*Bob Dylan, The Witmark Demos.
The booklet that accompanies this new release says that it is songs like "Tomorrow is Such A Long Time", which would be sung forever. Then it says that cuts like "Talkin' John Birch Paranoid Blues" would only be remembered by people who lived through the 1960s. This would be true except that in the year 2010, 48 years since Bob Dylan cut his first tunes, we now have John Birchers running for office.
A personal note: Listening to the Witmark demos, I was reading Our Kind of Traitor by John Le Carre or David Cornwall in real life. I was struck that I started listening to Bob Dylan and reading John le Carre in the same year. I have downstairs in my house my Doubleday book of the Month club edition of Spy Who Came in From the Cold, which I got when it first came out. That's almost 50 years of loyal reading. I'm waiting for the music and publishing industry to finally recognize me. Oh and yes, John le Carre doesn't disappoint. But he seldom does.
This morning's electoral-vote. com estimates have 206 Democrats and 201 Republicans in the House and the rest tied. Unbeknownst to the average political junkie, of the remaining tied races we do not have any polling data on 24 of them. So we're running blind at this point.
There is more nonsense appearing everyday. Politico said that early voting in Nevada give Democrats reason for concern. But veteran report John Ralston in the Las Vegas Sun reported that Democrats are outvoting Republicans in the early voting. But he does write that the vote tallies are looking like your average mid-term elections. Throughout the Midwest, Democratic voters are the sizeable number of the early voters since this is part of the Democratic GOTV strategy. In Texas, the Democratic Party has filed charges against the loc al Teabaggers, who have been harassing minorities at the polling places and tryingto instruct them how to vote. This apparently will be the strategy all through the election to keep the minority vote suppressed.
This should not come as a surprise since the NAACP released their report today on "Tea Party Nationalism", a joint project with the Institute for Research and Education on Human Rights. The report documented the on-going ties between hate groups and the movement. The report documents the specific ties of Tea Party members with these groups and shows that Tea Party Patriots and ResistNet are the two largest growing parties of the movement. Naturally, the Tea Party Express denounced the NAACP as smearing the group and working for the "liberal Democratic agenda."
Unfortunately, we have crossed the Rubican on these matters. It simply doesn't phase any of these people the they may be in bed with anti-semites, white supremacists or racists. Even if they are, they deny it. But the subterranean connections between the more unsavory groups should worry people. You see them pop up all over the place. Joe Miller's security contigent has relationships with militia groups who were involved with the Oklahoma City Bombings. And with the anti-Obama hatred whipped up by these people, anything will happen.
If you needed to connect the dots between racism, nationalism and the corporate world, look no further than Think Progress' piece this morning by Lee Fang on the leaked memo concerning the secret June meeting of the Koch Brothers, the Chamber of Commerce, Glenn Beck and the corporate special interests to develop the strategy for the 2010 elections. And special guests at this meeting were Fat Tony Scalia and Clarence Thomas, last known to be sitting justices on the Supreme Court. If Ruth Bader Ginsberg went to a left-wing strategy session, the Fox News noise machine would be demanding her death. Here, two justices are sitting in on strategy meetings concerned with implementing the Citizens United decision.
And yes, they plan to meet at Rio Rancho in January to discuss their strategy for the 2012 elections. I hope you will be there.
Counterpunch has an article linking the Koch Brothers to Americans for Prosperity as well as many of the astroturf organizations fighting the Cap and Trade law, climate change and other strange corporate agenda items.
If you put this all together, you have the makings of a genuine American fascist movement. The difference between the businessmen's plot to topple FDR and these guys is that the businessmen of the 1930s were only interested in stopping the New Deal. These modern guys have brought with them an ideology and they have married their corporate interests to the radical fringes in our society. It's strange to see something like the World Capitalist Conspiracy, which manipulates the nationals with their own brand of xenophobia. This could be a new unique ideology.
The real job of Americans over the next few years is to fight this new coalition and thwart their ambitions.
The revelations today by Think Progress and earlier this week by the New York Times are not linked to the espionage scandal that will hit conservatives.
Showing posts with label NAACP. Show all posts
Showing posts with label NAACP. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Disaster Alert--Obama is on Vacation
No sooner does President Obama start for the doors and the Beltway has a 3.6 earthquake. Summer and Obama vacations almost always spell disaster. Remember last August and the tea party eruptions? Just have to keep your fingers crossed. Of course, the GOP has blasted the First Family for leaving town since there is a crisis with the BP oil spill in the Gulf. And even more damaging are the Drudge reports that Obama has played Golf ten times, while Rome burns.
