The Libertarian Swindle

It was cruel and unfair to mock the teabaggers for such ignorant/hypocritical sentiments as "Keep the government out of my Medicare!"

It turns out that attitude has its roots in shameless fraud perpetrated as long as 60 years ago by none other than Charles Koch, the funder and manipulator of the astroturf teabaggers.

From The Nation:

When Texas Governor Rick Perry, a front-runner in the Republican primary for president, derides Social Security as a “Ponzi scheme” or a “monstrous lie,” that rhetoric can be traced back to the work of Hayek and Koch. And yet we now know that in private practice, Hayek was perfectly content to pay into Social Security and that Koch encouraged him to draw upon both Social Security and Medicare. Did they really believe what they wrote? Or were these attacks just scare-talk meant for the rubes, for you and us, “the public”?

Calling this mere hypocrisy downplays the seriousness of their fraud. Koch and Hayek are no more hypocritical than the used-car salesman who knowingly sells a lemon to a gullible buyer, or the financial agency that rates “AAA” instruments it knows are crap. This is a grand swindle played on a trusting, gullible public, a scam whose goal is to con America’s dying middle class into handing over their retirement money to the richest 0.1 percent, convincing them that in doing so, they’re “empowering” themselves and protecting their “individual liberty.”

Another question hangs over all this: Why didn’t Charles Koch offer to put up some of his enormous wealth to pay for Hayek’s temporary medical insurance? One obvious answer: because the state had already offered a better and freer program. But perhaps Koch’s stinginess also reveals the social ethic behind libertarian values: every man for himself; selfishness is a virtue.

The government programs and spending liberals want are programs and spending that benefit the maximum number of people, not the few.

Long Time Coming, But Not Over Yet

Via PZ Myers:

The real owners are the big wealthy business interests that control things and make all the important decisions. Forget the politicians, they’re an irrelevancy. The politicians are put there to give you the idea that you have freedom of choice. You don’t. You have no choice. You have owners. They own you. They own everything. They own all the important land. They own and control the corporations. They’ve long since bought and paid for the Senate, the Congress, the statehouses, the city halls. They’ve got the judges in their back pockets. And they own all the big media companies, so that they control just about all of the news and information you hear. They’ve got you by the balls. They spend billions of dollars every year lobbying ­ lobbying to get what they want. Well, we know what they want; they want more for themselves and less for everybody else.

But I’ll tell you what they don’t want. They don’t want a population of citizens capable of critical thinking. They don’t want well-informed, well-educated people capable of critical thinking. They’re not interested in that. That doesn’t help them. That’s against their interests. They don’t want people who are smart enough to sit around the kitchen table and figure out how badly they’re getting fucked by a system that threw them overboard 30 fucking years ago.

You know what they want? Obedient workers ­ people who are just smart enough to run the machines and do the paperwork but just dumb enough to passively accept all these increasingly shittier jobs with the lower pay, the longer hours, reduced benefits, the end of overtime and the vanishing pension that disappears the minute you go to collect it. And, now, they’re coming for your Social Security. They want your fucking retirement money. They want it back, so they can give it to their criminal friends on Wall Street. And you know something? They’ll get it. They’ll get it all, sooner or later, because they own this fucking place. It’s a big club, and you ain’t in it. You and I are not in the big club.

This country is finished.

Dead on of course. But I think if George Carlin could see the Occupy protesters, he might hold off on that last line.

No, Ezra Klein: You Are Not Worthy

Eager Villager Elf Ezra Fucking Klein hosted the Rachel Maddow show Thursday night, which just pissed me off no end.

I've never liked the supercilious little brat, especially since he seems to specialize in pretending just enough journalism to fool real liberals into thinking he's one of us.

HA! As evidenced by the unbelievable patronizing Ezra piece highlighted on Tuesday by Kevin Drum:

Ezra Klein says it's not the protests themselves that have caused him to take Occupy Wall Street seriously. It's a Tumblr called, “We Are The 99 Percent,” full of personal stories of people who have, seemingly, done everything right but are still struggling with debt, unemployment, and a stagnant future:

This is why I’m taking Occupy Wall Street — or, perhaps more specifically, the ‘We Are The 99 Percent’ movement — seriously. There are a lot of people who are getting an unusually raw deal right now. There is a small group of people who are getting an unusually good deal right now. That doesn’t sound to me like a stable equilibrium.

The organizers of Occupy Wall Street are fighting to upend the system. But what gives their movement the potential for power and potency is the masses who just want the system to work the way they were promised it would work. It’s not that 99 percent of Americans are really struggling. It’s not that 99 percent of Americans want a revolution. It’s that 99 percent of Americans sense that the fundamental bargain of our economy — work hard, play by the rules, get ahead — has been broken, and they want to see it restored.

I cannot do that one justice. Fortunately, Wonkette nails the annoying little fucker right to the wall:

Middle-aged yuppie child Ezra Klein is exactly the sort of youth welcomed at the dying Washington Post. Permanently cautious and nervously polite, quick to distance himself from ancient youthful indiscretion of a couple of years ago, inherently middle of the road and steeped in the meaningless bullshit policy/punditry circle jerk of the era, Klein can be counted on to write in that special way nobody really uses to communicate, because it’s writing that is only written to please his elders at think tanks and in the Kaplan/WaPo board room. “Look at the little feller,” you might hear Richard Cohen mumbling to a wastebasket. “Why, he’s not so different from me, in the 1960s, when I was no doubt on the meekly impotent side of everything happening around me.” And now Ezra Klein has bravely (cautiously) made it clear that he very vaguely supports the concept of the masses being upset about something, even if they haven’t FedExed their position papers and enclosures via the proper channels. The kids are all right!

It’s not the arrests that convinced me that “Occupy Wall Street” was worth covering seriously.

Well what then, what was it? What shuddering insight finally convinced the likes of EZRA KLEIN that something could finally be covered “seriously”?

Nor was it their press strategy, which largely consisted of tweeting journalists to cover a small protest that couldn’t say what, exactly, it hoped to achieve.

Channels and decorum, folks, it’s all about the proper media contact strategy using the proper channels and decorum. Mess that up, and you’ve messed up the daily calendar of the very important people not yet laid off by the Washington Post.

It was a Tumblr called, “We Are The 99 Percent,” and all it’s doing is posting grainy pictures of people holding handwritten signs telling their stories, one after the other.

Tumblr? Is that how the youths are getting their porn now, on their Blackberry? Hhmmph, and such grainy pictures! Do they not have access to a top-notch photojournalism department like we do, here at the closed-down Washington Post suburban bureau?

These are not rants against the system. They’re not anarchist manifestos. They’re not calls for a revolution.

Relax, managing editor of online news! I’m not going to Crazyland! Nothing about guillotines and lining up the motherfuckers against the wall in my corporate blog! I also apologize for using an exclamation mark, in my mind.

Let’s be clear. This isn’t really the 99 percent. If you’re in the 85th percentile, for instance, your household is making more than $100,000, and you’re probably doing okay. If you’re in the 95th percentile, your household is making more than $150,000.

Translation: “I am paid very well to paste in these statistics from various professional liberal organizations staffed by lifers who compile statistics. Let’s be quite clear that these Occupy Wall Street ruffians on the Tumblr do not have their statistics exactly correct.”

Fuck this guy.

Or, you know, don't. You know where he's been.

Here's a good OWS photo gallery to remind you of what Ezra doesn't, and never will, understand.

"Why would they oppose something we know would improve our economic situation?

Because they are willing - nay, eager - to destroy the economy in pursuit of ousting you, Mr. President.



Full transcript here.

Did Al-Qaeda Fund Ads Promoting David Williams for Governor?

Maybe not, but we'll never know. Thanks to the reichwing majority on the Supreme Court, the group that spent $1.36 million attacking Steve Beshear does not have to reveal where its money came from.

Jack Brammer at the Herald:

An independent political group called Restoring America reported Friday that it has raised and spent $1.365 million in Kentucky’s governor’s race.

The group, which has aired TV and radio ads against Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear and for Republican challenger David Williams, did not list any of its contributors in a report filed with the state Registry of Election Finance.

It simply reported that Restoring America, Inc., of Lexington, Ky., raised $1.365 million on Sept. 26 and spent the same amount on the same date with Strategic Media Placement Inc. of Delaware, Ohio, for “broadcast ads buys for advocacy.”

The report listed the group’s treasurer as Mark Blankenbecler of Powell, Ohio. A call to the phone number listed on the report revealed that his name actually is Mike Blankenbecler. He was not available for comment.

