Dragonfly de la Luz reviews marijuana professionally and founded the group "Stoners Against Prop 19."The debate over the California initiative to legalize marijuana has formed some unlikely alliances. On one side, some stoners and marijuana growers oppose Proposition 19, while some cops and mothers support legalization. MORE...
Since Obama has neither aggressively pursued the crash’s con men nor compellingly explained how they gamed the system, he sometimes looks as if he’s fronting for the industry even if he’s not. Voters are not only failing to give the White House credit for its economic successes but finding it guilty of transgressions it didn’t commit. The opposition is more than happy to pump up that confusion. When Mitch McConnell appeared on ABC’s “This Week” last month, he typically railed against the “extreme” government of “the last year and a half,” citing its takeover of banks as his first example. That this was utter fiction — the takeover took place two years ago, before Obama was president, with McConnell voting for it — went unchallenged by his questioner, Christiane Amanpour, and probably by many viewers inured to this big lie.
The real tragedy here, though, is not whatever happens in midterm elections. It’s the long-term prognosis for America. The obscene income inequality bequeathed by the three-decade rise of the financial industry has societal consequences graver than even the fundamental economic unfairness. When we reward financial engineers infinitely more than actual engineers, we “lure our most talented graduates to the largely unproductive chase” for Wall Street riches, as the economist Robert H. Frank wrote in The Times last weekend. Worse, Frank added, the continued squeeze on the middle class leads to a wholesale decline in the quality of American life — from more bankruptcy filings and divorces to a collapse in public services, whether road repair or education, that taxpayers will no longer support.
Even as the G.O.P. benefits from unlimited corporate campaign money, it’s pulling off the remarkable feat of persuading a large swath of anxious voters that it will lead a populist charge against the rulers of our economic pyramid — the banks, energy companies, insurance giants and other special interests underwriting its own candidates. Should those forces prevail, an America that still hasn’t remotely recovered from the worst hard times in 70 years will end up handing over even more power to those who greased the skids.
We can blame much of this turn of events on the deep pockets of oil billionaires like the Koch brothers and on the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, which freed corporations to try to buy any election they choose. But the Obama White House is hardly innocent. Its failure to hold the bust’s malefactors accountable has helped turn what should have been a clear-cut choice on Nov. 2 into a blurry contest between the party of big corporations and the party of business as usual. MORE...
Yesterday, Assange walked out of an interview with CNN, which he thought had been arranged to discuss the significance of the Iraq War revelations, because the CNN "reporter" seemed interested in asking only about petty, vapid rumors about Assange himself, not the substance of the leaks. The Nation's Greg Mitchell summarized that interview this way: "Assange to CNN: 'Do you want to talk about deaths of 104,000 people or my personal life?'" CNN's answer could not have been clearer: the latter, definitely.But the low point of this smear campaign was led by The New York Times' John Burns, who authored a sleazy hit piece on Assange -- filled with every tawdry, scurrilous tabloid rumor about him -- that was (and still is) prominently featured in the NYT, competing for attention with the stories about the leaked documents themselves, and often receiving more attention. Here's the current iteration of the front page of the NYT website, with the Assange story receiving top billing:
From the early days of the Civil Rights movement, Julian Bond was an active participant and leader. Today, as a professor of history at the University of Virginia, Bond brings a unique perspective to the classroom. Recently he spoke about the origins of the 1955 Montgomery Bus Boycott.
Charlette Report (seattlepi.com Reader Blog):The Oct. 22 rally at Seattle Central Community College sponsored by the National Day of Protest to Stop Police Brutality easily drew over 500 people to march downtown and stop at the place where John Williams was shot. From there the protesters had a "die in" where they fell to the ground and had a moment of silence.
The message was simple, accountability and a stop to police brutality. From a stage, speeches and microphones, you would think the police would at least be interested in listening to what was being said about their own department but the attitude of police nearby seemed to be apathy and indifference. I asked the police officers standing around getting ready to escort the rally and got comments of "No" and "they don't listen to us, so why should we listen to them?" Apparently there is still an "us vs. them" mentality in the police department with a good measure of disgust in their voice. I'm not sure if its a protective measure, denial or just plain attitude but whatever it is, its definitely there. MORE...
Ari Berman (NY Times op-ed):In 2005, Howard Dean, who was then the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, carried out a campaign to elect as many Democrats as possible. In long-ignored red states, both Mr. Dean and Rahm Emanuel, then the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, backed conservative Democrats who broke with the party’s leadership on core issues like gun control and abortion rights. Mr. Shuler was one of Mr. Emanuel’s top recruits. The party leaders did not give much thought to how a Democratic majority that included such conservative members could ever effectively govern.
With President Obama in office, some notable beneficiaries of the Democrats’ 50-state strategy have been antagonizing the party from within — causing legislative stalemate in Congress, especially in the Senate, and casting doubt on the long-term viability of a Democratic majority. As a result, the activists who were so inspired by Mr. Dean in 2006 and Mr. Obama in 2008 are now feeling buyer’s remorse.
Margaret Johnson, a former party chairwoman in Polk County, N.C., helped elect Representative Shuler but now believes the party would be better off without him. “I’d rather have a real Republican than a fake Democrat,” she said. “A real Republican motivates us to work. A fake Democrat de-motivates us.”
