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And the parlour games continue. A confirmed "hell no" vote from Republican Senator Karen Gilmour was flipped to a hell yes today when she replaced the chairman of the committee. That's two additional "Yes" votes, giving a 7-5 majority to pass the bill out of committee. The kicker is committee chairs receive additional compensation beyond their normal pay.
While Wisconsin gets the majority of coverage in the War on Labor, Ohio's Republican controlled Senate is playing games with committee oppointments to secure enough votes to pass SB5 (John Kasich's union-busting budget solution). When the President of the Senate discovered he did not have enough support within his own party to pass SB5 out of the committee, he replaced a no-voting Republican with a yes-voting Republican. Talk about playground rules.
Interesting case from the Supreme Court: Corporations do not have personal privacy under FOIA.
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=000&invol=...
Black Mail
Black Mail
Black Mail.
It's the fundamental Rape-Public-CON agenda: from the New Deal to No Deal.
:'(
GENOCIDE in AMERICA
I have been reluctant to give you this comment and prediction but we are facing dire and foreboding times in the United States of Mortal Sin. The enclosed words have been revealed to me and I wish to share these words with you.
We know that the billionaires and the GOP want to destroy the unions and the American middle class. Destruction of these cornerstones in America will give the billionaires and GOP total control of our elections to never again be out of office and power. I believe that the billionaires and the GOP are actually orchestrating a more devious and demonic plan. Their plan is the genocide of the poor, average, middle, and working classes in America. We also know that they can be bought and they can also rig our elections but these efforts will cost money. It is imperative for the billionaires and the GOP to leave the impression of being fiscally responsible by saving money. Genocide is an easier way to save money.
Genocide will take place with the billionaires buying out our public utilities and corporate farms to raise our utility bills and to create food inflation that will take away earned money and systematically starve Americans and have Americans die from lack of heat in the winter and bake to death in the summer.
Make no mistake that the billionaires and GOP genocide of Americans is well planned. The new immigrants entering America will be enslaved, impoverished, and lacking any say in their future. They will be the drones and the serfs for ten percent of Americans who will control them. GENOCIDE OF AMERICANS IS HERE and its impact will be obvious in 2012 with a tsunami depression. For Americans without health care the genocide has been well underway for three decades.
When you start believing your own sides bogus polls - its over. This poll would require that Americans completely flip from the November 2, 2010 election results - in FOUR MONTHS. That doesn’t happen.
You libs are losing what little subtlety you had, lets see just how badly this poll had to be cooked to get these results. From http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2011/03/01/a-shoddy-new-york-times-pol...
“How do you square these figures with the results of last November’s elections, in which anti-tax, anti-deficit, anti-public-union forces swept to historic victories in federal and state elections across the country? Well, you can’t, of course. The Times doesn’t even ask this blindingly obvious question, let alone try to answer it.
But if you read down to the seventh paragraph of the story, which is on page 17, not page 1, an answer emerges:
The nationwide telephone poll was conducted Feb. 24-27 with 984 adults and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points for all adults. Of those surveyed, 20 percent said there was a union member in their household, and 25 percent said there was a public employee in their household.
Although less than 12 percent of the workforce is unionized today, 20 percent of the households in the survey had a union member. Although government workers are 17 percent of the workforce, 25 percent of the households surveyed had one living there. In other words, the sample was wildly skewed toward the very people most likely to give the answers the Times was hoping to hear.”
We turned away from the insanity of Collectivism last November, after we saw, with crystal clarity, what Collectivism is. We DID listen to Ayn Rand (Atlas Shrugged is at #211 on Amazon at the moment) and hence my signature:
Atlas Shrugged was supposed to be a warning, NOT a newspaper!
I'd vote to RECALL Walker.
Look, it's the oldest trick in the book. The wealthy have a vested interest in keeping racism, sexism, and all the other hate/fear crimes alive. As long as they can have the lower classes fighting and fearing each other, they can get away with stealing us blind and doing whatever gets them what they want, by propigating fear and hate.
We MUST STAND TOGETHER--all races, all genders, all ethinicities, lower-class, middle-class, all faiths and non-faiths, etc. We are ALL in the same boat. It's us against them.
