Anyone who thinks they have all the Answers before they've even heard the Question - is Dangerously Deluded! Real Truth Requires Vigilance, Perseverance and Courage, regardless of Party and who wields Power. Left, Right, Center, Corporations, Government, Unions, Criminals or the Indifferent.
This secular value system is also reflected in the ’sexual revolution,’ which is the driving force behind the push for ‘gay marriage;’ and the Iowa Supreme Court decision is another indication that despite all the damage this revolution has caused to children, adults, family life and society (think abortion, divorce, pornography, rape, sexual abuse of children, sexually transmitted diseases, trafficking in women and children, unwed teen mothers and more), it continues to advance relentlessly.
It most certainly is not my intention to blame the epidemic of mass murders on the gay rights movement! It is my intention to point out that the success of the sexual revolution is inversely proportional to the decline in morality; and it is the decline of morality (and the faith that so often under girds it) that is the underlying cause of our modern day epidemic of mass murders.
Ok, sure he's not blaming The Gheys!, He's - uh - just blaming all the murder on the SEX! (And those morally bankrupt Gheys who keep trying to not "live in sin" anymore by getting Legit!) Yeah, because we've never in history had people of faith go on a mad rampage and cause mass murder - not in the Crusades, not during the Inquisition, not in Somalia, Ruwanda, Northern Ireland, Waco, Jonestown, Fallujah or Bosnia - no, no no - that could never happen!
But our winner, Harold Hill again. It‘s about his continuing attempt to disassociate himself and his inflammatory paranoia about an attack on the Second Amendment, an infringement of gun rights and the need to take your government back from an duly elected president, from a man shooting and killing three policemen in Pittsburgh, because he was afraid of, quote, the Obama gun ban that is on the way.
But now there has bee located criticism so clear, so pertinent that it is unanswerable. A conservative TV host warning that video games and television have a direct cause-and-effect relationship with violence and murder and even the murder of policemen. About the game Grand Theft Auto, this man said “we are training our kids to be killers. If you think that video games are just harmless fun, which everybody always says, you should know that the military, our leaders at the Pentagon, have never seen it that way.”
Who made that pithy observation? The same man who, last May 1st, described what one character in Grand Theft Auto and the people playing the game as him could do.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GLENN BECK, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: When a police officer comes after him, he can either light that police officer on fire or cut him in half with a chain saw. This is entertainment?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
OLBERMANN: Oh, hypocrisy and self-absorbed righteousness in unparalleled purity. But it gets better. According to Beck 2008, and no doubt to the surprise of Beck 2009, it is not just video games that can lead to murder.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BECK: According to the journal of American Medical Association just television, the introduction of television in the 1950s caused a doubling of the homicide rate in America.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
OLBERMANN: So video game can cause people to try to kill police, and television caused the doubling of the homicide rate. But Glenn Beck reducing the complexities of the world to the level of a video game for his television viewers, and telling them they need to rise up and take back their country before the government takes their guns, that couldn‘t possibly have anything to do with one of those viewers rising up to take back his country before the government takes his guns.
Glenn Beck, accessory, today‘s worst person in the world.
Now I almost sympathise with Beck for people accusing him of advocating Murder or attacking Police - which in plain fact he didn't do - and his current statements that "only the crazy nutball" is responsible for his own actions" because he's got a point about that. It's nice to hear him talk about how people need to work within our democratic framework, and not necessarily become violent. It's a little damn LATE - sometimes you do have to mention the obvious in the midst of calling our Democratically elected President a TYRANT, FASCIST or TOTALITARIAN - and therefore hardly anyone whose been listening to him for the last few months honestly believes it, but it's nice to hear.
However. when it came to Video games, or "TV" in general - he did seem to have a different opinion - that violent imagery and concepts have an impact on people - and NOT JUST THE NUTBALLS.
It's hard to put into words how GORGEOUS this is to hear, but what's even better is watching Rush's pained expressions as he gets pummeled for his support of Bush's Torture Policy by a Republican who voted for McCain who also happens to be a Vet from both the Marines and the Army.
Full Transcript of call
LIMBAUGH: We're going to go to Chicago. This is Charles. Charles, thank you for waiting and for calling. Great to have you here. Hello.
CALLER: Thanks, Rush. Rush, listen, I voted Republican, and I didn't -- really didn't want to see Obama get in office. But, you know, Rush, you're one reason to blame for this election, for the Republicans losing.
First of all, you kept harping about voting for Hillary. The second big issue is the -- was the torture issue. I'm a veteran. We're not supposed to be torturing these people. This is not Nazi Germany, Red China, or North Korea. There's other ways of interrogating people, and you kept harping about it -- "It's OK," or "It's not really torture." And it was just more than waterboarding. Some of these prisoners were killed under torture.
