The “religious” now have a much stronger grasp on our country. “Christian” is the word used, although those who call themselves that are often far from it. The old Communism bugaboo never completely went away, giving the new Socialism bugaboo strength much faster. Fear will always be the best threat, no matter the time or the place. They only have to change the names of who and what to fear.
Sometimes changing with the times isn’t such a good idea.
A good indicator of whether someone is sincere in their religious belief is how they use their religion – as a weapon or as a living example.
I’ve shared many, many times how I view these Religiious Right Republicans (majority Evangelical Christians) and they rank right up there putting on the dog and pony show.
But more than just the show – these folks use their religion as a weapon.
When did Jesus ever threaten anyone with a weapon?
My grandfather always said – if someone has to constantly tell you how great of a Christian they are – you can bet your last dime that person does not know the first thing about Jesus or God.
Bible Thumpers are a special breed – I don’t know who they are trying to convince more – me or themselves. How insecure does one have to be to always be trying to ‘save’ someone else?
Do these folks truly think they are going to be a big prize? More like a ‘surprise’ when God finally gets to tell them face to face – you’re such a G.D. jerk..
WASHINGTON — Top international climate scientists and disaster experts meeting in Africa had a sharp message Friday for the world’s political leaders: Get ready for more dangerous and “unprecedented extreme weather” caused by global warming.
Back to those holier-than-thou Christians – if these buffoons would actually take the time to read the Bible, they would find where God tells man to be good stewards of the Earth.
If we are such a godly Christian nation (as all Evangelicals profess we are), then why are the air and water pollution so bad?
But bad things happen when profits take precedence over people.
Republicans are going to make sure average Americans have no safety nets! This is a good article and describes republican plans in common-sense terms. In a republican future American Seniors will receive just as much health care as ‘a defined government contribution’ buys, having nothing to do with how much might be needed by any individual! Republicans will wage wars, they’ll put America ‘in control’ of the world militarily, and it will be at the expense of American citizens.
———————————–
5 questions about the GOP’s plan to privatize Medicare
(Reuters) – The Congressional Super Committee negotiations are coming down to the wire, and Republicans are demanding that Medicare privatization be included in any final budget deal.
The news comes on the heels of GOP Presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s recent call for creation of a “premium support” option that would let seniors choose between traditional fee-for-service Medicare or a defined amount of money that they could use to shop for a private plan in a federally-sponsored Medicare exchange marketplace. Romney’s proposal is a cousin of the privatization plan proposed by Rep. Paul Ryan, and endorsed by the House of Representatives earlier this year.
Even if the Super Committee process stalls, the future of Medicare will be a key issue in the 2012 Presidential race, and any restructuring of the program would impact billions of dollars of healthcare spending and tens of millions of beneficiaries. How would privatization impact seniors? How would benefits change, and what would it mean for seniors’ cost of healthcare? Here are answers to five key issues.
I wonder what the Republicans plan to do with this fasting growing population of seniors 90yrs +?
Hey, let’s all send them to a Republicans’ house to live – I’m sure the Party of Pro-Life will welcome each and everyone of these 90yrs+ seniors into their personal residence.
If this population increase continues ………and Medicare goes away…….just WTH is going to happen?
BTW – this is just considering the 90yrs+ age group……there are alot more seniors and approaching-seniors following right behind this group.
This is the result of how our health care technology is working to keep more people living longer but now we have one party that refuses to help people get access to health care – unless your’e one of them – the 1 percenters.
One more thing – the fact this 90yrs+ age group has tripled can also be attributed to the success of Medicare . How many of these people would still be alive if they did not have their Medicare health coverage?
So, maybe the Republicans DO like death panels? But they won’t call it that, they will just take away Medicare and if you’re not wealthy enough to pay – then it’s your fault.
The GOP Fantasy Land is such a cruel, cruel world – isn’t it?
If Republicans are in charge we won’t worry about a growing or an aging population. We’ll just die, and that includes all the average republicans too. Living will require wealth. Great, vast wealth.
