Joe Lieberman Misused $387,000, and All We Got Was An Article About John Edwards!

I know, I know...the John Edwards debacle was and is stunning, heart wrenching, and life changing, and now its back in the headlines in all its glory! Edwards announced today that there is a federal investigation going on into his campaign funds (.... to determine if certain funds disbursed to the company of the woman that he had an affair with were legally transferred, or if there was some nefarious plot to shut her up and keep her in grand style ...with their maybe love child...) over the sum of...um...$114,000, give or take.

Look maybe you can keep your baby's mama in a nice trailer park for that amount, but it seems to me that this might perhaps be production money, as she was the videographer on the campaign trail, and anyone who has had to shoot for hours and then spend hours editing down footage for public consumption will know that an amount like that is chump change. Did he pay her to go away? Did he buy her jewels and furs? Who knows and who cares?



His career is ruined for now, and it seems to me that it serves a whole portion of others in the political and business spectrum to have his voice shut down because of what his message was and is. So, yeah, hes an idiot narcissist who imploded, and he's lucky that, from the outside anyway, his family has survived....If you've read my previous posts on this subject, you'll know that it interests me little to hear speculation about the details of this stupidity, and if he misused 100 grand of campaign funds, I'm sure that there have been worse crimes committed...oh, like the Clinton's real estate bamboozle and Bill Clinton's flirtation with the young Monica Lewinsky. I'm sure that never, ever happens in the halls of power....right? What kind of time and money are we willing to waste because of the hint of a sex scandal?

Which brings me to Joe Lieberman, our favorite Jr. Senator here in Connecticut. Today in the local Stamford Advocate, we were treated to a large piece on the news of Edward's probe, and then a page or two back and in a small box, was the news that Joe himself is also under investigation for misuse of campaign funds. This is a story that is not being covered by much of the media, except for snippets in our local papers here in Connecticut, and only by the Connecticut blogs such as My Left Nutmeg, which has been great all through the nightmare that has been Connecticut politics for more years than even Bush was the national nightmare. The New Haven Register had this story about Lieberman, as if his misuse of funds was just a blip that a small fine would take care of; a civil penalty of $50,000.



The Register also had the same article on Edwards that was published in the Advocate, (but which the Advocate hasn't, as of this time, put on line; nor have they put up the Lieberman story.) The Edwards article talks about his buried career and how he is finished, the turmoil of his marriage and any other projections that the writer could come up with because, heaven knows there isn't much in the way of facts there; not the gay in the bathroom stall/affair with a male page sort of deliciousness brought to us by the now defunct republican majority; now THOSE were facts!

Still, the article makes the Edwards situation sound like he took pallets of cash to another country that we had invaded illegally and just lost it with no explanation....oh yeah,that's the former President of the United States, who we can hardly muster the balls to investigate on charges of real war crimes, much less the money misspent, lost, given out with no explanation, and pocketed in conflicts of interest such asHalliburton/Blackwater & it's subsidiaries/Cheney or Donald Rumsfeld/Tamiflu/Aspartame.

Look, I'm not an apologist for Edwards. I'm as disappointed as anyone who was a true believer in his message, and who was mortified to find that he didnt get out of the race, and continued to wield his delegates, knowing that this was likely to come out. But here's the deal, Edwards is not in office, nor has he been nominated to any cabinet post. He is old, tragic news, in a very interesting election cycle, who will likely have his second act as they all do in show business.

Joe Lieberman, on the other hand, is still actively jumping parties out there and holding his chairmanships on some pretty importantcommittees, (Homeland Security and Government Affairs to name but two.) He is a sitting senator and as much as his crony's have forgiven him for his insane campaign to get back into that seat, the people of Connecticut largely have not.

Why this isn't a bigger story isn't much of a mystery to me, because I was there and saw the tactics of the Lieberman campaign first hand. I worked for Ned Lamont during every free moment I had and manned a contentious poll on election day. The Lieberman investigation was about a whopping $387,000 that was given out improperly, and much of it was to stage a ground war here, when he hadn't planned much campaign presence at all because he was so sure that he would win! When faced with a real lack of volunteers, the campaign hired ground teams to disrupt Lamont's events and basically make a nuisance of themselves. They plastered much of downtown Stamford with Joe signage, which was illegal, they ran through the streets of anyplace that Lamont was appearing and jostled in front of TV cameras with signs that they, themselves didn't understand, and they menaced even old folks and parents with babies in carriages with their aggressive actions.

At a Lamont speech in Greenwich I asked some of the kids, (they were all black for that event and it made the white Joe T-shirts pulled over baggy clothes stand out all the more, as if a crowd of black kids on Greenwich Avenue weren't enough in that stogy old-money town!) if they knew what Joe stood for, and they said no, that a guy in a van offered them $60 per day to wear the t-shirt and support Joe. Later when someone I know asked again, the amount had been raised to $100 per day. A kid said that he didn't know who Joe was or what he stood for but that it was just a job and he was following orders. At the time I was down in what is the inner city of Stamford quite a bit for some personal reasons, and on the cul de sac circle of the cluster housing that now replaces part of the old projects, a white Joe van would drive up and kids would go up to the van looking for work.

At the time the army recruiting offices were active in just such neighborhoods because these were the kids likely to go for the bonus money to go to Iraq for an indeterminate amount of time. Was it right for Joe, who supported the war and had no answers on how we were going to handle the military in Iraq or when they came home, to have children working for him against their own interest? Was it right to pay the on the ground volunteers in a political campaign who don't know what they are representing? I told a few of them that he was pro war and they shrugged, like teens do, and said that they didn't care because it was a job. I felt like that white van circling the entryway to the neighborhood that held all the poor in this city separate from the very rich and thr quickly dwindling middle-class, was preying on these kids, and that they should have been as against the law as any predator enticing kids with cash or candy.

Joe was a strong Bush supporter and allowed himself to be used as a representative for the democratic party implying that some of us were pro Bush and pro war. In reality, Joe was in a world of his own and the only pro war people around were those who were afraid of the terra, and who bought the victory line against the facts presented by experts. That was not what the people of Connecticut wanted, and as our representative we let Joe know that in the primary when we chose Ned Lamont to be our candidate. Joe wouldn't take that laying down and he jumped parties to run as an independent, thus getting elected on the Republican vote and the votes of those who had known him for years here and who either weren't paying attention or who thought that he would come to his senses.

Those kids didn't understand that on key issues Joe was not for them and that they were actually working against their own interests. But that was another Rovian tactic that seemed to work well when used in many different cases. Many of them were very young and in no position to represent one candidate over another, but cash talks, and when a small amount wasn't enough the ante was upped.

Well, we would soon come to find that the way the campaign was paying out for these services was incorrect and illegal. But for Joe, who is still seated on his committees and who was welcomed back with open arms and a standing-O by his coworkers in the senate, even after he lied to his supposedconstituents , dumped his party, and let us know in no uncertain terms that he knew better than we did what was best for our state, this was a non-starter. Therules don't apply to guys like Joe; that's the old Bushism that was not only shot down, but smeared into a paste and is now being washed down the same sinkhole that it slithered out of so many years ago; before Reagan, before Nixon...back, back, back to the barons of power who set the stage for the wealthy to maintain their prominence by creating a permanent underclass to fight our wars and tend our lawns, middle-class be damned!

Joe Lieberman has been sheltered by the media of this state and the country for no reason at all. He has been allowed to conduct the business of paying his fine in relative privacy, and in light of other investigations that are getting bold print treatment, he has been favored as always, by a system that protects its own. The end is near for Herr Lieberman and his little Hadassah, so they can return to the country club in Westport where he has been seen airing his furry little body in the pool. He can write his book and take a nice cushy job like Hadassah has. He has certainly represented the interests of big business and war in his years in office enough to deserve something with a corner office and a seven figure salary.

Meanwhile, is it really worth the small civil fine to persue this matter with Edwards? It depends on how serious the powers that be, in whats left of the old guard of the federal government, want him silenced for the long term. However long, it wont be forever, because regardless of bad personal choices, which are just that, personal, the message of the two Americas still rings true, and as much as a watered down Obama will try to address the poverty issue, he is not a bulldog on this issue like Edwards is. So, we will see what happens, and just when you think that hes gone for good, like our friend Elliot Spitzer (who in polling today was overwhelmingly preferred over Patterson as Governor of NY...in fact they want him back!) the second act will arrive.

c/p Brilliant at Breakfast

For Chist's Sake, Who Cares? John Edwards in the Age of Holier-than-thou Morality

Tonight on Hardball, David Schuster, went on about how John Edwards' titillating 2006 affair has damaged his message on poverty so severely that...well, he has lost his message. So powerful is the media's feeling about this moral lapse that it surpasses everything else in his career, and all other news on this Friday dump-day.

The National Enquirer, after months of trying, for no real reason, to uncover this thing, as if no one else in politics ever has cheated, as if it means anything in the face of what his work and message has been....or even in the face of the news of the week or the fact that we are at war and planning another, has finally satisfied a hungry supermarket checkout line, dragging our culture further into the gutter.

Lies? You wanna talk lies? How about the lies that the democratic leadership don't want to waste time bringing to light? How about the sick, the old, the suffering that are hungry tonight because of the lies of the government and the insurance industry? What about those old republican ultra-conservatives who would force patriotic Americans to deny their right to the pursuit of happiness honestly, forcing don't-ask-don't-tell, while they have sordid bathroom sex with strangers, even sneaking them into the White House press briefings?

Yeah, HuffPo's Edward's Big News Page will fill you in on the immorality of that night way back 2006, and its even being suggested that then the family went forth, stoically, with this lie under their belts. But who is to say what happened, how they felt, and if they even knew? Maybe it was his own personal secret...Why do we care?

You know what? As heartbroken as I am, because this may answer the question of why he dropped out when and how he did, and as much as I hate liars, I've got to say that I don't think that it changes what his message has been in this race or how he would be as a President or a Vice President, Attorney General, or diplomat.
To deny his influence on the messages of the primary candidates, of all of them, is to deny the effective parts of Bill Clinton's Presidency, the social and political impact of RFK and JFK, and if you want to go there, evidence suggests that even Martin Luther King Jr strayed.

Anyone who has been on the road in any intense job capacity understands what happens sometimes in those intense hours and days and weeks. Not that it's OK; not that anyone would condone it. But can't we just understand that whatever it was back then, in 2006, they obviously worked it out and decided to go forward as the happy family that they appear to be. Can't we allow ourselves to learn from Edward's message about the Two America's and apply that to what needs to be done? Why does the message have to be tarnished by a slip that is as common as divorce is in this country?
All of Europe laughs at us, the ugly Americans who waste so much time on issues of morality while we slaughter innocents for oil and allow our own weakest citizens to go hungry and without proper care.

I don't like it, and I'm really, really disappointed, but humans are fallible and its not for us to question what happens in someone's personal life unless it is against the law or hurts others in some way that effects society as a whole.

Why are men like this? We are animals and the urge for sex with many different people is deep in the coil. That doesn't mean that we dont have the ability to reason and that we shouldn't strive to overcome those urges, especially when there are children and the construct of the family unit involved.

I cant say that I believe in marriage in general, as a 100% forever thing. I don't understand the mentality of lying to oneself that any particular marriage is the one that will weather years and trials. Rather, if I were to find someone who I felt compelled to marry, I would have to say, realistically, that its a craps shoot and that all we can hope for is to make it to old age together in one piece; that we would promise to try to understand the fallibility of humanity and to not be cruel to each other. Its not OK to make a promise and to be untrue, but its unrealistic to think that its possible for 100% of the people, especially in positions of power that require huge egos, to be perfect 100% of the time.

Why should this make a difference in what he did professionally?
I guess he should have told the truth up front...
I guess they all should have.
I suppose that if we took the same amount of time to hold up the truths of the Clinton's, the McCain's, the Bush's, the Cheney's...I wonder which would be more destructive to society as a whole.

As usual Americans will follow the bouncing ball, the shiny-shiny, and let the rest be buried. Its the soap opera effect...but this is not a story on TV, these are people who have some very real ideas that just could improve our lot as a country and the world as a whole. So, lets no get carried away with this crap. Move along, theres nothing to see here...except some ideals that were meant to bring us closer to what America was founded for.

John Edwards Says No.

According to Reuters, After giving the keynote speech at CTIA, the wireless industry showcase (that I wish I was at,) John Edwards was asked in a small Q&A session if he would accept the VP slot for either candidate....He said No.
Apparently he also declined to endorse one candidate or the other, but I would've guessed that!
Oh well...Onwards and ...upwards....

c/p RIPCoco

The Grammys and Crippled Chicken Farming While Reading Sunday's NY Times...Livin' in the Future and None of This Has Happened Yet....

I know, I know...where's she been? I don't know, I say, as I look through the unfinished drafts of the past couple of lousy weeks of school meetings and a sick, paralyzed chicken.... and just feeling overwhelmed by the political climate and the climate of my life which seem to meld like the mud and relentless rain that makes us run to the window at the sight of flurries, wondering what happened to our snowy winters? Is the end nigh?

All craziness aside, if i don't get something down about whats going on, I find that thoughts upon thoughts run round in my head, so maybe its better to just spit out a little something, rather than waiting for the time to get it all down here....and maybe its just a little shorter...maybe...just a little...

So, sitting here watching the Grammy's and with my fingers crossed for a positive outcome from the meeting(s) this week between the Writer's Guild and the Producers; the hope for 24 with Janeane Garafolo as an investigator looking into the actions of Jack Bauer, and, no doubt, swept up into the action of the world of 24; or I hope so anyway. Janeane is my favorite action hero!