What are these supporters of David Williams hiding? Why won't Williams demand that those supporters reveal themselves? Is he afraid that Kentucky voters would recoil in horror if we knew?

C'mon, Bully of Burkesville: prove you're not taking money from terrorists.

The Descent Into Barbarism

It's been there all along, really. The equation of dissent with treason in the oughts. The demonization of every opponent in the 1990s. The vicious misogyny toward "libbers" in the '70s. The beatings of hippies and flower children in the '60s. The hatred of the New Deal in the '30s.

Call it a legacy of slavery. A culture that did not just condone but defended, celebrated and killed hundreds of thousands of their fellow Americans to maintain the ultimate cruelty of slavery does not abandon its bloodthirsty soul in ten years, or a hundred, or 150.

Jonathan Schell at The Nation:

Presidential campaign debates are designed to give the candidates an opportunity to express themselves to voters. But the audiences, too, sometimes make their views known. That happened in the Republican debates on September 7 and 12, in two episodes that have been much noticed. On the 7th, NBC’s Brian Williams asked Texas Governor Rick Perry whether at any time while presiding over the executions of the 234 people who had suffered the death penalty under his governorship (it has now risen to 235) he had “struggled to sleep at night with the idea that any one of those might have been innocent.”

Perry had slept fine. Texas, he said, has a very “thoughtful” judicial system. Then he went on to issue a kind of threat. He said, “If you come into our state…and you kill…one of our citizens…you will be executed.” The crowd applauded enthusiastically.

SNIP

At the GOP debate on the 12th, there was another public expression of enthusiasm for loss of life in Texas. CNN’s Wolf Blitzer asked Texas Congressman Ron Paul, who favors repeal of President Obama’s health plan, what medical response he would recommend if a young man who had decided not to buy health insurance were to go into a coma.

Paul answered, “That’s what freedom is all about: taking your own risks.” He seemed to be saying that if the young man died, that was his problem.

There were cheers from the crowd.

Blitzer pressed on: “But Congressman, are you saying that society should just let him die?” Someone in the audience shouted, “Yeah!” And the crowd roared in approval.

A characteristic that these exchanges have in common is cruelty. Cruelty is a close cousin to injustice, yet it is different. Injustice and its opposite, justice—perhaps the most commonly used standards for judging the health of the body politic—are political criteria par excellence, and apply above all to systems and their institutions. Cruelty and its opposites, kindness, compassion and decency, are more personal. They are apolitical qualities that nevertheless have political consequences. A country’s sense of decency stands outside and above its politics, checking and setting limits on abuses. An unjust society must reform its laws and institutions. A cruel society must reform itself.

There have been many signs recently that the United States has been traveling down a steepening path of cruelty. It’s hard to say why such a thing is occurring, but it seems to have to do with a steadily growing faith in force as the solution to almost any problem, whether at home or abroad. Enthusiasm for killing is an unmistakable symptom of cruelty. It also appeared after the killing of Osama bin Laden, which touched off raucous celebrations around the country. It is one thing to believe in the unfortunate necessity of killing someone, another to revel in it. This is especially disturbing when it is not only government officials but ordinary people who engage in the effusions.

SNIP

We might also draw a connection between these abuses and the current direction of budgetary decisions, in which, as in the readiness to deny healthcare to the dying, a pitiless will to deprive suffering people of whatever aid they may be receiving is evident. The list of cuts, achieved or proposed, on the right-wing agenda is too long to recite, but recent examples include the astonishing obstruction of assistance to recent victims of Hurricane Irene and Tropical Storm Lee unless other programs are cut; opposition to extending unemployment benefits; defeat of the Dream Act, which would give immigrant children a path to citizenship; opposition to spending for the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (S-CHIP) as well as Head Start, and so on. It appears that no one is so unfortunate that he or she is exempt from spending cuts, while at the same time no one is so fortunate as to be ineligible for a tax cut. Budget decisions do not involve the death penalty, yet for many they are matters of life and death.

The cruelty of a society cannot be quantified any more than its reserves of decency can. Nor can either be legislated, though both can be manifested in legislation. For all that, there can be no doubt that basic decisions are silently made in the hearts and minds of millions that are prior to any laws, and probably more important. If they go one way, a movement of hundreds of thousands suddenly arises, seemingly out of nowhere, to protest a wrongful execution. When they go the other way, you wake up one day to hear, with a chill running down your spine, a room full of people cheering because several hundred of their fellow citizens have been killed.

Read the whole thing.

Whatever Happened to Cops Who Knew How to Talk People Down?

Yet more evidence that tasers are not an alternative to guns; they're a way for lazy cops to avoid talking down agitated citizens.

A horrifically painful and frequently lethal way.

From the Courier:

A Louisville Metro police officer used a Taser to subdue a man Tuesday morning, police said.

The man was standing in the roadway at Seventh and Jefferson streets was “acting bizarrely, trying to direct traffic,” said Carey Klain, a police spokeswoman.

Klain said the man became combative when approached by an off-duty Louisville Metro police officer and two Jefferson County sheriff’s deputies, leading the officer to use the Taser. A Taser emits an incapacitating electric shock.

The man, who was not identified, was taken by Louisville Metro Emergency Medical Services to University Hospital for evaluation. He was not believed to be injured by the Taser, Klain said.

No charges have been filed against the man.

Police spokeswoman says the man was not injured. I wonder if medical staff at University Hospital - or the man himself - would agree.

No charges filed - except for the blindingly painful electric charge administered to this man for ... no reason.

However much Louisville Metro police have budgeted for tasers, how about using that money instead for training on non-violent persuasion?

Tweet for Jobs

Ben "Wire Hangar" Chandler, DINO-KY6, has come out in favor of the American Jobs Act. Either he's suddenly realized he needs the 20,000 Sixth District Democrats who sat home last year and almost cost him re-election, or even Congressional Blue Dogs are starting to rally around our last chance to save the economy.

From Barefoot and Progressive:

A month after President Obama’s Jobs speech and his somewhat tepid expression of support, Democratic Congressman Ben Chandler today released this press release — a refreshing (and Awesome!) development:

“The American people’s top priority is job creation, and strengthening small businesses, rebuilding America and putting people back to work is a crucial part of growing our economy,” Congressman Chandler said. “This legislation is paid for in full and includes elements – the payroll tax credit, rebuilding our schools, a focus on improving infrastructure, and long-term deficit reduction – which I think both sides of the aisle can agree will get our country on the path to economic recovery. There is no time to waste: Congress must act now to create jobs, strengthen our middle class, and expand our economy.”

With even spineless repug-lites like Benny Boy coming out in favor of President Obama's jobs bill, the only obstacle is, as usual, congressional repugs.

And there's only one way to move them.

Zandar:

Until they're convinced that they will be punished more for not supporting the jobs bill, I doubt they will budge an inch. You can give Republicans where you live a Twitter nudge with the Tweet For Jobs page on the Obama '12 site.

Unless you think doing nothing about the jobs situation in this country is okay, that is.

Remember: If you don't ask, you don't get. The squeaky wheel gets the greese. Do it for your grandmother - Tweet For Jobs.

Two Civil Rights Pioneers Gone

Two more names for the list of Liberal Fighters for the People that history books overlook.

Via Attaturk at Firedoglake:

(L)et’s just say Fred Shuttlesworth was arguably the bravest American of the 1960s.

The Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth, 89, one of the bravest and most dynamic leaders of the civil rights movement, who survived bombings, beatings and dozens of arrests in his efforts to end segregation in Birmingham, Ala., and throughout the South, died Oct. 5 at a Birmingham hospital. His daughter Carolyn Shuttlesworth said the cause of death was not known. Rev. Shuttlesworth had been in poor health since having a stroke four years ago. Rev. Shuttlesworth, a Baptist minister and co-founder of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, helped establish nonviolent resistance as a central tenet of the civil rights movement, often at great personal risk. In the early 1960s, he and other protesters were attacked with truncheons, fire hoses and dogs unleashed by Birmingham’s public safety commissioner, Eugene “Bull” Connor. When the images of violence were shown on television and newspaper front pages, the horrors of segregation could no longer be ignored by the rest of the nation. Rev. Shuttlesworth is often ranked in the highest tier of the nation’s civil rights leaders, alongside the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and the Rev. Ralph David Abernathy, but few suffered more on the front lines. He was, King once said, “the most courageous civil rights fighter in the South.”

