Good Morning, Everyone. I hope you enjoy today with family and friends.
hat tip POU:
Dallas Boy Scout Troop 914 makes history with 12 new Eagle Scouts
Dallas’s own Boy Scout Troop 914 honored a whopping 12 Eagle Scouts on Nov. 6, 2010.
While 12 is already an unheard-of number to achieve as the highestest rank in Scouting at one time from one troop, these boys made history for yet another reason.
All 12 2010 Eagle Scout graduates in Troop 914 are African-American.
According to Boy Scouts of America National Council, this is the second time in history this many African-American Scouts have earned the highest rank of Eagle Scout at one time.
Inspired by retired SMU professor Dr. Emeritus Zan Wesley Holmes Jr. of the Perkins School of Theology, former Scout Master Allen Avery and current Assistant Scout Master San Salvador Edwards started Cub Scout Pack 914 in 1996.
At the time, the troop had four members, all aged around five or six years old. Since then, the troop has produced nearly 40 Eagle Scouts.
“We couldn’t let our boys go by the wayside,” Edwards said. “I got involved because my son wanted to get involved.”
Edwards, an active member of the community and Scout representative for the New St. Luke Eagle Scouts based in St. Luke “Community” United Methodist Church, is a role model and father figure to many of the boys in Troop 914.
Xavier Barkwell, one of the original four members of Troop 914, is now finishing up his first semester at the Naval Academy.
“My grandmother coerced me into doing [Boy Scouts],” Barkwell said. “She thought it would be a good thing for me to do.”
Though he confesses that he didn’t really like Scouting at first, he said that the experiences he had and the relationships he built have helped get him to where he is now. Avery and particularly Edwards are both like fathers to him.
“Mr. San… I would assume that he considers me like another son,” Barkwell said. “If I ever need anything, he’s there for me. He’s always looking out for me. His son is like my brother. Actually, I call him my brother when I introduce him to people. They’re like another family to me.”
Troop 914 claims that it is unique for several reasons, but the one to which Barkwell credits its success is that the troop is all-inclusive; whereas, other troops seem to be exclusive to a certain group or type of people.
Historically, when they were founded in 1910, Boy Scouts were segregated into white troops and ‘colored troops.’ There were still troops in the south that remained segregated until 1970. According to Barkwell, many troops still tend to be all, or basically all, one race.
“We’re a very diverse troop,” he said. “Other troops may be a little more conservative or centered around one or maybe two races. But it looks good to see a troop that’s not centered around one thing.”
Scouts in Troop 914 are black, white, all types of Hispanic and Asian.
“We are mostly an African-American troop, but we welcome everybody,” Edwards said. “We are the most diverse troop in the area.”
He and current Scout Master Keith Kennedy attribute the diversity to Troop 914′s uniqueness as a whole.
“We took the Boy Scouts program and tweaked it a little bit to make sure our boys understand life lessons,” Edwards said.
Life lessons include skills like how to treat people, particularly women, with respect, proper courtesy and manners for various occasions and even how to change a tire.
“I mean, why would you want to go on a date and the guy doesn’t know how to change a tire?” Edwards said.
Scoutmaster Keith Kennedy underscored the group’s community service projects.
His son Dillon, at age 13 a precocious Eagle Scout, registered 70 people as bone marrow and organ donors. Jordan McRae, 16, collected more than 500 books for the library at East Dallas Community School.
Jordan wrote famous Eagle Scouts asking for help, and received from Ross Perot about 300 books and a personal interview.
“His Eagle project came off without a hitch,” said Velena McRae, his mother.
The ceremony included remarks from dignitaries, including Dallas Police Chief David Brown. William Edwards, 16, got the biggest laugh in speaking for the Eagle Scout group.
“Yes, we’ve been camping a lot,” he said. “A little too much, if you ask me.”
Earnest Lloyd places the Eagle pin on the pocket of his son, Matthew Lloyd.
