FRONTLINE: ISIS treatment of women

Listen to and watch this Frontline episode here or http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/ if you can. It is about ISIS treatment of women they steal from their families.

This is what George Bush's Neo Con adventure has wrought. ISIS formed because Bush did not know the Iraqi army he disbanded needed to be utilized. Al Qaeda is a shell of its former self and ISIS has taken over. It is spreading and it is spreading fast.

THIS is why the Gordian Knot MUST be broken and why Iran must assume a place of power to break it. It's good for us, it's good for Iran and no matter what Netanyahu says it is good for Israel. I am hoping!

The Best Deal "Cutting the Gordian Knot"

George W. Bush through his utterly failed Iraq War handed Iran the keys to the kingdoms of power in the Middle East. Now we live with that as a new reality. The Iran nuclear agreement the president and his team created is making sure Iran does not turn those kingdom keys into a nuclear bomb!

Eternal US war in that region is IMPOSSIBLE. We have neither the will nor the money nor even the enormous man power it would ultimately take for an all out full blown war with Iran in an already mind numbingly complex region to stop Iran from acquiring a nuclear bomb and the ultimate power a nuclear bomb would bring them.

We would fail and our president knows that. Our president is razor sharp in his analysis and WILL avert WWIII through his brilliant ability to negotiate this important Iran nuclear deal. It saves Israel's posterior as well except lovers of war refuse to see it. They want war that they themselves do not want to fight. The cowards are perfectly happy to see other young men and women do the fighting -- and dying -- while they take off on their yachts. Those who oppose this important agreement are nothing short of despicable! Write, call, shout or smoke signal those in power to support the President's deal with Iran. It is the best deal for ALL of us. [See Scott Ritter's editorial "Cutting the Gordian Knot" here and below]

AND THEN WORK SO THAT A REPUBLICAN NEVER SETS FOOT INTO THE OVAL OFFICE AND WORK TO GET AN IMMORAL REPUBLICAN PARTY OUT OF CONGRESS AND ANYWHERE ELSE THEY EXIST SPREADING THEIR RUINOUS POISON TO AN UNKNOWING ELECTORATE WHO DOES NOT REALIZE WHAT THEY DO!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/scott-ritter/cutting-the-gordian-knot_b_7801566.html

BRILLANCE

HIS PRESIDENTIAL PRESS CONFERENCE WAS BRILLIANT!!!!

Congratulations, Mr. President

Congratulations, Mr. President, your last term in office has cemented your legacy and it will be a great one because you are a great man. I knew that when you first ran for president although, admittedly, some doubts lingered. I know now why I came to love you and still do.

The nuclear deal with Iran will go down in history as one of the greatest foreign policy achievements not only of this time but of all time and not only because of this nation but also because of the UK, France, Russia, China, Germany and, of course, Iran that were a part of it.

Prediction: If Republicans obstruct this historic nuclear agreement with Iran, like they have obstructed everything else the president has wanted for the nation to dig us out of the Republican ditch, it will be the last big thing they obstruct. They will be a fractured dead party ruined by yesterday's failed policies and they will never enter the White House. To emphasize how bad Republicans truly are Donald Trump is now leading the bellicose Republican primary pack .

The Republican Party of white, old racist obstructionists is a cancer on the nation's body politic and will kill us IF we let it . A science denying Republican nation of fear, hate, aggression and war will cost us much in blood and treasure it has already cost. It gained nothing but more war and a fractured-beyond-recognition Middle East. We handed Iran the keys to the kingdom of power because of Bush's Iraq War and now we must deal with those political realities.

The nuclear deal with Iran is historically great. You should support it letting Congress and anyone else who will listen know you do!

It is again why a Democrat must occupy the oval office and why DEMOCRATS must take over Congress. Get out the Democratic vote to make sure Hispanics, persons of color, the disabled, the elderly, veterans, women and progressives vote and do so for Democrats the only party that has our interests at heart.

MATH

Blogger: Below is satire but it easily could be real in a country where a large segment of the population believes the earth is only 6000 years old, evolution is a myth, Ted Nugent is talented, Sarah Palin is qualified to be President, FOX News is fair and balanced, Duck Dynasty is educational TV and President Obama is a Muslim illegal immigrant from Kenya who plans to wage war on Texas among other things.

Here or

https://www.facebook.com/1047wzzk/videos/10153501184904992/



WHY IT IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN EVER BEFORE IN VIEW OF REPUBLICAN STUPIDITY AND WAR MONGERING PROCLIVITY THAT A DEMOCRAT OCCUPY THE PRESIDENCY AND IF POSSIBLE THE CONGRESS!

The Imitation Game

No time to write a review but I will choose a quote from the film "The Imitation Game" we watched.

“Sometimes it’s the people no one imagines anything of who do the things that no one can imagine” – The Imitation Game

Why fascism political, religious or otherwise cannot be allowed to win the day.  In WWII the time in which the film takes place, western civilization and true democracy hung by a thread.  Give it a 10 star review. We loved it. 

The British code breaker mathematical genius Alan Turing saved our proverbial necks from fascism's tyranny!  Suggested reading:  "It Can Happen Here" by Sinclair Lewis.

It CAN happen here and we have the Republican Party to prove it.

Trumped (Read it it's funny I think?)

