House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy of Bakersfield offered this tweet on the Florida massacre: "The heart of our nation breaks with the senseless and tragic loss of these young students. Our prayers are with them and their families." In the meantime, he continues to sock away gun-lobby contributions*.
* bribes
Showing posts with label Republican Party. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Republican Party. Show all posts
Blue State Blues
Looking toward 2018, here are the top scorers in the California Republican delegation on "How often a member votes in line with Trump's position":
David Valadao (CA-21) 98.1%; Stephen Knight (CA-25) 98.1%; Mimi Walters (CA-45) 98.1%; Jeff Denham (CA-10) 98.1%; Ken Calvert (CA-42) 98.1%; Paul Cook (CA-8) 98.1%; Kevin McCarthy (CA-23) 98.1%; Doug LaMalfa (CA-1), 98.1%; Devin Nunes (CA-22) 98%; Ed Royce (CA-39) 96.2%; Darrell Issa (CA-49) 96.2%; Dana Rohrabacker (CA-48) 92.5%; and Tom McClintock 88.7%.
By comparison, of the six members of the House that vote least with Trump (at 9.4% of the time) -- a list that includes Raul Grijalva and Keith Ellison (the Progressive Caucus chairs), Bonnie Watson Coleman and Adriano Espaillat -- two, Maxine Waters and Barbara Lee, are from California (source: Nate Silver's FiveThirtyEight).
David Valadao (CA-21) 98.1%; Stephen Knight (CA-25) 98.1%; Mimi Walters (CA-45) 98.1%; Jeff Denham (CA-10) 98.1%; Ken Calvert (CA-42) 98.1%; Paul Cook (CA-8) 98.1%; Kevin McCarthy (CA-23) 98.1%; Doug LaMalfa (CA-1), 98.1%; Devin Nunes (CA-22) 98%; Ed Royce (CA-39) 96.2%; Darrell Issa (CA-49) 96.2%; Dana Rohrabacker (CA-48) 92.5%; and Tom McClintock 88.7%.
By comparison, of the six members of the House that vote least with Trump (at 9.4% of the time) -- a list that includes Raul Grijalva and Keith Ellison (the Progressive Caucus chairs), Bonnie Watson Coleman and Adriano Espaillat -- two, Maxine Waters and Barbara Lee, are from California (source: Nate Silver's FiveThirtyEight).
Newspeak
"War is Peace" has been the watchword of U.S. foreign policy for decades. Johnson, Nixon, Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush and Obama: each liked to wave his gun around. Dropping bombs on people is a presidential pastime, because it is as easy as ordering dessert and, for the commander in chief, politically risk free, American voters valuing as they do looking tough over being tough. Joining the Democrats in rechristening the various military adventures he inherited as "Trump's wars" will not end militarism. To succeed, the peace movement, should it remobilize, will need to take on both parties. Both are drenched in blood.
Trending
All nine eligible residents of Dixville Notch, New Hampshire, have voted, and it's looking grim for Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. Ohio governor John Kasich was the Republican winner, beating Donald Trump by three votes to two, while Senator Bernie Sanders swept with all four of the Democratic votes.
GOP to raise standards for office holders.
The Republicans are worried that having too many candidates in the race for president will confuse voters. The party had planned to use the low standing in the polls of some contenders to exclude them from the debates. But polls, especially at such an early stage in a campaign, are notoriously inaccurate yardsticks.
Something more precise was needed.
Since there is no way to gauge hypocrisy, two other widely used and accepted methods of gauging suitability are being proposed: all candidates must submit to drug and IQ tests. Only contestants with IQs over 70 and measurable amounts of cannabis in their blood streams will be permitted to compete. In the event that none of the current aspirants can meet these standards -- not likely in the case of cannabis, the GOP will have time to recruit replacements.
Since all the candidates have supported the use of such determinations by employers, there is little doubt that they won't welcome the application of the same standards to their own jobs. If some do object, perhaps that can be considered as the missing hypocrisy test.
Something more precise was needed.
