GOP - still "the Party of No"

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At yesterday's RNC meeting:

"We are going to take this president on with class. We are going to take this president on with dignity," Steele said. "This will be a very sharp and marked contrast to the shabby and classless way that the Democrats and the far left spoke of President Bush."

...

... After Republican state party chairmen meet Tuesday and Wednesday, the full RNC will attempt to convene Wednesday for a special meeting aimed at passing new
resolutions, including one asking Democrats to rename their party the "Democrat-Socialist Party."

Today the AP reports that:

Jeff Kent, a Washington state Republican, has spearheaded the effort to rebrand
the Democratic Party as "Socialist Democrat," combining a label associated with
governments of U.S. rivals such as Venezuela with a term some Republicans use to
ridicule Democrats.

Some party leaders described the resolution as "stupid" and "absurd," and have pushed to avoid a public flap by compromising with milder language that would simply criticize Democrats for what they call socialist tendencies.

So, the dead-ender Republicans are going to compromise and go foward by not doing anything differently. They'll keep right on refering to Democrats as socialists. And, according to RNC Chair Steel, they're no longer going to apologize for the things they've never apologized for.

Apparently, the Republicans plan is to change by not doing anything differently.
So, it's not surprising that:

Yesterday, Gallup released a study comparing the change in Republican party ID
among voters (those who who identify or lean GOP) from 2001 to 2009. Gallup
found that the party has lost support in 25 of 26 demographic categories (e.g.,
race, sex, geography, education, income and so on — see the graphic below) in
the last eight years.

more freedom is on the march.....

Chris Hedges, with the help of Dr. Juliette Fournot, does a nice job of asking the question.
who have we become??
as i continue to see the evidence of our national disorder expressing itself in the world, i become more and more dismayed. and i look around as americans, for the most part, continue on with life as usual. as we deplete the resources of planet earth, consuming and discarding like there is no tomorrow, we insure a bleak future, at best, for those who come after. and in the meantime humans are used as the pawns for the enrichment of the men in the shadows who are directing and profiting from the war machine nightmare.

what are we doing in other people's countries?? will we continue to go down this path???

wake up america!

Becoming What We Seek to Destroy

..........The U.S. fuels the bonfires of war. The more troops we send to Afghanistan, the more drones we send on bombing runs over Pakistan, the more airstrikes we carry out, the worse the unraveling will become. We have killed twice as many civilians as the Taliban this year and that number is sure to rise in the coming months.

"I find this term 'collateral damage' dehumanizing," Dr. Fournot said, "as if it is a necessity. People are sacrificed on the altar of an idea. Air power is blind. I know this from having been caught in numerous bombings.

"We are faced with two stark choices. We can withdraw and open negotiations with the Taliban or continue to expand the war until we are driven out. The corrupt and unpopular regimes of Hamid Karzai in Afghanistan and Asif Ali Zardari are impotent allies. The longer they remain tethered to the United States, the weaker they become. And the weaker they become, the louder become the calls for intervention in Pakistan. During the war in Vietnam, we invaded Cambodia to bring stability to the region and cut off rebel sanctuaries and supply routes. This tactic only empowered the Khmer Rouge. We seem poised, in much the same way, to do the same for radical Islamists in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

"If the Americans step up the war in Afghanistan, they will be sucked into Pakistan," Dr. Fournot warned. "Pakistan is a time bomb waiting to explode. You have a huge population, 170 million people. There is nuclear power. Pakistan is much more dangerous than Afghanistan. War always has its own logic. Once you set foot in war, you do not control it. It sucks you in."

full post

freedom is on the march....

this CBS 60 minutes piece was the most disgusting story i have seen in a good long time. i just have to ask..who have we become??? there is a debate going on about whether we should torture other humans and now this. humans in nevada are sitting at computers pulling the trigger on humans in another country and seem to think it's just fine. if fact they almost look like immature teenage boys playing video games. i repeat ...disgusting and that's the nicest thing i can think of to say. and the fact that my tax dollars are paying for this horror makes me sick. i sure as hell don't feel safer, just incredibly dirty.

Drones: America's New Air Force
60 Minutes' Lara Logan Reports On The Increasing Use Of Drones In The Battlefield
May 10, 2009
(CBS) Every so often in the history of war, a new weapon comes along that fundamentally rewrites the rules of battle. This is a story about a revolution in unmanned aviation that is doing just that. Most people know them as drones; the Air Force calls them "unmanned aerial vehicles." And right now, there are dozens of them in the skies over Iraq and Afghanistan, hunting down insurgents, every minute of every day. They've become one of the most important planes in the United States Air Force - and yet, the pilot is nowhere near the aircraft or the battlefield. They are controlled by remote control, from thousands of miles away. Many of the details of this weapons program are classified, but our 60 Minutes team was given secret clearance and unprecedented access to bring you this story.
Forty-five miles north of Las Vegas, on the edge of the Mojave desert, is Creech Air Force base. It is home to the only wing in the Air Force where none of the pilots ever leave the ground.
full story
watch video here if your stomach is strong

Same Old Sunday Bilge

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It's just not worth turning on the TV, Sunday mornings. The same old morally & intellectually bankrupt Beltway talking-heads invite the same old morally & intellectually bankrupt Rightwing political players to pontificate about the same old discredited notions.

The only ideas those Rightwingers have are toxic ideas. They aren't serious thinkers, they're self serving bullshit artists.

