June 2009 archive

Jun 18 2009

“Moderate” memes

This diary is prompted by Muskegon Critic’s “Yes, I Defend Obama” diary of Tuesday, and to a certain extent Budhydharma’s diary of that day and today’s diary about “the honeymoon.”  Here I am interested in how “moderate” memes work, as many of them seem unrelated to the concrete situations in which they are deployed.  My diary will quote a number of “moderate” memes as they have been used in commentary on DailyKos.com, and comment upon these quotes with the hopes of arriving at some productive criticism of our political discourse.

(Folks, I’m reposting this from Big Orange because I thought Edger needed to know about this….)

Jun 18 2009

Question about DD Policy re Tocquedeville Essays

I have been meaning to write this for the past week, but with a certain overlord’s antics and another overlord’s pronouncements I’ve been a bit distracted.  My question is why do Tocquedeville’s diaries not seem to show up in the list on the right hand side of the page?  He published an excellent diary late (est time very late) the night of June 9th on globalization (https://www.docudharma.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=14130) that was barely noticed by most people because by the time they awakened the next morning it had slid down the front page.  My guess is that had it been on the list on the right hand side of the page it would have been read more widely.  He has long been one of my favorite writers in orange and it’s great to know that he will be publishing here.  A review of essays published just now showed me that I have missed a good number.  Is it because I was too busy writing about ATJs and autobanning patrols and other b.s. and Tocquedeville’s essays are actually included in the list on the right, well, then I will have learned a lesson and will waste less time in other places.

If this essay makes no sense, please tell me and I will delete.

Jun 18 2009

When yesterday had a future.

Buhdy is probably going to ban me sooner or later for lazy blogolalia (like echolalia, only blog-centric).  Peter Schiff, who predicted much of the economic whirlwind that Obama is intending to put back in Pandora’s box, showed up in comments asking WTF the proprietors at The Automatic Earth, Ilargi and Stoneleigh, ever predicted.  After all, he is Peter Schiff!

Stoneleigh responded, and because the TAE feel free to post articles whole, this will be one of the few times that I re-produce Stoneleigh’s part of the post in its entirety, fair use be damned (They can feel free to sue me for all my debt obligations, then put me to work as an indentured slave milking goats).  As a one-time practicing scientist, I would consider the predictions made to be of the “strong” variety.

Jun 18 2009

Iran: Here Comes The Backlash

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Wednesday evening in the US.  Thursday morning in Iran.  The demonstrations continue throughout Iran, but there’s ominous news.  Again.  The New York Times reports:

Iranians angry at the results of last week’s election pushed their protest forward on Wednesday, from tens of thousands who again flooded the streets here to six soccer players on the national team who wore opposition green wristbands at a World Cup qualifying game.

But there were signs of an intensified crackdown: The government worked on many fronts to shield the outside world’s view of the unrest, banning coverage of the demonstrations, arresting journalists, threatening bloggers and trying to block Web sites like Facebook and Twitter, which have become vital outlets for information about the rising confrontation here.

The senior prosecutor in the central province of Isfahan, where there have also been tense demonstrations, went so far as to say protesters could be executed under Islamic law.

If you read the Twitter posts to #iranelection you see that Iran’s government is trying mightily to suppress communication.  Foreign journalists have been forced to leave the country.  Writers have been arrested. A photographer was stabbed. Cell phone service is sporadic.  The Internet has been slowed.  Disinformation and stalking abounds.  Arrests of bloggers and university students are common.  Violence continues in the streets.  Many have been killed and injured.  And many more have been threatened.  

Despite all of this, defiance of the government continues.  Twitter posts from Iran continue to describe the demonstrations. Six members of the Iranian football team wore green wrist bands for the first half of today’s game in protest.  Youtube is filled with photos of the massive, non-violent demonstrations by the pro-democracy opposition and the repressive violence of the government and its thugs.

The Iranian Democracy movement is absolutely worthy of our personal (as opposed to governmental) support.  Support and solidarity at this point require, indeed permit only the simplest of things.  As I said yesterday.  There are only simple things we can and should do:

Things like changing our location and time zone on Twitter to Tehran and GMT +3.5 hours.  Things like making our avatar green.  Things like reading the posts of those who are there.  Things like posting and distributing their videos on youtube.  Things like writing blogs and asking others to link arms with them in solidarity.  Things like talking about what ideas we might have that could be of help to them.

These are things that might be completely ineffective to help Iranians achieve democracy, to get a new, fair election, to overturn the sham outcome of their last election.  I realize that.  But that’s not what’s important.  That’s not what’s important now.

What’s important, I think, is our solidarity with their struggle, our saying, however we can say it, “Brothers and Sisters, we’re with you.  We want you to succeed.  We want you to be safe, and free.  We want you to obtain the change you seek.”

I am full of admiration for the courage of the Iranian movement.  I applaud and support these people.  Please join me in solidarity with them.  Sign the available petitions.  Take the small steps.  It’ll make you feel great.  And it’s the right thing to do.

