Town Hall Meeting

From the Inauguration, to Newspapers crumbling, to the Peace Prize, to Democrats. 2010 really is the Year of the Tiger!

Goodbye to 2009, Hello to 2010: Year of the Tiger

By ALEXANDER COCKBURN of Counter Punch

Once again hands are raised in stupefaction. How could they have missed him – meaning in this case Umar Abdulmutallab the Nigerian bomber on that flight from Amsterdam to Detroit. Why, his own father – one of the most powerful bankers in Africa – gave the US embassy in Lagos a warning! He was on the US master computer list of potential terrorists but never made it on to the watch list.

The Truthers reject the obvious answers – caution, bureaucratic inertia, buck-passing, turf fights – and say it was a plot. Obama joins Bush and Cheney in the big conspiracy. It won’t be long before David Griffin rushes out a book on the affair.

Personally, I’m not at all dismayed at evidence that intelligence gathering networks are flawed, that bureaucrats pass the buck. Hyper-efficiency in these matters indicates we have arrived at the perfect police state.

Of course there is room for common sense and elementary vigilance. In the case of the Virginia Tech killer there was plenty of evidence that Cho Seung-hui was a time bomb waiting to explode. Students talked about him as a possible shooter and refused to take classes with him. His essays so disturbed one of his teachers with their violent ravings that she arranged a secret signal in case she needed security during her tutorials.

And then was there was proof positive that the time bomb had exploded and the mass murder session began in the engineering building, the police state proved all too human in actual performance. The police cowered behind their cruisers until Cho Seung-hui finished off the last batch of his 32 victims, then killed himself. Then the police bravely rushed in and started sticking their guns in the faces of the traumatised students, screaming at them to freeze or be shot.

Read the rest here

Apparently some “charity” organizations have their limits! Children who are not in the U.S. legally are apparently deemed unworthy of toys. This includes the famous Salvation Army, among many others, according to a Houston Chronicle report. These charities check the “papers” before giving their help. In this time of giving, I suggest picking a charity that doesn’t discriminate. What a culture we have in the U.S!

Some toy drives check immigration status
By Jeannie Kever – Houston Chronicle

HOUSTON — They don’t claim to know who’s been naughty or nice, but some Houston charities are asking whether children are in the country legally before giving them toys.

In a year when more families than ever have asked for help, several programs providing Christmas gifts for needy children require at least one member of the household to be a U.S. citizen. Others ask for proof of income or rely on churches and schools to suggest recipients.

The Salvation Army and a charity affiliated with the Houston Fire Department are among those that consider immigration status, asking for birth certificates or Social Security cards for the children.

Read the rest here

Sing along! This song is so good and so important, its great to see Pete Seeger had a chance to sing it during the inauguration of Obama. You can see in the video George Lucas singing along! For those of you that don’t know, it was written in 1940 by Woodie Guthrie as a response to the song “God Bless America.”

Larry Lessig is an honest, very intelligent person who sees what is going on in America and is fighting to fix the major problems. He has started a project called Change Congress which wants to have public financing of elections. His point is that public financing must be addressed first because all other problems are a symptom of money ruining our democracy – whether its terrible environmental law, health care law, or regulations of Wall Street. Check out this excellent video and get started!

I was watching The News Hour with Jim Lehrer tonight to get some sane discussion and analysis of the debacle going on right now in the U.S. This quote from Politico.com’s Jeanne Cummings made my blood boil:

And I was hearing that their calls were like 99 percent to 1, you know. It was the local community bankers who were saying, “Please do this, because we’re next.” But otherwise it was very negative public response to this. And then, of course, we had some partisan petulance. I mean, it was sort of Washington at its worst. It was a really toxic mix.

So, Jeanne, of a company called POLITICO, you say the fact that congress actually responded to the will of the people was “Washington at its worst!” This is exactly what is wrong with this country since its founding. The leaders in Washington, and their surrogates that are sent out to “analyze” for we the people, have disdain for popular opinion. Alexander Hamilton referred to the American people as “the great beast.” That is why the people were not allowed to vote for their Senator until 1913! And here we find ourselves in a very serious national problem, where a democracy should let the people decide our destiny. Yet the powers that be, and their surrogates like Jeanne Cummings, the Cato Institute, the Heritage Foundation, AEI, the Wall Street Journal, etc, etc must wrest power from the people for our own sake.

