EMTs at Bill Thompson Rally
Photo: Edwin Martinez1

City Comptroller is running a courageous campaign against NYC's abysmal Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Here are some blogs of people supporting Thompson. (If you know of more, please do mention them in the comments.)

Blabbeando

Bloomberg Watch

Education Notes Online

Fed Up New Yorkers

Justice Not Change

Lost in the Ozone
- lists in detail the disastrous shape our city is in

Mole's Progressive Democrat

No Th3rd T3rm for Micha3l Bloomb3rg!

Pauline Park

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Some Other Endorsements:

Gay City News

Civic Center Residents Association NYC

DC 37

El Diario

Jonathan Tasini

Lambda Independent Democrats

Manhattan Young Democrats

NYC Kids PAC

Out People of Color Political Action Club

Stonewall Democratic Club

Uniformed Firefighters Association of Greater New York
(It must really be awful for them to see people dying in front of them because Bloomberg closed fire houses.)

Working Families Party

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Full List of Union Endorsements:

Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union (RWDSU, UFCW), Allied International Union, Amalgamated Transit Union Locals 1056 & 891, International Union of Operating Engineers, District Council 37, New York Metro Area Postal Union (APWU), Public Employees Federation (PEF), Communications Workers of America (CWA) Local 1180, UAW Region 9A, Fire Alarm Dispatchers Union, District Council 1707, BCTGM Local 50, Uniformed Firefighters Association (UFA), National Association of Letter Carriers: Branch 36, National Association of Social Workers, Local 2507, Uniformed EMT's and Paramedics, Local 3621, Uniformed EMS Officers Union, Local Union No. 3, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), Correction Officers’ Benevolent Association (COBA), Local 74, USWU, Teamsters National Black Caucus, New York State Chapter, Professional Staff Congress (PSC), Civil Service Employees Association (CSEA) Local 1000, Communications Workers of America (CWA) District 1, International Association of Machinists District 15, International Brotherhood of Teamsters Local 808, Local 94 of the International Union of Operating Engineers, The Associated Musicians of Greater New York Local 802 AFM, Transport Workers Union (TWU) Local 100

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Elected Officials:

President Barack Obama

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand

Senator Chuck Schumer

NY State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo

Governor David Paterson

City Council: Charles Barron, Gale Brewer, Leroy Comrie, Elizabeth Crowley, Bill de Blasio, Inez Dickens, Erik Martin Dilan, Mathieu Eugene, Julissa Ferreras, Lewis A. Fidler, Helen D. Foster, Daniel Garodnick, Vincent J. Gentile, Eric Gioia, Sara Gonzalez, Robert Jackson, Melinda Katz, Letitia James, John Liu, Melissa Mark-Vivento, Darlene Mealy, Rosie Mendez, Annabel Palma, Christine Quinn, Joel Rivera, Lawrence Seabrook, James Vacca, Albert Vann, David Weprin, Thomas White

US House of Representatives: Yvette Clarke, Joseph Crowley, Gregory Meeks, Charles B. Rangel, Jose Serrano, Kendall B. Stewart, Ed Towns, Nydia M. Velazquez, Anthony Weiner, David Yassky