And it just -- it was crazy for you to keep going on and on like Levin and Hannity and Hewitt. It's like you're all brainwashed.
And my last comment is, no matter what Obama does, you will still criticize him because I believe you're brainwashed. You're just -- and I hate to say it -- but I think you're a brainwashed Nazi. Anyone who could believe in torture just has got to be - there's got to be something wrong with them.
LIMBAUGH: You know --
CALLER: And I know Bush wanted to keep us safe and all of that, but we're not supposed to be torturing these people.
LIMBAUGH: Charles, if anybody is admitting that they're brainwashed it would be you.
CALLER: No, no, no, Rush. I don't think so.
LIMBAUGH: Charles. Charles, Charles --
CALLER: You, Hannity, Hewitt, and Levin are all brainwashed and you know it.
LIMBAUGH: -- you said -- you said at the beginning of your phone call --
CALLER: Yeah.
LIMBAUGH: -- that you didn't want Obama in there --
CALLER: That's right.
LIMBAUGH: -- but you voted for him because of me.
CALLER: I didn't vote for him. I voted for McCain. I voted Republican.
LIMBAUGH: Oh, so --
CALLER: I voted Republican.
LIMBAUGH: -- you're saying I turned people off to --
CALLER: You turned people off with all your -- all this "vote for Hillary" and all this BS, because you must think people are really stupid.
LIMBAUGH: That was Operation Chaos. That was to keep the --
CALLER: You -- no. It didn't work.
LIMBAUGH: -- chaos in the [unintelligible] of the Democrat primaries.
CALLER: It didn't work. And now what we have with you Hannity, Levin, and Hewitt: sour grapes. That's all we have. And believe me, I'm not -- I'm more to the right than I am to the left.
LIMBAUGH: Oh, of course, you are.
CALLER: I am, and that's --
LIMBAUGH: Of course, you are. You wouldn't be calling here with all these sour grapes if you weren't.
CALLER: Well, I'm so tired of listening to you --
LIMBAUGH: Oh, of course, you are.
CALLER: -- go on and on with this -- you've been brainwashed.
LIMBAUGH: I don't know of anybody who died from torture. I do not ever --
CALLER: We are not supposed to torture people.
LIMBAUGH: I do not ever --
CALLER: Do you remember World War II, the Nazis? The Nuremberg Trials?
LIMBAUGH: I --
CALLER: Do you remember the Nuremberg Trials?
LIMBAUGH: Charles --
CALLER: Klaus Barbie?
LIMBAUGH: Charles, let me say --
CALLER: Huh?
LIMBAUGH: Barack Obama --
CALLER: What's the matter with you?
LIMBAUGH: Barack --
CALLER: You never even served in a military.
LIMBAUGH: Barack Obama is --
CALLER: I served in the Marine Corps and the Army.
LIMBAUGH: Charles, Barack Obama is president of the United States today because of stupid, ignorant people who think like you do. You pose -- you and your ignorance are the most expensive commodity this country has. You think you know everything. You don't know diddly-squat.
You call me a Nazi? You call me somebody who supports torture and you want credibility on this program? You know, you're just plain embarrassing and ludicrous. But it doesn't surprise me that you're the kind of Republican that our last candidate attracted. Because you're no Republican at all based on what the hell you've said here.
Just for the record there's plenty of evidence of people being tortured to death by U.S. Forces.
Newly declassified Defense Department documents describe a pattern of “abusive” behavior by U.S. military interrogators that appears to have caused the deaths of several suspected terrorists imprisoned at a detention center in Afghanistan in December 2002, just two days after former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld authorized the use of "enhanced interrogation" techniques against prisoners in that country.
The previously secret pages were part of a wide-ranging report into detainee abuse in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay known as the Church Report, named after Vice Admiral Albert T. Church, the former Naval inspector general, who conducted the investigation at the request of Rumsfeld. That report, released in March 2004, said there was "no policy that condoned or authorized either abuse or torture," which critics of the Bush administration believed was a cover-up.
But the declassified Pentagon documents, coupled with a report issued last December by the Senate Armed Services Committee, tell a different story and lend credence to claims by civil libertarians and critics of former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld that refusal to release a fully classified version of the Church Report several years ago amounted to a cover-up.
Yes, we - the U.S. - tortured people TO DEATH.
Don't worry folks, this isn't the last we've heard of this - Limbaugh will probably spend all day tomorrow trying to re-habilitate himself after this one. Just Watch.
