GOP’s 2014 horror strategy

GOP’s 2014 horror strategy: Exploit Americans’ misfortune, drum up fake outrage.

Read here or at the link below for details. Forward if you choose.

http://www.salon.com/2014/01/02/gops_2014_horror_strategy_exploit_americans_misfortune_drum_up_fake_outrage/?source=newsletter

Under the Bridge

Chris Christie, Republican want-to-be for the 2016 White House will NEVER get there.  A bridge he cannot cross – specifically the George Washington Bridge – has gotten in his way.  Slowly but surely he will be thrown under it as the truth about either his political operatives or him closing two out of three lanes of that bridge as political payback will come out.  Closing two out of three lanes of the George Washington Bridge linking NYC to Fort Lee, NJ tying up traffic for two weeks as political payback to a Democratic mayor of Fort Lee for not endorsing Christie for Governor is a dastardly act and it could have cost lives.  I direct your attention to the story about it entitled: "Chris Christie - The Bridge Story Gets Legs" here or at the link below.

There are NO surprises for me where Republicans are concerned. They are NOT concerned about the little guy but they talk a hell of a good game convincing those who know little about the man behind the Republican curtain that they do. All over the country the powerful among Republicans think they can fool the masses by anti-government speak, indicting the poor and with a mix of faux patriotism.  Then they bully those who get in their way as icing on the Republican cake of mass poison.  Those who know government can work for the people if ethical people who truly care are elected are simply dirty tricked by Republicans into submission through gerrymandering or suppressing the Democratic vote.

The fact that Chris Christie did not give a rat's petuti about those whom this political retribution traffic tie up could have hurt or even killed is business as usual in Republican land. Anti-human is now woven deeply into the bone marrow of the Republican Party’s essence.  It is no big surprise that Chris Christie and/or his minions may have done this heinous multiple lane closing on this heavily trafficked bridge as political payback for that Fort Lee mayor who would not endorse Christie.

Christie is about the 1% and the fact that usually savvy New Jerseyians never figured that out is surprising and ultimately sad because NJ is not in great economic shape.  Christie in true Republican austerity form cut education and other social programs drastically while giving tax breaks to the very rich who do not need it and do not create jobs from it.  Chris Christie will NEVER be elected president because his past blunders and political bullying of the weak will be stripped down to the bone for the entire nation to see.  He cannot simply bully the sludge he created out of the way at least not to trod a path to the White House!

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/01/02/1266625/-Chris-Christie-The-Bridge-Story-Gets-Legs?detail=email

Bush League -- When Republicans Rule

Many of my thoughts end with the pronouncement WHY DEMOCRATS MUST, IN 2014, TURN THE HOUSE BLUE, KEEP THE SENATE AND, IN 2016, WIN THE PRESIDENCY.  I place that thought at the beginning of my opinion because of its importance with an explanation below.  I include with it a letter written by Ralph Nader to George W. Bush which shows what happens when Republicans rule. 

History is, indeed, written by the winners but what did we win?  A letter penned by Ralph Nader, a man with whom I am still angry for the Al Gore loss in 2000, explains it well.  I paste his letter below.  Why did the progressive Nader run when he knew that would take enough votes away from Democrats to allow Bush the presidential win?  Perhaps, simply, ego's rationale.  If Nader had not run Gore would have won Florida and the presidency in 2000.  Instead, we suffered the foreign and economic policy disasters of George W. Bush. Discerning eyes see clearly the dangerous trajectory in which his henchmen and Republicans before him, placed the nation and what happens when Republicans rule.

A different national history would have been written had there been an Al Gore presidency.  Global climate change would have been addressed, Iraq never would have occurred and I aver even 9/11 warnings, Bush ignored, would have been heeded by a President Gore.  Moreover, Wall Street fraud would have been diminished and, perhaps, the nation never would have been catapulted into the greatest recession since the Great Depression.  At the least there probably would have been "a much smaller 2008 recession, probably no foreclosure crisis and probably budget surpluses instead of deficits" (footnote 1)  would have been on the ledger.

In addition, one of Al Gore's signature legislation would  have been to address the devastating effects of global climate change.  Yes, climate change and global warming are facts, EVEN in winter's frigid cold with massive storms.  It exists in the extremes of summer's heat too with out-of-control fires, a multitude of tornadoes, hurricanes, severe droughts and the melting of polar ice caps.  99% of climate scientists say it is so and like evolution I, without a scintilla of hesitation, believe it.  The other 1% of scientists who disclaim it work for the oil companies who simply want to gorge on earth polluting dollars and try (like tobacco companies of old) to deny it killing hundreds of thousands as it even threatens, ultimately, the existence of life on earth as we know it.

George W. Bush and his entire administration are war criminals but because might often makes right and history is written by the winners no one of consequence will be indicted for the greatest war crimes in the history of this nation bar none. The lies perpetrated by Bush and his neocon henchman created the Iraq debacle. 

Destabilization through US invasion of Iraq based on Bush administration lies made the powder keg of Middle East nations fall like dominoes into sectarian violent chaos killing hundreds of thousands including thousands of Americans. Still, after over a decade, the fire of war rages, fruits of its chaos grow and thousands still die while millions are displaced.  God only knows what the huge totals really are and how these wars will end. 

Adherents to the moral principles of Nuremberg weep especially when Republicans rule!  

