October 17, 2009 archive

Sen. Bernie Sanders: “The Middle Class is Collapsing” (Updated and Crossposted)

Crossposted at Daily Kos

When Bernie speaks, he speaks the TRUTH (capital TRUTH)

    And though his words are not sugar coated he says five words that every American should hear Loud and Clear.

    “The Middle Class is Collapsing”


HuffingtonPost.com

    More below the fold

Weekend News Digest

Weekend News Digest is an Open Thread

Now with World and U.S. News.  38 Story Final.

From Yahoo News Top Stories

1 Pakistan launches massive anti-Taliban offensive

by S.H. Khan, AFP

2 hrs 51 mins ago

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AFP) – Pakistani troops backed by fighter jets launched a major operation against the Taliban in South Waziristan on Saturday, sparking deadly clashes with heavily-armed rebels, officials said.

The mountain district is part of a tribal belt on the Afghan border that US officials call the most dangerous place in the world and is home to thousands of Taliban and Al-Qaeda-linked fighters branded a major threat to the West.

Air strikes and heavy artillery pounded Taliban bases as troops advanced north, west and east after months spent planning an assault that is expected to pose a stern test for the military on terrain ideally suited to guerrillas.

AP Blows! (Zazi/Al-Queda Connection Story)

Remember all those stories about how Najibullah Zazi (the ‘New 9-11 Bomber’) had ‘direct contacts’ with yet another Al-Queda Number Three?

Not so true after all.

They were all based on faulty reporting by Associated Press Reporters Adam Goldman and Brett J. Blackledge.

The initial report, from New York, on Oct. 14 was based on AP’s misinterpretation of a series of telephone and e-mail exchanges between an AP reporter and two U.S. intelligence officials. The officials told the AP on Thursday that they had not been aware of any contact between al-Yazid and Zazi. They spoke throughout on condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigation.

Shame on you assholes.

The Core

The glass fogs from my own breath.

PhotobucketI wipe it away, but the veil remains. Perhaps it is on the other side of this pane. Is the window flawed, or is someone there on the other side breathing and wiping and trying to see me too?

Do you see the mental image of my creation, or adopt the image provided? Or do you only the microdots of pixels formulating characters put together in strands, the culmination of ancient works that created a written form of this language that still fails to convey meanings that try to claw their way out of my brain?  

Still, I feel on the cusp of something larger, like almost to the place where the glass will become crystalline. Its the damned language in the way. Allegory, parable, images, comparisons, examples and yet, and yet, I can never get to the philosophical place I need to be to solve this. Philosophy defies mere verbage, it scoffs the very attempt.

How can we fix this thing if we can’t actually get to the place where we discuss it?

Raise Your Hand If You Want The Public Option!

Simulposted at Daily Kos

Photobucket

Yay! Look at all those hands!

Ok now put your hand down…onto your phone….and dial 202-456-1111.

When the nice person answers tell the firmly but politely…but firmly, in a firm voice, the one you use for those times when it it is necessary to be, you know, firm…like now…



Please tell President Obama to MAKE (real firm, right there) Harry Reid include the Public Option in the final Senate Bill.

Because if you want a Public Option, that is about the only way we are going to get it.

Star Spangled Land of Misfit Toys

Most ignorance is vincible ignorance. We don’t know because we don’t want to know.

Aldous Huxley

I have long found Chris Hedges to be a beacon of morality in the belly of the beast that is post 9/11 fascist America. His book War is a Force that Gives Us Meaning is a superbly written, uncompromising look at the horrors of war seen through the eyes of a man who has been there, Hedges served as a war correspondent in some of the most vicious and senseless slaughtering sprees of the late Twentieth Century. His sheer courage in coming out in the early days of the Bushreich and denouncing war during a commencement address at Rockford College when the phony War on Terror was just ramping up during which he was jeered by the audience, his microphone cut off and he was run like a rabid dog from the campus, later his employer, the so-called liberal New York Times stabbed him in the back. Hedges went on to write what I consider to be a definitive expose of the authoritarian Christian Right entitled American Fascists and contributes weekly columns to the fine website Truthdig. As a fan, it was only natural that I would pick up his latest scathing condemnation of the dumb, foul rottenness that is America in terminal decline and while uneven it delivers like a baseball bat to the head. We truly are living in the existential Hell that is the Empire of Illusion.

