Chew on this and have at it. I am done with these so-called Liberal/Progressives who support this crap of a bill and are willing to sacrifice their principles for Obama.
Arguably, healthcare reform has been the be-all and end-all of this website since June 2009. So we're almost at a full calendar year now since the monumental moment when this teeny, tiny, little hope-shaped baby was given to Congress by the White House, and President Obama basically said, "Do something with this! Make me proud!"
Unfortunately, both Congress (both houses, with more blame being placed upon the Senate rather than the House) and the White House have managed to fuck it up beyond all recognition.
After months of debating, and rolling the facts over in my head, I simply cannot support this healthcare "reform" package. Essentially, I think it's a crock of shit. Unless this bill can and will include a public option (or if Alan Grayson's bill gains any traction), then please (PLEASE!) kill this motherfucking piece of crap!
The last few months have been very emotional personally. Waiting to see if I'm going to lose my home, get a day gig, lose the UI, maybe having the music career start back up, and watching my dog get old enough to have to make that final decision, it's been a roller coaster.
Add to that emotional baggage is the final straw for me with democrats, Obama, and last but not least, the GOS,all coming together last week in a craptastic display of hypocrisy, skullduggery, tomfoolery, and plain stupidity.
I recently posted in a diary by ANKOSS, called Bloggers awake! I very much like the general thrust of that diary, which concluded with
The facts are plain. Blogging without direct action is an impotent evolutionary dead-end for Internet politics. We must learn to use the Internet to mobilize EFFECTIVE political action. It is time to awaken from the enfeebling trance of empty emotional blog posting. It is time to take action.
However, the diary specifically suggested an action against a corporation, instead of an "action" targetting government. And even worse, IMO, was that there was no mention of an "action" targetting government, which had the specific electoral goal of getting better Congress critters elected.
Here's the latest GOP "stall tactic" in a very long parade of stall tactics:
Global-Warming Scientists 'Need to Go Back to Square One,' Rep. Barton Says By Karen Schuberg, March 03, 2010
"Science is verifiable, science is something that can be replicated," Barton, the ranking Republican on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, told CNSNews.com.
"This whole theory of global warming is just that: It's a theory. It's based on models. Models are based on variables, and conditions that the modelers that develop the models put into them. And the models don't replicate what's happened," Barton said. "So (scientists) need to go back to square one, look at the empirical data, look at alternative theories, and see if they can find a theory that actually fits the facts."
Bets by some of the same banks that helped Greece shroud its mounting debts may actually now be pushing the nation closer to the brink of financial ruin.
Echoing the kind of trades that nearly toppled the American International Group, the increasingly popular insurance against the risk of a Greek default is making it harder for Athens to raise the money it needs to pay its bills, according to traders and money managers.
"I don't know about you but whenever I read a blog I do not let my eye drop below half the screen in case I accidentally hit the bit where the comments reside. Of all the stinking, sliding, scuttling, weird, entomological creatures that inhabit the floor of the internet those comments on blogs are the most unbearable, almost beyond imagining," he added, getting into his stride and echoing comments made by fellow comedian David Mitchell earlier this year about the standard of online commentary.
Here's the thing. The truth? Useless. Facts, even more so. Reality? What the fuck is that?
There's only this: what people believe.
Men often become what they believe themselves to be. Men often become what they believe themselves to be. Men often become what they believe themselves to be. Men often become what they believe themselves to be.Men often become what they believe themselves to be. Men often become what they believe themselves to be. Men often become what they believe themselves to be.
Mahatma Gandhi
I'd like to think I am a tolerant man. I like Docudharma partly because of this toleration. There are few rules, and what rules there are are largely sensible. It's not a single mission blog, like some others, and so there's a great deal of freedom to explore what some people might consider the "wacky and crazy".
One of the reasons I spend more time here as of now as opposed to anywhere else in terms of participating on the internet is that I find most or many ideas that aren't palatable, at least tolerable, and that this benign toleration is preferable to constraining conversation and trying to create a community where topics that are "off-mission" are grounds for being banned from a site.
And, being a hermit, online community is important to me. One of the things that strikes me is if you think about it, most of us have people in our own lives who are dear friends and family members who hold views that we might consider crazed.
I once had an eminently accomplished and deeply analytical friend who thought that the Earth was 6,000 years old and that dinosaur fossils were placed in the earth to lure people to Satan.
