Fun Fact

WaPo, Margaret Sullivan:

Right-wing extremists committed 74 percent of the 372 politically motivated murders recorded in the United States between 2007 and 2016. Left-wing extremists committed less than 2 percent.
- snip -

But it’s safe to say that most news consumers, if they know anything about antifa, know what the president has told them, and what they’ve gleaned from the club-wielding protesters shown endlessly on TV: that it’s roughly the left-wing equivalent of neo-Nazis and white supremacists. 

That’s not only untrue, but it has the effect of tarring everyone who protests Trump, as well as those who peacefully march for climate-change awareness or rally against hate-mongering speakers such as Milo Yiannopoulos, the onetime Breitbart provocateur.

The best thing journalists can do is to relentlessly explain the beliefs, scope and scale of antifa, and to resist conflating it with liberal groups. And most important, to challenge politically motivated efforts to create a false equivalency between antifa and the rising tide of white supremacy. There is no comparison.

And Away We Go

This is not right.  Even though I sure as hell understand the impulse, I can't encourage or approve or condone. I have to condemn this action unless these people stayed to be arrested and jailed and fined for it.

Civil Disobedience is not about Justice if you don't follow through - you have to play the whole 9 innings.

We need to maintain a healthy skepticism and be wary of "movements".  Once put in motion, these things take on a life and a will of their own, and they can go in directions we can't anticipate and don't control.

What It Is

Call it the Rube-ification of America. And to borrow from Bill Maher: "Why do we always have to be the stoopid country?"

Paul Waldman, WaPo:

What’s truly remarkable isn’t that a bunch of cynical politicians thought they could ride their base voters’ anger into control of Congress by lying to them about what they could actually accomplish; it’s that their voters actually believed it. And then those voters got even angrier when it turned out that the president had the ability to veto bills passed by a Congress controlled by the other party. Who knew! So instead of looking for a presidential candidate who would treat them like adults, they elected Donald Trump, a man who would pander to their gullibility even more. 

Which brings us to where we are today. Republicans couldn’t be bothered for seven years to actually think about what repealing and replacing the ACA might involve, or whether there would be trade-offs and choices to make, or whether setting up a system that accorded with their conservative philosophy might not actually solve the problems of the health-care system. They thought it would be enough to tell their voters to get mad, and worry later about what it would take to keep the promises they made.
-and-

That’s not to say that there isn’t plenty of outright malice in what Republicans are doing, because there is. Their contempt for people who struggle economically is boundless. They’ve wanted to destroy Medicaid for decades, and they just might be able to do it. But their strongest motivation right now is fear, fear of the voters they regard as too dim-witted to be able to make a rational judgment about the most consequential policy question one can imagine.
We dodged one big-ass bullet at about 2:00 this morning, thanks partly to Collins, Murkowski and McCain - but thanks mostly to the simple fact that an awful lot of us have been up on our hind legs pushing back. Makes me proud.

BTW, it ain't over. Both McConnell and 45* issued the standard Daddy State threat - warning us we'd be sorry. 

When they say "Obamacare is failing" and "let Obamacare implode", they mean "we'll continue to sabotage Obamacare to punish you for not going along with us".

So don't get happy.

Today's Tweet

Get together
Get to work
Get shit done

Winning only blue districts won’t get Democrats the House — they’ll have to pick up some red seats, as well. https://t.co/7DcdrOovpz pic.twitter.com/ZrsBleu1Eq

— FiveThirtyEight (@FiveThirtyEight) April 4, 2017

It's Not Working For Them

Editorial Board, Sacramento Bee:

President Donald Trump’s chaotic first weeks have generated wide disapproval, and not all the protests have been placid. But U.S. Rep. Tom McClintock needs to stop insisting that the seniors, families and middle-aged picketers at his town hall this past weekend were an “anarchist element.”

As The Sacramento Bee’s Angela Hart reported Saturday, the unhappy crowd that greeted the Sierra Nevada’s man in Congress was anti-Trump and noisy. But McClintock’s claims to outside media afterward that “anarchists” had gathered to “disrupt” his meeting was true only if by “anarchists” you mean “neighbors and grandparents.”

