Dogged Blog

Wisconsin, are you people out of your freaking minds?

Really, Wisconsin? Every idiot who voted for Walker and who isn't a bazillionaire needs to read this book. Ignore the publication date (2004) and the name of the state in the title; nothing has changed, and middle America is middle America, it seems.

From the LA Times review:

Why do so many of us vote against our economic interests? Where’s the outrage at corporate manipulators? And whatever happened to middle-American progressivism? The questions are urgent as well as provocative.

[...]

A brilliant analysis—and funny to boot—What’s the Matter with Kansas? presents a critical assessment of who we are, while telling a remarkable story of how a group of frat boys, lawyers, and CEOs came to convince a nation that they spoke on behalf of the People.

D

Speak up before the Internet dies

Not blogging today. This is why.

Republicans 2012: Keeping millions out of work to put one man out of a job

 

What is particularly painful about this truthful observation is that most Repbulican VOTERS don’t feel this way — this is about the egos and blindness of Republican legislators and the racism and ideological madness of a small but vocal group of faux-patriots.

I’m not saying I think that rank-and-file Republicans and Democrats don’t want different things for the country; I think we do. And the country I want doesn’t match what Republicans want. But I would say that nearly everyone in this country regardless of party wants to see more jobs and a better economy. Just a wild guess.

Tantrum and appeasement: Your American government shows you them

I believe in funding government services with taxes. I believe the government should do things for the benefit of the nation. I believe in a social safety net. I believe in public health care, public education, and Social Security. That is the America I was raised to believe in.

I will never, ever understand why Democrats keep letting themselves be put on the defensive about what we as a party believe in. What's needed is for Democrats, and all liberals, to stand up for what we believe and have the debate on those issues, from a position of our own values and beliefs and principles,  instead of pre-capitulating before the debate is even engaged.

That's what the right does, and that's why they beat us even when we "win." Because we're always trying to get there first with the magic solution that will make everyone happy.

There is no way to reconcile some of our differences. We have to plot a course that acknowledges that sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. Without that, all we ever get is the crap we've ended up with in our government: a weak, ever-capitulating left, and a tantrum-throwing, spoiled-brat right.

I'd say a plague on both your houses and walk away if  the triumph of the right didn't lead to so much human suffering.

CNN: Wisconsin? Never heard of it. Charlie Sheen? We're all over it.

CNN is covering the second anniversary of the "Tea Party," how to make rotisserie chicken, and Charlie Sheen's breakdown.

But the 100,000 people in Madison protesting for their rights? The fact that the police refused to shut down the protest in the capitol and instead, went and slept with the protesters?

Ten seconds and cut. "Liberal media" my ass.

From somewhere I never expected to be getting my national political news, Boing Boing:

Police have just announced to the crowds inside the occupied State Capitol of Wisconsin: "We have been ordered by the legislature to kick you all out at 4:00 today. But we know what's right from wrong. We will not be kicking anyone out, in fact, we will be sleeping here with you!'

Full story here, with video.

Video: What if the Tea Party was black?

Every Tea Partier who goes all wide-eyed and dismayed when their movement is accused of racism should watch this video... but of course, they won't.

Lyrics and credits here.

What is the Tea Party bus doing in San Francisco tonight?

So, I'm out walking the dogs and what did I just see parked at the corner of 20th and Wawona, right behind 19th Ave. in San Francisco, but a big Tea Party bus with smaller little Tea Party minivan? I tried to take a photo but it was too dark, but it looked essentially like the one here, only with a Tom Paine quote about patriots protecting the country from its government instead of the "Tea Party Express" sign.

What I'd really like is these losers out of my neighborhood and my city, but it being a free country and all, I'll settle for an answer to this question: Where the hell have you guys been for the last few years?

Why is it that all during the Bush years you were silent as they imposed the Patriot Act, with its draconian infringement of personal liberty and basic civil rights, as the  government wiretapped its own citizens and built up the biggest government spending program of all, the war in Iraq?

Why is it that until we had a Black man as president you couldn't be bothered to stop listening to Rush long enough to gas up the Tea Party bus and drive around shaking your tiny fists in the air?

Why is it that nothing the government did bothered you, no matter how it indebted our nation and its future generations and destroyed our image and prestige across the world, until you thought the government was giving people too much -- health care, extended unemployment benefits, public education?

I don't think there has ever been a more transparent bunch of hypocrites in the entire history of this country.

The patriotism conundrum

Tomorrow is Independence Day, which means it's time for the flags, the expressions of support for our armed forces past and present, and of love for country. And that means it's time I'm awash in ambivalence.