Last night John Stewart produced a tour de force on those - Hannity, Beck, Bachmann and Limbaugh - who've decided to make a carreer of Speaking Crazy to Power.
Stewart: Tyranny? Tyranny?! Listen, you're in the minority now - it's supposed to taste like a shit taco! I recall that when you guy was in power we were asked "Why do you hate America? Love it or Leave it! Sit down and take it! Suck on my Truck Nuts." It's only been 10 Weeks, you guys have a mid-term election in 20 months - you need to learn how to Pace Your Rage!
Yeah, we should know - I'm still using drano flavored mouthwash after 8 years of Bush.
So I'm on Twitter and this comes across my screen....
newtgingrich The left blames everything on america It is one of the biggest differences between the left and the rest of us They instinctively blame us
My instinctive response was to shoot back, somewhat from the hip...
Vyan1 @newtgingrich The left realizes America can and should be better and has a responsibility to keep trying to be, the right wallows in failure
On reflection, it may have been a bit presumptious of me to speak for "the left", being as I have always felt to be essentially a centrist - so I put it you - do you "Blame America First" or do you, as I do, simply "Wish for America to be as Good As it Claims to Be?"
If you don't already have an answer, here a little food for thought while you decide.
First I have a somewhat extreme example of what Gingrich may be speaking of - a fairly intense and cutting critique of America from a decidedly left point of view - Naomi Wolf's : The End of America.
In this film, Wolf describes the ten specific steps which have historically been taken - from Stalin, to Mussolini, Mao, Pinchochet, Hitler and Bush - to close down an open society.
I originally diaried and detailed these steps when her book first came out in 2007.
Look at how impassioned Wolf speaks about America being "A Beacon To the World" - and contrast this to the reflexive gingoistic, sports-team cheerleading of America - even when it fails miserably - by those on the right.
Senator John McCain America has been and remains the greatest force for good in history. 8:47 AM Apr 3rd from txt
Like, is that supposed to be news? Is that in doubt? Did someone send out a Fatwa!
Sometimes their "We're Number One, We're Number One - USA! USA!" stuff really does begin to grate, particularly when they can't - or won't - back it up with anything!
I actually stopped following self-styled Progressive Republican Meghan McCain because of this tweet. It was just too much saccharine, my teeth started to hurt and I think it made my ankles swell.
McCainBlogette But on top of everything else, I LOVE being an American. Its the greatest country in the world and I want what's best for our country! 8:42 PM Mar 25th from web
I love America too, but I have to ask - what exactly are we the best at besides self-delusion?
We're the "Greatest"? We're Number One? Really?
According to the Global Health Council the Life Expectancy of an American at Birth, as compared to other counties where this data is available, was 78.2 years in 2007 - which Ranks at Number 38! (Japan was First with 82.8)
When it comes to which is the Smartest Nation, on the basis of IQ scores America is 22nd with an Average of 98. (1st was Hong Kong with 107)
America is indeed the Richest Nation in the world, with the highest per capital GDP of $29,605 - but it's obvious we aren't spending all that money or our health or education.
But then again maybe we are, but simply aren't getting our money's worth
When you look at the UN Health Data Index (PDF Table 6, Page 301) and compare our overall Health Ranking (which is 8th) with our spending on Health Care as a portion of GDP - We're Number #1! (in Costs, but not in Results)
Please note that Japan (which is an incredibly Health Conscious Country) spends almost HALF what we spend!)
Y'know what else we're the best at? We have the most Prisons! (Just chock full of minorities and the poor)
After three decades of explosive growth, the nation’s prison population has reached some grim milestones: More than 1 in 100 American adults are behind bars. One in nine black men, ages 20 to 34, are serving time, as are 1 in 36 adult Hispanic men.
Nationwide, the prison population hovers at almost 1.6 million, which surpasses all other countries for which there are reliable figures. The 50 states last year spent about $44 billion in tax dollars on corrections, up from nearly $11 billion in 1987.
Believe it or not, we actually spend more on keeping young people in jail than in school, with the almost the same results in both cases. Lousy.
As a major trading nation, the U.S. exports computers, software, movies, and food, among many other things. And it imports just about everything you can imagine. When the U.S. buys more than it sells, it makes up the difference-known as the trade deficit -by shipping dollars overseas. And in recent years it has been buying a lot more than it's been selling. After averaging a manageable USD $80 billion annually during the 1980s, the trade deficit soared into the USD $300 billion range in the 1990s. And by 2003, this figure had exploded to over USD $500 billion. That's about 5% of GDP, a level that, when it has occurred in other countries in the past, has preceded a sharp decline in the value of the local currency.