Democracy is a form of government, capitalism is a form of economics. If we vote for socialism, or for the investment banks to pay for their crimes, or for anything, then so be it. That is the will of the people. All you who want to spread democracy around the world, that is how it works. Lets start here at home, and the House rejecting this bailout was a great start.

He has said he thinks that you are rich only if you make more than $5 million per year. And if that’s not enough, he doesn’t know how many houses he owns.

I think that our representatives in Washington campaign 100% of the time now. They don’t represent we the people, they represent anyone who can come up with the most dough. And we all know the ones with the dough are about 1% of us. I think that’s why we have seen Obama move to the right since he won the Democratic nomination. The ones with the money don’t want anything to change substantially, they are fat and happy. I don’t mean to rag on Obama specifically, but I’m worried people will stop fighting for their cause, believing he will solve it for us. I think that is a huge mistake, and a very common one. The news media’s constant election coverage is a huge reason why this is. Remember that most of the campaign contributions go straight into the pockets of these giant media companies via those campaign advertisements, so they have all the reason to keep you watching. One would think that with all the coverage we would get more informed, but they focus on trivialities and the horse race…how many points is Obama up this week?!!…how could Obama throw one gutter ball on camera?!! Who gives a crap!

Here’s a cartoon that shows just how looney this campaign is.

More on Obama and where he gets his money…

“Who Owns Obama?”:
http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/pham150708.html

Obama Reality Check:
http://counterpunch.org/whitney07212008.html

Bush’s 3rd Term, even WSJ gushing over Obama:
http://www.wsj.com/public/article_print/SB121495450490321133.html

There may be one presidential candidate that actually will fight for you, even after an electoral victory, and that’s Cynthia McKinney of the Green Party.

Thanks Laura and G for the links!

PS: Did you notice 2 more banks quietly failed again late last Friday? I see a pattern here.

It is about 5:30pm PST, and Ohio Congressman Dennis Kucinich took to the floor of the House of Representatives to present 35 Articles of Impeachment against George W. Bush. The House session is being televised live on C-SPAN. Check it out on your TV or watch it online here: http://www.c-span.org/

For those who may think that impeachment isn’t worth it since he will be out of office anyway in 5 months (ahem, Speaker Pelosi), I say that this is a very important thing to do, even if it comes AFTER he is out of office. The reason is we must prosecute Presidents that abuse their power in order to prevent future ones from trying to do it too. Whether it’s Obama or McCain, they will look and say “hey if Bush can break the law without consequences, why can’t I do it too?” And when it comes to Bush, he didn’t just break any law, he broke extremely serious ones like the ultimate crime of aggression by invading another country that did not attack it.

If you haven’t yet seen the Bill O’reilly insanity clip, check it out. The man makes an error and just flat out can’t admit he made a mistake and blames the teleprompter guy! Sometimes the insanity of people like him can make us laugh. Check it out here or here, or click on the image below for both the original clip and Stephen Colbert’s rendition of it.

—-Update 5.16.2008
Good ol Viacom Corporation (the conglomerate that owns Comedy Central) took off the video from YouTube already, so I updated the link.
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—-Update 3.31.2009
Added vid that seemed to last below…
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In case you needed further proof that the separation of church and state in America is not even close to enforced:

“Until 1912, mail was delivered 7 days a week. As the postal service grew in popularity and usage in the 1800s, local religious leaders were noticing a decline in Sunday morning church attendance due to local post offices doubling as gathering places. These leaders appealed to the government to intervene and close post offices on Sundays.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usps#Sunday_mail_delivery

A cool flash thing that shows some interesting stats on our one and only earth. Check it out by clicking on the picture below. Seems like the time is ticking for how much longer earth will be habitable for humans, and there isn’t any doubt in my mind that humans, especially due to unrestrained capitalism, are speeding us all to the end.

Video clip from the Onion News Network: Are Americans Rich?

Thanks G for the link!

From an article titled “A Blood Pressure Lowering Guide to the Democratic Party and Democrats” in MRZine:

“While the web page of the DNC advertises itself as “The Democratic Party,” there is no way to join. You can give money, but you cannot join.”

