So the referendum in Catalonia is unconstitutional? A vote for Kurdish sovereignty is illegal? A collective initiative can be UNILATERAL?! These complaints don't sound very democratic... Communities wanting the right to self determination is the point of governments from the people's point of view. Rulers only care about taxes and fealty, but have to sell it like their population's consensus. Brexit was xenophobic and retrograde apparently, not the desire for emmancipation.
Tag: Democracy
April 7th, Let Us All Set Colorado Springs on Fire!
-- Local selections are coming up, and we shall see an obscenity take place once again as local Colorado Springs ...ugh.. 'pragmatists' move into inaction in mass. YES! -We know their game plan here, as it will be 'voting for the supposed lesser of 2 evils' time once again for America's most clueless political lemmings. The Democratic Party morons who always call themselves 'liberals' and 'progressives' will be voting for who they see as the lesser of evils in our beloved Fort Springs. And who will that be? LMAO at their idiocy.... It will be for a registered Republican! It's just so very very ironic really.... OK...OK... Nationally last time they voted for a Clintonite fake-o called Barracks O'bombs-away, who is actually Republican in policies covertly, while being gliberal overtly...yada yada yada and vomit ola... But here at home these same fools, who always think of themselves as being 'liberals', 'pragmatists', and 'progressives' are actually planning to vote for a registered Republican this time, all because her last name is 'Makepeace'. Myself, I would favor this woman becoming an honest lady and changing her name to Mary Lou 'Do-nothing' instead. But that simply will not happen, I am absolutely sure it won't. It just won't /// Honesty really takes place very seldom in politics. So what is all this about setting Colorado Springs on fire come April 7th? Well it is quite simple actually. Fed up with a life time of personally repeatedly observing our phony pretend 'democracy' and pretend 'elections' in the US, always always totally totally manipulated completely completely by Big Corporate Money, I will be personally setting myself on fire election day, April 7, in front of the municipal bldg, downtown. And you know what? You can too! In fact the more of us who do so, the more we will be talking 'truth to power' and also making a low cost light show ahead of the annual Fourth Of The Same Old Bullshit celebrations coming up soon. It's not really 'protest'... It's direct participation in our fabled Democratic system here in Unthinking Shitards of Assholelandia.... USA! USA! USA!! Let us showcase our great land! Fire it up! So show your patriotism and light up the city this election day! A hundred of us setting ourselves on fire all at one time, would make the world notice just how democratic our beloved USA really really is! So go to it, Patriots! Light up the deep dark night of the US of A! Snoring away and 'voting' for 'Do-nothing' will do absolutely nothing.
Springs Democrats hope democracy loses to State Senator John Morse
COLORADO SPRINGS, CO- International news headlines read "G-20 Summit Overshadowed by Syrian Crisis" but not in Colorado Springs! Here every politically active Democrat was working to defeat a recall of state senate leader John Morse, a democrat though barely. Morse is a duly elected, if unlikely, representative of conservative El Paso County, being assailed by a mutinous GOP majority angered by his stewarding of gun control legislation. The NRA has backed a blitzkrieg recall campaign, aided by local Republican officials and judges who connived election parameters designed to coax a recall victory. But who's on the side of right, presumably with the people? Democrats are crying foul. They're cursing corporate money and lobbyist-villain NRA, complaining that recalls shouldn't be motivated by ideological reasons. Really? Are recalls only for impropriety? I'd prefer corruption be answered with criminal charges, and scandal should produce resignations. I'd say ideology would be the most appropriate reason for a recall, especially if it's about a difference of opinion about the idea of representational government. Ironically, the underdog's usual complaint is that incumbents are always impossible to unseat, even when they act in total defiance of their constituents. Don't you hate that? The irony is compounded because no one will deny that the overwhelming majority in these neighborhoods oppose any abridgement of the Second Amendment right to wave guns. Senator Morse acted in defiance of that interest. Undemocratic, is what he was, as his critics accuse. We like to vilify the NRA as the worst of special interest lobbies, but one can't accuse them of being corporate, they're famously supported by members! The NRA is probably the single MOST democratic of lobbying outfits. The fact that the corporate media loves to demonize the NRA should give one pause about who's looking after who. What's very odd is that the NRA-backed Republicans are targeting a term-limited Democrat who has only a year left in office. What's that about? Pundits speculate that an NRA win would be symbolic, so it's worth the money they're spending. Maybe. It certainly will reinforce the corporate narrative that legislators daren't cross the NRA. How convenient. But the recall campaign, a national story now, is not so mysterious if you think about the Kabuki nature of our two party theater. The defense campaign contrived for Senator Morse is a disquietingly artificial shade for grassroots. Against "People Against Morse" the Democrats countered with: "A Whole Lot of People For Morse", which is certainly a catchy slogan for a politician looking to highten his visibility for a run at a next office, but for locals it lacks the ring of authenticity. What viewers outside the area don't know is that John Morse has been a superlatively minor functionary, with a reputation for backstabbing more than leading, and certainly no one to bother defending or applauding, even if his name came up, which it rarely did. Before this recall, people hadn't cared enough to even think about John Morse, except to spout the usual lesser of evils rap, when
The road to victory in Venezuela! Comparing Chavez to Obama…
Here is a post electoral review of the Chavez campaign leading up to his reelection earlier this month in Venezuela: Venezuela, camino a la Victoria. Oct/2012 And now, a look at the sad campaign of Barack Obama here in the US: First Presidential Debate: Obama vs. Romney. Democracy really does not exist in the US, does it?
