00.001-04:00

Demonstrating the same fanatical misogyny that he proudly proclaimed when he involved the neo Nazi fundamentalist Rick Warren in his campaign and inauguration, President Obama is actually blocking entry of a women's rights activist from Afghanistan on a pretext that is so flimsy it insults the intelligence of anyone with an IQ over 60. (From the Afghan Women's Mission's 3/17/11 Press Release - Hat Tip: Peace Action West)

The United States has denied a travel visa to Malalai Joya, an acclaimed women’s rights activist and former member of Afghanistan’s parliament. Ms. Joya, who was named one of TIME magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world in 2010, was set to begin a three-week US tour to promote an updated edition of her memoir, A Woman Among Warlords, published by Scribner, an imprint of Simon & Schuster.

Joya’s publisher at Scribner, Alexis Gargagliano, said, “We had the privilege to publish Ms. Joya, and her earlier 2009 book tour met with wide acclaim. The right of authors to travel and promote their work is central to freedom of expression and the full exchange of ideas.” Joya’s memoir has been translated into over a dozen languages, and she has toured widely including Australia, the UK, Canada, Norway, Germany, Italy, Spain, Portugal, France, and the Netherlands in support of the book over the past two years.

Colleagues of Ms. Joya’s report that when she presented herself as scheduled at the U.S. embassy, she was told she was being denied because she was “unemployed” and “lives underground.” Then 27, Joya was the youngest woman elected to Afghanistan’s parliament in 2005. Because of her harsh criticism of warlords and fundamentalists in Afghanistan, she has been the target of at least five assassination attempts. “The reason Joya lives underground is because she faces the constant threat of death for having had the courage to speak up for women’s rights – it’s obscene that the U.S. government would deny her entry,” said Sonali Kolhatkar of the Afghan Women’s Mission, a U.S. based organization that has hosted Joya for speaking tours in the past and is a sponsor of this year’s national tour.

This is ironic, given how both George W. Bush and Barack Bush both used women's rights violations by the Taliban as a justification for war. Yet, neither has lifted a finger to stop human rights violations against women by their puppet regime. Outside of Kabul, the situation for women is the same as it was under the Taliban.

Also, let's not forget the role of Hillary Clinton in this outrage. She may pretend to be a feminist when it is politically convenient to do so, but she is, in fact, a militant, Christian fundamentalist who gleefully embraces the misogyny of the Christian Right. (Ms. Clinton is so extreme in her fundamentalism that she is deeply involved in the dangerous, secretive cult known as "The Family" which, among other things, runs the C Street apartments for horny Republicans.)

In her short tenure in the Senate, Ms. Clinton demonstrated her militant fundamentalism by voting for the Iraq War and making her highest legislative priority trying to get us into war with Iran. As Secretary of State, Ms. Clinton has worked tirelessly to trigger a US-Iran war and to encourage Israel to provoke an Arab-Israeli war that Clinton and other fundamentalists believe is predicted by the nonsense in "Revelations."

Obama's action also is a subtle insult against writers and other artists. Treating creative people as "unemployed" is typical of the anti intellectualism of the right. Barack Bush is acting just like George W. Bush this time.

As Ronald Reagan's eighth term drags on, I still want real change. The bigotry and war mongering keep dragging on.

Hillary Clinton Photo: World Economic Forum

Join Public Citizen in Calling on President Obama to End All Government Subsidies for the Dangerous and Irresponsible Nuclear Industry

2011-03-18T21:00:00.003-04:00

Please Sign Public Citizen's Petition Against Nuclear Power Subsidies

Back in 2/17/10, Kate Sheppard wrote in the Guardian about President Obama's reprehensible sellout of our country to the dangerous and irresponsible nuclear power industry.

In his first state of the union address last month, Barack Obama declared that creating new clean energy jobs "means building a new generation of safe, clean nuclear power plants in this country". The following week, his administration proposed tripling the amount of money available for loan guarantees for nuclear power, to $54.5bn. And today, the administration took the next logical step in their plan to kick-start the nuclear revival in the United States, announcing that they will award the first loan to two new reactors in Burke County, Georgia – marking the first expansion of nuclear power in the United States in three decades.

The Obama administration's big payouts to the nuclear industry will be essential for expanding nuclear power; the industry has made it clear that there will be no nuclear renaissance unless the US taxpayer foots the bill. The economics of the nuclear industry are so dicey that Wall Street, no strangers to high-risk investments, have for years refused to finance new plants unless the government underwrites the deal. The nuclear industry has made its reliance on the taxpayer clear. "Without loan guarantees we will not build nuclear power plants," Michael J Wallace, co-chief executive of UniStar Nuclear and vice president of Constellation Energy, told the New York Times in 2007.

If jobs were Obama's real concern, he would have chosen the safer and more patriotic option of public transportation. Obama is perfectly aware of the fact that terrorists could easily attack any nuclear power plant in this country and create a nuclear disaster at least as bad as Chernobyl. Yet, he doesn't care because the only thing that matters to him is selling out America to big money campaign contributors.

And, the earthquake in Japan demonstrates just how vulnerable nuclear power plants are. Here are some relevant facts to keep in mind about earthquakes and nuclear power plants.

1) Earthquakes of the magnitude of the Japan quake happen a few times per century.

2) There are far more nuclear plants throughout this country and the world than most people realize. There are 442 nuclear power plants operating in the world, and over 100 nuclear reactors operating in 31 US states.

3) The epicenter of the recent earthquake in Japan was 60 miles from Japan's coast, and even farther from the nuclear power plants in catastrophe mode. A somewhat lower magnitude earthquake whose epicenter was closer to a nuclear power plant would do at least as much damage or more than Japan is experiencing now.

4) Alternative energy and conservation could make phasing out nuclear power plants out easy, given a decent amount of government spending.

Why does the nuclear industry even need insurance from the government? Private insurers have placed very narrow limits on what they will cover, limits that are far below the actual damages caused by even a relatively small nuclear disaster. The private sector recognizes that nuclear is too risky, and this government subsidy of powerful corporations and their wealthy owners is the only way to keep the nuclear industry operating.

That's why I find it so bizarre and hypocritical for "free market" conservatives and libertarians to defend the nuclear industry.

Please Take Action Towards Ending the Threat of Nuclear Power to Our Country!

Klan Brewer Extends Discrimination to Atheists

2011-03-17T21:26:00.002-04:00

Infamous white supremacist and heterosexist bigot, Klan Brewer, is misusing her office as Governor of Arizona to launch a discriminatory jihad against another minority group: atheists. (From the Freedom From Religion Foundation's 3/16/11 Press Release)

The Freedom From Religion Foundation, a national state/church watchdog, and four of its Arizona members, with the legal help of attorneys Richard W. Morris and Marc. J. Victor, filed a lawsuit in federal court yesterday seeking to enjoin Arizona Gov. Janice K. Brewer from declaring an “Arizona Day of Prayer” in conjunction with the National Day of Prayer.

The lawsuit also seeks a declaratory judgment declaring that Gov. Brewer violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution when she declared May 6, 2010, the “Arizona Day of Prayer.”

The lawsuit is the third legal challenge related to the National Day of Prayer by FFRF, which won a federal court ruling in FFRF v. Obama last year. U.S. District Judge Barbara Crabb of Wisconsin declared the National Day of Prayer unconstitutional.

Klan Brewer's contempt for the Establishment Clause of the US Constitution's First Amendment should surprise no one. She already violated the Constitutional mandate that immigration policy is under the purview of the federal government, not state governments.

Shitting on atheists like this may help her with the GOP's militant fundamentalist base, but it sends a message to centrists and liberals that Klan Brewer's hatred and bigotry knows no bounds. She has shown absolutely no interest in constructive policies to deal with her state's enormous problems like making the rich and their corporations pay their fair share in taxes. All she does is scapegoat, scapegoat, scapegoat.

Eventually she will run out of whipping boys and girls. That will be the end of her venomous political career.

Mitch McConnell Said Something Colossally Stupid About Japan's Nuclear Crisis

2011-03-16T19:30:00.002-04:00

The not-even-slightly-fabulous Mitch McConnell has shown the world just how far from fab he really is this time. Check out this doozy of a quote on the CBS News website.

"I don't think right after a major environmental catastrophe is a very good time to be making American domestic policy," Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell said on "Fox News Sunday." "My thought about it is, we ought not to make American and domestic policy based upon an event that happened in Japan."

Talk about some of the most ridiculous spin so far this decade. Let's think about some of the flaws in this.

1) The laws of Physics don't vary from country to country.

2) Engineering principles have nothing to do with national borders.

3) Japan's government is as not as amazingly corrupt as the US government, meaning, in this case, that nuclear safeguards are stronger in Japan.

4) A major catastrophe is a really good time to think about how to prevent similar catastrophes in the future. Obviously, we can't prevent earthquakes. But, we certainly can prevent nuclear power plants.

Photo: SanFranAnnie

Bush Regime Policies Obama Continues to Support 81-100

2011-03-16T19:00:00.001-04:00

Note: This is not a prioritized list.

81) Opposes banning land mines.

82) Is working to certify meat and dairy produced with genetically modified alfalfa as "organic."

83) Opposes truth in labeling laws on genetically modified foods.

84) Continues to spy on the emails and text messages of all Americans.

85) Expanding charter schools despite the fact that they aren't working.

86) Engaging in union busting against teachers unions.

87) Continues to deny detainees access to the courts.

88) Opposes any new gun control legislation.

89) Supported phony "elections" in Haiti where the balloting is rigged and the most popular political party is banned.

90) Working with George W. Bush and Bill Clinton to block aid to Haiti and to restrict it to corporations like KBR.

91) Keeping secret the names of White House visitors, even in cases not involving national security or diplomacy.

92) Fought in court for immunity for telecoms who helped the Bush Regime engage in illegal wiretapping.

93) Refused to vigorously enforce antitrust laws (e.g., break up Microsoft, Wal-Mart, Exxon-Mobil, Apple, Macys, etc.)

94) Opposes legalization of marijuana.

95) Continues to support the Unpatriotic Act.

96) Continues to issue illegal signing statements.

97) Supports outsourcing US jobs to India.

98) Continues to operate the torture center at Gitmo.

99) Resisting Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA) requests.

100) Interrogating innocent Americans who have traveled abroad, including demanding access to emails and other electronic records.

Even this doesn't come close to getting all of it.

Please put other items in the comments. I've already done more of this list in posts scheduled in the future, but there is room for new items at the end.

Awesome! I've Been Damned to "Hell" By a Militant, Christian Fundamentalist

2011-03-15T18:27:00.006-04:00

(Somehow I doubt the fundie was threatening me with an all expenses paid trip to a small town in Michigan. Photo: Danielle Walquist Lynch)

This is quite flattering. A militant, anti American fundamentalist has taken the trouble to damn me to "Hell" in a comment that s/he attempted to put on my blog. The Christian Taliban likes nothing better than to threaten people with eternal suffering.

I should note that I omitted the contact information the fundie included with the comment. I don't want to inadvertently help a ministry. I just want to share a good laugh.

I am less concerned about your tired liberal agenda because I know how it ends, you guys make the world increasing worse until the world finally ends and then you lose......and that is the really sad part. I hate probably everything you stand for but you're running out of time. In case no one else has ever told you, the devil has prepared a place for you that you WILL see if you don't turn to God. I know you don't want to hear that, but it is my job to tell you. I don't want to see anyone end up there, no matter how much I disagree with you. You give yourself credit for being so smart, so do a little research on hell. It is real and you are headed there, please listen to me now. I know you won't post this on your blog and I don't really care, but I PROMISE that you will remember these words either as the words that put you on the path to salvation OR you will remember them while burning in a lake of fire for eternity. Just ponder eternity.....can you even grasp what that means?

Jesus Christ died on a cross to save you from that place, grasp that. Even if you're not sure, why would you want to take a chance on 12,000 degrees coursing though every inch of your body forever? God will never send you to hell, but he does allow you to choose it for yourself and you are choosing it now. Fall on your face RIGHT NOW and ask Jesus to forgive you of your sins and live in your heart.

...

Probably won't hear anything (positive) from you, but I hope I do. Good luck & God bless.

There are so many things about this that are amusing. Here are a few.

1) This comment was off topic and old, submitted on a posting about a food author's sellout to corporate power. The post was from 2009.

2) The 12,000 degree figure is weird. The Bible was written thousands of years ago, but the Fahrenheit scale wasn't proposed until 1724, the Centigrade scale in 1744 (which evolved into today's Celsius scale later). What would these "degrees" be based on then? Why 12,000 other than it is a really high number for temperature?

3) The temperature of the surface of the Sun is 9940 F (5505 C). 12,000 degrees must be pretty darned hot. I'm thinking "Hell" should be portrayed as blue rather than red, since the Sun is yellow and "Hell" is hotter than the Sun's surface.

4) Why is it this clown's job to tell me I'm going to "Hell"? Who pays him? Is the money good?

5) Exactly how does one do credible research on "Hell"? The source document, the Bible, doesn't even get the origins of life and the planets correct. It is notorious for being riddled with contradictions.

6) Given that most of the world's potentially catastrophic problems are the result of conservative ideology (Global Warming, nuclear meltdowns, overpopulation, genetically modified food, war, etc.) and the rest are natural phenomena, it is cute and charming that this loser thinks that liberal policies are the danger.

Anyway, the irony in all of this is that there are too many legitimately frightening things in the real world. Why is there any need for religious fear mongering involving outlandish threats of hellfire and damnation anyway?

Why Are So Many Pedophiles Magnetically Drawn to Heterosexist Organizations?

2011-03-14T21:04:00.003-04:00

Late last month, Towleroad noted the arrest of a militant, Christian fundamentalist who was obsessed with attacking the queer community, on charges of masturbating in front of children in a public park.

The description of the alleged pedophile's and known homophobe's activities is rather striking.

The Times-Picayune adds:
"Armed with bullhorns, Bibles and picket signs, Storms and a group of followers in 2003 protested against Southern Decadence, the gay three-day festival held over Labor Day weekend in the French Quarter. Storms' efforts prompted the New Orleans City Council to ban megaphones and other amplification devices."

Here's the article from 2003 about Storms' campaigns to end Southern Decadence, which included a Christian parade and 'purity' rally decrying the depravity:
Last year, Storms videotaped public sex acts on Bourbon Street and made the tape available to state legislators, hoping to bring an end to the celebration.
"There's no economic gain that justifies an orgy in the streets," Storms said. "That's all it is -- a three-day orgy in the streets."

In 2005 Storms sued gay rights group Action Wisconsin, claiming the group defamed him by saying that he advocated the murder of gays. He lost the lawsuit, a decision that was upheld by the Wisconsin Supreme Court. Storms was then ordered to repay the group $87,000 in court costs.

Setting aside the specifics of this case, it is instructive to look at the larger pattern. Child molestation is quite common among Republican Party leaders, especially those in the Christian Right.

And the venomously heterosexist Roman Catholic Church is infamous for the rampant child rape in its clergy.

Why do heterosexist groups draw so many pedophiles? Part of it starts with their own rhetoric. Heterosexist bigots love conflating homosexuality with pedophilia (and bestiality and necrophilia) in fact free efforts to justify prejudice against queers and to emotionally abuse the LGBT community.

