Send The Blue Dogs Blocking Heathcare Reform A Message Now

Take action send a message to the gang of 6 blocking real health care reform.

Have you heard about the six senators who are out to kill health care reform. Of course, that's not how they'd phrase it. Sens. Baucus, Bingaman, Conrad, Enzi, Grassley and Snowe say they're striving for "bi-partisan compromise." But what they're actually doing is working to make sure reform won't include a public option or mandatory employer-based insurance - two key policies needed for effective reform.

There are 100 members of the Senate, but these six, inexplicably, seem to be holding all the cards when it comes to health care. So you probably won't be surprised to learn that all six have taken a huge amount of money from the health insurance industry and pharma.

via: credo action

Tweet Congress About Heathcare Reform Now

If you have a twitter account or want to create one then you can now tweet your lawmaker in Congress directly and tell them to support health care. Use the message composed already or write your own. Tell them to pass healthcare reform now and stop stalling. 60 years of waiting is enough.

WA Reichert and McMorris Defend Birthers

This is pretty good stuff. Firedoglake sent a reporter to Washington, DC to pin down suspected birther supporting members of Congress on just how they stood on the birther issue. Representative McMorris R 5th and Reichert R 8th of WA look pretty stupid defending this shit. McMorris is really not that surprising, we know she's a wingnut, but do the mostly well educated moderate folks in the 8th district know Reichert is propagating this crap.

Harvard Professor Failed Personality Test

Working as I did as a municipal court clerk for more then 25 years in Seattle, I saw my fair share of criminal cases come before the court that also involved police officers having to deal with unruly or abusive citizens or visa versa. Dealing with unruly officers is a story we all have some experience with.

When it comes to the arrest of Harvard Professor Henry Gates, that we are all learning more about each day because of the involvement of the President who apparently saw the incident as a teaching moment when asked the question about it in a nationally televised press conference, police and legal profession types have often referred to such a arrest in the classic legal system slang as the citizen who, “failed the personality test”.

What it usually involves is a unruly, drunk or disrespectful citizen/suspect who’s verbal abuse of officers, or other high jinks have given way inevitably to a form of police abuse of power and retribution the cops jokingly call the failure to pass the personality test.

The Gate’s case I think is a classic example.

Often officers will end up more or less throwing the book at the abusive disrespectful person, and taking him to jail for what maybe considered normally minor or chippie violations of the law. The defendant ends up spending the night in jail and having to deal with the pending charges. If the charges are dropped, as was the case in the Gates case, the officer has still successfully played the roll of prosecutor, judge, and jury because the defendant has been punished whether the prosecutorial authority pursues the case(s) or not. In most cases like this one when the charge person has little or no criminal record the punishment of one day in jail and all the legal hassles involved with dealing with the charge(s) are more punishment then the defendant would of received had he in fact inevitably been found guilty.

Professor Gates and President Obama are probably the two worst people in the world for a cop to pick on or deal with in such a circumstance. Gates made his name promoting and teaching civil rights and certainly knows more then the average cop will about racial based abuse by the police in this country. Obama made his political bones as an Illinois State Senator championing laws to protect against racial profiling.

So it’s no wonder that Obama and Gates are apparently making an effort to make the incident a teachable moment for the rest of us oblivious white folks. Maybe in the long run it may raise consciousness, if your not already a right wing racial bigot. In which case it will probably reinforce all your fears about loss of white power because of the election of a African American as president.

When Lynn Sweet of the Chicago Sun-Times asked the question during the press conference about the Gate’s incident I’m sure Obama though he’s been thrown a soft ball question about a subject he is well verse on, racial profiling. This is where the problem started. He immediately became the professor talking to a class of students at Harvard law school about the history of racial profiling in America. He started off all right by disclosing the professor was a friend and that he knew nothing about the real facts of the case. But soon drifted into a general condemnation of racial profiling in this nation which included the “police acted stupidly it appears in this case” remark. He been better off saying I don’t know what happened but it appears the charges have been dropped, and left it at that. Leaving the teaching for later.

Most knowledgeable observers of the case admit the police overreacted. Even though there is evidence that Gates was abusive to officers in his own home the smart or streetwise officer in most cases would of just said, “have a nice day” and left the scene happy to not have to hear the professor harangue them anymore as racists or profiling. Plus they would of not had to fill out all the paperwork involved with the arrest and booking.

