An Open Letter to My Legislators

Dear Senator Wanggaard and Representative Vos --

I am deeply distressed by Governor Walker’s threat to strip the collective bargaining rights of our public employees.

These people -- our teachers, ER nurses, 911 operators,  snow plow drivers, and others -- have given our state their best for many, many years.  To take their right to bargain collectively away from them is not just a slap in the face for all their hard work, it is just plain wrong.

Governor Walker has made a series of terrible blunders since taking office, mistakes that cost our state the good, high-paying jobs of the future -- turning down the money for high-speed rail (and the jobs and cleaner environment that would bring), turning away funding for rural broadband access, and making it more difficult to site new, efficient windmill generators among them -- and all this within 2 months of being sworn in!

This threat to our public employees is just his latest bad move, and it’s a tactic I urge you to oppose.

Certainly, during these tough times, all of us must tighten our belts and pitch in where we can for the common good.  The public employees union, as the employees themselves, agree with this.  It smacks of dictatorship to exclude these people from the talks that will affect their lives, their salaries, their benefits, and, thus, their futures.

Mr. Walker must not seek to balance Wisconsin’s budget on the backs of middle-class workers and the poor!  The benefits these people have now are ones they bargained for in good faith -- and sacrificed for  -- in the past.  It is wrong, just plain wrong, to take away those benefits, and the right to bargain for them, now or at any time in the future.

By acting unilaterally as he has threatened, Governor Walker is robbing Peter to pay Paul.  There is, in fact, no need to rob anyone.  Reasonable people can sit together across a table and come to reasonable agreements.

So, I urge you to stand up for the right of every Wisconsinite to organize and bargain collectively -- the right of all of us to seek our future together.

Because I have volunteered to teach 100+ students tomorrow in Kenosha, I will not be marching on the capital tomorrow.  But I will be with those protesters in spirit.

Since I cannot be there, I count on you to represent my interests.

Yours Sincerely,

Steve Sullivan

Then they came for the Trade Unionists....

This statement is often misquoted -- especially by the right wing, who like to insert themselves into it -- but here's the real thing.

And I want you to pay special attention to the 2nd stanza, and think about the Governor's threat to collective bargaining in Wisconsin:

First They came... - Pastor Martin Niemoller

First they came for the communists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.

Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me.

*
I guess the Governor felt he could just skip that first step in this day and age.


Stand up against the Governor of Wisconsin and for our teachers & public workers, before it's too late.

Contact your state reps.

WI Public Employees Over Compensated? NO!

Rutgers Prof Jeffrey Keefe just completed a study which shows that when controlling for education level Wisconsin Public Employees are undercompensated by 4.8% compared to similar private sector employees, and that INCLUDES their pension and health insurance benefit packages: http://www.epi.org/publications/entry/6759/

59% of full-time Wisconsin public sector workers hold at least a four-year college degree, compared with 30% of full-time private sector workers. Wisconsin state and local governments pay college-educated employees 25% less in annual compensation, on average, than private employers.

Action Alert Worker's Rights & the Budget Repair Bill

Many of you are already aware that Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker has planned legislation that will strip state workers of their right to collective bargaining.

Former U.S. Senator Russ Feingold released the following statement:

"Governor Walker’s request to the State Legislature to eliminate nearly all of the collective-bargaining rights for thousands of Wisconsin workers is big government at its worst. No private employer can do what the governor proposes, nor should it. For decades, Wisconsin has protected the rights of workers to collectively bargain with their employer on wages, benefits, workplace rules, and many other aspects of their employment. The governor is wrong to suggest that public workers are responsible for the state’s budget woes, and he is wrong to use that bogus excuse to strip them of rights that millions of other American workers have."

There are a number of things you can do:

There are buses going to Madison on Tuesday and Wednesday.
These buses are headed to rallies at the Capital. The buses will be leaving the park and ride at Highway 11 and I-94 at 7am. The rallies are planned for noon. The buses WILL be returning each day. If you want to be part of this and want to be on the bus please RSVP to Meg at megwi@aol.com

There will be marching and rallying in Racine on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday from 4pm to 6pm at the Racine Unified Central Office. That's at 2200 Northwestern Ave. Just show up and be supportive.

Call, email, or fax State Senator Van Wanggaard and tell him to vote against this proposal.
~His office phone number is 608 266 1832, or 866 615 7510. His mailbox is full now, but try again on Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday and
Thursday.
~His email address is sen.wanggaard@legis.wisconsin.gov
Send him an email right now and tell him that you do not want Wisconsin union
workers to have their rights taken away.
~His fax number is 608 282 3561. Send a fax telling him how you feel about what
Gov Walker is trying to do to your friends, relatives and neighbors.

Call the legislative hotline and tell your State Senator that you oppose this bill. That number is 877 753 5578.

Help make phone calls telling other people to call, email, or fax. There will be phone banks set up at the Labor Hall in Racine at 1840 Sycamore (across from
Skatetown). Calling will start tomorrow (Sunday) at 11am. If you can join in, RSVP to Meg at megwi@aol.com...or just show up. (You WILL need to bring your own cell phone to use,as we do not have phone lines set up. Make sure you have free minutes on Sundays.)
One or all actions will make a difference. Please join your friends, family and neighbors in Wisconsin who will be affected by this legislation!

Fruther Proof the Ryan is Lyin Sack of Shit

The following half truth (LIE!) courtesy Paully Ryan and the Weekneed Standard was posted by Nemo on Free Racine and is making all around the wingnut blogospere. The truth, which CONservatism cannot abide, follows below

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/cbo-director-says-obamacare-would-reduce-employment-800000-workers_547288.html

Chairman [Paul] Ryan: “[I]t’s been argued...that the new health care law will create jobs and increase labor force participation. But if I recall from your analysis, it was quite the opposite. Is that not the case?”

Director [Douglas] Elmendorf : “Yes.”...

[…]

Rep. [John] Campbell: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, we'll -- and Dr. Elmendorf -- and we'll continue this conversation right now. First on health care, before I get to -- before I get to broader issues, you just mentioned that you believe -- or that in your estimate, that the health care law would reduce the labor used in the economy by about 1/2 of 1 percent, given that, I believe you say, there's 160 million full-time people working in '20-'21. That means that, in your estimation, the health care law would reduce employment by 800,000 in '20-'21. Is that correct?

Director Elmendorf: Yes. The way I would put it is that we do estimate, as you said, that...employment will be about 160 million by the end of the decade. Half a percent of that is 800,000.

http://thehill.com/blogs/healthwatch/health-reform-implementation/143379-gop-jumps-on-old-cbo-job-numbers

EXCERPT: However, the CBO prediction is a little more nuanced. Last summer's CBO report said the projected labor reduction is "largely" the result of more people voluntarily staying out of the workforce because the healthcare reform law gives them better healthcare options through an expansion of Medicaid and new state-run health insurance exchanges.

From the report:

"The expansion of Medicaid and the availability of subsidies through the exchanges will effectively increase beneficiaries’ financial resources. Those additional resources will encourage some people to work fewer hours or to withdraw from the labor market."

Further, a ban on discriminating against preexisting conditions will likely "increase the appeal" of health insurance plans offered outside the workplace for older workers.

"As a result," CBO said, "some older workers will choose to retire earlier than they otherwise would." END EXCERPT

Hey, THAT means they'll leave job openings that younger workers can fill. BONUS!

Thank you Nemo for your continued service in allowing me to point out the lies required to advance the Con-servatisma. If you must lie to advance your thoughts, your thoughts are not advanced.

Hooray For Eqypt!

I'm so happy for the people of Egypt and hopeful that it goes well from here to peaceful democracy there and elsewhere!

Fux Snoozers Most Misinformed

The University of Maryland conducted a studt after the fall election that shows there is a disturbing amount of misinformation, you know propaganda in the Plutocratic States of America and that it is influencing the what citizens believe (wrongly) and how they vote (ignorantly): http://www.worldpublicopinion.org/pipa/pdf/dec10/Misinformation_Dec10_rpt.pdf

But Fux Snoozers are by far more likely to swallow the bullshit and then regurgitate it all over what remains of our republic. Fux viewers are by:
-14 points more likely to mistakenly believe that the stimulus legislation did not include tax cuts. -13 points more likely to erroneously believe that the auto bailout only occurred under Obama.
-12 points more likely to hold the incorrect belief that when TARP came up for a vote most Republicans opposed it.
-30 points more likely to mistakenly believe that most scientists do not agree that climate change is occurring.
-31 percent more likely to believe the that it is not clear that Obama was born in the United States.

