A Song of Life

I think a human being is like all the substances of life. Time can tear down. One is always competing against nature's cruel indifference. The tough stuff that happens can eat at you year after year after year and if you are not made of strong and smart stuff to survive you falter like Sisyphus, punished for his human frailty, trying to push that boulder up the hill. It becomes ultimately impossible and you just succumb to the forces of nature against you. I think that is an apt metaphor not only for me but for many of those for whom the advantages in life did not always fall their way.

Yes, life is hard. For some it is extremely hard and it takes its toll. BUT the human spirit is resilient and creative. One can lead that "purpose driven life" said by Pastor Rick Warren -- a person who is most definitely NOT my political ally but nonetheless has some worthy thoughts to consider.

I am prodded to ultimately leave behind good works and words; deeds and thoughts that count to make the lives of others better and to know they are not alone.

I am reminded of Don McLean's song: "Vincent" pasted here and at the link. I always loved that song as it spoke to me - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dipFMJckZOM. It may speak to you too.

Darrell Isa and the Republicons – Faux Outrage on the Right

I enclose here or below the NYT investigatory report entitled: 

"New York Times Benghazi Investigation Confirms Paper's Early Reporting On Video's Role" 

The article confirms the original statement on a TV news show by the administration's UN representative, Susan Rice, for which she was pilloried by Republicans. She said that the video released by a right wingnut Christian religious fanatic against the Muslim's holy Prophet was the rationale behind the embassy explosion.

Like everything, all House Oversight Committee Chair Darrell Isa and the Republicons can do is express faux outrage milking anything they can to indict and even impeach the president. Isa has WASTED MILLIONS on fake investigations that turn up NOTHING. From Fast and Furious, to the IRS NON scandal scandal to the Benghazi bombing they can find not a SHRED of evidence to even hint of executive culpability. Why? There is NONE.

Did Isa and the Republicans kvetch when Bush led the nation into a phony war killing thousands of Iraqis and Americans in the now even more explosive Middle East? Answer: OF COURSE NOT. But if it is against this president he will not hesitate to "investigate" even IF it is over nothing and abig time waste of tax payer money about which the Republicons are allegedly so concerned.

An FYI: Russia just suffered TWO successive suicide bombings killing two dozen. Point: It is nearly IMPOSSIBLE to protect against every fanatical suicide bomber who thinks that God is on his/her side. Free speech prevails in this nation even for a murderous Christian right wing religious fanatic who, too, thinks God is on HIS side and knows the violent response his blasphemy-to-Muslims film will provoke.

Ambassador Stephen's death was a tragedy no doubt but he knew it was a most dangerous position in which he placed himself. Give the president a break. He understands exactly what he is doing unlike most other Republicon presidents and Vice-Presidents who drag this nation into phony wars costing trillions!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/12/29/new-york-times-benghazi-investigation-video_n_4515646.html

An Open Letter to the Makers of The Wolf of Wall Street, and the Wolf Himself--A review by one who knows!

The latest movie craze: "The Wolf of Wall Street" with Leonardo DiCaprio and Jonah (Moneyball the movie) Hill feeds into our fascination with Wall Street greed and those who milk the system for billions even trillions and get away with it leaving the innocent holding the poorhouse bag.

For those who are thinking of seeing the film or for those who have already seen it I thought you might find this piece in LAWeekly interesting. It is written by one who would know a thing or two about it, the daughter of the "hero" of the film.

Truth is ALWAYS more interesting than fiction.

Here or http://blogs.laweekly.com/informer/2013/12/wolf_of_wall_street_prousalis.php?

The Spirit of Christmas

It is more important than ever to keep Congress and the Presidency in Democratic hands. The presidential opposition's obstructionist vilification will kill human dignity and human rights. Therefore, they will kill most of us.

It is to this end, the dedication of the rest of my life will be, to work for humanitarian causes within the only structural non-violent vehicle that is available to us today. For now, it is solely within the Democratic Party.

Yes, Christmas is for turning the other cheek BUT be mindful of those on the opposite side of the isle who every time we turn our cheek are sure to slap the other also. NO COMPROMISE, NO FALTERING, NO FAILING and NO CAPITULATION to bigotry of any sort.

And oh, yes, it is the responsibility of the collective many, i.e., our government, to help the poor especially when it was at the hands of the very very rich who ensured their poverty while those billionaires walked away with bonuses for doing it. No goods were created by the fraud of the 2% but it made them humongously rich while ensuring economic quicksand for everyone else.

The shoe must now be on the other foot. Make the top 2% pay by electing Democrats who would close the mile high tax loopholes the top 2% enjoy. Regulate Wall Street to the heights of Everest and jail those who abuse the laws concerning it. We must be an advocate for our neediest. That is, indeed, the spirit of Christmas!!

Happy holidays to all!

"The Federal Reserve was created 100 years ago. This is how it happened."

The title was taken from the Washington Post article by Neal Irwin, December 21, 2013 in which said:

A century ago this week, Congress passed the Federal Reserve Act, creating a central bank for a nation that was only beginning its economic ascendance. This is the story of how it came to be, from a nearly catastrophic financial panic to secret meetings of plutocrats on the Georgia coast to the pitched battle in the halls of Congress, excerpted from The Alchemists: Three Central Bankers and a World on Fire.