State Legislature: Assembly Member Peter J. Abbate, Senator Eric Adams, Senator Joseph P. Addabbo, Assembly Member Jeffrion Aubry, Assembly Member Inez Barron, Assembly Member Michael Benedetto, Assembly Member Michael Benjamin, Assembly Member Jonathan Bing, Assembly Member William F. Boyland, Assembly Member James F. Brennan, Assembly Member Alec Brook-Krasny, Assembly Member Karim Camara, Assembly Member Vivian E. Cook, Assembly Member Marcos Crespo, Assembly Member Michael DenDekker, Senator Martin Dilan, Assembly Member Jeffery Dinowitz, Senator Thomas Duane, Assembly Member Adriano Espaillat, Assembly Member Herman Farrell, Jr., Assembly Member Michael N. Gianaris, Assembly Member Vanessa Gibson, Deborah J. Glick, Assembly Member Richard Gottfried, Senator Ruth Hassell-Thompson, Assembly Member Carl E. Heastie, Assembly Member Andrew Hevesi, Assembly Member Dov Hikind, Senator Shirley Huntley, Assembly Member Janele Hyer-Spencer, Assembly Member Hakeem Jeffries, Assembly Member Brian Kavanagh, Assembly Member Micah Kellner, Senator Jeffrey Klein, Senator Liz Krueger, Assembly Member Rory Lancman, Councilmember Jessica Lappin, Assembly Member Joseph R. Lentol, Assembly Member Alan Maisel, Assembly Member Margaret M. Markey, Assembly Member Nettie Mayersohn, Assembly Member Grace Meng, Assembly Member Joan L. Millman, Senator Velmanette Montgomery, Assembly Member Catherine T. Nolan, Assembly Member Daniel O'Donnell, Assembly Member Felix W. Ortiz, Assembly Member Jose Peralta, Senator Bill Perkins, Assembly Member Nick Perry, Assembly Member Audrey I. Pheffer, Assembly Member Adam Clayton Powell, IV, Assembly Member Peter M. Rivera, Assembly Member Naomi Rivera, Assembly Member Jose Rivera, Assembly Member Anette M. Robinson, Assembly Member Linda Rosenthal, Senator John L. Sampson, Senator Diane Savino, Assembly Member William Scarborough, Senator Eric T. Schneiderman, State Senator Jose M. Serrano, Senator Malcolm Smith, Senator Toby Ann Stavisky, Assembly Member Matthew Titone, Assembly Member Michele R. Titus, Assembly Member Darryl C. Towns, Assembly Member Helene E. Weinstein, Assembly Member Mark Weprin, Assembly Member Keith L. T. Wright

Please Vote for Bill Thompson on Tuesday!

The New York Times isn't exactly a bastion of journalism. They are corporate media shills just one step above Faux News and Lou Dobbs. So, their endorsements are not exactly representative of the interests of the majority of the people who live here.

Even worse, this paper is financially beholden to Michael Bloomberg. Some of Bloomberg's tens of millions of dollars spent to buy the election go to ads on the NY Times website. They also are desperate, since they are losing money. So, it isn't shocking that they gave middle class readers the finger by endorsing would be Mayor for Life Bloomberg.

What is surprising is the way they endorsed the Little Mayor That Couldn't. They practically drooled over the worst NYC Mayor since Jimmy Walker. Here's a paragraph so divorced from the reality we experience here in NYC that one can not help but think that writing the editorial was outsourced abroad.

NY Times 10/23/09:

What makes the mayor stand out is not his political skill, although he has come a long way since his first clumsy days in office. He has run the $60 billion government with a keen attention to accountability and efficiency. He has chosen some of the best people in the country to work for him, and he has mostly let them do their jobs. As a result, many city services operate better than they have for years. The garbage mostly disappears on time. The police and fire departments respond quickly. Mr. Bloomberg’s 311 phone line allows New Yorkers to complain to a live human being. Often, they even see tangible results.

Let's compare this to the facts:

1) Outside of Manhattan, trash delivery is still spotty. Most people in NYC don't live in Manhattan.

2) It is generally difficult to impossible to get the NYPD to file a crime report, much less solve the crime.

3) The NYPD takes forever to show up when you call them, if they show up at all.

4) 311 is a terrible mess. It's as if it is run by the Deptartment Of Wrong Answers. Even worse, city agencies won't answer their direct numbers unless you are from a wealthy interest. Instead they insist you call 311, which gives incorrect information and misdirects calls.

5) Seldom do any people who are middle class or poor see any tangible results from the city government. The rich do get tons of taxpayer money shoveled at them, though.

The article goes on to say that Blomberg's efforts to spending millions of dollars to buy the election and his refusal to tolerate dissent are "small blemishes." That speaks volumes about the corporate media's hatred and contempt for democracy and civil liberties.

Whenever anybody says the Times is a liberal newspaper, I giggle.

If you like that funky, offbeat idea called democracy, you may be looking for someone else to vote for than Bloomberg. If you want something done about the execrable morass of NYC city government, you should definitely pick someone who won't run the city like a failed bank or brokerage firm. It's time for a decent mayor and a decent human being.

It's time for Bill Thompson for Mayor.