Want more clear evidence of the lies the Teabgnorant are more likely to believe? Read it and weep:
-Most economists estimate the stimulus caused job losses (12 points more likely)
-Most economists have estimated the health care law will worsen the deficit (31 points)
-The economy is getting worse (26 points)
-Their own income taxes have gone up (14 points)

Plutarch's like Rupert the Murdoch and the Koch Bros don't like bedrock American values like self determination through the INFORMED consent of the citizenry. They're not your countrymen, they're would-be overlords.

Torturer-In-Chief Forced to Cancel Trip

On February 7, 2011, two torture victims were to have filed criminal complaints for torture against former president George W. Bush in Geneva, who was due to speak at an event there on February 12th. On the eve of the filing of the complaints, George Bush cancelled his trip. Swiss law requires the presence of the alleged torturer on Swiss soil before a preliminary investigation can be open. The complaints could not be filed after Bush cancelled, as the basis for jurisdiction no longer existed.

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/02/08-2

On Monday, the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) released the 'Preliminary Bush Torture Indictment', a document outlining the core aspects of the case against Bush for torture, and his violations of the Convention Against Torture to which the United States is a signatory.

An Easy Understanding of the 2nd Amendment

An Easy Understanding of the 2nd Amendment

Seeing recent (today) Facebook gun owner posts, I figured this to be an appropriate rant.

The 2nd amendment to the US Constitution simply states: A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

...

The founders were quite scared of a standing army in the US; they wanted the states to form local militias that would be activated when necessary. In order to maintain this idea of not having a standing army, we needed the right of the people to keep an bear arms.

NFL a Triumph of Socialistic Capitalism

This Sunday millions of Americans will gather watch the spectacle of the NFL Superbowl, a triumph of socialistic capitalism. The NFL is by far the most successful professional sports enterprise in America today. And the reason for this great success? Revenue sharing among the individual franchises that make up the league, you know socialism. They share revenue on everything from tickets and TV to towels and t-shirts, with the individual franchise keeping a portion of the sales and the rest going for equal distribution among all the teams.

Make no mistake about it, the NFL and the individual franchises (except for the most-glorious Green Bay Packers, owned by The People of Green Bay) are capitalistic ventures intent on making a profit and a return on investment and that is as it should be. But the NFL, unlike it's now weaker cousin MLB (America's former passtime) long ago realized that the health and well being of the whole is directly related to, and dependent on, the health and well being of each individual member.

By socializing their success the NFL has been able to produce a superior product with most of the teams being competative at any given time and a fairly rapid turnover of championship teams. And this has been good for their customers, the fans who get competative teams to root for and close, entertaining games to watch, which in return is good for the NFL and all it's members. There are no Yankees in the NFL, using their big media market renvue advantage perenially to buy their way to success. There are no Cubs, perpetually refusing to re-invest revenue in a superior product, secure in the monopoly over their mindlessly loyal and long suffering fans. It's better to be successful on a wheat pile than king of a dung heap.

Purity is not always a good thing and often comes with severe drawbacks and shortcomings. It's true with dogs and horses. Constant inbreeding in the quest for purity ends up accentuating inherent weaknesses and in general, mutts tend to be healthier than purebreads. The same is true with economic systems. Pure capitalism and pure socialism soon show the cracks of their inherent weaknesses that inevitably lead to crisis and failure. But the balancing act of a healthy blend allows the strengths of both to come through while keeping expression of the weaknesses of each to a minimum.

So remember this Sunday when when your witnessing a prime display of sucessful socialistic capitalism that even the Packers from the smallest city in professional sports can reach the top and enjoy their day in the sun when there is a reasonable sharing of resources and a level playing field. Go PACK GO!

Egypt

I'm watching the events in Egypt in particular and the region in general with great hope for the people of the middle-east and a peaceful transition to freedom and democracy.

Gas prices be damned if it works out it would be well worth almost any price over the near term.

State of the Union? Unbalanced & Sick

From last Thursday's On Point with Tom Ashbrook: http://www.onpointradio.org/2011/01/inequality-societies

American inequality is at towering heights not seen since before the Great Depression. Wealth is packed at the top of the ladder, and dwindling on the rungs below.

The picture naturally makes many uneasy. A new global research effort says we are quite right to worry about it.

In their new book Inequality: The Enemy Between Us, two British epidemiologists say inequality is a public health issue, a national health issue. From crime rates to drug use to teenage pregnancy to heart disease and more, they say, the evidence shows inequality makes countries sick, even the rich.

Inequality: the enemy between us?

By Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett

Excerpt of the Excerpt: Like others, we had been working for some years trying to understand the tendency for health to be better in countries with smaller income differences between rich and poor. There are now around 200 studies of income inequality and health. Other researchers working on violent crime had shown that homicide rates were lower in more equal countries. We started to wonder whether this pattern applied to other health or social problems. To find out, we collected internationally comparable figures on levels of trust, mental illness, life expectancy, infant mortality, prevalence of drug use and levels of obesity, homicide rates and rates of imprisonment, teenage birth rates, children’s educational achievement, and measures of child wellbeing – for each of 21 rich developed market democracies.

To measure inequality we used the ratio of the incomes of the top 20 percent in each country compared to the incomes of the bottom 20 percent. In the more equal countries (Japan, Finland, Norway, Sweden) the top 20 percent have 3.4 to 4.0 times as much. In the more unequal societies (USA, Portugal, UK) they have between 7 and 8.5 times as much. By this measure they are twice as unequal as the more equal countries.

Although people have often regarded inequality as divisive and socially corrosive, that did not prepare us for what we found. The frequency of all these problems was systematically related to income inequality. The bigger the income differences between rich and poor in each society, the worse these health and social problems became. And rather than things being just a bit worse in more unequal countries, they were very much worse. More unequal countries tended to have three times the level of violence, of infant mortality and mental illness; teenage birth rates were six times as high, and rates of imprisonment increased eight-fold.

The sense that inequality is divisive was shown by the fact that in more unequal countries, only about 15 percent of the population feel they can trust others, compared to around two-thirds in the more equal ones. That evidence was supported by relationships with social capital and levels of violence – all showing that inequality damages the social fabric of society.
Although the statistics told us that these relationships could not be dismissed as chance, we thought we should check in a second, independent, test bed to see if the same relationships held true. We looked at data for the 50 states of the USA, asking exactly the same question: did the more equal states, like the more equal countries, also do better on all these health and social problems than the less equal ones?

The pattern was extraordinarily similar. What the evidence shows is a tendency for more unequal societies to be socially dysfunctional right across the board. It is not that one country or state has good health but high levels of violence, or high teenage birth rates but low levels of drug abuse. Instead, the pattern is for most problems to become better or worse together.

Wisconsin Governor Walker – A Plagiarist and Shill With No Ideas (of his own)

Wisconsin Governor Walker – A Plagiarist and Shill With No Ideas (of his own)

As the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign reports, Scott Walker, our new governor, is only pushing ideas from right-wing ideologues that funded his campaign.

62% of Americans: Leave Obamacare as is or Make it do MORE!

A January 2011 AP Poll shows 62% of Americans like Obamcare as is, or want to see it changed so that it does more. See Table HC14a, above. http://www.ap-gfkpoll.com/pdf/AP-GfK%20Poll%20011411.pdf

The GOPbuser Protection Act of 2011

Part of the GOPster corporate takeover involves an attack on the Constitutional Right of The People to seek redress for their grievances in order to protect Corprate ASSets. They call it "Tort Reform" and use the GOPmyth of many frivolous lawsuits and outrageous awards as cover for the schilling for their corporate sponsors.

That's bad enough, but their assualt on the rights of the most vulnerable among us to receive justice is nothing less than DISPICABLE!

