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Powder Keg. (sorry)
I own guns and would fight for my rights but only after I have time to clean those guns. Personally, I think wicks and matches should be outlawed since this country is a powder kep
Just a little re-iteration that we need to get progressive talk radio on more of the "big sticks." As I mentioned in the chat room, I was interviewed by Scheizer Fernsehen (Swiss Public Television), last Thursday evening, at my DL meeting. Later, while I was chatting with the correspondent, who is based in NYC I mentioned Thom's program. The correspondent had never heard of Thom Hartmann. I said Thom is the most popular progressive talk show host in the nation, and the program is disseminated internationally. The correspondent said, "Oh! A liberal Limbaugh?" I told him that wasn't really a valid comparison. He seemed interested, and said he would look into it a little more, at least.
I guess I'm just saying that I was a little surprised (or, maybe not) that a correspondent with foreign medium, interviewing people at a Drinking Liberally meeting, had never been exposed to much progressive media in this country. This is really a problem with "visibility."
Of course, I should mention that there is no progressive radio broadcast (except for one hour Mon. - Thurs. evenings) in this market, and I have to get my Hartmann, Miller, Schultz, and Malloy fixes over internet streaming.
What a world we live in.
Corn King is a great doc to watch to understand our nations cheap food policy- under the Carter Admin. Typical food costs used to be about 50% of an average Americans paycheck. This was changed to 15% while freeing up time. However, we do need to re-visit the high price of cheap as all this did was transfer costs elsewhere.
Hooray! The Gun Nut admitted that regulating machine guns is a mistake LOL!
Harry,
Ditto for warnings regarding this website. I also came anyway.
Thom,
As a person of faith, I thought you were the best person to ask this question. I am not Christian, so sometimes the subtleties elude me.
When exactly did the definition of good Christian stop including caring for the sick, the poor, and the prisoner? Wasn't caring for the least among us a core tenant of Christianity? Not to hear those screaming against health care, apparently.
Today it seems all that is needed to be Christian is to be anti-abortion, anti-gay and anti-evolution. Was this the another piece of the Reagan revolution? Was this part of the change in consciousness that moved us away from a we-society to the me-society?
Please help me understand. And Thanks for your smart, funny and thoughtful show.
PS. Every week you ask for politicians to wear their sponsors' logos like a NASCAR driver. I posted six such pics in my blog on your site.
Texas gov. clears man wrongfully convicted of rape
By BETSY BLANEY
Associated Press Writer
LUBBOCK, Texas -- Texas Gov. Rick Perry on Monday pardoned a man who died in prison after serving more than 13 years for a wrongful rape conviction.
Perry granted the state's first posthumous pardon to Tim Cole in Austin after receiving a recommendation from the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles.
Cole was convicted of a 1985 rape of a Texas Tech University student in Lubbock. The Army veteran was cleared by DNA evidence in 2008, nine years after he died in prison of complications from asthma at age 39.
http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/03/01/1507133/texas-gov-clears-man-wrong...
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OK, skip the obvious comments on the Texas judicial system, the need for effective defense for everyone brought before the bar of justice, and just think about: died in prison of complications from asthma at age 39. At 39. Dead in prison...from asthma.
Yet more, Astroturf proof . . .
http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/03/tea_party_leader_was_i...
Oh, and my girlfriend is living on a houseboat and I think I saw Adam & Steve yesterday morning!
If we're taxing "junk food" it's a different type of consumption tax than a tax on an actual material like tobacco. The incremental tax system on the production lines seems messy. Why don't we just tax the corn syrup up the production line. I know it doesn't solve the problem entirely, can make a food unhealthy without modifying it significantly + not all processed food is unhealthy, and food processing is a dynamic industry that is not directly related to the health of food, so I feel that system of taxation would expand beyond the realm of "junk food". Taxing corn syrup would not solve the "junk food" problem, but it would help, and would strike the problem directly, rather than obtuse solution, that would have an effect on realms outside of health & wellness.
(I didn't have a chance to proofread! I hope I'm making sense! Great show Thom.)
A lot of obesity is due to hormones as well...and gee...where are those coming from?
Acting Deputy Attorney General Gary Grindler will fill in for Yoo and Bybee at Leahy's hearing on Friday. I can imagine how this will go:
"When John Yoo says that a president can crush testicles, massacre villages, and nuke cities, Mr. Grindler, are there limits to that? Would a president have to stop after eight cities? Nine cities? Where's the line, if there is one?"
"I don't know," Senator. "I imagine you'd have to ask Professor Yoo. But to do that you'd need to stop being too chickens**t to enforce your own subpoenas, since we're not going to help you. We encourage you instead to go dick cheney yourself. With all due respect, sir."
"Understood, Acting Deputy Attorney General, but let me follow up if you don't mind with this question. If Mr. Yoo's contention is that it is legal for a president to do such things, would he maintain that it might conceivably be legal for another nation's president to do the same, including to our cities and villages and (if we had any) testicles? And, given that Professor Yoo has argued explicitly that neither international nor domestic law can be a constraint on such presidential prerogatives, isn't it almost a certainty that other nation's presidents must have the same prerogatives, unless there is something unique about our nation? What would that be, sir? And if there is not a satisfactory answer to that question, and if it is legal for presidents to destroy all human life, then it would seem to be legal to eliminate all law, since law will die with the human race. Can the elimination of law really be considered legal?"
"With all due respect, Senator, there's a Muslim behind your chair. Ha! Made you look. Oh god, that was a good one. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm. Senator? Are you . . . Somebody pick him up. Somebody. Oh, Jesus, call 911. Call 911!"