Interviews revealed a lot of gray-haired retirees worried about Medicare and workers fearful of the Republican plan to dismantle the Affordable Care Act. Some said they had driven hours through the Sierra to hear the congressman speak in downtown Roseville; others said they had never demonstrated before, but wanted to register their dismay at Trump’s ban on travel from seven Muslim-majority countries and his efforts to roll back environmental rules.

As someone whose district includes Yosemite National Park, and who gleefully embraced the tea party after the election of President Barack Obama, one might think McClintock would be alert to environmental issues and savvy enough to recognize a gathering grassroots firestorm.

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/opinion/editorials/article131123304.html#storylink=cpy

As always, we can expect politicians to try to shape the debate first by "defining down" the opponent - calling the protesters "anarchists" for example. I always liked that one.  People gathered in large groups on a specifically planned date at a specifically planned time for a specifically planned purpose may be many different things, but "anarchists" they are not.

Like the man said: Anarchy never really caught on because nobody shows up at the meetings.

But that wasn't anarchy, Congressman. That was opposition and that's what democracy looks like. Of course, you being Republican and all, it doesn't surprise me that you didn't recognize it when you saw it.

Anyway, denigrating the opposition is tried-n-true.  If you can count on your own political clique to show up in greater numbers than the other guy's, then it doesn't matter what weird outrageous thing falls outa your tater trap. You say it, Press Poodles print it and we can all go on pretending we're not living in a minority-ruled Oligarchy. Or Plutocracy. Or whatever other shitty system that isn't the Representative Democracy this fucking joint's supposed to be, goddammit.

And a solid pat on the shoulder goes to The Sacramento Bee for doing the job of the 4th Estate in pretty good shape this time.

The Barny Frank Handbook

Barny Frank in Policy Mic:

After 32 years in the House of Representatives, here is my advice on how people opposed to President Donald Trump’s assault on our basic values — a majority of those who voted last November — can best influence members of Congress. Done the right way, communications from citizens can have a significant impact on legislators, even when they claim to be immune to “pressure.” (“Pressure,” in legislative jargon, is the expression of views with which legislators disagree, as opposed to “public opinion” — the term used for sentiments that reinforce their own.)

The key to doing it right is being clear about the goal, which is to persuade the Senator or Representative receiving the communication that how he or she votes on the issue in question will affect how the sender will vote the next time the legislator is on the ballot. 

This means the following:

Make sure you’re registered to vote — lawmakers check. 

Many office holders will check this, especially for people who write to them frequently. Elected officials pay as much attention to those who are not registered to vote as butchers do to the food preferences of vegetarians.

Lawmakers don’t care about people outside of their district. 

You can only have an impact on legislators for or against whom you will have a chance to vote the next time they run. In almost all cases, this means only people in whose state or district you live. Senators or representatives whose names will not be on the ballot you cast are immune to your pressure. There is a small set of exceptions — representatives who want to run for a statewide office in the next election will be sensitives of voters throughout their states. 

Your signature — physical or electronic — on a mass petition will mean little.

You are trying to persuade the recipient of your communication that you care enough about an issue for it to motivate your voting behavior. Simply agreeing to put your name on a list does not convey this. I have had several experiences of writing back to the signer of a petition to give my view on an issue only to be answered by someone who wondered why I thought he or she cared. 

The communication must be individual. It can be an email, physical letter, a phone call or an office visit. It need not be elaborate or eloquent — it is an opinion to be counted, not an essay. But it will not have an impact unless it shows some individual initiative.

Know where your representative stands. 

If you have contact with an organization that is working on this issue, try to learn if the recipient of your opinion has taken a position on it. When I received letters from people urging me to vote for a bill of which I was the prominent main sponsor, I was skeptical that the writer would be watching how I voted.

Communicate — even if you and your representative disagree. 

On the other hand, even where you are represented by people whom you know oppose you on an issue, communicate anyway. Legislators do not simply vote yes or no on every issue. If enough people in a legislator’s voting constituency express strong opposition to a measure to which that legislator is ideologically or politically committed, it might lead him or her to ask the relevant leadership not to bring the bill up. Conflict avoidance is a cherished goal of many elected officials.

Say “thank you.” 