Please take a moment to read the attached letter from Disability Rights Wisconsin et. al. to see what being done to the defenseless in your name, for one reason, the conservation of money for the Ownership of Greed Oligarch's Party. It's only 3 pages, but what it reveals . . .
http://www.disabilityrightswi.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/Senate-letter-re-SB1-Aging-and-Disability-Groups.pdf

EXCERPT:For the large number of elderly residents of nursing homes or group homes who have any degree of memory loss, for children and adults with intellectual disabilities, and for many people with mental illness, asking the resident to testify about the abuse they experienced is not a realistic option (they may not clearly recall the events or their testimony may not be convincing to the court). The most accurate and compelling evidence of physical or mental abuse they have experienced in a facility would be a) an incident report created by staff of the facility contemporaneous with the incident, as required by federal and or state law; and b) investigative reports generated by the Wisconsin Department of Health Services (DHS). SB 1 explicitly prohibits prosecutors, residents, families, guardians, or advocates from using either of those types of reports in any criminal or civil legal proceeding. This prohibition applies to all state, county, and private long term care, psychiatric, or children’s facilities.

Republicons just make me SICK!

Voter ID, Unconstitutional, GOPolitically Motivated, Uneeded, WRONG!

Dear Citizens:

Many of you have written to me in response to my email yesterday about the voter ID bill. Some of you were very enthusiastic in your support of our efforts to fight back against this assault on our voting rights. But others of you had questions about the bill, and wondered why we oppose requiring qualified voters to show an ID at the polls. "You have to show an ID to rent a video, why not to vote?" someone asked. "With all the voter fraud out there, I think voter ID is a good idea," another person wrote.

I want to address these questions and fully explain why this bill is wrong for Wisconsin.

First of all, the right to vote is guaranteed to citizens of Wisconsin in our state constitution. The right to rent a movie, open a checking account, go to the bar, get on an airplane or any other similar activity is not, and requiring an ID for these types of activities is not a barrier to exercising a constitutionally-protect right. Voter ID is fundamentally different.

There is absolutely no evidence of a widespread conspiracy to commit voter fraud. Wisconsin's Republican Attorney General JB Van Hollen has made prosecuting so-called voter fraud one of his top priorities. However, after a two year investigation into the 2008 election, Van Hollen has found a scant 11 potentially improper ballots out of nearly 3 million total votes cast. http://www.jsonline.com/blogs/news/86917797.html

Of those, eight involved felons who voted while out in the community on probation or parole, a situation that voter ID would not remedy. That leaves 3 potentially bad votes out of 3,000,000 votes, or about 0.000001% of all votes cast. Voter ID is a solution in search of a problem.

The bill's authors, Republican Rep. Jeff Stone and Sen. Joe Leibham, have modeled their bill after Indiana's Voter ID law, which was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court. According to the Supreme Court case upholding Indiana’s Voter ID bill, the lower court found “99 percent of Indiana’s voting age population already possesses the necessary photo identification to vote under the requirements.”

Wisconsin’s population is substantially less likely to have a state-issued identification. Those without state-issued photo identification and who would need to obtain one under the Wisconsin Voter ID bill include:

•23 percent of all elderly Wisconsinites over the age of 65
•17 percent of white men and women
•55 percent of all African American males and 49 percent of African American women
•46 percent of Hispanic men and 59% of Hispanic women
•78 percent of African American males age 18-24 and 66 percent of African American women age 18-24
[Driver License Status of the Voting Age Population in Wisconsin, 6/05] http://www.brennancenter.org/page/-/d/download_file_50902.pdf

Yes, the bill as written does have a provision to provide free identification for some Wisconsinites. Each and every one of these people would have to take the time off (in many cases unpaid) from work or family obligations to flock to Wisconsin DMVs. However, access to the DMV is a problem in Wisconsin; Indiana provides its residents exponentially more access to its Department of Motor Vehicles offices to obtain identification.

Wisconsin and Indiana have similar voting age populations (4.35 million vs. 4,8 million), but Wisconsin is 50 percent larger geographically than Indiana (54,314 sq. miles vs. 35,870 sq. miles). Indiana not only provides its residents 50 percent more DMV offices than Wisconsin (140 to 91), but also nearly three times the total hours these facilities are open.

Also consider:

•Twenty-six percent of Wisconsin’s 91 DMVs are open one day a month or less, while none of Indiana’s are open less than 100 days a year and nearly all are open over 250 days a year.
•Wisconsin has only one DMV with weekend hours, while Indiana has 124 offices with weekend hours.
•Three Wisconsin counties have no DMVs, no Indiana county is without a DMV.
•Over half of Wisconsin’s 91 DMVs are open on a part-time basis, while Indiana provides full-time DMVs in every county.
[Wisconsin DMV service centers and hours, by county; Indiana Bureau of Motor Vehicles, locations and hours] http://dot.wi.gov/about/locate/dmv/scmap.htm

The need to expand the numbers and operational hours of Wisconsin DMVs to provide appropriate access could increase the $70 million biennial Wisconsin DMV budget by as much as 50 percent on top of the current $5 million price tag to provide free identifications.

Requiring eligible voters to produce ID at the polls is an unnecessary hurdle to exercising our right to vote which will prevent many people from voting. The "widespread voter fraud" that this bill is aimed at "fixing" does not exist, and the microscopic number of double votes will be FAR outpaced by the number of people who will be prevented from voting by the voter ID requirement. In a time when Wisconsin faces a $3 billion budget deficit, we simply cannot afford to double the DMV budget. Voter ID is a big-government, budget-busting solution in search of a problem; a solution that will make it more difficult to practice our most fundamental right.

That is why we oppose voter ID. I hope this email helps to answer your questions about this bill. If you're ready to join this fight, please sign up for our Voter Protection Task Force to push back against this assault on our democratic rights.

Sorry for the long email, but thank you, as always, for everything you do.

scot

One Wisconsin Now



One Wisconsin Now is a new-media online network of citizens from across Wisconsin committed to advancing progressive policy, leadership, values and ensuring equal economic opportunity for all.

Sarah Palin’s “blood libel” Sparks Reaction by Jewish Groups

Sarah Palin’s “blood libel” Sparks Reaction by Jewish Groups

The term “blood libel” is not a synonym for “false accusation.”

Thoughts on Arizona Shooting – Rhetoric, Sarah Palin, and Guns

Thoughts on Arizona Shooting – Rhetoric, Sarah Palin, and Guns

Repeal the Republicons!

Further proof, courtesy of the non-partisan CBO, that Republicons really don't care about the deficit (as if extention of the Bu$h tax cuts for the rich weren't proof enough: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/06/AR2011010604419.html

EXCERPT: In a letter to Boehner, budget office director Douglas Elmendorf estimated repeal would increase the deficit by $230 billion from 2012 to 2021, the 10-year estimating period for budget projections. Moreover, Elmendorf said about 32 million more people would be uninsured in 2019 as a consequence.

But Boehner told reporters: "I do not believe that repealing the job-killing health care law will increase the deficit."

Boehner's bit is further proof that are complete liars and GOPocrits. You see the House GOPsters instituted a rule that all the cost of all measures must be offset by corresponding cuts elsewhere except for tax cuts (for the rich) and repeal of the Job Saving Obamacare Law. HELLO! They wouldn't need to exempt it from their rule if it wasn't going to SAVE OUR GOVERNMENT MONEY!

Oh and bonus of BONUSES! Their GOPish exemption of tax cuts (for the rich) from their new House rule is blatant admission that tax cuts (for the rich) DO NOT increase government revenue!

Cons Supporting Terrorists (AGAIN!)

Wanted for arrest and prosecution: Rudy Giuliani and Bushites Michael Mukasey, Tom Ridge, and Fran Townsend. For violating U.S. law and providing material support to a U.S. designated terrorist organization: http://www.readersupportednews.org/off-site-news-section/69-69/4501-leading-conservatives-openly-support-terrorists

EXCERPT: Imagine if a group of leading American liberals met on foreign soil with -- and expressed vocal support for -- supporters of a terrorist group that had (a) a long history of hateful anti-American rhetoric, (b) an active role in both the takeover of a U.S. embassy and Saddam Hussein's brutal 1991 repression of Iraqi Shiites, (c) extensive financial and military support from Saddam, (d) multiple acts of violence aimed at civilians, and (e) years of being designated a "Terrorist organization" by the U.S. under Presidents of both parties, a designation which is ongoing? The ensuing uproar and orgies of denunciation would be deafening. (This will never see the light of day in the "Liberal" Press)

But on December 23, a group of leading conservatives -- including Rudy Giuliani and former Bush officials Michael Mukasey, Tom Ridge, and Fran Townsend -- did exactly that.

