Recent comments
ADHD: Hunter in a Farmer's World
Thom Hartmann has written a dozen books covering ADD / ADHD - Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder.
Join Thom for his new twice-weekly email newsletters on ADHD, whether it affects you or a member of your family.
Thom's Blog Is On the Move
By webmaster
Hello All
Thom's blog in this space and moving to a new home.
Please follow us across to hartmannreport.com - this will be the only place going forward to read Thom's blog posts and articles.
Palin -- At least the CEO's were fired.
Palin -- Has the US ever convicted other countries for forced feeding like they did for water boarding?
Alice...thank you for the correction. (This is NOT sarcasm: I truly appreciate it when someone points out I am wrong about something.)
Nevertheless, why then does Mr. Hartmann write, "now we have a choice"? In bitter truth we the people have less choice now under the One Party of Two Names than we have ever had at anytime in this nation's history,
And now that the Supreme Court has made money the ultimate electoral power -- now that the court has effectively approved the unlimited use of the irresistable mass hypnosis known as "advertising" -- the One Party of Two Names will remain all-powerful until the nation itself is dead. Such is the now-eternal reality of capitalist governance: absolute power and unlimited profit for the One Percent, total subjugation for all the rest of us forever (that is, until our species is extinct).
Moreover, to offer false hope where there is no hope at all is, in my opinion, the worst sort of deception there is. Not only does it deprive the victim of the ability to come to grips with reality (and in these circumstances we are all victims); it also obstructs any remaining human potential for transcending hopelessness and thereby -- some would say "miraculously" -- evolving a working solution.
Showing your gun in public is neither a sign of strength, power, courage, or intelligence. Remember, there is a huge difference between flashing a gun and using it. Demonstrating the ability to carry a firearm in a protest is asinine at best. The reich wing has already demonstrated how much power it yields in this country when it lost the executive branch of the government to a black man in two consecutive elections. As far as I am concerned, all this flashing of firepower is nothing more than a bunch of grown men throwing a temper tantrum. It says absolutely nothing positive about the reich wing of our society other than the fact that they are angry, armed, dangerous, probably not very well endowed, and definitely not very bright.
HT, I respectfully disagree. Capitalism is evil, because it nurtures the psychopathy that is running us and our country right into the ditch. Profits before life. Literally. The tragic consequences are self-evident, throughout the U.S. We need a better system that honors and values human life, where no one gets discarded. Truth and fairness? That will never happen under capitalism. - AIW
Loren, Thom calls himself a democratic socialist. I've heard it many times. - AIW
Geez Palin... I don't even remember commenting about that! Which post?
Then Chuck, why do I keep hearing about equal pay being an issue, and women still not getting equal pay for equal work? - AIW
ScottFromOz:
I like to use this phrase from Dr. Phil, whom I think is a conservative leaning jerk, when conservative relatives or comment posters begin their rich-ass-kissing routine. "How's that working for you? Any billionaires jumped out of the bushes yet to reward you? Wow, they're pretty lucky. They have all their biliions and you to defend them for free." The conversation usually ends abruptly.
It's funny, we are one of the few liberal family members on both sides, and are the ONLY ones living within our means and debt-free and have something tangible to show for it.
It,s not capitalism that's evil what about practicing conciouse capitalism where transparency truth and fairness are practiced because they come from what you are being .
Beingism is the future of our world .
Palindromedary, the leadership of the Chicago Black Panthers were massacred in 1969 a few blocks from where I used to live. Public opinion was changing at the time and the police had lost much support after their violent behavior of the Democratic National Convention the previous summer but there was still enough for them that they could get away with the murders.
Some non violent protesters might not show up if there is a likleyhood of being subjeced to violence but in the important periods of history most non violent protesters were not of that sort. In the '60s it was a virtual certainty that you would be roughed up (beaten up, fire hosed, set upon by dogs, what have you) at a demonstration. People commonly wore helmets to those events by the early '70s. The Tienemen Square protesters surely knew that what happened could happen.
If the protesters at Kent State had guns the Army would've got reinforcements - but that doesn't mean you should never use guns in a popular uprising. If you've already got the public on your side you can do whatever it takes, if you don't have their support it'll be a suicide charge. The Cuban Revolution started with 20 guys and snowballed until it was overwhelming. The David Koresh people had much of the public with them in Texas and elsewhere and the millionaire rancher against the BLM and his billionaire supporters are mobilizing their best PR to win the public because they know their success depends on it.
You should only use guns if you can win that way and you generally can't without the support of the public - and you wouldn't deserve to. It wouldn't be legit for an armed, obsessed, fanatical minority to decide what's good for everybody else.
Go start an illegals thread. This is all about the rich, conservatine and the militia wack jobs jumping at a chance to act like idiots.
This has defined America for years, and our media and policies reflect this. Today, unlike the past, "income inequality" refers exclusively to the gap between the better-off and the rich. The voices of the poor were virtually censored out of what we call "progressive" media. Today, Dem politicians no longer even claim that they "stand with the American people;" they explicitely state that they stand with the middle class. The poor have no voice in the public forum, absolutely no representation in government. We do, indeed, determine human worth by economic status.