There was nothing much on that mail-in ballot we got
Last night we filled in our mail-in ballots, and there was nothing much there at all. Many of the 'races' to vote on we just left blank because all the candidates paying their money to run were only Right Winger party candidates. Election races all bought by money make for basically very empty ballots without any real meaning to them. I wondered whether it was worth putting 65 cents on the envelopes to mail them in? I'm still debating in my mind that big question. This isn't really democracy, is it?
Yet a fourth term of Clintonism? Why US liberalism is bankrupt and without any bailout that would work for it
The Democratic Party has reduced our supposed US corporate financed and run 'democracy' down over the last quarter of a century down to whether we are all led by our throats to another 4 years of Country Bush and sons, or 4 more years of Slick Family Clinton, or not? That's it. That's what you get for 'leadership'. You will be persuaded one way or the other by corporate advertising to choose Pepsi or Coke, depending on which image pulls your heart strings the most? Gurgle-Gurgle..... Gasp!!!!!! 'Your Vote' doesn't really get counted when it is left to Pepsi and Coke to do the count. So just how bankrupt is US liberalism? As bankrupt as those people they say they so totally oppose? Can't be... can it? Let's turn to the Time Magazine cover of this week and read its lead article behind the Slick Willy face and consider if that could actually be so? The title with Bill Clintons' slimy mug and a globe in front of him is titled, 'Five Ideas that are changing the world (for the better)'. After all, Slcik is now like Al Gore and Jimmy Carter, a Democrat liberals' treasure trove of supposed brilliant insight! Don't laugh. You know that this is just exactly how American liberals believe! So what are the '5 ideas' that our genius Bill speaks there of? Idea Number 1 of the 5 in his ' the case for optimism' is ... don't laugh now!.... 'PHONES MEAN FREEDOM'!!!! Hey, all that cell phone proliferation is increasing Freedom around the world! Yes, I kid you not... Cell phones are cheap so everybody now is holding one, maybe even juggling several of them in the air all at one time?!!!! Bill says that this is leading to the proliferation of Freedom. Idea Number 2 of the 5 is that the world medical community is winning the fight against AIDS and by extension, all disease! 'HEALTH COMMUNITIES PROSPER' says Bill, and now sodas are kept out of public schools in the US! Idea Number 3 of the 5 is GREEN ENERGY EQUALS GOOD BUSINESS! Brazil is now planning to NOT cut down its last remaining rain forests at the same velocity as before, even as it no longer has them left standing to cut down. Slick is ecstatic! And Germany has more 'sun power energy' being made! And small farmers of South Africa are 'selling carbon credits on the world market'! O' Hallelujah and PTL! Idea Number 4 of 5 is WOMEN RULE! Left unsaid in Slick's arguments on this one is that wife Hillary, the Pentagon whore, is ruling over us. Nuf said... Bill says women are running the show in Rwanda, too.
Will Egyptian military dictatorship say now their candidate won the election?
First the Egyptian military brokered a deal with the Muslim Brotherhood, where the Left candidate was pushed off and out of the runoff. The Muslim Brotherhood seemed to think that they were then going to be allowed to SHARE power with the US-made military monster that has ruled Egypt for decades, hiding the generals' rule behind Mubarak, the now dying ex-dictator. But the Egyptian military wants it all, because Muslim Right Wingers are not good for business and making money is precisely what the generals most specialize in. Certainly they do not do good in keeping the country free of outside imperialist control. The generals prefer the stability of a military dictatorship hiding behind the international complicity of pretending that democracy somehow exists in Egypt. They want their man in as 'president' if at all possible? But the people are no longer willing to tolerate this game, even if governments of other countries still are. All this puts Israel, the US, and Western Europe in a big bind. How can they once again stabilize the biggest Arab country in terms of population? It's an increasingly difficult task for them. The people are trying to rise up and toss their game playing away for good, and the international super rich and their governments know that. Power to the Egyptian People! The time for it is NOW! The so-called 'international community' will try once again to cancel the popular will of a proud people now in rebellion.