I may be admittedly generalizing, but IMO The Left Looks at the precipitous erosion of our Civil and Constitutional Liberties and says - "Something is WRONG, Here!" The Right thinks this is all just fine. Hell, they want MORE of it.
The Left sees our Health Failing, our Rivers choked with toxins, our toothpaste and toys poisoned, our education system crumbling, our deficit and debt climbing, our trade imbalance growing, our prisons overflowing and we say - "NO MORE! It's time to change direction and rebuild our nation" The Right thinks that's just the cost of doing "Business".
Rather than address the real issues and problems America has, the Right pretends anyone who even suggests that there's a problem - is the Problem!
From Michele (Queen of the Anti-American/World Currency Mongers) Bachmann, to Michelle Malkin the only problem they see with America - is that it has to many LEFTY Complainers in it.
America won't win another war until the 1960s flower children are pushing up petunias.
Radicalized, the flower children morphed into lefty loonies who now masquerade as social progressives. No matter what they rename themselves, however, their agenda hasn't changed.
Utopia? Not exactly, but we're not exactly willing to Settle on just what we have at the moment.
Truly loving America, is realizing that We Can Do Better Than This.
We have GOT TO do better than this.
Conservatives hate to hear this but despite dozens of warnings to the FAA, PDB's and midnight runs to Condi's office by Tenet, Richard Clarke and Cofer Black - we Still got attacked on 9/11, and when the smoke cleared we let Bin Laden escape at Tora Bora, then we turned around and invaded the Wrong Country, for the Wrong reasons then proceeded to neglects the dire needs of the people of that nation for 7 years, while committing Torture (Yes, damnit it was Torture), random and indiscrimanate arrests and indefinate detention of people we knew were innocent - simply because "They Might Get Lawyers and SUE US!"
Hmm, ya think?
Pardon my plain straight-up American - but who the FUCK ELSE are we supposed to blame for all this?
America did it, so America needs to FIX It. Stand up and Take some RESPONSIBILITY Dag Nabbit.
That's the real difference between left and right - the right refuses to take responsibility for anything. This isn't even an exclusively Republican set us issues, a lot of Democrats voted for the War, a lot of Democrats voted for the Patriot Act, the Military Commissions Act, to undo Glass-Steagal, and for Free Trade without restrictions or regulation.
A lot of people messed up.
But we have a new Administration now, and a chance - merely a chance - to start cleaning this mess up. Unfortunately as we've seen with Steele, Cantor, Boehner and McConnel's stonewalling, as well as Leahy's failure to get *ANY* Republicans to even think about facing the truth, we're probably going to have to do it all without them.
Fine.
You guys can keep whining about "Judicial Activists" oppressing all those poor put-upon straight people who clearly need some protection from The Constitution...
newtgingrich The iowa court destroying the sanctity of marriage against the wishes of iowa voters is the newest example of [J]udicial arrogrance
We'll be over here - "Blaming America" for failing it's citizens, and not meeting it's own ideals, and doing what we can to actually make this union - little by little - a bit more perfect.
Vyan
P.S. Those old Hippies apparently Breed like Rabbits - good luck trying to wait them out.
On Thursday, House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers quietly released the final draft of an extensive report he first unveiled in January documenting the Bush administration’s “unreviewable war powers” and the possible crimes committed in implementing those policies.
In order to determine whether Bush officials broke laws, Conyers has recommended that Attorney General Eric Holder appoint a special prosecutor to launch a criminal inquiry to investigate, among other things, whether “enhanced interrogation techniques” used against alleged terrorist detainees violated international and federal laws against torture.
It's about TIME!
Following the dismal failure of the Leahy Truth Commission simply because Republicans insisted on covering their ears and eyes to the truth we now - finally - have a congressional call for the Special Prosecutor.
We know now that several high ranking Generals lied to Congress about their knowledge of torture taking place at Gitmo.
On the question of whether the was or wasn't actual torture taking place, that has been settled by the International Red Cross.
WASHINGTON, Nov. 29 - The International Committee of the Red Cross has charged in confidential reports to the United States government that the American military has intentionally used psychological and sometimes physical coercion "tantamount to torture" on prisoners at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.
The finding that the handling of prisoners detained and interrogated at Guantánamo amounted to torture came after a visit by a Red Cross inspection team that spent most of last June in Guantánamo.
BTW the organization which makes the determination under Geneva as to whether torture has occures - happens to be the International Red Cross.
We have always known - or should have - that the UN Convention Against Torture (signed by Ronald Reagan) leaves NO EXCUSES for the use of use of torture. None.
No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat of war, internal political in stability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture. An order from a superior officer or a public authority may not be invoked as a justification of torture.M
Excepted from the Conyers Report.
