Just some kid from the Chicago suburbs that moved to the southwest, went to law school, and ended up confronted with shifting ideals. My thoughts...boring and unedited.

Monday, July 28, 2008

Is Obama a Commie?

One would think that the left wing of the democratic party would have no problem with Obama, the "most liberal" senator. Of course, those rankings are completely fucking idiotic...amusing, but completely fucking idiotic. The following is a column by Josh Patashnick of The New Republic.


Taking Liberalties

Why the 'most liberal' rankings are a crock.

Josh Patashnik, The New Republic Published: Monday, July 28, 2008


Is Barack Obama a socialist? Well, let's see. His campaign platform makes no mention of proletarian revolution or nationalization of industry, and he trumpets his belief that "America's free market has been the engine of America's great progress. It's created a prosperity that is the envy of the world." Not quite Leninesque. On the other hand, Tom DeLay has made a logically rigorous counter-argument sure to convince second-graders everywhere: "I have said publicly, and I will again, that unless he proves me wrong, he is a Marxist." No word on whether DeLay proceeded to put his fingers in his ears and hum loudly.

John McCain, for his part, says only that he cannot guarantee that Obama is not a socialist. McCain told a crowd in Kansas City this month, "All I know is his voting record...[which is] more to the left than the announced socialist in the United States Senate, Bernie Sanders of Vermont." Really? No Senate-watcher--or senator--could sincerely believe that Obama is further left than Sanders or other liberal stalwarts like Barbara Boxer and Russ Feingold. And yet McCain seems to have facts on his side: After all, Obama stands atop the National Journal rankings as the most liberal member of the Senate. But that just means that National Journal's much-ballyhooed rankings are deeply flawed.

How did Obama, like John Kerry four years ago, achieve this awkward distinction? There are a few different things going on here. First, Obama missed a lot of votes--a third of the 99 votes National Journal included in its analysis. A large group of liberal Democratic senators is separated by just a few votes, and by missing so many, Obama deprived himself of chances to rack up more "conservative" votes. He didn't take public stances on all the votes he missed, but it's clear there are some where he would have strayed from the liberal line, knocking himself off the "most liberal" perch. He missed the December 4 vote on the free trade agreement with Peru, for instance, but publicly supported it, which would have counted as a "conservative" vote.

National Journal tries to compensate for missed votes, but the reality is that there's just no real way this ranking scheme can ever be accurately applied to senators who miss as many votes as presidential candidates do. The magazine recognizes this, since it declines to rank senators who miss more than half the votes in any of its three major issue areas--economic, foreign, and social policy. McCain, who missed more votes than Obama did, is excluded from the rankings for this reason. (If only Obama had been shrewd enough to skip a few more votes!) But once a senator crosses the 50 percent attendance threshold, he or she is immediately included in the rankings, even though the concerns about accuracy don't magically disappear at that point.

A more serious problem is that National Journal's system imputes ideological content to votes that they don't necessarily have. Each vote is scored as either "liberal" or "conservative," depending on how the majority of each caucus voted. But these categorizations often obscure more than they reveal. Sanders and Boxer, for instance--as well as Hillary Clinton--received credit for a "conservative" vote by opposing a proposal by Joe Lieberman to establish an independent Office of Public Integrity for the Senate. It's true that 21 of the 27 senators who supported the plan were Democrats, but the divide fell less along ideological lines than between good-government reformist types (including Republicans like McCain, Lindsey Graham, and Chuck Grassley) and, well, everybody else. There's nothing inherently liberal about favoring public accountability; one can easily imagine the partisan alignment of senators on this vote being quite different had it been Republicans, rather than Democrats, who had just retaken Congress pledging ethics reforms.

The pattern is the same for other "conservative" votes cast by senators to Obama's left. Sanders's only other "conservative" vote was against cloture on the immigration reform bill in June, which he opposed because he thought business interests were pushing for the bill in order to drive down wages. Two of Russ Feingold's four "conservative" votes were against Democratic bills that would have endorsed a partition of Iraq and limited the mission of U.S. troops there to counterterrorism and training missions. These "conservative" votes, like Sanders's on immigration, came because he was further left than the bulk of the Democratic caucus.

Other votes had less to do with ideology per se than with legislative tactics. Second and third on the list of most liberal senators, respectively, are Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, who cast just two "conservative" votes, and Joe Biden, who, like Obama, cast just one. Both Biden and Whitehouse were credited with a conservative vote for their support for a bill that would have funded non-embryonic stem-cell research. There's no substantive, ideologically liberal objection to such funding, but many Democrats opposed the bill since it was designed in large part to give conservatives cover to vote against funding for embryonic stem-cell research. Whitehouse and Biden supported both types of stem-cell funding. Is there anything conservative about that? Not really. You could just as easily say that Obama should have been credited with a conservative vote, for opposing what he considered to be an unmerited expansion in the size and scope of government.