Charles Dickens would have loved Donald Trump as much as he loved Mr. Taulkinghorn, the unscrupulous lawyer to the Dedlock family or Esther Summerson a very loving and affectionate heroine in "Bleak House," or Mr. Murdstone the nasty second father to David Copperfield's mother (see link below.) The Great Master, Dickens was, of course,  known for often naming his characters in Dickensian fashion describing the character traits of the person in the novel and what could be a more Dickensian name describing the egotist supreme Republican who wants to be king of the world, president of the United States, Donald Trump.

Trump surely can blow his own trumpet but our American narcissist supreme is, I believe, not to be underestimated.  He is gaining traction in the Republican Party of white racists as there are plenty of them and Trump, ever the businessman, knows it.  The Republican mainstream, once dismissing him as a side car comic relief act in the overflowing field of Republican wannabe presidential candidates now seems to be the main attraction pushing Jebby Bush to number two giving Republican moderates (what is left of them) heart failure.

Democrats are salivating, jumping up and down with glee as the Republican Party seemingly is committing suicide.  Jon Stewart had the absolute funniest segment on Trump's unveiling of his candidacy as he is sliding down the escalator in Trump Tower announcing it.  Stewart was thanking God for delivering the best comedy ever at a time when Jon Stewart is wrapping up his career.  What a gift, pardon the pun.

Trump's speeches, mostly the same, are filled with look at me, look at me, look at how rich and successful I am and I want to make America great again by building an impenetrable wall to keep the bad old immigrants out -- you know the Irish ooops, wrong century, I mean the Mexicans, Central Americans or heck anyone with darker than lily white German (Trump's ancestry) Anglo skin.  He is talking to the right Republican crowd.

Which crowd though is he talking to?  I am the most progressive and the strongest Democrat I know and yet, part of what he said struck some positive notes even to my Democratic liberal musical nerve.  Which part?  Well, NOT the anti-immigrant racist part to be sure, but the part when he talks about the insanity whopper of a foreign policy George Bush blunder that was Iraq complete with its 6 trillion-buck-and-counting-debt and its Middle East fracturing result. 

Oh yes, there is another part -- the trade deals and an economy that have created the 1% mega rich on the backs of the American middle class sending jobs to China and a million other places just not here in America.  Why when I place a call for support do I get a non-English-speaking contact in India with whom I have trouble talking?  Why can I not speak to someone in, well, Peoria?  I cannot because all the trade deals passed by politicians here under the radar screen of the average know-nothing American have sent low paying jobs overseas and created the largest disparity of wealth between the 1% richest and the middle class since the age of Teddy Roosevelt's robber barons at the turn of the 20th century.

Trump touts, of course, his book "The Art of the Deal" which by his standards is the best book ever written.  He, by his own admission, went to the best business school ever, got the best grades ever which allowed him to be the best deal maker ever and he married three of the best women ever (viva divorce) who gave him, naturally, the best children ever.  What a guy!  Is there anything this egotistical inflated blowhard balloon cannot do?  Everything he touches in the world according to Trump turns to gold.  He wants to make everyone else in America turn to gold too and can do it, he says, by building that impenetrable great wall on the Mexican border that will make the Chinese wall look anemic by comparison.

He gives a shot of steroids into the arm of a nation that since World War II has seemingly felt old, decrepit and that it has lost.  He makes us feel we can be young again and through his leadership regain a hegemony that seems to be coming apart perhaps like older empires have.

But Trump does not have it all.  Trump trumps himself because he appeals to the most dangerous human proclivity -- the inability to see things in shades of gray. He does not take into account our Founders greatest gift and that is a division of power.  He, if he becomes president, must work in the milieu of two other branches of government.  It means he may know the art of the deal but he seemingly fails to know the art of compromise.  Trump may be a dictator in his own company but he cannot be the dictator of this nation.  Like Sampson his real hair will be shorn and Trump, if president, will be trumped by forces beyond which even his power will wax weak.  Still, do not sell him short as many here love to be led and if we do not vote (Democratic, hopefully) in the general election the Donald, if he wins in the Republican primary, just may be chosen to do it.

http://www.howstuffworks.com/arts/literature/18-memorable-character-names-from-the-works-of-charles-dickens.htm#page=17

A Legacy for Jebby

Jebby should be asked about his brother's presidential legacy and what a legacy it is.  The article pasted below says it all.  Georgey Bush better not travel to Europe.  He risks being picked up for trial at the Hague for war crimes and crimes against humanity! 

Think about the havoc he reaped, how many thousands died, how many are STILL suffering, will lifetime suffer physically from their wounds and psychologically from the trauma because of that nincompoop who lied us into eternal war.  Because of him the Middle East is fractured beyond recognition with refugees by the millions. 

Have fun, Jebby, you should be able to think up endless hours of attempting to avoid answering the questions about your brother's role as Commander-in-Chief.  Still you have retained many of his "experts" that drove us and the world into a very big ditch! 

The media should be relentless in asking about that.  Story here or below.

"US torture doctors could face charges after report alleges post-9/11 'collusion'"

http://www.theguardian.com/law/2015/jul/10/us-torture-doctors-psychologists-apa-prosecution

NO NEED TO SAY HOW IMPORTANT A DEMOCRATIC VICTORY IN 2016 IS.  KEEP THE PRESIDENCY IN DEMOCRATIC HANDS AND WIN BACK THE SENATE.  DARE I HOPE A DEMOCRATIC TAKEOVER OF THE HOUSE? GET OUR ALLIES -- PROGRESSIVES, HISPANICS, ALL PEOPLE OF COLOR, WOMEN, THE DISABLED AND THE POOR -- OUT TO VOTE. WE ARE THE MAJORITY AND LET THE REPUBLICAN FRAUDSTERS KNOW THEY WILL STEAL NOTHING FROM US EVER AGAIN!

