Recent comments

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    "Mottos Are US! - Mottos for All Caucasians"

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    @Maxrot,

    Robert S. they have white Tea.

    "They" would...sorry.

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    I find Tea-Baggers hard to swallow

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    @Robert S. they have white Tea.

    How 'bout this for a T-Shirt

    Tea Bagging Caucasians

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    @Robert S. that s why you add cream.

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    In congruence with the Militia Act of 1792, the modern militia is expected to come to the call of his country with his fully equipped nuclear aircraft carriers and support fleets, nuclear submarines, air forces, infantry forces, and an unlimited cache of supplies.

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    @fsaronson,

    To my knowledge, tea comes in green or black or orange pekoe, but white?

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    Tea Party Sign

    Tea, it's the new Kool-Aid!

  • The Banksters...Orwell would be proud!   15 years 5 weeks ago

    I came across an extremely interesting article today.

    http://www.businessinsider.com/11-examples-of-recent-corruption-on-wall-...

    11 Examples Of How Insanely Corrupt The U.S. Financial System Has Become
    Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/11-examples-of-recent-corruption-on-wall-street-2010-4#gold-deposits-with-no-relation-to-actual-gold-2#ixzz0lCAQFDO8

    It has also now come out that most "gold" that is traded on the markets is not backed by the actual metal itself. For years, most people have assumed that the London Bullion Market Association, the world's largest gold market, had actual gold to back up the massive "gold deposits" at the major LBMA banks. But that is not the truth at all. Industry insiders are now revealing that LBMA banks actually have approximately a hundred times more gold deposits than actual gold bullion. When most people think they are buying gold what they are actually buying is pieces of paper that say that they own gold. Meanwhile they are being charged huge storage fees to store the gold.

    Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/11-examples-of-recent-corruption-on-wall-street-2010-4#gold-deposits-with-no-relation-to-actual-gold-2#ixzz0lCAQFDO8This is just the number two item. The article is fast reading, and oh so clear. Don't miss it.

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    The New Republicrat Pledge of Allegiance - by harry ashburn:

    I Pledge Allegiance to the Flag;

    Of the United Corporation of America;

    and to the Profit Statement for which It Stands.

    One Corporation, Under GATT, Unassailable;

    With Dividends and Stock Options for All ..Major Shareholders.

    ..void in Vermont, Oregon and 3 Mideast Nations.

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    Pledge of Allegiance

    I just heard a caller describe a version of the pledge of alliegance that was targetted at the tea partiers... A while ago I wrote down some thoughts on the pledge and wound up writing a version. This was in part born of saddnes of the current delusional tea-party brand of patriotism and a hope that the real principles and values that led to the creative, progressive experiment in self-governance will survive.

    Anyway... here it is, for what it's worth.

    Pledge of Allegiance

    I pledge allegiance to the ideals
    on which the United States of America was founded.
    And to the principles from which the republic was forged,
    through unified effort, vision, and courage

    to secure liberty and justice for all.

    “I”: The most specific and most generic term. The expression of an individual, but also the expression of every individual.
    “pledge”:
    promise, offer unconditionally,
    "
    allegiance": support, defense, stewardship, care, honesty, loyalty, candor,
    “ideals”: the perfection we strive for, the highest goal we imagine, the perpetually unmet expectation, the reference for moral navigation
    “United States of America”: the space where “a more perfect union” can be built, the voluntary federation of states, those committed to a common purpose, the great and ongoing experiment in respect and dedication to self-evident truths,
    “was founded”: is build from, foundation, beginning, origin, point from which this emerges, initial promise, original potential,
    “And to the principles”: the path toward the ideal, the practical implementation of self-evident truths such as “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”, the expression of transcendent truths, “establish justice, ensure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity...”, the law behind the laws
    “republic”: concern of the people, interest of the people (as opposed to monarch), <br>
    “forged”: created through directed effort, pounded, created through constructive conflict, created deliberately and through great effort
    “unified effort, vision, and courage”: the collective effort vision and courage, the contribution of all even if (and especially because) sincere, diverse effort and vision focused on the principles and ideals leads to strong results
    “secure”: protect, keep safe, create a safe space for, not to freeze in static state but create a space for dynamic growth
    “liberty”: freedom, four freedoms, freedom of speech and expression, freedom of worship, freedom from want, freedom from fear
    “justice”: equal opportunity and responsibility
    “all”: no exceptions, all are collectively sovereign, no individual has sovereign power except that granted by all

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    Tea Party sign or bumper sticker -

    The Tea Party: Any color, as long as it's white!

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    The pledge of allegiance is taught to kindergartners...how many 5 year olds are cognizant of what a pledge is, let alone an allegiance...or a republic for which it stands...

