Month: October 2011

Occupy Everywhere

by digby

Well, what do you know .. it took them several paragraphs in this NY Times article about the global protests, but they finally got it:

Despite the difference in language, landscape and scale, the protests were united in frustration with the widening gap between the rich and the poor.

“I have no problem with capitalism. I have no problem with a market economy. But I find the way the financial system is functioning deeply unethical,” Herbert Haberl, 51, said in Berlin. “We shouldn’t bail out the banks. We should bail out the people.”

Huzzah!

The editorial page spelled it out clearly this morning:

New figures released this week reported Britain’s highest jobless numbers in more than 15 years. Independent analysts expect unemployment — now 8.1 percent — to keep rising in the months ahead. The government has kept its promise to slash public-sector jobs — more than 100,000 have been lost in recent months. But its deficit-reduction policies have failed to revive the business confidence that was supposed to spur private-sector hiring.

Drastic public spending cuts were the wrong deficit-reduction strategy for the weakened British economy a year ago. And they are the wrong strategy for the faltering American economy today. Britain’s unhappy experience is further evidence that radical reductions in federal spending will do little but stifle economic recovery.

A few years of robust growth would go far toward making swollen federal deficits more manageable. But slashing government spending in an already stalled economy weakens anemic demand, leading to lost output and lost tax revenues. As revenues fall, deficit reduction requires longer, deeper spending cuts. Cut too far, too fast, and the result is not a balanced budget but a lost decade of no growth. That could now happen in Britain. And if the Republicans have their way, it could also happen here.

Austerity is a political ideology masquerading as an economic policy. It rests on a myth, impervious to facts, that portrays all government spending as wasteful and harmful, and unnecessary to the recovery. The real world is a lot more complicated. America has no need to repeat Mr. Cameron’s failed experiment.

Howie reminded me earlier today of the underlying threats from the Masters of the Universe to pack up their riches and leave Wall Street if they weren’t given the deference they demanded.

After today you have to wonder where it is they think they are going to go?

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Capitalism Hating Hippies Everywhere!
by David Atkins (“thereisnospoon”)

The Occupy protests are now a global phenomenon in over 900 cities.

Linking up with the Occupy Wall Street protests that began in New York, tens of thousands of people around the world took to the streets Saturday to reiterate their anger at the global financial system, corporate greed and government cutbacks.

Rallies were held in more than 900 cities in Europe, Africa and Asia, as well as in the United States, with some of the largest taking place in Europe. The demonstration in Rome turned violent, but crowds elsewhere were largely peaceful.

“What’s exciting about what’s happening is a sense of international solidarity,” said Ben Walker, 33, a university teacher from Norwich, England, who was carrying a tent and planning on camping overnight near the London Stock Exchange.

Organizers of the global demonstration said on their Web site that they were demanding a “true democracy.”

“United in one voice, we will let politicians, and the financial elites they serve, know it is up to us, the people, to decide our future,” they said.

Combine this reality with the massive popularity of the movement in the United States, and conservatives have to face the following choice. Either:

1) The majority of the world’s citizens and Americans are lazy, dirty hippie commie sympathizers who hate capitalism and freedom; or

2) There are some major, legitimate grievances against the financial industry and the new global plutocratic elite.

Right now, conservatives and Third Way “Democrats” in America are still opting for choice #1. Politically, though, they’re going to start losing credibility if they don’t attempt to acknowledge the frustration and at least pretend to do something about it.

Personally, I hope they choose the former. I would rather boot them out of office and put them on the sidelines of the national conversation, than make the futile attempt to have a honest conversation with them about the world’s problems.