Read the whole thing.

Then read this in the New York Times:

Derrick Bell, a legal scholar who worked to expose the persistence of racism in America through his books and articles and his provocative career moves — he gave up a Harvard Law School professorship to protest the school’s hiring practices — died on Wednesday in New York. He was 80.

SNIP

Mr. Bell was the first tenured black professor at Harvard Law School and later the first black dean of a law school that is not historically black. But he was perhaps better known for resigning from prestigious jobs than for accepting them.

In his 20s, while working at the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department, he was told to give up his membership in the N.A.A.C.P., which his superiors believed posed a conflict of interest. Instead, he quit the Justice Department, ignoring the advice of friends to try to change things from within.
Thirty years later, when he left Harvard Law School, he rejected similar advice. At the time, he said, his wife, Jewel Hairston Bell, asked him, “Why does it always have to be you?”

In “Ethical Ambition,” a memoir published in 2002, Mr. Bell wrote that his wife’s question trailed him afterward, as did another posed by his colleagues: “Who do you think you are?”

Addressing law students grappling with career decisions, he extolled what he called “a life of meaning and worth,” even though, he wrote, he sometimes alienated associates who saw his actions as “futile and foolish.”

The great icons of civil rights and liberal progress in general are important, but when we let emphasis on the few well-known giants erase the courageous work of the lesser-known, we rob our children of the idea that everyone has something to contribute, that you don't have to be "great" to do great things.

Pass It On

Digby brings us this great video from Brave New Films and asks that we pass it on. Now you pass it on.



Pass on the rest of it, too:

In contrast to the police violence in New York, San Francisco and elsewhere (I heard that in Louisville, there were mounted police AND the SWAT team - they must have NYC advisors), Los Angeles has a better way to address peaceful protests: join 'em.

From The Nation:

In a move that dramatizes the political differences between Los Angeles and New York, several members of the LA City Council today declared their support for Occupy LA and introduced a resolution that will put the city officially on record as endorsing the demostrators camped at City Hall. City Council president Eric Garcetti, who is running for mayor, visited the encampment yesterday and said, “Stay as long as you need, we’re here to support you.” And Council member Bill Rosendahl said Occupy LA demonstrators were "making democracy work."

Seven of fifteen Council members signed the resolution, which declares, among other things, that “today corporations hold undue power and influence in our country,” and notes that the LA County Federation of Labor has officially endorsed its “sisters and brothers” in Occupy LA.

While New York Mayor Bloomberg has been describing the demonstrations there as a problem, the LA city council is appealing to voters by endorsing the protesters’ critique of big banks and big money. And while the NYPD has arrested Wall Street marchers by the hundreds, and maced and pepper sprayed many, the LAPD has been complimented by Occupy LA for acting fairly and appropriately.

The full LA city council won’t vote on the resolution of support until next Tuesday, but one reporter at today’s council meeting, Simone Wilson of the L.A. Weekly, wrote that, “judging by their dramatic, heart-wrenched personal responses to occupiers during the meeting’s public comment period, no black-sheep councilmember is going to make the dick move of voting ‘No’ on such a popular cause.”

David Atkins "thereisnospoon" at Hullabaloo:

Meanwhile in Los Angeles, mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is officially backing the protests, handing out rain ponchos to the protesters:

The five-day old campout demonstration outside Los Angeles City Hall to protest Wall Street greed is getting official thumbs up from the city.

City News Service says the office of Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa distributed 100 rain ponchos to the demonstrators on Wednesday while seven of the 15 councilmembers voted in favor of a resolution in support of the Occupy LA protest.

The resolution, which is slated for a final vote next week, called the protest "a peaceful and vibrant exercise in First Amendment rights."

This is the difference between a city beholden to the vampires in the financial sector, and a city that isn't. It's the difference between a mayor with a community organizing and civic activism background, and a mayor beloved of the corrupt Third Way crowd who "earned" his chops playing games with other people's money. It's the difference between real progressivism, and authoritarian conservatism with a happy, socially liberal smile on its face.

Finally, for your enjoyment, lots of wonderful stories from Occupy LA.

Fight This. Fight This Like Rabid Ferrets

From Wonkette's own Outrage on Wheels Ken Layne:

Racist Republicans in Tennessee have their first success with the new “Voter ID” requirement: A 96-year-old black lady who has voted in all but one election (in 1960) that she was legally eligible to vote in has been denied the right to take part in democracy. Why? Oh, just some piece of missing paperwork. That’s the point of “Voter ID,” to stop people you don’t want voting — the poor, minorities, take your pick! — on a technicality. This is how so many black Americans were denied the vote in the South for a hundred years after being “emancipated.”

Dorothy Cooper, who worked her whole life as a housemaid, went down to see the authorities because she’d heard Tennessee’s racist new law would require a pile of documents for those who tried to vote in the future. And she was denied a Voter ID by a clerk at the counter, just as planned by the evil legislators who approved the law:

That morning, Cooper slipped a rent receipt, a copy of her lease, her voter registration card and her birth certificate into a Manila envelope. Typewritten on the birth certificate was her maiden name, Dorothy Alexander.

“But I didn’t have my marriage certificate,” Cooper said Tuesday afternoon, and that was the reason the clerk said she was denied a free voter ID at the Cherokee Boulevard Driver Service Center.

“I don’t know what difference it makes,” Cooper said.

We know what difference it makes. Dorothy Cooper is African-American. Occupy Chattanooga. Take everything from the rich whites and give it to the poor blacks.

Steven Benen:

Keep in mind, Dorothy Cooper has been voting for seven decades, but that was before Republicans decided that an imaginary problem required new restrictions to make it harder for voters to participate.

Indeed, in this specific case, Dorothy Cooper, an African-American woman living in the South, found it easier to vote during the Jim Crow era than under the new Republican rules. She’s found it easier to register before the Voting Rights Act than in 2011.

One of the main GOP proponents of the restrictions in Tennessee, apparently embarrassed, suggested this week senior citizens perhaps should be allowed to vote by absentee ballot without a photo ID.

But Cooper wants to go to the polls and cast her vote. It apparently brings her a sense of pride.

And next year, she’ll likely be one of 5 million Americans that an offensive Republican scheme will keep from the polls.

Yeah, thanks a fucking lot, Disappointed Democrats who stayed home last November and saddled the rest of us with anti-American repug demons disguised as governors and state legislators. Too late now for anyone to fix, but national Democrats are trying.

TPM:

Democrats are pivoting off a new report showing five million of their voters could be disenfranchised next year with a new multi-level attack aimed at new voter restriction laws across the country.

Starting Wednesday, the DSCC is going up with a online plan called the 2012 Election Protection Project, designed to “raise awareness and fight back against partisan attacks on voting rights.”

The program includes online tools and advertisements across several online platforms including Twitter, Facebook, and Google. The ads direct visitors to online petitions.

Here’s what the sponsored tweets pushing the program look like:

Use this tool. Work with your local Democratic party to find voters without whatever ridiculous ID your state's repugs are demanding and help those voters get registered and to the polls.

Every voter that you rescue from the repugs' New Jim Crow multiplies the value of your own vote by a factor of 10.

Fight this. Fight this like rabid ferrets.

The Occupation Grows - Join It Now

UPDATE Wall Street's paid-for thugs broke out the pepper spray, the batons and the cuffs last night. Pictures, video and descriptions here.

NY1 has coverage and video:

"Occupy Wall Street" protesters, community groups, unions and students have combined forces for a Lower Manhattan march this evening to demand Governor Andrew Cuomo and federal lawmakers stop giving tax breaks to the wealthy, eliminate budget cuts and restore jobs.

The thousands of demonstrators gathered in Foley Square and marched to Zuccotti Park, where the "Occupy Wall Street" protesters have stayed for two-and-a-half weeks.

Students from colleges in the neighborhood also staged walkouts from classes and joined the protests.

Among the dozens of participating representatives from city municipal unions is Transit Workers Union Local 100 President John Samuelsen, who said his union members share common concerns with the "Occupy Wall Street" organizers.

"One is joblessness, which is pervasive, and one is the disparity of wealth, which has continued to grow over the last several decades, and particularly in New York State right now," Samuelsen said.

He also said that the governor cannot say there is no money for raises for union members, when millionaires are still getting tax breaks.

While today's marchers do not have a single set of demands, participants said their diversity is an important aspect of their efforts.

"It gets to a point where you need to organize collectively. All different unions that are organizing today, the community-based organizations, all are out today, undivided," said Andy King of United New York.

