Monday, November 29, 2010

Why Wikileaks gives me hope

Over the last decade, it has become obvious to anyone paying attention that the very wealthy few were calling the shots and Washington does exactly what they are told, even when destroyed our middle class and our real national security to pursue goals that benefited that very few financially. Even the base of the right wing saw this clearly with the Wall Street bailout. Wall Street threatened to destroy our economy if we didn't bail them out (as if they hadn't already ) and our elected representatives voted to give them the money in spite of overwhelming public opposition.

A couple of things allowed them to do all this: 1) lame propaganda reasons fed to the public that just enough believed to vote for and give a democratic seal of approval to those action, 2) middle and upper middle class people in government and the corporate media who repeat and reinforce the propaganda and enact and enforce the real policy, and most importantly, 3) those functionaries either looking the other way or keeping their mouths shut about what is really going on.

Over the past few decades, we have seen tiny cracks in that wall of silence as individuals realized that by quietly serving the financial elite, they may be enriching their own family, but they were betraying other families like theirs, their country, and the human race. Daniel Ellsberg, the Church Committee, the Iran Contra hearings, journalists like Gary Webb, insiders who spoke out about the fabrication of intelligence before the Iraq War even started, Ambassador Joe Wilson, each seemed like a rock thrown in a pond that made ripples for a moment before the flat calm returned as if nothing ever happened.

Wikileaks could be different. The sheer volume of material makes you wonder if there aren't a LOT of people contributing material, and the recent State Department document dump shows that it can do real damage both to the propaganda facade and hopefully even the real policy.

Even if Wikileaks itself is shut down, and everyone who ever funneled documents to them is thrown in prison, whistleblowing has reached a critical mass and the genie cannot be put back in the bottle. It is also likely that those who have access to even more damaging information will be emboldened the more other people put out there.

This must scare the shit out the rich more than Nat Turner scared white plantation owners in the 19th century, and it should.

If Washington fails to do their job of making Wall Street, bankers, and the old money, spoiled trust fund babies subject to the rule of law instead of allowing them to make the law, some regulator told to look the other way, a soldier or diplomat asked to carry corporate water when it violates human rights or democracy, or a reporter who actually uses their skills to afflict the comfortable will air their dirty laundry in front of the whole world.

Once Washington realizes that nobody is listening when they say these leaks are treason and a danger to our national security, they will be forced to do one of two things:
  1. their jobs. Start legislating in the public interest not the interest of the wealthiest few, and bring the few to justice when they harm the rest of us and the rest of the world

    or

  2. Give up the pretense of democracy and execute the Pinochet Option.

The problem with the latter is it would depend on the same people to execute it who are now leaking like sieves, and in the long run, Americans will have no stomach for persecuting their relatives and neighbors.

The Libertarian wing of the Republican Party likes to entertain the Ayn Rand fantasy of the elite John Galts of the world withdrawing the contribution of their works and talents from the rest of us and the world falling apart, but they have it exactly backwards. First, that financial elite has no talent other than a lack of conscience and a mistaken belief that they are better than those born to the middle and working class, and second, without the willing cooperation of hundreds, even thousands of the working and middle class, they could not manipulate world events, access their fortunes, eat, and in many cases, they could not even wipe their asses since they have always had someone to do it for them.

Wikileaks isn't a crack in the dam of silence of all those people who carry water for the rich, it is the dam breaking, and the wall of water is fast approaching the mansions of those who have treated the rest of us like sheep for the slaughter for too long.

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

GRAPH: WAITING FOR SUPERMAN a SUPERDUD




Davis Guggenheim's ''blame the teachers, trust the corporate CEO's'' documentary has done less than a third the box office of his AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH at the same point.

Maybe the public put two and two together and figured out that it's unlikely that the bad guys in AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH are the SUPERMAN their kids WAITING FOR.

Don't you think there could be ways to fix our schools without making the rich richer?

Do you really think we can attract the best teachers if we take away their union and make their job security subject to the whims of a trust fund baby CEO, who spends all his time figuring out how to reduce labor costs or goose quarterly profits by FIRING people?