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I’m fairly sure Rush Limbaugh has hit a new low in reflexive Democrat bashing, and that’s saying something. Here’s Yglesias:

I don’t have a really strong view on whether or not it’s advisable to dispatch a small number of US combat troops to help fight the Lord’s Resistance Army. My instinct is to be skeptical. I want to see less military intervention, not more. But Rush Limbaugh’s instinct is to embrace brutal murderers:

Now, up until today, most Americans have never heard of the combat Lord’s Resistance Army. And here we are at war with them. Have you ever heard of Lord’s Resistance Army, Dawn? How about you, Brian? Snerdley, have you? You never heard of Lord’s Resistance Army? Well, proves my contention, most Americans have never heard of it, and here we are at war with them. Lord’s Resistance Army are Christians. It means God. I was only kidding. Lord’s Resistance Army are Christians. They are fighting the Muslims in Sudan. And Obama has sent troops, United States troops to remove them from the battlefield, which means kill them. That’s what the lingo means, “to help regional forces remove from the battlefield,” meaning capture or kill. […]Lord’s Resistance Army objectives. I have them here. “To remove dictatorship and stop the oppression of our people.” Now, again Lord’s Resistance Army is who Obama sent troops to help nations wipe out. The objectives of the Lord’s Resistance Army, what they’re trying to accomplish with their military action in these countries is the following: “To remove dictatorship and stop the oppression of our people; to fight for the immediate restoration of the competitive multiparty democracy in Uganda; to see an end to gross violation of human rights and dignity of Ugandans; to ensure the restoration of peace and security in Uganda, to ensure unity, sovereignty, and economic prosperity beneficial to all Ugandans, and to bring to an end the repressive policy of deliberate marginalization of groups of people who may not agree with the LRA ideology.” Those are the objectives of the group that we are fighting, or who are being fought and we are joining in the effort to remove them from the battlefield.

Considering that Rush is a leader of a rather large group of people who insist that Hitler was a leftist, I’m not entirely surprised. Rightwingers’ worldview is so Manichean they literally cannot conceive of anyone a Democrat or liberal might oppose not being the good guys — particularly if that enemy calls itself “Christian.” (Again, the proof offered for Hitler’s alleged leftism is that the word “socialism” appears in the name of the Nazi Party. So there you go.)

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Ordained by God

by digby

It looks as thought the Perry camp is just going flat out for the Christian Right what with his not-very-subtle anti-Morman campaign and now his wife going way beyond the normal dogwhistles to proclaim Perry has been ordained by God. Get a load of this from Sarah Posner:

About contemplating a run for president in 2010, “God was already speaking to me,” she said, “but he [Rick] didn’t want to hear it.”

But, she went on, “he was hearing from other people, too.” In the first of several biblical references, she added, “he needed to see the burning bush.”

Her husband prayed, Perry insisted. “He threw that fleece out there twice to make sure it came back with what he needed to do.” This is a reference to Gideon’s fleece, which, as Anthea Butler explained:

refers to an account in Judges 6:33-40. Gideon sets fleece on a threshing floor, using it as a way of asking God for a sign whether or not to go into battle against the Midianites. God gives Gideon the sign to smite the Midianites and to do battle with his Baal-worshiping neighbors.

Setting out Gideon’s fleece, then, “is a way for believers to seek God’s approval for their own ambitions or ‘calling,’ and to claim they are carrying out God’s purposes in conquering heathens and idol-worshipers.”

Who might the heathens be? Perry made the case that they may be lurking within the GOP: “We truly feel he was called to do this; we still feel called to do this,” she said, adding, “We’re being brutalized by our opponents, by our party. . . because of his faith. He’s the only true conservative.”

Unless Perry ends up as the Fred Thompson of this cycle and gets no votes, I’m guessing this is going to be quite a fight. That is a direct appeal to the religious right in language that suggests Perry is God’s choice. It’s pretty bold.

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Blue America welcomes Joe Miklosi

by digby

Howie makes the introduction:

Watch that video above of Colorado state Rep Joe Miklosi announcing his candidacy for the congressional seat passed from Tom Tancredo to an even further right crackpot, Mike Coffman. When he ends it with “God bless you,” he means it. The first time I spoke with him, we spent more time talking about Jesus’ message than I’ve talked about with every other candidate Blue America has ever endorsed– not because we endorse people who don’t embrace Jesus’ message… just because it isn’t a topic progressives usually talk about publicly. But Joe isn’t “usual.” As his campaign motto says, “not your ordinary Joe.” Before I tell you what his favorite Bible verse is (the one above is one of mine), let me tell you how I met Joe.