The International Business Times:

The Occupy Wall Street movement staged a massive rally on Wednesday night, drawing on the newfound support of labor unions to attract thousands of protestors to downtown Manhattan and amplify its critique of economic inequity. The protest was the largest since Occupy Wall Street began over two weeks ago, and it underscored the movement's increasing sophistication and breadth.

Union members wearing the t-shirts of their local shops marched alongside students, community organizers and activists. Protestors began by massing in Occupy Wall Street's base camp of Zuccotti Park, where veterans of the movement warned others to stay on the sidewalks and to remain respectful of police officers, an attempt to prevent a repeat of the mass arrests that marred a protest on the previous Saturday. They then slowly proceeded towards Foley Square, pounding drums, waving signs and chanting slogans that included "We are the 99 percent" and "We got sold out, banks got bailed out.

This could be it. This could be what finally turns the worm that has been destroying the country for the last 30 years.

What will you say, 30 years from now, when someone asks "What did you do in the class war?"

Join the Occupation in your town.

Repugs Want What Has Never Worked

As congressional repugs break out the shovels to bury the American Jobs Act, keep in mind that everything repugs propose is something that has been proven - multiple times - does not work.

Steve Benen last week:

Every time we see fresh evidence of the economy’s weakness or fragility, Republicans are quick to blame the White House. After all, if Obama is president, and the economy stinks, it must be his fault.

But in order for this to make sense, the administration would have to be getting its way when it comes to economic policy. Then Republicans would have a credible case to make: if only we’d try things the GOP’s way, we’d finally see great results.

As Greg Sargent explained in a gem of a post, Republicans have nothing to complain about, since we’re already sticking to their script.

No hiring surge is going to happen until Obama and Dems actually agree to do it their way in policy terms.

No hiring surge will happen until that job killing stimulus spending winds down; until Dems allow Republicans to extend the Bush tax cuts on the rich; until Dems agree to deep cuts to Federal programs; until municipal governments are forced to cut back and fend for themselves; until Dems embrace the notion that government must tighten its belt to restore business confidence; and until Dems begin seriously basing their policy response to unemployment on the conservative idea that if we only reduce the deficit, a thousand economic flowers will bloom. Only then we’ll see the surge in employment we’re all waiting for.

Oh, wait…

Very nicely done. I know Greg and I have both been banging this drum for a long while, but the point is largely missing from the larger discourse. Whether Republicans want to admit it or not, the economy is advancing exactly as they want it to. The private sector is being left to its own devices; the public sector is shedding jobs quickly and scrapping investments; and debt reduction is at the top of Washington’s to-do list.

This is the playbook the GOP put together. When it’s followed and it fails, Republicans should be prepared to accept responsibility for the consequences, instead of pretending they’re not getting their way.

As The Onion puts it:

Trying to avoid repeating bad things we did in the past is a good idea, historians say.

But it's not ignorance, it's a deliberate strategy, as David Atkins "thereisnospoon" at Hullabaloo explains:

As the Republican presidential candidates fall all over themselves to outdo the other in pushing reckless anti-government, anti-tax ideology, there is one progressive response that I've always been particularly fond of but is far too seldom used: the fact that never in the history of the modern nation state has an economy successfully operated along the lines the Tea Party envisions for America. Bill Clinton of all people made this point just recently in a meeting with bloggers:

You know, there’s not a single solitary example on the planet, not one, of a country that is succesful because the economy has triumphed over the government and choked it off and driven the tax rates to zero, driven the regulations to nonexistent and abolished all government programs, except for defense, so people in my income group never have to pay a nickel to see a cow jump over the moon. There is no example of a succesful country that looks like that.

This is one of the reasons that conservatives are so desperate to hold onto the notion of American exceptionalism: liberals have a wide of range of models from Japan to Scandinavia to prove the efficacy of various progressive solutions to America's problems. No country is perfect, of course, and solutions that work elsewhere may not work here. But as a general rule, progressives have effective examples worldwide to prove the value of our approach, whether it be in medicine, criminal justice, labor or otherwise.

Conservative approaches by contrast are a failure wherever and whenever they are tried. Theocracy inevitably leads to tyranny and despotism, whether it be the Christian theocracies of the Middle Ages or the modern theocracies of the Islamic world. Weapons-happy libertarianism ultimately ends in the sort of anarchic despotism we see in Somalia. Conservative approaches to finance, taxation and regulation lead inevitably to economic collapse, as seen in the history of basically every single country that ever even temporarily earned the "tiger" moniker from Austrian economists seeking to validate their theories.

So it's crucial for conservatives to insist that America never learn from anyone else's positive example, and that every problem in America be seen as sui generis. Faith-based policy making can only exist in an informational vacuum where real-world examples are never considered.

Progressives often lament that the conservative rhetorical construct is nearly impossible to demolish. But that's actually not true. Republican rhetoric, built as it is on a foundation of lies, is incredibly rickety when challenged in the right places. Destroy one pillar, and much of the rest of it comes tumbling down. But doing so would require taking on some taboo subjects that have been so vigorously protected by the conservative establishment as to have become sacred cows.

American exceptionalism is one of those sacred cows. It is what allows faith-based policy to exist. The notion, accepted by so much of the Democratic establishment, that we cannot even rhetorically challenge the idea that love of America means never looking abroad for ways we can improve, has to go by the wayside if we want to have a chance of taking this country back.

Of course, doing that won't happen overnight. But an easy way to lead into the argument would be to provide the negative counterexample: maybe we're not yet in a position where independent voters will pay attention to examples of solutions from around the world. But they should at least be open to the argument that Republican policies have never worked here or elsewhere, not least because it's true.

Liberals go with what works, and reject what doesn't.

The Occupation Reaches Louisville

Two Kentucky counties occupied; 118 to go.

From the Courier:

The Louisville demonstrators said they intended to “occupy” the grassy space across Fourth Street from the Kentucky Convention Center indefinitely — 24 hours a day — like their New York City counterparts have done with Zuccotti Park.

Curtis Morrison planned to pull an all-nighter — and more — for the protest, which may relocate at nights to the Belvedere before returning to the space at Jefferson and Fourth this morning. “Congress needs to look at this,” said Morrison, an organizer of the still-organizing demonstration. “They need to make some reforms or there’s going to be a revolution.”

About 140 protesters were present at 2 p.m., but Morrison said the group peaked earlier at roughly 200. The Occupy Louisville protest didn’t have a principal organizer, instead coalescing through word-of-mouth and social media.

Separate groups met at the Belvedere and at Fourth and Jefferson. Within an hour, the Belvedere protesters marched to Fourth and Jefferson, toting signs that said “Stop the War on Workers” and chanting, “The banks got a bailout, we got sold out.”

“I’m here because our federal government has sold us out,” protester Meredith Dooley said, holding a sign. “It’s government of the money, for the money, by the money. I hope people get greater awareness that their government is not representing them. People should be outraged by the inequality of wealth.”

Hillbilly Report has the video.

Join the Occupation in your town.

Inside/Outside Game

Many years ago, the late, great Isaac Asimov wrote a short story about human beings trying to overthrow alien invaders. The story focused on two characters: one a wild-eyed radical and the other a compromising bureaucrat. The radical starting screaming from Day One that the aliens were invaders, not friends, and we must kill them immediately before they took over. The bureaucrat condemned the radical as crazy and dangerous and had him locked up. Over the course of decades, this scenario repeated itself: the radical led protests against the encroachments of the aliens and the surrender of the planet by the bureaucrat, and the bureaucrat responded by jailing the radical.

In the end, the bureaucrat succeeded in using subterfuge and secret diplomacy to kick the aliens out. The radical, freed from his latest imprisonment, found himself hailed as a hero, while the bureaucrat was condemned as a collaborator. The radical objected to this mistreatment of the man he now realized had been right all along. The bureaucrat responded that the radical really was the hero. Without the radical's constant protest in contrast, the bureaucrat would have had no credibility in slowly building a strong opposition and leading it to victory.

David Atkins concludes a superb post on the protest left vs. the electoral left this way:

In order for change to take place, good Democrats do need to be in power. But only an angry and motivated populace angry with both Parties and strongly intent on holding Democrats accountable will scare and motivate Democrats enough to do what they were elected to do.

LBJ wouldn't have been pushed to do the right thing for civil rights without MLK. But neither would MLK have brought his dream to fruition without a president in power with the courage to enforce desegregation.