GOPocrisy Knows No Bounds!

And remember that in June the SCROTUS Robed Reationary Political Hactivists ruled that the USA (un)PATRIOT ACT superceded the first amendment, criminalizing even speech in support of designated terrorist groups and even when it's done by humanitarian groups trying to get these organizations to use international law to resolve conflicts peacefully: http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/supreme-court-affirms-material-support-law-free-speech/story?id=10970249 (Cuz you know the Warrantless-Wire-Tapping-Cons just loves them a bounch O Constitution, hell they're reading it on the floor of the house today!)

Once again we see with the GOPsters that it's not about issues or principals, but about power and control and whose got it and who they want to keep it. The Mujaheddin-e Khalq (MEK) aren't terrorists anymore, they're Fricken Freedom Fighters!

I just know the FBI is gonna perp walk these creeps any minute now, right? Cuz in America we believe in the rule of law and equal justice under it. Yeah right. Freedom, Justice and Democracy, my ass!

5 Myths About Federal Workers

For those of you misguided enough to buy the GOPmyth that government workers are over paid, are the problem and that we can balance our budgets on their backs:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/12/03/AR2010120303160.html

Just a little more of the plethora of evidence that the entire modern conservative agenda is fueled by lies. But we know that wingnuts need enemies, so here are your "enemies".

1. Federal employees are overpaid compared with private-sector workers.
Federal employees make on average 24 percent less than their private-sector counterparts. In addition, the average private-sector salary in 2010 for a recent college graduate was $48,661. Entry-level federal workers start at $34,075, or $42,209 for candidates with superior academic achievement.

2. The federal workforce is bigger than ever.
federal government employs 2.1 million people. The workforce is now slightly smaller than it was in 1967, at the height of Lyndon Johnson's Great Society, and today there are 100 million more Americans to serve. Even during the Reagan administration, when small government was a political mantra, there were still between 2.1 and 2.2 million federal workers. In fact, there was an increase of about 95,000 federal employees between 1981 and 1989. Today, two out of three federal civilian employees work for the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security, Veterans Affairs or Justice. The vast majority of government hiring since 2003 has been in these four departments.

3. You can't fire a federal worker.
In the 2009 fiscal year, 11,275 federal employees were fired for poor performance or misconduct. In addition, a survey of federal managers by the U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board suggests that besides those who are formally terminated, there are a sizable number of employees who voluntarily leave after they are counseled that their performance is unacceptable.

4. Most federal workers are paper-pushing clerks.
The vast majority of federal workers hold white-collar professional, administrative and technical jobs. Approximately 20 percent of federal workers have a master's degree, professional degree or doctorate, vs. 13 percent in the private sector. Fifty-one percent of federal employees have at least a college degree, compared with 35 percent in the private sector. Remarkably, more than 50 current or former federal employees have received Nobel Prizes. In fact, about one in four American Nobel laureates have been federal workers. Their contributions have included the eradication of polio, the mapping of the human genome and the harnessing of atomic energy.

5. Pay or hiring freezes would help slash the federal budget.
History has taught us that arbitrary, broad hiring and pay freezes don't return significant cost savings. How much will the government save by cutting 10 percent of the federal workforce - about 200,000 employees - as recommended by the president's deficit commission? If the work of federal employees is simply contracted to the private sector, the savings could be minimal or the move could even cost us more. If government employees are not replaced and their salaries are returned to the Treasury, the government would save at most $20 billion annually, or roughly 0.5 percent of total budget outlays.

A comment (and personal history) on RNC chair front-runner Reince Priebus

A comment (and personal history) on RNC chair front-runner Reince Priebus

Hey fellow BAPers, do you remember his 2004 failed campaign as "fondly" as I do?

We Can't Make It Here Anymore - by James Mcmurtry

Time to Cool Down

Time to Cool Down

GOPants On Fire

Since conservatism survives on a series of big lies swallowed by their gulligle minions, it's only fitting that politifact has chosen the adnnauseum repeated GOPsterism "Government take over of healthcare" as the 2010 Lie of the Year: http://politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2010/dec/16/lie-year-government-takeover-health-care/

Crafted by GOPundit Frnak Luntz, it has no basis in truth, but Republicons don't care about truth they care about messaging, you know GOPropaganda. Under the reform of broken healthcare system:
- Employers still continue to provide health insurance to the majority of Americans.
- More people will get private haelthcare coverage.
- Exchanges are set up for private insurers to compete to provide coverage to those without insurance
- The government does not run the hospitals
- the government does not employ the doctors
- It's all private, there is not government run public option to compete with private insurers
- Tax credits are provided to assist those with difficulty getting insurance to buy it from a private provider.

So "Government take over" and socialism are just plain lies, period.

By the way, the runner up was fruitcake Michelle Bachman's claim that Obama would spend $200,000,000 per day on his trip to India. No basis in fact there either. But that won't stop millions of Fux Snooze morons from gobbling it down and regurgitating it projectile fashion.

Tea Party Populists Unknowingly Against Small Business(TM)

Tea Party Populists Unknowingly Against Small Business(TM)

U.S. Bonds May Lose AAA Rating

For those who think you can have your cake and eat it too (tax cuts & deficit reduction): http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20101213/pl_afp/useconomypoliticstaxdeficit

Amelica Vely Funny!

Thomas Friedman asks: "What if China had a WikiLeaker and we could see what its embassy in Washington was reporting about America?"

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/01/opinion/01friedman.html?_r=1&ref=thomaslfriedman

The answer is pathetically amusing if you're an American and hearteningly hilarious if you're Chinese.

Wake up Obama – Your base isn’t with you anymore!

Wake up Obama – Your base isn’t with you anymore!

Americans are suckers – rules for taxes explained

Americans are suckers – rules for taxes explained

Toys for the Rich – your suggestions?

Toys for the Rich – your suggestions?

Touching junk is all about the money, stupid!

Touching junk is all about the money, stupid!

Why Support High Speed Rail?

Because it create jobs, because it cuts energy use and supports domestic energy, and brings the infrastructure of the future to our state -- all of which will make Wisconsin a better place to live and build a business.  Plus, if we don't do it, the federal money for it will leave and go elsewhere.  Good for business, good for the environment, good for Wisconsin.

Smarten up Governor-Elect Walker!

Check the video.

Bush Back in Rehab

And so the rehabilitation and revisionism of the Bush presidency began tonight with an interview by NBC's Matt Lauer full of cream puff questions and no followup. This will be followed by a media blitz carefully crafted by a high priced beltway PRopaganda firm to spin the aftermath of his decidership.

I see the War Criminal will be in Milwaukee on Wednesday to speak to a Christian group. Because of course, torture, warmongering, lying and concern for the healthy, the wealthy and the unoppressed are the essence of Christ's teachings. http://www.teenchallengeonline.com/

WTF Has Obama Done So Far?

http://whatthefuckhasobamadonesofar.com/

Click on the light blue box under the Obama accomplishment and you get another f''ing accomplishment. Pretty impressive list!

Why the Republicans Will FAIL to Improve the Edonomy

This article from the Washington Monthly hits the nail right on the head.

To summarize, they're plan isn't based on improving the economy, it's based on kowtowing to a political ideology that doesn't care about the economy.

And they're wedded to a series of "solutions" that have been proven not to work.

And they ignore solutions that were proven to work in the past (during FDR's days, among others), because those solutions don't fit in with their ideology.

So, even if they accomplish their spurious goals, it won't help the middle class.

(The upper class, though, will make off like bandits -- as they've been doing ever since the days of Ronald Reagan.)

But read the article and see for yourself.  It's not very long.

