Anti DLC Coalition

You Though The Koch Brothers Were Bad.....They're Worse Than You Thought

2011-04-25T10:15:00.000-07:00

by ADELE STAN (AlterNet)

You knew they were big. You knew they were evil. From the union-busting actions of their minions in Wisconsin and Ohio to their war on health-care reform, to their assault on the environment and their attacks on the science of climatology, Charles and David Koch have earned their place as the focus of progressives’ scrutiny in the age of the Tea Party — the destructive and regressive movement they bankroll. But a new report from the Center for American Progress Action Fund shows that, as bad as you thought the Kochs were, they’re actually worse. And their reach into virtually every aspect of political, economic and physical life on the planet is probably greater than you thought possible.

In The Koch Brothers: What You Need to Know About the Financiers of the Radical Right, author Tony Carrk, policy director of the CAP Action War Room, lays out a case that is breathtaking in its scope, showing how the Koch brothers are using their billions with the aim of reshaping the global economic system in such a way as to enrich themselves and their heirs at the expense of most other inhabitants of the planet.

While much of the report will have a familiar ring (especially to readers of AlterNet, and CAP Action’s own ThinkProgress), The Koch Brothers also addresses elements of the Koch agenda far beyond the well-trodden turf of Americans for Prosperity’s organizing against health-care reform or the pollution rap against Koch Industries, the second-largest privately held corporation in the United States, which the billionaire brothers command.

The Kochs and the Global Economy

Consider, for instance, the Kochs’ role in the financial business. You thought Koch Industries was just a high-polluting oil-and-gas-based conglomerate? Add in the part played on Wall Street by Koch Supply & Trading, and the depth of the Koch imprint on the economy is revealed. From Carrk’s report:

First, the Koch brothers fought efforts to give the Commodity Futures Trading Commission more oversight over speculative trading, whereby companies can artificially inflate prices on things such as oil, during the Wall Street reform debate. One of the Koch companies—Koch Supply & Trading—takes part in oil and derivatives trading. We should point out that oil speculation has reached an all-time high at the same time gas prices continue to skyrocket.

Then look at a recent position pushed by Americans for Prosperity, the Tea Party-allied astroturf group founded and funded by David Koch (and whose sibling organization, the Americans for Prosperity Foundation, he chairs):

Similarly, Americans for Prosperity supports the House continuing resolution that cuts spending by $61 billion. Those cuts would reduce the budget for the CFTC by one-third. Make no mistake: Gutting the CFTC or limiting its authority would be a boon to Wall Street businesses that use complex financial instruments. But while the result is more profits for oil companies, it means everyone else pays more at the pump.

Okay, now have a look at the Kochs’ recent direct contributions to political candidates:

The Kochs donated directly to 62 of the 87 members of the House GOP freshman class…and to 12 of the new members of the U.S. Senate.

No wonder, then, how that continuing resolution — the means for funding the government when a budget has not been passed into law — managed to get through the House. (It was subsequently rejected by the Senate, setting the stage for a possible shutdown of the government at the end of this week.) Those 62 Koch-backed freshmen are essentially driving the agenda of the House Republicans, because together they form a large enough bloc to prevent House Speaker John Boehner from amassing a majority on any piece of legislation, should they choose to, despite the 2010 Republican victories that handed control of the House to the GOP.

It should be noted that such “complex financial instruments” as those mentioned above had much to do with the 2008 Bush crash of Wall Street. The report reminds us that “from September 2007 to May 2009, American 401(k) and individual retirement accounts lost a total of $2.7 trillion.” But if the Kochs had their way, Social Security would no longer be financed by the federal government, and would instead be invested on Wall Street — a boon for financiers such as they. Too bad if your account takes a hit that lands you on the curb.

And while we think of Wall Street as an American institution, when Wall Street sneezes, the world gets a cold. The Bush crash set in motion a global recession. Less oversight of the financial shenanigans known as derivatives (or “complex financial instruments”) all but guarantees further crashes.

The Brothers Koch and the Body Politic

If you read the whole of the CAP Action report, you’ll see how the Koch influence on the nation’s politics is compounded and leveraged through a combination of the brothers’ direct contributions to candidates, their investment in astroturf groups such as Americans for Prosperity and FreedomWorks (which do political organizing), and their funding of right-wing think tanks, which send policy position papers daily to the in-boxes of senators, representatives and their aides. Carrk identified some 85 right-leaning think tanks that received a collective $85 million from the Kochs over the course of the last 15 years. These include the Cato Institute, of which David Koch was a founder, and other well-known outfits, such as the Federalist Society and the Heritage Foundation.

But that’s not all:

Charles and David Koch and their company, Koch Industries, do not limit their political donations to right-wing think tanks and advocacy groups. They also donate millions directly to candidates. Since 1990, the Koch network has donated $11 million to federal candidates, $9.8 million, or 89 percent, of which went to Republicans.

In Congress, the donations are well-targeted. Take, for example, the House Commerce and Energy Committee, whose imprint on legislation has a direct effect on Koch Industries’ core businesses. (Koch’s Flint Hill Resources, LLC, according to the report, “has a combined crude oil processing capacity of more than 800,000 barrels of oil per day.”) From the report:

The Kochs have contributed significantly to the House Energy and Commerce Committee. In fact, they are the single-largest oil and gas donor to members of the committee, contributing $279,500 to 22 of the committee’s 31 Republicans and $32,000 to five Democrats. Tim Phillips, the head of Americans for Prosperity, even co-authored an op-ed with chairman Fred Upton (R-MI), detailing how Congress could stop the EPA from ensuring a cleaner environment.

At the state level, the Koch influence is every bit as corrosive as it is at the national level, Carrk tells us.

The Koch network donated $1.2 million to help elect conservative Republican governors last year, including Wisconsin’s Scott Walker and Ohio’s John Kasich, both of whom are trying to take away collective bargaining rights. During the fight in Wisconsin, Americans for Prosperity ran an ad and orchestrated protests to support Gov. Walker’s union busting and orchestrated pro-Walker demonstrations. Americans for Prosperity also started a Web site urging people to “Stand with Governor Kasich.”

And that’s not even counting the money the brothers donate to candidates for state legislatures, or to support ballot measures designed to enrich them and their heirs. Carrk reports:

Data from the National Institute for Money in State Politics show that from 2003 to 2010, the Koch brothers, as well as their companies, employees, and affiliates, have donated $5.2 million to state candidates and ballot measures in 34 states. $3.4 million of those donations, or 65 percent, went to Republican candidates. Another $1 million, or 20 percent, went to one ballot initiative: the effort to overturn California’s clean energy law, AB 32.

Heck, as AlterNet reported, Americans for Prosperity was celebrating Scott Walker, the union-busting governor of Wisconsin, back when he was a mere county commissioner. In 2008, Walker served as the emcee for a ceremony by the Wisconsin chapter of the AFP Foundation — at which the organization’s “Defender of the American Dream” award was conferred upon Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., who now chairs the House Budget Committee. Ryan this week proposed a budget plan for 2012 that would privatize Medicare and slash Medicaid.

Much, Much More

In addition to a narrative on the duo’s activities in the political sphere, The Koch Brothers: What You Need to Know About the Financiers of the Radical Right serves up a bevy of lists and graphics that offer a range of facts and figures in an easy-to-grok form. There’s a list of all the freshman congressional representatives who have received Koch campaign dollars, and the dollar amounts they received. Those 85 Koch-funded think tanks are listed, with total-donations-per-tank noted next to their names. A map of the U.S. shows the states in which Koch Industries has facilities (nearly all 50). Another highlights the 32 states in which Americans for Prosperity has a state chapter.

There’s also a comprehensive listing of all the Koch Industries subsidiaries and what they make or sell, as well as a detailed section on the pollution and environmental infractions for which the conglomerate is responsible.

If you’re one of those people who like to be scared out of your wits, you’ll find the CAP Action report better than Wes Craven’s latest offering. Just consider this:

The significant victories the billionaire Koch brothers chalked up for their ideological and business interests in the 2010 elections is only a precursor of what is to come. The Koch brothers have already pledged to raise $88 million through their considerable network for policy and political projects for the 2012 election cycle.

How the GOP Is Committing Political Suicide With Ryan's Extremist Budget Plan

2011-04-19T06:07:00.000-07:00

How the GOP Is Committing Political Suicide With Ryan's Extremist Budget Plan
Believing their own spin, the GOP appears to have over-reached since the last election, alienating swing voters as it pursues a profoundly reactionary agenda.
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At first blush, it's difficult to grasp why all but four Republicans in the House would go on record endorsing a budget plan that would cost the economy millions of jobs, effectively end Medicare and result in deep cuts to Social Security, roll back new regulations on Wall Street and raise taxes on the middle class while slashing the rates paid by big business and the wealthy. It's especially tough to understand given that we're entering the 2012 campaign season, and their budget has no chance of becoming law.

But that's what happened last week when the GOP-controlled House passed a budget outline based on the radical plan hatched by Paul Ryan, R-Wisconsin.

A poll conducted last week found that, “when voters learn almost anything about [the Ryan plan], they turn sharply and intensely against it.” And why wouldn't they? According to an analysis by the non-partisan Center for Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP), the Republicans' “roadmap” would “end most of government other than Social Security, health care, and defense by 2050,” while providing the “largest tax cuts in history” for the wealthy.

Not wealthy yourself? Well that's too bad, because the plan would also “place a new consumption tax on most goods and services, a measure that would increase taxes on most low- and middle-income families.” According to the Tax Policy Center, about three-quarters of Americans — people who earn between $20,000 and $200,000 per year — would face tax increases if the GOP's scheme became law.

The New York Times called the budget, “the most regressive social legislation in many decades.”

In addition to making “entitlement” a dirty word, the Ryan bulldozer would go much further in knocking down government programs to achieve its goals. It would cut food stamps by $127 billion, or 20 percent, over the next 10 years, almost certainly increasing hunger among the poor. It would cut Pell grants for all 9.4 million student recipients next year, removing as many as one million of them from the program altogether. It would remove more than 100,000 low-income children from Head Start, and slash job-training programs for the unemployed desperate to learn new skills.

Conservatives are spinning this monstrosity as a “serious” attempt to address growing budget deficits, but the new tax cuts for corporations and the wealthiest Americans would result in rising deficits as far as the eye can see. According to CBPP's analysis, “the debt would continue to grow in relation to the size of the economy for at least 40 more years — reaching over 175 percent of GDP by 2050. Even by 2080, the debt would still equal about 100 percent of GDP.” (That's about where it stands today.) Ryan (who thinks Ayn Rand “makes the best case for the morality of democratic capitalism) admits his proposal is less a budget than it is an ideological “cause.”

It would be a painful cause to advance. Economist Ethan Pollack estimates that the Medicaid provision alone – just one small part of this radical restructuring of the social contract – would cost the American economy 2.1 million jobs over the next five years, the vast majority of which would be shed by the private sector.

Last fall, the Democrats attempted to tie Ryan's proposal to the GOP caucus, but Republicans distanced themselves from Ryan's “roadmap.” “It's his,” then minority-leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, told reporters during the campaign. “I know the Democrats are trying to say that it's the Republican leadership ['s plan], but they know that's not the case.”

But they certainly own Ryan's “roadmap to poverty” now, prompting head-scratching from political observers. Ezra Klein, noting that in the last election, “seniors turned out in big numbers, and Republicans carried voters over 65 by an astounding 21 points,” wondered whether the GOP can “take on Medicare and survive”? (The CBO says that by 2030, seniors would end up paying 70 percent of their health costs out of pocket under Ryan's plan, but that assumes insurers will cover them, which is anything but a given.) And Reuters' James Pethokoukis suggested that Ryan's plan may prove to be “a 73-page suicide note” for the party.

Support PFAW's Petition Campaign to Remove Wisconsin Republicans

2011-03-05T04:01:00.000-08:00

by Claude Chaney

There should be no doubt that Wisconsin is ground zero in the US class war. The rich are getting richer while the poor are getting poorer and the middle class is becoming jobless. While many of us among the middle class have become too complacent and trusting of those who have robbed us blind, others are ready to do battle in Wisconsin, in Indiana, in Ohio, in New Jersey and in the rest of the United States. The major task at hand is to get the word out. We cannot and will not trust the mainstream media to tell us the truth about ANYTHING remotely political when it comes to the middle class. When I say "mainstream media" I mean ALL of them, not just FOX. When over 100,000 union workers and their families were in and around the Wisconsin State Capitol, NBC, ABC and CBS all had conservative guests comment on the situation on their Sunday talk shows.
FOX continues to be outlandish. When one of their huge strapping commentators entered the Wisconsin State Capitol, he was immediately greeted with the chant "FOX LIES, FOX LIES". This commentator and Geraldo Rivera tell the audience that this is an example of the hatred and intolerence of another point of view present among the demonstrators. Have you ever heard a guest of Sean Hannity or Bill O'reilly attempt to present another point of view on their shows? Usually they are not permitted to get a word in edgewise and in many cases there are at least two or three consevative guests to the one progressive guest. I am not aware of anything FOX said about the female Move.on representative who entered a conservative function who was attacked and even kicked by males. This is just another example of how FOX is so "UNfair and UNbalanced". When the Tea Party manages to get 5,000 people at any event there is immediate coverage, but when the unions mass tens of thousands in Wisconsin or Ohio you get late or little or no coverage at all. There was no attention given to the Wisconsin demonstrations until the sixth day of it existence and even then it was by the Associated Press.
The Republican/Tea Party coalition may have some minor disagreements among themselves but they are both very determined to DESTROY the middle class. They have diverted the blame from the financial crisis from Wall Street (where is rightfully belongs to public sector workers). Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker gave millions of dollars of tax breaks to corporations: that is why there is a problem with revenue. Chris Christie ended the millionaire's tax in New Jersey as well as rejecting a federal project that would have provided 6,000 needed construction jobs to the residents of New Jersey;: that is why there is a problem with revenue.
People For The American Way is starting a petition to expediate the removal of the Wisconsin Republicans who support Governor Scott Walker's war on the middle class of that state. I wholeheartedly suggest that YOU follow my example and support this campaign with your dollars. You may not live in Wisconsin, but the same elements determined to destroy the middle class in Wisconsin are trying to do the same thing in your state if YOU let them. An attack on a union member anywhere is an attack on a union member everywhere. Please read about the PFAW petition......

In a move that many are contending is in direct violation of the state constitution and a departure from normal Senate rules, Republicans in the Wisconsin State Senate yesterday approved an order for the state's police to detain the Senate Democrats, who have left the state to block Gov. Scott Walker's attack on the middle class and workers' rights, and bring them to the Senate chambers. Gov. Walker also threatened that he would start sending layoff notices today to state workers.

Now they're running roughshod over state law and the rules of their own chamber ... and Gov. Walker has gone from simply acting like a dictator to acting like a hostage taker, with state jobs as his hostages. Unwilling to even consider compromise on his proposal to gut workers' fundamental rights, he is now threatening to start eliminating those state jobs if he doesn't get his way.

Perhaps the most outrageous part is that the layoffs are completely unnecessary to address the state's budget problems ... the same way his plan to destroy collective bargaining for public employees and make the middle class bear the entire economic sacrifice in fixing the state's budget is completely unnecessary.

If you're like me, you are wishing more than anything right now that Gov. Walker was eligible for recall this year -- especially since polling shows he would lose in an election between him and his 2010 gubernatorial opponent. Unfortunately, he can't be recalled until 2012, but eight of the Republican Senators backing his extreme power grab are eligible to be recalled now, including:

Randy Hopper, who won his last election by just 184 votes ...

Alberta Darling, who won her race by just over 1,000 ...

And Glenn Grothman, who on MSNBC's The Last Word, called protesters at the Wisconsin state capitol "slobs," and insisted that they were just a bunch of "college students having a fun party."

Here's what you can do today:

1. If you have not already done so, sign our petition indicating your support for the recall effort now underway in Wisconsin. If you have signed, make sure to spread the word! Share on Facebook and ask others to visit www.pfaw.org/Recall.

2. If you live in or near Wisconsin, you can start volunteering to help gather recall petition signatures. We have 60 days to get enough signatures to hold recall elections and our friends at the SEIU will be sending out a sizable wave of canvassers this weekend to get us off to a good start. Sign up here: http://action.seiu.org/page/s/wisconsinrecall

3. If you know ANYONE in Wisconsin, please call or email them as soon as you can and urge them to support the recall effort.

4. Make a contribution to PFAW's work on the recall campaign.

THE END OF THE DLC ! ! ! ! !

2011-02-09T19:25:00.000-08:00

by Claude Chaney

It has finally happened and it was long overdue....The DLC is toast.... gone, like the sudden end of nightmare. This gives the predominately progressive Democratic party the change to produce more unified platforms without having to pander to right wing corporate elements within the party. The DLC's goal was to
have TWO Republican parties. The 2010 elections were disastrous for Democrats but there was a silver lining in the dark cloud. DLC or corporate leaning Democrats lost to Republicans, as a result they are fewer in number, the Blanche Lincolns are almost all gone. Harry Truman once said that if the nation is given the choice of
right leaning Democrat and real Republican, the Republican will be chosen. He was absolutely right.

The Distruptive Drip of WikiLeaks and the Public's Right to Know

2011-01-09T11:17:00.000-08:00

by Caroline Arnold
Published of Sunday, January 9, 2011 by the Record Courier (Ohio)

This week I've been haunted by an AP Photo by Muhammed Muheisen in the Akron Beacon Journal (1/3/11 -- print edition only) showing a road in Pakistan just outside Islamabad. On pavement on the left are a fairly modern bus (maybe 1970s) and a rubber-tired two-wheeled cart pulled by a donkey; in the background a few pedestrians, a truck, tall light poles; in the foreground two small girls, one barefoot, walk on packed dirt past some rubble and another donkey. The accompanying news story was about the difficulties of President Zardari in holding his government together, and the threat to U.S. efforts to battle al-Qaida despite spending billions of dollars on Pakistan.

In 2010 the CIA (not the military) killed over 900 Pakistanis (of which 90 percent of the dead were civilians) in 132 drone attacks. (http://www.presstv.ir/detail/158523.html )

It defies comprehension. Our CIA is using expensive, high-tech, high-energy, no-risk devices for the extra-legal assassination of a handful of alleged terrorists, and in the process mostly killing poor people who use donkey carts and can't afford shoes for their children.

Last April WikiLeaks released a 2007 video in which U.S. soldiers in a helicopter opened fire on a group of civilians in Iraq, wounding two children and killing 12 people including two Reuters photographers. (http://www.businessinsider.com/collateral-murder-video-shows-deaths-reuters-reporters-in-iraq--2010-4#ixzz1AC7jyvdv)

This week Reuters reported that U.S. diplomatic cables released by Aftenposten (the Norwegian newspaper that has all the WikiLeaks documents) included the statement "As part of their overall embargo plan against Gaza, Israeli officials have confirmed on multiple occasions that they intend to keep the Gazan economy on the brink of collapse without quite pushing it over the edge" (http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/01/05-0)

The Republican Party, now in control of the U.S. House, is planning a Congressional inquiry into WikiLeaks and its founder, Julian Assange. Rep. Darrell Issa said that if Assange can't be seen as a terrorist, "therefore he must be a criminal -- "Otherwise the world is laughing at this paper tiger we've become." (http://www.techeye.net/internet/republicans-want-congressional-inquiry-into-wikileaks)

This week we learned further that U.S. intelligence officers, in response to the threat of WikiLeaks, are urging all government agencies to find ways to "detect behavioral changes" among federal employees with access to secret documents, suggesting the use of psychiatrists and sociologists assess the trustworthiness of workers by measuring their "relative happiness" or "despondence and grumpiness http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/01/05

But federal employees have already been deemed untrustworthy. They've already been forbidden to read WikiLeaks -- and thus kept from information that might be helpful or crucial to their effectiveness. http://articles.cnn.com/2010-12-03/us/wikileaks.access.warning_1_wikileaks-website-memo-documents?_s=PM:US

Traditional journalism is using WikiLeaks widely as a source, even though journalists can't make up their minds (individually or collectively) about whether Julian Assange is a journalist and WikiLeaks is journalism and thus protected by the First Amendment.

Like investigative journalism, WikiLeaks is based on the premise that the public has right to know what their governments are doing on their behalf with their tax money in their communities and worldwide.

Efforts by U. S. government agencies and commercial interests to convince the public that WikiLeaks is engaged in criminal espionage against the U.S. have fallen flat -- spying for whom? spying for what cause, what purpose or mission?

There has been no suggestion that WikiLeaks is turning a profit, or that it is supported by any government or corporation. Indeed, the fact that corporations are trying to suppress it and silence Assange should give us pause: why are big corporations trying to bring down WikiLeaks unless they are trying to hide something? When Assange's new book comes out, do we imagine that Amazon.com will refuse to sell it?

Ben Adler, writing in Newsweek, proposes that Assange does have an advocacy mission for WikiLeaks: " ... to disrupt the functioning of governments" http://www.newsweek.com/2011/01/04/why-journalists-aren-t-defending-julian-assange.html

Hold on: I thought that was the advocacy mission of Grover Norquist, of the Tea Party, of the new Republican majority in the House, and of the military-industrial complex and the mainstream media, though clearly for different purposes.

Yet perhaps it's time to disrupt the functioning of our government, when its leadership is trying to restrict our access to information, to spy on us, to kill or detain persons without due process, to privatize public services, to fund unwinnable wars, to support Israel's suppression of Palestinians, to provide tax breaks and bonuses for the very rich, and to underwrite big banks and health insurance companies as they gamble with citizens' homes and health.

My personal take on WikiLeaks: It's the drip before the deluge. If anyone can hack into any computerized system, thousands will. There are already copycat systems out there, though so far most of them are more tightly targeted and less well constructed than WikiLeaks. Assange himself has expressed grave reservations about a "GovernmentLeaks" project launched by Chinese experts, noting that "... they'd set up had no meaningful security. They have no reputation you can trust. It's very easy and very dangerous to do it wrong."http://blogs.forbes.com/gadyepstein/2010/11/30/assange-slams-chinas-wikileaks-copycat-very-dangerous-to-do-it-wrong

WikiLeaks can show us how dysfunctional our government is: how our government is spying on us, keeping Palestinians in poverty, measuring the "trustworthiness" of our neighbors, and investing in drones to slaughter barefoot children and old men in donkey carts.

But in democracy, dysfunctional government isn't just our problem. It's our responsibility.

Why We Need The Fairness Doctrine

2010-08-25T10:00:00.000-07:00

by Claude Chaney

Fox News only illustrates the need for the reinstatement of the fairness doctrine, which at one time guaranteed both sides of an issue being presented to the country. The Fairness Doctrine was abolished by Ronald Reagan and ever since with have had to deal with a plethora of half truths and deliberate misinformation by right wingers (the birthers, the swiftboaters, the smearing of ACORN, the death panels, the totally false representation of former US agriculture official Shirley Sherrod as a racist, etc.). In each case the propagation of these LIES took place on Fox television. Every LIE was proven false, yet each rose to a national audience because of Fox. As I am sure you have heard on countless occasions when dealing with the right, being right isn't enough. These people must be dealt with in a language they can understand. The time has come to take of the gloves because the biggest casualty here is "the truth". The United States has slipped from being #1 in the world in education to being #27. Conservatives (particularly religious conservatives) have been very successful in the manipulation of news distribution. Fox just gave one million dollars to the Republican Governors Conference yet it still claims to be "fair and balanced" This creates a huge misrepresentation to the US public. Fox is NOT a news organization, it is a Republican Political Action organization.

Patricia Estelle McCall introduces "Love, Or The Singularity of Gary"

2009-11-29T13:46:00.000-08:00

by Claude Chaney

On November 22, 2009 I had the pleasure of seeing a reading of "Love....Or The Singularity of Gary" by Patricia Estelle McCall (a.k.a. "Trish"), who is the daughter of Omar McCall Sr. This full length reading which took place at the Paris Health Club on West End Avenue in New York City had three characters, "Trish" as the survivor at age 45, Chandra Thomas as the survivor at 25 and Brian Schneider as the infamous Gary. Here we have an affluent Caucasian religious fanatic who pictures himself as a "Bishop" who has managed to imprison several young African-American females. He commits unspeakable acts on them, in some cases even murder. One of his victims has a relentless desire to stay alive and she uses every trick in her arsenal to do so.
I will not divulge any more information about the play because I want you to see it for yourself. You could hear a pin drop during this performance and thunderous applause from a full house at its completion. Everyone was surprised to find that this was based on a TRUE story. This was the second of three works by Patricia Estelle McCall, I wasn't able to see the first one "A Funeral" but if it was anything
like "Love...Or The Singularity of Gary" then it must have been a gem too.

The Obama Presidency.....so far

2009-09-03T04:43:00.001-07:00

by Claude Chaney
I voted for Barack Obama for president and if a new presidential election were held today with the same candidates I would still vote for Barack Obama. There is still an Obama sticker on my car. I believe that in his heart he is a good man, but I also believe that he is the best choice that we will be given. The media is leading us to believe that Obama's precipitious fall in popularity is due to his stand on health care. The truth is that he has abandoned many of the issues that he championed during his campaign. Guantanamo is still operational, in fact to my understanding there are even more prisoners there. We have more mercenaries (a.k.a. contractors) working abroad now than we had during the George W. Bush era. President Obama did not end US troop presence in Iraq, of course we have fewer troops but the US presence is still there. Several of the onorous Bush policies like unwarranted surveillance and rendition still exist. The Afghanistan war is not going well for the United States and President Obama is now seriously considering escalation. I can't help but draw parallels between Barack Obama and Lyndon Johnson, who also was a good man. President Johnson did more to advance the cause of civil rights than any other president in United States history, yet it was his support for the Viet-Nam war that brought him down. It seems as if Barack Obama is following the same tragic path. President Obama has done nothing to punish the scoundrels of the preceding administration and he always seems to be bending over backwards to get Republican approval for his policies. These actions do not endear him to the masses of people who elected him. Progressives are starting to ask questions because of his contradictory actions compared to campaign promises. This is the REAL reason for the decline in popularity. President Zelaya, the choice of the people of Honduras was unceremoniously removed from office. The Obama Administration voiced tepid disapproval at first but now seems to enthusiastically support the dictator Micheletti. In spite of these totally justifiable complaints President Obama has done several good things while in office, first and foremost is the selection of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court. Our courts are filled with right wing judges at all levels thanks to George W. Bush if McCain or a McCainlike candidate were elected civil rights gains and the right of a woman to choose to have an abortion would be gone.
Unfortunately there is a lot that goes on concerning the running of these United States that we don't know about. I am certain that President Obama is on the receiving end of enormous pressure from those who REALLY run this country (and its NOT the "people").
The bulk of the financial support for the Obama presidency came from the banks, not from the "people" in spite of the fact that President Obama had tremendous grassroots support. That is why the banks received billions of our tax dollars yet at the same time are reluctant to give loans or diminish the exorbitant salaries of their CEOs. Once elected you have to do the will of those who sent you to the presidency, no ifs, ands or buts. Please listen carefully to the comments of BC's Glen Ford.