Since there is no way to gauge hypocrisy, two other widely used and accepted methods of gauging suitability are being proposed: all candidates must submit to drug and IQ tests. Only contestants with IQs over 70 and measurable amounts of cannabis in their blood streams will be permitted to compete. In the event that none of the current aspirants can meet these standards -- not likely in the case of cannabis, the GOP will have time to recruit replacements.
Since all the candidates have supported the use of such determinations by employers, there is little doubt that they won't welcome the application of the same standards to their own jobs. If some do object, perhaps that can be considered as the missing hypocrisy test.
Finding the needle in the GOP haystack.
Republicans are worried that having too many candidates in the race for president will confuse voters. So the party is planning to use the low standing in the polls of some contenders to exclude them from the debates.
But polls, especially at such an early stage in a campaign, are notoriously inaccurate yardsticks. Something more precise is needed.
Since there is no way to gauge hypocrisy, two widely used and accepted methods of assessing suitability are being proposed: all candidates must submit to drug and IQ tests. Only contestants with IQs over 70 and measurable amounts of cannabis in their blood streams will be permitted to compete.
In the event that none of the current aspirants can meet these standards -- not likely in the case of cannabis, the GOP will have time to recruit replacements. Since all the candidates have supported the use of such determinations by employers, they will welcome the application of these standards to their own jobs.
If some do object, perhaps that can be added as the missing hypocrisy test.
Faux News
"Having failed electorally and failed in the courts, Republicans are hell-bent on destroying the Affordable Care Act in Americans' minds. A document circulated among House Republicans (revealed in today's NY Times) contains talking points to be repeated continuously: 'Because of Obamacare, I Lost My Insurance.' 'Obamacare Increases Health Care Costs.' 'The Exchanges May Not Be Secure, Putting Personal Information at Risk.' Fox News and right-wing radio amplify them. The mainstream media reports them as news.
"Admittedly, Obama played into their hands by botching the roll-out of the Act. But keep in mind the larger reality: Private for-profit insurers have wrecked the American healthcare system. Ours has been the only system in the world designed to avoid sick people. A single-payer system would have been preferable, and we'll eventually get there. But the Affordable Care Act at least sets minimum standards, requires insurers to take people with preexisting conditions, bars them from dropping coverage of people who get sick, and extends insurance to the poor and working class. These are huge accomplishments relative to where we've been. Initial problems with the website, and cancellations of some policies by insurance companies that can't meet the standards, are small potatoes." -- Robert Reich
Watch the feet not the mouth
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Bailing
The reliably feckless David Brooks has this to say about the domination of the GOP by radicals:
"It's probably futile to try to change current Republicans. It's smarter to build a new wing of the Republican Party, one that can compete in the Northeast, the mid-Atlantic states, in the upper Midwest and along the West Coast. It's smarter to build a new division that is different the way the Westin is different than the Sheraton..."
"Would a coastal and Midwestern G.O.P. sit easily with the Southern and Western one? No, but majority parties are usually coalitions of the incompatible. This is really the only chance Republicans have. The question is: Who's going to build a second G.O.P.?"
Representative democracy would benefit from such a development, but here's an easier way to do it than by trying to recapture the GOP. Stragglers from the moderate wing of the Republicans, if joined by the neoliberals, now a declining and reviled minority among Democrats, would form a new centrist, corporatist, neoliberal party (the New Whigs?). The Republican Party under this scenario would continue to represent fundamentalists, reactionaries and rightist libertarians. The Democratic Party would take on its proper role as the champion of the middle and working classes. And a green party, maybe the Green Party, would carry on with an agenda focused climate change. A House with four or five parties could only function by building coalitions, making it far more likely that rational, practical and more representative political outcomes would prevail.
All parties in the legislature have an interest in reining in the executive branch. The Founders envisioned ours as a legislative democracy, and it would serve us all to return to that model. The assignment of power through winner-take-all contests has proven itself to be dangerous to democracy as well as to wise stewardship.
"It's probably futile to try to change current Republicans. It's smarter to build a new wing of the Republican Party, one that can compete in the Northeast, the mid-Atlantic states, in the upper Midwest and along the West Coast. It's smarter to build a new division that is different the way the Westin is different than the Sheraton..."