Even if your Representative and Senators are committed to your causes, you should write or call to thank them — not frequently, but enough for them to feel reinforced.

Enlist the help of friends in other districts. 

Your direct communication with legislators outside your voting area will have no impact. But you do have friends, relatives, associates etc. Find out who the potentially influenceable legislators are on issues of prime importance to you, think about people you may know in their constituencies, and ask those who share your views to communicate with those who represent them. On an extremely important issue, get out the list to who you mail holidays cards or important invitations and ask them to communicate with their legislators.

To repeat the essence of point 5, if a legislator who you might have expected to vote differently — e.g. a Republican who votes no on a Trump priority — votes as you have urged, send a thank you.

Friday's Podcast

Episode 373 - All This Must End

The Professional Left

be sure to click on the Amazon link

5calls.org

MAKE YOUR VOICE HEARD

Turn your passive participation into active resistance. Facebook likes and Twitter retweets don't create the change you want to see.

Spend 5 minutes, make 5 calls.

There's one simple and straightforward way to influence the Government that is supposed to represent you: Call them on the phone.

Calling is the most effective way to influence your representative. 5 Calls gives you contacts and scripts so calling is quick and easy. We use your location to give you your local representatives so your calls are more impactful.

Want to know more? Read about why calling works or more about us

132,082 calls to date

Those Crafty Gals

Samantha Bee 25Jan2017

First Part:
(I should watch more of the bad shit - I had no idea the Marine Corps Band played the Monte Python theme)

Another Part:
(Don't miss MILCK starting about 4:15)

Trump Is Not Well

It's difficult to accept the validity of a Long-Distance Diagnosis. So even though it seems ridiculously obvious, we've seen this before when (eg) Robert Bork was saying much the same about Bill Clinton in the 90s.

So grains of salt are in order here.  

That said, it's not just a few people running around like their hair's on fire. This is becoming a very strongly-held conviction among observers who're otherwise calm and clear-eyed about such things.

Raw Story (a year ago):

But a lack of empathy is just one part of narcissistic personality disorder. Just beneath the surface layer of overwhelming arrogance lies a delicate self-esteem that is easily injured by any form of criticism. We have all seen Trump unjustifiably lash out at a number of people with harsh and often extremely odd personal attacks. When he thought he had been treated unfairly by Fox News host and Republican debate moderator Megyn Kelly, he responded by calling her a “bimbo” and later saying that she had “blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever.” In response to the strange, misogynistic comments Kelly said that she “may have overestimated his anger management skills.” If the news host would have pegged him as a bona fide narcissist from the beginning she might have expected such shamelessly flagrant behavior.

To be fair, it is certainly true that not all narcissists are terrible people. Some of our most beloved celebrities and musicians have been suspected narcissists, including Elvis Presley, Marlon Brando, Kanye West, and even Alec Baldwin. Not only are these decent people, some have also done a lot of good through philanthropic work. Surely Donald Trump has more in common with these individuals than he does with a psychopath like Saddam Hussein.

There is no doubt that this has been true of the past, yet there is one critical difference between those people and Trump or Saddam. Only the latter two were in or are pursuing positions as heads of state—a role that grants enormous power over world affairs and people’s lives. While a narcissistic personality might be one of the traits that allowed Trump to be such a successful businessman and reality TV star, it is also the trait that makes him potentially dangerous as a political leader.

We were warned. People saw it coming a year ago. And since then, Trump's behavior has done nothing but reinforce the view that the guy is fucking dangerous.

And still, it seems like Congress just sits and dithers away.  I imagine they're all scrambling mightily to wrangle a deal for themselves as they work out the plan to sink Trump, but we need to get to the nut-cuttin' here, guys.

Call 'em and tell 'em. 

The Capitol Switchboard: 202-224-3121

Today's Tweet

It's one big freak show and we're Front-Row-Center

CRAZY SURVEILLANCE VIDEO: Sex store employees fight off armed robber by throwing adult toys at him. @ABC7 at 4pm pic.twitter.com/E8QbuxJkEX

— Rob McMillan (@abc7robmcmillan) December 15, 2016

hat tip = MockPaperScissors

Resist

Robert Reich in AlterNet

As the era of Trump approaches, some of you are succumbing to the following four syndromes:

1. Normalizer Syndrome. You want to believe Trump will be just another president—more conservative and pompous than most, but one who will make rational decisions once in office.