The Grammy's show sucks, and maybe thats because a large percentage of the new talent out there sucks...and the snippets of a nod they give to what might be a real part of the canon of American Music are just not enough...for whatever thats worth anymore; like, if you were still proud to be an American and wanting to promote our culture. Funny how the Band, Canadians and one American, and the Beatles, represented by Ringo Star of the new smash non-hit, Liverpool 8, an oddly horrible song, and by Yoko Ono in a white top hat....where is Paul? Ah, I don't know/don't care about the most eligible batch in the world....and the Cirque du Soliel doing a pretty fantastic dance number out of the over pimped legacy (THERE! I used it!!) Are John and George looking down on this and smiling or just out there in the nothingness realizing how meaningless that anything of beauty that we've created is in the face of the real power in this world? Still, the bright point is really this Cirque strangeness set to Beatles music.

Oh, and the writers are pretty damned right in their demands, and absolutely correct to hang in there and disrupt the prime times of the lazy American couch people until the greedy producers give in.

Being a big MSNBC watcher, I've got to say that I'm pretty disgusted by whats been going down over there regarding the bad boyz club and their mysogynistic bullshit that is actively thrust upon us daily by the usual suspects, and the parade of the same old horrible pundits. Thats why I find it sort of disingenuous that the suits over there decided to suspend one of the better and more intellectual members of the reporting staff, for saying the word "Pimp" in regard to what Hillary Clinton has done with her daughter. Its a crappy, knee-jerk and overly PC reaction to a few letters written about someone who never ever says that kind of stuff. As opposed to the long history of abuse by Joe Scarborough and Tweet Matthews, I'm aghast that the management felt that Schuster was the right vehicle for whatever repositioning they are attempting. I wrote to them, and I would suggest that anyone else who has a position on this do the same.

I couldn't concentrate much on the morning shows today, except to re-register that the republicans hate McCain; and more power to them and him. I'm feeling confused by what we've been left with on our side. It isn't working very well for me, though I did vote for Obama. I just don't feel represented and I still cant figure out why Edwards backed out so soon. I hope that it becomes clear as time goes on because I just cant imagine that we can possibly go into what comes next without his values and vision. For Christ's sake, people are suffering, and we have to get some money back into the education system.
Oh, so many other things too, I know...but from the get go, the system in this country seems stacked, like a wall over which the poor can't see, to even know what it is they could have or what they might want to strive for...This is a blindness that is meant to keep the underclass permanent, regardless of the wasted talent and dreams that are left there...That, to me, is un-American. Aren't we all supposed to have some value?

Today, I went through the Sunday papers and, as usual, pulled out a few things to read in paper form rather than online. There is something about the Sunday New York Times and how it feels in your hand...the smudge of it, the smell of it.

The book review this week is a political issue, and between the candidates, partisans, and the wars, is a piece on African American Identity Politics, which reviews the book Sellout, by Randall Kelly, and the book A Bound Man: Why We Are Excited About Obama and Why he Cant Win, by Shelby Steele. They both seem to cover the difficulties faced by black people who either break out from the popular African American culture, or are not considered to be "black enough." Both raise some legitimate questions that are really timely but, according to the reviewer fall short in heavy handed, overwrought prose, and the authors also being somewhat self centered in their assessment of their subjects. I expect the market to be flooded with this sort of material before long. Honestly, I'm not surprised to see this so soon...and I hope that we see some deeper insight than the "who's to blame?" argument about the African American culture not taking responsibility for itself. I am going through some of this with some kids Im helping, and in the world of no-snitching and being trapped in the community center and/or in a dangerous neighborhood vs. getting out, even a little, there is the reality of accusation of not being "black enough." I wouldn't have thought it for afar, but on the ground, its very real.

Thanks so much to travel writer, James Vlahos, for exploring "The Other Iran," in the Travel Section. If you didn't get a chance to see this, pop over and see the slide show. This is the other Iran in the sense that it is the old Persian part of Iran, but the title of the article, the content, and the slide show, beg us to look at what John McCain and possibly Hillary Clinton have their sights set on as a threat worthy of preemptive strikes. Look, Im not saying that I endorse or understand their culture...nor do I know much about the weapon issue...but I sure as hell don't trust any sort of warning coming out of this administration. I would hope that a new administration wouldn't just continue the path of the war, but restart the investigations and involve the UN in them. This is a beautiful and intricate culture that the people of Iran have obviously preserved carefully. Other parts of the country range from sophisticated cities with universities and business, to countryside. Why don't the American people get to see more of this before Iran is totally demonized as part of the Bushco oil plan?

And finally, In the Connecticut Section, is a horribly sad story about 3 brain-injured soldiers who are struggling to pull out of what seems to amount to vegetative states, and after family struggles, horrible care, testimony before a senate committee, one was able to get the VA to pay for private care. The mother then called another mother from the VA hospital to help her get her son treatment...and so it goes. Why we cant provide our soldiers with better care is a question that is probably best posed to the existing administration that ignores these guys as much as is possible without getting caught. But the story is really about the mother's sacrifices, and about the support that they give each other. The soldiers are never going to be OK and there is just so much help a rehab hospital can be in these cases. This story is about the effect of this war on entire families, and on the very foundation of our country, if we are all not included in the war effort. We have to end this thing right away, but in the meantime, maybe we can actually sacrifice beyond shopping with our tax rebate. Maybe we can reach out to those in need and send to soldiers at the hospital and abroad...and help those in need right in our own towns...people are suffering and we are all a part of this thing, even if we opposed it and even if we despise it.

I also strongly suggest the magazine section ...the whole thing, this week. Its got the Defense secretary Gates on Iraq and Iran, and the beginning of pain...as in, does pain start in the womb? Do babies feel pain? This is not only interesting to those who suffer from chronic pain, but also to anyone who has a stake in the abortion battle. If it can feel pain, is it a human life?
And then a guy who eats bugs, as part of the usual food report, and a piece on the ethics of organ donation....on to a portfolio of Oscar contenders.

OK, enough is enough. I haven't even gotten to frank Rich yet. Why is it that weeks can go by without much or much to say about the Times, and then there is a day with some really, really bright points?

Finally, for Springsteen fans, here is a song from his new record, Magic, which is really kind of fantastic, for the amount of the time Ive had to listen to it. I really like the words to this....there isn't much of a video here; just stills...Ill try to find a better cut of it. Magic really deserved the Grammy, and as of this publishing time, he hasn't won anything for it.



For Springsteen's commentary on this song see the live show cut below..."this is a song about the future, but its really about whats happening now."...I wish I had the energy to see Bruce live again...But look at that crowd; the size of that place...that used to really give me a thrill, but anymore, its just anxiety provoking. I've seen him plenty anyway...

John Edwards-Grown Up

Congratulations to Barak Obama on his South Carolina Win...Still waiting to see who comes in second. I don't know when or if American voters might choke at uncertainty mixed with racism, but if they're gonna start to have second thoughts, I hope that its before the general election.
I guess that Bill Clinton didn't win much of anything until later in the primary season, so its impossible to guess what will happen as this thing goes on. As far as I'm concerned, with Edwards, its all about the message, and hopefully he will have a good long time to talk about these very important issues. Its early to pick a winner in this, but as much as I hear that people hate Hillary, I'm also hearing some trepidation that Obama might not have the experience that is is necessary for this time of war. If we get any kind of terra surprise, we might see a result that we didn't bargain for. I hope to god that any of our candidates who moves towards the front of the pack is ready to react and act like they know what they're doing and they're gonna kick some terra-ist ass !

c/p Brilliant at Breakfast

John Edwards, The Mill

Debate Night Chicken Blogging.....RIP to the Clinton Era...

The chickens love to roost outside in the cold...up on their roost trilling and cawing, all puffed up and warm inside their feathers...this is the best time to grab them for a hug and a kiss! The rumpless Arcuna is my favorite! He spends alot of time outside my window here watching me write.
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Meantime, inside the silly little cottage in the woods, I've been watching the unreal New Hampshire debates, and weighing the very real differences among the democratic field...and the circus-like insanity of the Republican field as a whole.(Cue: circus music)
I miss Mike Gravel, and am sort of thankful for Ron Paul. Besides his really deep insanity and spitballing on how things would be run if we lived in colonial times, he speaks some pretty heavy and fearless truth. Having him in any sort of decision making position in this country would be a disaster...but I love to hear him exclaim and then watch the scary, half/dead Thompson guffaw and respond incoherently.
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What I'm not hearing on either side here is how we are going to document the bold crimes that are still bleeding this country dry. I want some answers. I don't want to wipe the slate and move forward, trying to forget this brush with the pathological. I want it spelled out so that every grade school educated, under-served and under-represented citizen in the furthest reaches of America, can realize that they should never feel again like they have to vote against their own better interests in order to keep America safe.



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John Edwards is clearly the winner of this thing, if you're counting content and concrete plans that make sense. I love John Edwards...I have to say that he has really stood out in this process for me. I have no reservations about him. Why does the media work so hard on shutting coverage of him as a candidate out?

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I am, as usual when watching anything on ABC, bewildered at the mono-tonality of the Charlie Gibson-Diane Sawyer cult. Even Georgie Snuffleupagus has taken on the hushed morning tone of people who live in high rises with vast shiny wood floors and ununsed surfaces or perfect temples made of bamboo and facing just so. I can feel the Feng Shui of the delicacy with which these people report the news. ***********************************************************















All in all, I've found this process to be fantastic, because we have had the great fortune to have had a great field up until Iowa and to have heard what they have to say. The concept of hearing ideas spoken in a public forum had fallen away. And in a world where the Republican contenders are a bunch of bumbling nuts, I have to say that we still have an embarrassment of riches, in the bold ideas being laid out here; Bold ideas being just pulling ourselves together and trying to get us back to some semblance of where we were trying to be, so imperfectly, too many years ago.


















Its gratifying that Americans seem to really want change, but I hope that the difference between Obama and Edwards become as strikingly clear as they are to me and the rest of the political junkies out there. Look at the differences in policy on globalization, healthcare, and nuclear power, just to start. Take a look before they start to pull together too much, as they have already. Soon you wont be able to tell them apart; and they do make good counterparts. Its just too bad that they each need a VP who has some sort of older statesman thing going on. The two of them would be the most dynamic white house that we've ever had.

Hillary? She was just so-so...very heavy botox, lots of struggle, fighting back from the brink, and, I feel sort of sorry for her. The blog word is that the Clinton era is dead...RIP to the Clinton Era....

Edwards Gains Ground, as Obamarah and Billary Slug it out...And On the Other Side? Cue the Circus Music, the Left Behind, and the Swimming Monkeys!!

Sunday: Life after the morning shows?
Planet Earth on Discovery Channel.....
The world outside seems pretty big sometimes.... and the pathological bullshit going on in here is sort of unbearable in the face of this:



These guys can stay down for up to 30 mins!
Forget the tiny pandering of the animals with the biggest egos on this planet. we've got nothing compared to the survival skills that are evolving every day out there on Planet Earth...Pick your nature show, folks, and sit right down for a heart warming HD journey into how small we really are in the scheme of things. Maybe I'm getting old, and maybe its that I resisted the new technology for so long, but high definition really is the new hallucinogenic for people of a certain age.

And that drowning feeling? Well, after long strange dreams about swimming in the tropics with old ex-friends who I hope to never see again, I was brought back to Mitt Romney by Frank Rich, who shines a light once again on the should-be criminal ball-dropping of the pundits and press in this country. The frustration of that on this icy morning, chipping away at the path, and fuming about how a swift boat attack is all that could stand between us and a Romney presidency, is just too much for my weakened sensibilities!
Surely, its our fault because we give them the ratings, but then, we also don't have much choice, do we? Why would it be so wrong to bring back some type of fairness doctrine? What are they so afraid of if they are so right...?

So, we watch the same old corpses, and hope for an explosion by the likes of Larry O'Donnell, who has been as much as pooh-poohed this week for his temper last week, as opposed to looking at what it was that he said that was just so unseemly.
According to Frank Rich in today's New York Times:

Pushed over the edge by his peers’ polite chatter about Mitt Romney’s sermon on “Faith in America,” Mr. O’Donnell branded the speech “the worst” of his lifetime. Then he went on a rampage about Mr. Romney’s Mormon religion, shouting (among other things) that until 1978 it was “an officially racist faith.”

That claim just happens to be true. As the jaws of his scandalized co-stars dropped around him, Mr. O’Donnell then raised the rude question that almost no one in Washington asks aloud: Why didn’t Mr. Romney publicly renounce his church’s discriminatory practices before they were revoked? As the scion of one of America’s most prominent Mormon families, he might have made a difference. It’s not as if he was a toddler. By 1978 — the same year his contemporary, Bill Clinton, was elected governor in Arkansas — Mr. Romney had entered his 30s.

The answer is simple. Mr. Romney didn’t fight his church’s institutionalized apartheid, whatever his private misgivings, because that’s his character. Though he is trying to sell himself as a leader, he is actually a follower and a panderer, as confirmed by his flip-flops on nearly every issue.

Polite chatter. That's what gets me. Its politeness that got us where we are now...so, for Christ's sake, lets at least look at the truth before we install another idiot president in place of the current one. The words that we shall not speak are the ones that need to be spoken, so lets look at the skull and bones underpants of this thing. The Iraq war shows us that if we keep quiet in the runup to a disaster, it can be nearly impossible to disentangle ourselves from the ensuing mess.

Racism; I keep hearing it mentioned as a cautious point on why we shouldn't support Obama. He might not be able to win the general. But that caution belies a disconnect with what is really going on out there.
Its evident in how the press and other candidates on both sides underestimated the Oprah-Obama factor. Its evident in the condescending way with which Oprah, who is arguably a spokeswoman for not only African Americans in general, but American women and her fan base, which spans larger than most of us realize, was dismissed as a pop-icon with no real weight in something as heady as an election. Think again. The woman who decided to turn her back on trash talk, and who got the country reading again, is more powerful than maybe Jesus, and probably, at least as powerful as the M$M's script for this thing. At least she knocked things around a bit and made the contenders show some of their real colors. This is not Springsteen or Bon Jovi rallying the kids; Oprah is another animal altogether and she speaks to a different place in the psyche of real people who are struggling to get by. Why? I really don't know. Call it a mysterious phenomenon; but don't disregard it.

