This is what happens when the best of us can't figure out how to get Congress to do the right thing and have The Veteran's Administration provide all services necessary with alacrity.
If Wisconsin wants to take a giant leap into corruption, I think that’s a good move for them to make,” Lueders said. “It’s cowardly. It’s dirty. It violates the tradition of the state of Wisconsin, and it shows what miserable cowards that these people are that they would stick this in an omnibus motion
It may be usefull to remember that Scott Walker, a candidate for POTUS, is the head of this cabal as Governor of Wisconsin.
Source: host.madison.com
Dear Susan,
The substantial part of your reply (the second and third paragraphs) leaves me to think that you are replying about an entirely different piece of legislation; something apart from the Trans Pacific Partnership.
The suggestion that there is anything dynamic in the TPP (as I understand it to be) that you could possibly influence, even if you were Speaker of The House, is wildly different from what I know the legislation to be. Only members of congress can read the text of the agreement in a windowless room - you can't take any notes. The secrecy in which the TPP has been formed precludes any discussion about improving it. Susan, I never learned that you have a photograpic memory, so I doubt that you can discuss it with much substance. I never heard President Obama say how Senator Elizabeth Warren or anyone else was wrong, all Obama does is disagree without making any substantial points on how any TPP oponents are wrong.
The only people who talk substantively about the TPP are the opponents and, as I mentioned to you recently the substance of the TPP could be devastating to working San Diegans.
I keep coming back to the secrecy of the treaty — nothing of any merit that isn't a matter of national security needs to be hidden. That's why you should opose it in any form when you vote on it.
Well, Obama has certainly extended and hardened the cement on a lot of Bush’s post-9/11 Terror Inc. policies, so he’s very similar to Bush in every way that way. His domestic policy is a bit different, but when you talk about drones, the American Empire, the NSA, civil liberties, attacks on journalism and whistleblowers, he’s as bad or worse than Bush. He hasn’t started as many wars, but he’s extended the ones we had, and I don’t even think Dick Cheney or Richard Nixon would say the president has the right to unilaterally decide whom he can kill around the world. On Tuesdays, the president can just decide whom he wants to kill, and you know, since 9/11 there are magic words like “terror,” and if you use magic words, you can justify any power grab you want.
Not quite, John. Don't play the game: never talk about the office holder - only mention how FUBAR The Office of President of The United States is. That is how you get your point across.
Source: thedailybeast.com
866 Lobbyists for the Military Weapons Makers
First, there are lobbyists, hundreds of them, compared to a mere handful for organizations like Peace Action that advocate for lower levels of military spending. The Center for Responsive Politics, which tracks lobbying as well as campaign spending, says that “defense” lobbyists spent more than $126 million last year, an amount that doesn’t include activities for which Washington-based power brokers do not have to report.
According to the Center, 533 out of 866 registered lobbyists for “defense” companies were “revolvers,” i.e. individuals who have gone through the “revolving door” between government service and employment as lobbyists.
Take Lockheed Martin, the number one military contractor, as an example. It contracted with 21 firms last year on top of its own staff lobbyists to work Washington connections. All told Lockheed has 96 lobbyists, two-thirds of whom have gone through the revolving door, among them former Senators Alphonse D’Amato, John Breaux, and Trent Lott, and former Congressmen Bart Stupak and Sonny Callahan. In 2014, Lockheed spent half a million dollars on the services of the Podesta Group, headed by Tony Podesta and his brother John, who is in the news this week as the chairman of Hillary Clinton’s officially launched presidential campaign.
Generals Go Through the Revolving Door
It’s not just members of Congress and their staff. A Boston Globe article by Bryan Bender reported, “From 2004 through 2008, 80 percent of retiring three- and four-star officers went to work as consultants or defense executives, according to the Globe analysis. That compares with less than 50 percent who followed that path a decade earlier, from 1994 to 1998.” Bender reported that the Pentagon even sponsors seminars to teach retiring senior officers how to move from military service to a lucrative career with a military contractor.
“In some years, the move from general staff to industry is a virtual clean sweep. Thirty-four out of 39 three- and four-star generals and admirals who retired in 2007 are now working in defense roles — nearly 90 percent,” Bender found. Many of them also volunteer on Pentagon advisory committees.
And the revolving door doesn’t just lead to K Street lobbying firms; it also opens the way to “think tanks” funded by the weapons makers and media institutions that cover politics.
The impact of the contributions and the lobbying can be seen in a military budget in the vicinity of a trillion dollars a year if you add up the regular Defense Department appropriation, add the special war budget (now known as “Overseas Contingency Operations”), the Department of Energy’s allocation for nuclear weapons, the “homeland security” budget, the secret budgets of the CIA and NSA, and the expense of past wars. “There’s a huge imbalance between what we spend on the military and what we spend on diplomacy,” Hartung said.