It be back to the donuts shop for them.

It has always amazed me the things people will do when confronted with dealing with a police situation or officer. Standing up to police when your rights are being violated is one thing, but acting stupid or getting worked up when it comes to dealing with the police is another. Usually it involves some form of intoxication. Blacks and Latinos do experience racial profiling and police abuse of power often, especially in locations where that type of thing is institutionalized. That’s a reality that we all must accept and do what we can to overcome.

But in this case I think what really happened here is that both Gates and the officers overreacted. Gates by going into a tirade about race and directing it in a personal way to the officers, and the officers for not realizing that because of Gates personal life experience he needed to blow off some steam. The officers employed the personality test on Gates and in their minds they felt justified because of the no one should ever disrespect police code cops often are encourage to buy into or otherwise known on the street as failing the police personality test.

I'm sure Gates probably felt pretty dumb losing his keys and having to break into his own home to start with. The incident also says tons about his neighbor who apparently didn’t know him well enough to be able to recognize him as the person trying to gain entry through a window, which led them to call 911 in the first place.

It's Official A Nation of Retards Has Morphed Into The New GOP

Right wing bozos loved to label liberals as un-American traitor kooks and crybabies when they complained vigorously after the 2000 and 2004 elections or questioned American foreign or domestic policy disasters during the George W. Bush years. Little did we realize the extent that these same accusers were in fact a bunch of bat shit crazies who now represented the new base of the out of power malingering Republican party.

Yes, now with the shoe on the other foot, nothing has unloosed the fear filled nut case lunatic fringe ditto heads apparently more then the tea bagging bunch of crazies and malcontent we are now faced with on a daily basis since the election of President Barack Obama.

There is a certain fear that is palpable with this group of nuts that shouts the fact that they know deep down that their all white people's brand of Judeo Christian power wheeling and dealing is finally being pried from their cold dead hands, so to speak. They are liable to say and do anything in the state of desperation they now find themselves, desperately attempting to maintain their fleeting hold on power. But, it's over baby. In twenty years or so you'll be the minority race whether you like it or not.

Thus the truth has little chance or importance with this bunch right now, and like the communists, who long had represented the straw horse they've demonized, they have adopted the belief that the end justifies the means. They now more often then not take on the actual characteristics of those they have profess to hate as the antithesis of Americana they claim they have been empowered to guard and represent.

With them it is no wonder the dumb shit average American is easily duped by stupid and unsubstantiated Republican claims that health care reform is just a socialist form of demon worship or a communist plot to bring about world enslavement under a demon seed Manchurian candidate Muslim represented in the person of Barack Obama.

In actually universal health care is not a demon or a political system but common sense policy that strengthens the community's underpinnings as they are intended to be in any modern fair and just society.

When exactly did the public educational system in this country become so verifiability worthless that it continually failed to teach people the basic use of logic, common sense and the workings of our political system. Nearly half of these Americans have apparently turned into a nation of idiots who now spend their free time having doubts about the sitting president's birth and citizenship. Or openly preach discrimination and hatred towards any and all people who are not of white European heritage, religion or in agreement with their personal sexual morality standards. These people think gun ownership and use is the highest right in the land surpassing the overall security of the country and any and all others major issues of the day, including their own life or death.

In California these substance negative flag waving zealots have so severely limited the ability of the State to tax the citizens through bogus self centered people's initiatives that the government cannot fulfill the most basic of the State's responsibilities. Fuck paying for education, infrastructure or any other thing that used to represent what a progressive community felt were the basic requirements of a modern civilized society. Fuck you all I don't believe in taxes. You can all go die in hell, while at this very moment they are trying to bring this bullshit based form of government financing to my State. These are the self righteous, phony, religious types so selfish they see no benefit in helping others by the simple act of paying their fair share in taxes.

Ironically un-Christ like in their actions while preaching the tenets of their freaking doctored and misinterpreted self serving good book as justification for any and all of their wild hair up your ass ideas. These people call themselves Christians and hypocritically point fingers accusingly at those who are fortunate enough not to have gotten involved in the hypocrisy. I have news for you bastards your about as far from Christ like as Bozo the freaking Clown. If a hell exist, I'm sure your going to be the ones who burn the brightest and the longest in the fire of eternal freaking damnation.