Obama to attend memorial for shooting victims in Colorado
President Obama is preparing to visit Aurora, Colo., on Sunday to attend a memorial service for the victims of Friday’s mass shooting at a movie theater that killed a dozen people, according to law enforcement sources.
Read more at:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/
from the WHERE IS MY PONY AND UNICORN CROWD….
I swear….some of these folks will snap the last Black nerve.
……………………………………………….
The Obama Campaign Is Unworthy of a Democratic President
Posted: 07/20/2012 5:51 pm
As a Democrat and a staunch support of Barack Obama, I am completely disgusted by his campaign. Are we talking about the President of the United States? Are we talking about a principled man who has boosted our ideal for a fair and equitable America? Does this have anything to do with the American people?
1. A harassing campaign
Everybody takes turns to bombard us with e-mails, phone calls to chip in for one reason or the other. Even those of us who asked to only receive selective information.
To that “presidential” harassment one needs to add what the Democratic Party does: strangely enough they only call and e-mail to collect money. Never to tell us what are the important causes for the Party.
Last but not least, the individual candidates do the same: we have not heard from them either for the previous four years.
This creates an impression of frenetic nervousness and not the strength that we expect from the President and incumbent candidate.
2. It’s all about money while this is a Republican weaponry
……………………………………….
3. Is the function of a presidential campaign to become an advertising machine?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/georges-ugeux/the-obama-campaign-is-unw_b_1690930.html
FUCK’EM!
Are People Afraid that Blue Ivy Carter Is Going to Look “Too Black”?
by Dr. Boyce Watkins
You would fully expect that in the year 2012, black people would not have a problem looking black. But you would never guess that after seeing the reactions that many people had to seeing public pictures of Jay-Z and Beyonce’s daughter, Blue Ivy Carter. The photos of the little girl emerged, with the baby looking as beautiful and precious as one can imagine. But of course, when you put your baby out into cyberspace, the haters are going to emerge in full force, like an army of Cavity Creeps in a Crest commercial, all looking for blood.
People began analyzing the baby’s face and noticing that she looks like (surprise!) her father, Jay-Z. Jay-Z doesn’t have the same Eurocentric features that Beyonce is known for. Actually, when Beyonce had her skin lightened, I thought I was looking at her friend, Gwyneth Paltrow. Jay-Z’s ancestors were born on the other side of Africa, and perhaps his great, great, great grandmother didn’t have the “honor” of getting that late night visit from “massa” to lighten up his gene pool.
In all seriousness, Jay-Z has those pre-Michael Jackson features that so many of us still seem to dread: Big lips, the wide nose, and all the other things that make him look (gasp!) African American.
http://www.kulturekritic.com/2012/07/uncategorized/people-are-afraid-that-blue-ivy-carter-is-going-to-look-too-black/#
I can’t; I.JUST.CAN’T. today.
I know.
is there NOBODY that will talk to Boyce?
Romney Must Win Florida
by BooMan
Sat Jul 21st, 2012 at 01:25:42 PM EST
A new Survey USA poll of Florida shows Obama leading Romney 48%-43%. Even better, registered Republicans are significantly overrepresented in the poll. Mitt Romney must hope that these numbers are badly off, because a look at the electoral college calculator shows conclusively that Romney must win Florida. Let me explain.
If Obama wins Florida, he can lose the following states that he won in 2008 and still be elected with 271 electoral votes (one more than is needed to become president):
New Hampshire
Pennsylvania
Ohio
Indiana
Iowa
Virginia
North Carolina
Alternatively, if Obama were to win Florida and hold Pennsylvania, he could win with 271 votes while losing the following states that he won in 2008:
New Hampshire
Ohio
Indiana
Iowa
New Mexico
Colorado
Nevada
If you want to introduce Wisconsin into the conversation the math is a little different. But Romney would have to pretty much run the table on these states even if he won Wisconsin. For example, if Obama simply held Colorado and lost all the others, including Wisconsin, he’d still hit the 270 mark.