The tragedy of this generation is that we believe only those who are of current use to employers/the corporate state are legitimate human beings. Not everyone can work, due to health or circumstances, and there simply aren't jobs for all who need one. The US shipped out a huge portion of its working class jobs since the 1980s, and then wiped out basic poverty relief. This generation of trhe better-off, the middle class, decided that our surplus population - the unemployable, and the unemployed - are unworthy of the most basic human needs of food and shelter. That's a frightening deterioration of what we were as a people.
Yes, I would feel pretty bad about being a dupe in a private corporate army to fight for corporate higher profits! And that why I don't support our Dupes in the field!
Once they realize they were/are dupes (as in corporate pawns) they get PTSD.
“Military men are just dumb, stupid animals to be used as pawns in foreign policy.”
― Henry Kissinger
https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080829163144AAAY2UB
Illegals entering our country are told "this is a country of laws, you can't break our laws because you don't agree with them" All of a sudden some citizens feel that it's now ok to break the law, the law that they don't agree with... Hmmmmm
Laws against hate crimes? And I just wonder how many school children will spend time in capitalist-controlled profit-making prisons for minor name-calling in their schools. You know one child brought a toy water pistol...that looked like a toy water pistol to school and they called the cops on him.
http://www.prisonplanet.com/school-calls-cops-over-water-pistol-vows-to-...
GM and Chrysler saved? They should have let them drown in their own capitalist stupidity. Yes, jobs would have been lost but lots of jobs have been lost by companies outsourcing jobs and the CEOs, top execs, and the investors who made bad business decisions would not have walked away with many millions of dollars. By bailing out those people the government created a "moral hazard" that told these people that it is ok to do it again and again because the government, especially the tax payers, will be their to bail them out. Same thing with the bank bailouts.
Ended torture? Force feeding is not a form of torture?
chuckle: You might be right..as long as that Democrat wasn't a blue dog Democrat! Not all Dems are evil, tis true! But the ruling elite plays their cards just they way they want to make people think they have a true democracy...a close call might seem like a democracy that just missed the mark. Leaving the losers to opine that "if they only had one more win in the Senate or House...". That fosters the illusion of hope. They aint no dummies! They know they have to use a lot of deception to make people believe they still have a chance. They (the ruling elite) have to give the illusion that the Democrats are the hope and when the Democrats win...they (the Democrats) sell us out on the really important issues....like universal healthcare and then pass asinine menial ones like...well, I'm not going to say it.
Yes, AIW, I know I should have used the word "whine" and not "wine" in #43. ;-}
I started work about Reagan's time, and I specifically remember the seniority list dramatically ending at 30-years (Only one or two people stayed up to 33 years).. Now that I have 30 years seniority, I am literally smack in the middle by seniority, about 100 people above me any hundred people below Me. Today the seniority list goes up to 48 years, and instead of retirement parties every couple of months we get the email that another coworker died on the job without an opportunity to retire. And it's worse than that, because 30 years ago we could retire with only one wage earner,,, today two wage earners in a family out of the norm. As you can imagine I am very very very pissed off, that we get Reagan's trickle-down economics whether Democrat or Republican is in office. This all gets back to the economy run like a game of Monopoly, because the rich own the politicians (Which is why it's very difficult to tell the difference between Democrats and Republicans when it comes to trickle-down economics)..
chuckle8: Well, that was then, and it was obviously very dangerous thing to do...and very brave for sure. And that was just a handful of people. We don't know if there were lots of people who decided the risk was too great and didn't go.
But I just wonder how many protestors, today, would actually show up at a protest if they were pretty certain that some of them would be fired upon by police and would die. I don't think too many would actually show up. I think that most know that, after Kent State, and the flack the government got over that, that most people don't really think they will be shot at during those demonstrations.
It is very commendable, to be sure, that they do show up and demonstrate. We all owe them a great deal of gratitude. But it seems like they are just up against a brick wall and nothing will change for their efforts. A few will get roughed up, or tear gassed, or even have a head hit by a canister or bean bag causing brain damage and some may even get arrested. But no one expects the police to do another Kent State. So, I say that those who take up arms are braver (or crazier) than those who don't because those who do have a greater expectation of dying. But the result will also end up killing a lot of the opposition as well instead of just standing there and taking the abuse of some fat pig cops.
None of this is desirable and I hope it never happens (there's that "hope" word again)..and I hope things turn around before that happens. But I think it is inevitable, as things are going now. And I think that the armed right-wingers will strike out first. They have already proven the government has no balls in Nevada and during the Tea Party demonstrations where they carried guns and the government did not force their hand.
They will never respect you or fear you if you give up all your weapons or show that you will never defend yourself against their tyranny. The cumbaya crowd are just fooling themselves. The wolves are laughing at you!
chuckle8, card check died when Obama the Orator became Barack the Betrayer, which ensured it -- like any other "change we can believe in" -- was dead forever. See http://workinprogress.firedoglake.com/2010/04/13/what-happened-to-the-em...