Gloria Totten heads up Progressive Majority, an organization that does on the state legislature level what Blue America does on the congressional level. She told me about Joe months ago when he was considering running. “Joe is an outstanding progressive who has stood firm on the progressive issues we care most about,” she told me. “He is a proven leader who is committed to building our movement for the future– as Progressive Majority’s Colorado state director, Joe helped 60 progressives win state and local office. We were proud to support Joe in his bid for the State House and I’m thrilled to back his campaign for the U.S. Congress. Trust me, Washington, DC needs more public servants like Joe– smart, energetic, committed and passionate for the people.”

For the people… and more. This is one of Joe’s favorite Bible verses. It comes from the prophet Micah who Christ quoted when asked what does the Lord require of you? You probably don’t hear many on the “religious” right espousing this one:
To love justice, to seek mercy, and to walk humbly with the Lord.

Joe is perfectly comfortable talking about messages from Jesus like that– even if conservatives (see my favorite Bible verse up top) have tried to coopt Jesus for their ideology of selfishness and bigotry, greed and hatred. “This theme,” Joe told me this week, “has motivated me to pursue public policy that is more fair and just for every person. It clarifies, for example, my stance to repeal the unjust ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ law because all people should be able to serve in the United States military regardless of how they were born. The aspiration toward these goals helped to inspire my sponsorship of the DREAM Act. The DREAM Act beneficiaries are good kids, who play by the rules, earn good grades point averages and want to contribute to our society. By creating educational and workforce development opportunities for students we can energize and empower individuals and families and grow our economy for all Americans.”

Who would Jesus kill? Joe doesn’t seem to find Jesus wanting to kill anyone. “I oppose the death penalty because we can do better as a society,” he said. “We have killed innocent people as DNA testing has verified. We disproportionately kill people from communities of color, as the U.S. Supreme Court recently confirmed. A person rightfully convicted of murder or heinous act should spend the rest of their life in prison.”

Prison is pretty horrible. But our business elites have behaved (badly) knowing full well that the chances that they– regardless of what they do– aren’t likely to spend much time there. So what about Wall Street? What about OccupyWallStreet. I asked Joe what he thinks about the whole movement. His response:

“In regard to Wall Street and economic reform, I respect those that take peaceful action to advocate for an economy that rewards hard work, encourages innovation and investment in education, retools Americans, and produces livable wages.

“We can not allow Wall Street elitists to break the rules, change the rules, and keep moving the goalpost, away from hard working families. Because of Wall Street greed and arrogance in 2008, millions of families were robbed of the dreams they worked and saved for, our nation was hobbled, and the Wall Street crowd sauntered into Washington to rewrite the rules again– to give themselves a bailout. That’s not thrift, it’s theft.

“It is amazing to see so many inspired people– from and for various points of view– advocating for change and a fair financial system.”

We’re going to have Joe over at Crooks and Liars today at noon (Mountain Time, 11am here in L.A.) to talk about his campaign and why he’s running for Congress. I hope you’ll join us. And I hope I’ve presented Joe attractively enough so that you’d like to help him beat that crackpot Coffman. You can do that here on the Blue America page.

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Occupy the Boardroom — Give the 1% a piece of your mind

by digby

There’s a lot of Occupying going on today all over the world. In London they are trying to take the stock exchange. In Rome there are clashes with police. All over the US there are demonstrations. (Check here for one near you.) If you can, you should get out and join them in solidarity.

But before you leave the house today, you need to do one more thing: help us Occupy the Boardroom:

105 US cities occupied. 1499 MeetUps around the world. 50,000 people in the streets of New York and tens of thousands more in cities across the country. Wall Street occupied continuously for one month.

The Occupy Wall Street has struck a deep chord with ordinary people around the world and changed our idea of what we, the people, can accomplish by doing one simple thing: bearing witness on the very doorstep of those responsible for the global economic crisis.

