Category: U.S. Government
Rep. Michele Bachmann appeared on the Michael Savage show last week (see story at ProMNPolitics) and said she was “spending as much time as possible in my district”. No she’s not! She’s not here at all, and I know this because I’M IN HER DISTRICT. Where are you, Michele?
Then she sent out the pack of lies she calls her newsletter. In it we find this:
Credit Card Rates Are On the Rise
I predicted last year that unintended consequences could occur through enacting the Credit Card Act, and now we learn that credit card rates have risen to their highest point in nine years.
Typical Bachmann — she wants to take credit for obvious “predictions”.
A farmer stands on her dried rice field in Thanh Hoa province, 200 km (124 miles) south of Hanoi July 8, 2010. Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung has urged provincial authorities in central Vietnam to fight the worst drought in nearly two decades.
From Climate and Capitalism. I’m republishing the whole thing because it’s so important for future generations that people start thinking about this now, and those involved in organizing this want it spread around as much as possible. This movement is not yet big in America like it is in other countries.
Joel Kovel: Organizing the Ecosocialist International Network
Since its formation in 2007, Joel Kovel has been a leading figure in the Ecosocialist International Network. In this letter, Joel discusses where the EIN is going, including plans for forming chapters in the United States and Canada.
Joel’s comments were posted on July 5 in the EIN’s egroup. We encourage readers to join in the discussion of these issues there: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EI-Network/
I am sorry to take so long in getting this out to you following my return from Detroit and the USSF; and I have appreciated the postings that a number of you have made in the interim. Richard Greeman, who was active in Detroit, has been the latest to do so. I am placing a copy of his letter at the end of this, along with a thread spun off by other members of that list.
Essentially Richard says that the founders of the Ecosocialist International Network and its steering committee have done basically nothing to further the organization, and asks that we do not leave the members of the EI list and the ecosocialist movement in general in the lurch.
I am totally sympathetic to what Richard says and hope to rectify this with the present communication. Here are some thoughts and observations on the matter, all subject to debate and development:
1. There is nothing that has happened over the last decade that has disabused me of the conviction that ecosocialism is the most important idea before humanity and will remain so whether it succeeds or fails in being realized. However if it fails, so do we as a species. There is no need to rehearse once more the reasoning behind this, which I can assume that everyone who reads this shares.
2. Nobody should be thickheaded enough to think that the principles of ecosocialism are transparently known. Indeed, aside from the core principles that capitalism must be overcome and that whatever overcomes it must include an ecocentric ethic, there are, as I see it, only two axiomatic rules for ecosocialism—that it needs to be planetary in scope (ie, the notion of “ecosocialism in one country” is even more absurd than that of socialism in one country); and that it must be created, indeed, at this stage the main task for ecosocialists must be to provide the conditions so that ecosocialism can be built as a freely developing and nonhierarchical international collective.
I found another one! This one is very long and was meant to be a post for another website, but I thought it was a little too mean in tone, so I deemed it not fit to publish. Well, it’s fit enough for Citizen Sane, so this is its world-wide debut. This article is from some time in March 2010, shortly after the Coffee Party USA organization came out with their “civility pledge” which I thought was just beyond ridiculous. We’re talking about politics here, not Zen.
Dear Coffee Party, USA, there is no point in agreeing just for the sake of agreeing, especially in politics.
My philosophy is that people should fight for what they believe in, especially on the state and local levels, not what someone else tells them to believe in. That’s the reason why I don’t belong to a political party and very rarely join groups. Politics exist for debate and argument.
Sure, some people have to do it. The purpose of agreeing and finding common ground on the federal level is to reach agreements in the Senate and House only for the purpose of getting bills passed. Before that happens, they debate and argue strongly on many issues. (See Congressman Alan Grayson in the video — he is presenting an idea he believes in and wants others to support as is. He is not asking people to water it down and change it so it’s more right-wing). Congressmen and women don’t agree just for the sake of agreeing; they have to do it to get legislation passed, or the country would be at a standstill. That is the theory, at least. In fact, this misguided seeking out of bipartisanship is why the U.S. government has nearly been at a standstill for over a year.
I have heard tea baggers and now Coffee Party USA members complain that our government doesn’t listen to us. Yes, they do listen to us. They run their lives by poll numbers and focus groups. They are aware of protests and phone calls. Their staff tallies them. But it’s like that old saying about praying, (the idea that God always answers prayer, but sometimes he says “no”.) Our government does hear us, and they just often say “No”. That’s not the same as not hearing us. It’s unrealistic to believe that our government in a country with 300 million people should always do exactly what we want. There are 300 million different opinions on things, and that’s how it should be. We do not want to be a country of lemmings, we want to be individuals. That’s the only way political progress is ever made.
Yeah, and . . . . . . ?
For five years, I have been asking people to get so mad they get out in the streets and protest an unjust war. We need millions of people to protest the killing in the Middle East still being done in our names. We still have an unjust war going on, but Americans would rather do this ———— >
Look at how watered down and nearly meaningless the final agreement was at the Coffee Party in San Francisco. What is that sign supposed to mean? That could be a Tea Party sign.
Where politics should really be passionate and full of argument and debate is on the state and local levels, yet this is what the Coffee Party USA seems to want to stop. They want people to reach consensus just to prove how civilized we all are. State and local political organizations are where politics should not be middle of the road, watered-down generalized nothingness. State and local politics should be passionate enough to move people to hold rallies and demonstrate.
Why would anyone want to identify and empathize with the Tea Baggers? Yet, that is exactly what the Coffee Party USA people want us to do. Listen to their Blog Talk Radio show where they point out what we all have in common with [racist homophobic] people who want limited government. It’s downright chilling to hear.
Why aren’t the heads of BP, Transocean and Halliburton on trial for manslaughter or negligent homicide in the deaths of 11 oil rig workers in the Gulf of Mexico in April? Instead, BP is threatening journalists via their directives to the United States Coast Guard with criminal action if they dare to film the oil spill coming ashore. A foreign oil company telling our Coast Guard what to do? Yeah…. Only in the Corporate Fossil Fuel States of America.
video from NationalWildlife — May 20, 2010 — National Wildlife Federation’s President and CEO Larry Schweiger testified before the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee May 19, 2010 on what he witnessed while on the front lines of the oil spill response effort.
Science and entertainment are blending again, as James Cameron, director of Avatar, is now working with NASA. He’s been everywhere lately, spreading his message of stopping the rainforest destruction and environmental degradation. We loved Avatar, and it’s great that he is following it up with lots of interviews explaining the message of the movie and he even knows quite a bit about climate change. (Sigourney Weaver has also done some interviews on the rainforest and ocean.)
Cameron was at last week’s climate rally in Washington, he was on Democracy Now, on other radio and TV talk shows, and now he’s even helping out NASA. They are in development sessions for the new Mars rover, Curiosity, and Cameron will be helping them design the 3D camera. Here’s the story from Information Week.
James Cameron is working with the space agency to outfit the next-generation rover, Curiosity, with 3D cameras.
NASA is getting help from Hollywood director James Cameron to build 3D cameras for the next Mars rover, Curiosity.The space agency abandoned plans to build cameras with the capability for the rover in 2007 due to budgetary concerns.
That prompted the director ” known for blockbuster films Avatar and Titanic– to step in and personally petitioned the agency to build the cameras, according to NASA. The agency this month said it has delivered the last two of four science cameras — called Mastcams — for the rover without 3D capability.