The false association provides an opportunity for child rapists. Homophobic organizations tend to be places where their child raping members can camouflage themselves, hiding behind the same rhetoric that slanders and libels queers. The pedophiles instinctively hope that joining a group that is against LGBT people will make it seem like they are equally against child rapists and wouldn't think of doing the things that they actually do.

That certainly explains part of the draw that these hate groups have for child rapists. However, there is another aspect of this whole thing that can get lost.

Fanatically religious people and socially extreme right folks tend to be the least moral and ethical people in all of their personal dealings.

At work, its the fundies and the rightists who are most likely to lie to and about coworkers. Rabid Catholics are much more likely to try to weasel their way out of work than the general population. They are the most likely to mistreat their neighbors and romantic partners.

Being rabidly religious, or rightist, allows people to feel moral while living completely amoral lives. It's always that group over there that's bad, not them. It's the queers who are immoral, not the tax cheats. Women who have abortions are the ones to point the finger at, not people who cut people off in traffic just to save a few seconds, if that.

In this context of diversionary "morality," it is hardly mysterious that child molesters are drawn to the bastions of the bullshit. By being a hateful religious or political extremist, they can project their own heinous actions on other groups of people, whether they be Muslims (in the US, Christians in Muslim countries), queers, government workers, women who aren't doormats, atheists, or whomever else becomes the flavor of the month.

The rightist and rabidly Christian child rapists are taking what their political and religious compatriots do to its most extreme. A child molester who lies about "teh gays" not only feels camouflaged, but also is socialized in these institutions to feel like one of the good people.

Potential Meltdown in Japan Spotlights Insanity of Nuclear Power

2011-03-12T21:07:00.004-05:00

The earthquake in Japan was awful. However, it really wasn't that unusual. There will be earthquakes of comparable magnitude on an occasional basis. Rational policy making must take this reality into account.

Let's look at the biggest potential threat from the earthquake in Japan. Yesterday, the (Union of Concerned Scientists 3/11/11) issued a press release on the dangers posed by the first of two nuclear power plants in Japan.

If battery power is depleted before AC power is restored, however, the RCIC will stop supplying water to the core and the water level in the reactor core could drop. If it drops far enough, the core would overheat and the fuel would become damaged. Ultimately, a “meltdown” could occur: the core could become so hot that it forms a molten mass that melts through the steel reactor vessel. This would release a large amount of radioactivity from the vessel into the containment building that surrounds the vessel.

The containment building’s main purpose is to keep radioactivity from being released into the environment. A meltdown would build up pressure in the containment building. At this point we do not know if the earthquake damaged the containment building enough to undermine its ability to contain the pressure and allow radioactivity to leak out.

It gets worse. The Sydney Morning Herald is reporting similar concerns with a second nuclear power plant damaged by the earthquake.

If you want to understand what a nuclear meltdown is, think Chernobyl.

I certainly hope Japan and everyone downwind are lucky enough to avoid a meltdown and its consequences, but if we keep allowing nuclear power plants to operate near earthquake faults (or areas that experience hurricanes/typhoons), the kind of meltdowns people are worried about are inevitable at some point in the future.

It also is important to remember that terrorists could cause nuclear meltdowns at any nuclear power plants with significantly less effort than was expended with the 911 attacks. (Claims to the contrary from the nuclear industry and its bought politicians and pundits are as nonsensical as claims by the tobacco companies in the early 20th Century that cigarette smoking was good for peoples' health.)

Every nuclear power plant is a potential weapon of mass destruction.

How many more terrible nuclear disasters will it take before we get a clue and switch from nuclear power to green energy like wind, solar, tidal, and geothermal power? When will we start getting serious about conservation by dramatically reducing international trade and by expanding public transportation?

Oppose Really Terrible Budget Cuts

2011-03-11T21:00:00.000-05:00

"Tell President Obama and Senate Democrats: Stand up to Republican budget cuts"
From The Color of Change's Action Alert:

If the Republicans triumph in the current budget battle underway in Washington, Black communities could lose big. What’s at stake? Access to basic health care, housing assistance and job training programs that we need, especially during these tough economic times.

If Democrats cave to the GOP’s war on poor and working folks, the most vulnerable among us will be left to figure out how to make do with less while the wealthiest Americans aren’t asked to compromise on much at all.

Please tell President Obama and Senate Democrats to stand up to the Republican budget.

Take Action!

Terribly important government programs for the middle class and the poor are being slashed for highly profitable wars and tax cuts for the rich and the corporations they own. We need to make it clear that politicians in all political parties need to represent the needs and interests of the vast majority, not the wealthy few.

Bush Regime Policies Obama Continues to Support 61-80

2011-03-09T19:00:00.002-05:00

Note: This is not a prioritized list.

61) Demonizes liberals and progressives.

62) Lionizes the extreme right.

63) Through his Cat Food Commission, supported starting the privatization of Social Security.

64) Pushed through huge Medicaid cuts.

65) Flat funding US domestic AIDS budgets.

66) Improved relations with brutal military government in Burma in order to benefit Unocal.

67) Dramatically increased government subsidies for nuclear power plants, which are the most dangerous and vulnerable targets for terrorists while producing waste that cannot be disposed of safely.

68) Opposed a House resolution which would have recognized the Armenian Genocide.

69) Continuing the policy of creating AFRICOM instead of shutting the latest over extension of the US empire down.

70) Expanding military action in Afghanistan.

71) Expanding covert military operations in Iran.

72) Refusing to even propose an anti poverty initiative of any kind.

73) Refusing to acknowledge the problem of military suicides or help our veterans because it would show the damaging consequences of the wars.

74) Failing to support the Gulf Coast Civil Works Project, a long overdue program to create jobs and to help the recovery from Hurricane Katrina which still is far from done.

75) Supported tearing down safe and usable public housing in New Orleans and replacing it with far fewer units in a city where homelessness already had gotten worse.

76) Hired a Monsanto lobbyist as an administration adviser on food safety.

77) Condoned the arrest of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. for being at home while black.

78) Refused to lift a finger to pass the Employee Free Choice Act.

79) Met with a leader of the Mormon hate church in the White House.

80) Following the Bush regime policy of covering up the photos of torture at US detention facilities.

Continued next week.

Please put other items in the comments. I've already done more of this list in posts scheduled in the future, but there is room for new items at the end.

April 9, 10 Anti War Protests in NYC and SF

2011-03-07T18:50:00.004-05:00

Details have emerged on the upcoming protest against the seemingly endless wars. The protests, organized by the United National Antiwar Committee UNAC. You can download the protest flyers.

NYC · SF

Here are the demands from the flyers:

WE DEMAND Bring U.S. Troops, Mercenaries and War Contractors Home Now: Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan! End the sanctions and stop the threats of war against the people of Iran, North Korea and Yemen. No to war and plunder of the people of Latin America, the Caribbean and Africa! End U.S. Aid to Israel! End U.S. Support to the Israeli Occupation of Palestine and the Siege of Gaza! End support of dictators in North Africa!

WE DEMAND an end to FBI raids on antiwar, social justice, and international solidarity activists, an end to the racist persecution and prosecutions that ravage Muslim communities, an end to police terror
in Black and Latino communities, full rights and legality for immigrants and an end to all efforts to repress and punish Wikileaks and its contributors and founders.

WE DEMAND the immediate end to torture, rendition, secret trials, drone bombings and death squads.

WE DEMAND trillions for jobs, education, social services, an end to all foreclosures, quality single-payer healthcare for all, a
massive conversion to sustainable and planet-saving energy systems and public transportation and reparations to the victims of U.S. terror at home and abroad.

I especially am fond of the mention of public transportation, since it prevents Global Warming. Also, our dependency on automobiles puts us in Big Oil's pockets, which results in a lot of wars and military bases.

Here are the whens and wheres.

NYC:
Saturday, April 9th Noon
March & Rally
Union Square
14 St & Broadway

...

SF:
SUNDAY, APRIL 10TH
ASSEMBLE AT DOLORES PARK AT 11AM · NOON RALLY · MARCH AT 1:30PM

I hope a lot of people in those areas can turn out. These wars are horrific by themselves, but then you have to add the budgetary pressure they create, which is used as an excuse to cut desperately needed government programs and desperately needed government jobs.

The Right Sure Is Beating the Crap Out of the Word Reform

2011-03-03T19:15:00.003-05:00

"Welfare Reform"
"Free Market Reforms"
"Pension Reform"
"Tenure Reform"
"Tax Reform"

What do all of these have in common? All of them are rightist, deceptive, and harmful to society. Most importantly, all are efforts to roll back reforms in the name of "reform."

Let's look at "welfare reform." Welfare was a reform that was put into place to take some of the suffering out of an economic system where there never was enough employment for everyone. Yet, while Bill Clinton reappointed a Federal Reserve Board Chair who used monetary policy to keep unemployment even higher than it otherwise would be under capitalism, he also pushed through a set of cutbacks in welfare payments that served as a punishment for women, children, and for people of color which made them pay the price for this needlessly high unemployment.

Non Western countries had put in place numerous reforms to keep their economies from being completely dominated by their own wealthy elites and by foreign corporations. Rightist US governments, using economic leverage through the World Bank, IMF, and private banks, pushed through policies that significantly reversed the reforms that those governments had put into place, all in the name of "free market reforms."

"Pension reform," often called "Social Security Reform" here in the US, follows a similar pattern. Social Security and pensions are reforms that have done a lot to relieve poverty and misery among the elderly. Wealthy elites have decided they are done tolerating this, since they want all the money and wealth for themselves. So, they looted most private corporate pensions in the late 20th Century. Now, they are trying to loot Social Security and public employee pensions, all in this Orwellian use of the word "reform."

Then, there's tenure reform. Sleazy politicians like Michael Bloomberg and Scott Walker are trying to engage in the same age discrimination that private sector employers use. They private sector has been laying off older workers disproportionately and hiring younger workers disproportionately because older workers' experience has put them in a position where their work is worth more in terms of productivity, giving them higher salary scales. Also, older workers cost more in terms of health insurance. So, what do these sleazebags do? They create phony "budget crises" in order to justify massive age discrimination in the name of "tenure reform." Public school teachers have tenure to keep corrupt practices from determining who gets those jobs. While the original corruption tenure was meant to fight was patronage, tenure is an equally valid reform to prevent massive age discrimination.

Then, there is the right's biggest Orwellian phrase of them all, "tax reform." The graduated tax is the most important economic and political reform in US history. It is based on the fairest view of taxation. Those who are wealthier benefit more from society, so they owe society higher tax rates as compensation. Graduated tax rates also reduce social stratification, and make the upward mobility inherent in the American Dream a possibility outside of the world of fiction. Yet, the phony "tax reform" movement is attacking this reform by trying to cut taxes for the rich and raise them for the middle class and the poor through the flat tax.

Real tax reform would involve getting rid of tax loopholes used by the rich and corporations. It would involve raising the tax rates for the rich and corporations. It also would involve luxury and windfall profits taxes. Yet, the corporate shills and the corporate media never talk about real tax reform. They just want to distort "tax reform" as a spin term to divert more and more of this nation's income and wealth to the rich.

"Reform" sounds great. Real reform is great. However, the way the rightists abuse the word to attack important reforms is truly reprehensible. The middle class and the poor need to take back the word reform and make sure that it is no longer acceptable to attack real reform in the name of "reform."

Bush Regime Policies Obama Continues to Support 41-60

2011-03-02T19:00:00.006-05:00

Note: This is not a prioritized list.

41) Opposes a federal SUV tax.

42) Has taken no action to reduce the number of tax loopholes for wealthy and corporations.

43) Opposes treating capital gains (except from home sales) as regular income, taking income earned by working at higher rates.

44) Supports reducing the inheritance tax instead of raising it.

45) Uses high profile banksters as his top economic advisers.

46) Gradually eroding Net Neutrality.

47) Illegally criminalizing whistleblowers instead of going after the crooks they expose.

48) Sabotages global climate change summits and bullies poor nations in attendance.

49) Continues to make big promises on global AIDS but doesn't even include the funding in his proposed budgets.

50) Refuses to even propose a national safer sex campaign.

51) Supports fundamentalist "abstinence only" campaigns in the public schools.

52) Put carcinogenic body scanners in airports in order to help a lobbyist from the Bush Regime.

53) Continues to wildly exaggerate risks of terrorism to promote wars abroad.

54) Opposes an independent investigation of 911.

55) Continuing to practice torture at Guantanamo and throughout the world.

56) Siding with British Petroleum against the environment and the people in the Gulf Coast.

57) Discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity in Cabinet level appointments.

58) Engaging in saber rattling with Iran and Venezuela.

59) Reappointed corrupt and incompetent Federal Reserve Board Chair Ben Bernanke.

60) Lied about the "cleanup" after the British Petroleum oil spill.

More next week.

Please put other items in the comments. I've already done more of this list in posts scheduled in the future, but there is room for new items at the end.

Photos From Yesterday's Wisconsin Solidarity/Pro Democracy Protest in Manhattan

2011-02-27T11:15:00.002-05:00

Yesterday, a few thousand New Yorkers participated in a Wisconsin solidarity/pro democracy rally in Manhattan in City Hall Park and on the other side of Broadway. It was part of a collection of protests nationwide aimed at fighting the corporate oligarchs and the corrupt politicians they have bought.

Here's some of a promotional email I received about yesterday's protest from Democrats.com.

This Saturday we're drawing a line in the sand. The entire progressive movement is putting everything we have into one massive display of progressive solidarity nationwide.

We won't let Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker - or any other billionaire-bought TeaParty Governor - break the unions. Unions created America's middle class and if they disappear we'll all end up as corporate slaves.

The entire progressive movement - Netroots, unions, environmentalists, and community groups - will hold solidarity rallies in major cities, including every state capital, this Saturday around noon.

We'll demand an end to the attacks on workers' rights and public services across the country. We'll demand investment to create jobs. And we'll demand that the rich and powerful pay their fair share of taxes.

People may not be familiar with Democrats.com. It is not an official arm of the DNC. It is a site of grassroots, liberal Democrats who push the party to the left while opposing the rightist campaigns of the GOP.

There are a couple of things I should mention about the photos that follow:

1. Like it says on more lascivious queer blogs than this one, "click to embiggen."

2. The photos that I took towards the end of the protest didn't turn out at all. I think my cell phone was too low on power at that point. It's a shame because I didn't get shots of some great signs. But, as you can see, I got quite a few pics that did work.

Here are pics of some of the signs I really liked.

One of the speakers pointed out that the protests had only been put together over a few days. To me, this was in sharp contrast to the teabagger protests at townhalls during the healthcare debate that got fewer people showing up despite literally months of planning and threats from HMOs and health insurers that their employees better show up or lose their jobs.

Because the protest was on both sides of Broadway and had a few branches in City Hall Park, it would be easy for someone viewing it on a bus or walking by to not appreciate just how many people did show up. I've included a set of crowd shots so you can get an intuitive feel for the stretched out nature of the protest and its overall size.

I also received an email promoting this protest from The Color of Change. Here are a couple of points they made that I found particularly interesting.

Across America, the far right is working to gut government's ability to protect the most vulnerable among us, while at the same time attacking the middle class. If we let them succeed, our communities will be hit first, and hit the hardest.