Ultimately, the institutionalists need to allow the Occupy Wall Street protests to develop organically without attempting to convert them into electoral activism in any form. Supporting the protests is perhaps the most important thing progressives can be doing right now. As Robert Cruickshank tweeted:

We need to focus on generating the waves, not recruiting people to surf them.

But on the other hand, it would behoove movement progressives not to dismiss the arena of electoral politics and those who engage in it. If Mitt Romney becomes president or John Boehner remains the House Speaker, it won't matter how big or successful the protests become. For things to really work, Democrats will have to be in power and a powerful progressive protest movement with a healthy distrust of institutional Democrats will need to be in place to hold them accountable.

Down with Tyranny is working the inside/outside angle by strongly criticizing President Obama while researching, identifying and supporting congressional candidates who are genuine liberals. You can find them here.

For the Same Reason You Don't Piss Off Your Waiter

Because he will piss in your soup.

Congressional repugs have dissed and dismissed Ben Bernanke nonstop for two years. Ignored and humiliated him. Let him waste his breath begging congressional repugs to behave like sentient lawmakers, and done exactly the opposite of what he recommended.

Now they might just have pushed him too far.

Steve Benen:

... the Fed chair has spent the last several months pleading with GOP lawmakers not to cut spending in ways that that would hurt economic growth (Republicans have ignored his advice, just as they ignored him on the debt-ceiling fiasco). This morning, he repeated that plea and went slightly further, not only denouncing job-killing spending cuts, but recommending additional government intervention to prevent a downturn. “We need to make sure that the recovery continues and doesn’t drop back,” he told the Joint Economic Committee.

Bernanke didn’t explicitly endorse additional stimulus, but he didn’t leave many doubts either, pressing lawmakers for federal spending policies that “support growth.”

Congressional Republicans, for whatever reason, don’t seem to care, haven’t even considered any jobs bills this year, and have already vowed to kill a credible and bipartisan White House plan. Perhaps it’s because improving the economy isn’t in their “interests”?

I don't think Ben Bernanke actually gives a flying fuck about anyone who's not rich. He does, however, care deeply about his reputation as fed chair - a reputation that congressional repugs are shredding. They're making him look like a helpless, impotent bureaucrat. I'd say he's on the verge of proving to them that when it comes to manipulating the economy for political ends, he is far more powerful than they are.

I think Bernanke is about one insult away from flipping the switch on the printing presses and dropping a trillion or so bucks from helicopters onto the heads of poor and working-class Americans, who will spend every dime of it immediately on consumer goods, thus goosing the economy, creating millions of jobs and eliminating the deficit just in time for the 2012 election. I'm thinking 400 electoral votes for Obama, 350 dems in the House and 65 in the Senate.

And repugs will have no one to blame but themselves.

Occupy Lexington Day 6

Karla Ward at the Herald:

The Occupy Lexington Kentucky movement, modeled after Occupy Wall Street, started on Thursday, and Monday night saw a group still occupying the area outside Chase Tower on Main Street.

"We're here 'til the grievances are addressed," said Mike Davis, who was among about 30 people gathered in downtown Monday night.

Among their main concerns are what they describe as corporate greed and a disproportionate concentration of wealth.

"We are individuals gathered with voices in unison to make a stand for our right to the opportunity to live our best life," Davis said. "We want to shift the power back to the people."

SNIP

He said that at least 100 people have participated in the gathering each day; at least three people have camped out nightly downtown.

Stephen Shepard said he's been encouraged by the support the community has shown by honking horns, giving the thumbs-up sign and even dropping off pizzas and coffee as they pass by.

Occupy Louisville starts today.

Kentucky's indispensable Hillbilly Jim Pence has video coverage here.

Call the Waaaaaaaaaaaaahmbulance

David Williams has built his political career on bullying. He is re-elected to the state Senate by his constituents and to the Senate presidency by his colleagues because he is a bully. People either fear his bullying or want to benefit from his bullying of others. His primary qualification for office is his reputation as a bully.

Now he's whining like a little bitch because the big bad media is portraying him as ... a bully.

Beth Musgrave at the Herald:

Trailing badly in the polls, Republican David Williams said on Monday that a decade of bad press has hurt his campaign for the state’s top office.

In an interview with the Herald-Leader’s editorial board, the Republican nominee for governor said he has been unfairly portrayed as a bully by the media.

The Burkesville native, who has been president of the state Senate since 2000 and was first elected to the legislature in 1985, said he often shouldered the blame and political heat for unpopular stances taken by the Senate Republican caucus.

“Y’all have helped beat the hell out of me,” Williams said, referring to the media.

He has sometimes been referred to by his opponents and in editorials as the “Bully from Burkesville.”

“Nobody in Burkesville calls me a bully,” Williams said. “And few people in Frankfort do.”

Stop, you're killing me!

Everybody calls him a bully. People who hate him say it with disgust, and people who love him say it with pride, but everybody says it.

Hey David: people may disagree about the attractiveness of bullies, but everybody hates a WATB.

Declaration of Independence from Wall Street

Occupy Lexington is in its fifth day, and Occupy Louisville begins tomorrow. Barefoot and Progressive has the details.

The Rude Pundit sees the anti-corporate movement taking off:

No matter if it was intentional or not, the mass arrest of 700 of the Occupy Wall Street protesters on the Brooklyn Bridge in New York City on Saturday was a brilliant PR move, and it legitimized the snowballing activism as the beginning of a real movement. The media coverage has increased exponentially. For instance, NPR, which had been ignoring the protest, is now doing regular reports. The New York Times has had front page coverage.

The arrest of hundreds of peaceful marchers is proof that the demonstrations are having an effect. The NYPD, under the urging of the Bloomberg administration, no doubt, took a gamble, hoping that they could end the occupation once and for all. Instead, it ended up having the reverse effect, as the arrests and pepper-spraying the week before had, giving the protests more traction, more participants, and more power.

Wear those arrests as badges of honor, good provocateurs of the plaza. As Big Bill Haywood, the leader of the Industrial Workers of the World, said when he was imprisoned in Chicago in 1917, "A prison cell is the heritage we gain for the blood and lives our forefathers gave; they fought for religious freedom and left us with minds free from superstitious cant and dogma; they waged war for political justice; they carried on the struggle against chattel-slavery - these were the titanic battles that were fought, bringing us to the threshold of all wars - the class war - in which we are enlisted as workers." Now, Big Bill was given to hyperbole, but his point was that if you're gonna fuck with the powerful, the powerful are gonna try to fuck you up. But that the chance to battle should be inspirational, not dispiriting.

Remember, this is still the very, very beginning. Maybe, just maybe, as more actions happen, as unions get involved, as more arrests happen, as the tipping point of inevitable violence by authorities occurs, maybe we on the left can stop being such little bitches about the protests and unify behind them.

Later this week: Um, so what the fuck are we unifying behind?

David Atkins "thereisnospoon" at Hullabaloo can answer that:

The official list of grievances of the General Assembly of Occupy Wall Street:

As we gather together in solidarity to express a feeling of mass injustice, we must not lose sight of what brought us together. We write so that all people who feel wronged by the corporate forces of the world can know that we are your allies.

As one people, united, we acknowledge the reality: that the future of the human race requires the cooperation of its members; that our system must protect our rights, and upon corruption of that system, it is up to the individuals to protect their own rights, and those of their neighbors; that a democratic government derives its just power from the people, but corporations do not seek consent to extract wealth from the people and the Earth; and that no true democracy is attainable when the process is determined by economic power. We come to you at a time when corporations, which place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality, run our governments. We have peaceably assembled here, as is our right, to let these facts be known.