Romney cannot afford to lose Florida. If he loses Florida, it would take a miracle for him to win the election.
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2012/7/21/132542/002
And thus, Rick Scott’s embolden attempts to SUPPRESS FLVOTERS…
The Case Against Romney Releasing His Returns
Alex Altman makes it:
Set aside the moral or civic cases for the virtues of transparency. From a purely political perspective, Romney should dig in his heels on this position, particularly if we assume he’s correctly weighed the consequences of his options. Suppose, to pick one possibility at random, that Romney paid a very low tax rate for one or more years. Such a disclosure wouldn’t end the discussion; it would fan the flames. The Obama campaign would cut more ads casting Romney as a rapacious capitalist, except these would be buttressed by new facts in place of mere insinuations.
Adam Sorensen counters:
Morality and civic virtue don’t have anything to do with presidential politics now? That’s nuts.
Romney should release his returns on principle alone. Full financial disclosure is important in politics because you never know what tomfoolery human beings interested in power might have gotten up to. This isn’t case-specific: Romney strikes me as an upstanding guy who’s probably never so much as jay walked in his life. He’s an eagle scout. Just a rich one with a low tax rate. But as a general rule, we’re much better off erring on the side of disclosure with our leaders. We’re handing off the nuclear football, after all. If that’s not compelling enough, there’s policy value in seeing how little he paid. Call it a teachable moment for American revenue.
If he gets away with this, it will mark a new Palin-level of opacity with respect to the democratic process. It’s creepy, arrogant and contemptuous of the good judgment of the American people.
http://andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com/2012/07/the-case-against-romney-releasing-his-returns.html
Sat Jul 21, 2012 at 06:00 AM PDT.
Mother Jones finds two more major Romney outsourcing investments
More David Corn:
In recent weeks, Barack Obama and Mitt Romney have accused each other of being an “outsourcer in chief,” as their campaigns have tussled over Romney’s past at Bain Capital and the (non)release of his tax returns. But all this scuffling hasn’t taken into account an until-now unreported fact about Romney’s days at Bain: When he was running the private equity firm, he invested tens of millions of dollars in a pair of companies that specialized in outsourcing high-tech manufacturing and that developed offshore production facilities in Mexico, China, and elsewhere to build electronics for US firms.
In March 1999, shortly after Romney left Bain to take over the troubled Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, Brookside Capital Investors Inc., a Bain-related entity wholly owned by Romney, filed a report with the Securities and Exchange Commission that listed dozens of companies in which Brookside held a stake the previous quarter. The roster included investments in Singapore-based Flextronics International ($13 million) and Florida-headquartered Jabil Circuit Inc. ($41 million), two companies that were leaders in the fast-growing field of outsourcing electronics manufacturing and offshoring production to low-wage countries. Together, these two investments represented almost 10 percent of Brookside’s $559 million portfolio
At this point, should be obvious to anyone paying any sort of attention that Mitt Romney invested millions and made millions as pioneer of outsourcing. If he’s really as big a believer in free enterprise as he claims, Romney should be defending what he did, not denying it. But none of this has anything to do with principle for Romney. He’s running for office, and he’ll say whatever he thinks he needs to say to win. Just like he did at Bain.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/07/21/1112171/-Mother-Jones-finds-two-more-major-Romney-outsourcing-investments
Romney’s encouragement of Obama nuttiness
By Dana Milbank, Published: July 20
On an official Mitt Romney campaign conference call this week, former New Hampshire governor John Sununu tested the latest effort to paint the commander in chief as disloyal to his country.
“I wish this president would learn how to be an American,” the Romney surrogate said.
Sununu, challenged, later apologized for the words — but not the sentiment. And that’s not good enough.