Instead of asking the wealthiest of us to contribute their fair share in tough times, these politicans are trying to eliminate funding for Planned Parenthood, WIC, Americorps, Head Start, and even trying to destroy the right of workers to organize for better workplace conditions — all of which help uplift and protect our communities. And they're doing it while many elected officials in both parties overlook the corporate recklessness that has squeezed budgets across the country in the first place.

MoveOn.org played a major role in organizing and promoting the protests. They certainly deserve credit for that. I've noticed that MoveOn.org is great at mobilizing action when Republicans do horrible things. Yet, when Democrats do horrible things, they usually look the other way. Sometimes they even support horribe rightist policies from Democrats like Harry Reid's efforts to fund the Iraq War during the last two years of the Bush regime and Obama's wealthcare plan for the HMOs, health insurers, and Big Pharma. MoveOn.org promised their members not to support a bill without a strong Public Option and broke that promise when it was time for the actual vote.

In the future, I would really like it if MoveOn.org held Democrats to the same standards as Republicans. Maybe the Democrats wouldn't act like Republicans so often if groups like MoveOn.org were a bit less partisan in their approach.

I also would like to express my appreciation to all the people who showed up to the NYC protest in the cold on such short notice. There are plenty of people in NYC who are more than happy to take stands for social justice if there are opportunities to do so.

"American Thinker" Pundit Expresses the Right's Contempt for Middle Class Americans Who Work For a Living

2011-02-25T20:37:00.003-05:00

The extreme right always has held people who work for a living in utter contempt, but seldom do they put that contempt for hard work out on the Internet for people to see. But, the fringe right website which ironically refers to itself as the "American Thinker"...(I'll give you a chance to stop giggling.)...really went overboard on this one.

From a 2/21/11 Rant from the "American Thinker": (bolding mine)

That really frosted me. Why in hell was I bothering to get a postgraduate degree while a semiliterate guy who barely made it through high school got $400 a week for not working half the year? The scales fell from my eyes. Management wasn't the root of all evil. Union workers were just as lazy, greedy, and corrupt. I now saw the union as a grand rip-off. The union working man wasn't some noble, virtuous saint, fighting the good fight against the Robber Barons, as I'd always been taught. He was a drunken, stoned, uneducated, vulgar slob, ripping off a piece of the action for himself. And in my state he had the full force of the law and the state government behind him. So private sector employers fled.

I've been in grad school, and I've done temp work in a factory. In the real world, factory work is a lot harder and mind numbing than graduate school. But, the extreme right doesn't respect real work. They are propagandists for the idle rich who consider actual work to be far beneath them.

In spewing nonsense for the wealthy elites, the rightist pundits start to identify with the wealthy, including aping their prejudices. Vicarious classism and elitism become the sports of the day.

And, if you think that they only hate working people who belong to unions, think again. The right's efforts to cut programs that benefit working people like public education, Social Security, and Medicare so they can give ever larger tax cuts for the lazy, do nothing, rich proves that the right hates and sabotages all workers. They focus more venom on union members because union members aren't getting screwed over as badly as the rest of working people.

When it makes so money spewing propaganda for wealthy parasites, I guess it isn't surprising that the rightist noise machine projects its own worst qualities on people who do real work for a living. Making false accusations against unions and union workers is intellectually lazy.

Avoiding Glenn Beck's Advertisers

2011-02-24T22:30:00.000-05:00

DistributorCapNY did a great public service by posting a list of the evil corporations advertising on Glenn Beck. Check it out!

Thanks to DCap for doing this.

By the way, it's important to boycott every Fox/Murdoch media outlet, entertainment or "news" because one subsidizes the other.

Queer Labor, Green Party, GetEQUAL, NGLTF Support Wisconsin Protests

2011-02-24T07:00:00.004-05:00

People in this country are realizing that the pro democracy protests in Wisconsin and Ohio are an important part of resisting the totalitarian tactics of the wealthy oligarchs in this country. A lot of queers really get this. For instance, Pride at Work, an LGBT labor group sent out a message to its members in support of Wisconsin. From that email:

Rallies. Crowds spilling into the streets. Seas of people marching together in solidarity. Every day this week, nonstop.

This isn’t just happening in Egypt...but in Madison, Wisconsin.

Schools are closed. Workers, high school and college students, community members, faith groups and concerned citizens have dropped their daily lives to rally against Gov. Scott Walker’s draconian attacks on middle-class jobs and his proposal to strip Wisconsin teachers, nurses, social workers and other public employees of their collective bargaining rights.

Walker’s immediate attack is aimed directly at some 200,000 public workers—but the brave men and women taking to the streets come from every walk of life and recognize that all working people—public and private sector—are in jeopardy. And they know that if we don’t all speak out and stand together, we’ll all be targets.

The right to collective bargaining is vital for all workers, and particularly so for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender workers. For example, Wisconsin state laws do not include protections against discrimination based on gender identity and expression - so a union is likely the only form of protection for transgender workers.

Even for cis queers, having a union as backup can really help. If you are being discriminated by an employer, courts are an important venue for justice. However, it's your meager resources for lawyers vs. the employer's array of expensive corporate lawyers. Having union support really can help even things out. Of course, making workers of all sexual orientations and gender identities vulnerable is what a corrupt politician like Scott Walker is all about.

Pride at Work is asking people on Facebook to like the We Are One solidarity page.

The grassroots queer group, GetEQUAL, who played a major role in passing LGBT civil rights legislation in the last Congress, is supporting the protests on it's Facebook page. The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force also is supporting the peoples' movement.

This shows that there are queer organizations that understand Harvey Milk's vision of queer civil rights as part of a larger movement for civil rights and social justice. The HRC is ignoring the pro democracy protests, showing that all it cares about is big money donations from wealthy donors. Middle class and poor LGBT people don't even appear on the so called "Human Rights Campaign's" radar screen. However, they are happy to profit off of Harvey Milk's name by renting his former shop in the Castro to sell their tacky crap.

The Green Party also is supporting the pro democracy protests. From their 2/22/11 press release.

Green Party leaders declared today that the party solidly supports Wisconsin's public-sector employees protesting a bill introduced by Gov. Scott Walker to eliminate their benefits and collective bargaining rights.

"We in the Green Party are standing out front on this issue by standing with our labor and public service brothers and sisters here in Wisconsin," said AJ Segneri, co-chair of the Wisconsin Green Party (http://www.wisconsingreenparty.org).

On Feb. 17, the Wisconsin Greens issued a statement affirming that their party "salutes the state's public workers, and stands in solidarity with their fight to retain full collective bargaining rights with their employers" (http://www.wisconsingreenparty.org/?q=node/97).

Bush Regime Policies Obama Continues to Support 21-40

2011-02-23T19:00:00.004-05:00

Notes: This is not a prioritized list. This is part of a series of blog postings that will appear over the next few weeks.

21) Negotiated a corporate controlled trade deal with South Korea.

22) Opposes the US withdrawal from the World Trade Organization.

23) Opposes the repeal of NAFTA, CAFTA, and other corporate controlled trade agreements.

24) Continues Most Favored Trade Nation status with China.

25) Opposes increasing tariffs to balance budgets.

26) Opposes making it a felony to ship US jobs abroad.

27) Supports Israel's military siege of Gaza.

28) Gone along with Israel's illegal settlements in Palestinian territory.

29) Opposes the Gaza flotilla and has refused to challenge Israel's violations of the human rights of Americans involved in it.

30) Has used the IMF and World Bank (which the US dominates) to impose The Shock Doctrine on Greece and Ireland.

31) Opposes Medicare for All.

32) Opposes even the Public Option.

33) Participates in unconstitutional National Hate Breakfast.

34) Opposes moratorium on foreclosures.

35) Opposes subjecting hedge funds to the same regulations as legitimate mutual funds.

36) Opposes criminalizing derivatives.

37) Obnoxiously flaunts Christianity even though this is not a Christian nation. (at least according to George Washington and other founders)

38) Opposes a ban on all offshore oil drilling.

39) Continues government contracts with Halliburton, KBR, Xe, etc. despite their blatant misconduct.

40) Opposes closing unnecessary military bases abroad.

Stay tuned. There's more to come.

Please put other items in the comments. I've already done more of this list in posts scheduled in the future, but there is room for new items at the end.

It's Time to Make Roman Catholic Churches and Schools Adults Only

2011-02-22T07:00:00.004-05:00

It's another year, and the pro child molester RCC clergy are meddling in politics again to fight against birth control and abortion. Obviously, misogyny and racism play a huge role in these violations of the Roman Catholic Church's tax exempt status, but we all know the biggest reason for this: they want an ever increasing supply of children to molest.

The RCC clergy continues to protect the identities of child rapists among its ranks. Their insincere public apologies are coupled with behind the scenes political pressure on law enforcement to prevent criminal investigations of the rampant child rape in that church.

Enough!

It's time to take serious action to stop the constant child molestation in the Roman Catholic clergy. It's time to bar entrance to RCC churches and schools to anyone under the age of 18.

Pro child molestation activists might claim that such a rule is unconstitutional. They would claim that the RCC is exercising its constitutional rights by engaging in its business activities including religious services and religious brainwashing.

However, adult bookstore operators have a constitutional right to engage in their activities too. However, we protect children by making those businesses adults only. If we can put age restrictions on constitutionally protected businesses so that children don't see visual images of sex, than we certainly can put age restrictions on constitutionally protected churches to prevent children from being raped.

I'm sure that supporters of child rape will be deeply offended by this. Tough shit. This is a perfectly reasonable and legitimate proposal to dramatically reduce a heinous, inexcusable crime that the RCC's clergy continue to actively promote.

Pro Democracy Protests Even Spreading a Bit Into China

2011-02-21T23:30:00.001-05:00

Wal-Mart's favorite dictatorship, the fascist regime in China, is joining the list of totalitarians in suppressing dissent. (Reuters: 2/21/11)

Over the weekend, Chinese police and censors showed the Communist Party has little to fear from protesters hoping to emulate the unrest that has unseated Egypt's long-time president, Hosni Mubarak, and now threatens Libyan strongman Muammar Gaddafi.

Police dispersed dozens of people who gathered in central Beijing and Shanghai on Sunday after calls spread on overseas Chinese websites urging "Jasmine Revolution" gatherings. The police and foreign reporters outnumbered aspiring participants and curious passers-by caught up in the crowd.

There were no signs of protests in Beijing on Monday.

It's a small start, but a start nevertheless. After what the murderous Chinese regime did during the last series of pro democracy protests and how they ruthlessly suppress dissent, it isn't terribly shocking that people there are reluctant to try again.

If the Chinese eventually do win their freedom, I wonder where Wal-Mart will start shipping American jobs to.

Meanwhile, a study has shown that most US corporations and corporations that do business here in the US pay no federal income tax. (Those that do pay income tax pay far, far less than they should.)

It's bad enough that those fuckers keep shipping our jobs to foreign countries like China, but it's even worse that most of them pay nothing in taxes.

Let the NY Times Know That You Don't Like Their Biased Coverage of the Pro Democracy Protests in Wisconin and Ohio

2011-02-21T12:45:00.004-05:00

If you have followed the New York Times' coverage of the pro democracy protests in Wisconsin and Ohio, you can't help see how that once proud newspaper has become a Faux News style propaganda rag for the rich, for their corporations, for the GOP and against middle class and poor Americans.

I for one am sick and tired of that paper's content being comparable to that which one flushes down the toilet. If you don't like this, you should contact their circulation department, the one that is responsible for newspaper sales. As a customer, former customer, or someone who refuses to pay for their biased garbage, that's where you have the most leverage.

circulation@nytimes.com

Whenever you see a biased article, it also is a good idea to directly email the ~~reporter(s)~~ propagandist(s) who wrote it.

I'm sure you have a list of grievances against that rightist propaganda rag. Here are some of mine.

1) Refusing to acknowledge the fact that the Wisconsin and Ohio protests are pro democracy protests.

2) Failing to acknowledge the fact that the teabagger counter protests which the Times is promoting are tiny and completely staged by the Koch brothers.

3) Running public relations pieces glorifying Scott Walker instead of doing actual news coverage.

4) Censoring the fact that Wisconsin's deficits could easily be converted to surpluses by making Walker's rich campaign contributors pay their fair share in taxes.

5) Failing to acknowledge that the right to organize unions and the right to strike are universally recognized human rights.

6) Giving far more ink and pixels to the side of the rich and the Republicans than to the side of middle class Americans.

7) The general pattern of rightist propaganda at the NY Times.

8) The heavy news censorship at that paper which rivals that under Soviet Pravda.

You don't need to live in NY to take part in this action. This is a national propaganda rag, and they want circulation dollars from throughout the US. Please contact them now!

circulation@nytimes.com

Photos: Nemo's great uncle

qnr

Video Blog Explains the Economic Issues Involved in the Wisconsin Pro Democracy Protests

2011-02-20T23:00:00.001-05:00

Economic issues have played a role in pro democracy protests in the Middle East and the US.

Hat Tip: Monkey Muck

The video points out that Scott Walker started with a budget surplus only to give money to corporate special interests, which created the deficit.

Patriotic Americans Stand Up to Faux News

2011-02-20T13:00:00.004-05:00

It's good to see that the pro democracy protesters in Wisconsin are too patriotic to buy the anti American propaganda pushed by the foreign propaganda network, Faux News. That network is part of a broader terrorist propaganda network controlled by the infamous Australian fascist, Rupert Murdoch.

(Hat Tip: Freak Out Nation)

Note: I had to replace the video.

People for the American Way's Petition in Support of Wisconsin Public Workers

2011-02-19T22:00:00.002-05:00

Photo: doomyeti

This is a wonderful idea!

Stand with Wisconsin workers against the right-wing attack on their rights.

Public employees are teachers, police officers, sanitation workers, firefighters, snow plow drivers ... they are our friends, family and neighbors ... most are not rich, but they work hard and earn their benefits. I oppose attempts by politicians to gut their benefits and take away their rights, all to satisfy a partisan, political agenda.

I stand in support of Wisconsin's public employees, the Wisconsinites across the state protesting on their behalf and the state senators who have left the state in order to prevent Gov. Walker's draconian proposal from passing in the legislature.

Signed,

Please Sign the Petition!

In the eyes of the wealthy and corporate overlords, including the execrable Koch Brothers, every middle class American is a Wisconsin public employee. In other words, they are lowering public employee benefits and taking away basic freedoms from public employees as part of a broader strategy to keep stealing more and more from the middle class and the poor so they can hoard it for themselves.

We need to stop letting politicians in both parties get away with lying about phony "budget crises" that are purely imaginary. Making the rich pay their fair share in taxes would obliterate every state budget deficit and would generate budget surpluses that could be used to create desperately needed jobs and meet important human needs of the non rich.

The vast majority of the money held by the wealthy elites and their corporations really is rightfully ours. It's time that we insist that the politicians that supposedly represent us take it back for us.

Pro Democracy Protests Spread to Ohio

2011-02-19T08:15:00.001-05:00

Pro democracy protests keep spreading against fascism, corruption, rigged elections, violations of human rights, and economic attacks against the middle class and the poor. This time, they have spread to Ohio. (Labor Notes 2/18/11)

Thousands of workers, mostly public employee union members but also from the private sector, rallied at the Capitol in Columbus, Ohio, Thursday to stop a senate bill that would end public workers’ collective bargaining rights.