Photo (of Bloomberg at top): Edwin Martinez1

Ever since Osama bin Warren was allowed to unconstitutionally participate in the inauguration, there has been a growing disquiet with the Obama administration and congressional Democrats in the queer community. We constantly have been told to "give him a chance" whenever we speak up. Younger queers found it bizarre that basic rights are treated as trivialities which must be set aside indefinitely. Those of us who have been around longer remember being told "give him a chance" during a previous Administration only to have Bill Clinton turn out to be viciously homophobic.

Cleve Jones and the other organizers of the National Equality March (NEM) did something about it. They organized their butts off and got hundreds of thousands of queers to protest in DC with a very small budget. The NEM put queer issues back on the national agenda after years of both parties trying to keep all of them but same sex marriage from being addressed in any way at all in Congress and the media.

The NEM pointed a big red arrow at the DC Democrats poor record on queer issues. The Obama administration, being typically contemptuous of us, decided to throw us a bone by having the President make a speech at the HRC dinner. We choked on that bone.

This is where the courageous people who picketed the HRC dinner played a huge role. Obama's speech was irritating and offensive in the absence of overdue action, yet that irritation would have remained isolated and unfocused if not for the picketers galvanizing it.

Thanks to the massive outpouring of people and energy at the NEM and the HRC dinner picketers who were speaking for the vast majority of lgbt people, the Washington Democrats realized that they actually would have to do something for us. They picked passage of hate crimes legislation because that is the queer issue that has the most overwhelming support among the general population. In the process, they passed legislation on the second most important queer issue.

The NEM and the HRC picket didn't pass the legislation by themselves. People have been working on the issue for at least three decades. What they accomplished was to give a final push to an effort that had been stalled for far too long.

Thanks again to the street activists who made this happened. If people had all just sat home and waited, we wouldn't have passed a hate crimes bill for years, if not decades.

Photo: samirluther

Pissed off at the banksters? You are far from alone.

Video of the massive crowd showing their opposition to bankster corruption in Chicago: (Hat Tip Beans, Rice, and Gold)


Showdown in Chicago is a massive mobilization against the big bankster convention being held this year in Chicago. Here is a description of the coalition behind this efforts to stand up to corrupt interests.

We are everyday people – retirees, farmers, workers, homeowners, renters, students, clergy, and small business owners from across the United States. We are coming together in Chicago because there is so much at stake and no time to waste.

It is clear that our financial system is a mess and the American people are paying the price for it. Whether it be shrinking pensions, rising foreclosures, cresting unemployment, state budget cuts, payday lending, incredulous overdraft fees, and sky-high credit card interest rates – it is clear that the lack of regulation of the financial industry is hurting us all.

America can do better. Now is the time for us to enact significant financial reform to protect consumers and strengthen the American economy. If you believe now is the time to regulate the banks in the name of protecting people, we invite you to join us in Chicago, October 25-27.

The mobilization was quite successful. Thousands of people marched today against the parasitical behavior of the unregulated banksters.

Crowd shots from this protest say a lot.


Photo: Kate Thomas / SEIU



Photo: Carrie Sloan

The banksters have such a sense of entitlement, they even think that the press is obligated to avoid serious coverage of the protests. From The Nation 10/26/09:

Day two of the Showdown in Chicago, a three-day-long protest against big banks, began a bit dismally for The Nation. An email from American Bankers Association spokesman John Hall informed us that our press credentials had been revoked. The reason? Because we'd arrived early to cover a protest outside the ABA's annual meeting at the Sheraton Hotel the night before, he told us, ABA officials believed us to be "moles for the protesters."

The sad thing is that most corporate media outlets back down to this kind of crap, especially from major advertisers like the big banks.

Photo: Steve Rhodes

The level of evil from corporate America seems limitless.

From New Times Broward-Palm Beach 10/22/09:

Christina Turner, a 45-year-old Fort Lauderdale woman, was downtown, letting men at the bar by her drinks. The next thing she remembers is waking up on a roadside with cuts and bruises that indicated she may have been raped. As a safety precaution, she visited her doctor, who prescribed a month's worth of anti-AIDS medicine. And that's about when things went from horrible to unbelievably fucked.

When Turner went to change health insurance companies a few months later, she learned she was essentially uninsurable. Turner, a former health insurance underwriter, told the Huffington Post that the AIDS meds raised too many health questions, and that even after she repeatedly explained the assault (that doesn't sound fun) insurers wouldn't sell her a policy.