It’s not good enough because Sununu, like other prominent Republicans, is winking at those conservatives who continue to make the claim, often race-based, that President Obama is something un-American, something “other” than the rest of us. On Thursday, two days after Sununu’s attack, Romney himself said that Obama lacks “an understanding of what it is that makes America such a unique nation.”
Sununu and Romney are legitimizing people such as Cliff Kincaid. Also on Thursday, Kincaid convened his annual conference at the National Press Club for conspiracy-minded conservatives, this one about Obama and “Radical Islam.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/dana-milbank-romneys-encouragement-of-the-obama-conspiracies/2012/07/20/gJQAlFXWyW_story.html?tid=pm_opinions_pop
AFGE Defends Democracy – Know Your Voting Rights
Great find. Thank you!
Mitt Romney Is Lying About His Prior Financial Support For Outsourcing
By Elias Isquith July 21st, 2012
At times it’s been lost in the billowing dust resulting from the Battle For Glenn Kessler’s Soul, but the entire conversation over whether or not Romney was Bain Capital CEO from 1999-2002 is only important insofar as it relates to outsourcing. Romney’s tried to argue that since he wasn’t CEO of Bain Capital when the private equity firm did most of its investments in outsourcing, he shouldn’t be held responsible. As most of us have since been convinced, this is bullshit — twice over. But the focus has been largely on the first claim (that he wasn’t CEO) rather than the second (that he did not finance outsourcing operations).
Well, here comes Mother Jones’ David Corn and Nick Baumann to inform us that — surprise, surprise — Romney most certainly did put his money behind outsourcing:
In March 1999, shortly after Romney left Bain to take over the troubled Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, Brookside Capital Investors Inc., a Bain-related entity wholly owned by Romney, filed a report with the Securities and Exchange Commission that listed dozens of companies in which Brookside held a stake the previous quarter. The roster included investments in Singapore-based Flextronics International ($13 million) and Florida-headquartered Jabil Circuit Inc. ($41 million), two companies that were leaders in the fast-growing field of outsourcing electronics manufacturing and offshoring production to low-wage countries. Together, these two investments represented almost 10 percent of Brookside’s $559 million portfolio
And remember how much outrage Republicans expressed over the Obama campaign’s describing Romney as an outsourcing “pioneer?” I suppose a motivated fact-checker could find ‘cause, still, to find that claim outrageous after reading the following. But I doubt most the rest of us will:
Michael Marks, the American chairman and CEO of Flextronics at the time, was an outsourcing trailblazer and booster. “It is increasingly clear that outsourcing of electronics manufacturing is gaining momentum and acceptance in the world,” he declared in early 1999, noting that electronics firms “continue to divest [manufacturing] facilities.” Though Flextronics had operations in the United States, one of its key manufacturing facilities was in China—where it operated a 450,000-square-foot industrial hub.
A 1998 Flextronics prospectus reported: “We plan to significantly expand our industrial parks in China, Hungary and Mexico, and we recently purchased an 88-acre site in Sao Paulo, Brazil, where we plan to establish a new industrial park.” It also noted, “[O]ur growth is driven by the accelerating pace at which leading [electronics companies] are adopting outsourcing as a core business strategy.” Its key clients, it stated, were 3Com, Cisco, Microsoft, Hewlett-Packard, and Philips.
In a profile in Chief Executive magazine, Marks dismissed concern about shipping US jobs overseas. “Outsourcing is good for America,” he insisted. The magazine crowned him the king of electronics outsourcing: “Marks, more than anyone else, is responsible for the outsourcing trend in the tech industry.” And Romney had provided him capital for his efforts.