I have a family member who is a conservative Christian, committed adultery, married the woman he committed adultery with and divorced his wife, and once told me that my being gay was an abomination because it was "selfish" and that I was denying all my manifest charms to a woman. Apparently there have never been any limits on a person with such a history judging others while refusing to look at the "plank in his own eye" to employ a Biblical phrase.
I had a friend who came over unannounced at all hours, and called me up all the time for help, and finally what precipitated the end of our friendship was his trying to introduce me to the joys of crystal meth.
And, as I have said more than once, I have one sibling, a dear brother, who remains dear to me, who thinks among other things that the problem with Democrats is that Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid are too darn liberal and thinks that gay people shouldn't have certain civil rights because it would "cost the taxpayers money".
So, yeah, I'd like to think I am a tolerant man. The reason for me pointing out the above examples is to posit that sometimes we will tolerate a lot more in terms of bug-eyed battiness from family and the people we care about and adore in person than some people do on blogs. And that is the reason, I believe, that Docudharma cultivates viewpoint toleration as a social good. I know, there are some who believe that Docudharma is a "nutty fringe" website. This, I believe is worth the price, because when you start shutting down discussion you start losing good conversation and good ideas and anything that might result from that.
What I feel most of us realize on Docudharma is that people are more than the sum of their words on a blog. It is the totality of their existence that matters, and further too many other blogs forget that, to the detriment of forming the communities that are going to be the backbone of the liberal movement.
There are on this site people who appear to believe that the Illuminati are real and that the biggest problem we have today is a shadow government that is about to take over the world. There are others who seem to believe that global warming is a hoax and that vaccines cause autism and that 9/11 was a conspiracy.
1. A traffic jam in which no vehicular movement is possible, especially one caused by the blockage of key intersections within a grid of streets.
2. A complete lack of movement or progress resulting in a backup or stagnation:
"the political gridlock that prevented ... the President and Congress from moving expeditiously to cut the budget"
gridlock - Chiefly US
noun
1. (Engineering / Automotive Engineering) obstruction of urban traffic caused by queues of vehicles forming across junctions and causing further queues to form in the intersecting streets
2. a point in a dispute at which no agreement can be reached; deadlock political gridlock
Douchemook #1: Yes, I understand you paid a pretty penny for that fine Corinthian leather carry-on bag. That doesn't mean you should stroke it and pet it and call it "George" while the line behind you multiplies like bunnies fucking. Throw the fucking thing on the conveyor belt; it will be fine. The cow managed to wear it all those years without worrying about being rolled over a few metal bars, so you shouldn't either.
Okay, now for douchemook #2: yes, you, young bankstress, future Master of the Universe (assuming you can break the glass ceiling - good luck with that). You, with the three carry-on bags and little regard for the fact that there are other passengers on your flight who might need the overhead compartment space. You who were too fucking busy texting to notice that the line was leaving without you, stranding those of us unfortunate enough to be stuck behind you, while you made plans for dinner at some ludicrously expensive restaurant. Fine, I don't know that the restaurant is expensive, but you were acting like such a entitled twatwaffle that I can only assume the worst.
And just in case you are drinking and/or eating any thing while reading the rest of this, PUT IT DOWN. Asthmatics have your inhalers handy.
For our scientifically challenged fellow-citizens, it may hard to understand, but simply experiencing a few record-setting Snow Storms, does NOT automatically disprove the theory of Global Warming (aka Climate Change). Science doesn't work that way. Science takes evidence. Science takes data. Science takes experiments - and lots and lots of Measuring. ... It takes measuring of those boring things, called Facts.
The theory of Climate Change, views weather events from a long-term perspective. Climate varies from year to year. Decade to decade.
Climate is a generational phenomenon. (could be why the younger generation "gets it" -- more so than the older.)
Weather, on the other hand, changes with the wind. Weather is a daily event. Weather is the background noise, upon which we plan our daily lives.
In other words, weather can change - a lot; over the course of a week, or over a Season. ... Weather can even swing wildly over the course of a day sometimes - just ask anyone caught without rain gear, when unexpected downburst rolls in.
Weather is volatile. Weather is constantly changing. Climate not so much.
You see, my goal for DocuDharma is to make it a cool place to hang out. A no pressure zone where you can let it slip on occasion that you're part of the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party without having people get all in your face like you're a Yankee fan. A virtual Cheers where everyone knows your name Norm! and you can ignore blowhards like Cliff.