Source: gui.afsc.org
nowyoukno
The special agent in charge, he says “You know, if we go out there and start messing with those folks, they know judges, they know lawyers, they know politicians. You start locking their kids up, somebody’s going to jerk our chain.” He said they’re going to call us on it, and before you know it, they’re going to shut us down, and there goes your overtime.
What I began to see is that the drug war is totally about race. If we were locking up everybody, white and black, for doing the same drugs, they would have done the same thing they did with prohibition. They would have outlawed it. They would have said, “Let’s stop this craziness. You’re not putting my son in jail. My daughter isn’t going to jail.” If it was an equal enforcement opportunity operation, we wouldn’t be sitting here anyway.
…it needed hashtags, too.
Source: bennorton.com
diegueno reblogged
It’s easy to argue that people should be unarmed and only “peacefully” protest the government but that doesn’t work in actuality."In order for nonviolence to work, your opponent must have a conscience. The United States has none."-Stokely Carmichael
The government is armed and uses violence to enforce their will against the people. Armed resistance is the most effective means of controlling an out of control government and it doesn’t have to be violent. Violence and being armed are two separate subjects. This was proven at the Bundy Ranch incident where the federal government was attacking innocent people and an armed resistance stopped them without any bloodshed. It seems that a lot of your fear of an armed populace (but strangely not an armed government, which you are ok with) comes from ignorance. I strongly suggest reading: This Nonviolent Stuff’ll Get You Killed by Charles E. Cobb Jr.
The purpose of the second amendment is to retain access for the populace to military weapons to defend themselves from enemies foreign and domestic. Whether you like it or not that’s what it is and it is completely necessary. Without the second, you lose the first and then you have nothing.
For the sake of complete disclosure, the last part of the reblog is quoted here. The first part of the reblog had a looonnnnnnnnnggggggggg discourse about firearms, bullets and body armour which I omited.
...really? You're quoting Stokley Carmichael? I'd bet 8 to 10 that you're as white as the envelope on the table — making your choice to quote Carmichael more ironic. Still, a tool (and I mean quotes by people of color from a context seperate from anything related to support of the Second Amendment as the tool in this case) is a tool and is fair game. Further, I'm going to skip over whatever it is that you think happened that Cliven bundy provoked.
It comes down to that difference between us. I believe the fact that women as a group / class are no longer prohibited from voting or that black people are no longer property and are not excluded as a class from voting shows that the republic can be changed in significant ways for the better. You may believe that this this grooming by the public education system to create docile and complient citizens. I say that you're wrong to assume the latter.
There are two mistakes that most U.S. citizens make:
- That the political and electoral system that the political duopoly works in is functional
- That they are inconviencing themselves enough to fix the problem(s)
You do not prove your point by not participating and not trying to fix the system with the tools the system gives you. Time and treasure spent at the gun range doesn't make a difference for the republic, the commonwealth. Further, you're not showing how far and how hard you'll work in a cooperative way with others to prove the point that the republic is irrepreble.
Source: facebook.com
Dang, good news that I've been a registered Green for decades (nope, that ain't saying much).
But seriously, neither partisanship nor petulance makes the USA work any better. Waking up to the real problems we face in common and being in action to make systemic repairs would be a great alternative, IMHO.
President Obama and the FCC have taken a stand to protect the Internet’s future, but the cable companies are spending millions to block them and turn this into a partisan issue. We have days to show Congress that the public fully supports Obama’s call
The next few days are critical to keep corporations from killing the Net as we know it.
Verizon alone has spent $100 million lobbying for new powers to decide which sites load fast (hint: if you're a huge company paying Verizon big bucks, your site will fly; if you’re a citizen journalist or a cash-strapped startup, good luck).
FCC regulators just proposed strong new rules prohibiting Internet discrimination. The biggest threat now is fear of a Republican backlash in Congress to strip the FCC’s authority if they do the right thing.
Sign the petition to Congress not to kill Internet equality. When we get enough signatures to show the public is concerned, Avaazers will descend on the US Capitol to deliver our call directly to key Senate and House committees.
The Internet has always been a level playing field for anyone to put out content, creativity, innovation and information. It’s what’s made independent media outlets like Democracy Now! reach a massive audience that would otherwise be left to choose from corporate media channels like Fox News. This principle, that all sites have equal access to reach people through the same internet, is called Net Neutrality.
President Obama recently demanded the "strongest possible rules" to protect the Internet and his top regulator has indicated that he'll follow through. With a citizen brigade from around the country, we can show Congress -- in person -- that we're not going away until the free Net is fully protected.
The corporate censors, and the politicians whose elections they bankroll, are fighting tooth and nail. We've got to speak up now to prevent this 21st Century corporate censorship.