Yes, Flextronics had other backers; Romney wasn’t the sole reason this “outsourcing trailblazer and booster” enjoyed such great success. But for the GOP to argue that Mitt had nothing to do with the boom in outsourcing over the past 15 years is now, inarguably, absurd.
http://www.balloon-juice.com/2012/07/21/mitt-romney-is-lying-about-his-prior-financial-support-for-outsourcing/
Mitt Stands for Nothing
by BooMan
Sat Jul 21st, 2012 at 10:17:08 AM EST
Most people probably consider former President Jimmy Carter to be some kind of liberal, but that’s not how he ran for and won the nomination of his party. He was a centrist and moderate reformer, liberal only for his home state of Georgia. He was distinct from opponents like George Wallace in the South, from neo-conservatives like Scoop Jackson of Washington, and from liberals like Frank Church, Birch Bayh, and Sargent Shriver. If Carter represented a wing of the party, it was an emerging one. He came from the Southern wing of the party that accepted the righteousness of the Civil Rights Era. He was much more Blue Dog than liberal, and he governed that way, too, for the most part.
I was thinking about this when I read that George W. Bush will not be attending the Republican National Convention, let alone giving a speech there. Poppy Bush also declined an invitation, citing poor health. I hear that Sarah Palin didn’t even receive an invitation to appear. On the one hand, this seems like a whitewashing of history. On the other hand, it brings into stark relief the fact that Mitt Romney doesn’t really represent any faction of the Republican Party. He doesn’t represent Yankee Republicanism because he has completely abandoned the values of traditional New England conservatives in favor of the southern flavor of the national party. It’s not possible to find any issue where Romney is a moderate. This would not be true if Rudy Guiliani or Olympia Snowe or George Pataki were the nominee. There is no regional appeal to Romney. He will not compete for any votes anywhere between Delaware and Maine.
So, where is he taking his party? Carter helped solidify the New South and moderate his party’s racial views. Reagan created a conservative revolution within the GOP that his successor failed to reverse. Bill Clinton helped invent the New Democrats, the DLC, and the Third Way. George W. Bush pushed for compassionate conservatism, which meant big spending with no cops on the beat, and permawar as the cherry on top. Barack Obama created a new coalition and showed the Democrats a new way to win elections.
It seems like all our recent presidents, with the exception of Poppy Bush, have had a major impact on their party. But not Romney. He’s like an empty vessel. He might as well be Haley Barbour. Who could tell the difference?
The Republican National Convention is going to be weird. Dick Cheney might be the only Republican there who has ever been elected to serve in the White House. Maybe Dan Quayle will make it two.
And a Massachusetts conservative will give a speech that could just as well be delivered by Sen. Jefferson Beauregard “Jeff” Sessions III of Alabama.
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2012/7/21/10178/4553
July 20, 2012
The Globe persists
The Boston Globe is hanging on to Mitt’s butt like a Tokay gecko:
Interviews with a half-dozen of Romney’s former partners and associates, as well as public records, show that he was not merely an absentee owner [from 1999 to 2002]. He signed dozens of company documents, including filings with regulators on a vast array of Bain’s investment entities….
Two and a half years after leaving to run the Olympics, Romney finally signed his severance agreement in August 2001. Still, Romney’s name continued to appear as CEO and owner on dozens of Bain fund documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission until January 2002.
All of which reinforces speculation that the release of tax returns extending back to 1999 is essential to deflating both Romney’s Big Lie and his entire campaign.
http://pmcarpenter.blogs.com/p_m_carpenters_commentary/2012/07/the-globe-persists.html
21, 2012
Guessing the worst
Matthew Yglesias’ guess is that “the 2008-09 period … that coincides with major upheavals in financial markets and bank secrecy practices [is] far and away the most likely window for something more politically worrisome than a reputation for reticence.”
And guesses are all we have, since Mitt Romney’s “reputation for reticence”–also known as Nixonian secrecy; but what the hell, that never proved much of a problem, right?–is the only element of steadfastness he has demonstrated to date.
But this guessing business is a great game, since for Romney it’s possessed of a ghastly unendurability (I guess), while for us it’s not only pleasantly endurable, it’s to be downright encouraged. Everyone is free to think the worst of whatever Romney is so obviously hiding, and the tenaciousness of our thinking and guessing will keep him off balance for as long as he’s campaigning in secrecy and fear.