But even Politico finally fessed up that Tan Man Boehner has played Golf 199 times just this year. I guess now we know why he's tan. Democrats are seizing on this to mount a billboard in his district highlighting this fact. Can you imagine the legislative schedule if the Republicans actually won back the House? The champion vacation taker is George W. Bush, who spent three whole years of his eight years in office either at his ranch or at Camp David.
The Tan Man was in fine form this past week after Wall Street Reform finally passed--with all of 3 Republican votes. Conferring with K Street lobbyists, Boehner emerged to a press conference to advocate a one-year mortatorium on all federal regulations. Can you imagine how paralyzed the government would be?Mitch McConnell is saying that Republicans really shouldn't spell out their agenda because as Republican Congressman King from New York proclaimed the media would just pick it apart. Republicans held a video conference to gather ideas from regular people--the Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers, and the Home Builders of America--just folks. Mark Pence of Indiana appeared on Fox to defend Senator Kyle's statement that we must renew the tax cuts for the rich and that extended unemployment benefits were too costly. Pence used the old canned conservative argument that tax cuts for the rich generated more government revenues. Unfortunately, for him, the record has now been documented by OMB and other institutions that they massively increased the national debt. It was alright to advocate them with pie-in-the-sky projections when no one knew but now the verdict is in.
The Republicans are handing Democrats issues if they know what to do with them. An MSNBC poll of the public revealed that in every sector of the economy Americans overwhelmingly wanted more, not less regulation. As for the great social security cutters, Time magazine asked," If Congress and the President had to reduce spending, in which areas would you want tthem to cut?" 55%--wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. 46%--other defense spending. 34%--unemployment compensation. 20%--Medicaid. 17%--education. 16%-Medicare. 12%--Social Security. Any bets whether the military/terrorist complex is included in the Cat Food Commission findings this December?
Apparently, Americans have not gone crazy despite the 24/7 right-wing echo chamber. Even more surprising is that Texas really hasn't gone nuts either. The Texas Freedom Network Education Fund released its survey conducted by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research. The survey wanted to gauge public opinion on the intersection of politics and religion with the public schools. Coming after the Texas School Board's total revision of American history, this only seems appropriate. Are people in Texas so crazyas to agree to purge Thomas Jefferson from history and substitute John Calvin? Well, I guess not.
72% of likely Texas voters want teachers and scholars, not politicians to be responsible for writing curriculum requirements for public schools.
84% of Democrats, 63% of Republicans and 76% of Independents through all major urban areas want experts in charge of writing curriculum standards.
68% said that the separation of church and state is a key constitutional principle but 49% said that religions should have some influence in public schools.
But this finding doesn't mean that Texans want to sign on to the religious culture wars.
80% of likely Texas voters agree that high school classes on sex education should teach about" contraceptions,such as condoms and other birth control, along with abstinence."
88% think public schools should be required "to protect all children from bullying, harassment and discrimination in school, including the children of gay and lesbian parents or teenagers who are gay".
55% of likely Texas voters oppose using publicly funded vouchers that allow some students to attend private and religious schools.
As I've previously noted, something seems to be happening in the Texas governor race. Democrat Bill White has outraised GOP's Rick Perry and with Linda Chavez-Thompson as his Lt.Gov he has a good chance to swing the Latino vote. Locals polls show post the Arizona Immigration Law that Latinos has shifted dramatically to White.
Meg Whitman has tried to become Latino friendly in her race against Jerry Brown, even though her primary campaign ran ads for more restrictive immigration laws. But you wonder why someone would spend $100 million of her own money and counting to win any office. Meg has a keen sense of business. Her core campaign idea is to eliminate the California Income Tax. Pretty nifty. So she recoups her campiagn expenditures if she wins by eliminating the tax of her income. This is populism at work.
Meanwhile in Arizona, our experiment in ethnic cleansing continues. It seems Arizonans are not dying at a high rate, it's the illegals coming across the border. Death rates are reaching historical proportions. But the great news is that militiamen led by a real neo-Nazi are patrolling the border. The federal government claims they haven't broken any laws---yet.
