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I know what I would say if I were there vis a vis Joe Wilson: nothing. Because I wouldn't go. I'm also not going to watch. I can't watch this guy because I'm sick of the flowery, feel good language. When I wake one day and he has done just one of the following, I will care again:
1) fired Emmanuel
2) fired Geithner
3) fired Summers
4) ordered stop loss under DADT
5) proposed repeal of DOMA (because he believes it to be unconstitutional)
Absent just one of these things, he's Bush. Every time I see movement (listening to Volcker), then he proposes this crap with a freeze.
Obama's words are already bad, increased spending for the military and homeland insecurity, spending freeze on domestic programs. Guns, no butter.
In regards to the State of the Union Speech, I'm not all that excited about it. I certainly hope the President takes a firm stand, but my expectations are low. Even if he does make promises I like, I'm still not going to believe it until I see it.
"Actions speak louder than words!"
I haven't any trust in ANY... (let me repeat that) ANY POLITICIANS' word. Not worth the air their spoken into.
(I doubt I'll find many who disagree with me here, sorry if I'm just preaching to the choir. Just venting.)
Thom asks why Dubya is not being subjected to the kind of scrutiny that Tony Blair is undergoing in the UK. The answer is obvious.
By and large, here in the US, we're OK with the wars. Or, at least, those who hold the REAL power are.
To all the libertarians who are rejoicing at the Supreme Court decision: Let's open up the political system to real competition, and monopolies (or duopolies) stifle competition! Let's create a "free market" for our elections where any qualified candidate can have a chance to get elected.
I don't think Greed ever stops, its like a black hole it just keeps feeding on everything it can. That being the case regulations need to be re-instated and enforced.
The cons will continue asking for more and more, no matter what. That is their one and only strategy. And they stoop lower and lower to achieve their goals, tactics include, whining, crying, blustery empty threats, holding their breath, being ultra hypocritical and well pretty much acting like a bunch of petulant 3-year-olds.
22 Democratic senators voted to confrm John Roberts as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court - despite pleas from the "Democratic base."
Who should we look to now that the court has opened the money floodgates into the election campaigns?
How many Democratic senators are now prepared to vote to reconfirm Ben Bernanke as fed chair? If Capt. Hazeltine (Exxon Valdez) were to ask you for a ship's captain's position how would you react?
Who was telling Bush that the "fundamentals of the economy are strong"?
Whisky Tango Foxtrot - it's not a dance...
"What would Jefferson say about our current SCOTUS"
This is how Jefferson viewed corporations in his day -
"The selfish spirit of commerce knows no country, and feels no
passion or principle but that of gain." --Thomas Jefferson to
Larkin Smith, 1809.
Jefferson is rolling in his grave today watching his republican democracy slipping away from the country he so loved.
This decision (Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission) will essentially remove the voice of "We the People" from our representatives in Washington, DC. Now, it is clear that the largest corporations are going to use elected representatives as puppets to control the government for their own ends!
The pretense is past! Corporations are now powerful enough to use us ALL (Republican or Democrat) for their will, out in the open.... no need to hide the greed and corruption! With the help of the Supreme Court, Corporations RULE !
And now that the transformation is complete, it can be said that Corporations HAVE MORE RIGHTS THAN HUMANS!
Long live Corporations!
i feel some of the big bonuses and salary need to be pointed out by obama and even more clearly (to the regular folks) than thom has been thom been saying about the wages the one health care ceo got 700 million in 5 years i believe is the amount but i did the math on the actual amount on a 40 hr work week which i doubt he accomplished came out to 67,000 $ an hour now that catches peoples attention and hes just one guy . come on obama spring your trap tonight say i even offered them what they wanted a spending freeze and still not enough WHEN WILL THE GREED STOP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Maybe California can catch some of the Oregon rationality... hope it is contagious.
Congrats Thom, Oregon, all you crazy Pacific Northwest Progressives.... way to go.
What Should We Make of Obama's "Spending Freeze"
http://georgewashington2.blogspot.com/
As Wikipedia describes it:
In economics, austerity is when a national government reduces its spending in order to pay back creditors. Austerity is usually required when a government's fiscal deficit spending is felt to be unsustainable.