Scroll down and read a 100% correct opinion of George W. Bush written by the progressive Ralph Nader.

Footnote 1 -- Jerry Kronenberg, freelance writer, economic editorialist and cable TV commentator.

-----Original Message-----
From: Ralph Nader <info@nader.org>
To: Natalierosen@aol.com
Sent: Thu, Jan 2, 2014 4:00 pm
Subject: In the Public Interest: Letter to George W. Bush

In the Public Interest by Ralph Nader Is this email not displaying correctly? View it in your browser. Letter to George W. Bush Ralph Nader January 2, 2014   George W. Bush George W. Bush Presidential Center PO Box 560887 Dallas, Texas, 57356 Dear Mr. Bush: A few days ago I received a personalized letter from your Presidential Center which included a solicitation card for donations that actually provided words for my reply. They included “I’m honored to help tell the story of the Bush Presidency” and “I’m thrilled that the Bush Institute is advancing timeless principles and practical solutions to the challenges facing our world.” (Below were categories of “tax-deductible contributions” starting with $25 and going upward.) Did you mean the “timeless principles” that drove you and Mr. Cheney to invade the country of Iraq which, contrary to your fabrications, deceptions and cover-ups, never threatened the United States? Nor could Iraq [under its dictator and his dilapidated military] threaten its far more powerful neighbors, even if the Iraqi regime wanted to do so. Today, Iraq remains a country (roughly the size and population of Texas) you destroyed, a country where over a million Iraqis, including many children and infants (remember Fallujah?) lost their lives, millions more were sickened or injured, and millions more were forced to become refugees, including most of the Iraqi Christians. Iraq is a country rife with sectarian strife that your prolonged invasion provoked into what is now open warfare. Iraq is a country where al-Qaeda is spreading with explosions taking 20, 30, 40, 50 or 60 lives per day. Just this week, it was reported that the U.S. has sent Hellfire air-to-ground missiles to Iraq’s air force to be used against encampments of “the country’s branch of al-Qaeda.” There was no al-Qaeda in Iraq before your invasion. Al-Qaeda and Saddam Hussein were mortal enemies. The Bush/Cheney sociocide of Iraq, together with the loss of tens of thousands of U.S. soldiers’ lives, countless injuries and illnesses, registers, with the passage of time, no recognition by you that you did anything wrong nor have you accepted responsibility for the illegality of your military actions without a Congressional declaration of war. You even turned your back on Iraqis who worked with U.S. military occupation forces as drivers, translators etc. at great risk to themselves and their families and were desperately requesting visas to the U.S., often with the backing of U.S. military personnel. Your administration allowed fewer Iraqis into the U.S. than did Sweden in that same period and far, far fewer than Vietnamese refugees coming to the U.S. during the nineteen seventies. When you were a candidate, I called you a corporation running for the Presidency masquerading as a human being. In time you turned a metaphor into a reality. As a corporation, you express no remorse, no shame, no compassion and a resistance to admit anything other than that you have done nothing wrong. Day after day Iraqis, including children, continue to die or suffer terribly. When the paraplegic, U.S. army veteran, Tomas Young, wrote you last yearseeking some kind of recognition that many things went horribly criminal for many American soldiers and Iraqis, you did not deign to reply, as you did not deign to reply to Cindy Sheehan, who lost her son, Casey, in Iraq. As you said, “the interesting thing about being the president” is that you “don’t feel like [you] owe anybody an explanation.” As a former President, nothing has changed as you make very lucrative speeches before business groups and, remarkably, ask Americans for money to support your “continued work in public service.” Pollsters have said that they believe a majority of Iraqis would say that life today is worse for them than under the brutal dictatorship of Saddam Hussein. They would also say George W. Bush left Iraq worse off than when he entered it, despite the U.S. led sanctions prior to 2003 that took so many lives of Iraqi children and damaged the health of so many civilian families. Your national security advisor, Condoleezza Rice, said publically in 2012 that while “the arc of history” may well turn out better for post-invasion Iraq than the present day violent chaos, she did “take personal responsibility” for the casualties and the wreckage. Do you? Can you, at the very least, publically urge the federal government to admit more civilian Iraqis, who served in the U.S. military occupation, to this country to escape the retaliation that has been visited on their similarly-situated colleagues? Isn’t that the minimum you can do to very slightly lessen the multiple, massive blowbacks that your reckless military policies have caused? It was your own anti-terrorism White House adviser, Richard Clarke, who wrote in his book, Against All Enemies: Inside America’s War on Terror, soon after leaving his post, that the U.S. played right into Osama bin Laden’s hands by invading Iraq. Are you privately pondering what your invasion of Iraq did to the Iraqis and American military families, the economy and to the spread of al-Qaeda attacks in numerous countries? Sincerely yours, Ralph Nader P.S. I am enclosing as a contribution in kind to your presidential center library the book Rogue Nation: American Unilateralism and the Failure of Good Intentions by Clyde Prestowitz (2003) whom I’m sure you know. Note the positive remark on the back cover by General Wesley Clark.  follow on Twitter | friend on Facebook | forward to a friend  Copyright © 2014 Nader.Org, All rights reserved. You are receiving this email because you opted in at our website. Our mailing address is: Nader.Org P.O. Box 19367 Washington, DC 20036 Add us to your address book  unsubscribe from this list | update subscription preferences

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

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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