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Breaking the Veil, one Mind at a Time
Welcome to WWL, a place for Liberal Politics, Op/Eds, Information, Rants and Just Plain Fun.
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I consider this a Radical Gumbo, with many varied ingredients making more than the sum of its parts. We are no-holds barred, passionate and not overly PC here. Yes, Liberals can have Fangs. Jump in and be part of the cutting edge!
(Gottlieb is ALWAYS fp material! - promoted by Diane G)
The classic Ambrose Bierce short story, An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge has a man being hung and miraculously the rope breaks and he escapes and has an adventure only to find in the end the rope didn't break and his escape was a dying dream of desperation. In the end the man hangs from a stiff rope, dead of a broken neck.
Jodi lent us the movie "I Hope There's Beer in Hell" and we watched it yesterday morning.
Let me just say this: It is sick, twisted and wrong on nearly every level - portraying college guys as misogynist whore-pigs. And funny as hell.
It also has ABSOLUTELY STELLAR sarcastic one liners threaded throughout it. It may be the funniest movie I have ever seen. You know, in a pathetic, juvenile way. I usually don't like juvenile films, but this is an unprecedented masterpiece. Instant Cult Classic for a generation, like "Rocky Horror" became to a previous one.
I laughed until I cried, my ribs ached and I thought I was my face would crack.
Not for the PC or weak of stomach.
Yes, I am truly a horrible person, but I have a lot of fun!
The Open Thread is Open. I have a late start on Mondays, so will be here to take the heat about how, as a woman, I should hate this film. Heh.
PS: They're calling for our first winter snow storm Tues & Wed.... maybe I'll have time to write something other than drivel. Wooohoooo. Snow day=forced world-stop!
Now first off...I must tell you that I do not give a good goddamn who wins any big time American hypnomedia-sponsored sports event. Not in terms of being a "fan", anyway. It don't mean shit to me which group of overpaid, coddled-from-puberty motherfuckers wins a game of this sort on a purely sports or competition-based level. Two or three weeks from now no one except people who have nothing better to occupy their minds will even be able to remember which two teams played the game.
But still...the universe works in strange and mysterious ways, and anything that receives as much hype as the Stupor Bowl has a function in the grand scheme of things on this planet.
In Part 3 Cohen talked about the struggle for power and direction within the Democratic Party from the days of the Viet Nam War to the present, and wound up with "Frankly... I would love to see a primary challenge to Obama when he's up for re-election... Because unless you build a base through elections and then you hold the officials accountable, then you'll never get anywhere."
Here in the conclusion of the interview Cohen expands on those ideas and fills in some of the outlines to draw a rough set of guidelines or roadmap of how to get from where things stand now with the Democrats as out and out corporatists to a world of the kind of progressive populism they have been well known for at various points in history, and how it is going to take a no more Mr. Nice Guy approach from progressives and a lot of very hardnosed and fearless aggressiveness, of the kind that I think Muhammad Ali meant when he noted so many years ago "He who is not courageous enough to take risks will accomplish nothing in life."
Lately there has been a spate of diaries at such web sites as FireDogLake and "Open" Left wherein lay members - typically under attack from site moderators, who act as Democratic Party hacks and gatekeepers - have sought ways to bring back the Progressive Party, or join the Greens, or build up some other institution, that will allow progressives to act together as a cohesive political unit. (I posted an entry there myself, only to end up being attacked by site moderators, threatened with banishment, and ultimately banned when I refused to back down against their incessant bullying.)
Fellow FDLer TalkingStick points out the wisdom of studying the teabaggers for ideas about how we progressives can rebuild our own movement.
Mason calls for progressives to join him in building a Progressive Party from the ground up, apparently not aware that it already exists in states such as Vermont and Washington, and as Green Party affiliates inMissouri and Wisconsin. He is joined in this effort by MadHemingway, who posted the 1912 platform the Progressive Party ran on.
FDL members are not alone in Left Blogsylvania in expressing their utter disgust with the Democrats; at "Open" Left, such lay members as Arthur Lukas gripe about where progressives are and asks where we should go from here. Even at the Daily Obama, whereupon I also post, a poll I put up asking if it is time for progressives to break away from the Democratic received a fifty percent yes-vote.
Such discontent is often met by moderators and site owners with derision, insults, threats, and banishments of the "offending" members. Nevertheless, it has grown more difficult for the access-bloggers to bully progressives into submission, a lesson FDL's Jason Rosenbaum refused to learned after the beat-down his contemptuous post before the Massachusetts special election received. In short, no one on the left is buying into the Big Lie that Democrats are any different from Republicans in terms of substantive policies, nor are we responding to threats and insults anymore for "failing" to be bullied into supporting Democrats no matter what.
This discontent and refusal to be bullied has created an opening for progressives seeking to organize the left back into a cohesive and more importantly, effective movement in opposition to the far right. There are angry voices aplenty, people outraged by the betrayals of the man they though they were electing president in '08 and the endless capitulations to the GOP made by Democrats. Here we have an advantage.