We can fix schools within the public sector. The contribution CEO's, corporations, and hedge fund managers can make is PAYING THEIR FAIR SHARE OF TAXES and improving pay and working conditions so parents have time to supervise their kids and help them with their homework instead of working three jobs just to make the rent and put food on the table.

We could take that extra tax money and reduce class size, something that would make it easier for more teachers and students to succeed and make the job more attractive since it will involve more teaching and less crowd control.

Then when schools are failing, bring in MORE resources, tutors, after school programs, social workers, whatever it takes to get the kids up to speed, and encourage collaborations between teachers instead of competition so they can ALL do the best job possible.

Most people must have some intuitive sense that what I just said is closer to the way to go, and that trusting the people who outsourced our jobs, gambled with and foreclosed our mortgages, crashed our economy then asked for bailouts greater than the whole defense budget just a few years before, is not.


Monday, November 15, 2010

compromise is like a bowel movement

It may be necessary, but it is distasteful to announce it ahead of time.

Obama is not reassuring Democrats or the general public when he announces compromise before negotiations have even started.

It is best to announce your ideals and the policy you will fight for, then after actually going to the mat to get those ideals enacted, including using the bully pulpit to get the public to pressure your political opponents to give ground, and then when you've gone as far as you can, compromise as close as possible to the end, but apologize and say exactly who was the problem and what they demanded for their vote or their excuse for not giving it no matter what.

To do it the way Obama does is the equivalent of walking into a car dealership and telling them you are willing to pay a price they are comfortable with before you even say what model you want.

The Republicans seem to understand this, the Democrats, and Obama in particular, seem to think it's a virtue to tell us they are ready to pinch a loaf of compromise before their lunch has even reached the launch pad.

Friday, November 12, 2010

Bush CENSORED best parts of his autobiography

George W. Bush left some memorable key moments of his life, some funny, others of profound historic consequence.

To complete the historical record, we fished the censored pages from his editor's trash.

Some excerpts from the missing chapters:

Retired Bush valet: W has never wiped own ass




(AP) Thrallport, Maine--Alan Puckerthorn, recently retired lifelong valet of President George W. Bush is surprised that the public thinks of his former master as a "regular guy."


"I served Master Junior from the time he was out of his nappies until my arthritis made it difficult for me to dress and wipe him everyday," Puckerthorn said. "I doubt that he could survive more than a few hours or even minutes without servants to attend to his needs."

Remarkably, he claims the president has never even wiped himself after defecating. "Never. A gentleman does not touch feces even with toilet paper." In fact, toilet paper has never touched Bush's posterior. "His mother insisted we cleanse his anus with natural sponges soaked in mineral water, and then blow on it until it dried."

The rest of the chapter


No one could have predicted 9/11...except the pilot for a TV show on Fox a few months before 9/11.


Bush admits three separate times Saddam Hussein had nothing to do with 9/11...

Bush entertains real 9/11 funders at the White House

In 1999, Dick Cheney explained the strategic importance of the Middle East, Central Asia, and the pipeline routes from those areas--that just happen be exactly where we are fighting the "War on Terror"

WMD: who has enough to be a threat to the United States?

Colin Powell's aide
says Iraq War about OIL so we can't leave

Bush had innovative plan to avoid bad press in Iraq War says British government: kill journalists

Effects of Bush's pre-emptive war on bad press

Jesus talks to George W. Bush at his ranch

One day, George W. Bush was walking through woods at his ranch in Texas, and the Lord Jesus met him and walked with him, as Bush said he often did.

“Mr. President,” Jesus began respectfully, “I am deeply troubled.”

“What’s eating ya, beard boy?” Bush said to his Lord and Savior.

“I am deeply troubled because I have seen a country that does not know me. Their people do not follow my ways, and their leaders do not fear God and glorify themselves instead of him. They ignore the cries of their people and add to their affiliction. What would you do to make such a country come to know my love, Mr. President?”


George W. Bush did not think at all, for he was a decisive man who knew what he knew and needed no thought or evidence to tell others what to do. “This leader’s a bad man?”

“Yes,” Jesus said.

“We got to take him out. We’ll give some money to his enemies or even his bodyguards, so maybe one of ‘em’ll air condition his head and take his place.”