"Would a coastal and Midwestern G.O.P. sit easily with the Southern and Western one? No, but majority parties are usually coalitions of the incompatible. This is really the only chance Republicans have. The question is: Who's going to build a second G.O.P.?"
Representative democracy would benefit from such a development, but here's an easier way to do it than by trying to recapture the GOP. Stragglers from the moderate wing of the Republicans, if joined by the neoliberals, now a declining and reviled minority among Democrats, would form a new centrist, corporatist, neoliberal party (the New Whigs?). The Republican Party under this scenario would continue to represent fundamentalists, reactionaries and rightist libertarians. The Democratic Party would take on its proper role as the champion of the middle and working classes. And a green party, maybe the Green Party, would carry on with an agenda focused climate change. A House with four or five parties could only function by building coalitions, making it far more likely that rational, practical and more representative political outcomes would prevail.
All parties in the legislature have an interest in reining in the executive branch. The Founders envisioned ours as a legislative democracy, and it would serve us all to return to that model. The assignment of power through winner-take-all contests has proven itself to be dangerous to democracy as well as to wise stewardship.
"Benghazi, Alex, for 10 points."
Usually, the Right throws some crap against the wall and if it sticks they throw some more; if it doesn't, they throw something else. But this Benghazi crap isn't sticking and still they don't stop. Are they so out of ideas the can't even come up with a good lie anymore?
2012: Will voters "throw the bums out"?
I'm taken to task for having the temerity to suggest that Barack Obama may be held accountable for the nation's problems -- in the instance, for the decline in average American's income and net worth, and that there may be some justice in his impending political demise: "It's not Obama's fault. It's the policies, peoples." As if, I guess, it is John Boehner who is running the country.
It's true, though, that these "policies" are not Obama's alone. They have been been pursued through six administrations and a couple of dozen congresses controlled, it should not be forgotten, more often by Democrats than by Republicans. There is a lot of convenient buck passing in the nation's capital: the Republicans blame the Democrats for lack of "progress" on social issues; the Democrat's accuse the GOP of holding
economic reforms "hostage;" meanwhile, the oligarchs dictate the outcome of the legislative process, and the two parties get to go back to the electorate every couple of years with the same unresolved set of issues (we forget that the GOP agitates its base with "lesser of two evils" rhetoric familiar to us from Democratic propaganda).
It was Democrat Bill Clinton, at the end of the day, who passed the stalled pro-corporate agenda -- banking "reform," telecom "reform," welfare "reform," trade "reform," NAFTA, etc. -- beyond the reach of Republican George Bush the Elder. It is Obama who has doubled-down on militarism and security abuses. As Bush the Younger did with al Queda, Obama inflated the GOP and the Blue Dogs for his own purposes, empowering them, attempting to partner with them instead of closing ranks with congressional liberals (and thus losing the House, just as Clinton did, and for the same reason: why vote for Democrats if they are going govern on behalf the corporate elite instead of the majority?), and blaming the conservatives as he caved on issue after issue without a fight.
If BHO was a liberal warrior in the mold of FDR, HST and LBJ, he would not be in danger of getting the boot in November, as he probably will. But the real victory this fall will not go to the Democrats or the Republicans; whether it is Obama or Mitt Romney who takes the oath of office in January, the true winners will be the militarists and the masters of the security state. Obama? Romney?: the victims of the shredded social contract, the unemployed and underemployed, the homeless, the graduates without prospects drowning in debt, the hundreds of thousands of youth whose futures are being sacrificed to the war on drugs, the young men and women who will die in exotic locales of interest only to war profiteers, the innocent victims of American guns and bombs and gameboy war toys, none of these will know the difference.
----
Return of the Body Count: Dissecting Obama's Standard on Drone Strike Deaths by Justin Elliott (ProPublica 2012-06-05)
Democratic Website Publishes List of Obama Accomplishments, Half of Them Are the Names of People He's Killed (Reason 2012-06-12)
Most voters favor slashing foreign economic & military aid; few would cut domestic programs like Social Security, education and health care (Good).