I take the following from the article verbatim and link its entirety here or below.  It is a interesting account albeit a historically debated one, which you can read at the link below.  For those who want to know why we are the economy we are one should know about the history of a central bank and the early 20th century creation of the Federal Reserve.  There is no other institution on planet earth that will have as much influence on your life and the life of your posterity as the Federal Reserve!  The author's article begins as follows:

The mustachioed man in the silk top hat strode to his private railcar parked at a New Jersey train station, a mahogany-paneled affair with velvet drapes and well-polished brass accents. Five more men — and a legion of porters and servants — soon joined him. They referred to one another by their first names only, an uncommon informality in 1910, intended to give the staff no hints as to who the men actually were, lest rumors make their way to the newspapers and then to the trading floors of New York and London. One of the men, a German immigrant named Paul Warburg, carried a borrowed shotgun in order to look like a duck hunter, despite having never drawn a bead on a waterfowl in his life.

Adapted from “The Alchemists: Three Central Bankers and a World on Fire,” by Neil Irwin. Irwin, a Washington Post columnist and economics editor of Wonkblog, was the Post’s beat reporter covering the Federal Reserve and other central banks from 2007 to 2012. The book tells of how the central bankers came to exert vast power over the global economy, from their 17th century beginnings to the present, and tells the inside story of how they wielded that power from 2007 on as they fought a global financial crisis. Excerpted by permission of The Penguin Press, a member of the Penguin Group (USA), © Neil Irwin.Buy it from Amazon here.

Two days later, the car deposited the men at the small Georgia port town of Brunswick, where they boarded a boat for the final leg of their journey. Jekyll Island, their destination, was a private resort owned by the powerful banker J.P. Morgan and some friends, a refuge on the Atlantic where they could get away from the cold New York winter. Their host — the man in the silk top hat — was Nelson Aldrich, one of the most powerful senators of the day, a lawmaker who lorded over the nation’s financial matters.

For nine days, working all day and into the night, the six men debated how to reform the U.S. banking and monetary systems, trying to find a way to make this nation just finding its footing on the global stage less subject to the kinds of financial collapses that had seemingly been conquered in Western Europe. Secrecy was paramount. “Discovery,” wrote one attendee later, “simply must not happen, or else all our time and effort would have been wasted. If it were to be exposed publicly that our particular group had got together and written a banking bill, that bill would have no chance whatever of passage by Congress.”

For decades afterward, the most powerful men in American finance referred to one another as part of the “First Name Club.” Paul, Harry, Frank and the others were part of a small group that, in those nine days, invented the Federal Reserve System. Their task was more than administrative. Because the men at Jekyll Island weren't just trying to solve an economic problem — they were trying to solve a political problem as old as their republic.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/12/21/the-federal-reserve-was-created-100-years-ago-this-is-how-it-happened/

Neil Irwin's book "The Alchemists. " I provide at link to it here and below.  I have not read this book yet but I hope to.  It is summarized as follows 

When the first fissures became visible to the naked eye in August 2007, suddenly the most powerful men in the world were three men who were never elected to public office. They were the leaders of the world’s three most important central banks: Ben Bernanke of the U.S. Federal Reserve, Mervyn King of the Bank of England, and Jean-Claude Trichet of the European Central Bank. Over the next five years, they and their fellow central bankers deployed trillions of dollars, pounds and euros to contain the waves of panic that threatened to bring down the global financial system, moving on a scale and with a speed that had no precedent.

Neil Irwin’s The Alchemists is a gripping account of the most intense exercise in economic crisis management we’ve ever seen, a poker game in which the stakes have run into the trillions of dollars. The book begins in, of all places, Stockholm, Sweden, in the seventeenth century, where central banking had its rocky birth, and then progresses through a brisk but dazzling tutorial on how the central banker came to exert such vast influence over our world, from its troubled beginnings to the Age of Greenspan, bringing the reader into the present with a marvelous handle on how these figures and institutions became what they are – the possessors of extraordinary power over our collective fate.  What they chose to do with those powers is the heart of the story Irwin tells.

Irwin covered the Fed and other central banks from the earliest days of the crisis for the Washington Post, enjoying privileged access to leading central bankers and people close to them. His account, based on reporting that took place in 27 cities in 11 countries, is the holistic, truly global story of the central bankers’ role in the world economy we have been missing.  It is a landmark reckoning with central bankers and their power, with the great financial crisis of our time, and with the history of the relationship between capitalism and the state. Definitive, revelatory, and riveting, The Alchemists shows us where money comes from—and where it may well be going.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Alchemists-Three-Central-Bankers/dp/1594204624

This is a wonderful piece and worth reading.  It is what the Democratic Party engenders --smart, thinking, rational, thoughtful and humane people and why again it will be SO important to elect Democrats in 2014 across the nation and keep the presidency in 2016!