Oprah is a populist who has taken chances for her convictions, and as much as she turned her back on the wrestling masses that Jerry Springer gave a stage to for ratings, she still has been a forgiving force who finds the common ground that represents every person in every trailer park, every upper east side matron, and those in-between. Its uncanny how she has built on that and has managed to remain above the fray in her objectives, and its not something that anyone could have predicted. But, I would think that people who watch this stuff for a living might be a little more aware of who Oprah is.

Even as Oprah represents the black thing when she goes into her hey girl! ghetto voice or does her MLK I have seen the mountain tone,she crosses a line that white America cant cross; not even Hillary as the wife of the "first black president," or whatever he was....but as she crosses those lines, she does it as if white and brown America are right there with her. She makes people of all colors warriors in a battle that is more intellectual than anyone realizes. She is talking about racism, which is absolutely knee-jerk visceral in those who grew up in places where it was ingrained, but she does it as if we were all in the battle together against what might even be something even within ourselves. What works about this is that she has a tone of self-forgiving and understanding, which makes it all more understandable and acceptable as something that we all need to change. I say all of this as someone who doesn't much watch Oprah and who is not much of a fan, unless she has on a specific subject that I want to see.

According to Rich, though, the worry about ingrained racism shouldn't be that much of a problem for Obama:

Race is certainly a part of the groundswell, but not in a malevolent way. When I wrote here two weeks ago that racism is the dog that hasn’t barked in this campaign, some readers wrote in to say that only a fool would believe that white Americans would ever elect an African-American president, no matter what polls indicate. We’ll find out soon enough. If that’s the case, Mr. Obama can’t win in Iowa, where the population is roughly 95 percent white, or in New Hampshire, which is 96 percent white.

I’d argue instead that any sizable racist anti-Obama vote will be concentrated in states that no Democrat would carry in the general election. Otherwise, race may be either a neutral or positive factor for the Obama campaign. Check out the composition of Oprah’s television flock, which, like all daytime audiences, is largely female. Her viewers are overwhelmingly white (some 80 percent), blue collar (nearly half with incomes under $40,000) and older (50-plus). This is hardly the chardonnay-sipping, NPR-addicted, bi coastal hipster crowd that many assume to be Mr. Obama’s largest white constituency. They share the profile of Clinton Democrats — and of some Republicans too.

And that sticky religion thing? The things that we might prefer not to mention? Oprah and Obama both come off as pretty heavily religious, but they are not exclusive or freaky, like the underpants that Romney and his folks wear:

“Church free” is the key. This country has had its fill of often hypocritical family-values politicians dictating what is and is not acceptable religious and moral practice. Instead of handing down tablets of what constitutes faith in America, Romney-style, the Oprah-Obama movement practices an American form of ecumenicalism. It preaches a bit of heaven on earth in the form of a unified, live-and-let-live democracy that is greater than the sum of its countless disparate denominations. The pitch — or, to those who are not fans, the shtick — may be corny. “The audacity of hope” is corny too. But corn is preferable to holier-than-thou, and not just in Iowa.

I don't know about anyone else, but the idea of an Obama candidacy seems sort of nice to me. I don't want another Clinton crammed down my throat and I want real chance. I'm willing to, at least, pretend that there is some choice and that big corporations and oil interests don't control everything. Whats the worst thing that can happen? Hasn't it all happened already?

In an absolute reversal of the prevailing news blackout on John Edwards, this week's Newsweek calls John Edwards The Sleeper and The Road Warrior, and talks about how he really could win Iowa and become a contender in the big show:

But it's worth keeping in mind just how wrong the media echo chamber can be when it comes to predicting winners and losers. At about this time four years ago, Vermont Gov. Howard Dean was the press-anointed darling who could seemingly do no wrong in Iowa. Dour John Kerry was scorned by reporters as the should-have-been who had blown it and couldn't possibly win. But on caucus night, Kerry wound up the victor—and Dean wound up screaming. Reporters were left to wonder what they had missed. One story the talking heads may be missing this time: just how badly John Edwards hates to lose.

I'm so tired of being told who my candidate is gonna be. I'm so tired of the likes of Chris Matthews and his ilk bleating on about how Hillary cant possibly lose...so, why bother even voting? It seems to me that as the networks have a responsibility to not give results too early on election day, they should try to act like there is a choice and try to encourage people to vote. The problem with them is that their responsibility is to the shareholders and not to the process. Every time I get the feeling that I'm being told to not bother any longer, I send Edwards some money. I honestly think he is the best one for the job at this time, and I honestly think that he has a chance. I also would like to make Chris Matthews and Tim Russert wrong (even though they have started to change course already...cue Sam Seder's backup beep!)
Its just nice to see a little coverage of Edwards, as if he were there and an entity in this race, and its also a nice article. It acts as if he is some new guy that no one knows about...but the background never gets old in a race like this.

Huckabee is on the cover of the New York Times Magazine this week and if you needed any further evidence of his particular brand of insanity, just look to the third paragraph for Huckabee's joy at the endorsement of Tim LaHaye, the author of the Left Behind series and game. I wrote about the game a year ago here, and, really, if Huckabee believes in the wrathful Jesus of the Left Behind series, and that our kids should be playing a game that allows them to ride at the side of the angry Jesus and kill those who were not raptured up to heaven (your choice of automatic weapons!)...you know, the left behind...kill 'em all! This is when I start to wonder what the fuck is going on in the republican party; what could they be thinking?

Chris Matthews played a video today of a fake Huckabee commercial that is supposedly posted on Andrew Sullivan's site. I didn't see it there, or on YouTube, but I am looking for it.

On the Iowa Trail.....Larry O'Donnell Tells it Like it is in the Church of Mormon; and Maher too.......

Godspeed to John Edwards. With the Iowa Caucuses offering probably the most fair picture of middle Americans (albeit, jaded by this rather heady process that allows most of them to meet and talk with the candidates,) barreling towards us, and Barack and Hillary neck and neck, with only one mistake possible between the two of them, John is well within the margin of error, with a good network already in place in New Hampshire. I really believe that Edwards is the only electable candidate that isn't under the sway of the powers of the ego/career trap or the big power of the ruling corporations that quake at the idea of Edwards raining on their parade. For God's sake, when are Americans going to look at the hard facts and cast a vote that serves them and their fortunes, instead of voting on a vague impression taken from media bytes being thrown about by the M$M?


I would be very interested in seeing Barrack Obama win this thing too; as opposed to Hillary....BUT...I don't know if he has enough political experience to get things done in the office, and whoever gets this one has to hit the ground running. At the same time, I like the idea of ideals being tossed about; I liked the West Wing and I can easily see Obama starring in the next generation. But I get this red flag warning, strobing G-R-I-D-L-O-C-K. Maybe it will be that way to an extent anyway, considering that the war will become ours on inauguration day, and we are doing nothing to make it clear that there is a laundry list of criminals here, and their crimes are being glaringly ignored. If we don't go after the criminals now, we deserve what we get.
Can Obama handle the fallout of 8 years of the Bush crime syndicate?

To me, Edwards holds the key to the undoing of the insane policies that have been sliding into place since Reagan. He also doesn't care anymore what they say about him and what they do to him. He has been through it all and acts with the air of someone who is just concentrating on being himself, and screw the handlers and bullshit. Edwards still has a chance and I hope to god that he has the support in Iowa among people who are weighing the actual policies of the candidates.
And to be absolutely sure of this, it looks to me in hi-def, like Edwards has recently freshened up his botox, as has Chris Matthews. Whatever it takes, I'm for it!

On the other side, its clown-time all the time...its never over.
Rudy cackled through Timmeuh Russert's, "tough as they get..." according to Chris Matthews, questioning (NOT!) on Meet the Press. Every time he was asked about his scandalous ongoing rip-off of NYC during his tenure, he cackled hysterically, like a crazy man. But then, Matthews talking about cackling, is a bit of pot-kettle-black, and his ranking of who is a tough interviewer....well, these guys are so involved with each other's asses that its not worth getting angry anymore. Oh, and by the way, Matthews thought that Romney's not-Mormon, religion speech, was the best speech of the campaign! Huh? Hasn't he heard Edwards? Obama?...hell, even Oprah reading off cards, in her MLK-black voice, was better than that. He made no sense and he came off as disingenuous.

Lets get real about the church of Mormon and Mitt Romney's bullshit speech that has already gotten too much airtime by now. Mormon: There is a self appointed leader to whom,it is purported, Jesus himself appeared in 1820, and subsequently an angel dictated the Book of Mormon to him. Thus began a cult of Jesus-freakishness, in which Jesus is considered the creator of everything, replacing God, except to get a little help or direction from him here and there. There is some sort of planetary influence a la Scientology, a disgusting amount of sexism and racism, and the belief that those who don't practice this particular form of Christianity will not go to heaven. The notion that the followers were sent from heaven where they previously resided with god, and that they are following a predestined path in order to gain experience for their return to heaven, removes basic responsibility from them of having to question their assumed authority about all things Jesus; the rest of us be damned...unless we want to get baptized into the cult...then I guess we're saved, only to be explained away as some wandering sheep that have found their way back to the fold; as part of the grand predestined design, of course...like, to teach the rest a lesson...?

Mitt says that America's founders didn't mean to separate church from state THAT much, but at the same time he says that he will do his best to keep the two separate, except that...he is a devout Mormon, and so he must have believed the particularly disgusting teachings that he no doubt followed in his early 20's, such as the belief that blacks are from Mars, while Mormons are from Venus! yup....This group has a dirty history worth looking into, and old Mitt, by proclaiming his devotion throughout the years, particularly naming times of his life that he was still a Mormon, has made it clear who he is...exactly clear.

Larry O'Donnell hit this straight on yesterday on McLaughlin. I was so relieved to see someone able to express the disgust that I have been feeling about the fundamentalism coming from sectors of the republican party, that I started to count the minutes until this showed up on the YouTubes. Larry O'Donnell has the first comment, and its really the only thing you need to hear on this joke of a debate on religion and what the candidates intend to do with it.


I'm not a religious person, but I respect the urge in others, if it gives some comfort. Its certainly nice to have some belief and community in this world; something that I personally lack. I just cant see anyone with the devout belief that a certain group of people are going to heaven (coming from heaven, even,) and the rest of us are going to hell, (or are from hell,) as capable of being a leader to us all. Can one just set those sorts of beliefs aside? I didn't get the feeling from old Mitt's speech that he is able to separate anything from his religion.

...Oh and, he is no JFK...nope, not at all....


Bill Maher on Mormonism


Next up: Huckabee the circus freak...

c/p on Brilliant at Breakfast

John Edwards is The President That This Country Needs!

This is the man who should rightfully be leading us. I'm so tired of the likes of Chris Matthews telling us that Hillary has it all sewn up. Watch her numbers drop as I type this! This is not a done deal and I wouldn't underestimate the power of this man's convictions.

John Edwards is my choice for President of the United States, and if you care about the future for our children, and for what the America that we grew up in, full of hope and progress, used to stand for, you have to open the door to the possibility that we can stand for something again.

Give this video a few minutes of your time...it is a little long but well worth it in that it covers the message that John Edwards has consistently had for as many years as he has been in public service. I don't believe that this man is a liar; I saw him speak in Chicago in a small room, and I knew that what I was seeing was sincerity. As someone who you all know, knows my political stuff, a little too well sometimes, and as someone who is, as most of us are, really skeptical of both parties and all politicians, I would stake my life as I know it on this guy being clean and sincere. Also, Ive found that a good part about being obsessed with this stuff is that you get a gut feeling based on information and emotions...and my gut tells me that this is the guy that should be our nominee.
Jill already posted this on Brilliant at Breakfast, so I won't be cross pasting this one, but I did want to have it up here at RIPCoco too.

Consider John Edwards for 2008. He is the one who embodies all of the qualities that this country needs in order to heal and reclaim our place as the strongest and most influential country in the world. Lets have hope again:

Another Debate, Another Halloween....

Its Halloween...Boo!...and I'm listening to Marc Maron filling in for Randi Rhodes. Its almost like the old days except that he wont be on again tomorrow.

Last night I watched another democratic debate on MSNBC, and this one was notable in its horrible format and questions...and also in the poor moderating by Brian Williams, who was stiff and counter-intuitive. The light moments were the lightening round, which was basically the candidates talking in fast forward like Alvin Chipmunk, and Biden's comment about Rudy's "noun, verb, and 9-11" structure for every comment he makes.

The word today is that Barak Obama crashed hard, and I saw something that I find annoying in ...well, anyone, much less my President...He is not right on point... he says ummm alot and looks around too much. I think that he has his moments of real shining presence, but I find him to be sort of soft when it comes to the need for some sort of combative message to the people.

We are in what might be described as a serious crisis in this country. We are in trouble, and I don't want to feel like the man who wants to be my President doesn't have a strong sense of urgency. And its true also that when I saw them all debate live at Yearly Kos 2, Obama sat, leaning forward, looking to the side at the moderator rather than at the audience, and seemed almost young and sort of lacking in the kind of polish and presence that enables someone to go confidently into negotiations with world leaders; someone who goes in and kicks ass. I think that he is a gifted orator, but I don't know that he can really command the dyed in the wool politicos that have to be dealt with in this job. By this debate I can see clearly that he is green and he does need seasoning. Obama is just not ready yet....(notice that I say yet.)



