March 21, 2010 archive

We Need Every Voice in the Fight

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Yeah, I know, it’s hilarious to speak of “voices” in a “fight” when we are at this moment witnessing the kabuki kongress and the other bozo-bloated branches of government.

Yesterday, as rossl recounts in this excellent essay, we find there were around, oh, 1,500-2,000 teabaggers and up to 10,000 antiwar demonstrators.

Well it is good that folks are yelling louder.

But today, yes, it is delicious irony that on a day where we’ve never felt more like failures as Americans, hundreds of thousands of our fellow human beings marched in Washington just for the chance to make it so that they (or their mother, or their father, or their children or their friends or their … ) could have the rights and privileges of citizenship.

Here’s a recent report from their website:

raylab:

Ok, that’s it from us here. It’s been an amazing, beautiful and historic day here in Washington, DC. But, I want to remind everybody, this is just the beginning. Now the real work to pass immigration reform starts. We were 500,000 strong for the cause today and we should carry that strength and power with us as we move forward. Tomorrow, call your Senator at 866-877-5552 and tell them you want immigration reform now. We can win this, but we need every voice in the fight.

What I have learned from the HCR national debate is that my own supposed allies, Democrats, are willing to throw out human rights and human dignity as negotiating tools without even fucking using them.  That steams me.

The liberal white blogosphere, I have also come to learn, is not going to consistently cover this aspect of the upcoming immigration debate.

Buhdy spoke the other day about negotiation.

Fool me once.

I’m not watching C-SPAN or following live blogs of corrupted government officials voting for legislation that utterly devalues our most precious American values, the values that the demonstrators today feel strongly enough about to want to be citizens, even with all the problems in our country.

I’m watching folks 500,000 strong.  The media may not pay any attention to them and the white liberal blogs may see them only as a political calculation instead of as brothers and sisters.

I don’t have much of a voice tonight.  But I’m enough of a loudmouth to fake it when necessary.

Si Se Puede!

Sunday Train: Heritage Opposes Freedom to Choose High Speed Rail

Burning the Midnight Oil for Living Energy Independence

I’m shocked, shocked I say, that a belief tank partly funded by Big Oil and Union Busters would issue a piece attacking High Speed Rail. But they did, claiming that there is a “Coming High Speed Rail Financial Disaster”.

Less shocking is that the argument in the piece is tissue-thin, relying on shell games and appeal to stereotype in lieu of evidence.

Of course, just because its an empty argument does not mean its a pointless one. When you are trying to prevent solutions to problems, FUD … Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt … can sometimes be as effective as genuine argument.

Well, I hope someone out there is able to frame great counter-arguments that are useful in cracking into Dr. Utt’s (Economics) target audience of those with short attention spans and limited access to information. What I can offer here is raw material for those counter-arguments.

Uncle Sam For President

Take that you anti-American Teabaggers and Blue Dogs.

 Uncle Sam (Sam Dehne) is entering the fray but first only to put some hell in Rep. Dean Heller's (R, NV-O4) life like he has been doing for years for the Reno City Council.

Sam is no wimpy, mealy-mouthed progressive when he announces his platform:

http://www.renocitizen.com/con…

Some selected excerpts:

As a citizen activist in his state, Dehne has spoken at more

than a thousand public meetings to expose wrongful actions

perpetrated by public officials.

[Man oh man, I’m here to tell you that’s a fact.]

Dehne is also a long-time, world class, volunteer entertainer.

He has performed over 1,000 Charity concerts for seniors and veterans.

[You get what you pay for as far as Sam’s volunteer singing goes.]

Sam Dehne plans to initiate his Grassroots Campaign with some

of his own money and small donations from close supporters.

Dehne will not ask for,  nor accept, any contributions.

Any checks sent will be torn up. And any cash sent will

be put in the church collection plate… anonymously.

In other words… DO NOT send money unless

otherwise and subsequently officially advised.”

Sam says that every penny will be spent dearly…

as if it was his own money… which most of it is.

Recognize and honor the sovereignty of the people in no-nonsense terms. (Re-write the oath of office for public servants accordingly ~ and prosecute violators of the oath.)

Implement a national, fail-safe, trustworthy voting system that does not employ machines with secret codes that can be rigged to throw elections. (Use hand-marked, paper ballots that are eyeball tabulated at precinct level before being transported to any other location.)

