Monday, December 31, 2012

Obama Quietly Signs Abusive Spy Bill He Once Vowed to Eliminate


Obama Quietly Signs Abusive Spy Bill He Once Vowed to Eliminate

After Senate rejects oversight amendments, bill sails into law
- Lauren McCauley, staff writer
Under the cover of holiday weekend slumber, President Obama signed into law a five-year extension of the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, successfully solidifying unchecked surveillance authority for the remainder of his presidency.
Known as the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the law extends powers of the National Security Agency to conduct surveillance of Americans’ international emails and phone calls without obtaining a court order for each intercept.
The spying bill would have expired at the end of 2012 without the president's approval, the Associated Press reports.

No Country for Non-Narcissists?

What hope is there for those of us who don't volunteer to put our lives and personal information online, much less those who go out of their way to avoid doing so?

I have an idea for the Non-Narcissists of the world: if a prospective employer asks you why you don't have a Facebook presence, tell them you're too busy doing things to talk about doing things.


Colleges help students scrub online footprints

BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — Samantha Grossman wasn't always thrilled with the impression that emerged when people Googled her name.
"It wasn't anything too horrible," she said. "I just have a common name. There would be pictures, college partying pictures, that weren't of me, things I wouldn't want associated with me."
So before she graduated from Syracuse University last spring, the school provided her with a tool that allowed her to put her best Web foot forward. Now when people Google her, they go straight to a positive image — professional photo, cum laude degree and credentials — that she credits with helping her land a digital advertising job in New York.
"I wanted to make sure people would find the actual me and not these other people," she said.

Today's GOP - A Year in Review


Sunday, December 30, 2012

"Toto, I Believe We're Not in Kansas Anymore. Thank God!"

Need I say more?

Kansas Pursues Child Support From Sperm Donor
TOPEKA -- A Kansas man who signed away any parental rights when he donated sperm to a Topeka couple is now being pursued by the state for child support after the mother received financial assistance for the baby.
A lawyer for William Marotta argues that the state’s effort to have Marotta declared the baby’s father runs contrary to a 2007 Kansas Supreme Court ruling on sperm donors, The Topeka Capital-Journal reported.
A hearing on Marotta’s motion to dismiss the case is scheduled for Jan. 8 in Shawnee County District Court.
Marotta, a Topeka mechanic who has taken in foster children with his wife, answered a Craigslist ad in 2009 from a lesbian couple seeking a sperm donor.

Westboro Baptist Church vs Occupy Wall Street


The Job Market: Occupy Wall Street Teaches Mathematics


The Minimum Wage Job


Whiplash!!! Or Why I Have Not Commented on the Chained CPI Social Security Scam.

First of all, a short primer: 

The Chained CPI, or the Chained Consumer Price Index, is an alternative way to implement a Cost of Living Adjustment for Social Security. It is essentially a CUT in benefits, when measuring benefits against inflation and the cost of living. The long winded explanation of what a Chained CPI is, can be found here.

In short, it's a very, very bad idea for America.

But I haven't commented on this enormously important issue because, frankly, it's hard to tell where Chess Grandmaster Barack Obama and the Democrats have stood on this. The GOP, of course, wants to get rid of Social Security, and they'll settle for deep cuts. But Obama has been all over the board on this issue. First Dem US Senator Harry Reid says he is against it, now Obama says he offered it as a compromise to avoid the Fiscal Cliff, then it's off the table completely. What?

If you're as confused as me as to where the wind is blowing here, then now you know why I've refrained from screaming bloody murder at the Democrats for caving on this, and also from saying the Chained CPI is dead, dead, dead.

I don't know WTF is going on with these people...

Social Security and the National Debt: An Explanation So Simple Even a Republican Can Get It!


Stay Strong, Taverner of Democratic Underground: To Hell With Military Worship

A brave soul named Taverner has chosen to take on the "worship the military" culture not just once, but twice this week on the Democratic Underground. Taverner is totally right - no war since World War II has been for the defense of this country. Almost all the wars we've been in - including every one since 1945 - have been for the taking of other people's land and resources, and for corporate profit.

In the words of tblue on the same thread, I'm 90% with Taverner on this. Support the wounded warriors, but bring them all home!


I do not worship the ground our military walks on

A Drug Whose Price Jumped From $50 to $28,000. Ain't Capitalism Great?

This is one instance where the Government should take over production.


Questcor Finds Profits, at $28,000 a Vial



THE doctor was dumbfounded: a drug that used to cost $50 was now selling for $28,000 for a 5-milliliter vial.
The physician, Dr. Ladislas Lazaro IV, remembered occasionally prescribing this anti-inflammatory, named H.P. Acthar Gel, for goutback in the early 1990s. Then the drug seemed to fade from view. Dr. Lazaro had all but forgotten about it, until a sales representative from a company called Questcor Pharmaceuticals appeared at his office and suggested that he try it for various rheumatologic conditions.
“I’ve never seen anything like this,” Dr. Lazaro, a rheumatologist in Lafayette, La., says of the price increase.
How the price of this drug rose so far, so fast is a story for these troubled times in American health care — a tale of aggressive marketing, questionable medicine and, not least, out-of-control costs. At the center of it is Questcor, which turned the once-obscure Acthar into a hugely profitable wonder drug and itself into one of Wall Street’s highest fliers.

Saturday, December 29, 2012

Just a Reminder of What Capitalism Really Is


Justice for the Women of India! A Tale of Women's Struggles in Pictures


Powerful Photographs Of India Demanding Justice For Women


Paul Krugman: "Is Growth Over?"

Paul Krugman hits on something I've been talking about to real life people for years... growth is mainly going to the 1%, not the 99%. The economic changes, aka creative destruction, that has gone on since the 1980s, has been mostly destructive to the working class. Traditional economic theory says there's no such thing as a zero-sum game in economics. Well, the pattern over the last 30 years has been that it's a plus sum game for the Plutocracy... and a negative sum game for everyone else. Paul Krugman is catching on. But just as insightful are the comments that follow. Read past his article to see comments by John Hamilton, Rolland Norman, scpa, Fred, Val Szymanski, CT, Fred Hornan, and definitely do NOT miss the comment by Deathbyinches.