Every presidential wannabe has something to hide. Some handle the pressure of being exposed better than others, though. Much of the bitterness that Dwight Eisenhower felt toward Harry Truman during the former’s 1952 run, for instance, was engendered by Eisenhower’s persistent dread that the sitting president would leak certain compromising letters stored in official Army files about the general’s affair with his very hot chauffeur, Kay Summersby. (During the immediate postwar period Eisenhower was imprudent enough to ask puritanical Chief of Staff George Marshall in writing what he thought about Dwight’s dumping Mamie, taking up with Kay, and living happily ever after–to which Marshall directly responded that the vanquisher of European fascism must have lost his ever-loving mind.)
The point is, Dwight D. Eisenhower could handle pressure. W. Mitt Romney cannot. And it shows. It shows in his terror-drenched stump performances, it shows in his neurotic staff’s desperate distractions, it shows in his witnessed inability to ever permanently hold the line on … anything.
Which is why if I had to take another guess, it would be that Mitt Romney will fold on the tax-return issue, too. If I’m wrong and he doesn’t? That’s OK, because then we can go right on thinking and fondly guessing the worst.
http://pmcarpenter.blogs.com/p_m_carpenters_commentary/2012/07/guessing-the-worst.html
CORPORATIONS THAT PAID NOTHING IN TAXES FOR FOUR YEARS TELLS CONGRESS IT PAYS TO MUCH IN TAXES
Over a four years period from 2008 to 2011, Corning Inc. was one of 26 companies that managed to avoid paying any American income taxes, even though it earned nearly $3 billion during that time. In fact, according to Citizens For Tax Justice, the company received a $4 million refund from 2008 to 2010. That didn’t stop Susan Ford, a senior executive at the company, from telling the House Ways and Means Committee this week that America’s high corporate tax rate was putting her company at a disadvantage:
American manufacturers are at a distinct disadvantage to competitors headquartered in other countries. Specifically, foreign manufacturers uniformly face a lower corporate tax rate than U.S. manufacturers, and virtually all operate under territorial systems which encourage investment both abroad and at home.
Ford told the committee that Corning paid an effective tax rate of 36 percent in 2011, but as CTJ notes, she is counting taxes on profits earned overseas that haven’t yet been paid and won’t be unless the company decides to bring the money back to the United States. Corning’s actual tax rate in 2011, according to CTJ’s analysis, was actually negative 0.2 percent.
http://www.nationofchange.org/corporation-paid-nothing-taxes-four-years-tells-congress-it-pays-too-much-taxes-1342878398
I can’t watch this shit on tee vee pundits trying to dissect that murdering terrorist as someone who is quiet, smart, yadah, yadah, yahda! Even the photo of him is distorted to make him look non-white.
STOP IT! THIS BASTARD WAS A COLD-BLOODED, HEARTLESS, TERRORIST, WHO MURDERED 12 PEOPLE AND CRITICALLY WOUNDED 58 PEOPLE!
$1.5 BILLION OUR TAX PAYING $$$$
Obama Spends the Most, but Romney Raises More
By NICHOLAS CONFESSORE and DEREK WILLIS
Published: July 20, 2012
President Obama outspent Mitt Romney 2 to 1 in June even as Mr. Romney far outraised him, according to campaign reports filed on Friday with the Federal Election Commission, leaving Mr. Obama and the Democratic Party with significantly less cash on hand than Mr. Romney and the Republicans as polls show a head-to-head race.
Mr. Obama and the Democratic National Committee spent $70.8 million in June, including about $38 million on television advertising, as the president’s campaign sought to batter Mr. Romney over his ties to Bain Capital, the private equity firm.
Mr. Romney and the Republican National Committee spent $38.8 million, including about $11 million on television advertising — more than double what Mr. Romney’s campaign spent in May but far less than Mr. Obama.