Ted Kennedy (1932 - 2009)

2009-08-26T11:06:00.000-07:00

The loss of the third longest serving member of the Senate, Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts is a painful loss for liberals everywhere. Kennedy was in the middle of all progressive legislation for the past four decades. Just the loss of his seniority alone weakens the stature of Democrats in the Senate. It is believed that
Rose Kennedy told all of her children that since they were blessed it is their responsibility to do what they can to help others in accordance with a dictate from
the Bible (St. Luke). Ted Kennedy showed his belief in this concept by his actions, a leader in the battle of civil rights, gay rights and the right of the handicapped.
Ted Kennedy could have been president were it not for the Chappaquidic incident in which a supporter Mary Jo Kopeckni drowned in his car. Although this incident cost him his marriage as well as the presidency the voters of Massachusetts continued to return him to the Senate in increasingly large numbers.
It will take at least five months to find a replacement for Ted Kennedy, giving the Republicans another golden opportunity because now once again the philibuster becomes their potent weapon.
Ted Kennedy made universal health care his life's work, being one of it's earliest advocates going as far back as 1978 when he mentioned his broken back, the painful last days of his father and the debilitated state of his sister. He said that his family was able of weather these storms but if any of these catasthrophes had happened to the average American they would have gone bankrupt.
Those of us who feel that we deserve universal comprehensive health care should be inspired by Ted Kennedy's example. The time has come to get up off your duff and do something. So often liberals and/or progressives feel that just because they are right they will win. In this world being right means absolutely nothing, when you have a media that is more than willing to present the opposite perspective to the people in an ever expanding variety of soundbites. Let's get Healthcare for ALL! Do it for your families and DO IT FOR TED!

ATTENTION ALL CONGRESS MEMBERS, WHEN IT COMES TO HEALTH CARE IF YOUR NAME IS NOT ON THIS LIST....YOU ARE PART OF THE PROBLEM

2009-08-22T13:15:00.000-07:00

Albio Sires (NJ-13)
Alcee Hastings (FL-23)
Andre Carson (IN-07)
Barbara Lee (CA-09)
Barney Frank (MA-14)
Bennie Thompson (MS-02)
Bill Delahunt (MA-10)
Bill Pascrell (NJ-08)
Bob Filner (CA-51)
Carolyn Kilpatrick (MI-13)
Carolyn Maloney (NY-14)

Chaka Fattah (PA-02)
Chellie Pingree (MN-01)
Corrine Brown (FL-03)
Dennis Kucinich (OH-10)
Diane Watson (CA-33)
Donald Payne (NJ-10)
Donna Edwards (MD-04)
Earl Blumenauer (OR-03)
Ed Towns (NY-10)
Eddie Bernice Johnson (TX-30)
Elijah Cummings (MD-07)
Emanuel Cleaver (MO-05)
Eric Massa (NY-29)

Pete Stark (CA-13)
Grace Napolitano (CA-38)
Gwen Moore (WI-04)
Hank Johnson (GA-04)
Jackie Spier (CA-12)
Jerry Nadler (NY-08)
Jesse Jackson, Jr. (IL-02)
Jim McDermott (WA-07)
Jim McGovern (MA-03)
John Conyers (MI-14)
John Olver (MA-01)
John Tierney (MA-06)
J! ohn Yarmuth (KY-03)
Jose Serrano (NY-16)
Judy Chu (CA-32)

Keith Ellison (MN-05)
Laura Richardson (CA-37)
Linda Sanchez (CA-39)
Lloyd Doggett (TX-25)
Lucille Roybal-Alard (CA-34)
Luis Gutierrez (IL-04)
Lynn Woolsey (CA-06)
Marcia Fudge (OH-11)
Marcy Kaptur (OH-09)
Maurice Hinchey (NY-22)
Maxine Waters (CA-35)
Mazie Hirono (HI-02)
Mel Watts (NC-12)
Michael Honda (CA-15)

Mike Capuano (MA-08)
Nydia Valezquez (NY-12)
Peter DeFazio (OR-04)
Phil Hare (IL-17)
Raul Grijalva (AZ-07)
Robert Wexler (FL-19)
Rush Holt (NJ-12)
Sam Farr (CA-17)
Sheila Jackson Lee (TX-18)
William Lacy Clay (M0-01)
Yvette Clarke (NY-11)

....and we the people will remember on election day. A VIGOROUS national campaign will be initiated to replace you with a true progressive DEMOCRAT. You will have more to fear from the people than the insurance and pharmaceutical companies that have YOU in THEIR pockets.

MoveOn.org remains positive on health care (1)

2009-08-13T16:51:00.000-07:00

by Claude Chaney

It is now common knowledge that the rowdy mobs that are appearing at town hall meetings are bought and paid for by the insurance industry. We are not hearing that story being told on mainstream media. These manipulative vultures have convinced large numbers of senior citizens that President Obama is going to put them on death
panels and that their health care dollars will be given to younger people and they will die. In most other countries if you said that to someone you would probably get laughed at, not here. Many Americans have become so indoctrinated by right wing scare tactics that they seem incapable of thinking for themselves. Rightwingers also
told gunowners that the President was going to take their guns away and this lead to unprecedented gun sales in the south. The lie has become a very potent weapon for these conservatives and unfortunately most Americans still don't realize it.
Conservative talk show host Glenn Beck is responsable for spreading this fear. He
calls the President a racist without on scintilla of evidence, not giving his veiwers one example to verify his claim. I am pleased that an organized effort is already underway to contact Glenn Beck's sponsors and find out if they endorse this
ominous deception. Two of the sponsors we can start with are Wal-Mart and Travelocity. Progressives are far too polite, because many of them think that you can reason with the Rush Limbaughs of the country. You can not be "nice" or "rational" with these people. You have to be strong and if necessary get in their face and if they are loud, you be louder. The time has come for a massive March on Washington to raise awareness for the public option and then the single payer. Many of us make the mistake of laughing at those poor manipulated people who follow the likes of Beck and Limbaugh. Two people who make millions, yet most of their followers are people who don't have adequate healthcare themselves. There is nothing more pathetic than a person who heads a family earning $13,000 a year talking about being conservative and voting Republican. The right has been very successful in convincing low to moderate income people to vote against their own interests.
Once again MoveOn.org is taking the initiative. Please read the article that follows this one and conduct yourselves accordingly.

MoveOn.org remains positive on Health Care (2)

2009-08-13T16:49:00.000-07:00

Did you see today's breaking news? A former health insurance executive just went on record saying that right-wing mobs at town halls are the result of "stealth efforts by health insurance companies."1 And The Huffington Post reports that dirty energy companies are helping bankroll the mobs.2

It's infuriating—but the good news is that everyday folks are fighting back. And the great news is that we're making strides. In city after city, MoveOn Councils are proving to the media that the vast majority of Americans support the change agenda that President Obama ran on.

As we ramp up our "Real Voices for Change" campaign, here are some recent inspiring stories from MoveOn Councils around the country:

We're keeping it positive. At a town hall in Charlottesville, Virginia, national media were expecting a hostile and extremist crowd—but Rep. Tom Perriello was met by a large and very friendly group. NBC reported, "for the most part the crowd was subdued and in support of reforming the system."3 An event with Rep. Joe Sestak in Philadelphia, where the local MoveOn Council helped to turn people out, was "overwhelmingly civil."4 In Denver, at a high-profile event with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a few right-wing protesters compared President Obama to Hitler—but progressive protesters vastly outnumbered them.5
We're making direct contact with decision-makers. At a Jobs Fair in northwest Indiana, Council Coordinator David Lambeth handed a flyer supporting a REAL public option directly to Senator Evan Bayh—a key vote on health care reform—and had a quick conversation with him. The Council had organized a flyering event at that Jobs Fair precisely to create such a face-to-face opportunity.

The media is taking notice. Our signs and footage from MoveOn events are all over the news, including several national spots on MSNBC and NBC Nightly News (one of the most-watched shows on TV). And in one wild moment, conservative Tom Tancredo—a former Colorado congressman—actually waved a MoveOn health care sign on MSNBC!

We're getting good responses from members of Congress—even in "red" states. In Johnson County, KS, the Council organized a "honk and wave" outside of Rep. Dennis Moore's office. (Rep. Moore is a "blue dog" who supports the public option.) As Organizer Ian Rogers reported:

Despite some right-wing protesters who showed up and tried to disrupt the event, the members stayed strong and their efforts paid off. About twenty minutes after the right-wing protesters showed, Rep. Moore himself drove by the honk and wave. He honked, the tea-baggers booed, and Moore gave the thumbs up to our people and honked again.
Thank you so much for all you're doing to push back against the misconception that right-wing extremists speak for all of us. And there's much more to do in the weeks ahead—keep it up.

Noami Sims (1948 -2009)

2009-08-05T06:04:00.000-07:00

by Bee-Shuyan Huang

While the fashion industry continues to struggle with diversity on the runways,
supermodel Naomi Sims passed away at the age of 61 in Newark, NJ.

Known as the "first black supermodel," Sims lost her battle with cancer, reports the New York Times.

Sims grew up in a poor, mostly white neighborhood in Pittsburgh, PA and at 18 moved to New York City to attend the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT).

She started modeling to support herself, but it wasn't smooth sailing at first: She was told by every agency that her "skin was too dark," reports the newspaper.

So, she struck out on her own and started approaching photographers directly (talk about pro-active!).

Sims went on to model for designers including Halston, who in a 1974 New York Times article, said the following of the long-limbed beauty, "Naomi was the first. She was the great ambassador for all black people. She broke down all social barriers."

She soon landed campaigns for AT&T and was modeling for Bill Blass, then Sims made history when she appeared as the first-ever black model to grace the cover of Ladies' Home Journal. It was November of 1968 -- the middle of the Civil Rights Movement.

But after five years, Sims grew bored of the industry and decided to start a wig-making business, designing styles for black women. It eventually turned into a multi-million dollar company.

Ever the forward-thinking pioneer, the supermodel told The NY Times in 1969, "There is nothing sadder than an old, broke model, and there are many models who have nothing at the end of their career." Sims definitely was not one of them!

R.I.P.

Walter Cronkite 1917 - 2009

2009-07-21T03:39:00.000-07:00

Walter Cronkite, the CBS anchorman known as "Uncle Walter" for his easygoing, measured delivery and "the most trusted man in America" for his rectitude and gravitas, died Friday night in his New York home, CBS reported.

Buzz/CNN

Cronkite was 92.

"Walter was always more than just an anchor. He was someone we could trust to guide us through the most important issues of the day; a voice of certainty in an uncertain world," President Obama said in a statement Friday.

"He was family. He invited us to believe in him, and he never let us down. This country has lost an icon and a dear friend, and he will be truly missed."

His career spanned much of the 20th century, as well as the first decade of the 21st

The native of St. Joseph, Missouri, broke in as a newspaper journalist while in college, switched over to radio announcing in 1935, joined the United Press wire service by the end of the decade and jumped to CBS and its nascent television news division in 1950. iReport.com: Share your memories of Cronkite

He also made his mark as an Internet contributor in his later years with a handful of columns for the Huffington Post.

"He was the consummate television newsman," Don Hewitt, the onetime executive producer of the "CBS Evening News," told CNN. "He had all the credentials to be a writer, an editor, a broadcaster. There was only one Walter Cronkite, and there may never be another one." Watch colleagues explain why Cronkite was "the most trusted man in America" »

Cronkite covered World War II's Battle of the Bulge, the Nuremberg trials, several presidential elections, moon landings, the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and the Watergate scandal of President Richard Nixon's administration.

At times he even made news: A 1977 question to then-Egyptian President Anwar Sadat about Sadat's intent to go to Israel -- at the time considered a nonstarter because of the lack of a treaty between the two countries -- received a surprising "yes" from the Egyptian leader.

Soon after, Sadat traveled to Jerusalem, a trip that eventually led to the Camp David Accords, which included a peace deal between Israel and Egypt.

At his height of influence as CBS anchorman, Cronkite's judgment was believed so important it could affect even presidents. In early 1968, after the Tet Offensive, Cronkite traveled to Vietnam and gave a critical editorial calling the Vietnam War "mired in stalemate." Watch an overview of Cronkite's life »

Noting Cronkite's commentary, President Lyndon Johnson reportedly said, "If I've lost Cronkite, I've lost Middle America." Johnson announced he would not seek re-election less than two months later.

Don't Miss
Statement from CBS
Special report: Life of Walter Cronkite
TIME.com: The Man with America's Trust
Life.com: Remembering Walter Cronkite
Cronkite's own name was often floated as a presidential possibility -- wishful thinking on the part of some pundits, because Cronkite had little desire to enter politics once he'd become a successful anchorman.

He became, however, an outspoken critic of what he saw as flaws in government and broadcast journalism. He disliked the current war in Iraq, telling Esquire magazine, "Indeed, we are in another Vietnam. Almost play by play. It's a terrible mistake that we're in Iraq, and it's a terrible mistake to insist on staying there."

And he disliked the corporatization of news.

"The nation whose population depends on the explosively compressed headline service of television news can expect to be exploited by the demagogues and dictators who prey upon the semi-informed," he wrote in his 1996 memoir, "A Reporter's Life."

In a 2005 interview with CNN's Wolf Blitzer, he observed, "The misfortune with broadcasting today is that all -- even including your network, which is dedicated to the news -- do not take enough time to give us all of the facts and the background." Watch CNN's John King reflect on Cronkite's career »

"Walter was truly the father of television news. The trust that viewers placed in him was based on the recognition of his fairness, honesty and strict objectivity," said "60 Minutes" correspondent Morley Safer in a statement.

"And of course, his long experience as a shoe-leather reporter covering everything from local politics to World War II and its aftermath in the Soviet Union."

Mike Wallace, "60 Minutes" correspondent emeritus, said simply: "We were proud to work with him -- for him -- we loved him."

Premiere journalist of 20th century is born

Walter Leland Cronkite Jr. was born in St. Joseph, Missouri, on November 4, 1916. His father was a dentist, and Cronkite, who admired the man greatly, grew his famous mustache in emulation of his father.

The family moved to Kansas City soon after, and when he was 10, moved again to Houston, Texas. He remembered being attached to news at an early age, from delivering newspapers to starting a high school publication. Cronkite attended the University of Texas in Austin, but dropped out of college in 1935 after gaining a full-time job as a newspaper reporter.

He moved to Kansas City for a radio job at KCMO, where he was famed for his broadcasts of football game recreations. He would use wire reports about football games to broadcast what sounded like live, play-by-play commentary on the match.

It was in Kansas City that he also met his future wife, Betsy Maxwell, in the summer of 1936. The two married in 1940 and enjoyed almost 65 years of marriage. Betsy Cronkite died in 2005.

"She was one of the most beautiful people I ever saw in my life," he said in a PBS special. "I saw her for the first time ... coming down the hall ... and I fell in love before I ever knew her name, or what she did, or if I whether I would ever see her again in life."

Cronkite had a short stint with the United Press in 1937 -- "the KCMO experience," he wrote in "A Reporter's Life," "had cooled any thought I had that radio might be an interesting medium in which to practice journalism" -- but nevertheless, he joined an Oklahoma City station within a year to broadcast University of Oklahoma football games. After a detour with Braniff Airlines, he went back to the UP and the newspaper reporting he loved.

In 1942, after the United States' entry into World War II, he became a war correspondent, part of an elite corps of correspondents dubbed "the Writing 69th." As part of that unit, he accompanied a bomber on D-Day (the mission was thwarted by cloud cover) and flew on a number of dangerous sorties. After the war, he became the chief UP correspondent at the Nuremberg Trials for war crimes. He was widely admired; CBS tried to lure him into its Edward R. Murrow-led fold during the war, but Cronkite preferred being a newspaperman. Watch Cronkite remember WWII heroes »

Cronkite opened UP's Moscow, Russia, bureau after the war, but when the wire service tightened up on his salary in 1948, he decided to go back to radio at the urging of a friend who owned a radio station. He was the Washington correspondent for a radio group. Two years later, CBS came calling again, and this time Cronkite took the network up on its offer.

Into television news

But now the medium was television. Cronkite became the anchor of WTOP-TV, armed with little more than wire reports and his own skills, he recalled in his memoir.

Two years later, he broke into the national consciousness with his work at the 1952 political conventions, serving as CBS' "anchorman" -- a word coined to describe Cronkite's role as point person for the network's correspondents. Though there's some dispute as to who coined the word, Cronkite's influence was noted: in Sweden at the time, he recalled, anchormen were called "cronkiters."

But CBS News had a deep bench. The division was led by Murrow throughout the 1950s, and a number of other famous names -- Eric Sevareid, Douglas Edwards, Howard K. Smith -- were part of the team. Cronkite distinguished himself as CBS' lead space reporter as the United States and Soviet Union launched the space race. He never lost his taste for the beat, working with CNN on shuttle launches as recently as John Glenn's return mission in 1998.

In 1962, Cronkite took over as anchor of CBS' "Evening News" from Edwards. Television news was still in its infancy; the broadcast Cronkite delivered was 15 minutes long, dependent on sometimes day-old film, and in black and white. But with the Cold War, civil rights movement and the increasing rapidity of communications, the news business was changing. On September 2, 1963 -- Labor Day -- Cronkite's broadcast became a half-hour; the centerpiece was an extended interview with President John F. Kennedy. Watch Cronkite relive the day Kennedy was shot »

A little less than three months later, Kennedy was assassinated. Cronkite's coverage of that event, including a rare display of emotion on camera -- as he broadcast the news of Kennedy's death from the CBS newsroom -- helped cement his status.

However, for the first half of the 1960s, Cronkite's broadcast was No. 2 to NBC's "Huntley-Brinkley Report," hosted by Chet Huntley and David Brinkley. It wasn't until later in the decade that Cronkite and CBS overtook the NBC team for the No. 1 position, a mark it would hold for the rest of Cronkite's 19-year tenure.

"Uncle Walter" increasingly became the most-admired figure in the news media. His sign-off, "And that's the way it is," became a national catch-phrase. His coverage of moon missions was legendary, with his ability to anchor, unperturbed, for hour upon hour, earning him the affectionate nickname "Old Iron Pants." Read reaction to his death »

Another rare example of Cronkite showing emotion on air was the joy he expressed at Apollo 11's 1969 moon landing: "Man on the moon!" he exulted, rubbing his hands in delight.

'Most trusted man in America'

In 1972, a poll named him "the most trusted man in America." The anchorman had been one of the few TV journalists to note the import of Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein's reporting on Watergate and helped prompt CBS into following the story aggressively.

The network broadcast two extended segments on the affair just before the 1972 election. Cronkite was helped immensely by CBS' then White House correspondent, Dan Rather, who became one of Nixon's least favorite reporters with his determined questioning at White House press conferences.

Rather's and Cronkite's lives would cross again several years later. By the end of the 1970s, television news had become news itself, with Barbara Walters' million-dollar ABC contract in 1976 making headlines. The race to succeed Cronkite, who was nearing 65 and announced his forthcoming retirement in 1980, became a national focus. Watch CNN's John Roberts talk about Cronkite's influence on him »

In the end, Rather won the battle to succeed Cronkite over Roger Mudd, who was Cronkite's regular fill-in. Cronkite gave his last "Evening News" broadcast on March 6, 1981. His successor had a number of up-and-down years, which Cronkite watched from a distance. The two anchors were not "especially chummy," Cronkite once said.

In his later years, Cronkite -- who became a CBS board member -- distinguished himself with various news specials, but was disappointed he wasn't allowed to take a greater role at CBS.

"I want to say that probably 24 hours after I told CBS that I was stepping down at my 65th birthday, I was already regretting it. And I regretted it every day since," he once said.

He had planned to do documentaries for the network, as well as continue his summer science series "Walter Cronkite's Universe," but the series was canceled in 1982, and CBS was devoting fewer resources to documentaries. He also stayed physically active, an energetic tennis player and sailor.

Cronkite received dozens of awards during his life, including a number of Emmys and Peabodys. In 1981, he was awarded the nation's highest civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, by Jimmy Carter.

He also played himself in movies and on TV, including memorable episodes of "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" and "Murphy Brown."

But he never lost his zest for reporting, nor his opinions about the news media. His daughter, Kathy, played a Patty Hearst-like character in the scabrous 1976 movie "Network," a film Cronkite said "was all comedy" to him, though he shared beliefs in its message. He disparaged what he called "fluff" and constantly exhorted news departments to focus on hard news -- without opinion.

"Our job is only to hold up the mirror -- to tell and show the public what has happened," he once said.

Cronkite is survived by his three children, Nancy, Kathy and Walter III "Chip"; and four grandchildren.

The Michael Jackson Story (1958 - 2009) [Full 45 Miin BBC Documentary]

2009-07-18T22:31:00.001-07:00

more about "The Michael Jackson Story (1958 - 200...", posted with vodpod

We Want the Public Option!

2009-07-18T21:03:00.001-07:00

more about "We Want the Public Option!", posted with vodpod

Michael Jackson (1958 - 2009)

2009-07-04T07:53:00.000-07:00

I did not like the way Berry Gordy Jr. was portrayed in the movie "Dreamgirls". Of course he is not perfect, but who among us is? To me Mr. Gordy is a role model in spite of his perceived shortcomings. In the early days of Rock 'n' Roll most African-American performers were ripped off. They didn't receive just compensation for their work and also had stolen royalties. Two early pioneers who attempted to right this wrong were Berry Gordy Jr. and Sam Cooke, the first successful African-American owners of record companies with national (and later world-wide) distribution. Cooke understood the meaning of entrepeneurship. He wrote, produced and performed most of his songs and through his record company S.A.R he had many entertainers who became stars after his death(Bobby Womack, Billy Preston, Johnnie Taylor, Mel Carter). Cooke's death was very suspicious. He was disliked by many in the business because he was perceived as too "uppity" for a Black man of his time. After Cooke's demise Berry Gordy came to the forefront. Gordy went to the assembly line approach he saw while working for GM and applied it to making records. Just as the car companies had assembly lines for various parts of the cars that in the end all came together to have the finished product, Gordy did the same with his artists. There were teams of producers that worked with specific songwriters and performers who collectively came up with the finished product.
The most prominent songwriter/producer teams in the early days of Motown were
William "Mickey" Stevenson, William "Smokey" Robinson, Brian Holland-Lamont Dozier-Edward Holland, Nicholas Ashford-Valerie Simpson, Harvey Fuqua, Norman Whitfield-Barrett Strong, Pam Sawyer and Ronald Miller. They created and produced music for some of the most successful acts of all time.....Mary Wells, Marvin Gaye, The Four Tops, The Temptations, The Miracles, Diana Ross, The Supremes, Stevie Wonder, Gladys Knight & The Pips, Jr. Walker & The All Stars, Eddie Kendricks, David Ruffin, Martha & The Vandellas, The Marvelettes, Jimmy Ruffin, Shorty Long, Marv Johnson, Kim Weston, The Isley Brothers, Brenda Holloway and a group of teenagers from Gary, Indiana...The Jackson 5, lead by this little 10 year old afro clad dynamo named Micheal Jackson. It is not clear who should get credit for discovering Michael and his brothers...Bobby Taylor?, Diana Ross?, Gladys Knight? but Michael was a rare find and Gordy knew just what to do to bring these very young men to absolute stardom.
Berry Gordy found the major portion of his talent coming from residents of a Detroit housing project. Motown was so successful that when The Temptations peaked at
#29 with the Smokey Robinson penned "Get Ready" Motown top brass decided that this was unacceptable. At that time if any black entertainer was able to crossover and get a tune in the top 40 of the pop chart that was considered a major accomplishment but that wasn't good enough for Motown, so Temptations production went from Smokey Robinson to Norman Whitfield. In the case of the Jackson Five, Gordy decided that he will handle this one himself. He chose his collaborators to form "The Corporation" and then went on to give The Jackson 5 four straight pop and R&B #1 songs(I Want You Back, ABC, The Love You Save, I'll Be There) and two #2 pop songs( Mama's Pearl, Never Can Say Goodbye). The Jackson 5 had now reached world wide acceptance and acclaim.
At this time Motown was at the top of the music world but that in itself caused problems. It became harder and harder to keep everyone happy. Once you made a name for yourself at Motown it was considered a risk to leave, a risk that most Motown performers were not willing to take. Mary Wells, was Motown's first lady. She left and never regained the popularity she once had: eleven top 40 hits (including #1 My Guy, but only one away from Motown (Use Your Head #34). This all changed in 1969 when the Isley Brothers left Motown to form their own T-Neck label and immediately had smash hit "It's Your Thing" (#2 Pop, #1 R&B) and later went on to have twelve other top forty hits on the pop chart. This no doubt went on to embolden other Motown stars to make that move. The assembly line that was responsible for so many Motown hits had disintegrated. Major producer/writer teams like Holland-Dozier-Holland not only left but sued Berry Gordy over royalties. Both Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye wanted more creative control. Gladys Knight & The Pips went to Buddah Records and had even more success with Buddah than they had at Motown.The Spinners left to find stardom at Atlantic records. The Temptations went to Atlantic Records also for a brief stint but Berry Gordy was successful in wooing them back. Even Diana Ross left to sign with RCA records. Fortunately for Motown they were able to keep Stevie Wonder by offering him a huge long term contract. Marvin Gaye, like Stevie Wonder was granted creative control and stayed for several years, but in the early 80s he also left. The Commodores, Rick James, Lionel Richie and a resurgeant Smokey Robinson (with four big hits in the eighties (Cruisin', Being With You, Just To See Her,One Heartbeat)also kept Motown alive and kicking.
The Jackson 5 were also unhappy with the material they were given. It appeared as if their requests to perform their own songs or at minimum have someone else write better songs for them fell on deaf ears. Michael and his brothers left Motown to sign with CBS/Columbia/Sony. Legendary R&B songwriters Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff took over production. During this period The Jackson 5 became The Jacksons and they found success with songs like Enjoy Yourself(#6 pop), Shake Your Body(Down To The Ground)(#7 pop) but there were still more moves in the making. Michael decides to go solo. He had performed and recorded by himself previously with Motown with great success ( Ben (#1 pop) Got To Be There (#4 pop), Rockin' Robin (#2 pop), I Wanna Be Where You Are (#16 pop). But this time Michael wanted to be a solo act on a permanent basis. Michael made a historic appearance on the televised Motown Special. We saw a totally different Michael tall and thin with the sequined black jacket as he introduced the platinum selling Billy Jean (#1 pop) and showed some startling choreography (The moonwalk) this was the moment Michael made the transition from "star" to "mega superstar" The hits were seemingly endless...Don't Stop ('til You Get Enough)(#1 pop), Rock With You (#1 pop), Off The Wall (#10 pop), She's Out Of My Life (#10 pop), The Girl Is Mine (with Paul McCartney)(#2 pop), Beat It (#1 pop), Wanna Be Startin' Something (#5 pop), Human Nature (#7 pop), Say, Say, Say (with Paul McCartney)(#1 pop), PYT(Pretty Young Thing)(#10 pop), Thriller (#4 pop), I Just Can't Stop Loving You(with Siedah Garrett) (#1 pop), Bad (#1 pop), The Way You Make Me Feel (#1 pop),Man In The Mirror (#1 pop), Dirty Diana (#1 pop), Another Part Of Me (#11 pop), Smooth Criminal (#7 pop), Black Or White (#1 pop), Remember The Time (#3 pop), In The Closet (#6 pop), Jam (#26 pop), Heal The World (#27 pop), Who Is it? (#14 pop), Will You Be There (#7 pop), Scream (with Janet Jackson)/Childhood(#5 pop),You Are Not Alone (#1 pop), They Don't Care About Us (#30 pop), You Rock My World (#10 pop), Butterflies (#14 pop).
Prior to this enormous popularity and record breaking sales Michael went through some growing pains. There are very few child stars who successfully make the trasition to successful adult star. Sammy Davis Jr., Robert Blake and Jackie Coogan are the exceptions not the rule. The public is in general very fickle, but at the same time they have an image of you and they want to keep that image. Michael was no longer that cute little boy who lead the Jackson 5, he was becoming an adult. The look was changing, the voice was changing. As a result people around him began to criticize him in a playful manner, even going so far as to say he looked like a monkey. This accounts for the numerous plastic surgeries that continued to alter his appearance. Michael apparently took this personally. This coupled with Michael declaring that he suffered from vitiligo, a disease that causes unnatural lightening of the skin made Michael an object of criticism. Many people now felt that Michael was ashamed of being what he was.....black.
As if these problems weren't enough Michael was burned badly while shooting a commercial for Pepsi. The soft drink giant dropped Michael as a spokesman when Michael was accused of improper behavior with minors. I was a big fan of Michael's but at the time I was saying if he is actually guilty of this then he deserves to serve time. I also remember Phil Collins saying that he knew Michael and that he knew that Michael would never do anything to hurt a child. Michael may be a bit too trusting and too naive, but never would he do anything to morally damage a child. Collins' statement was very convincing to me since he was someone who was in the entertainment business and was also getting world-wide attention. The papparazzi and
sensationalist newspapers like the New York Post were having a field day at Jackson's
expense referring to him as "Jacko", "Wacko" and "Child Molester".
Michael was accused of child molestation on more than one occasion. He didn't help himself by admitting on national television that he slept with little boys at night.Some members of the press took this as a golden opportunity to sink Michael's career. Jackson meant exactly what he said "SLEEPING and that's all" Several of these young boys testified in his behalf. Of course this wasn't a good thing to do and it did show poor judgment but it was not criminal. Michael's other problem was to believe that money can solve everything. More money to silence accusers only led to even more money being requested. Michael was found innocent in both trials, but the tabloids continued to bother him. The first Michael Jackson song that came to my head after hearing about his untimely death was "Leave Me Allow" which he composed specifically to strike back at the press. Now that he is gone these same newspapers write glowing articles but while he was alive they tormented him. This is exactly the same thing that happened to Martin Luther King.
With all the hundreds of millions that he earned for himself and others Michael to the end was politically aware. He labelled former RCA and current Columbia/Sony record executive Tommy Mattola a racist because of his refusal to promote his African-American artists. Many of Michael's songs were political and showed a genuine concern for the have-nots of the world...."Heal The World", "We Are The World", "Man In The Mirror" and especially the last song he ever sang "They Don't Care About Us".
On that fateful last day Michael, who had just signed on to do an extensive 50 city tour date in England that was to be titled the "This is it" farewell tour was in need of some rest. He wanted to be the best he could be for his fans. He was warned against taking drugs that would induce long periods of sleep but he didn't listen because he trusted those people who were supposed to be watching him in the event of any irregularity. So at the age of 50, the world loses it's greatest entertainer/philanthropist.
In 1975, The Miracles made their first ever concept album "City of Angels", the title song was one of the finalists to become the official song of Los Angeles while another song "Love Machine (Pt. 1)" made it to the top of the charts. Also on the lp was the song "My Name Is Michael" which has some paralells to Michael Jackson, but that was not the intent. Listening to that song now gives one an erie feeling.
Christine Yarian wrote in the liner notes 'Any similarity or resemblance to persons either living or dead is purely coincidental and unintentional and should not be construed otherwise" This was twenty-four years ago, what a coincidence. Yarian also writes (speaking of the character Michael in the song). "He left quietly, as he had come, returning to the land he had left behind and the memories of another time. On that day, one of the darkest in L.A., only his legacy remained: one angel more in heaven, one angel less in the "City of Angels"
Like Sam Cooke, John Lennon, Rick Nelson, Sammy Davis Jr. and many others his music will always be with us. Rest in peace Michael.