You are under a grave delusion. Trump has a serious personality disorder and will pose a clear and present danger to America and the world.

2. Outrage Numbness Syndrome. You are no longer outraged by what Trump says or what he does—his incessant lies, his cabinet picks, his bullying, his hatefulness—because you’ve gone numb. You can’t conceive that someone like this is becoming president of the United States, so you’ve shut down emotionally. Maybe you’ve even stopped reading the news.

You need to get back in touch with your emotions and reengage with what’s happening.

3. Cynical Syndrome. You’ve become so cynical about the whole system—the Democrats who gave up on the working class and thereby opened the way for Trump, the Republicans who suppressed votes around the country, the media that gave Trump all the free time he wanted, the establishment that rigged the system—that you say the hell with it. Let Trump do his worst. How much worse can it get?

You need to wake up. It can get a lot worse.

4. Helpless Syndrome. You aren’t in denial. You know that nothing about this is normal; you haven’t become numb or stopped reading the news; you haven’t succumbed to cynicism. You desperately want to do something to prevent what’s about to occur.

But you don’t know what to do. You feel utterly powerless and immobilized.

Millions of others feel equally powerless. But taking action—demonstrating, resisting, objecting, demanding, speaking truth, joining with others, making a ruckus, and never ceasing to fight Trump’s pending tyranny—will empower you. And with that power you will not only minimize the damage that is about to occur, but also get this nation and the world back on the course it must be on.

If you find yourself falling into one or more of these syndromes, that’s understandable. Normalizing, numbing, becoming cynical, and feeling powerless are natural human responses to the gross absurdity and genuine peril posed by Trump.

But I urge you to pull yourself out. We need you in the peaceful resistance army, starting January 20.

Call It A Win

She's headed for a jail cell, at least temporarily, but the fact she survived the initial encounter - plus the simple fact there was a good buncha witnesses - just might combine to make it more likely she'll stay alive thru the rest of her ordeal.  

And that could mean that whoever's next stands a tiny bit better chance of being treated a tiny bit better as well.

Watchfulness and locks help honest people stay honest.  Transparency and citizen oversight help good cops stay good.

hat tip = AlterNet

A Giant Killer

Elizabeth Warren continues to be a great example of what political courage looks like; and what happens when somebody who knows a little something about leadership in a representative democracy stands up and speaks the kind of truth that makes oligarchs very uncomfortable.

(Reuters) - Big Wall Street banks are so upset with U.S. Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren's call for them to be broken up that some have discussed withholding campaign donations to Senate Democrats in symbolic protest, sources familiar with the discussions said.

Representatives from Citigroup, JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs and Bank of America, have met to discuss ways to urge Democrats, including Warren and Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown, to soften their party's tone toward Wall Street, sources familiar with the discussions said this week.

Bank officials said the idea of withholding donations was not discussed at a meeting of the four banks in Washington but it has been raised in one-on-one conversations between representatives of some of them. However, there was no agreement on coordinating any action, and each bank is making its own decision, they said.

The amount of money at stake, a maximum of $15,000 per bank, means the gesture is symbolic rather than material.

Moreover, banks' hostility toward Warren, who is not a presidential candidate, will not have a direct impact on the presumed Democratic front runner in the White House race, Hillary Clinton. That's because their fund-raising groups focus on congressional races rather than the presidential election

Still, political strategists say Clinton could struggle to raise money among Wall Street financiers who worry that Democrats are becoming less business friendly.

The bit that I hi-lited in yellow wins this week's Corporate Bullshitter award.  A "cap" of $15,000 is window dressing.  It's "symbolic rather than material"?  Well dip me in shit and call me lonesome - whooda thunk it?  When you threaten to take that away from a candidate, it's a signal - it means you'll (prob'ly) be spending hundreds of times that amount on attack ads and mailings and blowjobs for the pimps at AEI so they'll pop up on DumFux News & Meet The Press Poodles to spout warnings about all the horribleness that's just gotta happen if Bad Ol' Perfesser Egghead won't let the Giant Vampire Squid continue sucking the life out of everything we thought we were all supposed to be working for.