The only thing lacking in the new political environment is effective leadership among progressives. We will not find it among the self-appointed "leaders" of the 'netroots, the access-bloggers like Chris Bowers, Markos Moulitsas, and the aforementioned Rosenbaum whose only real goal is to gain access for themselves - and only themselves - to the inner circles of "serious" political power and corporate media recognition. It is therefore up to us to take on leadership roles and organize the left.
If we can take charge, we the progressive base, then we can finally begin the work of taking back America from the fascist elements that have usurped it for their own ends to the detriment of everybody else. The Full Court Press is one tool for doing that, and it's a very good start.
The January 21 Supreme Court decision [.pdf] in the Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission case lifted bans on corporate spending for campaign finance, drawing heavy criticism from across the country for the ruling's potential to undermine the American democratic process.
Now with that ruling in their back pockets, "[a]t least half a dozen leaders of the Republican Party have joined forces to create a new political group with the goal of organizing grass-roots support and raising funds ahead of the 2010 midterm elections, according to people familiar with the effort", says the Wall Street journal in an article January 30.
The Supreme Court ruling could potentially allow the group, called the American Action Network, to take unlimited contributions from corporations for use in political campaigns.
The New York Times reports that the group aims to "develop and market conservative ideas...hoping to capitalize on the fundraising and electioneering possibilities opened up by a recent Supreme Court ruling."
"This administration as well as Citizens United - when you combine the two the prospects for funding these types of efforts are greatly enhanced," said former senator Norm Coleman, one of the group's organizers.
RawStory lists the intitial members of the group as:
Friday afternoon I adopted a puny little Dracaena plant. Like most businesses these days, we have a firm that comes in and "manages" the plants in my restaurant, replacing them as they inevitably get damaged. I actually did that as a side job for a while, after my greenhouse days. So, in talking to the plant tech ladies, I told them I would take any plants they were just going to toss out.
Hardly a news worthy event, and yet, it reminded me that I haven't brought a new plant into this house in years. No money to blow, and nowhere to blow it if I had some. Another sign of the decline is that there are no longer greenhouses in every burg. It used to be you could find tropicals and exotics within a half hour of anywhere you stood. Even Home Depot only has seasonal greenhouses any more for outdoor planting in the summer. Sad. The obvious answer is people just don't have elective spending money to sustain the industry. The less obvious answer is almost amusing in its technology-backfires-yet again way. Plants die in new houses like this:
One of my friends bought a McMansion on the golf course nearby, and spent a huge amount of money to have his entry way atrium filled with plants, all which died almost immediately.
He was baffled. He replaced a few, then kept trying different plantings. When this came up in conversation, I explained how Low-E windows work and told him he would have to install full spectrum lighting to let them live, he was livid. He did as most people do: Gave up, bought some tacky statue and threw in some plastic plants.
"You mean they build all these houses with atriums, that cannot possibly support plant life?"
Uhhh, yep. Exaaaaaaaactly.
In the land of living behind closed doors and windows for at LEAST 5 months a year, houseplants used to be a huge industry for the oxygen bestowing factor, let alone the calming effect of having green softness inside against the cold harshness outside.
No more. People breathe dead, perpetually recycled air half the year. Their windows save them money, but cost them life giving rays. No full spectrum sunlight, no plants.
Journalism professor Jeff Cohen of FAIR and the Park Center for Independent Media on the struggle within the Democratic Party, starting from the Viet Nam War:
There's no doubt that there's an awakening. What concerns me is that the liberal base, the Democratic Party base, has never been more educated, in my view, and that's because of the independent media. The democratic base is against an imperial foreign policy. The democratic base is for real medicare for all, or at least the strongest public option that would really hurt private insurance. There's an understanding of history, and again it's largely because the independent media is giving us the news in real time, every day when we click on the computer and we watch Real News, we watch Democracy Now.
What hasn't translated is while we have this boom in independent media on the Internet, we don't have a boom of independent politics.
What I believe are needed are new groups, that will be on the Internet, mobilizing the millions to make the kinds of demands of the Democrats that the right wing base, which has clearly transformed the country, the right wing base in the Republican Party not only took over a major party, they haven't let up on that party until their agenda is put in place, whereas on our side we don't have that.
What needs to happen, this is what a few groups are doing, Progressive Democrats of America is one, the idea is we need to take over that major political party.
When people talk about change, and then they deliver only for insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies and Wall Street, you vote them out. You primary them. You know this is what the right wing has done for decades. It's what they're doing now.
What we get from MoveOn historically and other groups is apologies for democratic office holders who have faked left with their rhetoric and then governed for big business. And what we need is to primary these people.
Frankly... I would love to see a primary challenge to Obama when he's up for re-election.
Because unless you build a base through elections and then you hold the officials accountable, then you'll never get anywhere.
Immediately after the show last night, an email popped up in my inbox telling me I had a new comment on my Facebook. It was my 21 year old girlfriend Jodi, telling me my outro music was "lame and old sounding." She had listened to and liked the show. Go figure, she felt the need to do an intervention.
So I bundled up and made the trek up and over the hill, in metaphorically fitting fashion, to go hang with her and Linda for a little Friday night yahtzee.