They have taken our houses through an illegal foreclosure process, despite not having the original mortgage.
They have taken bailouts from taxpayers with impunity, and continue to give Executives exorbitant bonuses.
They have perpetuated inequality and discrimination in the workplace based on age, the color of one’s skin, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation.
They have poisoned the food supply through negligence, and undermined the farming system through monopolization.
They have profited off of the torture, confinement, and cruel treatment of countless animals, and actively hide these practices.
They have continuously sought to strip employees of the right to negotiate for better pay and safer working conditions.
They have held students hostage with tens of thousands of dollars of debt on education, which is itself a human right.
They have consistently outsourced labor and used that outsourcing as leverage to cut workers’ healthcare and pay.
They have influenced the courts to achieve the same rights as people, with none of the culpability or responsibility.
They have spent millions of dollars on legal teams that look for ways to get them out of contracts in regards to health insurance.
They have sold our privacy as a commodity.
They have used the military and police force to prevent freedom of the press. They have deliberately declined to recall faulty products endangering lives in pursuit of profit.
They determine economic policy, despite the catastrophic failures their policies have produced and continue to produce.
They have donated large sums of money to politicians, who are responsible for regulating them.
They continue to block alternate forms of energy to keep us dependent on oil.
They continue to block generic forms of medicine that could save people’s lives or provide relief in order to protect investments that have already turned a substantial profit.
They have purposely covered up oil spills, accidents, faulty bookkeeping, and inactive ingredients in pursuit of profit.
They purposefully keep people misinformed and fearful through their control of the media.
They have accepted private contracts to murder prisoners even when presented with serious doubts about their guilt.
They have perpetuated colonialism at home and abroad. They have participated in the torture and murder of innocent civilians overseas.
They continue to create weapons of mass destruction in order to receive government contracts. *

To the people of the world,

We, the New York City General Assembly occupying Wall Street in Liberty Square, urge you to assert your power.

Exercise your right to peaceably assemble; occupy public space; create a process to address the problems we face, and generate solutions accessible to everyone.

To all communities that take action and form groups in the spirit of direct democracy, we offer support, documentation, and all of the resources at our disposal.

Join us and make your voices heard!

There are those who will argue that this list is far too broad and inclusive for a specifically anti-Wall Street protest. While those critiques are understandable from a certain point of view, they miss the point of airing a set of grievances. Goals, which should be specific to dealing with the financial sector if they are to have a chance of fulfillment, are not the same as grievances. This list is powerful, not least because it addresses the myriad ways in which big business and the financial sector are destroying society, piece by piece. In terms of raising consciousness, it is important for the average person to realize that anger with Wall Street is about much more than bailouts, income inequality and massive bonuses. It's about the way the relentless pursuit of the next quarter's profits at the expense of all else warps the social fabric of a democracy.

The General Assembly in this well-considered document has hearkened back to a much older and more florid declaration that similarly began with a statement of principles and a list of grievances.

It is an important beginning. The General Assembly has lit the match. Now it's up to America at large to understand what is at stake, and turn a protest into a revolution.

If the needless arrest of 700 protesters yesterday, including small children doesn't inflame passion to help take our democracy back, it's hard to know what will.

Meanwhile, the anti-democratic Koch fortress is starting to show cracks. David Dayen at Firedoglake:

Bloomberg, the news organization for patchouli-burning, Birkenstock-wearing hippies everywhere, has a long story alleging that Koch Industries traded with Iran, paid bribes to win contracts, stole oil, and engaged in “violations of criminal law,” according to the company’s own internal documents.

SNIP

The article is hard to summarize because there are so many charges; so just go read it. If you want to know why we’re seeing a wave of protests against corporatism in this country, I would offer this article as Exhibit A.

Join the Occupation in your town.

Have You Hugged A Public Employee Today?

It's Public Employees Recognition Week in Kentucky.

First Lady Jane Beshear today presented a signed proclamation declaring the week of October 3 as Public Service Recognition Week in Kentucky. The celebration began nationally in 1985 to honor the men and women who serve our nation as federal, state, county and local government employees and ensure that our government is the best in the world.

“Public servants are the backbone of our communities,” said Mrs. Beshear. “This week provides not only a means to express our gratitude, but an opportunity to increase awareness and appreciation for the many services public employees provide to benefit and protect our lives each day.”

School students throughout the state have shown their appreciation to public employees by participating in the fourth-annual Public Service Recognition Poster Contest. Students were asked to create a poster around this year’s theme, “State Employees – Making a Difference Every Day in Every Way.” The 2011 winners (see below) were in attendance today and were recognized by the First Lady.

Arabella Grace Long, Taylor County Elementary School, age group 6-9
Kisaki Takeuchi, Lyon County High School, age group 10-13
Keri Dial, Metcalfe County High School, age group 14-18

As part of the week’s events, the Governor’s Ambassador Awards will also be announced on Oct. 6 at the Frankfort Civic Center. The program recognizes state employees who significantly and positively impact the lives of their co-workers, customers and community at large. Nominations are submitted by peers and local citizens in the areas of customer service, courage, leadership, professional achievement, teamwork, or community service and volunteerism. Each award recipient is honored with an engraved, personalized brick placed outside the Kentucky History Center. More than 100 nominations were received this year, involving approximately 230 employees.

Revenue Program Officer Natalie Brown, a 2010 Ambassador Award recipient, helped save the life of a man who had a heart attack while on the phone with her. “It was an honor to be a recipient of this award, and it was a privilege to stand alongside so many outstanding and hardworking employees. The Governor’s Ambassador Awards is a great program that recognizes the spirit of our state government’s dedicated workers who continue to serve the people of Kentucky.”

Visit the Personnel Cabinet’s website at www.personnel.ky.gov to view the poster contest winners and their artwork, a toolkit for managers, and the 2010 winners of the Governor’s Ambassador Awards. Recipients of the 2011 awards will be available Oct. 6.

Yesterday, Steve Benen highlighted this recent poll showing that only 15 percent of Americans trust government.

Seeing these results, I couldn’t help but think about Mike Lofgren, a retired GOP staffer on Capitol Hill, who last month offered a first-hand look at what motivates policymakers from his party. As Lofgren put it, congressional Republicans aren’t just eager to undermine Democrats at all costs, they’re also intent on undermining the public’s faith in political institutions themselves.

A couple of years ago, a Republican committee staff director told me candidly (and proudly) what the method was to all this obstruction and disruption. Should Republicans succeed in obstructing the Senate from doing its job, it would further lower Congress’s generic favorability rating among the American people. By sabotaging the reputation of an institution of government, the party that is programmatically against government would come out the relative winner…. Undermining Americans’ belief in their own institutions of self-government remains a prime GOP electoral strategy [emphasis added]

The point is nihilism for nihlism’s sake; the point is to create a dynamic in which the American mainstream simply won’t look to government for policy solutions, because the public simply won’t trust public institutions to respond effectively and responsibly.

And once Americans are convinced to turn their backs on these institutions, Republicans will find it easier to shrink government — preferably to the size where it can be “drowned in a bathtub” — and cut taxes, which is generally the ultimate goal anyway.

Congratulations, Republicans. By refusing to be responsible, refusing to compromise, and refusing to govern, it looks like your strategy is working.

Fight the anti-government nihilism. Hug a public employee today.

American Police State Finds New Ways to Suppress Dissent

The asshole-with-pepper-spray ploy backfired on the NYPD, so now they're trying old-fashioned herding them into a no-escape zone and arrest them all on bogus charges.

Susie Madrak at Crooks and Liars:

From the descriptions of the people who were there, it sounds as though Mayor Bloomberg's strategy is to thin the ranks of protesters with set-ups like this. The Powers That Be don't understand how many more people are waiting in line to support the Occupy Wall Street actions:

Police reopened the Brooklyn Bridge on Saturday evening after more than 500 anti-Wall Street protesters were arrested for blocking traffic lanes and attempting an unauthorized march across the span.

The arrests took place when a large group of marchers, participating in a second week of protests by the Occupy Wall Street movement, broke off from others on the bridge's pedestrian walkway and headed across the Brooklyn-bound lanes.

SNIP

Witnesses described a chaotic scene on the famous suspension bridge as a sea of police officers surrounded the protesters using orange mesh netting.

Some protesters tried to get away as officers started handcuffing members of the group. Dozens of protesters were seen handcuffed and sitting on the span as three buses were called in to take them away, witnesses and organizers said.

The NY Times interviewed protesters who said, despite NYPD claims, the police never warned them they couldn't walk in the roadway.

How long before Mikey's cops resort to lethal violence?

Occupy protests have spread to Chicago, Boston and San Francisco, where the cops are taking their cues from New York.

Stop Corporate Theft of Our Food

You can go vegan, grow all your own fruits and veggies organically or buy from local organic farms, never indulge in packaged food, and still fall victim to corporate destruction of our food supply as long as corporations own all the seeds.

And when people lose control of the food supply, we lose control of our democracy.

From Vandana Shiva at The Nation:

We are in a food emergency. Speculation and diversion of food to biofuel has contributed to an uncontrolled price rise, adding more to the billion already denied their right to food. Industrial agriculture is pushing species to extinction through the use of toxic chemicals that kill our bees and butterflies, our earthworms and soil organisms that create soil fertility. Plant and animal varieties are disappearing as monocultures displace biodiversity. Industrial, globalized agriculture is responsible for 40 percent of greenhouse gases, which then destabilize agriculture by causing climate chaos, creating new threats to food security.