The proposed law would take away public employees’ right to strike and make them pay 20 percent of their health care costs. Teachers would lose automatic step increases. The bill would end binding arbitration to resolve deadlocks in union-management negotiations. Republican Governor John Kasich ran on this anti-worker program.

And the "election" Kasich "won" was rigged by the same corrupt forces that rigged the "election" in Wisconsin that put Scott Walker in power.

4-5,000 pro democracy activists joined the protest. There were roughly 200 Astroturf teabagggers staging a fake counterprotest, inevitably on the orders of their corporate employers.

Check out some video from the protest.

These are real, hard working Americans. They aren't the parasitical idle rich that demand more and more of our money.

Disastrous Consequences of the Gold Bubble

2011-02-18T21:45:00.001-05:00

Photo: trader_john

The Gold Bubble hasn't burst yet, and it already is causing misery and destruction. A 2/11/11 Alternet article talks about the environmentally destructive nature of gold mining and processing.

Thinking of giving your sweetheart gold jewelry for Valentine's Day? You might want to first know what goes into making it. Extracting enough gold for one ring takes an average of two pounds of cyanide (a teaspoon will kill you). Processing the gold in one ring uses over 1,400 gallons of water, enough to meet the daily needs of 100 people. Left behind is a toxic sludge containing heavy metals, cyanide compounds, and arsenic. Each gold ring produces an average of 20 tons of waste - millions of tons over the life of a mine.

This article focuses on gold for jewelry, apparently because that is the consumer behavior that Alternet's readers are most likely to change. However, the largest cause of increased gold mining is the rapidly and ridiculously escalating gold prices on speculative markets. Every time someone tries to con people into believing that a highly volatile commodity like gold is a "safe haven," gold mining increases. Even worse, as gold gets more difficult to find, the environmental destruction per unit of gold increases because the gold gets more difficult to extract.

Since gold jewelry is the way that the average person speculates in gold, I suppose it is worth mentioning.

This gold fever also creates enormous human misery.

Producing gold can also come at great human cost. Mines are often imposed on communities that don't want them, and cause communities to lose their lands and livelihoods. Human costs also include the use of child labor in mines in Mali, dangerous conditions in mines in Ghana, and armed violence and human rights violations that have been linked to gold mines in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Last year, I complained about the Gold Bubble and the inevitable gold crash just waiting to happen.

I'm sorry, but gold is not worth anywhere near $1200 per ounce.

Yet, despite a drop on Friday, gold was trading at the astronomical level of $1194. This is just plain crazy.

Today, gold traded at $1,372.50 per ounce in New York.

WTF?

The gold bubble isn't just financial idiocy, it is destructive and dehumanizing.

Sigh. Remember how, in 2005, people warning about the Housing Bubble were treated like paranoid idiots? People never seem to learn.

Second Photo: SanFranAnnie

Pro Democracy Protests Spread to Wisconsin

2011-02-17T22:00:00.000-05:00

Photo: paulbaker

The wave of pro democracy protests that started in Tunisia is spreading farther and farther. First, it was Arab countries. Then, it Iran. Now, the pro democracy wave has hit the state of Wisconsin. (AFP 2/17/11)

A bill aimed at busting public workers unions in the US state of Wisconsin prompted mass protests and a statewide police hunt for Democratic lawmakers who fled to block the measure's passage Thursday.

Police estimate that more than 20,000 protesters flooded the state capital of Madison, some even sleeping overnight in the public galleries of the statehouse.

Normal life was brought to a halt by the legislative crisis, with scores of schools closed as teachers and other government workers called in sick and hit the streets to fight for their collective bargaining rights.

Just as was the case in pro democracy protests in Tunisia, Egypt, and elsewhere, there is a major economic element to the pro democracy protests in Wisconsin. In all of these cases, you had corrupt illegitimate leaders stealing from ordinary people in order to enrich the wealthy elites of those societies. The AFP coverage acknowledged that the protesters see the connections.

Many protestors appeared to be taking inspiration from the recent democratic uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia, with some even wearing King Tut hats.

Keep in mind that the fringe right extremist Scott Walker is illegitimately holding the office of Governor of Wisconsin as the result of massive election rigging involving big money campaign contributions from wealthy donors (including the Koch brothers), corporatist PAC money, direct corporate campaign spending, and a highly censored and propagandistic corporate press which is reminiscent of the non free press in the former Soviet Union and its satellite states.

The "election" that put Walker in power was as fake as the "elections" that Hosni Mubarek held and the ones that Stalin staged in the USSR.

The similarities between Walker and totalitarian dictators doesn't there. Walker has utter contempt for basic human rights like the right to strike and the right to organize unions and negotiate for wages and working conditions.

Walker also is fond of using deliberately deceptive propaganda to push his fascist, anti American political agenda. He is fond of lying about a phony "budget crisis" in Wisconsin despite the fact that making his wealthy donors pay their fair share in taxes would convert the state's deficits into surpluses that could create jobs throughout Wisconsin. It isn't a budget crisis. It's a corruption crisis that is bought about by the very kind of election rigging that put Walker into office in the first place.

I'm glad to see that the pro democracy movement has reached the USA. It's long overdue.

A Disturbing Pattern of Hospital Closings in NYC

2011-02-17T20:00:00.001-05:00

This is downright scary. (NY Pop Culture and Politics 2/11/11)

Gov. Andrew Cuomo has found enough state grant money to save Long Island College Hospital, NY1 reported. Because of the deal, 2,500 employees, who work at the Brooklyn hospital, will be able to keep their jobs.

In the time that Christine Quinn has been Speaker of the New York City Council, at least eight city hospitals have closed :

- North General Hospital in Harlem declared bankruptcy in 2010 ;
- St. Vincent's Hospital in the West Village was shut down in 2010 after shady backroom meetings ;
- St. John's Queens Hospital in Elmhurst went bankrupt in 2009 ;
- Mary Immaculate Hospital in Jamaica went bankrupt in 2009 ;
- Parkway Hospital in Forest Hills decided to close in 2008 ;
- Cabrini Medical Center in Manhattan closed in 2008 ;
- Victory Memorial Hospital in Bay Ridge closed in 2008 ; and
- St. Vincent's Midtown in Manhattan closed in 2007.

Three things struck me right away on this one.

1) Bloomberg has been mayor during this period and hasn't lifted a finger to save any hospital.

2) Before they were cash poor from the child molestation lawsuits, the Roman Catholic clergy were buying up hospitals so they could deny women patients access to birth control and abortion. As you can see, they have an execrable record in terms of managing hospitals.

3) "Policy experts" here and in other parts of the country have been babbling on about "excess hospital beds" for at least a couple of decades. If they had IQs over 60, they would realize that it is necessary to have extra hospital capacity in case of disasters. This includes terrorist attacks in NYC. These "efficiency experts" have no clue about the role that hospitals are supposed to play in the security of their cities, towns, and neighborhoods. You would think that NYC would learn from 911, but Bloomberg obviously has not.

Penny pinching HMOs and health insurers along with cutbacks in government funding for healthcare over the years have had devastating effects on hospitals and the people who need them. We need Medicare for All ASAP. What we don't need is what we have: a government that makes big money campaign contributions, reprehensible wars, other subsidies for corporations, and tax cuts for the rich higher priorities than human needs.

Photo: Edwin Martinez1

Bush Regime Policies Obama Continues to Support 1-20

2011-02-16T19:00:00.004-05:00

Notes: This is not a prioritized list. This is part of a series of blog postings that will appear over the next few weeks.

1) Opposes reinstating the Glass-Steagall restrictions on the banksters and brokesters.

2) Supports the coup government in Honduras.

3) Continues to involve high profile misogynist and heterosexist preachers in public events and public policy.

4) Continues to drag out the Iraq War.

5) Continues to drag out the Afghanistan War.

6) Is making our military increasingly dependent on mercenaries.

7) Continues to kidnap and torture people under "extraordinary rendition."

8) Refuses to prosecute crooked Bush regime officials.

9) Refuses to prosecute Wall St. crooks.

10) Opposes moratorium or even limits on interest rate increases on predatory mortgages.

11) Is expanding Bush's Hate Based Initiatives.

12) Cut taxes on the rich.

13) Raised taxes on the poor.

14) Opposed seizing British Petroleum and revoking its corporate charter.

15) Has barely funded public transportation in his budgets while making roads a high priority.

16) Supports the military dictatorship in Egypt against the Egyptian people.

17) Illegally wiretaps Americans without warrants.

18) Opposes nationalizing the banks and brokerages.

19) Compared homosexuality to bestiality and necrophilia in DOMA court filings.

20) Opposes government funding for abortion, a perfectly legitimate medical procedure.

Sadly, there's a lot more fodder for this list. Stay tuned.

Please put other items in the comments. I've already done more of this list in posts scheduled in the future, but there is room for new items at the end.

USDA Endangers America's Food Supply

2011-02-16T07:00:00.002-05:00

From TruthOut 2/15/11:

The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has approved plantings of three genetically engineered (GE) crops in as many weeks, including Monsanto Co.'s Roundup Ready sugar beets and alfalfa that are engineered to tolerate Roundup Ready weed-killing herbicide.

The USDA on February 11 also legalized, without restriction, the world's first GE corn crop meant for biofuel production. Biotech giant Syngenta's Event 3272 seed corn will simplify ethanol production and is not meant to feed animals or humans.

Farming corn for ethanol is a process that contributes to Global Warming because it takes more energy from fossil fuels to grow the corn in this country than the ethanol generates. Corn millers also are afraid that this corn will contaminate the food corn supply as well.

The alfalfa and sugar beet approvals are even more dangerous. Alfalfa is used for animal feed, and sugar beets get refined into sugar that goes into all sorts of processed foods without any knowledge by the people eating it.

You may have read biotech interests claiming that genetically modified food crops are the same as regular food crops. They even claim that they are being "scientific." However, it is not economically feasible to make a genuinely scientific claim that the food produced is the same.

1) There are too many non protein biochemicals alone to test.

2) There are too many proteins to test for the levels of each one.

3) It would be necessary to sequence every protein and RNA sequence or the corresponding DNA sequences. (This would be needed to guard against multiple DNA sequence insertions into the genome, modifying the structures of protein and RNA.)

4) The levels of pesticides and herbicides would need to be tested.

5) The levels of every biologically active air and water pollutant would need to be tested as well, since genetic changes could affect absorption and secretion of these chemicals. (For instance, if any corporate shill says that their frankenfood is the same, ask them to cite a specific study showing that the levels of hormones in common birth control pills are the same. Ask for similar citations about Viagra and Cialis while you are at it. Or, try Lipitor...maybe Naproxen.)

Think that's bad enough? It gets worse.

Instead of Truth in Labeling laws so people can be informed about the food they are eating contains genetically modified organisms, the laws are set up so that the chemical/biotech companies can actually sue food producers who put the fact that their items do not contain genetically modified organisms.

The only way to be sure that genetically modified foods are safe is to do long terms studies like the famous "nurses studies" where people report when they are eating the GMO foods and when they are eating non-frankenfoods. The chemical/biotech industry has made damned sure to make those studies impossible.

As usual, the Obama administration has put short term corporate profits above human needs and peoples' safety. Corporate pseudoscience is being tarted up like it was the actual product of the Scientific Method. It's as if Bush is still in the White House.

Photo: jurvetson

GOShame Person Admits He Doesn't Like LGBT People

2011-02-15T19:30:00.000-05:00

I know you are shocked, just shocked that a queer Republican doesn't like queers.

Hat Tip: Back to Stonewall

GOShame is one pathetic group of people.

Shocking Money Transfers by Milwaukee Roman Catholic Church in Child Rape Lawsuits

2011-02-14T07:47:00.002-05:00

This is absolutely sickening. (WTAQ 2/13/10)

The Archdiocese of Milwaukee says the transfer of $75 million over the last six years wasn't an effort to shield its assets from sex abuse settlements.

The families of sex abuse victims implied moving the money was something like a shell game during a bankruptcy hearing before a federal trustee. An attorney for the victims also asked about another $55 million put into a trust a year after the Wisconsin Supreme Court opened the door for victims to sue the archdiocese.

A spokesperson for the church denies the allegations, saying it has been liquidating all non-essential assets for years to help pay the costs of therapy and voluntary settlements. The spokesperson says the archdiocese had been holding the $75 million for local parishes in an investment account, then returned it when it quit offering those services.

The church says it only has $7 million available for settlements, but the families of victims apparently intend to challenge that figure.

Enormous money transfers like these are what you would expect from corporations evading taxes through offshore scams. This definitely should result in a criminal investigation.

By the way, there is a NYC angle to this story. Current NYC Archbishop Timothy Dolan was in charge of that subsidiary of the Roman Catholic Church when those incredibly suspicious money transfers took place. If the Roman Catholic Church were an accountable organization, Dolan already would have been forced to resign. However, it's far more likely that Ratzi or a future pontiff will make the scumbag into a "saint."

madhavaji

"Dirty F@#*ing Hippies Were Right!"

2011-02-14T07:00:00.001-05:00

Here's some food for thought. (Hat Tip: Tim Scared Stiff)

That reminds me of how advertising of Big Pharma's drugs has made it difficult for people to get accurate information about drugs in this information overload.

The criticism of Wal-Mart as job killing has been verified by a study by Hunter College and New York City Public Advocate Bill de Blasio. Yet, ~~Mubarek~~ Michael Bloomberg insists on shoving their job killing stores down our throats.

Will Iraq Be One of the Middle Eastern Dictatorships to Fall?

2011-02-13T16:00:00.001-05:00

Here are some interesting news stories that haven't been emphasized by the US corporate media.

Hundreds of Iraqis protest lack of basic services (Reuters 2/11/11)

Lawyers lead anti-government protest in Baghdad (AP 2/11/11)

Iraqis step up protest in job and food crisis (The National - Abu Dhabi 2/6/11)

Iraq's Maliki says he won't seek 3rd term, in possible reverberations from Egypt (Washington Post 2/11/11)

Someone who hasn't followed the Iraq story might be asking, "But, isn't Iraq a democracy?" Hardly. George W. and Barack Bush have rigged all the elections there to keep a divided and impotent government in place, a government that was so weak it couldn't even kick out Blackwater (now Xe) after that employees had gotten caught killing Iraqi civilians. If this vote rigging sounds shocking, remember that the 2000 and 2004 US presidential elections were stolen.

If freedom and democracy keep spreading in the Middle East, would it really be that surprising if the Iraqis decided they want some too? No one could blame them for taking what supposedly had been given to them by Saddam Hussein and then by George W. Bush.

Let's hope the Iraqis finally get their freedom.

Happy Darwin Day!

2011-02-12T17:19:00.003-05:00

Today is Darwin Day!

The website has a history of Darwin's life and accomplishments.

Did your school censor evolution partially or entirely out of your Biology classes, leaving them an incomprehensible mess? Learn the basics of evolution.

Here's some reasons to celebrate Darwin Day:

Props to the American Humanist Association for all they have done to support Darwin Day!

Why Hasn't the Military Ban Been Lifted Yet?

2011-02-12T13:10:00.005-05:00

Check this bullshit out. (CNN International 2/12/11)

The plan focuses on three tiers of training:

-- Tier one for experts who may frequently deal with "don't ask, don't tell" repeal matters, like chaplains and military lawyers.

-- Tier two for senior leaders who will need to oversee education and training of the troops in their command.