Development projects, welfare programs and other social spending are common areas of spending for cuts. In many countries, austerity measures have been associated with short-term standard of living declines until economic conditions improved once fiscal balance was achieved (such as in the United Kingdom under Margaret Thatcher, Canada under Jean Chrétien, and Spain under González).
Private banks, or institutions like the International Monetary Fund (IMF), may require that a country pursues an 'austerity policy' if it wants to re-finance loans that are about to come due. The government may be asked to stop issuing subsidies or to otherwise reduce public spending. When the IMF requires such a policy, the terms are known as 'IMF conditionalities'.
Poll finds Americans trust Fox News more than any other network
http://rawstory.com/2010/01/poll-fox-trusted-news/
A poll of (only) 1,151 registered American voters, who were asked whether they trust each of the major television news networks. Ranking number one: Fox News Channel.
"49% of Americans say they trust Fox News to 37% who disagree," the poll's authors wrote. "Predictably there is a large party split on this with 74% of Republicans but only 30% of Democrats saying they trust the right leaning network."
I also want to say that Thom reminds me in some ways to Brett Favre (which coming from me should be taken as a compliment). Favre did what he could to advance the Vikings’ cause, but the team allowed their quarterback to be beaten to a pulp and look like a jigsaw puzzle with a couple of pieces gone (wasn’t that a Jim Croce song?). It makes me think that the Vikings didn’t deserve to go to the promised land. One sportswriter noted that as Favre was hobbling out of the stadium, he was wrapped-up like a mummy—not just because of the injured angle, but an injured hand, bruised thigh and ribs. After the game, one of the offensive linemen supposedly asked Favre what more could he do; the appropriate answer would have been the next time not to take a break from blocking the opposing player in front of him every other down. For you interception freaks, Favre’s career int. percentage (3.2) compares favorably to the likes of Marino, Elway and Aikman, and even more favorably to Blanda (6.9), Namath (5.8), Bradshaw (5.4), and Unitas (4.9).
Anyways, like Favre, Thom soldiers on despite getting continuously battered and bruised, taking hits for the team even from the people he thinks are his “teammates.” Take the teabaggers, for instance. Thom took sack after sack from John O’Hara, who claims to represent the true nature of the tea party “movement.” O’Hara disabused Thom of all of his romantic notions about teabaggers, that they were playing on the same “team” with the same idea of how to “win” the game. Teabaggers are not “populists.” Teabaggers are against health care reform. Teabaggers are not against CEOs and Wall Street hooligans making millions and billions of dollars (they only care if “their” taxes are paying for those bonuses). Teabaggers are against government spending to create jobs. Teabaggers think that tax cuts are the answer for everything. Thom isn’t going to “win” with these guys, let alone go to the Super Bowl (unless he pays for the tickets).
It appears that right-wing activist James O'Keefe, responsible for the undercover "expose" of ACORN, was arrested, along with a couple of friends, for tampering with Sen. Mary Landrieu's office phones in a "Watergate" style operation. Interesting to see where this goes.
There was also something interesting I read in the book “Game Change” that certainly puzzles. Obama was apparently bored with being a U.S. senator, because he had to spend a lot of time with a bunch of old men (and women) who were bursting with self-inflation and did nothing all day but “yak, yak, yak.” Knowing this, why did Obama decide to give them the responsibility of formulating health care reform? Did he think they needed something to do to occupy their time, like something important? Perhaps this should be a lesson to him—that kids, no matter what their age, need parental guidance.
Is Obama really just trying to stay alive?
We know MLK was an important role model for Obama as well as John and Bobby Kennedy. We know he understands the progressive movement on its deepest levels. He has communicated this well to us. By not being a true champion of today's progressive causes he not only forsakes the millions that sent in their few dollars to his campaign, but the very memory of his mother who devoted her life to helping the poor of Indonesia.
We want him to be the progressive bulldog wielding an iron fist against an international network of corporations and moneyed interest who possess a level of power we can only imagine.
But what is it we're really asking of him? What price would he ultimately have to pay?
Perhaps the forces we face are too strong for just one man in the Oval Office. Perhaps the only force strong enough is a movement, an uprising, of the people.
We passed fair taxation on corporations tonight in Oregon! yahoo. Door--belling works! Yayyyyy. A little gratitude to replace a depressing month of bad news. Or maybe we fought harder because of loosing a Democratic seat in the Senate.