Today is the biggest action yet– the #OccupyWallStreet Global Day of Action. Today the 99% are joining together to stand up to Wall Street and the 1% who control it. In a world where the 1% prospers obscenely while the rest of us fall behind, we are demanding accountability for their crimes and telling them exactly how their actions have affected our lives.

Click here to OccupyTheBoardRoom and join in the Global Day of Action online.

Despite our growing strength, the Wall Street CEO’s and their cronies who crashed our economy still act like they can ignore us. So we’re aiming our voices directly at the people who caused this global crisis by filling up their inboxes with stories of how their recklessness affected our lives.

Last year (2009), Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorganChase, received $17.5 million in pay– not bad, especially considering that his company took $100.7 billion in taxpayer bailouts and that since then JPMorganChase has made a profit of $29.1 billion (2009-’10). Since 2009, JPMorganChase has spent tens of millions of dollars in lobbying Congress and in campaign “contributions.” At the same time Chase has foreclosed on thousands of families ($74 billion worth of foreclosed homes). Millions at the top, homeless shelters at the bottom. That’s how the 1% plays the game.

Click here to Occupy the Boardroom by sharing your 99%er story with the executives at Chase.

But OccupyWallStreet has allowed us to stand up and point out, loudly and powerfully, how the greed of the 1% has trumped the need of the 99%. So while hundreds of thousands of people around the world take action in the streets, we are joining in by virtually Occupying the Board Rooms and filling up the inboxes of the 1% with the stories of the 99%.

Click here to deliver your truth to the inbox of the Executives at Chase.

This is our moment. Seize it.

That letter went out this morning to all members of Blue America and to members of online organizations all over the country. Even if you are unable or unwilling to take to the streets, this is one thing we can all do — send the top 1% a piece of our minds. Occupy the Boardroom will make sure that they get these messages and that they are aware that the 99% is on to them.

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Right Wing “Brilliance”
by David Atkins (“thereisnospoon”)

It has been amusing to watch conservatives attempt to characterize the Occupy Wall Street protests. Some portray the movement as a collection of shiftless, ne’er-do-wells. Others paint it as the orchestrated creation of George Soros and the Democrats. Still others claim the unions are behind the protest. There is even the insinuation thrown around from time to time that the protesters are guilt-ridden trustafarians.

The right-wing is essentially throwing accusations against the wall to see what sticks, which isn’t entirely surprising given the popularity of the movement.

But this isn’t actually out of the ordinary for conservatives. For all their reputation for careful framing and targeted messaging, the conservative strategy has mostly been to throw the kitchen sink at liberal targets and just run with what works. Barack Obama is both evil Anti-Christ mastermind egghead, and clueless affirmative action dunce who can’t give a speech without a teleprompter. Bill Clinton was both cunning serial killer mob boss, and stupid rural hick not worth gracing the prestigious halls of the White House. Democrats are both the party of the class-warring mob, and of the liberal elite looking to take advantage of the common man.

Messaging for the right-wing has always had less to do with deductive determination of the best language and avenue of attack, and much more to do with throwing just about every potential attack out there to see what gets traction. Often, there will be multiple contradictory attacks happening simultaneously, designed to appeal to different species of ignorant or bigoted audiences.

That is also why their messaging largely works. They have absolutely no problem “Othering” anyone who disagrees with them in any way possible in order to shift as many people as possible into their camp. Liberals like Bob Somerby tut tut at this sort of dualistic approach to politics even as they moderate themselves into political irrelevance.

The Left need not need be as intellectually dishonest and inconsistent as the Right. But it should be as forceful in its revulsion for the “values” of the other side, and force a clarifying division of America into one camp or the other. Because when all is said and done, if the Left carries a progressive populist message, at the end of the day there will be more people in our camp than in theirs. Meanwhile, in a political world of moral clarity, Democrats will have greater success in actually implementing progressive policies and claiming mandates when they win elections, just as the Right continues to do after every successful election.

