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Funny how Rep. Issa wasn't up in arms about the CI decision allowing unlimited anonymous corporate donations?
Good for who?? Good for the dark side, that's who!
I live in CA...Issa is a well known gangster...there is nothing honest or truly patriotic about him. He is a liar and a thug who thinks that unlimited money equals unlimited power. He is the definition of a fascist.
You only have to see the fear in society and working life, to see the consequences of this charleton's request, it is obvious that this type of infringement will deter genuine people from exposing the truth,
Does he really believe that we trust him?
One of your Countries best piece of leglislation; discredited potentially by a shyster
He does not need the identities of the individuals to ascertain the facts, all the information needed could be supplied without disclosing named parties.
MUST not be allowed!!!!!
Very scary! Once again, our freedom, and all the tools of democracy, are eroding. It's amazing how intelligently and precisely targeted the efforts are to keep our population unaware of what's happening to them. We are losing our right to know.
Thom, how I wish my history teacher had spoken of our country's birth in such a gripping manner as you have! We spoiled brats reaping the benefits of those who came before need to hear it in those terms!
Ahmed Chalibi ------------------------------------------
Thom, the guy you are thinking of is "Ahmed Chalibi". He was the Bush Administrations "exit strategy", as they planed to replace Saddam with him. But when no WMD's were found, everyone started asking questions, and eventually the Bushies turned on him and declared him to be an Iranian spy.
Thom,
How do you like the corporate 24/7 news blackout on Egypt? Or the Obama Administration's deer in the headlights surprise? There weren't any warnig signs? Tunisia, Yemen, growing street riots in Cairo?
I study media, and this weekend all we got from corporate media 24/7 are the same pictures, over and over, and over... punditry and worse, out and out repetitive lies from every corporate channel in America. Here's an example; it had been widely reported around the World on Saturday morning that the Egyptian Army has sided with the populace. In fact twenty-four Egyptian Army tanks invaded the downtown Cairo public square, with about twenty revolutionaries sitting on top of each one late Friday night, early Saturday morning. NOT ONE American channel reported this. NOT ONE! In fact, they were deliberately spinning and lying the entire time! The pictures I saw from European press and Al Jezera looked like the fall of Havana or Saigon!
Uh, "protesters?"No, REVOLUTIONARIES! "It maybe time for some reforms?" Uh, a little late for that don't ya think? This from Anderson Cooper on CNN last night (I'm paraphrasing): I looks like maybe some of the elements of the Army are starting to appear sympathetic to the "protestorsers".... And, bull puckey like: It's starting to look like there is begining and growing anti - US sentiment in the streets... Really? I got news for CNN and Andersen Cooper: This is no less than an Anti-American Empire Revolution that is now burning in three countries in the Mid - East. And, this is just the beginning. This IS our East German moment in the Middle East. The dominoes are falling and American Empire is over. Somone ought to drive out to the Pentagon and tell 'em.
None of the major American channels reported another apalling fact. The US Chamber of Commerce is over there trying shore up Mubarak against the diplomatic efforts of our government? WTF? That's walking up damn close to the line of TREASON. Has US corporate news reported this? NO! Has Obama or Clinton said anything about this? NO! Are the majority of the American people in the dark about all of this? Isn't it just they way the powers that be like it?
The last vestige of raw power that Mubarak had this weekend was part, only part of the Egyptian Air Force. Did you see it was only a handful of planes buzzing the capital? Did your see the AAA guns on the personel carriers on the ground pointed skyward? That was a great big middle finger to those few Mubarak loyalists left (the Egyptian Air Force is an elitist institution) courtesy to of the Egyptian (now revolutionary) Army.
This won't be turned around. It's so obvious that all Obama and Clinton are trying to do now is buy time to get Mubarak out of there and try and control the succession of power. I saw corporate pundits all weekend on TV literally deciding who we should put in there next... Lovers of democracy my ass! And, Obama is allowing further corporate dominance of the media and control over the interenet and is planning a kill switch for the whole thing.
"THE REVOLUTION WILL NOT BE TELEVISED!"