It's true, though, that these "policies" are not Obama's alone. They have been been pursued through six administrations and a couple of dozen congresses controlled, it should not be forgotten, more often by Democrats than by Republicans. There is a lot of convenient buck passing in the nation's capital: the Republicans blame the Democrats for lack of "progress" on social issues; the Democrat's accuse the GOP of holding
economic reforms "hostage;" meanwhile, the oligarchs dictate the outcome of the legislative process, and the two parties get to go back to the electorate every couple of years with the same unresolved set of issues (we forget that the GOP agitates its base with "lesser of two evils" rhetoric familiar to us from Democratic propaganda).It was Democrat Bill Clinton, at the end of the day, who passed the stalled pro-corporate agenda -- banking "reform," telecom "reform," welfare "reform," trade "reform," NAFTA, etc. -- beyond the reach of Republican George Bush the Elder. It is Obama who has doubled-down on militarism and security abuses. As Bush the Younger did with al Queda, Obama inflated the GOP and the Blue Dogs for his own purposes, empowering them, attempting to partner with them instead of closing ranks with congressional liberals (and thus losing the House, just as Clinton did, and for the same reason: why vote for Democrats if they are going govern on behalf the corporate elite instead of the majority?), and blaming the conservatives as he caved on issue after issue without a fight.
If BHO was a liberal warrior in the mold of FDR, HST and LBJ, he would not be in danger of getting the boot in November, as he probably will. But the real victory this fall will not go to the Democrats or the Republicans; whether it is Obama or Mitt Romney who takes the oath of office in January, the true winners will be the militarists and the masters of the security state. Obama? Romney?: the victims of the shredded social contract, the unemployed and underemployed, the homeless, the graduates without prospects drowning in debt, the hundreds of thousands of youth whose futures are being sacrificed to the war on drugs, the young men and women who will die in exotic locales of interest only to war profiteers, the innocent victims of American guns and bombs and gameboy war toys, none of these will know the difference.
----
Return of the Body Count: Dissecting Obama's Standard on Drone Strike Deaths by Justin Elliott (ProPublica 2012-06-05)
Democratic Website Publishes List of Obama Accomplishments, Half of Them Are the Names of People He's Killed (Reason 2012-06-12)
Most voters favor slashing foreign economic & military aid; few would cut domestic programs like Social Security, education and health care (Good).
Saturday Catchup 2010-08-28
Capitalism, Threat or Menace: "Now, anyone can look at China's rapid economic growth and react with wonderment and awe. They have surpassed Japan, and are outranked only by the U.S. -- for now. Plus, they are the largest owner of American debt at the better part of a trillion dollars. China shows what you can do with a little industrial planning, policy and guidance from the government. But then again, many things are possible when you don't have those annoyances, those minor nuisances like environmental regulations, workplace safety, worker's rights, and democratic government. Chinese-style capitalism seems to be a purer form than its U.S. counterpart, and therefore a Republican nirvana, minus the part about government planning. And for now, we wait for a nascent labor movement to kick into gear and transform a country that responds to massive public unrest with military crackdowns. While Chinese workers jump out of windows, Americans are dying as well. In the U.S., workers die on exploding oil rigs and in deathtrap coalmines because their regulation-hating employers want to maximize profits. And besides, they say, regulations are dumb. Consumers die from unsafe food because food companies want to cut corners. Just like the Great Depression days when people lacked a safety net, the unemployed, foreclosed and student debtor-prisoners of today are turning to suicide at an alarming rate, with an increase of calls to suicide prevention hotlines." -- Capitalism Is Killing Us by David A. Love (Huffington Post 2010-08-25).
Hey, Glenn Beck: Here's how Martin Luther King described Jesus at the end of an essay published eight months after the civil rights leader was assassinated: "A voice out of Bethlehem two thousand years ago said that all men are equal.... Jesus of Nazareth wrote no books; he owned no property to endow him with influence. He had no friends in the courts of the powerful. But he changed the course of mankind with only the poor and the despised." King concluded this final essay, titled "A Testament of Hope," with a strikingly radical claim, indicating his strong identification with society's most disadvantaged and outcast persons. "Naive and unsophisticated though we may be," King said, "the poor and despised of the twentieth century will revolutionize this era. In our 'arrogance, lawlessness, and ingratitude,' we will fight for human justice, brotherhood, secure peace, and abundance for all." -- Martin Luther King, Democratic Socialist by Paul Street (The Black Commentator 2006-02-02).
