87 millions wasted / Romney Abandons Presidental Bid

To be fair, it's not as if the Democrats are interested in ending the war on drugs either. That issue goes past parties.

 

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Interesting list. If you look at it, you see that half the items on there are not "control" of people, but of corporations and piles of money - and that is perhaps the fundamental difference between the authoritarian left and the authoritarian right.

Since the obvious fact is not so obvious to many Americans, for some reason, a short list:

1) banning trans fats would not be control of what anyone eats. You can eat all the trans fats you want to. Corporations cannot put them - add extra - into the food they sell, because they are poisonous - that would be the only ban.

2) McCain/ Feingold did not control anyone's political speech. It is a law attempting to control the influence of corporations and large piles of money. No one is controlled in their speech by that law.

3) The estate tax does not tax an individual for dying. It taxes estates - piles of wealth formerly owned by a person who has died. The difference between a person and a pile of money is considered significant by the Left.

4) The fairness doctrine does not apply to individuals - it applies to corporations that have been granted exclusive exploitation privileges (defended by the government) for bands of the frequency spectrum. Individuals are free to be as "unfair" as they want to be - even individual employees of the corporations involved.

And so forth. This blind spot of the Right is at least as significant as the blind spot of the Authoritarian Left to its own meddling - and taking into account the much greater role of Right ideology in American politics, far more dangerous to individual liberty in the US.

 

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Public penance and punishment:

I am a coward. [Slap, slap] (Sound of chains slapping into my back in self chastisement.)[Slap]
I am lazy. [Slap, slap]
I only reply to easy targets (illogical Sandy). [Slap, Slap]
I avoid MadAnthony [Slap] (With that name, who wouldn’t avoid him? - Only one slap required.)
I leave the harder work to others (Iceaura etc.) [Slap, Slap]
I re-enforce the “dumb blond” stereotype. [Slap, Slap, Slap, Slap] (Extra slaps as I have two daughters.)
I post off thread, for fun. [Slap, Slap, Slap]
[Slap] – (Just in case I missed something.)

 

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I'm referring to legalized medical marijuana. In California we've passed prop 215. Which allows doctors to prescribe medical marijuana. Once this law was passed, Attorney General John Ashcroft wasn't happy. Then he started sending federal agents to raid the medical marijuana dispenseries. Ignoring the will of the California voters. This anti medical marijuana crusade has been soley prosecuted by conservative politicians.

 

There's a big difference between wanting to maintain an institution that has been the basis of civilization for millenia and has been defined the same way that entire time and imposing some new bullshit ban on something we've always been allowed to do. I'm much more concerned with preserving the rights we have than inventing new ones (gay marriage).

Not me. Fuck up your brain all you want. Do heroin, crack, speed, lick frogs, drink cough syrup, whatever. Just don't come looking for some handout when you destroy your life.

Again, not me.

Um, Tipper Gore? I love seeing naked women on TV. Not to mention that plenty of feminists would love to ban porno on the grounds that it objectifies women.

Again, I'm pretty sure that was Tipper Gore. The Reverend Al Sharpton has been active in that area as well.

All the right wing encroachments on civil liberties you mention are old news. While the Left wing encroachments are new, and exciting. We're not banning smoking, we're making everyone "smoke free!". We're not banning free speech; we're protecting the delicate sensibilities of women and minorities from being offended by mean old white males!

The Left has managed to banish religion from the public square almost completely. So I'm not worried about any imposition of rules that diminish civil liberties from the right.

But the left is managing to impose all the same bullshit rules and adding even more. Look at "free love" in the sixties verses sexual harassment law today. We're more constrained than ever in the workplace thanks to the left. Tell the wrong joke, you can get fired thanks to the pc thought police.

 

A democrat isn't going to do squat except cut and run from Iraq and totally ignore binLaden. They think terrorism is a law enforcement problem. Remember?

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Wrong. The demonic muslim terrorists were just waiting for an opportunity to start their death and destruction. Our getting Saddam rid the world of one of its worst terrorists. We didn't do it for applause. We did it because it was the right thing to do. I would never be a fan of Saddam. He was satan reincarnate.

