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Thom --- at face value, this story alone would be cause for considerable concern; but when you stop to realize that Big Oil is only one of the Big owners of our "democracy" -- one's mood really turns gloomy.
Thom, as the clearest and most informed thinker that any of us know, when it comes to our experiment in democracy -- I have a request of you: Would you please advise us on how to respond to the incessant pleas for contributions from "our side", as they battle to balance the message-spending. Every day I get 6-10 emails (I don't even pick up my phone anymore...) from good, progressive candidates; office holders; organizations; etc. (You probably get several times that!) And I'm getting *very* frustrated, because I know that the huge bank-roll on the other side will indeed buy votes (rightly or wrongly -- that's just the way it is) --- but I could give every non-essential nickel I have, and, in a lifetime, not counterbalance one day's chump change from the Koch brothers, or Adelson, or any Republican Super PAC. I feel I have to try...... but, at the same time, I feel like I'm on a fool's errand.
Please think deeply about this, and give us a short, on-air segment on how to proceed; and how to think about what is feeling more and more like we're just playing into the money-in-politics problem. Thanks in advance. Warmest regards, Mike
Don't leave out the John Birch Society and the Bircher's early writer-activist Phyllis Schlafly. She coauthored "A Choice, Not An Echo," which was widely distributed in the Goldwater campaign and started the Eagle Forum for mobilizing against the ERA and abortion rights. She was instrumental in folding these activists into the Republican party and highlighting such issues in Republican party platforms. I think she beat even the so-called Moral Majority into the act.
I like the Article1 Section 8 argument a lot! Now, who can claim standing and what lawyer wants to file the case?
I and many others feel your pain Palindrom, but beyond attentioning to and maintaiining what little we still do have left or 'is in the works' what do you propose? That Vets are given what was promised when we signed on the dotted line?........Don't be naive.
I have had VA healthcare for several years now and have not had a problem with them...actually...because I really don't have any serious health problems...yet. The doctor just prescribes the meds for asthma and lowering cholesterol and I just go in for my yearly blood test and see the doctor.
I thought their system was really very efficient and a model for what all Americans should have. But then, a relative, a Vietnam-era vet that suffered problems from the war--including Agent Orange, who has been on VA for many years now...called me up saying he was having excruciating pains in his lower back and legs, that his doctor said it was sciatica..and had him see a therapist.. which wasn't helping and getting much worse. In fact, he has lost a lot of weight (and he was not over-weight to begin with) and is emaciated as he hasn't been able to eat. He could barely walk with his cane..I had to practically carry him to the car..and he could barely talk. I found him in a nearly fetal position as he was squatting down near the ground. I thought he may be dying of cancer or something so I took him into the VA hospital emergency because we couldn't reach his doctor because the phone number we had just had a circular loop of recordings.
Once we got him to the VA hospital, and on an IV for pain, he seemed much better. And after several hours they had him wait in the waiting room for medicine which was another several hours before he got the medicine. And all that while, in the waiting room, he was back to grimacing, and squatting down near the floor pain. I told the doctor at the emergency room that he was still in a great deal of pain...but he acted like there was nothing more they could do...and that we should have contacted his doctor. The next day, his normal doctor called up and was ticked off that he went to the emergency room. But all of the other "patients" sitting in the waiting room all seemed to have various pains but nothing as bad as my relative.
What is so hilarious is that every time I go in...they always ask me...have you been thinking about suicide...have you been depressed...etc. etc. They try to get me to participate in various "programs". It's like they seem to be overly concerned about suicide but they are totally oblivious to the things that might cause one to commit suicide...like extreme pain and a feeling of hopelessness that comes about when your doctor and the VA system seems to be so uncaring about it.
They have all of these stupid programs...like losing weight (although losing weight is not stupid and is essential)...exercise programs and other "programs" where they get low-level social programs...and they have programs where they send out all kinds of "junk" mail on health-related matters...and all these programs stick their mosquito-like proboscises into the tax coffers to suck them dry. But when it comes to people suffering from pain...they say "just deal with it!" and "here, try this program ...or that program"...."you've got excruciating pain? Here, let me send you a mailer telling you how to deal with pain!" "Maybe you need to find Jesus?"
On the other hand, if it was the private medical systems...they would shove all kinds of medicines and IVs while charging $10 for every aspirin or many thousands of dollars for any hospital visit.
Evidence of more pre-programmed/auto-pilot trading.
Moody's waited until after markets closed on Thursday before announcing the downgrades so as not to encourage any mid-day knee-jerk reactions. Which was thoughtful considering the markets were already having a down day based on Fed announcements of the previous day.