The way things work right now, in a time history might well refer to as "the sick centuries," it doesn't matter if you have AIDS or not. If you've had anti-AIDS treatment, most insurance companies write you off as uncoverable. "It's basically an automatic no," one insurance agent told HP.

Sounds like: "Sorry 'bout that, friend. Hope the treatment worked out for you. Either way, get the fuck out of our office and have a nice death."

Having recently written about HMOs denying life saving HIV medications, I'm in no position to express surprise. I can definitely express horror. How can corrupt politicians like Mitch McConnell, Blanche Lincoln, John "Keating Five" McCain, Max Baucus, and Olympia Snowe sleep at night after trying to keep these evil companies in business at the expense of our healthcare, our economy, and our very humanity?

Nothing illustrates the need for real campaign finance reform than the corruption, mendacity, and insanity we have seen during the healthcare debate. Some might compare the Senate to a whorehouse, but prostitution is honest work, and prostitutes own their bodies. Senators do not own their Senate seats and have no right to put them up for sale.

The Senate Campaign by Linda McMahon, who resigned as WWE CEO to run for the Connecticutt GOP nomination has been a golden opportunity for snark, one which I have been happy to take advantage of. I'm not the only one. From Inside Wrestling Pulse 10/24/09:

It’s really funny to think about all the absurd crap that her opponents could mention. I mean, how would things go down in a debate?

“Mrs. McMahon, were you not the head of a company that at one point showed an 80 year old woman being a nymphomaniac and at one point giving birth to a hand?”

A video shows some of the wild things that have gone on in the WWE. The YouTube pages says, "This video may not be suitable for minors," which is comical since minors watched all this stuff on TV.



Here's the video of Ms. McMahon where she defends her involvement with the WWE. It's quite funny.



Ms. McMahon's political opponents will probably enjoy this staged video of her being chokeslammed and piledriven by a WWE performer.

Here's a parody video from the CT2010TV YouTube channel.



Here are some gratuitous pics of half naked WWE hunks for my gay/bi male readers. (Thumbnails link to full sized pics.)


















Photos: Linda McMahon for Senate
Big Ed's Photos
Big Ed's Photos
Pauley2483
shstrng

Billionaires for Wealthcare is at it again. They just got into a HMO/health insurer pr event and sang their little hearts out. The various Billionaires groups (e.g. "Billionaires for Bush") have been doing creative and funny street theater for years, calling attention to important public issues and entertaining people at protests. (Hat Tip Politics Plus)

 

The House and Senate have passed legislation extending federal hate crimes protection to gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, and disability. This victory on the second most important piece of lgbt civil rights legislation is very important. From the Advocate 10/22/09:

The Senate voted 68 to 29 Thursday to pass a Defense Department funding bill that includes a measure extending hate-crimes protections to people targeted on the basis of their gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, or disability.

The National Defense Authorization Act now goes to President Barack Obama’s desk for his signature.

We can not relax and assuming that President Obama will do the right thing. He has broken a wide range of promises on numerous issues including Iraq, illegal wiretapping, and restoring the rule of law. We need to keep up the pressure in order to try to make sure Obama signs the legislation.

Please Contact the White House!

The Mad Professah Lectures makes an excellent point about the legislation:

Today's 68-29 vote on the final version of the Department of Defense spending bill means that the federal hate crimes bill will become the first piece of federal legislation that includes gender identity and the first major piece of civil rights legislation on the LGBT agenda to be enacted.

The legislation had overwhelming Democratic support and heavy Republican opposition. People in the queer community might be interested in knowing that Lindsey Graham and Mitch McConnell voted against the legislation.

Russ Feingold, a Democrat, voted against it on the grounds that it was attached to legislation funding the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Some Republicans voted for it, including Ensign, McCain, Cornyn, Hutchison, Lugar, Bond, Voinovich, Snowe, and Collins. In some cases, it was difficult to know if they really supported extending hate crimes protections or if they didn't want to vote against the Defense Appropriations bill it was attached to.