I saw this on a poster that was part of an AlterNet article: They only call it class war when we speak up.
Well, let's speak up and have class war and end this attempted return of neofeudalism.
I believe that the right thing is for it NOT to work. But I fear that he has the forces of what i think of as "evil" on his side, the moneyed and powerful who have the agenda that no one is talking about - their own profit margins for their businesses and avoidance of taxes.. I wonder who has his ear, who is goading him on in the face of what seems like national disdain for his actions, and hs stubborn refusal to admit that he wants to triumph no matter what.
I was at a move-on rally in support of Wis. We had great support! People drove by honking and giving the thumbs up! Two papers and one news channel gave us coverage. The hateful comments on their websites were very dividing. The anger was scary! I feel they have no way to reply but with anger. One thing I have noticed is they never finish a subject. They change subject and attack.
The Pesident said we have to share the burden. So far I have only heard of the middle class and poor having to cut. It's time to spend some time finding out how much the Govenor makes. Really let's have the Goverment Starting at the top giving up a persentage of their income. The President should set the example! Then the Spreme Court, Senators.................... and so on.
Just a thought
g
"Citizens, united" can overturn "Citizens United"
Thom Should Stop supporting
And I agree with you a 100%!! These people are In-Tolerable! And just obnoxious! Facts - what facts!
THEY DO IT FOR $$$$$! It's all about the $$$ they get from those folks who have an agenda to sell. And there is a LOT of $$$ to be made here. Just thing of the $$$ to be made to debate, say Climate-Change. You go to the Koch brothers, give them your anti-climate warming spiel, say you can debate on all the major media outlets, and they give you zillions of $$$$!
Just watch these yo-yos debate the issues here. There are NO facts. It's all general and it's all bogus. But to someone who is not knowledgeable in the subject, or just does not know, the debate seems reasonable. Now multiply this like 20 times a day and you can see who eventually wins the debate. No contest!
This has to be stopped. The truth cannot prevail if there is no one to disprove the falsehoods or if the major media outlets refuse to debunk this nonsense. And this applies across the board with all right-wing pundits and "experts". They are all getting paid a lot of $$$ from special interest groups who have agendas they want to sell - has nothing to do with facts.
@making progress, I disagree. If they let him speak his mind, he is a valuable voice for the progressive movement.
I just wrote this in previous blog. I think is it VERY important that middle America wake up here!
It's very simple. This is a culture war. The repugs believe that the Public Schools are the problem for ALL our social ills. Their biggie - Abortion. They believe that if they get rid of the Public Schools they can get rid of liberal education and create Private Schools where all that will be taught is what is in the Bible. Science, Evolution, the liberal arts - all evil. They will no longer be taught. History - only what BIG BROTHER repug wants you to know.
This is BIG BROTHER in a BIG WAY! Small government? Forget it! Totalitarianism is NOT SMALL!
This whole UNSPOKEN agenda of the new repug party is COMPLETE control and COMPLETE dismantling of liberal democracy as we know it. This all sounds nice on paper but they will reap the whirlwind if they actually believe they can implement this in AMERICA!
To tell you the truth I am really getting sick of these smug, know-nothing, incipient fascist, fundamentalist autocrats who are trying to ram their in-tolerant bible toting nonsense down all American throats! Least they forget – this is AMERICA founded on the bed-rock of separation of State and Church. I live by that credo. But they want to eliminate that and make America a Theocracy. It’s not going to happen, at least in my lifetime.
We know what they are about. And we true Democracy loving Americans are not going to let it happen.
And tonight on MSNBC I heard a repug Wisconsin Senator refer to the demonstrators in the Wisconsin Capitol building as SLOBS and DIIRTY! This is what the right wing tea bagger movemnet think of us "Other" liberal Ameircans. Dirty SLOBS! These modern day know-nothings have lost all sense of reality!
Thom Should Stop supporting the right-wing echo chamber by no longer going on Fox. For The Love Of God; reduce the amount of time that you dedicate to debating facts with people like Carrie, Dan, or Wayne. You have already lost the debate by even engaging them in arguments over what are Facts. You are supposed to start from fact, and then debate the finer points. But you're debating reality with these people! They Own The Debate and you are letting them.