But the biggest threat we face is the control of seed and food moving out of the hands of farmers and communities and into a few corporate hands. Monopoly control of cottonseed and the introduction of genetically engineered Bt cotton has already given rise to an epidemic of farmers’ suicides in India. A quarter-million farmers have taken their lives because of debt induced by the high costs of nonrenewable seed, which spins billions of dollars of royalty for firms like Monsanto.

I started Navdanya in 1987 to address the challenge of GM seeds, seed patents and seed monopolies.

SNIP

The food emergency, however, calls for a much wider response.

The food movement must become more integrated, from seed to table, from village to city, from South to North. We need to be stronger in challenging the corporate control of our food system and the role of governments in increasing, rather than stopping, the corporate abuse of our seeds and soils, our bodies and our health. Michelle Obama has an organic garden at the White House, but the Obama administration is embracing GMOs in the United States and around the world. The US-India agriculture agreement—signed by President Bush and Prime Minister Singh in 2005, at the same time as the signing of the US-India nuclear deal—has on its board representatives from Monsanto, ADM and Walmart. The hijacking of our food systems is the hijacking of our democracy.

Read The Nation's special issue on the Global Food Movement.

Since I'm on a petition kick lately, here's one from Credo Action to stop Monsanto from replacing all our sweet corn with GMO frankenfood.

Brett Guthrie is a Lying Moron, Part 3

Also too cowardly to hold town halls in Kentucky's Second District, which he pretends to represent.

Still sending out emails full of motherfucking lies that his constituents have no chance to challenge him on.

Clearly, a Balanced Budget Amendment is long-overdue. We cannot continue to recklessly spend today so that our children and grandchildren can pick-up the bill tomorrow. Every child born today already owes more than $46,000 to our government’s creditors.

It’s time to stop spending money we don’t have. A constitutional mandate to pass a balanced budget every year would force Congress to only spend what it takes in. No more borrowing from China; no more taxing future generations, just common-sense fiscal policy to permanently change the culture of spending in Washington. Families across Kentucky know how to live within their means; it’s time their government does too.

Steve Benen demolished the balance budget amendment bullshit on Monday:

Those who continue to argue that House Republicans deserve to be taken seriously on public policy probably don’t fully appreciate how very wrong they are.

We’re in the midst of a jobs crisis; economic growth is anemic, and Americans are desperate for policymakers to take this crisis seriously. And yet, this is what’s on the mind of the congressional GOP.

Keep in mind, in early August, House Republican leaders told their members that “the best thing they could do during the August recess” was to sell their constituents on the idea of a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution. Apparently, the next wave is on the way.

This is just madness. Even if we put aside the fact that there are real problems that require immediate attention, and even if we ignore the proposal’s legislative prospects, the Republicans’ Balanced Budget Amendment is one of the worst ideas in the history of bad ideas. That congressional Republicans managed to create a BBA this year that was even worse than the previous version is a testament to their creativity, but it also reflects a degree of economic illiteracy that should disqualify them from any adult conversation on public policy.

What sensible policymakers should be doing is dismissing this “pathetic joke” of a proposal as quickly as possible.

That this is at the top of the priority list for congressional Republicans is a reminder of just how far gone they really are.

Guthrie concludes:

You can show your support for a balanced budget amendment by visiting www.americaspeakingout.com or www.guthrie.house.gov and submitting your thoughts.

Yes, do visit guthrie.house.gov and let him know what a lying moron he is.

Repugs Lie About Beshear Supporting Clean Air and Water

Yeah, you read that right: the latest GOP ad in the Kentucky governor's race attacks the incumbent for supporting EPA regulations.

Here's the irony: Steve Beshear, a supposed Democrat, adamantly opposes EPA's efforts to minimize the water pollution and air pollution from coal mining - pollution that is directly and literally killing Kentuckians in the coal fields.

And here's the hysterical part: The Lexington Herald ran a piece exposing the ad as a lie:

The statement: “Beshear supports Obama’s EPA plans that will drive out our coal jobs by driving up our energy costs.”

— Restoring America, a group supporting Republican gubernatorial candidate David Williams, in a television ad this week attacking Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear.

The ruling: False

The facts: Throughout this fall’s campaign for governor, Republican nominee David Williams has tried to tie Gov. Steve Beshear with Democratic President Obama, who is unpopular in the state.

And here's what's missing from the Herald's "campaign watchdog report:" For the last year, Steve Beshear has gone far out of his way to attack President Obama and blame the EPA for everything wrong in Kentucky coal country.

Barefoot and Progressive has the video of Beshear hysterically attacking President Obama for daring to protect the health and safety of Kentuckians:



It doesn't make any difference. Beshear is rolling to a landslide win. From the Courier:

Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear has extended his lead to 31 points over Republican Senate President David Williams, with just five weeks left before the Nov. 8 election, according to the latest Courier-Journal/WHAS11 Bluegrass Poll.

The poll, conducted by SurveyUSA, found that Beshear leads Williams 57 percent to 26 percent among likely Kentucky voters. The third candidate in the governor’s race, independent Gatewood Galbraith, had 8 percent, and 9 percent were undecided.

The poll questioned 569 likely voters Sept. 22-27 and has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.2 percentage points.

Beshear led Williams by 24 points in the last Bluegrass Poll, conducted in late July, and the fact that his lead continues to grow has some political observers convinced that his coattails will be long enough to carry most, if not all, of the state’s other Democratic candidates for constitutional offices to victory.

Why Barack Obama lets a dime of federal money cross the border into Kentucky is beyond me.

Better Life, My Ass

They are the coolest commercials on television. Classic rock music, diversely attractive people doing exciting and rewarding yet unselfish things, exhortations to live life large.

If you're a boomer like me, you can't resist dancing a little. Smiling. Wondering what obviously liberal group has the money to spend on so many spots with such high production values.

You see this one coming, right?

By Lindsay Beyerstein at MajikThise in November 2004:

What is the "Foundation for a Better Life"?

Who are these people and what do they want?

The first I heard of them was last night at the movies. The Foundation bought up half the pre-movie ad time to show uplifting TV spots about "Including Others" and "Helping Others."

The FFBL describes itself as follows:

The Foundation for a Better Life is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization started in 2000. The programs and projects of the Foundation are non-commercial and are solely humanitarian endeavors; the Foundation does not seek nor accept contributions or donations of any kind and is privately funded. The Foundation supports the belief that each individual is entitled to personal dignity and self-respect and that most individuals are willing, when given the opportunity, to take personal responsibility for their actions and well-being. The Foundation also believes that capable people may also benefit from encouragement and reminders from time to time. Generally people who have the opportunity and the ability will make appropriate common sense decisions which will have a positive and uplifting effect on themselves, their community, and their country.

The Foundation claims to be non-religious and non-political. Perhaps I need more moral uplift to combat the cynicism rampant in this day and age, but I suspect there's a catch. The FFLB spots remind me of those free Book of Mormon TV ads from the 1980s.

If anyone knows who's behind this outfit, please leave a comment. If anyone has already written on the subject, please send a link and I'll post it. I'm very curious.

Update: Thanks to readers Wayne and Paperwight of Fairshot.

Paperwight writes:

It's a guy named Phil Anschutz, a conservative Denver oil, internet and media guy. See here. Cursory Google searching and internic domain name registration checks seem to confirm.

See also actsofkindness.org.

Wayne unearthed another hint of a Mormon connection: Gary Dixon is the President of the FFBL and an Honored Brigham Young University alumnus.

Here are some excerpts from the San Diego Indymedia item described in the Portland Alliance article cited by Paperwight (above) Colorado billionaire supporting nationwide propaganda campaign:

Philip Anschutz, who the BBC described as having "a reputation as one of the hungriest of US corporate vultures", is currently using his wealth and power to support a slick ad campaign appearing on 10,000 billboards, in hundreds of movie theaters, and on nearly a thousand TV stations across the country. The Foundation for a Better Life (FBL)—the non-profit entity that officially produces and distributes the ads—has no contact information on its website, forbetterlife.org, but a series of posts and comments to the portland indymedia open publishing newswire uncovered the connection between Anschutz and FBL.[...]