Is Growth Over?

The great bulk of the economic commentary you read in the papers is focused on the short run: the effects of the “fiscal cliff” on U.S. recovery, the stresses on the euro, Japan’s latest attempt to break out of deflation. This focus is understandable, since one global depression can ruin your whole day. But our current travails will eventually end. What do we know about the prospects for long-run prosperity?
The answer is: less than we think.



Belated, Hilarious And Plausible Christmas Cartoon


Will the Pope EVER Reign in His Rabid Dog Priests?


Priest says women bring sexual and physical violence on themselves

How often do we see girls and mature women going around scantily dressed and in provocative clothes?They provoke the worst instincts, which end in violence or sexual abuse. They should search their consciences and ask: did we bring this on ourselves?

Friday, December 28, 2012

The Cost of War vs the Cost to Eradicate Hunger


Do You Support Globalization? Then You Need to Read This.


Letter from Chinese Laborer Pleading for Help Found in Halloween Decorations

Julie Keith was unpacking some of last year's Halloween decorations when she stumbled upon an upsetting letter wedged into the packaging.
Tucked in between two novelty headstones that she had purchased at Kmart, she found what appeared to be a letter from the Chinese laborer, who had made the decoration,pleading for help
The letter reads: "Sir, if you occasionally buy this product, please kindly resend this letter to the World Human Right Organization. Thousands people here who are under the persicution of the Chinese Communist Party Government will thank and remember you forever." 

"I was so frustrated that this letter had been sitting in storage for over a year, that this person had written this plea for help and nothing had come of it." Julie Keith told Yahoo! Shine. "Then I was shocked. This person had probably risked their life to get this letter in this package." 

Why I, Who Sympathize With Revolutionary Leftists, Vote Democrat Without Flinching

Let me lead off with what ticks me off about the Democratic Party.

One, they cave more than Fred Flintstone. The GOP - the ENTIRE GOP - will move in lock step in voting down any Congressional bill that represents a liberal, much less leftist approach to solving society's problems. Democrats will yield against this Sparta-style opposition and hand us BS like an Affordable Care Act with a corporate health insurance purchase mandate AND NO PUBLIC OPTION. You want to know what enrages me the most about Democrats? Their gutlessness. Their well-earned reputation of utter, weak kneed gutlessness. Then there's the drones. Nothing seems to say "summary execution" and "to hell with due process" quite like a remotely-piloted aircraft dropping bombs on innocent children in foreign countries. Democrats, with notable and very loud exceptions, swallow the nonsense that this is all about protecting America. President Obama on one hand mourns the deaths of American kids in a mass shooting, but on the other hand stands by while drones kill 21 kids in a single bombing - overseas, of course. What's worse? I fully expect some Democrats and liberals who read this, to say to themselves, or to me, "better those kids die by bombs than my son who's serving over there!" To that, I say... you are sick in the head. Democrats went along with the bailout of corporations in 2008 and the oppression of Occupy Wall Street in 2011. They turned on Occupy Protesters while the GOP embraced the much more violent Tea Party.  Democrats have shifted to the right in many other ways, not the least of examples being their back and forth wavering on Social Security cuts. They've caved on welfare reform, shipping American jobs overseas, tax cuts for the rich, the list just goes on and on and on. What they won't cave on, however, is their intolerance for honest animosity toward the right wing and their refusal to ponder real, necessary changes to stop the onward march of that rough beast called the Plutonomy on its way to Bethlehem.

Leftists have many reasons to stay home or vote for a third party and to say the heck with the Democratic Party. And so do I.

Here's one reason why we shouldn't.

Voting third party helps the other side win. Let the GOP be split up between Repugnant nutjobs and Looneytarian ultra right wingnuts. Remember H Ross Perot? He's the reason why Bill Clinton won over George Bush Sr. The Perot vote would have gone to Bush. Then in 2000 we got hoisted by our own petards when Ralph Nader split the Left vote. But for him Al Gore would have won Florida and 8 years of The Chimp wouldn't have happened. Let this be a lesson for all leftists.

And those who think a GOP-ruled USA would collapse and then lead to a new leftist utopia? Yeah, that's dumb. We're more likely to devolve into a Plutonomy like Mexico. A world like Les Miserables, if we're really lucky.

We need big, revolutionary changes in America. We need a seismic shift to the left in order to avoid becoming an economic dystopia. Voting for a liberal third party ensures GOP victories, there is no way around that, no argument that can refute that, history has spoken.  GOP victories are a big step back.

Survival logic dictates that when you're slipping on a cliffside, you don't just let go and fall into the abyss!!! Are we going to obey survival logic or suicide logic?

This is not to say that we should never fight for the CORRECT politician who is better for we the people. The time to fight for LEFTIST politicians is during the primaries. It's during the primaries that we get the Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warrens of the world, and it is there that we give them a fighting chance to win. But during the general election, there is but two choices for us, and no more: vote for the lesser of two evils, or get the greater of two evils by default. Fantasize as much as you want, during the general election, there is no option #3.

Thursday, December 27, 2012

Posting The Addresses of Gun Permit Holders Was SHEER IDIOCY.

Posting the names and Google maps locations of gun permit holders is an exercise of sheer stupidity.

I totally denounce this behavior, which came to light while I was out on Christmas break with my family, and I'll give just a few reasons why I denounce it.
  • It enables criminals to try and steal these guns when they think the owners are away. Many gun crimes are committed by stolen guns.
  • Not all gun owners are Conservative, case in point being Yours Truly. Even fewer are ever going to become violent criminals. This, thus, becomes an attack on innocent bystanders.
  • And all of this means that this move was both vindictive and unproductive - a horrible combination. 