The NAACP passed a rather tame resolution calling on the Tea Party gang to denounce those in their ranks who are racist. Naturally, they were attacked as racist by Sarah Palin and the tea party spokespeople. Those Obama as Hitler signs were plants from the "Crash the Tea Party" group, who are also alleged to be responsible for the group's bad spelling. However, Mark Williams on the Tea Party Express was demoted for posting a racist parody of blacks rejecting the Emancipation Proclamation on the group's website. This was on the day he appeared on Fox to call the NAACP racist.
the Tea Party Folks who posted a billboard in the small Iowa town that served as River City in the Music Man have pulled it down for fear of reprisals. It likened President Obama to Hitler and Lenin.
The anti-gay marriage group, NOM has started their summer tour of the states to rev up support for marriage. In Maine they drew 50 people, in Massachusetts another 50 and in Albany, New York a record 100. It's not going so well.
The great New Panther Party Voter intimidation pseudo-scandal, which has received round the clock coverage by Fox, was dealt a blow. The U.S. Civil Rights Commission, which is now rigged with conservatives, wants to study the "case" with an aim at attacking the Department of Justice. The case has one major flaw. There is no one claiming they were intimidated by the New Black Panthers at the polls. In fact, DOJ did prosecute one New Black Panther but on other grounds. Well, Abigail Thernstrom, a Bush appointee to the Commission, slammed her fellow conservatives as trying to use this case to "topple Eric Holder and President Obama if possible." She went on to say there was no merit to the accusations at all. The idea is to run this as the Willie Horton ad for 2012.
What's amusing in all this is that the man allowing this to become a Fox News special feature is Roger Ailes. Only this week Glenn Beck called Roger Ailes a "hero of the civil rights movement". The sublime reason for this is that Roger Ailes booked Martin Luther King, jr. on the old Mike Douglas show. Other than that Ailes was a prominent figure in devising Richard Nixon's southern strategy, which oozed racism.
Speaking of Glenn Beck, who is morphing more frequently than John McCain, the great showman said that Jesus Christ conquered death and did not return with his resurrection to seek revenge on the Jews who killed him. Spoken like a real Mormon. Beck's theology doesn't come from Mel Gibson's pre-Vatican II Catholicism but an old strain of American evangelical thought that Jesus is really of the Nordic race. There was a school of thought still lingering on the mudflats that Jesus simply couldn't be Jewish and, according to American racial theories, he exhibited characteristics of the Nordic race. This reached it's high-tide in the early 1930s. It is embarrassing that a leader of the American evangelical movement Rev. Buchen embraced Hitler and advocated the world be run by global fascism. Beck's own Mormonism was actually encouraged in Hitler's Germany, when Jews were being exterminated and the Christian churches were shut down or silenced.
I have to channel some of this insanity. Since this stuff is so repulsive, I'm switching to our Chamber of Commerce, which despite its claims of representing small business advocates the policy positions of our top 19 corporations. Progressives immediately took the bait about the Chamber's new call to cut social security spending and no regulations. But they missed the visionary aspects of the new platform. The Chamber has publically called for the privatization of our highways , waterways and opening public lands to more timber cutting. This comes at a time when free-market Hong Kong has just adopted its first minimum wage bill. The Chamber has gone back to the late 19th century for its motivation.
I am reviving my paper organization--The Newark Whaling,Sealing and Holding Company. This company estabished in 1833 at the height of our dependence on whale oil had one ship and managed in its short history to capture one whale off the coast of Valapraiso, Chile. it wasgiven the whaling rights off the New Jersey coast but it's ship sank and the original company was financially ruined. I've decided to revive it again to launch a new career in the privatizing of our waterways. I first thought I would aim at the Los Angeles River, now paved with concrete, but instead decided to privatize the Delaware River in keeping with the company's state of origin. With a Republican governor in New Jersey and a likely one in Pennsylvania this year , the political climate in these two states lends itself to privatizing the river border between the two states. And in keeping with the Tea Party spirit, I will stand on the bow of a rowboat and wade ashore in Trenton in honor of George Washington. Hopefully, I can receive a government loan to finance this endeavor.
If that doesn't work, I seek political asylum with the Six Nations in upstate New York. The Haudenosaunee lacrosse team was denied entrance into the UK for a lacrosse tournament because they were travelling on Iroquois Nation passports. Hillary Clinton had to intervene to OK them leaving the states on the passports but British authorities denied them admission because after all they actually invented lacrosse. Also, they invented federalism and had a great influence on Benjamin Franklin and his attitudes on federalism. And also, they built the Brooklyn Bridge. But no dice. They couldn't play but they looked great in their jerseys and long hair. They shouldn't feel bad. Lacrosse great Oren Lyons, one of their spiritual leaders and advocate for Indian rights, was deprived for decades a place in our own Lacrosse Hall of Fame, which had been exclusively for white players. Finally, they had to let him in because they were ashamed that the Hall would not include one of the greatest players of all time and someone from the people who invented the sport.