Ms. Johnson is right: Democrats would be in better shape, and would accomplish more, with a smaller and more ideologically cohesive caucus. It’s a sentiment that even Mr. Dean now echoes. “Having a big, open-tent Democratic Party is great, but not at the cost of getting nothing done,” he said. Since the passage of health care reform, few major bills have passed the Senate. Although the Democrats have a 59-vote majority, party leaders can barely find the votes for something as benign as extending unemployment benefits. MORE...
I've experienced the power of this volunteering directly. On Election Day of 2004, I was knocking on doors in Washington State and turned out three additional voters. One had forgotten about the election. Another needed a ride. A third didn't know how to submit his absentee ballot. My candidate won the governor's race by 133 votes, over a right-wing Republican who's now running neck and neck with the once seemingly unbeatable Senator Patty Murray. I didn't get those votes by any particular eloquence or skill, just by showing up. Any other volunteer would have had the same results. But had I and 50 other volunteers stayed home that day, we'd have lost. MORE...
The documents on WikiLeak describing human rights abuses in Iraq may implicate British as well as US forces, a human rights lawyer has said. Photograph: Jehad Nga/CorbisThe UN has called on Barack Obama to order a full investigation of US forces' involvement in human rights abuses in Iraq after a massive leak of military documents that detail torture, summary executions and war crimes.The call, by the UN's chief investigator on torture, Manfred Nowak, came as Phil Shiner, human rights specialist at Public Interest Lawyers in the UK, warned that some of the deaths documented in the Iraq war logs could have involved British forces and would be pursued through the UK courts. He demanded a public inquiry into allegations that British troops were responsible for civilian deaths during the conflict.
The Guardian has analysed the 400,000 documents, the biggest leak in US military history, and found 15,000 previously unreported civilian deaths. The logs show how US authorities failed to investigate hundreds of reports of abuse, torture, rape and murder by Iraqi police and soldiers whose conduct appears to be systematic and generally unpunished. MORE...
Investigative reporter Matt Taibbi has a new book, Griftopia, that covers the Koch brothers and others who are involved in the "Billionaires' Coup" (Frank Rich's phrase). The Coup is not exactly new; it's been talked about for weeks. But knowledge of the supporting infrastructure — the Big Money retreats and planning conferences — is a revelation. Olbermann calls it a "high finance cabal." Literally true. MORE...
President Barack Obama visited Palo Alto on Thursday night to attend a dinner at the home of Google executive Marissa Mayer. About 50 people attended the dinner, paying $30,000 to eat and converse with the president.
Al Giordano:The best case scenario for Democrats, however, is not that Prop 19 loses and comes up again in California in 2012, but to the contrary: If the historic Proposition 19 passes, the pundits and talking heads that generate the misnamed “conventional wisdom” in the Washington DC beltway will be falling all over each other to note that Prop 19 won and it pulled Boxer out of the fire with it. If coming out of Election Night, Prop 19 emerges with the sheen of a newly-minted winner, Democratic strategists will have little choice but to adopt a “50 state strategy” (especially in the 26 states - Maine, Massachusetts, and virtually everything west of the Mississippi River - that have citizen generated statewide ballot initiative processes), and go “all in” on legalizing, regulating and taxing marijuana, even if their politicians continue to balk at saying it aloud. And if you’re a Democratic (or Republican) politician that doesn’t yet see the writing on the wall, remember how most of you were wrong (or late) in your predictions two and three years ago, and that "Yes, We Can" means "Yes, We Cannabis," too. MORE...
An amazing group of college and high school students is getting out the vote for Patty Murray in Silverdale.
Kevin DeWine, the affable chairman of the Republican Party in Ohio, has a transparent board behind his desk at state headquarters where he scribbles reminders to himself. A permanent fixture is this list of words: "Spending, taxes, jobs, economy, deficit, debt."
DeWine says he keeps the issues inventory as a reminder to all of his party's candidates. "If they are not talking about these things," he says, "they are off-message."
And his candidates seem to listen. Republican Steve Stivers is in a rematch with Rep. Mary Jo Kilroy, one of those endangered-but-still-gutsy Democrats who won't back down from her support for the new health-care law, financial reform or the stimulus. Among the first words out of Stivers's mouth when I chatted with him over the phone were "the debt and jobs," followed quickly by "unemployment" and "big spending."
Thus the key question as the 2010 campaign enters its final days: Is there anything Democrats can do to shake the GOP off its relentlessly effective focus on a handful of themes? These seem to resonate with voters without actually solving any problems. So far, Republicans have not even been forced to explain how their promises add up. Will they get away with offering tax cuts and a reduction in the deficit without specifying before Nov. 2 what spending they would eliminate or trim?
In the meantime, Democrats have left loyalists such as Kilroy, who deserve better, without the support of a driving national message. There is no Democratic counterpart to Kevin DeWine's handy list. MORE...
With just over two weeks to go until Election Day, the biggest issue to emerge this election cycle is the potential impact that the rowdy and radical-right national movement that calls itself "The Tea Party" will have on the November 2, 2010 mid-term elections: win, lose or draw. That will be the big story this Election Day.
In truth, it is remarkable that this grassroots populist uprising is viewed as a new phenomenon, when these types of movements occur regularly in our system, on both the left and the right. It is equally noteworthy that anyone should either worry or believe -- depending on whether they agree or disagree with the Tea Party movement's agenda -- that this populist insurgency will, in the long run, make any real difference in Washington. It will not.
While I have no skills for prognostication, I can read history. And I understand how Washington works. Regardless of whether it is good or bad, the fact is that modern populist outrages follow a pattern, and all suffer similar fates. It will be the same for the Tea Party Movement -- just wait a few years. MORE...