Newspaper Posts Gun Owners' Names
A newspaper in New York has received a wave of criticism from its readers after publishing the names and addresses of all of the individuals with handgun or pistol permits in its coverage area.
Hundreds of residents in New York's Westchester and Rockland counties were surprised to findtheir names and addresses listed on a map posted by The Journal News on Sunday. Users can click any dot on the map to see which of their neighbors has a permit for a gun.
The map sparked more than 500 comments from readers within a day of its appearance on the website, many of them voicing outrage at the paper's decision to make the information public.
"This is CRAZY!! why in the world would you post every licensed gun owner information?? What do you hope to accomplish by doing this. This is the type of thing you do for sex offenders not law abiding gun owners. What next? should i hang a flag outside my house that says I own a gun? I am canceling my subscription with your paper today!!!" said commenter Curtis Maenza.


Oh, and did I mention that this idiot move by the Journal News was liable to backfire in their face? (Nope, because I actually didn't see this one coming.) Well, it turns out that it did backfire in their faces. The posting of the names and locations of gun permit holders has led to gun owners retaliating in kind: now the journalists who work at that company have been similarly exposed. Whether they were involved in the company's brain dead move or not.

Journalists’ Addresses Posted In Revenge For Newspaper’s Google Map Of Gun Permit Owners
A week after the Newtown massacre, The Journal News published an interactive Google Map with the names and addresses of gun permit owners in select New York cities. The bold move has escalatedinto a transparency arms race, after a Connecticut lawyer posted the phone number and addresses of the Journal‘s staff, including a Google Maps satellite Image of the Publisher’s home. “I don’t know whether the Journal’s publisher Janet Hasson is a permit holder herself, but here’s how to find her to ask,” read Christopher Fountain’s blog post. The double irony here is that open data was heralded as a tool of enlightened civic dialog, and has been co-opted for fierce partisanship, bordering on public endangerment.

Idiocy has begat idiocy.

America Has a Creepy People Problem

First, before I go into my opinions, let's start with the facts.

In 2012, President Barack Obama won re-election by 62,611,250 votes. Mitt Romney lost with 59,134,475 votes. That means President (re-elect) Obama won by a margin of under 3.5 million votes. That also means that while 1 out of 5 of America's 300 million citizens voted for Obama, nearly 1 out of 5 also voted for Romney. Can we agree on those facts?

Let's ask ourselves, then, what nearly 1 out of 5 people voted for when they tried to put Romney in the White House, shall we?


1 out of every 5 people you run across, voted for the man who said these things during his campaign for President. It's not that they didn't hear about it. The Mainstream Media did splash these gaffes and scandals all over the prime time news. The media did their job for once. The problem is that many Americans - at least 59 million of them, nearly 20 percent of our population - simply did not care. There was no outrage.

There was, however, outrage at every perceived misstep by Obama. The September 11, 2012 attacks on American diplomats in Benghazi, Libya, aroused much more ire at Obama than anything Romney did, to the point of Republican nutjobs issuing calls for his impeachment. The "Obama phones" meme, despite it being based on a pack of Right-wing lies, is widely popular now, much moreso than the "47%" meme. 

Despite the horrendously insensitive and condescending gaffes that Mitt Romney made, in which he dismissed almost half of the country as useless, he came within 3.5 million votes of winning the Presidency. This suggests that despite Mitt Romney's legion of major blunders and his own wife saying that Mitt's sanity is questionable, President Obama was but one GENUINE misstep away from losing this race. One. He could have lost re-election by bungling the Benghazi situation, he could have lost if the "Obama phones" meme had been true... he could have lost by just the PETTIEST of slip-ups.

Of course, if you look at who voted for Mitt Romney, an obvious candidate for explaining the fact that the voters were much more easily outraged at Obama than Romney... is racism

Be honest with yourself. If you knew someone who could hear out what Mitt Romney said about single mothers or 47% of the population and not be outraged, if your neighbor had nothing to say about his disdain toward funding for firefighters and police or his love of firing people, would that person not creep you out? Of course they would. It would most certainly be scary if their motivation for supporting Romney was racism.

But we like to live in denial, because denial helps prevent us from being rabblerousers. We don't like to point out large numbers of people as being, of all things, creepy. If nearly 20% of Americans accept this madness then it must be the norm... right? And we most certainly must be gracious to the nearly 50% of voters who went for Romney, right?

WRONG!!! Creepy is creepy. And voting for a person that you WATCHED as he stepped up and blamed single mothers for gun shooting rampages, is CREEPY. There are one of two things that motivate one's acceptance for such madmen: insanity, or in this case, racism. 

There is something broken, mentally speaking, inside these people. And odds are that you live next to them. Sure, they'll watch your dog while you're out, or keep an eye out for intruders. They may even go to your church. But the next time a rabid extremist dog like Mitt Romney runs for President, they'll have his back. And once again you'll be looking at the prospects of these creeps electing an America that pisses on the poor and working class, and blames single mothers for any one or more of the country's ills of the day. Or perhaps if a white Democratic candidate runs for President, things will be less rabid. In that case the problem really IS racism. But of course we can't call that a mental disease when it afflicts fully 20% of the population, now can we? That is, of course, sarcasm.

Monday, December 24, 2012

If You Find Yourself Inclined to Ask "Why Don't the Rich Care?" Please.. STOP.

Stop doing that. You're looking at the problem totally the wrong way. It's not that the Plutocracy - that subset of the rich that keeps fighting for tax cuts and welfare cuts and cheap labor - don't care. It's not that at all. They don't care, and the problem goes way past that, beyond that.

The problem is that they are predators and they see you as prey. The Plutocracy sees the working class as either a walking sack of blood to suck dry, and when you have nothing left to give, they cast you aside.

All right wing politics can be predicted by this basic motivation.

All-White Jury 2.0: All-Male Iowa Supreme Court Upholds Sexism


Time to run this dentist out of business. Now.