Meanwhile, Hillary has been touted by the press as the one, and we are basically being told to pack it in and head to the polls and pull her lever...but the same press that is telling us who to vote for and sizing up the big show as a Hillary vs. Rudy game, were tremendously quick to jump on her when they felt like she had made a big slip in saying that she believes that illegal immigrants should have access to drivers licenses. This is a hot button issue, and its one that is being skirted by most politicians; embraced by others....And Hillary made the mistake of stating a position!! Well, we can't have that, for Christ's sake!! I guess that its silly to note that all the candidates agreed with her except for Dodd. This is the crack in the veneer that they were looking for.

It dawned on me, much to my delight, that if Obama is looking young and green, and Hillary showed a hairline fracture, Edwards is only one mistake away from being the guy...and let me tell you, Edwards shined last night.

John Edwards is a man who has been through this ringer as the different apparitions that advisers and handlers will create at the big show. He has clearly straightened out, in his own mind, what his life is about and what his campaign is about. I think so anyway...Its impossible to ever truly trust any politician, but I've seen him up close, and I bought his line; hook, line, and sinker. I really think that he is the guy...and that if its not for President this time round, its to do some really important work on this country and whats wrong with it. Like Al Gore, he might actually be able to do more good while not being president.

What I love about this process, which is a much more open-format and full debate schedule than the Rovian Bushies would ever permit, is that the field is fantastic and varied. I'm not wishing that the field would narrow all that soon, mainly because I'm acutely aware that things are being said over and over that have needed to be said for years. And though its true that the corporate media has their own manipulated spin on what is being said, in their drive to make Hillary be the candidate, sound/YouTube bytes are being created that are bound to make their way out of that lock on information that is hanging heavily in the air on network TV, radio, and in the papers.I want everyone from the media powers-that-be to the bloggers to pick this stuff apart until its dust. I want the conversation about how horrible Bush has fucked us up to go on and on.

I keep remembering driving around here as the war began and as the first part of the attempted destruction of the constitution began, and the first horrible mistakes started to become apparent...and this is such a different atmosphere, even if we end up with the repugnant Hillary Clinton, (with her questionable ability to beat even Rudy Giuliani,) at least the things that needed to be said were, for the most part, said. All that is left is to try to understand why the House and Senate are not on board with what the country clearly wants....and where the corporate media thinks that they are getting off in distorting things so much. I love this stuff, even if it is gut-wrenching and heartbreaking most of the time.

Last weekend, I had a garage sale here at the Chicken Ranch , and due to my ever present Impeach Bush sign, I was treated to a day long running conversation about the extreme disappointment that people are feeling about the current majority rule and their lack of balls in getting us out of Iraq one way or another.

Why do I like John Edwards so much? He is very clear that if we are to continue on this road that we need to understand that we are going to have to sacrifice and take responsibility for the position that we are in. This isn't just Bush's mistake or something that politicians have to handle; we are all there in the thick of this thing and as time goes on it will effect us in much more palpable ways...so, don't look to the authority figures in this thing to get us out of it; they are every bit as helpless as we all are. This thing is going to take some real work to dig out of, and its not going to be easy.



By far, the most interesting person at the sale was the last guy, who was a local pump guy on his way to an emergency call. He wanted to get some toys for his grandchildren...and upon seeing my Impeach sign explained to me that he is a vet and that as far as he can see, that this is a fascist government.... then he went on to lay out every point that I had ever thought or had heard from the likes of Seder and Maron, the prophets out there, and my favorite blogs....not to mention what had been going around my head for all of these years. This is an older local guy who is not on the internets at all, and who is getting by listening to a local black liberal station which is supposedly available up here at 95.5 FM.

He reminded me of myself before AAR came out of nowhere and reminded me that there are sane voices out there somewhere...and he was so happy that he found someone who agreed with him. Sometimes it seems like we are out here rattling round in our own heads, and at some point critical mass has to ensure that there is some movement in the direction that we are mandating. They work for us, don't they? I mean, I guess that if Hillary gets into office, it will be the equivalent of more of the same lite, so you cant be too careful. But when are we gonna get so mad that we remove these people from power? What has to happen? How bad does it have to get before we demand that the networks even actually report on the demonstrations that we are marching in?

Garage sales are strange in that they cross personal barriers...who is buying what?...and who understands what? Many immigrants came by and they bought alot of my old sneakers at 50 cents a pop....I lowered the price for things like that, in that these are the people doing most of the heavy lifting around here. The Hispanics were the best hagglers, but I started to get a little tired of it all in that I was making the prices super low to begin with. I began to pull items back from even being on sale because I felt like...it was almost embarrassing to fight with an older Mexican woman about a jacket from Banana Republic or something, that was new, and that she wanted for a dollar...but that I could sell on eBay for $15...I was saying basically that I live uptown here in this beautiful place and that I have a computer to sell my fancy things, (actually my sister had given it to me as a present and I had never worn it,) and I was somehow torn between giving the stuff away and pulling it back...but I didn't want to haggle down to some silly price. Maybe I was losing my mind...maybe I had been in the garage too long. It was an odd sensation and it reminded me of why I usually just give stuff to the Salvation Army and let them sell it.

Maybe that I was just getting sick, which I was, but a whole day of discussing the extreme political distress that is going around out there, on top of going through all of my kid's baby stuff, my past, and seeing so many neighbors and people who came up from downtown to go through the "rich people's" stuff, frazzled me.

No doubt that I am frazzled and burned out anyway. I don't quite know what to do about it, because its not like I can shut off politics, or my kids, or my life...and even if I do, it goes round in my head until I can research the ideas and spit 'em out here or there...I don't know what to do. But something that I find heartening in all of this is that this guy, John Edwards, is really speaking the truth; and its not just a truth about the current situation. Its a truth about life in general and how we move around on this planet, what we can expect from our interaction in this society, and what our responsibilities are in life...towards each other, our families, our friends, and the larger world. The disconnect has to stop here...we must find our way back from becoming so disconnected. If we don't, we cant hope for much besides a fast food, cardboard, empty world, with a couch and a TV remote....
So let the debates continue, and maybe, just maybe, some little bit of information will get out there and into the popular psyche enough to wise us up...lift us up...

John Edwards on Health Care...This Guy is the Real Deal!

Jill posted this today, and I think that it should be cross posted to as many blogs and sites as possible.
This IS why we need John Edwards in the White House. There is just no question left in my mind that this man is finished with business as usual, and that he is ready to fight to change things. And not only to change things but to remember who we are and what we stand for. What good is any of it if citizens like this have to struggle like this for what should be (and were, I believe, before this disastrous regime put the plan into overdrive,) our rights. We have the right to health care; full health care. We have the right to jobs and the American dream, if we work hard and are able to get ahead somehow. The decks are stacked against anyone who isn't a millionaire in this country, folks...and thats the real truth.
This is the change we need...this guy is the one:



Pass it on.....

Edwards, Obama, Clinton, Lobbyists, and Campaign Reform...Money Talks... But Who is it Speaking For?

Digitotalitarians Unite!!



Here we go again.
Welcome Home!



Lets get one thing straight; No money is clean. I'm sure that the headlines about Edwards and Obama accepting donations from large corporations, and whatever the earth shattering revelations are in this world of overly literal campaigns and an undereducated populace that can only take in information in sound byte form, are interesting, but the fact, until there are actual facts that mean something, seems to be that this is a concocted line of what-ifs and maybes that don't add up to much.

We are frozen. Its as if, in this political atmosphere, no one should deviate from their position of 6 years ago, and no one should grow and change at all. I'm afraid of anyone who has learned nothing during this administration, much less the Bill Clinton Administration! But, besides the Rove instilled fear of the awe inspiring "flip-flop," I don't even see that as the issue here.
What I see happening is some form of desperate extrapolation to comb through every donation to try to connect it to some lobbyist...or the corporations that they represent.

We're all wading in the same pool here, folks, in that we could all be lobbyists, if you're gonna count the individual lawyer donations as a lump and the people who work for drug companies as a lump. Isn't that so many apples and oranges until every lawyer that has given cash to Edwards gets together and hires some guy to hand the money over in the interest of an issue or a set of issues? Then couldn't all individual blogger donations or Mom donations to Obama or Edwards also be called special interest contributions? Don't we all have special interests in whatever our pet issues are? So, where do you draw the line in tracing this stuff and who decides when a lobby is a lobby if its not formal? Its surely a slippery slope and I doubt that any candidate wants to have to pick apart every donation that comes in before there is some meaningful reform of campaign financing and lobbying, but isn't it safe to say that these lobby's are only formal if they are in fact formalized?.
But the wider message seems to me to be that Obama and Edwards don't want to accept donations from the overt lobbying population that has grown into a monster, and that Clinton is, as usual, carefully parsing her words to be sure to be so inclusive as to recognize that every lobby firm and every large corporation employs Americans. Now, that would be meaningful if deregulation had not allowed the top management and CEO culture to raid logical business structure, and suck all the money upwards....I don't believe that a Phillip Morris Lobby represents the guys who run the factory machines, and certainly not the pickers; probably not even the secretaries or administrators. So, when she says that she is supporting all Americans with her take on the lobby issue, she is saying that she supports the top tier of earners, because without corporate regulation back in place, there is no worker lobby of much substance out there....and certainly there is not a Phillip Morris Lobby that includes a Phillip Morris worker's lobby, representing the fact that the little guys will lose their jobs if big tobacco is hurt...This is all about corporations pushing their agendas forward so that the top guys can get really rich, really quick before the rules change again. And its clear to any of us in the real world out here that the agendas of large corporations largely do not represent the working people of America.
See, the bigger idea here doesn't have much to do with some donation that slipped past or some gotcha that Matt Drudge is looking for. its about the big picture and the desire to change things fundamentally. To assume that this stuff might effect you positively, beyond the fact that you may get killed by some drug or law that has been pushed through to your detriment, is fantasy and as likely as winning the lottery and having to deal with the "death tax" or a windfall tax. No, the conversation that Clinton is having that includes all Americans means all rich Americans, because this lobbying stuff is what goes on behind closed doors in the halls of power. To call it out is to open those doors and let some air in...and if that means that someone is out there looking through every contribution record to the Obama and Edwards campaigns, then so be it.

Lets try tying the fortunes of the top tier of corporate America to the fortunes of the bottom tier, and then revisit what the lobby is. How 'bout everyone gets a raise and that the big guys pay windfall taxes out the wazoo into funds set up for those who have lost their jobs due to technological advances that have allowed those windfalls? Don't get me started on outsourcing! How 'bout tying worker happiness and ability to achieve the American dream to how much a CEO can take home?...These guys will still surely get rich, but just not as rich...At some point its all just so much zeros on a statement anyway, isn't it?

Its a pretty bold move for Edwards and Obama to keep hammering this point, because surely it puts up the red flag to all the diggers out there to get to work to find the one bad contribution or person that works on a campaign who used to be a lobbyist...but, its an issue that needs to be addressed and I'm happy that its coming up. I'm also glad that we get a glimpse into the real Clinton, because her non-answers are rather frightening and it almost as if one tiny crack might let a ton of sludge loose that will not only be bad for the party, but dangerous for America.

I'm not perfect..OK, if you must know, I went to Wal-Mart some months ago and I bought some chinos for the kids that were probably made in China. I drive a Jeep that guzzles more gas than it should. I use air conditioning...hell, I love air conditioning! There are reasons for these things but I am not going to make excuses or go on about my carbon offsets. As I go along in life, I can certainly say that I've modified and changed and I am going to continue to do so. I need and want the tools to do that with, like a real hybrid truck that can get up my driveway in the winter. I expect that of anyone who is growing up in this life, and I certainly expect it of our leaders. We need the tools to make real choices and sacrifices, and we need leaders who aren't afraid to offer them. The deregulation thing has not worked out...lets just face it, change it, and move on.
And try really hard to look at who is profiting from these issues and leaving them as they stand. The hardest thing is probably to look at our own lives and to realize that some of the maintenance of the status quo by us is built on the fantasy that we might one day be in the class of the same people who benefit from these things.

Which brings me back to education. If we don't educate our kids, and ourselves, to think critically, make decisions, have ethics and morals, then how can we expect anything to get done?
What ever happened to that line of education? I think its gone in a haze of political correctness and some crazy tie-in between those things and religious upbringing. This idea is not true and doesn't fly. If we are so caught in political correctness that we cant even look to the past and talk about what was wrong or right with the way things went, then we are a country of sheep being groomed to be the rabble, while the elite get whats theirs.
No kid should leave the American school system without some critical real-life skills, decision making, and an idea of how great minds thought throughout history, and how the same is not only possible for them but expected of them!! Without that the American dream is dead and we might as well just prepare for the rapture.(...not!)

Netroots Nation...President's day at the Yearly Kos and the Wrapup.....

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I have seen the future of rock and roll and it is John Edwards!!
Yesterday at the Yearly Kos was confirmation for me that John Edwards is the one.
After a day of writing, and wringing and running round, I was able to get a great seat with Jill at the Presidential Leadership Forum, which was really more of a debate, and also just a stomping, energetic, loud, good time, with alot of the usual sound bytes and, for me, a great window into the unspoken body language, posturing, and those on their feet reactions than we normally see. This crowd was challenging in a way that these candidates are not especially used to, and it was clear who was easily able to embrace it and find it fun , and who was bristling ...not to mention that Mike Stark was sitting in front holding a sign that said "Hillary Stop Lying." (Check this guy out...hes awesome)

John Edwards speaks with the conviction of someone who is really devoted to changing things for the better and who has been through the mill of having his message shaped enough to get to a point where he has nothing to say except what is real to him...nothing else works ultimately. He loves a challenging audience and intelligent questions, and he is an active and thoughtful problem solver. It was so clear how energized he was by what we do and how the netroots have changed the playing field. And he is ready to change things, even if it means painful transitions and walking through the fire.
I came away from the forum feeling like he was really on fire, and I came away from the breakout session as a true believer. Hopefully I will be able to get a little video and audio up here.
I have to say that I went into this liking him (and Obama and Richardson as well) and came out completely sold that he is the future. I feel strongly that even if Hillary is the nominee and if she gets my vote, I will likely work for Edward's One America movement rather than put my energy into whatever she is doing...the rest Im not sure of...The ticket matters, the atmosphere in the country and the world matters....we'll see. But as of today, I remain an Edwards girl and I think that he needs to raise more funds because if more people saw him and what he's saying, he would be IT. Why the press is freezing him out is anyone's guess. I don't want to sound conspiratorial here so I'm not gonna say anything. In the coming weeks I want to talk more about Edwards specific plans and his ideas of how we can get back to the moral center of what America was supposed to be striving for.