But because money raised for the election cannot be spent until after the two parties hold their nominating conventions at the end of the summer, Mr. Obama appears to have far more money available to spend in the critical weeks ahead, when each candidate seeks to define the other.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/21/us/politics/obama-spends-the-most-in-june-but-romney-raises-more.html?_r=2&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120721
A Word from 57andfemale
Political ‘speech’ has historically been given more latitude than other ‘free speech’ but only because there were some limitations. There was a mechanism of accountability: all donors had to be disclosed and the amount of their donations would be limited, thereby limiting their influence to some extent. So if you stretched the truth, shaded the truth, manipulated the truth – the people who paid for that ad would be known to the public. It would take a large number of donors to generate said political speech. There were some consequences.
For many, many years, Republicans cried that we didn’t need no stinkin’ campaign finance laws. All we needed was disclosure, which by its very nature would put common sense limits and some accountability on those donors and thereby the campaign that they supported. Where did I hear this? Let me think…….
Oh, yes. Mitch McConnell.
Any many other Republicans.
Those crazy Democrats – well, they always thought that the public would not have its interests represented if there were NO limits on political speech through money. Money would drown out the interests of the people who could in no way compete with corporate and wealthy interests. It would, in fact, be the buying of public office by interests that could afford it more than the $50,000 family of four who would have to choose between school books or ear infection medicine and donating to campaigns. But as I said, those whacky Democrats…..
Fast forward to Citizens United. Money IS speech and well, no one could anticipate that foreign money would finance campaigns (Sheldon Adelson, Barclay’s Bank………) And certainly no one could ever anticipate that corporate money would drown out the interests of the millions of Americans who could not compete with that money. Why, that would be…….crazy.
Here we are. 2012. Mitch McConnell actually said with a straight face (and that may be the straightest face I’ve ever seen on a human being) that IF we demanded disclosure, well, the Koch Bros. might lose business because their customers wouldn’t like what they were advocating.
Someone in polyester elastic waist pants might actually decide to donate $50 to PBO rather than hand it over – I mean, gamble – it away in a Sheldon Adelson casino. Oh, the HORROR. It might hurt their bottom line if the American people saw how every package of Angel Soft was helping to elect Mitt Romney (God forbid). Or every Brawny towel or quarter slot machine might be buying the end of Medicare as we know it, dirty air, no clean energy, no safe food, no safe medications, no health care, no safety net, no investment in infrastructure. But we certainly wouldn’t want to have the Koch Bros. – or Bain Capital — damaged in any way by the TRUTH. Why, that would be anti-capitalism. That would be anti-rich. That would be anti-entitlement. In the truest sense of the word.
To review: unfettered money flowing to political campaigns/PAC’s could be controlled with disclosure. But not one Republican – I’m talking to YOU, John McCain – voted FOR disclosure. Now we have unfettered money — oh, I’m sorry Justice Kennedy, I mean ‘free’ speech – with no controls, no disclosures. Just money – able to lie and cheat and steal and buy our government. Thank you so much, you libertarian piece of crap. Your legacy of ‘freedom’ has now denied millions of Americans the right to an honest, informed election. Are you proud?
Money to LIE.
Which brings me to my point: no longer should political ‘speech’ be exempt from libel or slander laws. Political speech should now be held subject to any and all laws that are on the books to protect the public interest from disinformation. Drug companies aren’t allowed to do it, food manufacturers aren’t allowed to do it. Why should political campaigns and affiliated PAC’s be able to do it?
You manipulate PBO’s statements? You have now broken the law. You cut out what he said to make it sound like he said the opposite? You get your ass sued with an injunction slapped on your ass. And since the airwaves are given to networks as a courtesy, they are REQUIRED to pull such ads.
You want to spend unlimited amounts of money? You don’t want to disclose WHO is spending that money? Then you tell the effing TRUTH or you don’t get access to so much as a used piece of newsprint, much less the networks to spread your lies.
You can’t lie about Angel Soft. You should not be able to lie about PBO.