Newtcare doesn’t have the same ring to it. A think tank founded by Newt Gingrich was paid at least $37 million over eight years by health-care companies and industry groups for, among other things, what promotional material calls “access to Newt Gingrich” and “direct Newt interaction.” The think tank, called the Center for Health Action, recommended requiring “anyone who earns more than $50,000 a year must purchase health insurance or post a bond,” an insurance mandate similar to the one in President Obama’s policy and now reviled by conservatives. Gingrich stepped down from the think tank earlier this year to run for president. Gingrich came under fire earlier this week for earning as much as $1.8 million in consulting fees from Freddie Mac.
I’ve heard the republicans want to elect someone as President of the United States who is exactly like them — stoopid. Lucky for them they have so many choices this time!
(from the article)“As people are looking at the candidate that is the most conservative and the most consistent candidate, I’ve been that candidate. I haven’t had a gaffe or something that I’ve done that has caused me to fall in the polls,” Bachmann told Greta van Susteren in a Fox News interview. “People see in me someone who’s genuinely a social conservative, a fiscal conservative, a national security conservative and a Tea Partier. I’m the whole package.”
They also see a woman who louldy boasts about being a Submissive Wife and who wants to legislate a woman’s sex life from birth control to abortion.
I don’t think the current female population in America will ever be ready to go back to the good ol’ days where men were the masters and if they wanted to beat their wife – nobody really cared. Because, after all, the little woman probably got too mouth. wink-wink.
I think we (all who aren’t right-wing nutjobs) share a unique advantage no matter the outcome of the 2012 elections. On one hand the upcoming elections can keep republicans from becoming the majority. On the other hand we remember how well relaxing regulations and cutting taxes works. We will be better prepared for the next financial meltdown that will surely come as the result of republican majorities.
Here’s a quiz that shows which candidate holds similar political leanings to you, and allows you to click a candidate to see his/her positions on each of the questions.
An Open Letter From the Heart of OWS: “We ARE the Message”
Dear Society to Which You, We, She and He All Belong:
So we rocked it, right?
Dang diggitty we did. And are. And will, still. The beat don’ stop until the break of dawn.
And it’s always dawn somewhere.
We know some people out there find us raggedy, unkempt, and perhaps congenitally disorganized. And by nature we surely are highly suspicious of organization. Chaos, we get; chaos we like. We understand that from the joyous, raucous frenzy of the subatomically chaotic flowers the life we all know.
Organization, however, we fear. Because we know—because we, like 99% of all of you, have in the hardest ways learned—that, all too often, what “organized,” practically speaking, translates into is, “Screw you, outsider.”
Next thing you know we’re all on the outside, and the only people on the inside—where, as it turns out, all the things like food and money are—are those who, in one way or another, have made organizing a primary purpose of their mean, exclusionary little lives.
So, yes, we tend to take a more organic approach to the whole idea of power hierarchies.
Speaking of which (and as you’re probably aware) city governments all over the country have now deployed against us their black-booted militia, rousting us, in the middle of the night, from the public spaces we have been both literally and figuratively occupying. It wasn’t hard for their baton-wielding machine to achieve its goal. We are, after all, a peaceful collective. We are to a marching armed battalion as a sand castle to the rising tide.
Now you see us. Sun comes up. Now you don’t.
Turns out darkness does cover all manner of sin.
They called garbage stuff that meant so much to us. They so casually hurled so much of our lives into dumpsters.
The media machine, in its constant need of a safe narrative hook, likes to talk about how OWS lacks a cohesive statement of purpose. So, before we disappear altogether (or, more exactly, before we morph into a new manifestation), let us say this:
You know, we know, why we’ve been here—and are here yet. And we know that most of you, in spirit if not in body, have been here right along with us, through the cold nights, the exhaustion, the inspiration, the stress and joy and laughter of it all.
You know the source of our anger. You know the locus of our fear.