What Corruption and Force Have Wrought in Egypt
"The rise of powerful Islamic parties appears inevitable. It appears inevitable not because of the Quran or a backward tradition, but because we and Israel believed we could bend the aspirations of the Arab world to our will through corruption and force." - Chris Hedges
http://www.truthdig.com/report/print/what_corruption_and_force_have_wrought_in_egypt_20110130/
This is a Must Read!
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Thom,
Obama's SOTOS was complete bull. Yes, he actually articulated a Democratic vision which seems to be a first in a while. However, that vision, in accord with his political-economic behavior is decidedly corporatist. He said he was going to create jobs yet he said not one word about small business, where most new jobs are created. Yes, he did sign an SBA bill last year that provided $30B over several years for small business but it is dwarfed in comparison to TARP, zero percent trillions at the Fed window for the guys that Emmanueled us, and his corporate subsidies provided to the insurance companies et. al. .... It's no secret that health care premiums are skyrocketing! What happens when you add fifty million new subsidized customers to a market that is allowed to collude and set prices? Yeah, some people are being helped with the denial of care issues and that is a good thing, but we are all paying the hidden tax through the likes of Blue Sheild's 59% increase this year alone. I haven't heard one Democratic official admit this (and I am a very active Democrat.)
If you cut the entire domestic discretionary budget you only get 12% savings. It is nothing compared to the big four: Social Security, military spending, Medicare, and the fact that corporations for the most part, don't pay taxes while we support their exportation of our jobs! Social Security is supposed to be a stand alone trust fund. That leaves military spending ($1.2 trillion if you count all military spending hidden throughout the federal budget like mercenaries in the State Department budget, the black budget, myriad intel agencies, Homeland Security, nukes at DOE ad nauseum...), Medicare and seeing to it that corporations actually start paying taxes. Obama offered a "whopping" $15B in "defense cuts." That's less than a day and a half out of military spending for an entire year. Bet that Medicare will be savaged and soon!
Yes, the economy is growing but for whom? Main Street is still in the toilet and the banksters are sitting on two trillion dollars of our money that they won't lend to small business and Obama didn't say a damn thing about that either! WTF? Yeah, maybe "on average" we are doing great (and even that is debatable), but when you consider the huge and growing income disparity gap, the vast majority of Americans are hurting badly and will be doing so for "a generation" or more according to the "Finacial Crisis Inquiry Report."
I suggest you actually read the Report. Why have many of the perps circulated through this Administration? Why did Obama can"effin' moron" Emmanuel (gee, no "GE," I guess I'm some sort of "purist" and a member of the "professional left,"according to "Goober" Gibbs and Obama) only to replace him with Daley (JP Morgan.) Why did Obama's FCC approve the largest yet media consolidation when he pledged he would not do that and then turn around and appoint a direct beneficiary, the Chairman of GE, to his "jobs creation"panel, which has shipped over fifty-percent of its own jobs overseas?" And, Obama did this the Friday before SOTUS! What a hypocrite! The Emperor has no clothes and you know it!
While he waxed eloquent about a corporate driven green revolution somewhere off in the horizon, his Administration approved the sale and distribution of genetically modified Monsanto alfalfa that will impact practically the entire grocery food chain, without adequate study and with a whole lot of scientic and public opposition. And, he did this within days of the SOTUS!
BTW, if you do read the Financial Inquiry Report you will quickly realize that Obama's so called Financial Reform bill would not have stopped this crisis. Sorry to pop your bubble, but his so called "Financial Reform" is so much crap. The Inquiry Commission says in no uncertain terms that the conditions that created this mess still exist under this Administration. Like the "public option," the beef, Glas-Stegal provisions were removed by him, not the Republicans.
He said that he values "transparency" yet he held over thirty private, unannounced meetings with insurance company and HMO execs and he had to be sued under the Freedom of Information Act before he would release the documents and admit it. Dick Cheney's Energy Task Force anyone? He didn't have to be so duplicitous with "Financial Reform" because after all, he had Timmy, and Larry, and Rahm, et. al., right there in the White House with him.
And, he compromised with no one. He capitulated! He personally knifed the "public option" before he ever confronted the Republicans for a vote. Compromise requires BOTH parties to work together. How many Republicans voted for the final Health Care bill? How many are trying to tear it down right now? What "'effin'" compromise is he talking about? There was no compromise. NONE. ZIP. NADA. ZERO!
