Like Lawrence O'Donnell I too wear my Liberal label with pride. I am constantly confused about what makes a Tea Partier, far Right Winger and judgmental Evangelicals.
I mean there are a lot of non-sequiters here. For One, Tea Party people say they don't want big government but I am sure that many of them receive Social Security, Social Security Disability and/or Workmens Compensation. I am sure they have been through the mill with health insurance companies either for themselves or a family member. Yet they seem oblivious to the fact that those they endorse are endangering these very benefits they need as much as any struggling LIBERAL. Like Tea Partiers Right Wingers also decry big government and its involvement in our lives. Yet it was the paranoia of the extreme Right that brought about the Patriot Act, wiretapping of citizens and the potential for citizens to be arrested and detained indefinitely without the rights we all took for granted. As for Evangelicals well they certainly do not seem to live the love their own holy book preaches and, it seems if there is nothing hateful to promote they have little to say. So to say I am confused about what makes people like this be the people they are is an understatement. They will rush to the camps of Gingrich and Seamus's abusive owner (I said I would not dignify him by calling him by name, didn't I?) One camp espouses hatred and stereotypes and the other will say just about anything to make the one per cent and corporate greed acceptable. I just don't get it.
But, truth be told they probably don't get me either. They don't get why I just get riled when someone like Ron Paul says the Civil rights Act interfered with Property Rights. PROPERTY RIGHTS? How insensitive can anyone be? You mean to tell me that putting a stop to racist segregation and the disenfranchisement of the Black vote is about property rights? I shudder just thinking about this one. Supposedly because businesses could no longer tell Black people they couldn't come in for a cup of coffee interfered with their property rights! ...And people wonder why I am a Liberal!
I witnessed the violence against protesting students first hand and I remember the PENN STATE MASSACRE. It was MY college opposite of City Hall in NYC that suffered property damage in the millions because police endorsed violence by "Hard Hats" (a euphemism for the right wing back then) lurked in waiting with two by fours to attack students conducting a nonviolent anti war march down Wall Street as well as police violence against students and even people having lunch in City Hall Park. Police barged into the new building of Pace University and terrorized students to the point that male students ran downstairs to the girls' dorm to get them up and away from the police that were viciously attacking anyone in sight.
Although I did not participate in FREEDOM RIDES because I just too young I had teachers in junior high school that did and most of them had stitches as a result of being beaten down South marching with Dr. King.
I am a Liberal because my mom suffered a debilitating stroke when I was nine years old and, since she was speech impaired, as a result I had to become her advocate against adults who would make fun of her because of her speech. I had to argue with bus drivers who thought it was okay to close the bus doors on a disabled woman because somehow this wold make her move more quickly. As her caregiver, this led to my becoming a advocate and social service coordinator for the disabled helping disabled people, children and their families navigate a brutal system for the assistance they were entitled to. This is why I am a Liberal.
There's another reason. I am the product of an Irish/English American father and a dark skinned Puerto Rican mother. But for where I was born WE would have experienced the hatred Black people did. There are those saying that the Civil Rights Act was forced on a people that would have eventually changed their attitude.
Oh really?...And the South would have eventually freed the slaves many historians say. Why would the South have given up on its economic advantage: below par living conditions, horrible nutrition, women for the taking to say nothing of living a life of despair without the hope of ever living a different life. Now imagine knowing your children would endure the same horrors! ...And people should wait.
Although I choose to believe there is a lot of good about humanity I am not naive. I have come to see that if someone can get over by stepping on someone else he or she will do it in the name of religion or business or winning the vote. The campaigns GOP candidates are running give testament to this and THE major election will be a referendum on whether or not American people will vote for humanity or for bias.
THIS IS WHY I AM A LIBERAL!
Monday, January 30, 2012
Sunday, January 22, 2012
Where's The Love, Guys?
I guess I am following the advice that Polonious him Hamlet gave but never folllowed himself: "Brevity is the soul of wit."
As the countdown as to who the GOP nominee will be winds down I find myself having less and to say. Perhaps it is because of all the screaming at the news coverage of these candidates. Or, more to the point, I am so very weary of all the misrepresentation!