Zbig says that we are all suffering from an Obama malaise--and he should know about malaises since the Carter days. Bloomberg's poll reports that Obama is crashing wildly--at 52% approval rate; Gallup has been the same for about six months; and other polls show a 9 month plateau.
Charles Krauthammer warns conservatives they are seriously underestimating Obama. Charles, I thought you said he was the next Carter.
Anyway, Mr. Godwin will be sworn in to replace Harry Byrd on Tuesday and an hour later Harry Reid plans to call another vote on extending unemployment insurance. And we will see. Elena Kagan , Gallup tells us, has the lowest approval rate of someone about to be approved since they have been polling this odd question. Jefferson Beauregard Sessions claims that he may filibuster. This would then put Elena Kagan in the elite company with Abe Fortas, the only other Supreme Court nominee every filibustered, in the history of the United States. I doubt whether it will happen.
But that's the type of thing that happens when Obama goes on vacation. Phew, I noticed his plan has left Bar Harbor. Maybe we have averted a national disaster.
But even Politico finally fessed up that Tan Man Boehner has played Golf 199 times just this year. I guess now we know why he's tan. Democrats are seizing on this to mount a billboard in his district highlighting this fact. Can you imagine the legislative schedule if the Republicans actually won back the House? The champion vacation taker is George W. Bush, who spent three whole years of his eight years in office either at his ranch or at Camp David.
The Tan Man was in fine form this past week after Wall Street Reform finally passed--with all of 3 Republican votes. Conferring with K Street lobbyists, Boehner emerged to a press conference to advocate a one-year mortatorium on all federal regulations. Can you imagine how paralyzed the government would be?Mitch McConnell is saying that Republicans really shouldn't spell out their agenda because as Republican Congressman King from New York proclaimed the media would just pick it apart. Republicans held a video conference to gather ideas from regular people--the Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers, and the Home Builders of America--just folks. Mark Pence of Indiana appeared on Fox to defend Senator Kyle's statement that we must renew the tax cuts for the rich and that extended unemployment benefits were too costly. Pence used the old canned conservative argument that tax cuts for the rich generated more government revenues. Unfortunately, for him, the record has now been documented by OMB and other institutions that they massively increased the national debt. It was alright to advocate them with pie-in-the-sky projections when no one knew but now the verdict is in.
The Republicans are handing Democrats issues if they know what to do with them. An MSNBC poll of the public revealed that in every sector of the economy Americans overwhelmingly wanted more, not less regulation. As for the great social security cutters, Time magazine asked," If Congress and the President had to reduce spending, in which areas would you want tthem to cut?" 55%--wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. 46%--other defense spending. 34%--unemployment compensation. 20%--Medicaid. 17%--education. 16%-Medicare. 12%--Social Security. Any bets whether the military/terrorist complex is included in the Cat Food Commission findings this December?
Apparently, Americans have not gone crazy despite the 24/7 right-wing echo chamber. Even more surprising is that Texas really hasn't gone nuts either. The Texas Freedom Network Education Fund released its survey conducted by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research. The survey wanted to gauge public opinion on the intersection of politics and religion with the public schools. Coming after the Texas School Board's total revision of American history, this only seems appropriate. Are people in Texas so crazyas to agree to purge Thomas Jefferson from history and substitute John Calvin? Well, I guess not.
72% of likely Texas voters want teachers and scholars, not politicians to be responsible for writing curriculum requirements for public schools.
84% of Democrats, 63% of Republicans and 76% of Independents through all major urban areas want experts in charge of writing curriculum standards.
68% said that the separation of church and state is a key constitutional principle but 49% said that religions should have some influence in public schools.
But this finding doesn't mean that Texans want to sign on to the religious culture wars.
80% of likely Texas voters agree that high school classes on sex education should teach about" contraceptions,such as condoms and other birth control, along with abstinence."
88% think public schools should be required "to protect all children from bullying, harassment and discrimination in school, including the children of gay and lesbian parents or teenagers who are gay".
55% of likely Texas voters oppose using publicly funded vouchers that allow some students to attend private and religious schools.