What's interesting is that after having overnight to digest the double down-grades there were enough investors to collectively collude (by virtue to the trades they effected on Friday) in trade traffic to give the impression that credit ratings don't matter - or
Friday's trades were decided and set in motion ahead of time and no events, real or imaginary, were going to change those plans.
So who can check to see if the portfolios of those sycophantile committee members happened to have done especially well as a result of Friday's trades?
When government spies on you, as the NSA is doing (Obama loves this sh!t), they can't tell you because it would be "violating "our?" privacy" to tell us they are spying on us. They say it would "violate our privacy" but what they mean is it would violate THEIR privacy.
Published on Jun 23, 2012 by TheYoungTurks
"The surveillance experts at the National Security Agency won't tell two powerful United States Senators how many Americans have had their communications picked up by the agency as part of its sweeping new counterterrorism powers. The reason: it would violate your privacy to say so. That claim comes in a short letter sent Monday to civil libertarian Senators Ron Wyden and Mark Udall. The two members of the Senate's intelligence oversight committee asked the NSA a simple question last month: under the broad powers granted in 2008′s expansion of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, how many persons inside the United States have been spied upon by the NSA?...".* Ana Kasparian and Cenk Uygur discuss on The Young Turks.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vCqQ_wbp74o
NSA: It Would Violate Your Privacy to Say if We Spied on You-- By Spencer Ackerman
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2012/06/nsa-spied/
The US has been a warrior nation from it's inception. Our history is riddled with violent wars from our own hubris or greed wheather here there or anywhere else in any generation one could/can pull out of the hat. And rarely has it been for 'justifiable causes'.
That's the whole crux of this issue. The "too big to fail" means just that. When they are allowed to become this big, they cannot be allowed to go down and take the world's economy along with them, so countries bail them out, over and over. They knew this and it is one of the reasons they created these monolithic banks. It is also why Glass-Steagall was created in the first place and had it still been in force we may not have been in this global economic meltdown. It's like the governments of the world have sold the people into slavery to these crijminals.
"DON'T ATTEND YOUR OWN FUNERAL" [Direct-TV commercial spoof]
When your cable-tv provider engages in monopolistic practices they can make too much money.
When corporations make to much too money they often buy Washington politicians.
When paid to do so - politicians then cut taxes, reduce regulations and/or prosecute ill-advised wars.
When taxes are cut, regulations reduced and/or wars fought corporations make even more money.
When the political-right has too much money & power often progressive evangelist on the political-left (for example, Malcom X, Jesus, RFK, MLK, JFK...) are assassinated.
Don't be evil >>> Stop engaging in undemocratic and/or anti-competative practices!
Democracy in America has to be the biggest joke going at the moment, you have no democracy. Your country (like many) are ruled by the rich so they can remain rich and keep the rest of you down. Wake up and see what is going on around you before it is too late.
I'm not very optimistic and I'm dreading the flood of ugly lying commercials that will start saturating us. My hope is that they do so much advertising in such a dark and depressing way that people will turn it off, will refuse to consider these valid ideas or thoughts or facts.
We continue to refer to them as Republicans, Tea Partyers, Liberterians. They are NOT! They are the "New Right" of Paul Weyrich and follow his handbook to the letter. They've been around for 40yrs and took a foothold with Reagan. Weyrich founded many things including: Heritage Fdn which puts men & money together (think tank); Free Congress Fdn which recruits and grooms candidates from the White Evangelical Christian Church; ALEC which allows corporations (600+) to write our laws with the politicians (2000+republicans). They boilerplate them and pass them to Republican Governors for immediate implementation; Moral Majority which is attacking women, etc; American's Voice - communications. Now, add Citizens United so all those corporations can get rid of the Democrats or Democratic Republic of America - once & for all - and install their Theocracy. This is NOT a conspiracy theory. See wikipedia for a short, easy read on Paul Weyrich. Check out alecexposed dot org; sourcewatch dot org; alexwatch dot org....there's Many. The information has been verified and anyone can check the references. This is NOT just an election...it is the downfall of our Democratic Republic.
thank you longtime listenner
Republicans can fool some of the people some of the time. Republicans can fool all of the people some of the time. However, they cannot fool all of the people all of the time. The mud slinging and lies that are certain to come from the Right Wing Super PACs will not be believed by the people. The Koch brothers and their evil friends will not succeed in purchasing the President of the United States. It is certain that Mitt Romney is for sale, but the public will not purchase his story. President Obama and the Democrats will give the American people the truth, we will work hard to get him re-elected.
I have to listen to Thom late because Phoenix now plays the show later. I just heard Thom give a brilliant, succinct analysis of what's been happening since Bush wrecked the economy and the Republican plot to blame it on Obama to take back everything this year. He should write this down.