December 20, 2013

Dear Natalie, I’ve never seen "Duck Dynasty," but like many of you, I’ve been hearing a lot about the remarks of Phil Robertson, one of the stars of the reality show seen by millions. Robertson said some highly offensive things about LGBT people in an interview with GQ Magazine and, after much criticism, has been suspended indefinitely from the A&E Television Network. But I want to talk about what the 67-year-old from Louisiana said about African Americans during the pre-civil rights era: “I never, with my eyes, saw the mistreatment of any black person. Not once. Where we lived was all farmers. The blacks worked for the farmers. I hoed cotton with them. I’m with the blacks, because we’re white trash. We’re going across the field. They’re singing and happy. I never heard one of them, one black person, say, ‘I tell you what: These doggone white people’ – not a word! … Pre-entitlement, pre-welfare, you say: Were they happy? They were godly; they were happy; no one was singing the blues.” That’s simply breathtaking. I don’t know anything about Robertson’s experiences. But I grew up on a small cotton farm in Alabama and also worked in the fields alongside African Americans. It shouldn’t even be necessary to say that they were treated as second-class citizens, most of them mired in abject poverty and with very little opportunity for anything more. There was no such thing as equality in any sense of the word. And of course black folks didn’t go around saying anything about “these doggone white people.” The threat of racist violence was ever present, and there was virtually no chance any white person who harmed a black person would face anything close to justice. I wonder what Robertson would say about the four little black girls who were killed in the Klan bombing of Birmingham’s Sixteenth Street Baptist Church – or the many, many others who were lynched over the decades? What would he say about Emmett Till, the 14-year-old who was murdered for supposedly flirting with a white woman in Mississippi? Were they happy about their situation, too? Those like Governor Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, who trot out First Amendment arguments to defend the offensive speech of Robertson and bemoan the consequences they face, are equally misguided. Sure, Robertson has every right to say hateful, offensive things wherever and whenever he wants. But there is no First Amendment right to have a TV show. There is no First Amendment right to be free from criticism. No one is calling on the government to shut him up. Maybe Robertson simply doesn’t understand the hurtful nature of his words. Maybe he was blind to the reality of life for African Americans when he was growing up. Maybe he still is. Being oblivious to the suffering of others is at the root of racism.  But why is anyone in this day and age defending segregation and attempting to paint over the terrible injustices that took place during Jim Crow?   Regardless of Robertson’s personal experiences, this idea that African Americans had it good during Jim Crow is the same kind of historical revisionism that we hear from Holocaust deniers who want us to ignore the lessons of history. It must be denounced loudly and clearly. Sincerely, Morris Dees Founder, Southern Poverty Law Center

Make a contribution to support our work fighting hate, teaching tolerance, and seeking justice. Take advantage of corporate matching gift opportunities. Contact your employer's HR department to see if they will match your contributions to the SPLC. We welcome your feedback. Contact us online. 400 Washington Ave.

Thoughts on Leviticus

I watched the show "Duck Dynasty" once and felt like I needed a bath. Nothing about these low intellect right wingnuts appeals to me. It does not have to. I LOVE my state, I love the people in my neighborhood and I love the millions that are supportive of those who want to love whom they do. Nothing about love between two consenting non-incestuous adults in any way is "sinful" as if anyone on this show even could debate what sinful is.

A few thoughts on the prohibitions in the "Old Testament" section of Leviticus: Prohibition against eating pork, Mandating of animal sacrifices, Human slavery sanctioned, Prohibition against eating crab, clams, oysters, (This one is especially terrific) The profanity of disabled individuals - quoting

“For no one who has a blemish shall draw near, a man blind or lame, or who has a mutilated face or a limb too long, or a man who has an injured foot or an injured hand, or a hunchback, or a dwarf, or a man with a defect in his sights or an itching disease or scabs or crushed testicles; no man of the descendants of Aaron the priest who has a blemish shall come near to offer the Lord’s offerings by fire; since he has a blemish, he shall not come near to offer the bread of his God…He shall not come near the veil or approach the altar, because he has a blemish, that he may not profane my sanctuaries…” (Lev. 21:18–23)

I rest my case!

The Essence of Free Speech

Sarah Palin and Bobby Jindal are IDIOTS. 

Naturally, they are defending on "free speech" grounds Duck Dynasty star Phil Robertson's loathsome comment against gays and blacks.

This is NOT a free speech issue. Free Constitutional speech applies to the GOVERNMENT which cannot make a law prohibiting most speech or take away the right of anyone to exercise his religion.

This is about a TV show (private enterprise) getting protest from viewers. It is the private enterprise (the wingnuts love so much) executives' right to CAN that sorry jerk's posterior if they so choose!

Duck and Cover--Swift Truth and Profound Consequences

For those of you who do not know what the reality series "Duck Dynasty" is, I paste this link about its "star" Phil Robertson here or below. The reality show on A & E is watched and, incredulously to me, loved by many especially those on the extremist right who adore its southern, anti-intellectual red meat profane tone. Its "star" Phil Robertson made the following hate-infused comment according to Huffington Post: “In an interview with GQ's Drew Magary expressed his view that homosexuality was immoral, likening it to bestiality. Some of the remarks were made using off-color language.

Backlash was widespread and pronounced, including condemnation from GLAAD and the Human Rights Campaign.

On Wednesday evening, A&E released this statement to Entertainment Weekly":

We are extremely disappointed to have read Phil Robertson’s comments in GQ, which are based on his own personal beliefs and are not reflected in the series Duck Dynasty. His personal views in no way reflect those of A&E Networks, who have always been strong supporters and champions of the LGBT community. The network has placed Phil under hiatus from filming indefinitely.

I perused the show once because of the hoopla surrounding it and wondered who would watch that ugly show. It was, in my opinion, yuk-awful. The times have, indeed, changed after hard fought victories by the LGBT communities in this country and around the world. There NOW will be a price one WILL pay in public life here if one venomously besmirches an entire group that numbers in the millions. That is now a FACT and none too soon.

For those of us who value intellect, science, and fact-based opinions being gay, for most, is a state of being. It simply is. It is written in one's genetic code more than it is about personal choice. When know nothing right wingnut extremists impervious to truth use their speech to threaten, hate and to-the-core offend an entire group they will suffer the consequences. If they are in the media eye and if it becomes publicly known they will face suspension or firing. If they are candidates for high office they will lose more than they now will win at the ballot box. If they are among the massive masses then we of humane and educated thought will stand up against their hate.

Words matter. The words Robertson spoke are not only ridiculous but give credence and, to those of ignorance, give rationale handing them a permission slip to do violence. In the past gay people have killed themselves, tried to or have been brutally slain like Matthew Shepard because they could not change that which nature's edict pronounced. Some suffered in silence and braved the torment. Others eventually, in time, fought back.