Amen

A triumph for all those who believe in human rights, for all those who believe in justice and fair play and for all those who believe in the truth of history the Confederate flag, a vicious symbol of hate and the perpetuation of a system that kept people of color in chains, WILL be taken down from the S. Carolina state house steps.

Slavery, Jim Crow, cross burnings and hangings of poor blacks are that flag's legacy and the heritage white racists love to brag about so much.  If the south had been Civil War victorious, it would have continued its carnage against persons of color and it would have delayed if not eradicated our Founders’ promise of Constitutional equal rights for ALL men.  The continuation of a system and the flag it represents that deemed a human being 3/5ths of a person would not have ended.  The odiousness of that symbol lies in the outer limits of linguistic description.

The Republican S. Carolina state House member, Jenny Horne, pleading on the state house floor for the Confederate flag's removal is the righteous among our nation.  She deserves the Medal of Freedom because her tears and words eloquently delivered on that floor put the final nail in a Confederate flag draped coffin soaked in the blood of innocents bearing the strange fruit hanging from those Poplar trees. She scored the win and delivered the final blow to that ugly flag under which the murdered body of a very good man, Reverend/Representative Climenta Pinckney, ironically rode.   If you have not heard Jennie Horne's passionate plea I urge you to listen to it.

A momentous achievement happened today, the Confederate flag, symbol of hate, came down from the S. Carolina state house steps.  Truthfully, though, other symbols of our nation's original sin live on in other forms against the minority group de jour across this nation.  It lives on in the form of voter ID laws, anti-immigrant hostility and other forms of discrimination to keep those persons of color out of the voting booth and not only in the south.

Imagine, it took 300 years and many violent actions to secure rights for a people who had no rights but should have had them simply by their birth here.  I believe in luck.  One must be lucky in life to be born into the right circumstances, into the right group at the right time. Being born poor and black in the south and in many places of this nation, was and continues to be a stroke of bad luck that must be overcome.

Those of us who care about justice and fair play fight on, taking new fights to new venues of injustice to force our nation to live up to our declared national promise:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.

 

To that I say Amen!

Let Them Die?

 I offer a response to M. Hill's July 8 Letter: "No Help for the Homeless" in the Metro West News.  Link below.

Why is there so much gun violence in this nation whereas in Canada, a nation that has as many guns as we, has few deaths from guns?  Michael Moore asks that question in "Bowling for Columbine" and "Sicko."  The answer I think to the question Mr. Hill raises as to why no one helps the homeless is that so many in our nation simply do not care. It is why I believe there is a great sense of anomie -- alienation and the depression -- so many feel in this nation that is not true about our neighbor to the north. 

There are few in Canada who would say if someone is sick with no insurance just let them die in the street but it was said by attendees at a major Republican Party 2012 debate.  Let them die? Really? Just what kind of Christianity to these Cretans posses if they can say let those sick on the street just die? 

It is shameful that these human beings I see when I drive through downtown Framingham simply languish with no help to be had.  I say there but for the grace of god or fate go I.  They are us.  Take a good look and if it were you would you want to just die?

http://www.metrowestdailynews.com/article/20150704/OPINION/150708367/2014/OPINION

CONGRATS TO OUR WOMEN'S TEAM!!!!!!

U.S.A. Beats Japan 5-2 To Win Women's World Cup

Posted: 07/05/2015 8:50 pm EDT Updated: 07/05/2015 10:59 pm EDT

Kudos to Hillary and Happy Birthday America

Hillary Clinton, in the "Humans of New York" Facebook Post, reassured a sad and frightened gay youth. See link below. Hillary's response to him was beautiful and true. It is SO much better now for gays than any could ever have hoped it would be. For this young person who wrote to her, it will be even better.

He should seek out those who are on his side, who will love him for who he is and there are a bazillion of them. Hillary, our next president's, response to him was dazzling and true. She will be our first woman president and despite those who would politically bash her she is one incredible woman. She is smart beyond words and endlessly capable. That young person already has millions of friends plus the next president of the United States. Add one more -- ME!
 
For those who think this nation is not amazing think again. No nation is perfect and our mostly conservative court just handed millions of human beings rights they deserved. Ask a gay person who knew what it was like before Stonewall.

Happy Birthday America. I thank my grandparents for having the brilliance and fortitude at the turn of the 20th century to make the arduous trip here. This nation gave us a happier life as it has now given happiness to many gays. It will do that for that young person too.

Thank you, Hillary, for your magnificent words of support to him. I hope the young man listens and will see all the friends he has acquired; among them is the next first woman president of this nation.



http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/hillary-clinton-comments-humans-new-york-post-reassures-gay-youth-n386891

FOURTH OF JULY BANG

Our President is going out with a Fourth of July Bang.  Think about all the wonderful things that have occurred in the last month of his term of office alone.  He will, I believe, be remembered for that including the upholding of his Affordable Care Act offering health and life to millions who never had health insurance before; gay marriage one of the biggest and, in my opinion, one of the greatest civil rights decisions since the uprooting of Jim Crow in the nation's history granting marriage and happiness to millions who should have had the opportunity before.  Without the President's support this never would have occurred; and the upholding of the Fair Housing Act for which his administration argued.