Your part to play in this is signing this petition.
If there’s one thing that pretty much everyone can agree on about the shooting and its aftermath, it’s that Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon has done a terrible job handling every single aspect of this case, from not appointing a special prosecutor to replace Bob McCulloch to poor engagement with the community to doing nothing to stop the excessive use of force from police.
Take a look at the comments section of virtually any article about Michael Brown’s death, and you’ll see that Darren Wilson has a lot support out there (from truly horrible people). Why not translate that support into a political movement to sweep him into the governor’s mansion? If nothing else, we’ll see what it’s like when the governor is even worse than Nixon.
#4 on 6 Jobs Darren Wilson Could Do Next
The hubbub created by Washington insiders and political operatives around SJR 19 was little more than a sideshow to divert our attention, before an election, from the appalling records of both major parties on economic, environmental, and social justice issues.
"We the people" have seen our human rights shrink, along with dwindling economic opportunities and environmental desecration, while "corporate personhood" and "money as speech" have flourished under both party’s leadership.
Help Move to Amend build an independent grassroots democracy movement! Please spread the word and ask your friends to join Move to Amend.
SJR 19 failed to receive the necessary 60 votes in the Senate yesterday. It was never the magic pill to right the wrongs wrought on our Democratic Republic. The bill did not address the root of the rot infecting our democracy: Corporate Personhood.
There was a silver lining for the Democrats, who score a win (even though the bill was destined to fail) by associating their Party with campaign finance reform — right before an election.
Help Move to Amend build an independent grassroots democracy movement! Share this link by email and social media.
Our democracy is in crisis; SJR 19 and the proposal to overturn Citizens United merely addressed a symptom of our diseased democracy, but left the cause of the disease — large corporations wielding Constitutional rights — untreated.
Help Move to Amend pass the We the People Amendment! Share this link with everyone you know!
Move to Amend is the only grassroots organization building a real amendment movement in all 50 states to pass an amendment that actually solves our root problems by ending corporate Constitutional rights and money as speech.
For months DC non-profits have been raising money around SJR 19, a bill they knew was doomed to failure from the start. Move to Amend has a strategy to win and is doing everything possible, within our means, to pass the We the People Amendment, but we are nowhere near as well funded as the DC groups.
Source: addtoany.com
While many Americans disapprove of the institution as a whole, a large number are barred from participating in primary elections. States with closed primaries only allow voters registered to a specific party to decide who appears on the general election ballot.
Closed primaries combined with the two parties’ control of overwhelming amounts of resources have contributed to a 2014 primary election cycle that is more ceremonial than democratic.
Nationally, voter turnout in primary elections is near non-existent. It’s not necessarily because people don’t care; not caring, more often than not is a symptom, not a cause, of being disenfranchised. Sometimes it’s because they are not allowed (i.e. independent voters in closed primary states) and other times it’s because the primaries are uncontested (see the case of New York below).
No matter the causes, the fact of the matter is a very small minority of Americans get to decide who shows up on the November ballots.
To the Co-Sponsors of Senate Joint Resolution 19:
Thank you for standing up against big money and special interests in co-sponsoring SJR 19, but it doesn't go far enough.
For the past four years the Movement to Amend the Constitution has been clear: We must both abolish corporate constitutional rights AND get big money out of politics.
Don't advocate for an amendment that only goes part way!
Please AMEND SJR 19 to include this language:
"The rights protected by the Constitution of the United States are the rights of natural persons only. Artificial entities established by the laws of any State, the United States, or any foreign state shall have no rights under this Constitution and are subject to regulation by the People, through Federal, State, or local law. The privileges of artificial entities shall be determined by the People, through Federal, State, or local law, and shall not be construed to be inherent or inalienable."
Tens of thousands of volunteers across the nation have been building a grassroots movement over the past four years from the bottom up.
This movement came from everyday people taking this issue to their city governments, to town meeting debates, to candidate forums, to newspaper opinion pages, and to the ballot box directly. Nearly 600 cities and towns have now passed amendment resolutions.
Polling shows 80% of the American public believes that corporations should not have the same rights as people. State legislatures have been pressured to stand up as well, with 16 states passing resolutions calling for an amendment. “Ending Corporate Personhood” was a major theme in the demands that came from Occupy encampments across the country.
Please amend SJR 19 to eliminate corporate personhood to put We the People in the driver's seat of our government.
diegueno reblogged
Talking to Senators Rand Paul and Cory Booker before our interview about their juvenile justice bill.
#Bipartisanship
Notice how MSNBC didn't really give a damn about the bill that Paul and Booker were talking about covering this whole interview? The subject didn't matter — all they cared about was the 2010 interview that Rand Paul had with Rachel Maddow.