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The institution of today is not defined the same way as it was a thousand years ago. Or even a century ago. If you've the time and will, I would suggest Coontz's Marriage, A History: From Obedience to Intimacy, or, How Love Conquered Marriage.

And yet you support people who do.

That's a fairly bipartisan issue. On the one hand, you have Tipper Gore (music) and Bill Clinton/Janet Reno (television). To the other, there was Wildmon, Dobson, Susan Baker (Ms. Gore's partner in censorship), and a host of others.

Given your history of demanding equal time for the false under the pretense that it is true, I would suggest your description is a bit off the mark.

Again, this is one of your tragic distortions. Banishing religious supremacy from public institutions is not the same as banishing religion itself.

Do you enjoy being hit on by men?

We can start with that. And then we'll move on to whether you should have to hear at work about how you should be sucking cock or taking it up the ass. In the meantime, teachers are being disciplined in Washington state for complaining about the idea that a school should invite a prominent bigot to speak on MLK day. Professors have faced disciplinary action for describing the Bush administration in less-than-complimentary terms. Students have been harassed by the Secret Service for calling Bush a criminal. Ordinary citizens have been arrested for wearing t-shirts that criticize the president. Muslims have been detained for praying.

Oh, the poor conservatives. They're so oppressed because they can't be superior. They're so discriminated against because they have to be equal to everyone else.

You know, equality wouldn't be such a pain in the ass if you went about it with a modicum of good faith.

 

The rightwing authoritarian stuff is so common it's taken for granted - they get a pass on it - true. But the Allegedly Left encroachments are not new - it's just new that people espousing rightwing encroachments are labeled "left" . It's the label that moved.

The Libertarian Left is still where it was - ACLU and all. The Authoritarian Left is still where it was - advocating government imposed total compensation caps on executives, for example. Like a frog unable to see anything that isn't new and moving, the Right has forgotten about the Authoritarian Right and mistaken all new Authoritarian crap for Left politics (since some of it is). This causes them to label people like Tipper Gore "Left" - I've even seen the Clintons labeled "Left" !

There are new and exciting rightwing encroachments - such as having the telecommunications companies monitor private emails and phone calls for the govenment. You might even say they're a fad, these days.

Really? Try mailing a package on Sunday - the original Post Office delivered mail on Sundays, despite the strong Christianity of the original Postmasters, because the Constitution was taken seriously as meaning what it said.

I can't even buy a sixpack of beer on Sunday, in my state. There are special laws about Sunday commerce, Sunday bar hours, Sunday this and Sunday that - banished from the public sphere ? Get serious. Public Radio has special Sunday programming - organ music, hymns

 

This is a deliberate strategy. If they can get the public discourse to reflect this distortion, the real left will seem very, very remote. It's kind of like how "bipartisan" right now means "whatever Republicans want, they get", so, too, are conservatives hoping to define the terms of public discourse. Equality is bigoted oppression of majorities. Hillary Clinton is a liberal. Sexual consent is irrelevant. Just to name a few.

 

If he's such a bad guy, then why the hell did your country put him and his party in power 40 years ago?

 

We voted for Clinton too and look at what an abomination he turned out to be.

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What in the blue hell does that have to do with anything I just said?

 

Where do you think I work? At a bath house?

If you're talking about this:

I'd call your characterization misleading. The guy was black, talking about how Martin Luther King helped him overcome racism. A very appropriate speaker on MLK day.

The fact that he was a pastor means he likely doesn't approve of homosexuality. Should he then not be allowed to speak against racism? If someone doesn't sign on for your gay agenda, must they be silenced?

Without researching every single story you make reference to (with no links or supporting documentation), I'll judge them by the one I did research. I'm not impressed.

It outright banned running adds just before an election that mention a candidate by name. That's not a control of political speech?

The Right believes when you own something, it's yours. That pile of money you refer to is often a business, or a farm. The father dies, the business must be sold or shut down to pay the taxes. People are put out of work. And what about the fact that all taxes on that property have already been paid? Why does it suddenly become the property of the government because someone died?