Why the Democratic Party Sucks

If you want to know why the Democratic Party sucks give a listen to this week's This American Life episode: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/417/this-party-sucks

The first part of the show is about some Michigan Tea Partiers and how quickly they are co-opted by the Republicans and turned into GOPocrits. It's amusing and worth a listen.

The last twenty minutes is a discussion with Paul Begala, Clinton's political advisor about why the Democrats suck. In short, they're wusses and they always have an excuse to not press their advantage when they get the chance. It'll make you want to tear your hair out.

But like always say, I hate the Republicans for who they are. I hate the Democrats for who they refuse to be.

This About Sums It Up

The Nation Report's on GOPster Voter Supression in Racine

Inside the Wisconsin Right's voter-suppression scheme

by Sarah Posner
The Nation
10/29/10



From familiar stories about "illegal" electioneering by ACORN and the Black Panthers [1] to Sharron Angle's recent claim that Harry Reid is trying to steal the election by offering prospective voters free food-the myth of widespread voter fraud is now commonplace among Republicans. In just one example, an unconfirmed assertion [2] that Nevada voting machines already had Reid's name checked off became a national story, with Rush Limbaugh claiming that the "New Black Panther Party," with the "imprimatur of the Justice Department," was "running fraudulent elections" across the country.


In this swirling storm of misinformation and propaganda, a half-dozen Republican activists met in the community room of the Tri City National Bank in Sturtevant, Wisconsin on October 27, to receive training on how to be an election observer. Lou D'Abbraccio, an official with the Racine County Republican Party, laid out a parade of voter fraud horribles to the assembled men, from fraudulent voter registrations to vans organized by "leftists" ferrying people "incentivized" with money or coupons to cast multiple votes at different polling locations.


"There are polling locations where the election workers are largely Republican, and we have less concern," said D'Abbraccio, a member of the Racine Tea Party [3], the local chapter of Koch brothers-funded Americans for Prosperity. "Then there are polling places where, not so much. Historically we have observed things there that are issues."


This year, the Wisconsin GOP, Americans for Prosperity and Wisconsin tea party groups are working together, through the GOP and the tea party-affiliated website We're Watching Wisconsin Elections [4], to combat this alleged scourge on the democratic process.

D'Abbraccio went on to recount "war stories" from previous elections, particularly 2004, which he claimed was "the worst election I've experienced in Racine."


Even though Wisconsin law prohibits photography by anyone but news media inside a polling place, D'Abbraccio counseled his trainees to bring their cell phone cameras just in case. "Theoretically you're not supposed to take pictures," he said, but told the group to do it "surreptitiously" if they needed to document anything-and to "be careful."


The progressive group One Wisconsin Now [5] has asked [6] the US Attorney, the State Attorney General and the state Government Accountability Board to investigate a joint plan by the state Republican Party, Americans for Prosperity and local tea party groups "to engage in voter suppression" during the election, in violation of the Constitution and federal law. In particular, based on documents made available on the We're Watching Wisconsin Elections and other tea party sites, as well as a recording obtained by One Wisconsin
Now at a June meeting at which the coordination was discussed, AFP would pay for mailings to voters so that a list of supposedly ineligible voters could be used by tea party activists to challenge voters at the polls.


The GOP and tea party groups have denied [7] the existence of any plan, in spite of the public documents outlining it. Tim Dake, one of the speakers on the tape One Wisconsin Now obtained and a leading state tea party figure associated with the Wisconsin Grandsons of Liberty, called [8] the charges "ridiculous, reprehensible and could be construed as libel." But the We're Watching Wisconsin Elections site continues to publicize meetings organized by the Wisconsin Republican Party to train election observers and to make the training materials available on their site.


At the Racine County training, there was no discussion of using any lists to challenge the eligibility of voters. While D'Abbraccio urged his trainees to be polite, he nonetheless continually elaborated on and reinforced the impression that rampant fraud by "leftist" groups threatened the integrity of the election and that election observers were necessary to report such fraud to party officials and to challenge the eligibility of voters they suspected of fraud.


Even with appropriate training, said Wendy Weiser, Deputy Director of the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law, "that doesn't diminish our concern about what might happen on Election Day" with election observers. The proliferation of unsubstantiated claims of widespread voter fraud, she said, "cements distrust and hostility and lack of confidence and anger, and it's inaccurate. There's no basis for this, and stoking anger and mistrust around election time is not a good thing."


The unsubstantiated claim that ACORN had engaged in widespread fraud in the 2008 election is a well-worn trope in conservative media, along with the implication, and sometimes explicit claim, that the election of Barack Obama was illegitimate. After the conservative-instigated witch hunt led to ACORN closing its doors, additional bogeymen have been added to the mix.


As D'Abbraccio put it, "An organization running around comprised of all the alphabet soup of evil: AFSCME, SEIU, ACLU-every leftist group you can imagine put together some umbrella group called Election Protection. In the city of Racine, it actually took over polling locations [in 2004]." That year, Racine County was a hotbed of charges of voter fraud by conservatives, but an analysis [9] by the Brennan Center found just seven instances of ineligible voters knowingly casting ballots that were counted-just 0.0002 percent of the total votes cast statewide.


In spite of this lack of evidence, D'Abbraccio claimed to be "concerned with wholesale fraud." He painted a foreboding picture of "knocks and drags," which he described as vans trolling the streets for random people to pick up. He claimed that "leftist" groups give people campaign literature that was really a "coupon" to redeem at a local establishment. He said these vans "drag people from polling place to polling place and have them vote multiple times."


"That is a complete fantasy and fiction," said Scot Ross, executive director of One Wisconsin Now. "There is nothing like that that happened."


Reid Magney, a spokesman for the state Government Accountability Board, which oversees elections, said that there are "fairly rare instances" of people double-voting, citing one case last year in which a couple was convicted of voting in the polling places of both their primary residence and their vacation home. This was detected not due to a citizen complaint, he said, but because the "we [the GAB] proactively run checks after every election to make sure there is no double voting."

As far as other types of double-voting or ballot-stuffing, Magney said, "we haven't seen any kind of evidence of any widespread problem of that."


Ross added that the groups concerned about voter fraud have a "complete and total delusion that minorities are voting more than once. There's absolutely not one shred of evidence, no conviction, no charges, no nothing of that nature in the state of Wisconsin. I am aware of absolutely no activity like that."


About the alleged "knock and drag" efforts, D'Abbraccio said he followed vans around on previous election days and said he would be following vans this Tuesday as well. "We have on occasion followed them from polling place to polling place," he said. "The fact that they're looking for someone following them from polling place to polling place is a good indicator that something fishy is going on. I had one guy start pulling evasive maneuvers."


He speculated-without any basis-that Advancing Wisconsin, a group formed in 2008, may be the culprit this year. "We suspect that if it happens this time," said D'Abbraccio, "it's going to be through a group called Advancing Wisconsin, which was funded by George Soros [as] this kind of umbrella group that's intended to create a permanent election infrastructure for all these groups so they've got the know-how and resources on election day, and some of that know-how is how to cheat."


Meagan Mahaffey, Advancing Wisconsin's executive director, said her group did no voter registration drives in 2010. Of D'Abbraccio's statement, Mahaffey said, "I'm pretty shocked by it. It's a pretty serious allegation he's making. Nothing to back it up and nothing to show we are doing this. It's not true, not rooted in anything. Just a guy in a meeting saying whatever he wants to say."


D'Abbraccio also claimed that there is abuse of the corroboration process for voters who register on election day. Under Wisconsin law, if someone seeking to register on election day lacks the proper verification of their address-either their drivers' license number, the last four digits of their social security number or other acceptable proof for establishing residence, such as a lease or utility bill, they can have someone "corroborate" their residency. Referring to the process as "vouching,"


D'Abbraccio maintained that people are grabbed as they finish voting and asked to "vouch" for a stranger, producing an "endless loop" of people vouching for each other.


Magney, the GAB spokesperson, said that he was not aware of phony corroborations. "I'm not aware of us prosecuting" anyone for that, he said, adding, "I don't think that that's an issue."


"I have never heard such an allegation," said the Brennan Center's Weiser. "That is something that is certainly easily observable and easy to get caught" because "it is so elaborate and visible."