I assume those Beltway talking-heads were all at the White House Correspondents Dinner. Too bad they're brains are so atrophied that they didn't pick up on what Wanda was saying.

There's still journalism being committed in America, just not on Sunday mornings... or on network news.

The 2009 Pulitzer Prize Winners
Investigative Reporting
For a distinguished example of investigative reporting by an individual or team, presented as a single article or series, in print or online or both, Ten thousand dollars ($10,000).

Awarded to David Barstow of The New York Times for his tenacious reporting that revealed how some retired generals, working as radio and television analysts,had been co-opted by the Pentagon to make its case for the war in Iraq, and how many of them also had undisclosed ties to companies that benefited from policies they defended.

These stories on The New York Times web site may not be identical to the Prizewinning entry. Winning stories will be posted when available.
MESSAGE MACHINE: Behind TV Analysts, Pentagon’s Hidden Hand
One Man’s Military-Industrial-Media Complex

Naomi Klein on Maddow - Banking Bailout

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For a long time, we've been pointing out the real nature of the phony crony capitalism that's been promoted by so-called conservatives at the behest of Americas wealthiest families... private profits but socialized risk. And now we have the ultimate result, the Bank bailouts. Banks that were de-regulated so they could become 'too big to fail' and Banksters who gambled and lost, then demanded to be bail out on their terms or they'd crash the whole economy (and they really do have the power to do that).

With huge deficits generated by bailing out the Banksters, the excuse to cut, cut, cut social and infrastructure programs is in place and the minions of Americas greediest are beginning to nibble away at what's left of the middle-class. ( Steny Hoyer and other New Democrats are just as bad as Republican Congress-critters.)

Naomi Klein defines the problem clearly when she says; "A private sector crisis is being turned into a public sector crisis.".

Rachel Maddow Show, May 6, 2009: Naomi Klein on the Bank Bailouts

Klein said:

"the poorest and most vulnerable people in the country are being asked to bail out the most wealthy."

"It really does fit the thesis of The Shock Doctrine"

"Here we have just this transfer, this massive transfer of public wealth into private hands, and that’s continuing and it’s much, much larger, just on a much larger scale than any of the investments we’re seeing through the stimulus or the budget."

"Almost $12 trillion is being spent to bail out the financial sector compared to only about $1 trillion being spent on economic stimulus."

"My real concern is — has been my concern from day one — is that the crisis on Wall Street, created by deregulated capitalism, is not actually being solved, it’s being moved. A private sector crisis is being turned into a public sector crisis.”

- Everyone should read The Shock Doctrine:The Rise of Disaster Capitalism -

The No-Government Option

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Here's the answer for all those TEA Partying conservopublitarians who don't want government to do anything: Move to a place that isn't 'over-regulated' and doesn't have 'Big Government'...

REGULATION VACATION CELEBRATION!

blog on !!!!!!!!!

What an arrogant piece by a David Lewis, of the Lynden Tribune, who calls himself a reporter. Is a reporter the same as a journalist? Hmmm…. well, I don’t call myself a journalist or a reporter (my degree is in another field) but I do proudly call myself a blogger. I live in a participatory democracy and if we citizens aren’t vigilant we will lose it. I welcome all bloggers…. I have argued with a blogger, whom I’m sure I disagree with much of the time, on his blog. (he called me out even though he incorrectly referred to my blog as a Democratic Party blog. I speak only for myself on all 6 of my blogs) We may have stood next to each other at the grocery store and not even realized it. I have attended a baseball game with “my opposition.” The event was organized by a Bellingham Herald reporter, Sam Taylor. (he does have a degree from the University of Idaho School of Journalism and Mass Media)

What a hoot! He attributes “bloggers” with attacking his investment portfolio. Actually the looting took place long ago by the likes of the mitt-ster and the t boone man. That brand of icon has pretty much cleaned us out. We are now stuck servicing the debt, and if we’re lucky, cleaning up the mess they left. And the masters of casino capitalism and pyramid schemes are still jiggering around with the economy. It’s laughable to look to the stock market as a measure of our economic well being. The corporate media infotainment military industrial complex are the folks who playing the news tables. Shills like CNBC Financial Commentator Jim Cramer are hard at work everyday on the tv. Thankfully there are self-professed “snake oil salesman” aka comedian extraordinaire John Stewart, to call him out. I will use all my extra outrage and contempt for the greedy, self serving criminals who have put planet earth on life support and show no sign of stopping.



I love the idea that citizens are willing to pay attention, critically think, and communicate ideas, opinions and, at times. downright amazing content. Blog on!!!!!!!!!!

Blogs: Becoming a fast-news a la carte nation
Submitted by the Tribune on April 29, 2009 - 7:33am. Opinion
David LewisTribune reporter
  Blogs’ rise in popularity and their increased relevance as the preferred news source for many Americans has been on my list of plaguing, quotidian annoyances for some time now. Just uttering the word "blog" I find irksome. To my ear, it sounds too similar to an onomatopoetic euphemism for vomiting (e.g. his face turned green as he sprinted into the bathroom and blogged violently).  

Due to a recent event, though, blogs have officially been relocated from my list of petty annoyances to my list of loathsome objects. Blogging joins the ignominious ranks of things like Athlete’s Foot, mayonnaise (admittedly an illogical, yet nearly pathological aversion), and the intolerable television commercials for freecreditreport.com that feature songs annoying enough to motivate one to consider effecting his own deafness with a ball point pen, lint roller, Louisville Slugger, etc

full opinion