I do not care if "Duck Dynasty" is now ducking and covering. What is happening to Phil Robertson the "star" of Duck, should give sway to anyone in the media-driven limelight not to speak hate. If they must hate in public they must suffer the consequences. The shoe, in our time, finally, is on the other foot. The consequences now these public haters face will be swift, consequential and profound!

EACH DAY PRODUCES ANOTHER REASON WHY DEMOCRATS MUST BE ELECTED NATIONWIDE AND REPUBLICAN HATERS MUST BE DEFEATED SOUNDLY.  IT IS MY DREAM FOR REPUBLICANS TO BE ELECTORALLY CRUSHED AND NEVER TO REAR THEIR UGLY POLITICS AGAIN OR TO KEEP IT CONTAINED IN THE REDDEST OF STATES BUT TURNING THOSE WE CAN DEMOCRAT BLUE.  WE MUST UNCEASINGLY WORK TO MAKE THAT HAPPEN AND ENSURE DEMOCRATS TAKE THE HOUSE, KEEP THE SENATE AND IN 2016 RETAIN THE PRESIDENCY.  THE LIFE OF NOTHING LESS THAN THE REPUBLIC, YOUR LIVES AND THOSE OF YOUR POSTERITY ARE AT STAKE!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/12/18/phil-robertson-duck-dynasty_n_4469887.html?ncid=edlinkusaolp00000003

Can someone transplant his brain into mine--AMAZING child!!

Five year old genius Arden Hayes would make Steve Jobs proud.

Not only can he hold his own when discussing United States politics and world geography, but Hayes proved his Real Genius when offered a free Sony Xperia tablet during an appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live last night. “Well you could just give it away because we’re just planning to get an iPad for Christmas.”

A Mirror -- The economy in summary

I looked at a story on Huffington entitled "Income Inequality Is Hurting The Economy, 3 Dozen Economists Say" which I paste here or below for your interest. One blogger, I thought, gave the best response to this mixed opinion of 36 economists and mirrored my own.


She said:

Just like every other truly important part of life, we need a "government" that has the power to do what needs to be done. "Man" and "corporations" will only do the right thing when they are forced to do it. The GOP has made "regulation" an evil word, but where would we be if our laws did not exist? Asking a company to be a "team player" for the society really shouldn't be too much to ask, right? Success for society has always equaled success for business. The GOP's tag line for their 2012 national convention was "We built that". And so they have. The GOP has built the most unbalanced pay scale, overturning all the progress of the 20th century, progress that created a middle class in our economy. Mitt Romney visited China and admired the fact that their workers lived in dormitories with dozens of people sharing one bathroom. That's the GOP's ecstasy dream for the American worker too. And so they actively campaign to deregulate our nation, for the benefit of the owners not the workers. I can't figure out how the GOP ever manages to receive even 10% of the votes, since they only work the wealthiest 10% of our nation. It's time to WAKE UP those that do the work and undo all the policies that only benefit the ones that own them!

I could not have said it better myself. Why electing Democrats, while not a perfect Party, WILL be life saving for the preponderance of the middle class and thereby further rescue the nation. Pass this opinion on if you so choose.


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/12/17/income-inequality-economy_n_4460725.html

Interview of Mandy Patinkin -- Listen, Learn and Love

How anyone on planet earth could not find this interview riveting and loaded with insight, profundity and empathy I will never know. For those of you who have "Homeland" on cable and are watching it you will LOVE this interview but even if you do not watch the show the interview is so universally applicable and so sensitive to human feeling and the profundities of life that you should love it too.

Listen, learn and love!



http://www.bing.com/videos/watch/video/mandy-patinkin/17wfyiiva?cpkey=b27ca251-1dac-4ae2-b732-bc0397fed98a%257c%257c%257c%257c

Carl Sagan -- prescient seer!

Read this and pass it around!!!! WONDERFUL



A Science Icon Died 17 Years Ago. In His Last Interview, He Made A Warning That Gives Me Goosebumps.
www.upworthy.com
His dark prediction about the future has become our present.

The Left's Folly

I look at both sides of the equation which often leads me to immobility. I have serious questions of the left too. Why does Chomsky's left overlook the brutality of those whom the US opposes? Is US policy the best of a very bad lot?

Life is nasty, brutish and short just as Hobbs said it was. It remains so to this day. The will to live and survival of the fittest are two unalterable laws of nature. Under which power would YOU want to live and where has humane ethics ever played a part in the history of man with the exception of the defeat of the Nazi beast?

History is, in the final analysis, written by the winners.

Food for Thought

No, I am not a Chomsky adorer at least not like I was an adorer of Howard Zinn but if you can really hear what he is saying, the knowledge of sense is made.

These Utubes are, at least, passive and easy listening. They are food for thought, a commodity in rare supply these days.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PkTdMA0hmbo&list=TL43Lw4mjcW6cFNnWeP2TVhko2wvOUDMlj

I inadvertently deleted a response by a Mr. Kitchen to my Katherine Clark blog

I caught the name too late and the question this person had asked quickly passed before my eyes to get a good look at just what he was asking.  So if Mr. Kitchen sees this I hope he knows I would have answered his question had I not deleted it too fast.  Apologies for that.

Often, I do not answer and simply delete responses to my opinions because I consider them hostile or rude and because those responses often come from the right wingnut fringe.   I refuse to respond to insulting verbiage and answer questions that are posed not for discussion but for hostile embarrassment and assaults.

However, in this case, I think what Mr. Kitchen asked was not hostile but a question that deserves an answer.  So I will try to do that as simply as possible.  In essence the part of the question I caught was something like why do liberals like to use or appropriate other people's earned income?

My answer is that I do not know of a liberal, including me, that wants to appropriate other people's money.  Rather, government is designed by our Founders Constitutionally to serve the people through their elected representatives and the presidency. 