D'Abbraccio also accused the GAB of being derelict in its responsibility to purge 18,000 "invalid" registrations from the voter rolls, based on mail returned as undeliverable to the GAB.


But the reality is quite different. Magney said that as part of a routine check under the Help America Vote Act, the Board sent letters to voters whose details on their voter registrations didn't match other government records, such as the Department of Motor Vehicles database. Frequently, he said, such lack of a match is caused, for example, by one record bearing the person's middle initial only, while the other bears the person's full middle name. What's more, he said, the lack of a match doesn't render the person ineligible to vote; the purpose of the database match, he said, is only "to improve data quality." (The Republican State Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen sued [10] the board in 2008 in an attempt to force it to require a match for a voter to be eligible to vote; the case was dismissed.)


About the 18,000 voters whose letters were returned as undeliverable, and who conservatives are charging should be removed from voter rolls, Magney said, "we didn't feel comfortable removing [from the voter rolls] them based on one letter coming back, especially because there is no requirement in the law that your information has to match in the first place." He said the GAB sent a second letter, and 12,431 have come back as undeliverable a second time, in most cases probably because the voter had moved. "Those are the people who we have marked as inactive. If they show up to vote, their names won't be on the list at their polling place," although they could do a same-day registration as allowed by Wisconsin law.

Election observers can be perfectly innocuous, but the climate of "misinformation or fear, stoking fear of voter fraud" creates risks, said Weiser. While that has been has been occurring for several election cycles, she said, "what's different in this cycle is more mobilization of citizens, party activists and political operatives to police the polling places and to take matters in their own hands if people are overly outraged so they are more likely to cross lines, and that's a problem."




The Investigative Fund at The Nation Institute provided support for this article.




Links:
[1] http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2010/07/megyn-kellys-minstrel-show.html
[2] http://washingtonindependent.com/101801/evolution-of-a-voter-fraud-incident-in-nevada

[3] http://www.teapartypatriots.org/GroupNew/58c4786d-1c18-4553-a167-a20266a44f27/Racine_TEA_Party
[4] http://www.werewatchingwisconsinelections.org/index.html
[5] http://www.onewisconsinnow.org/
[6] http://www.savewisconsinsvote2010.org/
[7] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpCm92ud4SU&feature=player_embedded#!
[8] http://www.wisconsingrandsonsofliberty.com/
[9] http://www.truthaboutfraud.org/case_studies_by_state/wisconsin_2004.html
[10] http://www.brennancenter.org/content/resource/van_hollen_v_government_accountability_board_et_al/




http://www.thenation.com/article/155688/inside-wisconsin-rights-voter-suppression-scheme

Voting rights – know them

Voting rights – know them

I just found this lovely website that lets you find out if you can legally take time off work to vote in your state. It also talks about what employers can do related to your off-work activities, again by state. Check it out and SHARE!

I Remember - So I'm Voting for Democrats in 2010

Just a reminder why we ALL need to vote by Tuesday.

Vote Your Progressive Values!

Dear Progressives:

“Extremism in the pursuit of liberty is no vice.” So said the father of the conservative movement, Barry Goldwater before losing to JFK in 1964. It wasn’t true then and it isn’t true now. Extremism is a vice no matter how you slice it and even Goldwater would be shocked by the off-the-scale positions of his ideological progeny the teabaggers and the rest of the right-wing reactionaries currently all the rage. Heck this crowd would call Reagan a RINO and throw him under the bus!

Their thugs are using handcuffs on journalists and stomping on people’s heads for crying out loud! And that’s not the half of it. Is this what we’re coming to? Are these our values? Are these our leaders!? Is this what they call liberty? These people don’t have any ideas or solutions, only misdirected blind rage, a match and a can of gasoline.

The media is all-abuzz about an “enthusiasm gap” in this election. It’s all the herd can talk about on every channel between oilygarch financed 30 second rovian-gandabytes, designed to suppress and mislead voters. Well if there’s a gap in enthusiasm on the progressive side for going into the streets and town halls as an angry mob, shouting people down, carrying offensive signs, ranting about absurd conspiracies and pushing bizarre extremist positions, then I suppose they’re right. But if they’re referring to our enthusiasm to get out and vote for upstanding progressives like Senator Russ Feingold and preventing a corporatist sponsored wingnut takeover, they’re a class of chattering asses!

A lot of us have been a bit disappointed by the pace and degree of progress that can be made in Washington. But really, a lot of good things have been accomplished despite unrelenting GOPstructionism. Progress and sanity beats brut regression and reaction any day of the week. Tuesday I’ll be at the only poll that matters at 7:00 AM sharp, bursting with enthusiasm and I hope you and your friends and family will join me in voting our progressive values and stuffing extremism back in the bag!

Thank you,

Sean Cranley

Hey there Wisconsin: In less than 10 minutes you can vote NOW!

Hey there Wisconsin: In less than 10 minutes you can vote NOW!

Liberalism, It's Where We're Going

Over at Real Debased Wisconsin a post entitled Liberalism a Genetic Problem linked this very interesting article: http://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/weird/Scientists-May-Have-IDd-Liberal-Gene-105917218.html

Of course liberalism, it's not the problem, it's the solution. All human behaviour is explainable in context of our evolution. It's how we've evolved to live together very successfully as social animals in complex societies. To find that there are genes involved in this is predictable and hardly surprising.

Since liberalism is based on the higher human brain functions of empathy (concern for other individuals) and altruism (concern for the community) that have evolved to allow us the great evolutionary success we've had, I'd say the golden rule that has evolved out of these traits has started to serve us well. And since these are the traits that have the chance of allowing us to live together as a community of humans and preserve the planet, I'd say we're on the right track. With hope, we'll get there before our technology combined with our darker traits of individual and tribal greed and fear bring that evolution to an end.

It's also interesting to note that the expression of this gene is linked to healthy socialization in adolescence, reflected by having a lot of friends which tends to come from having empathy for others and getting along well in group. Thanks Real Debased Wisconsin for bringing this issue to the fore!

Turn off the Hate. Get out the Vote. Tell the Truth.

And a video telling the truth about the economy.



And an article telling the truth the TEA Party doesn't seem to want to know (Eight False Things...), and their corporate masters certainly don't want you to know.

http://institute.ourfuture.org/blog-entry/2010104222/false-things-public-knows-they-go-vote

Extreme Teabagnorance!

Christine O'Donnell typifies the ignorance of the Teabagger movement as mirror image of Sarah Palincomparison when asked to name a supreme court ruling she objected to. Her response; "Could you give me a specific case?" America, help is on the way to take our country backwards!
This is fricken scarelarious! http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/362219/october-14-2010/transitive-property-of-christine-o-donnell

Wingnut Watch - Beck and Fux Snooze Incitement

Byron Williams engaged in a shootout with California police in July where amazingly no one was killed. Turns out he was heavily armed and armoured and on his way to murder 11 people at the Tides Foundation and the ACLU in retaliation for the gulf oil disaster which was a conspiracy by Goerge Soros, Obama, Tides, a Brazilian oil company, etc. etc. At least that's what he was lead to believe by Fux Snooze's Glenn Beck, the aptly named Michael Savage and Alex Jones: http://mediamatters.org/research/201010110002

U.$. Chamber of TRAITOR$!

http://thinkprogress.org/2010/10/05/foreign-chamber-commerce/

The largest attack campaign against Democrats this fall is being waged by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, a trade association organized as a 501(c)(6) that can raise and spend unlimited funds without ever disclosing any of its donors. The Chamber has promised to spend an unprecedented $75 million to defeat candidates like Jack Conway, Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Jerry Brown, Rep. Joe Sestak (D-PA), and Rep. Tom Perriello (D-VA). As of Sept. 15th, the Chamber had aired more than 8,000 ads on behalf of GOP Senate candidates alone, according to a study from the Wesleyan Media Project. The Chamber’s spending has dwarfed every other issue group and most political party candidate committee spending. A ThinkProgress investigation has found that the Chamber funds its political attack campaign out of its general account, which solicits foreign funding. And while the Chamber will likely assert it has internal controls, foreign money is fungible, permitting the Chamber to run its unprecedented attack campaign. According to legal experts consulted by ThinkProgress, the Chamber is likely skirting longstanding campaign finance law that bans the involvement of foreign corporations in American elections.