And btw, Beck, it's not like we haven't seen your likes before:
The Tea Party is no joke: "There’s nothing in the world more tired than a progressive blogger like me flipping out over the latest idiocies emanating from the Fox News crowd. But this summer’s media hate-fest is different than anything we’ve seen before. What we’re watching is a calculated campaign to demonize blacks, Mexicans, and gays and convince a plurality of economically-depressed white voters that they are under imminent legal and perhaps even physical attack by a conspiracy of leftist nonwhites. They’re telling these people that their government is illegitimate and criminal and unironically urging secession and revolution." -- Tea Party Rocks Primaries by Matt Taibbi (Rolling Stone 2010-08-26).
The legendary Budd Schulberg told the Glenn Beck Story more than half a century ago:
In the end, though, you reap what you sow.
A step back for the security state: The New York state law mandating the removal from NYPD computerized databases of personal information of many thousands of entirely innocent citizens stopped and frisked wholly without reasonable suspicion, is a clear refutation not only of the policies of mayor Mike Bloomberg and NYPD commissioner Ray Kelly, but also of the Bush-Cheney-Obama insistence that national security and public safety trump individual constitutional liberties. If any civics classes still remain in public schools, NY governor David Paterson's signing statement is especially worth hearing and discussing in the context of a 22-page July 29 ACLU report card: "Obama Administration in Danger of Establishing 'New Normal' With Worst Bush-Era Policies." In office, Barack Obama has not only continued but expanded the disabling of the Bill of Rights begun by George W. Bush. "In a democracy," Governor Paterson said, "there are times when safety and liberty find themselves in conflict. From the Alien and Sedition Acts [opposition to which gave Thomas Jefferson the presidency] to the Patriot Act, we have experienced moments where liberty took a back seat." As president, Barack Obama has not done anything to rein in the excesses of the USA PATRIOT Act ("Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001" -- got to admire the Right's knack for clever marketing of bad ideas) . Indeed, when Democrats on the Judiciary Committee tried, once Obama was in the Oval Office, to enact a few reforms, the president helped the Republicans block most of them. -- What Obama Could Learn From Paterson: Lame-duck governor's inspiring words in defense of liberty by Nat Hentoff (Village Voice 2010-08-25).
Some very mean bugs are looking for you: The era of antibiotics is coming to a close. In just a couple of generations, what once appeared to be miracle medicines have been beaten into ineffectiveness by the bacteria they were designed to knock out. Once, scientists hailed the end of infectious diseases. Now, the post-antibiotic apocalypse is within sight. -- Are you ready for a world without antibiotics? by Sarah Boseley (Guardian UK 2010-08-12).
All your PowerPoint are belong to us: "I have been assigned as a staff officer to a headquarters in Afghanistan for about two months. During that time, I have not done anything productive. Fortunately little of substance is really done here, but that is a task we do well. We are part of the operational arm of the International Security Assistance Force commanded by U.S. Army Gen. David Petraeus. It is composed of military representatives from all the NATO countries, several of which I cannot pronounce. Officially, IJC was founded in late 2009 to coordinate operations among all the regional commands in Afghanistan. More likely it was founded to provide some general a three-star command. Starting with a small group of dedicated and intelligent officers, IJC has successfully grown into a stove-piped and bloated organization, top-heavy in rank. Around here you can't swing a dead cat without hitting a colonel. For headquarters staff, war consists largely of the endless tinkering with PowerPoint slides to conform with the idiosyncrasies of cognitively challenged generals in order to spoon-feed them information. Even one tiny flaw in a slide can halt a general's thought processes as abruptly as a computer system's blue screen of death." -- PowerPoints 'R' Us by Col. Lawrence Sellin, U.S. Army Reserves (Breitbart/UPI "Outside View" 2010-08-24). See, also: Colonel Kicked Out of Afghanistan for Anti-PowerPoint Rant by Spencer Ackerman (Wired/Danger Room 2010-08-27).