Perhaps the most nonsensical result produced by National Journal's system is this: Chris Dodd is ranked as the 23rd most liberal senator, despite casting only four "conservative" votes. One was against the Office of Public Integrity bill. Another was against an obscure amendment that, in a similar vein, would have tightened conflict-of-interest rules for individuals serving on FDA advisory panels (Kerry and Ted Kennedy took the "conservative" side with Dodd). The other two were Iraq votes on measures setting withdrawal timelines for American troops, which Dodd, who during the presidential campaign criticized Obama and Hillary Clinton from the left on Iraq, opposed because he wanted an even more aggressive timeline. And because Dodd was absent for so many votes, the impact of these "conservative" votes was magnified--so the very liberal Dodd landed right in the middle of the Democratic pack, despite not casting a single genuinely conservative vote.

So where does Obama really fall on the spectrum? No vote-ranking system can capture it perfectly, since ideology is as much about legislative priorities and emphases as it is about votes. But here's a rough idea: In his first two years in the Senate, when he didn't miss many votes, Obama ranked 16th and 10th on National Journal's "most liberal" list. A separate and more elaborate ranking system, developed by highly regarded political scientists Jeff Lewis and Keith Poole, found him to be the 11th most liberal senator in 2007 and 21st most liberal in the previous Congress. Obama clearly belongs to the party's liberal wing rather than its centrist contingent--he's essentially said as much--but he's not close to being the Senate's left-most member. (The same was true of Kerry, by the way: He's been ranked 20th and 12th in the past two National Journal rankings. In fact, the palpable absurdity of Kerry's "most liberal" ranking led the magazine to alter its methodology. Under current rules, Kerry would have been disqualified in 2004 for missing too many votes--a cold comfort now.)

That reality, of course, won't stop conservatives from trumpeting the "most liberal" label throughout the fall campaign. There's one problem, though: The public already believes Obama is a liberal, and he's winning nonetheless. According to a June Rasmussen poll, 67 percent of the public views Obama as liberal (Pew's numbers, from May, were similar). By contrast, in May 2004, only 45 percent viewed Kerry as liberal, and not until October did that figure crack the 50 percent mark. As Nate Silver has put it, the public's reaction to the charge that Obama is liberal appears to be, "Well, no shit! We're voting for him anyway." When the electoral fundamentals are as favorable to the Democrats as they are in 2008, conservatives have a steep hill to climb. And so they're working to convince the public not just that Obama is an ordinary liberal, but that he's the single most liberal senator in America. National Journal gave them a great gift. It would be a pity if facts got in their way.

so you're gonna save the world? better find out what that means...

Monday, July 21, 2008

rovean media types, selling drugs to the public, and shafted workers...

I made the mistake of attempting to watch meet the press again this week...I didn't make it past the first question posed to gore by brokaw. the question was brilliantly phrased in a way that must have made karl rove beem with pride. brokaw, in an apparent attempt to ask "the hard questions" and find an inner-journalist that no longer exists, posed a question on gore's challenge to go renewable for electricity completely within ten years. only it wasn't really a question - it was a statement, and the message was simple (much like brokaw's buddy peter being worried about his taxes being raised) - you want to raise taxes. it was one of those right-wing-the-answer-doesn't-matter questions because the listener isn't paying attention, all they hear is "raise taxes." and gore didn't call him on it, and this is why the democrats keep fucking losing. they need to call the media on this bullshit...he needed to declare that $300 billion would easily be found in appropriately taxing corporations, closing the loopholes which allow corporations and the uber-rich to avoid paying taxes altogether, and returning the tax structure to the level it was at when this country had an economy and democracy that was actually something to brag about. he needed to slap brokaw for buying into the right-wing talking point machine and declare that the money is there if we just quit giving it away to business. instead, he began to drone on and on and it took him quite some time to tell brokaw that the iraq war has cost much more. I find it insulting as an american that the question insinuated it could not be done...within a few short decades of developing a jet engine we put a fucking man on the moon - and I'm supposed to believe that we can't figure out to efficiently use wind and solar power to turn a light bulb on? liberal media my ass...

why is it that drug companies are allowed to market so heavily to joe public? why are we not gravely concerned that companies spend more money on marketing than they do on research and development? why is it that every other commercial is informing us to ask our doctor if some drug that we aren't even really sure what it does is right for us? isn't it a doctor's fucking job to determine which medicines are right for us - and not some hack of a "marketing" executive? people always like to knock on attorneys because of the few that advertise and seek clients that have been hurt in an accident, etc. we call them ambulance chasers and snicker and sneer at them. but when companies that are providing (or not providing as is increasingly the case) medicine do the same thing - we pump up their stock. this is bullshit and has to stop. but we have to stop complaining about the companies that are using the playing field we have given them to steal from us while they poison us and destroy our society...it is time to change the rules, alter the game so that we can actually stop them from stealing from us, poisoning us and destroying our society.