I try to elect people whose values are similar to my own so that the tax revenue collected will be spent on things that reflect my values. Left of center political beliefs often want government which rightfully collects something called TAXES to spend the money collected to help human beings who are its citizens and through no fault of their own are in trouble.  I do not consider that appropriating other people's money but rather spending tax revenue duly collected by the government and mandated by the Constitution to do exactly that.

The military of which Mr. Kitchen, I think, has been a part uses MY money from tax revenue to protect and defend us all.  I advocate for that, of course.  I am not suicidal.   There surely have been times, however,  that our nation has waged war and killed innocents in the name of democracy that I did not approve of that tax revenue appropriated for a foreign policy which demanded they kill for which reasons I did not approve.  Many wars this nation has waged have been either unnecessary, lied into or aggressively fought and MY tax dollar went to support it all.

However, that is the essence of our democracy.  We get the polices of those whom we elect.  Elections matter.  While defense is absolutely necessary for the life of this republic, I believe wars waged based on lies, or war waged to aggressively fight for the interests of the 1% are NOT wars to which I want my tax dollar to go.

Defense and homeland security dollars are absolutely necessary to spend but fighting wars based on lies as both Vietnam and most especially Iraq II were fought I believe it my duty to try to end those wars by electing those who share my beliefs to not spend my tax dollars in such a way.

Conversely, I would rather spend less on aggressive imperial war and MORE on, for example, health care, Wall Street regulation, food stamps for the poor, the NIH or unemployment for those who are out of a job through no fault of their own.  I am for many other tax dollars -- MY tax dollars -- to be spent for those things which can create jobs, save an economy, help the helpless and give health care to those who never had it.

So, Mr. Kitchen, I would say I am NOT spending other people's lawfully earned income but rather trying to elect those to Congress who would spend money collected by the government through the collection of taxes on things I deem better spent.

It is a matter of values, Mr. Kitchen.  Your wing always talks about values.  Well, the aforementioned are mine!

Grim Fairy Tales

I urge readers to read the NYT editorial entitled "Finally the Volcker Rule" below.  Just like Newtown it seems, God forbid, the ONLY way to thwart the forces aligning against us is to have another great catastrophe, Great Recession OR worse another Great Depression. The country simply, like Hamlet, cannot act when it should. We can only hope it will act on the Volcker rule now.

It seems the nation cannot act UNLESS and until catastrophe has shown its ugly face in the moment and, oh yes, this applies to climate change as well. Why is this so? Easy one word: money. It's all about the money and its Washington influence in Congress as it has been since the beginning. One might argue that in the developed world it was all about the money as well. That may be true but at least the rest of the developed world (NOT including the US) learns something, believes history's lessons and can change course when experts deem it necessary.

When will this country ever learn to trust those in the know whether about guns, Krugmanesque economists who predict correctly the truth about the boom and busts of the economy and what to do about it or the scientists who have been screaming climate change for a decade or more?

But no, our country goes with the right wing tooth fairy believers and science deniers who think Jesus with God at his side will come down on a magic chariot and lift all those who believe as they do to heaven. What proof of that is there? Answer: NONE. It is a Grim fairy tale -- emphasis on the grim -- but it makes a kid feel oh so much better. Unfortunately it will kill us all.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/13/opinion/finally-the-volcker-rule.html?hp&rref=opinion&_r=0

DEMOCRAT KATHERINE CLARK WINS THE 5TH DISTRICT RACE!!!!

Congrats to Democratic Representative Clark!! I was nearly sure Katherine Clark would win BUT one never knows in politics and the turnout was naturally light for December in the cold and snow.  Kudos to all who helped her achieve this important victory and KEEP MASSACHUSETTS ALL BLUE!!

Now the work really begins to turn state houses ALL over the nation blue, governor's offices blueand MOST importantly Democrats need to TAKE BACK the majority in the House.

Make no mistake the so called bipartisan budget deal that Ryan in part is taking credit for is done because Republicons know that if they shut the government down yet again they WILL pay for it in November.  Well, I say they should pay for it in November no matter what!! 

If God forbid Republicans take power again YOUR Social Security, YOUR Medicare, YOUR Affordable Healthcare Act and YOUR entire social safety net will get the ax and the 1% WILL take more wealth as if they needed any more.  Republicans are NO one's friend but the 1% wealthiest in the nation.  They want to keep the distribution of wealth the most unequal it has ever been in the history of the nation and thereby keep the nation from extricating itself from the Great Recession Republican's over 30 years ago began.

VOTE DEMOCRATIC blue whenever you can and save us from Republican rule.

Someone to Help! Vote for 5th District Democrat Katherine Clark, today Dec. 10, 2013-PLEASE READ

Please exercise the MOST IMPORTANT path to power you will ever have, your right to vote.  Why vote for the Democrat?  Because for most of you the part of the economic ladder you occupy is the great MIDDLE CLASS.  Democrats, although not perfect, represent the interests of us, the 99%.  The other party represents the millionaires and billionaires, the 1%, and would keep us stagnated in the economic malaise brought to us in 2007. DO NOT LET THEM DO THAT.  It is why it is so important to not only vote today, Dec. 10, in the Massachusetts 5th but to vote for Democrats EVERYWHERE and AT ANYTIME you can.

Our American Dream is, as you know, teetering.  The opposition wants to put more money into the hands of the 1% they think are "job creators."  The economic wealth scale favors this 1% and wealth is more unequally distributed than at any time in US history.  If the 1% are the job creators  then where are the jobs and why are they not coming faster since they have a majority of the wealth? Because our president and the Democratic Party have been obstructed at every turn. Why?  Because the Republican Party wants it all.  They want EVERYTHING you have. They are NOT the job creators but they ARE the wealth -- YOUR wealth -- stealers.  