There is more on the list during his eight years -- much more -- but I do not have the time to list the many other humane and good things this President has done for our nation in the face of virulent obstructionist and racist opposition who were dedicated to the ruination of his presidency and said exactly that.

The next great thing will be granting clemency to many jailed for non-violent offenses.  It will be the most granted clemency ever.  I am pasting the article from the NYT in its entirety below.   I wish he had four more years and a Democrat controlled Congress. 

Wishing cannot make it so.  My fervent prayer is that this nation with the help of millions upon millions of Hispanic voters, voters of color, women, the disabled,  the elderly and the intelligent who make up the Democratic and Progressive base, will kick extremist RepuGlican thug racists, corporate bought K Street legislative puppets, tea baggers and corrupt politicians from here to kingdom come OUT. 

Republicans, other right wing gun nut extremist fanatics and the extremist religious right are the know nothing anti-science cancer of hate in our nation.  They are killing us and they MUST be stopped!

ELECTIONS MATTER.  VOTE AND WORK FOR DEMOCRATS WHO CAN WIN!  GOD BLESS AMERICA AND GOD BLESS THIS PRESIDENT.  BECAUSE OF HIM IT IS FOR ME A HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY INDEED. I HOPE IT IS FOR YOU! 

Here is what the President is doing next: Obama Plans Broader Use of Clemency to Free Nonviolent Drug Offenders

By PETER BAKERJULY 3, 2015

Photo

Even though President Obama is expected to commute dozens of sentences, he will barely make a dent in clemency applications. Credit Doug Mills/The New York Times

WASHINGTON — Sometime in the next few weeks, aides expect President Obama to issue orders freeing dozens of federal prisoners locked up on nonviolent drug offenses. With the stroke of his pen, he will probably commute more sentences at one time than any president has in nearly half a century.

The expansive use of his clemency power is part of a broader effort by Mr. Obama to correct what he sees as the excesses of the past, when politicians eager to be tough on crime threw away the key even for minor criminals. With many Republicans and Democrats now agreeing that the nation went too far, Mr. Obama holds the power to unlock that prison door, especially for young African-American and Hispanic men disproportionately affected.

But even as he exercises authority more assertively than any of his modern predecessors, Mr. Obama has only begun to tackle the problem he has identified. In the next weeks, the total number of commutations for Mr. Obama’s presidency may surpass 80, but more than 30,000 federal inmates have come forward in response to his administration’s call for clemency applications. A cumbersome review process has advanced only a small fraction of them. And just a small fraction of those have reached the president’s desk for a signature.

“I think they honestly want to address some of the people who have been oversentenced in the last 30 years,” said Julie Stewart, the founder and president of Families Against Mandatory Minimums, a group advocating changes in sentencing. “I’m not sure they envisioned that it would be as complicated as it is, but it has become more complicated, whether it needs to be or not, and that’s what has bogged down the process.”

Overhauling the criminal justice system has become a bipartisan venture. Like Mr. Obama, Republicans running for his job are calling for systemic changes. Lawmakers from both parties are collaborating on legislation. And the United States Sentencing Commission has revised guidelines for drug offenders, so far retroactively reducing sentences for more than 9,500 inmates, nearly three-quarters of them black or Hispanic.

The drive to recalibrate the system has brought together groups from across the political spectrum. The Center for American Progress, a liberal advocacy organization with close ties to the White House and Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton, has teamed up with Koch Industries, the conglomerate owned by the conservative brothers Charles G. and David H. Koch, who finance Republican candidates, to press for reducing prison populations and overhauling sentencing.

“It’s a time when conservatives and liberals and libertarians and lots of different people on the political spectrum” have “come together in order to focus attention on excessive sentences, the costs and the like, and the need to correct some of those excesses,” said Neil Eggleston, the White House counsel who recommends clemency petitions to Mr. Obama. “So I think the president sees the commutations as a piece of that entire process.”

The challenge has been finding a way to use Mr. Obama’s clemency power in the face of bureaucratic and legal hurdles without making a mistake that would be devastating to the effort’s political viability. The White House has not forgotten the legacy of Willie Horton, a convicted murderer who raped a woman while furloughed from prison and became a powerful political symbol that helped doom the presidential candidacy of Gov. Michael S. Dukakis of Massachusetts in 1988.

But with time running short in Mr. Obama’s presidency, the White House has pushed the Justice Department to send more applicants more quickly. Mr. Eggleston told the department not to interpret guidelines too narrowly because it is up to the president to decide, according to officials. If it seems like a close case, he told the department to send it over.

Deborah Leff, the department’s pardon attorney, has likewise pressed lawyers representing candidates for clemency to hurry up and send more cases her way. “If there is one message I want you to take away today, it’s this: Sooner is better,” she told lawyers in a video seminar obtained by USA Today. “Delaying is not helpful.”

Under the Constitution, the president has the power to grant “pardons for offenses against the United States” or to commute federal sentences. A pardon is an act of presidential forgiveness and wipes away any remaining legal liabilities from a conviction. A commutation reduces a sentence but does not eliminate a conviction or restore civil rights lost as a result of the conviction.

In recent times, attention has focused on presidential pardons because they have become politically controversial, such as Gerald R. Ford’s pardon of Richard M. Nixon, the elder George Bush’s pardons of Iran-contra figures and Bill Clinton’s pardons of the financier Marc Rich and scores of others.