if the average family income had increased at the same rate as worker productivity over the last few decades, the average american family would be earning $20,000 more a year then it actually is. think about that for a minute...while inflation has gone up (and if you don't know, look into how inflation is determined now - they changed the rules to make it look much lower than it actually is...sneaky bastards - ow, and for all you partisan fucks out there, it was under clinton) and you are producing a shitload more, your pay has gone nowhere. think about it...an extra $20,000 a year for the average family - that is a college education, that is a new car, that is a home without worry about foreclosure, that is a savings for retirement, that is a way to not have to shop at walmart. thank god for the "free" market, without it we might actually have a society worth exporting to the world...

you've been in business for too long...

Thursday, July 17, 2008

The Death of Inspiration...

The following is a column from Nat Hentoff of the Sacramento Bee.

Nat Hentoff: Disillusioned about Barack Obama

By Nat Hentoff -
Published 12:00 am PDT Thursday, July 17, 2008

During my more than 60 years of covering national politics, I have never seen a candidate's principles and character so effectively tarnished — after so extraordinarily inspiring a start — as Barack Obama's. He has come to resemble another mellifluous orator I came to know in Boston during my first time reporting on a campaign — James Michael Curley, the skilful prestidigitator whom Spencer Tracy masterfully played in the movie "The Last Hurrah." Obama's deflation has not been due to ruthless opposition research by John McCain's team but by the "change" candidate himself. Like millions of Americans, I, for a time, was buoyed by not only the real-time prospect of our first black president but much more by the likelihood that Obama would pierce the dense hypocrisy and insatiable power-grabbing of current American politics.

Also, as a former teacher of constitutional law, Obama gave me "hope I could believe in" that he would rescue the Constitution's separation of powers, resuscitate the Bill of Rights and begin to restore our reputation around the world as a truly law-abiding nation.

Savoring the high expectations he had secured among so many Americans, Obama has decided he can also come closer to securing the Oval Office by softening his starlight enough to change some of his principles toward the calming center of our stormy political waters.

In a defense by Dan Gerstein, a New York political consultant — echoing what you'll be hearing more of from Obama's campaign operatives — the gossamer script goes: "He is trying to broaden his appeal to a larger electorate and to be true to this postpartisan, unifying message that he's been campaigning on." But instead of the ennobling clarion trombones of CHANGE we have been promised, this "adjusting" of one's principles has long been the common juggling of our common politicians.

Accordingly, as his presidential campaign gathered such momentum, Obama, with justifiable pride, pointed to the resounding fact that most of the bountiful funds he was raising came from small donors, "the people," not the sort of supporters who move above us in private jet planes.

But after abandoning his pledge to abide by public financing, this apostle of cleansing the political culture is now going after the high rollers. As the July 3 New York Times reported, "Last week, the Obama campaign collected about $5 million at an event featuring celebrities in Los Angeles. The evening began with a dinner at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion for more than 200 people who had contributed $28,500 per couple, or raised $50,000." Then there is the current furor among a rising number of Obama contributors with wallets far below the $50,000-a-pop crowd about his change on the "compromise" FISA Amendments Act of 2008 that passed the House and Senate, and has been signed by the grateful president.

The flimflam candidate had assured his faithful enthusiasts that he would filibuster this bill (which will immunize the telecommunications companies that enabled the president to break the law in his once-secret warrantless wiretapping) that turned our privacy rights upside down and out.

Now, by dismissing the scores of lawsuits against these companies from Americans wanting to know whether they've been ensnared in this giant government-spun Web, the president and such supporters as Obama will have made it close to impossible to conduct meaningful investigations of the intricate nexus of the ways these telecommunications giants can collect leads to Americans with no connections to terrorism — and could continue to so long as they're assured by a future lawless administration that national security demands breaking another law.

But what could be wrong with a new Obama approach, to assert his religious faith by, if elected, expanding the government funding of faith-based social services through churches and other religious institutions? The former constitutional law professor does avoid one separation-of-church-and-state problem by pledging that the recipients of these taxpayer funds could not engage in hiring discrimination on the basis of an employee's religion, thereby not limiting those hired to that particular faith.

However, I expect professor Obama knows of the importance in constitutional case law of the need to avoid excessive entanglements of the state with religious institutions. To prevent churches and other religious groups that get government funds from both discrimination in their employment practices, and from proselytizing with taxpayers' money, will require careful and extensive monitoring by the state.

Says the Rev. Dr. C. Welton Gaddy, a Baptist minister and president of the Interfaith Alliance, in the July 4 Jewish Week: "You can say none of this money should be used for proselytizing or that there shouldn't be discrimination, but what does that mean for the little storefront agency, where there can be a subtle or even more blatant form of discrimination, and where proselytizing does occur?" And not just storefront recipients.