The rest of the chapter

Comparison to Bush Disgusts Chimps

by Milo Cornelius Science Newswire staff writer

December 13, 2006

(Science Newswire) DES MOINES -- Conservatives howl when anyone compares George W. Bush to Hitler, and the left rolls their eyes when the right compares Bush to Winston Churchill or Franklin Delano Roosevelt, but no one has taken much offense when Bush is compared to a chimp—until now. Chimps who have been taught to communicate with humans have unanimously expressed anger and dismay at being compared with President Bush.

Over the last few decades, researchers have been able to teach primates to communicate with American Sign Language, lexigrams, and computers. Although their vocabulary is rudimentary, it is more than adequate not only for asking for basic needs to be met, but for expressing feelings and opinions.

Their distress was first discovered when a researcher was working on basic math with signing chimp Washoe, and she overheard another scientist refer to Bush as a “chimp faced moron.” She stopped her lesson to sign over and over “bush dirty bad stupid not chimp,” and persisted until the offending person told her that he agreed Bush was not a chimp, and that chimps are not dirty bad and stupid like Bush.

the rest of the story



Bush's forbidden love in the White House


Bush's love of bald heads

PIC: Bush PR effort in Middle East fails for mysterious reasons...



PICS: Bush Blackwater mercenary buddies forced to rebrand


Bush seeks Condi's help in a crisis at the UN


PIC: People of the world vote Bush number one!

Bush celebrates his black approval rating after Hurricane Katrina

Bush impeachment polls more like Nixon than Clinton


ANIMATION: changing map of Bush's true believers in the US



Reaction to Al Gore getting Nobel Prize


After a terrifying temper tantrum when he heard that his one time political opponent Al Gore had won the Nobel Prize, President George W. Bush was consoled when he heard the judges at the Hague would be far more likely to vote for him.

When President George W. Bush heard that Al Gore won the Nobel Prize, he terrified White House staff by smashing vases, slapping and kicking any servants that crossed his path and demanding to know why they hadn't bought the prize for him, drinking two bottles of cooking sherry, and refusing to take his psychiatric medications.

By Saturday, his handlers were able to calm him somewhat by sending him on a bike ride and promising he could watch ESPN the rest of the day when he returned.

the rest of the story

Bush says no WMD in Russia

At a press conference yesterday, President George W. Bush said he did not send troops to back Georgia in their brief war with Russia because Russia had no WMD.

"Look, I'm concerned when nations cross the borders of other nations and bomb and kill innocent people, but the fact is, Russia has no weapons that can reach the United States and no WMD. They just aren't a threat to us."

When pressed further, Bush said he had his staff review the public statements of his vice president Dick Cheney, his secretary of defense, Condi Rice, and former secretary of defense Don Rumsfeld over the last seven years and found that only two or three countries in the world may have nuclear weapons and other "WMD." MORE


Bush Bailout of Wall St. proves Orwell and Jack London right about the degeneracy and incompetence of the financial elite

King of Cayman Islands thanks Bush for Wall St. Bailout


The Cayman Islands formally thanked the United States for the first installment of the $350 billion Wall Street bailout.

"Just about all that money ended up in our banks, Mon," said king of the Caymen Islands and president of the Third National Bank of Post Office Box 7, Haile Ken Lay Selassie.

The Cayman Islands are notorious for their secret bank accounts used to escape individual and corporate taxes and launder drug money to make it available to banks and Wall St.

the rest of the chapter...

Bush to pardon at last minute to give more time for crimes

President Bush will not grant any pardons until immediately before Barack Obama's inauguration, so that he won't leave any of his administration's crimes unpardoned, a high ranking White House official said.

"We plan to be working until the very end of the administration, and the president wants to make sure his cabinet and staff are protected from prosecution for all their work," the official said.

In an earlier press conference, the president had revealed his thinking on this, saying, "One mistake my dad made was pardoning his fellas for Iran Contra on Christmas Eve, which my advisers tell me is nearly a month from the leaving office day. They could a done a lot of work for Poppy in that month and they wouldn't a had immunity. That would have a tragedery, which is to say a strategic tragedy."

the rest of the story

Oliver Stone's "W": "Forrest Gump goes to the White House" instead of the "Crawford Caligula"