Modern presidents have been far less likely to commute sentences. Lyndon B. Johnson commuted the sentences of 80 convicted criminals in the 1966 fiscal year, and no president since then has matched that in his entire administration, much less in a single year. Ronald Reagan commuted only 13 sentences in eight years in office, while George W. Bush commuted just 11 in the same amount of time. The elder Mr. Bush commuted three sentences in his four years.

Mr. Obama started out much like the others, commuting just one sentence in his first five years in office. But in his first term he signed a law easing sentencing for new inmates by reducing the disparity between crack and powder cocaine, while his attorney general, Eric H. Holder Jr., issued new guidelines to prosecutors to avoid charges requiring excessive prison terms.

In his second term, Mr. Obama embarked on an effort to use clemency and has raised his total commutations to 43, a number he may double this month. The initiative was begun last year by James M. Cole, then the deputy attorney general, who set criteria for who might qualify: generally nonviolent inmates who have served more than 10 years in prison, have behaved well while incarcerated and would not have received as lengthy a sentence under today’s revised rules.

“It’s a touchy situation,” Mr. Cole said in an interview. “You don’t want to just supplant a judge’s determination of sentence.” But after reviewing many clemency petitions, he said, “I’d seen a number of them where the sentences seemed very high for the conduct and it noted that the judge at the time of sentencing thought the sentence was too high. We looked at that and thought this really isn’t supplanting the judge.”

To respond to Mr. Cole’s call, several groups formed a consortium of lawyers to prepare applications for inmates, including the American Bar Association, the American Civil Liberties Union, the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and Ms. Stewart’s advocacy group. The more than 30,000 inmates who applied inundated the effort.

The consortium, called Clemency Project 2014, now has more than 50 law firms, more than 20 law schools and more than 1,500 lawyers participating. But the process is burdensome as the volunteer lawyers try to dig out documents from more than a decade ago to satisfy the criteria. So far, they have screened out 13,000 inmates who did not meet the guidelines and sent just over 50 applications to the Justice Department.

Cynthia W. Roseberry, who left her job as a top federal public defender in Georgia to lead the project, said it took a while to set up a process but it has now been streamlined. “The lawyers will be able to do the analysis a lot quicker and we’ll be able to move them faster,” she said.

Aside from the Clemency Project, the Justice Department has received more than 6,600 applications for commutations since Mr. Cole outlined the criteria, more than twice the rate over a similar period earlier in Mr. Obama’s presidency. Ms. Leff, the pardon attorney, has solicited volunteers from around the department to give a day or more a week to help out, but her office is taxed. The White House has asked Congress to increase funding for the office from $3.9 million this year to $5.9 million next year.

Margaret Love, who served as pardon attorney under the first Mr. Bush and Mr. Clinton and now represents prisoners applying for clemency, said the process had become a mess. “It’s really poor management,” she said. “These are people who don’t have any history with sentence reduction. They’ve been putting people in prison all their lives. They don’t know how to get them out.”

Senator Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, the Republican chairman of the Judiciary Committee, has expressed concern that the Justice Department has essentially outsourced a government function to the Clemency Project 2014. Department officials dispute that, saying the project does the same thing lawyers have always done in helping candidates for clemency prepare applications.

The department noted that it still reviews the cases and makes it own judgments before sending recommendations to the White House. Officials acknowledged that it was slow in starting the effort. “There was a start-up time, but now we’re really in it,” said Emily Pierce, a department spokeswoman. “We feel we’re moving at a good pace.”

In December, Mr. Obama commuted the sentences of eight drug offenders, and in March he followed up with 22 more. If he accepts most of the latest applications sent to the White House, some officials said it would probably double that last batch of 22, exceeding the 36 commutations Mr. Clinton issued at one time on his last day in office.

Among those Mr. Obama granted clemency in March were eight prisoners serving life sentences for crimes like possession with intent to distribute cocaine, growing more than 1,000 marijuana plants or possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.

Mr. Obama signed letters to the recipients explaining that they had demonstrated the potential to turn their lives around. “By doing so, you will affect not only your own life, but those close to you,” he wrote. “You will also influence, through your example, the possibility that others in your circumstances get their own second chance in the future.

“I believe in your ability to prove the doubters wrong,” he added. “So good luck, and Godspeed.”

The End of European Democracy?--The Law of Man

Does Greece mark the end of European Democracy? Read the link here or below.

Austerity is a horror in Greece and everywhere else. It is done for the rich and by the rich. They make out like bandits while the little guy pays the freight and croaks doing it.

WAKE UP, MIDDLE AMERICA. The Republicon Party sold you a CON and 1/2 the nation bought it voting even against their own interests. Blind nationalism and a hatred of Obama made them ruin themselves. We are lucky so far we have avoided another Great Recession and even Depression. What happened in Greece is proof of all of it. Austerity "conservatives" love so much does not work. When a Democrat is at the helm here he thinks about the middle class and that means you!

What would have happened if our president had not been choked by an obstructionist, nullifying, racist Republican Party and the increased stimulus he wanted was given? Our roads would have been fixed, our rails would be in shape, we would have improved our national grid, combated climate change, our transit system would have been developed and our infrastructure -- ALL of it -- repaired. All of that creates jobs and jobs brings in money to the treasury. As complex as economics is to me, I believe, it is that simple. The job figures are much better but the middle class is still losing and the gap between the rich and the poor grows deeper every day and eternal war ratchets up trillions in debt.

The repair that comes does so in the form of an Obama Democrat but his luck to get a Democratic Congress to work with him failed because the voters failed themselves and elected Congressional Republican science denying nincompoops. It is amazing we are in as decent shape as we are and can thank Obama's hard fought internal wars for that. Let's hope it stays that way.