The former First Lady and current Jr. Senator was in fine form in her turquoise pantsuit/jewelry combo and carefully measured answers.
Hillary was not prepared for this crowd and for the taxing and exacting reactions she would get. Simply put, she couldn't pander to us as if we were Wal-mart shoppers, and the reflected glow of Bill had long ago worn thin on this hawk. Hillary's carefully delivered sound bytes, came off as watered down Republican hackery. Really, I was surprised at how uncommunicative she was. How does she expect to get elected if there are things that she cant really go into and acts like she doesn't even have to explain it?
When pressed about pledging to not take special interest lobbyist money, Hillary made it clear that she wants to represent ALL of the people, including lobbyists, who are Americans too after all, and corporations, which are made up of Americans...right?
As John Edwards talked about the need to reform the system he urged Clinton to pledge...and her answer? "Well, John certainly has been taking that position."
That's it. And that's who she is. She believes that we should trust her record enough to believe that SHE couldn't possibly be swayed by lobby money. I just want to know why I should trust anyone who wont lay things out and acts like she is so above it all.
She said that she won't visit all the states but has that same "strategy" that Howard Dean talks about...But she does intend to visit all the red parts of the blue states. Its all a part of the strategy, you see.... she then went on to explain how she figured out where to go in NY State for the most bang...interesting, calculating...I know it happens all the time, but I don't need Hillary to go on about how clever she was in inserting herself into NY State politics when she decided that NY was the state she wanted. I don't think she is a bad senator, but I find her disingenuous and self congratulatory. She also seems to assume that its her and Howard all the way. I think that she takes alot for granted.

On the international front, Hillary believes that its not that the world hates Americans, but that its just Bush that they hate...huh? Doesn't what Bush orchestrates around the world reflect on us? Aren't we represented by our leaders? Aren't we sending them to do our work?
This disconnect is the red flag for me that Hillary doesn't really get what is coming down. We expect our politicians to tell us the truth, not be secretive. We also expect them to fucking represent us. We have had 6+ years of a president who condescends and acts like the things that he knows are too, too, secret for us to possibly understand. I don't like Hill's attitude about it. It of course there are classified issues, but its the attitude here that sits wrong...just quietly go about your business...don't use that tone with me!

Hillary also wanted to assure us that we are SAFER since 9-11 as far as our first responders system goes.....Well, Hillary, I'm here to tell you that I live a couple of towns over from you, and if anything happens...nuclear power plant accident, disease, chemical spill, hurricane, windstorm...we are screwed. Most houses in our area burn to the ground because we have a first responder network that is undermanned and with archaic equipment. But, we are in small towns...how about looking at New York City? Well, the system is far from safe or fixed, with communications that are still limited at best, and a billionaire mayor who is as concerned as Giuliani was with how how things look and smoothing over the deficits, leaving us all in danger in this most dangerous time that Herr Bush has created for us. In short, the radios still don't fully work!!

There is a small rumbling in the blogosphere to stop Hillary, because she would obviously be the GOP choice and she stands in the way of a real candidate getting out there. It feels pretty negative to me to turn on our own, but I have to say that there is something about Hillary that is not quite right and all there. I am uneasy with her and she sounds more and more Republican. She definitely wants to keep all options opened and she doesn't want to have to answer to anyone. I am really unsure about how she feels about globalization, social programs, war with Iran, real withdrawal from Iraq, and changing course in a big way in this country.
So far it seems pretty canned and positioned. She always seems to phrase things in a way that allows some way out..I dunno...

Obama is an incredible guy with great ideas. I cant say enough how much I feel for him and what his message is. I have been asking people about his breakout group and people came away from it awed and as true believers, but there is some but..but going round...Its always, IF he can get it, he would be great BUT can he? Is he ready? Its not clear to me that he is ready at all for the #1 job; nor does it seem clear to his supporters. I'd love to see him get some experience, grow a little older, and get better with the cameras and crowd. He hunched, he blushed, he leaned to the side and addressed the moderator directly, hardly looking to the audience...and I wanted to see more passion besides when Edwards tossed it to him and they tag teamed Hillary. This was a challenging group and even though it was his birthday, and the hall rang out with a good part of the HB song, I didnt sense that he felt as sympatico and as if he is one of the people as some of the others.

I've heard anecdotes from a couple of different people, about how he acts in the senate...as if he is just passing through and that his real job awaits him up higher...and I never really gave it much credence until now. Maybe he knows something we all don't know, or maybe you just have to be like that to make it through this process....but I like to feel like I could talk to any one of these people, just like any guy hanging round my town...and he is one that I'm not sure is comfortable enough in his own skin to realize that he is just some guy. ..just like anyone else...just a little extra vision and leadership qualities.


I love Chris Dodd and have pretty much no problem with him as my state's senior senator. He seems to have remembered his fire in the wake of Teddy Kennedy's flip-out on the floor when he started yelling "what is it you people hate about working people?"...fantastic!
It makes me happy to hear him and to proud to have him out there...His voice is important....but he is not the next President of the United States or even possibly our nominee...so this is all an exercise in getting information out and providing a wide field for us. I am very happy with this field, btw. I was just really disappointed that Ned Lamont still feels that he owes a debt of gratitude to him for his endorsement, and is campaigning for him actively. I would have liked to see Ned put his energy and following behind Edwards (who was one of the first politicians to come out for him.)
A great moment was when Obama speaking of public financing of campaigns, made the mistake of saying "...and I'm glad that Chris has gotten on board with this!" to which Dodd said "Ive been taking that stance for 15 years, I'm no NEWCOMER!"...Snap!

Richards was, as always, impressive and wonderful...but again, I just don't see it, and since he has said that he is not even interested in a job in the next administration because he feels like he has the best job in the world, I feel like I'm happy to have his input in the process, but I'm not gonna spend alot of time and energy on him.

And then there are Kucinich and Gravel, who are the perpetual short straws in these things where they draw randomly as to who is gonna sit where. They made the perfect bookends to that crew and were largely ignored and overlooked. Kucinich had some good points but was not forceful and lacked fire. Gravel seemed to struggle in and out of lucidity, providing some comic relief here and there...but it seemed like just so much nonsense and a little embarrassing.





































Netroots Nation is going to be the new name of this convention, and I think that its fitting that Markos step back at this point from being the king of this little party and let it grow beyond a blogger comment site that has become a social networking site. This organization has to be allowed to become as powerful as it is, without the collar of the person that is Kos.
Markos gave a really nice speech, which was quite touching all in all...and the comedians ranged from just so-so to pretty OK...and the community feeling was pretty strong over ice cream sundaes for those who waned to stand on line for half an hour to make their own or ices for the rest of us that wanted coffee more than anything.... by the time we all ended up sitting round on the couches blogging and watching the drunken goings on out on the patio.

By the time I stumbled down to the closing brunch this morning and loaded up on fruit and...bacon... (and a pretty funny exchange with staff about the huge amount of vegan bacon available and not taken, how they never serve that and don't really know what it is, and remembering that Janeane Garafolo said that she is a vegan except for bacon and sausage!)and listening to the debrief comments by the panel and many of the commenter's from DK, it seems like everyone feels like it was a huge success and that its a must for next year, no matter where they hold it!

Best purchase (thanks to Jill): a long Ethernet cable so I could sit on the bed with the laptop...it has really changed my hotel experience to be able to lay in bed and be on line at the same time!!

Tomorrow AM I'm off to the shambles of my home, where my William has taken to his bed with a headache, a baby chick died, and apparently no laundry has been done in days...Mom is nauseous, so I'm out of luck. It is really hard to get away like this because the falloout comes pretty hard. Next time I may just get a pet sitter and bring Will and Ben along....let them hang out at the pool or something...maybe next year will be more kid friendly. Jr. Activist Caucus anyone?

So, I know what Ill be doing this week...not to mention all the actual WORK I have to do...
Oh well...you wanna play, you gotta pay!
I met some really great people, had a great time with Jill...and did some good writing. I love going to new cities, even if I don't get around much, and I love getting alot of new ideas and feeling like Ive got something to say.
Thanks to everyone who worked so hard on this thing. Its greatly appreciated and I'm really looking forward to next year!

I hate flying....wish me luck!

Greetings from the Yearly Kos....

Disgusted that I lost a pretty big post last night, and tired from the up all night getting things ready, stress, and travel itself, I’ve arrived in this flat place, where I have a Hyatt room with a view (check out the ballpark,), a Westin-like bed, not so heavenly, and even fireworks that were just set off outside of my window at dusk last night, so close and at an angle that I’ve never seen before.

Of course that bomb sound makes me jump, and I’ve been looking at a bridge collapse on Keith Olbermann, and feeling spooky in general….tired and worried. Finally I guess I have to turn off the TV and try to move on to the issues at hand.

This bridge thing is not about tragedy, folks…Its infrastructure! This is what happens when an administration puts all of its money into wars that feed their own cronies and pockets and….what happens when bids go out to the lowest bidder regardless of the quality of the work…with no oversight….no oversight…remember Reagan saying that there is no reason that big business cant oversee itself?...

It’s not like the Big Dig hasn’t been going on and on forever in Boston; and didn’t a huge slab of concrete fall from the ceiling of that onto some cars?

New York, and apparently Chicago are in constant construction, but it all seems to be scrambling to keep up, when general upkeep is defunded more and more.

Is this the fault of the unions? Large corporations that use shoddy materials meant to need replacement sooner than you would’ve thought? Human error and lack of inspectors to even do the job of looking at everything from our food to the bridge we’re crossing?

Call this a metaphor for what’s wrong with how we’re doing things and our seeming inability to change course effectively.

This isn’t just some tragedy…its what happens when you have 6 years of the defunding of social programs and infrastructure, undercutting in bidding, and cronyism….and this bridge is not just some bridge, it’s the Bush Administration, Iraq, Halliburton and its subsidiaries, melamine and poison in our food, and the fucking computer that doesn’t really work and keeps needing tech support.

Apple is to PC as socialism is to capitalism. (Go figure that one out…and I’m a PC person who just wants a fucking PC that works for longer than a month at a time!!…so…?)

It’s hot here and the convention center is HUGE. It’s the biggest convention center in North America and there are all sorts of things going on…The people who work here seem to not care what any of the conventions are and the guy at the desk was quite surprised that the bloggers were coming here. What happened to the youth of America just being interested in their surroundings? The pizza girl in the Panini shop was musing that perhaps Barak Obama would stroll in there and order a pizza from her…like a star! I was telling her that maybe you can get a band at the booth and go and see him; security is no doubt tight, but they are having some forums with the candidate of your choice, and so…why not? I picked Edwards anyway, but when I think of what I want to talk to him about should I ever get the chance it all rolls together into me dissolving into tears while trying to explain how screwed up the system is and how I’m struggling so hard to get just one family on some health plan and to have heat this winter. Next thing I know, a friend of mine who is in the system is telling me that the same place where they are holding summer camp for the inner city kids and then the after school program is where some mentally ill patients are being “mainstreamed,” which is consisting of the patients sitting in chairs around the edges of the place where the kids are. And this began with the information that the kids need more counselors and supplies. The minute you scratch the surface of any of this, the whole bridge comes down. That’s what I want to tell Edwards. Not that he needs to come to my little city and fix the problems there, but that the whole system needs to be changed in a way that is not even possible for one president over 8 years…even one party 16 years! And this is what leads to people feeling like its all just too upsetting to even do some little part of helping in society, or to at least KNOW what’s going on. I suppose that if you live in my area, it makes it a little hard to drive around in that Hummer and plan your ski vacation if you have any idea of what your downtown neighbors are going through. But for society to work properly, we all should know, even if it’s a safety issue or for your property values; keep them in OK circumstances and give them a chance, so they won’t come to your neighborhood and rob you!

I’m fascinated by a Shriners convention that is going on here. There are Queens of the Golden Sphinx and Grand Ruler of all Oblivion and all that; completely African American, men and women and families, all dressed nicely….then walking by was a natty older man carrying a very tall stack of white straw hats…and a woman in the elevator had a great red tote bad that had golden sphinxes on it and gold lettering that I was trying to take in...The Queens of the Order of the Golden Sphinx, or some such….And the great big Shriner’s hats with the gold lettering….Juxtaposed with the slacker gen x,y,z goateed bloggers….every time the elevator opens I wish I was ready with my camera because the mix is fantastic!