Dental Assistant Fired For Being 'Irresistible' Is 'Devastated'


After working as a dental assistant for ten years, Melissa Nelson was fired for being too "irresistible" and a "threat" to her employer's marriage.
"I think it is completely wrong," Nelson said. "I think it is sending a message that men can do whatever they want in the work force."
On Friday, the all-male Iowa State Supreme Court ruled that James Knight, Nelson's boss, was within his legal rights when he fired her, affirming the decision of a lower court. 
"We do think the Iowa Supreme Court got it completely right," said Stuart Cochrane, an attorney for James Knight. "Our position has always been Mrs. Nelson was never terminated because of her gender, she was terminated because of concerns her behavior was not appropriate in the workplace. She's an attractive lady. Dr. Knight found her behavior and dress to be inappropriate."

What RomneyCare 2.0 aka the Individual Mandate Will Cost You if You Make an Ultra-Opulent $20K a Year

Are you struggling to make ends meet right now on $20K a year? 

Well, as of 2014, you will be required to add another $80 a month bill to your budget in the form of a health insurance policy, thanks to RomneyCare 2.0 aks the Individual Mandate.



When the fine folks on the Democratic Underground weren't trying to silence this basic fact, they were howling that the poor should be happy to shoulder this extra burden. The entire Democratic Party is going to learn a very hard political lesson when millions of low-income people get slapped with this extra bill and they decide to rebel. The hard lesson is you are an idiot if you adopt an individual health insurance mandate law, aka a "force people to purchase private corporation services" law, that was first proposed by the Heritage Foundation and first made into law in Massachusetts by Mitt Romney.

Woah, wait, what? Am I saying that forcing people to pay for health insurance by law, was an idea first put forth by right wingtards and actually forced upon citizens by the worst Republican Presidential candidate in the last 50 years? Why, yes, I am. As you can see when you clicked those links, history very much says this.

Democrats, you will wish you hadn't taken a gulp of this right wing kool-aid...

Sunday, December 23, 2012

Cheap U.S. Labor as a Weapon to Lower Canadian Wages? Yup, It's Happening.


Underpaid American workers are being used as weapons to drive down Canadian workers' wages. Again, the ugly face of foreign outsourcing rears its head - this time, "in favor" of America.


And this is not the only example. Ikea also leverages cheap American labor against domestic (Swedish, in their case) labor, as do other companies.


What a load of crap. It's bad enough that Chinese and other foreign workers are being used as weapons to reduce our working class's standard of living Now OUR working class is being used in the same way? What are the odds that Americans will say "hooray, they're now outsourcing to us"? Very high.

To hell with that. There's no "hooray" where I'm concerned. There should be no trade agreement between nations that allows for cheap labor anywhere. Pay a living wage to your workers or be isolated from the global economy.




Cheap U.S. Labor Used As Leverage To Lower Canadian Workers' Wages

The near-standstill in wage growth for American workers hasn't just been good for their employers. It's turning out to be a potential bargaining chip for Canadian companies, too -- at least the ones looking to leverage their employees into accepting smaller paychecks.
A Caterpillar manufacturing plant in Ontario wants to halve its workers' wages, according to The Wall Street Journal. In its negotiations with the autoworkers' union, management is citing a similar Caterpillar plant in Illinois where employees earn less than half of what the Canadian workers make. It's the latest example of how low-wage workers the world over are being forced into an international race to the bottom.
The ongoing trend of wage stagnation for American workers -- median income has barely changed in the U.S. over the past several decades, even as the very highest earners have accrued more and more wealth -- means that workers in the U.S. have become more competitive for jobs that were traditionally reserved for cheaper labor abroad.
High unemployment in the U.S. is helping to depress salaries, since employers have little incentive to pay their workers more when there are so many job-hunters who would gladly step in. The jobless rate has been creeping down since August, and hit its lowest rate in almost three years in December. Still, unemployment remains substantially higher than it was for most of the past decade.

A Great Cartoon Depicting Democrats vs Republicans


Why We Need Free College Education For All



For Poor, Leap to College Often Ends in a Hard Fall


Each showed the ability to do college work, even excel at it. But the need to earn money brought one set of strains, campus alienation brought others, and ties to boyfriends not in school added complications. With little guidance from family or school officials, college became a leap that they braved without a safety net.
The story of their lost footing is also the story of something larger — the growing role that education plays in preserving class divisions. Poor students have long trailed affluent peers in school performance, but from grade-school tests to college completion, the gaps are growing. With school success and earning prospects ever more entwined, the consequences carry far: education, a force meant to erode class barriers, appears to be fortifying them.
“Everyone wants to think of education as an equalizer — the place where upward mobility gets started,” said Greg J. Duncan, an economist at the University of California, Irvine. “But on virtually every measure we have, the gaps between high- and low-income kids are widening. It’s very disheartening.”
The growing role of class in academic success has taken experts by surprise since it follows decades of equal opportunity efforts and counters racial trends, where differences have narrowed. [B]It adds to fears over recent evidence suggesting that low-income Americans have lower chances of upward mobility than counterparts in Canada and Western Europe.[/B]

Most Americans Agree: Republicans Are Too Extreme

Time for Republicans to start complaining about "stupid American voters" and "the public is a bunch of lazy takers and looters" and all that nonsense. LOL!

Republican Party Too Extreme, Majority Of Americans Say: Poll

For the first time, a majority of Americans now say the Republican Party is too extreme, according to a poll released Thursday by CNN/ORC.
Fifty-three percent of people, including 22 percent of Republicans, said the GOP's views and policies have pushed them beyond the mainstream. The number is up dramatically from previous years. In 2010, fewer than 40 percent thought the party was too extreme.
Democrats were considered to be a "generally mainstream" party by 57 percent in the new poll.
"That's due in part to the fact that the Republican brand is not doing all that well,"said Keating Holland, CNN's polling director.

Behold "Limited Government" in Action: Florida GOP Governor Rick Scott Begging Obama to Stop a Port Strike


Republicans, who scream for limited government, are now begging the government to step in a labor dispute. My opinion? Dickhead Scott needs to be told to go stuff it.