Things will get much worse if the Koch brothers and their cult of followers acquire more power this November. I believe the greatest harm coming to America is the Constitutional Convention they will propose once they've got enough states under republican control. That will spell the end of everything progressive in America. Imagine the past 40 years of conservative's proposed ammendments becoming law: Balanced budget (this will be the initial, alarmist reason for the convention), Prayer in schools, Banning abortion and flag burning, enhancements to corporate rights, restrictions on voting ... just to name some of the destruction in store if such a convention comes into being.
Meanwhile, congress and the president missed opportunities to block the ramifications of citizens united: They could have easily imposed rules on the broadcast industry to a) limit or set the price for running political ads, b) require TV studios to play alternating ads between opposing viewpoints. Both points would make it possible for lesser funded candidates to compete more effectively with rich opponents.
If you want to get a bit creative, since Article 1 Section 8 gives only the congress the power to create and regulate money, congress could put limits on the use of currency for buying political ads. "This currency valid for uses as regulated by the congress..."
Some Voters Are Gullable And Believe Any Old Clap-Trap They See On TV Adverts. I Would Never Vote For The Outsourcing Pioneer.
America 2012 - The Best Democracy Money Can Buy.
Freud has been discounted but I enjoyed the slip with the Koch Brothers hosing not hosting their annual convention. I'm still idealisitc enough to think the Economic Royalist can be exposed and the people can vote thier own interests.
Spot on, THom! That "We’re entering a whole new era in American politics thanks to the Supreme Court" is so true. We are entering a very, very dark era in American politics, not only thanks to the Supreme Court but also thanks to the 50+ MILLION registered voters who were stupid enough to vote for George W. Bush TWICE!!! (oy!) and are stupid enough to believe what they see on television.
Very interesting and valid perspectives by Octavia Butler. Specifically, the part that says "to be led by a fool is to be led by the opportunists who control the fool' describes so well the 8 years under George W. Bush. Sad!
Since Thom is talking about Hitler and his eugenics program and persecution policies. I just want to point out, it wasn't just Hitler that came up with this stuff in Germany. Not saying that he doesn't deserve his fair share of blame, but lets not forget Himmler who pursued some of his own theories. Not to mention some of the medical experiments performed by several different people who were allowed access to perform whatever experiment they wanted.
Just sometimes feels like when the name Hitler is invoked (or Stalin for that matter) there is an implication that he willed all these terrible deeds despite opposition. Fact of the matter is, like any politician he saw the parade coming down the street and jumped in front of it. Though admittedly he was looking for that parade for quite some time.
N
What is currently happening in Japan
1,000 U.S. high school students to start volunteer work in tsunami zones: http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120610a6.html#.T-TaEJGRiuJ in the following prefectures: Fukushima, Ibaraki, iwate and Miyagi
50,000 tones of radioactive wastes are over 8000 Bq/Kg: http://fukushima-diary.com/2012/03/50000-tones-of-radioactive-wastes-are... (in Fukushima, Ibaraki, iwate, Miyagi prefectures)
Fukushima Plant Faces Typhoon Summer Plus Tornado Threat: http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-06-22/fukushima-plant-faces-typhoo...
Tornado Risk
The utility known as Tepco hasn’t decided to install any additional safety measures against tornadoes, Junichi Matsumoto, a general manager at the utility, told reporters May 7. “It may be necessary to investigate the possibility of tornadoes in Fukushima, but we don’t plan to take any action at the moment,” Matsumoto said.
Today is the birthday of the late author Octavia Butler. She wrote great speculative fiction. A couple of thoughts from her:
"Choose your leaders with wisdom and forethought. To be led by a coward is to be controlled by all that the coward fears. To be led by a fool is to be led by the opportunists who control the fool. To be led by a thief is to offer up your most precious treasures to be stolen. To be led by a liar is to ask to be lied to. To be led by a tyrant is to sell yourself and those you love into slavery."
"Beware, all too often we say what we hear others say. We think what we are told that we think. We see what we are permitted to see. Worse, we see what we are told that we see. Repetition and pride are the keys to this. To hear and to see even an obvious lie again and again and again, maybe to say it almost by reflex, and then to defend it because we have said it, and at last to embrace it because we’ve defended it."
The big banks will collapse eventually leaving just one of them standing. I have no inside knowledge just an educated guess. Like a big merger, only it affects everyone's life (think empire, monarchy, monopoly, oligarchy, it doesn't matter what its called). The trick is in controlling dissent. If they can control dissent then they can steer us wherever they wish, which more than likely is more consolidation of power.
The majority of people will get sick of bailing out banksters eventually. The banksters know this too, and probably have plans A, B, C, D to try and hold onto their power. The real question is what plans do you have to take your own power back?