2008 The Year in Review (Sports)

2009-02-16T05:35:00.000-08:00

The 2008 Superbowl was one of the best I've ever seen. Here was a true case of David vs. Goliath. The heavily favored New England Patriots were humbled by the underdog New York Giants. The former New Orleans Saints quarterback can now say that he has TWO sons with Superbowl rings after Eli Manning's courageous effort.
In baseball my favorite team in the senior circuit and my favorite team....period, The New York Mets had their third consecutive collapse in the final stages of the season. Although once again even though they had a heartbreak season it did have it's bright spots. The amazing resurgence of Carlos Delgado at the bat and on the field. Mike Pelfry had an incredible winning streak as he established himself as a bona-fide starter. For 2009 it appears as if The Mets have done something about the inefficient bullpen with the acquisition of baseball's most successful relief pitcher Francisco Rodriguez and the Mariners set up man J.J. Putz.
My favorite team in the junior circuit (and the only team I root for outside of the New York area) The Cleveland Indians made a surprising 3rd place finish after spending a substantial part of the season near the bottom. The power just disappeared, no 300 hitters. Cliff Lee picked up the slack after Cy Young award winner C.C. Sabathia sought greener pastures in Milwaukee and eventually with the Yankees. Lee was the only 20 game winner and he had the lowest E.R.A.

2008 The Year in Review (Music)

2009-01-24T04:47:00.000-08:00

In 2008 the music industry on the whole experienced a noticeable decrease in overall sales. Some artists had tremendous sales but most did not. Retail stores offering CDs have virtually disappeared. Sam Goody is gone, Virgin is gone, Circuit City is gone, Tower Records is disappearing. Barnes & Nobles and to a lesser degree Borders seem to be the only megastores left that actively promote their CD sales. The MP3 is replacing the CD. The record buying public now prefers to purchase its music online for as little as 99 cents per song. I know that there was some beautiful music made in 2008. Unfortunately I wasn't able to hear most of it because I was too busy creating my own (I Will Be Here For You - Claude Chaney & Friends - www.cdbaby.com/Claude Chaney3), but I did notice the year's biggest comeback.....Neil Diamond.
The smooth jazz outlets are disappearing with the loss of WJZZ in Philadelphia and WQCD in New York City. Clear Channel moves closer and closer to becoming a media monopoly. They own most of the radio stations and practically all of the outdoor advertisement. In most cases if you don't play ball with Clear Channel you don't play. This is just one more thing for which we can all thank George W. Bush. Minority ownership of radio stations has reached a new low. WCBS-FM returned this year, but not exactly the same as we remember it. The new format only features songs from the 60s, 70s and 80s.

PNAC: What informed American hasn't heard of the treacherous Project for a New American Century by now?

2009-01-19T03:27:00.000-08:00

PNAC is a small off-shoot, occupying the 5th floor, of the American Enterprise Institute which has been around since 1943. The AEI has 12 very busy floors where its operative have had plenty of time to send their operatives over to infiltrate the Democratic Party, or leave them in to be more accurate since the PNACers & AEIers are ORIGINALLY DEMOCRATS. To this day Richard Perle, Fieth and Wolfowitz are still Democrats. The day the Republican party, which they hijacked also, no longer suits their needs, they'll follow other PNAC neo-cons like Marshall Wittman back to the Democratic Party where the neoliberal Democratic Leadership Council is laying out the welcome mat for them.

The AEI, the PNAC & the DLC were founded by Scoop Jackson democrats who follow the philosophy of Leo Strauss. To this day the DLC is stacked with neo-conservative ideologues, who maintain deep personal ties to the war-mongers in the Bush Administration.

The DLC is following the footsteps of its neo-conservative, war-mongering predecessor organizations of the 1970s: the Coalition for a Democratic Majority (CDM)((also see www.disinfopedia.org/wiki.phtml?title=Coalition_for_a_D... )), founded in 1972 by the likes of Richard Perle, Midge Decter, Norman Podhoretz, Irving Kristol, and Jeane Kirkpatrick, among others; the Committee on the Present Danger (CPD) ((also see www.rightweb.irc-online.org/groupwatch/cpd.php )), founded in 1976 by Richard Perle, Midge Decter, Norman Podhoretz, Irving Kristol, and Jeane Kirkpatrick, et al; and the Committee for the Free World (CFW) (( also see www.disinfopedia.org/wiki.phtml?title=Committee_for_the... )), founded in 1981 by exactly the same crew. Rounding out the picture, CFW's chairman was none other than Donald Rumsfeld.

The "missing link" between the "Democratic" DLC and the now "Republican" CDM/CPD/CFW neo-cons, is the Social Democrats-USA, (SDUSA), whose chairman, Penn Kemble, was the Executive Director of the Coalition for a Democratic Majority in 1972, until he brought in Richard Perle's underling Stephen Bryen to take his place. Bryen, who created the hawkish Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA) in the early 1980s, when he served as Perle's aide at the Department of Defense, is another leading member of the neo-conservative gang that wants to go to war against the entire Arab world in the name of anti-terrorism. Providing daily coordination between Perle and Bryen would be Joshua Muravchik, a fixture at nearly every American Enterprise Institute event--but also a leader of SDUSA since its creation.

The DLC and SDUSA both maintain extremely close links to Tony Blair's British "New Labour" party faction, and in parallel, are out to recreate a new version of the Coalition for a Democratic Majority in time for the 2004 elections. The battle cry for this effort is to follow the "strong defense" lead of the original CDM's heroes: the late Dem Senators Henry "Scoop" Jackson, and Daniel Patrick Moynihan.

The CDM's two leading lights in Congress were the Democratic Senators Jackson and Moynihan. The Cold Warrior and fanatically pro-Israel
Jackson remains the model for the DLC crowd today. Former DLC president Joe Lieberman declares he is proud to be identified as a
"'Scoop' Jackson Democrat." It was these two Senators' offices that housed the Straussians behind the no-exit Iraq War.
http://forums.alternet.org/guest/motet?show+-ui13dz+-il... -

From Jackson's office:
Paul Wolfowitz
Richard Perle
Frank Gaffney

From Moynihan's office:
Elliott Abrams
Abram Shulsky
Gary Schmitt

In 1999, Norman Podhoretz, known as the "father" of neo-conservatism, wrote that the CDM was created to destroy the policies of 1972 Dem nominee George McGovern in the Democratic Party, especially because of McGovern's opposition the CDM was a flop that "never got off the ground." But in the mid-80s, the DLC certainly did get off the ground, and controls the Democratic Party today. http://forums.alternet.org/guest/motet?show+-ui13dz+-il... -

"...In the 1970s, under the leadership of Carl Gershman, SD/USA ((Social Democrats-USA)) became a supporter of Sen. Henry Jackson and his contingent of conservative, hawkish "defenders of democracy." As such, they gained a great deal of political experience and savvy, but little political power. It was not until the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980, that the SD/USA achieved positions of power and influence in both the labor movement and the government. (2)..."

"http://rightweb.irc-online.org/groupwatch/sd-usa.php "

Some SD-USA members:

"Carl Gershman, chair of SD/USA from 1974 to 1980, was an aide to Jeane Kirkpatrick when she was the U.S. ambassador to the United
Nations. In 1984, he served as an adviser to the National Bipartisan Commission on Central America (the Kissinger Commission) established
by President Reagan. (2) Penn Kemble was on the advisory committee of the U.S. Information Agency's (USIA) Voice of America. (34) Arch
Puddington worked for USIA's Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. (35) Elliott Abrams was Assistant Secretary of State for InterAmerican
Affairs in the Reagan administration. Prior to that he served as Assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights and as a staffer for
Sen. Henry Jackson. (40) Abrams was a major figure in the Iran-Contra Affair. (41) Bruce McColm served as a consultant to the U.S. Senate's
Central American Monitoring Group and has taken congressional representatives on fact-finding tours in Central America. (11) Jeane
Kirkpatrick was the U.S. delegate to the United Nations during the Reagan administration. (53) Max Kampleman was a legislative counsel
for Sen. Hubert Humphrey and a chief U.S. negotiator to the Geneva arms talks with the Soviet Union. (40)

The anti-communist, anti-left fervor of SD-USA is no second to PNAC (or the DLC, for that matter). Members were leaders in the AFL-CIO's efforts in overthrowing Allende in Chile, and later in anti-left action in Central America; they have been in the leadership of the
CIA's subversion wing -- the NED -- since its inception; they have been on the board of the terrorist Mas Canosa's Cuban-American
National Foundation; they supported the 2002 coup against Chavez in Venezuela and continue to support opposition terrorists, purging
unions in Venezuela (just as everywhere else) of any "left" leadership or influence by whatever means necessary.

http://forums.alternet.org/guest/motet?show+-ui13dz+-il... -

Michael Lind for instance traced their roots back to the right wing Shactmanite faction of the American Trotskyite movement who entered the Democratic Party in the 1960s and then split with the Left over the Vietnam War. Many members of this group continued their rightward itinerary by rallying to Senator Scoop Jackson’s campaign against the New Democrats. Some finished with the Democratic Leadership Council, while others found a home in the Reagan and now the Bush fils administrations. Other critics who promote an “Iran-Contra bis” scenario for the current flap over intelligence trace the group back to the policy cabal that had promoted the Contra war against the Sandinistas and who had lost their power and influence in the second Reagan Administration as a result of the Iran-Contra hearings of the late 1980s.
http://www.logosjournal.com/mason.htm
Let me point out, that another committee spawned from the same hellish cancer was the Balkan Action Committee which brought us step one of the PNAC wars, the one against Yugoslavia, and was staffed by the same neo-Cons. Rumsfeld, Perle, Wolfowitz, Abramowitz, Carlucci were all on its executive Committee.

They're pretty much the same. Both the same cancer, coming from the same place & destroying both parties.

If I were a Republican, I'd be pissed as hell at the Democrats from whom this stuff spawned. But as such I'm just a Progressive Democrat determined to keep that vermin out and toss out the ones they left behind warming their butts in my party. Lieberman, Feinstein, Kerry- ever wonder why they really went along with the war? It had nothing to do with being fooled! These wars were planned long ago with full complicity of the Democratic Leadership Council which firmly endorsed this war and has endorsed every scheme against the people that the Bush Administration has wanted.

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2008 The Year in Review (Movies)

2009-01-19T02:35:00.000-08:00

There were several movies I saw in 2008 that I thought were quite good. One of the best would have to be Tyler Perry's "The Family That Preys" This poignant tale of a friendship that transcends time, race and greed showed that Perry can not only do comedy but he can do drama too. The performances by Alfre Woodard and Kathy Bates were outstanding.
"Soul Men" gave us the final look at two legendary performers, the late Isaac Hayes and the late Bernie Mac. This film which, I believe to be loosely based on the lives of Sam Moore and David Prater (a.k.a. Sam & Dave) shows us another side of Samuel L. Jackson not previously seen.....the dancer.
Meryl Streep was convincing in the role of the determined nun fighting injustice against overwhelming odds in "Doubt" which deals with a very touchy subject that most people would rather avoid.....sexual advances on youth by people of authority within the church.
I was surprised that the late Heath Ledger was not given Oscar consideration for his role in "Batman: The Dark Knight" This was the first time that I've seen a villain so diabolical that he attacks not only his adversaries but his accomplices too. This is a stark contrast to Cesar Romero who played the role of the Joker on the Batman television series in the sixties.
My favorite movie of 2008 would have to be "Cadillac Records" primarily because it focuses on a era that I lived through and fondly remember. This was the music that my father and my uncle listened to. It's the music that I remember as a child. Chess Records had a roster that could rival Motown; Chuck Berry, Etta James, Muddy Waters, Little Walter, Howlin' Wolf, The Dells, The Moonglows, Ramsey Lewis, Fontella Bass, Billy Stewart, Sugar Pie DeSanto, Pigmeat Markham, Little Milton etc. The triumphant, yet tragic life of Leonard Chess left its mark on American popular music in the 50s and 60s at a time when Blues was making that transition to Rhythm and Blues. Although many critics downplayed Beyonce's portrayal of Etta James I felt she was quite good in the role of the young biracial singer with the famous white father who didn't want anything to do with her. Although he didn't have much screen time Mos Def was both believable and hilarious in the role of Chuck Berry. This was unquestionably one of the year's best.....especially if you lived through the era.

2008 The Year In Review (Politics)

2009-01-08T12:12:00.000-08:00

The Bush Administration will always be remembered for its campaign against terrorism. We must have heard the phrase "Weapons Of Mass Destruction" a million times or more. It appears as if we actually do have a problem with weapons of mass destruction, but it doesn't come from Iraq, it comes from right here in the good old USA. McDonald-Douglas and Boeing have created the most devastating weapons ever and most US citizens don't know anything about them. Illegal White phospherous bombs penetrate flesh straight to the bone. Water and Oxgyen only enhance the destruction of these merciless weapons which may be used by Israeli forces in Gaza due to the unusually high numbers of amputations reported. There are also deadly Tungsten weapons designed to kill huge numbers of people quickly. Polls indicate that a majority of the Israeli people do NOT approve of the carnage perpetrated by the Israeli government, but they are helpless in their attempts to stop it.
In 2008 we were able to see the bloodlust of our own government with the events of Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo yet the Bush Administration points a finger at Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe. Our hypocrisy knows no bounds. Technological advances have been made in crowd control to the extent that massive demonstrations are no longer a concern for right wing elements within the state and Federal government who have perfected the art of crowd control. With the media barrage of Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'reilly, Michelle Malkin and Anne Coulter the US viewing and listening public became overwhelmed with right wing rhetoric. Crucial events continue to remain unreported or underreported. Progressive outlets like "Air America" and "Pacifica" are drowned out by the far right. This resulted in millions of people being uninformed or misinformed. Many of us had to read the Observer or The Guardian to find out what was really happening in the US in 2008. Even after all of this I am still cautiously optimistic. I have nothing but goodwill towards the incoming President Barack Obama. I am glad I voted for him, but I am even happier that so many white people voted for him because it shows that for once "content" triumphed over "race". I did not vote for Obama because he is Black and I am Black. Clarence Thomas, Ward Connerly and
J. Kenneth Blackwell are all political figures of my race. I have an intense dislike for all three of them and their ilk. I wouldn't vote for them to be dogcatchers. My original choice for president was a white man....Dennis Kucinich. When he dropped out of the race he advised his supporters to vote for Obama.
Barack Obama comes into to office with great expectation. At the same time we must be keep in mind that he is only human. No one man can undo the damage George Bush has done to this country. It will take decades to achieve that miracle, but I do believe we will see an end to the Iraq war by 2011 and I also believe (based on his own statements) that Barack Obama is committed to putting people back to work and protecting the middle class. I am not pleased with many of Mr. Obama's cabinent choices and I have to admit that besides Iraq, I really don't see much signicant "change" in foreign policy under an Obama administration. Let's face it, in the past three decades when it comes to foreign policy there's not a dime's worth
of difference between the Democratic and Republican parties. But when we look at the whole picture Barack Obama is a welcomed improvement from George W. Bush. William Rivers Pitt put it best when he accessed the George W. Bush reign of terror by telling Mr. Bush "Something like you must never again be allowed to happen to this country, and if we save ourselves by preventing you from ever happening again, your greatness is assured. You are the tallest of all possible warnings, and a promise all of us must solemnly and stalwartly keep. If we can damn you to the past, we will save our own future.

May you live forever, you son of a bitch."

2008 The Year In Review (Person of The Year) Barack Obama

2009-01-03T19:10:00.000-08:00

Barack Obama is Person of the Year for the second consecutive year. He has surprised everyone by running a campaign centered around the issues and the people of the United States listened, making him the first African-American president in the history of the United States. After a rigorous campaign against Hillary Clinton the battle against John McCain was a cakewalk.
Mr. McCain continued to shoot himself in the foot by making statements like "The economy is fundamentally sound" and "I voted with George W. Bush 90% of the time." When McCain's campaign manager stated that the McCain camp would run on personality rather than the issues it sealed the doom of the G.O.P. In a quiet eloquent fashion Barack Obama told the US citizen that a vote for McCain would be a vote for the third term of George W. Bush, a president whose poll numbers are below 30% The media and the US public agreed that Obama had won all presidential debates. Mr. Obama appears to be just what the country needs. Someone genuinely concerned with the well being of ALL the people and someone who will make the rich pay their fair share of taxes.
When McCain tried to get the country to feel sorry for "Joe The Plumber" who would see part of his anticipated $250,000 salary being taxed all the Obama had to do was point out that "Joe The Plumber" wasn't even a plumber. He didn't even have a license. For the G.O.P the 2008 Presidential campaign was a perfect storm that sank them. If Barack Obama can put people back to work the same way that Franklin Roosevelt did in another turbulent era then next year, for a unprecented third time he could be chosen Person of The Year.

Freddie Hubbard ( 1938 - 2008 )

2009-01-02T08:52:00.000-08:00

Jazz trumpeter Freddie Hubbard died of complications from a November 26, 2008 heart attack. Hubbard died on December 29, 2008. The Indianapolis Indiana native began his career with two other jazz standouts, Wes and Monk Montgomery. Freddie was part of a small cadre of jazz musicians who successfully recorded for Creed Taylor's CTI label. Many of these artists (George Benson, Hubert Laws, Stanley Turrentine, Eumir Deodato) recorded and performed with each other and gave jazz a new younger audience. After CTI folded Hubbard went on to Columbia where his album "Super Blue" which contained a stunning rendition of Ross Vanelli's "The Surest Things Can Change" actually cracked Billboard's top 200. It peaked at #131, which is very unusual for a jazz artist. Some critics were quick to unreasonably pounce on Hubbard for becoming "too commercial" In my opinion this was garbage. Hubbard, like any other musician was in the business to make money. This was his livelihood. No one could say that Freddie Hubbard compromised the music. Freddie Hubbard was one of my favorite trumpeters. I will always remember him for the tune "First Light"

2008 The Year In Review (Census)

2009-01-02T08:30:00.000-08:00

Levi Stubbs Jr.(The Four Tops), Al Wilson, Paul Newman, Pervis Jackson (The Spinners), Freddie Hubbard, Odetta, Miriam Makeba, Eartha Kitt, Dock Ellis, Suzanne Pleshette, Heath Ledger, Roy Scheider, Norman Whitfield, Rudy Ray Moore, Sean Levert, Paul Davis, Eddy Arnold, Dick Martin, Jerry Wexler, Bo Diddley, Yves Saint Laurent, Cyd Charisse, Bernie Mac, George Carlin, Estelle Getty, Lou Teicher, Jerry Reed, Bill Melendez, Lloyd Thaxton, Studs Turkel, Michael Crichton, Dee Dee Warwick, Clive Barnes, Robert Prosky, Beverly Garland, Van Johnson, Majel Barrett Roddenberry, Harold Pinter, Barry Morse

Eartha Kitt (1927 - 2008)

2009-01-02T07:16:00.000-08:00

2008 does not end without the passing of yet another performing legend. Singer/Actress Eartha Kitt left us on December 25, 2008, the victim of colon cancer. The South Carolinian of biracial parentage defied the odds to become one of the most sought after icons in the industry. She co-starred with such legends as Sidney Poitier, Sammy Davis Jr. and Orson Welles. Ms. Kitt (along with Julie Newmar)
popularized the role of catwoman on the 60's tv show Batman. As a singer Ms. Kitt
will be remembered for the songs "Love For Sale", "C'est Si Bon" and her biggest hit of all "Santa Baby". She spoke four languages fluently and was able to sing in seven.

Odetta ( 1931 - 2008 )

2008-12-18T07:19:00.000-08:00

Folk legend Odetta has expired. Perhaps more than any other singer Odetta was the face of the Civil Rights movement in the United States. Odetta took an interest in music at a young age. When she moved with her sister and mother from Birmingham, Alabama to Los Angeles, California her mother recognized her talent and made great sacrifices to provide her at the time young teenager with costly music lessons. Odetta's career took off when she caught the eyes and ears of two performing legends...Harry Belafonte and Pete Seeger. Odetta was one of the first female performers to wear the "Afro" hairstyle. During the 60s she sold the bulk of her albums which included everything from interpretations of Leadbelly songs to my favorite Odetta classic "The Battle Hymn of The Republic.

Miriam Makeba (1932 - 2008)

2008-11-22T05:51:00.000-08:00

Miriam Makeba, perhaps the most famous exponent of world music passed away performing on stage in Italy, the victim of a heart attack at the age of 76. Ms. Makeba's career began with the Manhattan Brothers in South Africa. Ms. Makeba was forced to leave South Africa due to her opposition to the racist oppressive Aparthied regime, especially after one of her recordings "Beware Voerwoed" gained international attention. In her lifetime Ms. Makeba was married to two equally famous spouses; Hugh Masekela, South Africa's internationally acclaimed trumpet and flugelhorn player then Trinidadian Civil Rights activist Stokely Carmichael. Makeba's marriage to the later put her on the FBI's blacklist and forced the couple to live in Guinea. The FBI deliberately set out to destroy Makeba's career in The United States, making it illegal to play any of her material on the airwaves. She also was denied any performing venue within the United States.
At this time Miriam Makeba was celebrating her biggest hit "Pata, Pata" In spite of this harsh character assassination Ms. Makeba still prevailed, as time went by the demand for her music steadily grew even though she could not perform in the USA. This only seemed to make her even more popular outside the US where she was known for such classics as "The Click Song", "Can't Cross Over", "Be Humble" and "Maliaka". Miriam Makeba (a.k.a. Mama Africa) and her music will live on forever in the hearts of millions around the world who adored her.

Obama Wins Big!!!