Bunk. If the "fairness doctrine" were re-imposed (a wet dream of the Left), talk radio would be put out of business almost immediately. It was only the removal of that onerous law that allowed talk radio to flourish in the first place.

The fairness doctrine is a great example of the genius of the Left. Whenever it imposes some new burden or takes away a hard won right, it describes it as something good. The "fairness doctrine", who could oppose that? But when fairness is defined by law to mean that airtime given to a popular talkshow host (say Rush LImbaugh) must be balanced by an unpopular one (say Air America), simple economics will quickly determine that there will be no political speech on the radio.

The result: Conservative pundits are gagged, the liberal monopoly on the dissemination of information is restored. Except for the internet, but that would be step two.

 

(Insert title here)

And yet some women endure this kind of talk working in otherwise-respectable places such as insurance companies, industrial warehouses, and construction projects, among others. While you make a certain relevant point, you've managed to avoid the question still, which leaves me wondering if you really think it's somehow oppressive to assert that women should not have to endure such harassment at their place of work.

A professional bigot° who has actually threatens to destroy companies who disagree with his homophobic agenda, who lobbies the state legislature to promote, demand, and fight for state discrimination against homosexuals, who was invited to speak at the high school largely because his daughter was a student there? Nepotism and bigotry for MLK Day? Appropriate?

Given that black Civil Rights leaders saw a common reality between the oppression suffered by blacks and homosexuals, I think your question is a bit of a distortion. Bigotry is appropriate for MLK Day because he's black ... what the hell kind of logic is that? You sound a bit like Dr. Leonard Jeffries.

Professor Ward Churchill (we had at least one topic on the subject, but I guess you missed it); I'll have to dig up the one about the student with the poster calling Bush a criminal (I thought we had a topic about that story, or that included it); Jeff and Nicole Rank received an $80,000 settlement after being arrested for wearing anti-Bush t-shirts; Muslim clerics were detained after praying in the airport in Minneapolis. Let's see ... oh, here's a fun one: the Secret Service investigated an 81 year-old man for criticizing Bush ("they hanged the wrong man") in a letter to the editor; the Secret Service investigated a man for Stickers on his truck ... I wasn't aware you weren't paying attention to the news.
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Notes:

° A professional bigot — And allegedly fraudulent. It's a curious tale. Hutcherson apparently went abroad, ordered some foreign governments around under the auspices of being an envoy of the Bush administration. The administration denied this. The pastor then refused to show the tape. And while some might argue that Hutcherson has a reason to be combative with Eli Sanders and The Stranger, he would not provide the evidence for The Seattle Times, either. As the story trails off, Hutcherson never did cough up the alleged proof. A Seattle attorney filed a complaint with the FBI regarding the matter, but there is no suggestion that Bush's Department of Justice ever followed up on the issue. But, you know, he's black, and we're talking about MLK Day, here. And he's a celebrity, and his daughter goes to the school. And that's all that counts, isn't it?

 

Nope.

And the Right also believes that when the owner dies, the pile is sacrosant - that mere death of its owner is a trivial matter, compared with the rights of the pile.

BTW: when this law was the political hot button in Minnesota for a couple of weeks, the local righties searched all over for a family farm that had fallen victim to estate taxes as you describe - they looked in Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin, the heart of the family farm country. They couldn't find one. Not saying it's never happened, but it seems to be rare - unusual circumstances. The estate tax is a problem of the very rich - although if the Republicans keep blocking the inflation adjustment, it may eventually cost someone their father's farm. Typical Republican strategy: predict governmental malfeasance, then create it to be proven right.

But if you note my point: the fairness doctrine does not apply to individuals. It does not control individual speech, it controls corporations that own radio stations and such.

 

Regarding nepotism, that's a stretch. I've spoken at school functions where my children are students. Haven't you? How else do you think they can find people to speak for free?

As to the rest, I don't know anything about that guy apart from what I read in the article I posted. Nevertheless, why can't someone opposed to homosexuality speak out against racism? You demand 100% ideological purity?