Above all, the Left should not fear the Right’s vaunted message machine. Throw enough attacks out there, and some of them will stick more than others. All one need do is be unafraid to go on the attack in the first place.

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During the chaotic Occupy Wall Street march through the financial district this morning, we witnessed a protester on William Street get punched in the face by a police officer, seemingly without provocation. He says the officer hit him so hard his earring got knocked out, but he managed to escape arrest. We caught up with the protester later: his name is Felix Rivera-Pitre, and he told us what happened and how he got away.

Rivera-Pitre, who is HIV positive and used to be a dancer, tells us he was walking a little bit in front of the police on William Street, and admits he “shot the cop a look.” But then, according to Rivera-Pitre (and this is in line with what we witnessed), “The cop just lunged at me full throttle and hit me on the left side of my face…

Update: Animal New York published this video which appears to show what happened just before Rivera-Pitre was allegedly slugged in the face. At the 1:30 mark, an officer in a white shirt approaches Rivera-Pitre from behind, touches his arm, and tells him, “Get on the sidewalk.” Rivera-Pitre does indeed “shoot him a look”… and then the camera pans away. Cue horrified screaming and unified chanting “THE WHOLE WORLD IS WATCHING!”

I don’t know why that white shirt went nuts, but he went nuts.

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Some things just don’t mix

by digby

I can still hardly believe that anyone thinks it’s a good idea to allow loaded guns in bars, but this really takes the cake:

State Rep. Curry Todd (R-Collierville), chief sponsor of the controversial “guns in bars” bill, was arrested in Nashville Tuesday night. Todd was picked up by Metro Police and charged with DUI and possession of a handgun while under the influence. He was released on $3,000 bond.

Todd’s GMC Envoy was stopped near the corner of 21st and Blair at about 11:15 p.m. Tuesday. Police say they detected a strong odor of alcohol coming from the vehicle.

In performing a field sobriety test, police said Todd “demonstrated numerous indicators of impairment and the officer noted that the subject was unsteady on his feet, almost falling down at times. His speech was slurred, his eyes were red, watery and bloodshot.” Todd refused a field sobriety test.

According to an affidavit, police also found a loaded Smith and Wesson .38 Special between the driver’s seat and the car’s center console.

Wyatt Earp was famous for being a handgun confiscator. He did it because a bunch of drunken yahoos kept shooting up the saloons and killing people. I see no reason to believe that human nature has changed significantly and this inebriated fool seems to prove it. He’s just lucky he didn’t decide to brandish his loaded weapon at them and everyone else was lucky he didn’t try to shoot somebody or kill someone with his car.

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One Good One Down

by digby

From the “nobody could have predicted” file:

HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced Friday that the department is calling for a halt to the implementation of the CLASS Act — a stunning end to the financially troubled long-term care insurance program and a major setback to the health care reform law.

In a letter to congressional leaders, Sebelius said the department did everything it could to find a way to make the program self-sustaining — as the law requires it to be.

But the department’s analysis, she said, concluded that there was no way to do that.

“For 19 months, experts inside and outside of government have examined how HHS might implement a financially sustainable, voluntary and self-financed long-term care insurance program under the law that meets the needs of those seeking protection for the near term and those planning for the future,” Sebelius said in the letter. “But despite our best analytical efforts, I do not see a viable path forward for CLASS implementation at this time.

”After 19 months of research, “what we’ve determined is we do not have a path forward,” Assistant Secretary for Aging Kathy Greenlee said on a conference call with reporters. The law requires Sebelius to certify that the program would be fiscally solvent for 75 years.

I’m sure that many people are thrilled to see this horrific intrusion on American liberty scuttled. And I’m sure they will be just as thrilled when their geriatric parents and grandparents literally have nowhere to go when they get too sick to take care of themselves.

This was always one of the weak links in the health care reforms. As anyone who has dealt with elderly relatives with serious illnesses knows, the long term care system is rapidly falling apart and nobody wants to deal with it. And as long as we insist on having a health care system run by the profit motive this is going to remain the case.

My advice to young people today is to get a degree in nursing. You’re going to need it.

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