Those of us in the "know" versus those in power are going insane with the apparent appeal to the emotions approach to campaigning. In public speaking and debate this was the type of speech to avoid as it sacrificed quality and fact. In short, effective speaking was not appealing to the emotions. Yet, here we see hooligans standing up and giving standing ovations for hateful rhetoric, booing a gay serviceman and cheering capital punishment in Texas.
Right now the field has narrowed down to Gingrich, Santorum, Paul and Seamus the dog's abuser. Yep. Now I won't even mention his name at all.
But all the posturing about about how wrong social programs are and how people are bilking it I have this to say. Firstly most of the senior citizens I have known in my life barely received $800 per month in Social Security. Secondly the Federal guidelines that determine whether or not people will receive public Assistance are as follows: 1 person household, $10,890 annual income ($908 per month),
2 person household, $14,710 annual income ($1,226 per month) and for every additional person $3,820 is allowed for each additional person in a household.
Who are these people kidding? While Seamus's abusive owner claimed making $365,000 giving speeches "wasn't much" begs the question...Does HE (or any other GOP candidate) have any idea at all about these income eligibility requirements or that if a person/family makes ONE DOLLAR more a month they WILL NOT QUALIFY? As if making one dollar over this requirement is living the lavish life! It makes me think no poor Republicans attend the debates.
Nor, I imagine, do they know the humiliation one endures during the application process. If they did they might possibly understand the suffering and despair that leads to (although inexcusable) shootings at public assistance offices.
Lady Liberty invites the tired and poor to come into this nation. But the tired and poor are already here.
As the countdown as to who the GOP nominee will be winds down I find myself having less and to say. Perhaps it is because of all the screaming at the news coverage of these candidates. Or, more to the point, I am so very weary of all the misrepresentation!
Those of us in the "know" versus those in power are going insane with the apparent appeal to the emotions approach to campaigning. In public speaking and debate this was the type of speech to avoid as it sacrificed quality and fact. In short, effective speaking was not appealing to the emotions. Yet, here we see hooligans standing up and giving standing ovations for hateful rhetoric, booing a gay serviceman and cheering capital punishment in Texas.
Right now the field has narrowed down to Gingrich, Santorum, Paul and Seamus the dog's abuser. Yep. Now I won't even mention his name at all.
But all the posturing about about how wrong social programs are and how people are bilking it I have this to say. Firstly most of the senior citizens I have known in my life barely received $800 per month in Social Security. Secondly the Federal guidelines that determine whether or not people will receive public Assistance are as follows: 1 person household, $10,890 annual income ($908 per month),
2 person household, $14,710 annual income ($1,226 per month) and for every additional person $3,820 is allowed for each additional person in a household.
Who are these people kidding? While Seamus's abusive owner claimed making $365,000 giving speeches "wasn't much" begs the question...Does HE (or any other GOP candidate) have any idea at all about these income eligibility requirements or that if a person/family makes ONE DOLLAR more a month they WILL NOT QUALIFY? As if making one dollar over this requirement is living the lavish life! It makes me think no poor Republicans attend the debates.
Nor, I imagine, do they know the humiliation one endures during the application process. If they did they might possibly understand the suffering and despair that leads to (although inexcusable) shootings at public assistance offices.
Lady Liberty invites the tired and poor to come into this nation. But the tired and poor are already here.
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Show Us The MONEY (Trail)!!!!
Dear Romney:
As I mentioned in my recent blog about THE DOG DAYS OF SEAMUS, I no longer feel obligated to grace you with the prefix "Mr."
However that does not mean I will not give you another generous portion of my mind!
Succinctly put: SHOW US YOUR MONEY TRAIL for Pete's Sake! Everyone screamed and screamed for proof of President Obama's citizenship and yet you are balking at showing how much in taxes YOU habitually pay?
Oh, wait. That's right you are going to release your April filing. Hum. Not previous years. Hum. ...And this is why? Perhaps it's because you have already told your tax person to claim a higher tax rate?
As for creating jobs here why are you employing bankers on the Cayman Islands? Triple hum. Foot tapping now. Eyes rolling now. Flip flopping and tax readjusting is there ANY truth forthcoming in the foreseeable future?
Looks like you are keeping your tax history tightly under warps...with more protective covering than you gave Seamus!
As I mentioned in my recent blog about THE DOG DAYS OF SEAMUS, I no longer feel obligated to grace you with the prefix "Mr."