As I've previously noted, something seems to be happening in the Texas governor race. Democrat Bill White has outraised GOP's Rick Perry and with Linda Chavez-Thompson as his Lt.Gov he has a good chance to swing the Latino vote. Locals polls show post the Arizona Immigration Law that Latinos has shifted dramatically to White.
Meg Whitman has tried to become Latino friendly in her race against Jerry Brown, even though her primary campaign ran ads for more restrictive immigration laws. But you wonder why someone would spend $100 million of her own money and counting to win any office. Meg has a keen sense of business. Her core campaign idea is to eliminate the California Income Tax. Pretty nifty. So she recoups her campiagn expenditures if she wins by eliminating the tax of her income. This is populism at work.
Meanwhile in Arizona, our experiment in ethnic cleansing continues. It seems Arizonans are not dying at a high rate, it's the illegals coming across the border. Death rates are reaching historical proportions. But the great news is that militiamen led by a real neo-Nazi are patrolling the border. The federal government claims they haven't broken any laws---yet.
The NAACP passed a rather tame resolution calling on the Tea Party gang to denounce those in their ranks who are racist. Naturally, they were attacked as racist by Sarah Palin and the tea party spokespeople. Those Obama as Hitler signs were plants from the "Crash the Tea Party" group, who are also alleged to be responsible for the group's bad spelling. However, Mark Williams on the Tea Party Express was demoted for posting a racist parody of blacks rejecting the Emancipation Proclamation on the group's website. This was on the day he appeared on Fox to call the NAACP racist.
the Tea Party Folks who posted a billboard in the small Iowa town that served as River City in the Music Man have pulled it down for fear of reprisals. It likened President Obama to Hitler and Lenin.
The anti-gay marriage group, NOM has started their summer tour of the states to rev up support for marriage. In Maine they drew 50 people, in Massachusetts another 50 and in Albany, New York a record 100. It's not going so well.
The great New Panther Party Voter intimidation pseudo-scandal, which has received round the clock coverage by Fox, was dealt a blow. The U.S. Civil Rights Commission, which is now rigged with conservatives, wants to study the "case" with an aim at attacking the Department of Justice. The case has one major flaw. There is no one claiming they were intimidated by the New Black Panthers at the polls. In fact, DOJ did prosecute one New Black Panther but on other grounds. Well, Abigail Thernstrom, a Bush appointee to the Commission, slammed her fellow conservatives as trying to use this case to "topple Eric Holder and President Obama if possible." She went on to say there was no merit to the accusations at all. The idea is to run this as the Willie Horton ad for 2012.
What's amusing in all this is that the man allowing this to become a Fox News special feature is Roger Ailes. Only this week Glenn Beck called Roger Ailes a "hero of the civil rights movement". The sublime reason for this is that Roger Ailes booked Martin Luther King, jr. on the old Mike Douglas show. Other than that Ailes was a prominent figure in devising Richard Nixon's southern strategy, which oozed racism.
Speaking of Glenn Beck, who is morphing more frequently than John McCain, the great showman said that Jesus Christ conquered death and did not return with his resurrection to seek revenge on the Jews who killed him. Spoken like a real Mormon. Beck's theology doesn't come from Mel Gibson's pre-Vatican II Catholicism but an old strain of American evangelical thought that Jesus is really of the Nordic race. There was a school of thought still lingering on the mudflats that Jesus simply couldn't be Jewish and, according to American racial theories, he exhibited characteristics of the Nordic race. This reached it's high-tide in the early 1930s. It is embarrassing that a leader of the American evangelical movement Rev. Buchen embraced Hitler and advocated the world be run by global fascism. Beck's own Mormonism was actually encouraged in Hitler's Germany, when Jews were being exterminated and the Christian churches were shut down or silenced.
I have to channel some of this insanity. Since this stuff is so repulsive, I'm switching to our Chamber of Commerce, which despite its claims of representing small business advocates the policy positions of our top 19 corporations. Progressives immediately took the bait about the Chamber's new call to cut social security spending and no regulations. But they missed the visionary aspects of the new platform. The Chamber has publically called for the privatization of our highways , waterways and opening public lands to more timber cutting. This comes at a time when free-market Hong Kong has just adopted its first minimum wage bill. The Chamber has gone back to the late 19th century for its motivation.