2008-11-16T17:06:00.000-08:00

Barack Obama is now President-elect Obama with a larger than expected victory over Arizona senator John McCain. Mr. Obama became the first-ever elected African-American president. Throughout the campaign Mr. Obama never made race an issue and became president primarily because most Americans, black and white felt that he would be best suited to tackle the nation's most serious problem....the economy. Early on the pundits said that he could never carry the south and still win, but he did just that. He didn't win the south but he made serious inroads taking Florida, Viginia and North Carolina. This combined with taking the states with huge electoral votes, New York, California, Illinois made his victory a landslide. Two states that went to Bush in 2004 Indiana and Nevada were in the Obama column in 2008.
The voters judged Obama by the "content of his character and not by the color of his skin." Obama began this campaign in Iowa, a state with a 97% white population. Nationally Obama attracted the same percentage (44%) of white voters that John Kerry
had in 2004. The right wingers threw everything they had a him but nothing stuck (His middle name Hussein means that he is a muslim, he went to school in an anti-American madrassa in Indonesia, he never repudiated the Anti-American remarks of his
pastor of 20 years Jeremy Wright, he "palled around" with a known revolutionary (Ayers) who blew up buildings, he didn't wear an American flag on his lapel) Across the country McCain and Palin tolerated blatantly racist remarks by their supporters at rallies. Finally when McCain did come to Obama's defense he was soundly booed.
President-elect Obama's victory was an historic event and a proud one for the United States because now any black parent can tell his or her child that they can be what they want to be as long as they are willing to work hard for it. You can even be president. McCain in his own words ended his chances of winning this election when he said earlier "I don't know much about the economy" and "I voted with
President Bush 90% of the time"
Obama's election is NOT going to solve ALL of the nation's problems, but at least we can say we believe that we are going in another direction. There has been a rise in Klan membership and skinhead activity. This is something to be expected because whenever there are hard times racism rears its ugly head, but fortunately most of America is behind Mr. Obama and that could make all the difference.

Dee Dee Warwick (1945 - 2008)

2008-11-16T16:23:00.000-08:00

It is with regret we acknowledge the passing of Dee Dee Warwick. Ms. Warwick was the younger sister of famed vocalist Dionne Warwick. She expired at a New Jersey nursing home. Dee Dee didn't have a "commercial" voice like that of her multi-grammy award winning sister but it can be said that she was among the best female R&B performers of her era. Dee Dee's biggest hit was "She Didn't Know (She Kept On Talking) but she also was famous for the original version of "I'm Gonna Make You Love Me", which was also recorded by Madeline Bell and became a #2 smash for Diana Ross & The Supremes with The Temptations. Other Dee Dee Warwick gems were "Your Until Tomorrow", "I Wanna Be With You" and "I Haven't Got Anything Better To Do". My favorite Dee Dee Warwick recording was "Foolish Fool" penned by Ed Townsend (of "For Your Love" fame). Ms. Warwick did not like the song and did not want to record it and nearly walked out of the studio in protest. Fortunately, cooler heads prevailed and next to "She Didn't Know" this was her biggest hit. In 2007 Chaka Khan recorded an updated version of this R&B classic. Dee Dee Warwick like her sister Dionne, Cissy Houston, Whitney Houston and Darlene Love all have a connection to the
gospel group The Drinkard Singers.

Obama Slams McCain Manager For Saying Issues Don't Matter

2008-10-25T06:42:00.001-07:00

Barack Obama has won all three debates because he has addressed the issues. This is something the McCain/Palin team does only when forced to or when it happens to be an issue they support. Since the economy is bad and John McCain said he would stay in Iraq another hundred years in necessary (when the majority of the country is against the war). McCain would rather talk about Joe The Plumber, who in actuality isn't a plumber yet, and how he would be victimized by Obama taxing people who make more than $250.000.00 a year. McCain says at this time no one's taxes should be raised. This is ridiculous. If there are no taxes, who pays for infrastruction, education etc. McCain fails to tell us about the huge number of corporations that don't pay anything at all in taxes. When you can't confront the issues honestly you have no other recourse than to resort to criticizing Rev. Jeremiah Wright (when his associate Rev. John Hagee has said worse than Wright including an obbvious penchant for anti-semitism). How can McCain condemn Ayers for blowing up building when his "good friend" Gordon Liddy had done the same. McCain's campaign director talks about making "personalities" the focus of the campaign instead of "issues" because when it comes to the issues they don't have a leg to stand on

more about "Obama Slams McCain Manager For Saying...", posted with vodpod

The Vet Who Did Not Vet

2008-10-25T06:06:00.001-07:00

Here's the absolute truth. There was such a hoopla about Barack Obama's experience
"Sarah Palin (Pales In) in comparison"

more about "The Vet Who Did Not Vet", posted with vodpod

Levi Stubbs (1936 - 2008 )

2008-10-24T17:33:00.001-07:00

One would think that this is a music site, it isn't, but with the succession of deaths of R&B legends once again I must pay homage. These were the people who made the music for the soundtrack of my life, one such person was the late Levi Stubbs Jr.
I don't think I've seen any professional entertainer more than Levi Stubb's Four Tops. I saw them for the first time in 1964 at the Brooklyn Paramount Theatre promoting their new song "Baby I Need Your Loving" I knew then that they were going to be BIG.
The Four Tops went on to have 24 top 40 hits which included two #1's "I Can't Help Myself(Sugar Pie, Honey Bunch)" in 1965 and "Reach Out I'll Be There" in 1966 and in the process sold over 50 million records world-wide. The Four Tops and The Dells hold the record for longevity. The Dells had one personnel change early in their career, but the Four Tops had the same unit for over 40 years. They were only separated by death. With the passing of Levi Stubbs only one original member Abdul "Duke" Fakir is alive. The Four Tops and The Dells had other things in common besides longevity together. They both had lead singers with big booming voices. To this day there are still people who debate whether Marvin Junior or Levi Stubbs had the stronger voice.
The Four Tops were hitmakers for four decades. The group had an uncanny knack for making comebacks. The association with the legendary writing and producing team of Brian Holland, Lamont Dozier and Edward Holland created the bulk of the Four Tops hit repertoire: "Baby I Need Your Lovin" , "I Can't Help Myself", "It's The Same Old Song","Reach Out I'll Be There", "Something About You", "Shake Me, Wake Me (When It's Over)", "Standing In The Shadows Of Love", "Bernadette", "You Keep Running Away" When Holland-Dozier-Holland had a dispute with Motown President Berry Gordy and left Motown it initially had a debilitating effect on the record label and acts like the Four Tops and The Supremes experiencing slumping sales. The Four Tops resorted to making cover songs. Some were successful "Walk Away Renee" "If I Were A Carpenter" but these songs never reached the sales of the Holland-Dozier-Holland era. At this time the Four Tops worked with another blossoming Motown writer/producer Frank Wilson who along with Smokey Robinson created the Four Tops big comeback hit of 1970 "Still Waters (Love)". The album "Still Waters Run Deep" is considered by many to be their best ever. About a year later Berry Gordy decided to move Motown to Los Angeles. The Wilson produced "(That's The Way) Nature Planned It" Lp got a lot of attention, especially the medley "Hey Man/We Gotta Get You A Woman" that was featured regularly on the dance line on the popular tv program "Soul Train". This song would have been another big hit for the group had it not been for the Tops' reluctance to transplant to the west coast. The Four Tops insisted on staying in Detroit so Motown and The Four Tops parted company and Motown decided not to release "Hey Man/We Gotta Get You A Woman".
It was time for the Four Tops to make yet another comeback, this time moving to ABC/Dunhill records and working with another successful writing/producing team Dennis Lambert and Brian Potter. The duo returned the Tops to the higher positions on the charts with songs like "Keeper Of The Castle", the #4 hit "Ain't No Woman (Like The One I Got)", "Are You Man Enough" and "Sweet Understanding Love"
Then for some inexplicable reason the Four Tops disappeared from the pop chart but continued to triumph on the R&B Charts with songs like "We All Gotta Stick Together","One Chain(don't make no prison)" and "Midnight Flower" History then repeated itself when the Dennis Lambert-Brian Potter writing and producing team split from each other and from ABC Records, which a short time later folded.
After returning from England where they found success with a song that wasn't well received in the United States "Simple Game" (#3)it was time for yet another
comeback. The Four Tops signed with Casablanca Records and had another big hit
"When She Was My Girl" (#1 R&B, #11 Pop), but like ABC, Casablanca also bit the dust, leading the Four Tops to Arista Records where in 1988 they had their last Top 40 hit "Indestructible" with Smokey Robinson filling in for the ailing Lawrence Payton who passed away in 1997.
In 2000 Levi Stubbs was no longer able to perform with the Four Tops and Theo Peoples (formerly of the Temptations) replaced him as lead singer. Reinaldo "Obie" Benson, the composer of Marvin Gaye's smash hit "What's Goin' On?" and the Four Tops'
own "Sweet Understanding Love" died in 2006, he was replaced by Roquel Payton (the son of Lawrence Payton). The current Four Tops are Abdul Fakir, Theo Peoples, Ronnie McNeir and Roquel Payton. Just last week Levi Stubbs, who suffered from a stroke, cancer and a heart attack died in his sleep at the age of 72. The Four Tops were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990. Stubbs came from a family of exceptional entertainers, his younger brother Joe Stubbs was the lead voice on the 100 Proof (aged in soul) hit "Somebody's Been Sleeping" and the great Jackie Wilson was Levi's cousin.

The Immortals - The Greatest Artists of All Time: 79)The Four Tops by Smokey Robinson

2008-10-18T12:51:00.000-07:00

The Four Tops are a one-in-a-million singing group. They were the best in my neighborhood in Detroit when I was growing up. When I was eleven or so, my first group was an early version of what would become the Miracles. Back then the Four Tops were called the Four Aims. We all used to sing on the corners, at school functions and at house parties. Sometimes we'd have talent competitions. But all the groups in the neighborhood knew that if the Four Aims were going to be there, you were going to be singing for second place at best.
They were the first group from the neighborhood that sang modern harmony: They could sing like a gospel group but then do R&B like no one else. I love singers whom you can identify the first second they open their mouth, and Levi Stubbs is one of those; he's one of the greatest of all time. He has that distinctive voice, and his range is staggering. The combination of Levi, Obie Benson, Duke Fakir and Lawrence Payton was truly awesome.

When they came to Motown and teamed up with Holland-Dozier-Holland, there was no looking back. They performed some of the most dramatic records ever written: "Standing in the Shadows of Love," "Bernadette," "Reach Out I'll Be There," "I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie Honey Bunch)" and "Baby I Need Your Loving." Later, when Holland-Dozier-Holland left, I co-wrote "Still Water (Love)" with Frank Wilson for the Four Tops.

They were always great singers and great guys. When the Four Tops first came to Motown, the Miracles and I were the mainstays of the label, and the Temptations had just gotten there. But all the guys were very, very close. You'd come back to town from a fifty-one-night tour, and the first thing you did was shower and head back to Hitsville. We'd be there playing cards and shooting pool together into the early hours.

Levi is sick and he can't perform right now, but the Four Tops are still great. Obie -- who co-wrote "What's Going On" for Marvin Gaye -- and Duke are still there, and you've got some great new guys with them. So if you see the Four Tops now, you are still going to be mightily entertained. The Four Tops will always be one of the biggest and the best groups ever. Their music is forever.

This article was written for Rolling Stone Magazine by Smokey Robinson in 2004

Norman Whitfield (1941 - 2008)

2008-10-18T07:41:00.000-07:00

Norman Whitfield, one of the most prolific composer/arrangers of Motown Records has succumbed to diabetes. Whitfield produced songs for such top Motown acts as Gladys Knight & The Pips, Rare Earth, The Four Tops, Smokey Robinson & The Miracles, Marvin Gaye and The Supremes, but he had his greatest success with The Temptations, who had 38 top forty hits between 1964 and 1991, Whitfield produced 26 of the 38, which included gems like "Ain't Too Proud To Beg", "I Can't Get Next To You", "Just My Imagination", "Papa Was A Rolling Stone" "(I Know)I'm Losing You" and "I Wish It Would Rain". Whitfield earned the reputation of being a hard worker, driven to the point of perfection. This trait gave him quite a few enemies because of the hours spent in the studio recording artists. He was the type of person who would not take no for an answer if he felt he was right. Motown president Berry Gordy rejected the tune "I Heard It Through The Grapevine" by several artists. It appeared as if each time Gordy rejected it Whitfield would do it again with a different artist. Finally Gordy did accept a version by Gladys Knight & The Pips. This recording became the biggest Motown hit ever at that time. Seeing the success of the Gladys Knight & Pips version of the song Berry Gordy then approved the Marvin Gaye version, which even surpassed the one by Gladys Knight & The Pips to become Motown's all-time best seller.
When Whitfield left Motown he composed songs for movies like "Which Way Is Up?
the Richard Pryor film that had Stargard perform the Whitfield penned title song. He had even greater success with Rose Royce's "Car Wash" from the film of the same name. The song reached #1 on Billboard in 1977. Whitfield, like Ronald Isley and Dionne Warwick was a among a cadre of African-American artists who are constantly tormented by Internal Revenue Service. Whitfield left the music scene completely in
2000 primarily due to health concerns.

Pervis Jackson (1939 - 2008)

2008-10-18T06:40:00.000-07:00

Pervis Jackson, one of the original Spinners has passed away, a victim of cancer. Jackson was best known for providing the deep voice on tunes like "(They Just Can't Help It)Games People Play" This is the third death of a prominent member of this legendary Detroit group. Pervis Jackson is preceeded in death by Philippe Wynne and Billy Henderson. With a roster of stars that included The Four Tops, The Supremes, The Temptations, Smokey Robinson & The Miracles, Gladys Knight & The Pips and Rick James, The Spinners felt that they had been neglected for too long and that it was time for a change, so the group left Motown for Atlantic where they achieved world wide success with unforgettable songs like "One Of A Kind" "Rubberband Man" and "Then Came You". Before leaving Motown Stevie Wonder gave them their second top forty hit "It's A Shame" Between 1961 and 1995 The Spinners had 18 top forty hits, the biggest of all were "Then Came You" recorded with Dionne Warwick, reaching #1 in 1974, "Working My Way Back To You" and "Rubberband Man" both reaching the #2 spot in 1976 and 1980.

Al Wilson (1939 - 2008)

2008-10-17T22:58:00.000-07:00

In the year 2008 many R&B standouts have died, one of them was Meridan, Mississippi soul singer Al Wilson. From 1968 to 1976 Wilson had several top
40 hits which included "The Snake", "La La Peace Song", "Touch And Go" and
"I've Got A Feeling (We'll Be Seeing Each Other Again), but the biggest of
them all was the 1973 release "Show and Tell" which reached #1 on the Billboard
chart. Wilson along with The 5th Dimension were two of the first acts signed
by 60s rocker Johnny Rivers.

A reply to Anonymous

2008-10-12T12:13:00.000-07:00

There have been several people who have replied to a posting on this blog using the name "Anonymous" , one in particular replied to my article "Republican Apparel Ad: A Surprise to " because I expressed my outrage at having a conservative ad on a progressive blog. That particular "anonymous" knows who he or she was and this is my reply.....
"Does it bother you that I know the truth? There is not ONE thing I wrote in the article that cannot be verified, and you know it. I love this country. My objective is to save it from avaricious, fear-mongering imbecilic a------- like you.
You seem to be lacking the courage to mention your name "anonymous". I am not surprised.

Hannity Exposed as Fraud

2008-10-09T05:19:00.001-07:00

I have never seen Sean Hannity look more totally insignificant. Hannity has been extremely critical of Barack Obama because he associated with a radical bomber with regard to a charity. The more Hannity squealed about how he was not an anti-semite
Robert Gibbs pointed out that he gave an audience to a known anti-semite thereby exposing Hannity as a hypocrit. It's wrong when Obama casually communicates with Ayers, but it's ok for Hannity via his show give an audience to a bigot.

more about "Hannity Exposed as Fraud", posted with vodpod

Obama Is Right: McCain Was Wrong

2008-09-30T22:41:00.001-07:00

Final verdict: Obama 1, McCain 0

more about "Obama Is Right: McCain Was Wrong", posted with vodpod

Paul Newman 1925 - 2008

2008-09-27T11:36:00.000-07:00

Paul Newman, who succumbed to lung cancer at the age of 83 will not only be remembered as a fine actor but also as a great humanitarian. The multi-Oscar award actor starred in an array of unforgettable films like "The Sting" "Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid" "Exodus" and "Cool Hand Luke" but also spent a great deal of time helping those who are less fortunate. Through his "Newman's Own" food brand he earned over 250,000 that was donated to charity. He also played an active role in raising funds for refugees all over the world through the International Rescue Committee. Mr. Newman lead an exemplary life making him a role model for all.

Diebold Coverup, Says SAIC Report And Stephen Spoonamore

2008-08-30T04:50:00.001-07:00

more about "Diebold Coverup, Says SAIC Report And...", posted with vodpod

Olbermann spanks O'Reilly

2008-08-26T05:31:00.001-07:00

Bill O'Reilly, like all of us makes mistakes, but when it has been proven that you have make a mistake the right thing to do is to admit to the mistake and apologize. Here we have a case where O'Reilly makes a horrendous mistake and not only does he not admit to it, he REPEATS and defends it. The FOX network through it all continues to defend O'Reilly by claiming that he said "Normandy" instead of "Malmedy" This event shows that O'Reilly and the FOX network are morally challenged.

more about "Olbermann spanks O'Reilly", posted with vodpod

CNN Talks With McCain About His Role In Keating Five Scandal

2008-08-25T07:41:00.001-07:00

more about "CNN Talks With McCain About His Role ...", posted with vodpod

American Prayer

2008-08-23T07:56:00.001-07:00

more about "American Prayer", posted with vodpod

A New and Different China

2008-08-20T05:37:00.000-07:00

I am to put it mildly surprised at the image the current Chinese government is portraying to the world. It seems to be a blatant contradiction that China was chosen to be the host of the Olympics, an activity designed to promote world peace through friendly sport competition. The racist action of denying blacks and Mongolians entry to bars and restaurants only scratches the surface. China is assisting the government of Sudan in its genocide of the people of Darfur. Chinese projects in Sudan could be could be stopped if the Chinese government would express its disdain for the outright murder of innocent people. The Chinese government says "nothing" because it apparently sees nothing wrong with genocide. There is also the issue of Tibet, which China continues to make a colony, denying its residents freedom of expression.
I remember a very different China. A nation whose leadership opposed racism and financially supported world-wide movements that were progressive in nature. During the apartheid era
China could be counted on to supply weapons to South African liberation movements. I remember a China that emphasized educating its young about the history of western capitalistic exploitation and the significance of the Opium wars and the Boxer Rebellion. Today China itself is acting like those dreaded imperialists of that era.
It is ironic that the Chinese themselves were victims of racism when the Spanish athletes made the outrageous gesture of slanting their eyes in a group photo. The outlandish riots that continue to happen at European soccer stadiums as a result of alcohol consumption must have escaped the attention of the Chinese government. These events involved whites.
Because of the incompetence of the Bush administration there is very little that the United States can tell China about its racism or its exploitation of Tibet because if China demanded all the money the US has borrowed it would devastate the US economy. The main explanation given for the blockade and continued policy of not having diplomatic relations with Cuba has been "We don't do business with Communist countries" It just so happens that China still considers itself a Communist country, but the US government is making an exception because greedy multinationals see the one billion plus population as customers for their products.
As a person of African descent when I first heard of Blacks being prohibited from Chinese bars and restaurants my first reaction was to hope that all those of African descent who were participating the Olympics leave China. This would really show the Chinese government a financial consequence of racism. But after seriously thinking about it, maybe this is a bit impractical when one considers the sacrifice athletes have made to participate in this event which is a once in a lifetime opportunity. Something that can be done is to confront every Chinese official that comes to the US with this issue. It should be made the main topic of conversation everywhere. This cannot be forgotten.

Why I support the MoveOn.org protect the vote movement

2008-08-14T04:44:00.000-07:00

I get really upset when I hear pundits explain the reasons why Democrats lost the 2000 and 2004 elections. At the time the DLC was promoting a "benign neglect" policy that would attract more southern white male voters. (I wonder if they are still promoting that campaign now?). The so-called experts will give you a plethora of explanations ranging from the strength of the religious right (especially the evangelicals) to the need for tax relief. The truth of the matter and the issue that the majority of Republicans and DEMOCRATS refuse to admit is that the 2000 and 2004 elections were STOLEN. According to Greg Palast (British news anchor, journalist) the mechanisms to steal the 2008 elections are already in place. Black voters( and other minorities)were disenfranchised by defective voting machines and caging. We continue to be told that the Obama/McCain race is so close. That just makes it easier to steal. That's what we were told in the Bush/Kerry and Bush/Gore presidential elections: it was just soooooooooooooo close!
We need a paper trail! It is the only way that we can be assured of an honest election. This is why I support the MoveOn.org effort for an honest '08 election and you should too.

Voting Machines: Momentum for Paper RecordsMoveOn members wearing “Got Paper? Got Audits?” T-shirts packed a recent voting machines hearing in Congress, spurring many elected representatives to speak up for voter-verified paper records. Phone calls from MoveOn members nationwide are convincing more and more members of Congress to get behind the bill requiring paper records—bringing the total to over 200 co-sponsors! Sign the Petition » Election reform campaigns »

S-A-G-G-I-N ?????

2008-08-11T18:47:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I received this message from my cousin in California, who suggested that I pass it on. Barack Obama as Bill Cosby before him received a lot of criticism from segments of the black community for making similar statements. There are many out there in the black community who feel that wearing baggy pants, showing your underwear and using foul language is part of
"our" culture and that they are just "keeping it real" At the same time there are those in the Black community who have a totally different perpective on this dysfunctional behavior, but their voices are seldom heard in print or in the media.

Letter from a college student – Sent by Carl Walker:

The other day, a friend of mine visited me in the lobby of my dorm just to chat while her laundry was drying. As we were chatting, two young freshmen came by. One of the boys wanted to 'talk' to my friend (as in date). She asked him how old they were, and both of the boys replied 18.
My friend and I both laughed hysterically because we are both 22 years old. After my friend left, the young men were still hanging around and one wanted to know how he could gain her interest. The first thing I told him to do was to pull up his pants! He asked why, and then said he liked saggin' his pants. I told him to come over to my computer and spell the word saggin'. Then I told him to write the word saggin ' backwards.
S-A-G-G-I-N
N-I-G- G-A-S
I told him the origin of that look was from centuries ago. It was the intent of slave owners to demoralize the field workers by forbidding them to wear a belt as they worked in the fields or at any other rigorous job. In addition, men in prison wore their pants low when they were 'spoken for'. The other reason their pants looked like that was they were not allowed to have belts because prisoners were likely to try to commit suicide. And, saggin' pants prevents you from running.
We as young Black people have to be the ones to effect change. We are dying. The media has made a mockery of the Black American. Even our brothers and sisters from Africa don't take us seriously. Something as simple as pulling up your pants and standing with your head held high could make the biggest difference in the world's perception of us. It is time to do right by ourselves. We need to love and embrace each other. No one is going to do that for us.
It all comes down to perception. What people perceive is what is reality to them. We have to change not only the media's perception of us, but we need to change our perception of ourselves. Remember all eyes are on you Black Man. All eyes are on you Black Woman. All eyes are on your Black Child. People point the finger at us and expect us to engage in negative and illegal activities, to manifest loud, boisterous behavior, to spend our hard earned money in their stores, buying goods we don't need, or really want. We have allowed not only the media, but also the government and the world to portray us as a 'sub-culture.' They have stripped our culture down to the point where the image of Black people is perpetuated as rappers, athletes, drug users, and consumers of junk food, expensive tennis shoes, expensive cars, expensive TVs, cell phones and not investing in homes for our families.
We are so much more!!!!!!!

Isaac Hayes (1942-2008)

2008-08-11T18:08:00.000-07:00

It is with great sadness that this site acknowledges the passing of the versatile artist Isaac Hayes, who was an accomplished singer, composer, actor and radio personality. Hayes came from humble beginnings in Covington, Tennessee to stardom in Hollywood. Hayes, along with his partner David Porter played a vital role in the meteoric rise of Stax records in the early 60s. Hayes and Porter penned almost all of the Sam & Dave hits: "Soul Man", "I Thank You", "When Something Is Wrong With My Baby", "Hold On, I'm Coming", "You Don't Know Like I Know" This duo also gave The Emotions their first big hit "So I Can Love Him". Lou Rawls had one of his biggest hits "Your Good Thing (Is About To End)" due to the efforts of the Hayes-Porter duo, as did Linda Clifford (Red Light).
In the 70's Hayes stepped up to the mike. His initial album wasn't a commercial success, but the second one(Hot Buttered Soul), which included a reworking of Jimmy Webb's immortal hit "By The Time I Get To Phoenix" went platinum. This was followed by even bigger success. Hayes composed the soundtrack for the motion picture Shaft. The Theme from Shaft earned Hayes Grammys and an Oscar. After a long hiatus in 1980 Hayes revived his career as a singer with his redition of the Jesse Stone classic "Don't Let Go" Later Hayes became a huge success playing the role of Chef in Comedy Central's South Park. He left that show because it lampooned his religion (Scientology). Hayes then went to New York City, where he successfully entered the world of morning radio.

The Race Card and Other Falsehoods - Part Two

2008-08-03T20:28:00.000-07:00

I really want Mr. McCain's representative to read this article that appeared in the Pensito Review and then ask himself who is REALLY injecting race into the presidential race. It appears as if Mr. McCain was caught with his hand in the cookie jar and can't give any comprehensible explanation.

Black Reporter Removed by McCain Security in Florida; Whites Allowed to Stay
Trish Aug. 3, 2008
The McCain team swears that race was not an issue when a senior reporter from the Tallahassee Democrat was ejected from a campaign rally in Panama City but they can’t supply an alternate explanation.
Newspaper’s executive editor: “We’re deeply concerned and disturbed that our reporter — of all of those in that area — was asked to move. My understanding is that Stephen was the only reporter approached and asked to leave, and the only reporter in that area who is black
[Stephen] Price was among at least three other reporters, and the only black reporter, surrounding McCain’s campaign bus — Gov. Charlie Crist and his fiancee, Carole Rome, were already aboard — when a member of the Arizona senator’s security detail asked the reporter to identify himself. Price had shown his media credentials to enter the area.
Price showed his employee identification as well as his credentials for the Friday event.
“I explained I was with the state press, but the Secret Service man said that didn’t matter and that I would have to go,” Price said.
The big question is, what if anything had Price done to earn his removal?
Tallahassee Democrat Executive Editor Bob Gabordi said the incident was unwarranted.
“We’re deeply concerned and disturbed that our reporter — of all of those in that area — was asked to move,” Gabordi said. “My understanding is that Stephen was the only reporter approached and asked to leave the area, and the only reporter in that area who is black. Another reporter who stood up for Stephen was then asked to leave.”
The McCain team denies Price was removed because he is African-American.
“Access to the senator is tightly controlled,” [McCain advance man Jonathan] Block said. “I would first express regret that your reporter was moved, and I can tell you beyond a shadow of a doubt that race had nothing to do with it.”
And that’s supposed to settle it?