The real problem in this Country is the Corporate Republican Party AND the Democratic Leadership Council. You know as well as I that they BOTH are wholly owned susidiaries of the corporations. When Obama says that he is moving towards the middle, what he means is that he is serving the corporations, and you know that too. Why do you keep trying to pretend otherwise? In order to solve a problem first you have to recognize it and then acknowledge it. After listening to you for quite a while, and hearing you talk so much "psychology" on your show, I can only conclude that you are in a state of denial. You engage in wishful thinking and flights of fancy that somehow Obama will change... This is a guy who back when supported Joe Lieberman running against his own Party! Those are the kind of dellusional side effects that accompany denial.
You are spreading that denial which is helping to confuse your listeners. After Obama oversees the gutting of Medicare (and it is going to happen, you can take that to Goldman Sachs) are you still going to tell us that our health care system is much improved since Obama took office? "Medicare for everyone?" I've heard you say that many times. What you in fact are doing, is helping to set the table so that these greed heads can carve that up too!
What we are wittnessing in Egypt is the direct result of decades of Republican and DLC corporate foreign policy. It is nothing less than the collapse of American Empire in the Middle East after shoring up corrupt dictators for coprporate profits. Stay tuned, because if we don't take our government back from the corporatistas, and that includes Obama by his own actions, what we are seeing in Egypt is going to be happening right here.
Obama said he was going to change the way Washington works. Really? Washington has swallowed him whole. Yeah, I know you've said some things like this but you are all over the map on Obama. What I am writing about is your glowing praise of his SOTUS. I'm sorry to say this but you are starting to sound like that little techie kiss ass over at Daily KOs and all of his yuppie apparatchiks. Obama and they all ought to get an award for stealing defeat from the jaws of victory! I'm still trying to figure out how they managed the worst off year election results in seventy years after two terms of "W." Amazing! That is quite an accomplishment.
So when Obama talks about his great accomplishments he really ought to bring this up instead and how he managed to piss off the people who brought him to the dance or how Eric Holder suppressed the youth vote the week before the elections by saying that he was going to continue his pot raids et. al. after Obama said during his campaign that he was going to stop that too (talk about a place to cut a totally failed program from one end to the other). You don't think that had an effect? When Obama held his "youth town meeting" Friday on You Tube, that's all he heard! Two groups that supported Obama in 2008 did not show up in 2010: progrssives and young people. They couldn't have deflated their 2008 base any better than if they had planned it. Over there at Daily Kos they are saying that Ed Shutlz is dumb for pointing out the Administration's political hackery. What do computer hacks know about public policy anyway? From where I sit after thirty years in the policy arena, they don't know their own butts from first base
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTUY16CkS-k
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gl47z2g2EvI&feature=rec-LGOUT-exp_fresh+div-1r-7-HM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aU6NRYG3uTU&feature=related
Malcom X would have made a better president.
Scalia and Thomas were corrupt from the get go. Sandy had planned on retiring to Arizona until Gore beat Bush, allowing the people the right to vote would have delayed her retirement at least 4 if not 8 or 12 years. Gore would've been reelected, no 911 and no wars, maybe some gay thing would have beat Gore, McCain would likely have had the 2004 nomination.
One note, it is not illegal for the SCOTUS to prevent the public from voting, and it is not illegal for them to appoint whoever they want. "None Dare Call it Treason" excerpted in Nation [or MoJo]
Try listening to Thom, you might find that politics is worth paying attention to after all.
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What you say about bribes and
What you say about bribes and power doesn't make sense to me. It sounds too conspiratorial...
Idealists live their lives by what they read in books or conjure up in their minds: Realists live - and sometimes lose - their lives living in the real world.
If you haven't looked outside lately, do so. The real world is a very messy place. Some of it good, some of it bad and some of it just downright evil.
The Idealist always explains it away and create idealistic Utopias. The Realists always meet it head on and deals with the messiness, oftentimes to the detriment of their health or life.
The Idealist inspires hope - the Realist actually gets it done.