Florida governor asks Obama to block possible ports strike

MIAMI (Reuters) - Florida's Republican governor wants President Barack Obama to invoke federal law and order a cooling-off period if nearly 15,000 longshoremen walk off the job in a looming strike that would be a big blow to the state's economy, according to a letter he sent the president this week.
The International Longshoremen's Association union and the U.S. Maritime Alliance grouping of shippers and ports have been bargaining since March but reportedly remain far from a deal covering cargo handling at 15 ports on the U.S. Gulf and eastern coasts.
In October, when a previous contract expired, the sides agreed to a 90-day extension of terms that runs out on December 29.
Florida ports in Miami and Fort Lauderdale would be directly hit by a strike or lockout but a stoppage would also rattle overall transport and trade, which accounts for 550,000 jobs in the state and $66 billion in economic activity, Florida Governor Rick Scott said in a letter dated Thursday.

Saturday, December 22, 2012

If You're in Iowa, BOYCOTT THIS DENTIST. Fire Him for Being a Threat to Women's Rights


Court: 'Irresistible' Workers Can Be Fired

An Iowa dentist was within his legal rights when he fired a longtime employee he found to be "irresistible" and a threat to his marriage, the State Supreme Court unanimously ruled.
The seven justices, all male, affirmed on Friday a lower court's decision in favor of Dr. James Knight, who terminated Melissa Nelson after employing her for 10 and a half years as a dental assistant.
"We do think the Iowa Supreme Court got it completely right," said Stuart Cochrane, an attorney for James Knight. "Our position has always been Mrs. Nelson was never terminated because of her gender, she was terminated because of concerns her behavior was not appropriate in the workplace. She's an attractive lady. Dr. Knight found her behavior and dress to be inappropriate."
The two never had a sexual relationship or sought one, according to court documents, however in the final year and a half of Nelson's employment, Knight began to make comments about her clothing being too tight or distracting.

The Police Gangs of India as Useless as the Ones Here: Teargassing Protesters, and Guess Why


India police use water cannon, tear gas as gang-rape protests intensify

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Indian police used batons, tear gas and water cannon to turn back thousands of people marching on the presidential palace on Saturday in intensifying protests against the gang-rape of a woman on the streets and on social media.
The 23-year-old victim is battling for her life in hospital after she was beaten, raped for almost an hour and thrown out of a moving bus on a busy New Delhi street last Sunday. Five people have been arrested.
The protesters, largely college students, are demanding the death penalty for the accused and safety assurances for women.
New Delhi, home to about 16 million people, has the highest number of sex crimes among India's major cities. Police figures show a rape is reported on average every 18 hours and some other form of sexual attack every 14 hours.
Appealing for calm, India's junior minister for home affairs, R.P.N. Singh, said the government had listened to the protesters.

Is Gun Replication Technology At Our Doorstep?

Click, print, shoot: Downloadable guns possible (Update)


Sound far-fetched? It's not. And that is disquieting for U.S. gun control advocates. 
At least one group, called Defense Distributed, is claiming to have created downloadable weapon parts that can be built using the increasingly popular new generation of printer that uses plastics and other materials to create 3-D objects with moving parts.
University of Texas law student Cody Wilson, the 24-year-old "Wiki Weapons" project leader, says the group last month test fired a semiautomatic AR-15 rifle—one of the weapon types used in last week's Connecticut school massacre—which was built with some key parts created on a 3-D printer. The gun was fired six times before it broke.

Friday, December 21, 2012

A Hilarious Take on Christmas Dinner

Why do we liberals want unionization, better wages and working conditions for farm workers, migrant or otherwise? Here's why.



We pray, the Lord provides, and migrant farm workers pick. We owe those farm workers a big debt of gratitude.

What Is Your Slavery Footprint?

Do you believe the stuff that you buy is all made by workers who at least get some sort of wage in return for their labor? Think again.

If you dare to do so, take a look at how many slaves work to produce the goods you buy.

What Is Your Slavery Footprint?

Thursday, December 20, 2012

Company Fires, Rehires Cafeteria Woman Who Feeds Poor Student

To err is human, to forgive when they correct their error is not only divine but a necessity. Thank you, Cartwells, for fixing this mistake.

As for those who naysay free food for kids, or who yap about "There's no free lunch", fuck off, really. We waste millions of tons of food every year. WASTE. We could give some of that to the poor, thank you very much.

Company Fires, Rehires Cafeteria Woman Who Feeds Poor Student

Arguably, next to recess, lunchtime is one part of the day that schoolchildren look forward to the most. It's a time to grab some grub and socialize with friends. Dianne Brame, the cafeteria manager at Hudson Elementary School in Webster Groves, Missouri, said she knows each one of her students by name. Brame took a special interest in one fourth grade boy. She noticed that he used to be on the free lunch program, but he had not been renewed to continue receiving free meals. Brame believed that was because his mother, who does not speak English, did not understand the paperwork for getting access to the meals.
So Brame stepped in and tried communicating with the family through the mail, but to no avail. Any kids who do not have current eligibility status are allowed to receive only three free regular meals. After that, the protocol is that these kids receive only a cheese sandwich and a carton of milk. Brame feared that the boy would be made fun of or bullied. So she gave him a free regular lunch for two months.
(Rest of the story at Yahoo! News)

Wednesday, December 19, 2012

While We're Talking About Disarming Crazy People, How About We Also Disarm the Police?

The police and the military are the two largest organizations of violent gun nuts in America. They love their guns and many do not hesitate to use violence, be it with guns or batons. (Just ask any Occupy activist about that, or any poor minority neighborhood.) The police do not engage in mass killings, but they routinely kill innocent people, and often get away with it.

American citizens don't need high-velocity .223 ammo, and cops don't need Carbines or tanks. And they most certainly don't need stop-and-frisk or stop-and-ID.

That is all.


Tuesday, December 18, 2012

Please Sign This White House Petition: No Cuts to Social Security Benefits!