It's only a matter of time before one of these self righteous gerbil wheel brained fuckers does something real crazy being all full of their own self fulfilling diarrhea of stupid god on our side baseless ideas of what is right and wrong. Driven over the edge by Sara Palin's phony outrage or just one to many Glenn Beck shows watched or neo Nazi themes rationalized out there in the boonies before they snap like a cheap rope pulling too much dead weight. It won't be pretty I'm sure we all fear and realize.

Obstructionist Senators Need To Hear From You On Healthcare Reform Now

If you haven't heard yet there are six conservative Senators who sent a letter to Senate leadership requesting a delay on health care reform legislation. Despite their phony proselytizing about their concern for the health of the American people, the phony reasoning for delay they layout is their supposed concern about costs.

The real reason is they are shills for the medical industry interests and wingnut conservatives in the states they come from who want things to remain the same. I think we all need to contact these so called representatives and tell them how we really feel about their obstructionism.

This delaying tactic is the same one the opponents of Hillarycare in 1994 used to stop that attempt at reform. Fifty years of talking about health care reform in this country must end now.

The six Senate obstructionists are listed below. I suggest you pick one, google their website and write an email to them about your objections to ANY delay of health care reform.

Ben Nelson (D) Nebraska (ringleader)
Olympia Snowe (R) Maine
Joe Lieberman (I) Connecticut
Mary Landrieu (D) Louisiana
Ron Wyden (D) Oregon
Susan M Collins (R) Maine

Here's my email letter to Senator Nelson sent through his website that may give you an rough outline when composing your letter.

Dear Senator Nelson,

Americans are dying out here in the real world because of political obstructionist like you.

Your continuing attempts to stall or kill health care reform are hypocritical and show what a shill you are for the powers who want to block health care progress in this country. You say you are concerned about cost, but your record shows you had little of no concern about costs when industry supported bills like the Medicare Modernization Act of 2003 was passed or when it came to supporting the boondoggle of a god damn war in Iraq with billions of dollars without question.

That's because the truth is your either a total ignoramus or totally in the bag with the medical industry forces who want to maintain the status quo.

Probably both.

Your a phony and soon everyone will realize it. I will do everything in my power personally to see that you are defeated and I will work with other individuals who oppose your continued obstructionism should you run for reelection. We need Senators in this country who actually have the personal courage to finally fix the health care mess and fight for the people not the interest of the wealthy.

God knows we don't need anymore cronies of big business like you. We've got the totally brain dead Republican party for that. And you call yourself a Democrat. What Bullshit!

Sincerely,

Daniel O'Brien
Vashon, WA

Below is Obama's weekly address that points out that delay is exactly what we don't need now.

Obama's Remarkable Speech To NAACP

This 35 minute speech I think is one of the President's best lately. Worth spending the time to watch. God I love this president's ability to communicate. Every old white man bigot in America should be required to watch this.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

25 Year Old Bay Area Geek Who Facilitates Iranian Web Protests Info Under Direct Attack From Iran

Austin Heap a 25 year old bay area geek and IT director is developing a program called haystack that allows Iranian protesters to get their message through to the outside world in spite of the Iranian government establishment attempts to shutdown internet and phone access.

Heap has become somewhat of a local Iranian community and media darling since he developed methods that allowed Iranians to tweet and use other web communities to report what they see and hear is going on on the ground in Iran in the early days of the recent protests.

Prior to the the uprising Heap knew little about the internal workings of Iran. But he started the project because he strongly believes in free speech. "Americans ignored the subversion of their democracy. When the Iranians stood up to secure theirs, I could not let them down. The revolution may not be televised, but it will be tweeted." Heap is quoted as saying.

"Heap's weapon in the past few days was the proxy server, a computer configured to act as an intermediary between a computer user and the Internet. Such servers have many legitimate functions, such as speeding response times, and some illegitimate ones, such as helping spammers hide their identities."

What interested Heap was the use of a proxy server to bypass censorship. Properly configured, a proxy server could identify Web surfers in Iran and route them to Twitter and other sites the government had restricted. People around the world were posting network addresses for such proxies on Twitter and elsewhere, Heap said, but there was no organization and the servers were unpredictable."