-David Swanson- from Why Leahy Is Afraid to Subpoena Yoo
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=17858
THOM and friends need to update their web-site certificate . . . The latest Mircosquish security updates are farging with whole bunches of web-sites.
I did Harry. It appeared that an accreditation for this website had expired.
Harry, same thing here...except I wasn't here yesterday, just noticed it today.
Warning on this web=site: beginning yesterday, there was an error message on my computer when I tried to access this website. A warning of an unsecure web-site, and a recommendation not to open it. I opened it anyway. Anybody else encounter this?
As for Bernanke's claim that we need to import skilled workers, I have to question whether the issue is the training or the pay they're willing to accept.
There's plenty of American programmers looking for work and more being trained every day. The problem is their families are here in the USA where living costs are high, instead of in nations where the costs are lower, so companies want the cheaper workers and the heck with America.
And let's not forget that imported workers are more "disciplined" because if they offend their boss, they can lose their job and therefore their visa and back home they go.
And of course Thom's major point is good. Nations that subsidize graduate study have a huge advantage over us, since we saddle graduate students with huge debt.
Re: Libertarian Idiot....I'd like to remind everyone that "Libertarians are anarchists who wat police protection from their slaves"
Thom, check your email. I just sent you an old radio ad from 1947 saying "More doctors smoke Camels than any other cigarette."
Taxing junk food would be an extremely regressive tax, targeting those who could least afford it.
Rather, I would support price subsidies for healthier diets. Perhaps we could support community kitchens, or other ways of pooling resources.
Real-world example of elderly contributing to society:
My friend Steve's retired mother-in-law visited for a month.
She cared for Steve's child during the day, so Steve didn't pay for daycare.
The GDP went DOWN by the amount of the daycare money saved.
The WEALTH of our nation INCREASED (but not in a measurable way) by the amount of the retired mother-in-law's daycare labor (...which was also a labor of love, but that's another matter ...)
Libertarian Idiot on right now - "It's good for society when people die."
He's not even very good at economics but it's his sociopathy that is funniest.
SUPPORT THE U.S. POST OFFICE AT THE EXPENSE OF BANKSTERS
Stop throwing away the envelopes that credit card offers come in. They are typically metered envelopes and the post office gets paid when the envelope is returned. Be sure to remove any material that has your name or any other personal information. Add some scrap paper to increase the weight. (if you happen to be in Las Vegas, mail the leaflets for Girls, Girls, Girls that are handed out on the street corners) Seal the envelope and drop it in a remote mailbox. The Banksters will be charged by the U.S.P.O. and get nothing in return.
I have been doing this for years. It feels great to help support good union jobs here in the United States at the expense of the Banksters.
Meanwhile, it seems that some people in Arizona are fed-up with being the victims of Maricopa County sheriff Joe Arpaio’s racism, and have staged mass marches demanding “Joe must go.” Almost all are Latinos, of course. As attorney Michael Manning (who successfully won damages for five deaths in Arpaio’s jails) points out, Arpaio “masterfully” plays on the bigotry against “Mexicans”—illegal or not—and white voters who repeatedly re-elect him share the blame for fostering an atmosphere of brutality within his “system,” and racial prejudice outside of it. Arpaio and his principle henchman, Maricopa prosecutor Andrew Thomas, are also under fire for conducting politically-motivated vendettas against politicians and judges who oppose their “methods.”
This past weekend, MSNBC aired a special on race and “ethnicity” in some town hall special called “Obama’s America,” ostensibly about the current state of race relations since Obama’s election. “Ethnicity” of course is the current euphemism for Latinos, which is a deliberate mechanism for demoting the current predilection toward scapegoating and xenophobia, served with a portion of “rational discrimination” at a table where both whites and blacks can find a place. The problem is that Latinos can be white, indigenous, black or mixed race—the latter three of which don’t fit very easily into the category of “ethnicity.” We have to remember that the people that “real” Americans are prejudicial to are the same ones that Latinos of European descent are prejudicial toward. Racism is a powerful factor in the political, economic and social fabric of Latin America.
Even a story on Arpaio’s crimes seemed bent on deliberately sabotaging their racist effect. The report did note that Arpaio and his police goons have been stripped of their federal immigration arrest authority because of abuse of that authority, and despite that continue to raid Latino neighborhoods on the slightest pretext. Yet rather than focus on the violation of the civil rights of Latinos who are U.S. citizens, and who have been under constant harassment by Arpaio, all the video shown was of Mexicans climbing fences, running through the desert, or being handcuffed. While Arpaio now claims to have “inherent” federal enforcement rights to do anything he damn well pleases, the Justice Department is also twiddling its thumbs.
Other than a story on teen pregnancy, always an issue for people fearful that Latinos are multiplying like rabbits, or rats, the entire show focused solely on the black/white issue, and unlike its treatment of Latinos, avoided any negative stereotypes. There was nothing about the Shenandoah police chief and two of his officers under federal indictment for civil rights violations and conspiracy in the murder of a Latino immigrant, nothing about what the Southern Poverty Law Center refers to as a “civil rights crisis” in regard to dealings with Latinos regardless of legal status in the south—which isn’t hard to do, since as I have pointed out here before, the vast majority of Latinos residing in this country are legal residents, and 85 percent of those are U.S. citizens.
I don’t want sound completely negative, although it is hard to find where the “positives” are hiding. The only “positive” development I can think of just now is that the departure of Lou Dobbs has led to a noticeable decrease in the frequency of anti-Latino propaganda on CNN.