What do ‘we’ stand for?
An 'Anonymous' reader says that he/ she has had trouble figuring out just what Not My Tribe writers seem to be for. I personally find that hard to believe since we all the time have already patiently explained most of what we support and don't support, yet here we aim to please so I will briefly list out a few items that are generally what I, at least, am for. Internationalism, instead of US nationalism. Peace, instead of US militarism. Justice for all, instead of only justice bought by the dollar for the rich and denied to the poor. Respect for all cultures, nationalities, sexual orientations, and for both sexes and the poor... not disrespect for those who are deemed inferior by the monied classes. Democracy, not dictatorship of the business community over the working classes. Ecology, not capitalist pillage of the environment and capitalist over production of trash not really needed to live decent and fulfilled lives. Jobs for all guaranteed with decent incomes, not constant economic insecurity for most people on the planet. Decent medical care and educational systems, not medicine for profit making and schools that indoctrinate and create ignorance. Let's stop here, shall we, Anonymous? So you have called us negative and hateful more than a few times. What is it about the above political agendas you actually disagree with and why?
The voting booth is the last place to look to see Democracy in Action
Obama versus Romney? 'How did it come to this? How did democracy in America degenerate into a mind-numbing absurdity? The answer, in a word, is money.' 'It has transformed what has always been a profound dissociation between what democratic theory promises and the real world of American democracy into a yawning divide. Despite what students are told in civics classes (where they still exist) and what normative theories of democracy propose, democracy in America today has almost nothing to do with rational deliberation and debate, and very little to do with aggregating preferences or reconciling conflicting interests. It is about legitimating government of, by and for the corporate malefactors and Wall Street banksters who own Congress and the White House along with an obscenely large chunk of the nations wealth. The Occupy movement has driven this point home, but it was widely appreciated long before Zuccotti Park entered the national consciousness.' See Andrew Levine's Why the Voting Booth is the Last Place to Look for Political Change
“United For Global Change” is Madison Ave dilution of “Global Democracy” cry. Oct 15 not for Obameaningless change
UNITED FOR GLOBAL CHANGE certainly smacks of the meaningless slogan that swept President Hope to power. My guess is that this is Advertizer Omnicom's contract PR redesign to subvert the worldwide Global Democracy movement sparked by Spain's Indignant rebels and the Arab Spring. Original promotional materials called for GLOBAL DEMOCRACY, which meant something obviously, but might confuse Americans who think their illusion of democracy is enough, spread via Pax Americana. Global "Change" is a straw man open to pundits critical of unspecific demands, "Democracy" less so. Omnicom is just a guess, they're the outfit who saved McDonalds' skin with "I'm lovin it" and who was contracted by the USG to sell Obama's Wars to the international public. I forgot who won all the Addy in 2008 for the ad campaign of the year, brand "Obama." International demonstrations scheduled for October 15th are more than protests in solidarity for Occupy Wall Street in NYC. OCT15 is a call for DEMOCRACIA REAL YA, which I'm sorry, doesn't translate to REAL *CHANGE* NOW! What's change anymore but an Obamaesque meaningless platitude? Dispiriting is the infusion they've intended. "United for Global Change?" Yeah, I don't think so. First it's hard to swallow that "change" translates more universally than "democracy." Second, President Obama's neo-grassroots orgs are obviously trying to seed anticipation of 2012 with a meme of international support. We Are Change, Be the Change, Democrats For Change, Democratic Change, Change That Works, Change Happens --whatever. In your dreams Democratic party. The world isn't taking to the street to settle for an Obama Nothing Revolution. Wanna bet that this Global Change job was commissioned by something akin to Change International, funded by a USAID affiliate, dispersing funds meant to promote CIA-styled Democratic Astroturf pro-US counterrevolutionaries in regions not yet sufficiently subservient to US multinational extraction industries? So what if an establishment vanguard has succeeded in rebranding OCT 15 for placebo consumption. By all means please join the marches Saturday, regardless your unlike-minded companions. The vocabulary will be mixed, the media is already preparing headlines using the approved slogan makeover, but fear not, the rest of the world is marching for real Democracy and everyone knows it.