The country needs a DEMOCRATIC president to remain in the oval so our nation will not and cannot fail. While we are at it in the 2016 elections, Republican control of Congress must be stopped. A Republicon, any Republicon, will NOT -- I repeat NOT -- be about most of you.

FDR, Krugman, Progressive Politics win the day and if you who are among the middle classes do not see that then in survival-of-the-fittest mode you, your posterity and their posterity ultimately will not survive. This is the law of the jungle but should NOT be the law of man!

Elect a Democrat who can WIN!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/07/02/european-democracy-greece_n_7717658.html#comments

Read and Heed--Important to Know

A short political lesson is in order for those who do not know the difference between the political left and the political right. Then read the story below the italics explaining what is happening in Europe and all around the globe entitled "From Greece to France and China Nationalism is Back in a Big Way."

Nationalism means right wing extremist nationalism the kind that resembles Nazi Germany of old but not that old. Le Pen of France is a very extremist right nationalist and anti-Semite to boot as are most of the European nationalists i.e. Fascists. There is an extremist right party nearly everywhere in Europe. On the extreme left are the Communists.

The two extremes hate each other as the right in Hitlerian Germany pulled up a chair beside major industrialists from which they derived big money to support their war machine. They fueled the military machine and the human eradication concentration camps of Germany at that time. Some major banks and industrialists even in the US contributed to the rise of European Fascism for the bucks it would bring to them. Capitalism knows little morality except the morality of making cash. Allegedly, Prescott Bush, the father of George H. W. Bush, during his tenure at the industrialist firm of Harriman & Sons, was among them. He was soft on Hitler as many industrialists of that era were. Big money LOVES the nationalists no matter which group they want to annihilate. Humanitarian politics is NOT in the right wing nationalists' lexicon. Read "Family of Secrets: The Bush Dynasty, America's Invisible Government and the Hidden History of the last Fifty Years" by Russ Baker.

Beware and be afraid of extremes be very afraid as it can come to a homeland near you! Read and heed the news story by Howard Fineman below. It is important to know.

Then go out and work your posterior off for the Democratic Party unless you want uber nationalism with its sidecar of racist and religious hatred to overtake the day and IF Republicans gain the power of the presidency they will ruin a nation. GET OUT THE VOTE BIG TIME FROM NOW UNTIL NOVEMBER, 2016. You do NOT want the presidency in the power grip of any Republican. Your life, your children's lives, and their children's lives depend upon it. Simply look at what W. Bush unleashed like the god Hades, King of the Underworld and the god of death.

ELECT THE ONLY DEMOCRAT THAT IS ELECTABLE -- HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON.

"From Greece To France To China, Nationalism Is Back In A Big Way"

By: Howard Fineman

WASHINGTON -- In China, a military parade this year will commemorate not the triumph of communism, but, rather, the 70th anniversary of Japan's surrender in World War II. Chinese nationalism (and historical hatred of Japan) will trump Marxist ideology.

In France, right-wing ultra-nationalists support the referendum that Greek's leftist government called to determine whether the indebted country should accept the latest debt-deal proposal from its international creditors. Why? Because National Front party leader Marine Le Pen wants to use the same mechanism -- a referendum -- to vote France out of the European Union.

In Britain, Prime Minister David Cameron leads a Conservative Party majority, but is hobbled by Scots who want to split from England and by a splinter party that wants England out of the EU. The whole United Kingdom is consumed by questions of who it is and where it belongs.

And of course, in Greece and Germany, the name-calling between the two countries over the Greek bailout issue has become intense and is sure to worsen -- even while some observers suggested that Germany, if you count Prussia before it, has gone though more bankruptcies than Greece.

It turns out that “globalization” hasn’t doused, let alone put out, the embers of nationalism. It has inflamed them.

Global and regional frameworks -- from the EU to the UN to seemingly stable balance-of-power standoffs –-- are under assault amid a renewed obsession with national identity.

For a while, it appeared otherwise. Some public surveys, for instance, showed substantial support for the idea of a United Europe.  But it seems that support was for the idea, not the reality.

Many of the forces that once made a one-world future appealing -- global investment, migration, travel, communications -- can now make the planet seem crowded and cruel.

Global capital flows have brought rapacious profits to corporations while allowing generous welfare and pension spending in poorer countries, often resulting in “austerity” programs that are awakening and unleashing a nationalistic backlash.

“The ravages of globalization have made national identity that much more important,” said Jeremy Shapiro of the Brookings Institution, who previously worked in the Obama State Department. “Since World War II people have searched, nobly, for structures that would bring peace and prosperity to the world. In some ways they succeeded."

“But nationalism is the most powerful force in modern human affairs," Shapiro continued. "And that is clear in Europe and elsewhere once again.”

Greece may be just the beginning for Europe. Italy, Portugal and Spain face similar financial challenges and are also seeing growing nationalist resentment against big global lenders.

Immigration and travel have brought creative new cultural mixes and profits from tourism. Yet there are also 60 million refugees worldwide, “boat people” shunned and adrift in open seas from Asia to the Mediterranean, and rising us-versus-them resentment in countries where sluggish economies have stoked local resentment for immigrant labor.

Instant and ubiquitous global communications are another mixed blessing. The same system that spreads Taylor Swift videos and "Game of Thrones" allows the Islamic State, or ISIS, to recruit worldwide, creating another reason for nations to fear the rest of the world.