It will be my goal to help Senator Harry Reid get re-elected … so that he can continue to help Nevada using his seniority. I will offer my services in hopes of providing Reid with the benefits of my knowledge of the things that Nevada needs.

There are 10 very rich men in Nevada who made their massive fortunes thanks to Nevada. An argument can be made that they are at least partially responsible for the disrepair of the state’s budget and should contribute heavily to repairing it.

Make it a capital crime to tamper with the outcome of any election.

[That will open some seats on the Supreme Court in a hurry but Uncle Sam is not neglecting the other branches of government.]

Incarcerate for life any judge who works against truth and justice.

Incarcerate any elected official who swears to support and defend the Constitution without having a working knowledge of the supreme law of the land ~ especially including the Bill of Rights. (Swearing to serve something that you don’t understand is fraud.)

It gets better and better.  I leave you to enjoy as you will.

Best,  Terry

Weekend News Digest

I’m going to deviate from the usual news sources that I use for news. Today’s main sources will be from the other side of the pond and the Pacific. Mishima is part of the inspiration for the slight change from the “usual suspects” as sources. It’s good to see what their perspective is on world affairs and what we here in the US are missing from our MSM. America needs to hear how others perceive the news.

Anti-war protesters take to streets, defy US indifference

Demonstrators march during an anti-war protest in Washington, DC. Thousands of anti-war protesters took to the streets of the US capital Saturday, on the seventh anniversary of the US-led war in Iraq in a show of frustration widely ignored by the media and public.

(AFP/Nicholas Kamm)

Sat Mar 20, 7:24 pm ET

WASHINGTON (AFP) – Thousands of anti-war protesters took to the streets of the US capital Saturday, on the seventh anniversary of the US-led war in Iraq in a show of frustration widely ignored by the media and public.

As the National Marathon wound down in the city, protesters after midday gathered outside the White House bearing signs alluding to the high cost of the war both in money and human lives and decrying the use of unmanned aircraft, or drones, to bomb US enemies.

Under sunny skies and the watchful but discreet gaze of uniformed police, some demonstrators carried coffins draped in the Iraqi and Afghan flags in homage to civilian deaths the fighting in both countries has caused.

As always, this is also an Open Thread.

1000s march on capitol against healthcare, on White House for peace. Guess which is covered more…

Everyone seems to know that the tea party “movement” had a rally on the steps of the capitol yesterday.  They got in the face of a few Congressmen and now every Beltway media outlet from the Washington Post to Meet the Press is talking about it.  But there was another protest in town yesterday.  Thousands of people showed up in front of the White House to tell Obama (and Congress) to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, to treat Palestinians fairly, and to generally end the US military empire.

MSNBC estimates that somewhere between 1,500 and 2,000 tea party people showed up at the capitol building.  Yet the low end of the estimates for the number of people who showed up at the peace demonstration (including myself) is about 2,500, and the high end is about 10,000.  Where’s our moment on Meet the Press?  Where’s our article in the New York Times?

HCR Open Thread

I don’t have anything much to say, as typing still hurts, due to (in part) crappy health care and crappy health insurance (workman’s comp)

But the Dems are about to do the little they can do to salvage, in their eyes, the last year of caving and cowardice in the face of Republican and Corporate Terrorism. By passing a bill that is such a bastardization of any coherent legislation that no one really knows what it’s real affect will be. Especially after whatever last minute deals are cut today. Or, to not be egotistical, if YOU understand exactly what this bill will end up doing, how it will effect our “health” system, long term, in aggregate,  you are a better person than me.

There are only two things sure. We should all mourn what could have been. And Congress is owned by the Corporations.

Particulars and minutiae aside, the real problem in this country has been laid bare by this process. The fact that the government no longer belongs to the citizens it is supposed to represent. Period.

Veterans Charity? or Political PAC!

U.S. Navy Veterans Association. {If you visit that link be prepared, patriotic music, and looks like an real early style website produced by someone who is a lousy pitchman, or grifter, as it screams at you.}

Another scam charity by those who use our military personal and veterans for their own personal wealth and comfort? The cut and links below are the first of two reports on this charity{?} or extension of political PAC{!}. The second part and links follow that.