The job creators are most of YOU -- the great middle class.  You, the small business person of Main Street and YOU by your spending, IF you had the money to spend, ARE the real job creators.  

The national minimum wage of $7.25, nearly the same as the 1960's, is INSANELY low do NOT look to republicans to fix that.  They won't but Democrats WILL and money will be pumped into the economy because of it and THAT WILL create jobs.

It is MORE important than ever to vote for Democrats here and ACROSS the nation as it is important today for the Massachusetts 5th to Vote for Katherine Clark the Democrat to replace in the House the great now Senator Ed Markey.  

Republicans will bring you back to another era when people died because they had NO ONE to help. Government CAN work to help as it did after the Great Depression.  It has helped in part too after the 2007 Great Recession but not enough because Republicans OBSTRUCT us at every turn.  Remember that when you vote!

Today, December 10 in the Massachusetts 5th it is more important than EVER to vote for the Democrat Katherine Clark for the Congressional House of Representatives. All of our lives depend upon crushing Republicans in 2014 and then in 2016.  Only YOU can make sure we do!  Pass this to everyone you know.

IMPORTANT PLEASE READ!!

This reminder below was sent to me.  Please pass this on to everyone you know because in the larger sense it applies to them too even if they are not in the Mass. 5th District!    For those of you on my list to whom this applies PLEASE take note and PLEASE remember to vote on Tuesday, December 10th for the Democrat, Katherine Clark for Congressional House representative from the 5th District of Massachusetts.  

This is a special election to fill Ed Markey's seat.  This is IMPORTANT in our quest not ONLY in Massachusetts but all over the nation in 2014 to throw Tea Bag and other Republicans out who have SO malevolently obstructed this president in unprecedented innumerable ways.  The jobs figures that just came out are MUCH improved.  Just think what could have been done if the president had had the help of all in Congress. Our economy would have improved even faster than it has and WE would be reaping the benefits with real JOBS!

The president surely did not get ANY Republican help. He got OBSTRUCTION and useless delays. The Republicans in nearly treasonous fashion wanted our president and the nation to FAIL.  Republicans are NOT patriots!  It is a miracle the economy has rebounded from the Great Recession as well as it has.  So LET'S, FOR OUR PRESIDENT'S LAST TWO YEARS, GET HIM AND US SOME HELP.  VOTE DEMOCRATIC BLUE TO PULL, IN FDR STYLE, THE NATION COMPLETELY OUT OF THE ECONOMIC QUICK SAND IT WAS IN and for which the president was elected TWICE to do!

Please pass this on:  We need YOUR help to remind everyone to vote on Tuesday, December 10, 2013. It is incredible to realize how few people know about this most important election. Email all your contacts to remind them to vote. Call your friends, neighbors, and relatives.

The Katherine Clark campaign office at 303 Worcester Rd will be open all day Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, until at least 8pm daily. You can knock on doors, make calls, or get instructions for using the predictive dialing system in the office or at home. Hope to see you there!

Contact Tim Depin, Regional Field Director, Katherine Clark for Congress, for questions, 508-364-9114 or tim@katherineclarkforcongress.com.

If you need more motivation to get people out to vote, go to http://www.necn.com/12/06/13/Broadside-Mass-5th-candidates-clash-on-t/landing_broadside.html?blockID=859335&feedID=11110 to see the 3 parts of the recent NECN debate.

GOP CA -- Republican Lie No. 2

I SAID I WOULD SEND THE REPUBLICAN LIES AS I READ THEM.  HERE IS ANOTHER AND WHY ELECTING DEMOCRATS IS SO UNBELIEVABLY IMPORTANT!!

THU DEC 05, 2013 AT 05:00 PM PST

California GOP defends its fake health insurance web site

byJoan McCarter

 
 
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Remember that fake health insurance web sitethe California GOP created, the one they're sending their constituents to with helpful mailers about health insurance? The one that is nothing but "links to negative articles and twisted messages intended to sour people on signing up for health insurance before they ever land at the official health exchange site"?

Well, the California GOP is just pleased as punch with themselves, unrepentant in their defense of the trickery.

Sabrina Demayo Lockhart, communications director for the Assembly GOP Caucus, told ABC News that the goal of the site was informational. “It’s a complex law, and we wanted to make sure our constituents had the tools to understand what this law meant for them.” [...]

Critics say the GOP site only highlights the costs and penalties of the Affordable Care Act and ignores its potential benefits. Sections in question include an interactive calculator that totals the tax penalties Californians may incur if they don’t register for insurance, as well as the “Young Adults” section, which states:

“The Affordable Care Act requires young adults to pay higher premiums for health insurance because the law prohibits insurers from denying coverage to sicker individuals because of pre-existing conditions and limits what they can charge to older or sicker policy holders.  This will mean that young adults will pay higher premiums even though they are generally healthier and do not visit the doctor as often.”

Right. It's just information. About how young people are being ripped off so that the moochers and sick old people can have more. And they're proud of it. What Hunter said. Republicans are horrible people.

Mourning Mandela

As I sat and watched Fox Faux news wax effusive praise on the great Nelson Mandela I thought what hypocrites Faux News and all their minions are. In life the rightwingnuts despised and labeled Mandela a terrorist as the right wing "conservative" "Iron Lady" Margaret Thatcher did. These are the very people who loathed Mandela in life but now pretend to mourn him in death. I watched Fox News report his death, became nauseated by the sheer hypocrisy of it all and changed the channel fast.