This petition is rapidly approaching the threshold to force the White House to respond. Let's push it over the line!



WE PETITION THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION TO:

not cut Social Security and/or Medicare to simply keep taxes low on the wealthiest Americans


It is widely reported that the Democrats are about to finalize a deficit-reduction deal with Republicans. If true, it will cut Social Security payments over time. The cuts will increase as recipients grow older, reaching almost 10% at age 85.
As Presidents Reagan and Obama have said, Social Security has nothing to do with our country’s deficits. In fact, it is forbidden by law to contribute a penny to the deficit. It should not be cut in a deficit deal.
The wealthiest Americans received a windfall over the last decade, including more than $1 trillion in tax cuts which simply added to our debt. The rest of us got little but a terrible economy. True shared sacrifice means that the wealthy need to do their part this time; the elderly who are already hurting should not be hurt more.

Monday, December 17, 2012

A Voice For the Underclass: A New Website That Just Went Up

It's new but by all means check it out from time to time!

A Voice For the Underclass

New York City-Style Stop and Frisk 2.0 Comes to Arkansas


Stop and Frisk: It's Not Just For Inner City Minority Neighborhoods Anymore!


And I just want to remind the readers... this town of Paragould, Arkansas is not exactly a "town swarming with minorities" like the areas where the NYPD engaged in their stop-and-frisk harassment tactics. It was "right and just" when it happened to black people in New York's poor areas... what do the readers want to bet that it'll be met with protest by the same yea-sayers who defended this behavior in New York?

Armed Task Force to Patrol Streets

In response to a recent increase in crime, Paragould Mayor Mike Gaskill and Police Chief Todd Stovall offered residents at a town hall meeting Thursday night at West View Baptist Church what could be considered an extreme solution — armed officers patrolling the streets on foot......
Should an individual not produce identification, Stovall said his officers would not back down. Individuals who do not produce identification when asked could be charged with obstructing a governmental operation, according to Stovall.
 "I'm hoping we don't run across [any] of that," Stovall said. "Will there be people who buck us? There may be. But we have a right to be doing what we're doing. We have a zero-tolerance. We are prepared to throw your hind-end in jail, OK? We're not going to take a lot of flack."

A Thousand Years of Blackness: Boehner Talks of a Debt Ceiling Compromise

Disclaimer: As per this blog post, this is a parody of Chuck Norris's hysterical "Thousand Years of Darkness" plea for right wingers to get out and vote against President (Re-elected!!!) Obama. In his video he ranted about the coming death of "freedom" in America. As a result, I have started a series of blogs that seek to rub it into Conservatives' faces when one of their misguided, cherished "freedoms" are lost, or when a new idea proposes to take those "freedoms" away. This blog post, thus, highlights an act of betrayal of the misguided Conservative anti-tax, anti-debt movement by Congressman and Speaker of the House John Boehner.

Republicans have been trying to hold America hostage by threatening to run America into default rather than raise the debt ceiling. John Boehner has announced that he might not go with them on this. The Rabid Right will howl and the Conservatives will wail and gnash their teeth, as this is a very big issue for them. They will wail and gnash their teeth and I will celebrate their agony. Say byebye to your freedom to have an America devoid of taxes and social programs, losers.


Boehner offers debt-ceiling increase in cliff compromise



House Speaker John A. Boehner has offered to push any fight over the federal debt limit off for a year, a concession that would deprive Republicans of leverage in the budget battle but is breathing new life into stalled talks over the year-end “fiscal cliff.”
The offer came Friday, according to people in both parties familiar with the talks, as part of the latest effort by Boehner (R-Ohio) to strike a deal with President Obama to replace more than $500 billion in painful deficit-reduction measures set to take effect in January.
With the national debt already bumping up against a $16.4 trillion cap set last year, Congress risks a government default unless it acts to raise the debt ceiling in the next few months. Some Republicans had argued that party leaders should use the threat of default to demand additional spending cuts from Obama.
Boehner’s offer signals that he expects a big deal with sufficient savings to meet his demand that any debt limit increase be paired dollar for dollar with spending cuts. That would permit him to keep a key vow to his party — and head off a potentially nasty debt-limit fight — at least until the end of next year.


Sunday, December 16, 2012

Why It Is Our Patriotic Duty As Americans to Goad Conservatives

Because they're so easy to whip up into hysteria.

Democrats Who Oppose #Offshoring Win More Races. Big Time.


A follow-up on my previous blog: Let this be a warning to politicians who don't read the writing on the wall about foreign outsourcing.

Political Perils of Pending Trade Policy Battles Highlighted


Record 205 Democratic, GOP Campaigns Nationwide  Connected to Bipartisan American Public Anger About Trade Policy Status Quo of Job #Offshoring

Amidst Powerful GOP Wave, Best Defense Was a Fair Trade Offense With House Democrats Running On Fair Trade Platforms Three Times More Likely to Survive; Record 220-plus Trade Campaign Ads Nationwide


Washington, D.C. – House Democrats that ran on fair trade platforms in competitive and openseat races were three times as likely to survive the GOP tidal wave than Democrats who ran against  fair trade, according to a comprehensive 182-race, 70-page report released today by Public Citizen. The GOP tsunami obliterated many candidate-specific features of the midterm contests, but trade, job offshoring and/or government purchases of foreign-made goods were a stunningly persistent national focus of midterm election campaigns, with 205 candidates campaigning on these issues. A record number of 75 Republicans adopted some fair trade messaging as well, 43 of whom won their races. More than sixty races became “fair trade offs,” where both the Democrat and Republican ran on fair trade themes. Only 37 candidates campaigned in favor of more North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)-style trade agreements - about half of these candidates lost.


The Foreign Outsourcing of American Jobs: There are Stormclouds Brewing.

It's been a long time coming. Free trade has been one of the greatest frauds ever sold to the American public. It has offered the promise of cheaper prices and a bright future of higher-tech, higher-value jobs at the meager expense of sending low-end jobs overseas. Let the poor brown and yella people (sarcasm intended) do the manufacturing work while America moves up the value chain. Offshoring was supposed to bring increased prosperity to everyone, less work hours, and most importantly, access to foreign markets. It was time for America to embrace 'change' and adapt to the times.