But Obama insists this program will be the "moral center" of his administration. Just where is his own center of credibility? I remember the surge of hope for a national change as a child, during the Great Depression, when, while my mother would walk blocks to save a few cents on food, there came Franklin Delano Roosevelt! I haven't seen such a surge since Obama's first chorus, but I can no longer believe in this messenger of such tidings.

spiritual pollution...

yesterday I had a handful of discussions concerning what I see as obama's idiocy as of late in running the campaign that lost the democrats two important elections (and should have prevented clinton from ever getting to the white house). and now my head is spinning with rage-ahol and random thoughts that need to be emptied...

read an interesting column in a crap local chicago paper about josh hamilton's rise from the living dead...and it finally said what his story should tell us all (for those of you that don't know, he was destined to be a baseball god, only to throw it all away on booze and drugs, only to emerge from addiction purgatory to become a baseball god) - why do we throw away those that suffer from addiction? if they can hit a baseball a mile we will patiently wait for them to figure it out and fix themselves...if they might be "only" the next great mind or mother theresa, then we say fuck 'em and let them rot in jail...utter brilliance...

if obama continues running the campaign he has recently, he will lose the midwest...place your bets now...

which is one of the things that came up in discussion yesterday...contrary to popular belief, the midwest was only the house of the progressive movement because the economy was falling apart and leaving joe middle america out. get out of chicago and you have, for the most part, a very conservative electorate in most other cases. but they have always been willing to come around for progressive causes when the front-running theme is economic populism. it is why feingold and brown can win in places like wisconsin and ohio...and it is why obama will lose if he continues to shrug off his attacks on free market idiocy as "overheated rhetoric"...

this year could be it - the people, right and left, will embrace an us vs. them theme come election time...the only question is will the democrats finally get it right and make the "us" be average working people and the "them" the filthy rich and global corporations that have been bleeding us dry? or will they follow the same bullshit script that has been losing for decades and agree with mccain that the "us" is america and the "them" are crazed foreigners?

for fuck's sake...why is it so hard for them to see they need to stop playing the game on the far-right's field? if there is one simply lesson that should have been learned from the radical right's rise to power it is this - ideology matters. run ideologues and give them a theme and the people will come. make the theme economic issues from a progressive slant - and you will own the electorate in this climate. ignore the progressive economic view and you leave the public with to decide on bullshit that doesn't have much effect - and you lose on "cultural" issues in places like the midwest, where you should be cleaning up.

but then when you have the exact same people running the exact same campaign year after year after year. and in the meantime, while the republicans have used primaries to solidify their politicians behind a hard-right ideology, the democrats have continuously run around without a progressive theme - instead running on the "we're not really liberal" platform...

and that is the message that I am taking from obama's actions since securing the nomination - that it isn't ok to be an actual human being.

the democratic leadership is meeting with corporate leaders...they want corporate big whigs to know that they can work together...things that make you go hmmmm...

the senate did a study...turns out insanely rich americans are avoiding approximately $100 billion in taxes by using overseas tax havens. good thing we gave them huge tax breaks...

just once, I would like to hear a democratic leader with some balls tell us that it is too late for too little of a trickle down and that we need to blow the dam and bring the whole damn river down...

I guarantee that leader would be the most popular politician in america...

when it comes to environmental issues, I am beginning to agree that the "latte-sipping liberals" are out of touch...the vast majority of average people want to protect the environment and understand the benefits for everyone from doing so. unfortunately, right now the vast majority of average people are having to choose between gas to get to work and groceries or medicine. and so some of my well-meaning friends are appalled that the american people would support off-shore drilling when they are desperate for anything to help them deal with the fast rising cost of living...because the same people that have been calling for taxing gas heavily are those that usually can afford it...

but this is an issue that the left could grab, if they had any fucking brains (collectively). you want offshore drilling to combat the cost of gas? sure thing. but here's the catch, this time we are actually going to let you, the american people, own what is rightfully yours. instead of paying Big Oil to take your oil from your backyard and sell it at inflated prices on the world market, we are going to let you take it out of your own backyard and dump it straight into diffusing the cost of oil in this country...

look...all I'm saying is that the two biggest issues in which the american people overwhelming disagree with mccain and republicans on are the trend in economics towards "free" trade and deregulation and the war in iraq. obama is now taking the token democrat path and moving towards the republicans on the two issues that screaming a progressive message from the rooftops would assure victory on. bloody fucking brilliant strategy.

take a page from the roosevelts...when times get tough for people, give them an outlet for their anger and frustration and channel it into progressive politics through economic populism. its a tried and true method to bring folks to the liberal cause...go back to it.

I don't wanna know anything about the mixed up tales that you're shouting about...