The Race Card and other falsehoods

2008-08-01T04:54:00.000-07:00

This "catchy" phrase, a favorite with conservatives is frequently used when one doesn't want to acknowledge the existence of racial inequality. They look at it as an "excuse". This tactic raised it's ugly head again yesterday when a Mr. Wise, a McCain operative accused Mr. Obama of injecting "race" into the campaign when he said that he didn't look like any of the presidents on dollar bills. The media had a field day with this one. It was the talk of the pundits and given ample print in almost every major US newspaper. The fact of the matter is that Obama, could have been mentioning his youth, or his attire, or even his hairstyle. A "whining" Mr. Wise came to the conclusion that it could ONLY mean race. With the serious issues that presidential candidates are confronted with in this campaign it seems incongruous that this is the "issue?" that gets all the coverage.
Once again the Republican/Swiftboat/Atwater-Rove school has injected itself in yet another political campaign. I am certain that John McCain has never said anything that could be considered racist, (even with that "gorilla" joke he made a while back, I am still willing to give him the benefit of the doubt), but he doesn't have to, his operatives are doing that for him. Rarely have I seen him refute these caustic statements. Obama has had a simple fist bump be reported as a terrorist ritual. He has had his wife characterized as a participant in a hate whitey rally. He has had reporters publicly say that they wished he were dead.He
been held responsible for statements made by his pastor and by the rapper Ludicris. McCain on the other hand is given a free pass when it comes to his connections to the religious bigot John Hagee and his connections to Bob Jones University (that has displayed numerous examples of intolerence). McCain is a man who has changed his positions on so many issues, yet the press doesn't pin that "flip-flop" tag on him the way they did John Kerry. McCain was against torture, now he is for it. McCain was in favor of a woman's right to choose, now he is against it. McCain was for affirmative action, now he is against it.
Obama brushed aside Mr. Wise's comments by just saying that McCain is taking the "low road". This is true but he has to realize that the U.S. public is greatly influenced by what they see on television and what they see in print. The so-called "low road" can play a vital role to the road to victory. Look at what happened to Harold Ford Jr. (an African-American) in Tennessee. All these ethically challenged Republican operatives had to do was have a beautiful young blond say that she wanted to see Ford again. Ford was leading before that promotion hit the TV screen. The late racist senator from North Carolina Jesse Helms used a similar tactic in his campaign against another African-American opponent. His tv spots claimed that qualified white people were losing their jobs because of minorities. Nothing could have been further from the truth. There were no statistics that could verify this statement, yet Helms won.
Obama is making a serious mistake if he just lets this one go. John Kerry, like John McCain is a decorated war hero. In fact, I believe his heroics were even more substantial because his actions saved the lives of U.S. soldiers. The swiftboaters said that he was not a hero and implied that some of his wounds may have been self-inflicted. George Bush never said this, but he didn't have to, he had the swiftboaters to say it for him. Every time a McCain operative makes an outrageous statement Obama should deal with him or her immediately. Obama had to apologize for the statements of Rev. Wright, but McCain didn't have to apologize for the statements of
Rev. Hagee. Obama had to retract statements make about the working class people of Pennsylvania and even after doing so he still lost the state in the primary. Obama is going to have to realize that the Republicans have a history of fighting dirty and if he wants to win besides confronting electoral skullduggery he is also going to have to take the gloves off because the press is solidy behind McCain.

The Threat of Martial Law - Part Two

2008-07-27T18:09:00.000-07:00

Greg Palast showed the world how the 2000 and 2004 elections were stolen, mainly due to the chicanery of "caging" against the African-American community. The media underreported or didn't report the activities Katherine Graham, Jeb Bush and J. Kenneth Blackwell. The majority of television viewers across the nation did not see any coverage, so as a result they sincerely believe it didn't happen. Greg Palast also warned that the 2008 presidential campaign will also be stolen, unless there is a landslide Democratic turnout at the polls. Palast states that for all intents and purposes the '08 elections are already stolen. The pundits, regardless of network affilation continue to say "Obama is leading McCain, but by a close margin, 46% to 44%, why is it so close?" More than likely Obama is leading by a wider margin, but network news want to make it close so that when the fix is in, they can always say "McCain won a close race" "We told you it was close all along."
It has always been my belief that this is the scenario for 2008 (See "The Threat of Martial Law" on this site.) As I have said on previous occasions I hope that I am wrong about this one, but I feel that if this rogue element can topple foreign governments, why can't they do it here? The "true" rulers of this country really don't care about what happens to the rest of us. In my view the ones who really rule are the heads of corporate America. They are the ones who buy senators and congresspersons to execute their policy. According to ABC News, the Internal Revenue was "unable' to collect 1.6 billion dollars in tax revenue from these major corporations. CEO's salaries are at an all time high. These people have no sense of true patriotism. They make their money and they send it to a tax shelter haven out of the United States.
So many people tell me that there could NEVER be a coup in the United States because the people would NEVER allow it, to which I respond "Do you really think the leaders of Corporate America give a damn about what people think? They already have their own private armies (I am not even mentioning Blackwater) and the capacity to incarcerate huge numbers of people. Prison construction in the US is also at an all time high and massive incarceration has become a very lucrative business. Under the reign of the infamous Bush administration the oil industry, big pharma and the insurance industry have taken the American people to the cleaners big time. They have a very strong ally..........the apathetic U.S. Citizen, the one who doesn't vote, the one who is willing to do whatever he or she is told by a pastor who has his or her own agenda (which really doesn't adhere to biblical principles), the one whose idea of "news" is invading the private lives of movie stars. These same people are losing their jobs in record numbers and they are losing their sons and daughters in a war that was built on a lie. The trillions that have been spent on the war have put our grandchildren and great grandchildren in debt. This debt is owed primarily to Saudi Arabia and China. Yes, there are some people who are waking up. George W. Bush's popularity is STILL under 30%, but the problem is ....it may be too late.

An Open Letter to Fox News

2008-06-15T05:13:00.000-07:00

I am angered by the recent remarks by Fox media pundits. It is one thing to firmly support a point of view, but its totally different to deliberately and vindictively distort the image of a political adversary with total disregard for the truth. As you probably know by now your "racist" comments against Michelle Obama have not gone unnoticed. Besides Ms. Hill's outrageous fist bump comment, Liz Trotter's declaration of wishing Barack Obama dead hasn't gone unnoticed either, nor has Michelle Malkin's racist "Baby Mama" comment. I want you to imagine a national boycott of your sponsors' products by African-Americans. Your sponsors make a significant amount of money from Black America. One major lesson that Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks taught us was that corporate America understands the bottom line. This is why apartheid died in South Africa and segregation on Montgomery busses ended. The Michael Savage show has lost major sponsors due to reaction to several outrageous statements he made. I know that you probably think that you are "immune" but I am sure that you can be shown that you are not. Sure, the political thought of African-Americans is not monolithic, but there are enough of us out there to make a difference. We are not going to be publicly humiliated by racially motivated innuendo. I think a REAL apology is in order.
-Claude Chaney

The Year in Review, 2007 Person of the Year: Barack Obama

2008-02-22T14:12:00.000-08:00

Barack Obama is chosen as the "Person of The Year" for 2007 merely because he has come so far in such a relatively short period of time. He has proven himself to be a master organizer who has managed to raise more funds than any other presidential candidate in either party through the small donation of 20 or 30 dollars. The miracle of his campaign is that he has not made an issue of being the only serious African-American candidate. As a result he is appealing to all Democrats regardless of race , winning primaries in states like Idaho, Iowa and Nebraska that have relatively small communities of African-Americans if any. He has connected with the youth of the United States, promising them something "new" On various occasions I have heard his opponents (McCain, Bloomberg, Clinton) say you can't become President with so called "happy talk" but to this point he is proving them wrong. The same detractors point to his "lack of experience" but the public is well aware of the senators and congresspersons who have little passed legislation to go along with their "experience". It is apparent that the country wants to go in another direction and people are not going continue the failed policies of the seasoned politicians of both parties who continue to extract funds that should be going towards education, health care and protecting the environment instead to a senseless, unjustified and unwinnable war.

The Threat of Martial Law

2008-02-22T07:07:00.000-08:00

The rising tide of suspicion over the events of 9/11 continue you to grow, yet you hear nothing about it mainstream media. The number of people who are aware of the PNAC (Project For A New American Century) also continues to grow and once again very little is mentioned about this revolutionary project that espouses the need for a catasthrophic event to rally the public behind the president in the same way that the people supported President Franklin Roosevelt after Pearl Harbor. Could the destruction the world trade center be just the kind of event the authors of the PNAC anticipated? Why did Tower #7 go down when it was never hit
by a plane? Why was twin tower custodian Willie Rodriguez prevented from giving testimony during the 9/11 hearings when he has been around the world telling interested parties that there were a series of explosions that took place prior to the plane hitting the enormous structure? Why was our sky security system (N.O.R.A.D) down and ineffective for the very first time? (VP Richard Cheney was the man in charge). Who was in charge of overall security of the World Trade Center on that fateful date 9/11, it was none other than President George Bush's younger brother. All the these facts have been ignored or at best underreported by the major news outlets. This could only lead to the conclusion of collusion. They would much rather bombard us with the trials and trivails of Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan and Britney Spears.
This all leads to the strong possibility of martial law if President Bush decides he just doesn't want to leave office. There are many influencial conservative minded individuals who have made a long term investment in Iraq and I believe they have little regard for the wishes of the people of The United States who oppose the war. If John McCain is "elected" president it will not cause this group of people concern because it is painfully obvious that McCain will follow the same policies of Bush. Why would anyone do this knowing that Bush's popularity ratings are in the toilet hovering at around 28%? If either Clinton or Obama is the new president this will cause great concern for this power elite that wholeheartedly supports this war. It is very likely that they will demand that a "State of Emergency" be invoked and the war will continue. There are those who continue to say "Oh no, that's ridiculous, this is the USA, something of that nature would never happen here" To those people I would say "You probably would have said the same thing years ago if you were told that the day would come when all of our telephone conversations would be monitored too" The vast majority of USA citizens in my opinion are uninformed and it seems as if they don't want to think for themselves. This is the reason why we have millions of God fearing people who are following false religious zealots. The lemmings will find their way to the polls every election day without ever realizing they are voting against their own self interests.
There was another 9/11, the one in 1973 when people in Chile also thought "It would NEVER happen here" Well it did happen there and thousands of people were herded into stadiums and murdered because they opposed the policies of the US installed dictator Augusto Pinochet. In order to prevent something like this from happening the people of the United States must be proactive and not reactive. If nothing is done by the next election day it will already be too late. Just look at what Pervez Musharef did in Pakistan, what is there to prevent the Bush/Cheney cabal from doing the same thing here? I hope that I am wrong about this very real threat of martial law in the United States, but I don't think so.

Republican New Hampshire Legislator Wants Bush and Cheney Impeached and Prosecuted by Dan Dewalt (http://afterdowningstreet.org/node/31214)

2008-02-21T05:34:00.000-08:00

In a packed hearing room on Feb 19th, under a carved wooden sign reading "Live Free or Die", the New Hampshire House committee of State-Federal Relations and Veterans' Affairs heard testimony on Representative Betty Hall's HR 24, which calls on the U.S. Congress to begin impeachment hearings for George W. Bush and Dick Cheney.
What was most notable about the four straight hours of testimony was not that opponents of the resolution could only muster two people willing to testify against it, both Republican stalwarts using selected excerpts from Jefferson's parliamentary manual or from the bill itself, whose arguments were embarrassingly empty.
It was not that Kris Roberts, the committee chair, had taken this hearing seriously enough to have researched the law, history and nuances of the subject, and that he used this to inform the proceedings in a reasonably fair manner.
It was not the fact that after the hearing ended, several pro-impeachment witnesses were approached by committee members and thanked for their clarity and useful testimony.
It was not even the novelty of the interjections by one committee member that would periodically steer the conversation abruptly into Rockefeller/Trilateral Commission territory.
The most remarkable moment came late in the afternoon when Republican House member Steve Vaillancourt strode into the room to testify. After passing out copies of the second chapter of Patrick Buchanan's "Day of Reckoning" as supporting evidence, Vaillancourt opened his remarks quoting "fools rush in where wise men fear to tread", and it sounded like a set up to condemn a rush to impeach. But instead he said that Betty Hall is neither fool nor wise man, but is a model of courage and that her impeachment resolution should be supported.
And then the fun began.
Member Vaillancourt then gave a short history lesson, telling the committee that until Bush/Cheney, America had never engaged in an offensive war [sic.], and pointing out that the Truman, Eisenhower. Kennedy and Reagan "Doctrines" had all been based on defense and had not been offensive in nature. Warming to the subject, he delved into the ramifications of Bush/Cheney's actions, saying that their reckless foreign policy has been anti-American, unconstitutional, and ruinously costly to the nation.
He was fairly thundering by the time that he pronounced that not only should Bush and Cheney be impeached, but also they should be tried as war criminals in a Nuremburg style trial for crimes against humanity. He flatly stated that the war in Iraq has provided grounds for war crimes charges against the President and Vice President. And there was not one word of protest from a single committee member. They may or may not support this resolution to impeach, but there seems to be no one left with a credible argument to defend Bush/Cheney.
Vaillancourt said that he spoke not as a Republican, a New Hampshire citizen or an American, but as a member of humanity. His remarks made a common sense plea for an honest appraisal of our current political situation, for the acknowledgement that we have a duty to act as a decent and responsible people, and that principle be the governing factor of our government's actions. These are all values that should, and once did, cut across party lines. If the current political parties have forgotten this, and become so degraded as to allow the lawlessness and criminality of this administration to go unchecked, the people have not.
And at that hearing the people had their chance to speak. One member of the committee remarked that she had never before seen such a wide range of viewpoints as represented by the witnesses, to be so united on one issue.
After deliberation the next day, loyalty to party leadership proved a stronger pull than reasoned argument, for five committee members voted to recommend the bill, with eleven voting against. Now facing an uphill battle to get it passed in a full House vote in March, Betty Hall was still encouraged by the committee hearing and vote. She has received much more support for this resolution than she did with a similar effort last year, and is already working to get grass roots supporters out between now and the vote to get their legislators' attention.
If the grass roots continue to pour out as they did on Tuesday, and if there were a few more politicians like Steve Vaillancourt and Betty Hall, we might see things begin to change. It's instructive to remember that some politicians who are now leading the charge for impeachment did not want to talk about it only a few short months ago. The spotlight is now on the New Hampshire House, the third largest deliberative body on the planet, and arguably one of the more democratic representative systems anywhere as well. These representatives may listen to an outsider's viewpoint on what to do about the Constitution, but they will be influenced most by the neighbors whom they represent.
The question is, is New Hampshire angry enough and organized enough to convince the legislature to call for impeachment? For those outside of New Hampshire the question is, how can we raise the temperature everywhere else, making it all the more plausible that the Granite State will reach the boiling point.

Why No Child Left Behind Should Be Scrapped by Anthony Cody

2008-01-06T15:54:00.000-08:00

America’s schools have fallen into a giant trap. This trap is epic in its dimensions, because the people capable of leading us out of it have been silenced, and the initiative that could help us is being systematically squashed.Policymakers and the public have been seduced by a simple formulation. No Child Left Behind posits that we have troubled schools because they have not been accountable. If we make teachers and schools pay a price for the failure of their students, they will bring those students up to speed.
But schools are NOT the only factor determining student success. Urban neighborhoods are plagued by poverty and violence and recent reports in The Chronicle show that as many as 30 percent of the children in these neighborhoods suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder. Fully 40 percent of our students are English learners, but these students must take the same tests as native English speakers. Moreover, a recent study provides strong evidence that family-based factors such as the quality of day care, the home vocabulary and the amount of time spent reading and watching television at home account for two-thirds of the difference in academic success for students. Nonetheless, NCLB holds only the schools accountable.
Teachers are realizing that this is a raw deal. We can’t single-handedly solve these problems, and we can’t bring 100 percent of our students to proficiency in the next six years, no matter how “accountable” the law makes us, and no matter the punishments it metes out. But if we speak up to point out the injustice and unreasonableness of the demands on our schools, we are shouted down, accused of making excuses for ourselves and not having high expectations for our students. Thus, teachers have been silenced, our expertise squandered.
The fatal flaw of NCLB was that it assumed that teachers were obstacles to change; that we had to be coerced to set higher standards for ourselves and our students. As a result we have state-mandated standards, standardized tests - even scripted curriculum to tell us what to say in class. All of this has demoralized teachers by making us into the problem, rather than a big part of the solution.
But educators have not been completely immobilized. We have been learning in spite of the hostile conditions, and have discovered that:
– Although student success is heavily influenced by other factors, an effective teacher can make a huge difference.
– Teachers who are able to skillfully assess student learning on a daily basis can promote rapid growth by giving timely feedback and tailoring instruction to meet students’ needs.
– Teachers who collaborate together to develop common assessments and share techniques can build powerful learning communities that allow them to push their students to make great gains.
– Teachers are capable of developing assessments that reflect the values and skills desired by their local communities - and this yields a much higher level of student and teacher engagement, as can be seen in Nebraska ( www.nde.state.ne.us/focusstars/ index.htm).
– Teachers must be deeply involved in educational policy decisions - without our insights and support, policies on paper will not translate into real-world solutions.
While the recent proposed revisions of NCLB contained some improvements, the law remains fundamentally flawed, and does not deserve to be reauthorized. We need to step back and create a new vision of accountability - from the classroom up. Teachers are willing to be accountable for making a difference - that is why we entered this profession. But we must have reasonable goals that reflect the realities we face. We need to be given a much bigger role in designing the measures by which our students and schools are judged, and we must have the conditions and resources in our schools that allow for the high quality collaboration we need to succeed.
When we are asked to lead, we will be ready to help show the way. We are still teachers, after all.
Anthony Cody, a member of the Teacher Leaders Network, is a National Board certified teacher who works as a science coach with the Oakland Unified School District.
This article originally appeared in the January 6, 2008 issue of THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE

2007: The Year in Review (Census)

2008-01-01T17:19:00.000-08:00

Billy Henderson (Spinners), Tom Poston, Joey Bishop,
Deborah Kerr, Ike Turner, Phil Rizzuto, Evel Kneivel, Lady Bird Johnson, Norman Mailer,
Luciano Pavarotti, Bill Pinckney (Drifters), Beverly Sills, Marcel Marceau, Kurt Vonnegut,
Dan Fogelberg, Eddie Robinson, Joe Hunter (Funk Brothers), Molly Ivins, Pookie Hudson
(Spaniels), Denny Doherty (Mamas & Papas), Anna Nicole Smith, Calver DeForest,
Wally Schirra, Sean Taylor, Charles Nelson Reilly, Dick Wilson (Mr. Whipple), Porter Wagoner,
Julia Carson, Jack Valenti, Sidney Sheldon, Brooke Astor, Art Buchwald, Robert Goulet,
Yvonne DeCarlo, Don Ho, Arthur Schlesinger, Tom Snyder, Jane Wyman, Thomas Eagleton.

2007: The Year In Review (Politics)

2008-01-01T16:46:00.000-08:00

Because of a myriad of time consuming obligations, health concerns and unforseen circumstances this blog remained dormant for most of 2007. For the new year I will
try my best to resurrect it. Since December of 2004 I developed a small but vibrant
following that was lost due to a complete lack of production. Unlike the previous years
I will not be writing the "Year in Review" post. Robert Weissman and Medea Benjamin
have written two excellent "End of the year" summations for www.commondreams.org
which can be read below.

Victories in 2007 by Robert Weissman

2008-01-01T16:44:00.000-08:00

It’s easy enough to recount what went wrong in 2007.
But it wasn’t all bad. Not only did grassroots movements and citizen campaigns — and sometimes governments responsive to public demands — defeat and resist countless corporate power grabs, they won some vitally important, affirmative victories.
Like every new year, 2008 offers renewed hope, and the chance for new beginnings. There really were some important gains in 2007 that suggest countervailing forces to concentrated corporate power are on the rise.
The following list of 10 victories from 2007 doesn’t claim to be all-inclusive. And almost all of the victories are partial and inchoate. Whether they blossom into fuller achievements will depend on what happens in 2008 and beyond. Have ideas for victories that should be added to this list? Send me a note (rob@essential.org) or post a comment on the blog.
1. Cultural Change on Global Warming
There were numerous small steps forward to meet the greatest challenge of our day, including in the biggest carbon polluting country, the United States. The U.S. House of Representatives passed a respectable energy bill; the ultimately adopted energy bill will modestly improve energy efficiency in the United States. Many U.S. states are doing much more, most importantly requiring electric utilities to source an increasing amount of their energy from renewable supplies. The Sierra Club and grassroots groups have combined to defeat dozens of coal-fired power plant proposals. The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, held in Bali in December ended with a fizzle, thanks largely to U.S. intransigence, but even at Bali, there was agreement that climate change is a real threat.
This last point is probably the main achievement of 2007. There is now no serious argument about the reality of climate change and the need for action. Going forward, the challenge is to generate the political will for meaningful carbon emission cuts, immediately and for the long-term.
2. Bank of the South
Latin American countries joined together to launch the Bank of the South, an effort to create an alternative to the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Latin American countries — not just Venezuela — are making contributions to the new institution, which will then make project loans, especially for initiatives to facilitate regional integration.
Says Mark Weisbrot of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, “Politically, the new bank is another Declaration of Independence for South America, which as a result of epoch-making changes in the last few years is now more independent of the United States than Europe is.”
3. Treatment for People with HIV/AIDS
Somewhere between 2.5 million and 3 million people with HIV/AIDS in developing countries are now receiving life-saving antiretroviral treatment. This was only possible because of campaigns by people with HIV/AIDS in developing countries and their allies in rich countries. First, activist campaigns and speeded-up generic competition brought down the price for life-saving drugs from more than $10,000 a year per person to, in some cases, less than $100 per person. Then, campaigners successfully demanded aid money be made available to save lives.
Treatment coverage is only around a quarter to a third of need, and global need will grow dramatically in coming years. More international and developing country funding will be needed, and there will be ongoing disputes over patent and pharmaceutical issues. But significant progress is underway.
4. Thailand and Brazil Face Down Big Pharma
In January, Thailand issued compulsory licenses — an authorization for generic competition for products that remain on patent — for two medicines. This followed a prior compulsory license in December 2006. The resulting lowered prices on the medicines enabled Thailand to expand treatment significantly in its public health system — the cost of a heart disease drug fell by 98 percent, and just the initial price drop on an AIDS drug enabled the country to provide the medicine to an additional 20,000 people.
Brazil followed Thailand’s example in May, issuing its own compulsory license on an important AIDS medicine.
The compulsory licenses led drug companies to lower prices on key AIDS drugs around the world. Abbott Laboratories lowered its middle-income country price on a vital AIDS drug by 55 percent.
5. The Billionaire’s Tax Loophole Comes Under Scrutiny
2007 saw new attention focused on the incomes of super-rich private equity and hedge fund managers in the United States — and the stunning fact that they exploit a tax loophole to lower their tax rates to less than that of their secretaries.
The “carried interest” loophole lets private equity and hedge fund managers characterize a big portion of their management fees — their cut of the very high profits they make for investors — as capital gains income, instead of ordinary income. That means they can pay federal taxes at a 15 percent rate, instead of 35 percent.
The House of Representatives passed legislation to eliminate the loophole, but it failed in the Senate.
The issue won’t be going away, however. Says Damon Silvers of the AFL-CIO, “It’s finally dawned on people that the richest Americans aren’t paying any taxes.”
6. The U.S. Minimum Wage Goes Up
It’s still a long way from where it should be, but popular support for raising the minimum wage forced Senate Republicans to accede in May to a minimum wage rate hike.
The lowest paid workers in the United States (not counting farm workers and others exempted) will earn $7.25 in 2009. Roughly 13 million workers are expected to see their wages rise as a result.
7. McDonald’s Agrees to Pay Tomato Pickers More
McDonald’s in April agreed to pay a penny a pound more for the tomatoes it uses, with the extra money going directly to Florida farmworkers.
McDonald’s agreed to the arrangement in response to a farmworker campaign coordinated by the Coalition of Immokalee Workers. The coalition had earlier won a similar victory against Taco Bell.
Farmworkers earn about $10,000 a year. If the entire industry went along with the penny-a-pound arrangement, farmworker wages would rise by about 75 percent.
Unfortunately, an intransigent Florida Tomato Growers Exchange is refusing to implement the McDonald’s accord, fatuously claiming that it would violate unnamed federal and state rules. McDonald’s is placing its extra payments in escrow.
Meanwhile, the Coalition of Immokalee Workers is now focusing on Burger King, which is largely owned by Goldman Sachs and other private equity operations. They continue to reject the penny-a-pound demand — which would cost Burger King as estimated $250,000 a year.
8. School Fees Phased Out
For decades, the World Bank and other international agencies instructed developing countries to impose educational and health user fees — charges to go to school, or get access to care. The result: poor children (especially girls) were locked out of school, and sick people from poor families were denied healthcare.
Healthcare fees remain widespread, but primary school fees are finally being phased out throughout many of the world’s poorest countries, in part due to 2000 U.S. legislation requiring the United States to oppose World Bank loans that include user fees.
Primary school enrollment increased by 36 percent in sub-Saharan Africa and 22 percent in South and West Asia between 1999 and 2005, according to UNESCO. “Much of this is due to the abolishment of primary school tuition fees in 14 countries,” says Global Action for Children. “This ground-breaking measure has leveled the playing field, allowing many of the world’s poorest children access to the school house door.”
9. White-Collar Drug Pushers Punished
In May, the maker of Oxycontin, a highly addictive painkiller, pled guilty to charges of misbranding its drug. Purdue Pharma will pay more than $600 million in connection with the guilty plea.
Oxycontin offers major benefits to cancer patients and others with chronic pain, but is prone to abuse. It is especially popular in Appalachia, where it is known as hillbilly heroin.
U.S. Attorney John Brownlee says that scores of people have died as a result of Oxycontin abuse. The federal case against Purdue charged its sales reps misled health providers — including non-specialists in pain management — about the addictive properties of Oxycontin.
Purdue, a privately held Connecticut-based company, launched a major effort to avoid prosecution, including employing Rudy Giuliani to meet with prosecutors and argue against filing of charges.
But Brownlee refused to back down, though he did make some concessions. He did agree not to charge company executives with felonies (three pled guilty to misdemeanors), and he agreed to accept a guilty plea from a Purdue subsidiary, leaving the parent free to continue selling the drug to Medicare and other federal programs. The government could have come down harder on “white-collar drug pushers,” says Dr. Sidney Wolfe of Public Citizen’s health Research Group.
10. The Bush Countdown Begins
Only 385 more days of the Bush regime.
Happy New Year!