It turned out, instead, to be a case of "be careful what you wish for".

What happened when globalization hit America was prosperity did come. However, almost all of it went to the 1%, while workers got saddled with rampant joblessness, the death of job security, and an viciously escalating combination of rat races and employment musical chairs. "Who moved the cheese?" became a buzzword when in reality the story was that there was no cheese left. Huge numbers of low end manufacturing jobs left, the number of low paying service jobs and the smattering of high-paying jobs that replaced them did not make up the difference. Meanwhile, knowledge jobs began to move overseas as well.

The world feasted on American jobs and put Americans out of work, and Americans never got to participate in that globalism thing, except as customers of cheap imports. Americans are excluded not only from the global labor market, but the domestic market as well. And as for that much awaited access to foreign markets? American workers got none of that. Products made by American companies for the Chinese market, are all made in China by Chinese workers... not Americans. Such is the way of globalism across the board.

When you offshore more jobs than you inshore, you are mathematically bound to have a trade deficit. And boy, what a trade deficit America has. America runs, yearly, a trade deficit of between $400 to $500 billion, depending on the year. America runs a trade deficit with nearly every country on Earth that it trades with. Only HALF of that trade deficit is oil; the rest is goods and services, which we import more than we export.

Free traders have been given countless chances to sell globalism to America. They sold it on the count of jobs. They tried justifying it with fear of isolationism. They warned of price increases if tariffs happened; and even warned of trade wars. They tried to appeal to the plight of foreign workers if Americans blocked imports.

America drank the kool-aid, of course, all the way up until the aughts. But it was in the aughts that people started to see right through the lies. 

  • They started to ask, where are the jobs? And the free traders had no answer.
  • Americans started to ask why our tariffs would be considered trade wars, but China's currency devaluation and tariffs against us weren't considered trade wars? And the free traders ducked, dodged, changed the subject, and mumbled their way past those questions.
  • Our working class asked what good are cheap goods if no one has a job to afford them? And they were met with silence or streams of irrelevant gobbledygook from the pro-globalists.
  • We the People asked why we should care about foreign workers and their plight when we have whole families going into the street for want of jobs? Again, the free traders went mum at best, and howled "you're racists!" ad hominems at worst.
  • Finally, the workers saw the American government intervene to stop Haitian workers from getting a healthy minimum wage increase, and we asked: if this is about caring for the poor elsewhere, why is America's corporate elite fighting to keep their wages down? And the globalists shrugged and gave the skeptical public the silent treatment.
  • The environmentalists looked upon the dirty skies of China and the sickly nasty brown waters off the coast of India and asked, why are we exporting our pollution over there? Again, the free traders evaded the subject.
  • Most importantly, the country has been asking repeatedly, where is the working class's share of the gains from globalism? Ultimately, the free trade globalism movement had no answer.


The globalists, effectively, kept berating Americans for balking at offshoring, calling them racists, isolationists, fools, etcetera - that is when they didn't simply tune out the dissatisfied masses.

At some point they had to realize, the people were seeing right through this globalism scam, and that the time for debate and arguments were destined to come to an end. Perhaps the globalists thought that when the time for debate ended, that they would find a way to cow Americans into silence and acceptance. After all, people like me who were screaming about offshoring since before the aughts, were getting shouted down by Conservatives, Liberals and everyone in between. The globalists were riding the public relations gravy train on wheels made of biscuits and they didn't think the opposition would evolve beyond the hysterical fringe.

Funny, how that "embrace change" mantra can come back to bite you on the ass. Because boy, have things really changed when it comes to public opinion on globalism.

In 2004, the stormclouds started brewing as public opinion shifted dramatically against offshoring.

While the globalists sank to the bottom of their think tanks, safely sequestered from reality, hiding behind the shields of the media which slavishly echoed their tone-deaf arguments and proclamations about the benefits of globalism to the world... the Left and the Right, the Democratic and the Republican voters alike, began to see eye to eye on globalism. Much as they hate each other, both sides now share the same hatred for globalism and its war on America's working class. Sure, Republicans hate unions and will still vocally support offshoring over union labor, but when push comes to shove, what they say may not for much longer be what they do. Meanwhile, even the independent voters have fully turned against offshoring. America has grown tired of listening to the free traders and their defenses of globalism. Sadly, the globalists don't realize that no one wants to hear their nonsense anymore. The American people now want their heads, not their explanations.

And so three big storm supercells came into existence, swirling over the political landscape like a scene from an apocalyptic global warming movie. Political opposition to offshoring has entered the mainstream. Politicians no longer brag about fighting for globalism or its imaginary benefits to the working class. Politicians who tout their opposition to offshoring, practically have an "I win!" card when one looks at their winning record. All that remains now, is for most politicians to realize that opposing free trade is a high-value winning strategy, and when this happens, the supercells of the political apocalypse will sweep down across the latitudes: Democrats, Republicans and Independents moving like three Cat-6 hurricanes to raze all in their path. All this requires is a catalyst.

What that catalyst is, yet remains to be seen. Everything else has already happened except the final spark.

In what has to be one of the greatest ironies and insults to the globalist free traitors, one surprise candidate for that catalyst is none other than Jeffrey Immelt, the current CEO of global corporate supergiant General Electric (GE). Immelt, or more importantly GE itself, is the consummate Benedict Arnold of Corporate America, one of the top outsourcers of American jobs. His creds as a globalist are nigh unprecedented. Those of you who follow the outsourcing issue know him as the metaphorical Darth Vader of globalism... if not Palpatine himself, with GE being the Death Star.

WARNING: Those of you who have followed the issue of offshoring and know of Jeffrey Immelt, thus, should take a seat before you read on. I am quite serious about this. If you are at a coffee joint while reading this, you will probably howl and scare the hell out of other people. If you're on a train you'll jump so high you might falsely alert Homeland Security. This is a shocker for the ages.