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Jun 18 2009

Overnight Caption Contest

Jun 18 2009

Kucinich: How do you support the troops? Bring ’em home!

Dennis is on the spot, again!

Jun 18 2009

Pony Party: Captions & LOLs

Pony Party is an Open Thread.  Please feel free to post your own pics, vids, rants & raves in the comments, and please do not rec the party.

funny pictures
moar funny pictures

Jun 17 2009

the ONLY thing to defend is the rule of law

I never  r e a l l y  thought about the rule of law before. I took for granted that the law existed as a regulatory force in society. Something both to keep me in line and keep me safe. I had no idea how important the concept of a RULE of law would become to me.

Well, I had no idea until a little over eight years ago. . . until the dark years . . .

cross posted at dKos

Jun 17 2009

Four at Four

  1. The CS Monitor reports Federal judge rules Bush ‘torture memo’ lawyers could stand trial. In a 42-page decision, US District Judge Jeffrey White ruled John Yoo “can be held personally responsible for the indefinite military detention and alleged torture of an American citizen who was suspected of involvement with Al Qaeda.”

    “Like any other government official, government lawyers are responsible for the foreseeable consequences of their conduct,” White wrote.

    Meanwhile the CIA fights against full release of detainee torture report, reports the Washington Post. The CIA wants to suppress passages in a May 2004 report that describe “in graphic detail how the agency handled its detainees” claiming its disclosure could “damage ongoing counterterrorism operations”.

    The report was written by “Then-Inspector General John L. Helgerson and his team of investigators traveled to secret CIA prisons and witnessed interrogations firsthand, making them the only observers allowed into the detention sites who were not participants in the program”. The report indicated war crimes were committed.

    “The argument was that combining the techniques amounted to torture,” said a former agency official who read the report. “In essence, [Helgerson] was arguing in 2004 that there were clear violations of international laws and domestic laws.”

Four at Four continues with fighting in Pakistan, refugees number reach all-time high, cement, and climate change impact in your state.

Jun 17 2009

Bernie Sanders on Single Payer — Take Action

Bernie Sanders is circulating a petition advocating Single Payer.  Here’s what the good Senator has to say about it in his e-mail.  

Please read it and go to his web site and show your support for Single Payer.  We may have to settle for the fall-back position of a Public Option, but we should show them our true desires anyway.  

A PETITION TO CONGRESS

Supporting Single-Payer Health Care

Our current private health insurance system is the most costly, wasteful, complicated and bureaucratic in the world. Today, 46 million people have no health insurance. Even more are underinsured with high deductibles and co-payments. Close to 20,000 Americans die each year because they don’t have regular access to a doctor.  

The time is now for our nation to address the most profound moral and economic issue we face.  

The time is now for our country to join the rest of the industrialized world and provide cost-effective, comprehensive quality health care to every man, woman and child in our country.  

The time is now to take on the powerful special interests in the insurance and pharmaceutical industries and pass a single-payer national health care program.

Sign the petition

Tell Bernie your experience with health care and insurance.

For more background information, see my diary from a few days ago Healthcare: The Big Issue, The Big Test for Obama

We’ve got to keep pushing, keep yelling, keep demanding.  YYEELLLL!!!

Jun 17 2009

Change, Comfort, and Challenge

Think back on your life. Before every big life change, you have experienced some form of anxiety….either the butterflies in your stomach feeling of excitement and anticipation…or the butterflies in your stomach feeling of stark fear!

There have been times of great change in your life where you were eager to get on with it….and times when you needed a push to make the leap.

And if you are like me, there have been times when you had the opportunity for a great change in your life and didn’t take it….when you chickened out. And regretted it. Or even paid dearly for it. Sometimes it is just incredibly difficult to take that last step over the threshold and through the portal of change.

In fact sometimes it can seem that the portals of change are barred and have fierce guardians stationed before them…

PhotobucketPhotobucket

Jun 17 2009

More of the same from ObamaNation (abomination)

More of the same old same old from the Obama Administration.  

Obama Blocks List of Visitors to White House

The Obama administration is fighting to block access to names of visitors to the White House, taking up the Bush administration argument that a president doesn’t have to reveal who comes calling to influence policy decisions.

Despite President Barack Obama’s pledge to introduce a new era of transparency to Washington, and despite two rulings by a federal judge that the records are public, the Secret Service has denied msnbc.com’s request for the names of all White House visitors from Jan. 20 to the present. It also denied a narrower request by the nonpartisan watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, which sought logs of visits by executives of coal companies.

Updated: CREW says it filed suit Tuesday against the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees the Secret Service. Here’s a copy of CREW’s complaint.

“We are deeply disappointed,” said CREW attorney Anne L. Weismann, “that the Obama administration is following the same anti-transparency policy as the Bush administration when it comes to White House visitor records. Refusing to let the public know who visits the White House is not the action of a pro-transparency, pro-accountability administration.”

Enjoy your new overlords.  Same as the old overlords.

Oh, but I know, Obama is really trying!   He’s just up against such pressure and such opposition like a 67% approval rating and both houses of Congress.

Yup.

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