You’ve watched your money disappear. You’ve seen your opportunities diminish. You know with what disregard you have been, or could be, pushed aside. Many of you have seen the open road of your life become a narrow, unnavigable little path into a darkness you don’t want to go.
You’ve held and watched your young children, and felt the furious terror of knowing that their future has been greedily, wantonly leveraged against them.
We’ve all done these things. To one degree or another, most all of us have experienced the great American dream becoming the disgraceful American nightmare.
We who Occupy don’t have a “clear message,” because we are the clear message. We’re the canary in the coal mine. We’re the first responders to the American economy blowing up, to the tragic break in the system. The only difference between us and those who haven’t physically joined us is that we live upstream, nearer to where the damn broke.
And now we’re swimming, treading water, trying to keep our possessions from floating away. Look at us out here—and so many of you, out there—so wet! So cold. So shivering.
And with winter now coming hard upon us all.
And look at those who purposefully and meticulously caused this terrible flood, so high up in their warm buildings, so confident the frigid waters they so blithely let loose will never reach them.
We fear that decency, for its own sake, no longer counts.
We fear that right no longer makes any might at all.
We fear that what matters most about the human heart and soul matters least to those who now control America.
They took what is ours—our homes, our money, our jobs, our future, our concerns, our right to control what happens to us—and turned it into fat, rich food—which they then ate.
Gobble, gobble, gobble.
Speaking of which: remember us this Thanksgiving. If only for a moment, please include us in your prayers about what you want, for what you hope, for what you’re glad you have. And if this year your Thanksgiving isn’t all you wish it to be, bear in mind that there’s always next year. Maybe next year things will be better for you.
And maybe they won’t be, of course.
Either way, it couldn’t hurt you to buy a tarp. Eight by ten is a good size: triple-stitched, water-proof, heavily gusseted at the corners. We recommend you get one with brass grommets spaced two feet apart on each side. That’s the kind of thing that can be of real importance when the hard rains come.
Whenever a Republican Right-Winger starts complaining about the OWS protesters within my ear shot, I simply respond – if you applauded the Tea Party protesting in all those town halls and disrupting public places – then you also need to applaud the OWS protesters.
Then to add salt to their wound – I like to throw in – things could be worse, these mayors in these cities could have followed the Republicans’ lead in laying off all those police officers who you are now applauding for ‘arresting and kicking those protesters out of the public park”.
Hmm, these OWS protesters are doing at least one thing – they are showing that the 99% can still bankrupt these cities by having all that overtime pay for their police.
Whose going to be the first on the Right side of the political aisle to be willing to pay taxes to keep those police controlling the OWS protesters?
I’ve heard it said that they’ll simply replace the government (people/taxpayers) paid police forces with private forces. Think mercenaries. Think Blackwater.
I don’t believe I ever imagined from the 1950s to now, that anything like this could ever happen. Sucks to be wrong.
All I hear from those who don’t ‘get it’ about OWS are how violent the protesters are, how filthy, how… You know. You’ve heard it all too. Of course, when the Tea Baggers showed up to disrupt town hall meetings they came with guns and no one wanted to find out when they would use those guns so they were left alone. They were never confronted by anyone. We who aren’t Tea Baggers are smart enough to know to not mess with crazy.
The other criticism I hear is that OWS protesters want what they don’t work for, want to be given…, want to take from those who have labored.
What a bunch of bullshit.
Not a one of those protesters cares a whit about whether or not someone is wealthy. They just think wealth shouldn’t be able to buy our government. They don’t want a free ride, they want a fair chance. They don’t want laws that are skewed for anyone, just equal treatment and protections under the law. They want to work. They want to be able to believe The American Dream still exists.
You know I’ve had a lack of respect for today’s LE for quite awhile now. I’m certainly not gaining any confidence or trust in them lately. They’re mean, they’re violent, they have an “I’ve got a gun” attitude. I think many of them would like nothing better than to use those guns.