Let's Toast to Ten Good Things About 2007 by Medea Benjamin

2008-01-01T16:33:00.001-08:00

As we close this year on the low of Congress giving Bush more billions for war, and the assassination of Benazir Bhutto in Pakistan, let’s remember some of the year’s gains that can revive our spirits for the New Year. Here are just ten.
1. With the exception of the White House, this has been a banner year for environmental consciousness and action. Al Gore and the scientists of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change won the Nobel Peace Prize. Green building and renewable energy have exploded. Congress passed the Green Jobs Act of 2007, authorizing $125 million for green job training. Over 700 U.S. mayors, representing 25 percent of the U.S. population, have signed a pledge to reduce greenhouse gases by 2012. Illinois became the 26th state to require that some of the state’s electricity come from renewable sources and Kansas became the first state to refuse a permit for a new coal-fired power plant for health and environmental reasons. That’s progress!
2. On the global environmental scene, the Bush dinosaurs were tackled head on. When the US delegation at the UN climate change conference in Bali tried to sabotage the negotiations, the delegate from tiny Papua New Guinea threw diplomatic niceties to the wind and said that if the U.S. couldn’t lead, it should get out of the way. Embarrassed by international and domestic outrage, the U.S. delegation buckled, and the way was cleared for adopting the “Bali road map.” Although it is a weak mandate, it lays the groundwork for a stronger climate agreement post-2012 when the first phase of the Kyoto Protocols ends.
3. Imagine living in a waste-free urban society? Well, it’s no longer a utopian dream but a well-thought-out plan for India’s state of Kerala. The plan to be “waste-free” within five years includes waste prevention, intensive re-use and recycling, composting, replacing unsustainable materials with sustainable ones, training people to produce these materials, and providing funds for setting up sustainably run businesses. The ground-breaking plan, spearheaded by a local grassroots movement, demonstrates how citizen groups can advance pioneering policies to heal the planet.
4. While the war in Iraq rages on, a new war was stopped. The specter of war with Iran loomed large throughout the year, with Washington accusing Iran of killing U.S . soldiers in Iraq and being a nuclear threat. Then in December came the National Intelligence Estimate showing that the Bush administration knew all along that Iran had shelved its nuclear weapons program in 2003. It exposed the Administration claims of an Iranian threat as unjustifiably inflated, and the winds of war were suddenly subdued. Nothing is guaranteed, but a U.S. military attack on Iran is less likely now than it was earlier in the year.
5. This year also brought a decrease in tensions with North Korea. Hostilities flared after North Korea successfully conducted a nuclear test in 2006. But the Bush administration, bogged down in Iraq and pushed by international pressure, agreed to negotiate. Following a series of six-party talks involving North Korea, South Korea, China, Russia, Japan, and the U.S, on March 17, 2007, an historic agreement was reached. North Korea agreed to shut down its main nuclear facility and submit a list of its nuclear programs in exchange for fuel and normalization talks with the U.S. and Japan. During this age of raw aggression, it is a welcome example of putting diplomacy first.
6. The Iraqi people have little to celebrate, but there was one important victory for the people this year. Remember how the Bush administration and Congress were insisting that the Iraqi Parliament pass a new oil law? Touted as a way to “share oil revenue among all Iraqis”, the oil law was really designed to transform the country’s currently nationalized oil system to one open to foreign corporate control. But opposition was fierce inside Iraq, especially from the nation’s oil worker unions. In a rare sign of independence from Washington and concern for domestic opinion, the Iraqi Parliament withstood intense U.S. pressure and refused to pass the oil law.
7. In early 2007, few Americans had heard of the private security company Blackwater. By year’s end, Blackwater had become infamous for the killing of civilians in Iraq. The radical privatization of our military to corporations like Blackwater that are accountable to no one was exposed for all to see. This frightening process is still well under way, with more private contractors in Iraq than soldiers, but at least the issue has now entered the public dialogue. And Blackwater has received such a black eye that it’s unlikely to get a new Iraq contract when the present one expires in May.
8. One victory on both the war and environmental fronts came in Australia, where Labor Party’s Kevin Rudd beat conservative John Howard to become Prime Minister. Howard was an enthusiastic backer of George Bush’s disastrous war on terror, from defending the Guantánamo prison and extraordinary rendition to sending troops to Iraq and Afghanistan. Howard also joined Bush in refusing to ratify the Kyoto Agreement, arguing it would cost Australians jobs. After assuming office on December 3, Kevin Rudd immediately signed the Kyoto agreement and he has promised to remove Australia’s combat troops from Iraq by mid-2008.
9. Sometimes a loss is a win. Hugo Chavez had initiated a constitutional referendum that would have, among other changes, scrapped term limits. His immediate acceptance of a razor-thin margin of defeat before all the votes were even counted showed his democratic colors and made it a lot harder for Bush and the corporate media to label him a dictator. Despite the loss, Chavez remains extremely popular, especially among the poor and working class in Venezuela. And throughout Latin America, the historic transformation led by progressive leaders like Chavez continues to blossom.
10. Last but not least, this year saw the resignation of some of Bush’s closest allies in government - Donald Rumsfeld resigned as Secretary of Defense, Alberto Gonzalez as Attorney General, and Karl Rove as Deputy Chief of Staff. Best of all, we can give thanks that we only have ONE YEAR left of the criminal, war-mongering, constitution-shredding, rights-violating, torture-sanctioning Bush Administration! It’s just GOT to get better than this!

A Beautiful Corpse: Sixteen Sure Signs That the Regressive Right Is Over by David Michael Green

2007-11-10T07:23:00.000-08:00

Lordy, lord, it’s been a mean season, hasn’t it? And a long one, too.

We human beings (those bipeds lucky enough not to have been born a conservative or killed by one, that is) have suffered through the endless depravity, stupidity, duplicity and incompetence of the radical right for what now seems like forever. It’s been awful, and it’s been depressing, and that’s putting it mildly. To have had even a fraction of a heart this last decade means to have lived in Hell.

Finally, though, the end is nigh. The signs are all there. The regressive right is cracking up, a complete and utter victim of its own success at winning power and of its own absolute failure in wielding it.

The markers are everywhere, bubbling just below the surface. Here are sixteen of them, sure signs if ever there were that the era of destructive government is (nearly) over:

* Follow the money: If you know anything about how American politics has been played over the last century, you know that the concept of Democrats out-fundraising Republicans is about as likely as likely as George W. Bush getting an honorary degree from anybody besides Bob Jones U. It could happen, to be sure (especially in some freaky parallel universe), it’s just that it just ain’t very likely. But guess what? It’s happening now, and it’s a sure sign of the regressive apocalypse (where do I order tickets for that party?). What is even more telling than empty GOP coffers is that even the big corporate money is going to Democrats. Imagine Enron contributing to Al Gore’s campaign, and you’d just about have the picture. Is it possible that the healthcare industry had a recent change of heart and decided that guaranteed national healthcare is now more important than corporate profits, after all? It would be possible (though massively improbable), if they had ever had a heart to begin with. A much more plausible explanation is that the lobbyists for these fat-cats who are paid to sniff out power can see which way the wind is blowing, and that it ain’t to the east anymore, ladies and gentlemen. Even the finance, insurance and real estate industries are funneling more money to Democrats than to the Reprobatlicans. (Talk about your truly bizarro parallel universes! This is the stuff of science fiction novels.) House Democrats have $28 million in the bank right now, while the GOP has $1.6 million for its congressional races (no, that’s not a typo). When did that ever happen?

* Keep following the money: Has there ever been an economy this precarious for this long without throwing a rod or seizing an engine? Given how reviled Bush and his clones already are now, can you imagine how sour the public mood will be if there is a recession or worse in the coming year? When you start seeing stories about roving gangs of furious soccer moms beating up random Republicans caught without their Blackwater guards on K Street, you’ll know why. Just watch the American flag pins start flying off of lapels. Stay tuned for more on this one. Gasoline is now selling for five bucks a gallon in parts of California, and that was being headlined by the Drudge Report, that bastion of anti-regressive journalism. I smell a twenty-first century Whiskey Rebellion a-brewin’.

* Follow the leader: Everybody’s talking about him on the presidential campaign trail. It’s just that they all happen to be Democrats. Republicans desperately want to pretend that Bush never existed (though not as much as they will want to after another year of his follies). So much, in fact, that they don’t even mention his name in their debates or on the stump. The New York Times just reported that Democrats mentioned the lil’ Bush feller 47 times in their last debate. Republicans? Twice, with one being a critique by Ron Paul. And this is while they’re campaigning for conservative, pro-Bush votes, mind you. Did you know that Ronald Reagan (or, more accurately, the myth of Ronald Reagan) was still alive and in the White House? Neither did I, but if you listen to these bozos for more than five minutes you could certainly walk away with that impression (not to mention tinnitus and a whopping good brain hemorrhage as well, but that’s another matter). It’s a sure sign that your movement is in deep trouble when you can’t say the name of the sitting president who so completely exemplifies its principles, for fear that doing so will destroy your candidacy.

* Follow Tucker: Right out the door, in fact. Woo-freakin’-hoo. Was there ever an unctuous little bow-tied twit of a punky spoiled brat that you just wanted to slap silly more than Tucker Carlson? Well, guess what? His ratings are doing it for you. Seems that nobody is terribly interested anymore in what the young master debater has to say, and MSNBC is getting ready to pull the plug on him, bow-tie and all. Bummer, dude. Maybe you could become a liberal now! Or, hey, if you’re looking for a job, maybe you could get Bush to appoint you as ambassador to Smarmiland?

* Follow Keith: The reason MSNBC is getting ready to untuck the wee Carlson is because they want to make room for what viewers are actually interested in, which is more progressive politics, like the regular savagings of the rabid right by Keith Doberman. Here comes Rosie O’Donnell into the line-up, with a show that could make Keith look like a nice puppy by comparison. Apparently, even Joe Scarborough - fingers and toes all in the wind - is talking like a liberal these days. What was that Dylan line about not needing to be a weatherman…? You could almost come to love the free market, after all, eh?

* Follow Jon: Stewart, that is. And Stephen Colbert. Every night, incessantly, they do what sometimes seems like the only rational thing imaginable given the inanities of regressive politics in our unfortunate time. They mock it mercilessly. The good news is that for many people, especially young folk, this is their sole source of news about current developments. Is that a pretty serious indicator of the tragic state of the American polity? You betcha. But it could be a lot worse. People could be getting their ‘news’ from Fox, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Times, or even CNN or NBC. I think a very serious argument can be made that you learn more about the real world we actually inhabit from Stewart and Colbert than from the more subtle comedy shows presented every day by the mainstream disinformation media in the guise of ‘newscasts’. Brian Williams may be a more honest source of information than was Baghdad Bob, but not by much. Until The Nation becomes required reading and Democracy Now! the most watched news broadcast on television, Comedy Central may be the best alternative we’ve got.

* Follow the kids: Speaking of the young folk, they are becoming as scarce in the Republican Party as a good vowel in Kyrgyzstan. And why not? Who wants to be in the party that’s wrecking your environment, spending your future earnings, killing your friends for lies and telling you who you can sleep with? (Hint: You can’t sleep with anybody. Unless, of course, you’re a television preacher or a blow-hard regressive politician, in which case you can sleep with everyone. And everything. Baaaah.) What a fun bunch to hang with, eh? The even better news is that there is pretty strong evidence that people tend to stick for life with the party affiliation they adopt when they’re young. As in so many other ways, therefore, George W. Bush will be the gift that keeps on giving. Thirty years from now, when regressives are an extinct species visible only in dusty museum showcases, we may wonder why we weren’t as happy as little clams at a mollusk orgy to have had the Bush Leaguer around, doing a better job than we ever could have of smashing his ideology to bits.

* Follow Dobson: Please. Somebody get this destructive demon of the religious right into the home for doddering Precambrians where he belongs. As it happens, he might be taking care of it himself. It seems that Ol’ Jimmy is outraged that none of the Republican front-runners are as obsessed with controlling other peoples’ sexuality as his custom bible tells him they should be. He is therefore threatening to run a third-party candidate, thus ripping asunder the GOP, in which case I might just be forced into believing in god, after all. (Even better would be if McCain also launches a desperate last-call shot at the presidency with his own independent bid after losing the GOP nomination. Splitting the Halloween set vote three ways is definitely my version of heaven on earth.) Meanwhile, all indications are that the entire religious right is in complete disarray (oh, so that’s what they mean by “Hallelujah!”). Loads of its troops are disenchanted with politics, disenchanted with regressivism, disenchanted with the GOP candidates, and otherwise just generally reeking of betrayal, rage and a large dose of your garden-variety steroid-enhanced mass surliness. This does not a successful political movement make.

* Follow the polls: Which have been showing for a long time now that Americans are really pissed off about what has happened to their country, and in record numbers. That’s not exactly what you wanna hear when you’re an incumbent running for reelection, or trying to keep your party in power. It gets better yet, though. As Paul Krugman noted this week, political research is now showing that the American public is not just aimlessly angry, but is more liberal in its attitudes than it has been since the early 1960s. And the Baby Boomers haven’t even retired yet! Something tells me that killing stem-cell research and gutting Social Security, coupled with homophobia, environmental destruction, reckless aggression abroad and bankruptcy at home are not going to be big vote-getters in the coming decades. Call me crazy, but I’m going to go ahead and make that wild prediction.

* Follow the rude dude: Giuliani’s popularity in the GOP indicates that even those nuts have turned away, however reluctantly, from their own social conservatism. And now the nuttiest of them all, Pat Robertson, has just endorsed this nasty little Rottweiler with the sorta liberal social policies. There’s really only one viable explanation for that. Sex-obsessed pseudo-Jesus regressivism is a completely spent force, and the Pat Robertsons of this world have only two remaining choices: They can either jump on the bandwagon of sheer hypocrisy (Remember Robertson’s post-9/11 rant about the abortionists, and the lesbians, and the feminists, etc.? Remember how he once sued a certain mayor of New York City to block the latter’s support for gay marriage?), or they can demonstrate their utter irrelevance. Ol’ Pat has made his choice. He did both.

* Follow MoveOn: Sure, they’re not perfect, but they may be the best thing happening on the left these days in terms of real work with a real chance of success. More importantly, they’ve already shown that they know how to play hardball, and now they’re learning how to play sophisticated hardball. In many ways, they’re copying the playbook that the right adopted in the decades since the Goldwater ocean liner had its encounter with the proverbial iceberg, bringing the GOP back to the drawing board. Regressives have been winning for so long in part because they’ve been fighting smart, and in part because nobody was fighting back. The Democrats, of course, are still doing neither. But they’re not the only ones with fists. Look for the right to crumple like any schoolyard bully the minute somebody stands up to it, just as Move-On is now doing.

* Follow the retirements: Republican politicians are retiring in droves now. There are 14 so far who are quitting their House seats, including Ohio’s Deborah Pryce, one of the top members of the GOP leadership. Who wants the pleasure of defending the Republican record in next year’s election cycle, followed by a drubbing and an ignominious pink slip? Or, if you’re lucky enough to survive the tsunami, a lonely gig kicking around in forgotten wilderness of the mega-minority?

* Follow the numbers: As if the gods weren’t angry enough (perhaps at Robertson for backing the pro-gay rights Giuliani?), Republicans will have to defend twice the number of Senate seats up for election next year as will Democrats. That may seem like sheer coincidence, but there is actually a perverse irony here. This is the fruit of the GOP’s pyrrhic victory in 2002, when they used the Iraq war vote and general security hysteria to pummel hapless Tom Daschle-like Democrats. Now those very seats are up again, only this time the chicken has since come home to roost, and it’s an angry little fowl. That’s some awfully nasty karma to be carrying on your ledger, man. You might call Election 2008 the Revenge of Max Cleland.

* Follow the conversions: Just as might be expected, Republicans are starting to change their party affiliations, even in places like Missouri and Kansas (really!). And, just as also might be expected, you’re hearing the classic (and true) explanation for their move: “I didn’t leave the Republican Party, the Republican Party left me”. Sorry Ronnie Raygun, but what comes around… Watch for a whole lot more of this, especially after November 2008.

* Follow the food chain: They’re eating their young now. Predictable, to be sure, but still so much fun to watch. Did you hear that five conservative authors - including one of the Swift Boat hatchet-men, no less - are now suing their publishing house, Regnery (did they actually mean to call it ‘Degeneracy’ but it just got by the spell-checkers somehow?), and its parent company, Eagle Publishing? It seems they’re a little upset that Eagle “orchestrates and participates in a fraudulent, deceptively concealed and self dealing scheme to divert book sales away from retail outlets and to wholly owned subsidiary organizations within the Eagle conglomerate”, and thus rip the authors off of royalties owed to them. No kidding - really? I’m sorry, guys, but just who exactly did you think you were dealing with here? Look in the mirror! You cut a deal with a conservative press to publish your fraud, deception and self-dealing and you expected them to treat you better than George Bush did when he gave the gift of freedom and democracy to the Iraqis? And what’s up with your wanting fair treatment and fair pay for your labor? You guys are starting to sound like a bunch of whiney socialists, fer crissakes! And tort-reform-needing litigious ones, at that! This is America, Dudes. Your America. Get used to being scammed by people who are richer than you.

* Follow the fallow: The right’s agenda is not only bankrupt of real policy ideas, but nowadays it’s even bankrupt of effective red-herrings as well. Yesterday’s tried-and-true tropes no longer have that old magic anymore. “Terrorism, terrorism, terrorism. Gays, gays, gays.” Yawn, yawn, yawn. “Honey, have you seen the remote? I really need to change the channel. And what time are we supposed to pick up Johnny from Little League practice?” Ho. Hum. This show is over. Regressives would like to thank everyone in the audience for their participation. Unfortunately, neither your wallets nor your articles of clothing are available for return to you at this time…

If the signs of the looming conservative apocalypse get any clearer, even blind cave fish will be reading them. These guys are getting ready to crumble like a poppy seed muffin six days past its sell-by date.

It certainly couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch, could it?

I hope they get every little thing that is coming to them.

Except, of course, their Regnery royalties.

This article originally comes from COMMONDREAMS.ORG 11/10/07

Bush allied Democrats must go; Wiretap sanctioning is the last straw.

2007-08-07T06:22:00.000-07:00

Once again the "new" Democratic majority collectively failed to do what it was elected to do. It once again caved into the wishes of George W. Bush. What are these Democrats afraid of? George W. Bush is one of the most unpopular presidents of all time with poll numbers hovering just below 30 per cent. Thanks to the Democratic majority George W. Bush now has congressionally sanctioned powers to wiretap American citizens at will. Until those Democrats who continue to support unconstitutional Bush actions are shown that there are consequences for their actions they will continue to do what they having been doing.....becoming the silent partners of the morally challenged Bush administration. With the previous do nothing congress Democrats could always say "We were outnumbered" They can say that this time because they are in control of both houses. They have to be made to feel the heat. Every progressive voting Democrat should write to his or her representative in the Senate or House and express his or her outrage at Democratic inaction. What does King George have over them? Did he threaten them? Did he tell them "If you don't vote the way I want you to you the same thing that happened to Paul Wellstone will happen to you? I am really suprised at those Democrats who supported unconditional wiretaps (Webb, Inouye). This type of betrayal and complete disregard of the constitution by DEMOCRATS as well as Republicans can't continue. Something has to be done about it immediately. Bush cannot continue to have a rubber stamp Congress. The only was to stop this is to replace the Blue Dog/DLC Democrats with progressives. This will not be difficult because the Democratic/Progressive wing of the party is estimated to be at least 40%. I have always admired John Conyers. He has been on the right side of so many issues. I don't understand why the man who wrote a book on impeaching Bush is not backing off from doing so. The wiretap issue just shows the urgent need for the Impeachment of Bush, Cheney, Gonzales etc. NOW because they can do considerably more damage in the remainder of their lame duck term. Initially I was pleased to see Nancy Pelosi become the Democratic Congressional leader. I don't feel that way now. She continues to coddle this dangerous president. She is NOT reprensenting the will of the people who supported her. Most US citizens want impeachment. How can she be so compassionate with a tyrant when the Democratic presidential predecessor WAS IMPEACHED for one personal matter. George Bush's offenses are just too numerous to mention in this article. This why people around the country, and especially in California MUST support the candidacy of Cindy Sheehan when she runs against Pelosi. We cannot continue to financially support these people when they continue to forget us when the time comes to vote on issues crucial to the average US citizen. Of course we do have many progressive Democrats who have voted correctedly, but we need more of them. Democrats in this and the preceeding Do Nothing Congress have dropped the ball when it came to 1) The Iraq War 2) Supreme Court Nominations 3) Insurance 4)Abortion 5) Electoral Disenfranchement 6) The Environment 7) Partisan firings of Districts Attorney and now Unwarranted Domestic Surveillance. It's time to let the DINOS know that we're fed up and we're not going to take it anymore.

Centrists Didn't Hold by Noam Schieber

2007-08-05T21:35:00.001-07:00

NOT very long ago, the Democratic Leadership Council was a maker of presidents — or, at least, the maker of a president. In 1991, Gov. Bill Clinton of Arkansas, then the council’s chairman, elucidated the “New Democrat” ethos and previewed the themes of his presidential candidacy (“opportunity, responsibility, community”) with a speech at the centrist group’s annual conference. “It became the blueprint for my campaign message,” Mr. Clinton later wrote in his autobiography. He added, “By embracing ideas and values that were both liberal and conservative, it made voters who had not supported Democratic presidential candidates in years listen to our message.”
But few headlines will be made this weekend at the council’s “National Conversation” in Nashville. The next president of the United States almost certainly won’t be there. Not only are Democratic front-runners like Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama planning to skip the conference, but so are the Bill Richardsons and Chris Dodds of the field. That’s probably a good move for the candidates, as the council has become radioactive among Democratic primary voters. But the Democratic Leadership Council’s fading influence is also good news for the entire party.
One cause of the council’s decline is obvious. The group lost a direct line to the White House when Bill Clinton left office. But the change has also come about for more subtle reasons. The New Republic, where I work, was once closely associated with the council’s moderate agenda. These days, however, many of the fights the group picks seem as quaint to me and my colleagues as an old Fleetwood Mac song. Despite what you hear from the council, the biggest problem facing the Democrats, and the nation, is not the party’s liberal activists.
Before the Clinton presidency, the leadership council’s critique of the Democratic Party had merit. Many voters emerged from the 1970s and early ’80s deeply skeptical of liberalism. As Mr. Clinton put it in his 1991 speech, people who once voted for the Democrats no longer “trusted us in national elections to defend our national interest abroad, to put their values in our social policy at home or to take their tax money and spend it with discipline.”
The council grew out of frustration with Walter Mondale’s crushing 1984 defeat. Mr. Mondale had maneuvered to win the A.F.L.-C.I.O.’s endorsement during the Democratic primaries, but his victory was pyrrhic. The endorsement solidified Mr. Mondale’s reputation as the candidate of special interests. In order to shake the label, Mr. Mondale proposed raising taxes to cut the deficit, which only worsened his image among swing voters.
During the 1980s and ’90s, the council played a vital role in curbing both the perception and the reality of liberal excess inside the Democratic Party, and its efforts paved the way for Mr. Clinton’s ascendance. The council’s medicine worked. The centrist wing of the party won important battles on welfare reform, crime and the budget. By the late ’90s, Americans trusted Democrats to run the economy and keep their neighborhoods safe.
But George W. Bush taught Democrats of all stripes that their differences with one another were minor compared with the differences between them and Republicans. For seven years, Democrats have faced a radical administration that operates in bad faith. Yet there was the Democratic Leadership Council, still arguing that teachers unions endanger the republic.
Democrats, moderate and liberal, have been bewildered by the group’s post-Clinton agenda. Take, for example, the law passed by Congress in 2005 that makes it harder for ordinary people to declare bankruptcy. The measure’s only obvious beneficiary was the credit-card industry, and most Democrats opposed it. One main exception was a coalition of House members allied with the council. In an implicit rebuke to their Democratic colleagues, these New Democrats declared their support for the bill “as champions of both personal and fiscal responsibility.”
But Democrats had by this point done much to establish themselves as proponents of “personal and fiscal responsibility.” They were in no danger of trashing the party’s post-Clinton reputation. More important, the bill hardly seemed like a high priority amid the Bush administration’s vast upward redistribution of wealth.
The leadership council made an analogous mistake in the aftermath of the Iraq war. By 2006, most Democrats who supported the invasion had recanted. But council officials doubled down in the face of the fiasco, attacking opponents of the war during Ned Lamont’s Senate campaign against Joe Lieberman.
Today, the council has almost no constituency within the Democratic Party. About every five years, the Pew Research Center conducts a public opinion survey to sort out the country’s major ideological groupings. In 1999, Pew found that liberals and New Democrats each accounted for nearly one-quarter of the Democratic base. By the next survey in 2005, New Democrats had completely disappeared as a group and the liberals had doubled their share of the party. Many moderates, radicalized by President Bush, now define themselves as liberals.
On a variety of issues the council, and not the party’s liberal base, is out of touch with the popular mood. A recent Washington Post poll found that 60 percent of independents, along with 70 percent of Democrats, favor withdrawing from Iraq by next spring.
Two decades of work by the Democratic Leadership Council — and a not inconsiderable assist from President Bush — have made the Democratic Party the healthiest it has been in the 22 years of the council’s existence. Democrats should thank the group and then tell it that it’s no longer needed.
Noam Scheiber is a senior editor for The New Republic.

Democratic Congress Gives Bush a blank check for the Occupation

2007-05-25T17:27:00.000-07:00

It seems hard to believe, but the Democrats have once again embarrassed themselves and their constituents by giving George Bush billions of dollars to be squandered on this fruitless illegal occupation. 86 Democrats bowed down to King George and said yes master we will give you everything that you want. We will not permit any time restrictions of withdrawal. The progressive wing of the Democratic party(which also happens to be the majority of the Democratic party) will remember this in November. I just thought it would be different this time with Democrats in the majority of both houses, but this cowardly submission only shows that even with a Democratic majority it is still business as usually. The vast majority of the Democrats of this Congress was elected to put and end to this occupation, yet they have not done so. Money that should go to education, infrastructure, healthcare and natural disasters that happen within the United States (i.e Katrina and the Kansas tornados) will be squandered on death and destruction and more profits for the war profiteers. I am so tired of hearing that lame excuse "We had no choice, if we didn't go along with what the president wanted he would tell the American people that we Democrats don't support the troops" This is not only stupid and cowardly it is also illogical. The overwhelming majority of the people of the United States are opposed to this occupation. Who in his or her right mind would think that "this" administration supports our troops. This president to my knowledge has never attended the funeral of one fallen soldier. This administration sent our troops into illegal combat poorly equipped. This administration has worked feverishly to limit benefits our troops are entitled to. Those coming home injured were not adequately cared for at Walter Reade and other hospital facilities. How can it be said that this president supports our troops when mercenary outfits like Blackwater have contractors do the work of soldiers and get paid thousands of dollars more. There IS money available to give to the troops if Democrats decided to resist Bush. This president is peddling fear by saying "If we don't fight them there we will have to fight them here" That is a LIE! The Viet Nam war ended because Congress decided to end it. We were able to make a safe exit. If that happened in Viet Nam it can happen in Iraq.
"THEY" don't want "US" there! The Iraqi parliment voted for the exit of US troops, that is further evidence that we are "not" welcomed in Iraq as Mr. Bush or Mr. Cheney would have us believe. Democratic leadership MUST be challenged on this issue, which is just as egregious as anything done by Mr. Gonzalez, Mr. Wolfowitz or Mr. Bush. These Democrats have become the co-signers of an illegal aggressive occupation and must be dealt with at the polls.

