January 26, 2013

In Defense of Zero Dark Thirty by Michael Moore

There comes a point about two-thirds of the way through Zero Dark Thirty where it is clear something, or someone, on high has changed. The mood at the CIA has shifted, become subdued. It appears that the torture-approving guy who's been president for the past eight years seems to be, well, gone. And, just as a fish rots from the head down, the stench also seems to be gone. Word then comes down that - get this! - we can't torture any more! The CIA agents seem a bit disgruntled and dumbfounded. I mean, torture has worked soooo well these past eight years! Why can't we torture any more???

The answer is provided on a TV screen in the background where you see a black man (who apparently is the new president) and he's saying, in plain English, that America's torturing days are over, done, finished. There's an "aw, shit" look on their faces and then some new boss comes into the meeting room, slams his fist on the table and says, essentially, you've had eight years to find bin Laden - and all you've got to show for it are a bunch of photos of naked Arab men peeing on themselves and wearing dog collars and black hoods. Well, he shouts, those days are over! There's no secret group up on the top floor looking for bin Laden, you're it, and goddammit do your job and find him.

He is there to put the fear of God in them, probably because his boss, the new president, has (as we can presume) on his first day in office, ordered that bin Laden be found and killed. Unlike his frat boy predecessor who had little interest in finding bin Laden (even to the point of joking that "I really just don't spend that much time on him&quot , this new president was not an imbecile and all about business. Go find bin Laden - and don't use torture. Torture is morally wrong. Torture is the coward's way. C'mon - we're smart, we're the USA, and you're telling me we can't find a six-and-a-half-foot tall Saudi who's got a $25 million bounty on his head? Use your brains (like I do) and, goddammit, get to work! And then, as the movie shows the CIA abruptly shifts from torture porn to - are you sitting down? - detective work. Like cops do to find killers. Bin Laden was a killer - a mass killer - not a general of an army of soldiers, or the head of a country call Terrorstan.

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/276-74/15716-in-defense-of-zero-dark-thirty

January 24, 2013

so what's stopping her?

besides the obvious.

I figure Orly Tate's attempts to serve the prez. would go like this>

if you are so drawn to it, why not try forcing your way in?

January 24, 2013

David Sirota: Raising taxes isn’t “left-wing radical”!

A controversial Times column is just the latest example of special interests' Orwellian grip on political discourse

During the debate about President Obama’s proposal to let tiny bit of the those tax cuts expire, most reporters did exactly what Businessweek’s Joshua Green did: they pretended that letting Bush tax cuts on income above $250,000 would deny “the rich” any tax cuts whatsoever. This, of course, was demonstrably untrue, as the Obama proposal’s extension of tax cuts for all income below $250,000 still would have given the rich a big tax cut on their first $250,000 of income.
Despite that reality, however, the biased framing persisted. Indeed, wealthy reporters, campaign contributor-appeasing politicians and corporate lobbyists – motivated by both personal financial self-interest and by Beltway groupthink/pack psychology – kept portraying Obama’s proposal as something it was not. That ultimately confused many voters and helped make the final agreement both more conservative and even less reflective of mainstream public opinion. Specifically, the lie that those making more than $250,000 would receive no tax cuts made Obama’s whole proposal look too radical, thus laying the rhetorical groundwork for extending the Bush tax cuts for all income below $400,000, in the process re-imagining that stratospheric income level as somehow “middle class.”

That doesn’t mean there is one one lonely Rasputin pulling all the strings, nor does it mean there is a grand linguistic conspiracy run by a handful wordsmiths in a smoky back room (though said wordsmiths do certainly exist on K Street and in political consulting firms). Rather, it means that the political vocabulary has been so skewed for so long that many who speak the language don’t even know that they are forwarding subjective and often wildly inaccurate assumptions. It also means that it is no coincidence that those particular assumptions at once serve the interests of those with money and ignore the interests of We the People.

http://www.salon.com/2013/01/24/raising_taxes_isnt_left_wing_radical/

January 22, 2013

Libertarians Would End Federal Drug Laws and US Interventionism Abroad, Suck

Because they would also eliminate:

Social Security
Medicare
Medicaid
Student Loans
All Environmental Regulations
Head Start
School Lunches
School Breakfasts
Food Stamps
The Voting Rights Act
The Civil Rights Act

What did I miss?

And as for those two we liberals agree should be eliminated, the drug war and foreign interventionism? Well what the libertarians fail to mention when trying to court liberals is they would let states do whatever they wanted with drugs; so if you are in a red state the laws stay on the books and maybe get tougher. In addition to ending unnecessary wars the libertarians would eliminate any kind of foreign aid. Adios AIDS prevention in Africa!

Libertarians Suck!

January 21, 2013

an awesome and inspiring speech

probably the most progressive inaugural address since LBJ. this was no middle way go along to get along speech. this was a truly historical manifesto of 21st centural progressive american goals and values.

January 21, 2013

OMG that priest just spoke Spanish!

an he is a priest! there is something there to freak you out regardless of what kind of a nut you may be.

January 20, 2013

i just don't get the whole katy perry thing

her celebrity is incomprehensible to me.

January 19, 2013

So for what exactly are we supposed to be angry with the Algerians?

Granted that much of what we understand to have happened during this gas field hostage business may turn out to be wrong, but it would seems as if the Algerians brought a swift end to the crisis and probably saved a lot of lives. Hundreds of people held hostage at a gas plant? You think that didn't have the potential for some horrific bloodshed?

And again, it is early and we don't know all of the facts.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-21101092

January 19, 2013

Fox News Liberals are B-List Celebs of the Left

they are to the Democratic Party what Hollywood RWers are to the GOP. Kucinich is basically Chuck Norris.

January 14, 2013

Evangelical Leaders: Jesus Would Want Immigration Reform

Evangelical groups are planning a major campaign to sell congregants on immigration reform, arguing that the Bible offers theological support for aiding the undocumented population.

The Evangelical Immigration Table, a coalition of evangelical churches and organizations, say the new “I Was A Stranger” program will ask pastors to educate their flock about the Old and New Testament’s calls to aid outsiders, especially Jesus’ own sermons on the topic. Leaders say that Scripture’s recurring concept of the “stranger” in need is synonymous with undocumented immigrants today.

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2013/01/evangelical-leaders-jesus-would-want-immigration-reform.php?ref=fpnewsfeed