I am reviving my paper organization--The Newark Whaling,Sealing and Holding Company. This company estabished in 1833 at the height of our dependence on whale oil had one ship and managed in its short history to capture one whale off the coast of Valapraiso, Chile. it wasgiven the whaling rights off the New Jersey coast but it's ship sank and the original company was financially ruined. I've decided to revive it again to launch a new career in the privatizing of our waterways. I first thought I would aim at the Los Angeles River, now paved with concrete, but instead decided to privatize the Delaware River in keeping with the company's state of origin. With a Republican governor in New Jersey and a likely one in Pennsylvania this year , the political climate in these two states lends itself to privatizing the river border between the two states. And in keeping with the Tea Party spirit, I will stand on the bow of a rowboat and wade ashore in Trenton in honor of George Washington. Hopefully, I can receive a government loan to finance this endeavor.
If that doesn't work, I seek political asylum with the Six Nations in upstate New York. The Haudenosaunee lacrosse team was denied entrance into the UK for a lacrosse tournament because they were travelling on Iroquois Nation passports. Hillary Clinton had to intervene to OK them leaving the states on the passports but British authorities denied them admission because after all they actually invented lacrosse. Also, they invented federalism and had a great influence on Benjamin Franklin and his attitudes on federalism. And also, they built the Brooklyn Bridge. But no dice. They couldn't play but they looked great in their jerseys and long hair. They shouldn't feel bad. Lacrosse great Oren Lyons, one of their spiritual leaders and advocate for Indian rights, was deprived for decades a place in our own Lacrosse Hall of Fame, which had been exclusively for white players. Finally, they had to let him in because they were ashamed that the Hall would not include one of the greatest players of all time and someone from the people who invented the sport.
Zbig says that we are all suffering from an Obama malaise--and he should know about malaises since the Carter days. Bloomberg's poll reports that Obama is crashing wildly--at 52% approval rate; Gallup has been the same for about six months; and other polls show a 9 month plateau.
Charles Krauthammer warns conservatives they are seriously underestimating Obama. Charles, I thought you said he was the next Carter.
Anyway, Mr. Godwin will be sworn in to replace Harry Byrd on Tuesday and an hour later Harry Reid plans to call another vote on extending unemployment insurance. And we will see. Elena Kagan , Gallup tells us, has the lowest approval rate of someone about to be approved since they have been polling this odd question. Jefferson Beauregard Sessions claims that he may filibuster. This would then put Elena Kagan in the elite company with Abe Fortas, the only other Supreme Court nominee every filibustered, in the history of the United States. I doubt whether it will happen.
But that's the type of thing that happens when Obama goes on vacation. Phew, I noticed his plan has left Bar Harbor. Maybe we have averted a national disaster.
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Happy Bastille Day
Bruce Fein, the former Solicitor General under Reagan and constitutional scholar, appeared this morning on NPR to discuss his new book American Empire Before The Fall. He decried the massive expansion of presidential power and the fact that the use of military forces abroad no longer requires congressional approval. He pointed to the recent confirmation of General Petraeus, noting that no Senator asked him why we were in Afghanistan and when we were coming home. He quoted the Founding Fathers' about the dangers of perpetual war. On the show as a Georgetown University professor who claimed that the real dangers facing our constitutional order occurred under George W. Bush and that Fein was reacting to the election of President Obama. That's not fair to Fein, who testified before Kucinich's committee urging the impeachment of George W. Bush on the abuse of power. David Frum also appeared and made very rational arguments about why the United States really can't be called an Empire and insisted that the ppowers of the presidency are nothing like they were during the Cold War. David's arguments really need research because he argued that Cold War Presidents could wire-tap anyone without a court order and had almost total power when it came to war. He says that only with George W and Obama have the powers of the presidency come back close to their Cold War situation. Fein countered that the rule of law was being subverted by the powers being acquired by the post-2001 presidency and the insistence we are at war against a tactic--terrorism--than any nation-state. Therefore, since there is no standards for victory, we are committed to a perpetual war and even American citizens are targeted for assassination by the President without due process. He was referring to the American Muslim in Yemen.
In the afternoon, I moderated a panel on encouraging democratic change in Iran. Some of the discussion raised issues I posted before concerning pro-democracy programs. Members of Congress spoke about the need for Americans to speak out on human rights issues in Iran and to express solidarity with Iranians trying to change the nature of the government. One member recalled the efforts of the United States to support democratic change within the East Bloc and the Soviet Union. What struck me about the remarks was how ad-lib the efforts were to encourage democratic change then. Organizations used the kitchen sink approach with considerably less money than allocated to democracy assistance programs today and the local groups and civil society organizations controlled their own agenda when receiving this assistance. In other words, they owned the process more than emerging democrats do in the many efforts made over the last 10 years. The general conclusion was that negotiation, engagement are not incompatible with efforts to support Iranian democrats within the country.