Liveblogging is hard, but no harder than on many other platforms. You just have to remember to hit the 'Refresh' button on your browser instead of admiring your last bon mot for an hour or two.
On the other hand (appointment blogging) it sucks when you get no feedback from your audience.
Now I don't seem to have a problem with that so much in part because I don't care what people think, and also I'm perfectly comfortable expressing my interior dialog (and they called me mad at the institute). I talk to myself all day every day and twice as much on Sundays.
And I watch TV. All the time. I can't remember the last time I turned it off.
Coming up in GroundHog Month are some major sports events that I think we can enjoy together-
Puppy Bowl, Curling, America's Cup.
While I'm content to try and provide content myself, I think the Olympics is a little more than I can handle even on steroids and I'd like some volunteers.
Actually quite a bit more traumatic and time consuming than I expected.
Of course most of that is my fault, since I'm very obsessive about backups and notes.
And I shifted my installation paradigm for this one, sticking with the Microsoft defaults for as long as I could stand them, which is now.
XP Pro, Service Pack 3, all the updates including IE 8 and MP 11. The only thing proprietary is the network drivers and firewall included with my Asus A8N-E motherboard.
The good news is that it's looking more and more like a virus or malware since IE was behaving just as badly as my 1.5.0.12 Firefox. Hopefully by this evening I'll have a system I recognize and can be productive for you with.
Computer is still wonky. It seems to be malware or fucking Flashplayer/Firefox interaction. I'm putting it up for a full AdAware scan and I have no idea how long that will take. I'll be back with Afternoon Edition as soon as I can manage.
Thank you for your constant indulgence.
No Comments.
Update:
I haven't been able to keep my browser running for more than 30 minutes at a time since 6 am.
My next step is a fresh OS which will keep me busy for at least 6 hours.
I apologize to my readers.
My final activity while I back up my data will be to suggest some viewing alternatives for tonight, an essay I expect I'll be unable to participate in.
I recently came across, through a YouTube video, a rather unique French public service announcement. It encouraged heterosexual men to protect themselves against HIV/AIDS by using a condom before engaging in sexual contact. Predictable enough subject for a PSA, one might think, but the video's concept was both amusing and novel. While the American mind would likely appreciate the humor, it would also deem it too graphic to be aired on network television and probably cable as well. American liberalism has, I realize, a long standing Francophone tradition, just as American conservative thought has an equally lengthy history of criticizing it, so my point is not to cater directly to either camp. Somewhere between the two is something close to the truth and as such I seek to find it.
To get to my point, in France, sex is everywhere, and yet attitudes towards sexuality in one's personal life are often more traditional than in the United States. While on the continent, one often encounters nudity on billboards, street signs, and shop windows while out and about, but the attitude of most residents is that the body is a natural entity, as are public depictions of it without the benefit of clothes to disguise the objectionable parts. To us, of course, the only truly socially acceptable manner of presentation regarding the unveiled human body is in the art gallery and even then some people have been known to register their visible discomfort. Furthermore, we deem nudity or frank depictions of nudity in any form to often only be granted as a privilege based on reaching a certain age and with it some perceived degree of maturity, believing that children and minors ought not to be exposed to its supposedly corrupting influences until the age where they can make an informed decision whether or not to partake. Put that way, it sounds almost as though nudity is some health hazard, like smoking or consuming too much alcohol. Still, for all the energy we expend spinning out cautionary tales and guilt-laden commandments, one would think we ought to expect more for our efforts.
In part because we have some new Admins on board I'd like to discuss scheduling a bit.
I strongly believe in appointment blogging. Just like TV I think people tune in at specific times to catch their favorite authors and chat. Of course, like a DVR, the content is always there so you can interact at your convenience and carry on extended conversations.
Still, there's nothing sadder than pounding your refresh button and finding nothing new.
At DocuDharma we have 14 regular Front Page posts per day.
At 9, 10, 11, and noon I do Front Page promotions from member content. I generally pick them between 3 am and 8 am so if you want your subject featured in the morning it's best to post your essay previous to midnight the day before you wish it to appear (especially if the subject is time sensitive).
So as a reader of this blog that's what you can expect when you click in, along with whatever our members contribute whenever their muse smacks them upside the head.
Reform Immigration -
March on Washington
grid·lock