Here’s one I respect! Retired Philadelphia Police Captain, Ray Lewis, is arrested after protesting in solidarity with the 99%. Thank you Captain Lewis! Thank you for single handedly debunking the desperate right wing talking points that this is a movement of rag-tag jobless delinquents. Thank you for having the courage of your convictions, sir. We are proud to stand with you!
Well shoot! I can’t figure out how to size photos correctly for this format. Anyway, if the right-hand side of the photo hadn’t been cut off you would see the older gentleman being handcuffed by LE dressed in riot gear.
Unless you download the picture to your computer, you can’t resize it. What you are actually doing is linking to a photo that’s stored online somewhere. Check with WordPress “Help” to see if there’s any internal fix that would auto resize any photo over certain dimensions.
When you get your ‘news’ from Fox ‘News,’ you have no chance of gaining any truth or any understanding of OWS.
Yesterday, authorities charged Oscar Ramiro Ortega-Hernandez with attempting to assassinate President Obama after he allegedly fired an assault riffle at the White House. Never missing an opportunity to politicize such an event, Fox News baselessly tried to tie Ortega-Hernandez to the 99 Percent Movement, running a chyron that dubbed the man the “‘Occupy’ shooter.”
Fox & Friends host Gretchen Carlson said the shooter “may have tried to blend in with the Occupy protesters in D.C.,” and asked conservative blogger Michelle Malkin, “What would have happened if a tea party person had tried to do that?” Malkin took the bait, but admitted that “political ideology” was likely not a motivation of the man.
Meanwhile, Fox Nation, the social news site owned by Fox News, ran a headline yesterday blaring: “Man Linked to ‘Occupy’ Protest Charged With Attempted Assassination of Obama.” On Wednesday night’s Special Report — one of Fox’s “straight news” shows — host Bret Baier said, “Hernandez reportedly spent time with the Occupy D.C. protesters.”
All of the major issues of our day tie into this one fact: the wealthiest Americans and the wealthiest corporations are being over represented in Congress and under represented in the taxes they pay. The oil companies alone, (the world’s most profitable corporations in history), are receiving $50 billion dollars in subsidies every year. Mega-corporations are given tax breaks for off-shoring jobs. Major tax shelters in the Cayman Islands siphon needed money from our government. And this is only the tip of the iceberg. Increasingly, our laws favor the wealthiest 1% to the detriment of everyone else. It all starts here. Address this problem and everything else will take care of itself. This is the issue of our lives.
Insist on “No Representation without taxation!!” — Tracy Knauss
Michigan Republicans have seized on a bogus story about abandoned fetal remains to push through a bill that callously disregards the feelings of women who have to abort wanted pregnancies for medical reasons.
PrairiePopulistsAndProgressives.net 
The “religious” now have a much stronger grasp on our country. “Christian” is the word used, although those who call themselves that are often far from it. The old Communism bugaboo never completely went away, giving the new Socialism bugaboo strength much faster. Fear will always be the best threat, no matter the time or the place. They only have to change the names of who and what to fear.
Sometimes changing with the times isn’t such a good idea.
A good indicator of whether someone is sincere in their religious belief is how they use their religion – as a weapon or as a living example.
I’ve shared many, many times how I view these Religiious Right Republicans (majority Evangelical Christians) and they rank right up there putting on the dog and pony show.
But more than just the show – these folks use their religion as a weapon.
When did Jesus ever threaten anyone with a weapon?
My grandfather always said – if someone has to constantly tell you how great of a Christian they are – you can bet your last dime that person does not know the first thing about Jesus or God.
Bible Thumpers are a special breed – I don’t know who they are trying to convince more – me or themselves. How insecure does one have to be to always be trying to ‘save’ someone else?
Do these folks truly think they are going to be a big prize? More like a ‘surprise’ when God finally gets to tell them face to face – you’re such a G.D. jerk..
I have just the remedy for you, indy. It’ll put a smile on your face about the oh-so-godly ones and have you saying “amen”. I promise. 😉
The Bloggess
LMAO – Thanks for the laugh…
giggle
Life. No one gets out alive. Laugh loudly!