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    @quark, no no, I wasn't uncomfortable about you using a personal anecdote. I just didn't want you to think I was even coming close to degrading your father in my response. Here, I'll give you an anecdote in reply. My dad volunteered for the Marines in WWII, fought in the Pacific. I knew all my life that he was a WWII Marine corporal that fought in the Pacific. He was a radio man. It was only recently that I asked him if he was drafted, he replied, "Oh no I volunteered for the Marines, I didn't want to go to Europe, since I had problems with frost bite." My dad was raised in Minnesota, so I guess he knows what cold is. Now then, this anecdote is spot on to my point, he selflessly, noblely volunteered to put himself in harms way, up to a point, the defining line for him, don't want to freeze. Would I say that obviously he was just being selfish? Would you? Would I say that he didn't have some sort of pure self interest in his decision? Would you?

    Its hard to divorce even our best actions from our self interest completely. That's what I'm trying to get at.

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    The thing that amuses (and frustrates) me the most when Thom talks to a Tea Party "leader" like Hecker is that most of the "foot soldiers" in the movement have no clue what he is talking about once you get beyond the "tax and spend" mantra.

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    I think Thom didn't get the Birkenfeld reference, to wit:

    Jailed UBS Whistleblower Bradley Birkenfeld Makes Tax Day Clemency Request to President Obama

    A former banker for the Swiss giant UBS who blew the whistle on the biggest tax evasion scheme in US history is asking President Obama today for clemency to coincide with Tax Day, the day US income tax returns are due for most people. In January, Bradley Birkenfeld began serving a forty-month sentence despite playing a key role in uncovering the bank scandal. He first came forward to US authorities in 2007 and began providing inside information on how UBS was helping thousands of Americans evade taxes by hiding billions of dollars in secret Swiss accounts.

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    Report: Afghans in secret jail ‘made to dance’ to use bathroom

    By Daniel Tencer
    Thursday, April 15th, 2010 -- 1:42 pm

    What's real friends? Stones you've stubbed your toes on, the priorities which our tax dollars go to fund, our bombs falling from the skies in foreign lands, our prisoners in black sites, those are real. Are tea-partiers more real than the millions, yes millions who protested against the war in Iraq before it started? They get exponentially more coverage than the millions (that's orders of magnitude more coverage) and that makes them somehow more real. To whom?

    As reported today on Democracy Now! Last week, Renee Lynn Espeland was charged with “contributing to the delinquency of a minor” after her twelve-year-old daughter Frankie Hughes refused to leave Senator Tom Harkin’s office while protesting the war funding in the current appropriations bill. This week, the Des Moines police dropped the charges against Espeland, but her daughter still faces a trespassing charge.

    Let's get real folks...

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    Maxrot,

    Please forgive me for my personal anecdote about my father. I didn't mean to make you feel uncomfortable about commenting about it (if I did.) I just wanted to point out that people can live together and NOT take advantage of others. I wanted to do more than generalize.

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    um...OK...as I slowly back away.....

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    Golly . . . You never met my Mom . . .

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    @harry, in regards to your comments on my Side 1, Side A notation. I wasn't really trying to keep the idiots guess (as you implied), I was only trying to imply that neither side was more important than the other. However, I do try to be a minimalist in my comments (especially on things like slogans) so that things I didn't even mean can be perceived by people with different points of view. I guess I try to be as abstract and simple as I can when I write a slogan. Sometimes I'll re-read some slogan I've written and see it in a whole new light (sometimes its a good new insight, often not so much :-( ). Case in point: Where's the Beer Party? I think I've seen about 3 or 4 implications in it so far.

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    "HATRED IS NOT A FAMILY VALUE!"

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    @Charell; re: Revere: That's so like the unremembered predecessor to Rosa Parks, who got arrested for the same thing in Birmingham a few weeks prior. I'm ashamed to admit I forgot her name again.

  • Daily Topics - Thursday - April 15th 2010   15 years 5 weeks ago

    Ghost of 'Total Information Awareness'

    By Coleen Rowley
    April 15, 2010

    Since we all tend to reflexively cringe whenever someone mentions the ideological “F” topic, I’m going to try and minimize some of the natural revulsion and denial by writing the full word that we usually fear to name only once: fascism.

    The very easy answer to why and how "F" is presently developing was actually answered in 1795 by “the Father of the U.S. Constitution” and our fourth president, James Madison, who observed:

    Tease....click on the link, and remember who the author is...

  • The Banksters...Orwell would be proud!   15 years 5 weeks ago

    I saw this once on a political button.
    My sign would say:

    "HATRED IS NOT A FAMILY VALUE!"

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