First, i have to tell you that i blame all this on the God thing…
April 2008 archive
Apr 14 2008
What to Do about Torture, by Steven D
Reposted with permission from Booman Tribune
I’ve just Read Clammyc’s diary, This is Not Torture. First, let me say I was disgusted by what I read there. Even though I have read many similar stories before about the torture that was condoned and authorized in our names, to protect our freedoms, such descriptions never fail to make me physically ill. Beyond the sheer immorality of these acts, and their illegality under American and international law, we know that there was simply no justifiable reason for these “activities” — no ticking time bomb, no great or imminent terrorist threats that were exposed. It’s mostly been practiced on people with little or no connection to Al Qaeda.
So, what do we do? The media won’t cover this issue. Congress won’t hold impeachment hearings. McCain will likely continue the same pattern of deceit regarding the abuses at Gitmo, and at American bases in Iraq, Afghanistan and other “detention facilities” if he is elected President. He certainly won’t make it a priority to investigate the crimes of the Bush administration since he believes we are legitimately fighting the terrorists in Iraq, and he would like to fight the terrorists in Iran, too, for that matter. As for our Democratic candidates it likely won’t be a priority for them, either, unless we can raise public consciousness of the issue.
Apr 14 2008
Alert the Media to Torture
As the story of a America President torturing in your name quickly fades from the ludicrously small prominence it managed to achieve, Bittergate rages on. The candidate frenzy as well. A sad testimonial on both the traditional media AND the Blogosphere. Very sad. Though it’s been said many time, many ways….our media is a collection of clueless hacks. To them it is ‘just a job’ and not a ‘sacred’ responsibility to be taken seriously.
What can we do about it? StevenD has one suggestion over at Booman Tribune. There are two other things I can think of. One, keep writing essays/diaries, to keep it visible in the blogosphere, (which I will be doing) the second is, as the title implies, Alert The Media.
There are only two responsive entities in the media right now, Olbermann (KOlbermann@msnbc.com)
and Jack Cafferty at CNN
Please e-mail them, and if you don’t know what to say, sending them the ACLU/C&L petition (included below the fold) is not a bad way to go. Oh ad pleae go sign and send it too!
Apr 14 2008
Crying Rape
My Johnny Carson Moment… “I did not know that.”
I did not know that a certain person “cried rape” about the predatory lending which brought about the mortgage/lending crisis. I bet not many others here did either.
Are you tired of hearing the phrase “subprime crisis” without adequate explanation?
The following comment from OPOL’s recent diary put the pieces of the so-called “subprime crisis” story together for me… not to mention the current global economic crisis which has resulted from it all…
But in 2003, during the height of the crisis, Bush invoked a clause from the 1863 National Bank Act that pre-empted all state predatory lending laws and then made new rules that prevented states from enforcing their own consumer protection laws against national banks. thank you tahoebasha3
Ah, but from whence did the information in tahoebasha3’s comment emerge? Kindly bear with me as we look into it all. The “cry of rape” happens in Act Three.
Apr 14 2008
Pony Party: Tax Time
Eek! It’s that time of year again. I’m an American living in Soviet Canuckistan, so I have to file in both countries. I just filed my automatic extension form (if it’s automatic, why do I have to file? Hmmm…), because my Canuckistan taxes haven’t yet been filed. But what a complete and total pain to have to file in both countries. At least it’s easier in Canada, especially since I hand everything over to an accountant!
Anyone encountering female horses in the night about their taxes? (Heh) My advice – use your jar as a tax shelter – works for me!

Apr 14 2008
I am a bitter angry redneck liberal.
Okay, first off, shame on Hillary Clinton for wrapping herself so late in the game in the latest fashion of hard-working Americans. Shame on her for pretending she had to give a damn about the working class when she was shuffling off jobs overseas and cheerleading a bankruptcy bill for the socialized rich. And a special extra deep hearted jeer to her saying she now loves guns and God like she was George Allen.
I have long watched the Clintons lie with impunity, figuring you know, that’s just what politicians do. They lie. A lot. But when another politician, say Obama this time or Perot in the 90s, finally comes up and talks to America like adults and say some inconvient truths, that’s when the liars get to lying hardcore.
Now Hillary is all about steel barrels and gunpowder, when in the 90s she lead the Million Mom March against guns.