Live and let live.
🙂
WASHINGTON — Top international climate scientists and disaster experts meeting in Africa had a sharp message Friday for the world’s political leaders: Get ready for more dangerous and “unprecedented extreme weather” caused by global warming.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/18/intergovernmental-panel-climate-change-weather_n_1101270.html
It’s not like I’m surprised. I’ve been saying for the past 25 years that things like our seasons have been changing.
Back to those holier-than-thou Christians – if these buffoons would actually take the time to read the Bible, they would find where God tells man to be good stewards of the Earth.
If we are such a godly Christian nation (as all Evangelicals profess we are), then why are the air and water pollution so bad?
But bad things happen when profits take precedence over people.
Republicans are going to make sure average Americans have no safety nets! This is a good article and describes republican plans in common-sense terms. In a republican future American Seniors will receive just as much health care as ‘a defined government contribution’ buys, having nothing to do with how much might be needed by any individual! Republicans will wage wars, they’ll put America ‘in control’ of the world militarily, and it will be at the expense of American citizens.
———————————–
5 questions about the GOP’s plan to privatize Medicare
(Reuters) – The Congressional Super Committee negotiations are coming down to the wire, and Republicans are demanding that Medicare privatization be included in any final budget deal.
The news comes on the heels of GOP Presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s recent call for creation of a “premium support” option that would let seniors choose between traditional fee-for-service Medicare or a defined amount of money that they could use to shop for a private plan in a federally-sponsored Medicare exchange marketplace. Romney’s proposal is a cousin of the privatization plan proposed by Rep. Paul Ryan, and endorsed by the House of Representatives earlier this year.
Even if the Super Committee process stalls, the future of Medicare will be a key issue in the 2012 Presidential race, and any restructuring of the program would impact billions of dollars of healthcare spending and tens of millions of beneficiaries. How would privatization impact seniors? How would benefits change, and what would it mean for seniors’ cost of healthcare? Here are answers to five key issues.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/11/18/us-usa-medicare-questions-idUSTRE7AG1P220111118
I wonder what the Republicans plan to do with this fasting growing population of seniors 90yrs +?
Hey, let’s all send them to a Republicans’ house to live – I’m sure the Party of Pro-Life will welcome each and everyone of these 90yrs+ seniors into their personal residence.
If this population increase continues ………and Medicare goes away…….just WTH is going to happen?
http://www.nhpr.org/90-new-85-oldest-old-population-expanding-rapidly
This reminded me of a sign I saw yesterday (Not that it should have, but it did anyway. Often there’s no explanation for what pops into my head.) —
I am pro-choice; Romney is multiple-choice.
BTW – this is just considering the 90yrs+ age group……there are alot more seniors and approaching-seniors following right behind this group.
This is the result of how our health care technology is working to keep more people living longer but now we have one party that refuses to help people get access to health care – unless your’e one of them – the 1 percenters.
One more thing – the fact this 90yrs+ age group has tripled can also be attributed to the success of Medicare . How many of these people would still be alive if they did not have their Medicare health coverage?
So, maybe the Republicans DO like death panels? But they won’t call it that, they will just take away Medicare and if you’re not wealthy enough to pay – then it’s your fault.
The GOP Fantasy Land is such a cruel, cruel world – isn’t it?
If Republicans are in charge we won’t worry about a growing or an aging population. We’ll just die, and that includes all the average republicans too. Living will require wealth. Great, vast wealth.
If the current Far Right Winger GOP is in charge, before we die we’ll be forced to listen to all that Bible Thumping.
Oh God……just take me now!!!!
LMAO
Romney reminds me of the old saying – always a bridesmaid, never a bride.
Seriously, Mitt, get a clue and just tell the Far Right Wingers where to shove it and stand by what you say.
I still won’t like you but at least I can respect you….