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

another lesson in how to lose an election, corporate entitlement, and the death of tabloids...

obama's numbers, in a year tailor-made for a progressive voice, are eerily similar to those of kerry's four years ago. how can it be that in an environment where having (R) after your name seems to automatically drop you ten points the supposed savior of the democratic party has a virtually insignificant advantage over a man running as a Big R Republican? apparently everyone in the obama campaign has forgotten two simple lessons of history - number one (which still amazing me when democrats are blind to this one), people really don't want a nixon republican posing as a democrat...they'd rather have the reagan republican proudly posing as a republican. especially people like myself and the far-too numerous other young, disenchanted and "independent" voters...we, unlike the drones on the right, will not be taken for granted. gore found out the hard way...kerry found out the hard way...hell, clinton would've found out the hard way were it not for a little elfish looking libertarian businessman that crushed bush sr.'s hopes of a repeat four years. (yes, for all you bitching about how nader ruined the 2000 election for al gore...remember that al gore wouldn't have been in a position to run the second worst campaign in history - first until kerry's 2004 campaign - were it not for the dreaded third party spoiler on the right eight years earlier...you didn't have a problem with it then now did you?) and now, in quite possibly the absolute high point of political idiocy, obama is shifting hard right and calling his populist talk "overheated rhetoric". not only is he not inspiring to us anymore...but he doesn't sound inspiring anymore...he sounds like just another clinton-esque shitbag. and that is why, in a year and a political landscape when the obama of a few months ago would be opening up a 15 point advantage, the clinton obama is barely clinging to a lead in the polls. speaking as a ex-pat midwesterner...if you continue on this path, you are doomed in the region obama. your apparent desire to sacrifice everything for victory will prove all for naught when the one thing that assured you victory in the first place was your apparent willingness not to sacrifice the american people for political gain. NAFTA and its counterparts are wrong - cultural conservatives in the formerly industrial midwest know this...and by abandoning the economic populist ties that brought them to you, you will lose them. the war in iraq was a mistake and continues to be a disaster in more ways than the media's love affair with you and mccain will let us know - the american people have been telling washington this for years and sent you and your jackass friends there two years ago to end it...by abandoning that promise, you will lose them. no american likes the government to invade their privacy by reading their mail, listening into their phone calls, checking their banking records, and god knows what else - the southern libertarian belt is pissed off at the expansive government intrusions into their civil liberties, along with the far left and the middle...and by selling them out to corporate america, you will lose them. stop running the token democratic campaign...if you are doing it to win, you are very, very, very wrong. if you are doing it because you believe it...then you are just a shitbag and deserve to be tossed into the scrapheap with the rest of the useless class of fuckheads that have thrown us under the bus for decades. either way...my feeling at the moment can be summed up as such - fuck you.

banks are failing due to moronic risks and your tax dollars are going to step in and save the day. whatever happened to the importance of personal responsibility? granted, if someone were to tell me that if I took ridiculous and boneheaded financial risks I could keep the profits in the miniscule chance that it worked, but if it did not the government would pay it all off anyhow, I would've gone for it too. don't get me wrong, I am not against (in theory) the government saving industries that may need it (although the key word should be "industry" and not financial institution). there needs to be some sort of fall back to promote risks that very well may work to the benefit of society. the same is true for the individual entrepreneur...if we establish and stregthen the social safety net there is greater incentive for individuals to take the risks necessary in starting up new ventures. why is it that with corporate america we agree to raise the safety net with tax dollars, but with actual living, breathing human beings we rip it out and "reform" bankruptcy so that it is no help whatsoever to the average person? something is very, very wrong with this system...

turns out jon benet was not murdered by her parents. after all these years, DNA tests showed they didn't do it. at least they got an "oops, our bad, sorry" from law enforcement...because after having your little girl brutally murdered and law enforcement deciding you did it and trying in vain to find a way to pin it to you everything is much better if you get an "I'm sorry" in the end. at least the tabloids will be hurting for stories again now...back to batboy and satan's head in clouds. god help us all...

when there's nothing left to burn you have to set yourself on fire...

Monday, July 14, 2008

he’s got mental problems and freedom of speech is a bitch...