Who are these wingnut extremist liars kidding? In Republican Tea Party homes everywhere they are, I am sure, either thrilled or could not care less to learn about Mandela's demise. The Republican hierarchy, to which the Republican Tea Baggers pay homage, sit and plan before Mandela's body morphs cold, to sabotage the minority vote in this country, repeal sorely needed heath care for millions, and wage war on women while, they, if you can believe it, convene Republican groups to figure out how to "talk to women." Lincoln, whom the Republicans, to my sheer incredulity, tout as their own, would be sickened by Republican attempts at voter suppression. Mandela and King were advocates for the opposite of what Republicans in this country want.

Mandela, King and Lincoln, heroes among men, would NEVER accept Republican suppression of the minority vote they fought so hard against in their time. Nor would Mandela and King accept austerity, heath care vouchers, the 1% winners take all Ayn Randian cruelty or any of the Republican policy war on woman, hatred of immigrants, gays and other minorities.

The moral of this story is Republican reactionary hypocrites and liars are simply deplorable people infused with hate and desirous of the white power the “good ole days” bestowed upon white people only in a for whites only White House! Mourning Mandela in this country means Democrats, while not perfect, MUST in 2014 assume power in the states and on the federal level where they do not have it now. Further, in 2016 they must assume, in perpetuity, the presidency.

Mandela and King said to turn the other cheek, compromise with and love your enemies but they did not pose we sign a suicide pact with the devil.

Republican Obamacare Lie No. 1

Each day when I can I am going to summarize an outright Republican lie about Obamacare they and their mouthpiece minions like Fox News are spreading.  Here is the one for today which I think was on Larry O'Donnell's "LAST WORD" last evening.

Fox News and other Republican media featured a story and had on their news broadcasts a man who was the father of (I think) five children.  The littlest was 18 months old.  He claimed he signed up for Obamacare for his family, his wife and himself only to find out that Obamacare would not cover the youngest 18th month old. WHAT? Could this be possible?  Answer:  NO but you can IMAGINE what the Republicons did with that story and how many faux broadcasts that man was on iterating his experience UNTIL the forces of truth looked more closely into the man's story.

What REALLY happened:  Obamacare insured his family of four leaving off the 18 month old. WHY YOU MIGHT ASK? BECAUSE THE MAN WHO SINGED UP FORGOT OR FAILED TO PUT HIS YOUNGEST 18 MONTH OLD CHILD'S NAME INTO THE SIGN UP SO IT OF COURSE SIGNED UP FOUR OF HIS FIVE CHILDREN AND NOT FIVE.  IN SUMMARY: HE FORGOT, NEGLECTED OR OMITTED BY MISTAKE IN THE APPLICATION PROCESS THE NAME OF THE FIFTH CHILD OF 18 MONTHS.

ONCE THAT APPLICATION WAS REDONE CORRECTLY AND THE FIFTH CHILD OF 18 MONTHS NAME WAS, IN FACT, PUT ON THE APPLICATION OBAMACARE ACCEPTED THE APPLICATION FOR  HIS ENTIRE FAMILY INCLUDING, NATURALLY, THE 18 MONTH OLD.  

Think about it.  Would the healthcare Act of Obamacare concerned with most especially including insuring children that were once denied by insurance companies for a host of reasons do something as idiotic as that?  The Repubicrats are COUNTING on especially their know nothing minions and their side car media to regurgitate lies and those to whom they appeal NOT to think and deduce something as logical as that.

SPREAD THIS TRUTH AROUND.  IF YOU DESIRE MORE INFO ABOUT IT LOOK ON "THE LAST WORD" SITE OR IF YOU CANNOT GET IT THERE GOOGLE WHAT YOU ARE LOOKING FOR TO FIND THE STORY! 

WHY REPUBLICANS FOR THE MIDDLE CLASS RUIN EVERYTHING THEY TOUCH KEEPING THE COUNTRY IN THE HANDS OF THE 1% AND WHY THEY CANNOT BE TRUSTED AS THEY LIE, CHEAT AND STEAL ALL THE TIME TO GET WHAT THEY WANT FOR THEIR CORPORATE CRONIES AND WHY IT IS IMPORTANT IN 2014 TO RETURN THE HOUSE TO DEMOCRATIC HANDS, KEEP THE SENATE AND IN 2016 ELECT A DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENT IF YOU WANT SOMETHING AS NECESSARY AND LIFE GIVING AS HEALTHCARE NEVER TO BE REPEALED!!! MOREOVER, AND EQUALLY IMPORTANT, IS TO TURN THE STATE LEGISLATURES DEMOCRATIC BLUE!

SPREAD THIS STORY AROUND!

The Patient President: Obamacare Succeeding!

As usual the Republicans are trying with all their might to derail the president's Affordable Healthcare Act any way they can. They are now losing that battle as they have lost most battles to obstruct the president. This Congress, specifically because of a nullification Republican House, has the dubious distinction of passing the least amount of legislation in US history. It is shameful because there is so much more that needs to be done to heal the nation from immigration reform to repair of roads, bridges and economic repair of a nation that suffered, in 2007, the worst Recession since the Great Depression.

Our president has done the best he could with the most vicious and obstructionist Congressional House since the pre-Civil War era. Think how much could be done with a majority Democratic House and Senate.

Since the health care web site is now, as the president promised, working infinitely better Republicans now try to subvert it through more lies to their ever-so-racist Republican base hoping those lies will stick onto the moderate NON- racist middle just in time for the 2014 mid-term elections. Do not let them succeed.

How many times has one tried to get onto other private enterprise sites only to be stopped by a glitch or a site freezing up? The problem is endemic to technology and has NOTHING to do with the quality of the president's Affordable Healthcare Act which will work even better in time and provide health care to millions who have never had health insurance before. It is lifesaving legislation.