Our adventure in Afghanistan, as seen by the other side in Kunar Province:
Aw, how can we leave now?: Gitmo, the next Galapagos? It's a mighty ill wind that blows absolutely no good. Guantánamo Bay may be best known for its U.S. military base on Cuban soil and its unconstitutional prison, but to scientists at New York Botanical Garden's Caribbean Biodiversity Program it's a prime spot for ecological research. -- Guantánamo Bay, Site of Important Ecological Research by Julie Schwietert Collazo (Discover 2010-08-06).
Bon voyage: Perhaps you've had a good laugh over seasteading, the scheme hatched by rich libertarians to escape the clutches of democracy by living on giant metal platforms in the middle of the ocean. But as it turns out, seasteading is something of a wet dry run for some libertarians’ ultimate escape plan of uploading their brains into robot bodies and blasting off into space. This is also known as “transhumanism,” which is (very) loosely defined as a movement of people/future androids who are promoting the adoption of technologies that will eventually help “humans transcend biology,” in the words of Objectivist futurist Ray Kurzweil. -- The Ultimate Escape: The Bizarre Libertarian Plan of Uploading Brains into Robots to Escape Society by Brad Reed (AlterNet 2010-08-27).
Hey, they're cartoons anyway: A roundup of GOP candidates in the midterm elections as animated by NMA World Edition in Taiwan:
Can't help it. Love these guys. 美國反伊斯蘭情緒太超過?
Norman Rockwell's America was real: During World War II, the women in the small town of North Platte, Nebraska touched the lives of thousands of young soldiers on their way to war. It's not a bad model to keep before us now, as so many Americans deal with economic anxiety by demonizing their fellow citizens. -- Simple Gestures, Lifelong Memories by Abigail R. Esman (Forbes 2010-08-09).
Milestones: "Elizabeth Sargent, a poet, answered an advertisement to 'live and work in Carnegie Hall' 46 years ago and moved in with a recommendation from the literary critic Malcolm Cowley. Half a lifetime later, on Thursday, she was the last resident to move out of the 116-year-old studio apartments in Carnegie Hall Towers, which once percolated with creativity and personality Mark Twain used to smoke his pipe in the author’s club across the hall from Ms. Sargent’s studio; Marlon Brando entertained guests in the apartment directly below; and Leonard Bernstein read scores on the same floor. Norman Mailer penned works in her apartment, and Isadora Duncan danced down the hallway. 'This was a magical place,' Ms. Sargent said. 'Artists really had a freedom here; they developed here.'” -- In Apartments Above Carnegie Hall, a Coda for Longtime Residents by Liz Robbins (New York Times 2010-08-27).
George David Weiss, composer of Elvis' "Can't Help Falling in Love," "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" by The Tokens and "What a Wonderful World," Louis Armstrong's greatest hit, has died.
Hey, Glenn Beck: Here's how Martin Luther King described Jesus at the end of an essay published eight months after the civil rights leader was assassinated: "A voice out of Bethlehem two thousand years ago said that all men are equal.... Jesus of Nazareth wrote no books; he owned no property to endow him with influence. He had no friends in the courts of the powerful. But he changed the course of mankind with only the poor and the despised." King concluded this final essay, titled "A Testament of Hope," with a strikingly radical claim, indicating his strong identification with society's most disadvantaged and outcast persons. "Naive and unsophisticated though we may be," King said, "the poor and despised of the twentieth century will revolutionize this era. In our 'arrogance, lawlessness, and ingratitude,' we will fight for human justice, brotherhood, secure peace, and abundance for all." -- Martin Luther King, Democratic Socialist by Paul Street (The Black Commentator 2006-02-02).
And btw, Beck, it's not like we haven't seen your likes before:
The Tea Party is no joke: "There’s nothing in the world more tired than a progressive blogger like me flipping out over the latest idiocies emanating from the Fox News crowd. But this summer’s media hate-fest is different than anything we’ve seen before. What we’re watching is a calculated campaign to demonize blacks, Mexicans, and gays and convince a plurality of economically-depressed white voters that they are under imminent legal and perhaps even physical attack by a conspiracy of leftist nonwhites. They’re telling these people that their government is illegitimate and criminal and unironically urging secession and revolution." -- Tea Party Rocks Primaries by Matt Taibbi (Rolling Stone 2010-08-26).