The Bush Administration’s approach to power is, at its core, little more than a restatement of Mr. Nixon’s famous rationalization of presidential misdeeds: “When the president does it, that means it’s not illegal.” Under this view, laws that forbid torturing or degrading prisoners cannot constrain the president because, if the president ordered such acts as Commander in Chief, “that means it’s not illegal.” Under this view, it is not the courts that decide the reach of the law – it is the president – and neither the judiciary nor Congress can constrain him. And where statutory law or the Constitution itself appear to impose obstacles to presidential whim, creative counselors can be relied upon to reach whatever result the president desires.
This dismissive approach to our system of checks and balances was exemplified when the Vice President’s Chief of Staff, David Addington, appeared before the House Judiciary Committee on June 26, 2008. As much as any individual in the Bush Administration, David Addington is considered the architect of the concept of unchecked and unreviewable presidential powers known as the “unitary executive” (in a New Yorker profile, a former Pentagon attorney, Richard Schiffrin, said that he left one meeting with Mr. Addington with the impression that he “doesn’t believe there should be co-equal branches”). Yet when I questioned Mr. Addington about the unitary executive theory of government during our Judiciary Committee hearing, he responded, “I frankly, don’t know what you mean by unitary theory of government.”
It's understandable that some in congress, and even President Obama may be reluctant to repeat the Clinton Snipe Hunts of the 90's with something that appears to be a nothing more than "criminalizing policy differences" - but this is far more than just a differences, it really genuinely IS a War Crime and should be handled as such.
Hopefully this will only be the start of the heat turning up on this issue.
Vyan
Update: 6:36 pm: For those who are skeptical of Conyers ability to accomplish this - please remember that HJC has reached a deal to receive sworn depositions from Rove and Harriet Miers in the DOJ Firing Case. The Bolton subpeona is still making it's way through the courts, but it hasn't "gone away" by a long shot.
Click below to sign the Petition on Democrats.com to support a Special Prosecutor for BushCo.
Ok, we've been hearing it since the election and the first appearance of Sammy-Joe the (Un)Plumber: What Obama (and by extension his supporters) want to "Change" about America is to make it "Socialist".
The ridiculousness of this claim is so extreme that hardly anyway has responded to it anything besides snorting up their sleeve, but it's well past time we Progressives and Liberals rather started to define ourselves rather than allow ourselves and what we desire to be defined by people who don't know or care what we really stand for.
To that end I suggest we consider a completely new meme to describe that strategy we support for tackling America's problems. No it's not communism, or socialism, both of these are dusty 20th Century terms best applied to the Soviets or Red Chinese of by-gone years.
No, I think what we want is a Fair Market with Social-Capitalism.
The idea came to me based on a couple of interesting Tweet exchanges. The first with California Rep. Maxine Waters.
@maxinewaters: Barney nails it. http://is.gd/oKb5 This is exactly what I've been saying in all my tweets: $$ doesn't belong in private hands. Capital=evil.
Vyan1: I wouldn't say "Capital=Evil" - more like Unlimited Greed = Evil Capitol is a tool, it's a matter of what you do with it!
maxinewaters: The Capitol is not a tool! Or did u mean capital? No, capital=private ownership=evil. Only govt. can be trusted w/ $$ all else unfair
Vyan1: i meant money=tool for doing things. Unlimited Greed is the problem. (am constituent btw) Monopolies are a problem too!
maxinewaters A DM: "Only 1 source of jobs: companies/people who want to make $!" No, that's the problem w/ USA. We SHOULD work for justice, not $$. #TCOT
@maxinewaters: We need Michael Moore to do documentary how Bush set up the financial system via $GS & Paulson to fail to make Dems & #Obama look bad. #TCOT
Vyan1: Lots of footage of Grover Norquist on that MM film. This is the final result of the 30 year "Starving the Beast" strategy
Vyan1: the plan was loot the treasury and drive the deficit so high all entitlment programs would *HAVE* to be cut to the bone.
maxinewaters: That's why we're cutting deficit
I still disagree with Rep Waters premise that "Private Ownership=Evil" or that only the government can be trust with our money - I frankly don't trust either one of them but in our country we still need both private enterprise and government - the trick is making sure both of them keep each other in check.
However the comment that caught my eye is this one :"We SHOULD work for Justice, not $$"
Why can't we do both? Why shouldn't we do both?
If you disconnect the goal of becoming rich, what we so are often told is "The American Dream", from engaging fairly with your common man and from trying to install some for of social justie in the world - you wind up with what we've seen over the past 8 years. Unbridled Enron-inomics.