ever since all the hoopla over wes clark's legitimate question as to how exactly mccain getting shot down over vietnam and sitting in captivity means he would be qualified to be commander in chief I've been wondering why I am not hearing anything about the obvious problems with putting someone that suffered as a POW into the white house. we all are well aware that mccain has some mental issues - after ditching the wife that waited and raised his children while he was in a prisoner camp (granted she got chunky and disabled, and what self-respecting soldier wouldn't leave a fat cripple? especially one destined to drive the "straight talk express" when there is a pretty insanely rich girl with political connections waiting in the wings) he went on to berate the new wife (who sadly has been relegated to virtual arm candy status thanks to our media's love of over-simplification) in an alarming display of an underlying violent temper. we all are aware that spending years in captivity in the hellhole that was vietcong prisoner camps can seriously damage a person's pysche...hell a few months in solitary confinement can permanently and severely damage the mind of our prisoners in this country (and the deplorable conditions in our prisons is an entirely other topic worth exploring). so how has this not become an issue to consider? hell, the press fell all over themselves to annoint the boy king because you could sit down at the bar with him and have a beer (followed by a few shots and a few lines)...and we are told over and over and over that character counts and that the white house is not for the unstable. so why are we not questioning whether a man with obvious mental problems, albeit entirely understandable, should really be at the helm of the nation and the jaugernat that is the american military? is it because we have really become that militaristic of a country that an unstable but "tough" hawk has become our ideal leader? either way, here's a big thank you to the ever-vigilant american media for addressing things that matter...

obama and a whole bunch of others are up in arms over the new yorker cover for next week in which obama is in traditional arabic garb (since he is a muslim and all) and his wife has a big afro and an AK as an american flag sits in the burning fireplace behind them. the artist and the magazine say the picture mocks the ridiculous ignorance that is flying around the internet claiming obama is a muslim (and the fact that so many people not only find that to be true, but that they find it to matter at all is pretty fucking alarming), his wife is a bring-down-the-man-gun-toating-foxy-brown character, and the two of them are vehemently unpatriotic (because we all know, that true patriots put yellow ribbon magnets on their SUVs and tiny american flag pins on their lapels - nevermind that wearing the likeness of the american flag in such a manner is demeaning to the flag). and you know what...they are right. the cartoon is amusing and accomplishes exactly what it sets out to do (keep in mind it is the cover of the fucking new yorker...not exactly known to be widely read by the same crowd that is forwarding the manchurian candidate emails to your inbox). and even if not, even if it is "tasteless and offensive"...fuck them. freedom of speech is a bitch when it actually involves some sort of speech and not just throwing money into your campaign coffer isn't it. deal with it. brush it off and move on. of course this will be just another opportunity for the media to ignore what matters and give us two weeks of a "story" that has nothing to do with shit and will only accomplish one thing - the new yorker will sell. and kudos to them for that...

streets like a jungle, so call the police...

Wednesday, July 09, 2008

Open thank you letter to Mr. Obama...

Dear Mr. Obama:

I would like to take this opportunity to thank you from the very bottom of my heart. You see, years ago as I first became of voting age I noticed something about the two major political parties in this country that turned me off to the Democratic Party. Throughout the Clinton years I very clearly became to understand the most basic tenant of our party system, as far as Joe America was concerned, at least the Republicans stuck to their guns, at least they were the party of rich white men that did much less to hide that they were the party of rich white men. In a very odd way, Joe America could respect that, he could punch the ticket for the elephant because the elephant was principled - it may not be all the right principles, but at least the elephant stood for something. And so I have gone through my adult life shunning the Democratic Party for largely this reason. I, like many others, do not appreciate being lied to (as the Republican Party is now beginning to learn). I, like many others, realized that when the choice is between an elephant and a donkey that is wearing floppy ears and a false trunk, Joe America will take the real elephant...every time.

And then something happened. A politician from my home burst onto the national scene with charisma and principled discussion that Americans could identify with, regardless of which side of the isle they found themselves on. Finally, for the first time in my life, that politician with real national sway was a progressive voice. It seemed, that despite themselves, Democrats may have learned a valuable lesson about America - give the better angels of her nature a voice and she will follow its lead to the ends of the earth.

So I pulled myself back into the fray and began to believe that maybe I was wrong, maybe it was not too late to salvage the promise that America once offered the world. I began to wonder if we could rejoin the march towards freedom and prosperity, towards liberty and fairness, towards equality and justice. I began to truly believe that all we needed was someone that was not from the Washington mold, someone that was not ashamed to stand for the true America, a leader that provided the national outlet for real America. I even believed we may have found that leader in you Mr. Obama. Although I did not fully agree with your stances, I understood that there are times when a single person fronting a larger movement can have a profound impact on the world. I remembered that throughout history, Washington has been righted despite its best efforts thanks to a united and aroused citizenry and the man it has deemed acceptable to further its pursuit of securing life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all. Finally, I truly believed that American political culture could be altered before it was too late. I allowed myself to believe that at the very moment Lady Liberty stood at the edge and the nation's leaders were pushing her off, the American people could swoop in and pull her back.

I watched, worked and gave as you fought off another symbol of the follow the polls "leadership" offered by the Democratic Party throughout my lifetime, the same "leadership" that led me to vow never to give it my acquiesence with a vote. I celebrated when it became clear you would get the chance to be the frontman for that change, and I celebrated when it became official.