Did they really? All of them? Or just a few? The civil rights movement took place in the sixties, a time when homosexuality was officially defined as a mental illness. Yet you're saying that black civil rights leaders saw no difference between themselves and homosexuals? I find that very hard to believe.

I did a quick search regarding MLK and homosexuality and found that he never publically commented on the issue. His niece claims he was against gay rights. Others say different things. No one is really sure. But I'd venture that had you asked the civil rights workers in the sixties if they were also fighting for the right of one man to marry another man they'd have laughed in your face.
http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=293986

 

Notes on the struggle

Not ideological purity. Reasonable consistency. Nobody's perfect, and I think you know that. I mean, hets are always going to insult one another as cocksuckers, and men are always going to call women bitches. But that's a far cry from denying people civil rights. And I think even Hutch is aware that, while he is concerned about his civil rights because he's "the wrong color" as tradition has it in this country, he's perfectly willing to deny people civil rights because they're the wrong gender.

And, frankly, I think it's absolute bullshit that the color of his skin should make up for the fact that he is a professional persecutor.

Some. The Black Panthers and their associates for sure. From a speech and letter by Huey P. Newton

Let's see, Dr. King's widow had a bit to say on the subject:

Jasmine Cannick, on the occasion of Coretta Scott King's passing, published an article through New America Media called, "Gays Lose Advocate With Death of Mrs. King":

"Others say different things"? I'll go with the wife on this one.

I don't doubt many of them would have. The gay rights movement still struggles to transcend religious superstitions.

Life goes on. It's easy to say everything's a-okay when you're part of the empowered, discriminatory majority.
_____________________

Notes:

Newton, Huey P. "Speech to the Revolutionary Brothers and Sisters". August, 1970. See http://www.historyisaweapon.com/defcon1/newtonq.html

Wikiquote.com. "Coretta Scott King". Updated April 5, 2007. See http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Coretta_Scott_King

Cannick, Jasmyne. "Gays Lose Advocate With Death of Mrs. King". Pacific News Service. February 3, 2006. See http://news.pacificnews.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=49f895806ec3d69c13a2a9e169a6a15c

 

This indicates that you are probably ignorant of the history of the US / Saddam relationship. He was the US's "golden boy" back when Bushes VP was visiting him, shaking his hand, giving military aid, even secrete sattelite photos of where the Iranian troops* were during the US encouraged and supported 8 year war Saddam had with Iran. US was still angry at Iran after they had taken the embassy staff hostage at the end of Carter's presidency.
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*US actively assisted Saddam kill at least 100,000 Iranians with posion gas attacks. This is why when he went thru the "show trial" later that condemed him to death, the use of posion gas was not permitted to even be mentioned (might embarass the US). He was tried and convected because he killed a group of kurds who had tried to assinate him. Normally most people call groups that try to assinated the president of a country "terrorists" but with twisted logic, you are calling Saddam the terrorist and ignoring the fact that he was the US's hand picked, chosen "golden boy" well supported by Rumsfield, Chaney, Bush, etc. - I guess if he is a terrorist, then that means that those working with him on a common goal - I.e. the US's leadership were (and still are) "evil terrorists" also to help Saddam gas 100,000 soilders etc.

IMHO, Saddam, like many others, was one of the CIA's constructed "golden boys" who supsequently escaped their control and they had to get rid of him. Saddam made a big mistake - he tried to sell oil for Euros, instead of dollars. That is what got him killed. He was doing well, back when he did as US told him too. This "escape from control" is such a common pattern. It is happening again now in Packestain - Musharric was our "golden boy" there until about a year or two ago when he stopped taking orders. The US will see that he is killed soon too. - I do not understand why these "golden boys" never learn from history to be more like the Shaw of Iran was - live to grow old, get medical care in US hospitals, etc. don't try to escape control.

 

She doesn't know history, Billy. In fact, most republicans don't. And I bet quite a few democrats don't either. Who knows why...

 

History seems irrelevant inside a Land of Make Believe, where mistakes and consequences need not be considered. Those most frightened by the encroachment of reality are desperately trying to make themselves, and everyone else, still believe: "We can't be wrong. We can't be wrong. We can't be wrong..."