But the red part's the real kicker.  More and more, it's not about who lives in the White House.  It's about who owns the US Senate and the Governors' mansions, and the state legislatures and on down the line.

So we're busy arguing over the Federal-level shit - where we get to have a president and a coupla dozen high-profile Senators and Representatives in order to maintain the illusion of "self-government" (and that's not bound to last much past the next few cycles if things don't change in a big fuckin' hurry) - while the American Aristocracy is even busier puppeteering the rubes into slashing and burning at the state- local- and municipal levels.

And one last item: I know it sounds like I'm railing against all the doom-and-gloom coming from "the right" by railing about doom-and-gloom from what you might see as "the left".  If that's how you hear it, then you've internalized all the Middle-Ground bullshit we hear every day from practically every media outlet everywhere, and you must get the fuck over it.  

The difference is that I'm arguing in favor of the firewalls that have to be in place as a way of preventing the toxic and corrosive effects of having too much power concentrated in too few hands, while the other side is pimping the wholesome goodness of outright authoritarian rule.

Get up on your hind legs and make some noise.

Lend 'Em A Hand

From National Journal:

There will be no "boycott" of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's speech before Congress next month, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said Thursday.

But while she downplayed reports of an organized protest, she suggested some lawmakers might just be too busy to attend. And at least two Democrats have already decided they won't be on hand.

"I don't think anybody should use the word 'boycott,'" Pelosi said in her weekly press conference. "When these heads of state come, people are here doing their work, they're trying to pass legislation, they're meeting with their constituents and the rest. It's not a high-priority item for them."

Pelosi's pretty cagey.  This is a wink-wink-nudge-nudge-say-no-more proposition, and here's what I think we can do to help out:

Call all three of your Congress Critters and insist that you have an urgent matter requiring their attention; that you don't feel comfortable discussing it with a staffer; and that you can only make time for a visit on the exact date and at the exact time of Netan-fuckin'-yahu's address to the joint session.

Most of them will blow you off - Repubs especially have shown a particular affinity for turning their backs on us if there's a good grandstanding opportunity at hand - but we'll be giving the others some cover if they decide to stay away (ie: constituent service is still supposedly a thing).

And here's the plum - by calling the Repubs and giving them a chance to rebuff your requests, you have some nice advertising fodder for the 2016 election cycle.  

Kinda like this: 
"I called [insert Congress Critter's name here] regarding [insert urgent thingie here], but I guess hearing Uncle Bibi's sales pitch about sending more American kids to get all fucked up in some desert shithole was more important to him."

You're welcome.  Limber up, be creative and let the shit fly.

What's Next

A gazillion people turned out in Paris for a rally to show support for Charlie Hebdo, and now the magazine is set to pop their latest edition with this cover art:

Way to go, guys.

From The Guardian:

Zineb El Rhazoui, a surviving columnist at Charlie Hebdo magazine who worked on the new issue, said the cover was a call to forgive the terrorists who murdered her colleagues last week, saying she did not feel hate towards Chérif and Saïd Kouachi despite their deadly attack on the magazine, and urged Muslims to accept humour.

“We don’t feel any hate to them. We know that the struggle is not with them as people, but the struggle is with an ideology,” she told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

The two gunmen who launched the attack on the magazine’s offices last Wednesday killed five of France’s top cartoonists, saying that they wanted to avenge the prophet for Charlie Hebdo’s satire of him.

The grieving journalists who survived the murderous assault promised it would be business as usual at the weekly publication.

--and-- 

Asked to explain the magazine’s front cover, which features a cartoon of a crying Muhammad wearing a “Je suis Charlie” badge under the heading “All is forgiven”, Rhazoui said: “We feel that we have to forgive what happened. I think those who have been killed, if they would have been able to have a coffee today with the terrorists and just talk to ask them why have they done this … We feel at the Charlie Hebdo team that we need to forgive.”

So the exercise for a while will be to find as many Radical Islamist websites as possible (harder than I tho't), and post one of Charlie Hebdo's cartoons in the comments section.  