“Nations exist ultimately to protect their citizens against ‘outside’ influences,” said Shapiro. “That’s in terms of economics, culture and physical security.” In other words, the more threatening the planet becomes, the more people hold on to their national identity.

“Even ISIS wants to be a ‘state,” he said. “In fact, they claim to be one. And the reason is the same: protection for their people.”

For some nations, the best defense is a good nationalistic offense.

That is what President Vladimir Putin is doing in Russia, feeding an endless cycle of distracting nationalism by attacking Crimea and Ukraine and by threatening the Baltic States and Poland -– which respond in nationalistic ways of their own.

Russia, essentially kicked out of the G-7, has become something akin to a trolling hacker of the West's orderly network, setting one nation against another whenever it can, which is increasingly often.

And China, having adopted capitalism but not freedom, is growing so powerful that other Asian countries worry about their identity and respond to China’s might with fear.

Much of these countries' behavior is justified by history as well as by the behavior of China, which tends to treat its neighbors as nettlesome but ultimately weak.

“China doesn’t believe in a ‘balance of power,’” Henry Kissinger recently said during a speech in Washington. “The idea is incomprehensible to them, and that will not change.”

This means increasing nationalistic conflict, even as President Barack Obama tries to forge a new 11-nation Pacific trade organization that notably does not include the People’s Republic.

Congress voted last week to give Obama amplified powers to negotiate such a deal, but even if the Trans-Pacific Partnership comes into being, no one should expect nationalistic fervor to disappear from the shores of the Pacific.

It just means that China will stage another, even bigger parade.

Greece -- A Slippery Slope?

The following paragraphs below were made by bloggers whose points I thought salient and worthy of consideration about the present economic disaster in Greece. Are they accurate? Truthfully, I do not know. I do know I loathe "austerity" for nation states as remedies for the payment of debt because the national economic debt cannot and should not be paid on the backs of the poor! Is the bankruptcy of Greece but a slippery slope for other western nations whose currency is the Euro? I do not know that either. I surely hope not as another Bush years Great Recession I cannot take as our global economies are so intertwined; pull one knot and we all fall down.

Blogger No. 1 states

The destruction of countries on Europe's south and east are biggest reasons for all these economic problems. Libya, Syria and Ukraine, all countries destroyed in the past four years were created by western interference. Libya bombed by the west, rebels from Libya took arms from Libya to Syria through Turkey and instant civil war in Syria. Lots of refugees from both these countries and countries south or east of t hem coming to Europe in boats in the thousands every week. Ukraine was destroyed by US backed coup d'état. Refugees mostly going to Russia. Ukraine is destroying itself with it's civil war and the Ukrainian government's reckless policies. Yet, the IMF is willing to help Ukraine and not Greece.

All of southern Europe and not only Greece are being destroyed by the policy of austerity on the backs of the common people. The common people do not have money to pay back these loans by their governments.

Greece should do what Iceland did. Jail the banksters. Start over. Iceland is doing great. Austerity on the common people will never repay the banksters in a million years. It is a fantasy that the IMF has imposed on southern Europe for the past five years . It is not working and will never work.

Blogger No. 2 affirmed: Excellent points. I don't know what European powers were thinking when they decided to intervene in Libya and later Syria. I mean, I can understand national interests -ahem, oil- and why they, like the U.S., made such moves, but didn't these countries, specially Italy and France not expect influx of refugees as a aftermath? Even the Ukrainian disaster could have been avoided and now war goes on and the sanctions are hurting EU countries as much as Russia. 


Eurozone failure should not come as a surprise. Establishing a common currency introduces mutual dependence but maintaining individual states sovereignty precluded making effective/efficient fiscal policy amongst polities that were still mutually competitive. 

The following paragraphs below were made by bloggers whose points I thought salient and worthy of consideration about the present economic disaster in Greece.  Are they accurate?  Truthfully, I do not know.  I do know I loathe "austerity" for nation states as remedies for the payment of debt because the national economic debt cannot and should not be paid on the backs of the poor!  Is the bankruptcy of Greece but a slippery slope for other western nations whose currency is the Euro?  I do not know that either.  I surely hope not as another Bush years Great Recession I cannot take as our global economies are so intertwined; pull one knot and we all fall down.

Blogger No. 1 states

The destruction of countries on Europe's south and east are biggest reasons for all these economic problems. Libya, Syria and Ukraine, all countries destroyed in the past four years were created by western interference. Libya bombed by the west, rebels from Libya took arms from Libya to Syria through Turkey and instant civil war in Syria. Lots of refugees from both these countries and countries south or east of t hem coming to Europe in boats in the thousands every week. Ukraine was destroyed by US backed coup d'état. Refugees mostly going to Russia. Ukraine is destroying itself with it's civil war and the Ukrainian government's reckless policies. Yet, the IMF is willing to help Ukraine and not Greece.

All of southern Europe and not only Greece are being destroyed by the policy of austerity on the backs of the common people. The common people do not have money to pay back these loans by their governments.

Greece should do what Iceland did. Jail the banksters. Start over. Iceland is doing great. Austerity on the common people will never repay the banksters in a million years. It is a fantasy that the IMF has imposed on southern Europe for the past five years . It is not working and will never work.