-- Tier three for the rank-and-file, active-duty service members, reservists and civilians working for the Defense Department.

On March 1 Clifford Stanley, the undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness, will provide a progress report on the preparation for repeal to the White House, the secretary of defense and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

The memo says the "don't ask, don't tell" law will not be repealed until, among other milestones, the tier one and tier two training is complete and tier three training is underway.

That's correct. The first "progress report" will be due on March 1. Big fucking deal!

Lifting the ban isn't some highly complicated military maneuver. All that is needed is an order to end all the discharges and witchhunts. That's it.

I smell a rat.

Remember a couple of months ago when the military ban supposedly was lifted? There was legislation overturning "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," Bill Clinton's more draconian version of the military ban that passed early in that heterosexist administration.

The Obama Administration's record on the military ban hasn't been good either. They have given us a steady diet of foot dragging. When pressed by queer activists on the issue, Obama and his toadies kept saying they had "more important" things they had to get done. Those "more important" things always involved stealing from the middle class and the poor to give to the rich and the corporations they own.

Although President Obama claimed to be so worried about government spending, he insisted on spending government funds on appealing two rulings in separate court cases which overturned the ban as unconstitutional. His PR people flat out lied when they said he was obligated to appeal the cases.

In Congress, Obama and the Democrats responded to LGBT activists with delay, delay, delay. It was only after liberal and moderate voters were horrified at their deal to continue and expand on tax cuts for the rich (while raising taxes on the poor), that the Democrats threw their base and voted to "overturn" the current version of the military ban.

However, there was a catch. The ban would only be lifted when Defense Secretary Robert Gates, a homophobic holdover from the Bush regime, felt like it.

He hasn't felt like it.

I'm starting to wonder if Obama is deliberately delaying again in hopes he can make another "compromise" with the GOP that keeps the ban in place after all. After all the lies and betrayals we have seen from this administration, there is no way that anyone with an IQ over 60 will trust them on anything.

Photo: afagen

AFSCME Catches Bill O'Reilly in Lies About Public Employee Pensions

2011-02-10T20:00:00.005-05:00

Scapegoating public employees has become a favorite pastime of corporate media outlets, and Faux News is leading the way. Never mind that states are in fiscal troubles for two reasons:

- The Great Recession directly resulting from misconduct by corporations and the wealthy.

- Rich people not paying anywhere near their fair share in taxes.

Of course, Falafel Man cites Rupert Murdoch's wildly unreliable New York Post as his first source. What do you call it when Rupert Murdoch's propagandists start citing each other as sources?

Circular Unreasoning

Sarah Palin's Upcoming Masterpiece

2011-02-09T07:00:00.001-05:00

Don't Delay! Order Today!

Photo: sskennel

The Democratic Liquidation Council Is Under Liquidation

2011-02-08T18:35:00.004-05:00

The venomously bigoted, corrupt, extreme right organization, the "Democratic Leadership Council" which was really an organization that followed the lead and ideology of the Republican extreme right, is gone, gone gone. That's right. They are following their ideological clones at the Crystal Cathedral into bankruptcy.

The group was once chaired by Bill Clinton because Bubba thought the Democratic Party wasn't sufficiently corrupt, racist, sexist, and homophobic to satisfy him. He pushed through their hateful, GOP style policies throughout his time as President. Those very DLC policies drove Democratic voter turnout way down and kept it down, handing Congress to the GOP in 1994 and keeping them in power throughout the rest of his presidency.

(Lieberbush was Chair from 1995-2001, providing an example of just how reprehensible that organization truly was.)

The DLC proved itself to be sleazy all the way up to the bitter end. If you check their website, their main focus of late was trying to ship more American jobs abroad during the Great Recession.

One of the comical sideshows to all of this is that the corporate media keep portraying an organization whose political views are far to the right of the overwhelming majority of Americans as "centrist." Maybe the DLC's agenda was towards the center of the ideology of the rich Republicans who own these media outlets, but it sure was loony right for the bulk of us.

Obviously, the wealthy interests behind the Democratic Liquidation Council still have enormous power over the Democratic Party. However, it is nice to see one less organization in this world promoting bigotry, discrimination, and blatant political corruption.

Illustration: ddogbreath

IPod/GOP Parody

2011-02-07T06:56:00.001-05:00

There's so much room in our political system for parody.

The Right's Offensive Drooling Over Ronald Reagan

2011-02-06T22:00:00.000-05:00

I keep reading and hearing about the right's latest round of obsessive drooling over one of the most evil figures in US History, Ronald Reagan.

When I think of Ronald Reagan, I think of all the people who died because of his AIDS policies. Some of those people were people I knew.

Reagan should have been prosecuted for mass murder and genocide. He deserved to die in a prison hospital for his crimes in universal condemnation. Praising Ronald Reagan is the moral equivalent of tattooing a swastika to one's forehead. There's just no excuse for it.

You Can Send Out Your Darwin Day Ecards Too

2011-02-05T22:00:00.002-05:00

Image: bjornmeansbear

The fab folks at the American Humanist Association have done something special for this year's Darwin Day. They have set up ecards to mark the occasion. (For folks who like the paper old school way, they even let your print the cards rather than emailing them.)

Here's a brief description of Darwin Day for the uninitiated from the Darwin Day site.

CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN
February 12, 1809 to April 19, 1882
A Global Celebration
Darwin Day is an international celebration of science and humanity held on or around February 12, the day that Charles Darwin was born on in 1809. Specifically, it celebrates the discoveries and life of Charles Darwin -- the man who first described biological evolution via natural selection with scientific rigor. More generally, Darwin Day expresses gratitude for the enormous benefits that scientific knowledge, acquired through human curiosity and ingenuity, has contributed to the advancement of humanity.

The International Darwin Day Foundation website provides resources and publicity for individuals and institutions across the world to celebrate science and humanity every year, on, or near, February 12, Darwin's birthday. In addition to information about the life and legacy of Charles Darwin, this website provides practical examples, advice and templates for organizing and publicizing Darwin Day events. It also provides a directory of events where you can find celebrations taking place near you or register your own event for others to find.

Recognizing science as an international language accessible to all individuals and societies, the International Darwin Day Foundation provides a new global holiday that transcends separate nationalities and cultures. Darwin Day can be celebrated in many different ways: civic ceremonies with official proclamations, educational symposia, birthday parties, art shows, book discussions, lobby days, games, protests, and dinner parties. Organizers may include: academic societies, science organizations, freethought groups, religious congregations, libraries, museums, galleries, teachers and students, families and friends. In Darwin Day, we are able to recognize the diversity among us, while celebrating our common humanity and the universal understanding we share.

Remember: Darwin Day is February 12th.

Mayor for Life Bloomberg Throws Tantrum Against Parents

2011-02-05T07:58:00.008-05:00

Photo: Kenny Miller

Mayor for Life Michael Bloomberg has thrown a fit because parents didn't passively go along with his plan to close public schools so he can replace them with useless, for profit charter schools. (From CBS New York 2/4/11)

The educational panel was given a tongue-lashing Thursday night by an angry crowd. Another tongue-lashing came on Friday, this time from an irritated mayor who accused the crowd of overstepping its bounds, reports CBS 2′s Sean Hennessey.

Before the hearing about the school closures even began, parents, students and teachers chanted, help up posters insulting new Schools Chancellor Cathie Black.

Schools Chancellor Cathie Black, who mixed it up with a crowed during another schools closure meeting earlier this week, was again drowned out by shouting protesters. Black has come under withering criticism since Mayor Michael Bloomberg tapped her to succeed former Chancellor Joe Klein.

That's right. Parents, mostly poor, dared to stand up to the rampant corruption of the Bloomberg administration and its past two Schools Chancellors. According to Mayor for Life Bloomberg, that is unacceptable.

The mayor said what happened wasn’t one of the city’s finest moments. “This is embarrassing for New York City, for New York State, for America,” Bloomberg said.
...
“This is not democracy. Letting people yell and scream, that’s not freedom of expression,” Bloomberg said. “That’s just rying to take away somebody else’s rights.”

Obviously, these are deeply classist and racist lies by our pathetic excuse for a mayor. They also are the height of hypocrisy. Bloomberg is in no position to lecture anyone else about democracy when he has used hundreds of millions of dollars of money from his personal fortune and from his fascist Bloomberg media empire to buy the mayor's office three times in a row. Not only has Bloomberg repeatedly shown his fanatical hatred of middle class and poor New Yorkers, he has shown an equally uncompromising hatred of democracy and everything else America stands for.

Under the grossly unqualified and incompetent previous Schools Chancellor Joe Klein, the public schools in NYC fell further behind private schools that educate the children and grandchildren of Bloomberg's parasitical rich friends. Under Bloomberg's direction, Klein kept his focus away from educational improvement and pushed for poorly run but profitable charter schools. Klein also followed the Mayor for Life's instructions to change our city's public schools from educational institutions to test taking academies. That has been profitable for educational testing corporations, but it has damaged a school system that needs improvement, not corporate raids and hollowing out under The Shock Doctrine.

Now, Mayor for Life Bloomberg has put in another unqualified corporate shill, Cathie Black, in charge of slowly bleeding the public schools and trying to keep the vast majority of New Yorkers so horribly educated so that they won't be able to figure out Bloomberg and other super rich, corporatist parasites are doing to them and our society.

Bloomberg sees those of us who live in NYC as his personal serfs, who better be grateful for the abuse his administration heaps on us. He reminds me more and more of Hosni Mubarak and Zine El Abidine Ben Ali every day.

Angry at How the Koch Brothers Use Their Obscene Fortune?

2011-02-04T22:00:00.001-05:00

These are some of the Koch Industries subsidiaries you may decide not to do business with. (Source: Wikipedia viewed 2/3/11)

Among Koch Industries’ better known subsidiaries across various industries are:
- Georgia-Pacific paper and pulp company, maker of Brawny paper towels, Angel Soft toilet paper, Mardi Gras napkins and towels and Quilted Northern toilet paper.
- Invista, a polymer and fibers company that makes Stainmaster carpet, and Lycra fiber, among other products.
- Koch Pipeline Company LP, that owns and operates 4,000 miles of pipeline used to transport oil, natural gas liquids and chemicals.
- Flint Hill Resources LP, that operates oil refineries in six states.
- Koch Fertilizer, LLC, owns or has interests in fertilizer plants the United States, Canada, Trinidad and Tobago, Venezuela, and Italy, among others. In October 2010, a plant in Venezuela was nationalized by the government.

You also might be interested in a protest a few days ago against the Koch's secretive meeting with other rich rightists in posh Rancho Mirage, CA.

Photo: losinghand

New Yorkers: Take Action to Crack Down on Wall St.

2011-02-03T21:02:00.003-05:00

I received this Action Alert in an email from Credo/Working Assets (It has been edited for brevity.):

Call Attorney General Eric Schneiderman: Hold Wall Street criminals accountable!

Call New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman at (800) 771-7755.

New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has a chance to make sure some of Wall Street's biggest criminals don't get away with cheating millions of foreclosure victims. But we need you to make a call right now.

Less than a month ago, the lead Attorney General in a 50-state investigation of the mortgage industry, Tom Miller of Iowa, promised a group of foreclosure victims and their advocates that the investigation would "put people in jail."1

This was in response to revelations from Congressional hearings and news articles documenting pervasive abuses by mortgage servicers — the companies that collect the mortgage payments, impose late fees, negotiate loan modifications and initiate foreclosures.

But now AG Miller has changed his tune, calling the investigation "inherently civil," not criminal.2 And just last week, when AG Miller once again met with foreclosure victims, he refused to repeat his pledge to prosecute those responsible.

That's why we're teaming up with our friends at National People's Action for a national call campaign targeting the attorneys general of every state. Join thousands of activists across the country in calling your state's attorney general to demand that Wall Street's biggest criminals are held accountable for their crimes against foreclosure victims.

Call New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman now and demand criminal penalties for corrupt mortgage servicers.

Attorney General Eric Schneiderman — (800) 771-7755

I would mention that Schneiderman should go after all the other crimes being committed routinely by Wall St. as well.

Andrew Cuomo did very little as Attorney General to crack down on the Wall St. banksters and brokesters. However, Schneiderman campaigned on a promise to be "The Sheriff of Wall St." I do know that politicians try to weasel out of campaign promises when interests that make big campaign contributions are involved. That's why it is so critical for people to remind our new Atty. General of his responsibilities.

On a lighter note, here are some great quotes about banksters I ran in a previous posting about a year ago.

It is easier to rob by setting up a bank than by holding up a bank clerk.
Bertolt Brecht

I hate banks. They do nothing positive for anybody except take care of themselves. They`re first in with their fees and first out when there`s trouble.
Earl Warren

But if you want to continue to be slaves of the banks and pay the cost of your own slavery, then let bankers continue to create money and control credit.
Josiah Stamp

Banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies.
Thomas Jefferson

Whoever controls the volume of money in our country is absolute master of all industry and commerce...when you realize that the entire system is very easily controlled, one way or another, by a few powerful men at the top, you will not have to be told how periods of inflation and depression originate.
James Garfield, 20th US President
Assassinated, 1881

Photo: wot_nxt

The Role of Global Warming in the Shitty Weather Here in NYC

2011-02-02T21:22:00.003-05:00

(From Democracy Now! 2/2/11):

Extreme Weather: U.S. Gripped by Massive Winter Storm
Extreme weather is the story of the day across much of the United States. A massive winter storm has affected 100 million people from New Mexico to New England. Thousands of flights have been canceled. The National Weather Service issued storm watches, warnings and advisories in more than 30 states and blizzard warnings for eight. States of emergency were declared in Wisconsin, Illinois, Missouri and Oklahoma. Many scientists have linked the extreme winter weather patterns to climate change. A recent study by the U.S. Global Change Research Program found the amount of very heavy precipitation on the eastern seaboard from Washington, D.C., to Maine rose by 67 percent between 1958 and 2007.

Keep in mind that this winter has been wetter than 2007. Last month had the most snow of any January in the historical record.

People who are paid by Big Oil and Big Coal to deny Global Warming have tried to saw that all these snowstorms disprove it. They hope people don't know how these storms work. All the big snow storms in NYC start as rain storms in the Pacific or the Gulf Mexico. Then, they feed off moisture in the Atlantic that starts as rain and freezes to snow as it approaches land. So, if the ocean temperatures are warmer, their will be more moisture to feed these storms than there otherwise would be.

Global Warming isn't just here and human made. It's already a major pain in the ass.

So much of the junk science pushed by corporations from fields as divergent as Global Warming, to tobacco health risks, to the very real dangers of genetically modified foods get way too much traction because science education is so poor.

For instance, claims that genetically modified foods are the "same" as non modified foods are pure marketing fluff. If you know how many different kinds of biochemicals are present in food, there simply isn't an economically feasible way to test for all them. Then, there is the other problem of the effects that genetic modifications might have on how organisms absorb, store, and metabolize pesticides, herbicides, and pollutants that they encounter.

Meanwhile, the corporations' bought politicians divert attention from real educational reform towards scams like vouchers, charter schools, and anti union hysteria which have nothing to do with improving education in science or any other field.

I hope some of those Global Warming enablers with their junk science get stuck in a blizzard. It would be poetic justice.