Heap needs your help. His web server has been under attack directly by the Iranian government and that's the least of his problems. He is attempting to bring other willing programmers to San Francisco to work on the project but lacks the funds. He is trying disparately to get Haystack completed to coincide with the upcoming general strike in Iran. You can help by donating money and getting the word out to your friends and their friends in your online social communities like twitter, facebook and myspace.

Pictures From Space Station Include Vashon Seattle Tacoma

Thirty-five great photos taken over the last several months of the earth from the ISS. One photo even features the center of my universe Vashon Island, WA. via: boston.com big picture

Iran We hear Your Cry For Freedom!

I see the battle taking place in Iran as one between generations. The old one who remembers the 1979 uprising and blindly believe in the leaders who came to power in that earlier revolution and, the younger generation that sees the outside world and longs for greater personal freedom and a move away form an autocratic government.

Ironically the older generation always sees its revolution as being different from the one that follows. They suppress and brand the protesters as a "mob" or illegitimate, yet they are no more illegitimate then their generation was when they called for revolution in the past. "don't stand in the doorway don't block up the hall" , as Dylan put it in the song "times they are a changing".

There is a interesting story here about Neda the woman shot dead by a police sniper in the first days of the protests. Her violent death has become a symbol of the brutal suppression of the protests by Iranian authorities. Apparently her own mother is in denial about the responsibility for her death being caused by the those in power.“That’s what comes from pouring into the streets,” the mother is quoted as saying in the story. In the same story her brother talks of the disconnect between the older and younger generation in present day Iran.

Polaroid Sunset

Right Wing Media Enabling Racists Extremists And Lunatic Fringe

The ex-wife of James von Brunn, the racist nut who shot up the holocaust museum in Washington, DC yesterday, says she divorced him because he was totally consumed with hatred for Jews and "Negros" that “ate him alive like a cancer”.

How the heck can one be so fucking hateful and not be call on it by someone. Maybe it's because most of these nuts feel justified by what the right wing media passes off as news these days. Joe Scarborough of MSNBC thought it quite comical at the time that the Department of Homeland Security report indicated that right wing extremist groups and individuals posed a terror treat to the US. He remains to this day one of the biggest dumbshits on cable TV.

Hey Joe now that we've had the Tiller murder and the holocaust shooting, both by right wing crazies, what do you think of that DHS report now?

More Proof Senator Shelby Is An Idiot!

He claims that health care system in US is "best health care in the world". Well, that maybe if you actually have coverage provided and your an insulated rich SOB. Shelby somehow misses the point that we have the most expensive system in he world delivering what could the the worst coverage for the money spent, or that there are millions who have no medical coverage at all. We also have a huge population of unhealthy fat assess with no idea of what healthy living looks like. Many of these medically challenged obese are located in the region of the country where Shelby is considered to be a genius.

Gordon Brown Calls Omaha Beach "Obama Beach" in Speech

Whoops!

Moving Sculpture On Omaha Beach Comemorates D Day

Les Braves, by French sculptor Anilore Banon set up on Omaha Beach makes a moving statement I think that out does conventional attempts to portray just what happen that June day in 1944.

via: winds of change net

Alcoholic Monkeys Not Just Found At The Local Party

I always thought that people acted like monkeys when they indulged too much at the local party. Now I come to find out that monkeys mirror people with their drinking habits and actions after getting hammered. We're lucky monkeys can't drive.

A Photo Of Every Apple Product Ever Released

Yes a photo of every Apple product that's every been released. If you like to see a even bigger enlargement click here.

A New Practical Party Instead of the Republican Party Perhaps

I say woe to the left if someone could put together a political party that supported a mix between the best of libertarian thinking (not ideology) while also supporting practical efficient and needed basic government services to citizens. I think the Democrats would have their hands full. One of the best things about Obama has been his basic belief in doing what works, not necessarily doing what ideologues in his party or the other want.

Jesse Ventura the ex wrestler and former Governor of Minnesota, who appeared on CNN last night, seems to also be interested in doing what works when it comes to politics. As we all know by now Ventura is an interesting character and definitely a man's man type of fellow who is unbowed by the typical rhetoric from both the left of right.

I admire his ability to think for himself and not just blindly go with the flow like most ideologues and idiots do on both the right and the left. He got me thinking, especially in the light of the pending demise of the Republican Party who’s old angry white guy theme seems to be headed nowhere or the a left wing led Congress with the likes of go with the flow Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi or more Republican than Democratic Democrats

If independent populist reformers and libertarians like Ventura every completely got over their fear of government and its intervention in the lives of common people when necessary to provide basic public services we'd probably have something. I think they would be a formidable political force and the alternative to the present day no idea Republicans or the obstructing right wing Democratic types.