However that does not mean I will not give you another generous portion of my mind!
Succinctly put: SHOW US YOUR MONEY TRAIL for Pete's Sake! Everyone screamed and screamed for proof of President Obama's citizenship and yet you are balking at showing how much in taxes YOU habitually pay?
Oh, wait. That's right you are going to release your April filing. Hum. Not previous years. Hum. ...And this is why? Perhaps it's because you have already told your tax person to claim a higher tax rate?
As for creating jobs here why are you employing bankers on the Cayman Islands? Triple hum. Foot tapping now. Eyes rolling now. Flip flopping and tax readjusting is there ANY truth forthcoming in the foreseeable future?
Looks like you are keeping your tax history tightly under warps...with more protective covering than you gave Seamus!
Friday, January 13, 2012
The Dog Days of Seamus
By now we all know about Romney's love of dogs! As an animal lover I am appalled! His claims about how Seamus loved this is nothing more than personification with little knowledge or love for dogs at all.
Firstly, it is common instinct for dogs to love their "dens" and dens are very helpful for dogs that suffer separation anxiety. You see it nurtures the primordial nature of canines to back when they were wild and, as a training/comfort zone, there is nothing wrong with employing it for emotional security of the dog.
Now this is what happened. They all embarked on a twelve hour road trip with Seamus in his kennel strapped to the top of the station wagon because there was no room for him inside. Wait. I guess this is where Romney style economics comes in. With all his money was he just tooo cheap to rent a larger vehicle so that the dog could be with the rest of the family?
It is also unhealthy for a dog's eyes to be exposed to constant wind which is why it is recommended that windows be opened a little at the top when traveling with dogs. In addition the speed with which the car was going what was the wind chill factor? What about rest stops? Apparently this was not "productive" to efficiency because Seamus had gotten diarrhea which dripped onto the window. Romney (no more "Mr." for you, you beast!)pulled into a gas station and hosed the window and the dog down and then put the dog back into the kennel to be riding, dripping wet, at highway speeds.
No wonder you can't tell a corporation from a person when you treat your supposedly beloved pet in such a barbaric manner! I guess these are the values you taught your children too...that animals are commodities and when inconvenient it is okay to put them in the dead letter bin. HUMPH!
No matter what you say you are an awful human being. I thought so before but am convinced of it now and don't think animal lovers don't vote! We are part of the "fringe" you need to fear: animal loving, fair minded citizens! Now. Where is your tax return? The dead letter bin?
Firstly, it is common instinct for dogs to love their "dens" and dens are very helpful for dogs that suffer separation anxiety. You see it nurtures the primordial nature of canines to back when they were wild and, as a training/comfort zone, there is nothing wrong with employing it for emotional security of the dog.
Now this is what happened. They all embarked on a twelve hour road trip with Seamus in his kennel strapped to the top of the station wagon because there was no room for him inside. Wait. I guess this is where Romney style economics comes in. With all his money was he just tooo cheap to rent a larger vehicle so that the dog could be with the rest of the family?
It is also unhealthy for a dog's eyes to be exposed to constant wind which is why it is recommended that windows be opened a little at the top when traveling with dogs. In addition the speed with which the car was going what was the wind chill factor? What about rest stops? Apparently this was not "productive" to efficiency because Seamus had gotten diarrhea which dripped onto the window. Romney (no more "Mr." for you, you beast!)pulled into a gas station and hosed the window and the dog down and then put the dog back into the kennel to be riding, dripping wet, at highway speeds.
No wonder you can't tell a corporation from a person when you treat your supposedly beloved pet in such a barbaric manner! I guess these are the values you taught your children too...that animals are commodities and when inconvenient it is okay to put them in the dead letter bin. HUMPH!
No matter what you say you are an awful human being. I thought so before but am convinced of it now and don't think animal lovers don't vote! We are part of the "fringe" you need to fear: animal loving, fair minded citizens! Now. Where is your tax return? The dead letter bin?
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Thanks For The Memories!
With the help of the Republican candidates no one has to wait for the President or other democrats to begin their campaigns!