Image: ssoosay

Ayn Rand Took Social Security and Medicare

2011-02-02T07:00:00.003-05:00

Ayn Rand, the far rightist who started the bizarre cult of Objectivism, was one of the most fanatical opponents of government programs like Medicare and Social Security which serve the needs of the middle class and the poor. On the other hand, she loved this nation's wildly bloated military industrial complex, which subsidizes the rich.

Yet, guess what the idol of the Randroids actually did. (Alternet 1/29/11)

Ayn Rand was not only a schlock novelist, she was also the progenitor of a sweeping “moral philosophy” that justifies the privilege of the wealthy and demonizes not only the slothful, undeserving poor but the lackluster middle-classes as well.

Her books provided wide-ranging parables of "parasites," "looters" and "moochers" using the levers of government to steal the fruits of her heroes' labor. In the real world, however, Rand herself received Social Security payments and Medicare benefits under the name of Ann O'Connor (her husband was Frank O'Connor).

Take that Randroids!

You may recall that corrupt and incompetent former Federal Reserve Board stooge Alan Greenspan was a disciple of the Randroid cult. This is one of the reasons he fought against reinstituting regulations that would have prevented the Crash of 2008. He also refused to intervene to gradually cool off the housing bubble on the same "free market" grounds. However, he had no problem with manipulating interest rates to benefit the wealthy and powerful.

Here are some anti Ayn Rand/Objectivism Websites and Articles:

What's Wrong with Ayn Rand? (About.com)

Atlas Wanked: From Fiction to Fraud in 52 Years (Crooks and Liars)

Definition of "Randroid" (Urban Dictionary)

The Anti Ayn Rand Society (Facebook)

Ayn Rand Sucks (Facebook)

Why Randroids Will Always Fail (in mala fide)

Why Ayn Rand Sucks... (newspoodle's posterous)

Objectivism Criticism (blog)

Ayn Rand isn't just renowned for being a narcisist. She is infamous for being an absolutely terrible writer. Here are some bad reviews of her notoriously terribleFountainhead.

James Higgs

Ryan (Goodreads)

Brendan (Goodreads)

Foodpie (Goodreads)

Boehner, Other Rightists, Trying to Protect the Fetuses of Child Molesters

2011-01-31T20:00:00.004-05:00

I wish this headline involved hyperbole. Sadly, it is literally true.

From Mother Jones 1/28/11: (Hat Tip: Jed Report)

For years, federal laws restricting the use of government funds to pay for abortions have included exemptions for pregnancies resulting from rape or incest. (Another exemption covers pregnancies that could endanger the life of the woman.) But the "No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act," a bill with 173 mostly Republican co-sponsors that House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) has dubbed a top priority in the new Congress, contains a provision that would rewrite the rules to limit drastically the definition of rape and incest in these cases.

With this legislation, which was introduced last week by Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), Republicans propose that the rape exemption be limited to "forcible rape." This would rule out federal assistance for abortions in many rape cases, including instances of statutory rape, many of which are non-forcible. For example: If a 13-year-old girl is impregnated by a 24-year-old adult, she would no longer qualify to have Medicaid pay for an abortion. (Smith's spokesman did not respond to a call and an email requesting comment.)

Given that the bill also would forbid the use of tax benefits to pay for abortions, that 13-year-old's parents wouldn't be allowed to use money from a tax-exempt health savings account (HSA) to pay for the procedure. They also wouldn't be able to deduct the cost of the abortion or the cost of any insurance that paid for it as a medical expense.

Ratzi would love the scum behind this legislation.

This legislation is horrifying, but it isn't surprising. Boehner already has started a push for more vouchers that would put more DC school children in the hands of child molesting priests.

There also is a well known problem of rampant child molestation among Republican Party officials. I wonder how many of the cosponsors of the legislation have impregnated girls in the 13-15 range and don't want their embryos and fetuses aborted.

This is sick, sick, sick.

Of course, the general misogyny behind this heinous provision must be condemned too. What kind of sociopaths would actually try to narrow down what is considered rape? The level of hatred of women illustrated by this bill goes beyond disgusting. More from the Mother Jones article:

"This bill takes us back to a time when just saying 'no' wasn't enough to qualify as rape," says Steph Sterling, a lawyer and senior adviser to the National Women's Law Center. Laurie Levenson, a former assistant US attorney and expert on criminal law at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, notes that the new bill's authors are "using language that's not particularly clear, and some people are going to lose protection." Other types of rapes that would no longer be covered by the exemption include rapes in which the woman was drugged or given excessive amounts of alcohol, rapes of women with limited mental capacity, and many date rapes. "There are a lot of aspects of rape that are not included," Levenson says.

As for the incest exception, the bill would only allow federally funded abortions if the woman is under 18.

Aaaaaaaahh!

Photo: Talk Media News

Pissed Off About Comcast's Purge of Olbermann? It's Part of a Bigger Problem

2011-01-30T19:00:00.002-05:00

Comcast always has been an incredibly evil corporation. They make a shitload of money off the Internet, but they don't want to play by the rules. For instance, they have lobbied heavily against Net Neutrality, and they have censored emails to their customers from an organization with different political views than those of the far right Goppers who run Comcast.

So, it didn't surprise me that Comcast got rid of Keith Olbermann from its newly acquired MSNBC. Don't be surprised if other centrist or liberal hosts get the axe.

Free Press has sent out a press release that does an excellent job of bringing up the broader issues that Comcast's purchase of a majority interest in NBC Universal entails. Here is Josh Silver's statement.

"This deal is a win for Comcast, General Electric and NBC executives, and a devastating loss to everyone else, and to democracy itself. As of today, Comcast has an Orwellian amount of control over your media experience and your wallet. By controlling both information and the ways people access that information — by cable, broadcast and the Internet -- Comcast-NBC can and will block competition, stifle innovation and silence independent, opposing viewpoints.

“Comcast customers can expect to see their bills go up, as they foot the $30 billion tab. And even if you’re not a Comcast customer, you’re sure to end up paying more. Next, get ready for a merger wave, as other corporations seek out similar mega-deals to try to compete with Comcast-NBC. Putting too much media power in the hands of a single company is bad for the American people and for our democracy."

No kidding. Look at all the damage that already has been done by Rupert Murdoch's fascist media empire.

Photo: dmuth

Corporate Media Spreading Same "Looting" Bullshit About Cairo That They Did About New Orleans

2011-01-30T07:00:00.002-05:00

Remember how the Bush regime and its corporate media enablers made claims of "looting" in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina? Remember how those claims were wildly exaggerated and largely fictional, designed to justify leaving thousands of people there to die?

Well, it looks like the corporate media are justifying the brutalization of people with looting propaganda again, this time in Cairo. (CNN 1/29/11)

By day, tens of thousands turned out in cities across Egypt -- demanding the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak, calling for major economic and political reforms and, in multiple spots, bloodily clashing with police forces.

By night, with the security forces seemingly disappeared, some had stepped back to mourn those killed, treat their wounds or gather strength. Other citizens, meanwhile, gathered whatever weapons they could find as they banded together with friends, family and neighbors to protect their communities from roving bands of looters.

"There's no army, no one to prevent (theft and chaos). They disappeared," said one man from a Cairo suburb on Saturday night, who united with friends, cousins and neighbors to protect their property.

Yes, of course. The murderous police state in Egypt is necessary to protect the Egyptian people from the eeeeeebilllll looters. Put all those nasty people in Cairo in ~~the Superdome~~ a secure location for their own safety.

I can smell the bullshit all the way from the CNN corporate headquarters.

Image: US Government Export Portal

Message from Egypt from Friday

2011-01-29T19:00:00.001-05:00

No commentary here. Egyptian activists are asking people to pass this along to get around corporate media censorship in Egypt and the US.

URGENT MESSAGE FROM EGYPT:

To all the people of world
The people in Egypt are under governmental siege. Mubarak regime is banning Facebook, Twitter, and all other popular internet sites Now, the internet are completely blocked in Egypt. Tomorrow the government will block the 3 mobile phone network will be completely blocked. And there is news that even the phone landlines will be cut tomorrow, to prevent any news agency from following what will happen.

Suez city is already under siege now. The government cut the water supply and electricity, people, including, children and elderly are suffering there now. The patients in hospitals cannot get urgent medical care. The injured protesters are lying in the streets and the riot police are preventing people from helping them. The families of the killed protesters cannot get the bodies of their sons to bury them. This picture is the same in north Saini (El-Sheikh zoyad city) and in western Egypt (Al-salom). The riot police is cracking down on protesters in Ismailia, Alexandria, Fayoum, Shbin Elkoum, and Cairo, the capital, in many neighborhoods across the city.

The government is preparing to crackdown on the protesters in all Egyptian cities. They are using tear gas bombs, rubber and plastic pullets, chemicals like dilutes mustard gas against protesters. Several protesters today have been killed when the armored vehicles of the riot police hit them. Officials in plain clothes carrying blades and knives used to intimidate protesters. Thugs deployed by the Egyptian Ministry of Interior are roaming the streets of Cairo, setting fire on car-wheels as means of black propaganda to demonize protesters and justify police beatings and state torture

All this has been taken place over the past three days during the peaceful demonstrations in Cairo and other cities. Now, with the suspicious silence of the local media and the lack of coverage from the international media, Mubarak and his gang are blocking all the channels that can tell the world about what is happening.
People who call for their freedom need your support and help. Will you give them a hand?

The activists are flooding the net (youtube and other sites) with thousands of pictures and videos showing the riot police firing on armless people. The police started to use ammunition against protesters. 15-year old girl has been injured and another 25 year old man has been shot in the mouth. While nothing of these has appeared in the media, there is more to happen tomorrow. Will you keep silent? Will you keep your mouth shut while seeing all these cruelty and inhumane actions?

We don’t ask for much, just broadcast what is happening

Written by: Mariam Hussien

Fascist German Government Wants to Inflict More Misery on the Egyptian People

2011-01-29T10:29:00.008-05:00

The horribly corrupt, extreme right government led by German Chancellor Angela Merkel continues to push for more poverty in misery in Egypt even though the people of that country are so understandably outraged by what is being done to them that they are trying to overthrow the corrupt dictator in that country.

I should note that Merkel dishonestly refers to as "economic reforms" in Egypt are things like the following.

1) Selling off state owned industries at fire sale prices to multinational corporations that slash jobs and pay.

2) Cutting back on government food subsidies and other programs for the people.

3) Cutting taxes for the wealthy elites in Egypt while cutting taxes for foreign corporations and speculators. (So much for "austerity.")

4) Giving international banksters absolute power over Egypt's economic policies. (So much for "freedom" and "democracy.")

If you think I'm wrong or exaggerating, remember that Merkel was the banksters' point person in enforcing draconian social spending cuts on Greece and Ireland which easily could have been avoided by making corporations and the rich pay closer to their fair share in taxes.

Now, for her government's latest efforts to spread poverty and misery for the many, and unearned wealth for the few:
(Monsters and Critics 1/28/11)

Chancellor Angela Merkel appealed Friday for reforms in Egypt, saying through a spokesman, Christoph Steegmans, that Egypt suffered from 'a range of deficiencies.'

...

At a government news conference, Merkel spokesman Steegmans was very cautious, saying only that areas where reform was needed in Egypt included economic policy and in policies against poverty.

What are the kinds of policies that the fringe right government in Germany considers "against poverty"? Items 1-4 listed above.

It's not like these policies are new. The kind of plutocratic totalitarianism pushed by the Merkel government, the World Bank, the IMF, and many US and British officials has a known track record. In Central and South America, it has dramatically increased poverty and has employed military coups, suppression of dissent, torture, and mass murder.

The same things have been done in Russia, and to a lesser extent in Poland. The results were predictable: small super rich elites gorging on an orgy of conspicuous consumption while the overwhelming majority of the population suffered so badly they actually were better off economically under communism, as bad as that was economically.

If all of this sounds completely off the radar of what you are familiar with, I urge you to read The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein and Confessions of an Economic Hit Man by John Perkins.

If this reminds you of what has been going on here in the US, it should. The bailouts by Congress and the bankster controlled Federal Reserve of the banksters and brokesters but not the American people basically worked along the same lines. Bush may have pushed the congressional bailout, but Barack Obama voted for it in the Senate.

Imagine if there was no bailout of bad mortgage paper. Imagine instead if that bailout was directed at the people who needed help with their mortgages. Imagine also if the astronomical increases in interest rates for predatory adjustable rate mortgages were cut back dramatically or eliminated by federal law. The effects would have been.

1) Very few foreclosures.

2) A much smaller loss of equity for homeowners.

3) A much shorter recession, one that would have ended by late 2009 if not earlier.

4) Much smaller budget deficits due to much higher tax revenues in a less dysfunctional economy.

5) Much of the value of the mortgage paper would have been saved, indirectly by making it possible for people to pay off mortgages and by preventing the extremes of the collapse in housing prices.

6) Banksters would not be holding so many stolen properties, just waiting to sell them when the economy gets better while getting the federal government to assume the short term risks.

The ability of banksters, brokesters, and wealthy speculators to corrupt governments is hardly limited to Germany. It is highly common, and it includes most US government officials, at the federal, state, and local level. What makes Merkel and her fringe right government stand out so much is just how arrogant and entitled those corrupt politicians are.

It also frightens me to see an extreme right German government in collusion with totalitarian banksters. It reminds me too much of the mid 1930s.

Images: US Government Export Portal

madhavaji

miketually

respres

"Judge Rules White Girl Will Be Tried As Black Adult"

2011-01-27T19:30:00.000-05:00

I love the Onion, though I have to admit they usually don't go for such hard edged satire. This video is brilliant. (Hat Tip: Unqualified Offerings)

Judge Rules White Girl Will Be Tried As Black Adult

The Arizona Shooter's Far Right Political Views

2011-01-26T19:00:00.000-05:00

Note: I'm avoiding the usage of the shooter's name. I don't think a desperate desire for attention played a role in the Arizona shootings. However, I know that a lot of celebrity shooters are motivated by the desire for attention, and I don't want to further the notion a potential killer might have that murder is the way to get famous.

Far too quickly after the Arizona shootings, the extreme right media flooded the country with ridiculous propaganda saying the shooter was a "liberal." It was designed to confuse and obscure the far right views of the killer and distract attention from the role Sarah Palin's terrorist gun target map played in the killings. As one would expect, the corporate media used the rhetoric to say that the facts being presented by the left were comparable and any attempt to understand why the shootings happened was crass partisanship.

This makes it all the more important to get the real facts out there. The first clue, aside from the target of the attacks and Sarah Palin's map, was the shooter's rantings about gold and silver currency. Basing currency on precious metals is a long piety of the fringe right. However, there are other examples of the shooter's fringe right ideology, some of it too far to the right to even show up on Faux News.

From the Southern Poverty Law Center's Mark Potok:

1) He believes that government uses grammar as mind control to enslave people.

From Chip Berlet of Political Research Associates:

2) The shooter objects to the "second United States constitution" which includes the amendments passed after the Civil War.

From the shooter's YouTube Channel:

3) People shouldn't allow governments to create currencies for them.

4) He claims that referring to him as a terrorist is an "Ad hominem" attack. (This one is especially obscure, but especially nerdy rightists are fond of saying that any criticism, legitimate or not, is that kind of attack.)

5) He says that "you don't have to accept any of the federalist laws." (This one requires a bit of unpacking. The far right despises federalism because they think that it gives the central government too much power. "States rights" anyone?)