America and its democracy are being sold by the GOPsters to the highest bidders foreign and domestic and there is ZERO transparency.

White America Has Lost its Mind

From the ussual liars to witches and porn stars and the rest of the batshit crazy woodwork exhiles , this is an excellent chronical of the who and the why of the most extreme political movement in generations.

http://www.villagevoice.com/2010-09-29/news/white-america-has-lost-its-mind/

The Stimulus Worked

In fact it saved our butts.

The scary part is that this Republicon Regressionary Recession cost us 16% of GDP, whereas the last Deregulatory GOPster Debacle the S&L Crisis only cost us 6% of GDP. Meaning that the Cons have gotten almost three times more effective at fucking things up in the last 30 years. We're listing to starboard now, one more turn at the tiller from these guys and and we'll capsize!

Check this out: http://mydd.com/2010/7/28/the-blinder-zandi-report?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+mydd+%28MyDD%29

EXCERPTS:
A paper by economists Alan Blinder, (McCain advisor) an economist at Princeton and a former vice chairman of the Federal Reserve , and Mark Zandi, (Clinton advisor) the chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, finds that without the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) that bailed out the nation's financial sector, the bank stress tests, the emergency lending and asset purchases by the Federal Reserve, and the Obama Administration’s fiscal stimulus program - the much maligned American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) - the nation’s gross domestic product would be about 6.5 percent lower this year.

Additionally, Dr. Blinder and Dr. Zandi find that the US economy would have lost an additional 8.5 million jobs, on top of the more than 8 million lost so far; and the economy would be in the midst of a deflationary asset spiral, instead of low inflation. Overall, they conclude that the aggregate effects of the TARP and the ARRA "probably averted what could have been called Great Depression 2.0."

Mr. Blinder and Mr. Zandi emphasize the sheer size of the fallout from the financial crisis. They estimate the total direct cost of the recession at $1.6 trillion, and the total budgetary cost, after adding in nearly $750 billion in lost revenue from the weaker economy, at $2.35 trillion, or about 16 percent of G.D.P.

By comparison, the savings and loan crisis cost about $350 billion in today’s dollars: $275 billion in direct cost and an additional $75 billion from the recession of 1990-91 — or about 6 percent of G.D.P. at the time.

Shameless Self-Promotion

WGTD 91.1 FM Kenosha, 101.7 Elkhorn and 103.3 Lake Geneva Gateway Tech's public radio stations) will be featuring the Platte River Yacht Club (PRYC) on their Noon Tunes segments this week. The segment airs at about 12:25 PM each day and features local recording artists. The PRYC is a group of consisting of myself, family and friend who play folk and bluegrass music. Who knows, they might even play one or two of the songs I penned.

Whackidoodles at the Burlington Post Office Yesterday

I'm not sure what the Larouche reference is. Is he still emitting crazy from the grave? Of course ya gotta have Obama with a hitler stache because of all the atrocities he's committed making him Adolph-like, right?

I do have to agree with the restorer Glass-Steagals part, but how it overturning in 1999 is Obama's fault or grounds for impeachment is beyond me. Hell that was GOPster Phil Grahm's misdeed.

Obama's recession, yeah right, funny how it started well before he even took office. How stupid and whacky can these teabaggers get!?

I'm Voting Republican!

Hello, I'm a liberal. And of course we all know what that means. According to that unimpeachable font of truth and insight, El Snortbo (Rush Limbaugh), and his GOPunditry bretheren that makes me one of the Hate America First Crowd. And because we know by the quality of the source this MUST be true. And being that I do not have the memory of a gnat nor the grasp of an ameoba, and I understand how we got into the messes we're in and who is responsible for that, I'm VOTING REPUBLICAN. In fact I'm going Teabag all the way this fall!

If the America I hate (according Mr. Snortbo) is to fall then who better to bring that to fruition than the most extreme Republicans we can get? Who else will:

Lead us into expensive foreign misadventures for fun and profit spending blood and treasure, bankrupting us and making us hated and mistrusted by more and more of the rest world, even our allies?

Lead us into free trade where we trade away our jobs, our livelihoods, our know-how and even our sovereignty to benefit the few of us who make their fortunes as CEOs and major shareholders in nationless corporations.

Lead us into free-market fundamentalism, where the wise and all knowing hand of the market place (and those who manipulate it and make the rules) undermine the public interest and the middle class for their narrow selfish interest.

Lead us into deregulatory shangra-la where our money isn’t safe from predators, let alone our workers, environment, food, economy or our consumers.

Lead us into the redistribution of wealth where more and more of the resources generated by our people and our land are concentrated into the hands of fewer and fewer mega-rich who wield their money as political weapon against We The People to control our government and reap even more for themselves.

Lead us into ignorance where public education is destroyed to create a large underclass of insecure, low cost workers and where science that threatens interests of the economic powers that be is twisted and undermined in the short-term interest of the few.

Lead us into fundamentalist religiousity, backward thinking and vile xenophobia that we might emulate the piety of the dark ages once more.

Lead us into hatred, fear division and manipulation by the GOPunditry and their incessant GOPropaganda lies and create an ingorant electorate in capable of informed self governance.

Yes that pinnacle of virtue, El Snortbo has most truthfully proclaimed that as a Liberal, I hate everything about America. And that’s why I’m voting Republican, to take our country back(wards)!

If you hate America like I do, please help add to my list of Republican attributes so that we can convince all good America hating liberals and independants to hand supreme power to the Republican party and end this America once for all!

Bush hands Obama the Deficits

A Con recently asked me; “So if Reagan and Bush spend too much, it is bad. Yet when Obama spends as much and a hell of a lot more, it is stimulus and therefor good? Why isn't the spending of Reagan and Bush considered stimulus and therefor good? Why isn't Obama's spending considered excessive and therefor bad?”

Answer: The Republican S$^% sandwich handed to us all. Obama’s deficits were written in long before he took office. The current deficits are the result of the Republic Wars, the Republican Tax Cuts for the Rich and the of course the Great Republican Recession and resultant Republican reduced tax revenues.

So you see the very question asked is a deception, they are not really Obama's deficits. and yet this is the false mantra of GOPster Party and their GOPunditry. Yeah so the Con movement runs on lies, we all know that right? Wrong too many Americans watch Fux Snooze, have their brain put to sleep and are actually considering handing power back to the jerks that are the cause of it all!

You can read about the REAL sources of the deficits in the link below or in the excerpts I’ve provided. Bon Apetite.

http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=3036

Whoever won the presidency in 2008 was going to face a grim fiscal situation, a fact already well known as the presidential campaign got underway. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) presented a sobering outlook in its 2008 summer update,[1] and during the autumn, the news got relentlessly worse. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the two government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs) that became embroiled in the housing meltdown, failed in early September; two big financial firms — AIG and Lehman Brothers — collapsed soon thereafter; and others teetered. In December 2008, the National Bureau of Economic Research confirmed that the nation was in recession and pegged the starting date as December 2007. By the time CBO issued its new projections on January 7, 2009 — two weeks before Inauguration Day — it had already put the 2009 deficit at well over $1 trillion.[2]

The government put Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac into conservatorship in September 2008.[4] In October of that year, the Bush Administration and Congress enacted a rescue package to stabilize the financial system by creating the Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP). Together, TARP and the GSEs accounted for $245 billion (including extra debt-service costs) of fiscal 2009’s record deficit.

Just two policies dating from the Bush Administration — tax cuts and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan — accounted for over $500 billion of the deficit in 2009 and will account for almost $7 trillion in deficits in 2009 through 2019, including the associated debt-service costs. [6] (The prescription drug benefit enacted in 2003 accounts for further substantial increases in deficits and debt, which we are unable to quantify due to data limitations.) These impacts easily dwarf the stimulus and financial rescues. Furthermore, unlike those temporary costs, these inherited policies (especially the tax cuts and the drug benefit) do not fade away as the economy recovers (see Figure 1).