What is the point of all this? if you can imagine it, humans can do it and have done it. From the greatest good to the ultimate Evil. So do not be surprised that there may be a few plotting in back rooms to ultimately enrich and benefit themselves at the expense of millions of others. In fact this has happened many times in human history: The extermination of 6 million Jews in Germany - My Lai massacre in Vietnam - 1 million Cambodians murdered by the Kamer Rouge in Cambodia - 1000s of "supposed" withches burned at the stake by the Catholic Church in the Middle Ages (not to mention the hundreds of thousands of "supposed" Heretics also tortured and burned alive) - The Russian purges and Gulags where maybe 20 million died, brutally so - The Chinese Communist purges which ended the lives of Millions - on and on throughout human history. Even in the Old Testament, there are passages where one group of people would inavade another groups village and systematically murder all of its inhabitants, except for a few who were kept as slaves.
Human nature is not a pretty thing. It is at times Sublime: but unfortunatley, for Society and Nations, it is at other times brutally Savage.
Conspiratorial is the least of it!!
I don't know if happy is the word I would use to be here in the forum. I first came because Thom Hartmann and I share the same last name. other than that, I don't believe we have anything in common. I can't understand a fasinaction with politics. I can't take is seriously, hence I know how to live my life. Read what is written here in these blogs. I can sum up what is written in one short sentence. Democrats are good, Repubicans are bad. How can you take that seriously? Life is too short to waste worrying about such nonsense.
No, the Tea Party is made of
No, the Tea Party is made of people who know how to get things done. Progressives only know how to blame and complain, as exampled by what is spewed out on this site. If you want to accomplish something, join a Tea Party.
So why are you wasting you precious "Tea Party" time reading these "Progressive Blogs Then?
You are fortunate to be happy, successful and healthy. Long may you remain so. I doubt if many people are truly not beholden to anyone. No man is an island, and all that.
Your quote may be true of those who treat politics as a spectator sport, but not those who are active.
What makes you happy to be here in the forum?
What you say about bribes and power doesn't make sense to me. It sounds too conspiratorial. You need to lighten up, and follow you're inner voice, and stop believing in politicians who by your own definition are going to let you down. You're setting yourself up for failure.
The features of being me are 1. I'm happy. 2. I'm successful. 3 I'm not beholding to anyone. The benefits are: 1. I'm creative. 2. I'm healthy. 3. I don't have to have a label to know who I am.
Let me suggest a book to read "Even Cowgirls get the Blues" by Tom Robbins. Here is a quote from one of the characters in the book, Jellybean Bonanza. "Politics is for peope who have a passion for changing life but lack a passion fo living it."
How else do you explain those politicians who are forever flip-flopping, if they are not being corrupted by whoever is offering them bribes of money or power? I'm not talking about those who genuinely change their minds once in a while, as a result of presuasive evidence or arguments.
What do you see as the features and benefits of being a conservative, a progressive, or whatever you are?
First I don't believe anyone is clearly corrupt or clearly not. I may be nieve, but I believe most people are good decent folks. It's hard work, honesty and a little luck that makes a succesful (as defined by western culture) person. What language as person uses or speaks is irrelevant. If you want to persuade someone to follow you, it's not done by telling them how dumb they are, or how their values are all wrong. It's selling 101. Show a feature, and a benefit to the feature. I've been reading these blogs for about a month, and I don't see any features or benefits to being a progressive. All I see is an attempt by progressives to tear down conservatives. By the way, I'm not a member of the Tea Party, and I don't consider myself to be a conservative.
What are you doing here?
It would be interesting to study if conservatives used more old-fashioned language and progressives used more modern language.
Or if there was any difference in the language used by those who clearly are corrupt and those who are clearly not.
I'm a doer, I don't waste my time blaming anyone. Perchance!!!! A progressive using an archaric adverb.
Hypocrisy reigns in the hell-hole I call the United States of Mortal Sin. We talk about spreading democracy but our rat-hole nation has an addiction to dictators.
http://www.libertyforall.net/?p=5487
We can’t avoid economic disaster by slowing spending, lowering spending, cutting spending, or freezing spending. Nor can we nickel-and-dime our way out of the crisis. We must stop spending on items that cost the most. And, we should begin to stop the spending by stopping all wars and bringing the troops home.
Studying the Americans' behavior since W's appointment in 2001 to the present is a classic example in the study of stupidity.