Springs congressman Doug Lamborn tells citizens he answers to private propertied constituents not to public
COLORADO SPRINGS- Local citizens have had plenty to protest with Congressman Doug "Obama is a Tar-Baby" Lamborn, so now the Tea Party bigot has put up a sign, NO PROTESTING. Lamborn declined to meet with community leaders from the NAACP on Monday, or Move-On organizers on Wednesday. Are you in Colorado Congressional District Five? Well, you may neither SOLICIT a meeting with your government representative, nor LOITER hoping to wait him out. Politicians like Lamborn who want to shove undemocratic corrupt legislation down people's throats, and spout deeply offensive racist rhetoric out of sheer stupidity, have to hide where constituents can't reach them. Situating your office where your constituents can't reach you reminds me of former Senator Allard's office in the Plaza of the Rockies, where security guards forbid entry to anyone who didn't look investment-banker friendly. The plaza complex is now the Booz Allen Hamilton building, the world's largest weapons industry firms, chaired by James Woolsey and his wife, one of the Colorado College trustees. You'll note that one of Lamborn's neighbors is AECOM, another giant war profiteer. At least Allard chose an office which was centrally located, only a block from Congressman Hefley. Doug Lamborn's office is situated in an industrial office park where no one can hear you scream. So is isolating yourself from you constituents now standard MO for legislative office-holders? Not really. Representative government is hardly where you want to take a stand against a public's right to freedom of speech and freedom of assembly. Especially someone espousing to be a patriot for the Tea Party. Actually, if Lamborn wants to assert that his corporate representation gig is "private property," I'd say the crafty bugger is right. No shirt, no shoes? No representation.
Wisconsin election close, but no cigar, if there was a cigar
The recall defeat in Wisconsin brings to mind Emma Goldman's famous adage: "If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal." Now we'll never know if a Democrat majority in Madison would have behaved any different than a herd of Republicans. I doubt it. Activists are patting themselves on the back for their partial success, saying the effort was worth it, which is the usual consolation for losers, and ignores the fact that many of Wisconsin's present Democratic Party legislators already betray their constituents. Here's another quote, by a Japanese engineering professor I had in college who used to say in broken English: "You build bridge. It fall down. No partial credit." Imagine what he'd have thought of a bridge to nowhere.
Mr Smith goes to #FuckYouWashington
The netizens are revolting. On the eve of US "austerity measures" the Twitterverse is crowdsourcing its ire against the de facto seat of world government. The unprintable hashtag won't trend on social networks -- it's alleged, even as momentum builds like a movie title mashup. Typical sentiment: FuckYouWashington for putting profit above people. The laundry list of injustices is staggering and as a political party platform, it's writing itself. What is democracy but crowdsourced grievances in search of redress? As tweeters hurry to open external floodgates, it's going to be interesting to see which if any of the social networks decide to unleash its participants from the censorship which constrains the profanity they want to share. #FuckYouWashington for your mass murder, inhumanity, enslavement, penury and usury and then telling me this hashtag is profane.
Egypt revolution is victory 4 Democracy but credit for Tahrir goes to Anarchism
For a few interminable minutes there, okay-- days --and bloody, millions of Egyptians had taken to the streets rejecting the legitimacy of Egypt's authoritarian regime. The despotic Mubarak refused to budge and experts deemed the outcome a "stalemate." Really? A preponderance of citizens greater than most voter turnouts, versus an unmovable leader, and commentators want to call it a draw? Worse is overlooking the obvious about the leaderless opposition forces. Jan25 came together to demand freedom, which the West equates with Democracy. But the Egyptian activists accomplished it through Anarchism. The West fears the Muslim Brotherhood, but the real banned party is the anti-globalist youth movement whose name must not be spoken. When President Obama pretends the US will shepherd Egypt through its "transition" he is sidestepping the real epiphany of Tahrir Square, a people united by idealism, minus a government. "Anti-government" protesters, precisely.
The US favors me over Democracy. Who am I?
I imprison without charges, I torture, I assassinate, I overlook police brutality, I kill foreign journalists, I kill innocent civilians, I lie about how many. I spy on my people, I violate civil liberties, I impose emergency law, I persuade with propaganda of a complicit state media, I preside over a despised single party system, I rule with military might, I ally with tyrants & racists, I steal from the people, I provide for my cronies, I ignore public protest, I promise meaningful reform, when I have to, I deliver meaningless. Who am I? Answers: Guantanamo, Quantico, drones, Houston PD, Al Jazeera reporters, collateral damage, no body counts, warrant-less wiretaps, free-speech zones, Patriot Act, corporate MSM, phony twin corporate parties, military industrial complex, privatization, banks, unpopular wars, change, false hope.