The miracle is our patient president pulled another rabbit out of his amazing hat. But that is not enough for the obstructionist Republicans. They must do everything possible to subvert a president even rejecting federal help for the poorest of the poor through federal Medicaid payments in not only southern states like Georgia and Texas but other states that sport Republican-controlled state legislatures and governor's offices as well.

These are Republicans are without conscience because a singular extremist Party of nearly all white has not only objections to Democrats succeeding but more specifically to the first African American president succeeding and occupying the heretofore very White House.

Why the 2014 elections are so important and why Democrats must retake the House, keep the Senate and later, in 2016, take the presidency. Give and work for that when you can. Your life and your children's lives depend upon it!
Onward

The DNA Democratic Dance

I have long hoped for a DNA cancer fix.  I have hoped that one day science would be able to zero in on and then extract one's own mutant genes that begin cancer's odyssey and, in Shakespearean fashion, by opposing end them.

I am enclosing a quote below from an article (one of the BEST I have read yet) written by Howard Fineman on Huffington Post entitled “Meet Patrick Soon-Shiong, The LA Billionaire Reinventing Your Health Care." The interview and accompanying videos are about Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong's attempt to use one's personal genomic map to perfect the roulette wheel of modern-day medieval treatment of cancer (and other diseases) to gain its remission.

Since the Republican-induced sequester has frozen monies that could be used in tandem with private efforts, men like Dr. Soon-Shiong forge on a personal quest to find more effective and less toxic treatments through DNA. IMAGINE what could be discovered and how much faster it could be done IF the Republican Party were not the obstructionist party of anti-science anti-government.  Government could, with its awesome financing power, help prod the process of advanced DNA cancer treatment. 

It is still not the chromosomal DNA genetic fix I am hoping to someday witness but it is an improvement by far of present-day cancer treatment as it wades into the weeds of one's own genome to harness effective therapies in a quest to end the only torturous treatment options science has now. Yet more reasons -- as if we needed more -- why the murderous Republican Party MUST be defeated in 2014.

This is an amazing piece written about an amazing man.  I urge you to read it to see what man's evolutionary big brain can do.  I post the entirety of the article below the quote.  In pertinent part, it states:

Now, your doctor draws blood and tissue, sends the information to a medical Big Data center that, in seconds, sequences your entire genome and, more importantly, maps how the proteins and the cells in your body are translating your specific DNA mutation into tumor cells. Your doctor then accesses a secure global “bank” of cancer DNA and tissue, and develops an individual cocktail for you, administering it with precise nanotechnology. You recover at home, monitored by high-information devices connected through transmitters to your doctor and clinic.

This is a glimpse of the future that Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong of Los Angeles has spent a decade imagining -- and is now rapidly assembling. The technology and science are all at hand, he says. It’s “just” a matter of putting them together into a logical and humane whole.

See here or

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/12/01/patrick-soon-shiong_n_4351344.html

Why Democratic progressive capture of the House in 2014, keeping the Senate and ultimately securing the presidency in perpetuity is a matter of life and death.  Work by any means necessary to make it happen for you, your children, your children's children, and in reality for all of us.  Anything else is unacceptable.

Mazel Tov-An Incredible Bar Mitzvah Speech

Here or Below


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/30/bar-mitzvah-gay-marriage_n_4363083.html

REPUBLICONS and CHRISTIE TOO LIE!

Quote from Huffington: 

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie (R) said Monday he has no regrets that he decided against setting up a state health care exchange under the Affordable Care Act, saying he's glad the program's "failure" is not his responsibility.

"This is just an awful law that made no sense. I’m glad that the train wreck’s not mine, it’s his,” Christie said in an interview with NJ 101.5, referring to President Barack Obama. “It’s a train wreck that anyone who has managed anything ever in their lives could have seen coming.”

So what's new? Republicrats LIE and they LIE ALL the time. The goal for progressives is to CALL THEM OUT AND YES, MR. PRESIDENT, CALL REPUBLICONS OUT for their lies. Obamacare as the president said it would, is beginning to WORK and it is working well especially in states that already have healthcare exchanges set up like California, Massachusetts, Kentucky, Vermont (a state beginning to set up single payer because of the passage of the ACA.)  

One MUST scream over their lies and this tub of lies CHRISTIE. His state is NOT in goodshape.  Why? Because he is a Republican austerity humanoid. As long as he gets his state salary and as long as he has health care for his weight surgery courtesy of NJ taxpayers then he can call health care a "train wreck" and get away with it.   And "train wreck," well, it sounds so terrible but good for Repubicon LIE purposes.

STOP lying Gov. Christie!   IF you run for president you WILL get scrutiny so in reality I am going to sit back and enjoy the show IF he runs!!!

IT'S NEAR THANKSGIVING AND PEOPLE ARE BUSY BUT ONE MUST NEVER FORGET WHAT HAPPENS WHEN REPUBLICANS TAKE OFFICE.  HORROR STORIES HAPPEN.  JUST LOOK AT STATES LIKE FLORIDA, MICHIGAN, MAINE, ETC. WHERE REPUBLCRAT STATE LEGISLATURES HAVE RUN ROUGHSHOD OVER PEOPLE.  MORAL OF THIS STORY: GET OUT THERE IN RAIN, SNOW, SLEET, HAIL AND SUN TO GET THIS MESSAGE OUT. REPUBLIRATS MUST BE ELECTORALLY CRUSHED ALL OVER THE NATION!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING AND AFTER THE 2014 ELECTIONS, IF DEMS SWEEP, IT WILL BE THE SWEETEST THANKSGIVING OF ALL!!