Bain is a thorn in Romney's side and there is no getting away from his overt support of real estate speculation when he stated foreclosures should run their course allowing "investors" (AKA speculators)to buy properties at a fraction of the cost so they can resell at a profit. This profit will be huge! For example if a $200,000 home is foreclosed or "quick saled" that home might, for example be sold for $75,000 and then resold for $125,000. Years ago real estate ethics warned against speculators. Speculators were then white washed as this type of practice became "gentrification" which resulted in massive homelessness. As a New Yorker I witnessed this first hand. Neighborhoods that were communities became too expensive for people to stay and then became trendy with the ME GENERATION as their denizens.
Why were people in such shock about Wall Street and the loss of pensions etc.? We did after all have Bernie Madoff in our midst and this following the ENRON catastrophe during the Bush years. Excuse me but what were the penalties for those at fault? This story quickly slipped away even with leftist news channels as the noose was tightened around their throats! ENRON was an omen of what was to come and no one bothered to begin the checks and balances then. It was swept away under the rug of capitalist acceptable losses. Yes. Acceptable losses...as in war...as in class war.
Now Romney is calling the suffering many "envious." With voter suppression and immigration laws targeting certain ethnic groups the Republicans are campaigning for the Democrats. As they rally for pre-Civil War states rights under the guise of Lincoln and the Republican party of the time being abolitionists they cloak the real meaning of states' rights as it pertains to today: let's go back to back street abortions, decide who votes and who doesn't and who, based on how someone looks, is an illegal alien.
Keep talking because by the time you are finished the Democrats and President Obama will have nothing much left so say.
Bain is a thorn in Romney's side and there is no getting away from his overt support of real estate speculation when he stated foreclosures should run their course allowing "investors" (AKA speculators)to buy properties at a fraction of the cost so they can resell at a profit. This profit will be huge! For example if a $200,000 home is foreclosed or "quick saled" that home might, for example be sold for $75,000 and then resold for $125,000. Years ago real estate ethics warned against speculators. Speculators were then white washed as this type of practice became "gentrification" which resulted in massive homelessness. As a New Yorker I witnessed this first hand. Neighborhoods that were communities became too expensive for people to stay and then became trendy with the ME GENERATION as their denizens.
Why were people in such shock about Wall Street and the loss of pensions etc.? We did after all have Bernie Madoff in our midst and this following the ENRON catastrophe during the Bush years. Excuse me but what were the penalties for those at fault? This story quickly slipped away even with leftist news channels as the noose was tightened around their throats! ENRON was an omen of what was to come and no one bothered to begin the checks and balances then. It was swept away under the rug of capitalist acceptable losses. Yes. Acceptable losses...as in war...as in class war.
Now Romney is calling the suffering many "envious." With voter suppression and immigration laws targeting certain ethnic groups the Republicans are campaigning for the Democrats. As they rally for pre-Civil War states rights under the guise of Lincoln and the Republican party of the time being abolitionists they cloak the real meaning of states' rights as it pertains to today: let's go back to back street abortions, decide who votes and who doesn't and who, based on how someone looks, is an illegal alien.
Keep talking because by the time you are finished the Democrats and President Obama will have nothing much left so say.
Friday, January 6, 2012
And W're Walking....Backwards
As GOP “conservatives” battle for what I believe will be a very small number of extremist votes in the general election I want to scream! Now Ron Paul somehow equates The Civil Rights Act as an assault on property?
As a descendent of an African woman kidnapped to be a Spaniard's slave in Puerto Rico I have thought of what my ancestor endured as a slave. I always imagine the worse so, to some degree I really relate to the outrage African Americans feel when discussion inevitably comes around to repealing The Civil Rights Act in favor of states' rights. Let's not forget if “certain people” were not allowed to vote, eat where they wanted and sit at the front of the bus there would never had been the need for The Civil Rights Act to begin.
What is Mr. Paul talking about when he equate civil rights with property rights? Is he saying that somehow people are property after all? That people can once again “know their place?” Even the people of Texas were progressive enough to realize the Confederate flag on every license plate issued was a slap in the face to the Black experience here in the United States. With more wisdom than I sadly gave them credit for they knew a Confederate flag on all license plates would in essence provide cover for real racists. Rightfully what Texans really said was “You want it? Pay for a vanity plate!” Just as Texans have reached an epiphany I can only hope other states will follow.