Time and time again, bankers and business have used the leverage that money gives them to cut corners, overhype and inflate prices, and use legalistic fine-print to squeeze more and more dollars out of their customers, and out of their employees to place in thier stock value.
It's become one big game of "Whose got the biggest Stock Gain this Quarter!?"
That's what drove Enron, Aldephia, Global Crossing and now Bear-Sterns, Lehmann Brothers and AIG over a cliff.
Raw, unrestricted, unlimited, Naked Greed.
As a result the government has been forced to step into the picture - which leads me to my next Tweet exchange, this time with MSNBC's Contessa Brewer
contessabrewer Why can't gov't budget be more like a wise family's. Live within your means, save for the unexpected, use debt only 4 true investments.
Vyan1 @contessabrewer Most American Families live off their credit cards and their home equity - just like the government.
contessabrewer @Vyan1 Well, that's why I said WISE families.
Vyan1 @contessabrewer Hard to be that "Wise" when wages have remained stagnant (for those that still have wages) for 10 years while prices rise.
Rather than "Supply-Side" economics, maybe it's time we began to consider the "Demand-Side" of things. Businesses can thrive when consumers have buying power - the problem has been in the ever more dramatic drive to cram down prices, we've also crammed down wages and salaries. Price inflation has still continued (Remember $4 per gallon gas!), but wage inflation hasn't. What you could buy for a dollar last year, only gets you 80 cents this year - so how did people fill that gap?
With their credit cards.
Or by borrowing against their mortgage.
Here's a little audio on this from Thom Hartmann on the Mortgage Crisis.
Hartmann: (From the Wall Street Journal) As middle-class incomes are being wiped-out, manufacturing incomes are being wiped-out, people can't pay their mortgages. And the Financial Times points out that Banks are starting to lose money are the result of this.
What we've seen over the last 26 years is a dismantling of the core of the United States, and it's been done for a specific purpose. To dis-empower the Middle class.
When the credit golden goose ran out of eggs we landed right where we are now. It wasn't simply a case of the Wall Street incompetence and Main Street over-reach. Yet again, It was both!
The failure Bush years has opened up a window. It's becoming more and more common to hear "Too Big to Fail - is Too Big to EXIST!" from not just people on the fringe, but mainstream Economists and even Members of Congress. (Such as Senator Bernie Sanders, the only "Socialist" in Congress)
Sanders: We need to have the United States Government play a role in protecting the people against the greed of multi-national corporations. If a company is too big to fail, it's too big to exist!
We are not headed into a system where government owns and operates our entire economy. We are not headed into Communism, Socialism or Marxism - however we certainly can not maintain a system where corporations run completely Amok! If consumers and employees are passenger cars on our economic highways, attempting to navigate on a road filled with Super-Giant Corporate Semi-Trailers, we need to have some Rules of the Road to prevent the smaller cars from getting run into a ditch by the trucks. We need to have some guidelines, to keep traffic flowing, and some speed limits to prevent those massive trucks from Jack-knifing and creating a Million Car Pileup.
Again.
Therefore, maybe we do need to embrace a new form a capitalism. One that doesn't simply serve the selfish self-interest of investors and share-holders but also includes the idea of being a good neighbor and a responsible co-habitant in our society.
Maybe we need to move from the Dog-eat-Dog Demolition Derby model of capitalism to a cooperative one - to Social-Capitalism.
Maybe we should work and toil not just from financial reward, but also - for Social and Economic Justice.
Certainly there are time when "Justice" doesn't really pay well. And those may be the time where, for the sake of justice and the sake of our national well-being, Government has to step it with subsidies or not-for-profit options.
Maybe we need to realize that the "Free Market" alone, CAN NOT solve everyones problem in that what we really should strive for is a "FAIR Market" that allows everyone a chance to compete, even the little guys, without being crushed into powder by well entrenched interests.
Maybe it's time we starting defining ourselves, rather than letting other hurl their epithets our way.
We've all seen the warning signs and heard the angry cries from Wingnuttia - but it's time to stop laughing and recognize a very real threat that faces this nation.
The Southern Poverty Law Center headed by Morris Dees is the countries premier anti-hate resource, and in it's current yearly "Intelligence Report" on the activities of various domestic Hate Groups, there are more than a few familiar faces.
This week a report detailing at least 60 Post-9/11 plots of violence by Militant Right-Wing Militia and Birther groups was spiked in Missouri under the argument that sharing the information with Officers in the field would have been Political Profiling!
In Knoxville Tennessee it was shown that a mass-murderer, James Adkinson, - inspired directly by writings of Fox News Contributor Bernard Goldberg, as well as the rantings of Sean Hannity and Ann Coulter - perpetrated a deliberate Hate-Crime (i.e. Terrorism) against Liberals.