U.S. Navy Veterans Association: Under the radar  

Docudharna Times Sunday March 21




Sunday’s Headlines:

Vote on Health Bill Today Caps a Journey Back From the Brink

Finding a cure for Indonesia’s sick river

USA

California Tribe Hopes to Woo Salmon Home

New York schools’ ban on homemade goods at bake sales has parents steamed

Europe

Murder case of cheating wife and missing mattress grips France

Anger and disappointment in Ireland as the Pope’s letter fails to heal

Middle East

Iranians train Taliban to use roadside bombs

UN chief Ban Ki-moon demands Israel settlements halt

Asia

West Bengal villagers pay with blood for a steel plant

How the West poisoned Bangladesh

Africa

South African rapper Jub Jub accused over deaths of four schoolboys is targeted by angry pupil army

Years of conflict etched on a Congo village chief’s face

Latin America

After the revolution: Why are Farc’s young soldiers laying down their guns?

Aristocrats of the Caribbean

 

Talent agent’s secretary tells him there are three acts waiting to see him.

“I hope it isn’t another bunch of goddamned aristocrats!” he says.

The first act comes in and a couple of the men immediately beat up all the women and children, and begin to shit and piss all over them.

“And what do you call your act?” asks the talent agent.

“Haiti.”

Then the second act breaks into the office, beats up everybody in the first act, locks them in a closet, and leaves. Just before they disappear, the talent agent asks them what they call themselves.

“The United States.”

Third act comes in, unlocks the closet, cleans up the first act, hands out free medicine, and sends all the children to school.

The agent is impressed. “What’s the name of your act?” he says.

“Cuba.”

681x454

Qué bolá, mamacita!

 

Spelunker-in-Chief Caving on Military Commissions.

Military Commissions: Ritualized “justice” to cover-up torture, murder, & innocence.  

Obama’s flip-flopping on the use of military commissions means, apparently, we can never turn the page on BushCo, which permanently broke the Constitution.  The law is still subject to whims of stubborn rulers, justice is arbitrary, and “the days of compromising our values” are definitely not over.

Remember this gem from William Haynes who was over-seeing the rigged Military Commissions at Guantanamo, as related by the Commission’s chief prosecutor Col. Morris Davis?

“[Haynes] said these trials will be the Nuremberg of our time,” recalled Davis, referring to the Nazi tribunals in 1945, considered the model of procedural rights in the prosecution of war crimes. In response, Davis said he noted that at Nuremberg there had been some acquittals, which had lent great credibility to the proceedings.

“I said to him that if we come up short and there are some acquittals in our cases, it will at least validate the process,” Davis continued. “At which point, [Haynes’s] eyes got wide and he said, ‘Wait a minute, we can’t have acquittals. If we’ve been holding these guys for so long, how can we explain letting them get off? We can’t have acquittals. We’ve got to have convictions.'”

Col. Davis honorably resigned.

Contrast Hayne’s view of the law with that of Retired Rear Admiral John D. Hutson, who served as a Judge Advocate in the US Navy from 1973 to 2000, and was the Navy’s Judge Advocate General from 1997 to 2000:

“You can’t have a legitimate court unless you are willing to risk an acquittal. If you aren’t willing to accept the possibility that a jury will acquit the accused based on the evidence fairly presented, then it isn’t really a court. It’s a charade.”

Late Night Karaoke

Open Thread

Dick Army’s “Army of Dicks”

(Cross-posted from The Free Speech Zone)

Tea partiers and other anti-health care activists are known to get rowdy, but today’s protest on Capitol Hill–the day before the House is set to vote on historic health care legislation–went beyond the usual chanting and controversial signs, and veered into ugly bigotry and intimidation.

Civil rights hero Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) and fellow Congressional Black Caucus member Andre Carson (D-IN) related a particularly jarring encounter with a large crowd of protesters screaming “kill the bill”… and punctuating their chants with the word “nigger.

Standing next to Lewis, emerging from a Democratic caucus meeting with President Obama, Carson said people in the crowd yelled, “kill the bill and then the N-word” several times, while he and Lewis were exiting the Cannon House office building.

“People have been just downright mean,” Lewis added.

And that wasn’t an isolated incident. Early this afternoon, standing outside a Democratic whip meeting in the Longworth House office building, I watched Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) make his way out the door, en route to the neighboring Rayburn building. As he rounded the corner toward the exit, wading through a huge crowd of tea partiers and other health care protesters, an elderly white man screamed “Barney, you faggot”–a line that caused dozens of his confederates to erupt in laughter.

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo…

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