First of all, what should shock you and strike you to the floor is that manufacturing in America is making a historical comeback. Particularly at General Electric’s famous, long-lived Appliance Park, in Louisville, Kentucky, a place which those in the know have seen decline into obsolescence and irrelevance. This industrial park, once doomed to become a ghost town, has been dramatically revived. In 2013, dishwashers will be rolling off its assembly lines, among other things to be Made in the USA.

But that's not all. Then there's... Jeffrey Immelt.

Jeffrey Immelt, the man who was and still is known as a major conductor for jobs leaving the USA, recently said this of offshoring, and I made this text invisible to protect you in case you're not sitting down at home. To see it, use the mouse to select the area below:

Jeffrey Immelt, the CEO of General Electric, said that outsourcing is “quickly becoming mostly outdated as a business model for GE Appliances”
(Link to the quote here)


Feel free to rub your eyes and go over that again, but yes, you read that one right.

Outsourcing jobs to foreign countries is Caesar, as of late his nickname has been pincushion. The knives have come out from many directions, from politicians and the public, but now... et tu, Brute? Perhaps. If Jeffrey Immelt actually puts significant actions behind his words, if his words aren't simply an act of sensationalism, then he is the catalyst, he is Brutus to the globalist Caesar. It is midnight, it is December 21, 2012, it is dogs and cats sleeping together and its star is called Wormwood.

More than likely, however, his words were sensationalism.

The alternative is that not only is America making a historical comeback with domestic manufacturing jobs, but that comeback will be accelerating, fast.

The wage differential between the US and other nations like China and Mexico, is too great for that giant sucking sound to totally reverse itself in short order.

Still, though, the things I long predicted, are coming to pass, which are making offshoring less feasible:
1) The rise in oil prices makes the cost of transporting goods here from China a serious burden upon company profits. Same for transporting it from Mexico.
2) America's productivity advantage is eating the Chinese wage advantage like swarms of hungry mosquitoes: it is killing China with bug bites.
3) Chinese wages are up; and probably, so are Mexican wages.
4) The dollar is losing value, as a direct consequence of offshoring.
5) Americans are getting really, really pissed, and those three political supercells are on the move.

Don't look for your kids' toys, hard drives and TVs to be made here any time soon; but then again, who knows? There's a storm coming, and it's one that is going to put the wind in the working class sails... and bring frozen death to the fraud that is "globalism".

How should Liberals unfurl their sails when the storm hits? By making a strong bid to take over the offshoring discussion. We should be talking about renegotiating trade deals to require dramatically higher wage guarantees for Chinese, Mexican, etc. workers as a condition of allowing imports from those regions. In addition, if they wish to export to here, they must agree to and rigorously enforce American-level workplace safety regulations and pollution controls. Unionization should be legalized there, while we turn our efforts to abolishing the Taft-Hartley Act here. Liberals need to work on a way to reconstruct globalism into a system that outlaws the exploitation of workers, world wide. If we're successful, then it will give the globalists no place where they can find cheap labor. Remember peak oil? Well, this is peak exploitation: the point where exploitation starts creeping backward.

A Thousand Years of Blackness: New Approaches To Immigration Reform

Disclaimer: As per this blog post, this is a parody of Chuck Norris's hysterical "Thousand Years of Darkness" plea for right wingers to get out and vote against President (Re-elected!!!) Obama. In his video he ranted about the coming death of "freedom" in America. As a result, I have started a series of blogs that seek to rub it into Conservatives' faces when one of their misguided, cherished "freedoms" are lost, or when a new idea proposes to take those "freedoms" away. This blog post, thus, highlights a LA Times editorial that proposes a law to take away one of those "freedoms": the freedom to live in an America without a bunch of scary brown Mexican people. Boo friggin' hoo.

From the Los Angeles Times:


Instead of deportation or amnesty, the U.S. should adopt legalization without citizenship.

The debate over U.S. immigration policy has been rebooted. There now appears to be bipartisan support for what's generally called comprehensive reform. But a stumbling block remains: What to do about the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants among us. Deportation? Complete amnesty? A "path" to citizenship?
There is a way forward, and it can be best summarized by "none of the above." It lies, instead, between these choices. It's legalization without citizenship .
With as few conditions and as broadly as possible, we should offer undocumented immigrants status as "permanent noncitizen residents." Unlike current green card holders, these individuals would never have the option of naturalizing and becoming U.S. citizens. The only exception would be for minors who arrived here with their parents. Provided they have not committed any serious crimes, such individuals should be immediately eligible for citizenship.
Simplicity is one distinct virtue of this approach. The prospect of mass deportations (or the hope of mass self-deportations) is both unpalatable and impractical. And establishing and implementing a complicated pathway to citizenship — or even to a lesser legal status — requires more faith than most Americans have in our government's ability to administer programs effectively and fairly.


Granted, I have mixed feelings on immigration. Mexico has harsher immigration laws than we do. But the issue of Mexican immigrants, in particular, makes Conservatives' blood boil. So I say bring 'em in. Instead of attacking Mexican immigrants, we should be busting employers who exploit illegal immigrants and making examples of them so other employers straighten up their act. Businesses do in fact hire illegals to squeeze American workers out of jobs, cut corners on workplace safety, and lower wages. The way to handle that is to punish the businesses, not the workers. I'm not entirely sure if I want to implement any "permanent non-citizen status" for immigrants - they should all have a path to citizenship, in my opinion. But this law is driving Conservatives NUTS. So it's worth rubbing their noses into it!

Now, what is the Free Republic saying about this? The typical hysterical nonsense. Mexicans are destroying our culture, blah blah blah. Take a look if you want to laugh:

These unhinged idiots wouldn't mind if we were importing more Austrians or White Anglo-Saxon Protestants, of course.

Hear that, right wingers? That's the sound of your misguided concept of "liberty" dying... bone up on your Spanish, LOL!