If you want to model behavior, then you need to join Chris Hedges in Protest and Civil Disobedience. It's all we have left, Thom! It's all we have left.....
It's very simple. This is a culture war. The repugs believe that the Public Schools are the problem for ALL our social ills. Their biggie - Abortion. They believe that if they get rid of the Public Schools they can get rid of liberal education and create Private Schools where all that will be taught is what is in the Bible. Science, Evolution, the liberal arts - all evil. They will no longer be taught. History - only what BIG BROTHER repug wants you to know.
This is BIG BROTHER in a BIG WAY! Small government? Forget it! Totalitarianism is NOT SMALL!
This whole UNSPOKEN agenda of the new repug party is COMPLETE control and COMPLETE dismantling of liberal democracy as we know it. This all sounds nice on paper but they will reap the whirlwind if they actually believe they can implement this in AMERICA!
To tell you the truth I am really getting sick of these smug, know-nothing, incipient fascist, fundamentalist autocrats who are trying to ram their in-tolerant bible toting nonsense down all American throats! Least they forget – this is AMERICA founded on the bed-rock of separation of State and Church. I live by that credo. But they want to eliminate that and make America a Theocracy. It’s not going to happen, at least in my lifetime.
We know what they are about. And we true Democracy loving Americans are not going to let it happen.
brian a hayes It's called Machiavellian politics - the means justify the ends! Absolutely no morals or ethics are required - just cold and calculated power mongering! The repugs have no soul!
I just don't know if or where these union bashers went to school. Do they actually believe America is better off with 100's of million's of workers earning poverty wages and benefits? Just because private corporations have gutted the manufacturing sector, sent their jobs off shore, destroyed unions and living wages for most workers, do these people actually believe the public sector (the last vestage of middle class jobs) should also be crippled? These union haters probably went to public schools (but unfortunately didn't pay attention in class) because their parents and grandparents (probably union members or supporters) made the sacrifices so their children and grandchildren could have a "free" decent education. America's socioeconomic rush to the bottom is accelerating. Our children and grandchildren must have the same educational advantages we had, if America is to have any hope of competing with the rest of the world. Please read your kids history books. The assent of the unions built America's middle class from the ground up. Todays socalled Republican party want's to return America to the days of the "Robber Barons." Check out PBS's "American Experience" special on the Triangle Shirt Waist factory and the valiant struggle of those courageous women. Eisenhower, Nixon and even Ronald Regan would be shocked at the greed, arrogance, vindictiveness and shortsightedness of todays GOP. God help us all.
As Roy Zimmerman says, all of these rich corporate jerks and the pathetic, sell-out jerks they pay to put in office are on the end of the ship that's rising while the other end goes down. Destroy the middle class and the upper class won't be far behind.
I'm going to keep sounding this alarm until someone hears it, and strarts to sound it themselves.
Here it goes again. Someone looked at one of those CAFR things again. This time it was the state of Wisconsin.
Thought a few of you might want to see what trouble happens when someone goes and looks at one of those darn things.
http://realitybloger.wordpress.com/2011/03/01/wisconsins-real-financial-situation-explained/
Sent FYI from,
Walter Burien - CAFR1.com
I think and hope he is cooked politicially. Maybe he can become a toilet paper salesman at Georgia Pacific (Koch Industries)
Wonderfully written! I wish we could send this out to everyone!
In Thom's debate with T.J. his opponent said, "Elections have consequences." True, but the Republicans were not "elected to" do what they are doing as they often are claiming as is being made plain to them in Wisconsin, Indiana and Ohio.
T.J. also cried, "You're taking 15% from (a billionaire)! How much do you want to take from one person, how many pounds of flesh!?!" Would he ask the same about a $600 per week teacher? The billionaire hasn't gotten anywhere near giving "a pound of flesh".
The whole idea of a progressive tax - as envisioned by Tohmas Jefferson - calls for a system of taxing people based on their ability to pay without undue sacrifice.