The personhood issue will become a major subject in the months to come. When exactly is a person a person? I have my own views on at what point an abortion should be conducted but that is not the point. The issue is a woman's right to choose what is best for herself and her family. Three doctors have been arrested for performing late term abortions as of this writing. I do not support late term abortions personally but what were the circumstances? I do not know. Was it a matter of endangering the mother?
What if the personhood is determined to be the time of fertilization? What if the pill, IUD, condoms or any other practice to utilize birth control become illegal because it interferes with “Divine Will?” Despite my own personal views I am not going to pass judgment on another woman who chooses abortion at any point during the pregnancy. Unfortunately those who want to impose the definition of personhood on the rest of us will use any modification of the law as it stands to become more and more restrictive until there will no longer be a right to abortion.
To be brutally frank, and I would never wish this on anyone, I also believe should any of the candidates' daughter fall prey to a rapist, especially a minority perpetrator they would see to it that an abortion was done. We would never know about it of course but that is what money buys: privacy.
There's a reason some laws have become federal. No state nor can anyone in a particular state break a federal law. With obvious ploys to prevent democrats from voting such as outlawing SOULS TO THE POLLS, ridiculous voter registration policies which make it humanly impossible to process voter registration applications within forty-eight hours and the nit-picking of what photo is okay or not
One thing is clear. The GOP is afraid. VERY AFRAID.
As a descendent of an African woman kidnapped to be a Spaniard's slave in Puerto Rico I have thought of what my ancestor endured as a slave. I always imagine the worse so, to some degree I really relate to the outrage African Americans feel when discussion inevitably comes around to repealing The Civil Rights Act in favor of states' rights. Let's not forget if “certain people” were not allowed to vote, eat where they wanted and sit at the front of the bus there would never had been the need for The Civil Rights Act to begin.
What is Mr. Paul talking about when he equate civil rights with property rights? Is he saying that somehow people are property after all? That people can once again “know their place?” Even the people of Texas were progressive enough to realize the Confederate flag on every license plate issued was a slap in the face to the Black experience here in the United States. With more wisdom than I sadly gave them credit for they knew a Confederate flag on all license plates would in essence provide cover for real racists. Rightfully what Texans really said was “You want it? Pay for a vanity plate!” Just as Texans have reached an epiphany I can only hope other states will follow.
The personhood issue will become a major subject in the months to come. When exactly is a person a person? I have my own views on at what point an abortion should be conducted but that is not the point. The issue is a woman's right to choose what is best for herself and her family. Three doctors have been arrested for performing late term abortions as of this writing. I do not support late term abortions personally but what were the circumstances? I do not know. Was it a matter of endangering the mother?
What if the personhood is determined to be the time of fertilization? What if the pill, IUD, condoms or any other practice to utilize birth control become illegal because it interferes with “Divine Will?” Despite my own personal views I am not going to pass judgment on another woman who chooses abortion at any point during the pregnancy. Unfortunately those who want to impose the definition of personhood on the rest of us will use any modification of the law as it stands to become more and more restrictive until there will no longer be a right to abortion.
To be brutally frank, and I would never wish this on anyone, I also believe should any of the candidates' daughter fall prey to a rapist, especially a minority perpetrator they would see to it that an abortion was done. We would never know about it of course but that is what money buys: privacy.
There's a reason some laws have become federal. No state nor can anyone in a particular state break a federal law. With obvious ploys to prevent democrats from voting such as outlawing SOULS TO THE POLLS, ridiculous voter registration policies which make it humanly impossible to process voter registration applications within forty-eight hours and the nit-picking of what photo is okay or not
One thing is clear. The GOP is afraid. VERY AFRAID.
Waiting To Run Backwards...
As GOP “conservatives” battle for what I believe will be a very small number of extremist votes in the general election I want to scream! Now Ron Paul somehow equates The Civil Rights Act as an assault on property?
As a descendent of an African woman kidnapped to be a Spaniard's slave in Puerto Rico I have thought of what my ancestor endured as a slave. I always imagine the worse so, to some degree I really relate to the outrage African Americans feel when discussion inevitably comes around to repealing The Civil Rights Act in favor of states' rights. Let's not forget if “certain people” were not allowed to vote, eat where they wanted and sit at the front of the bus there would never had been the need for The Civil Rights Act to begin.