Which is why I am so grateful for your words and actions over the last few weeks. Just as I believed that it was possible to have a strong presence that could make us believe again, someone that could do for true Americanism what Reagan had done to dismantle it, you made it a point to abuse myself and countless others like me of that ridiculous notion by reminding us that the American political system and culture is beyond repair. Rather than believing the Bill of Rights could be salvaged and reconstructed, I now remember that state-sanctioned murder is to be applauded and illegal spying on American citizens should be, not only condoned, but celebrated. I remember that it actually is too much to ask that a politician in this landscape stand by positions that may be difficult to hold in the face of a media that always has its own bottom line at heart. I remember that it actually is too much to ask for a politician to stand up for civil liberties and to fight for those that cannot fight for themselves in the face of corporate dollars and Zogby polls.

And for that Mr. Obama, I give you my deepest gratitude. Were it not for you abandoning all that made your campaign worth supporting, I may at this very point continue to live under the deluded misapprehension that it was not too late. Now, I will always remember that those who cannot fight for themselves will eventually find a way to do so. In the meantime, thank you for reminding me to just enjoy the ride.

Your former supporter,

Mr. Colin Zeal, Esq.

Tuesday, July 08, 2008

pledging to dump it in another generation’s lap, free "speech" and stop not asking...

in a move that surprised peoples across the globe, the "Group of 8" - everyone's favorite economic superheroes - got together (including the boy king) and made a promise that will save the world for future generations. that's right - they agreed not to hold themselves to an agreement to maybe cut greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2050 and to not agree on which half they were talking about. pundits are pointing out that it is great step forward by world leaders in agreeing to sort of try, but not necessarily promise to do anything, to make a difference in a growing problem. in a world with increased natural disasters of alarming strength and regularity, where mother nature is pimp-slapping the human race every chance she gets for taking what is rightfully hers, eight of the most powerful men in the world agreed to make it the next few generations problems. the classic "I will be dead so why the fuck should I care" move which has been ever so popular from the "free" market crowd. by 2050, when we all are getting cancer by age 40 and our lungs are black by age 5 and our skin is literally melting in the sun while those of us that are lucky enough die in a natural disaster while those of us that aren't simply starve to death, at least we know that this generation of leaders will have pledged to not promise to do a damn thing about it. can you imagine if regular ass people got away with this? its like you going down to the bank and telling them you know they are concerned that you are not paying your mortgage and destroying the home, but not to worry, because by the time you have been dead for 30 years you pledge to not promise to pay half of it back. why can't mother nature ever manage to hit their uppity resorts?

our system is broken...we all know this. there are many causes, the vast majority of which are intertwined. but there are a few simple steps we might take that would make a big difference and allow us to actually address others...one of them is by limiting free "speech" protections to actual speech. I know this may seem utterly insane to those of us bred in a culture of corporations being "people" with all the protections of human beings but none of the responsibilities of human beings and where the pursuit of money is a moral obligation...but what if to earn the protection of the freedom of speech you actually had to use words? try to forget for a moment, if you can, how the world would suddenly implode on itself, and imagine a world where the act of giving money was not speech. now imagine a political process where you had to actually use words if you wanted to influence it rather than pouring money into coffers....and now you are beginning to see a better country and a better world. one where you and I matter, one where one person - one vote means something and is not drowned by the one dollar - one representative theory of modern american capitalism. and now that you have seen the light, it may be best to drink yourself into oblivion to forget the image...because otherwise you will spend many evenings watching newscasts in horror (trust me on this one)...

hold the presses - a new study shows what the brits and the israelis figured out years ago...openly gay people in the military does not undermine the "fighting spirit" of forces. of course some are still claiming that having a poop-chute poker in the foxhole next to you will "undermine trust" - because we all know that when the bullets start flying you can trust a trained killer to have your back as long as the anus he likes to put his penis into is accompanied by the vagina of an underage asian girl, but you cannot trust him if it happens to be accompanied by the penis of a person he is in a committed relationship of years with. this coming from folks in the same organization that send known crack and herione addicts back into warzones. but in a reminder that by and large our military is filled with more than a few good (wo)men, Air Force Lt. Gen. Robert Minter Alexander, a member of the original "don't ask, don't tell" panel realizes the ludicruous nature of assuming that our soldiers cannot get along with each other because of something so not-even-tangential to combat and Navy Vice Adm. Jack Shanahan told it like it is - that making sexual orientation an issue in the military means the armed forces cannot focus on the task at hand - "everyone was living a big lie -- the homosexuals were trying to hide their sexual orientation and the commanders were looking the other way because they didn't want to disrupt operations by trying to enforce the law." and don't forget..."don't ask, don't tell" was one of the wonderful things clinton gave us while he could have been focusing on providing you with health care.

my dick's bigger, that you'll see by the size of my artillery...

Monday, July 07, 2008

it doesn’t have to be this way...