Crowd builds in Al Tahrir Square, Cairo, two million defy Mubarak intimidation
Al Jazeera has reasserted live footage in Cairo today, for the Friday demonstration billed as "Day of Departure" meant to depose dictator Mubarak. Already gone are the US major network talking heads, fleeing in advance the predicted mayhem as if to dot the exclamation point of their Chaos in Egypt meme. Alas, they won't be here to offer color commentary on the hundreds of dozens of demonstrators of indeterminate religious-political orientation massing for Egyptian on Egyptian rioting. For the rest of us, this is a veritable revolution before our eyes. Perhaps the monumental event of our lifetime. Regardless the outcome, most of us are probably so estranged from reality to recognize it. This is what Democracy looks like. We only know representative democracy, warped beyond recognition by an electoral college system only a statistician's mother could love. Switzerland is the only direct democracy we're taught in school. But democratic participation in Switzerland is not much more complicated than a homeowners association in an affluent neighborhood. People power taking to the street, denouncing the illegitimacy of its authoritarian masters, leaderless, allied, that's real democracy. What a shame the American celebrities are missing the party. Williams and Couric fled with the expat community, Amanpour is already giving her veneer of respectability to the next interviewee, Zuckerberg not Assange, because the corporate media wants to call this a Facebook revolution sooner than Wikileaks'. Anderson Cooper is cowering on the hotel floor of an undisclosed location, unafraid to confess that he's fearing for his life, working that [brown] people-are-revolting angle. On the heroic independent media side, Democracy Now! correspondent Sharif Abdel Kouddous spent the night in Tahrir Square, sleeping among the activists, half of them with bandaged heads, waking at intervals by the alarm sounding for anticipated stone-throwers. None of the network journos showed any hesitation to criticize the harassment they encountered on the streets, though blaming Mubarak's thugs was never explicit, and none of them veered from celebrating the riots as "Egypts killing each other." Even Al Jazeera pretended to confuse the Pro and Anti sides, failing to discriminate between the side which was armed from the side taking cover, the knife wielders from desperate stone throwers trying to keep their attackers at bay. Finally this morning an AJ text crawl mentioned 300 fatalities since the protests began January 25th, otherwise there has been scant mention of innocent civilians killed, some of them shot in the head by nighttime snipers. All of the networks, even Al Jazeera express their incredulity that the demonstrators project no central leadership, failing to speculate why that may be. Al Jazeera takes care to mention, every time they consult one of their three correspondents on the ground, that they omit speaker identities "for their own safety." Even when they interview activists, the AJ anchors thank them for being brave enough to reveal their real names. Not discussed is the certain probability that calling out a demonstration leader will direct the security apparatus to deploy their snipers, summary arrest, or detention of
Wikileaks tests domino theory: Tunisia
In my imagination the Wikileaks war room in Ellington Hall, the Suffolk manor where Julian Assange is under house arrest, is not a book club reading circle racing through the "not much new" of Cablegate waiting for someone to cry BINGO. It's a war room. The wiki drip is not which diplomatic cables are the juiciest, or which can be released to garner the maximum exposure. Wikileaks is dropping the cables like depth charges, calibrated to explode where the enemy hull is the weakest. Who is trying to sink the great American ship of state terror? With our traditional adversaries won over to Capitalism, the American empire found wars it could pick safely, damn the collateral civilians, full speed ahead. But with Wikileaks it looks to me the US has finally met its match. Forget the communist peril attempting to topple regional dominoes, this is the barbarity of real Democracy at our gates. Attribute the Tunisian revolution to Wikileaks, or color-code it Jasmine to pretend it was USAIDed, I believe the first domino has fallen.
Prepare 4 Teabags swimming in De Nile
After all their prepping the lunatic fringe to go forth and murder Democrats, one of them at the very least tried. It's an evolving story, initial reports were that Gabrielle Giffords, D-AZ, was having an "on your corner" town-hall type meeting at a Safeway in Tucson and was shot dead. Actually she's still in surgery. She was on Sharon Angle's "Second Amendment Solution" list and Sarah Palin's Target List. Beck, Limbaugh, O'Reilly, Hannity, Gunny Bob, Michelle Malkin, Ann Coulter, Dobbs, Tancredo, the whole Racist Retarded Lot of them had been yucking it up, telling people that a better way for them to "Take back America" would be to simply shoot liberals. But they're going to be spinning it that the gunman was a "Lone Wolf" and not one of their demented demonic followers. Just like they did every other Lone Wolf who followed their "satiric" suggestions to Kill Americans Who Disagree With Them. And to think some people have to go all the way to Egypt to swim in De Nile Updates Ms Giffords is out of surgery and will be communicating. Judge Roll, dead. Another 9 year old girl, dead. 3 others, dead. What do the Minutemen have against 9 year old American Children? This makes two nationally recognized child murders at their hands. LA times says "some on left are quick to lay blame So the Racist Retardicans can't take the heat? People they threatened steadily for the past several years get gunned down by a Right Wing Lunatic and they say "Oh, no those bad ol' Lefties are jumping to conclusions So which is it, RepubliTards, Minute-vermin, TeaBags? Are you just a bunch of loudmouth blowhards when you say you wanted them DEAD or are you just God-Damned LYING about your actual complicity? Judge Roll was threatened by among others, ranchers. Many of them, on two separate judgments, one over what would otherwise be Ranch lands being set aside for conservation of jaguars. And the other being where he refused to throw out a lawsuit from a Minute-puke Rancher holding people prisoner on his ranch. Nothing RACIST or Inflammatory about any of that, no sir. Or saying that Liberals should be shot. The Secret Service urged him to drop charges against the Anti-American Terrorist Thugs who threatened him. Ain't that amazing? Threaten or even harshly criticize a Federal Judge on NON-Nazi freak related issues and the Secret Service will throw you under the jail for life and beyond. Apparently all you had to do in the Bush "justice" department to get away with shit like that would be a Klan sympathizer.