[Anschutz'] corporate empire includes a majority holding in Qwest Communications and ownership of several sports teams and arenas. Significantly, he also owns the United Artists, Regal and Edwards movie theater chains, where the FBL commercials are being shown. Whether or not FBL is paying for these slots is unknown. According to Outdoor Advertising Association of America, $10,000,000 worth of the cost of the billboard campaign is being donated by OAAA member companies. In other words, it is possible that this advertising blitz is costing FBL and Philip Anschutz very little money out-of-pocket. [...]

Yeah. A wingnut freakazoid on the danger level of the Koch brothers is using liberal music, liberal imagery, liberal language, liberal values to ... to .... what?

This has been going on for years, and the superficial message hasn't changed. If Anschutz has an ulterior motive, it's still hidden.

But there's one big clue that this is not what it appears.

Media Matters, last December:

Even when Fox is reporting on a completely innocuous story, they can't help themselves from lying. Fox & Friends ran a segment hosting one of their most prominent advertisers, the Foundation for a Better Life, and purporting to report "who's behind" the group, they hosted an unobjectionable, heroic woman who is featured in one of their ads. But, she's not "who's behind" the group; indeed, it doesn't even seem that she works for them. In fact, the actual people behind the group are right-wing, religious, anti-gay conservatives.

I think Media Matters got one thing wrong here: This is most certainly not "completely innocuous," and Fox does nothing accidentally or coincidentally.

Fox deliberately lied about the real person behind the FFBL, and they did so for a reason.

The FFBL and values.com are a poisoned apple. Don't eat it.

At Least They're Not Murdering Trade Unionists Here. Yet.

But the reluctance of the administration to forcefully condemn the practice elsewhere does not do anything to discourage those who'd like to start now.

From Firedoglake:

We have known for years about the dangers of being a trade unionist in Colombia, of the murders of organizers and labor officials. The murders have increased in frequency in the years since the US negotiated a trade deal with Colombia. They are well documented.

Now, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka has put names to the tragedy. In a letter to President Obama, Trumka says that 22 union activists have been killed in Colombia this year, including 15 since a so-called “Action Plan” designed to crack down on union violence was instituted in the country. All of their names are in a fact sheet at the end of the letter.

Trumka added that six Catholic bishops have been killed in Colombia in 2011. The Bishops Conference of Colombia believes the killings occurred because of “their courageous commitment… with the prophetic denunciation of injustice and the cause of the poorest in the country.” He concludes:

Simply put, Colombia should not be rewarded with a trade agreement until it develops a proven track record of ensuring that workers can exercise the fundamental rights of free association and collective bargaining; preventing violence against union leaders and other social justice advocates; and bringing to justice those who perpetrated such crimes. Providing Colombia with unfettered access to the U.S. market, and beneficial terms for investment, government procurement, and other commercial areas without requiring sustained and measurable progress toward protecting human rights will undercut our leverage to encourage Colombia to follow up its promises and intentions with effective actions.

Incidentally, in The Hill story on Trumka’s letter, right-wing commenters called the murder of 22 trade union activists “a good start,” along with other abhorrent or ignorant remarks.

In addition to sanctioning murder in the eyes of the world, the Colombia trade agreement will cost America up to 55,000 jobs at a time when the country can ill afford it.

The so called “free” trade agreements with Colombia, Panama and South Korea could come up for a vote in Congress (this) month.

Liberals know that trade unionists - union activists - are the only thing standing between working people and permanent serfdom. Which is why the plutocrats target them early, often and lethally.

Austerity in Action

It's the Republican Economic Utopia, and it's coming true right here in Lexington, Kentucky. Mitchie-poo and AynRandy are so proud.

From the Herald:

Three times in the last six weeks, families have abandoned elderly relatives at the Community Inn, a night shelter on Winchester Road, co-director Ginny Ramsey said.

"It is the same kind of abandonment that one would think of with a child because these were people who were unable to take care of themselves," Ramsey said.

Sometimes elderly people come into Lexington homeless shelters on their own, Ramsey said, but "we've never seen" families abandon elderly relatives.

When shelter officials tracked down two of the three families, Ramsey said, the family members said "they just couldn't deal with them anymore. That was it. They were done."

Once upon a time - all of a decade ago - those families could get home care or respite care for their elderly loved ones. Government care gladly provided by their tax-paying Kentucky neighbors, who know that such care is far cheaper than supporting the elderly in nursing homes.

Thank goodness our wise republican representatives have put a stop to such socialistic abominations, and forced stressed families to abandon their useless, parasitic members to the streets. The way jeebus intended.

Save This "Human Side of Government"

Yeah, calling your congress critter seems like a waste of time, and on many things that's true. But this is one that is so deeply embedded in the heart of America - established by Benjamin Franklin no less! - that call pressure may actually work.

David Dayen at Firedoglake:

I’m a little labor-heavy today, but this caught my eye. We’ve been discussing the imminent demise of the US Postal Service, and the potential loss of 120,000 good-paying jobs. But most of the near-term funding “crisis” for the USPS comes from an unusual pre-funding mandate for retiree benefits. James Parks explains:

The USPS economic crisis is the result of a provision of the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act of 2006 that requires the Postal Service to pre-fund the health care benefits of future retirees—a burden no other government agency or private company bears.

The legislation requires the USPS to fund a 75-year liability over a 10-year period, and that requirement costs the USPS more than $5.5 billion per year. Guffey also pointed out that “the federal government is holding billions of dollars in postal overpayments to its pension accounts.”

All of the USPS losses over the past four years come from this mandate. You cannot find another organization in the world, AFAIK, that pre-funds 75 years of benefits over a 10-year period. And it’s not just the overpayments, it’s the opportunity costs of having to hold that much reserve capital that cannot be used when times are tough, or to invest in more attractive services. This results from a 2006 law that was one of the last time bombs of the Denny Hastert-Bill Frist Congress. That needs to change.

Today, rallies are being held from 4-5:30pm local time to support the postal service. The locations are available here. Just about every Congressional district in the country will see a rally.

Over time, the postal service could need some additional innovation, as mail volume reduces. I suggested they take on simple banking, and there are other ideas available. In the short-term, the pre-funding mechanism is the entire problem.
Hopefully the rallies will stick to this very simple message.

The rallies were Tuesday, but the matter is still before Congress. More details here.

John Nichols at The Nation:

When I started covering politics, Jennings Randolph was completing his tenure as the grand old man of Capitol Hill. The last sitting member of Congress to have arrived with Franklin Roosevelt in 1933 (as a member of the House), he was still sitting as a senator from West Virginia more than fifty years later. Perhaps as importantly, he had been born only a little more than a century after the Constitution was adopted.

Randolph recognized the connection between the Constitution and the New Deal, seeing in both an element of nation-building that focused on the affirmative role of government and the necessary role of the extension of the federal government that could be found in every hinterland hamlet and urban neighborhood: the post office.

Randolph was the great defender of the postal service that Ben Franklin had established and that the framers of the Constitution had seen fit to recognize as an essential project of the federal endeavor.

Randolph waxed poetic about the post office, respecting the local facility, be it a frame building at a country crossroads or a brick-and-mortar monument at the center of the largest city. It was, he said, more than a purveyor of packages and mail, more than a source of employment, more even than a meeting spot and focal point for community.

The post office, Randolph explained, was the friendly and honorable face of a government that could otherwise seem distant and, at times, ominous.

As a true Jeffersonian Democrat, and a faithful New Dealer, Randolph argued that those who understood the positive role that government could play in the lives and communities of Americans had better make the defense of the post office a high priority.

“When the post office is closed, the flag comes down,” he said. “When the human side of government closes its doors, we’re all in trouble.”

Liberals want to keep what's best about America, while improving what needs improving. Ben Franklin's postal service is a keeper.

"Pass this jobs bill so I can sign it into law"

My repug congress critter prefers a balance budget amendment bill to bury what's left of the middle class - what does yours want?



Full transcript here.

Capitalist Leeches Taunting the Working Class

Digby:

It's hard to believe it's real, but here is video evidence of Wall Streeters drinking champagne from a balcony as they watch the protesters walk by:



You cannot make this stuff up.

Wall Street has been like this from the very beginning of the financial crisis, going out of their way to scoff at average people in trouble in this economy. ("We're doing God's work!")I guess they just don't see any need to keep a low profile and ride this out without inflaming the polloi. These "winners" want to rub their noses in it.

They just keep proving over and over again, in so many different ways, that they aren't as smart as they think they are.

Occupy protests are spreading around the country. Join the one in your town. Or if you're not in New York or can't make it there, you can help out the protesters with food and donations here.