"Know this if nothing else: This was a hate crime. I hate the damn left-wing liberals. There is a vast left-wing conspiracy in this country & these liberals are working together to attack every decent & honorable institution in the nation, trying to turn this country into a communist state. Shame on them....
Yet, the mainstream media ignores the report of an attempted Right-Wing Dirty Bomber in Maine.
“Amber (Cummings) indicated James was very upset with Barack Obama being elected President,” reported the Washington Regional Threat and Analysis Center (PDF link). “She indicated James had been in contact with ‘white supremacist group(s).’ Amber also indicated James mixed chemicals in the kitchen sink at their residence and had mentioned ‘dirty bombs.’”
“Also found was literature on how to build ‘dirty bombs’ and information about cesium-137, strontium-90 and cobalt-60, radioactive materials,” said theBangor Daily. “The FBI report also stated there was evidence linking James Cummings to white supremacist groups. This would seem to confirm observations by local tradesmen who worked at the Cummings home that he was an ardent admirer of Adolf Hitler and had a collection of Nazi memorabilia around the house, including a prominently displayed flag with swastika. Cummings claimed to have pieces of Hitler’s personal silverware and place settings, painter Mike Robbins said a few days after the shooting.”
Before he was inaugurated there were at least two distinct supramacists plots to assassinate Obama.
It's time we stopped sweeping this under the rug.
Since the year 2000 the number of U.S. hate groups has risen 54% to a current estimate of 926 active groups in 2008.
As in recent years, hate groups were animated by fears of Latino immigration. This rise in hate groups has coincided with a 40 percent growth in hate crimes against Latinos between 2003 and 2007, according to FBI statistics.
Two new factors were introduced to the volatile hate movement in 2008: the faltering economy and the Obama campaign.
"Barack Obama's election has inflamed racist extremists who see it as another sign that their country is under siege by non-whites," said Mark Potok, editor of the Intelligence Report, a quarterly investigative journal that monitors the radical right. "The idea of a black man in the White House, combined with the deepening economic crisis and continuing high levels of Latino immigration, has given white supremacists a real platform on which to recruit."
Moving far behind the usual skin-head, supremacist and neo-nazi's we would expect to spout this kind of rhetoric we're now hearing plenty of panicked and frightened fear-mongering from many many "mainstream" sources.
Even members of Congress.
Such as Michele (I'm Not a Kook) Bachmann on staging an Orderly Revolution" against Obama.
Bachmann: At this point the American people - it's like Thomas Jefferson said, a revolution every now and then is a good thing. We are at the point, Sean, of revolution. And by that, what I mean, an orderly revolution -- where the people of this country wake up get up and make a decision that this is not going to happen on their watch. It won't be our children and grandchildren that are in debt. It is we who are in debt, we who will be bankrupting this country, inside of ten years, if we don't get a grip. And we can't let the Democrats achieve their ends any longer.
If Tim Geithner is successful under President Obama, and they move us to an international currency. Then we have no hope of standing on our own as a sovereign nation with our own economic system. It's over. We can't do that.
Bachmann: Right now I'm a member of Congress. And I believe that my job here is to be a foreign correspondent, reporting from enemy lines. And people need to understand, this isn't a game. this isn't just a political talk show that's happening right now. This is our very freedom, and we have 230 years, a continuous link of freedom that every generation has ceded to the next generation. This may be the time when that link breaks. And I'm going to do everything I can, I know you are, to make sure that we keep that link secure. We cannot allow that link to break, because as Reagan said, America is the last great hope of mankind.
We've been hearing this kind of "marxist, socialist, new world currency, we're losing america to the immigrants (and the Gays)" stuff for some time - and we've typically laughed it off - but it's time we stopped laughing.
The guys at Southern Poverty Law - aren't.
The histrionics over the supposed 5 million bad mortgages is a prime example. On Oct. 9, the conservative online news site Drudge Report included a link to a story on the website of conservative talk radio KFYI-AM in Phoenix that said HUD had reported that 5 million illegal immigrants held bad mortgages. That same day, the Phoenix Business Journal posted an article stating that a HUD spokesman said there was "no basis" for the 5 million figure, and that the agency had no data reflecting the number of bad mortgages held by illegal immigrants.
But a few hours later on CNN's "Lou Dobbs Tonight" — a primary venue for the airing of false allegations about undocumented immigrants — San Diego radio show host Roger Hedgecock cited the bogus HUD statistic as a hard fact. By the following day, others were engaging in the journalistic equivalent of fabricating a "big fish" tale, embellishing the falsehood with their own extravagant claims. Rush Limbaugh stated on his radio program that HUD was "admitting 5 million illegal aliens were given mortgages ... with fake Social Security numbers and so forth to go out and purchase homes that they didn't have to pay back." Over at Clear Channel's "The War Room with Quinn & Rose," Jim Quinn claimed that while there were some excesses on Wall Street, the bigger problem was the issuance of "5 million mortgages to illegal aliens who didn't even have to come up with an ID."