Newtcare doesn’t have the same ring to it. A think tank founded by Newt Gingrich was paid at least $37 million over eight years by health-care companies and industry groups for, among other things, what promotional material calls “access to Newt Gingrich” and “direct Newt interaction.” The think tank, called the Center for Health Action, recommended requiring “anyone who earns more than $50,000 a year must purchase health insurance or post a bond,” an insurance mandate similar to the one in President Obama’s policy and now reviled by conservatives. Gingrich stepped down from the think tank earlier this year to run for president. Gingrich came under fire earlier this week for earning as much as $1.8 million in consulting fees from Freddie Mac.
Gingrich think tank collected millions from health-care industry
Barney Frank sums up what I suspect alot of people feel about Newt Gingrich.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/17/newt-gingrich-freddie-mac-barney-frank_n_1099393.html
I’ve heard the republicans want to elect someone as President of the United States who is exactly like them — stoopid. Lucky for them they have so many choices this time!
(from the article) “As people are looking at the candidate that is the most conservative and the most consistent candidate, I’ve been that candidate. I haven’t had a gaffe or something that I’ve done that has caused me to fall in the polls,” Bachmann told Greta van Susteren in a Fox News interview. “People see in me someone who’s genuinely a social conservative, a fiscal conservative, a national security conservative and a Tea Partier. I’m the whole package.”
They also see a woman who louldy boasts about being a Submissive Wife and who wants to legislate a woman’s sex life from birth control to abortion.
I don’t think the current female population in America will ever be ready to go back to the good ol’ days where men were the masters and if they wanted to beat their wife – nobody really cared. Because, after all, the little woman probably got too mouth. wink-wink.
THOSE days are gone……and good riddance…
Interesting article about Newt Gingrich. I saw a quote the other day – even Newt’s baggage has baggage.
What is so laughable is that this ultimate Washington insider is the person these Tea Party people are currently whooping and hollering about. WTH….
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/11/why-newt-gingrich-will-never-be-president/248456/
I think we (all who aren’t right-wing nutjobs) share a unique advantage no matter the outcome of the 2012 elections. On one hand the upcoming elections can keep republicans from becoming the majority. On the other hand we remember how well relaxing regulations and cutting taxes works. We will be better prepared for the next financial meltdown that will surely come as the result of republican majorities.
Here’s a quiz that shows which candidate holds similar political leanings to you, and allows you to click a candidate to see his/her positions on each of the questions.
http://2012election.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=004491
My results:
Obama 86%
Johnson 50%
Paul 47%
Huntsman 27%
Santorum 21%
Cain 20%
Gingrich 20%
Romney 18%
Perry 17%
Bachmann 9%
An Open Letter From the Heart of OWS: “We ARE the Message”
Dear Society to Which You, We, She and He All Belong:
So we rocked it, right?
Dang diggitty we did. And are. And will, still. The beat don’ stop until the break of dawn.
And it’s always dawn somewhere.
We know some people out there find us raggedy, unkempt, and perhaps congenitally disorganized. And by nature we surely are highly suspicious of organization. Chaos, we get; chaos we like. We understand that from the joyous, raucous frenzy of the subatomically chaotic flowers the life we all know.
Organization, however, we fear. Because we know—because we, like 99% of all of you, have in the hardest ways learned—that, all too often, what “organized,” practically speaking, translates into is, “Screw you, outsider.”
Next thing you know we’re all on the outside, and the only people on the inside—where, as it turns out, all the things like food and money are—are those who, in one way or another, have made organizing a primary purpose of their mean, exclusionary little lives.
So, yes, we tend to take a more organic approach to the whole idea of power hierarchies.
Speaking of which (and as you’re probably aware) city governments all over the country have now deployed against us their black-booted militia, rousting us, in the middle of the night, from the public spaces we have been both literally and figuratively occupying. It wasn’t hard for their baton-wielding machine to achieve its goal. We are, after all, a peaceful collective. We are to a marching armed battalion as a sand castle to the rising tide.
Now you see us. Sun comes up. Now you don’t.