The best moment for me was introducing civil rights legend John Lewis, who gave a rousing speech for human rights activism and the need for solidarity with all those oppressed in the world today. Lewis recited the various beatings and jailings he endured during our civil rights movement and urged the audience, "Never Give Up! Never Give Up!"
On that note, there is one positive development on our political landscape--the creation of the coalition of 175 groups under the umbrella name of "One Nation". After several months of internal negotiations, trade unions, civil rights groups, Hispanic advocacy organizations and other progressive movements finally recognized that there was too much at stake in this year's elections and beyond to allow the teahadists to dominate the discussion. Whether they can make the difference this year remains to be seen. But what makes them distinct from the teahadists, the coalition represents organizations and groups with vast grass-roots and community constituencies. It is the progressive answer to Obama's Coalition for America, which also has re-invented itself for the struggle in November. This is the way politics has to be done if one's ideas are going to succeed.
The NAACP passed a resolution asking that the teahadists remove the racists from their midst. You'll recall the teabaggers spitting at John Lewis and calling him racial epithets during the healthcare debate. The racist undertone of the tea party rallies has been obvious to any sane observer. What the NAACP asked is what any organization does--expel and denounce the extremists. This happened when the Republican Party was forced to denounce David Duke when he re-invented himself from Klansman and white supremacist to a conservative Republican. It also happened when yesteryear's conservatives booted out the John Birch Society from iits midst. But the NAACP resolution was met by Sarah Palin demanding an apology to the tea party. Right Wing radio has been non-stop racist rants from just prior to the election of Barack Obama and even yesterday Rush Limbaugh denounced the late George Steinbrenner for making African Americans millionaires. Apparently, it's now OK to be a racist.
Bruce Fein said something this morning that even if a majority voted away due process, that doesn't make it right. The Founding Fathers were deeply concerned about the majority oppression of the minority.
Meanwhile Senate Republicans continue to play little games with the Kagan nomination to the Supreme Court. Now they want her to pledge to recuse herself from any case having to do with the healthcare bill. Maybe Clarence Thomas should recuse himself because his wife runs a teabagger foundation with two large donors footing the bill.
A CBS poll says that only 13% of Americans believe Obama's policies have done anything for them. I am one of them. I got a tax cut this year--most who received a tax cut claim their taxes increased. Through streamling the FACSA process for applying for college aid, I got grants and loans equivalent of 20% of my son's education. With the Credit Card reform bill, my credit cards no longer have been jacking up my percentages as they did almost every month in 2008 and now they have to send me a bill giving me about 3 weeks to pay, instead of the 2 weeks of 2008 and 2009. This helps cash flow. I could refinance my house at rock bottom interest rates. The lost equity in my house has come back by 2/3rds. Under healthcare, I can cover my son until he is 26. If the full healthcare bill is implemented, I can't be denied coverage for pre-existing conditions and I will not go bankrupt if I have any serious illness. And, for my personal enjoyment, President Obama made the largest government grant for scientific research and development in the history of the world. So, thank you President Obama!
Another poll came out today that shows that the top priorities of the American People are 20% the economy, 20% jobs and only 5% the deficit. American people support tax hikes on the rich, and adopting the McColm plan of raising the cap on social security taxes. From the pundits and the media, you would think Americans are obsessively concerned about the deficit and the national debt.
A University of Michigan study just came out that showed that it really doesn't matter what the facts are--people will continue to believe what they want to believe. One example used was a question asked of Americans after Reagan severely cut the inflation of the Carter years. People were asked whether inflation has gone down or risen. The supermajority believed it had risen, despite this being one of the headline issues of the day. The Michigan study also showed that people who are shown to be wrong factually will double down on their original beliefs. So much for honest debate.
And with that we leave you with Mitch McConnell's insistance that tax cuts to the rich brought in vast government revenues during the Bush years. Ezra Klein debunked this myth as has the OMB. Challenged with the OMB findings, McConnell insisted on his original statement. Michigan researchers were right.