I can't honestly say I "love" my country. I love the idea of the United States. I think it's the best idea for a country anyone ever had, and I want to contribute to preserving the good and improving the not-so-good.

I'm willing to roll up my sleeves and work for the U.S. and her people, but "love" my country? I don't really know what that means. I don't automatically care more about people in America than people somewhere else, just because I happened to be born here. Besides, that's not love of country; it's national chauvinism.

To the bewilderment of many of my friends, I won't pledge allegiance to the flag. It's a piece of fabric. Yes, it has symbolic meaning to many people, and out of respect for them I'd never do anything to damage it or degrade it, but it means very little to me, and swearing allegiance to a piece of fabric is just not something I'm ever going to do.

And my feelings about the military are the most difficult for me to come clean about of all. A lot of young people in the armed forces are there because they had no other options, and I don't want anything bad to happen to them. I also know there are a few, a very, very few, just wars, and I believe the United States needs to have an army with the resources it needs to do its job when one arises.

But not all wars are just wars, and in most of them, the soldiers did not fight and die to "protect my freedom." They fought and died for other reasons, many of which they themselves didn't know, usually in the service of the egos of old men too complacent and powerful to risk anything themselves. Or for oil. Or national goals far less honorable than "freedom."

I don't think we should celebrate that. I think we should mourn it, and mourn the pain and suffering it caused to those soldiers and their families.

So while my neighbors hang out their flags and all my favorite blogs, Facebook and Twitter friends, and just about everyone I know says all the right things, and I quite literally have no place I really feel "safe" posting this, I'll just say that I hope everyone in the whole world has a safe and peaceful Independence Day.

What did liberals do?

Still marathoning West Wing. Still the best. Show. Ever.

What did liberals do that was so offensive to the Republican Party? I’ll tell you what they did. Liberals got women the right to vote. Liberals got African-Americans the right to vote. Liberals created Social Security and lifted millions of elderly people out of poverty. Liberals ended segregation. Liberals passed the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act. Liberals created Medicare. Liberals passed the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act. What did Conservatives do? They opposed them on every one of those things, every one. So when you try to hurl that label at my feet, ‘Liberal,’ as if it were something to be ashamed of, something dirty, something to run away from, it won’t work, because I will pick up that label and I will wear it as a badge of honor.

No tax cut has ever been too expensive, but health insurance reform apparently always is

So, where was all the right wing angst and hand-wringing over the cost of the Bush tax cuts? Where was the rending of garments and the gnashing of teeth over how much they'd cost the nation to implement?

Why is conservative wailing and moaning reserved only for the cost of health insurance reform? Is it just that there is one rule for the rich -- tax cuts and more tax cuts! no matter how much they cost! -- and another for the rest of us -- no government services; they cost too much!

Or is it that they still genuflect before Reaganomics, the idea that if you give lots and lots of money to the rich, it will trickle down to everyone else and stimulate the economy?

Fine. Then chew on this: If you lifted the crushing burden of outrageous health insurance premiums, which rise every year wildly beyond the rate anything else we buy -- food, housing, taxes, education, cars, computers -- on small businesses, you'd sure as hell stimulate the economy. After all, small businesses are not able to negotiate for good prices on health insurance for their workers, or the owners of the businesses, because their group is too small. So they go without, or go out of business. Fix that, and you save many small businesses and make them more desirable to excellent longterm employees. That's good, right? I mean, even a conservative should be able to get behind that goal.

It's even more dramatic for individuals who don't get employer health insurance. For example, if you raised my taxes a smidge to pay for a public option or single payer health care, they couldn't possibly be as high as the EIGHT HUNDRED DOLLARS A MONTH I pay as a private individual to get health insurance now. (And I should say that under Obama's health insurance reform plan, my taxes wouldn't go up because I don't make anything remotely close to $250,000 a year, but even if they did, my point still stands.)

Lifting that burden on those of us who don't get employer health insurance and are on our own -- since we, even more so than small businesses, cannot negotiate better rates the way huge corporations can -- would also stimulate the economy.

And despite what those crazy dreamers on the right side of the aisle seem to think, no, I can't "shop around" for a better rate or plan. I have two choices: My current plan, or no plan. Because I have a tragic pre-existing condition -- I'm 50, my BMI is too high, and I'm in menopause -- and thus, uninsurable. I drop this plan and I'm SOL, no matter how much I would and could pay.

Yeah, that's a functional, thriving system. No wonder we have such a vibrant health insurance marketplace, full of honest competition and free market juicy goodness.

So explain it to me, conservatives. You have no problem with the cost of the Bush tax cuts, which cost around the same as health insurance reform, but you're literally wetting your pants over the cost of fixing health insurance in this country. What's up with that, really?

As if I didn't know.