Turns out darkness does cover all manner of sin.
They called garbage stuff that meant so much to us. They so casually hurled so much of our lives into dumpsters.
The media machine, in its constant need of a safe narrative hook, likes to talk about how OWS lacks a cohesive statement of purpose. So, before we disappear altogether (or, more exactly, before we morph into a new manifestation), let us say this:
You know, we know, why we’ve been here—and are here yet. And we know that most of you, in spirit if not in body, have been here right along with us, through the cold nights, the exhaustion, the inspiration, the stress and joy and laughter of it all.
You know the source of our anger. You know the locus of our fear.
You’ve watched your money disappear. You’ve seen your opportunities diminish. You know with what disregard you have been, or could be, pushed aside. Many of you have seen the open road of your life become a narrow, unnavigable little path into a darkness you don’t want to go.
You’ve held and watched your young children, and felt the furious terror of knowing that their future has been greedily, wantonly leveraged against them.
We’ve all done these things. To one degree or another, most all of us have experienced the great American dream becoming the disgraceful American nightmare.
We who Occupy don’t have a “clear message,” because we are the clear message. We’re the canary in the coal mine. We’re the first responders to the American economy blowing up, to the tragic break in the system. The only difference between us and those who haven’t physically joined us is that we live upstream, nearer to where the damn broke.
And now we’re swimming, treading water, trying to keep our possessions from floating away. Look at us out here—and so many of you, out there—so wet! So cold. So shivering.
And with winter now coming hard upon us all.
And look at those who purposefully and meticulously caused this terrible flood, so high up in their warm buildings, so confident the frigid waters they so blithely let loose will never reach them.
We fear that decency, for its own sake, no longer counts.
We fear that right no longer makes any might at all.
We fear that what matters most about the human heart and soul matters least to those who now control America.
They took what is ours—our homes, our money, our jobs, our future, our concerns, our right to control what happens to us—and turned it into fat, rich food—which they then ate.
Gobble, gobble, gobble.
Speaking of which: remember us this Thanksgiving. If only for a moment, please include us in your prayers about what you want, for what you hope, for what you’re glad you have. And if this year your Thanksgiving isn’t all you wish it to be, bear in mind that there’s always next year. Maybe next year things will be better for you.
And maybe they won’t be, of course.
Either way, it couldn’t hurt you to buy a tarp. Eight by ten is a good size: triple-stitched, water-proof, heavily gusseted at the corners. We recommend you get one with brass grommets spaced two feet apart on each side. That’s the kind of thing that can be of real importance when the hard rains come.
http://johnshore.com/2011/11/17/an-open-letter-from-the-heart-of-occupy-wall-street/
Whenever a Republican Right-Winger starts complaining about the OWS protesters within my ear shot, I simply respond – if you applauded the Tea Party protesting in all those town halls and disrupting public places – then you also need to applaud the OWS protesters.
Then to add salt to their wound – I like to throw in – things could be worse, these mayors in these cities could have followed the Republicans’ lead in laying off all those police officers who you are now applauding for ‘arresting and kicking those protesters out of the public park”.
Hmm, these OWS protesters are doing at least one thing – they are showing that the 99% can still bankrupt these cities by having all that overtime pay for their police.
Whose going to be the first on the Right side of the political aisle to be willing to pay taxes to keep those police controlling the OWS protesters?
I’ve heard it said that they’ll simply replace the government (people/taxpayers) paid police forces with private forces. Think mercenaries. Think Blackwater.
I don’t believe I ever imagined from the 1950s to now, that anything like this could ever happen. Sucks to be wrong.
Do you think the 1% have figured out yet that there way more people in the 99% than there are in their group?
And without the 99% paying for the 1% – their little group won’t last for very long.
Even better, the 99% are gaining support because of the stupidity of the 1%, who have no idea what reality is.