President Obama’s 2011 budget proposes to reduce anticipated deficits over the next ten years, chiefly by letting the Bush tax cuts for high-income taxpayers expire on schedule, closing certain tax loopholes and reforming the international tax system, keeping estate taxes at their 2009 parameters, enacting health care reform, and freezing (in aggregate) most appropriations for non-security domestic programs for the next three years. The President also supports another round of temporary recovery measures that would boost the deficit in 2010 through 2012, a proposal that is appropriate in size and well targeted.[8] Center on Budget and Policy Priorities’ analyses have found that in aggregate, the President’s proposals would reduce deficits over the 2011-2020 period by an estimated $1.3 trillion.[9]

The health reform legislation begins that process. It takes important initial steps to restructure the health care payment and delivery systems and to move away from paying providers for more visits or procedures and toward rewarding effective, high-value health care. As we learn more about how to slow health care cost growth without endangering health care quality, strong additional measures will be essential. But restraining health care cost growth will not itself be sufficient to address the long-term fiscal problem. Other actions also will be needed, including steps to raise additional revenue and make changes in other programs.

Drink to your Health!

I went to a grocery store last weekend and out front there was a group of people who were raising money for a kid who has contracted Type 2 Diabetes, what was once refered to as Adult Onset Diabetes. It was bizzare though because in order to raise the funds they selling candy bars, soda and potato chips. I wonder if they were completely unconscious of the irony or if perhaps they were trying to help share their experience with the friends and families of others.

But what was really disturbing about the scene was their apparently complete lack in understanding of the American health care system. Everyone knows that the appropriate response to a catastrophic or chronic health problem in these United States (even more particularly in Wisconsin!) is to hold a charity fundraiser at a bar. That way everybody can have a great time, raise a completely inadequate sum of money compared to the mounting and on-going medical bills while soothing their consciences with the falacy that they actually accomplished something good and meaningful while swilling thier beer. Why it's a win/lose/win proposition and hell, two outta three ain't bad!

David Stockman - Republicans Should Declare Bankruptcy

In an a NY Time OpEd piece, Four Deformations of the Apocalypse http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/01/opinion/01stockman.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1 Reagan's former Director of the Office of Management and Budget, David Stockman blames extreme Republican ideology for the coming American economic apocalypse and states that their current insistence on extending the unaffordable Bush tax cuts so that the weathiest among us don't have to bear a mere 3% more in righting what's wrong is tantamount to the GOP declaring bankruptcy.

Deformation #1: At the urging of Failed Free-Market Fundamentalist Milton Freidman, Nixon takes us off the gold standard resulting fiscal irresponsibility and the rampant printing of money.

Deformation #2: Crushing debt from domestic excesses war mongering and the adoption three decades ago of the Republican religion that deficits don't matter if they result from tax cuts.

Deformation #3: The vast, deadly and unproductive expansion of Wall Street and the too greedy to fail banksters, whome he calls "wards of the state". (Or is it the other way around?)

Deformation #4: A war on the middle class and working families where the
top 1 percent of Americans received two-thirds of the gain in national income from the failing Wall Street casino while the bottom 90 percent got only 12 percent from Main Street. (Don't believe in the redistribution of wealth? There it is!)

Conclusion: The day of reckoning is close at hand and the Republican Party offers an irrelevant platform of ideological, bankrupt policies.

Mayor Bloomberg Makes Me Proud to be an American!

"We have come here to Governors Island to stand where the earliest settlers first set foot in New Amsterdam, and where the seeds of religious tolerance were first planted. We've come here to see the inspiring symbol of liberty that, more than 250 years later, would greet millions of immigrants in the harbor, and we come here to state as strongly as ever – this is the freest City in the world. That's what makes New York special and different and strong.

"Our doors are open to everyone – everyone with a dream and a willingness to work hard and play by the rules. New York City was built by immigrants, and it is sustained by immigrants – by people from more than a hundred different countries speaking more than two hundred different languages and professing every faith. And whether your parents were born here, or you came yesterday, you are a New Yorker.

"We may not always agree with every one of our neighbors. That's life and it's part of living in such a diverse and dense city. But we also recognize that part of being a New Yorker is living with your neighbors in mutual respect and tolerance. It was exactly that spirit of openness and acceptance that was attacked on 9/11.

"No one should be asked to leave their neighborhood. This is our neighborhood and we've been part of it for 27 years. Our opponents are not from this neighborhood."

"On that day, 3,000 people were killed because some murderous fanatics didn't want us to enjoy the freedom to profess our own faiths, to speak our own minds, to follow our own dreams and to live our own lives.

"Of all our precious freedoms, the most important may be the freedom to worship as we wish. And it is a freedom that, even here in a City that is rooted in Dutch tolerance, was hard-won over many years. In the mid-1650s, the small Jewish community living in Lower Manhattan petitioned Dutch Governor Peter Stuyvesant for the right to build a synagogue – and they were turned down.

"In 1657, when Stuyvesant also prohibited Quakers from holding meetings, a group of non-Quakers in Queens signed the Flushing Remonstrance, a petition in defense of the right of Quakers and others to freely practice their religion. It was perhaps the first formal, political petition for religious freedom in the American colonies – and the organizer was thrown in jail and then banished from New Amsterdam.

"In the 1700s, even as religious freedom took hold in America, Catholics in New York were effectively prohibited from practicing their religion – and priests could be arrested. Largely as a result, the first Catholic parish in New York City was not established until the 1780's – St. Peter's on Barclay Street, which still stands just one block north of the World Trade Center site and one block south of the proposed mosque and community center.

"This morning, the City's Landmark Preservation Commission unanimously voted not to extend landmark status to the building on Park Place where the mosque and community center are planned. The decision was based solely on the fact that there was little architectural significance to the building. But with or without landmark designation, there is nothing in the law that would prevent the owners from opening a mosque within the existing building. The simple fact is this building is private property, and the owners have a right to use the building as a house of worship.

"The government has no right whatsoever to deny that right – and if it were tried, the courts would almost certainly strike it down as a violation of the U.S. Constitution. Whatever you may think of the proposed mosque and community center, lost in the heat of the debate has been a basic question – should government attempt to deny private citizens the right to build a house of worship on private property based on their particular religion? That may happen in other countries, but we should never allow it to happen here. This nation was founded on the principle that the government must never choose between religions, or favor one over another.

"The World Trade Center Site will forever hold a special place in our City, in our hearts. But we would be untrue to the best part of ourselves – and who we are as New Yorkers and Americans – if we said 'no' to a mosque in Lower Manhattan.

"Let us not forget that Muslims were among those murdered on 9/11 and that our Muslim neighbors grieved with us as New Yorkers and as Americans. We would betray our values – and play into our enemies' hands – if we were to treat Muslims differently than anyone else. In fact, to cave to popular sentiment would be to hand a victory to the terrorists – and we should not stand for that.

"For that reason, I believe that this is an important test of the separation of church and state as we may see in our lifetime – as important a test – and it is critically important that we get it right.

"On September 11, 2001, thousands of first responders heroically rushed to the scene and saved tens of thousands of lives. More than 400 of those first responders did not make it out alive. In rushing into those burning buildings, not one of them asked 'What God do you pray to?' 'What beliefs do you hold?'

"The attack was an act of war – and our first responders defended not only our City but also our country and our Constitution. We do not honor their lives by denying the very Constitutional rights they died protecting. We honor their lives by defending those rights – and the freedoms that the terrorists attacked.

"Of course, it is fair to ask the organizers of the mosque to show some special sensitivity to the situation – and in fact, their plan envisions reaching beyond their walls and building an interfaith community. By doing so, it is my hope that the mosque will help to bring our City even closer together and help repudiate the false and repugnant idea that the attacks of 9/11 were in any way consistent with Islam. Muslims are as much a part of our City and our country as the people of any faith and they are as welcome to worship in Lower Manhattan as any other group. In fact, they have been worshipping at the site for the better part of a year, as is their right.

"The local community board in Lower Manhattan voted overwhelming to support the proposal and if it moves forward, I expect the community center and mosque will add to the life and vitality of the neighborhood and the entire City.

"Political controversies come and go, but our values and our traditions endure – and there is no neighborhood in this City that is off limits to God's love and mercy, as the religious leaders here with us today can attest."