6) He spews the right's drivel about property owners having a revolution.

7) He believes that he is being denied his civil rights. (It is common for white supremacists to have this view.)

8) Anything that inconveniences him or causes him problems is "unconstitutional" without having a valid or even reasonable reference to the text. (The rightist spin doctors often make fake allusions to the constitution because they know their flocks will never read it. The wealthcare law suddenly becomes "unconstitutional" though it is not. Environmental regulations are "unconstitutional" because they say so.)

9) He has an irrational hatred for the academy.

Most people have been relying on second hand descriptions of the shooter's YouTube Channel and videos. I have read that the channel had been taken down. Either that isn't true or it is back up. In any case, if you actually watch his absurd videos (fortunately they are short), you get a vastly different view of the shooter than the rightist bias spun in the corporate media. I don't blame you if you don't want to get near that nasty YouTube channel, but somebody needs to do it in order to get at the truth about the Arizona shootings.

The shooter's views may seem so over the top and bizarre that you are tempted to dismiss them as crazy. Keep in mind that the ones I referenced above are accepted as fact by many on the right fringe. A lot of people think that Glenn Beck's stuff is just random shit that comes off the top of his head. Actually, most of the things he says on TV are swiped from far right discourse on the Internet elsewhere. The shooter accepted some things that are too fringe (at least for now) for even Glenn Beck to use on his show, but Faux News' legitimizing of so much fringe right nonsense creates political and ideological space for the wild bullshit that some of the rightists spew and which the shooter bought into.

You may want to dismiss these views as crazy and idiosyncratic. They certainly are not idiosyncratic. They are part of the fringe right's world view.

Boehner, Lieberman to Push Discrimination Against Atheists and Child Molestation

2011-01-25T20:30:00.005-05:00

Whenever a Republican talks about "bipartisanship," it's bound to be something hateful and extreme. The latest efforts to shove unwanted vouchers down Washington, DC's throat is a rather blatant example of this. (Politico 1/24/11)

The day after President Barack Obama makes education a centerpiece of his State of the Union address, House Speaker John Boehner will try to force his hand on the issue of school vouchers in Washington, D.C. as a test of the White House’s commitment to bipartisanship.

The Ohio Republican, along with Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), will introduce legislation on Wednesday to reauthorize the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship program, the speaker’s office said Monday, making a school voucher initiative that Democrats, including Obama, have strongly opposed as a bargaining chip for beginning discussions on the administration’s desired education proposals.

“If the president is sincere about working together on education reform, we should start by saving this successful, bipartisan program that has helped so many underprivileged children get a quality education,” Boehner said in a statement to POLITICO.

In 2001, Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) did an excellent expose debunking claims by the corporate media and militant Christian fundamentalists that vouchers improve educational achievement. Studies funded by voucher supports show know educational advantage in voucher schools despite the ability of those schools to weed out disruptive students and students with learning disabilities.

It just isn't honest to say that there is any educational benefit to vouchers.

Of course, vouchers were never intended for educational purposes and certainly aren't meant to help poor people. Rightists like Boehner and Lieberman are the types who derive enormous pleasure from the suffering of the poor and the accumulation by the rich. This initiative is all about religious indoctrination and erosion of the First Amendment.

Vouchers, like any government funding of religion, is absolutely forbidden by the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. Yet, in the one of the most dishonest Supreme Court rulings since Plessy vs. Ferguson, a 5-4 majority fraudulently claimed that the purpose of vouchers was educational and that government funding of blatant religious indoctrination is somehow "constitutional."

Eventually, that blatantly unconstitutional ruling allow vouchers will be overturned by a more honest Supreme Court. In the meantime, We the People will have to defend the Constitution from anti American extremists like Boehner and Lieberman.

The obvious unconstitutionality of vouchers legislation is hardly the only problem with voucher legislation. This is a rather transparent effort to discriminate against atheists and force us to participate in religion by forcing us to pay for it. Reprehensible bigots like the ones behind the vouchers legislation are obsessed with shoving religion down the throats of atheist Americans instead of treating us as the full citizens of this country which we are.

As bad as the bigotry is, there is something even worse about vouchers programs. They promote child molestation. The dollar amounts are deliberately set so that poor parents can not send their children to elite private schools, but instead to Roman Catholic schools. This puts far more children in the clutches of child raping priests. The irony of a moralizing gasbag like Lieberman doing something he knows damned well will result in the rape of more children is enough to give any reasonable person pause.

Gold Bubble Keeps Expanding While Glenn Beck Advertiser Gets in Serious Legal Trouble

2011-01-24T23:30:00.004-05:00

Photo: trader_john

From a 7/17/10 post of mine on the gold bubble:

I'm sorry, but gold is not worth anywhere near $1200 per ounce.

Yet, despite a drop on Friday, gold was trading at the astronomical level of $1194. This is just plain crazy.

For decades, gold has been marketed to the gullible as a safe haven for currencies when paper (and now electronic) money fluctuate. However, if you remember the history, gold fluctuates much more wildly than currencies do.

Gold is now trading at well over $1300 per ounce.

Can you say "crazy"? I knew you could.

I'm sure if any gold bugs read this, phrases like "chicken little" will go through their heads. That's what people who wrote about the housing bubble were accused of being...until that bubble burst.

Meanwhile, Mother Jones has let us know that one of Glenn Beck's sleazy gold advertisers is in legal troubles.

Glenn Beck might, for once, be right: the government is coming for your gold. But only if you happened to buy it from one of Beck's *one-time advertisers, the Superior Gold Group. At the request of prosecutors from LA County and Santa Monica city who have filed a civil suit against the company, Los Angeles County judge has ordered that Superior Gold be placed into receivership and all of its assets—bank accounts, real estate, and presumably gold stored for customers—frozen. On Monday, a court-appointed lawyer actually physically seized control of the company, presumably to prevent further wrongdoing. The lawsuit alleged that among other things, Superior had defrauded its customers by overcharging them, fraudulently inducing them to buy overpriced collectors' coins rather than the bullion that they wanted, and taking customers' money for coins they never produced. The prosecutors hope that the lawsuit will provide restitution for all of the company's ripped off customers. The judge will hold a hearing later this month to decide whether the company's assets should remain frozen until the case goes to trial.

If the allegations made by prosecutors are accurate, then this company is overtly sleazy and dishonest. Any company that advertises with Glenn Beck has to be more than a bit disreputable.

However, we shouldn't lose site of the fact that the entire gold feeding frenzy industry is a sleazy effort to take advantage of novice investors who haven't followed historical trends on highly volatile commodities like precious metals and who really didn't grasp the dot.com or real estate bubbles either. Anyone with a lick of sense knows that gold is going to crash and big time in the near to mid term, leaving a lot of peoples' speculative frenzy empty and their futures threatened.

Tell Congress to Cut Wasteful War Spending

2011-01-24T19:00:00.003-05:00

codepinkhq

The new Republican majority in Congress keeps talking about cutting wasteful spending, yet the most wasteful spending imaginable: the Iraq War, the Afghanistan War, and the hugely bloated military budget are exempt because corporate and wealthy donors make money off of that spending.

Here's a chance to turn the GOP's faux deficit hawk bs against them. CODEPINK is asking people to contact their congresscritters and tell them to go after the real wasteful spending. From their Action Alert's Sample Letter:

Your position as my Congressperson at this time in history is a mighty responsibility. That responsibility includes finding a way out of the financial crisis we are in. As you well know, the number one issue on the minds of the American people is our ailing economy. We know that there is heavy pressure on you to slash government spending.

But where should that money come from? Not from social security, Medicare and programs shielding people from the ravages of the economic crisis. The only logical sector to cut is the military budget, which now consumes over 50% of our discretionary spending. Funding for war has created a financial drain that this congressional district and this nation cannot, and should not, pay any longer.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan—and the expanding attacks in Pakistan—helped plunge us into this financial crisis and have not made us any safer at home. The U.S. will spend more on the war in Afghanistan this year, adjusting for inflation, than we spent on the Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, the Mexican-American War, the Civil War and the Spanish-American War combined. The United States also spends nearly as much on military power as every other country in the world combined, plus we maintain troops at more than 800 bases around the world—often antagonizing the local people and making us targets for terrorist attacks.

We can’t afford these wars, we can’t win these wars, and they no longer have the support of the American people. We can’t afford to have military bases sprawled all over the world. We can’t afford to keep producing Cold War weapons that we don’t need and merely benefit a handful of weapons manufacturers. It’s time to end these unwinnable, unjustifiable wars and bring our war dollars home to tackle the most strategic task for our national security, rebuilding America.

I also urge you, as my Congressperson, to vote NO on any further war funding appropriations for Iraq and Afghanistan, whether in the FY2011 budget or in "supplemental" bills, in order to redirect this nation‘s resources toward improving our education system, infrastructure, and health care programs.

Please help us make our economy more robust and our nation more secure by bringing our war dollars home and taking a serious look at cutting other parts of our bloated Pentagon budget. We want a military that defends us here at home, not one that makes war overseas. And we want an economy that serves the people, not private military contractors.

Photo: madhavaji

As is the case for any suggested letter in an Action Alert form, it is a good idea for you to rewrite and personalize the letter so the congressmember's office doesn't get the same email over, and over, and over again. I definitely rewrote mine.

Please Take Action!

Gun Extremism Is a Far Greater Threat to Our Country Than Islamic Fundamantalism

2011-01-23T23:30:00.003-05:00

Every year, almost 30,000 Americans are killed by guns and the gun extremists who oppose rational efforts to regulate and eventually ban private gun ownership. That is roughly ten times the number of people who were killed in the 911 attacks, and that doesn't include the hundreds of thousands of Americans who are robbed and raped at gunpoint. Every year, the gun lobby's actions result in heinous crime that far outweighs the worst year of Muslim Right terrorism.

Yet, people are not willing to acknowledge the danger posed to this country by the bloodthirsty gun extremists.

After the Arizona shootings, which were done with a gun put in the hand of the killer by the gun lobby, the gun extremists responded by calling for more guns and fewer restrictions on guns. Gun terrorist propagandists were ready with claims that concealed guns would have prevented the shootings or stopped the shooter.

The fact is that the proposed gunslinging would have resulted in even more bystanders being shot, this time by the "hero" who was so mindless that he thought he was saving the day.

Even now, the gun extremists constantly talk about supposedly "legitimate" reasons to own guns. In a previous posting, I countered disinformation about gun ownership (and civil liberties) with the actual facts.

It really should be astonishing that the author actually makes the claim that gun ownership is a "civil liberty." This is fatuous nonsense. Taking away peoples' guns is merely a minor inconvenience. Let's look at the main reasons why people own guns.

1) Misguided attempts at self protection that actually do far more to endanger the gun owners and the people who live around them.

2) The commission of robbery, rape, murder, and other serious crimes.

3) Killing animals. This is often referred to as "sport hunting," despite the fact that it is too one sided to honestly be referred to as a sport. If people want to hunt for sport, they should be using spears or clubs, not guns.

Yes, I know that the gun extremists whine like spoiled, entitled children at the thought of not having their unnecessary and counterproductive guns. The vast majority of gun extremists are men who are abject sexual failures and use guns as substitute penises for their own members that get little or no attention from any human being other than themselves. I went into this in a bit more detail in one of the early postings on this blog.

Of course, National Rifle Association stickers are even worse, especially the ones that say that no one will ever take the owner's gun away. NRA stickers scream “man with tiny penis who cannot get an erection without Viagra or some other drug.”

And, gun magazines are hysterical. Macho-acting man/boys hold guns the way that tops hold their schlongs in gay porno movies. Guns as phallic symbols and castration anxieties have huge psychological influences over gun nuts. I think the main reason this aspect of the firearm fanatics doesn't get much press is that people are afraid of getting shot by an impotent gun owner with a penis so small he has trouble finding it.

Gun ownership and gun advocacy is a dangerous and often deadly way to try to compensate psychologically for sexual and interpersonal inadequacy. How many more Americans are going to get slaughtered, raped, and robbed before the politicians and public stop pandering to the gun extremists and the corporations who make money off of them?

Multiple Gunshot Incidents in Detroit and Washington State

2011-01-23T20:42:00.003-05:00

Four Detroit police officers shot inside precinct (Detroit News 1/23/11)

Police: At least 4 people shot outside Walmart in Washington state (CNN 1/23/11)

When is this country going to face reality and ban private gun ownership? How many more people are going to have to be robbed, raped, and murdered before we do?

Being Rightist and Mentally Ill Are Not Mutually Exclusive

2011-01-23T12:30:00.003-05:00

The corporate media have been working overtime to try to keep the far right from being held accountable for their role in the Arizona shootings. They have used every propaganda trick they can think of to keep people from thinking sensibly and rationally about the facts.

One of my least favorite tricks has been to dismiss the shooter as "mentally ill." This is disturbing on so many levels. The huge majority of mentally ill people inflict no harm on anyone. Yet, corporate media spin doctors want us to believe that mental illness is an automatic explanation for any bizarre act of violence. The goal is that we look no further. Considering the reality of the behavior of mentally ill people in this country, there is something flawed at the core in assuming that mental illness is sufficient to explain any killing, especially a highly political shooting spree primarily intended to assassinate a member of Congress.

There's another obvious problem with this whole narrative. Of the small minority of mentally ill people who have violent tendencies, can it even be reasonably suggested that those people don't have political views? Are politics the exclusive venue of the sane?

Obviously, that's a crock of shit. Someone can be dangerously mentally ill and at the same time be motivated by a far right point of view or the exhortations of a far right politician.

Some on the left have criticized the right for blaming mental illness exclusively at the same time the right continues its crusade to cut government services for the mentally ill. That's reasonable as far as it goes, but it misses the broader analysis that needs to be made.

Lady Bunny Has Her Way With Sarah Palin

2011-01-22T09:06:00.003-05:00

Swiped mercilessly from From the Left:

Lady Bunny is doing some of the best satire in the country.

Unintentional Humor from Heterosexist Fundamentalist

2011-01-21T21:00:00.001-05:00

Hat Tip: Jesus Fetus Fajita Fishsticks

For the first few seconds of this, I thought it was an SNL parody. I do have one question. Does homophobia make people stupid or does stupidity make people homophobic?

Far Right Spray Paints Death Threats Against California Governor

2011-01-21T18:15:00.000-05:00

From the CBS Sacramento website 1/21/11:

Santa Ana police were called at 7 a.m. about threatening graffiti on Greenville Street north of Alton Avenue, Santa Ana police Cpl. Anthony Bertagna said.
The graffiti read, “We gonna kill Gov. Brown 2 14 11,” Bertagna said.

Between 2:15 p.m. and 2:30 p.m., a Santa Ana police officer saw more threatening graffiti at 1700 W. Segerstrom Ave., Bertagna said.

The vandal spray-painted in red, “27 more days 4 Brown” and included a swastika, Bertagna said, adding someone later painted over the red “7″ with a black “6″ as if it were a countdown.

The Arizona shootings weren't the first act of far right terrorism since Obama was inaugurated. I wonder how much longer people will remain in denial about these attacks being "isolated incidents."

GOP Planning Jihad Against Amtrak

2011-01-20T18:50:00.003-05:00

Instead of doing sensible and productive things to reduce deficits like ending the Iraq and Afghanistan wars or making their wealthy donors pay their fair share in taxes, House Republicans are proposing slashing federal spending that benefits the middle class and the poor.