Could it be, Olbermann fired by FOX?
Since the following chain of logic is true, very possible and knowing the "ethical" standards of the American CorporaFascist Empire therefore very probable. Quote:November 05, 2010 12:14 PM What Role Did Comcast Play in Keith Olbermann's Suspension?--UPDATED By karoli There is a double standard at work with regard to Keith Olbermann's suspension, not only between other personalities appearing on MSNBC as commentators, but also at the very top level of the food chain. Comcast now owns MSNBC after their acquisition was completed earlier this year, despite protestations from many of us. A look at campaign finance disclosures for several organizations shows that Phil Anschutz, chairman of Comcast major shareholder and content partner with Comcast, donated large sums of money to the First Amendment Alliance, (How very Orwellian, have we wound back the clock to "1984"? Does the Legal Staff for the "First Amendment Alliance work only for the Rich? What a foolish question, of course they won't defend anybody else's freedom of speech -Jonah) one of the largest outside groups targeting Democrats in the 2010 midterm elections. The Anschutz Corporation, wholly owned by Phil Anschutz, gave $50,000 on 9/24/2010 to the First Amendment Alliance. The two candidates targeted by the First Amendment Alliance? Jack Conway and Michael Bennet. Keith Olbermann gave to Jack Conway's campaign along with Raul Grijalva and Gabrielle Giffords. In addition, the Anschutz family donated $169,900 to Republican candidates and committees during the 2010 election cycle, according to Open Secrets. Additionally, Comcast Corporation has contributed $125,000 to the Republican Governors' Association in the 2010 cycle (as of 9/30/2010). There's been a lot of chatter about MSNBC policy, and whether Olbermann should have gotten advance approval for his donations to Jack Conway, Raul Grijalva(Targeted, literally, by the Neo-Nazi group "the Minutemen" for taking a stand against their Racist anti-Immigrant policies, they fired shots at his office and have repeatedly threatened him, along with Murdering the American Child Briseņa Flores in her home because her surname is Spanish) and Gabrielle Giffords on October 28th. The policy I've seen reads like this: NBC and MSNBC TV require permission of the president of NBC News. (MSNBC.com is a joint venture of NBC Universal and Microsoft.) "Anyone working for NBC News who takes part in civic or other outside activities may find that these activities jeopardize his or her standing as an impartial journalist As opposed to an "entertainer" edit by Jonah because they may create the appearance of a conflict of interest. But not Corporate donations nor the contributions from the Elitist Scum who effectively ARE the corporation- Jonah Such activities may include participation in or contributions to political campaigns or groups that espouse controversial positions. (even though Mr Olbermann made huge sums of Profits for MSNBC by celebrating or opposing very controversial positions) You should (but not "Must" -Jonah) report any such potential conflicts in advance to, and obtain prior approval of, the President of NBC News or his designee." (who insist they have no such moral obligations, far less legal -Jonah) That language clearly says "should" and not "must". Further, anyone
I’m voting early, and I vote NO
I'll show you an absentee ballot. As the election looms, the Klieg lights intensify on the TP bogey-persons, TV talking heads harp about what a nail-biter this will be, pollsters dance with them that brought 'em, Michael Moore does his usual U-turn, to urge us to suck it up for the Dems, Medea Benjamin defends her eternal faith that activism "might" still move Obama, and ever multiple emails presume Obama's options must be preserved at all costs, usually a donation. Again I anticipate hearing from a friend who monitors local precinct printouts and calls to whip his charges to the polls. I've lost count of how many Facebook prompts I've gotten to pledge to vote -- but this time I'm going to make my ballot count. No amount of corporate-sponsored fear-based gap-closing civic-enthusiasm is going to coerce me to play this game. I will not support war, lack of health care, and class war unchallenged. The beasts unleashed by Citizens United will not buy my participation. Neither the conservative assholes, nor the liberal bullshitters can have it. They can have their tyranny, their obscene income disparity, their open war on nature and fellow-humankind. They can have their liberal pretense as the less bitter pill. It's a dose of cancer either way. I would have a preference actually, if forced to choose between a quick execution and a slow death by hard labor, but I would rather resist than be compelled to voice it. Silence is not consent, it's none of the above. What candidate have you got that's going to make a difference? In Colorado we've got nothing but corporate energy, weapons systems cowboys. Our good-cop senate incumbent is a corporate, education-privatizing, warmongering Zionist who like Obama says he's against all that. What you got? Imagine if American election monitors insisted on dipping American fingers in purple dye to prevent vote fraud. The traditional media photo representing Iraqi or Afghan elections makes it obvious it's really to provide graphic illustration of their buy-in to the election process. We judge the democracy flag-planting in Iraq and Afghanistan based on election turnouts don't we? Why shouldn't that symbolic math apply here too? Would Americans vote if their purple fingers were paraded to demonstrate their faith in American Democracy? Fuck No. Let the state media denounce it as voter apathy -- they can call it what they want, I won't be there.