I was following a group of black women in matching white dress suits with golden necklaces, sashes, and huge hats like crowns, each saying something or other, and there was a sign saying The Court of the Grand Messianic…whatever…and I was SO there, man!...but a kid in a suit at a desk stopped me….and I was trying to make my way down to the Starbucks where a huge mix of people were standing on line in the understaffed place, and chatting along: lurker here, blogger there...poobah and queen this way…

Here I am... back to this post and need to rest a bit before I figure out what’s going on, and get some food…just sit in the lobby and watch the comings and goings…but I was asking a bellman if the Shriners had any problem with having their pictures taken because I really want to photograph the thing…

Mom just told me, along with stories about the boys and birds and little chickens and did Wayne show up with the bucket truck yesterday, that when she worked at Storyville during college that the Shriners were THE wildest party that would book the place. That after the food service they would bring out the booze and lock out the help till morning. Morning brought a giant cleanup job beyond anything she had ever seen….But these Shriners are like a Baptist Sunday church group…during the daytime hours anyway!! We will have to see!!

Meanwhile in the south building of the largest convention hall in North America (and I am trying hard not to walk a million miles, lest I end up renting a scooter and really having some fun!) the empty shell of the Yearly Kos registration booth was abuzz last nite with volunteers running round, and here and there were signs that that the hipster youth was taking over from the Queen Sphinxes. I just want to check out the store…I’m all about shopping for swag…Shriners swag!! Ill do my best to at least get pictures.

Anyway, the booth was running late for the early arrival registration, and I went over to sit on a couch and watch the goings on while blogging (which I lost in that the file exists but it has no text in it. I was using a program called Jarte, and saved to a word format….the file is there but has nothing in it…oh well…) outside the bar where the organizers and known blogger guys were talking seriously on their phones and moving and shaking the blogosphere, or at east the YK….and after getting my bag and Edwards wristband for Saturday, I got all caught up in photographing the art and decoration here and in the center.

There is a wall o’ bones and ancient tools that repeat and repeat, and there is a tapestry/rug thing that I could swear looks like 9-11 and the fall of the World Trade Center, but is actually the Chicago skyline. The architecture of the place is so huge and it brings to mind…um…fear of the marketplace. Anyone would get agoraphobia here. It’s actually like a huge World Trade Center in that its got is own airflow and is like a world unto itself. I have to explore a bit more to find the mall and shops and food court, but really I’m pretty happy right here between the edge where the Kos is, and the lobby of the hotel with panini like fancy pizza, Starbucks, and the comfy couches full of people with laptops on one side and groups of bejeweled Shriners on the other.

More later from fantabulous YK2, where I am hard pressed to even leave my room but every time I do I get so many ideas…few of them having to do with progressive politics;-)

OK....Here are the girls....@ 1 day old! (Ive got Will on photo duty while Im away, so there will be more to come!!)

and, Im expecting some Serama eggs to incubate any day. Seramas are tiny chickens who, if they are bred right, are small enough to sit in your hand, with the girls being under a pound...go figure that I want the strangest breed who will likely end up int he basement for the winter...mud room at least...

Is It Bad? Is It Wrong?...One Foot Still Firmly Planted in the Other America...head in the Cotton Candy Clouds...

I was running around today...through the treadmill of what has become of our social services, and looking up as I drove away from the project town, a beautiful cousin was looking forlornly down from the little white house at the thugs next door who always hang on the steps and always have the thud, thud, thud of rap shaking the house, and knowing that the grandmother is working 24 hours per day till Saturday, and the mother is sort of a wreck, kicked out of her housing in Bridgeport...I looked up as I was driving away from this masterpiece of social engineering, and I thought to myself, how long till she comes down to hang with the guys, ends up pregnant or jumped into a gang? Is she the one with enough resilience to stand her ground and go through the horrible schools and maybe, just maybe, get to college? ....will she be the one to get out?
I drove away with Ben...the chosen one, because I have grown to love him gradually over time, and quite by accident...and why should it be just him?
Well there we were hauling $270 worth of groceries, that I hope will hold them through the Kos weekend along with some pizza and maybe a little Chinese food here and there. Two 13 year old boys eat alot more than you'd think....and how does Ben's mom do it on so little income and so many other kids to feed?
The radio came on and I heard the end of a report about Roberts having fallen at his Maine summer place. I held my breath because I don't want to be someone who hopes for the worst...and away we went to the pharmacy when the 1010 WINS finally came round again to the story and, shushing Ben, I raised my hands and yelled "Seizure!! That could be a stroke or a tumor!!"
Then I felt bad.
Is it wrong?

Ben said something about my reaction and I just looked at him and said something to the effect of, you know, this man represents someone who wants to take your rights away and keep us all trapped in the little box where he thinks god intended us to be..and that he is in his spot forever and is a Bush person.
I stopped and thought to myself, could we be lucky enough to just lose one by accident or by medical tragedy?...maybe he could hold on just long enough to expire when the dems take over.

And so, now I am who Bill O'Reilly says I am.

And he is already fully recovered. It was a known problem and he probably takes medication for it, and its perfectly controlled or he wouldn't have been nominated to the position that he is in.

Today I managed to get little done and come away from what I did feeling really disappointed and downtrodden. My son, Will, is really feeling badly and we've been up at night every night. I'm worried about leaving him, but I think I have to go...and that maybe part of his anxiety is that I am going...
And I have alot of busywork to do involving printing cards and writing up directions about dog food and how to get to appointments.
Then I got a call from Ben saying that his Mom has an emergency and needs me to call her at work...oh, and could I please come and get him because he is alone with his cousins and its so noisy that he cant ready, and hasn't slept....
It turned out, from what I could understand, that she had gotten a notice when she got home on Saturday that she had been behind on the electric bill and that the power was going to be turned off today. She spoke to the electric company and they told her that she had to pay $500 immediately or the power would be gone by the end of today. There she was at work, knowing that everything is precariously balanced and thinking that she would pay what she could by Saturday when she got her welfare checks for the 2 grand kids ($600...$500 of which she had just found out she would have to give to the electric company,) and since she had screwed up the "arrangement" that she had made during her medical crisis in May, she was stone out of luck.
Here is the deal: An "arrangement" with Connecticut Light and Power is what happens when there is no work and you have been sick so cant make the sporadic payments that you usually make just before its too late, as you juggle too many bills, too many kids, and not enough services.
The budget program isn't even an option because you can never quite pay off the arrangement, and every time you are late you sink deeper and deeper towards losing everything....because this is not the only "arrangement" that you've got going.

The very root of this sort of thing smacks of the Company Store that enables but never really gives you an out unless you win the lottery... and there is nothing to do to get out of the hole no matter how hard any one tries. So, why try? Why strive for the American dream or anything? And this is what leads to the thugs who wander the streets and have outstanding warrants for this and that. This is what leads to the accidental pregnancy, the random shooting, the robbery and jail time. But most of all, this is what leads to the anger out of helplessness...and stories of a deported sister who stabbed someone and was jailed and then deported; and that's how that little grandchild came to be here, motherless and an America citizen, but stuck in the other America, which, even as it is, beats the hell out of Haiti right now....

When I called the electric company, I hit the same wall that she had. But I am articulate and was able to implore the woman to look at all possibilities....things that might never get mentioned to someone who speaks broken English and who is making a call from work to keep the lights on for the children that she wont see until Saturday (and did I mention that her pay works out to around $4 an hour before taxes?) got mentioned and I wasn't going away or backing down.
The deal is that there might be some program here in town, and indeed, even the electric company has people who speak French Creole, if one knows that they should ask for that, but it all involves going on the Internet, or going to the government center, and being able to have the translator call at a particular time, and one has to pay for a new pay-as-you-go card for the cell phone...yes, that is 25 cents a minute...because its expensive to be poor and to have no credit.

The deal was that she actually had, over the past couple of years of not having work and not having money, not taking her medication for blood pressure, getting sick, going to school to get the certification for this $4 an hour job, racked up a bill for over $800...and the last "arrangement was for just a few months to take $300 per month, which equals one child's total monthly upkeep, just for the electric bill, to try to make this up. This unreasonable plan could not possibly succeed, but at a point I think that people will just take whatever is offered for fear of having their electricity cut off by the man. I knew that I could offer $20 per month to pay off the balance, and they would have to take it, but the deal that they offered would still make her pay $500 to keep the power on because she had to pay off the last "arrangement" as per "company policy"
The woman was very apologetic, but couldn't budge. Since I am leaving town I am not able to go and barge into the government center tomorrow and figure this out in some reasonable way....I know that there are some services or charities to help with things like this...small loans to set people free, perhaps?
I kept asking a million questions about different possibilities, and finally I said that it was just impossible that they couldn't have a budget plan for people like this. She said, oh yes, but you cant have any outstanding balance. I asked what the monthly payment would be on the budget plan and she said $109. I asked if they had ever been on it...ever..and she said no, that they had just paid sporadically.

So, here is someone who doesn't know what is available to her, and has already fallen behind before she has the opportunity to figure it out. The applications are so difficult anyway that people just stop trying.

What did I do? I paid the entire bill on a credit card and got her back on the budget plan. I told her to pay me what she could when her checks come, but not so much that she cant pay her other bills...and that we can work the rest out. The important thing is that going forward her electric bill is a reasonable amount. I told her that if she gets in trouble that she has to ask for help before it grows beyond the $109...and meanwhile, I have a new job of finding out what assistance exists for the oil bill and the rest. I know that there must be assistance available and that there is also help with the language barrier; its just a matter of having the TIME to make the calls and do the research. Time is what I don't have these days...and I am so troubled about some things I found out about the community center where the inner city kids go for camp and after school programs ...but that is for another day...and as soon as I can catch up with this one family, I have to attack this from a different angle, involving the fantasy world of the Joe Lieberman's and the Chris Shays' who believe that they are fully caring for all the children of this state in a wonderful world of cotton candy clouds and candy cane lanes ...(cue the Sam Seder "world of your imagination" music....)

I do need a respite, but how can I look at the matter at hand without extrapolating this entire setup of a situation into what it is....The fix is in and from the very core of that rotten Supreme Court comes the conviction of those who hold themselves superior and above the rabble, (include women in that equation, along with the poor and people of color,) and so when any opportunity comes for a ray of hope against the body that would force those young girls and boys to resign themselves to another generation of hopelessness, I perk up...I'm hoping...and if that makes me an evil, negative, lefty, creep, then so be it...
But I challenge OReilly and his chit-chat board to do anything like what Ive been doing, actually get your hands dirty kids, and then set up a charity to continue this work.... and then to continue to agree with these smug social engineers that women don't deserve to have choice, that affirmative action isn't needed, and that enough time has long ago passed in order to make up for all the wrongs done to the minorities of this country. We need some balance back on the court, and if there aren't gonna be term limits then maybe a couple of them are gonna have to meet with natural disaster...
And what better place to seize than on your dock at your country place?...at least its damned beautiful there...enjoy it John...you've worked so hard...

If John Edwards isn't exactly what this country needs, I don't know what is. The very point of this whole story is that the returning army is largely made up of poor minorities, and the cards are already stacked against them. Getting out of the war is one thing, restoring diplomatic ties is another...but social services is THE thing....forcing the poor to play on a clearly uneven playing field while funds to education and services are clearly cut, and forcing anyone to decide about family planning with the help of anyone but their family and their doctor is just not fair and its not allowing everyone the same chance...because we know that the prep school kids have a huge boost up, and we know that rich kids who make mistakes get special treatment, be it private doctors, special lawyers, or extra educational help...not to mention those great oceanfront summer homes with docks....
Education, medical care, insurance, the American dream....what else?

Off to the Yearly Kos...Welcome to Vincent Bird...John Edwards for President... and my Limited Experience With the Other America

Welcome to Vincent!! he is a baby Indian Ring Neck parakeet who has just come to live with us from Parrots & Co.. What can I say? Some things just make sense....and Vincent did.



















Well, one good thing about this whole mess is that life goes on...Gonzalez, Iraq, and the Hitler Youth who have been running important programs in our government, like HHS, run by this guy who threw back important reports that didn't have the correct political angle.












What makes this guy able to change reports about the health of the American public, and isn't it rather Third Riech-ian to force department after department to mention the success of Bushco a certain number of times in each paragraph...? How can this be??


























Here we are poised on the edge of the week that will feature the Yearly Kos, complete with all the major democratic candidates sniping at each other while looking sideways, shifty eyes to try to figure how that looks on them, and repositioning their bustles to march away with their various entourages...however that works....and I am slayed by the huge and disgusting specter of what Bushco has made of this administration and our constitution. Every blog, every television channel, for Christ's sake!!...every person that I meet on the street who sees my impeach button is just in sputtering disbelief. At least there is community in that, and there will be community at the Kos in that we feel that somehow we can do something in that all of our voices together have become very loud no matter how tiny any one of us is (thats me...the tiny one!)

Never have I seen such dripping contempt for the law, the branches of government, and the people, as I have with this crowd. The Nixon Whitehouse was absolutely liberal and socially correct, law-abiding and ...um...sweet, compared to this crowd. I just wanted a little something to sink my teeth into, not the fall of the empire!

















I'm living in fast forward and as usual I have too many irons in too many fires, and too many feet in different worlds. I've not been blogging much this week because every time Ive made a draft, it seems that life moves past that place and it all seems quaint.
So, yes, as of today I am apparently going to the Kos, and I wish I could say that Ive got all my chickens in a row and parrots standing at attention, but I don't...and this big messy life continues its course towards the nearest iceberg...if those even exist anymore. Maybe that's why the basement keeps flooding.
