Desperate to prove just how much they are bought and paid for by Big Oil, the Goppers want to eliminate $1.565 billion in annual Amtrak subsidies. The Goppers, hoping that people are ill informed, I'm sure will claim that Amtrak should be able to survive on its own.

But, they have no interest in making automobile transit pay its way. In addition to direct subsidies to that form of transit, most of our military spending goes to securing oil for the car culture and the Big Oil vultures that benefit financially from it. Those subsidies are in the hundreds of billions of dollars, which make the tiny Amtrak subsidy a mere pittance. None of the military budget subsidy of oil is on the chopping block.

And, Amtrak reduces our CO2 emissions, while Big Oil and the cars they love increase them. The Republicans are mostly Global Warming denialists, but that is hardly surprising. Big campaign checks from Big Oil and Big Coal make sure of that.

The attack on Amtrak is part of the bigger pay for play culture in DC. We need change to public financing of political campaigns. A big first step for that to happen is to have a judiciary honest enough to acknowledge the obvious fact that big money campaign contributions are not "speech."

They are bribes.

Will They Set Off Fireworks in Connecticut?

2011-01-19T06:43:00.005-05:00

Lieberman Will Not Run for Re-election

There is more good news. Get this from the NY Times blog posting referenced above.

But Linda McMahon, the wealthy pro-wrestling tycoon who spent $50 million on an unsuccessful Senate race last year, has already signaled she may run again in 2012.

We'll have Linda McMahon for comic relief? Again? I can't wait.

Take Action on Global Warming

2011-01-18T07:45:00.001-05:00

1. Don't Let Bought Politicians in Congress End EPA's Regulation of CO2 Emissions

Many politicians in the new Congress are threatening to cut EPA funding and to prohibit the EPA from regulating CO2 emissions as required by the Clean Air Act. This shows the pay for play atmosphere in DC, and Big Oil and Big Coal are paying the bills. Friends of the Earth is asking people to do something about this.

Keep the Clean Air Act Intact

The Clean Air Act -- the key existing federal tool to cut the pollution that causes global warming -- is under attack.

Anti-environment, climate-change-denying politicians are aiming to roll back the Clean Air Act as a tool to reduce dangerous climate pollution. We need to remind our representatives that a clean environment should come before the greed of big oil and dirty coal.

Please join us in the fight to save the Clean Air Act by sending your senators a message today.

Please Take Action Now!

2. Stop Oil Tankers in Canada's Great Bear Rainforest!
(This action is especially important if you are Canadian.)
This action involves protecting forests, which hold a lot of CO2. More importantly, its goal would also help to limit oil production, which is crucial in stopping Global Warming. (See Care2 Action Alert for full text)

The Great Bear Rainforest, a global treasure, needs your help now. The Great Bear Rainforest is located on the north coast of British Columbia, Canada and is the largest temperate rainforest left on the planet! It stores the same amount of CO2 produced by 28 million vehicles.

...

Enbridge, the world's largest pipeline company, wants to build a pipeline from the Alberta Tar Sands to the port of Kitimat, B.C., load this crude into huge oil tankers and sail these tankers through the heart of the Great Bear Rainforest and its dangerous waters. Enbridge owns the pipeline that leaked into the Kalamazoo River, Michigan, on June 26, 2010, in which approximately 877,000 gallons (3.4 million litres) ) of crude oil contaminated one of Michigan state's main waterways.

Anybody can Google "Enbridge oil spill history" to see the list of spills already caused by this company. For example,according to the Polaris Institute, an Ottawa advocacy group dedicated to change, Enbridge has a history of oil spills throughout Canada and the U.S.A. In August 2010, Polaris reported that Enbridge has been responsible for 610 oil spills that released more than 5.5 million gallons of oil from 1999 to 2008. Its website states that "The Michigan spill should be a wake up call to those who would allow Enbridge to build 2 pipelines from the Alberta Tar sands to the coast of B.C."

...

People in Canada and around the world, please TAKE ACTION NOW to tell Prime Minister Harper that we want, need and demand legislation to ban oil tankers in the pristine Great Bear Rainforest. Please sign my petition to tell Prime Minister Harper that this legislation is wanted, needed, and demanded to ensure that this Global Treasure, the Great Bear Rainforest, is not threatened by the risk of an oil spill!

Please Sign the Petition!

Arizona Shooting Victim Talks About Sarah Palin, Far Right's Responsibility for the Arizona Shootings

2011-01-15T09:29:00.003-05:00

I wonder if the corporate media will censor this.

Sarah Palin's Youngest Victim Was Buried Today

2011-01-13T23:29:00.002-05:00

Why isn't Sarah Palin facing a criminal investigation?

For Profit Hospital Cuts Back on Health Coverage for Its Workers

2011-01-13T19:00:00.001-05:00

This is a national disgrace.

Community Health Systems (CHS) is an incredibly evil corporation that runs for profit hospitals, including Wilkes-Barre General Hospital in Pennsylvania.

(From Labor Notes: 1/12/11)

CHS offers a health care plan that under-insures the individual or family, offering limited coverage and substantial co-pays, deductibles, and coinsurance. This unaffordable plan has already been forced on the non-union employees at the hospital, some of whom have acquired thousands of dollars in health care debt already, even when they are treated in the same hospital in which they work.

Even hospital employees are getting shitty healthcare. This is obviously corrupt and immoral. It also raises the question, would you trust healthcare from workers who don't have halfway decent healthcare themselves.

This is an example of healthcare cruelty and corruption that permeates our society. We need Medicare for All, not Obama's wealthcare plan for HMOs, health insurers, and Big Pharma. We also need to nationalize all for profit hospitals.

The employees in the nurses union went on a one day strike to fight for healthcare and to end other hateful and abusive practices by CHS. It's great to see people fighting back. This kind of fightback by unionized workers is why the corporate media lie like crazy to demonize unions. The owners and advertisers in the corporate media want everyone but the ultrarich to live in abject poverty and serfdom.

Learn more about the strike.

Photo: elisfanclub

Townhall Magazine Sends Out Inflammatory Email

2011-01-12T18:49:00.003-05:00

A few years ago, I got on the email list of the fringe right publication, Townhall Magazine, when I posted a comment on one of the blogs hosted on their website. I still get their emails. Many of them are trying to sell questionable investment advice, and many others give one insight into what the fringe is up to.

In the climate that exists in the aftermath of Sarah Palin's terrorist attack in Arizona, one would hope that the far right would tone down its rhetoric. They haven't toned it down much. They have sent out an inflammatory email with the title "Who are the Most Dangerous Liberals?" Get a load of this garbage they are using to sell their magazine.

Every conservative knows that liberals are working hard every day to recreate this country in their own image, tarnishing our great history and the hard-working people who live here. While some of the faces of the Left are too clownish to be taken seriously (see Keith Olbermann) others shy away from the limelight in order to push their agenda from behind a veil. Those people are some of the most dangerous liberals that threaten our way of life. Not to take away from some of the more obvious liberals, like the Barack Obamas and the Barney Franks of the world, there are many who push the leftwing radical agenda.

In the latest issue of Townhall Magazine we have identified the top 50 most dangerous liberals in America. We also have exposed their secret agendas, some as devious as any threat to the United States. Below are a few snippets from the list. Take a look and then get Townhall Magazine today!

Phrases like "tarnishing our great history" (note barely veiled racism), "threaten our way of life," and "secret agendas, some as devious as any threat to the United States" would have merely elicited laughter before the right's shooting spree in Arizona. But, now I realize that this kind of menacing rhetoric must be taken seriously. People get all riled up by this bullshit, and all it takes is something like Sarah Palin's gun target map to get the most militant to start shooting.

Two of the three people mentioned as "dangerous liberals" in the email actually are quite conservative, Barack Obama and Jon Stewart. When even people as far to the right as those two are branded as "dangerous liberals," this shows that very few public figures are immune to the dangerous rhetoric of the absolutist and sometimes eliminationist right. Oddly enough, the ad makes the unstable political extremists buy the magazine to find out the full list of people that they should hate and be terrified of.

This is really dangerous.

Irritating British Petroleum Commercials

2011-01-11T21:49:00.002-05:00

I am getting so sick of the deceptive commercials British Petroleum is using to try to give people a distorted image of itself after all the damage it did in the Gulf. In those commercials, they are trying to trick us into believing that the beaches are clean. That is misleading for at least two reasons.

1) With the "clean beaches," they were only cleaned at the surface level. Oil farther down in the sand is still there, waiting to eventually be brought up to the top by storms.

2) Most of the oil from the spill is still in the Gulf of Mexico. Some of that will inevitably end up washing up on the beaches periodically.

Other commercials tout how British Petroleum supposedly has done so much to people who lost their livelihoods to the storm. Anyone who has followed this news story knows better than that.

Here's the kind of video people should be seeing. Any time any station runs a British Petroleum commercial, they should have to give equal time to the truth.

Oil Uncovered On Pensacola Beach East Of Portofino November 19 2010

I Refuse to Go to the Daily Beast Until Howard Kurtz Is Fired

2011-01-10T07:15:00.004-05:00

Let's review the facts that no one can honestly dispute:

1) Sarah Palin put out a terrorist gun target map which was a deliberate set of instructions to shoot and kill members of Congress.

2) Sarah Palin is directly and personally responsible for the shootings in Arizona.

3) It is physically impossible to defend Sarah Palin without endorsing the terrorist attack in Arizona and gloating over what was done to the victims.

Yet, neo-Nazi Daily Beast commentator Howard Kurtz did just that. He defended Sarah Palin and attacked people who have enough honesty and integrity to acknowledge Sarah Palin's involvement in the shootings.

What a sick fuck!

No decent human being could defend Sarah Palin after what she has done. This isn't about left or right. It's about human decency and patriotism. Every moral, loyal, honest American is blaming that traitor Sarah Palin for the shootings because everyone, regardless of ideology, knows for a fact that Sarah Palin directly caused this to happen.

(Ordinarily, I would link to the offending article, but I refuse to ever link to another article by a neo-Nazi like Howard Kurtz again. I also refuse to link to or visit the Daily Beast until that terrorist loving Nazi is fired. I will not drive traffic to hate sites on the Web.)

Giffords Talked About the Threats She Faced

2011-01-09T19:00:00.000-05:00

Hat Tip: Delaware Liberal

Sarah Palin must be held accountable for what she has done.

Ann Althouse Plays Politics With Terrorist Attack

2011-01-09T12:31:00.003-05:00

Ann Coulter isn't the only vicious, extremist Ann on the far right. Another evil Ann is the fringe right blogger Ann Althouse. Althouse has done all sorts of hateful and evil things in the past. But, this time, she has gone to sickening extremes.

In her deceptively titled, Should We Succumb to the Temptation to Engage in Political Rhetoric, Making Generalizations From the Shooting of Congresswomen Giffords, Althouse plays sleazy rightist politics with a terrorist attack incited by Sarah Palin.

Althouse is perfectly aware of the fact that these shootings are the direct result of Sarah Palin's terrorist gun target map. Yet, Althouse plays shoot the messenger by calling people who state this fact "louts" who are "chewing up the wounded flesh in the meat grinder of political rhetoric."

Althouse even goes on to lie about the nature of what happened.

First, you might want to resist because it's the right thing to do not only out of respect for the dead and wounded but also because Jared Loughner is probably just a crazy guy whose acts say nothing about anybody else.

Bullshit! Everyone knows for a fact that Loughner was acting on the instructions given on Sarah Palin's terrorist map.

It's time for people on the right to stop the spin and the politics. It's time for them to be Americans first and political ideologues later. It's time for all patriotic Americans to denounce Sarah Palin and for all patriotic Americans to demand the long overdue criminal investigation of Sarah Palin's terrorist map and other inciting rhetoric.

Sarah Palin Should Face a Criminal Investigation

2011-01-08T18:18:00.003-05:00

As you may be aware of by now, Congressmember Gabrielle Giffords has been shot. Thus far, Ms. Giffords has survived, but a federal judge and a nine year old child were murdered in this terrorist attack.

Towelroad, like a number of blogs, is reporting the fact that Ms. Giffords is one of the Democrats on Sarah Palin's infamous gun target poster.

Sarah Palin already should have been facing a criminal investigation for that incitement to terrorism and act of treason. Now, there is no excuse. Palin must be arrested and prosecuted for this. Anyone who objects to this is a terrorist enemy of America.

Every cable network should drop Palin. Every bookstore should stop selling Palin's books so she can not profit from her acts of terrorism.

Important Privacy Warning!

2011-01-07T19:45:00.000-05:00

I got this via I Can't Believe This Is Not a Democracy:

Spokeo.com is a new online USA phone book w/personal information: everything from pics you've posted on FB or web, your approx credit score, home value, income, age. Remove yourself by searching your name, find the URL of your page, then go to the bottom right corner of the page and click on Privacy button to remove yourself.

I just did it. You have to give them your e-mail address for the final removal process, but I searched for my name after I went through the process and I was no longer listed.

Your call on whether you want to do this. Naturally they charge users for your information. Fuck that. If they don't contact me first to ask to buy that information, then I'm removing it. Note: You may be listed a few times. There were two entries for me, one of which was over 15 years old. The removal process is quick. You'll be off the site in minutes.

I would check back every few months, just in case. I was listed twice, and a lot of the information was wrong. I don't know if bad information is a good thing or not.

Countering the Propaganda War Against Government Workers

2011-01-06T18:46:00.004-05:00

Our economy is shitty because of the corruption and incompetence of corporate executives, wealthy speculators, and the rightist politicians they have bought. Yet, bought politicians and corporate media propagandists are working on a relentless jihad to scapegoat and punish government employees for the economic suffering we are experiencing. Steven Greenhouse of the extreme right (yes extreme right) New York Times wrote a vicious propaganda piece which is the most prominent anti worker rant currently being passed around the Internet. According to these rightist shills, only the rich should have even remotely decent lives.

If you are like me, you are burned out on reading and hearing the bullshit that is being spewed at middle class Americans who are unionized. I would like to focus on the fightback.

Brave New Films has put together a wonderful video on the subject which I encourage you to put up on your blog too.

AFSCME, the nation's largest public employee union, has come up with a Stop The Lies campaign to counter this seemingly endless wave of propaganda. They have their own video, albeit a bit less slick.

AFSCME also has an open letter which I urge you to sign against this constant barrage of lies.

I also would like to bring up a few points.

Some Facts the Corporate Media Don't Want You To Consider:

1) Laying off public sector workers makes life more difficult for people laid off in the private sector. It creates a bigger pool of people looking for the same small number of jobs.

2) Laying off public sector workers hurts the overall economy. Public workers provide services which help our society function more effectively. Public sector workers also are consumers, and lack of consumer spending is generally cited as one of the main causes of our incredibly slow economic recovery.

3) Cutting public sector salaries and benefits hurts private sector workers in the long term. This economic downturn won't last forever. Eventually, employers will be competing for workers again. When they do, the levels of compensation will be based on what other employers are offering. Lowering what public sector workers get will lower the standards of all non rich Americans in the long haul.

4) All the state "budget crises" are fake. Deficits could easily be switched to surpluses by making the rich pay a little closer to their fair share in taxes.

Update: I found this fab Laura Flaunders video on this subject.