Swiss refuse to hand over Polanski, US upset, still haven’t handed over Bush
Not trying to minimalize or trivialize date-rape or child molesting, but that's ONE count against Mr Polanski and (at least) Hundreds of Thousands of counts of Murder, including and especially children, against Messieurs Bush, Cheney, Rove, Petraeus, McChrystal, Rumsfeld, Prince, McCain, Kristol, "scooter" Libby, Murdoch, O'Reilly, Limbaugh, Hannity, Beck, Dobbs, Mesdames Rice, Malkin, Palin, Bachmann, Coulter and any other Accomplices in the Wars started with, enabled by and continued under the auspices of, blatant acts of Perjury. The charges of War Crimes against these "leaders" and propagandists are consistent with United States policies as expressed during the Nunrberg Trials against officials of the nation of Deutschland and the Vichy Government of France (which had been diplomatically recognized by the U.S.) and "collaborators" including and especially Propagandists, such as Axis Annie, Tokyo Rose and Lord Haw-Haw. Also recognized precedent, in U.S. RECENT history, every single person detained under the vague charge of "unlawful combatant" including those "arrested" in nations with which the United States has no formal extradition treaties nor, indeed, official recognition of their governments as being legitimate. Messieurs Bush and Cheney identified (vaguely) 60 foreign governments who they felt obliged to subject to the same levels of "regime change" imposed on the People of Iraq and Afghanistan. Tit for Tat. What goes around comes back around. When the U.S. "justice" department extradites War Criminals to the Hague, which unlike the Guantanamo Military Kangaroo Tribunals, does NOT have the Death Penalty, then and only then would they even begin to have a legitimate cause for their Crybaby-ass Whining about those bad ol' Europeans not extraditing to the U.S. Concentration Camp/Slave Labor "justice" System. Nationalism explicitly grants sovereignty equally to ALL nations, excluding ANY other nation from that right is not Nationalism, but Imperialism. Under quite a few treaties signed and ratified by the United States Congress and several Presidents, including the U.N. Charter, the Hague Conventions and Geneva Conventions, THIS IS ESPECIALLY AIMED TOWARD THE REPUBLICAN, TEABAG, DOMINIONIST, STATE'S RIGHTS AND OTHER DOUCHEBAG PARTIES who believe they and they alone can interpret the Constitution of the United States, or impose their so-called authority onto other Citizens of the United States or especially onto citizens in Other Nations Article 6 of the Constitution states in the second sentence: This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding. Bet Glenn Beck University never told you punks THAT, did he? Or Limbaugh or Michael "the savage" Weiner or Hannity... Did they? Pat Robertson, maybe? No?
Republican Party of El Salvador to lose its throne this Sunday
The Republican Party of El Salvador (ARENA), just like the Republican Party of the US, is a party of the death squads. As such, they have ruled for 20 years after inheriting the defeat of the Salvadoran Revolution by the US government. See about their coming loss of throne in this Sunday's elections. The Death Cries of the Salvadoran Right. However the defeat probably is not much of defeat in actuality, because FMLN candidate, Mauricio Funes, is more than likely as about as Left Wing as Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua, which is not very. We can look for the new FMLN regime to stumble about in the wilderness with many words against the US, but little actual rebellion. That has been the Daniel Ortega formula for holding onto power for the clique around him, and as a result, Nicaragua is in a Hellish Purgatory of inaction today. One can hardly blame the beaten populations of Nicaragua and El Salvador for not being able to push for more. After all they fought the Evil Empire for decades at great loss of life and limb... literally. No matter who was to win in El Salvador's elections the Salvadoran people still have the US death squads (the Pentagon) to contend with ultimately. Unfortunately little will probably have changed when the Republican Party of El Salvador loses its throne this Sunday. Let us hope that that is nothing more than my own pessimistic reading of what will result and that in actuality all of Central American will begin to tilt out of the orbit of the US Empire's total control with Funes' victory? We can only hope that the people will finally begin to gain some real liberation from the squalor that The Empire has put them in?