What is Mr. Paul talking about when he equate civil rights with property rights? Is he saying that somehow people are property after all? That people can once again “know their place?” Even the people of Texas were progressive enough to realize the Confederate flag on every license plate issued was a slap in the face to the Black experience here in the United States. With more wisdom than I sadly gave them credit for they knew a Confederate flag on all license plates would in essence provide cover for real racists. Rightfully what Texans really said was “You want it? Pay for a vanity plate!” Just as Texans have reached an epiphany I can only hope other states will follow.
The personhood issue will become a major subject in the months to come. When exactly is a person a person? I have my own views on at what point an abortion should be conducted but that is not the point. The issue is a woman's right to choose what is best for herself and her family. Three doctors have been arrested for performing late term abortions as of this writing. I do not support late term abortions personally but what were the circumstances? I do not know. Was it a matter of endangering the mother?
What if the personhood is determined to be the time of fertilization? What if the pill, IUD, condoms or any other practice to utilize birth control become illegal because it interferes with “Divine Will?” Despite my own personal views I am not going to pass judgment on another woman who chooses abortion at any point during the pregnancy. Unfortunately those who want to impose the definition of personhood on the rest of us will use any modification of the law as it stands to become more and more restrictive until there will no longer be a right to abortion.
To be brutally frank, and I would never wish this on anyone, I also believe should any of the candidates' daughter fall prey to a rapist, especially a minority perpetrator they would see to it that an abortion was done. We would never know about it of course but that is what money buys: privacy.
There's a reason some laws have become federal. No state nor can anyone in a particular state break a federal law. With obvious ploys to prevent democrats from voting such as outlawing SOULS TO THE POLLS, ridiculous voter registration policies which make it humanly impossible to process voter registration applications within forty-eight hours and the nit-picking of what photo is okay or not
One thing is clear. The GOP is afraid. VERY AFRAID.
As a descendent of an African woman kidnapped to be a Spaniard's slave in Puerto Rico I have thought of what my ancestor endured as a slave. I always imagine the worse so, to some degree I really relate to the outrage African Americans feel when discussion inevitably comes around to repealing The Civil Rights Act in favor of states' rights. Let's not forget if “certain people” were not allowed to vote, eat where they wanted and sit at the front of the bus there would never had been the need for The Civil Rights Act to begin.
What is Mr. Paul talking about when he equate civil rights with property rights? Is he saying that somehow people are property after all? That people can once again “know their place?” Even the people of Texas were progressive enough to realize the Confederate flag on every license plate issued was a slap in the face to the Black experience here in the United States. With more wisdom than I sadly gave them credit for they knew a Confederate flag on all license plates would in essence provide cover for real racists. Rightfully what Texans really said was “You want it? Pay for a vanity plate!” Just as Texans have reached an epiphany I can only hope other states will follow.
The personhood issue will become a major subject in the months to come. When exactly is a person a person? I have my own views on at what point an abortion should be conducted but that is not the point. The issue is a woman's right to choose what is best for herself and her family. Three doctors have been arrested for performing late term abortions as of this writing. I do not support late term abortions personally but what were the circumstances? I do not know. Was it a matter of endangering the mother?
What if the personhood is determined to be the time of fertilization? What if the pill, IUD, condoms or any other practice to utilize birth control become illegal because it interferes with “Divine Will?” Despite my own personal views I am not going to pass judgment on another woman who chooses abortion at any point during the pregnancy. Unfortunately those who want to impose the definition of personhood on the rest of us will use any modification of the law as it stands to become more and more restrictive until there will no longer be a right to abortion.
To be brutally frank, and I would never wish this on anyone, I also believe should any of the candidates' daughter fall prey to a rapist, especially a minority perpetrator they would see to it that an abortion was done. We would never know about it of course but that is what money buys: privacy.
There's a reason some laws have become federal. No state nor can anyone in a particular state break a federal law. With obvious ploys to prevent democrats from voting such as outlawing SOULS TO THE POLLS, ridiculous voter registration policies which make it humanly impossible to process voter registration applications within forty-eight hours and the nit-picking of what photo is okay or not
One thing is clear. The GOP is afraid. VERY AFRAID.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)