The Return of the DLC DC Democratic Party

2007-05-20T14:13:00.000-07:00

by A. Alexander, May 20th, 2007
By mid-2006 it looked like the DC Democrats had learned their lesson. It appeared they had finally realized that the Democratic Leadership Council's (DLC's) political playbook, was little more than the perfect recipe for becoming an irrelevant political party. During the last election cycle the once spine-challenged DLC smitten Republican wannabe DC Democrats, had actually embraced their base and began confronting the GOP's failed anti-working class policies. The result was electoral victory.To their credit, for the first two or three months, the DC Democrats governed the nation with the enthusiasm that they had co-opted from their thriving political base. Democrats opened meaningful investigations into the Bush administration's many illegal activities; they fashioned and passed a minimum wage increase; Reid and Pelosi worked together to close holes in domestic security; Democrats formulated legislation designed to reduce corporation representing lobbyist influence; and they formulated plans to end the Iraq War.One by one the Republicans managed to stall the passage of the Democratic agenda and the Democrats immediately reverted to their inside-the-beltway, guaranteed to lose DLC playbook. Instead of continuing to confront the administration over Iraq, Democrats entered negotiations that will eventually yield them nothing and bring the wars end no closer than the day it began in 2003. Instead of continuing to pressure the White House and Republicans to end the war, Pelosi and Emanuel hitched their political fortunes to the DLC inspired "free trade" agenda and immediately went about the business of selling out the American worker. That single act, selling out the American worker in favor of enriching corporations, is proof that the DC Democrats have sidled up, again, to the failed approach and agenda of the DLC. Incredible as it may seem, it appears to have taken the Democrats all of five months in power to forget that it had been the DLC's failed policies that had kept them in the political wilderness for all those years. And, too, Democrats seem to have forgotten that following their base had returned the Party to political power. The Democratic Congressional leadership would do well to be rid of the DLC and, perhaps, have Senator Webb of Virginia school them on something called "populism". Senator Webb understands the wave of discontent that is sweeping across America. He understands that the American worker is sick and tired of always getting the short end of the stick and that more policies designed to benefit corporations, won't win any elections for the Democratic Party. Corporations, if the Democrats hadn't noticed yet, have a Party...the Republican Party. Webb senses that Democrats could, if they had the courage and wisdom to align with the working people, establish a political dominance that would last into the foreseeable future. Unfortunately, DC Democrats have no interest in what Senator Webb might have to say. The DC Democrats have already turned their back on the base - on the working American and have realigned themselves with the guaranteed-to-lose DLC. The proof of the DC Democrat re-conversion can be found in the recent corporate coddling and selling out of the American worker - eh-hem - "fair trade bill" that Congressional Democrats secretly negotiated with the Bush administration. This article originally appeared in THE PROGRESSIVE DAILY BEACON

Two week suspension of Don Imus insufficient

2007-04-10T03:23:00.000-07:00

MSNBC/CBS radio personality Don Imus' two week suspension is tantamount to a slap on the wrist. Mr. Imus is a multi-millionaire. The amount of income lost to him during this two week period is peanuts. Mr. Imus has earned the dubious distinction of being permanently barred from the public airwaves for refering to the Women's basketball team of Rutgers as "nappy headed hos". ESPN fired Rush Limbaugh for making disparaging remarks about Donovan McNabb, the African-American quarterback of the Philadelphia Eagles. Limbaugh said that McNabb received an abundance of media attention because he was black. This was an obviously racist remark because that year McNabb led his team to the Super Bowl. Any quarterback, regardless of race who gets his team in the Super Bowl would get a lot of media attention. ESPN did the right thing. Mr. Limbaugh for many years has been the darling of right wing radio. In many parts of The United States the mere mention of his name conjures up images of dollar signs to the managers of radio stations, but this did not deter ESPN from taking the high road and firing Limbaugh. Like Limbaugh, Imus also represents big bucks for national radio, but unlike ESPN MSNBC/CBS radio prefers to give Don Imus a slap on the wrist. We are human and we all make mistakes. If this had been the first time that Imus made a racist remark I could probably support a two week suspension, but Mr. Imus as well as his associates Mr. McGuirk and Mr. Rosenberg have a history of making overtly racist remarks......and getting away with it. This has been documented by Media Matters "While purporting to "know" Imus, Oliphant apparently disregarded Imus' history and that of his executive producer, Bernard McGuirk -- as well as frequent guest and former Imus sportscaster Sid Rosenberg -- of making racially insensitive and incendiary remarks, which Media Matters for America has extensively documented." This incident should also be a lesson to the so-called Hip-Hop community. Mr. Imus , no doubt has been exposed to the more violent, mysogenous, anti-intellectual rantings of African-American hip-hop artists who have gone to such extremes as to malign such heroes as the late Rosa Parks. I know of no other ethnic group besides African-Americans who willfully degrade their own people (the frequent use of the "N' word and calling black females 'hos") for the almighty dollar. This by no means is a condemnation of all hip-hop because I have seen some very positive work from artists like Dead Prez and Public Enemy, but these are not the artists that are being promoted. They are not the ones who are making the BIG money. BET, since it's take over by Viacom has been saturated with derogatory videos. As people of African descent in the United States, it is our obligation to demand that people on the PUBLIC airwaves who commit slander like Don Imus be FIRED, no ifs, ands, or buts. Black people who commit similar offenses against other black people should also be dealt THE SAME punishment. Think about it.... Do you hear Jewish people refer to each other as "kikes"? Do you hear people of Italian descent refer to each other as "guineas"? Do you hear Hispanics refer to each other as "spics"? Do you hear Chinese people refer to each other as "chinks"? The answer to all of these questions is a resounding NO. That is because they have a love and respect for their people. Who is the beneficiary of this black on black degradation? ....besides the modern day minstrel who will do anything to get the "bling " there is also the conservative white owned and operated media empire "Clear Channel", that owns the vast majority of the profitable hip-hop outlets across this country. Payola is rampant in today's music industry, such negative videos and recordings can be "seen" or "heard" 3 or 4 times in just one hour. We have to let the broadcast media know we are not going to tolerate this nonsense anymore and there is no one better to start with than Don Imus.

Why the 15 British soldiers are REALLY held captive

2007-04-04T05:55:00.000-07:00

Thusfar the US media has told us that 15 British soldiers have been captured by the Iranian government. We were told that they were captured because Iran says that they were in Iranian waters. Rumors are already circulating about a Good Friday attack on Iran. British PM Tony Blair says that the British soldiers were in Iraqi waters and for that reason they should be immediately released. Well once again I see that we are not being told the real story. Once again we see a crucial foul-up by the Bush administration. It always seems be the case that if you want to know the truth you have to depend on the press that is outside of the United States when it comes to international matters. According to The Independent (UK) The United States was making an attempt to capture the head of Iranian security, which turned out to be a miserafble failure. It appears as if the 15 British soldiers were assisting the US in the accomplishment of this objective. "Better understanding of the seriousness of the US action in Arbil - and the angry Iranian response to it - should have led Downing Street and the Ministry of Defence to realise that Iran was likely to retaliate against American or British forces such as highly vulnerable Navy search parties in the Gulf. The two senior Iranian officers the US sought to capture were Mohammed Jafari, the powerful deputy head of the Iranian National Security Council, and General Minojahar Frouzanda, the chief of intelligence of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, according to Kurdish officials.'' How can this ridiculously idiotic move be justified in the eyes of the world. This act once again seriously damages the integrity of the United States. It also gives Iranian leadership political ammunition to convince their people of the need for further nuclear development for defensive purposes as a deterrent to United States aggression. This should be considered one of at least six impeachable acts committed by this president, yet with the exception of John Conyers and a few of his allies nothing is being done towards impeaching George W. Bush, even when the opposing party controls both houses of the legislative branch. The rest of the world is more than likely to think that the only impeachful offense is having sex out of wedlock. It's ok to bring your country into a war based on a lie and have over 3,500 soldiers killed. It's ok to remove Habeus Corpus. It's ok to spy on your own citizens without congressional approval. It's ok to remove district attorneys for doing their jobs. There are those who say that Mr. Bush only has a year left in his presidency and that we should just wait until his term is over. I say look at the damage he has caused in seven years. Why give him one more year to create even more havoc?

Eddie Robinson (1919 - 2007)

2007-04-04T05:47:00.000-07:00

Eddie Robinson, Grambling's outstanding football coach has passed away at the age of 88. Robinson won 408 games while losing only 165. He was responsible for sending over 200 football players to the NFL. Robinson often said two things that he was most proud of was being married to the same woman and having the same job for 57 years.

Billy Henderson (1940 - 2007)

2007-02-06T20:06:00.000-08:00

Billy Henderson, long time member of popular R&B vocal group the Spinners died this morning as a result of complications with diabetes. The Spinners were one the major acts of the 70s and 80s. In the early seventies the group had only marginal success with the talent laden Motown stable. One their last recordings, the Stevie Wonder written and produced "It's A Shame" became a major hit. The Spinners sought greener pastures at Atlantic Records where they enjoyed their greatest success with hits like "Rubberband Man' , "Then Came You" and ""(They Just Can't Help It)The Games People Play".

Joe Hunter (1930-2007)

2007-02-06T19:55:00.000-08:00

Pioneer Motown pianist Joe Hunter passed away this morning in Detroit. Hunter was one of the members of the Funk Brothers, an agregation that has played together on more hit records than Elvis, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones. Joe Hunter was the first pianist to be hired by Berry Gordy for his Motown record label during its infancy. Hunter was the driving force behind Smokey Robinson and The Miracles huge hit "You Really Got A Hold On Me" as well as Martha Reeves and The Vandellas "Love Is Like A Heat Wave" and Marvin Gaye's "How Sweet It Is( To be loved by you). Hunter joins other Funk Brother alumni like Pistol Allen and Johnny Griffin who did not make the Motown transition from Detroit to Los Angeles.

Molly Ivins (1945 - 2007)

2007-01-31T18:57:00.000-08:00

One of the most vibrant voices of the progressive community, Molly Ivins, has passed at the age of 62 of breast cancer. The nationally syndicated columnist spent many of her formative years at the New York Times. Ivins was a resident of Austin, Texas and is credited with giving George Bush the nickname "Scrub" and Texas governor Rick Perry, the nickname "Good Hair".

Impeachment by the People by Howard Zinn

2007-01-31T16:04:00.000-08:00

Published on Wednesday, January 31, 2007 by The Progressive

Courage is in short supply in Washington, D.C. The realities of the Iraq War cry out for the overthrow of a government that is criminally responsible for death, mutilation, torture, humiliation, chaos. But all we hear in the nation’s capital, which is the source of those catastrophes, is a whimper from the Democratic Party, muttering and nattering about “unity” and “bipartisanship,” in a situation that calls for bold action to immediately reverse the present course.
These are the Democrats who were brought to power in November by an electorate fed up with the war, furious at the Bush Administration, and counting on the new majority in Congress to represent the voters. But if sanity is to be restored in our national policies, it can only come about by a great popular upheaval, pushing both Republicans and Democrats into compliance with the national will.
The Declaration of Independence, revered as a document but ignored as a guide to action, needs to be read from pulpits and podiums, on street corners and community radio stations throughout the nation. Its words, forgotten for over two centuries, need to become a call to action for the first time since it was read aloud to crowds in the early excited days of the American Revolution: “Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it and institute new government.”
The “ends” referred to in the Declaration are the equal right of all to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” True, no government in the history of the nation has been faithful to those ends. Favors for the rich, neglect of the poor, massive violence in the interest of continental and world expansion—that is the persistent record of our government.
Still, there seems to be a special viciousness that accompanies the current assault on human rights, in this country and in the world. We have had repressive governments before, but none has legislated the end of habeas corpus, nor openly supported torture, nor declared the possibility of war without end. No government has so casually ignored the will of the people, affirmed the right of the President to ignore the Constitution, even to set aside laws passed by Congress.
The time is right, then, for a national campaign calling for the impeachment of President Bush and Vice President Cheney. Representative John Conyers, who held extensive hearings and introduced an impeachment resolution when the Republicans controlled Congress, is now head of the House Judiciary Committee and in a position to fight for such a resolution. He has apparently been silenced by his Democratic colleagues who throw out as nuggets of wisdom the usual political palaver about “realism” (while ignoring the realities staring them in the face) and politics being “the art of the possible” (while setting limits on what is possible).
I know I’m not the first to talk about impeachment. Indeed, judging by the public opinion polls, there are millions of Americans, indeed a majority of those polled, who declare themselves in favor if it is shown that the President lied us into war (a fact that is not debatable). There are at least a half-dozen books out on impeachment, and it’s been argued for eloquently by some of our finest journalists, John Nichols and Lewis Lapham among them. Indeed, an actual “indictment” has been drawn up by a former federal prosecutor, Elizabeth de la Vega, in a new book called United States v. George W. Bush et al, making a case, in devastating detail, to a fictional grand jury.
There is a logical next step in this development of an impeachment movement: the convening of “people’s impeachment hearings” all over the country. This is especially important given the timidity of the Democratic Party. Such hearings would bypass Congress, which is not representing the will of the people, and would constitute an inspiring example of grassroots democracy.
These hearings would be the contemporary equivalents of the unofficial gatherings that marked the resistance to the British Crown in the years leading up to the American Revolution. The story of the American Revolution is usually built around Lexington and Concord, around the battles and the Founding Fathers. What is forgotten is that the American colonists, unable to count on redress of their grievances from the official bodies of government, took matters into their own hands, even before the first battles of the Revolutionary War.
In 1772, town meetings in Massachusetts began setting up Committees of Correspondence, and the following year, such a committee was set up in Virginia. The first Continental Congress, beginning to meet in 1774, was a recognition that an extralegal body was necessary to represent the interests of the people. In 1774 and 1775, all through the colonies, parallel institutions were set up outside the official governmental bodies.
Throughout the nation’s history, the failure of government to deliver justice has led to the establishment of grassroots organizations, often ad hoc, dissolving after their purpose was fulfilled. For instance, after passage of the Fugitive Slave Act, knowing that the national government could not be counted on to repeal the act, black and white anti-slavery groups organized to nullify the law by acts of civil disobedience. They held meetings, made plans, and set about rescuing escaped slaves who were in danger of being returned to their masters.
In the desperate economic conditions of 1933 and 1934, before the Roosevelt Administration was doing anything to help people in distress, local groups were formed all over the country to demand government action. Unemployed Councils came into being, tenants’ groups fought evictions, and hundreds of thousands of people in the country formed self-help organizations to exchange goods and services and enable people to survive.
More recently, we recall the peace groups of the 1980s, which sprang up in hundreds of communities all over the country, and provoked city councils and state legislatures to pass resolutions in favor of a freeze on nuclear weapons. And local organizations have succeeded in getting more than 400 city councils to take a stand against the Patriot Act.
Impeachment hearings all over the country could excite and energize the peace movement. They would make headlines, and could push reluctant members of Congress in both parties to do what the Constitution provides for and what the present circumstances demand: the impeachment and removal from office of George Bush and Dick Cheney. Simply raising the issue in hundreds of communities and Congressional districts would have a healthy effect, and would be a sign that democracy, despite all attempts to destroy it in this era of war, is still alive.

William Pepper: "Dr Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated by U.S. government"

2007-01-19T19:31:00.000-08:00

In his newly released book "An Act Of State" Willam Pepper, a lawyer from England states that civil rights icon Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was murdered as part of plot authored by The FBI, under the leadership of J. Edgar Hoover, organized crime figures from New Orleans and Memphis and Lloyd Jowers, who Pepper identifies as the actual triggerman. Pepper has made an "unimpeachable" exhaustive 39 year study that proves his thesis beyond a doubt. Pepper represented the King family in court where a verdict of "unlawful death" was concluded. This heinous act included the collusion of US media and local law enforcement within the city of Memphis. James Earl Ray, who we were lead to believe was the assassin always proclaimed his innocence up until the day of his death. Ray initally asked Pepper to represent him in court. Pepper declined to do so until he was absolutely convinced that Ray played not even a minor role in the murder of Dr. King. In a short while Pepper concluded that Ray was indeed an innocent pawn in a government sponsored assassination. In addition to being a brilliant speaker, King was a master organizer who was putting the same relentless energy behind the Poor People's march and opposition to the Viet Nam war as he put behind the March On Washington. What will the history books say of this event? .....more than likely nothing. Those who know the truth will once again be called "Conspiracy Theorists", but this time it is not a theory. Pepper has given us the undisputed truth. It is our responsiblility to tell our children and our children's children the truth about the deaths of both Dr. Martin Luther King and Malcolm X, both victims of state sponsored racist terrorism. This is precisely why words like "freedom" and "liberty" mean nothing when they come (or came) out of the mouths of establishment warmongers like George W. Bush and the late, not so great J. Edgar Hoover. Like minded people were responsible for the New Orleans disaster. Could they also have played a role in the deaths of John Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, Paul Wellstone? It is not so farfetched after all.

Pookie Hudson (1934 - 2007)

2007-01-19T19:09:00.000-08:00

One of the founding fathers of Doo Wop Pookie Hudson has died from cancer at the age of 72. Hudson was the lead singer of the Spaniels, who along with The Penguins became the Doo Wop pioneers when they came on the scene in 1954. Hudson wrote most of the Spaniels material including the legendary "Goodnight Sweetheart Goodnight. Hudson's life was one of perserverance. He had the uncanny abilty to bounce back. In the early sixties his life took a dramatic change which would take him from being a revered performer to a homeless man. But the resilient Hudson put the Spaniels back together and provided the group with new audiences which led to national tours on the oldies circuit. The Spaniels like so many R&B groups of the fifties suffered the indignation of having their songs remade by a white group shortly after their initial release and see the white group make a fortune on their record. The McGuire Sisters version of "Goodnight Sweetheart Goodnight" surpassed The Spaniels' version in sales. in the same way as Hound Dog (Big Mama Thorton/Elvis Presley), Shake Rattle & Roll(Joe Turner/Bill Haley & The Comets) and Ain't That a Shame(Fats Domino/Pat Boone). Hudson continued to write material for the Spaniels up until the time of his death but unfortunately the demand was for the old songs, which really is a pity when one considers the high quality of the most recent Spaniels recordings.

Denny Doherty (1941 -2007)

2007-01-19T18:49:00.000-08:00

Rock's first casualty of 2007 is Denny Doherty of The Mamas & Papas, one of the most popular groups of the 1960s. Although Doherty was the lead singer on most of the Mamas & Papas hits much more attention was focused on the flamboyant John Phillips who wrote most of their hits like "California Dreaming" "Monday Monday" and "I Saw Her Again" Upon the passing of Denny Doherty, actress-singer Michelle Philips becomes the sole survivor of the sixties trend setting group which also became famous for their remake of the Five Royals/Shirelles' hit "Dedicated To The One I Love" which was one of their few hits that was not penned by Philips. The group's female lead, "Mama" Cass Elliot died in 1974. Elliott was a successful solo artist with the hits "Words Of Love" and "Dream A Little Dream Of Me" The chart life of this group was very short, a meager three years, but in that three years period they were frequently on the charts and on the road. In 1982 Phillips formed a reincarnated Mamas and Papas with Doherty, his daughter MacKenzie Phillips and former Spanky & Our Gang lead singer Spanky McPharland. The intragroup relationships kept the Mamas & The Papas in the public eye in the same way as another two man two women sensation Fleetwood Mac, a generation later.

A Tribute To A KIng

2007-01-15T05:27:00.000-08:00

Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was indeed a giant among men. As we celebrate his life and try to benefit from the lessons he taught we can't help but wonder what would he have been able to accomplish beyond his 39 years. King was able to mobilize the youth of his day with actions that produced results. With steadfast determination he made it possible for blacks to sit anywhere on the bus and he also filled the jails with demonstrating young men and women to such an extent that belligerent local authorities were neutralized. Today there is little doubt that Dr. King's assassination was a sophisticated plot by those who considered him a threat to the status quo. When the late Vice-president Hubert Humphrey said that Dr. King was on his potential list of vice presidential candidates the previliged right wing element felt compelled to act. If James Earl Ray was responsible (as the media led us to believe) ...he was not working alone. Former New York Times, New York Daily News and current WBAI radio personality Earl Caldwell was at the scene of the King assassination, but was prevented from giving testimony. Mr Caldwell wrote a book that could not find a publisher. There was and still is a deliberate attempt to muzzle his account of what happened that day. The right-wing pundits always say "Conspiracy Theory, Conspiracy Theory, Bah....." but what if there actually was a conspiracy and what if it is still going on?" Numerous attempts were made on the life of Malcolm X long before that fateful day at the Audubon Ballroom in Harlem. Clinton confident Ron Brown was found with a bullet in his head with no explanation of how it got there. Isn't the timing of the "accidental" death of Minnesota's Paul Wellstone somewhat suspect? There was a time when we would say we would never know but nevertheless the killers of Medgar Evers, James Chaney, Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman had to and will have to pay for their cowardly acts; De La Beckwith and Killian did not escape prosecution even though both faced justice late in life. Maybe one day the same thing will happen to the true killers of Martin King, who killed the man but not the dream. Isn't it odd that the vast majority of the victims of assassination or "accidental" death find themselves on the left of the political strectrum. The only exception in recent times to survive such an attack was Ronald Reagan. We should all remember Dr. King's ideals and honor his courage in these troubled times in which an administration bent on empire wants to use Social Security money to further its aim of world domination. Were he alive to today Martin King would oppose the Iraq War as vigorously and wholeheartedly as he opposed the Viet Nam War. In the area of Civil Rights things are as bad and in some cases even worse than they were in the 60s. These times may call for different tactics but they will require the same determination and focus Dr. King had to bear fruit.

The First Major Impeachment Event of '07 begins in San Francisco

2007-01-06T05:52:00.000-08:00

On January 4th, the first day of the new Congress, impeachment activities began in cities around the country. These actions are continuing including the very creative impeachment event that will take place at Ocean Beach in San Francisco, tomorrow, Saturday January 6. (See below for how you can get involved)Impeachment supporters are refusing to accept the notion that George W. Bush's criminal conduct is "off the table," as Nancy Pelosi stated. In fact, between now and the first day of spring, there will be a "winter offensive" by the impeachment movement. We will be outlining specific details of a nationwide action plan shortly.The ads in the New York Times and other newspapers are scheduled to appear in the coming weeks. Impeachment supporters have been ordering thousands of t-shirts, sweat shirts, bumper stickers, lawn signs and baseball caps, wearing and giving the ImpeachBush message - a great way to spread the word. The resource center is fully stocked and is continuing its 50% off sale on sweatshirts for a short while longer, so take advantage while you can. If you haven't worn one before, you'll be amazed at the positive response. Click here to get your ImpeachBush apparel.Tomorrow's impeachment action
San Francisco impeachment action at Ocean Beach Saturday, January 6, 10:30am-12 noon
Just two days after the new US Congress convenes, 1,200 people will gather for an impeachment event in Nancy Pelosi's backyard - on Ocean Beach in San Francisco. Early that morning, in 100 foot letters stretching 450 feet across the sand, volunteers from the Beach Impeach Project will outline the message: "IMPEACH."
At 10:30 a.m., the 1,200 attendees will arrive and lay their bodies down inside the message's lettering. At 11:00 a.m., a helicopter will arrive overhead and photographers will record the 1,200 in the sand spelling out "IMPEACH" with the SF skyline and the Golden Gale Bridge in the background. News editors will have compelling photos for the next morning's Sunday papers and the event will provide powerful visuals for the impeachment movement.
Join the event at Ocean Beach on January 6, 2007. 1000 Great Highway (Stairway 17), 10:30 a.m. to noon.

Hope In Every Season

2006-12-26T04:30:00.000-08:00

The year has gone, its ashes cold and blown away
A year of desperation, a year when all men cried
A year of tribulation, a year when no one tried
To hear the voices of the young men just outside the door
Crying for the stolen childhood vanished in some war
Tired and poor and hungry they ask this and nothing more today
Let every season of next year bring hope our way
As winter snowfalls fly, and spring brings clear pure rain
And summer's bright blue sky, leads into fall again
Let us hold our hands together let us start tonight
Let us work to heal the wounds, let's work to make things right
Build a world where children can grow tall and strong and never fight
Let every season bring us hope and love and light.

Claude Chaney, Margery Hauser, Marilyn Boccadoro
(c) 1984, 2006 Electra-City Music

James Brown (1933 - 2006)

2006-12-25T10:52:00.000-08:00

James Brown, the "Godfather of Soul" has died at the age of 73 from pneumonia. Brown is among a select group of entertainers ( like Marvin Gaye, Fats Domino, Aretha Franklin, Dionne Warwick, Stevie Wonder, Ray Charles, Elton John, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Temptations, The Supremes, Elvis Presley, and Madonna) who can lay claim to having 30 or more hits during the Rock era. Brown revitalized his career in 1987 with the song "Living In America" from one of the Rocky sequels. Brown's unforgettable dance numbers "Papa's Got A Brand New Bag", "I Feel Good (I Got You)","Cold Sweat" "There Was A Time", "Licking Stick", "Soul Power", "Hot Pants (She's got to use what she got to get what she wants)" are all legendary but Brown also had a sensitive side which was seen on hits like "It's A Man's, Man's, Man's, Man's World" "I Cry" and "Please, Please, Please". In his lifetime Brown did have problems with the law regarding car theft (in his youth) and drug use, but what I will always remember James Brown for was his appeal for calm during the Harlem riots of 1964. Brown went out among the people and spoke to his fans, disregarding his own personal safety during a riot. A few years later he recorded the song "Say It Loud I'm Black And I'm Proud" , which became an anthem. Like Ray Charles, Brown came from very humble beginnings. He did buck dancing for troops stationed in Georgia. He danced for the nickels and dimes that they threw at his feet. It is ironic that in the same year 2006 we lost "Soul Brother #1" and "Soul Brother #2 (Wilson Pickett). Cch’s all-time James Brown favorites:

1.There Was A Time
2.Papa’s Got A Brand New Bag
3.It’s A Man’s, Man’s Man’s Man’s Man’s Man’s World
4.Living In America
5.Say It Loud, I'm Black and I'm Proud
6.I Got You (I Feel Good)
7.I Cried
8.Cold Sweat
9.Get On The Goodfoot (Part One)
10. Out Of Sight

Mike Evans (1949-2006)

2006-12-22T17:45:00.000-08:00

Actor/Writer Michael Jonas Evans succumbed to throat cancer today at the age of 57. Mike immortalized the role of Lionel (the son of Louise and George Jefferson) on the immensely popular CBS series "The Jeffersons" a spinoff from "All In The Family". Mike Evans was also co-creator and principal writer of long running TV show "Good Times", which starred Esther Rolle and Jimmie (J.J) Walker. Because of Evans' commitment to "Good Times" he had to leave his role of Lionel in order to be a creative force for "Good Times".