The legendary Budd Schulberg told the Glenn Beck Story more than half a century ago:
In the end, though, you reap what you sow.
A step back for the security state: The New York state law mandating the removal from NYPD computerized databases of personal information of many thousands of entirely innocent citizens stopped and frisked wholly without reasonable suspicion, is a clear refutation not only of the policies of mayor Mike Bloomberg and NYPD commissioner Ray Kelly, but also of the Bush-Cheney-Obama insistence that national security and public safety trump individual constitutional liberties. If any civics classes still remain in public schools, NY governor David Paterson's signing statement is especially worth hearing and discussing in the context of a 22-page July 29 ACLU report card: "Obama Administration in Danger of Establishing 'New Normal' With Worst Bush-Era Policies." In office, Barack Obama has not only continued but expanded the disabling of the Bill of Rights begun by George W. Bush. "In a democracy," Governor Paterson said, "there are times when safety and liberty find themselves in conflict. From the Alien and Sedition Acts [opposition to which gave Thomas Jefferson the presidency] to the Patriot Act, we have experienced moments where liberty took a back seat." As president, Barack Obama has not done anything to rein in the excesses of the USA PATRIOT Act ("Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001" -- got to admire the Right's knack for clever marketing of bad ideas) . Indeed, when Democrats on the Judiciary Committee tried, once Obama was in the Oval Office, to enact a few reforms, the president helped the Republicans block most of them. -- What Obama Could Learn From Paterson: Lame-duck governor's inspiring words in defense of liberty by Nat Hentoff (Village Voice 2010-08-25).
Some very mean bugs are looking for you: The era of antibiotics is coming to a close. In just a couple of generations, what once appeared to be miracle medicines have been beaten into ineffectiveness by the bacteria they were designed to knock out. Once, scientists hailed the end of infectious diseases. Now, the post-antibiotic apocalypse is within sight. -- Are you ready for a world without antibiotics? by Sarah Boseley (Guardian UK 2010-08-12).
All your PowerPoint are belong to us: "I have been assigned as a staff officer to a headquarters in Afghanistan for about two months. During that time, I have not done anything productive. Fortunately little of substance is really done here, but that is a task we do well. We are part of the operational arm of the International Security Assistance Force commanded by U.S. Army Gen. David Petraeus. It is composed of military representatives from all the NATO countries, several of which I cannot pronounce. Officially, IJC was founded in late 2009 to coordinate operations among all the regional commands in Afghanistan. More likely it was founded to provide some general a three-star command. Starting with a small group of dedicated and intelligent officers, IJC has successfully grown into a stove-piped and bloated organization, top-heavy in rank. Around here you can't swing a dead cat without hitting a colonel. For headquarters staff, war consists largely of the endless tinkering with PowerPoint slides to conform with the idiosyncrasies of cognitively challenged generals in order to spoon-feed them information. Even one tiny flaw in a slide can halt a general's thought processes as abruptly as a computer system's blue screen of death." -- PowerPoints 'R' Us by Col. Lawrence Sellin, U.S. Army Reserves (Breitbart/UPI "Outside View" 2010-08-24). See, also: Colonel Kicked Out of Afghanistan for Anti-PowerPoint Rant by Spencer Ackerman (Wired/Danger Room 2010-08-27).
Our adventure in Afghanistan, as seen by the other side in Kunar Province:
Aw, how can we leave now?: Gitmo, the next Galapagos? It's a mighty ill wind that blows absolutely no good. Guantánamo Bay may be best known for its U.S. military base on Cuban soil and its unconstitutional prison, but to scientists at New York Botanical Garden's Caribbean Biodiversity Program it's a prime spot for ecological research. -- Guantánamo Bay, Site of Important Ecological Research by Julie Schwietert Collazo (Discover 2010-08-06).