All I hear from those who don’t ‘get it’ about OWS are how violent the protesters are, how filthy, how… You know. You’ve heard it all too. Of course, when the Tea Baggers showed up to disrupt town hall meetings they came with guns and no one wanted to find out when they would use those guns so they were left alone. They were never confronted by anyone. We who aren’t Tea Baggers are smart enough to know to not mess with crazy.
The other criticism I hear is that OWS protesters want what they don’t work for, want to be given…, want to take from those who have labored.
What a bunch of bullshit.
Not a one of those protesters cares a whit about whether or not someone is wealthy. They just think wealth shouldn’t be able to buy our government. They don’t want a free ride, they want a fair chance. They don’t want laws that are skewed for anyone, just equal treatment and protections under the law. They want to work. They want to be able to believe The American Dream still exists.
You know I’ve had a lack of respect for today’s LE for quite awhile now. I’m certainly not gaining any confidence or trust in them lately. They’re mean, they’re violent, they have an “I’ve got a gun” attitude. I think many of them would like nothing better than to use those guns.
They’ve lost a lot of my respect, too. Now I’m suspicious and distrustful. I don’t like feeling that way. 😦
Here’s one I respect! Retired Philadelphia Police Captain, Ray Lewis, is arrested after protesting in solidarity with the 99%. Thank you Captain Lewis! Thank you for single handedly debunking the desperate right wing talking points that this is a movement of rag-tag jobless delinquents. Thank you for having the courage of your convictions, sir. We are proud to stand with you!
Well shoot! I can’t figure out how to size photos correctly for this format. Anyway, if the right-hand side of the photo hadn’t been cut off you would see the older gentleman being handcuffed by LE dressed in riot gear.
Unless you download the picture to your computer, you can’t resize it. What you are actually doing is linking to a photo that’s stored online somewhere. Check with WordPress “Help” to see if there’s any internal fix that would auto resize any photo over certain dimensions.
When you get your ‘news’ from Fox ‘News,’ you have no chance of gaining any truth or any understanding of OWS.
Yesterday, authorities charged Oscar Ramiro Ortega-Hernandez with attempting to assassinate President Obama after he allegedly fired an assault riffle at the White House. Never missing an opportunity to politicize such an event, Fox News baselessly tried to tie Ortega-Hernandez to the 99 Percent Movement, running a chyron that dubbed the man the “‘Occupy’ shooter.”
Fox & Friends host Gretchen Carlson said the shooter “may have tried to blend in with the Occupy protesters in D.C.,” and asked conservative blogger Michelle Malkin, “What would have happened if a tea party person had tried to do that?” Malkin took the bait, but admitted that “political ideology” was likely not a motivation of the man.
Meanwhile, Fox Nation, the social news site owned by Fox News, ran a headline yesterday blaring: “Man Linked to ‘Occupy’ Protest Charged With Attempted Assassination of Obama.” On Wednesday night’s Special Report — one of Fox’s “straight news” shows — host Bret Baier said, “Hernandez reportedly spent time with the Occupy D.C. protesters.”
All of the major issues of our day tie into this one fact: the wealthiest Americans and the wealthiest corporations are being over represented in Congress and under represented in the taxes they pay. The oil companies alone, (the world’s most profitable corporations in history), are receiving $50 billion dollars in subsidies every year. Mega-corporations are given tax breaks for off-shoring jobs. Major tax shelters in the Cayman Islands siphon needed money from our government. And this is only the tip of the iceberg. Increasingly, our laws favor the wealthiest 1% to the detriment of everyone else. It all starts here. Address this problem and everything else will take care of itself. This is the issue of our lives.
Insist on “No Representation without taxation!!” — Tracy Knauss
A little more of that ‘small unobtrusive government’ those republicans like to talk about.
Michigan Republicans Push ‘Fetal Remains’ Bill That Traumatizes Women Who Miscarry
Michigan Republicans have seized on a bogus story about abandoned fetal remains to push through a bill that callously disregards the feelings of women who have to abort wanted pregnancies for medical reasons.
1984, here we come! Are are we already there? 1983, maybe?