Now Hillary is all home spun craving to appear in potato sack dresses, when she is the very product and poster child of the Baby Boomer Entitled generation and has the upper crust of lobbyists and donors carrying her train of silk and tears around.
And now Hillary is demanding to be the moral compass of the country, when she regrets every major decision she has made in the Senate, be it war or economics. When Obama said that the countryside was bitter and grasped for guns and god, he was right. Because people like Hillary, and more so Bush, has failed them, and they grab for the last few things they can believe in. The power of the gun and the glory of God.
The reason there was a mass secularization in Europe over the last 30 years is because their government was competent and put the good of the people over the good of the upper class. The people in Europe realized they did not have to look to some mythical person in the clouds for security, they could provide it themselves, either economically, politically or health-wise.
It is politicians like Hillary Rodham Clinton who have stolen this from everyday Americans. If she wants to claim the 90s as her experience, then she must also claim the massive selling out of America to foreign interest of the 90s as well. If she wants to claim her time in the White House on her resume, then she must accept responsibility for the subprime crisis created under her husband. She can’t selective claim experience, she must accept accountability for Waco, the Iraq War, the Bankruptcy Bill and countless other acts during her time of “experience” which have made the countryside bitter.
That is why Hillary is screaming like a banshee about this comment by Obama, because she and her fellow upper class cronies have created the bitter environment most of the country must deal with. Hillary knows if people start connecting the economic and political dots, it will all lead back to her in one way or another. So she must yell “Elitist!”, other wise people might notice she is what she says, and that she is attacking with her greatest weakness, her sense of entitlement.
Obama told the truth, and Hillary decided to lie about it once again. But I have to give her credit, the way she has been running this campaign, I am surprised she didn’t say Obama was “uppity.”
Because that’s the racial code word Hillary is using here, “elitist” for “uppity”, and Clinton really wishes Obama would know his place, in the back of her campaign bus, or at least under it.
Apr 14 2008
Tax Day: Figures don’t lie, liars figure
Tuesday is Tax Day, which prompts people to ask: What is the government doing with my money?
Well, there’s a trillion or two or three for the Iraq war.
Not to worry, says President Bush. The war is consuming only a “modest fraction” of the country’s wealth.
The National Priorities Project says that in 2007 the federal government spent 42.2 percent of every income tax dollar on military spending.
There’s an old cliche that figures don’t lie but liars figure. Who you gonna believe — the guy who lied us into the war?
Apr 14 2008
Updated – Dalai Lama: China Is Not Our Enemy
Amid the Chinese government stepping up claims that the Dalai Lama wants to foment a violent uprising in Tibet – including allegations today that they discovered an arms cache in a Tibetan monestary (link: http://www.reuters.com/article… ), the Dalai Lama gave a forceful reply last Friday.
He didn’t call them the Evil Empire. He didn’t say they were members of the Axis of Evil.
He said, “we are not anti-Chinese”.
The full interview can be found at MSNBC’s website here: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21…
Apr 14 2008
Pony Party, ‘An April Day’
An April Day When the warm sun, that brings Seed-time and harvest, has returned again, ‘T is sweet to visit the still wood, where springs The first flower of the plain. I love the season well, When forest glades are teeming with bright forms, Nor dark and many-folded clouds foretell The coming-on of storms. From …
Apr 14 2008
OK… see… I wasn’t TECHNICALLY lying…
…when I failed to mention that, along with you, I was also dating five other women, three of them pregnant via me, two close relatives (your sister is SO much hotter than I first thought), and my wife of eighteen years. See, though nothing I said was accurate, I was simply employing enhanced truth-telling techniques, which, apparently, President George Bush approved from the oval office!
Apr 14 2008
Docudharma Times Monday April 14
there’s battle lines being drawn
nobody’s right if everybody’s wrong
young people speakin there minds
getting so much resistance far behind
Co-Payments Go Way Up for Drugs With High Prices
Health insurance companies are rapidly adopting a new pricing system for very expensive drugs, asking patients to pay hundreds and even thousands of dollars for prescriptions for medications that may save their lives or slow the progress of serious diseases.
With the new pricing system, insurers abandoned the traditional arrangement that has patients pay a fixed amount, like $10, $20 or $30 for a prescription, no matter what the drug’s actual cost. Instead, they are charging patients a percentage of the cost of certain high-priced drugs, usually 20 to 33 percent, which can amount to thousands of dollars a month.