Jill did a fantastic job of encapsulating the democratic debate, as she has also been doing a great week-in-review thing at The Crone Speaks blog, and will have it up later on as an alternative to the reruns on 60 Minutes.
The thing that struck me was that Edwards is getting fed up; I like him when he is fed up. When he says things like "aren't you just SICK of this?" it really touches me....I was sick of this from the get-go, and I want Bush out of office...people are dying, people are suffering, and our country is falling apart.
But more to the point is that I have been trying to navigate some very difficult necessities with Ben's family, and it has given me full exposure to just a tiny part of what the day to day is like for people in the other America.
For those of you who don't know Ben, he is my son Will's best friend,and has been a wonderful addition to just about every day of our lives in one way or another for the past 5 years. Lately its every day because, thanks to welfare reform, Ben's mom has completed a course in being a home care companion and now has intermittent work that she has to take in order to secure her benefits, which takes her away from Ben (her 6th kid, and the only one still at home...the rest are grown up,) and the 2 grandkids that she is raising. I'm talking about a job that begins early Monday morning and goes till Saturday morning, 24 hours per day.
Who cares for the kids? Well, if Bill Clinton and the idiots who pushed this idiotic reform through ever asked that, maybe we would have less of a problem with kids in the inner city caught up in drugs, gangs, pregnancy, or just slipping through the cracks and unable to get their work done.
An older gentleman, who is just wonderful, watches the children during the week at this point and one of Ben's older sisters has been around with her 3 kids, but he is old and she is screwed up, and her kids are problematic, and the house is too small.
I take Ben because I want him and also because I don't want him to be there, doing nothing, and unable to read because its too noisy. Some of the kids go to the city camp, and some hang around.
In general the grownups seem to be careful about not letting anyone go to the playground alone...but, how long can that go on? One girl is a beautiful, tall 13 year old, and one kid is a troublemaker...one of the cousins is a tiny girl who has been known to kill small animals, and the last time I saw the responsible older sister/mom person, she was sitting next to an open bottle of rum with a pack of Newports on the couch next to her, braiding a kid's hair painfully, and slurring about how she has lost her housing and is moving to Florida in a couple of weeks.

This is welfare reform up close. Mom is working, the programs are limited and there are few supplies because the high school kids come into the community center once a week and steal everything. The public school puts out its supply list in a week or so, and each list contains items that cost roughly $100 per kid if you get the cheapest items at Staples. Mom is not around, and the local Supermarket moved from 1 block from the "complex," to 2 miles away, across the street from another huge supermarket! So, Shoprite opened a humongous market on rt. 1, which was needed, and then Stop and Shop proceeded to close their store and move directly across the street. Where is the city planning committee when these things are decided?
The "Village" which was built on the rubble of the high rise projects that used to be a fortress against the cops are cute little streets, like cul de sacs, carved into the inner city, with white houses and some low-rise apartments and condos for sale, but are only notable in that they look good in a driveby or a flyover, but are so shabbily constructed as to be made literally of plastic. The door jambs are flexible plastic that have taken on the dirt of a million little dirty hands and when you go to press the doorbell the entire piece bends in and then pops out. The carpeting inside is white; enough said....the blinds are the cheapest mini-blinds and have long ago buckled under their own weight, much less being opened and closed. These small houses are "rented" to low income families who are giving a portion of their benefit check for rent, and so there is no extra money for upkeep. The city has seemingly done none themselves, except to keep the streets clean. There are no garbage cans on the streets nor are there mail boxes. One has to walk off the compound to go to the post office, much less the store or market.
Going to the market used to consist of walking 3 blocks and pushing a cart back, but now it involves walking miles in the heat and pushing a cart back or taking a cab. Of course, one or two towers of the old projects still stand up the street, so these people are the lucky ones. The gardens are well tended and the residents of this place show alot of pride in their homes.

recently, the police came to the house next door to Ben's to find a guy who had an outstanding warrant for ...um...murder. he wouldn't come out and a bunch of guys came outside, a crowd gathered, and the new crop of Stamford police academy grads tasered a bunch of guys and threw some people around. This is the house next door that always has very loud rap music coming from it. The Bloods gang has a problem with certain Haitians and has shot guns in and around this area....and Ben feels like it is all very safe there. There is a strong Christian Haitian community down there, but Ben's family are not church members, so they keep to themselves and with their small group of friends and family.

In the time that this struggle has been going on with Ben's mother's work. I have continued to do what I have always done with them, which is to be their friend and to have Ben here as much as he wants to be with us. I also have, for the first time, helped them with doctors and groceries.
A social worker who had hooked Mom up with the schooling and job that takes her away for entire weeks at a time was supposed to help get the Husky health insurance forms in...and let me tell you, these are complicated forms for ME to fill out...so, she found herself too busy and out of money and blood pressure medication. The doctor wouldn't fill it unless she went in and that cost $90, not to mention the medication cost. So, she ran out of meds and became so sick that she couldn't work, get food, get out of bed...and finally she called me and asked if I could front her the money to see the Doctor.

I did, of course, and I also got some food because the cupboard was bare! I then set about filling out the papers to get Ben health insurance from the state, and realized that she is also eligible as a caretaker...not to mention that the two grandchildren that she has custody of are already on it, and she should have been offered it long ago for her and for Ben. The problem is that the forms are crazy complicated and even with a highlighter and little stickies, its nearly impossible to get it all done in reasonable time when someone is gone 100% of the time during the weekdays.
This is welfare reform....and I am keeping Ben up here while the others are left down there....I check the food, bring groceries, and hope for the best. I give the caretakers there my phone numbers and they lose them over and over...and finally we have a number of where the mom is working, so we can reach her. She got a cell phone but it is a pay as you go which is expensive, and she is only making $500 flat per week, which comes out to around $4 per hour....Oh, did I mention that this job is only temporary? Previously it was only the weekends, it may change again at the drop of a hat...who knows? Part of poverty and living in that other America is that everything is intermittent and everything costs more. Takeout or delivery food when the market is too far, taxis because you have no car, pay as you go phone at as much as 25 cents per minute because you cant guarantee payment in order to get an account with a cell phone company or don't have a credit card because you were offered many in the past and..... This is how it is.
















Our social services that were so handicapped by the Reagan administration in the days of Manhattan with streets covered with the homeless and AIDS patients, have been dealt such a blow by this horrible administration that it is impossible to judge budget feasibility or where we stand in the larger picture of what social security was supposed to be in spirit in this country, and it is unclear to me if we can have any focus group look at things against the current backdrop and make improvements or to assemble a panel of great philosophical minds and try to remember what it is that America is...what we were...why we were formed...and what we want to be.













































John Edwards is the guy to bring that conversation back to life. He has kept a consistent message since before this mess began, and even when the handlers got ahold of him, he has stayed on message.


Look, the majority of the country is on board with the anti-war, anti criminal behavior by our elected officials deal, and I'm not saying that we should let up in any way, but the important things to get done past that are diplomatic and having to do with how we will survive as a society if we don't honor the weakest among us. Wasn't the point of the formation of America so that everyone could have a chance at some sort of a life and the opportunity to achieve much more than that. Weren't these ideas formed by people who were fleeing a monarchical system that ensured a permanent upper class that one could only be born to, and a permanent underclass? Our constitution and laws are supposed to protect the rights of all people, and the aim of this government is supposed to be to perfect the original aim of the idea that everyone has the right to fulfill their potential in full while living with rights and dignity. I know that someone out there will bring up slavery and women's rights, but the point to me is that we are charged with the responsibility of working hard to perfect the tendency of humans to do what is the selfish, barbaric, and crazy thing. Isn't religion largely based on that? And isn't our government also based on that as well? Its the striving to overcome our own tendencies and to give everyone a chance...that would have to include putting a check on unfettered ...anything....we do not have the moral strength to do this internally...right?

I want to discuss the wealth factor in the Edwards equation, but I may save it for another post, because I am hoping that the issue evolves into the reality that they are ALL wealthy, and that the image of the slick lawyer who would take you to the cleaners is being exploited by the right here, and pasted on Edwards, with no real evidence that he has done anything to anyone...except to win against some large corporations. And since when does the average person care about large corporations being made to pay royally for mistakes that take people's lives? Especially when awards are decided largely next to a picture of how much a large corporation makes.
You would think that Edwards was taking grandma's farm away because she bumped someone's car at a red light! Now, that's good use of propaganda...but it has nothing to do with reality.
I hope that Edwards addresses this head on....and keeps up the good work like the great HAIR video:

The Rapture of the Bees...Is Maureen Dowd Necessary?...

Sorry to disappoint any fundamentalists out there, but its about as likely that God has raptured the bees to heaven to pollinate his heavenly crops as it is that hes gonna be rapturing you anytime soon! The NY Times Science Times this week had another piece on the mysterious and alarming disappearance of whole colonies of bees, called "colony collapse disorder." As their name implies, the most likely reasonable and scientific explanations are fungus, virus, or pesticides. But the snippet about the theories that abound on the internet and that bee rapture is one of them, are just great....As Marc Maron says in his current live show (appearing tonight and for the next few nights in LA with Janeane Garafolo and Henry Rollins...its a great show...check it out if you're out west!,) how fun a day will the rapture be for those of us who are unbelievers?...How great to see those "good" rapturous Christians go shooting off into the air like fireworks!
I had read somewhere, on some blog which I cant remember (but if anyone knows please let me know so I can give credit,) that also, of course we get their stuff. They wont need it in heaven anyway where they will have halos wings and apparently ...bees! They can also take the mosquitoes, mayflies, and houseflies too...oh, and the huge wasp that is stuck in the bathroom light upstairs...ok?...are we not all God's creatures?

In all seriousness, we have to get to the bottom of this bee thing or we are going to be looking at a huge and quick change in the foods available on this planet. Earth day always does this to me...Its the day before my birthday and I remember that even when I was a little kid that my Mom would take me to fairs in Brooklyn where we would buy ladybug and praying mantis eggs to put in the garden (not our garden, but Mom kept a line of pots and bulbs planted along the fence and constantly threw things like lady bug eggs onto the cocktail parties going on over there...don't even ask about the eggs hatching in the house because she forgot they were on the windowsill over the kitchen sink!....) I grew up with this strong feeling instilled in me of the earth as a fragile thing that was, back then, in danger...Ah, the 70's, when we were so innocent. The worst thing was the gas lines or that Jimmy Carter's rescue plans went bad...
I always get more environmental around my birthday, what with the spring coming and the growing urgency of what is going on, between what we have learned from Al Gore's movie and the press that problems like this bee problem are getting.

In much, much less serious matters, Maureen Dowd has weighed in this week twice on non-issues that are probably not worth the 0's and 1's used here to transmit this into the internet tubes. And no, I'm not going to waste anyone's time by posting them because they are...um...as vapid as she has been since her little vacation, and probably alot before that too...not even snarkily clever or cute...just stupid. You can always do a Google search for where they're posted if you haven't got Times Select, but if I were a paid Times Select reader (rather than a NY Times hard copy subscriber who gets Select in the package,) I would think twice about what I'm paying for. Dowd is quickly making herself irrelevant as she consistently focuses on what she, herself, in some previous incarnation, might point out to be be the silly girly pink story.
There are so many important stories being reported and/or not reported at all, and I cant believe that Edward's hair bills and Michelle Obama's chiding her husband are the most important things that she is thinking about. I guess that its a good sign that I'm not hanging on to her solely because she has been one of the few semi-reasonable voices in the press during the desperate times over the past 6+ years. Its a good sign that so many reporters have found their voices out there and that Americans are opening up to the truth and that its being reported more regularly.
So, do we need Dowd? In my mind, she is unimportant to the current discourse, and unless she finds something that grabs her attention that isn't about sitcom marital squabbles or a candidates hair, I'm not interested.
This is the thing: It serves a certain portion of our society to keep the majority in the dark about how the monied minority lives. In a capitalist society any of us can become rich enough to go to a salon that is going to charge more or less for a haircut, as long as it doesn't hurt or inconvenience anyone else. If that person spends $400 on a haircut and never gives to charity or has an attitude that the resources are god given rather than the product of hard work and the luck of the system, then maybe we can talk about it a bit and what it means in the bigger picture to be driving a Hummer with a Bush-Cheney sticker on it.
If the poor of this country are going to be caught up in how much a haircut costs, or that Al Franken got 2 million dollars from Air America, or any of these little facts that are presented in a vacuum, as if people aren't spending billions of dollars on every little thing that you or I can get cheaper with a coupon (not to mention the war, which has no real purpose, and has served to funnel more money into the pockets of those same rich folks, and I'd like to see the production bills on that spin machine!,) then they are not focusing on the real issues. The majority of this country is supposed to be surprised that things in New York City cost what they do, and rather than ask why those people are getting a tax cut, go out and buy a lottery ticket and hope against hope that they will be the one in 10 million who can join those ranks. To focus on what you cold buy with that $400 is not the point, but its what people like Dowd seem to want you to look at. Its almost like Michelle Malkin sneering "Dont you just wonder sometimes if maybe he didn't shoot himself in the leg just to garner sympathy?"....I say, what is it that I am not looking at because I'm being told to look over there at that shiny thing!?


John Edwards is rich; get used to it. Unlike the Bushies though, he has made his money by representing cases that, if you get past the "ambulance chaser" label, were actually class actions having to do with big business knowingly cutting corners and hurting people like you and me. Those people were also compensated in as large a sense as their lawyer was. He is not a guy who has stood outside of hospitals looking for someone who just got in a fender bender ( I've known some of those and they are not John Edwards...at least they are not spending any time running the Southern Poverty Law Center or the like.) If a lawyer who takes a large class action case does so for a portion of the proceeds, and the award is huge, (as they are usually set by the jury, which is also supposedly a sampling of people just like you or me,) then why would anyone in this capitalist society deny him the fruits of that labor? Isnt it a double standard to pin that label on Edwards before looking at his record in these things? Does he really belong in the same catagory as 1-800-LAW-YERS? And isn't our anger at lawyers in this society misdirected anyway? Who hasnt sat across from a lawyer and looked at the clock counting the hundreds of dollars slippign away? Who hasnt shot the shit on the telephone with their lawyer only to see that the shit shooting time is included in the bill? It seems to me that that there are bad ones and good ones. Maybe they are overpaid in some areas, and maybe the structure of some of these all or nothing class actions is wrong...but, I think that we might not see many of those cases if the class cant be empowered by a lawyer who is willing to risk his or her time in an all or none gamble...and surely, large corporations like tobacco compaanies have not been lining up historically to release information on the detrimental and deadly dangers of their products.