Maddow takes it upon herself to mount a defense of calling out Rand for speaking the indefensible 3 years ago for over 10 minutes. Afterward Lawrence O'Donnell had Ari Melber who talked about his get. The content wasn't the Paul/Booker bill but the man bites dog nature of the bipartisan action in The Senate. All of it was informative about MSNBC's editorial priorities.
MSNBC presents social justice priorities as long as the content is compelling to keep eyeballs' or ears' attention. It would seem that on Thursday Phil Griffin and/or his minions did not find the plight of those placed in a lower caste in our nation by the penal industrial complex a more compelling story than the Libertarianish reasoning (read white mansplaining how theories trump real world consequences of the practice of those theories) which they have on tape and will play over-and-over-and-over-and-over-and-over not as a practice of ideological principle but as an exercise of an ephemeral primacy and power of the fourth estate.
In the end, The REDEEM Act gets as much sunlight as a perp walk from the back door of the precinct to the paddy wagon parked half-a-block away. Those left to wear a scarlet letter for life after after being convicted for carrying some junk get just a little more than nothing because they don't watch MSNBC, they won't even pick up the phone to call their federal representative not just because they don't watch MSNBC (and who in poverty can afford the 2nd tier of cable services in the USA?) but also because they don't participate in the system. Perhaps some are lead by the charlatans of mass media rather than those who one needs a longer attention span to understand. So it is left to those who see the wisdom of something like the REDEEM Act and participate in electoral politics despite the diminished effectiveness of such conduct to carry the ball to their elected officials.
Who knows why, but last week Phil Griffin didn't put himself inside that intersection of that diagram; for that reason, the poor ex-cons loose.
The result of all this polarization is that the ideologically rigid have come to dominate the electoral process, taking a more active role in elections out of enthusiasm for their own side or hatred for the other side. They elect candidates who are more attuned to partisanship and less open to negotiating. Voters who want moderation and compromise become disillusioned and withdraw from politics, which further strengthens the hand of the hyper-partisan voters.
What is the end game on all this? It’s tough to say. Self-reinforcing cycles like this are hard to break, and so long as each side has a reliably large base of voters, the cycle will keep on churning. The Republicans, though, are already pushing the extremes of ideological purity — they just kicked out their conservative majority leader in favor of a libertarian crank whose policy positions are rooted in Ayn Randian fantasy. It’s possible they’ll isolate themselves so badly (they’re base is aging and emerging voter demographics are trending against them) that they’ll achieve rump party status and undergo a forced recalibration. You can only lose so many presidential elections before realizing something’s wrong.
Didja catch what Malloy did there? He gave you solid analysis from inside the Two Parties Are All That the USA Can Handle paradigm box.
For the sake of honesty, working in support of any political party when you are not either donating or being paid money is a waste of your time. The system is not responsive to needs of people who don't pay (damn, I don't know where to find that academic study that proves it). It's also constructed to prevent real partisan plurality. That's why I suggest that anyone who wants to see things work needs to fix the system, not the symptoms, first. The media and content generators (consider the secondary role that political officials, partisan hacks and spin doctors have) have a stake in the stasis of the political hegemony, too.
Pundits and journalists will always scoff at the notion at any more than 2 parties in the USA because 3+ parties mean more work for journalists to do an adequate job on covering politics. Pols will scoff at it because it would mean losing power and more work for them to legislate.
Source: salon.com
Senate Joint Resolution 19 is a proposed Constitutional Amendment to overturn Citizens United, but it doesn’t address corporate constitutional rights at all.
Move to Amend has vowed that we will not support any halfway measures that don't amend the Constitution in two necessary ways:
- Make clear that only human beings, not corporations have Constitutional rights;
- Make clear that money is not speech and campaign spending can be regulated.
Tens of thousands of volunteers across the nation have been building a grassroots movement over the past four years from the bottom up. This movement came from everyday people taking this issue to their city governments, to town meeting debates, to candidate forums, to newspaper opinion pages, and to the ballot box directly. Nearly 600 cities and towns have now passed amendment resolutions.
Polling shows 80% of the American public believes that corporations should not have the same rights as people. State legislatures have been pressured to stand up as well, with 16 states passing resolutions calling for an amendment. “Ending Corporate Personhood” was a major theme in the demands that came from Occupy encampments across the country.
The plan is that this amendment will get a vote in the Senate this year -- before election season. We cannot allow a proposal that doesn’t address corporate constitutional rights to get traction -- the amendment must match the demand of our movement: “A Corporation is Not a Person! Money is Not Free Speech!”
Fill out this form to send a message to the authors of SJR19 -- let them know that Corporate Personhood MUST be included in the language of the amendment.
Source: movetoamend.org