Costa Rica a prototypical Western Democracy
PUERTO JIMINEZ, CR- Touring Costa Rica has been interesting. Considering the turmoil of Central America, it may be a shining example of a functional Capitalist Democracy. Itīs got a healthy middle class and a relatively contented populace. Can it offer a lesson to its strife torn neighbors? Sure. Get rid of the Indios. Citizens of the "Rich Coast" pride themselves on being light skinned, owing to a Spanish heritage of course. Theyīre the descendants of settlers, mixed some with labor imports from the Caribbean. But the indigenous people are gone. Which makes for scarce land redistribution demands. When Columbus first came to Costa Rica, there were 400,000 inhabitants. When they saw that the Spaniards were enslaving whoever they conquered, the tribes hid in the mountains. As a result, Costa wasnīt properly subjugated like elsewhere. The Spanish didnīt want land that didnīt come with ready slave labor. But hiding didnīt save the indians. As the Spanish settled the land, the original population dwindled, to 10%, then 2% within 200 years. They are, as Randy Newman sang it: "Gone, real gone." There is an inspiring history to Costa Ricaīs present relatively egalitarian government, and Iīm going to write more about some of their laudable leaders. But I have to argue that CR smacks of US artifice. And lo, even as I cringe at the camo themed souvenir caps that remind me of the Contras, it turns out Oliver North operated his Contra army and drug smuggling operation out of an airfield in northern Costa Rica. Thereīs a surfing destination near there called Ollieīs Point, named after the would be filibuster himself. Those apolitical surfer fucks. (It is hard to surpress disdain for the hard-recreating American asses despoiling CR toilet paper. I cannot bear their vibes of inutile indifference.) So the Costa Ricans are less Central Americans than good old Americans. And that never meant Native American.
The US government’s hatred of Arab democracy is on display in Gaza
"The democratically elected Hamas government was targeted for destruction from the day it won the elections in 2006." With that sentence in his commentary, Nir Rosen sums up the growing Gaza massacre Gaza: the logic of colonial power, a commentary that also deals with the US government misuse of the word "terrorist." "As so often, the term 'terrorism' has proved a rhetorical smokescreen under cover of which the strong crush the weak." Yes, EXACTLY. Once, the Nazis called others terrorists, too. Rosen does not mention the military suppression of the victory by the Islamic party in Algeria in the elections of 1991, which the European colonial powers and the US government completely backed up and covered for as it was done. Afterwards, tens of thousands died in the conflicts that ensued. From this election might very well have come much of Osama bin Laden's anger at his US former allies and friends, the US government. Certainly this suppression of democracy in the Arab World must have played some part in the run up to 9/11. So there is nothing really too new about the hostility of the US, Israel, and in tailing along, the European governments also, for their hostility to the fact that the Palestinian population chose democratically to be represented by Hamas after the US buying off of the PLO post Arafat's death. All that nonsense about bringing democracy to Arabs from American elites that hate Arab democracy not withstanding. What is there about supposedly supporting democracy in the Arab World that the US government has pawned off on a gullible, naive, and ignorant US public is on show in sitting by and allowing the Jewish carnage making in Gaza? Yes, it is 'the Jews' that is running this Gaza slaughterhouse, and they do it with 'The Christians' backing them up. These are the same sort of 'Christians' that slaughtered off so many Jews in World War 2. Both groups are absolutely shameless in their utter hypocrisy. They care not a hoot for the Arabs or democracy.... anywhere! The US hatred of democracy in the Arab World is now about as exposed as it can get, and let us not hear this babble about the US government supporting it ever be brought up in the year ahead. The silence of Barack Obama as he supports the Israeli government and Bush Administration as they slaughter innocent Arab civilians is horrendous, and should bring shame to every single voter who got conned to vote for the guy. Unfortunately, people continue to want to think the best about the neo-Clintonite gang that Barack Obama has morphed himself into heading. Make a dumb decision to vote ' the lesser of two evils' in a pseudo US democracy, and then it becomes rather easy for most of these voters to justify further US government suppression of real democracy