So then, as a public person, in a society that is almost completely based on looks, he is criticized for having a stylist and for getting a haircut....? Dowd thinks that Edwards should go to the barber on Capital Hill, just like her dad did when it cost 25 cents to get a haircut...huh? Is that what she does before making public appearances? The guy is and was running for President of the United States....and if this is such an issue, I think that its time for us to demand the stylist bills from all of the candidates. If Edwards is going to be vilified for his cuteness, then I think we need to see all of the evidence...because, I would expect that the bills for all the rest of them are probably just as high. The difference is who holds up an entire airport by blocking a runway while waiting for a haircut, and who only spends time at spas and does nothing charitable in the world? Or, more to the point, at Dick and Lynn Cheney's totally solar powered compound in Wyoming, does the salon just come to them in a dark sedan? I expect that we are paying for it no matter if its called the Pink Sparkle Diamond Girl's Club or Joe's Head polishing and Bullet removal Service I just don't think that you can compare the life of a John Edwards, running from place to place and making public appearances, to ...me or you. And the truth is that the stylists who style TV and print are different in that they know about how color looks on screen and how to correct what would be a deathly white look under certain lights. They are also union workers in many cases and I don't know how reasonable it is to use a local barber to prepare for television appearances or if you wouldnt end up crossing a picket line at a film studio somewhere, depending on what the preparation was for. In the YouTube world, I would consider that a pretty reasonable cost. If he went to a local salon with a stupid name for highlights because he was reading washed out on camera, or his campaign wants to position him as sun washed, what is it to Dowd? Hell, 50 or 60 years ago when Dowd was a little girl, times were different in Washington...but, I would venture to say that she is part of the machine that stands poised to tear a John Edwards down for a bad haircut or unmatched foundation, so he is doing the right thing in making sure that he stays blow dried and streaked, and it is a campaign cost, just as surely as the clothes that he wears for appearances are.
I'd be interested in knowing how many consultants and stylists were paid to reconfigure Hillary's frumpiness or Rudy's hair (that must have taken an army!)...I could go on, buts lets not....
I'm not gonna link to it, so again, you'll have to go find it, but today Dowd insults her readers by questioning the relationship between Barak and Michelle Obama and if it plays well that she jokes around with him about the god on the campaign trail vs. the man at home who cant pick up after himself.
If Hillary can knowingly wink at her audience about what its like to live with a philandering egotistical man...any man...then so can Michelle. Dowd feigns concern that it might come off as too motherly and as if Barak is a young child answering to his mommy...did she actually say the word emasculating? She then goes on to say that if Michelle knows so much about how Barak should act then why didnt she know about X,Y, or Z business mistakes in the past?...huh? Is that it Maureen? Is that all you've got?




Michelle and Barak Obama might be according to Dowd, the George and Weezy Jefferson of this campaign, and though I am not supporting him for #1 I find him interesting for the future, (and of course I will support whoever the Dems ultimately come out with,)is it not sort of degrading to choose the jeffersons over the Cosbys? W
hat is Dowd exactly saying here? That young black people, or just any black people regardless of age, have to be careful not to present themselves as real people with real dialogue besides that hip hop rap or extremely silly Dyn-o-mite! image that we are supposed to have of them. If Dowd's advice is to try to not be who you are, then I would probably suggest running quickly in the other direction. It seems to me that most candidates who have tried to reshape their image or change their message as part of who they are, have failed.
Its been my feeling for years that if any of these Dems were to actually drop the artifice and just say what they think without the consultants hanging all over them, that maybe they would end their careers in one way it might begin it in another. Like Howard Dean lost everything, though it was arguably ended for him by whoever decided to turn down the crowd and release the track of just his howling voice, he was hardly ever not himself and he spoke truth to power. Most of these politicians would prefer to get into office, sacrificing some of their beliefs, however possible, in order to make a bigger change. But, many of them find that once you've begun to change things up in what you really believe in, it a slippery slope. I would prefer to see some of these people go down in a blazing glory, and have gotten something into the record for future generations, than to have pandered to the powers, cultural and otherwise, in order to shape an image that is really just part of so many sheep...
So, stop wasting my time, and your space in the NY Times, which is a pretty big platform, talking about bullshit. I understand, as Mom says, that Dowd has been out for some vacation, and it does sound like she is phoning it in while writing a book or whatever it is that these people do in their spare time. But, there are so many things going on right now, that it seems pretty damned counterproductive to tell the whole country what you probably should just be telling your friends over lunch.



2-3 eggs in the nest box so far, people....We are now 8 days into the cycle for egg #1, and if they're fertile, 23-25 days in I might hear a little peep peep. I have been ordered by my friends in the bird world to NOT look in the box...they told me quite dramatically, that the eggs would DIE a horrible death if I looked (and they know me well enough to know that that is probably the only thing that would stop me from hanging round the box making little birdy sounds to try to get the Mom out so I can peek!)....This is not easy for me....So I have to confess to shining a little flashlight into the hole on the nestbox to some pretty angry and squinting little eyes ruffling up and trying to adjust so that I CAN'T SEE!!!

And one more

thing: Ive got a great tool of the day, week, year for any of you who use eBay. This is a machine that gives you common typos for the names of things...which is how you find the best stuff on eBay. Sellers who make typos tend ot get lower prices because the search engines are not smart like...say, google, which will suggest different spellings.
Check this out: TypoSnipe

All is fair in love and eBay!

Ann Coulter Calls My Johnny Edwards a Bad Name, A River Runs Through My Basement but This Time its Rapids, Krugman Tries to Explain the Crash....

Welcome to all of you Brilliant folks who are popping over in the hopes of the same sort of smart and concise opinion and reporting that you enjoy daily on Brilliant at Breakfast...well, all I have to say is....ha, ha, ha, ha!...lately its sort of catch as catch can round here ...but Im happy to have you all here and I hope you like my little corner of the blogosphere!
(... and, of course, thanks to my pal Jill for the link!)
Its casual Friday, as Sammy Seder would say, and it began awfully early with what can only be described as rapids pouring into my basement at a speed that I havent seen in the 13 years that Ive been trying to get control of this slanted cottage hanging onto a boulder in the woods.
I ran to the hardware store in time to get one of the last little floor pumps and the very last big shopvac (14 gallons.) Beggers cant be choosers, and all of my planning with Consumer Reports in hand flew out the window when I was faced with more water than Ive seen down there ever.
See, I have an installed sump pump but it is over on the high ground part of the basement so it has never been used in the small floods that I get with every rain. Today I felt like I was prepared except that there is still around 6 inches of ice over the outlet pipe, which was frozen in the ground anyway. So by the time I got the pump home and started pulling heavy soaked laundry around, the pump guys came and we spent a couple of hours hanging out and shooting the breeze about global warming, one guy's python, my basement snake, and the ins and outs of pumps and shop vacs. I ended up, after the level went below the pumps, vacuming up 5 full shopvacs full of water and mud. I also did a ton of laundry and dragged stuff outside for the dump run that is certainly coming.
The whole time I was listening to podcasts from this past week...and man, is that enough to turn me inside out....and I kept telling myself that maybe I should flee the old house in the woods where my father wants it made very clear that not only did grandpa lay the crazy stone paths and stairs back then in the 40's, but that my father himself helped...credit where credit is due, for sure...and to make it very, very clear that his BLOOD is in the stones. That refers less to the squished fingers of a 10 year old up here on weekends and more to some metaphorical importance in the correction email, just so I know.
So, I guess that the Stamford version of Holes had a big effect on him in the summers that he was here....But really to say nothing of my past 13 years here...and, yes, I just replaced most of the path...blood washed away perhaps?...and I for one am gonna move on to say that yes, we all had a terrible childhood, but Ive been here all alone with a kid, and for most of the time with a young kid and before that an infant, when the place was falling down....So if those summers drew blood, then these full time, 24/7, years and years must count towards hemorrhage?
BUT ENOUGH ABOUT ME!! God, do I need a vacation and a shoulder to cry on today!

M-ann Coulter, at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC,) saw fit to call my boy John Edwards a "Faggot!" All I can say M-ann, is that YOU WISH!! If I were a gay male cross dresser, as Coulter seems to be, I would hope that Johnny were gay too! But must the she-male use such crude wording? Where I cone from the word "faggot" refers to a particular brand of catty gay person...or its a straight putdown like the N-word if said by a basher.
I know that when these neocons talk they tend to trash the very thing that is their deepest secrets and fear, so I view this as another message in code from Coulter...and perhaps a cry for help.
It occurs to me that, all free speech aside, we might be in much better cultural shape if lying haters like Coulter were not given a platform. I needs to become a pathetic last choice to book these people. Again, I wonder what happened to striving for real intellect and well researched ideas....


I am becoming more and more troubled at the democratic leadership's non-action on hearings and the beginning of impeachment. There is so much evidence and no excuse to not get right on this. I'm tired of what looks one way or another and trying to seem bi-partisan....people are dying and every day there is another report about this administration ordering unprepared and untrained reservists to go over there...and that the "surge" is just bullshit.
The there is the reality of how we treat our injured service people and how much they are cutting out of their benefits. How can this be America?

And around, around goes Rudy Guilliani, with not one person asking him what hes gonna do when he cheats on his new wife and she kicks him out of the white house?!

And the money....Krugman has a good analysis of how screwed we are, and even as all the president's men go on in lockstep about the economy being so great (for rich stockholders,) and full of jobs (the new manufacturing sector in McDonald's!,) we really have alot to worry about.

So I am overwhelmed between physical shutdown after the deluge, the sadness of just feeling stuff, anxiety about Peach in the tree and what would I do if I lose her, and Todd is maybe sick (though he uses so few words that its impossible to tell...and Enquiring minds need to know!)

Sunday is Origami day again at the Natural History Museum and I will have the whole day because my boys are taking morning and afternoon classes. I am definitely going to hit the evolution exhibit and take a ton of pictures so you all can see it....and then maybe if the dragon and mythological creatures exhibit isn't opened yet I will head to the village to bum around my old stomping grounds.

Here is Krugman for those of you trying to understand how Murtha could have caused the markets to crash!

March 2, 2007

Op-Ed Columnist

The Big Meltdown

By PAUL KRUGMAN

FEB. 27, 2008

The great market meltdown of 2007 began exactly a year ago, with a 9 percent fall in the Shanghai market, followed by a 416-point slide in the Dow. But as in the previous global financial crisis, which began with the devaluation of Thailand’s currency in the summer of 1997, it took many months before people realized how far the damage would spread.

At the start, all sorts of implausible explanations were offered for the drop in U.S. stock prices. It was, some said, the fault of Alan Greenspan, the former chairman of the Federal Reserve, as if his statement of the obvious — that the housing slump could possibly cause a recession — had been news to anyone. One Republican congressman blamed Representative John Murtha, claiming that his efforts to stop the “surge” in Iraq had somehow unnerved the markets.

Even blaming events in Shanghai for what happened in New York was foolish on its face, except to the extent that the slump in China — whose stock markets had a combined valuation of only about 5 percent of the U.S. markets’ valuation — served as a wake-up call for investors.

The truth is that efforts to pin the stock decline on any particular piece of news are a waste of time.

Wise analysts remember the classic study that Robert Shiller of Yale carried out during the market crash of Oct. 19, 1987. His conclusion? “No news story or rumor appearing on the 19th or over the preceding weekend was responsible.” In 2007, as in 1987, investors rushed for the exits not because of external events, but because they saw other investors doing the same.

What made the market so vulnerable to panic? It wasn’t so much a matter of irrational exuberance — although there was plenty of that, too — as it was a matter of irrational complacency.

After the bursting of the technology bubble of the 1990s failed to produce a global disaster, investors began to act as if nothing bad would ever happen again. Risk premiums — the extra return people demand when lending money to less than totally reliable borrowers — dwindled away.

For example, in the early years of the decade, high-yield corporate bonds (formerly known as junk bonds) were able to attract buyers only by offering interest rates eight to 10 percentage points higher than U.S. government bonds. By early 2007, that margin was down to little more than two percentage points.

For a while, growing complacency became a self-fulfilling prophecy. As the what-me-worry attitude spread, it became easier for questionable borrowers to roll over their debts, so default rates went down. Also, falling interest rates on risky bonds meant higher prices for those bonds, so those who owned such bonds experienced big capital gains, leading even more investors to conclude that risk was a thing of the past.

Sooner or later, however, reality was bound to intrude. By early 2007, the collapse of the U.S. housing boom had brought with it widespread defaults on subprime mortgages — loans to home buyers who fail to meet the strictest lending standards. Lenders insisted that this was an isolated problem, which wouldn’t spread to the rest of the market or to the real economy. But it did.

For a couple of months after the shock of Feb. 27, markets oscillated wildly, soaring on bits of apparent good news, then plunging again. But by late spring, it was clear that the self-reinforcing cycle of complacency had given way to a self-reinforcing cycle of anxiety.

There was still one big unknown: had large market players, hedge funds in particular, taken on so much leverage — borrowing to buy risky assets — that the falling prices of those assets would set off a chain reaction of defaults and bankruptcies? Now, as we survey the financial wreckage of a global recession, we know the answer.

In retrospect, the complacency of investors on the eve of the crisis seems puzzling. Why didn’t they see the risks?

Well, things always seem clearer with the benefit of hindsight. At the time, even pessimists were unsure of their ground. For example, Paul Krugman concluded a column published on March 2, 2007, which described how a financial meltdown might happen, by hedging his bets, declaring that: “I’m not saying that things will actually play out this way. But if we’re going to have a crisis, here’s how