I await your comments.
http://theobamadiary.com/2012/07/20/a-word-from-57andfemale/
How I lost my fear of Universal Health Care
When I moved to Canada in 2008, I was a die-hard conservative Republican. So when I found out that we were going to be covered by Canada’s Universal Health Care, I was somewhat disgusted. This meant we couldn’t choose our own health coverage, or even opt out if we wanted too. It also meant that abortion was covered by our taxes, something I had always believed was horrible. I believed based on my politics that government mandated health care was a violation of my freedom.
When I got pregnant shortly after moving, I was apprehensive. Would I even be able to have a home birth like I had experienced with my first 2 babies? Universal Health Care meant less choice right? So I would be forced to do whatever the medical system dictated regardless of my feelings, because of the government mandate. I even talked some of having my baby across the border in the US, where I could pay out of pocket for whatever birth I wanted. So imagine my surprise when I discovered that Midwives were not only covered by the Universal health care, they were encouraged! Even for hospital births. In Canada, Midwives and Dr’s were both respected, and often worked together.
I went to my first Midwife appointment and sat in the waiting room looking at the wall of informational pamphlets. I never went to the Dr growing up, we didn’t have health insurance, and my parents preferred a conservative naturopathic doctor anyways. And the doctor I had used for my first 2 births was also a conservative Christian. So I had never seen information on birth control and STDs. One of the pamphlets read “Pregnant Unexpectedly?” so I picked it up, wondering what it would say. The pamphlet talked about adoption, parenthood, or abortion. It went through the basics of what each option would entail and ended by saying that these choices were up to you. I was horrified that they included abortion on the list of options, and fact that the pamphlet was so balanced instead of “pro-life.”
During my appointment that day, the midwife asked her initial round of questions including whether or not I had desired to become pregnant in the first place. Looking back I am not surprised she asked that, I was depressed at the time, (even though I did not list that on my medical chart) and very vocal about my views on birth control (it wasn’t OK, ever.) No wonder she felt like she should ask if I was happy to be having this baby. But I was angry about the whole thing. In my mind, freedom was being violated, my rights were being decided for me by the evils of Universal Health Care.
Fast forward a little past the Canadian births of my third and fourth babies. I had better prenatal care than I had ever had in the States. I came in regularly for appointments to check on my health and my babies’ health throughout my pregnancy, and I never had to worry about how much a test cost or how much the blood draw fee was. I didn’t have to skip my ultrasound because of the expense. With my pregnancies in the States, I had limited my checkups to only a handful to keep costs down. When I went in to get the shot I needed because of my negative blood type, in Canada it was covered. In fact I got the recommended 2 doses instead of the more risky 1 dose because I didn’t have to worry about the expense. I had a wide array of options and flexibility when it came to my birth, and care providers that were more concerned with my health and the health of my baby than how much money they might make based on my birth, or what might impact their reputation best. When health care is universal, Drs are free to recommend and provide the best care for every patient instead of basing their care on what each patient can afford.
I found out that religious rights were still respected. The Catholic hospital in the area did not provide abortions, and they were not required too. I had an amazing medically safe birth, and excellent post-natal care with midwives who had to be trained, certified and approved by the medical system.
I started to feel differently about Universal government mandated and regulated Health care. I realized how many times my family had avoided hospital care because of our lack of coverage. When I mentioned to Canadians that I had been in a car accident as a teen and hadn’t gone into the hospital, they were shocked!
http://ayoungmomsmusings.blogspot.ca/2012/07/how-i-lost-my-fear-of-universal-health.html
These are the kinds of PERSONAL EXPEREICNES we need to hear and read about, not Ann Romney’s opening her trap and condescension to the very folks who are struggling to acheive what she and her family already have.
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ican’tbreeve*******
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Good Morning, Everyone :)
Good Morning, rikyrah & Everyone! :-) great way to start my day with the @nd City video Steph Cutter spoof