Max Keiser is right on...actual analysis of the problem. On his show today he had Nomi Prins,,,a person who knows what is happening on Wall St.
I am so sick of this gov't thinking they can print their way to full employment. Remember the abandoned factories all over the eastern US. How about trying to fill them with people making stuff for Wal-Mart
This is a little depressing but when I was a yoga teacher attending workshops our instructors told us to keep journals about our early experiences in yoga poses so that we would later better be able to help our students. As you gain more experience you sometimes forget what it was like to be a beginner and how difficult the early moves are.
Right now I am feeling the same defeat I have seen so many times when I register voters and they say they don't want anything to do with politics anymore, that they've given up. I haven't felt this for such a long time thanks to Thom's show, but I am sure feeling it now--I don't even want to watch the speech tomorrow-- and the only thing I can think of to do is to try to understand this feeling very well so that the next time I help register voters and people feel this very way I might better be able to convince a person to get back into the fight... It's difficult to keep making phone calls when you feel your Senators have heard your voice a million times, What can I say to them now that's any different from what I've said before, and why bother since nothing seems to be working.... I haven't experienced these sorts of voices in my head for awhile and I don't like it one bit!! But if I can pull myself out of this perhaps I can pull another person out of it later, too.
I think many people are feeling pretty hopeless, including me:-)
Let’s see for the period from 1980 to 2005, 20 years, when Republicans had control they produced 19.9 million jobs per the Bureau of Labor Statistics; and the 8 years that Clinton, a Democrat, produced 23.1 million jobs. At the same time he raised the taxes on the wealthy, countering the Free Marketers trickle down dogma of lowering taxes produces more jobs, Ya right, in China. The Republicans have failed miserably by the statistics, and they don’t lie. They are the party of the corporatists who are good at producing huge pay checks for CEOs by shipping jobs out of the country and lowering their taxes by passing them on to you. And the corporate democrats, like Obama, are copping this failed policy of tax breaks for corporations and the wealthy by keeping the Bush tax cuts. If Obama would point out the obivoius he would win on increasing taxes on the wealthy. And remember he did say he would do something about NAFTA, but has not
Reagan (1981-1988) 14.8 Jobs created when we had a manufacturing sector.
Bush 41 (1989-1992) 3.4
Clinton (1993-2000) 23.4
Bush 43 (2001-2005) 1.7 results from NAFTA and tax breaks for the rich.
Totals: Democrats 23.4 in 8 years and Republicans 19.9 for 20 years of free market politics and no results. Now you make the decision.
"Who speaks for the Trees?" William O.Douglas William Orville Douglas (October 16, 1898 – January 19, 1980) was a United States Supreme Court Associate Justice. With a term lasting 36 years and 209 days, he is the longest-serving justice in the history of the Supreme Court. http://www.thenation.com/doc/20030414/garrow
In light of the Supreme Court's decision to give the rights of a person to a non-person, I wonder how this applies to other non-persons like the trees, air, water, river, streams, animals, etc. "Who Speaks for the Trees?" Douglas tried to give our environment a voice by asking this question. He maintained trees have a first amendment right. He was way ahead of this time. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_O._Douglas
Now, the Supreme Court some 35 years later seems to be saying that that which has no way of speaking on it's own behalf, as in corporate America, has a voice and right to speak with equal protection under the law. I would surmise that because of this ruling the trees, air, water, land, animals have the same right as any plaintiff in any court case that Monsanto or other 'person' has.
Legal arguments presented for the trees and the environment by Douglas I would think would be a great interest right now. What an outstanding example he set as a judge and as a human being. He laid the groundwork for us. The supreme court ruling on corporate personhood is an abomination on one hand. What would Douglas do with this? This could be the answer to his question. I really think we can make this work for us and our beloved environment.
Bye Quark, its good to chat with sane people.
Nels,
I wonder if many progressives are burned out...
'Bye for now. 'Nice chatting with you, Nels.
I'd be satisfied if progressive talk radio personalities would just be as passionate about getting rid of the unverifiable methods as they were back in 2001 - 2008. Its as though they've been lulled to sleep because a Democrat actually got elected... just in time to take the blame for the crashing economy too... what a coincidence eh?