“The Democratic Party does not exist. At least not as an organized structure with members, solid principles, and discipline for those who violate its rules. Instead, it is a cauldron of constantly shifting groups, factions, and personalities often working at the same ends, sometimes working at contradictory ends…. The primary means to influence in the existing structure is cash money, and the more the merrier. The Democratic Party offers to supporters a degree of influence commensurate with the size of your financial contributions.”

Read the full article here: http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/townsend240807.html

Thanks G for the link!

I got a Bachelor’s degree in Economics, and I think this cartoon gave me plenty more to think about. How many of us really understand how our monetary system works? Maybe 1% or fewer? Check out the cartoon here. The title is “In Debt We Have Trusted,” For over 300 years

Here are some images I like…

That is the title of an essay by Alexander Cockburn, about the sensational case of 27 year old Michael Vick and dog fighting. You can find it here, its the second half of the article. Cockburn is an excellent writer who clarifies even the most clouded, hot button issue, such as this. He quotes “the Clarence Thomas of black sports writers,” Jason Whitlock, about how Vick obviously didn’t do it for the money, and that he must’ve done it because hip hop culture promotes it as fun. Hmm, that’s one theory you brilliant sports writer, you! This is where our media fail us daily – by not providing an intelligent context. How does torturing dogs fit into, say, torturing suspected enemies? Cockburn ends the article with a line that really resonates with me, so I’ll end with it too, “You can’t blame it all on rap-music culture, just one little rivulet in the imperial watershed.”

Sign the Senate petition showing your disdain for this decision by President Bush.

http://www.dscc.org/makeadifference/petitions/20070702_libby.htm

Thanks Topy for the link!

‘Nuff said. Thanks Topy for the picture!

About guns…

Yet people still say things like “Oh everybody thought there were WMD and that we had to invade. We were all duped.” That is flat out not true. Here is my research into how many and who voted against the war at the time.

“Although given little public credit at the time, or since, many of the 126 House Democrats who spoke out and voted against the October 2002 resolution that gave President Bush authority to wage war against Iraq have turned out to be correct in their warnings about the
problems a war would create.”

source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/03/AR
2006120301108_pf.html

“In the early morning hours of Oct. 11, 2002, the Democratic-controlled Senate voted 77-23 giving President Bush the authority to use military force in Iraq. Forty-eight of the Senate’s 49 Republicans voted yes; only Rhode Island’s Lincoln Chafee dissented. Of the 51 Democrats including the independent from Vermont), 29 voted yes and 22 voted no.”

source: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=7275360

So in total, 148 out of a possible 257 Democrat congress members voted against the war. That comes out to 58% of all Democrats voted against it!

Actual Senate and House Iraq Vote Breakdowns:
http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/
roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=107&session=2&vote=00237
http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2002/roll455.xml

Barbara Lee story that is sometimes confused with the Iraq War vote:

“On September 15 (2001), the US Congress approved a resolution authorizing President Bush to use “all necessary and appropriate force” against anyone associated with the terrorist attacks of September 11. The measure passed 98-0 in the Senate and 420-1 in the House. The lone dissenting vote was a colonel’s daughter and longtime maverick from California — Democrat Barbara Lee.

“I am convinced that military action will not prevent further acts of international terrorism against the United States,” Lee said on the House floor on Sept. 15. “There must be some of us who say, ‘Let’s step back for a moment and think through the implications of our actions today — let us more fully understand the consequences.'” ”

Source: http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2001/09/lee.html

I estimate about 20,000 showed up yesterday in Los Angeles to speak up for an end to the Iraq war and occupation. Check out the pictures here. Unfortunately, the local government no longer makes estimates, so we don’t really know, and the news media won’t pick up the duty. I made sure to get a sampling of the media coverage, so I watched the national NBC news and the local CBS news. Neither one covered the voices of the protesters for more than 10 seconds, and BOTH made sure to mention counter protesters. I was at the LA protest, and we outnumbered the counter protesters approx. 20,000 to 4. It is so sad that we can participate in such a huge showing of solidarity, but our voices are suppressed. When we behave peacefully, they don’t air our voices and they give us a few seconds of coverage. What do we have to do to be heard?!? This reminds me of the quote from John F. Kennedy, “Those who make peaceful revolution impossible make violent revolution inevitable.”

It is very inspiring to see so many turnout here, and this wasn’t even the main protest, that was at the Pentagon.