Bon voyage: Perhaps you've had a good laugh over seasteading, the scheme hatched by rich libertarians to escape the clutches of democracy by living on giant metal platforms in the middle of the ocean. But as it turns out, seasteading is something of a wet dry run for some libertarians’ ultimate escape plan of uploading their brains into robot bodies and blasting off into space. This is also known as “transhumanism,” which is (very) loosely defined as a movement of people/future androids who are promoting the adoption of technologies that will eventually help “humans transcend biology,” in the words of Objectivist futurist Ray Kurzweil. -- The Ultimate Escape: The Bizarre Libertarian Plan of Uploading Brains into Robots to Escape Society by Brad Reed (AlterNet 2010-08-27).
Hey, they're cartoons anyway: A roundup of GOP candidates in the midterm elections as animated by NMA World Edition in Taiwan:
Can't help it. Love these guys. 美國反伊斯蘭情緒太超過?
Norman Rockwell's America was real: During World War II, the women in the small town of North Platte, Nebraska touched the lives of thousands of young soldiers on their way to war. It's not a bad model to keep before us now, as so many Americans deal with economic anxiety by demonizing their fellow citizens. -- Simple Gestures, Lifelong Memories by Abigail R. Esman (Forbes 2010-08-09).
Milestones: "Elizabeth Sargent, a poet, answered an advertisement to 'live and work in Carnegie Hall' 46 years ago and moved in with a recommendation from the literary critic Malcolm Cowley. Half a lifetime later, on Thursday, she was the last resident to move out of the 116-year-old studio apartments in Carnegie Hall Towers, which once percolated with creativity and personality Mark Twain used to smoke his pipe in the author’s club across the hall from Ms. Sargent’s studio; Marlon Brando entertained guests in the apartment directly below; and Leonard Bernstein read scores on the same floor. Norman Mailer penned works in her apartment, and Isadora Duncan danced down the hallway. 'This was a magical place,' Ms. Sargent said. 'Artists really had a freedom here; they developed here.'” -- In Apartments Above Carnegie Hall, a Coda for Longtime Residents by Liz Robbins (New York Times 2010-08-27).
George David Weiss, composer of Elvis' "Can't Help Falling in Love," "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" by The Tokens and "What a Wonderful World," Louis Armstrong's greatest hit, has died.
Visual aid: The economy flatlined under Bush
Going into the general election, the Democrats had better remind voters that by any rational measure the economic performance of the administration of George W. Bush was the worst of any president at least since Herbert Hoover, maybe ever,
and that those'll be the good old days compared to what Speaker Boehner and President Gingrich (or whoever) have in store for us. (Source: Aughts were a lost decade for U.S. economy, workers by Neil Irwin; Washington Post 2010-01-02).
and that those'll be the good old days compared to what Speaker Boehner and President Gingrich (or whoever) have in store for us. (Source: Aughts were a lost decade for U.S. economy, workers by Neil Irwin; Washington Post 2010-01-02).
Politics: Those Wacky Republicans - a series
"Saturday Catchup" is still on vacation. The whackos in the GOP, on the other hand, never sleep.
See, also: In Search of the Craziest GOP Policy Proposal by Seyward Darby (The New Republic 2010-07-08).
See, also: In Search of the Craziest GOP Policy Proposal by Seyward Darby (The New Republic 2010-07-08).
Politics: The long-term prospects of the two major parties
A new study -- “Demographic Change and the Future of the Parties” -- argues that, in the long term, electoral advantage belongs to the Democrats. The country is becoming more diverse, the author says -- younger and more educated and less religious, and these trends are all ominous for the GOP. The underlying assumption, though, seems to be that the Democratic Party trolling the waters of the new demographics will be one with an "ambitious agenda in areas such as health care, financial reform, education, energy, and global relations," in other words, one resembling the party of FDR and LBJ. It's hard to imagine, on the other hand, that the party of Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, representing, as it does, Wall Street and international capitalism and the Pentagon, will hold any special appeal to the emerging majority of minorities and Millennials. “Demographic Change and the Future of the Parties” by Ruy Teixeira (The Center for American Progress Action Fund
Read the full report (pdf)
Download the executive summary (pdf)
Read the full report (pdf)
Download the executive summary (pdf)
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