(Is it weird that Googling "islamist assholes" only gets a list of blogs here in the US where all they ever do is hate on Muslims?  Yeah, OK - I don't think it's weird either.  Just checking.)

Which BTW should remind us that this is about pushing back against a shitty ideology, and not about fucking up the everyday people who get bamboozled (or bullied) into going along with a shitty ideology.

Chris Hedges

People are not moved by fact or reason.  They are moved by skillful manipulation of their emotions.



And so, what is Hedges doing?  
And so, both sides...  
And so, we remain paralyzed.


Manufacturing Consent

Ruby

Ruby --Dion and the Belmonts




Ruby on Tupac

Ruby Dee, 10-27-1922 - 06-11-2014

American actress, poet, playwright, screenwriter, journalist and activist. She is perhaps best known for co-starring in the film A Raisin in the Sun (1961) and the film American Gangster (2007) for which she was nominated for anAcademy Award for Best Supporting Actress. She was the recipient of Grammy, Emmy, Obie, Drama Desk, Screen Actors Guild Award, andScreen Actors Guild Lifetime Achievement Awards as well as the National Medal of Arts and the Kennedy Center Honors. She was married to actor Ossie Davis until his death in 2005. On June 11, 2014, Dee died at her home in New Rochelle, New York.

Dee was born Ruby Ann Wallace in Cleveland, Ohio in 1922,[1] to Gladys Hightower and Marshall Edward Nathaniel Wallace, a cook, waiter and porter. After her mother left the family, Dee's father remarried, to Emma Amelia Benson, a school teacher. [2][3][4][5]

Dee was raised in Harlem, New York.[6] She attended Hunter College High School and went on to graduate from Hunter College with a degree in romance languages in 1945. [7] She was a member of Delta Sigma Theta.[8]

God Love John Oliver

And the response was big enough to crash the server trying to handle the FCC's comments page.

It's up again now.

https://www.fcc.gov/comments

Try to remember that "The Government" is still (tho' sometimes just barely) in charge of some of its own functions; but privatization is a real thing and a real threat to our little experiment in self-governance; and that if we're going to have a real shot at turning back this hostile takeover, we'll have to step out from behind the comfortable illusion of online anonymity.

If you want the power, you have to stand up and take the power.  Nobody's handing it out.

Today's Eternal Sadness

My "Eternal Sadness" posts have always been about people dying because of our incredibly stoopid refusal to rein in the activities of the Ammosexuals among us who can't seem to wean themselves from the NRA's gun porn.

But I think I'll expand the definition a bit, and start including newsy items that indicate to me that there's something really shitty going on - the cause of which we can be pretty sure of - that we prob'ly won't; or can't; or just plain don't, do anything about.

So here's today's fer-instance:

"The rate of earthquakes increased dramatically in March and April," Williams said. "That alerted us to examine this further and put out this advisory statement."

While Oklahoma's buildings can withstand light earthquakes, the damage from a magnitude-5 temblor could be widespread. Oklahoma's last major earthquake was in November 2011, when a magnitude-5.6 earthquake centered near Prague, Oklahoma, destroyed 14 homes and injured at least two people.

"Building owners and government officials should have a special concern for older, unreinforced brick structures, which are vulnerable to serious damage during sufficient shaking," Bill Leith, a USGS senior science adviser for earthquakes and geologic hazards, said in the joint statement.

While scientists haven't ruled out natural causes for the increase, many researchers suspect the deep injection wells used for the disposal of fracking wastewater could be causing the earthquake activity. Fracking, short for hydraulic fracturing, is a method of extracting oil and gas by cracking open underground rock.

Ongoing studies have found a link between Oklahoma's high-volume wastewater injection wells and regions with an uptick in earthquakes.

It doesn't seem to me that it could be much clearer.  Ya start pumping jillions of gallons of waste water into the ground, and fairly soon after that, you get a humongous increase in both the numbers of earthquakes and in the magnitude of those quakes.

I remember a time in the mid-60s when the Army was pumping waste water into at least one deep well under The Rocky Mountain Arsenal near Denver, and gosh, suddenly we were having earthquakes in a region where earthquakes that could actually be felt by normal humans were practically unheard of (kinda like Okla-fuckin'-homa).  They stopped pumping that shit into the ground, and gosh again, no more earthquakes.