Blogger No. 2 affirmed:  Excellent points. I don't know what European powers were thinking when they decided to intervene in Libya and later Syria. I mean, I can understand national interests -ahem, oil- and why they, like the U.S., made such moves, but didn't these countries, specially Italy and France not expect influx of refugees as a aftermath? Even the Ukrainian disaster could have been avoided and now war goes on and the sanctions are hurting EU countries as much as Russia.

Eurozone failure should not come as a surprise. Establishing a common currency introduces mutual dependence but maintaining individual states sovereignty precluded making effective/efficient fiscal policy amongst polities that were still mutually competitive.

REPUGLICONS USE ECONOMIC AUSTERITY AS A WAY TO SCREW THE POOR AND ENRICH THE ALREADY RICH TO GET OUT OF STATE AND NATIONAL DEBT.  YET ANOTHER REASON AMONG ALL THE OTHER CONFEDERATE FLAG AND ANTI-IMMIGRANT LOATHSOME CONTENT OF REPUBLICAN CHARACTER AND WHY A DEMOCRAT MUST MUST MUST KEEP THE WHITE HOUSE, TAKE THE SENATE AND IN MY WILDEST DREAMS I HOPE FOR A DEMOCRATIC TAKEOVER OF THE HOUSE. 

ALL THE GOOD THINGS ACHIEVED LAST WEEK AND WEEKEND COULD BE DESTROYED IN A HEART BEAT SECOND.  REPUBLICANS DO NOT CARE ABOUT YOU BUT WILL DUPE THOSE LIKE US AS THEY IDEOLOGICALLY RAPE GAYS, THE POOR, WOMEN AND THE POWERLESS OF ALL THEY HAVE ACHIEVED!

Realty Check

Leave it to Glenn Greenwald to give a reality check refresher course on the equal marriage issue.  It is on the "Intercept."  and is beyond brilliant.  I post the link here and below.  Then scroll down and read my email to Glenn about his historical analysis of gay rights in the US.  I have some amendment to his analysis with respect to the president that I wrote on the "Intercept" blog.

https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/06/26/todays-supreme-court-ruling-though-expected-still-shocking/#respond

Your article is a BRILLIANT historical analysis and one of the best I have read.   Your historically dazzling article brought me back to reality.   But I will say, Glenn, I did on the "Intercept" blog an Obama supporting small dissent to what you said about him which I do not see on the blog yet. 

Still no one can argue your academically spellbinding analysis of why so  many felt as you said did during those mind crushing decades.  I hope you will be on the Rachel Maddow Show, or any of the other more progressive shows as well as Amy Goodman's "Democracy Now" if you haven't already discussed this on her show.

Kudos, you have written an award worthy editorial.  No one can argue with that!

ScotUS -- Frank Bruni -- New York Times "Our Weddings, Our Worth"

Here or below is an article by the editorialist Frank Bruni in the New York Times that a political ally and friend sent to me.  It's wonderful and beautifully written.  It is entitled "Our Weddings, Our Worth" and it characterizes so much so well on this contentious issue of our time.  It is entitled SCOTUS with the US rainbow colored (best I could do was pink and blue!)

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/06/28/opinion/sunday/frank-bruni-same-sex-marriage-supreme-court-our-weddings-our-worth.html?referrer=&_r=0

Glenn Greenwald again is dazzling--LGBT history lesson

I wrote Glenn: BRILLIANT historical analysis here or below by Glenn Greenwald.  It is one of the best I have read.   Your historically dazzling article brought us back to reality.   But I will say, Glenn, I did on the Intercept blog write an Obama supporting small dissent to what you said about him which I do not see on the blog yet.  Perhaps I will.

Still no one can argue your academically spellbinding analysis of why we felt as we did during those mind crushing decades.  I hope you will be on the Rachel Maddow Show, or any of the other more progressive shows as well as Amy Goodman's "Democracy Now" if you haven't already discussed this on her show.

Kudos, you have written an award worthy editorial.  No one can argue with that!




https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/06/26/todays-supreme-court-ruling-though-expected-still-shocking/#respond












N. Rosen

For All Time

I cannot thank Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Kennedy, the two more conservative justices, enough for doing the right thing handing down a 6/3 decision to uphold the ACA a/k/a Obamacare.   It is not an easy thing to step outside of one’s zone of political comfort.   I laud them for that.  

 

I have been critical, I admit, of what I saw as the conservative bent to the court that made it, in my opinion, an advocate for the very very rich.   I thought it did a great disservice to our nation’s humanity and had its worst effects on the poorest among us.  I have changed my opinion of the Court somewhat today and, indeed, apologize for any less than judicious comments I have made on a variety of issues in the past through the technological miracle of our time, the Internet , that sent my opinion many times to SCOTUS itself.

 

I still feel the same about the issues but because of the bravery, ethical purpose and humanity of most especially Justice Kennedy and Chief Justice Roberts, I can say that my views of the Court have been , to a degree, altered this day.   All the Justices who voted to uphold the ACA have made me proud to be American, proud of a system that can get it right on issues that can help those who, through no fault of their own, cannot help themselves to get the healthcare they so desperately need.   The Justices’ decision today upholding Obamacare will save many liv es.

Our system, one of checks and balances, our Founders got right centuries ago works.  From Marbury v. Madison in 1803 to King v. Burwell in 2015, a span of more than two centuries, our Founders gave the third branch of our system, the Court, permission to decide our most contentious issues. 

Societies change and the Court can change too ensuring our nation become fairer and more just.  That it can do this is the beauty of our nation that shines in Lady Liberty's lamp as an example it sets for all nations for all time.