In the afternoon, I moderated a panel on encouraging democratic change in Iran. Some of the discussion raised issues I posted before concerning pro-democracy programs. Members of Congress spoke about the need for Americans to speak out on human rights issues in Iran and to express solidarity with Iranians trying to change the nature of the government. One member recalled the efforts of the United States to support democratic change within the East Bloc and the Soviet Union. What struck me about the remarks was how ad-lib the efforts were to encourage democratic change then. Organizations used the kitchen sink approach with considerably less money than allocated to democracy assistance programs today and the local groups and civil society organizations controlled their own agenda when receiving this assistance. In other words, they owned the process more than emerging democrats do in the many efforts made over the last 10 years. The general conclusion was that negotiation, engagement are not incompatible with efforts to support Iranian democrats within the country.
The best moment for me was introducing civil rights legend John Lewis, who gave a rousing speech for human rights activism and the need for solidarity with all those oppressed in the world today. Lewis recited the various beatings and jailings he endured during our civil rights movement and urged the audience, "Never Give Up! Never Give Up!"
On that note, there is one positive development on our political landscape--the creation of the coalition of 175 groups under the umbrella name of "One Nation". After several months of internal negotiations, trade unions, civil rights groups, Hispanic advocacy organizations and other progressive movements finally recognized that there was too much at stake in this year's elections and beyond to allow the teahadists to dominate the discussion. Whether they can make the difference this year remains to be seen. But what makes them distinct from the teahadists, the coalition represents organizations and groups with vast grass-roots and community constituencies. It is the progressive answer to Obama's Coalition for America, which also has re-invented itself for the struggle in November. This is the way politics has to be done if one's ideas are going to succeed.
The NAACP passed a resolution asking that the teahadists remove the racists from their midst. You'll recall the teabaggers spitting at John Lewis and calling him racial epithets during the healthcare debate. The racist undertone of the tea party rallies has been obvious to any sane observer. What the NAACP asked is what any organization does--expel and denounce the extremists. This happened when the Republican Party was forced to denounce David Duke when he re-invented himself from Klansman and white supremacist to a conservative Republican. It also happened when yesteryear's conservatives booted out the John Birch Society from iits midst. But the NAACP resolution was met by Sarah Palin demanding an apology to the tea party. Right Wing radio has been non-stop racist rants from just prior to the election of Barack Obama and even yesterday Rush Limbaugh denounced the late George Steinbrenner for making African Americans millionaires. Apparently, it's now OK to be a racist.
Bruce Fein said something this morning that even if a majority voted away due process, that doesn't make it right. The Founding Fathers were deeply concerned about the majority oppression of the minority.
Meanwhile Senate Republicans continue to play little games with the Kagan nomination to the Supreme Court. Now they want her to pledge to recuse herself from any case having to do with the healthcare bill. Maybe Clarence Thomas should recuse himself because his wife runs a teabagger foundation with two large donors footing the bill.
A CBS poll says that only 13% of Americans believe Obama's policies have done anything for them. I am one of them. I got a tax cut this year--most who received a tax cut claim their taxes increased. Through streamling the FACSA process for applying for college aid, I got grants and loans equivalent of 20% of my son's education. With the Credit Card reform bill, my credit cards no longer have been jacking up my percentages as they did almost every month in 2008 and now they have to send me a bill giving me about 3 weeks to pay, instead of the 2 weeks of 2008 and 2009. This helps cash flow. I could refinance my house at rock bottom interest rates. The lost equity in my house has come back by 2/3rds. Under healthcare, I can cover my son until he is 26. If the full healthcare bill is implemented, I can't be denied coverage for pre-existing conditions and I will not go bankrupt if I have any serious illness. And, for my personal enjoyment, President Obama made the largest government grant for scientific research and development in the history of the world. So, thank you President Obama!
Another poll came out today that shows that the top priorities of the American People are 20% the economy, 20% jobs and only 5% the deficit. American people support tax hikes on the rich, and adopting the McColm plan of raising the cap on social security taxes. From the pundits and the media, you would think Americans are obsessively concerned about the deficit and the national debt.
A University of Michigan study just came out that showed that it really doesn't matter what the facts are--people will continue to believe what they want to believe. One example used was a question asked of Americans after Reagan severely cut the inflation of the Carter years. People were asked whether inflation has gone down or risen. The supermajority believed it had risen, despite this being one of the headline issues of the day. The Michigan study also showed that people who are shown to be wrong factually will double down on their original beliefs. So much for honest debate.
And with that we leave you with Mitch McConnell's insistance that tax cuts to the rich brought in vast government revenues during the Bush years. Ezra Klein debunked this myth as has the OMB. Challenged with the OMB findings, McConnell insisted on his original statement. Michigan researchers were right.
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