The difference now of course is that it's about energy - we can't stop suckin' that fossil tit because we think we're on the verge of dominating the world again - this time with our Exceptionally American Methane Dick and the awesomeness of our trusty sidekick, Canuckistan Tar Sands.

But there's another big difference now as well - we don't believe there's anything we can do about it because Big Energy and their Coin-Operated Politicians are in charge and we got nuthin' to say about nuthin'.

So, a few questions:

With all this nifty new gas and oil hitting the market, when can we expect the gods of the free market to start pushing down on the price?

Since we're prob'ly not going to do anything to stop the waste water disposal; and since we can expect more and bigger earthquakes because of it, who gets to pick up the tab for digging the mangled corpses out of the rubble?  Who gets to pay for rebuilding the towns and the cities?  Who gets to take care of the broken survivors?  Can we count on the oil companies for any of that?

We get to pay for it all - at the pump; on our monthly utilities; tax breaks and straight up subsidies for oil and gas companies; home insurance; disaster relief; and and and.

We pay for it on the front end, and in the middle, and afterwards too.  We also get to pay in terms of blood thru the sacrifice of our friends and family members - not just people in uniform fighting and bleeding and dying in desert shit holes; now we get to watch ordinary people fighting and bleeding and dying here at home as well.

They're demanding my permission to fuck me in the ass; I hafta bring my own lube; and then they expect me to give 'em cab fare home.

No soul and no honor.

It's (Supposed To Be) About Balance

JFK speaking at a meeting of the American Newspaper Publishers Association in 1961:



(hat tip = Democratic Underground)

"Solon decreed it a crime for any man to shrink from controversy" - that bit's pretty good, but beyond that, it seems like this speech is one of those moments in history that lets us see at least the beginnings of a certain unravelling.

He says it straight out - we have to take the right of all citizens to know what their government is up to and weigh it against the need to keep "the enemy" from knowing things we really need them not to know (insert snarky crack about Don Rumsfeld here).

I guess I could spend the next few decades trying to trace thru all the flips and turns of journalism just in the last half of the 20th century, trying to figure out where "it all went wrong".  And while that may be a truly fun ride, I get the feeling it's not as useful right now as figuring out what's been driving the enormous changes we've been seeing.  I'm not just talking about the tech revolution or whatever - I think it has everything to do with the tensions that are always present between What's-Best-For-The-Most vs what's good for a fairly narrow power agenda on the part of almost literally a few very well placed individuals.

Capt Obvious says, "Robbing the house gets a lot easier once you've killed the watch dog.  And if you can get the homeowners to kill their dog for you, well then you're one clever mother fucker, and maybe you deserve all the booty you can carry, and whoa - can I give you a hand?  Some of those pillow cases look pretty heavy."

We've had to fight this fight on several occasions - kinda what got us going in the first place back in the 18th century.  So here we go again.

It's not about pointing and laughing at The Tea Party. Although it's great sport and somebody needs to do that, they're mostly people who're rightly upset, but who're being co-opted and misled.

And it's not about pissing and moaning about how the Dems have also been co-opted and now they're just as bad as the Repubs.

It's not about immigrants or brown people in general, or your upper middle class douche-y Libertarian neighbors or the jag-off at the 7-11 who doesn't seem to care about satisfying your every whim in a humble but joyous way while constantly expressing his gratitude for the opportunity to slowly starve to death on $8.50 an hour.  It's also not about the kid in the do-rag and the baggy pants, and it's not about a whole fuckload of distractions that're easy to say and easy to understand and just as easy to recognize as total crapola once ya spend half a micro-neuron thinking about it.

It's not even about being mad at the right people - or being mad for the right reasons.  It's about figuring out what to do about being mad at the right people for the right reasons.  If I ever figure that one out, I'll be sure to let ya know, but in the mean time, yeah - let's take our country back.  We can start by taking it back from Goldman-Sachs, and from Exxon-Mobil, and from Koch Industries, and from The Walton Gang, and from whoever else wants to rule over us instead of serving beside us.