Even with this victory, we must keep our eyes on the most important queer civil rights bill in Congress, ENDA. Kevin Cathcart of Lambda Legal made an excellent point in its 10/22/09 Press Release:

"Now that the Hate Crimes Act has passed adding protections for all members of our community against violence motivated by hate, Congress must also pass an inclusive ENDA to protect us against discrimination on the job. The majority of Americans support workplace protections for lesbians, gay men, bisexuals and transgender people and there is no reason for further delay," Cathcart added.

Photo: Mike_flemming

As you may know, the once trustworthy BBC has given a platform for the leader of the small, neo-Nazi organization in the UK, the "British National Party."

The BBC has a complaints form, and this is what I wrote:

Putting a Nazi like Nick Griffin on your network, giving him time to spew his filth, is a personal attack on American viewers of BBC America and people in my country who thought they could trust BBC as a news network.

Tens of thousands of Americans died in WWII defending the UK from Nazis like Nick Griffin. Putting him on your network is the moral equivalent of urinating on the graves of Americans who died fighting Hitler in WWII. You are such ingrates.

The BBC has lost a tremendous amount of credibility as a news network. You are becoming another Faux News.

When people don't do enough to combat fascist propaganda networks like Faux News, the once mainstream media start veering towards the nutty right wing too.

This demonstrates that the need for independent media gets stronger every day.

Update: Here's the relevant part of the BBC's canned reply email:

The BBC is obliged to treat all political parties registered with the Electoral Commission and operating within the law with due impartiality. There is evidence of electoral support after the British National Party won two seats in the European Elections so like any party in this position the BNP may appear on programmes like Question Time.

I wasn't dumb enough to fall for this. The Green Party of England and Wales got two seats in the same European Elections, yet they were excluded from the program with spokespeople from the political parties, including the BNP Nazis.

So much for "impartiality."

The BBC is lying through its teeth.

The banksters are going off the rails. Now that the federal treasuries of the US and other countries have saved their slimy butts, they are deciding they are entitled to get away with everything. Here are some examples:

USA Today 10/21/09:
Latest bank fee is for paying off credit card on time every month
Bank of America is leading the way on this one, charging between $25 and $99 for some customers who pay off their cards on time. Citigroup is charging people who don't use their card for a minimum amount of $2400 per year.

The banksters even have a way of retaliating if you decide to get rid of their cards: you get punished with a lower credit rating if you do it.

From the Left 10/21/09:
Credit Card Offer Comes with a 79.9% Interest Rate
This is a true story. How can the banksters get away with it? A while back, the US Supreme Court ruled that regulations on credit cards only could be applied by the banks' states, not the customers' states. The banksters responded to that ruling by moving to places like South Dakota and Deleware where they don't have any rules on maximum interest rates. Congress still hasn't passed national credit card regulations that stop these astonishing interest rates.

Guardian 10/21/09
(Hat Tip: Citizens for Legitimate Government)
Public must learn to 'tolerate the inequality' of bonuses, says Goldman Sachs vice-chairman
Here are two truly infamous paragraphs:

In remarks that will fuel the row around excessive pay, Lord Griffiths, vice-chairman of Goldman Sachs International and a former adviser to Margaret Thatcher, said banks should not be ashamed of rewarding their staff.

Speaking to an audience at St Paul's Cathedral in London about morality in the marketplace last night, Griffiths said the British public should "tolerate the inequality as a way to achieve greater prosperity for all".

Why didn't that asswipe bankster just say, "Let them eat cake"?

British banksters can be just as repugnant as ones here in the good old USA.

The Question of Nationalization

There was a time when I was strongly opposed to bank nationalization. But, we have taxpayer bailouts and exorbitant fees going towards grotesquely large and completely unearned bonuses for banksters whose base salaries are astronomically and undeservedly high. How can people can money shoveled at them for almost destroying the world economy through their greed, incompetence, and stupidity?

Is nationalization the only way to finally put a stop to all of this disgusting corruption?

Photo: wot nxt

 

If you don't want to cry about blatant political corruption, laugh about it. Zaius Nation has a fun new game (Hat Tip to Vagabond Scholar).

It doesn't fit within my Blogger template, but it's well worth checking out.

Tired of Max Baucus and other corrupt politicians playing games with your healthcare and financial livelihood? Feel like doing something about the corruption? Here's something.

Tell Sen. Majority Leader Reid Not to Let the Baucus Bill Kill the Public Option!