Lo and behold, I became her project: Who knew I desperately needed a cultural makeover? Its true, since I left the Corporate world, I no longer had a crew of 20 somethings to influence my musical tastes. So, she warned my she was going to absolutely spam my Facebook with new music until I joined this century. Heh. I'm "too young" to be stuck in "ancient" music, apparently.
Then she introduced me to the "Magical" radio station, Pandora, that only plays "music you like, Diane, its MAGIC!" She could not believe I had never heard of it. I'm trying it out right now, and while I like what its playing, I am a bit disappointed so far. Its supposed to pick songs similar to the one you name, in music... but its just playing the band I named. I wanted to find new music that had similar qualities.
(UPDATE: I created another station, and its working better. Coolness. It IS magic!)
So, anyhoooo, I'm throwing in some videos she gave me below.
The first thing to go out the window when an aggressive, warlike nation starts a war (other than the truth) is whatever cultural understanding may have existed before.
For instance: what was the American pop culture 1960's view of middle eastern culture? Belly dance and music, beautiful architecture, snake charming, funny hats. Even children's story's like Ali Baba.
Conversely, what was the 1960's view of Vietnam? Sub human dirty gooks.
Today, there's a piece in the NYT about the beautiful ancient art of Vietnam, which surely never would have occured in the war years:
Before we blew up all the minarets in Bagdad, it was necessary to remove them as objects of beauty, as expressions of humanity -- we had to remove the ME from our cultural radar. How many American children today know about Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves? And how many worry about hook nosed terrorists?
To know a culture --even a Mickey Mouse pale imitation of the real thing -- is to understand the humanity, that there are real children, real families there at the other end of the gun-sights; different from us, yes, but real nonetheless.
I'd like for you to try a little experiment for me.
It's a very simple experiment, one that doesn't involve stoichiometry, Bunsen burners, p values, test tubes, or access to hydrochloric acid. It'll be fun, I swear.
Ready?
Fantastic! Let's begin.
Step 1: Think of five "liberal" or "progressive" Obama supporters you know. Try to include as many queer and transgender Obama supporters in that list as possible. It shouldn't be too hard to come up with a list of ardent queer and transgender Obama supporters in the wake of the Pope of Hope's hope-inducing HRC speech, not to mention his current--and sudden--almost deafening screeching about his plans to overturn "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" (which is in no way a cynical effort to shift the national debate away from his "failed" "attempt" at health care reform, nor is it a strategy to prevent "progressives" from starting to notice that over the past year he has fought--with a Democratic super-majority in Congress--to advance a hawkish neo-liberal agenda that is breathtaking in its scope; and no, it has nothing to do with the U.S. military's inability to recruit and retain enough prospective corpses for his ongoing wars of aggression).
Step 2: Call each of the Obamaniacs on your list and read the following statement to them:
"Obama has been President for one year now, during which time the Democrats have had a super-majority in Congress. Candidate Obama presented himself as a harbinger of change: the anti-Bush, if you will. Yet over the past year, Obama has (1) continued and/or strengthened a range of the very Bush administration policies that, as a "liberal/progressive", you once ardently opposed; (2) Enacted (or threatened to champion) paleoconservative policies that, had they been enacted by Bush, would have pissed you off so much that you just might have snapped and thrown down the gauntlet by attending a peaceful protest or a candlelight vigil. Here are just a few examples:
Gottlieb and I will be alive and in color (or is that off color?) on WWL radio tonight to guide you through Current Events taken from a Wildly Left Prospective.
Hear the Unreported & Under Reported Headlines stories you should be paying attention to, from US Politics, to the all of the Americas to our South, to the farthest reaches of the Earth.
Tonight, Cmdr Jeff Huber whose satires on military and foreign policy affairs appear at Antiwar.com,Aviation Week and Pen and Sword. Jeff's novel Bathtub Admirals, a lampoon of America's rise to global dominance, is on sale now - click the link in our sidebar!!!
Get the insider scoop on our Military's actions from wise and witty Cmdr Huber, tonight on WWL Radio!
Start your weekend off with brain food served with humor. So, grab a cocktail, pull a log up by the fire and join our conversation.
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(H/t to Stu Piddy.) Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair on Wednesday confirmed that President Obama can and does authorize assassinations of U.S. citizens, if those citizens are overseas. Are we all OK with this? Why no protest from progressive leaders within the Democratic Party? Progressives, leaders, within the Democratic Party? How can anyone still sane and moral in this country not agree with Glenn Greenwald (emphasis added):
Barack Obama, like George Bush before him, has claimed the authority to order American citizens murdered based solely on the unverified, uncharged, unchecked claim that they are associated with Terrorism and pose "a continuing and imminent threat to U.S. persons and interests." They're entitled to no charges, no trial, no ability to contest the accusations. Amazingly, the Bush administration's policy of merely imprisoning foreign nationals (along with a couple of American citizens) without charges -- based solely on the President's claim that they were Terrorists -- produced intense controversy for years. That, one will recall, was a grave assault on the Constitution. Shouldn't Obama's policy of ordering American citizens assassinated without any due process or checks of any kind -- not imprisoned, but killed -- produce at least as much controversy?
The January 21 Supreme Court 