Ahmet Ertegun (1923 -2006)

2006-12-22T16:50:00.000-08:00

One of the true giants of the production of modern music has passed away. Ahmet Ertegun, president of Atlantic Records died because of an injury during a Rolling Stones benefit. Ertegun had a strong love for American Rhythm and Blues music. His label, formed in 1947 (with Herb Abramson) became the leading producer of R&B with a stable of superstars that included Ray Charles, Ruth Brown, Big Joe Turner, Aretha Franklin, Wilson Pickett and Roberta Flack. In the 4os, so-called race records seldom found their way on mainstream radio. Ahmet Ertegun played a major role in changing that simply by recording irresistable music that made the listener feel good. Atlantic in the early years was a good example of people of different religions and ethnicities working together for the common good. Ahmet and his brother Nesuhi were Muslims, their partner Jerry Wexler and principal composers Jerry Lieber and Mike Stoller were Jewish. The major artists in the early years were African-American. Nesuhi Ertegun, Ahmet's older brother had a great love for jazz. It is because of Nesuhi that the public got a chance to hear John Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Rasaan Roland Kirk, The Modern Jazz Quartet and Eddie Harris. Fellow Turk Arif Mardin made major contributions as an arranger for many artists on the label, including the highly acclaimed "Young Rascals". In the 60s Atlantic distributed the Memphis based Stax Records bringing forth a new cadre of R&B superstars which included The Staple Singers, Otis Redding, Carla Thomas, Rufus Thomas, Johnnie Taylor, Eddie Floyd and composer, soon to be performer Isaac Hayes. Atlantic Records and Motown Records cornered the R&B market and even more notably the pop market in the 60s and 70s. These two independent record companies both had distinct sounds but you could easily distinguish the Motown artist from the Atlantic artist. The late Billy Eckstine was among the few to work with both companies. After the British invasion the music changed and although R&B continued to be popular the market did change being more attracted to English rock bands. Artists like the Shirelles, who had two #1 songs and 11 top forty hits disappeared from the charts never to return again. Ertegun had to change with the times in order to survive. Atlantic signed hard rock acts like Led Zeppelin, Cream, Yes along with such blockbuster attractions as The Rolling Stones, Genesis, Phil Collins and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young (who Ertegun convinced to join CSN). People like Ahmet Ertegun, Berry Gordy and Herb Alpert will always be remembered for starting very high quality independent music companies on a shoe-string budget. This type of rags-to-riches story in impossible to achieve in today's market because of the mega-mergers that have left us with basically five or six record companies. Until the time of his death Armet Ertegun at 83 years of age was still the leader of Atlantic Records eventhough he was forced to accept a distribution deal with Time-Warner over the objections of his partner Jerry Wexler. Ahmet Ertegun rest in peace and thank you for a job well done.

Peter Boyle (1935-2006)

2006-12-22T16:27:00.000-08:00

Emmy award winning actor Peter Boyle passed away earlier this week. Boyle was a very versatile actor who gained fame playing extremely diverse characters from the bigot in "Joe" to the tap dancing monster in "Young Frankenstein" to the grouchy father of Raymond in "Everybody Loves Raymond" Boyle survived a stroke and a previous heart attack (which took place on the set of "Everybody Loves Raymond"). John Lennon was the best man at Boyle's wedding.

2006: The Year In Review (Film)

2006-12-10T17:49:00.000-08:00

I didn't go to the movies very much in 2006. I am certain that there were several outstanding movies made, but most of them I did not see. Two movies that I consider the most memorable were "Sideways" in which Paul Giamatti was justly nominated for an Academy Award in his role as a 8th grade teacher who accompanies a friend on a series of extended bachelor parties prior to a wedding. The bloody "Flags Of Our Fathers", the Clint Eastwood film about the soldiers who raised the flag on Iwo Jima was also a standout. This was about a justified war as opposed to the ones in Viet Nam and Iraq. The viewer was given insight to the agony of a true American hero, Ira Hayes, who died practically penniless after outstanding service to his country.

Augusto Pinochet dies at 91

2006-12-10T17:07:00.000-08:00

One of the world's most notorious dictators, Augusto Pinochet expired today at the age of 91. Mr. Pinochet gained infamy as being one of the most brutal dictators of modern times. This site has a tradition of honoring the deceased , who in life excelled in a specific area or one who did outstanding service to others. This is the first time where I acknowledge the passing of an individual who has done neither. Yet I feel that it is important to note the passing of such a nefarious person because there will be those who will deny that he was responsible for the deaths of over 3,000 people. For United States citizens this is the equivalent of the deaths of the 9/11 victims. Salvador Allende Gossens was elected president by the Chilean people. Allende promised to nationalize Chilean copper. US operatives, specifically those with connections to multi-national copper organized this infamous coup d'etat in which people were herded into sports stadiums and massacred. It was painfully obvious that the United States played a vital role in Allende's death and Pinochet's reign of terror from 1973 to 1990. It rings hallow when you hear US politicians go on and on about freedom and democracy when most of them were very quiet when massacres were taking place in Chile, Argentina and other countries of South and Central America. The School of The Americas (now called the World Center for Hemispheric Cooperation, or something similar) trained people to kill their own people for blood money and US corporate interests. It is a shame that these massacres were committed in our name and that people, like Henry Kissinger (who allegedly also was part of this massacre) are considered heroes by US media when in reality they are criminals. There are people who have witnessed world reknown guitarist Victor Jara have both of his hands cut off in front of Pinochet's laughing soldiers who asked him to play now. This type of unbridled savagery also took place in the Congo, Argentina, Nicaragua and more recently in Iraq, all done in our name. I am convinced that most US citizens deplore this savage conduct. It is my hope that US citizens contact their elected officials and let them know that murder is not a value of The United States of America. I have a genuine concern for Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, who like Allende has the full support of his people but unless US citizens stand up to multi-national corporations and right wing elements within the US government Chavez could suffer the same fate as Allende.

2006: The Year In Review (Sports)

2006-12-04T12:13:00.000-08:00

The 2006 Major League Baseball All-Star game was simply amazing. The AL continues to dominate the NL by lopsided laughers to breath taking squeakers. The 2006 contest was definitely the latter. With two outs in the ninth inning I thought the game was over. I turned off the television and went to bed. When I woke the next morning I was surprised to see that the American League won it again.
The 2006 Playoffs and World Series were also exciting to watch even though the teams that I rooted for lost. Congratulations must go out to Tony LaRussa, who proved once again he knew how to get the best from his players, especially those on the bench. On several occasions Taguchi came through with the big hit, in one game it was a pinch-hit home run. Series MVP David Eckstein exploded in the World Series after a tepid start in the playoffs. Going into the playoffs The Saint Louis Cardinals seemed to be the weakest of the six contenders. Albert Pujols got off to a rather slow start but he came out of the slump to help make the Cardinals the '06 victors. Yadir Molina was just a 216 hitter during the regular season, but was one of the stars in both the playoffs and the World Series. The New York Mets were favored but losing three top starters and a relief ace put them in hole. Pedro Martinez, Orlando Hernandez and Steve Trachsel(after being hit with a pitch in a playoff game) were unavailable for the World Series. Relief specialist Duaner Sanchez was in a car accident, making his participation impossible. Yet injuries are part of the game. We can't take anything away from the Cardinals well deserved victory. I must say that I am surprised that Willie Randolph was not given the manager of the year award. Randolph in two years took made a last place team into a contender. Once again not to take anything away from Joe Girardi but his team finished below .500 and Girardi was fired.
In basketball Pat O'Riley returned to the winners circle by leading The Miami Heat to their very first NBA Championship. The injured Shaquille O'Neal must really be savoring this one after a few near misses in Los Angeles.
In football The New York Jets and The New York Giants seem to be going in opposite directions. The Giants losing two back to back heartbreakers find themselves behind their old nemesis The Dallas Cowboys, while the New York Jets (as of Dec. 3, 2006) are ahead of their division at 7-5 with four games left. The Bears, The Colts and The Chargers look really good but we won't know who will be the champ until 2007. All in all 2006 was an exciting year in sports.

2006: The Year In Review (Music)

2006-12-03T13:22:00.000-08:00

In 2006 I didn't get a chance to listen to music radio as often as I did in previous years. Most of my leisure time was spent listening to Pacifica Radio and
Air America radio. But when I did listen to music radio and sparingly watched videos I was once again impressed with John Legend, who is a major talent whose best years are still ahead of him. "Please Baby Don't", a collaboration with Sergio Mendes, from the "Timeless" CD was one of the standouts of '06. Mendes once again has re-invented himself. The "Timeless" CD does contain stellar performances by India.Arie,
Stevie Wonder, Gracinha Leporace and the aformentioned John Legend, but most of the CD is Brazilian classics redone in hip-hop. Such classics like Joao Donato's "The Frog" and Gilberto Gil's "Berimbeau" just don't sound right in Hip-Hop. I have been a big fan of Sergio Mendes since the 60's. I have 17 Sergio Mendes albums/CDs and eventhough I may not be too enthusiastic about "Timeless" I am thrilled to see him in the spotlight again.
George Benson's "Softly As In A Morning Sunrise" was in my opinion his best effort since the "Collaboration" CD with Earl Klugh. This song received considerable airplay on Jazz outlets all over the country. But the song I have chosen as "Song Of The Year" has to be Neil Young's "Let's Impeach The President" I was amazed at how many justifications for impeachment he presented in just one song. Young reunited with Crosby, Stills & Nash and toured the US to huge audiences in major cities. Because the corporate media avidly supports Bush there was little to no mention of the tour. I was also impressed with British newcomer Corinne Bailey Rae, whose unique vocal style is remeniscent of another era. She will be heard and seen in bigger venues in 2007 and beyond. That's the way I saw 2006 musically.

2006: The Year In Review (The Person Of The Year)

2006-11-26T03:53:00.000-08:00

Last year it was relatively easy to choose Cindy Sheehan as the person of the year because of the tremendous influence she has had in turning the citizenry of the United States against the war in Iraq. In 2006 making the choice was not easy. One strong candidate was newly elected Minnesota congressmen Keith Ellison. What Mr. Ellison was able to do was a miracle: Being an African-American, he won in a district that was 93% white. It is always refreshing to see people vote on issues instead of race. In addition to being an African-American, he also is a Muslim. Mr. Ellison also played an active roll in assisting Somalis to live in The United States. I was angered when I saw Keith Ellison on the Glenn Beck program where he was subjected to obviously bigoted interrogation, but through it all Ellison remained positive and even polite. Beck had the nerve to use the typical bigoted jargon "I have friends who are Muslims" and "I have been to mosques" and "I am not questioning your patriotism.....BUT" When in actuality that was exactly what he was doing...questioning Ellison's patriotism. Ellison remained calm and implied that
the people who elected him had no doubt in his love and commitment to his country. I was impressed by Keith Ellison but this site's "Person Of The Year" award goes to Howard Dean. Mr. Dean suffered the embarrassment of being the frontrunner in the quest to win his party's nomination for president and then lost primary after primary until he was elimnated completely. In spite of this painful defeat Dean was elected to lead the Democratic Party. Dean decided to take a completely different approach: campaign in ALL 50 states. Dean was challenged tooth and nail by prominent Democrats Rahm Emmanuel of Illinois and Charles Shumer of New York who felt that the Democratic Party would be best served by spending precious time and money in states that are Democratic strongholds....in other words preaching to the choir. As a result of Dean's foresight Democrats now control areas that one would never dream of being lead by a Democrat. Even Tom Delay's seat is held by a Democrat. The war between the Progressive Democrat and the corporate connected DLC Democrat is far from over, but under Dean's leadership it looks as if the progressives are at least at this time calling the shots.

Michael Richards' tirade only proves racism is alive and well in the USA

2006-11-24T05:02:00.000-08:00

Michael Richard's flurry of racial epithets directed at African-Americans at The Laugh Factory in West Hollywood continues to be the talk of the town. Richards publicly apologized nationally on the David Letterman show. We have all at one time or another said something that we wished that we could take back, but in Richard's case this is more than just something that slipped out. It showed deep feelings of contempt and racial hatred that may or may not have been long dormant. Richards'
showed his hatred for not only the African-Americans who were present at the Laugh factory but for all African-Americans. What would he have done if the hecklers were white? Jesse Jackson, (who also unleashed a racial epithet when he referred to New York City as Hymietown) said that he was willing to accept Richard's apology. Jackson's statement never went farther than the word "Hymietown" but Richard's statements were far more offensive. When addressing his
black heckler he repeated used the n word and said "If this were fifty years ago you would have a fork up your - - -?" and "That's what happens when you interrupt a white man.". Al Sharpton was in no mood to accept Richard's apology at this time stating that Richards remarks reflect deep-seeded racism and that Richards should get help.
As an African-American I have no tolerance for ethnic humor it doesn't matter what race, creed or color the comedian (or comedienne) may be. It's just not funny. I remember Jackie Robinson saying many years ago to Black Americans of the 1950s "Don't accept any derogatory statements directed at any other ethnic group because when the people who say such things are not in your company it is more than likely that they have racial insults about you" Race is a hot topic among comedians( and comediennes) and I have noticed that it is far more frequent among white than black. No one really knows what is in Richards' heart....is he genuinely sorry or is he sorry that he got caught? That was not the first time that Richards has publicly used racial epithets. Jewish audience members were insulted by Richards statements at another comedy club where Richards blamed Jews for "killing Christ", so we see a pattern developing. I cannot accept Richards' apology at this time either, but that doesn't mean that I might not change my mind at some time in the future. It will all depend on his actions. I remember when I was much younger I heard a statement attributed to Elvis Presley "The only things I want from Negros are to shine my shoes and buy my records" At that time I decided to never buy an Elvis Presley record again....and I didn't. But after hearing the late Red Foxx talk about a discussion he had with Elvis when he confronted Presley about that statement Presley said "I don't recall saying that but I may have, if I did it was because of the type of people I was around at that time. Those types of people are not around me today and as a result that is not the way I feel today." Foxx was convinced of Presley's sincerity. Later I found out that Presley was a very generous man who gave automobiles and thousands of dollars to people who were complete strangers to him, many of these people were African-Americans. My impression of Presley really changed when I heard glowing comments from Cissy Houston, who had nothing but praise for Presley. She became an integral part of Presley's show when she and the Sweet Inspirations (a black female quartet) became Presley's background singers. I also had a very negative opinion of another Elvis, Elvis Costello who made a derogatory statement about the late Ray Charles. As a result of using a racial epithet he was decked by vocalist Bonnie Bramlett. Costello apologized and went on to be a leading voice in the fight against apartheid in England. Will Richards be like Presley and Costello, I don't know but I hope so.

2006: The Year In Review (Census)

2006-11-23T05:27:00.000-08:00

In Memorium.......James Brown, Wilson Pickett, Ahmet Ertegun, Mike Evans, Peter Boyle, Ruth Brown, Steve Irwin, Mike Douglas, Jack Palance, Ed Bradley, Gerald Levert, Red Auerback, Trevor Berbick, Buck O'Neill, Billy Preston, Floyd Patterson, June Pointer, Gordon Parks, Lou Rawls

2006: The Year In Review (Politics)

2006-11-23T04:59:00.000-08:00

The Year In Review (Politics)

In general I would have to say 2006 was a good year politically. It seemed as if the American people for the first time in years woke up to the misdeeds of the
Republican party. I am very proud of the African-American voter, who was not
fooled by the pro-Bush media, nor the push for the increase in black enrollment
in the Republican Party put forth by Ken Mehlman. Blacks proved that they would
vote on the issues and not the ethnicity of the candidate even if the candidate happens
to be one of their own. Micheal Steele of Maryland, Lynn Swann of Pennsylvania
and J. Kenneth Blackwell of Ohio all learned this valuable lesson in 2006 when
Black voters in their states ALL chose their caucasian opponents. African-Americans
played a vital role in the victories of many progressive Democrats in races where
both major candidates were white. 88.1 percent of the African-American voters chose
Democratic or Independent candidates.
The movement for the impeachment of George W. Bush is gaining momentum.
You would never know this if you read the major newspapers or the watched the
corporate news media but there are several indicators that there is a determined
segment of the population that wants George W. Bush and Richard Cheney to pay
for their alleged crimes. It is ironic that the same person who initiated the undoing of
Richard Nixon is getting the ball rolling for the impeachment of George W. Bush.
Elizabeth Holtman has written a book entitled « George W. Bush : The case for
Impeachment » and the sales are brisk. Democrats won both the House and the Senate. Delay, Cunningham, Foley and Abramoff were just a few of the Republican operatives
who found themselves indicted for crimes ranging from extortion to endangering the
welfare of minors. Every remaining member of the Newt Gingrich revolution of 1994
is gone. Of course not all the political news of 2006 was good. The massacres in Darfur
continue and the rest of the world is trying to act as if it doesn’t notice. Arms dealers
in the United States have been accused of selling weapons to the heinous Sudanese
Butchers. Very quietly Ward Connerly triumphed in Michigan, eliminating affirmative
action in that state as he did in two others. The unusual factor in this case is Mr.
Connerly IS an African-American. This sellout( I really hate using this word but in this
case the shoe really fits) has to be reckoned with before we have
50 states without affirmative action instead of just three.
Lynne Stewart, the New York lawyer who was hotly pursued by the Homeland
Security contingent of the Bush administration was given a light sentence, 28 months for defending the notorious sheik who was convicted of playing a major role in
earlier attack on the World Trade Center in New York City. This case showed the
venom of the Bush Administration whose goal was to put Ms. Stewart behind bars for
the rest of her life for treason. The government had a very weak case against Stewart which was evident to both the judge and the jurors. Ms. Stewart, who is battling breast cancer is very active in her community, often defending people other lawyers wouldn’t even think of defending. Members of the community did not forget the service Ms. Stewart has given them over the years and as a result they packed the courtroom. Bush, Ashcroft, Gonzalez and company were trying to send a message to all lawyers who attempt to defend the defenseless but this time it didn’t work. The New York Post and New York Daily News ran headlines condemning the decision but in the end Lynne Stewart and the people triumphed. In 2006 it seems as if finally we have seen « checks and balances » in action. George W. Bush has been humbled into a lame duck. Nancy
Pelosi’s primary concern is ending the war in Iraq as soon as possible. This now
seems more of a possibilty than ever before. Mr. Bush is going to find it much
harder to push through ultra conservative candidates for the Supreme Court. In
summation politically speaking 2006 was a very good year.

Ruth Brown 1928-2006

2006-11-18T15:24:00.000-08:00

R&B pioneer Ruth Brown died today as a result of a stroke and a heart attack.
Ruth Brown was one of the major artists responsible for the popularity and eventual growth of Atlantic Records. Brown had several classic R&B hits in the early 50s which
included « So Long » « Mama He Treats Your Daughter Mean » and the #1 « Teardrops
From My Eyes » Brown resurrected her career in the 80s making Broadway appearances
in « Black & Blue ».

An Open Letter To "Meet The Press"

2006-11-12T16:48:00.000-08:00

Dear Mr. Russert,
In view of the Democratic landslide, don't you feel Meet The Press should feature two bonafide Democrats. After the Republican landslide of 1994 you had Phil Gramm and Alphonse D'Amato, two right wingers. Why have the potential 2008 Republican party presidential candidate( John McCain) on with a staunchly pro-war independent (Joseph Lieberman). The views of the majority are not being expressed. Is this because NBC is now owned by GE which is the world's leading manufacturer of weapons? Peace, Cch092775

Fall 2006

2006-11-12T16:23:00.000-08:00

Jack Palance (1929 - 2006)

2006-11-12T16:04:00.000-08:00

Veteran actor Jack Palance has passed away at the age of 87. He will be remembered as the TV host of "Ripley's Believe It Or Not" but even more significant is the fact that Palance won an Academy Award for best supporting actor in the film
"City Slickers" an accomplishment done at the age of 73.

Correction

2006-11-11T04:36:00.000-08:00

The following statement appeared in a previous post entitled "Democrat Landslide Makes George W. Bush a lame duck president" "Progressive Democrats still have a monumental task ahead because the elected Democrats were Conservative Democrats who are aligned in one way or another to the DLC." That statement was made in error. After further research I have found that the majority of Democrats elected were Progressive Democrats, in fact according to the Progressive Democrat Alliance there were actually 71 Progressive Democrats chosen for the new House of Representatives. Republican sources were responsible for promoting that statement and I admit I should have known better to carefully scrutinize any statement coming from the current Republican braintrust.

Ed Bradley (1941-2006)

2006-11-10T19:07:00.000-08:00

Ed Bradley will always be remembered as one of the principal anchors of the long running CBS news program "60 Minutes". Bradley captivated TV audiences with his investigative reports for more that two decades. He was an eleven time Emmy winner.
Bradley's face will be missed. He succumbed to Leukemia.

Gerald Levert (1966-2006)

2006-11-10T18:35:00.000-08:00

It is with regret we acknowledge the passing of Gerald Levert, soul singer, composer and producer who died in his sleep on November 10, 2006. Gerald was one of the relatively few R&B performers of the classic style that we just don't hear on the radio any more. Gerald was the son of the legendary Eddie Levert of the O'jays. Young Gerald and his brother would accompany their famous father around the US and the world. He was so amazed at what his father's group did onstage that he decided to follow in his father's footsteps. Gerald Levert's career took off with the release of the song "Casanova" in September of 1987( recorded with brother Sean Levert and Marc Gordon). This tune reached as high as #5 nationally on the Billboard chart. Gerald Levert returned to the top 40 with "Baby Hold On To Me"(with father Eddie Levert), "I'd Give Anything", Thinkin' Bout It" and "Taking Everything" My favorite Gerald Levert performance was when he appeared in the movie "Standing In The Shadows of Motown" where he performed a rousing rendition of Junior Walker's "Shotgun" accompanied by Tom Scott on the saxophone. It was one of the most memorable performances in a movie that was filled with many. It is indeed a tragedy that he has been taken from us a such a young age because I truly believe that although he has achieved tremendous success his best years as a singer-composer were still to come. At a mere 40 years of age he has left us too soon.

Democrat landslide makes George W. Bush a lame duck

2006-11-08T12:21:00.000-08:00

It appears as if George W. Bush is a lame duck president. Democrats(with the recent victories of Tester in Montana and Webb in Virginia) now control both the House of Representatives and The Senate, giving the president complete rejection on his policies, especially his Iraq War policy. To make things even better Donald Rumsfeld has finally decided to step down. I am ecstatic that J. Kenneth Blackwell lost. Mr Blackwell, an African-American played a pivotal roll in the suppression of the black vote in Ohio by permitting Republican goon squads to intimidate black voters and he also did not provide functional voting machines to minority areas of Ohio. Katherine Harris, like Kenneth Blackwell also supressed the black vote in Florida by removing the names of eligible black voters from Florida voting lists. Like, Blackwell she also got what she deserved.... a lopsided loss to Bill Nelson. Republican George "Macaca" Allen lost a squeaker to Democrat Jim Webb. Bob Casey Jr. defeated the #3 Republican in the Senate, Rick Santorium. Democrat Claire McCaskill was victorious in Missouri. Carpin defeated Steele in Maryland and Democrats won the vast majority of the governorships. Although this is a blessing Progressive Democrats still have a monumental task ahead because the elected Democrats were Conservative Democrats who are aligned in one way or another to the DLC. The '06 election was not without its disappointments to progressive Democrats. Ward Connerly was successful in dismantling affirmative action in Michigan, a state with an unemployment rate of 7.1 (primarily African-American). Michigan became the third state to follow this trecherous path. The Republicans turned out in force to elect Joe Lieberman in Connecticut. Everything did not go well for the Progressive Democrat but things look a lot better now that Bush for the first time in his presidency is not going to have a rubber stamp Congress. Conyers, Rangel and Diggs will find themselves at the head of powerful Congressional commitees because of their seniority. It is my hope that John Conyers pursues the impeachment of George W. Bush. Time will tell.

Dems Will Win ONLY If There Is A Fair Election

2006-11-06T15:29:00.000-08:00

Until recently the media has been telling us that the Democrats are heavily favored to take back the house and possibly the senate. All of a sudden today, November 6, 2006 they are telling us the Democratic lead is suddenly becoming more and more narrow. Karl Rove continues to say that his polls tell him the Republicans will remain in firm control of both houses of Congress. I may be wrong but the smug way in which he says this (as I have said so many times before )indicates something sinister that he knows and we don't. I know that the do nothing Congress has given George W. Bush the right to declare ANYONE an "enemy combatant" and at the same time new prisons have been built to house thousands of people. This indicates to me that the Bush administration foresees widespread opposition to election results and plan to incarcerate those who oppose its policies. Already people of Mexican descent in Texas have received phone calls and letters telling them that polling places have been changed, when they have not. The same dirty tricks used to steal presidential and gubernatorial elections in 2000 and 2004 will also be used in 2006. The Bush Administration is counting on fear and apathy. The October surprise we were promised came a little late on November 6, 2006 when we were told that Saddam Huessein will be hanged in Iraq. The criminally gullible masses here in the U.S.(especially those followers of Limbaugh, Dobson and Robertson) will no doubt look upon this as a momentous occasion when actually in the scheme of things it is insignificant. Saddam Huessein is no boy scout. He is responsible for the murder of over a hundred Kurds, but George W. Bush is responsibe for giving the orders that lead to the death of over 500,000 people, 3,321 of which were U.S. soldiers. After this massacre took place there was a picture taken of Donald Rumsfeld and Saddam Heussein shaking hands. This tactic of glorifying the execution of Heussein may help the Republicans as much as the "dirty tricks". At this time we don't know but we will know by tomorrow. Polls continue to show Strickland leads Blackwell, Nelson leads Harris, Casey leads Santorum, Brown leads Dewine, Menendez leads Kean Jr., George "Macaca" Allen and James Webb are in a toss up as well as Burns and Tester. If just overnight all the Republicans who trail miraculously become triumphant we can not come to any other conclusion except "foul play". The Republicans (I should say the Bush Republicans because I don't believe that all Republicans condone this outrageous conduct) are desperate and will do anything they can to hold on to power. Unfortunately the Democrats have been far too eager to roll over and play dead. I hope that we will not be hearing the same sappy concession speeches where the Democrat concedes for what he or she would call "the good of the country" (TO BE CONTINUED ON NOVEMBER 7, 2006).