Arctic Ice to be free in summer – but only for a limited time Greenpeace says


Greenpeace have announced a big give-away, Arctic Ice will be free to anyone who wants it in summer but only for a limited time.

The recent news in from IARC-JAXA (International Arctic Research Center / Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) is that in August-September 2009 that the arctic sea ice minimum exceeds that of 2005 and thus there is evidence of Global Cooling has caused much consternation in the among global warming fascisti.

Hard on the heels of this comes a British expedition to measure Arctic Ice thickness who report the thinning of sea ice.

The give-away has been organised by Greenpeace ostensibly to benefit all those green consumers who have thrown away their fridges due to worries about the Ozone layer and Global Warming only to exchange them for worries about food poisoning. On the other hand it could be seen as a neat way to reduce the sea ice and thus refute the Japanese work and cover this up by so-called good works.

“It’s the most natural way of keeping things cool” said Dawn Lovedyke the GP spokesperson and editor of the website lesbiangaia.web. “We are also planning refrigerated mercy ships to Africa and the Third World, after all everyone, without exclusion, has the right to Ice in their Budweiser even if they only eat Yam porridge.”

At a press conference having being picked up off the ice late yesterday after a trek of 435.782km, the British Catlin Arctic Survey team led by tough-guy Pen Gwynn and his companions, bulky unprepossessing Anny Portinstorm and puny scientist D.O.A. Attwork reported that ice floes were less than 1.8567m thick showing that this was first year ice, ideal for breaking up by household ice picks.

The team met many hardships during the voyage including Polar Bears sitting on ice floes and Inuit realtors angry about the team breaking up perfectly good building materials. Anny was nearly lost when she fell through the ice but was lucky enough to be thrown back by a passing sperm whale. “It was the closest enounter I’ve ever had with a Sperm before, it will stay with me for the rest of my life” she said.

[snip]

I pledge allegiance to Bill Gates

“I pledge allegiance to Bill Gates and to the corporation for which he stands.  One nation, under Microsoft, with standardized testing and low wages for all.”

Yesterday buhdydharma posted a diary Turns Out It Is Not The Republicans After All that I will reference often as I write about the education coup de tat that is occurring right under our noses.  The very rich, the ruling class, is usurping our public schools. It is a slow and deliberate coup. They are taking us in with their money, promises, and dictates, and if we don’t start paying attention, good public schools will be a thing of the past.

It’s difficult to know where to start with so much happening and so little education news ever being reported in the MSM.  So, I’m going to start in the middle and hope to provide more information in subsequent diaries. There is so much to know.  

First, I want to say that Bill Gates has done much good in the world through the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.  I thought his “small schools” initiative was a good idea in theory, although the execution has left something to be desired.  That being said, his newest endeavor is wrong is so many ways.  We should pay attention.  The people with the most money want to control ours.

The Toolbar

It just connected,so my mind is occupied lately.  My last computer complete wipe out and restore happened on……..guess…..you know me right……Sept 11.

Docudharma Times Saturday October 17




Saturday’s Headlines:

Bailout Helps Fuel a New Era of Wall Street Wealth

Frankfurt book fair’s controversial guest of honor: China

Record-High Deficit May Dash Big Plans

ICE-local immigration partnership to remain

Pakistan starts offensive in South Waziristan

President Karzai’s share of Afghan vote is slashed by fraud officials

Palestinian refugees reject ‘sell-out’ deal

Twist in Iraq’s democracy: anti-American party pushes electoral reform

Austria and Poland to help foot Opel takeover bill

Serbian president charged with hooliganism after opening champagne to celebrate World Cup qualification

Tsvangirai to boycott unity government over Mugabe’s ‘dishonest’ behaviour

Darfur: A deadly new chapter

In Mexico, gruesome slayings add to Guerrero’s toll

Get off the pot, Harry.

Setting: The men’s room at the Capitol Building in Washington DC. Camera pans on Harry Reid, who is sitting on the pot, fondling the toilet paper with his right hand, with his left elbow to knee, and chin cupped in his left hand.

Reid engages in internal dialogue

Harry (voiceover): Oooooh, oh. What am I ever, ever going to do?

Reid is now tearing at the corner of a sheet of toilet paper.

Harry: (voiceover): I’m never going to get sixty for anything. Ugh! There is nothing I can do to make those people like me. What do you have to do in this life to make senators trust you???

Reid sniffles.

Late Night Karaoke

Open Thread

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