So the Bush Bailout isn't the result of mismanagement, greed and deregulation - it's all because of those damn dirty illegals, not to mention the rest of those shiftless minorities - and ACORN too!
As the mortgage crisis worsened in 2008, more diatribes followed regarding what syndicated columnist Michelle Malkin called "the massive illegal alien mortgage racket." In September, she wrote that it was "no coincidence" that the areas hardest hit by the wave of foreclosures "also happen to be some of the nation's largest illegal alien sanctuaries." Rick Oltman, a former top official of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) now with the anti-immigrant Californians for Population Stabilization, wrote on that group's website that foreclosures are highest in border states and cities "swollen with illegal aliens." Still, he added charitably, "illegal immigration didn't cause this, it just made it worse.
Conservative commentators also didn't let facts stop them from continually repeating the fallacy that the Community Reinvestment Act had forced lenders to make high-risk mortgage loans to illegal immigrants and other minorities.
The CRA regulations were tightened in 1995 when Bill Clinton was president. Critics contend that left-wing activists — especially at the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), which became embroiled in controversy during the presidential campaign when it was investigated for voter registration fraud — began to use data showing how CRA banks performed to petition regulators to deny lenders' plans to expand or merge with other institutions. This, they say, coerced banks into making risky, poorly documented loans — including to illegal immigrants — resulting in large numbers of defaults, which in turn caused the mortgage morass.
Jinned up by all of this misplaced fear and outrage, a brand new Xenophobic Militia Movement as been steadily growing. Unlike the lone-wolf acts of people like Adkinson or Cummings, what we truly need to worry about is what Bachmann and to some extend Glenn Beck with his "We Surround Them" bruhaha are clearly attempting to foment. A committed, directed, networked and focused Resistance Movement of batshit-wingnuts who see any and all Liberals (or their Gay, Black, Brown and poor allies) as their enemy and the enemies of America.
People who seriously believe - like Alan Keyes - that America has been hijacked by an illegitimate usurper.
What is likely to happen if and when radical anti-abortionists like Keyes (or Eric Rudolph the Olympic Park Bomber), join their ideology with that of the Birthers, the Sovereigns who are trying to make their own-currency and secede (Palin-style) from America, the anti-immigrant Minute-Men who've begun to be infiltrated by Nativist Extremist, with the 2nd Amendment-ers, and perhaps the most deluded of all - the End-Timers?
How long before all this "Revolution" talk goes from inspiring single persons, to organized groups?
How long before someone taps into all this pent up fear and anger and sends it careening in the wrong deadly direction?
HBO: Right America Feeling Wronged!
All these Palinite-Americans have not gone away - they're still with us and now they've been rendered powerless in Congress - making them more dangerous than they've ever been.
Here are IMO four potential catalyst events which could spark this kind of coalescence -
1) The Firing of BlackWater/Xe by the State Dept in Iraq, putting thousands of heavily trained and right-out of the war/post-stress impacted merceneries OUT Of A JOB.
Blackwater has been fired by the State Department from its job protecting U.S. diplomats in Iraq.
Executives of the controversial U.S. security company were notified today by the State Department that its five-year, $1.2 billion contract for services in Iraq will not be renewed in May, U.S. officials tell ABC News. The contract provides yearly options for cancellations.
After working for noted Right-winger (and End-Times/Christian Supamacist) Erik Prince, these guys are ripe for Militia Recruitment. Just multiply Tim McVeigh by 1,000 and add seething hatred. What do you do when you're a former paid killer, go back to parking cars?
3) Allowing for Government to "Take-Over" and fix Pseudo-Banks like AIG - something Newt Gingrich has already called something akin to a "Dictatorship".
And the coup de grace?
4) Repealing "Don't Ask - Don't Tell". (Which at the moment seem to be on the back-burner)
These are the wingnuts worst nightmares, and rest assured the selfish self-aggrandizing power-whores among them (Beck, Gingrich, O'Reilly, Malkin, Ingraham, Bachmann, Cantor, Boehner, Cornyn and McConnell) will NOT stop their fear and hate-mongering once the blood start flowing.
More than likely - they'll AMP IT UP.
I'm certain that innocent Americans will suffer for it, we just have to make sure those who incite political violence, as well as those who perpetrate it aren't allowed to get away with it.