I've been in hiding...as the world continued to crumble around us I got sick of talking. as always...I've come out of it...

this morning I was unfortunate enough to catch some very bad morning television (my laziness kept me from plugging in my music as the remote for the television required much less work). the wonders of digital television meant that only one station was working this morning and I was stuck with the daily buzz. I used to think that show was a rather pathetic representation of our morning shows - but this morning I realized it is actually a fantastic representation of our pathetic morning shows. devoid of substance or real news with a few "pretty" faces and a right-wing asshole talking over women. sounds like the american media to me...

they were discussing the closing of 600 starbucks nationwide and the crew seemed concerned that americans might take some joy in the return of normalcy when a big corporation takes a bit of a hit. (I myself am torn on starbucks...they are good to their employees, but bad for the world overall). they cried about the 12,000 jobs that would be lost and the right-wing asshole actually said that the mom and pop coffee shops owe everything to starbucks. that's right folks...thank god for starbucks and walmart, because without them your local economy would be in ruins.

but these huge corporations move in and claim to bring "jobs" to an area...only they forget to tell us that with the handful of jobs they bring comes misery. way more jobs are lost as local business are forced to shutter their doors because they can't compete with a gigantic company with one concern and one concern only - profit. so lots of good local jobs disappear...and lots of local money is sucked out of town to corporate headquarters. and our towns die because of it.

I just learned that walmart is coming to truth or consequences (yes, the town actually named itself after the show...and regardless of how ridiculous that may be, it does not call for death by walmart). and so another small town in america will meet its demise. local shops that have been run by the same family for decades will be forced out. locals will be lose their jobs and be forced to go work for union-busting walmart for less-than-living wages. and then they will no longer be able to afford to shop at any of the other local shops or eat at the local mom and pop restaurants - and they will only be able to afford to buy cheap crap made with slave labor and eat at the mcdonalds in the food court. and the town will crumble...and we will applaud walmart for its stock prices.

don't get me wrong, walmart is not the sickness - it is a symptom. and until we recognize that, we will not be able to change it. the world was not meant to be this way...run by huge faceless corporations with no concern for anything but the bottom line. capitalism was not meant to be this way...even adam smith warned us that if we were not careful, the balance would shift and the system would produce unfair and inhumane results.

obama has lost my vote. his clinton-esque positions have exposed him as just another fraud. the only change he will bring is that a black man will be making the decisions that fuck the american people and the world. and sadly...that is actually progress.

anyone else pissed off that they were not born in another generation? it is fascinating to watch a society dismantle itself...but I'd much rather be watching from my armchair while living off my good pension and my nice health care. instead, I'm working my ass off to pay for the piece of paper on the wall (which I will be doing for a good 20 more years) and shipping a quarter of my income to taxes...

and what do I get for my taxes? not a damn thing. roads are crumbling, bridges collapsing. courts no longer upholding the rule of law. the commons being looted, redwoods cut, air polluted. and on top of it all, I have to pay even more for health insurance, fuel, groceries, etc. thank god for the "free" market...because without it I might actually be able to afford a simple life.

I find it sadly amusing that conservatives convinced people not to back universal health care because they claimed it would limit their choice in doctors. only now we are all stuck with highly restrictive private health insurance that, you guessed it, limits our choice in doctors. meanwhile, across the border our canadian friends can see whatever fucking doctor they choose...

as the rest of the world is starting to wise up and nationalize resources (namely oil), what is the response of our leaders? open up our commons to drilling by private companies to dump oil on to the global market to compete with nationalized oil companies...thereby lowering the cost of fuel by a penny. if they were serious about helping defray the cost of fuel in this nation they would not allow Big Oil to take your oil and then sell it back at global prices - the only result of which will be to line the pockets of Big Oil a little more before they move into the next area of fuel which they can milk you for. but then they aren't ever serious about helping humans...only corporations.

as nbc buys the weather channel, I am again horrified at how our airwaves were auctioned off to the highest bidder. thanks to "increased competition" we now have about three choices for news and entertainment - none of which offer anything of substance. the dumbing down of america...makes for big dividends...

so does the criminalizing of america. as the economy crumbles thanks to the "economics" of friedmanite fools like reagan, clinton, bush (and now obama) the one way you can still make a living is to build a prison. we house a greater percentage of our population in prisons than anyone...and its only going to get worse.

oddly enough, the appellate courts are always loath to uphold a sentence that a lower court fashioned that was lower than the federal guidelines. yet they have no problem with sentences that are eight years longer than those proposed by the federal guidelines...

and we all buy into it with the bullshit macho attitude of fuckheads like bush...who should have been in prison thanks to his addiction to alcohol and hard drugs. but thanks to his rich and connected daddy he managed to become president...

because nothing says self-reliance like living off your parents.

there was a time when american patriots were celebrated for standing up to a government that put global corporations above people...today we would marginalize and mock them.

words will lose their meaning...