Let's call it the Practical Party. A new party that would be willing to be open minded enough to support a national health care program, for instance, or see the benefit of social security for the elderly. Or be open to things like federally mandated worker protections and unions. Or stop interfering in marriage rights of its citizens or interjecting religion into politics. Or make it a policy to curtail American propensity for xenophobia and militarism.

Instead of just the ideological of every man or woman for himself or no tax anti government of any type that pervade most of the right wing types or the equally frustrating lemming like lefties that toe the party line even when it's not working or practical. I'm talking a hybrid here, so let's simply forget the use of too many labels.

Admittedly Ventura has never been one to follow any one ideology. He seems more interested in practical solutions to the problems at hand and solutions that offer the least amount of government intervention into the private affairs of citizens. He wants to decriminalize drugs, create rapid transit and rail, and prosecutes Cheney and anyone else involved in torture, get organized religion out of politics and on and on. He supports same sex marriage civil unions and many things most liberals, lefties and libertarians would agree with.

He now is living in Mexico part time and as he said "off the grid". He claims he watches no TV anymore and instead does lots of reading and surfing. If nothing else he is definitely an original and one has to admire him for that. Here is the interview from Larry King last night.

UFCW Single Payer Ad Attacks Insurance Companies

Let it be so Mr President!

Gay Marriage Proponents Attack On Bimbo Miss California Counterproductive

Okay she’s as dumb as a post. but I believe the 21 year old sheltered and conservative Carrie Prejean may not be the best target for gay marriage proponents to focus their wrath. As we all know now, she mangled the $20000 dollar question about gay marriage during the Miss America pageant and invented a new definition in the American lexicon of “opposite marriage” doing it.

First off Perez Hilton called the woman a “cunt” on cable television the day after which had to play badly and flame the fire with the vary people the gay marriage movement seeks support. It went down hill from there. I believe that Hilton’s antics played badly with straight moderates and independents in the middle of this question.

I also think this type of behavior from Hilton and the likes of Michael Musto cheapen the conversation and made gay talking heads look petty and superficial. The 21 years old beauty pageant contestant from a conservative family probably has a better chance to go to the moon then to know anything about the issue of gay marriage. She was viciously and immediately attacked for the mistake of stating her ditto head opinions.

I realize that same sex marriage is a civil right that needs to be codified in law throughout the nation. Perez Hilton and other self appointed gay marriage spokespersons lower themselves and the bar to the level of the opposition when they trivialize and belittle this unworldly blond little Miss Sunshine. I believe Miss Prejean would have had her 15 minutes of fame and that would have been the end of it except for the antics of Hilton and others to demonize her based on her own ignorance. In the end they made it all about intolerance, her and her breast augmentation.

Hilton certainly had a teachable moment, but instead he decided to turn it into drama queen catfight. I think Hilton saw that there’s no such thing as bad publicity and reviled in promoting the controversy by calling the woman a “dumb bitch” the night of the pageant then retracting the statement only to reinstate it the next day, adding that he should of called her a “the C word” instead. Then there’s the leaked news that the woman’s tits weren’t even real. She had a boob job paid for by the Miss California people I guess. It seemed like the leak was a cheap shot aimed at solidifying the beauty queen’s bimbonic status. Hypocrisy from the gay community that spends a lot of time dressing things up to make them appear like something else.

Most straight women, and many men, who are supportive of gay marriage would not approve of a woman being called a bimbo and cunt on national TV no matter what their feelings on the legalities of same sex marriage. Hilton selfishly inflamed the controversy with his potty mouth for personal gain, fame and fortune, using the righteousness of the gay marriage issue as a smokescreen. This motivation poisoned most meaningful and respectable discussion of the issue from the beginning of the controversy. Perez has also helped make the woman a national symbol for bigots to roll out when needed. I think it painted the same sex marriage movement as intolerant and reactionary rather then what it really is a rights movement interested in simple justice. God she’s freaking beauty queen, not a Harvard lawyer.

In the end I think most straight people saw the whole drama as overkill or ganging up on a weakling who really didn't deserve that much attention.